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Writing From Back To Front


Ergative

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SInce I've started using my beautiful Seven Seas Crossfield journal from Nanami Paper* for work-related tasks: notes during meetings, scribbling diagrams to help organize my thoughts, etc., I've found that I write in it in two directions. Starting at the front, I put my to-do list, which I return to over and over again to check things off (or, alas, add to it). Starting from the back, I put all the scribbles and notes that I don't expect to need again. This prevents short-term, "throwaway" notes from interfering with my longer term notes that I want to prevent getting buried over time.

 

Does anyone else write in other ways besides simple front-to-back? Or has anyone else happened upon a method that prevents important pages from getting buried by less important notes?

 

 

 

*No affiliation, just insanely happy with the journal, hence the full name punch

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I don't. I just started using the Midori Traveler's Notebook so now I have different sections and I use mini binder clips to section off the various different parts of the journals as well. In the past, in journals, I've always used those Post-It tab stickers to separate the journal into different sections into the journal.

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I do the same thing. Start a journal off from the front as well as the back and meet somewhere in the middle.

 

I haven't tried the post it as a divider though.

 

I use a post it for a different purpose, as a bookmark and to absorb any freshly written ink and prevent it from messing up the opposing page if I close the notebook right away.

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I'm trying something like this right now in my Field Notes notebook which I have in my pocket every day. Starting at the front I use it for all-purpose note taking, small topics, commenting on day-to-day stuff. These pages I number starting anew each month (So one month might have 3-5 pages of general notes)

 

Meanwhile, starting at the middle (also going forward), I have put all my topical sections, such as lists of long term plans, lists of books I want to get, quotes, progression of certain things, the documenting of larger projects, etc.

There are many of these topical sections, yet they get filled up less quickly, so hopefully both parts will reach completion at the same time.

I started doing this because I didn't like how the topical pages, which might still be in use after 2-3 months, got buried, and got to be looking messy, between so many pages of wild, less clean, less structured note taking pages.

 

I'm really just trying this out as a format though, and it's too early to say if I'm happy with it. Promising so far, I guess.

 

Lastly, if I really wanna go out on messing around with ink; so for scribbling, drawing or testing ink combos; I use the very last pages of the book. That's because these pages looked cool while while I were doing it, but very soon, and in the greater context of the whole book, I would feel annoyed by the mess

 

Am I overthinking all this?

Edited by mike.jane
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I have a particular 300-sheet miqielrius notebook I began at the first of the year to copy a variety of things in, like reference items, quotes, some specific dated diary type entries, etc. I therefore think of it in sections and plan to create a workable index for the whole thing.

 

In front of a section about three quarters into the journal I started related, dated journal entries that run from there, day by day, advancing backward toward the front of the book that I now plan to continue through most of the year. I have to admit that it's freaking me out a little. I've been wondering if I should continue as is or start from a new spot toward the front and explain it in the index. The only real concern ia if I ever want others to see it and understand. But it may be good to help me grow as a person doing this backwards long-term. : )

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I write lists on long, thin, notebook pads. I write journal entries and sketches in a nice, usually leather-bound, journal (of which I probably have close to a dozen--and which one I write in depends on just where I am in the house, and which journal is closer to my hands when I'm looking for one :-) ). For traveling watercolor or other small paintings, I use a notebook made either of heavy duty cold-pressed watercolor paper or notebooks made from gessoed canvas. I record ink/pen/etc. writing samples and info in a lined notebook specifically for that purpose, and for simple throwaway notes, doodles, etc., I use cheap, yet FP friendly, paper such as the notebooks we bought at Ikea recently for 99 cents each.

 

For me, that means that I don't have to worry how fast I'm using up a particular section in any given notebook or journal. Good paper is saved for important things that I want to last, and the cheaper papers are used for items I know I'm going to throw away--shopping lists, my awful attempts at math/budgeting, measurements, or any little quote or thing I just saw somewhere, but isn't important enough to save "forever". For me, it makes far more sense to keep separate notebooks for separate purposes. So, no, I don't start from the front and back of any given notebook/journal simultaneously.

"In the end, only kindness matters."

 

 

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