There’s something gratifying about cracking open the pages of a fresh, new planner. The blank pages feel like a year of infinite possibilities! And this year I’ll be using my new fave: the Passion Planner. On their website, they describe it as an appointment calendar, goal setting guide, journal, sketchbook, gratitude log & personal and work to-do lists all in one notebook and I couldn’t agree more! I wish I could take credit for discovering this awesome tool, but it came to me as gift from a friend last year. However, it made such an impact in my life, that I decided to buy another one for myself this year!
The Passion Planner has been a game-changer. These are just a few of my favorite features:
- The “Passion RoadMap”: It’s a one page overview of your short and long term goals. Once the Roadmap is setup and steps to create your goals are created, you will continue to revert to them throughout the course of months/ weeks.
- Monthly Reflections: This is where the real work comes in! There’s a section at the end of each month where you can revisit your Passion Roadmap and see if you made any strides towards achieving your goals. This is where you celebrate your wins, identify areas of improvements and make adjustments for the following month.
- Daily Focus: Before I started using this planner, I had long daily “to-do” lists that were impossible to complete and left me feeling like a complete failure at the end of the night. The daily focus forced me to ask the question: “If I can only accomplish one thing today and still feel like the day was a success, what would that thing be?” Talk about life changing! A simple shift in mindset, made all the difference.
- Space of Infinite Possibilities: Although this planner has tons of great features and tools already built in, they still leave plenty of open spaces and blank pages for whatever is most important to you. This could be budgeting, calorie tracking, gratitude journal, sketching, etc… This space is all yours to do with as you please!
- Monthly Layouts: At the start of every month, there’s a monthly layout which gives a big picture overview of what’s coming ahead and your progress. I really enjoy the “People to See”, “Places to Go” and “Things to Learn” areas because it forces me to be proactive in making time for those priorities.
As you can see, the list of awesome features goes on and on! But if I had to pick a favorite, I really LOVE how the weekly layout is broken down with room for a weekly focus, daily focuses, gratitude bullet journal section and both personal and work to-do lists. The fact that my personal goals were visually right there alongside my business/career goals allowed me to prioritize myself and those important (but non-urgent) tasks that I was seriously neglecting, like scheduling my yearly doctor appointments. With regards to my business, instead of focusing on time-sensitive tasks (i.e. mailing out client products/ editing), I was able to plan ahead and make time for the small steps required to achieve the bigger goals (i.e growth), like marketing via writing a blog post.
Like any tool, it only works if you work it. But if you’re willing to put in the time and make it a priority to keep up with the monthly/ weekly/ daily reflections, I promise you will see some serious “magic” begin to work its way into your life!