The Stoics have a long-standing tradition in journaling. In this video, Einzelgänger explains how you can use journaling for inner peace.
Key Takeaways
The Stoics have a long standing tradition in journaling, with Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations as clearest evidence.
Marcus Aurelius never meant to publish his diaries. This makes it more plausible that the contents of his Meditations are his honest thoughts about a variety of topics.
I could imagine that because a man in the position of emperor and most powerful person in the world didn’t have any equals to talk to, and, therefore, resorted to pen and paper as an outlet.
But it could also be that Marcus knew very well about the psychological benefits that journaling brings.
Benefits of Journaling
1. Preserving Personal Life Lessons
It’s great to have access to other people’s experiences and learn about life by reading books or watching YouTube videos. But there’s nothing like our own individual experiences.
Every person is unique and so is every situation. The only person we should compare ourselves with when it comes to personal growth, is our own past self.
By keeping track of our personal life lessons, we will know where and when — exactly — things went wrong and things went right.
Why is this important?
Many people make the same mistakes over and over again and just never seem to learn. By having certain key moments in writing, it’s easier to remember what we usually forget, so we can make wiser decisions in the present and future.
2. Illuminating What's in the Dark
In Jungian psychology, the shadow is the realm in the unconscious that harbors unwanted personality aspects, thoughts and desires.
Because we all wear a mask to show ourselves to society in a desirable manner, everything that’s undesirable is kicked down into the shadow.
What’s so dangerous about this is that the shadow can manifest itself in very destructive ways.
Journaling is a way to make sense of our own shadow behaviors, and keep track of when they emerge and what the look like.
By doing this, we shine a light on our unconscious inner world and, bit by bit, we basically journal ourselves into our souls.
3. Strengthening Discipline
Keeping a journal everyday is a discipline on its own. That’s why it’s hard to stick to it. But, when we manage to write a journal every day, this affects other areas in life as well.
Discipline is contagious. When you do something in a disciplined way, like exercise, you will automatically become more disciplined in regards to nutrition and sleep, and let go of bad habits that obstruct the good ones.
- For example, one of my key habits in regards to this channel is that I write down my daily goals on the night before. Even if it’s just one simple goal like ‘writing a video script’.
- This helps me to stay disciplined the next day, because it’s clear what I have to do and the burden of the future limits itself to that task alone. This not only strengthens discipline but reduces anxiety as well.
4. Reduce Anxiety
Simply put: journaling creates order out of chaos.
In way, it’s like cleaning a room. We take all the mess and put everything in perfect order, remove the dust and make sure it looks good.
After sharing these benefits with you, here are some words of caution.
In an article on Psychology Today Dr. Steven Stosny writes that journaling, when done wrong, can have negative effects on the mind as well.
Journaling can make people self-obsessed, passive towards life (meaning: observing instead of taking action), wallowing in the past, going on and on about all the bad things that have happened to them.
His advice on good journaling is, in a nutshell, doing it constructively, so it leads to solutions.