My system

So what system do I use? Well it is one that has evolved over time and I dare say will keep evolving as I have come to realise that there is probably no system that can be set up and will work forever. My current system is a mixture of online and paper journals planners and organisers.

Arc folder

My main everyday planner is an Arc folder.

I found my original one at Staples but there are now all sorts of ring-bound planner systems. They all work in the same way. You have a set of plastic rings which are solid in the middle and a punch to punch out indentations in the edge of your pages so that you can slot them into the planner. The advantage of this system is that you can add and remove pages as you wish. The disadvantage is that if you add and remove the same pages a lot the indents will weaken and they won't hold in the planner.

I have designed my own layouts for my Arc folder and I print these on 100 gsm paper, i.e. slightly heavier than standard copier paper, so they hold in the planner better and are nicer to write on.

My Arc folder holds my daily schedule and notes plus tracker, month notes and some project notes.

I also use the Arc for jotting down sayings that I see and want to remember, I stick pictures into it and sometimes draw on the pages. My Arc is my constant companion and builds into a record of my year.

Rough book

I always have a rough book or notebook with my as well. This is, as it says, a general book for notes, drawings, mindmaps, etc. It is to capture those rough ideas that pass through my mind and I think might be worth some more thought. 

I like my rough book to look appealing so my current one has a marbled cover but plain pages inside, of a good weight that they can take drawings as well as scribbles!

Diary

And then there is a diary. This is for the end of the day, just summing up what my main thoughts of the day were, sometimes a gratitude journal, sometimes just a new plan that I have been thinking over.

So those are my main paper systems. 

Online I use Google Calendar for dates and Trello for project organisation. There are so many online organisers out there and they all have their good and bad points. I am a very visual person and love that I can drag cards about on my Trello boards. (I was particularly excited the other day when I discovered that if you put the party popper emoji in a list title, Trello will pop confetti over your screen when you drag a card to that list!)

More about the Arc folder and Trello to come!