Should you start a reading journal?
You know that feeling when you finish an absolutely incredible book and you're basically vibrating with emotions? Like, you need to call someone immediately and be like "OH MY GOD YOU HAVE TO READ THIS" but then you open your mouth and... nothing. Just incoherent rambling about how it "hit different" and "gave me all the feels."
Or maybe you're scrolling through BookTok at 1am (again) and someone asks about that five-star read you devoured like two days ago, and suddenly your brain is completely empty. You loved it. You KNOW you loved it. But why? What even happened in it?
If you're nodding along, hi, welcome to my world! My TBR is longer than a CVS receipt, my shelves are doing that thing where books are stacked horizontally on top of other books, and honestly? Half the time I can't even remember if I've read something or just saw it recommended seventeen times on TikTok.
Between all that and the pressure to have something deep to say about every story, it can feel like you're just consuming books instead of connecting with them.
So I started jotting things down. Not in a "write a thesis about symbolism" way – just quick little notes. A line that made me ugly cry. Why a character reminded me of my sister. That moment when everything clicked and I had to put the book down and stare at the ceiling for five minutes.
Turns out, those messy little notes changed everything about how I read.
What I mean by "reflective reading"
Okay, so "reflective reading" sounds very fancy and academic, but it's really just paying attention to what books do to you. Like, actually noticing when something hits you in the feelings, or when you find yourself thinking about a character while you're doing laundry.
It's not about writing perfect book reviews or having intelligent literary opinions (though no shade if that's your thing). It's more like giving yourself permission to have feelings about books and actually remember them later.
You don't need to be a "real writer" or buy expensive journals or analyze every single page. You don't need a fancy setup. You don't need to journal after every book. You don't even need to finish the book (yes, we're allowed to DNF!). You just need to be curious about your own reading brain and maybe spend a few minutes figuring out why that enemies-to-lovers subplot destroyed you emotionally.
Maybe you want to find more books that'll hit you the same way. Maybe you're curious about what your reading habits say about you as a person. Maybe both. Either way, exploring is half the fun.
What’s coming in this series
Over the next few weeks, I'm going to walk you through how to start your own reading journal, and I promise it'll be way more chill than it sounds! We're talking about finding what works for YOUR life, not some Pinterest-perfect setup that you'll abandon after three days.
Here's what we'll cover:
Figure out what kind of reader you actually are (chaos reader? mood reader? someone who DNFs without guilt?)
Set up a journaling practice that doesn't feel like homework
Find your journaling style (bullet points? voice memos? doodles? all valid!)
Use prompts that actually spark something (not just "rate this book 1-10")
Create little rituals that make reading feel even more special
Why this is actually worth doing
Look, books already change us. They make us cry on public transport, stay up way too late, and occasionally throw them across the room (looking at you, every Sarah J. Maas cliffhanger).
But here's the thing: most of those moments just... disappear. We move on to the next book, the next TikTok rec, the next shiny cover. And yeah, that's fine, but what if we could hold onto some of those moments? What if we could remember not just what we read, but how it made us feel?
That's what journaling does. It catches those fleeting thoughts before they vanish into the void of your overcrowded brain. And honestly? It makes you realize how much books are quietly shaping who you're becoming.
Ready to give it a try?
If you're even slightly intrigued (or if you're just tired of forgetting amazing books the second you close them), let's do this together.
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