A beginner’s guide to journaling: Everything you’ve ever wanted to know about the self-care ritual

From image.ie

By Sarah Finnan

Ever wondered what the true difference between journaling and keeping a diary is? Denise Kenny of The Head Plan broke it down for us and, put simply: ‘Journaling puts you in the driver seat of life and keeping a diary puts you in the passenger seat of life’.

Today is World Meditation Day. A day that might have passed us by unmarked in previous years, if the past few months have taught us anything, it’s the importance of taking a few moments out of our schedules to dedicate to ourselves. 

Our social calendars have been void of activity for quite some time now but the whisper of normality hangs on the air and with it, the pressure to be busier than ever. For some, the prospect is exciting, for others it’s less so – but wherever you fall on the spectrum, checking in with yourself should still be of top priority. 

We spoke to Denise Kenny, founder of The Head Plan Guided Journal and The Head Plan Community app, about all things mindfulness and journaling. A wellness coach and certified meditation teacher, she’s passionate about incorporating balance and self-care into daily life – a change she believes we can all make, and quite easily so too. 

Conor McCabe Photography

Having dappled in journaling on and off myself for the past few years, I was familiar with the basic idea behind the practice. But there were still a few things I wanted to know… 

First off, how is journaling different from, say, keeping a diary? 

I have kept a journal of sorts since the age of seven. Of course, I started with one of those furry diaries with a padlock on it in which I recorded my day but my methods have changed hugely in the last few years – as have my style in journals!

I feel keeping a diary is more reflective – looking back on the day gone and noting down what happened good or bad in the past tense. Keeping a journal is more looking forward – planning your day ahead and aligning yourself to actions that will make those good moments, achievements and goals happen.

Is it important to physically write out journal entries? 

So important, in fact, I will go as far as to say it’s life-changing! I’ll be honest, it still blows my mind when I meet people and they say they don’t journal. Let me ask you this: What’s your goal in life? What’s your plan? Where do you want to go? Who do you want to be? As an avid journal-keeper, I can answer all of these but someone who does not journal won’t answer with certainty and unbeknownst to them, they may be in fact, caught up in someone else’s plan and just be aimlessly floating through life.

The physical act of taking a pen to paper, not only recording your goals and plans on how you’re going to get there but also having a place to reflect on achievements, is such a powerful practice. Journaling is the secret to getting clarity on what you really want in life and gives you that laser focus on what’s important. The simple act of writing down your goals and aligning your actions to them make you ten times more likely to achieve them. 

You make it sound so easy… does it actually work?

There is science behind it for any sceptics out there! The act of writing out our goals activates the brain’s reticular activating system (RAS), the part responsible for sorting through what’s important, meaning when you get your goal on paper, your brain is literally trained to focus on it.

Freewriting, when we encounter a problem, is also known to help us problem solve and tackle limiting blocks that can hold us back from our best too. Journaling keeps me accountable, focused, motivated, inspired and driven to reach my goals and I know if you start, you will feel this soon too. It’s so empowering.

Ok, we’ve established the importance of putting pen to paper… where’s the best place to start if you’ve never journaled before? 

The best thing about journaling, and one of the reasons I recommend it so much, is it’s so easy to start. 

Now that you’ve got the basics, what are Denise’s top tips for getting into the rhythm of things?

• The first thing I advise is to make sure you have a beautiful space to write in. This actually helps a lot more than you might think. You feel motivated to write in something beautiful. Have your journal within view – your bedside locker, the kitchen table – somewhere where you will see it.
• Leave time to plan for the day ahead. I am a huge believer in owning the day and not letting the day own you – with your weekly goals in mind, plan your day and assign yourself one main goal that you would like to achieve, followed by your tasks and actions. Tick them off one by one as you accomplish – this is so satisfying and chances are if you’ve not been in a habit of writing things down you’re about to be surprised. You’re probably doing so much more than you know.
• Plan your week under six different headings: Finance, Business & Career, Personal Development & Learning, Self-Care & Wellness, Physical Environment, Friends & Family. These headings were adapted from a life coaching tool that aims to help people find balance. Too many times we focus solely on one area in a week and so many of us are guilty of this being business and career!

