If you want your life to be a magnificent story, then begin by realizing that you are the author and everyday you have the opportunity to write a new page.

Usually we video tape many important occasions of our lives (marriages, functions, events) . How about recording every detail day by day in some storage medium – diary writing can assist you in actually recording your life.  A farmer uses a stick to control his bull in the bullock cart; teachers use report cards in schools to keep track of what their students are learning; employers keep check on their employees via task sheets, reports, appraisals – but how does one keep a track of "How I am Fairing in this Examination", called Life.  And that is why we today touch the topic of Diary Writing. Its been very difficult for me to generate this piece of information, and I have taken due care to touch the various aspects that could be useful to us.

What is Diary Writing....

• Diary writing is analogous to a tool our teachers used when we were studying in schools i.e. a Report Card. If properly used, Diary Writing can turn a powerful tool to monitor/record/plan our progress / status in life.

• More importantly it is a Discipline.

• Can be used as a informal way to write/speak/record our thoughts/ideas, self talks.

• Can be used to remember/record memories, emotions, moods, feelings ; as if we were talking to our most beloved friend.

• Can be used to keep task list, planners record/remember important dates/events.

• It is a tool to get Organized –Disciplined and to work in a Systematic, Planned manner.

• It can be used in a variety of ways (as we shall see) to implement radical changes in our lifestyles.

• Thus it can be used in both our Personal and Professional life to keep track of what's happening and what's not...

• If taken seriously it can be used "To do some research on yourself!"  :-)

• A Tool to do ideological thinking, planning.

What are the different types

• Personal Use of a diary, involves using a medium full page size diary; with month planners; notes on each page; most importantly a "Thought of the Day" on every page.

• Professional use of a diary, involves using a handy diary/organizer with : Notes; Timings / appointment sections; Contacts/telephone/address space; Year/Month/Week planners; Checklist ; Expenditure/Transaction recorders; Important data like nations/currency/ conversions/STD-ISD codes/; health/personal info pages.

• Pocket diary are small, short-term use diaries, that are used to record on the fly information coming from day-to-day field activities at work, travel to note down, instructions, telephone numbers, info.... Alternative use of such a Diary is mentioned in later paragraphs.

When and how much time should be allocated

Diary writing has to be implemented as a discipline, we must adhere to our routine, and allocate some time every day for our diary. As time will pass one will realize how important/effective maintaining a diary becomes.

Personal Use
We must allocate a Minimum of 2-5 minutes (i.e. 0.2% of time we have in a day) every day, any time, preferably early morning to record the previous day/ or at night to record current day.

Professional Use
This demands mainly planning, hence early morning to plan today or late night to plan the next day.

Pocket diaries can be used as and when the need arise.

Every day in Life is like opening a Bank Account and Closing It. As the day comes up, Life opens up a new Bank Account and deposits 1440 minutes in it, as time passes each minute is invested, and lost. It is upto you as to how you transact this minute and make profit/loss of that minute. Once gone, this minute is Gone for ever. At the end of day all the minutes in our Bank Account are emptied and the unused ones are wasted and we start again fresh the next day.

What Use Can We Make by Maintaining a Diary

Diary writing will be a very different experience and result won't be visible very quickly, perhaps a fortnight/month should take for us to realize the Complete Benefits of implementing this practice.

Activity Recorder

You will be using your diary most often with respect to this aspect. Diary writing is about recording/writing most of the time and then realizing its use/importance. Every day we start off , performing our tasks, meeting various people, interacting, accepting tasks/responsibilities/ challenges, facing problems, socializing also. In this aspect we can write about how a day in our life "today" went; was it fine, ok, excellent, boring –

• Did "I" experience/take part in some exciting/surprising situations/events?

• What were the various tasks "I" performed today?

• Did "I" meet some new person, made some contacts?

• Did "I" share some thoughts/took part in some discussions with someone?

• Did "I" achieve success/completion in "my" tasks (small or big)?

What are the various emotions/feelings/thoughts, state of minds "I" experienced during the various time of today? Have a look at the list below –

Now a thought must be strengthening in your minds, that isn't this is too much?.. the above areas which are presented to record upon are useful to monitor certain things about ourselves and will be clear in the Progress monitor sections.

Goal setting/Planning

Would you sit in a train or plane or car without knowing where it was going? The obvious answer is : No? Then why are you going through life without having any goals? Are you totally satisfied with the progress you are making in your Professional and Personal life? Do you have a written method to track your progress ?

Set a big goal. Most importantly write down all the necessary steps it will take. Who do "I" have to call? Where do "I" have to go? Does it require special training? Do "I" need tools or supplies? What sacrifices am "I" willing to make? Degenerate tasks into a subtask, a series of small tasks, elaborate your task list.

