4 ms·
The Simple Pleasure of Taking Notes
I'm not sure of the causal direction, but my mood and productivity both seem to shoot up whenever I take playful notes throughout the day. Here's how I do it:
1. I always have a pen(/pencil) and 3x5" notecard on me.
2. One side of the card is for to-dos (i.e., don't go to bed until you finish these N things), and the other for observations, questions, funny quotes from professors, books I should read, things to write about, etc.
3. When I'm bored or at least once at night, I go through the day's notes and (a) act on the easy ones, and (b) put the idea stuff in a text file for later.
I find that having a simple way to take notes keeps me on the ball and intellectually engaged. It may be a bit weird to whip out a note-card in public, but I've found that tons of stuff I didn't think was worth jotting down ends up being a gold mine later on.
- yan 18y agoI keep a small moleskine for medium to large notes. I keep small sheets of paper in my back pocket at all time to jot down something to do later today or tomorrow and cross out when done. I also catch myself implementing some GTD tips.
- brianlash 18y agoYeah, I bought some molesinke cahiers for the same purpose. Simple and lightweight, and they take a good beating. Still, I don't think I'd buy them again. Seconding Yan's sentiment, a notecard (or napkin!) is all you need in moments of inspiration.
- pgebhard 18y agoI find that a moleskine seems too nice to use up with my chicken-scratch quick notes. I tend to like the feeling of crumpling up a post-it after completing the task on it. I can't cleanly do that with a moleskine. Tearing the page out of those things really makes it less pristine and formal-looking.
- deleted 18y ago[deleted]
- pavelludiq 18y agoI tried to start taking notes, but im pretty chaotic and didn't seem to like it that much. And my handwriting is so horrible that i couldn't read some of them. I take notes from time to time in Knotes on my pc, but rarely and only when i find some idea that i think i might start working on sometime in the future(0.1% of those started, and only half finished). I just checked and i saw that i was supposed to by myself some beer last week :D
- delano 18y agoI write on anything. I have a deal with myself that whatever I'm noting doesn't have to be correct or even interesting. Just the act of writing it down is enough.
- joshuaxls 18y agoMerlin Mann coined the term "Hipster PDA" for this back when the GTD philosophy was taking off. http://www.43folders.com/2004/09/03/introducing-the-hipster-pda http://www.43folders.com/2004/09/03/introducing-the-hipster-...
- bprater 18y agoI'd love suggestion for something that would fit in a regular jeans or cargo short's pocket. I love moleskins, but the hard cover makes it tough to stuff in your pocket and sit down.
- talkaboutadate 18y agoI use the back of business cards. They're tough enough to sit on, easy to carry and small enough not to write too much.
- not_will 18y agotwitter+sms?
- tyn 18y agoFor me, my notecard is my mind
- craigbellot 18y agoJott.com
- ComputerGuru 18y agoSame here, but PostIt Notes are my best friends (instead of note cards) :)