I have been playing around with the idea of bullet journaling for a few years. Last year, I finally ditched my usual planner, and committed to setting up a journal according to the process established by the bullet journal creator, Ryder Carroll. I am so glad that I did. It has been the organizational system I’ve been looking for, because it is a system that you, yourself, design.
Traditional planners with pre-designed pages were always too constraining. Though they offered structure and consistency, I often would give up on them for long periods of time. Some weeks, I needed a ton of pages to write out my ideas, thoughts, to-do lists. Other weeks, I didn’t. This meant that pages would be wasted, and I’d search through to find extra pages when I needed them, ignoring the pre-drawn lines and graphics.
A blank journal, on the other hand, wasn’t constraining enough. I have always had journals, all my life, but they were a hodgepodge of inconsistent entries that I usually never referred back to. I could never find things I wrote when I needed them, it was hard to be organized. The journal was great, however, when I needed a lot of space to get my ideas out or work through a thought or design.
I never knew that a happy medium between a planner and a journal could exist, until I discovered bullet journaling.
The beauty of the bullet journal is the combination of the system, which provides structure, and the blank journal, which provides adaptability and freedom. With the bullet journal, you create future planning pages at the beginning of the journal. This is a place to jot down important dates, future appointments, reminders, goals, and any other information you need to refer to for future endeavors. Then, you create your pages, month by month, week by week, and day by day. You move tasks forward if you don’t complete them, or strike them out if you admit to yourself you no longer plan to accomplish them. You can take up as much or as little space as you need as you move through the year.
Making your own planner as you go sounds like a lot of work, and in the beginning, it can be. You have to learn what works for you. There is a simple, basic system established by the bullet journal creators, but there are so many other ways to organize your thoughts. There are entire websites and YouTube channels dedicated to innovative designs for bullet journaling. I have spent a lot of time considering the different options presented. I think it was time well-spent, because I did finally arrive at a system that works well for me.
Once you have your structure in place, creating the pages is easy. I keep mine very simple, which helps me stay consistent. Sometimes I’ll use a color or a marker, but mostly I just use a black pen. I use metallic washi tape to indicate when I am starting a new month in my journal so that I can easily see the months. You can also record related pages in the legend at the front of the journal (though I’ve found I haven’t kept up with this yet… maybe someday!)
Because that’s the thing, as you change, your journal changes with you. You’re never stuck with one structure or system. When you need something different, do something different. I am so happy that I now have one, organized place to keep all of my goals, thoughts, ideas, inspirations, and schedule information. And I look forward to growing and refining my process as I learn more.
design + surrender 