The Isolation Journals
This week I struggled to think of something to write about. I think it comes down to several things. I’ve been feeling a little disorganised with things I wanted to get done, this blog being one of them. I know the best way to approach all these tasks is to do them one at a time in order of priority. Knowing there were other things to do caused some anxiety and the feeling that I was forgetting something. I couldn’t quite pinpoint the source of the anxiety which frustrated me and didn’t alleviate it. This led to a noticeable increase in procrastination that took up five minutes here and there that began to add up. Anyway, Friday came, and I decided to have a look at my notes and just pick something to write about. It might not be that interesting or even any good, but I needed to get something out. There’s no breaking the chain of posts now, 26 and counting.
After looking at my notes on interesting content I come across, things that resonate with me or things I want to do more research on, I stopped on The Isolation Journals started by Suleika Jaouad. I came across Suleika Jaouad on Tim Ferriss’s podcast; she has such an inspirational story. She grew up in New York with a Tunisian father and a Swiss mother. She was diagnosed with leukaemia at the age of 22 and spent nearly 4 years in the hospital before going into remission. During her time spent in the hospital, she started her blog about her experience. Discussing loneliness and everything else that comes with cancer and being bedridden for so long. Her blog became very popular and caught the eye of the New York Times, which wanted her to write a few short stories. Seeing that she had nothing to lose, she asked for a column instead and so she started writing for the New York Times every week. After the Hospital she got her driver’s licence and solo road-tripped across the US to visit all those who supported her during her battle. She wrote a book about her experience called Between Two Kingdoms, which I am still reading. She has such an interesting story that is more relatable than you may think. On the podcast she discusses the decisions she made in her life and it put my own decisions into perspective.
The Isolation Journals was started by Suleika in March 2020 just as the pandemic started. She saw so many people struggling with loneliness and anxiety from this new way of living and she was reminded of what got her through her toughest times. She was journaling before she started her blog and during treatment, she did a 100-day creativity project with her family. She knew how valuable this exercise was to her and hoped it could do the same for others. If you sign up for the free newsletter you will get emailed a prompt every Sunday (the platform has many more features for $6 a month.) This journaling prompt will enable you to explore your creativity and pour your thoughts out onto a page. I haven’t done any yet, but I thought I’d sign up and explore the most recent prompt in this post. I feel like this may be a good thing to get into a habit of doing every Sunday evening/Monday morning. Let’s see how it goes.
The most recent prompt was from Connor Toomey: What interrupts your writing practice? What keeps you from the page?
By chance, I touched on this at the beginning of this post before I knew what the prompt was. It seems so applicable to how I was feeling when trying to come up with this week’s topic. Many things interrupt my writing and most of them don’t seem as important to me. This has helped me realise that I’ve been procrastinating way too frequently, and I’d like to become more aware of it. I think I work more efficiently when I plan and schedule my time. If I don’t plan or write it down, then I slip up and am more lenient with myself. Now this may seem like I’m hard on myself and that I should just take it easy, but I do actually enjoy it. Carving out time to write or learn a new skill is a lot more enjoyable when you get into a flow state and focus only on that task. It’s not the same if you’re doing it in dribs and drabs and just trying to get something done. I’ve done this for a few posts this year and I haven’t been happy with the outcome. The whole point is to improve, and I don’t want to feel like I’ve gone backwards.
I’ve heard many versions of the saying; you make time for what’s important. Hearing this, along with the many people explaining their interpretations of it, put things into perspective. You’re in control of all of your free time. It’s pretty normal these days to say we would like to do more of x, but we don’t have the time. This just means that x isn’t enough of a priority. Saying you don’t have the time for something has become so common that we don’t even give it a second thought. It almost distances the act of eating healthy or working out as a nice to do, but impossible to do in our current schedule/lifestyle. I now try to catch myself if I say this and ask whether I really want to do that thing. If it is something I want to make a part of my life, then I’ve got to make time for it. This may mean changing things around or giving something up. You choose what you want to prioritise, and within reason, you can change that at any time.
It felt good to run with a prompt and see where it goes. The Isolation Journals has evidently helped many people get through this tough time and it shows the importance of journaling. Mental health is so important, and you should take the time to look after yourself because no one else is going to do it for you. Even if it’s journaling for 10 minutes, set that time aside and go from there. Sign up to The Isolation Journals and give weekly journaling a go. You could even go back through the archives and write about other prompts like writing a poem where the speaker is dead or writing your own commencement speech for whoever needs it. There are 150 to choose from!