How to approach nature journaling using personal style

How to Approach Nature Journaling Using Your Personal Style

Every person is unique, special, and far too complex to ever place themselves neatly into single categories. Most of us have specific preferences about how we like to participate in our hobbies and we have more fun with the activity matches our nature personalities.

This post explores some of the many ways you can approach nature journaling so that you can have the most fun possible.

Some notes about these nature journaling approaches

This post describes common ways that people approach nature journaling but aren’t intended to be labels or used to tell you how you should nature journal. Most of us tend to prefer one pattern more than another. But most likely, each of us falls somewhere on the continuum between the two extremes.

Also, nature journaling supports all approaches and styles. Every journaling pattern has its pros and cons and each nature journaler discovers which pattern they prefer over time, and as they focus on journaling their personal nature experiences.

Our preferences can also change over time or across seasons, so please don’t feel locked into only one pattern.

You may take a different approach to our nature journaling practice depending on the day, your mood, your energy levels, how well you slept, the extent of existing commitments, etc. Actually enjoying nature and journaling about your experiences within it matter more than the mechanics of how you journal. Honor your own personality whenever you journal and enjoy the freedom nature journaling offers.

Disciplined journaling vs. inspired journaling

Disciplined nature journaling approach

Some journalers gravitate towards the disciplined approach to nature journaling. You may prefer this approach if you enjoy structure, routine, and want an organized approach to writing and building your observational skills.

Disciplined nature journalers create nature journal entries consistently; several times a week, if not daily. Their entries focus on everyday events and observations and may or may not include substantial personalization.

Pros of disciplined approach

  • Discover your interests very quickly because the routine of daily journaling generates a lot of data quickly
  • Improves writing, art, or photography skills very quickly through practice
  • Builds a routine that makes getting started easier
  • The discipline daily journalers rely on supports discipline in other areas of life
  • Get regular doses of fresh air, sunshine, which is healthy
  • Gives you a sense of accomplishment every day
  • Increases your feeling of connectedness with the natural world
  • Helps you appreciate how quickly time flies and how precious it is

Cons of disciplined approach

  • Requires discipline up front to build the daily nature journaling habit
  • May struggle at times to figure out what to write about
  • Familiarity may breed contempt (i.e. animals you see every day may cease to be very interesting).
  • Generates a lot of content quickly that may clutter your physical or digital space
  • Nature journaling may feel like one more obligation on days when you are uninspired or feeling depleted
  • May not allow time to develop ideas fully or build out journal entries into full creative expression (i.e. finished poem, edited photo, etc.)

Inspired nature journaling approach

Other nature journalers take a more flexible approach to their journaling and enjoy the inspired approach. You may enjoy this approach if you prefer your nature journaling to focus on your personal experiences and reactions to the nature world rather than objective observations.

Pros of inspired approach

  • Journal entries tend to convey a sense of wonder, excitement, and energy
  • Allows time to develop creative ideas (i.e. they have time to draft and revise a poem in between nature walks and consecutive journal entries)
  • Keeps nature journaling feeling fresh and avoids repetition

Cons of inspired approach

  • May struggle to journal since inspiration is fleeting. Without the discipline instilled by a regular nature journaling habit, journalers may struggle to โ€œdo the workโ€ of putting their thoughts in writing.
  • Writing, drawing, and/or photography skills might not advance because they’re only practiced intermittently.
  • May delay self-discovery about what form and subjects they naturally gravitate towards because they only journal every once in a while.
Author writing in nature journal. Photograph taken by the author. Copyright Now I Wonder.

Visual journaling vs. verbal journaling

Visual nature journaling approach

Many nature journalers prefer that their nature journals be filled with drawings or photographs. They focus naturally on representing nature through visual media and draw, paint, take photographs, or shoot video.

By far, drawing is the most popular visual media for nature journaling, although photography and videography are great options for visual nature journalers as well. Artistic nature journalers enjoy rendering plants and animals on the pages of their nature journals. Those journalers who prefer photography or videography enjoy capturing fleeting natural moments with their cameras.

Visual journalers use their medium to tell stories about what they experience while out in nature, as well as the meaning those experiences have for them. These stories can be simple snapshots that ground a nature experience in sequence (i.e. first I saw this animal, then I saw this other animal, etc.) or can be full-fledged narratives, complete with plot, characters, inciting incident, and obstacles to overcome.

Pros of visual approach

  • Excellent option if you don’t enjoy writing or expressing yourself in words.
  • Offers opportunity to expand your nature journaling hobby into additional creative expression beyond just writing.
  • Requires you to truly focus on the moment and the subject which you are drawing or photographing, which eases stress, increases relaxation, and enhances observations skills.

Cons of visual approach

  • Each nature journal entry usually takes longer to create, especially if you are drawing sketches in the field.
    • Photography happens faster out in the field but requires additional work to sort and prepare photographs.
  • You might focus too narrowly on one subject and miss exciting activity happening around you.
  • You may ignore or discount the non-visual sensory information that helps you connect deeply to the natural world, like sound and touch.
  • Artistic and photographic skills take time to build. You may feel discouraged if your early field drawings fail to meet your standards or if you fail to get usable photographs of interesting animals.
DSLR camera and palm tree nature journal. Photograph taken by the author. Copyright Now I Wonder.

