Hacking a GTD Moleskine
Update I wrote a follow-up to this post on 5 January 2007. It is available here. A shot of a fully completed page is also available here on Flickr.
I’ve always been apprehensive to join the almost-fanatical cult of Getting Things Done. I’ve heard more about it from the blogosphere (as well as non-blogger co-workers) for the greater part of a year and a half now, with massive blogs dedicated to bringing the GTD gospel to the masses of unenlightened IT workers and friends alike. Something about the GTD system seemed more than organised: it tiptoed the line of absolute obsessive-compulsive disorder. It seemed like the kind of thing my super-organised mother would use.
Ironically, my mother called me the other day to see how I was doing, and I explained how I was juggling freelance projects, what was left of my undergraduate education, my blog, and my social life, falling behind in the others when I focused on one. While I thought - and still think - that my existing form of time management has been extremely successful to date, my mother seemed to disagree fully. Writing off my mother’s comments about my lack of time management as those motherly words that no child ever really listens to, I continued on with my day. The same day, some friends and colleagues of mine also told me that I needed to clean up my time management system. Some of them were just punctual by nature; others were members of the Church of GTD. Obviously, something was wrong with my being nearly thirty minutes late on regular intervals, my absent-mindedness toward group assignments, and my utter inability to maximise my productivity in a given day. It was the ultimate in economic hypocrisy: here I was, three months from officially being an “economist,” and I was about as organised as I had been when I started college. Something needed to change.
I had tried to convert to the GTD discipline before, using my Treo 650, Shadow Plan and the built-in To Do system, but it felt clunky and hacked-together. I then tried the Kinkless GTD system that so many übergeeks have raved about only to find it equally complex. Half of the actions that GTD was tailored to had little to no relevance to my life, but I was stuck with them anyway. I found myself trying to process tasks into increasingly weirder Projects. My Someday/Maybe list was almost nonexistent. On the paper end of things, I had seen multiple variations of the whole Hipster PDA device, only to find it lacking any grace or aesthetic beauty. It seemed that no matter where I went, the GTD system just wasn’t for me; I’d lose the 43 folders somewhere in my apartment, index cards would appear crumpled and ugly, and the digital solutions had terrible or too complex interfaces.
I felt as if I was missing something; if GTD was so spectacular, why did it seem to be so awful? After a bit of research and a bit of creativity, I decided that I’d just build my own GTD-based system from scratch using a Moleskine Ruled Pocket Notebook and inspired by the Hipster, the PigPog, and a bit of my own interaction design to make it as intuitive as possible for me to use. Considering there’s such a huge GTD community, I decided to publish my own Moleskine Hack for people to use. And, with that, I present the official hyalineskies GTD System.
Building the Base
It doesn’t take a lot to build this system; it cost me under $20 for everything. Here’s what you’ll need:
- One (1) Moleskine Ruled Pocket Notebook
- Seven (7) Post-It® Tabs, at least three different colours (I used the tabs because they’re easier to grab onto in a rush as well as large.)
- One (1) Extra Fine point Sanford Sharpie or other permanent marker
- A pen of some sort to use with the Moleskine. This is a pen that you’ll need to keep around with the system all the time — I constantly carry a Lamy Vista fountain pen, so that’s what I’m using.
Once you’ve rustled up the necessary materials, it’s time to start hacking.
Preparing the Moleskine
In all honesty, calling the hyalineskies system a GTD system is kind of a misnomer, as it’s more closely related to the PigPog system than GTD: it cuts all of the organisation of GTD and pares it down to its task process. In this case, the Moleskine takes care of task Inboxing, Processing, Project outlining, and the Someday / Maybe list. “Hard calendar” events, such as doctor’s appointments and meeting times, are handled electronically by my Motorola Q. I’ve cut out the 43 Folders jazz and actually don’t use any type of foldering system at all; the folder in the back of the Moleskine is used for storing business cards (both my own and others’ cards.)
1. Date the outside, right edge, in the bottom right upper corner.
You should date the Moleskine with the date at which you plan on beginning its use; when the Moleskine is full, you will write the finished date underneath it and prep a new one. This way, you’ll always have a running archive of your tasks.
