The Lost Art Of Journaling
Some of the best people I know keep journals. Whether it’s for documenting their global travel or simply capturing the fleeting moments of everyday life, you can always find a journal right by their side. Now as great as I think I am, I can’t journal. Odd for me to say as a writer, but I honestly can’t.
The art of journaling was lost to me a long, long time ago. When I was in elementary school I had a cute little purple diary that I carried everywhere. I wrote all the little silly things a girl my age should write about. How mean my dad was for making me eat veggies, how much fun I had with my Cabbage Patch Kid Chester, how annoying my step-brother was and of course my “boyfriend” Oliver and crush Corey Patterson. I spilled my little heart out in this diary and it was my escape to a different world. Then my meanie step-brother somehow got hold of my precious diary and read it over the phone to all his friends and his cousin. Devastated wasn’t the word for how I felt. My entire life was in that book! My every thought and emotion just laid bare for strangers to see, dissect, judge and poke fun of. I never felt so vulnerable, I also never wrote in a journal again.
From that day to this one my mind became my journal. I may write down a brief blurb on a calendar, but my memory is where the events of my life truly live. I remember events in my life with stunningly vivid clarity. I can remember things in great detail, from smells and sounds to outfits, hand gestures and entire conversations word for word. I don’t forget a thing! Having such a sharp memory has certainly helped me in many areas of my life, but if my life depended on writing things down, I would be the subject of a sad song at a funeral because my mind goes completely blank.
My problem with journaling is after not doing it for so long I don’t know where to start or what to write. My mind knows what details need to be captured, but translating that to paper keeps me perplexed. I know people will say “Just write, write anything,” but oddly enough as much as I remember, I never feel like I have anything to write. I don’t think my everyday life and random thoughts are much to write home about so when I look at these journals with hundreds of pages my first thought is always “What the hell can I say to fill that?” But lately I’ve been thinking about journaling again. After years of keeping the thoughts and memories in, maybe it’s finally time to let them out. I was thinking since I travel quite a bit maybe keeping a travel journal would be a good place to start, just to get me used to writing my experiences and dreams down again. Maybe having a specific topic will take some of the pressure off. Still not sure exactly what I would say to the blank pages staring back at me, but I think it would bring some kind of therapeutic release and help me reconnect with the passion that I lost.
Do you write in a journal? How did you get started, what do you write about?
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I think the internet and blogging has ruined me for journaling in the traditional sense. I am just writing pieces after a long time. I have a tendency to “think in ellipses,” as my old english teacher would say. I would leave out details that are pertinent to the story and its so frustrating that i end up writing nothing at all. Ido want to blog more frequently so I need to get into the habit of writing anything at all. (see, even this felt like rambling!)
Ugh, I feel you. Can’t put every single thing online – I had a blog about my dreams but, I really needed to put down on paper the events and thoughts that were catalysts to those dreams in the first place. I’m also someone that likes to remember every detail, and sometimes in the midst of writing, I’ll become disinterested and minimize the importance of what I’m writing so I’ll cut it short. Don’t be discouraged grace!
You keep writing too, Marloweovershakespeare! As for myself, I’ll try not to, lol. I keep a writing blog (as in prose, fiction and poetry), and I am thinking of starting a writing blog about black women and mental health. :)
Thank you for writing about an old habit of mine. I’ll try to stop thinking about how juvenile my words may seem and just write how I feel, its about time I do anyway. There’s an autiobio I have to compose and complete.
Is there really much difference between keeping a personal blog and journaling? In high school, I used to share my journal with my closest friends, and they’d help me through my problems and laugh at my wit. Now I do the same thing, just…with whomever happens to stumble across me on the internet.
For me there is. There I am not exactly the same in a blog as I am in a journal. I can be as unrefined as I want to be in a journal. With a blog, anyone can look me up technically-my co workers, acquaintances I don’t really talk to, family with whom I don’t share a certain aspect of myself. I feel like being a bit more polished online.
I love journaling. I have to purchase a new journal every year. Also, I have to make sure I have a certain pen to write with. I enjoy it because it is a form of releasment for me. I’m the type of person that doesn’t open up to a lot of people. One disadvantage to journaling is someone may read it. Since this has happened to me in the past, I no longer include names nor dates. Overall, I still enjoy it. So I believe journaling is an activity that I will always partake in.
Ditto I just bought a new journal and haven’t written one word. : ( I will try keeping it in my purse. Gonna also try writing while I sip my evening tea.
I have been journaling since I was in the 3rd grade, and just as I purchase a new planner every year, I have to get that key notebook to keep my thoughts and feelings. While I do journal online, there is something about writing down my thoughts that is very therapeutic, and I love going back to read entries from years ago to see how much I’ve grown as an individual.
