In your paper planner, tasks can live in more than one home at the same time. However, they are easy to find, depending on which list you need:

  • Tasks with hard dates appear on daily planner pages, in the list of tasks for that day. These daily task lists are your Do Today lists.
  • Soft date tasks and Someday/Maybe tasks appear at the end, behind special context tabs you set up. Tasks can be listed more than once, behind different contexts, if needed.
    • Soft date tasks are entered at the top of the page, in the rough order you’d like to do them.
    • Someday/Maybe tasks are entered at the bottom of those same pages.
  • Future next steps for projects are kept on pages behind the Projects tab at the back (for larger projects) or on the page where the project was first outlined (for small, short projects).
  • Unprocessed tasks stay right on the Notes pages where you collected them, mixed in with your other notes. They stand out because they have checkboxes next to them. They remain unchecked until you triage them.

This approach allows duplicate entries. This is OK. It’s never stressful remembering that something was already accomplished—in fact, it’s rewarding. When you see a task you already completed, you’ll just cross it off or reprocess it and move on.