Journaling Is More Powerful Than You Think It Is with Amanda Stern Ep 95

Join me as I interview Amanda Sterns about Journaling, in this chat, entitled "Journaling Is More Powerful Than You Think It Is."

Amanda navigated the diverse applications of journaling, from managing mental health to supercharging productivity, ensuring listeners can tailor this transformative tool to fit your unique entrepreneurial path.

The heartwarming practice of collaborative journaling can significantly deepen bonds and enhance communication. This episode takes you through the emotional resonance this method holds.

Alongside live interactions with our listeners, we explored the potential of journaling to foster self-compassion and provide solace amidst the rollercoaster of self-employment.

Rounding out our conversation, Amanda shared her expertise on the Journaling for Growth Membership Program, a beacon for those seeking a community of like-minded journaling enthusiasts.

Drawing from personal experiences and listener contributions, we celebrated the myriad of journaling formats that exist – from morning pages to habit trackers, digital apps to old-school pen and paper – each one a stepping stone towards greater self-understanding and goal achievement.

Connect with Amanda: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amandasternjournaling/

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My name is Brenda Meller. I'm a LinkedIn coach, consultant, speaker, and author. My company is Meller Marketing and I help business professionals get a bigger slice of the LinkedIn pie.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:48

My name is Brenda Meller and this is my show, which I like to call Enthusiastically Self-Employed, because I bring on amazing guests to help those of you who are self-employed to stay that way and to give you some business and different tips along the way. And for those of you who are watching whether you're watching us live on LinkedIn, on YouTube or on Instagram I'd love it if you could do us a favor. Drop a comment below and let us know where in the world you're watching from. If you could. That lets us know that the live stream is working and picking up.

Speaker 1: 1:17

I'm always a little bit like Amanda when we do these things. I'm like hopefully the live stream picks. You know, if you're in a live audience, you can see people and they're waving to you and they're saying your mic's not working. But when we're in the live stream, we rely upon people like Brynn Tillman, who's in the audience. On LinkedIn, she's saying hello, my friend. So now I know the live stream is picking up and, as we're waiting for your comments to come in from the audience, I want to take a moment to introduce you to Amanda, and Amanda and I met originally through LinkedIn. We had a good conversation. I said why don't we come on the LinkedIn show? And, amanda, for those people who haven't met you yet, why don't you tell us a bit about yourself?

Speaker 2: 1:54

Yeah, thank you. I always love to share my story from the very beginning, which is that I found journaling when I was an angsty teenager having a really hard day. None of my friends could come to the phone, so I picked up a notebook and a pencil and I started to write and it was that day that I discovered really the magic that there is in journaling and it was the start for me of building this practice that has served me through my entire life, and now I help other people create practices of their own so they can know themselves, love themselves and really live lives that they love and are worthy of.

Speaker 1: 2:37

That's awesome, and this topic this is near and dear to me too. I used to journal. I used to journal I don't now, but I think you've been warming me up to the idea, and I wanted to wait until our talk to hear what you have to say about the power of journaling today. For those of you who are joining us, you're seeing the topic up on screen. We're going to be talking today about journaling and how it is more powerful than you think it is, so I'm just going to throw the floor right to you, amanda, and tell us and just if you could tell us what we need to know about the power of journaling.

Speaker 2: 3:06

Yeah. So I will start by saying journaling is more than we think it is. So many people seem to think of journaling as the small little thing that fits in a small little box that has to look a particular way, and I talk to people all the time who say things like, yeah, I've tried journaling and it doesn't really do much for me. Or like I've tried journaling and I don't really like it. Or worse, this is the worst one, which is I've tried journaling and it doesn't work for me, so there must be something wrong with me. And so often it's just a misalignment between what we want our journaling to do for us and how we're going about getting there. I spoke to somebody recently who wanted to use their journaling to move their life forward, to really figure out what direction they were going to go in, how they were going to create this business that they were creating for themselves in a way that felt really sustainable and really good, and then was showing me how he had been journaling and had talked about how unsatisfying it was, and I was like, oh yeah, now I get it, because what you're doing could be helpful in some situations, but it's not the way that's going to get you to what you want. I always love to start with people with what do you want your journaling to do for you? Because journaling can do so many things for you. Because journaling can do so many things.

