I recently had a stressfully large quantity of small tasks to do on a deadline. First, making a list eased the stress -- I had a place to collect tasks as I thought of them, rather than trying to keep them all straight in my head. Second, having a list provides a reward structure: if you get a thing done, you get to tick a box. And then the list is shorter. Some tasks ended up being more complicated -- break it down! I'd make a new subtask, and tick the box.
Todo lists are also highly recommended for people with ADHD for unstimulating, repetitive tasks. Chore sheets, for example, are how my house stays marginally clean. Chores are broken into daily, weekly, and monthly tasks. Again, the best reward is tick the box. The irony here is that I've lived my whole life with ADHD, and it wasn't until my kid struggled with his own ADHD that I learned this incredible hack from his counselor.
Lists are stressors. Unwritten lists are way bigger stressors. When you tick the box the relief is palpable. That said, I don't use apps for this purpose. Pen and paper, a whiteboard, or a laminated printout is best. Because the last thing I need when I'm aiming to finish unstimulating tasks is to interact with a smartphone.
So after I quit with the intention of becoming a software engineer I was trying to find ways to tweak my brain to feel like I was still playing. I ended up programming a daily/weekly list so I could check off items as I did them.. I then added a faux xp bar and gave myself 10xp for dailies and 30 for weeklies. Then it was on. I keep myself in check to not add random bullshit to gain xp from - but using psychological manipulative videogame tactics to keep my brain on track in everyday life has completely changed everything for me.
Throughout all of this I've also returned to videogames in the last few months with a much healthier approach, because now I get my gratification from my real world goals and my need to check off my task list is greater than my need for more pixels. It's made videogames a lot more enjoyable too not focusing on playing past the point they're fun.
I don't find this to be true (in my case) for repeatable tasks like chores. Sure, ticking the box may provide a little relief, but knowing that it has to be done all over again the next week, endlessly, doesn't help with finding satisfaction.
> a stressfully large quantity of small tasks to do on a deadline
This is like the ideal use-case for lists and list apps. The list has an endpoint, you can stack tasks up then knock them down. Your progress through the project is actually hill-shaped[1], not "Sisyphus pushing the rock up the hill"-shaped.
Haha, I figured some of this out when my son was diagnosed too. My diagnosis came a couple years later.
Lately I’ve been wanting an eink display that generates TODOs for a day based on periodical tasks and my calendar. I’d just stick it on my refrigerator I think, maybe have the option to toggle to a calendar view as well. Time and remembering tasks is such an issue in my family, it seems like it could be a huge help. Unfortunately I’d need to write that program and those displays can be super expensive — I’m not sure when I’ll get the chance.
Doing it with an old iPad would be trivial, but I don’t want my kids to have free access to an iPad on the refrigerator. Plus they burn through batteries, are a bit too obvious, and wouldn’t have the subtle grayscale appearance I’d like to have. It could be an alright way to validate the idea, at least.
This is very accurate and partly while I, shameless plug here, built Nestful[0]. Nestful also utilizes periods for tasks, but takes it a bit further by trying to eliminate decision making by allowing you to just do "whatever's next".
Prioritizing a task when adding it is way less stressful than deciding which one to do just before doing it.
The first time I created a checklist in a Trello card, and then completed it … the whole list does this shimmer when you tick the last checkbox. It’s just delightful.
Personally I don't see the same relief when ticking a box, but I 100% get the unwritten list. If there is something I need to do that is unscheduled and undocumented, I feel it always takes up a huge portion of my thinking. Writing it down and creating a reminder forces me to at least think about when I will try to do it, and lets me forget about it till that point.
He's not wrong: to-do apps don't provide any sort of motivation. On the other hand, at least for those of us with unreliable memories, lists are essential. However, it is too easy to spend too much time with the lists. They are just a tool, and shouldn't soak up your time.
The trick is to work your own motivation into your workflow "I'll get a coffee when I finish my emails". "When I finish writing this draft, I'll get a beer". "I'm going to slog through this, and then take myself out to dinner". Whatever tickles your fancy.
