Bullet Journaling to Save a Life

I started bullet journaling in the spring of 2017, the Monday my parents went with me to emergency appointments with three different mental health care professionals. They each said the same thing: hospitalization. My father politely, but firmly, rejected this. I didn’t argue; I didn’t want to go.

So we left the counseling center and went to Barnes & Noble instead, likely at my insistence and as a result of my long-standing belief that books and coffee could fix anything—even this. I gravitated toward the revolving display of Moleskine journals in various inviting colors, entranced like a child in a candy store. Movies said that diamonds were a girl’s best friend, but stationery was mine.

The store didn’t have any yellow journals, my favorite, so I picked out a soft-cover turquoise one with dotted pages and paired it with a set of brush pens I didn’t quite know how to use. I placed them on the sales counter, avoiding the cashier’s eye. I’m unsure what they saw that day, could only imagine what the pronounced circles under my eyes must have looked like. I had barely slept the prior forty-eight hours. But as I walked out with my tan bag swinging on my wrist, I resolved that these tools would save my life.

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An avid journaler for most of my life, it’s no surprise that I eventually picked up bullet journaling as an adult (despite some initial resistance). Creative journals, like the ones from the Disney Channel Original Movie Read It and Weep (2006) and the book series designed like a preteen’s diary, Amelia’s Notebook by Marissa Moss (1995), captivated me. My own middle school journals took those as inspiration, and I began to experiment. I filled my precious spiral-bound hardcover notebooks with colorful words written in marker that stood out against the pencil, with doodles and sketches to accompany my daily reflections.

By high school, my creative journaling began to include a friend. At the beginning of sophomore year, my best friend and I found out that he would have his schedule switched, effectively separating us, likely to the relief of our teachers but to our shared devastation. The solution was to journal. We started “The Peter Pan Notebook,” a spiral-bound book that we passed back and forth in the hallway between classes and filled with our thoughts: letters to each other, lists, plans for after school, fan fiction, my novel ideas, his inspiration for films, and lots of doodles. We eventually filled four of those journals, each decorated with sketches in permanent marker and quotes from our favorite musicals and Jonas Brothers songs, memorializing a friendship that, for the year we kept them, was perfect.

My college journals became what might have been recognizable as a precursor to the bullet journal. I kept hardcover Moleskine journals that held everything—to-do lists, calendars, goals, notes—all organized with color-coded sticky tabs. When inspiration struck, I would fill pages with scenes from novels that only existed in my mind, featuring characters who were closer than my friends. I documented, analyzed, and dreamed all in one place. I didn’t know yet I was writing for my life, or that writing was what I wanted to do with it. All I knew was that I felt vulnerable and lonely on Grounds, UVA’s campus—a Black minnow in a shark-filled ocean—but I was safe between those covers, so I took my ink-filled lifeline everywhere.

At the time, the administrative assistant in the admissions office with whom I worked as an intern observed my creations with interest and asked if they were bullet journals. Despite her warmness and our closeness, I remember my body instinctively curving over my stuffed journal, held to my chest at the inquiry. Bullet journaling, I presumed, was a thing for white suburban moms who needed a creative outlet when their kids’ schedules got overwhelming. Not for me, a twenty-something Black college student, a wannabe writer, who was increasingly anxious about leaving the little nest she’d finally made for herself at the University of Virginia because she had nothing figured out.

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Transitions don’t agree with me. For a girl whose forever dream was to fly away from her hometown, I never made it too far. My desire for newness clashed with my need for comfort, routine, familiarity to catch me if I stumbled; I wanted to soar but couldn’t completely let go of the safety net.

I often label this feeling as “needing a new pot,” like a plant whose roots have filled its container, beginning to cramp, signaling it’s time for a new, larger one if the plant is to continue growing. The end of undergrad signaled the need for a transplant, but I ignored the fact that for humans, the process of “repotting” can be distressing. It was a reminder that even the best of metaphors extend only so far.

My repotting included transitioning to the difficulties of graduate school and the often-hostile nature of academia, living on my own for the first time, struggling with feelings of isolation and inadequacy, finding my voice as a writer, and missing my college friends. By the end of my first semester, I’d hoped the month I’d spent earlier in the fall having random crying spells in my friend’s car was the worst of it. I didn’t last long into the spring semester before I started seeing a counselor at the campus wellness center who also led mindfulness meditation groups.

While I was only half committed to the encouraged daily, twenty-minute meditations on my own time, I loved the grounding and centering activities we learned. I found the weekly gratitude logs we were expected to fill out and return at the next group meeting the best part of my week. Even if my meditations column remained blank and the page was returned tearstained, I consistently wrote about how grateful I was for my dog, sunflowers at Trader Joe’s, and hot cups of coffee. Long after I left the group, I continued the practice of writing down three to five things I was grateful for every day in my journals.

This practice helped me cope with a newfound diagnosis of bipolar II. Though I was grateful to have a name for the disconcerting emotional upheavals I frequently experienced, the diagnosis snatched any semblance of control I had over my life. The routine of picking up a journal and committing to writing down my gratitudes kept me afloat.

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The day I talked to my psychiatrist about my diagnosis, she suggested I keep track of my moods to see patterns forming around my food intake, any exercise, and my medication. As I listened to her list the overwhelming number of things I would need to track, I realized what I needed was to get organized—and the bullet journals I’d written off seemed the perfect way to do it.

