5 Benefits to Keep a Journal
3 Mins Read
Did you ever use to keep a diary as a child, and start each line with ‘Dear Diary’? Even though you are all grown up now doesn’t mean writing journals is beyond you, some of the most extraordinary people have kept journals: Albert Einstein didn’t just write about research, he also wrote amusing travel journals and daily thoughts. You can actually find these archived online now at www.alberteinstein.info; if you want to see the journals of the first woman to win the Nobel prize, Marie Curie, you will have to donate special clothing and sign a waiver - her pioneering research on radioactivity has affected her notebooks too! Winston Churchill, Leonard Da Vinci, Charles Darwin were all famous journal-writers. More contemporary journal writers include Mr and Mrs Obama, or actress Emma Watson, among many others we will likely find out about when they publish their memoirs.
So it turns out that your parents or teachers were on the right track when they gave you that diary to write in – the benefits of keeping a journal go far beyond just recording that day you spilled coffee over your shirt or when you won ten bucks at the lottery.
1 Journals Help Improve Thought Clarity and Decision Making
When you transfer thoughts from mind to paper, this not only helps give structure to ideas that you had in your mind, it also clears up mental capacity to think about issues instead of storing issues.
2 Writing Reduces Stress
There is more and more scientific research about the mental benefits of writing (https://psychcentral.com/lib/the-health-benefits-of-journaling/). Writing about anger, sadness and other painful emotions helps to release the intensity of these feelings. By doing so you will feel calmer and be better able to stay in the present.
3 Journaling boosts creativity
Modern society and smartphones bring along with it a daily influx of new content, ads, and information in general that most of us end up just absorbing but never creating. Creativity is a muscle that deteriorates without practice. Go to any creative writing course and the first commandment is always to write more, because the more you use your creativity the more creative you become. Journaling can be about more than documentation, it can also be about your ideas. Eventually, you will see the creativity flow into different areas of your thinking as well.
4 Writing Journals is a Tool for Self-improvement
The privacy of the journal lets you express yourself more openly than you ever could to any person. When you write down your life experience and your reactions and emotions, this gives you access to past moments in time that you can look back upon and compare against your present self. So someday you can be like, ‘why on earth did I do that?’, or say ‘wow that is actually a really good mindset, I need to learn to think from that perspective again’. You become your own mentor.
5 Improves Memory
According to research published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, expressive writing reduces intrusive thoughts about negative events and improves working memory. A set of experiments conducted by Martin Conway and Susan Gathercole at Lancaster University also suggest that writing about your experiences can improve memory retention. And you also may have heard that the action of writing with pen and paper has more memory-enhancing benefits than typing too!
Watercolour floral illustration print notebook by SCKCART
As a bonus benefit, keeping a journal will make it easier for you to write that autobiography or memoir for when you finally become famous. That’s how Michelle Obama wrote her bestselling memoir Becoming, after all. Here are some great ideas for you to start writing about, https://psychcentral.com/blog/30-journaling-prompts-for-self-reflection-and-self-discovery/, and before you start, check out these creative notebooks and writing materials designed by our Qraftie sellers.
Thank you for being an appreciative reader as always. If you enjoying this blog post, please share it with your family and friends. We wish you great success in things you are passionate about.
Sources: Forbes Bustle Skipprichard
December 2019
About the author
This blog is written by Qraftie Ambassador, Bernard Yu. Bernard enjoys reading, writing, and water sports. His dream is to have a house next to the ocean furnished with beautiful handcrafted items.
