A Little, Sort of Lousy Guide to Journaling

Yes, we are all stuck at home and yes, it pretty much sucks. Tomorrow shall be the official day sealing my victorious second month under curfew. I wish I could say that these fifty something days was the most productive period of my whole life. However, it came as a great misfortune that I proved to be the disappointment that I was meant to be.

My first month of curfew was spent in a haze. The only thing that I was aware of at the time was that my bowel movements had improved. Otherwise, it was mostly a loop of thoughtless eat-sleep-repeat scenario. I was not feeling anything, except for a numbed satisfaction of feeding into my basic human needs, without having to be at war with the everyday toil of work.

Fast-forward to the second month I find myself in this very irate, heterogeneous state of a worrying procrastinator. I wanted to do something productive, but I noticed how time was freely available to me, which lulled me into pushing being productive for the next day. Each night when I went to bed, I was horrified at how little I had done for the day and went to sleep in a slight state of agitation. This became a continuous loop until last week, where my nightly agitation had built up and was threatening to explode as acute depression.

I being the obvious millennial that I am, started browsing on my phone to find solutions to this alien trauma I was in. Google being the spying thing it is, suddenly started recommending me YouTube videos on self-improvement. That is when I came across Andrew Kirby’s videos. Now Andrew Kirby should be the most under-hyped, sensible and the most empathetic YouTube the internet has ever created. You will know why when you start viewing his content. Now, the content that hit home was his video on journaling. So, I being the somewhat — of — a- sensible human being that I am, decided to share with you a version of journaling that seems inviting enough to the little brain I have left after trauma ( trust me when I say that that god-damned thing fried a significant part of my gray matter).

Since I hate creating too many decorations, let me delve right into the essentials of this not too fussy process. So, here is the deal; there are five parts to journaling.

1. Identify — You basically point out an issue.

2. Discover — You need to make sure that the issue is what you think it is and not something else by exploring it. ( This is important since most of us get into the wrong relationships simply because we do not explore much beyond the number of vowels the other person uses in their initial greeting via text)

3. Strategize — You make a plan to overcome your obstacles.

4. Clear the way — It goes as it sounds. You simply identify the obstacles that stand in the way of your plan and find means of removing them. If you are lucky enough, this could lead to other discoveries.

5. Commit — You set a time frame that you plan on completing this and ask of the progress that was made. Did you reach your goal? What got in your way? How can you do better next time? (Yes, they are simple questions that sometimes make you give hilarious answers. You will discover only when you start!)

One ideal question that you can ask yourself to help you gain a vision of a better you is, ‘Who is the perfect me in five years?’ If the identification point is that you are not the perfect you, you go through five years going through steps 2–5 to make incremental changes to become the best version of you. When you spend time thinking or writing on any given step, it is advisable to ask ‘what’ and ‘how’ questions. You could even question the philosophy behind your choice of chicken nuggets, if that is what you want as an identification point. But, I guess I am not that much of a happy soul to hit myself up with such a glorious question, so I have to stick with much sterner versions of it.

Now, let us look at a model journaling scenario. Bear with me if the writing reads out as routine and if I am repetitive with words because my vocabulary is barely above that of a high schooler.

1. Identify-

· What is it that you have to achieve?

I need to be more disciplined in my day-to-day life.

· What will discipline bring you if you achieve it?

I will be more productive in my day-to-day life, and the things I dread doing today will become easier.

2. Discover-

· What kind of things that you dread are you trying to do?

I dread waking up early, exercising and eating healthy food throughout the day.

· What is it about these habits that make you want them in your life?

Waking up gives me time in the day, and could make me feel like I have a purpose in the day. Exercising and eating healthy can clearly help me live my best life, and feel strong and able.

3. Clear the way-

· What stopped you from doing the above today?

I set my alarm for as late as possible and skipped breakfast and exercise.

· Nice try, but what seriously stopped you from doing this today?

I planned on being lazy by setting a late alarm, and set myself up for failure by skipping breakfast, and telling myself I would exercise later in the day when all my energy was spent.

· What caused you to set a late alarm?

I went to bed late, so I knew I would need as much sleep as possible.

· What caused you to miss exercise today?

I got home from work and let the exhaustion to take over.

4. Strategize

· What things can you do in order to reach your dreams?

I can go to bed early, set an early alarm and honour it in the morning. I can immediately wake up and start to do yoga and plan my meals for the day after that. I can make breakfast after yoga.

· How will you ensure that you will stick to your plan?

I will fill my husband in on what I plan on doing and ask him to help me follow through this idea. (this is also adding accountability for one’s actions)

5. Commit

· Now with it pretty clear what you are going to do to start your journey on self — discipline, what is it that you are able to commit to make it happen?

I am going to go to bed by 10 every day, set an alarm for 6, do yoga for 30 minutes and eat oatmeal while I prepare my day’s healthy foods, so I can be in the shower by 7.30am. I’m going to tell my husband my plan and ask him to remind me if I am about to fall off this rail.

· What is the necessary time frame for you to perform this routine in order to claim victory?

Four weeks/28 days.

· What are the terms of your success?

I will spend 28 days, each day fulfilling the commitments that I have set forth to go to bed early, wake up, do yoga and eat better.

The next step is to put that review date on your calendar, and start writing your progress for the next 28 days in your journal to make it accountable. This is called ‘written accountability’. It is as if you have created a clone of yourself in a part of your mind. This clone keeps you accountable to what you have written down. If you have not executed your plan, it is as if you have failed your mind clone.

This whole process might sound crazy and tedious at first. I mean you are literally sending a rake through the deepest, unused parts of your mind to extract questions you have never asked yourself ever before. Then your mind goes numb, not knowing answers for those questions. My first journal — entry is the most embarrassing piece of writing that I have created to date. The most common answer to step three of my journal was, ‘It is just genetics and the mood swings I get with PMS’. I have good news though. The crappiness in my writing has reduced significantly by day six. My thoughts have cleared up and my brain has started to make more logical connections between my journal and the actual events of my boring life. Before the journal, I was completely fueled by emotions. Now, it is as if my brain has the first say in everything. So, now if I start to get mad at something, my brain just reminds me of an entry in the journal that I had to accomplish before getting mad. Eventually my brain focuses on the entry and I forget to get mad. However, I do not let this happen with important emotions and urges like sleep, love, the need to use the loo and eating spicy samosas. I mean who wants to end up being a robot in the name of a journal?

So there you have it. My journal says I was supposed to have finished this post by the dawn of yesterday. My mind clone must probably be drunk by now. But, hey I managed to actually complete this and that is what matters. I hope everyone who reads my below-average article will try and juice some inspiration out of it and create a post faster than I did or on a merrier note, finally make the best choice in chicken nuggets. If you still do not want to do it, I advise you to buy one of those fancy, expensive notebooks, stare at it for a long time and meditate on how much you actually spent on it. I am sure it will trigger the writer in you immediately, since the pandemic has left most of us either penniless or at half the income of what we initially were at. Now that I am done with this, I will go ahead and rake my brain for another task to accomplish. Hopefully, my mind clone will still have it in her to forgive me. Enjoy!