Spring break came really quickly, which meant only one thing; I had no college. I spent the first week or two blissfully lacking any responsibilities allowing me to just laze around the house. Though, I quickly got annoyed with the void of productivity I was having so I sought a way to make me do stuff.

What I found was simple to-do lists. The night before I'd write down a number of things that I should have been doing the following day and I found being "told" what to do was highly effective, even if it was myself doing the telling. Having a list of things that I had to do made it more important. Waking up and thinking "I should clean my bedroom today" is all well and good, but you usually just shove it out of your mind. Having it written down is a way to making it official.

My to-do lists stretch from "be sure to have breakfast!" to "write that script that controls users backend access". As of yet, a month or so into having my lists "dictate" my life, I've never missed an item on it. My productivity has soared and I'm no longer wasting time around the house with nothing to do but make tea.

I'm still testing to see how many things I can put on my list before it gets too much, and I usually end up with hours left to spend how I like it.

Try it yourself.

(I can tick "write a blog post" off my list now.)