As for the best method to follow, Denise is a keen advocate for The Head Plan style of journaling – a method that relies on 15 minutes of journaling for the week ahead, followed by five minutes of journaling for the day ahead and then a short five-minute reflection at the end of the day.

I always advise people to start with a style of journaling that we call The Head Plan Method, this is the method that we introduced in our first journal. Our guided journaling practice is broken into sections from long and short term goal discovery right down to weekly goals and your daily actions. So, in order not to overwhelm, I suggest committing to at least one week – starting on a day of the week that suits you to plan for the week ahead.

At the end of the day, I reflect on my proudest moment that day. I practice gratitude, I ensure I have practiced some form of self-care – even if it’s just a cup of tea for five minutes in peace – and then I go again and plan for the following day.

We have a free download on The Head Plan website in which you can experience this method of journaling and try it for a week.

Should journaling be done at the same time every day?

Yes, I am very passionate about building positive habits, rituals and routines in order to bring the best version of myself to the day ahead. I journal every morning and evening at the same time.

If we don’t commit to a set time, especially in the beginning, our journaling can be neglected. I advise building it into your morning and evening ritual.

 Any advice for perfectionists (aka me!) who find it hard just to sit down and write? 

The beauty of journaling is there are no wrong answers… it’s your journal, your style, your words. If I could offer any advice, it would be to dedicate the time, commit to it and just go for it. Once you start and you feel the productivity and positivity levels increase it’s hard to stop. Nothing but good can come from starting a journal.

First launching The Head Plan in December 2019, Denise and her team have gone on to empower thousands of people in over 70 different countries to follow their lead and start journaling.

The Head Plan Journal can be purchased online via their official website, on Amazon or in-store at Arnotts and Brown Thomas.

https://www.image.ie/self/a-beginners-guide-to-journaling-everything-youve-ever-wanted-to-know-about-the-self-care-ritual-267439

A woman mailed her diary to a stranger, who added an entry and did the same. People have kept it going for a year.

From washingtonpost.com

Kyra Peralte thought keeping a diary during the pandemic might help her sort out her tangled feelings. Then she decided to drop her journal in the mail and share it with a stranger.

Peralte — a mother of two in Montclair, N.J. — started writing candidly last April about the challenges of juggling work, marriage and motherhood during a global crisis.

Writing was cathartic, but Peralte, 44, wanted to know how other women were doing. Was she alone in her feelings or were other women experiencing the same overwhelming stress? She craved connection.

So she made an unusual offer. She invited other women from near and far to fill the remaining lined pages of her black-and-white marbled composition notebook with their own pandemic tales.

“I wanted an interaction that felt human, and it feels very human to read someone else’s writing,” said Peralte, a children’s game designer.

She dreamed up “The Traveling Diary” — a simple notebook that would traverse the globe via snail mail, collecting handwritten stories and, ultimately, creating a community.

Kyra Peralte had an idea to send a composition notebook with her diary entry to a stranger last April. The woman who got it did the same, and a year later, seven diaries have circulated, and 115 women have been part of the traveling diary. (Courtesy of Kyra Peralte)

A year later, seven marbled notebooks have circulated in various locations — from the United States to Australia, Canada to South Africa — and a growing group of strangers have formed an unexpected friendship as a result. So far, 115 women have signed up to participate.

Peralte found her first contributor on a Zoom conference for entrepreneurs, during which she mentioned her diary idea. A woman from North Carolina immediately reached out and said she would like to write in the book. 

From there, Peralte wrote a Medium article, in an effort to recruit more women to get involved. Word spread, and she created a website so participants could easily add their names to the queue. Each person is allowed to keep the diary for up to three days and fill as many pages as they wish, with whatever writing or artwork they choose. Then, they are responsible for mailing it to the next person, whose address Peralte provides.

Women around the world from various cultures, races and lifestyles eagerly signed up to share their stories. They each began filling the pages with their own handwriting, narrating their pandemic experiences, recounting obstacles they faced and sharing lessons they learned. While some women wrote about grief and heartbreak, others wrote about joy and new love.

“Everyone approaches the blank pages in their own personal way,” Peralte said.

The entries all reflect the moment in time when they were written.

Amy Tingle, 52, sat down with the diary last September, in the wake of civil unrest and ongoing protests, and she decided to focus her entry on America’s racial reckoning.

“I couldn’t escape the sadness,” said Tingle, who lives in Maine. “I remember being really disappointed in humanity.”

Writing in the communal diary, “was definitely a therapeutic thing during that time,” she said. As an artist, she also included a collage of women, symbolizing the sense of friendship she felt with other participants.

While writing her own thoughts was healing, she said, it was equally meaningful to read the words of other women who held the book before her.

“It was so fascinating to know that we’re all in the same moment in time, but having such different experiences,” Tingle said.

Kirsty Nicol, 29, who lives in London, heard about the Traveling Diary through a friend. She received the journal two months ago, after it was shipped from New York City.

“It came to me at a challenging time during lockdown,” she said, adding that on top of struggling with prolonged isolation and pandemic fatigue, she also got tonsillitis. Reading the entries allowed her to escape, transporting her into the lives of others and finding bits of wisdom they left.

One woman from Australia had written: “Working with the setbacks. Not against them. Patience and gratitude. It’s a dance. Life is moving and we can stomp our feet in rejection, or we can gracefully embrace the mess, tidying as we go.”

While some women opted to write about broad issues impacting society, others got more personal.

When Colleen Martin, 44, received the diary on her doorstep in Florham Park, N.J., last November, “I had just recently lost my brother,” she said.

Although she had originally signed up for the Traveling Diary months prior, it ultimately arrived at just the right moment for her, she said.

“By the time I actually got it and wrote in it, it was much more of a therapeutic relief,” she said, explaining that she wrote about her grief.

It helped her look for meaning and “the growth and development that occurs in terrible times.”

Martin shipped off the diary to the next participant, and shortly after, Dior Sarr, 33, received it at her home in Toronto just before the new year.

“I wrote about my ambitions, my goals and how I wanted to step into the new year,” she said. It felt meaningful to “to pass on something so personal. It felt like these were women that I had known even though I didn’t know them at all,” said Sarr, who works in health care.

Recently, though, Sarr did meet some of the women whose stories she read, through a virtual get-together that Peralte organized.

“It has really evolved into a community,” Peralte said. She often hosts Zoom events so the women get the chance to get to know one another more, share stories they might have missed and connect more intimately. Some of the women, she said, have actually become close friends.

Nan Seymour, 54, described meeting fellow Traveling Diary participants as a “miraculous” experience.

Seymour, who lives in Salt Lake City, received the diary last month. She learned about the project on social media and immediately signed up.

“I loved that it was a tangible book, and I loved that it was coming by snail mail, operating at a different speed and frequency than our jacked-up Internet-based life,” she said.

Holding the book in her hands, “I felt like I was reading something sacred,” she said. As she slowly examined the 12 entries that preceded her own, “it evoked a sense of awe.”

“I found all the experiences relatable in their essence, but there were definitely reports from lives very different than my own,” she said.

Seymour wrote a personal essay about her 26-year-old daughter, who is transgender.

“I wanted to represent that part of my life, and I thought it might benefit others,” she said, adding that she knew her words would be well-received.

“We’re all drawn to this project from the same heart-based purpose,” she said. “Once you come through this door, you’re meeting people whose values align.”

Although six notebooks are still traveling the globe, the original diary — which contains Peralte’s very first entry about navigating pandemic life and reconnecting with family — is finally back in her possession, with two more books expected to arrive in May.

“It was beautiful to have it again and to read it,” she said. “I carry these stories with me on a daily basis.”

She feels a strong bond with the people who wrote them, none of whom she would have otherwise known.

Peralte’s spontaneous idea, she said, has had a profound effect on her, and she hopes, the other women who were part of it.

