Journaling | Intuition Development | Emotional Wellness
Tune In To Your Inner Voice
Access the healing powers of your inner guidance through journaling exercises, daily journal prompts, tools for building intuition, and resources for emotional wellness & emotional healing.
Journal Prompts For Finding Yourself
Finding yourself often involves uncovering the things about yourself that you’ve hidden away based on messages you’ve received from the world about what is and isn’t acceptable to think, feel, do, and be. We all want to be loved, accepted, and connected to other humans. From the time we’re an infant we’re dependent on human connection for our very survival. We go throughout life with this hard-wired desire to connect and belong, and sometimes the need to connect and belong causes us to lose touch with deep parts of ourselves that we believe pose a threat to belonging and connection. Because living life as the full and complete you can feel like a threat to human connection, sometimes the journey to find yourself can be a bit scary and confusing. These journal prompts for finding yourself are designed to gently guide you through a conversation with yourself to help you re-discover the you that exists beyond the fear of what the world has to say about it.
Gain New Insights Into Yourself With These Illuminating Self Growth Tests
I remember when I really wanted to work on self growth, but I wasn’t quite sure how to go about it. I wish I’d understood then that self growth was already happening, but sometimes it can be hard to recognize progress! One of the first really meaningful ways I found help early in my self growth journey was through self growth tests like those I’m going to share in this article. I remember taking the Myers Briggs test and thinking, “Oh, I’m not abnormal or somehow wrong or defective; this really helps me to understand myself better.” I was fairly obsessive about it after that, and had many friends take the test and tell me their personality types. Once I knew my friends’ types, I would try to guess people’s types from observation or having them answer a few questions. I actually got pretty good at it!
Now, no personality type can describe everything about a person, but tests like this can be really helpful on the self growth journey. These self growth tests can help you learn new things about yourself, confirm things you already know about yourself, and bring together a series of disconnected ideas about who you are. All of these things can be incredibly helpful for self growth! Personality tests are also a fun way to get started with self growth because they’re pretty easy to take and the results can be amusing.
Here are a few tests that I’ve found helpful for self growth.
Reading Journal Prompts For Self Discovery
I love reading and I love journaling, but I’m more of an emotive journal writer. That’s why I love the idea of making your reading journal a place not just to record what you read, but to reflect on what the book meant to you and what you can learn about yourself and the world around you from your reading. These reading journal prompts were created to help you explore what your reading meant to you. Let’s get started!
My favorite quote from this book is: ____. I really connected with this quote because: ____.
The character I’m most like in this book is ____, because ____.
The character I’m least like in this book is ____, because ____.
The most important thing I learned from this book is ____.
Self Care Journal Prompts For Nurturing Mind, Body & Soul
We get a TON of messages about what self care is and what self care isn’t. Despite all those messages (and maybe in part because of them), there was a time when I honestly found self care really confusing. In large part, this is because I was looking outside myself to answer my questions about what self care looks like.
We’re told self care is getting a pedicure, or buying ourselves a treat, or setting boundaries, or standing up for ourselves, or taking a bubble bath, or we’re told that thinking self care is pedicures and bubble baths is a “not deep” silly way to talk about self care. What I learned when I began to use journaling to really listen to myself is that self care can be a bubble bath, pedi, setting boundaries, or pretty much anything else that actually makes me feel cared for by me. Writing it out this way it seems so obvious, but this was truly lost on me for a long time.
Self care was definitely not something I was taught growing up, and I didn’t really know how to listen to myself to find out how I needed to experience care. It turns out that the self care I most needed was learning how to hear myself over the noise of ingrained coping patterns and societal messages. Journaling became my designated time to sit and listen to myself and hear about my needs and desires. As my journaling practice helped me connect more deeply with myself, I also learned to hear myself throughout the day. This made self care so much easier! Sometimes I fall into old patterns and quell my own voice and needs to accommodate someone or something else, and sometimes life is just hard and that makes self care difficult, but it is so much easier to meet my own needs now that I know what they are!
I wrote these self care journal prompts with the hope that these prompts will help you nurture your connection with yourself and learn what self care looks like for you.
