I’ve journaled most of my life.
Journaling is an exploration and involves the practice of regularly writing a daily or weekly journal that explores thoughts and feelings surrounding the events of your life. Journaling is a way of managing stress, a self-exploration tool that works best when done consistently.
Indeed, the health benefits of journaling include improving cognitive functioning, strengthening immune systems, and counteracting the adverse effects of stress.
When you journal, you write anything you want without judgment from anyone. My goal is to write my thoughts on what is hurting me and events that I want to let go of or even understand. Sometimes, there is nothing to understand. Let it be. Or write how you feel and write some gratitude about that day.
Mari McCarthy, in her 2019 book Journaling to Heal Body, Mind and Soul, writes that the top three reasons for adopting journaling include:
Stress Reduction: When you journal stressful events or painful emotions, you create a safe space to explore complex feelings. You give yourself an outlet for honest and healthy expression. Relief from
Physical Pain: Writing about physical problems helps manage or minimize your pain, uncovering emotional distress, environmental triggers and coping mechanisms.
Release from Inner Conflict: If you dwell on problems, regrets, or dilemmas, journaling will help untangle your thoughts. You gain perspective and identify patterns, potential lessons, and action steps by writing your thoughts and feelings.
“There is more journaling can do for you than you could ever imagine possible,” says Jill Grumbache, the founder of the Quebec-based Holistic Journaling, dedicated to women’s knowledge and well-being.
“You journal to heal. You journal for joy. Your journal to rise. Your journal to dig deep,” says Grumbache. “We write the unreasonable that becomes the reason, and we release the unreasonable because we come to our senses about events.”
Grumbache founded Holistic Journaling following a mentorship with Journal Therapy pioneer Kathleen Adams, director of the Therapeutic Writing Institute and the Center for Journal Therapy. “For years, I didn’t think my journaling healed; it listened and received,” says Grumbache. “I didn’t understand how to use a journal to heal, to joy, to rise–how to change your story, your narrative, to help lift yourself out of depression and support our brain’s neuroplasticity to rewire itself.”
Journaling has the potential to play a crucial role in a significant change globally and deserves to be at the level of yoga, meditation and mindfulness. The more knowledge you have, the more well-being you will have. You will have more self-compassion about self, towards others, and we will have a more compassionate world.”
A journal,
- Is a free therapist.
- Doesn’t judge.
- Let’s release the balance to heal emotionally and spiritually.
- Helps us remember and revisit lessons learned.
- Is an honest reflection of ourselves and our life journey.
Remember, “Journaling doesn’t take time; it gives time.”
If you’d like to know more about journaling and need a place to begin, contact me at OM@OlgaMunari.com. If you are seeking life coaching or spiritual enlightenment, contact me through my website olgamunari.com
