broomcloset ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- On Writing // 100th Entry!!
Hello everyone! Just wanted to mention that this is my 100th Diaryland Entry!! Whoo-hooo! Not a bad milestone, eh? ;) Good day, dear friends. Welcome to another installment of Stories from the Broom Closet. I suppose I shouldn't say "installment" - life doesn't really come in installments, does it? Some occurences in ones life may stand out as larger in contrast to the others, but all moments in life are pretty much connected in the fluid, unknowable matter we call time. I've been thinking about writing and journaling lately. A friend of mine lent me the Stephen King book Different Seasons, and she pointed out the introductory paragraph for the story The Body. She said that was exactly how she felt about writing. The paragraph was, amazingly, able to grasp that feeling of awe that happens when you commit thoughts that seemed too emence and too great in your head to a medium such as paper, then suddenly it doesn't seem so huge or so scary anymore. Or sometimes, as significant. It has long been known that writing is therapudic, probably for the above reason - something that will just not leave you alone because it is driving you mad in your head will stop feeling so insurmountable when you commit it to paper. You have taken the thoughts out of your head and they lie there before you on the pages, just words, nothing more. No longer the terrible, menacing creature in your head, you can see the thoughts for what they are: just words. It instantly puts them in perspective. You see them in relation to the grander scheme of things - almost infantesimal. But I digress somewhat... The topics of writing and journaling brings to mind the subtopic of online journaling. Do you think that people who have never kept a conventional journal before are attracted to the online version? Is it the ease of use? The public-yet-private thrill of internet anonymity? There are hundreds of thousands of us online journalers in existance, whether they use sites like Diaryland or host their diaries themselves. Do conventional journalers have online versions too, or are they happier with the pen-and-paper medium? I recently attended a workshop on journaling put on by a woman who goes to my church. (yeah, yeah, I am Wiccan but I do still have an association to my parent's church ;) She has been keeping journals for many moons now; not the typical dated what-I-had-for-breakfast-today type of journals, but big hard-covered blank-paged art book journals with lots of collages, coloured pens, drawings and random thoughts. They were wonderful! We didn't read them of course, but she was generous enough to let us flip through the pages to see her unique layouts and collage pages. So this of course inspired me to buy a black coil-bound sketch book from Staples along with some snazzy pens and a glue stick. But have I written in it? ... uh, no. Why not? ... uh, i dunno. When it comes to committing things to paper, I have a hard time. For some reason I'm scared to do so. I know that writing is therapudic and I know writing would probably help me handle depression. I know all of these things - intellectually. You know what my fear of writing is like? It's like the whole Chicken Wiccan thing - afraid to take first steps. Not so much afraid of things not working as I am about them actually working. Words are powerful. Writing is powerful. Sharing your written words is powerful. Power can be scary. Writing can be scary. But you know what? I refuse to be scared any more. I've had enough of it. I'm not going to let a little thing like fear stand in my way of getting better and healing myself. Now, where are my spiffy new pens? -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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