There is a certain peace to making sure you have time to yourself, time to reflect, time to think. Be it ten minutes, an hour, a whole day, a weekend, or even a week. That time to yourself to reflect and evaluate your recent thoughts and expand on those thoughts is important. It goes hand-in-hand with being a better version of yourself and taking care of yourself. Remember to take time for yourself. Be strict with your boundaries. Emphasize the importance to others of why you need this time to reflect. Encourage others to do the same.

Having a journal is a great space to give time to yourself because you can be yourself in your journal. No one else will be seeing your journal except you. You can word-vomit all of your thoughts, reflect on them, expand on them, get to the foundation of your thoughts and emotions, all without judgment. And all of this takes time. Whenever I journal, I spend at least an hour on it. Planning my week, organizing my priorities, writing out my thoughts, and reflecting. It’s no small feat, which is why being consistent with it is so hard. It’s time-consuming, but important. I myself am trying to get back into the habit of journaling and reflecting. It’s difficult, I won’t lie. I went through the whole month of January hardly touching my journal. But it’s a new month, and a new lunar year, and it’s never too late to start good habits.