Journaling Philosophy

Stationery and notebook people like myself are fiercely in love with their tools. And for good reason. Stationery, notebooks, and art supplies are avenues to express thoughts, experiences, and reflections. People who don’t understand call it useless materialism, and while enthusiasts are susceptible to it just as any other hobbyist in other realms, it’s not correct to dismiss these tools and people’s love of them.

Brief History with Notebooks and Sketchbooks

I’ve loved notebooks for as long as I can remember. My earliest memory was when my mother bought me a small hardcover journal with a picture of a white teddy bear on the cover from a local bookstore. She told me it was for writing my thoughts. I don’t remember doing much with it, other than a few scribbles with my pencil, but I was enamored by the concept.

In junior high and high school, I focused much of my attention on sketchbooks, trying to experiment with my artistic style that I was always too afraid to fully immerse myself in due to perfectionism. Instead of being free to experiment, I was too afraid to draw something I deemed as ugly. But I still enjoyed the act of drawing in a notebook. Back then, journal and sketchbook spreads were displayed on Live Journal, a platform not as toxic as modern social media as we know today, but still an avenue for comparison fatigue as you clicked through different sites and saw beautiful, hand-drawn spreads. But it was also useful because it opened me up to different ideas that I could use for my own sketchbook. This was before Ryder Carroll created the bullet journal system, which exploded in popularity on social media.

I let my perfectionism feed my inferiority complex instead of experimenting and practicing. It wasn’t until I was in a drawing class in undergrad where I slowly gained confidence in my own artistic style. I wasn’t the best, but I had a style, and moved forward.

I was way too harsh with colored pencils back then

I journaled off and on throughout my youth, but it wasn’t until college where I developed a regular journaling habit, partly influenced by all of the writing courses I took that required journal entries that reflected on reading assignments (looking back, requiring handwritten journal entries was much more useful than Blackboard message boards, but that’s a whole other topic). I began journaling extensively around 2010 in undergrad as I was starting to discover who I was and what meant the most to me. I have ebbed and flowed throughout the years, but have for the most part kept up with a consistent journaling practiced that has helped me ground myself.

Stopping the Overwhelm

But journaling takes many forms. It can be in the form of simple lists, daily logs, memory keeping, stream-of-consciousness, an hour-by-hour synopsis (interstitial journaling), etc. It can easily lead to overwhelm to find the right system. Another common snag is the fear of “profaning the pretty notebook”, where the writer feels that their thoughts are too embarrassing or not smart enough to justify the use of the notebook. I have experienced both of these snags in my journaling practice, but I eventually got over them as I continued to push through my writing. It’s still a temptation, but not as strong as before.

With that, I want to introduce a few points to help you push through if you’re struggling with your journaling:

1. A filled notebook will always be more interesting than an empty one. An empty notebook is useless and boring. Nothing is sadder than an empty, useless notebook.

1. What you say is more important than the notebook. Deep and intriguing thoughts written in a cheap notebook is better than aesthetically pleasing spreads in an expensive notebook without much depth. That doesn’t mean you should compare yourself to others or think that your thoughts are not worthy. The point is to be courageous enough to use your journal to reflect and think. None of us will sound like Aristotle, but we can at least better understand our voice.

1. Figure out what journaling style works best for you. You don’t have to do stream-of-consciousness, feelings-based journaling. You can simply log interesting bits about your day, brainstorm ideas, use a commonplace book for quotes and paraphrases, or plan for the future. Five-year diaries are great for simple day-to-day tracking of interesting tidbits over a five-year span.

1. If you want to journal about your feelings, make sure it doesn’t become a door to spiral into negative thinking. Feelings-based journaling should always be based in reality and provide space for moving forward in hope. Ground your feelings in reality, which is based on a mixture of experience and facts. While feelings are important, they should not be the only barometer to measure the state of a situation. While for some, externalizing feelings on paper finds relief, for others it can trigger negative feelings even more. If you’re susceptible to this, find other journaling methods, or maybe step back for a while.

If you’re interested in finding ways to journal in a way that examines your feelings while grounding you in reality and provides hope, check out the Ignatian Examen.

1. Do not view your notebook as a precious object. Who you are is more important than the object. The notebook is a reflection of your own unique story on earth. This is why I love notebooks, not because they are precious in and of themselves, but because they are the best avenue to reflect on my own unique story on earth. Notebooks and pens are only useful if they reflect your own unique life. We all have callings, and notebooks help us reflect this truth. Notebooks also are the best medium to show the messiness of our lives, whether through writing or drawing. They showcase our pain, interests, joy, loves, and passions in a way that other media can’t. We don’t have to live extraordinary lives to have good journal entires; we just have to get up and live life.

