When I was a kid, I kept a diary.
I would chronicle my worries, which boys I liked, and all that a 13 year old thinks about. As I grew older, it's a habit that I let slip away from me. Looking back, I wish I had kept writing my thoughts.
It's not until about a year or two ago that I really started to journal again, well into my 30s.
At first, I found it hard to write down my thoughts without judging them, or me. I type for a living, so my handwriting has gone a little "downhill". I would find myself writing down my thoughts and instead of taking the time to really absorb what I was thinking, I would just look at the words overall and think to myself "wow, your handwriting really sucks today". That was how I re-started my journal journey.
Rough start, I'd say.
But I kept going because I soon realized the power that lies behind writing your thoughts. I just had to push judgement aside and realize that my journal is like a little clubhouse just for me and me.
It's where I go to just be with myself, my inner child, my intuition, my truest self.
As you read previously, I get anxious. I have little hamsters in my head, as I like to call them, that provide me tons of different ideas of what to worry about. That said, I have discovered that releasing these worries or thoughts onto paper allows them to have a place to go. If the thoughts are on the page, they no longer need to be in my head. The more I write, the quieter I get inside. It's peaceful.
Journaling brings me peace.
Journaling helps me get to know myself. I write down my thoughts, which allows me to look at them from a third party position, from another perspective. It's so hard sometimes to get out of our own heads and take a look at the events around us or the feelings we experience from a different perspective. It helps to read the words back to ourselves, to see how we really feel. I sometimes go even further and put the physical journal across the room to ponder what I have just written, just to have yet another angle by which to look at my thoughts. I love getting to know myself every day.
If you aren't the writing type, then download an app if you prefer - I'm sure there's an app for that.
If you work at a computer, you can open a blank word document and write things down through out the day. I often do that as it helps me better focus on my job if I can get the distracting thoughts out.
It's truly amazing how writing the thoughts down will release them from our mind, will allow them to flow freely. It allows us to take a better look at how we feel, instead of internalizing all our thoughts.
And sometimes, you decide that you love journaling so much that you start a blog where you post some of your journal entries and then strangers, much like yourself, might get inspired by your words.
Thanks for reading my journal, folks.
I love you all.
MarMar