by Rowlandwithaw

Created on: November 19, 2011

The first thing about keeping a journal is to think about what you want it to be. Journals can fall into various categories. For many people, particularly those involved in the visual arts, a journal is a way of developing ideas – preliminary sketches, ideas for projects or ‘recce’ pictures for reference. Similarly for writers and aspiring writers, a journal is a place to scribble down new ideas and plots, interesting words, and it’s a ‘word gymnasium’ where you can flex your writing muscles.

A journal can also be more like a diary – a regular record of your life – what was called a ‘diurnal’ in the 16th century! (There’s not much new under the sun….) The first journal that sometimes kicks off a lifetime’s habit is a travel journal – whether it’s a family holiday of a lifetime or an epic voyage.

So of course the answer to ‘what do you want the journal to be?’ is not a ‘once and for all’ decision – your journal can easily change direction. Mine began as a place to record my thoughts and feelings at a particularly bad period of my life. By now as I’m just completing no. 42, it has evolved into a compendium of thoughts, ideas, quotes, sketches and photos cataloguing my life.

The next consideration would probably be: how do you want to keep your journal? I think many people have the idea of keeping a journal in a massive leather bound tome with beautiful copperplate writing and the odd ‘illuminated majuscule’! Well if you’re a skilled calligrapher that might be the route to take. However, for most of us, the content is more important than the container. It may seem like a good idea to write your journal, say, once a week at the weekend when you have a bit more time for yourself. But I think that in the real world, events overtake us, we don’t get the allotted slot and so the journal remains unwritten – a low priority which eventually falls of the schedule altogether. My personal advice would be to write it in an ad hoc way – grabbing the opportunity as it happens. My approach is to have my Moleskine to hand at all times. (I’m on a plane and I’ve just taken a minute out of writing this to jot down a headline I noticed on another passenger’s newspaper!) An alternative for a travel journal documenting a family holiday might be to make the journal itself part of the holiday -  with everybody contributing something to document the day’s activity whether it be a sentence, a postcard or train ticket!

Which brings me to the third question: what elements will go into the journal? Well, in my case, anything and everything – I write, I sketch, I paste in- photos I’ve taken, cuttings, cards from restaurants, images from the Web and occasionally printed articles which I have written. In fact, anything goes – there are even a few instances where the restaurant has made its own entry in the form of wine or coffee stains . . . 

So just a few simple ideas on getting started with keeping a journal.

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