2. Add your contact information to the inside cover.
The Moleskine has a section for contact information for a reason; on the Moleskine that I write hyalineskies entries in, there is even a fairly large cash reward. If the book is of considerable value, don’t hesitate to assign a dollar value to it — any promised incentive will increase the chances of you getting your book back. It may also be wise to include alternate contact information or emergency contact information to this page if you carry it with you daily.
3. Number the odd pages of the book.
Starting with the first ruled page, number the page in the lower right corner with the number 1. Your last numbered page will be number 191. Don’t worry about numbering the other pages; the time it takes to number them is fairly useless considering your search accuracy will be within two pages with the odd-numbered system. You’re also probably not prone to looking at the even page numbers, considering they’re on the back of the sheets.
It’s tabs time
Once you’ve got the Moleskine prepped for use, it’s time to label your tabs. Take the Sharpie you used to mark the side of the book and write on your tabs. For two of the tabs (preferably of the same colour,) write INBOX / NEXT PROCESSED. For another two, wrote PROJECTS. For yet another pair, write SOMEDAY / MAYBE. These tabs will give you direct access to the proper sections of the Moleskine.
What about that last tab? Label it SPECIAL PRIORITY. It’s entirely optional, but having a special priority tab allows you to mark a Project or Task as taking priority over everything else. I’ve got the tab more for putting priority on social things than business things, as I tend to forget key social events more than I do key business ones.
Once you’re done labeling, put the spare INBOX, PROJECTS, and SOMEDAY tabs, as well as the SPECIAL PRIORITY tab, on the last page of the Moleskine. The last page of the Moleskine is card stock, so it holds the tabs well and is pretty useless for writing GTD content upon. Take the remaining three tabs and place them on the upper parts of the page, as close together as possible. Put INBOX on Page 5, PROJECTS on Page 123, and SOMEDAY on Page 189. If you tend to have more Projects, you’ll probably want to put the tab on a different page and increase the space available to Projects; this goes for the other sections as well and this is just a general guideline.
If you look at my Moleskine head-on, my tabs seem tangent to one another on the y-axis. I’ve done this in accordance with an extrapolation of the old interaction design principle of Fitts’ Law, which states that a speed-accuracy tradeoff exists in a pointing atmosphere. In a more intuitive sense, having these tabs close together allows you to quickly flip between sections of the Moleskine with very little movement.
Formatting the Moleskine sections
After much deliberation, I came up with a format for listing tasks which seems in some ways to be fairly complex at first glance, but it’s awfully intuitive to me (and my own intuition was the priority here.) At the top of the section, label it with the section name and then a small legend for formatting. For example, in the INBOX / NEXT PROCESSED section, the first two lines (pictured at left) are written as such:
INBOX/NEXT ACTIONS
DATE TASK(REF)(ITERATION) [PROJ.] WAIT?
The legend may seem fairly cryptic at first, but here’s what it stands for:
DATE: The short date (e.g.,05/31) of the time the task was entered. If you don’t process tasks daily, this gives you an idea of the age of the task at hand.TASK: The actual task. This can span multiple lines if need be, but leave at least a half-centimetre margin on the right side for theWAIT?boolean (which I’ll explain in a second.)(REF): A reference number. If this task was moved forward in the list and not dumped into a project, you can then reference the page of the original task here. If you’re really obsessive-compulsive, you could do something likepage:linewhere the page number and line number correspond to the task.(ITERATION): An iteration number for tasks pushed forward. This gives you an at-a-glance look at how many times the task was moved forward; it also gives an idea to the degree of “stubbornness” of the task. You increment this value every time you process tasks and push them forward.[PROJ.]: Put a page number in square brackets when processing a task to denote that you’ve spawned a project off of the task. In this case, you get a reference number to a page in the notebook’sPROJECTSsection, so you can track where the Project was created and why that might’ve been the case.WAIT?: If you’re waiting for a response from somebody, simply put an X in this “column” of the page. If you followed the above rules, this is a constant margin down the side of your page. This way, on processing tasks for the day, you have a quick visual cue to all of the tasks you’re waiting for someone or something else before you can take action.
Format the PROJECTS section like the INBOX session, but devote a whole page to a project when a project is started. For the SOMEDAY / MAYBE section, I simply wrote a section header, as task metadata is not important to me in this section of the notebook.
What about those first five pages? Title Page 1 PROJECTS INDEX, and underneath write the legend NAME, PAGES. The first five pages exist to build a quick-access Table of Contents for your PROJECTS section, more of which will be explained in the next section of this article. Once you’re done formatting, you’ll be good.
