How to Prioritize When There’s Always More To Do

Advice for managing life's chaos and focusing on what's important

Things worth prioritizing in life

Health and fitness

todoist how to prioritize health pyramid

Sleep and rest

Friends, family, and relationships

Productive work

Things to deprioritize

Busy work

Negativity

9 Strategies for prioritizing your tasks

1. Capture all of your tasks in one place

todoist how to prioritize productivity system

App callout note: Read the full section on Tips for...

Read the full section on Tips for prioritizing tasks in Todoist.

2. Stay focused by eliminating distractions

todoist how to prioritize freedom self control

3. Don’t fall for shiny object syndrome

todoist how to prioritize thought bubbles

4. Understand importance over urgency with the Eisenhower Matrix

Todoist how to prioritize Eisenhower Matrix

how to prioritize to-do list eisenhower matrix

App callout note: Read more on the Eisenhower Matrix, including...

Read more on the Eisenhower Matrix, including how to implement this productivity method in Todoist.

5. Manage your energy, not your time

6. Take stock of what’s important with The Commitment Inventory

App callout note: Read more on The Commitment Inventory, including...

Read more on The Commitment Inventory, including how to implement this productivity method in Todoist.

7. Put your most important task first with Eat the Frog

how to prioritize eat the frog todo list

App callout note: 🐸 Read more on Eat the Frog,...

🐸 Read more on Eat the Frog, including how to implement this productivity method in Todoist.

8. Account for your hours with the Time Blocking method

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App callout note: Read more on Time Blocking, including how...

Read more on Time Blocking, including how to implement this productivity method in Todoist.

9. Eliminate non-priority tasks with Warren Buffett’s “2 List” Strategy

5 Tips for prioritizing tasks in Todoist

Create projects for your life

App callout note: 💡 Todoist Tip: Use Todoist’s sort options...

💡 Todoist Tip: Use Todoist’s sort options to group your Today view by Projects. Sort → Custom View → Group by → Project. You’ll have a clear view of the areas of your life that get your focus in a given day.

Balance the week ahead with upcoming view

App callout note: Get ahead of Monday with a Weekly...

Get ahead of Monday with a Weekly Review practice. Think about your priorities for the next seven days during a dedicated review session where you reflect on what you accomplished last week and your focus for the week ahead.

Add priority levels to your tasks

todoist how to prioritize todoist smartphone

App callout note: 💡 Todoist Tip: Make accessing your top...

💡 Todoist Tip: Make accessing your top priorities easier. Create a filter called “My Priority Tasks” with the query “p1 & !assigned to” to filter out your priority 1 tasks that are assigned to you (and not others).

Add important projects, labels, and filters to your Favorites

App callout note: Add important labels to Todoist Favorites. Use...

Add important labels to Todoist Favorites. Use labels in Todoist to earmark your tasks for when you’re in the zone to focus on high-priority tasks. For example, create labels like “Deep Work”, “High Energy”, or “Frog”, and add them to the tasks that demand your attention when you’re in the right mode to tackle them.

Get rid of old tasks with Todoist filters

App callout note: Need to tidy your to-do list? Read...

Need to tidy your to-do list? Read our article on using the Marie Kondo approach to your Todoist. Need something more drastic? Declare to-do list bankruptcy.

Fadeke Adegbuyi

Fadeke is a writer and marketer. She's passionate about telling stories of better ways to live and work.