15 Ways To Use Your Journal To Become Absolutely Unstoppable
“A personal journal is an ideal environment in which to become. It is a perfect place for you to think, feel, discover, expand, remember, and dream.” — Brad Wilcox
When I was 20, I was serving a humanitarian church mission in Pennsylvania.
This included working 80+ hours per week. It was highly fulfilling but also highly taxing. One day, I reached a very low point emotionally. I was facing extreme challenges and difficulty in this experience.
I experienced a divine intervention.
I found an article written by a person who explained that journaling had changed her life and brought her tremendous insight. She had experiences filling hundreds of journals over 30 years.
I was amazed. This article hit me like a ton of bricks.
I don’t know if anything has impacted my life any more at any point in time than reading that single article.
She was referring mainly to spiritual insights and connections she had gotten while writing in her journal, but I realized the far-reaching implications that my journal could have on everything in my life.
I got out my own journal after reading that article, inserted a copy of the article, and wrote something like this:
“I just read this article. I believe this is going to be a life-changing thing for me. From this point on, I will journal every single day.”
That was 15 years ago.
I have journaled nearly every single day for the last 15 years. I have since filled hundreds of journals.
Sometimes, I journal for an hour or more straight.
I would not have a PhD without journaling. Nor would I have published 6 books.
Journaling has completely changed my life, probably more so than any other single practice. It can likewise change yours.
As you may guess, I journal very differently from the way most people do. Over the last 15 years, I’ve compiled 15 lessons that will fundamentally transform the way you look at pen and paper. I’m excited to share these lessons with you.
In this article, you will learn:
- How to optimize writing in your journal to get bigger and better insights each day
- How to re-shape the way your see yourself, others, and the world to become healed emotionally
- How to become a much better writer, planner, thinker, and strategist
- How to think in better ways that will dramatically increase your income
Let’s get started.
#1 — Ignore And Discard The “Right” Way
There is no “right” or “wrong” way to journal.
Most people get so caught up in the “right” way to journal that they never start. In reality, there are thousands of different ways to journal, and they are all very subjective. How you journal is completely up to you.
I just take a plain piece of paper and start writing. Honestly, every journal session I have is different. There are core models, frameworks, and questions that I ask myself (which you’ll learn in this article), but ultimately there is no right or wrong way to journal.
See your journal as a “private tool-kit.” Your journal is a space and a place for you to write down your thoughts, ideas, goals, and challenges.
Let go of the need to find the perfect way, and just start writing every day.
#2 — Only Write To Yourself From Now On
When I first began journaling on my mission, I was writing with others in mind. I was writing with the thought that someone else would read my words someday.
While that can be very valuable, simply cataloging your history for somebody else to discover later on is very different from the type of journaling I am inviting you to do.
The type of journaling I am inviting you to do is both highly therapeutic and can transform your entire life.
From this day forward, only journal for yourself. Your journal practice will become more effective, powerful, and enjoyable when you solely write for yourself and not for other people. You’ll become a lot more honest and flexible in what you’re willing to write down.
Consider that psychologists have studied the practice of “writing and burning,” where people write in their journal and then burn or throw away what they wrote.
While you don’t have to burn or throw away your journals (I keep my journals and don’t throw them away), it’s important to recognize the immense benefits that come to those who do.
They learn, grow, and benefit tremendously from their journal regardless of if they or anyone else ever comes back to it. Even if the ability to come back to their journal is intentionally destroyed, they benefit from letting their thoughts out on paper.
The benefit is gained through the act of journaling itself, not an unspecified moment in the future. The same is true of you.
Someday later, an older version of yourself, your children, or their children may find what you wrote.
Don’t worry about that for now.
Your journal is for you.
Write whatever you want. Be completely honest.
(Paradoxically, your posterity will likely find your honest and open entries far more fascinating and valuable than any other form of journaling.)
#3 — Don’t Feel The Need To Re-Read Your Journals
I don’t re-read my journals.
Once again, your journal is for you.
It’s for helping you heal, emotionally regulate, think, plan, strategize, and create.
Your current journal is the best tool for this.
Your previous journals don’t need to be re-read to have inherent value. The value that you gained was by using them in the present moment, whenever that was.
You can go back and re-read your journals if you want, but that’s not the primary purpose of journaling and certainly not an obligation. Such an obligation would require enormous amounts of time and emotional energy.
I very rarely read old journals except in specific cases. As an author, I will often strategize new ideas and insights for upcoming books in my journal. If there’s an idea that I created in my journal, I will go back to that idea so that I can add it to my book.
There is also one key page that I re-read. In the front page of every journal, I answer 5 key questions.
1 — Where am I now?
Here, you can literally write down whatever you are doing in your life. What projects am I working on? What are we doing as a family? What did I recently buy or do? What are the challenges that I’m solving and the things I am thinking about? The purpose of this section is to give a clear snapshot that will help you picture what stage of life you were in at the time.
2 — What are my wins in the last 90 days?
Here, I put personal and professional wins, whatever they may be. This is whatever happened between the day I started the new journal and 90 days prior to that.
3 — What are the key wins I want to have in the next 30–90 days?
What would make an absolutely amazing month for you if you did all of those things? Write it down.
4 — What are my goals for the next 12 months?
Put the biggest three things here. As Jim Collins said: “If you have more than 3 priorities, you have none.”
5 — What are my goals for the next 3 years?
This is where you can think and strategize imaginatively about a really big future that’s still close enough to focus on.
I keep these 5 questions and their answers in the front of my journal where I can easily access them and go back to them. Besides this page, there’s very little time I need to spend re-reading old journals.
The primary purpose of journaling is to re-frame the way that you think, and to re-shape how you view yourself, others, the world around you, and God.
Focus on the journal you’re creating right now.
#4 — Journal Every Night For 5 Minutes
“Never go to sleep without a request to your subconscious.” ― Thomas Edison
Most people procrastinate sleep. This sets them up for less sleep, poorer sleep, and a poorer day tomorrow.
Rather than procrastinate sleep by engaging in distracting activities before bed — what if you proactively prepared for sleep by writing in your journal?
At night, simply spend 5 minutes journaling. Start by writing down three things you’re grateful for, which can transform the quality of your sleep.
You get to choose how you frame each day.
Frame the day in a positive and useful way so that you can use it, rather than be used by it.
What I write that proactively prepares me for sleep is the answer to this question:
“What are the main ways I am different than who I was the day before?”
This question helps me see how I truly am different from who I was even 24 hours before.
This question helps me to document and remember important experiences I might have glossed over otherwise.
Here are some other variations of that same question to get you started:
- What were the important experiences that I had today?
- What things did I learn today?
- Where did I see the hand of God today?
- How am I different because of the things that I learned today?
- How am I now better and more informed that who I was yesterday? What do I now know?
Simply writing the answers to these questions will help you find, analyze, and reflect on different things.
You’ll realize a lot more happened than you originally thought. You’ll view the events of the day positively, and then imprint them deeper into your memory.
You’ll begin to view each day differently, and you’ll have a higher expectation and vision of success tomorrow.
#5 — Journal Every Morning For 5 Minutes
Journal before input.
Inputs include your texts, emails, social media, phone notifications, and even books and courses.
All of these things are adding more things to your brain.
Before this, journal. Give your mind space to let new insights and new connections come as you learn new things for the day.
Rather than opening your phone like most people do and
Put thoughts onto paper while your brain is creative, and while your subconscious is primed.
While you are asleep, your brain and your subconscious mind are working. When you wake up, capture the ideas that your subconscious has already been working on all night by journaling.
When you’re asleep, your brain formulates new memories and re-shapes your worldview based on new things that you learned the day before. It’s also letting go of old ideas, beliefs, and worldviews that are no longer relevant or useful to you.
When you journal in the morning for 5 minutes, you take advantage of all of this growth that happened during the night.
Write about what you’re grateful for. Write down your goals. If you just give yourself the space to receive insights, they will come.
So many times in those morning journaling sessions, when I am in a fresh environment clarifying my thoughts through writing, the greatest and biggest insights have hit me and come to me.
Life-changing insights will come through this morning time.
Give yourself the space to connect.
#6 — Get Yourself Into A Specific Environment
There’s a lot of research about the role your environment plays in your behavior. In fact, the entirety of my first book, Willpower Doesn’t Work, is devoted to this.
When you put yourself in an environment that encourages you to have the right mindset, the way you think changes.
Create a “sacred space” to journal. Rather than journaling just anywhere, create a special and protected place for this to happen.
This doesn’t have to be fancy.
For me, I get hydrated, drive my car down the road, park, and journal in my car. My car has become a sacred space for journaling. Create a sacred space and begin to journal from the right environment You can also prep further by saying a prayer or meditating (more on that soon).
Journal where nothing and nobody can distract you for those precious minutes.
Doing this will increase the perceived value that you have of your journaling experience. Ritualizing your journaling to a sacred environment will make it an experience that you look forward to every single day.
#7 — Meditate And Pray Before You Journal
Before I journal, I pray to God. I seek inspiration. I ask for guidance, for insights, and to learn things that I didn’t know before.
I ask Him to see things differently that I didn’t see before. I ask for help to be aware of things that I should be aware of. I ask Him to help me focus my ideas, my energy, my intentions, and my thoughts.
Whatever your specific beliefs on prayer or meditation may be, doing something beforehand to slow down and get your mind in the right frame of mind before journaling, can massively multiply the results you get. For me, prayer is very powerful. It gets me to a place of open inspiration and free-flowing ideas.
8— Journal From A Grateful State
Gratitude is the mother of all virtues. Gratitude can create abundance, excitement, and insight.
Be grateful when you journal. Get yourself into a grateful state.
Prayer and meditation beforehand help with this, but you want to continue to amplify that state while you actually are in the process of journaling.
One of the things I do to deepen the right frame of mind is to write down things I am grateful for.
Write down, feel, and review your progress from the last couple of weeks or the last few days. Measure your momentum. Become humbled and grateful for the AMAZING things you’ve already accomplished in your life.
Become grateful for your goals, and your future self, when you journal.
#9 — Learn That The Past And the Future Are Simply Drafts
This lesson is both crucial and massive.
The past and the future are simply drafts which you can refine and re-purpose in the words of your journal.
Write about your past, and re-frame it.
Your past is a reflection of your present self, rather than your present self being a reflection of your past self.
It’s who you are in the present that shapes the meaning of what your life. The past is a draft. You control the meaning of that draft.
As an author, I’ve learned that more drafts you’re willing to write, the more insight, clarity, and connection you get.
Your past is a draft, it’s not solidified. Your future is also a draft. You can change your future and refine it slightly each day. Yes, you should have goals and a vision, but you don’t need to have it all figured out.
A few weeks from now, you may see your past differently than the person you are today. Your future self will view your past differently than you do now.
Bit by bit, you can chisel away at learning who your future self is by refining your “draft” in your journal. Your vision, goals, and plans will be a little bit different 3–4 weeks from now, even if your overarching vision is the same. It’s helpful to continually update the draft of your goals.
Always treat your past and present as drafts when writing, reflecting, and journaling. When you view the past and future as drafts, you’ll be in a great place here and now.
Doing this frees you and gives you the comforting reassurance that you don’t have to have it all figured out right now. You just need to commit proactively to the very next step, every morning, while you journal.
Your drafts are things you’re getting better and better at.
#10 — Learn That You Are Not Your Past Self
When you’re journaling, regularly reflect on how you are different than your past self. This goes back to the evening question, “In what ways am I different than who I was the day before?” This also goes back to the questions I answer in the beginning of every journal measuring the past 90 days of wins.
You are different from who you were 10 days ago, and also different from who you were 10 years ago. By acknowledging that you are not your past self, it allows you to continually see how you are evolving and changing.
By acknowledging and learning those changes, you’ll set up your brain to change faster.
Be empathetic towards your past self. There’s no reason to be mad at your past self.
You know things that they didn’t know. You have resources that they didn’t have.
Have compassion, love, and understanding for your past self.
Measuring how much you’ve changed will reinforce your brain’s belief in your capability to continue to change. You’ll have the capability to believe bigger and better things about yourself when you measure how you have changed in the past.
#11 — Learn That You Are Not Your Present Self
“The person you are right now is as transient, as fleeting and as temporary as all the people you’ve ever been.” — Dr. Daniel Gilbert
One of the core differences between people with a fixed mindset and a growth mindset is that people with a fixed mindset are overly attached to who they are in the present moment.
With a fixed mindset, you overly identify, and overly label yourself.
With a fixed mindset, you say “this is who I am.”
With a growth mindset, you’re a lot more open to change. As Brene Brown would say, you’re more focused on getting it right than being right. You’re open to questioning your own assumptions and ideas.
This is what happened to Andre Norman, whose full story I share in Personality Isn’t Permanent. Below is a brief section of his story from the book.
“Initially, he decided he wanted to get out of prison. He didn’t want to be there anymore. But then he thought to himself that just ‘getting out’ wasn’t enough. Seventy-five percent of people who leave prison come right back. Lessons are repeated until they are leanred. Instead of ‘being free,’ Andre made his goal to ‘be successful.’
‘Where do successful people come from?’ he thought to himself.
‘They come from college. If I go to college too, then I’ll be successful,’ was his reasoning. Having grown up in Boston, he knew of only one school by name, Harvard. Sitting in his cell, rethinking his life…he decided he was going go to Harvard…That single goal, his new purpose, gave Andre a path to getting out of prison and becoming a new version of himself.” — Excerpt from Personality Isn’t Permanent
Today, Andre has an fellowship at Harvard.
He wasn’t defined by his present as a prisoner.
Your present isn’t who you’re going to be.
Your future self tomorrow is going to be a lot less ignorant than who you are today.
Journaling every day helps you to avoid being overly defined by your present. You’re continuously and creatively adapting your ideas, goals, mindsets, and approach when you journal every day. You’re not overly defined by one specific circumstance or event.
#12 —Learn That You Are Not Your Future Self
“Imagination is more important than knowledge.” — Albert Einstein
Most people project who they are now into the future, rather than realizing just how different that person is going to and can be.
Recognizing that who you will be in the future is different from who you are now is very healthy.
The past and the future are simply tools for operating more effectively in the present.
Your journal is where you can become connected to, become grateful for, and start acting from your future self. This goes back to the concept of “drafts”.
You can determine frames for your future in your journal.
The more connected you are to your future self, the better decisions you will make in the here and now.
#13 —Your Past + Present + Future = Tools
“The only way to make your present better is by making your future bigger.” — Dan Sullivan
Time is not sequential. It all exists here and now.
As you take these (past, present, and future) to your journal, remember the following principle.
Are these helping you? Are they healing you?
The way you use these tools in light of what you learned in #10-#12 is fully up to you.
#14 — Psychologically And Emotionally Heal With Your Journal
Your journal is a safe place. It’s a place where you can become healed emotionally.
Your journal is the place to build psychological flexibility.
Be continually becoming better at using the past, present, and future as tools, and by continually re-framing your past, you will become transformed by your journal. You’ll have freedom and space to make better decisions. You’ll become more inspired and more excited every day.
Your emotional flexibility will increase. You won’t be rigid and dogmatic if you’re willing to use your journal.
From this place of emotional flexibility, you can have the space to win really big. You can also easily recover if and when things don’t work out the way you originally thought.
Your journal will help you be more flexible every day.
#15 — Strategize And Make REALLY Important Decisions
Your journal is a place to make very important decisions.
In my journal, I have planned and strategized my career. I have written connections of who I need to reach out to. I have connected ideas and creative insights in ways that have propelled me forward.
When you’re journaling, you are able to map out ideas more objectively. You’re able to increase your own self-awareness.
If you’ve gotten this far, you’ll have begun to see your past, present, and future very differently and strategically.
You’ll be on a plane where you can make BIG and BOLD moves towards your future self and receive what you truly want.
Write your biggest goals. Write your biggest dreams. Remember, nobody needs to read this except for you.
Your journal is where you can become extremely vulnerable, humble, and creative with what you are willing to and what you want to accomplish.
Your written insights will inform the strategy of your life.
What could you do?
Conclusion — How Will You Change?
With your journal, you can:
- Attract money, people, circumstances, and ideas into your life
- Deepen your relationship with God
- Become psychologically flexible and emotionally unstuck
- Re-frame even your biggest challenges and traumas
- Absolutely change your life
The vast majority of people don’t know these things. But you do. You can help them and yourself. You can become your future self.
How will you journal?
Have a beautiful day.
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(These are tools built on the frameworks from my book Be Your Future Self Now, which recently became the #1 book in Korea.)
