I kept journals for years, and have sometimes regretted junking them. I realized, over the years, that my main “goal” hadn’t changed: a tranquil life. After years of employment, I am retired; after years of work learning to manage bipolar disorder, I have found the calm I longed for. While I still do some private journaling, it’s mostly for short-term personal management. I recently started a Substack to examine my life with bipolar - a public journal of private reflection. For now, my life is calm, tranquil, and I give thanks every day.
The clarity, the calm, the quiet power of what you’ve walked through and where you’ve arrived. That line — “a public journal of private reflection” — is stunning. I relate deeply to that impulse, especially now that my own writing has moved from private spiral notebooks into something shared, witnessed. Thank you for naming your journey so honestly. And for reminding me that tranquility isn’t just a wish — it can become a way of life. I’m so glad you’ve found it.
OMG. Thank you for saying this. I discovered the same thing. Years ago, pre-pandemic, I looked at years worth of journals and all I found was the same stuff written over and over again. Rumination, going around and around on a hamster wheel, going nowhere. I know many people extol the virtues of journaling, but looking back at the journals and realizing nothing had changed was troubling to me. You can journal until the cows come home, but the only way your life is going to change is through action.
I agree, but in my life changed - true and real changed occurre when I took action that was soul led......... these days I don't do a thing unless I know it's coming directly from that source.
I really appreciate this. I used to journal and then I stopped, but it makes me feel guilty. But this makes me think I stopped for a reason—I had looped around the same things and just didn’t need to, anymore.
Haha! I've only been a subscriber for a week and Monica, already you have ripped into the fabric of my carefully constructed clothing of routines, rituals and reasonings with words that shred the seams like a pair of razor sharp dressmaking scissors!
This morning you chose to call out "Journaling" just as I sat here in my morning-sunny armchair, coffee at the ready, staring at my recently much neglected journal (spiral backed with a delicate gold pattern of gum tree leaves and a cockatoo or two) and I just burst out laughing like a demented kookaburra!
In recent weeks I have been running around "like a blue-arsed fly" as we say here in Australia, looking after my octogenarian in-laws, one of whom had a stoke and landed in a rehabilitation hospital for 8 weeks. Yoga, meditation and especially Journaling went out the window with that fly!
And guess what? My brain did not explode from the pressure of unwritten thoughts and emotions; my soul did not shrivel and die because I chose not to contemplate my navel from the inside; my body did not atrophy from lack of yogic acrobatics (in fact, my sciatica finally eased for the first time in years!) I SURVIVED! And, thanks to your gritty, honest words, I shall continue in this vain until I choose to do otherwise! So glad I'm here with you ❤️
Well damn, if this isn’t the most joyful detonation of sacred routines I’ve read all week.
You just dismantled journaling, yoga, and the martyrdom of daily rituals in one hilarious, soul-freeing swoop — and did it with cockatoos, kookaburras, and blue-arsed flies in the mix. Honestly, I should just hand you the mic and let you host the next Circle.
And this — “my soul did not shrivel and die because I chose not to contemplate my navel from the inside” — is now officially hanging in the Daily Rewire Hall of Fame.
You are exactly why I write. Not because you followed all the prompts or breathed perfectly, but because you saw yourself in the middle of your wild, imperfect, life-saving week — and you laughed. That laugh was the miracle. That was the medicine.
Please don’t stop writing.
Even if it’s not in your pretty spiral-bound cockatoo journal.
Even if it’s just here, in the comments.
We need this kind of clear-seeing mischief in the world.
Haha! Monica! Thank you for your kind words! I've never aspired to "hanging in (anyone's) Hall of Fame" but now that I've apparently achieved this Lofty, if unknown, goal, I'm glad it was YOUR Hall of Fame!
I've had a love of the written word in all it's forms (novels, articles, text books, blogs) since high school where I aspired to becoming an English teacher. However, failure in my final year and leaving home at 17 to get away from Narcissistic Mum and Enabling Dad left me working in a jeans factory to pay rent on a tiny flat and run my car.
I always thought there might be a book in me somewhere. But what kind? Self Help? Unqualified. Science fiction? Unqualified. Romance? Qualified but unable to construct a happy ending from experience. And we know how journaling turned out.......
But, like you seem to be, I'm just an ordinary woman who has accumulated 6+ decades of experience and a burgeoning need to share it for the "good of womankind".
