Activist Amira Yahyaoui's structure for supreme organization
Amira Yahyaoui values organization. She's a Tunisian refugee, exiled from her home at 17, who started a globally-renowned nonprofit to fight for government accountability, and now a startup helping students apply for financial aid. Amira needed one place to control her how-do-you-get-all-that-done-in-24-hours life. Notion is her organizational framework.
Insights from
Amira Yahyaoui
Activist & entrepreneur
1
A calendar that's not just dates.
It's a habit tracker.
Amira keeps a calendar in Notion that holds her accountable for all her habits. Before, she'd pingpong between multiple apps and calendars to see if she actually did the habit she hoped to accomplish. Ironically, the back-and-forth took up so much time that it was impossible to get to everything.
Now, she's using a Notion calendar as her personal home base. Each day, she's able to trigger and track all her habits, like workouts and journal entries. This makes it possible for Amira to see all the things that matter to her in one place, know immediately that they got done, and see when they happened.
Amira’s calendar is like a habit tracker for what she wants to accomplish every day.
I love using Notion's calendar because you don't need to build a tracker on top of it. It’s a huge advantage because everything is in one place.
2
Imagine not being stressed when you pack for travel
Amira's activism takes her around the globe. Try packing for dozens of trips per year. Most people get stressed prepping for a weekend getaway.
Amira uses a template in Notion for all the different types of trips she takes. A week in cold weather? She's got a template for that packing list. A couple days on the beach? You bet there's a packing template for that. Even her skincare routine has a Notion template. As a frequent traveler, this practice frees her from the stress of knowing what to bring. She just copies the template, makes sure she has everything, then she's off.
Amira uses templates to make packing a breeze.
Notion lowered a lot of the effort I need to put into organization. It saves the time that goes into the work of being organized.
3
Custom pages to share what matters most
Amira left her home at age 17. Ever since, she's been trying to get her mother to catalog the Tunisian recipes from her youth that she swears she can still taste. Together, they're finally doing it in Notion.
She has one Notion page that acts as her recipe book. Within that page are sub-pages customized for each recipe. They're organized just like a cookbook, with photos, ingredients and instructions for each. And now, Amira and her mother are even bringing more cooks into the kitchen. They created a shareable Notion link to the recipe book, so her aunt can contribute family recipes too.
Amira catalogs recipes from her childhood with her mother.
Notion creates a connection between someone like me, who is a tech nerd, and someone like my mother, who isn't.
