So many journal entries are dead ends but you don’t know until you write them down and think about them.

My main influences in the whole idea of keeping a journal were, oddly, Henry David Thoreau and Tom McGuane. The latter used to keep his on tiny dime store notebooks, which he would toss in a box. The best and most influential journals for me where those of Dostoyevsky, with Flaubert coming in as a close second, also Loren Eisley.

It’s important for a writer not to put too much in a journal for fear of losing the energy and attention that should be left for the work itself. 

Your subconscious mind is trying to help you all the time. That’s why I keep a journal –- not for chatter but for mostly the images that flow into the mind or little ideas.I keep a running journal, and I have all of my life, so it’s like your gold mine when you start writing.
   — Jim Harrison, (novelist, Dalva, Legends Of The Fall). The notes above are from his journal while writing Dalva.

This is a two-page spread from my upcoming journal, Creativity as a Way of Life.

You can download the journaling page, on the right side above, here or by clicking on the image below. It is 8.5 x 11 inches in size so easy to print out.

More on the thinking behind the journals here.