A graphic of a man and woman making a list

Episode 332 – How to get things out of your head and onto a list

Are you one of those people whose mind feels as if it's racing all the time with ideas and tasks that need to be done? Tasks come to you while you are eating lunch, in bed, or on your commute and it can feel completely overwhelming and difficult to make sense of. In today's podcast we’re going to talk about eradicating the noise in your head and capturing it on an actionable list, so you feel clarity about what needs to be done.

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Transcript of this podcast episode

00:00
Are you one of those people whose mind feels as if it's racing all the time with ideas and tasks that need to be done? Tasks come to you while you're eating lunch, in bed or on your commute, and it can feel completely overwhelming and difficult to make sense of in today's podcast, we're going to talk about eradicating the noise in your head and capturing it on an actionable list so you feel clarity about what needs to be done.

00:40
You're listening to the declutter book podcast bringing you tried and tested no nonsense tips and advice from the leading experts in decluttering and organizing your home. Now here are your hosts Ingrid Jansen and Lesley Spellman.

01:03
Hello and welcome listeners. I'm Ingrid and I'm Lesley. If you're new to the declutter hub podcast, you're so welcome. What you'll find is that we try and find a fun factor in the serious business of decluttering, and if you've been here for a while, you know exactly what we mean. So thank you so much for listening. If you'd

01:23
like to get involved in conversations relating to this podcast. It all takes place in our Facebook group. So come and join our lovely, warm, supportive community. To find the Facebook group, go to declutter hub.com, forward slash group to find out more, or you can search for the declutter hub community on Facebook. Well,

01:42
hello listeners, and hello Lesley. What a nice topic we're talking about today. I

01:47
love a list. I know, do you know what? And this came about as a result of a question that came into our membership for a Q A couple of weeks ago, right? And so we were like, You know what? That's a really, really good question. So we're going to cover it also on the podcast. So thank you, Veronica, for helping us come up with this idea, with things that are whirling around in your head. And so she's not on her own, you know. So Veronica came to us, and she's like, I've just moved house. I've got, I still got boxes that I need to unpack. Every room that I go in, I just look and I see task after task after task. I have tasks bobbing into my head while I'm eating my dinner and all that, and I'm just struggling to make sense of it all. How do I proceed forward without feeling completely paralyzed? Really? She felt felt paralyzed in decision making because there were so many things that she perceived that needed to be done. And so we thought about it, we chatted about it, as we do for all of our Q, a questions, and then we came up with a bit of a plan for Veronica, right? Yes,

02:47
because we we don't want all these stocks to overwhelm people. Whether you're you have a lot of clutter or not, you know, we have all got a lot of stuff on our plate and a lot of things to do. So how do you kind of go into, oh my gosh, there's so much that needs to be done to okay, I've got a plan here, and this is how I'm going to tackle this. And I'm going to, you know, work my way through it. Because, you know, it can feel really overwhelming when you've got a lot of things that you're kind of, especially when they're whirling around in your head, right? And you lie in bed at night and you're like, I can't sleep all these things. I need to do this. And call that person, send the card, and blah, blah, blah, and it all comes into your head, and you're like, Whoa. I've got so much to do. How am I going to get it all done? Exactly?

