PBP12: J is also for Journals
(Still catching up!)
Keeping a journal has been a big part of my life for a long time, but unlike a lot of the longtime journal-writers I know, I didn’t really start until I was introduced to the internet. I tried, repeatedly, as a child to keep a handwritten journal, but my attention would wander too quickly. There was too little going on in my life of interest to write about, and going back through my old entries held no joy.
Of course, the internet changed everything, as it is wont to do. From my earliest days online, I was keeping a public journal- first on my own hosted sites, coded in the simplest html with crappy Paint graphics, and improving (slowly) from there. (Okay, I admit my very first website was not a blog. It was a Sailor Moon fansite. I was 11! 
) For a very long time I had no comment functionality- not even a chatbox or a tagboard- so I was still talking to myself, but there was something different. I still haven’t figured out what.
I am now going on 26, and since those days I have always had a blog, even if I would disappear for weeks at a time. I went from my own hosted sites to livejournal (and then to another and then another and possibly a fourth- it’s been so long I’m not sure anymore); then I wandered back to my own hand-coded crappy html, and then eventually made the transition to WordPress. Almost all of these blogs are lost to me, now. (Which isn’t such a bad thing, because honestly, I whined a lot.)
Over these years I have repeatedly asked myself why. Why do I blog? Why do I feel the need to share my thoughts with the internet? I don’t do the journaling that many other pagans do- I don’t record my spellwork or my rituals or my dreams. I’ve recorded my divination attempts a grand whopping once. I have no particular insight or experience to share. I am trying to build a path, but it’s not something I’m comfortable sharing with everyone, so I’ve only blogged about it sporadically. (I’ve thought about doing password protected entries, but they make me feel twitchy and I don’t know why. Possibly because I have always been too shy to ask my online friends to be included in their password-locked entries.) (I may create a public, but not widely shared, subdomain off of this one and use that. Hm.)
It boils down to: even though I am not sharing anything particularly interesting, keeping a journal helps me keep my brain in order. It helps me stay in touch/up to date with people I might not otherwise. It gives me the opportunity to gain insight from people reading, and maybe shows others that they’re not the only one in the same mess.
Do you keep a journal? Why or why not? Do you want to change that?
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Like you, I have never been able to keep a journal. Even my Pagan journaling is very sporadic, although I have a BOS with the important stuff in there. I’ll probably be blogging about it later as well.
I recently started my first blog ever and that was a big step I’m pretty happy with. I guess it was just time.
It’s good to know I’m not the only one who’s bad at keeping records ;)
Elani Temperance recently posted..F is for Failing and Finding Solace
I don’t keep a “proper” journal. My handwritten one is where all my whining goes, mostly. I’ve had a blog in various forms that is now mostly in the form of a journal. I just never think that my day is that interesting to chronicle it, so it’s not really a “here’s what I did today” thing. Like you though, it’s a place to keep my thoughts in order, or a way to get them put in order. They’re usually not, so it helps in that. Plus, occasionally someone comments, and that feels nice, too
Amanda recently posted..My relationship with photography
I’ve kept a “real” blog since 2008. I think we’ve known each other for most of that time, maybe longer. I just like sharing my life with other people, I guess, and I like looking back on it myself.
I have kept a proper journal for most of my life though. I find hand writing to be really comforting.
Rachel recently posted..This Is My Jam: Cover Me
hmm. Should I post copies of your first web site? I think I have the links to all of your old journals too. Whee this could be fun.
http://www.geocities.com/kitti10411/ Geocities has gone away but….
Feel free to never share any other old links!
i’ve had my livejournal since 2004. i’ve been writing on and off in it since then. it seems that i mostly turn to it to complain and whine or let out frustrations. this is probably why i’ll never add anyone i know in real life. i too, don’t have many real life friends, so it’s nice to be able to write an entry and have people comment on it who have gone through similar things. i think having online journals and the like are a good way to get a dose of positive attention. i think everyone needs that once in a while.
i’ve had paper journals too, but those tended to contain poems/quotes/pictures that i liked. lj is just much more convenient. and it’s really cool to look back and read about things that i haven’t thought about since they first occurred.