« a diary. a journal. a record. »
Irene's treasures (outtake from the book). Photographed at the Sheraton Chicago Towers, July 25, 2009, with Nikon D300, 35 mm lens.
While I was in Chicago, I shared a hotel room with the amazing Jen Lee, one of the most beautiful writers I know in real life (and who has just recently published a lovely little minibook of meaningful and lyrical poetry, available here). As soon as we'd checked into our hotel, we wandered to a nearby grill for some much-needed lunch, and our conversation turned to journaling.
"You'd think that for as long as I've been blogging," I was saying, "I'd be a pretty avid journaller. But I'm actually pretty horrifying at it. I think it just makes me feel really ridiculous -- like I'm just sitting there talking to myself. And then, sometimes I write something, and I don't like how it turned out; or I try to create 'art,' and it's just frightening, so I rip the page out, and then I have a journal with a ripped page, and that looks like crap, so then I just discard the book altogether."
She blinked.
"Okay," she said, looking at me like I'd grown a second head, "I think maybe you're just too hung up on the process. I don't think journals are supposed to be that perfect."
"Yeah?" I asked. "How do you do it?"
"Well," she began, "I try to write at least three pages every morning."
"Like in The Artist's Way?" I interrupted.
"Yes," she said, "I just write, totally stream-of-consciousness, for 3 straight pages. I find that this helps centres me for the day, and I don't let myself turn on my computer for the day until I've written these three pages. It keeps my email inbox from prioritizing my day, you know? So I write. And sometimes it's deep thoughts, and sometimes it's just a list of what I need to do, or pick up at the market."
"Oh really?" I said, paying close attention. "So your journal isn't just your innermost thoughts and dreams?"
"Well, sometimes it is," she admitted. "and sometimes it's the start of a story idea. But I carry my journal with me, and add things to it all day long. Sometimes it's a phone number of a new friend or dry cleaner. Or someone's mailing address. I basically just write everything down in my journal. If I'm required to handwrite something, it goes in my journal."
"So it sounds like it's just a hodgepodge of stuff -- no real rhyme or organization."
"Other than date, no," Jen admitted. "The cool thing is that I can always find that phone number or figure out when I dropped off the dry cleaning, because I just have to flip through the pages to the right date."
I love this idea. I think the reason journaling hasn't worked for me in the past has to do with structure. But if I just look at my journal as a place to record my life -- my messy, disorganized life, with its half-thoughts, and to-do lists and scrawled messages and the occasional fortune-cookie fortune or found photograph -- the end result pretty much accomplishes the recording, chronicling purpose, doesn't it?
Song: Fel Del Av Gården (Officiell) by MOVITS! I have no idea what they're singing, but they were on Stephen Colbert this week, and I think I love them.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009 at 12:00AM
Reader Comments (39)
I've always sucked at journaling because I have treated my journal like it was going to end up like Anne Frank's diary - something to record for all of posterity, that the rest of the world would see. My teenage years diaries sound incredibly pretentious. I'd start for a week and then quit. I really like this idea of journaling, it seems more authentic.
i too get hung up on the process and so i nodded along, karen, with much of what you were saying...thanks for sharing this. i like jen's ideas. :)
loves this.
it's totally liberating.
Pages in the morning ... every morning reminds me of Natalie Goldberg and her 1986 book , "Writing Down The Bones." I like to do a bit of practice writing most days and I'm always surprised where the pen or keyboard takes me. The best things come out during those writing moments and the unedited voice is with certainty from the truest part of myself.
I actually wrote about this yesterday here.... http://giftsofthejourney.wordpress.com/2009/07/28/tell-me-a-story-tuesdays/
I love the synchronicity of thought.
I miss journaling. I found it very therapeutic.
I'm exactly like you. That's why I have 1/18 written journals lying around the house.
This is an interesting take on journaling. Perhaps, I should pick it up too.
I love journaling, but I just do it whenever the mood comes. I like Jen's idea. Journaling has helped me gain a bit of perspective. I love the music for today :)
I love this. So true. My journal has been my savior through my roughest times and is my steady friend to keep my thoughts from tripping me up during the day. No, there's no such thing as perfection needed. Here's a post of mine on journaling:
http://leisahammett.typepad.com/the_journey_with_grace/2009/04/the-salve-of-journaling.html
I've just recently gotten back into journaling. I decided that I was going to write Everyday for the next year, even if it's just a line or two that came to me during the day. On top of that more structured writing, I'm also doing the morning pages... 3 pages in the morning before starting my day.
There was a time when I did write in my journal everyday for over 5 years. Then I stopped. And I've noticed, as I slowly get back into, my journals definitely look like Jen's... an assortment of written information along with the entries I make for that day.
Let me second the recommendation of Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones... what she teaches is Zen writing practice, where keeping your hand moving, telling your internal editor to cram it (and basically treating writing as a meditation, not something that requires a product) are key. Most of the book is exercises designed to help you do that. I can't tell you how many times I've pulled that book out (or her second one like it, called Wild Mind) over the last 18 years and gotten myself writing again.