03:34
And then, you know what happens for a lot of people is they do write all these things down, and then they've got, like, a to do list that's like 70 or 80 tasks long, and that's not ideal either. So he's finding a way forward to take these things out of your mind, capture them down, prioritize them and put them into a list that's going to make sense to be able for you to make progress forwards. That's what we're talking about. So I think the advice that we gave to Veronica, well, I know that the advice that we gave Veronica, in fact, because it was just, you know, a couple of weeks ago, was that because we know, because Veronica is a member, and so we know her house well, because we do deep dives into all of our members homes, and so we know exactly what's going on in them. And obviously they keep us up to date in the forum and things like that all the time. So basically, we know Veronica's situation. She's recently moved. She's got back boxes to unpack, you know, she's got 456, spaces, plus a storage unit that she needs to deal with. And so it's very much about how, how is she going to do that? So it doesn't matter what your house looks like or what situation you're in, and indeed, these kind of things can also be done for in a work context as well. This is not just domestically Ingrid, and I do this very same thing in a work context because so it can be forever anything, but obviously today we're going to talk about it in a sort of decluttering, organizing household context. So I think the first thing that we recommended to Veronica was to to go around the. Grab a piece of paper, or your phone, whichever you feel most comfortable with, notepads, Pen Paper, whatever, go into a room, sit yourself down and scan the room and to see what you see as you're going around that room, and capture everything that you feel needs to be done, or anything that pops into your mind. And this can be anything from picking up a piece of paper off the floor that needs to be put in the bin all the way up to doing a major renovation of that room. So everything in between, everything's on the table here, we just need to write all these things down. Some of them are going to be things that absolutely need to be done. Some of them are going to be like, Oh, I would love that to be done more dream, more more dreams than actual things that are likely to happen at this moment in time. So we're just really putting together a kind of wish list, brainstorm list of things that need to be done, right? Yes,

05:56
and it can be really as as simple as I need to empty the bin in this room. To, oh, that light bulb needs changing that's broken. Or, Wow, what's that in the in the window sill, just behind my curtains? I need to look at that and tidy that up. To, gosh, I need to do some cleaning and hoovering. I see some, you know, cobwebs that I see some dust on my skirting boards. Or I need to change the bedding to oh, I need to declutter my wardrobe. Or, Wow, that lamp is falling apart. What happened to that? Can I fix it? Can I mend it? Why is that pair of shoes still on the floor that had should have gone to the cobblers a couple of weeks ago and I completely forgot all about it. Or, Oh yeah, on the back of that door is that dress that needs to go to the dry cleaners, because it needs to be dry cleaned. And the last time I wore it, I realized there was a button missing, and the hem has gotten loose. Oh my goodness, that can be like already 30 things in one room by itself, right? And we haven't even talked about, Do I want new curtains? Should this room be painted? Gosh, there's one. Oh, there's a leak. Looks like a leak in the corner. Oh, I need to have somebody look at this. Or, Oh, my windows are getting really old, and I need to get a quote for replacing that. I mean, Lesley, we could go on and on, really, can't we? Yeah, and

07:20
so I think it'd be useful. So at this point, just to be clear, so we're trying to capture our thoughts about individual rooms. We're going to go room by room. We're not going to flip from one room to the other. At the moment, we're going to go right, okay, now for this next half an hour or so, I'm going to go into the bathroom and I'm going to look around and I'm going to do all of the things that Ingrid has talked about. And what you're likely to come up with is, is a list of things in different categories. Don't worry about the categorization at the moment, but what you're going to try, what you're going to come up with is DIY tasks, which you may be able to do, some of which you may be able to do, some of which you might need to outsource to a trades person. You're going to come up with renovation ideas. You know, do I want to paint the room? Do I want to get new furniture? All of those kind of things, as Ingrid says we're going to, you going to come up with a list of potentially things that need to be returned to a shop, you know, things that you have bought that or returned to other people, you know. So returns, in general, furnishings that we've already spoken about. You might want a new sofa and things like that, cleaning tasks. So you might see cobwebs sitting there on the lamp. You see a cobweb on that lamp. Write it on the list, because that's going to be, of course, we're going to clean the whole room in one go, but just write the cobweb to remind you that that needs to be done. We're going to have things like changing a light bulb, things like that. And we're going to have fixing things, mending things. Then we're going to have decluttering tasks. And so this is not really the time to go. I need to declutter this drawer and this drawer and this drawer and this drawer, if it's decluttering, unless you can see specific things in that room that you haven't tackled yet, just put decluttering down in a kind of one category at the moment. But if you have tackled the room, then start to take different categories out that out that you would like to deal with, and then we're going to have things that we would consider to be daily reset tasks, so that picking up the piece of paper off the floor, you know, if it's in a kitchen, kind of wiping the work surfaces, putting a load of laundry on they will be in there as well. So you're going to have a wide range of tasks that need to be done in that room. And so the most important thing is getting that noise out of your head and getting it onto some kind of list, paper or digital. Then we need to move on to next steps. Yes,