Progress Monitor

The data which is a written is a representation of our activities and can be read/reviewed at regular intervals, lets say a week/fortnight/monthly. While we are glancing through the data we assimilated, we can observe our progress/collective records on certain events which would be useful. Regarding Goal Setting, we must note our progress on the tasks we had planned, what is their status, review and re-plan if necessary.

Now going back to the first section of Activity Recording, which elaborated the various things one could record, we will find that the use of recording will be clear as the recording is reviewed. Our state of mind, our personality, how we reflect it to others will be clear when we look at the record of the emotions/feelings we expressed everyday. In this way we can know the various moods we experienced thru the week, or period; and make judgments as to whether we were positive all the time, negative, silent, joyous, worried .. i.e. our mental state. In our normal hustle and bustle of life, most people do not find time to reflect on this simple but essential aspect about our mental state and emotions. However, by maintaining a diary and developing the habit of reviewing it we can keep track of our attitudes and improve on them.

Affirmations Tool

This is a very useful aspect which can be utilized by maintaining the discipline of diary writing. Affirmations are Advertisements/Commercials written by You, for You. It is like writing a commercial/Ad to yourself about yourself, for yourself. Sounds Crazy, it is a bit, and very powerful too. It is a statement made in a present tense, of the kind of person you want to be. It can be both positive or negative, but should be used in positive manner. These statements will sleep into your consciousness. And since you will be listening them so often, you will soon begin to believe them. With our diary we can write affirmations everyday, read them, live with such empowering beliefs that will help to control our thoughts. Also if your diary has a 'Thought for the Day', then it will also aid in this process.

• I love writing my daily self instructions.

• Life is great.

• Life is getting better and better ,day by day.

• I respond +vely to all situations, no matter what :-).

• I am willing to keep learning about life and what it takes to make it work.

• I am powerful, healthy.

• I replace fear and anxiety with confidence and determination

If you want to change your life fast, even thought it may seem its slow, then use affirmations, write them, read them every day; this is probably the most effective, important use the diary can be made to.

Refresher

Our moods switch, someday life seems to be the best, rich, beautiful and joyous. Flipping the coin, on the other hand we find ourselves restless, bored with routine tasks as we many times say in Hindi "Aaj Puk Gaya" ; we find there is nothing to do, sitting idle, and many times we may also find ourselves lonely, far away from our beloved ones. We think where is the beautiful/cheerful life! So to get back all those joyous, happy moments, get refreshed/rejunavated, you can simply thumb through your personal diary. It will be found to be refreshing. As you will flip through the pages, you will keep your memories live, you will experience those days, and yes you definitely will, since you are simply rewinding, and replaying the recordings of your Life.

Imagine remembering every details of every day of every month of the last year – Does this seem enticing, fulfilling and satisfactory? I am doing this for the past 3 years and am glad to share my experience with all of you in this article. Positive affirmations, empowering beliefs are Proven Mind Power tools. You will experience the use of this practice, even if you get involved in the simple process of recording every day on paper, and then reading it. As time passes you will get fascinated by this discipline and start enjoying it. Diary writing is an experience worth implementing. Give it a go! Every one has to do something different to make a difference.

Do you feel Life to be Lonely, Failure, Unhappy?

This is an alternative use that Pocket/Small diaries can be made use of . This is a very different use, which involves using 3 different small diaries named :

• Grateful
  Record all names of people who have played some role in you life, people to whom you are grateful. Names can easily touch figures of 50-100.

• Success
  Record all tasks that you completed day by day, which gained you success. Its not necessary for that task to be a big one. Every small success, in every mediocre/common task can be entered in this section. Lets say fixing up the car problem by your own self, cooking some delicious recipe, maintaining the discipline of diary writing for this month.

• Happy
  Record every moment, event you took part in, which made you feel happy. Example : Meeting some person, getting/gifting something, entertainment, fun.

In future –

Whenever you feel failure, think of all the Success stories by opening your Success Diary.
When you feel unhappy or dejected Open up Happy Diary.
And if you feel Lonely, open up Grateful Diary to remember all those who have been with/for you.

Instead of maintaining 3 different pocket diaries, one can keep 3 sections in their personal diary, and implement this process to suit one's needs.

Life is all about Learning,
Study as if you were live forever
Live as if you were to die tomorrow
– M K Gandhi

After we leave our coaches, schools, teachers, colleges and move away from parents, work, why do we stop learning about the basics of Life? School is not over. It is never out. Jack Confield of the Chicken Soup for Soul say that in the US of America, 1 out of every 7 people goes to the book store and buys a book to learn about self, and basics of life in their entire lives. This means that 6 out of every 7 refuse to learn. Are you going to be amongst the 6 refusers!

I hope you found this information, useful and worth thinking and Implementing.