Recently, journaling has become a hallmark of the self-care movement, alongside positive thinking. Some people might be skeptical about the positive effects that something as simple as journaling could possibly have on your mental health or your general well-being. However, I am here to argue in favour of this seemingly vain practice, and give you three proven ways to use journaling to improve your well-being.
Journaling as a method of self-reflection can be traced back for centuries, and its benefits seem to go beyond helping you organize your thoughts and recording your memories. They range from boosts in mindfulness to a stronger immune system to a better mood and lower stress levels.
When and how does journaling benefit you?
Researchers are still unclear about the primary underlying mechanisms of journaling that could lead to some of these effects. In order to understand what it is about journaling that makes us feel better, let’s first take a closer look at it from the lens of positive psychology. Psychologist Sonja Lyubomirsky and colleagues have proposed that there are three major factors that contribute to happiness: first, a genetic baseline for your capacity to experience positive emotions; second, your life circumstances and demographics such as age and socioeconomic status; and third, the activities you do intentionally in your everyday life. Since the first two factors are by and large uncontrollable, the best way to increase your happiness is through your daily volitional activities.
In this article, I will discuss three scientifically tested journaling exercises — gratitude journaling, positive thinking journaling, and emotional disclosure journaling — that you can put into practice and find the one that best fits your needs.
Gratitude journaling
If you’re thinking about taking up journaling but don’t know where to start, consider gratitude journaling. Some prompts to catalyze your writing include writing three things that went well each day, listing things in your life that you feel grateful for, or even writing a gratitude letter to someone in your life — sending it is optional!
Gratitude interventions have been consistently found to be an effective way to increase a person’s subjective well-being. In a study conducted by psychologist Martin Seligman and colleagues, in a gratitude journaling group, participants were asked to write about three things that went well each day, and in the comparison group, they completed a journaling exercise that required them to write about early childhood memories. The study results showed that the gratitude group reported feeling less depressed and experienced more positive effects than the individuals who completed the non-gratitude journaling task in the control group.
Additionally, the benefits of gratitude journaling might extend to expressing our appreciation for others. Psychologist Steven Toepfer and colleagues found that participants were generally happier and experienced decreased depressive symptoms after writing gratitude letters once a week for a period of three weeks to express their appreciation for somebody.
Positive thinking
An alternative to gratitude journaling is positive thinking journaling, which entails a wide range of prompts or themes. However, most studies have focused on journaling exercises that require participants to journal about their goals, hopes for the future, and their best possible selves.
To put this type of journaling into practice, think about your best possible self; reflect on what you might want to become in the future and the best possible scenarios for current and future situations in your life.
There are several theories about how this journaling exercise might be beneficial. A study by Laura King indicates that the benefits of journaling about your best possible self might be in the process itself, since journaling in detail about a desired outcome might help you organize your thoughts, focus on your goals, and increase your overall happiness.
Interestingly, a recent study by Leonie Manthey and colleagues sought to compare the effectiveness of these two previously discussed approaches — that is, gratitude and positive thinking journaling. The study found that the effect of both approaches was moderated by the participants’ reported interest and enjoyment of the intervention.
Emotional disclosure
However, the benefits of journaling should not be reduced to short-term increases in positive emotion due to the pure enjoyment of the activity. Not all journaling methods have effects limited to a short timespan. Other journaling approaches seem to cause sustained long-term effects, decreasing people’s negative emotions and even benefiting their physical health. A well-researched example is emotional disclosure journaling.
There are moments in which the pleasure of writing about our best possible selves or the feelings of gratitude toward things in our life will be overshadowed by overwhelming stress or sadness. During these inevitable moments in life, you might find comfort in emotional disclosure journaling. Emotional disclosure journaling involves writing emotionally about past events that were distressful or even traumatic.
Previous research suggests that the process of emotional disclosure in writing might help you make sense of the event, which will consequently decrease your stress and allow you to think about other things. According to psychologist James Pennebaker, the benefits of emotional disclosure journaling might be partially explained by the cognitive processing theory.
Pennebaker pooled the results of five years of experimental studies on emotional disclosure and found that participants who had benefited most from the exercise used significantly more causation words — such as ‘because’ and ‘cause’ — and insight words — such as ‘know’ and ‘consider’ — compared to those who had not benefited from the writing exercise. These results suggest that for emotional disclosure to be effective, you must make sense of the event.
Compared to other journaling methods, emotional disclosure seems to cause short-term increases in distress and other negative effects; however, participants often report feeling better and show improved physiological health measurements in the long term. For example, a study by Kelley and colleagues showed that although it didn’t seem to have a significant effect in the short term, three months after an emotional disclosure exercise, participants showed decreased symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis than a control group.
Whether you’re feeling stuck in life, going through a phase of hardships, or recently underwent a stressful event like surgery, journaling might serve as an accessible practice to increase your happiness and well-being. Without a doubt, it has earned its spot as a hallmark of self-care.
Maria Natalia Rodriguez is a fourth-year student specializing in Psychology. Maria is the media director for the University of Toronto Sports and Business Organization, the social media manager for TEDxToronto, and the content & strategy director for the Athlete Tech Group.
