Wonder and Curiosity Journal

Started by DecimalRocket, November 12, 2017, 07:14:14 AM

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DecimalRocket

You've heard of Gratitude Journals, right? So how about a Wonder and Curiosity Journal? I've thought of the idea when I was younger and it's been one of the greatest influences in bettering my life.

It has given me benefits like :

1) Less dissociative experiences.
When you're full of wonder, it allows something pleasant from the emotional numbness. Wonder allows a certain energy for life that dissociative experiences lack.

2) More meaning and motivation for life.
This allows more interest towards everyday life, even routine tasks. When you learn to find wonder in something that seems ordinary or even something troubling, things become more rewarding to experience.

3) More openess to new experiences.
Curiosity is the opposite of fear. It's wanting to discover more even in the face of risks. This can benefit people to have more openness in all areas of life — including recovery.

4) More acceptance towards life
The thing about curiosity is that curiosity can be present in both positive and negative situations. It's not asking, "What good might happen?" or "What bad might happen?". It's simply asking, "What will happen?" and whatever it is, looking forward to know.

I'm not saying you'll have the same experience as me. Everyone is different. But I thought I'd give this idea a try to share it.

Here's how to do it.

Technique # 1 Wonder Lists

Like a gratitude journal, you can list a number of things you feel give you curiosity or wonder. It can be sensory like a beautiful sunset or a touching piece of music. It could be quotes or certain ideas. It could be a certain piece of information you find interest in and want to look at. It could be events in your or other's life.

This trains your ability to see these things in everyday life.

Technique #2 First Eyes

One thing is to see the world like a child or an alien. Imagine never seeing something, hearing about something, thinking about something and so on. When you realize with awed surprise how strange it is for something to exist, then you've found your wonder.

Pick anything and write what you think of it this way.

The grand goal is to be able to see things like this for long hours at a time — so everything in your life can allow a certain wonder.

Technique # 3 Grand Time
One practice I've thought of is imagining what something is like in the past or the future.

I remember a story of a tourist guide who was guiding people through a normal looking park. The park seemed ordinary but when he told the story of the wartorn heroes and terror — it became more interesting. Now imagine that same tourist guide asking questions of what this park will become in the future — what possibilites for it could await?

This could be used with ordinary objects. Notice an apple. This apple was picked in a farm, it was sold somewhere, transported for possibly several miles, placed in a grocery and found its way into your hand. Even small things have a history to them and these objects slowly morph into different things in the future — like we do as human beings.

Write it in your journal.

Technique # 4 Reframing.

What's a more interesting way of seeing something? Take a hobby, a book, a website, a movie, an activity and so on. Then write down a description of it and transform it in the most interesting way possible.

How we say things affect how interesting they are. Like the teacher who drones on in monotone compared to a teacher who's more animated in her lectures.

Here are some tips to make things interesting.

a.Mention sensory details. What we can visualize catches our attention more.

b.Use high contrasts. When you compere something mediocre with something much worse, what looks mediocre looks a lot more amazing.

c.Imagine saying it in a certain tone of voice you enjoy.

d. Use analogies. Compare something uninteresting with something you find interesting.

Technique # 5 Questions
It's a simple technique to understand. Ask things in what you find most interesting or what you want to find interesting.

Sometimes the answers don't come from finding the answers, but in asking the right questions. Asking questions changes your understanding of an experience, allowing you to know what you don't know. Curiosity only exists when there is something you know you don't know.

Technique # 6 Grand Size

If the grand time technique allows you to find wonder across time periods, this technique allows you to find wonder in size.

It involves visualizing. First you imagine yourself where you are. Slowly zooming out to the whole town or city. . . The whole country . . . The whole continent . . . The whole solar system . . . To the whole galaxy.

But don't rush it. Imagine what's happening. The billions of people living out their complex lives you will never meet. The different natural phenemona around the world. The different events, different objects, different places and everything that you will never hear about. What might be out there in the galaxy you will never hear about in your lifetime.

Write it in your journal. Remember it sometimes when you go across your ordinary life and realize you're a part of all this — connected with everything in the world.

Technique # 6 Sensory Appreciation.

Enjoy something delicious, something that sounds amazing, something that looks awe inspiring, something that feels wonderful to the touch or even a peace inducing smell. It could be something physical like exercising or going out hiking.

You can take a picture of whatever it is and write about it.

Technique # 7 Novelty and Familiarity

Notice small details in what makes something new. What small details make something interesting? What is changing in it or what is changing in every moment? Every month? Every week? Everyday? Every second?

Another part of this technique is to notice something familiar about your choice of interest. This allows people to be more comfortable with something that seems too unknown and scary. What does it remind you of? — something that's more familiar? What certain details allow memories?

Write it down.

......

Thanks for reading.

If you want to read more about my experience with this, check out the 11th post in the second page of my journal. (http://outofthefog.net/C-PTSD/forum/index.php?topic=7921.15)

If you have any questions, ask me.

Bye!  :wave:

ah

Hi DecimalRocket
Or just Rocket?

Didn't want to leave this without a response. I've been having a really hard time lately, so it'll take me a while to digest what you wrote here, think about it and try it out to see what effects it has on me. It's worth more time and effort than just a quick read, methinks.

So ironically that means I didn't read it yet.
:disappear:
ah, the joys of utter exhaustion and that feeling of climbing very slowly out of a deep, dark pit every single day.
I could probably really use WCT.

Thinking of you.
And, on an unrelated topic, your mind rocks :yes:




woodsgnome

#2
Dear Professor of WCT/Wonder & Curiosity Therapy,

Thanks for this primer on the basics of WCT. It touches on an amazing assortment of the field's potential, not only in descriptive terms but pointing out ways of applying the curriculum.

I can tell you what's always the hardest for us students--it's when all the wonder/curiosity slips too far into the painful parts of the past, to the 'what went wrong' page of our old life's script. The tendency is to get stuck at that point in the story.

That stuck spot also involves what I consider the most important lesson you provide--the notion of re-framing. I'll add another--play with options and be creatively open to surprise yourself. Remember, you're writing your new script for the world ahead.

So while we consider the past, largely in negative terms, we can regard the wonder/curiosity route as going the other way. Instead of getting stuck in our old story, we can build from it...not on it, but from it.

There's a lot to WCT that might seem trivial to the new student. We're taught to value utter seriousness as the only option. The latter has a place, sure--but as hinted, it can get stale and cause one to get stuck if we don't watch out.

I think it's easy to figure I must really be enjoying this new therapy. Another good quality is that it's always available to us, free if we can stay open enough to find it.

Thanks again.