Using the hyalineskies GTD system
At this point, you’re good to go — well, at least from the construction part. There are a few things to remember while using the system to maintain its efficiency and effectiveness.
1. Use the Moleskine’s fabric bookmark to record your current active position, and move the Inbox tab accordingly.
The Moleskine’s built-in bookmark should always be set to your insertion point - that is, it should always rest on a page where there is space for you to Inbox tasks in the INBOX section. It’s the easiest thing to grab onto and flip open in a rush. Once you’ve processed tasks up to the active point, move the INBOX tab up to the last page where tasks have been processed. If you’re staying on top of things, your INBOX tab should rest on the same page as the built-in bookmark daily.
2. Record Next Actions as being Next Actions. Reference their parents.
I mark Next Actions with a left arrow (-> ) before the task name to signify that it is the next action taken on a previous task. In the (REF) parentheses, I write the page number of the original task that the next action corresponds to. Whenever I am creating a new action, the (REF) is set to an empty set (ø) and the (ITERATION) is set to zero (0).
3. When moving a task forward, increment its iteration.
When I move a task forward, I copy all of its original properties and then increment (ITERATION) by 1. If a task lasts for more than three or so processes (three iterations), it is seemingly becoming more stubborn and I should probably either defer the task to SOMEDAY or get it done.
4. Mark the waiting for column if you’re stalled.
This column exists to provide an easy visual cue to the tasks you’re stalled on due to other circumstances. If you fail to mark the column, you’re losing that quick-scan functionality of what you’re waiting on.
5. When dumping a task to a project, mark it with the project page.
If you’re dumping an Inbox task to a Project when processing, mark it with the proper [PROJECT] markup. This way, you’ll know what page (and what project) it went off to.
6. When creating a new Project or a new page for an existing Project, update the Project Index.
The project index is useless unless kept up to date. Whenever a new project is created, add it to the Project Index. This goes for pages, too; if your project ends up colliding with another and has a disjointed page, marking the index with FREELANCE WORK, 124, 130 allows you to remember that the Freelance Work Project contains data on both pages 124 and 130.
See you in January
And with that, I’m off to try the GTD system until January 2007, when I’ll write a follow-up post to this one. We’ll see if the GTD system actually works out for me this time; with this much planning and eagerness to be more efficient, I’m optimistic that it’ll work this time. Maybe all I needed was to revert back to the basics of pen and paper. It seemed to work for Bruce Chatwin and numerous generations before us; I’ve got little doubt that it will work for me as well.
Article Abstract
Posted 7 November 2006. Approx. 2,395 words.
I’ve been able to avoid the crazy Getting Things Done phenomenon for quite a while now; after a failed attempt at trying it out using my Treo 650, I’m going back to the old school. In a little over an hour, I crafted my own GTD-and-PigPog inspired system using a Moleskine Pocket Notebook as its core.
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Seems very similar to the system I’ve been using for a few months now. I think it was first posted by Jerry Britio
I tried using a Moleskine for a while as a complete GTD system except it lacked a couple of things I really needed:
1. I need to move, remove, and archive pages. How long is my project list going to be? I have no idea. So I really need a loose-leaf binder so I can move stuff around.
2. I need a year calendar big enough that I can put all my daily appointments in it. This is my hack for the 43 folders - put things like “pay mortgage” or “mid-year review” on the day you need to pay attention to it.
3. I want a full contacts list so I can easily get people’s addresses and phone numbers.
All of those things I need in one system so now I use a Franklin Covey binder with my own custom GTD pages. It’s not as sexy or as portable as a Moleskine but it holds everything I need in exactly the way I want it.
I do use a Moleskine as the inbox of my system. I always have it on me for note taking and for new items coming in. I use a red tab on a blotter page to alert me when I have unprocessed stuff in the Moleskine. Then I just sit down and process it.
After using the GTD system for about four months now, I can clearly say that it’s become an important part of my life. I know how weird that sounds but knowing what you need to do when you need to do it is very freeing.
And yes, although I spend a lot of time pontificating my GTD system, I do get a lot more done in a lot less time.
The only GTD system that I’ve used is TiddlyMonkeyGTD, it uses Tiddlywiki which is a funny HTML page that allows microcontent. It seems like all the other GTD systems out there are pretty conforming but this one seems pretty freestyle.
