The road ahead: using a travel journal to chart and reach your writing goals
- 4 days ago
- 5 min read
How keeping a travel journal can help you reach your writing goals
We all have that gorgeous notebook we grabbed to document our travels lying somewhere in the house. What should have been a curated, poetic collection of unforgettable moments became a forgotten, chaotic time capsule, abandoned somewhere on a shelf. All those memories and raw stories you scribbled down in a moment of blissful joy are still close at hand. I bet if you were to grab it and read through it, you would relive that exact same joyful moment.
So why only make these types of journals when we travel? Why not make one for the creative journeys we make towards our writing goals? To feel each moment of joy, pride, and chaos as we move closer to finishing our first novel, publishing a poetry collection, or starting a substack. When it comes to writing, we constantly approach our destination by wandering aimlessly through the endless tabs and notes, hoping we magically stumble on a finished project. But like traveling into the unknown, it is always good to have a roadmap to remind us where we are heading.
In this post, I will show you the benefits of having a roadmap and the joy we are setting up for our future selves as writers.
Of course, it all starts with a notebook, and I’ll share set-up ideas later on, but first, focus on the roadmap.
Setting a clear destination
The destination will always be the goal you want to end at. The wonders of the world you want to gaze at in complete awe and say, “I finally made it!” Now, we writers tend to be vague about the exact destination we want to walk towards. “I want to write more” is the same as saying “I want to go somewhere warm.” You know vaguely where you want to go, but there is no exact location you can pin down. When you know the exact end location, your mind will start to create a road towards it.
What is the underlying goal of “you writing more”? Is it to hone your writing skills? To write your first novel? Do you want to make writing your job? When you have found the exact location, pin it down.
Planning the roadmap
When planning a journey into the unknown, you don’t just go there and figure it out. You break the trip down into days, places of interest, and directions. You know where you’ll be sleeping, restaurants you want to try out, and how you will be traveling around.
If your goal is to write a poetry collection, the roadmap would look like this,
Your sleeping place will become the tools and spaces to make the journey easier. For example: Having a space to collect your potential poems, a notebook to write new poems in, or a timer that reminds you to take a moment to work on your collection.
Places of interest are things that inspire your collection. Nature, music, other poets, artists, and quotes. Gather these and add them to your journal as little moments of inspiration. A big part of writing is feeling motivated to write and inspired to create.
Transportation and maps keep us from getting lost in the unknown. Yes, we are making an actual roadmap here through micro-goals. For a poetry collection that could look like writing out the ideas for your collection. Chapters? How many poems do you want to be in the collection? What is the theme? How are you going to connect your poems through the collection? All these moments can be broken down into smaller objectives we can take on one day at a time, and they will keep us moving until the collection is done. By planning ahead, the road becomes easier to follow.
Traveling light
Just like when we actually travel, overpacking will strain the journey. The weight of carrying more than we need will only slow us down, cause creative fatigue, and lead to feeling unmotivated. We writers tend to overpack emotionally, for example: perfectionism, fear of judgment, and narrow beliefs around our writing practices.
But to be honest, traveling is a messy and chaotic endeavor. So let go of what you don’t want to bring with you on this journey. Let it be messy but completely aligned with who you really are. Poetry, like all art, is a soul language. It needs to come from within for it to speak, or it will fall flat to the reader. Let your soul speak with a small rucksack instead of having to drag a heavy suitcase along.
You can do this by making a packing list. For example: Bringing curiosity, patience, and understanding. Leaving behind perfectionism, fear of judgment, and self-doubt. You will have something to remind you of how you want to travel, and that will motivate you to keep moving.
Let your writing goals not become an intangible dream. Grab that notebook and start mapping out your destination and how you want the journey to be.
Here are some tips I used in my journal
Get a notebook that reminds you of what your journey would be like. If it is a novel or a poetry collection, get one that resembles the theme or feel of your book.
A destination page should be the core of your travel plans. For me, it holds the architecture of what I want my poetry collection to be.
Make a packing list of the things you want to bring on this journey and one for what you want to leave behind.
Build different roadmaps for each chapter (plotting). What is happening in this chapter, and how will it move forward?
Leave footnotes at the end of each page of things you still need to do, where you might need some redirection, or fun ideas you might want to incorporate.
Keep a diary of all the special moments where you made progress. Write the joys, the feedback, and the progress. You can even add some pictures, doodles, or stickers.
Set up a space for you to freewrite your creative ideas. Creativity needs space, and who knows what will grow from these new ideas?
Add a playlist. No road trip is complete without a playlist. Write down the songs that inspired or motivated you during your writing journey.
Highlights page. Set up a space for you to write down the highlights of your journey. Is that reaching a certain wordcount, your cover reveal, a book announcement, or writing your first post on Substack? Give all these milestones a place for you to return to later in life and see the joys of the journey you have made as a poet / writer.
Your travel journal guided you through a glorious, chaotic collection of small but precious moments. Now, it's time to use that same compass to navigate your way to the finish line of your writing goals. Have fun traveling!
Thank you so much for reading. If you enjoyed this post, consider joining my free newsletter for more creative writing tips, journal ideas, and poetry prompts.
All my love,
CoraLynn
A Gentle Quill
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