C) Telling Your Stories

A Week’s Worth of Journaling Prompts: Reflections for the Future

September 19, 2011
Thumbnail image for A Week’s Worth of Journaling Prompts: Reflections for the Future

I have just been reading Writer Magazine’s June 2011 interview of Gail Godwin, regarding her recently released The Making of a Writer, Volume 2: Journals, 1963-1969. Godwin’s purpose in publishing her edited journal entries is to inspire other writers by sharing her journey and growth as a writer, as well as how she mines her [...]

Read the full article →

A Week’s Worth of Journaling Prompts: Using Your Journal for Memoir

September 12, 2011
Thumbnail image for A Week’s Worth of Journaling Prompts: Using Your Journal for Memoir

Journal writing is good for so many things: emotional catharsis, sorting out problems, recording life events, self-reflection, and personal growth. It is also a writer’s tool, in which we write about our characters, explore possibilities, and practice writing dialog. Often, though, we don’t make use of previous entries. We mull over things in writing, and [...]

Read the full article →

Making Meaning Through Journal Writing: Our Shared Humanity

March 16, 2011
Thumbnail image for Making Meaning Through Journal Writing: Our Shared Humanity

THIS week’s journaling prompts help us explore our responses to painful world events, as well as how we could, can, and do help others. The prompts are designed to help us understand, on a deeper level, what triggers our sense of empathy for other human beings. I’d like to continue this theme and talk about [...]

Read the full article →

Journaling Sensory Details: What We Hear

February 2, 2011
Thumbnail image for Journaling Sensory Details: What We Hear

JOURNALING is a way of giving voice to our inner thoughts and feelings; in a very real sense, it’s a monologue for an audience of one. But journal writing can help us develop more than one voice and in more than one form. We can write in the child’s voice, the teenager’s voice, and the [...]

Read the full article →

Making Ourselves Understood

December 7, 2010
Thumbnail image for Making Ourselves Understood

Did you know that journal writing, in addition to helping you make meaning of life’s events, can help improve your communication with others? Whether we’re writing or speaking, our goal is to communicate our thoughts and feelings. When journal writing, you have the freedom to bring up vague ideas and give them definition and form, to surface buried feelings and examine and nurture them into a shape that makes sense.

Read the full article →

Sensory Details: Handwriting Trains the Brain

November 9, 2010
Thumbnail image for Sensory Details: Handwriting Trains the Brain

GIVEN my preference for journaling and writing on the computer rather than writing by hand, I thought a recent Wall Street Journal article, “How Handwriting Trains the Brain” (10/5/2010), was interesting. The gist of the article was that the practice of handwriting improves the ability to develop and express ideas. The study was conducted with [...]

Read the full article →

Making Meaning Through Journal Writing: Stories of Our Memories

October 12, 2010
Thumbnail image for Making Meaning Through Journal Writing: Stories of Our Memories

THIS YEAR I began the habit, at the beginning of each month, of reading my journal entries for the same month of the previous year. It’s so interesting to recall where I was a year ago at this time, to read about my hopes and dreams and fears. I always want to know: Have I made any progress? What was I working on? What was going on for me emotionally? Are there any patterns related to time of year?

Read the full article →

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →