How to start journaling and make it stick
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If you want to start journaling but have never quite managed to make the habit stick, you are certainly not alone.
Perhaps you have bought beautiful notebooks, enthusiastically written the first few pages and then quietly abandoned them. Perhaps you sit down with every intention of journalling, only to find yourself staring at a blank page, wondering what exactly you are supposed to write. Or perhaps journalling has become one more worthy habit you feel you ought to cultivate, and therefore another item on your to-do list you have to tick off.
For years, I was forever starting journals. Every New Year, I would search for the planner or notebook that would finally organise my life and my thoughts. Inevitably, I would abandon it by February.
That changed after a trip back to Melbourne, Australia, in December 2024. Jet-lagged and late night scrolling through YouTube, I found myself watching Hobonichi Cousin set-up videos and became fascinated by the paper, fountain pens, stickers and small creative rituals surrounding them. I eventually ordered one back to London and, for the first time, journalling became something I wanted to return to rather than something I was trying to make myself do.
What finally worked for me was not more discipline. It was making journalling easier to begin, pleasurable to return to and natural enough to fit into the life I already had.
If you want to begin today, the basic method is very simple:
Choose somewhere to write. Attach journalling to something you already do. Give yourself five minutes. Being with “Good morning” or “Good evening” and write what is on your mind like you’re talking to yourself. Then stop before the practice starts to feel burdensome.
That is enough to begin.
The deeper value can come later. Over time, a journal can become more than a record of your days. It can give you a place to slow down, notice what is happening within and around you, and understand your thoughts and reactions with greater clarity.
Journalling helps us pay attention. And intentional refinement begins with paying attention.
1. How to start journalling today?
You do not need to wait for a new year, buy a particular notebook or design the perfect routine to start journalling.
Begin with the life you have. And the tools you already have.
Choose a notebook or digital space you are comfortable using. Find a natural moment in your existing routine and give yourself five or ten minutes rather than an ambitious target. Then begin the conversation simply with:
Good morning.
Or:
Good evening.
Tell yourself what is happening. Just like you’re having a conversation with yourself.
If you are beginning your first week of journalling, keep your definition of success deliberately small. Three sentences count. Five minutes count. An entry that simply says you are tired and do not feel like writing also counts.
And if you miss tomorrow, it’s ok. Nothing has gone wrong.
There is no need to catch up, reconstruct the days you missed or promise yourself that you will be more disciplined from now on. Open the journal to a fresh page and begin with today.
This matters because a sustainable journalling practice needs room for real life. You are building a relationship with reflection, not maintaining an unbroken attendance record.
As you continue on this journey, pay attention to what makes the practice easier for you to return to. You may discover that you enjoy writing first thing in the morning, prefer a few quiet minutes before bed or like having your journal besides you while you drink your coffee.
The purpose at this stage is not to create the perfect journalling routine.
It’s just simply to begin.
2. Why is it so Difficult to start journalling?
One reason journalling can feel unexpectedly difficult is that we form an idealised picture of what it is supposed to look like before we have even begun.
We imagine long, beautifully written entries filled with profound observations. We read about morning routines involving three handwritten pages before breakfast. We see people sharing their immaculate journals online and assume ours should look similarly considered. Then we open our pristine and discover that we have absolutely nothing interesting to say.
The blank page becomes intimidating when we believe whatever we put on it ought to be meaningful and extraordinary.
But a journal does not need to be profound to be worthwhile, and you do not need to become a different sort of woman before you are qualified to keep one.
Your journal might contain a page of thoughtful reflection one day and three incoherent sentences the next. It might record an important decision alongside what you ate for lunch, something funny your husband said, a work frustration and a reminder to buy toothpaste. None of this invalidates the practice.
Therefore, part of the beginning is releasing yourself from the idea of journalling “correctly“.
This includes allowing yourself to spoil the notebook.
I still struggle with this, to be honest. I have a collection of beautiful, fountain pen-friendly notebooks that remain untouched because there is something mildly terrifying about making the first mark on a pristine page. My solution is to put an ink swatch on the back page as a little inauguration ritual. That means I can no longer “ruin” the journal. Once its no longer perfect, then the pressure disappears.
By the way, you do not need to adopt any peculiar ritual, but the principle here is to make those imperfect beginnings easier.
If the expensive notebook makes you nervous, use an inexpensive one. If three pages feel paralysing, then just write three lines and call it a day. Let’s remove whatever barrier is making it unnecessarily difficult for you to start.
