Journaling may be a practice that you’ve done since grade school where you wrote about your crush of the day, a practice you pick up when you’re upset and need a space to process, or something you’ve never done or understood. No matter where you are on your journaling journey, my hope is that this post will be a helpful gateway to engage with the experience.
As Joyce Chapman says in Journaling for Joy, “Through the act of writing things down, you allow yourself to wake up, be aware, and pay attention to what your life has to teach you.”
Journal writing is the process of putting pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) and, for many, it can be a therapeutic brain dump to bring light to dark, uncharted territory.
Marion Woodman writes, “My journal became a mirror in which I could see and hear my truth resonating in my own daily experience.”
Ideas to get you started:
1. Answer a basic prompt that will change each time you write, “At this moment I’m feeling . . . ”
2. Write an unsent letter—to someone who’s hurt you, whom you’ve hurt, who’s passed away.
3. Capture a nighttime dream.
4. Answer, “What question do I need to answer for myself? What do I want to know? What information do I need to tap into? What would I most like to get out of this writing?
5. Answer, “Where am I in my life right now and where do I want to be?”
6. Explore an issue or experience from the third person or another person’s point of view.
7. Answer, “What’s most on my mind right now is . . .”
8. Use all your senses to describe the setting you’re in.
9. Describe your current self-care strategy.
10. Start with the word “Today” and keep writing.
Journaling is a tool to help explore and better understand patterns, motivations, fears, and struggles. It’s also a safe space to capture dreams, to celebrate, and to grow.
I’ll leave you with this beautiful passage by Susan Tiberghien from One Year to a Writing Life, “With your words you give life to what you see, what you hear, what you touch. In this way you transform the outer thing that you see or touch into something inner. You bridge the outer and inner worlds, the visible and the invisible. This is the gift of journaling. Your daily life calls you in a thousand directions; journal writing centers you. You slow down and write. You learn to look anew at the world around you.”
Let’s get started, shall we?
Grab pen, paper, and spend 10 minutes writing using one of the suggested tools above and let me know how it goes! Bisous. x
PS Here’s 11 journal prompts to help you connect with your values via The Good Trade.
