Michelle's Mindworks

You probably already know this, but a writer’s notebook is a place to brainstorm, journal, jot down ideas, draw maps, get creative, and write whatever else you desire. It can be digital, physical, or a mishmash of both.

I prefer a mishmash of both. Ideas flow differently when you put pen to paper, but I can’t carry a notebook as conveniently as I can a phone.

Should You Condense Your Notebooks?

While it’s often better to condense the number of active notebooks, I admit to having multiple. Aside from my physical and digital writing notebooks, I have a pocket-sized notebook that fits in my purse and an office pad that acts like glorified scrap paper.

Too many active notebooks can make it difficult to find notes. A singular notebook with multiple purposes can lead to the same issue. Organizational techniques can give you the best of both worlds. Experiment to find what works for you.

Prioritize One Notebook

I find it best to prioritize a single notebook and use the others to compensate for its shortcomings. My digital notebook is my main notebook, because I always have access to it via my phone. If I write anything important in another notebook or on a piece of scrap paper, I transfer it to my digital notebook by typing it out or snapping a picture of it.

To prioritize a physical notebook, tape in paper or snap a picture so you can later transfer the info into your notebook.

Digital Tabs

I use Microsoft OneNote as my digital notebook because I can efficiently separate my notebook into sections.

In OneNote, I have a writing notebook, a journal, and a recipe book. Inside my writing notebook, I can have as many sections as I like. I have one for each project, one for blog posts, and one for brainstorming.

I can’t put a section into a section: only pages. But I can reorganize those pages and even transfer them to other sections and notebooks. I can draw, type, import photos, and create charts. Using OneNote on a tablet gives you even more options.

At one point, I tried to replace my physical notebook with an iPad and pen. I got a paper textured screen protector, which helped it feel notebook-like while writing, but I found that I preferred using a physical notebook: The feature that turns handwriting into typed text was error-prone and physical pens don’t loose their charge after an hour.

If you own a tablet, give it a shot, but I wouldn’t sink money into going completely digital.

Physical Tabs

You might be more limited on tabs in a physical notebook, but that can be a good thing!

My physical notebook has four tabs: Planning/Organizing, Notes/Morning Pages, Current Project, and Brainstorm. (Morning Pages are a writing exercise I [try to] do every day. Basically, I word vomit anything I want for fifteen minutes. To do lists, plot ideas, project ideas, journal entries— anything.)

The first two sections are extensions of my journal while the last three focus on writing projects. Only one project get a tab to itself, which helps me to focus on the project instead of giving into the temptation to start new ones before I finish my current writing project.

Table of Contents

While my OneNote notebook has a build in table of contents that I can freely organize, I have to create my own in my physical notebook. It takes a little effort, but it’s a game changer.

Dedicate the first few pages of your notebook to your table of contents and number your notebook pages. (It’s worth the effort, I promise.) When you use a page, title it. Then jot down the title and page number in the table of contents.

It’s so simple, but it blew my mind when I began implementing it. I could finally find the things I’d written down!

Get a Discbound Notebook

My writing notebook is a letter-sized, discbound notebook and the ability to insert and remove pages at will is life changing. (You could also use a binder for this effect, but discbounds are much quieter.)

I can run pages through my printer. I can mix and match lined sheets with dotted ones. And unlike tabbed spiral-bounds, my heavily used section will never run out of paper!

I also don’t have the weight of a hundred unused (or already used) pages.

Organizing a Discbound or Binder

Each section of my discbound notebook has its own table of contents and I number the pages as I go. Unlike a regular notebook, I can keep similar pages together.

Say I’m taking notes on a book I’m reading and start on page 5. I get to the bottom of the page and flip to its backside. Instead of numbering it page 6, I number it 5a to signal it’s a continuation of page 5. I can add as many page 5s as I need.

If I want to write on page 6, I jump to the next available sheet. When I decide to continue my page 5 notes, I can insert a sheet between 5a and 6.

My table of contents looks much neater since I switched to a discbound. Before, notes would jump from page 5 to 7 to 15 with morning pages in between. Now, all morning pages are written on page 3. (3a, 3b, 3c, and so on.) There’s no such thing as running out of room.

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How do you keep your writer’s notebook organized? Would something like this work for you? Let me know in the comments!