The tools I use - April 2022

Table Of Contents

Here are the tools I use every day to keep my life in order.

Software

I use these four apps each day to manage my health, my money, my attention, and my time.

Weight Watchers, YNAB, Todoist, Fantastical

Weight Watchers

I use the Weight Watchers app to budget the food I eat each day. I've tried several approaches to finding and maintaining a healthy weight, including a ketogenic diet and calorie counting. This app has been easiest for me to stick with over time. The app is designed around the Weight Watcher methodology for weight loss, and I find the methodology much more important than the technology...a theme for much of the software I choose.

I began using the Weight Watchers app after hitting a new max weight at the beginning of 2022

You Need A Budget (YNAB)

I use YNAB to budget the money I earn and spend each day. YNAB is a great app, but what makes it truly great is the budgeting methodology it's built around. The budgeting habit never stuck for me until YNAB taught me to budget only the money I have and quit trying to predict how much I'd spend in the future. I can't actually remember when I started using YNAB (sometime before 2018), but I haven't looked back since.

Check out my list of the best YNAB tutorials.

YNAB budget categories
My top level budget categories in 2022

Todoist

I use Todoist to budget my attention each day. Todoist's labels and filters make it endlessly customizable. After over 6 years of use, I've settled on a simple GTD setup. I follow the GTD methodology, which means I dump every actionable input into my Todoist inbox so that my mind can be clear. I'm working on saying "no" to inputs and requests that are not aligned with my primary responsibilities and goals. This winnowing process occurs during my weekly review. To date I've completed 16,384 tasks in Todoist.

Day to day I work out of my next action lists

Fantastical

I use Fantastical to budget my time each day. I agonized over whether to use a third party app for calendar management, considering how good stock apps are these days. The features that pushed me over the edge were the natural language processing and the highly customizable views and iOS widgets.

Hardware

Phone, laptop, watch

I use an iPhone 13 mini, a 2017 MacBook Pro (yes, the worst one), and an Apple Watch Series 7. I don't upgrade often (previous phone was iPhone XS and watch was series 1), but have found this combination of devices to work well for me. I also have an iPad Pro from 2018 which I used until very recently as a study device, but lately I've been favoring the iPhone as my study and reading device.

Home gym

In 2020 I ditched my gym membership for a set of adjustable dumb bells and never looked back. I added a stationary bike for cardio late last year, and I don't think I'll ever go back to the gym. This combination of equipment is all I need to maintain my basic fitness.

The basics

Of course, I use a number of other apps and hardware (banking, journaling, camera, etc.), but these are the ones I really couldn't live without. I use them daily to keep my life in order.

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