However, portability might be an issue here…
And aesthetic, Moleskine with fountain pen? Nice.
Hi, just wanted to say that I’m now obsessed with finding a Vista fountain pen somewhere because it looks really awesome. GTD system looks interesting as well, I’ll wait for your follow-up though. Has the pen given you any trouble with leaking, so forth? It looked pretty darn sturdy.
Careful wih fountain pens when flying. Some tend to leak or even “squirt”… I need an electronic version of GTD… still looking for one that matches my needs though. Wish it were as easy to make one on the computer as it is on a ruled notebook.
I have done somewhat the same, Except, I bought a moleskine contact book. This eliminates having to buy your own tabs. You can peel off the letter stickers on the tabs and mark them in different colors for the different parts(e.g. projects). It also eliminates having to number your pages, because the tabs are there. Sweet to see how everybody adapts it so that it works for them!
Flat Bookmarking Pens are great with Moleskines too if carrying around a fountain pen becomes a hassle. Thanks for sharing your GTD technique! I may have to give it a try.
Question:
1. You’ve just decided that Task A needs to be done, and it is part of the project on p. 135. Do you enter Task A in INBOX/NEXT ACTIONS or only on the project page (p. 135) or both?
TIA
I’m really interested in this technique, but to a neophyte like me, this whole system is very unclear. If you could show some examples of properly formatted and completed tasks, that would be a big help
What do you use the 2nd tab of each pair for?
How do you indicate a completed action?
What are the spare tabs for? You mention you put them on the last page.
Hi–I went out and bought the fountain pen on its aesthetics and your recommendation alone, on saturday, and I’ve been quite pleased so far. It’s going to get some real world stress-testing now at school so I’ll see how well it goes!
Save for still having to buy some tabs, I have my first Moleskine all set up and ready to go. Great set of instructions that were easy to follow and well thought out!
I thought about adding another section to mine for journal/blog post ideas, but ended up picking up larger Moleskine purely for writing.
Cool system- I’m looking for a replacement moleskine GTD system since my dog ate the last one (wasn’t that happy with it anyhow). Question- the tags seem to stick out quite a long way- how secure and robust are they? (Would they survive the rigours of the bottom of a work bag?)
Wow did this take off. I’m happy to see that this is helping some people with their New Year’s Resolutions.
emdub: I carry fountain pens with me on flights all the time. If you use a bottled ink / screw converter on the pen and leave extra airspace in the cartridge, you usually don’t have any problems provided the pen is capped and facing up. I’ve carried my Vista with me to tons of places.
Dennis Bretz: Only on the Project page. Project pages are independent lists than the primary Inbox. If you are adding an action when you haven’t processed, then yes, it goes on the Inbox Unprocessed (and you reference the project;) otherwise, it stays on the project page.
Alan Mace: You’ll see a photo in today’s followup post.
Mark and David Ray: To indicate a completed action, strike it through. The spare tabs on the back are in case you lose a tab. You’ll have extras if you’re away from home.
Archaeogeek: Really robust, actually. I was afraid of that too when I made the system so I made the extra tabs at the back. Mine sits in the bottom of a Chrome Citizen most of the time, and aside from the Moleskine getting some indentations in it, the tabs are holding up surprisingly well.
Dude,
The hip PDA system is the shit. Index cards held together by a rubber band or just left lying together…
Idea for marking the “waiting†column:
I mark items that are put on hold with a slash (“/â€Â) in the waiting column, making them easily identifiable. Once an item is no longer on hold I add a backslash (“\â€Â) to the slash, effectively making it into an X.
Thanks for the follow up. I’ve been trying this system for the last couple of weeks. It’s been helped by my buying and actually reading the book and I’m making lots of progress. While I’m not really over the hump yet, I have dealt with no less than seven things that have been just sitting undone for over a year! Hopefully I’ll be fully up to speed by the end of January and making strides in the stuff I want/need to do.
Still I’m a little unclear on a couple of things. Firstly, if you only put the action in the “project” page, how do you keep it in mind as something you need to do next? My understanding was that the idea is to keep everything right in front of you, since your brain sucks at remembering but excels at prioritizing. Subsequently, if something’s a project action, I put it in both places with a reference to the project page (the “[###]” that you mention). So far, the only drawback to that I see is having to write an action twice, although it seems that only reinforces its importance.
