Welcome to the Planner Palace Podcast, a podcast hosted by two
true Planner Palace. My name is Mark or Mark your
pages. And I'm Jess or Jessie Curran,
and as we talked about in our last episode, this is Part 2 of
Community questions because you guys just had too many
questions, too many great questions.
So we had to make sure that we got to as many of them as
possible before we get into it. Thank you so much for giving us
your thoughts about your 2025 Planner lineup.
It's really cool to see what you guys are thinking about using or
possibly retiring from your lineups.
I know that I have a tendency to just kind of add and add and
add. So it's always nice to get the
reminder to be like, hey, maybe I'd just go down to like one
notebook or a handful of notebooks rather than like 2
armfuls of notebooks. Well, Jess, let's go ahead and
get right into the questions. I'm going to pick the first one.
This is like brass tacks. You know, we're getting to the
drama early. We're not even going to tease
this one here. This is a question that says I
know you both have your favorite notebook brands, but has there
ever been one that you've decided never to use ever again?
Yes, Oh dear. I think that I, I literally a
couple months ago, I think possibly one or two had a video
go up on the channel about like 5 notebooks that I just did not
like and then three that I actually really enjoyed.
That one was specifically for memberships though, because I
don't need to spread my negativity around to everybody.
But yes, there have been some that I've decided I shan't be
using again. But also like, I also feel like
there are uses for pretty much any notebook.
So for instance, like LT19 Seventeens, I know that they're
not great for everyday journal, but I wouldn't not use them
again. If I found a specific use where
I just wanted like black ink on paper and I didn't mind the
ghosting and stuff, then like sure, I'd use them for everyday
journaling. No, that's not going to be one
for me. One in particular that didn't
vibe so well was actually a Taifosi notebook, which is
interesting because they're kind of fast becoming one of my kind
of preferred brands. But this particular notebook
they had and I think, you know, the 1 was so smudgy.
I don't know what the paper was coated with, but nothing would
eye on it. Not all of their notebooks are
like that, it was just this one particular one they came out
with. But that notebook definitely
would not be one that I would use in the everyday.
What do you think Mark? What about your not preferred
notebooks? Yeah, so that is one that came
to mind was that one. I haven't tried any of the newer
ones. And you actually told me that it
has changed from that because we had a lot of long conversations
of it. I was like, Oh my goodness, that
was just like you had to work so hard.
I was putting like smudge paper between every page.
Like this is not working out for me.
I would say just like cheap notebooks.
Early on in my bullet journaling life, I was grabbing just
notebooks from Michael's or the craft store or whatever it was
because they were like a dime a dozen.
And at that point I didn't know anything about paper quality.
I didn't know anything about brands.
Literally after a month of using it, it was falling out of the
binding and it was horrible. And now that I have much nicer
notebooks, I just know that I'll never go back to using crap.
And no offense if that's the journal that you use, I'm just
saying like for B didn't work out too well.
I'm sorry, a little harsh. There was my response on that
one. Yeah, wow, really coming out
shots and shots fired here. But it's funny because like, one
of my favorite notebooks is a cheap notebook.
It's this like little kind of like soft spiral notebook or
whatever. It's supposed to be good for
people who are left-handed. I mean, not me, but like, I find
it just very enjoyable to write in.
But I think it's because it's cheap that I feel like I can
just be very free and messy and scrappy with it.
And I only ever use it for like, jotting down things kind of
like, you know, mentally processing thoughts and stuff,
trying to work out what I want in my planner.
If I'm doing a planner setup and stuff, I'll start in the scrappy
notebook. So then it doesn't feel like I'm
kind of quote, quote, wasting the pages of my nicer notebook.
Keeping on the topic of supplies, though, and notebooks
that we would or wouldn't use, would you ever consider using a
hobenichi? This person in particular was
thinking about supplementing their journal lineup with that
one. Yeah, so I did use a hobenichi
once. It was an undated one.
It was is a tecco I believe. I think when I did my review I
called it a techno because I thought it sounded super cool
but they were like is it got a deck out?
I think it's. A hold of.
Pitcher, a teacher. OK, yeah.
So I can't pronounce the words. And I kind of liked it, but it
was undated. And I think everyone who has
them uses like a dated version of it.
And I really like that. I've used the night owl planners
which are somewhat similar but more like US based, you know
like I don't know just it works with the time that I do.
