Writing in a journal regularly has been an exercise practiced by many philosophers over the centuries and millennia. I think of Marcus Aurelius, the famous Roman emperor who was a Stoic philosopher. 2,000 years ago, he wrote in his journal. It gave rise to the very great book Thoughts for Myself, a great book by the Stoic physicist Marcus Aurelius. But at the base, it was only a journal that he wrote for himself, it was not supposed to become a book. It shows you that philosophers used the journal to think, to reflect.
The second benefit of writing in a journal is to keep clarity. Personally, I am very clear about my goals, whether they are short term, medium term, long term. And I have this clarity because I write in the journal. It is super important because having clear goals, not just in your head but on a piece of paper, also allows you to align your daily actions with your goals.
The idea is to know where we are going, every day, put actions in place to get there. Many people tend to live from day to day, as they say in French, which means that they do things india whatsapp number data automatically. We also say "they navigate by sight", that is to say they do not ask themselves questions about the future but they get up, they go to work, they work, they come home, they relax and the next day, they go back to work. This is a way of life that, in my opinion, is not the best if you want to achieve great things and succeed in beautiful things.
Life is way too short after all. Personally, I prefer to have a vision that I work towards every day. Having a journal that I can write all of these things in really helps me keep track of my goals and have that clarity that is essential if you are serious about achieving your goals. In a moment, I will show you exactly how you can have clarity through your journal.
Third great benefit: the journal allows you to track your progress. Personally, I track my failures, my successes, the things I did well, the things I did badly, the things I sometimes regret. It allows you to track your personal development. It's like sometimes having the opportunity to go back in time, you go back to the person you were a few years ago. If I say to myself: "Hey, it's 2022, how did Johan think in 2017?" I just have to go to my journal from 2017 to see how I thought, how I reasoned. It allows me to see how far we've come since then. How do you know that you're evolving? How do you know if you're on the right track if you don't track anything? Difficult. Well, keeping a journal allows you to do exactly that.