The HeartWord Way

Hello, fellow bullet journalists! I hope you all are finding a way to stay cool in this hot weather!

Today, I’ll be sharing both habits to track in your bullet journal and different layouts for your habit tracker. I know this is kind of a random post, but I didn’t start working on my post until yesterday. Whoops!

What is a Habit Tracker?

For those of you who don’t know what a habit tracker is, it’s a page where you create a space to track what habits you want to keep doing and also those that you want to stop doing. This can be done in a bullet journal, in a notebook, or even on a piece of paper stuck on the wall beside your bed.

To create one of these, just sit down with a pen and paper and think about your daily routine. Start with the moment you wake up. Imagine yourself going through your day, writing down any habits you want to start or stop doing as you do so.

Layouts

I’ve only tried two different habit tracker layouts in the time I’ve been bullet journaling. I haven’t tried very many because the ones I’ve used have worked really well, so I didn’t feel the need to try new ones.

This is the habit tracker that I’ve used for most of my bullet journaling time.

How To Create It: It’s pretty simple: a title at the very top, the dates underneath, and habits that I want to track written down the side.
How To Fill It In: When you’re going through your tracker each day, make an x or some other mark (color it in, do stripes, etc.) in the appointed square to show you completed that habit.
Advantages: This layout is good if you are tracking a lot of habits. In this picture, I’m only tracking ten habits, but this page can hold up to at least seventeen (and even more if you use two pages). You can also do a few designs (flowers, cats, etc.) at the bottom to make it more interesting!
Disadvantages: There aren’t any disadvantages for this layout except for the fact that it does get tiring to use the same layout over and over again. That’s why I ended up trying the other layout I’m about to show you.

This layout is one I copied from a post on Pinterest.

How To Create It: For this layout, you just create mini calendars, with one square per day, and at the bottom, you can include an extra space to name your habit.
How To Fill It In: Each day, as you go through, if you completed the habit, then you color in the appropriate square.
Advantages: This one is also good for plenty of habits, but it can’t hold as many as the first layout can. On this page, I have twelve habits, but I think I could have fit about sixteen.
Disadvantages: I will say that I remember this one being difficult to fill out (using three different colors) and tiring to make (it’s not fun to write the same numbers over and over again). I suggest you fill them all out in in just one color, not three different ones. And this tracker layout is worth the mind numbing-ness of writing the same things over and over again!

Habits to Track

I’ve compiled a huge list for you guys of things you can track in your habit tracker. Some of these things will apply to you; some will not. The best thing to do is to just go through the list and ask yourself, “Do I need to work on that? Or am I doing pretty good in that area?” If you feel like you’re doing good, then you probably don’t need to track that habit. If you feel like that area needs more work, go ahead and track it. If you’re not sure about something, track it. Then, at the end of the month, you can look back and see your progress to decide if you need to track it again next month.

And now I’ll go ahead and jump right in to the list:

HEALTH

Water consumption
Calorie goal
Brushed teeth
Skin care routine
Showered
Hair routine
Eating a good breakfast
Step goal
Exercised
Floss
Medications/vitamins
Stretched
No or less smoking/alchohol/unhealthy snacks/sugar/caffeine
Routine for fingernails and toenails
Veggie/fruit servings
Period tracker
Getting good sleep

MENTAL HEALTH

Writing
Read
Spent time drawing
Limit screen time
Track moods
Journal
Meditate
Gratitude log
Listened to music
Spent time outside
Enjoy a hobby
Random act of kindness
Reflect on your day
Reduce social media time
Reduce TV time
Compliment someone

SPIRITUAL

Devotions
Prayed
Bible reading

PRODUCTIVITY

Studied (for school)
Worked on a project
Paid bills
Grocery shopping
Meal plan
Make lists
Prioritize
Update bullet journal
Do one task working towards a bigger goal
Write down goals

HOUSE TASKS

Cleaned
Made bed
Did dishes
Changed sheets
Laundry
Ironing
Put clothes away
Watered plants
Dust
Declutter
Recycle
Pet care
Chores

SOCIAL HEALTH

Spent time with kids
Spent time with partner
Spent time with friends

See You Next Week!

Well, I hope you all enjoyed this post and found it helpful!

I’m going to start trying to post at the same time each week, but I may be late on some days (for instance, I’m a little bit late today). Check back at 2:00 pm EST on Friday for another post!

Thanks for reading! Happy writing!

Three things will last forever – faith, hope, and love – and the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13:13 NLT)

Hello, everyone! I hope you are all enjoying your summer so far!

