I thought it'd be nice to have a general thread about journaling, journals, pens, etc. So here it is! So! Do you keep a paper journal? Do you find it helpful, or do you just enjoy having a paper record of your thoughts in general? What do you like to write in? What do you use to write with? I definitely find journaling a helpful tool as a private sounding board for thoughts that I don't want to share, but do want to dissect or just write down. Personally my current journal is a Paperblank midi - warning, pretty! - and I like the Pilot Opt pens, but I am rapidly becoming a pen nerd, so this may change. Howboutchu?
I keep a journal more or less in the spirit of Julia Cameron's Morning Pages, but with a bit less of the rigorous consistency Cameron recommends. For those unfamiliar, the Morning Pages are supposed to be 3 pages (and absolutely no less) of stream of consciousness, unfiltered, and done first thing in the morning every day. In practice, I do one to five pages (but really try to do at least three), as soon as I have the time - usually once I get to work or to class - almost every day, but unless I have something that I really feel the need to untangle, I skip weekends. My journal is basically anything that is currently crossing my mind when I write. Today for example there was a page with a to-do list for today and the next 3 days (typical for when I'm stressed out) followed by a page and a half of why I should stop beating myself up over my artistic output or lack thereof, followed by a neat little page in which I'm listing, like, a battle plan of how I can organize myself in ways that make producing art easier on me. But some days it's just rambling, some days it's depressive venting in all caps, some days it's song lyrics repeated over and over for 2 pages, some days it's pondering about art, some days it's poetic descriptions of petting my cats while watching the sunset, some days it's just doodles, some days it's ambitious plans for artistic projects. Mostly, the point of it is that it serves almost as a sort of meditation, allowing my frantic thoughts to pass by, end up in my journal and kinda stay there and allow me to do stuff with my life! It's a therapeutic tool and it has amazing positive effects on me. Since I've kept this habit since 2013, by now there are several notebooks which constitute "my journal", some of which are prettier than others. Currently I'm using a notebook with neon rainbow pages! But my favorites still are these, so I'm thinking once I finish the rainbow notebook and one more which I have lined up, I'll just stock up on these beauties. They were the best for a million reasons, not only were they super beautiful and simple but also I liked to use matching pens for each of them, which was great! I'm thinking for my current one, right now I'm writing with a black pen but I SHOULD switch to a white gel pen because it's prettier. And maybe in the future do a DIY one with black pages, to write in with my silver gel pen.
@wixbloom - That actually sounds really interesting! I should try doing that once in a while to supplement my usual journaling. Work mornings won't work for that, but maybe on weekends or before bed, whenever I'm feeling most loose? Would be interesting to record my pre-Adderall morning thoughts. Thanks for mentioning it, I've never heard of it before! Your journal sounds really useful, and fun to look at (I really like that sky print journal, oh man), too. The physical journal is important to me, it's got to be Just Right - My current one is the petfect size and has a soothing muted blue colour and bold patterns, and my next one will definitely be the tiger lily print when this one's full. It has to feel good in my hands, have the right paper, etc... that may be weird. I definitely go more formal with mine overall, though, and it's very different from blogging (which may be very personal, but isn't written for an audience of me alone, either). My entries are half a page to two pages (I do print in small block letters, though). Most of the entries are dissecting errant thoughts (or obsessive ones - It really helps, actually), feelings about feelings, mood tracking and prediction, pondering over moods and emotions, and contemplating why things happen. I usually only talk about day to day events if they're major, or relevant as a jumping off point for something (i.e. I journaled about my apartment being burglarised because it had further ranging effects beyond 'someone stole some of my stuff'). I definitely think it is beneficial to have a safe, private space to record my thoughts all in one spot; now that I've started journaling in that way, I've actually been keeping up with it (as opposed to trying to keep a captain's log of what I did, which is boring to me - I've tried that since like 2012 and never kept up with it. I'm just not interesting enough on that front). I haven't yet journaled in an active mood crash, but I definitely plan to, should be interesting to see the benefit either at the time, or later, as I often reread my journal entries to get a better picture of where my brain's at. I think as I do it more and more, it'll evolve over time and become more stream of consciousness. It'll be interesting to read in retrospect!
