Hi everyone: a full tour of the processes, principles and pages of my Notion Productivity System this week... alliteration... awesome! You can download the full template here: www.bettercreating.com/downloads Thanks in advance for all your support! Happy creating.
Simon, a QUESTION: Firstly, wonderful video! 👍🏼 Secondly, I am likely going to purchase one of your templates. I’m interested in ‘A Complete Life OS’, but I have noticed on your website [£26] it doesn’t include under ‘Included:💡 🗄️ Knowledge Bank’ but instead the ‘📔 Prompted Daily Journal’. But, here in this video 5:07 [as well as, in the text body of Productive OS, and images on your website with the Complete OS], you’re showing the Knowledge Bank, as part of the Complete OS. To get the Knowledge Bank should I instead purchase the ‘A Creative Life OS’, and then purchase separately the ‘Prompted Daily Journal’ separate to get all the parts? Or does the Complete Life OS actually include absolutely everything? Thank you, I look forward to your response, so I know which one or one(s) to purchase.
Hi, ah, thanks for letting me know that that is not clear from the images. Yes: essentially the Complete Life OS has absolutely everything in it. 👍 Thanks for your comment and support! :)
Productive Life OS doesn’t have Journal or creation database. Creative Life OS adds the creation database system. Complete Life OS adds both Journal and Creation database System. I will eventually get around to adding an Intentional Life OS option that is everything except the creation database system. Hope that makes sense!
Hi, no not at all: other than the content creation dashboard it will work for anyone who wants to manage tasks and projects, take notes and collect reference / knowledge / track regular practices journal and set goals. I’m sure you could also adapt the content creation dashboard for managing multiple events and create your own templates: but I would maybe just use the project database for that. The ‘Productive Life OS’ has everything other than the content creation dashboard that is more media specific. Hope that helps! Thanks. :)
Simon, thank you so much for creating this!! I have ADHD and organising things is making my life much easier. It was difficult to create something easy to use with a good overview... Now that I'm using yours it saves me time and a headache!! Thank you!!!
So great to read this and that all this is properly helping. Enjoy and hopefully there will be more soon useful stuff soon on the channel. All the best! :)
Your content is amazing, Simon! I'm new with Notion and still learning a lot of things, but wanted to show some gratitude for your hard work in these templates. I downloaded both your Complete Life OS and Financial Notion. Will spread the word! Thank you! :)
Simon... where have you been my whole life. I feel as if a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders by discovering your channel today. Your content is impeccable and I feel as If youre my own personal guide to help me get my sh*t together with the content youre putting out. THANK YOU!
Great to read comments like this - it is the whole reason to be making content: work out things that are valuable, share them with others - we all win! :) Welcome to the BC Community! please spread the word and se you on the next one - there will be a new version of the template coming soon with lots of new additions - I'll be in touch with existing users on how they can transfer across if they want to too :)
I stumbled across your channel while searching for solutions for my Notion setup. Your content is gold and I'm currently binge watching it while setting up my Notion! Thank you for sharing these free knowledge with us
You are a true master.I bought the templates and everything looks awesome. You deserve a lot more followers. Thank you very much. You just made my life so much easier.
Comments like this make it well worth it. Thanks so much for your support and glad it’s helpful! Just help me spread the word! Lots more Notion joy to come now the API is Beta too. :) 👍🙌
Hey Simon, this looks great and I am going to get the full blown version. I am wondering if a 2022 version is on the way soon? I appreciate what you are doing, thanks, Dean
Hi - great to hear - we've got a great community of users now! I'm aiming to launch it as soonas it's ready in the next month - but if you want to get this one and text it out - i'll be sharing a discounted price for existing users so they only pay me for the new additions and work on the updates. They will have to transfer across to the new template of course! Cheers.
Hi Simon! Just starting to learn more about Notion and your templates. Your website states ETA mid March, are you still on track for the release of version 3?
Looking OK for Friday 31st and have a video planned for then - I’m incorporating a new Notion feature thou that I’ve been testing that is yet to be released (so waiting for confirmation on when it will be first!) jump on the wait list and I’ll email more info shortly. :) thanks for watching.
It is great to see your channel grows! :-) I really liked learning how to build the system from you (I liked what you said about teaching us how to catch the fish), but now I am very tempted to buy the one you already completed....OH...ok, I bought it! Hope I can use it well. It would be really great if I can make a reference list (e.g., for academic journal articles or books) out of the bibliography of inspiration table, or link this to reference programme somehow... I think it would be hugely popular among academics. Do you have any plans to develop one? Anyway, thanks a lot!
Hi! Thanks so much for downloading, keeping me eating my dinners! I like the academic reference list extension Idea. Will have a think about it. Nice one.
Simon, I love your videos! Can you give an example of how you would tie in a Journal entry to a video project? I see that you have a filtered view of your Journal database in your Video production template. What is being filtered for in the Journal view and how does this help you practically when creating videos? Thank you!
Hi Mel, ah thank you. Great to hear. Yeah, it’s for us I do some writing in daily reflections or there are ideas of quotes I find and record in the journal - I can then tag them and link them to a creative output if I want to share or reference later. Hope that helps. :)
So, I have finally bit the bullet and tried out Notion. And I can honestly say that I am amazed at how many people rave about notion when it is soooooo buggy. I have wasted a lot of time trying to get Notion set up and yet still can not understand how anyone can recommend notion with all of the wasting of my time bugs in it. If you want to import say, oh I don't know, anything...whether that is Evernote, Asana, HTML for crying out loud, you might as well forget it. It will fail every time. Then it will get stuck where you can't do anything in notion unless you close out of the browser. But then when you open up notion again, guess what, it doesn't automatically open up My Life OS, but rather still stuck thinking it has to import something and keeps opening up a blank page trying to still import. You can clear out cookies and such, but it won't matter. And you can set dark mode all day long, but when you log out of notion and log back in, you must go back into settings and set it from light mode to dark mode. And I just started using Notion yesterday. I haven't even fully played around with it. I am sure it is far more buggy than this because it can't even do the simple things without being buggy so how can I possibly trust that it will keep a good database of what I put into it. And yes I have reached out to tech support. And they said that they are aware that some people are having problems with these issues but they do not have an ETA of a fix as of yet. They said they will let me know someday once they have a fix. That is awesome.....