“The Traveling Diary is making sisters out of strangers,” she said.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2021/05/04/traveling-diary-stranger-covid/

Alan Duncan's diaries: An insider's account of Boris Johnson, Brexit and Britain's Middle East secrets

From middleeasteye.net

By Chris Mullin

The former Conservative minister's newly published diaries heap scathing criticism on Brexit and Boris Johnson       

Every British government has its diarist; a secret scribbler, usually one who dwells in the foothills of power, quietly observing the comings and goings of the big beasts and the events that preoccupy them.  

It was Alan Clark, a middle-ranking defence minister, whose bestselling diaries sensationally illuminated the Thatcher decade. In the mid-1990s, Gyles Brandreth, a lowly whip, provided the best inside account of John Major’s disintegrating government. Then, as now, the Tories were tearing themselves apart over Europe.    

My own three volumes of diaries (two of which scraped into the bestseller lists) charted the rise and fall of New Labour under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. More recently, Sasha Swire, the wife of Hugo Swire, who served as a minister in David Cameron’s government, provided glimpses of life inside the tiny elite who governed us between 2010 and 2016.

Now Alan Duncan, a middle-ranking Foreign Office minister, delivers a behind-the-scenes account of these last five turbulent years of political life in Britain, titled In the Thick of It. The stakes are high. Brexit, the rise of Boris Johnson and Britain’s diminishing role in the world are the big themes.  

In passing, he also sheds light on a little-known area: Britain’s close relationship with the strategically vital Gulf state of Oman. It is no secret that Britain has long been heavily involved in Oman, one of the UK’s last remaining outposts in the Middle East. British officers staff the Omani armed forces, and the communications monitoring agency, GCHQ has a base there.  In addition, the sultanate, like many of its neighbours, is an important market for British weapons.

Omani sultan's 'privy council'

Duncan’s interest in the region dates back to his days as an oil trader. In 2014, Cameron appointed him a special envoy to Oman, a job he took very seriously. He was a member of what he refers to as the sultan’s “privy council”, a group of six prominent members of the British establishment who meet annually with the sultan to offer advice. 

Duncan says he has attended 14 such meetings since 2001, and one has only to run an eye down the cast list to gauge the importance the UK attaches to the relationship. Fellow members of the so-called privy council have included serving and former heads of the Secret Intelligence Service, a former private secretary to the Queen, several former chiefs of the armed forces, and Mervyn King, the former governor of the Bank of England.

Conservative MP Alan Duncan arrives at Downing Street in September 2019 (AFP)

The entertainment is lavish. Duncan writes of the sultan’s New Year’s dinner in 2019: “I was in the same seat I’ve occupied for the last 20 years … it was not so much a buffet as a sumptuous feast with two lines of tables, each perhaps 15 yards long groaning with massive platters of lobster, prawns, chicken etc. That’s just for starters. We come back again beneath domed silver lids. Then puddings and the New Year cake which is eight feet high … Dinner finished about 2am and then we had a concert until 4.30am.”

Oman’s Sultan Qaboos, who reigned for almost 50 years, died in January 2020 and was succeeded by his cousin. A high-level delegation had to be scrambled at short notice to pay respects to the new ruler: Prince Charles, the prime minister, the defence secretary and the chief of defence staff. Be in no doubt: Oman matters to the UK.  

Given his longstanding interest in the region, the author might reasonably have expected that his Foreign Office responsibilities would include the Middle East. But the Conservative Friends of Israel, noting his pro-Palestinian sympathies, had other ideas.

Duncan’s entry for 16 July 2016 notes: “At 5.30pm I go to the Foreign Office. All seems clear and agreed that I will be minister for the Middle East, as expected … But when I see Boris [Johnson] at 6pm it seems a massive problem has arisen … Boris says the Conservative Friends of Israel are going ballistic … As I see it, it is for no other reason than that I believe in the rights of Palestinians and whereas they pretend to believe in two parallel states, it is quite clear that they don’t and so they set out to destroy genuine advocates for Palestine.”    

Cowards in the face of Israel

It seems that pro-Israel groups were also lobbying the prime minister’s office: “Now Number 10 are telling Boris I cannot have the Middle East … In any other country [this] … would in my view be seen as entrenched espionage.” In fairness, there were other objections, with Duncan’s former business connections in the Middle East were also seen as a problem. He was ultimately allocated responsibility for Europe and the Americas, with the exception of Oman, which he was allowed to keep.

