Journaling is one of the most powerful tools for self-discovery. By picking up a journal and a pencil, you can gain a space to explore your thoughts, emotions and experiences in a creative and meaningful way. Whether you’re discovering your identity, uncovering creative passions or clarifying your future goals, journaling can help you gain valuable insights into who you are and what you want from life.

Ahead, we’ll explore 22 thoughtful journaling prompts, each one crafted to help you embark on a journey of creativity and self-discovery. These prompts go beyond simple reflection—they are designed to assist you in unlocking your true creative potential, overcoming obstacles and inspiring personal growth.

Journal Prompts for Discovering Your Identity and Values

Understanding your identity and values is key to living an authentic life and embracing the things that make you, you. These prompts are designed to help you start journaling while learning more about your core identity and establishing your most important values. 

Write to Your Younger Self

A woman’s hands holding a handwriting-filled notebook open on a white tabletop. There is also another open notebook and a white sheet of paper lying on the table, both of which have been filled with a bubble chart titled ‘Twenty year old Yasmine.’
In the Skillshare class “Writing for Self-Discovery: 6 Journaling Prompts for Gratitude and Growth,” teacher Yasmine Cheyenne creates a bubble chart to visualize the priorities and interests of her younger self. 

Prompt Idea: Channel your younger self and explore your past mindset. 

Created By: Yasmine Cheyenne

How to Use This Prompt: 

Start by choosing a timeframe. For instance, you could write to your 15-year-old self, 20-year-old self, or 50-year-old self—it’s completely up to you. Then, create a bubble map to help yourself recall what life was like at that time. You can include your interests, priorities, major life events or anything else. 

Finally, write a letter to your younger self, including topics such as where you are today versus where you were then, things you’re excited to tell them, things you want to change and things you’re planning on doing in the future. 

Why It’s Effective: This prompt can help you understand who you were in the past, get a clearer idea of who you are now and stay true to yourself going forward. It can also help you appreciate all you’ve accomplished and recognize how many things have changed (and how many have stayed the same). 

Take the Class: In the class “Writing for Self-Discovery: 6 Journaling Prompts for Gratitude and Growth,” you’ll learn how to cultivate joy, work through regret, redefine your idea of success and more, all with the help and guidance of wellness expert Yasmine Cheyenne. 

Contemplate a Defining Moment

Prompt Idea: Reflect on a defining moment in your life.

How to Use This Prompt:

Brainstorm a few instances in your life that you think qualify as defining moments. Pick one to explore on a deeper level.

Next, write about that moment in more detail. Note your mindset at the time, the events preceding it and the impact it had on you.

Then, try to articulate why that moment was a defining one and describe any ways in which that moment still affects you today.

Why It’s Effective: This prompt offers you a chance to reflect on some of the most pivotal moments in your life, examine their impact and see how they may still be affecting you to this day.

Pinpoint Your Values

Prompt Idea: List your most important values and explain why they matter to you.

How to Use This Prompt:

Make a list of your top five values. These could include things like loyalty, freedom, family, self-expression and spirituality, among many others.

Consider each value and explain how it influences the choices you make, whether those choices are big or small.

For instance, if self-expression is one of your values, you could describe how you strive to express yourself and what self-expression means to you. 

Why It’s Effective: Determining your core values can help you understand what motivates you and remember what's most important to your authentic self.

Recognize Role Models

Prompt Idea: Name your role models and list the qualities you admire in them.

How to Use This Prompt:

Create a list of one or more of the most prominent role models in your life. These role models could be people you looked up to as a child while growing up or now.

Next, describe the qualities they possess that resonate with you. Why are those qualities important to you? Do they relate to your own goals and priorities? Is there anything all your role models have in common?

Why It’s Effective: Identifying the people you look up to can help you realize what you value most in others and gain a clearer idea of the person you want to become.

Take Stock of Past Beliefs

Prompt Idea: List any beliefs or opinions that you used to have but no longer do.

How to Use This Prompt: 

Think about some of the beliefs that used to strongly resonate with you. 

Explain what those beliefs entailed, why you adopted them, when you stopped holding them and what you think made you change your mind. Contemplate what those changes mean about your identity, and consider whether you feel truer to yourself now.

Why It’s Effective: If you're willing to honestly evaluate the changes your beliefs have undergone, you can gain a better understanding of yourself and the ways in which you've evolved over time.

Journal Prompts for Emotional Awareness

Emotional awareness is essential for understanding and managing your feelings in a healthy and productive way. Use these prompts to tune into your emotional patterns and better navigate the highs and lows of life with clarity and composure.

