Ideas for journaling
“What got you to actually keep a journal?”
24 answers from 24 people · Updated Oct 12, 2026
This day last year, what did I care about? Two years ago today, what funny thing did my toddler say? How to actually make time for a daily journal? The answer is a five-year journal. One page per calendar day (September 4) and each page has entries for five years (2024,2025,2026,2027,2028).I look forward to picking it up each day to see what I was up to, and I’ll actually write in it bc each entry is short - just a few lines. It’s powerful to see patterns YOY and perspective shift - one year later, can’t remember what “lots of work stress” was even about!
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I’ve been doing this for eight years now, and it’s become an integral part of my daily life, as well as a yearly practice. Every day I simply jot down what happened and how it made me feel—just a few sentences or phrases, and it takes only a few minutes. As I write, I can glance at previous years above (since each page will hold 5 years of the same date) and notice what has stayed the same and what has changed. A tiny reflection. At the end of the whole year, I read through the entire journal (the lines for that year) cover to cover. As I’m reading, I take notes on what I like and what I don’t like. What I want to see change, what I would like to do more of. The people and events that brought me joy. And those that didn’t. It can be so easy to forget the small things. The mundane smiles of a Tuesday in February. I then use those notes to help cohere my thoughts around any changes I’d like to make in my life for the next year and anything I’d like to double down on. These journals to me are such a great example of “little big change”: some small adjustment that, when done every day, makes a big difference!
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I’ve never in my life filled a journal and I’ve been in the same one since 2017 (🫣) I’d never able to sustain momentum until I saw this Austin Kleon post about date stamps. I got one, and now I at least stamp the date daily, and sometimes that leads to more. It’s not pressuring myself to journal, it’s just an easy first step and then I can see if I feel like taking another. Now, with a little luck, I might manage to put this journal to bed before hitting its 10 year birthday.
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Rifle Paper Co. Stitched Notebooks
The three-pack stitched notebook sets from Rifle Paper Co. are beautiful and blissfully short, which means I get to experience the joy of filling up a diary to the last page more frequently! The three-packs also typically last me about a year, which feels vaguely poetic.
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introducing you to my one and only true love: the a6 midori grid notebook. small but mighty—it lays flat, is not intimidating to write in as you can fill up a page quite easily, and little to no bleed in the pages.
the perfect planner, and the only one i've liked enough to use for more than like 3 weeks. as a self-employed therapist, i have a lot of appointments, paperwork, and random things to keep track of on my own, and this planner is all i need! the a6 size is small and so cute, which makes it perfect to throw in a purse. i bring mine everywhere!! will be ordering every year for the rest of my life, most likely.
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Maybe I’m just maturing or maybe it’s the planner, but this is the only one I’ve ever been able to stay consistent with. I got the CP Petite starter bundle which is a discbound system that comes with a bunch of different planner formats to try out and see which works best for you, then you can order your desired inserts separately. They have dated and undated inserts. I know there are some other similar ones out there but this one is very aesthetically pleasing to me and I love all the customizable options.
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I’m a fair weather journal-er. Not much makes me cringe but reading my unedited, inner thoughts? No thank you. Plus a blank page is too intimidating. I ordered this because I am not a fan of summer and figured maybe this would help me work through my feelings of this season and perhaps remind me of the very few parts I do like. If I lived way up north I think I could romanticize summer but Atlanta is not her best in the heat!
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I've got a 'one line a day' journal. I'm not allowed to be mad at myself if i miss a day.
One sentence a day? I can do that most days. A colleague is on her seventh year of doing this. I'm on month nine
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I have an aversion to “journaling” apparently. I’ve always thought of it as a more serious ordeal than it needs to be (thank you bullet journal craze of the late 2010s) at the start of this year I started a “diary” instead. I write in it every day, even if it’s just a sentence or two, but the “dear diary” really lowered the stakes for me. So I guess if journaling doesn’t work for you, try a diary.
