This is for those of you who think you’re not journaling right!

Your journaling practice will start simple. It might be you describing your feelings at the end of each day, a morning gratitude list, or recording your stream of thoughts. Whatever the case may be, your journaling practice won’t stay the same.

Journals naturally evolve as you learn more about yourself and as you challenge yourself to grow.

That’s because your jouranl is a reflection of the evolution that’s going on in your inner world.

The person you are right now is not the person you’re going to be six months from now.

As you write, reflect, and repeat, you’ll start wanting to receive more from your entries. You’ll notice a sense of lack when you go back to read your journal.

Maybe you’ll wish you added more detail. You may find that you have questions based on your old entries (That’s how you get the best prompts for yourself). Your journal evolves when you decide you want to give more to your future self to reflect on and you put it into action. This happens on it’s own, and you don’t need to worry about perfecting your journal.

Evolution is in challenging yourself to be thorough, digging deeper, exploring more, and turning over untouched stones.

Whatever you do, Please resist the urge to compare your journal to others.

Know that your journaling practice is one of a kind.

Its’ easy to look at what other people do and think that your journal is inadequate or wrong.

Making journal comparisons is as unhelpful as comparing yourself to a competitive bodybuilder while you’re already content with your morning jog.

Different people have different minds, emotions, experiences, goals, and lifestyles — and so, our journals should fit our unique molds, not somebody else’s.

There is no default standard for journaling no more than there is a standard lifestyle or state of being.

If there is a “rule” for journaling, it is to be authentic.

Individuality is an indisputable, unchanging fact, and trying to force your journaling practice into somebody else’s mold is a sure way to frustrate yourself. Additionally, doing that limits what you can do. Great things happen when you’re willing to be experimental, creative, and curious.

Experimental, creative, curious.

Being experimental means trying new things without any expectation for how they should come out.

I’m not talking about looking up different journaling techniques and going through a trial and error run, (though that’s perfectly fine to do) what I’m talking about is blindly switching up what you do in your journal based purely on a whim.

Going into journaling with a “let’s see what’s going to happen” attitude creates space for authenticity and it eliminates the possibility of you thinking you’re not doing something right.

What is there to get wrong when this is just one big ol’ experiment?

Being creative in journaling has a similar meaning. (This time, I’m not talking about art). It’s crafting your own techniques and styles based on what you’ve experimented with.

Maybe you borrowed elements from other journaling styles you’ve looked up and stitched them to techniques you came up with on your own.

Creativity is just stringing together everything you know to make something new.

Being curious in journaling means you are exploring your inner self with a sense of wonder, rather than viewing your journaling practice as a mission. (Unless of course you have a specific goal in mind).

But if you are journaling to get to know yourself, it’s best to approach it like a kid in another country’s candy store. The attitude you want to have is one that is open to whatever you might find there.

Remember to give to yourself, be curious, be passionate, be creative, and be authentic. If you do, everything you want to accomplish with your journal practice will fall into itself.

Thanks for the read, happy journaling and happy evolving❤️