The Best Gratitude Journals to Help You Get Out of a Funk

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Getting your thoughts down on a page may sound simple, but you can potentially gain a lot of mental-health benefits by practicing it regularly. Journals are great stress-reduction tools, and they're recommended by many therapists for helping to make sense of your thoughts and feelings. Gratitude journals take things a step further by focusing on mindfulness, reflection, and yes, counting your blessings. Don’t know where to start? As Dr. Bryan E. Robinson, author and psychotherapist tells Best Products, “"Ask not how life is treating you. Ask how you are treating life." That mindset shift is all you need to begin practicing gratitude.

But if it still feels intimidating, picking up a gratitude journal is a great place to start. A dedicated gratitude journal with fill-in prompts can make sticking to the practice even easier.

The Best Gratitude Journals

• Best Overall: The 5-Minute Gratitude Journal: Give Thanks, Practice Positivity, Find Joy

• Best For A.M. and P.M. Check-Ins: Papier Little Daily Thanks Gratitude Journal

• Simplest Format: CreateSpace Good Days Start With Gratitude Journal

• Best For a Meditative Mindset: Mandala Publishing Gratitude: A Day and Night Reflection Journal

• For Gratitude on the Go: Clever Fox Undated Planner

Why Gratitude Journaling Is Important

Gratitude journals are, in part, geared toward cultivating a reflective and more resilient mindset toward the experiences of our day-to-day lives. Because humans tend to have a strong negativity bias that makes us focus on the bad, a gratitude journal can help guide you toward reframing events in a neutral or even more positive way. If you struggle with rumination, a gratitude journal can offer an alternate way to process the ups and downs of life.

Because gratitude journals come in all different types and formats, we’ve rounded up a few here and explained how they work so you can choose the one that’s best for you. Whether you want to dive deep into your psyche with reflections and words of affirmation, or just want to spend less than 5 minutes getting your thoughts out, one of these 11 journals will be a great guides for you.

‘The 5-Minute Gratitude Journal: Give Thanks, Practice Positivity, Find Joy’ by Sophia Godkin, Ph.D.

Product Description: The 5-Minute Gratitude Journal is an excellent entry point for anyone who's been wanting to start journaling but doesn't think they have the time. It’s written by psychologist Sophia Goodkin, Ph.D., and offers a streamlined but effective format for daily journaling.

Each undated entry page presents you with four prompts that are all a little bit different. This helps you get into the writing habit while keeping the thought-starters fresh. And instead of making long lists, each prompt typically focuses on just one positive thing at a time. It’s perfect for anyone who might feel overwhelmed at the idea of sticking to a journaling practice because it only requires you to commit five minutes to it.

We’re naming this gratitude journal as the best overall in this guide because of its clean format, straightforward language, and minimal time investment, which feels very compatible with most people’s needs. As one reviewer sums up, “It gets my day started in such a relaxing and positive way.”

More: The Best Goal-Tracking Apps to Start Healthy Habits Anytime

Little Daily Thanks Gratitude Journal

Make gratitude an all-day practice with the Papier Little Daily Thanks Gratitude Journal.

Each page represents a day of the week, letting you check in morning and night with three things that you're grateful for. This gratitude journal also focuses on setting monthly intentions, so you can shift the focus to areas of your life that could use a little more love.

Although this gratitude journal isn't cheap, we really love this hardcover's playful design and high-quality paper stock — plus, it comes with a ribbon bookmark for holding your place.

Good Days Start With Gratitude Journal

Want to keep your gratitude journaling super simple? The Good Days Start With Gratitude journal is the one you should get.

This journal has a two-page weekly layout, offering three lines per day for you to fill in the prompt, “Today I am thankful for...” Each week also greets you with a quote at the very top and wraps up with a prompt for you to list the highlights of your week.

This is one of the best-selling gratitude journals on Amazon, and although some people say that having the same prompt every single day can feel repetitive, others love that it keeps things short and sweet. As one reviewer says, “This gratitude journal is great, especially for the price. I love that it doesn’t take up too much of my time, but it helps me pause for a few minutes each day to reflect and remember all that I have to be grateful for.”

Gratitude: A Day and Night Reflection Journal

If you already make it a point to carve out time to journal or meditate (or both!), let Gratitude: A Day and Night Reflection Journal help guide your thoughts toward thankfulness and emotional regulation.

Each undated, two-page spread provides space for morning and nighttime thoughts, and the prompts are the same throughout the journal. These prompts leave you a bit more space to go long with your answers if you tend to dig in deep.

