The World on my terms

Over the last four years, I have found that journaling can be a powerful tool for self-discovery, offering numerous benefits that can enhance personal growth and understanding. I keep coming back to this as I struggle with being a writer, at least in my own mind. 

Writing isn’t easy; it can be painful at times to write what I’m feeling because it can seem either too trivial or too personal. Both options contain the nagging self-doubt that goes with anxiety. I try to do my best and hope it will be good enough.

My anxiety is my worst enemy, and I just found the strength to face it and fight until I conquered it myself, with the help of my therapist. 

Journaling provides a way to enhance self-awareness and understand myself and how I fit into the world around me. Before I started journaling, I felt lost, empty, and alone. I raged against real and imagined things, letting anger govern my thoughts and actions. I naively thought I was strong enough to solve everything independently; of course, I wasn’t. All that I accomplished was to ruin my health through anxiety and stress that I never realized I had. 

Journaling encourages reflection on thoughts and feelings, which helped me finally understand myself and the big, imposing world around me. Writing is therapeutic for me. I find myself uncovering feelings I kept hidden for so long that I forgot I even had them in the first place. 

Uncovering those hidden memories and feelings helped me gain a deeper understanding of myself as I determined what they meant and why I hid or suppressed them in the first place. The values and motivations for my actions became clear once I started examining them more closely.

Writing down thoughts can help organize and clarify them, making it easier to identify patterns, beliefs, and emotions that may not be apparent at first—the motivations from my past bubble back to the surface in the present. Sometimes, dealing with them can come as a shock I wasn’t prepared for, but most of the time, my memory is pretty good. 

Journaling provides a safe space to express my emotions as I make these discoveries, which can be particularly beneficial for processing complex feelings and reducing stress or anxiety. I am prepared to handle the future by dealing with my past and present. Writing gives me insulation from the outside world as I describe what bothered me in the past and present. Things surprise me less than before when I’m writing. I feel more capable of handling things than I used to, which gives me the confidence to carry on. 

Goal setting and tracking are the tricky parts for me. I still haven’t mastered the self-discipline to write on a set schedule or for a pre-determined amount of time each day. The online writers I admire most make it seem so easy, but I know they face the same basic struggles that I face now. That gives me hope for the future. It allows individuals to set personal goals and track their progress, providing motivation and a sense of accomplishment as they reflect on their journey.

Writing about challenges can lead to new insights and solutions, helping me approach problems from different perspectives. I remind myself of this every day. It is essential in my life as I put the pieces of my jigsaw life puzzle together. It feels like I start over far too often without making much progress.

Writing sparks my creativity, allowing me to explore new ideas and possibilities without judgment—at least until I publish my stories and feel that they aren’t good enough, when my inferiority complex sets in. As unreasonable as that sounds for writing a blog, I have a fear of rejection.

Journaling can serve as a therapeutic outlet, helping to alleviate stress by providing a way to unload thoughts and emotions. I’ve found that journaling helps steady my mood. It wasn’t an easy habit to follow, but the rewards were worth the effort. Once you start journaling, you might find you are constantly being negative. That is normal because you are getting rid of your anger.  I keep trying to focus on positive things, but I seem to have a lot of anger to release. I know I can write, but I want my writing to follow a theme.

When I reflect on my experiences, they enhance my intuition, help me trust my instincts, and help me make more informed decisions. Experience is the best teacher, and we all have a wealth of knowledge at our disposal if we choose to use it. Like so many people, I tend to avoid painful memories and lessons from my past when I should recognize the lessons learned.

By documenting challenges and how they were overcome, journaling fosters resilience and a growth mindset, reinforcing the belief that setbacks are part of the journey—another hard lesson to learn, at least for me. I was taught that failure meant I did something wrong when all I did was make a mistake. I could correct it if I took the time and energy to discover precisely what that mistake was, figure out an alternative step, and then try again. Failure is nothing more than the road to success because if you never fail, then you’ve never tried. 

Journaling creates a record of personal growth over time, allowing individuals to look back and see how far they’ve come, which can be incredibly empowering. I revisit my old stories regularly to see my progress because it is easier to see that from reading a year back than just a week.

Incorporating journaling into daily routines can lead to profound insights and a more fulfilling understanding of oneself, making it an invaluable practice for self-discovery.