MANAGING MY 'TO DO' LIST

By Barb Hansen
June, 2012

I've been looking for ways to save time so I searched "save time" on the Internet. It was a big waste of you-know-what.

 Oh, there are a zillion links that tell us why we need to keep a to do list and how to rank our tasks. Heck, I do keep a to do list. The problem is that it's longer at the end of the day than it was at the start.

 For years my Dad would tell me, "Barb, Time marches on. Take time to smell the roses." I tried. Dad died some time ago, but I still hear his words in my head. Alas, I'm still working on the smell-the-roses dictum.

 Part of my problem is that I love my work managing our yacht charter and yacht school in N. Fort Myers. I love working around the house, even pulling weeds or dust-sweeping up those ubiquitous border collie dog hairs. Twenty-five years in our home and nearly 30 years in business. Life is good.

Still, there is that nagging to do list.

I wag my finger and preach to people to make time to go cruising. But, I confess to you, brothers and sisters, that I have failed to live by the gospel of relaxation myself. I confess that my work ethic alter ego has sometimes planted a not-kindly thought in my mind: How come they get to go on a cruise and I have to work?

Mea Culpa. I know, what I have to do is learn from my customers. They know how to manage their time rather than the other way around. They learned how to reward themselves for jobs well done rather than weight themselves down with blame for jobs undone.

Dad was right. Time marches on. It can't give us more of itself. It flows regularly and inescapably forward. There is no turning back the clock or the calendar. Time and tide wait for no man. Nor this woman.

So I am hereby making some mid-course corrections.

One is I am going to let my to do list get longer and from now on, in my mind, longer is better. I'll sleep at night knowing that it's all written down.

Another correction is rather than blame myself for jobs not done, I'll congratulate myself for doing important jobs well.

And the last is that I will now add fun things to the list just to, you know, smell the roses. Thanks, Dad.