journal

Learn about 7 writing styles to consider when composing your journal.

There are many “out of the box” ways to utilize your journal. What follows is a list of some examples:

Find personal answers: It has been said that when we are confused about a situation, we shouldn’t be because all of the answers lie within ourselves. Do you believe this to be true? Have you ever been genuinely puzzled about something in your life? Once it was resolved, did you feel that you knew the answers? Or did the answers lie elsewhere?

Write in your journal. If you are in the middle of a difficult time, try to work through it in your journal. If not, spend some time reflecting to see how you discovered the answers.

Set personal goals: The world is filled with possibilities for each of us. We can choose where to live, what job to take, what hobby to enjoy, and much more. However, sometimes we start a project and lose interest quickly because we find another project that excites us. We find we have no time

7 Writing Styles for Journal Writing

How boring would it be if all you did for your journal was write the date and what you did for that day? The following are a few writing styles that you may choose (on different occasions) to help express your thoughts:

Freewriting (stream of consciousness writing). Write anything and everything that comes to mind. You do not need to follow any logical formation of thoughts, and you do not need to worry if grammar, spelling, or even the ideas are acceptable. Do not do anything that would interrupt the flow of thoughts from your mind to the paper.

Do not censor any thoughts, and do not concern yourself with any associations you would make. Some days, freewriting will seem like an exercise in insanity since nothing makes sense. Other days, the thoughts and ideas revealed by freewriting can be astonishing.

Freewriting works best if you set a time limit of ten to thirty minutes. When you reread these pages, do not edit your work, just read them and enjoy the exciting way your mind works and how thoughts can flow from your creative center.

This is a beautiful technique to remove random thoughts from your mind and focus yourself on other tasks.

Focused freewriting

Focused freewriting is when you start with a topic. Write down the topic at the beginning of the page. Then write down any and every association or thought that comes to mind. Soon you can take a topic without any ideas associated with it and make various lists, comments, and ideas. As with freewriting, set a time limit and do not censor your thoughts or ideas—keep the pen moving across the page.

Brainstorming

This is a two-step process. First, write a topic at the top of the page. Make lists of all the random ideas associated with the topic. The ideas can be words, phrases, or sentences. When you have a large number of ideas, stop. The second step is to organize those ideas into groups. This technique helps you see how various ideas fit together under one topic. If you group your ideas and have a list with only one or two ideas, brainstorm that list. This is an excellent way to make associations and find smaller topics under a larger heading.

Journalist questions

Who? What? When? Why? Where? How? These questions force you to approach a topic from multiple perspectives. This is an excellent way to approach ideas you do not understand or sort out problems in emotional perspective entries. Write down your topic or problem at the top of the page. Then ask each question in turn about your topic. Write down your response. Soon, you will have a logical organization of thoughts about your topic.

Mapping (Webbing, Clustering)

This is a visual way of brainstorming. Please write down your topic in the middle of the paper and circle it. Then draw lines from the main topic to other circles and write in each major sub-topic of the original topic. Connect it to the original topic, a sub-topic, or a sub-sub-topic with each thought. Continue branching off your thoughts until you run out of ideas. This is a great way to visualize and organize thoughts similar to a flow chart and lets you see how things are connected.

Lists

This is a quick and easy way to organize thoughts. Like a shopping list, make lists of what you are happy or upset about, things you need to do, etc. In a short amount of time, you can have several lists of basic ideas. This is a quick way of catching up on your journal writing if you have fallen behind or an easy way to organize many thoughts before you start detail writing each one.

Prompts

These are words, quotes, or ideas that help to jump-start the imagination. If you have several favorite quotes, questions that are important to you, or ideas that you want to mull over at a later date, keep them together in a notebook or a computer file—whatever organization method you enjoy. When you cannot think of anything to write, look over your prompts and see what sparks your imagination. Another technique is to open the dictionary, encyclopedia, or thesaurus to a random page and write about the first thing you see on that page.

Perceived world

This is the most common journal-writing technique. Written from your point of view, it is how you perceive the world and events around you. Often called descriptive writing, it puts your descriptions of events, people, and places into your journal.

Reflective writing

When you analyze the past, whether it is your journal, past events, or past thoughts, then commit them to paper; this is reflective writing. The distance between the past and the present lends additional insight into the issue and gives clarity of sight to an event not easily interpreted.

Altered point of view

This is writing from the point of view of another person, and this can often give insight into another person’s emotions or decision-making. Each of us takes our path through life, and when we walk in the shoes of another person, we can understand why a person took a different path through life.

Dialogue writing

This form of writing is an imaginary conversation between you and another person. This is a problematic method of writing. You must understand your own words and why you said them, but you must also be faithful to the person you are speaking with and put the right words into their mouths (not what you want them to say). Often, you can gain insight into the actions of others as you see how your words prompt their response or vice versa.

Dialogue is a way of interacting with others. This is a safe method for having a private conversation or telling someone what you think, wish, or did, without the pain of the other person’s knowledge knowing that the conversation ever took place on paper.

Unsent letter writing

Write an honest letter telling someone what you think, why an event occurred, an apology, or an explanation, but never send it. The recipient of the letter is your journal. The emotions of the letter are between you and the one who will never read your thoughts and feelings. Writing a letter adds credence to an event. This is a way of communicating with a lost friend, deceased person, or a person you never met.
Think ahead to one hundred years; one of your ancestors will be seeking to better understand himself by trying to get to know you. What will you leave behind? Will there be videos to view, an oral interview to listen to, or a journal to read? Your ancestor will find your journal to be of great value. You will be one-on-one with him, sharing your innermost thoughts, feelings, and reflections.

Your journal is the repository of your experiences, and it becomes a guide, a mirror, a confidant, and a friend. It is essential to have a journal that is a statement of who you are. The following are a few ideas that will help improve your journal writing.

Your journal is a record of your life.

In your journal, you will record essential experiences because they affect you. You will want to explore your thoughts and feelings and your experiences.

But a journal is not just a diary; entries you make regarding your day, events you experience, and their effects on you are only springboards to a more fulfilling activity. You will delve beyond the experiences, events, and emotions to discover what essential teachings life holds for you.

As you write your journal, cover topics from life and chronological point of view.

Life topics can include the following:

  • Economics, income, work, career
  • Living arrangements
  • Family developments (birth of a sibling, death of a grandparent, and so forth)
  • Extended-family developments
  • Health
  • Education
  • Hobbies, interests, talents
  • Church or religion
  • Annual holidays and vacations
  • Friendships

Chronological topics can include things such as the following:

  • Roots, or the person’s family heritage up to their birth
  • Birth, including the family setting in which the person was born
  • Pre-school childhood
  • Childhood, perhaps through grade school
  • Adolescent years
  • Coming of age as a young adult
  • Young parenting years
  • Later parenting years
  • Empty-nest years and retirement
  • Death and legacy

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