Naomi Osaka credits journaling for overcoming certain mental struggles: "I feel like it gives me clarity"

Naomi Osaka created chaos last year at the French Open by refusing to do post-match press conferences citing mental health issues.

While the topic was very serious, she received a lot of backlash for the decision including event organizers and some players who, while sympathetic to Osaka and her cause, underlined that it's simply part of their job. Osaka then took time off to deal with her mental struggles only returning at the Olympics and the US Open.

Neither of those events were good results-wise and the Japanese player is yet to have a deep run after crashing out quite early in Australia. She did admit that she is doing a lot better now and recently revealed something that helped her do it. She said:

“Lately, I’ve been writing in my journal, and I think that that keeps my thoughts in order. I feel like it gives me clarity on what I want to do and what I want to accomplish.”

She also touched upon why she went public with her struggles:

“It was important to me to be public because… I think it gives me clarity. Just saying out loud that I’ll take a break and I’ll come back when I am truly in love with the sport and I know what I want to do here; it gave me time to reset myself.”