How keeping a happiness journal can change your perspective
Despite loving to write, I never gravitated toward journaling. Sure, I had the canonical couple of diary runs that always only lasted a week at best, but I was never able to take it seriously. It felt strange to sit down and write about an ordinary day, and I often closed my journal feeling like my life was mundane. Instead, I’d check back with a wild entry every few months whenever something that seemed life-altering happened.
This cycle had been ongoing throughout my life until my junior year of college. One evening, after a particularly long, tough day, I was looking for any way to shift my mood. I reached for an old journal in hopes of making sense of my emotions by dumping them all onto the page when, instead, I found myself reflecting. I could sit and stew about all the bad moments of the day, or I could try to change my perspective.
That day, I wrote my first ever “happiness journal” entry.
My happiness journal is a space dedicated to highlighting the good in each day. Whether it’s reflecting on something big like an award, or something small like “I enjoyed my coffee today,” the happiness journal has altered how I view my day. While I admittedly don’t do it every day, I do it frequently enough, and the ideology behind it has even permeated my lifestyle. Whether it’s physically writing down my happy moments or mindfully reflecting on them, taking a moment to intentionally highlight the good in each day has been a rewarding ritual.
I like to think there is no such thing as an overall “bad day” — sure, there are days where things don’t go as you planned, and a domino effect of moments can add up and make you feel like the whole day was rotten. But the happiness journal has helped me reframe this ideology. Even on the worst of long, stressful days, I can always still come up with two-to-three good moments.
This isn’t to undermine the importance of recognizing your feelings — sometimes writing down all the messy, sad, angry emotions is essential, and letting it out is healthy. I believe, though, there is also room for the positives. Sometimes these can go hand in hand, and the result can be a weight lifted off your chest. You can pair them by writing one page of the not-so-good moments that are weighing on you, and turn to the next page to dig up the happiness moments. This side-by-side reflection of my day helps me put things in perspective and leaves me feeling uplifted.
If you’re like me and have always loved the idea of journaling but could never get into the habit, the happiness journal might be the perfect prompt for you! It’s easy because it doesn’t have to be a full journal-like entry – I format mine in bullets, often writing a couple words or a sentence that characterize each happy moment. The reflection always makes me see my day in a better light, and looking back on past happy moments always makes me smile at the memories tied to them.
Whether you have the best day of your life or the worst, I promise you’ll discover some happy moments you can latch on to to help shift your mood.