The Notebook To-Do List: A Two-Minute Tip on Clearing Your Head (2017)
This is a clip of under two minutes from July 2017, filed with my early KetoDick recordings. It never went on YouTube, and it isn't about keto or nutrition. It's a productivity tip: how I get every obligation out of my head and onto paper. I'm posting it because I came back to the idea in later group Lives, where I tied it to why diets slip.
In this recording
- [0:01] I use small 3-by-5-inch notebooks. I write down every single thing I need to do: personal, professional, and any special third project.
- [0:01] I tear the pages out, lay them on a table, and group them by when they're due or by what kind of task they are.
- [0:01] Then I rewrite them into three books, or one book with three sections: personal, business, and the specific project.
- [0:34] After that there's nothing I'm forced to remember, so my mind is free. If it mattered, I wrote it down.
- [0:34] The reward: when a page is done, tear it up, shred it, burn it, "throw it in the ocean."
- [1:16] Writing by hand helps me remember the items. I said studies found people who wrote lists remembered them better than people who typed them.
- [1:16] Bonus: a paper pad is harder to hack, and much easier to leave somewhere.
What this has to do with keto
Nothing directly, and I won't pretend otherwise. But it shows up again. In a November 2017 kitchen Live I mentioned having talked about writing your obligations in a notebook. The point there was that a missed meal plan often isn't a failure (live RFTC2543). When you see everything you're carrying, you can admit that the meal prep slipped because you were with your kids or looking after a sick relative. That was a decision about what you valued, not proof you can't diet. The kitchen Q&A has that part.
By 2020 the same idea had become my first coaching question: what are your top three priorities, and is weight loss one of them? (Diet and your top three; live QTSN8647). The notebook is the practical half of that question. You can't rank your priorities until you can see them all.
A note on the study claim
I said that studies of people who hand-write versus type their to-do lists found the writers remembered more (live RKQG8896). I didn't name a study in the clip, and none of the evidence pages for this site covers handwriting and memory. Take that line as my recollection, not a checked finding. The tip works or doesn't on its own terms: try it for a week and see whether your head feels clearer.
Key points
- Get every obligation onto paper, including the small ones.
- Sort them into three sections: personal, business, one special project.
- Tear out finished pages; it's a small, satisfying reward.
- Seeing everything you carry makes it easier to forgive a diet slip that was really a priority call.