Journaling

I believe everyone should keep a journal. I can pull out a journal from 30 years ago ... or more ... read an entry and one of two things happens:

1. A whole flood of memories return that would otherwise be totally forgotten.
2. Or I scratch my head and say, I do not remember this at all.

No. 2 occurs much less often than No. 1.

There are many types of journals:

Daily happenings
Random thoughts
Prayer journal
Sermon journal
Poetry journal
Travel journal
Books read journal
Family journal .............. we are limited only by our own imagination.

There are people who keep a number of journals, each one a specific topic and they write in them on those occasions when something fits that specific journal.

One of my great grandfathers fought with the 25th Wisconsin Infantry in the Civil War. I really wish he had kept a journal.

I also believe everyone should write their memoirs, not so much for themselves, but for their children and grandchildren and ......................

 

I never got into journaling. It just does not appeal to me.

 

I don't like journaling. I was glad to learn that Jesus never journaled. :smilewinkgrin:

 

I used to journal, but then I got married, had kids, and the internet was invented. No more time to journal!

 

I will leave the diary keeping to my wife.

 

Yes, I have a daily prayer journal and will write down imporant notes as needed.

I use a simple moleskin that I keep on my desk at my study. I just keep it present as I conduct my daily disciplines. For me I just started doing it and found that it was too important for me to keep out of my regular routine. So its just there and part of it, like brushing your teeth.

Collins' in Good to Great talks about the principle of the flywheel. It takes a lot to get a flywheel going but once it has momentum you only need to hit a couple of times to keep it rolling. Journaling, for me, has been like that.

The prayer side is a daily thing, the occassional notes are occassional.

 

Journals and diaries are two different things and should not be confused.

 

Journal = Diary
Democrat = Marxist

Some folks have no sense of gradation.

 

I don't, but now that I am older I wish I would have done so.

 

I do. The important thing is that you just have to be disciplined to keep at it.

Journaling helps me track where i was spiritually and what I am learning. I wll leave them to my family who will certainly throw them away!

 

Just put my 9th annual journal on the shelf. I journal daily with a key thought from my devotions, and brief capsule of the day, and the weather in the morning.

I wish I had started 40 years ago instead of 10.

 

Most of my journals consist of daily thoughts that may have become sermons. Early on, they were about church life and what happened.

To-day, they are mostly prayer journals, but I do include fresh spiritual thoughts. Now that my short-term memory suffers from my strokes, the journal becomes exceedingly important on a daily basis. Also, the reason for that daily exercise at five each morning.

Cheers,

Jim

 

I did journal for a while as a teen but someone found it, read it and then cruelly made fun of me so I keep my thoughts to myself now and don't trust anything so private to paper. Nowadays my journal is a reminder of my husband's dr and hospital appointments and peoples' birthdays.

 

Since I don't have a life, don't do anything or go anywhere, I have nothing to journal about.

 

You can do a prayer journal, or a journal recording things you learn as you read the Bible.

 

we are called on to remember what God has done. That's an admonition I have often fallen short on.

It helps me not forget what God has done.

(Not to mention, it makes for some good Bible study illustrations from time to time )

 

I used to up until a couple of years ago. Not really sure why I stopped, I just did.

Every now and then when looking for something in a storage box I'll run across one of my journal notebooks and I'll look at a few entries. I'll read about some of the things I did about 10 years or so ago and wonder, "what on earth was I thinking when I did that?" It can be a good trip down memory lane or a bad trip, depending on what page I turn to LOL.