I have journaled off and on since I was eight years old. When I was young, I just wrote about what I did and how u felt, happy, sad, excited. Playing outside with AJ, sad over the death of one of my chickens.
When I was in high school, it was dreams and a bit of drama from relationships.
In college, I wrote about all of the other people that I hurt. I wrote prayers regarding my struggle watching others suffer and not knowing how to help.
I would cry and be at a loss over friends who lost friends because of human nature, those who were depressed, lost, cutting, or just at their wits end from school. I was focused on others.
I recently read through the last two years of journals.
Post college it turned almost completely to issues with my girlfriend. Almost all of them were prayers of confusion a to marry or not.
Comically, after the break up they turned to dramatic woes and throngs of love and anguish for my loss an a struggle to deal with a broken relationship. As time went on they move more and more into centering on the pain in my own heart. Journals of praise and gratitude became more in frequent. Journals regarding my care for others, no longer written.
Even after an unfortunate event that left a friend with deep wounds, rather than care for her, my entries focused on how the situation affected me.
I am embarrassed of these sections. I am tempted sometimes to remove them. But I keep them as a reminder. As they how were my focus really is.
We don’t get to write out our lives. We don’t decide what decisions other people make or how it affects us. But we can always choose how we respond and what we focus on.
How will you write out your life?
I am going to re write whatever happens to me as care for others. Not myself.
Broken Crowns 