Before buying a planner, it's important to consider what you're looking for, what your goals are, and how you like to stay organized. The MYO Slim Planner is particularly useful for anyone who has struggled to build a planner habit in the past, since the easiest way to use a planner is to make sure it's on you and accessible at all times. The templates are saved in Microsoft Excel ".xlsx" format and can be used with the newer versions of Excel that support the XML document standard (Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021 and Office 365). If you have one of the older versions of Excel that only supports the ".xls" format (Excel 2000, 2002/XP & 2003), or if you don't have Excel installed, use Microsoft Office Online or one of the Microsoft Excel/Microsoft Office alternatives FreeOffice PlanMaker, LibreOffice Calc, Google Sheets and others, which are all free of charge ( OpenOffice Calc unfortunately has minor formatting problems when opening our calendars). Also compatible with Microsoft Office for Mac (macOS) and Microsoft Office mobile for iPad/iOS, Android and Windows 10 mobile. Dr. Lyons points out that the benefits of having a planner or agenda aren't just aesthetic. "Often, structuring our time takes us out of a reactive mode and out of a place of urgency, and as a result we're more proactive with our time as opposed to reactive. And that, in and of itself, lowers our stress levels and makes us more able to manage our attention efficiently. Trying to complete a task while holding our entire agenda for the day in our heads is an inefficient use of our time and energy, so that ends up leaking out and we aren’t able to be as efficient as we could bein other important facets of our lives, like our relationships and our self care. There really are a lot of ramifications for not being efficient with our time management." What to Look For in a Planner Instead of an app or gadget that claims to jump-start your productivity, consider investing in a good paper planner. There is plenty of research that shows how actually writing down your to-do list and schedule for the day — rather than typing it out on a laptop or iPhone — makes you feel more engaged in the task at hand. And once the calendar year is complete, a physical planner becomes an artifact — a time capsule, if you will — of its happenings. Leafing through the well-loved Hobonichi Techo planners I’ve used over the years brings me almost as much pleasure as scribbling in them did.

While I’ve been devoted to Hobonichi Techo for most of my adult life, I’ve covered the Strategist’s stationery beat long enough to know that finding the right planner out of the very vast and very particular world of paper goods can be overwhelming. (I have, after all, updated this list faithfully every January and was tasked with selecting the best 100 notebooks for our massive notebook-testing story.) For certain parts of the day, decide what you’re going to focus on, and focus solely on that one thing," she says. "I put things into my calendar, and when I do that thing, I do that only. As much as you can, do one thing at one time and schedule it in your calendar. I even have my morning walks and my meditation in my calendar. If you think about it, when you’re doing six or seven things at one time, your energy is fragmented among those six or seven things, so it’s going to take you six times longer to do each of those tasks. But if you focus on one task at a time before moving to the next, you’ve got fully focused energy that’s not fragmented. And that’s how you become more efficient and save more time and energy."

Printable 2022 Monthly Planner Templates

This roundup was researched and written by Brigitt Earley, who has written and edited hundreds of buying guides for various publications over the course of the last 10 years. Not to mention, Earley knows a thing or two about scheduling and staying organized—she is a freelancer for more than a half-dozen publications, all while running a household of six (including four kids under the age of 4!). printable calendar free. The 2022 calendar is in Word format so it's easy to change the colours and the size to A3 or A5. Pros: includes space for planning, to do lists, and gratitude; has two built-in bookmarks; easy to carry around; editor-approved When buying an agenda, another important question to ask yourself is when and for how long you intend on using it. Some agendas on this list are designed for limited spaces of time (e.g., six weeks or three months at a time); others are undated so that users can focus on accomplishing specific short-term goals. Other goal-oriented planners include inspirational quotes, tips on staying focused, and other tools meant to guide you along your journey. Meanwhile, more traditional, dated planners and agendas simply lay out the entire calendar year or school year.

There's also a wide variety of colors and options. The book cloth cover version of the Ink+Volt Goal Planner is available in 14 different colors, but there are also "soft touch" and "Starlight" variant covers available with different textures entirely. You can also choose between dated and undated versions. While we love the "Joy" Meal Planner, which has a clean look available in four different colors, Papier offers dozens of additional cover selections from a range of designers. Dr. Lyons echoes this sentiment, saying, "Simply having a planner be an action plan that lays out your goals is best, and thinking about it as an action plan for achieving your goals actually reduces stress because it lays our achievable action steps. It plots a way of achieving your goal in achievable, bite-sized steps."

Date Calculators

Live a happy life.” This simple we have in mind has been our guiding light in creating the printables we’ve included in The Happy Life Planner. We believe that in life, no matter what, one can choose to be happy if he wants to.

Christy Whitman, life coach and author of The Art of Having It All: A Woman’s Guide to Unlimited Abundance Selecting the right planner depends on your individual needs. When shopping, consider what you intend to use it for (scheduling, goal setting, note-taking, etc.) and other important factors like size, organization tabs, and digital capabilities. Ultimately, the best planner for you will be one with the features that help you succeed. The templates are saved in Microsoft Word ".docx" format and can be used with the newer versions of Word that support the XML document standard (Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021 and Office 365). If you have one of the older versions of Word that only supports the ".doc" format (Word 2000, 2002/XP & 2003), or if you don't have Word installed, use Microsoft Office Online or one of the Microsoft Word/Microsoft Office alternatives FreeOffice TextMaker, LibreOffice Writer, Google Docs and others, which are all free of charge ( OpenOffice Writer unfortunately has formatting problems when opening our calendars), or use a docx to doc converter (available for online or offline use). Also compatible with Microsoft Office for Mac (macOS) and Microsoft Office mobile for iPad/iOS, Android and Windows 10 mobile.He also adds that it's important to lay out in your planner "where there’s time for recuperation, because in the same way that we can’t effectively multi-task, we can’t sustain a work day for eight or 16 hours nonstop. So being able to plan where we recuperate means that we’ll be able to be more effective when we do work. And there’s something about being able to identify your goals and being able to parse them out in a scheduled sense of time that is empowering. And in our urgency culture, it’s one of the most effective ways of regaining a sense of power and agency." And yes, designing this free planner 2022 was so much fun! Thanks to Design Cuts and Creative Market for the design elements we used in creating it. So what are the cute printables included?