🔼: [[⭐️ Integration]], [[💡 Reflection|Reflection]], [[⭐️ Self-Care]], [[💡 Self-Intimacy|Self-Intimacy]] ### 🕯️ Journaling Journaling is essentially the [[Practices 🕯️|Practice 🕯️]] of talking to yourself with an external aid. Journaling can require us to slow down and it can naturally structure our thinking; all by itself, it enables us to express, reflect on, and explore our thoughts and [[⭐️ Emotions]] with greater [[☀️ Clarity]] — it’s a [[🕯️ Mindfulness|🕯️ mindfulness practice]] that can even help us resolve some [[💡 Trauma|trauma]] even without intending to do so. Journaling is often much more helpful than everyday internal thought, which is more often than not fragmented and recursive and never seen through to the end (see: [[💡 Papañca|papañca]]). Journaling can reduce or even stop this because we have to finish a thought to write a coherent sentence. It helps us be more mindful and self-attuned in our day-to-day, which over time reveals our [[⭐️ Needs]], [[⭐ Values]], and [[💡 Desires|Desires]] because we illuminate what bothers us, what nurtures and [[⭐️ Rest and Restoration|⭐️ restores]] us, what distresses us and what we can do about it to free up inner resources we may never have otherwise known were taken up. --- - [[🔑 Our minds are natural story-tellers]] - [[🔑 We learn and discover the most by going inward]] - [[🔑 Journaling helps us unblend]] --- We can journal whenever we want to, and it can be quite helpful when we're experiencing strong [[⭐️ Emotions]] or aren’t feeling them, when we have a problem to ponder, when we want to reflect, before bed, or after waking. The purpose of a journal isn’t just to keep a record of our thoughts or the events of the day like some kind of ledger. It can be a powerful ally in an attempt to better understand ourselves and explore moments of resonance. It’s a way of self-[[Mirroring]] or [[Rubber Ducking]], or a way to [[🔑 Tell and act the truth|🔑 tell the truth]] to ourselves. I’ve found it’s a way of blowing dust to see what invisible forms become visible, to [[🛠 Palpating|🛠 Palpate]], to uncover what I know, think, feel, want, need. It helps us see more than the tip of an iceberg, it gives various [[💡 Parts|parts of ourselves]] the space to be seen, heard, understood, and felt — even befriended. I often don’t fully know what I think, feel, or know about something until after I’ve written about it. **The point of journaling is not the journal itself**. - It’s to let ourselves complete each sentence and fully hear ourselves out, which sometimes allows problems to metabolize and resolve. This is a place to be completely unguarded with yourself, to say things in the privacy of the page (or screen) that you would be hesitant to say to anyone else. Mountains can start to shift on their own in response to this [[Practices 🕯️|Practice 🕯️]] alone. - It’s the self-connection and insight that happens as a byproduct of the act of journaling. This is true to such an extent that there are people who journal until they feel it’s complete and then throw away the pages or delete the text. I will sometimes [[🕯️ Pendulation|🕯️ pendulate]] between journaling and closing my eyes and attuning to my interiority or just allowing whatever is there to be there through a practice like [[🧘 Do Nothing]]. > [!NOTE] > Journaling is likely my single most disproportionally powerful [[Practices 🕯️|Practice 🕯️]] because it supports all the others. Whatever it is I’m focusing on, I write about it. I create lists and [[🕯️ Remembrances]], I create [[🛠️ Want To-Do List|🛠️ Want To-Do Lists]], it’s where I go to [[💡 Reflection|Reflect]] and [[⭐️ Integration|Integrate]]. It is how I sit down with myself and have a check-in to see how I’m doing with [[🕯️ Self-Stewardship]]. The most important person we speak to is ourselves — prioritize it. ##### Journaling Prompts I used to consider journaling prompts juvenile and condescending, even when I was a child, but some parts of me have changed their minds. If you’ve ever seen an especially good interview with someone you admire, you may have noticed that what made the interview good isn’t the interviewee, but the interviewer asking the right questions. Their questions prompt the interviewer to explore things they would never have thought to mention otherwise. The same is true for a classroom or in the presence of an expert — good questions stir the interviewee and draw things out of them that they may never have been able to on their own. Journaling prompts do this for us. They are interview questions meant to help us draw things out of us that lie dormant. [[⭐ Questions]] can be incredibly powerful. - Journaling for Insight on [[📱 Waking Up]] - What am I unwilling to feel? - What am I avoiding? There are others strewn throughout the Guide. ##### Format - [[🛠 Freewriting]] - [[🕯️ Letters from Love]] - [[🛠 Emotional Journaling]] - [[🛠 Visual Journaling]] - [[🛠 Integration Journal]] - [[🛠 Solo Parts Work Journal]] - [[🛠️ Navigation Journal]] - [[🛠 Bullet Journal]] - [[🕯️ Gratitude]] ##### Medium ###### Writing by Hand - Always tactile and portable, can be soothing and luxurious. All we need is a notebook and something to write with, and there are oceans of options. We can take our time considering and pick the ones that resonate with us most or bring us the most joy and comfort. - Forces us to slow down, to consider, and to not get too ahead of ourselves. [[🔑 As speed decreases, wonder increases]]. - For some, writing by hand can help us reach greater depths than typing. - Wonderfully freeform, we can chose all sorts of pens and pencils, write all over the page, add paint and stickers and drawings — anything. - Potentially less secure than typing if someone finds our journal or it gets misplaced. There's also the possibility of irreparable damage, and it isn't as searchable as a digital journal. ###### Typing - If we can type faster than we can think, it can help prevent certain parts from arising and interfering while others speak. Self-analysis stops, we might feel less self-conscious, less paralyzed, and find that we can learn things we would never have expected because parts don't have the time to self-judge and analyze. - If you find a keyboard you like, typing can be a fluid, satisfying, and tactile experience. - A digital journal can be synced to several devices, is searchable and (thanks to Obsidian) connectable. We can also add photos, videos, music whatever we want. - Some of us may find it more difficult to stay immersed our inner-world if we’re opening our eyes to write. If we can type with our eyes closed, this might be easier. - Most of the time digital notes are not in our handwriting, which makes them less expressive. - In some ways more limiting than pen and paper. We can't do much to change colors or write in shapes or upside down or draw pictures. It's also substantially more expensive and requires looking at a screen. - Typing might also be a form of natural [[🛠 Bilateral Stimulation]]. ###### Talking Out Loud - It might be helpful to talk aloud while interacting with parts — I suspect for the same reason it can be helpful for people to talk to themselves, or why [[Rubber Ducking]] is so effective. - Talking out loud helps me stay focused and sometimes helps me gain valuable insights I otherwise never would have. - There’s software that can transcribe audio files, so we don’t have to give up a written document to reflect on, though it may not be a perfect transcription and is unlikely to be helpfully formatted. - Especially useful if writing is difficult, if the things we want to say come faster than our ability to write them, or if we're immersed in our inner world. - Obsidian has a built-in voice recorder. ###### Audio + Video - Helpful for noticing our body language and might help us notice something we couldn’t in the moment. - Could prove valuable months or even years later. - Gives us a lot more material for integration work. ###### Hybrid - The most complex, but it covers several bases. Using multiple methods at once, can help us capture all of the most important things we want to. - I’ve combined the [[🛠 Solo Parts Work Journal]] with an audio recording and [[🛠 Visual Journaling]] because [[💡 Parts|Parts]] don’t always communicate verbally, so it's important to me that I bring in the body and image. I often add splashes of water color to my journal before I start, just because I find it visually pleasing and it delights some of my parts. It also helps with [[🛠 Containment]] and tells me which pages are parts work pages.