What Journaling Does for Me

You hear everyone talk about how great journaling is. 
And they are right.

Journaling rocks.

Yet I’ve gone in and out of journaling throughout the years. 
In this post I am going to describe what journaling looks like for me, and the value I see in it today.

What the act of journaling actually looks like for me

I use a software app called Bear to journal in.

I like it because it’s super minimalistic.
It’s easy to focus on just what I am writing.
It has great markdown and shortcut features.
I can also use it ask a task management system. 
It has an awesome hash tagging organization system.

And so for me… journaling involves open up a new window on Bear, typing in the date… and then writing.

I just type.
Flow. 
Write a stream of thought of whatever comes to mind.

I like typing more than writing because I have an insanely fast typing speed and I can type near the speed that I can speak at.

This means journaling for me via typing flows very much free from thought.
I am basically thinking out loud with a slight speed throttle so that I think words out a bit more detailed.

What journaling leads to for me

Sometimes it’s just getting something out. 

But more often than not, the journal is a muse toward an idea that I take action on.

Sometimes I’m journaling and I think “Oh man… I need to create that thing in my business…” and then I just take that creative energy from writing and plow it straight into building some system or new idea in my businesses.

Other times journaling may lead me to some idea for an art or personal thing that is important in my life. And I lead from journaling just into that.

Sometimes, I start journaling and then I write a blog post like this.

Journaling is the warm up

To me, journaling is like warming up your brain for something good.

Sometimes I am working through and processing things, but the way that I operate, it often serves to get me thinking and moving in a direction. And then I can take action.

How I use physical paper for journaling

I don’t “journal” much on physical paper but I do often do mind-maps.
I love putting some rough idea in the middle of a page and then mapping off of it.

It’s fun to put in dreams of the future, or aspects of a business you are trying to figure out. Or even dreams for a personal hobby or project.

I find when I want to dream, pen and paper are better for that.
When I want to flow ideas & create, that’s where I go to typing.

I should journal more, so should you

I write a lot of these blog posts as reminders to myself.
I should journal more. 
It leads to good things.

You should probably journal more too. 
It would probably lead to good things.