3. Start with a journal you actually want to use
There is no single correct tool for journalling. If someone tells you that you need to purchase a bunch of expensive stationery before you can start, check to see if it’s an affiliate link! LOL
Because a simple notebook and a Bic pen are all you need. You can even write digitally if that removes friction. You can use lined paper, blank paper, a structured journal or whatever happens to be sitting in your desk drawer.
At the same time, I would not dismiss the importance of pleasure.
My own practice changed when I discovered paper I loved writing on and, later, fountain pens and the joys of swapping inks. I became fascinated by the craftsmanship, inks and ritual of using them. Choosing a favourite pen became part of the experience, and practising my handwriting gave me another reason to return to the page.
However, the lesson here is not that you need a Hobonichi Cousin and a collection of fountain pens to journal. You absolutely do not.
It’s just that we are more likely to return to the practice when it involves something we genuinely enjoy.
Consider what would make journalling inviting to you. Is it that you enjoy the tactile experience of beautiful paper? Perhaps you would rather use an ordinary notebook you can carry everywhere without worrying about damaging it. You may enjoy decorating the pages with photographs, event tickets, ephemera, sticks or scraps from your day, or prefer nothing but black ink on white paper.
The objects themselves may not matter as much. But the setting matters enormously, such as a quiet space, your morning coffee, ten minutes before the houseful wakes or a few moments at the end of your working day.
Refinement is not about making a simple practice elaborate or expensive. It is about recognising the conditions that help you engage with it well and creating more of them.
4. What should you write in a journal?
This is often the question that stops a beginner before she has really started.
The internet offers an almost limitless supply of journalling prompts. You can even ask ChatGPT to generate a bunch of prompts to help you get started. However, whilst they’re useful, you do not need one hundred questions before you can begin having a conversation with yourself.
I often start with two words:
Good morning.
From there, I write as though I am talking through my thoughts with a close friend. I might describe how I am feeling, something I am anticipating, what happened yesterday or a thought that has been occupying more mental space than I would like.
The principle here is deliberate simplicity. Like when you first meet your best friend, you don’t start the conversation by asking her a profound question about the meaning of life. You start by saying hello, how are you doing, and allow the conversation to unfold.
Your journal can work in much the same way.
If you are looking for simple journalling prompts for beginners, try:
- Good morning. This morning I’m thinking about…
- Something I keep coming back to is…
- Today I noticed…
- I felt most like myself today because…
- Something bothered me today, and I think it was because…
- One thing I don’t want to forget about today is…
- At the moment, I am grateful for…
You can even use it to document your journey to becoming the woman you’ve admired. The ups, the downs and manifestation.
And if you genuinely do not feel like writing that day, write that too.
Good morning. I’m not feeling it today. Bye!
Then close your journal and continue with your day.
5. How to make journalling a habit
If you want to journal more consistently, attach it to something an already established routine.
James Clear, the renowned author of Atomic Habits, calls this approach habit stacking, based on BJ Fogg’s earlier study of the “anchoring” concept, where you pair or anchor a new behaviour with a habit you’re already doing, so the existing behaviour becomes the cue for the new one.
For example, after I make my morning coffee, I will write for five minutes while I drink it.
Or after I get into bed, I will write about one thing I want to remember from the day.
My own practice has developed into two different rituals. A morning brain dump and an evening record-keeping.
In the morning, after collecting the coffee my husband made before leaving for work, I take it upstairs to the Savvy Studio, aka my home office, and open the balcony door. Whilst the crisp morning air and sound of birds fill the room, I choose a fountain pen, open my Hobonichi and just write. I write down whatever is on my mind. It is loose and unstructured, primarily a way of clearing mental space. This is my version of the moring pages if you like.
My evening journal has a different purpose. I record the day’s events more deliberately, add stickers, ephemera, or washi tapes when I feel like it, and make plans for the following day.
The morning helps me release; the evening helps me remember.
Your rhythm may be completely different to mine. But instead of asking when should I journal?
You should ask: Where and how could journalling fit naturally into the life I already have?
6. Your ordinary life is worth writing about
We often assume that a journal becomes interesting when something interesting happens.
Yet most of our lives are not made up of dramatic milestones, glamorous events or profound revelations. The reality is, they’re mostly made up of all the ordinary, mundane day-to-day stuff.
