LIVE LIFE WELL
The Commonplace Journal and Magic
Magic is high on my list of favorite words. Not the magician type of magic. More like the magic that occurs when you tweak a food recipe with different ingredients and magic happens. Or when you walk through a forest and feel like life cannot get any better.
Are you new to the Commonplace Journal (CJ) world?
I had never heard of one until about 6 weeks ago. One of my sisters told me about best-selling, non-fiction motivational writer Dan Pink (I mentioned him before). And Dan Pink advised, in his How to Get Smarter YouTube video (time stamp 6:25), to start a CJ as it will “build another brain”. That sounded good to me. Somewhere else he said, in essence, that you will find magic happen if you use a commonplace journal.
What the heck is a Commonplace Journal?
AKA Commonplace Book. I like journal though; it sounds more personal. According to Wikipedia, commonplace books or journals have been around for thousands of years. They are used to compile useful or interesting information. People such as Cicero, Aristotle, Thomas Jefferson, John Milton, Ronald Reagan, Virginia Woolf, E.M. Forster, Francis Bacon, and Isaac Newton, just to name off a few, used them.
CJ’s can be depositories of things like:
Quotes
Bible verses that you may want to especially meditate on
Poems written by you or others
Wise sayings, wisdom collected
Ideas that may become brilliant ones (if magic happens)
Lists of movies you want to watch or books you want to read
Things you are pondering
A meaningful doodle or sketch
Something inspiring
An interesting or surprising fact
Catchy words to a song that really grabs you
Project ideas
New words you learn and want to remember
A snippet from a strange dream you had
A joke or something funny
Axioms, idioms, adages, truisms, maxims, etc.
Cool fact: Leonardo da Vinci used commonplace books to record ideas, observations, information about anatomy, nature, engineering; inventions, and much more.
So, have I found magic happen?
Yes. I would say yes. It has sparked my thinking and writing in ways that surprise me. My world feels like it has more color. Ideas come more freely.
How do Commonplace Journals relate to wellness?
Good question, discupulus. (Yes, I recently added Latin to my Duolingo Spanish lessons.) Discupulus means learner, by the way.And no, that is not written down in my CJ. Yet.
Answer: For one, it stimulates your brain. And that’s always good. Two, it can be transforming for your physical, mental, and spiritual health potentially by sharpening your focus on these things and motivating you to improvement in these areas. Thirdly, magic may happen. And magic is fun, and fun is an anti-depressant. 😃
Follow up on my last article, “Can We Talk About Alcohol” :
If you are interested in learning more about alcohol, its effects, and major benefits of taking a break, I came across an excellent YouTube video by Dr. Mark Hyman this you will find helpful. When Quitting Alcohol, These 10 Things Will Change in 30 Days.
Back to CJ’s
So I highly encourage you to get a journal so that you can get your magic going. That is the one I got. I particularly like it because it has a blank Table of Contents in front and the pages have dots instead of lines, which is my preference for this type of thing. It might also be a good idea to get some calligraphy pens or other fun pens to increase the odds of magic happening.
Magic promoter,
~Vanessa
www.vanessamarsden.com
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