findinG ordeR iN chaOS

Are you a list maker, I am. My way of organizing my life is writing down everything, and I highly recommend doing that. You might be surprised how clear your life may become if you just find the time and will to jot all of it. You may use any medium you want, the purpose is to take your thoughts out of the mind and give them some breathing space.

Lists can be as simple as your to-do list for today or the weekend, to a result of a serious thought process that lists down your life's major ambitions, lets call it your wishlist. A lot of us have a vague idea of a million things we want to accomplish if we have enough time or energy or resources. If these things are really listed down you might realize that some of the things might not even be as big as you felt and might be completed over the weekend. It might just be a mental block or a victim of procrastination that we are so good at. Like last year we (my husband and I) geared up the courage and went for sky-diving one Saturday. It was so much fun and one item checked from '50 things I want to do before I die' list.

My father always wanted my mother to keep a writing pad to write down anything she remembers to buy from the market and handover the piece of paper to whoever is going to the market at the end of the week. Believe it or not, it took more than ten years of pestering from my dad to make ma get into the habit of doing that and saving papa or the help a few additional trips of the market for the forgotten items.

David Allen has come up with a wonderful concept for Getting Things Done or popularly know as GTD. As his site explains GTD is sophisticated without being confining, the subtle effectiveness of GTD lies in its radically common sense notion that with a complete and current inventory of all your commitments, organized and reviewed in a systematic way, you can focus clearly, view your world from optimal angles and make trusted choices about what to do (and not do) at any moment. GTD embodies an easy, step-by-step and highly efficient method for achieving this relaxed, productive state.

A lot of us are pretty meticulous in our professional life but totally disorganized in personal. I can't really believe if anyone can survive the professional world without having some kind of list, it might just be the to-do in outlook or lotus notes (or a simple list on the writing pad).

Here are some of advantages of doing listing...

Saves time – At the most basic level, making a list would save you from making multiple trips to the grocery store, or from calling the doctor's office again to confirm if the appointment for the X-ray could also be available the same day as the blood test appointment.

Saves money – Lists prevent you from impulsive buys. When you have a list of exactly what you need to buy then buying anything that is not on the list would make you think twice about whether you really need it. This could be an excellent way for shopaholics to control their urges.

Prevents you from forgetting to do things that you might regret later – Adding "mom's birthday – call Saturday" might make your mother a very happy woman and you the favorite son :o). Also, say while going to a parent teacher conference. Has it even happened to you that as soon as you step out of the room, you curse (under your breath hopefully, your kid might be with you) and wish you had asked question blah blah and blah that you were thinking about yesterday?

You know your life's goals – Writing sets your priorities straight. Say you make a list of the 50 things you want to do before you die. It might reveal a lot of surprises to you.

Works as a reminder - and makes you feel guilty enough to complete the tasks on hand.

New found motivation - The very satisfaction on striking out work you have completed may work as an excellent motivator to work towards the completion of items on your list.

Gives you a sense of purpose - and you don't feel lost through the day thinking that you are forgetting something important.

Here are examples of my lists to give you an idea about what you can possibly do:
1. My daily to-do
2. Weekend to-do
3. Stuff to buy (by store)
4. What i want to achieve in 2, 5, and 10 years from now

I'm am avid reader and I’ve starting maintaining my list of books in Google Books with three labels of Read, to Read and Reading. This is also a kind of list.

You can find some very good sites on the Internet that can help you set and manage goals for yourself and also for list-management.

For goal setting - 43things.com or GetGoaling.com are great places to begin.

For making to-do lists –

Remember the Milk - You can get email, SMS or IM reminders, has a lot of keyboard shortcuts. You can create smart list to combine items from different list to make a new one. You can just add a item by sending an email or SMS to this site. You can also get an iPhone application, though using it is not free.

Google Task List – IT can be used both for making a to-do list and for goal management. This article explains how.

ReQuall – God! I like this one. You can integrate it with your phone, IM, text messaging or email. You can just the toll-free number and tell ReQall whether you want to add, recall or share your reminders. You can listen the lists, add to them send them to friends.

Todoist - A really simple and bare minimum to-do list. It also has keyboard shortcuts for easy navigation.

CheckVist - This has a tree structure where you can make sub tasks within a task.

Ta-da Lists - The best thing about this one is that you can share it with others. You can share and modify it mutually. The lists can be made really colorful so you can make a gray list for office work (really dull) and a mauve for things you want to achieve in the next quarter.

Tree Do List – This is also a tree structure list manager but also provides features for managing book marks, news feeds etc.

And you know what, nothing can beat a piece of paper and a pen or a normal todo.txt file on your desktop.

Follow whatever you are most comfortable with. The idea is not to get boggled by complicating things but to make life easier. Tell me if you have a list now or at least if you are thinking about it!