Developing self confidence through journaling

A journal is a great way to support you on your journey towards building your self confidence

Writing is such a powerful way of healing and a journal is one of the best ways to get your thoughts down in a private way.

As you go through your confidence building journey you can use your journal to help yourself associate your feelings with your thoughts and your thoughts with your feelings.

Your journal can help you to find out what motivates you in life, develop new skills, learn new strategies for dealing with life in general, write down ideas and plan them through and find out more about the person you are by asking questions of yourself and writing down answers to those questions.

A journal is an essential tool when it comes to learning about ourselves because it helps you to map out where you are and watch your progress as you go through different issues. I am always amazed at how much I learn and how different I have become when I read my journals from 12-18 months ago.

By keeping a journal, we begin to realize all the little things we do not truly know or understand about ourselves and find ways to overcome that.  Of course if you are writing your deepest, darkest secrets in your journal you will want to make sure you keep it in a safe place where it can’t be found!

Listen to your inner self through your journal

When you write out your thoughts and feelings, allowing what comes out on paper to just flow without restrictions you will be able to see exactly what your inner self wants you to know.

You will be amazed at the answers that will come from within you when you allow it to happen but many of us don’t, so when you begin journaling whilst it is great to write about your day, what has happened and where you are also spend time just allowing your thoughts to flow without interruption.

You will find yourself recording thoughts that may seem insignificant and yet have a profound affect on your life!
I remember writing about how I spend money on myself only to realize that in fact I don’t. There is nothing I do to spend money or time on me. I realized that my self worth was really low and I needed to change that by believing I was worth buying a magazine for or getting my nails done every week.

If I wasn’t writing free flow in my journal I would have missed that simple revelation that showed me I don’t support myself enough and it is because I had low self worth. It changed everything I did, including my lack of exercise, and my life transformed!  Never under estimate the little things.

Allowing inspiration to strike

You will find on this journey that you may be doing the most mundane things, or just waking up and something amazing hits you – an insight or an idea – and keeping a diary close by allows you to record that as the idea comes to you, otherwise you will find you forget it and it is lost forever.

Some of the greatest inventors and thinkers kept journals including one of the most prolific inventors in history, Thomas Edison.

As I mentioned earlier one of the most helpful things a journal does is give us the ability to look back on records and refer to them, for example if you encountered a problem and overcame it in the past and a similar problem crops up then you can reflect back and apply the same solution or adapt it for a more positive outcome.

Your journal can remind you of past achievements and this goes a long way to building self-confidence and helping you succeed in life when things get tough and can help comfort you.

Learning from the past

A technique which is very popular and one which keeping a journal can help you accomplish is the “best-better” technique, this technique can be applied to any situation that crops up in life and simply relies on you looking back on the situation and finding what you liked about it or what you experienced from it and then deciding how you could do better next time or how you could have better experienced from it.

The key to recovering from past mistakes and succeeding in the future is to learn from your mistakes but remember to focus on your strong points rather than your weak ones. If you concentrate more on your weak points rather than your strong ones then very often this leads to you unconsciously reinforcing them which then lead to low self-esteem and of course having a low self-esteem isn’t positive.

It is only by building on your strengths can you increase your self-esteem and your self-esteem is the crucial factor to understanding your weaknesses and correcting them and therefore building a positive outlook on life which greatly increases your chances of success. 

So by noting down your experiences in your journal you are able to look back on them and gain a clearer understanding of yourself and how you feel which ultimately determines how you think and how you think determines how successful you are in life.   

Decorate and name your journal

When you go looking for a journal don’t think about what to get or buy something because it is expensive or looks pretty. Instead allow your journal to come to you, you may be in a shop and look at a cheap looking notepad and feel that it would make a great space to write it – if that happens trust yourself and buy it.

This is not about having the most expensive journal to write in but to enjoy having a place to express yourself freely without having to worry about it being neat or in order.

You may want to think about decorating your journal with positive images and words, especially using your affirmations so they are always there for you to see.

A journal is a powerful self improvement tool and as you work towards enhancing and building your self confidence, self worth and spiritual insights your journal will become a close and valued companion that will give you the space to scream when you are mad and to share when you are happy.

There is no wrong or right way when it comes to buying and writing in a journal so don’t get caught up in how you should do it and just go out there and buy a notepad and get writing. You will love the insights you discover and most importantly you will find it becomes a great place to release the burdens you are keeping inside.

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