Thoughts on Analogue Journalling

It has been just over a week since I started writing down daily notes on paper instead of typing them into a Markdown text file in iA Writer. Overall, things are going well, particularly when it comes to keeping it updated. Here are a few observations I’m made from the experience so far:

1. My handwriting is still bad, but starting to improve a bit. I have this weird thing where my brain tells my hand to mark out the next letter, or a completely different one, from the one I mean to write, resulting in a lot of corrections. I’m hoping that forcing myself to write by hand every day will start to iron out that particular kink from my brain.
2. I’m less obsessive about my sleep pattern in my notes, preferring to make a general comment on whether I slept well the previous night. Similarly for meals, unless it’s something new we’re having.
3. Writing down things that I should get done in the near future feels more like a commitment than doing so as a digital note.
4. Having the journal pad and pen nearby is great for jotting down songs that I’ve heard from the radio, so I can look them up later online.
5. I don’t feel such a compulsion to note down stuff to make it look like I’ve had an eventful day. If I only have a few things worth noting, that’s okay. Likewise, if there’s a lot of things I got through, that’s fine too, and if that means going over more than one page so be it.

I’m not planning on digitising any of these notes, at least not currently. Where I feel something is worth preserving for posterity online, I’ll transcribe it into a blog-post here.

I should add that I’ve no shortage of writing implements, as I have at least four pens just from my visits to the doctor’s surgery for vaccinations, plus a few freebies from other places.