The Silent to-Do List
Charlotte Booth • 14 June 2023
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Anyone who knows me knows I love a to-do list as it’s a way of keeping my life organised and ensuring everything gets done. However, I’ve recently also been battling with the ‘silent to-do list’ which isn’t quite as satisfying.
Let me explain.
For the last year I’ve been working on a minimalist lifestyle and have been decluttering my house like a demon. Every month for the last six months I have sold 60+ books and donated two bin-bags of ‘stuff’ to charity. And yet the house is still full.
It’s an interesting journey. It stems from my time working abroad when I found it freeing to only have the stuff I could fit into a 23KG suitcase and a carry-on bag. Ten changes of clothes, basic cosmetics, a laptop and a kindle. I didn’t really need much else and if I did buy something I had to ensure it was worth the effort to take home again. Despite this experience, I still own so much more than I need.
Whilst some items like my hot tub bring so much joy it’s worth it, there are other things that have become overwhelming. Minimalist Fumio Sasaki introduced me to the idea of the ‘silent to-do list’ and it is something that really rings true for me.
The concept is that the more stuff you have around, the more you have to do with it to maintain, organise and utilise it. It’s almost like the items owned come with a to-do list of their own that you can’t ignore.
For me the hundreds, if not thousands of books I have are no longer comforting as they are constantly and silently screaming ‘read me’ and judging me for buying but not reading more. It may seem a first world problem but a real one nonetheless and it is a feeling we have all had in one way or another;
- The washing up that needs doing and plays on your mind.
- The laundry that has piled up which you need to deal with.
- The running kit that reminds you that you haven’t used it in a while.
- The DIY material you have but not yet put to use.
- The blog post that needs writing, but you haven’t had time.
- The web updates that need doing when you get around to it.
According to Fumio Sasaki, the only way to shut up the ‘silent to-do list’ is to get rid of the stuff leading it. For me it’s to get rid of books I will never read or have already read. For others it could be reducing the number of clothes they have so that there will never be piles of washing, or actually completing the DIY task and using the material and tools bought.
In business, it could mean outsourcing the tasks
that play on your mind but never get done. A means of decluttering the to-do list.
Getting someone else to write your blogs and do your monthly web updates will not only be a load off your mind as the tasks are no longer yelling at you that they need to get done but also they will be done, on time month after month. And the best thing? It’s not you that has to do them!
Helping with this ‘silent to-do list’ is one of the reasons I have introduced a new set of wonderful and time-saving monthly packages. Every month all of those content writing tasks and web updates are done for you as well as offering peace of mind with proofreading anything you write in-house ensuring your brand integrity is maintained.
What is on your silent to-do list? What would you love to get rid off so you no longer have to deal with it? Why not have a chat
with me and see what I could take off your silent to-do list leaving you to get on with the other to-do list.
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There is nothing more amusing than checking out mediaeval artistic renditions of lions and other heraldic creatures. These beasts, grimacing and gurning are a strange juxtaposition of human, animal and demon and as far from the cute image of Alex from the Madagascar franchise or in fact a real lion as you could possibly get. There are three main reasons mediaeval lions are so ‘bad’ and un-representational; The artists were following a very tight brief. Some of the artists may never have seen a lion, and were following the descriptions they were given. These lions were representing heraldic principals of bravery, nobility and authority; all very human characteristics. When viewed through this lens it becomes more understandable why they look the way they do, but they are still ‘not right’ and not a great tool for learning about lions. Generative AI is very similar to an uninformed but talented mediaeval artist. There is a element of intelligence but at the end of the day it is following a brief, with no actual ‘knowledge’ of the thing it is producing. As an example, if you prompt your generative AI (ChatGPT and the like) to produce a blog for your new product or service, aimed at your ideal customer avatar you will in all likelihood get a mediaeval lion out the other end. Sort of recognisable, and sort of not. This is because AI doesn’t know what a customer is (ideal or otherwise), has no idea what your product or service is and does, and has no true understanding of how this service or product will serve your ideal customer and their needs. Of course, AI is pulling all the information available from the internet to help with its answer but there is no understanding there. There is no determining fact from falsehoods or even which websites are trustworthy and which are not. So, it skims the internet and puts together content which suits the brief as it understands it. This is then when the actual work should start as this content shouldn’t be used in the raw. It should be edited and tweaked by a human who DOES understand the brief, has been a customer (ideal or otherwise) and can imagine what your ideal customer will feel when using your product or services. We are in a world now, where we have generative AI promoting products and services to humans, when it has no concept of what a human is and how it thinks, meaning the marketing department are in fact more important than ever for ensuring content and copy is aimed at humans and human emotions. You could argue that the world would be a more entertaining place if there were more mediaeval lions in it, but it wouldn’t be a great environment for learning, or for basing purchasing decisions on. If you want to maintain the human element in your content, then I would love to help . Explain the brief, your CTA and your ideal client and I will know what I need to ask to get a clear idea before writing. Then you can rest assured your content was written by a human for a human and we can leave the mediaeval lions to the museums.
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