Setup a Daily Journal You Will Use Every Single Day
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Journaling can be used for all aspects of life. This year, I am trying to use more than one notebook to work on projects throughout the year. I have chosen to focus on reading, cooking with different food and recipes, and planning out my work on the blog in a Passion Planner. Even though I am working in different notebooks, I always come back to my daily journal to be the constant notebook I have nearby.
A daily journal is critical to keep up with the daily chaos that surrounds our roles, our schedules, and our minds trying to keep up. This blog post is not just about starting a journal; it's about creating a personalized outlet for your thoughts, dreams, and aspirations. The best part about journaling is that it is customizable. You may like my setup, and you may want your journal to look a bit differently. I invite you to take what you need from my daily journal. After a lot of trial and error, you will see my journal mainly focuses on planning, thinking, reflecting, and dreaming.
Reflecting on My Old Journal
The first thing I do when I am getting ready to move into a new notebook is review my old notebook. For this migration, I decided to examine how I am spending my time in my journal. Nothing was too surprising here: I use my daily journal for plans and ideas. However, I was surprised that I am not using it as much as I thought to tap into feelings, complete braindumps or morning pages, or focus on my own personal learning. I do want to make sure I keep up with my memories pages more in the new notebook; however, I also use photos to cover old pages of notes so all of my journals end up looking like photo albums.
Moving Into a New Journal
Read >> Unlocking a Fresh Start: How to Effortlessly Move Your Bullet Journal to a New Notebook
I was working in a B5 notebook, and I loved the extra space. However, I am excited to get back into an A5 notebook. A5 is just the size that I think most people come back to because it is small enough to carry around but large enough to have enough space to work within daily. My new journal is from Notebook Therapy. I normally work in an Archer & Olive notebook, but A5s weren’t available when I needed to order.
First impressions of my Notebook Therapy notebook:
The paper and pages have a great feel/write well and are 160 gsm
The lay-flat quality is fantastic. It is easy to work in this notebook.
The fall leaves everywhere are perfect, and I love the olive-green color
Gold gilded pages may be one of my favorite design details so far on my recent notebooks
No pen loop, but I added one with my favorite pen loops from Leuchtturm in army green
Read More >> Battle of the B5 Notebooks: Archer and Olive vs. Dingbats - Which Reigns Supreme?
Materials Used
Notebook Therapy A5 Tsuki ‘Maple Journey’ Limited Edition Bullet Journal ☾
Chic Sparrow A5 CRÈME | CLASSIC Color: Crème Brûlée
The Rongrong Sticker Book Planner Babe Theme
Hemlock & Oak Monthly Tabs in Rosewood (This Rosewood matches my reading journal!)
Leuchtturm1917 Pen Loop (Army is a perfect match for my notebook)
Click on the images to shop
First Pages | Creating a Vision
I made my vision board in Canva this year! If you like the style of mine and want to use them, feel free to grab this FREE Canva Template Link. I really liked working in Canva to make my vision boards because all of the photos are right there at your fingertips. I could change the font, filter a photo, or even add graphics if I wanted to make my vision board complete. I made two vision boards this year and put them both in my daily planner: My personal vision board and my blog vision board. I wanted to put both into my daily journal because I often come back to all of my goals when I am planning or thinking up a new idea.
I also included a Level 10 life for the front of my journal because I feel like it helps me with goal setting and putting the different areas of my life into action steps I can take to improve the focus area. These are not the typical 10 areas for a Level 10 life, but I adapted the focus areas to my own life.
Spouse/Partner (Example goal: Keep regular date nights)
Daughter (Example goal: Potty training)
Finances (Example goal: Pay off a credit card)
Home (The physical environment of our house, Example goal: Setup a weekly cleaning rotation)
Career (Example goal: Reframe to positive when I get negative about career pause)
Fun & Creativity (Example goal: 2024 project stack)
Personal Development (Example goal: Keep up with reading and reading journal)
Health & Fitness (Example goal: Focus on daily movement)
Family & Friends (Example goal: Initiate conversations)
Blog (Example goal: Consistent content)
Making Plans
The beginning part of my journal looks like any standard planner you would find. I have tried this a few different ways in my daily journal, and I am pleased with putting all of my planning layouts first in my notebook, and then leaving the rest for notes and creative thinking. I feel like this keeps all of my schedules, appointments, to-dos, and tasks together, rather than spread out throughout the notebook.
Layouts:
Future planning (Six months out)
January monthly + weeklies
February monthly + weeklies
March monthly + weeklies
April monthly + weeklies
Monthly reflections = Moments of joy and memories that are important after each month
Helpful Other Layouts
24 in 24 Goals: I got this from Gretchen Rubin! She focuses on 24 different things that she wants to do in the new year. I feel like this is a great model for goal-setting because these items can include large goals or small goals. For example, I have started adding to my list things like “hike on a mountain” or “read 60 books this calendar year.”
Move Your Body Daily: Dutch-door style tracking, I wanted to make sure that I was purposeful about my movement in a way that didn’t feel micromanaged. Some items I can put into the day’s slot: Mom Stroller Class, Yoga, Step Count, or Family Walk.
Everyday Notes
This is my favorite part of any notebook because these pages are left BLANK. Most of my notebook is blank until I start writing each day. If you think back to my daily journaling reflection at the beginning of this post, I know that I will use my everyday notes pages for:
Work notes
Braindumps/Working through feelings
Memories
Ideas for any of my other notebooks in my project stack like my reading journal or my food and recipe journal
At the time of this post, my first few pages include work to-do tasks for the day, a braindump, a review and recap of a TV show we watched, and a printables idea for the blog. I also included memory pages for our daughter’s first birthday, a zoo trip, my mom’s visit from Michigan, and Arizona pictures from a nature preserve we love.
My Last Page
On a final note, I always keep the last page as a note page for what worked and what did not work while using any journal. I really liked doing this with my previous daily journal, and it allowed me to figure out that I wanted all of my planning pages together in the front of the notebook rather than spread out throughout all of the pages.
