I’ve kept a journal for most of my life. I bought them at the Scholastic Book Fair or Borders (RIP to an excellent bookstore). There were several with locks and tiny keys. Anyone remember the GirlTalk Password Journal? Yeah, I had one of those too. Another was black spiral bound with a Parisian street painting or other scene. It’s at my parent’s house. Others with ornate covers, magnetic flaps, and ribbon bookmarks. Those bookmarks are a must. During college my journal consisted of multiple Microsoft Word documents. The latest are leather.
I even like journal-based books. The Royal Diaries and Dear America series published by Scholastic were regular library checkouts. I own Cleopatra VII: Daughter of the Nileand Voyage on the Great Titanic: The Diary of Margaret Ann Brady, R.M.S. Titanic 1912. History via the imagined feelings of people or through the eyes of fictional people was fascinating to me. Writing is my favorite mode of self-expression.
Journaling isn’t solely expression, it’s documentation. It’s history, a personal record. Reading old entries helps to understand self. Journaling is a private place to unburden your mind. Everything doesn’t need to and shouldn’t stay bottled up. “Get a journal” is often tossed out on social media when people overshare. I have to agree. The internet is not a safe place and it’s okay to keep some mystery about yourself. Pouring out thoughts where no one else is meant to see them is cathartic.
Creating a place to note ideas, dreams, and prayers is worth the effort. A record of how long you’ve pondered or toyed with an idea. Ticking off which dreams came true and which evolved over time. The answered prayers and those that were thankfully unanswered. Some prayers, if answered, would have led to ruin. Seeing growth in your own hand or voice is powerful. Seeing how far you’ve come or where you endeavor to return is motivating. It’s a reminder to continue or the light you strive to reach.
Buy a journal, grab a spare notebook, open the Notes app, make a new Word document. Voice memos, anything that works for you. Document your life. Your words, thoughts, wants, needs, desires, feelings. All of it, be able to recall your story for yourself. Living a life is full and if we’re lucky, long. Bullet points of the day, blurbs, keywords. Whatever fits you, I encourage you to do it.
In writing this post, I pulled what I have access to, journals from college to today. 15 years of material. Reading through made me laugh, cringe, and want to scream. I did half-yell into one journal in case younger me, on a different timeline, could hear it and save herself some headaches. Every instance where I should have put myself first was glaring back at me. I knew better and chose to do the opposite. I’m reminded of times when I should have dared to leap. Insecurities around weight and talent have done a number on me for years. I should toss a cord cutting bath back into 2014, free yourself girl.
Through the hard parts I see the consistency of my character. Always loved my friends deeply, always been an introvert, intrinsically motivated, music continues to inspire and heal, agitated by inequities, and have known exactly who I want to be since 2010. I knew then that I needed to stop giving a damn. I held on to my enjoyment of profanity. I can pinpoint the starts of my love for pole, interest in Carnival and soca, and my well documented time in therapy. It’s also been helpful when people I trust let me know what they see in me. I’m always shocked and a bit humbled.
I’ve freed myself from the weird habit of writing as if someone might read my journal and judge me. If I can’t be honest and open with myself what is the point? I know the value of revisiting entries at regular intervals. If I had done so 10 years ago, I may have lived and chosen differently. I’m not upset, that life is for another me to experience. This one is fine and blessedly I have grown. It may only be by the grace of those at the Spirit Party but I am thankful. I get to keep recording the unfolding, uphill trajectory of this life of mine.
