I keep a few cheap notebooks by my workspace. Ones for paintings/planning, another for programming ideas/in progress developments, one for personal/venting and

I keep a few cheap notebooks by my workspace. Ones for paintings/planning, another for programming ideas/in progress developments, one for personal/venting and another for poetry and jazz. I find them useful as a way to organize my thoughts that just plain text can't match. I kind of use them as a break from my screens when I'm trying to think. As far as tools. A pen and paper, that's it. If you want to get fancy flip a notebook over and write from the backside in for a simple two topic book. Earmark pages. No methodolgy. I prefer to keep it messy, then I don't have to deal with constraints. Learning cursive helps To get the most out of it I keep a extra notebook and pen folded in my breastpocket of my jacket. When I'm commuting, need a quick scratch, out for a dart it's right there. I prefer loose stream of consciousness writing to just codify the damn ideas. For me using paper for note taking is relaxing and more natural then trying to fill a text box or fighting software to make a graph. I refuse to use some service for this on the same grounds that I refuse to work with digital painting programs. Physicality matters