We also like that each nightly page includes a checklist of different emotions to provide nuance to any day that you might otherwise label as simply “good” or “bad.” As one reviewer says, “Writing in this daily has legitimately helped my mental health... The quality of this is gorgeous and I really love writing in it.”

Undated Planner

How often does a daily planner encourage you to look back at your week? The Clever Fox planner is great for the productivity-minded, but it also leaves plenty of room for setting intentions and celebrating achievements.

This planner is undated for your convenience and features 54 weekly spreads. Your seven days are planned out all on one page with the opposite functioning as a goal-setting hub, keeping to-dos, habit tracking, and monthly priorities at the forefront. It also comes with an elastic closure, inner pocket, pen loop, and six sheets of stickers (!), because why not?

Reviewers who love planning out every area of their life adore the layout and also the quality of this planner, with one person saying, “It’s very sturdy but not stiff... The pages don’t bleed with heavy ink. I take A LOT of notes and I never filled the pages up. And it’s so stinking cute. I really love this planner.”

Today With Intention: A Guided Journal for Reflection, Mindfulness, and Self-Care

Gratitude is an ongoing practice, much like self-care. If making lists isn't your style, and you prefer open-ended prompts that allow you to reflect on today and set yourself up for a successful tomorrow, check out the Today With Intention gratitude journal.

Taking a more holistic approach, it aims to integrate gratitude into the positive mindset that you're trying to cultivate. And even if the prompts are the same throughout, each day builds on the last, helping to build momentum in a healthy direction.

Says one reviewer, “I’m about to purchase my third journal! It gave me stability, allowed me to only focus on the positive parts of my day, set intentions for tomorrow, and provided simple prompts easy to write about in like 5 minutes a day.”

Everything Sucks: A Gratitude Journal for People Who Have Been Through Some Sh*t

We get it: If you’re not used to looking on the bright side, trying to start a gratitude practice can feel a little too “live, laugh, love” for your liking.

So, lean in! Everything Sucks: A Gratitude Journal for People Who Have Been Through Some Sh*t can help you redefine gratitude — with as many F-bombs as you need. This gratitude journal has fun, varied prompts throughout that range from list-making to free-writing, and it focuses not just on what you're grateful for but what makes you feel happy and relaxed.

The language and quotes throughout are raw and real, and that seems to be what resonates the most with reviewers. As one person says, “Loved this journal! It’s not full of irrelevant fluff that I can’t relate to. This one IS me! I love the prompts, feels like questions my friends would actually ask!”

Do It For Yourself (Guided Journal): A Motivational Journal

For some people, it might feel easier to be in touch with gratitude if you can find ways to feel good about yourself and where you’re at in your life. This motivating journal is perfect for reminding you that planting the seeds for success is half the battle. It encourages you to check in with yourself, your intuition, and shares little ways you can start planting the seeds for the life that you want. Along the way, you can reflect on small feelings of gratitude that grow bigger over time.

There are 75 thought-provoking prompts that will help you get in touch with what you want, stop comparing yourself to other people, and stay in touch with gratitude along the way.

Gratitude Journal

Each page features two spaces to write down what you’re grateful for in the morning and the evening of each day. The affirmation at the top of the page is simple, clear, and easy to repeat to yourself a few times out loud or in front of a mirror so you can start each day on a positive note. If you don’t want your gratitude journal to stick out with a kitschy design, this elevated cover look is perfect for you.

If you need even more help turning around your negative thought process, there are easy prompt pages that allow you to write out a situation, your response to it, and space to reframe the thought into a positive action. This will not only help you practice gratitude; but will help quell anxiety and usher in the practice of natural positive thinking.

Hardcover Gratitude Journal

With 368 blank pages divided into three days per page, this journal has the capacity to last you three years. How? At the top of each page is a date with no year, like July 8. Underneath are three lines repeated three times with the opportunity to fill in the year at the top. Doodle three things you’re grateful for that day, and come back the next year and the next to see how your gratitude has evolved over time. It’s a great way to remember who you were, what you were thinking, and where you were in life in any given year and reflect on your growth.

Guided: The Five Minute Journal

The minimalist design of this gratitude journal allows it to rest on any surface of your home without calling too much attention. Want to keep it in the kitchen? Great, it’ll blend in. Want it on the coffee table? It looks just as chic next to your fashion books.

Since this book is made from 100% plastic-free packaging, it’s the perfect gift for the eco-friendly person in your life. Each page features a positive and inspirational quote and includes prompts for both morning and night to list what you’re grateful for, and space to write your own daily affirmation. Since you can write in the dates on the top of the pages it’s okay to skip a few days; you won’t be wasting any precious pages.

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