By Isabel Staskiewicz, BA, MSW (in progress)
Have you ever thought about journaling but didn’t know where to start? No worries! I’m here to help. There are many benefits to journaling including reducing stress, emotion processing, promoting gratitude, problem solving, and overall improving mental health. There are many different ways that you can journal including gratitude journaling, reflective journaling, art journaling, mindfulness journaling and so many more. The beauty of journaling is that you can customize it to fit your needs. Here’s a quick guide to these different types of journaling.
- Gratitude journaling: Take five minutes each day to write down what you are grateful for. This can include highlights from your day or just taking time to notice what you value. Some prompts include: What was my favorite part of the day? Who am I thankful for in my life? What do I appreciate about myself?
- Reflective journaling: Reflective journaling is digging deeper into your thoughts and feelings. This is not just writing about what you did that day, but how you felt and what thoughts you had. This can be a great way to track thought patterns!
- Art Journaling: Art journaling is great for those who are creative. You do not need to be an artist by any means to practice art journaling. This can be done in so many different ways including drawing your favorite part about your day, drawing an emoji of what emotion you feel, making a scrapbook page describing your day and emotions. If you need more inspiration, there are so many examples on pinterest and google!
- Mindfulness Journaling: Mindfulness journaling focuses on how you are feeling in the present moment. It is a great grounding technique focusing on your current experiences, emotions, and thoughts. This would be great to pair with other mindfulness tools. For example pairing this with a body scan or the five senses exercise would be a great addition!
- Self-esteem journaling: One of my favorite types of journaling to share with my clients is self esteem journaling. This is taking time each day to acknowledge something that you like about yourself and something that you did good that day. This can be a great confidence booster especially for adolescents and teens struggling with their self esteem or social anxiety. Some prompts include: What is one thing you like about yourself? What is one thing you did well today? What is something you’ve accomplished that you’re proud of? What is one positive experience you had today?
These are only a few of the many types of journaling that exist. If any of these pique your interest I would encourage you to try it for a week or two and see how you feel! Our lives can become very busy and overwhelming around this time of year, so this is a great time to start journaling by taking five to ten minutes a day to dedicate to journaling. It is a great mindfulness practice to help relax and reflect in these busy times.
Isabel is a clinical intern at The Center for Mindfulness & CBT. She specializes in working with individuals with anxiety, depression, OCD, and ADHD. As an intern, Isabel has a discounted rate of $55/session and is accepting new clients. Click here to learn more about Isabel or to book a session with her.
