Journal For Discipline

76 - This article is part of a series.

View the original post: https://drewredifer.com/blog/articles/journal-for-discipline.html Originally published on 2021-10-02 at drewredifer.com.

Journal For Discipline!
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Over the past two years I have kept a daily journal for tracking tasks, notes, and events. For taking notes I follow the Bullet Journal Method. The images to follow display how I have organize my journal. It is what works for me.

Journal Supplies
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Journal, Pen, and Whiteout Tape

For my journals I use ones with bullet grid paper. This journal measures five and a half inches in width and eight and a half inches in height. I got this one in a pack of three from Walmart. The brand is simplygenius and it is really cheaply made. I prefer my first two journals, which I also got from Walmart, the Exceed brand. Unfortunatly, last I checked they had stopped selling this higher quality journal and instead have opted for the super cheap made in China, simplygenius journals.

Normally I would not care about the specific type of pen I used, but the paper in this journal is so bad that I had to experiment to find a pen that would actually write on this terrible paper. The ultra fine Pilot G-2 (0.38) does the job. Additionally, I always try to have some White-Out tape handy for my frequent mistakes.

Journal Organization
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The first two full page spreads in my Journal are reserved for a quick full year at a glance. I divide each page into thirds (or quarters). Each third contains a full calendar for that specific month followed by space to schedule events by day.

Year at a glance

Year at a glance cont…

At the begining of each month I reserve several pages to be devoted to that month. That includes a page for that months calendar along with the following sections:

Full months calendar
Goals for the month
Brain Dump section
Brain dump for work
Brain dump for my personal life

Month at a glance

Check-In section
Check-In for my physical state
Check-In for my spiritual state
Daily gratitude tracker

LHS: Monthly Check-In, RHS: Monthly Gratitudes

Daily memory tracker
Additional tracker for something I’m trying to be intentional about

LHS: Montly Memories, RHS: Monthly “Insert-Intention”

Daily habit tracker

Monthly Habit Tracker

After completing the month at a glance and its cooresponding sections I leave a full page spread for my week at a glance. This is where I break the spread into columns with each week day getting a full column and the last column being split between the weekend. The daily columns include the following: a section for top priorities, space for notes, and lastly a section that breaks down my waking hours for that day to schedule events.

Week at a glance

Each day is where the meat of the journaling takes place, but first I reserve a page at the begining of each working week for a Weekly To-Do List. This is where I list out tasks that I want to accomplish throughout the week. I typically start to fill this section out towards the end of the work week as I begin to think ahead to what needs to be done over the weekend.

The day of the week is pretty self explainatory. I include the following sections you see below: The date, the top priorities for the day, and a section to the right for scheduled events by hour for the day. While I am often lazy about the monthly sections in my journaling I am very disciplined about my daily tasks. I fill this section out first thing every morning and it allows me to think through what all needs to be accomplished for the day. As the day progresses I fill this page out and often carry on to the next page.

LHS: Weekly To-Do, RHS: Day at a glance

As priviously noted above, this type of journaling and layout is what works for me. If you are serious about journaling I suggest you take the time to research what works for other people and build out your own methodology. My only suggestion is to not over think it, just start journaling!

If you found this article interesting and would like to share a comment with me, please feel free to reach out to me directly via my personal email at (drew@drewredifer.com).

76 - This article is part of a series.

4:30 AM

September 7, 2021·2 mins

Discipline Time Habits Morning

View the original post: https://drewredifer.com/blog/articles/why-I-make-waking-up-early-a-priority.html Originally published on 2021-09-07 at drewredifer.com. When you are young you are dependent on others and you have few responsibilities. Therefore you do not have to spend the bulk of your time managing these responsibilities. However, as you age you increase both your independence and the number of things that you are responsible for. You want to maximize this new found independence and responsibility, and in fact I firmly believe that doing so to the best of your ability constitutes a life well lived. For further reading see my article on this topic: Maturity Matters. Unfortunatly, this comes at the expense of your personal time.

Maturity Matters

August 22, 2021·8 mins

Maturity Responsibility Discipline

View the original post: https://drewredifer.com/blog/articles/maturity-matters-and-why-it-is-the-responsibility-of-all-of-us-to-bare-our-burden.html Originally published on 2021-08-22 at drewredifer.com. Why it is the responsibility of all of us to bear our respective burdens # As a kid I can remember taking my experience and applying it to the adults around me. I thought most adults were boring because they did not spend their time as I did exploring the woods, hanging out with friends or playing sports all day. In fact now that I think about it this must be why we in society put so much value in professional sports. If you really think about it, professional athletes are the kids that never gave up the dream, they managed to keep playing a childrens game long after the rest of us quit. As you mature, you (should) take on more and more responsibilities and you (should) begin to make the shift of relating more to your exhausted parents than the kids that spend all day running around the neighborhood.

Latin

September 7, 2021·3 mins

Latin Language Classical-Education Books

View the original post: https://drewredifer.com/blog/articles/latin-resources.html Originally published on 2021-09-07 at drewredifer.com. WHY I want to learn it and HOW I plan to do it # Why? # A current long term goal of mine is to read through many of the great works that have come out of Western Culture in chronological order. This year I have slowly been progressing through the great works of the ancient Greeks, starting with the Epics, moving on to the Drama and Lyrical works, followed by the Histories and finishing with the Philosophers. After completing the Greeks I will be moving on to the Romans and this has sparked an interest in looking into how difficult it would be to read these works in the original, Latin.