How I use my planner + Bullet Journal notebook

Tina commented on yesterday's post on my Bullet Journal notebook changeover asking how I use my planner along with my Bullet Journal notebook system that I described in that post. I started to write a "short" reply but it got really long so I decided to just do a separate post about it!

It's all very personal so I won't be able to show you any photos of my pages, not that you would be able to read my writing. (I keep telling myself, if it's worth writing, it's worth writing legibly! Anyway...)

But I can tell you lots of specifics and examples of how I use my Bullet Journal system along with my planner.

I call it a Bullet Journal, but it's really not. That's a common buzzword these days, so when I say that people automatically have a pretty good idea of what I'm talking about, but I have modified the BuJo system to my own needs.

First of all, NO forward planning goes in my Bullet Journal. None at all. All forward planning goes in my planner. I wrote a post last year on how I used my planner along with my day per page diary, and all of the part about how I use my planner still applies so you can see that in this post here. In today's post I will focus on how I use my Pseudo BuJo system.

Some people might not like to use two separate books. But after years of trying hundreds of different planners trying to find a system that works for me, using two separate books is a small price to pay for a system that works so well for me. Using a separate planner allows me to plan the entire year in one book without rewriting. I use up a notebook in 3-4 months, and I would not want to have to rewrite all my forward plans several times per year. Also the two separate books help me keep their purposes separate: forward planning only in my planner, day to day recording only in my notebook. Another advantage of separate books is I can have them both open side by side so I can see today's details in relation to the rest of the week and my weekly task lists.

As you saw in yesterday's post, I'm using a large unlined Moleskine notebook for my journal. I wrote some details of how I use it in my Journaling Lessons Learned post. But today I will give you some day-by-day detailed examples of how I use this notebook.

The evening before, I start a fresh page and write the day and date at the top. Then I leave some space so I can write significant events right at the top of the page where I can see them easily. Then I write if my husband is traveling, and any scheduled events or appointments I have that day. Then I slot in MUST DO tasks for that day. I only write tasks I MUST DO THAT DAY, nothing that is optional because these would mix in with the Must-Do tasks, and I need to be able to see easily what I absolutely must do that day. Then if I get those done, I look at my weekly task list (in my planner) to see what else I can fit in today.

Therefore my day is planned the evening before, and I wake up knowing exactly what I have to do today. As the day rolls on, I record things right in the notebook. Sometimes I use one page for a day, sometimes less, often two pages.

Bullet Journal symbols: I don't really use them. I have my own very simplified system using only asterisk *  box []  dot . and arrow -->  Here is what they mean:

       [] Task. When the task is finished, I check it off.

      *[] Very important task. Do these first.

• Information/ notes. For example if I phoned someone, I tick off the To Call box and write a dot under with notes on the phone call, who I spoke to and what they said, and the number I called so I can call them again if I need to follow up. Which brings me to...

      ---> Follow-up action or ongoing. To continue the phone call example, under the dot information I'll write --> Sue will call me back next week when the new stock is in. That way I know the result is not complete yet.

This is why I love using unlined pages: I can write between lines easily. If I'm writing on lined pages, I don't have as much space between my writing to make notes like this unless I skip lines, which feels wasteful to me. Without lines, I can always cram more writing in between.

If I've written something that becomes irrelevant I line it out. For example this morning I had written Call G's friend's mom to arrange playdate tomorrow, but I had to line it out this morning because G is sick so I can't make play plans for her for tomorrow.

I record emergent tasks (those things that come up during the day that you hadn't planned but get done anyway), so I have a record of when I did them.

Here's a real-life example: I record online orders with the amount, which card I paid with, confirmation numbers, etc. I keep a list of these in the back and track when I ordered, when it shipped and when I received it so I make sure I'm getting everything I ordered. For example I ordered something back in October, they shipped it to me but the contents were wrong with an invoice to someone else, so they said they sent it again but I never received the replacement. I called two weeks ago (noted in my BuJo and on the monthly reference book) and they said it had been shipped, but if it does not arrive today I will be emailing them again, armed with ordering dates, confirmation numbers, phone conversation details and the entire timeline history, all thanks to details written in my BuJo and easily referenced in my monthly reference booklet.

Here's another actual example from today: my daughter has been ill for a couple of days, and when my kids are ill I write their symptoms and note when they stay home from school. Thanks to my BuJo and handy-dandy monthly reference calendar, I noticed she had a similar thing back in January where she was off school the same number of days, and that she often gets a tummy ache when she has a cold. In my monthly reference booklet on the day I write "G home from school, ill" then on the day's page I write her symptoms. That way I have a quick reference of sick days, and can look up what was wrong.

What else? I pretty much write everything in there. For example, yesterday my daughter was looking at a book of British birds and asked what the genus and species names meant. So in my notebook I wrote Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species (remembered from "King Philip Came Over For Good Steak") and explained classifications. Years from now it will be fun to look back through my notebook and see that she was interested in taxonomy that day.

Also every day I write the weather and temperature, and anything else significant. When I walk in the forest I write in my book which birds and wildlife I saw, and what flowers are blooming. Yesterday the daffodils in front of our house started blooming so I wrote that too. As I continue to do this, it will be fun to compare year to year. For example last year was a very snowy winter and spring came late. This year the winter was very mild (although rainy) and things are blooming already.

This gives you a good idea of how I use my BuJo. I don't write my feelings. I did that in journals years ago and found the emotional dumping was not helpful and not anything I wanted to read again. This is just a record. I do write when I'm happy or excited about something, but again it's factual. There's no pontificating here, which I did endlessly in previous journals and did not like.

I also don't decorate my BuJo. You'll find no washi tape here. I'm not artistic, and I find decorations distracting (and time consuming) so I don't do them. But, when we are waiting somewhere (like at a restaurant) and my kids are bored, I hand them my book and colored pens and let them draw. It's fun to have my kids' art in my book, and years from now I know it will be great to see their little-kid drawings in my book and see what they were thinking alongside what we were doing that exact day.

All of this goes from the front of the book. Anything that happened today goes right on the page. Anything non-day-specific like my online orders tracking or list of stuff I need next time I go to Ikea goes in the back of the book. I don't index these, because it's easy to flip through the back pages to find what I'm looking for. When I first started Bullet Journaling, I mixed lists between daily pages and it was a nightmare to find anything, even with page indexing. This way is much easier for me: daily record from the front, lists from the back.

I carry my journal with me absolutely everywhere, so it's important that the book is light enough or else I tend to leave it at home. That was my downfall with a dated day per page diary last year, because I need the big A5 size page but the thickness of the daily book meant it was too heavy. I'm really enjoying the large Moleskine blank notebooks because the narrow book is lighter than other comparably-sized books and is relatively thin, and very streamlined.

This post turned out to be very long! And it might sound complicated, but it's actually very simple. I just write everything in my notebook, and take it with me everywhere.

If you have any other questions let me know in the comments and I'll be happy to answer!