Kickstart Your Journaling Journey: Tips for Beginners
Is journaling really as good as they say it is? The answer is yes.
- written by Joy Onu
- 4 min read
- 31 Aug, 2023
Journaling For Beginners || Photo By Mart production If you grew up writing in your diary, you know what we’re talking about, the art of journaling your thoughts is actually pretty great, especially for your mental health. It’s become popular these days, and all with good reason.
Journaling in itself is a way to declutter your mind when you’re feeling anxious, depressed, and emotional. Journaling isn’t just about negative emotions, there’s also space in there for your goals, your dreams, and the dreams that do come true.
When it comes to mental health, journaling is one of the most powerful tools out there, it acts as a channel to let go of deep rooted emotions you need healing from. If you’ve been hearing about journaling but you’re not sure how or where to begin, here are a few tips that will help you navigate the different types of journaling, and the benefits they have on your mental health.
What Type Of Journaling Would You Be Into?
Before we get into the nitty-gritty, it is important to begin your journey to journaling with a clear and concise plan, journaling is multifaceted, it doesn’t necessarily have to be an every day diary format, you can have one journal to accommodate various types of journaling.
The types of journaling go from gratitude journaling, to food, dream, fitness, and one of my all time favorites, reflective journalism. For starters, reflective journaling is pretty common, you get to write about your feelings, describe your feelings, and write about what has made you feel this way. Another kind of journaling that works wonders on your mind is gratitude journaling.
Journaling For Your Mental health
If you’re thinking about journaling for your mental health, but you’re still unsure of where to begin, don’t worry we’ve got you. The first step of any kind of journaling is to get a journal, whether that’s a book, or an app, or a website, whatever your medium is, go for it.
Your journal has to have a purpose before you begin, but no pressure. Mental health is a huge umbrella, what exactly do you need this journal to help with? Whether that's stress, trauma, loneliness, anxiety, or just crappy days. Once you’ve decided the purpose, your journaling journey can be your oyster
Journaling doesn’t require perfectionism
Journaling is the one time you can write without a care in the world. So don’t overthink it. It doesn’t have to be the perfect words, the perfect tone, or the perfect grammar, this is the one place where you get to be yourself truly without any sort of judgment.
At the end of the day, your journal is for you, so it can be anything you want it to be. Most importantly, you need to be as consistent as possible when using a journal. Think about it as your new best friend that you tell everything to, and remember to make use of it even when you have nothing or too much to say.
Benefits of Journaling
Along with the few tips we have on journaling, it is important to highlight a few benefits of journaling, like we’ve said before, journaling is an art, and it should really be treated as such. It has helped numerous people through a lot of things, and there’s been studies that have shown that when people write about their stress, anxiety, or even heartbreak, it helps them recover quickly.
The benefits are endless, but we will try to divulge as much as we can. First off, journaling will help you with depression. If you’re feeling an immense sadness about your life, grab a gratitude journal and write about the people or things you remain grateful for, there’s been a link between gratitude and lower rates of depression.
Also, if you often find yourself feeling anxious, journaling is what you need to get out of your own way, you can manage your anxiety and stress by writing journal entries that are positive and good for you. Journals are also great when it comes to achieving things in life, whether that’s writing the goals you want to achieve, or keeping track of your goals and the progress you’ve made so far.
There are so many ways to get started on your journaling journey, these tips should definitely help out, and if you’re still unsure on what to write about, you could make use of journaling prompts to help you start out. It is important to remember that as much as journaling is amazing, it is only one piece of the puzzle. If you want to improve your mental health, you can journal all you like, but do not hesitate to reach out to professionals if you ever need it.