“Just Plan” January

Ah, January. The holiday madness is over and it’s time to reset and get back into the swing of things.

Except for the part where January is not only my first convention of the year and deadlines for multiple submissions, but also my birthday month. So, it’s time to bust out and double down on the planners.

I attended Anime LA; it’s my hometown con, and it’s when I see the majority of my con-friends in one fell swoop. This year was extra special because I brought along two of my nieces for their first ever convention. I’ve been attending and cosplaying for years, so it was so sweet seeing these baby weebs experience this. The only downside was rushing to finish a draft I meant to have done by NYE. I was stressing out over finishing other drafts and making sure I met my self-imposed deadlines. Though I did get to have a sit-down, catch-up meeting with another budding author about our goals and plans for 2026.

And so we planned.

This is the “Just Plan” part. I’m realizing with each new blog post this is apparently my trend: I ramble, then whabam – the point.

My local, Nano-refugee writing group came up with the theme of “Just Plan January” since a few of us love planners and had some big goals for the year. I got into Bullet Journaling a few years ago in an attempt at…who knows what. I loved the idea of planners growing up, but could never get them to work for me, so the “customize everything” aspect of a Bujo intrigued me. And, as a kinetic learner, once I write something down, I’m much more likely to remember it.

My planners will never be Insta-pretty. I don’t buy fancy markers or use a ton of stickers, my handwriting is doctorial-level bad, and my traditional media art skills are borderline non-existent. But, that’s not the point. It just has to work for me.

I don’t want to make this post picture-heavy, so feel free to check out my post about my planner pages here for reference. I have a bullet journal for my day-to-day and have added more writer-themed pages to my “crafting” planner (writing’s a craft, it counts). My bujo gets a different theme every month, and I’m opening the year with Dungeons & Dragons (hence the dice on the front page, the magic schools themed habit tracker, and the Quest Board for big goals for the year). This year, I’ve added a sleep tracker along the edge of my habits page, and have little washi tape tabs to help me flip from month-to-month. Important writing deadlines and events are going on calendars in both planners (the anxiety is real, y’all).

In my “craft” planner, I’ve got:

• a Writer’s Bingo Card I made for my local writing group;
• a simplified reading tracker: I had a super complicated one last year so I could make a blanket;
• a Scene Idea list: a place to jot down the idea or quote that sparks the scene, what story I want to use it for, and a little check box for when I finally find it a home;
• calendar pages for marketing and social media posting; and
• blank character dossier pages: I had to dig through my reader magnet to find out if I ever mentioned a character’s hair color. No thank you, never again.

The best part of this kind of planner is I can easily add other pages as I think of them. And I probably will, knowing me.

Our writing group is helping motivate each other, figure out what tools and tricks help us, and sharing resources. Between them, Pinterest, a lot of Photoshop, and a few freebies from authors like Jenna Harte, I’ve got a journal and a planner setup I’m pretty happy with. Having the group and my fellow authors to bolster each other has made my plan for 2026 a lot more…achievable? On paper at least.

I’ve got my goal of applying to five anthologies this year (two of those deadlines are coming up quick), and the sit down gave me a game plan for maybe-hopefully-querying a novel this summer. Throw in the other theme months our group has in store, I’ll hopefully have all sorts of good news this year as I add to more and more of the West Coast Wyrd world.

I even made badge ribbons for it at Anime LA!