Okay, I need to be completely honest with you about something that’s been running my life since I was old enough to own a neon-colored Lisa Frank planner. And yes, I was absolutely “that kid”—the one with different colored markers for different subjects, scheduling everything every day of the week by hour from homework time to friend hangouts to tests and soccer practice. (My high school best friend still brings this overbooked up at least once a year, by the way.)
Get my point? I have a serious problem with to-do lists.
Like, the kind of problem where I look at my daily list and think, “Holy shit, am I secretly three people?” You know that feeling? When you’ve written down enough tasks for a small army, and somehow you still think you can get it all done before dinner?
Right. That’s been my entire life…
This isn’t one of those stories where I figured it all out and now I have the perfect relationship with right-sized expectations around time, work and productivity now (spoiler alert: I definitely don’t). This is me, sitting here at my desk with my favorite black Pilot V7 pen (because of course I have a favorite pen), sharing what I’m learning while still very much in the thick of it. If you’ve ever wondered why your brain seems to think you can accomplish seventeen big things between 7 hours on a Tuesday… welcome to the club. Population: way too many of us driven and ambitious women with relational trauma histories.
It Started Early (Like, Embarrassingly Early)
Picture this: a seventeen-year-old on this tiny island off the coast of Maine. I mean, we’re talking 3,000 people. One grocery store that closes at 6 PM. And where if you sneezed on one side of the island they would say “Gesundheit!” on the other side. This girl wasn’t just aiming for valedictorian. She was doing it while running student council, serving as senior class treasurer, playing two sports (badly, but still showing up), participating in civil service programs, and somehow finding time to represent Maine in Washington D.C. at youth leadership conferences.
I know. I know. Even writing it out makes me tired.
From the outside, it probably looked like impressive ambition, right? From the inside? It felt like I was constantly trying to outrun something I couldn’t name. Something that whispered “not enough” no matter how many boxes I checked off my ever-growing lists.
My best friend used to joke—and honestly, she wasn’t wrong—that watching me plan a weekend was like watching someone coordinate a military operation. She’d suggest we “just hang out,” and I’d show up with this color-coded itinerary for Saturday afternoon. Four different activities. Timed to the hour. (I wish I was kidding, but I’m really not.)
