Matt Ragland shows how to set up a bullet journal from scratch. He recommends dot-grid notebooks like the Baron Fig Confidant, personalizes the opening page with his name and a journal name, and explains his index system for tracking page numbers and linking between journals.
Chapters
Hi everyone, my name is Matt, and welcome to another Bullet Journal productivity video. I'm really excited to share this upcoming series with you. What I wanted to do for the new year, going from 2019 into 2020, I've done 2 years of productivity planning videos, and like, here's what you do for the new year, and here's all the things that you, that you need to do, here's my system. I still think a lot of that matters, and so I'm gonna have those linked, and I do plan on having a a specific crush 2020 with the Bullet Journal type of video. But what I see a lot of people asking about, and what I have heard from a lot of you, is how do we get back to the basics, and how do we break down the Bullet Journal into the essential steps needed to get our thoughts down, to get our tasks down, and make sure that we are making progress and staying consistent and doing it in a healthy way with a bullet journal. And so the series that I have for you is just called Bullet Journal Basics, and there are going to be probably about 10 or 12 videos over the next couple of months that will take you through each step of how to set up and use your bullet journal for success going into the new year. Or really, if you watch this at any time, doesn't have to be the new year, because I'm guessing, you know, you might come across this on YouTube and it's June. And June's a lovely month to start a bullet journal. So make sure that you check out what will become other videos in this playlist, in this series. It's going to be linked up here and definitely in the end screen as well. But this first video that we're going to be talking about is just the very first moment of getting that fresh new bullet journal. Talk a little bit about what kind of bullet journal, like, you should start with, what kind of brands are the best fit for you, what do I recommend, just all the getting started stuff of that very first Bullet Journal that you want to set up. Ready? Let's go ahead and get started.
For the Bullet Journal Basics series, I'm using the Baron Fig Confidant hardcover notebook. It is beautifully made. I really like it. It's a little smaller than the Leuchtturm official branded Bullet Journal. They're both great, and really any kind of dot grid notebook is a really good choice for your bullet journaling needs. But I like to use this Baron Fig Confont.
It has a cloth, hardbound cloth kind of COVID so it's very, very classy looking.
I always get compliments on it. So here, obviously, you're going to put your name, any contact information that you want. I also like to name my journals based on like mountains or parks that I've been to. So This is from 2018 Banff and then 2019 Teton. I haven't come up with a name for this one yet, but that way I can use it for referencing, which is another video, a different video that I'm going to do. The way that most first pages are glued in notebooks makes them a little difficult to write on. They just have a lot more, you know, it just feels weird. And so I don't do anything special specific on this first page. Really, the only thing I do is I just use it for like scratch paper or pen tests. I also always do like a dot grid count. So like 36 dots down, 24 across, and sometimes I'll put like little signifiers at the halfway point of the pages, like just a little, just a little pen mark, just so I can easily kind of go back and reference like this is about where half-page, like, delineation or section would be. So that's all I do for the first page right there. The way that I set up my index is right from the top, I write down the date that I started this Bullet Journal, and then the date that I end up finishing, same, this Bullet Journal. The other thing that I'll do that I've started recently is that I'll also put down, again, kind of referencing that naming convention, is is I'll write down the previous Bullet Journal that I used. And so in this example, it would be the 2019 Teton would go right here on previous Bullet Journal. And then whichever one I end up using next will go right here. So I can know this is the one that I had, this is the one that I'm using. It's a lot easier to kind of thread thoughts back and forth between the two.
The other reference that I'll put right here is for the field note.
Notebook that, or pocket notebook, that I might be using at the beginning of this. And I name my field notes as well.
And so you can see right here that on the inside I put the name here.
Normally I'll put the name here, but since it's, it's a black, I have to use this, uh, you know, different kind of metallic Sharpie, and it doesn't give me as fine of a point. So I just wrote the name down here..
And the convention for this is FN Field Notes. This is the Group 11 Series Bronze for kind of the foil outside.
This is a beautiful release, by the way. But that's how I get the name for this, and it's going to go right here so I can know which Field Note I'm— which Field Note notebook I am referencing throughout this. And then it's a pretty standard index layout. So page 3, description of whatever is coming next. And I have both pages for an index here, and I will use the index for like important notes, meetings, dates, monthly layouts. I don't use a future log. I'm not using a future log this year, which I'll talk about more in a different video. But start/finish dates, like I said up here, but this, this description, this index I don't, I don't, I don't like have any strong rules for it. Like I said, it's just the page number, and I'll use it to reference important notes, meetings, or dates. And then from here, we'll talk about this in the next video for monthly layouts, but then it's just going directly into that monthly layout. So that is the outline for like the bullet journal basics start, which kind of notebook you want to use, what goes here in the contact page if you want to do some kind of naming reference. Again, check out the video for that once it's up. This first page is kind of just like scratch, scratch paper, and I do always write down the number of dots vertically and horizontally so I can reference it for like sectioning off the page later on. And then the index, date start, date finish, previous, next bullet journal, and any field notes reference that I might be using at the beginning. And then just a very simple page number, description of the thing that I'm indexing.
So I hope you keep in mind for this first video in Bullet Journal basics that what matters is not so much the notebook, or the type of paper, or the pen that you use. You can use anything that you want to use the, say, Bullet Journal methodology. I do think, I do think a notebook is important because then you're keeping everything in one place and it's not a bunch of like discarded scraps of paper, even index cards, which I do love. But it allows you to keep everything in one place and reference it as the year goes on. In the next video in the Bullet Journal Basics series, we're going to be talking about the daily spread, how to use signifiers, what rapid logging is, and how you can keep everything going on a day-to-day basis and kind of link it, connect it to other goals that you have in your life. Thanks so much for watching. If you're new to my YouTube channel, give it a thumbs up and subscribe if you like this. There's going to be, again, an entire Bullet Journal Basics series, and there are all kinds of videos about bullet journaling, planning, goals, systems, and how to do it all with analog tools like a bullet journal, like pen and paper, index cards, all kinds of things that are very tactile that you can hold and you can feel and you can love with your hands. Maybe not the way that I should have said that, but I'm not going to edit it out. Thank you so much for watching, and I'll see you in the next video.
