It’s no secret I love stationary. I recently posted a photo of the above notebooks on Instagram and a grammar school friend remembered my affinity for pads and pens even then; she told a story of how I convinced her to buy this cool troll pen at a book fair in first grade.

I’m also constantly looking for ways to stay organized and keep on task. I need to because I have a lot of irons in the fire:

• I have a full time job
• I’m developing online courses for myself and others
• I host a weekly podcast
• I have 2 blogs
• I have a baby girl on the way

I need a few tools to make sure I don’t lose track of what I need to do and when. There are a few tried and true tools I use, and a couple of new ones I’m trying this year.

Bullet Journaling

This was a system I discovered a few years ago thanks to one of my favorite podcasts, The Pen Addict. It shows you how to keep track of monthly, weekly, and daily tasks, lists, and much more. It gives you a dead-simple system of icons and indexing to keep everything straight. And the best part is it’s fully customizable.

I’ve customized the system a bit over the years through some trial and error, but here’s what I’ve settled on:

I use the Leuchtturm1917 Dotted. It’s the recommended one, as well as a great notebook.

At the front of the notebook, I’ll have a section where I transfer notes from old to new, add lists & collections, and goals for the year.

I will have dedicated pages to Months, Work Weeks, and Weekends. I use something else for daily tracking.

I’ll try to keep note-taking to a minimum, but I will add lists and more organized ideas, noting the pages in the index.

I try to keep the same notebook all year, & the end of 6 months, I’ll “reset” — add a blank page, then new goals and collections.

I’m a huge fan of this system. It’s a nice way to not only keep track of my monthly and weekly tasks, but look back every few months and see what I’ve accomplished, and what I still need to accomplish.

Field Notes

Since I don’t always have my bullet journal on me, but still prefer writing notes in a notebook, I always have a Field Notes Brand notebook in my back pocket. These things get pretty beat up, but they are great for quick notes and sketches.

Hobonichi Techo

In the photo above, you may notice that I have 2 notebooks. The bottom one is my Bullet Journal. The top one is my Hobonichi Techo; this is a smaller page-a-day planner that I’ve been clamoring to get for a while. I finally pulled the trigger this year.

These planners are made by a company in Japan and they are of great quality and size. I was actually a bit worried I’d find the book too small (it’s an A6) but it’s just right!

Because it’s important for me to track daily tasks, appointment, and hours (as in, time I spent working on something), I wanted a planner than gave me a little more rigidness than bullet journaling. I wanted to easily lay out hours on pages clearly marked by day for easy reference. I’ve started using this for the Daily Plan Bar that Mike Rohde wrote about in December. I’ve really enjoyed how sturdy and compact the planner is. My only wish is that it had a bookmark like the Leuchtturm1917.

Finally, there are lots of cool covers and accessories for it. Right now I’m using just the planner, but it’s nice to know that if I wanted a case, I have options.

The Hobonichi website is a little confusing, so here’s an Amazon link to the planner.

Pens

I love me some pens. Here’s a short list of the ones I like to use:

• Sharpie Pen
• Papermate Flair
• Retro 51 Tornado

Bear Notes

As far as digital tools go, Bear Notes is my favorite note taking app. It’s available for iOS and MacOS, and it’s beautiful. It’s easy to use, it syncs quickly, and it’s relatively cheap. I’m a big fan.

Fantastical

I rely heavily on my calendar from day-to-day and of everything I’ve used, Fantastical is the best. The desktop app is a bit pricy ($40) but worth it in my opinion. It integrates well with both Google and MacOS, and it’s companion iOS app is great.

Calendly

Related is perhaps my favorite new tool, Calendly. It’s a web-based scheduling app that makes setting up appointments super easy. I use it for scheduling guests for my podcast as well as consults and other conversations I might be having. Connect your calendars, set available times, and send out a link to anyone who wants to schedule time with you. Calendly will adjust for time zones, follow-up with both you and the person you’re meeting with, and add the event to both of your calendars.

So Far so Good!

