Having a daily to do list with GTD
In some ways, Getting Things Done discourages creating a daily to do list. It certainly has been seen to discourage misusing the calendar, and in many ways GTD is intentionally disconnected from the concept of time. Instead, it is based around next actions, priorities and contexts.
However, I have found it really hard to operate purely with next actions and contexts, and I end up having too many active projects at any one time. I've also struggled to truly utilize contexts and make them narrow down my next actions in the way I want, that feels aligned with my priorities. For me, a daily to do list has previously been very useful for my productivity.
Something I appreciate and have maintained from GTD, is that if you assign a task a date and then you breeze by it and feel guilty about it, then that's unhelpful. I appreciate that GTD pushes me to only truly use dates on my calendar and due dates in my todo app for items that absolutely must be done on those days.
So I have chosen not to utilize due dates for the purpose of a daily todo list. Instead, I have a simple today label which I assign to tasks the night before or in the morning, to narrow down my next actions to ones I will aim to accomplish that day. Then, at the end of the day I can clear the today labels entirely (or carry them over), and I don't feel any guilt at all about doing that it doesn't have too much meaning other than "I decided I want to work on this today". This distinction is important for me, as I can keep full trust that anything that absolutely must be done will be in my calendar or have a due date, and those dates are very separate from my today label.
With this approach, I have aimed to combine two approaches that over the years I've found very effective for my productivity: a daily to do list, and the GTD system.