As for the to-do list: keep it simple. Using a fancy app tempts you to waste time beautifying the list, with categories, priorities, and other unhelpful nonsense. That doesn't get anything done. Personally, I use a simple text document. It auto-opens when I log in. The stuff that needs done first is at the top. Stuff to do "when I have time" accumulates at the bottom. Every few months, I delete stuff that is no longer relevent; otherwise the bottom part would grow forever.
Finally, a last trick, which comes from my wife's PhD advisor. Always end the day with one little, easy task undone. The next day, tackling that easy task helps get you back into a productive mindset. Try it - it really does help!
> The trick is to work your own motivation into your workflow "I'll get a coffee when I finish my emails". "When I finish writing this draft, I'll get a beer". "I'm going to slog through this, and then take myself out to dinner". Whatever tickles your fancy.
I don’t understand this, I have tried it but the willpower trick doesn’t work on me. If I want to do the task I’ll do it and if I want a coffee I’ll get a coffee. Denying myself the coffee when I don’t want to do the task just makes me less caffeinated while I procrastinate and takes almost the same discipline as just doing the task. I have to reason the ”lizard brain” into at least being neutral or ambivalent about doing the task.
The problem with to-do lists is that they get to be huge, way more than you can do in a reasonable day, and seeing a long and ever-growing list of tasks that you can never finish creates stress and inhibits your motivation.
The mind hack to avoid this problem is to consider your to-do list to be a "pantry" that contains everything you could work on. At the beginning of each day, open your pantry and choose the few items you want to get done that day. Then close the pantry and don't look at it again.
Just work off the small list of items for that day. You can even write it down on paper, which makes it very satisfying to strike off each completed task. At the end of the day, return any unfinished items to the pantry, and throw the paper away.
With Spaced Repetition memory tools, people add everything they want to remember, then skip some days of reviewing, and then there are mountains of entries "the system wants me to review". The system is only reflecting the ongoing effort cost of keeping that many facts in memory. Review them, or risk forgetting them, is the choice. TODO lists have way more than you can do because you put that much in them. That doesn't sound like a problem with to-do lists, anymore than "I bought more books than I can read" is a problem with books; it sounds victim-blamey but it's not books' fault that you bought them.
Avoiding a todo list lets you forget about some things and thus not do them without having to explicitly make the decision to not do them. That feels better, easier, but I'm not sure it actually is better - shouldn't making a conscious decision what to prioritise and what to forget lead to a better outcome?
> ever-growing list of tasks that you can never finish creates stress and inhibits your motivation
Is an actual thing. Our brain gets overloaded that way while it keeps track of tasks in the background, requiring energy and memory. Writing stuff down helps, but it's still _there_.
You actually have to cross it out or clearly discriminate ideas and actual tasks you want to do and can do within a reasonable time frame.
I like to separate out projects from tasks. For me, project is something that requires multiple tasks to complete. I have Trello boards for tracking projects in various areas of life. I will only put tasks in todo list for projects that I'm doing. I will keep checklist of tasks that need to be done for each projects if want to work out in advance.
This system is great for tracking house projects since there is always a large number of them. It is also good for planning things for the future, I have lists of plants to get in the fall.
The problem I have with this system is that I have enough regular tasks that don't pick up many projects. I also don't run the process for syncing tasks frequently enough. I wish they were all in one system.
I use this method and I want to highlight another advantage, besides shortening a huge list into a small, manageable amount. It allows you to pick the tasks for the day based on the current context. How much time do I have in the day (e.g., do I have a lot of meetings scheduled or not), what are the most important/urgent tasks at the moment, what is my energy level, and so on.
The only TODO app that actually works for me and is super, duper simple is this:
Make a calendar event. Make it repeat just often enough to be annoying. If necessary (e.g., taxes) make a couple more that are much more forceful with their language near an actual deadline.
That's it. When you're done, delete the repeating calendar thing.
It feels awesome deleting an infinite set of repeating events in the future. It's essentially self-induced negative reinforcement on a platform you cannot really ignore as an adult working in technology.
