Anyone here keep a journal?

[Mike_Lowery]

I mean like with pen(cil) and paper, not a blog or anything like that. I started keeping one (although not as religiously as I wish to) last May. I find it therapeutic and mind-opening.

What kind of book are you using? I'm using Moleskine journals that I bought from Barnes & Noble.

[Ron Whitfield]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

Please don't tell us you keep it in the bathroom!

[Honoruru]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

I’ve been keeping a journal since May 18, 1970. You do the math.

Back then, I used a Vernon Royal Personal Account Book (Records) and dutifully recorded the comings and goings in my life until my last entry on a Vernon Royal, which was on July 11, 1989, after which I went digital, using a CP/M-based Kaypro II, and continued my entries using WordStar (remember that?), and then WordPerfect, and now MS Word. Since then, besides continuing my journal, I’ve been transcribing all my past hand-written entries from the Vernon Royal books into digital form.

I never went online with my journal, and when the blog craze started, I had no intention of doing an online journal (though I did consider starting a blog). And you’re right, Mike, it is “therapeutic and mind-opening,” especially the ones from the past, the further back, the more revealing. Another thing is my handwriting was better then, and more expressive. My original intent in transcribing the hand-written accounts into digital form was to then destroy the physical journal books, simplify my life, but I somehow could not part with them.

Moleskine are nice and I’ve been thinking about getting some. They’re attractive, useful, and historic. With any luck, they’ll last a lifetime. Good luck with your journal.

[helen]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

I don't do a paper journal or an on-line blog. At times what I try to do is sort of like how Honoruru does by keeping it on a computer, however I am doing it to test out whatever word processing program I am using at the time, so the entries are kind of tame, something where I can so show someone else and not get anyone into trouble. Trouble is after about two or three months after I start it, I just lost interest in it.

[Creative-1]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

I've kept a journal since I got my first computer in 1982.

As I tell my students at HPU - I teach business consulting - the WORST place for a person to deal with their issues and challenges is in their head.

Putting them onto paper, or a digital form, allows one to have a better perspective on them.

Better still is talking about them with a skillful listener.

It's also useful in helping me remember details of things my wife and I do.

A (somewhat) funny anecdote: I was reading some of my dad's autobiography to him last month. He's now 92, but wrote it 12 years ago.

He thought half was true and the other half wasn't!

[Leo Lakio]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

To those who do this on a computer --- PLEASE be sure you have off-site backup of these journal entries!!!

Years ago, a friend of mine kept a journal of his battle with brain cancer. This, he says, was a key piece of his healing and survival.

When his home burned down years later, and he lost both his computer AND his backup drive, he was so glad that he had burned CDs of all the material - and left them in my care, so none of them were lost.

(Granted, CDs are now considered a rather unreliable backup option, due to their degradation rate, but you get my point.)

He (and his family) said that nothing on the destroyed computer was as valuable and irreplaceable as these journal entries. I suspect those of you who have been writing one for years can imagine how they felt.

[TATTRAT]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

Leo, though I don't have brain cancer, I have been thinking of starting a journal for much the same reason.

I have actually gone and gotten a journal, but I am having the hardest time dedicating things to paper, I start, and stop, and feel I am whining more than anything. I dunno. Just trying to explore some outlets to take the pressure of my mind.

I really like the idea of a journal, and am going to try and force myself into it, it is just SO much harder to get going than I ever imagined, and I am stumped as to why.

[Leo Lakio]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

I have actually gone and gotten a journal, but I am having the hardest time dedicating things to paper, I start, and stop, and feel I am whining more than anything. I dunno. Just trying to explore some outlets to take the pressure of my mind.

Who says whining is bad? TATT, the journal is for YOU only - no one else gets to judge whether or not the writing is good, NO ONE but yourself.

Write what you NEED to write - if it feels like a whine to you, maybe that means that your mind needs a non-judgmental outlet to whine to. Considering what you've been dealing with, you are entitled to a good whine or two (or two hundred).

Don't edit, censor or judge your output at the start, or you'll never satisfy your inner critic, and you'll never do the writing. Just put down on paper what you want to say, set no boundaries as you begin - just go for it.

Personally, the only time I kept a journal was when I went through a divorce, and right up until the time I met the Alpha Female, about a five-year period. And when I felt I had reached a point where I had learned from the experience, made the personal changes I needed to make, and moved well beyond the sorrow of that period ... I destroyed the writings. Went out of town, built a lovely little bonfire on a beach, and burned the lot. Never regretted it in the 18 years since.

