Mindfulness is now an official component of many elite teams’ training programs, with a 2024 meta-analysis of 11 studies finding that mindfulness training significantly improves athletes’ mindfulness levels, performance, and fluency, while also helping combat psychological anxiety. Currently, some of the most commonly used approaches are Mindfulness-Acceptance-Commitment (MAC training) and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR). These approaches embrace myriad approaches, ranging from mindfulness meditation to acceptance exercises, values clarification, behavioral commitment, and mindful movement. In many programs, journaling is chosen as a means to accept thoughts and feelings without judgment, promote greater self-awareness, and identify one’s personal goals. It is also used to identify harmful patterns, reflect on one’s efforts, and track and celebrate progress.
What Is Mindfulness Journaling?
Mindfulness journaling involves writing down one’s thoughts, emotions, and experiences in a non-judgmental way. The aim is to connect with one’s inner self, deepen awareness, and cultivate a sense of inner calm. Studies have shown that repressing tough emotions that athletes can face—including fear, disappointment, and anxiety—can have negative effects. Through mindfulness, athletes can accept that these emotions can sometimes arise, as can negative thoughts that tell them they aren’t fast, smart, or adept enough. Journaling allows athletes to capture these thoughts and emotions and their responses to them. In time, they can begin noticing patterns and defining new, healthier thoughts and affirmations that can serve them better. They can also start to notice that negative thoughts and emotions, far from defining them, are impermanent. They can also begin to catch “automatic negative thoughts” that make them doubt their skill, ability, and worth. These thoughts include filtering out the good and remaining with the bad, seeing situations in “all or nothing” terms, and personalization—assuming that others feel a certain way just because they do.
What Do Athletes Need for Journaling?
Journaling is accessible to athletes of all ages and levels. All they need is a notebook, a pen, and a quiet workspace where they can focus on their challenges, progress, and training goals without interruption. Athletes can take advantage of existing home offices to ensure they have the solitude and peace they need to connect with their inner world. To boost their focus, they can add sustainable elements to this home workspace. Examples include plants, which have been proven to increase productivity. Other elements that can help them deepen their concentration and invoke a sense of mindful tranquility include natural lighting and furniture made of natural, eco-friendly materials. To make the most of journaling, athletes should schedule regular writing sessions and use the same journal. They can use their journal to write about how they feel and reflect on their thoughts, emotions, and behavioral patterns.
What Are the Benefits of Mindfulness Journaling?
Numerous studies have shown that mindfulness journaling has numerous benefits athletes can leverage to boost their well-being and performance. These include reduced anxiety, breaking free from obsessive thinking and brooding, improving one’s awareness and perception of events, regulating emotions, and boosting one’s physical health. Proven effects include lowered blood pressure, better moods, improved psychological well-being, and fewer depressive and avoidance symptoms. Even though the experience of writing can be difficult or painful, it can also be valuable and meaningful. Ultimately, it can play a key role in accepting things an athlete cannot change.
Helping Athletes Craft Their Identity
A 2024 study published in the journal Sport in Society showed that journal writing can help athletes in their quest to transform from promising talents into serious, committed athletes. The researchers concluded that writing in a journal helps athletes create both an inner dialogue and an athlete-coach dialogue that shapes their mentality and choices. Through their writing, they can reframe their outlook on themselves and their position, defining their understanding and priorities. The study authors stated that journaling can motivate athletes “to engage in corporeal practices that bridge the gap between ‘is’ and ‘should be.’”
Mindfulness journaling has a host of mental, psychological, and physical benefits. Athletes can take advantage of these benefits to boost their focus, mood, and self-awareness. Research indicates that journaling can also help athletes engage in useful dialogues with themselves… the kind that helps them convert from fledgling to elite sports persons.