You wake up, brush your teeth, get dressed, go to work, decide what’s for dinner, run errands, have cups of coffee, small frustrations, fleeting thoughts, and gestures of kindness that could easily pass unnoticed.
Writing about these things gives them texture.
One of the pleasures I have discovered in keeping a journal is recording the small gestures that could so easily disappear into an ordinary day. The coffee my husband makes for me every morning before leaving for work, for example, is a very small thing. Yet when I pause to notice gestures like that and put them into words, they become part of the story I remember about my life, something I really appreciate rather than background details I barely registered.
That is one reason journalling has made me more grateful for the ordinary. It gives me a reason to notice.
Your journal might capture a sentence from a conversation that stayed with you, the first properly crisp morning of autumn, a meal you want to remember, something you handled better than you would have a year ago, or a beautiful building ou pass every day but finally stopped to look at.
None of these observations needs to become a lesson.
Sometimes just noticing is enough.
There is a temptation, particularly when we are interested in personal development, to turn every experience into a project for improvement. Journaling can offer something gentler. It allows us to observe our lives before rushing to optimise them.
An extraordinary life is not constructed solely from extraordinary events. Much of its quality is shaped by whether we were sufficiently present to notice the ordinary ones.
7. Journalling for self-discovery: when the page shows you something you need to see
The deeper value of journalling often emerges when we begin to notice not only what is happening in our lives, but how we are responding to it.
This is where journalling for self-discovery moves beyond simply recording your day. Over time, your entries can help you recognise recurring thoughts, reactions, values and patterns that are much harder to see while they are circulating in your head.
I experienced this following a difficult situation at work. I felt I had been treated unfairly, and over time that feeling developed into resentment towards the organisation and the management.
The resentment itself was understandable. What concerned me more was noticing that it was beginning to change me.
Certain situations and people can bring out characteristics in us that we do not particularly like. By writing honestly about what was happening, I recognised the shift in my behaviour earlier than I otherwise might have done. That gave me an opportunity to consider my own response and take corrective action before I allowed the situation to turn me into someone I did not want to become.
Whilst the journal did not solve the external problem, it helped me see more clearly how it was affecting me internally.
You may begin to notice which situations repeatedly unsettle you, which environments energise you, which boundaries you keep allowing to be crossed, what you are avoiding, what you value more than you realised and where your behaviour is moving out of alignment with the woman you want to be. Noticing is an important part of developing a savvy mindset that helps you to react with grace and elegance.
That knowledge creates choice. And choice is where refinement begins.
a simple journalling framework for self-discovery: Notice, Explore, Choose
When something on the page feels worthy of deeper reflection, you can use these three simple steps to help you process them.
Notice
Begin with what is actually there. What happened? What are you feeling? What thought keeps returning? What have you found yourself writing about repeatedly?
Try to observe before your judge.
Explore
Become curious about your response. Why might this matter so much? Is there a pattern? What value, fear, assumption or desire might sit underneath it? Are you responding to what happened, or to the meaning you have attached to what happened?
You do not need to force an answer. The purpose is greater understanding, not instant resolution.
Choose
Once you understand something more clearly, you get to choose what you do with it. Ask whether you want to do anything with that knowledge. Is there something to appreciate, release or reconsider? A conversation to have? A boundary to establish? A behaviour to change? Or perhaps just something you now understand about yourself and want to remember?
Notice. Explore. Choose.
Reflection becomes intentional refinement when greater awareness helps us make a more deliberate choice about what happens next.
8. The particular pleasure of writing a journal by hand
As I mentioned earlier, you do not have to keep a handwritten journal or write with a fountain pen. However, if you want to help you down that rabbit hole, I’d gladly oblige! haha… but I digress.
A digital practice is still a practice, and the convenience of having a device on hand (aka your phone) may just be that one thing that makes journalling sustainable for you.
There are, however, interesting reasons to consider putting pen to paper.
A 2024 high-density EEG study of 36 university students found more elaborate patterns of brain connectivity when participants formed words by hand than when they typed them. The researchers linked these patterns to brain processes associated with memory formation and encoding new information, suggesting that the movements involved in handwriting create conditions that support learning.
I find this particularly interesting because I’ve always found that writing things down has helped me digest, absorb and remember information much better than when I don’t. At work, for example, I have to take physical notes during meetings. The act of listening, deciding what matters and writing it down helps me process the discussion and recall it afterwards.
I notice something similar when I journal.
