BENEFITS OF JOURNALING

JOURNALING

“Writing in a journal each day allows you to direct your focus to what you accomplished, what you’re grateful for and what you’re committed to doing better tomorrow. Thus, you are more deeply enjoy your journey each day.” Hal Elrod

Journaling is not a new concept. In the past people kept personal journals where they would write their days events, thoughts and feelings. Almost every self help or self development book you read, the first advise they give is journal every morning. You hear people emphasising on journaling on YouTube videos and podcasts. Do you ever wonder why there is so much emphasis on journaling? It turns out that journaling has many benefits and it costs you no more than ten to twenty minutes of your time. It is easy to do and can be a fun and creative activity.

There are many reasons why people journal. Some want to express their gratitude, record their days events, write down prayers or goals or dreams, write their thoughts, to self-reflect, record their travel journey or pregnancy experience and so much more.

Benefits of Journaling

Increases Self-awareness

Journaling helps us step back from this hectic day to day busy life and reflect on ourselves, our needs, dreams, thoughts, wants, goals, daily activities and different aspects of our lives. It is a great way of getting to know yourself.

Reduces Stress

Writing your feelings, thoughts and emotions in a journal helps you “dump” these negative feeling on a paper. You might have heard people mention that once they have talked about their problems, they feel better. Journaling is a way of talking about your problems on a paper. Once you’ve journaled your problems you’ll feel relieved. This helps reduce your stress and anxiety level.

Clarify your thoughts and feelings

You might have a lot of conflicting thoughts. Maybe some of them don’t make sense. It can become very confusing and frustrating at times. Journaling helps organise those thoughts and make them apprehensible.

Increase problem solving skills

“Typically we problem solve from a left-brained, analytical perspective. But sometimes the answer can only be found by engaging right-brained creativity and intuition. Writing unlocks these other capabilities, and affords the opportunity for unexpected solutions to seemingly unsolvable problems”, psychcentral.com

Resolve Conflict

Writing down can resolve any misunderstandings. It will be easier to practise empathy once you’ve written down the events and reflected on it.

Cope with depression

Journaling can help you track your thoughts associated with your mental illness. It can help one identify the triggers so you can find ways to reduce these triggers or the impact these triggers have. By writing your thoughts without any judgement or filtration you are able to monitor your negative thoughts and behavioural pattern.This gives your a chance to acknowledge these thoughts and behaviours and find ways to deal with them.

Increases Altruism

Research shows that regularly noting feelings of gratitude in a journal leads to increased altruism. Gratitude journal leads people to experience more of the emotion, makes people more supportive of others and improves relationships. Research has shown that there is noticeable changes in how the brain responds to giving.

“It turns out that the neural connection between gratitude and giving is very deep, both literally and figuratively. A region deep in the frontal lobe of the brain, called the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, is key to supporting both. Anatomically, this region is wired up to be a hub for processing the value of risk and reward; it’s richly connected to even deeper brain regions that provide a kick of pleasurable neurochemicals in the right circumstances. It holds abstract representations of the inner and outer world that help with complex reasoning, one’s representation of oneself and even social processing”, Christina Karns — The Conversation.

For anyone suffering from mental illness journaling shouldn’t be the only means of trying to cope with your illness. Combine journaling with:

• proper diet
• exercise
• socialising
• spending time doing activities that you enjoy
• counselling
• medication if that is prescribed by your healthcare practitioner

7 Key Reasons to Journal by Robin Sharma

Different types of journaling is used for different purposes. Each has its own benefits. Journaling is the only way to express, observe and reflect on your inner thoughts, emotions and feelings without the fear of being judged. It is a way of writing your dreams, imaginations and goals and coming up with plans to turn these into reality. It is a way to monitor your progress and so much more.

Even though I love writing I don’t journal everyday. It shouldn’t feel like a chore. I tend to write for the following reasons:

• I feel like writing
• I need to clear my head
• I need to write down ideas so I don’t forget them
• To practise gratitude
• Set goals and steps required to achieve those goals.

Writing for me is a form of relaxation. I absolutely love writing and I would like to grow as a writer. Re-reading some of the previous journal entries helps me monitor my progress.

“The starting point of discovering who you are, your gifts, your talents, your dreams, is being comfortable with yourself. Spend time alone. Write in a journal.” Robin Sharma

NOTE: IF YOU ARE SUFFERING FROM ANY FORM OF MENTAL ILLNESS OR ANY OTHER MEDICAL CONDITIONS PLEASE SEEK PROFESSIONAL MEDICAL ADVISE.

Start journaling. Make it fun. Enjoy the process.