When I started journaling, it was really hard to get words on the page.
Even 4 years of journaling later, some days it is still hard to get the words on the page. However, I do promise it does get much easier over time.
Why is it so hard to know what to write?
If it is so hard, why do I keep going with it?
The most simple answer I can come up with is that the work I do in my journal prepares me for the work I want to do in my life.
The difficult decisions, the courageous conversations, and living a life that makes me feel alive.
My journal gives me the chance to sort through the kinks and pent up emotion before it is presented to the world.
Not in a perfectionist way, but in a “I am aware of where I’m at today” way.
Some days of journaling are filled with gratitude and celebration. Other days, I hesitate to write anything down at all.
I realized where the hesitation comes from. It comes from fear.
Who knew that writing something down was so scary, but it is. It feels like if I write something down it is permanent or it defines who I am.
However, whatever it may be, if I am afraid to confront it in my journal, I’ll likely be afraid to confront it in my life.
So might as confront the fears in a safe space where the only judgment comes from yourself.
I realized when I’m journaling, the fears usually fall into 1 of 4 buckets.
Here are the 4 most common fears I encounter when I journal. Maybe you can relate.
I fear it won’t be good enough.
I’m not sure what I expect my journal entry to look like, but I am afraid it won’t be good enough. That I’m not addressing enough of what is going on in my life or writing enough or doing it with enough intentionality. Then I remind myself that I showed up to my journal at all and that is enough in itself.
I fear my fears.
You would think that it would be easier to face your fears in your journal rather than the real world. While it probably is, that doesn’t make writing down your fears any easier. I have found, though, that writing down my fears explains a lot of the feelings I haven’t been able to explain.
I fear my dreams.
I’m worried that if I write a dream down and it doesn’t happen, then I’m a fraud or a failure. But if I don’t acknowledge the things I want to do, how will I ever be able to acknowledge the actions I need to take to make my dreams happen?
I fear reality.
It can be scary to write the actual facts of life down. My journal is this perfect little world to me, but reality is out there. There are hard things that need to be dealt with, but journaling through it can make the reality seem more manageable and you more capable.
I want to leave you with Brene Brown’s words from her book The Gifts of Imperfection:
“Gremlins are like toddlers. If you ignore them, they get louder. It’s usually best to just acknowledge the messages. Write them down. I know it seems counterintuitive, but writing them down and owning the gremlins’ message doesn’t give the messages more power, it gives us more power. It gives us the opportunity to say, ‘I get it. I see that I’m afraid of this, but I’m going to do it anyway.’”
Let’s decide we are going to do it anyway.
