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WHAT IS A STRESS DIARY?Why would I need it?

Stress has become synonymous with our normal life and the pace we are trying to keep up. It seems such a natural part of life and accompanies us every day in different forms and situations.

Our stressors and its demands affect each one of us differently and we respond and react in our own unique way. With the skills and strategies we have at our disposal we make the most of our situation and try to cope as best as we can. Sometimes this though, is not enough and we feel excessively overwhelmed, as too much demand is placed upon us. To cope we may use a range of unique strategies and even at times refuse to acknowledge we may have reached ‘burnout’.

All the warning signals can be evident, yet we may tend to ignore this and press on, based on our beliefs, our motivations and the demands we have to conform to. The truth is though, that managing stress is a daily process, in every thought, situation and action. It becomes a skill mastered and practiced regularly and from this competency, it truly becomes stress ‘managing’.With this tool your competence at managing your stress becomes so much easier. By using a Stress Diary/Journal and doing your daily entries for the 4 week period in this Diary Journal you will become so much more aware of the impact stress has on you, as an individual. As we all experience stress in a totally unique and different way and on a different level, both on a daily and long-term basis, this Diary Journal becomes a personal and confidential insight into how you think about, react, respond and adapt to stressful events.

Once you start your daily entries you’ll begin to see the connections between your stress symptoms, the source of your stress, your awareness of your coping skills, your stress triggers and its impact

on your behaviour and you as a person.

MY MISSIONI passionately believe that ‘No one is broken’ and that ‘People simply need the tools

to manage their lives more effectively’. The STRESS DIARIES are created as a highly effective,practical and affordable tool to help you MANAGE YOUR STRESS IN 28 DAYS.

MY VISION

I believe through innovation, practical application and a sincere focus to help alleviate stress globally in any form and any environment. My strive is that no one should be denied the opportunity to enjoy living a healthy life and

this tool is my contribution to this vision.

Gino Norris, Author

What does the Diary/Journal do for me?Stress Diaries are important for understanding the causes of short-term stress in your life. They also give you an important insight into how you react to stress, and help you to identify the level of stress at which you prefer to operate.

The idea behind Stress Diaries is that, on a regular basis, you record information about the stresses you are experiencing, so that you can analyse these stresses and then manage them. This is important because often these stresses flit in and out of our minds without getting the attention and focus that they deserve. As well as helping you capture and analyse the most common sources of stress in your life, Stress Diaries help you to understand:

• The causes of stress in more detail;• The levels of stress at which you operate most effectively; and• How you react to stress, and whether your reactions are appropriate and useful.

Stress Diaries, therefore, give you the important information that you need to manage stress. It also allows you to see perspective to see the bigger picture and more intense details.

How it is structured?Our Stress Diaries has these sections laid out for you, and you are to simply complete the information and entries on a regular and daily basis – for a period of 4 weeks. Having analysed your diary, you should fully understand what the most important and frequent sources of stress are, in your life. You should appreciate the levels of stress at which you are happiest. You should also know the sort of situations that causes you stress so that you can prepare for them and manage them well. As well as this, you should now understand how you react to stress, and the symptoms that you show, when you are stressed. When you experience these symptoms in the future, this should be a trigger for you to use appropriate stress management techniques.

Commit to making daily entries into your diary over the full length period of time – on a daily basis. After a period of about 4 weeks, you should be able to start to see patterns. By now you can see the contrast in what events causes you the most stress, compared to what events cause you the least. You can now see at what stress level you can function best. Your goal now will be to lessen the stress in your daily life, by managing how you deal with stressful situations - and you can do this by responding to the stress in your life in a more proactive/positive manner.

Stress Diaries are useful in that they gather information regularly and routinely, over a period of time. This helps you to separate the common, routine stresses from those that only occur occasionally. They establish a pattern that you can analyse to extract the information that you need. It is a very useful tool for anyone suffering from Stress and effective for anyone wanting to really get to grips with their stress suffering and really make a concerted effort to manage it.

