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How to Market Your 'To Do' List to Yourself

by Kevin L. Polk, Ph.D.

If you are like a lot of people, you have some things to do that you have been putting off doing. Maybe you have scheduled time to do them repeatedly with no luck. Maybe you have got started a few times, only to suddenly find something else to do. In other words, you are avoiding spending time. You may be beating yourself up over not getting it done, but it's still not done. You may be offering yourself a reward at the end of getting it done, but it is still not done. Beating yourself up does no good because you don't like getting beat up. The reward does work because it's just not enough to convince you to spend the time. It seems that you need to market the task to yourself.

Using marketing to help sell yourself to do things you otherwise avoid doing makes perfect sense. Doing things requires time, and time is like money. We use the same words for time as money (spend, save, invest, etc.). So in essence when you are trying to convince yourself to do something, you are trying to sell yourself on the idea of spending the time to do it. But a lot of the time you're not buying. You need to put on your marketer's hat, do a good pitch, and get yourself to shell out the time.

While I am certainly not a professional marketer, I have heard lots about selling benefits over features. That is, don't sell on the number of cup holders in the minivan; sell how great it feels to have a place to put your drink. So it would seem when you are trying to convince yourself to do something and you are not convinced, you are probably trying to sell yourself features. When you're putting off doing laundry maybe your selling yourself the fact they will smell nice, forgetting the benefit of keeping your friends. The point is that you need to focus on the benefits of getting things done. Write these benefits down next to the things on your "to do" list. Practice thinking about the benefits before you can think of why not to do something.

Benefits trigger positive emotions that can make you spend your time. That is, people (including you) buy because of the positive emotions connected to the benefits. You will spend time (and money) based on positive emotions. So when you write down benefits for your "To Do" list, come up with ones that trigger passion. Not necessarily sexual passion, though we all know it sells, but passion toward anything. Put these benefits where you will see them and connect them to your things to do. You could go so far as to insert your own home-made ads in magazines, or videotape your own TV commercials. You get the idea, use the marketing you know and apply it to your "To Do" list. With some trial and error you will be able sell yourself on spending time in the right places. If you can do that, you can surely sell others on spending their money.

Dr. Polk is a Clinical Psychologist and Stress Management Expert http://www.timedoctor.com

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