My Teenage Years in Journal Form!

If you remember last Tuesday I did the 'my life in writing tag' and I shared with you some of my journals from my younger years. Well lots of you said that you would like to see more of those journals and know more about my progression in the way that I journal, how I journal and why I journal etc.

I am happy to share with you as I usually am, however these journals have been heavily screened and vetted! There is a whole load of teenage angst, hormones, emotions, crushes and all that cringey cringey stuff going on in there. Some of it made for really interesting reading, the rest I was like super dooper cringe!

My journals are important to me though, some of them had some crappy things in but it is what happens in our lives, the good, the bad and the in between stuff that makes us who we are and shapes us as a person. For that I am grateful (mostly) and now and then it is interesting to go back over stuff and remember that. They are a record of my life, some of the events in there I would not have remembered at all, some of it is everyday and seemingly mundane but a fantastic social history record and documentation of me and of course my legacy. Some of the events have been blown all out of proportion by a hormonal teenage me desperate for a boyfriend wondering why I was never asked to dance but when I look back on it now I think "Anna, seriously, get a grip" for it is totally inconsequential in the grand scheme of things but obviously very important to me back then.

I also find it interesting to see that some things never change and that I was very much the same person back then as I am now, just a lot happier with who I am as a person. I have done a lot of growing up but I am still doing the soul searching and the day dreaming. I am still the same eccentric, ginger frizzy haired, bouncing ball of laughter that I always was which in itself is comforting. I am still not quite ready for adult hood yet though even though I will be 33 a week after this is posted.

As you will see my style of journalling hasn't changed all that much. I still love to mix written journalling with art journalling and you get to see some of my earliest doodles and the progression of the hedgehog until I got it just the way I wanted it. I kept it all, crossings out and reworkings, all of it is still there bound between the pages.

I will do a post / vlog one day on past journals, legacy leaving and of course whether or not you do or do not write stuff that you wouldn't want your Grandchildren to read when they are clearing out your attic!