Welcome to the Random Journal Day Link Up for June! I am overflowing with enthusiasm (naturally) in excess tonight as I tap out these words to share all the good stuff going on here this weekend. Big breaths…OK. So, as you all know we link up and share from our journals the first Friday of each month. All Journal Keepers (and planner addicts?) are welcome. Please jump in as you are and hang out with us. We are an easy-going bunch, and open to all sorts of nonsense!
This month is THREE times as special because not only do we have an extremely wonderful Featured Journal Keeper but we also have a Giveaway from her very generous heart and soul! All of this coinciding with our 21 Days of Journaling in June journey. Phew. Awesomeness abounds.
Our Guest and featured journal girl, Kel Rolfe is an inspiration and creative spirit, and I am grateful to have her with us. She really has a way with words and shares her creative gifts and talents graciously through her Writing /Blogging (Nourishment for the Soul) and Art Journaling (SoulDare). Grab a cup of something good and let’s soak in our sister’s words! Don’t forget to enter the Giveaway (Kel will explain how) and Link Up (Automatic Entry)! Happy RJD, Friends!
My name is Kel Rohlf! And I love words and playing with them in my journals.
I am honored to be the RJD guest host this month. Dawn graciously invited me to share about my passion for keeping journals. My earliest memory of personal journaling is tied to a small green diary with a golden latch lock and a key. It’s long gone now, but I do recall writing down my first fight with a friend, where I swore at her. Oh my!
The earliest journal that I have on my shelf is from the autumn of 1985, when I was still single. I am not sure why I decided to keep a personal journal. But I am glad that I started the journey, because it is so fun to go back and see how my life has changed, but most of all to see God’s faithfulness.
Reading the entries from the mid 80s and my early married life cause me to smile. What a young naïve girl, I was back then. My journals have evolved over the years. My taste in the type of journal and the contents have changed with my growing need to express myself and discover who I am in light of God’s love and presence in my life.
I used to buy various journals based on their covers. Over the past few years, I have decided that the best fit for me is an unlined, spiral bound art journal, because the contents of my journals keep changing.
A journal is more than a blank book to me; I maintain a relationship with my journal. It is my personal space to dialogue with God, doodle my dreams, ask myself hard questions, to take notes, to sketch ideas and to just express myself in a variety of ways. Lately, I have been including magazine collage and other art media.
Journaling is mostly a private experience. However, my life has been enriched by two journaling mentors. Mary Ann offers a journaling group at our church. We started out taking a class from her, based on the book Spiritual Journaling by Richard Peace. After the class completed, we formed a monthly accountability group. Each month, Mary Ann brings us a journaling prompt. We each write silently for about 20 minutes. Then she invites us to read our response to one another, if we want. Every time, we are amazed at how our written words minister to each other. Amazingly, her chosen topic is just what our hearts needed that afternoon.
My other journaling mentor and dear friend is Lynn Morrissey. Her book, Love Letters to God: Deeper Intimacy through Written Prayer reveals Lynn’s passion for writing to God as personal devotion. Her experience encourages me to be more real with God, especially in my journal. She has taught me a variety of approaches to journaling. As a certified Journal to the Self facilitator, she leads participants through a multifaceted workshop to deepen our experience with journaling. Through her workshops, I learned how to write acrostics, use springboard questions, write character sketches and utilize list making for self-discovery to name just a few techniques.
Journaling offers me space to improve and cultivate my writing skills. I began blogging in 2008 as a way to share devotions, which I first pondered in my journals. Then in 2011, I edited and compiled several blog posts into a self-published devotional called Defining Moments: Overflowing with Living Words. I continue to use my journal to meet with God and to write the words that He impresses on my heart at Nourishment for the Soul. (http://kelrohlf.wordpress.com)
I’d like to offer a giveaway to celebrate the joy of journaling and the fruit it bears in our lives.
To participate in the giveaway for a free copy of my book and a blank mixed-media art journal, leave a comment here or link-up for Random Journal Day or do both. I will pick a winner randomly on Monday, June 9th!
“Thus speaks the Lord God of Israel, saying: ‘Write in a book for yourself all the words that I have spoken to you.’ (Jeremiah 30:6 NKJV)
Linking with Friends: Create with Joy, Missional Women, Christian Mommy Blogger
Let’s Get This Party Started!
Enthusiastically, Dawn 
28 responses to “Random Journal Day Link- Up #41 with Kel Rohlf”
Oh man, I have been deep into “moving mode” and did not even realize it was RJD!! Yikes! I am so glad i happened to pop over here and I smiled when I saw your sweet face at the top of the post!! Now I have 3 great books to look for. These all sound so good and inspiring. Susie
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Hi Susie, I knew both you and Pam have so much going on right now that it would not be likely for eaither of you to participate- understandable. I am sure all your journals are packed! I am glad to see you here though! And I can testify about Both Kel’s and Lynn’s books…I have them both- pure excellence and inspiration. The other I will have to check out for sure, I think I have heard of it , many moons ago.
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Yep the journals are packed. It was hard to do because I do not know when I will see them again! We may be staying with the kids or a rental until we buy a house and unpack them again! I feel so naked without them! Haha!
