I need to be honest about something.
I’m a stationery addict.
If I pass an actual stationery shop (a rare and magical sight these days), I have to pop in and I never leave without at least one notebook and pen, but more often a whole carrier bag full of stationery, because I can’t resist it.
But most of my trouble starts online – one innocent click and suddenly I’m three pages deep on a stationery website convincing myself I definitely need another dotted A5 journal and a pink fountain pen.
And the daft thing is I already own enough notebooks to last several lifetimes. And they are everywhere in my house.
Two on the kitchen windowsill. Shelves full of them in my office (along with the stashes in my office cupboards. One by my bed. A little one in my handbag. One in the car. One by the bath. Random ones hiding all over the house, just in case I have a brilliant idea.
If I ever leave the house without one, I feel twitchy. Yes, I could use my phone. But it’s not the same. I can’t scribble on my phone. A notebook feels like magic waiting to happen.
But there is method in the madness
Notebooks have been one of the most powerful tools in my business.
Every phone call, every coaching session (given and received), every half-formed idea, every house viewing, every parents’ evening, every lightbulb moment – they are all all captured somewhere in a notebook.
They are filled with doodles, quotes, blog ideas, podcast notes, nonsense, genius, product ideas I wasn’t ready for back in 2012 but fit brilliantly now.
Chloe, when she was little, used to draw cute surprises in many of them. They’re part of our family story as much as they’re part of my business story.
They document my journey
Not in a diary or journalling sense (I’m not that organised and never really got into journaling), but through the notes I made in coaching calls, programmes I joined, ideas scribbled down in the supermarket car park, flashes of inspiration when I least expected them.
Oh and my handwriting is TERRIBLE in my notebooks because I’m always trying to keep up with my brain, so I scribble and scrawl and rush to get the words down before they disappear.
My notebooks show me how far I’ve come.
They take me right back to early-days 2012 Claire – the tired, scared, debt-ridden, post-business-liquidation mum of a four-year-old who still wasn’t sleeping. The Claire who was building The Girls Mean Business with no idea where it would lead. The one who desperately wanted to make it work.
The magic hidden inside
A quick look at any of those older notebooks is like stepping back into my life then, which does two powerful things.
Firstly, it helps me remember what life was like in those days, which helps me support those mums building businesses in the same position now.
Otherwise it’s easy for me (as a 55-year-old mum of a now 17 year old) to forget how hard it was with a baby, then a toddler, then a 7 year old I pulled from school and home-educated for 3 years due to bullying… and through it all, the never-ending bills to pay.
It’s easy for me to forget how exhausting it was. How I had to juggle and balance and cope, all while building a business and trying to make money. (I still have to do all those things now, but in a different way.)
Secondly, it shows me how full of ideas I was, and how good those ideas were.
These last few years I’ve battled with tricky health and brain fog and those notebooks help me remember that my brain used to work so much better.
I had so much more energy then (even as mum to a nocturnal toddler). I had huge dreams (most of which I’ve achieved over 14 years, which is amazing and proof that planning and vision boards work!).
When I’m stuck for what to write, what to create, or where to go next… I pull out my old notebooks. There is always something in there that ignites a new idea.
There is zero structure in my notebooks. And that’s the beauty.
I know my notebooks would drive organised people mad. They’re full of phone numbers, recipes, birthday lists, puppy vaccinations, and the mindmaps that became £100k products, all jumbled together.
Many have little sticky tabs sticking out the top, where I’ve marked the best, juiciest bits. They are messy and definitely have no trace of Instagram-aesthetic, but they are absolutely priceless.
Many’s the time, especially during our several house moves, that I’ve briefly considered sticking my old notebooks on the bonfire or in the recycling. But I can’t do it. I can’t throw them away, not yet. One day I will, but for now they are my treasure trove, my archive, and my never-ending source of ideas.
When’s the last time you looked at your old notebooks?
Do it, the sooner the better. Make a cuppa. Sit down for an hour. Flick through the pages.
You will find:
- Ideas you forgot you had
- Products hiding in scribbles
- Blog posts you could write today
- Content your audience will love
- Reminders of how capable you’ve always been
- Evidence of your brilliance, in your own handwriting
You’ll remember things you’d completely forgotten. You’ll get excited. You’ll reconnect with the version of you who dreamed big before life got noisy.
Most of all, you’ll realise how far you’ve come, and how much you already know.
It’s all there in ink and pencil and doodles.
Happy notebooking. It might just be the reset and inspiration you didn’t know you needed.
Love, Claire xx