A Comic Journaling Exercise to Kickstart Your Day

Try this simple journaling technique for mental health

COMIC JOURNALING

Try this simple journaling technique for mental health

Created by the author.

What do you do to start your day? Exercise, journaling, or nothing special at all? I was in the last category. But I found out that a short reflection on the day ahead strengthens my motivation and the feeling of control over my life. I want to share with you my comic journaling technique for mental health, especially suited for non-artists and anyone looking for a low-effort, high-reward mental practice!

This exercise is divided into two parts. The first part makes you think about positive aspects of your day that you are looking forward to, and the second part makes you tackle the tasks you are not looking forward to doing today. By using the power of visualization, the objective of this exercise is to make you see that you are ready to kickstart your day, with the ability to deal with all the different tasks lying ahead.

What you need for this exercise

The only thing you need is a paper and a pen/pencil, analog or digital — anything works. You can also first read everything and see if you feel like doing it yourself.

All the drawing skills explained

For all non-artists here (artists, feel free to skip to the next section), we will start with a few basic drawing skills you will need. First, try drawing a few facial expressions: happy, sad, worried, or angry. Inspire yourself in my drawings below and feel free to copy my lines. Pay attention to the eyebrow and mouth shape: they are most indicative of the emotions we feel.

Examples of facial expressions (created by the author).

Examples of facial expressions (created by the author).

The last skill is somewhat specific, but you will need it for the second exercise. Practice drawing cute puppy eyes as explained in the image below: You start out with two circles, add two smaller bubbles inside, and color the rest of the circle in black.

Drawing cute puppy eyes (created by the author).

You will also need to draw some stick figures, but I’ll go ahead and assume you know how to do that. If not, feel free to copy my examples. Let’s get into it then!

Exercise 1: What are you looking forward to today?

This exercise trains you to think about the positive aspects of your day. Think about what you are looking forward to experiencing today. Are you going to have a coffee break with your partner or a colleague? Or are you expecting a package with a book from your favorite author? Or maybe you can’t wait to watch an episode of that new show later today?

Write this event down and draw an emotional expression that shows how you feel about it. We practiced these expressions above, so feel free to copy one of them.

An expression reflecting my emotional state (created by the author).

You can also draw an aspect of this situation that you are especially looking forward to. For coffee lovers writing about having a coffee break, the coffee itself will be a big part of the enthusiasm.

An aspect I am especially looking forward to (created by the author).

The last part of this exercise, if you can spare some extra time on it, is to draw the whole situation. In the case of a coffee break, this will include you, the crucial object which is coffee, and your friend who might join you. Make sure to pay attention to the facial expressions of your characters, but don’t worry about the overall look. This is supposed to be fast and dirty sketching.

A situation I am looking forward to today (created by the author).

Exercise 2: What are you NOT looking forward to today?

Is there a task you dread or really don’t feel like doing today, but you know you have to? If not, then great, skip this part and feel grateful for the amazing things from the first exercise. But if you do, as is often the case with me, write down what you are not looking forward to and visualize it.

Once you have identified the dreadful task/event/thing, think of it as a geometrical shape. You can go crazy with the shape here, it doesn’t have to be exactly geometrical (see my example below). The second step is to give it a nickname, which can be funny, endearing, or reflect how it makes you feel. In the image below I called the task of preparing a presentation a “Presio.” From now on I will refer to the dreadful task/event/thing as Presio.

Your dreaded task as a shape (created by the author).

Now draw yourself as a stick figure with your Presio right next to you (see the image below). Don’t worry if the shape doesn’t look the same as in the last picture — it’s good to let Presio’s shape change in each picture. In the end, you might notice that how you drew it reflects the change in your attitude toward this problem.

Make a speech bubble talking to Presio and explaining why you don’t feel like doing it. In my case with Presio there would be many reasons: I could be doing something so much more fun than a boring presentation, no one will even care how well I do it in the end, etc. These reasons might require more speech bubbles on the sides or even a longer text — don’t shy away from writing down everything that comes to your mind.

Talking to the task: Why don’t you like it? (created by the author).

Now comes the crucial part: Draw your version of Presio again, but this time with the cute eyes we practiced in the beginning (see my image below). You can draw the eyes as big as you want: the bigger they are, the cuter they will be. Let your Presio say in a speech bubble why he* might think that he is in fact an interesting and useful task. If you are unsure what these reasons might be, let your imagination go wild here. What are some of the positive consequences of doing this task?

*I decided my Presio is of male gender here, but you can choose any gender you want.

In the case of Presio, he would say that he is interesting because by doing a presentation, you get to learn a lot about cool new topics. He is also useful because you learn how to summarize complex information and present it in front of other people. These are highly valued skills in our society, he reminds me. In the end, Presio is there to help me get better at what I do!

“Presio” explaining why he might be useful after all (created by the author).

Now it’s up to you to react to this. Did you believe any of Presio’s (or whatever your task is called) reasons? Did the cute eyes make you more sympathetic to his cause to teach you how to be a better presenter and a knowledgable person? Even if you are not 100% convinced, I’m sure you are a bit closer to seeing his side of the story.

Finish up by drawing a facial expression that reflects your emotional state right now. You can also add a speech bubble expressing your thoughts after this exercise. At this point, you might be able to identify additional reasons for tackling the issue we have been working on — add them in your speech bubble this time.

Draw how you fell in the end (created by the author).

If you are still on the fence, just remember the first exercise: there is something to look forward to today.

And feel free to check out my other two articles about other ways to apply comic journaling to mental health.

Comic Journaling for Mental Health
Did you know that making comics can make you feel better?medium.com

How to Reason With Your Emotions Through Comic Journaling
Beat procrastination and other struggles through humor and visualizationmedium.com

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