On Being Sick

Being sick is no fun. I am lucky that I don’t get sick all that often. Unfortunately, today is one of those rare times. I woke up in the middle of the night and knew my body was fighting something. My Oura ring data confirmed things in the morning (not that I needed confirmation, though it is somewhat comforting to know the ring is able to pick up on important changes in my biometrics).

My illness is complicated a bit by the fact that I need to spend a good part of tomorrow afternoon and evening flying across the country. Normally that would throw me for an additional mental loop, perhaps worsening my condition. That situation has me leaning in hard to developing a positive mindset. I am lucky I can take today off and just relax. However, I am also actively working in my mind to convince my body that I am healing and that my trip tomorrow will arise without incident. We shall see.

Being under the weather brings up a few other thoughts about mental framing. For me, I can easily get down on myself for not being as ‘productive’ as I should be. I’ve put off grading for most the past couple weeks and I had hoped to get more done today. I am reframing this as a forced pause that was needed. I am hoping that feeling better, along with the start of the new year, will give me a ‘fresh start effect’ as I dive back into teaching.

It is also a reminder that the body must be respected. I’ve been out of my own bed for almost two weeks now. I spent the night in the Charlotte airport recently, and stayed up late seeing Phish in the Big Apple. My diet, being away from home, has also been off kilter. I respect that my body is sending me a message.

Ultimately, illness interrupts the story we tell about ourselves as capable and in control. It demands less striving and more listening, at least for a while. If there’s wisdom here, it’s not in enduring sickness, but in noticing how quickly we forget the gift of feeling well again.

Nano Banana Pro Revisited

Yesterday I wrote about my disappointment with the latest version of Google’s image generator, Nano Banana Pro. I decided to ask Gemini what I was missing and lo and behold, it explained to me what I was doing wrong. I also realized that the best way to make infographics, which I’ll want to do for my students, is to use Notebook LM, not Nano Banana.

Here are a couple of pics I created for my next lessons in AP Gov and APUSH. We are looking at the New Deal and Great Society in AP Gov and Nat Turner’s Rebellion in APUSH.

Pretty cool.

Three Ways I Use Notion

For years, I used Evernote as my digital brain, but now I am a devoted Notion user. I use other tools like the Google Suite and Apple Notes, but my day-to-day life admin happens in Notion. Many people don’t need tools like this, but I find powerful apps like Notion both immensely helpful and, dare I say, fun to use. I thought I’d share a few examples of how I use Notion.

One way I use Notion is for keeping a Daily Note, a productivity idea popularized initially by Roam Research. There are a ton of things I try to do every day, such as meditating, taking my vitamins, reading an entry from The Daily Stoic, and having my daughter share something with me that she is grateful for. For minds like mine, lists are helpful. I use a Daily Note template in Notion that I can reproduce each morning that contains a list of all the things I want to get done every single day. Obviously, as the day goes on I check ‘em off the list. I’m near a computer all day so this isn’t hard. At the end of the day, the Daily Note is a record of what I accomplished. I have other things in the Daily Note as well, including the top three To Dos that are unique to that day. I also have links to other heavily used Notion pages, like my ‘second brain’ note collection or my miscellaneous brainstorms. Notion makes their pages heavily customizable so I have dialed in my Daily Note to suit my personality.

Another way I use Notion is to save all my brainstorms. Like most people, every once in a while I need to do a braindump and get everything out of my head. With Notion I can save all these brainstorms and attach them to my Daily Note and add tags so they are visible in other parts of my Notion. Again, do you need this to be productive? A lot of people would say no; but it definitely helps me.

A third way I use Notion is for keeping trip notes. When I have a trip planned, I open a new trip template (on my Travel page in my Personal Dashboard) and I’m ready to drop in screenshots of hotel and plane reservations, along with my packing lists and other important notes. Having a system helps minimize the damage my natural forgetfulness can do.

There are a ton of other ways I use Notion and I’ll likely share more in the future. There are other apps that do what Notion does, like Capacities and Craft, but Notion continues to work well for me.