Hey Reader

A mindset that costs me more time and energy than I'd like to admit is feeling like I have to start from scratch every time I do something 😝

While there are some situations when starting from zero can be useful, there are also a lot of instances where this just isn't necessary.

Thankfully we don't actually have to start from nothing in those cases; there are things we can do and make to help future-us out!

I've even made some for you, so let's have a look 👀

The idea - Use templates to make life easier

As fun as starting from scratch is whenever we go to do something, it can certainly use up a lot of our time and energy 😅

Rather starting from zero every time, templates help by giving us something to start with. We just have to customise them in the moment to fit the specific situation.

They save time, reduce decision fatigue, and mean we can spend our energy on other more important things.

Templates aren't just for documents though. Some of my favourite day-to-day templates are:

• Text-replacement shortcuts on my phone (e.g. typing "mmm" replaces with my email address, and "fx" replaces with 💪)
• Pre-scaffolded text for regular posts (like monthly book club polls)
• ​Journal spread planner template to plan all my journal setups
• My background music for videos
• The pre-done headers for this newsletter; we love a consistent format 😛

While my templates aren't necessarily going to be the same ones that would be most helpful for you, building templates into our common tasks and routines can help make things easier and faster.

Notion Template Library

Recently I added some bonus templates to our free Notion library 🥳 The highlights include:

• Personal Curriculum template: a fun trend to help combat brain rot, the personal curriculum idea has been really popular for several months now. It's more than just a reading list though, so this template helps you dig deeper into what you want to learn and how you'll go about it.
• Simple Second Brain template: brains are made for having ideas, not for holding them. I like to designate all my notes, thoughts, and ideas to my second brain which is set up similarly to this one.
• Weekly Meal Plan template: meal planning already takes up so much brain power, so I don't want to use up that energy by drawing up the planning structure each week. This one is set up to make sure things like on-hand ingredients and events are taken into consideration as part of the planning process.
• Wind Down Checklists: whether it's the end of the work day or decompressing after a social event, having a process for switching off can make transitioning to the next thing easier. This one has separate checklists for different situations so you can pick-and-choose the ones applicable to you.
• Master Packing List: pre-trip organisation is already stressful enough and nobody likes having to constantly ask themselves "have I forgotten something?" Starting with a full list of anything and everything we might need to pack and then just pruning back to the actual needs can safeguard us from forgotten items (like my wallet! 🤦‍♀️)

We have a bunch of other templates over in the library though, so hit the button below to jump over there and check them out!

Got another template you'd love to see? Hit reply and let me know! I'm always looking to add extra helpful templates there 😄

Pssst...the Goober Readathon is coming!

May is approaching and with it comes the Goober Readathon! 👻

If you love reading, or you're trying to develop a reading habit, then this reading challenge is for you!

The long-story-short is that we have a set of 27 reading prompts to pick-and-choose from to help guide your May reads. With the books we complete in May, we'll be helping our mascot Ghostie Goober learn how to cook.

(Don't worry, you don't have to read cookbooks...unless you want to 😛)

The challenge is open to anyone, fully free, and a lot of fun 😊 For all the details on how to get involved, check out the intro video!

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Hope to have you on board!

Let's take action

Take some time to consider what repeated tasks in your life could benefit from a template.

It could be as simple as sentence starters for journaling, text-replacement shortcuts for commonly used phrases, or more complex things like document layouts and structures.

While setting up your own templates is a great way to make sure they're perfectly tailored to you, it can be nice to have some templates to help you build your templates!

Be sure to jump over to our free Notion template library and check out what's over there 😈

Until next time!

- Jess