Why I’m ditching Obsidian as a task manager

On By Elizabeth TaiIn Essays
  1. When Obsidian stopped working for me as a task manager
  2. There are a few problems with this system, at least, for me
    1. I have to add tasks to more than a dozen project notes
    2. I have to schedule my tasks
    3. I needed mobile access after all
    4. I do not get good visibility of my tasks
    5. I needed more functionality to my task system
    6. I spend far too much time organising my tasks rather than doing them
    7. I’m no longer taking notes of what I’m learning!
  3. What’s next

When Obsidian stopped working for me as a task manager

For most of this year, I’ve been using Obsidian as a task manager. It’s been working swimmingly for me. I liked how everything is in one place – my project notes, what I learned at work, and my tasks.

Until it stopped working for me. A couple of weeks ago, I realise that I’m still overwhelmed despite using the system.

Initially, I found myself avoiding weekly reviews more and more, which is a bad idea as they are crucial to keep me sane during the working week. Back in the days when I was literally managing the content of a global company, it would’ve been suicide to skip a weekly review. It isn’t suicide now as a tech writer, but it will make me foggy and put me in firefighting mode the whole week if I skip it.

But yet, I find myself avoiding the task over and over again. So I set out to find out why.

In the end, I realised that it fundamentally came down to the system I’ve set up in Obsidian. My system is explained in the video below.

Basically, my tasks “lives” in individual project notes. Then, using the Tasks plug-in, I embed it in my Daily Notes template so that I get to see what I have to do each day.

There are a few problems with this system, at least, for me

I have to add tasks to more than a dozen project notes

It makes my workflow less seamless than I’d like.

I have to schedule my tasks

Tasks is set up in a way where I need to put in a date to ensure it appears in my daily notes. The problem with this approach is I often do not know, week by week, when I can do a certain task. While I can roughly say I’d like to do a task in a particular week, I can’t say the same for a particular day. I find myself rescheduling a task over and over again, and looking at the ever-expanding list of Overdue tasks makes my brain sad.

I needed mobile access after all

I have jury rigged a way to access my Obsidian vault without using its Sync features, so I can actually open, edit my notes on my mobile. However, it isn’t easy to do the same with my tasks. So a lot of times, I can only access my tasks during working hours. As a result, I find myself ignoring and forgetting to do my personal tasks, which I often action after working hours.

I do not get good visibility of my tasks

As most of my tasks are nestled in Project Notes or my Someday/Maybe project notes, I don’t have a bird’s eye view of what tasks I have in entirety … unless I open all the project notes.

I needed more functionality to my task system

I actually do have a page that lists all the tasks that I have on my plate, include the someday/maybe ones. But that’s yet another document to add to my weekly review. I suppose I could use the Dataview plug-in to get more functionality, but I’m reluctant to add more complexity to my Obsidian vault. Unlike some, I’m not a fan of adding a bazzilion plug-ins to make Obsidian more feature rich. To which I come to this point:

I spend far too much time organising my tasks rather than doing them

I have to open, review and edit a dozen project notes a week. No wonder I dread doing my weekly reviews! Imagine having to pore over that amount of documentation or information just to figure out what I need to do next week!

There’s also one more reason why I think it’s a bad idea (at least for me) to turn make Obsidian my task manager.

I’m no longer taking notes of what I’m learning!

I get a little stab of anxiety each time I open Obsidian these days. Where what used to be a delight, a little library of my thoughts and ideas, is now a reminder that YOU HAVE SO MANY TASKS PENDING, DON’T YOU KNOW?

Maybe, just maybe, Obsidian should just do what it’s best at: As a note-taking app.

What’s next

I think I know what’s the true source of my anxiety when it comes to my system. I came across an interesting video by Carl Pullein about how organizing tasks into project folders (like how I’m doing it) is a recipe for overwhelm. Instead, he recommends a “time sector” method.

It made me go – aha! That’s how I’d prefer to organize my work. Since my work is often fluid, and priorities change day by day, I’d like a system where I can “see” what I need to do in any week. I found Pullein’s system fascinating.

Sure, I could replicate this system in Obsidian, but you know what? I don’t want to do the legwork and like I said, I don’t want to add more complexity to my vault. And what if there comes a day when the plug-in suddenly stops working? The thought of having to fix a system held up by a web of plug-ins is not appealing to me. What if I just use a ready-made platform?

So, I’m moving my tasks to Todoist, but still keeping notes via my project notes. I may use an Obsidian-Todoist plug-in to embed Todoist tasks on my Daily Notes, but that’s something I’ll look into in the future.

Just a few minutes of adding my tasks into Todoist, I felt a kind of peace. I’m not sure if it’s the novelty of a new thing talking, or whether I’m finally seeing the “layout of the land” when it comes to the tasks I have on my plate.

However, I’m not sure how to integrate my work’s Jira project management system with Todoist, and I’ve not found an easy way to compartmentalize my tasks the way Pullein does it in Jira.

I just hope the context switching won’t make my workflow more challenging than it already is! Stay tuned for the results of the experiment!

48 thoughts on “Why I’m ditching Obsidian as a task manager”

  9. Cecilia Mjausson Huster: @liztai Thanks for sharing. I’ve used a paper planner for a while but it fell by the wayside a few weeks ago. Mostly because I would plan out my tasks on the weekend & by Tuesday my priorities would have shifted. My notes are in Joplin. Joplin is a bit janky compared to Evernote. 😕My tasks are on a piece of paper and in my head. 😱 What I really want is a system with arbitrarily deep to-do items. Add the ability to link to and from my notes and I would be a lot less overwhelmed, I think. via mastodon.design

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  17. frederick :a_thisisfine:: @liztai – I feel this! Thanks for sharing your thoughts on it. I’ve been keeping my tasks in a different app lately and using the outliner plugin to copy over for the big to-dos on my daily note when working on larger projects. Doesn’t take much time and helps with that in my face visual aid when I really need it there. While I love having all my notes, projects, and journals accessible through obsidian, I don’t need it to be my onestop shop. Even though I truly love it so much 😅 via mas.to

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  26. Evan Light: @liztai Decision fatigue makes the TODO decisions harder? For sure.Tracking projects within project docs? This came naturally to me after seeing the fragmentation of knowledge with various workplaces.As a result, a few months ago, I increasingly found myself moving toward something like this Time Sector. However, this is a logical extrapolation! Wonderful not to have to iterate myself to get there!Thank you for sharing! via tenforward.social

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  46. Scott Killen 🇺🇸: @liztai In my case, in #Obsidian, I use the #tasks plugin. I built a “Tasks Dashboard” note containing a query to round up all my tasks in one place. That note is pinned as a panel to my right sidebar, so I always have a place to see all my unfinished tasks prioritized in relation to each other.https://gist.githubusercontent.com/ScottKillen/857d7572b3a0f39064c89afe17dca967/raw/f4ed5c02617da0767bc87ebc142ed0ea258b670c/Dashboard%2520-%2520Tasks.md
    obsidian
    tasks via ttocs.io

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