20 Best Guided Journals To Become Your Best Self
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I’ve been a fan of journaling ever since I was a young girl—whether it was writing in my diary about my day, thoughts about my crush, how my older brother teased me, or all of the angsty details of my teenage life. Now that I’m older, I’ve continued to journal and have seen how my process has changed: spilling my emotions onto paper, recording a daily mood scale, answering helpful journal prompts for a more focused entry, and discovering a guided journal to add to my morning routine. Although my writing style has fluctuated over the years, there is one thing that has stayed constant—I always feel better after journaling my thoughts, feelings, and emotions.
I’ve typically used a journal with lined, blank pages, but I’ve also recently discovered just how using a guided journal can enhance my practice. Unlike a freestyle journal method, they provide a deeper reflection with questions that you may not think of on your own.
What Are The Benefits Of Using A Guided Journal?
Whether or not you think that you need extra while journaling, there are many benefits to using a guided journal. From the organized pages, daily prompts, and intuitive questions, these journals can bring value to your self-care practice, and by simply writing your thoughts onto paper, can provide additional health benefits. Health experts share that writing in a journal for at least five minutes regularly can also positively impact your mental health in these ways:
Reduce stress
Relieve anxiety
Improve mood
Calm your mind and body
Help problem solve
Create a better understanding of yourself
20 Guided Journals to Help You Become Your Best Self
There are many different types of journals that can help you focus and also offer the guidance that you’re looking for. From mindfulness journals to ones that help with relieving anxiety, we rounded up some of the best guided journals to help you be your best self!
Price Reference (average price):
$ | Under $15
$$ | Between $15-$25
$$$ | More than $25
Guided Journals
Image: Amazon
Becoming: A Guided Journal for Discovering Your Voice
Michelle Obama
Price: $
Created by Michelle Obama, this guided journal accompanies her New York Times Best Seller, Becoming, and includes daily prompts influenced by quotes from her famous book. It is meant to offer guidance and allow you a space to write all of your thoughts and experiences without judgment. It’s intended to help the writer capture their voice and lead to more self-acceptance and authenticity. This is one of the top-selling guided journals, too!
Image: Urban Outfitters
5 Minute Journal
Intelligent Change
Price: $$$
If you’re new to journaling or would like to add something quick to your self-care practice, this is the journal for you. Each page has five simple questions to help you think from a place of gratitude and provides space for a simple answer in a few lines. These questions will take at least 5 minutes (or however long you want), but can help to start each day fresh.
Image: Etsy
More Than Gratitude
Paige Tate And Co
Price: $$
Created by a small business, this 100-day guided journal will help you create a more positive mindset with gratitude prompts for short, sweet journal entries. After it’s completed, you can look back and see how you feel and the progress that you’ve made over a series of 100 days.
21-Day Self-Reflection Growth Journal
Swift Wellness
Price: $
We suggest our 21-Day Self-Reflection journal to help you create a healthy habit of journaling. Along with building your journaling skills, the guided prompts and inspirational quotes will help you practice achieving your goals, clearing your mind, and feeling ready for the day ahead. You can easily download it to your tablet or print it out.
Image: Etsy
Girls Like Honey
The Writing Shop Co.
Price: $$
This 90-day journal highlights the experience of Black/Latina women. It is meant to build self-awareness and includes questions that can reveal behaviors that may be helping or sabotaging you and your well-being. Your unique story can be revealed, especially when writing in this journal regularly.
Journals For Mindfulness
Image: Amazon
Dwell: A Journal for Naming, Processing, & Embracing Your Emotions
Devon Loftus
Price: $$
Explore and build a better connection to your emotions with this guided journal. Developed by creative writing teacher and licensed psychologist, Devon Loftus, it guides writers to name and explore all of their emotions—joy, anger, contentment, and all others that we encompass. It also includes essays to inspire creativity and help you answer the questions more openly. This could be a great journal to accompany a freeform one—the best of both worlds!
Image: Amazon
Self Love: Workbook For Women
Megan Logan, MSW, LCSW
Price: $
This journal is catered to women and to help you love yourself more! At Swift, we know that self-love is a process, and there are so many ways to learn how to love yourself, even if that includes using a guided journal. Release self-doubt and practice more self-love from special questionnaires and guided prompts that encourage you to discover that there is more to love about yourself. This workbook has thousands of positive reviews that share how helpful it was to use and how they wanted to write in it consistently!
Image: Amazon
Daily Gratitude Journal
Taja
Price: $$
A gratitude journal that only takes 5 minutes a day, it has the same format as the Five Minute Journal on this list, making it a great one to consider if you are looking for a quick journal routine. It also includes cute graphic stickers to help you feel more organized and answer some of the prompts! This journal has also been proven to improve mood and enhance positive well-being.
