[Looks like I’m posting late again. I’d love to be able to say, “Check for new posts every Saturday morning bright and early at 7 am!” But it’s been hard to stay consistent with how busy school has been. My apologies, and thanks for understanding!]
Introductory note aside, I thought we’d do something a little different today! Usually I stick to blogging about reading books, writing books, admiring bookshelves, discussing the nature of books, watching books (oh wait, I mean movies), et cetera. Basically everything that equals story. With the exception of Subplots & Storylines, Adventure Awaits isn’t really a lifestyle blog.
Buuuut as we all know, life doesn’t fit in boxes. What affects life inadvertently affects writing. When life is prioritized, writing tends to go better. When life is chaos, I struggle to find time to string together even a paragraph, and when I do get time, my brain is too tired to make good use of it.
So, ladies and gentlemen, may I introduce you to…
THE BULLET JOURNAL
Cue fanfare and trumpets!
This day planner/to-do list/calendar has been around for a while, but you may not have heard of it. Worry not, I shall do my best to get you well acquainted.
Before we begin, I’m not promising a miracle cure or easy fix. Bullet journaling may not even be for you. (Keep in mind, I’m the kind of person who LOVES lists, because they let me pin my thoughts down on paper where I can see them, manage them, and conquer them. You may be the exact opposite, which is great too.) But after keeping a bullet journal for the past year, and loving it, I’d like to share my experience. Who knows, it might help you put 2018 in ship-shape order!
what is a bullet journal?
They call it the analog system for the digital age–essentially, it’s whatever you want to make it. A typical bullet journal functions as a day planner combined with a to-do list, with calendars and goals and similar things thrown in. You can actually buy an official bullet journal, or read all about the real thing HERE.
Some people get really fancy and make theirs an art journal as well, with artwork and photos and quotes and washi tape and stickers all over the place. Just look up “bullet journal” on Pinterest or Instagram and you’ll find endless photos of aesthetically gorgeous journals. #jealous
What’s great, though, is that you don’t need anything fancy to get started. A regular old notebook works just as well. Spending hours on pretty art isn’t necessary unless you want to do it. The key to a bullet journal is how you organize it.
Rather than repeat what’s already on the website, I’ll be showing you my own personal methods.
Before we get there, you may be thinking, “But I have my phone’s calendar, notes, and apps to do all of this. Why would I go to the trouble of making a special journal?” If your phone’s tools are working for you, great! I still use all of those things too, because my phone does go with me where my bullet journal does not. What I prefer about bullet journaling, however, is the way everything is in one place. And I find that the physical act of writing makes things easier to remember and more satisfying to check off.
the notebook itself
I first heard about bullet journaling from my pal Lisa (affectionately referred to as Lisa Pickle about 99.3729% of the time) in 2016, and thought it sounded quite fun. So for the last couple months of the year, I experimented in an old notebook, just to see if I liked it and how I wanted to set it up. Then in January 2017, I bought this pretty notebook from Chapters and dove in for real! *is secretly pleased that the cover matches my blog* This notebook is lined, but next year I really want to try a dot-grid notebook!
organization
Like I mentioned before, this is definitely the key to making a bullet journal work for you, and it’s what sets it apart from regular planners.
I drew this legend on the first page to remember what each symbol means, but by now I no longer have to refer to it. Most of these are the official symbols, with one or two I made up for myself.
- (dot) = a task that is yet to be completed (this is what you’d use on a to-do list, for example)
- (x) = once you’ve completed a task, you turn the dot into an x to mark it off
- (>) = to move a task to a different list, scratch a right-facing arrow over the dot to signify that it’s been moved elsewhere in the notebook
- (<) = when you scribble down a task during Monday, let’s say, like “pick up cookies at the bakery” but it’s really a task for next Wednesday, you later draw a left-facing arrow over the dot to signify that you’ve scheduled the task (as in, moved it to Wednesday)
- (a star) = priority task (self-explanatory)
- (open circle) = an event, rather than a task
- (dash) = a note, rather than a task or event
If it sounds complicated, it really isn’t–and you can always simplify these symbols however you like. My migrating and scheduling symbols have kind of merged over the year to just a “>” that tells me an incomplete task was moved to a future list.
On my next page, I have an index or table of contents. Since I didn’t know ahead of time where all my pages would end up, I just filled this in as I went along throughout the year, naming the pages and indicating the page numbers. This makes it easy for me to flip through and find what I’m looking for.
future logs
A future log is a six-month spread (again, set up however you like) that lists the major events and tasks coming up over the next half a year. I love this spread because it gives me a birds-eye view! Pictured below is my July-December future log.
