9-1 Calendars are not To-Do lists

Transcript

1. Module 9: calendars are not to do lists Sun, 5/1 8:44PM 5:01 SUMMARY KEYWORDS brain, list, calendar, moms, mental, items, tomorrow, repetitive, energy, saves, adhd, happen, rhythms, dumps, kitchen, big long list, upkeep, pediatrician, turn, waitlist SPEAKERS Patricia Sung Patricia Sung 00:00 Hey there successful mama, welcome back to how to give calendar for ADHD moms. bonus lesson we are talking about to do lists. I was beating like, am I trying to do too much accounting class and to do this, but you really can't separate the two. So I decided to go ahead. And so this was not planned at the beginning. So welcome back, turn off any distractions and let's jump in, and move ahead here. Patricia Sung 00:28 Okay. So when we talk about our to do list, a lot of times our to do lists ends up on your calendar. But to do lists and calendars are two different systems, they are not the same thing. And on times, our ADHD brain goes well, but this is all the stuff I'm doing tomorrow. So I put it in one place. And yes, that is a good starting point, you do want to have everything in the same place. But the problem is, when you have your calendar items that have to be done, like at a certain time, and then you put your To Do Lists things in there that don't have to be done at a certain time, then your brain sees this big long list, and it loses the important things in the mix. So they don't stand out anymore. Patricia Sung 01:11 And then who, what when your brain sees the to do list items on there, it's like oh, well, like really happy to do that today, then your brain starts to categorize your schedule as like things that I don't really have to do. And that's not good, because our brain needs to know this is important. And then you pay attention to it. And these things are optional, and I don't have to pay attention to them. Patricia Sung 01:34 Our brain needs that distinction. So we can't put the two things together in the same list. They
2. can be next to each other, but they need to be separate for our brains, they just do. So to determine where it goes, That doesn't have to be done at a certain time. If yes, then it goes on your calendar. If it does not have to be on a certain time, then it is a to do list item. That for example, like if you're like I have to call a pediatrician right at eight o'clock tomorrow, okay, then yes, that is something that goes on your calendar because it has to happen right at eight o'clock tomorrow. But if it's just call the pediatrician because I need to make our annual checkups, then that's not time specific and it can go on your to do list. Gotta move my little talking head again. Patricia Sung 02:18 Okay. So we have items that are time specific, they go on our calendars. And our brain tends to organize time, like into now and not now. So calendar items fallen like that now category like this happens to has to happen right at this specific time, it's a now item. That's why it goes on the calendar. The not now things like things that we could do like whenever they're not now and our brain doesn't have that same sense of urgency towards those. Patricia Sung 02:48 When we look at all the things that we do, especially as moms, there's a lot of them. A lot of the things we do are repetitive and can be like automated or created into like a routine or rhythms so that we can take the mental energy out of them. And make that like simpler, but our brain doesn't do that automatically arranges things like here's all the things I need to get done today. And like dumps them into one spot, which is okay, but then we need to sort that out and prioritize and figure out where do those things go? How do I make this easier? Because I see all the time, ADHD moms will be like, Well, what's on your list of things to do tomorrow. Patricia Sung 03:29 And they'll be like, well, I need to do laundry, I need to clean off the counters, I need to clean the kitchen and they start naming all these things relates to things that we do over and over again. So we don't need to come up with a system like we don't need to think of all those things on our to do list every time. Like we always have to do them. So we can find a way that makes that easier. And when you stop and think about it, you're like, oh, but our brain doesn't think like that automatically. It's like, well, if I don't write it down, it's not gonna happen. I have to write it down. And yes, we do have to write down words that are going to happen. Patricia Sung 04:00 But there is a way to make that easier. So those things that are repetitive, we can turn into routines, we can turn into rhythms in our day so that we are gaining efficiency. We're not reinventing the wheel trying to come up with all the things we need to do to get the house ready. Like if we're having company. It saves us time because we're not sitting here waiting, who really neat doing due tomorrow and like trying to think of all that we already have a plan in place so we can get to doing right away. And to me the most important thing is that it's saving
3. my mental energy when I'm trying to think of like all the things that I need to do to upkeep my house in a week like that makes my head hurt just thinking about it. I don't want to have to spend my mental energy on that. Patricia Sung 04:41 But also like if I do if I'm spending all my mental energy coming up with like a cleaning list for my kitchen, that means I'm not going to have mental energy for something else and that's not okay. So if you want to do that, sign up for the class the waitlist is ready to go in there or if it's already available, sign up. Now let's talk about our to do list items which are one off items.