There was a curious sequel to this little episode. Shai Masot, an Israeli diplomat, was caught on camera talking of “taking down” Duncan. The Israeli ambassador called to apologise, asserting that the individual concerned had been hired locally and did not have diplomatic status. “All total bollocks,” writes Duncan. “Masot is a first or second secretary, a member of military intelligence, employed specifically as a parliamentary and undercover propagandist.”

The incident was quickly brushed under the carpet. Masot, who also had Labour Party contacts, was sent home. The British government, anxious to avoid a row with the Israelis, did not pursue the matter. Neither did the Labour Party, which has been cowed by allegations of antisemitism.

Duncan, despite being a model of discretion in public, was privately scathing about the UK’s attitude towards Israel. “We are supine, lickspittle, insignificant cowards,” he remarks after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was feted at Downing Street.

“Where is the British reaction?” he asks after a pro-settlement Israeli politician asserted that all of the occupied West Bank belonged to Israel.

“It is not just the end of the two-state solution. It is the end of any principled stand on the issue by the UK, given that this has always been a red-line for us and we intend to do nothing,” he writes of an Israeli plan to evict 500 Bedouin from land on the edge of Jerusalem to make way for settlers. 

Haunted by Brexit

But it is Brexit, not Israel, that haunts this volume. Indeed, it haunts the entire Conservative Party.

In February 2016, Duncan, a long-time Eurosceptic, briefly flirted with the Leave campaign, but one visit to the Vote Leave headquarters was enough to bring home to him the company he would be keeping and, thereafter, he was solidly behind the Remain campaign.

He explains his conversion thus: “Somewhere along the line from the early 1990s the cause of honest and thoughtful Euro-scepticism mutated into a form of simplistic nationalism which strikes me as ugly and demeaning. Instead of campaigning for the reform of outdated EU institutions and seeking a better deal for the UK, too many Euro-sceptics retreated instead into crude sloganeering. There was a rational and pragmatic case to be made for leaving the EU, but few bothered to make it. Instead we faced a wave of populist nonsense, emotive platitudes and downright lies.”

Although sympathetic to the impossible task she faced and publicly loyal throughout to the then-prime minister, Theresa May, Duncan, like others, despaired at her lack of empathy: “No poise or presence. Charisma by-pass. No personality.”    

In July 2016, Boris Johnson was appointed foreign secretary and Duncan, his deputy in all but name, was well-placed to observe. His opinion of Johnson was low. Six days before May was due to make a major speech on Europe, Johnson published a lengthy essay setting out what were described as his “red lines” on the subject, thereby entirely undermining her. 

Once again, Duncan was scathing: “[He] thinks he is the next Churchill. He has a self-deluding, mock-romantic passion which is not rooted in realism. He is disloyal. A decade of press attention has gone to his head and he doesn’t appreciate that the gloss has gone. His comedy routine has gone stale; his lack of seriousness in a serious job rankles … He is a clown, a self-centred ego, an embarrassing buffoon, with an untidy mind and sub-zero diplomatic judgement. He is an international stain on our reputation … a lonely, selfish, shambolic, ill-disciplined, shameless clot.”

Maybe. But it is a measure of Britain’s decline in the world that this man is now our prime minister. Somewhere in the bowels of government, another secret scribbler will be at work continuing to chart the UK’s remorseless slide into insularity and irrelevance. Oh yes, and I have it on good authority that the Queen keeps a diary, too. I wonder what she makes of it all.  

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.

https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/uk-alan-duncan-diaries-insider-account-boris-johnson-brexit-middle-east-secrets

How to Check Twitter, Read Gibbon, and Watch The Serpent, All While Remembering to Call Your Mother

From townandcountrymag.com

By Daniel Mendelsohn

A book I’ve been thinking about a great deal over the past year is a slender 1989 French novel with the rather hair-raising title Les tablettes de buis d’Apronenia Avitia (“The Boxwood Tablets of Apronenia Avitia”). “Tablets” refers to the ancient Romans’ version of the Samsung Galaxy: You’d slather a rectangular wooden tablet with wax and use a sharp stylus to write in it, then smooth over the wax when you needed to reuse the tablet. The scratchings in question here are a series of diary entries by the fictitious 4th-century AD Roman matron whose name is in the title; the novel consists of her jottings over two decades—shopping lists, somewhat lite musings on parties and friends, affairs and deaths. The poignancy is that we, unlike Apronenia, are aware of the significance of the occasional references to the “barbarian” tribes just outside Rome, or to the bothersome little sect called Christians. Which is to say we’re aware that the world she records in such touching detail is about to disappear.

