Question #38
“How do I get started journaling? Also, I don’t really know why it’s supposed to be good??”
Dear BM,
Let’s start with the second question first. Journaling can be good for you for a few reasons. (1) It can give you a place to get your thoughts and emotions out of your body so that you’re not carrying them around. (2) It can help you organize and process your thoughts and feelings about a specific thing. (3) Journaling can also help you keep records of your daily life and routine for future versions of yourself, or for loved ones who might be interested in your life.
As for how to journal, it’s really as easy as opening up a notebook and starting to write. You can just write about your day to start, or you can just free write about whatever comes into your head for five straight minutes. You can also get a guided journal or some journal prompts which will give you a question or statement as a topic or starting point for your journal. If you’re not into physically writing, you can also type your journal, or make voice notes as a journal, or even make videos as a form of journaling. If words are hard for you, you could draw or paint your journals too! It might be a good idea to take some time exploring whichever of these methods sound good to you, to get an idea of what form of journaling you might like.
For creating a journaling practice, here’s an idea: challenge yourself to journal for 30 days in a row and see how you feel about it after that month. It’s enough time to play with different forms, and explore how you might want to use journaling as a practice in your life.
One of the things that I’ve found most helpful with journaling is looking back over older journal entries and seeing where my head was at the time. Sometimes it’s remarkable to see how consistently I think and feel about things, and at other times, it’s amazing to see how radically different things are now compared to then.
So grab a cute notebook, and a nice pen (or your laptop, or phone, or camera, or canvas), and get started! You don’t have to keep doing it forever. You can stop if it’s not for you, and you can come back to it later.
