If you are anything like me, you like to mentally keep track of everything you do, keep a mental to do list so to speak. The problem with this is that at some point you are trying to keep track of so much stuff in your memory that you don’t have enough energy to actually think. Have you ever had so much on your mind on a daily basis that you just couldn’t seem to get anything done? Chances are you often remember that you said you would do something but forgot and it usually comes up while you are doing something else you have already postponed some.
The thing is, the human working memory is limited to about 7 pieces of information at a time. I like to think of it as RAM on your computer. Once you fill it all up, you can’t remember anything further without first deleting some of the older information. In the case of computers the solution to this is install more memory, but for humans it’s not that simple. To be able to remember information for longer we need to move most of this information to our long term memory and retrieve it when we need it. The keyword here is, when we need it. Meaning you have to use energy to actually think about it to retrieve the info.
Now, during the day you have to deal with everything going on around you, pay attention to other stuff, collect more information and so on, you end up burning a lot of energy and if you don’t stop to think about what you wanted to do you end up forgetting about it.
When do most people usually remember what they set out to do during the day? That’s right, in the evening. That’s when most people start to relax, burn off some stress hormones, and start becoming more present when they suddenly remember that they still had to do something. What this tells us is that this process of remembering is constantly running in the background of your brain and when it receives enough energy it kicks in.
Wouldn’t it be grate if you didn’t have to use your mental energy lugging around your 53+ things you said you wanted to do? Wouldn’t it be grate if you knew on a day to day basis exactly what you still had to do and what you have already done without thinking about it?
What you need to do is to not use up precious brainpower to keep track and remember all the things you intend to do, instead write them somewhere you can easily find them.
A long time a go a close friend of mine told me one very powerful peace of advice. Our brain is design to process and interpret information. It’s not designed to remember and keep track of stuff. So if your brain isn’t meant to remember so much stuff, you need to use other tools to help jog your memory.
Spring cleaning for your brain
The concept of cleaning out mental clutter goes online by multiple names, from rebooting your brain, making a brain flush or cleaning out the grill, but the basic idea is the same:
Get everything out of your head and onto paper or another physical form you can check back to when you need it. This way you free up you mental capacity to actually process all the information effectively.
To do this you have to start with a flush of everything that’s on your mind on a day to day basis:
- You take a peace o paper and for the next 30min. you start writing down your ENTIRE to do list. And I do mean EVERYTHING. From: “I need to take out the trash”, to “I need to research those headphones I like to buy” or “order a new laptop”. Write until you can write no more.
The first time you do this, you will probably end up with some 100+ things you need to do. That’s how many things were running in the background of you mind, nagging you every now and then that you still haven’t done them.
- Once you have your complete list, you go over it and start noticing things you can group together. Now you build separate lists for the main categories that come up.
For example I have a list called “Car” another list “Housekeeping” and another “Finances”. In each of these list copy over the tasks that are related to that particular topic
For example:
- Wash clothes
- take out the trash
- clean the dishes from last night
- order the bookshelf by category
Out of the some 100+ things you had to do that seemed incredibly overwhelming you are now down to a more manageable 5-6 lists of tasks.
- Now forget everything you have written.
The fact of the matter is that you now have removed everything that was cluttering up your thinking and interrupting your train of taught down on paper. You don’t need to think about it any longer, because you can look at the list at any time you want. You can remove a lot of stress and recover a huge amount of energy simply by not having all those small nagging reminders throughout the day interrupting you from what you are just doing.
- Each day, pick one list to work off of, take it with you and slowly cross the things off the list.
The advantage of having similar activities on the same list is that you can get them quickly done one after the other. If you have a list of things you need to buy, you can get everything bought in one visit to the store and be done with. The same when it comes with household chores. If you know exactly what you have to do, you can get them all done one after the other without losing any time or energy in between.
- Repeat this exercise every 1 to 3 Months as needed.
I used housekeeping as the metaphor here, because just like housework, this stress free state doesn’t last and you need to repeat the exercise every once in a while. The thing about life is that things keep happening constantly and we just have to deal with them. I know I’m in need of another brain cleaning soon.
If you do this exercise regularly and keep at it you will improve your results drastically and will feel a lot better about yourself because you actually did all the stuff you wanted to get done.
