Making the list

I am one of those people who needs to make a list for most things… even if it has just one item. It makes me feel organized and like I’ve thought things through. Even when I used to chart out my study schedules back in my student days (oh wait a minute, I am still there!)… I religiously made out plans to the minute hoping somewhere that I vaguely followed it. More often than not I would end up having spent more time making the schedule than sticking to it. And when I start making a list and have only one item, I usually add more things to it, whether they were entirely relevant or not. It makes me feel like I have an agenda. Very weird… but I know others who do it! Besides, having more than one thing to do promotes the need to complete at least one of the tasks enlisted. Indeed when I used to work for CTS, I used to have my own white board space on which everyday I would neatly enlist my “Tasks for the day”. As the day wore on, the guilt of not having completed any would slowly take over and I would work really hard to complete at least one major ‘bullet point’ because I took (and still take) extreme happiness in adding a check-mark to an action item once completed. That’s what seals the accomplishment, for me. My own acknowledgment of a job well-done (which I don’t give myself unless it’s truly done to the best of my satisfaction). And well, personally I need these silly boosts to elevate me to do the next item on the list (usually in the order of priority) and as the saying goes – If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it. Whatever works, works.