How One Index Card Can Drastically Improve Your Journaling?

If you read any of guide to improving your life you likely already know the many benefits to a journaling practive. The biggest problem many aspirant journalers have is what to write about.

For a long time I suggested a guided journal to get started. There’s the Five Minute and Two Minute Journals, and there is the Daily Stoic Journal or Steal Like an Artist Journal. All serve the same purpose to give you a guide to journal.

We all have notebooks laying around, we all want to journal, we all want to be guided — so just create your own.

Tucked into my journal is a humble index card. On it are two main sections, filled with tried and true journaling prompts.

Everyday, after I date my journal I write few things, lifted from the two minute journal.

I will let go of…
3 Things I am grateful for…
3 things I will focus on…

Below that are some questions that help me to write just a bit more.

What should I keep doing that is producing good results in my life?
What am I nervous/anxious about right now? Why?
What should I stop doing?
What should I start doing?

Finally a post it has two more questions that I am testing.

What is one thing I can do today at work that will make me feel accomplished?
What is one thing I can do today that will make feel good?

Each morning when I sit down to journal, if I feel like I have nothing to write about I ask myself one or more of these questions and without exception I always end up down the rabbit hole.

I have kept a journal for over 3 years now. What started as a way to deal with the death of my father has become a tool that makes everyday better. My Journal Card is just one way that makes it easier to do.

If my prompts don’t get you started just ask yourself what is the best thing that happened yesterday and write about that.

Once you get into a rhythm of regular reflection, you might find it helpful to think bigger picture. I wrote about how annual themes can guide your year instead of rigid resolutions.

Related: The Solutions Log · Annual Themes

This article was originally written on Medium.