Hello Brains!
It's that time of year... back to school!
Or as I like to call it,
ADHD New Years.
This year, it's all going to be different.
The past is behind us,
we get a fresh start.
I'm going to be SO organized this year! [Explosion]
[Intro Music]
I'm not in school anymore, but I still get this feeling any time I get a new planner or productivity app.
Maybe... maybe this is the one!
It has a calendar, a place for my to-dos.
I mean yeah, I stopped using the last one after two weeks, but the last one didn't have THIS!
It even works, for a while.
I can't wait to set it up, or cross off my to-dos,
or fill in these boxes.
And suddenly, I'm flossing everyday, and eating SALAD.
Cut to... [Trashcan slamming shut]
Two weeks later, those boxes feel bossy.
The food tracker is overwhelming,
and I'm back to the freedom of random Post-It notes
lists wherever I feel like creating them,
and notebooks full of ideas and epiphanies that I will never find again.
Here's the ADHD conundrum:
to stay organized and on task, we need structure,
because that's not how our brains naturally work.
But then we reject that structure, because that's not how our brains naturally work!
Planners are structured predictably, consistently
logically, sequentially, neurotypically.
And that's not how we work.
There isn't a planner in the world that will know that you need ten pages between June and July just to doodle.
Not one that skips Mondays because some days you don't need a to-do list, you need a nap.
And it's not even the designer's fault.
Who could design something like that?
I mean seriously, unless a designer who also had ADHD designed a planner that was flexible enough
to keep up with their brain, but structured enough to keep them on track,
comprehensive enough to contain all the information they needed in one place,
but simple enough that they could open it without getting overwhelmed,
and adaptable enough that they could get bored with ALL of it, and just change it the next week!
And oh my god, someone did.
The Bullet Journal IS all that, and more.
I'll explain how it works in a second, and I even did a tutorial on it for you.
But first....
If you're like me, and you love using pen and paper, but you feel guilty using it because
obviously digital is better and more practical, and no....
That's not true!
Here's why analogue can actually be better than your digital system.
Although if you've found a digital system that works for you, ignore me entirely.
Here's a cat video!
1. Pen and paper help with memory encoding.
Our brains process information better when we write out the letters by hand, instead of just hitting the keys.
So stuff you write by hand, you're more likely to remember.
2. It's not online.
Having a physical planner to refer to makes it so your goals, dreams, to-dos, life....
can't be intruded on by pop-up ads or incoming texts.
For those of us who get distracted easily, that's a serious advantage.
3. It's still there.
Long after we've upgraded our phones or crashed our computers.
Which can help us to develop a sense of who we are and give us a record of life as we lived it.
OK, now that we've gotten the paper stigma out of the way....
Here's why the bullet journal is the best analogue system for ADHDers I've found.
It gives us the freedom of a regular notebook,
while providing the structure of a regular planner.
How does it do this? Magic! (I'm kidding).
There are a few basic elements of structure:
the index, a yearly, monthly, and daily log, a key,
but you create it as you go and design your own layouts.
So it's not only tailored to you today. It allows you to get bored and mix it up.
And all you really need is an empty notebook and a pen.
Here are the basic elements of this system and why they work so well for those of us with ADHD.
The Index! This is what allows us to create as we go.
Wanna create a list of every ice cream flavor you hate?
Cool! Flip to a blank page and do it.
Wanna be able to find it the next time you're about to order ice cream?
Put it in the index.
I don't know why we didn't think of this before!
Also, no more writing down a brilliant idea and being sure it's in your notebook... here...somewhere?
I think maybe this isn't the one.
The Symbol Key
Shorthand systems are great for speedy brains.
You probably already know this. You probably already use a version of it.
You probably also forget what your own symbols mean.
Writing them down for future reference? Brilliant!
The Yearly, Monthly, and Daily layouts.
There are infinite variations of this,
but they all accomplish the same thing that's helpful for ADHD brains:
natural visual limits of time.
Which can otherwise feel kind of... unlimited to us.
Migration!
Probably the best part of the whole system.
I explain more in the tutorial, but basically
it keeps important things from falling through the cracks, while letting unimportant things fade away.
How, you might ask?
When you have to hand-write a to-do over and over again and find space to do it,
it makes you really question how important it actually is.
Which simplifies your life.
[Ding!]
But for those of you who really need the searchability of a digital system,
(and weren't you supposed to be watching cat videos?)
You can make it digital!!!
There's a service called Evernote,
you may have heard of it,
that allows you to take pictures of your bullet journal and upload them to your private digital notebook.
Whaaaatt!
Staples? If you're watching, I'm sorry for the loss in planner sales.
But on the bright side, I'll be buying a lot more pens!
That's it for this week.
Check out the tutorial and let me know how the system works for you!
If you like what I do, subscribe. And if you love what I do,
consider supporting me on Patreon, like these Brains did.
[Singing] Did you ever know that you're my [Stops] What?
Edward says I have to stop before I get a copyright strike on my channel.
He says, "You're welcome".
Bye, Brains!
Check out the tutorial I was able to make!
Question Time!
Do you specifically have side effects when you take your meds?
Yeah, I'm on Vyvanse, and yeah a couple?
I'm not as hungry when I'm on them, and sometimes I get a little anxious
although if I exercise or meditate, that pretty much takes care of that.
as long as I'm not on too high a dose.
But I've been taking ADHD meds pretty much since I was a kid and I haven't grown a second head or anything, so.....I think I'm good.