> 1. [...] You want to postpone a task? Please enter the exact date to postpone this to. Which project to add this to? Tags? Subtasks? The amount of things one can customize is really large, but making all this decisions has a cost
and also
> 5. Tasks are not the same. Get milk, write an essay, plan a vacation, reconnect with a friend. These are things of different magnitude, different emotional connection, different context and time commitment. Some tasks aren’t even tasks, e.g. simply items to keep track of or be reminded of. But TODO apps treat them the same. They get the similar looking rows neatly organized in a unified interface.
Obviously, combining 1 and 5 you have all the more issues relating to the need to make decisions between your different task categories, should you choose to manage that aspect too...
In all, the pain with TOOD apps/lists (for me) is not "getting the list done". It's actually "making and maintaining the list". What to put in the list? What not to put? When to update? What kind of details? What sources - Slack, emails, discussions, meetings, ideas? The overhead of just making/maintaining the list is what kills it.
So my take on this is that people try to organize themselves to death.
They take TODO app and think it will help them become next Bill Gates - just like waking up earlier or reading more books.
Problem is waking up earlier or reading more books and so TODO apps won't do anything for you.
TODO app will help you achieve a goal if you first have a goal and something real not like "become rich" and then you start putting in "get milk, write essay".
Don't put getting milk on your todo list.
Try to write an essay - well put steps or things you have to read first to write an essay, let's say you write an essay on Seneca, well obviously your todo should contain:
- read on shortness of life by Seneca
- read Seneca wiki page and take notes
- read Seneca wikiquotes page and take notes
- write an outline
- write out first paragraph introducing reader to Seneca based on wiki page notes
- write out paragraph on "On Shortness of Life"
If you have clear goal todo list is useful, if you want to manage your whole life and maintain it in todo app - that is not doable.
Lol. I don't need a todo app to remind me to work on my side projects. I need a todo app to make sure I have paid the bills to payees that refuse automated payment methods, to ensure I know the 20 or so important dates related to my kids school for things like speech dates (date that it needs to be handed in, date that the speech is done), homework, and things like tablets the dogs need to take, and tax return stuff, planning holidays, the 3 or 4 steps (that need to be done in a specific order) for car insurance renewal, 7 DIY jobs to be done around the houses ... and so on. Of course I could try to hold it all in my head and just do the thing, or whatever.
Ah, it's the "just do things" part of time management discussions. It's a good perspective to have as part of the discussion, as they too often lead to talking about time management tools more than actual doing things.
At that level I wonder if the measured time is even useful. I'd imagine myself just looking at the commited code/specs done at the end of the day and assert if it was productive or not.
I think the argument is that there are still unexplored Todo app models out there. For me, I think the ideal Todo app is probably a WhatsApp-style interface with one or more AI personalities helping me achieve one or more goals e.g. a side project partner, a gym buddy, etc.
This article encompasses lots of the reasons why I dislike traditional todo apps as well.
Unlike the author I did end up creating my own solution which solves a lot of the problems suggested by using a tree structure instead of a list structure. I have found it works better for my productivity than any other app as it encourages breaking tasks down into smaller chunks which are then easy to complete and build momentum as OP suggests.
I also did this. I decided after a few false starts that I was simply never going to commit to use a todo system that someone else made, so I wrote my own.
The tree-of-tasks idea is great and exactly what I did.
I probably won’t ever release it since I’m under no delusions that I’m creating something novel, but I love seeing how others approach the problem and taking ideas to incorporate into my system.
I made it integrate with my PS1 variable so that it's useful from the terminal; my terminal prompt includes the current task, the same way it includes the git branch.
(There's a GUI I'm working on too, at the moment).
Got hugged to death? 404 now.
Edit: lol, did you implement a referral block from HN at the JS level...? That seems silly, you've already sent the data...
The issue with app apps is that are isolated stuff, we have a single brain, we need integration. That's why I live in Emacs, where org-mode alone can integrate next to anything.
A simple example, jut note about a payable bill due before a certain date:
- we need the bill, for instance a pdf file
- perhaps the email where so send a payment confirmation to be polite
- a note with the date and the amount
- annotating after the payment the payment reference from the bank
- ...
Only in an integrated system such simple task can be done. No isolated todo app can.
