What’s in your toolkit? 9 tools to make your life easier

We’ve all got 99 problems, right? Here are some fixes for nine of the big ones.

Time management
Problem: You’ve got stuff to do, but you just can’t stop procrastibaking (it’s a word!), fiddling around online, or otherwise making terrible use of your time.

Tool: A website blocker like SelfControl will stop you wasting the day on the Daily Mail website on websites that aren’t related to work or study, while time tracking apps like Hours provide a visual report of what you’ve been doing, and for how long. Or you could get some actual self-control, but where’s the fun in that?

Overspending
Problem: You and your credit card are way too friendly, and your card balance is starting to make your eyes water.

Solution: Cold hard cash. Get thee to an ATM and get enough money out to last you a week. Remove your bank and credit cards from your wallet (leave them somewhere safe at home). The temptation to buy everything at Haigh’s dissipates pretty quickly when you’ve only got $20 in your wallet. 

Life admin
Problem: Paying bills, booking flights and responding to random emails – life admin is the worst.  

Solution: Make a dynamic to-do list using a tool like Evernote, stick a reminder in your calendar, or outsource your problems to a virtual personal assistant (no, really). 

Forgetting stuff
Problem: If you’re anything like me, you’ve probably forgotten to collect your child from daycare a fair few important things in your time.  

Solution: Or, just let it go – new research shows that forgetting stuff can make you smarter, so celebrate your brain instead.  

Losing stuff
Problem: Life is one long search for your keys, phone and sunglasses.

Solution: A bluetooth tracker like Tile. About the size of a 5c coin, you can attach these trackers to your essential items, and then use your phone to call them. If they’re really lost, GPS functionality can show you their last known location.

Too many emails
Problem: Your workplace has a reply-all culture, you receive too many unsolicited emails, or you just can’t seem to get on top of your inbox.

Solution: Thankfully, there are a few good ways to get your emails under control, depending on your mail client. Subscribe from unwanted or no-longer-relevant newsletters, use flags to categorise Outlook emails, file or delete emails after reading, or set up rules to filter Gmail content. 

Dying phone battery
Problem: Too much Facebook stalking, not enough phone battery – but you’re out and about and have nowhere to plug your phone in.

Solution: A portable charger that you can use on the go. You can also get into good battery-saving practices, like dimming your phone screen, limiting the number of apps in use at any one time, and changing your settings so your screen doesn’t light up every time you get a notification.

Trouble sleeping
Problem: You’re in bed, staring at the ceiling.

Solution: Improve your ‘sleep hygiene’ by switching off devices at least an hour before you go to sleep. Create a bedtime routine, drink something soothing (like chamomile tea), update your mattress and pillows and recreate your bedroom to be a truly relaxing space. Breaking a sweat every day can help too – just don’t do it too close to bedtime.

Stagnating
Problem: You’re old and stuck in your ways. Life is a bit same-samey, and you spend too much time parked in front of the TV, bingeing on shows you don’t really care about.

Tool: A short course from UTS Open to reinvigorate your brain. Whether it’s blockchain or systems thinking, copyright for human rights, genomics or even problem solving (so you don’t have read articles like this anymore!) UTS Open has something for you.

Looking to solve more of your life’s problems? Discover tools, processes and methodologies with a free online short course from UTS Open.