Journaling In Addiction And Recovery – Our Ultimate Guide

The aim of this guide is to provide you with the basics behind journaling (diary writing), look at the various ways you can do it and provide you with ideas and suggestions to get you going if you’ve never tried writing your thoughts and feelings down on paper before.

You will also find 40 prompts to get you going if you’re new to this concept, or if your minds gone blank or you can’t think of a thing to write. These topics will give you a good grounding in the right direction for your recovery journey.

So, What’s Journaling All About?

Journaling, AKA diary writing is essentially a way of keeping a regular record and a way of expressing your experiences, thoughts, feelings, highs, lows, worries, love, struggles, triumphs, major life events and anything else that you want to include to, especially if they relate to your addiction and/or recovery.

Journaling can be an extremely powerful and helpful tool to advance your healing process and provides a way of physically releasing any pent up negative or positive thoughts or feelings that you may have. For example, a journal can be used to record your recovery-related struggles and accomplishments, or to identify and work through difficult emotions.

It also helps to hold yourself accountable for your decisions and actions and helps you invest in your own self-discovery.

Even if you aren’t in recovery yet and are still using and/or drinking, journaling can be a great way of documenting your thoughts and feelings, tracking your progress if you’re trying to reduce or stop using and/or drinking and having a physical way of checking your real-time progress as compared to your proposed reduction plan. This way of holding yourself to account is a great first step in the right direction towards your goals, hopes and dreams.

Journaling is a type of expressive writing, where your main goal is not to produce a “product” (story, article, essay, etc.) but instead to simply use the process of putting your thoughts and feelings down on paper to help you better understand and cope with the strange, and sometimes intense thoughts, feelings and emotions that you’re experiencing along the initial stages of your recovery.

Types Of Journaling

**Be creative and try new ways of Journaling.**

There are many different types of journaling and several of these lend themselves well to working through emotions involved in the recovery process. Journaling in recovery might take the form of:

Here’s Some Examples

A Diary – where you write down the events of the day and how you felt about them.
An Evening Reflection Journal – where you reflect on the day’s events and ponder ways that you may have thought or behaved differently that would have involved better choices.
A Gratitude Journal – where you write about things that you are grateful for and appreciative of. In a prior article, we looked at gratitude journals and how they can benefit your recovery. You can read the article by clicking here.
A Goal-Focused Journal – where you keep track of your goals and objectives and your progress toward these.
Stream Of Consciousness Journaling – is when you pick an allotted period of time and write down whatever comes into their head. The important thing is to not give in to the urge to edit the writing. Also don’t stop writing to check on spelling, grammar, or punctuation as this will interrupt the flow.
Spiritual Journaling is when an individual is turning to a spiritual path to help them with their addiction. When you write about your spiritual development, it is like keeping a travel log only in this case the journey is internal.

Below are ways that a person might journal about the same situation in different ways, using the four different types of journaling mentioned above.

Diary

Today was a bad day. I got upset right off the bat first thing in the morning when I could not find my keys. I yelled at my wife and accused her of moving them. Then I found them in my coat pocket.
But I did not tell my wife or apologise. I just left the house. I felt lousy for the rest of the day, guilty that I had accused her and yelled at her, and disappointed and angry at myself for not apologising and admitting my own fault till much later in the day.

Evening Reflection Journal

Event: Yelled at wife this morning & accused her of moving my keys (but they were in my pocket); left house without apologising.
Reflection on Event: I could have asked wife instead of accusing; I could have stopped to recollect when I had last used keys and what I might have done with them…Would likely have found keys sooner and avoided a negative experience for us both. Will try to stop and think before immediately making accusations next time.

Gratitude Journal

I am grateful for a loving wife who puts up with my quick temper and impulsive behaviour.
I am grateful that I found my keys in time to get to work without being late.
I am grateful that my wife is willing to accept my apology, even when it comes too late.
I am grateful that I have this opportunity to reflect on my actions and consider better options before I drive my loving wife away from me.

Goal-Focused Journal

I will improve my ability to hold my temper and not deflect my frustrations toward others, especially my wife. I will do this by using the following steps:
1) I will take 3 deep breaths when I feel myself becoming frustrated or angry.
2) I will use the time to think about what I am about to say and how to say it.
3) I will consciously choose to ask questions and explore options before jumping to a conclusion or saying what immediately pops into my mind when I am upset.

