I’ve written about the fabulous journaling app Day One before, but exactly a month ago, I crossed the 1,500-entry threshold.
I began journaling on-and-off on a trip to San Francisco in 2013, but began again in earnest about two years later. Since June 2015, I haven’t missed a day.
I find that journaling is enjoyable not principally for the sake of looking backward — I can see with just a tap what I did on this day in 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 — but in the ability to sort of “offload” any feelings, ideas, concerns, or synapse-firings into a centralized, easily-searchable place. I have tags for everything from a great meal I had, to my children’s first words, to the feeling that comes with an excellent run. Again, for me, it isn’t so much about the writing — it’s about the having written.
My consistency in journaling doesn’t come from push notifications or any kind of gamification — though Day One does have the former. Rather, it comes from seeing entire weeks and months of entries pile up, and the feeling of loss aversion if I were to miss a day. I might perhaps try developing the same practice around blogging. 🙂
