The Best Journals To Start The New Year With

Journaling is a popular suggestion when it comes to making or keeping New Year's Resolutions. Much like meditating, crystal healing, and yoga, journaling has become a foundation of self care — with scientific evidence to back up its benefits. A 2006 study showed that just 15 minutes of journaling twice a day for one week helped reduce depression, anxiety, and even hostility, especially if the writer was already upset. An even older study — this one from 1995 — found that expressing emotions about traumatic or stressful situations helps boost your immune system.

Besides helping manage anxiety, journaling can also help you get organized, which can give you a much-needed mood boost. Some of the feelings of being organizing can come just from listing your tasks, concerns, or fears out so you can see them. You can also start tracking your moods, or what influences your mood change so you can understand what your triggers are (via University of Rochester Medical Center). Nothing can hold you accountable for trying to break the negative self-talk pattern quite like reading your own words back to you, either.

Another surprising benefit? Journaling taps into both sides of your brain. Physically writing is a left-brain-controlled action, which is also the side of the brain's analytical and rational. Evidence suggests keeping your left brain occupied with physical activity (writing) allows your right brain to be more creative and tap more into your feelings (via PsychCentral).

Whether you're new to journaling or a bullet-journaling pro, we rounded up the best journals to start the new year with.

Mindfulness is defined by Greater Good Magazine as: "maintaining a moment-by-moment awareness of our thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, and surrounding environment, through a gentle, nurturing lens." One way of incorporating mindfulness into your daily life is through a journaling habit so you'll want to check out A Year of Mindfulness: A 52-Week Guided Journal to Cultivate Peace and Presence (A Year of Reflections Journal).

Staring at a blank page can be daunting, though, and that's where this journal shines. Especially helpful for people new to mindfulness or journaling, each week has a new mindfulness theme to focus on plus there are daily prompts meant to help you re-engage with yourself and the world around you.

Since Ryder Carroll posted his video on bullet journaling in 2013, the trend has exploded. On TikTok alone, over there have been over 2.4 billion views for #bulletjournal. Helpful especially for people who like to keep one journal for everything instead of multiple journals, bullet journaling is all about getting organized (via Real Simple).

To kick off the new year with a new bullet journal, you'll want to get the medium A5 dotted journal from Leuchtturm1917. Carroll actually worked with the brand to create the perfect notebook for bullet journaling back in 2014 (via New York Magazine). What started as a Kickstarter campaign is now the official Bullet Journal, and definitely the journal you should grab for 2022.

Sometimes it's more than just a blank page that can be daunting when it comes to journaling. Since there aren't any fast and clear rules on the best ways to journal, it's all up to what feels best for you. A lot of people who want to get into the habit of journaling but are afraid of what a time commitment it could be (or, of course, what to write), turn to journals with prompts — especially ones that require small, simple answers. That's where Q&A A Day comes in.

Starting January 1st, each page has the date and a question at the top. The rest of the page has five spaces for answers. That's the great part about this journal: it's meant to last five years. Each year, you go back to the beginning, answering the same questions but seeing how they've changed. There are now even themed Q&A A Day books, like one for writers, travelers, or one meant for couples to share.

If you already have a daily tarot ritual or you're looking to start one, it's hugely beneficial to keep track of your card pulls with a tarot journal. Not only does this make for a great way to track the progress of how you're growing as a tarot reader, but you'll also have a working interpretation dictionary you've created yourself (via Biddy Tarot).

The 2022 Writual Tarot Journal is going to be the tarot journal you'll want to get for so many different reasons. Not only does the journal come with an astrological reference guide, moon phase guide, a tracker of all full and new moons, eclipses, and retrogrades, but it also has a fillable birth chart and tons of tarot spreads. Plus, of course, daily tracking to help you keep your tarot routine.

If your New Year's Resolution is to spend more time in the kitchen, you should get a recipe journal to track your progress. This recipe journal from Daisy and Decor is perfect: there's a space for you to write down the recipe you're using, including space for ingredients and directions. There's also a space for notes you can write during or after the cooking or baking process is done.

The coolest part about this cooking journal, in particular, is that it has a section just for you to write down the date you made that recipe and anything else you want to remember about that dish or who you shared it with.