Journaling
Through most of my life, I dismissed journaling as something frivolous, a waste of time, and not something that “men” do. Over many years of deployments and civilian workforce challenges, I kept the problems I faced in my own head, mulling them over and over. The challenges would often wait for me to have free time to resurface, but they could show up any time. On the drive home, I would be on autopilot thinking about a situation, replaying it again and again in my head, thinking about how it could be different if I only changed this or that. Sometimes my kids would be showing me a project for school and a past situation would come up and compete for my attention. However, the past situations’ favorite time to show up was when I was trying to sleep. I could lay there for hours playing out all the possible scenarios. I would be exhausted and sometimes more irritable the next morning instead of rested and refreshed. The stress was so bad at one point that I worked with a therapist, and that is when I discovered the power of journaling.
Journaling probably is not what you think it is and it actually can benefit many aspects of our lives. Read on to learn more.
What is Journaling?
Journaling is a simple process that provides a powerful tool for reflection, stress relief, improving performance, achieving thought clarity, and improving our overall well-being. Journaling involves looking back over events that have happened, writing them down, and reflecting on them to learn from our life’s experiences. Journaling can also be an opportunity to look forward and set intentions for what we are going to do. Days later, we can look back and determine how close we came to achieving those intentions. Journaling is process that helps us learn about ourselves and grow.
Why Journaling?
Dr. J.W. Pennebaker a professor at the University of Texas, Austin, and the author of Opening Up: The Healing Power of Expressing Emotions, has researched journaling as a tool for expression for many years. Dr. Pennebaker’s research shows that expressing painful emotions is good for our emotional health, and journaling also boosts our physical health (1997). Other studies cited in peer reviewed journals support Pennebaker’s observations for patients diagnosed with Asthma and Rheumatoid Arthritis, as well as students who are dealing with anxiety as they enter college, and for nurses dealing with the stress of their jobs.
Who uses journals?
Lots of people journal – athletes, business leaders, people recovering from traumatic experiences, and everyday people. Many top professional and Olympic athletes consistently practice journaling including tennis star Serena Williams (Kent, 2011) and Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps (Panwar, 2022). In fact, some coaches require the athletes they train to journal consistently.
Athletes use journaling to help them manage stress, increase self-awareness, and improve their coping skills. Just imagine, if journaling can help elite athletes improve their performance and reach their goals, journaling can probably help you in every aspect of your personal and professional life.
Dr. Richard Kent, the author of Writing on the Bus: Our Games Using Notebooks and Athlete Journals (2011), has studied athletes’ writing and its effect on training and performance. Dr. Kent works with individual athletes, coaches, schools and teams to use writing to improve overall performance. Kent explains that athletes who journal have a private space to explore their wins and losses, their emotions, and other aspects of their performance.
Dr. Jim Loehr, founder of the Human Performance Institute, has worked with top athletes and business executives for many years and reflective journaling has been a key part of the program. Dr. Loehr, in his book Leading With Character (2020), claims that in all the years of his program, every client experienced some form of change due their reflective journaling activities. Dr. Loehr is a staunch advocate of journaling because of the insights that people begin to see, even in the early stages of their journaling experience.
Dr. Nancy Adler, a professor of Organizational Behavior McGill University, Montreal, Canada, states that her own research shows the effectiveness of journaling on improving leaders’ performance. Outstanding leaders gain a competitive advantage by seeing and comprehending their environment and understanding how changes will affect their organization before others can. Dr. Adler recommends that leaders commit to at least 15 minutes a day writing in their journal. Over time, thoughts will become clearer, patterns will emerge and opportunities will present themselves (Adler, 2016).
People who are recovering from injury or trauma use journals to help in their treatment and recovery. A study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) showed that people who write about emotionally traumatic events have experienced beneficial effects in their well-being and greater symptom reductions compared to those who did not journal (Smith, Stone, Hurewitz, & Kaell, 1999).
How do you journal?
The best way to journal is to make handwritten notes and drawings. According to Dr. Jim Loehr, the time we need to think about turning our thoughts into hand written words actually helps us process the thoughts behind our feelings, assumptions, and interpretations. Slowing down to write out the words actually helps us reach clarity. Turning a feeling into a sentence will help identify the often jumbled-up thoughts we experience, turning them into a clear concept that allows us to start working towards solutions. If you prefer to use a computer, there is still a benefit to digital journals, so by all means, use the computer because it is better than not journaling at all.
How do I get started?
When I purchased my first journal; it was a nice leather bound book with ruled pages just waiting for me to fill them. Then I went to write my first line, “not that” I thought to myself, “that is crazy,” “that doesn’t make sense.” I decided to wait and try again tomorrow, and the same thing happened. I was experiencing writers block and my only audience was myself. Finally, I used a set of writing prompts to help me get started. Looking at that blank page can be intimidating. There is no one right place to start, but I have found that writing prompts can help you flow into the things that are on your mind. Here are some of the ones I like to use:
· The things I am grateful for today are:
· The things I want to accomplish today are:
· The thing I wish I would have done yesterday is:
· My goals are:
· My values are:
· I believe my life’s purpose is:
· I think my strengths are:
· My opportunities for improvement are:
In future blogs we will explore some of these topics such as purpose, values, and goals in greater depth. For now, let’s just use these to get started.
If you are interested, let’s have a conversation about how journaling can benefit you. Contact me at Lou.Kelley@thehoningstone.com.
LPK
The Honing Stone
References
Adler, N. J. (2016, January 13). Want to Be an Outstanding Leader? Keep a Journal. Retrieved from Harvard Business Review: https://hbr.org/2016/01/want-to-be-an-outstanding-leader-keep-a-journal
Kent, R. (2011). Writing on the Bus: Using Athletic Team Notebooks and Journals to Advance Learning and Performance in Sports. New York: Peter Lang Inc.
Loehr, J., & Kenney, C. (2020). Leading with character:10 minutes a day to a brilliant legacy. Hoboken: Wiley.
Panwar, S. (2022, June 23). “It’s Not Fair to Me”- Michael Phelps’ Wife Opened Up on His Actions She Resented. Retrieved from Essentially Sports: https://www.essentiallysports.com/us-sports-news-swimming-news-nicole-phelps-its-not-fair-to-me-michael-phelps-wife-opened-up-on-his-actions-she-resented/
Pennebaker, J. W. (1997). Opening up: the healing power of expressing emotions. New York: Guliford Press.
Smith, J. M., Stone, A. A., Hurewitz, A., & Kaell, A. (1999). Effects of writing about stressful experiences on symptom reduction in patients with atshma or Rheumatoid Arthritis: A randomized trial. JAMA, 1304-1309. doi:10.1001/jama.281.14.1304