The Promise

Life had gotten too busy. It seemed as if my

existence had become just one long to-do list.

I had forgotten about my dreams, my goals,

my what-ifs, my "what if I could's."

-Amy Haines

The Bullet Journal method's mission is to help us become mindful about how we spend our two most valuable resources in life: our time and our energy. If you're going to invest both reading this book, it's only fair to start by highlighting what's in it for you. To sum it up:

The Bullet Journal method will help you accomplish more by working on less. It helps

you identify and focus on what is meaningful

by stripping away what is meaningless.

How does it do this? By weaving together productivity, mindfulness, and intentionality into a framework that is flexible, forgiving, and, most importantly, practical. Let's take a closer look at each.

Productivity

Do you ever feel overwhelmed by all your responsibilities? Sometimes life feels like a hellish game of whack-a-mole, condemned to stomping out never-ending chores, meetings, emails, and texts. Your multitasking madness has you squeezing in workouts by pacing across your apartment while FaceTiming your sister-who is asking if you could breathe less heavily. Nothing is getting the attention it deserves, and it doesn't feel good. You hate disappointing other people as much as you hate disappointing yourself. To get more done, you've even hacked your sleep, whittling it down to the bare minimum-except now you're a zombie because . . . you've hacked your sleep down to the bare minimum.

Let's step back. Every year between 1950 and 2000, Americans increased their productivity about 1 to 4 percent. Since 2005, however, this growth has slowed in advanced economies, with a productivity decrease recorded in the United States in 2016. Maybe our rapidly evolving technology that promises us near-limitless options to keep us busy is not, in fact, making us more productive?

One possible explanation for our productivity slowdown is that we're paralyzed by information overload. As Daniel Levitin writes in The Organized Mind, information overload is worse for our focus than exhaustion or smoking marijuana.

It stands to reason, then, that to be more productive we need a way to stem the tide of digital distractions. Enter the Bullet Journal, an analog solution that provides the offline space needed to process, to think, and to focus. When you open your notebook, you automatically unplug. It momentarily pauses the influx of information so your mind can catch up. Things become less of a blur, and you can finally examine your life with greater clarity.

The Bullet Journal will help you declutter your packed mind so you can finally examine your thoughts from an objective distance.

We often cobble together ways to organize ourselves on the fly. A little of this app; a little of that calendar. Over time, this results in an unwieldy productivity Frankenstein of Post-its, various apps, and email. It kinda works, but it also feels like it's coming apart at the seams. You waste time deliberating where information should go and trying to locate it later: Did you write something down in your notes app or on a Post-it? And where did that Post-it go, anyway?

Many a great idea, "keeper" thought, or important "note to self" has fallen victim to a misplaced scrap of paper or an outdated app. It's a compounding inefficiency that drains your bandwidth, but it's completely avoidable. The Bullet Journal is...