Do you have a master (task) list and how did you set it up?

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#1

I’ve been using the GTD system for a while but it doesn’t work for me when it comes to organizing all of my tasks. This is what it looks like at the moment, but I’m looking for something more effective:

Next actions
Waiting on/for
Read/review
Recurring
Miscellaneous
Someday/maybe

(I’m using the PARA system so I keep my projects on a separate list. )

Perhaps the best way to go about this is to categorize all tasks into areas or categories (work, school, finances, self-improvement, etc.)?

Any thoughts or advice?

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#2

My GTD approach relies on tags and bookmarks to mimic a master list. All tasks are grouped by areas of responsibility. This has the benefit of being able to quickly view tasks by associated context, area of resonsibility, and if it’s a next action, waiting item etc.

All notes are still in Dynalist but don’t have tags aplied.

Hope this is helpful.

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#3

What are you finding ineffective about your current approach? GTD also recommends breaking your next actions down by contexts that are useful for you e.g. computer tasks, errands, house tasks etc - you can also break them down by energy - low, medium high etc so you can match task to your current tiredness – GTD doesn’t really like priorities but you could also do this with the colour labels red, orange, yellow etc - one important reason to break your lists down further is that a ginormous unstructured list can be quite intimidating and offputting

The real key to GTD is to regularly process your lists (ideally weekly) so that most of the time you know what is a priority right now anyway, but the lists act as a safety net

Just FYI I must have listened to the GTD audible book 5 times, and each time have made small improvements to my system - there’s so much information it’s easy to miss things the first time

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#4

Awesome! I think I will do the same. Thanks! :slight_smile:

#5

My only problem was organizing all of my tasks. Some of my lists ended up being too long and overwhelming and they lacked context.

Now I am thinking of grouping my tasks by areas of responsibility (work, school etc.) and applying tags (next actions, waiting on, someday, high priority etc.).

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#6

I have found this to be true as well. The downside is that searching multiple documents becomes a little strange.

I don’t feel 100% confident that tasks are all Included in my search (I could be missing something in my understanding of Dynalist).

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#7

I use a combination of search and tags.

Read more about my tags structure here:

To see all projects with next actions I search for:

“# parent:@@Project” CTRL + enter searches all documents.

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