People’s hobbies, recipes, and lifestyles flooded the screen of the off-brand cube computer sitting in our living room. Granted, I only used it to play Minesweeper, but there was a whole world out there that I could access right in my home!
I had kept journals for years. Since I learned how to write, I would create stories and recount my days at night before bed. As I grew up, the stories moved to other notebooks (I have an addiction to blank paper and always have a spare notebook or two) and the purpose of the journal grew from remembering what I did yesterday to processing through feelings and events.
I am a person of passion. When I love something, I love it with all my heart and it stays with me. Most would say that’s one of my better qualities. I get deeply invested in my hobbies and take it very personally when someone seems disinterested, as though my hobbies are part of my personality. Drawing the line is difficult sometimes, but I’m working through it 🙂
As a twenty-one year old young adult, I can confidently say I have not once filled a journal. At the turn of the year (2025), I decided I would finally complete a notebook. The chosen victim for this challenge is a lined hardcover that was gifted to me by my mother for Christmas of 2024. It’s a light green color with various illustrations of plants scattered among the board. In the top center is a line of text that says, “Never Stop Growing”. While her main motivation for getting the book for me is my obsession with plant life, I took that message to heart.
Never stop growing.
To some, it may just be another notebook. To most, it’s an average journal that can withstand a beating in a child’s backpack due to its reinforced cover. But to me, this book is representative of everything I stood for when I was twelve years old: memory retention and healing. My goal is to fill these pages cover-to-cover with happenings of my days and mind.
I say this hoping there is someone else out there who struggles similarly, for one reason or another, to commit to filling a notebook. Most of my issues stem from simply not liking the cover anymore, so no reason is too shallow 🙂
Just five minutes out of your day can be spent fondly remembering what you had for breakfast or what funny thing your friend said to you. If you’re overwhelmed, use one of the pages to write down every single thing that comes through your mind. I call that the “brain dump” page. Let this be an encouragement to you to stick with your journals. Or, if you haven’t started one, go for it! However you want to get started, just remember:
Never stop growing.