I store my I Ching readings on my computer; I have done for many years. It makes them easier to review, both because my handwriting’s in the ‘inebriated spider meanderings’ class, and because of the wonders of search.
“Didn’t I receive this hexagram before when I was trying to work out what to write to X?”
With a pen-and-paper journal, it’d take hours flipping through pages to answer this question. (If you want to keep a paper journal, I strongly recommend also maintaining a hexagram index for it!) And questions like “Isn’t this usually the relating hexagram?” or “Is it my imagination, or am I getting the fifth line moving a lot when I ask about this topic?” would simply be unanswerable.
In the software I store my readings in now, it’s just a matter of checking a couple of boxes and clicking ‘search’. Also, I can’t destroy the information by spilling a drink on it! (I have this bad habit of using water-soluble ink.) I use UltraRecall to store everything, from business projects and emails to readings.
If you need a life-sized life-organiser, I recommend UltraRecall. But it’s not specifically designed as journalling software, and if that’s all you want it might well be overkill. I was prompted to write this post because Steve Pavlina is recommending some journalling software. Order it through his site and it comes with some templates he contributed – could be worth the purchase just for these.
I haven’t tried this one, but many of its features sound ideal for an I Ching journal. The ability to create categories (journalling in general, dreams, I Ching readings, synchronicities…?); the use of topic ‘tags’; a full keyword search that would enable you to search by hexagram; a ‘loose-leaf’ feature as well as dated entries, that you could use to store your developing ideas on particular hexagrams; the option of adding multimedia to your entries. It also allows you to create your own templates, something that can be very useful for readings – not just to ensure you write down the question and the text of your answers, but also, if you so wish, to begin a session with an ‘intention for the reading’ or end with ‘how this changes things’.
Most important of all, it’s designed to make it easy to open the program and start writing straight away, which is a vital feature if a program’s going to get used, instead of just being an interesting thing you might try when you have time to work it out. Oh, and there’s a 45 day free trial, no less, which also includes Steve P’s templates.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a temptation to resist.