Simplify Your Digital Life (Second Brain)

Summary

This video explains how to simplify digital life using a whiteboard app like Milanote. The speaker contrasts Milanote's simplicity with Notion, which can be overwhelming for beginners. They share their personal organization method based on the 'PAR' method (Projects, Areas, Resources, Archives), showing how they manage ideas, tasks, and content. The video emphasizes the importance of maintaining a single inbox for organization and provides tips on how to manage digital clutter effectively. The speaker also invites viewers to join a free productivity-focused community for further learning and support.

Takeaways

• 📋 Notion is a great tool, but it can be complicated for some users due to its extensive features.
• 📝 The video introduces a simpler whiteboard app called Milanote, which costs $10 per month, but is valued for its simplicity and folder structure.
• ⚡ Notion is often too complex for beginners, and Milanote offers a more straightforward and user-friendly approach for digital organization.
• 📦 The speaker uses the PARA method (Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives) from Tiago Forte to organize their life and recommends this system.
• 📥 It's crucial to have a single inbox for collecting ideas quickly, especially when in busy or fast-paced environments like the gym.
• 🔄 The speaker emphasizes organizing the inbox once or twice a week to avoid clutter and chaos, ensuring items are categorized into projects, areas, or archives.
• 📱 Milanote is praised for being adaptable across devices (iPhone, iPad, Mac), allowing easy access to and organization of digital content.
• 📚 Resources can be categorized, including items like books, future purchases, or recipes, ensuring that frequently needed content is always accessible.
• 🎯 A core part of the system is keeping the inbox minimal and organized regularly, preventing digital clutter from becoming overwhelming.
• 🌐 The speaker encourages viewers to join a free community for more productivity tips and shares details about a 90-day challenge for growth and content creation.

Q & A

What are the main tools the speaker uses for digital organization?

The speaker primarily uses Notion and Milanote for digital organization. While they are a fan of both tools, they find Milanote simpler for their daily needs.

Why does the speaker find Milanote more valuable despite its cost?

The speaker values Milanote for its simplicity and folder structure, which they find unique and more suited to their ADHD and digital organization style, despite it costing $10 per month.

What system does the speaker follow for organizing their digital life?

The speaker follows a system inspired by Tiago Forte's PARA method, which organizes information into four categories: Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives. The speaker also includes an 'Inbox' system for capturing ideas on the go.

What is the role of an 'Inbox' in the speaker's system?

The Inbox is a critical part of the system for capturing ideas, notes, and tasks quickly when the speaker is in a busy or fast-paced environment. The speaker later organizes these notes into the appropriate categories once or twice a week.

How does the speaker suggest managing large amounts of notes?

The speaker emphasizes the importance of maintaining a single, centralized inbox and organizing it regularly. They warn against accumulating too many notes, which can lead to disorganization, similar to how people might take photos and never look at them again.

How does the speaker distinguish between Projects, Areas, and Resources?

Projects are tasks with a defined goal and end date, Areas are ongoing responsibilities that are never completed, and Resources are collections of learning materials, ideas, or information for future reference.

What challenge did the speaker face before implementing this system?

Before implementing this system, the speaker struggled with digital disorganization. Their computer and notes were messy, which affected their mental clarity and productivity.

How does the speaker use Milanote for resource organization?

The speaker uses Milanote to categorize resources like books, learning materials, and recipes. They store these resources in specific folders to easily access them later, based on their content type or purpose.

What strategy does the speaker recommend for staying organized in fast-paced situations?

The speaker recommends using an Inbox system to capture ideas quickly when you're busy or not at your desk. Once a week, they organize these ideas into their appropriate categories.

What feedback does the speaker encourage from their audience?

The speaker asks for feedback on how they can improve their videos, inviting viewers to comment with constructive criticism. They express a desire to grow and improve their content based on audience suggestions.

Outlines

00:00

📝 Simplifying Digital Organization with Minote

The speaker introduces Notion as a powerful tool, but potentially complicated for some users. To simplify digital organization, they recommend Minote, a whiteboard app that costs $10 per month, which they find valuable due to its simplicity and structure. The speaker discusses their personal struggle with digital clutter and how organizing systems like Notion and Minote helped them regain control. They highlight how these tools can improve productivity, work, and even personal life, emphasizing the importance of a structured digital system for a clearer mind.

