Wednesday, February 22, 2012

?All Done?: A New Kind of Checklist

By: Winnie Yu

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For years, I followed the common wisdom of creating a to-do list to help me keep track of everything I needed to do. I jotted down phone calls I had to make, groceries I needed to buy, bills I had to pay and everything else that I had to accomplish in my jam-packed days. I kept it reasonable -- no more than eight items or so -- knowing that too many to-dos were likely to make me freeze up.

Even so, some days, just looking at my to-do list was enough to make me break into a cold sweat. And then, as each item was crossed off, I?d feel the burden lift until I felt completely light and relaxed by the end of the day. Then I?d do the same thing the next day.

Making a to-do list achieved what I needed most at the time: an organized way to keep track of things that had to get done. (Here?s how to write a smart to-do list.) But for my sanity, I?d prefer to keep another kind of list: an all-done list.

You might wonder, why bother? Unlike the to-do list, the all-done list doesn?t overlook the things we do that come so automatically to us moms, things that don?t necessarily wind up on the to-do list but still manage to get done. The laundry. The phone call to mom. The banking. The dog walks. The trips to the recycling bin ? you get the idea.

So now, if I want to give myself a pat on the back at the end of the day, I write down everything I did that day -- from carting the kids home from track practice to purchasing a birthday card.

After all, if we don?t celebrate our achievements, who will?

Source: http://www.completelyyou.com/blog/mom/new_list/index.html

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