My Bullet Journal presentation from the 2017 Moonlight & Magnolias -- part 1

Hi, all! I did my presentation on Bullet Journals at this year's Moonlight & Magnolias (thanks very much to Ryder Carroll for permission) and it went over really well!

Several GRW members who were unable to attend expressed an interest in learning more about Bullet Journals, so I'll be blogging my presentation over the next few weeks. Welcome to part one of "Bullet Journals: Getting Control of Your Life and Your Writing with B. Snow."

follow along with the handy-dandy outline

First off, the What: What is a Bullet Journal?

A bullet journal is a highly customizable organization system.

(Yes, that sentence deserves to be in bold, purple, different font. I will come back to it several times over the course of these posts.)

The official Bullet Journal site calls the Bullet Journal "The analog system for the digital age."

That might sound complicated. To translate for non-science types like me: 

"The Bullet Journal is a notebook you write in."

my first BuJo (Yoobi composition book from Target)
 and my second and current BuJo, received at a Dreamspinner Press Authors Workshop

index from first journal, recent pages from current journal

The bullet journal (or BuJo, for short) is a notebook you write in, but there is a system to it, created and trademarked by Ryder Carroll, a digital product designer. Yes, a guy who can actually do technology, and yet he chose to go low-tech with the bullet journal.

[Note: if an app or electronic planner, or traditional planner works for you, you probably don't need a bullet journal. :) But! You can combine your bullet journal with calendar or planner apps and reminder alarms to help you get things done. And now there's a Bullet Journal companion app with reference materials and reminders to help you get the most out of your BuJo.]

One reason to go low-tech is that we remember things better when we write them by hand than we do when we type them.  

Writing by hand takes some time and some effort. Part of the bullet journal system is doing things with intention, reflecting on what you're doing so you can focus on the things that make your life better and get rid of the things that just clutter up your days.

I don't think it's a coincidence that the past couple of years have seen interest surging in bullet journals, Marie Kondo's Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, facebook gratitude posts, and hygge. They all have to do with focus, intention, and making one's life simpler and better. 

As you write things in your bullet journal, think about 

     a) what tasks/goals you want to achieve,

     b) how you'll achieve them, and

     c) WHY you want to achieve them, i.e. if they are adding to the quality of your life.

So yes, you'll spend some time writing. But I hope this writing will end up helping you declutter your mind and your life, so you can focus on the things that will make your life simpler and better.

There is one more bonus to the low-techness of the bullet journal: it will help you fall asleep for two reasons. I'll discuss the first reason in my next blog post. The second reason is that bullet journalling before bed means no electronics at night. Clinical psychologist Anne Bartolucci, who specializes in behavioral sleep medicine, gave a great presentation a few years ago at M&M on sleep problems. One of the things she mentioned is that blue light pouring into your eyes within two hours of going to bed will make it harder to fall asleep. Guess where blue light comes from? Pretty much every electronic item you own that has a screen. Yes, you can set your tablet or kindle app to sepia, but it would be even better to shut off all electronics and look at paper.  

In the next blog post I'll talk about why I started a bullet journal, including that first reason a bullet journal will help you fall asleep.

Just out of curiosity, were you at my M&M presentation? If so, what came up that was helpful? What questions did you have that I didn't cover, that I might be able to talk about in these blog posts?

Thanks for reading! 

B