How to Use a To-Do List to Reinvent Your Identity
There are two main ways to think about your personality. One looks at traits like openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, and agreeableness.
The other focuses on actions or personal projects, such as “overcoming anxiety,” “stopping laziness,” or “starting a weekly workout routine.” These achievements help define who you are. This perspective makes it easier to analyze your life effectively.
What we do influences who we become. Personal projects are future-focused and push us forward. By paying attention to their path, we can better understand our true self. If we don’t like the direction, we can change it and become more productive.
Review your personal projects Personal projects aren’t just formal tasks like enrolling your child in a good school. They include activities you choose happily. These can be simple, like walking the dog, or very serious, like organizing a charity event.
Take ten minutes to list everything you're doing now. Don’t limit yourself—you can include chores and hobbies. My team and I studied many people's lists and found some common types of personal projects.
Work-related: planning your monthly budget. Relationships: having dinner with a friend. Household: buying a new filter for the fridge. Fun: going on a cruise. Health: losing 5 kg. Self-improvement: learning to handle anxiety.
The last type is especially important. It involves activities aimed at personal growth, like “becoming a better listener” or “feeling less anxious while talking.” These projects can bring feelings of depression or vulnerability.
If you see these in your life, you might notice you're stuck in a cycle—thinking about what you have to do and feeling frustrated with your progress. Still, intrapersonal projects can also boost your creativity and openness to new ideas.
If you find intrapersonal projects on your list, ask who started them. If they come from your own wish to change, they will likely help you and be easier to stick with. If someone else forced them on you, it’s better to drop those projects.
Studies show that actions you control yourself tend to increase happiness more than those imposed from outside.
Look at how your character affects your projects The main benefit of viewing personality through actions is the chance to change. This way, you can pick and adapt your personal projects on purpose. But your character still plays a role.
Research shows that traits like extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness influence how you see your projects.
These traits also shape what projects you choose and how hard they are to do. For example, people high in neuroticism tend to see things more negatively. They often see most projects as stressful. If this sounds familiar, try to include small activities that lift your mood. You don’t need big goals; starting with small, enjoyable tasks works better.
Personality traits matter for happiness. But your projects can have a stronger effect on how you feel inside. For example, a quiet, sad person isn’t doomed to a bad life. They can still find happiness through the right projects.