The Benefits of Journaling on your Mental Health!

  

Journaling is a way of documenting your ideas and emotions in writing. It’s something I’ve often turned to when I’m feeling uneasy, as a way of thinking through issues and explaining them better. It’s also really cathartic to write things down - it’s like offloading concerns from your head onto the sheet in front of you. Writing down your worries can be a healthy way for anyone to help ease stress, and all you need is a pen and a journal.

"Some people like to keep a regular journal, like a diary, with a daily thought or affirmation but it doesn’t have to be as structured as this," says Sangeeta Pattanaik, a Mental Wellness Coach and founder of ReLive - Because YOU Matter.

"The peace and support that you gain with putting your feelings and ideas down on paper, together with the insight that comes from knowing and recognizing your emotional triggers, is a real formula for advanced mental health."

Benefits Of Journaling

Well, journaling is no longer old-fashioned or just for a certain older-and-wiser age. It’s something you need to do now. Yes, it’s true. Journaling does more than just help you save your thoughts or find self-expression. It’s great for your health.

From work and money matters to health problems, it's normal to feel overwhelmed sometimes - but particularly at the moment. The risk and fear surrounding the pandemic have severely taken a toll on mental health, leaving a lot of us anxious, stressed, and feeling low.

One of the key benefits of journaling on your mental health is that it maintains emotional regulation. Keeping a written journal can help to recognize patterns in your feelings and behaviors, which in turn permits you to recognize whether particular triggers affect your mood.

Journaling is also about externalizing worries and anxieties too. Your journal can be an outlet for anxiety where you can 'worry dump' and get all your ideas and emotions down on paper.

If you haven’t journal in a while, here are some unbelievable journaling benefits that will inspire you to get back into the habit.

Reduces Anxiety. An excess of stress and anxiety can be damaging to your physical, mental, and emotional health. It’s confirmed. Journaling is an incredible stress management tool, a good-for-you habit that lessens the impact of physical stressors on your health. A study showed that descriptive writing (like journaling) for only 10 to 15 minutes a day three to five times throughout four months was enough to lower blood pressure and increase liver functionality. Plus, writing about stressful experiences can help you peacefully manage them. Try writing a journal as a pre-bedtime meditation habit to help you relax and de-stress.

Keeps Memory Sharp. Journaling helps keep your brain in tip-top form. Not only does it increase memory and comprehension, but it also increases working memory capacity, which may reveal improved cognitive processing.

Promotes Mood. Want more sunshine in your life? Try journaling. A unique social and behavioral outcome of journaling is this: it can improve your mood and give you a greater sense of overall emotional health and peace.

Strengthens Emotional Functions. Associated with mood is how journaling benefits overall emotional health: As journaling habits are developed, benefits become long-term, meaning that diarists become more in tune with their wellness by combining with inner needs and wants. Journaling evokes mindfulness and helps writers remain present while keeping aspects. It presents an opportunity for emotional release and helps the brain control emotions. It provides a greater sense of belief and self-identity. Journaling can help in the management of personal adversity and change, and emphasize important patterns and growth in life. Research even shows that expressive writing can help individuals develop more structured, adaptive writing about themselves, others, and the world. What’s more, journaling opens and engages right-brained creativity, which gives you passage to your full brainpower. Truly, journaling encourages growth.

Promotes Immune Function. Believe it or not, expressive writing can increase your immunity and decrease your risk of disease. Those who journal boast improved immune system functioning as well as lessened indications of asthma and rheumatoid arthritis. Expressive writing has been shown to improve liver and lung function and combat certain illnesses; it has even been reported to aid the injured heal quicker.

However, a journal doesn’t have to be all about negative emotions. Positive psychology, giving importance to the good stuff, can help to shift your mindset to a more positive one. And the 'little wins' you experience doesn’t have to be main events or milestones - it can be as small as a text from a loved one or seeing the sun rising or sunset.

How to start journaling

Start with freestyle writing

Take out ten minutes each day when you are usually less busy. It can help to direct your 'stream of consciousness' - aka, writing down whatever comes into your head.

I often recommend 'freestyle writing', whereby you put pen to paper - or finger to board - and just write, unfiltered, without hesitating to check spelling, grammar, punctuation." It can be insightful to journal in this way and often drives some helpful research around what is going on for you that you might not have previously been informed of."

Choose a topic

You could also try selecting a topic each day. This could be a broad subject such as your relationship, friendships, or work, depending on what is on your mind.

"Within each topic, reflect on your hopes, ambitions, concern what you wish you'd done otherwise, how you made a positive impact, how you landed at your decisions." There are so many ways to explore your world in a journal.

Remember it is just for you

When you start to write a journal, you may feel doubtful or less interested. If this happens, it is necessary to write about those feelings. Your journal is just for you and you do not need to show it to anybody, so it is your confidential friend.

"Please do not think that you need to write flawlessly. If you want, you can include images, pictures, and colors and you can state if you feel angry. One page can be loaded with very untidy circles or zigzag lines. In your journal you can write anything in any way you like, as it is solely for you."

Think positive

Trying to 'be positive' can feel quite strange, especially if you are feeling concerned. That being said, it can help to write down three things that you are obliged for at the end of each day. "This can be easy - just a short paragraph to review each one can be a great mood booster.

Keep the journals safe

Keep the journals somewhere hidden but convenient as it can be useful to re-read, to ponder on how you coped with past concerns and what helped get you through. "At some point - it could be the next day, or in a week, month or year - you might read back what you have previously written. "New experience might come onward."

So, great. You get it: Journaling is helpful for you physically, mentally, and emotionally. But what if you find yourself stuck, looking fruitlessly at a blank sheet? Well first, discard the guilt of not being consistent or immediately motivated. Simply start where you are. If you need to initially just write a single line or detail the specifics of what you had for breakfast, do it. Don’t preoccupy yourself with managing perfect punctuation, structure, or spelling. Just write and don’t restrict yourself. This is for you. Just remember: You don’t have to be Shakespeare.

Lastly, If you’re looking to improve your mental health and prosperity, maintain a journal.

Do comment what all ways this blog added value to your life and don’t forget to share it and follow me on Instagram & Facebook - @relivewithsangeeta & ReLive-Because You Matter