How to Optimize Your Todoist System for Focus, Clarity, and Execution
If your Todoist feels heavy, it’s usually because execution, planning, and habits are mixed together. This guide shows how to separate those roles so your daily list stays clear, calm, and actionable.
This post is a follow‑up and optimization of a previous Todoist system I shared. The original worked — until my life, training, and responsibilities outgrew it.
👉 If you haven’t made a todoist system yet, STOP, this is an advanced todoist tutorial, start simple here.
This post builds directly on that foundation and focuses on what changed once the system started feeling heavy. For a long time, my Todoist setup looked solid. Tasks were getting done. Habits were consistent. Training and work were moving forward. But opening Todoist started to feel heavier instead of clearer — not because I had too much to do, but because everything was asking for attention at the same time.
That friction is what led me to rebuild the system.
This post breaks down what was flawed in my original setup and how I optimized Todoist into a calmer, execution‑first system you can adapt for your own life.
Where My Old System Started to Break Down
The original system was built around structure, discipline, and consistency.
It did a great job of capturing everything:
Training sessions
Business tasks
Personal admin
Nutrition habits
Supplements
Mobility
Journaling
Delegated work
The problem wasn’t lack of organization. The problem was lack of separation. Over time, I noticed a pattern:
Every time I opened Todoist, I felt a low-grade pressure — even on days when I was objectively doing well.
Why?
Because my task manager had become a place where execution tasks and maintenance habits lived side by side. A hard, focus-heavy task like “Write a blog post” sat right next to “Take supplements” or “No artificial sugar today.”
My brain didn’t know the difference. It treated everything as urgent, effortful work. That’s when I realized the issue wasn’t motivation or discipline.
It was classification.
The Core Problem: Habits Competing With Real Work
When everything looks actionable, nothing actually is.
Most people don’t have a task management problem.
They have a classification problem.
We put two very different types of tasks into the same list:
Things that require focus, sequencing, and effort
Things that simply confirm the kind of person we’re trying to be
Examples:
“Film a training video” and “Take supplements”
“Write a blog post” and “No artificial sugar today”
“Plan next week’s schedule” and “Walk the dogs”
One of these requires thinking. The other requires consistency. But when they live in the same place, your brain treats them the same. That’s where overwhelm comes from. The solution isn’t fewer habits. It isn’t fewer goals.
It’s separation of intent.
The Principle That Changed Everything
Here’s the rule that unlocked my entire system:
If it doesn’t require strategy, it shouldn’t compete with strategy.
Habits are not tasks you decide to do. They’re evidence that you showed up. Once I stopped asking my task manager to do everything, and instead gave each list a single job, everything got easier.
The Three Modes You Need (And Most People Don’t Separate)
Your brain operates in three distinct modes:
Execution Mode — What do I need to do right now?
Planning Mode — What do I need to progress this week?
Maintenance Mode — Did I live in alignment today?
Most Todoist setups mash all three together. This system intentionally keeps them separate.
Step 1: Create a Dedicated Habit Project
Goal: Separate maintenance from execution so your brain can relax.
First, create a new project in Todoist.
Name it something obvious and calming, like: 🧘 Daily Habits
This project has one job: Hold anything that is about consistency, health, identity, or maintenance.
Examples of tasks that belong here:
Supplements
Nutrition check‑ins
Walking the dogs
Journaling
Mobility
Stretching
“No artificial sugar today”
If you would still want to do it on your worst day, it’s probably a habit.
Move all of those tasks into this project. This one change alone will dramatically clean up your system.
Step 2: Make Habits Time‑Triggered, Not Attention‑Triggered
Habits don’t need to stare at you all day. They need to show up when it’s time to do them.
For each habit in your Daily Habits project:
Give it a specific time
Make it recurring
Examples:
Afternoon supplements → every day at 3:00 PM
Nutrition check‑in → every day at 10:30 PM
Journaling → every day at 11:00 PM
Now these tasks stay invisible until they matter.
You don’t waste cognitive energy seeing them all day.
