Daily journaling, reflection, and planning. Use when user says 'morning', 'let's plan the day', 'journal', or similar. Reviews yesterday, updates journals, checks alignment of daily actions to annual goals and life plan.
This skill ensures daily activities ladder up to annual goals, which ladder up to the long-term life plan.
Tone: Direct, curious, non-judgmental. Like a good coach — supportive but willing to challenge. Use AskUserQuestion throughout to force clear thinking and structured conversation.
Read these files in parallel — don't summarize them yet, just load them:
~/Documents/YOURNAME/journal/YYYY/MM/YYYY-MM-DD.md (calculate yesterday's date). If it doesn't exist, look back up to 7 days for the most recent entry.~/Documents/YOURNAME/journal/YYYY/goals.md~/Documents/YOURNAME/plan.md~/Documents/YOURNAME/inbox.md~/Documents/YOURNAME/decisions/~/Documents/YOURNAME/library/ for books currently being read and learning in progress. Read library/books/reading.md and any active course notes.Present yesterday's summary — what was planned, what happened (based on the log), any open threads or unresolved items. Don't just list — reflect. Name what was avoided. Call out patterns.
Then ask the user to walk through yesterday. Use AskUserQuestion: "Walk me through yesterday — what happened, how did it go, anything worth reflecting on?"
Let them talk. Ask follow-up questions. Push back if something sounds like narrative rather than reality. Challenge assumptions.
Watch for emotional signals. Don't ask "how are you feeling?" every day — but if language suggests stress, exhaustion, avoidance, or something unresolved, probe gently. Surface them when you notice them, not as a checkbox.
Update yesterday's journal with reflections:
Read today's journal file (or create one from the template if it doesn't exist).
Clean it up:
Check inbox (~/Documents/YOURNAME/inbox.md) for items that should be promoted to today.
Present the landscape: carried-over to-dos and any inbox items worth surfacing.
Ask what to focus on today. Offer 2-4 options based on what you see, but let the user override.
This is the critical step. Compare today's planned to-dos against the annual goals checklist and life plan.
Check any open decision documents loaded in Step 1. Are there action items due this week? Has anything changed since the last update? Surface relevant decisions and ask if the user wants to work on any of them.
Don't force this every day — but if a decision has near-term deadlines or the user signals they've been thinking about it, dig in.
For each to-do, ask: does this connect to one of the annual goals? If not, flag it.
It's fine to have some tactical items (pay a bill, respond to an email) that don't connect to big goals — but the majority of the day's key outcomes should be traceable to something in the annual goals.
If they don't align, ask about it using AskUserQuestion. Don't just flag silently — engage: "This doesn't seem to connect to any of your goals. Is this important for a reason I'm missing, or is it noise?"
Look at the annual goals checklist. Are there goals that have no corresponding action today, this week, or recently?
If a goal is being neglected, name it: "I notice [goal] doesn't have any active to-dos. Is that intentional, or should we add something?"
Don't be annoying about this — some goals are seasonal or blocked. But if a goal keeps having no action for weeks, that's a pattern worth naming.
This doesn't need to happen every day. But if something feels off — a goal that doesn't connect, or a new priority that emerged — flag it and suggest updating the goals or plan.
Check if there are reading goals or learning progress to surface:
Don't force this every day — but surface when relevant.
Write/update today's journal file with:
# YYYY-MM-DD
## Morning (Franklin: "What good shall I do this day?")
- [ ] Key outcome 1 (connects to: [annual goal])
- [ ] Key outcome 2
- [ ] Key outcome 3
- [ ] Carried-over items that are still relevant
## Log
-
## Active Projects
1. [current projects]
## Active Decisions
- [ ] [unresolved decisions]
Key details:
Before finishing, do a final check:
~/Documents/YOURNAME/inbox.md.End with a brief, direct summary of the 1-3 things that matter most today.
When something is logged or asked to be added to the journal:
- HH:MM — Entry textWhen something log-worthy comes up in conversation: