The early morning is my favorite time of day. I enjoy the quiet of the morning. Nothing is expected from me when I wake up, and it’s a wonderful, lovely time to write.
To help keep my mornings calm, I’m starting to use more analog tools. I journal in an analog, physical notebook almost every morning. I’ve kept a daily journal since 2019. I started with digital apps, then e-ink devices, then finally decided on (primarily) analog notebooks.
Digital tools are still necessary for many of my daily tasks, but I use analog tools to ground myself in the physical world. For example, if my mind feels so full that I worry I will forget to reflect on something important, I make a bulleted list, a to-process list. Journaling in a physical notebook helps me start my day in a calm headspace.
Since I’ve found my analog journaling process calming, I’ve thought about other areas in my life in which I could add more analog tools, particularly for my writing process. Some of these include measuring time and creating a calm ambiance.
Measuring Time
I think a lot about how I should be spending my time. I often time block tasks for the day and use digital timers to bound my time spent on tasks to specific intervals. But to slow my mornings down, I am shifting toward analog timers. I use an hourglass to measure 15-minute intervals. One of my favorite ways to measure time is something I picked up from a blog by A.C. on Baum-Kuchen. A.C. lights incense while journaling a Daily Page, akin to morning pages. I use incense that burn for about 25 minutes to measure the time I spend writing. As the length of the incense burns down, the size of the incense gives me a visual estimation of the time I’ve spent writing.
Creating Ambiance
My morning environment also affects the level of calm I experience. I use several tools to create a comfortable and calm ambiance.
For example, the incense helps measure time, but it also fills my room with the smell of rose, a scent I now associate with the calm of my writing sessions. I also enjoy peeking at the whirling smoke and watching it gradually dissipate.
Similarly, texture helps me feel more calm. My notebooks are generally kept in leather covers. The soft feel of my Pueblo leather binder encourages me to notice the passage of time and the beauty of the imperfections that come along with time. The scratchy sound and feedback from writing with a fine-tipped pen on textured paper (e.g., Midori MD) is also soothing. Lastly, merino wool desk pads provide comfort for my hands while writing. These pleasant sensory experiences, smell, sound, and touch, contribute to the calm of my mornings.
My analog tools help make my mornings feel serene. However, digital tools also have an important place in my life. While I try to maintain an “analog first” mindset, I still use digital apps. Digital tools are well suited for organizing, connecting, and archiving notes. I’ve written about digital note-taking organization and combining digital and analog information on Medium.
Important Challenges of Analog Systems and Writing Prose
I recently had to move, and that involved taking boxes full of notebooks, along with several bottles of ink and a few fountain pens. The experience made me never want to move again, all the while knowing I will likely move again next year. With the stress of the move in mind, I strongly considered giving up physical notebooks altogether. And, honestly, I still think about eschewing all notebook usage, going paperless.
I enjoy writing with analog tools, but the space and weight of them is sometimes difficult to justify. Moreover, keeping analog writing tools organized requires free, unstructured time, all of which are based on some level of financial wealth.
Audre Lorde explains the challenge of writing prose in her essay, Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining:
Of all the art forms, poetry is the most economical…As we reclaim our literature, poetry has been the major voice of the poor, working class, and Colored women. A room of one’s own may be a necessity for writing prose, but so are reams of paper, a typewriter, and plenty of time. The actual requirements to produce the visual arts also help determine along class lines, whose art is whose…we need to be aware of the effect of class and economic differences on the supplies available for producing art.
Whether using analog or digital tools, writing requires considerable amounts of time and space, both physical and mental space. Analog tools, by their nature, require more space than digital tools. Each analog tool is generally used for a single purpose. We write in notebooks. There’s no ambiguity about its function. However, a smartphone can be used as a journal, a timer, a word processor, and a media player, taking up much less space than several years of physical journals.
As I’ve only been keeping physical notebooks for a few years, I wonder what my notebook collection will look like several years later. I wonder what my life will look like years from now and if I will have the resources necessary to maintain a consistent practice of reflection and writing using analog tools. We may need to adapt our writing rituals to the resources available to us, which often change, sometimes for better and other times for worse.
In practice, the way I use analog tools is flexible. Some mornings, I just need to get out the door for a very early, very long run. When I have time later in the morning, I’m then able to journal and review other plans for the day. If it’s the weekend and I have no major responsibilities, I might have the time, energy, and mental space to burn incense and play around with words, writing stories and other drafts.
My writing tools are like a toolbox. I don’t always need every tool available to me, but they’re here for me as I need them. What’s in your writing toolbox?
Notes
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Take care. Talk soon.