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Practical Advice on Journaling
Maintaining a journal need not be as intimidating as it may appear. Don't think you must be born with a writer's flair to keep a journal. Some people do display a great knack for turning a memorable phrase. No one needs to encourage such folks to journal. For them it is as easy as breathing.
This page is written to encourage those who display no such abilities but will still benefit from the exercise of putting their prayers, meditations and thoughts to pen and paper.
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HOW TO DEVELOP A SPIRITUAL JOURNAL by Dan Phillips - (615) 790-7129 - 109 Breckenridge Road - Franklin, Tennessee 37067
(Reprinted with Permission)
BEGINNINGS
A journal is a helpful way of keeping up with our spiritual journey. A spiritual journal is different from a regular journal. It is a written record of personal reactions to spiritual matters.
I began keeping a personal spiritual journal several years ago, and I have found it helpful in discovering God's active work in my life.
I keep my journal with my Bible to record important new insights, prayers from the Bible that have been helpful to me, and meaningful passages from spiritual books I am reading. The importance of a spiritual journal is that it gathers strength in helping us with our daily spiritual life, especially if we write in it often. A journal of spiritual materials grows more powerful as it is used.
HELPFUL SUGGESTIONS
Let me first suggest that you buy a journal that has a feel of importance about it. I often go to a first class bookstore and buy a journal that is made of genuine bonded leather. This type of journal has a feel of permanence to it, and it will last.
I have also found it helpful to include entries by date. This allows quick retrevial of materials that have previously been entered.
A helpful way to begin a day entry is to write a brief sentence to record and briefly describe events which are taking place in your life that day. Describe anything which comes to your mind.
State the facts recent experiences as briefly as possible and make them a matter of prayer concern.
WHAT SHOULD I INCLUDE IN MY JOURNAL?
Bible verses, sermon notes, or phrases that have a special meaning for you. Explore your feelings as you study the Bible. Experiences that have been meaningful to you should be added. New awareness of God's revealing himself to you should be included.
Quotes from books that are meaningful to you.
Any thoughts that come to your mind. Note any images that touch your life. (Example: An eagle crossing the sky)
Note especially feelings you have. Write how you feel about events, persons, ideas, and relationships.
What books are you reading? Keep a list of books you read. Write phrases from these books in your journal.
Note "anything that rings a bell in your life" in your journal.
Every month summarize the month. What were key events that happened?
HOW SHOULD I BEGIN?
Write fast, write everything, include everything. Write from your feeling, accept whatever comes to mind, and note it in your journal.
As you begin, ask this question: "What is the most important thing going on in my life right now?"
Begin with an image. "This period of my life has been like a narrow bridge."
Write all "the feelings" you have in one day.
Keep photographs, news clippings, and notes of world events.
WHAT DEVICES SHOULD I USE?
Feelings, descriptions, reflections (re-looking at the past), images, thought, and "whatever comes to mind" are what should be included in your journal. Keep lists of events, past happenings, or important events that have happened in your own life. Dialogue with yourself. Carry on an imaginary conversation with yourself. This can be helpful.
In summary, your spiritual journal is the key to developing your spiritual life. Work hard with it and your life will be greatly enriched.
ABOUT THE WORKSHOP AND CONFERENCE LEADER
Dan Phillips is an ordained Baptist minister and futuristic technologist. Formerly he built an international satellite network and worked on the Apollo Space Program. He is a former pastor, a writer and editor, and for 14 years worked as an educational religious consultant for a major religious publishing house. For several years he led a course titled "How to Develop Your Spiritual Life" at large conference centers during the summer months. Time after time people shared how this conference changed their lives. Spiritual Directions is a continuation of this conference.
HOW TO DEVELOP YOUR SPIRITUAL LIFE RETREAT
Freddie Buechner tells the story of being in a cafe in Chicago and overhearing one person asking another, "What is God doing in your life?" He was overcome by the question, realizing how few people in our world even consider such a question.
Spiritual Directions deals with just that important question. "What is God doing in your life?" Or, another way of asking the question is to say, "What is the shape of your life at this present moment." Believing that understanding where we are presently is the key to discovering our future directions, a Spiritual Directions Weekend is a way of exploring God speaking to us.