I don't like like the military timing and schedules because
that's not how I use time. So if it's like 12 then 12345
versus 13141516. I don't like that I like it more
basic how I like to use it. I also just think that there are
so many different versions of it and you can really make it your
own. In last episode, someone asked
about like customizing their planners or their journals and
making it their own. I think that's really great way
to do that. You can buy the different covers
for it. You can buy the lineup or the
the layout of it that you like and works best for you and try
different things. So I definitely would if I found
the right one, but I would have to get over the ghosting.
They're just very thin, but good paper.
And I don't know. I do it again every time I every
time I say ghost, I have like a, a reaction.
My body is just like, oh, you don't like it?
Stop saying that you're going to do it.
You don't like it. And I just it's weird.
I'm, I'm noticing now that after 2 episodes of doing it, every
time I talk about ghosting, I literally it's like a ghost is
in the room. I get chills.
Is the ghosting in the room with us?
It is. It's all the journals I'll never
use ever again. I've been very interested in the
Hobonichi kind of like series. I don't know what they call it,
lineup range, range, there's the word, but I don't think that I
would personally use it. I have been so super curious,
like so very tempted to get one and try it out.
And especially because you see like the Hobonichi creators
online with their very like pretty small handwriting with
their very, very black ink pens and they put their little
stickers on, but like only little ones because you don't
want to bulk it up too much. It's very, very cute.
But it's also, I know not the way that I plan.
Like I like to have the flexibility of a blank notebook
with dots not fully blank. Come on, can't write in a
straight line to save myself. But I don't think that the style
of the planner would actually work for how I like to plan.
I also know that, like you, ghosting is not my not my
friend. While I do like ghosting when
you're just doing black ink on paper, which is probably what I
would do with a hope and Ichi, I don't use that often enough to
really warrant getting one for myself.
But I do like the idea of supplementing your lineup with a
pre printed planner. I think that that idea in
general can totally get behind. I have every so often thought
about possibly how I could use a pre printed planner in my
lineup. It wouldn't be for my everyday
journal, but I don't really have like a an immediate need for
anything that I would use it for.
So it's kind of like a curiosity point that I don't really need
to use right now because my journaling purpose doesn't
really align. With absolutely, this next
question, Jess actually reminded me of the last episode we had
because you talked about your 2025 lineup and your R&D
journals and all of this. And I saw this question.
I was like, we have to ask this one because I'm sure people
watch your videos of 100 different ways to do a thing.
I watch your videos of 100 different ways and I say to
myself, like, how in the world do you create all of these
different ideas? This question specifically I'm
going to join my question with their question is how do you
have time for all of the spreads in journaling and how in the
hell do you come up with 100 different ideas for something
ever? Well, the, the easy answer is I
don't sleep very much when I was like still a teacher and stuff.
They're like, how do you find the time to do all of this kind
of stuff? And I'm just like, I don't
prioritize myself care. That's how I do it.
Do not do what I do now that I do work for myself though and I
have a little bit more flexibility in terms of how I
schedule my time. I try and restrain myself to
waking hours or typical waking hours for doing journaling
content. And I'm getting slowly getting
better and not working in the evenings though we are in the
late up to the end of year. So I know that that's not going
to hold like there are going to be evenings that I'm working on
them. But as was mentioned, this is my
job. I work for myself as a content
creator who makes journaling content.
So my days are very much filled, especially around the periods
where I'm making those very big idea videos.
They just filled with me sitting at my desk making layout after
layout after layout. So the way that I am able to use
my time in that kind of like lends itself to being able to
make as many pages as I do. Not necessarily something that
everybody has time for, though I can understand that.
When I was a teacher, it was very much like just using any
available time in my evenings that wasn't spent doing teacher
related stuff, doing stuff for the channel, making content and
things like that. Neglecting my well-being.
Not a good time nowadays. If I were doing it not as a job,
if I was still teaching, I wouldn't be a content creator
anymore. That was kind of the, the
ultimatum, all the tomato that I gave myself.
It's like, OK, you're going to, you're going to do 1 because you
can't do both and do both of them to the level that you
really want to do them at. So it's like, OK, if it's going
to be teaching versus content creating, which one's going to
win out? I'm like, I'm going to give it,
I'm going to give it a shot. I can always go back to teaching
if I wanted to, But it's like you're kind of on a, you built
the train up, you've got some momentum with this content
creating gig that you're just going to see how that rides out
and still riding the train. So that's good.
