I own a lot of Moleskines, for the same reasons you do – and also they beautify Pilot ink like nobody’s business – but they always end up being writing receptacles rather than actual journals. I don’t think I’ve ever really had a space that’s purely for my own eyes, as you put it, where the only person I am lying to or manipulating is myself.

I might grab another one, though. I’ve been looking at alternate practices to meditation itself, and I could use a space to just record what I actually think, rather than what sounds funny to my Twitter feed or all three of my blog readers – though sometimes the two manage to coincide. Thanks for the recommendation.

Right now I’m using it to keep track of what I’m reading–it’s more of a commonplace book than a confessional. I am curious about what modes of journaling other people find helpful. I can think of four modes in my own attempts at journaling: chronicling events, expressing emotions, working out thoughts or arguments, and recording notes or quotations. Of course these will be all mixed up in practice, but what’s interesting about the journal is that the privacy makes all these modes appropriate; when you switch over to online tools, each mode seems to demand a different technology.