Every time I’m motivated enough to do a deep-clean of my bedroom, I inevitably dredge up relics from my childhood: artwork, posters, and most importantly, journals. When I happen to stumble on one of my old diaries, any effort at cleaning promptly stops. Hooked, I sit down amidst the mess of t-shirts and trinkets and begin to read.
Why is it that these chronicles are so interesting, years later? It’s not that the events of my third-grade life were particularly juicy in themselves – my days largely consisted of completing my school reading logs and making up dance routines with my brother. Still, there’s something deeply moving in finding some undeniable proof of your own growth. I’ve kept journals intermittently since I was seven years old, and when I go back to read them, I’m always struck by how much it still sounds like me. My struggles were different, but it’s the same person experiencing them.
It’s easy to dismiss journaling as a childish pastime, reserved for writing poems about crushes in locked diaries. In my opinion, however, the older we get, the more journaling becomes of value. As our lives become increasingly stressful, complex, and riddled by real adult problems, it becomes more important than ever that we have a reliable outlet for those frustrations.
The Science Behind the ‘Brain Dump’
My purpose today is to convince you to start journaling, not only for nostalgia but for the proven benefits it provides for mental health. According to WebMD, journaling can reduce anxiety, regulate emotions, and take us out of that dangerous cycle of brooding and moping when things are bad. On a similar note, a 2007 study by UCLA psychology professor Matthew D. Lieberman found that ‘affect labeling’, the process of putting our feelings into words, diminishes the response of the amygdala, our brain’s emotional processor. By reducing amygdala overactivity, ‘affect labeling’ instead promotes activity in the prefrontal cortex, further inhibiting negative emotions.
My personal experiences corroborate these findings – sometimes when we’re faced with a problem, what we need isn’t necessarily a solution, but a release. By unbottling our thoughts and feelings, especially the less pleasant ones, we set them free. When I’m experiencing a sadness so intense it feels all-consuming, putting those thoughts onto paper removes a big part of their burden. As cliché as it sounds, writing down my negative thoughts really does make me feel lighter.
Freedom from Perception & Embracing the Cringe
At the same time, I’m aware of the difficulty that comes with complete, brutal honesty, even when we’re not concerned with being ‘found out’. I don’t worry about anyone stealing my journal and reading it, but I still sometimes catch myself putting a positive spin on thoughts I’m not necessarily proud of. This is an urge we must avoid as much as possible; as young people, particularly as young women, we have very few spaces entirely free of perception. We meticulously curate our Instagram photo dumps to get praise, and we labor over our essays so we get good grades — it’s hard not to feel like you’re constantly performing. The beauty of keeping a journal is that it negates this desire to be perceived positively. By creating a private space where we can say anything, we remove some of this performative instinct and push ourselves towards self-acceptance.
Similarly, one of my favorite aspects of journaling is how it’s taught me to embrace my past selves rather than hide them. We all have times in our lives that we cringe at in retrospect (I wouldn’t mind forgetting all of eighth grade), but when we read snapshots of those times and see written evidence of the joy and pain we were experiencing, it’s hard to maintain that feeling of shame. When I find journal entries from that fateful year of middle school, I no longer feel embarrassed by my past self; I want to hug her. Things will work out, I want to tell her, maybe not in the way that you think, but they will.
Getting Started
There’s a conception that becoming a journaler requires daily essay-length entries that chronicle your life in excruciating detail. I’m here to tell you that this isn’t true. Sure, write about the mundane stuff (give it a few years, and it’ll all be interesting to read), but more importantly, dive deep. Ask yourself questions: Why am I really sad? Why do I like this person so much? What type of friend do I want to be? Some of my entries are a paragraph long; others stretch for fifteen pages. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is the feeling journaling leaves you with, both the short-term relief of having expressed yourself and the long-term pride in how far you’ve come. So why wait? The next step towards inner peace is just a few words away.