Let's knock on wood and make sure that that keeps happening.
Yeah, I can't imagine in a planner world without you in it.
And that's just saying that to blow smoke, like I really mean
that. You're such a part of it.
You're this cornerstone of just creativity and good vibes and
like community and all of that. I'm glad you chose content
creation and it's working out for you because I would be real
sad if you chose teaching over this just because you have so
many amazing ideas. And I know exactly what you mean
about how you use that time because I'm on the opposite end
of this where this is a hobby for me that feels like a second
job. And my advice is how do you have
time? Is that you actually time block
and you make the time you want for it.
It's like a hobby for me. So if I played golf on a regular
basis, I would make the time and block that time out to go and do
that thing. Or if I liked movies, I would
block out that time to go watch a new movie.
That's how I do it with my planner creation.
I do it before work. Sometimes if I have time over
lunch, I might do recorded video or do a thing.
Or if we're just sitting around in the evenings watching TVI
have a another notebook I use for just ideas.
I'm just sketching out different things.
So it's about finding the time and time that you want to use
for something that you enjoy. If you really like it, you'll
make time for it. That's how I look at it.
No, I completely agree with that.
I know that one of the videos we shared on the channel a little
while ago was a flip through of my friend's reading journal
setup because she does excellent things in her reading journal.
And one of the comments that came out was like, Oh, well, she
obviously like doesn't have a life because this is all she
must do with her time. And it's like, no, this is, this
is her primary hobby. Like reading and reading,
journaling is something that is important to her and that she
values. So she makes time in her day,
sets aside time in her day to do those things.
Now, if we're thinking about journaling in general, you know,
trying to make time for that and all of that kind of thing, You
don't necessarily have to make as much time for it as I do
because I said I'm out here making like 100 layout idea
videos and stuff on a semi regular basis.
You do not need to have the 6-7 or whatever hours a day that I
dedicate to my craft, but finding some kind of pockets of
time in amongst your schedule. They don't have to be all at
once as well. Sprinkle them throughout your
day, do a 5 minute here and there.
It all adds up and you'll be able to do a lot of different
things in your journal that you might not otherwise have thought
you could on. Your question of like how I come
up with ideas is literally like a lot of me sitting here just
racking my brain and what else is there?
I see this just like a big brainstorming session.
It would be the same thing like what I do at work when we're
trying to think up a new feature for a product that we're
building. It's just you're throwing ideas
out there thinking about how you use it, using a lot of that same
mental methodology on coming up with ideas and things like that.
So I half joke asking that question.
I'm just, I had a hard time. I put out a video a week or two
ago with like 3 vertical weekly ideas and I had a really hard
time being like, are these different enough to even
validate making a video with them combined?
And when I see your videos of like 30-5 different ways to do
this, it's just like, damn, like it's amazing.
I don't mean it in a negative way when I say like, how do you
do it? I'm just always just like damn,
that's awesome that you can generate that many ideas and
execute on them too. Yeah, I think it also comes from
just like living in the journaling space as much as I do
because like a lot of the content that I'm consuming
online, whether that be like YouTube, Instagram, whatever
else that's journaling related, I also take a very kind of like
problem solution approach to it. So it's like, OK, well, if this
is the kind of like area of life that people are trying to make
journaling layouts around, and what kind of reasons would they
have for setting up layouts? What kind of like issues are
they trying to solve? What kind of things are they
trying to capture in terms of information?
And how can we set that up in terms of different layout ideas?
It's a fun like kind of problem solving game keeping on the kind
of content creation or train of things.
One question we have is how do you keep motivated to create
content? I think for me it's about
finding the fun in it. So as someone who's creating
content and sharing it, I, I, I see them as two different things
too. Like if you're creeping your
bullet journal for yourself and using it versus what you and I
are doing and others are treating content and then
sharing that. I think for me, it's about
finding what's fun about it. I think the reason that I've
been able to keep up with it is because the content I'm creating
the bullet journal, I'm creating my weekly spreads.
I'm using that for work. So there's an immediate use for
it. I'm literally creating it to use
it right away versus just in my other journals just for ideas.
It's kind of a sketch of an idea of something I might use in the
future. I think that's one way to do it.
