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+[1]Westley Winks
+[2]Résumé [3]Peace Corps [4]Posts [5]Bookshelf [6]Weeknotes
+Table Of Contents
+
+    [8]How I journal
+  • [9]Five points—Location, win, tension, gratitude, and values
+  • [10]Why this system works for me
+  • [11]What it looks like in practice
+
+How I journal
+
+I’ve had a seemingly typical journaling experience over the years: try
+journaling because someone smart told me it’s good for me, white-knuckle my way
+through how I should be doing it, it doesn’t stick, I don’t journal for a
+while, and repeat that endlessly. Last year, I finally landed on a journaling
+system that works for me.
+
+I’ve been out of the habit for over a month now^[12]1 so I wanted to write
+about my system to get me excited about it again and restart the habit. Here we
+go.
+
+Five points—Location, win, tension, gratitude, and values
+
+I’ve tried physical notebooks, morning pages, stream-of-thought writing, bullet
+points, and basically everything else recommended by the journaling gurus. What
+finally stuck was a framework I learned from Sahil Bloom—[13]the 1-1-1 method.
+I’ve adapted it for myself such that I write down five points each night (in a
+perfect world).
+
+  • Location. The more specific the better. It’s fun to read old entries and
+    remember exactly what hotel room I was in or whose house I was staying at.
+  • One win. The highlight of the day. Something that made me smile or feel
+    proud.
+  • One point of tension. Something that caused anxiety, stress, or anything
+    else I struggled with or am dreading.
+  • One piece of gratitude. We all know by now that writing down things you’re
+    grateful for is good for the soul.
+  • One behavior that connects to my values. This is an addition that I made to
+    ensure that my [14]values and behaviors are aligned. Did I do something
+    today that I say is important to me?
+
+Each of these is usually just a sentence but the door is open to expand where I
+want. If something really great happened that day, I’ll savor it by writing a
+paragraph or more. If I was feeling particularly anxious, I’ll explore that
+further.
+
+Why this system works for me
+
+The thing that made journaling hard to do consistently—like any habit—was that
+there was too much friction. I never really knew what was worth writing and
+what wasn’t, what future me was interested in remembering and what he didn’t
+care about. Journaling always became more of a chore than anything else,
+something I felt like I should be doing but didn’t want to. Like eating
+vegetables or going to the gym.
+
+On the days when I can’t be bothered to do anything, I only need to write five
+things. Sometimes they aren’t even full sentences—it takes me about 30 seconds
+minimum. But this system is also flexible enough to give me space to dig down
+when I want to.
+
+Besides being easier to write, it’s also more interesting to read back entries
+later on. When I was semi-consistent with just writing down what I did for the
+day, reading them back the next month was so dull. I journal partly to document
+my life and I don’t really care that I bought bread on May 8th, 2023. This
+system does a fantastic job of capturing the meaningful highs and lows of my
+life without cluttering my journal with the boring stuff.
+
+What it looks like in practice
+
+I’m on my computer quite a lot and typing has always been easier than
+handwriting for me. Not to mention my abysmal handwriting that can be hard to
+read sometimes. So, I do all of this in a digital journal.
+
+Herman Martinus [15]wrote about the many benefits that come from plain text
+journaling. When my journal is One Big Text File, it is easy to back up, move
+around, search, edit, and store. I use [16]jrnl to add some “sugar” on top of
+it, though.
+
+jrnl works through the command line and I can just type jrnl to create a new
+timestamped entry in my text editor of choice. Again, I really try to reduce
+friction when it comes to journaling and this is about as frictionless as it
+gets. It also allows templating, searching, tagging, and tools to view specific
+entries. My favorite feature is jrnl -today-in-history that returns all of my
+previous entries for the given day.
+
+When I’m not at my computer, I usually handwrite my five points in my Moleskine
+notebook that I use for tasks and notes. When I’m back to my computer, I
+transcribe it into jrnl. In a pinch, I can also write myself a Signal message
+to copy and paste later.
+
+With this journaling system, I am recording, analyzing, and remembering the
+important bits of my life in a way that is easy and sustainable for me. Now I
+just need to go out and get started—yet again.
+
+ 1. Due to a major life transition. I probably should have been journaling more
+    but it ended up on the back burner for one reason or another. [17]↩
+
+Created: 2024-12-13
+
+Last modified: 2024-12-13
+
+[18]Written by Human, Not by AI
+
+Like my writing?
+
+Say thanks by [19]buying me a coffee or [20]send me an email with your
+thoughts.
+
+[21]Email me [22] Ko-fi donations Buy me a coffee
+
+Keep Reading
+
+[23]How I solved an online treasure hunt
+[24] plain-text [25] productivity
+
+Your Most Humble and Obedient Servant
+
+© 2025 Westley Winks. The content of this page is licensed under [26]CC BY 4.0
+[27]home | [28]résumé | [29]peace corps | [30]posts | [31]bookshelf | [32]
+weeknotes
+
+References:
+
+[1] https://wwinks.com/
+[2] https://wwinks.com/cv/
+[3] https://wwinks.com/peace-corps/
+[4] https://wwinks.com/p/
+[5] https://wwinks.com/b/
+[6] https://wwinks.com/w/
+[8] https://wwinks.com/p/how-i-journal/#top
+[9] https://wwinks.com/p/how-i-journal/#five-pointslocation-win-tension-gratitude-and-values
+[10] https://wwinks.com/p/how-i-journal/#why-this-system-works-for-me
+[11] https://wwinks.com/p/how-i-journal/#what-it-looks-like-in-practice
+[12] https://wwinks.com/p/how-i-journal/#fn:1
+[13] https://www.sahilbloom.com/newsletter/the-1-1-1-method-forecasts-for-the-future-more
+[14] https://every.to/no-small-plans/how-to-identify-and-live-your-life-by-your-values
+[15] https://herman.bearblog.dev/plain-text-journaling/
+[16] https://jrnl.sh/
+[17] https://wwinks.com/p/how-i-journal/#fnref:1
+[18] https://notbyai.fyi/
+[19] https://ko-fi.com/wwinks
+[20] mailto:westley.stood549@passmail.net?subject=How%20I%20journal
+[21] mailto:westley.stood549@passmail.net?subject=How%20I%20journal
+[22] https://ko-fi.com/wwinks
+[23] https://wwinks.com/p/suntup-treasure-hunt/
+[24] https://wwinks.com/t/plain-text
+[25] https://wwinks.com/t/productivity
+[26] https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/?ref=chooser-v1
+[27] https://wwinks.com/
+[28] https://wwinks.com/cv/
+[29] https://wwinks.com/peace-corps/
+[30] https://wwinks.com/p/
+[31] https://wwinks.com/b/
+[32] https://wwinks.com/w/