JournalSpeak by Nicole Sachs LCSW

For me, JournalSpeak, often called 'Rage on the Page' (though its scope extends far beyond anger), was a profound awakening in my recovery. It went beyond simply resolving my chronic pain caused by Tension Myositis Syndrome (TMS), or The Mindbody Syndrome. This daily commitment to JournalSpeak revolutionised my perception of self-awareness and personal development. It's a practice unlike any other form of journaling I've encountered, one that reached into my core and instigated a complete life transformation. I wouldn't hesitate to say it was life-saving.

JournalSpeak has taught me many lessons, not just how to unravel emotions. I've learnt how to set boundaries, I now understand why I am how I am, it's taught me total self-acceptance, how to stop being who others want/need me to be, how to stop people-pleasing and trying to be someone I'm not.

In-depth personal help with emotional exploration

To further help folks understand this method and go deeper than perhaps you can on your own, I created the Emotional Embodiment series of guided classes specifically to help with this kind of work. If you struggle with this, let me help you figure it out and shift some emotional energy. You can purchase this series outright as a course with lifetime access, or enjoy it along with 200+ other valuable resources as part of my Mind-Body Mastery Membership. This is not essential, but it can help massively if the mere idea of this fills you with dread and resistance!

The ultimate guide to JournalSpeak

JournalSpeak is a daily expressive writing practice, but also a sort of language or a suggested tone of voice in which to write it in. This method of offloading onto paper (or keyboard) is a way to give your unfelt feelings a voice. A voice in a safe space, where ONLY YOU can hear what is said and how it is expressed. JournalSpeak is an intimate practice between you and your innermost self.

Every day, you grab a notebook or a computer and purge out your negative emotions, traumatic experiences, stresses and hidden feelings. Anything occupying space in your brain that causes you stress. JournalSpeak is the place where you can really let go and rant it all out, brutally, honestly, messily, swear and shout if you need to, get it all thrashed out onto the page. Imagine it's almost like releasing an internal toxin, like puking or pooing. No one else is going to read it, you won’t even read it, you’re just giving your suppressed self a voice and letting it out. The words don’t have to even be legible. Write a letter to someone who hurt you (you will never send it) tell someone off, imagine that little child inside you kicking and screaming your hurtful feelings. 

The three JournalSpeak lists

Start by writing three bullet-point lists of stressors. Then, in those three lists, you outline all the things you can think of that occupy stressful or hurtful space in your mind. Think about what's made you unhappy, incidents where you felt grief, embarrassment, fear, guilt, anger, resentment, jealousy, abandonment, anxiety, unworthiness, sadness, loss, desperation, trauma, etc. As big or as little as it may seem to you now, write it down if it upsets you. Take a look at the Journaling Topics & Themes page for more information on this.

Categorise those feelings into these three lists:

List 1) My past stressors - for example, traumatic childhood, difficult relationship breakups, emotional abuse, parent stuff, sibling stuff, school stuff, relationships, difficult friends. Your childhood is a crucially important time of your life where you learn patterns of behaviour and ways to cope that you will carry with you into adulthood, so don’t brush over something seemingly unimportant or what you perceive to now be nothing to worry about. If it hurt you back then, it needs voicing now.

List 2) My present stressors - for example, your job, family, money worries, relationship problems, health fears, family struggles, difficult friends, loss/grief. You will probably find yourself listing a lot of stress in regards to your symptoms here. It's fine to start journaling about your frustration with the symptoms, but try to shift your focus onto the underlying emotions, rather than the symptoms themselves.

List 3) My personality traits - this was my biggest list BY FAR. TMS sufferers are inherently self-critical, so there might be a lot here that you pick out. For example, unworthiness, not feeling good enough, shame, validation seeking, perfectionism, body-consciousness, being easily offended, catastrophising, blame, self-pity, guilt, things that make you live in constant conflict with yourself etc. 

At first, I thought being a perfectionist was a good thing, but I’ve come to learn that it's a form of self-sabotage in a way, always expecting to mess something up at every turn, making sure I triple-check everything and do only my absolute best at everything or I will be a failure. Obviously, now I see that as a detriment to my overall well-being, and I can see how I was starving myself of the self-compassion I needed to break free of these cycles. Look deeper into your own personality traits, what feeling do they give you deep down? There could be some gems in there that you don’t see at first glance. I continue to add and change this list, if you're anything like me it might take time for you to peel back the layers of yourself you’ve built up for so many years and really look at yourself objectively in this way, but it will come.

The lists don’t have to be very long or detailed (nobody is going to read these but you), and if they seem overwhelming, just start with one or two things on each list and go from there. I built my lists over a few months, and have actually removed a lot from the present and personality ones since doing this work...things have changed THAT MUCH.

How to practice JournalSpeak

I found it easiest to do my JournalSpeak practice in the morning. I get up, grab a cup of tea and go back to bed with my computer. Obviously, this won’t work for some people, so pick a time in your day where you can have uninterrupted privacy for half an hour or so and do it every day if you can. Showing up for yourself in this way is an act of DEEP self-care and will have more impact than just letting your emotions out. Later on, when you feel the positive impact that this work is having, you can pull back a little on the frequency of your journaling, but try to keep it consistent if you can. I journal as and when I need to now and it's enough for me now that I am chronic pain-free.

