When you’re overwhelmed, you aren’t as effective as you would like to be. You aren’t doing the things you planned to do because you have too much to fit into your day. You’re probably reacting to circumstances and lurching from potential crisis to potential crisis.

In the four lessons of this module, you’ll learn techniques to clarify your projects and tasks and ways to prioritize them, so you can schedule the key actions that will move your business forward.

Lesson 1: Prepare a Master List

Compile a Master List

The feeling of overwhelm comes from being out of control. When you feel out of control, you’re at the mercy of things happening to you. You don’t feel like you’re in the driver’s seat.

Remember that this is just a feeling; it isn’t the truth about your situation. You are always in control.

It’s normal to feel confused when you have a head full of things to do and not enough time to do them all. It’s a sort of paralysis. You don’t know where to start to make changes, which can feel overwhelming.

Most of us use our brains as a storage facility to keep track of all the little things we have to do. But our brains are not designed for storage. They’re designed for creating and solving problems. To free up space in your brain for more productive activities, start storing your to-do list outside of your head.

The first step is to get everything on paper by creating a master list. This will:

• Free up brain space so you can focus on coming up with creative solutions and solving problems
• Centralize all tasks in one place
• Increase clarity of thought
• Allow time to focus on planning and taking action.

There’s power in writing. The moment you write something down, you release a little bit of brain power. You can then use that brain power where you need it most, to focus on what you need to do to advance your business plans.

You don’t have to use paper and pencil, though many people find that helpful. You can use your laptop or phone to keep a digital master list. 

A master list captures every single thing you have going on in both your business and your life. It’s important to know what the total picture looks like before you can make changes.

Write down everything you know you have to do – home, family, business, clients, hobbies, travel, etc. If something is on your mind that means it’s important and is draining your energy, so don’t censor yourself. It won’t take a long time to do this – it’s more of a brainstorm with yourself.

Begin by thinking about what you’re currently working on. Then build it up to include everything; list all the things you need to do, should do, or want to do. The order of the list doesn’t matter at this stage. It’s just a brain dump.

You can include:

• Projects already in progress or that need to be started
• Commitments you’ve made
• Emails and calls
• Meetings
• Training and professional development
• Upcoming events
• Travel plans
• Other tasks such as booking a holiday, visiting the dentist, etc.
• Any other ‘post-it note reminders’ you have in your mind

Don’t despair if your list is long. Most people have between 50 – 100 things on their master list.

You can use a variety of tools to collect your data. Try not to use too many, and empty them regularly as tasks get completed. Some of these tools include:

• Lists in Word or another word processing software
• Spreadsheets
• Project plans
• Task lists in Outlook
• Mind maps
• Voicemail and email
• Apps

Once you have your complete list, categorize it into 3 major sections, such as home, business, and family. Avoid dividing the list up more than that. If you end up with 10 to-do lists, you’ll be overwhelmed trying to keep up with them all.

We’ll focus largely on the business to-do list in this course, but the strategies you’ll use will help you manage your other lists as well.

Define Projects and Tasks

As we’ve mentioned, overwhelm can come from feeling like you never get anything completed. Sometimes this happens because we set out with unrealistic expectations. We try to finish a massive project in just a few days, fail to complete it, and end up feeling disappointed with ourselves.

Start by making the distinction between a project and a task.

A project has a start, a middle, and an end, and is made up of tasks. These tasks are then broken down into a series of actions, and these actions take you to your desired goal.

Here’s an example:

Setting up a website is a project which breaks down into tasks – e.g. find a web designer, plan the page contents, decide on a hosting platform, etc. Actions would be contracting a designer, writing the contents, signing up to a hosting platform, etc.

If you have items like ‘Redo my website’ on your master list, you need to break them down into chunks.

Break Down Results into Chunks

Your master list will be a mixture of projects, tasks, and actions. Now you need to rearrange these elements into a more useable format.

A categorized master task list provides an immediately accessible overview of your workload. You can see all the tasks that require your attention and you can decide if you are able to take on any more tasks.

Go through your list and identify:

• Projects
• Tasks
• Actions

Move around related elements so you have everything that relates to a specific project together. Use the Business Master List we’ve provided to help you or set something up on your computer that’s equivalent.

You should end up with a list of key projects and the tasks and actions required to achieve them.

When you look at your business to-do list now, you’ll see that your projects are immediately more manageable and you should feel less overwhelmed by the prospect of achieving your goals.