9 Fantastic Benefits of Journal Writing (Even If You Think It's a Waste of Time)
So, you think writing in a journal is silly, right? It's time consuming, yields a bunch of bad writing you'll never use in your professional career, and you'd die (or, at least, feel embarrassed) if anyone got a hold of it. It could even ruin your best relationships if it got into the wrong hands.
Despite those major negatives, writing in a journal can have many benefits for you, including relieving your stress and advancing your writing career. I don't know about you, but those two benefits are extremely important to me.
Let's dig deeper into what you can achieve through journal writing.
1. Relieve Your Stress
Journal writing can be extremely cathartic. When you have a lot on your plate, writing down your thoughts and feelings can help you overcome the stress and stay in control.
2. Advance Your Career
Journal writing on a regular basis can help you improve your writing and can give you a brainstorming session on how you can advance your career.
3. Set Your Goals
A journal is a great place to do some goal-setting. Figure out what would make you happy and write down how you can achieve that happiness.
4. Monitor Your Success
Keeping record of your accomplishments on a regular basis will help you to become more productive, allowing you to figure out what you need to do next to accomplish your goals.
5. Gain Control of Your Emotions
It always helps to tell other people about the issues you are having, but what if you don't feel comfortable confiding in other people? Write about your problems in your journal. If it helps, read it out loud to help satisfy your need to talk it through.
6. Zone in on Your Thoughts
When you communicate with others, you need things to talk about. If you're anything like me, you probably don't get out much and would prefer to read a book at home. But when you do get out into the world, having some opinions on things other than writing can help fuel a good conversation.
7. Speak Your Mind Without Speaking
If you have some built-up tension or would like to tell someone off, use your journal to spout out. If that person lives with you, either write it out and delete it or use a strong password to prevent inappropriate access to your journal. Speaking your mind can do an immense amount of damage to your reputation. When you spout out to the wrong person, you may find it difficult to ever achieve success in your writing career.
8. Clear Your Mind for Your Writing
Writing down your thoughts and troubles will help clear your mind for your writing and prevent your negative thoughts from eating up your productivity.
9. Find Fodder for Your Writing
After several months of journal writing, go back through your journal entries and jot down writing ideas that come to mind. Who knows, that journal entry from two months ago could be the key to your next book.
So, what benefits have you achieved by journal writing? Do tell!
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