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Morning pages has changed my life. You can learn more in Julia Cameron's book The Artist's Way. But the assignment is simple - every day (ideally in the morning) write 3 stream-of-consciousness pages about whatever the eff is in your head. No pressure, just start writing. You will be amazed at what comes out. And it will open up brain space for creativity and inspiration. It takes me about 20 minutes, and I usually don't manage to do it every day. But when I do, I thank myself!
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For the longest time, I thought typing wouldn’t count, but I’d avoid the pressure of writing in my journal or just plain not have it on me when inspiration struck. Then one day I realized I’d rather have my thoughts and memories typed on my little phone screen than not have them documented at all?? Also, being able to add pics from my camera roll changed the game for me. I still get journal intimidation, but I’m also writing more than I ever have before? 🤷♀️
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Our Q&A a Day: 3-Year Journal for 2 People
My partner and I go to sleep at (very) different times - me much earlier than him. But every night before I sleep, he comes in to say goodnight, and we answer the question of the day in this notebook. Some are ridiculous, some are sentimental, some we roll our eyes at, but it's a constant ritual and a moment to connect every night before we dive into our respective evenings. Seeing the similarities/and differences over the years is an added bonus!
Morning Pages in a Spiral Decomposition Book
This is a habit that I wish I started earlier in life, but luckily one that was extremely encouraged in my MFA program. I re-rec’d this specifically because you must use a spiral bound notebook that is not overly precious. If it’s too beautiful a notebook, you may not allow yourself to get messy.
My favorite journaling app. It started out as a daily diary to scrapbook everything digital (photos taken that day, anything else I want to remember), and it became so much more than that. A database to track my Mom's health. A place for my Dana Scully-esque field reports during my internship. The ability to search entries by tags, pin important entries, and view entries in a list, calendar, location, or media view are so helpful and the interface is easy to navigate. The base app is free, but I use the silver version.
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When I was in rehab, I was told to keep a list of my worries and then check in a few days later and see how many of them had been handled by the universe. That seemed crazy - the universe doesn’t handle shit, I do! - but lo and behold, when I’d read back over the previous days’ entries I couldn’t believe how much had evaporated just from releasing the worry, rather than letting it rattle and knock around etc. Now I keep a (fairly) regular list that goes like this: 3 worries 3 questions 3 things I’m proud of 3 things I’m grateful for 3 wishes They can be big, small, trivial, powerful. I use a different color of Le Pen for each category (that’s just for fun!) Journaling can seem like such a task, but if it’s simple and focused (and appealing, hence the Le Pens) then it becomes part of your morning or evening and allows you a place to park your agitation outside of your roiling mind! Freeing up disc space is key to healing:)
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a pocket notebook for recommendations
or as I like to call it: my steve rogers notebook (like after he defrosted). helps me keep track of my backlog of books I want to read and also things that I try out with who recommended it to me so that I can go back and tell them what I think. p.s. making your own notebook is surprisingly easy. and very relaxing once you get into the rhythm of it.
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Moleskine Pocket Notebook (Grid or Dot)
I love the paper feel and quality of Moleskine books. The pocket size would be great for your purposes, and the black comes in grid, dots, ruled, or plain.
It’s a lovely practice to just have these things to nourish you as you move away from online consistency.
✅ cheap ✅ no rules ✅ anyone can do it One of my absolute favorite non therapy therapies … the young ones are the best at it … one page from my 6 yr olds journal
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Sure, you can spend hours journaling about what’s going on in your life, or you can do what I do: spend 3 minutes a day writing down the who-what-where-why-how details of the day on an index card. At the end of the week, I add the good stuff to my annual journal, plus pictures, drawings, quotes, etc. Then I toss out the index cards!
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i’m a big advocate for journaling in general, but i spent many years with empty pages. i’d have thoughts and reflections throughout the day, but they’d disappear by the time i went to write them down, and when i intentionally sat down with pen in hand, my mind would go blank. it wasn’t until i gave myself permission, which at first felt sacrilegious to the concept of journaling, to jot things down in my notes app and transfer them into my journal later that i was actually able to keep track of those thoughts. i’ve found that the process of rewriting them helps me process them, too.
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