[Kalalau]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

I have a journal on the computer, I do it in Hawaiian (as best I can) to keep anybody nosy from having too easy a time mucking around in private matters. I used to keep a history calendar. For years I made brief notes on personal or general news day by day on calendars. It started with the 3 Mile Island (1978?) and ended when the voters of California installed Schwarzenegger as governor, that was kind of a sorry, thats all I can stand point but of course there have been so many more since then. Day by day it was all there: St. Helens blowing up, Iran hostages taken and released, every trip to Hawai'i and elsewhere, illnesses and deaths of family and friends and cats, parties, its interesting to look over the old history calendars and remember how things unfolded.

[TATTRAT]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

Who says whining is bad? TATT, the journal is for YOU only - no one else gets to judge whether or not the writing is good, NO ONE but yourself.

Write what you NEED to write - if it feels like a whine to you, maybe that means that your mind needs a non-judgmental outlet to whine to. Considering what you've been dealing with, you are entitled to a good whine or two (or two hundred).

Don't edit, censor or judge your output at the start, or you'll never satisfy your inner critic, and you'll never do the writing. Just put down on paper what you want to say, set no boundaries as you begin - just go for it.

Personally, the only time I kept a journal was when I went through a divorce, and right up until the time I met the Alpha Female, about a five-year period. And when I felt I had reached a point where I had learned from the experience, made the personal changes I needed to make, and moved well beyond the sorrow of that period ... I destroyed the writings. Went out of town, built a lovely little bonfire on a beach, and burned the lot. Never regretted it in the 18 years since.

I appreciate the very thoughtful, and well said reply Craig. I am going to sleep on it, and see if I can re-center myself.

[mel]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

To those who do this on a computer --- PLEASE be sure you have off-site backup of these journal entries!!!

Since word processing files don't take up much space, a good offsite place to store your journal is Google Docs, or just simply email the entries to yourself to a web based email client... such as Gmail or Yahoo Mail. Gmail has a 7GB limit on email, and Yahoo's unlimited... we're talking word processing here, so text will take practically forever to fill these limits up. Just keep your journal entries organized within the web interface.

There are of course other off site cloud offerings, such as iCloud from Apple which is currently free or for pay, Carbonite and several others like it.

[TATTRAT]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

That is wonderful, and I appreciate the technology, but once something is digital, and stored "off site", then I would worry about privacy. Seems silly, as we all put out so much info on the daily, but if I were to have a journal/diary, I wouldn't want to have it stored/hosted digitally, because once you put it out there, you have no control over it against people that may really want that info. I am not speaking for myself, I am just saying. . .once it goes digital, you are open to a whole different word of trouble than say your girlfriend finding it, or something.

I like the idea of a journal/diary, handwritten, and in my possession, for many reason, one of them being I can burn it in a fire pit if need be, lol.

[helen]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

Off-site doesn't mean on-line somewhere. It just means that the copy is in different physical location from you. One example is backing it up to a CD, DVD, flash drive or portable hard drive and moving that thing to another place, like a bank's safety deposit box.

[TATTRAT]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

Off-site doesn't mean on-line somewhere. It just means that the copy is in different physical location from you. One example is backing it up to a CD, DVD, flash drive or portable hard drive and moving that thing to another place, like a bank's safety deposit box.

That's fine. And that type of copy is still within my possession.

If you are hosting your stuff, to a HD/Server that is not your own, leaves room for speculation that it could be hacked/read/published by anyone, pretty simple.

Not saying I have anything of that caliber to be worried about, I would just prefer to keep it analog, and the headlines have stuff daily of things that get leaked, from digital sources, and I would prefer to not set myself up.

Although, I would be flattered if someone really wanted to take the time to hunt me down, and publish what I thought was "Oh, so private", lol.

I don't know why, but when I think of a journal/diary/personal memoir/essay, I don't want ANYONE to have access to it, until the time that I feel I am ready to share. Selfish? Sure. And I am not one that is a conspiracy nut, and like I said to Leo, I am ready to reconsider, and give it a go, I think for me it is like tattoos, it's something for me, not anyone else. Doing it digitally means it isn't just for me, potentially. . . And I am paranoid about my ex, and her pentagon level creeping.

I know, WAYYYYYYYYYYYYY over thinking this stuff, lol, I have just gotten a little up tight the past couple of years, sorry my HT family.

[Kaonohi]

Re: Anyone here keep a journal?

I mean like with pen(cil) and paper, not a blog or anything like that. I started keeping one (although not as religiously as I wish to) last May. I find it therapeutic and mind-opening.

What kind of book are you using? I'm using Moleskine journals that I bought from Barnes & Noble.

Yeah but.... For what? I keep a log of "Unusual occurrences." FWIW

For sure, moleskin........

Some stricking stuff, too! FWIW!