First off, for me it's still surreal that I'm able to have one of these awesome dot grid journals that everyone in the bullet journaling community seems to have! I don't know why it's so hard for my own head to wrap around that I have one. I actually ended up spending more money on it that I should have, considering on the actual Leuchtturm website they're all $19.50 no matter the color, but ignorant past me was told amazon was the cheapest all the time so I assumed the $33 orange Leuchtturm was special or something haha. Luckily I only got it for $27 but that's still a lot more than I should have paid. Oh well. I don't know...for some reason it's hard for me to believe I have the same journal that all the "pros" are using. In the art world it's hard to get the best of the best supplies because of the prices, and I guess for me this Leuchtturm is the "best of the best" and it's so crazy for my brain to compute that I have what the pros are using.
I'm in LOVE with my orange Leuchtturm and I started penciling in January today! But, if you've been paying attention to my bullet journal Instagram (@haleyjournals), more importantly my story posts, you would have seen my late night, finals week, sleep deprived, "rant" about how going from a RULED Moleskine to a DOTTED Leuchtturm was going to be like learning bullet journaling all over again. And that's really the only way I can think of describing it. It all makes sense in my brain, but it's sort of hard to get the words out to explain how I feel.
In the beginning, when I started bullet journaling, I tried making the most artsy layouts and colored them all in. But that was also in the summer when I had a ton of time. As the semester started I almost completely dropped off, and my style went purely minimalistic. Now, I'm able to manage the artsy-to-minimal ratio and make it efficient, yet fancy and colorful, at the same time. BUT, everyone I've ever watched/followed in the BuJo community has had a Leuchtturm and a lot of the people who use these dot-grid journals usually have boxed in sections. I've just adapted to using a ruled journal, so my style has too. I could still use this style in my Leuchtturm, there just wouldn't be horizontal lines across my page and I would have the option to do something vertically more easily than I have in the past. It feels like I'm starting over again because I want to try out all these different options, but at the same time I've learned that having something that works for me, and is my own comfortable style, is more important than trying to have layouts that look like everyone else's.
So I think by now you can see my conflict: Try out all the new things I can accomplish with the dot grid vs Keep my style and know it'll work for me.
Obviously I can try out new things every month just to see if it'll work for me, but at the same time I don't want to waste pages, you know? I'm currently trying out my good friend Caitlin's (@sunshine.and.stationery on Instagram) style of a calendar/monthly goals page to see if I can get a calendar to work for me again for my next (and last!!) semester of college.
I think it's one of those things where I'm still in the "honeymoon" phase with my new Leuchtturm and I don't want to mess it up in any way. I remember being the same way with my Moleskine when I first got it. And now that I know they're only $20 instead of $30+ I can always get another one without having to worry about if I'm going to be breaking my bank or not (as much anyway, haha). It's just things like these that seem to make me feel like I'm crazy because I'm pretty sure no one else feels like this with their Leuchtturm, haha!
I'm still trying to figure out how to "personalize" my orange Leuchtturm. On my gray Moleskine I have my chubby robin sticker, and I've checked back to the same artist who sold me that sticker, and they have other chubby birds I can now choose from. But at the same time I want something different for my new journal and the new year. I stood out a little on Instagram because I had my little bird, and most know me by it, while a lot of people either had personal covers made or the popular mandala decals on the spines of their journals. I just want to be different and stand out but, again, I'm in the honeymoon phase and my cover looks so nice and new I don't want to put something on it yet! I've been lurking around RedBubble for stickers and I'm sure there will be a sticker I just HAVE to put on there sometime, but I'm waiting for now. Maybe for the first month or so of 2017 I'll have it plain and see how I feel. That way I can have that "new journal" feeling for a while longer (:
Well, there's my little discussion/rant about how I feel about moving into my Leuchtturm. Even after typing out my thoughts I'm a bit conflicted still on what I want to do. But I'm sure I'll figure it out. I'm leaning toward just doing what works for me and trying different variations of that, but who knows what will happen! Happy Journaling! <3
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