Journaling Saves — better living through journaling

Post image for Circle Journey Books Correspondence Kit

A long time ago, I received two blank Circle Journey kits as a birthday gift. Since then, I’ve been using one of them with an old friend. They’re amazing kits for sharing with someone else and each time I get this journal back in the mail, it’s like Christmas.

Over the past six years, my friend and I have filled this journal with images from the past and present, musings on life, love, and how it’s all turning out. The journal used to travel 3,000 back and forth between New Haven and Seattle, but I finally convinced her to move here. So now it’s mailed to and from the same zip code. I could have walked down the street and put it in her mailbox, but what fun is there in that?

The blank Circle Journey kit

I think we both regularly forget about the Circle Journal, and when we rediscover it, it’s so inspiring we can’t help but create a new entry and send it off in the mail.

It amazes me how long ago my entries feel. A polaroid of my tiny studio apartment the day I moved out and onto the houseboat, the window propped open with a scrap of driftwood. A super-saturated photo of sunlight streaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows in the Aloha Cabana, a view my friend soon claimed as her when she moved into my apartment. It feels like ancient history.

If you have another willing friend or family member, do the Circle Journey with them. It’s so much fun and so rewarding. Each time it returns in the mail, it’s a gift to both of you. The last round arrived in a makeshift packaging with a note saying “There’s so much love, the envelopes have become too small!”

It might be helpful to choose a period of time to send this back and forth. With this particular journal, it seems to be each time one of us moves, which has been at least annually for the past decade. But you could use birthdays or holidays or seasons as a landmark to remember to contribute the journal.

I couldn’t find any place to buy them new online anymore, unfortunately. But you don’t need the kit to do this, of course. You just need a willing friend or family member and a bound journal or notebook of some sort.

Below are a few photos of our circle jounal in progress. (I especially love all the lyrics on the envelopes, including a song from the TV series, “My So-called Life.”) Click on the thumbnails for a larger version of the image.