How To Organise Your Life In 2 Hours A Week

I'm not going to sit here and tell you that organising your life is the easiest thing to do.

Because it's not.

I know from personal experience that I didn't do it for years because it felt too complicated and I got overwhelmed.

Whether it was

Spending more time organising than actually doing
Knowing I wanted to be organised, but not knowing how, or
Making the perfect set up, only to stop using it after 2 weeks when it got too complicated to maintain

I just felt like it wasn't worth the effort.

That maybe, I was better off just continuing to deal with my 20 to-do lists, overflowing calendar and a mind that would never switch off.

But I'm an ambitious person.

I didn't want to give up that easily.

So I asked myself: how could I make this easy?

I knew something would be better than nothing.

I was determined to work out how I could stop procrastinating on this, stop getting overwhelmed, and just do the thing I knew I needed to do.

The answer?

Stop watching 2.5 hour 'Building a Second Brain' videos from productivity experts, trying to re-create every step.

Stop trying to be perfect.

And start making something that would work for a real, normal, busy person.

2 years later, this has turned into a system that has everything I need to feel calm, clear and in control without being overly complicated.

A system that gives me 80% of the benefits with 20% of the effort.

My Notion Digital Home Base has kept me above water while I've balanced my busy life.

I've used it to manage my work, uni studies, business, content, and every single aspect of my personal life.

Today, I thought I'd show you exactly how I've set Notion up to organise my life in 2 hours a week.

We'll go through the 4 key elements that any organisation system needs.

Then I'll show you how to create the perfect layout, incorporating these 4 areas without being overcomplicated and cluttered.

Hopefully, this gives you the inspiration you need for your own life.

Whether it's overcoming the procrastination on creating your own system.

Upgrading your current one.

Or just opening your mind to the possibilities.

P.S. This newsletter will give you the foundations you need to create your own productivity system. But if you want to skip the time, energy, and fiddly work, the official Notion Digital Home Base has just launched!

This resources gives you the pre-made template and life organisation tutorial to get started right now. You can find out more here.

Element 1: Master Task List

First up, we have the star of the show.

The thing I will never shut up about.

Our master task list.

Tasks are action items, things you must execute on.

But what is a master task list, you might ask?

Imagine you have just moved into a new house.

You're feeling overwhelmed, and you want to write down all the tasks you must do to make your house a home.

A to-do list would be like either:

A. Writing absolutely everything you need to do, combined, on one single list with no order or categories

B. Writing 5 different lists for 5 different rooms of the house, even though you know that some areas will have overlaps in tasks

A master task list, on the other hand, would look like this:

Everything is written on one list.

BUT

Everything on that list is categorised.

You can sort all the items - for example starting with the hardest room and ending with the easiest.

You can filter the list to view only action items for only one room - let's say your kitchen.

You can make notes for each task - all the items that you need to buy to set up your kitchen.

You can remove the tasks as you complete them, so they're not cluttering your visual space.

Then, when you're done with your kitchen, you can filter the list to your study.

Making the process of setting up your entire house less stressful, more organised, and more fun.

Here's an example of what it looks like in a realistic sense.

This is the master task list that appears when you first enter the Notion Digital Home Base.

We go through this together as part of the 'onboarding' process.

The categories on this list, and my own personal master task list include:

Status
Context
Due Date
Energy
Priority

This list is how you get everything out of your head, without creating a mess that's too overwhelming to even look at, let alone use.

A good master task list will house every active task that currently exists in your life.

But it will allow you to filter, sort, edit, and control them with ease.

Element 2: Projects

Projects are short-term pursuits in your life or work that typically have a start and end date, and are related to a certain goal.

For example:

Complete quarterly social media plan
Plan an engagement party
Renovate the backyard
Write a client report
Complete a course
Set up new office

That new house that we're moving into and setting up from our last example?

That's a project.

'Organise new home'.

Under this you can keep not only your big tasks.

'Set up kitchen'.

But also your smaller sub-tasks.

'Kitchen shopping'.
All your inspiration photos.
The best places to buy things.
The receipts and reference numbers from your orders.

And anything else you may need.

Creating a 'projects' database in Notion provides you with one space to store all these projects.

You can also create a template for each new project to make keeping information, documents and tasks easy.

Here's an example of what your projects page could look like.

Element 3: Areas

Areas are long-term, ongoing responsibilities that you want to manage over time.

Major areas could be:

Personal
Work
Business

Minor areas could be:

Health & wellness
Side hustle
Finances
Home
Pets
Work responsibilities (ie. marketing, admin, etc.)

These things don't usually have an end date.

We will finish our 'organise new home' project.

But we won't finish our 'home' life area - maintenance, moving and cleaning will always be ongoing parts of our lives.

The Notion Digital Home Base has 2 major areas: work and personal.

These areas are so powerful because they keep the different areas of your life separate.

Work and personal stop moulding into one, creating mental separation and improving your focus.

Each of these major areas has minor areas within, like the examples above.

A simple way to organise the important, ongoing things in your life.

Element 4: References

Without a doubt the most underrated concept that exists.

Spaces specifically designed to store topics, interests or information that may be useful in the future.

Because right now?

Your brain is trying to remember it all.

You're multitasking because a small part of your attention is always dedicated to not forgetting the important things.