09:28
exactly. Because then you need to start to put some organize kind of you need to organize your tasks, right? Because you need to assign priorities. And, you know, you it's nice that you kind of ponder in a room and go, oh, I want to do some renovations. I want to do painting, but probably maybe changing the beds or emptying the bin if it's overflowing, is more urgent than I need to have this room painted. So you're going to have to think about, okay per room, what are my priorities? What are some. Are the US after

10:00
the after the we're talking about dreams and putting things into realities. We're talking a little bit wider, so that whole section needs to come out. Dean, now, please. No. Sorry, I apologize. I'm just looking I thought, I thought we could pull it back, back round, but it went too far in. So yeah, let's so I said something like so, what are next steps? And so next you need to talk about, yeah, taking this list and making it into something that's going to mean that. And talk about goals. Ingrid, talk about dreams. We will talk about smart goals and all that kind of stuff. Yeah, yeah.

10:34
Exactly. Lesley, everything is on the list now, but how are we going to make this wonderful list from from a dream into a reality. You know, we need to be smart. We need to set goals for ourselves. I know,

10:49
because you know, to be honest with you, Ingrid, a list in itself can be overwhelming, so this where we've got to at the moment, we've we've taken our first steps, and we've gone right, let's capture the information that's in our heads, then we put it onto a list. But it's not got any further forward. It's still a jumbled up mess of things that need to be done, whether it's in our head or on a list, better on the list than in your head, but we still got work to do, right in order to change these dreams, as Ingrid said, you know, into actual reality. So we need to do some goal setting. We need to break it down. We need to prioritize. We need to assign priorities. All of those kind of things need to be done, and so that's what we're going to talk about after the break.

11:29
Hi everyone. Welcome back. So you've got your list, you're starting to think about goals and how you're going to do this, but I think what you need to do first is decide your next step is, do I want to put this all and keep this all on paper, or do I want to do this list digitally? Or if you've got it on paper, you might go, wow, that is a lot more than I thought. I actually need to now transfer it to a digital version, because then it will be easier for me to manage this list going forward. Because, of course, some of the tasks might be things that you can do really quickly and that you can get off your list quickly. You might realize that you want to transfer some of the tasks into a I want to do this daily list and not have it on your kind of big overall task list. So working with a digital calendar or digital list can be much simpler for you moving forwards. And of course, tasks need to be added all the time, and you don't want to get lists that are scribbled out and have crossed out and then add things on. And then you need to start writing smaller and smaller to keep adding things onto that one piece of paper on that list. So think about that. Are you a paper list maker, or is it now time to go more digital? I want

12:49
to talk a little bit more about that Ingrid, actually, because there's no doubt at all that the information that you can capture on a digital to do list is way superior or easier then to what you can capture on paper, because you can put deadlines, you can put recurring tasks, you can put descriptions, you can add links. You can, you know, attach ideas of things that you have found. And so the opportunities are endless with a digital to do list. You know, we use Asana, you will know, you will have heard us talk about that before. We couldn't do it otherwise, and we use it. Well, I use it. I don't think Ingrid does for our personal lives, as well as our household stuff, as well as our work stuff, and because it just allows so much more it's more extensive than what you could capture on paper. So you might be a person. Oh, definitely don't want a digital list. At some point, there may be a crossover where you need to be brave enough to step out of your comfort zone and try a digital list, because they are better. Is the wrong word, because it's depends on what suits you. You know, a list that you work with is the best one for you to work with. So if paper works for you, then work with paper. But just sometimes we need to step out of our comfort zone a little bit and embrace the opportunity of digital because quite often, when we step over into that digital world, if we're not used to being in it, we go, oh, actually, it's actually really good. You just need but you need to spend a little bit more time on it, to learn it, to establish it into your routines, and so don't be afraid of digital lists. But equally, if it's a definite, no, no, I am not going to do that, then just carry on capturing your things on paper. But no, it's a little bit more wieldy on paper than it is in a digital list. Yeah, I

