Let every day be worthy

Flipping back through my collection of diary excerpts relating to the subject of why we journal, I happened upon this one . . .

William Lyon Mackenzie King, who would one day become Canada's 10th Prime Minister (and whose image also now appears on our $50 bill), wrote in his diary on September 6, 1893 at age 18:

"This diary is to contain a very brief sketch of the events, actions, feelings and thoughts of my daily life. It must above all be a true and faithful account. The chief object of my keeping this diary is that I may be ashamed to let even one day have nothing worthy of its showing, and it is hoped that through its pages the reader may be able to trace how the author has sought to improve his time." (From Diaries of William Lyon Mackenzie King, Library and Archives Canada)

This excerpt relates very directly to my own thoughts these days -- the acute desire to improve my time and not let even one day slip by without accomplishing a worthy deed.

I'm making good progress on my side project, a new set of journal materials related to goal setting. As I've read and sketched and drawn up new prompts, I've been exploring the fundamental connection between journaling and the pursuit of one's goals.

The connection isn't new, of course, but I'm truly enjoying sorting it out in my own way, creating my very own recipe for goal achievement through journaling. In addition to my usual journal themes and prompts, I've been thinking about purposeful, deliberate forward direction. I've been thinking about how to create a plan for achieving your goals that you'll want to dive into, with everything you've got, right now. That is the key. That is my goal for this set and I can't wait to share it with you.


Previous journal excerpts:
C.S. Lewis
Ralph Waldo Emerson 
Virginia Woolf
Sir Walter Scott
Siegfried Sassoon
Alice James
Sofia Tolstoy

Work in progress

I've assigned myself a journal-related side project that carries all the hallmarks of a good goal -- it's specific, difficult and time-limited. Over the last several weeks, I've been reading research papers and textbooks, gathering facts and figures, and making detailed outlines. It's slowly moving forward and, one day soon, I'm confident it will come together nicely and I'll be able to share it with the world.

Right now, however, it's a bit of a jumbled mess -- in my mind's eye and in my notes. I think this doodle from yesterday pretty much sums it up -- a little bit of everything, none of it quite complete, one thing right on top of the next.

Ever feel like that?

Pattern doodles

Doodled some patterns while I was thinking a little more about goals and journals, trying to fit it all together so that I can put something of value down on paper. Almost there, I think.

I loved making all those dots and lines -- so much so that I think I'll try it again next time!

Journal writing when we're sad?

I mentioned on Tuesday that I'd been reading up on goal setting theory. At one point, I was working my way through a chapter on goal pursuit when I came across a paragraph containing the following two sentences:

“Sad mood has been found to facilitate problem solving and signals a need for changing the status quo. ... These studies imply that sad mood supports the generation of self-regulation strategies that lead to wise commitment to potential goals.”*

I didn't know that. In my notes, after the above quote, I wrote, "Huh! Who'd have thought?"

Just then a diary excerpt popped to mind. It was one that I had noted, but had decided not to use because it seemed a bit depressing for a light-hearted blog post. It was this one:

“My diary again. It’s sad to be going back to old habits I gave up since I got married. I used to write when I felt depressed – now I suppose it’s for the same reason.” (Sofia Tolstoy, Russian diarist and wife of novelist Leo Tolstoy, October 8, 1862, age 18)**

Possibly it's just me, and this may already be quite obvious, but learning something new about problem solving while sad and remembering the diary excerpt made something click for me.

Do you ever have the impulse to journal when you're upset or down? I certainly do. Perhaps, deep down (or right there on the surface), that impulse to journal represents more than the simple desire to vent or despair, but also the desire to solve a problem that we know needs solving. Perhaps these are the moments when one's journal becomes more than a record of events. Perhaps these are the moments when journaling offers a unique opportunity to think on paper, to put challenges into perspective, to clarify our aims, to determine the best manner in which to move in the direction of our goals. Perhaps these are the moments when we are reminded that journaling can be a powerful tool for transformative change.

It's definitely something I'll be thinking about in the journal entries to come. 


* From New Developments in Goal Setting and Task Performance, edited by Edwin A. Locke and Gary P. Latham, p. 527-8

** From The Diaries of Sofia Tolstoy, English language translation and Introduction by Cathy Porter

Back and forth

I've been reading up on some of the recent research on goal setting theory. At one point today, I was flipping through pages and thinking about other things entirely when I came across an unexpected parallel between a bit of research and a couple of the diary excerpts I've found. (At least I think it's a parallel -- possibly I've imagined a link where none actually exists.) It has to do with the way people set goals when they're feeling sad. I needed to think about it a little, so I doodled.

