Daily journal writing is a powerful tool for those wanting to implement changes in their lives and understand themselves a bit better. It is something I have been doing since I was little (I’m one of those people who are never without a journal… What am I saying, I’m one of those people who have at least 10 notebooks in different sizes so they can take them anywhere!). I might have never journaled every single day, but every week or every time there was something massive happening in my life (whether it was good or bad).
If like me you follow personal development blogs, YouTube channels, or read books about personal growth, you’ve probably found yourself reading about how journaling can change your life. But why is journaling beneficial for you?
Why Write a Journal Diary?
Writing a journal is a fantastic way to reflect on everything that has happened to you, whether today, during the week, or even in the past few months (I usually try to do that when I spend more than a month without journaling… which can easily happen and is not a big deal!). It helps us understand the things that we have done, why we have done them, and how they did affect our lives in general.
It’s a way of reflecting on ourselves and our behaviours, as well as the world that surrounds us and how we interact with it. But this may sound too scientific… I will just go on to say that is a great tool for self-awareness and self-management!
It’s not only a way of recording everything that happens to you in your life, and although it can be seen as a hobby, it offers you so much more than that.
Journaling helps you achieve your goals
If you are a person with lots of goals (like me!), daily journal writing (or weekly journaling, if you prefer it) is a great way to keep track of them. In fact, just the act of sitting down and jotting your ideas about what you want to achieve and how is already a pretty good start. You will have your aims and objectives, as well as your method of reaching them, at hand at all times to check them out when you feel a bit lost.
It’s also a great help to see how you progress in the achievement of your goals. Day after day, week after week, you will be logging in your accomplishments, which will be an amazing source of motivation!
At the same time, whenever you are having a bad day or you feel like you haven’t performed as well as you intended to, writing it down will help you understand where you failed. Next time, you will know more about the things that lead you away from your path to success.
Journaling helps you feel grateful
One of the keys to happiness is without a doubt gratitude. But in our daily lives, when we are rushing from bed to work to the gym to have dinner to bed again, sometimes it’s hard finding a moment to think about all of the things we feel grateful for. You might want to do it in bed, once the day is over, but when you’re too tired… you might just fall asleep straight away!
It’s true: we are busy. And when we are not that busy, the habit of being busy makes us occupy ourselves on something important again. In these circumstances, gratitude can slip away without us realising how many beautiful things we have in our lives.
When you create the habit of journaling, you’re giving space to not only think about all of those things but to make them (somewhat) physical. And there is something really powerful in the act of giving a thought its own physical space in the world, even if it’s just on a piece of paper only you will read.
And why is being grateful important for your wellness? Well, according to the Harvard Medical School blog, “Gratitude helps people feel more positive emotions, relish good experiences, improve their health, deal with adversity, and build strong relationships.» It also “helps people connect to something larger than themselves as individuals—whether to other people, nature, or a higher power” as they recognise that part of the goodness in their lives partially comes from something outside of them.
Journaling helps you learn about yourself
Besides learning about how you get on with your life goals, daily journal writing is a beautiful tool for self-discovery and self-improvement.
Just think about it. How many behaviours do you engage with without acknowledging them? How do others’ actions affect you emotionally? Do you happen to be subject to cycles? And how does all of this impact your life? Is there a way to improve these factors so that you live a more fulfilling life?
Getting to know your patterns and behaviours, as well as those of the people around you, is a powerful tool for self-improvement. Furthermore, it makes you aware of who you are and what you are capable of, which can serve you as a starting point to grow bigger and better, becoming who you want to be.
Although I have to say, you might find out that you are already who you want to be. And that’s amazing too!
The key to self-love, I may add, is getting to know who you are. Without that, there’s no room for improvement, there’s no room for love, and there’s no room for bigger things.
Have you ever written a journal but stopped doing it for whatever reason? Then, why not return to the habit and spend some time with yourself tonight? It might be just what you need to put your thoughts in order and relax.
And if you’ve never done it before, do you think you will give it a try? I know it can be a bit daunting at the beginning (where should you even start?), which is why my next post will be about how to start writing a journal. Stay tuned if you don’t want to miss it!
Much love,
Sof