- Hi everyone my name is Matt
and welcome to another Bullet
Journal Productivity video.
In this episode I'm getting
into what is always a very
popular topic here on the
channel and across YouTube,
and it's getting ready for the new year.
Now this is going to be a little
bit different than my past,
like, annual planning videos,
you can check out them
in the past two years in
the description below,
but in this one I'm showing you how
I'm doing a six month
layout in my bullet journal
and how I am planning
out all of the events,
how I'm doing a future log
in context with the daily,
weekly, monthly spread,
how I'm using the index,
all of those things I'm going
to get into in this video.
Now what you're not
going to see as much of
in this video I'm going to
have a separate video for it,
is how to plan out your goals.
Now that may sound a little odd to you for
like an annual planning video,
but since I have a system that
I've been consistent with,
a layout and a spread
that I'm comfortable with,
and have been able to work
on for several months now,
what I'm going to do for
really the first time
is do an expanded, like
I said, six month layout,
so I can use the future log in context
with the actual planning that
I'm going to do on a daily,
weekly, monthly basis
for the first six months.
I think that's all that
I really need to cover
in the intro for this.
I know that what you like seeing
is the actual like bullet journal layout
from the overhead shot.
So go ahead and grab some coffee,
get your bullet journal ready,
and let's go ahead and dive in.
I'm starting 2020 with
the Clear Habit Journal,
and while I do have a complete review
of this journal on my channel
that you can check out up here,
I still want to go over
like really quickly
some of the reasons that I
chose this particular journal
to start the new year rather
than a completely blank
one like the Baron Fig Confidant,
or a kind of structured
one like the self journal,
or the full focus planner.
What I like about the Clear Habit Journal
is that it has a few things
that that I would use any way
that save me the time
of kind of recreating
it on a daily basis, weekly,
monthly, whatever it is,
start out that, it has an index, again,
the Baron Fig Confidant
is probably my go to
blank bullet journal,
but it is totally blank.
It does have an index, it has the
one line per day journaling
that I've liked doing,
which also frees up some more
space on my monthly layout,
which I'll show you in a few minutes.
also has page numbers,
which you can't really see,
but just trust me, it
does, and that's nice.
It also has, even though, I'll talk about
the habit trackers in
this, but it also has pages
upon pages of more habits
than you could possibly track.
Again, that is something that I cover
in more detail in the
clear journal review.
The other thing that I really like
are the pages signifiers for where the
pages halved and thirded,
halved-ed and thirded-ed.
That's not how you say it
but you get what I'm saying.
I would normally mark this out myself
and the only reason I've put these here
are so you can see the
indicators themselves
a little more specifically and directly,
but they're just these light
like plus or hashmark
indicators to show you
where the page is
sectioned off and split up.
So those are the main
reasons that I chose this,
what I call a semi structured planner,
like Clear Habit Journal.
I did a little bit of doodling on it,
just 2020 right here one of
my favorite quotes right here,
so I used these metallic Sharpies to make,
to make this on the dark
paper, looks real nice.
I also have the year right year
on the spine of the journal.
I haven't named this one yet,
one last thing before I get too deep
into explaining the
journal is that I do have
a bullet journal basic
series that walks you
through every piece of
setting up your Bujo.
So, whether that's the
index, the monthly layout,
the daily, the weekly,
preview, review all of this,
I'm going to give you a
big picture overview of it
in this video but then there is a specific
bullet journal basic series
that will be linked on the
end screen of this video,
and I go through everything.
So if you have specific
questions make sure
that you watch those videos as well.
We'll start with the index and the reason
for that is something that I've struggled
with in the past is proper indexing.
Like here's last year's Leuchtturm.
And you can see that I
did a pretty good job
of it through May but then completely fell
off the wagon and didn't
do apparently anything
in the rest of the year.
One of the reasons I believe
that I struggle with that,
and indexing in general,
is because the future log
doesn't feel like it's in context
with anything else that
I'm doing for my spreads
for the rest of the year.
So what I'm doing, to
keep myself accountable
for both the index consistent planning,
and a contextual future
log is that I laid out
the first six months of
my year, pre-planned,
kind of pre laid out
in the bullet journal.
Now, I haven't filled out
every single month yet,
I need to do that over
the next couple of days.
But what each month looks like,
just as a big picture view here,
is that I have the monthly layout here,
and then in this column
is the day of the month
and the corresponding day of the week.
So January 1st, New Year's
Day, W for Wednesday.
come across and I'm still
using the simple habit tracker,
again keeping everything in
context of movement, journaling,
reading, just an X to signify
that I have done those.
And then tracking my mood
right here, a.m. and p.m. mood,
and then where I used to have
the, where I used to have a,
one line journal with my monthly layout,
see where I didn't do
it very well here, where
I used to have one line
journal in my monthly layout,
now, again with Clear I
already have that back here
on the one line per day section,
and I can reference this page eight.
