Right after a session, write four short lines: the main idea in your own words, how you reacted to it, the question that stayed open, and one thing you will try before the next appointment. Five minutes is enough, and it is the version you will still understand a week later.
Right after a session, it is still easy to remember the tone of voice, examples, and exact words. By evening, it may already be difficult to reconstruct the thought you wanted to hold on to.
Four questions are enough for a note. Your answers will make it easier to return to what mattered before your next appointment.
For a system that also covers preparation and notes between appointments, see how to use a journal before, after, and between therapy sessions.
A five-minute note template
Open a note right after the conversation or later, when you have the energy. If you find it hard to stop, set a timer for five minutes. One or two sentences per question are enough.
What do I want to remember?
Write down one idea in your own words. Do not try to quote your therapist exactly.
What did I notice in myself?
Name a feeling or physical response: anger, relief, shame, tension in your shoulders, or an urge to change the subject.
What question was left unanswered?
Write down one. For example: “Why did I agree when I wanted to say no?”
What will I try before the next session?
Write down something you agreed on with your therapist or a step you chose yourself: “Before replying to a work message, pause and check what I am afraid of right now.”
A completed entry might look like this:
I want to remember that I ask for advice even when I have already made the decision. During the conversation, I was angry and clenching my jaw. One question remains: what am I looking for when I seek someone else’s agreement? Before the next appointment, I will try making one small decision without asking my friends and note how I feel.
The entry preserves what may be useful later: the idea, the response, the question, and the next step.
What you can leave out
You can omit your therapist’s exact words, some of the topics, and details that are difficult to see on the page. You do not need to search for the “right insight,” either.
If you are unsure about the wording, say so directly: “This is roughly how I understood the conversation.” Memory can fill in a remark, so it is better not to present an uncertain retelling as a quotation. If precision matters, ask your therapist at the next appointment.
After a difficult session, you may have enough energy only to get home, eat, and rest. In that case, you can skip the note.
Before the next session, reading one note is enough
A few minutes before the appointment, open your latest note and mark each point:
- this has changed;
- this still matters;
- I want to discuss this.
Choose one question to discuss. If you want to show your therapist part of your journal, decide in advance which excerpt you are comfortable sharing. You can read one sentence, summarize it, or keep the note entirely to yourself. The separate guide to sharing your journal with a therapist explains how to choose an excerpt and state a boundary.
In Leaflo, you can save these four questions, protect entries with a PIN or biometrics, and open the relevant note before an appointment. The app helps you keep observations between sessions, but it does not replace a therapist.
What we know about memory after therapy
In two small studies, participants remembered only part of the content of cognitive behavioral therapy. In a study of 48 adults with depression, better recall of the material was associated with adherence to recommendations and some treatment outcomes. This association does not prove that notes improved the outcome.
The studies did not test this four-question template. Five minutes is a practical limit here, not a clinical recommendation.
Stop if writing increases the tension
Detailed writing about a traumatic experience is different from a short note. The US Department of Veterans Affairs’ National Center for PTSD describes Written Exposure Therapy as a separate treatment: five sessions, specific instructions, 30 minutes of writing, and clinician monitoring. You should not attempt to replicate this protocol on your own.
If the tension rises as you write, you lose your sense of place and time, or you cannot stop replaying the session, close the note. Tell your therapist what happened. Together, you can choose a different format or time, or decide not to keep notes.
A worked example
Here is what the four lines look like when they are actually filled in, half an hour after a session, on a phone, in a cafe:
Main idea. That I treat "being needed" and "being valued" as the same thing, so I keep taking on work I do not want.
My reaction. Recognised it immediately and then wanted to argue with it. Still slightly annoyed, which probably means it landed.
Open question. What happens if I say no to something small this week — what is the fear underneath that, exactly?
One step. Decline the Friday request. Notice what I feel afterwards and write one line.
That is under ninety words. It took four minutes. Two weeks later, it is still legible: it holds the insight, the resistance, the question, and the experiment. A transcript of the whole session would hold more and be less useful, because there would be nothing to find in it.
For the full cycle around sessions, see how to use a journal before, after, and between therapy, and if you want to bring notes into the room, how to share your journal with a therapist covers what to send.
