Mine is more of a personalised planner these days. Bullet journaling ruined pre-made diaries and planners for me, but it’s a headache having to keep ruling it myself. I keep thinking I’ll get some stamps made, or print out my current format, but then I’ll tweak it a bit for some reason and realise I’ve found an even better format.
New year is in September for me, so I’m not starting a new one for January. But happy to chat about my favourite trackers and features (cos no one irl cares)
I realised a while back that I needed to eliminate gaps between the months, in order to see time properly. I kept having “wait, that’s happening next week?” moments, at the turn of the month. I know it’s a bit stupid, but that’s actually the least of my time management problems. My future log flips and folds so I can always see a few weeks ahead. Game changer,
I don’t do a daily page anymore, instead I’ve created a weekly spread, where I can see how I’m allocating time, keep a master list, and transfer that to daily lists. And last year I started colour coding those lists as have to /hope to (Kendra/Lazy Genius idea) as well as writing down one priority per week.
My favourite trackers right now is for hrt/cycle. I’m a bit old to finally be recognising the diet, sleep, mood, energy, exercise, concentration relationships but it’s so incredibly helpful. Now that I can predict where my productivity slumps are likely to fall, I don’t overschedule, and I don’t fall behind or get in a mess or even just feel bad about myself. Or if there’s a crunch where things just need doing, I know to ask for help, instead of stupidly trying to power through.
My list of items ordered/received was incredibly helpful last month. Not remotely pretty but a sanity (and money) saver.
I’ve not found habit trackers useful because I forget to make a habit of filling them in. I let my phone take care of exercise tracking and recurring birthdays and anniversaries because it’s better at that than I am.
I glue in flip out pages for things I need to consult when I’m scheduling my week. Pre-christmas planning lists were flip outs, and in a week or two I’ll do holiday planning, shopping, packing lists in that format too.
Some extra busy weeks I glue an extra page, or fold in pages to make a centre section. The week before Christmas was like that but the two week holiday period was all on one page because individual days stopped existing.
What does your monthly review look like?