Pro tip: it took me 4 months to figure out a weekly spread that actually works for me
When I started journaling back in 2019 I copied those fancy spreads from Instagram with the mood trackers and habit grids, and I would spend 45 minutes drawing boxes before I even wrote anything down. I switched to a plain list layout 4 months later after I realized I was dreading opening the notebook at all. Now it is just three columns, date, task, done, and I finish a week in about 5 minutes. I miss how fun the old spreads looked, but I actually use this one every day. Anyone else go through a bunch of layouts before something simple finally stuck?
What made you finally give up on the fancy spreads, was it the time suck or did you just stop caring about how it looked? I ask because I went through almost the same thing, except my breaking point was the mood tracker. I kept forgetting to color in the little squares and then I would feel guilty staring at a half empty grid. Did you try any layouts in between the Instagram style ones and your three column setup, or was it a hard jump? Curious if the plain list was the first simple thing you tested or like the fifth.