You are so correct. I have already watched a variety of planning/ motivational videos and gathered a great structure. But beginning it is the most painstaking thing which is procrastinated by us all. How do I create such self-awareness that I would cling to the task at my own will? Build your own ideas from scratch on the basis of what subject holds a magnetising effect on you. Anything which is fun to explore and yet sellable. A business model based on your nature. I am sure you would wake up early morning if it was a holiday trip, but you don't do it for work. You don't just decide and make it your truth. Instead, succeed each day with your tiny habits and sticking to a routine, until it becomes your behaviour. Use music, role model, art or anything that inspires you. Juice up each day by sharpening the saw and use it for the rest of the day. Enter that state of mind.
I like to watch productivity videos as I do schoolwork. I use the browser Opera which has a built-in feature to make RU-vid videos pop out of the browser so I can overlay it over my online textbook. So I just have that in the corner talking about that good productive stuff as I do homework, thus helping me be more productive. You could give that a shot. Play his videos in the background (if you can-I know that can mess people up so it depends on the person) as you do your work, and use the productive premises to motivate you.
One of the reason i liked your video is your speed in talking - it personally annoys me to wait for people to say a single word.... your was adrenaline rush but time efficient. and i liked your other ideas too so THANKS FOR POSTING
Great vids! I would consider adding silence time of around 4 seconds total scattered in some places of the video to allow viewers to process what was just said (for instance, 0.25-1 seconds at the end of your most powerful sentence in the video). Just an idea!
***** thanks! That's probably not a bad idea; I've been focusing on making my editing snappier, but it could probably stand to have some pauses here and there.
I like this idea. I love your videos Thomas Frank, (my absolute favorite channel,) but I find I have to watch the video 2 and 3 times just to catch everything. That probably won't go away by adding seconds of silence because you stuff the vids with so much great information, but I do feel like it would help me process the essence of what you're saying in each point.
Great video. I know your videos are for college students, but I've been around a (long) time and after 20+ years as a professional, I have almost the identical system as you and it works! Your suggestions are spot-on and should help students build the habits and skills now that they can use for 20+ years. ;)
Hey Daan, feel free to find some tutorials on my channel - evernote also has a great list of videos on their RU-vid channel - sorry for the delayed comment :D
My weekly planning I do as follows; I plan the entire week on Sunday, then I review the planning for that week on Thursday. This prevents two things from happening; I prevent myself from front-loading all of my weekly tasks and I also prevent myself from backloading them as well. It is very tempting if you make a week planning to burn through your work at the beginning of the week to try and have completely free days for the rest. When I reach the half-way point, I review if I will have time to finish what I set out to do; in other words, I review whether my expectations for that week were realistic or stifled in some way. Depending on what the outcome of that review is, I will adjust my expectations, either by balancing out the week by putting some more stuff on the schedule or by planning ahead the things I'm not able to finish this week for the week after.
Pt Nick Sure! It's nothing to do with computers, really. It's more akin to filling a truck. Loading in the front or in the back is going to determine the balance of the car. If you put all the stuff you do "in the front', as in, right after the weekend, you may wear yourself out or have nothing else to do for the rest of the week. If you load "in the back" it's the other way around. It's important that you spread your tasks over the entire week, so you don't become inactive. It's okay if there's a variance in the amount of work you do from day to day, but try to have something to do every day of the week. Even in the weekend or your off day in the week, plan ahead what you would like to do for fun.
Alderick van Klaveren oh, ok. A problem I have is that I never set time aside to have fun, then I just end up burning out, or distracting myself when I SHOULD be doing work. I'm so bad at this.
+Pt Nick, oh what a familiar problem. Which does not mean that a work whole day long. The saddest thing is when I know I have 5 important tasks to do. And instead of doing them and then having my leisure time, I procrastinate them for days or weeks. And while procrastinating, I literally have free time (because I'm not doing anything productive), but it does not feel like leisure time at all. I never enjoy it the same way as if I had already finished the 5 important tasks. And even though this sounds like "Wow, obviously you have a chilled life with lots of free time", I also end up burning out, because I tend to have extended periods of time with no real quality leisure time. I never get my head empty this way :(
Thank you for this video. It is exactly what I was looking for. Something to organise my: - Huge list of random tasks - Day-to-day tasks - Ideas and other notes Thanks brother!
This is pretty close to how my planning process works. It's changed from high school where I used to keep (and fail) a planner for my work, until I learned that planner + white board is only good for non-school stuff. I usually have Habit RPG act as my daily plan with the combination of Dailes and To-Dos. OneNote and my mac's Stickies app keeps the bulk of my weekly tasks. I'm a student so it makes more sense to keep everything within access of my computer since my room is mostly used for sleeping and eating nowadays.