Speaker 2: 4:36

Journaling can help us know ourselves and love ourselves and really design lives that we love. Journaling can help us manage our mental health and our anxiety and our stress. Journaling can help us be focused and productive. Journaling can help us to improve our relationships, be better communicators, to be more in tune with how we feel and what we think, and to get better at asking for help, and so much more. But one technique isn't going to get you there. There's no one size fits all when it comes to journaling, which I think is where people get really hung up, because when folks want to start journaling, so many people turn to Google or they turn to that celebrity person who has been talking about journaling and they think, oh, this is the way to do it. And there's so many people out there who tell people here is the way to journal, and if that way to journal doesn't align with your goals, it's really hard to feel like that is a satisfying practice.

Speaker 1: 5:38

That's really great advice, and there might be people watching that are like me. I'm like I used to have, and I guess it was more of a diary than a journal but I used to have a diary when I was growing up. Up through high school, college and probably young adult was when I stopped writing in there and maybe they're thinking about gosh. I've heard about this. I've heard about you talk about celebrities. I've heard about other people that are journaling and it's helping them and in their business, and a lot of the viewers of this show and listeners of the podcast are self-employed. So talk to us about that audience. If you are self-employed, how can journaling help you and also give us some advice on how to even get started with that?

Speaker 2: 6:14

Yeah, so journaling, first and foremost, can help us know ourselves. If we are going to be successful in our businesses or in any area of life, we have to know who we are. We have to get really comfortable with who we are and I want to say hi, lee. Lee is one of my dearest friends, one of my biggest supporters. Lee, thank you for tuning in this morning, but it's so important to remember that we are whole people and we come to everything we do as a whole person.

Speaker 2: 6:45

Integrate all of those things. It helps us to see patterns and connections between different parts of our lives. Journaling can help, helps me every morning when I sit down to journal to take stock of how I am and who I am today, because we are all a little different every day, and I love the magic of sitting down and meeting myself fresh every morning, because when I recognize who I am, how I am, it helps me identify what I need that day, because I always have my big running to-do list, like most self-employed people or most people in general, right, and so being able to look at this list and think through the lens of who am I today, how much energy do I have today, what would really light me up and drive me and not just oh, here's this list I have to trudge through. So just really being able to use journaling to bring our whole selves to everything we do is powerful.

Speaker 1: 7:56

Yeah, and you just made me think I wish I had started journaling at the beginning of my solopreneur career, because I remember and maybe I could even start a journal and start documenting this. I remember the thoughts and the feelings that I was having at that point and how different I am from where I am today in that perspective and I guess in my mind I've always thought about maybe this is part of what's holding me back. I thought about journaling and diary being more on a personal level and now my focus is it's not about the guys and will I be popular at school and you had a diary about but now it's more the hopes and fears that we have about our business. And even over the past few years, with what's been happening with the pandemic and things shifting and now things coming back, I think it could be a really interesting look at gosh, where I was back then and where I am today.

Speaker 2: 8:47

Thoughts on that. Yeah, I love having my journal as a growth marker because it is so hard to see our growth. I was thinking yesterday about babies. Right, babies are tiny and if you see a baby every day, they don't look like they grow much from day to day. But take a trip by yourself to the grocery store or go away for the weekend. You come back and all of a sudden, baby has gotten so much bigger, right, but baby has been growing this whole time. We just couldn't see it because we were so close.

Speaker 2: 9:17

And we are the same way because we are so close to ourselves. We're in our heads all the time. Journaling gives us the capacity to step away, to step outside and really gain perspective. I love to use journaling to track my progress toward my goals because it's so hard to feel in the day-to-day when I have that massive to-do list that never seems to get cleared right. It's so easy to feel discouraged and feel like I'm not making progress. But being able to go back in my journal to see where I started and how far I've come can give so much more momentum, so much more confidence, so much more gratitude for the journey, which just helps propel me forward.

