What’s your greatest fear? Is it spiders, losing a loved one, or maybe heights? I’ve asked many people this question but have yet to hear someone share the same fear as I do: time. That thing that moves too fast at moments and drawls like a sloth at others. That thing that can turn even the most vivid of experiences into a foggy memory. I guess that’s why I fear time so much. It’s the forgetting and saying goodbye to something that will never be as it once was. But I’ve found that this complex fear has a pretty simple solution: pen and paper.
There’s a big difference between thinking something versus turning that thought into a coherent sentence. I’ve found that journaling is a great exercise in sifting through the chaotic mess in our minds. It forces you to slow down, reflect on what you’d like to say, and spell it out letter by letter. For me, it’s an act that’s clarified my thoughts and emotions, with new realizations coming mid-sentence.
When I was younger, I read series like Dork Diaries and Dear Dumb Diary, which also pushed me to start cataloging my life. Like the protagonists in those series, my entries initially sounded like, “You won’t believe this… so and so said blah blah…” — you get the idea. My journal was my gossip dump. Elementary school drama can only be so interesting, but the fact that there was a journal that was only mine, with “KEEP OUT” scribbled in by my hand, meant so much to me at a young age. But as I grew up and swallowed the difficult pill that is adolescence, my journaling morphed from mere gossip into something crucial in my attempt to understand the world around me and, most importantly, myself.
Journaling is an old concept that’s well known for how it promotes self-reflection. Still, many people never get into it. I think it’s because they simply don’t know what to write. Of course, there are no rules, but I totally understand the stress of a blank page and the paralysis of endless possibilities. So, I’ll share my approach to journaling in hopes that you can pull some inspiration from it!
Firstly, I like to ask myself: What do I need? Do I need to rant? Do I need to figure out how I’m feeling? Do I need to clear up some brain space and express some ideas? We crave different things every day. This means that my entries are by no means uniform. Some days, I’ll write several pages on family troubles, and others, a single page of disconnected musings just to clear my head. If I’m feeling a creative spark, I might even scribble down lines of poetry. Most days, however, I keep it simple and write down whatever happened that day and how it made me feel. Don’t feel the pressure to label your journal as one thing. Let it be a collage of your mind and reflect your changing moods. It’ll make your journal way more interesting to look back on anyway!
Speaking of looking back, after reading my past journals, I noticed I tend to rant and complain. Sometimes, that’s exactly what I need, but it’s also something I indulge in a little too much. Lately, I’ve been trying to use journaling as a way to practice gratitude. In hopes of restructuring my mindset into something more optimistic, I’ve made it a goal in 2024 to include a little piece of gratitude in each entry. Try to romanticize the little mundane moments! Maybe the strawberries you had were perfectly ripe, or you saw a campus cat while you walked to class. As cliché as it sounds, writing down what you appreciate in your life truly makes the small things so much sweeter.
My love for journaling can be summed up in a quote by Aristotle that goes, “Knowing thyself is the beginning of all wisdom.” Amidst all the tasks we have to juggle every day, moments fly past us in shapeless blurs of color. By writing it down, however, we get to experience life twice and, most importantly, see ourselves from a slower perspective. Give it a try. Grab some paper and a pen and see what you discover.
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