Joys of travel journaling

Alison Laycock

Journaling is more than keeping a diary. It offers the chance to engage in a beautiful friendship with yourself as you share the best and worst stages of your journey/ holiday. All those experiences you wish to keep as a wonderful memory can be preserved in ink, those feelings you need to figure out but don’t wish to share with anyone just yet and the letters you wish to write but have no plan on sending can be shared with your journal.

Journaling is like talking to your best friend and having all the benefits that brings as long as you stay open-minded to being honest with yourself. So first things first, go out and buy yourself a notebook you will be happy carrying around with you so you can write in it whenever needed. Treat yourself to a quality one which will make you want to open it up and write your thoughts down. Now choose what you will write with, for some a pencil is preferred as they can easily correct mistakes, for others a fountain pen as they know they will write with more care and take their time and for others it might be using bright colours which will help them quickly find a memory later.

Now you are equipped and ready to start, what joys can you expect to experience through journaling?

1. Guarding memories:

Journaling is a good way to guard a memory through writing about it, what happened, how you felt, who else shared this with you and many more parts. It could be a particular time of life and you want to remember the people you met along the way and the things you experienced. This allows you to keep them altogether and easy to find when wanting to share them later with friends or write about your travel experience.

2. Writing in your mother tongue:

Travelling or living abroad can often mean that you have the wonderful opportunity to speak a foreign language throughout the day. Journaling provides a place where you can express yourself in your mother tongue. It can be tiring to speak a different language all the time and you might find you don’t express yourself freely enough to other people. You can offload to the journal whenever you want.

3. Track your thoughts/ feelings:

Writing over a period of time can allow you to see where your thoughts and feelings are at that moment either at that time or later when looking back. This can also help show you how you talk to yourself when recording these events and see if you do talk to yourself as you would to your best friend who has the same life events. If you don’t then you may find a better self – talk.

4. Time with and for yourself:

Journaling gives you the space to step back from everyone and everything around you as you go into your own bubble to record your thoughts and feelings. If you are journaling in a notebook, then it has taken you away from your devices and social media which will provide you with a welcome break where you can focus on yourself. When

else do you give yourself this time?

5. Planning journeys/ routes/ timetables

Writing your notes down in the journal means you can keep all the information you need together and you can refer to your notes as you travel along making any changes you need.

As well as experiencing many joys there are also many benefits to journaling. You may find yourself less stressed, more mindful, more understanding of yourself and others as well as a greater ability to recall memories as you have taken the chance to record events in greater detail. When you return from your travels your thoughts, feelings and memories will already be recorded.

Let us know how your journaling goes and enjoy choosing the right notebook for you!

There are Journaling courses and workshops available at http://www.beingthebestyoucanbe.org