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Modern life by its very nature is chaotic. Overlapping schedules, multiple commitments, planning months in advance, all these things crush down on us creating stress and distress. One of the greatest accomplishments of your personal system is to get your (and other peoples) calendars under control. I’m not limiting these techniques to Moleskine specifically, but any more the name is synonymous with the little black organizer book that has become so popular. So regardless of your journal’s manufacturer you can do follow these tips to get your calendar under control.

Decide what time interval is most important.

Some people live their lives one day at a time, some live from weekend to weekend, and some live a month in advance. Each breakdown of our lives has strengths and weaknesses we need to account for when setting up our planners in the most efficient manner for us. If you run a very hectic life or are responsible for tracking the lives of others (Moms and Dads, you know I’m talking to you) a daily planner can get you through the schedule planning with a minimum of muss and fuss. Some challenges do arise with this however.

How do I put more than one person’s schedule on a daily calendar?

I have seen lots of advice on this matter but the two most effective methods I’ve found are color-coding and the column approach. If you are able to keep more than one color pen with you at all times (one of those nice multi-function pens may do the trick) you can color code the entries in a way that jumps out at you on the page. My personal preference is the column method. This approach breaks the daily calendar into two or more vertical columns, each representing the schedule of one person. In my case with three kids and a spouse I wind up with five columns. The next step is where personal preference starts to kick in. You can create rows across the columns to designate each time slot or use the columns as designated lists. The upside of this technique is being able to see all the schedules at a glance. The downside is if you have a small notebook it can become very cramped if you have lots of entries. This is where again I suggest you deviate from the norms…if you have a grid layout book turn it on its side (landscape mode for the techies out there) and create the columns across the page.

Do I need to fill out a year’s worth of daily calendar pages in my planner?

NO. As much fun as it may seem to sit for an evening drawing lines and numbering pages (what? I think it would be fun.) you don’t need to go that far in advance. The question becomes…how far DO you have to go? Take a look at your current schedule. Count how many items you have booked for next month already. Do the same for the month after that, and so on. What you are looking for is the month where you drop below 15 items already planned. That is how far out you need your daily calendar. From that 15 event month on you can use a monthly or weekly layout for your capture (I’ll explain how to do this later) rather than all the numbered pages. The catch is once you cross that 15 entry line you will want to create a section for that month on a daily basis in your planner. Ok, so where did the magic number 15 come from? In most pocket planners you can comfortably write 15 lines of text. 15 also happens to conveniently work out to about half a month of events. Nothing mystical…just an easy to remember line in the sand.

So how do I reschedule something in this mess?

It really isn’t as hard as it would seem. Rather than erasing entries and trying to make the page look pristine, just draw a line through the entry and make a small note as to the day it was transferred to, or as I do, the page number of the calendar the entry is now on. Make sure you jump to that page and record the new entry though. The benefit of this method is when the day comes around the event was originally scheduled for you can still see it; it acts as a tickler for the event without any effort at all.

But I don’t have enough stuff for a daily calendar…or…I have a calendar at work that’s separate from my personal one.

In either of these cases, when a large block of your time each day is spoken for by another calendar or your activity load isn’t that heavy, you can use a weekly or monthly calendar to the same effect. One of the things I have adopted is the transfer of the first meeting or event for my next work day into my personal calendar for that day. Why? Because when am at home I can quickly open my planner and see what the first thing is on the agenda for the next day at work AND when I need to be there. Stress, at least the early morning kind, be gone!

It all sounds a little too easy. How do I handle repeating events?

Ah, the classic territory of the electronic organizer. One of the most touted features of smart phones, PDAs, and online calendars is entering an event once and having it fill in on every occurrence. This can’t be done with paper you say? Nay, Nay I Say! (Thank you John Pinette.) Here’s how it works:

Create a page that is just for the recurring event…let’s say soccer practice (or a business meeting…whatever example makes you feel more at home) On this page write down the frequency of the occurrence (Every Wednesday from 7-9pm) and other vital information (address, contact numbers, things to bring, etc.) Note the page number of the page you wrote the information on. Now all you need to do is go to each day it should occur on (again, every Wednesday) and make a note of that page number. If you want to get even fancier use different shapes or symbols along with the page number to identify different people.

There are even more tips I’ll share over the coming weeks but I don’t want to short change the other topics I started with in Part 1. Next up, tracking passwords and accounts.

The more information we deal with on a daily basis, the more important it becomes to capture that information in a consistent location for reference and use. The GTD methodology espouses a “trusted system” approach that I agree with, but with caveats.

