The Bullet Journal Method by Ryder Carroll, Summary

Are you feeling distracted and disorganized? The Bullet Journal Method may be your answer!

I’ve heard a lot about the bullet journal. However, I didn’t understand the system. I saw a bullet journal in a dollar store and bought one. When I got home, removed the packaging and opened the book, all I saw were a bunch of dots. I didn’t have a clue what to do. So I did what any normal person would do, I did a search on Google.

I started watching a YouTube video, but shortly gave up. Videos are not my primary way of learning. I came across The Bullet Journal Method by Ryder Carroll and decided to read it. For this book, although I previewed it first, I decided to read most of it since I wanted to master the system. Remember, you read as much of a book as you need to. No more, no less.

The Bullet Journal Method by Ryder Carroll is not a book that works well in e-book format. There are way too many links in the book to jump to different sections to see what the author is talking about. For me, I found it distracting and started to lose my focus. This book is better as a print book.

What is the Bullet Journal Method?

The bullet journal method is a personal operating system. It helps you to structure your life and focus on the things that matter. Ryder Carroll created the system because of his attention deficit disorder (ADD). Many people who don’t suffer from ADD have successfully used his system in many ways.

In one of the YouTube videos that I watched, Ryder Carroll said something that I thought was interesting. The bullet journal is a mindfulness practice that's disguised as a productivity system. And I thought, that's very interesting, how can I work with that?

The bullet journal is all the following:

1. To-do-list
2. Journal
3. Planner
4. Sketchbook

Bullet Journal Method Description on Amazon

“The Bullet Journal Method is about much more than organizing your notes and to-do lists. It's about what Carroll calls “intentional living”: weeding out distractions and focusing your time and energy in pursuit of what's truly meaningful, in both your work and your personal life. It's about spending more time with what you care about, by working on fewer things. His new book shows you how to…

• Track the past: Using nothing more than a pen and paper, create a clear and comprehensive record of your thoughts.

• Order the present: Find daily calm by tackling your to-do list in a more mindful, systematic, and productive way.

• Design the future: Transform your vague curiosities into meaningful goals, and then break those goals into manageable action steps that lead to big change.”

Goal of the Bullet Journal Method

According to the author, the mission of the Bullet Journal Method is to help you become more mindful about how you spend your time and energy. It does this by combining productivity, mindfulness, and being intentional into a framework that’s flexible, forgiving, and practical.

“The Bullet Journal method will help you accomplish more by working on less. It helps you identify and focus on what is meaningful by stripping away what is meaningless.”

Productivity

When you open a notebook, you remove yourself from digital distractions. This gives you the opportunity to process, think, and focus. You pause the information overload, giving you the space and time to reflect and examine your life clearly.

The Bullet Journal Method helps you to keep important things in one place. It forces you to get granular, turning ideas into goals and so on. Learn how to weed out distractions.

Mindfulness

The Bullet Journal Method helps you to orient yourself. You see what's right in front of you. And you become laser clear about who you are, where you are, and what you want. Writing by hand forces you to become focused in a distracted world.

Intentionality

For something to be sustainable, it has to fit into your lifestyle and schedule. The Bullet Journal Method is a bridge between your beliefs and actions. It helps you to keep in touch with the things that really matter to you.

Bullet journaling forces you to be reflective. You define what's important, why it's important to you, then figure out how to pursue those things. You're reminded of these every day, which allows you to act on them. You learn the art of intentional living.

Bullet Journal Method

There are two components of the bullet journal method. 

1. System
2. Practice

To use the bullet journal method to achieve your goals, you need to believe in what you're doing. And you need to become more self-aware and have regular check-ins with yourself. It's a living autobiography. You are able to distinguish between the meaningful and the meaningless. To live an intentional life, your actions must align with your beliefs.

Every day, you're bombarded with thousands of thoughts. What do you choose to focus on?

“Every decision requires you to focus and focus is an investment of your time and energy.”

You need to find a way to limit the amount of decisions you have to make. There's a simple way to check if a decision is important.

Exercise in The Bullet Journal Method

The author asks you to make a list of:

• What you're working on.
• The things you should be working on.
• What you want to be working on.

I got busy and started to work on my list. Then it struck me that I'd gone through that process already. What I needed to do, was to figure out how to get things done. I like to give myself projects that can help me in my business and career. And I created my Personal Learning Development Plan.

The intent of the Plan is to allow me to get a pool of ideas to pivot my business. To do this, I wanted to read and digest books that had valuable information. What I needed at this point, was a system that enabled me to complete the project deliverables.

There's a lot that’s happening in my life right now, and I needed to figure out which task/activities were the most important to me achieving my goals.

The above diagram is the perfect litmus test.

Clarify Your Goals: Questions to Ask for Each Goal

The questions to ask yourself are, What:

• About this goal sparked my curiosity?
• Motivated me to want to invest time and energy here?
• Am I trying to accomplish?
• Will it require?
• Is my definition of success for the goal?

The Bullet Journal System

There are four core collections:

1. Daily Log
2. Monthly Log
3. Future Log
4. Index 

The Index rules the other three collections.

Index: Where to find items in your bullet journal. This is similar to a table of contents. I think this is a game-changer. How many times have you recorded important information in a notebook and not know where to find it? This has happened to me many times leaving me a frustrated woman.

Future Log: Future tasks and events that are outside the current month.

Monthly Log: Overview of the time and tasks to complete for the current month. It's a monthly mental inventory.

Daily Log: It's where you quickly write down your thoughts for the day.

Migration: Getting rid of meaningless information from your notebook.

Collections: A stack of information you need to organize.

Things to Keep in Mind

1. Things you need to do (Tasks).
2. Your experiences (Events).
3. Information you don't want to forget (Notes)

Once Ryder Carroll explains the symbols and his rationale for using them, it immediately makes sense.

Avil's Thoughts on the Bullet Journal Method

I think the system is an excellent one. And one that I plan to use. It's a simple system when you understand it. But it's very technical to explain. I found that frustrating in the book. What I recommend is that before you read The Bullet Journal Method, you watch the YouTube video that Ryder Carroll created.

It's less than 5 minutes, but packed with a lot of information that will help you to understand the content of the book.

This book is worth the read. I found many applications for what I learned. And I discovered ways to improve my products. This book will make you think. There is a section on gratitude. Before I go to sleep, I write down five things that I'm grateful for. I've been doing this for a while now, but I do it in an app.

I often rush through the process and I need to slow things down. I need to write things I’m grateful for  in a notebook or even my bullet journal. Why? The act of writing down what I'm grateful for in my own handwriting will force me to experience what I'm grateful for.

Next Steps

Wondering what to do next, you can do all of:

1. Buy my new book, Leadership Reading: Spilling the Tea on How Top Leaders Read

2. If you want to Consult 1:1 about Effective Reading Strategies

3. Subscribe to my YouTube Channel

4. Join the Art of Learning Membership Site

5. Download Unlock Your Genius Power Reading Tips Sheet

6. Buy me a cup of coffee!

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