Keeping a Diary | Should you Keep it Private or Share it
Long before I started to blog I wrote weekly and sometimes daily, in a regular hard bound notebook and called it “a diary”. I have kept a diary for my entire life, and by this time in my life I know it is something I will not ever loose or stop doing. It is so ingrained in my to write in a diary that I can’t stop. It is not a daily habit, like eating breakfast or brushing my teeth (things I can’t not do), but it’s as much as part of my life as this blog, although a bit more secret…
When it comes to Keeping a Diary and a blog at the same time, this is a question you must ask yourself: Should you Keep it Private or Share it with the online community?
Keeping a Diary and Sharing it
I love looking at filled journal pages, don’t you? Written pages with quirky or beautiful handwriting are magical to me. You know the kind, that some people share on their blog or instagram? They’re so private yet shared freely by the authors. I don’t know how they do it. Maybe they write differently than I do, or started to journal to share notebooks online? Some handwriting is hard to decipher, but others are easy to read, and that would scare me. Journaling that anyone could read? No thank you (for me).
I don’t think I’ll ever want to share everything from the particular notebook series that I call my diaries. They are way too private, and if they wouldn’t be so very private then they wouldn’t be so meaningful to me!
Plus, I share so many other things here, like my messy desk, the inside of my Art Journal and what I’m feeling when it comes to creating art, that maybe I need to keep the written journaling to my self? I wouldn’t feel free to write what ever was inside my brain if I knew someone (unknown to me), could read it all. I would probably feel violated and sad about it, if I went ahead and shared it.
But if you think it’s not that private, then I encourage you to share your journal freely. It’s your choice of course, and I even envy those who can. I write so much I could share something daily for the rest of my life if I wanted to…
I have shared a lot of what’s inside my many different diaries here through the years already! This is when it comes to spreads that didn’t have journaling on them. Then I don’t mind you getting to be inspired by the pages.
The “other things” I add into my private diary are things that I cut and paste, found quotes and my own doodles, sometimes I fill a page just to test a new ink.
To me these pages are not as private and does not reveal my inner most feelings, so I’m okay sharing them and will continue to when I can. But last week I found a flip through of my diary filmed two years ago that I never edited, and while contemplating sharing it I had to give this a little more thought. Could I share the written pages?
Keeping a Diary Private
I came to the conclusion that no, I don’t want to share most of the written pages. It is too personal, and I like to keep it away from the internet. Keeping a diary Private is part of the lovely feeling that diary keeping is for me. It is made to be a brain dump of stupid thoughts, whining, complaining, thinking on paper and letting things go. My diary is a notebook of feelings, thoughts and ideas, of dreams. Until I decide to write them here I’m keeping them all private.
That said, I decided to share the video I filmed back in January 2016 anyway. It shows me opening up a brand new Moleskine Notebook. Mine is pink and “plain” which means it is without lines, the kind I like the most. Then I flip through a filled diary, ready to be archived. The full one is a Leuchtturm, also in pink, that my friend Jana gave me (special edition with pink cover and green elastic ribbon as closure). I have cut out or blurred most of the pages with text, so now it feels good to be sharing this video with you guys.
I hope you like it!
Flip through of finished diary
Flip-through video of a FULL Leuchtturm1917 & NEW Moleskine Notebook on Studio iHanna on YouTube. Please click the video to make sure you’re subscribed there, it helps motivate me and for more people to find my videos. Thank you.
The Notebooks
- New Moleskine Plain Notebook – Moleskine Classic Notebook, Large, Plain with a Hard Cover 5 x 8.25 inches
- Leuchtturm1917 – Leuchtturm1917 Medium Hardcover Notebook, 5.75 X 8.25 inches, 249 Blank Pages, New Pink
So, what should you do? I can not tell you if you should keep yours private or share it, or do like me and do both. But one thing I’m sure of: keeping a diary should feel like it’s a secret confession, something you’re whispering to a dear friend. If it just feels blah or boring, writing about the weather and what you ate today, then it’s not really a diary in the true sense. The benefits come when you poor your heart out. So I hope that’s what you’re doing, then decided if you can share your whole heart, or only parts of it, with the entire world.
Let me know below if you’re a diary writer too?
Diary Keepin’ Inspiration
- More about the Lecutturm1917 Notebook – a kind of review from me
- All blog posts tagged DIARY on this blog, if you’re curious
- Get some free Inspiration for your Notebook – printable quotes to inspire you through the year
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Thanks for sharing your flip through! I love your style of combining writing and collage and doodling in one notebook. So many times I think each type of expression must be kept in its own specific notebook. But why?! I like your freedom to mix and match and do whatever is important to you that day, all in the same binding! Thank you for showing us that art doesn’t have to be rigid! Thank you for encouraging us to play and create and just enjoy art!
For me I prefer as flip through video (because I feel like it would take someone a lot of effort to pause and read my walls of text and really who has time for that?) is much less personal than taking a picture and posting it online. I really admire people who can openly share their journals but mine contain work things and stuff about my family which isn’t really mine to put out there.
All that being said when I see someone post a page I don’t think I have ever actually read every word, that would make me so uncomfortable! I mostly get the vibe of it, usually admire the person’s handwriting and then move on.
Thanks for sharing your journal with us! It’s always fun to see what other people are working on!
I started writing a diary when I was 10 years old and kept on writing off and on until around 2009, when I started art journaling. I don’t write as many and as ‘private’ in for example my ‘Chronicles’ art journal as I used to in my notebooks, but I do edit all the photo’s I take of my art journal pages before sharing them on the internet and I often blur parts of it. Mirna says she doesn’t actually read every word but I have shared pages in the past that I thought noone would read (a lot of small written text) but they did! I received comments that made me realize they read the page and it made me feel uncomfortable so now I am extra careful to not show it all. I sometimes miss the daily ‘writing diary’and hope to pick it up again some day, but I would never ever show those pages… it’s the most private text and like you say in your post, I would indeed feel violated if someone would read it.
I loved the way you carefully blurred yet still shared. Like you, I could never share such personal things; heck, I can’t even share the non-personal stuff yet! I hope one day to find the confidence to do so. I appreciate you sharing though, and that you are willing to say you don’t share it all (and like me, are even a bit envious of those who can- even though you could never write/ journal/ keep a diary in the same way if you *did* share it all… and part of the point is to do it for yourself, right?).