The Bullet Journal, as initially invented, isn’t a productivity system.
The Bullet Journal, as initially invented, is a disability aid as much as a cane, a wheelchair, or glasses.
The Bullet Journal was invented by a man with executive function issues to manage his neurodivergance without his life falling apart.
The reason I still use one a decade in is because it is a tool and support system that allows me to function in a world that is not built for me. I am praised for being “organized.” (Hint: Sure with appropriate supports. Anyone who knew me before I was about 40 knows better). But I often joke that if the task doesn’t find itself in my Bullet Journal, it will never be done.
I came of age in the late 1980s. Pushing through pain, difficulty and ignoring limits was the rhetoric of the day. The Bullet Journal method taught me that a lot of the “No Limits” rhetoric around achievement is total bullshit.
I am not a fantasy hero. I am a real person. I need more sleep than average. Chaos overwhelms me and can cause me to spin around in pointless circles. I do not and cannot keep my non-routine responsibilities in mind from moment to moment. I had a terrible habit of overcommitting to something that I “should” be able to do and then crashing for a few months.
It sucks as a way to live. You’re only productive in bursts this way and you’re often cleaning up a mess from crashing instead of actually accomplishing something new. You feel guilty about the recovery periods.
You have no chance of answering the real question, “How do I want to live?”
Using the Bullet Journal over the past ten years has taught me to stop that.
A lot of the discussion of a Bullet Journal talks about layouts, trackers, stencils, and other things. The thing is, that’s the not core of what a Bullet Journal is about. Ryder Carrol, the inventor of the system, put it best. “A Bullet Journal is a mindfulness practice disguised as a productivity system.”
And so it is.
It is the practice of the Bullet Journal that makes it work. You start thinking about your time in a far more realistic way. You have a Future collection that lets you think longer-term. That collection can then narrow in to what you want and need to address in your monthly collection. I added a weekly collection (my only real modification to the actual system) so that I could plan, week by week, what I wanted to do to work towards what I wanted done in a particular month.
Then, the day. This becomes the soul and focus of the Bullet Journal, which you do now.
In reality, the only time you have is now. Right now, in this moment you are reading a blog post. That’s what you’re accomplishing and how you are spending your time.
The Bullet Journal encourages you to curate your time. It encourages you to focus on now in the context of a much longer life. My now is writing this blog post. But there are more nows coming up today that I am not really thinking about. I don’t need to keep them in mind in any way while I write this because I have already thought about and written down what I want to do with the multiple nows of today. Those nows will include laundry and bike rides and prepping for next week, but after a decade of curating the now, I have a pretty good idea of what my energy really looks like, what is necessary to make sure my life runs comfortably, and what is, frankly, wishful thinking. As many of my nows as I need to today will include me with my feet up and zoning out to a book, or a video game or a craft project while my body and brain restores.
Ten years ago, I started screwing around with a Bullet Journal. Nothing too exciting and nothing too fancy. My first notebook was a spiral bound job my husband brought home from a conference. My first pen a ballpoint pen I found lying around.
Do I use the fancy Leuchtturm1917 dotted grid notebook with the fountain pen these days? I do. But they’re not important to the system, just fun to use. Do I ever use stickers and colored inks and stencils? Sometimes. But that’s just fun when I feel like it, not the core of the system.
The best and most useful Bullet Journals are often quite messy. My brother, in looking at my Bullet Journal during the family Beach Week, asked me how in the hell anyone can read that? Well, I can. That’s what counts.
A messy Bullet Journal is one that gets used. Allow yourself to have a messy Bullet Journal also means that you’re leaning into the system, which is remarkably forgiving.
Bad day where you couldn’t make yourself do anything? Tasks sit there quietly. When you review them, you get to decide – must I do them? Am I lying to myself about how much energy I have? Is this really important to me?
That last is important. Part of the system is being honest with yourself to CROSS OUT what you have decided isn’t important enough to DO.
There are disadvantages. If you are forgetful enough to need a Bullet Journal, one of the things you’re very likely to forget or leave behind somewhere is that Bullet Journal. Yes, I’ve had family mail me mine after having left it behind on a visit. Yes, I’ve asked my husband to take a picture of the current day’s page because I forgot to put it in my work bag. (There is a companion Bullet Journal app some people use as a backup. I have tried it, but it didn’t really stick for me. You might be different.)
But in life, things are very rarely totally positive or totally negative. The Bullet Journal system legitimately changed my life for the better.