I think if you're also so using it as just content creation and
you're out there is finding new ways to do it, as many people
hated reels and creating those and like trying to jump on that
train. I freaking love it.
I think that's so fun. I think it's so creative.
Like I love nothing more than like finding a funny sound that
I found someone else that's not in the journal community and
being like, oh, OK, how can I take that and use that for our
space, right? And that to me, it's actually
very similar, kind of like your idea generation for your
planner, things where I'm using my brain a bit differently,
where I'm like, OK, here's a thing or an idea or a trend.
Now, how do I make this work for planning Bullet Journal,
stationary. And luckily we fit into a lot of
stereotypes in this community and we all do it.
So it's easy to talk about spending your money on things
you don't want, getting it out of the notebook, buying another
pen, you know, whatever that might be, or just sharing things
that you love. I love talking about exciting
things that I'm buying for myself.
New pens, new ink, you know, getting a box of stationary or a
subscription box. It's always just fun to do.
So do what excites you and keep having fun with it.
And then make sure that you're doing it for yourself, even if
you're sharing with other people as well.
Yeah, I think that having some kind of like purpose or reason
to come back to is probably what kept me going at the start.
Because for me with starting content creation, like, you
know, before making it my job and before I was even making any
money off it or anything like that, it was just an, I have
ideas and I want to give to other people.
Like I want to help other people with their journaling because I
have so many ideas for journaling.
But I think that like not necessarily saying that you're
creating in the journaling space or like creating in whichever
space you're creating in. It's like, what is your reason
for creating it? Is it so that you have a
creative outlet? Because then you can really just
lean into that. It's not about the numbers and
the followers and all of that kind of thing.
It's you being able to use up, expend your creative energy.
If it gets to a point where like me, it's like I create so I can
continue to put food on the table.
It's a little bit different. I mean, you know, there's also
obviously the, the other aspect of it that it's just something I
enjoy. It's something that I like, you
know, enjoy getting to create the layouts and connect with our
community and all of that kind of thing.
My big purpose being like, I have ideas and I want to share
them and I want to help other people.
Like there are other ways to do that as well outside of creating
content. But because I enjoy it so much,
that's kind of like what I guess helps push me forward with it.
Let's keep on this same trailer. There's another great question
from someone who asked about how we learned to record and edit
audio and video for YouTube. Trial and error.
It's really it's a really unsophisticated answer practice.
Oh, we love that one. But honestly, that's kind of
what it is like the first videos you make suck, like it's just
what it is. Like we talked about it in the
last episode, but Jesses little rabbit noises of at the end of
every sentence, which is sort of grating.
Like you make the video, you pick it apart politely and then
you do better in the next one. We've been doing this for a
couple of years now, so we've kind of come up with our own
editing styles and all of this. But if you actually want to like
learn, learn how to do it, there's a lot of really great
low risk ways to do that. One of them is YouTube.
Literally just take the editing software you're going to be
using like once you've found what you want to use and then
just do like, you know, I movie Maker for beginners or like
whatever Film Aura for beginners, Adobe Premiere Pro
for beginners, like any of those introductory videos will set you
up in the right direction. Yeah, I would say for me, I have
a background in audio production.
So I worked in radio before I started my entire career inside
of design. So I was a radio DJ on there
doing that. And as a part of that job, you
also have to edit and record audio for the commercials as
well. So I already was used to that.
And then while I was doing radio, because you don't make a
lot of money in radio, I was also working at a nightclub and
in the nightclub get a lot of AV all around.
And I used to work there during the day and I used to cut up
videos for us to use in the nightclub at night and then also
for TV commercials. So that was my first way to kind
of get my hands into using that type of equipment and doing that
type of thing. It wasn't educated and like
actually taught. I taught myself and had someone
else teach me. But it's funny because then it
was like all these years later that I hadn't done that skill
and so much has changed. I mean, it changes like every
year and like something new comes out.
But when I started recording editing content for YouTube and
for Instagram and all of that for bullet journaling planning,
I just used my phone. And for the first two years I
recorded and I edited on my phone.
No extra anything. I think I used in shot.
I bought the premium version of that, which is like a one time
cost and I've been using it ever since.
I that's what I use for my reels and other things I do on my
phone. But I just use that and you just
kind of learn and you watch videos on how to do different
things, especially like lighting like this.
