Journal

JOURNALS-DAILY REMINDERS-DIARIES

A learning expression of sharing information for keeping a journal, diary or daily reminder.

COMMENTS ON KEEPING A JOURNAL, DIARY OR DAILY REMINDER

I think that keeping a journal, dairy or daily reminder is one of the best independent methods for self expression, knowledge and experience. A journal can be started at any time in your life and the longer it is maintained, the more valuable it becomes to you and your intimate friends and relatives. I started mine originally as a date, tax record, phone, and scrapbook when I began college. I hope that some of these suggestions will help you to become inspired to keep a journal for a long time.
Try to think of it not just as a diary as much as a record of growth. It can be used as a daily, weekly, monthly or any combination of times. Save and use images to visually enhance your journal. These images will give you pictures of what you want to remember or save. They can be photographs which have been trimmed down to smaller size, magazine images, tiny statistical articles, advertisements, drawings, diagrams, ticket stubs and labels etc.

Use both printed and cursive characters to record or collect your material or ideas. Daily suggestions for writing: Weather conditions, how you started versus how you ended your day, positive and negative events and what you did or did not do. Annex pages can be kept somewhere within your journal to keep records such as; things to do, places to go, movies, music, books, codes, combinations, phone numbers, lists to remember, etc.

Birthdays, Anniversaries or noteworthy events in a calendar or daily reminder can be used to remember important dates. You can accumulate this information over a year or two since so many people know at least one famous person who shares their birthday. Include relatives, friends, mentors, heroes and sheros, popular figures in history, advisors, idols, etc.

The Personal Approach in a journal, Diary or Daily reminder: Include by any means, anything that you consider important including what and how you are eating such as foods and vitamins. Exercise habits can give you an idea of what you have been doing and how it has affected you. Your entries will help you to create images and to continue the use of your writing skills and vocabulary. Often journals will have some large or small parts that are very private or in fact secretive. You must decide who can have access to look at or read your journal, reminder or diary.

Try to incorporate your personal tastes as often as possible. Interests and images can be used to establish an alphabet of symbols and images that will eventually mirror what you are about. Consider how important a journal can be to family members and close friends. Memories after all are what we use to see where we are headed in life. These written memories remind us that what we don’t do is just as important as what we do. I like to include the alphabet in cursive, capital print, and bubble letters as well as other styles. This is meant to give some graphic variety to my pages.

I hope that these suggestions and the demonstration will help you to become inspired just as I have been inspired by so many others. I am sure that this process will give you a tangible method for seeing your life as you want it to appear as a document.

Sincerely,

Raymond Holbert