Have you ever tried to journal and felt you were hitting a brick wall?
Ever felt journaling is not meant for you?
Then this post may be for you.
That is exactly how I felt many years back as I dipped my toes into journaling. And every once in a while it may happen even when you are used to journaling.
Not to worry….it just means your creativity is seeking a little extra boost. And we all know the feeling of ease when the words start flowing like a sea once that dam breaks down.
My first experience with journaling was at a yoga studio I tried out when my son was an infant. I am grateful to my yoga teacher who introduced timed journaling as part of a yoga session. I was told this was to identify our thought patterns.
A few years later, I was part of a Bible based study group where the writer chatted with God through journaling over her morning coffee. Soon, I came across “Conversations with God” by Neale Donald Walsch. I learnt that both these works shared “automatic writing” aka journaling as a core means to connect with the supernatural (the collective subconscious mind).
Whether you are trying to converse with God or just sort out the thoughts in your mind, journaling provides so much clarity; so many aha moments. It is no joke when they say the answers you seek lie within you. It leaves you amazed at how much knowledge was within you already that you had no clue about (no clue at least to the immediate conscious mind). Not to mention the unparalleled feeling of being connected to your higher self/ universal consciousness. When it starts to flow, it is almost addictive.
If you are new to journaling, here are a few tips to make your experience a little easier. Let me also share the blocks I ran into with each step and how I got around it… in case this makes for a seamless journaling path for you:
- Set a timer for 10 minutes, then try to write or type anything that comes to your mind.
What did I do?: Since I was told this was to identify our thought patterns, I took it literally. I diligently tried to identify each thought in my mind one after the other to find the pattern.
What did I learn from it?: Journaling is a semi meditative experience meant to access our subconscious. By trying to consciously identify each thought, I was trying to keep my mind at the conscious level. And further, this was making my mind do more mental work than outside journaling.
As a result when I felt I could not identify my thoughts at that moment, I kept getting stuck in between the process. Like a sewing machine that needed some oil. And even felt journaling may not have been for me. But again, I had to keep in mind that practice makes perfect. Maybe with the next attempt I would get the hang of it.
How did I get around it?: I had to just ease into typing or writing, where I wasn’t thinking about the thoughts in my mind. I started off with a sentence, then just kept on typing randomly, without thinking if what I was typing was related to it. So I was not typing with a goal in mind. Pretty much like how our mind works when we daydream or ruminate.
- Try to journal when you have a difficult scenario to handle.
Journaling may provide clarity on what is going on behind the scenes in a difficult scenario. And it is pretty impressive how journaling gives valuable solutions for it too.
Click here to read an example of how a journaling attempt helped bring clarity to my mind, when it was hard to stay present in the moment. It led me from one piece of wisdom to the next and so on, all the way to a surprising revelation of the root cause!
What did I do?: Debate the value of journaling vs handling the scenario by thinking it over in my mind.
What did I learn from it?: Mentally thinking it over is a good step. However, if I seemed to reach a dead end with it, journaling still gave me valuable insights and even helped me get it off my chest. It proved to be cathartic and relieving.
How did I get around it?: I added journaling to my solution oriented strategies.
- Find the right time to journal.
Many spiritual practitioners and gurus advise journaling first thing in the morning on waking up. Now what if you are not able to find time right as you wake up? Read on to see what we can do…
Our brain waves are transitioning from sleep to waking state as soon as we wake up. Typically those brain waves are the best to work with affirmations, meditations or any other work accessing the subconscious for deep and lasting transformation (in fact the very basis of hypnotherapy).
Did someone say journaling is a semi meditative experience? 🙂 Like meditation, journaling right after waking is to help connect to our subconscious mind first thing in the morning, so that we can have clarity throughout our day. Life can be easy to navigate then, and we can make the best choices.
But in my case, with a little one to take care of, who woke up with me and refused to sleep until I was calling it a day too, this became hard.
What did I do?: I played around with the time that worked for me.
What did I learn from it?: Journaling whenever I could find a quiet moment was still insightful and cathartic to me. There is no right or wrong way. The answer is always whatever works best in the given circumstances.
How did I get around it?: I chose a time when I would not be disturbed for about 15-20 minutes. Nowadays, that is most often when my son is at school. I found a place with reduced noise and distractions. And then tried journaling. (Reminds me of the times I tried meditating in my car parked under a tree during lunch break at work.)
Once when I felt checkmated by life, I had a journaling experience that gave me a lot of clarity, leading me from one piece of inner wisdom to the next. You can read about it in this post.
Now I even have an Ebook and an entire coaching course founded on automatic writing and journaling!! Of course with the help of the conscious mind to design and format it and integrate with helpful worksheets and other elements, after the bulk of its creation from the subconscious.
A deeper way to get answers from your subconscious mind is by hypnotherapy. And no, it’s not the stage show kind of hypnotherapy. It’s the kind where you enter a deep guided meditation and are guided one on one by an expert therapist to seek answers and deliver therapeutic elements from there on. You can read how it gave me clarity here.
So, could you please tell me about your experience with journaling?
