I started journaling after sixth grade. Well, really I started in sixth grade when we had to keep a daily journal in English class; I just kept going after school ended although I didn’t write song lyrics anymore to fill the pages when I couldn’t think of anything else to say.
I would fill leftover notebooks after semesters ended, especially enjoying filling college ruled ones because more lines meant I could write more. I wrote everything right down to what mail I received and who I talked to on the phone (things I can’t imagine writing now). At some point I stopped writing or wrote more sporadically, but in the past few years I’ve started to make a better effort toward it.
Somewhere in there, I read that journals are like letters to go. As someone who really hasn’t been prayerful for much of my life, I realized that maybe that’s why I didn’t feel like "prayer” as I had been taught didn’t work for me, because I got such a sense of it– without knowing it– in my journal writing. It also made me want to journal more, to know that by writing it down, maybe it was easier for God to read (he could read it on his own timeline rather than having to drop everything to listen to my prayer. I realize he’s a busy guy.
However, not long after the pandemic went into full swing, I realized I needed to make a change in my own prayer life. I thought that maybe instead of doing my five-minute prayer as I did in the traditional sense of how we are thought to pray, that maybe I should take that time to write in my journal each morning instead.
A friend gave me the cool journal in the photo which also works well because it lays flat. As a left hander, it’s probably the first bound book I’ve been able to write in easily.
Once I started journaling the way, I found that I liked it, that it was a good way for me to draw closer to God. And to feel more like he’s listening. Prayer often feels empty, as if I’m sitting in a big room alone, but there is something more comforting about seeing my words in my handwriting on paper.
And God doesn’t seem to mind I’ve been sending him so many letters.