Here’s why:

Keeping it REALLY simple

All Anxiety does is allow you to add, view and check off to-do items. No reminders — that’s what Task.fm is for! — no email, no integration with web apps. Just a clean list.

Living in your menubar

Anxiety doesn’t have to be in the dock to function. It just sits in your menubar, waiting for you to pop open the attractive, compact HUD display. Keeping it out of the dock means it’s not distracting, but putting in the menubar means it’s there when you need it.

Playing nicely with others

Anxiety doesn’t replace your iCal or Google Calendar, but you can choose to have your Anxiety items listed as to-dos in either iCal or Apple Mail. That way, if you need to assign dates and times to them, place them on your calendar, add reminders, etc., you can do it fairly quickly.

Going easy on your system resources

Anxiety only uses 7 or 8MB of memory on my system, compared to 24MB for iCal and 55MB for Mail. It’s as if you don’t even have it open.

For me, Anxiety is basically a list of article ideas and pitches to send out when I have time. You could really use it for any kind of list, though. Certainly, it’s not going to be enough for some people, but it’s worth considering if your organizational style  is fairly loose and lightweight.

What’s your favorite to-do list app? Let us know in the comments.

Jay is a freelance writer based in Seattle, WA. He writes about software for Download Squad and contributes interviews to Geek Monthly magazine, among others. You can also follow him on Twitter and at his blog.

It’s certainly not always an easy decision to make, but here are some signs that you’ve gone too far need to scale back on the obsessive list-making:

You’re Spending More Time Making Lists Than Doing Work

If you’re using list-making to procrastinate by jotting down more and more low-priority tasks instead of getting any of the high-priority ones finished, you’re in trouble. It’s a vicious cycle, too, because the list only gets more overwhelming as you make it longer.

Your List Has Stale Items On It

When you’ve got a bunch of tasks that have been sitting on your to-do list, making you feel guilty for months, it’s time to either do them or wipe the slate clean. Sometimes, admitting that you’re not actually going to get something done can be as much of a relief as finishing it. Either way, make sure you’re not seeing stale tasks when you look at your to-do list.

Your List Has No Sense of Priority

If you’ve got a full make of stuff to do with notes in the margins, or an email folder full of action items that all appear equally urgent, you might want to start over. When your list isn’t telling you what your next action should be, it’s hurting you more than it’s helping.

Throwing away your to-do list doesn’t mean getting rid of everything on it. It means reevaluating what you should be doing right now, and making a clean, less-intimidating list. In fact, try to finish a couple of your most pressing tasks BEFORE you make that new list, so you don’t end up in the trap of drafting and redrafting pages of items without acting on any of them.

I know lists can seem immensely important, but sometimes you just have to let them go. Happy prioritizing!

Jay is a freelance writer based in Seattle, WA. He blogs about software for Download Squad and contributes interviews to Geek Monthly magazine, among others. You can also find him on Twitter.

Photo Credit – waterboy_of_the_lord