A do not do list is a short list of habits, tasks or commitments you deliberately stop, limit or decline. Also called a not-to-do list, it helps you decide what can come off your plate. When you live with chronic illness, that can mean saving energy for a shower, a conversation or simply getting through the afternoon.
I have lived with fluctuating energy for years. Somewhere along the way, I convinced myself that a layer of dust protects my furniture. This is questionable housekeeping science, but a perfectly serviceable objection to dusting when I need to rest.
There are things that need doing. Then there are things that have acquired the status of a moral duty despite being, on closer inspection, ironing.
What belongs on a do not do list?
Put something on the list when it costs you more than it gives back and you have some room to change it. That might be repeatedly opening your inbox, agreeing to an optional meeting, or cleaning a room to a standard nobody in the household actually needs.
A to-do list records actions to take. A not-to-do list records decisions you want to stop making over and over: “I won't answer non-urgent work messages during my rest break,” for example.
The idea has a long life in productivity writing. Tim Ferriss wrote about a not-to-do list in 2007, focusing on habits that interrupt work. For those of us living with chronic illness, the useful question is often more basic: what can I remove so the day asks less of me?
Leave room for rest, care and enjoyment
Something can be worthwhile without producing anything. A chat with a friend, an afternoon watching television or lying quietly may deserve space in your day. “Unproductive” is a poor test of whether an activity matters.
Don't add medication, necessary care, food or essential responsibilities to the list because they are tiring. If those tasks are becoming unmanageable, the question is what help or adjustment is available. Deleting the reminder does not delete the need.
How to make a do not do list you can actually use
- Look at one ordinary day. Notice where your attention or energy went. Include the small interruptions and the work of managing illness. You do not need a month-long audit before you are allowed to stop folding pajamas.
- Pick one to three things you can change. Choose a repeated irritation, an optional task or a commitment you routinely regret. Start with something small enough to act on.
- Write a specific boundary. “Stop overdoing it” is difficult to use. “I won't add optional errands after a medical appointment” tells you what decision to make.
- Give it an alternative and an exception. You might check messages at agreed times, while keeping an urgent contact route open. A useful rule should survive contact with your actual life.
- Review it after a week, or when circumstances change. Keep what helps. Adjust what creates more work. Your list is allowed to be different during a flare, a busy care week or a period when you have more support.
One workable boundary is enough to begin. There is no prize for creating an enormous second list to feel guilty about.
10 do not do list examples for limited-energy days
These are options to adapt, not ten new rules. Take the ones that fit your circumstances.
1. Don't treat every message as urgent
Try: “I won't open email every time I pause what I'm doing.”
If your responsibilities allow it, choose times to check messages and turn off non-essential alerts between them. Tell people how to reach you when something genuinely cannot wait. A person on call, waiting for care information or responsible for a child may need a different arrangement.
2. Don't keep several demanding tasks open at once
Try: “I won't switch between this form and my inbox.”
Put the other task somewhere you can find it again: a note, a saved draft or a reminder. Finish one manageable piece before deciding what comes next. If silence makes concentration harder for you, keep the background sound or other support that helps; this is no purity contest about how attention should work.
3. Don't agree to an open-ended call when you have ten minutes
Try: “I can talk until 3:15, then I need to go.”
Say it at the start. You can care about someone and have limited capacity for a conversation. A friend having a difficult time is still a friend, rather than an item to delete in the pursuit of greater efficiency.
If setting the limit feels awkward, our guide to handling uncomfortable conversations offers a way into the discussion.
4. Don't answer every unknown caller automatically
Try: “I'll screen unexpected calls when I'm not waiting for something important.”
Screening unknown numbers became second nature to me. But a blanket rule has obvious problems when a hospital, support service or delivery driver may call from a number you don't recognise. Make exceptions for expected calls and check voicemail if you use it. Not every legitimate caller can leave a detailed message.
5. Don't let optional phone activity take over bedtime
Try: “I won't read work email once I've settled down for the night.”
If scrolling keeps you awake longer than you want, choose a stopping point or move the relevant app out of easy reach. You may still need your phone nearby for alarms, accessibility tools, health monitoring or contact with someone who supports you. Keep those functions available.
6. Don't keep scrolling after you want to stop
Try: “When I notice I'm no longer enjoying this, I'll close the feed.”
Online friendships and disabled communities can be valuable, especially when getting out is difficult. You get to distinguish between connection you want and a feed you are watching out of habit. A timer, a shortcut directly to a group or turning off recommendations may help you make that distinction in practice.
7. Don't spend essential energy on optional housework
Try: “I won't iron bedding or fold clothes that can live in a basket.”
Keep food hygiene and clear walking routes in view. Then decide which cosmetic jobs can wait, be simplified or disappear altogether. My furniture can continue enjoying its protective dust layer; a spill that makes the floor slippery needs a different decision.
For more specific adaptations, read how to manage housework with fibromyalgia and ME/CFS.
8. Don't say yes before checking what it will cost
Try: “Let me check what I can manage and get back to you.”
Count travel, preparation and any recovery time you need, as well as the event itself. A free afternoon on the calendar does not necessarily mean you have capacity. You can decline, suggest a shorter visit or ask whether there is another way to take part.
For care you cannot simply decline, try making the request specific: “I can arrange the appointment, but I need someone else to do the driving.” Whether help is available is a real constraint, not a test of how confidently you ask.
9. Don't make rest depend on finishing the backlog
Try: “I won't postpone the rest I need until every task is done.”
A list of unfinished work can always grow. Make room for rest within the day you have, rather than putting it beyond a finish line that keeps moving. If work is part of the pressure, what a mental health day can offer is a useful related read, although taking time off is not available to everyone and does not resolve an inaccessible workload.
A note about ME/CFS: post-exertional malaise can worsen symptoms after physical or mental activity, sometimes with a delay. The CDC describes pacing as balancing activity and rest within individual limits and warns that pushing on a good day can lead to a crash. A list is an organisational aid; it does not replace an individual care plan or mean every chronic illness needs the same approach.
10. Don't use completed tasks as a measure of your worth
Try: “I won't call the day a failure because the list is unfinished.”
There may be days when illness takes up almost all the available space. A not-to-do list cannot make those days easy. It can at least avoid joining the chorus insisting you should have done more.
A not-to-do list template to copy
Use a piece of paper, your notes app or a voice note. Fill this in for one boundary; add more only if you find it useful.
My boundary for this week
I won't: [one specific task, habit or commitment]
This makes room for: [something I need or value]
Instead, I will: [a smaller action, an alternative or rest]
An exception is: [a genuine responsibility or situation that changes the rule]
I'll review it: [a date or a change in circumstances]
Filled-in example: I won't add optional errands after a medical appointment. This makes room for eating and resting when I get home. Instead, I'll keep a separate errands list for another day or ask for help. An exception is something essential that cannot wait and that I can safely manage. I'll review this after my next appointment.
When saying no is difficult
Advice about boundaries often assumes you control your working hours, have someone to share care with and can afford to outsource the exhausting bits. Plenty of people have none of those options.
Look for the part you can change. Ask which task takes priority when a manager adds work. Negotiate the timing of a non-urgent request. Agree on a simpler household standard. If necessary tasks consistently exceed what you can manage, that may require practical support or changes to the demands being placed on you.
If a task matters but you cannot start it, putting it on a forbidden list may only hide the difficulty. A smaller first step, help with the task or a different way to do it may be more useful.
And if the list itself becomes another obligation, shorten it. Today, one decision may be enough: the pajamas can remain unironed.