***** totally makes sense. When I was a student, I used an app called Strike, which lets you create single-use, disposable to-do lists. So I'd use Wunderlist to capture all my tasks, then create my daily plan in Strike so I wouldn't get overwhelmed looking at every single thing I had to do all the time.
Lately I've been, well excruciatingly bored. This year I am taking very non-challenging courses. At most, I do 30 minutes of homework and studying a night to get A's. I find myself with a lot of unwanted free time (I like to keep myself busy), and am very tired of this monotonous lifestyle. Even my job (I work at a restaurant) can be extremely boring, even on faster-paced days. What can I do to keep my brain stimulated?
Kelsey Watlington do you have a list of goals? Check out my Impossible List here - maybe it'll give you some inspiration: collegeinfogeek.com/about/meet-the-author/my-impossible-list/ I find that setting goals and trying to gamify elements of my life makes things more interesting. When I worked in a restaurant, I'd challenge myself to get everything done as fast as possible (though my main challenge was to find a more mentally stimulating job). For fitness, I used an app called Fitocracy to turn working out into a game, and it amped my motivation to ridiculous levels.
Thanks, I was struggling with adding too many ToDo's on my list, panicking that I'll never get it all done! Now I will throw them all in an Ideas place, and I can pick them out realistically to do weekly and daily.
7 лет назад
-Invent AI -Take over the world -Lose world to AI Crap...
Hey Thomas, Do you have any study/organization tips for adults who have ADHD? Our brains are wired differently; and we are not able to follow through with tasks/events based on normal neurotypical people who are driven by: 1. Rewards 2. Consequences 3. Importance. Adults with ADHD are driven by: 1. Urgency 2. Interest 3. Novel/Innovation 4. Challenging. You have a cornucopia list of great planning and studying tips; but I'm personally finding it quite difficult to stay on track for the long-term; as well as in the moment with studying. Any suggestions?
ADHD drugs work well, don't be afraid to ask your doctor to keep trying new 1's until you find which works the best for your brain, Daniel Amen's Brain Boost (multi-vitaimin) & 2-3grams of fish oil a day (1/2 in morning 1/2 in afternoon) reward yourself with chocolate increases dopamine, excerise as you as starting to feel unfocused.
Oh, I forgot to ask if you have a video on your content creation process -- for blogs, videos, books, etc. It would be great to see your idea, development and creation process using your same, or similar, tools. Thanks!
The most important task should be the first thing you do when you wake up so you get a high sense of accomplishment and then the rest of the day after that should be a breeze. Also if you don’t finish something on your daily task move it to the first thing you would do for your next days daily tasks
So much help from this, Thomas! Thank you! I'm a new subscriber and I'd be starting college in August. Guess I'll be doing a marathon of your channel! More power and God bless!
I really like this setup! :D I'm planning on using a similar setup when I start college. Except I'm going to buy a Hobonichi Cousin planner since it has a yearly view that allows you to track or make a table of content type thing with it, 2-page weekly spreads with 24 hour timeline, and daily pages that also has a timeline. I think it'll really help without adding to my anxiety. I also think I'm going to use OneNote for most of my brain-dumping.
Thomas so glad your making vids! I always feel so motivated after every one I watch. Essentially I have a small planner for school assignments, lets me know what I should work on. 2 physical calanders for habits,due dates, and events. Habitrpg for anything non school related and personal goals and I've been using evernote for about five years now mostly to journal but I'm starting to get more organized with idea notebooks.
fenixright right on! I think you'll find Evernote very useful for capturing ideas. I use it for that and so much more - itineraries, personal statements, travel plans - it's made my life so much more organized.
You are completely right on creating a solution that fits yourself. The systems out there are not, in my opinion, one solution is ideal for all. I have tried many :-| not always fun - in fact it takes time playing with them rather than recording, implementing and being effective! Thanks for your approach! I use a mix that, I think.... works ok....
my gosh why are you so handsome? I find myself replaying passages over and over because my mind wanders off about how someone can be THAT good looking and also smart..
