I hold my hands up.
I’m a fraud.
For decades I have been extolling the virtues of speedwriting, journaling, of visiting a café, taking a notebook and just writing.
“Put your pen on the paper and just go!” writes Natalie Goldberg in Writing Down the Bones, the book that first taught me the value of visiting a café and just writing for the sake of it.
Sure, I believe in the power of journaling and am brilliant at telling other people to practise the habit. I’m just not quite so good at taking a dose of my own medicine.
But then, over the last few weeks I’ve received multiple what I call ‘bonks on the head’, steering me firmly in the direction of rekindling my journaling habit.
So let me back up a little.
You may know that Ian and I repatriated to the UK almost a year ago after the best part of 34 years overseas in a number of different countries.
We returned with an empty nest, which is not surprising considering the fact that our kids are now 28 and 30. And they live in Germany and Spain.
We knew repatriation would be tough.
We know that settling into a new country takes at least a year and we know that the country we left all those years ago has changed beyond recognition in that time. We expected that the pandemic would make it harder to see people and live any kind of normal life. But it has been tough. I’ve been lonely. For an extrovert, that’s harsh.
But 18 months into a pandemic and 12 months into being back home has taken its toll on my wellbeing. Let’s be honest, my happiness. I’ve been tired and grumpy, lacking in motivation, maybe even a bit depressed. That’s not ‘me’ and I don’t like it.
However, I’m self-aware enough to recognise this has been happening and knew I had to take steps to put things right. To claw my way back to a sense of peace. I was just not quite sure what that might look like.
Before you think this blog is some kind of Pity Party let me tell you that what follows are the steps I took to put things right. I can also tell you that I have now taken the Very First Step and can disclose that doing so made me very happy indeed! You’ll find out about that at the end.
The Universe has a way of sending me appropriate ‘bonks on the head’ when I most need them, so this is what happened.
The Patti Smith Insight
Two weeks ago I found myself reading Patti Smith’s latest memoir – The Year of the Monkey.
It tells how she took a year to wander about, to go with the flow, to follow her intuition and whatever opportunities came her way and just see what happens. Along the way she would visit divey bars and cafes, chat to the locals, order a drink or a coffee and see what might unfold. Her writing is picaresque. It is mundane and yet I find it exquisite in the way it captures the banal and imbues it with magic.
The magic, for me, is simply that she makes it real.
Insight 1: I need to go with the flow more and maybe visit random cafes.
The Louise Wiles Insight
And then I saw an advert for a free workshop on wellbeing run by my friend Louise Wiles of Thriving Abroad. In this workshop we learned about the Permah Six Pillars of Wellbeing and how we need to have elements of all of them in our lives if we are to find a sense of contentment.
Those pillars are:
P – positive emotion
E – engagement
R – relationships
M – meaning
A – accomplishment
H – health
This tool is not about work (a tough one for someone like me who has always been driven), nor about the house I live in, nor the place in which I live. Engagement, Relationships, Meaning and Accomplishment all leapt out at me during the workshop and I began to realise where some of those had been lacking of late.
Insight 2: I needed to accomplish something without a work-related end goal.
The Carolyn Vines Insight
The very day after Louise’s workshop I found myself attracted to a free session led by my dear friend, fellow writer and now coach, Carolyn Vines, on journaling and writing for self-reflection. I signed up immediately. I met Carolyn in the Netherlands, she joined my writers’ circle and we have supported each other on our writing journeys for over a decade.
As you may know I run my own free monthly session, Speedwrite Live, where attendees are given a writing prompt, write for ten minutes and then share their writing and give feedback.
I guessed this would be the same. I love spontaneous writing and, as I am usually the teacher or facilitator, I reckoned it would be fun to be the student for a change. Much as a masseuse knows she needs to get her own massages for her own health, right? Joining Carolyn’s class was an act of self-indulgence.
So, I went and was delighted to discover that Carolyn’s session was not remotely like mine. Instead, by leading us to write (but not share) on three different angles of a central emotional theme we were led gently towards insight, inspiration and even resolution of an issue. And all this happened in under an hour.
I was hooked.
Her class reminded me that journaling works and has a deeper impact and can lead to more understanding than we might expect.
Note: Carolyn will be my guest at the 9th December In Conversation Masterclass, when we will be talking about journaling for self-reflection and you will be able to try her methods for yourself. Here is the Zoom link.
Insight 3: journaling works
The Signe Hovem Insight
Two days ago I was delighted to interview another dear friend of mine, Signe Hovem. Signe and I had met in Stavanger back in the mid-90s when our two three-year-olds were in the same class at nursery school. Signe was a budding writer and delighted to join the Writers’ Circle I was running there.
All these years later and she has written her book, The Space Between: an empath’s field guide, published 12 October by She Writes Press.
During our conversation, we discussed how location can influence our writing and also, the power of journaling. Signe is a passionate and regular journaler. She may not have published any major work in the decades since we first met but she is still a writer to the core. She ‘follows the natural light round the house’ during the day and writes in sunny corners.
Signe reminded me that the word create means to bring into being. So, simply writing something in a journal, committing it to paper is bringing something into being that was not there before. It is a creative act. At the end of speedwriting or journaling we achieve something, make something.
For Signe, her journal is almost a sacred object. She blesses hers before she starts to use them. The peace and understanding that she finds in journaling inspired me, yet again to writing ‘just because’ not for any reason. Because we are writers. Journaling counts.
Note: Jo Parfitt In Conversation with Signe Hovem will be available on my podcast in October. Find it where you find your podcasts.
Insight 4: Journaling brings something into being – it is creative
The epiphany!
It took less than 24 hours from my chat with Signe to decide how I would find my way back to happiness and take my first step.
Thanks to the insights that came from four ‘bonks on the head’ – from Patti, Louise, Carolyn and Signe – I promise:
- To start using the beautiful leather-bound, handmade journal gifted to me by Melinda more than 10 years ago. It’s embossed with my name and I deemed it too precious to use, Now seems the right time to crack open its spine.
- To visit 100 different independent cafés, take my notebook and write. I do not need to do this in 100 days. I just need to do it regularly.
- To write whatever comes to me. There is no goal. I will simply bring something into being; I will create. That alone is a valuable accomplishment.
- To keep the writing private. The work I produce is not for sharing, for publication or for sale. It is for me. For my sake.
- To take a photograph of each of the cafés I visit and put them on Instagram in the hope that they will inspire others to do the same. I will use the hashtag #100cafechallenge. Psst. Two of my friends have already said they want to join in and one of them is Carolyn.
What happened since
And so I did this yesterday for the first time. I visited a café called Euphorium in Saint Christopher’s Place in London W1. I ordered a flat white, opened my notebook and just wrote. I’m not going to share what I wrote but I will let you see a photograph of my notebook and of the café.
I can report that doing such a small thing made me incredibly happy. I had done something for myself that reminded me I am a writer. Was it self-indulgent, or was it actually necessary?
I am journaling my way back to happiness.
Join in?
Are you going to join me? Follow me at @Joparfittwriter over at Instagram and add your own pictures. No writing. Just a photo as a record that you accomplished something valuable for you, that you are a writer.
