Is your to-do list absolutely bonkers? Does envisioning the errands, tasks, appointments, meetings, and on and on and on send you into a spiral of sheer overwhelm? Yep, me too! And that’s coming from someone who organizes for fun! (Seriously: I’m currently building a personal library catalog - and I have bookshelves ALL. OVER. MY. HOUSE. In fact, as I write this, I’m leaning on one of my favorite pillows, which happens to reference my love for reading). 

So how do you turn your list of 525,600 minutes tasks into a manageable log of items you can accomplish? First step, make the list. No, really, start there. So often, we try and keep everything in our heads. Maybe your memory is a tour-de-force, but I’d like to save that brainpower for writing my next newsletter or creating the perfect asset, not reminding myself I have an important call at 3:15 PM. So make a list. It may seem daunting at first, but stick with me here because the next step is a game changer. Second step, prioritize everything on your list. Prioritization is a must. I like to use the Eisenhower matrix. This is a fancy-sounding title for a simple tool that will help you decide what to do when. There are four quadrants, with everything above the axis noting items that are important and urgent and those below as less important or urgent. And? There’s a WHOLE quadrant dedicated to stuff you can just DELETE. I don’t mean things like taking your dog for her next round of vaccinations; that's important. I mean tasks that are time-wasters. Like, maybe you don’t need to degrease the tiny panels inside your waffle maker today. Maybe you can just wait on that - or toss those suckers in a sink of soapy water instead of using a toothbrush to scrub them. 🤷🏽‍♀️ (Of COURSE I’ve never done anything like that). Ahem. Back to the matrix. The pics at the bottom of this post demonstrate how the tool works, plus my personalized format, so you can get an idea of how a completed matrix might look. 

As promised, here are the bite-sized chunks for this section: 

Bite 1: Write that list. It’ll be long, but that’s okay! 

Bite 2: Prioritize your tasks with an Eisenhower matrix. This may seem tedious at first, but I promise: extra care on the front end means much less work on the back end. Or at least, smarter work! 😉