My favorite WRITING journals?

Personal preferences, and you should try several to find yours.

I like grids or dots best, or blank.
Must take fountain pens… though some bleed can be tolerated — I use fat juicy pens!
I want it big enough to write a lot in, but not too big.
MUST. LAY. FLAT.
I like bound journals, but not essential.
I like a pockets in a journal, though I can add my own.
I like sturdy closures of some sort.

These red/grey/black Cadic or Okina journals
(above and at the end of Daily Journal, 2) are still my favorite journals.
After trying out several new journals I am going back to them once
I get through some of the others I have bought.
Their size is a bit bigger than the 5×8 (A5 in a Dingbat above) — 7×10 (a true B5).
OE or OKINA NOTEBOOKS (also known as CADIC) can be bought at WetPaint.
Flax may carry them in-store, or contact Bud Felson bud@okinasales.com 505-310-3746

I’ve tried a few journals this year, and other than my
Hahnemühle Nostalgie Sketchbook and Hahnemühle Watercolour Journal,
I’ve only found a couple that meet even half my needs.

I’ve enjoyed Dingbat Journals, but like the little bit bigger size of a true B5.
If I was not going back to Cadic I’d buy more of them.
I wish they had a few more nice colors, but I love that they are environmentally friendly.

And while Archer and Olive makes a beautiful journal, they are just not my cup of tea.
I am using the ones I have for special projects…

I think finding a journal you like is important,
may not be able to be put into words.

Get over that “i’m-not-worthy” feeling of
having a beautiful or wonderful journal
and you don’t have the right or best words to put in it…

What do I do if I start a journal and HATE it?
I repurpose it.  I do not ruin my writing for several months with the dang thing.
I mean more to me than that.
Sometimes it goes into our finish room or some such place for note-taking
(minus my person pages!)

WHERE do I journal?

I like a good spot to journal…
wow my mind immediately
went to the ocean.  But then it would, beachgurl that I am!
Most times it is in bed before
the day starts, or at its end.
Fewer chance of interruptions.
If I am not moved to journal, which is rare, I do it anyway.
I take 15 minutes at beginning
and end of the day and give it a go.
I have a Post-it list of things
to write about at the back but I rarely use it.  I also like to have a clean creative place to journal — and so my painting desk is often a journaling spot in our studio, but…

Never ever at my business desk.  Too distracting.

I also like coffeehouses.  I stay away from bakeries, too tempting.

Also, if I go to a coffee house or travel that is the only time my journal
leaves my home… I really don’t want to lose it.
That is just me.  Toooooo much information in that journal.

You feeling like yours might be read?

I’m not talking about a kid,
or if you live with roommates and peeps come and go.
By all means, in those cases, lock it up.
But I know if I had to worry about my mate not respecting my privacy
I’d have to take another look at my mate!
I personally (not saying you have to be this way) don’t care if Mitchell reads mine
but if I asked him not to he would not… trust is important in mates.

I think it is important that you do not have to edit what you write in your journal.

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Continuing from Daily Journal, 1…

Okay Okay Okay, what if
I am not dealing with crap?
What about other things to write about?

A calendar of our business dealings.

I had a dated paginated desk calendar my whole life and I hated two things:
1) pages left blank (wasted) because nothing much happened;
2) If I had a lot to say even business-wise there was not enough space.

This year (gads why did it take me so long) I ditched my calendar and picked up a journal, above, and made my own. Date and day at the top, for fun I get to do inky pleasures.
I have a calendar for futuring dates on my computer/phone so no need for that here.

I LOVE IT.

Because our business is OURS I use the same journal to jot down
what I worked on as I do to write my personal issues.
Everything in one place, love life to a stitch pattern or paint formula…

I would not do that if I worked for someone else or had to share with colleagues!

I use it to lift my spirits.
I have had serious depression (past) and fight it sometimes NOW.
Having a place to do gratitude daily and/or write things that
uplift or guide me is a huge part of my journal.
Above, I noticed how our happiest cat attacks the day…
when nobody will play with her she grabs her ball and heads for the hallway!
And a quote from May Sarton, favorite writer, from “Journal of a Solitude.”.

Memories, current and past.
Mitchell and I trying inks in my journal at the Pelikan gathering…
Spilled ink on memories of food shopping at PSU…
Hearing gunshots in Portland reminded me of the day my college boyfriend and I had a bullet come through the window in our Ralphael Soriano apartment…
Andrea sent me a cheery letter…
The wonderful Chester berries, second year we found them.

I never was one to keep a diary and didn’t want to write
about my boyfriend or some such thing in a diary… maybe because, nosy Mom?

I started keeping journal in college when architecture became important to me,
and noting how the creative minds around me worked.
I brought many lovely cheap red and black journals from Chinatown back from trips…
Sadly, I can’t use them today  because they are not fountain pen friendly!

