I’ve been journaling sine I was a pre-teen. I just wrote down my thoughts and what was going on in my life. In high school I journaled my prayers and some of life’s happenings. During college, I journaled more frequently, and it became more of an outpouring of my thoughts and feelings than just what’s going on. In adulthood, I seemed to only journal when I was struggling with something.
Then I discovered Morning Pages, creative journaling, and Bullet Journaling. These were complete game-changers.
I started writing every morning a flow of consciousness upon waking without thinking about my handwriting, whether it made sense, or if it had a purpose. I just spewed it all onto the page. It was amazing how much clutter that process cleared from mind.
Bullet Journaling gave me a way to organize my notes so I could find them later along with capturing and honoring my daily tasks and appointments. I am so grateful for Ryder Carroll making this method of planning known to the world. It has brought me tremendous gratification in what before seemed like mundane things, which, in turn, made my life feel mundane. But giving each task a place on the page and letting it be ok to want to write it all down and check it off brought value and satisfaction.
Creative journaling lit a spark in me I did not even know was there. It grew from the Bullet Journal community that labeled drawing as doodling, which sounds much less intimidating. So, I started doodling. Then I started playing with paint. Before I knew it, I was prepping pages for hours at a time while my family watched TV, so I could journal throughout the week on beautiful pages. It was exhilarating, and brought me so much joy!
If you haven’t yet, I highly recommend trying one or all three of these forms of journaling!