Keeping a daily diary doesn’t come easily to most people, but it takes less effort than you might imagine. It could also become a meaningful way to reflect and grow as a person.
For more than 10 years, I’ve written a few words every morning, and what I’ve learned from this practice has changed my life. My only regret is not starting sooner.
If you’re interested in adding a daily journaling practice to your life, these tips and tools can help you not only get started, but also stick with it.
Why Keep a Journal or Diary?
My diary is a tool for clearing out my thoughts, recording details of my life that are sometimes useful to know later, and reflecting. The value in reflecting, however, only became apparent after I’d been writing for several years and could look back on my life to see it from a different perspective.
I’ve always been very hard on myself. I don’t make excuses, and I look upon my failures with consternation. Whenever I’ve gone back and read a series of diary entries from low points in my life, I’ve been able to view them with an outsider’s perspective. I can see more clearly just how tough things were, or how many things went wrong at once, or the gravity of a single event that I might have downplayed in the moment. This reflection has led me to be more compassionate toward myself—and toward others. I have learned to cut myself some slack.
You might discover something else, whether a pattern of behavior or something you want to change. Or maybe with hindsight you realize the things you thought you wanted to change don’t need changing at all. Journaling sheds light on all these things.
Memory is fickle. The personal self-reflection that we do entirely in our heads differs wildly from what we can do with notes. In short, that’s why I’ve kept up my daily writing for more than 10 years.
What Should You Write in Your Journal?
Start every diary entry with the date and your location. Why bother if your computer or phone can add them automatically? A few reasons. First, you will never stare at a blank page, and you will always know how to start. Second, metadata can get bungled over time or during file transfers, so it’s more reliable to add them manually. Third, typing the date and location into the diary entry itself ensures that those very important pieces of information are searchable.
What else should you write? A diary entry can be a simple brain dump. That’s what I do. Other things worth mentioning are major events, strong emotions, and hopes and dreams.
If following a method helps, you could try gratitude journaling. Some parents I know ask their kids at the end of the day to reflect on their “rose, thorn, bud“—one highlight from the day, one difficulty, and something they’re looking forward to—which is an equally good diary formula.
How to Make It a Habit
The best trick I have for forming a new habit is to tie it to an existing one. Find a habit that you already have and combine it with a few minutes of daily writing.
I journal every morning as soon as I have coffee in front of me. My coffee-making routine is non-negotiable, immovable, set in stone, seven days a week. Even when I stay in a hotel, I bring a travel coffee maker with me, and I write in my diary while drinking the coffee.
