“How do I know what I think until I see what I say”
E.M. Forster
You know when you are enjoying a juicy conversation with a friend and stumble into ideas you didn’t know you had? I’ve been getting similar “aha” moments from an improv-inspired form of journaling. I’ve been calling it Discovery Journaling.
It works like an improv scene. Instead of planning what to write or actively thinking, you let ideas emerge and follow what comes up.
Invention and Discovery
In improv, we distinguish between “invention” and “discovery”. “Invention” is when you think of a good idea and bring it to the scene. It can give scenes a solid push but can risk feeling artificially imposed. “Discovery” in improv is when you find out what you’re doing and why while you’re doing it. You find yourself delightfully surprised at what you’ve just said or done. “Where did that come from?” (This is why I call my beginners’ course The Delight of Surprising Yourself.)
Invention is driven by creativity and cleverness. Discovery comes from being open to exploring without a plan.
In an improv scene, this can look like two characters doing an activity together, maybe talking about something trivial until one or both the players notice something unusual like a stumble, an odd reaction or turn of phrase. Something that catches their attention. Then they start to drill down into what it means and discover a whole world. Neither of them planned it but it all makes perfect (usually very funny!) sense.
This is how I’ve been doing journaling. It’s similar to but different from Julia Cameron’s Morning Pages.
I don’t always love getting started. But I’m almost always glad I did it. Nearly every time, I discover an insight, a new idea, a nice turn of phrase, a feeling I didn’t know I had.
I think of it like gently panning for gold (in a gold-rich area!). Mostly not much is happening. But staying with it, something usually turns up.
If you’d like to try, here are some guidelines based on what I do.
Panning for Gold: How to Practice Discovery Journaling
Decide a quantity
You need to shake off your inner critic so the most important thing is to define success as an amount not whether you think it was good or not. You could choose a time like 10 minutes, a word count, or size of paper. I fill a page of A4. I’d suggest keeping this regular so that amount is the default even when you don’t feel inspired.
Don’t do your best
This was a favourite reminder from improv pioneer Keith Johnstone. Trying to be “good” takes you back to what you already know. You’re practising being open to discovering something new. There’s a paradox: You get the best outcome when you don’t try. Let go.
Make no attempt to be interesting. Sometimes I’ll have something on my mind that I want to explore. But most of the time, I begin with banal details of what’s happening around me, how well I slept, what I did yesterday. Almost always within a few minutes, I stumble into something genuinely interesting.
Notice specks of gold
“[People] occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.” Winston Churchill.
Occasionally something will catch your attention. Explore it. A banal thought will connect to an interesting one. Or you’ll find yourself writing an unusual turn of phrase or an unexpected metaphor. Explore those bits of gold. Go into them in more detail. What do they mean to you? I sometimes quickly underline it or put a star at the side if I think I might want to come back to it later. When you’ve got everything you can from them, you can move on.
Keep it flowing
Stopping leaves space for self-criticism, brain freeze or distraction. You don’t have to go fast but do keep going. If you’re feeling blocked, that’s not a problem. Write what’s happening for example “I feel blocked” and continue from there. How do you feel about that? What does it remind you of? Isn’t it funny that we have that unnecessary “c” in front of the “k” in the word “block”? I remember playing with Lego blocks as a child. Etc. I write mine by hand so sometimes I focus on the shapes of the letters or the way the pen moves on the paper. Don’t rush. But do keep flowing.
Relax and trust
Know that if you quietly stay with it, things will come up. But you can’t force them to. If you’re writing for long periods without finding anything that intrigues you, you’re probably trying too hard and the effort is preventing you from noticing the interesting moments.
Experiments
Experiment with handwriting
I’ve been doing mine by hand. There’s something helpful about the physical movement that comes with writing. The fact that it’s slower than typing helps regulate my speed too. It helps me drop through skittery surface thoughts into something deeper. And I spend enough time typing. The downside is it’s less easily searchable.
Experiment with speaking
You could also do this verbally. Set a timer for speaking your thoughts. This must be out loud to get the thoughts out of your head. I’d suggest recording yourself. It means you capture any good bits without having to stop. It also creates a clear start and finish. Electronic dictation systems are quite good if you want to end up with a more-or-less clear text version.
Experiment with AI
This only really works if you end up with an electronic version but I’ve heard some people getting a lot from pasting their journal entries into an AI engine like ChatGPT and asking it what it notices. It can often see things in your writing that you might not have noticed yourself.
Troubleshooting
Ideas for three common stumbling blocks:
“I’m stuck”
Relax. Ease off. Most likely you’re stuck because you’re trying too hard. If we compare it to speaking, you probably don’t get brain freeze chatting to a friend. But some people do when the stakes feel higher, like giving a public presentation. This isn’t a public presentation. Remind yourself that it doesn’t matter. You win by finding your way back to flow. Good stuff will come if you keep coming back to flow.
“I’m distracted / bored / restless”
Hey, no one said it was exciting! We’re so overstimulated now, that settling down to a low-stimulation activity can be difficult. And also worthwhile. Be gentle with yourself. You could start with a smaller quantity – 5 minutes instead of ten, half a page instead of a whole one. Rather than trying to force yourself, use distraction, boredom and restlessness as gentle reminders to come back to what’s here right now. It might happen a lot!
“I don’t have time”
Maybe it genuinely isn’t the best use of your precious time. We can’t do everything. We can’t even do all the things we’d like to. But you do get choices. Check if there’s another thing you do that isn’t serving you (overconsuming social media is a common one). If there is you can swap some time from there. Or not. But it’s helpful to own your choice: “I’m choosing to do this rather than that.”
Rather than adding journaling as a task on a “to do” list, it’s probably more helpful to attach it to another habit you already have (aka “habit stacking”). For example, you do it after breakfast. Or before bed. Or whatever. You don’t forget to brush your teeth, and you don’t need to put it on a “to do” list. You do it semi-automatically because it’s what comes next in your routine.
One Flavour of Many
There are other wonderful ways to journal, of course:
- Archival – To remember what you did.
- Intention setting – To plan for the coming day. I like Tim Ferris’s 5 Minute Journal structure and sometimes use this too.
- Morning:
- Three things you’re grateful for.
- Three things that would make today great.
- Three qualities you want to affirm in yourself “I am …..”
- Evening:
- Three great things that happened today.
- Three things you could have done to make today better.
- Morning:
- Targeted reflection – Deliberately exploring a certain topic theme. “How do I feel about my work?” or whatever.
But I’ve grown to enjoy this open-ended journaling. It’s like doing a discovery-based improv scene. Start with nothing, relax, trust, spot tiny, interesting things as they come up and follow them wherever they lead.
Much of ourselves lives outside the spotlight of our conscious attention. We don’t know what we don’t know. Exploring in this way brings a little bit more to light each time.
If you’re curious, maybe experiment with it for five days over the next week and see how you get on. I’d love to know what you find.
Support
Longstanding improviser and wonderful person Debra Hopper often runs guided journaling sessions. She did a class for us a while back and it was great. Email her or join her mailing list to find out about future ones. https://debrahopperonline.com/events
I talked to Debra about the taster session she ran for us in July 2022 here.