i used different things according to what i have to do. i use "do it tomorrow" chrome app for not academic things i want to do, and for school i use everyday a notebook for my homeworks during the week/day . for exams, proyects , event, and free days i use a board calendar . and for a week i have too many things to do i use a simple white board , so i write everything on the board on saturday and as soon as i finish one task i erase it so i feel like there is less to do
Hello, I really ejoy watching your videos and learn a lot from it. You showed in this video a short scene from your Evernote account. Right now I'm trying to establish GTD from David Allen with Evernote. I saw a lot of interesting things in your Evernote, like "Taking notes from books" or the "accomplishment journal". Could you make a video about Evernote, where you show your different categories and structures? :)
I really like the video I would add another subsection to part 1. This part would be specific mentalities or schemas that I want to adapt in some way into my life (and are generally thought based action steps that I can do at any random moment of downtime). An example of a mental program that I have adapted so to speak is"I am the master architect of my own reality". I have specific moments in time where I will say this to myself out loud but if I find an extra moment of down time then I might consult this schema/mentality list to proceed downloading something.
wow I love the idea of writing the time you want to get a task done instead of the time you want to get it started! It definitely adds the stress of deadlines I associate with online schoolwork haha. Also, when I used the "writing time to get started technique", it made me want to procrastinate and I would often put off the task if I was even a minute late to the starting time
I'm so new to organizing my tasks, I felt like I could barely keep up with all of this info! I'm coming from a place of lacking the self-starter initiative for anything, but I at least know I need to start looking at how to organize. I wish there was a cookie cutter system I could wrap my mind around. This is going to be so hard. Whinging done.
Why wouldn't you just assign times to your tasks in Todoist? Just seems counterproductive to split up your tasks between Todoist, a notebook, and a whiteboard, especially if you're probably on your computer the most
Firstly, shout out to any O2 phone service users (UK) you can get 1 year of free Evernote Premium just by being a customer, and it literally takes 30 seconds to set up if you have an evernote account. Just google Evernote O2. And Thomas, great video, what do you tend to do with your left over 'maybe pile' when you don't get them done? Carry them over, or force yourself out of grit to get them done before bed? Your beard game is strong bro.
Uni Bridges if something in Maybe isn't done by the end of the week, I'll most likely carry it over - unless it's something that I've decided can go on the back burner after I've made it through the week. At that point, I know it's still in Todoist or Evernote, so I can just push it off. Granted, the Maybe section is a new addition, so I've only got two weeks' worth of practice to look back on.
I have a my own system as well, and in mine it's based on one fundamental idea, improving/perfection. The idea that you have to constantly be changing, and improve, never settle for where you are, and that goes for our systems too Thomas. I hope you also don't settle for anything, not on any opinions, interests, and in this case your 3-tier planning system, it's great for people to get an idea about how to plan and it works for you, but know one thing, and that is that there is definitely a even better way to do it, and you need to find that. Like here are a few disadvantages to start with, you time estimations are too broad, you need to get down to 10/15 minutes precision. Your system needs to be more flexible able to adapt as new ideas spring in mind and people around you affect you. You need to look at life as a much more complex thing, and have a much more detailed and complex system. But that's only my opinion, how am I right?
Was reading The Great Gatsby and saw that Gatsby, like you, also planned out everyday down to the minute and included general goals/habits he wanted to achieve, which some could say his success and wealth are attributed to. I thought the resemblance was intriguing : imgur.com/a/7x7uR
I can definitely relate to the Frankenstein organization system... I have been screwing around with mine for *years* and it changes every semester, between semesters, and even WITHIN the semester. There has to be a lot of flexibility for organizing... what works at one point in the year may not work in the other! (I don't use my planner half as much during school breaks as I do during the semester, for example). Love your videos, sir! Below is my hectic-looking planner system... it's hard to explain. TLDR; it takes a lot of finagling to get a system right! Also, it doesn't have to look super perfect or make sense to everyone else as long as it works for you! My planning system is a little... hectic looking? But it works for me for some weird reason (it looks as if I'm trying to ward off spies from ever finding me). I have an 8.5 x 11 planner with huuuuuge daily spots. I separate the daily boxes into three sections: school to dos, personal to dos (chores, hanging out with people, etc.) and also a third section which is a little bit complicated. It houses any and all events going on (for example, it's Black History Month so my school is doing a bunch of movie viewings and stuff so I put the date/time/location/title of those events down on this side). It also houses my "upcoming events" warnings... I have a bad habit about forgetting important dates until the week they happen, so I've started to write "__ weeks to (insert important school/personal event)". This is usually used for exams or term paper due dates, but it also houses some other big events (I'm going to PAX this year, so I also have warnings for that). It's a double sided planner, so on the "inactive" side of the week I have a bunch of sticky notes with important information. Generally it includes a map of important dates (can you tell I'm very forgetful?), steps to term projects (if they are ongoing throughout the semester I put all due dates on a sticky note and check them off as the semester goes), review steps for any exams coming up (one per each class), the office hours of each of my professors, and one or two inspirational quotes. So if it's Monday, then my sticky notes will be on the Thursday/Friday/Saturday/Sunday page and vice versa. I plan my days as they come (the night before), as I find this adds less pressure on me (a combination of anxiety and depression sometimes makes things overwhelming, so if I'm having a bad day and I feel like I can't get much done, there's nothing planned for the coming days so I can just rearrange everything!). If I know I have a really busy day coming I will take a bigger lined sticky note and literally map out my entire day hour by hour (I don't plan the times where I'm not working/in school/traveling/doing something, but it's important for me to know where my free time is so I can more effectively use it). There are two other minor components... I have a small whiteboard to keep the next three important exams/projects dates coming up on one side, then the other I have things I am doing daily. Thursday nights I put what *needs to get done* by Monday on there so I make sure to prioritize those. And then I just have a plain old calendar to keep track of doctor's appointments and birthdays. I keep this one mostly empty... sometimes it's nice to clear your head by looking at an empty calendar!
