20 Years of Journaling

Last night, I started my first attempt at bullet journaling. It isn’t as pretty as all the salivating bullet journal pictures I see on Instagram, but it served my purpose of neatly capturing all I achieved, learnt, wanted to do and many other things for the day in a single page. At that instant, I realised, I had started journaling when I was around 10 or 11 years old. I got my first notebook as a gift from my father when I was in the fifth grade. I don’t know what gave him the idea to gift me one, but I have to say, it was the best gift and idea for a parent to give to a child, since this has remained with me so far in my life and has helped me a lot too.

Back then, I used to call it a Diary. I still have different kinds of notebooks from my childhood diary writing days, at my parents place. I used to write down about all my favorite days, fights that I had with my friends but couldn’t tell anyone about, my secret crushes, my dreams, and so many other things. Now, the diary has evolved, and although it is still very personal to me, it contains less secrets and more memories and to-do lists or self motivating pointers, and is now called a journal 🙂 However, now and then, I still do note down or write a few entries about things that have caused me a lot of sorrow, or things that I can’t understand. I have realised, writing about the good stuff makes me cherish the good memories years later, and writing about the bad stuff, makes me deal with circumstances much better.

So over the years, this has been my diary/journal writing story:

1. I started with a plain school notebook when I was in 5th grade, wrapped it up with a gift wrapping paper that I found in a store with clouds in it, and then used glitter pen to write my name in it, which said, Prachi’s Diary..lol (I wish I had a picture to show you guys) 😀
2. Over the years, from school to college, I used actual dated diaries, to write about my diary entires- these were more what I did in a day kind of entries really. Make for amazing stories every time I read them now..lol!
3. I had a period of hiatus when I started working, because life had suddenly become a routine of working and partying and socializing and dating..and I just ignored my best friend and my diary for a really long while
4. Then, I got married, and really struggled the first few years of my marriage. It was a big change for me, and something I couldn’t talk about or complain about to my normal friends or family, since my issues didn’t make sense to most people. I started writing again. I poured open my heart, my issues, my complaints. But this time, it was the online media. I have one blog (this one), which is shared with everyone. And I have another private blog, that I use as my diary. Sometimes, I need to vent, to rant, to complain, and writing on paper is harder these days. So the online version of my diary/journal has helped me a lot, to write, and then analyse and cope with my problems.
5. These days, I use another simple notebook to sometimes write on paper when I feel like, and I have just started to try out bullet journaling. I am trying to track my exercise and diet mainly, along with what I’m reading, my sleep habits, things I liked or didn’t like that particular day. It’s in a very beta stage right now, but here is a snapshot of what my first entry looks like 🙂
6. In addition, I have also downloaded a book journal, from Modern Mrs. Darcy’s book journaling class session, and I am just trying to put it together, so I can start using it- and I am really excited about it!

I hope I get to continue with my journaling habits forever, and I hope I can gain a lot more from my reading life, via the book journal as well! I will write an updated post on my book journal, as soon I have finished putting it together and have updated some pages:) Can’t wait! I’d love to hear your comments on your experiences journaling or diary writing and what you use for a journal. Do you keep a common journal to track reading and normal life goals, or separate ones? What time do you update your journals generally?