Does Anyone Keep A Journal Anymore?

Over the years I have kept track of a lot of my thoughts that I have had in probably 20 or so small journals. I don’t have a real sense of organization in some of these journals for the most part. I have one journal that I have notes in dating all the way back to 2017. In that journal you can find notes from random meetings, answers to some of the tests that I have taken in grad school, and recaps of my day/week. You named it I probably have it written in this journal somewhere.

In January 2020 I decided that I was going to keep myself a little more organized for the year. I had been doing some research on what kind of planner or journal I should get that can help me out with this. I came across this thing people called a bullet journal. A bullet journaling is a method of personal organization that was designed by Ryder Carroll. Using the bullet journal system it organizes reminders, scheduling, to-do list, brainstorming, and many other things into one journal. The name “bullet journal” comes from the bullet point system to log your information on, but also because of the dot journals that are used rather than the lined ones.

The cool thing about the bullet journal is that you build and make the journal all by yourself. The way that I created mine was by going onto Pinterest, Instagram, and YouTube and seeing how other people made theirs. I took ideas from different people and made my own. That’s what so awesome about the bullet journal, no two journals are typically the same.

For example, I show you a breakdown of a typical month in my bullet journal.

On the first page of the month, I try to typically make some kind of cover for the month that is themed for what that month is known for. Like in the example below I have my birthday month of August, where I drew a Lone Star beer can because it was time to party for my birthday month!

On the next page, I have a list of goals that I would like to complete for the month. I always go back to the previous month and see if I didn’t complete any of my goals and try to add them to the next month’s goals.

On the page next to that I have a monthly planner. I have every day of the month listed and I write the big event of the day on there. Sometimes it will be something simple like “Cooked Dinner” or sometimes I will list out everything that I did for the day. On the other side of the monthly planner, I have a habit tracker. For this particular month, I listed 4 habits that I wanted to do better at. I believe the 4 habits were “W” for work out, “T” for brush my teeth 3 times a day, “J” for journaling, and “B” making my bed every day. I colored coated them and filled them in when I completed the task. At the bottom of the page, I have a spot for putting my total amount of distance ran, daily steps, and biked for the month. Above or below each box I have my goal amount.

This is where the bread and butter of creating the bullet journal went for me. I have my daily planner for the whole. I divided the page into 3 and the bottom third on the right page I split in half for Saturday and Sunday. Each day has its only little section. In those sections, I of course put the date and day of the week which is really simple. I list out the task that I need to compete for the day as well as meetings or events that take place for that day. On the right side of the day, I have included boxes to list my daily running biking, and biking activity. I am also big on keeping myself hydrated because of all the sweating that I do. So I draw 2 Nalgene water bottles that I will end at the end of each day with how much water I have consumed. I have a section on Sunday that I put my total of running, daily walking, and biking totals for the week go so it is easier to count up at the end of the month.

I think my journal is kept pretty simple compared to some of the ones that I have seen. Like I said before you can make it completely simple like mine or have tons more things on the page. I use felt tip pens to make most of the journal, besides all of the tasks in the daily planner section. I also use a ruler before I cannot draw that straight of lines. If you aren’t that artsy or good at using a ruler you can find people on Etsy.com that will make bullet journals for you. If you are a slight bit interested in bullet journals I really recommend just Googling them. People go all out for their journals and make them look really cool. I am a simple man and just keep mine in a little blue journal. But hey, if you have any questions about bullet journal or anything, I am no expert, but feel free to email and I will gladly help you out.

I know that this blog is a little different than the ones that I typically do, but I bring it back full circle with this. I use my bullet journal to help me plan out my camping and hiking trips better. When I have a trip planned out I have a whole section in the back of my journal that I keep a list of things that I always need to bring with me when I go hiking/camping. Plus with this journal I realize how much more free time I have that