Dear diary…

You know that feeling of trying to find a light switch in the dark? The type of situation where only in hindsight the path is clear but in the midst of it your vision feels cloudy at best. At the Guides project we think we’ve found a better way to navigate this kind of situation, by inviting reflections and embracing emotions through Journaling. It’s a well documented way to help people make connections between what is important to them, their community, and the world.

Journaling is not just a little thing you do to pass the time, to write down your memories; though it can be. It’s a strategy that has helped many influential and wise people become better at what they do. Marcus Aurelius, Anne Frank, Mark Twain…. the list of people that journalled is long.. very long…

Journalling comes in all shapes and sizes, from long form analogue handwritten stream of consciousness to digital bullet points; a snapshot of things you noticed. You can go introspective by journaling alone in full privacy, or collectively with others to help make sense of a situation or topic. In its essence, it’s a written record of our thoughts and feelings, expressed in the moment or building on the benefit of the passing of time. It’s a powerful tool for personal growth, discovery, and co-creative self-expression. But most of all it should be clarifying, fulfilling and fun.

Most people will be familiar with the adult version of “dear diary”, expressive writing to delve deep into your thoughts and emotions. There are significant benefits to this practice, by picking up a notebook and dropping what’s on your mind down on paper for as little as 5-15 minutes a day is already associated with increased self-confidence, creativity, and positive emotions. This form of expressive writing is often done alone. However, journaling can also be done together with others, giving you an opportunity to speculate on paper, confident that your ideas, observations, emotions, and writing will be accepted without criticism. Appreciating what thoughts and emotions are alive for another helps with mutual understanding and acceptance.

Journaling complements actively using your brain, for example in shorter bullet-point type expressions such as Noticing. Noticing is a conscious, effortful, explicit, and logical process, a ‘System Two’ process as Daniel Kahneman describes in his best-selling book from 2011, Thinking, Fast and Slow. This means, it helps to remove yourself a bit from the action, think ahead or reflect back to see the things you’ve missed, and patterns that might have since emerged. Something that typically our intuitive systems (System One) overlook in the heat of the moment, yet are crucial in making sense of what is happening around us. Dotting down three things you noticed in a day can go a long way in making sense of the world, particularly when combined with practicing gratitude.

Not everything, however, has to come from your own reflections. Often the best decisions emerge when you look beyond what’s available and reject the presented options. Get a fresh perspective by asking a question that will help broaden the horizon and unpack the situation in front of you. Asking questions is a great way to journal together, fuel prosocial behavior (social acts beneficial to others) and come to a more coherent understanding.

“Question everything” - Thomas Jefferson, Nelson Mandela, Euripides.... etc..

Asking lots of questions unlocks learning and improves interpersonal bonding. The first step in becoming a better questioner is simply to ask more questions, and becoming better at questioning makes you ask more questions, a helpful virtuous cycle. However, the type, tone, sequence, and framing matter. When it comes to understanding a complex situation, it is recommended to ask open ended questions. Unfortunately sometimes we hold back on questions because we might be too eager to impress, or worry about it being the wrong question. However, asking questions in a journal creates a safe space for exploration.

As our picture builds, cracks can appear. Seeing that something isn’t quite right is one thing, finding the energy to actually do something about it is quite another. The difference between the two states is the emotion you feel, an internal drive of sorts. We call this thing that makes you want to do something about it a ‘Tension’. It’s subjective, but can easily resonate with others. While this might sound a bit esoteric, making Tensions explicit actually powers multi billion dollar companies, for example as a cornerstone concept of Holacracy at Zappos. Tensions help guide and focus a community in their collective journaling.

So how do we start? Start small, with something you notice, something you’re grateful for, something you have reflected on, or something that bothers you. If you’re going analogue into free flow journaling grab a piece of paper and a pen and just let your conscious flow, uncover what you thought was hidden. If you’re using journaling to make sense of a specific situation, try capturing your reflections, think of meaningful questions that help clarify, or express a tension to connect with others and fuel change. Do it for yourself, or share it with your community. You never know what hidden patterns it might reveal.

In most cases, journaling will help an opaque situation become accessible, make it feel more familiar, and connect with others in the process. At the Guides project we’ve started to experiment with a Journal in our space on Guides.co, where we post reflections, ask questions, and share tensions… early days. We’re still working on it but we’d love to hear what you think, come and join us on on Discord (and hopefully soon on Guides.co)!

🙏

Casper

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Just a few helpful (re)sources: a great starter guide and overview of journaling is The Art of Journaling: How To Start Journaling, Benefits of Journaling, and More, by the Daily Stoic. For more research on the health benefit check out Positive Psychology and Emotional and physical health benefits of expressive writing (2018), Balkie et. al.. To dive deeper into questions have a look at HBR’s The Surprising Power of Questions (2018), and for Noticing The Power of Noticing: What the Best Leaders See (2014), Bezerman. On our system 1 & 2 thinking: Thinking, Fast and Slow (2013), Daniel Kahneman.