Wow - sounds like you are having a crap time with this! Sorry to hear that. Sounds like it isn’t for you. A couple of thoughts. 1. Mine remains in dark mode all the time. Not sure why that isn’t working for you. 2. If you are loading a lot of pages / large template or importing a lot of data you will need to give it some time to index all of it: then it is much faster and smoother. Yes: speed of search and loading is the weaker side of Notion. I find it totally fine day to day personally. 3. If for example you duplicate a large template such as my Life OS template you need to allow this to index. It’s like one person building an entire database in an instant so it needs some time: I have TONS of data in my workspace and it’s very smooth - I duplicated a full workspace to create a new version and I had to give it time before I could search it quickly. Not ideal but a very usual workflow. All the best!
Hi Simon, thank you for your great work, love it. Got a few questions, I remember in your previous video you had a database of the Bibliography of Inspiration and also Reading List for creative ideas capture, I didn't see it in this video, did you combine them into one Knowledge Bank?
Hi Jordan: yeah: those are basically the knowledge bank in filtered views. One for stuff I’ve consumed and want to keep / link to projects etc, the other for stuff that sounds interesting to read at somepoint. :)
@@BetterCreating Simon, your LOS is getting awesome! tempted to buy the template :) I was building mine from August, Marie, Tomas, Khe, Daniel and your videos. Thanks for all your awesome ideas!
looking at current exchange rate is, the complete Notion would currently be around $44 Canadian - Gumroad add sales tax on top of listed prices if applicable. :)
Simon, I love your video's and I assume I would love your template which I am considering. I would be a newbiew to notion but I think getting the template could jump start my learning. Anyway this is waht I wanted to find out. Essentially what I want to do is create a Content/Idea "Incubator" where I take the ideas and handle working with them (jf I decide to go with them) so storing the research, screen shots, scripts, and such for multiple mediums (written and video) and then actually doing the work in them at least for the writing. A secondary goal would be an application that I could say bring in my artiest or editor to edit the documents or the arties tolook at what is needed and drop off finished work. Is Notion the right tool for this? Is your system (the 26$ one cause I am getting into stoicism as well so that sounds good) what I need. Currently I do task managment in tick tick is this something I should replace with notion?
Hi Seth - thanks for the message. At first read yes - I think this template could be a great base for you to do all of this. My content creation management section of the template is set up for planning, writing and processing RUclips videos - but could easily be adapted to other mediums with a little practice. I use the knowledge bank to collect research and references and then Link them to the projects. With a bit of learning - I’m sure you could set it up to be used by multiple people. I’ve done this on video collabs before by offering access to the right pages for collaborators. If you are new to Notion it might take a bit of time to workout how to adapt and amend the elements - but yes - I feel Notion is on average the best platform to customise a system to your needs across task management, gathering references and managing content. Hope that helps! Thanks. :)
Thanks Simon, your content is so helpful. I’m new to Notion but utterly loving it! When I first heard of it, I had a vision of what I wanted but the blank page was completely intimidating. Your practical step by step approach has helped me know where to start and learn from there. As I’ve been creating, I realized that I specifically do some tasks on my desktop (work, financial planning) and others on my iPad (journaling, menu planning, web browsing) so I’m thinking of creating 2 main home pages - 1 designed for the desktop & 1 for the iPad. I’m really excited about that prospect and I think it will really hone my productivity that much more. Unfortunately I haven’t purchased your templates because I really only learn by creating things for myself. Do you have a Gumroad page where people can send you a donation?
Wendy this is such a lovely message to read - so pleased to hear the channel content is being used as you are using it. Thanks! Yes: that’s the idea: so much better to learn your self and adapt as you go! Amazing. Thank you for the suggestion of a donation: perhaps the best option would be to download my stoic journal template where you can specify an amount you want to give for it. plus that template’s value is really in the content of the promoted journaling pages I created: not so much about the Notion programming. :) you can find it here: bettercreating.gumroad.com/l/StoicJournal
No, this complete system build is a paid offer because a. It’s a way for me to afford to keep making things like this and share this with people, b. It was 1000’s of hours of work to make and I personally would be happy to pay for it: I’ve found that people who have downloaded it genuinely feedback it’s a very fair price for what they get, and C. I also offer free step by step videos on how to build each section on the channel too. Thanks for watching. :)
I really don’t agree with this. The principles of quick capture and gathering knowledge (PARA) actioning tasks and projects (GTD) and building systems to focus goals and habits (Atomic Habits / James Clear etc etc) are all ideas widely explored in the productivity space, and if anything, this system is more inspired by David Allen than anything else. I love August’s work: where there are overlaps, I hope he will be glad to see his natural influence (as I express in the video).
Copy cat...? Nah, I don't think so. All the productivity systems (GTD, August Bradley, Better Creating etc.) certainly have some common flavours and no wonder since they all are about productivity. Still each of them have their own angle and I enjoy taking influences from all of them to tune my own flavour (also in Notion). It's the same as in music: all the greatest melodies have already been composed but we still keep getting tons of new great songs. @Better Creating: Keep up the good work and may your business prosper! (y)
Thanks for this. That’s about the shape of it! TBH I watched more on August’s channel recently to find out more about his system and loved discovering the overlaps and differences I wasn’t aware of. Nice one. 👍
Great video Simon. Currently using variations of your systems to plan my practical dissertation, using Essentialism as a framework for the movement dramaturg! Would love to see your system and approach for budgeting - I have tried a couple before and I manage to have a solid receipt and expenditure tracker, but for creating and managing budgets, less so.
I've watch Ali's, Thomas Franks, and Marie Poulins Notion videos for hours trying to recreate what they do. You pretty much got their stuff, personalized it to your own and added your own flair and improved it to a simpler use! I just purchased your template, so good! As a beginner, I binged watch all the Notion videos I can and ended up over-engineering my Notion system and there are just too many things to keep track of. I think you strike the right balance between them all. Can you create a video breaking down the Knowledge database? Thanks!
Ah I’m pleased you’re finding the vids helpful. Totally: it’s so easy to get over invested and over engineer these things. I’ve found I’ve been stripping my stuff back to simplify it further the more I use the system and realise what is actually useful to me personally. Little secret... I’ve only ever watched one Marie Poulin vid! I should really check out more of her stuff: she’s excellent! Welcome to team BC!
