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Photo of a One-Page Notebook created by the Author especially for this article (that’s why it looks so clean and uncrumpled)
There’s a sweet little niche in the stationery world for everyday-carry (EDC) notebooks.
Field Notes, Moleskine, Rite in the Rain, Leuchtturm1917, Rhodia, good ol’ Spirax, and so many more. You’ll find them in stores and on websites guaranteed to make your paper-loving mouth water! Whatever your preference, you can find it in an A6 or A7 size notebook: lines, grid, blank, stapled, coil, stitched.
I’ve used (and loved) many of those little cuties, but there’s a new contender for paper notes that’s free of the pressure a proper notebook can imply, and it doesn’t cost a thing.
Always with you
Introducing what I have affectionately dubbed my One-Page Notebook (1PN). The One-Page Notebook is simply a regular sheet of paper, folded in half two to three times. It’s big enough to write on without needing a card cover, and small enough to fit in a pocket or in whatever you’re using to carry your stuff.
If you’ve ever played around with The Hipster PDA concept (another gift from Merlin Mann to the world), the 1PN might feel somewhat familiar. The One-Page Notebook is what The Hipster PDA might look like when it’s on holiday.
My every day carry (EDC) is a Bellroy crossbody bag. There’s room for an A6 notebook in the centre section, but A7 fits nicely into one of the inner pouches so that’s the size I use. My current notebook is an el-cheapo no-name spiral top lined pad with a translucent plastic cover, but it’s not alone in there! Tucked neatly behind it is my sweet little 1PN.
Three 1PNs. On the left is a new one, in the middle, one that’s been refolded to use the other side of a sheet, and on the right a true blue 1PN I’ve been using for the past couple of weeks.
A 1PN stays shut or opens like a book, offering four double-page spreads to write, draw, list, diagram, and scribble upon. Sixteen tiny pages per sheet, if you use it double-sided. You can confine your etchings to a single ‘page’, or use the whole spread in one go.
The strength of a 1PN lies in its constraints.
With little room to work with, you are more likely to be concise and precise. The pages will fill up much faster than a regular notebook, so you are more likely to process and transfer any treasures it holds into your personal knowledge management system (PKM) while the ideas are still fresh.
Will a single sheet of paper be too flimsy to write on? Not in my experience, especially if you choose 100 gsm paper or fold a couple of sheets together.
I sometimes grab a piece of scrap paper (printed on one side) when I need a new 1PN, which feels like a satisfyingly practical way to reduce waste. Folding two or three sheets together gives extra space for your thoughts and adds more heft to the structure. I find that two sheets together, when folded three times, provide a surface that’s more than firm enough to write on.
Won’t some of the mini ‘pages’ be upside down in relation to the others? Why, yes! And that’s a beautiful thing. When you open out your 1PN to its original size, you’ll be presented with a pleasing patchwork of brain waves in visual form that may actually spark some new ideas. I love seeing unrelated things sitting right next to each other when the paper is unfolded.
What do I do with it once it’s full? When there’s no space left, I recommend unfolding the paper and digitising it. You can go through each entry and transfer anything worth revisiting into whatever system you use for keepables, but in the interests of time, snapping a quick pic and storing in a dated daily note or yearly folder is a quick solution.
Once that’s done, the paper can safely be destroyed. Or placed into a file labelled with the current year, if you can’t bear to get rid of it.
One-Page Notebook tips and recommendations
Hold two or three sheets of 80 gsm paper together and fold them in half three times, depending on how big you want your notebook. One sheet of 100 gsm paper works on its own; don’t try to fold more than two together.
Kokuyo sells reams of A5 fountain pen friendly paper. I’ve found 3 sheets folded twice to work well.
Use up the blank side of scrap paper
Date each page as you use it, remembering to include the year.
The edges of your folded pages will likely not line up exactly. Embrace the imperfection!
Don’t leave more than 2 weeks between starting a 1PN and processing what’s on it. Doesn’t matter if it’s not full; you want to go through the ideas while they’re still fresh.
Ignore the previous tip (but always take care of anything you captured that’s time sensitive within a couple of days).
Digitise each sheet as it’s filled and discard it, or stuff filled sheets into a yearly file folder. Take in the patchwork of those beautiful, dog-eared snippets of your life at the end of the year and see what stands out.
The One-Page Notebook could replace a regular notebook in your EDC, or it could be an adjunct to it.
Writing in this tiny wad of paper feels like I’m using the spaces between the official chapters of my life, somehow. Like it doesn’t matter what goes here. There’s no judgement or pressure or expectation, or anything other than whatever my brain feels like bringing into the physical world.
Whether or not I’ll keep using shop-bought tiny notebooks, I can’t say. Whatever happens, it’s good to know I will always have a compact one-page notebook with me to record the things that spill out of my brain.
Even if you are happy with your current notebook system, I highly recommend keeping a One-Page Notebook on hand. Everyone needs a no-pressure place to capture tiny thoughts!
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