Figured it might be a good discussion question. Crossposted to !pkms@lemmy.blahaj.zone.
Especially as someone who wants to help grow !journaling@sh.itjust.works, and to participate to help it grow, but in the end I come from !pkms@lemmy.blahaj.zone and I think of what I have far more as a Personal Knowledge Management System than a journal. I spend far less time on personal feelings and thoughts and “what did I do today?” and a lot more on making it a knowledge repository for Future Me. And if what I do is actually pretty separate from journaling it would be cool to know so I don’t invade threads I shouldn’t be talking in.
I have seperate systems for other thoughts. Like I have a notebook just for my takes on media, and a git repo for technical things I’ve learned. On top of that I’m a diarist, so my diary entries are often more like letters.
But I specifically try to avoid just listing out what I’ve been doing and instead try to pick out a couple events and how I feel about them. For me it’s much more about documenting feelings.
Is it publicly accessible? I would like to see what’s in it as It’s something I’ve been considering doing myself for all my ‘Linux’ tips and tweaks as I have no idea where to share them (they’re in a markdown file for now).
Like in actual letters (written to yourself, maybe)? I like the idea.
When we were in our twenties, my best friend and I (we’re still besties all those decades later) were studying far away one from the other and we wrote to each other a lot. Like, a lot, multiple times a week if not daily. A few people knowing the intensity of our exchanges compared us to lovers (we were not, we were just avid to share ideas and fun together). It was a rich (and real fun) period that ended with us moving to… email.
I miss that intensity (and the fun, too) and our absolutely un-censored exchange of ideas.
I mean, no matter how stupid, daring, unpopular, clumsy was whatever we wanted to try we would do it. We feared no judgment from one another (and certainly no hate or public shaming, like we can see happening way too often online) and we also feared not looking like amateurs (that we were), or to show that we mastered not what we were writing about. Imho, that freedom was essential to us growing because it allowed us to experiment and to explore things and ideas without self-censoring or caring about one’s own image/reputation. Something not many people would dare to do nowadays online, alas.
Probably even more than that freedom, I miss that it was obvious (for some of us at least) that if we wanted to fuel a friendship (or even just really keep in touch) we would exchange snail mails with those persons we cared about. And that we would have to take the time to write letters (or cards) to them and more time to read theirs, carefully.
Back then, I received such letters almost every single day, and I wrote almost daily too. This year, I’ve received one letter, and I sent two… Which is double what I received and sent last year :(