How, What, Why to write in 'My personal diary'? Personal diary writing - Methodology

A diary can be your very best listening and loyal friend. I think it is a right time to post this, as many people will take resolution to start writing a personal diary. Keeping and writing a diary is one of the most important things in my life. I am the biggest fan of writing my diary. Diary writing is considered to be a very personal form of writing. Even though the people all over the world prefers to use blogs and other digital formats to write Diary, however the conventional style of writing in a paper diary is still a popular form of expression of one’s thoughts and feelings. It gives me pleasure and feel, when I write in paper with my own hands, because whenever I write with my hands, I will think and feel the each words I write. I started writing two times earlier but failed to continue, but now I am doing it every day for the last three years, 2016 is my 4th year of my journey.The only reason is, I like to write. I share my opinion here on how to start/write diary.  whatever I mention below are my opinion only. 

​Why to write a diary

• The basic rule of writing Diary is – Write if and only if you really feel like writing a Diary, don't just do it for the sake of doing, following your friends or relatives etc. who may have a habit of writing a diary.
• It is a good activity to look back at our life and analyse on the basis of your past, It is accounting mechanism.
• Reading old memories: I cannot tell you how much I love, love, love when I read my diary which I wrote few years back. When I turn up in a new place or start a new part of my life, I like to write what I want to achieve or my first impressions and re-reading these is so much fun and useful.
• Get to know yourself better
• Creativity
• Your life time friend: People will come and go in your life, but He is the best one who can come along with you all the time and to whom you can share everything.
• Understand that eventually the diary will become your best friend, silent confessor, or witness. You will eventually trust your diary more than anything, even your biggest secrets and you will start speaking with him.

How to write a diary

• Doesn’t need to be formal: It is for you. So try to give importance to the content and not to the format and handwriting. But make sure it is legible.
• A Diary is very personal form of writing, thus should be written in a private or secluded place, like your bedroom, study room or any place where there is nobody else is present. It is best to write where nobody can see you writing in your diary. This will reduce the possibility of the other person's attention towards your dairy.
• Keep your diary secret as far as possible because revelations of its contents may harm you or those persons feeling about whom you have mentioned something in it. For keeping it in a secret way, you can write in a coded form of names. That is how I encode it when I mention a name.
• Most important of all, the dairy should be of high quality paper and written by a quality pen to last the writing a life time.
• The quality of Diary writing depends upon the creativity, imagination and expression of the individual. Diary writing skills can be enhanced by imagining and emotions a situation that you put in.
• Write truthfully. Write about your secrets which you cannot expose in front of others. It can be about your ex-boyfriend (or girlfriend)
• You can also stick some souvenirs like photos, flower petals or anything associated with what happened that day to be more creative. I even attach the bills and others notables too.

What to write in a diary

• What to write : Simply, Whatever
• It is highly appropriate to write your diary ‘before your day begins’ or ‘before the day ends’. Writing ‘before the day begins’, enables you to express your emotions about how the day will turn out to be, what you dreamt in the night etc. At night you can summarize the events of your day, you can relate it to the emotions you had in the morning and so on.
• It is not necessary to write every day. Write only when something unexceptional or interesting happens in your routine life. Uneventful days can be written with just Date and Time, with a line or two describing it. Because routine things spoils the quality of the content.
• If you are wondering what to write then there is no dearth of what you want to write. The matter which can write can be anything like your achievement, hopes for the future, mistakes, improvements, likes, dislikes etc. Whatever you write, it should be legible and neat, so that when you want to read it later after decades you don’t have to guess the alphabets you have written.
• It is not compulsory to write every event of the day rather made only exceptional and entertaining details. Writing in detail about everything will make your writing boring and lengthy and will drain your energy.
• Diary Writing is not just about words. You can also create self-portraits, pen portraits of others; express your experience, hopes, fears, joys, sorrows etc. with these graphics. However don’t overdo it, which will make it more like a scrapbook than a Diary.
• You can also use some photos, flower petals or anything associated with the happenings you are writing about to make it more and more creative and attractive. If you went to  a theater to see an interesting movie or a concert, you can paste your entry passes or tickets to make it memorable.

​Diary must have(according to me):

• Date: Date for which you are writing. Follow the same pattern till the last page. Most of the diaries comes with imprinted date.
• Time stamp of writing: Some prefer to write the diary at night, which may become next day. So I used to add this column on every page.
• Place: This shows where was I writing the diary, and at future I will come to know that I was there on that particular day.
• Salutation: For effective Diary Writing, one can address his/her Diary as a second person, like ‘Hi! Diary’ or ‘Dear!, Diary’ or one can call it anything like friend, bro or name it like Prince, Tom etc. according to one’s choice. This method is effective because we tend to be more open about our emotions and word formation is easy because, in our day to day life we interact in this way. So it’s natural and effortless technique.
• Authentication: Always put your sign at the end for authentication that you have written it.
• Heading: A suitable descriptive heading which will describe the entire page or day. Ex: ‘It was a Blessed day’, or ‘got congratulations’, or ‘so disappointed and Hectic day’.
• Optionally,You can add this too. I write the dress and color and the foods I have taken for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner. Now You may think it is silly, but after some years it will be a moment to cherish. 

Don'ts 

• Don't be dishonest: Do not cheat and be honest, because you are writing your words of hearts, and which is especially for yourself. So do not cheat.
• Don't keep it open: Never give your diary to anyone to read or comment. If you have the attitude that someone will read this one day, then there you will not be loyal to your diary. Keep it tucked away from prying eyes.
• Don't write it on social media. Try to write your journal on diary, not on online media or social media.
• A diary should be written for first person, not second or third. (i.e.) you write for yourself about yourself. Ex: I went to my school. (not he went to school)
• Do not write bluff. Always write truthfully. This diary will always listen, never forget, never judge and nor will it ever reveal your secrets. So do not worry about writing the truth in it no matter how horrible it is.

Problems in writing

• Don’t get discouraged: Writing your diary daily can get repetitive and discouraging. However, fret not for a diary provides a record of your life, in only your view, and no one else.
• Make sure you keep up to date when writing a diary: Always try to keep your diary with you. I used to take wherever I go. Don’t try to postpone the writings. You are writing it for yourself not for any assignment.
• If you have not written in the diary for a few weeks, then do not worry about it. You can surely put up the new date and give the reason and apologize for it. After all, it is your friend! For example, - Sorry I could not write to you. I was terribly busy.For the dated pages, leave it empty or just write a apologize statement.

​Fine, let me summarize this to new joiner into the club:

Things your diary doesn’t have to be:

• Neat and tidy
• Logical
• Grammatically correct
• Politically correct
• Interesting to other people
• Regular
• Frequent
• What you did today

Things your diary might include:

• A record of events
• Concert tickets
• Photos
• Letters
• Drawings
• Poems
• Thoughts
• Feelings
• Ideas
• Dreams
• Hopes
• Disappointments
• Plans
• Prayers

Things your diary probably should be:

• Legible
• Dated 

A few last things to think about:

• You can write anywhere
• You can write anytime

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​I hope, this will gives some good view for those who start to write diaries, because I was also inspired some article on news paper, but later it became a part of my life now.

Regards,
​Joachin Joseph