This is why I use kanban-style folders in place of projects: "now" for this week, "next" for this month, "soon" for the coming months, and "later" for after that. I also have "recurring" and "waiting/check-in" fokders.
Thank you very much for this excellent video. I’m working with todoist since many years and I love it. Actually I’m not using labels too much and I try to add a date to any task. Today have learnt that this is not necessary and not even goal leading. From tomorrow on will start working with labels... Best,
Thank you for this! I have a few things on my Todoist that are location dependent but not time dependent. So I keep rescheduling them until I get to that location. I've been doing it for over a month now with one task. I've done well with my "videos" category: it helps me track upcoming videos I plan to film and their category. But I'm not doing it outside that category. So thank you for the push!
I can relate to the "Photo" task. I forget what I meant and strike it off only to realized I missed something few weeks after. That's why I had trust issues for a while 😅.
Thanks a lot Carl! I spent hours today and yesterday watching your tutorials after deciding this is the task/project app for me I am going to stick to now, in premium mode of course. I have a 'beautiful' setup now, and am ready to give it a spin :)
Very useful video Carl!! I use to date must of the task because I have so many project list that I think it would be impossible to see if they don't have a date assigned. Maybe they are hopeful tasks, but they must be done in a certain date range.
Hi Julio, you could make sure only the very next task in each project has a date. That way, once you complete it, you can add a date to the next task. That would be another way to reduce your daily to-do list.
I like to have an overview for tasks that are overdue and due today together with tasks that I want to do today. In order to not misuse the date field, which is strictly for deadlines except for my Tickler folder, I have a label @focus that I give to the tasks I just want to do today and use a filter called Focus instead of the Today view. I also want to have a separate section for tasks I have to be a home for (labeled @home), so the filter is defined like this: "((due before:tomorrow | @focus) & !@home), ((due before:tomorrow | @focus) & @home)".
See if you can get labels to work for you. That might help to reduce the number of tasks you have on your today list each day and allow you to batch your work.
Great video, Carl! Thank you for sharing. I have a question though. I use dates for tasks I plan to do on a specific day and for deadlines. However I end up with 15-20 tasks each day and review them daily to reschedule. My problem (aside that I still plan too many tasks per day and not getting enough of them done😊 ) is that I have many small projects with smaller subtasks and sever miscellaneous tasks i plan and therefore date. I would like to build a system that does not require having to date all of them. I am not a GTD expert but get the highlights. Therefore I believe my answers could lie there. May I ask you what would be your approach to managing this in Todoist? Are the rules of GTD helpful here or do you recommend another strategy? Thanks a lot!
Hi Michael, for projects that have a lot of tasks, the only task that would be dated for me would be the very next task. Once I have that done, if I have time, I can go into the project itself and do the next tasks. Once I have finished, I will date the very next task and move on to my next piece of work.
Hello Carl, makes sense to me! Thank you very much for your feedback. I will try it out😊. And again, thank you for sharing your content. Your videos, podcasts and courses have already helped me out greatly.
I have a similar problem, except that 1 "project" goes across many levels and making sure I do all the tasks on 1 level before moving on to the next level is very hard to keep track of and get the correct reminders. Not to mention having to give them extreme names (as sometimes there are many of the same task - IE new real estate listings). Super confusing. But I'm still trying.
@@madnessofmymind Hmmm Do you work from projects or your today view? If you're working from both that can cause overwhelm and confusion. It's better to pick one. Today view (and make sure you do a daily review to get the right tasks in there) or project view and focus on one or two projects per day.
Oh do I see myself in this.... Guilty! I'm experimenting with the labels and filters. Some tasks have as much as 3-4 labels and can show up in many filters if needed. This is a drawback.But one way has shown to be quite effective. Let's say I'm doing a weekIy review. I set the "next action" label to the very first task that will move me forward in any project. I then also set the priority to that task. Here I'm quite sloppy because I set prio 1 or 2 to too many tasks - I need to improve on that. But let's say I've labeled and prioritised everything the right way. I have created filters that gather "Next Action" + "prio1", then another filter with "Next action" + "Prio2".... I've read Carl's suggestion of chosing the either Project or Today list way of doing things. I'm trying to concentrate on projects by checking the filter for "NA"+Prio1 and that's usually things I do need to do today. Tricky and I'm still finding my ways around it..
Does Apple Notes have the same email plug-in, labels, calendar dates, and other such features as Todoist? Are Apple native apps just as good as Todoist?
