How I Learned to Fill a Journal

I have so many half filled spiral ring notebooks from high school and college. Buying a new one was always more exciting than finishing the one I had. Moleskins made the joy of buying and the shame of abandoning even stronger (they’re so expensive!). I couldn’t do it.

But then I started reading Austin Kleon’s blog. And then Kleon pointed to Lynda Barry. Both wrote about journaling and keeping notebooks in a way that made it less intimidating. I was jealous of their attitude.

Here’s what I try to do now because of them…

Use one notebook to catch EVERYTHING. Let it all commingle. A to do list next to a prayer next to doodles next to a “I’m depressed enough to try writing a poem” poem (an example of which will NOT be included in the post). Cast a wide net and add something every day. But most of all, have fun. Play around. Let loose. Who cares.

And make sure you go back and revisit old journals later. You’ll be surprised at all you caught. Stand back and see the big picture. Connect the dots. Check for themes.  Let that inspire what comes next in your current notebook.

Read again all the words you once thought important enough to write down. They might still mean something.

It’s a lot easier for me to get stressed and frustrated when I don’t start the morning journaling. I’ve also had to start journaling with my phone on the other side of the room. I kept catching myself picking it up whenever I started writing about something that made me uncomfortable.

I need to take away that distraction. If what I’m journaling about is making me uncomfortable, it’s probably a sign I’m heading in the right direction. That’s the exact thing I should be working out in writing.

Another book that’s really helped me with this is Opening Up by Writing It Down: How Expressive Writing Improves Health and Eases Emotional Pain.

My main takeaway: Have a difficult memory or situation you’re struggling with? Set a timer for 20 minutes and write nonstop the whole time. Just get in the zone and get it out. When the timer is up, close the journal. Give yourself a moment to breathe. Do it again tomorrow. See how you feel after 3 or 4 days of this.

---

Everything I put in my notebooks: journaling, prayers, plans, rants, stories, jokes, lists, quotes, questions, sermons, memories, and a drawing of Homer Simpson from memory.

---

Austin Kleon on keeping a notebook

When does a diary pay off?

A journal is a magic space to hang out

The page is a place (based on Lynda Barry quotes!)

---

Journaling exercise from Lynda Barry

Sometimes when I’m having trouble writing a story, I’ll play this video. Lynda Barry recorded this memory writing exercise for her college class (which you can read all about in the awesome book Syllabus).

Why You Should Keep Track of Your Mistakes

“Every time he made a decision, he’d write himself a memo about what he expected to happen. Then nine months later he opened it up and read it to find out how wrong he’d been. He wanted to learn the most he could from each and every error.”

-The Social Animal by David Brooks

I started keeping a journal specifically to keep track of my first year on staff at my church in Kansas. Today starts week 3 and I’m making a lot of decisions. I’m trying to keep track of all of them and what I hope their outcomes will be. We’ll see how I wrong I am. I’m sure it’s going to be fascinating to look back on the entries of this journal three or four years from now.

Here are a few reasons I think it’s a good idea:

I’ll be less likely to make the same mistakes twice.

It’ll make me better at helping other people just starting out on staff at a church. I think sometimes when we’re discipling our just being a good friend (often the same thing) we can find ourselves thinking “There’s no way I was ever this naive, right?” Keeping a journal will give you tangible proof that, yes, you were once just as dumb and uninformed.

What if you had kept a journal of your first year married? First year as a parent? First year as an empty nester? Mister Rogers’ great ability to communicate with and care for children was often credited to his ability to still remember what it was like to be a child himself. He could remember how visceral the fear of getting your first haircut was, so he knew just what a child facing that might need to hear to be comforted.

Also, when we find success we can rewrite the story of how we got there to stand down the rough patches, the mistakes, the missteps, the absolute screw-ups along the way, so we’re left with a neat and tidy narrative of how you made every right decision to get you where you are today.

A journal keeps you honest.

Clean Your Mind the Way You Clean Your Closet

I know I’m desperate for something to do when I start cleaning. It’s always a last resort.

There’s a closet in my living room full of junk. I’ve tried to go in there a few times and organize it all but it becomes too overwhelming. I know the only effective way to truly clean that mess up is to empty the closet of all the contents. It’s too hard to just get myself in there, close the door, and rearrange things in that limited space. I’ve got to take it all out and start fresh. It’s easier to make sense of what you’ve got when it spread out on the floor in front of you. You can judge what deserves to go back in the closet and what’s actually been trash the whole time. You can uncover hidden treasures that sat lost and forgotten for years.

It’s easier to organize everything by dumping it all out of the container first. It’s true for your closet, your backpack, the trunk of your car, and your brain.

Let your thoughts out (Journaling! Talking to a friend! Seeing a counselor!) so you can organize them better. Some will turn out to be junk that needs to be thrown away. Some times you’ll discover hidden treasures that sat lost and forgotten for years. But you’ve got to let them all out first.

Fiona Apple agrees:

"You’ve got these stories you’re not telling anybody. Each one of those stories is like this little ball of yarn. If you don’t [express them], they end up getting tangled together inside. Then it’s really hard to sort through them."

What Dracula Taught Me About Journaling

Growing up I thought keeping a diary was just for girls and journaling was just for Doug. And almost every tv show I watched as a kid had an episode where someone finds the main character’s diary and reads their darkest secrets. Why would I ever want to journal?! Someone could find it and read it!

But that’s actually the best part of having a journal.

I’ve been reading Bram Stoker’s Dracula because I’m in the mood for something spooky. Last night I read a passage where a woman is writing in her diary and she describes why she enjoys the process so much. She writes:

“I am anxious, and it soothes me to express myself here; it is like whispering to one’s self and listening at the same time.”

Journaling is so great because it’s a chance for you to eavesdrop on a conversation with yourself.

You’re giving yourself the time and space to vomit up all your thoughts and feelings about what’s been going on, examine it all, and organize your thoughts. Are you ever at a loss because you’re not really sure how you feel about something going on in your life? It’s like you’re in a fog and everything is ambiguous and weird? Any time I get that way I try to write it all out.

Process it on paper. Wrap words around those vague feelings hiding out in the back of your mind. Get it out of your system and make sure you pay attention to what’s coming out. It might surprise you. Eavesdrop on yourself.

Thanks for the lesson, Dracula.

WANT MORE?

I found this really in great article highlighting nearly a dozen reasons Why Keeping a Daily Journal Could Change Your Life