Write it down

My dad is a counselor. He is always telling his clients to journal. He says you need to write it down to get it out. I've never really taken his advice before (no surprise, huh Diddy?). I am one that needs to discover it for myself for some reason. Recently a friend gave me a life-changing book that encourages journaling. So I finally decided to give it a try.

Blogging and journaling are two different things. Journaling involves ripping junk right out of your heart and slapping it down on paper. If you need to cuss, cuss. If you need to change topics at random in the middle of a paragraph - do it. Put pen to paper and write it out long hand. Do whatever it takes - just get the thoughts onto paper.

I have committed to journal 3 pages every morning before getting out of bed. Start the day off fresh - get the junk out and don't carry it into your day with you. Funnily enough, once I started journaling - I can't seem to stop. In the past 7 days, I have written 33 pages. I can't tell you how much better I feel - how much I have learned about myself. It's unreal.

Another thing I have committed to do is NOT going back and re-reading my journal any time soon. The point is to get it out, not go back and mull it over, analyzing the whole mess. At first I was a little inhibited. I thought, "What if someone finds this. Maybe I should put some things in code." I am starting to come out of that. It's a little weird, but the more freely I allow myself to write, the easier it comes.

The best thing about it all is not just learning more about myself. It is receiving clarity on some of the lies I have believed. Seeing new things about God. Understanding who I am in relation to Him. Realizing that I am important and worth something and that's it's OK to take care of me.

If you don't journal - you should start today. I promise it will change your life...

Things to think about...

I haven't posted in while. Quite frankly, I haven't had much to say. I've been in a reflective mood lately. I promised someone I would start journaling, so I guess I've been expressing myself there. I'm on a path to unearth the real me. I haven't posted lately because I don't want to post something just to fill cyberspace with empty words, but I can offer you this:

"Integrity is a bigger thing than telling the truth. It is about being a certain kind of person. It is about being people who know who we are and what we are, and it is about being true to what we are even when it could cost us more than we should like to pay." -Lewis Smedes

"Be more concerned with your character than with your reputation, because your character is what you really are while your reputation is merely what others think you are." -John Wooden

"Authenticity is a powerful witness to the presence of God in our lives. It doesn't mean that we're perfect. It means that we're real. It means that we're honest about our imperfections and our struggles. We don't gloss over them and put on a happy Christian face to cover up our pain." -Rory Noland

Whatever you do, forsake all else and follow Him.