The Rest is Still Unwritten

Good morning yall~

Im here for my bi-weekly flexing and ready to gloat in ur inbox again~~~

Jokes but I did finish filling out my last journal! Its one of the many things that really helped me move forward in my life and gives me hella content for my future books/media publication (whenever that happens (manifesting)). There’s been a lot of times when it feels like nothing is ever being done in my life, or that Ive just been recycling the same thoughts over a longer period of time. These thoughts constantly put me in a rut.

But journaling has been the perfect escape to these loops. I saw the patterns that came up, and in these patterns I found solutions to the constant problems I was having. I started journaling in a very rough place mentally and it has kept me so grounded since then (after a few months of consistency though). I’ve been doing them daily since last April (mostly) and its one of those lil daily accomplishments that’ve really helped grant clarity.

The hardest part was figuring out how to set it up tho; it was something that I wanted to be repeatable, no critical thought needed, and mostly brief. So with that, and some help from the Make Art Not Content podcast (i love them), I found a pretty good formula:

1. Time I woke up

2. Time I go to bed

3. A summary of the day - bits about how i’m feeling, what I did, random thoughts (this was the most healing part in the long run as i got more comfortable w writing abt myself)

4. What I learned - could be anything from technical skills, fun facts, or life lessons

5. Art I worked on - Id write the amount of time I worked, broken down by each sitting at my desk, and then what parts I worked on, and occasionally some parts of the piece Im worried about

6. A lil memory/ story of the day. I felt that my daily life has been rly boring out here, as its just jumping between classes and art, but this was a great way to highlight different things in the day and rly made me more present in the day.

This is usually a ten minute end of day thing, and after a while its very easy to finish up this lil task (once i stop mindlessly scrolling on instagram)(its also a great way to not use ur phone before bed). And for some extra pages:

I have some goals that I want to achieve in the span of the journal at the beginning. Be them manifestations, or ideas that would recenter me, its always a nice reminder.

At the end of the book I have a few pages (I call it “the Library”) with life lessons and behaviors that keep happening in my life to j have all the things I’ve learned in a few pages. Its humbling but also real asf; its been nice seeing the mental progress i’ve made, especially on days that feel like Im back at the start.

And on the last page, is just a list of all the pieces + time i put into each piece that I made while I was using the journal.

This is a longer email only because this has been something that has really helped me in my personal, mental, and artistic journey. And its been fun lmao

Alas Im typing this in the middle of class and have not had dinner yet so I bid yall

farewell

love

faraz

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So ur still here? theres legit a divider what else do u want? anywhomst - heres the podcast that talked me into journaling! This guy fully gets me into a grindset i have done my most consistent work w this podcast series playing. I stan his harsh realities of being an artist~

Make Art Not Content

Dont wanna click the link? dont worry its just a zip bomb thatll take all ur financial info xox0. in my regret, i give you a pic

of my Library: