Fun Friday: Preparation - Always Preparing Things

It is Friday, right? That's what the calendar says at least, so I bet it is actually Friday. My day started the way most of my working days started - early but rested. It was a nice change from the way things have been going lately.

I am getting ready for a trip. I will travel across the entire country twice and across half of the country twice as well. There is lots of travel in my future, and I love that, but it brings some additional tasks and things to prepare that do not usually come up. My desk is littered with reminders and things to move into my various planners.

I tried to do some work in my next planner yesterday. I wanted to decorate my personal planner and get started with the new year. I messed up every page that I tried to complete. After fixing some of the mistakes, I just gave up because nothing was working the way I wanted. At all. I was very frustrated with myself.

Frustration is one of those emotions that can color your entire day. I experienced this over and over again when I was working, and that feeling continues now that I am no longer working full-time with other people. My frustrations are now focused internally rather than on other people. After I did not manage to make what I was intending to make, I just stopped trying and moved on to other things. I will go back and completely fix what was messed up later, but not yet. I am still just frustrated that I was not able to draw straight lines or count. So, now I am working in my work journal where I am not using straight lines.

Now, as you probably know by now, I am someone who likes routine and structure. In fact, I crave the boundaries that come with having some structure in my life. My planners are one of the ways that I provide myself with structure and with boundaries.

My planners look very different from each other. My personal planner is hand-drawn and very consistent. Each page spread contains a week. The days each have a box, and there are places in the center of the pages where I can write notes or track specific things. My work planner has gone through a huge transformation since I left my most recent job. When I was working a therapy job, I had a spread per week just like my personal planner. Now that I doing things from home, I have changed up the structure. I now have daily task lists that I create each morning and refer to several times per day. I have also discovered that having a yearly calendar is essential for my planning needs, so I am making sure that the next work planner includes an annual calendar that can hold all sorts of deadlines and symposia.

At the end of each of my planners, I do a bit of brainstorming and a review of what worked well and what needs something else. When I start a new planner, I like to have some things set up ahead of time and space for other things to be added as needed. I always include a calendar, an index, and quest pages. I enjoy doing some decorations in my planners, but I don't draw much or design much. I tend to use stickers and washi tape to give me some color and decoration on the pages rather than doing some of the things that others do in their books.

I enjoy having blank pages to fill. I like figuring out ways to put things together and make them useful for me. I like having the flexibility to change everything when I want to and how I want to. I have tried pre-printed planners, but they did not do what I needed them to do, so I make my own.

Today's entry in my planner includes blogging (check!), marketing a new on-demand CMTE, and nothing else. I have finished the trip planning that I have to do, so no travel things are on the list. I might leave my house today to get trip snacks and then come home to finish packing. In fact, I can get out now and get back before it gets any hotter outside.

See you!