My Personal Dashboard/System as an Indie Hacker & Creator
As indie hackers and creators, we are often juggling multiple things simultaneously. It's very easy for things to get out of hand as our ambition often gets the better of us 😅 I want to be really intentional about how I spend my time so this chaos was unacceptable.
In order to fix this, a few years ago, I moved my entire life to Notion. Over the years, I've changed this up a few times and I'm pretty happy with where I've landed. Today, I'd love to give y'all a peek into my personal dashboard and workflow.
(Link for this setup as a template is at the bottom of the article)
To begin with, it's really critical for your system to work for and not the other way around. This is a really key feature otherwise you aren't going to use it consistently if it's creating more work for you. I'm stating the obvious but anything that needs to be done more than twice should be automated.
The first thing I do every year is to plan my goals. I now use the "Five F's to Freedom" method where I create one goal for each of these 5 categories - Fun, Family, Financial, Faculty & Fitness. I also use a template to keep my goals clear, consistent and organized.
Starting with Goals first sets the tone for the rest of the year and helps me prioritize better. Ideally, all the projects, tasks & habits I'm trying to inculcate should help me get closer to one of my goals. If not, they are first in line to be discarded.
All my goals are associated with Projects which are associated with Tasks.
Notion makes it really simple to create these relationships so I have full visibility. For example, the Project below is associated to a Goal and the Tasks needed to complete it.
I heavily use page templates as I'm the slowest when I'm starting something new. The blank canvas feels daunting and templates help me guide and organize my thoughts. It also ensures that things are consistent and my future self is going to thank me for it.
The favorite part of my workflow is how I organize my Bookmarks. Most people save their bookmarks in their browser. I like to call this the "Digital Blackhole" method of saving bookmarks. They are going to be lost forever and you aren't going to be reminded to read them…
I use a browser extension + Notion to basically clip the entire webpage and store it in my Notion database. This allows me to read the webpage from within Notion and also add highlights/comments for my own reference. The entire article is now also searchable within Notion 🤯
The reading I do on a daily basis involves a mix of reading articles on the web and reading books. That's why, I maintain a common database for the books and the bookmarks that I plan to read. I create separate views into this database for easier access
I also have a lightweight daily habit logger that's auto generated daily on a recurring schedule. I want to avoid manual data entry so I've hooked up my indoor bike to Zapier and auto update my workout checkbox when the 30 min workout criteria is met 😎
Everything that I need to write in a day goes in my Notes database (even if its a Google Form). Notion has AI baked in the product and this is truly a game changer in becoming more productive. This is what your workflow could look like when you are putting down your thoughts
Finally, knowing how I'm doing so far in the year is really important as it allows me to course correct if I'm not sticking to my plans. I use a bunch of Notion wizardry to hookup a "statistics" card for myself.
I hope you found this useful. I would love to hear what you guys think about my setup.
If you'd like to use this as well, you can duplicate my Notion template and get started in minutes - Maker OS Notion Template
As my way of saying thank you to this community, I'm offering it for a "pay what you like" price ($5 minimum). It's going to be $19 afterwards!