Man... Your content is amazing! Just bought the template and soooooo looking forward to incorporating it with some of the contextual dashboards I have set up from watching Marie Poulin's content. Hope to see you and her collab someday. That would be utterly mind blowing 🤯😎
WOW! I LOVE this. I've only recently discovered Notion and started researching templates, but I didn't want disconnected pieces, and also didn't want to spend weeks/months learning how to create a functional system. I also didn't want some of the other packages that were too complex. This has everything I have been dreaming of, organized in such a streamlined, sensible, elegant way. I'm ordering the Complete version and am so excited to learn how to use it. I've been a paper planning nerd for many years, but I'm ready to have everything in a streamlined system that fits in my phone. I'm subscribing and look forward to learning more from you in the future.
Hi Cara; thank you so much for posting; really keeps me motivated to hear this can be so useful to people. 🙌 really appreciate your support and happy tinkering with your new system! Spread the word! 😊
Outstanding video Simon. I’ve bought August Bradley’s course and learned a great deal from it. But it’s complex and I’ve found myself struggling to simplify it. Your system looks exactly what I’m looking for. A new subscriber and customer here!
Great Video Simon, I just downloaded the template ready to deploy it into action. I currently have a system I developed, but wanted to show some gratitude for your hard work in these templates. Keep up the great posts! Cheers!!
The £45 is for the Version 2 that is double the size and scope of the one in this video: interestingly the majority of people i speak to who have downloaded the template are telling me i'm underpricing it! Build hours on this are into the months! thanks for watching
I’ve been obsessed with creating my Notion systems as of late and I’m so glad I stumbled upon your videos! It replicates how I want my processes to look like and has solved a ton of problems that I’ve been stuck with with other apps. Thank you so much for your work and looking forward to binging more of your content! :)
Awesome: love this! Great to read when someone else is going off down the Notion Rabbit hole! Enjoy the builds and tours: make sure to check out my videos on minimalism and intentional living too: they informed a lot of how I’ve approach the thinking behind my systems also :) Great to have you onboard!
Hi Simon I have just downloaded the template and so looking forward to tying it out…is there anyway you could help with the iOS shortcut for quick capture..do you have a shortcut you could share? Thx again Nigel
Hi Nigel - thanks for downloading - hope it is as useful to you as it is to me! The webclipper is a chrome extension: just search Notion webclipper in Google on chrome and download. You can also use the basic Apple share function on phones / tablets and pick the database. I’m trialing a new web clipping extension at moment thou so watch this space on the channel - could be awesome!
Tks for this useful and wonderful content. I have a question. if I understood correctly for project management, you have a main database of projects and a main database of all tasks that you reference to the projects main database and by doing that you can have a dashboard of all tasks in one view. My question is... is it possible to have the tasks inside each project in the main database and still have a dashboard of all projects tasks in one go or in this case I need to have one dashboard per project? tks.
Thanks! Yeah - it’s two databases referencing each other. You can have project specific views of tasks within project pages: This year I’ve updated my personal system to do this with a linked database view of the tasks list that is then filtered by the project page it’s in. Works very well! I’m doing these kind of updates at the moment for my 2022 template. :)
Your ideas are great but I find you go too fast and flick around screens much quicker than most people can follow. I love your stuff but struggle with the pace.
Hey man! Excellent content! I purchased your Complete Life OS Notion template and have been going through it. Trying to get my channel more organized. I'm terrible at this stuff lol and I am slowly figuring out the template and this video is helpful, but I was wondering if you have any plans to make a longer, more in-depth video on each section and how everything works together? This video is good, but a more in-depth video would be helpful. Also, I make videos for my channel as well as for a company and I'm trying to figure out the best way to integrate the companies videos that I need to do into your template as its more designed for just filtering your channel videos. Any thoughts or tips on that? Anyways thanks for all the hard work you do keep it up!
Hi Jake, Thanks for supporting me and downloading - hope it works well for you! And great to hear you are enjoying the content. I would suggest you look at my Notion Builds Playlist: There is a video breaking down how I use each section of the template and howe to to build them which will give you a better understanding. I will eventually do some more in depth videos on workflow using this system - but I think a lot of it is covered in these videos for now. I'm developing a version 2 currently and so how to use videos will follow that. Ps. Don't worry: I'll make the new version available to people who have downloaded already at a discounted price based on what's new. :)
Regarding dividing up company and personal videos: You could create a new number column like I have for videos called 'Company Videos' or something and then filter a /create linked database view of these / create a new template page for them in the same way the template currently manages 'shorts' and 'videos'. Again - I want to look at creating a more integrated content manager that has 'channels' to divide up the use case more comprehensively soon. :) Good luck!
@@BetterCreating Of course and thank you! I'm going through those videos and its helping and just as I start using the system it's starting to make more sense haha. When do you think version 2 might be out?
Hey mate, great work. Your content is one of the best on here by far. Just a question, how do you get the pages to be so wide? Mine are always squashed, even on full width.
Ah thanks pal: much appreciated: spread the word! Mine is just wide I think as I’m on an iMac for the screencasts. Or it could be that you haven’t selected make page fullwidth on the page options in the top right: in fact : thats probably it. Good luck! :)
@@BetterCreating alright mate, thank you. Probably my tiny mac causing issues, haha. Otherwise, I'll be spreading the word. I have been doing this for years myself but become fond when someone takes their time to educate others as many don't truly understand the concept of "productivity", but it's really all about making your system catered to your weaknesses, strengths and needs.
Thanks! - I’ll be doing a load of new updates to this system this year and how i use it so keep an eye out for those too :) Can’t claim the second brain concept thou! That’s thanks to reading David Allen’s GTD and Tiago Forte. :)
Loved this video. Your system is so well populated even inside each page in the databases! usually you see a nice dashboard and then the pages are not that populated. It is beautiful! I have been building my system and am pretty happy with it as it is super simple and less databases to work with, but its ugly.. i look at yours and im like, this is so sleek! mine is basic: white, headers, a bit of colours... have to work on this. but at least the function is there, just need to work on form :) Love your content!
Thanks for the kind words - sounds like you have a great system. Yeah - making it attractive whist functional really made the difference for me to enjoy and KEEP using it all. :) been making a client database system this week that I’m well chuffed with. 👍
Wonderful video, spending so much time absorbing this late on a Friday night! Just want to say, please keep up your quality content and you will have 100ks of followers in no time - you deserve it!
