17 Tips on Keeping a Journal or Diary

1. New to keeping a journal? Start with writing, Today, I am grateful for, and fill in the blank with what you are grateful for.

2. Write in your journal freely. Do not worry about how it looks, or even grammar and spelling errors. Write how you want, what you want, and where you want.

3. Writing a word, sentences, paragraphs or pages, journaling whatever you have to say that day, is just the right amount to write.

4. Set your journal where you will see it everyday, i.e., on your nightstand, at your desk, where you have coffee. This will help to remind you to journal.

5. Part of keeping a journal is skipping a day, a week, and even months.

6. Your journal is a daily gift you give to yourself.

7. Remember to use your journal for your benefit and well being, what ever that means to you. Keeping a journal is a powerful tool that you can give to yourself everyday.
Plus, this creates time for you every day.

8. Write with a pen, pencil, felt pen, crayons, or colored pencils. Whatever you choose.

9. Journal whatever is important for you to write about right then and there. I've journaled about a fabulous soup I ate, my concerns about a friendship, my dreams for the future.

10. Find the right journal, book, for you: The right size, shape, color, lined or unlined.

12. Find the right place for you to write: In bed, at your desk, on the kitchen table.

13. Find the right time of day for you to write: Morning, noon or night.

14. Keeping your journal private. That can mean setting boundaries with those in your home, it may mean hiding it, or locking it away. You will have to make an individual decision about what that means to you.

15. Re-read your journal or not. Rarely do I re-read my journals, but when I have it has been very supportive. Some people always read what they have written. Again, it is a personal choice.

16. You can journal in a book, on your computer, in a Blog which is a web log, you can use a tape recorder, video camera, emails, or a calendar.

17. Whatever you have to say in your journal is perfect, because that is what is important to you right now.

Copyright 2006 OMDC, LLC

Doreene Clement, a cancer victor and author of The 5 Year Journal, is currently writing a new book and movie, Blessed, about her life and her cancer experience. For more information www.the5yearjournal.com 480.423.8095