An evolution of self: 3 lessons I've learned from journaling
How turning to the page can offer insight into the workings of time and the mind
I’ve been a daily chronicler of my life for the last six years. (More or less daily — there are decently long stretches I’ve had to go back and recall from memory — but on average, daily’s about right.)
Some would consider it a feat of discipline — or neuroticism. But for me, it’s been a balm for the feverish, itching uncertainty of daily life. I am and have always been a fairly sensitive person. I worry, I feel deeply, I anticipate, I regret, I love. These feelings aren’t unique to me, but they can take up so much energy.
You might think, then, that I first turned to journaling to navigate the emotional landscape of young adulthood — but that’s not quite the case. I started because of a more fundamental craving I have to record, to document, to remember. I found that so much of life rushes past me, that I can only hold so little in my awareness. Experience, if not attended to, fades fast from memory. I can’t stand this reality of the mind.
So, I journaled my days — one by one until they’ve added up to 2,205 days, records stowed away just waiting to be relived. And I’ve learned many little lessons from the habit. The top three are outlined below.
We need a meditative distance from our daily feelings
Our feelings, in the moment they arise, are persistent and nagging and artless. They won’t be silenced or reasoned with; they will only be felt. That’s one of the best lessons I took away from a recent favorite read, Why Buddhism Is True. Author Robert Wright shows us that our feelings simply demand attention — often only to then mislead us and exaggerate. They evolved to get us to do something important, not necessarily to be accurate.
I believe in the value and beauty of feelings, but I know how easily I can be carried away by an anxious thought or a twinge of anger. These feelings are strong and animalistic — sometimes fleeting, sometimes dragged out.
And I’ve found that one of the best ways to navigate them is to write them down and then see them later, when they’ve shrunk and cooled down. It’s astounding how some perspective can take something big and challenging and nameless and strip it down to what it is: a passing feeling with a root cause.
Time is always relentlessly passing
Our perception of time is always changing. As a child, it’s slow. As an adult, it’s fast. In a boring meeting, it’s slow again. The weekend always goes too fast.
But, for humans just living their lives on earth, time is always humming along in the background, shuffling us from one moment to the next — independent of how we feel about it.
This ever-present quality of time is difficult to capture because we quickly forget about it and go back to our days, forgetting how much change and transformation the flow of time brings with it. How could it have been a year since the last time I saw you? Do my parents have a few more gray hairs? It’s these subtle, gradual changes that a journaling habit can tease out.
Through this daily practice, we’re reminded of time’s onward march and our own finite supply of it — which is one of our most needed reminders. As the Stoics say, Memento mori. A sobering way of saying: remember you aren’t here forever.
There is a sheer diversity and beauty to the day-to-day
As life unfolds in the moment, I’m often bogged down by the mundanity of it all. Close up, it all gets obscured, making it difficult to see that each day I carve a path through, the more of my essence I’ve brought into the world.
Yet, when I read back over old entries, I’m able to see all those mundane moments in the larger arc of my life. I see that the person I met briefly and serendipitously that one evening has turned into my closest friend. Those routine grocery shopping trips merge into a nostalgic glow of the time I lived in the city. The job I didn’t enjoy was a stepping stone to something much larger.
It’s the day-to-day moments that make a life — and only from reviewing these moments with a little distance can we form the clearest, truest stories of our lives and their direction.
More on how we lose sight of this awe — and where we can end up without it — next time.
I really enjoyed this. My journaling practice has shifted in the past few years. I used to record the mundane details of my day, but now I record more of my thoughts and feelings. This made me think that I should go back to recording some of those small, seemingly insignificant parts of my day. I love going back and reading those entries.
I've been trying to do this since picking up 'The Artist's Way' and her recommended practice of 'Daily Pages,' which aren't exactly journaling. On the days I can do it, I find it really helps a lot--in terms of both slowing me down (which is good for me) but idea generation.