How to Organize Your Life with Notion: Creating an All In One Notion Planner

Notion

Jan 1

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Are you new to Notion and wondering exactly how to organize your life with Notion? Creating an all in one Notion planner doesn’t have to be difficult! If you aren’t interested in purchasing a Notion Ultimate Life Planner, let me show you how to create the customizable Notion life planner you want! Out of all the Notion template ideas I create, an all in one life planner for Notion is by far my favorite! Happy planning!

Completely new to Notion? Learn everything you need to know with my Notion for Beginners guide here!

Creating a planner to organize your entire life sounds intimidating but it doesn’t have to be! My best advice, especially for beginners, is to be intentional with your pages and build your dashboard slowly over time. You can do so much with Notion but it’s powerful in its simplest form without automations, formulas, and widgets! If these things are what’s holding you back, definitely dive in! You can always add them later on!

If you’re ready to dive right in, check out the 31 Day Dashboard Roadmap! It has everything you need to create an aesthetic, functional Notion Dashboard in an easy-to-follow, step-by-step guide!

How to Organize Your Life with Notion: Be Intentional from the Start

I know we all want to jump right in when creating a new Notion Dashboard but it’s really important to think through your pages before you get started! If you are intentional from the start, you’ll be more satisfied and have a Dashboard that works best for your work style and life.

Before you start mapping out Databases and Pages, sit down and think through what you need from a Notion Dashboard. Why are you hoping to use Notion? What parts of your life need to be organized and streamlined with Notion?

There are many, beautiful templates on Pinterest and social media but when you dig further, quite a few of them are mostly fluff. They’re not full of well thought out systems. They may look good, but many lack the substance needed to really level up your life!

My Process for Creating Dashboards

When I’m creating a new Dashboard, I think really intentionally about the most important aspects of the system needed. I figure out exactly what style planner is needed, what pages will be most impactful, and what Pages may seem cool but are actually pretty unnecessary once you dive in.

Next, I create a rough skeleton that includes every page and feature I want to include in the Dashboard. I write it all out on a blank Page that eventually becomes the Dashboard itself.

Once my skeleton is done, I start to create. I make the main database, develop other important pages, and create space for all the features and Pages I listed in my rough skeleton.

Then, once the meat of the Notion Dashboard is done, I worry about aesthetics. I’ll change colors, add headings, embed widgets, create icons…whatever I want done aesthetically comes last.

Because while it’s important for your Notion Dashboard to look good, it’s not as important as it being functional!

Creating an All In One Notion Planner: Start With Your Table of Contents

Once you’ve thought intentionally about your systems, let’s jump into your Dashboard skeleton! Create a long list of ideas of everything you want to include in your Notion Dashboard. You can always delete things later, don’t be shy!

Drag and drop Page ideas so they are roughly grouped together. For example, weekly and daily and monthly planners would be together because they’re similar.

Now split your page into two columns. Whatever you want featured on your Dashboard, drag to Column 2. Everything else can stay int Column 1 as the beginnings to your Table of Contents.

Now, before we can move on, let’s touch on some important topics.

Are you a Scroller or a Nester?

I split Notion users into two categories. People who scroll and people who nest.

If you’re a scroller, you don’t mind if your Notion Dashboard goes on for miles. You’ll use links to jump to different sections, scroll until you find what you need, and prefer to have everything out in the open rather than tucked away.

Nesters are the opposite. They prefer to have as much as possible above the fold. Nesters don’t like searching for things at the bottom of a page. They would rather click through their organized pages and folders than scroll.

It’s important to know if you’re a scroller or a nester. It will really impact your Dashboard design!

Dashboards are important real estate!

Notion Dashboard homepages are important real estate! There is only so much you can fit on one page before it starts to feel crowded and overwhelming. If you are a scroller, you have a bit more room to play with but even the scrolliest of scrollers will lose things at the very bottom eventually!

Don’t be afraid to use your Table of Contents or Quick Links! I like to think of non-Dashboard pages in two categories: Things you reference infrequently and things you do quite a large volume of work in.

For Goal Trackers, Reading Trackers, and other similar pages, you’re not going to be working in or referencing them every day. They don’t necessarily need space on your Dashboard.

If you’re a Weekly Planner person who likes a calendar, weekly priorities, and entire lists dedicated to each week, you’ll likely want to put that on a different page as well to ensure you don’t need to sacrifice anything for space purposes!

