Meeting Ryder Carroll, creator of the Bullet Journal
On habits and routines...
Meeting my Heroes is an occasional essay series from Matt Carmichael.
I think a lot about about how to stay organized and keep on top of tasks. It’s not easy, but it’s so important. It’s something I failed to learn. It’s been a struggle, therefore, my entire life. And therefore something I’ve tried and struggled to instill in my kids.
Starting in 6th grade or so every year during back-to-school time we’d make sure to pick up a small, red leatherish planner called an assignment book. The best ones were from an Evanston bookstore called Chandlers (RIP). It would have space for every day of the school year for me to write down what homework I had to do.
Every year I’d fill it diligently for about a week. And then less diligently. And then really sparsely. By October it would just be blank pages taking up space in my already crowded backpack.
Since then I’ve spent my life trying sometimes (in fits and spurts, but mostly not bothering) to find an organizational system that worked for me.
I had hoped with computers and later with palm pilots and smart phones that I could figure something out. But no.
I found some good calendar software at the end of 1998 (originally the Palm Pilot desktop software) I’ve been able to keep that up and can tell you with some certainty where I was on every day since.
But the to-do and other organization eluded me. I’d kind of given up.
And then my friend Scott Smith posted something on his Facebook page about journaling. I’d read little bits about this world and culture from time to time. As I said, I was always on the lookout. But as I read his post and the responses to it, I started to follow him down a rabbit hole. I read a lot of reviews and blog posts. I watched a bunch of YouTube videos and then I pulled the trigger and bought a notebook, the official Bullet Journal from Leuchtturm.
The Bullet Journal is a physical notebook, which is important. Neuroscience tells how much more we learn with the physical act of writing. (Also, it’s an excuse to buy pens).
It starts with blank dot grid pages, so you have to design your own system and draw it in. You figure out what matters most, and how best to keep track of it. That was hugely useful to me. I’d always wanted a notebook where I could keep longer term ideas, as well as a to-do list. I also wanted something where I could easily blend work stuff and life stuff. The Bullet Journal lead me to a way of doing that.
October 1, 2018 was a Monday so I started my journal at the start of a week and the start of the month. I have kept it up nearly every day since. It has helped me immeasurably. I use it to record things I need to do, thoughts about projects I’m working on, and other things from time to time like softball stats, the house points we used to award our kids and even topics for this newsletter..
The Bullet Journal was created by a guy named Ryder Carroll and, although it had been around a while, he published a book about it not long after I started using it. The timing was perfect. He did a book signing at the library in Lincoln Square where I wrote a good chunk of Buyographics, and thus I got to meet him. I love libraries.
Ryder was chill and approachable in a well-attended talk and Q&A. Among other things, he’s got this amazing ASMR voice. I’m not sure if you could put together an easy demographic profile of those who came out to hear him. But there is one camp that use draw/paint/watercolor/washi tape elaborate layouts each month and then post them for insta-likes. Which seems to go against the rather minimalist approach to the whole idea. Ryder addressed this elephant in the room and said that yeah, there are folks who kind of miss the point. But that he’s also heard from people for whom this is the time they set aside to be creative. That’s important, too. And if this is their outlet, that’s perfectly in line with Bullet Journals.
Ryder talked about how it’s a system and a practice. The system is what you put it your journal, and how. Ryder has ADHD and started the Bullet Journal as a way to manage that and all the related noise in his head. One lesson from Ryder, therefore, is that if you have a problem, you’re likely not alone. So if you solve something for yourself, you’re probably solving it for enough people that you can scale it into a thing and therefore help lots of people.
It’s the practice that’s really important, and the part I’m still not as good at. The idea is to build the journal into your daily routine.
In the morning you use it to plot out your day and what tasks you want to accomplish. In the evening you spend a couple of minutes reflecting on what you got done and moving forward tasks that you didn’t quite get done. You can also use it to write reflections on the day, your thoughts and ideas.
The challenging part is that when things in life are most chaotic, it’s hardest to keep it up. Yet, that’s exactly when you need the most structure and routine to keep you sane.
I always thought routine and structure were lame and stifled creativity. But I was 100% wrong. Habits and routines allow you to do some critical things without thinking about them. That frees up your thinking time for more important and creative things. This discipline also helps you stay on top of things you need to get done so you don’t have to spend so much mental energy keeping track and stressing about what is and isn’t done yet.
The Bullet Journal takes all that load off of your head.
Much has been written about habits and routines (try Charles Duhigg’s “Power of Habit” for starters) and I wish I’d understood it all sooner in life.
It’s never too late to learn, and never too soon to start trying.