From my experience, journaling automatically gets dubbed stereotypically as a teenage girl whirling away the afternoon, writing away. The operative word being ‘stereotypically’. Therefore it’s a generalised, often false, assumption (not to mention sexist).
From my experience, journaling can make you feel physically and mentally better about yourself. From my experience, there is real benefit to be gained from the direct intention of doing something.
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That’s what I want to go through. Anyone can journal.
Writing with intention can give you real results. The beauty of mental health journaling (or any journaling, really) is that you have a safe, personal space to process your thoughts, feelings or symptoms.
What better way to improve mental health awareness than from within yourself?
There are several different approaches to journaling. Here are just a few – some of which are relevant to my post on mindfulness you read a few weeks ago.
Gratitude
I love writing because it can be such an intimate act of self care.
You can use that intimacy to remind yourself what do already have, rather than predominantly focusing on what you want to have (something we all struggle with, there’s no shame. We can’t be 100% grateful 100% of the time).
If you lost everything, what three things would you miss most? How would you feel after writing a letter to a past lover? These are just a couple of subjects you could consider during your daily journaling exercises.
You might be surprised at how different you feel afterwards – for the better or worse. What are we really grateful for? There is usually a lot of emotion we don’t realise we are holding onto; which brings me nicely onto my next point.
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Manifestation and Mindfulness
Whether you are a spiritual person or not, I think it’s safe to say that we all like at least a little bit of control in our lives?
Well, you’re in luck!
Writing and journaling are the perfect way to practically practice mindfulness (that was a mouthful). Through writing, you are forcing yourself (or not, depending on how you look at it) to be in the present moment.
You’re writing and nothing else. That in itself gives me confidence because I know I’ll get at least 20 minutes to myself today. You can, too, if you give it a go.
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A ‘Mind Dump’
This is essentially writing what’s on your mind right here, right now as it comes. So you might be writing about what a great day you had, then spontaneously move on to an argument you had with your partner a week ago.
Recognising this can give us an idea of the intricacies of our thought patterns, I find. That way you can work out what energy or thoughts are holding you back.
These are just my thoughts, by no means do you have to journal. Just give it a go.
– D
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