Don't be So Afraid to Fail! Failure is Important and it's Going to Happen Anyway so...

I used to regret the birth of my first son. 

I saw it as a failure. I failed myself and I failed him.  I wanted a natural birth and it all went wrong.

I don't regret it anymore, and that's not because he's a strapping 6 foot tall, 16 year old hockey player either! It's because I was able to look at what went wrong and use it to be able to be proud of my 5 other births. I'm proud that nurses and midwives came to me after my births, congratulating me and telling me how they had never seen someone so calm and relaxed giving birth before. That they actually didn't believe that I was in labour, figuring that they'd be sending me home. They thought they knew what would happen, only to see my baby come into the world 45 minutes later.

But, I'll get on my birth soap box another day! Though feel free to contact me if you want more information.

Today, I'll stay on my Planner Soapbox and get back to the topic of failure and why it's important. I believe that we make mistakes for a reason. I would never have had the 5 wonderful birth experiences I did if it wasn't for the one that I 'failed'. So, I want you now to call up a failure. That shouldn't be too hard because we are continuously beating ourselves up over our failures, over and over. Don't choose anything too big, but I'm sure you've got a bunch to choose from on a self criticising loop in your mind.

Now, I want you to think of lessons learned from this failure. Maybe, this so called failure is too fresh to have enough hindsight. Maybe the lessons have not become apparent yet, but they will in time. 

Try instead, then, to think of an earlier one, one with enough time so that you can see what you've learned. What have you done since that you wouldn't or couldn't have done if you hadn't made that mistake? What will you never do or always do because of that mistake? In short, what have you learned from this mistake? 

Failures are not there to make us feel foolish, ashamed or stupid. Failures help us learn. I wish that the word failure didn't have such a bad connotation otherwise we would more readily see their helpfulness. Sometimes, the lesson doesn't always come right away, so we are left with those negative feelings that make us feel terrible about ourselves, and when the lesson does come, there's usually enough time passed that we don't even make the connection with the failure. So the negative connotation stays.

I have homework for you this week!

Eep! What? Homework?  I know... I'm very mean.

It's not a hard assignment, I simply want you to take one of your mistakes or failures and turn it around and let some light onto the lesson learned. Hopefully, you can erase a few regrets, like I did!

Please share a lesson learned in the comments below, and feel free to be cryptic if you don't want to share the entire story. Sometimes we like to keep our failures private, and that's ok!! Unlike that poor French skater, I think her Olympic failure is every woman's nightmare, poor thing!

To lighten the mood a bit, here's a fabulous video on how to fix mistakes in your planner or bullet journal. 

 

Fall in Love with Planning all Over Again - Rediscover Your Favourite Hobby

Whether you are a minimal maven or you have so many stickers on your planner that you can barely see the appointments written in, it's all perfect! Why do you love planning? Because it's pretty? Because it keeps you organised?  Or a little of both? Every reason is a good reason, anything that makes you happy is a good reason!

Whatever your reason, we've all chosen paper planners as our hobby and we prefer to use a paper planner over the free, albeit plain and boring, one that comes with our phone. We've all chosen paper planners for as many unique reasons as we are unique. Maybe it's for a creative outlet, or we think, create and work better when we put pen (and stickers) to paper. Or maybe it's because we became so sick and tired from the incessant beeping and vibrating from our phones that an analogue system seemed to offer some peace.

But does it really? Do you have a peaceful planning system? For me, paper planners are more peaceful than my phone. Relying on my phone and it's alarms stress me out. However, there seems to be different sources of stress when it comes to paper planners! We feel like we need to plan the 'right' way (whatever that is), we feel that we NEED to find the 'perfect' planner, and have it yesterday! We feel that our planner needs to look Instagram worthy every week. And then we become so overwhelmed by all the planners, products, and stickers that we own and have no where to store them. That's a lot to stress over for something that's supposed to make you happy! You are supposed to be in LOVE with you hobby after all. 

So I've put together the guide below to help relieve some of that stress, to help you enjoy it more and maybe rekindle your love for this hobby if it's gone a little stale.  I've sorted through my past blog posts, videos and classes and pulled them together in a way to create this guide for you. So you can Fall in LOVE with Planning all over again!

Your Guide to Rediscovering Your LOVE for Planning

Finding the Perfect Planner:

I don't think that there is only ONE perfect planner for each of us. Actually I know that there isn't. I believe that there are many different planners that you can use successfully and any one of those options will make you happy and keep you organised. So how do you find one of the many 'right' planners for you? Read through some of the blog posts in this section of the guide to help.

5 Surprising Questions You Never Thought to ask Yourself Before Buying Your Next Planner

13 Ways to Know if Your Planner is the Right Planner For You

Perfect Planner Hacks to make Your Planner Work Better for You Now! this one has a video too!

 

 

Staying Organised:

Of course, the main purpose of having a planner is to stay organised, whether or not that's your main purpose is another story! It's perfectly fine if you just want to play with stickers! However, if you would like tips on staying organised read the blog posts linked bel

Find out if you are Planning the Correct Way?