05:03

🔄 Organizing Projects, Areas, and Resources

The speaker explains a method for organizing tasks based on the PAR (Project, Areas, Resources) framework by Tiago Forte. They stress that each project should have a clear end goal, while areas refer to ongoing tasks, such as managing a YouTube channel. Resources include materials for learning, such as book notes and ideas. The speaker mentions how organizing everything into categories and ensuring everything has its place, either in projects or resources, helps maintain clarity and productivity.

10:05

🍽️ Managing a Digital Inbox for Ideas and Resources

The speaker discusses the importance of maintaining a singular, organized inbox for capturing ideas quickly, whether from a phone or computer. They recommend regularly reviewing and sorting this inbox into projects, areas, or resources, instead of letting it overflow. Using examples like saving YouTube videos or food recipes (e.g., protein pancakes), they explain how items should be organized in a structured manner, ensuring that everything is easily accessible and connected when needed.

15:08

🎯 Continuous Improvement of Digital Workflow

The speaker shares how they continually optimize their digital organization system, creating specific archives for different types of content. They use tools like Minote to handle everything from project management to storing ideas from multiple devices. The speaker emphasizes the importance of simplifying their system and ensuring that everything is visually organized for easy recall. They invite viewers to join their community or participate in their 90-day challenge to improve their own productivity systems and reach personal goals.

📊 Feedback and Improving Video Content

In this final section, the speaker requests feedback from viewers on their video, encouraging comments for improvement. They reference previous feedback about their presentation style and discuss how they have adjusted based on this input. The speaker underscores the importance of constructive criticism for their growth as a content creator and emphasizes their desire to make better videos by understanding what viewers find helpful or confusing.

Keywords

💡Notion

Notion is a digital productivity tool that helps users organize and manage their tasks, projects, and notes. In the video, the speaker mentions that while Notion is a powerful tool, it can feel overly complicated for some users due to its extensive functions and options. Despite its complexity, the speaker uses it to track tasks and videos for YouTube, highlighting its flexibility.

💡MiNote

MiNote (referred to as 'Milanote' in some contexts) is a whiteboard app that allows for simple, visual organization of ideas. The speaker prefers MiNote over Notion due to its simplicity and efficient folder structure, even though it costs $10 per month. MiNote is the speaker’s daily driver for organizing digital life, emphasizing its ease of use compared to more complex systems like Notion.

💡Inbox

In this context, an inbox refers to a centralized place where ideas and information are stored temporarily before being organized. The speaker highlights the importance of having one single inbox to capture ideas in fast-paced or stressful situations, like when at the gym, and to avoid the clutter associated with scattered notes across multiple platforms. Organizing the inbox weekly is crucial to staying productive and efficient.

💡PAR method

The PAR method, developed by Tiago Forte, stands for Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archive. This method helps in structuring information and tasks. The speaker adapts this system to their own needs, especially in managing ADHD and digital organization. Each section serves a specific purpose: projects have clear goals, areas involve ongoing responsibilities, resources are for learning or reference materials, and the archive stores inactive items.

💡Second Brain

A 'second brain' refers to a digital or physical system used to store ideas, notes, and tasks outside of one's mind, thus freeing up mental space. In the video, the speaker mentions storing information from books in their second brain using Apple Notes or MiNote. This system helps them organize content that they later refer to, making it a crucial part of their workflow and knowledge management.

💡Inbox Zero

Inbox Zero is the practice of keeping an inbox (whether for emails, notes, or ideas) as empty as possible by regularly processing and organizing items. The speaker compares this concept to managing digital notes, where they advocate for clearing the inbox once a week to maintain mental clarity and prevent feeling overwhelmed. The method supports productivity by reducing digital clutter.

💡Digital Life Organization

This refers to the practice of structuring and managing one's digital tasks, ideas, and content in an efficient way. The speaker emphasizes the value of organizing their digital life through apps like MiNote and systems like the PAR method. By doing so, they gain clarity, reduce stress, and increase productivity in both work and personal life.

💡Resources

Resources, as mentioned in the PAR method, are materials that serve as reference points, such as learning materials, books, or recipes. In the video, the speaker stores important content like book summaries, recipes, or creative inspiration from other content creators in the resources section. These are often reviewed and used for future projects.

💡Areas

In the PAR method, 'Areas' represent ongoing responsibilities or roles that need continuous attention, unlike projects that have clear end goals. The speaker uses their YouTube channel as an example of an area because it is an ongoing endeavor with no definite completion, requiring regular updates and maintenance.

💡Simplification

Simplification is a recurring theme in the video, where the speaker advocates for simplifying digital tools and workflows to enhance productivity. They contrast Notion's complexity with MiNote’s simplicity, arguing that simpler tools often lead to better results, especially when starting to organize one’s digital life. The emphasis is on reducing overwhelm and making tools more intuitive.

