Rant: The whole "spread before you write" thing never worked for me

I kept seeing everyone online say you have to lay out your entire monthly spread before you even think about jotting down notes... but after two months of trying that with a new journal, I ended up with half-empty pages and wasted space because my plans changed. A friend just looked at my spread and said "why don't you just start writing and let the pages fill up naturally?" and honestly, that simple shift made my bujo feel less like a chore. Has anyone else ditched the rigid setups and just gone with a more free-form flow?

2 comments

2 Comments

clark.joel1mo ago

Exactly. Planning everything never survives the first real day.

foster.oscar1mo ago

I think this applies to more than just bullet journals. I notice with meal planning people will map out a whole week of dinners, buy all the groceries, then life happens and they end up ordering pizza three times anyway. Same with weekend plans, you cram every hour with activities but then you just want to nap. Sometimes you gotta leave room for the messy, unplanned stuff to actually fit. Isn't it funny how we try to control everything before it even happens?