How Intuition Benefits Wellbeing
To dig into how intuition benefits wellbeing, we first need to talk about what intuition is. I explored this more deeply in my post on what intuition means, but by way of recap here, intuition is a quick way of knowing that doesn’t come from logical reasoning or the conscious mind. Intuitive knowing comes from an accumulation of all the knowledge that we hold; some of this knowledge comes from our personal experiences and some of it comes from inherited instinctual information. Intuition is an important way that we arrive at conclusions and make decisions. We often think of intuition as being an animal-like instinct coming from our spirit, or a feeling more than an intellectual knowing. Intuition might speak to us through words, phrases, music, images, or symbols that float into our mind. Intuition is one of those things that can be hard to define in words, but easier to feel or explain metaphorically. With that definition of intuition in mind, let’s explore how intuition benefits wellbeing.
We’re already using our intuition, so we are better off when we learn how to use our intuition well.
Cozy Journal Prompts For Self Love
What does it mean to love yourself? If this question feels hard to answer, that’s okay. We get a lot of conflicting messages from the world around us about what self love looks like and those messages can be hard to wade through. These journal prompts for self love are designed to help you connect with yourself so that you can hear what you have to say about feeling loved by yourself. Grab your journal and pen and cozy up for a conversation with yourself about loving you.
Think of a moment when you felt really loved by yourself. Write about this self love memory and include all the details you remember about this experience. What emotions did you experience? What physical sensations were associated with those emotions? What thoughts were associated with this experience? What led up to this experience? How did you feel beforehand? How did you feel afterwards? Why did this experience make you experience self love so intensely? How did this experience impact you in the moment? Has this experience with self love continued to impact you? If so, how?
How do you most commonly show yourself love? Do the ways you commonly show self love help you to feel loved? How do you know when you’re feeling loved by yourself?
How does showing yourself love impact your life? How would feeling even more self love impact your life?
Warm Gratitude Prompts For A Grateful Heart
Let’s explore what it means to be grateful (and even what it means to be ungrateful) together. These gratitude prompts will help you recall grateful moments and memories, reflect on what you’re grateful for and how it feels to experience gratitude. These gratitude prompts are also designed to help you explore messages you’ve received about gratitude since childhood and delve into how those messages might be impacting how you experience gratitude today. Grab your journal, and let’s get started!
Gratitude Prompts
What are you grateful to have experienced in the last year?
Did you experience gratitude today? What are you grateful for about today?
When you were a child, did the adults in your life express or exhibit gratitude? If yes, what kinds of things were the adults in your life particularly likely to express or exhibit gratitude about? How did they express or exhibit gratitude (in other words, how did you know they were feeling grateful)? How have these childhood experiences influenced the way you express and experience gratitude today?
What is something that feels like of silly to be grateful for, but that you’re still grateful for? Why are you grateful for this? Why does it feel a little silly to be grateful for this?
Let Happiness In With These Happiness Journal Prompts
Happiness is often something we desire, but it’s less common to actively reflect in a “big picture” way on what actually brings us happiness. These happiness journal prompts are designed to help you explore what happiness feels like, what it means to be happy for you, and what does and doesn’t bring happiness to your life. Grab your journal and let’s get started unpacking your conceptions about happiness and your experiences of happiness.
Finish this sentence with the first thing that comes to mind: “To be happy I need _____.” Why do you think this is the first thing that came to mind? Write one paragraph arguing that you need this thing to be happy. Write one paragraph arguing that you don’t need this thing to be happy.
When did you feel the happiest today? Write about everything you remember from the experience. What physical sensations were associated with feeling happy? How did you know that you were feeling happy? What about the experience made you happy? What thoughts were associated with the experience?
Write about a time in your childhood when you felt happy. What physical sensations were associated with feeling happy? How did you know that you were feeling happy? What about the experience made you happy? What thoughts were associated with the experience?
Grounding Journal Prompts For Embodiment
Explore what it means to be connected and attuned to your body and your five senses with these journal prompts designed to help you on the journey to live an embodied life. We’ll begin with journal prompts that explore your connection to your five senses, and end with journal prompts to help you reflect on what it means to you to live an embodied life.
Write about a childhood memory of having a pleasant emotional response to a sound, scent, or taste. Write down everything you can remember about the experience and how it felt. What emotions did you experience? What physical sensations were associated with those emotions?
Think about a texture that you find pleasant (this could be a food texture, clothing texture, etc.). Write about this texture in as much detail as possible. What does it feel like? What emotions do you associate with it? Why do you think you find this texture pleasant?
In an average day, how often do you consciously pay attention to and experience pleasant sensations associated with sound? Take a few deep breaths and then try to lightly focus on only the sounds you are hearing for 5 minutes. Describe the sounds you heard. How did you feel focusing on sound for a few minutes? What emotions arose for you? What physical sensations were associated with those emotions? What thoughts arose?
Journal Prompts For September
Journal through the month of September with me with these daily journal prompts for September! These September journal prompts explore a variety of topics. In September we’ll journal about memories, our first experiences of love, and the eras of our lives. We’ll also do a few fun journaling exercises involving poetry, free association, our dreams, and a personality test.
Journal Prompts for September 1st
What time period of your life do you feel most nostalgic for? What emotions accompany the nostalgia? What physical sensations do you experience in your body when these emotions arise? Why do you think you are being drawn to this time period of your life right now?
Journal Prompts for September 2nd
What is your first memory of feeling loved? Write about everything you can remember about this experience including how it felt emotionally to feel loved and what physical sensations were associated with those emotions.
Journal Prompts for September 3rd
In your journal, create a simple timeline of your life describing the “eras” of your life. How did you differentiate between the eras (schools, jobs, where you lived, friends you were close to, relationships, etc.)?
Journal Prompts for September 4th
What were your favorite books and movies growing up? Why were these favorites? If you remember the first time you read a favorite book or watched a favorite movie, write about that experience. Are there any similarities between these books and movies and books and movies you enjoy today?
Journal Prompts For August
Journal through the month of August with me with these daily journal prompts for August! These August journal prompts explore a variety of topics. In August we’ll journal about the life we imagine versus the life we live, living life with all five senses, and how we respond to the ups and downs of life. We’ll also do a few fun journaling exercises involving poetry, free association, our dreams, and a personality test.
Journal Prompts for August 1st
Think about a moment in childhood when you imagined what a future time in your life would be like. The imagined future time could be a big or small life moment; it could be an event that was happening the next week, imagining what life would like two years in the future, or what life as an adult would be like. What did you imagine this future moment would be like? What did you imagine this future moment would feel like? What was the future moment like in reality? How did the future moment feel in reality? What was similar about the moment you imagined and the moment you experienced? What was different about the moment you imagined and the moment you experienced? Did the moment you imagined influence how you experienced the moment in reality? If so, how?
Journal Prompts for August 2nd
What scent brings up the strongest emotions for you? What emotions does this scent bring up? Write about a time when this scent brought up strong emotions. Why does this scent bring up strong feelings for you?
Journal Prompts for August 3rd
Think about a time in your life when everything was going particularly well. What was going on in your life at this time? What emotions did you experience? What kind of things did you say to yourself about why things were going well?
Relaxing Summer Journal Prompts
Check out these summer journal prompts to celebrate summer!
What was the best part of your spring? What do you want to remember about this experience?
What was the hardest part of your spring? What made this experience so difficult? How did this experience make you feel?
What will you miss about this spring? What will you not miss about this spring?
Are there habits or routines that were part of your spring that you want to leave behind as you move into the summer?
What are you most looking forward to this summer?
Where in your life do you want to experience growth? What does a growth in this area of your life look like? What’s one easy first step you can take to encourage growth in this area of your life?
What positive impacts does the summer season tend to have on your mental health? What negative impacts does the summer season tend to have on your mental health? Are there ways that you can accentuate the positive impacts and mitigate the negative impacts?
Journal Prompts For July
Journal through the month of July with me with these daily journal prompts for July! These July journal prompts explore a variety of topics. In July we’ll journal about independence and interdependence, relaxation, and the role of planning and spontaneity in our lives. We’ll also do a few fun journaling exercises involving poetry, free association, our dreams, and a personality test.
Journal Prompts for July 1st
In general, do you consider yourself a more planned or spontaneous person? Write about why you consider yourself to be a more planned person or a more spontaneous person.
Journal Prompts for July 2nd
How do you like to spend your time when you’re relaxing? What makes these activities relaxing?
Journal Prompts for July 3rd
In what areas or aspects of your life are you most independent? In what areas or aspects of your life do you most rely on others?
Journal Prompts For June
Journal through the month of June with me with these daily journal prompts for June! These June journal prompts explore a variety of topics. In June we’ll journal about friendship, intuition, and knowing ourselves. We’ll also do a few fun journaling exercises involving poetry, free association, our dreams, and a personality test.
Journal Prompts for June 1st
Think of a time you felt very connected with a sense of who you are as a person. Write down everything you can remember about this memory. What did it feel like? Why do you think you felt so connected with you in this moment?
