We felt good while filling those pages of diaries with our thoughts just to clear our minds. However, as we started to grow up, somewhere down the line, we have stopped maintaining those diaries and in their place, we've got our hands on mobile phones.
Keeping or maintaining a journal is helpful and has many positive benefits. Journaling is all about writing down your thoughts and feelings to understand them more easily. It also helps to control our emotions, stress, fears, and improve our mental health.
Effective journaling can also be used as a way to solve our problems and help us to lead a better life physically and mentally. Written words have a lot of power in them and sometimes it can heal an individual and help him/her to overcome their issues or face their struggles.
Some benefits of journaling:
- Manage anxiety
- Reduces Stress
- Helps to Cope up with depression
- Helps one to prioritize their problems, issues, and fears.
- Tracking day to day symptoms which can trigger one and learning to recognize and control them.
- Provides an opportunity for self-talk and motivates oneself with positive thoughts.
But sometimes while maintaining a journal, an individual needs to incorporate some healthy habits into his/her daily life so that one can derive the best benefits from it:
- Meditation is important as it helps to calm your mind and relax.
- Having a healthy and balanced diet is equally essential, what you eat can reflect on your mood.
- Treat yourself with good, long hours of deep sleep so that your mind and brain can relax.
Whenever you start to write, always remember the acronym 'WRITE'.
- W - It denotes what to do you want to write? To answer that think about what is going on in your life, current thoughts and feelings, what are the things that you are trying to avoid or striving towards.
- R - It denotes to review and reflect on it. To do that take a few minutes to be still and try to think about what you want and what you don't want. Be calm and breathe.
- I - It denotes Investigate. Investigate your thoughts and feelings and if you feel like there is none then take a moment and try to refocus to find another opportunity for mindfulness.
- T - T denotes Time. The concept of Time is very essential while journaling. Set a timer or an alarm to see what have you written in the projected time. Before starting to write, mention your start time and projected time at the top of the page.
- E - E denotes Exit strategically with introspection. After you're done writing take a moment to reflect on it and sum up your takeaway in a few sentences.
Guidelines
Every day set aside certain minutes to write and reflect on your life. It'll help you to think about what you have done on that day. Keep a pen and paper handy as whenever any thought comes into your mind, you can write it down.
While writing the journal to make your mind free from any judgments and let your words flow freely. Don't worry about any mistakes that you make while writing.
Every day set aside certain minutes to write and reflect on your life. It'll help you to think about what you have done on that day. Keep a pen and paper handy as whenever any thought comes into your mind, you can write it down.
While writing the journal to make your mind free from any judgments and let your words flow freely. Don't worry about any mistakes that you make while writing.
Journaling will help you to detangle your thoughts and will help you to know yourself by revealing your darkest fears, feelings, and emotions. It is an easy and efficient way to de-stress and keep your chaotic thoughts at bay.
Written by - Srijita Roy
Written by - Srijita Roy
Edited by - Rudransh Khurana
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