Productivity Messiness

Warning, the next thousand plus words are technical-style wonky and include boring topics touching on government social programs, the 1990s database wars, and system-level thinking. But it’s predominately about taking notes. Is your excitement building? Or have you deleted this already?

I’m okay either way. Personally, I geek out over writing productivity and Get Things Done task management (GTD) solutions; these keep my thoughts in a crazy chaotic, loose order to easily access things I often forget like furnace filter sizes in the house. I have nightmares about driving to Home Depot, waltzing down an aisle, and forgetting the dimensions. Rest assured, that’s never happened to me. More importantly, though, I use certain tools to track my writing projects. What I’m thinking about. Why it matters. Where I’m trying to go with it. The problem is, these systems also have a simple trap: We cling to our illusions.

Yes, I’m here typing, but is anything happening? Is this getting me any closer to a finished product? Sometimes it feels like a fight between freedom and the structure I’m trying to build. And I’m not always sure which side’s winning.

Sigh.

Years back, to solve this challenge, I adopted Roam Research, a beautiful service that you can mold to do what you want. For me, that’s a Zettelkasten-lite approach to note-taking. What is this? It’s complicated. I read a book; I learned something from said book.

But I don’t follow its rules perfectly.

You see, my mind jumps. So, I leverage bulleted lists to jot my ideas down on a digital canvas. One never knows when you may find that Jerry Maguire inspiration and write all night. It happens. Roam works great for this. I type. And when I lose the flow, or an idea, I hit enter and move on. Next bullet. It’s easy. I can go from drafting a paragraph on the next Jason Sheridan book to my lunch plans.

Categorizing Chaos and Tools A Plenty

But what makes the system a wonder is that I review my work and categorize each bullet—eventually. Does this belong in a blog post? High-minded literature? Maybe a hiking trail to take or a restaurant to try? If you’re in professional sales, you might want to highlight a contact or update an account plan. A nurse? Use it to document a work process.

One day, if this fledgling idea graduates to a full article or book, I can just adjust the tag and track accordingly. It’s not uncommon to have multiple bullets correlate around the same idea.

When this happens, trumpets sound, and angels descend down upon high.

And the system is portable, Roam isn’t required. I could do this with note cards (stack and sort)—some folks do. It’s an easy way to get started. There are infinite options.

All businesses gravitate toward certain tools due to licensing, security, or legal constraints. If you work for Google, they want the employees using Docs or Keep instead of OneNote. Because I’ve logged stops across Big Tech and writers will grasp at straws to improve their work, I tend to tinker with everything. Some I’ve abandoned due to fit: SimpleNote, Bear, AppleNotes (granted, Apple is quickly changing the game, and the pencil integration is fantastic).

All Roads Lead to Roam, Until They Don’t

Then, there is Notion.

I’ve tried to love it. The company has built a legion of diehard fans and iterates quickly. But its structure has limited the Zettelkasten in me. Why? The lack of an easy Daily Note featureobs. In Roam (and Obsidian), you just bullet. At end of day, nobody wants to see an empty page. It’s a motivator. A strong one, it turns out. I drafted two books last year. That doesn’t mean they are masterpieces, but they are on paper.

Again, I just start typing; when my idea loses steam I hit enter and move to the next one.

Day end, I go back and tag the output using backlinks. If the snippets are related to an upcoming post, I tag them. If my brain hops to researching details on Alexander the Great for no particular reason, I bullet the details and save them for later—the last JPLA newsletter took three months before finish. If I have no idea what I’m doing, I’ll save it for later. The workflow is simple and powerful.

And Notion doesn’t have it, not really.

I tried resolving the problem by downloading templates. There are hundreds of these; a regular economy has been built around Notion productivity systems. None landed. There were no Eureka moments. I almost abandoned switching, but one thing made the tool click, at least for me.

Database Structure Matters

Yes, it’s the database—the greatest technology created over the last fifty years. No, it’s not AI. For me, it’s all about rows and columns. I lived through the ‘90s database wars between IBM, Sybase, Microsoft, Informix, and Oracle, flowing into the early 2000s. The technology has been a part of my career; like an old glove, now and then you do get to go home again. Both Roam and Notion use databases but with entirely different approaches.

Roam Research is an interconnected graph database where information flows through bidirectional links. Each bullet is an entry. The loose categories link the bullets together. There is a spontaneity in using it.

But Notion is structured more like a yesteryear database; here, each page or entry functions as a record with fields (properties) attached to it. Basically, it’s a text blob. It took time to wrap my head around this, but I was off and running once that clicked. What I like about switching tools is that it allows me to reexamine my workflow. Systems matter.

With pen in hand, I wrote down my Roam categories—writing snippets, article ideas, projects considering, books to read, things to remember (those furnace filter sizes again), movies to watch, famous quotes, etc., With the initial mapping documented, I built a global tag database. Here, it’s a big, one-column table with simple descriptions.

Then, I created another database called the Slip Box (a Zettelkasten concept) that links to the global tag database. In Roam, this is just a category where I toss everything. If an idea hasn’t boiled enough yet it stays here, but it’s important to check these remnants because every idea needs a place. That crazy dream kicking around inside your head has to find a home. Also, I created another database to track tasks around the messiness inside my Slip Box, leveraging the same interconnected tags and tables.

The Sprawl of Spiderweb Views

But evildoers and do-good nicks beware, flexibility can lead to complexity. Interconnected tables have their place, sure. But the bigger the system gets, it’s easy to lose the plot amidst a growing maze. Take, for example, the controversy with the US Treasury where online trolls shouted how the government pays out social security to impossibly old people.

Be skeptical. Isolated records rarely tell the entire story.

Effective applications and databases use interconnected tables with cross-referenced records, lookup tables for validation, and indexes to prevent fraud and minimize large-scale errors. Data might mistakenly associate a SSN with my 125-year-doppelgänger; however, COBOL logic can reference another table to prevent an erroneous or fraudulent payment¹.

Similarly, with Notion using far-less complexity (I’m only tracking my own mess), I created individual views in each defined category on separate pages. A corresponding view for accepted projects. And another view that also links to a database to track tasks. Between both, I can review each project, where I spend my time, and, more importantly, if I’m falling behind.

Yes, it happens. Writing happens in spurts. So does being productive.

Letting Go

What makes Roam work is that it’s a consistent changing flow. Notion hardens the process but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

Still, the lack of the daily page bothered me a touch. I resolved this by creating a simple static page called, yes, The Daily Note. Now, I do miss being able to see each day how much I’ve written (and how little, also important). But what I do love here is that I can right-click each bullet and simply send the snippet to the project or post or whatever. If I don’t have a place for thought/idea, I leave it. Or I move it into the Slip Box for later.

Remember a productivity system doesn’t have to be in Roam, Evernote, Bear, or Notion. These could be ideas on a stack of notecards waiting to be sorted.

And if you can’t find a place for a thought? Sadly, some ideas deserve to die. I don’t do this enough. Writing takes time—books even more so. There is no need to hoard every insight. The muses of myth and legend are generous; trust that what you let go will find another eager soul ready to run with it. Writing—and life—demands such honesty. I guess… maybe… I don’t know. Onward.

Footnotes