Much appreciated Niel. I will indeed! Great to see people are finding my stuff valuable. Opening a theatre production in London at the moment so taking a little planned break from making vids. Back on it now thou! :)
OMG i have bought the whole notion it was a bit expensive and now i'm so overwhelmd omg omg omg i don't understand you jump from one to one thing sometimes ...
Thank you for downloading. :) Yes: I would suggest this video is offered as a tour, not a comprehensive guide to using the template so I do jump about between things! Please check out my productivity and Notion playlists for more specific videos on all the elements and the thinking behind them, how to build them and use them. This early video is a good place to start on creating a productivity system and the GTD principles that inspired me to make mine: ruclips.net/video/PuG0sLiIL1o/видео.html Hope that helps!
Hihi, i am really like your template, and i would like to ask if i buy your template, am i getting the update in future if there are any update in your template?
Hi, thanks for watching and great to hear. Yeah, if I update the template in the future i will let everyone who has downloaded know via the mailing list: so just keep hold of the link. I don’t know how easy it would be to move information to a new version you would need to duplicate to your workspace however. I would try to share details of what’s adjusted thou. I’ll be making other templates that can be added in at some point: but these may be additional. Hope that helps! Thanks, S
Omygosh Simon! Just bought your LifeOS template! INCREDIBLE! Thank you for the 100000000 hrs you must have spent creating it. I'm diving in tonight! ♥️
Thanks for your support: Hope you enjoy it and modify it to be your own! And yes, I Darby count the hours but it kept me busy in lockdowns when work was quiet!! 👍
@bettercreating, you mentioned this is your 2021 version. Are you planning a 2022 version? With less than two months before the end of the year, I would be interested in the changes being noted, probably now, as it would help with deciding what is most important and which of your systems would be good for our particular needs.
Hi Tere, I am planning on making some layout changes in 2022 but need to get out of November freelance work first before I look at what it will be seriously. It will mostly be small adjustments to menu, using the new grouping function better etc: much of which users can do anyway to own needs. Simply put: The Productive, Creative and Complete Notion templates are all the same other than the creative Notion adding a content creation dashboard system to the basic productive Notion template, and the Complete Notion adding the content creation dashboard and also a promoted stoic journal. Hope that helps a bit for now. :) thanks for watching!
@@BetterCreating Geez, you sound like a lawyer. I worked as a paralegal for 25+ years, so consider my sentence in that Context. The first I understand, paying clients always come first. Where you lost me was should I buy now (which I totally understand why you would say now, really) or wait for the update. I am working on my Brain (first after brain injury, and second because it excites me more than other parts right now), so I am not in any hurry. I don't know, does the rate of exchange go up or down with the economy (rhetorical question)? It has been a bit since I looked; I had a vet bill looming and I was saving $ so I don't remember, do buyers of the entire system get free or deeply discounted updates? Your encouragement keeps me going! Thanks.
I was just diagnosed with ADHD. I kept being told just break down the task into smaller tasks and keep track, but no one actually talked about HOW to do that. You will literally be responsible for helping me meet my academic and personal goals. I can finally get past the stuck point of not knowing how to start projects and document the steps as tasks. Thank you so much!
Hi Sarah, thanks so much for sharing this, and I’m so pleased that the system is genuinely going to help you with your work! That’s what it’s all about! Let me know how it goes using the template 🤗🙌👍
@@BetterCreating Will do! Talk about a perfect time to start, I just came from your synced block video. This is going to make onboarding so much easier! The possibilities are endless...but not overwhelmingly so LOL
Are you planning any updates to the templates to utilize the new API within notion ? If yes, will these updates be freely available for those who already purchases your templates now ?
Hi there, thanks for asking. I will update the templates later in the year most likely. However, it’s not really possible to add ready to use API functionality as it is something one has to set up with your own automation account most often (e.g. using Zapier it Automate.io). So any updates in this area would be making it ‘API ready’ I expect... either way, I will notify people who have downloaded via my newsletter about any updates available. It would mean re-duplicating it however as it’s not possible to automatically update the copy you have made to your own system. Hope that helps! If I make additional elements for the system these could be paid for separately (like my financial tracker) - but i offered discounts for this to existing users. I would think the best approach will be to follow videos to adapt yourself in some cases. :)
Hi everyone: a full tour of the processes, principles and pages of my Notion Productivity System this week... alliteration... awesome! You can download the full template here: www.bettercreating.com/downloads Thanks in advance for all your support! Happy creating.
Simon, a QUESTION:
Firstly, wonderful video! 👍🏼
Secondly, I am likely going to purchase one of your templates. I’m interested in ‘A Complete Life OS’, but I have noticed on your website [£26] it doesn’t include under ‘Included:💡 🗄️ Knowledge Bank’ but instead the ‘📔 Prompted Daily Journal’. But, here in this video 5:07 [as well as, in the text body of Productive OS, and images on your website with the Complete OS], you’re showing the Knowledge Bank, as part of the Complete OS. To get the Knowledge Bank should I instead purchase the ‘A Creative Life OS’, and then purchase separately the ‘Prompted Daily Journal’ separate to get all the parts? Or does the Complete Life OS actually include absolutely everything?
Thank you, I look forward to your response, so I know which one or one(s) to purchase.
Hi, ah, thanks for letting me know that that is not clear from the images. Yes: essentially the Complete Life OS has absolutely everything in it. 👍 Thanks for your comment and support! :)
Productive Life OS doesn’t have Journal or creation database. Creative Life OS adds the creation database system.
Complete Life OS adds both Journal and Creation database System. I will eventually get around to adding an Intentional Life OS option that is everything except the creation database system. Hope that makes sense!
Can I ask is this just for creative process? I as i work in events
Hi, no not at all: other than the content creation dashboard it will work for anyone who wants to manage tasks and projects, take notes and collect reference / knowledge / track regular practices journal and set goals. I’m sure you could also adapt the content creation dashboard for managing multiple events and create your own templates: but I would maybe just use the project database for that. The ‘Productive Life OS’ has everything other than the content creation dashboard that is more media specific. Hope that helps! Thanks. :)
Simon, thank you so much for creating this!! I have ADHD and organising things is making my life much easier. It was difficult to create something easy to use with a good overview... Now that I'm using yours it saves me time and a headache!! Thank you!!!
