Back to My Bullet Journal

by Kim Werker | Mar 8, 2016 | Living Creatively | 19 comments

I started my first Bullet Journal two years ago, and it (finally) made me into a notebook-keeper. Which is good, because, being a writer, I was starting to feel like I was doing something wrong in my inability to stick with a notebook habit.

Like with many systems, though, I suppose I got a little antsy, or bored, and when the Get to Work Book came out last year, I thought that maybe its more structured design would enable me to be more structured, while still being flexible enough to accommodate some simple bullet journaling. So I ordered one and fell in love with it.

But the GTWB is big. Quite big. It’s not as easy to tote around as a plain-old notebook. So after a while I started looking around some more, and discovered the Hibonichi planner. Which is small. And lovely. With surprisingly solid, very thin paper my fountain pen wouldn’t bleed through.

And though I enjoyed adapting to the Hibonichi, and it’s just so fabulous, after a disappointingly short time I found myself longing for the less rigid structure of a plain-old notebook Bullet Journal again. The grass is always greener, people. The grass is always greener.

I wanted to be able to take notes wherever I wanted, and have a day’s to-do list be any length it needed to be. I wanted a notebook without much structure that I could just tote around everywhere, to hold all the thoughts, tasks, and notes I need to capture.

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So I plucked a brand new notebook from my shelf (which I’d purchased right before the GTWB launched), and took a few minutes to set up a new Bullet Journal. And I felt like I had come home.

Now. In the years since I first came upon this delightfully simple system, bloggers have gone nuts showing off their own journals. I love me some journal eye candy. I love it so much.

But I do not produce an eye-candy journal. No, I most certainly do not. I do not colour-code. I do not adorn. I do not apply fancy hand-lettering to headings and titles. I don’t even try to keep my handwriting in check.

So I thought, though I’ve only been back at it for a week, that I’d show you a few spreads from my new BuJo (that’s what the kids call it these days).

Up at the top of the post is something new I’m trying out this time around: a Calendex; it’s like the love child of an index and a yearly calendar. As you can see, I haven’t actually used it yet. But I do have some things coming up later in the year, so I anticipate I’ll end up using it. Even if I don’t, it sure is pretty. And it’s the first time I took a ruler to my journal. Fancy.

Month & Day Spread

Above is the spread with my February task list on the left, and some daily to-do lists on the right. I didn’t keep a monthly task list in my last journal, but I think I’ll stick with it in this one. It felt pretty good to mark all the February tasks as completed at the end of the month, and it helped to see them all in one place.

For daily to-dos, well. This is why I fell in love with this system in the first place (this, and the whole index idea). It’s second nature to me to make lists this way now (not that it’s terribly different from any other kind of to-do list.) I’ve also added a daily tracker bit in the top-right corner of each day’s list. I’m using this to keep up with exercising and my daily art/craft making habit. In the past, I’ve kept track of my daily making on a dedicated spread, but I’ve come to accept that I don’t end up using dedicated spreads very much, but I do use a daily list. So this is my solution.

(Yes, I totally did end up scoring a pair of Paul Simon tickets on the 24th. Thirteenth Row, Centre. Holy smokes.)

Day & Notes Spread

Heh. So, yeah, I turned the page and totally didn’t do the daily tracking thing on the next few days. I’m back to it now, though.

What I really want to highlight here is that my journal is not tidy. There’s loads of Bullet Journal pr0n around, you guys, and I gotta say it all strikes me as pretty fictional. You can keep a meticulous journal if you write things down after the fact, but there’s just no way that a work-in-progress can be perfect. It’s fiction. So here’s my reality.

On the left, you can see some messy notes. On the right, you can see some very rough notes I started making in pencil, because I knew I’d have to erase things and really mess around.

You might notice that these photos do not feature my beloved fountain pen. I discovered many years ago that two things allow me to keep my handwriting legible: small ruled lines or grids (I was a college-rule student all the way; no wide-ruled paper for me!), and a pen that allows for some friction. In fact, the only time I’m truly happy with my handwriting is when I write in pencil. The friction is ace.