Every wonder of the world was built without todo apps. Every enduring work of literature, every renaissance painting, every leap forward in sanitation and medicine, every architectural triumph, every breakthrough in our understanding of the cosmos, every great expedition, every moon landing. All these achievements involved organisation and planning – including breaking things down into lists of tasks – but I bet very few of them involved people fretting about how to redesign their lists to be more 'motivating'.
The modern notion that we can derive enduring motivation from the design of a list-making methodology, if only we could find the winning formula, is insane. Motivation comes from beholding the intended achievement itself. If you don't want to carry out a task, either the task is not in service of a worthwhile goal, or it is but you are failing to notice that.
> All these achievements involved organisation and planning – including breaking things down into lists of tasks – but I bet very few of them involved people fretting about how to redesign their lists to be more 'motivating'.
Are you sure that is the case? The origins of the term Akrasia date to biblical times; it's clear many people struggled with motivation for certain type of work back then.
> The modern notion that we can derive enduring motivation from the design of a list-making methodology, if only we could find the winning formula, is insane. Motivation comes from beholding the intended achievement itself.
Unfortunately, specialization of labor works directly against that. Few people assemble the final pieces to behold the achievement; everyone else is toiling at things that go into things to support people making things that go into other things, etc.
> If you don't want to carry out a task, either the task is not in service of a worthwhile goal, or it is but you are failing to notice that.
Indeed, but "failing to notice that" isn't something trivial, and for great many people, the failure to notice (or rather, the failure to feel, because noticing at the intellectual level is by itself not motivation) has a biological cause.
Not sure about the apps. I just use GTD on paper using a paper agenda combined with a binder to store everything. The main benefit is not having to remember everything that has to be done. When I was younger I found it very unpleasant to have all of these things in my head all the time. Then I discovered GTD and never looked back. As remarked in the article, not everything that comes in gets done. Once every so often it is a good idea to purge tasks that have been in there for quite a bit of time and still did not get done.
Call me an old school but this is how I keep track of things. Everyday morning, I start my day with writing on a notebook ( yes, a hard paper notebook ) with the title “things to do” and write top 3-4 times I would like to finish it. Be it work or personal, don’t matter. All goes there.
At the end of the day, I check how many I have finished and repeat it again next day. No stats, no achievement feelings except the sense of satisfaction I get that I am doing things that needs to be done
After trying almost everything I can imagine (probably twice) to manage my tasks and time I found the sweetspot from hybrid model of digital and analog. The system is rather simple: I write stuff to the paper (home and work) and then take a picture/scan with my phone. I use the appropriate cloud provider app depending on the context. Files are stored in chronological order.
I keep the current state on paper and whenever I need I just cleanup notes to the cloud and shred the papers.
The beauty of this is that I think I have finally got back the time that all these tools took from me. It was much simpler than I thought.
I do something similar for notes: I have an A4 whiteboard I basically always have with me at home. I pace around a lot while thinking and love writing on a physical something. Most ideas are short term, and can be erased, but for anything else, I snap a picture of the whiteboard.
Notes apps are laughably terrible, I hate limiting my stream of consciousness to a one dimensional line of characters. Worse is trying to do it with two thumbs on a smartphone.
I've personally found that I was "holding it wrong" when it comes to TODO apps. I think everyone likely has a slightly different approach to personal productivity that works best for them, but here are some insights that helped me:
1. Finding the right time scale: some people plan out their entire day, some their week, etc. For me, planning at a monthly timescale is more appropriate.
2. Don't use TODOs for chores and habit tracking. At first, I tried using todo apps to also track stuff like chores or hobbies I wanted to pursue daily. For me, this had the negative effects of making my chores take up even more brain space (now I not only have to do the chore but I actually have to mark it as done etc) and turning hobbies into a deadening "do it because you must" sort of obligation instead of a fun pursuit. It turns out I was getting these things done anyway so they weren't a good fit for a todo app which in this case just increased overhead for no reason.
3. It's important to recognize what counts as a concrete task and what sort of projects are more general, free form creative endeavors that it may not be worth it to squeeze into an itemized todo list. For me, many of the actual todos I have are temporal events, so what I really needed was a calendar. For my creative projects, I do a lot better when I actually don't constrain myself with a todo list.