As you can probably tell from the title, today I will be showing you my new bullet journal!

My Opening Pages

Below is my title page. At first, I thought I would leave this page blank. But then I decided that my journal needed a title page.

Next is my key/reference page. This key is different than all of the keys I have done before, and I think it will really help me out! I’ve drawn out lines that correspond to 1/4, 1/3, and 1/2 marks on the page. I also counted out all of the dots both vertically and horizontally.

Here is my future log. Here I will write down future holidays/dates that I need to be aware of. When I start a new month in my bullet journal, I look ahead using the future log so I know what’s coming up. I decided to use a rainbow theme for this month since I haven’t used that in a while.

Here on page four, I have my books-to-be-read page. I didn’t really use this page a lot in my previous bullet journal, but I’m hoping to use it more this time. I also changed it up a bit from my last page. I did the shelves differently (definitely more interesting this way, I think) and also added some decorations to the shelves (using stickers). When I think of a book I want to read in the future, I’ll draw a book on one of the shelves and label it. Once I’ve read it, I’ll color it in with a colored pencil.

Page five is my summer goals, which you can check out in more detail in this post.

On these two pages, I am giving an inventory of my washi tape collection. I’ve seen other bullet journalists do this, and I really enjoyed organizing all of my tape into little collections (I just love organizing things!). Also, at the bottom right corner, you probably see a cat. I gave this cat some clothes and also stuck some washing tape on the clothes to make it look like he is wearing the washi tape (because the washi tape is on hangers, like clothes normally are). Maybe it was a bit much, but I think it’s cute.

Page eight consists of a page where I will write down all of my favorite books, movies, songs, hobbies, and foods.

This was a page I designed to help me spend more time doing art. It might be kinda hard to read the banner, but it says, “Art Projects.” The categories are the name of the project, start date, end date, and the “Fun Scale.” The fun scale is basically my rating of how much I enjoyed it. The banner was a lot of work, because I had to use a ruler and measure out every single flag, but I think it looks neat (I am too much of a perfectionist).

And as a finale for my opening pages, I dedicated two pages to “Bullet Journal Extra Ideas.” These pages just have a bunch of borders, titles, page corners, boxes, and banners for me to look back at to use in this journal.

June Monthly Pages

To start off the month of June, I have my usual monthly overview. On the left, beneath the title, I have spaces for my goals, memories, books I read during June, and a place to record the time I spend writing. On the right page, I have my calendar, a cat sunbathing, and spaces for events and notes. Beneath notes, I have a quote: “Girls just wanna have sun.”

Next I have my June money plan. This is where I record how many shifts I work, all of my checks, and the total amount I earned. To the right of all of that, I have a space to record how much I want to spend, save, tithe, and also how much money is leftover from my spending amount. At the very bottom, I have a place to write out spending ideas.

This is my highlights page (I just realized I spelled it wrong on my picture). I’ve never done one of these pages before, so I thought it was time to try one out. Basically at the end of the day, I’ll write in the designated box what the highlight of my day was. At the bottom, I doodled a cat stretching after getting out of bed. This is my favorite cat doodle I did!

Next, I have my mood tracker. I saw the design on Pinterest and absolutely LOVED IT! On each day, I’ll color a heart according to the main mood I felt that day. I did have a mood tracker for all of 2020 in my past journal, but as I finish each month, I’ll go back to my old journal and fill it in.

Next, I have my usual habit tracker with my habits going down the page and dates going across.

Whew, onto the last one. This is my first weekly page. This is the first time I’ve used circles as the daily sections, so I think it should be interesting. I also have spaces for my to-do list, goals, and notes. I labeled this “Week 1” because this is my first week in this journal.

My Bullet Journaling Experience

I have been bullet journaling for about a year and a half now, and I’ve gone through two journals.

I’d say I’m pretty experienced and knowledgeable in the bullet journaling method. I’ve tried all sorts of different spreads, and I know which ones will and will not work for me. I have had a few bumps along the way (failed spreads, unfinished pages, periods where I haven’t had time to journal, etc.), but I’ve always worked them out.

I’m going to try to be more creative in this journal than I have in past journals. I’m going to let my creative side thrive! I’ll do this by using more types of titles, borders, designs, etc., and also doing more doodles on each page.

If you have any questions, I’d love to answer them as best as I can! Let me know in the comments!

And here is a review page I did in the back of my last journal:

*Note: The pages that have a red X beside them were failed pages.

Until Next Week…

That’s it for this post! I hope you enjoyed all of my pictures and all my doodled cats! Next week… Well, I’m actually not sure what next week’s post will be yet.