Mental Health Benefits of Journaling (A Practice To Help You Live More Mindfully)
journaling (verb) ; putting pen to paper to unleash your inner voice; a potential tool for more mindfulness if you use it in such a way.
A journaling practice provide us with the opportunity to look inwardly, which can help us toward higher self expansion.
A consistent journaling practice can help us to achieve our goals beyond a conventional way because it offers us the space for deep inner reflection where our unique ideas can be awakened, expressed and acknowledged. Journaling can act as a tool to help improve our ability to be mindful and self aware, by providing the space to reflect on ideas, thoughts and feelings that can promote deeper self growth.
Gaining a deeper relationship to self can, ultimately, improve the general quality of our lives.
Healthy vs. Unhealthy Journaling
Let’s start with talking about something that might seem counter intuitive for me to say:
Yes, like many things, journaling can be unproductive if you use it unwisely.
Just as I believe that too much talk therapy done in an unproductive & unhealthy way can be counterproductive to your mental health; using journaling to feed negative ways of thinking and further rumination and complaining about issues without positive resolution can be equally unhealthy.
Obviously, I’m not here to control how you self express; however, I do want you to be generally aware of how journaling through your difficult emotions can be more productive for you.
Keep in mind that there’s a difference between digging deeper into the blame or hatred about a circumstance, person or event vs. finding a way to vent in a healthy way where there’s self reflection, an opportunity for self responsibility and positive problem solving.
With that said; let’s move forward with how this mental health tool can be a huge gateway toward your personal growth.
Why Journal? The potential mental health benefits can include:
improve mood
reduce stress
guidance & clarity toward achieving goals
gain self awareness
increase self confidence
improved memory
improve ability to emotionally regulate
increase ability to emotionally express
increased intuition; being more “in tune with self”
improved relationship with a healthy sense of self control (internal locus of control)
“The Journal of Experimental Psychology published research that shows how writing your thoughts down can reduce intrusive thoughts about negative events and improve working memory. Even the simple act of writing something down lets your brain know you want to remember it.” -kaiserpermanente.org
Journaling: A strategy for mindfulness
A journaling practice can help to:
promote healthy self reflection
help to bring the unconscious; conscious
better self understanding and understanding of your experiences
can help identify areas of struggle
tool to brainstorm for positive solutions and ideas for healthy change
can help you gain healthy perspective around fear, anxiety and worry
a general tool to help you discover positive perspective
promote inspiration / thinking outside the box
What are the benefits of journaling?
Journaling can provide “a place to put it.” Meaning a place to put down unsettled thoughts, which can lead to more clarity of mind and an enhanced peaceful demeanor.
There's so much that a consistent journaling practice offers you.
A consistent journaling practice is a way to process and work through the emotions that are occurring on a daily basis. It's one of those practices that you may not even realize how much is helping you to stay grounded and clear. (until it’s gone) Allowing thoughts to flow onto a page via writing is a targeted way to allow for self expression and a release of emotions. This can help you clear out any thoughts and feelings that may be blocking you from taking healthy action. Not to mention that journaling can also help you with processing and understanding difficult emotions.
How often should I journal?
A daily practice is recommended. However, like any practice, I want you to think about personalizing your writing time so it fits into your lifestyle and you set up a structure that you’re more likely to stick too. Usually, I recommend a morning practice as you’re just emerging from an unconscious state and have a day ahead to ground within any self reflection and commit to any intention you may set for that day.
What kind of journal should I get?
There are journals out there these days for whatever you need or want to work on. Don’t hold yourself back if you’re not finding the specific topic or area of growth that you’re looking to increase your self awareness around. If you don’t see it; create it; or change the wording within any journal you have or might find to be more self specific to your needs and wants.
*some references are listed at the bottom of this post.
Examples of the different styles of mindfulness journals out there: (there’s so many!)
reflection journal
action journal (journal to create positive change)
dream journal
gratitude journal
goal journal
journal to increase self love / self confidence
anti-anxiety journal
For your health
food journal
fitness journal
For your creative expression
drawing or sketch journal
poetry journal
stream of consciousness journal (more on this below)
Examples of journaling prompts:
I AM STATEMENTS (to promote self confidence & self love)
I AM proud of myself for:
I AM grateful for these three moments I created yesterday:
I AM capable because:
I AM deserving of success & happiness because:
Self Reflective Questions (to promote deeper inner wisdom & self awareness)
What’s one behavior that I want to be intentional about today? (not complaining, being less judgmental)
What’s one action that I can take today to promote healthy change in my life?
What have I been avoiding? What is one small action I can take toward healthy resolution of that area of my life?
Like any form of medium, I would recommend seeking a journal format that speaks to you. For example, are you better with less structure and like to free flow write or do you want a step by step question and answer format?
If you want more structure I would point you toward a goal setting journal with more prompts or any journal that offers you the structure and lay out that aligns with your style.
Stream of consciousness journaling
In the workbook The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron (highly recommend) a stream of consciousness writing practice referred to as “morning pages” is recommended to get you more in tune with yourself. Morning pages are where you fill up 3 blank pages with stream of consciousness writing.
What is stream of consciousness writing?
Stream of consciousness writing is a creative writing technique that allows for fragmented sentence structure and unfiltered thoughts and feelings with little regard for correct grammar. The point of this type of writing is to unleash the way our non-linear brains process information. In a nutshell, it's writing down thoughts as they come to you without any conscious editing or way of organization. It’s allowing your self expression to flow out of you; literally.
The thought behind this kind of writing is to allow your unconscious mind to stream onto the paper. People tend to struggle with this, similar to meditation, until the lack of structure actually begins to open and allow deeper unconscious thoughts to emerge. Obviously, this practice takes time and the more you sit, practice and work through the resistance of "not knowing what to write" you will tap into the benefit of the practice.
A final tip and some motivation for you to start journaling for mindfulness:
Committing to a journaling/mindfulness practice will be your first step toward starting. As Nike says, “Just do it.” Like developing any other healthy self habit, it might take a little bit to find the structure, time and way that this tool can work to help enhance your self growth and ability to be more mindful. Be patient. Take your time to find the "right" practice and time frame to commitment to so you can set yourself up for success.
Some Recommended Resources for Journals
*Above images taken by San Diego based Photographer Renata Amazonas.