This took me a really like look back at my old videos.
It is atrocious. I used to have a glow light and
like and like a cardboard box thing in the back of my videos.
Go back that far when I first started and you will see it and
you will, oh, it's horrible. But that's what you do.
And just like just just said, you watch that and you're like,
OK, how do I improve my lighting?
And you watch videos on how to do that.
And then you go, OK, I'm ready to upgrade my camera.
You know, I'm going to go from my phone to an actual camera.
What's the easiest camera to use?
But honestly, I mean, your phone, the newer phones
sometimes better quality than anything else.
It's kind of insane. So it's it's pretty awesome the
way that you can, you can make that happen.
Yeah, I mean, I used my phone for video recording for at least
the first like four years or something of making content.
I think I didn't change over to a proper, proper, proper camera
until I was literally full time content creating.
I'm pretty sure I got a proper microphone about a year into the
piece because I told myself like, no, you have to prove to
yourself that you're. We're actually going to stick
with this. You're actually gonna keep going
with it. You know, get your reps in
before you change. Like go and spend the money, I
suppose to change over your microphone.
But good audio is usually more important than good video.
That's a big piece of advice. You don't want it sounding like
you're like underwater. Nobody wants to listen to that.
Keeping all the content creating train.
Because we got a lot of questions about that, which like
I locally love talking about it. So I'm like all for it.
But this one was What advice can you give to someone who just
created an Instagram account to share their Buddha creations
online? So the best advice I'm going to
give you is learn how to take good shots of your journal with
your phone. That will involve a little bit
of lighting. There's different ways and a lot
of people just use natural lighting.
But the problem is, is you then have to rely on nature to give
you that good light. I remember years ago someone was
like, I can't take any pictures because it's been raining here
for three weeks. And I was like, EW, like you
rely on real nature. You can do really easy stuff
with just like a ring light down on top of your journal and get
something like honestly your phone can do good photo editing.
Now AI can do like really quick like lighting hacks for you to
kind of make it look nice. I think hands down best thing
you can ever do is just learn how to take a good photo of your
journal to share it online and that will make such a difference
in how you do it. I think that if you do want to
use natural lighting, having a setup that is mobile is really
useful. So I literally had a shelf that
was from an old like, I don't know, set of shelves that we had
like an old bookcase. I would do that as my thing so
that I could take it around to the parts of my house that had
the best lighting at the time. I'd like prop it up against the
window so that I could get the natural light or like bring it
into the lounge room or whatever.
Having a mobile system very much helped with that.
Also, if you're going to do some kind of like photo editing or
whatnot, you want a good app for it.
Snapseed is a really good one. It's free.
You can like up the contrast, brighten things up.
The best part about it though, is that you can like select by
color, which means that if your pages end up looking like really
yellow, like really blue, depending on the lighting, you
can literally specifically select that color on the picture
and desaturate it or brighten that or whatever.
And that's the ones that people often use when they're sharing
their photos because we all know that the stuff that people share
online isn't 100% real. But when it comes to those kind
of like still images and stuff where it's like, oh, the
blackout notebook looks so dark and like the contrast is
popping. Yeah, it's probably edited or
it's got a filter or something. Like play around with them, find
the style that you like. Snap Seat is a really good app
though if you just just want to like up contrast and brightness
and things like that. And as a person who is
colorblind and can't see the difference between if your page
looks a little bit more bluish or yellow or whatever, I also
use that. I couldn't think of it when I
was mentioning the other apps before, but that's one.
As soon as I found that one, I haven't used anything else
honestly. I mean, yes, your phone can
automatically clean things up for you, but that's one where
you have a little bit more control and there's already pre
done filters in there too that you can use.
I can't say enough about it. I just let's get into a fun one.
This is is about planning, but the question is what do you do
while you're working inside of your planner?
Are you watching TV? Listening to music?
And if you are, what are you watching or listening to?
Nice, because I set up as many layouts as I do and I often need
to film them when I'm setting them up.
It means that I can't necessarily do a lot of stuff
that like, causes me to pause too much.
So I find that things that are like heavy on the audio are
usually good. I mean, like, I could totally
watch something that gets me to pause, but the process would
take way too long. And then I'd have to edit out
all of these parts with my hands are just like, right.
