on journaling at year’s end

I’m officially off work for the next two weeks, and as if to oblige my deepest cocooning wish, temperatures in Houston have plummeted, and will apparently continue to do so through the end of the week. As I type, I’m sitting under a blanket on my couch, there’s a fire roaring, and my notebook(s), pens and paints are sitting next to me. BLISS.

If you’ve been following me for any amount of time, you know that I’m a big journaller — in fact, several years ago, I even wrote a primer about how I journal. Since that time, my practice has evolved: instead of keeping a single notebook, as I did back when I wrote that primer, I now have two. One of them is more of a sketchbook/daily journal that I use every evening to wind down. The other remains the brainstorming, ephemera-collecting, doodling catch-all that I’ve done for a long time. It’s a tool that helps me work things out that I’m trying to wrangle. And during this time off, I’m spending a lot of time in that journal.

During the next two weeks, my goal is to spend more time analogue than digital. I’m going to take some time and reflect on the past year, because a lot of really great stuff happened. And I want to begin planning my 2023: really digging into thinking about how I envision the world in which I want to live and figure out how I can take steps to make it happen. Time to plan the new year’s lightmaking, babes.

Here’s wishing you some good downtime as well, my friends. And incidentally: if you’re a journaler, would like to become a journaler, or knows someone who is, and especially if you’re hoping to make 2023 a year where you change the world, my good friends at Blue Willow Books are bundling a signed copy of The Lightmaker’s Manifesto with a small Moleskine journal to get your new year started off right! The best part is that I’ll happily personalize any copies you buy for yourself or a friend, and they ship internationally. So be sure to get your copy here!