How To Start Your Basic Bullet Journal

Assalammualaikum.
Hi dah-lings!

I got into this bullet journalling whole caboodle only recently; 16 days ago to be exact so kindly don't expect this post to be the ultimate guide to bullet journalling 😅😅

As I started blog walking, I noticed some bloggers wrote tips on bullet journalling and their experience doing it. At first, I couldn't be more disinterested but after I kept stumbling upon so many irresistibly cute images on Pinterest (which till now I haven't really gotten the hang of), I decided to actually learn bullet journalling, or BuJo as they call it.

I started reading the Bullet Journal official website tutorials and watched countless videos on YouTube on bullet journals, all during the time I was a passenger during our travel back to KL for hub's exam, 12th Jan to be exact. I watched so many videos and read so many articles in the moving car I almost become carsick.

During that journey, I became so inspired I even spent RM24.90 to buy 4 sets of Washi tapes from China which needed at least 14 days to arrive!

What Is A Bullet Journal?

If you have been using Notes or any equivalent note-taking apps, a period tracker app, an expense tracker app, a handwritten diary, some Stick-It Notes and multiple small pieces of paper you use to write a To-Do List and fold them and put it in your purse, then you might want consider a bullet journal.

A bullet journal combines all the above in one planner.
I love that it really gives you the freedom of making your own life schedule without having to worry about unused pages in the usual premade planners.
But, it will be so private that you should not lose it.

1. The Journal

Get yourself an affordable, nice planner. Most tutorials recommend a dot grid planner - that makes it easier to create straight lines and design stuff on it. But I would say if you have an unused planner that is not dotted grid, you should use that first before splurging into a new planner.

I am someone who won't necessarily stick to one obsession for long.
So I decided to use the Maybank planner my little sister Aisyah gave me one or two years back. It was still clean, untouched and the size was perfect for a bullet journal.

The only disadvantage is maybe the insides are not dotted but rather blank on one side and lined on the other - which certainly won't help my uncreativity.
I will most certainly buy a dotted grid planner if this bullet journal of mine works out well.

The Maybank Journal. I think this is a B5 sized planner

2. Pinterest Account

I relied so heavily on Pinterest for bullet journal designs. I became so inspired by all of them I almost forgot my own capability. How could people actually write those nice calligraphies?!

Really, just browse through Pinterest and pin those designs you like and suit your creativity and aptitude.

If you are hopeless in drawing a straight line without a ruler like me, then go for the simple yet practical designs.

3. Index

The Index is basically the "Table of Contents".
Some tutorials said an Index is not necessary for a bullet journal but I think it will help once my BuJo is filled with useful materials. I will need some sort of Index to help me browse through and quickly search for pages in my BuJo.

This is how my simple Index page looks like

I divided my Index into "Categories" and "Scheduling".

So, pages like "Travel Necessities" (which I really2 plan on writing) and "Period Trackers" will go under Categories while my "Future Logs", "Monthly Spread" or perhaps "Weekly Spread" will come under Scheduling.

Click here for my Index original header idea
Click here for the Index content idea

4. A Key Page

The Key page just helps you organise your planner more systematically so that you know what each symbol stands for.

My advice: don't create too many symbols or you will easily forget them.
I am a tick-box person, I find the original dot symbol for "Task" does not work for me. I like to see my task being ticked in a box as they are completed.

A real simple Key page. The header idea comes from Pinterest

5. Year Review Spread

A spread is two pages combined together (or at least that is how I understand it).
This spread is just the normal whole year view in almost all types of premade planners.

I spent a very long time drawing this 2020 Year Planner spread on my BuJo but I didn't regret it one bit.
I just wish I am better at doodlings so that I can make the pages look a lot more interesting and cute.

Hand-drawn, little by little

6. The Future Log

Future Log is also commonly found in most premade planners, just that they are not called Future Logs in those planners.
They are basically the page where the calendar is printed on and you can make notes for each month - that's Future Log.

This is how my Future Log looks like

My Future Log is also a simple one, easily drawn and written but I spent almost an hour perfecting the numbers and making sure I don't accidentally draw non-parallel lines.

While going through tutorials, most of the ideas are only design ideas.
They don't show what they really put on those pages - so here I am divulging a little bit of the content of my BuJo. I edited out some of the more private ones 😋

7. Customise Your Own BuJo

There are so many other pages that you can create in your BuJo to suit your life scheduling.
Some recommend monthly spread and weekly spread.

I did try a monthly spread for January, and will most probably do it again for February but I'll have to see if I want to continue doing it for the subsequent months. This is probably what I love most about BuJo - it gives you total freedom of what you want to incorporate into your planner.

There are many tutorials for daily log; or daily planner (the non BuJo language).
I find daily log useful but I can't stick to writing on my BuJo daily so I skip many days.
I still wonder when do BuJo-ians actually write their daily logs.
Do people actually have time to plan their day before their day actually started?
Or do they plan the night before?

As of now, I start writing my daily log mid-day and have written only 3 daily logs.

Daily Log

Above is how one of my daily logs look like.
If you notice, I used the dot symbol for my Tasks on Jan 20th but changed to the tick boxes on Jan 21st because I don't like how my completed tasks look like without the tick boxes.

This is my January Spread. Click here for the original Pinterest image

My January spread is also known as the January dashboard simply because the Pinterest idea I got it from called it a dashboard.

I spent a long time drawing these boxes, I might not use this design again for February but this is one of the simplest designs since it incorporates only boxes and shades and I am awful in doodling and calligraphy.

The headers should actually read 3 Things To Do In Jan, Books to Read, Notes, Events and Next Month but because my handwriting in those boxes was bad, I re-shaded them all black and am just waiting for it to dry up and rewrite those headers.

Since I can't seem to write daily logs but still have things that I must do within that week, I created this modified weekly spread. It doesn't look like the weekly spreads they show in Pinterest but since this is my BuJo, I'll design my own pages to suit my own scheduling.

My modified weekly spread

8. A Saviour

My kayu hands cannot keep up with drawing and designing.
Even a heart symbol will look asymmetry in my hands and a circle will end up an oval.

If you notice, most of my designs are straight lines and thus, the triangle-shaped ruler (the professional name for it is a set square) is one of the most important pieces of equipment in my arsenal.

Triangle-shaped ruler 

I bought the set for only RM3.90 from Popular Bookstore. It also comes with a protractor which I don't need. The set square was my knight in shining armour while I was drawing my January dashboard, what more with one side of my planned page is blank. I can't afford to have lines with unequal distances between them.

I wrote "At least 1 blog post" as my task for this week but it seems I accomplished two! I love this sense of achievement 😆
Now I just hope that I can stick with this planner for a long time and get my life more organised.
I am hitting 30 this year, I should be more organised and prim and proper and whatever lah.

Perhaps I will write more about my experiences with BuJo in the future. I already feel some disadvantages with it and now am looking for ways to overcome them. I even created a new blog tag; Bullet Journal. Let's hope the tag gets filled with good posts :)

'til then


-Because life is a test-

-AkMaR-
http://nur-akmar.blogspot.com