You're just not a journal person.
Yes, you've heard about the benefits of journaling. But spending 30 minutes a day writing about where you went, what you ate, who you spoke to, what you did at work...
You don't have time for that!
Besides, staring at a big blank page, trying to think of stuff to fill it with, and doing that every single day? Doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun.
Well, here's the good news. You don't have to keep a traditional, “here's everything I did today” type of journal. There are other types of journals, many of which don’t take much time or effort to keep.
If you can find just five free minutes in your day, here are four types of “5-minute journals” you can keep.
1. The Quick Journal
With quick journaling, you don't worry about filling an entire page in your journal. You don’t even have to write a whole paragraph.
Instead, you write just a sentence or two about something significant that happened that day. For example:
* Went to the dentist. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.
* Got an A on my science report. Yay!
* Just had the best chocolate cake ever. So glad I got the recipe.
Keeping a record like this gives you something to look back on. It can be fun to look through your “quick journal” and see what was going on in your life a week, month, or year ago.
2. A Gratitude Journal.
It can be too easy to ignore the good, positive things in our lives and focus on the negative. And that can negatively impact your overall mood, general outlook, and even your productivity.
Want to start focusing more on the positive than the negative? Start a gratitude journal.
Considering how little time and effort it takes, gratitude journaling can have some amazing benefits. In one study [http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/why_gratitude_is_good/], participants were asked to spend time every day focusing on gratitude. After just a few weeks, many of them felt more optimistic, were able to sleep better at night, and even had lower blood pressure.
Keeping a gratitude journal is easy. At the end of every day, write down one to three things you’re grateful for. The only “rule” is that you pick things that are different from what you've already written in your gratitude journal.
After a few days, you’ll be amazed by how many good, positive things there are in your life that you can be grateful for.
3. A Project Journal.
Reaching a big goal (finishing a complicated report, losing 50 pounds, getting that promotion) can be exhilarating. You feel like you're on top of the world, and can't wait to tackle the next big goal on your list.
But there's a problem with “big wins” like this. They don't happen very often. So what do you do in the meantime, when you're goal is to lose 50 pounds but, so far, you've only lost 2. Or you want to write a novel but, so far, have only eked out 500 words.
When you're trying to reach a goal that might take weeks, or even months, it can be hard to stay motivated and not give up. Even if you *can't* give up (because it's a project for work or school) a lack of motivation can make doing the work more difficult. And make you more prone to procrastination.
Luckily, there's a solution. Teresa Amabile (a professor at Harvard, and co-author of *The Progress Principle*) observed 238 professionals. And she found that one of the key things that kept people motivated, whether at work in general or when working on specific projects, was making progress. Even if the progress was small, it was enough to keep them motivated.
Unfortunately, most of us don't notice our “small wins,” so we don’t benefit from “the progress principle” as much as we could.
Here’s the fix. Start keeping a project journal. Every day, spend a few minutes writing about the progress you've made on the project, no matter how big or small. Try to write down at least one “small win.” For example:
* I lost another pound.
* I came up with a great title for my novel.
* I spent 10 minutes cleaning out the garage.
Keeping track of your small wins will not only keep you motivated, but it will make you less likely to fall prey to the procrastination monster.
4. A “Morning Page” Journal
Maybe it starts before you get out of bed in the morning. You might be in the middle of a yawn when your mind is suddenly flooded with:
* All of the stuff you have to do that day.
* All the little things that bugging or annoying you.
* All the bigger things you’re worried about.
All of that mental noise can be exhausting. And it can make it difficult to face the rest of your day with energy and enthusiasm.
That's where morning pages come in. Popularized by Julia Cameron in her book *The Artists Way,* doing morning pages is a freewriting exercise where you write whatever pops into your head stream-of-consciousness style. You don't worry about grammar, spelling, punctuation, or even writing in complete sentences. You just write.
Cameron suggests writing three full pages every morning. But even writing for just five minutes can help to drastically clear your head, and get you ready to tackle the rest of your day.
Maybe you’ve thought about journaling, but decided you didn’t have the time. But if you can set aside just five minutes a day, you can start a journal.
If you've never kept a journal before, journaling every day might be a hard habit to stick with at first. But, before long, spending five minutes with your journal will become a daily ritual that you truly look forward to.
