First Some Old Business from 2012

Pressing family obligations in April and May 2012 delayed my write-up of my 2012 fake journal experience. Sadly in a move of colossal stupidity I wrote my wrap up post on a scrap of paper not in my regular journal. When the dust settled it was nowhere to be found. I kept thinking I would rewrite it and more family obligations again came up. That's sometimes how things happen. Moral of that story: always write your write ups in your regular writing journal where you can find them!

It's been a mad dash through the months to today. More clutter has accumulated on my desk (which is unusual for me, but this is the way things seem to be). During a recent illness I had time to sort through all the accumulated pieces of this and that. I found many delightful tidbits. Alas I didn't find my 2012 write up, but I did find a couple pages of brief notes.

So here, before we move on to preparing for International Fake Journal Month 2013, are some notes that wrap up my 2012 experience.

Oh, and you'll note that there was a darkness to these ideas. There tends to be a darkness to my fake journals, perhaps because there isn't much darkness in my actual journals. I think these are all good ideas to explore. They just might not be journals I would like to post for public consumption. My regular journals have been shifting into private mode again in the past 3 years. It came as no surprise to me that my ideas for IFJM 2012 were all rather private as well.

Notes (from a beat up piece of paper found at the bottom of a pile)—

• Originally I had huge plans for IFJM 2012. I was going to go to a particular corner every day and draw. I had a vague notion that this was somewhere someone close to the journal keeper had died. 

• The idea morphed into views from a particular bridge. The idea of working with architecture appealed to me. It seemed at first that the character might actually commit suicide at the end of the month.

• I decided I didn't want to do my musings on death in public. It's not how I work as an artist. I muse in private and then go public with what I think is useful or helpful to me and my relationship with the world. For me a big part of fake journaling and the aspect of posting hinges on maintaining healthy boundaries within which I have complete freedom to create. If it isn't something I want to post I might hinder myself in the actual creation, unless I decide that it will be a non-posted year.

• IFJM is also about growth in skills so the task of architecture was a good one…

• My project morphed into a happier one when I met Frank, a character to whom I alluded to in my prep post in 2012.

Now as to what actually transpired:

I found that my initial plans really would be too time intensive. They were abandoned for a closer look at the life of a character who had simple goals—to look at the clouds every day. (For reasons readers will understand.)

Here's what I firmly believe about IFJM and fake journals. You have to sit with ideas for even a short while (more than a couple days) to know if they fit for you and your current life—are the ideas actually doable given the current demands on your time and the responsibilities in your life?!

During last IFJM I was enrolled in 3 classes at the Atelier (trying to reconnect my brain, eye, hand). If I were going to go ahead with either of the architecturally-based ideas one of which included a character named Frank, I would have to carve out at least 90 minutes a day and that wasn't possible.

Sometimes you have to push yourself. You also have to have a clear assessment of your limits. 

That applies to your regular journal practice—if you're obsessive about journaling to the point of exclusion you have no life. 

It made perfect sense for me, therefore, to focus on one simple page spread a day, and work on mixing blues and whites to create clouds (the skill building portion). 

I ended up spending 15 to 30 minutes a day on my 2013 fake journal and that worked out to be just about right. Useful, but not burdensome given other constraints in my life.

Through a process of sitting down and casting about for ideas and then looking carefully at those ideas I found one which I wanted to explore; an idea I was happy exploring in a public forum; and an idea I could execute in a brief amount of time.

This is something that I encourage you all to do whether this is your first time keeping a fake journal, or you've done it before.

I want you to have a positive experience.

That's my wrap up for 2012. 

In the next few days I'll post about prepping for 2013 to jog your memory and get you planning a doable concept.

I will also introduce this year's button, slogan, and my own plans.

I hope you'll check back during March to see what I'm up to, and for help in your own planning. I look forward to seeing what you do in your 2013 fake journal.