When planning goals and targets, ensuring that they are appropriate and achievable is key if you want them to succeed. In a previous article, we looked at setting SMART goals. You can read the article by clicking here.

We would highly recommend that you use all of the different styles of journaling, whichever best fits your needs and desired outcomes from writing the entry into your journal. This will change every time you write an entry.

Benefits Of Keeping A Recovery Journal

Studies have shown that journaling encourages the writer to disclose emotions with less fear of criticism. Journaling has been associated with reduced depression and grief reactions, as well as improved health outcomes including reduced stress, improved immune function and reduced digestive issue symptoms.

It is theorised that actively repressing difficult thoughts and feelings requires effort and acknowledging and writing about these feelings reduces overall stress in the body.

Translating an event into words helps the individual to understand it and make meaning of it, which contributes to additional positive outcomes.

A study published in 2001 in the Journal of Experimental Psychology found that expressive diary writing enhanced cognitive integration (the re-visiting and “updating” of ideas) and increased the capacity for working memory.

The Science Behind Journaling

Understanding the benefits of journaling has come a long way over the past few years and there’s a myriad of reasons why anyone should utilise journaling as a form of self-expression, decompression and practice of daily gratitude.

Oh, and the best part? There are no gatekeepers or stereotypes in the world of journaling and no barriers to entry.

It’s for everyone and anyone. So, why should you keep a journal and what are the physical and mental health benefits of journaling?

Health Benefits Of Journaling (Based on Science)

Let’s start with one of the main three pillars of life, your health.

It may seem hard to believe that writing a journal improves your health, but it’s true! If you kept a diary under your mattress as a teenager, you may remember how nice it felt to liberate all of your emotions on a piece of paper. Well, science now shows there is something to it.

What Does Journaling Do to Your Brain?

Let’s start this journey with our well-being headquarters—the brain. How does journaling impact the brain? An experimental study conducted at Michigan State University revealed that expressive writing can help our brain “cool down” in the state of worrying.

On a neurological level, being worried is like you’re constantly multitasking. You’re trying to focus on one thing, but a portion of your cognitive efforts are always wasted on suppressing those worries, making it hard to stay fully present.

This experiment was conducted with college students suffering from anxiety. They were split into two groups and tasked with a ‘flanker test’ that measured their response speed and accuracy. Before approaching the task, one group had an 8-minute session of expressive writing about their deepest emotions, while the others journaled about their daily activities.

Both groups performed equally well on speed and accuracy tests, however, the expressive writing group was more efficient and used fewer brain resources, as measured with EEG (detecting electrical activity in your brain).

The study showed that the act of expressive writing can clear your mind’s worries and free up resources in your brain that could be put to use on other tasks.
Michigan State University

Another study, conducted by UCLA leading experts, measured people’s brain activity during journal therapy. They discovered that written words can make an experience of trauma less intense.

For example, when participants looked at an angry face image, their amygdala (the brain’s emotional region) activity increased. However, once they began associating words with images, their emotional reaction reduced greatly.

Professor and researcher Matthew D. Lieberman from UCLA explained that putting feelings into words is like hitting a break when you see a yellow light.

Every journaling session lowers your brain’s reactions, making them less intense, and allows your feelings to become more elaborate.
Matthew D. Lieberman

Another important effect of journaling on the brain is memory improvement, but we will tackle that one in a later section.

Benefits Of Journaling For The Immune System

Now that you know that expressive writing impacts our nervous system, you can already make the assumption that it affects all of our functions, directly or indirectly, including the immune system.

But, how does this happen?

After conducting a series of research about journaling, the famous psychologist James Pennebaker concluded that journaling can help strengthen our immune system. He believes that journaling works as a stress-relief tool, by reducing the impact of stressors on our immune-system cells.

It’s not only that expressive writing lowers our chances of getting ill, but it also increases the chances of fighting a slewof serious diseases. Some of them are rheumatoid arthritis, asthma, and cancer. The health benefits of journaling are even visible in quicker postoperative recoveries and faster healing of wounds among the older generation!

If this is not enough to convince you to pick up the pen and paper or download a journal app, a 2005 study showed that writing about traumatic events, distress and overall feelings, can lower our chances of getting sick, while journaling 15-20 minutes per day, over a 4-month period, is enough to lower blood pressure and achieve better liver functionality.

All these research results show us that there are significant health benefits of journaling. Expressive writing can help enhance our immune system and positively impact our brain.

However, the effect is certainly indirect. There is something that happens in between. That ‘something’ is the mental health effects of journaling.

