I am always on the look out for a good planner, and I totally prefer a paper and pen version.  I was recently sent a review copy of The 7 Minute Life™ Daily Planner from the folks at The 7 Minute Life.  It is a 7.3″ x 8.5″ spiral bound planner for moms, professionals, and really any adult and retails for $24.95.  It is designed to help you organize your life and maximize your impact, and is undated but intended to be used throughout 90 continuous days.

The 7 Minute Life Daily Planner

There are many components to this planner that are unlike any time management tool that I have used before.  Not only is it very thorough, but it is made with a busy person in mind.  While many of the sections seemed to apply to folks in business, I was able to cater it to my own needs as a blogger, mom, and homeschool parent.

To learn a little bit more about the “why” behind the planner, this video gives you some background:

The planner starts with an introduction explaining the goal of using it.  It is to offer the user time management strategies for work and home in the following ways:

It goes on to tell you why you need it, what it will do for you, and how to get started with the Think – Write – Do system.

The steps presented in this system are:

• Prioritize Your Top 10 Values
• Discovering Your Purpose
• Establish Your 90-Day Goals
  • Unfinished Tasks
  • Mental Clutter
  • Home Repair
  • Life Connections
  • Annual Projects and Tasks
  • Your 12 Month Calendar
  • The Meeting Planner
  • Notes Pages
  • The Annual Exercise Progress Report
  • The Daily Progress Report
    • 5 before 11 (Your Daily Top Priority “To-Do” List)

How I Used It

First of all, I have to say that I loved the pockets in the front and back of the planner.  I used it to put little notes, receipts, business cards, and more in throughout the time that I have been using the planner.  It’s helping to keep me a bit more organized on top of all of the written tools in the planner itself!

I started the life planner out by filling out the preliminary steps first.  I really enjoyed the Prioritize step, and it was eye-opening to see which things ranked highest on my list of priorities when being truly honest with myself.

Next, I wrote my purpose statement about my life, wrote my list of things I love, and finally came up with my purpose words, taken straight from my purpose statement.

I filled out a lot of the other worksheet pages after that, such as my strengths and highest value activities, mental clutter I needed to just write down to get out of my head, and my goals.  These goals included personal, work related, financial, and life goals.

Next, there was a space for unfinished work tasks.  I wrote down even the small ones because there is power in a check mark when getting these things done!

The section for Home Repair is almost bare on my planner.  This isn’t because we have nothing to do around here, but more because I am not sure what all we need to have repaired and who to contact.  Most of our “to do”s on this one are cosmetic.  I may still add a few things on there in the future.

There are several Monthly Calendar pages and Meeting Planner pages as well before finally getting to the Daily Progress Report pages.

The page above (and partially filled out by me below) are the first page of the Daily Progress Report.  As you can see, there are several sections on here.  My favorite part is the 5 before 11 system.  You write down your 5 highest priority things to tackle before 11am that day.  This should be done the evening before so you can just wake up and start tackling them!

This section was the most used and best feature for me, personally.  In using this system, I found that I could be much more productive than just winging it.  It was very motivating to see progress so early in the day!  Some days it made me want to push forward and get even more things done, and some days it just afforded me the time to relax, breathe, and enjoy the rest of my day much more carefree.

The second page of the Daily Progress Report has a space for appointments (starting at 7AM and ending at 10PM), a place to write 3 people to write Thank You Notes to, a place to jot down VoiceMail information, and a big space for writing down any other notes for the day.

Between each month of Daily Progess Report Pages, there is a Monthly Progress Report to talk about what worked best, how you can adjust for next month, action steps for the next month, and goals and deadlines for the next month.  There are several blank pages for notes, and even an Exercise Progress Report page at the very end.

Final Thoughts

I have enjoyed using this planner.  There are many features in it that I have never seen before that I loved.  The 5 before 11 idea is ingenious and really helped keep me motivated!  I liked being able to keep all of my day to day and month to month information in one place.  The fact that this planner also encouraged me to think about my life as a whole first and then break it down into smaller goals and tasks was awesome!

When I use this planner up, I will look into getting another one for sure.  I know that there is a dated digital version available as well, and I might look into that option.

If you’re interested in finding out more, check out the Getting Started page. It is loaded with free resources and tons of instructional videos for getting the most out of this unique planner.