The Analog Toolkit of a Working Engineer
Every day I sit at a computer, run engineering models, field calls from clients, and cycle through tabs — email, calendar, task manager, back to the model, repeat. Technology is my job. It’s also, increasingly, the thing making my job harder.
When Everything Lives in One Place, Nothing Gets Done
The promise of digital tools is consolidation: one device, one screen, everything in reach. In practice, that consolidation became a trap. While a model was running, I’d check email. While reviewing calculations, I’d glance at my calendar. I was always doing the work and thinking about the next thing at the same time. That kind of context-switching doesn’t just cost time — it erodes the quality of whatever you’re actually trying to do.
Analog tools don’t fix this by replacing technology. They fix it by offloading specific cognitive jobs to objects that can’t tempt you with notifications. The goal isn’t to go off-grid. It’s to give your brain fewer things to juggle.
The Ritual That Starts the Day
My first analog tool isn’t a notebook — it’s coffee. I grew up in Colombia, surrounded by it, and the act of making a cup has become a ritual that signals to my brain: deep work is starting now. The specific coffee matters too. It’s from my family’s farm, and that story makes the habit stick.
Paired with the coffee is a Time Timer. If you haven’t seen one, it’s a circular analog clock where you can set a duration and watch the colored disc shrink as time passes. There’s no number to read, no calculation to make — you just see how much time is left.
For someone who deals with ADHD and time blindness, this thing is a genuine tool, not a novelty. If I have 20 minutes before a meeting, I set it, put it on my desk, and stop thinking about the clock entirely. When it goes off, I move. No more compulsive tab-switching to check the time. No more anxiety about whether I’ll miss the meeting. The timer holds that mental space so I don’t have to.
Reading, Capturing, and Actually Keeping What You Learn
I’ve started reading more physical books, and the difference in retention is hard to explain until you experience it. Part of it is the tactile feedback — feeling the pages, watching the bookmark migrate toward the back cover. Progress you can see changes how you engage with the material.
My reading practice pairs the book with two pocket notebooks. The first is a quote journal: anything that strikes me gets written down with a book title and page number for reference. The second is where the thinking happens. After a few weeks, I come back to those quotes, pick the ones still resonating, and write a short reflection on how the idea is landing in my actual life. It’s a slow process. It’s also the only system that’s actually made reading stick in a meaningful way.
For travel, I use a Kindle Paperwhite — not fully analog, but close enough. It keeps me off my phone, it fits in a pocket, and it means I’m never without something worth reading. I’ll take it.
The constant across all of this is a pocket notebook system built around a Paper Republic Grand Voyager cover. Inside I keep three notebooks: a master index that tracks everything I’ve captured across all my notebooks, a catch-all for daily notes, sketches, and whatever needs to exist on paper right now, and a collections notebook for ongoing reference lists — books to read, stationery to try, recurring routines, household maintenance. The catch-all gets replaced every week or two. The collections notebook stays.
My pen of choice lately is the Pilot Vanishing Point — a fountain pen with a retractable nib. For someone grabbing it between tasks or on a walk, the fact that it clicks open instead of uncapping is genuinely meaningful. One click and you’re writing.
Progress You Can See, Presence You Can Feel
Here’s what I didn’t expect when I started leaning on analog tools: the motivation that comes from visible progress. A stack of filled notebooks represents years of thinking. A time timer visually shrinks. A physical book shows you, page by page, how far you’ve come. Digital equivalents exist, but they don’t hit the same way. A folder of notes feels like a chore. A shelf of journals feels like a life.
For me, the deeper shift was this: when I stopped managing everything through the same device I use to do my work, I became more present during both. The engineering work gets my full attention. The walks, the reading, the coffee ritual — those get my full attention too.
The analog toolkit isn’t about doing more or accumulating gear. It’s about finding the specific places where your current system is quietly breaking, and replacing those pieces with something simpler.
So here’s the challenge: the next time you go for a walk, leave your phone behind and bring a notebook and a pen instead. Any notebook. Any pen. If something comes to mind, write it down. That’s it. It’s a small thing, and it might be the one that changes how you think about the rest.
What analog tools have made it into your daily carry? I’d love to hear what’s working — drop it in the comments.