Speaker 1: 10:06

That's a great point. So I was wondering, as you were talking, and you made me think about this too is there any science or logic behind the time of day that we journal? Should we do it first thing morning? Should we do it right before we hit the pillow middle of the day? Should we get into a routine or just journal when the mood strikes? What do you think about that?

Speaker 2: 10:25

I think whatever works best for you, is the best way for you to journal. I journal in the morning because that's where it fits in my schedule, but for years and years I was an evening journaler and I have discovered that my morning journaling and my evening journaling have different flavors to them. My morning journaling is much more intentional. It's very focused on who am I, what do I need today, how am I going to make it happen. It is a very action oriented, intention setting journaling that I do in the morning.

Speaker 2: 10:59

My evening journaling tends to be much more reflective. It tends to be much more here's what I did today, here's how I feel about it, here's what I'm grateful for. And so it's just a different flavor and that's what works best for me. If you want to sleep better, taking a few minutes to journal before you go to bed can be a beautiful way to just get everything out of your brain, all that stuff that's going to make your head so heavy and make your brain work overtime as soon as you turn off the light and put your head on the pillow. Just taking a couple of minutes, even to just dump all of that stuff out so it's living on paper and not in our brain just has made. It can make so much difference.

Speaker 1: 11:42

Yeah, that's a great point. You just made me think about something too, as you're talking about different times of day and the mindset and the mood and where you're at. So a few years ago and I guess I've been doing this for many years now I have I guess we can call them journals that I would write something in there for my kids I have one for my daughter and one for my son and I would write something in there and then I would just put it on her desk or her table in her room and wait until she finds it, and then she knows I wrote something in there and she would flip to it and she would write something back and sometimes I would write a question how was your day, how are you feeling? Other times I would just write random things like about how proud I am of being her mom and whatnot, and I did the same thing for my son and my son's a teenager and parents of teenagers. This is a really good way of communicating with your kids, because how was your day? Fine, would you learn nothing?

Speaker 1: 12:27

So I'd write things in there and he would write back to me he was struggling, his last week, his last few weeks of school, his senioritis really bad and he's not really academically driven. He just wanted to get through graduation and he was coming into class late and we got sick of all the calls we were getting from the high school. I said tell you what, joshua? I said I will give you a hundred dollars. We had two weeks left of school at this point. I said I will give you a hundred dollars if I don't get any calls from any of your teachers for the last two weeks of school.

Speaker 1: 12:54

And he did it and I and he forgot about it. And then I wrote in his journal and this was in June of last year. I wrote in his journal hey, when you read this, come and see me and ask me for the a hundred dollars that I owe you. And six months went by. It was like about three weeks ago. I said journal it Cause I remembered it and he had forgotten. And he dug up his room and he finally found it and he brought it up to me. But I think I don't know. Would you consider that a journal still, if it's written back and forth between people, or is journaling?

Speaker 2: 13:24

really a solo activity. Yes, I would definitely call that journaling. That's collaborative journaling, and what a beautiful way to use it to build relationships. Journaling and what a beautiful way to use it to build relationships. That is so gorgeous and I'm, oh, I'm so excited to think of the people who are hearing this and their wheels are turning on, who they can have a collaborative journal with and who they can build relationships with through this.

Speaker 2: 13:48

But I want to point out too that journaling, even when we do it by ourselves, is something that can improve our relationships, because the more I journal, the more comfortable I get with expressing my thoughts, the better I get at recognizing my feelings and naming those emotions. I have so much better emotional vocabulary when I have an active journaling practice, because I'm practicing tapping in and naming those feelings and then I can identify what it is I need. So I don't have to make the people around me be mind readers. I can just ask for the help that I need. I'm feeling overwhelmed right now. I have a lot going on. Can you please help me make dinner by doing these specific things? It's so much better a path to get my needs met than I need some help around here, right or some of the things that I want to, or I'm prone to exclaim when I'm just feeling really frazzled and frustrated, that it's just journaling even myself has made every relationship I have better.

