The long weekend begins!

My company was kind enough to give us Thursday and Friday off for the 4th of July holiday. As usual I have a million things I want to get done, and that is absolutely impossible.

One of the items on my “to do list” this weekend is to re-organize the folders I use to stash interesting blog posts in, but that will be for tonight when it rains.

There is a concept that you can manage three things at a time on a list and that three items are not as overwhelming as 30 tasks. We all have 30 tasks to get done today. Looking at a huge list is overwhelming. This seems obvious, but we all write up a massive lists anyway.

You know you can’t possibly do thirty things. You do three and call it good, time for a drink. If you break the list up and commit to getting three items done by 10AM, it is a list you can clear. After a short break to refresh and stretch the legs, you are ready to take on the next three items.

I think that grouping related tasks is helpful. This morning I am going to two Post Offices and then to at least one bank. My third stop will be Starbucks for a massive Iced Coffee. All of these stops are on a loop of about 10 miles. All involve leaving the house and driving around.

When I get home I have some writing to do and some emails to send. Two activities but probably 40 things to do under those two umbrellas. But by grouping my writing activities together I can be more efficient. Instead of writing a blog post and running off to the Post Office, I will write several posts and several emails.

Later today when it cools off, I’ll be out in the yard tackling three items that need to get done out there before Hurricane Arthur blows through.

On Monday I posted, Weekends are for What?, about how we spend so much of our free time being busy. I try to be efficient with my list and I try to find things that don’t really need to get done. Washing the car would be nice, but does it REALLY need to get done? Not really.

Questions:

• Do you use a list to get things done?
• Have you stopped doing some tasks or activities to free up time to relax and re-charge?
• What is your biggest time waster?

Have a great 4th of July week every one.

Andy

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