Creating A Digital Writing Hub

“If you are always avoiding risk, you are missing out on life.” —Anonymous

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Dear readers,

The quote has nothing to do with this post. I just saw it, and I liked it 🙂

So… I know I said in the “Where was I?” post that I would hopefully keep to a consistent schedule. Well… that failed. Hopefully, from here on out, I could stick to a schedule, maybe not a weekly Sunday thing, but at least like a once-a-month thing. I’m going to start small before I make a more substantial commitment. Hopefully, I can commit to a weekly schedule some time in the future.

I mentioned the notion briefly in last week’s (a couple of months ago)post, but here, I want to go into more depth on how I landed with the notion.

I am very interested in everything needing a digital or physical place, and I cannot mix and match. For example, good notes are only used for school even though I can use them as a digital planner or stuff for my writing, but I need help. Once my mind has assigned itself to one thing, I cannot use said thing for something else. I have one notebook as my diary/journal, one for my daily to-do list, one for a brain dump, and one for my writing. I cannot put something writing-related into my brain dump notebook or my daily to-do list in my brain dump notebook. I also don’t use my notebooks that quickly, and let’s say I stop using my writing notebook because I do not like the notebook anymore or for whatever reason, I would need a new space to put my writing in. In a digital example, I use Google Docs for school and school only. It is a great place to do my writing as it has everything I need in one place and syncs ideally between devices. The issue is that I’ve already assigned Google Docs to school, so now I cannot use it for creative writing. The only time I use it for writing is when something is completed, and I transfer it into Google Docs for safekeeping, but I do not do any writing on the app itself. Instead, I use Quip for all my creative writing.

The reason behind all this is that my mind sees an app or the notebook and gets into whatever mindset I need for whatever I am about to do. So, if I open Google Docs for school, my brain is in a school mood, and it is easier to tune out another aspect of my mind to focus on school. But if I were to open Google Docs for creative writing, I would struggle with my creativity because my mind is in a school mood, and it gets confused as to why I’m trying to tune into my creative side and tune out my school side. Does that make sense? I don’t know.

Due to my brain being annoying that way, I need one designated place for writing. I had that — Quip — but I wanted a more aesthetic place for planning. Before, I had used Quip’s embedded Excel sheet to plan when I would write/edit/post blog posts, but it got extremely confusing as I filled it up and drove me away from planning, which meant my blog posts were all over the place.

I have tried multiple calendars, to-do list apps, planners, and writing apps, and I have yet to stick with me. I turned to the notion, as I had previously used it for school planning but had stopped for a couple of years as I found something more straightforward and better for school.

I erased everything from my old notion and watched videos and Pinterest of people’s notion dashboards for creative writing. This process had taken several months to get done because I was too lazy to re-step up everything. Honestly, I wouldn’t say I like it, and it didn’t help that the notion had updated since I last used it, and new functions/updated functions appeared, and I had to re-learn how to use the program. I kept pushing it off for a while, but when I finally got myself to sit down and use the notion, I was happy with how it turned out. I used a template that someone else had created, so I will not be showing it since it is someone else’s work, but I completely personalized it to suit my needs.

So far, it has been great and easier to use. The only issue is I have a habit of not frequently checking notions. I do not like notifications on my phone other than messages, calls, and personal email. I barely check my digital to-do list, and I don’t know why my brain is like this, but it is the brain I have to live with. I’m trying to get into the habit of checking it more frequently.

So now, my digital space for writing is Notion and Quip. The notion is for all my planning for my blog and creative writing, and Quip is for the actual writing aspect.

Thank you for reading; I hope you have a fantastic day or night whenever you’re reading.

A.B.💜

P.S. I changed my sign-off name, from Purple Stitch, trying to “mature” my writing image.

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The reason for the bow and arrow emojis is that I found this explanation of the bow and arrow and fell in love. One can take any symbol to mean whatever they want, so your meaning of a bow and arrow might differ from mine, and that’s okay. A bow and arrow help me keep my hope and determination in my future. An arrow can only be shot by pulling it backwards. So when life is dragging you back with difficulties, it will launch you into something extraordinary. Just remember to focus and keep your aim.