12 Psychedelic Journaling Tips
Key Takeaways:
Journaling can help you process your personal and therapeutic insights from a psychedelic journey.
We offer these tips so you can enhance your psychedelic journaling and build tools for reflection. Simple things go a long way, like setting aside technology and using the right notebook.
It’s best practice to begin journaling before the journey, but it’s never too late to get started. In fact, the most important thing is to start journaling today.
“Spend some time away,
Getting ready for the day you're born again.”
- Mac Demarco, Chamber of Reflection
The word “psychedelic” means “mind-manifesting” or “soul-revealing”. When we use these plants, we can look deep into ourselves. We can see our minds and hearts more vividly, and understand why we think and feel the ways we do.
Eventually, the effects wear off.
When we return to “normal” life, things might be different. Perhaps we feel gratitude and contentment. Maybe confusion and consternation.
Whether we’re overflowing with joy or suffering, how do we make sense of this?
One of the best ways to fully process psychedelic experiences is to journal, to write what we think, feel, imagine, and desire.
When we sift through our joys and sorrows in this way, we can make sense of our psychedelic insights and create meaningful change for ourselves.
Psychedelic Journaling Tips
You don’t have to be a skilled writer or a meditation guru to engage in psychedelic journaling. In fact, all you really need is a pen, paper, and curiosity.
These twelve tips show you how:
1. Start Today
Get started right away. Grab a pen and paper (see tip #2) and write down whatever is on your mind.
You can write about a previous experience or something upcoming or just your general thoughts when it comes to “psychedelics”. Do this today!
2. Use Pen & Paper
Most psychedelic experiences ground people in the present moment and the real world. That’s a good thing. Lean into this by using a physical pen and physical paper.
We highly recommend getting a specific notebook for journaling. If you can use one specifically for psychedelic insights or use your general “life”.
Note: Read all the way to Tip #12 for the best type of psychedelic journal to use.
3. Make It Messy
Write whatever is on your mind without judgment. There are no mistakes, except to not write authentically.
Spelling? Who kares?
Grammar? Not important hear.
No one needs to see this but you, and anyone you do share with shouldn’t care (see Tip #9 about sharing with others).
Make it messy! Let your stream of conscious flow and gently shoo away your internal writing critic if it pops up.
4. Limit Technology
Journal with just you, your writing tools, and warm lighting.
When it comes to psychedelics, technology is rarely your friend. Compare an experience on your couch, eating pizza to one out in nature, staring at plants - there’s really no comparison at all.
Silence your phone and eliminate unnecessary technology - TV, social media - for your psychedelic journaling. Music can be very helpful, but set it at the start and forget it until you close the notebook.
5. Build Muscle
If you can, journal before a psychedelic experience. This will help you build your mindfulness muscles so you are ready for action. Writing helps you sift through your intentions, priming your brain and body for a meaningful trip.
When we’re in good “journaling shape”, reflective practices are like second nature, making psychedelic aftercare/integration an enjoyable process.
6. Explore Healing Modalities
Try to write about how psychedelics affect you.
How do psychedelics affect us? Depends on whom you ask. Consider the following and see if they spark inspiration:
Inner Healer: We move naturally towards healing and growth, but obstacles get in our way. Psychedelics remove these things, like limiting beliefs and bad habits, and they unburden our innate healing capacities.
Reset: Psychedelics help people who feel stuck. They free us up to think, feel, and behave differently. Speaking scientifically, psychedelics promote neuroplasticity and neurogenesis - the creation of new neural pathways in the brain. If humans had a “reset” button, psychedelics would be the closest thing to it.
Play Time: When children play, they explore. They can try on new clothes, pretend to be new people, create worlds of fantasy. Psychedelics do something similar for adults: they alter our consciousness and bend the rules of reality. Then we - much like children - return to our normal lives with a new experience, perhaps having learned something and grown.
