From Counselling Connection:

Journaling as a Tool to Reduce Stress

Journaling is a way of tracking the development of our thoughts and feelings. It enables us to not only record our journey but also to write down our goals and our plans on how to reach those goals.

The journal is a very powerful tool which assists us in recording our perceptions. The Journal, as the name implies, leads us on a journey which helps us to reveal our true selves. We are not simply recording our experiences as in a diary.

With a Journal, we are going beyond simply recording what “happens” in our lives to a process of transformation into our highest concept of ourselves and allowing a healing to take place. A journal helps us to discover ourselves and our higher purpose. By combining the tool of journaling with all the other tools we have discussed, we will reveal the essence of our being is love, life and laughter.

Research has shown that journaling merely fifteen minutes each day, can improve one’s health and one’s stress levels. There is a correlation between the expression of thoughts and feelings and one’s sense of self worth. The stronger you express your feelings, the greater the transformation through the journalling process and thus the greater the reward.

The purpose of our journals is to help us express our thoughts and feelings in a deep, intimate and personal way. Our journal may include descriptions of our daily interactions with others and the feelings that arise out of those interactions.

The key factor is to understand that we are a part of the equation. Events may happen far away from us, but our day to day personal experience is something we are taking part in. We can work through painful memories, or events in our lives, or scribe joyful experiences.

Both painful experiences and joyful experiences give us a great insight into how we are living our lives and how we can make new more empowering choices in the future and be happy with the choices we made in the past that got is to the place we are today. All thoughts and feelings are important to the process of your journal and no entry is too big or too small.

It is probably best when we have a flexible approach to our journals and include pictures that we find, or make, sketches, articles from magazines and books and quotes from people in our lives or historical figures.

Often people will ask questions of themselves in their journal and then as they add to their journal, they answer these questions. The important thing is that we are able to express ourselves and allow for the journal to be part of our journey revealing our path and empowering us to see ourselves more clearly and make choices that are more empowering.

The depth of your writing is not as important as the process and putting pen to paper, or fingers to the keyboard. Our goal is personal discovery and positive transformation knowing that “as we change our minds, we change our lives.”