Save Time by Using Smartphone Geolocation Reminders

Here is a simple and easy to use, time saving feature that many people haven't set up on their smartphone: use geolocation reminders. Simply put, you can dictate a reminder which will appear on your phone when you arrive at home. For example, "Remind me to take the steak out of the freezer when I get home" or "remind me to water the flowers when I get home." Whatever you want to remember but don't need to think about until you get there, you can use geolocation reminders. You can also set geo reminders for your workplace, and (although I haven't) set them for specific places like your local grocery store. You can find nice, detailed instructions for iPhones here on how to do this. Geolocation reminders work on Droids, too. Note that you can set reminders for times, too, which also are helpful, such as "Remind me to call my wife at four."

The main idea is, of course, to remember something, but the added bonus is that you can task your phone with the work of both recording it and reminding you. Recently I heard about some research that points out we can only keep four things in our brain at a time, so this is a way to help declutter your mind and keep room available for other, bigger things that need your attention. I also have mentioned suffering from Dementia of the Preoccupied, and this helps with that, too. 

I also have written about the Things program in the past, which I use for organized to do lists. One of the many features I like about this program is that any dictated reminders get put in the Things inbox so I can move them to a list later and not forget about them. 

Take time today to get your smartphone set up and take advantage of this helpful feature. I hope you will find it as helpful as I have!

Stop Digging Yourself a Bigger Hole & Get Stuff Organized with Things

"If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging." 

 -Will Rogers 

Things Interface. Image Source

For the past month I've been using Cultured Code's Things program for keeping track of tasks and stuff I want to remember.  I really liked it and have found it to be very helpful. As I've written about before, I find myself becoming more and more forgetful with and ever growing amount of information. (See Dementia of the Preoccupied) It seems I have all sorts of things I want to remember and ideas, questions, and to-do items that pop into my head at inopportune moments, and if I don't make a note of them, I will forget.

I've tried numerous systems over the years, everything from digital notes and Post-Its, the Reminders app on my phone, and other programs similar to Things. Most often I'd just send myself an email, resulting in an ever growing inbox of unorganized items that could not be sorted by importance or categorized. This resulted in major inefficiencies of re-reading the same items and missing important items that were buried. I was digging myself into a bigger hole. Things has changed this.

One of the best things about Things is the fact that it works across all my devices. The app is on my iPhone, iPad and also my Mac. Any item I add syncs across all of these locations. It sounds simple, but is wonderful. Thoughts occur anywhere; access to your lists and tasks should mirror this. It also integrates with Siri, which is super helpful. Anytime I think of something I don't want to forget, I only need to tell Siri to "Remind me to..." and the item is added to Things. I love the convenience of this compared to my past inefficient systems. 

The four buckets in Things. Image from Things.

The features within Things program itself make it so much better than just using the iPhone's Reminders app or Notes. Each item that you add can be categorized in one of four buckets:

1. Something that needs to be done Today
2. Items that are Next
3. Scheduled Items you assign a due date
4. Items that can be put into a Someday bucket

There are many other features in the program, most of which I haven't even tried out yet. The interface is simple and it was easy to get started. It has a two week trial period, which is a great way to get started. The week I bought the program it was half off the $50 retail price which was a nice plus. 

I first heard about Things in December at the TIES Conference from Mark Wallace. Mark's presentation was entitled, "Redeeming Time: Finding Freedom from Overload" and was one of the best I attended. Mark shared the Will Rogers quote above and it fit my current lack of an effective system. He also mentioned the book Margin: Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial, and Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives by Richard Swenson which I had read and liked, so I was hooked. (See a previous post on Crazy Busy: You Are Letting the Screen Strangle Your Soul.) 

Mark talked about the "stuff generators" in our lives: email, social media, family, students, home. He pointed out that research has proven we can only hold four to seven things in our short term memories. Capturing and offloading it into the least amount of places is therefore necessary. Then we need to clarify and organizing our stuff into actions and outcomes, which you can do with Things. I am thankful I was at his presentation and saw this solution. Hopefully you find it beneficial, too.

The Teenage Brain +Dementia of the Preoccupied

I listened to a great podcast last week on NPR's Fresh Air. Terry Gross, the host, interviewed neurologist Dr. Frances Jensen, author of the recently published book The Teenage Brain.  The podcast was entitled, Why Teens Are Impulsive, Addiction-Prone And Should Protect Their Brains.  As both an educator and parent, I found the interview fascinating and enlightening, and would encourage you to listen to it or read the transcript.  Her insight and findings about "learning and multitasking, stress and memory, sleep, addiction, and decision-making" (quote source) are important to understand.

Dr. Jensen explains how the prefrontal cortex of a teens' brain is one of the last areas to develop and become fully connected (myelinated).  This is the area of your brain where decisions are made, where we have our impulse control, and where adults are able to use self control and think twice about risky behavior.  It's no wonder that teens make decisions that can seem senseless to adults. 

She also explains how teens can learn very quickly as connections are being made. This has benefits in education of course, but can also be problematic, especially when drugs or alcohol are involved.  These substances can be especially addictive in teens during the important formative time in their development.  Stress can also be problematic to a teen's brain development, altering how connections are made.  This can lead to increased issues with depression in adulthood.

Dementia of the Preoccupied

Toward the end of the interview, no longer talking about the teenage brain, the host asks Dr. Jensen about her own brain.  Specifically, what she has noticed happening lately, and I was especially intrigued by a term she coined, "Dementia of the Preoccupied."  

"But in a way to explain my own shortcomings in my life with so many things coming at me in one direction - having to switch modes from clinical to basic research to patients to administration, like, you know, on an hourly basis, just so much is coming at me. And you do - things fall through the cracks... So I just have now decided to call it the dementia of the preoccupied because I refuse to think that I'm actually becoming demented - that I just know it's all environmental... I think we're not dwelling on tasks long enough to consolidate our memories, frankly."

She goes on to explain that research is being done to find the "optimal age for this sort of distracted learning" and it is your mid-to-late-30s. After that it plateaus.  I know I was going somewhere with this, but I'm 42 and can't recall what exactly it was...

She ends the interview mentioning that today's medical students can't possibly memorize everything, and so medical schools are beginning to teach their students "how to access information" and the skills of "scanning" and "validating information sources and knowing where to go when." Fortunately these skills are the some of the same ones we are talking about in education: information and media literacy.  Again, I'm sure there was more I meant to write but, well, you know...