12 Prompts To Kickstart Your Journaling Practice

The benefits of a daily journaling ritual are numerous and there are all kinds of methods for it depending on the purpose. For this post I'm going to keep it super simple and just share a few prompts that you may wish to consider if you're one of the millions of people who want to journal but just don't know where to start.

Intentions, Actions, and Reflections

Most of us start our day with a loose idea of what it is that we want to do during the course of our day. However, once we start engaging with external forces, our intentions get put on hold. We tackle urgent issues as they arise. Then, in the evening as we're trying to prepare for sleep we start reflecting (ruminating) on all of the things we DIDN'T get done. The prompts I'll offer up here are an attempt to provide you with an algorithm that can run on auto-pilot and make your AM intentions purposeful & focused - while bringing a sense of celebration & tranquility to your PM bedtime routine. Your actions throughout the day will improve gradually over time in a way that aligns with your intentions. Just trust the algorithm/process.

AM Prompts

1. A couple of my overnight wins were ____ and ____.

2. My alter-ego for today is _____.

3. 3 things that I'm grateful for are _____, _____, and _____.

4. Some obstacles I'll face today include _____.

5. Things I need to remind myself include _____.

6. 3 things that would make today great are _____, _____, and _____.

7. Daily affirmations: I am _____ and _____.

Bonus AM prompts:

1. What's one thing I could do to contribute to my family, class, or community without being asked?

2. What's one thing I could do to be more healthy today than yesterday?

PM Prompts

1. Today's "That's Like Me" 1% improvement was ______.

2. 3 amazing things that happened today were _____, _____, and _____.

3. _____ is something that I still need to work on.

How does it feel?

How does it feel to start your day with gratitude, setting intentions, visualizing tough situations, and making decisions about the kind of person you want to be when trouble appears?

How does it feel to end your day by acknowledging a the highlight of your day and logging it as a new baseline behavior, to celebrate the blessings in your life, and to constructively address behaviors that you've yet to master?

What do you notice about your energy, work, and love as you log more and more entries in your journal?

Leave a comment and let me know how it goes!