Benefits Of Journaling For Mental Health

The above experiments, whilst making claims of physical health benefits, show us the power that mental health has on our system as a whole.

Maybe those that preached “It’s all in your head” have a point.

Whilst this doesn’t mean that people’s problems are imaginary, it does put emphasis on the importance of resolving issues within and escaping the dungeon of our own minds.

If you’re faced with a math problem, would you rather solve it on paper, or in your head? We assume it’s easier to see a solution after writing it down. Why would some of our mental problems be any different?

The exact mechanism by which expressive writing works is still unknown.

People usually think that it’s the cathartic effect that’s beneficial, however, many psychologists agree that catharsis is not enough. The mechanisms that are considered as beneficial are:

Emotional Confrontation: confronting our inhibited emotions can help reduce stress and tensions.
Cognitive Processing: journaling about events and emotions helps us create a coherent narrative about them, resulting in a better adaptation and multiperspectivism.
Repeated Sessions: journaling on a daily basis can help us overcome negative emotional responses, as we become more and more able to reflect on our lives from various perspectives.

Simply put, when you keep a journal you improve your emotional intelligence. That means gaining the ability to name, elaborate, manage, and control your emotions, as well as empathise with others. Consequently, your way of thinking becomes much clearer, your decisions become more constructive and you feel less nervous and stressed out. All this makes you a healthier person.

So far, science has shown that the benefits of journaling are visible in a many mental illnesses such as depression, anxiety, PTSD, body image distortions, suicidality, as well as in some temporary conditions like sadness over a breakup, being a victim of a natural disaster or experiencing bereavement.

Here are some tips on how you can start journaling from a health related standpoint:

Try to write every day and make it easy: keep a pen and paper handy at all times.
Write whatever feels right: remember, it’s your private place to discuss whatever you want. There is no right or wrong.
Look at your writing time as personal relaxation time when you wind down and de-stress.
When you write in a journal, provide an opportunity for positive self-talk and identify negative thoughts and behaviours.
Focus on your inner voice and find a soothing and relaxing place inside yourself.
Track any symptoms day-to-day, recognise triggers and learn how to control them.
Know that you are doing something good for your mind and body.

So far, we’ve mostly covered how journaling can help us release what’s negative within us so we can become healthier, but let’s not forget that this practice can be focused on positive experiences as well.

Positive moments are equally worth our attention and journaling time, if not even more. This is where gratitude journaling comes into play.

Psychological Benefits Of Journaling

Though we can say that the mental health benefits of journaling are also psychological benefits, we think that these terms do differ to some extent. What we mean by ‘the psychological benefits of journaling’ are the cognitive, social and organisational improvements that can be achieved not only through extensive and expressive writing, but also through short journaling sessions or by using a simple planner.

Benefits Of Journaling For Memory

Not only is the journal your personal ‘external hard disk’ with all of your thoughts, opinions, events or ideas stored in one place, but it can also improve your own memory.

Writing improves our ability to temporarily store and use various information, or better say, it improves our working memory. Working memory is much more than the ability to memorise a phone number for longer than 10 minutes.

It’s about extending our capacities to receive new information, retrieve the existing knowledge, connect them, and work with them. The process of writing means constantly employing our working memory which is essential for performing any given task.

To sum it up—journaling helps you free up space in your own memory while enhancing your operating capacities at the same time. How neat, right?

Benefits Of Journaling For Relationships

As we mentioned already, keeping a journal can help you self-reflect, elaborate feelings, and gain more profound insights into various events that happen in your daily life.

So, journaling makes you more self-aware. That works for relationships as well. Here’s how.

For example, imagine one of your best friends has just ditched you for the third time this month to grab coffee. You may be feeling anger, sadness or even fear (from being abandoned).

These emotions are valid, but they could also be a tad bit irrational. If you keep these feelings locked inside, they will probably grow, and your interpretation of the situation might take the irrational road. This is an addict trait and one that is worth being actively mindful of.

Writing down the situation and your thoughts may help you take into account that your friend might be going through something themselves. Journaling can help you put some distance between you and your possibly self-destructive thoughts of a situation and help you gain perspective, clarity and empathy. Trying to see things from different perspectives can also help us to correctly interpret what’s happening when our mind may be focusing on the negative possibilities. Learn how you can do this by clicking here.

