Thoughts...ideas...tension

I found this in a Jane Davenport drawing book "Beautiful Faces"  It's SO true!

What to put in your journal...

What shall I write about today? That is the eternal question a Journal Keeper has when they open their journal to write...

I almost always start by recording the events in my day. If it's in the morning, I write about the day before. If it's at night I write about that day's happenings. I usually just make a list of the things that happened. It primes the pump and I like looking back on my daily parade of events and how it's changed over the years. Some year, if I have Alzheimers, I will reread it like a really good story book...Maybe.

Sometime during the writing, or after the writing of my list of things though, I ponder and reflect on different aspects of my day. I don't just make a list - I embellish the list with:

• observations about my day or the people in my day
• insights about what I read or studied
• memories that I've been reminded about as I saw things that reminded me of yesteryear
• impressions of people, places, things I saw
• feelings about events and interactions
• plans to remember for down the road
• analysis of why things went the way they did
• dreams of how my life could be better and how I will try to make it so...
• hopes for the future
• failures - "what the heck?" moments!
• successes - "WOW - that was God!" moments
• happy, funny times - like the time when Hudson said... or when Lyla did...
• and sad times - including tears - there are more tear stained pages than I would like to recall...

I pick one or two off the above list.... I don't write for 3 hours a day LOL. Capture your most important ponderings...

Journaling is more than a "bed-to-bed" list. It's alive with all my further thoughts on the day and reactions to events I want to remember...

What do YOU think???

Memories...

OH! Remember the day that happened????

Nothing is more fun than sharing memories with my sisters or my dad of when we grew up. Childhood memories are the only things holding us together these days it seems. Our families are growing and we are busier than ever. Our locations have changed over the years and the once a year family gathering doesn't always include all of us. So the times when we can get together I usually try to turn the talk to memories of some kind. The ties that bind...

My Grandpa kept a diary all his life. It was usually a little tiny Moleskine notebook - one each year-  with space for like 2 lines for each day!  Earlier diaries had a two-page spread and you had to squeeze all your words into little tiny lines... No room for extra thinking there! Later notebooks had a page for each day. The writing is cryptic with lots of initials to decode but even the little bit he wrote each day is a treasure to me.

Grandpa's diaries - one for each year

1945 Diary - one page spread per week!

I recently looked up my birthdate in Grandpa's diary for 1957 - there you now know how old I am!
Heartwarming to read about that day according to my Grandpa...

"R (my dad) came at 4.10 (that's a.m.) to announce arrival of Debbie Ruth (me) at 2:30. Up 7. to Sc as usual. We went to P.C. (port credit) P.O. (post office) & A&P (grocery store) shopping. Home & spreading manure till noon. After lunch had sleep on patio in sun. Ada went to hosp. to see Pat & the new baby. I spread more manure then over to Sc for usual work. Ada joined me & did washing. After supper we went to Hassell & got some plants. Took Elwood home. Got more plants at greenhouse by W's. then to Lundgreens for some more. Found S fam. had been here while we were out. Ada (Grandma) phone D. re baby. Lil Wright & Marjorie Dudgeon here for nearly an hour. Reading. Bed 11:50.

Fair warmer."




Can't imagine my kids being so excited about their firstborn that they woke me up at 4:30 a.m. to tell me! It's so nice my Grandpa captured that and that I can "see" that excitement of my dad - all these years later. My Grandma visited my mom every day in the hospital and many days after I was home too. My mom's mother had passed away a few years before. I was not Grandma's first grandbaby. She had MANY by then, but she went over and helped my mom out - and probably held me and fed me on those visits. Awww.... I feel loved even now.

Even though he only wrote a little bit each day, there's a lifetime of memories I can read years later.

When I started writing in my journal I only wrote about MY events. I try to include more details since I read Grandpa's diaries. There are so many questions I ask my dad or ones I wish I could ask Grandpa. And, after reading a few of Grandpa's journals I started writing about what all the members of my family happened to be doing that day. And sometimes I will include photos in my computer journal.  My life is not just about me but it's also about my family and my interactions with them. Maybe they'll be like me and will love to read and recall the days we did this or that. Will like to read about their Grandparents in my journal and their cousins or their friends of long ago?

I've missed a lot of those things from their very early years but I'm trying to catch them now - because I know how valuable my Grandpa's memories are to me... I hope my memories and family stories will be valued by my kids down the road...

What about you? Are you writing with a mind that someone down the road might WANT to read about your daily events and get to know you in a way they could never have known you in person? Will you tell the family stories in your journal? Have you got some family stories that are precious that need to be remembered?

Types of Journals - Writer's Notebook

Do you love to write? Then a Writer's Notebook / Journal is for you!

A writer's notebook is a special kind of journal. You write things down as you learn them - or as you think up an idea - or as you do research for your writing. There is no end to the possible things to include in your writer's notebook. It's a tool for learning, for practicing and for exploring ideas.

Grab yourself a writing instruction book and take notes of writing ideas you come up with as you read it.

Read the newspaper and cut out articles that give you ideas for a novel or give you statistics you might need for your non-fiction book. Even cutting out and pasting in good titles can help you learn to formulate your own.

Take a few minutes and explore your topic with mind-maps. Put a word or topic in the center of your page. Quickly brainstorm more words and topics that come to mind and link them with lines - like spokes on a wheel. Keep on coming up with more ideas and words until you have exhausted every possible thought related to your topic. You may be surprised at where your thoughts take you. Your brain loves to play games like this...this thought is connected to that thought and oh I remember this memory and that game...and so on and so on...You can also draw little pictures if you like.

