Memos & Memoires

How to Journal: The Short Version

With Peggy Guiler

If you have journaled faithfully since you were a child, kept a journal for two days or never even entertained the idea you can find a little help and encouragement here. There may be a memoir in the making…

Spend some time with Peggy Guiler as she introduces, or perhaps returns us, to the value of capturing our thoughts in her talk about memos and memoires.

MEET PEGGY GUILER

Peggy Guiler grew up in Port Dover, Ontario, on the lakefront and with the encouragement of some wonderful teachers, her passion for words took her to Ottawa, where she studied Journalism before finding work at a local paper.

She started a family before moving back to Port Dover to work at home, in the community, and alongside her husband. Their partnership would transition to single parenthood, so Peggy picked up extra work writing freelance for three newspapers.

The news industry took a heavy hit in the 90’s , so Peggy once again found a new passion, finding a niche in Mental Health Peer Support. There, she developed training programs for a local group and expanded that to the provincial level. Peggy’s experience, education, and ease with both listening and public speaking served her well as a trainer, facilitator, and speaker for over 20 years.

Approaching retirement, she persued Coaching, and Community Ministry. Her business, River of Hope Enterprises, offers a variety of life services; she officiates marriage ceremonies, offers personal guidance, as well as journaling training. To support her passions for the past 14 years, she has joyfully driven a school bus, and more recently taken on work as a Chaplain in a Long-Term care facility.

We are delighted to welcome her to round out our Mix it up May series with her message about Memos & Memoires.

Coming soon… Watch the gathering here.

READING

Etty Hillesum, in the collection of her journals and letters called “An Interrupted Life – Letters from Westerbork”, was trying to decide what discipline would be best for her each morning.

"Half an hour of exercises combined with half an hour of meditation can set the tone for the whole day.

But it’s not simple, that sort of “quiet hour.” It has to be learned. A lot of unimportant inner litter and bits and pieces have to be swept out first. Even a small head can be piled high inside with irrelevant distractions. True, there may be edifying emotions and thoughts, too, but the clutter is ever-present. So let this be the aim of the meditation: to turn one’s innermost being into a vast empty plain, with none of that treacherous undergrowth to impede the view. So that something of “God” can enter you, and something of “Love,” too. Not the kind of love deluxe that you revel in deliciously for half an hour, taking pride in how sublime you can feel, but the love you can apply to small, everyday things.

I might of course read the Bible each morning, but I don’t think I’m ready for that, I still worry about the real meaning of the book, rather than lose myself in it.

I think I’ll read a little bit of The Philosopher’s Garden” each morning instead. I might of course confine myself to writing a few words on these blue- lined pages. To the patient examination of just one single thought, even if none of my thoughts is very important. In the past, ambition had to be marvelous, perfect, I simply could not allow myself to write down any old thing, even though I was sometimes bursting with the longing to do just that.

August 4/414:30 pm

Let me be full of pathos then, write down everything inside me, and when I have written all the unconsciousness and exaggeration out of my system, perhaps I will then get down to myself. ……no I can’t work it out, try as I may. This writing is sort of rough draft; I try things out, discard this and that, and hope all the pieces will fit together in the end. But I mustn’t run away from myself, or from difficult problems and I don’t really – what I do run away from is the difficulty of writing it all down. It all comes out so clumsily. But then you don’t put things down on paper to produce masterpieces, but to gain some clarity. I am still ashamed of myself, afraid to let myself go, to let things pour out of me; I am dreadfully inhibited, and that has because I have not yet learned to accept myself as I am.”