Your Emotional Eating Toolkit: Journaling

This blog post is the first in a series where we’re giving advice on tools you can try and see if they are worth adding to your ‘toolkit’ when you’re faced with emotional eating. Some tools will work for you and others you won’t find as helpful—give them a try!

The act of writing down your emotions and experiences has a lot of benefits: it can help calm your anxious mind, be an outlet for angry thoughts, or even create a happy memory for you to return to whenever you’re feeling upset. Journaling can also seem like a way of meditating: making you slow down and allowing you to focus only on yourself for a moment.

There is no on-size-fits-all to journaling (which means you can’t fail at it!) but one good way to start is to get off the digital devices—laptop, phone, tablet—that take over our days and pick-up pen and paper. Even buy yourself a notebook! Something with a quote or art on the cover that speaks to you. Some people love lined pages, others prefer ring-bound books, it is entirely up to you!

The only rule we recommend with journaling is that your notebook should remain private—for your eyes only! This way you can write honestly without fear of criticism or like you have to discuss your entries with your partner. Of course, sharing your inner world with someone you trust if also ok! Your journal is a personal space where you can fully be yourself, so make sure you love the look and feel of it!

Here are a few ideas you can use to get started, but there is no wrong way, so feel free to get creative!

• Start your entry with a date so you can look back on your experiences.
• If you’re feeling unsure how to begin writing, write a quote you find inspiring or an affirmation that really speaks to you at that moment at the top of the page (even a song lyric).
• Write in full cursive sentences or use bullets to get ideas out as fast as you think of them.
• Spend time pasting pictures or doodling in the margins to personalize your notebook (and relax your mind).
• At the end of an entry, test out including something you’re thankful for or maybe something you’ve done recently that makes you feel good.
• Journaling, often like a therapy session, may make you surprised at what comes to the front of your mind. Be honest, compassionate, and non-judgemental with yourself!

The best time to journal is when it works best for you, when you can find a moment to really get into how you are feeling. That could mean first thing when you wake up, shaking off your anxiety before facing the day, or when you get time to yourself in the bathtub away from the kids.

The more you journal the more ‘data’ you’ll have to reflect on. Maybe you’re always journaling the night before a stressful work meeting in order to relax, or perhaps you find negative self-talk creeps into your entries when you haven’t slept well. Bit by bit awareness of your personal emotional triggers will support you when you’re tempted to eat to escape from feeling. Eventually, journaling might even become something you reach for to understand your emotions instead of chips, cake, or doughnuts. 

💛 Your peace awaits.