Hi Carl, great video. My question is why are you keeping Wunderlist when in May this year it's going away? I like you layout of reminders but my Mac is on able to run Sierra. Thanks
Man I don’t know what to do, I meet someone and I make them a task in my todo list but the date never works out. Some times it takes longer then it should or it never gets done at all, sometimes it just happens so fast, now I understand why I should never date any of my tasks.
Thanks. I'd already come to the conclusion that dates don't work for me. I have a list (that is constantly being added to) and I just want to remember it and knock off what I consider the "one next thing" - but that depends if my left or right brain is in control that day (bookkeeping? or design? or write?.). What I'm really looking for is a single one-page list where I can give labels (or colors) for high, medium, and low priority but then ALSO to be able to drag them up and down in my list each morning. (I used to do this with Evernote just by making a list, and copy & pasting and rearranging.) I see now that ToDoist does not allow you to manually drag tasks up and down a simple list? If so, I need to give Notion another look. I like that you can make a task so much faster in notion too.
Hi Trish, you can manually drag and drop tasks around within the project itself but you are correct in any filtered view. By their very nature a filtered view has a set of parameters (that you set) that gives you the order. That include the default filters; today and upcoming.
Hi Carl! Catching Up! Only did the dislike because you asked for it with Anthony Reyes. :-) Great basics refresher video of GTD Hard Landscape, Soft Landscape, Next Action, Lists, Open Loops, Ubiquitous Capture Device, etc. :-) For those that have not read the book or are not true GTDers, Carl does a fantastic job at adapting to today's current needs with Todosit; which, gives you the ability to quickly scan your whole life list of tasks and actions. Choose one task or action to complete now. Then, as soon as you’re done, you have to complete something else. The reason for my commentary is it helps me to get better too. :-) Great job as always Carl!!!
Brilliant video Carl - thank you. One question - how do you stop things from falling through the cracks when you have no due date? I note you use loads of projects and labels so it must be hard to keep up with everything on Todoist?
Hi Mike, for me I will always catch errant tasks when I do my weekly review. As long as tasks that need to be done before my next weekly review get dated, I'm confident nothing will get missed. The key to all of this is doing the weekly review.
For things like housework chores I use the natural trigger. That is, if something is untidy or needs cleaning I will see it and do it right away. I don't need a task for those kind of things. The only one I do have a task for is to clean the back of the TV and my computer monitor as I cannot see those. That task comes up every Saturday as a routine.
Why are you using both the project READ/WATCH/REVIEW and the labels To_Read, To_Watch, etc.... Maybe only the labels are enough without introducing possible inconsistencies?
Great video Carl. I actually try not to use dates unless it's unavoidable. Really the only tasks that have dates on them are the ones with recurring dates, and many of those tasks are strategically placed at the beginning, middle or end of the month on Sundays, because they only need to be done (sometime) during the month, and They're spread out so as not to overload any particular part of my calendar. As far as labels, I have a nice array of them depending on what/how I'm working my projects (Months, Days of the Week, Energy Levels, Time Blocks, A-E Groups, etc.)
@@Carl_Pullein weird, it doesn't seem to work for me. I create a new task and paste the link to a shareable Evernote note and it just shows the hyperlink.
@@SethDRobertson Hi Seth, To get the Evernote logo you would need to create a "Classic Note Link" from your Evernote app on your computer. Apparently, this only works if you are using a Mac.
I recently started using Todoist and paid for the Premium version. However, despite replacing an A3 box of manila folders full of lists, it's not part of my workflow yet. This video probably saved me from a rookie mistake of using dates where they are not needed.
@@Carl_Pullein One of the most difficult issues for me with Dave Allen's GTD approach was always having a list of what he called 'open loops', or next actions. I'm thinking that the best way to handle those is with a priority scheme. Of course, a weekly review as well. But yeah, we are all victims of our own wishful thinking when it comes to what we can accomplish in a day. (and then, underestimate what we can accomplish in a year.)
hello! do you know a way to apply filters to subtasks?? I have many "main task" with subtask 1, subtask 2, subtask 3 and so in a project. If I filter I can only see the subtask with no clue from where it came from. Any idea o how to see both the main task and the subtask for the day??? something like ## for main tasks....
Why does Todoist mark everything "completed"? This is annoying in productivity view....where I see that even tasks I deleted are showing as "completed" which is not correct. I see it happening in this video too (update at the bottom of the screen) which makes me think that is just how Todoist labels EVERYTHING. Is there a better way, or another option I'm missing?
