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How do you keep your life organized?
I'm interested to hear your methods, tools, and philosophies. Do you write meticulous to-do lists? Pen-n-paper, or a favourite app? Rigorous habit building?
Whatever it is you do that keeps your life in check and gets you to do things on time, I'd love to hear it.
My Outlook calendar is essential for making sure I have all my dates correct. As soon as I plan anything, it immediately goes on my calendar; not only does this remind me as the date gets closer, but the act of typing it into my calendar puts it in my brain and keeps it there. Even if I don't remember the exact date, it's always in the back of my head as something that's approaching.
Microsoft To Do: I have a list for everything, because I am a very forgetful person. A list of movies to watch, books to read, names I'd name my children, project lists for my cars, groceries, general shopping, my favorite meals and on and on. Every day I check the app and add stuff to my daily task list, sometimes it's totally new stuff, other times it's stuff that's carried over from the previous day.
I'm not a very organized person and never really have been, but as my life has become more complicated, I've found these two little things help me stay on top of stuff and not feel like I'm wandering around listless (pun intended) and in a fog.
I do essentially the same thing but with the default reminders and notes app on iOS. Reminders for damn near anything I need or want to be reminded about (e.g. things I need to do tomorrow, shows to watch, games to play, grocery lists, random tidbit of information that someone mentioned that I want to look up later, etc.) and then the notes app for anything longer than that (e.g. projects I'm working on, research about a new _____ that I'm considering getting, comparisons of different brands of a certain food item I like so that I remember which one to get next time I need it, etc.).
On iOS there's an app called 'remind faster' that pretty much does exactly what it sounds like. Makes creating reminders and adding items to the many lists I have a breeze. Even faster, a lot of times I'll just tell Siri to do it ("Hey Siri, add potatoes to the grocery list).
Microsoft To Do is a great app! I am mostly all in on google (typing this from a chromebook) but Microsoft's To Do app is great (I think they acquired another app and rebranded it, right?).
It was a different name and different company, though at this point I can't remember what it was, as it's already been several years since the Microsoft buyout.
To keep my stuff organized I follow 2 simple rules:
To keep my to-dos I use emails and paper:
The problems I've found with maintaining a place for everything and everything in its place stem from having too much stuff crammed into too little space. If something I need needs to be excavated, it's unlikely to return. I may put all the other stuff away, but I'm keeping out my recently used items unless I have STRONG reason to suspect I won't need them again for a while. This leads to a cascading leapfrog of stuff until the room is cluttered again, as I keep bringing new objects to the foreground.
To properly have a dedicated space for everything requires 2 or 3 times the floor space I currently occupy so everything can have a place to be stored where it does not have anything else on top of or in front of it.
That is a very interesting point. Can you consider getting rid of some things you don't really use? Or maybe dedicating bigger spaces for a broader type of objects: a bowl for red pens and another for green ones -> a bowl for pens.
Much of the reason I hold on to so much is the expectation that if I get rid of things now, I'd have to throw away money re-purchasing them once I move to a larger space. Most of the stuff is objectively not junk, just things I don't use often enough (but can't see a clear enough "I won't need this again" to give it away or sell).
Two things I know I'd like to sell are two full-size keyboards. I like them both, but I use 60% boards and a separate numpad to prevent RSI while mousing. I don't expect to use those in the future. The proceeds could fund one of the 60% Model F reruns, so I can alternate between the F for daytime and Poker w/ clears for night.
This is the philosophy of a lot of minimalists. I spend a little bit of time reading minimalist blogs, youtube channels, and a couple of sub reddits. Virtually every day, there is a post about how someone started their minimalism journey only to then end up with more mess within X period of time. The very top response, with the most votes, is often what you describe. It doesn't matter how minimalist you want your life to be, but unless you're organized, you'll need to declutter every few months. Everything having its own place makes life much easier.
