* not actually important if you’ve been putting them off for a month * insanely important but complicated things that need to be broken down into smaller tasks * important things with a lot of emotional baggage attached; either hand these off to someone who will not have that, or make time to unpack that baggage - unpacking it is usually the harder option and likely to become its own constantly-deferred to-do.
I used to have this same problem. My solution is to push items into the future if it's clear I'm not going to be able to get to them the next day. Sort of like GTD's tickler file. As long as your todo list tool allows you to add dates, you can view only items due today. That's made having a large list of tasks much easier to manage, because I only see what I have to work on today.
I've tried it a few times but it doesn't work for me because of your third point. I can't maintain a TODO list and I've always had mine grow too big. I end up having to drag 5-10 things to the next day every day after a month or so. I know it's because I'm horrible at prioritization and I do best when given a list of crap to do and can pick and choose what I feel like doing when I feel like doing it.
I use a big whiteboard calendar for my most important deadlines, bills, and appointments. I use a calendar app for recurring events. Then I use Obsidian to dump thoughts, lists, any random crap I think of that I can search through.