What I would do is say P,
eight, one line journal.
Again, that gives me
more on the referencing,
I can also say, this is page 24,
come back, right here,
to the appropriate page
and I can see January month page 24.
So this is how I'll be like
referencing and threading,
just an example of it right here.
Same thing for February month page 42.
I'm also referencing this here
in the index month by month.
So here's my monthly layout.
There are, as I've already
mentioned habit trackers,
but it's kind of the same thing,
I want to keep everything
in context right here.
So, these are the three core
habits that I track every day
that I know correlate
very highly to happiness
and lack of stress, if I'm
doing additional habit trackers
then I would do that
just in the habit tracker
section of Clear.
So what I'm doing with
the this extra section
of the monthly layout
is putting my primary
projects and objectives.
So, product tours and onboarding,
launch challenge and community,
and then a bullet journal basics series,
which is already in progress
but just some additional
notes right here I'll talk
about this in a minute.
So going into a week
ahead I would put the days
of the week right up here.
I referenced the previous
week in the past years
bullet journal that I
just migrated away from,
and then I would put
my goals and objectives
for the week on this page.
Each day, then, is split into half a page
and again I can reference
this really easily
and clear because they
have a little plus sign
right here to section off
that half of the page.
And I'll be putting in, like say 11 a.m.
is when we have our Podia team meeting.
So what I do is at the top
I put in all of my events,
agenda items meetings,
and then a few lines down
I'll start to put in my task for the day.
So data review is always
something that I do on Monday.
Now again, just to reference it,
I do have a daily bullet
journal layout video
in the BuJo basic series so I'm not going
to get too deep into it right here,
but half a page for each day.
And then a quarter page for the weekends.
That is everything that I have.
So I went through every week
for the first six months,
and laid all of this out
so you can see for January,
then I go into the 13th, 19th, those days,
20 through 26, those days.
And then all the way through February 2nd,
so then I go through those
days, I will get into February
a little bit right here, but
then that next page, page 42,
is where I started to build
in that monthly layout.
What's important about this
layout and the structure
for me going into 2020
is that it allows me
to kind of easily work on the things that
I've struggled with in the bullet journal,
and that is indexing,
that's the future long,
that is keeping notes,
because I have everything
already structured, laid out.
So if I have an event in March,
I don't have to put it in a future log
that I haven't been
very good at looking at,
I don't have to try and
index it where again,
I haven't been very good at doing that.
It allows me to just
go to that day, ahead,
and say this is what I'm doing
at the beginning of March.
So I went through again,
and did this for every month
for the first six months.
Now why would I do it
for the first six months,
not for the entire 12 months?
To see how many I could fit.
I think if I did, like say
one bullet journal for,
like, every six months I think that would
be a really good use of everything.
The other thing that
I didn't want to smash
everything like as many
days as I could into this
is because after six months, other than
it being a nice splitting
point for the year,
is here I'm at page 138 and now
I can use the rest of
the pages in this journal
for notes collections and brainstorms.
So what I'll do, this
is where I'll use a lot
more like unstructured notetaking,
collections, brainstorms,
in order to reference back to the pages
to the events, to the tasks that I have.
Because something that I've struggled with
for also for a couple of years
with normal bullet
journaling is where to put
my collections and notes,
I might do things like
say here on page 82,
just notes and random tasks,
but like, it feels a little,
it feels it really messes with the flow
of the entire bullet journal, and it left
a lot of like unused pages,
like here is the books
collection right here
and it was not even half a page,
because then I started using just,
I had to get to the next
page to do, like the next,
the next bit of layout.
And so I wasn't really sure,
I never felt great, I
never found a good way
to have a collection or
like a series of notes
that didn't get in the
way of my normal flow.
So now I have this entire
six months section.
It's not all filled out yet,
but I have this entire six
months section right here.
So this is the first
six months of the year
and then I get into everything
that I can do for notes.
And so what I would
probably do right here,
again for January, January is on page 138.
So now,
and say these are January
notes and brainstorms,
what I can do to reference
them, is they begin other,
page 138, I can also come to
January itself, first one,
the monthly layout, and write
down here, page 138, notes.
So page 138 for notes,
collections, whatever,
if I end up with a specific
page for a collection,
I can still add that
into the index easily.
But here, I'm referencing page
138 for notes and collections
and I know when I'm
looking at it, like okay,
where I've been making those for January,
things, is page 138.
The other thing that I can do
is as I'm making these notes,
say like, add videos to
Ace 2020 course, page 25,
for goals specific objectives.
That brings me back here,
where it's cross referenced
page 138 notes for Ace.
The other thing that I
can do like let's say
on Saturday the 11th is,
I want to film Ace videos.
Okay?
So I want to do this, and I could say
little arrow right there,
that's just my own indicator.
Could say notes,
list on page 138.
So then I'm coming back
here, over to page 138,
videos to make.
So then I have my list of videos for Ace
that I'm going to shoot.
