I’ve always had a bit of a love-hate relationship with journalling. I kept saying I’d try it – and then I never did. I tried doing it in groups with others, but I got bored when I finished long before they did because I was typing and full of ideas, whereas the others were writing by hand. Or maybe I just like to be alone with my thoughts and the idea of others on the call, all writing silently, hindered my creative process more than it helped.
But anyway, I decided to give it a go this summer.
When I was a child, I used to write all the time. I did it even when I had no specific reason or obligation, like a school project or something I had to do. I just thought it was fun and I loved to right all kinds of texts and make audio recordings of people, sounds in the nature, and my ideas. I guess the podcast shouldn’t come as a surprise.
When I was having a hard time as a teenager , I put my thoughts and feelings in writing because it helped. Nobody told me to do it. Somehow intuitively I figured out that putting things in writing – just for myself – would bring me some clarity and comfort.
As an adult, I still write, but it’s hard to find time in a busy schedule to write for myself. Not for an audience. Not for work. Not for learning – but for me. And that was the first thing I noticed when I started this writing challenge – I do still enjoy it. And sharing the writing between my languages not only helps me to develop those skills, but I access different parts of myself.
Also, writing things down helps you to get clarity that you maybe wouldn’t have if you just took the time to be still and reflect. It’s a bit like when friends say they see things more clearly and intentionally when they’re looking at them so they can describe them to me. Maybe writing helps us to really pay attention.
I’m not going to keep the texts for a long time. I learned when I was younger that there’s something quite liberating about getting rid of them when they’ve served their purpose. But, even though this was a mini-challenge during a quieter period in August, I can see myself keeping up with this. And if I don’t keep exactly to the schedule, it’s no big deal. But I should be able to manage one hour a week.
The rules
I know I won’t do it every day, so I said 4 times a week, to keep it manageable. This means one session for each language – English, German, Romanian, and Portuguese.
I have 15 minutes each time and I stop when the timer stops or when I’ve finished my sentence. If I can’t think of anything to write, then I sit there quietly until the time is up. Maybe another idea will come.
At first I wanted to say no dictionary. But that’s annoying when a word central to your topic is missing. So using it once or twice for single important words is ok, but only for that. It’s not about checking everything and making perfect sentences, it’s about getting the ideas from brain to laptop!
I chose 4 week days when I’ll be at my desk anyway. Please no comments about pen and paper being the only way – there are some people, including me, who physically can’t do that!
Topics – I look for writing prompts or use an idea from my head. Then I see where it goes!
So, what did I find out?
Week 1
English
Writing wasn’t hard, but it took me a while to get out of my head. In fact, I could use part of this text for a social media post. Future Kirsty will thank me, but that wasn’t what I was going for. It seems it’s easier for me to tap in to logical thoughts and practical plans in English. In terms of what I’m really thinking and feeling – that takes a while to surface !
402 words
German
This was actually more interesting – I could be more creative and personal. I could write on a deeper level faster than in the English text. I was missing one word – helpfully my brain provided it in Portuguese – but I didn’t look it up because I had access to enough other words to make my point.
393 words. Almost as many as in the English text.
Romanian
Why did I choose a difficult topic? This is where I broke my own initial dictionary rule because I needed a word that was key to my concept. I wasn’t sure if I was importing words from Portuguese because that word is similar. I wasn’t, but I’m glad I checked because otherwise it would have distracted and annoyed me.
I couldn’t write as fast as I can in English. I couldn’t access as many other ways of saying the same thing as I can in German. I had to think harder, but there were fewer filler words and somehow the thoughts were clearer.
281 words. Fewer than in German, but perhaps more clarity!
Portuguese
This was actually easier than the Romanian task. Perhaps because I chose a topic that was a bit easier and less abstract. But I think the more interesting thing is about the level of vocabulary. My passive Romanian vocabulary is better than Portuguese because I’ve been learning it for an extra three years. But the Romanian words didn’t come as fast when I needed them. I guess I’m having more active interactions with the Portuguese language nowadays, so even though the text feels more basic, it’s easier to access the words when I want them.
307 words
Week 2
English
This was definitely easier to write than the first English text. There was a lot going on in it and I covered a lot in those 15 minutes. Maybe with practise this will get easier. I find writing in English easier, obviously, but it’s harder to really reflect when my fingers can keep up with my brain!
556 words
German
I had a lot to say that day and the text had a more logical structure to it. I had access to the words that I needed, but maybe slowing down to form the sentences in German made me take a bit more care with how the whole thing fitted together.
442 words
Romanian
This is where things started to fall apart and I started using the time to do useful things. I’ve been saying for ages that I want to post something in Romanian on LinkedIn and I used the time for that – for the first draft at least. It’s not the final version and it’s not finished, but not doing this thing had been annoying me because I don’t usually procrastinate. Still, the idea for journalling time wasn’t really to get stuff done from my to-do-list!
326 words
Portuguese
So here I continued with the bad habit from the day before. I had a creative task to do for a meeting that I attend – in English – and I decided to do the task in Portuguese here.
So I wrote les – not so much because of the language, but because the task required a higher level of thought and creativity and I couldn’t just get writing. It would have been harder for me in English too!
In the end, I’m glad I did it in Portuguese because that helped me to see things in a different way and focus more. But again, I don’t want to use this time to get stuff done because sometimes hyper-productivity fills up all our space to be creative.
So … useful not to do it in English, but maybe not the best use for journalling writing time.
204 words
What did I learn?
I discovered:
- That I enjoyed the process of writing for myself more than I thought I would. Or maybe I’d just forgotten that I enjoy it!
- In terms of developing my skills, each language benefits in a different way. Each one will benefit from this exercise if I decide to continue.
- The differences between writing in Romanian and Portuguese surprised me the most. I really thought the Romanian ones would be easier, but they weren’t always.
- In English I’m just good at getting my thoughts down and polishing the text later. Sometimes my excessive focus on getting things right in the other languages interrupts my thoughts too much. It would be better to have a longer draft that needs some love and attention, especially for longer texts, than to spend too long writing the thing because I want it to be perfect from the outset!
Writing without a specific goal can show me what I really think about all kinds of things! Sometimes it’s a surprise! Sometimes it gives me new ideas.
So, I’m going to continue – but this time is mine for writing spontaneously and it’s not to be used for getting texts finished, especially in my weaker languages.
How is your relationship with journalling? Do you use any additional languages? Would you like to try? Have you noticed any differences in terms of the way in which you express yourself?
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