Journals and Papers

Here at Journals and Papers, we often wonder that if children were allowed to write outside the lines in school what kind of creative adults would every child become. Most people prefer a lined journal. We’ve heard comments that if they had a blank journal, their writing would be messy, all over the place, they can’t write straight. We wonder at this logic and the creativity that it squashes. We can be creative individuals if we aren’t constrained to boxed, lined, circular, or rectangular drawn out spaces, which suggest we write inside of and not to go outside of the lines already drawn for us.

Is it the intimidation of a blank page, staring at us, clean and pristine that somehow gives us a sacrilegious notion that we shouldn’t muck it up with plain old meanderings. There is a solution to that. Buy a blank journal, and on the first page, write a title page, such as, “This Journal Belongs To…”, or “Property of …”. And also add a date. Now that the first page tainted with ink, it should be easy to turn to the second page and place some form of graphic upon it. Is it still hard to write on the blank page staring at you? On the second page then, use a photograph, or cut-out a picture, quote or text from a favourite magazine. Place that on the second page. Then on the third facing page, turn the journal on an angle and add some text that goes from the bottom left corner (which if angled is on top now) across to the right corner. There are no lines to constrain your creative efforts on this blank-paged journal.

You can write across the page, down the page, corner to corner, around the outside edges, ending in the middle, or from the middle out, from bottom to top, top to bottom, or side to side. The creativity is limitless, and you would be surprised the type of thoughts that you could be unleashing by not staying to what we grew up with - staying within the lines, and writing neat and tidy-like.

This post is not intended to be tongue-in-cheek, but rather a light-hearted look at other ways to journal creatively within the pages of a blank journal.

There are many different types of journals that writers can keep. What if you simply don’t want to write all the time? Perhaps you are an artist, or if you don’t want to call yourself an artist, maybe you love designing and creating new things. Why not combine your love of writing and creation into an art form, and make pages relevant to the thoughts and ideas you wish, and incorporate them into a journal?

I found a lovely site, called, ‘Keeping an Art Journal’, which explains art journaling and blogs about different workshops and ideas. After looking at several sites, and doing some research, I would define art journaling as, “Creative expressions on paper or in bound book format, which include any medium which the artist combines into a message that is preserved and recorded, expressed uniquely from the artist’s perspective.”

Sounds easy enough - go for creativity, and as with all journaling, remember there is no one to judge or grade you. If you have an idea or message that you want to express, simply gather paper or a bound book. Then, take whatever medium you would like to use to draw, sketch, paint, collage, scrapbook, glue, photograph, etc., and place your idea creatively on the page.

Examples of art journals can be collages combined with words or quotes, photography embellished with poems, or fabric and paint illustrations. Words may not even belong on your page if the concepts you are expressing don’t need them. If you are new to art journaling, start with a few simple concepts and progress slowly. Look up ‘art journal’ in your web browser and see many different types of samples. Here is another site ‘Art Journal Everyday‘, which also explains art journaling.

If you are looking for great journals/sketchbooks and paper to help you with your art journal pages, Journals and Papers has specialty paper which will accept different mediums. Check them out at: Journals and Papers.com