And then I ran out of time. As it turns out, there are violins to practice and sports schedules to be kept. Looking forward to writing a little more about this tomorrow!

Doodling and thinking, thinking and doodling

Got out my watercolours so I could think a little.

I'm thinking that I may have overdone it with the journal excerpts. Except I can't even tell you how fascinating I find them. I was hoping that posting them as I encountered them might help me to make sense of them and, at the same time, offer an interesting journal-related tidbit or two.

If there is one common theme I've noticed, it's how the journal keepers seem to intend for their entries to turn their inner thoughts/dialogues/narratives into tangible things. (Perhaps so that they can pick them up, take a good look at them, identify shapes and patterns, put them in order, and maybe even start to take control of them?) They talk about creating a deep old desk, a receptacle, a tablet. Days have movement, and emotions and sensations are geysers.

In my own journals and here on the blog, I often feel like I'm grasping at something I urgently need to figure out, and I can almost touch it, but not quite. Like some of the journalers in the previous posts, I hope that when I look back, it will all miraculously make sense. Sometimes, when I look back, I do see a pattern and I can start to understand why I went this way or that. Then I can evaluate whether it was a good choice and whether I can chart a better course going forward. When that happens, I feel a little less lost, I feel a sense of purpose, which is a welcome relief from the ever-present intensity of forging one's own path in the world.

So what's next? I'm not entirely sure at this moment, but I'll keep moving forward (probably with fewer quotes from old journal entries) and keep looking back for clues and good ideas and new paths.

An outlet to that geyser of emotions, sensations, speculations and reflections

American diarist Alice James wrote in her diary on May 31, 1889 at age 40:

“I think that if I get into the habit of writing a bit about what happens, or rather doesn’t happen, I may lose a little of the sense of loneliness and desolation which abides with me. …[I]t may bring relief as an outlet to that geyser of emotions, sensations, speculations and reflections which ferments perpetually within my poor old carcass for its sins; so here goes, my first Journal!”

From The Diary of Alice James, edited by Leon Edel

Previous journal excerpts:
C.S. Lewis
Ralph Waldo Emerson 
Virginia Woolf
Sir Walter Scott
Siegfried Sassoon 

Hasty and passionate scrawlings

English poet Siegfried Sassoon wrote in his diary on January 8, 1921 at age 34:

“For I want this to be a readable book, a memorial of vanished days, a consoling reminder of delights and speculations and disappointments, things which can no longer be regretted or remade.

At this moment I am paralysed by the excellence of my pen and paper. I am scared of making a blot on the first page. Nevertheless I am aware of the futility of diaries written (or composed) with laboured care. Self-revelation eludes such a plodding pursuit.

Let there be hasty and passionate scrawlings, exaggerated and cautious gropings after truth, or over-meticulous recordings of names, places, conversations, and episodes; but never an apparent pause for the most effective phrase, or the least hint that the diarist has an eye on his possible audience."

A little further on in the same entry, he wrote:

"Blast this journal, it is as pompous as hell already.”

From Siegfried Sassoon Diaries, 1920-1922, Siegfried Sassoon

Previous journal excerpts:
C.S. Lewis
Ralph Waldo Emerson 
Virginia Woolf
Sir Walter Scott

I wish the zeal may but last

I love today's quote so much that I made a little watercolour note of it in my sketchbook.

Scottish novelist and poet Sir Walter Scott wrote in his journal on November 21, 1825 at age 54:

"I am enamoured of my journal. I wish the zeal may but last."

Wishing you much zeal in the keeping of your journal!

Previous journal excerpts:
C.S. Lewis
Ralph Waldo Emerson 
Virginia Woolf

Some deep old desk

Virginia Woolf wrote in her diary on April 20, 1919 at age 37:

"What sort of diary should I like mine to be? Something loose knit, & yet not slovenly, so elastic that it will embrace any thing, solemn, slight or beautiful that comes into my mind. I should like it to resemble some deep old desk, or capacious hold-all, in which one flings a mass of odds & ends without looking them through. I should like to come back, after a year or two, & find that the collection had sorted itself & refined itself & coalesced . . .

The main requisite, I think on re-reading my old volumes, is not to play the part of censor, but to write as the mood comes or of anything whatever; since I was curious to find how I went for things put in haphazard, & found the significance to lie where I never saw it at the time."

From The Diary of Virginia Woolf, Volume I: 1915-1919, edited by Anne Olivier Bell

Additional journal excerpts:
C.S. Lewis
Ralph Waldo Emerson