“Until I read Anne Frank’s diary, I had found books a literal escape from what could be the harsh reality around me. After I read the diary, I had a fresh way of viewing the both literature and the world. From then on, I found I was impatient with books that were not honest or that were trivial and frivolous.”

– Alexandra Fuller

People who keep up a diary or journal do so for individual reasons based on their personality, circumstances, and needs.

I think my favorite thing about writing a journal, though, is looking back at the images of my friends and I growing up, and newborn chickens, and pets that have long since traveled over the rainbow bridge. When we’re happy, we forget that it’s only a moment in time, fleeting and destined to be lost forever. The fact that we can hold on to pieces of that happiness is magical.

This is just one of the few reasons why you should take the time to write, now.

You’ll express yourself.

Expressing yourself is another important aspect of keeping a diary. Beyond simply offering a means of self expression through the written word, often diaries are full of doodles and drawings that accentuate the actual text of what is being written.

Regardless of the actual content, this mirror of expression allows you to say what otherwise might be too challenging to say and give voice to emotions that may otherwise be repressed. It allows you to rehearse difficult conversations on paper as well. Having the blank page to fill up is in many ways an analogy to life, seeing yourself be expressed one letter and one doodle at a time.

You can build memories on paper.

Sometimes even the minute details of events in our past are items we grow to cherish as we get older. By keeping a detailed diary or journal you are documenting those moments in your life that are worth writing about.

We have to realize that  we remember only a few things from the yesteryear and there was no way we could relive them.  A diary or journal can be your Memory Bank too.

It will improve your writing skill.

Overtime, you learn to organize your drifting thoughts and capture them on the paper.

Practice makes perfect! Seeing your writing develop is very rewarding.

Better opportunities for new ideas.

Keeping a journal can be both a clearing-house and – in the next word, sentence or page – become an incubator where you tap into your imagination and unleash your creativity and ideas.

It helps you get through the bad days.

Getting your feelings written down on paper feels much better than keeping them to yourself. It can also help you think about things more clearly.

Writing it down takes the edge off more toxic feelings and emotions and helps you better understand what you’re feeling, freeing up thinking space to gain clarity on what to do next.

This in turn can help you help you think about things more clearly, and maybe even help decide how you feel about things if you are unsure.

So, go on.

Write.