How to write a to-do list

One line, your own words

A task is one line, written the way you'd say it. "Call about the gutters." "Cake for friday." "Email Priya back."

The line only has to mean something to the person reading it, and that's you. So skip the formal phrasing and the details you already know, and use the words your own head uses. You're leaving a note for yourself later today, not writing documentation for a stranger.

"Gutters" is a complete task

Half of what stops people mid-list is the feeling that a task isn't written well enough. "Gutters" is fine. Future you knows exactly what it means, and the point was to get it out of your head before it left on its own.

You can always add more later, a date, a note, a phone number. But a vague task on the list beats a well-written one in your memory every single time, so write the sloppy version now.

Put a day on it or it's today forever

Here's the move most people skip. Anything you're not doing today gets a day, even a rough one.

Skip this and every task lands on one big pile called now, and the pile grows until you dread looking at it. Write "renew the passport, next month" instead and the task leaves, then comes back when it's due¹. The list you look at every day stays short, which is the whole trick to still looking at it.

Say the day in your own words too: "thursday", "saturday morning", "the 1st". If writing the date takes more effort than that, the tool is fighting you.

Write it where you're standing

The biggest to-do list mistake isn't in the writing at all. It's the plan to write it down later, back at your desk, once you find the notebook.

Later is where tasks go to die. The thought you have in the parking lot doesn't keep, so the list has to be reachable from the parking lot². Say it to the car, type it into the chat you already have open, tell the kitchen speaker while you stir.

Where you write it down matters more than what you write, because the perfectly worded task you never wrote down is worth nothing.

Stop at five

For today, pick about five things and stop. Five isn't magic, it's just what a normal day actually holds. A list you finish teaches you to trust it, and a list you never finish teaches you to skim it.

Everything else gets a day and leaves. Tomorrow the list refills itself from the dates you wrote, and you get the strange, calm experience of a to-do list that's short every single morning.

That's the entire skill. One line, your words, a day attached, written where you stand.

Frequently asked questions

How do I write a to-do list for work?

The same way, one line per promise with a day on it. The difference at work is where the promises arrive, which is mostly Slack, email, and hallways. Write each one down in the moment you say yes, right where you said it, because the ones you plan to log later are the ones that get dropped.

Should every task start with a verb?

No. "Gutters" works fine if you know what it means. The verb rule only helps when a task is secretly a project, where "plan the party" stalls but "book the room" happens. If a task keeps not happening, try rewriting it as the very next physical step.

How long should a to-do list be?

Today's list: about five real things. The whole list can be as long as your life is, because tasks with dates are out of sight until their day comes. It's the undated pile that turns a list into wallpaper.

Should I write my to-do list on paper or in an app?

Paper is lovely for today, and plenty of organized people run their day off an index card. The app earns its place at later and elsewhere: the task due next month, the thought from the car, the reminder that finds you in the kitchen. Plenty of people use both.

Footnotes

1. What actually belongs on today's list why the short list you finish beats the long one you sort. ↩
2. What a to-do list app is actually for why where you are when you remember something decides everything. ↩