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How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
41–50 of 65 posts
Re: How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
#42Over the years, I've tried many digital to-do lists, including one I wrote myself. Today, I just use a notebook. The trick that I made work is to have two to-do lists: daily and quarterly. For daily, it's simple. I have a variation of the Bullet Journal [1], but interleaved with meeting notes, ideas, etc. But many ideas are bigger than what you can accomplish/benchmark on a daily basis. For those, I have two pages pe…
I also use paper: 1) master todo list: "list of lists" what neets to be done for each category / project 2) calendar with daily todo list: what from master todo list needs to be done today or at specific day Everything without built-in three letter agency spying... I use Moleskine.
Moleskine squared notepads are my favourite writing materials in the world. It would be nice if they weren't so expensive, but it's worth the cost.
Re: How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
#43Interesting thread. Wondering if anyone here has tried using shorthand, a.k.a. stenography, for to-do lists? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shorthand I remember people using it much earlier, and it was offered in a neighborhood typing class I took as a kid. Plus, had seen books about it then.
You may be interested in Quikscript, a writing system inspired by shorthand and intended to replace the messy English writing system.
Re: How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Bullet Journal looks interesting, but to me it feels much more like it should be a tablet app, than in a physical notebook (mainly due to migration of items, but this is of course achievable with an erasable pen or pencil). I say this as someone that is trying to use a physical notebook more & better, and looking for good organisational/notekeeping schemes.
An app never works for productivity stuff.
My issue is latency from _idea in head_ to adequately captured somewhere.
A book is usually open in front of me with a pen at the ready. An application.. well it depends, but best-case scenario is that it's in a easy-to-switch-to window and is natural to just get the idea down without jumping through hoops.
As an aside from a sufferer of ADHD, I think Augmented Reality tech would be a killer platform for an in-place TODO/Note/Reminder/assistant.
Re: How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
#45My paper to-do list is only immediate things (e.g. pick up 'script, dog to vet). Everything else is on the calendar (with reminders) and gets moved to the list when it's time.
Anything non-trivial, I put on my calendar. In addition to telling me 'what' I should be doing, it also tells me 'when' I should be doing it. I've found knowing 'when' - no matter how arbitrarily declared - is huge for preventing things from continuing to haunt me.
Re: How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
#46Interesting that no one has mentioned Google Keep - it works for me, mostly because it's available for both Android and IOS and as a web service. I have to admit syncing is not always perfect, though.
Just curious, any particular reason why others don't mention it?
Re: How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
#47I've found out recently that rather than being something you make or plan, TODO list is the end result of doing something else. Specifically, it's the result of taking notes about your life and your works, TODO list is just what left after you filter out all the actionable items. For example, when I'm doing development work, I'm trying to keep a journal of what I'm doing, why I'm doing something, which step of the ta…
"I think TODO list is just a special kind of notes, and I think a lot of people would benefit from taking more notes about their lives, both for the past (journal) and future (planning)."
I think this is a really good point, in fact if I look at my TODO lists many if not most of the items get added after I complete them.
Re: How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
#48Interesting that no one has mentioned Google Keep - it works for me, mostly because it's available for both Android and IOS and as a web service. I have to admit syncing is not always perfect, though. Just curious, any particular reason why others don't mention it?
I use Keep, and it's become a pretty central part of my life over the last year or so. I never stuck with any other to-do apps- either they were way too extensive (Evernote) or not flexible enough (Wanderlist, Google tasks, Any.do, etc). I like Keep because it lets me store random notes that I need access to during the year (books I want to read, workout lists), to do lists that are transient (a shopping list, recipes), and to do lists that need to stick around for a while (Personal Goals for September). Something about having all that just displayed on one scrollable screen works really well with my mindset where other apps feel tedious and unhelpful.
Re: How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
#49I always create a list of things I did and that somehow helps me reflect on things I may have missed or could have done better. Not exactly a todo list but it works for me.
Re: How Writing To-Do Lists Helps Your Brain
#50Over the years, I've tried many digital to-do lists, including one I wrote myself. Today, I just use a notebook. The trick that I made work is to have two to-do lists: daily and quarterly. For daily, it's simple. I have a variation of the Bullet Journal [1], but interleaved with meeting notes, ideas, etc. But many ideas are bigger than what you can accomplish/benchmark on a daily basis. For those, I have two pages pe…
Do you carry your notebook with yourself everywhere?