How To Use Your Filofax And Stay Positive During The Coronavirus Lockdown

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Discover These Inspiring Coronaviris Productivity & Work From Home Tips

Is your mental health during lockdown suffering? Are you experiencing the "lockdown blues"? Is your planner-life suffering due to your current lack of a social life or work commitments? Maybe you are working from home now and desperately need some coronavirus lockdown tips? Let's explore some inspiring ways for you to be productive at home and stay happy in isolation, by adapting how to use your Filofax.

Thank you for stopping by to have a browse through my blog. I have been reading that some of you in the online planner community are feeling a bit lost in your planners, with Covid 19 taking away normal routines, school, work, and social lives. So I thought I would write this blog expressing my thoughts on the topic, and offer a few ideas to help you guys survive the coronavirus lockdown, by putting your Filofax, or other planner systems, to more effective use.

Stay Positive During Lockdown And Forget Forward Planning

Life in lockdown is all about living in the moment instead of planning ahead. There is such a dreadful sense of uncertainty about the future, that it can feel pointless and impossible to think about our lives in terms of what is to come. Instead, all we have is what is happening right now, in front of us, today.

But perhaps this is a good thing? Isn't this our chance to step off the conveyor belt and be mindful of the present moment, instead of always looking ahead? We are always too preoccupied with questions about the future; What is happening tomorrow? What is the schedule for next week? What about next month, next year, or even five years' time? Stop. Let us just think about today.

Now is your opportunity to live in the present moment, and experience the beauty of having a clear mind, instead of one that is normally cluttered with thoughts and worries about the past and the future.

Image by Miesha Moriniere from Pixabay 

Of course, this leaves those of you who love to use your Filofax to plan your lives in a bit of a conundrum. The whole point of using a planner is to help us organise the week, month, and even the year ahead of time, often scheduling days down to the hour when we have lots going on.

Something clearly needs to change about the way we use our planners if we want to look after our mental health during lockdown though because let's face it, looking at an empty diary is simply depressing.

How To Use Your Filofax During Lockdown

For those of you who have found that your weekly and monthly spreads are looking a bit empty and pathetic these days, this suggestion is for you. Forget About Weekly & Monthly Planner Spreads!

There is nothing worse than having a big and beautiful Filofax or life planner when you have no "life" - no appointments, meetings, deadlines, or project plans to fill your planner with. We have all lost our social lives, and many of you have also lost your work routines and commitments too. So why make yourself feel even worse by looking at empty weekly and monthly planner spreads?

We need to adapt the way we plan by mirroring the way we have had to adapt to a lifestyle that is no longer about tomorrow, next week, or next month. Because, my friends, it is all about today!

Image by Pexels from Pixabay 

I don't know about you, but in the past, I have always avoided using those daily planner inserts that divide the day up into time slots. But these may be exactly what we need right now. If you don't have any, head over to the Filofax website and see what your options are.

Daily planner inserts, the ones that divide the day up into hourly slots, are ideal right now because they force us to look at exactly what we are doing with our time. It is far too easy when our normal routines have been knocked off the radar to act like we are on holiday and indulge in lazing around, especially when the sun is shining. But the fact is that we are not on holiday, and some sort of daily routine needs to be in place if we are not to find ourselves slumming around the house in our PJs feeling unmotivated.

The hourly slots on a daily planner layout encourage us to continue to think about maintaining a healthy structure throughout the day, scheduling in time for relaxation and meals so that we can stay focussed and energized instead of demotivated and depressed. If you find that your daily schedule is looking too empty, seeing those empty time slots on the page will encourage you to think about how you can spend some of that time more productively while you are home. You will also get that feel-good factor when you look back over your day and see how much you have been able to accomplish.

How To Avoid Lockdown Blues With These Stay At Home Tips

Daily planning is so relevant right now. If you think about it, each and every day, during the current global pandemic, has a special significance. The way we choose to function each day may have an effect on the bigger picture.

Before the pandemic most days were treated the same, we had the work and school week, and we had the weekends. But now there is so little to distinguish the week from the weekend, with our kids at home permanently and nowhere to go out at the weekends. Every day feels the same as the one before, and this can really get us down. Lockdown Blues are real.

It is so important for our mental health during lockdown to try and stay productive each and every day. We have to try and craft structure into our days as well as our weeks so that we can feel optimistic in these dark times.

Image by Wokandapix from Pixabay 

Luckily it can be surprising how much you can achieve in a single day when you put your mind to it. And the best way to put your mind to something is to get out your planner! Once you start brainstorming and making those lists that you so love to make, your daily schedule will soon start to fill up, and you will begin to feel busy and with a sense of purpose again.

So let us have a look at some of the activities and tasks that might go into making up your day. They may seem mundane, but it's the mundane things that make up our lives. They always have, and they always will. It's just that now they are kind of magnified.