Always remember, anything that’s on a separate page can be integrated to your Dashboard with Linked Database views and synced blocks. For example, I have a “Current Goals” Callout Box synced to my Dashboard. I also have a Linked Database of my Cleaning Template that’s filtered to show only today’s tasks. This allows me to see information quickly without it taking tons of space on my Dashboard.

Possible Page Categories:

Traditional Time-Based Planners like daily, weekly or monthly planner pages
Productivity Pages including task lists and project planners
Trackers like goal setting, habit tracking, bucket lists, and reading trackers
Personal Development Pages for affirmations, journaling, vision boards, and bucket lists
Pages for Resets and Routines like morning routines, evening routines, Weekly Resets, and Monthly Resets
Task Specific Pages for managing finances, meal planning, hobby organization, workout planners, wishlists, and travel planning

Creating a Calendar Database for your Notion Ultimate Life Planner

Most people will agree that the central system of any good planner needs to be a Calendar. When using Notion, this means a Calendar Database. The great thing about starting with a Calendar Database is that we can then use this Database to build out other parts of your Notion Dashboard.

What is a Notion Database?

A Notion Database is essentially a collection of Notion Pages that can be organized by the properties you assign to them. Pages in a Notion Database work the exact same way as other Pages in your Notion Dashboard in that you can add all of the same blocks, add Databases within your Database, link to outside pages, and use the same blocks and features! If you could do it on a non-Database Page, you can do it in a Database Page.

So what makes a Notion Database Page different? The addition of properties. With properties, you can start to organize your data. There are many properties but the ones I use most frequently are: Date, Select, Multi-Select, Progress, and Checkbox.

One Notion Database versus Many Notion Databases

When you first start using Notion, you may be tempted to get ultra-organized and use a different Database for everything. And while I understand (and have fallen for) the temptation, I would caution you against creating tons of Databases. Why?

Combining Notion Databases is much more difficult than separating them. You can very easily duplicate a Database and delete the properties and content you don’t want. Combining them is much more of a hassle.

Let’s say you want to create a Goals Database separate from your Calendar Database. What happens when you want to add your goals to your Calendar? Or if you have a separate recipe planner and want to add a casserole to Wednesday’s to-do list. Suddenly having multiple Databases becomes a bit more complicated.

To learn more about combining Databases and why I think it’s a good idea to use one Database for most tasks, check out Red Gregory’s Youtube video on the topic! It’s super informative and explained far better than I could explain it in an article!

Creating Your Notion Database

Creating the Database is actually fairly simple. On your Notion page, type /calendar and select Calendar Database. You can customize the layout settings, I usually hide the title and start with the Monthly View when setting up a new Calendar Database.

From here, you can start adding things to your Calendar! Before you go too crazy, continue reading to learn about setting up properties. It would be a bit of a pain to go back and update your properties later after planning out entire months of appointments and events after the fact!

Why you should consider creating a “Database” Select Property!

Before we continue on to discussing Properties further, let’s discuss creating a “Database” Select Property!

As I’ve mentioned, I like to keep as few Databases as possible to allow me to move tasks and events between them easily. I do this with a Select property that allows me to use Linked Databases and the Filter features as pseudo-Databases.

In my “Database” Select Property, I currently have options for Calendar, To-Do List, Goal Setting, Hobby, and Home Project. I’m still building this Dashboard so I anticipate having a few more categories (Meal Planning and Workouts for sure) as I continue to grow it.

I then filter each Database View or Linked Database on my page by the Database(s) I would like to appear.

Everything I want on my Calendar View is tagged as “Calendar”. If something has a date but is not tagged Calendar, it won’t pop up.

I have a List View on the lefthand side of my Dashboard with my To-Do List. Anything tagged To-Do will appear here. I can add a date but it won’t populate to my Calendar View unless I add the Calendar Tag.

My Goals are on a separate page in a Linked Database tagged with Goal Setting. If I want to add a related task to my To-Do list from that page, I can just click “+ New” from that Database and adjust the Properties! I can also add a Goal to my Calendar or To-Do List by adjusting the Properties.

With this Select Tag, I’ve essentially created a way to use one Database as multiple Databases. The only downside to this method is you have the same Properties across each Database, which can get complicated the more you add.

Which brings me to my next piece of advice…

Add Properties as you need them

I know having a Database fully set up feels nice. But it also means adding far more Properties and options than you’ll likely end up using. We tend to get overly ambitious when we start organizing and think we’re going to have it more together than we ever will.

Rather than starting with Properties you don’t need, create Properties as you go. You could go a long way with the Date property and the Database Select Property depending on what your needs are!

