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Why I Let My Phone Run My Life

One of the biggest struggles I’ve had since quitting my teaching job to take care of my own children is staying organized. I was a reasonably organized teacher. I had binders for every subject, specially labeled computer files for each week of each class, and I even (mostly) stayed on top of my grading.

But home life is harder to organize. There are so many things to keep track of, and less boundary between personal tasks and work tasks. Feeding and caring for the baby needs to be done, but eating and showering equally needs to happen, and there is no boundary between baby time and mommy time. As far as babies are concerned, everything belongs to them, especially mom’s body.

And then not only are there baby needs and mommy needs to balance, there’s also a house to care for. Food to cook, and, if you’re like me, other projects that aren’t as optional as they might seem to others, because doing them is the only way you can feel that you are still your own person and not some new nameless being known only by the generic title of “mom.”

So, how to keep everything organized? How to remember to take showers, to get meat out of the freezer so supper tomorrow will actually happen, and to send that email, all while a baby wants to be held every minute of every day (and night)?

Ideas that didn’t work for me

I tried writing lists on little scraps of paper the day before, but I was frustrated by having to rewrite all the routine things that had to be done every day, or most days, but that still managed to be left on the back burner if I didn’t explicitly plan them.

I was always discouraged about having forgotten to do the dishes, or vacuum, or sweep….

So I tried the command center thing.

I put an inspiring quote on the wall. I made white board calendar templates and framed them so I could write reach month’s events as they happened. I made a weekly schedule so that I could have a recurring checklist of daily and weekly tasks. And I made a menu board.

The menu board worked pretty well. I often filled it out, but the weekly planned schedule didn’t. If I couldn’t do Monday’s tasks for some reason, my whole week got thrown off. And besides, seeing my list of daily and weekly tasks that I still wasn’t doing despite having a chart on my wall was just discouraging. Even though I could cross off all the things I did, all I was really seeing was the things I hadn’t done.

And then even when I did do a task, it wasn’t worth the trouble of going to the kitchen to cross it off, because then I would just have to wipe off all the marker the next day and start over.

So the command center wasn’t working.

I tried redoing the quote, redoing my weekly board to be more user friendly, reorganizing things to make my writing supplies easier to access, but it still wasn’t working.

That’s when I heard about Todoist, and the idea of a phone-based system that was actually designed to help people manage complicated work schedules as well as personal tasks was enticing.

I installed it on my phone, and I have never looked back.

Five ways Todoist helps me stay sane

Remembering stuff

You know that feeling where you know you need to do something but you can’t remember what it was? And how frustrating that is? Or you know you need something at the store, but you can’t remember what?

I don’t have that problem nearly as often now, thanks to the todoist inbox.

If I notice I’m low on soap, I can just grab my phone and add a task. If someone mentions something they would like to have, I can add a task, and when their birthday rolls around, I know what to get them. If I hear a cool song on the radio, I can write that down too so that I can listen to it again. Or if a friend recommends a good book, or I get a letter I need to answer, or if I just come up with a marvelous idea that I can’t act on right away, all I have to do is grab my phone and type a couple words.

Then, when I have a few minutes to sit down, I can take all my notes and put them in the right categories, and schedule them to pop up automatically when they need to be done. The program is designed that way, so it’s really easy.

Shopping

Having the inbox function is great for shopping, because when I run out of something in the bathroom, or think of something I need in the bedroom, I don’t have to either remember it or go to my specific shopping list place to write it down. I can just add a task to my shopping project right there on my phone.

And then I don’t have the issue of forgetting my shopping list, because it’s right there on my phone, and I rarely forget to bring my phone.

Another great feature for shopping is that I can share the shopping project with my husband, so he can add items to the lists as well, even when I’m already at the store, (and vice versa.) It helps smooth out communications that way.

Marriage meetings

Another way todoist helps me and my husband communicate is helping us organize our weekly marriage meeting. (If you’re married and not doing a weekly marriage meeting, you should really consider it. It’s amazing. Read this article to get started on the right foot.)

We were doing the meeting thing but it was a little hard sometimes because we couldn’t remember all the little things we needed to talk about. So it dragged out and got disorganized… And we would write down the decisions we made each week on a piece of paper, and then forget to look at it again.

Todoist changed all that. Now we have a shared meeting project where we can both dump the things we need to discuss, and when we get to the “what needs to happen around here” section, all we need to do is look at the list. It’s easy, effective, and satisfying.

And then when we decide what to do, it’s easy to schedule things and decide who will do them right there in the app.

Menu planning

I’ve also started using todoist to plan my menus. I love it because I can plan my menu anywhere or anytime I have a free moment. I can be in bed having trouble sleeping, sitting in a chair nursing a baby, or waiting at a doctor’s office, and I can just whip out by phone and plan a menu, creating appropriate shopping list entries at the same time, and scheduling cooking tasks, like get out frozen meat at the appropriate time.

I still have an occasional day where dinner time rolls around and I don’t know what to make, but it is so much less frequent now.

Keeping it together

I sometimes struggle with depression, get sick, or just get overwhelmed. And as frustrating as it is to be sick, depressed, or overwhelmed and need a break, the worst part is when it’s basically over, and you’re able to start getting back to work. Picking up all the pieces of your life, and trying to remember where you were after a good night’s sleep is hard enough, but after a week of being out of it, on vacation or sick–that’s practically impossible, and likely to send you back into the pits of overwhelmed despair.

With todoist, though, I don’t have to worry about it. The undone tasks pile up in my to-do list, yes, but I can just chip away at them one at a time, and they get automatically rescheduled when they are supposed to be. It only takes a few days to get back on track with household tasks.

And for more unusual projects, all the tasks are still there. I don’t have to recreate the whole idea in my head again every time I have to take a break.

To sum up

I have been using todoist every day since July, and it has been incredibly helpful, both for accomplishing everyday mundane tasks like cooking dinner, but also for helping me move ahead on exciting projects and accomplish big goals. Out reminds me to exercise, to write, and to keep in contact with friends more consistently. It helps me plan activities to do with my kids, dates with my husband, and gifts for my friends and family. It also helped me finish writing and publishing my book.

Perhaps most importantly, it makes it easier for me to forgive myself for not accomplishing every single thing every day. If you can’t get through everything on your list for the day, that’s okay. It keeps track of what you did accomplish, how close you came to the goal you set yourself for the day, and lets you reschedule tasks easily and simply for another day. I love waking up in the morning and looking at all the things I can decide to do today. And then in the evening, I can look and see how many things I accomplished, and what things I get to do later.

Todoist has been a lifesaver for me. I have been not just more productive, but also more relaxed since I started using it, and while I still have plenty of challenges, todoist helps me face them.

If you want to use it too, it’s available at Todoist.com, or in your phone’s app store

(For the record, I use the free version of todoist, which is available for free to anyone, and I have not been asked to write this review, nor am I receiving anything in return for it. I just happen to think it’s a wonderful way to use tech to help people be happier and more effective.)