Fountain pens are lovely to write with, and I certainly haven’t given mine up, but they’re just so smooth! Too smooth. I’ve taken to using a Micron pen in this journal, and it’s for sure the right choice.

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Do you keep a Bullet Journal? What are your favourite modules and hacks? And is your journal super neat and tidy, or more of a mess like mine?

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Lindsey

Once again I must thank you for bringing Bullet Journal to my attention two (!!) years ago. I’ve been fairly consistent with mine (with a few month long breaks scattered here and there) and ultimately, it’s changed my organization habits for the better. Mine is totally basic like yours, although I did just buy a set of Staedler pens to add a little bit of color.

I love looking at the fun things people do with their journals, and sometimes I pick up a few hacks here and there but in the end I find simpler is better for me. I love using washi tape on the edges of pages I go back to frequently, and I just added a “bookshelf” page to track my reading for 2016.

Kim Werker

Ooh, are you going to use colour in a systematic way, or just for the pretty?

Thanks for reminding me of the washi-tape bookmarking trick. I’m only on Page 9 of my new journal, but I already have a feeling I’m going to go back to this page over and over again!

Lindsey

Right now color is just for the pretty, though I just started a new job so eventually it may end up being more to keep track of things easily! :)

Kim Werker

Jean Bauhaus

Mine looks a lot like yours, although I do try to liven mine up a bit with doodles and washi tape. But my handwriting is terrible and my spreads are pretty basic. I love looking at the bujo porn on Instagram but I do wonder how much time some of these people spend making their bullet journals pretty instead of actually doing the stuff they write down in them.

allenabg

A thought we share! My BuJo is a mishmash of lists that work for me with some monthly calendars stuck in here and there. It is not pretty at all and I don’t need it to be. I marvel at the pretty ones but don’t have _make journal super pretty on my task list. :)

Heidi Johnson

Yay! so glad to hear it’s not just me that has messy, plain jane bullet journal. In fact I’m not sure my would be considered a ‘real’ bujo. But hey, it works for me and I get stuff done. I’m an extra large Moleskeine grid dot girl and after 6 months I think I have a system set up that works. Love me some washi tape to mark each month and all its weeks, projects and dreams. That’s all the color coding I do and it really helps to get me to the right page.

Heather

I’ve been a bullet journal convert since you first wrote about it two years ago (thanks!). I love the flexibility. I like looking at the beautiful versions online, but mine is messy all the way. I mix it up a bit with different colours, but still pretty basic. I think about doing pretty things, but I know that it would be a big distraction for me.

Paige

Much like other folks, you showed me the way to Bullet Journaling and it changed my work habits at the time! As a procrastinator who gets overwhelmed with too many tasks, I liked the Getting Things Done method, but couldn’t figure out a way that worked to track all these action items. I lapsed on the BuJo for about a year and am picking it back up again as of 2016 now that I work from home. I had no idea how much the world of fancy planners had exploded in the meantime and felt like I had fallen behind on what the concept was when I started following a couple of FB groups! When I started at my old job it was ONLY for work, so my idea of flair was using a skull and crossbones ribbon stapled in for a bookmark! After a week or two of feeling overwhelmed I realized i could take the good ideas and continue with what worked for me. I added a couple of pages I didn’t used to have – a few pages for Happy Thoughts so I can note a good thing each day, a budget tracker, and I’m trying a weekly tasklist in addition to the monthly and daily. I have some washi tape to add color, but also use it to make it easier to flip to months and frequently used pages. (And to cover up mistakes!) I bought a couple of stickers – a hydration tracker and some circles to draw a face on for mood tracking – and will see if I use those at all. But mostly it’s a plain old bulleted list of tasks with some collections at the back of the notebook. Even doing the bit of setup I do at the beginning of… Read more »