Verbal nature journaling approach

Luckily, nature journalers can choose to journal using words rather than through drawing or photography. Journalers who prefer this approach represent their nature experiences through words and writing. Writing in nature journaling range from short phrases to objective lists, to narratives, essays, or poems.

Pros of verbal approach

  • Word use comes naturally to us as we’ve spent our entire lives building our vocabularies in our native languages.
  • Fast means to document observations, thoughts, and feelings.
  • Requires no more than a notebook and a pen or pencil.
  • Words can stand alone or support drawings as captions or additional notes.

Cons of verbal approach

  • Pages filled with words are not as visually interesting as pages filled or accented with drawings or photographs.
  • We may struggle with word choice.
    • For example, nature is filled with every shade of green imaginable, which can be hard to describe in words. We may struggle to move beyond bland descriptions such as โ€œbright greenโ€, โ€œspring greenโ€, and โ€œforest greenโ€.
  • Words are constructs created and agreed upon by many people. They may not convey the same feeling of personal experience as a drawing or a photograph does.

Scientific journaling vs. philosophical journaling

Scientific nature journaling

Nature journaling lends itself to teaching about the plants, animals, and phenomena that surround us in nature. Some nature journalers prefer to focus on objective experiences and observations. Their observations often lead them asking questions and researching the answers. This scientific approach to nature journaling helps journalers appreciate nature by encouraging them to learn about what they see.

Pros to scientific approach

  • Comfortable for private people who prefer minimal personal disclosure and a more objective approach.
  • Develop great depth of knowledge about researched topics.
  • Become skilled in species identification, ecology, and animal behavior.
  • Can participate in citizen scientist projects that expand scientists’ understanding of the nature world.

Cons of scientific approach

  • Research into questions raised through journaling takes additional time to complete.
  • May experience difficulty answering questions or identifying species, which can be frustrating.
  • Analyzing nature may prevent you from enjoying it.
  • May feel less creative or like you’re nature journaling “right”

Philosophical nature journaling approach

Nature journalers who gravitate towards the more “philosophical” end of the nature journaling spectrum focus their efforts on questions like “what did this experience mean to me?”. They care about how their time in nature affects them personally and how they connect to the natural world.

Philosophical nature journalers enjoy deep thinking about broad topics that impact humanity. They journal to learn about themselves and their place in the natural world so enjoy writing subjective journal entries that include personal thoughts, feelings, and disclosure.

Pros of philosophical approach

  • Comfortable for people whose goals include self-discovery and personal connections.
  • Increase sense of connection with fellow humans, fellow creatures, and our amazing planet.
  • Can feel more “creative” because of the personal, free-form nature of the approach.

Cons of philosophical approach

  • Emphasis on personal experience and self-discovery may limit nuance and detail about the natural world in journal entries.
  • May miss the broader context within which animals and plants live because of their focus on their personal experiences.
Nature journal with abstract blue cover and three pens. Photograph taken by the author. Copyright Now I Wonder.

Free-form journaling vs. structured journaling

Free-form nature journaling

Nature journalers who enjoy taking a free-form approach find that their nature journal entries vary depending on the journalers’ mood, energy levels, and what they see and experience while out in nature.

These journalers often enjoy writing “stream of consciousness” entries, or using the free-writing technique to document the thoughts that flow through their mings. Many use prompts or other points of inspiration for their nature journaling but don’t use templates or mimic other people’s journaling style.

Pros of free-form approach

  • Lends itself to self-discovery thanks to the freedom involved
  • Generates a lot of content quickly
  • Bypasses inner critics which makes nature journaling enjoyable and fun
  • Element of surprise and self-discovery as free-form journalers never know what their entries will include or how the entries will look when they start an entry.

Cons of free-form approach

  • Engagement with nature may stay shallow due to skipping from topic to topic
  • May miss some exciting animals and plants while focusing on keeping up with thoughts
  • May fail to document information that didn’t seem important in the moment but that could help illuminate the experience later.

Structured nature journaling approach

Nature journalers who gravitate towards a structured approach to journaling organize their journal entries methodically. They prefer to have a plan for what they will write in their nature journals, even if that plan represents only a general topic. Structured nature journaling often involves use of templates to help the journaler organize their thoughts and use of prompts to guide the journaler’s nature experience.

Pros of structured approach

  • Less pressure to come up with unique ideas of what to capture in each entry.
  • Allows the focus to be on the experiences in nature, not immediate creativity in the moment
  • Easy to see patterns such as seasonal changes and animal behavior because the entries are structured the same and the same information is documented in every entry.

Cons of structured approach

  • May feel constricting to nature journalers who want freedom to express themselves.
  • May struggle to find the โ€œbestโ€ template or way to organize their journal entries.
  • May feel bored with nature journaling over time due to repetitive use of the same template or structure.

Conclusion

As you can see, each of us brings our own personalities and preferences into our nature journaling. No matter where your preferences land on the continuum of these different approaches, you can enjoy exploring nature more when you capture your thoughts and experiences in a way that works best for you.

No approach is any better than any other. Our nature journals reflect our unique personalities and preferences in ways that can never be duplicated by anyone else. And that makes nature journaling an endlessly creative endeavor, no matter which combination of approaches you prefer.

Happy nature journaling!

author avatar
Christine
Christine is the creator and author of NowIWonder.com, a website dedicated to the animals and plants that share our world, and the science that helps us understand them. Inspired by lifelong exploration and learning, Christine loves to share her knowledge with others who want to connect with wild faces and wild spaces.

Similar Posts