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Choose The Right Self-Care Journal For You

BY Finn + Ali
Co-founders of The Positive Planner Ali + Finn sitting on a sofa together

How to choose the
right self-care journal for you.
A guide to our Planner, Wellness, Bullet and Free Writing Journal.

 

If you’re in our Positive Planner Facebook Group - wait, you’re not? Well head on over and join in the fun! - then you’ll know there’s often quite some discussion going on about how to choose the right book from our Positive Planner Family. We’ve been talking about how our Planner, Wellness, Bullet and Free Writing Journal differ from each other and how to choose the right self-care journal for you.

So if you’re new to our books, can’t quite make up your mind or just want to know a bit more, read on. This guide will tell you what makes each one unique and how you can use them to bring more positivity into your life.

 

THE POSITIVE PLANNER

I’m new to self-care and mindfulness. I want to create a regular self-care habit but don't know how to. I'd like to be a bit more organised in life.

 

A Black man in a dark blue t-shirt holding an open copy of The Positive Planner

 

Sound familiar? Then we think The Positive Planner is the one you’re looking for. We know how hard it can be to create and stick to a regular self-care habit. Finding me-time in daily life can be hard! And if that wasn’t enough, research tells us it can take up to 66 days to make a habit stick! So what can you do?

Well, we created The Positive Planner with all this in mind. We were both struggling with our mental health and knew we needed something that would encourage us to make journaling, mindfulness and gratitude part of our everyday lives. And so the Yellow One was born.

The Positive Planner is a journal that takes you on a 12-week journey of self-care, gratitude and daily positivity. And we think that’s absolutely enough time to make it stick!

WHAT’S IN IT?

The Positive Planner is split into 12 weekly sections. Each week has space for 7 days of morning intentions and evening reflections, a gratitude moment and mood checker. We’ve also packed it full of useful tools and activities designed to enhance positivity and manage your wellbeing.

 

 

But with all that said, the Yellow One is still very much a planner at heart. It features all the organisational extras you’d expect - meal planners, shopping lists and monthly diary spreads - that all encourage you to keep your daily life in check.

 

HOW TO USE IT

There’s one thing to remember with all our planners and journals: YOU decide how best to use them! There is no right or wrong way to do this.

Although The Positive Planner was designed as a 12-week programme, it was important for us that there’s no pressure to work on it every day. Added to that, we wanted to make sure that you don't need a huge amount of time for it - we think you can do the work in just 5 minutes at the beginning and end of the day. The 12 weekly units are undated, allowing you to jump in and out as you like. Each page guides and prompts you so the Planner really does become an easy and beautiful burst of positivity to start and end your day with.

If you'd like to try out a free Mini Edition of The Positive Planner to find out if it's for you, you can find one in our Resource Library. Click here to enter. 

 

THE POSITIVE WELLNESS JOURNAL

I've finished my Positive Planner. I’d like to take a more holistic approach to my self-care and include mind, body and soul together. I want to go deeper into my mental and physical wellbeing. 

 

 

The Positive Planner is a great introduction to creating a regular self-care habit, but where do you go when you want to dig a bit deeper? Well, if you've finished the Yellow one or you're looking to build on a self-care routine, then The Positive Wellness Journal is what you're looking for and could really be the one to go for if you want to choose the right self-care journal for you.

The Orange One is dedicated to bringing a complete body awareness to how you move through your day. We know there’s a strong correlation between our mental and physical health and so it made absolute sense for us to create a journal with a holistic approach to self-care.

The Positive Wellness Journal is designed as a 12-week programme that’s divided into 3 sections - Mind, Body and Soul. These areas need different support in order for you to thrive and flourish and this journal encourages you to discover just what you need.

 

WHAT’S IN IT?

If you work on it every day, the Mind, Body and Soul sections each last a month. You’ll see a familiar layout to The Positive Planner with space for daily intentions, reflections, gratitudes and mood-checking, but we’ve developed these to include more space for daily journaling as well as reflections on your body and soul.

 

 

Added to all that, you’ll find the journal goes into much more detail about the self-care you can do for these three areas in turn. We’ve also included heaps of practices and activities such as breathing exercises, stretching and yoga and art therapy.

 

 

HOW TO USE IT

As with The Positive Planner, you decide how you want to use this journal. It’s designed as a 12-week course, but you can dip in and out as you need, adding in the date yourself when you work in it.

