A journal is different from a diary, and is simply a record (kept regularly, but not necessarily daily) of your thoughts and reflections.  How do you go about keeping a journal, and why would you do so?  Read on to find out more.

Firstly, what are the benefits of a journal?  It is a tool for reflection and ordering your thoughts.  Most people don’t ever look at themselves and why they behave in a particular way, then wonder why they seem to be stuck with the same issues and the same bottlenecks.  When you consciously reflect on your thoughts and feelings and record that in a journal, it helps you to make sense of them and move onwards.

You can also record business ideas or plans in a journal.  I read somewhere that the average person has two ideas a year that if planned and implemented properly would make them a millionaire.  Clearly, writing them down and doing some initial planning is an important first step.

A journal needs to be private.  It is a place for personal thoughts and reflections, not for public review and analysis of your life.  So Facebook and Twitter are not suitable substitutes for a journal, and neither is maintaining a public blog (such as this one), although they have their place too.

Most people will just write a few sentences, some others find drawing a diagram or even a picture a more useful approach.

What tools can you use to keep a journal?

The obvious one is a small notebook, like the Moleskine series.  These have an inside pocket, a marker band that lets you go straight to the page you want and lightly lined paper.  Many journal writers find the texture of the paper very important and also prefer to write with a fountain pen, as these flow easily over the paper.  The notebooks can be retained and become a legacy of your thoughts and feelings.

Another approach is to simply record your thoughts in a Word document, or similar program.  It is a familiar tool for most people and you can also password protect it to keep it private.

WordPress allows you to enter postings, which you can keep private (although the default is to publish everything publicly).  This is an open source tool and you can even install it standalone on your desktop computer.

Whichever way you record your journal, the important thing is that you honestly and introspectively record your thoughts, impressions and ideas so that you can make sense of them and grow as a person.

Tags: how to regain your freedom, Self-actualization, subversive

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 28th, 2010 at 12:11 pm and is filed under Daily subversive tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.