How to journal + journaling inspo

Journaling is something that has helped me massively, and can help you. In this post I will be giving you tips on how to journal, as well as some journaling inspo, because sometimes it’s hard to know what to write!

Benefits of journaling

• Lowers stress and anxiety, by getting all of your worries out on paper
• Clears your mind
• Helps you see things from different perspectives
• Theraputic
• You can work through your problems
• You get to know yourself better
• You can change your mindset
• You can change your perspective on life
• You can spill the tea in them, if there’s something you can’t tell anyone else
• You can document life goals, celebrations, memories, feelings, etc

So now you know that there are a whole load of benefits to journaling! It’s something I’ve been doing for nearly 9 years, so I feel like I’m pretty good at staying consistent. (I’ve kept diaries all throughout my school years since late primary school – you can’t even imagine the gossip that’s in them lol).

What are the different type of journals?

Journaling doesn’t always have to be one thing. If you have never liked freely writing without prompts because you find it boring, then you don’t have to do that! And if you don’t like writing with prompts because you find it limiting, then you don’t have to do that either! There are TONS of different techniques and ways you can journal, and I’m going to show you my favourites!

Feelings journal

This is exactly how it sounds, you write about your feelings.

A feelings journal has specifically helped me with my stress and anxiety.

Prompts/ideas if you don’t know what to talk about:

• If you have any worries about something
• How you feel about your job, school, uni
• How you feel about your relationship, friendships, co workers
• If you have any gossip (it’s fun to read back years later)
• Are you sad? Why?
• Are you scared of the future? What about it and why?
• If you’ve enjoyed something
• Your favourite book, movie, place and why you like it
• How you feel about your body
• If you felt confident that day
• If you enjoyed your food that day
• How your body actually feels (did you feel more hungry than usual? Did you have low energy?) – this helps to know your body better.
• Do you have any exciting plans coming up?
• Your life goals and how you can achieve them
• Gratitude
• Your favourite memories
• What made you happy today

There is so many things that you can talk about, and honestly, you don’t have to write everyday. You don’t have to write once a month. You can write whenever you want, whenever you feel like it.

That’s the best thing about this journal, is that there is no judgment.

If you are feeling bad or guilty about something, if you have done something wrong, you can write about it and no one can judge you. You can just work through your feelings. You don’t have to validate your feelings to anyone in there.

If you have any thought dumps you can write them in there.

Just think of this journal as if you’re over sharing. There is nothing that you can’t talk about!!

What will I get out of this journal?

One of the best examples I can give, is it can really help you see a different perspective.

For example, I have been so worried and anxious about my uni grades, but since writing all of my feelings out and reading it back, I realise that I have worked hard, so no matter the outcome, I know I’ve tried my best. I haven’t enjoyed my course at all, so it’ll honestly just be amazing to scrape a pass. Everything will work out.

Sometimes when I read my journal back, I think to myself, why am I worrying? Some things are out of my control, so why should I worry about it if I can’t do anything about it?

When you read your journals back, it’s like reading it as though someone else has written them, and then you can think about it from a different perspective, like you’re trying to help a friend or family member.

Feeling journal’s really help get you out of your own head and realise that your problem usually isn’t as big and scary as you think.

It also helps you get to know yourself better! You can figure out how your mind works, what makes you happy and sad, what/who you need to cut out of your life and how you can actually put yourself first.

Manifestation journal

There are loads of ways you can manifest… so far I’ve only tried the scripting method.

I have been doing it since the new year, so 4ish months now.

What is the scripting method?

It is basically writing your dream day in the life, as if it has already happened. So you will say things like ‘I had the best day doing…’ ‘I am so lucky, today was the best day ever because…’.

So you are literally putting yourself in the mindset of you living your dream life and writing how you think you would feel and what you’d be doing.

Now I’m no expert, but I’ve heard that putting yourself in that mindset will make your brain look for ways to create that reality for yourself. So I’m definitely not missing out on that!

