Keeping a journal to help mental health?

[Juliecloud]

Does anyone do this? I read Dr Julie Smith’s book recently and she recommends keeping a journal. I’m feeling pretty low at the moment so I’m keen to try something that I’ve not tried before.

What sort of things do you write about? Do you have set things you write about each day? Like daily gratitudes, goals etc? Or do you just write anything?

Hi OP. I have recently started keeping a journal. I have a set list that I include, gratitude, mood, sleep, have I been out of the house.
Then I write about anything that is in my head. Things that can affect me, work, relationship, anything really.

It really helps me to write things down, so they aren’t in my head. Also it’s useful
to track my mood and other factors.

I’ve recently started therapy so I also write about that too, it feels so big in my head and writing about it really helps that too.

Thank you 😊

It does help. I just write whatever is on my mind, how I feel about various situations and people, how my therapy is going, insights I've had. Not structure to it, I don't even date it. A new entry is signalled only by a change of pen colour.

I do often let my therapist read the odd entry to give him a window into my head, so to speak.

Yes I think journaling really helps. I tended to do it only now and then when I felt something big had happened that I wanted to process..

But when I was reading my journals back recently, I could see in those periods when I was doing it every day I was making massive progress every day.

I used to do it at night before bed, and heard people talking about doing it in the morning. I always thought who has the time in the morning- but I tried it once and actually massively preferred it.

I've stopped doing it for the past month- but should restart again.

I just write about what's been happening and how I feel about it. Plus what I'm worried about that's coming up - and that helps me get to the point where I can figure out what to do about it.

@Juliecloud sorry you're feeling low.

I get up an hour earlier in the morning and write a journal and meditate it helps lots, I have daily goals that I write in and tick off - nothing big but things I want to achieve eg Duolingo (Spanish) daily, 10 min meditation, 5 min yoga, 1 min plank, clean bathroom, walk outside for 10 mins that kind a thing.

I also write my values, strengths, what I want to develop and revisit daily.

I have also started to note what my inner voice is saying to me which is basically very negative and I am trying to tackle that