So great to read this and that all this is properly helping. Enjoy and hopefully there will be more soon useful stuff soon on the channel. All the best! :)
So good to see s.o else sharing this struggle :))
Thank you Barbara for sharing this I feel relieved to see people like me striving to get better
Keep up being awesome pals. :)
Your content is amazing, Simon! I'm new with Notion and still learning a lot of things, but wanted to show some gratitude for your hard work in these templates. I downloaded both your Complete Life OS and Financial Notion. Will spread the word! Thank you! :)
Ah thanks Ron, very much appreciated! Hope you enjoy them and thanks for following the channel. :)
Simon... where have you been my whole life. I feel as if a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders by discovering your channel today. Your content is impeccable and I feel as If youre my own personal guide to help me get my sh*t together with the content youre putting out. THANK YOU!
Great to read comments like this - it is the whole reason to be making content: work out things that are valuable, share them with others - we all win! :) Welcome to the BC Community! please spread the word and se you on the next one - there will be a new version of the template coming soon with lots of new additions - I'll be in touch with existing users on how they can transfer across if they want to too :)
@@BetterCreating thank you! Was about to purchase your complete notion template but il hold until the new version releases. Can’t wait!
I stumbled across your channel while searching for solutions for my Notion setup. Your content is gold and I'm currently binge watching it while setting up my Notion!
Thank you for sharing these free knowledge with us
You are very welcome! Thanks for the feedback! :)
It's fun watching your system evolve. It's also fun watching how much your beard has gone gray. 😂
Hahaha! It’s coming on this year!
Omg I lovvve the complete life OS template!!
All I have to say right now is *chefs kiss*
Cannot wait to use this in my daily life 😊
Ah great to hear. Thanks for downloading it and joining the community! Have fun adapting it to your needs and tinkering with it. 👍
I'm buying it. Hopefully it'll bring organization into my life because I'm a complete mess.
Enjoy! And thanks for supporting me with the download. Hope it helps! :)
great video! thanks
You're welcome!
Thanks for this video ! Very helpful ! Good jobs !
Nice one - glad it’s useful!
You are a true master.I bought the templates and everything looks awesome. You deserve a lot more followers. Thank you very much. You just made my life so much easier.
Comments like this make it well worth it. Thanks so much for your support and glad it’s helpful! Just help me spread the word! Lots more Notion joy to come now the API is Beta too. :) 👍🙌
Thanks Simon, this is great :)
Hey Simon, this looks great and I am going to get the full blown version. I am wondering if a 2022 version is on the way soon? I appreciate what you are doing, thanks, Dean
Hi - great to hear - we've got a great community of users now! I'm aiming to launch it as soonas it's ready in the next month - but if you want to get this one and text it out - i'll be sharing a discounted price for existing users so they only pay me for the new additions and work on the updates. They will have to transfer across to the new template of course! Cheers.
Great video and system! You can call it Vee Cam
Thanks! Still musing on this!
Need that complex template in my life lol
email me - replied to your other message.
Hi Simon! Just starting to learn more about Notion and your templates. Your website states ETA mid March, are you still on track for the release of version 3?
Looking OK for Friday 31st and have a video planned for then - I’m incorporating a new Notion feature thou that I’ve been testing that is yet to be released (so waiting for confirmation on when it will be first!) jump on the wait list and I’ll email more info shortly. :) thanks for watching.
love this!
Nice one! Thanks for watching the channel!
It is great to see your channel grows! :-) I really liked learning how to build the system from you (I liked what you said about teaching us how to catch the fish), but now I am very tempted to buy the one you already completed....OH...ok, I bought it! Hope I can use it well. It would be really great if I can make a reference list (e.g., for academic journal articles or books) out of the bibliography of inspiration table, or link this to reference programme somehow... I think it would be hugely popular among academics. Do you have any plans to develop one? Anyway, thanks a lot!
Hi! Thanks so much for downloading, keeping me eating my dinners! I like the academic reference list extension Idea. Will have a think about it. Nice one.
Simon, I love your videos! Can you give an example of how you would tie in a Journal entry to a video project? I see that you have a filtered view of your Journal database in your Video production template. What is being filtered for in the Journal view and how does this help you practically when creating videos? Thank you!
Hi Mel, ah thank you. Great to hear. Yeah, it’s for us I do some writing in daily reflections or there are ideas of quotes I find and record in the journal - I can then tag them and link them to a creative output if I want to share or reference later. Hope that helps. :)
So, I have finally bit the bullet and tried out Notion. And I can honestly say that I am amazed at how many people rave about notion when it is soooooo buggy. I have wasted a lot of time trying to get Notion set up and yet still can not understand how anyone can recommend notion with all of the wasting of my time bugs in it. If you want to import say, oh I don't know, anything...whether that is Evernote, Asana, HTML for crying out loud, you might as well forget it. It will fail every time. Then it will get stuck where you can't do anything in notion unless you close out of the browser. But then when you open up notion again, guess what, it doesn't automatically open up My Life OS, but rather still stuck thinking it has to import something and keeps opening up a blank page trying to still import. You can clear out cookies and such, but it won't matter. And you can set dark mode all day long, but when you log out of notion and log back in, you must go back into settings and set it from light mode to dark mode. And I just started using Notion yesterday. I haven't even fully played around with it. I am sure it is far more buggy than this because it can't even do the simple things without being buggy so how can I possibly trust that it will keep a good database of what I put into it. And yes I have reached out to tech support. And they said that they are aware that some people are having problems with these issues but they do not have an ETA of a fix as of yet. They said they will let me know someday once they have a fix. That is awesome.....
Wow - sounds like you are having a crap time with this! Sorry to hear that. Sounds like it isn’t for you.
A couple of thoughts.
1. Mine remains in dark mode all the time. Not sure why that isn’t working for you.
2. If you are loading a lot of pages / large template or importing a lot of data you will need to give it some time to index all of it: then it is much faster and smoother. Yes: speed of search and loading is the weaker side of Notion. I find it totally fine day to day personally.
3. If for example you duplicate a large template such as my Life OS template you need to allow this to index. It’s like one person building an entire database in an instant so it needs some time: I have TONS of data in my workspace and it’s very smooth - I duplicated a full workspace to create a new version and I had to give it time before I could search it quickly. Not ideal but a very usual workflow.
All the best!
@@BetterCreating Duplicating LifeOS went smoothly. Just can not import Evernote or Asana over.
Hi Simon, thank you for your great work, love it. Got a few questions, I remember in your previous video you had a database of the Bibliography of Inspiration and also Reading List for creative ideas capture, I didn't see it in this video, did you combine them into one Knowledge Bank?