Evaluate Your Current Mood

A journal lying open on a cream-colored tabletop. Both pages have been filled with doodles and handwritten text in various shades of blue, as well as a Polaroid photo, scraps of colorful paper, washi tape, stamps and stickers. A woman’s hands can be seen using a calligraphy pen to add blue-colored text.
In the Skillshare class “Art Journaling for Self-Care: 3 Exercises for Reflection and Growth,” teacher Amanda Rach Lee shows students how to explore their current feelings with a creative and colorful journal entry. 

Prompt Idea: Create a quick and casual journal entry that captures your feelings for the day or week. 

Created By: Amanda Rach Lee

How to Use This Prompt: 

Begin by asking yourself how you feel right now (or today, or this week), and then set aside some space where you can take note of a small accomplishment or thing that makes you happy. 

When Amanda is creating a journal spread, she likes to start with the large features and then fill in the rest. If you want to take a similar approach, create two or three major sections before adding decorations like photos, stickers, doodles or stamps. Then, fill in the blanks with brief reflections and details about your feelings. 

Why It’s Effective: Journaling about your current feelings can help you live in the moment, achieve a more meditative state of mind and learn to be more in-tune with your emotions. And if you’re someone who loves stickers and other stationery supplies but doesn’t know where to use them, this prompt offers a perfect place to start. 

Take the Class: In the class “Art Journaling for Self-Care: 3 Exercises for Reflection and Growth,” you’ll use fun and approachable art journaling exercises to explore how you’re feeling, what you want and who you are. 

Name Frequent Emotions

Prompt Idea: Think about the emotions you most often experience.

How to Use This Prompt:

Name three emotions you experience on a regular basis—for instance, those could be joy, love and anticipation, amusement, anxiety and doubt, or any other combination you can think of.

Then, explain the conditions that create those emotions, and describe how you react to them. Is there anything you'd like to change about your response?

Why It’s Effective: Naming the emotions you experience most often can help you develop deeper emotional awareness, and learning about how you react to them can help you begin to shape your responses in more constructive and positive ways.

Create a Joyous Collage

Prompt Idea: Collect and arrange collage materials that represent things, people and places that bring you joy.

How to Use This Prompt: 

Start sketching things that spark joy in your life, or browse magazines and newspapers to find images and words that elicit a joyful response.

Arrange your clippings and drawings in your journal, and then add captions, doodles and decorations that explain and enhance your joy.

Why It’s Effective: Understanding what makes you happy can help you prioritize the things that truly boost your mood and improve your life.

Examine Your Expression

Prompt idea: Describe how you typically express strong emotions.

How to Use This Prompt: 

Write about the ways in which you express your feelings—whether through words, actions, or internal reflection. For example, maybe you tend to react to anger by yelling, or maybe you typically react to confusion by shutting down and waiting for things to make sense again.

What do you think about the ways you react to your emotions? Are there emotions you find harder to express? What do you like and dislike about your typical methods of expression?

Why It’s Effective: Understanding how you express emotions can help you communicate more effectively, react to your feelings in a healthier way and identify areas where you might need more emotional support.

Journal Prompts for Fostering Creativity and Passion

Whether through casual hobbies or serious artistic endeavors, tapping into your creative energy and passions can bring new meaning and joy to your everyday life. With these prompts, we’ll explore ways in which you can reconnect with your creative instincts and ignite fresh ideas. 

Make a Color Collage

A woman’s hands holding a small notebook open on a white tabletop. The two visible notebook pages have been decorated with a blue-themed collage that includes a photo of the sea under a blue sky, a cut-out sketch of blue flowers, blue scraps of paper and blue doodles.
In the Skillshare class “10-Minute Art Journaling: A 7-Day Challenge to Conquer Artist’s Block,” teacher Ashton Womack arranges photos, sketches and doodles to create a blue-themed collage with beachy vibes. 

Prompt Idea: Use a variety of materials to create a collage around one or two predominant colors. 

Created By: Ashton Womack

How to Use This Prompt: 

If you already know what color you’d like to create your collage around, begin by gathering supplies and collage materials that match it. For instance, if your chosen color is yellow, you could gather yellow tape, markers, pencils, photos, stickers, drawings and magazine clippings. 

Or if you’re not sure what color you want to use but already have a stockpile of collage materials, start by pulling out a few collage materials that resonate with you and identifying the predominant colors within them. 

Next, arrange your collage materials on your journal pages in a way that makes sense to you, then decorate any remaining space with doodles, stickers, handwritten text and anything else you’d like to add. To keep your creativity flowing, try to assemble and finish your collage in about ten minutes or less. 

Why It’s Effective: This prompt helps you learn to make quick artistic choices, gain a deeper appreciation of colors and overcome self-doubt. And by limiting yourself to around ten minutes, you’ll force yourself to stop questioning your decisions and trust your creative intuition. 

Take the Class: In the class “10-Minute Art Journaling: A 7-Day Challenge to Conquer Artist’s Block,” you’ll learn to conquer the always-daunting blank page and discover how to jumpstart your creative process. 

