Shooting your to dos with real bullets?
A selection of my diaries and planners over the past 7 years.
I think I may be a papyrophile. I love all things paper
and stationery. And I love notebooks and diaries especially.
Over the past few years I have been on a mission to find
The Perfect Diary. I’ve tried page-a-days, week-to-views and bullet journaling.
I’ve tried big and small. And they have all had their compelling pro’s and con’s.
Probably the idea that has struck me the most has been
that of the Bullet Journal. It is intended to be an “analog method for the
digital age that will help you track the past, order the present, and design
your future.” If you haven’t ever heard of a Bullet Journal, this video,
by Ryder Carroll (the creator of the “BuJo”) gives an overview. Some people
have taken their “BuJo’s” to the extreme – washi tape, brush pens, tracking to
the nth degree – which just points to its customisability. But at
the heart of it, its methodology is really simple and logical.
So why didn’t it consistently work for me?
Well, while I love the flexibility of a classic bullet
journal, my work means that I still need a space to plan appointments. With time slots. Ahead of time. And I enjoy having space to write down extra notes
and lists in between, but I don’t enjoy having to set up my bullet journal as I
go along.
I’m not writing off Bullet Journals completely, I may
well circle back to them one day. But for this stage of my life, I need some
kind of a balanced combination. So I created it – enter: The Equilibrium
Planner.
The Equilibrium Planner doesn’t force the use of bullets,
but I do highly recommend them. They provide a means of subtly, yet clearly
distinguishing between every kind of note you jot down – and showing level of
completion! These are the bullets that I have settled on (shown on the index
page of the Equilibrium Planner), but of course they are totally adaptable – do
whatever suits you!
Tasks, errands and appointments are shown using squares, circles and triangles respectively. As you complete a task, you colour the square in, so at a glance you can see how you are progressing. I’ve sometimes even been so hooked on showing my progress that I’ve divide the squares into quarters! It beats crossing tasks off as you go along, because there are days when you’ve slogged at something for hours, and yet you’re not finished it, so you still can’t quite cross it off. Completion bias (the tendency to feel driven to tick things off a list and complete tasks) is a very real phenomenon, and the use of bullets can help fulfil that compulsion in a healthier way, since the focus is on progress as part of completion. A Marie Forleo mantra springs to mind: “progress not perfection”.
Then, at the end of the week (or day, or month, whatever time period you’re using) you go through your list and make sure that there are no empty bullets. No, I don’t mean you have to have completed everything in the allocated time frame! We are human, life happens. But this process will help you make sure no task gets forgotten. So – look at each task in turn. If it’s completed, give yourself a pat on the back. If it’s partially completed, give yourself half a pat – put an arrow through and transfer it to the next week so that you can aim to complete it then. If it is blank, you either need to migrate it (put an arrow through it and write it on the next week) or cancel it (put a line through it). So in principle, at the end of a page, you should have no blank bullets, everything should be either coloured in, arrowed or crossed through.
To give you an idea of how this can be put into action, here is a picture of a section of my planner from 2022…
By the way…I don’t only use bullets in my Equilibrium
Planner – I use them everywhere. Even on my fridge calendar that I use for meal
planning and keeping track of what’s in the freezer! (If you are interested in
my tips about meal planning, have a squizz at this Instagram post).
So I hope this has given you some ideas on how to use
bullets. And here’s to you shooting through your to do list!