Hi Jordan: yeah: those are basically the knowledge bank in filtered views. One for stuff I’ve consumed and want to keep / link to projects etc, the other for stuff that sounds interesting to read at somepoint. :)
Happy Friday!
Good day to you sir!
@@BetterCreating Simon, your LOS is getting awesome! tempted to buy the template :) I was building mine from August, Marie, Tomas, Khe, Daniel and your videos. Thanks for all your awesome ideas!
would love to get the templates however how much do they cost in Canadian dollars?
looking at current exchange rate is, the complete Notion would currently be around $44 Canadian - Gumroad add sales tax on top of listed prices if applicable. :)
@@BetterCreating I went ahead and bought it anyway 😃 loving it. Thanks so much and great work btw. Brilliant.
Ah great to hear! Great to have you in the BC Community! :)
Simon, I love your video's and I assume I would love your template which I am considering. I would be a newbiew to notion but I think getting the template could jump start my learning. Anyway this is waht I wanted to find out. Essentially what I want to do is create a Content/Idea "Incubator" where I take the ideas and handle working with them (jf I decide to go with them) so storing the research, screen shots, scripts, and such for multiple mediums (written and video) and then actually doing the work in them at least for the writing. A secondary goal would be an application that I could say bring in my artiest or editor to edit the documents or the arties tolook at what is needed and drop off finished work. Is Notion the right tool for this? Is your system (the 26$ one cause I am getting into stoicism as well so that sounds good) what I need. Currently I do task managment in tick tick is this something I should replace with notion?
Hi Seth - thanks for the message. At first read yes - I think this template could be a great base for you to do all of this. My content creation management section of the template is set up for planning, writing and processing RUclips videos - but could easily be adapted to other mediums with a little practice. I use the knowledge bank to collect research and references and then Link them to the projects. With a bit of learning - I’m sure you could set it up to be used by multiple people. I’ve done this on video collabs before by offering access to the right pages for collaborators. If you are new to Notion it might take a bit of time to workout how to adapt and amend the elements - but yes - I feel Notion is on average the best platform to customise a system to your needs across task management, gathering references and managing content. Hope that helps! Thanks. :)
I love managing tasks and projects on Notion and this can be done in lots of different ways - it’s where my system started off.
@@BetterCreating thank you!
why not CAMV or VCAM? I think it doesn't sound that bad
Ah nice one.
Thanks Simon, your content is so helpful. I’m new to Notion but utterly loving it! When I first heard of it, I had a vision of what I wanted but the blank page was completely intimidating. Your practical step by step approach has helped me know where to start and learn from there. As I’ve been creating, I realized that I specifically do some tasks on my desktop (work, financial planning) and others on my iPad (journaling, menu planning, web browsing) so I’m thinking of creating 2 main home pages - 1 designed for the desktop & 1 for the iPad. I’m really excited about that prospect and I think it will really hone my productivity that much more. Unfortunately I haven’t purchased your templates because I really only learn by creating things for myself. Do you have a Gumroad page where people can send you a donation?
Wendy this is such a lovely message to read - so pleased to hear the channel content is being used as you are using it. Thanks! Yes: that’s the idea: so much better to learn your self and adapt as you go! Amazing. Thank you for the suggestion of a donation: perhaps the best option would be to download my stoic journal template where you can specify an amount you want to give for it. plus that template’s value is really in the content of the promoted journaling pages I created: not so much about the Notion programming. :) you can find it here: bettercreating.gumroad.com/l/StoicJournal
Ps. Love your idea of an iPad and desktop specific homepage!
@@BetterCreating perfect thanks Simon. Will do 😊
Thank you for your support Wendy! See you on the next one.
Back tap function?? What the what?? 🤯🤯🤯
Haha: yeah it’s great: check out my video on journaling for full deets :)
its not free??
No, this complete system build is a paid offer because a. It’s a way for me to afford to keep making things like this and share this with people, b. It was 1000’s of hours of work to make and I personally would be happy to pay for it: I’ve found that people who have downloaded it genuinely feedback it’s a very fair price for what they get, and C. I also offer free step by step videos on how to build each section on the channel too. Thanks for watching. :)
@@BetterCreating you could've at least release a lite version of the template, to get people going. Making me watch this video in full
Nice idea - I’ll look into some free template ideas for the basics.
Copy Cat Alert!!!!!
You are using other people's ideas and selling it in your name. Shameeeee!!!!!
the exactly same system of august bradley
I really don’t agree with this. The principles of quick capture and gathering knowledge (PARA) actioning tasks and projects (GTD) and building systems to focus goals and habits (Atomic Habits / James Clear etc etc) are all ideas widely explored in the productivity space, and if anything, this system is more inspired by David Allen than anything else. I love August’s work: where there are overlaps, I hope he will be glad to see his natural influence (as I express in the video).
Copy cat...? Nah, I don't think so.
All the productivity systems (GTD, August Bradley, Better Creating etc.) certainly have some common flavours and no wonder since they all are about productivity. Still each of them have their own angle and I enjoy taking influences from all of them to tune my own flavour (also in Notion). It's the same as in music: all the greatest melodies have already been composed but we still keep getting tons of new great songs.
@Better Creating: Keep up the good work and may your business prosper! (y)
Thanks for this. That’s about the shape of it! TBH I watched more on August’s channel recently to find out more about his system and loved discovering the overlaps and differences I wasn’t aware of. Nice one. 👍
Great video Simon. Currently using variations of your systems to plan my practical dissertation, using Essentialism as a framework for the movement dramaturg! Would love to see your system and approach for budgeting - I have tried a couple before and I manage to have a solid receipt and expenditure tracker, but for creating and managing budgets, less so.
I've watch Ali's, Thomas Franks, and Marie Poulins Notion videos for hours trying to recreate what they do. You pretty much got their stuff, personalized it to your own and added your own flair and improved it to a simpler use! I just purchased your template, so good! As a beginner, I binged watch all the Notion videos I can and ended up over-engineering my Notion system and there are just too many things to keep track of. I think you strike the right balance between them all. Can you create a video breaking down the Knowledge database? Thanks!
Ah I’m pleased you’re finding the vids helpful. Totally: it’s so easy to get over invested and over engineer these things. I’ve found I’ve been stripping my stuff back to simplify it further the more I use the system and realise what is actually useful to me personally. Little secret... I’ve only ever watched one Marie Poulin vid! I should really check out more of her stuff: she’s excellent! Welcome to team BC!