I want to keep a journal but I'm too secretive to put down certain things on paper (or screen or whatnot). Like, even if I'm absolutely sure that I'll be the only one accessing it, I still won't write some stuff down. Which seems to kind of defeat the purpose. Any advice? There's a pack of notebooks at Costco that I keep eyeing, but I'm less picky about writing implements and will use whatever's on hand.
@Saro Codes! Either vaguing, like referrimg to "the situation that is currently happening" instead of specifics, silly spy codes like "red falcon V", or straight up a simple substitution cypher (which is always super fun to do), such as a book cypher or running key - those things are super easy to learn, lots of fun to do, almost impossible to crack without the key.
My journal is a very large Google document with the most recent entries added at the top. It's typically venting/processing combined with ideas and thoughts too random and poorly expressed to be worth posting on the Internet or sharing with people until they're better put together. Kind of a rough cut of my brain for the last year and change.
I know this feeling! Once in a while I'll not write something down, though less and less now. Keeping it on an encrypted flash drive, if you want a digital journal, can be helpful - There are journaling programs that can be run from flash drives, in fact. If you want a hardcopy journal and live alone, I find hiding the journal can be helpful and that's about where I am, it lives under my socks when I don't have it with me (though I usually do, since it's small). A step above that might be something like a stash book (there's lots of varieties of these, some with locks, some without). Or, perhaps a low-security safe, like one of these? Thanks for your input, everyone, it's interesting to read!
Alright I'm gonna do the thing! Journal is a Decomposition notebook that's on hand and pen is a medium Pentel RSVP that feels pretty good.
I started keeping a very simplified bullet journal in January. I don't need any code or anything because my handwriting is so terrible. I'm thinking about starting up a separate day book, which was a thing middle class merchants did in the 18th-19th centuries. It's just simple notes of what happened that day. It's not really a place for "deep thoughts" (although you can put them in there if you like, I guess). I found the plain bullet journal format (not, for the love of GodBearMan, those crazy things hyperactive women on YouTube make) to be simple enough that I could keep it up for the most part. You don't have to write long confessional pieces or "deep thoughts"--just short statements of what you plan to do and actually do during the day.
My equipment is a hardbound Piccadilly notebook I got at Barnes and Noble for half price (so, like $3.00), which is comparable to a Moleskine, and a Pilot Metropolitan pen. Or whatever pen is handy. I like pens, so I have some Hi-Tecs and some Staedtlers and some Sarasas and a bunch of other ones.
I like journals! I haven't ever been able to keep a daily journaling habit (although now that I'm doing Habitica I could see if it helps me reinforce giving that stream-of-consciousness method a try again), but I like to write out my feelings, and the tactile feeling of writing utensil on paper is a good stim for me. Right now I have two active journals - one little palm-sized black Moleskine that I've used for various list-making, gaming notes, story ideas, and sketches but is currently getting the most use as a way to count knitting repeats, and one handmade, handbound, gorgeous embossed leather journal that was a gift from a girlfriend at RenFaire that I use for religious musings and tarot study (I should take pictures of it for this thread, it's amazingly beautiful.) My favorite pens are Pilot G-2 gel pens, but I'll use pencil some too for the informal tiny journal.
I find those actually better than Moleskine. Moleskines are nice, but they're also overpriced. Good notebooks, but still. I actually have a Hi-Tec C in my cart on Jetpen! It's one of those multi pens you can customise, I look forward to ordering it and getting it. Stadlers are actually a favourite, though, along with Faber-Castell, which are probably my favourite of favourites for drawing and writing alike (also, Sakura Micron, as much as I wish the physical pens looked nicer. They come in a lot of colours, though! Paper Mate Flair will do, as will Marvy Le Pen, but both tend to bleed through paper). On the pen scale, I prefer felt tip > fine ballpoint > gel (the line width is too thick on most) > rollerball (smudges, why - Good for drawing, though) > in a distant last, fountain pens, I press too hard for them. /pen nerding I think it's similar for me, if not specifically a stim as such? It's very focusing and calming when I sit down with my journal, and just the right tools and paper are part of that for sure. Yes, please take pictures! I should snap mine real quick later, too.
