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For more than three months now, I’ve been using a Positivity Journal.

At the end of every day, I take out my journal and write down the date and a few words or sentences about things that made me happy that day or positive things that occurred.

Since I suffer from nightmare disorder, I thought that maybe writing positive things down right before going to bed might help to reduce the nightmares. It hasn’t had any effect on that, but I’m still using my positivity journal for other reasons:

1) It makes me stop and reflect on the day. I generally only take a couple minutes to jot things down in my journal, but those couple of minutes are enough to remind me of good things that happened earlier in the day that, due to other things coming up, I might have pushed from my mind. It’s nice to think of things that happened hours before and think of how awesome it was.

2) It helps put things into perspective. I’m careful about not putting negative things into my journal, and to avoid writing things like “I was having a bad day but then XYZ happened and it was all better.” Instead, I just focus on the happy, positive things (just “XYZ happened”). And that, in and of itself, helps to diminish anything negative that might have happened.

3) It makes me more grateful. When you reflect on how the day went, you appreciate that much more the good things that happened, the good times you had, the good people you saw. I feel as though I have more gratitude for the everyday things, because when I stop and reflect on the day, little things will sometimes jump out at me as items to add to my positivity journal.

4) It makes me realize what really matters to me. Spending time with friends and family makes it into the journal very regularly. When I feel satisfied with my work, when I have a good sleep, when I don’t have anxiety, when I enjoy tasty food, all of that makes it into the journal. One day, my entry was just “Getting some alone time. Tidied the house.” Another day I commented how cute the mother dear’s cat is. It’s interesting to see what jumps out at you when you’re sitting down with your journal, what makes you happy and positive, and what shows up day after day.

5) It helps me to understand just how many positive things happen every day. If I were actually writing every single thing that happened each day that was positive, it would wind up being pages upon pages. Instead, I might write down the highlights, or the first three things that jump to mind – but as I’m writing them down, it often brings a smile to my face when I consider that what I’m writing is just a tiny sliver of the positivity around me.

Do you have a positivity journal? What happy/positive things happened to you today? What kinds of things make you happy? Share in the comments section below!

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