Coaching practices for Focus List Reminder
Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Focus List Reminder, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.
Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?
- I started a list of someday ideas months ago and now I dread opening it
- I either cling to priorities I set ages ago that don’t fit my life anymore, or I only ever rethink them in a panic when something’s already going wrong
- Even after I’ve gone through all my lists there’s still this faint background hum that I’m forgetting something
- In the moment someone asks me to take something on, my priorities are nowhere in sight
- I open my laptop and the inbox instantly hijacks my whole day
Practices that may help
- The Someday List
A someday list (popularized in David Allen’s Getting Things Done framework and common in life-design practice) is a trusted place to park valuable ideas, projects, and desires that are not actionable now without losing them or letting them occupy mental RAM. Its value depends entirely on the reviews being regular enough that you trust the list, and honest enough that it stays current. There is limited formal research on this specific tool, but the underlying capture-and-clarify mechanism is consistent with cognitive offloading research. - Review the someday list weekly — even briefly
An unreviewed someday list is a guilt pile; a reviewed one is a planning resource.
The Someday List - Run a quarterly focus review to refresh the lists
Revisit and rebuild both lists every quarter — priorities shift, and so should the lists.
Warren Buffett’s Two-List Strategy - Do a mind sweep to surface anything the system hasn’t captured
Before ending the review, spend 5 minutes writing down anything still bothering or nagging in your mind.
The GTD Weekly Review - Keep your Focus List physically visible
Post your top 5 somewhere unavoidable so every new request gets evaluated against them.
Warren Buffett’s Two-List Strategy - Name one most-important task each morning
Each day, identify the single item from your Focus List that most needs to move forward today.
Warren Buffett’s Two-List Strategy - Use the someday list as a values barometer
What you keep adding to the someday list — and what you keep not doing — reveals what you actually value versus what you think you value.
The Someday List - Keep an attention capture list during hyperfocus
Write down every impulse, distraction, and off-topic idea that arises during a session rather than acting on or suppressing it.
Hyperfocus: Directing Intense Attention to What Matters Most - Review and revise the bucket list quarterly
A list reviewed only at writing is nostalgia; one reviewed quarterly is a live planning document.
The Bucket List Method - Give someday items a time horizon to distinguish near and far
Not all someday items are equal — some are waiting for next month, others for retirement.
The Someday List
Related concerns
- Daily Mit List
Each week, review what happened, clear the decks, and commit to next week’s MITs.
Do a brief weekly review and planning session
- Weekly Review Someday List
An unreviewed someday list is a guilt pile; a reviewed one is a planning resource.
Review the someday list weekly — even briefly
- Bucket List Method
A bucket list, used seriously, forces clarity about what you actually want from your remaining time — not a fantasy wish list but a working inventory of experiences and goals that get scheduled, funded, and pursued. The method works best when it is grounded in temporal awareness (life is finite) and actively reviewed rather than written once and forgotten. Evidence is largely anecdotal and from life design practice; the underlying motivation mechanisms are real.
- Two List Strategy Focus
The Buffett two-list strategy asks you to write down 25 career or life goals, circle the top 5, then treat everything else on the list as active avoidances — not "do later" items. The story is apocryphal and its precise origin is unverified, but the underlying principle — that near-priority goals steal attention from top priorities — is consistent with how cognitive resources and opportunity costs work.
- When The Bucket List Method Review The List Quarterly
A list reviewed only at writing is nostalgia; one reviewed quarterly is a live planning document.
Review and revise the bucket list quarterly
- Bucket List Review
A list reviewed only at writing is nostalgia; one reviewed quarterly is a live planning document.
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