Since Sundays can get a little boring around here (what with not much being open), I’d been wracking my brain to find a way to make myself feel productive on these days, while also occupying my time in a way that wasn’t just watching Netflix all day (although we all know that sometimes those days are desperately needed). Scrolling through my explore page on instagram, I’ve frequently seen people’s beautiful spreads in something called a bullet journal, and been intrigued by them. When I was passing through Tiger one day, I saw that they had bullet journals, and decided to take the plunge for myself. Since the journals found at Tiger aren’t too expensive, I figured if I didn’t like it, or couldn’t get the hang of it, I wouldn’t be out too much, and I would still have a nice journal for other purposes, potentially. A little under one month in, here are some of my thoughts:

Initially, I was worried that I was trying my hand at bullet journaling merely because I wanted an excuse to doodle a lot, and to make pretty planner pages. Even though that can be a big part of it, bullet journaling is at its base, whatever you want to make it. Before I actually started on a journal of my own (and had even made the purchase), it was suggested to me that I join some Facebook groups. On these pages, people ask for advice regarding purchases, or ways to layout their spreads, but they are also full of people sharing their monthly themes, or how they’ve laid out their mood trackers, so there are plenty of place from which to draw inspiration. I’ve found that these pages were a great help when I was just starting out, and have continued to give me ideas/inspiration for how I might set up future months, or future pages.

I decided to start simple. I followed the basic layout described on the bullet journal website and started with a simple index page. One of the most important bullet journaling rules is to number every page so that you can easily find everything you put in it, no matter how much you fill it up. The index is essentially just for putting all the page numbers for everything. You can also use a key to denote different symbols for all your “bullet points” that you’ll use, but I didn’t do this as I prefer just keeping a simple box, and adding a check mark in it when I’ve completed something. Again, bullet journaling is really finding what works for you, so you don’t have to follow the set up instructions verbatim. Following the index is a future log, which has the next year (or in my case, I only did six months) laid out, so you can put big events/dates in your calendar at a glance. The same goes for monthly spreads. You can make these spreads as artsy as you like, or just go with a plain calendar look to see your whole month at a glance. You’ll go more into specifics when you get into your weekly breakdowns (I’m still debating if I like these, considering that my daily events don’t change much from week to week, but I can see how this would be useful for some people). In each month, you can also have trackers. I went fairly basic doing a sleep tracker, a mood tracker, and a hydration tracker. You can personalize these to whatever you want to track (if anything), and then see how it works out.

So far (and only being a couple of weeks into it), I’m really enjoying the process of bullet journaling. I’ve set up April already – I decided to be a little bit more adventurous, and to make it themed (but again, your journal can be as artistic or minimalistic as you want), and I find that keeping a physical tracker of certain things has helped motivate me to stay on track (especially with drinking water because I’m actually abysmal at it). It allows me to have a visual representation of what I want to track, while also putting all of my to-do lists in one place, rather than on little bits of paper everywhere. Even though I’m still partial to using my phone as a reminder for big events/interviews/anything important, it’s still nice to have a physical reminder of those as well if I need to have a check-in on what my week looks like.

Bullet journaling also gives you the space for creativity in the form of bigger spreads, that can be personalized for whatever you like. For instance, I have one for countries I’ve visited in Europe, where I’ve drawn a map of Europe, and am coloring the countries as I visit each one. I also have a theatre one, where I’ve drawn the page to look like a playbill from Broadway, and am writing in each show I attend throughout the year, along with the date and location so I can have a written list of them by the end of the year. You could also pencil out some long term goals, books you’ve read in the year, or anything else that floats your boat.

I know that there’s a “certain” way bullet journaling was initially meant to be done, but it seems to have shifted into very much a personalized experience. You can use an identified “bullet journal”, or you can use any old notebook that works for you. I personally really like the little dots everywhere because it allows me to evenly space things, and connect dots fairly easily, but there are also grid lined notebooks if that’s more up your alley. I enjoy the fact that I can make it what I want, while also indulging my inner artistic side (which is not the most talented of artistic sides by any means), AND use it to stay organized. It’s a fun way to do it all, while also giving me something to do on those days where nothing else seems to peak my interest.

I think the fact that you can highly personalize your bullet journal to whatever you want it to be is something that makes this activity feasible for anyone. Sure, I may not have beautiful calligraphy adorning every page, and mine is more on the simplistic side, but it works for me. The fact that (at least, as far as I have seen), the facebook pages have been very supportive to anyone who asks for advice, makes it that much more of an inviting community. As someone who likes to scrapbook, and make those as nice as can be, and as someone who already utilizes a journal (when I can, not as great at it as I used to be), bullet journaling felt like a natural possibility of something I would like doing. It can be a bit intimidating to see all the instagram pages devoted to making beautiful pages, and youtube videos of set up processes, but I’ve been trying to just use those as inspiration, rather than something which I’m striving to achieve.

Initial thoughts: Ultimately, I’m really enjoying my initial foray into bullet journaling. I haven’t gotten to the point where I take it everywhere with me (although I do take it on holidays so I can keep my trackers up to date), but there’s something about organizing my life on physical paper that is pleasing to me. I can keep all of my to do lists in one place, and work through them strategically (as well as easily find them in my sometimes mess of a room). I’m hopeful that I’m going to keep on doing it in the months to come, and that it’ll simultaneously help me feel productive, while also giving me some joy. Here’s to hopefully more months of successful bullet journaling!

This has really just been a brain dump, and a little different from my other posts, but I figured why not explore some new topics, and talk about some new things I’ve discovered while on my travels. This has definitely been one of them! Keep your eyes peeled for future travel posts coming next month!