If you haven’t noticed already, I have a bit of an obsession with planners and notebooks, especially the ones that come from Japan. It’s taken me a while to put this together (and a few years to figure out a planning system that worked for me and my specific needs), but I think this is it. The Japanese term techo kaigi roughly translates to “planner meeting” – this is where you take a mindful inventory of your current planner system to see what worked and didn’t work for you. I’ve more or less stuck to the same system as last year, and I’ve pared down the amount of planners I use (bye, Nolty!) and expanding the notebooks I plan on using, instead.
The newest and smallest addition to my system is the passport-sized Traveler’s Company notebook. I had my eye on it back in October and really wanted one, but really, I had no use for it at the time. I pulled the trigger on getting myself early this year to use as a travel planner. The goal is to use up one booklet per place that I visit and keep it as a travel ‘artifact’, as the folks at Baum-Kuchen like to call them. This fits in well with my goal of living with intention, and since I love to analog plan anyway, this is perfect. It fits in my bag and takes up very little space. I also like keeping a few emergency meds and band aids in the zip pocket, just in case.
Out of all my planners, this is the one you can really go town with in terms of decorating and I’m sit waiting on a few more Shopee orders to come through before I start setting it up. I keep wanting to buy the entire ‘set’ of accessories and ephemera on the main website and keep having to remind myself that this is an exercise in slow living, not instant gratification. I’m most excited to see the soft, nubuck leather get worn and patina over time with use, as well as see how many travel plans I can fit into this cover, especially if my plans for this year push through. I don’t want to be stuck indoors again for yet another year, so every time I see this little guy, it’s a sign that I should be making plans to go explore!
Next in my line up is my A6 Hobonichi Techo English Planner, something I added to my line up last year. Don’t let the small size fool you – you can squeeze in a lot with the 4mm graph paper. I use this as my daily journal, using the months section as a daily gratitude log. I’m been incredibly frustrated with everything that’s been going on lately with the Omicron surge and I have had my days where I just had nothing to write about expect doom and gloom, but that’s when the practice of daily journaling becomes even more important. I write everything down from my dreams the night before to unpacking whatever emotion I would find myself dragging about that day. It’s a fantastic check-in tool and it’s always nice to go through the gratitude log and remember all the good memories I collected over the course of a month.
My everyday carry (EDC) and catch all is my Hobonichi Weeks. I discovered this planning system in 2020 and I’ve just really enjoyed how compact, versatile, and sturdy it is. It has a weekly spread on the left and the same 4mm graph paper on the right side for notes and what have you, and I use the weekly scheduler to list down appointments and events for that day as well as time-sensitive tasks, while using the right side to log my meals, my running task list, reminders, even my grocery list. It has been the first thing I would reach for in the mornings, and when paired with a Moterm cover, I would use as a wallet while out on my errands. The Moterm cover has taken a little break since I only mostly order everything online now, but this planing system has really served me well for the way my brain likes to process information. Last year, I tried using two – separating my business and personal, but that didn’t quite work for me. I ended up not using one as much and eventually just kept everything in one book.
I have a simple Muji B6 Ruled Open Flat Notebook for course and workshop notes for my coaching practice. I’ve named it ‘The Coaching Playbook’ and it holds my course notes as well as other coaching courses that I take up during the year. I prioritize education and have a few hours in my morning where I like to study, and I process information best by writing it down. I also like to have everything in one place, so this is another new addition to my techo kaigi. I used to keep my notes in clear Muji binders, but I end up keeping them in a corner because they’re too bulky and forgetting about them eventually. This one stays in my drawer and I like how the pages stay flat because of the binding. The goal is to just start on this and buy more of the same kind of notebook as time goes on so there’s a uniformity to it instead of shuffling through loose leaf notes. I’ll reuse the binders for my other interests.
And lastly, there’s my Van der Spek planner. This beauty is custom made to fit Franklin Covey Compact-sized inserts – they’re slightly wider than the standard, but not a big as personal wide. This is the perfect size for me. You can see the long process it took for me to get from ideation in 2017 to it finally arriving on my doorstep in 2021 here. The quality is impeccable and it’ll definitely last me a lifetime. I use this as my daily and reference planner – everything that takes up too much space in my weeks goes in here. Ironically, while the size is for Franklin Covey compact inserts, I’ve discovered that I don’t really like using them and I have a few favorites I download off of Etsy.
I had bought the FCC Universal inserts on Amazon Japan to try, but I noticed that using a weekly vertical spread where I can block off my appointments works best for where I’m at in my life now. I have tabs for my personal, coaching, digital marketing, sales, and reference pages and it keeps all my mind maps, brain dumps, notes, and everything under the sun tucked away by topic for me to go over and plan out, and once solidified, would be scheduled into my Hobonichi Weeks for execution. This 30mm chunky monkey is an extension of my brain and I love it so much. It hardly ever leaves my desk and I have no plans taking it everywhere with me.
I love my neat little techo kaigi stack for this year. For someone who struggle with anxiety, being able to plan ahead, look at what’s coming up in the next couple of days, look back at what I’ve accomplished, and just having something analog that I can hold and flip through. I’ve seen people on YouTube with stacks of planners to use for the year and, while I find it impressive, I just don’t have the time to use eight different planners for health, finances, spirituality, art, etc. I think one EDC and a daily-slash-reference planner is enough for me to use every day, a journal for my daily morning pages, and a travel planner that I can pull out when we can finally go out again.