So, in the end, I've settled on using a calendar to track important tasks I need to do each month (usually "life admin" type stuff) and that's it. I found that everything else was way too fine grained to be useful.
I use Sublime as my TODO app, just a text file. I have too much context switching at my job and I can't remember everything. Say, I'm doing a code review for 1 hour and during that time, several people from HR, QA, devs, etc. message me or approach me in person about something important (or not). So I just write it down and forget about it, because I'm busy doing my code review. I could've used some ticketing system but it's too much work to create an issue, add proper description, deadlines etc. compared to just quickly appending a line to a text file. In the evening and in the morning I inspect the list, prioritize it, and often I just delete entries if there were added long time ago and I did nothing about them (because of priorities). If it's something critical, people will definitely message me again. It's worked well for the past 5 years. I've tried various apps but nothing beats the flexibility of a simple text file.
I use a pile of paper and pen next to my desk. It’s my TODO and also my random idea dump. Sometimes all of the tasks get finished and the ideas executed and checked off. Other times they languish. Eventually I crumple up the ones that have been collecting dust too long and toss them in the recycling bin. If it sat around forgotten for that long it wasn’t important. My goal is to augment the information filtering and prioritization neural network that sits behind my forehead, not fight against it by imposing artificial constraints, categories or rigidity on it. Just as important as retaining and acquiring information is letting go of useless info.
To a great extent I feel the same about working in a team. I’ve found that a team of 3-8 people with a well aligned vision doesn’t need to track tasks or assign priorities. Especially when there is good guidance from above on the longer term vision. I’ve seen these tools used as duck tape for the wrong team, team size, product vision, etc.
> I’ve made a list of strategies to help me get things done, and ended up with 13 items (things like “extract the next smallest step as a separate task” or “work on it for just 2 minutes”)
I like the app (or webpage) Workflowy. It uses bullet lists which resonates very well with my way of structuring things. I also find it better to do weekly plans than daily or context based and then just move unfinished tasks to the next week, should they not be completed. If they hang around for too long, I just delete them.
[+] [-] klyrs|2 years ago|reply
Todo lists are also highly recommended for people with ADHD for unstimulating, repetitive tasks. Chore sheets, for example, are how my house stays marginally clean. Chores are broken into daily, weekly, and monthly tasks. Again, the best reward is tick the box. The irony here is that I've lived my whole life with ADHD, and it wasn't until my kid struggled with his own ADHD that I learned this incredible hack from his counselor.
Lists are stressors. Unwritten lists are way bigger stressors. When you tick the box the relief is palpable. That said, I don't use apps for this purpose. Pen and paper, a whiteboard, or a laminated printout is best. Because the last thing I need when I'm aiming to finish unstimulating tasks is to interact with a smartphone.
[+] [-] paczki|2 years ago|reply
I've been more or less addicted to MMOs, especially World of Warcraft. During Shadowlands (the previous expansion) the game was so awful that I quit for the first time after playing since 2004. I could play all day, and grind for hours on end just for Number Go Up™ and Box Checked©. It had NEVER occurred to me, even with an ADHD diagnosis, that this was the primary driving factor behind my addiction.
So after I quit with the intention of becoming a software engineer I was trying to find ways to tweak my brain to feel like I was still playing. I ended up programming a daily/weekly list so I could check off items as I did them.. I then added a faux xp bar and gave myself 10xp for dailies and 30 for weeklies. Then it was on. I keep myself in check to not add random bullshit to gain xp from - but using psychological manipulative videogame tactics to keep my brain on track in everyday life has completely changed everything for me.
Throughout all of this I've also returned to videogames in the last few months with a much healthier approach, because now I get my gratification from my real world goals and my need to check off my task list is greater than my need for more pixels. It's made videogames a lot more enjoyable too not focusing on playing past the point they're fun.
[+] [-] franky47|2 years ago|reply
I don't find this to be true (in my case) for repeatable tasks like chores. Sure, ticking the box may provide a little relief, but knowing that it has to be done all over again the next week, endlessly, doesn't help with finding satisfaction.
