Those lines are gold, thank you. I frequently tell people at work I'll do things the same day and it just piles up.

I’ll be trying this today!

Like you, I planned at the night before. But I just time boxing, you may hear about this (Elon Musk uses it). It is really really push me to run faster and be more productive. I finished tasks I'd needed all day to do within 4 productive hours.

Just made this comment to get your awesome book.

To stay sane I DON’T EDIT MY TO DO LIST AT THE SAME DAY!!!

This are such valuable tips.  In particular the suggested response to the boss who asks for a report.  Just adding "...by 3pm tomorrow" when you agree is so elegant. It packs all the negotiation into a few works and also trains your boss (who we all know has the potential to wreak havoc on our schedule) to respect your time without making a big deal about it.  Bravo Neville!

that's good.

i do something similar. i do a to do list in the end of the workday for the next day. i list all of the stuff that needs to be done, even if not all can be done.

at the beginning of the day i go over the list, choose some small quick tasks and some larger ones. i memorize them, and start working.

at the end of the day, i will go over the list i did, and see what i managed/remembered to do. i mark out what i did. the task that i forgot to do, probably were not that important to do, and i will move them to the next day :)

that way i make sure i only do what is A MUST, or really important. of course i will try and make first the next day, those that i didn't do the day before (if they are important enough :) )

I agree with you! Anytime I include things into my to-do list on the very day, I barely get half of it done.

 

Another tip I use is, I try not to have more than 10 things on my list, because once I go through a list with more than 10 tasks in it, I just become mentally tired, before even getting started😂

Really informative, the reason why I subscribed to your emails! You give game when you aren’t even giving game😂 keep on being great bro!

When I saw the summarized version of this on LinkedIn, I immediately liked the post & applied it. I'm on my 3rd day now. And it has been creating wonders already.

 

In my work, I usually stay sane by wearing earphones (even when there's no music). It signals people not to talk to me. It allows me to get drowned in my work.

Hi Neville,

 

To-do list aren't new on the market, I've heard more people than I can remember to create one before you get to work. But, what they failed to define is when they WILL work, and when they WON'T.

 

I've been using a to-do list from my college days, but I could hardly complete all tasks ever. Why? Because I didn't know how to say, "I've got it on my to-do list for tomorrow."

 

I learned to keep unnecessarily interrupting calls short by using Tim Ferris's advice of telling people, you're in the middle of something or asking them to define their long stories in an email. And now it's you.

 

I guess the more time people spend banging their heads on the keyboard, the more creative ways they come with to save it. And I hope down the road as I gain more experience, I become like one of you guys.

 

Seriously! Thanks so much for sharing this insight.

I'm just doing this Comment for the free Book you promised me

 

So

 

Here goes

 

I have come to understand that my Inner Champion undergoes a slow death when I Don't say ' no '

 

so I set myself Goals for each month

 

Financial Goals

 

Goals for my passion

 

Goals for my Career

 

Movie goals ( I mean why not??? )

 

 

 

and then I create an outline of what a perfect day would look like

 

I create a set of daily tasks that would take me close to these goals and make me happy.

 

Once that's done

 

I just add tasks onto those Primary tasks each morning

 

Each task is evaluated to make sure that they will take me closer to those goals

 

and

 

If it will not

 

I just say NO

 

It's hard

 

But I say no

No idea if this is also common in the US, but in my country, clients have this obsession with sending super long voicenotes via WhatsApp (like... 8' long audios, it's insane). So I started telling them that I listen to their voicenotes while showering or... errr... passing the contents of the bowels out of the body (oh this came out fancy) because they're too long and that's the only "free time" I have. It made some of them feel weird so they just started sending texts, like a normal person would do :P

I look at Neville's drawings to get my zen fix for the day. Oh yeah!

If you don't want people to expect immediate responses (esp. during non-office hours), schedule your replies to go out the next working day. In this way, you train others to respect your schedule and way of working.

Thank you so much, this is so helpful. I try to plan as well, but I struggle to keep my plan because I almost always add something to the list on the same day, then get stress out because I am not being able to do some of it.

 

PS: can I pls get a copy of your book You are gonna die? It is nice to plan for my death.

I'm not sure if this is allowed at all work places, but listening to something in the background is very helpful for me. Also, setting a timer. I find that if I have a difficult task to complete, setting a timer and telling myself I only have to work on it for an hour before I get a break is helpful.

Hey Neville!

 

I try to keep it as simple as possible.

 

I have 3 points of 100% control every day - morning, evening, at the end of the week.

 

Every morning I work on my main priority for the day. If done by afternoon I go on the second on and finally the third one.  If it's not done I keep working on the same task.

 

I never have more than 3 things on my To Be Completed list. I have a Radar list where I add things to keep in mind. This is the "It would be nice to do this as well" list.

 

Every evening I review the day by asking a series of ultra-secret questions and see what can I do better tomorrow.

 

Every week I review the week with - yes - a series of ultra-secret questions and I see what I can improve for the following week. What were the main obstacles, etc.

 

Then I decide the main projects for the next week, what resources I need, what will be the main obstacles to get them done.

 

Set myself some nice juicy targets and off we go.

 

 

 

That's it :D.

 

P.S. Your system it's pretty cool as well.

I only check my email once a day. *gasp* I know! But, it's filled with everyone else's priorities, so I quickly get to inbox zero and focus on my own intentions.

Years ago I had used your format and it worked.  Then I lost the info.  For the last week I was wishing I had it still.  (We moved and it might be in one of fifty+ boxes.). And now this email!  Add mind reader to your impressive list of accomplishments!!  Thank you.

Thank you Jenny, I hope they work well for you! Such a simple and easy way to change the outcome right??

Awesome, best of luck with it Greg!

Oh interesting! I've tried boxing things in certain times, but for me personally it hasn't always worked great.

 

So long as I get all the stuff on my to-do list done I kind of don't care too much HOW I do it, so long as it gets done.

 

It's crazy how different people are in their approaches!

Bahhaha.....well at least you will remember NOT TO ADD TO YOUR TO-DO LIST THE SAME DAY!

Hey Neil thanks, it definitely is a great little sentence to let everyone be on the same page, know the work in question will be finished, and also not add it to your schedule the same day :)

I feel seen. I asked Neville about that video on Twitter couple of days ago, he responded (helpful as always) and now a blog post :-)     Thanks man.