Benefits of manifesting:

• Positive mindset – you’re writing your dream life, no negativity involved
• Hopeful thinking – allows you to believe you can achieve your dream life
• Empowering you to become the best version of yourself
• You will see opportunities that will get you to your dream life more clearly
• Reframes negativity in your mindset to be more positive
• Lowers stress – for me, it’s made me stress less because I know that I will eventually get that dream life

I would HIGHLY recommend manifesting. I stress about things a lot, and get very anxious about things, but manifesting has made me much less stressed. For example, if someone would ask me ‘what are you going to do with your life?’, I would feel so anxious and think ‘omg I have no idea’ and I would be worrying and thinking about my future for days.

Now that I have started manifesting, I don’t feel as nervous to think about my future, because I feel like I can just sense that things are going to workout for me. Obviously there are days when I really get in my head and freak out, but generally, I have a positive and open mindset for the future!

The future is SO uncertain, but manifesting has helped me stay positive and never think of ANYTHING negative.

What can I write about? Here are some writing prompts:

Career:

• Where are you working?
• What do you wear?
• How much money do you make?
• How many hours do you work?
• What’s your work life balance?
• Do you work for yourself?

Home:

• Where are you living?
• What does your house look like?
• Who do you live with?
• How many bedrooms do you have?
• Do you have your dream dressing room? kitchen?
• What’s your favourite room in your house?

Relationship:

• What is your partner like?
• What do they ideally look like?
• How do they treat you?
• How often do you see each other?
• What do you do for fun together?
• What are your love languages?

Finance:

• How much money are you making?
• Do you have financial freedom?
• How much do you spend every month?
• What things do you spend on every month?
• Are you able to afford the lifestyle that you want?

Day to day life:

• What’s your morning routine?
• What does your daily routine look like?
• How do you feel every day?
• What are you wearing day to day life?
• What is your night routine?

Friendships:

• who are your friends?
• What do you do for fun with them?
• What are their traits?
• What are you like around them?
• Do they fit into your life?

You:

• What do you look like?
• What do you wear?
• What does your hair look like?
• What does your makeup look like?
• What does your body look like?
• How do you feel? (Confident, smart, etc)
• What do you smell like?
• What do other people think of you?

Just think of every part of your life, and how you want it to be.

Standard planner

This one doesn’t really need much explanation! But it is the planner I use the most, and basically helps me run my busy life!

Obviously there are many daily planners that you can get, but when I’m re purchasing my daily planners, I need to make sure they have these things in them:

• To do list section
• Schedule section
• Section where I can write my gratitude
• Overview of the week
• Overview of the month
• Somewhere I can write my goals (either the start of the planner – or every month)

The benefits of having a daily planner:

• Keeps you organised
• You don’t get as overwhelmed with how much stuff you have to do
• You can schedule things you enjoy
• You can keep in control of your life
• You are never late because you plan everything out
• You can hold yourself accountable
• You can stay productive by planning ahead (if you know you’re starting your period for example you can plan lighter tasks for that week)

Journals/journaling techniques I want to start:

• Shadow work
  • I want to have a journal solely for working on myself and working through problems. I know my feelings journal does that for me now, but in my feelings journal sometimes I just want to write all of my feelings so I can get it out. But when I want to be really intentional and actually work through the problem, then I can use a shadow work journal to actually come up or work through solutions to overcome problems.
• Dream journal
  • I actually have some WILD dreams, and I need to start tracking them, even if it’s just on the notes app in my phone, because I want to know if there’s some meaning behind my crazy dreams.

If you’re feeling stressed I have a post on lowering stress and anxiety at uni! The tips can be applied even if you’re not at uni <3 http://bigsisterera.com/how-to-reduce-stress-and-anxiety-at-uni/

Thank you for reading <3

I hope this helped you in some way and gave you that final push if you were thinking about journaling! Let me know if you start journaling and how you like it!