Secondly, I understand the (iteration) reference. Whenever I “clean up” my pages to bring errant tasks onto a single two-page spread from elsewhere, I write down that it’s the second time I had to enter it. But I don’t get the (ref) tag. Is that supposed to be a trackback to the initial task that spawned it? If so, why would you want to track that?
I read your follow-up, but I didn’t see any new pictures, other than the small one at the top. What would be helpful would be a dead-on shot of a full page of your inbox and projects pages with labels illustrating the code and how you use it. I think the system is workable in the way I’m running it, but I would like to understand your concept better.
Thanks!
Nice work! Clear and concise but with enough space to allow the reader to adapt there own style to the moleskine.
James, Sydney, Australia
p.s like the style of your blog very smart.
Thanks for the excellent moleskine posts. Having tried dozens of online and offline computerized GTD tools, you inspired me to put together my own Moleskine based GTD system, which I’ve described in my blog.
Great work with the moleskine. The only question that I have is: Do you devote an entire page to a project? Do you re-record all of the related tasks on the project page? Do you realize that my one question has now become three?
Anyway, enjoy the buzz that you’ve created. It’s definitely warranted.
Guess I answered my first question by actually reading your post…thanks.
I’m trying this out with a cheap notebook (so i won’t get it mixed up with my moleskin diary *g*, plus they cost a bomb in australia)
I expanded a little on your notetaking format. I’m trying:
DATE @context TASK(REF)(ITER) [PROJ.] WAIT? NX Action?
the @ context is self explanitory if you know GTD
I put an arrow in the NX Action column at the end to remind myself that there is an open loop. Good for small projects which aren’t worth a project page but I might forget need another action.
eg Write letter ->
arrow is to remind myself to add ‘post letter’ to the list when this action is done.
Thanks for the layout, i stumbled upon this as my first intro to GTD and i’ve found the layout the most usefil to me so far.
You are the best :)
I found this post via LifeHacker, and I’ll defenitely start using your system with my Moleskine! IT’s usefull, it’s practical, it’s great! You deserve an important place in my rss feeds and bookmarks!
Thanks
Ivy
This post is great… I saw one of these notebooks in a store this weekend and this page was in my del.icio.us network tagged by an old mentor (for ‘moleskine’)… I’m going to give this a shot as my time/task management skills are quite atrocious and this is quite a bit more organized than my usual method of tasking.
thx,
shaun
I’d love to see a little YouTube video displaying this….
Sorry to be picky, and I’m sure it doesn’t matter where the date goes, but… what is a “bottom right upper corner”?
Yeeeeah, that was kinda snarky, in retrospect. Sorry ’bout that. I really didn’t understand what you were saying though…
Anyway, I’m trying a version of this — I found an academic calendar (August 2007 - August 2008) that has lots of note space on each page. I plan to use August - December of this year for calendar/date-based tasks, and the Dec - August 2008 for my context lists. The book has a removable cover with flaps, so I’ll look for a small blank notebook to slip into the back for general notes.
In December I’ll buy a 12 month calendar, and use Aug - December for lists; in August I’ll buy another academic calendar, and so on.
Might work out, might not, but worth a try. Thanks for the basic plan — I love the sticky label idea, especially for context pages that will be shifting places as pages fill up.
This page is awesome !!!!
Thanks a lot for the tips…. I have just read the GTD book and I had a couple of Moleskines, i am a fanatic of them…..so after this I couldn´t resist trying your method, and I´ve done it.
It really works for me, I have read a couple of others pages and from my point of view this is the best. You really did it great !
The only difference is that i have adapted the format of the tasks to :
Done? Date Subject Repetition Reference *Project* Context
And my categories in the GTD Moleskine are:
Index
Next Actions
Waiting for
Projects
Someday/Maybe
Notes/Reference
Since now, I will be unpatient waiting for the posts in your blog, i´ve added you to my del.icio.us and RSS feeds.
Thanks a lot for your effort, I think you are vey valuable, if you have any other projects, webs, or something do let me know becacuse I would be really interested in seeing it or keeping in touch.
Regards,
Oscar Martinez
Can you explain what goes in the Projects, and Someday / Maybe Section in detail?
Just curious! Why do you initially place the “Inbox / Processed” tab on page 5? Are you using the first four pages for some other purpose, or do you start your task tracking on page one?