Journaling about relationships doesn’t have to be focused on a single relationship or a specific situation. You can still work on your relationships through journaling by asking yourself some more abstract questions:

What do I find the most rewarding in my friendship with… (persons name)? Why?
How do I feel about… (persons name) and constantly being late? How does that affect me? Is something going on in his life that I could help with?
What are the five things I can’t stand about my mother, and what are the five qualities that I appreciate?

We will once more repeat that journaling is beneficial to you, and your sense of self and as you progress and develop your personality, your relationships will improve as well, both with yourself and others.

Benefits Of Journaling For Productivity

Five Minute Journal and Productivity Planner

Do you often wake up with an unclear idea about your tasks for that day? So, you snooze a couple of times before actually remembering that you need to go to the bank ASAP? It happens.

Or perhaps, you’re more of a task procrastinator. You sit staring blankly at your laptop, the project document is opened in another tab, while you’re in your fourth straight hour of watching Vice documentaries.

If you’d like to cut the procrastination habits and gear yourself towards better performance, journaling is the first step to reaching that goal.

Journaling for productivity doesn’t have to last longer than 10 minutes per day, but it can have immense benefits on your organisation, daily structure, and performance.

Here are some of the things you can do to boost your productivity through journaling:

List your yearly, monthly, weekly and daily goals and tasks;
Break them into steps, so they become more achievable;
Organise them by priority;
Think about the personal benefits of every goal achieved and write it down.

However, sometimes, this is not enough. Besides motivation and knowing what to do and how to do it, you also need discipline. One of the best techniques geared towards achieving discipline is having focus time. This technique gives you undivided attention on a single task during several 30-minute sessions with 5-minute breaks in between.

Other Benefits Of Journaling Include:

Helping you prioritise problems, goals and responsibilities.
Tracking your symptoms, setbacks and successes on a regular basis.
Helping you to better recognise, understand and deal with triggers, cravings and urges.
Help you to identify negative or self-defeating thoughts and self-talk so that you can challenge and reintegrate these internal messages using a more positive viewpoint.
Provides you with a source of motivation and accountability in the form of checking your progress and to see how far you’ve come since a previous date or incident.
Allows you to set small, achievable goals which can be tracked throughout your journal.

TIP: If you’re still using or drinking, track your consumption in your journal. You can then track your use, has it gone up or down? Are you achieving your reduction goals if you are currently going through a tapered reduction program? You can also see how far you’ve come when you look back at it in the future.

How To Keep A Recovery Journal

There is no wrong or right way to journal. Write in whatever way that feels right for you in order for you to express yourself, benefit from using different journaling formats to achieve the desired outcome, and learn from the review of your reflections over time.

Your journaling can be “structured” (for instance writing in a Reflective or Gratitude Journal every evening) or more loose and flexible, such as jotting down notes in a diary-type journal to capture important thoughts as they come to mind or to write about your awareness of intense feelings, cravings or temptations.

We would highly recommend that you use all of the journaling styles to meet the needs of that moment. For example, use a diary style entry to express your thoughts or feelings, use an evening reflection journal to mentally recap a stressful, positive or negative daily event so that you may learn from it, or you could use a gratitude style entry to remind yourself of something that you’re grateful for whenever something comes to mind.

Make sure that you schedule time in your day to write in your journal. If you don’t already use a daily recovery plan to maximise your recovery efforts each day, you can learn all about them and how to create your own, with free downloadable templates by clicking here.

**TIP: Try using a key so that you can achieve multiple roles, benefits and journaling style in one go.**

Here Are Some Suggestions For Writing In Your Journal:

Pick a private place to write that is free from distractions.
Pick a time to write when you won’t have anyone possibly “looking over your shoulder” and trying to read what you’re writing. Your journal is a personal thing, solely for you to benefit from. You must feel comfortable enough to be totally honest and uncensored in your writing.
Set aside 20-30 minutes to write about feelings and experiences that you feel had an important impact. You can always add extra entries into your journal at any time of the day or night.
Try to write at least once a day, every day if possible, as the consistency will help you to organise your thoughts. If you can’t write daily then at least try to write on a regular schedule.
Throughout the day, keep a pen and paper handy to jot down snippets of thoughts and feelings that you can later elaborate on in your journal. These could be text, pictures, numbers, sketches or anything else that you find helpful. You can then tape these into your journal or copy it into your journal if you don’t want to stick bits of paper in your journal.
Set aside time periodically (every few days or once a week) to review your journal entries and reflect on them. You could then use a reflection style entry, a goal based entry or a combination of the two to reflect on recent events, what worked well, what didn’t, how things could be better by setting goals for the following set period. You can then review this again on your next review date to see how you got on.
Make sure that you schedule time in your day to write in your journal. If you don’t already use a daily recovery plan to maximise your recovery efforts each day, you can learn all about them and how to create your own, with free downloadable templates by clicking here.

