don't just think about it
When I was a little girl I always wanted to keep a journal. ‘Little’ in this case quite literally means little - I think I was 5 or 6 when I started having thoughts that were too big for my head and needed to be put on paper. Everyone knew I loved to write and read, and I would often receive beautiful new notebooks for birthdays and for Christmas. They were so nice and special that I would be nervous to 'mess them up', so I would delay writing in them as long as possible.
Once I eventually gave in to the pull of fresh pages, I would get in the habit of writing daily or weekly for a while and then just forget, or intentionally put off writing. After a considerable amount of time had passed since the last entry, I would treat the notebook with disdain and refuse to write in it ever again. It was tainted. It was a reminder of my failure in my commitment to myself, a physical embodiment of laziness, the character trait I always despised the most.
Even still, in my parents’ home there are boxes of quarter-filled notebooks with a few sentences scratched on a few pages. There’s something in me that can’t seem to get rid of them, these odd relics of a childhood that has now passed by. When I read them now, I treasure how imperfect a lot of these entries are. I have a full page on the first party I ever went to in high school. A word for word recount of an argument my friends had at a 10th birthday party. A journal entry on how nervous I was the night before I started grade 9. When I look at these notebooks now, I see that I journaled the moments that mattered the most to me in my life. I didn’t care about writing down the mundane. I spent a lot of my school days being bored to tears, so maybe the blank pages are a good representation of what those years of my life felt like. I wish I could have written more. I wish I could have seen the blank pages as a challenge and not a moral failure, that I could have picked up the pen and written more about all the things that happened in my life then.
Sometime over the last few years, it's like a switch has flipped in my head. I got over those terrible feelings and started writing without any internal expectations. Writing for the sake of writing. Maybe I just needed to grow up a bit? I’m very proud of myself this year because I think I can finally say that I’ve picked up the habit of journaling and stuck with it throughout a full year. In May 2023 I began writing in a small Moleskin journal. I finished that one. I picked up another one in September 2023. I finished that one. And now I’ve got a full-size Moleskin, that I throw in every bag and write in multiple times a week. It’s also where I’ve written the first drafts of nearly all these blog posts, and so many pros and cons lists about practically every decision I’ve ever made. Some of it is painfully mundane. But I am infinitely glad to have stopped thinking about journaling and actually started doing it.
Nothing is always better than something. I’m learning to do things imperfectly. It’s hard, because I’ve always been hard on myself. But I think I find that none of my habits have been as rewarding as journaling. I love having time to write. I love that I always feel better after writing. I love that if I need to take a week or two off from journaling, I can jump right back without any negative thoughts. I love that I have a habit that I stuck with and that allows me to get off my phone!
My tips and tricks on journaling
Pick a journal you like the feeling of, but also one that is portable. My first completed notebook was a pocket sized 9x14cm Moleskin. It was the size of my wallet and also had the added bonus of actually fitting into pockets on clothing. I needed it to be small so I had no excuse to leave it at home, even when I wasn’t bringing a purse with me. Once I had that habit done, I sized up to a larger notebook, which I can still squish into the oversized pockets on my winter coat. I also picked a pen that I liked my handwriting in - Muji’s 0.38 pen in black ink. Another thing, use your journal for everything, lists and movie reviews and things that you need to remember for later. Whip it out to write in it instead of looking at your phone in a waiting room. Write in it as you sit at a restaurant alone.
No context things I wrote down this year
As we pass through the weird part of the end of the year where the days all blend into one, I thought I’d share a few excerpts from my journals as I've been re-reading them. Bits and pieces of what I was processing in 2024. Things I thought about and people I saw.
February 5th
Yesterday on the drive to Lena's I saw a white Mazda with five differently coloured pigeons in back window, flying around. Extremely strange to see. Maybe there is magic in the world.
March 4th
Who do I become when I decide I don't have to save the world? Who do I become when I realize it is still my responsibility to try?
March 19th
When things get overwhelming, I listen to Pharaoh Sanders and try to spot all the love that is everywhere. Today, there are two mom friends with their babies talking to each other happily and baristas who are excited to see each other and a family touring a nearby university with their daughter and just lots of people really holding on to one another. Life can never be too heavy when you remember the love that is all around. That's the point. That's the whole point.
May 20th
I really like the person I am becoming. That’s a hard thing to say but I am becoming more convinced that it is true. I’m not suffering. I’m finding meaning in so many things. Everything is so improbable and yet we persist.
June 3rd
A brilliant Monday, exciting in the way that Mondays are promising and not depressing or dark like Mondays can otherwise be. I’m sitting on this bench under a tree on a day that’s getting better by the hour. Remember how the sun felt today whenever you get too cold. Remember the beauty of its light.
August 1st
I stole this from a tweet: “You will continue to be crushed by the weight of both your ambition and your inadequacy until you choose to address at least one”
August 5th
I’m eating my first real meal of the day at the only place open in the entire town - a Chinese restaurant. Similar to American Waffle Houses, I think Chinese-Canadian restaurants will be some of the last institutions standing when the world all falls apart. How am I here again? No beer sadly, as I probably would have had one - I’ll save that for a later day. Here I am now, but on the other side of the world there’s a war and the Japanese stock market has crashed. Destruction and chaos while I sit in a town I don’t belong in. The world keeps spinning and I want to live a remarkable life. I think I am already living one.
October 8th
Your anxiety will send you to an early grave. Get a handle on it before it shreds your insides even more than it already has.
October 19th
God, I am lucky to have wonderful people in my life. We laugh. We know how good we have it. Life goes on.
October 21st
We are in a leadership crisis. No one is engaging. Voters are apathetic. What will take for us to have someone to believe in again?
October 27th
One thing to be hopeful for - the darkness of the days might make it easier to focus on myself. To figure out where I’m going. To a larger extent, I know I need to learn how to go alone. Do you remember what it is like to feel creative?
November 2nd
Until we learn to love each other we are spiralling towards disaster. Until we learn to love the most heinous parts of others and ourselves, we will die of isolation and boredom. Love can’t save us all though - are we not also obligated to act? To look up and cultivate community? You must reclaim power by working in harmony with others. Too many people are screaming for a world that doesn’t exist yet. Others have been tricked into contentment.
November 23rd
On the Lower East Side, at night, a beautiful old brownstone house. Through the translucent curtains, a parent holding and moving with their newborn baby. The quality of light so golden and illuminated, we stopped on the street corner and stared.
Reader - thank you for being here. I'd like to think that I'm not just thinking about writing anymore, I'm actually doing it.
love n hugs,
sam
Special thanks: to Liz, who has kept an imperfect journal for over a decade. Your small sprawling notebooks with writing going every which way, covered in so many different things, were my first inspiration to start writing for my own sake.
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