You will inevitably have tasks on your task list or to-do list that are “Do Later” or “Not Right Now” tasks. However, it is important that you still keep on top of these. You will want to continue to progress these among all your other to-do list items.

I personally find a great way to manage these is to use time-boxing. So I will schedule these in my calendar or diary. When I come across a task that doesn’t need to be done right now, or I am too busy to deal with it, (but there is still value in doing it!) I look at when I think I will be able to fit it in to get it done before any given deadline (or if not specified deadline when I need to make progress by).

These tasks will then go in the diary or calendar with an allocated time slot. Sometimes these will end up needing to be moved due to unexpected urgent work. However, the majority of the time, these will get dealt with at the scheduled time.

If these are not scheduled, these tasks can easily drop off the list completely and get forgotten about. This can also help you stop drifting along and be more focused when tackling these sort of tasks.

If there are more “aspirational” tasks, they might go on the Someday List instead. These can then be revisited at the appropriate or quieter time.