I did a search for online journal writing just to see what popped up. What popped up is interesting if the first return is any indication. I didn’t get past the first site Google showed me. Writing the Journey is actually a resource for personal journal writing, not necessarily for online journal writing. Blogs, journals, diaries, they’re all the same thing when published online in my opinion. I don’t think you can define them by what kind of writing is found within the pages, whether it be in a notebook or on a Web site. The one difference is blogging. You can’t blog without a computer while you can journal and make diary entries with or without a computer.

I wrote about my perceptions on journals, diaries, and blogs when I first started this blog. You can read them Here and Here.

I realize that blogs were originally link-driven sites with a mixture of commentary and/or personal thoughts and essays. Not much has changed except for the technology, the diversity of those using the technology and how they have chosen to use the technology. Rebecca Blood’s piece on Weblogs: A History and Perspective is worth a read for the curious at heart.

I’ve digressed a bit from my original focus … so back to my wonderful find this morning, Writing the Journey. The basic premise of this site is to open the door to an internal dialog with your spiritual self through journal writing. I should note that I believe that there is a difference between religion and spirituality. While a religious person is spiritual by definition, spirituality can live outside of an organized religious structure. It’s an internal state of being, a state of knowing your true self and it can’t be confined by religious dogma. We, as individuals, can and do confine its expression through our own beliefs and thoughts about what’s right and what’s wrong with our world and ourselves. Using journal writing as a way to uncover who we believe ourselves to be is a powerful tool.

The site offers an online journal writing workshop with well defined concepts and exercises. There’s a free monthly newsletter, resources and a review on software designed especially for computer journaling that can be password protected. 1stJournal by NextWord offers a free 21-day trial. If I were going to journal using my computer, I’d try this software but I prefer to do it with pen and paper. There’s something organic about the connection of mind to hand and a pen scratching out words across a piece of paper that excites my senses. That and the fact that I write much differently on my computer. Actually, what’s different is that I edit my words more when using a keyboard than I do with pen in hand and a notebook of perfectly lined paper.

I should write more about my personal experiences with journaling. Maybe it will excite me enough to get me back into the journaling process daily. My mind was much clearer and my writing became more colorful and expressive when I was journaling everyday. I should take my own advice and just do it!