How I'm tracking my life with Jira in 2026

Starting this year I'm experimenting using Jira to track my life. Over the last year at work I've gotten used to Jira, especially the swimlanes feature for grouping tickets into different projects.

So far I've created a Jira organization and configured queries to sort tickets into a handful of areas.

Work: High level tasks from work so that I get an idea of how to plan the rest of the tasks (Actual work work would be tracked in the company Jira)

Side Projects: Projects I'm working on such as building my homelab

Writing: Planning, writing and scheduling blog posts, such as this one

Learning: To be read/watched list for technical books, blog posts and conference talks I want to consume

Opensource: Work I'm picking up upstream

Everything else: Laundry, submitting CFPs, anything else I want to track but doesn't fit in any of the above

The goal is not to put deadlines on everything, but to have an idea at all times what I should be doing and how much I've accomplished so far (even if its something small). And I must say I'm liking it so far. Having one place to track everything gives you a feeling of control and makes you feel less overwhelmed even if you have a lot of things going on at the same time.

And yes, it is fun waking up to emails from Jira reminding you that your laundry is due today.