Quitting the Party Scene for My Journal

I’ve been quite active in the party/clubbing scene for a decade. I didn’t party hard and I didn’t crave it but I almost never passed an invite for a round of shots few drinks with my friends. Besides, most of my partying was all about getting rid of the stress from work and just having a good time with some friends – so everything in moderation (kinda).

2018 was a strange and quite a difficult year for me. I was in a place where all I wanted to do was get drunk and get lost in a sea of people. I spent weekdays with a bottle of vodka and then tequila on weekends. It was a vicious cycle but because it kept me numb, I did not want to escape it. I started to crave the party scene despite how introverted I was because I did not want to be alone with my thoughts. And plus, it was fun.

The party scene kept me from dealing with my own reality but of course, I wanted to get better. I knew I would have to face my problems eventually so I took small steps to channel my anxiety and anger into something more productive. One thing led to another and I found myself listening to podcasts and watching videos about self-care.

In the latter part of 2018, I took better care of myself. I stopped drinking on weekdays but still couldn’t stay away from the getting wasted every weekend.

…and then I discovered the “morning pages”

On my quest to healing and self-discovery, I stumbled upon Lavendaire’s YouTube channel specifically her videos on the Morning Pages. She isn’t the creator of the Morning Pages but she is a proponent of this practice. The Morning Pages is a journaling exercise devised by Julia Cameron, writer of The Artist’s Way. All you need to do is “three pages of longhand writing, strictly stream-of-consciousness”.

One of the objectives of this practice is to unleash your creativity. But really, it can do more than that. Once you get into it, it becomes some form of meditation or therapy even.

I was curious about the morning pages and I was desperate to try anything to prevent me from spiraling down.

I officially started writing streams of consciousness in January 2019. When I started, I wasn’t consistent and was a bit uncomfortable with writing my innermost thoughts and feelings. Then I started to get the hang of it and started to form a habit. I would get up at 7 in the morning, drink a glass of water, then start writing.

I was not expecting it to yield results (creatively) but then it did. And when I was hooked, I couldn’t break the habit. It had come to a point where I was excited about waking up the next day because that meant another day of writing.

Leaving the party scene without hesitation

You see, I treated my morning pages as a brain dump and also a form of meditation. At that point, I had already seen the positive effects of long-form journaling such as the quality of content that I write and create. Most of my brilliant ideas were sprung from writing morning pages. Because of that, I started to become a little bit superstitious about my morning pages that I would always find time to sit down and write.

I was still partying early in 2019 but I started to despise it. Staying up all night at the club meant that I wouldn’t have time to journal the next morning because I’d probably still be asleep by then.

Read: Airplane Mode – Journaling While Traveling

I was really determined to stick to the habit of journaling every morning because it had been helping me get through my problems. I knew that I could easily lose my momentum if I skipped at least a day or two so I decided to give up late nights and clubbing (unless there was a special occasion) – without hesitation.

Changing a part of my (2018) lifestyle was a no-brainer for me. I thought that I could tune out my sadness with booze and music and eventually pick myself up but it took me too long to recover. I am glad that I found an alternative method to cope and deal with the things that have been dealing with. This was better for my mental health and along the way, helped me unleash a more creative side of me.

I traded hangovers for brain dumps, late nights for early mornings, and shot glasses for coffee cups all for my love for this fruitful habit of journaling.