I’ve been working on trauma recovery this year and decided to implement a mindfulness habit of stopping 3 times a day and just noticing what my body is feeling. This is a somatic exercise for CPTSD because when you pay attention to what your body is feeling you can train it to process physical reactions such as fight or flight instinct…then your nervous system can learn to react in a healthy way instead of the reactions festering into anxiety, depression, feeling numb.
Anyway…so I added reminders and tracking through streaks and finally settled on using Day One for this activity since I can pull out my phone to do it or do it on the iPad or computer…or even at work by sending an email. In the past few years I have tried off and on paper journals, Wordpress and Day One…my handwriting is terrible and my hands are getting more stiff in my mid 40s. I’m worried that Wordpress will go down someday and I’ll lose all my old stuff.
I created a second journal in Day One called daily feelings and just freeform such as typing what I’m experiencing my body…my wife got annoyed because I told her the wrong day for a meeting…my lungs feel hot…and sometimes summarize a day or some thoughts on goals and successes. Writing helps me process.
Sometimes a quick post becomes a longer post so I move it to the longer post.
So yeah not sure this is a bullet journal…you tell me?
I guess it depends on what you do on the Day One app. The only real indicator of whether something is a bujo or not, is if you use the rapid log/bullet point system to organize your day and maybe a monthly log; everything else is nice to have but is not necessary.
I use a simple yearly, monthly, and daily logs, and some habit trackers but I also use a second journal to write down my feelings and pretty much anything I want to say that day; I used to keep them in the same notebook, but now I keep them in two for privacy reasons.
Personally, I don’t think it matters what you call your journal practice, as long as it helps you.
I think short answer it is if you think it is!
but if you approach it from a more dogmatic angle then it’s probably not bulletjournal. i think the major concepts are around how you log your day, and what rituals you have to reflect on what you log. theres a more strict system in place and even being analogue is part of the system. I dabbled with a digital bujo before but i dropped it, and i switched to analogue, following the system more closely and ive been doing it for 4 months now!
I agree with Ricardo, on both points, but if it works for you, it doesn’t matter what you call it.
As for digital vs analogue, it doesn’t matter too much. I think bullet journal works better with pen and paper, but I know people who use digital ones, and it works for them, so more power to them.
You can check the official How to Bullet Journal video (also linked in side-bar), to get the idea of basics of Bullet Journal. You don’t have to do everything. Personally, I consider daily log to be the central pillar of bullet journal, around which the whole system is built, but others may have a different opinion about this.
