Summary of "My Things 3 Setup: Organizing Both My Work and Personal Life"
Organizing Personal and Work Life with Things 3 for ADHD
The video presents a detailed setup and workflow for managing both personal and work life using the Things 3 task manager, tailored especially for individuals with ADHD. It combines lifestyle and productivity tips to create an effective and manageable system.
Key Lifestyle and Productivity Tips
Using a Task Manager as a “Visual Brain”
- Essential for remembering tasks and deadlines, particularly for ADHD users.
- Unlike calendars, task managers require actively checking off completed tasks, preventing tasks from being ignored once their scheduled time passes.
Core Organizational Structure
- Separate personal and work areas to avoid mixing responsibilities.
- Use Areas in Things 3 to organize projects and tasks by category.
Personal Life Organization
- Create projects for recurring tasks such as paying bills, grocery shopping, and house projects.
- Set recurring tasks for essential routines like watering plants, ordering medications, and workouts.
- Conduct a weekly Sunday review inspired by the Getting Things Done methodology:
- Plan out the week.
- Balance tasks.
- Push incomplete tasks forward.
- Use a “Reset Day” task on Sunday as a deadline for cleaning, laundry, dishes, car washing, and charging devices to help prevent procrastination.
- Organize grocery lists with headings by store for efficient shopping.
- Use emojis in project and area titles for quick visual identification.
Work Life Organization
- Create multiple areas for different types of work tasks:
- One-off tasks (e.g., emails, returning review units).
- Long-term projects unrelated to current business work.
- Sponsorships project with headings for potential, active, and completed deals.
- Split video projects into three areas due to Things 3 limitations:
- Active full-length videos (from scripting to posting).
- Shorts (short-form content, despite some personal dislike but willingness to adapt).
- Ideas (concepts with notes that evolve over time).
- Use shortcuts to automate project creation with predefined steps, saving time and ensuring consistency.
- Utilize Things 3’s unique feature of start and due dates to manage multi-day projects effectively.
Views and Workflow in Things 3
- Inbox: Quickly dump tasks when on the go or when details are missing.
- Today view: Focus on daily tasks.
- Upcoming view: Plan the week and check future tasks.
- Sunday view: Holds tasks without due dates but intended to be done soon; weekly review encourages pruning these tasks.
- Someday view: For tasks without deadlines, though used minimally due to complexity.
Automation and Shortcuts
- Extensive use of iOS Shortcuts to streamline task addition:
- Quick entry with full data input or quick dumping to inbox.
- Automatically add webpage links in markdown format to task notes.
- Create laundry timer tasks with adjustable durations.
- Shopping list shortcut that parses multiple items into the shopping list project.
Additional Tips
- Use headings and emojis to enhance visual organization and efficiency.
- Maintain regular weekly reviews and reset days to balance workload and prevent task overload.
Notable Products and Tools Mentioned
- Things 3: The main task manager app used across iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and watchOS.
- Scrantal: Sponsor of the video; a visual knowledge management tool featuring card-based note-taking, backlinking, and board organization.
- iOS Shortcuts: Used extensively to automate and streamline task management workflows.
Summary
This video offers a comprehensive, ADHD-friendly system for managing personal and professional tasks using Things 3. It emphasizes:
- Separation of work and personal life.
- Recurring task management.
- Weekly reviews.
- Automation through shortcuts.
The approach balances discipline with flexibility, helping to prevent overwhelm and improve productivity.
Category
Lifestyle
Share this summary
Is the summary off?
If you think the summary is inaccurate, you can reprocess it with the latest model.
Preparing reprocess...