If Your To-Do List is Impossible, You’re Doing it Right

Here’s how a productivity writer approaches her to-do list

Photo: Klaus Vedfelt/Getty Images

Although I write about creativity and productivity for a living, my to-do list is a nightmare. Every day, it’s about a page long with 40 to 50 items. There are categories, subcategories, incremental tasks. Do I check everything off my list every day? No. And that’s the entire point. My list is about the urgent, everyday things, but also about the larger scale, capital-I-Important things I don’t want to lose sight of.

It’s a mess but it’s an inspiring mess. If you keep the bigger possibilities visible — through, yes, staring them down every morning — you remember what all the smaller tasks are in service of. Here’s how to start a whole new to-do list that includes everything you really want to do.

To Do a Great Big Thing, Break It Into Tiny Daily Things

Start with the moonshots

If 2020 taught us anything, it’s that the future is unpredictable. Many people are taking advantage of the turmoil and disruption to their daily routines. You or someone you know is…