How to Create Routine Bullet Journal Spreads

As a person who lives her life by a very rigid schedule, I have not only found creating routines in my bullet journal to be helpful in times of change, but they also motivate me to stick to them as much as I can. I first started creating my routine spreads when I would experience a change such as a new semester of college or a different work schedule.

I plan digitally, using an iPad and the application GoodNotes and Bargain Depot Stylus 2 Pack from Amazon. Currently I am still using GoodNotes 4. If you are curious to why I plan digitally you should check out my blog post Switching to a Digital Planner-Paperless Planning.

Why should you create your own routines?

Not only is having a set out routine a way to manage your time, but is a practice that benefits your mental health. Taking the time to create your ideal routine also allows you to incorporate new tasks or habits that further enhance your efficiency in the morning or to promote a better nights sleep. As I will show at the end of the post you can use routine spreads like this for any type of routine whether it be a morning gym routine or a relaxed summer night time routine filled with self-care tasks. My advice for when you are starting a new routine or adding a new task is to give yourself more than enough time to complete it the first couple of days and as you finish make note of how long it took. Once you come to see how long it takes you to complete it then you can start setting your alarm for a later time or starting later in the evening if its a night time routine task.

1. Tasks

The first step in creating your routine is to list out the tasks that you want to accomplish during this routine. If you are implementing a new routine I would suggest starting with one new habit or task at a time. The example that I will be walking through is how I made my new night time/in bed routine. I am creating a new routine because I am working towards not using my iPad to fall asleep at night. I am making this change incorporation with my well-being project for one of my college courses.

• change clothes
• wash face
• brush teeth
• journal
• screen time
• read 
• pill and meditate
• light out

2. Organization

The second step is to decide how your want to section off the various tasks. This step is more focused on if you want to include time stamps or estimated amount of time each task will take to complete. I find that this is not a necessary element that I include in all of my routines. For this new night routine I will be including them since I have a set time frame for when I want to have everything done by. 

• 9:00
• change clothes
• wash face
• brush teeth
• 9:30
• journal
• screen time
• 10:00
• read 
• 10:30
• pill and meditate
• 11:00
• lights out

3. Layout

The next step is to decide what style of layout you want to use. Because I prefer to plan using a vertical layout I also tend to also use a vertical layout for my routines. I honestly believe that I think in a vertical way. Other options besides a vertical timeline style like what I use is to use a horizontal timeline, road map or even simply a bullet pointed list. For this step I recommend looking at how many tasks you have and compare them to other routine bullet journal spreads on Pinterest. Check out this blog post on 17 Routine Spreads in Your Bullet Journal to Bring You More Structure.

4. Put the Pen to the Paper

For this last step you will start with a rough sketch of your layout and then start by adding your tasks in the order you want to complete them. For the style of spread I am doing this means drawing a straight line down the center of the page and then diving the line into even sections for all of my tasks. Once I have everything divided I will add the titles of the tasks. If you choose to add time stamps or estimated completion times this is when you would add those. Lastly you will add the title of the page to the top and the doodles to the tasks if that is what you chose to do. 

My Finished Night Routine

Here are some of the other routine spreads that I have made:

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For more bullet journal ideas check out my other blog posts

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