3 Reasons You Need a Weekly, not Daily Planner

Planners.  Picking out a planner can be overwhelming.  Especially if you don’t know what you are looking for. 

The easiest place to start is this: Rule out all of the daily planners.  That will greatly reduce the number of options to choose from.

Next, ignore all of the weekly planners that just have a blank square for each day with no times in it.  

Then, ignore the weekly planners that have no room for weekends.

Finally, ignore the weekly planners that have each day laid out horizontally instead of vertically.

Now you are left with some real possibilities!

 (Scroll down to download my weekly planning guide including the weekly layout I use!)

Why do you need a weekly planner?

#1: Weekly Planning is Proactive, Daily Planning is Reactive

When you wake up each day and sit down to create your plan for the day, you are already behind.  Hear me out. When you create a daily plan, whether you realize it or not, you are limiting yourself to working on things that you believe you can do today only.  As you rack your brain deciding what to put on the plan for today, you are bombarded by the “right now” tasks on your mind.

Your daily plan fills up with the stuff that you are reacting to. Tasks such as, “get groceries, mail package, return call, send emails, etc.” Your brain is not thinking about priority. It is thinking about what is foremost on your mind. You are reacting to the squeaky wheel. 

Weekly planning is much more intentional and thoughtful. When you set aside time to create your plan for the upcoming week, you are looking at a larger picture. You are being proactive in thought and priorities.

#2: Weekly Planning Prevents Over-Scheduling

Daily planning leads to long term over-scheduling.  When you only look at one day at a time, you never see the bigger picture.  For example, if a friend reaches out and asks you if you are free for lunch today and you are only looking at today and see that your lunch hour is open, you will likely say yes to the invitation.

However, if you have a weekly plan in front of you, you might notice that the next 3 days are packed and today’s lunch hour is the one bit of free space and time you have.  Seeing that will likely lead you to suggest a different day to meet for lunch and prevent you from getting over-scheduled and over booked.

#3: Weekly Planning Creates Space for Larger Projects

Back to point #1...daily planning has you focused on what you think you can accomplish in the current day. So, what about those larger tasks and projects? The ones that you will need to work on for several days or weeks. When you are only focused on planning one day at a time, you miss out on the opportunity to make progress on larger projects. For example, maybe you have a desire to paint your bedroom walls a new color. If you are operating and planning one day at a time, you will wake up each day and realize that there is no way you can paint the room today. So, you never start. However, weekly planning opens the door to break down that task and get started. You may recognize that you can pick out paint on one day, prep the room another day, and prioritize time over an upcoming  weekend to paint.

Shifting from daily planning to weekly planning takes practice and time.  If you are brand new to weekly planning,  grab my weekly planning guide and see the exact weekly planner layout I use every day!