Adventures in Journaling

 

I was fifteen years old when my parents gifted me a blank journal at Christmas. It was just a simple book with lined pages and a picture of a cat on the cover. I’d had diaries before…the little books with gold lined edges, a date designation at the top of each page, and a lock that matched every other lock of every other diary in the whole world. So much for keeping your thoughts protected, right?

                The diary years frustrated me because I always felt compelled to have enough news from the day to fill the pages. I couldn’t leave lines blank. But on the extra newsy days, the pages weren’t big enough to hold the goodness. The journal felt like the answer to the diary dilemma. The pages of the journal were all blank with no constraints. I could write half a page and pick up on the very next line the next day. I could write eight pages.

                And until about five years ago, I filled book after book after book of those lined pages. All the heartaches of the single years, the stories that would only happen to Bekah, the dreams and the dailiness, and the joys of finding Ryan and beginning our life together are captured in books of lined pages.

                Eventually I arrived at the point where my brain moved faster than my hands, and my handwriting deteriorated as I scrambled to keep up with my thoughts before they flew away.

                Something had to change.

                So I moved to journaling on my computer. I type really fast, so my fingers can keep up easily with my thoughts. The change was the grown-up answer to my journaling frustrations, just as the journal book had been the answer to my teenage diary drama. I can print them to keep with my handwritten versions

                Not long ago, I told Ryan that I was frustrated with my journaling again. He asked what was wrong, and I rolled my eyes as I answered. “It’s becoming a boring record of what I ate and a list of my activities for the day.” (To clarify: I know some people do journal their food intake for accountability purposes. There’s no shame in that! But that wasn’t why I was journaling it. I just literally ran out of interesting things to say about the day, so I said, “Well, I had some cobb salad for lunch and then I took a walk around the lake.”) It’s sad for a writer to stare at quarter-pages, typed, single-spaced that comprise nothing more than a laundry list of boring details that won’t matter in 50 years. Or 50 minutes, actually.

                I made a goal to do better starting in July. Yes, I realize I should probably have pursued this longer than one day before writing about it in this space, but perhaps I’m doing it now as an additional means of accountability to keep going. I’m also giving myself the grace and freedom to change it up if I find some part of it isn’t working.

                I’m still capturing my thoughts in a typed format. That remains a win. But I’m giving myself some prompts to guide my thoughts as I write:

                The best parts of my day: In this section I’m pushing myself to write stories, but I’m also pushing myself to think back over the day to the things that went well. Yesterday was easy, because yesterday was a nice day. I know there will be some days when I’ll have to reach to find the best hidden in the muck. But I want to start these journal entries by thinking about the good, and if that requires a push, then I have a built-in push.

                The hard parts of my day: I don’t want to call them bad, though they might feel that way. They might even actually be that way. Sometimes the hard parts have the best stories, and I don’t want to skip capturing those. And I want to create room to think the hard stuff through so I can learn from it.

                Today’s rhythms: This is the record-keeping section for accountability. How did I exercise? Did I go for a walk? Did I log a decent number of steps? How did I do with hydration? Did I cook something fun?

                I also added notes about what I studied in the Bible and what I read in whatever book I’m in that day.

                Along the way, I highlighted the words I want to come back and revisit later…brainstorms for another day.

                It was a thing of beauty to sit back and see real stories and words worth preserving…not just notes about cobb salad and lake strolls.

                I understand that journaling doesn’t make every heart sing like it does for me. I know some of you think sitting to capture thoughts sounds like the ultimate torture. But I’m a big believer in reflecting and preserving, and I look forward to doing so with renewed purpose.