Over the next several posts, I’d like to present some guest thoughts from interesting folks in my online community. Today’s is from Lynda Monk, director of the International Association for Journal Writing. Please enjoy!
Most of us want to feel productive and motivated in our lives and work. Feeling this way is not always easy amidst multiple responsibilities and demands on our time. One of the tools that I use to help me stay productive, focused and motivated is regular journal writing.
Here are 3 ways journaling can be helpful and support you and your productivity:
1) Use Journaling to Process Your Thoughts, Feelings – and Blocks!
Journal writing offers you a place to vent, release stress and process emotions that might cause procrastination and resistance. In fact, your journal can be a place to explore your thoughts on both your productivity and procrastination.
Try this Journaling Activity
Set a timer for 10 minutes and write your thoughts and feelings about productivity and/or procrastination. These journaling prompts might help you get started:
- I am most productive when…
- I sometimes find myself procrastinating when…
- The key areas in my life where I would like to be more productive at this time include…
2) Use Journaling to Gain Clarity
There are many journaling methods to help gain clarity and focus.
When it comes to clarity and productivity, it’s important to focus on what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. Also consider what you might like to stop doing.
It’s not always that we need to do more but rather that we need to focus on less.
Nathan W. Morris
Try this Journaling Activity
Make a list of your top 5 goals or priority projects at this time. Then look at each goal and make a list of the action steps you need to take to reach this goal.
Here is a sample of this activity in from the pages of my journal:
Goal: Publish 10 new journals for sale on Amazon by the end of July.
Action Steps:
- Finalize uploading and approval of our first 3 journals in our Creative Journal Series
- Create the next 3 journals in the series along with co-author Eric Maisel
- Market and promote the first journals in the series
- Decide on our next journals to create and publish
- Create efficiencies in our journal publication process (based on our learning to date with this project)
Ok, it’s your turn. Try this activity in the pages of your journal. People who write down their goals are more likely to achieve them!
3) Create a Journaling Habit Pathway
Some habits matter more than others in remaking businesses and lives. These are keystone habits, and they can influence how people work, eat, play, live, spend and communicate. Keystone habits start a process that, over time, transforms everything.
Paul O’Neill
Journal writing can become a healthy habit. And this habit of journaling can become a ‘keystone habit’, helping us create other habits that increase our productivity and motivation.
Over the years I have explored my life habits (both positive and negative) in the pages of my journal. This reflective awareness practice has helped me cultivate more of the positive habits. And it has also helped me to break ‘bad’ habits – or those that don’t serve me well.
Try this Journaling Activity
Make a list of your ‘keystone’ productivity habits – the things you do on a regular basis that make a positive difference in your life and/or business. These might include habits such as journal writing, setting goals, taking daily inspired action towards your goals etc. Take time to write these down and notice how you feel as you do this.
Also consider, “What is one new keystone habit you might like to cultivate at this time?”
May journaling support you to live a productive and self-aware life. Get curious and ask yourself: “I wonder how journaling might help me be more productive, focused and motivated? This question can make a great journaling prompt!
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Lynda Monk is director of the International Association for Journal Writing.
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Promote Healing, Ignite Creativity, and Discover Writing Tips from Two Journaling Experts
“This book is a beautiful quilt, each chapter written by one of the wisest voices in the journaling world, on every aspect of journal writing imaginable.” —Ruth Folit, founder and past director of the International Association for Journal Writing
#1 Best Seller in Writing Skills, Writing Guides, and Nonfiction Writing Reference
The Next-Generation Book on Journaling Techniques
Learn from the best. The Great Book of Journaling equips you with practical and effective journaling techniques, advances your writing skills, and enhances self-esteem. Written by esteemed psychotherapist Eric Maisel and journaling expert Lynda Monk, Director of the International Association for Journal Writing, this book guides you on a path of healing, creativity, and self-discovery.
Discover the therapeutic magic of journal writing. Experience the transformative power of journaling. By engaging in daily meditations and personal writing, you can tap into your innate creativity and nurture self-love.
Packed full of valuable journal writing knowhow. We’ve rounded up 40 of the top journal experts in the world to explain exactly what journal writing can do for you! The Great Book of Journaling is full of practical tips, evidence-based research, and rich anecdotes from their coaching, teaching, therapy work with journal writers, and personal journal writing.
Inside find:
- Innovative journaling techniques to boost your creativity and writing skills
- Therapeutic writing methods to foster healing and high self-esteem
- Daily meditation practices for cultivating self-love and wellness
- Expert advice from 40 leading journaling professionals for deepening your personal writing
If you have read Mindfulness Journal, The Self-Discovery Journal, or No Worries, you will love The Great Book of Journaling. Also, don’t miss Eric Maisel’s Redesign Your Mind and The Power of Daily Practice.
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This Post is republished on Medium.
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Photo credit: iStock
