If your morning routine is too full and sitting down to write for 15 min will cause you more stress, try to experiment with the evening journaling using either a to-do list approach or gratitude journaling.

The best time for narrative journaling (expressive writing) may be the time of the day when you feel most relaxed, and your brain is in an alpha brain wave state. 

Right after waking up your brain shifts from delta waves (deep sleep) to theta (daydreaming), which is the ideal time for contemplation and creative work during 5–15 minutes.

Finally, brain waves transform to alpha waves when you are in a relaxed state without information overload.

Anything that “goes into” your mind during the first hour is your “blueprint” for the day. For example, when I know I have an important meeting or a presentation to give, I would journal about this for 20 min as first thing in the morning.

However, you have to be aware, that at that moment when you will be writing down your thoughts and emotions, you may experience greater arousal. But after the confrontation of your emotional release, you feel you have “emptied your mind”.