Why Your To-Do List Feels Heavy {Ep 222}

Your to-do list can look harmless on paper and still feel like a brick on your chest. We’ve all had those days where the list isn’t just “a lot” it feels heavy, blurry, and somehow personal. I want to pull that apart and show you what’s really going on so you can stop blaming yourself and start planning in a way that feels lighter.

I'll talk about the key distinction that changes everything. Mental tasks versus energetic tasks. Mental tasks are your logical admin like scheduling, filing, paying bills, and handling simple content logistics. Energetic tasks demand presence and visibility like recording a podcast, meeting a new client, or sending an email that asks you to share your voice. That’s why a five-minute email can feel harder than an hour of admin, and why forcing yourself through “resistance” can quietly push you toward burnout.

I also share how I work with my current capacity while I’m studying, why I avoid stacking too many high-energy jobs in one day, and the simple method I used to track my physical, mental, and energetic state hour by hour. You’ll get practical productivity and energy management strategies you can use immediately: save admin for quieter gaps, protect your best hours for big energy work, and break heavy tasks into small, logical steps so you can build momentum without draining your battery. I’ll also link my to-do list webinar in the show notes for extra support.

If you know your business should feel more than what it is, press play. Subscribe, share this with a friend who’s drowning in their list, and leave a review so more people can find the support.

Transcript

Welcome And Why It Matters

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hi everyone and welcome to this episode of Tuesday Talks with Darlene. Today I want to talk about why your to-do list feels heavy. Now I've actually done a webinar on to-do lists and I will link that into the show notes that I have on my webpage and also on the um podcast platforms as well. I'll make sure I link it in there. Now thank you for watching and listening. I would love for you to like, share, comment, subscribe. It would I would really appreciate it because it helps get the message out there. Now, most of us look at our to-do list and feel a heavy weight in our chest. And I've done that, especially when I've done to-do lists differently. I've done it where, you know, I've I've taken down every single thing, you know, I've not jotted it down everything, and I look at it and I go, oh my goodness, oh my goodness, it's just it's too much, it's too much. Because we see that long list of tasks and we think of it as a burden. Now, this heaviness doesn't usually come with how much work we have to do, it actually comes from mixing our logical brain with the deep energy work. And if your entire list is just one big blurry cloud of stuff, then your energy stays scattered and you're

Where The Heaviness Comes From

SPEAKER_00 1:20

going to end up feeling completely drained. That does actually happen. And I felt it. So this is why I can talk about this because I've been there, I've done that, and I really want to talk about to-do lists again. And I want to talk about why your list actually feels heavy and how you can actually help change that. It's about moving away from that feeling of pushing uphill and finding a rhythm that actually supports you. Because when you understand the energy of the task, you stop struggling and start actually flowing. And this is what's happened for me. And, you know, for those that are watching now, um, like when this episode comes out, I'm actually studying, which means that I've taken a lot of stuff away from my business. And I'm really only doing the podcast at the moment. I am in the process of getting a membership going, which will happen. I'm not pushing myself though, because I understand what requires my time now. And at the moment, it's not really doing anything except creating uh just a few posts. And I've got a program where I actually put the video in and it creates reels for me, which makes content so much easier. Now I want to talk about how mental tasks and energetic tasks are not the same, and you'll be thinking, what's she going on about? And that's quite alright. You can you can say that. Your brain handles logical admin with ease, because these mental tasks are things like filing, scheduling, or paying a bill. They use your logic, but they don't require so much of yourself. You know, the things you've done all the time, they're easy, they're whatever. Whereas the energetic tasks require you to be fully present. Like this podcast, it requires me to be fully present. Now, I've actually taken about half an hour or a bit longer for me to actually be ready for this podcast

Mental Tasks Vs Energetic Tasks

SPEAKER_00 3:24

because as you can probably hear, I'm not feeling the best. Yet I knew I needed to do this podcast episode. Yes, it's coming out Tuesday. Yet I wanted to really talk about to-do list. Now, um, seeing a new client could also be an energetic task, and sometimes they can feel heavier because they take a different kind of fuel to actually finish the beautiful um project or whatever it is. So this podcast takes takes a different kind of energy for me, whereas scheduling, creating that rule and scheduling it is easy because number one, the reel is done by um by that software, and then all I've got to do is just schedule it with you know the bit of text. Easy. Whereas, as I said, this podcast, I had about half an hour for me to get ready because I want to give 100%. I want to give 100%. Now, also a five-minute email can carry a lot of weight. If an email feels heavy, it's likely an energetic task in disguise. It's usually about visibility or sharing your voice. And the weight isn't about time, it's about the energy a task demands from you. And once you see the difference between these two types of work, you can actually stop blaming yourself for feeling tired. Because guess what? We run a business, we will get tired. And learning how to understand the different types of actual tasks is really cool. Now, we don't want to push through the heaviness that drains our battery because this is ignoring the signal of resistance and it can create burnout. When a task feels like a mountain, your body is giving you a clear sign, and pushing through it often leads to results that feel forced or even stilted. You know, it's like like there's been many times I've looked at things that I've written, and sometimes I use AI, and I just read through it and I'm going, that just sounds wrong. It just sounds so wrong. And then I get fed up, and then I get frustrated, and then I'm like, oh my goodness, and then I I walk away because I know that if I don't walk away,

Why Pushing Through Causes Burnout

SPEAKER_00 5:48

I'm going to end up burning out. And it's happened in the past where I haven't walked away from things. Now it doesn't mean walking away totally, it just means walking walking, it just means walking away at that moment, and when I come back, I'm in a better place. Like this podcast episode, as I said, I took at least 30 minutes beforehand because I want to give you 100%. Now, also, when you stack energetic tasks, they can create a leak in your focus. When you try and do too many high-energy jobs in one day, you can actually crash. And you can end up staring at the screen because your battery is simply empty. At the moment, for me, I'm feeling tired. Um, I'm unwell. So I did a little bit this morning and then that was it. I went to bed. It is now nighttime, and I've got more energy because I rested, because I was able to do that, I was able to rest, which means I've got more energy for this podcast episode. That was me not stacking the energy tasks. Now, in the past, when I did one-on-one, I could have three clients a day. Now, depending on how long those clients went for, sometimes I could only have three clients a day. Other times I could have more. Now, those are energetic high tasks. That means I needed to be prepared for those sessions and to be able to show up for my clients 100%. It meant I took time before and after each session to help prepare me and then also let go of that session. I learned how to let go when I was working in the healthcare field because I couldn't take things on. It wasn't me. I just couldn't take things on. Because if I took all of that on, I would have burnt out 20,000 times in the healthcare field. And it's the same thing in our business. We can't take everything on. And that's another episode I'm going to do in a probably a couple of weeks, where it's about holding space without taking on the client's baggage. So that's another one that I'll um, you know, I'm going to do in a couple of weeks. So keep an eye out for that one. Now, I want you to learn how to recognize that your current capacity is actually a strength. This isn't about being lazy or avoiding the work. It's about knowing when you have the right energy to do a specific job well. And the way I learned that was I actually, um, for I think it was a week or maybe even longer, every hour I wrote down how I was feeling physically, how I was feeling mentally, what my energy was like. Like I could have felt physically fantastic, and yet the energy was low. I looked at what task I was doing. I looked at, you know, what I'd been drinking and

