Self-Improvement

Wouldn’t it be so much cooler if the goals we wanted to accomplish were more like quests?

Why can’t we refer to ourselves as heroes with an epic quest, anyway?

Well, the founders of The Hero’s Journal had the same exact questions and decided to do something about it!

What is a Hero’s Journal? Essentially, it is a pre-made bullet journal that helps you achieve a big goal, project, dream–whatever you want to call it–in 90-day intervals. But instead of a normal pre-made bullet journal that doesn’t have a “theme,” the Hero’s Journal turns productivity into a quest.

The idea started out as a Kickstarter created by Nick and Kyle (the founders) after they were fed up with trying to set up goals and then failing to achieve them. Pretty sure many of us are in that same boat and really like the concept of turning goals into IRL quests, so it is no surprise when their original Kickstarter achieved over 100% of its goal!

I stumbled across the Hero’s Journal through a random Facebook ad. I really enjoy playing (and DMing!) Dungeons & Dragons so this reminded me of building out a character sheet and going on a tabletop adventure. Of course, I ordered one of the journals without hesitation.

Diving into the journal

The journal itself is well made. A golden embossed emblem sits on the top of the bright red cover. The texture is nice to the touch and feels like smoothed out fabric. You also get a free sticker of their wizard mascot, which I promptly put on my reusable Kleen Kanteen like the fake VSCO girl I am.

Opening up the journal is quite magical. Okay, not literally, but the contents inside are truly worth the money.

You have a table of contents to help guide you (along with a ribbon bookmark like a classic journal to save your page), a few pages explaining how it all works, and of course dozens of cute illustrations to really make the journal come alive. Plus, if you check out their Facebook page, you’ll find all sorts of inspiration for coloring in the illustrations.

What I really like about the Hero’s Journal is the emphasis of accountability and the ability to be very detailed about the quest you want to embark on.

There are countless productivity articles out there that mention how you should be very specific about the goal you want to achieve and break it down into manageable pieces that you can work on daily, weekly, or monthly.

The main way to be overly specific to help keep you accountable is simply writing out your goal in a specific way. Instead of saying “learn a new language,” try to write it out as “I want to learn how to speak, write, and read basic Spanish in 90 days.”

From there, you can put together the positives of achieving your goal but also remember to write out the negatives of not achieving your goal.

Of course, you can do exactly that with the Hero’s Journal. In fact, it is the first part of your quest! You first map out your goal and also write out the consequences of not sticking to your quest. Plus, you have the ability to list “allies,” or friends and family–and even objects and places!–that can help you achieve your quest.

Once you set up the foundations, you’re ready to embark on your quest! Again, Hero’s Journal will help you break down the goal into very manageable steps and then you have daily page setups very similar to a bullet journal to help you create a to-do list, write down any notes from the day, and also log things that you are grateful for each day.

The journal is pre-planned for 90 days worth of journaling and then broken into “Chapters,” which can each represent bigger milestones or goal posts you want to hit by the end of that chapter. And of course, the cute illustrations can be found throughout the daily pages and not just the main overview pages!

If you’re not much for physical bullet journals the team also released a digital version that is also cheaper and comes with extra goodies.

Final thoughts

For about two years now I’ve been manually putting together a bullet journal with different monthly themes but it can be quite time-consuming. I’m also not super great at pretty or cool handwriting and illustrations so my bujo layouts tend to look sad in comparison to the lovely spreads that can be found online. I definitely wanted to try a “pre-made” journal but wasn’t having much luck finding one that I liked aesthetically until finally happening across the Hero’s Journal. Now I’m not sure I will go back to making my own bullet journal layouts!

If you’re looking to add more whimsy to your goal-setting and want to feel like the hero of your own quest, then do give Hero’s Journal a try! Whether you go analog or digital, be sure to let me know what your first quest will be and we can be accountability allies! 🙂

Disclaimer: I am not affiliated or sponsored by The Hero’s Journal and bought the journal with my own money and of my own accord. All the thoughts in this post are my own.