Journal Prompts for June 2nd
How do you define “intuition”? What does it mean to be in touch with your intuition? What does it feel like to be in touch with your intuition? What does it feel like to be disconnected from your intuition? How do you know when you’re in touch with your intuition? Is being in touch with your intuition something you value? Why or why not?
Journal Prompts For May
Journal through the month of May with me with these daily journal prompts for May! These May journal prompts explore a variety of topics. In May we’ll journal about our connection to nature, the stories we tell ourselves, childhood daydreams, confidence, and internal transitions. We’ll also do a few fun journaling exercises involving poetry, free association, our dreams, and a personality test.
P.S. If you’re looking for journal prompts for a different month, find your monthly journal prompts here!
Journal Prompts for May 1st
If you had to rate the speed at which you live your daily life on a scale of 1-10, what rating would you give it? Whether you think the pace of your daily life is slow, fast, or in-between, how does this speed impact you positively? How does this speed impact you negatively? Are you happy with the speed at which you live your life? Ideally, would you live your life at a faster or slower pace than you currently live it? If you would like to change the pace at which you live, what’s one small practical thing you could do to work on that?
Journal Prompts for May 2nd
How does the changing of the seasons impact your life? How does your schedule or your daily activities change when the seasons change? What impact does the change of seasons have on your mental and emotional health and wellbeing? How can this help you reflect on your connection to nature and the natural world?
Journal Prompts For April
Journal through the month of April with me with these daily journal prompts for April! These April journal prompts explore a variety of topics. In April we’ll journal about the importance of having fun, trying new things, caring for ourselves, and our internal self versus the self we present to the world. We’ll also do a few fun journaling exercises involving poetry, free association, our dreams, and a personality test.
P.S. If you’re looking for journal prompts for a different month, find your monthly journal prompts here!
Journal Prompts for April 1st
In the last year, when did you have the most fun? Write down everything you remember about this memory. What did it feel like to have fun? What physical sensations, emotions, and thoughts were associated with the experience? Why was this experience fun for you?
Journal Prompts for April 2nd
Write down the names of the five people you most admire (these can be people you know, fictional characters, celebrities, etc.). Write a couple of sentences about why you admire each of these people. Review what you wrote. Do you notice any themes in what you admire about these people? Why do you think these traits or characteristics are things you admire? Do you see these same traits or characteristics in yourself?
Night Journal Prompts For A Peaceful Heart
Ending your day with journaling can be a relaxing way to ease out the hustle and bustle of the day. Journaling at night can also help you connect with yourself, understand yourself better, and ease into sleep. In this article you’ll find night journal prompts along with four fun night journal exercises that incorporate poetry, music, meditation, and free association into your journaling practice.
Night journal prompts
Here are a few night journal prompts to end your day with! Choose a few night journal prompts from the list below and use them every day, or mix up your night journal practice and choose different prompts every night.
What’s one thing I can do to make myself feel cared for this evening?
How connected with myself did I feel throughout the day today? How grounded (in the present moment and connected to my body) did I feel today? How often did I check in with myself today to see how I was doing and what I needed?
Spring Journal Prompts To Inspire Renewal
Check out these spring journal prompts to celebrate spring and the fresh start it represents as you journal.
What was the hardest part of your winter? What made this experience so difficult? How did this experience make you feel?
What was the best part of your winter? What do you want to remember about this experience?
What will you miss about this winter? What will you not miss about this winter?
Are there habits or routines that were part of your winter that you want to leave behind this spring?
What are you most looking forward to this spring?
Where in your life do you want a fresh start? What does a fresh start in this area of your life look like? What’s one easy first step you can to creating a fresh start in this area of your life?
Healing Journal Prompts For Mental Health
These journal prompts are designed to help you work through difficult emotions when they arise and to help you explore the state of your mental health and consider what better mental health looks like for you. I’m not a therapist and this isn’t the same thing as therapy, these are simply questions that have helped me improve my own mental health. A lot of the journal prompts on this website are journal prompts for mental health, so feel free to explore and find journal prompts that are a good fit for you. Check out the suggestions for more mental health journal prompts at the end of this article, too.
365 Daily Writing Prompts For Deep Reflection
Find daily writing prompts for a year of journaling here! Each month’s writing prompts explore a variety of topics designed to help you better know yourself and emotionally care for yourself. In addition to daily writing prompts, you’ll also find links to other journaling ideas for each month below. This daily writing prompts series is in progress, so check back for updates for future months!
January Daily Writing Prompts
Find daily writing prompts for January here. These daily writing prompts explore change, memories, relationships, and relaxation among other topics.