journaling tip: self-censorship

What I mean by “Self-censorship” is not writing the whole truth and nothing but the truth in your journals. Sometimes it is really hard to dig deep and be completely honest. But if you can’t do that in your own journal, where can you do it?

Have you ever written a heart wrenching entry that was cathartic to have written out, but then everytime you open your journal you see it and it sends a painful memory back to you? You may then find yourself either not wanting to use that journal or not wanting to write such entries down, which is not helpful at all. You may even be tempted to rip the entry out, burn it, throw it away. Which is fine, if you really want to do that. I hate ripping pages out of my journal though. My journal is me- the good, the bad, and the ugly. Sometimes we need to be raw and ugly in order to find the beauty in our lives.

Life is not always peachy and sometimes you just need to vent. Writing it out in your journal can help get all those emotions out safely and in a constructive way. We also may censor ourselves in our journals because we are often taught to not express our emotions or opinions-keep everything “pleasant”. Your journal is the place to write down your honest thoughts at that moment, even if that changes in the next moment.

Below are some visuals from my own journal and how I dealt with self-censorship. I wrote all my angst out in my journal…but after I dealt with the emotions and the situation passed, I didn’t want to see it anymore. So, I covered it up! It’s not beautiful, but it served its purpose. I needed to write what was inside of my head, but I didn’t want to see it everytime I opened my journal.

On the spread above I actually sewed pieces of scrap fabric to my journal page, covering up my entry. I know what’s under there…but I don’t need to see it anymore. I liked how the sewn-in fabric added more character to my already bulging journal.

This spread above you can see the thread stitches poking through. I also covered up some of the writing with pencil scribbles and also glued on another scrap piece of dark fabric.

If you can be honest with yourself in your journal, you may feel better afterwards. Or if not totally better, at least lighter and with more clarity.

Other cover-up tips:

+ Staple the pages together- this is good if one day you do want to go back and read the entry. You just need to get the staples out!
+ Glue the pages together
+ Glue a decorative piece of paper on top
+ Paint, scribble, doodle on top of the entry
+ Write on a separate sheet of paper. If you want to put it in your journal, you can by stapling it in, paperclipping, or by gluing an envelope and sticking the paper in there. If you don’t want to keep it in your journal, toss it, burn it, shred it up!

Posted in journaling tips, visual journaling

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 28th, 2009 at 12:20 pm.