Hey Reader,

Last week I shared why I like to give people starting points, without giving away hyper-customized pre-built systems.

My systems are SO customized to my individual needs… if I were to give them to someone who isn’t me (or at least a Notion power user 😅) then I’m setting them up to fail.

It’s really easy to look at advanced systems and think that’s what you should be striving for, but good systems are emergent and require both input + feedback… from you!

Good system and workflow design is about discovering your needs, and sometimes a simple approach is the key to building some much-needed momentum. Too much complexity too early can often lead to de-motivation!

A good system is one you actually use. A good habit is one you can actually achieve.

In the case of daily journaling, I think a lot of folks are afraid to start because they’re not sure what to journal about, or they’re afraid about doing it “wrong” (not possible). But, I’ve found that the best way to overcome that fear is to start with a very low bar, and build up the habit over time.

Make it doable, then scale the practice.

Don’t think about the final product, think about what is good enough for right now.

Here’s an example of one of my very early Journal entries from 2019:

It was basically just a list of things I did, or things that make me happy. Short, simple, and hardly any database properties were used.

Over time as I built comfort with Notion and built the journaling habit, I started to add different properties and filters, and found fun and creative ways to generate insights from the data. (Hopefully, with the help of AI, that process gets even easier soon! 👀)

At its core, I view journaling and personal data tracking is a curiosity practice. The more I feed data into the Journal database, the more access I have to notice patterns and changes over time. Eventually, it turned into this!​

Of course, I know that saying “start easy” is, well, easier said than done.

That’s why the concept of prioritization is so important — if you’re going to start with one thing at a time, it makes sense to start with the most impactful thing. (Like Greg McKeown points out in the book Essentialism, the idea of “priorities” is an oxymoron. When it comes to the most important thing… there can only be one.)

This conversation comes up a lot, which is why I was so appreciative of my friend Jessica Abel’s workshop about prioritization last week. I need to track things to make them real for my brain and having a reliable framework or process to make that happen is an absolute game-changer.

If you’ve been feeling stuck in analysis paralysis or the throes of indecision, then this free 60-minute workshop might be the decision-making life raft you need.

We co-created a fun Notion template to work through your own prioritization predicaments, which includes something Jessica calls the Weighted Decision Matrix — you plug in the reflections from your worksheet, and it bleep bloops out your projects based on weighted prioritization. (So cool.)

The live workshop is over, but you can get the free replay here.

Remember: No one can define your values for you. This prioritization practice is about making choices that support you and your unique values, goals, and commitments.

Until next time!

P.S. I had to re-post my latest YouTube video because I missed some key edits (oops!), so if you got a message about the video being private, my apologies, the new one is now on my channel!

I take you behind the scenes of my personal Notion journal (complete with some TMI), I share the properties I use and why, and then I walk you through building a simplified one from scratch.

​Check out the video, and download the journal template I built here!

Leave a comment if you have any questions; I’ll be doing a follow up video to answer some of the questions that have already come through. Thanks for watching!

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