Journaling is a way of listening to yourself, and uniquely telling a different story. It gives you a deeper perspective of your brilliant ideas, dreams you have for your future, thoughts concerning important things in your life, or even problems you might be experiencing. Many people have found that journaling brings life transforming insights. On the other hand, journaling can be particularly beneficial in your journey to financial freedom.
Financial journaling focuses your attention on details that affect your personal finances. Being able to effectively manage your earnings, get out of debt, and make prudent investment choices needs daily mindfulness. Noting down important information about your personal finances on a regular basis is a great way to stay conscious of the financial decisions you make.
Although there are numerous journaling tools, you may want to consider conventional journaling by handwriting. Studies show that insignificant activities like pressing the pen on paper, seeing the letters (and drawings) you write, and hearing the sound you make while writing gives ‘hooks’ to your brain for more memories and creates more activity in the sensorimotor of the brain.
Where do you Start With Financial Journaling?
Of course, you need a notebook dedicated to financial journaling and possibly a special pen to make the exercise momentous. Set a specific time within the day, preferably early morning or just before bedtime. Alternatively, you may choose to journal weekly or fortnightly.
Fundamentally, find what works best for you.
Here are some ways you can make your financial journaling most effective:
Journal to Organize Your Finances
A good starting point is understanding your financial position, the worth of your current possessions and debts (personal balance sheet) and how much you have earned and spent (personal income statement) within a specific period.
Unlike an elaborate spreadsheet with mathematical details, this will be a simple documentation of numbers accompanied by a personal touch of ideas and thoughts. This exercise organizes your finances by helping you assess how you have managed your earnings.
Moreover, you will have a retrospective perspective of your past emotions and insights that led to the decisions you made. Having a bird’s eye view of what you own, will show you what you need to kick out and bring in to get your finances on track.
To get started on conducting a personal financial assessment, learn more about the personal financial course, Lengo Program, here.
Keep Accurate Financial Records and Measure Progress
You should journal important financial events including but not limited to a loan you lent to; a friend or family, an unexpected income, a significant change in the market like a surge in price of an asset, or the first cheque you received in your new business.
As you get in the habit of jotting down these events, and the thoughts and ideas associated with them, you realize how important it is to keep records. You can always refer back to your journals to retrieve important information that could benefit you in future.
Additionally, you will be able to measure your progress and financial growth over time. What you can measure you can improve.
Get Creative With Managing Finances
Writing your goals and actions that correspond to these goals increases your probability of achieving your financial dreams. Once you have your goals written down, review them regularly and journal how you intend to achieve them.
This is where your creativity comes in. Earlier, we saw that writing by hand increases your memory and creativity. Journaling will help you develop creative and innovative ideas and ways to increase the value of your finances.
Challenge Your Mindset
What are your thoughts about money, your spending, how and what you earn, etc? These are important questions to ask and answer in your financial journal. How you think affects how you feel and how you feel shapes the decisions you make, and in turn affect the actions you take.
The more you think through issues, the more you discover new capacities and latent potential. This is a form of exercising leadership on yourself; by asking questions and attempting the answers.
You can shape your life by interrogating your mindset and making corresponding changes.
Solve Problems and Relieve Stress
Once you write something on paper, you cannot CTRL+X or hit the delete button. Whether it’s a dilemma, a challenge, or a problem, you are forced to confront it and come up with a solution. As you engage your brain, you’re spurred to think critically and solve issues.
As you journal, you get an opportunity to have a deeper understanding of your finances and how to overcome setbacks.
Moreover, journaling has a calming effect and is valuable for alleviating stress.
Well, then, take your pen and begin journaling and accomplish your financial dreams.
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