Forget About TO DO Lists — This Little Trick Will Make You Truly Productive

I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with to do lists; I can’t seem to live without them, but they also tend to stress me out.

On one hand, they make my life easier because they keep me organized, but on the other hand, they always tell me what to do; and I don’t like being told what to do — it takes the fun out of things. Also, they make tasks seem like chores — and nobody likes doing chores. After years of making countless to do lists in school, I got burnt out and once I graduated I couldn’t look at to do lists anymore. It’s not because I couldn’t physically do the task, it was a more of a mental hurdle and it affected my motivation, and as a result, reduced my productivity.

But I figured out a solution to this problem; one that allowed me to stay organized and on top of things without the annoying and commanding tone of the classic to do lists. From now on — I make “WANT TO” lists.

Instead of writing what I HAVE to do, I write what I WANT to do.

Now you’re probably telling yourself: “There many things in life that you HAVE to do, and it’s not up to you whether you want to do them or not”. You’re right! You’re required to do certain things in life. But not really… if we get philosophical here for a moment — technically — everything is actually a choice. You might suffer severe consequences if you don’t do certain things, but you’re simply making the choice of not wanting to suffer or make other people suffer.

Anyway, enough with being philosophical and back to being practical; Yes! there are things you have to do like paying bills, or doing chores or pick up your dog’s poop. But if you change your view slightly and realize that it’s actually your choice, it doesn’t sound like a task anymore.

How to write a WANT TO list:

Here is how you write a WANT to list (Some people like formulas so here is the formula of a WANT TO task):

“I want to [task] because [reason/explanation]”

Sounds simple right? Almost too simple… But let me explain: let’s take paying bills as an example and plug in the variables into the formula above: (You probably can tell that I’ve read way too many math books…)

“I want to pay the bills because I don’t want to get in trouble with the authorities/I want electricity at my home/I want to watch Lost on cable…”

You’ll find out that are a ton of reasons why you actually want to do those tasks that seem boring or annoying. You’ll also find out that some of the reasons might sound really negative, like for example: “I want to eat lunch, because I don’t want to die of hunger”. Harsh… But that’s ok — even if it’s negative it still serves the purpose. Of course it’s always nice to look at the positive reasoning behind things, but it’s up to you — it depends mostly on what really drives you personally. Here is how you can turn this negative example into a positive one: “I want to eat lunch because I want to taste delicious food”. Boom! Feels better.

You can give shallow or deep reasons. For example, a shallow reason would be: “I want to do my homework because I don’t want to fail my class”. A deeper reasoning would sound more like “I want to do my homework because I want to challenge myself intellectually and gain knowledge” (but you might not want to say it out loud because you could get beat up after school).

Anyway, you get the idea.

It’s true — making those lists seems like much more work than making a simple to do list where you just quickly jot down all the things you have to do today. But personally, after a few consecutive days of writing the elaborate WANT TO lists, I stopped writing the whole explanation because I didn’t need to anymore— the attitude and mindset were there automatically! I actually do it subconsciously now and it boosted my motivation and positive outlook on life in general.

Try it. You’ll find out that things are way more fun when you realize that you WANT to do them. So go enjoy your new mindset and do whatever the f*** you WANT TO do!