Coming out as a (not very good) Planner Girl | One Book July

I absolutely love all things notebooks and paper, as regular readers of this blog already knows. And that love also includes planners and calendars, or what ever you want to call them. And the idea of planning your day out, setting long term goals, picking a focus, working towards the bigger picture… But how do one do that really? How?

Back when I was in school it was easy to fill out my planner with dentist appointments each week and such, but these days it can be more of a struggle… But still, I love the idea of being on top of things. Being my own boss…

I love buying or making new notebooks and calendars. I love the pens, the acronyms, the self-help-books, the planner community online where you get to see gorgeous, decorated spreads of other people’s books all the time (if you want to). I love watching videos on how planner girls set up their traveler’s notebooks, use their functional planners and set goals and so on. Love it!

But thinking about planning and watching how other’s do it is not the same as doing it yourself, right? Nope, it’s a whole other matter entirely. Watching is easy, doing is hard. Finding inspiration is easy, implementing it and using it is difficult, at least to me. It’s always been an ongoing struggle.

I buy a planner, and then stop using it. I create a new cool system, then forget to use it and ditch the idea entirely. And even the years that I’ve used the same system for a long time I’ve always felt like a bad planner girl. I’m just not very good at doing what I set out to do, especially when setting my own deadlines.

Reading about Bullet Journaling

But one thing that was working a long time for me, in some ways, was using the Bullet Journal method. It’s not a specific book but instead a system created to be modified for your specific needs. I think I found out about it from Kim, a long time ago, when she started using it. And since then I’ve been using it too, on and off. I thought of it as a great place for knowing where and how to write down your super long to do-list. But Bullet Journaling is a lot more than that, as I’m discovering as I’m reading through the book about it, that came out last year. It’s called The Bullet Journal Method and it’s written by the originator of the method himself, Ryder Carroll.

If you haven’t heard of the system or want to learn it from the source, go buy the book. I think it’s full of gems, but more on that another day (when I’ve finished reading it).

I actually got it for Christmas last year, but I’m really reading it this week for the first time. I was inspired by a video on YouTube, as well as the YouTube summer challenge called One Book July, which has been going for six years now. It’s about downsizing in some way, and trying to use just one book for all your lists, planning and thoughts. I’ve never felt inclined to join before, but this year their focus is the Bullet Journal method and reading the book together, which sounded good to me.

I jumped in!

One book July on YouTube

I decided to join this YouTube challenge by reading the first couple of chapters, taking notes on it and then re-starting my own Bullet Journaling practice in a notebook I’d already bought. It has a pink cover, dot grid papers and numbered pages, so it’s perfect for this kind of journaling.

I’ll write more about the method and my takes on it another time, but to share my enthusiasm, here’s the video I filmed about it:

Now please send your good thoughts for me to keep bullet journaling (and reflecting each day) in my new journal, at least for the month, to see where it leads me. Right now, three days in, it feels fantastic although I’m a bit afraid to be too enthusiastic about it in case I fall of the bandwagon again, as they say. It’s happened before, hehe. And the first quote I lettered on my Quote collection page that I set up, was this, so who knows if that is pre-determining my success…

Mentioned a few videos and things in the video, that I wanted to link you to, for easy access. Here they are:

• Rho?s BuJo Set Up – Rhomany’s video that inspired me to join this year’s One Book July challenge and read the book (although I watched her 3 hour long live first)
• The Bullet Journal Method – Track the Past, Order the Present, Design the Future by Ryder Carroll – buy the book!
• The Bullet Journal Site – the analog method for the digital age (great information for newbies)
• One Book July – on YouTube, a planner and journaling challenge with a lot of videos to watch (no videos, but plenty of playlists to bookmark)
• New Year Bullet Journal Spread Ideas 2019 – by Amanda RachLee that I mention in the video (she makes pretty-pretty pages in her BuJo)

I’m sure I forgot to link or mention something, but as always, feel free to ask questions and I’ll try to get back to you as soon as I can.

xoxo
/iHanna in Sweden, the not very good at planning girl that wants to be a great planner girl

Sign up for the Studio iHanna Newsletter here

Books on art, crafts & creativity

Stitch with love online workshop with iHanna