Openness, Awareness, Compassion: Psychedelics promote “OAC” and these things help us live more full lives. When we’re Open, we accept what life offers and stay curious about experiences. With Awareness, we experience clarity and connection with one’s intuition. When we’re Compassionate, we cultivate grace and love, for others and ourselves.
Think about one of these ideas the next time you go to journal and write whatever comes up for you. Revisit some psychedelic integration journaling prompts (Tip #10) if you need more structure.
7. Combine Journaling + Mindfulness
Before you journal, try doing a mindfulness activity. We write best when we’re in a good mindset - a mindset of openness, awareness, and compassion. And mindfulness can get us to that headspace. Here are a few activity suggestions:
Meditate (breathing, body scan, visualization, gratitude)
Stretch
Do yoga
Walk
Spend time in nature
Try the mindfulness + journal combo with an activity you already enjoy. For example, if you know five minute walks help you feel calm, give that a go before your next journaling session.
8. Combine Journaling + Psychoactive Plants
Enhance the writing experience with a supportive plant or herbal supplement, like kava, blue lily, kanna, or kratom. Maddie occasionally drinks kava before journaling sessions and shared this with us:
“I use kava because it helps me get fully relaxed. I usually prepare kava, set an intention for the evening, drink it, and turn on some music before sitting down to write. With kava I feel like I can connect with my emotions and let my mind and heart flow on the pages.”
9. Share With Others
“Happiness is only real when shared"
- Christopher McCandless, Into the Wild
Modern life is hard. Love and care from others makes it easier. We encourage psychedelic journal-ers to share their experience with others, as appropriate. Perhaps, you don’t tell everyone everything, but is there someone in your life who can hear and support you?
There are important considerations you should make about WHAT you share and with WHOM you share. Check out our piece on how to talk to friends and family members about psychedelics for more ideas.
10. Use Specific Prompts
Earlier in Tip #6, we asked you to think generally about psychedelic healing concepts (e.g., inner healer, psychedelics as a reset).
If that worked, great! If it didn’t, sorry we missed the mark, but try this out:
Use specific journaling prompts to guide your writing, especially if you’re feeling stuck or unmotivated. Here are a few sample prompts from our Psychedelic Integration Journaling Prompts article:
Before
What areas of your life do you want to address?
Consider openness, awareness, and compassion. Which stands out as an important idea to bring into your journey?
Same Day
What key ideas, feelings, or energies stand out to you?
Imagine you can “talk” to the psychedelic experience directly. What does this conversation look like?
After:
What might seem difficult, yet important to do?
Fill this in: “I feel that ____________ is most important to me at this time.”
11. Set A Timer
Set aside dedicated time to journal with a timer. Five minutes? 15? 50?!
If you’re feeling some resistance to journaling, go with a smaller time block. Put the activity into something manageable, bite-sized. When the timer goes off, hooray you’re done! Of course, you can continue if you’d like, but great job today. Set another timer tomorrow.
If you’re eager and enthusiastic, you may encounter the opposite problem of getting started: stopping! Your drive is a great thing, but you don’t want to burn yourself out with a one or two lengthy sessions and fail to come back the next day. A timer can be a nice gentle reminder that you’ve set the time you set aside - your mind, heart, and fingers could use a break now and you can always return later.
12. Use A Spiral Bound Journal
Imagine: You follow all eleven tips. You finally sit down to journal, you grab your pen and open your notepad to discover an obnoxious new barrier: it’s hard to physically write in your journal.
Maybe the notebook is stiff, so you try to bend it and fold it, but it feels weird.
Maybe the pages flip on you, so you try paperweights, but they get in the way of your writing hand. This notebook ain’t working.
Solution: Use a spiral bound journal. You can write on the go; you can flip pages with ease; you can write without needing to back tension from another page. Spiral bound solves so many problems, and you deserve as little friction as possible.
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Psychedelic journaling can be a beautiful, supportive process To build an effective practice, consider the practical and therapeutic tips in this guide and get started right away.
If you’re still unsure, book a call with us and we’ll lend a hand.
