The Power of Journaling

When you hear the phrase journaling, you might picture writing in a diary. However, it's much more than that. When used the right away, journaling is a powerful tool for self-reflection, self-improvement, and working toward your goals. Learn more about the power of journaling and how you can use it to help meet your wants and needs.

The History of Journaling

Keeping letters, diaries, or journals is an ancient tradition that dates back to at least 10th century Japan. However, you can find examples of successful people throughout history keeping some type of journal. Celebrities and diplomats alike have maintained a journal for posterity. Famed 19th century playwright, Oscar Wilde, once stated that he never traveled without his diary.

Health Benefits of Journaling

As it turns out, our ancestors might have been onto something with regards to journaling. Researchers are now beginning to find increasing evidence to support the idea that journaling can have a positive impact on mental and physical well-being. Some researchers believe journaling can reduce the symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis and asthma. Additionally, University of Texas at Austin researcher and psychologist, James Pennebaker, believes writing is a good stress management tool and can help decrease the effect of stress on the body.

Improves Clarity

Journaling doesn't just help your physical health. In fact, it offers a variety of benefits. If you journal every morning and evening, you can quickly start to see the inconsistencies in your life. This will help you discover what you need to remove, add, and keep in your life to help you form a sense of identity and meet your goals. As you're making small and large decisions about your life along the way, you can use the assistance of an online psychic and your journal to get more clarity about the path you need to take.

Helps With Goals

When you write down your goals in a journal, you're turning them from vague ideas in your head to concrete targets you can work toward. You can also use your journal to record your progress toward meeting your goal. If you encounter a setback, you'll have an easier time evaluating what happened and learning from it when you write it down.

Increases Your Gratitude

Life moves so quickly that it's sometimes hard to focus on gratitude. However, when you take a step back and set aside time every day to write about what you're thankful for, you'll start to see the richness of your life. Plus, not only does focusing on your gratitude help you shift toward a more positive mindset, but it also offers several other benefits, such as:

• Increased happiness.
• Stronger emotions.
• More optimism.
• Higher self-esteem.
• Increased energy levels.
• Deeper friendships.
• Increased productivity.

Lightens Your Emotions

Several studies have found that journaling helps reduce emotional stress. When you write about sadness, anger, fear, or other painful emotions, you can reduce the intensity of those feelings. Additionally, journaling can help you increase focus and resolve disagreements with others. If you feel like you're having problems with pent-up emotions and thoughts, consider writing them down in a journal to clarify why they're bothering you. You can then discuss these feelings with a phone psychic to gain more understanding of why you can't get past them and how to move on.

Helps With Learning

As humans, we're not that great at remembering things. We forget a lot of what we see and even more of what we hear. If you want to remember something, write it down. When you write down what you've learned, you have a much better chance of remembering it. This difference in learning has to do with how your brain is wired. Listening requires a different part of the brain that doesn't discriminate between important and non-important information. On the other hand, writing requires the part of your brain that can target and hold on to important information.

How to Begin Journaling

Journaling is most effective when you do it every day. It can take anywhere from a few moments to 30 minutes. When you're journaling, don't worry about proper spelling or punctuation. These are your private thoughts, and you want to focus more on what you're writing instead of how you're writing it. Write quickly, because this frees your mind from the rules of writing and lets you focus more on the thoughts and feelings would like to write down.

While some people will use an app for their journal, you're less likely to write down everything you want to get out of your mind when you have to do it using a small screen and keyboard. That's why an old-fashioned paper journal, diary, notebook, or whatever you have on hand, and a pen are usually best for journaling.

An Example of Daily Journaling

If you're interested in giving journaling a try, consider the following example. This type of journaling only takes five minutes every day to complete — three minutes in the morning and two minutes in the evening. In the morning, you can fill out the following prompts:

I am grateful for...

I will make today great by:

1.

2.

3.

For my daily affirmation, I believe I am...

By filling out these prompts in the morning, you're setting yourself up with positive thoughts for a good day. In the evening, you can then take a few minutes to fill in these two prompts:

Three amazing things that happened today:

1.

2.

3.

What could I have done to make today better?

By taking five minutes each day to fill in these journal prompts, you can become more aware of the good things in your life, make sure you're focusing on the important priorities, and stay focused on your top goals.

Although journaling has been around for hundreds of years, it's gaining in popularity again. If you're looking for assistance with meeting goals and leading a better life, journaling can help you do it.