Keep Your Notes in Order with the Daily Scratchpad

Notepad

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The following is a guest post by Gretchen Rubin of The Happiness Project

We’re all looking for ways to work both faster and calmer, and I recently hit on a trick that keeps my desk tidier and my thoughts clearer.

One of my most annoying habits is my tendency to scribble down important phone numbers, “Don’t forget!!!” notes, and helpful URLs on any piece of paper that happens to be cluttering up my desk.

An hour later, I throw away what appears to be trash, or I flip over a piece of paper —and the key info vanishes. Or even if the information was still there, I have no idea what it means. Sure, that phone number has a star by it, so it must be important—but I can’t remember whose number it is.


I’ve hit on a neat workday solution: a “scratch paper for the day.” I keep a pad of paper by the phone, and anytime I have the urge to make a note, I discipline myself only to use that pad of paper. At the end of the day, I toss the piece of paper, after copying anything I need to keep on the next day’s paper.

It has made an astonishing difference to my sense of order. I’m not surrounded by illegible scribbles that may—or may not—be critically important. When I need information, I can easily find it.

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March 24, 2008 | Filed Under Practical, Productivity 

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7 Responses to “Keep Your Notes in Order with the Daily Scratchpad”

  1. Tea Packaging on March 24th, 2008

    I just figured this one out myself… seems obvious, but i cant tell you how many contacts I lose this way! The trick seems to be to do the end of day copy / info filing, otherwise you just have a whole pad of scribbles. Better than a desk full, but not much more useful-

  2. Patrick Rhone on March 24th, 2008

    I actually have gotten into a similar habit with my “Today” index card. I keep an index card with three simple things I would like to accomplish for the day written on it. I keep this on my desk next to my laptop. Then, I use the rest of the whitespace on the card to capture notes, phone numbers, and other like incoming items. At the end of the day, I move any undone items from the original three to the card for the next day, add more to equal three on that card, and then toss the old card into my Inbox for processing the random notes and numbers and such. This system has really worked for me. Especially the “three things” aspect because it makes me feel like I am accomplishing something.

  3. The Lemon Law Guy on March 25th, 2008

    Yep, this simple tool is incredibly powerfull - and i have it in my backpocket by the way. Idea, though, is widely described over the net and well known as a ‘hipster pda’. check here for more info - http://wiki.43folders.com/index.php/Hipster_PDA

  4. Sekhmet on March 27th, 2008

    I’m a notorious note taker - stickie notes, index cards, notebooks, PDA you name it and I use it to take notes. However, I too loose track of info, ideas, lists and other notes that if they were organized and not in various piles maybe I could develop my ideas and not forget important info. I found two free programs that I am trying out and so far they seem to help. Zulu Pad at http://www.gersic.com/zulupad and Stickies v6.5 at http://www.zhornsoftware.co.uk.

  5. Bill on April 9th, 2008

    I use a small 6X4 spiral notebook next to my phone on my desk. It is small enough it doesn’t get in the way and the spiral pages keep it note. I normal transfer information to my address book and task system, but I never throw away the pages so if I forget to transfer it, I still have a record. When the book is full I date the cover page and keep in a drawer for a year or so. The thing I gotta get better at is to write a name next to a phone number so weeks later I can remember who’s number it is.

  6. Tommy on April 16th, 2008

    I’m w/ Bill on the spiral notebook dedicated to this purpose. I have one (5×7 - Ampad spiral Project Planner) I use to take notes when I am on the phone and larger (legal - Ampad spiral Project Planner) notebook where I put action items and map out ideas/thoughts. Also I should mentioned how important, but simple, it is to date each page. I like these brand of notebooks cause of the layout (a simple grid) of the page, including a place for a date, page #, title, ruled lines, and a sidebar area. I do as far to file these away when I am done with them for at least a couple years. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone back to them to look for an idea, locate some contact information, you name it.

    I’ve also tried just about every online solution you can name (PC and Mac — I use both). I mean all of them. None of them work for me. Although I’ve been on a computer since the early 80s, I am a paper and mechanical pencil kind of guy. Now with that said after I map out ideas on paper I do move them onto my computer. And of course all my writing and source documents are computer-based. I like Microsoft OneNote and the integration now with Outlook ‘07 is pretty amazing. Now if I just had an extension for Firefox so I could send materials directly from my browser to OneNote ‘07, like you can with MS Explorer I’d be set.

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