14:37
think so as well. And I think what where for me, I think the wins really are is that you can then, with a digital list, you can really kind of start to move things around in the right order and assign deadlines or dates to it while on a paper list, you kind of have to rewrite it then right what are my priorities? What am I going to do next? Because, of course, you've got now a whole list of one room, but. Now you need to kind of go, Okay, what needs to be done first? What's the priority, absolute priority in this room? What is lovely that then I do next and what needs to be done later? For example, you might think yourself, oh, I would love to have this room painted. That's on my great list. But if your room is full of clutter, that's going to be very difficult. You're going to have to then put the cluttering higher on the list and higher in the priority, because you can't paint a room when there's lots of clutter, because you're going to spend so much time moving the clutter back and forth that the painting takes much longer it's of course, it can be done. Everything can be done, but it is better. And you probably notice that the less clutter, the easier it is to do DIY, renovation, cleaning, even changing beds. You know, is easier when there's less clutter in a bedroom. So, and I think once you start to really think it through, because a lot of people get into a model because they haven't thought about the order in which they want to do things, and then they want to do things in the wrong order. And they get constantly, they go up against barriers. Oh, yeah, I want, oh, actually can't do that. Oh, every Oh, but it needs to that first and then, then, need to do that first while you if you start to put some thinking time into this, it can really, really help you move a project forward. I think

16:31
that managing lists is a task in itself, Ingrid. So, you know, within our working week, you know, I will spend I probably on our work lists. I look at it on a daily basis. I reassign priorities. I decide what I'm going to do for today, but then on a very regular basis, I will go through our list, project by project, and this is work related mostly, and I will look at that and see whether it feels sensible given what we're working with at the moment. Because we all have ideas six months ago of what we're going to do, but then the reality hits. And you know, for us, we threw a book in the mix and all that kind of stuff. And so all the things that we plan to do, we have not been able to do because all the things took priority. And so everything is constantly shifting and evolving. So we need to one of our tasks each week, each week needs to be to look at our list and reevaluate them and see whether they still make sense. And so that's something to schedule time, timing to do. And I think for me, looking at those lists and reevaluating those lists reminds me of what I need to do, but it takes the pressure off a little bit, because you know, if you've got a load of things on a digital list, in particular where it's like, overdue, overdue, overdue, overdue, which mine typically looks like, you know? I mean, it can be like, oh, all these overdue tasks. But just by going and saying, Do you know what? I know, I had a deadline of the of the 15th of January for that one. But actually that can wait until February, takes the pressure off you a little bit as well. So that constant reevaluation of list certainly calms me down, right? I you know, it's definitely something that I when the going gets tough, the list, evaluating and shifting around is something that calms me down and takes the pressure off, whereas, I think certainly on a paper list that can't be manipulated quite as easily, it's a little bit more tricky. And if you've got things in that big, long, list, it can feel so overwhelming. Yeah,

18:22
yeah, definitely. And then, of course, you know, you you start to think about the order, you start to assign priorities. And I think you might also have the realization, actually, there are things on this list that I can't do, or I need to have help from other people, or I need to discuss this with other people. You know, if you are in a household with with kids and a partner or family, or however it works, or roommates, if there are kind of structural things that need to be done, you can't just be steaming ahead and not get anybody else involved. You probably have to kind of do some conversations and kind of talk to other people as well, what's our next priority and which room needs to come next? Because you might have a feeling this is the room I want to focus on while somebody else thinks. But hold on a minute. Have you seen this in my room? You go, Yep, it's on my list. But I think that's more important because, for whatever reason, so you need to really think things through. And I think once, I think a lot of people just try to race through life and just get things done, and they never kind of go, let's just take a breath. Have a cup of tea, look at this list and go, Okay, what is going on here? Because sometimes what we spoke with in the beginning of this podcast, the lists are on different lists, and it's not amalgamated yet. It's not been really communicated with other people, but in your own head, Sometimes the problem can be so much beer Well, if you kind of sit down and try to work it through a little bit, it's like, okay, you can start to formulate a plan. Plan. And of course, then the next step is, how are you going to schedule time in your diary to do all of this?

