Writing a journal daily could help improve your mental health, and your life
Putting pen to paper and writing down your emotions, thoughts, and feelings could have a positive impact on your wellbeing.
From jotting down what you are grateful for, to recording the joyful moments of your day; scientific research suggests that journaling can help you work through negative feelings of anxiety and stress. Writing a journal for just 15-20 minutes a day, 3-4 times a week can have a positive impact on mental health; acting as a tool for self-awareness, self-reflection, emotional processing, and stress reduction. The British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy has a great blog post about this here
At Coffeenotes we love journaling using our sustainable stationery.
Our five top tips to help start your journaling journey
- Find a pen and notebook dedicated to your journal. We recommend our stitched notebooks in Medio(A5 or Grande (A4 Short). They come in lined, dotted or plain for whatever you want to write, draw or doodle as part of your everyday journal.
- Try to build journaling into your every day routine, even if you just write a few words on the days you don’t feel inspired.
- Always write for yourself. The only person who needs to read it is you, and don’t worry about spelling, or handwriting. Be creative – doodles, mind maps and drawings can also be helpful.
- Write about anything that comes to mind, There are lots of journaling prompts online. Our favourites prompts to write about include –
- A daily list of everything you were grateful for
- An event that impacted you
- A letter to someone special
- A list of your goals
- The best decision you ever made
- 3 small things that bring you joy every day
- Be realistic don’t set your expectations too high. A journal isn’t a therapist, but it might help you learn about yourself.
If you need mental health support please go to mental health charity Mind for more information on how to access help.