Reduce Stress | List Producer

My Email Inbox Is Overwhelming

May 2, 2012/14 Comments/in Decision Making, Increase Productivity, Reduce Stress, Saving Time, Tool for Success/by Paula Rizzo

Nutdanai Apikhomboonwaroot : FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I get a ridiculous amount of mail to my personal email account everyday. It’s not that I’m that popular — I just like to sign up for newsletters, deals, advertisements, alerts, etc. I think I need to scale back because it’s getting a little much to handle.

Every morning — I sort through no less than 10-15 emails that I’ve gotten early in the morning or the night before while I slept. I delete most of them without ever opening them. These are the coupon codes and “secret” sales for online and brick and mortar stores. I feel like I should keep subscribing to these because you “never know” when you might want a coupon. But really — it’s just crowding up my email box and slowing me down. Read more

List Maker Turns Passion Into Career

May 1, 2012/0 Comments/in Benefits of List Making, Boost Memory, Decision Making, Fellow List Producers, Increase Productivity, Learning With a List, List Making, Reduce Stress, Saving Money, Saving Time, Tool for Success/by Paula Rizzo

Imagine a place filled with lists to help you navigate through anything in your life. Moving, grocery shopping, meal planning — you name it. Well, such a place exists at ListPlanIt.com. It’s a site started by Jennifer Tankersley and you guessed it — she’s this month’s Featured List Producer:

Q: Why do you call yourself a compulsive list producer?

A: I’ve always been a list maker. I’ve used them to set goals, to help me remember important things, and to organize my thoughts. In December of 2006, I had an inspiration. It suddenly occurred to me that a template in list form would be convenient for printing and then using again in the future. Less than 6 months later, ListPlanIt.com was born. ListPlanIt is a website of my creation that contains hundreds (about 700, actually) of lists and planning pages for its members to print, download, type into, and/or save. Read more

Keep Track of Restaurants

April 23, 2012/2 Comments/in Apps, Benefits of List Making, Decision Making, Increase Productivity, Learning With a List, List Making, Reduce Stress, Saving Money, Saving Time, Tool for Success/by Paula Rizzo

I take food very seriously. I accumulate restaurant recommendations like someone would keep a rare coin collection. For me — there is no substitute for great food. So I really enjoy giving recommendations and also receiving them.

But in all my list-making frenzy I haven’t been able to find a good way to keep track of all my restaurant recommendations til now. I used to write them down on paper, then I started putting them in my Astrid, Wunderlist or Clear apps. But I kept finding that the lists would get buried or I would forget which app I was using Read more

Checklist for Enjoying Time Alone

April 19, 2012/5 Comments/in Benefits of List Making, Decision Making, Fellow List Producers, Guest Posts, Health, Learning With a List, Reduce Stress, Relationships, Tool for Success/by Paula Rizzo

I have an older brother but we’re eight years apart so basically I grew up as an only child. I was fortunate to have three amazing girl cousins who were and are like sisters to me. They included me in on all their sisterly things and I never spent a Halloween or birthday without them. But being an “only child” I learned how to play on my own and occupy myself. I actually love my alone time and look forward to it sometimes.

I’ve been known to go to movies alone, go to the theater alone, go to restaurants and eat alone — etc. I love it! It’s an empowering feeling to be happy enough in my own skin to be able to spend time by myself and be OK with it. I probably wouldn’t plan a vacation on my own, like my friends Danielle and Brian have, that scares me a bit but otherwise I’m a pretty independent person. Read more

Remember Everything That Ever Happens

April 18, 2012/0 Comments/in Benefits of List Making, Boost Memory, Increase Productivity, Learning With a List, List Making, Reduce Stress, Saving Money, Saving Time, Tool for Success/by Paula Rizzo

Sometimes a funny thing happens when you hang up the phone after an important conversation. You forget everything that just happened! Haven’t we all been there? I know I have. I have a fail proof way of dealing with this. I take notes on life.

Almost every time I’m on the phone — I take notes. Even if it’s not an “important” call — I jot down words, phrases and questions that come up. This way I pay better attention and really focus on what’s being said. And I don’t lose track of my follow up questions. It turns out you don’t even have to really take notes — you can just doodle. There was a recent study in Applied Cognitive Psychology that found people who doodle were 29 percent better at a memory test than people who didn’t doodle.

I also use the “note-taking technique” during meetings and when I read magazines. If I don’t — I move on to the next project and poof everything I learned goes out of my head. I’m constantly writing down tidbits I want to remember, websites I want to check out and ideas that I have. It helps you to think about what you’re doing and be mindful — remember multitasking is impossible!