2. If a paper notebook is too restrictive, digital journaling tools such as Day One, Apple’s Journaling app, or a text editor would be great ways of quickly getting out your thoughts. Though this is geared toward stationery lovers, digital journaling is a great medium if the notebook is too slow and daunting. I tried to journal in Obsidian once, but it turned into a big mushy mess.

At the end of the day, it’s just paper. Don’t get too caught up in the hype of using a pretty notebook and creating perfect spreads. It should be a conduit to freely show yourself, not restrict you. In the end, it takes courage to reflect on who you are, what you want to change about yourself, and where you’re going.

Non-exhaustive list of famous journals:

• The Confessions of St. Augustine

• Meditations by Marcus Aurelius

• The Diary of Ann Frank

• Charles Darwin

• Leonardo di Vinci

• The Story of a Soul by Therese of Lisieux

• The Spiritual Exercises by St. Ignatius Loyola

I'm Writing a Novel

My spiritual director has been hounding me for years to dedicate more time to writing and take it seriously. Like all writers, I knew that was necessary, but found reasons to distract myself from that reality because writing is hard, even when you’re somewhat good at it. She reminded me that at the end, God will ask how we used the gifts he’s given us. Ouch. I’ve met with her for almost 10 years, so she knows me pretty well. She helped me discern that writing is more than just a hobby. I need to treat it as a vocation. And I need to step out of my comfort zone and focus on something that’s been gnawing at me for years.

Nonfiction is my comfort zone, despite the stories that have flooded my head for years. I relate deeply to von Balthasar’s concept of treating your life as a Theodrama, because in the end, we are all somewhat actors in a play with an unmoved mover who spoke the universe into existence. And novels are a reflection of real events. So what’s my excuse now? Well, my own perfectionism, I guess. That’s an easy trick for the enemy (which is a mishmash of my own natural inclinations, the fallen world, and spiritual forces) to hit me with. So I’m going to disregard that and keep going. Also, writing a fictional story with an engrossing plot line and story arc has felt daunting to me. But now that I’m starting the process, it’s flowing quite naturally. I’m sure I’ll hit some snags and dry spells, but for now I’ll keep writing.

Pantsing and Plotting

I learned two types of novel writers: pantsers and plotters. Pantsers write by the seat of their pants without knowing where the story is going. Plotters plot out every detail before writing. I’ve always been more of a pantser (my thesis chair tried to get me to write out an outline of my thesis because it went all over the place). But this time I’m incorporating more a balanced approach. I’m letting the writing guide the story as I write it, while also taking time to plotting out the structure as the story matures and moves. The story arc has changed and morphed from its original beginning in my head, but as it changes I make notes of areas I need to expand on, characters I need to introduce, and plot lines that need to be introduced. With this workflow in mind, I thought I would share some of the tools I use to accomplish this. I’m only about 3,000 words in, but this experimentation stage has allowed me to see what foundational elements work for me.

Digital Process: Scrivener 

Thankfully we live in the golden age of writing programs that allow us to avoid Microsoft Word and other traditional word processors. These programs value simplicity and writer-focused needs over a traditional word processing structure that values an all-or-nothing approach that makes you fit into their specific rules. I don’t have to expound on Word too much, because we all know (or at least those born before 1995) the struggle of using it.

For the actual writing part, I’m using Scrivener. I had a copy of this program years ago and tried to use it for my thesis, but it didn’t click with my particular situation for heavy essay format heavily influenced by technical writing. I instead needed a program that incorporated structured documentation. Scrivener felt too unstructured and unorganized for my use case. But for writing a novel? Fantastic. It allows me to have specific sections for character layouts, chapters, scenes, notes, research, and other areas that allow me to plot out and write my story.

It combines plotting and writing into one seamless system, with enough wiggle room for organized chaos. Scrivener is a digital version of a desk setup: you have your notecards on one side, your notes on the other side, and other pertinent information on another side. Then in the middle of your desk is the actual book itself. Putting chapter sections into individual folders is also a killer feature that makes it worth it over Microsoft Word. Have you ever tried to create a new section in a Word document? Even after years of advanced Word use, it still takes too long to organize sections and pages. Good luck moving sections into new chapters.

Scrivener also has a typewriter feature for focused writing. This has been useful for me when I don’t want to see all my options and notes available.