Speaker 1: 14:55

That's amazing and it's great to think about that journaling and how it helps to get you to know you better. And you just made me think, as we're talking about collaborative journaling too, I do this with my kids. Maybe I should do one with my spouse too. And you made me think of the honey-do list, or why haven't you done that? Or we sometimes will joke because he's like the neighborhood watch and he'll say so-and-so, had a tow truck pull up to their house today and I'll say make sure you write it in the log. Like we don't have a log. But I would always joke make sure you write it in the log.

Speaker 1: 15:19

And I thought about getting something where I documented. Chris told me tow truck picked up the neighbor's car, Just funny. And then, ps, could you please unload the dishwasher tonight? But going back, all kidding aside, going back to what your point was there, when you journal it helps you to know you better and it helps you, I think, also to make sense of and get clarity on some of the thoughts that you're feeling and even the confidence that you have about your business. Would you agree with that?

Speaker 2: 15:45

Absolutely. I will say, the biggest transformation I have seen in myself and in so many of my clients is that through journaling we get to know ourselves. The more we know ourselves, the more compassion we can have toward ourselves. It's so much easier to be compassionate to other people than it ever is to be compassionate to ourselves, and the more self-compassion we have, the more love for ourselves we can build. And coming from a place of love, we can do anything. We can do all of the hard things in our businesses. We can have all of those hard conversations in life. We can juggle all of the balls and know which balls to sit down when we're tired. Right, we can do all of those hard things if we come from a place of self knowledge, self compassion and self-love.

Speaker 1: 16:37

That's great and so many great things, and I'm seeing some folks that are jumping in here and people like Susan saying I'm so excited to catch this live.

Speaker 1: 16:42

The great thing about doing these live videos there's a little bit of a delay, so when we ask you in a moment to our audience to answer, ask you questions, there'll be a little bit of a delay. But I think there's something that has to be said with catching these live, because you get the moment to ask the expert people like Amanda, questions about journaling. And I think what I'd like to do is we're actually going to change gears, because we're already starting to get some great questions and conversation coming in, Amanda, and I want to give you the opportunity to reflect upon some of the things that are being shared, because one of the questions I was going to ask you next was about formats. So let me pull up David's question here as an example. I'm going to read the question for those listening on the podcast. David Buck says journaling is so powerful I need to devote more time to it. Amanda, do you have any suggestions on the types of journal formats to use?

Speaker 2: 17:30

Yes, and I will start by saying it depends on what you want your journaling to do for you. And this is where the nuance comes in, because there is no one size fits all that's going to meet everybody's needs with journaling all of the time. And I talk often about this need for a toolbox, because when you think about your toolbox at home, you have a hammer in it, and a hammer is really good at specific things. You can pound nails into walls and pull them out and you can smash lids back down on paint cans, but a hammer won't fix your bathroom sink. You're going to need a screwdriver and a pair of pliers and a wrench, and knowing what tools you have in your toolbox, when to use them and how to use them, helps you get all your fix-it jobs done. The same thing with journaling and having a journaler's toolbox that we can use and knowing what techniques you have in there, when and how to use them, can help you get all of your needs met. I don't want to say your fix-it job's done, but really it can just meet our needs in so many ways. So I'm going to just briefly share some ways to journal and see what resonates.

Speaker 2: 18:43

One of my favorite ways to journal is stream of consciousness journaling. It is just taking whatever thoughts you have in your brain and dumping them on the page. Sometimes it's called brain dumping or free writing. If anyone has read the Artist's Way and knows about morning pages, that's really the style of it is whatever's in your head, put it on the page. It can be really good at clearing your brain out.

Speaker 2: 19:06

It can be really good, yeah, to relax at the end of the day, just to get all of the stuff here onto paper so that you have more space to think and be creative and breathe and be human. Right, it's hard to human sometimes with all of the stuff in our brains. But if you are prone, if we are prone, to go into that negative spiral and really catch ourselves this is bad and that is bad and we just ruminate, then it's better to really limit how much of this you do. So again, if you are prone to shame, sadness, anxiety, all of those things, then it's really important to just be careful there. This is a page I created for myself. I'm a big fan of having some structure in my journaling and I'll just walk really quickly through this document I created for myself, again out of my need.

Speaker 1: 19:59

It's a larger view. Bring you into the larger view so folks can see that.

