Journals

Saturday, December 14, 2013
















Keeping a journal has been something I've done since I learned to write. I'll write anything in my notebook of the moment - what I did that day, why I'm mad at the world (a frequent topic from age 14-16), what I want to do with my life, where I want to travel, a nice song I heard on the radio, a moment of nostalgia - pretty much anything and everything goes into the pages.
Every so often I like to look at my journals. Flipping through them is a lot of things - humbling, embarassing (most of the time), laugh-inducing - realizing how ridiculous I can be and how I blow things out of proportion so often. I think keeping journals is one of the best ways to grow as a person, not to mention it's a good way to keep track of moments in your life you might otherwise forget! You're not likely to forget the big things like graduation, huge trips, new crushes, breakups.. but you might forget what you did one random Thursday afternoon in 2005. It's nice to have something to remind you of the little things you experienced and went through!
As you can see, my first journal is from 1996, I was just a tiny smidge of a six year old. I desperately wanted to be able to write like an adult, and the entries from that little red and black journal are full of hilarious attempts at doing this. I'd put random quotation marks around letters and use semi-colons in the middle of words. My friend Felicia moved away when I was in the eighth grade and for ages we sent journals back and forth to each other every few weeks. The green one down on the bottom is one of the ones we sent. I love that one because it has some of me and some of her in it, and we were ridiculously funny at the time (I might be a bit biased but I still laugh at some of the things we wrote).
Every so often I forget to write in my journal for a period of time, and I know how cliche it sounds but when I start up again I feel so much better. It is, like everyone says, therapeutic to write down all your thoughts and ideas, the things that have happened to you and the things you hope and want to happen. Do you guys keep journals? I'm not sure I'll ever stop writing in one.

No Comments Yet, Leave Yours!

Katie said...

How wonderful that you kept these. I have always written a diary but I am not a hoarder and therefore haven't got the ones from when I was young. It makes me sad.

Unknown said...

Amazing! I have all my old diaries and I did a very similar blog post on it (great minds!). It brings out a mixture of feelings doesn't it: sheer embarrassement/joy/sadness.

I have to admit, reading mine made me so happy that I'm where I am now! I wouldn't go back to being at school in a million years!

Caroline x
Cocktails and Caroline

Unknown said...

Wow, thats such a great memory to have with you, all those journals! I only really journalled when I went on trips, and one of those I only managed to keep up for 2 days! I wish I had kept a journal though!

Unknown said...

Oh my! This is absolutely brilliant!It is amazing that you still have the one from when you were 6!! I have always had a journal of sorts and reading through the ones from ages past make me chuckle at my forever changing handwriting and cringe so hard that I contemplate burning all of them :)
I am so glad I have found your blog (via Cider With Rosie). Had a nosy peek at some of your other posts- your photos are so good btw!- and I love 'em.

Mo x

Lisa Barton said...

I too had journals from around age 9 until I was in my twenties - each year my parents would gift me a "love is .. " diary which they would then proceed to read! When I married in my mid 20's my husband threw them all away when I was out saying I didnt need them anymore - needless to say that marrriage didnt last and all my written memories were lost. Now in my mid 40's I keep a one line a day diary as well as Project Life which I do mainly for posterity for my 4 young daughters :)

Petra said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Petra said...

Laughed so much at the "what I'm mad at the world at" part. I went through some memory boxes a few days ago since we're moving next month and I came across my old journals and notebooks we used to write in with friends. It almost hurt to re-read them! :D Oh the anger, the drama, the boys... :DD Oh the teenage years -so glad that's over! :D

Unknown said...

Good god, it's not that often that I'm inspired by a blog post but this one has definitely inspired me! I love how you've added little things in your journals like tickets and pamphlets etc and you've now inspired me to get my butt to the shops tomorrow and buy a journal to write in! Thank you for that :) x

http://a-city-girls-thoughts.blogspot.be/

Unknown said...

I'm so inspired by this, thank you! I feel so stressed out at the moment as was looking for the perfect way to de-stress and looks as though i have found my answer. I'm obsessed with notebooks and have about 10 in my collection. I know what to fill them with now. Thank you! x

www.themondaygirl.com