Article on Journaling, by Ryan Holiday
In this great article, Ryan Holiday, author of many books including another 5 Heart Rating, The Obstacle is the Way, talks about all the “wise and brilliant” people in history who made time to journal. The list is impressive: Oscar Wilde, Susan Sontag, Marcus Aurelius, John Quincy Adams, Anne Frank, Virginia Woolf, Henry David Thoreau, Joan Didion, and my favorite journaler of all time, Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Great film creators have also been known to journal. Some saying they keep a journal bedside and write down the details of their dreams.
His book, Daily Stoic Journal, authored along with Stephen Hanselman, as seen here in the feature photo, is also something you may want to check out if you’re into journalling or want to be. He and Hanselman also wrote The Daily Stoic, 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living. Enjoy the article here:
Note: Holiday is a HUGE fan of Marcus Aurelius and references and quotes him on the regular. You can follow Ryan Holiday on Twitter @RyanHoliday for daily inspirations and insights.
PS When my daughter read this 5 Heart Rating she wrote this to me and gave me permission to share it with you. She spent time in the Peace Corps in West Africa and had a very difficult time:
“Journaling in Guinea is what kept me sane. I wrote non-stop. It was my way of feeling like I was communicating with someone in my native tongue (English) so that I wouldn’t drive myself mad with all that was going on around me and all the languages etc. I know one day I will read all of them (I gave them to you right?) cuz I want to remember what it was like. Time passes and it seems like it almost didn’t happen but when I talk about it, it still feels very real. Life is weird. I definitely knew that by journaling people would give me a little more space because I would look “productive” and they couldn’t read it because they didn’t know English. It was my way of coping. And I’m glad I am creative enough and a problem-solver and know peopel well/can read people well to have known to do that from the start. I definitely would’ve been completely lost had I not. I would’ve lost myself.”
