The Benefits of Journaling

I’m a bit of a productivity freak. I spent quite a bit of my time measuring how well did I complete my tasks, how long it takes me to complete them, etc. I’m always keen to learn how I can do something better. 

Initially, I thought that everyone’s like that. Everyone wants to do everything as efficiently as possible, right? As it turns out, that’s not the case. I’ve learned that a lot of people simply don’t care. They just want to get through their tasks without spending too much thought and effort on it. Talking about work, Gallup found that 87% of people are not engaged. This just shows that people are not invested in trying to do their best work.

I’ve developed my own technique that helps me get through every week feeling that I’ve done something. Here’s a quick breakdown of my journaling process. 

Every Sunday evening I sit down for about an hour and write my journal. I write down how the week went, what specific events happened, were there any hardships, etc. It’s a bit like therapy – you write down important thoughts and events that happened. It allows you to think more clearly as you let these things out of your chest. I find it immensely helpful to write out my emotions. Almost as soon as I do, they lose their power over me. 

After the reflection, I write down the goals for the week. They may be something as simple as calling someone or as difficult as a full day of focused work on a topic (e.g. completing a part of machine learning project). It can be any goal that needs to be completed within the week. I prioritise what’s the most important thing for me to do and not what someone else demands me to do. It’s a subtle difference, but I find it incredibly important.

Throughout the week as I complete these tasks, I get the mental satisfaction of being able to cross them off. It really makes my life much more enjoyable. Journaling removes a lot of the stress from my life and helps me do my work in a focused way. If I ever don’t know what to do, I can just open my notebook and check what’s the most important thing to do this week.

At the end of each week, I’ll review how well I’ve done, reflect on it and make new goals. I dubbed it “Reflection Sunday” and I highly encourage you to try it out. I’ve been doing this for a couple of years now. It takes just an hour and I can say with confidence that it’s one of the better habits that I’ve taken on. 

As a cherry on top you’ll realise that you now have a summary of your year in weekly chunks. You’ve started writing down your life story.