How does it feel to live in the middle of something that feels like the end of life as we know it?

How does it feel to live in the middle of something that feels a lot like the end of life as we know it? Is there a way to live in an unsettled present, looking at an unknowable future, that allows you to feel as if you have some kind of control?

The questions raised by that little French book are, to be sure, ones that all of us have been struggling with over the past 12 months. But their implications will linger. With spring stirring and widespread vaccination in sight, people are starting to emerge blinking into the light and wondering what’s next. How do we create meaningful order in our lives? How do we structure our daily experience out of the sudden, hard-won stillness?

Some writer friends of mine were recently remarking that, on the whole, many of us seemed both slightly more productive and slightly less crazed than other people. Although I myself certainly don’t feel that I’ve dealt with things better than anyone else—just ask the friendly crew at the Tops Market Pharmacy in Rhinebeck, New York—I started to ponder why it might be the case.

One thing was obvious: When you’re a writer you tend to be isolated during much of your working life anyway. That aspect of the last year, at least, hasn’t felt all that strange to us.

But solitude has its dangers. You can get lost in it. Your motivation can dissolve. In order to have a career as a working writer (or any kind of freelance or self-employed career), there’s something you need to master that most working people don’t have to think about, let alone create for themselves, something that’s crucial to a healthy work life—to a healthy life, period.

That something is structure. If you work in an office or a restaurant or a school, you may complain about the punching in and out, the prescribed lunch hours, the daily or weekly conferences and meetings. But be thankful: You’re actually more efficient—a better, happier worker—as a result of the temporal discipline that’s being imposed on you. Trust me on this one. When I got my first book contract, I wasted four years futzing around with all my “free” time. I’d learned a thing or two by the time I wrote my next one, which was twice as long but took me one-fifth the time to write.

The problem that a lot of people have been facing since early 2020 isn’t, in fact, all that different from what I had to confront when I started my career. Here are some ways I’ve learned to structure my own days over the years—tricks and stratagems that can help create a sense of ongoing purpose…whether in business or pleasure.

Cultivate a Secret Obsession

Commit to some kind of consistent, private activity that no one else will see and gives you pleasure. Keeping a diary is a great idea; 10 years from now you’ll be happy to have a record of this extraordinary moment (as will your descendants, who can auction it off in April 2521). But it can be knitting, or cooking, or whatever, as long as it’s just for you, something neither visible to nor judge-able by anyone else.

And don’t doom yourself from the start by making it a daily activity; part of creating a structure that works is being realistic about what you can do. Regularity is what’s key here: Whatever else is happening (writer’s block, pandemic), it’s essential to feel you’re involved in an ongoing activity that you know how to do and is producing a tangible result. I’ve kept a journal since I was about 11, and the sense of coming home to it every few days is both rewarding and oddly comforting.

Commit to a Long-Term Project

It’s amazing what psychological relief you can derive from being immersed over a long period in a book, or series of books, or complete oeuvre of some dead Russian director, which will take you into a future you can’t yet imagine. A few years ago I listened to the audiobook of (hello, Apronenia!) all of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; since it’s 125 hours and 31 minutes, and since I decided I’d only listen while driving—and, moreover, since I basically drive only to the local supermarket and dry cleaner (this was before I got on a first name basis with the gang at Tops)—it took three years.

During that time I moved house and published two books; Rome wasn’t the only place that had seen some dramatic shifts. Seriously, it’s vital to have a sense of being involved in an activity that will move you beyond the present moment. (Your project should not involve current events–related books or films or whatever, nothing about the election, Covid, the collapse of neoliberalism, migration, populist tyrants, the Kardashians. Biography and history are great—anything to remind you that there is and has always been a world out there.)

