I used to put only my most major, most important tasks on my to-do list, things that may take more than a day to accomplish and that I would really set my mind on. The problem with that was, when I didn’t feel like working on a major task, I didn’t get anything done at all. I would sit there trying to hype myself up to do the big tasks.  Then, the little tasks would pile up until I was way behind on everything.

So, I started putting a variety of things on my to-do list, some things that take hours or days, some things that can be done in a half hour or so, and even short 10-minute tasks. Now, there’s always something I can convince myself to do, so if I’m not in the mood to work on a big task now, I can get the little things done so they’re out of the way when I am in the mood to work on the big task (or when the deadline on the big task is looming and I’ve procrastinated it so long, I must work on it at the expense of everything else!).

It also feels good and is motivating to check stuff off the list, even if it’s just something little!

On a related note, I just bought this shirt: http://tr.im/yW1c !

I’ve had some “failures” and some successes with my ADD lately. One thing that is definitely helping me is putting my bills in Google Calendar.

I scheduled 2 small bills to be paid monthly from my online banking interface. Because I’m bad at keeping track of my checking account level and don’t want to bounce checks, I didn’t automate my more expensive bills.

But, I do have a semi-automated system that helps. I am on my Gmail account daily for personal emails and for work emails which get forwarded there, so I look at Gmail constantly.

So, I sat down and set up all of my monthly bill dates in Google Calendar and have it email me 1 day ahead of when they need to be paid. If I do more than one day, I’ll put it off and forget. Less, and I might miss it. So, I get an automated notice from myself by email that says “Pay Credit Card Bill Online Tomorrow” and I leave it “unread” so it is bold until I pay it.

It has worked very well and the only problem now is remembering to enter in the one-time bills since I rarely look through my bill pile anymore! It has saved me late fees and raised interest rates since I pay on time now!

I’m notorious for missing bills. I’m sure I have paid several hundred dollars of late fees in my lifetime, which I can’t really afford to be doing.

I don’t have so much money that I’m willing to set up auto-payment for all of the bills online (for fear of risking overdraft), but I did set up auto-payment for 2 of my smaller bills through my bank website.

For the rest, I set up a Google Calendar with alerts. So, I get notified the day I need to put bills in the mail (I thought about notifying myself further in advance, but then I’d put it off and probably forget.) Now I just have to remember to take it to the post office once I fill it out! If I still have trouble, I’ll set up 2nd alerts for the day after the payment should be mailed, saying “Have you mailed the Credit Card bill yet?” I also enabled the calendar widget in Google Labs so it shows up in my GMail sidebar.

Now if I could only get better about balancing my checkbook. (Thank goodness for online bank statements!)