I have ADHD and I'm trying to put together a system that works for me. I find the use of labels without dates to be quite difficult to manage (for me). Without a date to jog my memory the tasks get lost in the ether. I understand the concept of a weekly review but I've found that for things I want to do but haven't done it helps to reschedule for the next day so it at least stays in my view. Not great, I know but losing focus on tasks is a real problem. Any suggestions?
I don't know very much about ADHD, but one problem you may face by having all your tasks shift forward each day is things will get lost at the bottom of you list as it will, over time, become enormous and then overwhelming and then useless.
Carl Pullein no ;) I mean, u write a task and in dependence of keywords, Todoist puts the task into a projekt.. like „call Kevin“ (and coz u have some tasks with kevin in your work projekt or u entered already Kevin in past) Todoist sort it automatically into Work or ask u for
Thanks for the lesson - from this I was able to streamline my settings and be less date driven. Thanks again.
You're very welcome, Bruce.
Wow. This is great! Changing up my system. Less clutter the better. Love the channel!
Good luck, Kevin. It does help to reduce your overwhelm.
This is why I use kanban-style folders in place of projects: "now" for this week, "next" for this month, "soon" for the coming months, and "later" for after that. I also have "recurring" and "waiting/check-in" fokders.
That could work well, Steven. 👍
I didn't realize how much more I could be doing with labels. I have so much gratitude for these productivity tips. Thank you
They're amazing little things are those labels 😎 They can save us a lot of stress.
Oh, that's insane what this guy are helpful! So simple but it so hard to realize... Thank you Carl so much.
You're very welcome, Jacek.
Thank you very much for this excellent video. I’m working with todoist since many years and I love it. Actually I’m not using labels too much and I try to add a date to any task. Today have learnt that this is not necessary and not even goal leading. From tomorrow on will start working with labels... Best,
Glad to have helped, Martin. Good luck with the labels.
Great video with solid principles for task management. Love the real world examples.
Thank you, Robert. Glad you liked it. 🙏
Just what I have been looking for, thanks Carl!
You're very welcome, Craig.
Thank you for this! I have a few things on my Todoist that are location dependent but not time dependent. So I keep rescheduling them until I get to that location. I've been doing it for over a month now with one task. I've done well with my "videos" category: it helps me track upcoming videos I plan to film and their category. But I'm not doing it outside that category. So thank you for the push!
Glad to have been of some help :-)
I can relate to the "Photo" task. I forget what I meant and strike it off only to realized I missed something few weeks after. That's why I had trust issues for a while 😅.
I've done it so many time LOL 🤦♂️
Thanks a lot Carl! I spent hours today and yesterday watching your tutorials after deciding this is the task/project app for me I am going to stick to now, in premium mode of course. I have a 'beautiful' setup now, and am ready to give it a spin :)
That's fantastic, Arnie! Glad you got some value from these videos. Good with getting going with your system.
Very useful video Carl!! I use to date must of the task because I have so many project list that I think it would be impossible to see if they don't have a date assigned. Maybe they are hopeful tasks, but they must be done in a certain date range.
Hi Julio, you could make sure only the very next task in each project has a date. That way, once you complete it, you can add a date to the next task. That would be another way to reduce your daily to-do list.
Great ideas, thx
I like to have an overview for tasks that are overdue and due today together with tasks that I want to do today. In order to not misuse the date field, which is strictly for deadlines except for my Tickler folder, I have a label @focus that I give to the tasks I just want to do today and use a filter called Focus instead of the Today view. I also want to have a separate section for tasks I have to be a home for (labeled @home), so the filter is defined like this: "((due before:tomorrow | @focus) & !@home), ((due before:tomorrow | @focus) & @home)".
That's a great use of filter, Morpheus 👍
Awesome video Carl! I guess I am using way too many dates and it’s part of why I get frustrated.
See if you can get labels to work for you. That might help to reduce the number of tasks you have on your today list each day and allow you to batch your work.
Great video, Carl! Thank you for sharing. I have a question though. I use dates for tasks I plan to do on a specific day and for deadlines. However I end up with 15-20 tasks each day and review them daily to reschedule. My problem (aside that I still plan too many tasks per day and not getting enough of them done😊 ) is that I have many small projects with smaller subtasks and sever miscellaneous tasks i plan and therefore date. I would like to build a system that does not require having to date all of them. I am not a GTD expert but get the highlights. Therefore I believe my answers could lie there. May I ask you what would be your approach to managing this in Todoist? Are the rules of GTD helpful here or do you recommend another strategy? Thanks a lot!
Hi Michael, for projects that have a lot of tasks, the only task that would be dated for me would be the very next task. Once I have that done, if I have time, I can go into the project itself and do the next tasks. Once I have finished, I will date the very next task and move on to my next piece of work.
