Why do I have an actual journal?
- to keep track of my mood/depression, and to try to improve it. I used to journal every day, however that proved tedious and not as helpful, so now I write when I feel the need to (about once per week)
- Ideas can hit you at any time, and I personally find its easier to sketch diagrams as opposed to typing on a smartphone. Exception: voice memos, which I've dabbled in - it's a physical book that, unless someone stole, I know is mine that I can call my own.
Tips on starting a diary/journal (your mileage may vary)
- journal: moleskine, Lechtturm1917 are my personal favorites.
- keep first two pages blank for a table of contents. You don't have to content every page, just important ones you want to refer back to
- I don't use a bullet journal format, but it's something other people really like
Conclusion:
In Edmund Morris' bio of Theodore Roosevelt, he mentioned that TR's journals were written as if he knew other people will read them. When I'm writing, I make a conscious effort to have that mindset because it keeps me accountable for writing the truth, and writing down my entire thought process.
meta: this was a long write
Only I prefer twin-ring notebooks since they lie flat better.
I find it very helpful to have a place to vent or just elaborate on my thoughts. I rarely go back and read previous entries, aside from reflective times like New Year's. I love its existence as something akin to an art piece. It provides a candid snapshot into the daily train of thought of a twentysomething developer and writer.
It's deeply personal, but I do hope someday to make it available for people to read in some context -- it's the most real and honest thing I've ever created.
I have blog posts going back to 2001 on http://www.ryanmercer.com though (starting with all of my embarrassingly angsty and emo high school live journal posts) and my Twitter, Instagram and Facebook posts all get copied via IFTTT and Zapier zaps for future reference/mining if I ever see the need.
I also use 'ryanmercer' everywhere I can online so that, with a little context of a past thought or conversation, I can relatively easily find the thread via Google. I also have years of IRC logs in Channels I participated in, however I stopped logging them when I switched my daily driver to a Chromebox a year and change ago.
My hope is that some day I'll be able to take all of my blog posts, all of my ryanmercer comments online and my social media posts and feed them into a service or piece of software and create an approximation of me as sufficiently-advanced chat bot.
I do maintain a hipster PDA [1] with index cards for ideas, general lists, and doodles/scratches. I've found that to be a helpful tool.