We want something that makes future Jess's life a little
easier. So previously I was watching
things like Gilmore Girls because they talk at 100 miles a
minute, which means that you don't actually have to watch
because they're describing in full what's going on.
That works really well. Also any kind of like true crime
thing because often sometimes, provided it's in your first
language, it's pretty easy to know what's going on without
actually having to watch the screen.
And more recently, I've actually been getting into audiobooks
because previously I didn't have good access to them.
And now I've actually been able to kind of like broaden my
horizons in terms of reading and listening to some audiobooks
while I do my work. What about you, Mark?
So I have to keep it very musical because if I listen to a
book I can't write in a journal and also comprehend what's
happening there too. It's also why I can't watch a
new movie while I'm doing something else as well.
Also, I have a really bad habit for some reason with audio books
and TV or movie, as as I'm writing my own sentence, I'm
getting the information and then I start writing what I'm hearing
on my page. But it doesn't happen with
music. So I can listen to music and my
music is very diverse. It's mostly very upbeat, rap,
pop, kind of rock, whatever I'm into at that exact moment, I
will listen to it at nauseam. And I'm dancing, I'm moving, I'm
having fun. It just adds to the enjoyment in
my space. So that's what I'm doing.
Yeah, I find that any kind of music with lyrics for me, if I'm
trying to actually write something out doesn't work
because exactly like you said, I'll just start writing lyrics
instead of writing what I was supposed to be writing down.
So I've found that like, like, you know, some people do lofi
and lofi is fine, but I find that hip hop lofi is best.
Like that's what I've really enjoyed when it comes to like,
no lyrics, but still music and still kind of upbeat.
I have tried non musical, someone told me about brown
noise which just sounds disgusting every time I say it.
I love brown noise, it's really good.
Oh my gosh it literally has changed my life.
Like when I want to focus that just like I feel it.
I don't know if this happens to you, I think everyone has a
different reaction. I feel it in my shoulders.
Like I literally feel like this weight on me and it's like a
weighted blanket of noise. I know it sounds so weird but if
you've never listened to brown noise it is amazing.
I know some people use it to fall asleep.
So someone I work with was telling me that they use brown
noise for productivity and I was talking about it to someone
else. They were like, oh, I can't
listen. I'd fall asleep.
That's what I use to fall asleep.
But I'm telling you, focus, especially this brain, always,
something's happening in here. That's another good one.
You just want to be like laser focused.
I love the idea like the different noise colors as well
because white noise sounds like really tinny.
Green noise is pretty good, but brown and pink noise are
probably my favorite noises of the noise, like color noise.
I also do that when I'm reading I on my tablet.
It also helps me drown on other stuff as well because I have
like the opposite effect that when I'm reading I can't have
other stuff also happening like I said because I need to focus
and the brown noise reminds me of like the ocean.
So like if I'm sitting outside and I'm listening to it and I
can read, I comprehend so much more of what I'm reading.
All these. I wish I would have known that
when I was younger because it would have helped me a lot more
in school I feel like. My favorite thing for reading
rather than journaling is like those 12 hour ambiance tracks
that you get. The ones that are like, you
know, reading room with a crackling fireplace and a thumb
thunderstorm or whatever. It feels like one of those like
keywords stuffed titles. But a lot of those, they're
really, really good. I was totally just listening to
one last night. I was like sitting over in my
reading chair, had the fireplace going on my computer screen.
It was quite nice. Before I found Brown Noise for
focus, I used to turn on a Cafe 1 and you could control the
coffee ambience and you could control the coffee people
chatter ambience, so you could really figure out what you
wanted. But then I found brown noise and
I haven't gone back since. So we had a couple of questions
about this topic, so I figured we should probably slip this one
in here. But how do you find motivation
to work with your journal every day?
I guess probably a better question is do you find
motivation to work with your journal every day?
Yeah, because it is literally how I get my work done.
So I was just talking to my Barber about this the other day.
He was asking me about like, the social media stuff and all of
that. And we got into this
conversation about adult ADHD and he was saying how, you know,
he was diagnosed younger with it.
And I've never been officially diagnosed, but I know.
And he was saying that it is something that we move from
different topics, right? This hyper focusing on things
and then never using things again.
Bullet journaling is the only thing in my entire life,
literally, that I've stuck with for as long as I have Video
games, music changes all the time.
The pen I like to use changes on a weekly basis.
