To-Do Lists Are For Forgetting

Plus: Fall is THIS CLOSE and a Tweet So Accurate I Hate It.

Pat Miller
August 15, 2026 • Estimated Reading Time: 2 minutes

Happy Saturday - I “Fridays Offed” so hard yesterday that I didn’t even get my newsletter out on time. Whoops. Golf rules. Have a great weekend!

To-Do Lists are For Forgetting Your Work

You might think we keep to-do lists so we remember everything that must be done. While technically true, I use mine so I can forget everything and only worry about exactly what must be done today. Here’s how I set up my “Forget to Finish” to-do list.

1 - Brain Dump - Write down all of your tasks that must be done. The one-offs, the recurring weekly tasks, everything.

2 - Does Anyone Care? - Before organizing all that work, go through it and see what items are there for performative reasons. The work you think you “should” do, or the work you believe your clients “need.” It might turn out that you’re doing things nobody wants, or work you could easily drop. Ruthlessly eliminate tasks.

3 - Can I delegate? - Can this be handed to a contractor or a VA? Can AI do it? As I’m booting up Claude Cowork I’m realizing many complete tasks and much of the task prep can be handed to it on a consistent basis.

4 - Schedule the Work by Production Date - If you schedule your tasks for the day they’re due you’ll always be working on deadline. If you know you need 3 days to complete a tasks schedule it 3 days before it’s due so you know exactly what must be done that day. You’ll have protected space to work and you won’t carry the burden of a last minute deadline.

When you work all of these steps you’ll only have today’s work on your list. And, everything else will be out of your mind. What do I need to do on Thursday? Who cares - that’s a Thursday problem.

If you want some help with this join me for an Idea Slam on my show. I’d love to help you on-air during Businessing with Pat Miller.

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Tweet of the week

I hate it when the internet is right.

Three Things I’m Thinking About This Week

There’s Football on my TV! - I don’t care that’s 8th string players from Southeast New Mexico Tech on the field. Football. Bears. Good Times. Fall is undefeated - bring it on!
Claude Has Stopped Asking Permission - Claude's Auto Mode has now turned on as a default which means it will act independently without asking permission. sounds a little spooky, but it's actually a good thing. it turns out Claude on auto mode makes fewer risky decisions than we do when we blindly approve every request it makes. by just rapid-fire approving everything, we invite Claude to do things it should. Is this the start of “AI Knows What’s Best for Us?” We’ll see.
Small Business Owners Community Conference - The Countdown is on for the 6th annual Small Business Owners Conference sponsored by Athena Legal Solutions and Money Masters Bookkeeping. This year’s event in September is the room where you FIND YOUR PEOPLE. You’ll be surrounded by others that know what you’re building, have shared what you’re facing, and they’re ready and willing to collaborate with you. It’s a room like no other - Get your ticket now!