Thank you. Creating lists in Facebook only let's you filter news feed but doesn't allow you to post to them. With circles, not only can you filter out to just see friends in that circle but you can also post updates that will only be seen by them.
Actually, I have tested this myself and have found that changing the privacy settings (like the screenshot you've provided) does not in fact apply towards the list. It's for all wall posts. For circleriot, all that you would need to do is add friends into your circles and that would be the end of it as far as maintaining your circles. Anything that you share within a circle will ONLY be viewed by the users who you choose.
I'm not modifying a list there, I'm modifying the privacy settings of a wall post I'm in the process of making. When making a wall post, there's a little padlock and from selecting the customize option, you can target an update to a list. In this specific case, See Everything is a list I've created. Adding people to that list after this update has already been posted does exactly what you describe, it allows me to maintain just that list and they sell all previous and future things that I limit to it. While I don't use this much for status updates, I use it heavily for restricting photo albums.
It's also not for all wall posts unless you check the box at the bottom of that dialog setting it as the default.