Ryder Carroll is credited with the creation of the bullet journaling technique—a simple yet effective individualized mix of to-do lists, planners, and diaries organized with various bullets, whose meanings are often explained in a key in the front of the book. Despite Carroll’s guidance through TED Talk and book, The Bullet Journal Method (2018), I would argue, based on my own experiences and witnessing truly stunning journals over the years, there is no “correct” way to bullet journal. This is what makes it so appealing. It is possible to take the core guiding principles of intentionally planning your day in quick, easy-to-decipher shorthand as well as systematically logging any important information and still add your personality.

Visual art and literature have always defined me, so when I sat down with my turquoise journal after the trifecta of counseling appointments in 2017, I knew there was no way I would do the simple bulleted lists. I was much more drawn to the elaborate, artistic spreads I saw on Instagram, adorned with brush lettered headings and colorful trackers. If I was going to bullet journal to save my life, I would make it beautiful in the process.

Mental illness and PWIs almost made me forget the truth of who I am—a maker of beautiful things. I had learned to fold myself small, rarely letting my mind roam, fearful I would take up too much space. Regular bullet journaling guided me back to myself, reminded me that my love is vibrant and expansive. I came back in flashes; after every couple dozen pages of intense tracking and documenting, there were marker sketches of girls whose stories I wanted to know interspersed among the diligent trackers and mood logs. A few pages on, I would capture a few sentences—the very corner of a larger image I had to see the rest of, bits of narratives I needed to tell. I welcomed the fragments whenever I had them, introducing them into the journal wherever they fit, intuiting that I should not force them but make sure I had a space to collect these pieces of myself that were flying back.

Mental illness and PWIs almost made me forget the truth of who I am—a maker of beautiful things.

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Over my last four years of fairly consistent bullet journaling, my own system has evolved not only from journal to journal; it also shifts within the pages of one notebook. Writing in my turquoise Moleskine in 2017 was a several-times-a-day ritual: logging my food in my meal spreads, checking off that I had taken my medication in my habit tracker, noting how much sleep I had gotten, and jotting down my moods, in addition to keeping track of my everyday appointments in a weekly calendar, accompanied by sections dedicated to goals, to-do lists, and a notes section. It was not only helpful to be able to see what factors might have made my moods shift, but also useful when I saw my psychiatrist, who could make better recommendations based on more information. I also kept a gratitude log, which held my letters to God, written like diary entries, but ones in which I needed to feel like someone was reading because I was holding on for dear life.

When my anxiety started to lessen and my mood leveled off, I found that I didn’t need to track so intensely. During those good stretches, I abandoned trackers, opting only for my weekly spread with sections for notes, to-dos, and goals, plus daily journal entries. And for most of the pandemic, as there was little to plan for, I stuck mostly to day-to-day journal entries. But in every iteration, I have kept a gratitude log. It helps to remember what kept me afloat on the hard days.

These days, I keep a huge 8.5″ x 11″ turquoise hardcover bullet journal that came in one of Archer & Olive’s quarterly subscription boxes—a woman-owned brand I love for its vegan, eco-friendly, and wellness-inspired books. (It also helps that the paper is ultra thick so I can paint in them with no worry.) I’m less afraid of writing now, and bullet journaling helps me be brave. I write my aspirations and inspirations: I keep lists of the publications I want to pitch, editors I want to work with, bullet-pointed pitch ideas, writers I want to meet . . . And sometimes when I get just the right word, it sparks a paragraph that I get down before it slips away—because who knows what it might become someday?

On the last night of the month, I prepare for the one ahead. I pull my repurposed candle jars, full of assorted pens and markers, close by as I open to a blank page. I make a pretty cover page for the month, complete with a calendar, then set my goals, enough to fill the page. There was a time when my monthly goals were nothing but to stay alive, take my medicine, and eat. Now, it’s a mix of academic goals, creative writing goals, and health and wellness goals. I give myself permission to document as well as dream, making sure to list the things I want so badly that just committing them to paper makes my pulse spike: publish a book, finish my doctorate, fall in love.

Most often, one of my first goals listed is some variation of this: Be gentle with myself. Rest, take it easy, be soft with myself because I deserve that. I try to keep these notes in mind as I build and fill my page for the week: a spot for my calendar, plus sections for to-dos, goals, notes, and, of course, gratitude. I often ask myself, How can I be productive while honoring my desire to be gentle with myself? The question informs how many tasks I add to my to-dos and goals, how I parcel them out through the week, and how I try to go slow. Each night, or first thing in the morning, I plan for the day ahead. I decide on three to five tasks from my weekly to-dos and goals to tackle that day, jotting down updates on how it’s going throughout.

I’ve gone back to tracking: a dot for every “human thing” I do, like getting dressed and having morning coffee, taking my medication, and going for a walk. Perhaps it seems tedious, the continuous tracking and reflecting. But I find its rhythm constant and soothing as a heartbeat. It centers me throughout the day, a quiet place I can return to after a few hours navigating the storm of my tumultuous moods. I’ll add finding a four-leaf clover to my gratitude list. I’ll adorn the page with blue painted flowers that look like china patterns. And some days, I write affirmations down the side of the page until I run out of space:

I love myself

I love myself

I love myself

I love myself

I love myself . . .

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