Let me know when you need that "Circle" hosted! 😉😆
🤭 I journal. I’m not consistent about it. But it is a way for me to process what is going on in my life, but more importantly in my heart. I don’t write in my journals for others to discover someday. I journal to work out what I can’t quite seem to get. For me, there seems to be a hand -brain - heart connection. And I remember it better if I write it down.
Sometimes, as I write, my heart starts writing back. Sometimes the child in me (even tho I’m 68, she is alive and healing) writes back. I don’t think my journals will make much sense to others. But they do to me.
I watched your video as you painted the beautiful details with devotion. ❤️. You have a brain/heart/hand connection that creates beauty. And you are doing the same thing with your substack.
I love that you’ve found a rhythm that works for you. That’s really the point, isn’t it? Not to follow someone else’s prescription, but to trust what opens your heart, what helps you listen more closely. The hand-brain-heart connection you describe — that’s real. And I hear the tenderness in how you speak of your inner child. That’s sacred work.
And thank you for what you said about the painting. I think we’re all just trying to give shape to what we feel, in whatever way comes most naturally. Keep doing what works for you. I sure am.
I stopped journaling years ago too. As one of your other readers stated so well above, I also started feeling like a hamster on a wheel going around and around. Maybe the quiet time that I have now allows me to understand or address things in the moment and let them go a bit easier. I try not to dwell in my head, analyzing, as much as I did when I was younger. I find that I feel more empathy, clarity, and connection from reading content like yours, as well as the comments within these communities.
I always wanted to be heard, but I never wrote. I didn’t journal, write poetry, or even write letters unless I absolutely had to. So I got loud and larger than life. I did theater and learned to project. Wherever I was, you could hear me a block away. But no one was really listening.
Then I retired and started writing. For the first time, I actually feel heard.
There’s something so powerful about that shift — from projecting to expressing, from being loud to finally being heard. Theater gave you voice, but writing gave you witness. That’s a whole different kind of liberation.
And the most beautiful part? You didn’t force it. You waited until it was true. Until the page could hold you the way the stage never quite could.
You’re not just writing now — you’re being received. And that’s everything.
There’s something really tender and wise in the way you described your shift — not just in journaling, but in how you meet yourself each morning. It sounds like your ritual has matured alongside you. What once held your pain now holds your presence. That’s not a loss — that’s a signal of integration.
I love that you still sit in the same spot. That space remembers. And whether it’s words, doodles, a dream, or just silence — you’re still arriving to yourself. That’s the real practice. No judgment. Just noticing.
Thank you for sharing your process with such honesty. You’re not alone in it.
i think this is why people like ChatGPT so much - it talks back. Of course, what it says...
I think if I revisited my journals with this lens I would absolutely see the pattern I've been circling. I'll bet you could deliver a killer pdf on moving from circling to integrating. I can't tell you how many times I have thought I had a recent insight, only to pick up a journal from 15 years ago to see the exact same insight (not integrated, I guess!).
Monica, I clicked the link for the Refoundation offer but it wouldn't go through. The description does describe how I feel right now...... not broken but not quite knowing where I fit at this season.
I do feel like I'm spinning my wheels a little , and would like clarity, with my soul, on releasing what no longer fits, reviving what still lights me up and building from there, out of growth....
I have journaled in an attempt to figure out what I wanted from life, who I was and to rail about perceived injustices. On average, I journaled maybe 3 times a year over a period of maybe 7 years. When I look over those journal entries, there was a pattern. While it was clear what I needed to change, I couldn’t seem to take the necessary steps. I’m still
I kept journals for years, and have sometimes regretted junking them. I realized, over the years, that my main “goal” hadn’t changed: a tranquil life. After years of employment, I am retired; after years of work learning to manage bipolar disorder, I have found the calm I longed for. While I still do some private journaling, it’s mostly for short-term personal management. I recently started a Substack to examine my life with bipolar - a public journal of private reflection. For now, my life is calm, tranquil, and I give thanks every day.
The clarity, the calm, the quiet power of what you’ve walked through and where you’ve arrived. That line — “a public journal of private reflection” — is stunning. I relate deeply to that impulse, especially now that my own writing has moved from private spiral notebooks into something shared, witnessed. Thank you for naming your journey so honestly. And for reminding me that tranquility isn’t just a wish — it can become a way of life. I’m so glad you’ve found it.