We feel morning and evening practices are the way to get the most out of the The Positive Wellness Journal. But take it easy and don’t force it. You'll lose the benefits as soon as you add a ‘must’ into the equation!

 

If you'd like to try out a free Mini Edition of The Positive Wellness Journal to find out if it's for you, you can find one in our Resource Library. Click here to enter. 

 

THE POSITIVE BULLET DIARY

I’m looking for an appointment diary that leaves me space to be creative. I want a diary I can add all my lists to. I'd love to start bullet journaling but find the idea of creating beautiful spreads intimidating.  

 

 

The Positive Bullet Diary was born to be an inspirational space to encourage you to be positive, productive and most of all creative! Research tells us that creativity can help reduce anxiety, depression and stress and so it was a natural next step for us to want to give you something that allowed you to get organised but also let your creativity run riot!

 

 

 

If you google #BuJo, you’ll find some extraordinarily beautiful weekly and monthly spreads, but if we’re honest, we find them a bit intimidating. Not everyone has the time or artistic practice to create such beauties. So we designed the Blue One to include a helping hand. Our diary has BuJo templates throughout for you to personalise and embellish yourself.

 

WHAT'S IN IT?

The Positive Bullet Diary is an undated 12-month diary and bullet journal with plenty of dot-grid pages for you to add your own flair. It can really make planning your life a beautiful experience!

 

 

The Blue One is a fantastic space to organise your day-to-day life and appointments, events and commitments. An easy-to-follow layout encourages you to break down your to-do lists with clever keys and there’s even space for emotional reflections, so you can track your mood alongside your productivity. If this is all sparking something in you, then The Positive Bullet Diary is the one you need if you want to choose the right self-care journal for you.

 

 

And in case you’re a little nervous about how to get started, we’ve packed the Bullet with tips to help you! There are practice pages for calligraphy headings and banners along with advice on which pens and keys to use. You'll also find some beautiful affirmation artwork and illustrations to colour in - no book could be part of the Positive Family without them!

 

HOW TO USE IT

What’s so special about The Positive Bullet Diary is that we’ve left it all up to you! You can be truly inspired and creative on its pages - anything goes!

The Positive Bullet Diary is undated so you can start it at any time. Whether you want it for a particular project or an area of your life, there’s no pressure to fill it in every day. If you do though, there’s 12 months of space there.

The Blue One is very different from our other books. Its main focus is organisation and productivity combined with creativity, so we think it’s great to use alongside the The Positive Planner or The Positive Wellness Journal to leave you perfectly equipped with all the encouragement and tools you need to move towards a true self-care and wellbeing mindset.

 

THE POSITIVE FREE WRITING JOURNAL

I love the daily journaling in The Positive Planner and The Positive Wellness Journal but would like to explore this more and need more space. I want a place to journal using my own prompts. I need a space to vent. I'd like a book to use when I do a Positive Planner Workshop. I'm a stationery lover and just can't say no! 

We’re ALL about journaling at The Positive Planner. Each one of our books includes daily journaling entries, but from listening to you, we know that sometimes you just want that little bit more space to let your pen flow. So we listened, and here’s that space for you in The Positive Free Writing Journal!

 

 

WHAT'S IN IT?

Nothing! And that's the joy of The Positive Free Writing Journal! This one is all about you having the freedom to write about what you want without feeling under pressure to stay within a few lines. You'll find 215 pages of lined paper in this one. The book is slightly larger than our other journals (if you know it, it's the same size as our gratitude journal for kids, The Positive Doodle Diary). It’s also a flat-lay with slightly thicker paper so there's no bleed through. Journaling in this book is simply a joy!

 

 

HOW TO USE IT

It's up to you how you use The Positive Free Writing Journal. There are no rules. You can use it every day, as a support if you're going through a difficult time, expand on a Braintangle after a Positive Planner Workshop ... the ways you can use it are endless. We think it's the perfect partner for The Positive Planner or The Positive Wellness Journal. It's also a great add-on for The Positive Bullet Diary too.

 

So that’s our Planner, Wellness, Bullet and Free Writing a nutshell. What do you think? Which one (or two! Or four!) are you going to choose? We hope we’ve helped you choose the right self-care journal for you! We'd love to see which one you've gone for - tag us in your pictures on Instagram with @the_positive_planner

 

 

1 Comment

  1. I absolutely LOVE these! All of them!! I got all excited about the concept of a self care journal tonight and was looking for some beautiful (and highly effective) options. Thank youuuuu!


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