Man... Your content is amazing! Just bought the template and soooooo looking forward to incorporating it with some of the contextual dashboards I have set up from watching Marie Poulin's content. Hope to see you and her collab someday. That would be utterly mind blowing 🤯😎
Rick, thanks so much that means a lot. You know what? I should share your comment with Marie and see it we can make it happen! She’s awesome. 👍
I would love to see this too!
@@CaraMoulds1 I clearly need to get on this!
WOW! I LOVE this. I've only recently discovered Notion and started researching templates, but I didn't want disconnected pieces, and also didn't want to spend weeks/months learning how to create a functional system. I also didn't want some of the other packages that were too complex. This has everything I have been dreaming of, organized in such a streamlined, sensible, elegant way. I'm ordering the Complete version and am so excited to learn how to use it. I've been a paper planning nerd for many years, but I'm ready to have everything in a streamlined system that fits in my phone. I'm subscribing and look forward to learning more from you in the future.
Hi Cara; thank you so much for posting; really keeps me motivated to hear this can be so useful to people. 🙌 really appreciate your support and happy tinkering with your new system! Spread the word! 😊
This ist simply amazing 🤩
I really want to have it. Is it possible via paypal?
Ah, glad you like it. Yes: PayPal is a payment option at checkout. Nice one.
@@BetterCreating i sent you an email. Please contact me.
Wouldn't M.V.A.C have been a better acronym ?
Outstanding video Simon. I’ve bought August Bradley’s course and learned a great deal from it. But it’s complex and I’ve found myself struggling to simplify it. Your system looks exactly what I’m looking for. A new subscriber and customer here!
Thanks for the message. This kind of note makes it all worth it. Nice one. :)
@@BetterCreating Most welcome. Just bought your full template - have a beer on me!
Great Video Simon, I just downloaded the template ready to deploy it into action. I currently have a system I developed, but wanted to show some gratitude for your hard work in these templates. Keep up the great posts! Cheers!!
Hi Felix: really appreciate that sir! Nice one. Hope it can inspire some new ideas for your own system and thanks for the support. 👌
Went to hit buy then saw the price 45 pounds....7 pounds would have definitely bought it
The £45 is for the Version 2 that is double the size and scope of the one in this video: interestingly the majority of people i speak to who have downloaded the template are telling me i'm underpricing it! Build hours on this are into the months! thanks for watching
I’ve been obsessed with creating my Notion systems as of late and I’m so glad I stumbled upon your videos! It replicates how I want my processes to look like and has solved a ton of problems that I’ve been stuck with with other apps. Thank you so much for your work and looking forward to binging more of your content! :)
Awesome: love this! Great to read when someone else is going off down the Notion Rabbit hole! Enjoy the builds and tours: make sure to check out my videos on minimalism and intentional living too: they informed a lot of how I’ve approach the thinking behind my systems also :) Great to have you onboard!
Hi Simon I have just downloaded the template and so looking forward to tying it out…is there anyway you could help with the iOS shortcut for quick capture..do you have a shortcut you could share? Thx again Nigel
Hi Nigel - thanks for downloading - hope it is as useful to you as it is to me! The webclipper is a chrome extension: just search Notion webclipper in Google on chrome and download. You can also use the basic Apple share function on phones / tablets and pick the database. I’m trialing a new web clipping extension at moment thou so watch this space on the channel - could be awesome!
Tks for this useful and wonderful content. I have a question. if I understood correctly for project management, you have a main database of projects and a main database of all tasks that you reference to the projects main database and by doing that you can have a dashboard of all tasks in one view. My question is... is it possible to have the tasks inside each project in the main database and still have a dashboard of all projects tasks in one go or in this case I need to have one dashboard per project? tks.
Thanks! Yeah - it’s two databases referencing each other. You can have project specific views of tasks within project pages: This year I’ve updated my personal system to do this with a linked database view of the tasks list that is then filtered by the project page it’s in. Works very well! I’m doing these kind of updates at the moment for my 2022 template. :)
Your ideas are great but I find you go too fast and flick around screens much quicker than most people can follow. I love your stuff but struggle with the pace.
Thanks for the feedback - always a balance of keeping a good pace to keep people engaged vs going too fast!
Yeah, I agree this is great! something I have been looking for I am buying right now. I hope it sticks and I use it wisely
Great - hope it works well for you! Building this system and using it has personally transformed my output and life balance. Love it. :)
Hey man! Excellent content! I purchased your Complete Life OS Notion template and have been going through it. Trying to get my channel more organized. I'm terrible at this stuff lol and I am slowly figuring out the template and this video is helpful, but I was wondering if you have any plans to make a longer, more in-depth video on each section and how everything works together? This video is good, but a more in-depth video would be helpful. Also, I make videos for my channel as well as for a company and I'm trying to figure out the best way to integrate the companies videos that I need to do into your template as its more designed for just filtering your channel videos. Any thoughts or tips on that?
Anyways thanks for all the hard work you do keep it up!
Hi Jake,
Thanks for supporting me and downloading - hope it works well for you! And great to hear you are enjoying the content. I would suggest you look at my Notion Builds Playlist: There is a video breaking down how I use each section of the template and howe to to build them which will give you a better understanding. I will eventually do some more in depth videos on workflow using this system - but I think a lot of it is covered in these videos for now. I'm developing a version 2 currently and so how to use videos will follow that. Ps. Don't worry: I'll make the new version available to people who have downloaded already at a discounted price based on what's new. :)
Regarding dividing up company and personal videos: You could create a new number column like I have for videos called 'Company Videos' or something and then filter a /create linked database view of these / create a new template page for them in the same way the template currently manages 'shorts' and 'videos'. Again - I want to look at creating a more integrated content manager that has 'channels' to divide up the use case more comprehensively soon. :) Good luck!
@@BetterCreating Of course and thank you! I'm going through those videos and its helping and just as I start using the system it's starting to make more sense haha. When do you think version 2 might be out?
All depends on life and how easy it is to turn my new ideas and elements in my system into a template. Hoping Jan.
Hey mate, great work. Your content is one of the best on here by far. Just a question, how do you get the pages to be so wide? Mine are always squashed, even on full width.
Ah thanks pal: much appreciated: spread the word!
