How to Journal
There's no single right way. But there are wrong questions to start with.
The first question most people ask themselves when they start a journal is: what should I write about?
That’s the wrong question. It leads to the feeling that there’s a correct type of content — and that what you actually feel or think might not qualify.
A better question is: what’s happening?
Write about what is, not what should be
A journal isn’t a place for the official version. You don’t need to be consistent, logical, or likeable to yourself. You can write about being petty, about being afraid for no reason, about something that should excite you but doesn’t.
That’s exactly the material.
Many people abandon journals because they start keeping them as event logs. Today I went here, then there, I ate this. That’s boring to write and useless to read.
Events are a pretext. What you felt before, during, and after — that’s the journal.
Regularity vs. honesty
The popular advice is: write every day, even when you have nothing to say. There’s some truth in that — regularity builds habit. But regularity without honesty is just filling pages.
Better to write something true once a week than something neutral every day.
There’s no single method. There’s only one requirement: that you write what you actually think — not what you’d like to think.
That’s harder than it looks. And that’s exactly why it’s worth doing.