Journaling is a self-reflective activity and you can even see it as a form of therapy. It can be aided by the use of other activities that also foster an inner, reflective state. Meditating, mindfulness, walking in nature, listening to music and taking a nap or resting are other ways that you can increase the ability of your deeper thoughts and feelings to emerge.

**TIP: Be creative, your journal doesn’t have to be only words in one colour, in one format. Try including other things such as sketches, colours and writing fonts to name just a few!**

The use of journaling can be an important tool in your recovery toolbox. It can help you recognise when and under what conditions you might be most at risk for a slip-up; and it can help you identify situations and attitudes that empower you and assist you in remaining strong in your commitment to sobriety.

The Recovery Journal

Many people who are clean and/or sober and in recovery keep a journal. Writing things down can be a very powerful way to process your feelings and get them “off your chest.” Often, problems don’t seem quite so big or so awful once you’ve worked through them on paper and seen them visually with your own eyes.

However you don’t have to be clean or sober to benefit from this therapeutic form of writing. Using a journal whilst you still use or drink can help you track your usage, help you to better manage your cravings and urges as well as help you to offload those negative feelings that we all experience when we used or drank. For example, I’m useless, I’ll never get clean or sober, I’d be better off dead, I’m worthless and only causing heartache for my family and friends and so on.

A journal is also a great way to keep an eye on your progress as you move beyond active addiction and into recovery. A year or two from now, you might look back on what you wrote and be astonished at what you have accomplished!

Your recovery journal doesn’t have to be fancy—you can get your thoughts down in a notebook, email memos to yourself, use a recovery app, buy a specific journaling journal or just start a word document which is saved as a computer file.

Remember: You can write about whatever you want. And no one has to ever see a word of it, so be honest!
Drink ‘n’ Drugs

Your Mental Health

If you struggle with your mental health, journaling can provide a positive way of expressing your feelings, thoughts and emotions and releasing any anger or negative feelings that you may be experiencing.

In your journal, you can also track your stress, anxiety, fear, anger or any other emotion that you struggle with. In the example above, you can colour in an hourly block throughout the day for that 24 hour period, to express whether your thoughts, feelings or emotions are under control, rising upward, difficult to manage or at a critical point.

You could also write down reminders, goals or tasks that are a priority for you to grow and develop to improve your addiction, recovery or mental health and tick them off once you’ve achieved them. you can then look back on them to remind you how far you’ve come and how hard you’ve worked to get to where you are now. This can be a great source of motivation and pride.

What Should I Write About?

What should you write about in your recovery journal? Anything you want, really. Here are some ideas to get you started:

Your emotions today.
Feelings about being in recovery (both good and bad).
How your overall recovery plan is going, what’s working? What isn’t?
Your feelings after an Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) or Narcotics Anonymous (NA) meeting or therapy session.
Triggers that you’ve identified. Where? When? Who? Why?
Urges, what set it off? What can you do to avoid it happening again?
Your plans for avoiding addiction triggers and dealing with cravings. Who do you need to call or see? What worked well which helped you before? What makes it worse? How did it happen this time?
Things you are grateful for?
Thoughts on running into old friends, colleagues or addicts. What will you do if this happens?
Thoughts on making amends. Who? How? When? Where? Why? What did you do? What can you do? Would they be willing to make amends at all?
Thoughts on patching things up in relationships. Is it worth it? What’s good about it? Why did it go wrong before?
Your current priorities. Abstinence/sobriety? Fellowship? Family? Friends? Work? Education? Health? Finances? Criminality? Therapy?
Your motivations to stay sober or clean?
Your current strengths and weaknesses. What would you like to work on? How can you achieve it? By when?
Thoughts about finances, work issues, your criminal record, debts, grief.
Your victories, failures and progress in recovery. What’s worked? What hasn’t? Why it hasn’t? How you can improve? How you can avoid making the same mistakes again? How will you celebrate your successes?
Your new view of yourself. Do you like it? What would you like to improve? How can do achieve it? By when? Which bits are you proud of? What positive attributes do you like?
An exercise log and new activities you want to try. List the things you want to try? By when? How will you go about it? How is your exercise level now? How can you improve it?
Meditation and relaxation practices you’d like to try. How can you incorporate them into your daily routine? Are there clubs or others you can do them with?
Thoughts on your eating habits and new foods you’d like to try. How is your diet? Does it need improving? How?
Short and long-term goals. What do you want to do in a year from now? 5 years from now? How will you achieve it? With who? How? When? Where? With what?
Reflections on your progress over time. Has it gone better? Worse? Stayed the same? Why has it gone the way it has? What can you do to change/improve things?
Your hopes and dreams for the future. What’s your goal for work? Education? Hobbies? Interests? Helping others? Giving back to the community? Relationships? Money? Health? Recovery?

