To-do lists and vacation

Image by Viveka Rosin from Pixabay

Vacation is rapidly approaching, and there are 10X more things to do compared to available time. The usual approach has been to go for the more boring list and as a house owner there is an endless supply of things to attend. I have things on that list that has been there for five years. But one has to prioritize… Me and my wife just tried a new approach. We wrote both a “chore list” and a “fun list”. Consequently, this shall be our best vacation ever, Inshallah.

I am a slave to my calendar, and I love to-do lists. It is the safest way to ensure that things get done. I have noticed a particularly effective method is to write three (3) things that must get done during the day, unconditionally. They must not be on the fun list; they must be on the chore list. These things should be written down the day before, for optimal efficacy. But early in the day/first thing in the morning works well too. Just make sure that those three things are ticked off at the end of the day, no matter what happens. I know few things that bring me a stronger sense of progression than this.

For some reason, I haven’t tried this “3-things-method” with a fun list. Maybe it also works quite well? An obvious problem is that fun actions have low or zero friction and are difficult to stop once you get started. Whereas a chore is very unlikely to be over-worked. Thus, when writing a fun list it could be wise to quantify the actions. 1) Play video game for XX minutes. 2) Work on project for YY minutes and so on. Maybe three things is too much honestly… Maybe it is enough to just specify one (1) task on your daily fun list and consider it a reward for finishing your 3 chores. Hmmm, I shall try that out and see what happens. There’s zero chance that I have time to do three funny things in a given day anyway.

Since many years, I have established a couple of rock-solid habits. 1) Practice a musical instrument for 15 minutes each day. 2) Practice French for five minutes every day. 3) Write one weekly blog post. Habit 1) has been going for over a decade now without interruption. Habit 2) is on day 2063 today. Habit 3) is on week 236. Not too bad. These three habits are part of a personal improvement scheme. If I just keep showing up, I will become a slightly better human being after each session, no matter what happens. That’s one of the thoughts that keep me going and isn’t that such a nice feeling? These are small and extremely well-defined habits, and they are also easy enough to pull off every day so that I cannot justify quitting. If they would have been more challenging, it is very unlikely that I could have kept the fire burning for so many years. Also, these three things aren’t that pleasurable to be honest. They really do feel like a chore for the most part. But these habits are now so well established that I never ever put them in any kind of daily to-do list. Those lists are for other boring things that are crucial to execute but you don’t need to do that often.

So, maybe I have three lists? A chore list (3 things that are important and easy to procrastinate), a fun list (1 specific thing that you only do for the purpose of itself) and a ritual (drums, language and writing in my case). The ritual is the most important. It is a foundation in constant growth albeit slow. But compound interest is a powerful fact.

Back to the vacation theme then. It’ll be very similar to my daily lists, but on a four-week horizon instead. Maybe you wonder if it isn’t horrible to kill all spontaneity on a vacation? Fair point, a critical building block is that rest should be 100% chore free. Even God rested on the seventh day. And like him, it is perfectly okay and quite desirable to schedule “Nothing” on your daily to-do list once in a while. Those days tend to be my best days.