I am a lifelong learner, and I love to take notes. Any type of notes. There is something about recording knowledge that just gets me excited! Note taking is a common practice among high school students, using pen and paper. When I went to college, I began taking digital notes. Being somewhat of a perfectionist, I would write them using LaTeX. It would take twice as long, but I was convinced the end result was always better. As I transitioned into adulthood where formal classes are rare, I pretty much stopped taking notes altogether. Job related tasks did not warrant a cause for notes. It was a different type of learning at work. I would use sticky pads here and there, but I was not convinced I should be taking notes daily. In addition, my strive for perfection dissuaded me from even beginning. Daily tasks and job responsibilities are messy, often ill defined. How could I even begin to capture that in a file?

As I mentioned, I am a lifelong learner, and through a video course I was taking, I discovered Zim Desktop Wiki. I was completely blown away by features offered by Zim; features I did not even know existed. All of a sudden I had this fantastic tool that allowed me to write down all of my thoughts, ideas, and plans in an easy and organized fashion. Zim gave me the space that I did not know I needed. I feel free to write down any idea that I come up with and to dive into as much detail as I please.

Zim’s wide array of features make it a great tool for work, course notes, and my personal goals. I use the daily journal feature to transcribe all work related thoughts and actions, so I can easily look back at any day and know exactly what I did. I have made a habit to record the impacts of my work as well, so I can readily review my accomplishments. For course notes, Zim’s hierarchical structure is by far the best way to keep them clean. I can easily breakup each chapter into sub-chapters and so on, including examples without cluttering the theory. Additionally, Zim has an equation editor and can export pages to LaTeX! I can have my cake and eat it too.

With all that being said, the largest enhancement to my life has been my ability to write down and track my long term goals. Zim empowers me by making it easy to reference, expand upon, and review a single page of my goals. I no longer forget things that I want to work on, and my entire track record is there for me to view. Having a single place to collect my thoughts and ideas has kept me accountable in achieving my goals.

Overall, I am grateful to have found this fantastic tool. It has helped me organize my thoughts, goals, and life. I happily take notes every day, and I even wrote this post in Zim!