Oprah said that she had been advocating gratitude for 25 years after retiring from television. Oprah wrote that she kept a gratitude journal for over a decade and encouraged everyone to do the same. After that, life became hectic. My schedule overwhelmed me. My journal was still open some nights, but I lost my habit of writing five things every day in my gratitude journal.
She picked up an old journal.
Oprah stated that she wondered why she no longer felt the simple joys of life. “Since 1996 I had accumulated more wealth, more responsibility, more possessions; everything, it seemed, had grown exponentially–except my happiness. What is the secret to my never-ending joy despite all my opportunities and options? I felt so stretched that I couldn’t feel much. Too busy.
She said, “But, the truth is, in 1996, I was also busy.” I made gratitude my daily priority. I spent the day searching for things to be thankful for and always found something.
Although most people are aware that journaling can be helpful, they don’t make it a priority. How can journaling be made easy? How can we make journaling feel like an obligation, but still get the benefits?
How to make journaling easy
Over the past year, I spent a lot of time thinking about ways to make journaling easier. It was so important that I teamed up with Baron Fig, a premium notebook maker, to create the Clear Habit Journal. This combination dot grid notebook and daily journal is easy to use, but it also makes it easier to build any habit.
Let’s not start selling our wares.
The truth is that there’s no “right” way of journaling. It doesn’t matter where you are or how you do it. You only need a piece or blank paper to journal. There is an easy way to journal even though there are many ways to do it.
Write one sentence per day.
One sentence per day journaling is a great way to have fun. It is easy to do. It is easy to feel accomplished. You’ll feel satisfied when you complete your journaling.
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- It doesn’t have to be something impressive to be useful.
- These Journaling Prompts Make Journaling Simple
- Let’s discuss the process that I created to make journaling easy.
Each Habit Journal was designed to make it as simple as possible to keep a daily journal. It begins with a section called One Line Per Day.
A space is provided at the top of every One Line Per Day page for a prompt. These are some examples of journaling prompts that you might use:
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- What has happened today? (Daily journal)
- What am I grateful to today? (Gratitude journal)
- What is your most important task right now? (Productivity journal)
- What was my sleep like last night? (Sleep journal)
- What is my current mood? (Mood journal)
Below the prompt are 31 lines. Each day of the month will have one line. Here is your single sentence for each day.
All you need to do to get started with journaling is to write down your prompt and then jot down a few words every day. After the month is over, you will be able to look back at 31 wonderful journal entries. This experience was designed to make journaling easy enough that you’ll want to do it every day. That’s it. This page shows a photo of the One Line Per Day section.
What to Do From Here
If a habit feels annoying, it’s unlikely that you will stick with it. Journaling does not have to be complicated. Write one sentence about the day. It doesn’t matter if you use my habit notebook or not.
It doesn’t matter how easy it is to show up. Madeleine L’Engle (author of A Wrinkle in Time) said it best: “Just write a little every day.”