Question about feedback that changed how I journal

So a friend read my journal entries last month and said "you're just writing a list of things that happened, not how you felt about them." That hit me hard. I realized I was just dumping facts about my day, like "went to the store, saw Dave, bought milk." Now I try to add one emotion per entry, like why seeing Dave made me feel weird or what I was really thinking at the store. Has anyone else gotten a piece of criticism like that that totally shifted the way you do something?

4 comments

4 Comments

markh8513d ago

Yeah @linda114 I used to think the same way actually, like journaling was just for remembering stuff. But then I tried adding feelings for a week and it made me realize how much I was hiding from myself in those old entries. The facts are useful but the feelings make it actually matter.

linda11413d ago

Journaling isn't therapy. You don't need to dig deep every time. Sometimes milk is just milk and Dave is just Dave. People overthink this stuff way too much. A factual log helps you remember what you did last Tuesday. That has value too.

olivia_moore13d ago

I tried both ways over the years and what worked best for me was a mix. I started out just logging facts like what I did that day or who I talked to. It was useful but after a while it started feeling like I was just filling a calendar. Then I tried writing how I felt about things and honestly it opened up stuff I didn't realize was sitting there. Not every entry needs to be heavy but adding a sentence about why something mattered gave the facts a reason to be written down in the first place.

emma_flores13d ago

My neighbor Dave keeps a journal and he writes down what he ate for lunch every day. It's been going on for like three years now. Last week he had a turkey sandwich on Tuesday and then on Thursday he had the same thing and got all excited because he found the pattern. I don't know why but it makes me smile when he tells me about the sandwich repeats. Sometimes I just jot down stuff like the weather or what song was stuck in my head that day. Its not deep at all but it reminds me of the small stuff that makes up a life.