Journaling to get to the heart of the matter
A practice to get to know yourself and understand the beliefs that hold you back
Journaling can take many shapes. It can be a log of day to day happenings, or it can be a deep dive into your thoughts and feelings. I find the latter to be more helpful in taking your yoga practice off the mat through practicing the yoga principle of Svadhyaya, or Self-Study. Getting to know the beliefs that hold you back is how you let them go.
I started journaling at age 10 after reading the Diary of Anne Frank. I have many journals, filled with my thoughts and “adventures,” dating back to 1982. Back then it was a log of daily events. In my teen years I wrote about the boys that I liked, relationships, trips with family and by myself.
There were years in the middle when my kids were small that I got away from writing altogether. I was Just. So. Tired. Eventually, when I crawled out of young child parenthood and back to being able to think again, I reconnected to my journaling practice.
This time, however, it was less about day to day events, and more about dealing with my internal world. I journaled to process difficult emotions and feelings spurred by interactions with other people. I wrote letters to them (that I never sent) as a way to feel and then release intense feelings. The more I wrote, the less stuck I felt.
Stream-of-consciousness writing from the heart
This type of writing takes practice and involves letting go. As a Type A “recovering perfectionist,” this wasn’t easy at first. To go from planning and controlling everything to finding a flow wasn’t natural for me. Letting my heart and pen take the lead, rather than planning what to say, involved releasing self-judgment and censorship. I embraced self-kindness and self-compassion so that I could meet whatever came out onto the page just as it was.
It was through this type of writing that I uncovered my stories. I learned that I felt like too much and not enough simultaneously. My perfectionism was based in my need to feel loved by my father after my parents divorce. I learned that my desire to feel seen and heard by my parents drove much of my overachiever behavior.
In the end, I realized that these stories that I was telling myself weren’t actually true. It wasn’t that I was too much, it was that my parents were unable to tolerate my big feelings. I didn’t need to be perfect, as my father loved me regardless. My mother wasn’t going to see me regardless of what I did, so I didn’t need to prove myself to anyone. I could be just as I am and that was enough. That is enough.
Journaling is a skill that can be learned and practiced
Like meditation or learning any type of skill, stream-of-consciousness journaling takes practice and self-acceptance. And gets easier and more natural over time the more you practice.
I think of it as writing from the heart, rather than writing from the head. What does your heart need to say that your head is censoring or suppressing? Often the thoughts are young and irrational, but that’s the point.
These words and thoughts are your anger and fears, and your younger self trying to find their voice. They are thoughts, they are not who you are. If you are writing things that make logical sense, you are writing from your head and bypassing your heart.
The Heart feels ALL the things
The Heart holds trauma, memories, shame, regret, worry, and the younger versions of yourself. Your younger self retains your childhood hurts, fears and unskillful coping strategies. These often show up in adulthood when you feel stressed, anxious, afraid, or angry.
It is your younger self “driving the car” when you lose your shit over things that don’t matter. When you make a big deal over things that are less significant than you are making them out to be, that’s a clue. The younger self acts out because they are not rational, they are young, scared, and doing their best to protect you. They cultivated unskillful coping behaviors for situations that they were too young to handle, but had to.
- Physical and/or emotional neglect
- Physical and/or emotional abuse
- Having parents who were addicts
- Having parents who were unskillful themselves and were stuck in their own traumas
- and more
Kids often have to deal with situations that seem scary to them, and if their adults are unable to handle their fears, kids make up stories about themselves, like:
- I don’t deserve to be loved because I am not (smart, good, ____) enough.
- My feelings are too big and I am alone with them.
- I am a burden, nobody wants me around.
These aren’t stories that you necessarily recognize, but they drive your behavior until you unhook yourself from them.
Journaling helps you see your stories
Journaling has helped me look at my stories and see them as stories. When you write from your heart, your pen flows out on the paper, and you learn what stories are driving your behavior.
When you do this regularly, it frees your heart from its burdens and you feel happier, and lighter. You learn things about yourself that you didn’t know. You learn what you really want and need as an adult, what no longer serves you, and what beliefs you can release.
For me, journaling has been a life-saving and sanity-saving practice. It has prevented me from sending angry emails to various people, and instead has allowed me to process my anger (and grief) so that I can write something that is true and less charged. I can write from my adult self, rather than my triggered child self.
Improving constructive communication
When you read an email where someone is yelling at you, it’s hard to read and difficult to understand. When you read a carefully crafted email, you can take in the information without becoming triggered yourself. This helps with successful communication.
Being able to express yourself and your heart in a way that will make sense to another person is the goal for any writer. It doesn’t matter whether you are writing a book, a blog post, or an email. The goal is clear communication.
Taking the charge out of your writing and being able to write calmly and logically is better for communication. Writing from the heart for yourself, however, is where the true healing happens.
How to journal
There are many ways to journal. If you’ve never done it before, it can be helpful to start with a prompt. Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of “Eat, Pray, Love,” “Big Magic,” and many other books, writes a letter to herself from Love every day. I find letter writing to be a powerful way to get to the bottom of things because you focus your attention at/from someone or something.
Writing a letter that you don’t send is a way to express your emotions without hurting anyone. Your feelings are real and true, but the stories behind them may not be. Letting them all out on the page is a safe way to feel your feelings and get them out. If they don’t go out, they go in, and over time, can cause physical symptoms.
If there is a person in your life with whom you struggle, this is a way to let go of your anger, frustration, and grief without unleashing it on that person. As yoga practitioners we want to practice Ahimsa/Non-Harming. Learning what beliefs are driving your feelings/behaviors helps you have a new relationship with them.
Journal prompts
- Dear _____, I am so angry at you. When you said/did_______ I felt ______. (continue writing about what you felt, why you felt that way, and see what insights come up)
- Dear Love, what would you have me know today? (you can also write from Anxiety, Grief, your younger self, etc)
- I am not sure what I am feeling today, but I have this sensation in my chest/throat/head…(describe the sensation and see where it takes you)
- I reacted really badly today and I’m not sure what it’s all about. (describe how you felt and see what memories arise. Write those down too and see if you can find a common theme)
These are a few prompts to get you started. For those of you who already have a journaling practice, what prompts do you use regularly that you find helpful? Please share them in the comments.
Monthly journaling practice
Every month I run an online group called Sangha Sundays. This Sangha is a community of like-minded people seeking to understand themselves better. I send out journal prompts on the first of each month to help you explore the monthly topic before we gather together online at the end of the month to learn and share with each other. We’ve discussed topics such as Ahimsa/Non-harming, making mistakes, being present, finding Santosha/Contentment, and more.
If you would like to be part of this group, you can either drop in or get a subscription. Paid subscribers to Yoga Living 50 and Beyond get a discounted rate on subscriptions, as do Purple Room Yoga class subscribers.
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