Journal

About this tool

Daily journal: what it is and how to use it

A journal is a place to write down your day, your thoughts or your plans, a few lines at a time. This free online journal gives you five templates: free write, morning, Seneca's evening review, gratitude and a brain dump. It runs in your browser, lets you search past entries and keeps them on your own device.

An old habit, and what research on writing found

Looking back over the day is an old practice. In On Anger 3.36, Seneca describes the custom of the philosopher Sextius, who questioned himself each evening about the day just gone, and says he does the same. The Evening review template uses his three questions in Aubrey Stewart's translation. More in our guide to Stoicism.

One line of research looks at a narrower kind of writing. A 2006 meta-analysis of 146 randomised studies found that disclosing thoughts and feelings about personal, meaningful topics had a positive average effect, but a very small one, and results depend on what people write.

The Brain dump template turns what is on your mind into lines you can sort. The tool makes no claim about how a journal will make you feel. Our page on how to stop overthinking goes further into the writing studies.

How to use it

1. Choose a template: free write, morning, evening review, gratitude or brain dump.
2. Check the date, then write a few lines in the boxes.
3. For a brain dump, press Sort the lines and mark each line do, later or let go.
4. Press Save entry, or Ctrl + Enter. Saving again on the same date and template replaces that entry.
5. Search past entries by a word or a date, and use Download all to keep a copy.

An example

Say Tuesday felt cluttered. At night you pick Brain dump and write five lines: call the dentist, the comment in the meeting, the weekend, the boiler, a birthday card. Sorting them leaves two to do tomorrow, two for later and one to let go.