#10 The threefold transformative way you aren't harnessing the power of lists
My proven age-old techniques to ensure I'm always engaged in something awesome.
The first way: Free up your clogged mind
What is the basis of a free mind? What do I mean by a "free mind". I'd describe it as: A mind free of anxiety about the future, and free of regret of the past. If you think about it, all we think about is these two things, we're either worried that something won't go the way we want it to, or we're sad that something didn't go the way we planned it to. And if we free ourselves of these two, we might as well be calling it an Empty Mind. So the task is to really just, as Bruce Lee also said, Empty Your Mind!
As against what—you ask? As against, a mind that is clogged, when your mind has been dealing with many things all day—things that haven't been resolved yet:
that project at work needs more attention,
that conversation with a loved one is still giving you the irk,
that thing you saw on social media wouldn't it be nice if you had it,
what's going to be for dinner today, come on you can't eat that, didn't workout today, and so on.
In a state of mind that has been dealing with all this and more, and you are escaping it all by swiping on social media and someone in your family adds another thing to it which you know you didn't resolve from yesterday, your mind basically says, enough is enough. You either react with anger or just log out. You don't engage, this state is what I am calling a clogged mind. There's just too much for it to hold on to that it can't function freely.
It's not just you. All humans deal with this. Even humans who have been given extreme responsibilities to manage. Heads of states, of armies, your company's CEO, the doctor that sews us up when we go in the emergency room with a bad injury, them and us, all of humans with lives that tend to linger in our minds. But what these high value individuals have setup up differently than you is that they know they need to be in their prime position mentally and physically in order for them to make the right decisions. They just take what they are doing in the now far more seriously than you do.
This prime position is achieved when they aren't anxious about any thing. And that happens either when they've already resolved the reasons for any anxieties or they or someone for them has noted it down, assuring them that “that thing” they're thinking about is well noted and will be available for them to pick up once their high value task is done.
Put simply, they more or less have their mind-clogging items of life organised in a simple three part list: Do it now. Do it later. Let someone else do it.
It begins at noting everything down on a single list and then sorting it out in these, Now, Later or Someone else sublists. So the best thing you can do when you feel there's too much happening is to just note everything down. When you assure your mind, that its constant thoughts have been recorded, it quickly starts being present in the moment. It does this because it doesn't have to keep tabs on half-thoughts. When you sit down to note the thoughts, you'd find that you have to complete the thoughts else they don't make sense. And that helps both in completing the thoughts and in picking up the item when you come back to it. Or delegate it to someone else. You could even name the lists: Do it, Defer it, Delegate it - it’s the same but this has 3Ds and just sound better.
This method allows you and your mind to be in the now. Anything that can wait, is now in the Defer it list, and anything that someone else can do is in the Delegate it list. And you and your attention is on the first item on the Do It list.
That's it, that is all I have to tell you today. You do this for long enough you’d be transformed in no time. You may not need to worry about the rest.
This is the short version of what my point is. But if you're here for the long version, read on.
The second way it will transform your life: You'd be able to summon your mood at will
Oh you greedy you. You had to read on, didn’t you? Okay then, here’s how I came to realise this second way.
So I am an only child. And growing up, I was dependant on kids outside of my family to be entertained. So I was subject to the dreaded, "not in the mood" many a times. For instance, as a young adult even, my best friend said no at least a gazzilion times to come for a run with me, I guess we all need another similar aged human wanting to do what we want to do, as children and even as adults.
Does it sound bleak that I was the only child and needed children from other families to even just play? It wasn’t, I had a system going. I had access to multiple families that I would visit, to have my fill of hanging out with other kids. And that gave me choice.
I could choose who to go to when, and who not to go to when!
Most of these families had two or more kids, and more often than not they’d end up fighting amongst each other. Things would escalate quickly, and I could just as quickly leave to go back home. Peaceful, quiet, and just the same as I left it last.
So that was the setting. But my secret to remaining engaged, always-up-to-something childhood was making lists. I’d make lists of things that I can do, should I have to, when there is no one around to hang out with. Sort of like a backup. There was no pressure to do these things, but just that these things were available for me to do should I be extremely bored. Sort of a Do-When-You're-Bored list.
I’d put things like drawing, football, catch ball, music (it meant making mixtapes using tape recorders), names of cartoons I can watch on tv, and so on.
This habit of making lists continued.
Even today, even this article you're reading is one item in a list of ideas to write about, a list of ideas that I constantly come back to, and reflect upon. When I reflect upon an idea enough it becomes an article to be shared with you. It's that simple.
But there are other lists too. See this one I made in 2020:
This is a list of stuff I love to do, I made this because when there's too many non-fun things that are happening in a day, it's best to be reminded of what I love to do instead, just so that I don't miss out on doing at least one of those things on that day. It’s an accepted that when done these things bring me joy. Since you know, mood follows action.
