Wander & Wonder

I just wanted to share a little journaling prompt that I use everyday. I called this prompt the “arrow method” (it probably has already been invented by someone somewhere so take it with a grain of salt that I invented it).

If you did not know this about me already, I possess the super power of finding stress non-stressful situations. Given this ability, it is important for me to use little tricks to help ease my anxiety so that I can move forward throughout my day. As you probably know already, writing down your thoughts, worries, or really anything that comes to mind is a proven way to not only relieve negativity, but also allows you to process what you are feeling in any given moment. That is why journalling is so widely recommended for everyone, especially people who tend to overthink like myself!

With that little intro, I present to you the “arrow method”:

• Morning: Write down 1-3 things that you are scared may happen throughout the day (just the thought alone of any of these things happening induces fear, anxiety, or any other unpleasant feeling). Then draw a little arrow and turn the emotion-filled statement into a comforting, rational statement (as if a friend was answering your fear). Then draw one last arrow with a quick solution that you can implement to avoid your fear from happening.
  
• Evening: Re-read the fears you had written that morning and reflect. Next to each fear, write down if the event happened or not.
  • If the event did not happen, note down how it was avoided (i.e. was the solution you gave in the morning useful?).
  • If the event did happen), note down if it was it as bad as you had thought? Also write down how you got through that hard event or what you learned from it.

Here is an example of one of my own journal prompts (this one was on a scrap paper as I did not have my journal with me at the time…but it shows that you can really do this activity anywhere and at any time):

I find this exercise so helpful because:

1. It instantly calms me down and de-escalates the fear into something achievable and neutral.
2. I often experience similar stressors over time. So when I do feel these same types of fear, I have a nice record of how I got through that fear in the past. This is called “evidence-gathering” which is basically collecting proof that you can get through stressful situations and that you can change your outlook on stressful situations (because most of the time, our own thoughts about the situation are much more stressful than the situation itself).

I hope that you try out this prompt and find it useful. I find that as time goes on, you will see that you are able to do this process in your mind as well, especially when new “what-ifs” inevitably arise throughout the day. And who knows, maybe one day I won’t even need to write down these fears as I will have upgraded my old super power to a new one: finding ways to de-stress stressful situations.