Once you’ve finished your draft, or if you want to export specific sections, you can compile your novel together in a manuscript format. We’ll see how that goes when I eventually get there. Who knows how long that will take…

Analog Process: A5 Three-Ring Binder and Notecards

Of course I can’t have a fully digital process. As I’ve harped on multiple times on this Substack, I have to balance my digital tools with analog tools. But I don’t want my analog tools to distract me from the actual writing part of the process, because it’s easy to use my tools as distraction.

My analog structure almost mirrors the digital structure in Scrivener, but I use analog tools for plotting and planning the story arc and characters. This structure has allowed me to switch contexts between plotting and writing. When I need to turn away from writing, I turn to my notebook and notecards.

I am using an A5 three-ring binder (ironically called a Plotter) for notes, character descriptions, and setting descriptions. I started out using note cards, and may go back to using those as I come up with more ideas, but for now A5 paper has been a good size for me. A binder system works well for easily moving sections and ideas back and forth more so than a traditional fixed notebook.

Once I have my ideas and notes written down on paper, I convert them into their respective folders in Scrivener. I then have everything I need contained as I write my story.

Overall I’m happy with this setup and plan to use it as I move through this process. I’m sure it will change. But I’m hoping it will keep me motivated to keep placing words onto paper. Stay tuned!

Part 2: Sacred Space Notebook

A few years ago I purchased an A6 notebook cover from Little Mountain Bindery, a small business in Fayetteville, Arkansas, that makes custom notebook covers and offers book rebinding services. As a fellow Arkansan, I felt compelled to support this local stationery business. Since I mostly use A5 covers, I thought I’d try a different size this time. For Americans who don’t understand random paper size callouts, here’s a quick overview:

A4 is the popular standard sized document, sized slightly longer and skinnier than our 8.5x11 standard sized document. If you fold an A4 in half on the long edge, you get A5, which is used predominantly for notebooks and planners. A6, as you can guess, is half the size of A5. Since I had a few A5 covers, I decided to go for the A6 cover for pocket notebooks. I tend to use pocket notebooks for jotting down notes and keeping any other scribbles that don’t require large amounts of writing. Many users today find them a useful means to stave off doomscrolling.

I also find myself gravitating toward smaller notebooks for Mass. They’re compact enough to slip in and out during times in the service when I want to jot down a quick reflection from the homily, or a prayer that comes to me that I want to reflect on more deeply. Since Mass is an interactive experience, I don’t have many opportunities to sit and reflect for too long, so a small form factor is most useful for me in those situations. For a long time I used this A6 brown trifold cover for my Mass notes, and then put it aside for a while. However, I decided to push it to its limit to see how I could make this simple notebook cover a reflection of my interactivity in Mass. I didn’t just want to create a place for words, but a sacred space that incorporated reflection, images, and scripture passages. I’m still figuring out what works best for me, but I’m pleased so far with what I’ve created.

This A6 journal is similar to the Traveler’s Notebook system I discussed in Part 1 of this series on personal operating systems. It’s a brown leather cover with cords to place three pocket A6 notebooks. This design, however, incorporates a trifold cover instead of the bifold of the Traveler’s. The first part of my Mass cover is my reflection journal. This is my go-to for journaling and reflecting on anything that pops into my mind. This practice helps me focus on the present moment and not let my mind wander too much during the homily or other quiet moments in the Mass. The second cord holds a handmade pocket iconostasis made by DoorNumber9 on Etsy. The iconostasis is a small sewn book that shows all 12 Great Feasts of the Church. Each scene can be flipped through in a book form or expanded in an accordion style.

It’s such a clever way to meditate on the major stories outlined in the New Testament in a visual way. I’ve written some about the philosophy of Iconography in past articles and how meld them into my spiritual life. The iconostasis fits perfectly in this A6 cover, and I love the ability to create a compact notebook shrine that’s easy to take with me. It’s another tool for me to disconnect with my phone and focus on the constraints of the objects in front of me, with the visual interactivity to keep me engaged in a unique way.

The third cord holds a Field Notes pocket notebook for traditional rote prayers and chaplets. I used to keep this in my Plotter I wrote about in a previous article. But I decided to move it over to this cover since it fits well in this A6 cover. This size is perfect for chaplets that I don’t know from memory, such as the St. Michael chaplet. Housing prayers in a simple pocket notebook keeps these items more organized than digital means, or even in a pre-made book, as it allows me to curate my own on prayers that are meaningful to me.

