Back to BuJo

I was always a big fan of the principles of Getting Things Done (GTD) by David Allen. Since I first heard of the PARA method I also started to dive in and use the framework Tiago Forte explains in the books, videos and articles I consumed. I have always needed a system which gives the diverse and numerous tasks and information pieces a home, which fly around my head and into my inboxes all the time. It sounded paradise-like to have a mind like water, to be in control and to be as efficient as you can while pursuing your goals. I organized my life with digital tools. The only paper-based stuff were my notes, which were subsequently captured into my digital productivity system. It was a necessity to have a system, which helps me keep track and to be in control of all the aspects of life. Despite the pressure which led to learning and introducing this let’s call it life admin system, it didn’t feel like a duty. I enjoy building systems.

I still apply GTD and PARA at work where they make me survive a growing numbers of tasks and frequent changes of plan. Recently, as international political tensions were on the rise, I started to think more about the safety and accessibility of my data. I thought to myself, that it might be a good idea to become independent from specific software.

So I started to look for alternative tools which would still let me access my data even if a product wouldn’t be available anymore and which would also be a safe heaven for sensitive data. I have to say, that was quite an adventure! I searched and tested a bunch of tools, but wasn’t too happy about them. Something was always missing. Either I found them too expensive for personal use or they lacked something. Also, it seemed hard to migrate all of my content. I had an article data base with a workflow for blog posts (even if until today I don’t own a blog, yap!), a projects, a recipe and a book wish data base plus tables to track the health supply for myself, my husband and our cats. I had long task lists with many old and irrelevant entries, even from the time before the migration from one tool to another.

The impulse to look an unexpected direction came from someone who was played into my YouTube playlist by a benevolent algorithm: It was Tiago Forte’s wife Lauren. In the video below she gives an inspiring insight into her rather analog setup and explains how she organizes her life with four notebooks.

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We have different lives and preferences and I am in no way as visually creative as she is. But it made me curious to browse through my three old Bullet Journals which slept well in my bedroom book shelf since 2021. I wrote them between 2019 and 2021. All of them were written in hard times: I created the first journal when I was at the bottom and spent weeks in a day-treatment clinic. I needed to organize appointments for the treatment afterwards, but phones were not allowed inside. The challenge was, that I needed to write down, whom to call outside and if and when the therapist I called would be available which is usually communicated on their mailbox. I stumbled over the Bullet Journal method on the internet and started my first journal. This gave me the opportunity to write down insights from therapy sessions which would maybe have been forgotten otherwise.

The second journal was written when the pandemic started and after having learned more about Bullet Journaling. When I read the pages from February and March 2020 I saw when I met my aunt the last time before the lockdown and when I visited my grandmother who died in the second lockdown in 2021. I read what I thought then and realized how right I was with many thoughts at that time or that feelings I had about meeting someone were legit signs for events which happened later in life. The third notebook was mostly used for therapist sessions and used for the fight back to a normal life. It was fascinating in another way. While a lot was happening in the outside world in the second journal the third showed how much work I put into getting better. I filled a whole book with my thoughts and therapy notes.

Fun Fact: these first journals were written in an era, during which I was about life and digital admin systems like GTD and PARA. I documented my ideas and the implementation of “Get Stuff done like a boss” (an online course by Tiago Forte) and the PARA-system. I saw them as a means not only to organize life, but also to close the gap between the meaning of my life and action. Eventually I went so digital that I left my journals altogether, and the way along with the architecture is still documented in them.

I don’t have that much of a record about the years since then. I was good at capturing thoughts and tasks and to put them into work, but I don’t have any coherent records of what else was going on in my life and with me. Was I annoyed, when this happened? Was this something I liked? When did this important thing happen, if it doesn’t have a calendar entry? It is not just the lack of a chronicle, I also had neither an outlet nor a place for my thoughts and feelings in a self-empathetic way. I have some memories stored in my mind but these are rather a collection of situations which are prone to be forgotten or overwritten. I was productive and strong, but I must have at least unconsciously felt, that I lacked connection to myself, my needs and my feelings.

This realization motivated me to give Bullet Journaling another try. In the years since my first journals I had always thought my life was too complex for it because I filled a 300 pages notebook in two months in 2020. I concluded that my life way maybe just very dynamic at that time and that it might have been an exception.

As I want it to be as simple and low maintenance as possible I stayed very close to the original setup that Ryder Carroll describes “The Bullet Journal Method”. What I started to use and didn’t stop using ever since:

1. digital calendar: for appointments and tasks, which need to happen on a certain day; 2. all other tasks including tasks with deadlines go into the Bullet Journal;

3. The future log is for future tasks. 4. Ideas often come to me when I’m not at the office or on the go, so I use the BuJo app to jot down things that pop into my head while I’m out and about. I transfer them to my journal when I’m at home or at the office. Since the app automatically deletes entries after three days, it serves as another tool to help me stay focused. 5. Projects requiring additional digital content: Obsidian syncing with the cloud of my Swiss cloud provider. I just use Obsidian on my two computers , which protects me from clipping and stuffing things into my digital system all the time. The markdown files created with Obsidian can be opened by text apps on my phone and tablet as well. This way I can use them for minor updates or checks like “when did my cats get the last deworming treatment”. The thumb rule is “BuJo first”! 6. File saving: I use the same Swiss cloud service for the files I need to Was “Back to BuJo” worth it? 7. Digital file structure: I shifted all of my PARA files into the already existing Archive-folder. Then I adapted the structure to a hybrid way of thinking or how I interpret BuJo coming from PARA: 1. Collections 2. Areas 3. Archive When I migrate from one BuJo to another I decide which collection accompanies me to the next journal. The same will happen with the files in the „Collections“-Folder . Areas have to be maintained and usually just change with new or discontinued responsibilities in life. Archive might get sub-folders with the names and times of the BuJo in the future. I can tell you when I migrated the current journal.

Was “Back to BuJo” worth it?

A 100% yes! I felt instantly so much lighter, calmer and in the present. I also got more done. The reliability concerns of my so-far-system made me undertake a radical change and I don’t regret it. My Bullet Journal knows that I will never in life be able to empty my inbox, to clean out my task lists and to keep them up-to-date and I tried it over many years: I reviewed all of my flight levels, checked in on my goals and areas of responsibility and sadly got less of the things done which were important for me because I had so much to process all the time. Before the “Back to BuJo”-adventure I wasn’t aware that I needed a mechanism to limit myself. I just don’t have the time for system maintenance.

The daily log is fantastic, because like Lauren I tend to worry or to feel anxious at certain times (especially on mornings or Sundays). The daily log keeps my focus on the current day, which protects me from overwhelm and future anxiety.

At first I thought, that I would process all of my inbox and tasks lists and migrate them to the Bullet Journal. When I exported my inbox from my digital tool, I realized that just the unprocessed items from this one digital inbox where 96 PDF-Pages. In other words I had a „Mind like water with a trail of clutter“ behind me. Imagine: I would have noted down to harvest our cherry tree in the garden and would probably have reached the point to capture it 3 years later. :-)

So I decided to just write down things I have to do, should do and want to do in three columns, like Ryder Carroll recommends it in his book and migrated the content into my Bullet Journal. When I did that, I felt like a balloon letting go of its ballast and rising into the air. Instead of curating long goal lists like a curator who keeps putting together exhibitions I did the 5–4–3–2–1 exercise and have since forced myself to stick to it. Now I follow my few goals actively instead of administrating them. This article is one of them.

I first imported notion to obsidian with the importer. This was quite a chaotic experience! The data bases dissolved and the pictures, which were previously embedded into my notion pages were to be found at unexpected places in the form of additional files. Honestly I saw that most of the pictures which moved from one system to another have no relevance and I don’t even remember what their original context was. I will do a cleanup of my vault later, also in order to safe file space. A learning which I I apply now is that I I decide on a case-by-case basis, how the previous page, table or data base content fits best into my new setup and then I migrate just this piece. Another form of self-limitation, because everything else wouldn’t be maintainable for me. My notion calendar will be used until my latest task-deadline in the old long task, project and inbox data bases end. Then I will migrate to the calendar app my Swiss e-mail-provider provides. So all in all is is a long-term thing! Maybe there is an easier way out there, but for the moment this is the way I am on with the time I have at hand.

