Photo by Maverick Frame on Unsplash
I’ve been thinking about managing my To-Do list more personally. Every list I use lacks a specific feature I need. Configuring these ready-made products like Apple’s Reminders, Google’s Tasks, and various others is impossible for me as just a regular user.
My current annoyances
”Lost” Tasks
I often forget non-habit tasks. For instance, I write down “try mixing Greek yogurt with carbs” but completely forget it if I do not open the app.
The “You OWE it” Problem
When I skip a habitual task, the app shows a red “Yesterday” status the next day. I become frustrated because I cannot mark today’s task as done until yesterday’s is complete. The app keeps the missed task tied to yesterday, only to push it to today. This feels like a debt, not an actual task. I am not literally owed anything. I simply want to mark it done for today, not carry over the missed day! This mechanism creates a “you owe” list that is ultimately unhelpful.
What was I doing?
Another issue is that it is impossible to tell if a task is finished. I don’t see my completed work. The user must go into the app and open the “Completed” section to check.
You did what now?
Lack of Meaningful Statistics
Most apps offer numbers, metrics, which I deeply despise because they don’t tell me anything. I want to be able to see how many I’ve done/skipped more visually than just numbers. My life isn’t rocket science to count numbers very thoroughly; I don’t care if I have 80% of charge or 79%, it’s 4/5 approx, that’s it (maybe even less, because I don’t want to drain it to less than 1/5). Anyway, it has to be visually represented more psychologically than pure data.
Why am I seeing this now?
I often categorise my tasks into Habit, Chore, Personal, Work and Family. It’s simple and I track them semi-separately. This means I can easily filter out work-related items from my visual statistics or simply my view. For example, I don’t want to see work lists right now so I turn them off and my view clears up for my weekends or whenever I’m relaxing. It seems pretty logical, right? However, despite all the to-do lists I’ve tried none of them seem to solve that one annoying problem.
A Binary System is Not Enough
I cannot believe I’m saying this, but, jokes aside, for some tasks, they are not simply true or false. I need to add a “skip” option. This means I deliberately skipping a task for a reason that day. This prevents the app from constantly reminding me. I also need “uncertain” status for tasks that depend on others. For example, “meet Victoria at 1 pm.” She could simply say “ah well not today let’s make it tomorrow”
Essentially, standard to-do apps are too basic. They rely on simple, rigid checkboxes, which simply doesn’t track how life works.
We need systems that move beyond “done” or “not done.” They must handle things like deliberately skipping tasks, marking items as uncertain, and showing progress visually, and not just in boring percentages. Current apps miss the mark because they force real-world complexity into a too-simple digital box.