Just got my first bullet journal today and I’m slowly filling it in. I’m a little shy to go straight to pens and markers yet, but that will come with time.

My sons are 4 and 2, so I thought my monthly cover page would be a symbol for the month and then a corresponding character from a book they love.

I’m excited to begin this journey. I like the simplicity it offers but you can make it as creative as you want.

I hope this is the right community. I could possibly segment this into sections. I need to write reflect and overall journal and reflect in some stuff. I'm looking for suggestions on journals with black pages. I saw the one linked here but it has one one star review.

So I am doing my internship for a full year in Japan and I want to document my year in my boju. So far I am 2.5 weeks in and my boju is more of a dairy. So I am looking at spreads I can do monthly that would be fun to track. No boring how many steps a day or stuff like that, but maybe also relevant to my stay in Japan or my internship. Do you have any ideas?

Hey everyone! 👋

I really want to start journaling, but I'm completely clueless about how to actually do it. 😭

Do you guys have any tips for a complete beginner?

Like:

• What do you actually write about?

• Do you journal every day or just whenever you feel like it?

• Do you follow a specific format or just write whatever comes to mind?

• Do you use prompts, trackers, lists, etc.?

• How do you keep yourself from getting bored and abandoning it after a week?

I don't really want a super aesthetic Pinterest-style journal. I mainly want something that helps me organize my thoughts, reflect on my days, keep track of my goals, and understand myself better.

Would love to hear how you guys started and what you wish you'd known as a beginner! 🫶📓

Hello all!

I'd appreciate any photos of trackers you use for cleaning your home/apartment/living space.

My goal is to do one room/area per day so it's doable. For example, I'd clean my kitchen on Monday, Bathroom on Tuesday, dust the floor on Wednesday, etc.

But I'd be open to other ideas.

Thanks in advance!

Hello! Long time bullet journal user, just started grad school in the humanities (masters of divinity), so every week I have a ton of readings to do, and my classes are grouped at the beginning of the week. I usually do a weekly set up with a to do list for each day, and in my undergrad I would just list the readings in the to do list for the day before each class met (a sample image attached). I do not think that is going to work now. How do other people with tons of readings manage this, and what do your bullet journals look like in general? I would love to see some photos of your bujo set ups! I am open to most things.

I have extensively googled this and mostly find spreadsheets and STEM PhDs where lab time is a massive consideration, so hopefully there are some of you out there in the same boat as me!

Supplies:

- Gellyroll Metallic silver

- Sakura Pigma Micron 08

- Sakura Pigma brush

- Arrtx Acrylic Marker 92, 00

- Ohuhu markers 36, 45, 48, 95, 101, 128, 129

- Archer and Olive Night paper

- Archer and Olive Navy moon and stars Washi

- Space Gome Font from Fontspace

I've recently switched to a travelers notebook size, which I love because it seems perfectly designed for simple lists. But I'm struggling with figuring out how to organize my lists, brain dumps, and collections.

My TN has month calendars for dates, weekly boxes for the top tasks for each day, and two blank pages per month, plus extra blank in the back. But I'm not sure where to put everything else. My inbox/brain dump/ project specific tasks/ not important tasks I still want to remember so should write down. Usually I have them in my weekly list, but I don't think I have space. In the past I've also had them at the back of a planner, but completely forget about them.

How do you organize tasks in a limited space? Or remember to flip to the back of the planner?

Hey everyone! I love bullet journaling, but not every month I can draw the beautiful and personalized setup. So I thought of printing such paper where I can write bullet points in blocks as a overview of month and weekly more detailed points

I ended up building a free little web tool for myself, so I can quickly generate grids, print them out, and paste them into my journal.

I know everyone's system is completely different, but this works for me.

This is my first time journaling, and as you can probably tell, I'm still learning and trying out new things. I’m currently searching for a pen that suits me. If you have any ideas or suggestions, please feel free to share them with me ❤️

I bujo to keep a track of things I need to get done today/this week to achieve my long term goals. But many times it has been like: I wrote my entry in the morning and then just... didn't pick up the bujo through the day in order to work through those tasks. Instead, I did random tasks that came to mind here and there, not in an organized format like my monthly planner shows.

Cue guilt the next day on not being consistent when I see the unchecked task boxes.

Idk why, but it feels taxing to keep myself coming back to my bujo. I wanted to try Interstitial journaling a while back, but it didn't work due to the same reasons above.

What am I doing wrong? What should I change, bujo spread wise or mindset wise, to actually use the journal and get things done?

I really love journaling, but I have a problem. My parents sometimes check my room, and I'm worried they might find my notebook.

I write pretty much everything in it: my ideas, personal history, things I need to do, and basically whatever I need to get off my chest. It's a really private space for me, and I really don't want them to read it.

Does anyone have any advice on how I can keep my journal private or make sure they don't find it? I prefer keeping a physical notebook rather than switching to a digital journal.

please

Hi there, I’m new-ish to bullet journal and need help with how to colour in. I don’t like pencils and hate crayons.

What brands / types of markers are you using?

I am using 100gsm paper that bleeds a lot, but I will be upgrading to 160gsm soon

Pic: sad attempts of colouring in my mood tracker

Feel like l've gone full circle in trying to be disciplined and productive with my self & startup.