What a lovely response - thank you.
OMG. Thank you for saying this. I discovered the same thing. Years ago, pre-pandemic, I looked at years worth of journals and all I found was the same stuff written over and over again. Rumination, going around and around on a hamster wheel, going nowhere. I know many people extol the virtues of journaling, but looking back at the journals and realizing nothing had changed was troubling to me. You can journal until the cows come home, but the only way your life is going to change is through action.
I agree, but in my life changed - true and real changed occurre when I took action that was soul led......... these days I don't do a thing unless I know it's coming directly from that source.
I really appreciate this. I used to journal and then I stopped, but it makes me feel guilty. But this makes me think I stopped for a reason—I had looped around the same things and just didn’t need to, anymore.
Haha! I've only been a subscriber for a week and Monica, already you have ripped into the fabric of my carefully constructed clothing of routines, rituals and reasonings with words that shred the seams like a pair of razor sharp dressmaking scissors!
This morning you chose to call out "Journaling" just as I sat here in my morning-sunny armchair, coffee at the ready, staring at my recently much neglected journal (spiral backed with a delicate gold pattern of gum tree leaves and a cockatoo or two) and I just burst out laughing like a demented kookaburra!
In recent weeks I have been running around "like a blue-arsed fly" as we say here in Australia, looking after my octogenarian in-laws, one of whom had a stoke and landed in a rehabilitation hospital for 8 weeks. Yoga, meditation and especially Journaling went out the window with that fly!
And guess what? My brain did not explode from the pressure of unwritten thoughts and emotions; my soul did not shrivel and die because I chose not to contemplate my navel from the inside; my body did not atrophy from lack of yogic acrobatics (in fact, my sciatica finally eased for the first time in years!) I SURVIVED! And, thanks to your gritty, honest words, I shall continue in this vain until I choose to do otherwise! So glad I'm here with you ❤️
Well damn, if this isn’t the most joyful detonation of sacred routines I’ve read all week.
You just dismantled journaling, yoga, and the martyrdom of daily rituals in one hilarious, soul-freeing swoop — and did it with cockatoos, kookaburras, and blue-arsed flies in the mix. Honestly, I should just hand you the mic and let you host the next Circle.
And this — “my soul did not shrivel and die because I chose not to contemplate my navel from the inside” — is now officially hanging in the Daily Rewire Hall of Fame.
You are exactly why I write. Not because you followed all the prompts or breathed perfectly, but because you saw yourself in the middle of your wild, imperfect, life-saving week — and you laughed. That laugh was the miracle. That was the medicine.
Please don’t stop writing.
Even if it’s not in your pretty spiral-bound cockatoo journal.
Even if it’s just here, in the comments.
We need this kind of clear-seeing mischief in the world.
So glad you’re here with us. Now stay loud.
Haha! Monica! Thank you for your kind words! I've never aspired to "hanging in (anyone's) Hall of Fame" but now that I've apparently achieved this Lofty, if unknown, goal, I'm glad it was YOUR Hall of Fame!
I've had a love of the written word in all it's forms (novels, articles, text books, blogs) since high school where I aspired to becoming an English teacher. However, failure in my final year and leaving home at 17 to get away from Narcissistic Mum and Enabling Dad left me working in a jeans factory to pay rent on a tiny flat and run my car.
I always thought there might be a book in me somewhere. But what kind? Self Help? Unqualified. Science fiction? Unqualified. Romance? Qualified but unable to construct a happy ending from experience. And we know how journaling turned out.......
But, like you seem to be, I'm just an ordinary woman who has accumulated 6+ decades of experience and a burgeoning need to share it for the "good of womankind".
Let me know when you need that "Circle" hosted! 😉😆
YES!🫂
🤭 I journal. I’m not consistent about it. But it is a way for me to process what is going on in my life, but more importantly in my heart. I don’t write in my journals for others to discover someday. I journal to work out what I can’t quite seem to get. For me, there seems to be a hand -brain - heart connection. And I remember it better if I write it down.
Sometimes, as I write, my heart starts writing back. Sometimes the child in me (even tho I’m 68, she is alive and healing) writes back. I don’t think my journals will make much sense to others. But they do to me.
