Deliberate Journaling
DELIBERATE JOURNALING
Why journaling?
Do you need a journal to write your romantic fantasies, wild imaginations, dreams and hopes? The answer is yes, and more so you need a journal to write your goals, ambitions, your strategies, your ideas, your road map, anything that you really want to bring to form.
As a matter of fact, your thoughts, written down and revisited often can turn out to be a blessing that you need in order to transform your life.
Deliberate journaling is when you open your journal and ask yourself what do I need to tell myself today? what can I say of myself or the world I live in? what do I need to accomplish today? or what am I grateful for today? Then, allow thoughts and words to flow through as you write them down. It might sound silly, the things you write but keep the flow going and after you put the pen down, reread what you wrote and underline the message that seem important to you.
In my book, “Say I Can” – Be a Deliberate Co-creator of Your Own Life, I have dedicated a whole chapter on journaling. A process I credit to have led me to figure part of myself that I did not know existed. Journaling helped me to see my life experiences in a different light. I began being grateful for the small things I accomplished every day, thereafter I looked forward to writing what else I was grateful for and what I wanted to bring to my life. The more I continued journaling, the more I became clear of what I wanted in life.
I did this exercise of journaling to experiment it with the things I wanted to experience in my life and I witnessed their manifestation come quicker. From career to travels, love to joy, freedom to clarity all were discussed in my journals before they manifested to my reality.
Don’t believe anything I say or write here, if you have a scientific mind like I do, experiment it yourself and see what change in the next 7 days, 21 days, 30 days or in 1 year.
When you practice journaling, over time it becomes a habit. When this habit is ingrained in your mind, you will find yourself writing thoughts to express life in various ways as it unfolds to you. After some time of journaling, you will start to see a pattern, the connecting thread of all there is in your experiences. You will then appreciate the role you play in making life happen to you.
Many have said, and I will repeat it here, “You create your own reality”, so never give away that power to someone else. After all, in life, your best bet is to think it, write it and follow through with action. And, if you can’t get it right now, go within and ask for help. When you receive this help, which may come to you in form of something you listen to, read, or have strong feeling about, write these thoughts down. Deconstruct what is relevant to you and act upon this choice. This journaling experience will be far much better than trying to get others tell you how to live your life.
I attended a master class with Robin Sharma and he shared seven reasons why you should use a journal. Use journaling to accomplish these seven things and your life will never be the same again.
1. Journaling to organize your thinking
Write what you want to accomplish in a day, a month, a year or five years. Write down your top five things you want to experience in this life? You can even map your entire life in a journal.
2. Journaling to promote hope
When you are going through a tough or a painful life cycle, write down in a journal how you want your life to unfold. Write down your desires, emotions and successes, mapping how you can move from where you are right now to where you want to go. Use journal to promote hope and live each day your best life.
3. Journaling to repeat and re-live your favorite experiences
Write the beautiful moments of your life that bring greatest joy and connect with this moments. I have written in my book how I used journaling to re-live my beautiful childhood memories that was rich with unconditional love. And every time I feel down, I revisit this time to heal my current life.
4. Journaling to imprint deliberate gratitude
The more you appreciate the small things of life, the more you will open to big things of life to flow to you. Gratitude is just like any other muscle you practice developing. So, look for things you are grateful for and record it in your journal and to take this a step further, connect this gratitude with the emotions of joy and love.
5. Journaling to help you process through and release low energy emotions
When going through a tough life season, journal this pain away to help you heal and release this hurtful feeling. Release all low emotions to create room for love and joy. Most effective way is to write a letter to those who caused you harm and in the letter, pour your heart out and at the end forgive them and ask them to forgive you. When you release this lower energy, you foster room for love and joy or any other positive emotion you want to experience.
6. Journaling to help you improve information retention.
Write what you learn in a journal will help you retain more. Dissect what you learned and see how you can use the information in your journal to expand your life. So, when you attend a seminar or a group discussion, carry with you a journal to write important things.
7. Journaling to helps you record your remarkable life.
Write down your beautiful life because, only you who will live your life, and no one else will ever be you. Write a beautiful autobiography of your life and at the end of this short ride called life, you will be happy to have lived your best life and left behind something to inspire others long after you are gone.
Written by Mercy Njenga. Author: Say I Can- www.mercynjenga.com