Journaling

Thoth was the Egyptian God of writing among other things. He is attributed to all the writings of ancient Egypt. Its even said that the bible was only written down by men but inspired by God. Since prehistoric times mankind has felt a need to "write it down." Imagine how much the first grocery list would be worth, or a string of love letters between a cave man and a cave woman, preserved in a rolled up animal skin and most likely written in the blood of that which provided the canvas. This also probably inspired that relic of a grocery list.
1. Mammoth chops
2. Fire
3. Cave deodorizer 
I have found that most people feel it necessary to have a journal for about everthing in their life. In one article I read, the author suggested a dream journal,  a meditation journal, and a journal to record results from magical rituals. That is three journals to have to keep up with and just seems a bit overkill to me. 
However, I imagine that the amount of journals one needs depends on the level of organization that they require in their life. Me personally, I like things condensed. 
I keep two journals. One is a poetry journal where I babble and brainstorm much for the purpose of seeing what falls out. Entrys here are somewhere between suggestion and archetype I suppose in an automatic writing sort of way. 
My other journal is my esoteric/philosophy/spiritual journal. This one is a lot more organized in a less organized way. In this journal, I read, then take notes on material, and jot down my own ideas.
My journals I guess are as chaotic as any tempest. There is no direct theme, just an endless ever changing thread of....whatever trail my mind was dragging me down at the moment. However,  at some point I did instill some organization to my journaling system in the form of keys, which is basically, little of the top of my head symbols scawled in the headers and margins that categorize entrys (example: dreams,  original thoughts and material, things to study further). I gave these keys a glossary, luckily, because, as I sat watching the steam rise from my tea while flipping through page after crinkling page I had no idea what some of those symbols meant, and without the symbols not even I,  the author of said babbling, had any idea what I was thinking or talking about. 
So today I find myself extremely excited about having this new blog and all I can think about is how I would like to get blogging but, here I am with all these journals to draw from, a hot cup of tea to sip on( when I'm writing,  there will be tea), and then I have no idea what I should write about. So I wrote about my journals. 
The next step in my journaling process is a thing I call harvesting(which I'm sure is not a technique wholly my own). Ultimately the entries in my journal are original thoughts and ideas or poetic babble without no real meaning. To harvest, I go through these notebooks to remove the dross and then take what remains to further development it, whether it be as a poem, essay or story. 
Throughout my whole life I cannot remember not having a journal, and I often find myself wondering what happened to most of them. There was a time when I used composition notebooks, which was inspired by the serial killer in the movie seven, which ultimately inspired me later to condense. 
So, to all the lost journals of mine, wherever you might be, whether it's in ashes reduced to subatomic particles or not bio degrading in a landfill somewhere, know that your memory is cherished,  and you are not forgotten. 

Salutation pending 
Johnny R Draper 

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