Editing The Pen Addict 618/transcript (section)

== Journaling Use ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' Josh asks, I love collecting and using fountain pens, but I don't have much to write on a daily or weekly basis that aren't conducive to the work that I'm doing. I've tried free journaling as a way to use my pens, but I can't get into a good journaling habit. Do you have any advice on how I can use my fountain pens more?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So this is a constant battle for me, Josh, that I think about. Like I do some journaling and I do planning and I do my five-year journal, which is limited, right? So anytime someone asks about this type of thing, I always recommend starting small, right? You want to do the smallest task with your pen. And if that's writing down a short task list for the day, you know, like the three things you need to do today, write that down. And then all of a sudden, well, you tried to do the one thing and something changed or the schedule changed and now you're writing more. And these little things tend to build into bigger things into using your fountain pens. So I have my five-year journal. There's been a couple of times where that's a limited space, limited thing. So, you know, I have like five or six lines in a small area and I've wanted to write more. So I'll get out a different notebook and continue just kind of writing down my thoughts from there. So these small things kind of like lead you into larger things. So if you use them for the little stuff, you're eventually going to pick up the bigger stuff. And then some of the things I do, which you'll have to figure out what works for you. Some of the side tasks that I do when sometimes I just want to write and put words on a page. But I'm not very thoughtful or creative like from a journaling or like a letter writing perspective, right? So I write down a lot of album lyrics. I copy poems. I copy book passages. I copy quotes. And I'll just write them down on a notebook. Like I'm not like particular about these things. But sometimes I just want to use my pens and I'll just start writing these things down. And then it just kind of builds on itself. Like I don't necessarily have any like habits built from that other than like I'm willing to write things down more. Right. Wherever that may be, you know, whichever notebook I have using. I have never been someone who's been able to say, OK, today, June 5th journal entry go. Right. Like that doesn't work that way.

'''Myke Hurley:''' What did work for me was Myke's theme system. I would think of his free journaling, right? So yeah. Josh. That doesn't work for me. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' But something like Myke's theme system has worked for me in the past because it says, OK, June 5th go. But what about this? What about this? What about this? And I can answer those questions and put down my thoughts and track what I was thinking about those things. So any kind of prompts help. Staring at a blank page is is not something that works for me. A lot of people are very able to do that and just start writing. I can't do that. I need prompts. So, you know, that's another thing, you know, can find find a good prompt for you, even if it's just like gratitude. Right. You're just using your stuff. Don't be particular about the pen. Don't be particular about the paper. And don't be particular about the place. Right. Where you're sitting or where you're standing or if you're on the road. You just have to kind of do the little small stuff with a pen and a piece of paper. And then that just kind of leads into wanting to do more. At least that's what I've found as someone who does not have like a traditional journaling habit.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So obviously I have opinions on this one because this is somewhat similar to the situation I've been in and that I was in that led me to create the theme system journal, which was the idea of sitting down and just writing in a journal. I actually think is like a pro level journal. Oh. Right.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Oh, it's aspirational.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. Because I have actually, this is, I have a second journal because I'm working on something and there is an element of like free journaling in it. And now I can do it. I can sit down in front of a blank page and just start writing and just see where it takes me, which is a really great thing to do. But I think it takes a daily practice before then to get to the point where you feel like you could reflect in that way. Right. And so when I created my own system in a, I think it was, yeah, it was a Hobonichi Tech Show. That was kind of like what I built the system in and then we made the journal out of it. And what I like about the theme system journal is that it's not telling you what to do, but it's giving you four boxes that you can repeat every day. Right. And so if you go to the website, if you go to themesystem.com, you'll get some ideas. Like we have like a large selection of like prompt ideas that you could put in the boxes. And I recommend that you take a look at those and see if there's anything that jumps out to you as maybe to do something yourself. But my recommendation, my strong recommendation for you is to gratitude journal, which is what Brad mentioned. And because gratitude journaling is very easy, right? In a sense of it is a thing that you can replicate and that you just have to work to think of what are three things today that even made you feel good or you're thankful for. And if you say you have three things and you say to yourself, I will use three pens. Great. Right. You've hit all the birds of all the stones at that point. So that would be my recommendation to you is to start with very basic gratitude journaling because I also just think that that style, like gratitude journaling, I think is just good for people's mental health. Like I do it now. My big box in the middle of my theme system journal is gratitude journaling. That's what I do there.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So I have every day, I force myself, right? Like because that's the practice. You must write three things that you are grateful for, that you are thankful for. And yeah, with my journaling, I use two pens every day, right? I use one to do all the headings and then one to write the whatever it is that I'm writing. So that is a big recommendation or to do some kind of like habit tracking or something like that. Yep. Colton writes in and says, I've been spoiled by the Platinum 3776 nib. It takes zero pressure to write consistently and will write on just about any kind of paper. Then I pick up some kind of ball pen and I have to push down hard to get it to write. I've tried the 0.5 millimeter auto gel refill, the Schmidt P8126N27 and the space pen refill from my Mark I. But they all need some amount of pressure. Is there a refill that doesn't need pressure and can write at a low angle?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So you have discovered the mechanical engineering design of a ball in a tip of a pen. You have to move the ball to get the ink to flow around the ball to the page. So it's really, really challenging to find something that's a ball type pen to do this, right? Like, you know, drawing pens and marker type pens, right? Those would work. Pencils would work.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, I would have said like a Sharpie pen, right? Yeah, fountain pens. That would do it. I mean, if there's something where you don't want a fountain pen, a Sharpie or a felt tip pen, like a Copic or something like that, that's going to do it for you. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So you've run into like a technical limitation, right? Because if you do find something that requires less pressure, do you know how much ink is going to be on the page to like exist and to actually make a line with a ball mechanism in a pen? It's going to be like a flood. Now, if you want that, that's cool. Like you could get like the Uniball Vision or the eye is what it's called in some parts of the world. I don't know where Colton lives. Because, you know, you get like a 1.0 millimeter gel ink pen. Yeah. Like you're going to have an easier time pushing that pen across the page, right? Because it has, you know, more ink passing around the ball and it's going to require less friction on the page to move. But are you going to like the output? Yeah. Right. Like, so there's this balance. Like you, you've, you've, you're wanting to invent magic and like I'm all for it. But like I, it's, you're going to limit yourself so much in the output that I don't think you're going to be happy. So I think you should continue being spoiled by the Platinum 3770 Nix, 7786 nib because it's maybe the greatest fountain pit nib there is.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yep. I would agree with that too. All right. If you have a question that you would like us to answer on the show or you have some feedback or some follow up about this episode, you can always go to penaddictfeedback.com and you can leave us your thoughts and questions there. If you want to find Brad online, if you want to go read Brad's review of the new Jetstream Light Touch, right, is the name? Light Touch, yeah. I don't know why I struggle with that name. I always want to put one in there for some reason.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I wish they would have done something more specific. It's a very generic name, so it's hard to remember.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, I mean, isn't this one for Colton if it's a light touch, you know? I guess what Colton's looking for, right? Closing the name, Brad.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Maybe try the Jetstream Light Touch. You're still going to have to push and pull the pen though.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It says Light Touch. I don't know what to say. I don't know. You can go to penaddict.com. Brad is at penaddict online and he's over at twitch.tv slash penaddict. You can check out Brad's products over at spokedesign.com. You can find me here on RelayFM and I am at iMike, I-M-Y-K-E, and you can find my products over at cortexbrand.com. Thank you to our sponsors this week, ExpressVPN, the St. Louis Pen Show and Pen Chalet. We'll be back next time. Until then, say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.

[[Category:Podcast Transcripts]]
[[Category:The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript]]