How I Organize My Life: My Notion Command Center

Jeff -

Thanks to a single Notion page, I manage a full-time job, content creation across 4 platforms, and everything else in my life with total peace of mind. It took a couple of years to get here, but I finally have a reliable system that I trust completely.

Instead of boring you with every little detail, I'll focus on the five key benefits of my Command Center to hopefully inspire upgrades for your own Notion setup.

Watch it in action

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Benefit #1: No More Planning Paralysis

Every morning, I do the exact same thing: I push my "New Day" button to generate my daily checklist. This removes the mental burden of deciding what to do next, letting me focus on doing instead of deliberating.

Obviously, tailor the New Day button to your own needs. In my actual workspace, I have a "Social Media" task that reminds me to respond to every YouTube comment, because nothing says authentic engagement like responding to strangers according to a checklist. 😬

Benefit #2: Frictionless Action-Taking

As a content creator, I get ideas at random moments. Thanks to my New Idea button under Quick Actions, one click - BOOM - I can capture a video idea, add tags, and start brainstorming right away.

The same logic applies to my other buttons. I've connected each button to a corresponding backend database:

  • "New idea" connects to my ideas database
  • "New friend" connects to my friends database
  • "New prompt" connects to my prompts database

Having these buttons on my Command Center means I don't have to navigate to separate pages to capture information, eliminating the barrier between thinking and doing.

Again, you can tailor this for your own needs. If you like to read, find a free book tracker template, duplicate it in your workspace, and create a button that adds entries to that database.

Benefit #3: Intuitive Structure

Let's take a step back and look at the overall layout of my Command Center. It's split into 4 sections:

  1. Quick-access buttons and links
  2. Tasks and projects
  3. Areas
  4. Notes

The Areas section is organized to match how my brain naturally processes information. I have 4 area pillars: Content Creation, Personal Life, My Business, and the Workplace. Under each pillar, I've added areas that "belong" to that pillar: YouTube for content, travel and health for personal, taxes for business, and career development for work.

Why does this matter? Let's say my wifi stops working. It's unlikely I remember exactly where I saved that information, so I think: the router is in my apartment, which is part of my housing area, let's click into that, oh right I have a resource page for internet, and yes these are the troubleshooting steps I wrote down months ago.

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The beauty of this setup: We store information exactly where our future selves will look for it.

Benefit #4: Custom-Fit System

You might recall that after clicking my New Day button, I create a new page in my Make Time section, based on my favorite productivity book by Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky.

Let's say today is Sunday. After I click the date (which automatically shows the day via a Notion formula), I fill in three fields:

  1. My Daily highlight: The one task I must complete today—"Wrap up AI Agents research."
  2. I'm grateful that "My Notion course is #1 on the PPA platform."
  3. Let Go: This is where I reframe negatives into positives. Recently a family member fell ill, but I write: "I get to spend more time bonding with my mom and brother."

The whole point of this modular system is that we can replace the Make Time workflow with any template we want. We could download a free habit tracker template, create a "Daily Habit Tracker" section, link it to the template, and make it part of our daily routine instead.

Don't think of your Notion workspace as a rigid structure, but as a modular system with components you can swap out as your needs evolve.

Benefit #5: Information That Finds You

Your Command Center surfaces exactly what you need, when you need it.

If I open my "Gemini for Productivity Workshop" project, I only see tasks, resources, and notes relevant to this project.

All this is possible thanks to Notion's relations feature, which I cover in my "Build Your Command Center in Notion" course.

I want to be very clear: if you have a solid workflow where nothing slips through the cracks, don't change anything. The best systems are the ones you enjoy using consistently.

That said, if you don't want to waste years on trial and error and just want something that works, I share all my Notion templates in my course, along with my step-by-step thought process for building a personalized Command Center tailored to your needs.

If You Enjoyed This

If you found this helpful, check out my Top 8 Productivity Tips for Notion!