Thoughts from the Lighthouse - On writing a Journal

I have been thinking about writing a journal. Looking back over the year I find that an aide memoir would have been useful - so much has happened over the last year - how will I remember it in all its glory? Quite aside from that, I also used to enjoy writing one, but why did I stop – another of those things I cant quite remember! Keeping a journal is a time-honoured tradition, an individual history which allows future indulgences in nostalgia.

Going through my Grandmothers positions recently revealed a large number of journals, which provide a powerful insight into my family's past and some of the incredible things that happened and made her who she was. They also provided both poignant and happy memories of someone we can no longer talk with. Her observations and reflections now providing us with windows through which we can view her world. Subsequent conversations amongst the family revealed a long family tradition for writing journals. Is my desire to write one again just a family trait?

Journals come in many forms, some are stories of people, some provide us with social and historical commentary, while some show us deep personal explorations. Many encompass all of these at different times. Apart from a way to remember and the pleasure that writing can bring, why do people keep journals?

I enjoy studying leadership and what makes people happy and allows them to achieve in their lives. Everyone is so different and everyone at some time, does something incredible, we just don’t always know what it is. A common theme, from the literature and from conversations with people who I have been privileged to learn from, is the need to build personal leadership as the first step. Developing self awareness and understanding allows us to effectively manage ourselves. This combined with a sense of personal direction and of what is important to us gives the grounding to lead ourselves and to stay true to our values. When these values include a strong sense of ethics, this foundation seems to allow people to build happiness and to be successful at what ever they choose.

Taking time out to reflect, to think things through, how to react, how you reacted, how you feel etc is not a luxury I have allowed myself for a long while now. Yes to an extent it happens anyway but there is something about taking the time to actually think it through on paper that makes the whole thing more worthwhile and personally rewarding.

A lot of the thinking through I might have done in a journal has, to an extent, been don't on emails to various peoples. The benefit of working through things in writing, of developing ideas not entirely lost but inevitably censored based on actually having an external audience. No matter how close or trusted the recipient is they still form an external audience and their thoughts, feelings and reactions are taking into account as you write. How will they think about this? Will it change what they think about me? Does how they think of me matter to me?

While an external audience may limit both topic and content, and in a way act as a censor of thoughts they bring benefits too. Will the recipient of the words actually get my point? Unlike a spoken conversation a written one requires much greater clarity and precision. The instant feedback from the listener confirming their reaction and understanding and even their interest is missing. In a written conversation, words are all that is available to the reader, without any clues to the feeling or intent of the speaker. 95% of communication is non verbal - comes from things other than the words - so to communicate just using the 5% is a good skill to practice.

In discussing journals with the family we talked not only about the ones family members had written but also those that have been published - what do the works of diarists as diverse as Samuel Peepyes and Alan Clark bring to us? What can we learn from them? Are they relevant as social histories?

For me the answer lies in part in who they were written for. If we write for ourselves will we be more candid than if we write for an external audience? If we write with the aim of publication how 'revisionary' will we be with the truth. To what extent will we portray events accurately or consider how we will be perceived. Will we discuss our feelings accurately or within the realms of how people would be expected to react if they want to be seen in a good light. In terms of the social historical relevance of such journals it does not seem to matter - they still provide interesting insights. For those who turn to such writings to gain an understanding of an individual, or for those who publish 'to be understood' it becomes highly relevant.

To an extent we all recount our past within a framework of who we are and how we want people to perceive us. Imagine talking about your childhood at a dinner party with people you don't really know compared to telling the same story to someone very close to you. How does the story change? For most of us its considerably. Why then do people assume that writing a journal will be more intimate? Often it is, but if written for public consumption is it not more like the dinner party version?

To an extent how we talk about things shapes how we feel about them too. The words we use to describe events shape our feelings about those events. If we describe something in positive and happy terms do we not remember it that way, whereas if we describe the same event using gloomy language our memories of the event become less favourable? Our ability to 'reframe' events allows us to present ourselves to ourselves in what we consider to be the best possible way. Therefore how honest can a journal be? To what extent does it become a justification for our actions?

If we write about our feelings and motivations towards something do they become true? In acknowledging them do they become more real? Is the converse also true? If I don't observe a thought does it cease to exist, a bit like the tree that falls in the woods – if no one hears it did it make a noise? I am not sure that scientists really have an answer here for us yet – what we do know is that just by observing we already know we have changed that thought and therefore the outcome.

So in writing a journal what will my motivation be, who will the audience be, how will this change things and just how much reflection is appropriate or possible?