Too long a s/m list

[TesTeq]

Use time-based lists.

Some people divide their long Someday/Maybe list into several lists that group future projects according to their probability to become active (or their priority).

Some people define time-based lists:
- SMWR (Someday/Maybe Weekly Reviewed);
- SMMR (Someday/Maybe Monthly Reviewed);
- SMQR (Someday/Maybe Quarterly Reviewed);
- SMYR (Someday/Maybe Yearly Reviewed).
The Someday/Maybe projects are put on these lists according to your current judgement when you should think again about a given project.

 

[Gardener]

So I followed my own advice and split my projects into Now, Soon, and Someday in tonight's weekly review.

I'll actually still be reviewing most of them weekly, so this doesn't change anything there.

But it's amazing how just having an alternative named "Soon" lets me take a lot of stuff out of "Now", without a fight. For the first time in months I didn't have to painfully, item by item, struggle to prune my current workload down to a reasonable size.

Weird.

Gardener

 

[Mic]

My personal take would be to treat the whole lot like a new inbox pile, go through the lot as if they'd just turned up. Do you need to do them all to be happy?

You phrased it nicely, but right now, as I mentioned above, I went through a first group of s/m and although I knocked a few off my list, I found that most I MUST keep.

I decided not to keep actions on my someday maybe - just projects.

That's absolutly true. Every time I move a project to s/m I first copy any attached info from the NA/NAs to the project record, delete the NA and only then move the project record itself to s/m. When I move a project back to active- I decide next action/s and remake them on the right NA list.

You mentioned that some items were not just waiting for time but for money too. Could you put most of those items on a checklist of "Things I'd like to buy when I have more money".

I thought to do that, but so many s/m records already have attached info like phone numbers, plans of steps to take, reference to where to find material I saved, etc., that I did not want to erase them from my system. Maybe I should create a whole seperate list for these within my system and have a line in my WR checklist saying "Consider activating money waiting project/s".

I thank you and all the others who replied so far, for the ideas and clarity you gave me.

Mic