Before Making Your Lifebook

You've just received your Lifebook template, and already your mind is racing ahead – the colours, the pictures, all the pages waiting to be chosen. There's something so lovely about this exact moment. Nothing decided yet. Everything still possible.

Before you dive in, give yourself a little pause first. Make yourself something warm to drink, curl up somewhere comfortable, grab a few loose sheets of paper, just a bit of quiet daydreaming before the doing begins.

First, let's figure out the shape of your book.

Do you want a Lifebook that grows with you for years to come? Something yearly, holding your hopes for the months ahead? Or maybe something seasonal – closer to the life you're actually in right now, what you'd love to nurture this autumn, or welcome in once spring rolls around again?

And how do you want to actually use it? Some of us love the feel of a proper bound book in our hands – whole, finished, something you simply flip through. Others love a binder better, so you can tuck in a new dream whenever it shows up, shuffle a section around, or quietly let a page go once it stops feeling like you.

Picture, too, where it'll live and when you'll reach for it. On your nightstand? Open on the studio table? During a slow Sunday morning, tea in hand, still in your pyjamas? Little things like this make a book worth coming back to.

Now, the fun part – gathering what actually goes inside.

You could use the Becoming Bundle to help you dig a little deeper, or just let your pen wander loosely across a few pages first, no pressure, no plan yet.

What would I love to have in my life right now?
Who do I want to become in this chapter?
What do I want to give more time and care to?

Let the big dreams sit right next to the small. A home you adore. Work that lights you up. More energy. Time to paint again. Affection. A garden. Slower mornings. Something you've wanted for years, or something you're only just now brave enough to admit, even to yourself.

As you write, notice what keeps popping up. Home, family, friendship, work, creativity, beauty, health, love, adventure, learning – pick whichever of these actually matter to you, and let the rest go.

These can become your section titles – and since there's never quite enough room on a title page, keep them short and sweet. The Home, or Family and Home. The Health, or Body and Self-Love. The Work, or Creativity and Craft.

Then play around inside each one for a bit.

Say one section is Home and Family – imagine an ordinary evening there. What happens the second you walk through the door? What does the light look like? Who's pottering around nearby? How do you spend the evening together? What makes this exact place feel like home to you?

Or if it's Work – picture a day that actually leaves you satisfied. What did you spend your hours doing? What did you make, or help happen? And how much of the day is left over, afterwards, for the rest of your beautifully ordinary life?

Chase the small details – they're what make a vision feel alive instead of vague. Maybe the big wooden table matters because you can already hear people laughing around it. Maybe the studio matters because you imagine leaving your paints out overnight.

Once a scene starts to feel real in your body, start turning it into pictures. Gather photos, paint, sketch, or play around with AI until you find an image close to what's in your head. Sometimes a picture helps you understand what you actually want. Sometimes, halfway through making it, the wish quietly shifts into something else entirely – and that's more than fine too.

Take your time. Only keep what truly makes you happy.

Then, back to your template. Choose your pages, arrange your sections, bring it all together – your words, your pictures, your whole lovely mess of hopes.

And somewhere in the middle of doing this, the book starts to feel real. You turn a page and there's the home you've been quietly longing for. Another, and it's the work that makes you want to get up in the morning. And tucked somewhere between them, a small ordinary scene – a forest walk, breakfast with your people, an afternoon with your hands in something you're making – the kind of day you'd actually love to live, over and over.

Bit by bit, your visions are taking the shape of a book.

So go on – what's the very first page calling your name?