75%SAVINGS

• STRESS AND STRESS RELATED HEALTH ISSUES COST AN EMPLOYER THE EQUIVALENT OF £1400.00 PER YEAR, PER EMPLOYEE.

• 85% OF ALL GENERAL PRACTITIONER VISITS PER YEAR IS STRESS RELATED.

• THE STRESS DIARIES WILL COST YOU LESS THAN £1.00 PER DAY TO CHANGE THAT STRESS HABIT [IT TAKES 28 DAYS TO CHANGE A HABIT!].

How to use the Stress Diaries

Make an entry in your diary after each incident that is stressful enough for you to feel that it is significant. Every time you make an entry, record the following information:

1. Date and Time of day: Include the time of day that you are feeling stressed. Be conscientious about this. You can find the companion Stress Diary: Daily Recorder Journal, in a handy small size print, to carry with you and record your entries in your Stress diary/journal after the event.

2. What was the situation: Identify the situation that caused you stress. Attempt to be as precise as you can. Was it the annoying comment from a co-worker or were you stuck in a traffic jam? [Think about What was the preceding event: Perhaps you have woken up late, or you are late to a meeting, or have an impending deadline - and you just didn’t need that traffic jam or the annoying comment from your co-worker. Sometimes the preceding cause (rather than the actual situation - e.g., the annoying comment) can be the cause to get a stress reaction from you. Remember that stress is often how the situation is perceived - so if you can, attempt to identify the thoughts underlying the stressful situation or preceding event.

3. What were your symptoms: Was your heart racing, did your breathing speed up, or perhaps you got a tension headache? These are examples of some physical symptoms of stress. Alternatively you may notice that you have difficulty concentrating, adopt a more negative outlook or feel more anxious and fearful. These are some of the psychological and emotional symptoms of stress.

4. What was your initial thoughts: What were the thoughts that went through your head. Or what did you tell yourself at the time?

5. How intensely did you rate the level of your stress: Rate from 1 (very little stress) to 10 (extreme stress).

6. How did you react/respond : Here you can describe how you responded. For example, did you react to the annoying comment from the co-worker or see the situation as an opportunity to practice your breathing exercises? How are you currently coping with each of the causes of stress? [Think about How effective was your behaviour: Did you get the desired results? Did you act appropriately or could you have changed your behaviour?

7. Rate your comfort with how you coped: Rate from 1 (very little stress) to 10 (extreme stress).

8. How could you have reacted/behaved: Was your response justified? How would you react in a similar situation in the future.

You will reap the real benefits of having a stress diary in the first few weeks. After this, the benefit you get will reduce each additional day. If, however, your lifestyle changes, or you begin to suffer from stress again in the future, then it may be worth using the diary approach again. You will probably find that the stresses you face have changed. If this is the case, then keeping a diary again will help you to develop a different approach to deal with them.

OUR STRESS DIARIES COLLECTION

BOOK 1: THE STRESS DIARY JOURNALThis dairy/journal helps you look for underlying causes of stress.

During the 4 weeks you will be using it you will focus on the kinds of stress you can control and it will show you how to eliminate it, avoid it, and cope with it so you feel happier, healthier and more relaxed.

How the Diary is set out

To determine your Stress levels, a Stress Assessment Test is included in this Journal/Diary, with a scoring key for you to use. The Diary/Journal is divided into a 4 week cycle as a Stress Reduction and awareness program. Each week has 7 days, from Monday to Sunday. Each week has a daily Stress Recording Page and an accompanying Stress Analysis Page - plus a page to add your personal notes or thoughts about your day or progress. Each week is summarized and Stress incidents analysed to determine stressors, patterns of occurrences, skills training needs, coping strategies, stress reduction progress and overall progress. Each week is then compiled into a full monthly summary to highlight weekly and monthly progress.

Using the Stress Diary Journal

From your Daily Recorder [fully explained below on page 12] you make your entries about your stressful incidents during the day - in your diary - at the end of each day. You are to study your notes to learn how often you are feeling stressed and how you are coping. See if you can recognise any patterns, particular times of the day, certain people, a situation that repeats itself...The more notes you take, the more you can learn about your stress patterns. Ask yourself which ways of coping with stress work best for you and which don’t work or maybe have other effects that you do not like.

Once you uncover the obvious sources of your stress, the diary/journal encourages you to look deeper for underlying sources of stress like time pressure, financial pressure and relationship problems. The Diary Journal may highlight particular issues for you to address and also introduces you to particular patterns of difficulties. You will become aware of ways to think, react and respond differently to stress.

The Diary/Journal helps you gain skills to:

Becoming aware of the situations you find stressful; identifying the triggers for your stress; identifying your initial appraisals or initial thoughts; be aware of and changing your negative self-talk; managing your reactions and responses; and subsequently taking control & keeping your stress in perspective. That is why you would need a Stress Diary Journal.

So isn’t it worth spending a few minutes a day observing and writing down your stress-related symptoms if it will help you feel more at ease now?

BOOK 2. REFLECTION JOURNALThis Stress Diary: Reflection Journal is a companion guide to the Stress Diary Journal and used as an additional reflective tool to further enhance your insight and understanding of your stress, in a more in-depth way.

When using the Reflection Journal you can use it as a standalone or companion guide to the Stress Diary Journal. You are to choose 1 significant Stress Entry per day, from your Stress Diary Journal for the length of your 4 week program that you may want to elaborate and focus on. You are to use the guideline questions and answer spaces that are provided for you, and in the space provided you can add your personal notes or thoughts about your day or progress.

Weekly summaries of your progress are included, to advance your progress and

by answering these questions and adding your own observations you will increase your skills at understand and managing your reactions and responses, to daily stressors and stress triggers. The Reflection Journal is an easy way to record and focus on how to reflect on your experiences and how you can learn from it, or update your skills in changing your approach to Stress Management.

Analysing your Reflection Journal

Included in the Reflection Journal, you will find that analysis of your stress is included in your daily entries, and also as part of your weekly stress summary, to assess your progress. Your weekly summary of stressful events and how you managed your stressors is an indication of your progress and allow you to plan for and adjust your strategies to manage these stressors/stressful situations/events. Addressing the different stressors that you have experienced will help you to alert you to these situations, their triggers and to use alternative strategies to address them. You will find in the weekly summary, that looking at your lists of stresses, those at the top of each list are the most important for you to learn to control. When you have worked through the stresses, look at how you assessed their underlying causes, and your appraisal of how well you handled the stressful event. In areas where you handled stress poorly, you can target, adjust and improve your focus on these.

The Reflection Journal finally, allows you to look at how you felt when you were under stress. You are to look at how it affected your happiness and your effectiveness, understand how you behaved, and think about how you felt. Using the analysis and skills you gain from these exercises should give you the skills to improve how you manage your stress. Having analyzed your stress entries, you should fully understand what the most important and frequent sources of stress are in your life. You should appreciate the levels of stress at which you are happiest. You should also know the sort of situations that cause you stress so that you can prepare for them and manage them well. As well as this, you should now understand how you react to stress, and the symptoms that you show when you are stressed. When you experience these symptoms in the future, this should be a trigger for you to use appropriate stress management techniques.

BOOK 3. DAILY RECORDER

This is a companion guide to the Stress Diary Journal in a handy size to carry about and for you to easily record your daily stress entries. Each Stress entry is individually presented for ease of recording ‘on the go’ and to then transfer these entries to your Stress Diary Journal, or the Stress Diary: Reflection Journal, at the end of your day.

This makes remembering these Stress incidents/events much easier, and keeping you in touch

with managing your stress more effectively. You can with ease record the daily stressful events as they occur just after these incidents or at a time more convenient for you.

Reflecting on these incidents is a good way of learning to manage your stress in a more constructive way. Transferring these incidents at the end of your day to your Stress Diary Journal and analysis of the experience, concludes the process of assessing, reflecting on, reviewing, learning from, practicing skills, planning, setting targets, monitoring progress and thus improving your Stress Management competency skills.

THE COMPLETE 28 DAY PROCESS

STEP 1: FIRST USE THE DAILY RECORDER.

Using the complete Stress Diaries set start out with the Daily Recorder. It allows you to keep this handy tool with you for a quick way to record stressful incidents, as they occur. This is an easy process: What to include

to complete your daily Diary/Journal entries:

• Date and Time of day: Include the time of day that you are feeling stressed. Be conscientious about this. You can find the companion Stress Diary: Daily Recorder Journal, in a handy small size print, to carry with you and record your entries in your Stress diary/journal after the event.

• What was the situation: Identify the situation that caused you stress. Attempt to be as precise as you can. Was it the annoying comment from a co-worker or were you stuck in a traffic jam? [Think about What was the preceding event: Perhaps you have woken up late, or you are late to a meeting, or have an impending deadline - and you just didn’t need that traffic jam or the annoying comment from your co-worker. Sometimes the preceding cause (rather than the actual situation - e.g., the annoying comment) can be the cause to get a stress reaction from you. Remember that stress is often how the situation is perceived - so if you can, attempt to identify the thoughts underlying the stressful situation or preceding event.

1. Start recording your daily stress entries here.

• What were your symptoms: Was your heart racing, did your breathing speed up, or perhaps you got a tension headache? These are examples of some physical symptoms of stress. Alternatively you may notice that you have difficulty concentrating, adopt a more negative outlook or feel more anxious and fearful. These are some of the psychological and emotional symptoms of stress.

• What was your initial thoughts: What were the thoughts that went through your head. Or what did you tell yourself at the time?

• How intensely did you rate the level of your stress: Rate from 1 (very little stress) to 10 (extreme stress).

• How did you react/respond : Here you can describe how you responded. For example, did you react to the annoying comment from the co-worker or see the situation as an opportunity to practice your breathing exercises? How are you currently coping with each of the causes of stress? [Think about How effective was your behaviour: Did you get the desired results? Did you act appropriately or could you have changed your behaviour?

• Rate your comfort with how you coped: Rate from 1 (very little stress) to 10 (extreme stress).

• How could you have reacted/behaved: Was your response justified? How would you react in a similar situation in the future.

Then simply transfer this information to the STRESS DIARY JOURNAL at the end of the day.

STEP 2: THEN USE THE STRESS DIARY JOURNAL

In the Stress Diary Journal we include, for ease of reference, some guidance information to assist you along the way. This includes info on: What causes stress / Stress signs and symptoms / Faulty thinking patterns / How

we react to stress / Challenging your initial thoughts / Defense Mechanisms and / Questioning your unhealthy thoughts

The Stress diary Journal is specifically structured and meticulously set out with tables and guidance prompts/questions to guide you and illicit information about your stress. You are to simply respond to these and add your responses to the questions/prompts in the appropriate spaces. The diary is divided into a 4 weekly cycle or 28 days as a stress awareness and reduction programme. Each week has 7 days, running from Monday to Sunday.

For each week cycle, a section is set out as follows.

1. An introduction page explaining the stress entry process

2. A Prediction page—to predict the things you will be stressing about for that week and you have to rate your belief in this on a scale of 1—10, and A log to record every day that you have completed your entries—for the whole week

3. A page to record your daily stress entries, as they happen

2. Transfer and record your more intense stressful incidents here.

4. An accompanying Stress Analysis page

5. An additional page to record your personal notes and thoughts.

Each week’s entries are shown in a weekly summary to reflect your total stressful incidents recorded and analysed to determine triggers, patterns of occurrences, skills training needs, coping strategies used, stress reduction progress and overall progress shown. Finally, each week is then compiled into a full monthly summary, to highlight your weekly and monthly progress.

RECORDING YOUR STRESS ENTRIES – an Example

A. THE PROCESS – HOW TO

1. Predict the things that will stress you for that week. You are also to add how much you believe in this prediction, on a scale of 1 - 10 [0 here would be the least, while 10 would show the strongest belief].

2. On the recording log page - Tick off every day of the week that you are adding your entries.

3. Record the day and date of your entry 4. Add a code for your entry [A, 1, or how-ever you can recognize your entry]

5. The stress entry sheet: Add your stressful incident as they occur/happened [Just record the information as you will later get a chance to analyze it in more detail]. Think about what happened and be as precise as you can, e.g., was it the annoying comment from a co-worker that got you stressing. Complete these entries for the whole day [morning, afternoon, night]

6. Rate your stress [how you felt at the time] on a scale of 1 - 10

[Here follows a SAMPLE ENTRY completed for you]

Sample Stress Entry sheet[Here follows a SAMPLE ENTRY completed for you]

B. STRESS ANALYIS PAGE: ANALYSING THESE STRESS ENTRIES

1. Choose the most stressful events you recorded for the day and transfer the code for it in the space provided 2. Add the level of stress you rated it 3. State the stressful issue [abbreviated] 4. The symptoms you felt (e.g. “butterflies in your stomach”, anger, headache, raised pulse rate, sweaty palms, etc.). - p16 5. State how you reacted - p41 6. How well you handled the event or how well you coped: What strategies have you used to cope 7. If you were unhappy with the outcome, state what you could have done or what you would do next time in a similar situation 8. Highlight 3 top stressful difficulties or problems you are encountering from the above 9. List their possible causes or the triggers that might have caused it 10. Offer some optional solutions to these 3 top stressors

How to use the Stress Diary[Here follows a SAMPLE ANALYSIS SHEET completed for you]

C. COMPLETE YOUR PERSONAL INSIGHTS ON THE FOLLOWING PAGE

You may want to record:

• how you felt about the stressful incident • how you feel about recording this information • how you rated your stressful incident before and after the incident • add how you rate it now • did you like your response • would you change it • what are you learning • what you need to do more, etc…

Or simply your personal thoughts…

D. SUMMARY SHEET: COMPLETE YOUR WEEKLY SUMMARY OF RECORDINGS • Add the highest type of stress incidents recorded • Add the triggers that caused these stresses • Select from the list which are more difficult to manage:

1. Your appraisal [How you decide that you will stress or not]. 2. Your self-talk. 3. Your initial reaction 4. Your response 5. Your behaviours 6. Your lack of skills

• Add which days are more stressful for you • Add which times are more stressful for you • Were you right in your initial prediction of how and about what you would stress? • Set 3 targets for yourself for the following week

[SAMPLE PERSONAL NOTES SHEET completed for you]

How to use the Stress Diary

[WEEKLY SUMMARY SHEET]

D. FINALLY – COMPLETE YOUR MONTHLY SUMMARY

1. Add the total monthly stressful events drawn from your 4 weekly summaries and add the total. [p115]

2. Include the total for each week

3. Deduct and include how much stressful incidents you have reduced for each week

4. Add the total stressful incidents you have reduced for the month

MONTHLY SUMMARY SHEETS

NEXT: THE GRAPH: TRANSFER THOSE SCORES HERE TO SHOW YOUR PROGRESS:

These are transferred to a Monthly Stress Graph. P116

The 4 bars indicate the 4 weeks [x] And total incidents to be recorded [y]

Mark with an X on the corresponding bar that indicates the total stressful incidents you recorded for the week.

Connect these starting from the xy, or ‘0’ point of the graph - with a line and then connect each from week 1 to week 4 - to show your graph of how you increased or decreased your stressful incidents.

TO CONCLUDE - COMPLETE THE FOLLOWING TABLE WITH INFORMATION ABOUT:

• Rate your progress on a scale of 1 - 10 on how accurate you were in your ‘Stress Prediction’ • How intensely stressed you are • How you reduced your stress incidents • How you rate positive changes in your appraisals• How you changed your thought patterns • Changes in how you react to stress Changes in your behaviors • How you rate your overall progress How you rate having more control • How more effective you are in managing your stress How your attitude has changed

• Rate your outlook in life now

1. Write freely about where you feel you progressed best. 2. What are you more competent at. 3. What you may need to focus more on.

MY PROGRESS TO DATE

STEP 3: FINALLY USE THE REFLECTION JOURNAL

FINALLY

You are to choose 1 significant Stress Entry per day, from your Stress Diary Journal for the length of your 4 week program that you may want to elaborate and focus on.

You are to use the guideline questions and answer spaces that are provided for you:

In the Entry Page: Simply add your entry here and answer the prompting questions about the stressor.

Questions include:

• How the stressor is influencing you, • If you are doing anything differently, • explore your coping skills, • how you rate the stressor now and • how you are setting new goals and targets to achieve

Complete your Personal Notes Page: Simply add your own notes and insights in the special page provided.

You will have greater insight about your particular stress and how you are coping with the 4 weekly summary sheets included for you.

You can easily monitor your progress with the weekly summary sheets to give you greater insight. These summaries of your progress are included, to advance your progress and by answering the questions and adding your own observations you will increase your skills at understand and managing your reactions and responses, to daily stressors and stress triggers.

Finally you get to complete a full monthly summary to conclude your program and assess your progress.

THAT IS IT!

ANALYSING THE STRESS DIARY AND YOUR PROGRESS

1. First, look at the different stresses you experienced during the time you kept your diary. You will become aware of the types of stress that you experienced by frequency, with the most frequent stresses at the top of your list.

2. You will note that those stressors that regularly appear are the most important for you to learn to control.

3. Working through the stresses, look at your assessments of their underlying causes, and your appraisal of how well you handled the stressful event. Do these show you areas where you handled stress poorly, and could improve your stress management skills? Look through your diary at the situations that cause you stress.

4. Look through your diary at the situations that cause you stress.

5. Look also at how you felt when you were under stress. Look at how it affected your happiness and your effectiveness, understand how you behaved, and think about how you felt.

6. Review how you rate the intensity of your stress at different days and over the light of the period you are using the Stress Diary, and how this changes with time

7. Remember your predictions about how much you would stress and review the truth or validity of these – as it will help you reduce the stressors on a daily basis

8. Review by setting your daily goals and analysing regularly what needs updating and which targets you are successfully accomplishing

Having analysed your diary, you should fully understand what the most important and frequent sources of stress are, in your life. You should appreciate the levels of stress at which you are happiest. You should

also know the sort of situations that causes you stress so that you can prepare for them and manage them well. As well as this, you should now understand how you react to stress, and the symptoms that you show, when you are stressed. When you experience these symptoms in the future, this should be a trigger for you to use appropriate stress management techniques.

Commit to making daily entries into your diary over the full length period of time – on a daily basis. After a period of about 4 weeks, you should be able to start to see patterns. By now you can see the contrast in what events causes you the most stress, compared to what events cause you the least. You can now see at what stress level you can function best. Your goal now will be to lessen the stress in your daily life, by managing how you deal with stressful situations - and you can do this by responding to the stress in your life in a more proactive/positive manner.

THE BENEFITS OF USING THE STRESS DIARIES

• Diary or Journal writing is a fantastic experience. As a written activity you may have to share the passion for the written word, but the benefits outshine the best of reasons not to attempts it. It is an organised activity and this implies organisation in most forms. The Diary/Journal is specifically structured with effective guidelines and prompting questions to illicit the most important information to aid your stress management skills.

• It asks of you to be more highly organised, to set a specific time and to create this ‘my time’ as a routine – and thus providing you with a welcome break from the hectic schedule and activities of the day – to take time out and to reflect. This teaches you new routines and specific time management skills to give yourself - this time. It helps in you managing stress, as one of the more difficult things about managing stress is the excessive demands made on you, at once. Stress may mean you do not have enough time to get to do everything you need to, and doing your entries at a specifically determined time will help you assert this skill. By taking the time for entries into the Diary/Journal you develop the ability to make time for important things...your life.

