Perhaps most helpful about the Pandemic Project is that it presents journaling about really big, stressful events in a bite-sized fashion. The project offers prompts related to pandemic-related stressors that stretch from the obvious, like health anxieties, to more specific topics like how relationships may be evolving or changing throughout this time. “Use it to try to understand those problems that are getting under your skin.” “Many people often start writing about COVID-19 and then begin writing about other topics that are bothering them more than they thought,” says the project website. Pennebaker, who is a researcher at the University of Texas at Austin, and a team of other psychologists started the Pandemic Project last year to help people get into or expand their expressive writing as a way to help deal with the stress of rolling lockdowns across the country. Experts say this exercise of expressive writing can be especially during stressful periods. Whether it’s keeping a record of the day, documenting big memories, practicing gratitude or recounting travel, the options are nearly endless. Journaling is a practice every person can adapt to their own lives. Journaling has also been linked to surprising health outcomes like improved immunity and better vaccine effectiveness. In a 2006 study, 100 students were asked to journal just 15 minutes twice per week and those that did reported reduced symptoms of anxiety, depression, and stress. Research has shown that journaling does, in fact, reduce stress.
As opposed to something you have to commit to doing every day for the rest of your life.” “My recommendation is to think of expressive writing as a life course correction. Pennebaker, a social psychologist, told the New York Times. “One of the interesting problems of writing too much, especially if you’re going through a difficult time, is that writing becomes more like rumination and that’s the last thing in the world you need,” James W. Experts tend to agree that journaling is good for mental health and managing stress, but being mindful about it is the best approach. Having a road map offers a little encouragement, but also direction and inspiration for what could be an otherwise stressful act of self-care. At any rate, it can be daunting, but the more I’m able to incorporate structure and prompts into my writing the friendlier it becomes.
Sometimes journaling can be a means of coping with the day to day or recounting memories.
Unlike a lot of the stories I write - whether I’ve pitched them or they’ve been assigned - journaling is personal and the audience is just me, my biggest critic. Suddenly a blank page seems intimidating, no combination of words seem to convey how I feel and the worst writers block sets in. But when it comes to journaling, it’s not always been so easy. I construct sentences and stories all day, every day, so I kind of consider words to be my speciality. Self-reflection isn’t always easy, but it’s worth it.Īs a longtime writer, I’ve always struggled with putting a pen to a page for myself.
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