Journaling is just arguing with yourself on paper until one side tells the truth.

Writing something down forces you to slow it into sentences, and sentences are harder to fake than the loop running in your head. When you put both sides on a page, one of them starts sounding thin. Nobody is reading, so there is no reason to keep defending the version that makes you look good. That is usually when the real reason shows up, three paragraphs in.

Try it once this week with something you have been going back and forth on. Write the case for each side until you catch yourself contradicting a line you already wrote. Circle that line.