#planning tips

i’m not talking about planners, cute layouts, or waking up at 5am. these are the planning habits that helped when motivation was low and my brain felt full already!!

plan energy, not time

instead of asking “when will i do this”, ask “what kind of energy does this need”. some things need focus, some need calm, some need zero thinking. match tasks to how you usually feel, not to the clock

decide in advance what you’re allowed to drop

every week, i pick one thing that’s optional. if the week gets messy, that’s the first thing to go. this stops the spiral of feeling like you failed everything

keep a “later but not now” list

this is for ideas, goals, random motivation bursts. writing them down somewhere separate stops you from overloading today with things that don’t belong there yet

plan for friction

most plans fail because we assume everything will go smoothly. add buffer time, expect delays, assume low focus days exist. planning with realism feels way kinder

break tasks by stopping point, not start

instead of “work on essay”, plan “stop after outline” or “stop after one page”. knowing where you’re allowed to stop makes starting easier

don’t plan every day the same

some days are good for thinking, some for doing, some for catching up. labeling days loosely helps you stop forcing productivity when it’s not there

review plans quietly

once a week, look at what actually happened without judging it. what worked stays, what didn’t gets adjusted. no punishment, no dramatic reset

use planning to reduce thinking, not add to it

if a system makes you think more, it’s not helping. good planning should make decisions automatic, not heavier

planning isn’t about control. it’s about giving future you fewer decisions to stress about. when it feels lighter, you’re doing it right ♡

MY MANIFESTING LIST ;

every year i always make a list of the things that i wanna manifest in 2025, i dont always complete it in the first sitting bcuz i add onto it as the year progresses but i like to have a basic framework of everything that im manifesting in that year.

also along with my manifest list for 2025, i also create a 2025 vision board because it motivates me and reminds me of all the amazing things that im going to experience in 2025.

REFLECTING ON THIS YEAR ;

so in my notion i have a section called the 'monthly digest' where every single month i break down the 4 weeks of the month and everything that i did in them in relation to my goals. after every month i write a little summary.

hey guys! I am a big planner and I love to plan in advance of everything.

I am taking the SAT in june 2021 and i decided to show you all how i plan. I know it is a bit overkill planning 6 months in advance but you can never be too prepared!

to start, i have two options for everyone: notion or google docs.

Notion is a free note taking app that i absolutely love and is using.

Google docs a free web based note taking site

you can use other programs or plan all of this on paper but these are the two i recommend.

how i plan:

1. Gather your supplies

at first i ordered all the prep books i needed which  are what i based my study schedule around.

2. Add up all the chapters and divide it by weeks remaining

if you are in a time crunch, i would add up all the chapters you need to finish and divide it by the amount of weeks you have left.

for example: if you had 36 chapters you need to get through but you only had 4 weeks.

36/4 - 9 chapters per week (which seems a bit extreme so plan accordingly)

but if you are like me and like to plan in advance, work backwards. Pick how many chapters you would like to complete per week and work backwards from the test date. Make sure to included plenty of days for practice tests too!

3. Write out a rough draft on google docs.

you can skip this step but i wrote down all the chapters and what i need to do on a google doc.

as you can see i separated the math section from the reading & writing. i also separated it by prep books too! this is super helpful in organization and gives it a cleaner look.

4. Add into notion

if you use notion to plan out your entire life like me, this step is essential! I basically made a whole new page dedicated to  sat prep and i important all my plans and divided into weeks.

I also included a monthly overview.

I hope this helps you on your SAT/ACT tests and gives at least a bit of structure to your study routine! 

{ 2020 quarantine challenge :: day 1 } how i plan my days + my “study” schedule

basically a wEek in the LiFe of a bErkEley (graduating) senior + deep dive into how i plan and remember each day i spend in quarantine while still attending ~*zoom university*~ !! yeet

• an introduction •

because i spend a lot of time online, i find that my google calendar is the quickest and easiest way for me to manage my time !! though i use my planner / bullet journal on a daily basis to manage my TODOs (+ to journal), i find that gcal gives me the best flexibility and efficiency when it comes to actually planning out and scheduling my day!

the fact that i can check it on my phone while i’m on the go (hurray @ integration across devices) also helped a lot when i was still on-campus and didn’t have the ability to take out my planner from my backpack. and even now in quarantine, when i don’t want to be on my laptop, i can just quickly glance at whatever mobile device to see what i need to do next!

but ya, here comes a (very long) breakdown of how i use this system to keep my days goin’ ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ 

There are many ways to set up an academic planner. Here are some of my best tips based on how I used my own academic planner these past few years: 

Use the monthly overview calendar pages and don’t forget to refer to these pages everyday. This is a good place to record exam dates, assignment and group project deliverable due dates, dates of professional events and their locations, and dates of non-academic/personal events (such as family events).

