Journaling for happiness & mental health

Do I Journal?

YES! Ever since I was young I always had an instinctive feeling to keep a Journal. I vividly remember I was about 10 and I had a beautiful notebook with a lock; I wrote pages and pages about my secrets and deepest feelings of school crushes. I loved it! Until one day my mum found it and read it! I was absolutely mortified as you can imagine! After I never wrote anything as long as I lived with my mum again.

I didn’t journal for a while but when I moved to Prague 10 years ago I found I was drawn to journaling again and it really helped me manage the changes and emotions of adapting to a new country and culture, also I was sure my mum couldn’t read it from another country.

Should you Journal?

Apparently, there are proven wellness and health benefit to journaling for just 15-20 minutes a day including:

• Reduces Stress

• Improves immune function

• Keeps your memory sharp

• Boosts your mood

• Strengthens your emotional function.

So if you feel stuck or lonely or stressed, especially during these difficult Covid lockdown times then maybe this could help you in some way. I mean with everything closed many of us do have some extra time.

There’s absolutely something therapeutic and meditative about simply putting pen to paper and letting your thoughts and emotions flow through the ink and be absorbed by the paper.

How can you journal?

Now you don’t need to write a book, just put pen to paper and jot what comes to mind even start with just one point. Recently I came across a journaling system called bullet journal. It combines mindfulness and organization; in short, quick bullet points in such a way that you can track the past, present, and future. Check it out.