The Art of Journal Writing

Daily journal writing is a practice that is invaluable to creating a relationship with the open page, and for renewing your relationship with yourself. This is true whether you are a blogger, a novelist or screenwriter, poet, or someone who just has the need to write down her own thoughts once in a while.

Growing up in a small town, before the world wide web, it was difficult to find resources on writing. When I was twelve years old I found a stack of old Writers Digest magazines for sale at the school book fair. I bought both stacks: two dozen magazines for a quarter. Inside were interviews and articles about authors and by authors on the practice of writing. I savored every word, and practically memorized articles by the likes of John MacDonald and Stephen King (who had only published two novels at the time of publication). Nothing, I think, was more valuable to my own writing pursuits than those magazines, with the exception of one book I discovered many years later, by Natalie Goldberg. I see her book in bookstores everywhere these days, and it makes me very happy for her.

Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within, is all about the practice of journal writing. It is not about how to write short stories, poetry, novels, magazine articles, or anything else as structured as that. It is about the writer, alone with a pen and a notebook, simply writing.

In contrast to blogging, journal writing is about the private act of writing itself, and practicing your writing aside from any publishable pieces you may find yourself working on. It is about letting your pen do the work, letting your words flow unrestricted and unharnessed, unpolluted by your preconceptions of what your words should be. She teaches the writer how to overcome writer’s block, through constant daily practice.

Goldberg encourages the writer to sit alone in unusual places, to write without regard to rules of punctuation or grammar, or even those nasty little margins on the edges of the page. Through her simple, fundamental lessons, she shows the writer how to free his or her own unique and irresistible “voice”.

I won’t try to encapsulate her entire book here, but rather I would encourage any writer, or anyone who has ever wanted to write, to pick up her book. Read every page, and follow every piece of gentle advice she brings to you. She will help you develop a close and intimate relationship with your own words, with your paper and pen. You will never again face writer’s block, or the intimidation of facing a blank empty page. You will never again question who you are as a writer, or wonder what your “voice” really is.

I have read dozens of books, and thousands of articles on writing, including many on journal writing. Writing Down the Bones is, to this day, the only one I have kept.

Tagged as: Book Review, journal writing, Natalie Goldberg