Clearer Paths With Balance Creating Lists

After parting ways with Southern New Hampshire University last month I've been spending time working on me, setting fire to the next career path, enriching my relationships and doing my best to limit the affect on my family, both immediate and extended, as much as possible.

This means networking, collaborating and lots of inquiry and reflection, both intra- and interpersonal. It also means updating a portfolio that had sat dormant for months, no years, on end. Sprucing up a resume and beginning to craft cover letters. It's spending time shopping out freelance skills between full-time job search duties, returning favors for friends and family that are helping out and answering questions for peers who are tapping into your knowledge bank when things aren't adding up for them. All the while, helping my wife, Karen, to maintain as normal an experience for our family, most notably our twin 7-year old daughters, Adison and Zoey.

With all of these moving parts I began to notice I was feeling a bit anxious, falling behind on self appointed tasks and grasping to make sense of it all. I found myself struggling to determine what amount of time should be spent where and when. This lead to moments of doing nothing. I was starting tasks, but then getting distracted and never finishing them. I needed to make sense of the chaos and move toward an understanding of all the tasks at hand, personal and professional. In a phrase, I needed to find balance in my life

For a very long time I worked in a group that was very organized and task focused. The daily deliverables presented themselves to me every morning in the form of a list. A list that contained tasks from our project management software as well as my own extraneous tasks that weren't so formalized: checking email, going to meetings, creating and publishing social media content and numerous other branding tasks. 

Notes App is a great resource for jotting
down lists while on the go.

So, reverting to a proven tactic, I started jotting things down. I pulled out my iPad. Opened up my Notes app and started a list. It grew very quickly, so I started categorizing and organizing them. Eventually I had created lists for Household, Job Search, Networking, Freelance and Portfolio, Banking, Questions, Things to Check Out and even Blog Post ideas. Effectively it turned out to be a list of lists. 

The lists gave me a new found direction and helped me into the next chapter of progress. Checking things off felt great. When I look back at the crossed off tasks on my done list I feel accomplished. More importantly I feel driven to complete further tasks, create future lists and move beyond the apathy and procrastination.

In retrospect, it seems so obvious, yet it wasn't until I started to put down the items in list format that it became so. Lists aren't for everybody but they can be therapeutic. They give me purpose and direction and could be anxiety soothing for you as well. If you're feeling a bit at wits end or apathetic, try writing your tasks down and see if you don't feel better by defining a clearer path to success by creating a list.

Whatever your tasks, do you find lists to be helpful?