Learners will learn about the many benefits of journaling, both for mental and physical wellbeing. They will explore practical journaling activities that can help service users develop a safe and effective journaling practice.
One in three people in Scotland are thought to be affected by a mental health problem each year.However, not everyone is ready to discuss their problems with a friend, counsellor or other professional. Journaling provides people with a space to explore their thoughts, ideas and hopes in privacy. It has been proven to have a positive effect on mental health. It is one of a group of therapies that provides an opportunity for people to reflect on and analyse their lives and the events and people surrounding them, and to get in touch with their feelings. It can also be used to problem-solve and to help people decide what problems they want to share with whom.
This course introduces practitioners to the benefits of journaling, before exploring a range of techniques that can help journalers tap into their feelings, thoughts, hopes and dreams. Learners experiment with a variety of journaling techniques, including automatic writing, writing unsent letters, mark-making, and practices such as keeping ‘morning pages’. There is space and time to discuss issues around sfae journaling and how to help journalers identify issues they might want to share with others, including friends, relatives and professionals.
Journaling has also been used to great effect with literacies learners, providing them with a space to develop their own unique relationship with writing without worrying about the judgement of others. By developing a regular private writing habit, journalers rediscover a joy in writing that might have been lost through bad experiences at school, college or in the workplace.
This course can be run as a one-off session, short course or longer course. It can be tailored to different groups of learners, including those working in the NHS, education, as literacies workers or in care homes. Different topics can be covered to suit the needs and desires of practitioners in different workplaces. All learners will leave with a toolkit of exercises to keep help them introduce journaling in their own workplace. Please get in touch with Bechaela Walker if you’d like to talk more about how we can shape this course to meet your groups’ needs: [email protected]