KEEP A F*CKING JOURNAL
For some, this one is going to sound like a waste of time or like I’m trying to get you to write your deepest special secrets in your little pink diary with a tiny lock on it. This is neither. And hey, if you want a pink diary, you go for it. You’ll get no judgment from me. Do what makes you happy.
I’m talking about giving yourself a chance to let the swarm of wasps that is our general daily consciousness out of its irritated brain-hive.
We often think too much and yet, not enough. We dwell on the minutia of the day, what we’ll do or who we’ll be tomorrow, what’s next on our calendar, how we’re too fat or too skinny, or just how fucked up the world seems to be. But when it comes to things that truly matter, our loved ones, our health, our happiness, our real goals in life, we let those slip away because they’re for later when we have more time or more energy. Yeah, that day isn’t coming. You have to make time now by filtering out the unnecessaries.
When you write in a journal, you give yourself a sounding board, someone you can trust with anything: yourself. It’s not about writing down that you had a sandwich at 12:37 PM. It’s about writing meaningfully to yourself as a friend to unload your troubles and find solutions to your own problems. It’s also a chance to truly clear your head.
When I journal, I feel like my own therapist. Most of the time, I don’t have a clue what I’m going to write when I sit down, but by the end of it, maybe 500 words or so later, the journal version of me has figured out what’s going through my head and has a game-plan to move forward.
If I feel stressed but don’t realize why, writing it out makes it real, makes it tangible, makes it something I can wrap my head around and actually repair like a mechanic fixes a car. They say “two heads are better than one” and it’s true. You just happen to be both heads.
It doesn’t matter if you like writing in a paper journal or prefer typing on a computer. The key is just to get your thoughts out of your head and onto paper. It doesn’t have to be pretty or use proper grammar or even use punctuation. No one is going to read that shit but you and nine times out of ten, you probably won’t read it again either. You just need the takeaway: that thing you figured out from each entry. If you wrote that you weren’t spending enough time with your family and promised yourself to do better, that’s what’s important. That was the gift journal-you just handed you wrapped in self-discovery. Listen to it.
Keep your journal safe. It shouldn’t just be a collection of bad things you say about people, but at the same time, it needs to be something you can trust to stay private. Journaling software that requires a password is your best bet. Those old journals with locks were a little too easy to pick as many siblings can attest to. You just need to trust that no one else will read it so you’re not filtering what you say. You won’t see any real benefits if you’re not being honest because you’re afraid of peeping eyes. Some people even write the entry and then burn the paper or delete the document. It’s your journal, it’s your call.
“Just get that shit out of your head and let your conscience be your guide.”
— Paraphrased from Jiminy Cricket
