#BulletJournal Guide & Inspo

As you already know by now, I’ve joined the bullet journal fuss, and yes my dear friends, you should do the same.

For those of you who don’t know what a bullet journal is: it’s a kind of mix between a diary, a planner and basically everything else you want. You can write your thoughts on it, keep track of all your appointments, goals, hobbies and projects; you have total freedom on the layouts, content, decoration and everything else that comes with it.

I already own a creative journal – go see the flip through – and I quit on my planner a while ago because it didn’t work for me anymore; so I was a little skeptical about trying this new method, but then my friend at Toad Diaries gave me the opportunity of designing my own bullet journal so I decided to give it a try.

I chose this pretty floral design and I also customized the quotes on the front, “Head in the clouds.. but my gravity’s centered” ,and back of the diary, “New York City.. I’m coming for you”.
I chose the dotted pages and I have to say that I regret a bit my choice because I should have put smaller dots, but it’s working great anyway.

There are so many designs you can choose from and so many features that you can pick. You can really create the perfect diary for you, and they also already have page numbers, which is great. I highly suggest you getting yours at Toad Diaries website because they’re amazing.

Go see the bullet journal website for the classical guide lines; I decided to work a bit differently.

FIRST PAGES:

I’m not going to use an index but I’ll color co-ordinate the most important pages that have a common topic, like blog and university.

As you can see I love colors and I was very disappointed when I saw that I couldn’t use my markers because they bleed trough the pages because they are too thin, but the watercolors are just perfect and I can use them with no problems.

In the first three pages I put and decorated my word of the year, conquer, from the quote “the day you decide to love yourself is the day you’ll conquer the world”; set my goals up and left a space to draw the milestones and happiest memories of this year.
In the following page I decided to do a recap of all the statistics regarding my blog and I’ll do that every month to keep track of the progresses and projects.

LAYOUTS:

Monthly sheet: I’ve divided it into three main sections, one for every part of the day, so everything will be organized better and I will able to see immediately when I have my appointments. Also I’ve chosen a quote of the month, which for May is “I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul“, which is also written on my bracelet, so yes I stole it from Corbico Jewerly.

Dailies: Basically what you so here is to write down all your tasks, events and everything you have to do that day. You do it for every day; decorating, adding, writing however you want.
As you can see I also put a little graphic to indicate all the hours of the day and to keep track of the time I got up and went to bed and the hours I spent studying or giving reps.

Weekly sheet: After trying the dailies I found out that they weren’t working for me so I decided to try this layout out and I have to say that it’s perfect for me and that I might be a little obsessed about the rainbow colors too.
I divided it into “appointments”, “blog” and “to-do” and left space for a quote of inspiration, notes and a little calendar.

MONTHLY TRACKER:

The monthly tracker is one of the fundamental features of the bullet journal, it helps you keep track of all your habits and I’m still trying to figure out what I want to put in it, but for now, it looks like this:

 OTHER SPREADS:

As I said you can put whatever you want on your bullet journal and that’s the beauty of it.

Other than the “brain dump” page for my blog, which you can see in the previous photo, I’ve added some more little things:

Since I have my finals this week I created a study plan to organize all the subjects that I have to study, my to-dos and goals.

On the left side I’ve also written some study tips to help me and keep me focused.
If you’re a student I highly suggest you trying this so you’ll optimize your time and ace your exams.

I’ve decided to join the “quoted challenge” by @onicahanby, during which you write a quote about a pre-decided topic everyday and you share them and your progress on Instagram.

I love quotes so when I saw this I had to do it and I added my usual color touches to it.

I’ve also started again the 30 days squat challenge and I hope that having to color all the boxes and write down my progresses, will motivate me not to quit and to finish it this time.

I’ve also added the quote “you don’t get the ass you want by sitting on it”.

(I know I spelled tracker wrong).

For last I decided to create a big to-do list for those tasks that are general and not due to a specific day.

You have total freedom on what to put on your bullet journal and you can create the perfect one for you.

You can create a to-read list, a goal list for every month, a travel checklist or a vision board.

Regarding my materials all I use is my Toad Diaries bullet journal, a normal pen, some color pencils and my watercolors with my pen brush from Pentel.

I can assure you that you don’t need any fancy pen or anything really complicate or expensive. You can even use a normal notebook and a pencil if that’s what you have. The only limit is your imagination.

If you need some ideas on doodles, layouts and lettering.. Your wish is granted:

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Now I want to give you some tips and tricks:

• Having a bullet journal can change your life. You’ll be more productive and motivated, believe me.
• Get informed before starting it. Watch videos on Youtube, read blog posts and search for it on Pinterest – I took a lot of inspo from Boho Berry, be sure to check her out!
• Be free and let your creativity flow. Maybe it’s just me but everything seems like a goo opportunity to be creative and create something unique and original.
• Try different things until you find the perfect one for you. Dailies didn’t work for me but the weekly spread is fantastic.
• Don’t aim to perfection. Messy is fine, mistakes are great.
• Don’t limit yourself.

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I hope this little guide and flip through helped you decide whether to start your own bullet journal or not and gave you motivation and some inspiration as well.

I was thinking about doing another post like this with more  and new ideas next month, what do you think about it?

Do you have a bullet journal? What spreads do you use? Give us some tips and ideas in the comments!

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Disclaimer: The mentioned products have been sent to me for free by the brand or PR agency so that I could make an objective evaluation and declare my honest opinion, not influenced in any way by having received the products in question.
All opinions are my own, as usual.

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Take a peek at my updated Bullet journal!

Create your own bullet journals in a few simple moves