(Crickets) love visual simplicity and organizational abundance (micro solutions). You prefer your everyday used items hidden out of sight, but you do tend to pile items until you can put them away properly. You are a classic organizer in every way.
As a classic organizer, Crickets are the people for which planners were often designed for.
Our resident Cricket Meshelle (the manager of Skylab Letterpress — she keeps the wheels on that particular bus oiled and on-time!) is the quintessential Cricket. She utilizes spreadsheets like a pro but is also creative (it’s possible to do both).
Her personal aesthetic is polished and minimal. Her organizational systems are equal to this. Meshelle loves Halloween and she often goes all out decorating for the holiday so being a Cricket doesn’t mean that you have to go full minimalist. But Crickets are considerably more likely to keep their possessions pared down to what is important to them and then organize and compartmentalize all the detritus.
Meshelle’s favorite planner at the moment is the Field Notes 56-Week Planner. It is minimal but somewhat compartmentalized with lots of lines to keep text neat. Most of the planning she does is for work so the Field Notes Planner has the right minimal aesthetic for her while providing her with plenty of space to keep all her to-do’s — and no fussy pre-printed designs to get in the way of getting down to business.
Some Crickets may prefer greater micro-organizational options like a Bullet Journal or Theme System Journal. Other options might be an Erin Condren Life Planner (or better yet, her new Focused Planners) or other similar options. A Jibun Techo might be good for a Cricket who wants to use time blocking in their planning. If your focus is on goal setting, the MiGoals or Purpose planner might be good options.
Crickets will be most likely to seek out “the perfect planner” but remember that the key is to find a planner that fits your needs or can be easily tweaked to fulfill your needs. Crickets may often pile or postpone organizing until they have time to “do it right” which can lead to piles and inevitable chaos which can create stress. So, the best advice for Crickets (and really, anyone) is to be okay with “good enough”.
If you have not found “the perfect planner”, Crickets might want to consider purchasing a fully customizable planner like the Golden Coil or Agendio. With some pre-planning, Crickets can custom build a planner that meets their needs exactly the way they want.
Some Crickets may benefit from having more than one planner in order to micro-organize information — a larger, specific planner for work and then maybe smaller, portable planner like the Hobonichi Weeks for personal info and even a separate journal to keep as a diary. If multiple planners seem “too much”, Crickets might skip a work paper planner and rely on a digital system for business and use their paper planner for personal project tracking, notes and lists to keep down the clutter.
Crickets might wish they could use a super embellished Traveler’s Notebook (or employ the multi-notebook system utilized by our resident Bee) but a planning system with more structure may be better suited to the personal organizational temperament of a Cricket.
If the planning system requires too much time or effort, Crickets are inclined to postpone planning until it can be done “perfectly”. I advise Crickets avoid the Bullet Journal Instagram rabbit hole– that way lies madness and planning indecision while you ruminate on the perfect layout, lettering and color scheme. Remember to embrace simplicity and “good enough” so that you can utilize your planning or notebook to stay on task without getting distracted trying to find “the perfect system.” (Really, I think that’s good advice for all of us, don’t you?)
(Ladybugs) Love visual simplicity and organizational simplicity. You prefer to have all your items hidden out-of-sight. You also need fast and easy solutions, like bins and baskets without lids.