Speaker 2: 20:03

Perfect, but this came out of my need for more structure. But I love sharing it with people because then folks get ideas of what's possible for them. So in this I write the date. I have a place where I write my word of the year or my theme, because sometimes I come up with these great ideas and if I don't remind myself every day then I forget it exists. So every day I write my word of the year. This year I have two and they're implement and integrate. Then I give my statement.

Speaker 2: 20:32

And what was the other word? Integrate, integrate, love it, yep, and they go hand in hand and I love them both together as a pair, and already I've seen them do really beautiful things for me. I have a place to write my ikigai verse or my purpose statement. I have a place where I write my new moon intention. Here's my schedule for the day, my to-do list. I have a habit tracker. I have also six intention setting questions that I ask myself every morning, really to be able to figure out what I need and how I'm going to get my needs met. And so some questions that I have asked myself in the past are what is the most important thing for me to do today? How can I show up as my best me? What does my soul need today? How will I feed my mind today? How will I take care of my body today and who will I connect with? So being able to think about my life in a wholeness right, being able to think about my life in a wholeness right with these questions and asking myself the same questions every day, helps me to identify patterns. It helps me meet myself where I'm at. It gives myself some consistency. Susan, great question.

Speaker 2: 21:43

Morning pages is a technique that comes out of the Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. She recommends getting up first thing in the morning and just free writing three pages, three full pages, and then just clearing out your brain, and it's a way for creative people to become more creative. It works well for a lot of people who are interested in that. It is hard for some people to write three pages a day, so I always say that is a specific technique for a specific purpose, but it's adaptable, right? Can you write five minutes a day or 10 minutes a day? I'm a huge fan of using a timer in my journaling and writing for time, not for amount, but I also don't give myself a quota.

Speaker 2: 22:30

Journaling is just as much about the container that we give it. It's as much about the space and the time to think as it is about any of our input. And to say we have to write three full pages, I think does a lot of us a disservice, because sometimes one word is sufficient. Sometimes I write the date on the top of the page and then I sit there for 20 minutes and then I write a single sentence and I thank myself for what I accomplished and then I move on with my day, and so just being willing to be flexible, to think about what you need out of your journaling and create a path for yourself to get there, understanding that every day looks a little different, that we are a little different and it's okay for our journaling to look a little different every day too, that we don't have to journal the exact same way every day.

Speaker 2: 23:26

I showed you what I do, but I don't do all of this every day. You can see I didn't do all of this every day. You can see. You can see I didn't answer all of my questions today. Some days I just remind myself of these things that are important. Some days I just do my schedule and then I write four pages in my journal. So just giving myself the flexibility to be able to show up for myself is the most important thing. Ooh, I love this.

Speaker 1: 23:55

I was actually thinking the same thing as Lee and I found that I did the typing thing in high school and I got the handle of it and I can type fast. I was working with my son on a project last night and he was watching me type and I don't look down at the keyboard and I just type really fast. When I write, I feel like my handwriting is a bit messy. It's probably messier when I'm not feeling in a good mood, and when I'm feeling in a good mood I write. I take the time to write, but I find that in some aspects it slows you down when you're handwriting versus typing, but you also get fatigued faster because I'm just not used to writing as much as I used to. What are your thoughts on journaling electronically? And, lee Krausen, thank you for joining us. Lee Lee mentions an electronic notebook. What are your thoughts on that, amanda?

Speaker 2: 24:34

I always say the best way to journal is the way that works best for you. I love the magic of handwriting my journal because I do so much on a keyboard and I'm in front of a screen so much that just being able to disconnect does me so much good. And I love what you said, brenda, about your handwriting looking different depending on the mood that you're in. That can be so telling when we go back and visit our journals to think, oh huh, I can tell just by my penmanship what kind of a day I had. Most of the pages in my journal look pretty much the same. Right, I don't make it fancy, I don't use. I learned this year.

Speaker 2: 25:13

I don't like using different colors in my journal. In my journal I only write with black ink. On my one pager I only write with blue ink. I tried to use these beautiful colored markers I got and I was like, ooh, I don't like how it feels to do colored markers, but some people absolutely love that.

Speaker 2: 25:29

Some people look at their handwriting and think, oh my gosh, I don't want to handwrite my journal and cool, type it, use an app. I love the idea of using an electronic notebook so you get the best of both worlds. I have a really good friend who does all of her journaling with her Apple Pen on her iPad, and that way she gets the joy of writing it but also being able to keep it electronically. So play around, find what works best for you. There are some people and again, depending on the purpose of your journaling, you might want to go back and revisit it on a regular basis. Other people you might want to go back and revisit it on a regular basis. Other people for other purposes. Just writing it out is good enough, right? You don't necessarily need to go back and revisit every journal entry.

Speaker 1: 26:23

So again, it all goes back to our purpose. Yeah, I love that. And as you're talking about the purpose of your journal and the goals and things like that we talked about earlier, I see my good friend Kenneth Lang. Hey, kenneth, thanks for watching. He suggests for those of you who are job seekers, maybe watching this video or listening to this later journaling is really great during job search. Share your feelings there. And he says he still refers back to what he wrote years ago. So in this aspect, the goal of the journal could be just documenting the job search journey and I think that's perfectly fine. What do you think, amanda?

Speaker 2: 26:52

Yeah, I think it's a beautiful way to journal. My brother-in-law shared with me that years ago, when he was in a job search, he kept a spreadsheet just an Excel spreadsheet where every day he documented the actions he took in looking for this new job. And he was like maybe that's journaling. And I was like, yeah, I would say so. If you are reflecting and keeping track of data and you're collecting information to measure your progress, that is totally journaling. And it goes back to what I said at the beginning, that when we think of journaling as this tiny little thing that has to look a certain way so it can fit in a small little box, it can only do us so much good. But when we look at the things that we're already doing that are on the cusp of journaling or journal-esque right, how many of us sit down to plan our day? How many of us keep a workout log, plan our day? How many of us keep a workout log? How many of us jot down notes on the calendar about the great thing that happened today?

Speaker 2: 27:57

Those are all forms of journaling and taking just that extra step of reflection and I think about it in terms of a workout log. Right, like I keep track of my sets and my reps because I'm not going to remember as I go through how many I've done if I don't see it tally up on the page. But also I'm not going to remember the next time I go back to that workout what I lifted or what the circumstances are around it. So if I take a few minutes after my workout to jot down, my left knee was tweaky. I felt really lethargic. Oh, you know what? I didn't sleep well last night. Right To just put some evidence or some background in there. So the next time I come back to that workout I can make sure I've slept well, I've had enough protein, I'm hydrated. I'm not worried about all of those things. But just moving from here are my sets and reps to here are the circumstances around it has elevated it from a workout log to a journal.

Speaker 1: 28:57

That's a really good point. It could be like even things like when you talk about the workout log was it raining or snowing or cold that day? There's other things that are impacting, and it's funny that you talk about protein. I'm hearing so much lately about getting more protein in your diet, especially as we age, and the importance of that too. So if there's anyone watching who's an expert in protein and nutrition, let me know.

Speaker 2: 29:17

Maybe I'll have you on my show of the weather and the phase of the moon, because my moods are tied really closely to the weather, especially in the wintertime, so I just collect it as a point of data. So when I'm going back through and reflecting oh, I had a hard day last Tuesday, oh, guess what, Last Tuesday was rainy, which reminded me that the last time I had a hard day it was rainy, right? So it's just again another way to collect information, to see patterns and put all the pieces together so we really know ourselves.

Speaker 1: 29:56

Yeah, I like it. It's just jocular. It's like pulling it all together because then you can take a step back and look at the big picture of it. I see a comment coming from Susan, and Susan is mentioning I use Penzu. I'm not familiar with that, but she says I use Penzu. I'm not familiar with that, but she says I use Penzu in addition to a physical journal, which makes me think that Penzu might be a digital journal. And, amanda, do you have any thoughts or suggestions on apps that allow for digital journaling? Does anything come to mind that you'd like to share with us?

