@jks I don’t mind sharing, if you don’t mind reading about it.
The original impetus for my journaling was as part of a mental health exercise.
I was already using DEVONThink to collect scans of paperwork and where I put my writing projects. So I started journaling, using the rich text format at first. In the process of my writing projects I learnt how to use the Fountain markup format for script writing and that led me to getting comfortable with Markdown.
Part of the mental health exercise of journaling, for me at least, is to go back and read about where you were at and what you were thinking about in the past. At first it started with me just typing a few lines about what I had watched, listened to, and read that day at the end of my journal.
At the same time I was learning automation in MacOS and DEVONThink all the while doing all my journaling on my phone. I started experimenting with Shortcuts and I found a way to grab the info from, for example the podcasts I was listening to, and adding it to my journal.
At the moment I track my weight, workouts, bike rides, swim sessions, as well as what media I am consuming, meditation times, and the main event: my thoughts throughout the day.
The tl:dr is that a day’s journal ends up being a kind of snapshot of the day I had and the thoughts I had that day. I don’t track the data over time and have plans to lose weight or train for a marathon of keep a record of everything I’ve watched or read, BUT!, when I look back at a journal from last year I have a few hints about where I was at mentally, physically, socially. FUN FACT I have a shortcut that calls up a random journal entry from the last two years. It’s a great way to introduce myself to the stranger I was X number of days ago.
I have a daily note; a combination journal/planner/dashboard
but instead of updating it, I add separate notes throughout the day
All note titles are prefixed with the date (yyyy-mm-dd …)
When viewed in title sequence, the set of notes are a snapshot of my day
The benefits of individual notes are
easier entry
notes can be tagged separately; for example Journal-Daily, Journal-Note, Journal-NoteHealth, Journal-NoteFinances, Journal-Photo … plus any other appropriate tags
That sounds similar to my approach. Thanks for sharing that.
I think the “random day” is a really powerful concept. It is something that I do as well but rather than being led to a random journal entry, I also keep a (nearly)daily photography journal which has a random selection feature. I like to pull a random photo and then connect with several “data points” such as
the photo content itself like what that reflects to me
the memory of where I was when I took that photo (or posted it)
connect all that to my DEVONthink journal where I can see even more details like a dream I may have had that day, or any other waking life things that were going on in that time frame
I find that I often connect back to something relevant to my present moment, even from something that happened a decade or more ago.
Sometimes when I am in a rut or facing a problem or challenge, this technique helps bring clarity to me about how to deal with the situation.
It goes to show you how things occur in cycles and also to see where we came from (like you say, that “stranger” from that time period) compared to who we are today.
I wrestle with how fiddly I get with my journal. I try to keep in focus the idea that overall the journal should be “frictionless” and nothing should get in the way of the main objective, writing down my thoughts. I’ve considered adding photos to my journal process but it’s too “edge case” in my mind to make any effort on that front.
@DTLow ‘s many notes idea is something I have tried but I like the simplicity of one document per day. I have a markdown {{TOC}} table of content at the top and bottom of my journal so when I open it I can skip to any part of the journal quickly.
I’ve been experimenting with making a Shortcut that opens today’s journal, adds a “## Time of day” at the bottom and gets me to just typing my thoughts as quickly as possible. As it is now I just open it and type that text.
As with many situations, it’s a push and pull between futzing about in Shortcuts or just doing the main work.
