The 5 Journal Prompts I Swear By

And why it's important in sobriety

When I first got sober, there were three things that I was advised to do every day; one of these was to journal.

As someone who’s always loved writing, I’d tried to write a diary on several occasions but the things I wrote made me cringe, so the thought of having to “journal” as a grown adult gave me the ick. Wasn’t it what American teenagers did?

But I was determined to make sobriety stick so I (reluctantly) began. I started off just writing a little every day, guided by these prompts:

1. One thing I’m doing well

2. One thing I need to work on

3. One I’m looking forward to

4. Two things I like about myself

5. Three things I’m grateful for

But it didn’t come easily to me at first.

I couldn’t always think of something I was doing well or liked about myself, but I’d just write “not drinking” and “my skin is improving”. But after persisting it became easier and easier, and one day something happened; I couldn’t stop writing! It was like the floodgates had opened and I could write about (almost) anything.

If I’m honest, there were days when I just couldn’t face writing down the thoughts in my head. It was too painful. But I knew that if I wanted to get something out, I now had an outlet.

Why is it good to journal?

It’s proven that writing your thoughts and feelings down can help reduce stress levels and improve clarity to situations, positively impacting the messaging in our heads; having a busy brain, journalling helps me get things out of my head and safely onto paper, and the next day things don’t seem as bad.

What do you do if you want to get started?

Any notebook will do or you can treat yourself to a fabric covered one, like these from Etsy. TK Maxx have a great selection of notebooks too, and I recently treated myself to a personalised Papier one. Your thoughts and feelings are precious; they deserve somewhere special to live!

If you don’t like physically writing (maybe you’re also worried someone might find it and read it), use your computer or a journal app and password protect it.

I like to journal at the end of the day, writing about everything that’s happened or anything I’ve been worrying about, but some people like to “set their intentions” by journalling in the morning. Try both and find a time which works for you.

And it’s as easy as that.