In today’s post, I am going to focus on just the first part of My Dashboard in Notion. This section contains the navigation to Key Pages and Quick Links. It also provides a list of Things To Do, broken out into highlights.

I learned how to create My Dashboard on a SkillShare tutorial taught by Ali Abdaal. I was able to sign up for an account for free for 30 days and followed his Notion Masterclass: Maximize Your Productivity and Organisation. (I spelled it the British way so that you could find it.) Ali’s class taught the basics of how to create what he referred to as LifeOS or Life Operating System.

Under Key Pages are the high level pages that cover my Professional, Personal, and student life. I also created pages for big projects that I work on every day: this blog and a book. What is really nice about Notion is that clicking on a Key Page, such as Liberty University, will show all the sub-pages that I have associated with that main page. I only access these pages when I am looking for something specific to that higher level view of the forest and need to identify a specific tree or two.

Right below Key Pages are the Quick Links. These work like shortcuts to more complex databases and integrated pages. I have components from many of these integrated further down in My Dashboard so that I can see what I need to see from a single page. Sometimes, though, I need to review the data or different views or maybe need to change the filters to manipulate what I see down below.

My Quick Links take me to the following management areas that I want to see on a regular basis: Budget, Password Manager, Habit Tracker, Daily Journal, Ultimate Notes, and Ultimate Tasks.

My Quick Links also has databases with integrated pages that I need to collect information for a better quality of life or for better organization, but that I do not necessarily want to see every day but do need to access on a more frequent basis, such as my: Gluten-Free Recipe Book, Dissertation/Research Planner, and Data Calendar.

The final section on the top portion of My Dashboard are Things to Do. I have these broken out into three high-level buckets of Professional, Personal, and Side. This is a quick and easily updated and modified list of high level items that I have prioritized for an unspecified time period. As I complete some of the tasks, I update them with new ones, continuously moving the needle forward. Sometimes these tasks are pulled from the task management system, Ultimate Tasks. Others are just things that I want to do or should do – like drink 64oz of water each day.

August Bradley teaches a system referred to as Pillars, Pipelines, and Vaults. I am considering revamping My Dashboard to incorporate some of those principles, but have not decided yet. A lot of what I have set up already has many of the items that he discusses and teaches, but I am waiting until I make it through all 52 of his videos before I make any changes.

Notion is an awesome productivity tool, but does require daily use and maintenance to reach its full potential. Like any organization or productivity system, you get out of it what you put into it. I have found using My Dashboard to be a seamless integration into my life because it has replaced my calendar, to-do lists, project post-it notes, notetaking software, and more. Just as an example, while at the vet today, I was able to schedule their next appointment as a task and it automatically populated my calendar for me and is visible right on my digital desktop regardless of the device.

Let me know if you find this information helpful or if you have any questions.