How to Start Journaling for Beginners

I wished my journals looked as cool as this, but whatever. This ain’t a journal race. Photo Cred: Shifa Sarguru.

Journaling has a slew of health benefits, but beyond that there are many reasons why you might want to commit to a writing practice. Not only can journaling offer you emotional reprieve as you’re processing a situation, but it can be really fun.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the blank page, I’d like to offer you some tips to forging down the written path. I’ve been journaling (fairly) regularly since I was eleven years old, so I can definitely help you get on the path to the covered page. Let’s go!

1. Leave behind your perfectionism

You are not writing the journals of Sylvia Plath or Anais Nin, so your first step to journaling is to drop your perfectionism at the cover. Journaling isn’t about perfectionism. It’s about expression — leaving the trace of what you feel and think on the page. The act of journaling isn’t about what you create. It’s about the movement of the pen on the page. This is not for anyone else’s eyes or judgment. This is for you. You are the storyteller. You are the reader. You can be just as you are — totally imperfect and a little crazy (you are human after all).

2. Know that you can write ANYTHING

Sometimes people get intimidated by journaling because they think — I have to write a certain way, or I have to spell out my day from morning to sunrise. You don’t have to do ANYTHING when it comes to journaling besides putting your pen to page. Journaling can be drawing, or just covering a page with the same word over and over. There are no rules. This is not an assignment. There’s no right or wrong. If you’re feeling overcome by society’s strictures, close your eyes and take a deep breath. Take another. And another. We don’t breathe enough with intention in this world. So, take all the breaths you need and shake off the fetters of societal expectation, and write as you wish.

3. Secure your environment

Unfortunately, we live in a world where people lack boundaries, so that means journals are not always safe to sneaking eyes. I must confess: I have been a bad friend and sister and have read journals that have not belonged to me. I will continually say Hail Mary’s for the rest of my life to make up for my boundary sins. That said, I have also been a victim of unwelcome eyes on my personal…