Dot Journaling: A Practical Guide: How to Start and Keep the Planner, To-Do List, and Diary That’ll Actually Help You Get Your Life Together

by Rachel Wilkerson Miller

I started dot journaling on January 1, 2016, and I quickly fell in love. It was exactly what I hadn’t realized I needed: a single notebook that incorporated my to-do lists, helped me stay organized, served as a fun creative outlet, and led me back to my roots as a diarist—I was thrilled to discover that I had no problem writing in it every single day. And in this book, I’ll show you how to get started dot journaling, and how to make it a habit (or an addiction?) for you,

A dot journal is a system for writing down all the things that you want to remember in a single notebook:

When you’re writing in your journal (which can be any notebook you like), you’ll jot everything down quickly using short words/phrases (instead of writing in full sentences), and you’ll mark each item with one of a handful of simple symbols—hint:

Dot journaling is an amazing way of recording everything that matters to you and keeping your life together both figuratively and literally.

the most important thing is that it doesn’t have any sort of preprinted text telling you what to write and where to write it—so

IS A DOT JOURNAL A TO-DO LIST OR A PLANNER OR A DIARY? A. YES. This was my main question before I started dot journaling, and I was very annoyed when people told me it was all of these things. But it is all of these things!

Dot journaling is good for . . . People who like pen and paper to-do lists People who have a million to-do lists floating around People who are really into setting goals People who like stationery, journaling, scrapbooking, beautiful pens, etc. People who really love planners People who really want to love planners, or who want to be more organized People who would really like to keep a journal/diary but are having trouble sticking with the habit.

One of the best aspects of dot journaling—and a huge reason for its popularity—is how adaptable it is.

There are as many styles of dot journals as there are dot journalers.

My goal was to create dot journal layouts for this book that are simple enough that they’ll spark creativity, and pretty enough that you’ll enjoy looking at them.

I promise, my actual journal contains considerably more correction tape, crooked lines, and curse words. And yours probably will, too.

Throughout this book, I’ll use the words journal and notebook interchangeably to refer to the physical book itself. I’ll also shorten dot journal to journal.

First, dot journaling is an excellent way to be more organized. Aside from keeping me gainfully employed, being organized is one way I practice self-care.

Tracking your day-to-day life also makes it easier to understand exactly what makes you happy and healthy (and what makes you unhappy and unhealthy), achieve your goals, and live your best life.

dot journaling (like all journaling/diary keeping) is a way of better understanding who you are, and making sense of the world around you.

Writing about yourself and your life—even just brief notes!—is a huge privilege, and that writing can be incredibly liberating. Writing in a diary is, at its core, a declaration that your voice matters.

So maybe dot journaling will help you answer the big, scary questions about who you are and what you want out of life. Or maybe it’ll just help you pay your cable bill on time. Either way, I think it’s pretty worth it.

1. Keep it simple, especially at first.

2. Do a little preplanning.

3. Don’t overthink it!

Dot journaling: a method of planning, journaling, and note-taking that involves writing quick, short phrases or sentences and marking them with simple symbols so you can easily categorize and track them.

idea is to keep each item super brief,

Tasks: things you need to do or have already done

Events: things that are going to happen, and things that already have

Notes: thoughts, observations, and basically everything that is neith...

Dot: the main symbol you’ll use when writing items in your dot journal; it signifies “this is a ta...

Spread: the way information is organi...

Title: the word/phrase you write somewhere on a spread—most

Future spread: a year-at-a-glance calendar where you can put events, goals, and long-term things you need to do

Monthly spread: a monthly calendar + things you need to do that month + things you forgot to do last month

Weekly spread (aka “weeklies”): a weekly calendar + things you need to do that week + things...

Daily spread (aka “dailies”): the things you did and/or need to do today, ...

Habit trackers: spreads where you enter activities ...

Dot journaling is essentially just creating spreads and then adding information to them as appropriate.

You can set up spreads tied to particular topics or categories when you first start your dot journal, or you can also create them anytime you feel like it, wherever you are in the journal.

THE INDEX The index is typically the first page you’ll set up in your dot journal; like a traditional book index, it’s a list of topics and the page numbers on which they appear. So every time you write about something important that you’ll likely want to reference later, you’ll flip to your index and write the topic and the corresponding page number there.

If your journal doesn’t have prenumbered pages (which is highly likely), you can just number them yourself. You could number every single page before you start, but if you’re lazy like I am, you can do like I do and just number about twenty pages at a time.

You don’t have to put everything in your index, but it’s worthwhile to add lists, events, spreads, and ideas you know you will probably want to reference later.

And the items in your index can be as specific or as general as you like.

My advice is to play with different options and adjust as necessary as you go. While I’d never considered putting an index in a diary or notebook before I started dot journaling, I’ve found that it’s a pretty brilliant idea.

THE SYMBOLS The symbols are one of the core aspects of what makes a dot journal, well, a dot journal.

Write a dot next to things that you need to do.

Draw an x over the dot to mark to-dos that are complete.

Write the less-than symbol (<) over the dot to show that a task has been scheduled, or write the greater-than symbol (>) over it to sh...

You can migrate the same item over and over and over again

Add a caret (^) over the dot when you’ve started a task.

Use a dash for quick thoughts, notes, observations, or smaller events.

Draw an open box to mark big events

Put a slash through any items that are no l...

I also write the x and other symbols inside the event box when appropriate.