Highlights

Notion is a great tool but can be complicated for many users, which is why the speaker prefers a simpler alternative.

Minote is the speaker’s preferred whiteboard app and daily driver, costing $10 per month, but its simplicity and folder structure make it worth the price.

The video aims to help users simplify their digital life by using a whiteboard app like Minote instead of complex tools like Notion.

The speaker mentions Figma as a free alternative whiteboard app that they used before switching to Minote.

The speaker stresses that if your digital life (like computer organization) is messy, it can negatively impact your mental clarity, much like a messy physical space.

An efficient digital system helps with productivity, organization, and overall life management, not just for work but also for personal areas like relationships.

Notion’s complexity, while free, can be overwhelming for beginners, so Minote is suggested as a simpler alternative.

The speaker introduces the PAR method (Project, Areas, Resources, Archive) based on Thiago Forte’s system for organizing digital notes and projects.

An inbox is vital for fast-paced life, helping store ideas quickly when you’re in a hurry, to be organized later.

The speaker compares collecting notes to taking photos—you may store them but never look at them again unless organized properly.

The speaker created their own variation of the PAR method, tweaking it for their ADHD needs, emphasizing the importance of regular organization.

The speaker emphasizes the importance of having one inbox for ideas, which is processed weekly to avoid clutter and overwhelm.

Minote is praised for its flexibility in helping the speaker keep their inbox close to empty and organize digital content efficiently.

The speaker explains that organizing digital notes and media helps them stay on track with projects and life goals, including maintaining a YouTube channel.

The speaker discusses how the PAR method helps manage various digital resources, like screenshots, future purchases, and video ideas, in a clear and structured way.

