How I Bujo!

Warning: This post has absolutely nothing to do with skincare.  It's all about how I bullet journal.

I am a bullet journaling.  I have been since last July and it's the only journal that I've stuck with.  If you don't know anything about bullet journaling, I recommend checking out Ryder Carroll's channel on YouTube.  He is the creator of the bullet journaling method and his intro is pretty quick.

The basic idea with bullet journaling is that through the day you write down either things that need to be done, labelled with dots, or interesting things that you have done that you'd like to remember, labelled with open circles.  The dots can be turned into x's when you've completed the item, >'s if you need to do the item on a different day, or /'s if you've only started an item.  It's called rapid logging and it's awesome.  It's quick and painless and those of us who are infinitely more comfortable typing than writing by hand don't get our hands tired.  There's more to it than that, but rapid logging, I would say, is the heart of bullet journaling.

Carroll developed this method before instagram was a sparkle in its founder's eye though and things have evolved.  In the age of internet, competitive aesthetically pleasing photos are a thing, so washi tape, brush pens, and fancy lettering have taken over most of what you'll see about bullet journals online.  They aren't essential in the slightest, but I like pretty things, so I'm not upset about their proliferation.

My bullet journal starts with an index (a must!) followed by my Year at a Glance page.  Some people call it a Year in Pixels; I don't.  This is my mood tracker sheet, which I'm only sharing because I've had a really good start to the year.  The box around the 20th of January denotes a day on my period.  I track it against my mood because I like to see if it has any impact on how I'm feeling.  Normally it doesn't.  Last year, I found that this became a really good way to predict my periods too because they all fell along the same slant.  Visually, I could tell at a glance when I was due to begin.

After my mood tracker, I have my future logs.  Theoretically, you put stuff that you know is coming up in your future logs as you find out about them and then you create monthly spreads and put them down in a more linear fashion.  In actuality, I put everything in Google Calendar so my phone will remind me about events.  I almost left out future logs completely this year, but, in the end, I caved to peer pressure and did them anyways.  I think I might use unused space to do a monthly reflection at the end of each month.  We'll see.

My future logs are currently so boring that you don't even get a picture of them.

After my future logs, I have my January tracking page.  As you can see, I don't track crazy amounts of things.  The boxes filled in with scribbles are done on a scale from red to purple that works for me and the things with a check/tick are just done in rainbow order to make them look pretty.  I don't stress too much about the amount of white space on the right of my tracking because it's useful for writing notes about irregularities.  As you might be able to guess, I track my period on this page too.  Here I'm comparing it to my skin and looking for patterns with hormones and skin quality (hey, I guess this is a little about skin care!)

After that, I start in on the daily spreads.  In theory, I bullet journal in the morning and the evening.  In the morning, I have some quiet time to put down washi tape and write the date in a pretty way; then I list what I want to do that date.  It's not just a to-do list in the sense of this is what I have to do.  I also include fun stuff that I get to do, stuff that I want to remember.

In the evening, I change my dots to x's, >'s, or /'s depending on if I've done them, need to do them another day, or only have done them part of the way and add in any extra stuff that I'd like to remember about the day.

The bit that is personal to me is in the right hand column.  I write down two "something goods" about the day (SG=Something Good), I write down something creative I've done that day, and I write down a way I've been nice to myself (NTM=Nice To Me).

In all, this takes a little less than half a page, so I do two days to a page and usually do some random doodle or use a sticker if there's extra room.

I always pick the washi tape first and match the colours to the washi; both days get the same colour scheme.

Are you still with me?  Do I have enough readers who are interested in my life beyond skin care to still be reading?  Good, because I have a couple of other spreads.

In bullet journalling, a spread is a two page layout.  They're generally placed on whatever the next two page layout that's free and then marked in the index in order to find them later.  I've got three so far.  The first, I'm not going to share with you.  It's my mental health spread and it's a reminder of some goals I have, but it's rather personal.  The next is a bit more light hearted.  It's a daily doodle spread.  I suck at doodling, but would like to get better, so I'm attempting one a day.  Mostly, I'm doing this, but I think it's something I'll add to next months tracker page because I know there are days that I've skipped.

Please forgive the shadows.  This was a quick snapshot that I took for my mother, who also bullet journals.  When I remember to do the daily doodle, I usually google "how to doodle..." and find instructions online for easy doodles.  These did not come from my own mind, but I'm hoping they're a first step to my own doodles.

Finally, a new spread that barely has anything on it.  It's a spread to help me remember meals that I've made that I want to repeat in the future.

I've got my regular repertoire of meals, but this is for things that aren't in the normal rotation.  I try to do red meat once a week, chicken twice a week, fish once a week, vegetarian twice a week, and eggs once a week.  Sometimes, I get stuck for ideas, so I'm hoping that this will help me remember things that were tasty that I don't normally think to make.  The opposite page was left blank to write notes on recipes.

So, that's how I use my bullet journal.  It was long winded, but I tend to be a bit long winded.  It's part of my charm, really.  If you're interested in more non-skincare type posts, let me know.  I'll probably do a few more bullet journal ones here and there because it's something I am really into, but they likely won't be as long as this one.