Journaling – A Walk Through Memories

While writing my blog last weekend, it became clear what this week's blog topic would be. As I went through my past entries deciding which links to include, I notice that most of my 16 months of unemployment are here, at different stages along the way. I recognized that I had been journaling without realizing it. It is a high level of journaling rather than a personal one. Still, it served the purpose of showing me many things along the different journeys.

I started research of journaling for this blog. I confess I did not get very far very fast … life has a way of limiting time like that. However, for the purposes of this blog, I did find some key information that I would like to share.

Journaling can help with:

• Stress Management
  
• Problem Resolution
  
• Seeing the Bigger Picture
  
• Your Progress on Chosen Goals
  
• Plus a wide range of other benefits
  

You can do easy journaling by just writing down your thoughts when you get the urge to capture the moment. This capture of thoughts, ideas, or even of an event can be short or lengthy. You can do harder journaling; you go into detail about a thought, idea, or an event. The greatest thing about journaling is that it is 'personal' to you! It is in your style, wording, thoughts, and ideas. No one will ever have a journal just like yours.

Journaling is not supposed to bring more stress into your life. It is not another item on your To-Do List. If it feels that way when you think about starting it, you are looking at it wrong. It isn't a job or a task but more of a capture of the moments of your life. Once they are gone, if you don't have them written down, you have a great chance of losing them forever. Journaling allows us to look back at a specific moment of our life and enjoy it again. I have found, even the writings that I thought were terribly negative when I wrote them, strike me much differently when I read them later.

Reading my previous blogs here, I noticed that the details of those times of my life come back to me. Details are not with words there but they seem to have taken up residence in my heart. My mind brings them back to my remembrance with more clarity than when I wrote them.

Many people hear 'Journaling' and groan with the thought of lugging pen and paper around everywhere. With today's technology, journaling actually could not be easier! You can use a computer, a handheld PDA, your phone if it is has the ability for Notes: written or spoken. I am sure that nearly everyone has something with them most of the day that would be useful to use for journal entries.

If you want to learn more, many websites offer tools and advice. My caution is not to think there are hard and fast rules. You are, after all, unique and no one can tell you exactly what will be best for you!

Thanks for reading and Happy Journaling!