The To Do List

So do you want the good news first? Or the bad news? The bad news? Fine, pessimists! The bad news is that despite my best efforts I haven’t got everything done. I gave it my all, I really did. As well as doing my normal day job, on top of traipsing around the country promoting The To Do List to anyone and everyone I also posted cakes to cousins, bought a new mobile phone, found the password to my e-saver account, bought some shirts that fit me, chased up invoices. Cancelled sim cards, wrote letters of complaint to Debenhams about underpant related issues (can you believe that they actually asked me to send them to them by post?), replied to unanswered email, fixed guttering and much, much more but it still wasn’t enough. Even now as I sit at my desk typing out this here blog I can see the pile of half-read books that needed finishing, the electricity bill that was pinned to the wall in order to remind me to apply for a capped rate and the broken computer scanner that all my attempts to fix it only seemed to make it more rather than less broken than it was before. Now while part of me feels a bit depressed about the fact that I haven’t achieved what I set out to achieve another part of actually feels pretty good because if you look at things from the other way round there is basically a whole lot of stuff that got done this month that wouldn’t have got done had it not been for the list. Viewed like that this can only been seen as an unmitigated success…or at least that’s the way I’ve decided to spin it! Anyway, to conclude this blog I thought that what I might do is finish off with a few comments from readers who have read The To Do List as a way not only of encouraging you to buy the book but also to start a list of your very own!

“Mike, finished it, fantastic. Inspirational! My first hurdle is the list itself... I keep writing bits in rough, afraid to write it "in best"... gulp - will do that next! All the best, Debbie”

“Hi Mike, I picked up "The To Do List" whilst at Heathrow airport at the end of Dec and read it on my first few days on holidays in Central America. One of my new Canadian travel friends was intrigued so I passed it onto her to read. By the end of our trip we had compiled our own to do lists with a plan to check in with one another to monitor our progress. She then gave it to her sister who read it at San Jose in Costa Rica and got chatting to a guy who already had his to do list written but wanted to read the book. So we've sent it off with no knowledge of where it might end up next but thought you might like to know that list mania is breaking out across the world! Anj.”

“Hi Mike, just had to write to say how much i enjoyed the to-do list. I'm always making lists like yours and now you've inspired me to stop making excuses and get on with it! Chris.”

“Hi Mike, I finished your book The To Do List this morning, no mean feat as it's not due to be published for another week. However I am now incredibly sad. Sad, not because I didn't enjoy it but because I didn't want it to end, the sign of a great book if ever there was one. Many thanks for the kick up the proverbial, Jeremy.”

“Hi Mike, thank you for making me feel normal! If you ever have a moment where you feel like you need to get organised again - get a Dymo labeller - BLISS! Tanya.”

So that’s that then. That was my January To Do List. And so now we’re done, why don’t you grab a pen and some paper and get scribbling a list of your own! Go on, you know it makes sense!

Happy list making

Mike x

PS. Feel free to drop me an email via my website (www.mikegayle.co.uk) and keep me up to date with your list making progress.

PPS. If you’d like to read The To Do List – the story of the year I tried to get everything on a 1,277 item to-do list done! – please visit any good bookstore, or try one of these links:
www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/displayProductDetails.do?sku=6252258
www.borders.co.uk/book/the-to-do-list/1077878/
www.play.com/Books/Books/4-/6526720/The-To-Do-List/Product.html