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If you ever walk into my counseling office, you will hear me say this more than anything else:
You should try journaling.
Journaling is a cheap, if not free, method of exercising mindfulness and self-expression in a way that directly effects your mood and overall health by utilizing a different perspective through which to interpret your thoughts.
We naturally extend our minds onto the page, and these extensions can themselves be targets of metacognition, to be mused about and reflected upon just like regular thoughts and feelings. - As cited in Know Thyself by Stephen M. Fleming
In general, journaling (4):
Increases positive feelings such as joy and contentment
Helps with the catharsis of traumatic or stressful experiences and the connected emotions
Increases self-awareness
Reduces physical illness complaints related to emotional upheaval (10)
Increases immune function (10)
Increases understanding and assimilation of complex issues and critical reflection when learning (11)
Can produce greater academic performance (2)
I could go on, as the research on journaling is prolific, but the point is this – journaling is an effective method of increasing mental and physical well-being in combination with counseling or on its own.
So how do you do it?
Research shows that journaling can take many forms and remain just as effective. You can write poetry, stream of consciousness, fictional stories, recount memories that are traumatic in nature, write letters that you may never send, or even answer prompts provided by a book or your counselor.
The most popular version of journaling, however, is expressive writing. Expressive writing is free from judgments and criticisms and focuses on the present moment. Think of it as mindfulness journaling.
Expressive writing in three quick steps:
1. Grab your pen and paper.
2. Begin describing your present moment. Use all five senses. What do you see, smell, taste, hear, and feel? What is going on around you? If you leave the present and start writing about the future or past, that is okay. Simply guide your thoughts back to your present moment.
3. Do this for 15 to 20 minutes for at least 4 days a week.(6)
What not to do when journaling:
1. Don’t be judgmental of yourself or your thoughts. The goal is to just get it out and onto paper.
2. Don’t focus on grammar.
3. Don’t express intense, negative emotion or relive intense and traumatic experiences when journaling without giving yourself time afterwards to process the experience.
A little commentary about “don’t” number three. Journaling can sometimes result in a generally negative feeling when you have just written for several minutes about something hard or negative. That is okay. Take care of yourself by building in time after your journal session to do things that help take you down from the negative place and carry you into a more positive peaceful state of mind. (5)
If the idea of journaling appeals to you, I would love for you to join me as I provide journaling prompts every Sunday on the Remedy House Instagram! You can follow along by searching for the #RHJournalPrompt hashtag on Instagram also.
For more interactive resources on journaling view my YouTube video.
So, what do you think?
Have you tried journaling?
What do you love or hate about it?
What tips would you give to someone trying journaling for the first time?
1 Haq, K. S. (2017). Journaling as Reciprocity: Creating Healing Connections through Loss. Perspectives on Practice, 356-359.
2 Isik, S., & Erguner-Tekinalp, B. (2017). The effects of gratitude journaling on Turkish first year college students' college adjustment, life satisfaction, and positive affect. International Journal of Advanced Counselling, 164-175.
3 Konig, A., Eonta, A., Dyal, S. R., & Vrana, S. R. (2014). Enhancing the Benefits of Written Emotional DIsclosure Through Response Training. ScienceDirect, 344-357.
4 McArdle, S., & Byrt, R. (2001). Fiction, poetry, and mental health: expressive and therapeutic uses of literature. Journal of Psychiatiric and Mental Health Nursing, 517-524.
5 Mercer, A., Warson, E., & Zhao, J. (2010). Visual Journaling: An intervention to influence stress, anxiety, and affect levels in medical students. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 143-148.
6 Miller, C. M. (2017). The Mental Health Benefits of Expressive Writing. Harvard Health Publications.
7 Ross, C. A. (2017). The benefits of therapeutic writing in acute psychiatric units. Mental Health Practice, 33-38.
8 Shen, L., Yang, L., Zhang, J., & Zhang, M. (2018). Benefits of expressive writing in reducing test anxiety: A randomized controlled trial in Chinese samples. PLoS ONE, 1-15.
9 Toly, V. B., Blanchette, J. E., Musil, C. M., & Zauszniewski, J. A. (2016). Journaling as reinforcement for the resourcefulness training intervention in mothers of technology-dependent children. Applied Nursing Research, 269-274.
10 Ullrich, P. M., & Lutegendorf, S. K. (2002). Journaling about stressful events: Effects of cognitive processing and emotional expression. The Society of Behavioral Medicine, 244-250.
11 Wedgeworth, M. L., Carter, S. C., & Ford, C. D. (2017). Clincial Faculty PReceptors and EMntal Health Reflectiosn: Learning Through Journaling. The Journal for Nurse Practitioners, 411-417.
*A note on format. This article is not properly formatted in APA, MLA, or Chicago. Alas, I am bound by technical limitations on this platform and a desire to introduce a level of readability so I humbly beg your forgiveness on this.
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