This is a great way to journal if morning pages or free writing doesn’t work for you. I did this the time consuming way by getting 200 post it notes and writing a variety of journal prompts on each one (potentially doubling up on some prompts as I wrote these over a series of weeks).
I folded up the post it notes and placed them inside a glass jar (which I decorated a little bit), and gave the person a posh journal too.
Feeling slightly jealous of the gift I’d created I recently decided to make my own. Although I do find morning pages and free writing easy, there are days when my mind is blank or I don’t have that instant inspiration.
To make it easier, and to make sure I wasn’t doubling up, I made a list of 200 prompts and printed them off, cut them up, and then folded them into my own glass journal jar.
Although some of the prompts are a similar theme, just being worded slightly different will/can result in a different writing response.
These are so cheap and easy to make, and are a great inspirational tool if you want to journal but don’t know where to start.
My only rules are (when doing this myself)
- I have to answer the prompt I have chosen and can’t put it back and pick another one.
- I have to fill at least one page of an A5 notebook (no short answers allowed)
If you would like to create your own journal jar, I have created a sheet with the prompts I have used for my own jar. The prompts are a mixture of lists, memories, letters and personal development. You can find the prompts here.
Alternatively, you can use the spreadsheet, put number 1-200 in a number generator, and whichever number comes out you then use as your prompt and then delete that prompt from the list, the next time using 1-199 in the number generator.
If you’d like to do this you can make a copy of this sheet to use the same prompts as me.