I feel that this is why discipline is important when you want to be organized, regardless of going the minimalist path or not. If you are not disciplined enough you either end up with a lot of junk because you can't stop getting stuff of because you are not disciplined enough to put it in place. But even if you fail it is easy to learn from mistakes with that system :)
Honestly I just don't do anything of note nor do I have anyone of note in my life with big life events. makes me life pretty simple.
I'm pretty much all-in on Google:
Over the years, I have tried many digital aids to keep myself organized, but never really found that they worked to give me the sort of control and benefit I needed. I basically tried to do what people in IT often like to do, automate the problem away, but that doesn't really work when the process is shit and requirements incomplete.
For me, my things aren't quite about keeping things organized in the first place but keeping an overview and giving myself room to stop and think on a regular basis.
What I have found over time is that organizing everything that goes and all that is fine, but it doesn't actually always help me personally on actually having a grip on things. It took me a while to realize this, and I want to stress this is all highly personal and anecdotal. But, not everything is important, and just keeping a list where you order things based on priority didn't do it for me.
Out of this realization and a bunch of experimentation came two main tools and one secondary tool. A big analogue notebook, a smaller one and a digital memo tool. The big notebook I basically use to clear my head. Basically in situations where:
I take the big notebook and just start writing out my thoughts. Sort of a monologue with myself, which for me really works to drill down on things and also actually start giving priority to things that matter and I have control over.
The reason I went old-fashioned pen and paper here is because I realized that with typing my thought process is different and I am simply not always reaching the same conclusions. Also, I tend to simply forget about digital tools where having a big notebook is a nice physically reminder of it being a thing I can use.
The smaller notebook I do use for actual organizing on a high level on a daily basis but is heavily influenced by any insights gained in the big one. Basically, at the start of each day, I take the previous day's list and see if there are leftover items. I then just see if they were actually important, and I do want to finish them, or if they actually might not just be done because they aren't actually that important. Then I add anything new that I might want to pick up that day as well as things that pop up during the day.
So basically it isn't a todo list in the sense of "I have to do this", but more a list of "this is on my mind for today of things I have/want to potentially spend time on". So it is more a thing to keep, not loose sight of things in a way that is low pressure and workable for me.
Finally, the digital tool is called memos. It is a neat twitter style note taking app which I basically use on the go when I don't have my notepad available.
I should note that for work I still have my mail, calendar, team kanban board and backlog which I also use. But if I purely used those and (similar) digital tools outside work to keep track of things that comes by I simply would get lost in the all the noise and swept up by all the madness at work. The pen and paper method really is to have it all come together, make sense, determine what actually is important, what is actually urgent (not the same as important), etc.
That is a very broad question because your needs may be quite different mine. I work as a dentist so most of my life is already scheduled and the only thing that I have to plan on my own is studying for my master's degree. I also have ADHD which requires some pretty extreme things sometimes. I will try however to write a short list of things I do that I think will be useful under any circumstance:
My whole philosophy to do things is based in the concept of workflows: most of the things we do daily are repetitive. There may be some variations each time, no patient or mouth is exactly the same and neither is every function you have to code or stories you want to write. However, there are usually many similarities and some clear guidelines you can follow. Whatever it is in your day to day life that you want to become better at doing, the most important thing is finding out a routine or a workflow you can apply to get reliable results. A workflow may just be a plan, a checklist or a flowchart. Here are some examples:
Diagnosing my patients is the same every time: While every case is different, I always follow the same routine, ask the same questions, look at the same things and plan treatments and appointments in the same order. The first time I see a patient I write a full treatment plan in order and with the amount of time I think I need every day to execute the treatment. That means that I don't have to rely on memory to know what comes next or that if I need to refer a patient to another professional, they know where to find the treatment plan and instantly know what comes next. If I ever forget to write, which happens from time to time, it's utter chaos.
