I released my 2025 Journal PDF (for Supernote) yesterday, and in the middle of describing it, I realized that I have never explained how I plan my year around weeks and 13-week blocks. There are mentions of it in a few posts, but nothing canonical.

I use a week as my main planning timespan, not months or quarters. Additionally, I use Monday as the first day of the week, which is normal for a lot of the world, but not Americans. When I think of how a week flows, the Saturday and Sunday are a unit. I think of them as the start of the week, but almost no software will let you do that, so I got used to them being at the end.

So, all of my projects are estimated in terms of weeks, and I program in sprints that are a multiple of weeks. Then, I split the year into four 13-weeks “quarters”, which is close to a year (364 days). This year, 2024, started on a Monday, and because it was a leap year, April 1 and July 1 were exactly on 13-week boundaries (Oct 1 was only a day off), so my system correlated to normal quarters about as well as it ever could. This doesn’t happen again until 2052. I hope I am there to see it and that I still care.

My journal is set up to follow the flow of a week. Days of the week tend to be similar to each other—so, there is a feel to a Monday, a Tuesday, a Sunday, etc. But March 3rd will not be like April 3rd or October 3rd. A lot of recurring meetings are weekly or bi-weekly, or on the “Third Thursday of the Month” or some other pattern that works well with my system.

When a year doesn’t start on a Monday, I have to incorporate some of the previous year into it. For me, 2025 starts on December 30, 2024. I usually start my yearly goals in the previous year just to get a running start, so it doesn’t really matter if a few extra days get into my journal.

If I have to deal with something that is on a month or quarter boundary, they are just a regular day in the journal. External deadlines can be on any day.

If this sounds good to you, you can use my 2025 Journal (PDF).