Journaling my way to peace

It’s amazing what happens to your blog once you have something to talk about. All of a sudden there are new worries, new stresses, and new excitement to chronicle for the world to read. Your fingers fly everyday to record for posterity every ache, every thought, and every symptom. What once was a weak attempt to continue writing once a week through the fog of bitterness and defeat, has become an effort in reigning yourself in not to blab the constant state of your bowels and heartburn. (Yea, as if I really edit that out!)

In an age of technology, I think many of us have forgotten the simple things though. Like journaling the old fashioned way. You know, writing to yourself in a small book, way back before we became so narcissistic that we assume EVERYONE wants to read our innermost personal thoughts? I found an almost blank journal on the bookshelves at home. Apparently I had decided two or three years ago to keep a gardening journal. I have started writing in it daily at work to record the most random thoughts, quotes, fears, symptoms etc. It’s rather ugly, like someone’s 80’s wallpaper threw up all over it. I can’t imagine I ever chose it for myself, but I’m a little to thrifty to buy something new (or impatient when I had words ready to bleed across a page, take your pick)

It’s very therapeutic. There is no pressure to make a cohesive sentence or edit my sometimes horrible spelling. I do not have to pretend to be able to make a descriptive sentence full of spelling bee adjectives. It’s just me and my thoughts in a quiet moment of reflection during a hectic day.

Don’t get me wrong, I do end up smearing the blog with some of the same things that fall on those pages. Consider that journal a rough draft of the blog. The point is, it makes me appreciate myself and the simple things in life. It helps me to calm down and breathe.

I’ve never been good at keeping a journal going for long periods of time and I don’t expect to start now. I’ve done them on and off for years both electronically and via paper. I challenge you to spend a week chronicling your thoughts for just yourself though. Not on a blog, not with the intent of it to be read but just for you and then go back and read it at the end of the week.

Are you a person you would want to be around? What would you say to yourself if you read those words on a blog?

Some psychiatrists say that talking to yourself means you’re crazy. I say if you don’t even like talking to yourself, then how can you expect someone else to?