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PaperclipPerfector  4mo ago (text post)   2576 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 20, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

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I'm thinking of keeping a journal. It's something my parents tried to instill in me as a child, but I didn't see the point then (of course). Now that I'm much older, I think I can see more of why that type of record keeping/thought organizing might be useful.

I'm planning to type my entries on my Windows desktop. While my initial plan is to just make a folder of text files, I think it would useful to have software that helps me organize it. Ideally, I'd like to be able to sort entries by date or topic (tag?), with multiple entries per date and the possibility of associating other media with entries.

Are there any journal keepers here on The Motte with software recommendations or other journal tips?

OneNote is great and I use it and depend on it for my job, but I ended up using Joplin for my personal "note taking" app. I chose it over Obsidian for reasons now largely lost to time, I recall the things people praised Obsidian for weren't things I cared about, integrations of various kinds. Joplin syncs to DropBox, and I'm able to use it on mac/windows/ios. It's built on some bloated framework so it's a little slow to load on desktop OS's, though.

That said, as far as journals go, Joplin only contains my dream journal. Regular, brief daily journal entries go in a weekly planner, I use Leuchtturm A5 because they're easy to find and are formatted well. You can also get a different color every year and then you don't even have to label them. If I actually have something to say then I'll try for an essay and save that with its date in my personal documents.

I'm maybe a little obsessively reflective, but it definitely seems worthwhile to leave some breadcrumbs for yourself as you make your way through the world. I recently came across some of my earlier journaling from ~20 years ago at my childhood home and it was not what I expected, in a good way. There's a lot we forget.

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