In college, I took an entry level English class and part of my teacher’s weekly assignment was to have a journal. She didn’t care what we wrote, as long as we wrote something. It was a writing heavy class and we had to do a ton of it. That’s where I got the idea from her that you needed to be writing constantly in order to write well. Journaling was part of that. It wasn’t until after college, however, that I started writing seriously, as a hobby. The housing market was horrible, the job market was horrible, the housing bubble had just burst. I journaled to cope with it all. So I’d write stories and journal on a regular routine. Three years ago, my wife and I had our first daughter and that routine went out of the window. But I still journal when I can. And when I do that stream of consciousness journaling, it’s really about letting all of my bad feelings out so I can clear my mind and figure out what it is that’s really bothering me and what I need to focus on. Usually, when it put it on paper, it seems so much smaller than what it is in my head. That’s what I really like. The sound of the clicking keys, and then seeing just how small the problem really is is therapeutic. From there, I can start to work or find solutions. I can write down something good that happened that day, something I want to hold onto for later. Sometimes I keep my journals. But I usually delete them. It’s a source of therapy. There are a couple of times I can remember specifically where I just opened up a file, wrote a bunch of nasty, angry things filled with obscenities, basically every venting onto paper I could, and then I just deleted it. I just needed to say that and then throw it away and move on. I can get anxious about things. Sometimes, in the morning, it just feels like I wake up and sprint all day. I make sure the kids are ready, I’m ready, I get to work on time without breaking any traffic laws, doing all that, and then making sure I’m killing it at work, and taking care of any project I have on the side. It just feels like there are all these things happening and I have to run just to keep up with it. The journaling is a way to stop, to tell myself that I don’t have to be running, flat out, all of the time. If I journal, I’ll probably find what it is that I need to find mentally. I wish I could say that by journaling the answers to my problems just come to me, but they don’t. It’s just a step in that process. Of course, in my marriage, I’ve been journaling. It helps me focus and define what it is that is bothering me, whenever my wife and I fight, so I can go back to her and say: Okay, look. Here’s how I feel about this. I’m sorry I couldn’t articulate that earlier. It’s a simple habit that’s extremely helpful.