This is helpful as far as it goes, but he talks much too slowly. It's easy to learn this all this "yamma yakka," if you double the speed. You will be able to absorb this much better, and use it more easily or, at the very least, you will be able to acquire the full benefits of RU-vid-induced OCD. Just sit back with a cup of coffee after going to Settings, Speed and selecting 2x, press Play and enjoy your new, hyper-productive, Getting-Done-Things Lifestyle. Pity that RU-vid does not provide 3X.
Sorry if i made some mistakes, english is not my native language... Recently (last year the most) I was having so much problems to concentrate and organize my duties... So I started to read about ADHD cognitive-comportamental therapies, and some stuff are great, but man! You have the gift to summarize and teach their tactics is a awesome way!! You got my subscription in the very first video! Thanks and Greeting from Brazil.
I like my system from one platform, currently I use apple apps since I believe they make very functional/minimalistic interfaces. So I keep taking notes/reminders at 1 click away. I use those 3 apps: Reminders, Calendar, Notes. My "second brain' being Notes, containing things from projects to journaling. Then my favorite part: while I'm journaling ,if I mentioned a task that I want to be reminded of, I select the text to share it in Reminders app. then from my reminders I schedule some tasks related to certain date or location. And the last step: If some reminder seems to be like an event I drag it to Calendar app. That seems like perfectly ordered process to me, my only problem is with procrastination :((((
Just a thought I was thinking about... To keep the constant surge of productivity, I guess reading on productivity in your freetime makes you "refresh" your slackiness back to it's curious and productive self. Would that be the case for others? I mean, when I first got on CIG, I became obsessed with productivity. Now, I slacked a bit, but I think it's because I'm not as deep on it as I was. Reading more on it would, potentially, makes me go there again.
I don't really have any tips I can think of. But I do have a slight "problem" (I don't even know if it really is a problem) regarding the opposite, NOT getting stuff done, or more specifically, relaxing, taking a break. I try not to do anything on Saturdays to let my body and mind cool down, but sometimes it doesn't work out, and I end up doing something anyways. Other days I may find myself sick, and of course, trying to do stuff when I really should be trying to get better can make it worse. If I don't do work for 1 day, it may pile up the following day.
***** totally feel you - I'm pretty much the same way. My brain doesn't really shut off, so there's always a compulsion to work more. But I've realized that a side effect of this is that I'm not always super-productive when I'm "working", so now I pre-plan fun things so I'm forced to get my work done before they start.
I will tell you simply* how to have a plan for plans. no.1 you no.2 know your goals for general accomplish no.3 system syncing no.4 be a robot no.5 remember to have organized fun *you will make it complicated with your interpretation and so on
How much time Do you spend planning all this stuff. I mean even if you're efficiënt without this It still takes time, practice and really self-known. planning with time and How much work you can do is really hard. was It hard for you at the beginning because It really looks hard to me.😳
This is kind of a Frankenstein collage of Apps and paper which is not entirely portable because of the white board and maybe not always taking a notepad everywhere you go. It's interesting because I have been doing some of the same things and it isn't working for me. I'm in the process of getting everything into apps. Btw, I'm not criticizing the methodology. There are some good concepts but this probably won't work for most people in today's fast paced, over-loaded world. But still, thanks for sharing.
