As I said in my first bullet journal article, I needed to figure out how to combine my work and personal items together so I could keep my number of journals to two. I don’t want anything but writing and brainstorming in my writing journal. I couldn’t find a lot online about people who use their journals for both work and personal items. It seems people generally either have two separate journals, only use a journal for one or the other, or combine one with electronic help. I had three main spreads to figure out for this: future log, monthly log and my daily/weekly spreads. (I apologize for my photography and the shadows of my hand in them! But I don’t apologize for the utilitarian nature of my spreads. I don’t even use a ruler. There are tons of other places you can go to find pretty bullet journals.)

The easiest was the monthly log. A lot of people get very complicated with theirs, wanting to see a grid-like a calendar that hangs on a wall. I’ve used the more traditional, original monthly spread before and liked it, so I’m sticking with that. On the left-hand page, I run down the numbers of the days of the month, with the letter of the week next to it. Here I can transfer birthdays, events and appointments from my future log. On the right-hand page, I divide the page in half with a horizontal line halfway down the page. Since I have more “projects” at work than I do personally, I write down the projects for work in the top section and then anything I’m working on or need to note for personal things in the bottom half. If I start needing more room for work, I’ll consider only using the bottom third for personal items.

Next was my future log. This maps out the entire year. I had originally intended to just have an empty space for each month but decided to add a little grid calendar in each section for a visual representation of the month. One the future log I can put birthdays, planned time off, holidays, important meetings and events that I know about months in advance. Then when that month rolls around, I can transfer those to my monthly log. I wanted to have plenty of space, so I used two pages for six months, four pages total for the year. For this spread, I start with holidays and birthdays at the top, followed by personal items and put work-related meetings and items at the bottom and move up.

Finally, I needed to figure out my daily logs. One of the benefits of a bullet journal is its flexibility. A lot of the daily/weekly spreads I’ve seen online do a fixed spread for their dailies/weeklies. Some may have daily pages in addition where they can keep the flexibility. I didn’t want to give up my flexibility, but I also didn’t want to have two sets of pages. So I knew I needed to figure out a way to combine them somehow. I needed some kind of weekly calendar to put appointments later in the week where I could see them. Only a daily log wouldn’t work either.

I started by running a calendar for the week across the top of a two-page spread. Then having dailies below. In addition, I had a monthly habit tracker. While the weekly calendar was working fine, I didn’t like the habit tracker being so separate from what I was looking at every day. So I decided to try and fit in a weekly habit tracker instead. Below is what I have come up with. I think it’s working well, but I could always change it up again if I think of something else. The ability to change your mind is one of the major benefits of the bullet journal!

The calendar goes down the left of the left-hand page, with the habit tracker next to it. Drawing the boxes for that is a little tedious, but I feel like I need something to guide me. A blank square is too blank. I have room in the first box for a short inspirational quote. On the right page, I start my dailies. I used a little flag for the day of the week and the date. I put a little cloud and a short description of the weather and beneath a positive statement for the day. Invetiably, my note for Friday is, “It’s Friday!” On the right, you can see the beginnings of the box for my food log. I’m not currently counting calories or anything. I just write down what I eat during the day. This way the dailies can be as short or long as I need them.

A note about my dailies. I log all my items together whether personal or work-related. There’s no way to tell how much room I might need for either type, so I don’t have a designated space. For work items, I used the standard bullet. For all appointments/events, I use the original open circle bullet. For personal items, instead of doing some other shape I use a bullet with an open circled around it. So it looks more like a target. This way I can still use the > to reschedule and X them out when complete, but there is enough difference for me to tell the difference between them at a glance. And I still use a hash for notes when needed. I keep a running collection of meeting notes though, so I don’t have a ton of notes showing up in my daily logs.

So those are my main bullet journal spreads in detail and how I combine my work and personal items together. I have two more articles planned, one on my meal planning spreads and the other on my goal planning for the year.