HolisticImprovement

Keeping a daily journal has changed my life for the better in so many ways. Before I kept a journal, I thought that journaling was pointless, but ever since I started keeping one in 2011, I haven’t looked back once. Here are some of the great benefits journaling can offer:

1. Self-Discovery

Journaling daily allows you to see much deeper into yourself than if you just went through life without recording anything. You can identify patterns, let out pent-up emotions, and the best part is, you don’t need to censor yourself at all because nobody will ever read it but you! Also, your thoughts and priorities have much more clarity to them after journaling for a while.

2. Record Lessons

If you mess up in real life, you usually get a negative emotional reaction from the consequence, which subconsciously conditions you to stop repeating that behavior. But, what if the things you’re doing require lots of small failures to get good at them? Examples of this could be building up social skills, blogging, entrepreneurship, public speaking and much more.

By journaling, you can let those emotions out, dig deep into what went wrong, and really find out why that happened so you can improve on it the next time.

3. Become A Better Writer

The best way to become a better writer is to simply write more. Of course, your journal entries don’t need to ever be edited or read like fine prose, but if you try to write well in your journal, I guarantee that your writing will improve. You don’t need to write 300,000 words in 1 year, all you need to do is write for a few minutes every day.

As I look back into my past journal entries, I realize that I had a pretty rough start. I barely followed any writing rules, and my writing was disorganized. As the months went by, my entries started to make more sense, and flow much more smoothly. Don’t be discouraged if you’re not great when you start, because the only way to go is up.

4. Self-Discipline

Another great reason to keep a daily journal is that it forces you to have self-discipline. It has to be a habit, or else you won’t do it every day. I don’t have it completely down yet, and I have been journaling since 2011. At first, I wrote entries whenever I felt like it (which wasn’t often) because I could always find something more “important” to do. But as I placed a higher priority on it, I now have streaks where I journal daily for weeks on end.

5. Long-term Self-Reflection

Personally, this is the main reason that I keep a journal. I don’t have a great memory. All the things I do every day, all the crazy stuff that happens, even just the way I think and interact with the world, is changing constantly. I want to be able to look back 50 years from now and find out what I went through every day. I want to read to my grandchildren amazing stories about my teenage years and beyond. Do you really want to get old and forget about your younger life except for the basic events?

Even now, I look back on some of my posts from last year and can see that my thinking patterns and interests have changed considerably. Yet, some of the things stay the same, and it’s awesome to be able to look at yourself in every stage of your development.

Every night before I go to bed, I sit down at my computer and free-write in a password-protected word document for a few minutes about anything and everything. It may be what I’m thinking, feeling, wanting to do, any memorable moments and stories from the day, etc. My only rule is that I don’t stop writing. I usually get about half a page in every night, but it’s different for everyone. Another easy way to journal is through ohlife.

Journaling has helped me in so many ways, and I couldn’t recommend it enough. How has it helped you? Write about it in the comments below.

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