Have a weekly to-do list for specific tasks. Ask yourself exactly what you need to get done to make the task as specific as possible. This will help you break down your work in manageable steps. For example, if you have to work on individual assignments or group projects, it might be helpful to record tasks such as conducting steps of the relevant research process, writing your specific part of the group project, editing an individual/group paper or other project materials, and meeting up for group project discussions and their locations. And if you have assessments to study for and/or need to schedule personal studying time, you might find it beneficial to record tasks such as creating study guides and flashcards for the specific chapters you have to study for, especially if there has been a change in the syllabus, and meeting up for partner or group study sessions and their locations.

Record your tasks or appointments on each relevant day. These might include meeting with a teacher or professor during office hours and running academic or non-academic tasks. If you don’t have specific tasks for that particular day, revise your tasks for the week to account for any progress you might have made! 

Record tasks for your daily routine each day as well. You will feel so much better having been able to be productive and you will also maintain good work-life balance.

Have a self-care activity planned for each day. While it is important to be academically productive, it is equally important to unwind and relax after a stressful day. Try to mix it up so you have something new to look forward to every day!

So I used a processor called The Novel Factory for a while, and while it was more expensive than it was worth, I did learn one tip that I would reccomend any planners at least know if not use (pantsers, you do you)

What is the Goal-Decision Cycle and what’s so good about it?

It’s a style of planning scenes so that they all flow together and keep the tension building until the climax. It’s also useful to see where there’s gaps in the story, and see plotholes earlier. It’s also character-based, making it ideal for plotting stories that revolve around their characters rather than the other way around.

So how do I do it?

First brainstorm what you want the following plotpoints to be: inciting incident, point of no return, midpoint, breaking point (or dark moment), climax and resolution. Then brainstorm what you want to happen in between these plotpoints and make sure that they’re all in order. Your story will likely start with a goal scene and end with a decision scene. (Though this is not universal. If your character starts by reacting to something and slowly revealing what that thing, it could start with a reaction scene)

GOAL SCENES:

Your character will go into this scene with a goal. Something they want to achieve, for whatever motive or reason. Then something will get in the way. It will stand between your character and their goal. Finally, a disaster occurs; either your character experiences the consequences of failing to meet their goal, or they face the unforseen consequences of meeting their goal. There is often nuance to this, such as your character has been forced to choose between two bad options, and now they will try to minimize their losses, but it’s still a disaster. Or maybe they only completed their goal partly. After writing in what their goal, conflict, and disaster, write in the notes for the scene. This can range from nothing, to some combination of: side character motive, other stakes, things you need to foreshadow, other parts of the scene, or bits of dialogue and/or prose.

Example:

Goal: Wants to defeat and kill magical monster

Conflict: Magical monster is stronger than protag, with inpenetrable fur - protag only has a spear and a sword.

Disaster: By killing magical monster, protag releases a curse upon themself - if they don’t manage to lift it in seventeen days, they will die a painful death

Notes:

- king is watching - wants to see if this plan works and successfully removes protag from picture

- gets arm crushed in fight

- monster has a symbol on it’s head that’s the same as the sorcerer’s symbol in the next act

- “Come at me you little piece of --” The towering mass of magic and muscle turned around and bared it’s teeth. Protag’s voice turned small. “Oh shit.”

In this example, the goal and conflict are pretty straightforward (and a bit cliche, but whatever), but the disaster comes from a result of achieving the goal. As their goal in the beginning was to kill the monster, they likely didn’t believe that there would be a curse, and therefore it was an unforseen consequence.

REACTION SCENES:

After some consequence that happens as a result of trying to achieve their goal, your character’s going to have to do a little processing. Your character just went through some shit, so they’re going to have some feelings about that. After your character gets through the emotional reaction, then they can start going through their choices. Ideally neither of them are good. At a bare level, their choices are to do something or do nothing, but as your specific circumstance allows, there may be different or even more options. Then your character comes to a conclusion, which becomes their goal in the next scene. Sometimes these reactions scenes can cover broad expanses of time, or sometimes they’re pretty short. (These scenes are usually when you have bigger time gaps).

Example:

Reaction: Anger; protag was promised that nothing bad would happen if they won the fight and killed the monster

Choices: Yell at the people who made that promise - express anger (wastes time, will probably make the situation worse) OR figure out out how to lift the curse (people will probably try to trick them again, or think them gullible)

Decision: Yell at people - they’re not allowed to think they can insult protag’s honor and not get away with it.

Notes:

- Protag examined their hand. Swirling black streaks were slowly crawling up protag’s arm. A beautiful precursor to the death that would take them in a few short weeks.

- Sorcerer has his servants occupy protag as long as possible

- Anger is causing protag to miss details

In this example, protag makes a faster choice - they don’t have much time to spare. The decision they make is a showcase of their character. While it might be more logical to lift the curse, we can tell that the protag’s priorities are in a different order.

But what if I don’t want my story to have this much (goal or reaction)

While you always want to alternate between these two options, and you want to have an equal number of goal scenes to reaction scenes, that 1:1 ratio does not have to apply to your wordcount. Faster stories are going to have the bulk of the wordcount in the goal scenes, and slower, more reflective stories are going to have the bulk in your reaction scenes.