Comment by allenu

I've also discovered that breaking down tasks into micro-tasks helps me get going on things. I've found that I get easily overwhelmed if I have a massive list of things to get done, and adding another task to it makes it even worse. However, just nesting tasks into parent tasks and finding the right "child" to place a new task in makes it feel more manageable, and I know that those nested tasks are typically small things that I can accomplish.

I use this system for my projects but I don't rely on any software other than a text editor. I like the app demo shown at the end of the article, but I find custom software never feels fast enough for jotting down tasks in the right place within a hierarchy as compared with a text editor. I just use a markdown file with indented lines to indicate nesting level. Once I complete a task, I put an x within a little box, like "- [x] bug: page layout ..."

It's very satisfying when you have a big task that's a little abstract and overwhelming at the start, but over time gets more and more subtasks as you dig into it, and then those subtasks get closed out one by one, leading you to finally close out the top-level task that started it all. The fact that the text of the subtasks remain also gives a quick indication just how big that task really was. (I don't delete completed tasks, but I do move them somewhere else in the file to keep it organized somewhat.)