20:09
Yeah, exactly. And I think, you know, we do need to schedule time, whatever that is. We need to understand that in order for households to tick along in the way that we wanted to tick along, that involves time, energy and effort, and that's the reality. And we can't much as we might want to bury our head in the sand and think that it will all just sit still. It doesn't, you know, houses need to be cleaned, need to be kind of managed, need to be tidied, needs to be renovated from time to time, need to be decluttered. You know, they they involve a lot of maintenance and a lot of effort to keep the way that we want them to be, or to change them into the way that we want them to be. So we absolutely need to choose to spend time on these things. I think it's important when we're allocating that time to really think about our own behaviors as well. So there are times, you know, when I look at my to do list, and the days kind of run away with me a little bit, and I say, Oh, I really need to do this job, but it's actually quite a big job that I will choose not to do. That big job that involves more deep thinking than you know, quite often I have to do quite a lot of writing for magazines and things like that, particularly now with the book coming out, and so it's like I can't do that at 430 in the afternoon. I should really have done that at 930 but the day ran away with me. And so therefore I'm going to do other little easier tasks that I can just tick off and tick off and tick off. And I'm going to leave this kind of deep thinking work to the following day, for example. So sometimes, even during the course of a day, you don't get done what you intended to get done, and you need to be reevaluating whether it makes sense for you to do it at the time. You know, we talk a lot about, we know, in the decluttering context, about evaluating your time and energy when do you work best? And it's about seizing those moments when you feel kind of all buoyed up to do something and to do some of the more difficult things that you've been putting off. And one of the things that we have learned so much we're working with members is that tasks that people procrastinate over. Once you actually go, Okay, I'm actually going to get it done and never as bad as you think they're going to be, we build them up hugely into something that they invariably are not. Once you actually tackle it, it's like, Oh, that wasn't too bad. Why have I been wasting time on it? I won't say what it is, but Ingrid was talking about something just before we recorded this podcast. She's looking like, what was that? What was that? Why am I procrastinating on this so much? You know, we've all got our own version of what that looks like, because we think it's going to be more difficult. It's more difficult than something simple, like making a change or altering a typo or putting the kettle on or whatever. And so we just, you know, we just procrastinate over these things. It's human nature, right? Yeah, yeah.

22:45
I think it's also Lesley. I think what's important to realize for people is that some of these tasks that are now in your big list are not something that has to be put on a list to be done next month. There are things you have to do every day that are non negotiable. You know, every day probably you need to do some sort of washing up. You need to probably do something with rubbish or recycling. You need to do something with laundry and clothing, whether it's folding putting a laundry on, you need to probably wipe your sides. If you've got pets, you probably need to feed your animals every day. So there are things that need that come back time and time again. You can put them in a separate daily task list that's not lives in your main kind of big to do list. You can just say, Okay, this is my daily list. These are things I have to do every day, because once I get that done, then I like, Okay, I'm in good shape. Now where's the time to start and tackle something else? I mean, I don't change my bedding every day, you know, once, once a week, or every, every two weeks, I think, Oh, let me change the beds, and then it's done. But you know, you so you can make lists of returning chores and tasks to take the pressure of that bigger list of other things you have in mind, but the first step is to get it all out of your head.