How To Use Your Filofax To Plan Your Lockdown Day By Day

I have come up with this list of ideas to hopefully inspire you to think about the kinds of ways you might like to use your Filofax in order to plan into your Covid 19 lockdown days. And if you don't own a Filofax or a conventional "planner", a simple notebook will do just as well. In fact, why not head over to the Filofax website after reading the rest of this article to see some of the awesome notebook options they have?

• SHOPPING LISTS - Limited shopping trips are of course so important right now as we all want to help slow down the spread of the virus and ensure that we are not putting our loved ones at home at any unnecessary risk. This means extra planning is needed to make sure that we can achieve the fine balance of buying enough shopping so that we can last for a reasonable amount of time without having to go to the supermarket again, but we must do it without any selfish stockpiling, and that takes some serious planning ahead.

• MEAL PLANS - Taking the time to plan meals helps you to keep on top of your "pantry" so that you can update your shopping list ready for the next time you need to make yourself vulnerable and head to the supermarket. It is also useful in helping us to keep on top of our health as many of us are not moving about and getting the daily exercise that we would normally get in everyday life. It is surprising how many calories we would normally burn using the London Underground system (if you live in the city) or just walking around in our jobs, and window shopping at weekends.

• SCHEDULED EXERCISE - Speaking of health, planning exercise into your daily schedule will do wonders, not only for your physical health but also for your mental wellbeing. Staying indoors for long periods of time makes us feel sluggish and tired, whereas regular exercise offers fresh air and an energy boost, helping you to stay positive during the lockdown. We are being advised to allow ourselves one outing per day for exercise, so when will you schedule yours into your day? A morning cycle perhaps? Walking the dog after lunch? An evening jog or stroll with the kids or your partner before dinner? Don' forget that indoor exercise can be added on top of that, which opens up opportunities for yoga in the living room or skipping in the garden. I have a hula hoop, and it is an awesome calorie-burner, not to mention being a LOT of fun. Why not order a few funky hula hoops for the kids to help them burn some energy?

• SCHOOL OR WORK TIMETABLE - Parents will have plenty of daily tasks to fill up a planner because kids rarely organise themselves. Those of you who are working from home will also have to work out a schedule with adequate breaks that work well around your family. If you and your partner are working from home, you might decide to divide the day into time slots that allow you both to have private use of a room in the house for video conferences or phone calls. Children will also need morning and lunch breaks if you have decided to adopt a more formal homeschooling setup.

• FUN STUFF & QUALITY TIME - Quality time with yourself or your family is often something we forget to add to our planners. These are things that are all the more important now that we are all living, working, and playing under the same roof. Scheduling time into your day to get together with the other members of your household, perhaps to watch a film or play a board game, can really help to ease tension and provide everyone with a break and some bonding time. It is just as important to add in moments of me-time, whether it is setting aside an hour in the evening to have a soak in the bath, or an hour in the mid-morning to be alone and read a good book.

• MORNING & EVENING ROUTINES - When we are living our lives in this day-to-day manner setting out a simple morning and evening routine can really help to add some structure and keep those lockdown blues at bay by stopping the days from melting into one another. If you have children, maybe you would like to take the time to get together as a family and read a bedtime story at night. Getting up an hour before everyone else in the house wakes can be the perfect opportunity to enjoy a cup of coffee and reflect with a journal or your Filofax Planner to mentally prepare yourself for the day ahead and stay positive. Have you read my previous post yet? I have compiled some Journaling Tips for Filofax & Ring Planner Users.

• WEEKEND PROJECTS - A great way of separating your week from your weekends when you have to stay at home is to plan weekend projects. They can be creative projects or hobbies, DIY projects, food prep or baking, gardening, or working on that novel you have always wanted to write. You can plan weekend projects to enjoy with the rest of the people in your household, or alternatively use them as a way to dedicate some time for yourself.

You Can Stay Positive During The Lockdown!

When we find ourselves in a situation that is challenging the only way to get through it is to find a way to make it work for us. The Covid 19 Lockdown may be the end of life as we knew it, but it is not the end of life.

We mustn't forget that social distancing, self-isolation, and lockdown restrictions are incredibly positive. They are tools that enable us as individuals to make a difference in the world.

Let's learn to embrace the changes and love the lockdown because in participating willingly and proactively, we are making the choice to help save lives.

Image by Luisella Planeta Leoni from Pixabay 

I hope that I have offered some useful ideas and that you are feeling a bit more inspired to use your Filofax organisers and other planner systems to visualise the different opportunities that each day brings you during this experience. Don't let the lockdown blues get the better of you just because you have to stay at home. There are some great ideas here on how to use your Filofax to look after your mental health during the lockdown.

Let me know if you would like more work from home tips to help you stay productive in isolation, and in the meantime, you can check out my previous post "Minimalist Planner Tips".

Please leave your comments or ideas below, because I love to read them, and I always respond to each and every one.

Have a great week... or should I say... have a great day?

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