When a person is being treated for mental illness or a substance use disorder, they can benefit from knowing how to participate in their own care. Journaling is one way to support your own healing. At The Pavilion in Williamsburg, Virginia, we encourage our clients to utilize a wide range of tools to promote their own recovery from addiction and mental illness, including writing about their feelings and experiences.
Benefits of Journaling
If you have not journaled previously, you might wonder why you would take the time now, when you may already have a lot going on. There are numerous benefits to keeping a journal, which include:
- Reducing anxiety symptoms
- Helping to break a loop of obsessing on a certain topic
- Increasing your awareness of your own behavior patterns
- Improving your emotional regulation
- Becoming better at expressing emotions and asking for help
- Tracking your daily mood and symptoms
- Helping you to put more thought into the ideas and beliefs you hold or decisions you need to make
What Makes Journaling a Good Option?
There are many reasons why writing can be a great addition to other forms of treatment:
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- Affordability – a notebook and pen or access to a keyboard can be free or very cheap.
- Portability – you can write pretty much anywhere you are able to collect your thoughts and put them into words.
- No interactions with medications – you don’t need to ingest anything in order to use this treatment option.
- Compatible with talk therapy – your therapist might even find it helpful to read your entries if you choose to share them.
- Little time is required – five to ten minutes is often enough time to capture your day-to-day thoughts.
- Flexibility – whenever you want to write, you just need to pull out your chosen tools.
Types of Journals
You might have a certain notion of what it means to write in a journal, and maybe that method appeals to you. On the other hand, you might like to try other types of journaling:
- Stream of consciousness – just let the thoughts flow without trying to guide them in a certain way.
- Lists – set a topic for the entry and then write everything related to that subject. Some list ideas could include:
- Feelings
- Choices
- Losses
- Enjoyable experiences
- Triggers
- Coping skills
- Gratitude-focused – write about things that make you feel thankful.
- Affirmations – write down positive things about who you are or what you are doing with your life.
- Intentions – set in writing what things you wish to accomplish.
- Prayers and blessings – write down things you wish to see happen in your own life or in the lives of people around you.
- Daily inventory – this can be a good way to process and reflect on your day. The good, the bad, and the ugly can all help us to learn and grow.
In some cases, you might struggle to decide what you want to write about. You can find writing prompts online. You also might not feel like using words at all, and an art journal might be more your speed.
Journaling Tips
If you’re not used to journaling, you may not be sure where to start. Some things to consider include:
- Starting on paper first – This will allow you to add drawings if you like.
- Making it a habit – If you set a certain time every day when you will journal, it will be easier to stick to it. Consider pairing it with another habit you already follow, like journaling right before or after a meal, bedtime, or waking up.
- Keeping it simple – You might like a fancy booklet with lots of special features, but you can also just use a notebook.
- Don’t worry about grammatical or spelling mistakes – The journal is purely for your own benefit, so it doesn’t need to be perfect.
What To Do with Completed Journals
Your journals belong to you. Once you finish a journal, you get to decide what you want to do with it. You can:
- Hold onto it and review it later, to see your growth over time
- Share it with your therapist or someone else you trust
- Destroy it
At The Pavilion, we used trauma-informed, evidence-based treatment to support our adult and senior patients in their mental health and addiction recovery. This includes inpatient and outpatient treatment, with several different types of therapy, individualized treatment plans, medication management and education, nutritional consultation, and family participation.