Hello Carl, makes sense to me! Thank you very much for your feedback. I will try it out😊. And again, thank you for sharing your content. Your videos, podcasts and courses have already helped me out greatly.
I have a similar problem, except that 1 "project" goes across many levels and making sure I do all the tasks on 1 level before moving on to the next level is very hard to keep track of and get the correct reminders. Not to mention having to give them extreme names (as sometimes there are many of the same task - IE new real estate listings). Super confusing. But I'm still trying.
@@madnessofmymind Hmmm Do you work from projects or your today view? If you're working from both that can cause overwhelm and confusion. It's better to pick one. Today view (and make sure you do a daily review to get the right tasks in there) or project view and focus on one or two projects per day.
Oh do I see myself in this.... Guilty! I'm experimenting with the labels and filters. Some tasks have as much as 3-4 labels and can show up in many filters if needed. This is a drawback.But one way has shown to be quite effective. Let's say I'm doing a weekIy review. I set the "next action" label to the very first task that will move me forward in any project. I then also set the priority to that task. Here I'm quite sloppy because I set prio 1 or 2 to too many tasks - I need to improve on that. But let's say I've labeled and prioritised everything the right way. I have created filters that gather "Next Action" + "prio1", then another filter with "Next action" + "Prio2"....
I've read Carl's suggestion of chosing the either Project or Today list way of doing things. I'm trying to concentrate on projects by checking the filter for "NA"+Prio1 and that's usually things I do need to do today. Tricky and I'm still finding my ways around it..
Does Apple Notes have the same email plug-in, labels, calendar dates, and other such features as Todoist? Are Apple native apps just as good as Todoist?
Hi Carl, great video. My question is why are you keeping Wunderlist when in May this year it's going away? I like you layout of reminders but my Mac is on able to run Sierra. Thanks
Wunderlist? I've never used it. I use Todoist.
@@Carl_Pullein Sorry my bad , I thought you said Wunderlist. Old hearing I guess.
Man I don’t know what to do, I meet someone and I make them a task in my todo list but the date never works out. Some times it takes longer then it should or it never gets done at all, sometimes it just happens so fast, now I understand why I should never date any of my tasks.
Thanks. I'd already come to the conclusion that dates don't work for me. I have a list (that is constantly being added to) and I just want to remember it and knock off what I consider the "one next thing" - but that depends if my left or right brain is in control that day (bookkeeping? or design? or write?.). What I'm really looking for is a single one-page list where I can give labels (or colors) for high, medium, and low priority but then ALSO to be able to drag them up and down in my list each morning. (I used to do this with Evernote just by making a list, and copy & pasting and rearranging.) I see now that ToDoist does not allow you to manually drag tasks up and down a simple list? If so, I need to give Notion another look. I like that you can make a task so much faster in notion too.
Hi Trish, you can manually drag and drop tasks around within the project itself but you are correct in any filtered view. By their very nature a filtered view has a set of parameters (that you set) that gives you the order. That include the default filters; today and upcoming.
This one was EXTREMELY helpful :)
Very happy to hear that, Steve. Glad you found it useful. 🙏
Very useful tips! 👏🏼👏🏼
Thank you, always, Tiago 🙏
Another of those Ah-Ha lessons by Carl. He seems to see when I get off track and gives the lesson that will pull me back to a smoothly running system!
Hahaha, thank you, Jim. Glad you found it useful :-)
Can these principles be applied to any system we use, even if it is not specifically Todoist?
Hi Carl! Catching Up! Only did the dislike because you asked for it with Anthony Reyes. :-) Great basics refresher video of GTD Hard Landscape, Soft Landscape, Next Action, Lists, Open Loops, Ubiquitous Capture Device, etc. :-) For those that have not read the book or are not true GTDers, Carl does a fantastic job at adapting to today's current needs with Todosit; which, gives you the ability to quickly scan your whole life list of tasks and actions. Choose one task or action to complete now. Then, as soon as you’re done, you have to complete something else. The reason for my commentary is it helps me to get better too. :-) Great job as always Carl!!!
Thank you always, Marco for your support.
Brilliant video Carl - thank you. One question - how do you stop things from falling through the cracks when you have no due date? I note you use loads of projects and labels so it must be hard to keep up with everything on Todoist?
Hi Mike, for me I will always catch errant tasks when I do my weekly review. As long as tasks that need to be done before my next weekly review get dated, I'm confident nothing will get missed. The key to all of this is doing the weekly review.