Kat Sklar

I’m closing in on the end of my second volume of bullet journaling (more or less) since first coming across it in your blog. A few thoughts: I do four week spreads instead of month spreads, and I do a whole whack of them at the beginning of the book. For each week on the four week spread I leave room for a subtotal. I use these spreads to track major occasions (travel, holidays, concert tickets) but also to track my work hours by week and medications that have a dose per week limit. On the right side of the spread, I put in goals in home, work and social categories. The goals are things that fit this: “If I don’t do/make progress on __________ during the next four weeks, I’ll feel sad.” At the end of the four weeks, I’ll check the goal off, or put an arrow next to it if I didn’t get it done indicating it has moved to the next 4 week spread or else leave myself a note about why the goal was abandoned. Here’s the funny thing: I don’t keep my daily/weekly to dos in my actual bullet journal – I keep them in Asana (an online task/project management site). For work stuff, I use a bullet journal like spread on a legal pad to summarize the major tasks whose details are in Asana. I find I need to keep that list front and center and visible at work at all times, and I also find the symbolism of LEAVING THE LIST AT THE OFFICE super helpful. My best hack for my work to do list is to start the week by counting up the hours during the week where I won’t be making progress on my to do list (meetings, mostly), and… Read more »

Lu K

Hi and thank you for sharing. I have an index/table of content starting on the very last page. Th heading is page number and topic and I number each page in the notebook. This way, I can reference specific things like a conversation or specific pages for future reference. I don’t add anything if the page is not something I need to remember. When the book is done, I label the spine but I can see using an index referencing each notebook. Good info and thank you.

Kim Werker

Thanks for sharing how you mark special kinds of tasks, Kat! Your system is so sensible, and I’m going to see if I can use it when tasks in my journal relate to tasks I keep track of in Trello (which I use for pretty much every work project I have going).

Jo Mackriell

I love my bullet journal, and like you love to see what others do too. Have been doing it for about 3 months now and it goes everywhere with me.

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Judith

It is wo great to hear from others who are sticking with the simple bullet journal format. I love the looks but who has time for fancy decorations or tiny little spaces for to do lists. I also love knowing how people combine electronic organization with their journals. And I confess that I find the word bujo ugly and unappealing. Oh well!

Sarah

THANK YOU. I went back to bullet journaling in June and I can’t even handle the cutesy stuff (also, how simple are these people’s lives that they can fit everything they need to do in a week on two pages of an A5 notebook. I do make my weekly spreads and my date headings pretty with flair pens and I think I’m going to steal the washi tape bookmark idea (right now I’m using paperclips on the week spread and the day page) but other than that… it’s a very functional mess.

Kim

Looking for ways to track in my passion planner, thanks for sharing your process!

Dryden

I get really frustrated looking at people’s perfectly written and beautifully illustrated bullet journals. It’s not whatI want to spend my time on. I was a BuJo advocate for a while and fell out of the habit (mostly bc of the lack of the future planning, which I see lots of suggestions for these days). I want to get back into it, bc the parts that worked really worked. But every time I try to look for inspiration and guidance I find these ones that are so far from what I had done previously. I get the appeal, but just not for me. My life is too inconsistent and this is why the basic journaling system appeals more to me.

I LOVE THE INDEXING THOUGH! I use it for everything now. I made a separate notebooks for a few topics including one for a a long-term training course I’m in, and one for lectures, workshops, and worksheets for some personal goal and self-improvement work and I use the index so that I can come back to topics when the inspiration hits me, or after each class. I did something very similar (more of a table of contents) 10 years ago when I worked on my grad school thesis and I found it incredibly helpful then too.

I’m really feeling the need to do more personal reflection/journaling/morning pages style diary keeping and am thinking about adding that into this notebook as well so that I can write when I have the time instead of only when I’m home.

Kim Werker

With my switch to smaller format bullet journals (http://www.kimwerker.com/2016/10/24/small-format-bullet-journal-trial-error/), I intend to keep a separate art/writing journal. We’ll see if I can manage to really set that habit!