Writing is definitely a great technique of self-evaluation — you can learn a lot about yourself by just putting pen to paper. ;)
I still journal, just not as much and the pages don’t have a lot of writing. I started in school from a teachers recommendation. Blogging has indeed took away the art, but for me I’m not that comfortable typing my thoughts. I have a habit of wanting to write things down before typing; I did that all through college. Whenever I had a paper, it was written first and then typed. I found an old journal/diary of mine a few years ago, and I couldn’t help but laugh some of the things I wrote. Creepy how I used to think….I used to write about a lot of people I disliked/liked and other embarrassing things, but I didn’t throw it away. It refreshed my memory on a lot of things I forgot about. When I journal now, I write about things that bug me at that given moment but it’s never complete…
i keep an e-journal that i let no one read… it lets me get out all the feelings i can’t tell anyone because of how dark or disturbing they can be for others to read. i’ve been doing it off and on since 2007.. i have about 3 years of my everyday documented.. i dont physically write out a journal because my hands end up hurting or my horrid handwriting stops me
I journal and blog. I’m a writer by necessity as I think so much and can’t have all of those thoughts inside of me at one time. I think my ideas and my words matter, but because I’m a quiet person by nature, I don’t have too many places to just be myself and speak what it is I truly mean without being misunderstood. That’s why I journal. My blog is like a condensed, cohesive page from my journal so it all works out in the end.
I started young. I was a young reader, maybe age 3 or 4 and just as early a writer. I never worried (then or now) about my words getting out because I always felt what I was writing was my truth. And that’s what I write about; my truth. What I think, what I feel, what I worry about, what I’m trying to do. I keep it knowing one day I’ll pick it up, read it, and just smile and marvel at how far I’ve come; also I keep it for vanity & posterity – the thought of my kids or grandkids reading my words and knowing me as more than “mom” or “nana” one day makes me smile.
I haven’t kept up my journal in years. I think I will start that up again. Great idea!
I used to write in my journal a lot. However, I started getting busy with school, dating, and life. So much has been happening within the past couple of years that the thought of writing each and every detail in my journal just discouraged me from writing. I found that talking to other people about my thoughts was so much simpler.
Nowadays, I miss writing. It was one of the things that I loved to do. I’m trying to finish my journal that I have had since 2010 (sad, I know), but it’s quite hard. I’ve even started trying to skip pages to finish it. LOL. Maybe I should make that one of my resolutions, huh? :)
I once kept at journal and stopped journaling for the same reason you did: someone got a hold of it. After that I never felt safe writing my deepest thoughts down on paper again. For me blogging has become my way of writing things down.I have scraps of paper that I write blog post ideas and other ideas down–I once carried around a little notepad for these ideas, now I carry my laptop everywhere.
I keep my journal in my brain, my heart and soul.
I’ve kept a journal since I was 9 years old. It helped me deal with the divorce of my parents. I don’t write about events and day to day activities just my inner most thoughts and analytical views of my own basic emotions. I guess it’s my personal journey of self discovery. Since acquiring my first laptop and smart phones I no longer write pen to paper but the process is still the same for me. I have so many random thoughts and spurts of inspiration that I would be lost without writing them out. I love filing them somewhere I can return to easily and sometimes I even change or write over entries once I’ve grown through something.
I have been journaling off and on since I received my first diary for my 7th birthday. Journaling has provided me an outlet to unleash my anger, organize my thoughts and strategize my future. During difficult times, journaling was very therapeutic for me allowing me to vent and write down how I was feeling, being able to express myself without worrying about what others would think of me because it was for my eyes only. Through journaling, I have had many conversations with God thanking him for current blessings and those that are to come(many of which did come to pass). For me, journaling is a wonderful outlet to express yourself fully and authentically.
I used to get overwhelmed by all the blank pages of a journal and was confronted also with, as you put it , the “What the hell can I say to fill that?” fear. Using a theme journal, writing prompts, or some sort of guided journal to assist is the best way to resurrect one’s innate journaling and self-expression desire, or at least that has been my experience.
There is no doubt in my mind that a travel journal will thrill you to pieces, maybe not at the moment you are writing in it but certainly during those moments when you are reflecting upon it and recalling the sweet, lovely memories that would have been lost for good had you not written them down.
Happy journaling!!!
I’m 25 & I still write in my journal..I’ve been writing in one since I was 14 (11yrs). I used to write every night but the older I got the harder that was to do. I did notice as an adult I usually tend to only write in my journal when I’m sad, which is not good because I don’t want to look back in them & think that my whole like has been sad. I try to write in it now, when I’m happy as well as sad.
For me writing is therapy & I enjoy it, no one should force themselves to write. I love to read back & see how I’ve grown or NOT lol. And I don’t have the best memory so sometimes when I read things, I have no recollection of what I’m talking about, its almost like reading someone elses diary…scary. But I love it…I hope I write in it until I’m an old lady.
I have a blog also & to me its not the same. My blog is an outlet to share what I choose, but my journal is my deep personal thoughts.
I started over 15 years ago and continue to this day. It’s interesting to look back to see what you wrote. I encourage everyone to do it….and also to write letters to loved ones or anyone! The art of writing is just…..awesome.
I don’t have a physical journal but I do “write” on my laptop quite a bit and I’ve been trying to make myself do it more lately because I’m going to be majoring in journalism so I want to get my writing skills up. Sometimes I feel like you, like I don’t have anything to write about. Then other times I have one thing I need to get off my chest and it turns into seven pages worth of things I didn’t realize I was even thinking! It’s refreshing. Some of the things I write, I post them on Facebook to get other opinions on a certain topic so I purposely write like I’m always talking to someone regardless of if someone will actually read it or not. I think it’s easier that way, to write as though you’re having a conversation then it won’t feel so empty.