Contain projects - get your projects under control

Do you have a clear idea about what the things you need and want to do are 🤔, or do you find yourself stressed out 😫 that you might have forgotten something? Do you know how long the things you are currently taking or will take? ⏰ Do you have an overview of what’s stuck and what’s working?  Do you have a big picture of what your current obligations and commitments are, including the ones to yourself?

The key to peace of mind is containment: knowing that all your projects are under control, that the things you need to do are all captured somewhere easy to access and remember, and that there isn't something else you possibly need to take care of that you've forgotten.


The containment of projects and things you have to do brings peace in the same way in which the key to cleanliness is to have everything in the place in which it belongs. To contain all your projects though, you must know what these projects are, and be able to get them out of your head, and into some form of the organizational system. This on its own is a big task for people that have never attempted containment. Give yourself time to gather all your projects in one place, and update them with everything you need to do, and everything you want to do.

You will keep on remembering things to add, and that is fine. Keep coming back and updating. ✍ You will get there eventually, and your mind will sigh in relief when everything is finally captured somewhere. Add social projects, plans, a project for your own organization of time and budget, add everything. Then experiment how you can fit slots for these projects in your time - there's no rule to this, nor can it be - everything here is as personal as choosing room decoration. One cannot tell you how many hours you should spend on this or that part of your life more than they can tell you how many pairs of shoes 👢 you should own. Just make sure you put everything somewhere, that you have some time slot to touch each of your projects. Even if you can't put all these things in your time, at least have an accessible list of projects, and their steps.

Now the fun and slightly harder part begin. You must be able to keep on coming back to the place where you stored these items, and update the progress you made. These will help you see at a glance where to start the next day, what the next steps to be done are, and what is your current level of progress. 

Sometimes you will forget to update things, and you will just do them instead. This is generally a good sign that some of your projects have become crystal clear to you indeed. We generally tend to tackle things that are clearer to us, rather than the murkier ones, because it's simply easier to achieve tasks when we know what they are.

If you have been away from the place your projects were contained, one or two of your projects have likely progressed greatly in the meantime, and the others have possibly been forgotten. Many people get discouraged at this point. What are you supposed to do with all these tasks, that are now long done? And what about the others, that you should have done a long time ago? 😫

Let yourself take the time to clear out this space. If you are at a completely different point in your project, simply delete the list of tasks you had and plan out the next steps. Look again at the projects you let fall behind, decide whether you still want to do them, and make a point out of taking up a few tasks in them.

Update the space, refresh the space, even if you have fallen behind. If you find your priorities have changed dramatically, simply start from a new blank slate space.

Work on this mission to establish containment, keep containment or return to containment, as you would be returning your room to its cleanliness state. Then enjoy the peace of mind, clarity and focus that containment provides