A good list can help you in so many ways. Here are three I particularly value as an HSP.
I’ve written dozens of articles about self-care for highly sensitive people (HSPs), including the crucial basics: ample sleep, solitude, self-compassion, self-regulation, and spiritual connection.
Somehow, though, I’ve never written about lists. That is crazy, because I’m the Queen of Lists. I LOVE lists. In fact, “make great lists” belongs near the top of my list of best stress-prevention practices.
Using the right lists at the right time, you can make complex, wonderful things happen. Best of all, you can do all that without getting overwhelmed. In fact, lists are so universally effective that I recommend them without hesitation to any sensitive person wishing to pull off anything from a birthday party to a cross-country move, while remaining (reasonably) cool and unruffled.
As David Allen comments in his invaluable book, Getting Things Done, “It’s possible for a person to have an overwhelming number of things to do and still function productively with a clear head and a positive sense of relaxed control.”
When I first read this, I thought, “Wow! Could this be true?” I always tried to stay relaxed while being productive. Unfortunately, my head frequently felt muddled, and my sense of control was certainly not relaxed. Could I really experience the “elevated levels of effectiveness and efficiency” he described, while remaining calm?
The answer was “Yes.” And mindful list making is one of his key tools. I’ll say more below about Getting Things Done. But first let’s look at three ways a good list can help you prevent stress and overwhelm.
1— When you take time to make a list, you leverage your HSP strength of deep-processing
Remember the four attributes all HSPs share? They are deep processing, overarousal, emotional intensity or empathy, and sensory sensitivity. When you make a list, you leverage the first of these attributes—your deep-processing ability.
It doesn’t matter whether you are planning a simple trip to the grocery store, or a complex voyage to India: when you think through an event, activity, or project ahead of time, listing actions or items, you give your deep-thinking mind a chance to anticipate all sorts of considerations and possible complications.
This foresight empowers you to prevent snags, protecting your future self (and others you are planning for) from unpleasantly overarousing problems. This kind of preparation is a natural expression of the conscientiousness for which HSPs are noted. We really, really want things to go well.
Fortunately, our brains are hard-wired to help us ensure that. Your thoughtful lists enable you to remember complex sequences and track multiple items. A good list can help you follow through on big responsibilities, confident that you won’t forget things.
2—Good lists prevent mistakes when you are overstimulated
Overarousal is a built-in challenge for HSPs. When I get overaroused, my functionality plunges from “very good” to “utterly useless.” My brain overheats. I try hard to avoid those brain-melting situations where many things (or people) are coming at me all at once. For those times when they do happen, though, we can learn from professionals like surgeons, airline pilots, and construction project managers.
These people process multiple streams of information every day while making crucial decisions under pressure. Their preferred support strategy? Checklists.
In his fascinating book, The Checklist Manifesto, Atul Gawande describes dramatic improvements in hospital mortality rates that occurred at one hospital when simple checklists were introduced for pre- and post-surgical procedures. He also recounts Sully Sullenberger’s famous Hudson River landing, during which Sullenberger coolly followed a checklist developed by flight experts for just such a scenario.
I have my own version of these life-saving checklists. For a recent vacation, my partner and I had to pack four people and six days’ worth of food into two cars. In addition, I needed to pack my own suitcase. We had two house guests, and my work schedule was full.
In the past, all this would have overwhelmed me: too much, all at once. But this time, I was clear-headed and amazingly calm, because I had lists for everything. Personal Packing. Meals. Perishable groceries. Non-perishable groceries. I simply did what my lists told me to do. The system worked perfectly.
To be clear, I had made these lists earlier, when I was calm and focused. Like Sully Sullenberger landing his plane on the Hudson River (well, sort of), I didn’t have to think. Even if I did get over-aroused, it didn’t matter. Knowing this made me even calmer, because fear of getting over-aroused and forgetting things is itself overarousing (a phenomenon I call the ”HSP hall of mirrors.”)
3—When you have all your “to-do’s” captured on a trusted list, you can relax
All these very specific lists for packing, groceries, surgical procedures and aviation safety are powerful tools to prevent stress. But even more powerful is the philosophy of life and work underlying good list-making—a philosophy that allows you, as David Allen put it, “to have an overwhelming number of things to do and still function productively with a clear head and a positive sense of relaxed control.”
Allen’s book, Getting Things Done, is full of lists and systems. These strategies exist, however, in service of a higher purpose: to clear your mind. You do that by getting your projects and “to-do” lists out of your head and into trusted systems. For HSPs, this brain-emptying process is a godsend.
Why? Because if we’re holding a fact or an idea in our brain, we’re hardwired to think about it. Deeply. If we try to hold too many facts and ideas at once, our brains simply overheat trying to process them all. A good list can help you empty out your brain and give it a rest.
To put this another way, lists, along with systems, templates, and routines, set you up to do a lot without having to think too much. That way, you can stay cool, even when things heat up around you. Even better, should any unexpected glitches in fact occur, your mind is free to address them.
HSPs need an uncluttered mental environment
These brain-sparing strategies are helpful for everyone. However, HSPs particularly stand to gain from skillful list-making because we are affected by our environment much more than non-HSPs are. This tendency is called environmental susceptibility.
If you are highly sensitive, you can easily see how your external environment affects you. You can’t help but notice your sensitivity to fumes, bright lights, loud noises, strong smells, other people’s energy, and so on. However, the concept of environmental susceptibility also applies to your internal environment.
