to-do lists, reader boards, and focus

I have a love-hate relationship with to-do lists.

Things I Love About To-Do Lists:

• The warm, happy feeling of satisfaction that results from slashing a big thick line through one of the tasks. Done! Finished! You've accomplished something!
• They remind me to do things that would completely slip from my mind if not put on paper.

Things I Hate About To-Do Lists:

• The cold, sinking feeling of failure that results from not being able to slash a big thick line through all of the tasks. You're slow! Inefficient! You lose!
• I keep adding tasks that would completely slip my mind if not put on paper, to the point where I'm frozen by the onslaught of my own expectations. Classic deer-in-the-headlights response: look at the list! It's long! Where do I start? What do I do? What's most important? How do I pick? Shoot, an hour has gone by and I still can't decide where to start!

Today was my day off, and I didn't get much crossed off the list. The first thing I decided to work on - going over all my finances and creating a working budget - took much longer than I expected. I was nowhere near finished by the time I had to leave for Spanish class, and I left frustrated with how little I had accomplished.

On the way back from class, I passed a readerboard that said, "The smallest action is better than the greatest intention." Ah, I think. This is part of my problem. I "intend" to do so many things that I can't possibly get them all done, and then I get frustrated with myself. But what good are my intentions if I can't (or don't) follow through? Nothing comes of them, except disappointment.

I need to give myself permission to slow down. So often, if I can see (or think I can see) what an end result will look like, I get impatient when the steps to get there take time. One part of me is interested in a lot of different things, and so I try to do all of them, all at once, because I don't want to miss out. The other part of me delights in excellence and would rather not do something at all than do it poorly or halfway. The result is me, caught in the middle, feeling like the world's biggest failure because I'm doing a bunch of different things but I'm not doing any of them well.

I suppose it comes down to this: do I trust God? If so, I need to let some things go. If I truly believe that he loves me and wants what's best for me, I have the freedom say no to things without worrying about "missing out" on anything. (Except maybe the frantic, listless, unsettled feeling that has been following me around lately... I might miss out on that.)

So. I'm at the pont where I intend to do less.

Looks like it's time to revisit the readerboard.