It has been a HOT minute since I have spoken about planners on any platform. Leaving Instagram and Facebook has certainly curtailed my planner-sharing activity though not my actual planner usage. Although I am not using the planner I started 2023 with I am idealistically hopeful that I will stay with one planner for the whole year in 2024. The life of a former Planner Tramp can be subdued for only so long. Here is my latest planner tramp tale.
Back to the beginning…
If you have been with me awhile you may remember the days of Planner Boot Camp. You may have participated in one of them which I started in 2015 after a series I wrote in 2014 called Planning with Purpose. It was just a little shout-out in a Facebook group inviting “planner tramps” to unite and overcome the propensity for planner hopping prevalent in the paper-purchasing community. That first call had an overwhelming response as about fifty (if memory serves me correctly) accepted the challenge and received their PBC certificates. The next few years I rolled out more calls for Planner Tramps to unite and stick to “one planner” to rule them all at least for the 31 days of PBC. I challenged participants to avoid ogling all the options available as the market became saturated and to curate their own planner practice with intention and self-discipline. One year, due to word-of-mouth sharing, we had an overwhelming response with sign-ups in the three hundred range!
As for me, I have to admit all this perusing planners and being immersed in the planner community (yes, that is a thing!) did not help me practice what I preached. If anything it grew into a consuming habit, and though I began the endeavor to help others, I found mostly my heap of planners growing higher in the process.
More does not necessitate better…
Sometimes having more options just equals more distraction. Or when the thing you have to help you do your thing becomes an all-consuming thing then the thing you think you need needs to be reevaluated.
Stay with me.
Still here? We humans are so darn good at making mountains out of molehills, right? But both have a purpose and maybe that’s the point. Because anyone can jot down dates in a blank notebook and call it a day. But that’s not who we are. Humans are experts at mountain making. We despise the simple things often to our own detriment. If there is a way to do it, we complicate it. Or simplify it – so we say-which usually means ADDING to something that was already straightforward, ie. simple.
With the swing of the pendulum historically we go from one extreme to the other. But, I see one thing occurring continuously in the short life I have lived. One can plan, but life happens regardless. There is only so much you can count on, and post-COVID, I think everyone has swallowed more than one bitter pill they’d rather not have to repeat.
We can plan, but it’s our response to the unplanned events in life that will ultimately define us.
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So, with a plethora of planner possibilities at our fingertips, promising to help us be all that we can be, how do we find that balance without feeling like it’s all too much? How do we find the way through the promises to the practical help we hope to have in what are, after all, glorified notebooks?
To that end, I will bring you a few possibilities I have handpicked which I believe are worth a glance. And if that doesn’t help you make a choice, we can always kick off the new year with a return to Planner Boot Camp or Planning with Purpose Revisited. Either way, I do believe there are many options, but the key to your peace of mind with regard to the diverse variety of choices available is to clarify what you need most from your planner (think toool) and recognize what does not work for you. The best piece of advice I have in this regard: The grass is not always greener. OR as the case may be, the planner page that looks pretty in someone else’s planner does not guarantee happiness (or “planner peace” or even functionality) for you!
Let’s keep our eyes on what is most important, and let the thing, however wonderful it may be, remain the thing and not THE THING. If you follow me this far, I know you will love all the planner things I have planned for October. I will be sharing more of the happenings and mishaps from this past year with journals, planners, and notebooks- what worked, what didn’t, and why it doesn’t matter.
Mostly, if you have been missing this old Planner Tramp, I hope you will come to see all that will be here this Fall! Do you have your lineup for 2024? Let me know what you are using to keep your days running smoothly. Have a simple alternative to the pricey planner selection available? Then do share below. Is there a specific planner you would like to see reviewed here? Tell me and I will reach out and see if I can make it happen. Have a memory or lesson learned you can share from PBC? Comment below. Also, be sure and check the Planner Review Page for discount codes, giveaways, and all posts listed for your convenience.
Thank you for being here.
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As a PS, if you feel inclined and are on social media platforms it would be great if you could share with your friends, as I am using my blog space fairly exclusively in the days ahead. I appreciate your support greatly! I do have YouTube and Twitter accounts, but for how long is anyone’s guess!
Enthusiastically, Dawn 