Do you journal
I journal and have experienced several benefits over the years. Journaling has become so popular today that there are a variety of journals to buy from self-care journals to gratitude journals. There is probably a journal for some area of life you want to work on, or you can face the blank journal page in a normal black and white composition notebook you got on sale at Walmart for 69 cents. Over the years my journals have evolved like me and now I invest in a hard cover one that can withstand being shuffled from room to room.
The benefits that I have encountered are three-fold:
Writing down thoughts has helped me process emotions like anger, depression, and anxiety.
Writing down the day’s events and interactions has captured happy memories I can relive later.
Writing down the present day issues helped me see patterns in people, places, and things I need to take action on in my life.
I did a YouTube video on journaling with some examples of how simply writing improved my life. One example I discussed was realizing after months of complaining about a colleague at work that the colleague was not on “my side” and had their own agenda. They were intentionally dropping the ball in an effort to get transferred to another department. After seeing that pattern in the journal entries, I was able to take action at work and address the problem in a mediation with the person and our supervisor.
If you have ever said, “why does this keep happening to me?” You are experiencing a pattern and may want to journal to find the root cause. Ask yourself questions like:
Do I lose my temper when I have to interact with this person? Why?
Do I feel overworked and unappreciated? I used to love my job. Where is this coming from?
Do I say “yes” to others too quickly and then regret it and feel annoyed later?
Am I eating my emotions rather than facing them?
You can go to therapy every day and talk about your problems. However, if YOU never become self-aware and see the problem, you will keep experiencing the feeling/interaction you do not want. Find some paper and write it out. Good luck. By the way, I am not compensated in anyway by Barnes & Noble but I wanted you to have some examples of journals for sale.
