Love of Lists

I love lists! Always have. When I'm confused or overwhelmed, making a list of what's on my mind or what needs to be done or anything at all, really, helps me to focus and move forward. When I'm starting a new project or feeling dispersed at work, a list of 'to do's' does the trick. When all is well and I just want to make sure that loose ends get handled on the weekend, I make a list.

It's not just me - there are beloved lists everywhere. Some people love the Ten Commandments. Some people eagerly await David Letterman's Top Ten lists. The Bill of Rights can be seen as a list. The NY Times Bestseller Fiction and Non-fiction lists are a favorite of many. Shopping Lists help you to stay sane in the supermarket. A budget is essentially an organized list. There is a movie "Ten Things I Hate about You" or some such. (That's a list too) And, of course, the list of 100 things that I want to do before I die.

What is a list, anyway, but a series of somehow related items. The relationship is totally whatever you decide it should be. You can make a list of 10 Blue Things that I saw today, a list of spices that should not be put on salad, a list of types of shoes in your closet.

So just for fun, let's try making some arbitrary lists. How about this for starters:
Ten financial terms that I don't really understand.
Ten places in the world that I'd like to visit.
Ten names of politicians that I remember voting for.
Ten friends that I haven't seen in more than 3 months.
Ten things in my house that can be thrown away.
Ten songwriters or classical composers or people who somehow make music.
Ten musical instruments used in an orchestra. (or in a marching band)

Ok, I could go on and on, but I'm starting to want to look up those financial terms and find pictures of those exotic places or maybe call or write to one of those friends, etc.

Perhaps making a list is more than just a focusing device. Perhaps it stretches your understanding of some category of items just by establishing the relationship that allows those items to be on the same list. Wow, that sounds convoluted, but there's something fascinating about it. The Better Baby Institute had a teaching system involving showing flash cards to your baby of 10 items from some category, like 10 dog breeds or 10 trees or some such. The rationale was that with 10 examples, the baby could get an idea of the gist of the category. Seeing 10 breeds of dog gave a better understanding of the concept of dog.

Enough for now. I've got to go make a list or work on handling one or........