HOW TO WRITE — The Full Workflow

🔁 The System at a Glance

Idea pops → add to writing-backlog/ → open Writing Prompts.base → pick one → write → publish

That’s it. No friction. No context switching.

1. Capture a new idea (30 seconds)

When something pops in your head:

  1. Open Obsidian → go to writing-backlog/ folder
  2. Create a new note — name it something short (this won’t be the URL, just for you)
  3. Add this at the top:
---
title: Your idea title here
status: seed
effort: "🟢 Quick (under 10 min)"
tags: [writing-idea]
---

Effort guide:

  • 🟢 Quick (under 10 min) — Raw opinion, short story, reaction
  • 🟡 Medium (10–30 min) — Needs some structure or screenshots
  • 🔴 Deep (30+ min) — Research, data, multiple angles
  1. Dump 2–3 bullet points of what you’d say. Even messy. Even incomplete.
  2. Done. Close it.

2. See your ideas (the dashboard)

Open Writing Prompts.base from the file explorer.

You get three views:

  • 📋 All Ideas — full table, grouped by status
  • 🟢 Quick Wins — only posts you can finish in one sitting
  • ✍️ Ready to Write — ideas that are outlined and ready to go

When you have 10 minutes → open “🟢 Quick Wins” and pick one.
When you have an hour → open “✍️ Ready to Write.”

3. Promote an idea to a real post

When you’re ready to actually write something:

  1. Create a new folder in content/writing/your-post-slug/
  2. Create index.md inside it
  3. Use Ctrl/Cmd+P → “Templates: Insert template” → new-post to insert the frontmatter
  4. Start writing below the ---
  5. In the backlog note for this idea, change status: seed → status: drafting

4. Publish

When done writing:

  1. Change draft: true → draft: false in the index.md frontmatter
  2. In the backlog note, change status: drafting → status: published
  3. Press Ctrl+P → “Git: Commit and push” (or wait 10 min for auto-push)
  4. Vercel builds in ~60 seconds. Done.

Status values (what to put in frontmatter)

StatusMeaning
seedJust the idea, maybe a bullet or two
outlinedYou know what you want to say, rough structure exists
draftingActively writing in content/writing/
publishedLive on the site

URLs your posts will have

  • Homepage: naveenkumarv.com/personal/
  • A post: naveenkumarv.com/personal/writing/your-post-title/
  • Impossible list: naveenkumarv.com/personal/impossible-list/

Setting up the Templates plugin (one-time, if not done)

  1. Obsidian → Settings → Core plugins → make sure Templates is ON
  2. Settings → Templates → set Template folder location to _templates
  3. Done. Now Ctrl/Cmd+P → Insert template → new-post works anywhere.

Setting up Obsidian Git (one-time, if not done)

  1. Obsidian → Settings → Community plugins → Browse → “Obsidian Git” → Install → Enable
  2. Settings → Obsidian Git:
    • Auto commit-and-sync interval: 10 (minutes)
    • Enable “Auto push”
    • Enable “Pull updates on startup”
  3. Now writing auto-publishes every 10 min — or manually with Ctrl+P → Git: Commit and push.