Cut out a picture from a magazine and use it as a writing prompt. Make up a story.

Copy passages from your favorite authors novel. Look for great examples of description, settings, and turns of phrase.

Make lists of books you want to read or books you have read and write your thoughts about them, about the writing style and what you notice about how your favourite author writes. Study the greats!

Record snippets of conversation you overhear in a coffee shop or a line up.

Make lists of your favourite words, your favourite character names and whatever else you can  think of to add.

List titles you come up with for your next great novel.

List ideas of topics you want to know more about.
Research recipes they might have made in the 1800's or things you learn about shipbuilding - anything that you might need to know to write your book or articles for magazines.

List all the things you know about. What are you an expert at? Write it down and find a place to write an article to share all you know about....

Keep track of publishers you might want to submit to.
If you find out the editor's name of your favorite magazine, make a note of their contact information.

Use your writer's journal to collect any and all ideas that might be of any use at all to your future "magnum opus"

Here are the sections I have in my Writer's Journal right now:
To Do
A section for the writing course I 'm working on
Quotes
Article ideas
Book ideas
Life stories
Family stories
Research
Blog ideas
Social Media ideas
Creative Writing ideas
Publishing - a list of places I could submit articles to
Authors to follow
Books to read - and notes on books I read
Grammar - at the end because I don't want to look at that until the end but I keep checklists for editing and the rules for the things I get wrong all the time, and words I tend to misspell - mispell- miss spell?

Have fun with this. Add to it every day. Practice writing.

What else can you think of to add to your writer's journal? Have you read any good books that would help new writer's get started keeping their own writer's journal?
Please share below!

A season of new growth...

It's spring! It's spring! The birds are throwing seeds out of the bird feeder for the squirrels. The dog wants out every 10 minutes to chase said squirrels. (At least he's getting his exercise!) And I'm taking photos and sketching, trying to get to the studio to paint and taking long walks by the river with my hubby instead...

And you... how are you doing?

Recently I was doing a review of my goals - a little bit late this month - and I did some journaling in that process. I thought I'd write and tell you how I use my journal to track progress and design a path of growth for myself personally, in relationships and in my business.

At the beginning of the year I sat down for several days with my journal and some other notebooks and set some goals for myself.I wrote them all down and outlined my plans for making them happen. One of those goals was to track my painting more carefully through this year. Another was to enter ALL the local art shows I could and a couple that were further afield. So this month I have been busy painting to meet those goals.

Every three months I have marked on my calendar to review those goals and see just how I'm doing and what course corrections I need to make.

When I actually got around to doing this in April, I took myself out for a date at a local coffee shop with my notebooks in a tote bag and started to write down all the things that happened in March first. Just a list of accomplishments, events and things that went well. Then I noted some things that didn't go well and then I wrote about why and what happened (briefly) to stop me in my tracks.

Then I looked back over the pages I wrote in Jan and February. I was a bit surprised at all the things that have happened since the beginning of the year. In spite of being sick for 4 weeks in the middle of that time, I still got a lot done! And I AM making progress toward those goals I set . That made me feel great!

I think we tend to forget the good and we remember too much of the 'not so good'. Why do our brains do that???  It's good to look back and remind ourselves of our progress and collect the GOOD memories in our journals!

After reviewing my goals again, I wrote down what I needed to do in the next 3 months to work towards them for the next three months. There are areas of my house and areas of my business that need to be more organized so I made lists of things to do to bring that about. There are relationships I want to keep working on as a regular thing - my kids, my grandkids and my friends. I thought about things I might do with them or for them in the next little while so I'm consciously building and maintaining with those people who are very important in my life. Being purposeful...not just letting it drift.

Then I looked ahead to my year. There are some things now coming up in the fall that I need to prepare for today. There are some goals I let slip because I was much busier than I had thought I would be and I made adjustments to those long term plans. I always seem to bite off more than I can chew. At least there's forward motion! That's the aim. Plan for growth. Plan to accomplish stuff. Plan to be... what I know God wants me to be.

It's all about tracking what you've done, and then planning where you're headed for. I think a lot of journal keepers are planners like this - or wish to be!

There are all kinds of things we track in life. When I was a little girl we tracked our height on a doorpost to measure and see in black and white how much we had grown. And in our journals, we can still keep track of how much we've grown. You are also able to design a path of growth for yourself
- not just physically (although a weight loss journal is good!) but also as a way to keep in front of your eyes those written down goals and ideas for things to achieve and aim for in all the other areas of life too.

Here are some examples of practical things to track in your journal:

Books you have read. Write about them and what you thought after reading them
Make a page for recording decisions you have made - why you made them and then draw up a chart to measure your stick-to-it-ivness.
Every month have a sit down with yourself (in a nice coffee shop :-) ) and record your goals.
Measure how you are doing with monthly or weekly checkups. Reset your course accordingly.
Make a template on a sticky note with questions to answer on each day's journal page - especially if you're trying to break or remain proactive about habits you want to change or to add.

Keeping a journal is a great way to look back from time to time to see how far have you come. In art after a person has been painting for a good part of their lifetime, they will have a retrospective show that shows their favourite paintings. You will see the key paintings in their life that showed them new growth in skill or genre or subject matter. You will see the paintings that meant the most to them.

If it's important to you, include it in your journal. It's your own personal "Retrospective."