Writing 3 EXAMPLE: OF JOURNAL ENTRY 1 AND 2

Journal entry 1

While undertaking preliminary discussions as a group we came to realise there were two factors having a large impact on our lives. These were stress and busyness. This finding for our group correlated highly with what has been publicised in the media many times before, which is between work, family, hobbies and our social lives, we (Australians) are leading busier, stressful and faster lifestyles than ever before (Strazdins & Loughrey, 2007; Wells, 2019). We knew as a group any intervention we chose would need to be time efficient and easy to administer so as to not add anymore to our already on the go and busy lives.

Over the years, research has suggested Positive Psychology Interventions (PPIs) can be effective in increasing and enhancing wellbeing, as well as decreasing depressive symptoms (Bolier et al, 2013; Sin & Lyubomirsky 2009). Mindfulness is both a widely and commonly implemented Positive Psychology Intervention (PPI). While there are a variety of mindfulness based interventions which can be implemented either formally (mediation, yoga, breathe-work) or informally (colouring, day to day activities), all share the common aim of allowing the participant to mindfully pay “attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally” (Black, 2011; Zhang et al, 2021).

After completing preliminary research and discussions we decided as a group to choose mindful colouring thus we have now, at the time of writing this journal, completed approximately 1.5 weeks of our 3 week intervention. We thought choosing mindful colouring would keep the intervention simple enough for us to administer at home (we didn’t need anything that wasn’t already in our possessions; paper and pencils) as well as not adding extra stress into our already busy lives. As discovered through research there are many known benefits of implementing a mindful colouring intervention. While ease, accessibility and convenience are three of those known benefits, providing a person with a sense of calmness and ease, a sense of purpose and improving levels of stress and anxiety are all benefits which cannot be overlooked (Carruthers and Hood, 2011; Czerwinski, et al. 2020; Dresler & Perera, 2019).

As stated above we are now in the middle of our intervention. While I feel like there have been times where I have been able to use mindful colouring to destress before going to bed, I have seen in myself no significant changes to what our group was aiming to achieve in implementing the intervention interns of a reduction in my stress and anxiety. I have noticed however when colouring at times I have been frustrated with the lack of colouring I have achieved in our agreed upon time (10 minutes) and the annoyance in needing to colour smaller areas of a picture, this clearly going against what it is we are setting out to achieve in terms of increasing our mindfulness and decreasing our stress.

I cannot argue the mindful colouring intervention can be fun and simplistic to do and costs nothing if you have all the necessary materials to get started. While I, at this time, don’t feel the intervention is or will be beneficial to me, I have enjoyed at times participating in the intervention and used in the right way for the right people, I would recommend it. As I am currently a school teacher the known benefits mindful colouring has for school students is something which cannot be ignored, and I believe this will be something I will implement into my practice for term four and beyond. I am eager to see where the next 1.5 weeks goes and to see whether undertaking the intervention has in fact impacted my pre-test results in any way. 

References

Black, D. S. (2011). A brief definition of mindfulness. 
Behavioral Neuroscience, 7(2), 109. 

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.362.6829&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Boiler, L., Haverman, M., Westerhof, G.J., Riper, H., Smit, F., & Bohlmeijer, E. (2013). Positive psychology interventions: A meta-analysis of randomised controlled studies. 
BMC Public Health, 13(119). 

https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-13-119

Carruthers, C. P., & Hood, C. D. (2011). Mindfulness and well-being: Implications for TR practice. 
Therapeutic Recreation Journal 45(3), 171–189.

Czerwinski, N. Egan, H. Cook, A. & Mantzio, M. (2020). Teachers and mindful colouring to tackle burnout and increase mindfulness, resiliency and wellbeing. 
Contemporary School of Psychology.

 https://doi.org/10.1007/s40688-020-00279-9

Dresler, E. and Perera, P. (2019). ‘Doing mindful colouring’: just a leisure activity or something more? 
Leisure Studies 38(6), 862-874

 https://doi.org/10.1080/02614367.2019.1583765

Sin, N. L., & Lyubomirsky, S. (2009). Enhancing well-being and alleviating depressive symptoms with positive psychology interventions: A practice-friendly meta-analysis. 
Journal of Clinical Psychology, 65(5), 467-487. 

http://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.20593

Strazdins, L., & Loughrey, B. (2007). Too busy: why time is a health and environmental problem. 
NSW Public Health Bulletin, 18, 11-12. 

