Journaling

By consistently reflecting on our thoughts, beliefs, and actions through writing, we gain self-knowledge and can consciously shape our character and behaviour. As Socrates conveys this succinctly, "the unexamined life is not worth living."

Just like the Stoics, reflecting on philosophical concepts and perspectives in our journaling practice allows us to consciously cultivate virtues and achieve greater equanimity. It is a practical tool for living out our philosophical principles and values.

Journaling not only helps us construct a coherent narrative of our experiences, but also discover meaning in our lives, which existentialist philosophers have emphasised as crucial for .

The act of writing our story, rather than passively living it, empowers us to be the authors of our lives and to discern purpose and significance in our experiences.

There has been documented emotional and physical health benefits on expressive writing. These include .

This is because journaling and mental clarity which is key to better psychological well-being.

Pose philosophical questions to yourself and explore them in your journal. You don't have to respond to them right away if you don't have an "answer".

The key here is to live the questions. Save these burning questions in your journal and you can revisit them several months or even years later. As the poet Rainer Maria Rilke frames this nicely:

"Perhaps someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."

There are several ways of doing this.

• Write a personal manifesto containing principles and guidelines that you aspire to live by. Our is a worthy example!

• Explain in your own words about the concepts you've learned by taking notes.

Philosophical exercises from the Stoic tradition are very applicable to journaling. Here's a few:

• Negative visualisation When dealing with anxiety, imagine what is the worst thing that could happen. Write it down including details of the scenario and note any emotions that arise. Then reflect on these questions: If this misfortune really happened, what would I do? How would I cope and move forward? What inner strengths and external resources could I draw upon? How does this imagined loss reveals what you value and appreciate about your life now. What do you feel grateful for in this moment, knowing it won't last forever? Although this is a possibility, is it likely going to happen? What can you do right now that is within your control to make sure that it is less likely to happen?

Like how can be used as prompts for discussion, they can be also used as journaling prompts.

Reflecting on thought experiments opens up new pathways of reasoning especially when you're understanding them for the first time. And this can bring up new insights in your journaling practice.

As , deciding the type of identity that you want to be first is key to effective goal setting.

The philosophical approach to discovering those identities would be to incorporate virtues like courage, justice, compassion, etc. For instance, if you want to be taken seriously at work, you may work towards becoming the identity of a courageous colleague.

Based on this identity, you may set smaller achievable goals like scheduling a 1:1 meeting with a trusted coworker every two weeks to give each other hard, honest feedback that you wouldn't share in larger work settings.