While keeping a journal may seem more appropriate for a lovelorn teenager or aspiring novelist, it can benefit older adults.
“Starting a journal can help to improve your wellbeing and quality of life, particularly for seniors,” Beth Ann Scruggs wrote on the blog for Rock Hill, South Carolina-based Adult Enrichment Centers. Scruggs holds a doctorate in education and is Center Director at Renew, part of a nonprofit that champions equity for adults.
“Journaling may serve as an invaluable tool to process events by analyzing and freeing any negative feelings involved,” Scruggs said. “Journaling boosts memory in several ways. Not only does reading old entries help trigger memories, it also reminds us of events we may have forgotten. And the very act of creating your journal entries helps improve recall.”
The technique can help ease a few other issues that disproportionally affect seniors.
A study published in Educational Gerontology established three primary benefits for seniors who write down their thoughts regularly, for example.
“Keeping a journal assists older persons to cope with day-to-day situations, it enables them to experience the joy of discovery, and it helps to nurture their own voice and spirit,” researchers said.
In another study published in JAMA, researchers said “patients with mild to moderately severe asthma or rheumatoid arthritis who wrote about stressful life experiences had clinically relevant changes in health status at 4 months compared with those in the control group.”
And if you’re in a caregiving role, writing about the day-to-day experience, even casually, can help you cope, family therapist Barry J. Jacobs wrote for AARP.
“There is something about recording what is happening to us and our emotional reactions that enables family caregivers to stand apart from the onrush of tasks and crises they’re immersed in and observe what they’re going through, reflect on its greater meanings and feel more in control,” he said.
“The important thing is to take the concerns and reactions swirling through your head and deposit them on paper (or a computer screen) so that they preoccupy you less. You don’t need to use big words or full sentences or even words at all; drawings work, too. Just empty the contents of your mind without judging yourself.”
If you’d like to tap the benefits of writing in a journal, follow these tips from mental health care professionals.
Start small
Rather than filling up a whole notebook on day one, it’s more effective to take it slow. Set a timer and write just one or two minutes each day as you’re starting out, psychologist and founder of Mending Trauma, Amy Hoyt, told Healthline.
“Micro-steps are less likely to be rejected by the brain, whereas large sweeping changes can feel unsafe, and we may give up,” she said.
Choose a method that’s already accessible to you — and natural to use. Options include typing on a blank document on the Notepad program on your PC, using a notes app on your cell phone, or buying a cheap notebook and writing with a ballpoint pen or mechanical pencil.
Warm-up
Ahead of writing, prepare by taking several deep breaths and observing your surroundings, Lori L. Cangilla, a Pittsburg-based psychologist and avid journal writer, told Healthline. Then, write what you see. Doing this is called free writing.
You can “describe that experience until something else comes forward in your journaling,” if you draw a blank, Cangilla said.
Don’t hold back
“It’s your journal, so you can be as petty, blunt, and honest as you wish,” Cangilla said. You can try to write as quickly as you can to avoid editing your words.
Create a visual journal
“If you don’t like to write, a journal can take on different forms,” psychologist Stephanie A. Sarkis said in a blog she wrote for Psychology Today.
“A journal isn’t necessarily just words — you can also create sketches and even paint in a journal. Visual journals have been found to increase the ability to reflect on one’s actions, which can make changes in behavior.”
Follow a prompt
If you’re struggling with a topic, borrow one from phycologist Lori Ryland, who suggested these prompts to Healthline:
- Write your favorite memories from childhood or your children’s lives.
- Go out into nature, and write about the experience.
- Describe something you fear doing and why.
- Describe something you love doing and why.
- Describe yourself, including your personality and roles at work and home. Then describe yourself from the perspective of a close friend or family member.
- If you wake up tomorrow having everything you want, what does this look like? Where are you? Who are you with? What are you doing with your time?
Record or dictate if you like
“If you prefer to talk out loud about your ideas as a way to process them, or if you just don’t like to write ... consider dictating your thoughts or recording them,” Sarkis said.
“This could be as simple as just speaking your thoughts into your phone for a few minutes while you sit in your car in the parking lot during your lunch break.”
Mix it up
Don’t feel you must limit yourself to one approach, Sarkis said in another blog post.
“Nothing says you have to stick with just one. In fact, changing up how you journal can give you new insights into yourself, and that is exactly what journaling is all about.”
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