Until the Coffee gets Cold
I have been journaling for quite some time, but consistently daily in one form or the other for a couple of years, since 2019 I guess. Since I am, it seems, chronically undecided about everything, these entries are, much to my own annoyance, either on paper - mostly in Leuchtturm notebooks which had been a personal go-to for a while (there had been various Japanese stationery as well - but more on that in a future post) - or digitally in either Emacs or Obsidian, depending on which part of the year we are.
Don't ask...
To be honest, it's a bit of a mess, but regardless of the medium, I journal usually first thing in the morning. Not having had my journaling time already feels as if there is something missing from the day.
I think that it doesn't take that much of time, but every now and then things get either out of hand in terms of time spent, or I simply don't know what to come up with in the first place. Either way, it seems a good idea to have some sort of time-frame to focus on writing.
I have tried to use timers in the past, but found the idea of having to set a timer, even if it's automated, too annoying and somewhat intrusive. This got extra obvious in those moments when I managed to forget the existence of said timer in the first place and then wonder why on earth an alarm fires off when I was already doing something else.
After reading "Tales From The Cafe" by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (only the second book had been available in the store when I was looking for something to read, so that’s what I bought) I got the idea to steal borrow the concept and simply fill a cup of coffee, which I, given the time of day, would do anyway, and then write until it's cold (or empty for that matter) and then stop.
That's it. One coffee, one entry.
I have been doing this routine of the coffee-timer so to say, only for an admittedly short while - a week or so - but so far it felt far more natural and whole lot less stressful than using a timer or similar. I simply take a cup and write until the cup is either cold or empty. Done! Easy!
And should the time not be enough I can refill or simply choose a larger cup to begin with - stay tuned for the inevitable "my-favourite-pint-sized-coffee-mug" post.