Journaling Can Help the Pre-teen Heal
Preteen Journaling—
Life is composed of both bad and good events. The good events provide us with happiness and a desire for things to stay that way. But the reality is that bad things happen to everyone at one time or another. Sometimes these unpleasant events can hurt us and cause tremendous pain for long periods of time. The death of a loved one would be a good example of an unhappy event that can injure a pre-teen and cause them to experience prolonged grief.
Recording life experiences in a journal is one way pre-teens can heal themselves when they are confronted with painful events. Here are some ways the journal does this.
Most therapists who counsel grief stricken pre-teens encourage their patients to maintain a journal in addition to any healing treatment. Through journaling pre-teens can process life experiences more thoroughly and quickly, whether receiving counseling on not, and receive the healing they might need.
Sense of Self
One of the advantages of healing through writing experiences and feelings in a journal is that it results in the pre-teen strengthening their sense of self. Initially when we suffer grief we may feel weak and sometimes hopeless. Although weakness and hopelessness are common experiences for many people, the pre-teen who maintains a journal has the opportunity to record these feelings and overcome them with a deeper understanding of life and a stronger sense of self, of who they are as a person.
Integration
Integrating the life around us with our own internal experience is another way we achieve healing. And healing builds character. Aside from healing, integrating ourselves with our environment is essential to our survival, success, and happiness. The pre-teen who maintains a journal of their life experience has a better chance with healing and integration than one who doesn’t. Again, journaling is concerned with processing events and learning about ourselves and the world around us.
Balance
Another advantage of maintaining a journal for healing is that it helps us find balance and harmony when we are faced with loss and the resulting grief. The healing process can be a prolonged event of ups and downs that can affect our mood and how we interact with those around us. Journaling can help the grieving pre-teen find more balance in their day-to-day life by providing them with a way to express themselves.
Heal Relationships
Journaling can also help the pre-teen heal relationships. The pre-teen years are a time when young people more fully discover the meaning of love and relationships. But moments of disappointment, hurt, anger, and/or resentment are part of all relationships. These are, for the most part, normal experiences, especially in the realm of interpersonal relationships, whether those relationships are with family, friends, or other significant people. Journaling gives the pre-teen the advantage of processing the negative emotions that result from any type of relationship.
In this article we have looked at some of the ways in which journaling can help the pre-teen heal from grief or relationships that cause them pain. If you know a pre-teen who may need relief from the grief and pain of living life, encourage them to start journaling.
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“A sweet, simple self-esteem building journal for kids!”
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