24 Ways to Stay Organised

The Secret to Successful Planning and Why I HATE It!

 

Beginner to Planner Girl:

If you are new to all this, I know how completely overwhelming it can be! There are so many different things to discover and terms to learn. It is incredibly fun, so don't let the details get in your way. Pop on over to this blog post: 

Newbie Planner Girls Start HERE! 6 tips for you

There's even a CHEAT SHEET!!

Then continue on with this blog series, called OMG! Where do I start?

OMG Where do I Start? Planner Series: Choosing a Binding
OMG Where do I Start? Planner Series: What SIZE to choose
OMG Where do I Start? Planner Series: What inserts to choose
OMG Where do I Start? Planner Series: How to Make Multiple Planners Work
OMG Where do I Start? Planner Series: 4 things to do Before you Buy All the Things!

 

Decorating: 

Ah, the fun bit!! Well I guess every part of planning is fun for me, but then again, I'm odd and I know not everyone gets giddy over the organisation part of it!

Here's a few of my favourite projects in videos and blog posts:

Shake it Off! A Shaker Dashboard Tutorial!

Get the Look! 5 Planner Styles You Can Copy Today

 

 

I even have an entire class at Big Picture Classes dedicated to making planner clips, check it out:

Planner Clips
 

I've got a new YouTube video up with 21 ways to use Washi in Your Planner and there is even a free printable checklist so you can keep the list of all 21 ways on hand or even add it to your planner.

FREE Printable Checklist 

Storage:

With any hobby comes the task of sorting and organsing and storing all the supplies you want, ahem 'need'. If you want some inspiration to help with your planner supply organisation, this video gives you a tour of my craft room.

 

 If you remember one thing from this blog today, let it be this: It's your planner, it's your hobby and it's supposed to make you happy. It's a space where you can enjoy some of your free time. There's no guilt, no stress and no shame. It's a book, made out of paper who's job is to give you feel joy and make you feel like you've got this thing called life under control!

I'm Sharing My 2018 Planner Line-Up with You!

I could get by with just the one planner, but hey, where's the fun in that?! Instead, I'm using a few planners to spice things up and to make this wonderful hobby of ours a little more fun. Oh and of course, to keep me organised!

 Let's start with my Main Planner, my workhorse, my unicorn of perfection, my planner! It is a Tardis after all, so it's bigger on the inside. It's a traveler's notebook, which suits this lefty to a T and I can add as many inserts in it as I need and it'll take them! For now though, I have 3, a bullet journal, my Commit30 planner and a lined Erin Condren notebook that I'm using to plan my next class. Why am I babbling on? Just hit play on the video below and see for yourself!!

 I've been super happy with my planner setup for quite a while now. But, this year I've changed up the planners that I'm using. Mostly because I went to PlannerCon Europe in October. I can't resist buying pretty new planners, but some were free gifts!

So besides keeping things fun, what am I using the other planners for you ask? They help me track my habits, plan social media and have a family calendar on hand while on the go. Let's have a look at these other planners, shall we?

My favourite planner after the Tardis is my Leuchtturm1917. It was a free gift from Leuchtturm at PlannerCon and I love it so much that I wanted to FIND (or even create) a reason to use it. So I swapped out the plain notebook I had been using to draft blog posts for this book. Yes, I'm old school! I can't think in front of a blank computer screen, but a blank page of a notebook works for me. I can use the Leuchtturm to plan out when the blog posts will go live in it's calendar section of the book and then reference the page number where I've written the draft. They've even got a little spot for that. So smart! 

 

My favourite part though, is the tracking section. I write in what I want to track and colour in the squares as I do the tasks I'm tracking. I add more details in the calendar along side the blog post titles. I love coming and filling in what I accomplished each day. It's very satisfying!

 

You can get a peek at it in this video:

 

Next up is my Erin Condren Life planner I bought it at PlannerCon. It's bound, which is better for this lefty. I'm using it to plan social media posts and eventhough I haven't found my rhythm with this planner yet, I really love it. I'm working on making a habit out of using this planner!

 

I've had my Gillio Mia Cara since last Christmas and it's first role is my wallet, but I also copy all of my family's appointments and activities into it, so that when I'm at the doctor's office, or somewhere similar, and I need to make an appointment, I don't need to bring the entire wall calendar with me!

 I'm adding a bonus planner! I just started with this planner last week. It's a Carpe Diem Traveler's Notebook that I bought at (yup, you guessed it!) PlannerCon. I love it! It's pretty and practically. I had put it on my shelf with my other pretty planners, to wait until a need for a planner arose. Well, last week that reason showed up! I needed a place to brainstorm and draft ideas for my YouTube videos. I went to the shelf and this one seemed perfect. The inserts are simply lined or dotted, perfect for my needs.

 

Well, there you have it, that's how I stay organised and to be completely honest, it also keeps me sane!! Let me know in the comments what planner(s) you are using this year.