Your Corner of the Universe: A Guide to Self-therapy through Journal Writing

Why Keep A Journal?

People have all kinds of reasons for starting a journal, as the historical excerpts show. What are yours? Do you want to satisfy a creative urge, to release pent-up emotions? Is this a way to work out self-correction or to clear the air with confession? Will you use your journal to clarify your own unique perceptions or to help you make decisions? Will it be an organizational tool for goal setting, or a way to tap into and resolve questions about the past? Will this be your private domain, a place to retreat to after a day of nurturing and caring for others, enhanced perhaps by pillows, muted lighting, and hot chocolate? A private niche just for you--yours alone?

Perhaps you want to use your journal as an instrument for tuning in to your own body's rhythms or for providing balance between peace and risk. You can also make it the place where you celebrate time and events in a more lasting and permanent manner.

There are journal techniques that can help you achieve all these varied goals and more. They take effort, of course, and concentration, and yet the act of creating, patiently and with perseverance, will ultimately carry you along as you feel the results of your own mind's efforts. And results come in many forms. (From Chapter 1 Options, page 17.)