To Journal--or Not

A reader and a writer-in-progress asked me not long ago what my journaling routine is like. I had to confess that I don't journal.

I've tried--more than once, actually. But what I learned about myself is that the time and thought and energy required to keep a journal seemed to drain the same (time and thought and energy) away from my fiction writing. I soon developed a kind of distaste and impatience for even the briefest journal entry and had to stop. 

It was almost a disappointing...