Random journal prompt: tap for a question you can answer fast

Tap for a random journal prompt

Here’s the shuffler. Tap Another question until one looks easy, then write your line in the box.

Write your first line

Today’s question

What did you get right on the first try today?

Another question Write without one

Your line

Save my line

Five plain words are enough.

Your line stays on this device. It is saved only in this browser and never sent anywhere.

It draws from the 35 questions further down this page, which we wrote ourselves and sorted by the five faces you’d also find in the app.

If you’d rather just write, the Write without one button clears the question and leaves you an empty box.

Want a longer list to browse instead? The pillar guide has 120 journal prompts sorted by mood, and each of them fits in a line.

Why let the page pick the question

A list of 100 prompts is lovely on a slow Sunday afternoon.

Late on a weeknight it’s a different job. The phone charger only works at one angle, the day is still loud in your head, and scrolling 100 questions to find the right one starts to feel like homework.

So a shuffle skips that job.

You don’t have to like the question. You only have to be able to answer it, and the first noun that comes to mind is usually enough.

But tapping is fun. Some nights you could reroll for ten minutes and write nothing, which is the same blank page with better animation.

Three taps, then answer whatever is showing.

And if you really can’t answer it, that’s a line too: “Didn’t like the question. Too tired for it.”

Nobody’s grading this.

How to answer a random prompt in one line

The fastest answer is one thing you could photograph: a place, an object, a person or a meal. One small detail after it finishes the line.

So a question like “What do you want to keep from today?” doesn’t need a speech, and “The window seat on the bus, sun on one side of my face” is a perfectly good reply.

They’re plain on purpose. Answer the question you got, not a better one.

And the page has no opinion about your handwriting, or your spelling.

But if a question sends you somewhere bigger, follow it and keep going. Most nights, one line will do.

A question that’s already waiting

A random question is one way past a blank page. Another is to give the day something to write about first.

On paper, the trick is to do one small thing first, like reading two pages or watering the plant on the windowsill.

Then write a line about it. Something you did a few minutes ago is still fresh, so the words are easy to find.

How the app asks its question

We make Yumemira, the small-steps journal for iPhone, around that trick, so we’re biased here. A pen works just as well.

In the app, you pick something you want, like reading more, and each day offers one small step. When you mark it done, Mira cheers and a button says Say how it went.

For a blank entry in the phone journal, Mira asks a question that fits the time of day.

The app doesn’t shuffle like this page does. Its question changes with the day, and Another question shows the next one in that set.

Once you start typing, the question shrinks to a small card. The arrows beside it do the same job as the Another question button.

Either way, the question only has to get you to the first word. The rest of the line is yours.

Random journal questions, sorted by how today felt

These are the 35 questions the shuffler draws from, written by us in plain words so that each one can be answered in a single line, even when you’re half asleep.

Tap a face below, and the shuffler at the top draws only from that face’s group.

How did today feel?

Tap a face. Tap it again to take it off.

Great Okay So-so Worried Hard

Every face is fine.

Your pick stays on this page. Nothing is sent anywhere.

The worried and hard groups ask about one small next step on purpose.

Keep hard-day answers short and true. The page doesn’t need the whole story tonight.

Make a random prompt jar on paper

If the phone stays in another room at night, you can copy ten of the questions above onto strips of paper and fold them into a mug by the bed.

Each night you pull one out without looking and answer it in your notebook before the strip goes into a second mug for used questions.

If you’d rather have order than chance, a prompt for every date takes the choosing away in a different way.

And for a first week of writing anything at all, easy prompts for beginners start even smaller.

Back in 1975, the fix for a stuck afternoon was one card from a shuffled deck.

Tonight, before the phone goes on its charger, tap the shuffler once. Five words will do.

That’s tonight’s card.