Transcripts

notion is a great tool and I use it

every single day but for many people

notion might be a bit complicated

especially with all these functions and

options and in this video I would like

to help you to simplify your Digital

Life with a simple Whiteboard app in my

case I use minote where I'm a huge fan

besides of notion and also is my daily

driver notion and minod but it also cost

$10 per month which I feel for my case

completely valuable because its

Simplicity and folder structure which is

in my case unique but for for this

example which I'm going to show you in

this video you can use any other

Whiteboard app for example figma which

is free and it's also a pretty good tool

um which I also used before for a while

but then I switched to me note and I

said hey $10 is totally fine for what

I'm getting for it so how do we actually

organize our Digital Life which I had

huge problem because in the past I was

not organized I mean I was organized in

terms of spaces and everything because I

have seen it every every single day but

like my computer was an entire mess and

everything was like kind of lying around

and also the thing is if your computer

is kind of like messy your brain is also

messy same with your your room if your

room is messy somehow in my opinion your

brain is also a bit messy which I had

huge problems in the past not with

cleaning my room and keeping it tidy

with organizing and storing actually

ideas and systems and my digital notes

whatever it is it helps you in terms of

studying it is it helps you in terms of

work it helps you in terms of life it

can also help you in relationships it

can help you in every situation in your

life and if you once understand how it

works life becomes easier and more

organized and structured especially in

terms of work and efficiency and

productivity so getting into it and this

system right here in my Whiteboard app

me note which I use every single day um

and notion is in my case a bit too

complicated

um for many people in the beginning so

for example if we have notion here I'm

going to show you for a really quick

moment how my notion is look looks like

that is my notion um that is everything

I have what I'm doing which videos I'm

producing my ticker what I need to do

every single day um which videos I need

to record and the best performing videos

and that's how I'm doing it in notion um

yeah never mind and mil note is way way

I seriously way simple and there's also

the thing how we should start with it

because notion for many people is a bit

too complicated even if it's free and

with Mila note it is more simple and

sometimes things which are simpler are

sometimes better especially in the

beginning and that is why I'm using

Milan note and starting off first we

have for example an entire way possible

means I'm just changing my coffee in my

um we have the entire thing here which

is a project a par method based on

Thiago Forte par is Project areas

resources and archive right here um and

it is his method just I just put it a

bit more into my perspective and how it

works a bit better for my ADHD way of

not taking and digital organization and

what is also really important is an

inbox so we're starting off with an

inbox because it is so important in

stret situations in fastpac life what we

currently have if you're in the gym if

you're somewhere you're walking and you

have an idea you need you need to store

the idea and what we most have an issue

is is where do I organ as where do I put

it in an inbox that I find it later on

because I my biggest pain was like I

have Apple notes and there's like I

don't know 300 pages of stuff I was

collecting but I never used it ever

again it's like a bit with photos which

I actually do look at my photos but a

lot of people probably just take a photo

or most people and then we never look at

them again and that the same with the

inbox you put something in your inbox

because you don't have an inbox in the

beginning and then you will never see

them again it's like um and so the most

important thing is in the beginning we

need one specific inbox not two not

three one one inbox okay this one is

base one inbox but in two different

cases um which is super simple and I

will come up in that one moment so the

most important thing is when we have an

x

Xbox Xbox when we have an inbox we store

ideas from phone or computer and

organize it later on that is really

important because when we are in a

stressful situation when we are in a gym

we are

not mentally in this position that we

have enough time to store it so we just

put it somewhere in the Inbox and once

or twice a week or whenever you are free

you organize it and structure because

you know okay do I need it for a project

which have a goal have an end in mind

and it's yeah it always have an end in

mind means this could be 3 months could

be 9 months it could be even 2 years but

it have an end in mind then we also have

areas which or organize it into area

which is something I always need to look

at again so it's a role or

responsibility ongoing maintenance so

it's never completed and that's

something for ex my YouTube channel my

YouTube channel is never completed it is

an infinite game

um then we also have resources might be

screenshots might be ideas might be

future purchases future importance

learning things books food recipes when

you're getting into learning for example

here I have something for life for books

for content for business uh for mind and

for imitation from other content

creators for example um and then we have

an

archive um you know and any topic of

ongoing interest whatever interests you

I mostly for example when I read

something on my iPad on a book um and

then I use it in my second brain I

always store it in resource in books

specifically um first of all on the

Apple notes and then later on when the

book is finished I put it later with

catb together and myself put it into me

note or into notion but notion would be

destroying this video

Simplicity um and then yeah we have kis

which are inactive items so everything

what we currently don't need we store

there so because out of sight out of

mind but the problem is with out of

sight out of mind we also get into other

issues so for example if we want to do

it in the near future let's say in a

month and we St in kiv somehow is

exactly how Apple notes is going later

on you end up with 300 notes and you

never watch them again so what I did and

kind of improved from my own perspective

the par method is I created project

areas and resource specific archives

which I look which I are looking a bit

more because they just have six boards

two boards and five and oras have 16

boards which is way more and sometimes

seriously I just delete stuff but

sometimes we need stuff in the future

again so everything what you see here in

Project areas and resource is

there is used once a week minimum and

that is really important um and when we

want for example um to organize it

somewhere and we are as I explained in

this inbox situation we are somewhere

and we want to store it we need one

specific location and from from there on

later on we store it into project areas

resource and if you don't need it into

archiv and I use this system for over a

year now and it works perfectly great

and I always optimize it for f further

individual needs and the inbox is pretty

simple we have an iPad for example and

we are around I'm not on my desk for

example I have my iPad with me or my

phone let's say this my phone and I have

an idea and I write this idea down

pretty simple right but then the thing

is okay we need to write it down so we

can organize it later so I called it

inbox zero similar to people talking

about email inbox zero because if you

have too many stuff you're getting

