Summary
Joe reframes to-do lists: most are just your critical self-talk written down. “This is what I have to do” becomes either a life controlled by the list, or guilt when you don’t complete it. Neither gets you the life you want.
The solution has two parts: ask what makes everything else easier or irrelevant (high leverage), and design HOW you’ll do it to be enjoyable. An executive went from 60-70 hour weeks with 10-12% growth to focusing on just three high-leverage items daily—and the company grew faster while he felt better.
Key Concepts
Key Quotes
“What you’re doing is just taking that critical self-talk that you have in your head and making a list.”
“Does it make any sense to think about what you’re going to do without how you’re going to do it?”
“What are the three things I can do that make everything else either easier or irrelevant?”
“If it’s enjoyable, you’re more likely to do it. If it’s enjoyable, it’s more efficient.”
Transcript
The problem with to-do lists is that you think to yourself, this is what I have to get done and then you put it on a list and then maybe you do it, maybe you don’t. And that’s the problem. What’s happening most of the time when you say this is what I have to do and you put it into a to-do list. What you’re doing is just taking that critical selft talk that you have in your head and you’re saying okay I’m going to make a list and then I’m either going to do it and feel like my entire life is controlled by this to-do list or you’re going to say oh yeah I’m not going to do that and then I’m going to feel bad about not doing that and I’m going to go why didn’t I get everything done on my to-do list and neither of those are actually getting the life that you want. Does it make any sense at all to think about what you’re going to do without how you’re going to do it? And yet our to-do lists never really talk about how we’re going to do it. So, let me give you this example. You have a three-year-old and you’re like, “Okay, you brush your teeth.” It’s not very likely. Now, if you think about how to do it, it could change everything. So, for instance, if you say to a three-year-old, “Hey, how about we brush our teeth together?” They’re far more likely to brush their teeth than if you just tell them to go and do it. So, how you do something, how you approach it is going to make a very big difference in whether you get the thing done. So, if you’re doing a great to-do list that works for you instead of you working for it, you’re asking it a question that’s actually relevant to you, that actually makes you feel purpose, and you’re also writing down how you’re going to do it in a way that’s super enjoyable. You’re giving the thought to how you’re going to do it so that you want to do it. And once those two things are in place, then you can make a great to-do list that it. So, let me tell you a story. As some of you know, I coach famous executives. And I had this one executive who was constantly in the to-do list, just going from meeting to meeting non-stop, working 60, 70 hours a week and doing pretty good. Actually, the company was growing pretty well. It was like 10 12% a year. We talked about a different way of doing time management, a different way of doing a to-do list. and he started thinking about his days as what are the three things that I can do that make everything else either easier or irrelevant and that’s all he would focus on just getting those three things done and so all of a sudden his to-do list was the most high lever stuff and there’s a fulfillingness to like checking off a to-do list but man do you feel great if you’ve done something that you know will make a substantial difference I’ve never heard anybody say you know I want a job where I don’t make any difference at all. It’s part of what we are as humans. We love to have an impact. We like to have a big impact on our lives. We like to help other people. We do not want to do something that is just wrote that. Yeah, I’m not going to remember what I did in two days or three days. It’s not how we want to exist. And so, not only is it super effective at changing a company and his company grew, but it also felt better on a day-to-day basis. And that’s one of the big keys is when you are doing a to-do list, it’s really important to figure out how to make it enjoyable. And why is that the case? It’s the case because if it’s enjoyable, you’re more likely to do it. If it’s enjoyable, it’s more efficient. And what I mean by that is that if it takes me a lot of energy to do something, it’s not efficient. If I have a car that takes a gallon of gas to move a mile, no matter how fast it goes, it’s not efficient. If I have energy at the end of the day because everything I’ve done has given me energy or has taken the least amount of energy, then it’s very efficient. I can keep on going. I can produce so much and I can do it with a lot of joy and what I produce is going to be better because what do you want? You want a product created by somebody who’s freaking miserable or do you want a actually energized and enjoying their world? My friend Thiago is talking to us one day about how he hates YouTube meetings. And there was like three of us there. We were in this mastermind. We’re all chatting about being content creators and everything. And he said, “There’s just no way to enjoy YouTube meetings.” And we were all laughing. Of course you can. We do. And we went through all the different things that were completely unenjoyable about the meeting. And you could see him start to light up. You could see him start to see that there is maybe a different way to do YouTube, something that was enjoyable because if I enjoy it, I’m going to do it. And doing it is more important than anything else. Next thing you know, his YouTube channel has completely jumped over the last year. You can just see the numbers. has gone way up because he found a way to enjoy doing YouTube. And this works everywhere I look. When somebody’s really enjoying what they do, what they’re passionate about, and they feel a deep sense of purpose in, they’re far more likely to be successful than the person who’s doing it because they have to. So typically what people think about at this point is they say, “Oh, well, if I just enjoy everything that I’m doing, then I’m not not going to do anything of value.” But that it’s just simply not true. As we’ve already talked about, we enjoy being of service. We enjoy being of purpose. We enjoy the fact that we’re effective, that we’re having an impact. And so, yeah, maybe we need a break one day. Maybe what we would enjoy one day is going to the park or taking a vacation. But at some point we are going to reach a place where we want to have an impact, where we want to feel purpose. So I learned this from my daughter. So right before she graduated from high school, she went and she worked at the Smithsonian in Panama. She had some friends there and so she had fun, but she also was helping the mangroves and helping the ecology of these islands that she cares about. The next year she graduates from high school and she decides she saved all of her money and she is going to go and tour Europe. And halfway through she calls me up and she goes, “Yeah, I’m really liking it, Dad, but you know, there’s just not the sense of purpose that I had when I was in Panama.” And I have met billionaires who don’t have to work. I have met people who are working for the post office. And there’s not one that I’ve ever met who doesn’t want that sense of purpose, who doesn’t want to feel like they are doing something that’s meaningful. So, going back to your to-do list, think about this. When you look at the list, have you said to yourself, “Oh, this is something I’m gonna enjoy doing, that I’m gonna feel like I’m on my purpose, like I’m having an impact, or is it just a list of things that my brain has been telling me to do in some abusive fashion for the last, I don’t know, two years, 20 years? What What’s your to-do list?” So, now you have a great to-do list, and that’s fantastic. One that works for you instead of you working for it. But the underlying issue is still there. The underlying issue is that you still are telling yourself you have to do stuff all the time. You have this relationship with this critical self-t talk, this voice in your head that is not as productive as it could be. And if you want to start really looking at that, we have a free micro course. You can find it here or you can click the link below and there we’ll start to really get into how the voice in the head works and how you can start changing your relationship with it.