Journaling

Ponder This

“Journal writing is a voyage to the interior.”

“I wrote. I wrote all the things I couldn’t say to him. I wrote about how much I believed in us. I wrote about how much I trusted God. I wrote that I was praying for him. I wrote down all the jokes I could remember, which weren’t many.”

––Kimberly Novosel, Loved

“The habit of writing for my eye is good practice. It loosens the ligaments.”

––Virginia Woolf

“There is, of course, always the personal satisfaction of writing down one's own experiences so they may be saved, caught and pinned under glass, hoarded against the winter of forgetfulness. Time has been cheated a little, at least, in one's own life, and a personal, trivial immortality of an old self assured.”

––Anne Morrow Lindbergh, North to the Orient

Many people mistakenly associate a journal with a diary. Of course, those who used diaries long ago were mostly journaling. What we really have here is an issue with semantics, or the way a particular word has developed over time and become associated with an idea or activity. We all have heard the “Dear Diary,” beginnings to writing that we may associate with a detailed chronicle of our lives. It doesn’t have to be that way. For years I resisted journaling because I tried to write about my life—the events and people and circumstances within. I would wind up ripping out pages or throwing away whole journals because I’d written about something I didn’t want to remember or think about. Oh! What I wouldn’t give to have that writing back now!

Philosophically speaking, we change. Our lives, circumstances, ideas, dreams, fears, hopes and realities mold, develop and morph over time. While a month after breaking up with a boyfriend or girlfriend you may wish to eradicate every expression of love you once made toward that person, sometimes what’s between the lines can be edifying and cathartic six months or a year later. In addition, journaling doesn’t have to be a chronicle of your life. It can be a chronicle of your thoughts, ideas and interaction with the world. It can be like a drawer full of treasures you hold onto for years, to open and look through during times of peace or calamity…treasures you may someday want to turn into art or use to help yourself or someone else.

Once I stopped using my journal as a stew of weapons to beat myself over the head with, I became intrigued with the amount of solid, interesting ideas floating around in my consciousness. Instead of detailing my mistakes in life, or feeling stupid for loving someone who didn’t love me in return, I felt empowered by the workings of a mind that is unique—just as yours, and everyone’s, is.

If you try for 3months to practice journaling every day, using the prewriting techniques to guide you into your deepest thoughts, you may find it to be a dialogue between you and your spirit…a forum where you can encourage, train, learn and motivate yourself to seek the things you are passionate about. I’ve known people who’ve used journaling every day to focus themselves on a goal, or to move from a less than desirable situation into something more pleasing.

I invite you to start a journal and write a bit every morning or evening, not just about the events of the day, but about how you are interpreting them and what ideas come to you…the funny, tragic, unusual or ordinary circumstances of life and how you see them. Train your mind to express the things it plays with all the time, and you may find you are coming up with unique and different solutions to problems that have been plaguing you for a long time.

When they found Mother Teresa’s journals after her death, many people were shocked at her expressions of doubt as to whether she was on the right path, or whether God was with her. I think the expression of those doubts allowed her the freedom to put one foot in front of the other on a daily basis. We all live with doubt and confusion. I think it may be impossible to complete rid ourselves of those two conundrums of life. Think of all the great spirits who expressed doubt only to find they were right! (Galileo, Newton, Edison, Einstein.) And how many countless humans have found by expressing their doubts they have the freedom to act on their faith (whatever their faith may be in).

Journaling will generally allow you to get your feelings out, but it doesn't have to be specifically about those feelings, or a diary which becomes a laundry list of the day’s events. It can be a home for ideas…and ultimately, ideas change the world. Write them down. If you find, after 3 months, it’s not helping, you can always abandon it. What have you got to lose?