Illustration by the talented Gillian Eilidh O’Mara, who is also a wonderful writer.
Someone once said there’s a sure way to know if you are a humble person: If you think you are, you’re not!
I’ve pondered the idea of humility a fair bit, over the years. I do not see it as something to strive for. It’s not a box to tick or an “am I…
Moving my tasks away from apps to plain text lists was supposed to simplify everything. To take the pressure off. So why have I spent so many years optimising them?
Because I didn’t understand the job they did best.
Before getting on with the doing, task management requires you to…
I keep my calendar in the todo.txt format, in Obsidian, using the Todo.txt Mode plugin to move completed events to a done.md file each day.
This week I opened that done.md file only to find it completely blank. Gasp! A plain text nightmare!! This was not supposed to even be able to happen. Not in my system!
But pride comes before disaster, and arrogance…
This post represents a change in topic from the bulk of what I write. To help you distinguish the plain text productivity themes at a glance from those that are more overtly Christ-centred, look for the sparkle ✨ emoji in the title.
Images from Pexels, combined by me
**TLDR : Don’t place sad, stupid, or shiny stuff on the…
I was initially excited to discover a new plain text productivity site this week, with sections on open format apps and tips for plain text workflows. Hooray! I thought. Another resource to add to my Blogroll!
But a few seconds in, things began to feel off.
It didn’t take long to realise that I was looking at one of the internet’s newest claims to shame, the…
When Stefano Marinelli posted about compromises and tolerance, I knew he was right because I’ve seen this in action:
Life is full of compromises. And the more you live, the more you learn (or should learn) to be at least a little tolerant of the choices others make, even when they seem to clash with your own convictions. …Fight your battles. Stand for what you…
After years perfecting a simple plain text productivity system for tracking my tasks and time, I should have been happy. Surely the search was over at last? But something still felt wrong; incomplete.
The information was all there, but I still had trouble focusing on the next important thing. The system worked beautifully on any device, but my…
Screenshots are from each company’s official website
Today I’ll be sharing
No affiliates, just good stuff.
I can still scarcely believe that what was supposed to be a 2-week experiment turned into a sustainable, calm-inducing way to keep up with all the time-specific events that make up my life.
My aim in writing about it is not to have you do the same — unless, of course, you really want to — but to see that because this…
Hand written text by the Author, 1988
Today I discovered I Write Like, a browser-based Markdown text editor from Koding Robots doo.
Apparently, I write like …Corey Doctorow. This is obviously not a comment on my use of expletives!
I Write Like is free to use in your browser, with a one-time payment for premium features. Thank you, Koding Robots, for not using the subscription…
I’m slowly working my way through the list of the (Mac-only) Setapp apps I’ve used for years, looking for free or one-time purchase alternatives.
Three apps I’ve started testing are Maccy (clipboard manager), Textshot (OCR), and Shottr (screenshots).
My journey to a Paste substitute began with Maccy.…
It’s true that plain text can be beautiful when it is boring in all the right ways, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have a little fun. Let’s take a look at an unashamedly Obsidian-only tweak I’ve been playing around with for the task lists that live in my plain text planner.
Super niche, I know, but you can use the…
Image by the Author. To-list text reads: Cut up veggies for salad Lego; Update PTA transactions
I’ve been fascinated by time and task management for decades. This post is another in the series of how my approach is evolving.
In 2023, Steph Ango (CEO of Obsidian) wrote about his extraordinarily simple approach to writing to-do lists. This…
Mum on the gas box at the house she and Meema lived in before moving to the cottage
Lately I’ve been looking at the subscription software I use, trying to decide what should stay and what needs to go. The evaluation process is not as straightforward as I thought it was going to be.
So I’m looking into the concept of…
Could you complete your work today if your usual apps were inaccessible? Consider this your wake up call is to store your work in open formats, even if (actually, especially if) you are required to use closed format apps to do your daily work.
What’s a…
No deep dives today, just a list of worthwhile productivity related things I’ve come across lately. Some universal, most Apple flavoured.
Create an automation in Apple Shortcuts that fires when you get someone to text the word “Lost” to your number. Have it take your…
Recently I talked about the importance of owning your work, not just the app you used to create it. Another side of that idea is nicely put in this advice from Trevor Flowers —
The best advice I have for new nerds: Refuse to pay rent.
Don’t subscribe. Don’t lease. Don’t use their cloud. Don’t slip down the freemium slope. Don’t create…
I love writing lists and making plans using simple, practical tools. Tools like locally stored plain text, fountain pens, and mechanical pencils.
As much as I love the feel and space efficiency of the Pilot Dr Grip 4 + 1 ballpoint pen, fountain pens tick other boxes I can’t ignore:
Last week I promised to talk about filtering information with the built-in Search plugin in Obsidian. While that is busy cooking, here are two links and one idea to brighten up your plain text workflow.
“ The IDE for tasks, notes, and planning”
Thymer is a new way to take…
No deep dives today, just a list of worthwhile productivity related things I’ve come across lately. Some universal, most Apple flavoured.
Create an automation in Apple Shortcuts that fires when you get someone to text the word “Lost” to your number. Have it take your…
There’s no getting around it; Artificial Intelligence (AI) has ruined some phrases that used to work just fine. I can’t help caring about that, though I wish I didn’t! And so I am working on gaining the confidence to write whatever I want, when I want — the same way I have no problem wearing my Crocs to the supermarket, no matter how many…
Recently I mentioned that all my to-dos get thrown into one text file, in the todo.txt format. It’s incredibly quick to add new tasks. And once you know some simple formatting rules, it’s also easy to see just the tasks you want to see, when you want to see them.
By the end of this article you will understand how to create, adjust, and reuse saved searches in Obsidian to filter a todo.txt file…
This week a potential customer asked me for an evaluation preview of one of my educational PDF ebooks. “No problem!” I said, “I’ll get that to you today.”
Right! Time to watermark a lower resolution copy of the PDF and upload it to the files section of my website. This is a process I have done many times in the past — but not for about two years. It took a…
Envelope budgeting is the practice of planning ahead for known expenses by regularly putting money into pre-determined categories, or envelopes. As the name suggests, it is often done with real cash placed into real envelopes.
Envelope budgeting can be done in digital banking with a series of separate accounts, but that can be limiting.…