Dear Journal

Many people suffer from feeling alone. Thousands of people walking the streets and hundreds walking the office, and still we often feel so alone. It seems that the very things that make us feel alone are the same things that would undoubtedly give us the support and communication that is so vital. They are those horrible situations that have happened to us, those unthinkable grievances that we all suppress into the darkest recesses of our memory—deep enough not to affect the way others see us, but still present enough to create the cold feeling of being terribly and utterly alone. It seems that we have furnished our comfortable lives with so many masks of control, stability, and independence that we have become professional life-realtors: we can show our lives to each other, convincing one another of the perfect emotional or financial status that we pretend to all enjoy. If we were to swallow our desire to control the uncontrollable and stabilize that which is already unstable and just open up to one another, throwing out our pathological phobia of being vulnerable, we would see that we have more in common with each other than we may understand. Every situation is different, but the feelings that we feel are often shared.

The first step that is needed cannot realistically be finding someone and telling him or her of your deepest, darkest secrets—maybe in a perfect, idealistic world you could. What is needed is to tell yourself what you feel. Is it possible that one of the main reasons that we feel alone is that we don’t understand why we feel the way we feel—feeling lost in the crowd, alone in this isolation. Self-awareness is important for self-development. The best way to mature and grow is to find, realize, and admit where maturity and growth is needed. This may seem so obvious and over-generalized, and admittedly, it is. But that does not make it any less true.

There must be a way to fight the greatest enemy posing a threat to our emotional security: ourselves. Journaling is certainly one way. Journaling is perhaps the most effective and direct way to get a deeper understanding of yourself and the world around you. By putting your thoughts in writing, you trigger some unique mental processes that often lead to invaluable new insights. Even still, directing your words onto paper is not easy for many people; the difference between the idea that is in your mind and words that come out attempting to describe it sometimes just don’t match up… and it gets frustrating. But the truest aspect about journaling is that it the best place for introspection and growth that is available.

However, do not let your words become a stage to try and find pity, affirmation, or attention. Only when you write with the knowledge that no one will ever read the words that you are writing—when there is truly no other audience but yourself—only then will your words come out in the honesty that is necessary to understand the feelings that create the heavy burden that weighs on all of our minds, individually.

Polymaths such as, Leonardo da Vinci and Thomas Edison, were firm believers in using notebooks and journals as tools to record their ideas and feelings, much like modern creatives use pda's, netbooks, blackberries, etc. Try to write several statements a day that start with "I wonder,why, how, etc...”

If you're pressed for time you might consider mind mapping. Mind Mapping, is a great way to save space and time when you journal.

A mind map is a design used to represent words, ideas, tasks, or other items linked to and arranged around a central key word or idea. Mind maps are used to generate, visualize, structure, and classify ideas, as an aid in study, organization, problem solving, decision making, and writing.

The elements of a given mind map are arranged intuitively according to the importance of the concepts, and are classified into groupings, branches, or areas, with the goal of representing semantic or other connections between portions of information. Mind maps may also aid recall of existing memories.

If you choose to mind map remember that "everything connects" (e.g. Imagine a flower. Draw a picture of the sun). Making connections between things that are dissimilar is an asset when it comes to creative thinking. Practice thinking about how different things relate to each other, and how different things can be combined to make something completely different.

Basic Rules for Mind Mapping:

1. Sheet sideways.

2. Pen or computer

3. Select topic, problem or subject and purpose.

4. Start in the center of the page.

5. Use color to trigger memory. Each separate main branch
has a different color and each sub-branches for that main
branch stays with that branch's color.

6. Branches closest to the center are thicker.

7. Each idea starts a new branch.

8. Use images to express ideas whenever possible.

9. The image or word needs to sit on the line and in print.

10. The line needs to be the same length as the image or
word.

These are your memoirs and are only a few methods on how to keep a journal. Not all journals will change history, but they will enhance your creativity, reduce stress, help focus, etc. if used properly.

Wondering how to achieve a small measure of immortality? Keep a journal.

Adam T. Wamack (A Young Influence)
Ruben Harris