Sounds like a nice handwriting exercise, but Outlook + Blackberry accomplishes all of this without adding another item to my daily carry. I carry a small notepad to meetings to brainstorm and jot speaker notes, but they all inevitably get transferred to Outlook, and then that piece of paper goes bye bye.
I like the idea of this a lot, but I might just be missing something here. How are you flagging a task as complete when it’s done?
Great article. I use a system based on yours, although I heavily simplified it to match my own needs better. I am using the system for a couple of months now, seems to work pretty good (though I must force myself to maintain the habit every now and then).
I was wondering… How’s it going for you? You write ’see you again in January’ .. I suspect that was meant to be January 2007? Are you still using your system, did you change it and it what way?
Thanks for the inspiration, Hans
Thanks a lot for the tips….
Thanks a lot for your effort, I think you are vey valuable, if you have any other projects, webs, or something do let me know becacuse I would be really interested in seeing it or keeping in touch.
Eston, I’m obviously very late to the party, but this is a great project and I’m going to give it a go this year. I’ve read through the comments and helpful Flickr photos, but I’m wondering if you can talk more about your “projects” page. You wrote: “Format the PROJECTS section like the INBOX session, but devote a whole page to a project when a project is started.”
Could you clarify a bit? Specifically, I’m not clear what the corresponding (ref)(iteration)[project] variables that appear on the “inbox/next actions” page would be on the “projects” page. How exactly do you you keep track of the various next actions associated with this project? (Sorry to be dense.)
Thanks for whatever clarification you can offer. A picture of a completed projects page would be super (and, if I’m not mistaken, pretty much round out your Flickr collection of your GTD moleskine hack.)
Thanks again!
–e
Hi Eston, after a fair bit of research I’ve implemented this approach in a good notebook (not Moleskine, unfortunately). The funny thing is: now I’m facing a psychological barrier. Whereas I’ve been happily jotting down stuff in a text file and on index cards, I don’t really want to “spoil” this notebook by listing random crap in it. Silly, isn’t it?
I notice you don’t say anything about contexts. Are they not important to you? You talk about “processing” inbox items and crossing them out, but normally when you process an item you put it somewhere, right?
I also don’t really understand the REF thing. Why would you want to refer to the page of the original task? There will be lots of unrelated tasks on that page; I don’t see what you achieve by it. In your photo of a completed page, nearly every task had an empty-set symbol in the REF column, so do you actually use it much?
When I read your posts about this system and the comments, it all seemed fairly straightforward. Now that I’ve done all the work, I’m not so sure. In short, I’d love an updated post!
Thanks for what you’ve contributed so far.
To update my own post, I’m sort of settling into a pattern. I use index cards for capture and periodically transfer those items to the notebook. By the time I process them, the trivial items are done, so they don’t clutter up the notebook. Also, the transfer offers a chance to refine the idea. This means there is no barrier to entry in the index cards, so I do capture everything, but the notebook only retains worthwhile actions.
I also don’t use the REF, and haven’t had a chance to use iterations yet. I will use them, but I won’t write (0), I’ll only write (1) or (2) or whatever. Small detail.
Finally, on contexts, I can see now that I’m going to need to set up @home and @work contexts, to keep those things separate, and probably @phone and @shops as well. That shouldn’t be too hard. Let’s say @home fills up a page. That could be the trigger for a “review”, where all outstanding items are reconsidered and transferred to a new page if need be. Something like that anyway…
http://jangeisler.wordpress.com/2008/05/10/moleskines-finally-arrived/
Check new pics of my hack.
Hyalineskies, thanks for ideas I used for my own Moleskine
Thanks for the post. I just started using a very simple system in a Moleskin notebook. I do my task/index list starting at the back page moving forward. For tasks that I want to jot additional notes for I start from the front of the book and work towards the back. I number the book and add page numbers to the task list. I use simple hand drawn icons to denote different types of tasks. The first page of the book(front and back) is use as a “project” index for larger projects.
I use a fisher space pen. It’s nice and small. I thought about using a pilot G-2 mini because I think it writes better but I don’t like carrying a retractable pen in my pocket.
Also, if you like to have a straight edge with you for drawing/diagramming check this out:
http://www.helixusa.com/Products/Helix/Technical+Drawing/Accessories/Details/20542.html
Fits perfectly in my notebook and is paper thin.
