CARVE OUT PERSONAL SPACE
I never thought it was all that important, this personal space. I grew up in a three bedroom townhouse that I shared with my parents and four siblings, so we were pretty much piled on top of each other most of the time. Iʻm used to that. Iʻm used to noise and chaos and sharing the TV and doing homework on the couch instead of at a desk.
Sharing spaces is familiar to me.
And yet sitting at my desk, which is only my desk, is comforting. Itʻs like returning home after a long trip or taking a shower after a sweaty, arduous hike. Itʻs like this scene from one of my favorite movies, Centerstage (with a very young Zoe Saldana):
My desk is one of my sacred spaces. Here, I create, I work, I relax, I read, I drift off to sleep with my neck at an uncomfortable angle. I need the space to store my pens and stickers and Post Its so that I can set about the fun and comforting business of building my templates each day and thoughtfully planning what I need and want to do. This may take only a handful of minutes or it might take an hour, but the bujo forces me to
CARVE OUT PERSONAL TIME
on a regular basis. Every weekday I begin my day with my journal, and every day ends the same way. Itʻs Me Time in which I check in with myself. Having a designated space for Work or Writing or Creating or Journaling forces me to switch my brain to the task at hand. So if Iʻm at my desk, Iʻm there to write or pay some bills or doodle, and itʻs time to separate myself from the daily chores, even if only for fifteen minutes. One of the most important functions of my bujo, though is to
ROOT MYSELF IN MY INTENT
My journal isnʻt (merely) a list of errands and reminders. This journal is a way for me to guide myself toward my own happiness. I know that sounds so New Agey. But when I write my To Dos and my Daily and Weekly Goals, itʻs done deliberately with consideration and resolve. Sometimes the To Do list is unreasonably but necessarily long, and having it written down ahead of time, I feel more prepared and less stressed. These errands and goals are no longer simple tasks-- I see them as steps I need to take to get to where I want to be.
When I wake up on a day Iʻm not working at either job (which is rare, and therefore too exciting), Iʻm so worried Iʻll squander the day fighting between two separate impulses: to catch up on the household chores or to drool in front of a binge session of The Great British Bake Off. My bujo affords me the opportunity to make time for both-- sometimes even on the same day! Youʻd think the scheduling and lists would make for a dull, rigid life, but it isnʻt. Bullet journaling actually liberates me. Thereʻs less indecision, less internal struggles, greater presence when Iʻm doing the things Iʻm doing.
BONUS REASON
Bullet journaling takes practice in both its creation and execution. You figure out what kind of book (hardcover? softcover?) and the template (what kind of prompts will help you meet your daily, short-term, and long-term goals?), and that changes depending on your goals. But you also practice doing the actual work of honing your intent and actually working toward those goals. For me, itʻs learning to find what makes me happy and then doing what makes me happy. Itʻs shedding so much of the "supposed tos" and replacing it with "want tos" without all the guilt I might usually summon.
But the really beautiful thing about bullet journaling is that itʻs forgiving. You decide what it looks like. There is no judgment (unless you check out how other people do such creative things with their bujos and you mourn your lack of creative execution, so advice: donʻt do that). If your last entry was a chilly Sunday in December and the next page is a hot and sweaty July Friday, you couldnʻt tell because you donʻt have those skipped, empty pages of the typical planner. No empty pages glaring at you.
Iʻve been sounding like a broken record about two things lately: eating the damn frog (ask Meredith), and bullet journaling. In my unsolicited opinion, you should probably do both.
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