/daily

name: daily
description: Create daily notes and manage morning, midday, and evening routines. Structure daily planning, task review, and end-of-day reflection. Use for daily productivity routines or when asked to create today's note.
allowed-tools: Read, Write, Edit, Glob, Grep, TaskCreate, TaskUpdate, TaskList, TaskGet
user-invocable: true

Daily Workflow Skill

Creates daily notes and provides structured workflows for morning planning, midday check-ins, and evening shutdowns.

Usage

Invoke with `/daily` or ask Claude to create today's note or help with daily routines.

Create Today's Note

/daily

Or simply ask:

• "Create today's daily note"
• "Start my morning routine"
• "Help me with evening shutdown"

Daily Note Creation

What Happens

1. **Checks if today's note exists**

• If yes: Opens the existing note
• If no: Creates new note from template

2. **Template Processing**

• Replaces `{{date}}` with today's date
• Replaces `{{date:format}}` with formatted dates
• Handles date arithmetic (e.g., `{{date-1}}` for yesterday)

3. **Automatic Organization**

• Places note in `Daily Notes/` folder
• Names file with today's date (YYYY-MM-DD.md)
• Preserves template structure

Template Variables

Your daily template can use:

• `{{date}}` - Today's date in default format
• `{{date:dddd}}` - Day name (e.g., Monday)
• `{{date:MMMM DD, YYYY}}` - Formatted date
• `{{date-1:YYYY-MM-DD}}` - Yesterday's date
• `{{date+1:YYYY-MM-DD}}` - Tomorrow's date
• `{{time}}` - Current time

Morning Routine (5-10 minutes)

Automated Steps

1. Create today's daily note (if not exists) 2. Pull incomplete tasks from yesterday 3. Read this week's ONE Big Thing from `Goals/3. Weekly Review.md` 4. Surface active project next-actions from `Projects/*/CLAUDE.md` 5. Review weekly goals for today's priority

Cascade Context Surfacing

Before interactive prompts, automatically surface:

• **ONE Big Thing** from most recent weekly review
• **Active project next-actions** from `Projects/*/CLAUDE.md` (read "Next Actions" section)
• **Monthly priority** from `Goals/2. Monthly Goals.md`

Display as a brief context block at the top of the morning routine:

### Today's Context
- **Week's ONE Big Thing:** [from weekly review]
- **Active Projects:** [project names with first next-action each]
- **Monthly Focus:** [from monthly goals]

Interactive Prompts

• "What's your ONE thing for today?"
• "What might get in the way?"
• "How do you want to feel at end of day?"

Task Creation Guidance

When adding tasks to the daily note, recommend linking to goals/projects:

- [ ] Draft API spec — Supports: [[Projects/MyApp]]
- [ ] Review chapter 3 — Supports: [[1. Yearly Goals#Read 12 books]]

Morning Checklist

• [ ] Daily note created
• [ ] Cascade context reviewed (ONE Big Thing, projects, monthly focus)
• [ ] Yesterday's incomplete tasks reviewed
• [ ] ONE priority identified
• [ ] Time blocks set
• [ ] Potential obstacles identified

Midday Check-in (2-3 minutes)

Quick Review

1. Check morning task completion 2. Compare actual vs planned time use 3. Assess energy level 4. Identify afternoon priorities

Adjustments

• Reschedule incomplete morning tasks
• Add urgent items that emerged
• Reorder by current energy level
• Note any blockers

Midday Questions

• "How's your energy right now?"
• "What's the most important thing for this afternoon?"
• "What can you let go of today?"

Evening Shutdown (5 minutes)

Capture

1. Mark completed tasks with [x] 2. Add notes and learnings 3. Log energy levels (1-10) 4. Record gratitude items

Goal & Project Attention Summary

Automatically generate an end-of-day summary showing which goals and projects received attention:

### Today's Cascade Impact
- **Goals touched:** [[Goal 1]] (2 tasks), [[Goal 3]] (1 task)
- **Projects advanced:** [[ProjectA]] (3 tasks), [[ProjectB]] (1 task)
- **Unlinked tasks:** 2 (consider linking to a goal or project)

Reflect

• What went well today?
• What could be better?
• What did I learn?
• What am I grateful for?

Prepare

1. Identify tomorrow's priority (preview) 2. Move incomplete tasks to tomorrow or delete 3. Commit changes to git (`/push`)

Shutdown Checklist

• [ ] All tasks updated (done/moved/deleted)
• [ ] Reflection completed
• [ ] Tomorrow's priority identified
• [ ] Changes committed

Daily Note Structure

Standard daily note template:

# {{date}}

## Focus
> What's the ONE thing that would make today successful?

## Time Blocks
- Morning (9-12):
- Afternoon (12-5):
- Evening (5+):

## Tasks
### Must Do Today
- [ ]

### Work
- [ ]

### Personal
- [ ]

## Notes
[Capture thoughts, meeting notes, ideas]

## Reflection
- **Wins:**
- **Challenges:**
- **Learned:**
- **Grateful for:**
- **Energy:** /10
- **Tomorrow's priority:**

Time Block Strategies

Energy-Based

• High energy tasks in morning
• Administrative work after lunch
• Creative work when naturally alert

Context-Based

• Batch similar tasks together
• Minimize context switching
• Protect deep work blocks

Configuration

Customize paths to match your vault:

• Daily notes folder: `Daily Notes/`
• Template location: `Templates/Daily Template.md`
• Date format: `YYYY-MM-DD`

Different Date Formats

• `YYYY-MM-DD` - Standard ISO format (recommended)
• `MM-DD-YYYY` - US format
• `DD-MM-YYYY` - European format
• `YYYY-MM-DD-ddd` - Include day abbreviation

Folder Organization by Month

Organize daily notes by month/year:

Daily Notes/2024/01/2024-01-15.md

Task-Based Progress Tracking

The daily skill uses session tasks to show progress during multi-step routines.

Morning Routine Tasks

Create tasks at skill start:

TaskCreate:
  subject: "Create daily note"
  description: "Create or open today's daily note from template"
  activeForm: "Creating daily note..."

TaskCreate:
  subject: "Pull incomplete tasks"