The Well Done List
End each day by naming what you did well given where you were
- Difficulty
- Starter
- Time to result
- ~days to results
- Steps
- 4
- Confidence
- 72%
The Well Done List is Chris Williamson's variation on Oliver Burkeman's 'done list.' Where a gratitude journal tends toward the fruity and fluffy ('I had a great walk, I'm grateful for my health'), the Well Done List asks a sharper question: what did you do well today, weighted by where you were at the time? The mechanism is contextual self-credit. Remaining cordial during a difficult meeting despite being tired counts as a genuine 'well done' precisely because it accounts for the difficulty of your starting state, something a gratitude entry ('I kept my cool') wouldn't capture in the same personal way. Because it registers effort against circumstance, it works even on days you woke up sick or on the wrong side of the bed: you can still live the life you were given today well. It's a lightweight end-of-day reframe that builds self-compassion through accurate acknowledgement rather than forced positivity.
Origin
Williamson and his friend George devised it on a month-long road trip across America as a build on Burkeman's 'done list,' renaming it the Well Done List.
Core principles
- 01Recognise what you did well, not merely what you're grateful for
- 02Judge your actions in the context of the state you were in that day
- 03A 'well done' is personal and effortful, where gratitude tends to be pro-social and fluffy
- 04You can live well within whatever hand today dealt you
How to run it
- 1
Review the day for wins
At the end of the day, look back and identify the things you did well rather than only what happened to you.
Watch out Distinguish it from gratitude journaling, which tends to become fluffy and pro-social.
- 2
Weight by your starting state
Judge each action in the context of where you were at the time, so a small win under hard conditions counts fully.
Pro tip Staying cordial in a difficult meeting while exhausted is a real 'well done'.
- 3
Name it as personal, not generic
Record the item in a way that reflects genuine personal effort rather than a generic thankfulness statement.
- 4
Credit living your given day well
Even on a sick day or a bad-mood day, acknowledge that you lived the life you were handed today well.
In the wild
Williamson contrasts a gratitude entry with a Well Done entry. A gratitude journal drifts to 'I had a great walk, I'm grateful for my health', which stays fruity and impersonal. The Well Done List instead records something like: 'I managed to remain cordial today during a difficult meeting despite the fact that I was tired.' That counts as a genuine well done because it factors in the state he was in at the time. The same act framed as gratitude ('I kept my cool') loses the personal, effortful, context-sensitive quality that makes the reframe land.
→ Crediting effort-in-context builds self-compassion that generic gratitude journaling misses.
Common mistakes
Collapsing it back into gratitude
Listing generic thankfulness items ignores the difficulty of your circumstances and loses the personal, effortful credit the practice is built on.
Ignoring your starting state
Recording only 'objective' wins without weighting them by how you felt strips out the contextual dignity that makes small acts count.
Is it for you?
Best for
People who find gratitude practice too generic and want credit for effort in context.
Not ideal for
Anyone seeking a broad thankfulness practice rather than a performance-in-context review.
From the transcript
“why don't we just call it a well done list”
“I managed to um remain cordial today during a difficult meeting despite the fact that I was tired like that's a well done”
From the episode
8 Unexpected Lessons To Be Less Hard On Yourself - Oliver Burkeman - #840
Oliver Burkeman