Importance of Journaling

I myself have been journaling for years. Writing all the lessons I learn and all the ideas I get has become a habit for me. And to be honest, it’s difficult to imagine how my life would be without it.

I had stacks of books filled with pictures, drawings, doodles, random quotes, essays and stories dating back to being about 10 years old. One day a Dominant I was involved with didn't like what he read in one of them and took all my books outside and burned them in a barrel. I now rely more on computer journals than hard copies. Truth be told, nothing can replace the look and feel of handwriting, it can show how upset, how sad and how happy someone is, doodles of happy faces, smacked down exclamation points, scribbles of the word fuck or bitch, but due to recent events, I stopped such things and have resorted to a type of blog instead.

I like the interaction of others that can come from a public journal, but at times, there is a place and time for everything and not everything I put down into words or pictures make it to the public. I welcome comments and perspectives that differ from my own and can enhance my learning curve and growth. Sometimes a random comment from a total stranger can spark new inspiration or an epiphany of my own.

The benefits

1. It trains you to be observant and to be positive.

Once you make journaling a habit, you will develop the habit of being observant in all your experiences.Writing, like the service of a submissive . . . . the devil is in the details. Instead of paying attention to the negative side of things, you pay attention to the positive side to extract lessons from it. Instead of taking things for granted, you look for new ideas that you can implement. Reducing the scatter in your life.

2. It prevents you from losing an idea.

Have you ever gotten an idea only to lose it later because you didn’t write it down? I often experience that myself. But then I developed the habit of writing down every idea that comes into my mind as soon as possible. If I’m away from my computer, I usually write it down on a piece of paper that I bring wherever I go. I will then transfer the idea to the journal in my computer.

3. It helps you memorize an idea.

Even if you do nothing else, the act of writing helps you memorize the idea better. I often remember the things I write down without looking back at my notes. These days the older I get, the more and more I am forgetting things.

4. It trains you to express your thoughts.

I often take lessons from my experiences and write them down in my journal. Since I want to write a concise statement that summarizes the lesson, I need to think for a while to make it concise. This is a good exercise for me because over time I can express my thoughts better, allowing me a tool in which I learn a better way to develop my communication skills and a better way to learn to focus. It disentangles thoughts and ideas. It can also become a playground where the everyday rules of writing, reflecting, and planning no longer apply. Without censorship, your mind is free to run wild.

5. It helps you expand your ideas, broaden your horizons, develop the writer within

When you try to come up with a sentence to express an idea, you are thinking actively about it. Thinking actively helps you connect your idea to another idea, enhancing your ability of self expression. At the end, you will expand your ideas. Building bridges of inner thinking toward outer events, being able to clearly see the line of cause and effect.

6. It helps you review all the lessons you’ve learned.

Why should you repeat the same mistakes you’ve made? By reviewing your journal, you can quickly see the lessons you’ve learned and the ideas you’ve gotten. You can do whatever necessary to avoid repeating the same mistakes. You can use the ideas to propel yourself forward. Allowing yourself to re-experience the past with today's adult mind. Increasing your self knowledge also allows for the building of self confidence.

7. It allows you to see your progress over time.

After keeping a journal for years, you can look back at it and see how far you’ve gone. Things that were big problems in the past might seem small today. The raw ideas you had in the past might have been realized today. Seeing your progress motivates you to move even further ahead. The concept of motivation is not seeing how far we have to go, but looking and seeing how far we've come. It is virtually impossible to write a journal and not discover more about yourself.

8. It can create results in your life.

Much like writing down goals and accomplishing them or writing a list of things to do and doing them in chronological order to better enhance your time management skills, a journal can help you create a clear path of what you want and what you desire in life.

9. It can save your relationship, your future and your sanity.

A journal is a great way to reduce stress by releasing pent up emotions and frustrations. It can keep you from saying things you don't really mean to say when you are angry, allowing you time to rethink everything you have thought and wanted to say before doing so. It can keep you balanced and allow for permanent sanity in a time of temporary insanity.

10. It can bring stability and trust

Your owner is not a mind reader and lets face it, often we think our partner should know us without having to explain ourselves or our process of thinking and feeling and reveal patterns of behavior. Subtle hints given to an owner through your writing can help him develop new rituals, protocols and structure, which will increase your stability and enhance your congruency and trust in one another's integrity.

11. The act of writing accesses your left brain, allowing the right brain to create

The left side of your brain is analytical and rational. While your left brain is occupied, your right brain is free to create, intuit and feel. In sum, writing removes mental blocks and allows you to use all of your brainpower to better understand yourself, others and the world around you, allowing for better judgement and problem solving skills. Typically we problem solve from a left-brained, analytical perspective. But sometimes the answer can only be found by engaging right-brained creativity and intuition. Writing unlocks these other capabilities, and affords the opportunity for unexpected solutions to seemingly unsolvable problems.

Journaling is an ancient tradition, one that dates back to at least 10th century Japan. Successful people throughout history have kept journals. Presidents have maintained them for posterity; other famous figures for their own purposes.

Oscar Wilde, one of my favorite people said: “I never travel without my diary. One should always have something sensational to read on the train.