This works because I've also over the years established in my heart and mind that inspiration / mood is waiting for us to get up and do something. Just like we're waiting for it to strike before we do something. The truth is, unless we act, inspiration / mood keeps hiding. But as soon as we do, anything really, so long as with intention, it decides to show up.
So lists to help remind us of our sources of joy, like this one, will help you bring in the mood at will. And that is a super power, if you ask me.
The third way: Transformed Life Project
Making lists also helped me figure out work. Today we have much better ways to make lists than just a list of things written on paper. Think lists within lists of ideas / topics / tasks / projects / you take your pick.
Just like many lists on physical pages are stored inside a file and the files are stored inside folders and the folders on to shelves in rooms and rooms within a building and so on. The lists we have on our computers today can be lists of items, inside what I call pages, and those pages can be within nestled folders. Nothing fancy, no Notion, no Obsidian, no special software is needed to do this. But just the willingness to keep it tidy and to base it on our system of life.
The beauty of it all today is, should you be willing to use some of these softwares I mention, that you could link any list item to any other list item in any other folder and then use AI compounded questions about anything that you may have written about in the past. But that's a story for another time.
A page each where you can store...
You can store, what you read, watch or listen to - so chill time.
You can store, what you want to eat, drink or cook some day - so eating time.
You can store, what you need to get done today, this week, or even next month - so work time.
You can store, ideas about your hobby that you want to turn to a serious passion some day - so side hustle time.
With storage space in gigabytes (a lot) in our pockets, and terabytes (a lot more) in the cloud, and a simple text file with lists taking up only kilobytes (very little), we all have potentially the biggest personal libraries of what our lives can be right in our pockets in the form of those smart phones we keep carrying around.
The smartest, most successful individual you can think of also has the same capacities of storing ideas as you do, even they have the same number of hours in the day as you do, but they are just organised differently.
And this is where I am asking you to start, and when you make it a mess of it all, start again, no pressure. Just like anything else, this get better with practice.
Step 1: Think of what matters to you the most. Typical things could be:
Home, Work, Hang out.
Mind, Body, Soul
Create, Consume, Manage
For instance, I'd use, Soul, Hangout, or Consume to list things that I need to watch on TV, or places I need to visit in the city. Just like that, under Create, I'd put art ideas that I need to create, or the work project that I need to complete. Under Consume, I'd put all inputs, both for the mind and the body. Under Manage I'd put things like my medical records, finances, etc.
Another extremely efficient way to list items that I need to act on for me and we spoke of earlier in the article, has been:
Do it, Defer it, Delegate it - This system is setup to ensure all our effort, attention and abilities are locked on to what matters most, right now.
Step 2: Make a folder or a nestled page for each of these lists that you come up with.
Step 3: Every time you have an idea, an issue, an anxiety, this is the only place you can add your ideas and thoughts, you have to use the system for it to become the massive library we spoke of earlier. Anything that comes to mind, religiously just note it down and allow yourself to forget about it.
Step 4: Once in a while, revisit your lists structure see if it is working or does it need mending in terms of changing things around a little.
Step 5: On these revisits, you'd also find many ideas go together, and how you can build from there to make bigger things in your life. I call it compounded creativity.
Creativity isn't one thing at one time, it is mostly, a couple of things coming together at all times. The more often we make obscure connections between seemingly unconnected items on our lists the more often we create something beautiful.
We may not spend so much time thinking of lists in our own life. But if we do, we'd see there's so much to do, and so less time. This list making business is the business of your life, not of others who employ you, not of others you are working with, not of others in your family, not of others who are your friends, but just you. And these lists, will bring you more action, better mood and in effect a tad bit more mindful about living your days. And that's where I leave you to it.
It was nice to have your attention, now go do something awesome. Speak to you next week.
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Art Updates:
(01 of 03) Custom Love-To-Do List
So I actually went ahead and made the list from 2020 again. Here’s what the 2024 list looks like:
Have one made for you, with your own items on on the list.
(02 of 03) One of you bought the Dream Poster
I was delighted to see that notification, KaChing it went, “You have a new order!”.
(03 of 03) Awesome Response on the Custom Name Cards
I have been delighted this week with the response I got on the Name Cards. You all in different ways appreciated the design, the colours, the type style, the overall feel of the artworks and that just makes me extremely happy. I can’t believe something I made from scratch is something you all loved so much.
Just as a reminder - you can still just WhatsApp me if you’d like me to create one for you too.
If you want me to make one for you, just click the link below and process the order and I’ll be in touch.
And And And, I almost forgot
This week I also started work on an actual brand logo for one of our subscribers. It has been so exciting to discover the nuances of a new area of life, of their unique knowledge and their page. Once they launch the logo, I’d share with you all here too (with their permission of course). Some exciting stuff this.
Here’s what I am upto otherwise—check how I can help you and how you can help me:
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That’s all for today, speak to you next Sunday! You have a blessed week.