This system has been great so far. The Hobonichi Techo has been a great addition to my workflow, and Calendly has been a game changer for me. I absolutely love it.

What tools are helping you stay organized? I’d love to hear about them!

How I’m Staying Organized in 2017 was originally published in Thoughts from Joe Casabona on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I finished reading the first of my 2 January Reading books on Friday: The Expectant Father. It’s a book that touts being the “ultimate guide for Dads-to-be” and as a Dad-to-be that knew very little about the role, I really appreciated how thorough it was.

It takes the pregnancy month-by-month, telling you what’s going on with Mom, the baby, and possibly you. It is chock full of advice for how to handle certain situations (and how not to), and some of the most important things you can do as a soon-to-be father, but also as the most important asset to your partner. It helped me put things in perspective, gave me some great advice, and happily, confirmed I’m doing the right thing most of the time.

The most valuable stuff for me came at the end: the birth, what happens, what can happen, and what happens after. The birthing class Erin and I are taking covered some of this, but reading helped it stick.

What Happens After?

The thing I’m most nervous about is what to do after the baby is born. How do I play with her? What if I’m too rough? How soft is that soft spot? Will I know what to do, when I need to do it?

What if I’m not prepared for this at all?

I’ve never held a baby younger than 2 months old, and even that was recent — my friend Katie’s son. I was very nervous I was going to break him because he’s so small (I did not).

The book assured me that every dad asks these questions, which I kind of already knew in the back of my mind. It also answered some of the questions and talks about baby’s first few weeks in the world. The author also plugs his next book, The New Father: A Dad’s Guide to the First Year, a lot. I was a little put off by this. However, as an author myself I understand for 2 reasons:

1. Man’s gotta eat
2. There’s so much content, there’s no way he could fit it all in a single book

I don’t necessarily feel I was shortchanged, and he does prepare me a bit. But a little more wouldn’t hurt.

Highly Recommended

All-in-all, I highly recommend it. I have lots of dog-eared pages to revisit a little closer to the due date, and conversations to have with my wife.

I also learned a lot of fascinating things (did you know babies can differentiate between their parents’ voices around 30 weeks?). The author mentions that a lot new dads can feel amazement at what a woman’s body can do, and that’s completely true. I’m also amazed at what babies in-utero know and do instinctively. Creating life is a crazy and wonderful thing.

Reading Update: The Expectant Father was originally published in Thoughts from Joe Casabona on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Man. I don’t feel good about that click baity headline. But maybe it caught your attention. It must have since you’re reading.

Earlier today I wrote a bit of a tweetstorm about the state of fake news and how to combat it. Truth be told, I don’t think there is a way to stop it. But more on that later.

Fake News isn’t some new thing

First things first: Fake News isn’t new. The Daily Show is over 20 years old. The Onion, a very popular (and obviously fake) news outlet has been around since 1988. According to this article by Politico* it started around the time of the Printing Press.

Here’s the thing: People lie. A lot. For whatever reason. Maybe they don’t want to get in trouble (“I didn’t break the chair!”). Maybe they want to push an agenda (**Partisan Statement that turned out to be a lie**). Lies are as old as time itself*. They will definitely make their way into the news.

People Believe what They want to Believe

It’s a bigger issue today because information travels fast — really fast. And you can find any information you want on anything, so it’s easy to backup your claims using any old link. This brings me to my next point: people believe what they want to believe, no matter what.

It’s part of the reason arguing with [dad/brother/uncle/coworker/rando on Twitter] is so frustrating. You’re not going to change the hearts and minds of most people. It’s kind of sad, but it’s true. It’s really up to big media organizations to make sure we get real news. However…

Ad Money > The Truth

The truth is news organizations need to make money, and ads are still the best way to do it. And for ads to work, people need to view the pages with ads on them. And to get page views, you need to write things people want to read and share. And this will be easier if you’re confirming what people want to believe.

So organizations write click-bait headlines, bury the lead, and hope people will react to the less than truthful part of the story, for the sake of more eyeballs and misinformation.

But that’s a real problem because organizations need to make money to operate and still make good quality content. So what do we do?

