These are the steps to recreate my organizational system. Each step adds more overhead, so stop when you've found a nice balance.
Step One: Put things you want to do on your to-do list, and every once in a while, give yourself permission to do them.
Step Two: Do a few things you want to do before you do things you need to do.
Step Three: Flag the top item on your list, then go down the list in order, flagging an item if you'd rather do it than the previously flagged item. Once you flag something you wouldn't mind doing now, do all the flagged items in reverse order. Push an item to the bottom if you make progress but don't finish.
Step Four: Create buckets of similar-priority items, so that higher-priority items will always be above lower priority items.
Just remember that it's all just a game to help you get things done. Use common sense!
As of August 2012, I have an OmniFocus file containing just over 400 things I'd like to do. It's almost a flat list, but several items have children when sub-tasks are appropriate. I use the list to help me remember a lot of things:
I use the notes field extensively, often with images to jog my memory so that I can quickly decide whether to do something, which is important because I scan the entire list multiple times per day.
I used to feel vaguely unsatisfied when I had free time before I started using my to-do list this way. I'd have a free day and be unable to remember any of the interesting projects that seemed to come to mind when I had much more important things to do. Now I can not only find those projects easily, but my daily routine reminds me of their existence so I end up thinking of them throughout the day, which builds excitement and nudges me into developing the ideas little by little on the backburner.
These are the OmniFocus macros I use to help make the system described above more efficient.
Move to Bottom: When a task takes more than one sitting, I move it to the bottom of the bucket so that I tend to work on everything a little bit in rotation. The Move to Bottom script (found in this forum thread) does that in one click.
Tomorrow: Contexts are useful to filter out tasks that aren't appropriate for you to do at the current time, but they're a lot of organizational overhead, so I avoid them when I can. Instead, I use the Tomorrow Script to set the Start field to 4am the next day when I know I won't get to something until at least tomorrow.
BAM: Future instances of a recurring task tend to keep too much of the state of the previous instance, so instead of checking them off, I click the BAM script, which clears the flag, clears the start date, moves the task to the bottom of the list, then checks it off. BAM!
I often feel like something is lost in the transition from an interesting question to the corresponding
That's why I don't have a rule for breaking tasks into smaller pieces. I have a rule that every to-do item needs to make me want to do the task. Sometimes that means breaking the task down into a chunk so simple that I may as well get it out of the way. Sometimes it means adding an interesting bit of information that makes me want to think about the problem again. Sometimes it just means sprucing up the language!
When I put things on my to-do list, it's because I'm imagining myself in the future having completed them and I like what I see. If I look at one of those to-do items in the future and that future doesn't seem appealing, the task needs better marketing!
Funneling all Internet news into my e-mail inbox worked so well that I started doing something very similar with to-dos. I dusted off my copy of OmniFocus1 and started using it to store every little thing I wanted to do, from completing my thesis work to checking out links. It's all there, in one, big, nearly flat list.
I've used to-do software as a dumping ground for daily minutiae before, but I didn't have policies for missed deadlines or prioritization. I didn't know what to do when I put off an item for "too long" and I didn't know when to be happy with the order I tackled things. This time around, I'm using FV, an algorithm for scheduling that helps you balance the quest for efficiency with the psychological requirements of being able to do work, namely: motivation and activation energy. It's interesting and you should check it out. It's working very well for me2.
Removing the fear of opening my to-do list had an unexpected side-effect: I hardly ever read my Funneler feed any more. I get home, start working down my to-do list, and usually don't stop until I go to bed. I won't glance at my e-mail inbox for more than a few seconds at a time.
That felt familiar. Then I realized the pattern: whenever I find a way of making a better list of things to do, I stop using the old one.
Now that I have a seemingly sustainable strategy for staying energized and motivated, for mixing play and work in a way that results in still doing some work, the question is: have I perfected the art of living?
I wish. :( I've gotten myself to do some annoying tasks, start some bothersome (but necessary) habits, and make regular progress on some big projects… but my progress on those projects is often slow and it's unclear whether that's because it's my natural, sustainable pace, or I'm not pushing myself hard enough. And there are things I still can't get myself to do, like run errands3. There are also times when inspiration strikes and I can't act on it immediately without breaking my flow, and that's just annoying.
All in all, though, I'm feeling more capable and productive than ever. I just hope it doesn't wear off.
Ideally, I would run every day. However, when I don't feel it, I typically end up not exercising at all, so I devised an exercise plan based on structured procrastination.
I now have a list of exercises in priority order so that when I don't feel like doing the first one, I can use the second as a backup, and when neither of those sound appealing, there's always the third… The list ends with “touch finger to nose and hold,” so really, I have no excuse for not building a daily exercise habit. I have a backup plan for every level of lazy!
Hopefully this helps me get this body moving a little bit more day-to-day. I'll let you know how it goes, but you can also check these bars showing my last week of activity. Spikes are good, and hopefully there's at last one every day: