Self Care Journal

I am not huge on writing, but I am fond of the idea of keeping a journal. I feel like it is an obligation and it is time consuming. As a student, I have stress and little time, so if that sounds like something you can relate to (which honestly who can't?) check out my DIY Self Care/Mood Tracker Bullet Journal... I hope this offers innovation and inspiration!!

Materials:

Notebook (blank or bullet)

Pen or Pencil (and eraser) - side note: I outlined everything in pencil and went over in pen, after it dried I went back and erased lightly.

Gel Pens and/or colored pencils

Draw a picture that you can incorporate symbols into, for example I chose balloons for March, because I celebrate my birthday during this month. For February I chose hearts, but you can choose anything that is relatively easy to draw and color. It helps to make it into a picture so you can visualize the month as a whole. Make sure to make a shape/symbol for each day of the month. So for March I made 31 balloons. I chose to color the balloons in according to how I am feeling. I did this by assigning a color to certain emotions.

For example...

pink - happy

blue - sad

green - bored

yellow - stressed

I have also been interested in tracking how exercise, sleep, eating and other things can impact me. I have decided to track the following:

- steps (enter a number - for me the ideal is 10,000) - I use my Fitbit Charge 4 to track steps and sleep

- hours of sleep (enter a number - for me the ideal is 8) - I need to get 8 but that never actually happens so this is somewhat a goal for me.

- meals (enter a number - for me the ideal is 3) - make sure they are balanced ( :

- physical activity (yes or no) - for me I think physical activity like runs or pick up basketball games help me sleep, and I feel more productive.

- stress level (on a scale of 0 to 10) - sometimes its hard to accurately identify stress but its good to take a moment and maybe even jot down what you were thinking about or something you had any emotion (good or bad) towards

- relaxing time (yes or no, if so what I did, reading, Netflix, walk, deep breathing) - Relaxation is a necessity, for me this is usually with a blanket and device to watch Netflix, depending on the weather (and my status of binge watching) I also take walks

- quality of day (on a scale of 0/bad to 10/excellent) - Looking back from the moment you got out of bed to the (rather pleasant) moment you got back in bed, how was your day?

- Social time with friends? (yes or no) - It is important to stay connected and reach out to those who you care about.

- Notes - I use this as a quick chance to describe my day using as little or as many words as I like.

Depending on how creative you are and how much time you have, you can always add emojis or pictures. For me, doodling is relaxing but maybe not something I'm good at - but it's all good!

Feel free to personalize since it is YOUR journal after all, there are so many inspirations for ideas on Pinterest, instagram, etc... I hope you enjoyed this instructable and were inspired to start a mood tracker/bullet journal! Thank you ( ;