Once you start adding more Properties, make sure you’re being intentional with them. Having too many Properties can get messy and overwhelming. We’re going to talk about Database Templates in a moment but much of what you want to include in your Properties section could also be accomplished in the body of a Page using checklists!

Filters and Sorts

I’ve mentioned Filters a bit already but once you have your Database set up, you can use Filters and Sorts in different Database Views or with Linked Databases to really take your Dashboard to the next level.

Creating the right combination of Filters and Sorts can help your to-do list, goals, and other Databases work harder for you by ordering the most important tasks for you. To do this, just add a Select Property for Priority. Add options for High, Medium, and Low. Tag your items accordingly. At the top of the database click “Sort” and add a Sort by Priority. You may need to move your Options around depending on the order you input them in but that’s a quick fix!

Now, when you add a task that’s High Priority, your Sort will move it to the top for you and you won’t need to make decisions about what to do first!

Automations Help Your All-In-One Life Planner for Notion Run Smoothly

Using Properties is a great way to get started with Notion Automations. While they’re not technically labeled Automations, they do optimize your Notion Dashboard’s functioning without you lifting a finger! But there are three other Notion Automations I want to share with you and they’re easier to set up than they sound!

Database Templates

I suppose Database Templates aren’t technically Automations but since you can use them in an Automation, I’m including them here!

Database Templates are a game changer when it comes to getting organized in Notion. They’re Pages you can set up one time in your Databases and use again and again. This streamlines your workload and makes your process uniform as you’re working from the same starting point each time.

To create a Database Template, hover at the top of your Database and click the blue down arrow next to the “New” button. This is where all your Database Templates will be stored. Then click “+ New Template” and start creating! You can later edit this Database Template from the same menu. This is also where you’ll set up Recurring Database Templates.

So what should you use Database Templates for? Well…anything you do repeatedly! Meal planning, grocery lists, party planning, DIY projects, planning pages, goal setting pages, workouts, notetaking, project workflows…anything that you’ll create a Notion page for more than once would be a great candidate for a Database Template!

I currently have Database Templates for my Sunday Reset, Monday Power Hour, and each of my business workflows. They really make my work at home and in my business more efficient! And if you want to level up your Database Templates, keep reading!

Recurring Database Templates

Recurring Database Templates are exactly what they sound like. With this Notion feature, you can set your Database Templates to appear in your Databases at regular intervals you set in advance.

Setting up Recurring Database Templates really takes the guess work out of planning. You can have tasks appear in your Dashboard automatically when it’s time!

To set up a Recurring Database Template, first create your Database Template. Then, click the blue down arrow at the top of your database, hover next to the Database Template you’d like to set to repeat, click the Repeat option, and adjust the options. Don’t forget to click Save! I currently have Recurring Database Templates set up for my Sunday Reset and Monday Power Hour.

I also use them extensively on my Home Management Planner. Each cleaning and home maintenance task have a Database Template and I’ve set each to repeat weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly depending on how often we need to complete the task. While I’m normally a proponent of keeping everything in one Notion Database, this is an example of when I use a separate Database. There are dozens of Database Templates in this Database and it would be overwhelming for me, personally, to wade through them to find other Database Templates I need! I use a Linked List View of this Database on my Dashboard to see my tasks instead!

Recurring Database Templates aren’t all sunshine and roses though. There are two things to keep in mind when setting them up!

I would caution you against setting up Database Templates that repeat daily. These will continue to repeat daily even if you forget to delete the previous day or step away from your Notion for vacation (unless you remember to turn them off, of course). They can really pile up and can be overwhelming to deal with if you haven’t been working in Notion very much, especially if you have multiple daily templates set up.

The second thing to keep in mind is that any Database Template set to repeat will not appear in your Database until it is set to repeat. This means that even if you have something repeating weekly or monthly, it will not appear in your Database or on your Calendar View ahead of time. This is a bit annoying and is mostly an issue when you’re using Notion to organize your Calendar. If you set up Recurring Database Templates for recurring meetings or tasks, you won’t see them until the exact moment they are set to repeat.

A workaround I use is setting things to repeat earlier than scheduled. For example, we do our big deep clean on Saturdays but sometimes I have time on Friday to get started. I set my cleaning tasks to repeat on Friday at 12 AM instead of Saturday at 12 AM so they pop up ahead of time. I do the same thing for my Monday Power Hour. It’s set to pop up on my Notion Dashboard on Sundays with my Sunday Reset Template. When I’m resetting my Notion Dashboard for the week, I put things from my To-Do list that are overdue or really need to get done on the Monday Power Hour list. If it didn’t pop up until Monday when it’s scheduled, I wouldn’t be able to do that!

