If you’re anything like me and you have a ton of nosey siblings (or friends), journaling isn’t your favorite past time. But now that I’m older, I’ve started just writing stuff down in a notebook–anything from what happened today to stories and recipes. Or sometimes I just sketch.
There are a lot of benefits to journaling I didn’t even realize until recently. I thought I should share them with you, so here they are!
You can preserve memories
You can ensure that you remember everything–your first kiss, the day you ate two dozen cookies by yourself or chugged an entire liter of mountain dew–and maybe you can show it to your kids one day.
You can sit down one day, and read back through your entries, relieving those moments and the emotions intertwined with them. (Trust me, you’ll thank me in about fifty years.)
You can preserve dreams
You know those brilliant ideas that come to you at night when you’re in bed? Or something that excited you when you were younger?
Well, if you don’t write that idea or tidbit of inspiration down, chances are, you’ll forget about it.
You can work out your thoughts and emotions
When you’re feeling alone and hurting, you can write it down. It helps you get everything you’re feeling out and gives you a chance to work through it all without being judged or criticized. But you don’t just have to write down when you’re feeling angry or down–you can write about exciting stuff that’s happened to you. Then, when you’ve got the blues, you can just go back and read about it.
You heal
If something–or someone–has really hurt you and you feel like you can’t tell anyone else…you have your journal. Just like I said before, you can pour out your emotions on those pages.
They’re not going to tell anyone.
It can help you achieve your goals
Now, this is where journaling has helped me the most. I write down what I’m hoping to do or achieve, and every day I write the date and whether or not I worked on that goal. If it’s exercising. I draw a calendar and check off the days that I workout. I log how I feel after the workouts, what I eat, etc. Or if it’s getting better grades, I log the time I’ve spent studying each day and what I studied.
I think you get the idea.
You improve your writing skills
Your English teacher will be happy about this one (provided you use proper spelling and grammar when journaling!) You learn how to sort your thoughts and phrase them as you wish because you’re writing a story–your story.
You learn self-discipline
Writing in your journal every day and making time for it every day no matter what teaches you to be disciplined. I’m sure that’ll make your parents happy.
You learn to be grateful for the little things in life
Especially when you’re writing about the good things that happened you that day. It makes you grateful for everything that’s happening or has happened, to you. And gratitude has a lot of amazing benefits including fighting depression, improves your mood, makes other people want to hang around you, improves your sleep, and highers your self-esteem. And that’s just a few! There’s a whole lot more!
#teensonly 