Create a Schedule

Only teenagers think that total freedom equals total happiness. The fact is that if you know you have to be doing a certain thing at a certain time each day, the sense of relief is palpable. Do your journal writing (or whatever) at the same time every day; you’ll find yourself looking forward to it. Ditto your Proust reading. My latest reading project is the memoirs of the Duc de Saint-Simon, the French aristocrat who (minutely) recorded the doings at the court of Louis XIV; the standard French edition is seven 1,000-page volumes.

I wake up every morning around 6, clump downstairs to make my coffee, clump back up avec café, and read exactly 10 pages. (Regularity is ­everything—and not just for your gastroenterologist.) Then I get myself up, make the bed (crucial), get dressed, have breakfast, and enter my morning writing session—about 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Then lunch. (Give yourself a real lunch. No one’s watching, and you’ll feel better about your work if you don’t feel deprived.) Then comes the afternoon work session, from 2-ish to around 6:30 or 7. Then drink, dinner, whatever Netflix I happen to be engrossed in, and bed. Nothing is better in a freelancer’s day than to feel you’ve earned your pleasure. (Go to bed at the same time every day, too. You’d be surprised how many fewer Ambien you’ll need from Tops.)

Be Realistic About Temptations

Structured breaks are a particularly good way to handle social media. Twitter didn’t exist when I was first figuring out the freelance life, but it has become as much of a distraction for me as it is for everyone else—lately more than ever, of course, when our lives have been wholly online. You’ll feel better and more in control if you admit that you’re going to be posting, but create pockets of time for tweeting, Instagramming, Facebooking, and the rest. I’m quite active on Twitter, but I look at it only in the morning, at lunchtime, and when my workday is over.

Ditto for consumption of other media—and entertainment. (I watch a huge amount of TV—but only after I’ve knocked off for the day.) If you “just peek” at CNN or Netflix, you’ll never get back to work. Save it for your evening cocktail. This may hurt, but…the world will go on without you, and you don’t actually need to know about everything as it’s happening. (In fact, a little distance will make it easier to handle when you do plunge in.)

Dress the Part

The Covid-era joke about conducting business Zooms in your underwear was funny for a few weeks. No more. Work is serious: Take it seriously, even if no one is watching. That means bathing, shaving, hair-combing, and the rest. Since March 7, 2020, no one has been close enough to me to know how I smell. Still, I dig out the Santa Maria Novella every day and spritz. If you feel like a human being, you’ll act like one.

Finally, remember: It will end. If there’s one thing you learn from the fall of the Roman Empire or the intrigues at Versailles, it’s that everything really does pass. And if today we know about how bad the crisis was back then, it’s because some people, at least, kept their heads, woke up in the morning, got dressed, went to their desks, and wrote the words in their journals that comfort us today.

Which reminds me: It’s time for Saint-Simon. Gotta go!

https://www.townandcountrymag.com/society/a36135864/how-to-multitask-effectively/

London artist’s compelling Corona diary compared to the work of Samuel Pepys goes global

From pressreleases.responsesource.com

A stunningly sketched graphic diary of the UK’s pandemic experience has gone global after taking social media by storm and providing 25,000 meals for people in need.

Vic Lee’s Corona Diary raised £5,000 for the food charity FareShare when it was self-published in the first months of the pandemic last year.

Among hundreds of stories in the unique book, which chronicles a whole 12 months in black and white, Vic mentions Marcus Rashford’s work with FareShare and was inspired to donate himself.

Now, a year on, a second book has gone global thanks to it being picked up by a publisher and a new Artist Edition has also been added.

Vic’s first Artist Edition, which covered the six months from January 2020 to June 2020, was self-funded and self-published. It sold all 2,500 copies within just eight weeks to buyers around the world thanks to word of mouth and social media buzz. 

He said: “The original post of the first few pages I shared on LinkedIn especially, sort of blew up – it was viewed 250,000 times, with over 12,000 likes and thousands of comments telling me to publish it as a book."

