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Now, students are beginning to return to face-to-face learning, and employees are beginning to return to the office. Stationery such as pencil boxes and notebooks may be the first choice. If you are the type of person who forgets important tasks and appointments almost immediately, then one item you might also want to consider buying is a planner. "Always using a planner is the key to helping someone stay organized and focused," explained Tammy C. O'Neil of CPT, a professional organizer specializing in ADHD and chronic chaos. "The planner represents your life priorities and a visual daily guide to how to accomplish them."

Nowadays, there are planners designed for everything from daily organization and travel to wedding planning and meal tracking. We discussed with experts the benefits of these different planners in terms of organization, time management, and anxiety, and also collected some highly rated options that meet various needs.

Learn more about the benefits of using the planner | digital calendar and planner | tips and tricks for using the planner

With so many planners on the market, experts we interviewed said that before exploring options, it’s best to write down what you want to accomplish with your plan. "You are creative and want to add stickers etc. to decorate your planner? How big do you want your planner? Do you want spiral binding or hard binding? Will you carry your planner with you every day? Find one Respect your natural brain type planner," O'Neill suggested.

When considering what you want the planner to look like, also consider the purpose for which you will use it. O'Neil pointed out that in addition to traditional planners designed to track daily, weekly, and monthly tasks and events, there are also planners created for people who want to maintain exercise, meals, and self-care activities.

Taking into account the guidance of experts, we have collected some highly rated planners to meet various needs and several different styles.

This schedule from Papier is specially designed for students, starting in August 2021 and continuing until July 2022. It includes weekly and monthly overviews, as well as sections for writing down your schedule and assignment deadlines each semester. It also has a financial tracker, which will come in handy if you want to stick to a strict budget.

Although many planners have dates within a certain year or other time frame, this planner from BulletKeeper does not indicate a date, which means you can fill in the 12-month difference at any time. There are five weekly pages between each calendar, and there are 68 blank pages at the end of the notebook for you to jot down notes, reminders, etc. The vegan leather hardcover book comes in five colors: gray, brown, yellow, orange, and blue.

Ban.do is known for its quirky planner, filled with silly stickers and calm coloring pages. This spiral bound book is designed to take you from August 2021 to December 2022, including year, month, and week views, as well as pages for notes, coloring, and more. It includes stickers for marking the calendar-if you run out or just want more options, the company sells a variety of sticker book options.

According to the brand, Happiness Planner was created in 2015 to "combine cognitive behavioral therapy technology with goal setting." This iteration of the planner in 2022 has 432 pages, including monthly goal setting, daily pages, inspirational quotes, etc. There are also places for you to track your sleep, exercise, and diet, as well as to take notes and express gratitude for events and accomplishments, large and small.

This planner from ArtofBarbell is designed for those who want to track their food intake and become a more mindful dieter. There are periods of up to five meals that can be tracked every day. During these periods, you can evaluate your hunger and mood during each meal, and explain why you eat and how you feel afterwards. If you are not familiar with the nutritional journey, the planner also includes a comprehensive list of proteins, fats, carbohydrates, etc.

A wedding planner is a great way for brides and grooms to stay organized during the busy planning process. I personally use this to manage all the endless to-dos before my wedding. I like that it has a section for my supplier contact information and a place to write my vows on top of the usual weekly and monthly overviews. There are several different prints and styles of the planner, and other useful parts, including places to leave notes during the cake tasting and budget checklist.

According to O'Neil, there are many benefits to using the planner on a consistent basis. She pointed out that with a planner, you can "control [your] time, money, and space" and "increase productivity." Melissa Levy, founder of the professional organization company Declutter Design, also explained that using a planner allows you to "clean up the clutter in your brain" so you can focus on any task at hand.

"By continuing to use the planner, we can look at our lives and see if the things we spend time doing are in line with our values ​​and priorities," O'Neill added. "Investing time in planning allows us to track how, where and when we spend our time."

However, planners are not for everyone. According to Levi, those who "always lose things" may not get along well with body planners. Likewise, she said that for people who "hate to write down," they may not be the best option.

In a world where we spend most of our time in front of the screen, things such as planners can appear outdated and outdated. After all, most mobile phones and laptops come with a calendar application that can be synchronized with our email. Even Levy admitted that she uses iCal on her phone to stay organized and share items with her family. However, what makes technology so beautiful—its accessibility, operability, and ubiquity—can also be a burden, especially for the younger generation who grew up on mobile phones and computers.

"All of us have a short attention span, which makes it difficult for us to focus on work from the beginning. But when you see young professionals, they are all on the phone [and ] The world on the computer grew up. They keep getting notifications," explained Dr. Larry Rosen, a research psychologist and former chair of the Department of Psychology at California State University, Dominguez Hills. In his research, Rosen found that technology use and anxiety are directly related-for example, a study he published on "Computers in Human Behavior" concluded that the increase in technology use is related to disease Predict accurately.

Rosen also found that using technology in a learning environment can have negative effects. When he and his colleagues monitored the phone usage of 216 college students, they found that FOMO—or anxiety caused by fear of missing the Internet—predicted poor classroom performance.

"The phone itself brings anxiety," he explained. "The anxiety part-technical anxiety-directly predicts poor course performance. The more anxious you are, the more social media you use, and the more social media you use, the worse your grades." According to Rosen Say, you "found the same result" in your work environment.

When you use your phone as a planner to track upcoming events, tasks, and to-dos, it’s almost impossible not to be distracted by a large number of notifications and text messages. Rosen refers to this as a "social obligation" triggered by anxiety-"You feel you have to check frequently," he explained.

However, with the planner, these interferences are eliminated. Using the planner will have the opposite experience-as Rosen said, all you have to do is "write down something and then check it." He added that personally, this method allows him to organize things in order of importance more flexibly and create a daily to-do list, so he can check the first thing every morning.

O'Neill advises her clients to record their daily schedule in their schedule and note the estimated time for each task or appointment. After that, they write down the actual time required for each project and reflect on whether their achievements "fit with their daily goals." "If the daily goals are not completed, we will review them together to remove obstacles," she explained.

O'Neill also said that once you finish off the list, you can help you focus on the task at hand. "Time division"—including “listing your “favorite” items on your schedule”—also “allows you to focus on specific tasks,” she pointed out.

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Morgan Greenwald is the SEO editor of NBC News Select.

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