Journal Writing Ideas: Daily Gratitudes :Writing Forward

Posted by Melissa Donovan on October 22, 2012 ?

Be grateful and you?ll never run out of writing ideas.

In honor of the forthcoming holidays, here?s a post on using gratitude to come up with writing ideas.

You might call your journal a notebook or diary. It?s the handy place where you store your thoughts, ideas, experiences, and your work, either on paper or in an electronic file.

A journal is an ongoing log, usually with dated entries. Some journals are topical (dream journals, travel journals, freewriting journals), while others are left open to explore just about anything.

Many topical journals are meant to improve the quality of life. For example, people who are working to lose weight might keep a diet and exercise journal. Folks who are trying to better themselves might keep a self-improvement journal. Parents may keep a journal of their children?s development. But there?s another type of journal that suits just about anyone, writers and non-writers alike, and that is the appreciation journal.

Journal Writing and Gratitude

Where do you get your journal writing ideas? Do you ever sit down to write in your journal and find that you don?t have anything to say? When you practice daily gratitude, you?ll always have something to write about.

There are a couple of ways to use gratitude to inspire journal writing ideas:

• Every morning, spend 15 minutes writing about one thing you?re grateful for.
• Every night, write a short list of things that happened throughout the day that you?re thankful for.

Don?t limit yourself to writing about big, momentous things. Be grateful for the little things, too. You can even dedicate a notebook for your daily gratitudes.

Over time, you?ll find that you have a lot to appreciate. You may also notice people around you who are ether appreciative or unappreciative. These observations can inform your fiction and poetry writing and will certainly influence your work if you write memoirs or personal essays. For example, a gracious neighbor could inspire a character for your novel, just as an ungrateful co-worker could inspire a villain in one of your stories. The people and things that you appreciate could become the subjects of poems and essays.

Benefits of Gratitude

While exploring your own gratitude can provide you with plenty of writing ideas, there are other benefits as well. Here are five reasons why documenting what you?re grateful for can be beneficial:

1. A great way to start your day. It?s not always easy to roll out of bed and propel yourself into your daily routine. Some days it?s downright dreadful, like when you know you have to attend a long, boring meeting, take a test, or see the doctor. If you write in your appreciation journal in the A.M., it will jump-start your day on a positive note and a day that starts off good is less likely to turn sour.
2. Good for the soul. The process of thinking about what you are grateful for and expressing your gratitude just makes you feel good. This could be contagious, and other people around you might absorb some of that positive energy. This makes life better for everyone.
3. Promote positive thinking. Because the things for which you?re grateful are the positives in life, when you focus on them, you are directing your attention away from the negatives. According to some experts, concentrating on the good things in life attracts more good things to you.
4. Generate new thoughts and ideas. This is especially useful for creative people, like writers. When you force yourself to sit down each day and think about something, the result is a string of thoughts and ideas. Some of these will be great fodder for articles, stories, and poems.
5. A great way to end your day. When it?s time to wind down and shift into relaxation mode, thinking about the good things in life will help you clear your mind and put you in a lighter, brighter mood. That?s an excellent way to prepare for a decent night?s sleep!

Over the years, I have kept an appreciation journal on and off. I find that after a few weeks of daily gratitude in my journal writing, being thankful becomes second nature. Though some days there?s not enough time to write down my thoughts, I try to start off each day by thinking about at least one thing that I?m truly grateful for. The result? My attitude is more positive, it?s easier for me to put a smile on my face (even when I?m dealing with adversity), and minor annoyances tend to roll off my shoulder. I just feel better overall. I?ve also found that thankfulness in myself and others (or lack thereof) has given me plenty of writing ideas, especially when I?m creating characters.

Try it for yourself and see how beneficial gratitude can be!

Do you keep an appreciation journal or any other kind of journal? Have you ever written a list of things that you?re thankful for? What are they? Do you spend much time on your own journal writing? How do you use your journal to promote creative thinking and inspire fresh writing ideas?

About Melissa Donovan
Melissa Donovan is a website designer and copywriter. She writes fiction and poetry and is the founder and editor of Writing Forward, a blog packed with creative writing tips and ideas.

Source: http://www.writingforward.com/writing-ideas/journal-writing-ideas-daily-gratitudes?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=journal-writing-ideas-daily-gratitudes

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