The value of journalling

Or; it's not just about the big things.

Journalling, diary keeping. I've tried so many times over the years. Every now and then I pick up a note book to discover it's another abandoned journal with a handful of entries. I just couldn't get on with it. I think my life felt too ordinary to be worth journalling and my thoughts were often pompous and overblown.

Yet I believed in the value of journalling. I knew and knew of so many people who found great value in journalling. But I couldn't even keep up a gratitude journal of 3 bullet points a day.

I guess I kept trying different approaches because I knew if I found one that worked it would benefit me and, by extension, my creativity..

I had learnt one basic truth about journalling. It should be raw, honest and authentic and that meant it needed to be hand written. This is probably obvious to anyone who journals. Hand written is much harder to edit. You can cross things out but they are still there, reminding you of what you really felt. You can tear a page out but the evidence will still remain in some way. You can lie to yourself but the truth will always be looking at you.

At some point I realised my journal didn't have to be about big things and momentous thoughts. It could be a private place to work out my thoughts on a variety of things and to record my feelings about things. One recent entry in my current and most successful attempt so far just reads “technology is not my friend”.

So, to my current attempt. I took into account what I like and how I like information to be shared and I came up with this.

This is one of the less ranting ones I felt happy sharing.

I introduced a little cartoon avatar of me and had him say what I was thinking. It helped in that there was a little but of drawing each time which meant there was a degree of play, which suits my personality, and it also created a barrier between me and what was being said so I felt I could be more honest.

So far it seems to be working. I've journalled some 90 pages over the last two months.

I thoroughly recommend journaling as a way of making sense of things and understanding why some things make no sense