Ask HN: How Do You Journal?

I tried it two years ago. Don't remember why but I think it helped to clear my head. Like dumping a RAM or throwing out the trash. And it indeed worked. But over time it became like twitter where i felt like i should write down every though i had. And so i stopped. I also did not want to force myself to write something just because i wanted to write.

Anyhow, finding the right pen was very important. I discovered that i am a huge fan of gel pens and after trying dozens of them i landed on pentel energel. I found them to have the best glide and feel and the 0.7mm felt perfect to me. Though i found others with better pigment(black, of course, not blue!) the energel was just the best overall.

Also, finding the right diary was very hard. You need the right paper texture, thickness, size, number of pages. It is very personal thing and for me it was very hard to find what i was after.

Lastly, I got into fountain pens. Actually that might have been the initial reason to get into writing, and i found there is little difference between pens and tips and is mostly about the right ink.

After decades, i finally made up a proper signature, so that was great.

And yeah, i recommend it. Get into pens, paper, writing and whatnot. You can only gain from the experience.

I wrote my own timeline website and use it to post a (private) daily diary entry. The timeline is zoomable and pannable, so i can scroll through all the entries easily, and zoom out to see my whole life and all the important life events. Entries have an 'importance' setting, so when zooming out the daily stuff disappears and only big events are visible.

The issue I'm having is that the daily file is sometimes a running log of notes I jotted down, other times a structured journal entry written the next morning. I wish I could separate the two so that I could export all my proper journal entry into a pdf.

Same here. I'm a fast typist, so the effort and slowness of pen and paper make me think more about what I'm writing. My longhand notes make me feel more like I've really gotten the thoughts out of my head and examined them and can stop stressing about them, which is funny since I'm more likely to lose the paper notes than if I typed them into a file which would automatically be backed up. So it's more about the process of writing for me than the recording.

And despite being slower, I'll often find that I've knocked out a couple pages pretty quickly once I get started. Getting started is the hard part.

I’ve been journaling regularly all my life; I consider myself a journaling expert!

I’ve gone through dozens of hardcover Moleskines and a couple Hobonichis, and countless other random notebooks. Because I write so much and don’t want to create waste, I use fountain pens which I fill with my favorite waterproof, UV-resistant, archival inks.

These days I typically use 3 physical journals daily:

- a pocket-sized softcover sketchbook which I keep in my wallet for thoughts/drawings about town

- a larger softcover Leuchtturm for more longform writing, which I bring along when I’m feeling thoughtful

- a Hobonichi “5 year journal” which I keep at home, every morning briefly logging the main events of the previous day

3 books is probably overkill for most people. I don’t set journaling goals/expectations for myself, rather I just write when I feel the need to work something out (which is pretty well all the time). My journals get filled with random doodles, writing in all directions, ticket stubs, etc. I’m quite informal about it but I’m never without some type of notebook. I follow the maxim “an artist is a person with a sketchbook attached,” believing that the same applies to writers and journals. I’m more consistent about carrying my notebooks than I am with carrying my phone.

I also use Obsidian heavily for general PKM, and sometimes journal-type essays wind up in there if my hand is tired.

I highly recommend the nonfiction book ‘The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper’ for those interested in the technology of notebooks/sketchbooks, how they have evolved over time, and how people use them for various applications that most people never think of.