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| (some dates blurred out for privacy) |
You can see that I included birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, exams, important writing deadlines, and miscellaneous things like a wedding and a concert.
monthly spreads
I find this is the most fun to make, but also the most time-consuming! Every month I draw out a fresh calendar, which I fill in with my work schedule, school projects, events, appointments, birthdays, and more. Basically, it’s like zooming in on part of your future log, but in calendar format.
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| (sorry, a wee bit more blurring here too) |
I start by drawing out the calendar with a ruler and pen. Then I list my goals for the month along the right-hand side, turning the dots into x’s once each task is completed. Lately a number of goals haven’t been completed by the end of the month, so they’re forwarded to the next month . . . and then the next month, and the next, until I finally finish them. Heh.
I also enjoy decorating my monthly spreads a little bit. It’s fun to change it up every month with a new color combo.
At the bottom of the spread, I draw a few habit trackers, which I’ll explain in more detail right away.
(Just a note: some people break their monthly spreads down into weekly spreads as well, but for me they’re redundant and take too much time.)
habit trackers
This is another favorite thing of mine! And I sound like a broken record saying this, but habit trackers are yet another thing that are very individual. Some people use them, others don’t. Some people track dozens of habits, others–like me–track just a few.
I chose to track my writing, blogging, reading, and bedtime habits. (Too many habits would’ve been hard to keep track of, and I suspect I would’ve fallen off the wagon if I’d attempted a dozen right away.) Each day that I write, work on blogging, read a book, or go to bed by 10:30 pm, I color in a square. (The bedtime habit has been an epic fail this year! Oops!) I’ve also seen people track exercise, devotions, how much water they drink, chores, and all sorts of things. And I may add one or two new habits next year. But the point is to make habit trackers work for you. They’re meant to motivate you and give you an honest look at how you spend your time.
daily logs
Every night before bed, I write down what I’ve done that day, check my goal progress, and fill in my habit trackers. If there are several things pressing on my mind for the next day, I’ll make a to-do list under that day’s heading. This takes just a couple minutes, and it’s relaxing to put the day to rest on paper.
My daily logs usually take just a few lines, unless I did a lot of varied things throughout the day. I’ll write down things like school times, work shifts, and errands I ran; or the fact that I edited my WIP, read a book, answered blog comments, hung out with family, or went out to eat. I’m not strict with how I list these things.
In this way, I’d say my daily logs are more like a bare bones journal. But some days that have a lot going on turn into more of a to-do list . . . which might be more effective if I carried my bullet journal around with me everywhere I went, but for what I need, using it once or twice at the beginning and end of my day works fine.
By the by, I don’t actually have a superhuman memory when I sit down to write those Subplots & Storylines monthly summaries. I rely hugely on my bullet journal!
Here’s a glimpse at a couple of pretty average daily logs:
As you can see, I mostly use the dashes to indicate notes about what I’ve done. To-do items are x’d out if I finished at the end of the day, or forwarded (>) to a different day if not. I don’t keep a strict amount of lines for each day–I just fill in each one as I go along.
extras
A bullet journal can be more than a planner and to-do list! You can also add less frequently used pages to keep track of anything and everything you want. I kept my extras to a minimum this year. Mainly, I made pages of books I’ve read, movies I’ve watched, future blog post ideas, and a few other topics.
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| (here’s proof that your journal doesn’t have to be perfect–you can see the whiteout in the header. xD) |
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| (whatever you can read here is probably incomprehensible. looks like I was keeping track of tv episodes too) |
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| (spoiler alert!) |
some tips and tricks
- I’m quite pleased that I managed to keep up this new habit of bullet journaling for a whole year! For me, the trick was to keep the notebook and pens/pencils right next to my bed so that it was one of the last things I’d see every day. It reminds to me to write in it every night.
- Track what’s important to you. This applies to the whole concept, not just habit trackers. If all you want to write in your calendars are appointments and big events that you absolutely should not forget, fine. If you want to go into great detail and schedule in little everyday activities, that’s also fine.
- Don’t be afraid to change it up. I did stick to pretty much the same format throughout, but with my experimental journal in 2016, I tried a bunch of things to see what I liked.
- Make it pretty if you like, but don’t feel like you have to.
- Make it functional. You can create top-notch aesthetics, but if your bullet journal isn’t useful in some way, you may as well call it an art journal.
- You do you. Yep, I’ve said it about a hundred times in this post already, but if you’re going to use a bullet journal, set it up in a way that works for you. What’s your schedule like? How much time do you want to spend on this every day? What’s the best time of day to use your bullet journal? What are your primary reasons for using it in the first place?
- Think outside the box! You could borrow the bullet journal format for something that’s not a planner at all–it could be used for a writing journal, a notebook of strictly to-do lists, a collection of ideas, an address book, a homework organizer, whatever!
and that’s it.
Thanks for coming along for the tour! I hope you enjoyed this glimpse into a little tool I use to manage life.