I’ve spent my very first week in the Passion Planner, and let me just say – the transition has been more difficult than I had anticipated!
Let me start off by saying that I’m in no way criticising the Passion Planner system, or saying that it’s bad. This is just my experience of going through the transition. As we all know, change isn’t easy! So, please don’t take my comments as a negative experience with the planner, I’m just talking through what I’m feeling while getting accustomed to it.
Switching over to the Passion Planner has been hard for me for a few reasons:
I’m not sure what to look at first
When I open up to my weekly spread, there is a lot going on.
As a Bullet Journal user going on 4 years, I’m used to opening up to my daily rapid logs and having a list of tasks for the day. I know exactly where to look, and what to do.
In the Passion Planner, my eyes sort of jump around the spread. I’m thinking “Wait, what day is it?”, while I glance at my week, To-Do Lists and Space of Infinite Possibility.
It’s not as much of a straightforward look at my tasks for the day as I’m used to. But with more practice, I’m sure I’ll become more comfortable with the Passion Planner layout.
I’m hesitant to commit things to the schedule
I’m struggling with thoughts like “What if I write something down in marker, and then my plans change?”.
I don’t like when my planner looks messy. But, I think I just need to resolve to write down what my ideal plan is, and if things don’t happen, then they don’t. If plans change, I’ll use white-out. That’s really all I can do, and I’ll have to be okay with it.
I’m also having trouble working with chucks of time where I have things to do, but I’m not sure when I’ll be doing them.
The weekend, for instance. I don’t usually plan out time to get my tasks and errands done. I just know that I have between Saturday and Sunday to do those things, and I’ll get them done when I feel like it.
I also like to keep time open to be spontaneous. If the weather is nice, maybe my husband and I will take a drive somewhere, or something like that. So, binding all my tasks to time feels a little too restrictive for me.
It’s structured, but not as structured as I thought
I’m not totally certain how I should be using some of the monthly fields, like This Month’s Focus, People To See, and Places To Go.
There is some guidance in the front of the planner that says to use weekly and daily focus boxes to write just one thing that you could accomplish that day or week and still feel successful. So, I’ll assume that I should apply the same method to the monthly focus for both Personal and Work.
But for the lists – should I be writing down every single person I have to meet with? Or only focus on travelling and visiting people. Should I write down every place I have to go to do something? Or only places I’m visiting specially? How granular should it be?
I guess this is up to the interpretation of the user. For the month of January, I’ve listed out only the people and places that I’m excited for, and that I have obligations to.
Prioritizing tasks is hard
Committing tasks to the 4 slots available for each Top Priority, Priority, and Errands for Personal and Work is difficult for me.
What’s the difference between Top Priority and Priority? How do I determine what makes it onto these lists?
In my bullet journal, my daily spreads are almost entirely made up of tasks. I need much more than 12 slots, if I’m going to continue keeping track of them all.
Furthermore, I don’t usually involve my planner in my work life. I keep track of my work tasks and appointments in software.
For the sake of using the Passion Planner as designed, I’ve filled in some high-level tasks in the Work section, but I’m not sure I’ll continue. It doesn’t seem like it’ll be the best use of this valuable space.
What’s Working
I’m enjoying how visual the Passion Planner is
I like seeing my whole week laid out in time blocks. It helps me to see exactly where I’m going to have time for tasks so I can make better decisions about how to use my time.
I’m feeling encouraged to use some color when blocking out my schedule. I’m keeping myself limited to just a few colors so I don’t have to lug around a bunch of markers, but compared to my minimalist Bullet Journal, it’s nice and refreshing to see.
The Passion Planner has encouragement built in
The Passion Planner has weekly quotes and challenges to help keep you going.They’re often related to each other, too! I’ve only had one week of experience with these so far, but doing the challenge was fun, and I thought the quote was helpful to look at. I’m looking forward to them in the coming weeks!
A pre-printed planner is a nice change of pace
I love how flexible Bullet Journals are, I do. But after writing my own planners out for nearly 4 years, having one that is pre-printed is so nice. The Passion Planner even has free space each week, plus 40 blank pages for you to use however you want, so I still feel like I have a great deal of flexibility.
I know that the Passion Planner website has printables and add-ons for your planner, too. So adding in other elements I use in my Bullet Journal, like habit trackers, will be easy.
What I’m Going To Do Differently
Adding tasks into my schedule
So far, I’ve only used the schedule portion of the weekly spread for events. I’ve been putting my tasks in the Personal/Work To-Do Lists, and Space of Infinite Possibility. However, I don’t think this is really working for me. It’s difficult to determine which tasks need to be done on which day.
Going forward, I want to add daily tasks into the schedule, around my events. I think this is closer to how the Passion Planner is intended to be used.
I’ll select tasks from throughout the schedule to prioritize and add to the To-Do Lists below, so I can easily see what is most important.
Redefine the Work To-Do List
I mentioned before that I don’t use my planner for work, and wanted to make better use of this space. However, it’s important to me that I stay true to how the Passion Planner is designed to be used. So, my plan is to use this space to separate out one category of my tasks.
I’m involved in some leadership committees for my roller derby league, which is very much like a job! I’m responsible for hitting a lot of different deadlines with these tasks, so pulling them out of my Personal To-Do List, and grouping them in the Work To-Do List will probably serve me better.
That’s my plan going forward! I’ll check in again next week and we’ll see how it went!
Have you had similar experiences when starting a new planner? Let me know in the comments!