[+] [-] crabmusket|2 years ago|reply
This is like the ideal use-case for lists and list apps. The list has an endpoint, you can stack tasks up then knock them down. Your progress through the project is actually hill-shaped[1], not "Sisyphus pushing the rock up the hill"-shaped.
[1]: https://basecamp.com/shapeup/3.4-chapter-13#work-is-like-a-h...
[+] [-] steve_adams_86|2 years ago|reply
Lately I’ve been wanting an eink display that generates TODOs for a day based on periodical tasks and my calendar. I’d just stick it on my refrigerator I think, maybe have the option to toggle to a calendar view as well. Time and remembering tasks is such an issue in my family, it seems like it could be a huge help. Unfortunately I’d need to write that program and those displays can be super expensive — I’m not sure when I’ll get the chance.
Doing it with an old iPad would be trivial, but I don’t want my kids to have free access to an iPad on the refrigerator. Plus they burn through batteries, are a bit too obvious, and wouldn’t have the subtle grayscale appearance I’d like to have. It could be an alright way to validate the idea, at least.
[+] [-] oDot|2 years ago|reply
Prioritizing a task when adding it is way less stressful than deciding which one to do just before doing it.
[0] https://nestful.app
[+] [-] doctor_eval|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jclardy|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wruza|2 years ago|reply
It also provides unmatched satisfaction when you see a THICK stack of past todo papers in your drawer.
[+] [-] bradley13|2 years ago|reply
The trick is to work your own motivation into your workflow "I'll get a coffee when I finish my emails". "When I finish writing this draft, I'll get a beer". "I'm going to slog through this, and then take myself out to dinner". Whatever tickles your fancy.
As for the to-do list: keep it simple. Using a fancy app tempts you to waste time beautifying the list, with categories, priorities, and other unhelpful nonsense. That doesn't get anything done. Personally, I use a simple text document. It auto-opens when I log in. The stuff that needs done first is at the top. Stuff to do "when I have time" accumulates at the bottom. Every few months, I delete stuff that is no longer relevent; otherwise the bottom part would grow forever.
Finally, a last trick, which comes from my wife's PhD advisor. Always end the day with one little, easy task undone. The next day, tackling that easy task helps get you back into a productive mindset. Try it - it really does help!
[+] [-] mattnewton|2 years ago|reply
I don’t understand this, I have tried it but the willpower trick doesn’t work on me. If I want to do the task I’ll do it and if I want a coffee I’ll get a coffee. Denying myself the coffee when I don’t want to do the task just makes me less caffeinated while I procrastinate and takes almost the same discipline as just doing the task. I have to reason the ”lizard brain” into at least being neutral or ambivalent about doing the task.
[+] [-] tmoertel|2 years ago|reply
The mind hack to avoid this problem is to consider your to-do list to be a "pantry" that contains everything you could work on. At the beginning of each day, open your pantry and choose the few items you want to get done that day. Then close the pantry and don't look at it again.
Just work off the small list of items for that day. You can even write it down on paper, which makes it very satisfying to strike off each completed task. At the end of the day, return any unfinished items to the pantry, and throw the paper away.
[+] [-] jodrellblank|2 years ago|reply
Avoiding a todo list lets you forget about some things and thus not do them without having to explicitly make the decision to not do them. That feels better, easier, but I'm not sure it actually is better - shouldn't making a conscious decision what to prioritise and what to forget lead to a better outcome?
[+] [-] dgb23|2 years ago|reply
Move "ideas" into "todos" with intent.
And by the way this:
> ever-growing list of tasks that you can never finish creates stress and inhibits your motivation
Is an actual thing. Our brain gets overloaded that way while it keeps track of tasks in the background, requiring energy and memory. Writing stuff down helps, but it's still _there_.
You actually have to cross it out or clearly discriminate ideas and actual tasks you want to do and can do within a reasonable time frame.
[+] [-] nicbou|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ianburrell|2 years ago|reply
This system is great for tracking house projects since there is always a large number of them. It is also good for planning things for the future, I have lists of plants to get in the fall.
