Stop overcomplicating things. Software engineers have a weird tendency to over-engineer everything, from software to their personal lives. A very good (and funny) post about this can be found here: https://justfuckingusehtml.com/.
This will be a simple post about the simplifications I made in my daily life (related to work, finances and studies) that I think are pure gold:
Notetaking
You don’t need ANYTHING more than Apple Notes/Windows Notepad. Seriously, nothing. You don’t need fancy tables, calendar sync, labels, images, nothing. Notetaking should be just plain text. If taking notes is easy, you’ll take them more often. I’m using just pen and paper. “But how am I going to find my notes from 6 months ago of a specific topic?” How often do you do this? I really really doubt you have done this more than a couple of times in your entire life. But hey, you can add dates on a paper, okay?
Todo lists
I can’t help myself to don’t laugh when I see people using apps for todo lists. Come on, why? Downloading a 50Mb app in your phone, having one more tab bookmarked for a web app, one more desktop app installed, one more account, one more place to look for things. Wanna use something digital? Just use Apple Notes/Notepad. Wanna use something even better? Pen and paper. “But if I’ll need to see my todo list from the grocery store line?” You just won’t.
Expenses tracking
You don’t need a crazy app to do this. A simple Google Worksheet document can do everything you need. I used a SUPER basic spreadsheet for more than 6 years. I NEVER missed anything. Recently, I built my own personal finances app, but it wasn’t because of any particular reason, I just wanted to build it and so I did. Just for fun.
Fitess/sleep tracking
Seriously, did you stop for a minute to think why you do this? What’s the difference of knowing you did 1,000 or 2,000 steps? If you’re an athlete, those metrics are too imprecise for you. If you’re not an athlete, you don’t need them. I’m not even talking about sleep tracking… god. Sleeping with a WATCH? You’ll know if you slept well just by waking up and realizing if you’re tired or not. Just stop.
”Focus mode”
The thing that helped me the most was a simple $5 kitchen timer. I just set it to 25 minutes and lock in. When it beeps, I make a short pause, then set 25 minutes again. Good and old pomodoro, without any app or lo-fi music theme.
OS
For me, nothing beats Windows + WSL. Windows because it’s where I feel “at home”, so it’s where I’m most productive. WSL because Linux for coding is the best. I simply don’t like MacOS, I don’t even know why. I feel “slow” and unproductive. Also, they’re super overpriced in Brazil. It would be better to have a Linux PC? Of course it would, but then I’ll need another PC for playing videogames and using Windows specific software, and having 2 PCs? Thanks, but no. Windows + WSL gives me all I need.
Studies
You probably had/have a list of things to study, maybe a list of blog posts to read, a list of courses, of youtube videos. I tried different things to keep them, nothing worked better than just sending it to myself on whatsapp. Every day I open whatsapp and see the last message to myself on a pinned chat, you can’t miss that.
Subscriptions
CANCEL UNUSED SUBSCRIPTIONS. I’m pretty sure you have at least one. “But there’s a TV show that I love in that streamig!”. Then watch it, finish it and cancel. You can cancel and subscribe again when you want. Why keep it? I do this ALL the time. I had a Prime Video subscription just to watch Invincible, now that the 3rd season has ended, I cancelled it. I can subscribe again when the new season comes out and that’s it.
Gadgets
You don’t need a $200 mouse, a $300 keyboard, a $300 headphone and so on. I just love a simple fact that it’s always true in my work experience. The junior/mid-level engineers enter a call with a super fancy headphone, standing desks, a DSLR camera as webcam, a dedicated microphone etc. Then the Principal Engineer hops in the call with headphones that comes with a Motorolla smartphone, the built-in webcam, without any external keyboard mouse or monitor, and using a dinner table as workplace. Does it mean you cannot have it? Of course not. If you really like those things, go on. I used to find gadgets super cool. But I realized they don’t make ANY difference to me. And I just don’t want you to feel that you need those needs, becaue you don’t.