Everyone has a story. Life is a journey, and each new day begins a
new chapter for each of us. How are you telling your story? Keeping a journal allows us to write down our
experiences, our thoughts, our feelings, and our dreams for the future.
I have been journaling for over the last
fifty-plus years, and I still have every one of those journals. I recently took the time to look back at the
journals I kept as a teenager. I must be
honest here and admit I am in my mid-sixties today. Looking back on my teen years, I would have
to say in all honesty; I am lucky to be alive.
I was a wild child, though it was a different time in the late sixties
and early seventies.
Those journals are jam-packed
full of poems, drawings, trials, and tribulations, all of which have brought me
into what is I believe is called the golden years of my life. Looking back, I understand how those years
have shaped the woman I have become today.
One of the things I found in
reviewing those journals of my life is that I could carry on a complete conversation
with myself. I would ask myself a
boatload of questions or complain about my parents, fights with girlfriends,
and that description of my first kiss left me holding my stomach. I was
laughing so hard. The point is, I was
spending a lot of time self-dialoguing with myself. Did I answer the boatload of questions? Not always at that particular time, but
looking ahead in years, I found they pretty much answered themselves. Oh, and by the way, I got over the traumatic
experience of French kissing.
What I did find interesting is when I would come across a
problem I needed to solve, I always asked the same four questions. To this day, I still use those, but the wordage
is a bit different. Any life problem I
have had, I asked my self the following questions for many years:
- What is the purpose of my having experienced
this the last (timeline)?
- What am I trying to do here?
- What lesson am I supposed to learn from this
experience?
- What’s the real issue of personal growth for me
in this experience?
It is important to note that
these questions are not easy to answer in the throws of chaos. The last time I used them, it took almost a
year to work through the issues.
However, it will help you work through the experience and come out on
top of it, with a clear understanding of why this what meant to happen. As I said, the last time I answered these, I
came to understand one of the many valuable lessons. If you don’t listen to your guides, they will
pick you up and throw you on the floor.
Another factor I recognized was that I was establishing
future goals, whether it be New Year’s resolutions, or a daily, weekly, or
monthly goal. By writing out my goals, I
was able to write out a plan on how to achieve them and identify any obstacles
that stood in my way.
Another realization I had, with
goal setting, is that I found the way I dealt with the goals when they didn’t
look like I was going to reach them was to write out the problem and readjust
the aim to bring it to reality. Similar
to a Plan B strategy, though sometimes I made it to Plan W. We all take different paths in life. Often those paths reached a crossroads, and
it’s then I would have to choose to go left or right. When I was making those choices, it was
interesting to see I eventually reached my goals, though the journey could
sometimes be challenging, sometimes risky, but fun.
Through the twists and turns in
my life journey through the years, came personal growth. That’s the thing with journaling; you can go
back and reflect on where you have been and how much you have grown. I worked
through so many issues along that journey in my notebooks that it was
interesting to read on how my analytical skills evolved in handling life challenges,
how I wrote out each twist and came up with a way to move past the turns.
The other surprising aspect was
how my creativity opened. I would use
colored pens, draw, glued or taped in pictures of my friends and I going to
concerts, or hanging out at Cherokee Park, pictures from magazines, right down
to my favorite cookie recipes. News flash, I still do that today. I have a giant bucket of gel pens and even to
this day tape in exciting things I find. I also have been known to dry flower
petals I have grown and glue them in as well.
If you’re not journaling today,
you should consider doing so. Your life
is extraordinary, and your journey is meaningful. Every experience brings a lesson, joy, and
success in your life. It will bring you
to your authentic self, open your consciousness and bring transformation to
your life. So, start recording your life
today, I promise when you look back in your journal five years from now, you
will be amazed how far you have come.
I have designed a journal that you can use to start recording your journey. Yes, I had that creative idea of making my own journal’s. You can find “The Journey to Enlightenment” on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1095908324?pf_rd_p=183f5289-9dc0-416f-942e-e8f213ef368b&pf_rd_r=15R387RZXCY83XYEPJS4