How To Journal To Feel Good And Ease Anxiety

Comfort is key, make some tea, get cozy, and journal!

*Adapted from my upcoming ebook: How to Feel Good

“The practice of journaling is an effective strategy for prioritizing tasks, managing stress, reducing anxiety, and increasing productivity.”  - Journaling as an effective tool to promote metacognition and enhance study methods in a pharmacology course, during and after the pandemic

Journaling is a great way to sit with yourself. And there’s no wrong way to do it! I prefer to use pen and paper, but you can type it out if that feels better or more accessible to you. The one thing I would recommend, however, is limiting distractions. Put your phone away or on Do Not Disturb. If you’re on your computer then close all other windows except for your journal. Start small if this feels hard, just sit down for a few minutes at a time and let your mind go where it wants. That’s the beauty of it, there doesn’t have to be rules. If you’re having a hard time thinking of anything to write then write that! “I can’t think of anything to write. Why am I doing this?” 

Remember, there’s no wrong way to do it, but it might also be helpful to use a prompt. Here are some that I like to use:

• Brain Dump. Just dump out the contents of your brain. No rules! Anything and everything that comes to mind. Just let it come out. Put your pen (or pencil) to paper and just go.

  
  

• Future Self. Imagine the ideal version of yourself, the ideal version of your life, in the future. It could be one year, five years, or ten years from now. It could be fifty years! Write down what you’re like, how you spend your day, where you are, who you’re with. Anything you can think of.

  
  

• Joyful Past. Think about a time in your life when you were truly happy. Could be a moment or a longer period of time, maybe even years! Where were you? What were you doing? Who were you with? What were the ingredients of this happiness? Be specific or general. Maybe reflect on several different times in your life.

  
  

• Four Questions. These are the four questions I ask myself at the end of every day. What gave me energy today? What drained me? What did I learn? What am I excited about? It’s good to do this for a while because you start to notice patterns. Sometimes a lot of the same things are giving me energy or draining me. This helps me figure out what I need to nurture and what I need to prune. Reflecting on what I learned is great because it forces me to interact with that information again, and it’s not typically what you thought you learned. Maybe it’s something you learned about yourself or another person in your life rather than a fact or a skill. For me that often looks like, “I learned that Stevie is doing better recently and he likes his new therapist.” I find these are the most important things to know and to retain. The last question helps me remember what I’m looking forward to. If you’re struggling to think of something, think about simple things: your morning coffee, a conversation with a loved one, a delicious meal, some quiet time, a book you're reading. If you’re still struggling then set the intention to do something that you can be excited about. Set the intention to go to a new coffee shop that you’ve been wanting to try, to call and talk with a friend you haven’t spoken with in a while, to go on an adventure in the forest or the mountains or in another city.

  
  

• Unsent Letters. I often write letters to people in my life or from my past without the intention of ever sending them. I often do this if I’m feeling a little (or a lot) contention or strain between me and another person. Those things tend to eat at me, even when I’m not noticing them. It helps me immensely to spend time with those thoughts and give myself the opportunity to navigate my own feelings concerning my relationships.

Pen and paper, on a computer, two minutes or twenty. All of these count as journaling. Try not to be judgmental. Be kind and curious and get to know yourself. You might really like what you find out.