You seem EXCEEDINGLY anal. Yet, there are glating omissions in your description. For example, what are the second set of tabs used for? Why are the first five pages titled INBOX when elsewhere you describe them as a PROJECT INDEX? My point . . . and there really is one here . . . you seem to love organization yet miss the glaringly obvious omissions in your scheme. Suggest you spend more time reflecting and editing and less time trying to invent and impress. otherwise, however, you did good work. Thank you for the ideas.
::looks at the comment above::
Was that really necessary?
Guess not. It’s not PC to criticize and by doing so arrive at a synthesis of new ideas. It might hurt her feelings. We should all just clap loudly and give her an A for the effort. Heck if she was a black woman or an Eskimo we could even give her an A+!!!
Not Overly Impressed:
Nothing’s wrong with a little criticism, but I think you’re being a little too vitriolic in your reply  you could have simply asked for what you needed clarification on. Anyway, here’s my little list of clarifications:
Extra Tabs: Somewhere I wrote “The last page of the Moleskine is card stock, so it holds the tabs well and is pretty useless for writing GTD content upon.” I kind of thought this was implied, but I can see how you’d find it unclear. They’re simply spare tabs. These things tend to fall off, and the spare tabs are remarkably useful.
The Project Index is different than the Inbox; I’m not sure where I said the first five pages are titled Inbox. The Project Index is exactly that, using the first five pages of the Moleskine as a table of contents to the Projects on Page 123. Inbox is a different section in used to track tasks for sorting (possibly into Projects) later.
This point is much less of a reply to your questions, but it stands as a pretty good marker that you didn’t really spend time reading this post or much about its author before criticising him. Last I checked, I’m still a white male.
(Also, perhaps you shouldn’t attempt to school me on editing when your own accusatory comment has three errors of its own.)
Could someone tell me how they did labeling with context in a moleskin-hack?
Great idea. I’ve just hacked my notebook (actually not a moleskine but close enough - next iteration is with the regular moleskine (I need the envelope in the back). As an educator, consultant and very busy person with a massive variety of life, fitness, family and other tasks. Photo (click the tags to see an earlier version) http://twitpic.com/11×1g I plan to share this with my students (who wish to try it, not mandatory!) as time management is the #1 challenge I’ve come across in all of my courses (not talent, inspiration, knowledge or intelligence - organisation trumps all). Thanks!
When an action gets transferred into its own project page do associated “next actions / processed” get written in bot the latter and former sections? i.o.w. is a project’s “next actions” completely separate from the “next action / processed” section of the notebook?
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How odd; I’ve been using almost the exact same system as you for the last two years, and we’ve never even met. Like you, I find electronic options for GTD to be clunky, not mobile enough, and usually loaded with things I don’t use; in particular, I live in Chicago and mostly get around by bicycling and walking, which makes my Treo a pretty bad option for jotting down quick notes on the go. I discovered that my plain ol’ Moleskine actually serves this purpose far better than any electronic option, which is why I’ve never gone back.
Now, that said, I do my tabs a little differently than you do, which I thought I’d share…
I don’t actually write on my tabs, but rather use their colors to denote specific types of pages: a red tab for the inbox, multiple blue tabs for my context-based next-action lists, green tabs for non-action pages I return to on a regular basis (my someday/maybe list, for example), and yellow tabs for text that I would like to transfer to my computer at a later time. What I do, then, is keep track of my inbox and action lists in the front of the notebook, and my project and someday/maybe lists in the back; as a page gets filled, I simply move on to the next blank page in the notebook (either forwards or backwards), moving the colored tab at the same time. When I reach the middle, time for a new Moleskine!
What I like most about this system is two-fold: 1) That I spend absolutely no time at all “pre-working” my new notebook into a GTD-friendly one; and 2) that I can jot down thoughts and notes in their correct places on the go, with almost no disruption at all. Oh, and like you, I do technically use an electronic option for one aspect; I still maintain my actual calendar items on my Treo, which I’ve synced at home to both my Mac and my Google Calendar account.
Anyway, I posted a couple of pictures of my own notebook earlier this year to my Flickr account; here are their URLs, if anyone is interested in checking it out:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jasonpettus/128943581/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jasonpettus/128943538/
Thanks for the great article, and good luck with your job search!