What are your tips for starting a journal?

I’m 63 and have been journalling since five years old — 58 years and counting.

Don’t overthink this journalling thing.

Journalling is just making brief notes. It quickly becomes drudgery (a chore) when you turn it into some kind of literary or philosophical exercise — personal essays are better for that. The worth of journalling is spontaneity of writing.

Just use standard desk diaries for the purpose — “day a page” or “two days to a page” in A5 or A6 size works better than other formats. Alternate the cover colours between years — red, blue, black, red, blue, black if you’re using Collins diaries.

Learn to compose concisely within the fixed space and not drone on, and use a dateline (boldfaced below) when you’re in a different city:—

Tuesday, 25 February 1983

INNSBRUCK, Austria — Arrived too early at 10 a.m. so couldn’t check into Hotel Zabo. Freezing, empty streets. Café Nylon serves coffee stronger than I thought. Right now (11:30 a.m.) the emotion inside me is best described as “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.” See if that turns out right.

I have my journals and my essays. I file my essays in my filing cabinet under either “Private Essays [year]” or “Swipe File [year]” and forget about them. Most of them have been retyped and posted to my blog since 1995. Frankly, do your longform writing in your blog because you can easily add photos and stuff

In the fullness of time when I’ve kicked the bucket, my kids and descendants have the exhilaration of reorganising my papers and trying to figure out this bizarre UFO called cursive handwriting.

Or they can use the papers as fuel for a nice winter bonfire.

Thanks for the A2A.