Key elements in a Spiritual Direction's Retreat
How to hear God's voice
How to develop your own Spiritual Journal
Remembering when God spoke to us
How to have a mini-retreat
Reminders of God's work in our lives
JOURNAL WORKSHOP RETREATS
Developing journals has long been a part of Dan Phillips' life. He have kept journals for over 20 years. From spiritual journals to daily journals, he knows how to help you begin a life changing journal that will make a difference in your life.
PRIVATE RETREATS
Private one day retreats (including one night) are available on a limited basis.
[Reproduced with Dan Phillip's permission. Visit his excellent website - http://edge.edge.net/~dphillip/Journal.html ].
Neil Culbertson
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Further Thoughts on Journaling by Neil Culbertson
How Often Should I Journal?
Its up to you, but unless you really mean to keep a daily diary and like doing this sort of thing I don't recommend journaling daily. Once or twice a week on the average is plently. Journal when God does something special or gives you a special insight into your situation, motives or actions. Journal the highs and the lows of your experiences. Record how God resolves special times of challenge or testing. Make note of when the Lord reveals sin you never before realized was hindering your relationship with Him and others. Make entries when you have specific answers to prayers.
What sort of things should I include in my exercises in journaling?
All of the stuff above (I'll add a few other ideas as I get time).
Take time to go back and review past journal entries and discoveries.
Looking back on significant meetings with the Lord, special insights, and other entries, is very important in journaling. We don't record these events to just move ahead and never look back. There is much benefit from recalling what the Lord has done with our lives and in comparing it with where we are now. The backward look allows us to see if we have truly moved ahead or if we have been spinning our spiritual wheels. We can better determine if we have been dealing with a greater measure of God's grace as we live with "thorns" the Lord has decided not to remove.
Reflection gives us a broader perspective of what God has really been up to. When we examine the "spiritual markers" of God's way with us, patterns emerge and paths become obvious that we would otherwise have missed. Haven't you ever gone out for a run or taken a hike in the forest only to discover that the same terrain looks entirely different on the return trip? You see things going back that you never noticed while going forward. The same is true when we look back on our lives. We see things we never saw while pushing ahead.
For instance, I never planned on being a missionary and ministering in a cross-cultural setting for the major part of my life. But as I look back on critical junctures in my life, I am amazed at the pointers which indicated that this is exactly where God intended for me to be. I had planned to minister to a middle-class American congregation in the Pacific Northwest. But God's consistent leading throughout my pre-seminary and seminary days indicated that the Lord had other things in mind. In my undergraduate studies I roomed with all Canadian bunk mates; so much for the homogenous American experience. Furthermore, these were all Dutch Canadians. I ended up taking 2 years of Dutch and though my fluency has always been a matter of debate, I could at least ask directions to the bathroom and find a future wife. In Seminary, my room mates were, as it turned out, from six or seven different African countries (Mulawi, Ghana, Zimbawe, Nigeria--Tiv and Ebo tribes, Camaroon). I was also approached by a Korean student who asked asked if I would tutor him in Hebrew. All my practical field education was done outside of the USA, though I tried to find U.S. churches willing to take me. Looking back I can easily wonder what ever gave me the idea that God was preparing me for a typical US congregation?
Over the years, I have gone back and reviewed journals dating 5-10 years prior. And sometimes, in the act of recalling what God was doing then, I am confronted with how similar his directions and leadings are now. The net result is that I gain great confidence in my present calling by seeing how God laid the foundation before I was even aware how the pieces were going to fit. A journal records milestones and significant providences from which we can better discern where God is taking our lives.
At other times the backward look has resulted in new insights into painful trials or unhappy conflicts. I have found that reflection on my journaling on these times often has helped to draw the poisonous hurt from my heart about those events and heal the wounds. Frequently it is only in later reflection that I have been able to see how God used the trial to produce a greater good in my life. Having a written record that still preserves the sting and protests I lodged at the time prevents me from burying the event in a fog of denial. Sometimes, only much later as I go over the situation, do I experience the real embarrasment of discovery that the failure to love more was really mine. A written record doesn't allow you to re-invent how you felt at the time.
There are so many good things to say about taking time to reflect on your spiritual walk through the discipline of journaling. But even better is to discover it for yourself by starting on the journey of a reflective and intentional life. Socrates had it right when he said, "The unexamined life is not worth living." Take it to heart dear pilgrim. Take it to heart!
Rev. E. Neil Culbertson
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