Whenever we finish one task, it is SO helpful to have a list of next steps so we don’t waste time trying to figure out what to do. I keep a list of upcoming book publish dates and books I want to read, too. And I have ideas for Instagram posts I could create. I have a list of house projects I want to work on. I keep a list of blog posts I want to write or revamp in Evernote. (Granted, it was 2020 where we spent a lot of time in quarantine so I had more time on my hands, but still! Keeping a running list definitely helped motivate me to keep reading.) The first year I tracked my books in Evernote, I read 200 books! I love to read, so it’s fun for me to keep a list in Evernote of all of the books I’ve read in a particular year. In the same vein as writing down my workouts for my streak, it can be really gratifying to be able to look back and see exactly what I’ve accomplished when I write it down in Evernote. 4- Use Evernote to track what you’ve accomplished. When I’m making my breakfast in the morning, I will just pull up my current grocery list/meal planning note to see what’s for dinner, and then I can set out meat to thaw or double check that I have all of the ingredients I need. Keeping my meal plan in Evernote also makes it easy to see what I have planned for dinner each day. I pulled up a new note in Evernote, and each day I worked out, I would write down the date, the workout I did, and how long it was.Īnd if I need to get to the store but am in a hurry, I can just pull up an old list and shop from that! We always have similar breakfasts and lunches, and I can just follow the previous meal plan I made for dinners. Sick of being so sporadic with my workouts, I decided to see how many days in a row I could work out without missing. I did something similar using a list in Evernote. Once that happened, he always made sure to do his joke writing because he didn’t want to break the streak he had going. So he grabbed a blank calendar and each day that he spent time writing jokes, he would draw an X over that day.Įventually the Xs started to add up and he got a little streak going.

The story goes that Jerry wanted to get into the habit of spending at least 5 minutes per day writing new jokes for his stand up comedy routine. When I want to add a new habit into my routine, one of my favorite strategies for doing so is what some people call “the Jerry Seinfeld method.” The Jerry Seinfeld Method of Productivity One of the ways I do that is by using Evernote to track my habit streak. I am a pen and paper girl at heart, and so it was harder for me to get into the habit of opening an app and using it consistently.īut the thing that finally caused me to become a daily Evernote devotee is when I figured out that I could use Evernote to keep track of my hobbies and interests, not just boring paperwork. I admit, while Donnie was all in on Evernote from the beginning, it took me a little longer to get on board. It had all of the features we were looking for and has stood the test of time– we’ve been using it for over a decade now! 2- Use a streak in Evernote to start a new habit. We did tons of research and tested many, many apps and solutions for maintaining a digital filing cabinet, and Evernote was our favorite by far. (Both of those scenarios have actually happened to me, by the way. If I’m at the mechanic and don’t have the correct insurance card in my glove compartment? I can pull up my current insurance information in Evernote and get it to the mechanic right away. If I’m at the doctor’s office and realize I’ve forgotten an important piece of medical paperwork? I can pull it up in Evernote and email it to the doctor within seconds. Not only does our digital filing cabinet completely eliminate paper clutter from our house, it also allows us to securely access all of our most important documents anytime, from any location, in just a few clicks. ( You can learn more about the scanning apps we use, along with the other tools that come in handy when maintaining our digital filing cabinet, in this post.) Rather than keeping our medical paperwork, insurance information, bills, financial papers, and more in an overstuffed filing cabinet, we scan it all using an app on our phones and file it digitally in Evernote.

How to organize your life and home