The problem I have with this system is that I have enough regular tasks that don't pick up many projects. I also don't run the process for syncing tasks frequently enough. I wish they were all in one system.
[+] [-] hesk|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] euroderf|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 3pt14159|2 years ago|reply
Make a calendar event. Make it repeat just often enough to be annoying. If necessary (e.g., taxes) make a couple more that are much more forceful with their language near an actual deadline.
That's it. When you're done, delete the repeating calendar thing.
It feels awesome deleting an infinite set of repeating events in the future. It's essentially self-induced negative reinforcement on a platform you cannot really ignore as an adult working in technology.
[+] [-] rapht|2 years ago|reply
> 1. [...] You want to postpone a task? Please enter the exact date to postpone this to. Which project to add this to? Tags? Subtasks? The amount of things one can customize is really large, but making all this decisions has a cost
and also
> 5. Tasks are not the same. Get milk, write an essay, plan a vacation, reconnect with a friend. These are things of different magnitude, different emotional connection, different context and time commitment. Some tasks aren’t even tasks, e.g. simply items to keep track of or be reminded of. But TODO apps treat them the same. They get the similar looking rows neatly organized in a unified interface.
Obviously, combining 1 and 5 you have all the more issues relating to the need to make decisions between your different task categories, should you choose to manage that aspect too...
In all, the pain with TOOD apps/lists (for me) is not "getting the list done". It's actually "making and maintaining the list". What to put in the list? What not to put? When to update? What kind of details? What sources - Slack, emails, discussions, meetings, ideas? The overhead of just making/maintaining the list is what kills it.
[+] [-] ozim|2 years ago|reply
They take TODO app and think it will help them become next Bill Gates - just like waking up earlier or reading more books.
Problem is waking up earlier or reading more books and so TODO apps won't do anything for you.
TODO app will help you achieve a goal if you first have a goal and something real not like "become rich" and then you start putting in "get milk, write essay".
Don't put getting milk on your todo list.
Try to write an essay - well put steps or things you have to read first to write an essay, let's say you write an essay on Seneca, well obviously your todo should contain:
- read on shortness of life by Seneca - read Seneca wiki page and take notes - read Seneca wikiquotes page and take notes - write an outline - write out first paragraph introducing reader to Seneca based on wiki page notes - write out paragraph on "On Shortness of Life"
If you have clear goal todo list is useful, if you want to manage your whole life and maintain it in todo app - that is not doable.
[+] [-] kkoncevicius|2 years ago|reply
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SW7CsUrIy4
[+] [-] quickthrower2|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ketzu|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] makeitdouble|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Sirikon|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ryanjshaw|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mgirkins|2 years ago|reply
Unlike the author I did end up creating my own solution which solves a lot of the problems suggested by using a tree structure instead of a list structure. I have found it works better for my productivity than any other app as it encourages breaking tasks down into smaller chunks which are then easy to complete and build momentum as OP suggests.
It’s available at https://tatask.com
I’m always open to feedback on improving it too.
[+] [-] senkora|2 years ago|reply
The tree-of-tasks idea is great and exactly what I did.
I probably won’t ever release it since I’m under no delusions that I’m creating something novel, but I love seeing how others approach the problem and taking ideas to incorporate into my system.
[+] [-] lelanthran|2 years ago|reply
https://github.com/lelanthran/frame/blob/release/v0.1.4/docs...
I made it integrate with my PS1 variable so that it's useful from the terminal; my terminal prompt includes the current task, the same way it includes the git branch.
(There's a GUI I'm working on too, at the moment).
[+] [-] toyg|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] moneywoes|2 years ago|reply
And compared to say Jira the benefit here is unlimited sub folders?
[+] [-] hnuser123456|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] OO000oo|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kkfx|2 years ago|reply
A simple example, jut note about a payable bill due before a certain date:
- we need the bill, for instance a pdf file
- perhaps the email where so send a payment confirmation to be polite
- a note with the date and the amount
- annotating after the payment the payment reference from the bank
- ...
Only in an integrated system such simple task can be done. No isolated todo app can.
