Journal Reflection

where wisdom appears

“The mind is a surprising place, you don’t know what it may be hiding until you start knocking around in there.” -- Hayley Phelan

Have you ever glanced back over your journal and been a bit taken aback by reading a bit of wisdom you wrote months or years ago but now don’t remember writing it? Maybe it was about recognizing a pattern that’s still bothering you, or an insight that somehow you had forgotten you had. Wisdom isn’t a fixed level that, once it arrives, always stays the same. It’s more like a wave that comes and goes and needs periodic refreshing and deepening. That’s the role of reflection.

There’s a part of journaling that is somewhat like automatic writing, it’s done in a slightly different state of consciousness from your full waking state. And, it’s an important state that lets you just write, without thinking about spelling, grammar, or what anyone else might think about what you’re writing. Julia Cameron described this type of writing as “morning pages.” Free writing.

As podcaster Kim Forrester summarizes it: “Write drunk; edit sober.”

While insights and ahas often come during this writing, in my experience, the real gifts appear later, during my reflection times where I reread and rethink previous writing. In a Eudaemonia podcast with Michael Radparvar, co-founder of Holstee, he says, “I think the initial process is important to keep a very wide funnel and then you can go back and piece, and pull out, the things that are really important for you.”

There many ways to make reflection part of your journal practice.

Spontaneous - as you’re journaling, you might realize that you want to remember something or come back and think about it later. I use a highlighter to make  something that looks like an asterisk (I like to think of it as a flower.) Or if it prompts a question, I’ll just use the highlighter to make a question mark.

Periodic - maybe you want to set a regular date for reviewing your journal and expanding on anything that strikes you, or make notes in the margins.

Index - I like to make index pages at the back of the journal to note insights or anything else I might want to find again easily. We’ll talk more about special pages for the back of your journal later, howevr, one of my favorites is my page for “What brings me joy?” 

What ways of reflecting on your journal writing work for you?

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