paper journaling versus e-journaling

It feels like every week or so, someone in The Daily Journal guild asks "Should I keep a paper journal or an electronic journal?" I decided to compile some thoughts:

Benefits of physical journaling:

• Cool notebooks! Cool pens!
• Can easily draw/doodle/sketch in your journal
• Using a physical journal (instead of computer/phone) means less distractions
• You may just like the feeling of physically writing on paper
• You may find it more satisfying to flip through a filled notebook than scroll through a long file

Benefits of e-journaling:

• Can easily edit your writing
• Can easily attach digital media (photos, screenshots, digital art)
• Can search text, so you can easily find old entries you want to re-read
• Can back up your journal to make sure you never lose it
• You may be able to type faster than you write, or just not want to deal with handwriting issues

For myself, the ability to edit my writing is huge. I constantly edit my stuff—changing my wording for clarity and flow, adding additional dialogue and extra thoughts. I often re-read my entries a few days later and discover I have more to say. I also type much more quickly than I write and find it helps my thoughts to flow more freely. So e-journaling is perfect for me.

But that's just me! Maybe you use journaling primarily as a way to vent and get things off your chest and you never go back to change what you've written. Or maybe your thoughts come more easily on paper. That's valid. Basically, you have to consider your own workflow and priorities to decide what works for you.