Find a Better Revenue Stream

This one is tough, because if not ads, then what? You’ll get people who want to fund you with “quid pro quo” money or memberships that have the same effect. “We’re paying you, so write what we want you to write.”

Get Government Funding

Do you really think this one will happen? And if it does, how many people will actually trust it?

We Need to Form Better Habits

The only real solution to combat Fake News is to make smarter people, and there’s no quick fix for that. We need to take our current process:

1. See Headline
2. React
3. Share

And change it to this:

1. See Headline
2. Read Article
3. React
4. Research
5. Share

I know that asks a lot, but what I’m really getting at is this:

Train yourself to be a skeptic.

Most importantly, we need to start (if we haven’t already) teaching this sort of critical thinking in schools, from a young age. I’m not saying make kids cynical, but critical thinking is important in an age of information overload and opinions flying as freely as pollen in the springtime. We need to show them how to read and research, and to do that we’ll need to practice what we preach.

*I didn’t separately research this. Could be fake!

Some Thoughts on Fake News that You’ll Never Believe! was originally published in Thoughts from Joe Casabona on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

A year almost to the day, I wrote a post on my (then only) blog called The Curious Thing About Running. I was fresh off my second half marathon and while it was difficult, I was excited to complete a challenge that required both physical and mental toughness. As a matter of fact, I said that very thing:

The curious thing about running is this: it’s a challenge that’s both physical and mental. That means completing the physical gives you an immediate high — that endorphin high I was talking about. But once that goes away, you’re left with a different high. It’s the high you feel by knowing that you’re mentally tough enough to run a distance you’ve never run before…

And that is definitely true. But a funny thing happened after that. See, I live in the Northeast, and it was January. And the Northeast in January is cold. And running in the cold is pretty high up on my “things I least want to do” list.

Plus, I was getting married in less than 6 months! There was so much to do!

Did I mention it was cold?

I kind of fell off the wagon of running. Sure I had all of these amazing thoughts and feelings. I got pretty emotional after that race, and since then I’ve run a 10K and attempted another half, but it didn’t work out. I stopped training.

Turns out you can’t take a 10 month break from running and expect to just get back into it. Running is not riding a bike.

The very thought of running right now is not unfathomable, but it’s definitely not high up there on my list of things to do. I lost that mental toughness that I was talking about.

So What Now?

So what now indeed. The excuses can keep coming, if I so desire:

• But I have so much work to do.
• I have a baby coming in less than 2 months!
• It’s still January! SO COLD.

After I couldn’t do the last half marathon I attempted, I beat myself up…a lot. I couldn’t believe I failed at something I was so sure I’d be able to do. But then you know what I did? I went back to doing nothing about it. It’s way easier to be mad at yourself for a short amount of time than to commit to a several months long process.

To be honest, I think my wife is a little relieved that I’m not running long distances in the shape I’m in. At 257 lbs, distance running is rough on everything. So I need a new plan.

Finding that Mental Toughness

I want to get that feeling back — the one I felt after completing the last half marathon. This past weekend had me thinking a lot about it because it was the 2017 Walt Disney World Marathon weekend.

I need to devise a plan that starts with easing my way back into running, along with weight loss. Sure, I’ve been walking a lot more. I’ve been eating better. Those are the physical hurdles I need to overcome in order to be able to run 13.1 miles again, this time without worrying my friends and family.

But I also need to find that mental toughness.

Baseball is ninety percent mental and the other half is physical. -Yogi Berra

I love that quote from Yogi Berra, and not only because it’s one of his most famous Yogisms. I think it can be said of a lot of challenging activities. You need to commit yourself to it, both mentally and physically. You need to give 140%. That’s more than the normal 110% you hear about.

To be honest, I’m not sure how I will find that mental toughness I need. There’s a lot of other things I’d rather do with my free time besides running. Good thing I have a good support system. You can see some of them in the photos above.

But I know I want to. Now I just need to.

Running 12 Months Ago vs. Running Today was originally published in Thoughts from Joe Casabona on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.