[+] [-] cal85|2 years ago|reply
The modern notion that we can derive enduring motivation from the design of a list-making methodology, if only we could find the winning formula, is insane. Motivation comes from beholding the intended achievement itself. If you don't want to carry out a task, either the task is not in service of a worthwhile goal, or it is but you are failing to notice that.
[+] [-] TeMPOraL|2 years ago|reply
Are you sure that is the case? The origins of the term Akrasia date to biblical times; it's clear many people struggled with motivation for certain type of work back then.
> The modern notion that we can derive enduring motivation from the design of a list-making methodology, if only we could find the winning formula, is insane. Motivation comes from beholding the intended achievement itself.
Unfortunately, specialization of labor works directly against that. Few people assemble the final pieces to behold the achievement; everyone else is toiling at things that go into things to support people making things that go into other things, etc.
> If you don't want to carry out a task, either the task is not in service of a worthwhile goal, or it is but you are failing to notice that.
Indeed, but "failing to notice that" isn't something trivial, and for great many people, the failure to notice (or rather, the failure to feel, because noticing at the intellectual level is by itself not motivation) has a biological cause.
[+] [-] Capricorn2481|2 years ago|reply
But were they done without todo lists?
[+] [-] rodrigobahiense|2 years ago|reply
It isn't because some individuals are better fit for something that others wouldn't benefit from help.
[+] [-] cjfd|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rohith2506|2 years ago|reply
At the end of the day, I check how many I have finished and repeat it again next day. No stats, no achievement feelings except the sense of satisfaction I get that I am doing things that needs to be done
[+] [-] crucialfelix|2 years ago|reply
So I took the list of TODO app criticisms (nicely stated) and asked ChatGPT to generate a list of strategies.
Then I fed it my "troublesome" list of TODOs and asked it to apply the strategies for actionable encouragement.
prompts and results: https://gist.github.com/crucialfelix/e934611ba44abc7952c13fb...
These were in some cases helpful, some a bit off, but all of them gave a spark of randomness to the list I've been ignoring and that made it engaging.
I could easily turn this into a cli and run it from Obsidian with my perpetual list of things I won't do.
[+] [-] SnoozingBoa|2 years ago|reply
I keep the current state on paper and whenever I need I just cleanup notes to the cloud and shred the papers.
The beauty of this is that I think I have finally got back the time that all these tools took from me. It was much simpler than I thought.
[+] [-] sph|2 years ago|reply
Notes apps are laughably terrible, I hate limiting my stream of consciousness to a one dimensional line of characters. Worse is trying to do it with two thumbs on a smartphone.
[+] [-] voidhorse|2 years ago|reply
1. Finding the right time scale: some people plan out their entire day, some their week, etc. For me, planning at a monthly timescale is more appropriate. 2. Don't use TODOs for chores and habit tracking. At first, I tried using todo apps to also track stuff like chores or hobbies I wanted to pursue daily. For me, this had the negative effects of making my chores take up even more brain space (now I not only have to do the chore but I actually have to mark it as done etc) and turning hobbies into a deadening "do it because you must" sort of obligation instead of a fun pursuit. It turns out I was getting these things done anyway so they weren't a good fit for a todo app which in this case just increased overhead for no reason. 3. It's important to recognize what counts as a concrete task and what sort of projects are more general, free form creative endeavors that it may not be worth it to squeeze into an itemized todo list. For me, many of the actual todos I have are temporal events, so what I really needed was a calendar. For my creative projects, I do a lot better when I actually don't constrain myself with a todo list.
So, in the end, I've settled on using a calendar to track important tasks I need to do each month (usually "life admin" type stuff) and that's it. I found that everything else was way too fine grained to be useful.
[+] [-] kgeist|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gazpacho|2 years ago|reply
To a great extent I feel the same about working in a team. I’ve found that a team of 3-8 people with a well aligned vision doesn’t need to track tasks or assign priorities. Especially when there is good guidance from above on the longer term vision. I’ve seen these tools used as duck tape for the wrong team, team size, product vision, etc.
[+] [-] drivers99|2 years ago|reply
I'd love to see that list
[+] [-] sfy|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nottorp|2 years ago|reply