If I am told I have to do something, I write it down immediately. I've been living with myself long enough to know that I can't rely on my memory even if my life depends on it. I always have a piece of paper and a pen on me, or my Apple Watch or my iPhone. I either write a note or a reminder. If it's something that has to be done later that day, I will immediately set up an alarm. If not, every night I check all notes, reminders and pieces of paper. If it's something I have to do soon, I will schedule it right then: I will create a reminder not just with the date, but the time I expect to do the thing too so my smartwatch rings and reminds me of what I have to do. I also have the Reminders widget in my Home Screen set for "Today" so I can see at a glance what I have scheduled to do that day. If it's some cool idea that I thought about, I will set a calendar date for the first Saturday of the next month with the idea and link it to a note if I need to expand on it. If it's an interesting book, I have a note in Apple Notes with all the books I want to write with a short summary, who recommended it and why I want to read it. I want to make it very clear: I write a reminder for even the most simple things. For example, I took a dental model of a patient that I have to move to another practice. Not only did I put it in my bag that I always carry with me, I also set a reminder so my watch tells me first thing in the morning when I am at that other practice that I have to take out the model from my bag and do whatever I need with it, just in case I reach into my bag and I don't see it or remember to take it out. I prefer to look stupid always writing notes and reminders than forget to do things.
Studying or reading scientific articles is also the same every time: I load the PDF of the article or book (or print the website in PDF) to MarginNote 3 (it's just the app I use), I create a mind map with the idea and how different concepts relate to each other and I either add it to Obsidian if it's information I want to categorise about a topic, add it to Anki if it's a fact I want to memorise or change any workflow in my daily practice if it's something new or different I want to start doing. If I don't take useful notes and do something immediately with it, I may as well have read absolutely nothing.
If it's something I have to do every day, be it sleep, read, play games, eat, exercise or whatever. I block part of my day to do it. I prefer to do things every day rather than every other day: I have found that if I work out just 3 times a week, I am more likely to skip a workout that if I work out 5 times a week. If I have two huge study blocks of time per week, it's harder for me to do it than studying a little bit every day. I even clean the house a little every day. This may sound inefficient because it is, but it's the only strategy I have found to stick to doing things and develop habits. Doing things (almost) every day is likely to clog up your schedule so I am okay replacing some habits with others: cardio with weight lifting, playing games instead of reading... or even giving up some things temporary, like reading or playing games in favour of practicing dental waxing so I learn faster.
If it's a big project (i.e. reading a huge reference book), I create small sub-tasks for it (i.e. dividing a book by chapters) and I set up both a time to read it everyday and a deadline (if there isn't one).
If I come by a book or article I really really want or need to read, I schedule a time to do it.
Every morning I check the daily reminders and the things I have to do and evaluate if it's even possible to do them when I planned to do. If it isn't I immediately reschedule it.
So to sum up, my secret to do things is just scheduling them as soon as possible. I schedule even the most little things. There are reminders to wash my car and motorcycle, monthly reminders to check tyre pressure, reminders every 6 month to check spare tire pressure, weekly reminder to deep clean a certain room of the house. Reminders to send mails, read mails, read certain scientific articles, go grocery shopping...
Library looks interesting - any chance you've got a quick youtube tutorial of it in use? I've read the docs and think I get it but I always seem to process a video demo better.
What parts interest you the most? If I made a comprehensive video it would probably be over an hour long and really boring :/
The archiving of various websites and videos and then the reading / playback afterwards.
I've often thought about hooking the RSS feed of various youtube channels I follow and just downloading the videos locally and having a background playlist that goes through offline.
yeah whenever I find an interesting YouTube channel that I want to follow I just run something like this:
(The same command is used to create a new database or to append to an existing one.)
