Day One, it Begins...

I used to love to journal. I had many different journal books throughout my teens. I would pour my heart into my journal. When I was upset, I would write. When I was happy, I would write. You get the picture. At times when I thought nobody in the whole world cared, my journal was there to console me.

I was never a consistent in journaling every single day. It was only something I did out of necessity, when the mood hit. It was a sort of therapy, when I needed it.

As life has taken over, there didn't seem to be time for the journals or the books. Now my life seems to consist of spending my days in a mind numbing office job that seems to be sucking the very brain cells out of me with every phone call that I answer or faxed order that I enter into the computer.

I look back at those care free journal days, when the biggest crisis in the world was that I might not have a date for the prom. Now I spend my days answering phones and answering the same questions over and over, only to pick up my six year old daughter from daycare and try to come up with something edible for dinner. By the time I get my daughter into bed the only thing I seem to have the energy for is to zone out in front of the television and let it suck a few more brain cells while we're at it.

I recently began reading "Julie & Julia" by Julie Powell. In a nutshell, it is about a girl stuck in a dead end office job (sound familiar?) who decides to cook every recipe in Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cuisine" in one year and writes a blog about it. She wasn't sure why she was doing it, but she knew that she had to do something. She changed from a person who went home lamenting about her horrible job and horrible day, so someone who looked forward to the next meal she was going to cook and how it would turn out.

I felt inspired. I felt that I could relate to Julie so well. I wanted to have something worthwhile to look forward to as well. While I was at work today, talking about the book and how inspirational it is, one of my co-workers asked me if it made me want to make a goal to stick with for one year, like Julie did. I thought about it for a while, and it occurred to me...

I would commit to journaling EVERY day for one year. I may not always write a lot, but I would write something every day.

Let's see what happens, shall we?