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18093462/

Wells, R. (2019, June 04). We’re so addicted to being busy, Australians are becoming ‘rest resistant’. 
The Sydney Morning Herald. 

https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/life-and-relationships/we-re-so-addicted-to-being-busy-australians-are-becoming-rest-resistant-20190602-p51tqx.html

Zhang, W., Lee, E. K. P., Mak, E. C. W., Ho, C. Y., & Wong, S. Y. S. (2021). Mindfulness-based interventions: an overall review. 
British Medical Bulletin, 138(1), 41-57. 

https://doi.org/10.1093/bmb/ldab005

Journal entry 2

This final reflection is written nearly 2 weeks post mindful colouring intervention. As stated in my previous reflection, we (Australians) pride ourselves on how much we work, often using this as a way to ‘do’ rather than give ourselves the opportunity to just ‘be’ with ourselves, our minds, our body’s, our thoughts and feelings. In my own therapy my therapist uses a model called Internal Family Systems (IFS), a model founded by Richard Schwartz which was developed as an approach after ‘listening to people in therapy speak about inner parts within themselves’ (GoodTherapy, 2018). Within applying and using this model, I have learnt we all have a ‘SELF’ but many parts which are separated into three distinct types, managers, firefighters and exiles. Between working full time, studying and running two business I am aware, work is one of my ‘firefighters’, used as a way to distract ‘the mind when exiles break free from suppression… and protect the consciousness from feeling the pain’ associated with the exiles (GoodTherapy, 2018). Because of this, I found trying to be with myself for the ten minutes exceptionally hard at times, as it gave me more time to be with the thoughts and feelings I work hard to keep exiled.

I am absolutely proud of myself for undertaking and completing the intervention. For me personally, I have always found implementing something therapeutic or ‘un-structured’ to be a hard task and have often fallen off the wagon early when doing something, especially when it is ‘unsupported’ and self-administered. I went into this self-administered PPI skeptical it would have no impact on post-test scores or life as well as with the thought of me simply not maintaining the ten minutes of mindful colouring a day. To my surprise and through much frustration and annoyance at times, I managed to colour every day despite whether or not I wanted to. I have a big fear of failing and disappointing others, and as I knew this was a group assessment this certainly played into ensuring me continuing to implement and finish the intervention. I did find it difficult at times to maintain the ten minutes due to increased fluctuations with my mental health and often wonder how a self-administered intervention like this would work for those with long-standing mental illnesses or health issues, for an extended period of time and the benefits of this, as it is often found people with long standing mental illness are more difficult to engage in ongoing treatment or interventions and have high dropout rates (Dixon, Holoshitz & Nossel, 2016).

As first thought, my post-test results did not change significantly at the end of the implementation of the self-administered intervention. Surprisingly my anxiety levels on my post-test scores were significantly higher than what they originally were. My results did not support our hypothesis/aim or support findings from various studies as mentioned in journal one. I did notice however, during the intervention (specifically when colouring) I was able to focus on only one intrusive thought and follow the thought the whole way through rather than bouncing from intrusive thought to intrusive thought which is what I often do.

Unfortunately the majority of studies completed on mindful colouring involve its affects on stress and anxiety. In the future, more studies focusing on depression need to be considered/administered as we found our results (as a group) to be more inline with its impact on depression as opposed to anxiety and stress. Even though I don’t feel I had success with the implantation of the mindful colouring intervention, I still feel the intervention used at the right time on the right person would be beneficial and show positive results correlating to those found in previous studies.

References

Dixon, L. B., Holoshitz, Y., & Nossel, I. (2016). Treatment engagement of individuals experience mental illness: review and update. 
World Psychiatry, 15(1), 13-20. 

http://doi.org/10.1002/wps.20306

GoodTherapy. (2018). 
Internal Family Systems. 

https://www.goodtherapy.org/learn-about-therapy/types/internal-family-systems-therapy