Writing in a journal can be one of the most beneficial strategies for self-growth or better health. It can allow you to track the patterns of your life and your emotions, to see the entirety of your life in an entirely new way. But keeping a journal that helps with stress management isn’t as easy as simply writing what you do and eat each day. To get the most from your new practice, you have to know what to write in the journal.
If you’re trying to include journaling in your daily routine, whether it’s for better stress management or exploration, then here’s a quick guide to what it may help to write about.
Journaling is a very good way to reduce stress if you do it correctly. The first question you need to ask yourself when you’re wondering what to write in the journal is about your purpose. You need to know what areas of your life you’d like to learn more about and what your goals are.
Generally, the best way to reduce stress through journaling is to write about your feelings and thoughts around stressful events and come up with solutions. However, journaling can also be used to reduce stress through self-exploration.
The problem with proscriptive rules about what to write in the journal is that everyone has different goals when it comes to journaling.
For example, you may use journaling to help with:
Journaling isn’t just a random self-improvement technique invented by an online guru.
It has scientifically-backed health benefits like:
So whether you’re thinking about making journaling a regular part of your life or just an occasionally used strategy during stressful times, you’ll probably see some very good effects.
Not every self-improvement strategy works for everyone, and it’s the same with journaling. Some common barriers to journaling are:
Obviously, if you try journaling and it leaves you feeling negative or annoyed, then it might not be for you. You could also try some other strategies like speaking your diary into a recorder, starting a video journal, or talking to a therapist to avoid some of the writing.
Once you’ve decided that you want to journal, then you need to know what to write in the journal. Because if all you can think of to write about is what you had for lunch, you won’t see any benefits and the practice won’t continue.
There really is no right or wrong way to journal, it all depends on you. And that means you may journal every day, a few times a week, or when needed. Whatever works for you, works. And just remember that even if you stop journaling for a while or forget, you can always go back to it. This flexibility is one of the best benefits of journaling.
If you already journal and it’s working for you, then keep it up. But if you need some journaling ideas, then here are a few that can be very helpful:
If you struggle with writing about negative feelings and thoughts all the time, leaving you exhausted and feeling hopeless at the end of a journaling session, then end each session with solutions.
At the end of your journaling time, try to come up with two or three solutions for the problems you’ve unearthed. They don’t have to be large solutions that solve the problem entirely. Even a small solution that might momentarily lift your mood will be helpful and might give you an energetic boost that helps you find the solution to a larger problem. You might also end a session by writing a short to-do list of self-care practices or try to write down a better question that could lead you to a new perspective on your issue.
An easy and very rewarding way to journal is to write three or more things that you’re grateful for each day. This can help relieve stress, remind you of all the good in your life, and improve your mood. It will also teach you to look around at your life with new ideas, seeing the good as well as the bad. You can be as brief or as detailed as you want about the things that you are thankful for in your life.
You don't necessarily need to write down every mundane aspect of your life, but that isn’t the same as a personal planning journal. Life is busy and it can be hard to remember everything you have to do. This can lead to stress and unease.
You can help relieve some of that stress by keeping a personal planning journal. This can also help get you clarity on what you want to do next.
Some of the things you can record in this journal include:
You’ll be surprised by how this type of journal frees up your mind and helps you remember the important things in life. It can help lower your stress levels and get you more clarity on what you want to do next and what makes you feel happier and healthier. It's also a great tool for personal accountability.
If you’re going through a stressful emotional period and trying to find a way to cope, then an emotion journal can help. This is where you write about what you’re feeling in response to events in your life. For negative events, this can help you process and hopefully find solutions. And for positive events, it can help you enjoy your successes and happy memories.
There’s no right or wrong when it comes to this kind of journaling. Just write about whatever is taking up emotional room on the day and remember to focus on finding solutions or silver linings at the end.
Finding stress management strategies that work for you is a very important step in dealing with any level of stress and especially for Adrenal Fatigue Syndrome (AFS) recovery. AFS is a common complaint in the modern world cause by constant, low-grade stress. This type of stress can occur because of relationships, work, poor health, environmental factors, or lifestyle factors.
When you experience any stress, it activates the NeuroEndoMetabolic (NEM) stress response. This prompts the release of cortisol from the adrenal glands, which then changes the functioning of the body’s organs and systems that make up the NEM's six circuits. These changes prepare you to respond to the stress, to fight it or flee, and help protect you from damage.
However, when stress is chronic and ongoing, the NEM stress response stays active longer than it should while cortisol levels (the stress hormone) remain high at the same time. This can cause the adrenals to fatigue and the circuits to become unbalanced and dysfunctional, causing a wide range of symptoms and problems.
The Neuroaffect Circuit is part of the NEM stress response and includes the brain, microbiome or bacterial balance in the body, and the autonomic nervous system (ANS). These three components work together when you’re healthy to help manage stress, and they are especially connected to the kind of emotional challenges journalling can help with.
When you’re stressed, the ANS activates to prompt the release of powerful hormones and neurotransmitters (NT). These flood the brain and cause changes throughout the body. When your stress is chronic, the ANS must remain in this state rather than going back to a resting state. This allows the flood of chemicals to continue, impacting the brain and microbiome.
This state can cause issues like:
The strong connection between the brain and the gut through the vagus nerve means that the microbiome will also be negatively impacted by this state. This can lead to the overgrowth of bad bacteria and poor gut health. And in turn, this can negatively affect the health of the brain and cause troubling symptoms.
Finding strategies to lower your stress levels and better manage your emotional responses is key to recovering from this situation. Here’s how keeping a journal may help with that:
Overall, this may help to reduce your stress levels and better prepare you to cope with the next stressor. It also helps to improve AFS symptoms and Neuroaffect imbalances as well.
If you’re planning to start journaling for stress management, then you just need to start somewhere. Learning what to write in the journal is often a matter of experience and time. As you maintain the practice, you will get a better idea about what’s relevant and helpful and what’s not.
Here are a few quick tips to get you started:
Keeping a journal for stress management or self-improvement can be a very beneficial strategy. But first, you have to know what to write in the journal, and that depends on your personality, your goals, and what you want to get from the practice.
