The best writing project I ever took was to start a daily diary.
I have introduced to the Bullet Journal two years ago and I immediately fell in love with it.
Although initially, it was hard to remember to write every day I soon fell in a habit. At the end of the day, I had a beautiful log of all the things I did in that year – the places I visited, the projects I took, the dinners I cooked. I even knew who visited me and when what I did at work, what I shopped and what I ate in the restaurants.
I was so pleased with it that next year I decided to go a step further and instead of recording my day in bullet points, record them in prose. I bought a Paperblank diary with a beautiful intricate blue and silver pattern on the cover and wrote in it for the whole year. The diary went with me when I was on holiday or was traveling for work.
This year I bought an A5 size page-a-day diary and faithfully started recording my days in it. It is one activity I look forward to most in my day. It gives me the opportunity to reflect on what I did on the whole day. Was I productive or did I waste time? Was I happy or miserable? What was I grateful for? What are my plans for the next day, week or month?
My daily diary is giving meaning to my days. If I don’t record in it, I feel as if I have not lived that day.
Anais Nin, a writer who is known more for her quotes than any other writer, was a compulsive diary keeper. In her own words:
The period without the diary remains an ordeal. Every evening I want my diary as one wants opium.
This diary is my kief, hashish and opium pipe. This is my drug and my vice.
My diary seems to keep me whole.
If writing is your thing and you want to build a habit of writing daily, you must start keeping a daily diary.