I watched your video as you painted the beautiful details with devotion. ❤️. You have a brain/heart/hand connection that creates beauty. And you are doing the same thing with your substack.
I love that you’ve found a rhythm that works for you. That’s really the point, isn’t it? Not to follow someone else’s prescription, but to trust what opens your heart, what helps you listen more closely. The hand-brain-heart connection you describe — that’s real. And I hear the tenderness in how you speak of your inner child. That’s sacred work.
And thank you for what you said about the painting. I think we’re all just trying to give shape to what we feel, in whatever way comes most naturally. Keep doing what works for you. I sure am.
I stopped journaling years ago too. As one of your other readers stated so well above, I also started feeling like a hamster on a wheel going around and around. Maybe the quiet time that I have now allows me to understand or address things in the moment and let them go a bit easier. I try not to dwell in my head, analyzing, as much as I did when I was younger. I find that I feel more empathy, clarity, and connection from reading content like yours, as well as the comments within these communities.
Love this my friend!😘❤️
Ugh I feel this. I called it “longing for belonging.” I need to burn those books I’ve hoarded.
I always wanted to be heard, but I never wrote. I didn’t journal, write poetry, or even write letters unless I absolutely had to. So I got loud and larger than life. I did theater and learned to project. Wherever I was, you could hear me a block away. But no one was really listening.
Then I retired and started writing. For the first time, I actually feel heard.
There’s something so powerful about that shift — from projecting to expressing, from being loud to finally being heard. Theater gave you voice, but writing gave you witness. That’s a whole different kind of liberation.
And the most beautiful part? You didn’t force it. You waited until it was true. Until the page could hold you the way the stage never quite could.
You’re not just writing now — you’re being received. And that’s everything.
Thank you for listening.
I have a self of at least 10 journals
And I know there are 5 or more in other drawers and boxes
I am sure I can find a similar thread in all too
Thank you for sharing that your looked back to look forward.
I feel like I am in a similar process.
I was asking myself over the last year why I stopped journaling was it bad? Do I not need it ?
I do still sit in the same place where I used to journal
I get up eat and look out to my yard for peace and reflection
Occasionally I journal
Sometimes because of an odd dream
Some times I write a few words then doodle
There was a time when I couldn’t function until I dumped my thought onto the journal pages
So filled with angst and anxiety at difficult moments and life transitions
Now I journal sometimes
I read. Positive message
I might even check an astrological message
And I feel ok with it being different things now
I will not judge if I should journal
I guess I have grown enough to choose and do what feels right in my morning moment
There’s something really tender and wise in the way you described your shift — not just in journaling, but in how you meet yourself each morning. It sounds like your ritual has matured alongside you. What once held your pain now holds your presence. That’s not a loss — that’s a signal of integration.
I love that you still sit in the same spot. That space remembers. And whether it’s words, doodles, a dream, or just silence — you’re still arriving to yourself. That’s the real practice. No judgment. Just noticing.
Thank you for sharing your process with such honesty. You’re not alone in it.
Thank you 🙏 🥹
I think those feelings are universal, Monica. Thank you for saying what many of us feel, but are afraid to share—even in a journal.
Oops I'm doing it again 😅
You caught me.
i think this is why people like ChatGPT so much - it talks back. Of course, what it says...
I think if I revisited my journals with this lens I would absolutely see the pattern I've been circling. I'll bet you could deliver a killer pdf on moving from circling to integrating. I can't tell you how many times I have thought I had a recent insight, only to pick up a journal from 15 years ago to see the exact same insight (not integrated, I guess!).
Yes. My desire has always been the same. And, I actually found it with two of my husbands, but they are both dead now.
Monica, I clicked the link for the Refoundation offer but it wouldn't go through. The description does describe how I feel right now...... not broken but not quite knowing where I fit at this season.
I do feel like I'm spinning my wheels a little , and would like clarity, with my soul, on releasing what no longer fits, reviving what still lights me up and building from there, out of growth....
Hey go to DM- direct message, send me a message with your email. I'll send it to you
I have journaled in an attempt to figure out what I wanted from life, who I was and to rail about perceived injustices. On average, I journaled maybe 3 times a year over a period of maybe 7 years. When I look over those journal entries, there was a pattern. While it was clear what I needed to change, I couldn’t seem to take the necessary steps. I’m still
stuck in old patterns. Maybe it’s fear? Hmmmm.