Favorite Apps for Overcoming Procrastination!!

It wasn’t too long ago that I wrote a post on how to overcome procrastination using a little box and slips of paper. I have since joined the new techy age and am now conquering procrastination with my 2 favorite apps for overcoming procrastination!

Here they are: Trello and Focus Time. (Trello will also work on your computer so you can use it even if you don’t have a device that takes apps.)

These two apps are revolutionizing my life in the area of getting things done! In this post I’d like to show you how to I use the Trello app to get things done in case you want to give it a try.

It will seem complicated because there are so many steps, but it’s really not. I found it to be kind of fun even! Here goes:

How to Set Up the Trello App to Get Things Done

1. Download the Trello app, and watch this video on how to set up your boards and lists.

2. Make your first board and call it the Current Project Board. 

3. Make 6 lists on your board in the following order:

• Daily To-Do
• 3 Most Helpful Goals
• 3 Urgent Goals
• Miscellaneous: Important (1-2 on scale of 1-5)
• Miscellaneous: Less Important (3 on scale of 1-5)
• Miscellaneous: Not Very Important (4-5 on a scale of 1-5)

(Note: You’ll have to either get rid of the lists that Trello supplies you – to do, doing, and done – or rename them to come up with the 7 lists I just suggested.)

4. Think of all the things you’ve been procrastinating and rate them on a scale of 1 to 5 according to how important they are to accomplish. See the screen shot to the left for some of the things I have on my list.

Click on “add a card” and put the 1’s and 2’s on the Miscellaneous: Important list, the 3’s on the Miscellaneous: Less Important, and the 4’s and 5’s on the  Miscellaneous: Not Very Important list. I actually include the numbers on my little card (see screen shot).

My reason for rating the to-do’s was threefold: First, it helped me figure out what was most important to start working on (the 1’s). 2nd, it helped me figure out which of the three lists to put the tasks on, and 3rd, it helped me psychologically, because all of a sudden I went from having a HUGE to-do list to just having a pretty small and manageable one, because after doing it, only the 1’s seemed all that important for now.

5. Look at all the items on the Misc: Important list and ask yourself this question: “What 3 goals are causing me the most stress in my life?”  or “What 3 goals do I REALLY need to get done?” or “What 3 goals are adding the most negative energy to my life because I’ve been procrastinating them forever?”

Based on your answers to those questions, choose 3 goals and move them to your “3 Most Helpful Goals List.”

I have 2 rules for this list: 1) I can only have 3 goals on it, and 2) I can’t add a new goal until I finish ALL of the old goals! This helps keep me from continually putting off the dreaded goal on the list (and often all of the goals on the list are dreaded goals).

The screen shot to the left is what my list looked like a week ago. It only had 2 items on it because I had just completed one of them – update the donut app. It only has 1 item on it now because I’ve also figured out why my blog posts weren’t sending!

6. See if you need to add anything to the Urgent Goals list. This is a list of time-sensitive goals that need to be done right away so you may or may not have items to put on this list.

If they’re easy to do (both time-wise and emotionally), I put them on the daily to-do. If they’re hard to do, either emotionally or because they take a fair amount of time, I put them on the urgent list.

I try to keep this list to 3 items so I don’t get overwhelmed. My current Urgent Goals list only has 2 things on it: 1) Plan online procrastination class, and 2) Plan speech and interpersonal communications class (for local homeschoolers).

7. Add a card of colorful icons (see screenshot above) to the following 3 lists: Daily To-Do, 3 Most Helpful Goals, and 3 Urgent Goals. I do this for psychological reasons because it helps me to focus on just one goal.

I put the goal I’m working on at the top of the list and put the colorful card right under it. That helps me to think, “Wait a minute, I don’t have to do ALL of these goals, just this one I’m working on  right now.”

Not to mention the fact that it’s cute and colorful (thanks to Heidi Bylsma who gave me the idea of replacing my boring asterisks with colorful icons.)

On my Daily To-Do list I use the row of colorful icons to separate the to-do’s I’m planning to do today from the to-do’s I’m planning to do tomorrow and at a later date (see screenshot).

8. Daily Maintenance: Anytime you think of a new task, add it to one of your lists. These are mainly for non-routine jobs that you tend to procrastinate. For example, I never put washing clothes on a list because it’s something I do on a regular basis without procrastination. If you think of something that will just take a short time (maybe 10 minutes) and you can do it today or tomorrow, put it on your Daily To-Do list instead.

More Help

For me this app works best when used with the Focus Time app, which I’ll also be writing a post on soon. Also, I’m beginning a class on overcoming procrastination through the renewing of the mind beginning October 19th. If you’d like more info on that, click on the following link: Procrastination class.

If you have any questions about the Trello app, please ask them in the comments below! I had a hard time figuring out the best way to explain the system so I’m not sure how helpful this was. (But at least I got to delete the card that told me to write the post!)

I can tell you that the system is helping me check goals off my list that have been there for years, so if you struggle with this, I hope you’ll give it a try.