What my mama told me, and when I finally heard it

My mom told me that “a to-do list is like a mental compass that you use to navigate the ocean of junk inside your head,” our essayist writes.

In the morning, before getting up, I write this to-do list in a small notebook: 

1. Go to the bank.

2. Get a nice haircut.

3. Pick up my final, signed academic statement from my college.

4. Submit the packet of poems.

I think, “That’s enough for one day,” and I roll out of bed.

Up until a few years ago, I didn’t aim to be anywhere. And in order to be nowhere, one does not need a to-do list as a guide. Simply existing had been enough for me. Focusing only on the most pressing matter in front of me was enough. Let the next urgent moment think for me. 

My mama had tried to teach me about planning my day ever since I was 10. But I never practiced it until I was 25 and done with college. That’s when I awoke to the fact that I didn’t want to waste any more time. I live in Nigeria, where life and success can be difficult. There seem to be many avenues to failure here.

My mom told me that “a to-do list is like a mental compass that you use to navigate the ocean of junk inside your head.” 

Here’s one of my mom’s typical to-do lists:

1. Take the kids to the tailor shop.

2. Call Mama X for my products.

3. Remind Joseph to call the mechanic.

Every day she writes a list. I never understood why she had to write down a list that consists of items you can easily hold in your mind. “Your to-do list is like your second mind,” she told my younger self. “And you’re going to need a second mind sometimes in your life.”

I didn’t understand what she meant by “a second mind” until I seemed to lose my first mind trying to navigate my everyday life. What do you call waking up and trudging around each day for weeks and months like a zombie, achieving nothing? 

I grew up seeing my mother firmly in charge of her day. She knew – and still knows – where she needed to be at every moment, in every major and minor detail. She’s always in motion and always on time. And if she ever feels lost or overwhelmed, she consults her second mind. It’s contained in a school exercise book she keeps in the bag she carries with her everywhere she goes.

My mom may not be good at singing, acting, or sports. But she is excellent at business, bookkeeping, and planning. Planning, in fact, is at the top of her list.

“Plan for tomorrow,” was the tagline of a commercial I saw every evening on the local news growing up. It’s my mom’s headline, her bulletin: plan, plan, plan.

Sometimes, it seems as though it’s July in my mind – the rainy season here. Inside my head, it won’t stop raining torrents of confused and distracting thoughts that overflow my mental gutters and lead nowhere. I need a second mind – now!

Memories from childhood endure, especially memories of things your mama told you when you were little. Perhaps you were a baby giggling in the crib, or a young child walking with your mom to the local market, kicking up the dust mindlessly. The young me resisted my mother’s advice. But today, right at the bottom of my daily to-do list, I write: Make a new list. 

My mom may be wrong about a thousand things, but she’s got this thing right. And now, finally, like a hungry fish, I’ve eagerly swallowed her advice – hook, line, and sinker. 

As I sit in the barbershop awaiting my nice haircut, a colleague asks me, “What’s next?”

“Pick up my final clearance form from college,” I say. “Then submit my packet of poems, then go to bed.”

“You’ve got it figured out like a granny,” he teases.

“No,” I say, “like my mother.”

In 2020, I learned the value of self-discipline. In 2021, I learned consistency. And last year, full of promise and hope, I began to practice what my mother finally succeeded in teaching me for so many years: I awake every morning, my mind renewed. I stride confidently into a chaotic society – with my second mind secure in my breast pocket.