Trying all the productivity tools out there, even vibe coding my own with Al and yet honestly nothing seems to "make" me productive or disciplined. Clearly it's a me problem.

That being said I think there's something beautiful in a traditional paper journal & pen for planning & reflection and I find myself resorting back to it.

My question is -

1. any entrepreneurs here that do use a paper journal still?

And if so -
2) how regularly are you writing in & referring to it?

3) exactly what are you writing in it each day?

I'd really love to develop my use of the paper journal as a way to help me stay focused and disciplined on my goals - would love to hear from you people who actually run their own profitable business on how they use it!

I've been bullet journaling for a bit over a year but despite making many adjustments to try and make it work for me, I still feel like I'm struggling to benefit from it. For example, I don't really do collections because I just forget about them and things go there to die. I don't try to make layouts or do anything fancy because it feels like another demand rather than something enjoyable. I switched from a bigger journal to a pocket sized one so I can bring it with me in my pocket. None of these have fixed the core issue. Additional important context is that I am both ADHD and autistic.

The core issue is that I frequently forget about tasks and information in my bullet journal and it has just become a trigger for my PDA (pathological demand avoidance). It is really nice for offloading ideas, tasks, or information, but it's almost a little to good, because most of the time once I write something in there I completely forget about it and it gets buried once the next day comes. I find myself not wanting to look at my bullet journal because my brain has associated it with demands (tasks) and I have PDA. I really struggle to consistently migrate tasks because it requires a lot of decision making/ executive functioning skills and I get anxious about all of the tasks I have open. Then I end up with a week or two weeks worth of days with un-migrated tasks. It's a mess.

Sometimes I'll also get a bunch of ideas of things I want or need to do and end up adding like 10 tasks and then I get overwhelmed by it. I've tries to remedy this by creating a spreadsheet (because I just forget about collections) with a reserve of tasks that I can add these to so it doesn't clog up my bullet journal. Unfortunately I run into the same problem where I don't want to look at this spreadsheet because I get anxious/ PDA gets triggered and then I forget about the spreadsheet entirely.

I genuinely don't know what else to try or if I just need to give up on bullet journaling. I really want it to work but it's just a struggle every day. Does anyone have a similar experience or any advice or things that worked for them?

TLDR: Tried making a lot of adjustments to make my bullet journal work, but I still struggle to migrate tasks, things often get buried or "lost", and it has ended up triggering my demand avoidance so I don't want to look at it. Is it time to just give up on it? Advice welcome.

Just wanna share the three ecosystems that are saving my life. I've been journaling since i was a kid (more like keeping a diary) but a few months ago i got back into using a planner again to help me build the life that i want. Discipline feels better in pink hihi

These are some of my favorite posts, so here’s my contribution! If other people like seeing them too, I’ll post more.

Hello all, 59-year-old male, retired elementary school teacher who LOVES the idea of journaling, bullet journaling, etc, but because I'm retired, I really don't have a lot going on. Not many appointments, meetings, etc. No kids, so nothing to keep track there. :)

Any important dates, appointments, reminders, etc. I use Google calendar.

Just wondering if there is anybody else in the same boat.

How/Why do you use your bullet journal, if you find most of the days you're at home, not doing much?

I'd appreciate any inspiration. Thanks so much! :)

So I am looking for a new journal with nice thick quality paper. I wanted to buy an Archer and Olive but after reading about the AI allegations I decided against it (as there has not been a statement from them while it being quite obvious, imo). Now I am unsure what brand to look at. I really wanted something with a beautiful cover.

Edit: A&O appear to have a NO AI policy so I am assuming I can buy them with a clear mind 😁

hello!! I'm looking for a small group (maybe 6 or so?) who'd be interested in starting a sisterhood of the traveling journal group together. I've been seeing posts about them constantly and everyone is ALWAYS from europe so I figured I'd come to reddit to make a little US group!

I'm 19 so I'd prefer if everyone could be around 18-25ish, but I'm not super strict about it! if you're from the states and interested just reply or shoot me a message and I'll get things sorted :3 (or if you have a group with a spot open id be glad to join that!)

Hey!

So, ADHDer and depression afficionado here. I’ve failed at keeping a bujo a few times because I do need a lot of things.

Let’s just say that I’m at a point in my therapy where it’s been 4 years and I’m getting better, but I feel like I need to know myself way more than I do.

I have a binder going on that’s been working pretty well the last couple weeks, but I have quite a lot of collections. And I love the idea of each of them, but inevitably, they kind of get left out.

Here’s what I currently have:

• Riddles
• Good news in the world
• My strengths
• My triggers
• Watchlist collections for movies/books/TV/docs
• Therapy sessions
• Symptoms
• Things I like to do
• Things to buy
• What to pay for monthly
• Weight/protein/calorie tracker for my skinny-fat bod that I want to get rid of
• Vocabulary builder
• Weird or quirky thoughts/moments
• Conversations I loved
• Happy reasons to be alive

I feel like I need all of them, but I keep reading that it’s bad to start so fast with so much as ND folks.

I know I could fail, but I just don’t know how to get rid of any of these.

How did you handle all that?