Being productive with your days means being intentional with your time and energy. Your time and energy are your most valuable resources. But they’re non-renewable resources, so productivity becomes all about ensuring they don’t go to waste. And you do that day by day–by filling out a Today Card each day.
But a Today Card is different from so many of the to-do lists we’ve all filled out at previous (usually unproductive) times in our lives. The Today Card is built up of the items that serve your important goals. So you can’t simply fill it with reminders of things that you’re either likely to do anyway, or that already live on your calendar or reminder app.
The Today System works by using points to motivate you to do what’s important to you. And those points work. They motivate you to do today what you might not do otherwise. Your brain recognizes that not making time for the items worth the most points has consequences: a lower score. And that motivates you to push to get those items done.
So in a way, slots on the card–especially the top ones worth the most points–are also scarce (just like your time and effort). So don’t waste those spaces on items that meet any of these conditions:
- things that aren’t really important, even if they’re time sensitive
- things that will get done anyway
- things you don’t need outside motivation to get done
What should go on your card are things that are important, and that you probably wouldn’t tackle today, if you didn’t motivate yourself with points for doing them. But that takes some knowledge–knowledge about yourself, your habits, your tendencies, and your schedule.
What you need to do is look at the things on your plate, and understand which of the two kinds of tasks they are: push tasks or pull tasks. Then focus on the push tasks to put on your card.
Let’s look at those 2 categories below.
Two Kinds of Tasks
The difference between push tasks and pull tasks is simple, but also a little complicated. It’s simple because it all boils down to the difference between what you need an external push to do, and what you don’t. But it’s complicated because that’s a bit different for everyone. After all, each person has different idiosyncrasies—different strengths and weaknesses.
Knowing the difference between which tasks are push and pull for you, and being able to leverage that difference as you plan each day, can have a significant impact on how productive you are. After all, your card each day is your plan for making today a contribution to your highest goals. So making sure the right things go on it, and in the right place, is meaningful work.
Pull Tasks
Pull tasks are things that you don’t need external motivation to do. And furthermore, the consequences of not doing the task are so immediate that there’s no other external force needed to get it to the front of your mind.
You may need a reminder to do a pull task, but once you’ve been reminded, really no additional effort or incentive is required.
Pull tasks can also be things that you do automatically. They can either be habits, like making coffee every morning, or responsibilities that are so ingrained in your life, that you do them without much thought. Events on your calendar, like meetings, are also pull tasks.
It all really boils down to what is both important to do, but that there are no other external forces in place to make you do the task.
Push Tasks
Push tasks are the things that you not only have to remind yourself to do, but you also need to hold yourself accountable for. They’re important, but perhaps the type of task that you would tend to either forget about or put off in favor of other things.
It’s an unfortunate truth, but in most cases, the long term, goal-serving tasks that will really make a difference in your life will be push tasks. Very few external forces or people will knock down your door each day and force you to follow through on your goals. Everyone has better things to do–which often involve trying to get you to do the work that will help them achieve their goals.
That’s why it’s so important to focus on putting these tasks on your card each day. Getting them done is important. Your very vision for your life depends on them. But they tend to be too daunting, too ambiguous, and too easy to put off until “later”. So they often don’t get attention over the urgent things piling into our inboxes. That’s why we need a push to get us to do them, especially to get us to do them sooner, rather than later.
Again, the types of push tasks for one person may not be push tasks for another person. It all depends on your own situation, habits, tendencies, and psychological make up. That’s why knowing yourself, and being honest with yourself, are key parts of getting a productivity system like the today system to really work for you.
Know Thyself to Improve Thyself
Self-improvement is actually just ongoing self-discovery. We can’t improve what we don’t understand. And so many of us don’t understand ourselves nearly as well as we think we do. That’s why reflection is so important.
You can make all the goals and task lists you want. But if you don’t look back regularly on how well you’ve followed through on how you intended to spend each day, your improvement will be limited.
Your score each day–good or bad–is telling you something. Your weekly score trends are telling you something. Are you taking the time to listen, process, and use that information? The more you do, the more you will learn what your push tasks and pull tasks are. The more you will learn how to fill out your card each day in a way that makes sure you’re spending it wisely.
We each live our lives, but we don’t experience it in the increment “life”. We experience each day. We spend each day. And after we do that enough, and in a certain way, we come to feel either proud or regretful. Any tool that will allow us to measure which feeling we’re more likely to experience–before it’s a foregone conclusion–that’s a tool worth using. And in my humble (and admittedly biased) opinion, The Today System–with its emphasis on push tasks on your card each day–might just be that tool.
Thanks for reading.
