Last time, I wrote about how my prayer notebook might be organized. This time, I’m going to write a bit about the physical “notebook” itself.
The Tool:
I was going to title this section “The Hardware,” but two of my possible tool options are software and I thought it might be rather confusing for me to use a computer term. Anyway, my criteria are that it be easy to use and portable. Here are three possibilities that I’m playing with right now:
- A Circa notebook. I purchased some inexpensive Circa notebooks on clearance a while back. I was thinking of using one of them for my prayer notebook. The pages are 4.25 x 5.5 (half of an 8.5 x 11 sheet). The beauty of Circa is that pages are easily removed, replaced, and movable. I can design my own pages. Tabbed dividers are a bit expensive, but I could alternately just get some stick-on tabs and use different colored cardstock.
- Microsoft OneNote. My upgrade to Microsoft Office 2007 provided me with OneNote and although I’ve played with it, I have yet to really use it, so I’m not quite sure whether it will work well for me (you know, because I’m still rather resistant to change). However, this software is a real contender for my prayer notebook, especially since I’m at the computer so much and I type much faster than I write. It also allows me to just cut and paste prayer requests that come in e-mail. Any type of computer-based prayer list isn’t in-the-pocket portable, but my computer is at least somewhat portable. And private.
- Microsoft Excel. I could have separate tabs for each person. It’s really similar to the OneNote option. Hmm… come to think of it, OneNote would probably be much easier to use… IF I go the software route.
I guess the thing with doing an online thing is that I get distracted when I’m on the computer. Plus, the physical act of writing really is helpful… I’ve got some things to think about.
Last time, I wrote about the features I’d like in my prayer notebook. This time, I’m going to write a bit about how the notebook might be organized.
Organization:
I figure there are several ways to organize my prayer notebook, including:
- Create a section for each group of people/categories (family, personal friends, church leaders, church friends, missionaries, the world, etc.), and then in each section, have a page for each person/category.
- Create a section for each day of the week. Some people/categories I will pray for daily; some weekly; some as the need arises.
- Create a section for each day of the month. A while back, I put together a prayer calendar that combines three “30 days of praying” types of resources that I found online: attributes of God, husband, and children. I could organize the entire prayer notebook by day, so that I pray for a different person/group of people each day of the month. I’ve read that this can actually work really well with index cards. I’m not so sure how I would translate this to a notebook, though.
Each of these methods of organizing my notebook has its pros and cons. I could use all of these methods or something else entirely.
Next time, I’ll write about the tool I’ll use.
I really need to create a prayer notebook. I keep intending to start one, and I might even design one, and then I abandon it because it doesn’t meet my needs. I guess it’s part of my weird perfectionist tendency: I plan and plan because I want it to be perfect, but the thing that I plan doesn’t happen because I don’t come up with the perfect plan.
Features:
Simply put, my notebook would, of course, include the date, the request/what I’m praying for, and space for answered prayer.
Other features that I want in my prayer notebook include:
- Portability. I’d prefer something that’s easy to carry around. I probably won’t carry it with me outside the house (private prayers, after all), but I would like to be able to take it with me to wherever I’m praying in the house.
- The ability to have tabbed sections. For example, I might have one section for my family (a page for the family as a whole, plus a separate page for each family member), one section for specific people, one section for events/broader things, etc.
- Removable pages. When a page is full of answered prayers and/or a certain age, I’d like to be able to archive them somehow. Or, if people’s statuses change (for example, a friend becomes a church leader or something like that), I’d like to have the option to be able to easily move that person to the appropriate section. In other words, I’d like to have the ability to move things around when and if I want to.
- Space for recording additional info. For example, I’d like to have enough space to include long answers to prayer requests without feeling like I’ve wasted a lot of space if there aren’t long answers. Ways people do this:
- Vertical rule – put a line down the page so that you have space on the left for the request and space on the right for the answer. This wouldn’t work too well if I have a small notebook, though.
- Left-side, right-side format – use one side of the facing page to write the request(s) and the other side of the page to write the answer(s). This gives me more space than the option listed immediately above.
- Front page, back page format – similar to the option immediately above, but using the back of the page rather than one of the pages facing me.
- Space under the request – leave several blank lines under the request. Or, leave the entire rest of the page blank.
I’ll write a little more about the organization of my prayer notebook in my next post.