Bullet journaling is the only thing for me that has worked for
as long as I've been doing it. It works.
You know, I don't have to go look for anything else, even
though I do all the time because my brain's like, Mark, you want
something different in your life And I'm like, Nope, this really
does its job for me. So that's really, I don't have
to find motivation to use it because I know that it works for
me. I think the motivation maybe is
more about like the excitement about the pen, the stamp, the
sticker, the whatever I'm into at that time, just bringing that
into my journal because I find that that makes me more excited
to use it. But I'm using it no matter what
to get my job done. So that's, that's my approach.
How about you? You know, I, I feel you on that
because in terms of I know hobbies, if we think about
hobbies specifically, bullet journaling is the longest
standing hobby that I have had because it did kind of start as
that way to be a little bit more creative, have a creative outlet
that also helped me kind of like organize my life.
So that has been a very big motivator.
And because I stuck with it as long as I have, it means that it
now has the track record that I know that it works.
So, you know, if I'm ever feeling a little bit slumpy with
my journal, like I was hardcore slumping in both February and
March of this year, but stuck with it because I know that it
has worked for me. I've come out of those slumps
before. I've still gotten a lot of value
out of the process. So I stick with it.
But that doesn't necessarily mean that I actually touch my
journal every day. Like there are going to be some
days where I like have other things going on.
Life is hectic, maybe I'm traveling.
I don't see my journal as like being this thing that I have to
get in with every day. I tend to get in with it every
day. Like there's a reason that I
call my bullet journal my everyday journal and it's
because it usually gets everyday use.
That's because it's how I organize my life and stuff.
There are still going to be some days where like I don't touch
it. Like anytime I go on a trip, I
usually don't end up touching it really at all.
I take it with me because it feels more comfortable to have
it there. But oftentimes, like if I'm gone
for a six day trip, 4 out of those six days, I won't touch it
at all and it will only be in the last two.
I'm like, all right, do we want to hit the ground running when
we get back? What do we need to like think
about and prepare for and all of that kind of stuff.
But I feel like if you go into either bullet journaling or
planning or something with this kind of expectation that you
have to use it every single day, then when you get to the days
that you don't, it will feel like a shortcoming on your own
part. And, and that I don't think that
your journal should ever make you feel less about yourself.
Like that's not a happy place to be in.
So I don't give it that kind of expectation of like, you must
touch this every single day, otherwise you're not a real
bullet journal, you're fraud kind of a thing.
We don't want that. All right, Jess, this is
something that I'm going to manifest out into the world for
you because I think we all need this at some point.
If you had the possibility of making a seasonal collection or
just a collection as a whole with Archer and Olive, what do
you think you would make it? I have two ideas.
First one would be that would be like science related.
So we're thinking like conical flasks, bakers test tubes, round
bottom flasks kind of things. Maybe like I know NA double
Helix kind of stuff like, I don't know, physics symbol or
whatever. That would be kind of fun.
That would be kind of cool. Maybe like, you know, chemical
symbol for caffeine and stuff, because everybody loves a coffee
except for me. Sounds of things, whatever.
I have this caffeine and Coke 0 accounts.
So that would be one idea very kind of like sciency based and
then the other idea would be like epic fantasy based.
So I'm thinking like I know your travel pack and maps and like
swords and Dragons, that kind of stuff like that would be a
really cool collection. I mean, we all know that you
already had a collection with Orchard Olive.
Would you do anything differently if you were to do it
again or? I'm not going to lie to you,
Jess, I've thought about this a lot because I had such a good
experience doing that with them. The thought of doing that again
makes me really excited. I would bring back all the
special features of my journal, like the smart Marks and some of
those other pieces I put in there.
I would probably just refine a little bit.
I would make the page numbers a little bit darker.
I felt like they were a little bit light.
But you know, I don't want to make anyone super mad, but still
make it helpful. But the cover, I would love to
design another cover. It was so much fun coming up
with that. And I did the video when I
talked about that where I talked about all my other ideas, like I
have a lot of other ideas that I would love to execute for a
different journal like that. Maybe some like Bauhaus or
something a little bit closer to that.
I think my design was close to that, but not 100%.
I would just like to do more with it.
So that's that's how I would roll, I think.
