A better todo list includes emotional + energy costs and benefits
February 15 2011, 7:51 PM
If you are like me, you have many todos on your todo lists. And some of
those items never seem to get done, no matter what. One idea I had was to have the costs associated with each todo. For
example, if I had as a todo "read Dr Seuss with my son", then energy cost
is low. However, if I have "clean up the back basement" then the energy
cost is high. Likewise, if a todo is make a hair cut appointment, th
emotional cost of that is low, but if I have to make a dentist appointment
then the emotional cost (for me) is high. Why bother with this? Well, a number of reasons. I find there are days that
I am less stressed andmore energetic and less stressed and those are good
days to do the high energy and high emotional cost todos. Likewise there
are days when I am stressed and tired and when all I want to do is read to
my son and maybe catch up on my own reading or get some rest. There's one other aspect to that. If you find that a task is high energy,
you can break it up into a number of low energy tasks. That can help you
get going and make progress even on days you are tired. The same goes for
tasks with high emotional costs. That brings me to the benefit side. Some tasks might be hard to reduce the
cost on. However what you should also be looking at is what the benefit is
for each do as well, and try to tackle the ones with high benefit. Or
reframe the todo so that it is one of a greater benefit. Cleaning up the
back basement is a high energy cost for me, but cleaning up the back
basement to make it easier to do X Y and Z provides me with a lot of
emotional benefit and eventually means I will need to spend less time
moving things around which saves energy. So that will help motivate me to
do it. There are other costs you can associate with todos as well, from money to
happiness to whatever you can think of. The next time you are looking at
your todo list, think about the costs and benefits of each task and plan
accordingly.
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Sent from my BlackBerry Handheld.
those items never seem to get done, no matter what. One idea I had was to have the costs associated with each todo. For
example, if I had as a todo "read Dr Seuss with my son", then energy cost
is low. However, if I have "clean up the back basement" then the energy
cost is high. Likewise, if a todo is make a hair cut appointment, th
emotional cost of that is low, but if I have to make a dentist appointment
then the emotional cost (for me) is high. Why bother with this? Well, a number of reasons. I find there are days that
I am less stressed andmore energetic and less stressed and those are good
days to do the high energy and high emotional cost todos. Likewise there
are days when I am stressed and tired and when all I want to do is read to
my son and maybe catch up on my own reading or get some rest. There's one other aspect to that. If you find that a task is high energy,
you can break it up into a number of low energy tasks. That can help you
get going and make progress even on days you are tired. The same goes for
tasks with high emotional costs. That brings me to the benefit side. Some tasks might be hard to reduce the
cost on. However what you should also be looking at is what the benefit is
for each do as well, and try to tackle the ones with high benefit. Or
reframe the todo so that it is one of a greater benefit. Cleaning up the
back basement is a high energy cost for me, but cleaning up the back
basement to make it easier to do X Y and Z provides me with a lot of
emotional benefit and eventually means I will need to spend less time
moving things around which saves energy. So that will help motivate me to
do it. There are other costs you can associate with todos as well, from money to
happiness to whatever you can think of. The next time you are looking at
your todo list, think about the costs and benefits of each task and plan
accordingly.
-----------------
Sent from my BlackBerry Handheld.
884 views and 1 response
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Feb 15 2011, 9:34 PMArchimedes Trajano (Facebook) responded:When I was using Things and even in my current todo.txt file we can add tags to a todo entry one of the built in tags for Things was effort cost. You can try tagging your todo entries to have that information.