You can't switch off because you don't know whether you'll drop an important ball if you do.

You're wasting time searching for information you already know, and wasting energy keeping these things top of mind.

Creating these reference lists is incredibly easy.

I'll even give you a list to get you started

To buy
Books
Travel
Cooking
Gardening
Tea / coffee
Web design
Movies / TV shows
Personal productivity
Any other interest, hobby or topic relevant to your life

Your 'to buy' reference list could contain all the random bits you need to purchase for your 'organise new home' project.

So next time you happen to be at the shops, you can open your list and save yourself another shopping trip.

The Notion DHB provides you with multiple pre-designed reference lists, ready for you to use.

Creating The Perfect Layout

We have our four major elements:

Tasks (master task list)
Projects
Areas
References

Now, it's time to set up our overall space to

Make it simple and aesthetic, to increase our focus and motivation
Make it logical, so everything them work together in the most efficient way possible

This is the part that really got my brain working.

I've tried hundreds of different layouts, taking inspiration from YouTube videos, templates, everything you could think of.

But, I've finally found my favourite.

Start with your personal dashboard.

Create a home page to see all your tasks, projects, daily priorities and life areas at a glance.

For me, and in the Notion DHB this houses:

My booksmarks bar, daily highlights and life organisation box (below)
All projects
All tasks
Access to my major areas: personal space, work (and business)

Create a dedicated page for each major life area.

I've tried housing everything in my personal dashboard.

It just got too messy.

Instead, I created a few key pages for my major life areas: personal, work (and business).

These pages contain:

Tasks
Projects
Minor areas and
Reference lists

But ONLY those related to this specific life area (don't have your work tasks in your personal life area!)

Plus, the synced bookmarks bar and daily highlights.

Add in your bonus features

You have your main system in place.

Now, this is where you get creative and think out of the box.

Add in bonus features that

Bring you joy
Make your life easier
Increase your productivity
Or anything else you've seen that you want to integrate!

Here are some of my favourites.

A life organisation box including access to your brain dump page.

A synced bookmarks bar for quick access to your most used pages.

For example: home page, brain dump, personal space & work

Place this synced block on every single page in your home base.

(Synced blocks mean that if you change one block, ie. add a new page to your bookmarks bar, it will change across all pages)

A synced daily highlights box to see your most important priorities at a glance.

A link to your calendar to access it with the least resistance possible.

A navigation toggle for pages with lots of sub-pages.

This will make it quick and easy for you to access the minor life area you're looking for!

Action Steps

Organising your life really is only as hard as you make it.

By sticking to the four key categories that we went through:

Tasks
Projects
Areas
References

And creating a layout that makes them work seamlessly together.

You will be able to become the most organised version of yourself, in less time, with less energy and less stress.

There are two options for exactly how you can get started right now.

Option 1:

Invest in the Notion Digital Home Base and get access to the pre-made template, life organisation workshop and set-up tutorial.

This will give you everything you need to organise your life in a simple but effective way.

Without you having to invest the time and energy in developing your own system.

Find out more & access the Notion DHB

Option 2:

Take the free Notion101 course.

These 6 modules teach you the foundations to using Notion in life and business.

It even gets you started with your own life hub.

You can then use the principles we went through in this newsletter to create your own life organisation system!

You can access the Notion101 course here.

Option 3:

Start from scratch and/or a system other than Notion.

If Notion isn't your thing, or you already have another system going, here is what I would suggest.

1. Make your lists

So many people make the mistake of trying to organise their lives on a productivity app without even knowing what they need to organise.

Make a list of your:

Areas: the major and minor
Projects: current and upcoming
Reference lists: what might you like to keep track of?

2. Create your perfect layout

Use this guide as inspiration, and organise your four elements in the best format for you.

Remember: tasks, projects, areas and references.

3. Populate your system

Take the time to get everything from your head into your system, so you can start to organise it

4. Create maintenance habit

Make sure to keep your system up-to-date and organised by creating regular brain dumping and organising habits.

This is how you know you can trust it!

Looking for extra resources to get started?

Here are some suggested videos:

How One App Changed My Life: The Cure To Mental Overload

5 Time Management Tips To Organise a Busy Schedule

Notion101: A Digital Home Base (newsletter)

An additional note

This newsletter will be turned into a YouTube video.

I know it's much easier to watch a Notion tutorial than it is to read one (it's also much easier to talk through one than to write one)!

If you want to be reminded when this video gets released, you can subscribe to my YouTube channel.

See you next week!

Tayla

Looking for more resources?

You'll find all my Notion templates, courses and other free resources here.

Want to become a peak performer?

If you're an ambitious and driven individual, find out more and inquire about a free discovery call here, so you can excel in your career, without sacrificing your personal ambitions or wellbeing.

This is productivity & performance coaching from someone who has done years of research and experimentation, developing a series of simple, evidence-backed habits, routines and systems that unlock the path to taking back control over your time, energy, focus and mind, and reaching your full potential.

Are you a creator, solopreneur or small business looking to upgrade your digital organisation?

After harnessing Notion to run my entire life and business, I'm here to help you do it too.

Inquire about a free discovery call here to explore how you can streamline your processes to save time, money and mental energy with simple Notion systems.

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