I would I'd be keen to say it. I've been thinking about how I'm
going to use my marked notebook and because of the page numbers
I was considering using it for my like long term collections
journal. Maybe because that one's one
where I do usually go and number the pages anyway because things
aren't necessarily in chronal logical order to be seen.
I make no promises, but that is what I'm currently considering.
All righty. Next question was what is the
number one feature of your current bullet journal that
helps you with your productivity?
Mine's going to be real simple. It's having my task and my notes
just together on one page. So I kind of do a bit of daily
logging I guess, but it's for a weekly view.
I don't write down each and every single date and then have
my task and my notes for that. I have a section of my weekly
that is all for tasks. I just do like a running task
list of anything I have to get done and then I have a separate
notes section where I write down notes for my meetings and
whatnot. Sometimes tasks will show up
there and I'll integrate them in, but having a separate space
for each of those is what helps me the most get those things
done. And then I will say my index is
helpful from our productivity standpoint and kind of
efficiency. Because if I need to find that
information again, specifically if it's a note on a page that's
a weekly, I'll write that inside of my index so I can find it
again quickly versus like trying to remember where that was.
Because this brain doesn't hold on to that type of information
about yourself. What's yours?
Sadly saying it's like it's literally just daily logs.
Like I love my daily logs. It's literally just my, my first
drop point for any kind of information.
It's where I go to get all of my tasks done and stuff.
But if we're going to embellish on that, make it a little bit
more fancy, then I would probably say it would be
priority indicators, which are effectively like little
signifiers that I might use beside a particular entry in the
daily log. Just to kind of highlight it as
saying like, hey, this is the thing that needs to get done
first. It kind of just helps me like
hone my focus on that one thing. So it's like when I'm glancing
at the list, hey, this one has like a bright yellow dot next to
it. It's kind of important.
We should probably start there. I think that just having that
kind of like set aside as like priority important highlight for
the day just really helps me get the most out of my daily log
without getting kind of like lost in the weeds of anything
and everything that might end up on there.
That's a really interesting one. I've found that I've kind of
dumped mine down a lot where I'm just putting like an exclamation
point. Now if I know it has to be
really, really important to get done.
I used to try to do like, you know, a little eyeball or like a
little screen if it was like look at this website or do this
thing. Now I just put an exclamation
point or grab a highlighter and be like you need to remember
this and then I make it happen. Yeah, I find that the color
helps and make like kind of stand out a little bit more
because I don't typically tend to use a lot of color on my
layouts outside of like the theme.
So, you know, we've got the second line highlights and stuff
that are just there for readability or like, you know,
the colored elements is part of the theme itself in terms of
like titles and decorations or whatever.
So if I pick something that's like theme adjacent so it
doesn't stand out too much and look like hideous, who let this
guy in, it still just helps me kind of like draw my attention
to it. Also, I use exclamation points
for notes rather than a dash. So I'm like out here doing rogue
things with the bullet journal key.
It's interesting you're out there breaking rules, Jessica.
I tell you, it makes me a little bit nervous, but I'm excited
about it and I'm glad it works for you.
I think that's the most important part of this.
So such a good question. Let's ask the audience this
question this week, which is what is your most productive
spread or thing that you do inside of your bullet journal or
your planner that just keeps you moving, keeps you on top of
things? Drop that in the comments for
us. You can leave it as a note for
the podcast if you want. Or of course, you can always
e-mail us Planner Pals podcast@gmail.com or you can
also drop a comment. We'll show a picture we have on
our Instagram at Planter Pals podcast as well.
I'm really eager to hear everybody's thoughts about that
one because I'm always looking for other ways to bring like
more productivity into my productivity system.
And we did try and get to as many questions as we could
invoke this episode and last. So if we didn't quite get to
your question, we do apologize. We're going to have to do
another one of these because you guys have so many good things
that you want to know from us and about the community in
general. If you do have any more
questions, leave them in the comments.
We'll try and get to them as best we can, but otherwise,
Mark, what are we going to be talking about next week?
In our next episode, we're actually going to be talking
more about productivity and productivity methods.
I know justice is a topic that's true and dear to your heart.
You have a lot of great things teed up for that.
I cannot wait to talk about those because I have a handful
as well that just have helped me throughout the years too, that I
use inside of my planner and bullet journal.
So when we come back to you next time, Planner Pals will be
talking all about that. Until then, thanks for hanging
out with us today.