And I can listen here, and I also know
I can put like a parentheses right there
page 29 task.
I could also if I wanted
to, rather than page 29,
I could also say, January 11th.
Or I could do both.
Because now, basically what I have,
and let's talk about the
future log a little bit
is basically now I have
a contextual future log.
I already know that I have
a day laid out for it,
which does give it that
kind of structured feel
that a self journal, or a
full focus planner might have.
But coming in to say
like the march layout,
I know on March 5th, which is a Thursday,
I am speaking at a conference.
So now I already have this planned out,
if I want to know what I'm doing in March,
I can just go ahead and
turn to the March layout
instead of having a March layout
in addition to a March future log.
Now, what writer would say
in the bullet journal method
is that the future log
informs the monthly layout
when you're ready to get there,
but I have just always struggled with that
and I wanted to try and
I've really been excited
about doing this in a pre
planned monthly layout
so that I can use it as
a contextual future log.
Now you may think to yourself,
and it's a very reasonable thought of,
well Matt, why don't you just go ahead
and get a structured like daily planner,
like you would the self journal
or the full focus planner,
which are both very good like structured,
goal centric, habits centric planners.
The reason that I didn't
want to do that personally
is that even though those are
structured like from a daily,
weekly, monthly standpoint, I have my own,
as you've seen, upgraded
rapid logging system
that I use, that I feel
really comfortable with,
that allows me to get a lot of information
in a relatively condensed
section of pages.
So now we can see how all
of this ties together.
I go to the index right here and see that
January starts on page
24, I could go to April,
which starts on page 80,
and I can look at and say like okay
what do I have during this month,
what are my projects
and objectives, habits,
the way that I'm tracking those,
and then I can also use the different days
to say like okay I have
something on, you know,
like say February 17th, oh wow,
I really didn't mean to do
that, but how nice is that?
So, in the week of February 17th,
I already have that here and
I can put in a specific event.
So, if I have, like say for example,
I'm speaking on Thursday the fifth.
The second, this is
the week of the second.
and so the Thursday
would be right down here,
even though I haven't
filled it out just yet,
and say, you know, March
Five, and I can put
down all the speaking details
that I need right here.
I can also cross reference
back here into my notes
to add any additional like flight hotel,
or like speaking arrangement information.
So you see how I'm referencing
everything back and forth?
The full six month layout gives
me a contextual future log
that I can reference, index,
put events on, and be ready for.
The one line per day journal
works really well for me
and I can see everything again,
kind of together in context
for the different months,
see how things are going.
And then I'm using the
final, basically 50 pages,
of the journal for my notes,
collections, and brainstorms.
So that's how I am planning
to use the Clear Habit Journal
for the first six months of
2020 to keep myself on task
to better plan for future events
and stay in context with them and for them
as I plan and keep myself accountable
for the things that I
need to do for the people
that I need to take care of,
the projects that I want to accomplish,
and the way that I want to live my life.
I hope this video gave
you some really good ideas
about how you could structure
your bullet journal,
how you could lay things out,
whether it is just a day at a time,
which is great for getting
started or for like, say,
a week, a month, or a quarter at a time.
What's important to
remember is that you should
find a bullet journal system
and process that works for you,
that works for your life,
that works for where
you are right now in terms of being
a consistent bulletin journalist.
And if that's the case, then
I would say keep it simple,
keep it small, maybe
just a couple of bullets,
tasks, notes, meetings, whatever it is,
every single day just so that
you can be consistent with it,
and then that will help
you build motivation
and build momentum towards
doing it over a long
period of time, which
coincidentally is a great way
to build any habits in the new year.
Now you may have been
watching this and thought,
well, can you give me a
little bit more specifics
about this part of the bullet journal?
And that's a really good question.
So what you'll see in the inscreen
and again in the
description for this video
is that I have a bullet
journal basics series
that's going on right now,
I'm kind of interrupting it
for this 2020 planning video,
that talks all about the index,
the opening pages, the daily layout,
the monthly layout, weekly
spreads, reviews, previews,
all of that so everything
that you would want to know
in very specific detail
about the bullet journal
is going to be covered
in this basic series
that's linked in the endcard,
and in the description below.
So check that out if you're
new to bullet journaling
or you just want some more
context on what the thing is.
Thanks again for watching everyone
and thanks for the support over the past,
however long you've been watching,
whether this is your first video,
or your 100th video
watching on this channel,
I'm extremely grateful as we go into 2020,
the channel turns three in February,
and probably going to pass
40,000 subscribers before then.
So just incredible, thank you so much,
and yeah again, from
the bottom of my heart,
I can wait for 2020 and
seeing all the cool things
that are going to happen for all of us,
and how we can plan,
and execute, and focus
on the things that matter to us,
using a bullet journal, using
other analog methods to just,
yeah, have the best,
have the best year ever.
So, thank you so much for watching,
I'll see you in the next video.
Bye.
(upbeat electronic music)
