Start with a concrete detail
Describe a gesture, object, or place rather than beginning with a broad emotional label. Specific details give a journal entry texture and allow the reader, including your future self, to make an interpretation.
Change the narrator
Write the same brief scene from another viewpoint. Notice which details become important and which disappear. This exercise reveals how voice shapes an apparently simple event.
Leave visual space
Alternate dense writing with small sketches or a single line. Page rhythm can help a journal feel readable without turning every entry into a finished composition.