One thing I am sad and a bit annoyed though is that my article data base for all my creative ideas didn’t import as intended. On the other hand it forces me once again to dream and to curate less and to do more. I will keep my notion data base for a while in order to find certain information in case I need it. All in all I am glad that instead of building my perfect dream data base I am making my dreams come true.

What stayed from my weekly reviews are three steps, which I still do most Sundays:

1. The collection of all pieces of paper lying around in the house and in my bags,
2. the capturing and processing of bills, receipts and bank account movements,
3. the emptying of my inboxes by processing them. My inboxes are my e-mail-accounts and my inbox tray for paper documents. That’s it! There are no digital inboxes apart from e-mails anymore.

The weekly review is a 38 minute task, because this is the time which I have available most of the days. Also it is the average time available for tasks with the Priority “C” I calculated according to the ALPEN method. I limit the duration of this task by setting a timer.

Having just one page to write down tasks in the monthly log means limiting and striking of the numerous tasks which were written down in the previous month. To do this feels so liberating, and it is so much fun, just amazing! Striking through tasks which I neither want nor have to do has become my favourite activity of the month.

I started to use the mood signifier (=) in my new Bullet Journal 2.0 for feelings and a triangle (△) for needs. This key was mentioned in a comment of another Bullet Journalist in one of Ryder Carroll’s newer videos on YouTube and I think it is a great addition which closes the gap between feelings and actions. The usual dot for tasks is also the dot I use for the strategy I deduct from the need in case I have time and energy to to the inner work on that day. Sometimes I just notice my feelings and that’s it! This way the Bullet Journal is not only my productivity system, it also integrates what I dived into the last years: non-violent communication and the high value for self-care, clarity and effective interpersonal communication. The tasks derived from my needs always get a star for „priority“, because my needs are as important as any important task. I previously had a separate NVC-journal for self empathy, which might not be that insightful without the other content of what happened that specific day when I revisit it later. As you can see from the example below seems a little like a good friend or a parent giving you advice on what you could do to feel better and then you decide to follow it with priority. On good days you can decide to write down and enjoy the fulfillment of your needs, and you can revisit this wonderful moment as often as you want.

Another thing I had started in an old notebook-calendar and now integrated into my BuJo 2.0 is the ALPEN-method. I always estimate the time I have at hand for tasks the next or the same day. I usually do my task-planning for the day the night before in order to avoid time pressure and to quick-start into the day. I categorize them and estimate the time use. This avoids overwhelm by limiting the number of tasks I plan to take care of on a specific day (there it is again, the self-limitation!). Having a daily task list with different different priorities helps me to progress in all categories. I use ⁕• for important tasks, • for tasks, which at least theoretically could also be done by other people and ↓• for routine tasks. In a BuJo the daily task planning works really quick, because I just put the estimated time needed for a task in minutes into a circle behind the task. In case I need to use a different order than working through the priorities I order them by number like Ryder Carroll does. For example if I need to get an errand done before the shop closes I will put this task before others even if it is less important than other tasks.

This is an example I took from my current BuJo, which is usually written in German. I translated it into English and left the messy style, so that you can see, what it looks like in real life including spelling mistakes 😂. TÜV by the way is the German name for the obligatory technical car inspection, which needs to happen every two years.

Please let me know if this was helpful and if you would like to know more about it. I am still thinking about the optimal order of my previously PARA-ordered digital system. At the moment I use the the order 1 — Collections, 2 — Areas, 3 — Archive . Since I manage my tasks primarily in my Bullet Journal I have realized that I don’t touch the files which are stemming from Projects and Resources (now my handful of Collections) not that often as the ones in Areas. Example: I track the medication of my cats in my Areas every month as I am responsible for my cats and their well being. I do this more often than I touch some of my projects in the collections. But sometimes I have one specific project like this article which I am intensely working on it. I will let you know when I have collected more experience with my hybrid system.