Tera's Wish

shine time journaling

I have come to collect stories of different kinds of journaling from the people who share with me through Tera's Wish. Two weeks ago, I received a phone call from a lovely lady named Denise and her 12-year-old daughter Amanda. They had read the website and called me about a project they were working on. During the conversation, Amanda told me about Shine Time Journaling and they gave me permission to share it with you.

Denise is the mother of eight children; three biological children and five foster kids. In an effort to give each child the attention they deserve, the family began what they call "shine time". It started at the dinner table as each child was asked what they had done that day. When someone had something special happen, a toast (usually milk) was raised in celebration. The problem was that some of the children were shy about telling their own stories.

Denise wanted to encourage the children to encourage one another. One Sunday she suggested that instead of telling what they had done that day, they went around the table and Denise asked each child to tell something good about one of the other children. When it was a moment to shine, both children were toasted. Denise said she was amazed at the way this caused the kids to bond to one another. They began to actively talk and want to brag about each other's accomplishments.

Denise decided that these moments were too good to pass up, so she purchased a book with blank pages. Each Sunday they would go around the table and if something was truly special, everyone would agree and the event was recorded in the Shine Journal. Sometimes a Polaroid photo, a ribbon, or other illustration of the event would accompany it.

In < Creating a Charmed Life, author Victoria Moran. I also mentions "Shine Time". In it, she describes a day in which she encouraged her husband to go off to a workshop instead of doing work around the house she had asked him to do. "He thought I was being selfless and wonderful", she writes, "but I really wasn't. You see, I'd had a lot of shine time that week - a couple of career successes, a lunch out with five favorite friends, and a massage that accounted for one, entire, luxurious hour. I was full. When you're basking in the sun, it's natural to want those you love to join you there. But if you are not getting enough of your own shine time, it's easy to be needy, whiny, and pitiful."

She continues, "It can get worse than that: the shine-deficient tend to resent other people's accomplishments and dampen their dreams. Sometimes, they sabotage the potential of even their own children because their need for personal recognition is so seldom met."

Denise's family uses their Shine Time journal as a way to bring everyone together. She says that the kids will often go back and read the pages of their own success. They proudly show their friends what their brothers and sisters have written about them in it. Amanda has now started her own Shine Time journal as a sort of variation on a gratitude journal. Each night, she writes down all of the compliments that she receives, good grades, awards, honors, etc. She has divided her journal by School, Friends, Family, and Future. She dates each entry and includes as much detail as she can as to who said it, the circumstances, and as much detail as possible.

Denise says that she can see a huge difference in Amanda's self esteem since she began Shine Time journaling. When she is feeling insecure, the journal has become proof of her ability to succeed in all of the areas of her life.

If you have tried gratitude journaling, but found that it was too intense to do everyday- Shine Time journaling may be a wonderful alternative for you - or perhaps for your family.

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