A Plan to Get Back on Track

Picture by Stormberry. Still on the Bullet Journal Project.

The last period of the year at the University starts and I've managed to enroll in two classes, one of which is the last subject I need to pass to complete my studies for the Finance diploma. I'm so close!! I'm excited and full of energy and hope, but at the same time I remember the hard lessons learned during the past period, where here and there I sometimes lost sight of my schedule and then got lots of work to do. My schedule was quite packed, I must admit, and there were days where I worked myself close to an aneurism (so to say), with so much I studied and how hard I did my summaries and readings. This meant also that some things had to give and me left behind, neglected, and the ones that got the worse of my lack of time were my penpals.

Picture by Stormberry. My post bag :-)

This time around, I decided to make time and give some priority to my lovely penpals, and all the people that had been writing to me, for over the last year and start replying to them. I wasn't going to feel guilty again when opening my P.O.Box and finding a letter in it. So, since my studies had not really started yet, I decided to use the time and get back on track with my penpals and start replying to them. My pile has been going thinner and thinner as I reply to my friends, managing already to send out four letters, and then this very weekend finding the time and the energy to reply to seven friends! Wow, that's quite a feat for someone like me, who usually takes a couple of days to reply to one letter. :-) I normally write the very way I speak: I just don't shut up. Really. But this time I tried to practice some restriction and gathered my thoughts better for the benefit of my friends. :-)

However, I have many penpals and it's not fair to either of them for me to reply to them only once a year or so, just because I'm studying. Of course, my penpals are the best penpals in the planet: all of them beautiful, sweet and understanding girls, but still, they are important to me, and I should show how much they matter to me by carving out time to be with them. This is how an idea occured to me: I'll have a "Letter Writing" day every week. And since now I don't have German on Mondays, what better than make myself a "Letter Writing Monday"?

Picture by Stormberry. Starbucks' coffee and letter

Last week I decided to go after work to a Starbucks' coffeeshop that's close to my office, basically to decide it the place could work for me for some studying. I've been thinking about spicing up my study time by once a week taking myself to a different place, close to work, so I could get to study without having been drained first by the traffic jams one always finds at that time of the day. This Starbucks is quite loud, so it would hardly be ideal for studying, not to mention that it tends to be quite packed, but as I sat there writing my letters with a cup of Latin American blend of Espresso Roast, I realized that the place was perfect for this. And that became a seed of an idea that slowly took roots in my head until the decision of a "Letter Writing Monday" was born.

On Tumblr I follow a lot of blogs that have to do with studying, and lot of them show pictures of notes, summaries, mind maps, neat desks and notes covering tables with a laptop here and there, and a trademark Starbucks cup. Not many of these talk to you about programmed down time, and down time is needed. So, I need to reply to my friends, and I need to plan in a break in my schedule, make time for classes, studies, readings, and yes, me-time with letter writing, friend-meeting and movie nights.

I still haven't thought about installing a particular date for meeting with my friends, whom I haven't seen in quite a few weeks now, but to begin with the new period, I'm setting my letter-days and my initial study days. :-) All the rest will come around.

Oh, BTW, on the matter of the Bullet Journal, I'm about to finish my notebook, which will complete my project. I have been thinking about making a video about it, my first, because it might be too much for photographing and then writing a post about it. Who knows. As it is, there are nice parts of it, and parts I didn't like so much. My planning system with have a little variation for next year - and not only the new binder I'm planning on getting. But we shall see about that.