A Multitude of Dreams

Writing is a way to sort to release the torrent of thoughts and fears that swirl around in my head. If I didn't write my mind would get so full I'd go crazy. Its basically like a hurricane whirling around in my mind and the only way to calm the storm is by sitting down with my journal, to write everything that's causing the hurricane to rage in my mind.

Over the last few months and years of writing, I've come to the conclusion that if what you use to write with, your pen, plays a massive part in the freedom that you have to write. I'm mentioned before that I've been using a Parker Fountain Pen to write in my journal. The Parker Pen is a high quality product that I absolutely love to use because of the smoothness that this brand of fountain pen has. I've never had an issue with using it as a left handed writer or as a writer in general. The only fountain pen I been stuck to using with my journal is, as far as I'm aware, the Parker Urban Fountain Pen in Vibrant Magenta Chrome. I got it from Paperchase in Brighton, England, last year. Its worth £40 there (or £39.95 online) but by some miracle and a massive sale I ended up getting it for £12. That's why I'm so fussy about who uses it and what it gets used for. Its not every day you find such a good price for such a good quality product that I simply love using! 

The other conclusion I've come to is that the book itself that you end up journaling in plays a big part in the writing process. I've become extremely fussy with the stationary I like to use to journal in. You might be aware that I've been using a Moleskine for a few months now, after using another brand of notebook. I had used various Moleskine notebooks for over a year, before getting this other book from Paperchase. However as I was using the notebook from Paperchase, I knew that soon as I finished, I would go back to the using the Moleskine. The biggest reason behind this has been the quality and feel of the paper when I write, the spacing of the lines and how the fountain pen's ink reacts to the paper itself as I write (I always use the same pen when writing in my journal). Its something that I've found quite hard to explain to people, so I've stopped asking for journals as birthday and Christmas presents as people will just find a cheaper notebook to give me. I have tried to draw in my journals before but because of the lines, the drawings never looked good. Given I'm a perfectionist and couldn't bare to look at the drawings I'd made when I was writing around them. I want to enjoy writing a book that feels good to write in, even if it costs a bit more money. 

Now that I've defined the pen and type of journal I prefer to use, I'll write about why I journal and what I write about. As many of you know I'm on anti-depression tablets and have been on them for a few months. Journaling is another form for me to relieve the depression. I write about how I feel about life, and how the depression effects my thoughts, my dreams, my feelings and my actions. If I don't write then I feel like my head is going to explode.

Though there are some days when I want to write, and I have time to write, but I just can't. I don't know what to say, I don't know what to write about. The words get stuck somewhere between my brain and the tip of my pen. I know I need to write down the frustration that I so often feel. Yet so often finding the space and the time to sit down and write about how I'm feeling can be difficult. I might have a good pen and a lovely notebook, but if I'm not in the right state of mind to write then I can't. The right state of mind is dependant on whether or not I feel comfortable and safe enough to write. I've stayed in places where I didn't feel comfortable or safe enough to write whilst I was there so I didn't and would have to go out to a coffee shop (café) to sit and write about how I'm feeling.

My journal is a place of many dreams. I write my dreams down with a hope that if I wrote them down they'll become true. I write about ideas that I have, that I can't act upon due to the impossibility and craziness of these dreams. It takes a lot of force, sometimes, to force myself to write down these thoughts and dreams. Its why I don't read my entries after I've written, to stop myself being discouraged by what I've written. Its why my old journals are hidden in a box under my bed. Its not to stop other people from reading them, its to stop me from reading them again, because the entries are either too crazy to read or too ... repetitive, as I have been know to rewrite about a topic until I've managed to get the topic out of my system.