When practiced with intent, writing can benefit the human body and mind in numerous ways. Although it may seem like just another activity, it is a stepping-stone towards better emotional well-being.
How does it help? It helps in regulating your mood, reducing stress and anxiety, bettering self-awareness, improving problem-solving skills, enhancing memory, emotional control, and enabling positive thinking. The process requires you to pen your emotions and everything you feel in an unfiltered way, without having to face judgement or criticism from anyone. You have to embrace your feelings honestly. With consistent writing, you can identify your emotional and mental patterns, and more importantly, the triggers in your life. This helps you self-reflect and work on the tendencies that might be hampering your growth.
Journalling is considered an excellent tool for self-improvement, which certainly leads to personal growth. Here are some benefits:
1. Reduced stress levels - As per an article by ‘Positive Psychology’, journalling can reduce your stress levels to a great extent. It states, ’Research suggests that journalling can help us accept rather than judge our mental experiences, resulting in fewer negative emotions in response to stressors‘. The article also adds, ’The time spent journalling about our deepest thoughts and feelings can even reduce the number of sick days we take off work.’
2. Emotional release - This is a much-needed outcome! Writing can actually stabilise our emotions. As found in several studies and reports, people actually feel lighter after penning down things that are bothering them or weighing them down. These don’t just include negative emotions. Even the positive feelings, while documented, can help you feel even happier.
3. Better memory - Journalling regularly can help you improve your memory. When we write, it helps imprint the words in our minds and so it’s lesser likely that we will forget them. This is why in schools and colleges, students are often encouraged to write down things repeatedly in order to memorise them better.
4. Self-reflection - Journalling is also an art that can help you discover yourself in various ways. There have been so many instances where people uncovered various layers to themselves, the more they journalled. This form of introspection enables you to gain a better understanding about one’s motivations, thoughts and behaviours.
5. Improved coping mechanisms - Journalling offers absolute clarity and enables us to understand problems minutely and closely. When the core problems become evident, the next step is to take action to overcome or cope with them.
6. Setting goals and achieving them - Writing down any kind of aims or ambitions, both short- and long-term, enables us to stay focused. Writing about them keeps us motivated to go that extra mile to achieve our goals.
7. Creative thinking - Regular journaling enhances the ability to think and explore our creativity. We become sharper and more open-minded, going beyond our limits to think and brainstorm, with new perspectives in place.
8. Enhanced self-esteem - Regular writing improves your self-understanding, thinking abilities, problem-solving skills, ability to channelise your emotions better, and positive thinking. These aspects will further your self-esteem.