4 ms·

I started journaling in high school and found a very effective medium for it: a dedicated gmail account. I created a new account only for this, and periodicall

I started journaling in high school and found a very effective medium for it: a dedicated gmail account. I created a new account only for this, and periodically send emails from that account to itself, each email representing a day and having a subject line of the form "July 20, 2016". Since the account has never been used in any other way, the inbox becomes a pure index of dates, and the account receives no other messages because no person or service is aware it exists besides me. Advantages: --nobody can find it lying around --inherently passworded --nobody can ever even know it exists unless I tell them --indexed, searchable.....can't tell you how wonderful it is to be able to type in a person's name and find the day I met them, years and years later. --never gets damaged or lost: it'll go down when gmail dies. not anytime soon. --infinite "pages" --accessible from anywhere It's been wonderfully rewarding. It isn't until you start keeping a journal, and have had it for quite some time, that you start to realize just how much of your life you forget. As soon as you reread something from a certain day, you might think, "Wow! I totally forgot about that!" but now the memory is reawakened, fresh as yesterday. The memory was still there, hibernating. It might have been lost if you hadn't dusted it off. But then there are many other memories, from 7 and 8 and 9 years ago, the small day-to-day interactions, the smaller subplots in the greater storyline....that may as well be from someone else's life. I know the places and people they're describing, but I have no memory of having done these things anymore. It's a little sad in a way. I'm glad I keep a journal. 10/10 recommend even if you only update occasionally.

brianliou91 10y ago
Great idea thanks for sharing! Using gmail as a journal though does seem to contradict the message in this article because by using Gmail, while it is extremely efficient, it's not 100% private. Maybe it's just my own paranoia but I feel like you would even more fall into that disconnect "between what I thought I was supposed to feel (what a normal person would feel) and what I actually felt." Or maybe I'm interpreting this article incorrectly?
- aerovistae 10y ago
  I didn't actually read this particular article, I was just making a related comment. So I can't really debate it with you! But what do you mean it's not really private? IF you are referring to Google having access, this is my response, otherwise, not sure what you meant: I mean....I believe in anonymity through numbers. Even if there were employees at google for some insane reason sitting around reading private gmail accounts, what are the odds mine would come up for notice among more than a billion others? It's pretty ordinary. It's not full of child porn. It's like worrying someone would notice a particular grain of sand on a beach just because it's sitting right there in the open.
dawie 10y ago
I love this idea. Thanks for sharing! I have been using paper, Evernote and apps, but I love this simple approach and I think it will work really well for me, since there is so little friction with all the upside I am looking for.
seanp2k2 10y ago
Sounds fun but I do more of a photo journal with my phone, which I keep with me always. On a normal day I'll maybe take a few photos. On a more notable day I'll have a few dozen at least. Scrolling back through my albums helps me remember lots! I like doing it this way because I do it without thinking about it; it's not really any extra work.
- aerovistae 10y ago
  I always liked words more than photos, myself.

brianliou91 10y ago

Great idea thanks for sharing! Using gmail as a journal though does seem to contradict the message in this article because by using Gmail, while it is extremely efficient, it's not 100% private. Maybe it's just my own paranoia but I feel like you would even more fall into that disconnect "between what I thought I was supposed to feel (what a normal person would feel) and what I actually felt." Or maybe I'm interpreting this article incorrectly?

aerovistae 10y ago
I didn't actually read this particular article, I was just making a related comment. So I can't really debate it with you! But what do you mean it's not really private? IF you are referring to Google having access, this is my response, otherwise, not sure what you meant: I mean....I believe in anonymity through numbers. Even if there were employees at google for some insane reason sitting around reading private gmail accounts, what are the odds mine would come up for notice among more than a billion others? It's pretty ordinary. It's not full of child porn. It's like worrying someone would notice a particular grain of sand on a beach just because it's sitting right there in the open.

dawie 10y ago

I love this idea. Thanks for sharing! I have been using paper, Evernote and apps, but I love this simple approach and I think it will work really well for me, since there is so little friction with all the upside I am looking for.

seanp2k2 10y ago

Sounds fun but I do more of a photo journal with my phone, which I keep with me always. On a normal day I'll maybe take a few photos. On a more notable day I'll have a few dozen at least. Scrolling back through my albums helps me remember lots! I like doing it this way because I do it without thinking about it; it's not really any extra work.

aerovistae 10y ago
I always liked words more than photos, myself.