For some, Bullet Journaling is the most amazing thing in the world, for others it is the biggest chore and they would honestly rather buy a planner at Target. Recently, I became hooked on Bullet Journaling. I had always been an organizational freak, but the planners I bought never had everything I wanted.
I also loved to journal, but never had enough time to do it consistently. The easy solution, Bullet Journaling! It's the perfect mix and I am so excited to share my top 10 tips for anyone on the fence or excited about starting their Bullet Journal.
1. Decide what you want to get out of it
Everyone wants something different in a planner. It's good to think about the must have elements that are lacking in your generic, store bought planner. Perhaps, you want to track your fitness, or how many places you've been throughout the year. Good news, the options are endless!
2. Plan in advance
This is very important. You want to make sure that the journal you've chosen (I recommend one with grid pages) has enough space for your whole year and any other pages you want included. Know what you're doing before you start, it just makes life easier.
3. Use it to set goals
This is a very handy tool to complete your yearly goals. How can you not accomplish them when you spent so long crafting your personally-designed Bullet Journal? I like to include a page collage of my big goals, and then three smaller goals at the start of every month. Of course, you can customize it any way you want, you can even include a habit tracker.
4. Ruler, Ruler, Ruler
Straight lines make your Bullet Journal look clean and official. A ruler is your greatest friend here in that it helps you make everything center as well as keeping your writing concise. A journal with grid pages also helps.
5. Look for ideas to get inspired
There is no shame!!! Go on google and search the heck out of it. Find new ideas, be inspired, even copy page per page if that is what you want. There is no right or wrong way to do this, and looking for ideas is the best way to get started.
6. Have a scratch notebook by your side
Have a journal you bought five years ago and never picked up? Perfect. You'll definitely need it to test out ideas you're hesitant about or colors you're just not sure will match together. This is a great help especially if you've never done Bullet Journaling before.
7. Try new fonts, shapes and colors, Be creative!
When I first started, I tried out everything I could, copied fonts of the internet, different tags other people were using in their bullet journal's and even calligraphy! This is great because it creates a sort of index you can use to look back on and mimic in your journal, the hard part is done, you can just copy!
8. Try it out for a few months, if you don't like it, no harm done.
As far as using it in a busy schedule like mine, I'm not sure how my bullet journal will handle the task, but I know if I end up ditching it for a Target planner, I'll still be proud of my work. It's a great time consumer regardless, you get obsessed after a while (take breaks).
9. Create a memento you'll cherish.
This is very important. You want to be able to make this a keepsake of your year. Create pages that you can look back on, like a year in pixels page, or a moment of the month page where you glue your favorite picture on at the end of every month, anything to make your most recent year special!
10. Don't stop there!
However your Bullet Journaling adventure takes you, you can take elements out of it into your daily life. Making your organizational skills more creative and present in your life whether that be your workout regime, our you homework load. The skills you learn by doing this can last even after the year is done, that is, if you don't decide to do another bullet journal for the next year (you will).
