Productive uses for your empty journals
If you're like me, you’ve seen a journal or notebook at a bookstore and thought, “This is cute! I’m gonna buy that!“ with full intention of filling it’s pages, cover to cover with… something.
But in reality, you have so many journals that you actually don't know what to do with them. Those poor lonely, little journals, stacked in a corner with nothing to do. 🥺
At least your intentions were good, right?
This coming year I have a goal to use all of the empty journals sitting in the corner, and I have a few ideas on how to fill them. And who knows, maybe some of these suggestions will be helpful for you too!
A Brain Dumping Journal
If you're not familiar with the concept of brain dumping, don't worry. I didn't know this is an actual process until recently and actually thought I came up with this idea myself. I did this all the time in college and lovingly referred to as “word vomiting“. 🤮
The concept of brain dumping originates from David Allen and his productivity management book, Getting Things Done. The crucial aspect of brain dumping is to capture your thoughts in an external collection tool that you routinely check or routinely empty. This frees up space in your mind to do what you're really good at or to process a concept or idea you've had while focusing on another task at a later time.
Think of your mind as a room that you want to tidy up. The first thing that you would do to clean the room is to gather specific items in one place to either be sorted as trash, something to keep something to potentially give away. This process is pretty low lift and especially helpful for me to do after I wake up in the morning or before going to sleep at night especially since I tend to have overwhelming thoughts around those times.
To try it out, you’ll need a timer, a journal and a writing utensil. Start by setting a timer for about five to 10 minutes. Note the date on a clean page, and then proceed to write down everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) in your head. Remember, this an allocated space to collect whatever thoughts that you have to make sure that you free up space in your brain.
And that's it. ✨
If you want to take this even further, take a look at your stream of conscious after you've stepped away from it for a period of time and try and organize your thoughts into groups with similar themes. You might notice that there's a specific thought in your mind that you keep coming back to that can be turned into a task, or it’s a idea you want to pursue. I would HIGHLY recommend keeping as much of this process as possible monologue.
Not that Im not a fan of digital notes, its just something about getting these thoughts all on paper that seem to make them stick for me. 🤷🏽♀️
2. Personal Dictionary Journal
A dictionary journal gives you a space to remember interesting words or phrases. I started one in college to remember some of the interesting stuff I would hear students talk about (I wasn’t super cool or popular in school so it helped to know the lingo). Make sure you get the definition as well as the context in which the person had said this word.
3. Pros & Cons List Journal
I also think a pros and cons journal is a good way to fill a journal easily. And it’s pretty self explanatory. Write a list of pros and cons of a decision you want to make, then tally them up!
4. Burn Letter Journal
My favorite suggestion on this list is a burn letter journal kind of like the burn book in that movie Mean Girls where they just say a bunch of like really mean and ugly stuff about people. 😂
Sometimes things happen where you are the target of someone's rage and insensitivity (which might be justified and might not be) but if you really need to express how big of a jerk someone is being and you don’t have a friend or professional resource to talk to in a timely manner, you can write a note to that shitty person, telling them how you feel. I make my burn letters as emotional as I can get. Really getting into the heart of your feelings gives you the chance to take out all your rage in a way that won’t get you convicted for murder, and then (hopefully after some time) let it go. This is for your eyes only, none of it ever needs to be given to anybody else if you don’t want it to.
5. Gift Ideas Journal
For the many people in our lives, it’s hard to keep up with everyone’s likes and desires in your head. So don’t! Write them down! And I would recommend you keep this list digitally and someplace where you can update it often when you find out another thing someone you care for really likes. That way you aren’t struggling around the time of their birthdays or holidays to get them something nice!
6. Period / Ovulation Tracker Journal
Since the tech world is becoming a… *lot* more sus for us human beings with ovulation cycles and periods, might I suggest manually tracking the days in which you ovulate and have your period. There are so many resources from Planned Parenthood and onward to help easily get the proper calculations for predicting your cycles without the hassle of giving up that personal data to companies that may use it improperly. This is also a place to discover patterns of which negatively affect your symptoms during your cycles, too. For example, regular alcohol and caffeine consumption makes my migraine unbearable so I take extra care to consume them sparingly before my cycle starts.
7. Affirmations / compliments Journal
One of my goals for 2023 is to start an affirmation journal again, a place to write down loving and safe things I want to repeatedly go to whenever I’m having a crap day. Affirmations work for me! Whatever it is about saying positive things about myself and the space around me, when I keep the routine of saying or wiriting them down, I have access to that good energy all day.
However I know that it can be hard to access some of those positive things about ourselves. So that’s where a compliment journal might be an alternative solution. It's where you list out all of the compliments that people have said about you or people have said like to you directly. So that hopefully, after listing out so many nice things people have said, you start to believe them.
8. Analog Password Journal
Just in case you don’t feel the need to pay for a password protector, going analog and keeping it in a safe space might be a good alternative!
9. Love Letters Journal
If I ever have any children, writing them love letters and giving them a stack when they are older is something I hope will always make them feel loved. Something about writing love letters is so full of emotion and old timey. Even if it’s to someone random to compliment them or remember a nice moment you noticed them, its just another way to get your feelings out in a positive way. TO be given a love letter as a gift has to be one of the best things. To know someone carefully crafted all their emotions onto the paper like that…. *sigh*
That's really cute. 🥰
10. Code Scribbles / Scrap Paper Journal
If you have a 9-5 I’m sure you’ve had times where taking note of something would have been very helpful in a meeting or to help you sort your thoughts out. ALWAYS have a space to record the things you’ve done during the day to cover your ass! I can’t say enough!
11. *BONUS* Brag Sheet Journal
With your work and scrap paper journals you should have a space to recollect to awesome accomplishments you have made for your workplace so you don’t have to fish for successful examples of your leadership and patience during interviews. Pat yourself on the back when you’ve saved the company money, and WRITE IT DOWN! This is the only way you’ll be able to recollect the exact moment in which you achieved this success.
This is something that I, myself need to do more closely as I move up in my career.
And that’s it! 🎉
I’m fresh out of ideas. I’m sure there are other brilliant ways to use the journals we have. It feels like a waste to throw them out. Hopefully these ideas will lead to some special memories!
I also have a video of this exact topic with a little more detail a flair.
Happy journaling!
