Journaling in your first year at university: writing through the strangest year

First year at university is one of the largest changes a person goes through, and it happens surrounded by people performing how well it's going. Everyone is in a new city, nobody has any structure, and the official position is that this is the best time of your life.

A journal is where the other version gets recorded: the one that can't be posted, and that most people only admit to years later, when they find out everyone else felt the same.

Homesickness is normal and nobody says so

In the first term, an enormous number of people are quietly miserable, and almost none of them say it, because everyone else appears to be thriving.

Writing it down does two things. It stops you concluding you're the only one, and it gives you a record. By March, reading October's entries is genuinely reassuring, because you will have completely forgotten how hard the first six weeks were.

Write down who you're becoming

This is the year you find out which parts of you were you and which were your family, your school, or your town. Some opinions you arrived with won't survive the year, and some will get stronger.

That's much more interesting if it's recorded. Almost nobody remembers what they actually believed at eighteen, and reading it back later is one of the few genuinely startling experiences a journal offers.

The friendships move fast

First-term friendships are often based on proximity and panic, and they reshuffle around Christmas. That reshuffle hurts and is rarely discussed.

Write about who you're spending time with and whether you like who you are around them. That's the question that matters, and at nineteen it's very easy not to ask it while you're relieved to have anyone at all.

Track the work honestly

The structure of school is gone and nobody notices if you don't turn up. That's fine for about five weeks.

A short weekly entry on what you actually did, rather than what you meant to do, catches the drift early. It's also the most useful thing to have if you end up needing to explain a difficult term to a tutor, because it's dated and specific rather than a vague account of a bad few months.

Start your own private journal tonight.

Innera keeps your stories encrypted on your device. Free to start.

Download on the App Store

Free to start. Your stories stay encrypted on your device.

Prompts for the year

• How was this week, without the version I'd post?
• What have I changed my mind about since I got here?
• Who do I like being around, and why?
• What did I actually do this week, honestly?
• What do I want to be true by summer?

When it's more than settling in

Struggling to settle is normal; not eating, not sleeping, not leaving your room for days, or feeling like there's no point is not something to write through alone. Every university has a counselling service, and using it in first year is common and unremarkable.

Why it needs to be private

You're living in a shared building with thin walls and no privacy, often with people you've known for eight weeks. A notebook in a shared room is not private, and neither is anything posted anywhere.

Innera keeps every story encrypted on your device, so the honest account of a year everyone else is performing stays yours, including the parts about the people two doors down.