Thanks for the helpful video. I noticed at the 1:50 mark that you have chapter notes for The Power of Habit. I'm about 1/3 of the way through the book and I'm kicking myself that I didn't take notes. Perhaps a weird request, but is there any chance I can get a copy of your notes?
Hey, uhh... can you share with us your (impersonal, of course) Evernote notes (such as the one on Power of Habits)? Provided that's even possible, of course. It'd be super useful.
There's only one system that really works at all times, for all people, and that every successful person follows. Shut up, stop babbling about systems, get up, get to work, and don't stop working until the job is done. Everything else is pure BS, and will probably stop your success in its tracks.
You only look at Todoist once a week while making your weekly plan? New tasks that get captured during the week just sit in your Todoist inbox and don't get processed (assigned contexts and stuff) until Sunday?
Very useful tips, however, to divide your planning into several applications and also use notebooks - for me you can get confused and miss the point, everything that you described can be coolly organized in LeaderTask, break everything down there according to projects and tasks, but you should not completely abandon the blank notes , but it is better to keep records there about some thoughts or ideas that do not yet have exact numbers or terms.
Thomas, could you do a video about the schedule of Benjamin Franklin? I'm not american, but I recently watched a short video on his daily routine and found it fascinating
I would pay to watch this system adapted to 2021 implemeblnted to Notion! It helped me to unlock myself back then but now I feel like I can't use it in all-in-one app
I just have one question. Would homework assignments count as one individual task like one assignment= one task or do you just have a general HW time situation goin on? Anyways Keep the vids comming
Will you please do a video about how you use google calendar and evernote? Is there a all-in-one app that don't need to switch from app to app? Thanks! Huge fan of you!
Super helpful, thank you so much for these tips that have made me so much more organised!! I don't think you realise how much of an inspiration you are to others..keep it up!! :)
Your video is informative thnx.. I have one question If I set time for each task and arrange it one after other task than I feel trapped. Stressful. I start procrastinating and end up doing nothing. How to work on this pls help.
Carla Donaldson I have been using todoist for almost a year now. But, I find that it is just a long todolist similar to writing it on paper.I have a premium todoist account after only about 30 days of using it since I like to attach files related to the task. I am working on creating my system to prioritize better. I also just started using evernote. The biggest draw back with evernote is that you can only use 2 devices. If you have a phone,work PC and home PC you would have to upgrade or you would be unable to use it since they keep forcing upgrade ads. I logged into the website and removed 1 device. My home device and now just use the work laptop and phone. I can take the laptop home everyday if I want. But, I actually only take it home on the weekends. I also use teamviewer to remote into it from home as needed.
Jeffrey Rust I miss Sunrise. One decent option is to use Nozbe for task management (it syncs to Evernote and Google Calendar -- as well as Dropbox and Google Drive), so you can see Evernote Reminders in the app and have the option to subscribe to the calendar to show all tasks with due dates on your Google calendar. And it also handles labels/categories and other features.
Why do i think every person having personal tasking videos spend more time planning than doing actual work?! This is not a criticism but when i try to do this kind of planning i never get it really donne because some other things comes in way, sometimes i forget something, a different task changes due time because the client asks for one day sooner, etc.
I usually use a calender with boxes set for each day and i would assign a few topics or exam practice on the specific day and after completion i would just cross it out. However, i usually over-do the planning and i set unrealistic goals so i don't get things done one time. Don't do this!
Rakib sdq I actually do this too, which is why I try my best to apply the fudge ratio concept to my planning so I can be realistic about what will get done. I'll do a video about this soon :)
do you have any suggestions for someone who has to move too many different locations to replace the Whiteboard. Or another form of a white word that I'm unaware of. I've tried this with a notebook but not good at consistently pulling it out and it doesn't serve the same purpose as a white board that just sitting there in constant View
Ok thanks But all of you need to stop lying. All you did was research the info . You were not using this or other systems for years. Even some of most busiest people dont use all of this
Rym Bs the system definitely evolved over time. My first step was adding the whiteboard for daily planning, and actually at that time I was trying an even weirder system with two whiteboards and lots of post-it notes that you can see here: collegeinfogeek.com/whiteboards-and-post-it-notes/ Eventually I got tired of the second whiteboard and the post-it notes, so I moved my editorial calendar into Google Calendar and started doing weekly planning in the paper notebook. At first, the weekly plan was just one big list; recently I added the Events and Maybe sections to organize things better. I think the most important practice that keeps this system running smoothly is my morning routine, which I track in HabitRPG. It forces me to check my calendar every morning (I used to forget at times), and then create my daily plan. It's pretty much my lynchpin.