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Susie- Moving…sounds like an adventure :0) look forward to seeing the lessons God cultivates this season…and wondering are you keeping a journal during the move?
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So great meeting you Kel, thanks for sharing.
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nice to meet you, too! peace and joy-Kel
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[…] Friends: It is the Friday of the month which means it’s Random Journal Day! Come check it out HERE – Featured Journal Keeper, Kel Rohlf, is serving up a great GIVEAWAY you don’t want to […]
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[…] the years I have found my journal to be a place, where I cultivate trust. Today, I am linking with Dawn and others who love journaling! I am the guest “hostess.” I will be giving away a copy […]
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Truly wonderful! Thank you for sharing how meaningful your journaling is to you. Truly inspirational!
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Thanks Maria- Journaling is like my daily cup of coffee couldn’t start the day without it 🙂
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Kel, I was so excited when I learned you would be the featured author/journal keeper here (all journalers are authors!), and then I read my name, and am utterly humbled. You are always so generous, and you inspire me in ways you cannot know. Like you, I was given those darling diaries with locks and keys as a child. And guess who always lost her key?! Guess who also did not complete those pages? But that’s ok. It showed me that writing was a means of capturing my little life onto the page and for catharting my childhood angst (like those girlfriend fights you mention, or for me, what boy was capturing my heart). My journals too have evolved–mostly as outpourings of my soul to the Lord, but also a canvas on which to paint snippets from my daily experiences, quotations, Scripture verses, and my art-of-the-heart collages (to name some). I love what you and Dawn our doing here! Journal on!
Love
Lynni
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Lynni- How could I ever share about journaling without mentioning you…my champion and mentor and captian of the journaling revolution! Truly you inspire me and I know God is going to expand and enrich and draw many other to Himself through the Heartsight Journaling ministry He has given to you…here’s to the new beginnings! Peace and love-Kel
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That being said- does Lynn have a contact page or anything for Heartsight Journaling, Kel? PS I love the way you actually have the name Lynni as your nickname for Lynn. It just reveals a sweet relationship between the two of you, I adore!
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Just posted my link–what a great giveaway, Kel!
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Dawn- Loved your link and look forward to how Bullet Journaling revolutionizes your life!
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I need to go find me an entry to write on, glad I have all weekend to do so. 🙂
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Deanna- Glad you found RJD and look forward to reading your link entry!
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There is nothing like a new journal – fresh, nothing written, waiting for those first thoughts to be recorded. Thanks for the opportunity for the new journal!
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Yes! A blank journal is full of so much potential to play, explore and discover and express our created selves!
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Joanneviola- you won the giveaway! Pls send mailing address to dawn at dawn.paoletta@gmail.com
Congrats! I’ll send you book and journal as soon as I get a mailing address.
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Wow. I never thought of having a journaling mentor. Thanks for sharing yours with us. I am definitely interested in a journaling mentor.
Melissa
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Thankfully God led Lynni to write a book, so that she can mentor us through her writing! And the book Journal to the Self is like having Kathleen Adams mentor and coach us through her techniques! And Dawn’s 21 Days of Journaling is another virtual mentoring experience!
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[…] I apologize for being late to my own gathering but I am ever so grateful for my fellow Journal Keeping pals who make sure to show up and make themselves at home anyway! One of the prompts for this past week […]
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Kel, you mentor me in art-journaling. As we said over tea yesterday, I collage for metaphors of discovery for insight and writing, which I know you do. But you also take it to a whole other level as an art form. So YOU mentor me!
And to Melissa….there are wonderful books on journaling that will help you. And as one of my mentors, author Gail MacDonald says (and she wrote some about journaling in her book Cliimbing Higher), her mentors were all book mentors (actually she said dead ones), but hopefully, as an author, I’m not joining their ranks immediately.
And to Dawn…..Kel met me as Lynni (well, Lynn, in one of my workshps, but afterward, I asked her to call me that. Funny, my brother, Danny, whom she knows or other family members *never* call me that. It started as this goofy high-school thing w/ girlfriends, adding i’s or ie’s to our names. And it stuck. Kind of ridiculous for someone of my vintage now, but if my husband calls me Lynn, I wonder what I did wrong!
As for Heartsight Journaling….. no, no website, etc. I have really been praying about that. I have been teaching classes in my home, but realize that some could go online. I also taught Journal to the Self for Kay Adams, online. It’s a neat forum, but I love the face-to-face with students. R
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such a great post ! a fellow journaller [journalist?!] it’s always fascinating to hear another’s journey and tales out of school =)
ty for sharing openly and offering generously – blessings!
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[…] winner of the Random Journal Giveaway w/Kel Rohlf is Joanneviola ! Congratulations! Please e-mail your mailing address to dawn.paoletta@gmail.com […]
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[…] through Written Prayer “. To my delight, my dear blogging friend and fellow journal keeper, Kel Rohlf- shared Lynn’s book and writing on her blog awhile back and I was thrilled to recognize the […]
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[…] favorite Journal Pals is here on the blog today sharing her own blend of journal love. My friend, Kel Rohlfe, is a kindred creative, and word girl. I am grateful to know her and blessed that God allowed us to […]
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