Why would journaling be a waste of time?

Journaling might be a waste of time: it depends on the value perceived in journaling. Maybe, if your house is burning down or your father is having a heart attack or …. (Insert your own calamity here) : it could be correct thinking that ‘journaling is a waste of time’ at that moment. Another reason for not journaling is if we don’t see how it would positively impact us; therefore we can’t value it. Here are some common thoughts:

• Journaling might use up our valuable time for work or other urgent responsibilities and we would end up feeling overwhelmed.
• We can’t see the results straight away because it’s a long term investment so there’s no point in doing it.
• We might feel that being reflective is self-indulgent and lazy. We would not like to view ourselves that way.
• It’s not our buzz so it doesn’t appeal to us.
• Or perfectionism might stop us in our tracks. (but who’s looking at how you journal?)

If we find ourselves relating to one of these common answers it might be good to reflect a little deeper to understand why we have these reactions and then we can ask ourselves if it is true or might there be some benefit to journaling. There are as many different ways of journaling and it takes some time to try out different ideas. It depends on what we want and what we are looking for.

I know someone who was told by a professional that they should journal every evening before they go to sleep because they struggled with sleeping. The idea was that if they journaled about the day they could put down on paper what they were worrying about, what their achievements were and maybe who they should talk to the next day, etc.  The person tried it once and said it was boring. My thoughts are that it might well be boring for the type of person who needs a bit of direction especially if they had never journaled before, as in this case. “Just journal whatever you want” could work for a writer but for a non-writer that sounds terrifying so having some boundaries and direction can be good for some. Otherwise it can feel like sailing off into the distance with no map or compass.

Often in life we feel we don’t have time to do ‘something’ because

• we don’t value it or
• we don’t believe it will make a difference in our lives; or
• we want to do it but we don’t know how;
• or we want to do it but we are lost in the trivia of our daily details.

This is true for anything, including journaling. I would suggest if you have never journaled then aim to start with a couple of sentences or just write for 5 minutes. Dipping your toes in the water might be less overwhelming than sailing off into the distance; and once it feels more comfortable you could try a little longer. 

Introspection is fundamental to growth

Here are some questions that might be helpful if we struggle to know what to write about:

• how was your day;
• What were your struggles?
• What did you learn;
• Did you meet new people?
• What is your general mood?
• Is there anything you could be grateful for?
• Do you notice any pain or tension in your body?
• What do you need to let go of?
• Do you need to forgive?
• Do you need more companionship?
• Do you do anything satisfying outside of work?
• The best is if You construct your own relevant question.

Time constraints

We do need to make time for whatever we want to do, even journaling. Probably most of us have read Steven Covey’s book: First Things First, and will know that he designed a productivity management system to help us be more productive and effective.

Here is my attempt at displaying his time matrix, The four quadrant strategy, in this table.

Quadrant 1 Urgent and important All those things that demand your attention or need damage control.	Quadrant 2 Not urgent but important – you are free for quality time; you need to allocate the time so that you do it: Block it in your diary so that when it’s done you feel fulfilled and happily satisfied.
Quadrant 3 Urgent but not important – deception and distraction, making you feel compelled to respond.	Quadrant 4 Not urgent and not important. – Time wasters and trivia: dump it and/or don’t do it. Nobody cares if you do it.

I refrain from explaining Steven’s method as my aim is a little different to Steven Covey’s. I am trying to live a well-paced life that allows me to be less driven and calmer. I am not living my life in the business sector, striving for more production. I am more interested in what I can exclude from my day as I only want to fill my time with what I value and love.

In the past I was a people pleaser and I said ‘yes’ to everything others wanted which created a lot of disharmony in my life because of the dissidence. Now I try to be more discerning about if it aligns with my values. Saying ‘yes’ so that I will be liked is not one of my values anymore. I ask myself: is it going to support my values, add to my well-being or bring me joy. Basically does it fit in with my values and my aim for living? This is still a life long challenge for me.

I use Steven Covey’s quadrant system a little differently as his aim is: how can you achieve more productivity? My question for myself is how can I maintain my values and goals for my best life? I try not to live in quadrant one where everything is urgent and important as this makes me feel frazzled, I aim to live in quadrant two most of the time; and I try not to live in quadrant three where I am open to deception and distraction or quadrant four where time wasters and trivia dumps happen.  I aim to ask myself what do I spend most of my day doing. It’s not easy and even as I write this I feel challenged by it.

Here are 5 examples of some of my distractions:

• Pleasing others at the expense of myself
• Scrolling social media
• Not screening out unimportant messaging and emails
• Thinking some things have to happen immediately when no one but myself is making the deadline.
• not taking sufficient rests.

We will all have our own struggles:

• Obsessively cleaning
• Too much T.V. or gaming.
• It’s whatever takes up your time, that is not important to you, and you know that actually you really want to do something else: paint, write, journal, start a hobby, look after your health, go for a walk, etc

I regularly find that I am asking myself: if I only have one year left to live what would I have liked to have done? I am not saying you need to journal but I find it is a tool that brings clarity and calm.

So the question is: if you decide that journaling is not a time waster, is it something you would like to do? If so, but you  don’t know what to journal about, how about thinking about what you really value in life or what’s stopping you from doing what you really want to do?

What do you think journaling is?

Thank you for reading my post.

here is part one of journaling An Overview

and part two My way: a creative way.