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I purchased Charlie Gilkey’s Premium Action Planners because first of all, Charlie is pretty darn awesome and knows his productivity stuff so I trust what he puts out, and secondly, well, because I really needed them. The last few months I’ve been feeling the overwhelm. After our site redesign, business picked up more than we had planned for and my old systems (GTD using email as a todo list, a cork board, a notebook, and google calendar) were no longer sufficient.

I admit, at first I was feeling resistant to using the planners. I felt so busy that I kept putting off the time to actually use them. Plus, when you have a system that you’ve used for several years that you’re used to, it’s hard to switch even though you realize that your system isn’t working for you. Also, and this is a little embarrassing to admit, I was feeling resistant to printing the planners out. Yes, I feel guilty printing anything at all out, ever. I know, I know.

Anyway, once I got over my resistance, I decided to start with the weekly and daily planners. That seemed like the most logical way to go so that I could dive right in and also because Charlie mentioned to start with the weekly planner in his instructions regarding the free version of the planners, which are free by the way. Did I mention they are free?

I had both the Premium Action Planners and the Freelancer Workweek planners. I decided to go with the Freelancer planners for the week for client projects since I’m obviously a freelancer and then go with the Weekly Action Planner for my own projects.

The first thing I realized is that I didn’t have enough room on the Freelancer Workweek planner to fit all of the projects in. I actually had 16 client projects all running at once (large and small), so the space for 5 of them wasn’t sufficient. And yes, I’m the first to admit that this is an insane amount of projects for one freelancer to have at once (it was only temporary, I swear). Anyhow, that wasn’t a big deal. I just used more sheets and made due.

Going a little bit further in, I noticed something that I REALLY like, which is that the events, projects, and tasks are all put together in a fluid way. Normally, I would have to use 3 different systems for each of these things. It’s a really great way to provide yourself a bird’s eye view. Seeing everything at once really helps me feel less overwhelmed. It’s like, “Ok, I can see it all laid out and know what I have to do, so now I can just dive in”. I also like how all the planners complement each other. You can see how the yearly planner affects the quarterly planner, which then affects the monthly planner and so on until your daily planner.

You know what I liked most about the planners though? They are simple. As I mentioned above, I was very resistant to starting a new system. Combine that with an already overwhelmed brain, and yep, it wasn’t easy for me. But, once I figured out how they all worked, the process was refreshingly straightforward. I can see myself using these for quite awhile to come. And, I’ve also discovered that I really like the paper method. Technology is great, but sometimes it gets in the way too and actually makes you spend more time on things.

So, I wake up in the morning, spend 5-10 minutes writing my daily tasks and other stuff out, review it again at the end of the day for 5-10 minutes, and that’s all I need to do to keep everything moving forward. Can’t much simpler than that, really. That is, unless you have nothing to do all day. In which case, you probably don’t need planners anyway.

The same goes for the yearly, quarterly, and monthly planners. It all seems like it’d take a long time to do, but really once I committed myself, I made most of my progress on the planners my first time using them in about 45 minutes or so. Not shabby, right?

So, would I recommend these? You bet! If you’re feeling the overwhelm, give them a try. You’ve got nothing to lose except perhaps a few dollars (they range from $12-$22) and a few minutes of your time. I tell you what, saving gobs of time and keeping on top of my stuff is more important to me than a few lattes, especially if you divide the cost by 12 months. That’s like, what, $1-$1.83 per month?

I’d recommend purchasing both the Premium Action Planners and Premium Freelancer Workweek Planners if you’re a freelancer yourself. The Premium Blog Planners also look very handy for bloggers, but I haven’t tried those out yet myself.

Click here to check out the premium planners.

*Note: If you click on one of the links above and then later decide to purchase the planners, I will get paid as an affiliate. Then I will retire luxuriously wealthy with Koldo to San Sabastian, Spain and eat pintxos and seafood all day long.

Also, I may update this post in the future after I’ve used them a few months to let you know how the system is still working for me. I have several personal projects in particular coming up the next few months that require some heavy duty planning, so we’ll see how it goes!