Reflect on Enjoyable Creative Pursuits

Prompt Idea: Think about the creative endeavors you've taken that you enjoyed the most.

How to Use This Prompt:

Write about past (or currently ongoing) creative projects that you've gotten the most enjoyment from, whether that means creative writing exercises, ambitious paintings or anything in between.

Explore why you think those projects resonated with you, and describe how they made you feel. 

Why It’s Effective: This prompt can help you hone in on the creative activities that enrich your life and bring you happiness. And if you're in a creative rut, completing this prompt can lead you to remember what you loved about the creative process to begin with.

Explore a Creative Dream

Prompt Idea: Consider a creative pursuit you want to try (and perhaps have always wanted to try) but haven't.

How to Use This Prompt:

First, identify a creative activity or project you've been curious about but haven’t yet pursued. Then, try to figure out why you haven't taken the plunge. What is holding you back? Is it yourself, logistics, resources or a combination of many factors?

To finish, write about the aspects of that creative pursuit that appeal to you, and make a plan to take the first steps toward trying it.

Why It’s Effective: With this prompt, you'll take the time to think about the creative outlets you want to pursue and identify tangible steps you can take to turn your creative dreams into a reality.

Nail Down Your Inspirations

Prompt Idea: Determine when you feel most inspired and why.

How to Use This Prompt: 

Think about the moments you experience when your creative ideas flow freely, or when you feel the most motivated to create.

Identify any common threads, and make a definitive list of the people, places and circumstances that jumpstart your creativity best.

Why It’s Effective: Getting a clear idea of what inspires you can make it easier to cultivate relationships, environments and habits that send your creativity into overdrive.

Journal Prompts for Achieving Personal Growth

Personal growth is an ongoing journey of learning, self-improvement and evolution. Prompts crafted to help you reflect on your experiences, mindset and challenges can help you identify areas for growth and celebrate the progress you’ve made.

Give Yourself Freedom

A woman’s hands writing on a piece of paper lying on a tiled tabletop. The paper is a worksheet titled ‘Day 3: Journaling for Freedom.’ It instructs students to circle an area in their life where they want more freedom, then write a journal entry that explains how they’ll give themselves that freedom.
In the Skillshare class “Journaling for Grounding & Positivity: A 7-day Practice with Cello Meditation Music,” teacher The Wong Janice shows students how to give themselves more freedom through the power of journaling. 

Prompt Idea: Identify an area of your life in which you wish to have more freedom, then make a plan for giving yourself the freedom you crave. 

Created By: The Wong Janice

How to Use This Prompt:

First, consider the eight different aspects of life: career and work, finances and wealth, love and relationships, fun and entertainment, family and friends, health and fitness, personal and spiritual development, and physical environment. 

Choose an aspect in which you want to have more freedom, and in your journal complete the sentence “I allow myself to…”. For example, if you choose the health and fitness aspect of life, you might write a sentence like “I allow myself to make time for exercise I think is fun.”

Finally, write down a concrete step you can take to give yourself that freedom. Using the example above, that could be something like “I will take the trampoline workout class I’ve been curious about for months.”

Why It’s Effective: This prompt is an incredible tool for identifying areas in your life where you might be holding yourself back from reaching your full potential. 

Take the Class: In the class “Journaling for Grounding & Positivity: A 7-day Practice with Cello Meditation Music,” The Wong Janice will guide you through seven days of unique and thought-provoking journaling exercises, all against an enchanting backdrop of ambient cello music. 

Learn From Failure

Prompt Idea: Describe a time in which you failed to reach your goal, and contemplate what you learned from it.

How to Use This Prompt:

Think about a time when you set out to achieve a certain goal or result but failed to do so.

Write about the circumstances surrounding your failure and the factors that contributed to it. Then, reflect on your response to failing and the lessons you learned from it (or can learn from it in retrospect).

Why It’s Effective: This prompt can spur you to shift your focus from failure to growth, and may help you view setbacks as opportunities for learning and improvement.

Celebrate a New Skill

Prompt Idea: Describe a skill you've recently learned or improved upon.

How to Use This Prompt:

Write about a skill you’ve learned or improved upon. It could be as small as learning how to cut an onion more efficiently or as significant as mastering a gourmet cooking technique.

Reflect on the process of learning the skill, and detail how it's contributed to your personal or professional growth. Also, think about how learning something new has made you feel.

Why It’s Effective: Recognizing and celebrating the effort you put into learning new things helps you to appreciate ongoing personal development, give yourself credit for your creative efforts and motivate yourself to continue learning.

Rejoice in an Achievement

Prompt Idea:  Describe or draw a recent achievement, and explain what it means to you.

How to Use This Prompt: 

Skillshare teacher Amanda Rach Lee touched on this idea in the class featured above, but it's so impactful it warrants mentioning again.

For this prompt, write about (or draw, or paint) something you’ve accomplished recently, no matter how big or small. It could be anything at all, from successfully baking your first loaf of sourdough bread to landing a big promotion to finally ticking all the items off your to-do list.

Reflect on the effort you put in to achieve it, how it felt to succeed and why you're proud of yourself.

Why It’s Effective: Celebrating achievements builds self-confidence, clarifies your priorities and reinforces a positive mindset for future growth. 

Take Charge of Challenges

Prompt Idea: Explain how you typically approach challenges.

How to Use This Prompt: 

Reflect on your problem-solving methods when faced with a challenge. Do you approach it with optimism, determination, doubt or hesitation? Do you tend to ask for help or try to overcome every challenge alone? Are you happy with the way you tackle challenges?

After answering those questions, write about what your answers reveal about your mindset.

Why It’s Effective: Getting a better understanding of how you instinctively approach obstacles can help you adopt more effective strategies for both problem-solving and personal growth.

Journal Prompts for Envisioning Your Future and Finding Your Purpose

Envisioning your future and discovering your purpose can help you build a life that's aligned with your deepest aspirations. Here, we’ll explore prompts that invite you to imagine your future, define your life’s purpose and identify the steps you can take to make your dreams come true.

Draw What You Want

A woman’s hands drawing on a piece of paper lying on a brown wooden tabletop. The paper is titled ‘What I Want’ and has four illustrations on it, each in its own box. One says ‘a good nap’ and depicts a woman laying in bed, one says ‘a home in Philly’ and depicts two dogs in front of steps and a door, one says ‘a glass of wine’ and depicts a glass of wine on a table, and one depicts a disco ball.
In the Skillshare class “Visual Journaling: Drawing Your Feelings,” teacher Jordan Sondler draws four illustrations that capture what she wants in the moment. 

Prompt Idea: Draw the things you want either now or in the future. 

Created By: Jordan Sondler

How to Use This Prompt:

Think about what you want, whether that means the things you want this second, this week, this year or this decade. 

Next, pick one of those things and begin drawing it. It can be a material object, a feeling, an event or an accomplishment—whatever feels right to you. You can be as abstract or realistic as you want, and you can focus on things that are easily attainable, difficult to achieve and everything in between. 

Why It’s Effective: This prompt is valuable not just because it can help you learn more about yourself and what you want but also because it can help you get motivated to achieve your goals. 

Take the Class: In the class “Visual Journaling: Drawing Your Feelings,” you’ll learn about the importance of visual journaling, along with how to create artistic representations of your inspirations, dislikes, desires and fears. 

Form a Goal

Prompt Idea: Define a goal you want to achieve within the next year.

How to Use This Prompt:

Identify a personal, professional or creative goal you want to accomplish within the next 12 months, whether it's taking more time for yourself, learning something that benefits your career or pursuing a new creative hobby.

Why is that goal important to you? What steps can you realistically take to achieve it?

Why It’s Effective: This prompt helps you gain a clearer sense of your priorities and encourages you to create an actionable plan to move toward your aspirations in a timely manner.

Imagine Your Legacy

Prompt Idea: Describe the kind of legacy you want to leave behind.

How to Use This Prompt:

Reflect on the impact you want to have on the world, your family, or your community. How do you want to be remembered, and who do you want to remember you?

Writing a letter to one of your future descendants or making a list of items that you'd like to include in a personal time capsule may help you organize your thoughts.

Why It’s Effective: Thinking about your legacy and how you'll be remembered can help you align your actions and decisions with a greater sense of purpose.

Draw Your Future

Prompt Idea: Sketch yourself and your surroundings as you imagine they'll be in five years' time.

How to Use This Prompt:

Visualize your life five years from now and make a sketch that depicts it. Be sure to include sketches of your surroundings, your activities and your appearance.

Write captions and notes to add more detail and context to your drawing as needed. If you're not a proficient artist, don't worry—what matters most is the future your drawing represents, not realism. 

Why It’s Effective: This prompt will help you visualize long-term goals and get a clearer idea of the future you want for yourself.

Find Your Creative Spark with Skillshare Classes

Journaling is a transformative tool for self-discovery, and provides a safe space where you can explore your identity, emotions, creativity and aspirations. By engaging with the 22 prompts provided here, you can not only foster self-awareness but also set yourself up for meaningful personal growth.

To deepen your learning and expand on these reflections, explore the many Skillshare classes that focus on journaling, mindfulness and creative self-expression. With the help of expert teachers and a class full of like-minded students, you can get practical guidance, find new inspiration and make journaling a consistent and impactful part of your life.

Not sure where to start? Here are some classes we think you’ll love: 

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Written By
Carrie Buchholz

Carrie Buchholz

Carrie Buchholz is a freelance writer who lives in Northern Colorado with her husband and dog.

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