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Although it’s hard for me to admit it, I believe that I can be or have everything I want in life, but… I can’t be or have it at the same time. With my background of multitasking, I realized that in order to be able to dedicate myself to some projects and activities, I need to be able to set aside some things in order to accomplish other goals. Because after all, it’s a matter of choice.

But how is this time-effort management done? And how can I calculate the profit in terms of fun? To answer these questions, I decided to cut the crap and stop wasting time with unnecessary distractions. Things that for one reason or another are not important and probably not even an emergency. Sounds good, right?

Well, after thinking for a while, I realized that everyone does their ” to-do list”, but no one does their “not  to-do list”. By analyzing my own priorities and values, I decided to create a list of things I didn’t want to do or shouldn’t do. All these things were following the same path: they were demotivating me and bringing nothing good to my life.

So I decided to step forward and create my very first “Not To-do Checklist”. As always, it was a huge iteration and at this point I can count a few versions. The first time I did it, I was selfish and tried to focus on tasks that sucked up my energy. Then I started thinking about the people around me: what could I give them if I had more time? And what would be the consequences for them if I stopped doing what I didn’t like?

Conclusion: I was not able to remove all the boring tasks from my life, but I was able to reduce them and at least realize their true importance. Shortly thereafter I also realized that I was spending three hours a week on which I was doing nothing useful and interesting. So the math was done and I realized that I was spending six days out of the year doing things that were of no interest at all. Put another way, I was wasting days of my life on things that were not that valuable or interesting.

After my experience, I now believe that what we don’t like will always be there waiting for us. Nevertheless, we have the choice (or at least we can try) to remove them from the daily or weekly “To Do” list. If you’re not sure about this, create your own test: leave things undone for a week or so and then see if there are any major repercussions. Of one thing I am sure: if you never try it, you will never know.