Why Empty Pages Can Feel So Intimidating
Let's talk more planner theory. Does anyone else get weirdly intimidated by a brand new, freshly opened planner?
At first it feels exciting, right? Fresh pages, clean layouts, untouched tabs, all that possibility laid out in front of you. Your handwriting is suddenly neater. Your life feels about 12% more under control just by opening the thing!
And then somewhere in the back of your mind, this little voice starts whispering, “But what if I mess it up?”
One crossed-out task, dab of white out or mis-spelled word and suddenly the illusion is broken.
I think a lot of us do this, especially with expensive planners or particularly beautiful ones. We hesitate to write in them because we want them to stay neat, consistent and aestheticly pleasing. Thanks to social media, this has slowly become the definition of a planner “done properly.”
Which is funny when you think about it, because planners are literally designed to contain our messy human lives.
I don't know about you, but my life has scribbles, rescheduled appointments (oh so many rescheduled appointments....), half-finished lists, bad handwriting days, random notes jammed into margins, days or even weeks where everything falls apart a bit.
But somehow cracking open a new planner full of empty pages makes us feel like we’re supposed to become our ideal selves overnight. You know, that other you: the person who meal plans every Sunday, tracks 14 habits, journals daily, never misses a workout, and somehow has perfectly spaced handwriting at all times.
Meanwhile, most of us are just trying to remember whether we already bought toothpaste.
I also think there’s something about a blank planner that feels emotionally loaded. It’s a fresh start. A reset. Proof that maybe this time we’ll finally become the organized/creative/luxury lifestlye/whimsical (insert whatever adjective works for you here) person we imagine ourselves being.
But then life happens, and the planner starts looking… lived in. As I work to let go of my own perfectionism, I’m more comfortable saying out loud that that’s the whole point.
Some of my favorite planners I’ve used over the years have looked terrible by December 31st. Bent pages, crossed-out tasks, tea stains, sticky notes hanging out everywhere, notes I can't read anymore but knew exactly what they meant when I wrote them. Those planners carried my real life. Frankly I wish more of those types of planners were shown on social media!
What about you, do you hesitate to “mess up” a new planner? Do empty pages motivate you or stress you out a little?
When you look back at old planners, do you prefer the neat ones… or the ones that clearly got very well used every single day?
As always on Fridays, feel free to discuss anything ring planner related, and have a fantastic weekend!