Buttons

The last Automation I want to discuss today is the Button Automations. Buttons can (and will) have their own article so I’m not going to share everything Button related today. But they are really cool and honestly a bit fun to work with!

With a Button, you can set up almost anything to happen in your Notion at…the push of a button. You can update Properties, add Pages to your Databases, create a brand new Page using a template you’ve already created…the opportunities are limitless!

To create a Button, type /button and select the Button option to create a new block. Then create! If you’re adding multiple blocks, I find it helpful to create it outside the Button and drag and drop it in!

Here are some ways I use Buttons in my Notion Dashboard!

I add a “Add Task to To-Do List” Button to any pages that aren’t connected to my main Database. For example, I have this Button on my Garden Planner so I can easily add a task to my To-Do List View of my main Database from the Garden Page!
I have a Create Daily Planner Button on my Dashboard that will create a new Daily Planner schedule.
There’s a “New Week” Button on my Dashboard that creates a new Habit Tracker Database on my Dashboard.
I’m setting up “New Workout” and “New Meal Plan” Buttons for my Dashboard soon!

I know even I’m not using Buttons to their fullest potential and I’m looking forward to maximizing them this year!

Creating an Aesthetic Dashboard Layout for Your Notion Life Planner

Many people are drawn to Notion because it looks so nice. The Notion Aesthetic is real and it’s not as hard to set up as you may think! While you can definitely make your Dashboard beautiful in complicated ways, you can also do so easily with native Notion Features!

Aesthetic Notion Features

Using Notion’s Native features without any fancy Formulas is a great way to get started with creating an Aesthetic Dashboard. Here are my favorites!

Click the “…” in the top left of your Dashboard to change the Font Style, Text Size, and Width of your Dashboard. You can also click “Customize Page” and turn off Top Level Discussions if that’s not a feature you’re using.
Add a Cover Photo to your Pages and Database Pages by hovering above the Page Title and clicking Add Cover Photo. You can add your own photo, link to one, or search Unsplash for stock photos.
Add Icons to your Pages by hovering above the Page Title and clicking “Add Icon”. You can use Emojis, Icons, or create your own custom Icons to use.
Using a divider line by typing - - - into your Dashboard.
Columns! You can create up to 5 columns and adjust their sizes. You can also split columns. For example, I split my Dashboard into 2 columns and adjusted it so my left column is smaller. Then, I divided the larger column into two columns.
Adding Images. You can upload your own, link from a URL, add a GIF, or use Unsplash for stock photos.
Use Headings or Toggle Headings
Change the Font or Block Color by clicking the six dots to the left of the block and selecting Color.
My favorite is a Gallery View! You can change the settings of a Gallery View Database to show the Cover Photo. Add Cover Photos to each Database page and your Gallery View will look so cool.

Widgets

Another way to create an aesthetic Notion Dashboard is through the use of Widgets! Widgets are not Native to Notion but are created to enhance your Dashboard. There are some really cool developers out there, I find most of my Widgets on TikTok though I do use them sparingly. Why?

I think many Widgets are mostly aesthetic and don’t actually serve a true purpose on your Notion Dashboard. And while that’s great and looks really good, I can easily glance at the top of my computer to see the date. Many widgets take up a good chunk of space on your Dashboard and I get easily distracted. If something isn’t near the top, I may forget it exists! So using that space for a Widget doesn’t make sense for me. If it does for you, I’m excited for you! I’m a bit jealous of some of these really sleek-looking Dashboards but know it’s not the most functional for my own brain.

One Widget that is almost never worth the space is the Spotify Widget! It currently only plays a preview of the song and then you need to leave Notion and head to Spotify to get the full playlist. I do use this feature on my Favorite Things lists to share playlist ideas with my community but that’s the only time I find it useful! Once you can finally play an entire playlist from your Notion Dashboard, I will 100% change my tune because I do think that’s very fun and useful!

For more support in creating an aesthetic, functional Notion Dashboard, check out the 31 Day Dashboard Roadmap! It’s full of tutorials, tips, and resources!

This was a long one! I hope you have everything you need to get started building your All in One Notion Planner! It’s easy to get overwhelmed setting up your Notion Dashboard for the first time but I promise if you do a little bit each day, you’ll get it done!