I started really getting into productivity and intentional living about 2 and a half years ago.
One of the most life-altering habits I discovered along the way was that of documenting my life.
This has been such a game-changer for how I look at life, and how I go about it every single day. So in this blog post, I'll be sharing how I personally choose to document my life. Hopefully, you'll get some good ideas to incorporate into your own life!
Analogue
Bullet journal
For the third consecutive year now, my bullet journal has been my trusty companion to hold all my trackers and all the possible ways of documenting my life. I have found this system to be so reliable for me, for it has evolved with me over the years.
The things I document in my bullet journal are:
Goals for the year - further broken down into each month
Habits for every month
Things I'm grateful for every single day
A few aspects of my health
Things I do in my life - documented in the form of daily, weekly and monthly logs!
Books I read, movies and shows I watch
Check out a few of my bullet journal setups here!
Journal
I've been journaling or 'writing in my diary' since I was about 14. It's always been my go-to way to vent out my feelings and as a catchall for all my emotions for almost 9 years now. I do a recap of the day along in terms of what all happened during its course and I how felt about all of it, at the end of the day, as a part of my night routine.
By doing this every day, over a period of time, this has built an account of my life and my experiences in it. I can rely on this documentation to refer back to a previous incident or to simply reflect on my life.
Digital
Google Calendar
I started using Google Calendar wisely about a year ago, in April 2020. My system of documentation within Google Calendar is that I have created multiple calendars for each aspect of my life and I keep a track of all the 24 hours of my day within those calendars.
For example, for any given day, I'll be able to look at how much time I spent sleeping, doing work, learning, reading, etc. This system enables me to manage my time better and to keep an eye on how and where I'm spending my time. I explain my process of using Google Calendar in this video:
Notion
Notion is basically a second-brain for me at this point. Notion houses all my data I need to store somewhere, in case I need to come back to it later. Notion is basically a planning and organisation related web service that allows you to create your own system of planning, lists, tables and much more! It's highly customisable and hence caters to most of my needs pretty well. I document most of the backend work of this very blog, the Save Ourselves Youtube channel and any kind of admin work in Notion. It also houses some project plans and goals I want to revisit later on.
Out of all my other documentation methods, Instagram is the least systematic one. Its purpose is to capture moments as and when they come and create a very organic, unplanned collection of memories. Through its archive feature, I can access all my earlier stories, sort them into relevant highlights and also get creative by using all the available photo and video features.