Getting Started on your journaling journey..

The most amazing discovery I have made in this lifetime is 'Journaling'. As I have discussed in Write your way to glory, Journaling it is a one stop solution for self-therapy, enhancing clarity and providing a constructive structure to thoughts.

I started maintaining a personal diary since I was in the 7th Grade, thanks to my father who inculcated the habit of writing one page a day since I was very young (though his intention was for me to improve my handwriting). However, it is a habit that stuck with me and I have since then resorted to a personal diary (now, a journal) to plan, vent, channelize and grow. My previous article talks about managing time, and let me tell you that journaling has played the most important role in helping me prioritize and execute so many things in time without stressing out.

 So, how should you start? Firstly, determine what all are you going to use your journal for and make sure to create provisions for each of these topics. In my case, I use my journals for the following activities :

1. Goal setting (yearly, monthly, weekly) in different dimensions of life: I have an entire article dedicated to this topic and my journal has played a great role in making me more aware and effective at goal setting and accomplishing.

2. Weekly meal & workout planning and logging: Everyone who knows me, knows that I consider fitness as one of my top most priorities. Weekly planning is achievable because it is short term planning resulting in long term results. It is not overwhelming as it is feasible to foresee the week coming up. Meal planning ensures less time spent on thinking about what to cook, financial savings from unplanned dine outs and take aways and of course, better health from more aware food choices. Similarly, planning workouts ensure compliance and helps derive all the benefits of exercising. Again, I have an entire article dedicated to planning holistic workouts. Meal and workout logging takes hardly 15 minutes every day but goes a long way in providing clarity, enhancing self-awareness and honestly just taking the stress away from the individual to make better decisions.

3. Line ups, timelines for content creation for articles and choreographies: This is specifically applicable for me as these are two areas that I want to progress in apart from my conventional career goals. It will be different for you and other people. I, personally believe that 'ideas not captured are ideas not created at all'. We are so bogged down by multiple thoughts that almost, always we tend to overlook some amazing ideas that cross our minds during the day. My journal is the safe net that captures my ideas and helps me convert them into reality by helping me chalk out a plan and ensuring compliance to timelines. To give you an example, I list down the articles or dance forms (for songs), against which I allot release dates and provide step-wise timelines (articles - rough draft, editing, proof-read, publish; choreographies - conceptualization, practice, record, edit, post).

4. Re-orientation and recovery of focus: If you want to do well and do more at the same time, you are bound to feel overwhelmed, burdened and lost if you do not find a medium to off-load. In the past, I failed to understand why I was lacking consistency, and now I know why. The cycle I usually fell for was - Excitement - Hard work - Being overwhelmed by the magnitude - loss of focus - Failure. Now I break the cycle at point 3 (being overwhelmed), I use my journal to vent and re-orient my thoughts and regain my focus. Believe me, anyone who says they haven't fallen off the wagon are lying. The ones who are successful learnt to channelize their thoughts and emotions through this very phase and wouldn't we all love to be successful.

5. Gratitude: This one needs a very special mention and has been a game changer for me. The power of gratitude has touched me and millions of others around the world and it is a concept that each one of us should be empowered with. I have already started working on this topic and will link it up when I release the same

On that note, I would like to take this and every opportunity to express my gratitude to all my readers for such amazing responses and feedback. I find a lot of inspiration in the interactions I have with so many of you through comments and inbox messages. I am working on many such practical, relevant and doable topics and I am sure of finding the same response from all of you for my future work too.

If you are new to my profile, do check out my other work on LinkedIn where I share my experiences and approach towards life skills (professional and personal) and The White Rice Girl, where I talk about sustainable fitness. Also, do spread the word among your friends, colleagues and acquaintances, if you feel any of these articles are relevant or helpful to them.