Last night I spent a good amount of time reading through a couple old journals of mine. I’ve kept a journal since…hmm…maybe 4th grade? Can’t say for sure, but a long time.
I used to write copious amounts in my journals. Blah blah blahing about anything and everything. I still keep a journal, but entries are much shorter now; usually just one brief page. And I’m okay with that. It’s much more quality over quantity these days. I’d say one page of my current journal says more than a weeks worth of entries in my 6th grade diary.
Speaking of diaries, I was reading the other day about the difference between diaries and journals. Not something I had really thought about, but an important distinction in some contexts. I’ve pretty much always referred to my personal notebook as my journal. Diary sounds dumb. Anyways, the distinction made in whatever it was I was reading was that a diary is a record of events, whereas a journal is a record of thoughts (oftentimes about those events).
Now I’m wondering what it would be like to keep a diary. An actual record of what I do each day. Not like “Woke up. Showered. Drank coffee. Scanned facebook.” But a memory of important moments. I remember a brief span of time–probably a week–where my goal in my journal was to record a moment in time from the day. Just a simple moment that I thought would be good to hold onto. The point was to give me something worthwhile to jot down, but also to be a touch more aware of my day in reflection, to appreciate the moments more. Maybe I’ll try that again.