Step 3: Build a Daily Habit Filter (So Maintenance Stops Competing With Focus)
Before fixing my execution view, I had to give habits a proper home. Up until this point, habits were scattered across my system. Some lived in Life OS. Some lived alongside work. All of them showed up during the day — whether I could act on them or not.
So instead of trying to hide habits everywhere else, I did something simpler:
I gave them their own filter.
Why a Habit Filter Matters
Habits don’t need constant attention.
They need containment.
When habits are visible all day, they quietly drain focus. When they’re hidden completely, they get forgotten. The answer is a filter that shows them only when they’re relevant.
This is what that looks like.
How to Build the Daily Habit Filter in Todoist
Quick setup checklist:
Open Todoist → Filters
Click Add Filter
Name it something obvious, like: 🧘 Daily Habits — Due Now
Use this filter query:
#🧘 Daily Habits
& (overdue | due before: +3 hours)
What This Filter Does
Only shows tasks from your Daily Habits project
Only shows habits that are:
overdue, or
due today
This became my end-of-day scorecard, not a work list. I don’t plan from this view. I don’t prioritize from this view.
I check it when the day is winding down and ask one simple question:
Did I live in alignment today?
Once habits were contained here, everything else got lighter.
Step 4: Build a True “Master Today” Filter
This is your command center. If it’s here, it deserves focus.
This is the most important part of the system. Your Master Today view should answer exactly one question:
What do I personally need to execute today?
That’s it. No habits. No maintenance. No delegated work.
Here’s the filter I use:
(today | overdue)
& !#🧘 Daily Habits& !#Life OS
& !assigned to: others
What this does:
Shows only tasks due today or overdue
Removes all habits
Removes life maintenance items
Removes tasks assigned to other people
This becomes the only list I work from during the day.
If something is in this view, it deserves focus.
Step 4: Create a Weekly Planning View (Not an Execution List)
Weekly planning is about direction, not pressure.
Your weekly view should help you answer:
What needs to move forward over the next 7 days?
Here’s the weekly filter:
due before: +7 days
& !#🧘 Daily Habits
& !#Life OS
& assigned to: me
This view is not something you grind through. You open it during your weekly review, pull a few priorities into Master Today, and close it.
Think of it as a menu, not a checklist.
Step 5: Separate Delegation From Execution
If you manage other people, this is critical.
You should not see delegated work mixed into your execution views.
Create a separate filter for employee or team tasks, for example:
#Karate RX
& assigned to: others
This becomes a manager view, not a work list.
You check it intentionally — you don’t live in it.
This prevents constant context‑switching and unnecessary stress.
Step 6: Use Habits as a Scorecard, Not a To‑Do List
At the end of the day, I open my habits view.
Not to decide what to do.
But to answer one question:
Did I live in alignment today?
I check things off quickly. No drama. No perfectionism.
Some days aren’t perfect. That’s fine.
The system is there to reflect reality — not judge it.
Why This System Works
At a glance:
This setup works because it respects how your brain actually operates.
Focus needs boundaries
Habits need invisibility
Planning needs space
When everything lives together, everything feels urgent.
When each list has a single job, your mind can relax.
Final Thought: Optimizing Todoist Isn’t About Doing More
Most articles about Todoist optimization focus on features, shortcuts, or productivity hacks.
What I learned is that the real optimization happens at the psychological level.
A good Todoist system doesn’t motivate you. It doesn’t pressure you. It doesn’t constantly remind you of everything you haven’t done.
It creates clear lanes:
One place to execute
One place to plan
One place to maintain alignment
When you optimize Todoist around how your brain actually works — instead of how you think it should work — clarity becomes the default.
A productivity system shouldn’t make you feel productive.
It should make it easier to do the work that matters, while quietly supporting the life you’re trying to build.
If your Todoist system feels heavy, it’s not because you’re undisciplined.
It’s probably because your system is asking one list to do too many jobs.
Separate execution from maintenance.
Your focus will thank you for it.
— Sean
The Average Ninja