Tracking Your Capacity Hour By Hour

SPEAKER_00 8:54

eating. All of that helped me understand when I actually work better for certain tasks. Now that's changed again because I'm now sharing, and so I need to work around my energy, but also when I'm actually free to do things. So it's not about working harder, it's about working with the energy you have right now. And if you do what I did every hour, write down those things, you will understand what works well for you. Like for me, my energy normally is better in the mornings. I'm more of a morning person, although that's changed slightly. I'm still more of a morning person. And so I love having clients in the morning. And when you stop fighting your natural energy, you can actually start organizing your day in a way that actually feels good. Now it's um nearly seven o'clock at night, actually, and normally I don't do podcast episodes or anything at night because in the past it has actually stopped me from sleeping well. As I said, things have changed, and that's where if if circumstances change, then redo that um thing of writing down, you know, every hour what's going on, because then you'll understand okay, this has changed. Has the way I work changed as well, or is it still the same? Because it may not change, and what you also want to do is align your list with your natural rhythm. As I said, I'm a morning person. That's where clients in the morning and doing these kind of things in the morning are actually better for me. Although, as I said, I've rested today, so I've actually got heaps of energy, and I'll probably end up doing a couple of podcast episodes. This is what I love about what I do because I work with energy so much and I help business women with their intuition, with their energy, it's actually really cool. Now, a few things you can actually do. You can save the logical admin for your quiet gaps. So

Aligning Work With Your Rhythm

SPEAKER_00 11:00

use the times when you feel less on to handle those mental tasks. Now, these tasks still take energy, but they don't require you to be visible or vocal. Not vocal like on a podcast episode. They might require you to do maybe an email or something, but you're not it's not a huge amount of energy. If it's an oh, excuse me, if it's an email that makes you feel heavy, then prepare yourself first before you respond to that email. And another thing you can do is protect your

Simple Ways To Reshape Your List

SPEAKER_00 11:36

peak moments for big energy work. So do a podcast episode or a client call when you feel bright and clear, like I am now. This actually makes the heavy tasks feel lighter because you've got the fuel for them, because you're working with your rhythm, you've got the fuel for all the different tasks. And break the heavy energetic tasks into tiny mental steps. If that task feels too big, turn it into a few logical parts. Because completing a small mental step can help you build the momentum you need. Now, on recording these podcast episodes, that doesn't mean I am going to sit down and put them on YouTube and put them into I use um bus route, put them into all that. No, I will record the episodes and then I'm gonna stop. And I will leave it for tomorrow or Sunday or Monday, whatever, to then do the rest of it. Because I need to create graphics and then I put it into the software I use and get the clips. There are other tasks that I need to do. So while I'm feeling great, I'm going to record podcast episodes. I'm not going to do the rest of it. That's what it means by breaking them down into tiny mental steps. So even the ones where I need lots of energy, you can break them down. The reason for this is your to-do list is a tool to support you, not a stick to beat yourself with. And many people say, and it also depends on how you run as well. But the people out there say you only need three things on your list a day. Well, that doesn't always work out for me. I like to put more on them sometimes. It depends how I'm feeling. Remember, at the end of the day, your business grows better when you aren't constantly exhausted by your own list. Because that to-do list shouldn't be a source of constant stress. Like it was for me in the past. It's been this, you know, like I'd look at the list and go, oh my goodness, no, no, no,

Turn The List Into An Energy Map

SPEAKER_00 13:44

no. It actually should be a map for your energy. It's about deciding that how you feel while you work actually matters. As I said, I'm feeling great, so I'm going to record podcast episodes. And when you stop treating every task like it's the same and start respecting the energy it takes, the pressure starts to drop away. You stop feeling like you're constantly chasing your tail and start feeling like you're actually in flow with your business. The goal isn't to be a machine that finishes every single thing every day. The goal is to be the person that works in a way that feels sustainable sustainable and real. Because that list that drains you becomes a burden. Yet a list that respects your energy is a foundation. It's a foundation for your business, the way you want to run your business. That's been today's episode. Thank you so much for watching, listening, liking, subscribing, sharing, commenting, all that amazing stuff that I really appreciate. Because that's also sort of gets the message out there. And I really appreciate it. Wishing you a beautiful day wherever you are in this world.