For as long as I can remember, I have always journaled. I started back in the 3rd grade when seemingly everyone kept one after our teacher asked us to keep a diary for a week as an assignment. Most of my classmates stuck out for about a week. Me, I’m on my 27th year of journaling and I don’t think I’m going to be quitting anytime soon.
I think it helps to give a little context about myself and my journaling habit. I don’t journal every day, which I know some hardcore journal writers would scorn at. I used to write every day religiously, often multiple times a day.
My feelings would fill pages after pages of my thoughts and feelings. A habit of writing a journal heals me in different ways. But I realized I’m spending way too much time putting my thoughts into the paper when I could have been doing something a little more productive and fruitful with my time.
So about five years ago, I decided to limit my writing to about 30 to an hour of journaling and I’m lifting my rule on trying to write every day. I now average around 4 to 5 days of journal writing a week which I think is a perfect balance.
Having had close to 3 decades of journal writing, I can honestly say it has tremendous events in my life, both personal and career-wise. In this article, I will explain some of its benefits and how it might benefit your life too. Stick around.
Benefits of journaling for Mental Health
1.Documenting My Days
If you want to start a journal the easy way is “keep it simple”. I started with documenting my days, what happened, who I interacted with, the highs and lows of that day.
Writing about my everyday activities in the journal really kickstarts my writing skills and helped me to recall significant events.
After more than two decades of writing, I still include the day’s events but now I stick to the important and significant ones. In doing so, I can easily go through past entries and see major events and how I handled it.
When I feel very upset or depressed I look back to my days and feel happy again. A habit of writing a journal is one of the good daily habits that improves the quality of your life.
Related Article: 21 Simple Ways to Boost Your Mental Health
2. A Great Way to Organize Your Thoughts
When I started keeping a journal way back in elementary school, there was very little sense in what I was writing. As young as I was, I wasn’t really capable of introspection and deeper thoughts. I went online to do a couple of research and I stumbled upon online paper help, a great online resource for anyone having trouble coming up with the right words and ideas. It really helped me jumpstart my daily journals. I stuck to documenting what had happened that day.
A couple of months in, after my mom realized I was keeping a diary, she suggested adding in my thoughts and feelings for each of the important moments of the day.
Regardless of her intentions, my journal became my avenue not only for documenting each of the things that happened that day but it also allowed me to make sense of my thoughts and feelings.
There are several benefits of Journaling for Depression, Anxiety, and Stress made me realize that I am having a really good booby. Writing in a journal is working as a coping mechanism if you are going through hard days. I feel like a more organized person as I can go through all of my life events so quickly.
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3. Mood Booster
Another benefit I discovered with journal writing is its ability to boost my feelings anytime I feel down. Because I’m able to easily recognize what I’m feeling and I’m putting it down in a concrete way, it’s easy for me to break it down and inspect why I’m feeling this way, what caused it, and how should I react to it.
During times when I’m in a particularly heavy funk and I’m feeling demotivated to write, I go through my previous journal entries and read through some of them.
Seeing where I was in the past and where I currently now help to put things into perspective. Whatever the situation I’m facing now, sooner or later it will pass, I just have to push through it. Journal helps me to be a happier person. One thing is sure I am not giving up my journalling habit.
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4. Improving Self-Awareness
Through journaling, I have a far better understanding of myself, my thoughts, feelings, and actions. Any time I encounter a problem or a situation, I can easily predict how I might react and try to divert it into a constructive one.
During particularly hard times, I’m able to understand that none of it will last and the best I can do is try to process how I’m feeling so I’m better prepared when it does happen again.
By writing you can encourage more positive self-talk and write down some of these short positive affirmations to boost your positive vibes.
In a way, I have become a less reactive person, able to gauge my feelings first before showing any reactions no matter the situation.
How a habit of writing in a journal benefits overall wellbeing?
Writing is one kind of therapy where you express your daily struggle and wins. When you start writing a journal on a daily basis, you will find out that your feelings are coming out easily. Writing works as a therapeutic to get rid of emotional pain in your life.
Journalling for mental health can give you the ease of any mental issues like depression, anxiety, panic attack, and emotional trauma.
Is journalling good for mental health?
Journaling has brought so many benefits into my life and the ones I’ve mentioned above are only the major ones I can think of.
Journaling for mental health benefits each individual and you can try some of these tips to improve your mental health.
By writing in a journal, you’re jotting down your problems and worries. You can track any trigger points and symptoms of any of your mental health issues as you are writing into a journal daily.
It improves your mood, communication skill, decreased negative thoughts and greater the feeling of happiness.
Through journal writing, I’m able to form meaningful and lasting relationships. I’m better suited to work with others. And I have a clearer focus on my goals and aspirations.
Just because I have decades of experience doesn’t mean you can’t begin to form the habit of writing in a journal. So start, TODAY. Don’t hold yourself by thinking you are not good at writing.
Simply write down your daily events and how do you feel. Spare only 10 minutes to reflect your entire day and see how journaling benefits your mental health.
Do you ever write into a journal? If not, let me know which things make you hesitate to start a journal.
If you are already writing in a journal, be nice enough to share your experience or just share a pic of your journal.
I love to see your journal. Keep sharing this article and write back to me.