24:08
Yeah, and I think easily, you know, just talking about that equally, uh, Ingrid, there are tasks on the other end that are nice to have. We've talked about nice to haves that are like, I'd love to paint this room, but that might be five years down the line. So we need to, we definitely need to prioritize and understand what significance each of those things on the list has. And that's what writing a list, room per room, capturing it, ideally, using a digital to do list that you can manipulate, manipulate it much easier, and work with it much more easily, or if not, put it into a you know, that we've got. There's great notebooks now. There's like, Project notebooks, where you can split things down into projects and things like that. You'll have your own way of doing that. We definitely, definitely, wholeheartedly recommend a notebook for lists and not just random scraps of the back of envelopes. It's definitely better for you. To capture all of your things together in one place. It makes it a lot easier, because often, if you put things on envelopes, you'll lose the list that you have written. If it's in a notebook, there's more chance that you're going to be able to keep it so yeah, so really, this podcast was more about taking the noise out of your head and trying to get it to a stage that you can actually do something with it and make positive progress forward. There's a whole load of stuff that needs to be done to get those tasks done, but that's a conversation for another podcast, right? Ingrid, yes,

25:30
absolutely. I mean, you know all the tasks that we have to do in our lives, you know we have to do a lot to make you know, running a house is not a 20 minute job every day, there's, there's lots of things involved, and we need to realize that when we whether we rent or have our own house, we always have to do these things. But the nice thing is, once you kind of start to get a handle on all these tasks, you actually start to get more time to enjoy yourself and to have a good time. And in the end, that's what we all want, right? We don't want to be doing chores every weekend, every hour of the day. We want to be, you know, going for a walk or go, I don't know, meet a friend for a coffee or just chill and lay on the sofa and do nothing for a while. I mean, once you get all these tasks better in your diary and more scheduled and more organized, I think there's more time to do fun stuff, and I think that's the most important thing, absolutely well, listeners, I hope you have enjoyed this podcast and it has given you food for thought, and maybe you're thinking to yourself, yes, that is me. I've got all these things swirling around. I'm going to grab a notebook or find a digital to do list, and I'm going to write it all down. Let us know in the comments. We would love to hear from you. But for now, thanks so much for listening, and we'll see you next week.

26:56
Thanks so much for listening to the declutter hook podcast. Don't forget to subscribe to us in your podcast player so you don't miss an episode and we'll see you next week.

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Recent Posts

Episode 361 – Decluttering for yourself – why Swedish death cleaning might not be for you

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Jennet Pidgeon says:

8 February 2025 at 5:59 PM

I am so glad I chose to listen to this podcast first today. My head was particularly "muddled". I chose not to go to a meeting today, so I would have a whole day to "declutter".I wanted to be productive, get moving and accomplish something, but was feeling completely overwhelmed. I have been a lot more "clear minded" and productive lately, so I was feeling frustrated that I felt "paralyzed" today. This video made so much sense! It is a big job to go room by room to list what needs to be done, but is something that will really help me". Right now I had about 6 bigger tasks I want to do, but kept procrastinating because the thought of starting them overwhelms me. They were taking up a lot of space in my head! The tasks are in several categories. One example is to clear out my small dresser that is beside my bed and more accessible, then fill it with the items (panties, socks, nighties etc. ) that I use all the time and cull the stuff that is currently in there. Before I go room by room, I want to respond to an email I received from you (Lesley and Ingrid) about where I am at. "Writing" it down will give me a starting point. Thanks for giving me more than I expected from this video. It was funny because I am actually trying to make less lists. For example instead of writing down-water my plants, I just do it or put my clean dishes away-I just do it or look for a pound of butter for baking-I will do that right now!

Reply
1. Ingrid Jansen says:
  
  10 February 2025 at 10:35 AM
  
  Glad to hear this podcast helped you to get clear on what your next steps are.
  
  Reply

Episode 332 – How to get things out of your head and onto a list

Episode 361 – Decluttering for yourself – why Swedish death cleaning might not be for you

Episode 360 – Gretchen Rubin – The secret to happiness in a cluttered world

Episode 359 – Matt Paxton – Finding the treasures in the trash

Episode 358 – Ingrid and Lesley go hypothetical

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