Publishers Frances Lincoln quickly saw the diary’s importance and Vic signed a book deal within five weeks of getting in touch.

The 88-page hand-crafted book, packed with evocative images from the first six months of the pandemic, headed worldwide.

From Sir Captain Tom Moore’s legacy, to lockdown hair, Eat Out To Help Out, UK government decisions and Trump, and moments that have quickly been forgotten, Vic’s books have been likened to those of Samuel Pepys, as a modern-day chronicler of a year like no other.

The book has also gone on to win a flurry of awards and been lauded as extra special and rare to cover a complete year in our lifetime.

Vic, of South London, added: “The Corona Diary is an important book to a lot of people. It records a lot of what happened and also personal experiences and thoughts.

"I didn't realise when I made the first book just how important it was. The people buying it, from hairdressers to designers, builders, mums and dads and students, came from all walks of life. The comments they posted on their platforms made me realise that this was more than just another book that will be bought and left on a shelf. It's something to cherish, keep and look back on in one, two, or five years’ time."

Reviews of the Corona Diary have drawn parallels with Pepys’ iconic 17th century works detailing the plague and great fire of London.

Vic said: “It records what has affected everyone. This is not a personal story as such, but an overall, this is what happened to all of us and what we went through together globally.

“It is a book for everyone. It will not be forgotten, I’ve received messages that tell me the book has helped people have a better understanding of what happened, as they blanked out much of the year they missed, and to look back on and smile, laugh and cry.

“The diary isn’t just a book to buy, but a book to own and keep for generations to come. I have had new parents buy these books for their children born in 2020, to keep and have as a memento. For their children that experienced 2020 to look back on.

“A highlight was when lockdown happened globally, it felt like nature made a comeback. Pollution levels dropped beyond expectations, way beyond. At one point oil companies were selling barrels of oil at minus $34! They were actually paying people to take the barrels as they had nowhere to store them and no one was driving anywhere.

“There are parts about the NHS, of doctors and nurses in every country going above and beyond. This was very emotional to illustrate and write about.”

The Frances Lincoln published first edition has sold just under 10,000 copies in its first two months of release.

Vic has just launched the second Artist’s Edition, a timely follow up chronicling a second six months -- from June 2020 to January 2021.
Selling 1,000 copies in its first week, this latest edition is also gaining worldwide attention.

Vic added: “The £5,000 FareShare was not planned. I had no income, no work, and no help. All my projects stopped abruptly. I didn’t know where my money would come from. After the final books of the Artist Edition sold. I took a step back and remembered my background, my Mum passed from cancer when I was three, leaving my Dad, who never remarried, to raise two kids, aged three and four.

“We lived on a council estate. I was a shy, skinny ginger kid with Sellotaped National Health glasses who was bullied at school.

“But I always drew and I had a good sense of humour, and that’s what got me through. We had child allowance to help out, no fancy goods and my Dad drove a car older than me! I included a piece about Marcus Rashford in the first book, and now the second. An important character for me.

“When the book did so well, I felt like I needed to give back a little. I donated £5,000 of my own money to FareShare. I am now keeping an eye on things and hope I will be able to offer the same if the second artist edition sells out.

“My books are now used in some schools as part of the curriculum in art, in the UK. And many schools and universities use them in research and as inspirational books for art students, both in the UK and overseas.

“To be able to make, self-fund and publish something that inspires children and adults alike is amazing.

“It has been incredible. I wasn’t going to make a second book, but I realised that the situation after June wasn’t getting any better. So, I spent the next six months on the second volume. This has only just been released. I also wanted to keep this edition a little special as a signed Artist Edition only.

“Being a published author has taken me by surprise, I haven’t really stopped to think about it to be honest as I am keeping busy on other projects as things are slowly having some semblance to normality again. 

“Being compared to Samuel Pepys is great – a complete honour.”

Vic Lee’s second volume, limited and signed, Artist Edition is available through www.coronadiary2020.com . It costs £50 plus postage and packaging.

The first edition, published by Frances Lincoln, is available globally in most book stores and online.

https://pressreleases.responsesource.com/news/101201/london-artist-s-compelling-corona-diary-compared-to-the-work/