I hope you had a good weekend and are feeling rested and positive this Monday morning.
This is a short email course to help you reset your practice after the summer - 4 emails, Monday to Thursday this week.
The ideas I’m sharing are principles that have helped me immensely on my practice journey.
make a plan
review and reflect
keep it simple
trust the process
None of this is especially innovative, but, like most things, the more you put in, the more you get out.
I find that planning and reflection work best if I write them down all in one place - a notebook that I use as a journal.
A practice journal is a habit, tool and ritual all rolled into one.
A journal gives you a place to write your thoughts, ideas and observations.
It helps you think more deeply.
I’ve been keeping a journal for years and years and it’s the single thing that helps me find ways to grow and balance my practice. 🪴
My favourite notebook is the Leuchturm 1917 journal, medium size, with a hardcover and dotted pages. It comes in many beautiful colours.
I start a new one at the start of each ‘term’, January, April/May, and September.
You don’t need a special journal though, any notebook you have to hand will be perfect to get started.
It helps to have a simple structure, and this is what I will be sharing with you.
Let’s start with monthly planning.
The goal: use a journal to plan and organise your time
The strategy: set priorities and use the month as your deadline
Write an outline of your schedule for the month ahead
Write one or two monthly goals, plus a short list of things to do
Block out time on your schedule to work towards your goal
Monthly planning helps me think about what I need to do to move my practice forward, and, importantly, how to bring more happiness and balance to my life.
How to make a monthly plan.
open your journal so you have two facing pages that are blank
on the left side, write the name of the month at the top in capitals
underneath, number the days of the month down the left side (for September, you will write numbers 1 - 30)
next, write the letters for the day of the week, alongside the numbers
go through your calendar and emails etc. to find out dates for events, personal appointments etc. and add them to your schedule
identify which days you have available to work on goals for your practice
This page is your schedule and now acts as a simple planner and calendar.
You can see real life photos from my journals on Instagram here (no account needed).
How to set your monthly goals.
on the right-side page, opposite the schedule, write your goals for the month, plus to-do items if you like
when setting a goal try to think of the first/next thing that you can achieve, rather than the ‘end-point’
a monthly goal may contribute toward a larger long-term goal
or it may be something smaller or short-term
you may like to include one or two personal goals
try to limit yourself to a small number of things that feel achievable in the time you have available
When I first started this exercise I was hopelessly, wildly optimistic and utterly unrealistic about how much I could achieve in a given month! 🙄
I would then feel dispirited as I hadn’t been able to achieve very much of my list at all.
Completing this task monthly for many years has helped me to:
a) be far more realistic about what I can get done in a month
b) to complete things that I need to do but have been putting off
Copying tasks over to a new month for several months in a row helps me realise when I need to ask for help or to apply a little more kind self-discipline in order to move the needle.
As you go through the month you can write a small cross next to anything that you get done. I prefer this to putting a line through as it looks neater.
One last tip, use a nice pen in your journal. I am a fan of the Muji 0.5 gel pen, and I have a big bundle of them, plus a stack of refills so I never run out.
When you keep a journal for your practice and your life, you will slowly but surely see things shift and change in a positive way. ✨
Do you use a journal to plan your practice?
I’d love to hear how you use it.
That’s all for today.
Tracy 👩🏼💻
P.S. You might be interested in my Hayfever webinar, available on replay, as I’m offering a free one-hour Q and A this Thursday, 15th September from 1 pm - 2 pm. The webinar is available here. 🌾