Mine is just wide I think as I’m on an iMac for the screencasts. Or it could be that you haven’t selected make page fullwidth on the page options in the top right: in fact : thats probably it. Good luck! :)
@@BetterCreating alright mate, thank you. Probably my tiny mac causing issues, haha. Otherwise, I'll be spreading the word. I have been doing this for years myself but become fond when someone takes their time to educate others as many don't truly understand the concept of "productivity", but it's really all about making your system catered to your weaknesses, strengths and needs.
This is awesome, a nutrition/workout plan & life would be complete
Nice idea!
Thanks for watching :)
It was great to see someone else’s approach. I love the “second brain” concept.
Thanks! - I’ll be doing a load of new updates to this system this year and how i use it so keep an eye out for those too :) Can’t claim the second brain concept thou! That’s thanks to reading David Allen’s GTD and Tiago Forte. :)
@@BetterCreating Thinking about buying the template, but will those updates be added free of charge or should I wait in that case?
Loved this video. Your system is so well populated even inside each page in the databases! usually you see a nice dashboard and then the pages are not that populated. It is beautiful! I have been building my system and am pretty happy with it as it is super simple and less databases to work with, but its ugly.. i look at yours and im like, this is so sleek! mine is basic: white, headers, a bit of colours... have to work on this. but at least the function is there, just need to work on form :) Love your content!
Thanks for the kind words - sounds like you have a great system. Yeah - making it attractive whist functional really made the difference for me to enjoy and KEEP using it all. :) been making a client database system this week that I’m well chuffed with. 👍
Wonderful video, spending so much time absorbing this late on a Friday night! Just want to say, please keep up your quality content and you will have 100ks of followers in no time - you deserve it!
Much appreciated Niel. I will indeed! Great to see people are finding my stuff valuable. Opening a theatre production in London at the moment so taking a little planned break from making vids. Back on it now thou! :)
Looks awesome! You could swap out visualise for See? S.C.A.M but I’m not sure how that would go for marketing the system 😂
HAHA! Best comment of the week. But yes... No. no... no maybe not. 😂😅
OMG i have bought the whole notion it was a bit expensive and now i'm so overwhelmd omg omg omg i don't understand you jump from one to one thing sometimes ...
Thank you for downloading. :) Yes: I would suggest this video is offered as a tour, not a comprehensive guide to using the template so I do jump about between things! Please check out my productivity and Notion playlists for more specific videos on all the elements and the thinking behind them, how to build them and use them. This early video is a good place to start on creating a productivity system and the GTD principles that inspired me to make mine: ruclips.net/video/PuG0sLiIL1o/видео.html
Hope that helps!
Hihi, i am really like your template, and i would like to ask if i buy your template, am i getting the update in future if there are any update in your template?
Hi, thanks for watching and great to hear. Yeah, if I update the template in the future i will let everyone who has downloaded know via the mailing list: so just keep hold of the link. I don’t know how easy it would be to move information to a new version you would need to duplicate to your workspace however. I would try to share details of what’s adjusted thou. I’ll be making other templates that can be added in at some point: but these may be additional. Hope that helps! Thanks, S
Omygosh Simon! Just bought your LifeOS template! INCREDIBLE! Thank you for the 100000000 hrs you must have spent creating it. I'm diving in tonight! ♥️
Thanks for your support: Hope you enjoy it and modify it to be your own! And yes, I Darby count the hours but it kept me busy in lockdowns when work was quiet!! 👍
Hello! I bought your templates and have been using it for months now.
Thank you for helping people make their lives manageable again!
That’s awesome Chris: thanks for the support!
@bettercreating, you mentioned this is your 2021 version. Are you planning a 2022 version? With less than two months before the end of the year, I would be interested in the changes being noted, probably now, as it would help with deciding what is most important and which of your systems would be good for our particular needs.
Hi Tere,
I am planning on making some layout changes in 2022 but need to get out of November freelance work first before I look at what it will be seriously. It will mostly be small adjustments to menu, using the new grouping function better etc: much of which users can do anyway to own needs.
Simply put: The Productive, Creative and Complete Notion templates are all the same other than the creative Notion adding a content creation dashboard system to the basic productive Notion template, and the Complete Notion adding the content creation dashboard and also a promoted stoic journal. Hope that helps a bit for now. :) thanks for watching!
@@BetterCreating Geez, you sound like a lawyer. I worked as a paralegal for 25+ years, so consider my sentence in that Context. The first I understand, paying clients always come first.
Where you lost me was should I buy now (which I totally understand why you would say now, really) or wait for the update. I am working on my Brain (first after brain injury, and second because it excites me more than other parts right now), so I am not in any hurry. I don't know, does the rate of exchange go up or down with the economy (rhetorical question)? It has been a bit since I looked; I had a vet bill looming and I was saving $ so I don't remember, do buyers of the entire system get free or deeply discounted updates?
Your encouragement keeps me going! Thanks.
I was just diagnosed with ADHD. I kept being told just break down the task into smaller tasks and keep track, but no one actually talked about HOW to do that. You will literally be responsible for helping me meet my academic and personal goals. I can finally get past the stuck point of not knowing how to start projects and document the steps as tasks. Thank you so much!
Hi Sarah, thanks so much for sharing this, and I’m so pleased that the system is genuinely going to help you with your work! That’s what it’s all about! Let me know how it goes using the template 🤗🙌👍
@@BetterCreating Will do! Talk about a perfect time to start, I just came from your synced block video. This is going to make onboarding so much easier! The possibilities are endless...but not overwhelmingly so LOL
Are you planning any updates to the templates to utilize the new API within notion ? If yes, will these updates be freely available for those who already purchases your templates now ?
Hi there, thanks for asking. I will update the templates later in the year most likely. However, it’s not really possible to add ready to use API functionality as it is something one has to set up with your own automation account most often (e.g. using Zapier it Automate.io). So any updates in this area would be making it ‘API ready’ I expect... either way, I will notify people who have downloaded via my newsletter about any updates available. It would mean re-duplicating it however as it’s not possible to automatically update the copy you have made to your own system. Hope that helps! If I make additional elements for the system these could be paid for separately (like my financial tracker) - but i offered discounts for this to existing users. I would think the best approach will be to follow videos to adapt yourself in some cases. :)
Just what I was looking for! Great template btw!
Thanks, great to hear. Hope you enjoy it. :)