Thanks Carl. I’ll have to dig that video out next!
How do you handle daily and weekly, or every few days, routines (like housework tasks) in this scenario?
Maybe they would be better as calendar items?
Mike Bacon will have to think about that, as it never occurred to me to use a calendar for these tasks, ta.
For things like housework chores I use the natural trigger. That is, if something is untidy or needs cleaning I will see it and do it right away. I don't need a task for those kind of things. The only one I do have a task for is to clean the back of the TV and my computer monitor as I cannot see those. That task comes up every Saturday as a routine.
Why are you using both the project READ/WATCH/REVIEW and the labels To_Read, To_Watch, etc.... Maybe only the labels are enough without introducing possible inconsistencies?
Apologies, Davide, this is my demo account and I accidentally didn't delete the previous set up.
Great video Carl. I actually try not to use dates unless it's unavoidable. Really the only tasks that have dates on them are the ones with recurring dates, and many of those tasks are strategically placed at the beginning, middle or end of the month on Sundays, because they only need to be done (sometime) during the month, and They're spread out so as not to overload any particular part of my calendar. As far as labels, I have a nice array of them depending on what/how I'm working my projects (Months, Days of the Week, Energy Levels, Time Blocks, A-E Groups, etc.)
Sounds like to you have a good set up there, Michael. 😎
How did you get that Evernote integration? Under your routines project I see a task with an Evernote icon.
There you go, Seth. Eric explained it 👍
@@Carl_Pullein weird, it doesn't seem to work for me. I create a new task and paste the link to a shareable Evernote note and it just shows the hyperlink.
@@Carl_Pullein Nevermind! I figured it out. It needs to be the internal link.
@@SethDRobertson Hi Seth, To get the Evernote logo you would need to create a "Classic Note Link" from your Evernote app on your computer. Apparently, this only works if you are using a Mac.
I recently started using Todoist and paid for the Premium version. However, despite replacing an A3 box of manila folders full of lists, it's not part of my workflow yet. This video probably saved me from a rookie mistake of using dates where they are not needed.
Oh yes, dating everything causes so many problems later. All you need to do is get into the habit of dating only what needs to be done.
@@Carl_Pullein One of the most difficult issues for me with Dave Allen's GTD approach was always having a list of what he called 'open loops', or next actions. I'm thinking that the best way to handle those is with a priority scheme. Of course, a weekly review as well. But yeah, we are all victims of our own wishful thinking when it comes to what we can accomplish in a day. (and then, underestimate what we can accomplish in a year.)
@@cmonkey63 I would agree with you there.
hello! do you know a way to apply filters to subtasks?? I have many "main task" with subtask 1, subtask 2, subtask 3 and so in a project. If I filter I can only see the subtask with no clue from where it came from. Any idea o how to see both the main task and the subtask for the day??? something like ## for main tasks....
##PROJECT - will give you everything including the subtasks. #PROJECT just gives you the sub tasks.
125 likes, 0 dislike... so far, so good
No no, I need some dislikes ;-) Dislikes shows it's hitting the point. ;-)
Why does Todoist mark everything "completed"? This is annoying in productivity view....where I see that even tasks I deleted are showing as "completed" which is not correct. I see it happening in this video too (update at the bottom of the screen) which makes me think that is just how Todoist labels EVERYTHING. Is there a better way, or another option I'm missing?
Hmm is it that important? I don't want to be spending time in my completed/deleted tasks area. I'm only interested in what needs to happen next.
I have ADHD and I'm trying to put together a system that works for me. I find the use of labels without dates to be quite difficult to manage (for me). Without a date to jog my memory the tasks get lost in the ether. I understand the concept of a weekly review but I've found that for things I want to do but haven't done it helps to reschedule for the next day so it at least stays in my view. Not great, I know but losing focus on tasks is a real problem. Any suggestions?
I don't know very much about ADHD, but one problem you may face by having all your tasks shift forward each day is things will get lost at the bottom of you list as it will, over time, become enormous and then overwhelming and then useless.
A nice thing woulf be: rules like with hazel ;)
We have filters which does almost the same things. 👍
Carl Pullein no ;) I mean, u write a task and in dependence of keywords, Todoist puts the task into a projekt.. like „call Kevin“ (and coz u have some tasks with kevin in your work projekt or u entered already Kevin in past) Todoist sort it automatically into Work or ask u for
Carl Pullein 👍🏼
@@DGHF OOh I think we might be a long way from that happening. I can see a lot of problems there too. If Kevin is in multiple projects for example.