Does anyone journal?

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Just that really. I love to write and I love a nice notebook but whenever I decide to start a journal I just stare at the page and never know where to begin. The idea of using one feels like it could be cathartic to me. I often feel like my brain is overwhelmed with things to do and remember. I find writing events, appointments etc down in my diary instantly makes me feel better but I guess a journal goes beyond that and is more about emotions rather than practical obligations and reminders.

So if you journal, what do you write? And do you keep all of your journals or get rid of them when they're full? How often do you write?

I do and in German. It was a language exercise at my school, plus my mother could speak German, which I’ve kept going. I also use pen and ink.

If a journal is the same as a diary, I'm 65 and I've kept one every day since I was 18, from 6th form to retirement. I've moved from paper to PC in the last 10 years.

It's been very useful from a practical viewpoint to look back to find out exactly when I broke my arm, bought that sofa, moved house etc. And the cringe factor can be quite amusing in retrospect, barely remembering blokes I was mad about at the time!

Another recommendation for the morning pages from The Artist’s Way. You don’t have to get the book or do the whole thing, just google morning pages and try that.

Although, the whole book is really interesting. I'm doing a chapter every month or two. Dialling it in. No stress.

DH is now on to his second Line a Day diary. It's left in a kitchen drawer so anyone can read it. It's useful to look back on things and seeing connections, such as one of the parties Boris had happened to coincide with Dominic Cummings leaving his post. Really good to read back at the restrictions we were living under at the time, which seem to have been quickly forgotten.

@Crackof Oh, yes, I am a fan. I’ve done it several times and seen incredible outcomes.

I have a bullet journal, so not a really a full emotional account, or even particularly anything interesting but more than a book of appointments and to do.

It tends to run with whatever I want/need at the time. Sometimes there's a gratitude log, mood trackers and chores - interesting to see this year if the mood drops before the chores or the chores before the mood. I put quotes in, and it's often interesting seeing the quotes I put in versus what is happening that week.

Goals go in too, and it's a good tool to reflect on.

I'm not particularly interested in detailing what happened each day and how I felt about it. But I love the planning, reflection and tracking of various things. I suppose it gives me a bit more of an abstract picture of how I was at the time, rather than 'I was miserable on 4th April because I broke my favourite cup'.

I have debated starting a sentence a day book. It might be a good place to start if it's something you wanted to try.

Oh and I'm a massive hoarder. I have all of mine in their various completed states (I drop it for months, then really miss the order it brings and the creative outlet (Instagram bullet journal and you'll see, I'm nowhere that good but function over form, for me))

I might do it again too. Life changes, and it's good to keep tabs!

I did.

On and off from about age 11 to 14-ish.
Then from about age 16-21 I kept one every single day. I haven't looked back at them in 10 years or more though.

My mum has kept a daily diary since the 70s. Just a line or two. Mentions the weather, who she saw that day etc.
My favourite entry is the one announcing my birth. "FullName born at 1:59am weighing 6 pound 6." What's even nicer to me is that it's in my dads handwriting. He NEVER wrote in "the diary", so the fact that he did for that is really sweet to me.
The saddest entry is the day he died unexpectedly. Mum simply wrote "M (my dads initial) died overnight. H (my auntie), H (my sister) + S (me) came."

I do a bullet journal - i find it easier as I really overthink about other people looking at my "diary" so if it is primarily a to do and have done list, it is less emotionally demanding.

What I have done though is get a tiny photo printer and stick in photos of lovely places / seeing friends / interesting sights etc and adding those to the journal so while it looks quite dry "Meet B 8.45, parkrun", with the photo it is the day we went to parkrun in full Christmas Elf gear and it was freezing... I find that also justifies taking some of the pictures as I know I will be using them to look back on, and the two between them trigger loads of memories.