I’ve been journaling in DayOne for about 12 years. I think today’s “On This Day” hit a new record of over 20 prior entries. It is nice to be able to do this daily “look back”. ✍️

@ronguest That must be quite a treasure trove of memories

@ronguest that’s really amazing! Any tips to stay consistent? Any specific format for your entries or are they just free form?

@ronguest that is great! I try to stay consistent but hard to maintain the routine.

@brandontreb have to follow this conversation to get some tips.

@brandontreb I used to have a daily Reminder in the evening. But it is no longer necessary as I have “the habit”. These days I just go free form. For a time I used a “Day Summary” template with sections labeled “Any notable things happen today”, “I’ve been thinking about”, and “What’s Next” but I no longer use that. I do still have those questions in mind when I post. My posts are general “matter of fact” rather than deep thoughts. That’s just the way I am.

@pratik Seeing those old memories is part of what keeps me journaling. I don’t need a reminder to journal any more because every day I want to open the app and look back.

@brandontreb You don’t have to journal in a consistent voice/audience. You’re not writing a memoir. ;) DayOne is good for keeping a detailed record of your life (photos, events, etc), but you can pretty much use anything. I’m working on my own app, but just a notebook and (fountain)pen. Consistency is key. It’s a habit.

@Archimage This is really great advice. Like most things, I tend to overthink journaling. That's why the habit next sticks.

My process every time:

1. Start journaling
2. Realize I could build better journaling software
3. Start building software
4. Before completion, decide to make it a Sass
5. Never finish it
6. Stop journaling
7. goto 1

@brandontreb Heh. Well I built my app so I could journal the way I wanted to. I just built a journaling function into my writing app. Then it got too cumbersome code-wise so I split it out into a separate app.