Notion All-in-one Workspace

[Theta]

Hey there,

recently I found this software called notion, which hasn't been mentioned here a lot. Its basically a note taking system, a bit similar to one note, but I think it has a lot of value to offer.

It is highly flexible. I guess you could setup almost any kind of life-tracking, note-taking, calendar, productivity system with it. You are the architect of your system.

The downside of it is, that its somewhat online and you can't have the files on your computer.

Its free, if you don't upload too much. If you have a university email address you can get the personal pro version with more storage space for free.

I would highly recommend to check it out.

https://www.notion.so/

 

I also found an in-depth tutorial series on how to build a "Life Operating System" using notion. You can basically automate your life using notion, so that you know exactly what to execute. You can go from a long term view of your life into the short term view and know hourly what to do to align with your highest goals and values.

Its systems thinking for daily life.

I'm excited to check it out more.

 

[nahtanoj]

How you found this guy? Amazing videos on system thinking. I'm going to check that app! I'm using One Note but I have a mess ? I need to go back and design something like this notion OS.

[nahtanoj]

@nahtanoj Update I implemented this and is amazing! Notion is my commonplace book now!!

[nahtanoj]

[Yog]

What are your daily boards like ?

This is mine atm.

[nahtanoj]

@Yog Right now I'm just using the method explained in the video above. I just changed the Pillars part with my own values, strengths, ME sheet that I discover doing the Life Purpose Course. I also have some motivation toggles around containing my vision board and other stuff I find important. One of the things I'm missing is something like your station codex. But the part that I love about the Life OS is the Vaults, I have somany linked databases between books DB, quotes DB, media DB, courses DB, Trip Log DB, Journals DB etc it's amazing, specially the Knowledge Lab is mind blowing, I can see the value of this down the road, specially for creative purposes. 

[Yog]

@nahtanoj  Its a bombastic software.... I actually spontaneously came up with similar principles and methods for organization, like vaults and pillars.

The only thing I don't like is that it is cloud based, you cant have all your stuff offline on your PC, just some temporary cache, that suxs. Nor can you create solid backups from which you can load and recover. This seems very limiting, idk if they improved it. I think you can set up your own server, but not sure. It seems crucial to me that there has to be a solid recovery/backup offline system for a commonplace book.  But daaaamn I love the design and the functionalities. I've never seen a software so user friendly and powerful as this one.

The good thing is that atm they have a pdf, XML, or even better HTML exports of a workspace or a page. I usually do backups there and store them on an external hard drive + an USB. If I need to send a page, vault or anything to someone I can export it as HTML, rar it and send it over.

Right now, as I am heavily and diligently studying astral projection I am creating a subsection about it. There will be verification cases, studies, visuals, audio, methods, theories, navigation,tips n tricks, things to do there, all interlinked and neatly organized in a wiki. Probably going to share a v1 of it here once it gets into proper form.

Edited October 6, 2020 by Yog

[nahtanoj]

@Yog Amazing, I think the same as you, they need to make offline posible, and more backup options. I have plans to dive deep into astral projection in the future. I had success doing some lucid dreaming but i went off doing other things. Im going to follow you to be looking for that. Another question I have is if you can explain your toggles and daily batches part in your notion implementation?

[smurf88]

Notion is quite nice, I've used it for work before and it's great for sharing workspaces. Although personally I like to use everything offline so I use OneNote, or Outline when on MacOS.

The idea of using it to schedule out your day is really cool though, I don't think the other apps would work as well for that.

Edited October 7, 2020 by smurf88

[nahtanoj]

@smurf88 I did use OneNote in the pass, my problem with it is that it doesn't inspire me, yeah I can link some pages but thats all. Notion has some crazy capabilities specially with Databases, you can make some crazy data crunches inside it. One thing that gives me crazy about OneNote is the way you can't align text boxes. In notion you are more limited but the alignment works beautifully. 

[Yog]

4 hours ago, nahtanoj said:

@Yog Amazing, I think the same as you, they need to make offline posible, and more backup options. I have plans to dive deep into astral projection in the future. I had success doing some lucid dreaming but i went off doing other things. Im going to follow you to be looking for that. Another question I have is if you can explain your toggles and daily batches part in your notion implementation?

Oh yea, sure. I'll re-upload some screenshots it because I've been renovating the workspace. I like to give it a bit of a space station sci-fi  twist. Make it more inspirational.

The Bridge page is not my home page, but it is something akin action page, its the page that is open almost all the time, it serves as a command center.

The "batches", that I renamed to "Daily Station Duties" are my daily blocks, all the repeatable activities that I will be doing every day. All are in time based order, from morning till the end of the day. It functions like a nested to-do list. Starting with the first one and ending with the last one. The toggles are sub activities.

For eg the Logistics (shopping, cleaning, using the internet, the phone, cooking, storing...ect) section has a couple of things that have to be done, so they have sub check boxes, or the "heat sink part is "where I chose one or few of the suggested activities. All of them are hyperlinked to the page of the given activity, each to-do batch has its own page, in those pages I do have my nested "vaults", journals, calendars ect pertaining to the activity.  For eg if I am working out, I open the bio-maintenance page, see what the goals are, execute,log it into the calendar and go back to bridge, check that box. I journal directly in the calendar entries. its Just as a thought dump, notes and observations regarding workout for eg.

 

• Creation = Art/Music projects (1 active at a time). First thing in the morning.
• Bio-Psy Maintenance = Working out/nutrition and all my dedicated spiritual activities, (practicing astral projection, doing meditation,
  contemplation...ect). I do both in 1 go. for eg 1h workout, 1h meditation lets say.
• ISK - Harvesting = My job. (ISK= interstellar credits, lol)
• Logistic = Basically maintenance and communication (shopping, cleaning, using the internet, downloading stuff, using the phone, cooking, storing, calling, washing clothes...ect)
• Heat Sink = Leisure activity
• Bridge Lock-down = Going trough every page I used during the day (hyperlinks in the toggle) and checking all logs, doing some plans for the next day ect

Oh and the QR code is there to turn of the alarm. In case I want to over-nap/sleep, I'l have to see the bridge page.

Edited October 8, 2020 by Yog

[nahtanoj]

@Yog WOW This is amazing, I have the same sci-fi style in my system, I'm trying to gamified it by thinking I'm in a Battlestar Galactica Game, so all my pictures are from BSG. I'm going to implement the daily block style you have, it makes so much sense. Thanks a lot for the explanation and BTW I love your Station Codex I stole some of yours and put them in my Mindset page.