You feel that all of your body and some of your spirit has come down to your fingertips.
—Norman Mailer

This is what I do most mornings: I pour a freshly brewed mug of French press coffee and open a blue hardcover journal with smooth lined paper. I look up towards the corner of the ceiling in my office, to the left of the window, wave and say, “Hi Jesus!”

Humor me—I know Jesus isn’t hovering up there like a Botticelli putti. As some people light candles, finger prayer beads, or meditate, my ritual greeting opens my heart. I feel loved and I smile—prayer releases oxytocin, dopamine and serotonin—the feel-good hormones. Then Jesus and I have a chat and I record it in my notebook. 

I started writing out my prayers because I can’t pray more than a minute or two before my mind wanders. Who did I hear needed help? Who did I already pray for? What did I ask God to do? I would have no idea if I didn’t write things down. 

Writing in My Jesus Book has over time become a practice of gratitude, a meditation, and a self-examination. My heart has expanded, my world has expanded, I live with more intention. I cannot write as I did last winter, “I want my life to be significant,” and then binge-watch Netflix all weekend. Or, “help me to be kind to someone today,” and ignore everyone at the grocery store. Sometimes I do a brain dump—my relatives in Ukraine, my daughter’s health, where am I going to board my incorrigible dog for the weekend? My entries are transparent—sometimes hopeful, sometimes grateful, often despairing. For a long time “Jesus, help! Please help!” was all I could manage.

I have kept a journal since high school. There’s a long shelf of notebooks in my office from the last few years: oversize spiral bound hardbacks; a dozen labelled “Therapy;” several  black bullet journals. Sometimes I think I should throw my old notebooks away, but I keep them because they show me the trajectory of my life, because they document the truths I’ve lived, because they record my challenges and triumphs and who I aspire to be as I wave at Jesus every morning.