To-Do Lists. We
all have them, and for many of us they invoke feelings of stress, overwhelm,
and the thought of “how in the hell
am I supposed to get all of this done in such a short amount of time?”
I used to feel like this quite frequently until Jonny recently
saved my sanity and bought me this Plenty
of Time Calendar as part of my graduation present. This planner is changing my life and
revolutionizing the way I do things….let me explain….
In the past, I would read through a typical bullet style "to-do" list on a regular piece of paper and it would have sounded something like this in my head as I read through it:
“Ah shit, I have to pay my credit card bill today….ugh…” or “I need to schedule a Spanish class….I can’t keep putting it off” or “I don’t know if I really want to work out today….I might just skip it". Notice as you read through these things that the overall trend of my energy is that of a negative “Have-To”.
However, here is a snap shot from yesterday of my new to-do list that I am now using......
Now that I have this new amazing planner, I put
each of my “to-dos” under positive qualities that I want to evoke in myself while participating
in each task. It is a new way of
composing my day moment-by-moment.
Instead of organizing my day around what I have to do, I am instead invoking these qualities of how I want to
relate to myself while completing each task, and looking at these “to-do” items
in a positive light so I better understand why I am making them a priority in
my life.
So for example, when I paid my credit card bill yesterday,
instead of feeling stressed that I had to pay it, I instead got to practice
feelings of gratitude for paying off bills for all of the blessings I have
already received in my life. Doing
this allowed me to look at my bill from a perspective of abundance rather than lack. Or, when I worked out this morning, I knew
that I was partaking in my workout because it helps me to evoke feelings of
self-worth when I exercise. Knowing this going into it, it inspired me to make sure that
I got my exercise done instead of just skipping it because I was feeling lazy. Or what about scheduling my Spanish
class and then actually going to class? This is a new amazing opportunity for me to practice total love and acceptance for myself
while I make mistakes and trip over the grammar of subjuntivo y impartivo. And what
about this huge list of personal emails that I need to respond to? Well, instead of looking at it as this overwhelming list of people I have to get back to
– I can instead practice immense amounts of gratitude for all of the amazing
friends in my life! And when I do
that, the new story in my head sounds something like this “Holy smokes! I’m so grateful that I have these
friends from all over that are writing me emails and I get to write back to them and share my love and appreciation of
our friendship with them!”
By re-creating my life and the way that I relate to myself
while getting things done, I find that I am way more productive throughout my
day and enjoy my life so much more while accomplishing my tasks. It has been such a simple, yet profound
shift and one that I would encourage you to try out – and you don’t need this
fancy book to try it. I
have created a new to-do list for you with these qualities at this link here. Print it off, fill it out, invoke
positivity and let me know how using it changes your day! And if you really love this new
technique as much as I do – go buy the book – it’s really amazing.
Love,
Elsie
Elsie
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