The Journal Prompt

Insightful Journal Prompts Delivered Weekly.

Good morning!

Welcome back to The Journal Prompt, your weekly companion for introspection and personal growth. 🌿

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In This Week’s Issue (6-minute read)

💬 Quote of the Week

🖼️ Framing Your Reflection

✍️ Three Insightful Journal Prompts

Framing Your Reflection 🖼️

A couple of weeks ago I spoke with Shannon (real name changed to preserve her privacy).

She replied to the Chains of Command edition because of a potential email spam folder issue.

But then, Shannon’s Courage turned a mundane exchange into a heart to heart conversation.

She shared how she’s at an all time low with her happiness despite having an amazing life story to tell.

But there was one particular thing she said that scared me a bit.

And it’s the reason I completely re-wrote this newsletter issue.

She thought that writing about negative emotions places her focus on the wrong things, and it’s certainly not what positive people do.

If that was 100% true………then why was she sad and frustrated to the point she was blocked from writing and putting together/organizing her books?

How can we be consumed by negative emotions of such magnitude and NOT know their source?

I’d been in her exact shoes before during my first marriage (story for another time).

But I’m extremely cautious of giving any type of prescriptive advice.

Using someone else’s map of Reality to navigate your own is very dangerous.

I am not you.

I have neither your temperament nor accumulated nuanced wisdom specific to your life experience.

And we dive into moral hazard waters when making decisions for which we don’t bear the consequences.

However….

I feel strongly enough to contradict myself on the above in one regard…

It is almost never a good idea to not write about negative emotions.

And there’s a difference between dwelling in those negative emotions and processing those emotions.

The renowned psychologist Carl Jung called that suppressing the Shadow - the dark side of our character (which we all like to pretend we don’t have).

Robert Louis Stevenson, the author of Treasure Island, gave an eery glimpse into what our Shadow is capable of in his 1886 novel, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

The main character, Dr. Jekyll, is your typical upstanding citizen - a wealthy, respected doctor and scientist with perfect manners.

But one day…..

Dr. Jekyll cooks up some kind of potion that transforms him into Mr. Hyde - his Shadow alter-ego who goes around murdering, raping, and generally indulging every twisted impulse.

Stevenson’s point is that the more virtuous we try to outwardly become for others, despite how they treat us or the contradictory desires we may have, the bigger the danger our Shadow poses, particularly because we passionately deny its existence within us.

We are infinitely complex beings.

There are subconscious processes in our mind that drive us.

As Carl Jung said, “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will rule your life and you will call it fate”.

The moral of Stevenson’s story, Jung’s main point on the Shadow, and what to the best of my limited ability I was trying to convey to Shannon was this…

Negative emotions are part of the human experience, and are typically signals for things going wrong.

Sometimes they manifest because we are being childish, and our thoughts are wrong (we’re not perfect beings).

But sometimes…..

They signals have something deeply important to say.

And the more we try to repress them out of some well-meaning but misguided sense of morality, the more dangerous they become.

Ignored voices only get louder.

Ignored long enough and they will take what they want by force (at the societal level this causes revolutions).

This is where journaling is especially useful.

It enables us to have a conversation with our Shadow by creating space between us and those dark thoughts.

And in that space, we can shine a conscious light on the subconscious processes that may be going haywire.

If one day we wake up….

….pissed off at the way the toothpaste comes out of the tube….

.…or at the way our spouse sips their coffee….

….and we don’t know where it’s coming from……nor why it won’t go away no matter how many “positive affirmations” we throw at the problem…..

The answer is not a tighter leash on the lesser angels of our nature.

The way forward lies through difficult conversations with your Shadow in pursuit of the truth.

Becoming aware of our Shadow allows us to channel those marrow-deep powerful impulses into productive and creative pursuits.

We become whole and integrated.

Simple to write.

Difficult to execute.

Taming the dragon within not only requires courage…..but harder part?

We have to acknowledge that it exists within us in the first place.

WARNING - avoid conversations with your Shadow at your own peril.

For as we have learned from almost every fairy tale ever told……monsters only grow bigger in the dark.

Three Journal Prompts ✍️

🔍 Where to Begin

If you are stuck where to begin, that’s normal. The goal here is not perfection, but to get your pen/keyboard moving.

If there a memories that still make you cry or get angry, write them out in as much detail as possible, and describe your emotions while you write them.

Let this literally be a rant and brain dump. The purpose here is not coherence, but to make space in your head to think by putting it on paper.

Then read them, and as you read them, write some more and get more out of your head.

Eventually, you will give it structure, and the words will feel accurate. And then, after enough digging, things will reveal themselves to you.

🧠 Finding the Dragon’s Lair

Our inner dragons can often come from two sources:

• Anxiety stemming from not actively pursuing things that spark our curiosity.

• Being jealous of others.

So we can gain insight into ourselves by turning those into questions.

Using Curiosity for Discovery

• What are things that spark my curiosity? Am I pursuing those things?

• If so, in what way, and do I feel satiated in the way I am going about it?

• If not, what is preventing me from exploring? Is this a real obstacle, or is it tied to a limiting belief I have?

Using Jealousy for Discovery

Are you jealous of someone specifically in your life? If so, what specifically is making you jealous? Why do you think it gets under your skin so much?

Are there things you feel deprived of that you love? Are there things you feel deprived of things you feel you rightfully deserve? If so, why do you feel like you deserve them?

🔭 Forecasting Resentment

Sometimes we can get direction on where to start digging by forecasting our resentment, especially in the context of a person.

Crucial thing here - giving your Shadow (which is part of you) permission to speak its version of the truth - that means suspending judgement in the answers it gives you.

Consider this:

If your status quo remained the same for the next 10 years, is there a person you feel that you would blame and despise because of it?

Often, this can pin point the exact person with whom we are avoiding a difficult conversation (this was my case when married to my first wife), and to unto whom our ego may be projecting blame.

As we dive deeper into understanding ourselves, let’s remember that we are not alone.

Writing is healing and healing can hurt - reach out to friends and family. They are there for you.

Sending Good Vibes,

Ivan

P.S.

We will be re-branding soon, and adding another section to the newsletter.

Stay tuned 👀

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