Your to-do list is lying to you

Do this. Do that. Do more. Do better. It's a trap.

If you’re ready to tell your to-do list to do one, this one’s for you…

It’s September 22. I’ve had to get over my deep-rooted discomfort with asking for help and sent my mum and SOS message. The triplets have been home for two months. I’ve been doing 24 feeds every 24 hours and, to be blunt, I’m hanging on by a thread.

My mum came straight over, made me a cup of tea and told me to sit down. “Don’t worry, I’ll sort things out.”

I picked up Rafa and went over to the armchair, wearily. As I sipped my tea, I saw my mum rush about my house, getting increasingly stressed. She worked harder, faster, doubled-down on the multi-tasking until she was completely frantic.

I looked up from my chair and it hit me, “Oh, she hasn’t realised yet. She still thinks it’s possible to get all this stuff done.”

Mama, there is no getting through the to-do list.

It’s all a lie.

Let me break it down…

Lie 1: You should be able to have, do and be it all

It’s trying to fit ten versions of you into one day.

Be the fit mum, the organic mum, the sexy mum, the career mum, the stay at home mum, the adventure mum…. Oh and by the way, each of these “mums” comes with a shit-tonne of work.

Lie 2: Everything is urgent

There’s no hierarchy, so everything on your list feels like it needs doing now. Or as I frequently yell at my triplets “RIGHT NOW!!!!”

It’s like whackamole and the only way to get through it is to go faster and faster. Until our arms are nothing but a blur as we whack for our lives, not knowing what we’re whacking or why any more. It’s reactive, it’s not a strategy.

Lie 3: It’s all on you

Don’t believe the hype. This was never designed as a one-woman job! It shouldn’t all be on one woman’s to-do list. The only reason I’m able to sit and write this to you now is because my mum and aunt are gardening with my boys right now.

The way out isn’t doing more. It’s choosing priorities, not perfection. This is the second step of breaking up with mum guilt.

Introducing…The Priority Filter

This tool helped me cope with running a fast-growing business that was often over capacity. I took it into motherhood and gave it a make-over.

It got baked into my thinking 20 years ago. This is how I look at everything on the list.

• Non-negotiable

• Not now

• Not me

• Not happening

Ready to give it a test-run?

Step 1, Do a brain dump. Write out everything that’s on your mental load, your to-do list, the stuff you’re doing, need to do, or have forgotten about. Don’t be frightened by the scale of the task. A mum who’d burned out twice got me to do this. It’s liberating.

Step 2, Work out what really matters to you most. What are the one or two things you can look back on at the end of a long day/week and feel proud you achieved. When I asked this at a recent workshop, we got answers like “Walking in nature with my son at the weekend”, “Reading a bedtime story every night” and “Friday night movie night”.

Step 3, Sort everything on the list into 4 boxes:

• Non-negotiable

  This falls into two groups:
  – what matters most to you as a mum e.g. reading bedtime stories - (see step 2).
  – what has to happen so life doesn’t fall apart e.g. packing lunch to take to nursery.

• Not now
  This stuff matters but doesn’t have to take up precious mental bandwidth right now. We can park it to revisit later e.g. ordering a present for the birthday party in a couple of weeks.

• Not me
  Don’t be a martyr. This is everything that doesn’t have to be done by you goes here. Paid or unpaid e.g. walking the dog. Maybe someone else wouldn’t do it as well as you, but if it is possible for someone else to do it, put it here.

• Not happening
  This is my favourite category. When you take a long, hard look at that list there will be some stuff that you don’t even need to do. Nice to haves. Or perhaps things that are really important to other people but genuinely aren’t a priority for you e.g. I didn’t bother with baby classes. I didn’t bother reading parenting books as when I tried it, they just made me feel shit. I didn’t bother doing anything that involved taking the triple pram on public transport - it just wasn’t happening.

Screen shot this.

This tool enables me to cut through the noise and get some clarity around what matters most right now. It also gave me permission to things that other people told me I should be doing but really weren’t me.

I didn’t need anyone’s approval. If those things got skipped so I could concentrate on what mattered to me, so be it.

Let’s get real

• What actually matters most to you in motherhood?

• What can wait?

• What doesn’t have to be done by you?

• And what’s just… not happening?

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