Hi, I'd just like some advice about journals if possible. Apologies in advance for the long post.
I’ve kept journals on and off since 1992. I threw out ten years worth of them in 2001 and regretted it and started it up again in 2002, then about five years ago I got paranoid about them but I had them scanned and destroyed the paper copies. I did start journaling again but only in cheap books or on loose paper and threw it away afterwards.
Then two years ago I decided to start a journal again, one I can keep without being paranoid about anyone seeing it or the contents upsetting me at a later date. That journal is almost complete after two years, whereas at one time I used to go through one journal in six months or less and accumulated a lot of books. In this journal, which is a midi size Paperblanks notebook, I do write what I feel and it’s not all positive, after all life isn’t all milk and honey and I feel that a journal needs to show reality but it’s not the pages of ranting and going into pinpoint detail like I did before, I don’t write anything that would offend someone if they read it and I also paste in photos and cinema tickets and things such as that so it’s good to look back on.
I also keep an appointment diary, a planner, I use it for up and coming appointments but I also write retrospectively in it and just write a quick snippet about what I do each day, this just gives a quick overall view of the year.
However, although I don’t feel the need to journal in the same way that I used to do years ago, when I have something I need to work out or I feel angry or upset, I still need that outlet yet I’m reluctant to write all this in my nice journal and I don’t find it the same journaling on the computer.
I have recently come across my old scanned journals on my hard drive and have decided to have them printed again but not in their full form. I would like to keep certain parts in print but the whole lot still on computer for privacy reasons. I am now in the process of doing that. So I am printing out one journal at a time (there are eight in all), reading through them and picking out the parts I want to keep. This I find both intriguing and depressing. Going back over the old feelings and rants is making it all come back again, which is why I feel all that information is too much for me, yet at the same time it gives me insight into how I’ve coped with things and reading this can help me cope with things in the future.
I do have something on my mind now and today I got a reporters notepad, sat in a café and wrote fourteen pages analysing and getting to the nitty gritty of my worries and I feel better for it. Entries such as this I don’t plan to keep. Once the pad is full I will throw it away. But I realise now I do need that release.
So my question is that. Part of me is tempted to go back to the type of journaling that I did before and just not worry about it being seen or it upsetting me if I reread it. Another part of me is thinking should I just get rid of any type of sparodic journaling that I do, including the nice journal with the photos, keep on journaling in cheaper books and throw it away afterwards and just keep my appointment diaries with the briefest of entries which will take up little space and be easy to look back on. Is keeping more than this, even the journal with the pictures, just duplication? What about the idea of editing my old journals, is there any point in doing this? I want to do it but am confused about the whole thing.