Many times I’ve wanted to start a journal and struggled with the same question. It always seems to go:

Captains Log, YYYY/MM/DD:

Same shit, different day.

End log

It’s not that noteworthy things never happen, it’s just that they’re so infrequent for me that I can never make a habit of logging them.

I use mine as a way to keep track of events around me (no politics or earth shattering stuff, just daily & intimate stuff), things I want to be able to remember. And to help me put a semblance of order in my the mess I call my thoughts. Also as… a sketchbook which I find fun and relaxing to do even though I’m no artist.

My main suggestion would be to make it fun and exciting. The more it is, the more likely it will become a habit you will enjoy keeping.

Oh, I’m 50+ and I’ve been journaling for almost 50 years, if that makes any difference.

BTW, I very recently decided to try to ‘revitalize’ the !journaling@sh.itjust.works community. Here is two posts that may interest you: How do you actually start journaling? and How do you guys make short journal entries?

I hope you won’t mind that shameless plug but I thought it might interest you to know about that community. So, if you ever feel like joining and participating, do not hesitate. For the moment, people have been commenting below my posts, which is already a nice (and huge) change, but I would love to see more people posting new content. And if that’s something that worries you, there is no such thing as a stupid question ;)

Mostly just what’s been going on with me and people I know. What’s been on my mind or stuff I’m looking forward to. I don’t write super frequently so it works out for me

I’m a bit of a history nerd so I like to do just a little world news and what I think about it at the time so maybe one day I can look back to see if my initial take was right. Sometimes what my current day to day looks like or explaining some stuff I do like I was explaining it to a person who had no idea.

I think I do that because I’ve always liked the idea of someone finding my notebook years from now.

There’s lots of schools of thought on how you should write your diary, but imo the most important thing to keep in mind is that diary is for you.

I primarily use my diary as a coping mechanism to deal with stress and to reframe my outlook. This means I don’t think very hard about what I’m writing, I’m just putting my feelings onto a page. Then once those thoughts are on paper they become easier to deconstruct.

My primary diary pulls double duty, and I use it to plan out the following day. When I reflect on how today went, it’s easier to make a plan for tomorrow. And at least in my experience it’s easier to make a plan the day before than to wait and see how I feel the next day.

Some people like a themed diary. I keep a separate gratitude journal where the only rule is to write things in it that made me happy. This is helpful on bad days when I can’t think of anything good going on in my life

If you’re into mental health and self improvement, there’s loads of literature on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) online. CBT is the gold standard of psychiatric care currently, and is primarily self directed through journaling exercises. Searching for these exercises could give you a framework if you’d like to follow something a bit more rigid

Mine is more goal based, I have a section for what I accomplished today, what I worked on, what I couldn’t do and why, anything in particular that I noticed from a physical, mental or emotional standpoint, the status of long term goals, new ideas, and what I’m looking forward to tomorrow.

I don’t fill out every section every day, except for the first one. I just like to do it because it gives me some purpose on this wonderful journey of mine.

Think of it this way. Whatever would help with witness testimony is whatever people write in diaries. Have you ever read Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations?

Anything. Thoughts. Feelings. I write short stories in mine sometimes

For me diary is an emotional outlet to process emotions. So I usually write how do I feel and what caused it.

I also write medical anomalies that happen in my life that is highly likely that I will forget them.

e.g. runny nose from hay fever(?)

I am a person that dosn’t form habits so I write when It strikes me fancy and I don’t feel guilty that I don’t do it everyday.

Sometimes I write a really oustanding event that is a contender for my TOP 10 days of my life (I have seperate file in my digital diary for them)

I also have separate files for writing about a topic I am reaserching and thinking about.

Every quarter I also review last 3 months and set myself theme for the next three months.

Write the date.

Write what you are doing today or what you did today/yesterday. Write how you feel or how you felt about it. Write what you are excited about and worried about in the future. All these things will help you remember your mindset at the time when looking back.

Below, I’ve quoted a comment I wrote last year on kbin (RIP) about what I keep in my journal.

I started keeping a daily journal about 10 years ago. It’s helpful for tracking what I worked on as well as various health issues. I skim through it once a week before talking to my therapist and read all entries from the past year when I need to prepare documentation for my annual performance review at work. I’ll grep through the whole thing occasionally when I’m trying to remember when some particular event was. (I don’t do that very often, but it is handy when I need it!)

I typically track:

• current date for the entry (both in the file and as the file name)
• date and time I wrote the entry
• when I went to bed
• when I woke up
• health issues (if any)
• what I worked on (professionally and for my hobbies)
• places I went (if anywhere)
• significant conversations (particularly if there’s something I need to follow up on)
• what I’m watching/reading/playing/etc.
• anything else that seems noteworthy

I keep my journal in plain text files named like YYYY-MM-DD.txt. Right now it’s all in one big folder. I have it in version control and back it up to various places occasionally. I’ll probably split it so there is a folder for each year eventually.

I started doing this after someone came up to talk to me and I realized that I’d recognized him from a particular place a few years earlier but could not for the life of me remember his name!

A notable change since then is that I’ve augmented the journal with a set of weekly “time card” files where I jot down a few words about what I’m doing each day as I do it – super useful for preparing summaries for my boss on what I got done each week, and it’s helped reduce some of my anxiety/depression problems. I keep that as a set of conceptually related but separate files. To be clear, I make those for my own use; work doesn’t require it, and I don’t share them verbatim with anyone. They’re just another tool to help me remember the things I want to make sure I don’t forget.

I think it would be fun to be able to read back to the day to get some perspective on how things have changed. What I was right about, what I had wrong.

I’ve never written a journal that lasted more than a week or two. But what I sort of wish I had done was write like to a close friend who is far away, telling them about my life. “Dear Diary,” is how they traditionally begin right?

It doesn’t have to be super formal or in a particular format. Years later it will trigger a bunch of memories that you will have forgotten. That’s the fun part.