Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Imagine having a personal guide that helps you untangle your thoughts, process your emotions, and gain clarity about your life, all without needing anyone else's input. That's what journaling did for me and can do for you.
[00:00:13] Journaling has helped me overcome overwhelming emotions and thoughts whenever I struggle to make decisions or see patterns and behaviors, when I have a hard time processing past emotions, whenever I need more clarity on my goals, values or my dreams. By the end of this episode, you'll know exactly how to start a journaling practice. Even if you've never journaled before or if you tried and you never could, stick with it and how to use it as a tool to understand yourself better on a deeper level. Make sure you like this video so that I know that you're enjoying it and subscribe so you never miss an upload. Now let's talk about why I'm such an advocate for journaling. There are three main reasons why I am, so let's start with the first one. Writing things down help clear your mind I learned that I'm really good at solving my own problems, but we're not designed to store everything in our heads. When I journal, I take the pressure off my mind and create space for new ideas and insights to come through. And this is because when you write things down, you reduce your stress, you increase your clarity and improve your problem solving skills. These are all the things that I experience and this is also backed by science. The second thing is journaling. Help with my overthinking since overthinking is the same thoughts going in circles. Journaling took those thoughts and helped me lay them out, helping me actually process them and what they mean. I started my journaling journey back in October of 2021 when I was going through a really tough emotional time. One day I just told myself to open up my notes app and get it out because I was overthinking. Emotionally I was fucked up and my thoughts were just racing a mile a minute throughout the whole month of October. I just returned every single day, multiple times a day to get off my chest and out of my head what was going on with me. And that's where I saw the reduction in stress and the increased clarity and problem solving and my overthinking simmering down a little bit. And lastly, as you guys already know, I'm a huge advocate for getting to know yourself. Journaling helped me with self discovery so much. When you're on a self discovery journey, identifying patterns in your thoughts, behaviors and emotions is essential. Understanding why you react to things, the way that you do is also very important. And clarifying your desires, your dreams and your goals are all part of the self discovery process and generally help me take this to another level. So with this in mind, let's break down exactly how I started so that you can too. I had to remove the pressure and remind myself that there's no real right way to journal. When I first opened up my notes app, I paused a second overthinking how I should start. But I had to forget the idea that journaling had to be their diary or pages of perfect poetic writing. It's not about being a writer, it's about being honest with yourself. Some days it will be bullet points, some days will be sentences, some days it'll look like I just wrote an essay. The goal is to get your thoughts out of your head. As I was reflecting on how I used to journal, the three techniques that I use were free writing, brain dumps, and prompts. I still use all three, but brain dumps are my go to Free writing is when you write whatever comes to mind for five to 10 minutes. No filters, no editing. This could look like I feel frustrated today, but I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because and just allowing yourself to write whatever thoughts come Brain dumps are when you write before bed or first thing in the morning, writing down everything on your mind, task worries, random thoughts. Whatever it is, it clears mental clutter. I like to do end of the day recaps where I write down how my day was, what happened, what would I like to do. I write down my to do list, my grocery list, who had me up that day, whatever it is that's on my mind, I literally get it all out right before bed. And the third technique I used was prompts. I am guilty of being someone that loves to write. So sometimes I like to have a little bit of direction and I love a good question or thought that intrigues me. I thought that passed by that I want to unlock a little bit deeper and it just helps give you a good starting point. Some example prompts I use when I first started out include what's something I'm avoiding right now and why. This could be emotions you're not processing, this could be tasks that you need to get done on your to do list, or big goals that you're trying to actualize that you haven't been able to get started on. Asking yourself this question and then why will help you uncover and unlock what's going on. There is a self sabotage. Maybe you'll realize that You're a big procrastinator. Whatever the reason, this prompt will help you figure it out. Another Another one is what's one thing I need to hear today? It could be a harsh truth, or it could be some gentle reminders that you're doing the best that you can to give yourself grace, that you're proud of how you're showing up. What made me feel most alive this week is another prompt. If you watch my video on how to figure out what it is that you really want in life, you know that this is a question that I asked so that you know exactly what lights you up so that you can add more of that into your life. And lastly, what's draining my energy and what's giving me energy. I also talked about this in the Energy Audio video. I did a couple videos back. Try all of the techniques out, or maybe you already know which one will work for you. Now let's dig a little bit deeper. Let's talk about using journaling to process emotions and uncover hidden thoughts. Sometimes when I first started to journal, I was just writing to release to get the emotions out of my system. Other times I was journaling to understand to analyze patterns and triggers to become a better version of myself. For example, writing to process your emotions could look like a stressful event happens. You write out what happened, how you felt and what thoughts came up. Over time, you start seeing patterns. Every time I feel criticized, I shut down and you ask yourself why, what happened and what triggered it. And just a pro tip and something I like to do, always reread your past general entries so that you can see how much you've grown. Sometimes you forget how far we come or the things that we were asking for. And now we're living in a live prayer or manifestation or behavior that we were hoping to get over. So make sure you're rereading your journal entries. Journaling also isn't just about the past. It's also really good for dreaming and goal setting. Journaling for clarity and goal setting could look like visualizing your dream life through writing. And an example exercise for this would be to close your eyes and picture your dream day. Then you will write it down. Detail what time did you wake up? How did you feel? Where are you and who are you with? 2 Wednesdays from now, April 23rd there is a video coming on this so make sure you subscribe or come back so you don't miss it. But essentially to use journaling for clarity and goal setting, you can reverse engineer your goals by writing it out for example, my dream is to be my most authentic self all the time. A journal prompt for this could be what would an authentic version of me do today? Now that we've explored different ways to journal, it wouldn't be right if I didn't address a common struggle how to stay consistent When I first started out, I was so eager to release and identify my patterns and habits that were keeping me stuck feeling how I was feeling. It was the only release that I had where I felt safe to be myself and say what I truly was feeling. But I know that the eagerness that I had is not the case for everyone. So if the idea of journaling every day feels overwhelming, start with 2 minutes bullet points. Like I mentioned before, a couple sentences, a paragraph, shit, even a sentence a day is progress. Another way to make journaling a habit is to make the process enjoyable and easy to access. Keep your journal visible like on your nightstand or desk or right next to in your bed, like I do sometimes. And try voice memo journaling if writing isn't your thing, I do also sometimes spell on my phone and go to voice memos if what's on my mind feels like it's too much to write. And lastly, to create a journaling habit, let go of the expectation that it has to be perfect. Messy handwriting, random thoughts, unfinished sentences. It all counts. Sometimes I literally write BRB in the middle of a thought because I have something else to do. Sometimes I return to the thought and sometimes I don't. But it all counts. We are at the end of the episode, but I do want to leave you with a couple key takeaways. Remember, journaling is not about writing beautifully, it's about being honest with yourself. When you open up your notebook or your notes app, the biggest thing is to just be honest with yourself and how you're feeling and what you're going through, because that's the only way you're going to get through whatever it is you're trying to get through. Journaling is a tool for clarity, self discovery, dreaming, emotional processing, and honestly, even more so. Use it as a tool to help you. And lastly, there's no right or wrong way to start. Just start. If you enjoyed this video, let me know by liking it. And make sure you subscribe so you never miss an upload. If you have any questions, leave them down in the comments and I'll see you in the next episode.
