Journaling

I feel like journaling is one of those things that you see on pinterest and it looks super aesthetic so you go try it and it just ends badly. Or you try to take up journaling as a new years resolution and you do it for like three days and then never again. On my sixteenth birthday I decided that I was going to try to journal everyday of being 16, that's a full year people! We're talking a full three hundred and sixty five days here! Honestly don't know what got in to me because it was way more of a commitment than I thought, but I was determined to tackle my goal. I set an alarm to go off every night at 10:15pm for me to sit down and journal before I went to bed. The idea was to use the alarm start the habit in my brain to journal everyday because, it takes roughly 30 days before something even becomes a habit. Let me speak from experience and say that it worked and that alarm is still set to this day, two years later. So every night I sat down on the floor in the middle of my room and got out my journal and pencil and wrote a page. I told myself that a part of my goal was to write a full page everyday, and I did. Sometimes I wrote about what I did that day, what I was feeling, or even a prayer, it really just depended on the day. So my seventeenth birthday rolled around and I had done it! I journaled every single day for a whole year! I managed to fill up a whole journal and a half (I always have lots to say lol). This journaling experience was so fun and eye opening for me that I decided to do a round two! So I journaled another complete year and loved it even more. Long story short I recently turned eighteen and I'm on year three of this journaling everyday adventure and I don't plan on stopping anytime soon. I'm not going to lie there have been some days that have been a struggle. Some days I'm not in the mood, or I'd rather binge a show on Netflix instead. I have to tell myself that I need to journal because deep down I love it and getting all of my thoughts on paper is more important than that "Americas Next Top Model Episode", a guilty pleasure of mine lol. Journaling has been a very rewarding experience for me as well, I love opening an old journal and reading an entry from a year ago and looking back on all the old memories. Since my journaling experience has been such an awesome journey for me here are a five ways to actually keep up with your journaling this year. Happy Journaling!

1. Reminder- set a reminder for yourself to journal because its easy to forget. you can do what I did and set an alarm on your phone or even a sticky note on your mirror works
2. Cute Journal- sometimes having a cute journal to write in is motivating
3. No Pressure- don't feel like you have to pour out all your feelings every time you journal
4. Be yourself- let your journal be whatever you want it to be
5. Different Types of Journaling- there are so many journaling styles out there, try out a bunch and see what you like best