Intro: Journal Prompts
Welcome to Journal on it, a podcast where we slow down, tune in, and turn the page on the story we tell ourselves. I’m Shannon, and each week we explore the powerful practice of journaling and self-reflection to help you reconnect with your thoughts, your purpose, and your inner voice. Whether you’re new to journaling or you’ve got stacks of filled notebooks, this space is for anyone ready to grow, heal, and get honest, one page at a time. Let’s dig deep, write freely, and reflect boldly.
Episode 6
So we did some journaling together last week and we used prompts to do that. And I think part way towards the end, I did say we would kind of do our normal thing with journal prompts. So here that is, probably should have done it flip-flopped, but that’s okay.
What is a Journal Prompt?
So what is a journal prompt? It is anything that you use to guide your journaling session or time. This can be a question, a concept, a statement, anything that you use to kind of guide your session.
You can use these to guide you towards a realization or to help you work through a plan. You can use them for anything that you really are trying to work towards, be it like a deeper understanding of yourself or anything you don’t fully know how to get there on your own.
A lot of times people use these to kind of dig deep into something, an issue they’re experiencing. So that’s a really good use of these. A lot of people also use them as like jumping off points. So if you’re going to use one to like start your journaling, that’s also another good way to use them.
The Pros
Now for the pros. It can help you develop self-reflection. It can also help you develop like a mindfulness practice and work on being more mindful throughout the day. It can help you get your mind working on a specific topic that you want to focus on.
It will also fight the blank page anxiety that some people experience, myself included. It can force you to think outside of the box, and there’s a whole host of mental health benefits the same way there is for most types of journaling.
The Cons
Now for the cons. A lot of people can find these very limiting. Instead of using it as a chance to be very creative, they find it’s exceptionally like structured and they find themselves falling into like a specific format and they don’t find a lot of growth there.
That can be one of the issues. It can also be very repetitive. So if you’re following the same series of prompts every time, you’re not gonna dig deep within yourself and get that kind of benefit of the mindfulness practices of trying to reflect a little deeply within yourself.
The other big one that I find is it has a lot of overwhelming options. If you type in journal prompts into Google or Pinterest or YouTube, you’re gonna find thousands and thousands of options and it can be difficult to sift through what you’re looking for. It can be helpful, but it can also be really difficult to find what you’re actively looking for.
The Biggest Con
The biggest con or negative in my opinion is it can really force you to stay on a negative train of thought. It can cause you to spiral a little bit because a lot of times like you’ll find these shadow work ones and they can kind of go into past traumas and in an uncontrolled or too structured environment that can be difficult to handle and difficult to cope with.
So that’s probably the biggest con in my personal opinion. But I think with a little bit of help, either from a professional or a friend, you can do those types of prompts and see benefits from them. But always be cautious.
Personally, I use them often!
For me personally, I do use journal prompts quite often. I use them when I’m having like a low mental energy day or if work has completely drained me and I just can’t even think straight. I will just go on Pinterest, that’s my preferred platform, and sniff through a bunch of them that I have pre-saved, find one that has like four or five, and kind of use those as my prompts for the day.
That way I can still journal, but I’m also not overexerting my limited mental energy. I also use them when I have something I’m trying to work through or focus on and I’m not certain what questions I need to be asking myself.
Looking at what I use.
So pulling up my Pinterest here, I have some for how to stop self-sabotaging yourself, how to accept yourself, how to cope with anger, questions to ask on a hard day. Let’s see, I have one for helping me understand how my nervous system reacts to things and how I can better respond to that.
So there’s endless options. I just kind of sift through and find the ones that work really well for me. And then usually I put on a little bit of music and I will write the question out or write whatever out and answer, fill it out, however I need. Then I’ll write the next prompt, next scenario, and repeat. And I’ll do that until I’ve answered everything that was on my list to answer for the day.
Where the growth happens
And sometimes I find when I’m doing this, what I think will be a short answer, I will eventually fill a page or two or three. And not always, but oftentimes when I’ve gone down that kind of path where I’ve kind of used the prompt and gone a little bit further than I anticipated, that’s where I really find the most guidance, the most growth out of.
I know that probably doesn’t make the most sense, but it’s where I find the kernel of information that like I was truly looking for is when I’ve gone a little bit further than what the prompt originally wanted me to go.
Once I’ve dug that little bit further down and I’ve thought about it a little bit more, usually that little bit of information I’ve dug out is what I needed. And it’s not always like some big grand thing.
A personal example
Like the other day, I was really struggling. I was like, my schedule seems off. I can’t figure it out. How can I fix this? And I sat down and I forget what I had looked up, but I had looked up something for figuring out your routine and your schedule.
And I realized I had tried to add a bunch of things to my schedule all at once instead of doing it one item at a time like I used to. And by adding so many, I had kind of overwhelmed myself, which led to me forgetting things.
So I went back to the basics. Everything I needed to do in the day. It got an alarm set. Everything was labeled. And I made sure that I only added one, maybe two things a week to my schedule. That way I wasn’t overworking my mind.
Its a great way to start
I will also say I think this is one of the easier forms of journaling to get into. You can buy a journal that already has prompts in it. It’s also very easy to find the prompts. So it’s a very low barrier to entry kind of style of journaling.
And I think that can be highly beneficial if you really aren’t certain where you want to start. Or if you aren’t certain you want to go ahead and start a personal journal, but you want to start the practice and develop the skill and the habit of it, I think it can be a great easy way to start journaling.
Check out where I share prompts
And I did want to note if you do want to try some journal prompts. I have been for a while on a Instagram page with the same title of the podcast journal on it. Been putting out three times a week give or take different prompts.
Some of them are just like one-offs. Some of them are series of questions. So feel free to go check that out. Also, that’s where I kind of put the time that we’re releasing the podcast. So feel free to kind of check that out.
And like I said, you can find them really anywhere. I find them all the time on Pinterest. I’ve googled them. I’ve done some guided journal practice on YouTube. That was a great place for me. I really enjoyed it because a lot of times that meant I didn’t have to find the music and they can be a little bit more upbeat.
Outro
Thanks for joining me on Journal On It, where we slow down, tune in, and turn the page together. If something resonated with you today, take a moment to journal it out and let the words lead you. You can find show notes, journal prompts, and more at the link in the episode description. Remember, growth happens one honest page at a time. Until next time, keep writing, keep reflecting, and keep showing up for yourself. I’m Shannon, and I’ll meet you back here soon.
The Podcast:
Resources:
https://positivepsychology.com/benefits-of-journaling