And then to play videos from YouTube (if your local media player supports it,
mpvdoes):And if you just want to listen:
If you want to download locally to the ~/Videos/ folder
If you want to watch the local videos after downloading:
It is the same command and it will prioritize playing videos that have been downloaded over videos that have not been downloaded. But to explicitly only watch local videos you can do this:
To update playlists you can run
And it will go through all the saved playlists. I run this once per day via
cron. It will delay checking playlists for which videos have not been uploaded to since it last checked (it will wait twice as long each time, up to one year; and it will check more frequently if a playlist has a new video).If you want to ignore the smart update behavior you can force updating:
I'm not a super organized person but I've started trying two apps that kinda help:
Tick-tick for quick things that I need to do. (not really using it for groceries or anything even though I probably should) Typing "Take out the trash every two weeks starting Tuesday" syntax is easier than using a calendar app in my mind.
Using Tick-Tick, I do habit tracking too, and one of the things I've added recently is a Daily Note on Obsidian for my day, just to keep my brain organized and to remember what I did every day. It's more of a journaling thing even though I don't like jounaling in general.
One thing my therapist recommended to me was to try and carry a small notebook around to write down any stray thoughts that might be bothering me, but I don't like "manually organizing" things lol. That way I can be more "in the moment" which has helped me, I'm migrating all those things onto Obsidian now.
I use a google calendar sometimes and I have some .txt lists for various types of things. In the kitchen I have a dossier for recipes and a good old notepad for shopping and cooking lists.
But for the most part, like routine, things to do, where things are stored, ideas, etc. I use my awesome memory. It's about 80% filled with mistakes, regrets and embarrassing moments, but the remaining 20% is plenty!
Todoist, Dakboard in the kitchen + Outlook calendar. YNAB for finances. That keeps the family organised, more or less.
For me, a physical bullet journal/planner works best. Right now, I'm using a bullet journal for work (where I need to juggle a lot of tasks and remember a lot of things), and a regular planner for life stuff (where not that much is happening but I need to remember various appointments and stay on top of tasks). I tried to go digital but it's just not for me.
If I have to be totally honest - I have a wife. She really is amazing at keeping our family organized. Other than that, I don't do anything more advanced than a shared calendar and a todo app for basic reminders.
Apple Reminders and a Pomodoro timer (a 25 minute work session followed by a 5 minute break).
My philosophy and process has changed over the years. I try not to stringently arrange my personal life as that leads me to frustration when things don't work out "exactly" as I planned. I am also anti-list in my personal life as that is just a way to generate anxiety, IMO.
With that in mind, I do use the following tools to keep my personal life more or less organized.
At work, I add three additional tools
I find I'm incredibly terrible at organization, a big part of it is due to my ADHD. I have probably about a dozen notebooks that have two pages of todos, notes or ideas and then a bunch of scribbles and doodles and then a bunch of blank pages. I have tried various todo/notes apps and they all fall to the wayside.
The best I can do is a calendar shared with my wife. Early on in our relationship said if it's not in the calendar it's optional, so that has made it the most effective way to keep track of my personal life.
At work we use a ticketing system and daily standups that I can easily keep track of what needs to be done.
I use:
aCalendar for my dated appointments
Tasks (F-Droid, Free and Open Source) for projects that have multiple subtasks
Paper and notebooks for little tasks that I are done quickly that I can scratch off.
I'd like to keep everything in one place but I've never found anything that is so appealing that will make me drop everything and use it, especially when I comes to the ease of quick handwritten paper notes
That's the neat thing, I don't! I only use my Outlook calendar for work stuff but outside of that I just sort of wing it.
I have a pretty simple life
What I do have I keep track using ToDoIst plus writing various notes stickies and also Google calendar
I rotate between optimal and bare bones, depending on my life's squall force.
When I fall behind because something happens, I take a scrap of paper and list my top priorities, including any self care, and only focus on that.
Other small things,
Alas, I don’t. I’m grasping at straws by collecting all my various calendars into Fantastical on iOS, and rambling down some notes in an Obsidian that syncs to every device. It keeps me floating for now.
Google calendar, with tasks. Most things go there. I also use Tody (spelled like that) to keep track of those house chores that have to be done like every month or every other week, because I find it's more flexible.
It's nudie magazine day!
Now, what year do you think it is?
/just kidding