This is my “Happy” journal. It is one of hundreds of journals I have. This is one I started January 1997. It was a time when I began to grasp my mental health identity and discover strategies to live with it effectively. Up until this point, I journalled only when I was having a depressive episode and I would write all my negative thoughts on to a page to purge it. It was helpful. Sadly, I had pages and pages of anger, sadness and hurt. Pages I kept to reread and remind myself of the pain I needed to release. It was therapeutic it’s own way but not exactly uplifting.
During this particular time in my life, a lower time, I was browsing through an old book shop and I came across this journal. I am a lover of cats so it stood out to me. When I picked it up I fell in love with the pages – some blank, some with beautiful prints of cats, and some with cat quotes. It was speaking to me and I purchased it. I held on to it for a bit – afraid to christen it with content that I might later find to be unworthy. Finally, there was a day when I began. The first entry was a typical entry. I introduced myself to any future selves reading it, spoke about my journey and how that day was a new day.
There were a few entries similar to that. Then, I came to a cat page – a page that had I couldn’t write on because it was filled with a picture. I stared at it. I didn’t want to pass it by without finding a way to use that page. I wrote on the margin – a wish. One wish. Something I wanted to write down in case writing it down would turn it from a wish to a reality. Then, I wrote another wish. And then, another. Before I knew it, wishes were coming to me. Things I was hoping for; things to get excited about; things that inspired me. I paused and realized something was happening. I was generating a feeling of well-being and enthusiasm. I was using a space in a way I never had before – I was writing in different directions, using different coloured pens. I had found an inner pot of creativity that was waiting to be tapped and it was producing joy. It was wonderful and from that moment, I knew that this journal must only be for positive and creative expression. I have a need to purge the dark and unhealthy thoughts and feelings in an expressive form but not here. I have another journal for that. This one will be the one that I come back to fill me full, to spark my imagination and to challenge me to find new and different ways to be inspired.
How do you connect with that inspiration?
The Ginger Genie 