We will be going week-by-week through the entire year and exploring daily journaling prompts together. Feel free to stop by the forums and share the answers to your prompts, or keeping your journal answers private - either choice is perfect.

A Year of Journaling Prompts Week One

January 1st: Have you heard of six-word epitaphs? Also called six-word memoirs, these are simple writing exercises. Basically, you sum up your life so far in six words. For example, mine might honestly be, "Too much, too little time. Help!" since sometimes I really do get too many plates juggling at the same time.

Write your own six-word epitaph. Now reread it aloud to yourself and think about how you feel about your six-word life summary. Happy? Sad? Proud? Hopeful?

January 2nd: List 5 things you are proud of. These can either be things you have accomplished, personality traits and character qualities, relationships you've been part of or anything that gives you a healthy sense of pride.

January 3rd: List 5 things you are not proud of. These can be full-blown regrets, things you've done or said, character qualities you consider flaws, etc. Look back at your list from yesterday and see whether any of your answers have parallels or common threads.

For example, one thing I dislike about myself is my disorganization. However, one thing I like about myself and am proud of, is my ability to make anything fun and exciting, or get down on the floor and play with my kids. Do you see how the two are related? I often let the housecleaning go because I'm too busy "having fun" with the kids. The one is related to the other. Glance back through your two lists and see whether you have any similar pairings as well.

January 4th: Write down three long term (5 years or more) goals. They need to be very specific and measurable. Don't write "I want to have more money". Write instead something like, "I want to have my consumer debt paid off."

January 5th: Look at your list from yesterday and for each goal on your list write down one, or more shorter term goals, for the next year. For my example of being debt free within 5 years, I might then write down "Pay off car note early." since that is something I could conceivably do within the next year.

January 6th: Look at what you've written down the past two days. Think of five, small action-steps you can take towards achieving those goals. Make these sure these steps are something you can actually do. In my example of paying off debt I had written down "Make pizza at home instead of eating pizza out" which was something we had been doing at least twice a month. This saved us $20 per month, or $240 per year just from that one little change.

Your journal can be a powerful catalyst for change as you begin to actually record and document these tiny steps towards huge changes.

January 7th: Look over the past week's worth of journaling prompt answers. How do you feel about your answers? As you compare the things you are proud of, with those you are not, and look over your goals are you optimistic? Have you made your goals achievable? Are you afraid of making the changes needed to attain your goals?

Spend a few minutes journaling how you feel about your previous answers in your journal. Be sure to star, highlight or list any other goals or action-steps that come to mind.