I have never been a “journal” person. Not because I don’t like to journal, but because I always tumble into the “I’ll do it later” mentality and fall off the routine. In an effort to be a more positive and appreciative person, I decided to give journaling another go at the start of 2016. But instead of daily entries detailing events or pondering my existence, I wrote down at least 3 “happy” things that happened over the course of the day.
I’ll admit, I slacked a bit during the holidays, so I ended up cramming a few days at a time toward the end, but on the whole, I managed to stay consistent in my journal efforts for the first time.
1/11/16 – CORN MUFFINS
1/26/16 – Orchard Skittles and reclining movie theater seats.
2/5/16 – Mac n’ cheese absolutely MURDERED my cramps.
2/18/16 – Went through a car wash without suffering a panic attack.
3/2/16 – MANUSCRIPT DONE AND SENT! AHHHHH!
3/10/16 -Made the cashier at a gas station laugh.
4/10/16 – Discovered Would I Lie To You? reruns on Youtube.
4/26/16 – Survived a day with no coffee.
5/5/16 – Captain America: Civil War was awesome, and the Winter Soldier is FINE.
5/27/16 – Two-story Barnes & Noble in NYC, A.K.A, heaven.
5/28/16 – Steve Martin playing the banjo at the intermission of Bright Star.
6/10/16 – Cereal. I just really love cereal.
6/20/16 – New shampoo smells great.
7/10/16 – Mom, Dad, and I driving around to all Pokestops in the area.
7/20/16 – So cool to see the format of my book.
8/8/16 – Got to watch a beautiful sunrise.
8/26/16 – Stayed up until 2AM reading and finished two books in one day.
9/30/16 – MY BOOK WAS RELEASED ON AMAZON!!! AHHH!!!
10/1/16 – MY BOOK WAS RELEASED AT BN.COM!!! AHHH!!!
10/6/16 – First person told me they like my book!
11/9/16 – Solidarity, unity, and determination.
11/27/16 – Killed a fly with my ninja skills.
12/16/16 – 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown reruns. I AM ADDICTED.
12/25/16 – Held my baby cousin for the first time.
12/26/16 – Giveaway ended with 1,202 entries.
12/29/16 – Burritos with friends, catching up for 4 hours.
2016, on the whole, was not a great year, but looking back through my journal has reminded me that there was at least a little bit of good to be found in each day. A small bit of sun to part the dismal clouds. Sometimes (and by sometimes, I mean frequently) the “good things” were something as small as “Chinese food for dinner!” or “Had a great workout today.” There were multiple days where I wrote basically the same thing; some variation of “good workout, work was okay, got some editing/writing done.” It is also alarming how many times I wrote about coffee, pizza, starting a book, and getting to sleep on time. Mundane things, maybe, but I’ve found there’s nothing wrong with thinking the “boring” things are positive.
There were some not so good days in there, too. On June 7th, I only wrote one thing down: nothing. Implying that nothing good happened the entire day. But looking back on it now, I don’t remember what made that day so bad, so really, it must not have been as awful as I thought at the time. That’s not to say that bad things should be ignored, because they shouldn’t. Bad things are a part of life, and they must be acknowledged, but they should not conquer all else.
The year might not have been great, but despite the bad things that happened, there are tiny pinpricks of light that make the bad far less bleak, even if it’s something as small as “Corn muffins!” I only intended to keep this journal for a year, sort of as an experiment, but I’m going to keep going into 2017, and probably beyond. There are a lot of blank pages left in my Happy Things journal, and I look forward to filling them.
Frostwritten 