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I promised I would give you a glimpse into my bullet journalling. This is it.
I first came across bullet journalling a few months ago. As someone who loves making lists for almost everything, and comes up with a minute by minute ‘plan of attack’ for even the simplest tasks, bullet journalling seemed perfect for me.
The main problem I’ve found so far with the system is that I’m a perfectionist. By its very nature, a bullet journal cannot be always perfect (though the endless stream of images on pinterest and instagram would like us to believe otherwise).
I researched and researched and researched before I bought my notebook. There are two main notebook brands that the well known bullet journalists champion – the Moleskin and the Leuchttrum1917. I went with the later, despite my worries about the see-through-ness of the pages, simply because I couldn’t afford the Moleskin I preferred. My BuJo is lined.
As I began to use the notebook, I realised that my fears were confirmed – the pages are really thin and the type of pen you would use for the beautiful headings goes right through the page. In a number of videos I watched, the bullet journalists referred to this phenomenon as ghosting. I’m not a fan of ghosting. I like pages new. I like them thick. That said, I’ve managed to survive.
As the primary purpose of this notebook was to replace my previous writing notebook (which I love but sadly cannot find anywhere), I haven’t gotten hugely into the weekly, monthly and yearly planners that the Bullet Journal movement is famous for. And I don’t see the point of making lists of movies or books. or tracing out trackers for everything under the sun. Mostly, this book is for writing, for notes and ideas and quotes and snippets and words. A couple of weeks ago, I started a word count tracker. Despite last week being wholly unsuccessful on the writing front, I feel that this tracker will prove especially helpful when we hit November (which is only a few months away!! nobody panic!).
What’s worked:
- The index feature. I’m in love with it and it makes finding things so much easier. Before, I’d be leafing through pages and pages of various notebooks to find what I’m looking for. No longer! 🙂
- Combining all my notes and scribbles, whether for work or writing or life, into the one place.
- Allowing my inner decorator to fly free with meters of washi tape and a truckload of beautiful pens.
What hasn’t worked:
- Trackers, the recommended set up in general. I don’t really have enough separate tasks on my plate at the moment to fill out a day by day log.
- The thinness of the paper really gets to me. I want to use nice, thick pens but they are visible on the next page, sometimes through a number of pages.
- It’s not as pretty as I’d like, but that can be worked upon 🙂
Have you joined the Bullet Journal craze? Does it work for you? What parts have you adapted to suit your own style?
R.E. Navan 
I started bullet journaling in June and I’m honestly loving it! Now that I’m completely immersed in college, I miss writing a daily the night before sometimes but I give myself a pass. There’s just too much to do and too less time that I’m not able to carve out ten minutes to bujo.
I’m loving it though, it helps me a lot in keeping track of events, my blogging and work which is sideline to college and daily life.
That’s precisely why I love my BuJo so much – I can use it for whatever I wish, and if I want to ignore the examples online I can. I don’t track everything, either. My life isn’t exciting enough for me to have half the trackers people on Pinterest use, but it’s perfect for the things I do use it for.
I wish I had your persistence with the index. I’m such a failure with mine!
Haha I haven’t updated mine in weeks 😛 But I do like the idea of it.
My writing hand is all screwed up, and I haven’t managed to train the other one, so although the Bullet Journal looks interesting, I haven’t tried it. I thought of finding a way to adapt it to Evernote, but then I realized, I’m retired, I don’t have many projects to keep track of, and when I do I can do it with Google Calendar. If I was still a busy profressional, so to speak, I absolutely would use something like it, although it would probably be more stark than some of the examples I’ve seen. Good luck with it!
Thanks 🙂
This is really interesting. I’ve been experimenting with using a planner, but that’s not going so well b/c I tend to plan in my head and on the fly…I don’t know, maybe bullet journaling would work better. Something to consider.
I think it’s definitely worth a shot but isn’t for everyone. Maybe do a trial spread on a piece of paper first?
Yeah, might be a good idea before I spend any money. 🙂