Take fifteen minutes of mindful thought to journal every day and you can change your life forever. Is that a bold claim? Maybe, but it’s also an entirely realistic one. You see, there’s a method of keeping a journal that stands the test of time, one that’s far older than you may realize.
Now, of course, just keeping a journal isn’t enough. You’ll have to make yourself act on the things that you write. But that comes after you pave the road to your future. This method, though not new by any chance, is what I call ‘active journaling.’
I’m a writer. It’s what I love to do, and I’m lucky to have found this passion when I was so young. Over the years that you write, you come to a deeper appreciation of the craft as much more than mere penned words on paper.
You see, writing is powerful — perhaps the most powerful form of self-development. With specific practices implemented into your busy life, it becomes possible to write your future. This is the premise of this timeless method, the one that I’ve dubbed Active Journaling.
Let’s start by looking at one of history’s most obvious examples of this method: Marcus Aurelius. Marcus Aurelius was an emperor of Rome nearly two-thousand years ago, and what was most remarkable about this emperor was the virtue with which he lived.
Emperors can have whatever they want, that’s as simple as it sounds. To look at Marcus’ life and to see how uprightly and how virtuous he lived is astounding to say the very least. For a man to live in, and rule, at the height of an empire renowned for debauchery and baseless pleasures, and to see that this man wisely abstained from such frivolities of the day is impressive to say the least.
However, Marcus’ greatest contribution to our modern world is not his empire, nor the virtuous life that he led. Marcus’ greatest contribution to this modern age is his journal, a small volume we nowadays know as the Meditations.
Marcus’ Meditations were entries that he wrote to himself on the wise and virtuous Stoic life. He wrote these to himself, consistently reminding himself of the life that he aimed to live. Marcus wrote his future, living in accordance with what he wrote.
If Marcus was doing this nearly two millennia ago, it’s safe to say that this practice of journaling is hardly a revolutionary one. Journaling as a discipline stands as one of the oldest and most easily accessible forms of self-development.
This form of writing is far more impressive than penned words on paper. Active journaling is thought and feeling poured from the mind and the soul onto the page. It is taking the chaos in your head and making sense of it. Active journaling gives you a skill that immediately sets you apart from others: self-awareness.
Writing such as this over time gives you a birds-eye-view of your head-space. The ebb and flow of your thoughts and feelings, their sources, the ways you can control them — with this ability of self-awareness comes the potential for real growth.
Self-awareness is the first step to self-knowledge. Self-knowledge, with consistent action, leads to self-mastery.
How does this all work? What is the method?
To understand the core of this practice, you have to understand ideas. Ideas rule the world.
“Writers are the fundamental and irresistible aristocracy of the world.” — Henry David Thoreau
In writing this, Thoreau meant writers, as the propagators of ideas, ruled the world. Plato wrote The Republic, and in so doing he outlined the workings of justice and government. His ideas became the operating-system of society moving forward. He became a fundamental aristocrat of the world.
Plato shaped societies to come with The Republic. Thomas Paine may have ignited the Revolutionary War in writing Common Sense, which changed the West forever. In writing the Gospels of Christ, the disciples laid the groundwork for the largest religion in the world.
Ideas rule the world. You can rule your world with ideas. You can change your life by harnessing their power.
Fifteen minutes of mindful journaling every day, and consistent action on what you write — these are the core principles of active journaling.
How?
This is the part where I describe my method, which is by no means the perfect method. My method is five-steps. What is lovely about active journaling is that it is accessible to everyone. All you need is a pen, some paper, and the desire to change your life.
It’s a simple method to write your future like an author would write a novel.
Here are the five steps:
Step one: Ideas. This is the longest step, insofar as it requires deep thought. All you have to do is sit down, with no distractions, and concentrate your full mind on this. First, write what you fear the most; what you desire the most — down to the detail; what is your biggest dream? What would you do with your life if money didn’t matter? Explore your thoughts and feelings head on. What’s your passion? What will be your purpose?
This step involves facing your mistakes, your regrets, and honestly addressing the state of your life and yourself. It’s uncomfortable, but, in the end, it’s empowering.
Step two: Goals. Now that you know what you want the most, what your dreams are, etc., how can you attain that in the real world? Realistically? What do you want your life to look like in three years physically? Mentally? Emotionally? Write it out. Maybe you want to be a power-lifter? Write it out. Maybe a pianist? Write it out. Find the thing that you want to do, and decide you are going to do it.
Step three: Habits. This is the ‘active’ part of active journaling. Whatever goals you previously wrote, take them, deconstruct them — reverse engineer them into the simplest and most sustainable habits that you can think of. Reading for half-an-hour a day; working out every day. Whatever habits that will lead you to your goal, write them out and dedicate yourself to them.
A method of habit-journaling that I use is, in a bullet-journal, write out the habits along the left-most side, then write out the next thirty days along the top of the same page. With this graph of habits by the day, you can track the consistency of your habits by marking the days that you acted on them.
Step four: Consistency. Your dreams won’t be built in a week. At some point you have to take your eyes off the horizon and glue them to the road in front of you. Enjoy the process instead of pining after the result. Think of yourself like a sculptor: every day is another chip away at the marble block, and, one day, you’ll be able to look at yourself — the sculpture — and marvel at how far you’ve come.
Step five: Learn. Once you’ve been on the road for any amount of time, you’ll have more ideas, new thoughts, new feelings. Maybe you learn that you have a remarkable constitution for adversity? Write it out. Identify with it. Know yourself, and these personal revelations will solidify your sense of purpose and your drive to succeed.
This habit, hopefully, will become as integral to your life as it is to mine. I love journaling for the sense of comfort and mindfulness that it brings. It’s like building a personal refuge in your own thoughts. In time, this habit will change your life. You will write your future.
Active journaling is one of many methods that I use on my road to self-knowledge. I believe that knowing oneself, and acting consistently on that knowledge, leads to a life of fulfilling relationships, inner peace, and renewed purpose in your life.
Therefore, know thyself.