You make another list. Set another reminder.
Write something down so you won’t forget it…. then spend 10 minutes looking for the place you wrote it down.
Very efficient. 😉
Because apparently the solution to remembering the client follow-up, permission slip, groceries, dentist appointment, AND school spirit day is to become better at remembering things.
You keep things moving. Make sure nothing falls through the cracks. Try to stay one step ahead of everything.
And you know what, that makes sense.
But if you stopped for a minute and looked at your day, you’d probably notice something: a surprising number of things still depend on you.
The permission slip sitting on the counter. The client waiting for a response. The groceries you need to remember on the way home. The appointment coming up next week. The laundry that’s still in the dryer. The random thing somebody mentioned 3 days ago that you’re apparently now responsible for remembering. Somehow.
Even when nothing looks urgent, your attention is getting pulled in a dozen different directions all day long. And that’s usually the thing you’re trying to out-discipline.
Not the work itself. The responsibility.
Being the person who remembers. The person who notices. The person who keeps things moving.
When you picture a future version of yourself, it’s easy to imagine she’s just MUCH better at this.
More organized. More productive. Somehow aware of school spirit day before 7:42 that morning.
Except maybe she’s not better at remembering the permission slip, the client follow-up, the groceries, AND tomorrow’s dentist appointment.
She’s just not the designated brain for all of them anymore.
Which means she can finish the offer copy without stopping halfway through to schedule the dentist.
Or sit with her kids without mentally checking tomorrow’s calendar.
Or spend an hour on something that won’t pay off by 5pm today…. without needing every loose end in her life handled first.
And that’s the part that’s easy to miss.
Because right now, most moms aren’t trying to create a better day. They’re trying to create more room inside a day that’s already crowded.
So every now and then, you get a glimpse of it. A quiet afternoon. A productive work block. A day that feels surprisingly easy.
And you think: “There it is.” And that easy afternoon stops feeling like a lucky accident….
Until everything fills back up again.
Not because you failed. Not because you suddenly became less disciplined. Because you’re still the person all those things come back to.
Stewards are pretty familiar with this – ‘cause if they stop remembering everything for 5 minutes, they’re not entirely sure what might happen. 😉
That’s actually one of the five results on a short quiz I created. If you don’t know your archetype yet, you can find it at yourunbusylife.com/quiz.
Because maybe the future version of you isn’t better at carrying 47 things.
Maybe she just finally resigned from being everybody’s external hard drive.
