If you're heading towards any sort of long-term goal, a simple journal can be a very powerful tool. In it, you can track your progress day by day and week by week. It might not seem like much at first ? but pretty quickly, you'll find that you can flip back to previous weeks and see how you've improved。

　　The very act of recording something often helps you to be motivated to do it, too! This works really well for exercise programs, diets, reading plans, studying.。。

　　追踪计划的进展情况

　　如果你正朝向一个长期目标前进，那么简单的写写日记就是一个非常有效的工具。在日记中，你可以日复一日或者周复一周的追踪计划的进展情况。可能最初效果并不明显---但是很快，你就会发现和几周之前相比，自己已经取得了明显进步。

　　记录事件的行为还能经常帮助你坚持做下去!这对于锻炼、控制食欲、阅读计划和学习等等非常有效。

　　2. Explore Your Thoughts

　　When I'm feeling upset or anxious, journaling almost always helps. It gives me a space to spill out what I really think, and often seeing it in black and white gives me a sense of perspective!

　　Many people find that writing about problems is actually more helpful than speaking about them。

　　开拓你的思想

　　当我感到低落或者紧张时，写日记总是会帮我平静下来。它让我表达出内心的真实想法，并且让我能客观的看待问题!

　　许多人都注意到把问题写出来其实比述说出来更有帮助。

　　3. Record Your Life

　　One day, your journal could be a very interesting historical document ? for you, for your family, and potentially for a wider audience. Obviously, you might not want anyone to ever read the journal itself, but by recording details of your life, you'll have them for future reference。

　　Your memory will fade over time, and things which seem perfectly normal and commonplace now might be fascinating to your grandchildren. With technology changing especially rapidly, the world of the early 21st century might seem almost unrecognizable in a few decades. A journal can keep these memories alive。

　　记录你的生活

　　有一天，你会发现你的日记变成了一本非常有趣的历史记录--对于你自己，你的家人，甚至一些潜在的更多的读者。很明显你可能不希望有人读到自己的日记，但是通过记录生活中的点点滴滴，你已经在为将来的生活提供了参考。

　　你的记忆会随着时间的流逝而褪色，现在看起来平淡无奇的事物，在若干年后或许就会让你的子孙们为之着迷。随着人类技术的飞速发展，21世纪早期的样子或许在几十年之后就让人无法辨认。一本日记可以让这些记忆依旧鲜活。

　　4. Become More Self-Aware

　　If you keep a journal regularly over a period of time, you're going to become more aware of your own thoughts and feelings ? and perhaps your failings. You'll spot patterns, both positive and negative ones。

　　Few of us take time on a daily or weekly basis to step out of the busy moment-by-moment flow of our lives. But this higher-level reflection can be incredibly important, even life-changing. A few sessions writing in your journal could lead to a breakthrough that gets you to change careers, get fit, or turn your life around。

　　变得更加敏锐

　　如果坚持写一段时间的日记，你将对自己的思想和感觉更加敏锐--可能也包括你的弱点。你会发现积极和消极的模式。

　　很少有人能留意每天或者每周的忙碌生活中时刻发生的事情。但是这种更敏锐的反应非常重要，甚至能改变你的生活。在日记里写下几段话能给你带来事业上的改进，让你变得更健康或者改变你的生活。

　　5. Improve Your Writing

　　Finally, keeping a journal will almost certainly help you to become a better writer. This might not be a benefit that you're necessarily looking for ? but almost all of us have to write in some context (perhaps emails or reports at work)。

　　Regularly journaling helps you get into the habit of writing, so that it seems like less of a chore. It can also help you to express yourself in different ways through words ? perhaps you might write a poem in your journal, or deliberately try to expand your vocabulary。

　　提高你的写作能力

　　最后，坚持写日记肯定会帮助你成为一个更好的作者。或许这不是你所渴求的---但你毕竟要用到写作(或许是写信，也可能是工作报告)。

　　坚持写日记能帮助你养成写作的习惯，让写作并不像是一件苦差事。它还能帮助你通过语言以多种途径来表达思想---你可以在日记中写一首诗，或者有意尝试扩大你的词汇量。