Monk Manual Review

Monk Manual can change your live for better:

The Monk’s Guide is a 90-day journal experience based on the wisdom of monks, created by Steven Lawson. Monk’s Manual website boasts that it is a “do + do method”. This is the vision, as explained by the founders of the Monk’s Manual.

The information of the monks’ manual is also well explained:

What the world needs now, is monks sweet monks.
We find a radical way of living in monasteries. A way that flips contemporary thinking on its head. Where the world says focus on more, the monk says focus on less. Where the world seeks to master outcomes, the monk seeks to master self. Where the world fills our lives with noise and distraction, the monk fills his or her life with quiet and focus. Where the world pursues a life of independence, the monk pursues a life of trust, walking the path of life with God and others. Where the world medicates, the monk meditates.
We are on an ambitious mission to help busy people utilize timeless monastic principles to live with greater peace and purpose in their everyday lives.

I have to say that all this suits me, being a spiritual person who is completely dependent on self-reflection, self-improvement, meaning of life and teaching.

When my monk’s manual arrived in the mail, I must have done a little happy dance. I have no idea if it will be another newspaper or not, which is piled on top of my school and others – half filled with all the discarded things, or if it will fulfill my vision of “gentle monks” for my life.

The Monk’s Handbook pages are designed to be a daily, weekly, and monthly planner, but they are only meant to be used for three months. 90 days is the time to take a good look at where you are, where you are, and where you are going. Monk manual pages can be downloaded by subscribing here! You can try those pages for just $7. It took me a minute to figure out how to use the Monk’s Handbook. Fortunately, once on the mailing list, I received an email from the creator with helpful tips and explanations on how to use the manual. Check out the Monk user guide on official site.

Until now, The Monk’s Manual was only available through these download pages. That’s how I used it. However, there were a lot of pages to print, so I decided to print only the pages I needed for a month and fit them into my daily schedule.

I’m not going to lie. It takes a lot of dedication to make this work and be effective. But that is case with any sort of self-reflective practice. You can’t just start it one day and then not think about it for a month. It takes daily attendance in the morning, evening, and throughout the day to really see what is going on in your daily life and how it is effecting your productivity, relationships, and spiritual well-being. Time is also spent at the beginning and ending of each week and month to reflect on the highs and lows of each week and how you can do better next week.

The Monk Manual isn’t for the faint of heart. It is for people who are really looking for a way to fine tune their mental and spiritual well-being and bring it in alignment with everyday life.

The Monk’s Guide is a 90-day journal that promotes planning and reflection rather than filling the day with tasks and checking them off. This journal is very useful if you are looking for more in life than just the short-term feeling of accomplishing a task, and show you what you have accomplished while moving toward a larger goal in your life.

MONTHLY

The notebook is divided into three sections, Monthly, Weekly, and Daily. This is to help plan, act, and reflect within each timeframe to help provide a more purposeful life.

WEEKLY

When I first started it was a bit overwhelming at first because there are no examples or guides on how to start. There is a short intro to what you will get out of using the manual, but no specific pointers on where to start. The website has a lot of good material and if you are looking to use this, I would start with their pdf guide here.

DAILY

The daily page is my favorite page and it’s where I have the most information about what I’m trying to do for a living. I’ve struggled to find a new focus for my work over the past month and it’s really helped prepare me for the day ahead. I start my daily page with a morning coffee and at the end of the day I fill the second page with my evening drink for relaxation and reflection.

I wake up every morning with Alexa’s voice ringing out from my echo spot, “Reminder — Monk Manual.” Most mornings I sleep right through it but as I climb out of the bed each morning, I find myself reaching not for my cell phone first, but for my Monk Manual on the bedside table. And my favorite gel ink pen — usually in a bright pink, red, or teal color.

The Monk Manual isn’t just a journal. For me, it has been a companion, a way for me to organize my thoughts and plan for my day, and a walk through my own internal growth. It has been a catalyst of great change for me.

As I began this journey, I was yearning for some kind of big change in my life, although I wasn’t really sure what that change would be. I had no idea it would be the change I’d been praying for, more than the past ten years of my life. No, I cannot say the Monk Manual made this change for me, but I can say it put me on the right path mentally and helped to prepare my heart to accept the blessing.

What is the Monk manual?

In what seemed like an all-out stalking, my Facebook feed pestered me with ads about the Monk Manual. I guess the Facebook algorithm knew, I’d be prime purchasing material for the book. I admit, I clicked on it every time. It intrigued me.

The Monk Manual is a 90-day journal experience based on the wisdom of monks, created by Steven Lawson. The Monk Manual website boasts it is a “system for being + doing.” Here is the vision, as described by the founders of the Monk Manual:

For over 2000 years men and women have set out for the hills, fields and mountains to become Monks — searching for happiness, freedom, peace, joy, balance, fulfillment, confidence, stability, passion and God.
Who says the rest of us can’t experience the same things?
Drawing from the wisdom of monastic life, modern psychology and best practices in personal productivity, the Monk Manual provides a daily system that will help you find clarity, purpose, wisdom, and peace in the moments that make up your life.

The mission of the Monk Manual is also eloquently defined:

What the world needs now, is monks sweet monks.
We find a radical way of living in monasteries. A way that flips contemporary thinking on its head. Where the world says focus on more, the monk says focus on less. Where the world seeks to master outcomes, the monk seeks to master self. Where the world fills our lives with noise and distraction, the monk fills his or her life with quiet and focus. Where the world pursues a life of independence, the monk pursues a life of trust, walking the path of life with God and others. Where the world medicates, the monk meditates.
We are on an ambitious mission to help busy people utilize timeless monastic principles to live with greater peace and purpose in their everyday lives.

I must say — everything about that resonates with me, being a spiritual person who leans in heavily toward self-reflection, self-improvement, life-meaning and lessons.

When my Monk Manual came in the mail, I may have done a little happy dance. I had no idea whether or not it would be another journal, stacked on my bookshelf with the others — half-filled and wholly discarded, or if it would fulfill my “monks sweet monks” vision for my life.

The Monk Manual pages are set up like a daily, weekly, and monthly planner but it is only intended to be used for three months. 90 days is the amount of time needed to truly do a deep dive evaluation of where you have been, where you are, and where you are going. Monk Manual pages can be downloaded by signing up here! You can try out the pages for only $7.

It took me a minute to understand how to use the Monk Manual. Thankfully, once I was on the email list I received emails from the creator with helpful tips and explanations about how to use the manual. Take a peak at the Monk Manual user guide you receive when you download the pages:

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Up until now the Monk Manual has only been available via the downloadable pages. That is how I used it. However, it’s a lot of pages to print out so I decided to just print out the pages I needed for a month and integrated them into my daily calendar.

A beautiful hardcover book has been released from the Kickstarter page for those of us who want something beautiful in our hands, with printed pages from Kinkos. The Monk Guide is completely designed in-house and production ready. The early bird price is just $26 and will ship by Christmas. It’s time to start the new year with a sports resolution in hand.

The Monk Manual is a 90-day journal that fills your day with activity and encourages planning and reflection rather than checking. These essays are useful if you are looking for more in life than a brief sense of accomplishment, and show how you have succeeded as you progress towards bigger goals.

Monk Manual started as a Kickstarter project in October 2018 by Steven Lawson. Leaning on his background in psychology, he has built a very interesting and purpose-driven notebook layout.