Pick one topic you have occupying the most space in your stress head at the time from one of your lists, in any order you like, and just start writing. Nicole suggests writing for a minimum of 20 mins, which is the 'sweet spot' of time where you’re giving in to resisting writing, and you’ve wriggled your way through a few thoughts and got to the good stuff - THE FEELINGS. Start telling the story and describe how it made you feel. Let yourself be brutal and childlike. No need for proper English or even full sentence construction here, just allow your primitive self to rant. See if you can observe what those thoughts or memories make you feel inside, and sit with that feeling no matter how hard it is.

FEEL your feelings, don't overthink them. Try not to get caught up in the story too much, bring the topic to mind, let it build, then allow yourself to feel whatever that experience felt like to you.

This is a weird concept to figure out if you've forever only THOUGHT about your emotions. Have a read of this quick tutorial on how to feel your feelings physically and find out why it matters for TMS recovery.

Then when your time is up, just screw up the paper and throw it away, or delete the words you typed on the computer screen...and you’re DONE. You've now let your true feelings surface and be heard, and they now have the chance to be let free from your heart. You don’t need to fix anything, change anything or forgive anyone, just look at the feelings, sit with them and really feel them, see them for what they are and let them vent. Sometimes your feelings will flow like this, sometimes they won’t..and that's OK.

JournalSpeak prompts, themes and ideas

Check out my JournalSpeak prompts and ideas for emotional release article for some help here if you need a nudge to get started, and take a look at the Journaling Topics & Themes page for more information and help. 

Don't be afraid of giving your emotions a voice

Your chronic symptoms are a sign that there is something inside you shouting to be acknowledged; it is just a messenger letting you know that something needs to be addressed. You are safe and well, you just need to address these emotions that are struggling to arise, keeping you in fight or flight mode and fuelling your suffering.

Sometimes your writing will flow like a raging river, sometimes it won’t. You will probably expect to feel like you're not diving deep enough, you might not be doing it right, but that's normal and that’s OK! Have a read through my what to expect section too. Sometimes you’ll be stuck on what to say, it takes some practice and some days it feels impossible, but consistency is KEY. Show up for yourself, especially on days you are resisting and trying to find excuses to NOT journal. The emotions might feel worse for a little while as you're unravelling this stuff, but keep going, it's part of the process, and it quickly fades and loosens its grip.

The JournalSpeak 'tone of voice'

When I first started JournalSpeak, I only ever wrote like I was telling someone a story about a past event, but I soon found out that I wasn’t really getting to the visceral, filthy truth of those thoughts. Here’s an example that Nicole often uses to explain the 'switch' in the tone of voice she now teaches, which allows you to properly express the true core of your negative feelings. 

Instead of writing:

“My kids really wind me up, I’m tired all the time and my husband is always working and I’m finding it really hard to cope...”

Write something like this:

“I fucking hate being a parent, sometimes I hate my kids...” 

Do you see the difference in the rawness of those thoughts? This is utterly shocking stuff to write, you certainly wouldn’t ever admit this to anyone, even yourself, but nonetheless, she had FELT it! PLUS, it doesn’t even have to stay true, of course she doesn’t REALLY hate her kids, but at times she felt it, and that’s where the real truth is, IT WAS TRUE AS SHE HAD FELT IT, and that’s what needs to be heard, felt and purged.

Not all journaling sessions will be like this, they certainly weren’t for me, a lot of the time they stay in 'storytelling' mode and sometimes dip into this heavier mode, but I did have breakthrough moments like this and it certainly taught me how to be more brutally honest in all sessions and never skirt over stuff superficially.  

Try closing with something lighter

When I come to the end of my 20 minutes or so of heavy heart journaling, I sometimes like to close with a few minutes about more positive things, things that are thriving in my life, things that I'm looking forward to or things I am appreciative of. It's a huge cliché that gratitude journaling helps your mental well-being, but it can help lighten the load if you need to. Think of a few things that come to mind and sit with those feelings and observe what those thoughts do to your body and mind. They could be as simple as 'I'm thankful for my comfy bed, my partner, my home, this online community, this learning', things like that.

Sometimes my journaling has ONLY positive thoughts, some days you will feel like you've got nothing left to say, so to keep things going and keep showing up maybe write about all the good things in your life, your mini-wins and breakthroughs, realisations about yourself or your hopes and dreams, even something as simple as how fortunate you are to be able to give yourself this time each day to focus on YOU.

It’s likely that your emotions could be in full rollercoaster mode at this point, so plenty of self-soothing is required next. My preferred method is meditation or yoga. Not only does this settle down your emotional state, but it also allows you to drop into your body and away from your thoughts and restore balance to the nervous system.

The Cure for Chronic Pain podcast

You can listen to my first interview on Nicole's Podcast here, when I first recovered, or the latest one here, catching up on the life changes I've experienced since my first appearance on The Cure for Chronic Pain podcast.

Emotional Embodiment is really important

Check out my Emotional Embodiment masterclass series for extra help with this. It's a 12-part guided somatic journaling course with writing exercises along with the appropriate movement, breath or meditation elements to allow emotional expression and processing to happen. Ideal for anyone looking to deepen their journaling practice or anyone lost on how to do it! It's a part of my Membership.