I still keep journals of influences and mentors and ideas.
The bright colored KOLO (blank) journal and sketchbooks are great —
I bought a bunch when a store was going out of sale — and in the last image I photocopied a couple of Pat Southern Pearce’s images with some notes about her and
creative things she said or materials she used to get her effects.
It is nice when you get to MEET these people!

This idea of daily journaling is also applied to other areas, and so I have different places where I write and mess around with ideas.  Once the discipline is learned it is easily moved to all my other pursuits.

My sketchbook is not only a place where I sketch daily, but I also love to put quotes that move me at the edge of one side, or sometimes they become a whole page.  Oddly, I often find a perfect quote after
I’ve created a sketch.  I like that!

Sketching daily — just fifteen minutes, just one sketch — does something good
to my heart and psyche. Playing with lines and color relaxes me and opens my heart.

The same discipline I use for journaling becomes a template
for keeping my hand in the creative game.

I use journalling as a way to go deeper in my spiritual practice.
I was a Zen practitioner (solely) for many years, then met the Tibetans.
One practice that sang to me was the practice of Lojong/Tonglen,
and I added that to my sit practice.
Above, the red journal was my first study journal — it is 25 years old.
When I want to add to it, sometimes I can write on the page,
but sometimes Ii have to resort to a Post-it (second image)…
Then I started slipping whole second torn out pages in, and now it bulges.

In 2014 I also decided to do a year long meditation with sketches
(3d and 4th images above).  I  loved that, combining a favorite Buddhist statue
with a day where whatever came to me was written under the sketch.
It allowed me to see how far I’ve come in my understanding!

In many ways, the attention and gifts
I offer to those I love I also give to myself.
How many of you don’t do that for you?

See Daily Journal, 3, tomorrow!

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Many articles are coming out now about the benefits of keeping a daily journal.
Some are scientific, some are new age, some are creatives-driven, and
are written by reporters who were assigned the article.

I’ve been journaling daily for 47 years…
I’m not saying I never missed a day… I’m not compulsive —
but, the more you do the more it becomes second nature
the more you feel the benefits and you begin to yearn for your journal…
like talking to a best friend but sometimes a bit better.

Journaling can save your life.

I believe this.  Absolutely.

You know what it is like when you are angry, broke up with some arsehole, got the blues?  Have a problem and have exhausted discussion of it with every single friend you know (“shuddup already”), or maybe cannot talk to anyone about it?

The discussion cycles through your head day and night, relentlessly.
Zennies call it monkeymind, for it surely behaves like a monkey, ya-ya-yahing,
the same tape usually, going nowhere positive, just a rerun of events, chattering endlessly.
“WHY did he leave me?”
“What did I do to deserve this or that?”
“How can I fix this or that?”
“I hate her I hate her I hate her.”

Most of these events or situations don’t have answers or resolution.
Even if they do you won’t get to it by running over the same territory daily like a truck.
They are often incomprehensible.
Especially when you are a self-reflecting person who owns their mistakes
and so reviews the bumps in life — conscious people are going to be more bothered
by the insanities of interactions with others that make no sense.
Your mind wants to see what you did… What they did…
If there were clues this might happen…

Because usually there is no “answer”, it just repeats and repeats the same musings.

You are STUCK.

Writing it down exhausts the energy… trust me.
I went through a terrible time with my former husband, I filled a journal with anger.
What I learned was that after writing “I hate him” several times after an argument
my mind said, “GOT IT!  You hate him… enough! You got anything else in there?”
Seriously.  I just reviewed a bunch of old journals and tossed a few of these,
because they were pretty boring (I save most journals).
I saved a couple sample pages, a slice to remember,
but really, those journals were to save my sanity in a moment where
I could not understand why he was apparently trying to hurt me.
“I wouldn’t do THAT, if I felt THAT WAY I’d leave.”
On and on I went — I could not wrap my mind around his behavior.
I had to exhaust the anger and confusion every so often just so I could move on
and be more productive in untangling my marriage issues, or even to work!

I think our minds want acknowledgment, that we are listening.
Especially in hard, confusing, hopeless times.
I believe that this can come in the form of painting or making melody —
if you are a creative —
but also, that energy can be exhausted (acknowledged) by committing
both the stupid shit and the brilliant insights into your journal.

When you take pen to paper, you are engaging every one of your modalities:
you are physically engaging your body in the issue;
you are certainly engaging verbal/auditory patterning;
and finally, visual types can see what they’ve written.
Engaging all the modalities let’s your mind feel thoroughly heard.

I believe it will save many of us from spiraling into depression.
I have experience with that, so I knows this stuff!

See Daily Journal, 2, tomorrow!

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