Your capture tool should suit the environments where you are capturing information. I shall explain. If you are a highly mobile individual, one who could be anywhere at any time, your system needs to reflect that level of agility. A locked down, desktop-computer based system will not be your best option on its own. On the flip side, if you are a dedicated desk worker a pocket sized system for the professional road warrior also may be less than optimal. So how do you choose what is the right fit for you?

I have been changing from notebook to notebook, capture system to capture system for years now always in search of the “perfect” one. The one system that will make me more efficient, less likely to procrastinate, and look more professional having the information I need right at my fingertips. I haven’t found it yet, but I have come up with a number of observations about ways to “write it down.”

Don’t let it get away

Every idea, commitment, promise, thought, or task is a candidate for capture in your paper system. While I don’t believe you will ever achieve the “mind like water” goal as preached by other systems, I do believe you can reach a level of mental peace knowing the details of your activities are kept safe and accessible when the memory is called to doubt.

As an extension of the classic educational concept, memory is reinforced through writing learned items down. But how much is enough? Do you capture every possible thought or only the ones you think you might forget? How do you recall ideas from your system when you can’t remember having them in the first place? How do you organize a task list spread across fifteen pages on ten different topics? There are some tips and tricks I’ve gathered from around the web as well as through my own experiences you may find helpful.

Index of Contents

As any good librarian will tell you the two most powerful parts of a reference book are the table of contents and the index. My recommendation: merge the two. This should work for any type planner, be it three-ring, spiral bound, fully bound, or index cards.

At the back of your system select a few pages to set aside for your “Index of Contents” (notice the catchy little hybrid there?) Since I hate to waste paper in my planners I do a little math to figure out how many pages from the back my index should begin. Take the number of pages in your book and divide it by the number of lines on a page if you are using a ruled book. If you prefer a blank book you just need to guess how many lines you could write on a page. The number you are left with is the number of pages you should count back from the back cover to begin your index. In concept if you were to title every page in your book and enter a line for each in your index you would have just enough space.

Give yourself breathing room

One of the biggest jumps I made in my system was to give myself permission to have one topic per page. For some reason I got it into my head I needed to fill every open inch or line on a page so I wasn’t “wasting space.” The trouble trying to organize this mash of topics and notes caused far outweighed the benefits of condensing the content. By using a page per topic I can group and mark items as they are needed, something that lends itself to some of the other reference features of my system.

For example, I needed to keep a copy of my daughter’s soccer schedule for the fall with me so I knew when her games are. My initial options were:

1. Load the schedule into Google Calendar and access it from my phone. Result: useful but slow to access. The SMS reminder was convenient for the gentle “poke” but the calendar was inaccessible when there was no cellular service at the time.
2. Write the game schedule on each day a game is planned in the correct time slot on the page. Result: Time consuming and not easy to update when there were schedule changes. It was nice when looking at a specific day but it made things tough when planning for several dates.
3. Make a list of the dates and schedule on one page. Result: a master list for the soccer season I could jump to just by using the page numbered reference in the index (let the cat out of the bag on that one.) The problem arose when trying to see what was happening on a given day. I had to jump from list to list to list to make sure I caught everything.

My final result – a combination of options two and three. Here’s how it works:

1. I created a page in my planner for the soccer schedule and noted every game, time, and location.
2. I noted the page number and title in the index at the back of the planner.
3. I then noted on each day a game was scheduled in the calendar section (I’ll discuss this later) with the notation “Soccer 92.” The number is the page number of the game schedule. This way I can quickly see what’s on a given day while also have a master list for reference.

So far, this technique has been working well for anything that has multiple occurrences. It also works out well for noting a work history or task history (I’ll discuss these later as well.)

The saga continues

In cases where the notes for a given topic continue on past one page, I do not see a reason to create line after line in my index for the same item. I have adopted the technique of “previous, next” on my pages to continue the story easily.

At the bottom right of the first page on a topic in my planner you will find this: “à ##” which is the number of the page where the notes continue. On that second page you will find “## ß” in the bottom left and “à ##” in the bottom right. This tells you how you can find the previous page of notes and the next page. I repeat this over and over for each additional page. I may add an additional title and index entry if there is a substantial subtopic in the main one.

Scribble, scribble, scribble

So what is my requirement for whether or not I capture something? It’s a simple question I ask myself about each item. “Might I need to know this later?” It sounds almost too simple but it is easier to capture things you eventually don’t need rather than miss the things you do. When I have idle time (it sometimes happens) I flip through the pages and as I find entries I know I absolutely don’t need any more I draw a single line through them. Visually when I scan a page I’ve taught myself to skip those items with a strike-through and move on quickly.

So what now?

I’ve been capturing furiously, noting everything I think I might need. So now what do I do with all this? How do I keep it organized and make it useful? That comes in part three.