Not Sure Where To Start Or Got Stuck?

Check Out Our 40 Prompts To Get You Going:

What does unconditional love look like for you? Have you ever felt it? With who? When? How can you find it again for for the first time?
Dear past me…
Dear present me…
Dear future me…
Write a letter to the 1 of the 5 people you love the most, even if you don’t deliver it.
If you only had 5 minutes left on earth, who would you want to be with? Way would you want to say? To who?
What would I be doing right now if I wasn’t in recovery?
List 3 things you remember that happened in your childhood which make you laugh.
What 1 thing can I do today to improve my situation?
What 1 thing can I do today for someone else?
What have I learned about myself during the recovery process? What do I hope to learn?
Write a goodbye letter to something in your life you want to eliminate during your recovery process.
What are the things in your life that make you smile?
What are you grateful for in your own life? For the next 10 minutes, write down as many as you can. Or write down 10 new things you’re grateful for every day for the next week.
When were you the most confident? How did it feel? What made you feel that way? How can you feel that way again?
Write a chapter you would love to read in your own autobiography about an event that you’ve experienced over your time in addiction or recovery.
Write down as many details as you can about one memory you’ll never forget.
What does the word “freedom” mean to you?
How have you seen yourself progress in the past week? What made that happen? How can you keep it going?
List 5 things you couldn’t live without, and explain why.
Identify something kind you’ve done for someone recently. How can you show the same love to yourself?
Write about your first love – it could be a person, a place, a pet or an experience.
Describe yourself in 5 words. Then, describe yourself in 10 words. Then, describe yourself in 100 words.
Draft a list of everything in your life you’d like to say “No” to. How can you make it happen?
Draft a list of everything in your life you’d like to say “Yes” to. How can you make it happen?
If you could spend 5 minutes with someone who has died, who would it be, what would you want to say or do with them and why? Are they a loved one? A celebrity? Religious figure?
Write down the words you most want to hear someone say to you right now.
What’s your top 5 dog or cat names and why?
Identify the last mistake you made, that you feel ashamed about. What did you learn? How can you avoid it happening again?
What is something you’re tired of? Why?
Where would you like to visit if you could go anywhere? On this planet or another?
How are you doing, right now? Don’t hold back. Be deadly honest!
Write down 3 things you do better than most people.
In recovery, what’s one skill you’d love to learn?
If you could have one superpower, what would it be and why?
Write down 4 questions you want answers to. How will you get those answers?
When you meet new people, what do you want them to know about you?
What do you want to accomplish tomorrow?
Do you like who you are when no one is watching? How can you change that if you don’t?
Do you believe in ghosts or aliens? If so, why or why not?

Why not try something a little more creative? Try creating your own acrostic poem!

What About The Future?

Keeping your journals provide you with a great source of motivation, pride and inspiration for you to continue heading in the right direction.

If you ever decided to write about your journey through addiction and into recovery, your journals will provide you with a resource upon which you can use to refresh your memory about past events and ensure that your book has a personal, real life and “lived and succeeded” mentality which reader will be able to relate to. This helps them to use your writing to motivate them to change their life and begin to head in the right direction. You may also save a life with your writing too!

Do you want more prompts or ideas? You can find more by clicking here.

Benefits Of Journaling – Our Final Words

As you can see, not only are there various types of journaling, but you can also benefit from this activity in so many ways. Journaling is not just about free-form expressive writing, it’s also about making lists, plans, writing about gratitude or filling out a planner.

Science has shown that journaling can only bring you good things: improvements to your mental and physical health, memory, relationships and productivity. What’s most important—it doesn’t cost anything. All you need is a notebook and pen, or a journal app and some motivation.

Journaling In Addiction And Recovery – Our Ultimate Guide

So, What’s Journaling All About?

Types Of Journaling