overwhelmed our brains are not made for

all of this dopamine High activity stuff

which some people understand earlier or

later on in life

hopefully um and sometimes a slow life

is a better life sometimes it depends um

and for example yeah we start in inbox

and M note is perfect for that it has

two inboxes in some ways one which is

over the phone so when we have something

which I write down in a week on my iPad

on my phone it gets stored here and the

thing is I need once a week store it

somewhere so for example um there's

ideas from a book and I need to store it

this is something I need for content for

this week then I can store it into my 12

week strategy because I need this one

this content probably for this week's

video um or somewhere else um so and

then at the end of this week I always

try to keep this completely empty and

every and put it everywhere where it

makes sense so this one tries to be as

little as possible maybe there like one

or 10 ideas up to but if we have a

specific amount of ideas it gets fulled

so it try to be always empty it once a

week not empty but like organize it once

a week and mostly when I'm starting in a

day and I was like oh there was the

notes I was taking yesterday oh I just

organized it qu quickly in the morning

because I know okay that is probably an

area which is an never ended completing

task it is a project is have an ending

goal and I need it for this video or

it's like a learning inspiration which I

need for future purchases okay I put it

into resources and another really

interesting thing here as well is for

example when we are watching a YouTube

video and you're like hey it is a great

interesting video and I want to create

content about it or is a music is a song

or it is um a food recipe and we want to

save recipe let's say we are getting

protein pancakes pretty simple one of my

favorite dishes or dishes or food

whatever yeah we getting all the stuff

and then we are looking for example we

click on this one video which I saved

here or let's take Foo because he's also

German I have an English uh Challen uh

Channel then I have this me not

extension and then this one I can save

this to home I can also store it

immediately but I find it simple to save

it first on the home then get back into

meal note and then this video is into

our unsorted section and this unsorted

section is always here like videos which

I kind of want to watch in the future or

is pretty important for future videos

topics and then I need to organize it

and oh yeah well look how what I have in

my resources I have food food recipes

perfect so I put it into food recipes

and it's stored here we can also

organize this fold further but seriously

funny funny video pretty interesting

video if you want to watch it so I have

all the stuff here and then I can just

quickly be

somewhere um and just like oh I need a

food recipe just look in

here protein pancakes whatever we can

also make it even more into specific

folders currently I'm fine with it

because it's not too much and I don't

get overwhelmed probably if it's getting

more I organize it into sweets salty and

whatever Foods or breakfast lunch and

dinner yeah that is pretty simple from

the computer so either we have it on the

computer on Google Chrome it could be

also website and we could store it

together and what I also sometimes like

is okay we have a specific topic let's

see if not a food

recipe oh maybe let's take a food recipe

and then we like hey we want to connect

these two because we can combine these

two recipes we can make a connection can

color it also we can color it with

yellow make it a bit thicker and then

make it for example yellow and it's like

okay these two recipes we can combine

together and then makes everything

simpler because the better a video the

better a thing is Vis visually the

easier we can remember it yeah so that's

how I'm having this inbox into zero

um well and we can actually use this

system for literally everything so for

example on my Windows computer um or my

iCloud which I would like to go down but

on this computer it is not that

structured but yeah let's get into this

because download for example always

keeps empty but I use don't use computer

this much so we are having the shared

win and Mech folder so that's my entire

digital iCloud folder right give me a

second so we have the shared win and

make

folder and I also need probably need to

organize that so every what is here it

it is not organized for this week uh I

mainly use it on my computer back there

but yeah this for example interconnected

with all my devices iPad MacBook um iMac

Windows computer and iPhone so I can

organize it and have project areas

resources and archives then we can get

into projects and then we have the

project which I'm currently doing the

short weeks POV iPhone photo inbox

numbers 90 days to

5Ks all of that is here and then also um

screen recordings and I can just quickly

access it here then we have areas which

is for example documents iPhone folder

in general about iPhone related things

mostly photos photo content in general

ready to publish content which is always

there I always need to publish any type

of content video content music downloads

for example if I need for YouTube video

editing and all the stuff you can

seriously this system is Milan note you

can use it for everything and is so

simple when we are using me note and a

white port app where we have specific

folders I don't want to put this video

in full length but yeah I hope this

video gives you a short explanation a

simple video how to organize it in a

really simple way and maybe when you

understand the system after a while and

implement it long enough you create can

create something like notion like I was

doing here or we can also get in depth

in my commun Community about it so if

you're interested to learn more about

productivity I have a completely free

community where I'm talking and have

also weekly calls in it which is just

starting right now and yeah that is for

example simpli simplify your Digital

Life here's the video which I'm

currently recording um then need to edit

it and whatsoever yeah that's my 90day

Challenge and yeah if you're interested

to really get an in-depth feeling of

that stuff feel free to join my Discord

Community challenge or a 90day challenge

if you also want to make

5,000 subscribers and Euros or dollars

in 12 weeks or 90 days with the strategy

I'm currently doing yeah links are down

below and I hope you like this video and

if there's something unclear you didn't

understand please leave a comment down

below because I would like to make the

videos better and it's not really

important for myself to understand

because in this case I understood it it

is important that you understand it and

if I can improve myself of EXP explation

and making it better for you I would be

super happy I got one comment last time

that I was doing my forget notion video

on my iPad because I was always looking

down and taking the notes and he said it

was a bit more difficult to focus on my

talking because I was so often looking

on down on my iPad so this time I was

putting it on my computer and explain it

right there so that thing so either

leave a like and if you didn't like this

video please comment it and tell me what

I can do better because a dislike

doesn't really help me it just helped me

that okay the video maybe doesn't was

good but I don't know what to do better

for another video so if you comment

something down below I know for next

time hey this is the thing I need to

improve to make my videos better so yeah

and I want to improve I'm I'm not a big

YouTuber yet and I don't really have a

huge following but I would like to

improve so please leave your feedback

down in the comments and see you guys in

my next video bye