*Note: This was originally published in 2021 on my former website.
Journaling is powerful.
I used to journal a lot when I was in middle school. Journaling was my first choice of self-care. I was hooked about writing about everything that was going on in my life at the time, but as I went into high school and got older, I stopped journaling. Now that I’m done university, I think it’s time to pick up this old habit again because of its benefits.
When I was still journaling back in middle school, I didn’t know many other people that were also doing it.
Fast forward to 2020, and journaling is mainstream and considered a big tool for self-care. Some examples of journaling today include regular journaling (where you write down the things that have happened in your day and your thoughts), and bullet journaling, where it’s part-planner, part diary, and part goal progress keeper.
So why is journaling resonating with so many people these days?
There are a multitude of reasons, but from what I’ve researched, and know from my own experiences, a big part of the appeal of journaling is that it forces people to think deeply about their lives, the goals they want to accomplish, and whether or not how they’re currently living their lives are getting them closer to where they want to be.
Here are some screenshots from reddit users who share their thoughts on how journaling changed their lives:
When you write an entry in your journal, you don’t have to write pages and pages of words, you can write however much you want. When I was trying to come back to writing in my journal, I thought that I had to write long entries.
When I was younger, I had enough time and energy to write long entries, but now I understand that how many words I write doesn’t matter, but rather the act of writing whatever is on my mind so I can have a place to settle my thoughts, investigate those thoughts and go from there.
Other than possibly changing your life for the better, journaling is a good way to remember all the things that have happened in your life, the good, the bad, and the in-between.
When you choose to journal, you’re actively choosing to see how much your life has gone by and all the blessings and trials you’ve gone through and where you might want to go next.
Trish types away 