A couple weeks ago, I mentioned in one of my posts that we’ve been starting to tackle a couple of house projects recently. One of those projects was to clean out our upstairs bedrooms so we can paint them. We’re making good progress, but we both realized we have SO MUCH stuff!! We’ve already taken a whole trunk load of stuff to good will, and I’m sure there will be more!

Anyway, while I was cleaning, I came across a bunch of my old journals. I’ve mentioned before that I journal every day, writing down highlights and low points of my day in case I ever want to look back at it – kind of like my own personal time capsule! If I had to guess, I’d say I’ve been journaling pretty consistently since my junior year of high school, so I have a good 12-13 years of memories written down.

Of course, I HAD to take some time while I was cleaning to skim through a couple of the pages and reminisce a little bit. If I went to a concert, or some kind of event where I got a ticket, I’d stick those in the pages of my journals, too, so it was cool to take those trips down memory lane as well.

A lot of what I wrote about was relatively uneventful, every day items, but there were some things that almost made me laugh. I use my journal as a good way to vent about things as well, and some of the things I was worried about back then, just seem pretty silly to me now! I won’t go into detail here, cuz quite honestly it’s a little embarrassing – LOL – but if I could go back in time, I’d love to tell myself not to stress so much about such things. All those things didn’t amount to much of anything in the end and I’m still alive to tell the tale. But I’m sure as a teenager it really did feel like the world was ending at times!

I also wanted to scream at myself a few times too. I skimmed through some of the journals I had while I was dating my previous boyfriend, and I don’t know if I realized it at the time I was writing it, but going back and reading it, there were so many red flags I was writing about, I can’t believe that relationship didn’t end sooner than it did. I was a little disappointed in myself for putting so much time and effort into that relationship when the signs that I should have called it quits way sooner were clearly there.

It made me so mad, I contemplated throwing the journals away. I didn’t want to have to be reminded of any of that again. And I still may throw them away at some point, but for now I decided to keep them. Hate it or love it, it’s still a part of my personal history, and it’s helped turn me into the person I am today. So much has changed since then, and it serves as a reminder of how I don’t want to be treated, and how much better I have it now.

I can’t wait to look back in a few years at the journal I’m writing now, and the ones I’ve used most recently and compare it to the older ones. I’ve grown so much since I’ve started journaling. I’ve matured. I’ve learned what it means to be properly loved. Everything is just overall so much better than it was, and I can only imagine that it will continue to get better and better as life goes on.

If you don’t currently journal, I do strongly encourage it! I’ll be the first to admit that there are plenty of days that I don’t feel like taking a few minutes to sit down and get my thoughts out, but it is kind of cool to keep some of those memories locked away forever. And like I said earlier, it’s a GREAT way to vent your frustrations, too!

I hope we all get some much needed sunshine this weekend!

Until next time! 🙂

Megan Reiffenberger