Today’s Fresh Start: a daily planner that won’t make you feel bad
Today’s Fresh Start: one page, one day, one thing
A printable ADHD daily planner for busy leaders. Plan your day around one thing, then throw the page away.
Why a fresh start
If you’re anything like me, you’ve tried all sorts of apps and processes to plan your day. Getting Things Done. Bullet journaling, which was a lot of effort and quite hard work. Cal Newport’s Time Block Planner, which is great, except for one thing.
I’d plan a day, then forget to use it the next. Then the next time I opened it, I had to flick through the blank pages and feel bad about my plans before I got to today. Even on a good run, I’d see the previous days, everything I didn’t finish, and it demotivated me.
So I made a single page. You plan today on it. At the end of the day, you throw it away. The next morning, you get a fresh start.
No graveyard of unused pages, and no broken promises staring back at you.
What’s on the page
Today’s One Thing. The one thing that would make today a good day, if it’s the only thing you get done.
Today’s Other Things. A few other things that truly matter today. Not your whole to-do list.
Clarity Score. Mood, energy and focus, each out of five. A ten-second check on how you’re starting the day.
Time Block Planner. Seven in the morning to seven at night, with your day blocked around your One Thing.
Two reflections. What went well yesterday? What can I learn from yesterday?
How to use it
Decide your One Thing for today.
Score your mood, energy and focus. Be honest. It changes what a realistic day looks like.
Capture a few other things that truly matter.
Time-block your day around your One Thing. Put it where your energy is best.
Adapt the day as you go, using the columns. Something always takes longer than you thought. Move it to the next column and replan the rest of the day. That’s how most of my days go.
End the day with the two reflections, then throw the page away. There are successes and failures on it, but you don’t need it tomorrow.
Tip: set up tomorrow’s page the evening before. Jot down anything you mustn’t forget, with a little box next to it. In the morning, decide your One Thing first.
Tip: print a page a day, or upload the PDF to a printing service and get it made into a pad. Mine’s from Vistaprint.
Print it tonight, and start fresh tomorrow.
Watch me plan a real day
Nine minutes: why the other planners didn’t stick, then a real day planned, replanned and thrown away.
The Planner
One page, one day. Print it, use it, toss it. Free PDF, no email needed.
Want help with this?
This page is one of the ways I made my own days work. In coaching, we build the ways of working that fit how you’re wired.
Created by
Richard Russell
Executive coach
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Here’s a printable ADHD daily planner: plan the day around one thing, then throw the page away.