Image: Amazon
Calm: A Day & Night Reflection Journal
Insight Editions
Price: $$
Relieve stress and feel calmer with this special journal. This 90-day reflection journal can be a tool to learn more about your stressors and help you boost your well-being. Each page inspires mindfulness by recording your daily mood and activities for the present day, then provides some additional space to write about your evening. Start and end your day calmly and with more peace of mind.
Image: Amazon
Awaken: 90-Day Mindfulness Journal
Isabella AVila
Price: $$
A deeply intuitive guided journal that is meant to aid your personal growth and well-being. If you’re new to journaling, I would suggest starting first with another one from this list, but for avid writers, this journal can lead to enhanced sleep, focus, self-awareness, and productivity. Through daily use, it is meant to cultivate more mindfulness, clarity, and help uncover our own hidden emotions and desires. Over the 90 days, you will learn more about yourself and cultivate self-acceptance.
Journals For Mental Health
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52-Week Mental Health Journal
Cynthia Catchings, LCSW-s, LCSW-C, MSSW
Price: $$
Created by licensed psychologists, this journal will track your mental health journey throughout an entire year! It includes effective prompts, developed from evidence-based methods, to achieve a healthier well-being and offers inspiring quotes from philosophers and artists throughout for some extra food for thought. This guided journal for mental health is very well-rounded and will help you reap many benefits!
Image: Urban Outfitters
One Question A Day For Finding Calm
Aimee Chase
Price: $$
Start a journal that is meant to record three years of your life with only one question a day. Ideal to make your mind think in new ways, each question requires you to pause and unwind, starting or ending your day with easy reflection and a breath of fresh air. This journal would be interesting to look back on once completed, too!
Image: Nordstrom
Body Love
ROsebud Woman
Price: $$
A unique guided journal that helps build a healthier relationship with your whole body! This 6-week daily journal includes memorable quotes, thoughtful questions, and checklists for self-care to establish a regular writing routine. Show gratitude to your body through words of affirmation!
Image: Amazon
Let That Sh*t Go
Monica Sweeney
Price: $
Here is a best-selling guided notebook that social media loves to rave about! This journal motivates you to reduce negativity, build trust, and help you focus on living a happier life. With over 120 pages to fill including journal prompts, the wording might be direct (and a little sarcastic), but overall, this journal will be a fun writing companion that will make you feel better with every entry.
Image: Amazon
Zen As F*ck
Monica Sweeney
Price: $
This sister-journal to Let That Sh*t Go takes a slightly different approach to living a more zen and peaceful life. It is filled with positive affirmations and writing activities that inspire you to release what’s no longer serving you. Every entry is meant to teach you a new way to practice living life with less stress by taking care of your mind, body, and soul.
Image: Amazon
Mental Health Check-In Journal
Taylor M. Ham, LMFT
Price: $
Boost your self-care and overall mental health with this journal. The style of this workbook is more analytical with 70 days worth of prompts, check-ins, and questions to observe your mind to understand what behaviors work (and don’t work) for you!
Journals For Depression & Anxiety
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Worry for Nothing
Four Progress
Price: $$
If you worry a little too often, then this might be the best-guided journal for you. (I’m certainly one of those people.) Based on Cognitive Behavioral Practices, it offers a worksheet to train your mind to document your worries and stressors and consider a new perspective. Its proven methods equip you with mindful tools to worry less and feel calmer throughout your day, even after completing the journal.
Image: Amazon
No Worries
Bella Mente Press
Price: $
This is a 12-week anxiety and self-care journal that will help you process what’s on your mind and gently re-frame your thoughts. It is meant to help you manage your worries and negative thoughts, then later identify where your anxiety may come from. The journal is designed to use a few minutes each day and help you prioritize your mental health. This “No Worries” journal includes daily journaling pages, self-care ideas, an emotional support cheat sheet, habit trackers, and monthly progress sheets.
Image: Amazon
Out of Your Mind: A Journal & Coloring Book for the Anxious Mind
Dani DiPirro
Price: $
If you feel like you are struggling with anxiety, then this could be the one for you! It incorporates coloring pages to relax and creatively channel your anxiety. However, there are still writing pages with insightful prompts that will make you want to write, color, and doodle, too.
Image: Amazon
The Anxiety Check-In
Bree Cartwright
Price: $
Last, but not least, here is another mental health journal that can help you relieve your anxiety, add a little more structure to your self-care routine, and help you to feel better on your worst days. The journal is filled with simple, honest questions to help sort out all of your thoughts that seem to go on non-stop in your head. While this specific journal is meant to help relieve stressors and build more self-awareness, it’s also a daily tool to remind you that you’re going to be okay.
Being intentional about building a closer relationship with yourself and enhancing your self-care routine is always a good idea. Whatever your preferred journaling style or mental health needs are, a guided journal can bring undiscovered value to your daily life and overall mental well-being.
