GIVE YOUR JOURNAL SOME LOVE, SOME PERSONALITY AND SOME PURPOSE BEFORE YOU EVEN BEGIN TO CREATE IN IT

THIS IS HOW TO CONNECT WITH YOUR JOURNAL ON A DEEPER LEVEL FOR GREATER SELF-CONNECTION AND SELF-CARE

When your journal feels special to you, when it feels like an extension of you, that is when you can start getting the real wellness benefits back from your journaling time. When you create an inspiring and safe space for you to tap into your creativity and to lay yourself bare, your ideas and art and words will flow from you and onto those pages with ease.

GIVE your journal a THEME

I absolutely love having themed journals. There is just something that makes sense in my mind when all the pages are connected and tell their own story. I find that the pages flow and my creativity flows too when there is a consistent stream of ideas to explore on the pages.

A theme can be as simple or as complex as you choose. The way I choose themes for my journals is simply by looking at areas of my life that I am exploring or experiencing and want to document within the pages. More often than not the ‘title’ of a journal will be inspired by a line or word from a quote or book. Another way of theming a journal could be to collect similar types of art/writing for example, a book of quotes or song lyrics, a travel journal, an inspiration journal etc.

DECORATE AND PERSONALISE THE COVER

Decorating the cover of your journal is the first step in feeling a deeper connection to your journal. The process of creating a cover can really inspire and motivate you to keep creating inside your journal. I think that a good journal cover (like a good book cover!) can tell its own little story and give an intriguing hint or two about what you’ll find within the pages inside.

This means keeping the ‘theme’ of your journal in mind as you decorate the cover and finding ways to portray this theme as best you can. Some things to consider as you personalise your cover are the colours you use, any imagery you can add and the title you give your journal.

START WITH THE ENDPAPER

The endpaper is the very first page between the cover and the first title page of a book. I never leave this blank and like to use this space to add a quote or some journaling that sums up the theme of the journal, I do this as a method of inspiring me and reconnecting me to my theme and vision for the journal every time I sit down to create in it.

GIVE IT A SPECIAL HOME

Where does your journal live when you are not using it? I like to keep mine in a wire storage shelf/box on my desk, where I can see them all and be constantly reminded of and inspired by them.

CHOOSE YOUR JOURNAL

Let your journal be the place you turn to when you’re feeling stressed or overwhelmed and it will soon become a safe space for you to offload and unwind and a space you crave being in.