So to recap, this cover houses three main components:

• personal reflection

• iconostasis for visual prayer and meditation

• commonplace pocket notebook for traditional rote prayers and chaplets

These three components housed in one cover provides a unique experience that allows me to slow down and engage in practices that actively help me grow as a person. I hope this inspires you to reflect on how you can create your own personal physical system.

Part 1: Traveler's Notebook System

To start off this series, I want to give an overview of the Traveler’s Notebook system, a simple leather cover with strings that allow you to insert multiple slim notebooks. Many companies have their own version of this system. The “official” Traveler’s Notebook system was created by the Japanese company Midori in 2006. This system gained popularity fast in the stationery world due to its sleek and open-ended customizability. It takes time to get used to if you are used to traditional square notebooks. The full-size version is a more rectangular A5-slim size. Midori designed these covers in the Japanese wabi-sabi design philosophy, which focuses on simplicity, nature, imperfection, and impermanence.

Ninety percent of my journaling happens through notebook covers now. As much as I love the traditional hardbound notebook, I love the ability to customize a full system to my own. It also comes with the added benefit of making my own notebooks. It makes it a little cheaper in the long run (if you don’t continue buying covers…).

The main con to this, however, is that you have to try find a reason to use multiple slim notebooks at the same time if you want to commit to something like this. But that’s part of the fun of the system. It’s also easy to get overwhelmed. To me, it’s a mixture of both. But over the years, I’ve experimented with different notebook ideas enough to know what I’ll use and won’t use.

Even though I love the idea of these notebook covers, it took me a while to get comfortable with the slim format. When I first acquired a full-size Traveler’s Notebook, I mostly used it as a junk journal and commonplace book for song lyrics and quotes. It was easy to travel with and jot down lyrics to songs that spoke to me at specific times. I eventually learned how to make my own pocket folders using card stock. This allowed me to store various items such as prayer cards in my Traveler’s Notebook system. This is when it started to click: I could customize this system in a way that reflects my personality in more ways than a simple notebook could. I enjoyed the idea of physically containing objects that are important to me in a way that I haven’t experienced in a long time due to digital curation and storage via computers and smartphones. It was like a neatly organized binder on the first day of school.

my first Traveler’s Notebook

Even though it was slowly clicking, I was still reticent to journal in this system due to its size. I think a lot of the problem had to do with the type of paper I was using. I mostly used the blank paper inserts, which were great for junk journaling and random lyrics, but a bit uncontrollable for my writing.

Freedom Overspill

Later on I moved to the limited edition Hotel series. As a long lover of hotels, I felt drawn to the design style and retro stickers. I’m glad I got it when I did, because they now sell for ridiculous amounts of money on eBay.

For a long time I used this cover to junk journal with my granddad’s old user manuals. I now use this cover as my main wallet, complete with a wallet insert, card holder that I use for holy cards, and graph paper insert for journaling. The graph paper insert helped me feel comfortable with the slim rectangular format.

Why I Journal by Hand

I use a journal insert because it helps my brain slow down and focus on what I need to think deeply about. Typing doesn’t allow my thoughts to flow to deeper places as writing by hand does. They skim the surface to quickly arrive to their destination. I use a keyboard to bang out emails as swiftly and concise as possible. It’s a good tool, but not the best route to discover the intricacies of myself as a human being. Not everyone feels this way, of course, but it’s a good practice for me to switch contexts and slow down. I don’t want to rapidly bang out my thoughts in the same way I bang out an email or text message.

Watercoloring

Recently I found a blue Traveler’s Notebook that I use for watercoloring. I wanted to get back to traditional sketching and painting, and this was an easy system to bring along.I also bring a watercolor pen and small pan of paints in a kit.

Encountering the Real World

In the Traveler’s Notebook system, mixing my wallet and journal together provides a compact solution for my essentials. It’s a good way for me to compartmentalize my life in a way that doesn’t require the use of a screen. I want to ensure I don’t fall into the trap of only living life digitally or not at all. But I also want to ensure I don’t over consume the physical objects that lure me in life. As with everything, I must maintain a delicate balance.

Lately it seems like a tide is shifting for us who are fatigued by social media and the internet in general. With the rise of AI slop, never-ending social media discourse, the internet feels synthetic now. This synthetic world accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic and has only increased with AI. Facebook feels distorted. YouTube feels shallow (although it’s been great for long-form podcasts recently). And Instagram is overstimulating with content and pressure to buy. I avoid TikTok because I don’t like its addicting nature. Notebook systems like Traveler’s keep me away from this synthetic space. It puts me in my own little space that I can partially control.