100 Replies to “How to Journal: Start Here | Kati Morton”

  1. Journaling is something I want to learn to do so this vid is helpful, many thanks Kati and many thanks to the person who asked the question

  2. Can you do a video of people mixing marijuana with anti depressant/ anti anxiety meds please. I started serteraline and I feel like I can just lie down for hours doing nothing

  3. The DBT card can be a good starting place. I did my undergrad internship at a middle school (2nd-8th grade I know it's more like elementary. I had one girl on my caseload trying to process the grief over loosing her her father. I was able to find a symptom tracker for kids. She was doing well with it and finding it helpful. When she was stuck on what to journal about I had her choose 3 emotions from her tracker and write a sentence or two about each one. She found it helpful. My journaling usually begins with questions I have.

  4. I’m watching this at 02:26 in the morning and I’ve only had 4hours sleep in the past two days some of which has been at school

  5. i wanna start journaling bc ppl have said it helped them but it's hard since i usually use it to vent but later end up hating how messy it seems and start on a new journal. im like an indecisive perfectionist 🙁

  6. One thing that helped me make an effective journal is that the moment I have an automatic thought or symptom I write down the situation and my subsequent thought as simple and objectively as possible. It helps me to put it away so it doesn’t bother me in the moment and analyze what things trigger my thought patterns so I can catch and challenge them. Sometimes I’ll summarize it in my phone and then write it with more detail later

  7. yes my counselor and I talk about this daily, and I love journaling. I haven't had much time to really fully sit down and write. I have used my note pad on my phone for whats been going on. Sometimes I use bullet points and sometimes I just let my brain ramble on. If I have time i like to go back through my phone and sit re think and work on making it a very good journal entry

  8. When I was going through a break up, I filmed myself talking about my feelings because when I talk I don't overthink my words like when I write, it comes out more naturally.

  9. In the past few years I've mostly used journaling as a way to vent emotions, mostly if I'm ruminating at night and can't fall asleep. You wouldn't believe the number of journal entries that start, "It is 2 in the morning and I am super not excited to be journaling because I want to be asleep but I know I'll feel better once I write this all out." Sure enough, a couple pages later I invariably feel better and it's easier to fall asleep. I guess what I'm saying is you don't even have to really like journaling in order for it to help, you can go into it begrudgingly and still get benefit from it.

  10. I tried journling today in bullet point form and I really liked it.
    I found it helpful to start by bullet pointing how my body feels right now
    – I’m a little warm
    – A little bit of a head ache
    And so on, to get rooted

    After that I wrote down little things that I’ve done this week and things I’m planning on doing and looking forward to. It’s very nice and helpful to write down the small things, not only the things you would tell people about. 🙂
    – I’m looking forward to putting up some pictures on my wall this week
    – I found a helpful video from Kati
    – I got through a tough seminar in school yesterday
    – I ate breakfast today without stressing
    And so on..

    Good luck 🙂

  11. Kati, How to deal paranoia along with swear anxiety and toxic shame although trigger by surroundings like people and environment.???

  12. I use Journaling as more of a diary and I find that or actually really helps since I don't have a therapist I treat the journal as more of a therapist type thing and I really helps sort through everything

  13. Its crazy how many journals I have. I will write until my hand hurts. I barely read over them because it makes me sad (I've been depressed for most of my life) but its good to look back when trying to figure out what went wrong and when. And you will start to notice patterns.


  15. Look into bullet journaling; it’s not just about bullet points. It’s a combination of having a planner, and a journal combined into one. You can set up a mood tracker, bill tracker, important calendar dates. It’s very creative. I love it.

  16. I have bullet journaled for 2 years now but I've had serious ruts and anxiety. I had to unstructure and just have free journaling pages to get my thoughts out, instead of doing disciplined spreads every week. Dont get me wrong spreads are so wonderful, but mentally they take time, inspiration, and motivation. And i truly need the perfect combo of all 3 to bujo. Thank you for validating that some of what I'm doing is good and ok, and reminding me the importance of lots of bujo elements (health trackers, weekly and monthly spreads, goal tracking, finance tracking, plus artistic expression) are what people trying to be their best selves do. ❤ needed this!

  17. I start with the date and then:
    1. Grateful (list what I'm grateful for)
    2. Review (Events of past 24 hours or so … as little description as possible. I'm just revisiting the past day or so and not writing about feelings or reactions, though I can't help it sometimes)
    3. Anxious (what is currently worrying me and why? I may expand on my feelings or the details here)
    4. Upset (what/who has me upset and why? I may expend here too)
    5. Excited (what am I looking forward to or really happy about? Again, I'll go into detail)
    6. Optional–People (who am I concerned about or want to think about)
    7. Optional–Questions (I will ask myself questions about whatever topics come to mind. I will also try to answer questions from past entries that I've thought about)
    8. Resolutions (what changes do I need to make or what changes that I have made do I need to keep up?)

  18. I use an app called Daylio for journaling. I rate how I'm feeling on a scale from "Awful" to "Rad", select the activites I did that day, and jot down any notes. It gives me a notification each day to remind me to do so.
    You can even export your entries into a document…although it's one giant cut and paste (the paid version puts then I'm a PDF, I don't know if it looks nicer). I brought my entries into my therapist and she loves it. She's currently evaluating if me not using the app each night affects my mood overall, because I don't have that minute of processing my day.

  19. I have such a hard time with journaling. I love the idea but my hand writing tends to be super messy and it drives me crazy. I would use a laptop but It doesn’t seem as personal. This video helped me with a place to start. Thank you.

  20. Thank you for inspiring me to start journaling again and also for reminding me of the importance of tracking symptoms or moods. In the past have sometimes used addressing my entries to my future self which can be nice to read back, it is a nice way to be reminded of how much self love I can have when I reread all the words of encouragement I wrote to my future self.

  21. its such a same that my mother used to read all of my journals 🙁 she read everything without asking. she keep having this habit so i write them not in my mother tongue

  22. I'm dealing with the aftermath of a fairly uncomfortable divorce and I've been keeping a private journal on LiveJournal. I'm kind of stunned that it's still a thing, but i'm happy that I can keep it and make to so no one can read it. It helps getting my shit in order.
    Also, thank you. You've been really helpful with all this stuff.

  23. Do you have video on your advice to ppl like me who are thinking of becoming a therapist? Any tips before pursuing counseling as a career choice? I’m taking a break from school rn but Marriage and Family therapy is something I’m leaning towards. Also, there’s therapist that focuses on adults and others that focuses on adolescents, is there such thing as therapist who focuses on emerging adults? That’s what I really want to focus on.

  24. I often start to journal but don't really stick with it for even a week… I have a fear that someone will read it and think I'm ridiculous and the things I write about are trivial.

  25. When I’m obsessing over an event or situation, I find journaling to be a super helpful and insightful way to process everything. I tend to write the incident as objectively as possible then include the emotions and reactions i felt. Then what this incident reminded me of in the past and possibly how I’ve dealt with it. Finally what i want from the situation and if there’s anything I’ve learned. Also if anything comes to mind of what i could’ve done differently and if some music/poem/show/movie/book/scripture/etc. reminds of or gave me something to reflect in relation to the situation.
    It’s also been helpful to have my therapist read my journal entries to catch her up more quickly to where I’m at and we can work on things more.

  26. So, I joined the text service and was wondering if we could get the ones that you already did? I am in love with the idea and really want to get a lot from it!

  27. I used to never journal, then one day a few months ago I just started doing it. I write it more in that letter way, but oddly I tend to write in second-person point of view, like someone else is talking to me about my thoughts (using terms like "you" and "you're")……. maybe that's a bit weird? lol

  28. I use a mood tracker. It let's be put down what I'm feeling and write down what is going on and rate it on a scale of 1 to 5. It helps.

  29. I started journaling a couple of years ago, to deal with anxiety, and the advise at the time was to just write, 3 pages of A4, and you would get to the bottom of the things bothering you. If you were struggling, you would acknowledge that you were struggling, until something came to you. After a while, I started meditating, and that allowed me to remember things I had long forgotten about, and helped me make sense of things that had happened to me before then. Since then, I have used it to treat mental illnesses, as I can write things I would never say to anyone else, and that has helped me greatly in dealing with everything.

  30. I have a diary type journal and I write things that happened during the day there and then I use this app called dailio to track my moods and activities. The app is really quick and easy and you get an overview of your month. I’ve found both of these ways really useful.

  31. i don't have one specific way I journal. sometimes i feel like writing about a certain situation thats going on in my life. sometimes i want to draw a picture. sometimes i write a poem. sometimes i write the lyrics to a song that i've connected with recently. so my journal is a huge mix of things, which basically represents my mind and all the random thoughts i have. i've found journaling extremely helpful and therapeutic once I got rid of the notion that I had to be journaling everyday in a certain style or form!

  32. I try to take just a few minutes a day to journal about how much sleep i got and my sleep pattern, my mood, highlights of the day, and at least three things I'm grateful for that happened that day. It can take less than five minutes but is immensely helpful because it helps me check in with myself and stay on track. Sometimes I'll just write the basics and sometimes I'll fill page after page with absolute nonsense just to vent or problem solve or reflect. I also noticed a lot of people talked about the ways they write in letter format and I want to say thank you!! That's very helpful and I think I might start doing that!! Y'all are rad

  33. I almost had a mental breakdown today, and I was searching through the internet to see if I could find anything. I clicked on one of your videos, and it almost instantly calmed me down. Don't know how, but thanks.

  34. Is engaging good though? Sometimes I wonder whether over thinking is not the real problem with some and stuffing it down and not thinking about your psychological problems, just work so hard you have no time to dwell on your problems is not the real solution, as this has been practiced by our ancestors until a few decades ago when people started having time and money and depression…

  35. A goal on my bucket list is to journal every single day for a year straight. The only thing I have to do to 'journal' for the day is to write the date and at least one word (has to be that day before midnight, or at least before I go to bed if I end up staying out late past midnight). If I do journal, it almost always ends up being more than one word though.

    I created this goal back in February 2018 and since then I have journaled every day for the majority of the year.. I have accidentally skipped days (I actually just missed 31st Dec), so my goal is far from complete, but it's definitely helped me to maintain a fairly consistent journalling habit.

    Although not strictly a journal per say, another tool I use to track my mood and what I get up to is an app called Daylio. I'm not as strict with it, such as having to complete entries on the day.. but if I don't enter anything on the day it's usually only a day or two later. I track my mood three times a day (because I find it difficult to summarise a whole day with one mood level) and the activities I engaged in during the time I assessed my mood (morning: before 10am, day: 10am-4pm, evening: 4pm-10pm). The scale I use is a pretty simple 1-5, and the app works out the average mood for my day if it fluctuates. So far I have tracked my mood and activities for OVER A YEAR! I have found it quite helpful.

  36. I needed this..God bless you..have your book I can't wait to read it..currently taking Zoloft Generic and I was diagnosed with PTSD and General Anxiety Disorder due to Childhood Abuse and Adolescence abuse

  37. I have tried journaling but I never really got into it. And also I’m scared someone will read it, I don’t wanna burn it or throw it away either… so I just never did it lol

  38. I personally use an app called Daylio as a kind of journal where I can track my mood, symptoms and what I've been up to that day. Also I find it easy to use since phones are such a big part of our lives nowadays and sometimes even my therapist takes a look at the data it provides since I update atleast once a day… and honestly I can recommend it to anyone that feels like they're too busy to journal since it takes less than a minute to input the data and you can have the app notify you so you don't forget!

  39. Kati morton I got a journal today for my emotions and what I'm going through and I put one anger feeling in my journal so I'm using a journal for my emotions how I'm doing in my life instead of bad stuff

  40. journaling was all from never being understood, and when brought to my attention id make it significant when i journaled.
    it helped me address problems people face with my shyness, and really opened a new way for me to save my psyce by sort of building a barrier from my personal thoughts to day-to-day conversation that you know (probably wont remember forever).
    i do illustrate as well to keep my art ambitions high, or address something that ive seen or am aroud to keep relevant with my era my surroundings b/c when it comes to prestigous arts its really just dedication that gets you there!

