Saturday 7 December 2013

MY bespoke 'Question and Answer' 5 Year Journal!

Some of you may remember the Diary Resolution, which I made at the beginning of the year. Remember that beautiful notepad I was going to make a mark in every single day?! Well, yet, again I failed with this resolution. However, my love affair with writing continues and this has resulted in a new form of journaling for me.

Image from Google Search Result here.


You may have heard of the Q and A a Day, 5 Year Journal (currently selling for £8.26 on Amazon). This journal has one page allocated for each day of the year. At the top of each page is a question and then the page is split equally in to five. The theory is for five years running on each date, you write honestly in answer to the question. Then in five years time, you will be left with a full journal showing how you and your life has evolved.

Image from Google Search Result here!


I've known about this journal for a while and it has always intrigued me. In theory, you can learn quite a lot about one person from how they respond to a simple question.

After the marathon and some life changes earlier in the year when suddenly I had plenty of time on my hands and a despondent attitude to life. I decided, I needed to do something I would like again. I would write my problems and frustrations away. For a while, this made me feel better but then I got bored of dwelling and writing about the same darn things over and over. I was just making things worse for myself, replaying things in my head. I liked the idea of the Q & A journal as I guess to an extent 'It takes our head out of the grey clouds' and makes us think about the big picture. It considers our lives from many perspectives and respects the many different roles we all play as well as our individual personalities but you know even though people talk highly of the Q & A Journal, some reviews criticise the quality of the questions asked and I for one, was not happy to wait for Amazon to deliver my order. I wanted to start my journal straight away. Ha, I told you when I want something, I tend to want it NOW or not at all.



So off to WHSmith, I went and brought a normal blank 5 year journal and gave each date a separate question. The question varied from ones mentioned in reviews of the Q & A, to my own random questions and then to some more questions bespoke to my life and ever since, I have filled this diary in every single day for over two months now and I am not yet bored.






In fact, I look forward to filling it in each day and when I'm having a 'bad' moment or am late and in traffic or something, it seems to help that I now have the journal to think of and the reassurance that in a few hours just before bed I will be filling it in and answering my little question, just like I did last night and will do tomorrow night. Every day and experience comes to an end but my journal and I will live on. Well, at least for five years and then I will buy another one!!!

For example, here are some questions for August:
23 What relationship are you trying to nurture?
24 Write a postcard about your day
25 Favourite smell
26 Last piece of housework I did
27 It is Dad's birthday. Write something Dad-related
28 Last meeting I had
29 A piece of body language to master is __________

I think the Q and A diary, the original or bespoke by you could be a lovely little gift for Christmas. It doesn't take long to fill out each day, is fun and what is more, to write a journal you don't need to be anything (intelligent or beautiful or a certain size) but honest. It is a gift that you can personalise for example if your Mother loves to read, you could mix some general questions in with some about her reading habits (books, characters etc) and then maybe even some about your childhood or her relationship with you now.

For example, this could be some of your questions to ask in August:
23 We've had a few happy times, Mum. Describe one and what it meant to you?
24 What did your star sign say today, was it accurate?
25/ Mum, you always used to take me on a Sunday afternoon trip. Tell me something about somewhere we've been together and the time we shared there.
26/ Mum, describe our most recent encounter together.
27/ Mum, if you saw a shooting star today then what wish would you make?
28/ Mum, what fiction character comes immediately to mind and why?
29/ What is your favourite book right now?

You could even make more of a gift of it by writing a little dedication or letter to her at the beginning or writing random messages on random days like I love you, You're A Star etc so she smiles as she turns the page.



I also have a little 5 year journal, I write just a few lines in this every day. There is only a little space to write about each day in so it has to be kept short and to the point. In fact, I don't even have to write much, even if only a mark or doodle again to compare one day this year with the same day next etc.



Do you keep a journal of any kind? What do you think of the Q and A Journal? Would you like to keep one or give one as a gift?





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