I don’t have to tell you how much your mind state affects you… and to be clear, this internal environment includes any tasks you haven’t yet completed, and haven’t captured on a trusted list. Because your brain is designed to create and synthesize, not to hold and store information, and it has a habit of pinging you repeatedly about something you haven’t done.
Even worse, your brain has no sense of timing or priorities. It will ping you randomly, yet persistently, whether or not you could possibly take action in this moment. It’s like having all your phone notifications turned on, all the time. Ugh.
I’m firmly committed to the lifelong task of taming my mind. In the meantime, however, I’m resigned to the reality that it goes wherever I go. Short of cutting off my head (with the inevitable unpleasant side effects), the best antidote I know for painful overarousal is an effective, thorough list.
Do lists help you stay sane? Please post your comments and questions on the Sustainably Sensitive blog page.
Image © Emily Agnew 2024
Note: This post is an updated version of the article that first appeared here September 4, 2018.
I am a HUGE fan of lists.! Lists at the cottage pinned to the wall that outline to the frequent visitors what is in each drawer or tote. I use the app Wunderlist for packing lists for travel and for some home maintenance. I use Amazon’s Alexa for shopping lists: everyone in the house can verbally add to the weekly grocery list, and I have mundane chores tracked on Alexa too. At work I have a project board for bigger things, and on my desk – shockingly – I have a HAND WRITTEN (!) list of things of personal work tasks. I don’t think my head would ever clear without these tools – once they are out of brain and tracked i can distance myself a bi5 from them and the items on them are much less overwhelming. Great article!
Karen, it’s great to hear from you, and thanks for mentioning these higher-tech list options! For some reason, I like putting things on paper…but I will take a look at Wunderlist as you are the second person who has mentioned that to me recently.
Considering how much you like lists, I’m guessing you’d really like “Getting Things Done”, if you haven’t already read it….he helps you create systems to acknowledge and track all your projects AND the next steps for each one, so those aren’t “pinging” you either. That changed my life!
Hi Emily,
Perhaps it might be helpful to others to know not all lists have to be linear and vertical with #1 to be done before #2. What works for me is a visually different style list I lovingly call my SPIDER. Got the idea from Brain Mapping. I use it to plan a week, a day, a meeting, something I want to write, a talk I have to give..
I put my topic in the center and what forms are “arms” from that center for the larger categories. As I think of what I want to accomplish, thoughts come randomly, but I can put them in the proper leg. They are all ‘captured’. If I remember something later, it has a place to land.
If I’m really fastidious, I’ll guesstimate how much time something will take. I can also number things all over the page if I want a sequence. And if I suddenly have a block of time open I can select an item appropriate to that time. I get the ‘reward’ of crossing things off. If something seems complex, I can create a little spider on that leg 😉
I’ve solved the problem of loose lists by just having just one spider notebook, not huge and unwieldy.. My current one is 80 sheets 7.5″x9.75. And always with a very pretty cover! Again everything is captured, relatively easily findable with a flipping thru pages. And last tip, I leave the first few pages of my spider notebook blank so I can make a note where to find something that was really important. Numbering the pages helps. xoTaj
HI Taj, that is fascinating…your spider sounds like a mind map/ list hybrid that is very powerful and flexible! The way lists look is so personal…thank you for sharing this in such detail.
It’s wonderful to read about everyone’s creative solutions! I’m an inveterate list maker. I’ve tried many different methods, some artistic and fun and many mundane and linear. Currently I have a 5 X 8 spiral notebook in which I can keep daily lists but track leftover tasks. Wanderlust sounds interesting but I prefer paper. It feels more solid, real and grounding for me.
I used to drive myself nuts before trips, to the extent that it hardly felt worth it. My salvation has been designing checklists for packing (for a variety of locations) and home instructions, veterinarian health permissions for dog, etc. They have made all the difference. What a relief!
Thank you for this wonderful article. I wish I had read it 20 years ago! Hearing you validate what being an HSP is like has been a soothing balm for my soul.
Hi Mary, I’m very happy to hear you have lists that make life so much easier for you. This really is an issue for everyone, not just HSPs….but as HSPs we are already dealing with a higher-thank-average need to process things, and overloading our brains with anything that could be put on paper instead is unnecessarily taxing!
I haven’t read your blog yet, but I will. Actually, I will read all your self employment…making your business work blogs. Maybe I can figure out a way to make some money.
I’ll say one thing though…I have always thought I was an extremely organized person. …until my mother had a health crisis and I had to step up as one of her POAs!
I’m still not organized and I’ve been making list after list for 5.5 months!
Some people have attributed my confusion to not ‘ knowing ‘ how the medical system works. Certainly navigating through the Canadian medical system shouldn’t be a secret nor should it favor certain people.
Like everyone who has commented before me, I felt a resounding YES when I read this article. Lists and checklists definitely keep me sane.
At work, where we are expected to be paperless, I have a OneNote notebook literally called Checklists. I like that in OneNote, you can set up your lists with checkboxes that you can tick off just by clicking.
I also use mindmaps to think through a process on my way to creating a checklist, or just for processing information or emotions. I have a journal dedicated to my mindmaps, like others here have mentioned.
Mostly, Emily, I love how you used the subject of lists to highlight the beautiful qualities of highly sensitive people.
Kim, I second the motion about checking things off! I will even add to my list things I have already done, just so I can check them off:) I agree that it’s great to have a more flowing, less linear processing strategy like mind mapping to get the clarity needed to make a good list.
Thanks for your comment about highlighting HSP qualities. I feel like that is one of the things I’m here for:)