We are well into the second quarter of the year now, and many Linsly students have sports and other extracurriculars on top of their coursework. This can be very stressful, and it is easy to get overwhelmed. Journaling can be a great way to process your thoughts and collect your mind so that you can refocus yourself on the things you have dedicated yourself to.
When you think of journaling, you may imagine the beautiful pages of notebooks that decorate Pinterest. Certainly you can be artistic and decorative with your journal if you want, but that’s not the only way to journal. Other people write about their life every morning or night, follow prompts, or just jot down a few notes whenever they feel like it. What you do depends on who you are and what will help you.
Here are some ideas and variations:
- Find a guided journal if you feel that you have trouble deciding what to write about. There are some very good ones out there; you may also be able to find a list of prompts on the internet.
- If you are artistic, try drawing regularly (such as daily or weekly) or mixing watercolors to represent your moods.
- Don’t add to your stress. If you don’t have time to write a lot, or it sounds too overwhelming, go small. You could try doing bullet points, or only writing a sentence or two every so often. Artists could just add a small sketch.
- You don’t have to stick to a regular schedule; you could just come to your journal when you feel like it.
- If you need to work through a decision or problem, you can draw or write out your thought process and work through your options.
- If you have trouble finding your own words, you could write quotes, or lists of songs that you resonate with. As long as you’re not passing anyone else’s work off as your own, there’s nothing wrong with appreciating other writing.
- Perhaps you don’t like the traditional tone and format of the journal entry. Instead, you could write poetry, or letters to someone (whether you plan to show them or not).
- Some people keep gratitude journals where they write one thing they’re thankful for every day. You could also adjust this to one positive thing that happened that day.
- It may be helpful to scribble out everything on your mind in a brain dump.
- Rather than simply listing the events of your day, you could write a reflection of them and how you felt about them.
As you can tell, there are a multitude of ways to journal, and this is far from a comprehensive list. Some of these ideas may work for you. Others probably won’t. Maybe journaling in any form isn’t helpful for you. But if you haven’t tried it before, this may be a good time to do so. And if you have, maybe all you need is to try something different. Customize the way you journal. Your notebook doesn’t need to look like anyone else’s. After all, you aren’t anyone else.