Typing allows me to put words onto a screen very quickly. When I write with a fountain pen, I have to form each letter stroke by stroke. That slower physical process gives my thoughts time to catch up with my words. I can consider not only what I want to say, but how I want to say it.
Consider the difference between receiving a handwritten letter versus a quickly composed email. A handwritten letter carries evidence of someone’s time and attention. The paper chosen, the pen used, the words considered, each letter physically formed. Even before we consider what it says, just the act of holding a physical letter addressed to yourself can feel thoughtful and warming.
There is something rather special about extending some of that deliberateness to a conversation with yourself.
Not everything in life benefits from greater speed and efficiency. Sometimes slowing down creates the headspace we need to process and understand what is in front of us and how to move forward.
9. How to keep joournalling without making it another obligation
Once you have started, resist the temptation to make your new habit increasingly complicated. Unless you want to of course.
You do not need to write for longer because ten minutes has become easy. You do not need to fill every page, use increasingly sophisticated prompts or compensate for days you miss.
Instead, notice what makes you want to return.
If a beautiful pen makes you want to write, use one. If a plain notebook makes you feel freer, choose that. If journal prompts help you think, keep a small selection nearby. If you miss several days, open to the next page and start again.
Do not catch up. I sometimes use previous blank pages in my Hobonichi Cousin for ink swatches, zentangles or doodles.
The most important thing to remember is that your journal is not an administrative record requireing every data to be accounted for.
As the practice becomes more familiar, occasionally read back what you have written. Notice hat repeats and what has changed. Pay attention to what you are grateful for, what is taking too much of your energy, what seems increasingly important and where your words no longer quite match the life you say you want.
Then, when somethign deserves closer attention:
Notice. Explore. Choose.
A journal does not need to document an extraordinary life to be valuable. Perhaps its greater gift is teaching us to pay closer attention to the life we are already living. To recognise the beauty in its ordinary moments, understand ourselves more clearly and notice, while there is still time to choose, the women we are becoming.
That is how a simple habit of putting words onto a page can become a practice of intentional refinement and tell the story you want to tell about your life.
Now, over to you. Open whatever notebook or notes app you already have and write:
Today I’m thinking about…
Give yourself five minutes. That is enough.
Frequentyly Asked Questions: How to start journaling
What should a beginner write in a journal?
Begin with whatever is already occupying your mind. You might describe your day, record something you want to remember, explore how you are feeling or simply write about what you are thinking at that moment.
If the blank page feels intimidating, start conversationally: “Good morning. Today I’m thinking about…” There is no requirement for a journal entry to be profound or particularly long.
Do I need to journal every day?
No. Daily journalling can help establish a routine, but consistency does not have to mean perfection. If you miss a day – or several days – there is no need to catch up if you don’t want to. Just begin again with today.
If you would like to make the practice more regular, attach it to something you already do, such as drinking your morning coffee, finishing work or preparing for bed.
How long should I journal?
There is no ideal length. Five or ten minutes can be enough, particularly when you are beginning.
Some entries may naturally become several pages; others may be only a few sentences. The useful measure is whether the practice gives you space to reflect, not how many words you produce.
What if I don’t know what to write in my journal?
Write about that. Begin with “I don’t know what to write today, but…” and see what follows. Alternatively, try “Something I noticed today was…” or “Something that has been on my mind is…”
If nothing comes, you are allowed to stop. Journalling should create space for reflection rather than pressure to perform.
Is it better to journal by hand or digitally?
Neither format is universally better for journalling. Research has found differences in brain activity associated with handwriting and typing, including patterns connected with processes involved in learning and memory retention.
For me, the benefits are also practical. Writing by hand slows me down and helps me absorb and remember what I am processing. For you, however, the portability or convenience of a digital journal may be what allows you to maintain the practice.
Choose the format that best supports what you want from journalling and makes you want to return to it.
What is the difference between a journal and a diary?
The terms overlap, and there is no universally agreed distinction. A diary is often understood as a chronological record of events, while a journal may include events alongside thoughts, emotions, ideas, reflection, planning and self-exploration.
In practice, your journal can be both. There is no need to decide which category it belongs to before you begin.
Remember, elegance isn’t something you’re born with. It’s a mindset, how you show up, and a lifestyle you can cultivate, no matter where you’re starting from.
Here is the first section of the Elegant Woman Roadmap to help you transform into the elegant, confident woman you aspire to be.
Are you ready to level up?
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