If you were forced to write your to-do list on a scrap of paper tiny enough to fit in the smallest pocket of your jeans, what would you put on it?

Or (just in case you don’t wear jeans!) what one thing can you do today that’ll make this day a win?

Under-scheduling. Leaving room for the magic. Setting the bar super low. Whatever you want to call it, what if you didn’t force yourself to do all of the things today?

We live in a society that is always on. Pushing ourselves late into the night is seen as something to be celebrated. Time quilting is lauded as the greatest strategy ever to get stuff done that you won’t otherwise squeeze into your day.

And I get, really I do. With everyone else hustling, getting so much done in the time it takes me to make a coffee, if you’re not careful it can start to feel like you’re going to get left behind.

Do you ever pause, look around you, and wonder where everyone’s in such a hurry to get to?

There are exceptions of course. In the wee small hours of April 10th 2007, my poor mum was mentally willing my husband to please tie his shoe laces faster – she was afraid our son would be born in her kitchen!

But exceptions aside, life is a marathon, not a sprint. Can you imagine Usain Bolt running twenty six miles at the same pace he does his 100 metres? Crazy! It just can’t be done.

Instead, what if we chipped away, little by little? Under-scheduling.

Repeated daily actions over time adding up, over the course of a year, to super-human achievement.

Write five hundred words every day for a year and you’ve got yourself two weighty ninety thousand word manuscripts.

Eat just 135 less calories every day for a year and you’re looking at the most painless one stone weight loss ever. (Assuming all calories are equal and “calories in equals calories out.” Personally I’m not convinced!)

Read just five pages of a book every day for a year and you’ll get through … okay, that one depends on the size of the book – but you get the idea!

Slash the to-do list (or throw it away completely. You can remember one or two things without needing to write them down and if you can’t remember something, it probably wasn’t that important in the first place!)

You’re not a hamster. It’s time to climb off the wheel and enjoy the view – but only if you slow down enough to see it! Are you game?