  41. This is a really validating video. I used to be scared to journal because I never knew where to start. Now I recognize that I don’t have to write a novel each day, just a few things!

  42. I'm afraid to journal, even though I'm not living with my mother anymore, because my first journaling experience was when I hit puberty and my mother gave me a journal and encouraged me to write in it. When it was full, she took it back and read it and kept it and used what I wrote against me. I never journaled again after that until I was an adult, but even now I want to immediately tear up everything i write.

  43. It can also help you to get started if you find a weekly calendar with space for each day, so you only have to fill in the paragraph that will fit on that day

  44. How do you journal if you have a fear of it being discovered ? I had someone read my journal when I was 17 years old. They then proceeded to make fun of what I wrote. To this day I fear writing my innermost thoughts down. So I use an online notepad that's "locked." I know writing by hand would be more beneficial. How do I let go of fear of discovery ???

  45. Thank you Kati! That helped! Sorry if you mentioned this before, but how do we write to you if we have a question we would like you to talk about in your future video. Is it through your business email? Thanks!

  46. I love this text service, but my finances no good and have to cancel how do I go about canceling the text service

  47. I started using a fauxbonichi (based on the Japanese styled Hobonichi), and it's a page a day. I feel like it's working for me. I'm writing in a small journal. ? I write about what happened in the day, but today I realized how I'm feeling and I documented it. I think I realized that I don't really document how I'm feeling emotionally or mentally. But something tells me I should start.

    I'm not on any medication, but I do see a therapist. This was a very helpful video! ?

  48. When I journal, it's usually to vent. Like I won't even care about nice handwriting, I just let all of my frustration out. I really want to have a more organized approach, maybe even make it pretty like how a lot of people do. I think it would be beneficial until I can get a counselor

  49. i get really scared and anxious when writing because my perfectionism kicks in, so i reached a compromise with myself to do a haiku about my day, it's short so it's less time spent stressing and it's syllable limits help me channel my need to be precise

  50. My basic journaling consists of ten things that have gone well today/ this week.
    I some times write to my Grandfather (Mums Dad ) who we lost in 1980 , who I have always felt a strong affinity with.

  51. I have thirty six omni journals that I've finished . My omni's include art and bullet journaling and diary style . I also do trash my journal too . Like I have pages where I just stick my gum in and pages where I color then cut it in pieces tape it back together agian. Very fun .I decorate my journals so they are more my style . Journaling is the bomb.

  52. Hi… so I'm 13 and have suffered with depression (self diagnosed) for 3 years now… I watched this video a while back and only waited to revisit it if the journal helped and it really has… if I go into detail with something I choose to only do that with the happy things to make me feel better and remind myself I can have happy moments when I'm going through a bad stage and just bullet point if I felt bad at a certain time… I've found myself happy crying at all the good things I've had happen to me whenever I've been feeling down because in my mind I've just been thinking about how shitty my life is then oh wait… no its not… thank you Kati ☺?

  53. What if its hard to identify exactly how you feel? When I am manic, I notice that I cant even identify how Im feeling, in order to keep track. Like its hard to guage what im exactly feeling at the moment at times

  54. I've tried to journal a lot and failed a lot, but I want to try again and only focus on my feelings and emotions, how I felt etc. When I tried and failed I think it was because I was forcing myself to wrote about stuff I didn't need to write about, I want to try by just writing about what I need to write about

  55. I started journaling, serously about a year ago. I couldn’t think of anything to write about so I hit the Internet and found some prompts and that helped a lot. Then a couple of weeks ago I found 'Journaling jars'. Obviously not a new idea, but it is new to me. I like the idea of revisiting an idea to see whats changed.

    I never intended to be a daily journaler, but I want to be consistant so I have set aside time on a Saturday morning to just write.

  56. I want to start journaling, but I don't think I'd ever truthfully write how I actually feel in fear of someone reading it. Everytime i start writing, I start to think of how someone reading my thoughts would think me uncool or lame. It's an irrational fear because I live alone but that's what I'm dealing with.

  57. My journals are for writing only, and I keep audio journals . My pics and mementos goes in Photo albums.I do try to use all the space, and mix dates. I have been journaling since age 15 to my present 77.

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