I've been journalling off and on since I was like 4. When I was a kid I accumulated journals & gave them all different names - there are like 30 journals tucked away in a few boxes in my room right now. Some day I want to type them all up. There's a huge variety - some are tiny, some are slim, one even has a (broken) lock. These days I keep writing journals, which I use both for journalling purposes and for (fan)fiction purposes. These are usually plain spiral notebooks, usually blue or purple, that I adorn with Homestuck stickers. Recently I've found myself in excess of composition notebooks, so I've been using those as writing journals of late. I also use Evernote, for the digital side of both my journalling and my fiction (though I mirror the more important stuff on Google Docs.) I sometimes keep a digital, daily "captain's log" type thing; generally I have a cycle of logging daily (or, nightly; usually it's right before I go to sleep) for months at a time, and then dropping it for months at a time. This summer I've mostly dropped it, although I have been doing other, less-organized journalling. I may try and pick it back up again soon, though I'm going to give the Morning Pages thing a shot.
What's in the pen case? Three Pilot Varsitys Two Pilot Metropolitans (and some ink cartridges) Three Pilot G-Tecs Two Highlighters Glue Stick Protractor, straightedge, triangle, protractor compass Zebra Sarasa Multi (four inks, one pencil) Pencil leads
I made a very nice, very simple letter substitution code back in middle school. All symbols were comprised of either vertical/horizontal line combinations or diagonal line combinations, so handwriting was almost never a problem. I wrote journals with it for at least 6 years, and can still start writing in it easily now. READING is something like a fifth of that speed at best... but, you know. I can read it. The only problem is that somewhere along the years I mixed up the symbols for M and N, and for 5 6 7 8.... makes rereading old ones a little difficult sometimes.
@swirlingflight - That's really clever. I know how to make and use one-time pads (uncrackable encryption! Yes!), but decrypting it takes time, a calculator, and, of course, the secret key, which, if you lose it, it's gone to the ages. I should try to make my own symbol encryption some time, too. Then again, my handwriting is apparently its own encryption. I think that's a bit exaggerated, but hey, whatever works.
I used to journal, and I still have a bunch of books that are partly filled with nonsense and embarrassing writing, but i havent finished a whole journal in years. when i was younger i think an occupational therapist got me to start journaling as handwriting practice or something but it sucked also i'm weird in that i get nervous about ruining a nice book by filling it with garbage so i just have a few journals ive never used
Oh no, it me. I have more than a few beautiful notebooks with nothing in them because what will I write will it be worthy of this beautiful journal?
I have more than a few beautiful notebooks with nothing in them because I have a problem with impulse-buying pretty notebooks, apparently, and I don't actually journal that much. Most of them end up being used for taking notes for things I'm studying. ...Right, journaling. I do it off and on. Every few years I remember that I am terrible at remembering things, and decide to keep a journal so I can look back and see what I was doing and what was going on sometime down the line. I make daily entries for a few weeks and then start slacking off and eventually quit. The most success I ever had was when I used a composition book to make checklists of things I wanted to accomplish every day, and then checked them off as I did them and noted down my success rate and anything else interesting under the list. I think I kept that up for several months before I got distracted and ... I just remembered I started doing that again a few months ago and stopped in late June for some reason. Huh. Maybe I'll start it again.
Popping back into this thread to share the beautiful pen haul I just received: Uni Mitsubishi Pure Color-F, Uni Jetstream, Pilot Opt (I CANNOT UNDERSTATE HOW GORGEOUS THIS PEN IS. The photo does it no justice. It's a metallic blue-black gradient with silver speckles), Hi Tec Coleto C 3 Color Multi (custom, has pen, pencil, and eraser), Sailor G-Free, Dong-A Miffy Scented in Rose (actually a really good pen, and a beautiful ruddy colour, but there's no scent :(), Zebra Sasara Chupa Chup scented (also a good pen with almost no scent, but it looks cool), and Sakura Pigma Micron 005. I don't even know which one I want to journal with first. They're all really good. The Opt and the Coleto are definitely about to live in my day bag until the pen case I bought on eBay (a dollar! But a three week shipping time.) arrives. I am excite.