• Being organised in this way will benefit you in all other aspects of your life. It acknowledge that you are a unique person and validates you as deserving of making time for yourself. It also helps you to develop a much more structured approach to your thinking.

• Writing and reflecting on your entries on a daily basis or at a regular time will give that peace of mind that ‘my time’ is a reward. When you adhere to this, you can expand your ‘my time’ if you need, to have more time for yourself or for a particular activity you may wish to do.

• Being organised calls for planning skills, and this is what the Diary/Journal does very effectively. It is structured with planning exercises and to review these at a set time. The feedback that you get from this is that you will be able to know and monitor your progress with the ease of simply recording your entries and reviewing them regularly. It becomes a supportive tool – without the need for dependency and it will guide you to develop effective stress management skills – or expose special skills you may have - but that you did not know you had, or were using.

• Your entries will allow you more free time to structure and organise your life activities, on a daily basis and for the duration of the period you are using the diary/journal. Doing these will create a routine and subsequently you will see the ease and comfort of recording of information – as it will also become much easier in analysing your thoughts and actions. This means you will adjust your responses and behaviours to stressors much easier.

The Diary/Journal is effective as it allows you to write your entries, in your own time, and even if you do not feel comfortable talking to someone about your difficulties – you are free to do so in your Stress

Diary/Journal. Your Diary/Journal is proof of your progress and growth…

• The most important of information you will enter will become more crystallised as you regularly repeat these incidents causing you stress, and soon definitive patterns about these will emerge. In this way the Diary/ Journal alerts you to ‘triggers and dangers’ for it helps you to structure memories/events/incidents and put these in perspective to you. It helps you to become aware of these patterns and plan for when you should be aware of them. It will highlight which of these are beneficial and which may be triggers that you need to react to, in an alternate way. It will highlight definitive patterns of your reactions and responses to particular patterns and in this simplistic way, you will get to know yourself better. It will allow you to evaluate if you are comfortable with the present situation or prompt you to review – that maybe an alternate strategy/skills set is needed.

• Your entries will make your thought process so much more cohesive and clear, and this will help you in developing more effective thought patterns or ways of thinking. It will be effective in organising your thoughts for an important meeting, communication with others or to get that raise!.

• Whilst a passive activity – this Diary/Journal does help you to be more assertive in your communication, simply because it highlights the stressors imposed on you, or that you’re unconsciously imposing on yourself – and then with this realisation, to change it. It helps in that you can think that ‘enough is enough’ and you will change things on a daily basis or for the long term, and this will benefit you managing stressful situations so much better. In its simplistic form it helps you keep track of and be so much more aware of your daily activities – and therefore you will be able to structure your activities and day better. Being aware of this makes planning your day, week and month easier. It also does have significant impact on other areas of your life, and the skills you will practice and master here will lead to lifelong learning skills, too valuable not to undertake.

• The process of Diary/Journal writing is an enriching experience and can be akin to finding your inner self, your thoughts, and to discover the hidden gems [your inherent skills & competencies]

that have faded over a period of time. The beauty of using and completing this Diary/Journal program is simply to allow you to uncover these hidden gems, to polish them brightly, put them back inside where they belong…so they may shine.

• You completing this process will help you develop those skills like; patience and a longer concentration span, be more focused, be increasingly aware of what you want, how it should be done and how you will do, or allow it to happen. This is self-empowerment.

• This level of concentration bodes well to implement as a strong motivating force in targets/goals you want to accomplish in all areas of your life. It will help you to give free expression to yourself, especially to ‘let it all out’ in confidence and privacy at the end of the day, and to be able to control it yourself, can be amazing. By being able to take this time to create a free space, to slow down your thoughts, to feel you are empowering you and to develop so much more in competence…these are benefits you may not want to let go…

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