Getting From Notebooks to My System

I have a confession to make. I love notebooks. I love the feel of writing on paper with a good pen. I love making lists on paper, too.

Unfortunately, I have a problem getting those lists back into my productivity system.

I found a notebook in my briefcase this week containing a bunch of items I needed to get to…last week. So I decided to think about how to sync my notebook with my electronics.

The system I’m going to explain here I’ve used for a few weeks, and I’ve had good results with it so far.

The Materials

• A notebook. I bought a fun little notebook, plastic covered, spiral bound.
• Flags. I have a packet of Post-it Flags(aff) tucked into the back pocket of the notebook.

The Method

Every night I mark a new page with the vertical flag from yesterday. This is my starting point.

During the day, everything gets written in here. If it is a to-do, it has a little box drawn against it.

At the end of the day, I put everything into its proper electronic place. If for some reason I can’t translate it into electronic format, I put a horizontal flag on it.

At the end of the week, all horizontals are either scanned into the computer or removed.

It’s a fairly simple system, but it is working so far. What I find is that other than the to-do items, pretty much everything in the book is simply thinking out loud. Most of it does not need to be put into the electronic format.

Photo by Wm Jas