Speaker 2: 30:22

Yeah, there's all kinds of things out there. One that comes to mind is Game On. It's spelled G-A-I-M. It stands for gratitude, action, intention and mindfulness. Maybe A friend of mine created it and I'm going to I probably just slaughtered it but Game On. But again, it goes back to we each have to find what works best for us. So if you wanted to use a digital journaling app, test them, try them out, see what you think. What works for you isn't necessarily what's going to work for me, and that's something I love so much that there's no one size fits all here. It's figure it out and try it.

Speaker 2: 31:07

I know people who keep six different journals at a go, one for each specific thing that they're keeping a journal on. I don't do that because I think it's complicated for me and that would be putting barriers in my way and getting in my own way. There are people who absolutely love bullet journaling and making their journal really creative and beautiful, and I love that. And I don't do that either because I know myself and will get caught up in all of the stuff of journaling the markers and the stickers and the layouts and the embellishments. So, finding what works best for you, whether it's a physical journal, a digital journal, whether you go back and forth, whether you have a journal just for work.

Speaker 2: 31:51

I worked with a client last summer, two years ago, who said I'm here just because I want to use journaling to be a better manager. I'm not really interested in exploring my feelings, I just want to show up better for the people I need to show up for, and we were able to tailor her journaling exactly for that. Journaling can be all encompassing and cover our whole life, if that's what we want. But journaling can also be really helpful in different segments of our lives and we get to choose. And if what works for me is different than what works for you, how beautiful is that that we each get to create a practice that we love that helps us get where we want to go.

Speaker 1: 32:32

I love that You're inspiring me, and I've got like a box of different notebooks and journals, some of which have been gifted to me, some of which I got at trade shows and events and things like that, and I'm like someday and sometimes I pull them out and it's the kids' journals and things like that. But you just made me think. I'm not big on New Year's resolutions. I feel like sometimes they they pan out and sometimes they don't. But we're still in the month of January, as we're having this conversation here on LinkedIn and YouTube and Instagram today.

Speaker 1: 33:00

We might be listening to this later on the podcast, I might be a little bit later on in the year, but no time like the present. Whatever month you're in, pull out a journal and just start journaling. That's what I'm hearing from you, amanda, and what I'd like to do now is, as we start to wrap up our conversation. First, I want to pull up your LinkedIn profile, if that's OK, on screen here, and are you open to connecting with folks if they're watching this on LinkedIn, and, if so, do you have any instructions that you'd like to share with them?

Speaker 2: 33:31

Yeah, I am absolutely open to connecting with folks. I love to connect with folks who have beautiful journaling practices. I love to connect with folks who have no journaling practice but really want one. Find me, connect with me. Please connect with me. I think following people is weird. I'm just checking out what you're doing, but I don't want you to really see that I'm here, because I'm here for conversations and if I can help you make your journaling better, that's exactly what I'm here for can help you make your journaling better.

Speaker 1: 34:10

That's exactly what I'm here for. And for those that are listening on the podcast, it's Amanda Stern. Her last name is S-T-E-R-N. If you go to linkedincom, slash in slash, amanda Stern journaling, all one word, just one L, which I realized. I had a typo earlier. I had two L's but it is just one L in there.

Speaker 1: 34:30

And, amanda, I know that you have creator mode turned on your profile, but it's okay, I'll give folks some instructions on, because when they visit your profile and you have creator mode turned on, the people at LinkedIn decided when you turned on creator mode, we're going to change your default button from connect to follow. So what that means. And when you say I don't know why you follow people, I don't know why they make that an option, because some people actually do want to connect. But when you visit Amanda's profile, you might not see the connect button follow. If you do want to connect with her, you can. You just got to click on the more button and then, underneath that more button, you should see an option that will either say personalized invite or connect.

Speaker 1: 35:04

And then, if I were you, what I would do is mention hey, I heard you on the interview with Brenda Meller Name drop me, because then she'll know where you're coming from on there and it sounds like you're pretty open to accepting those connections. Is that fair to say? Absolutely fair to say? All right, great to know, okay, and the next thing is let's talk about if people are interested in working with you. Tell us a bit about what you offer, if you could.

Speaker 2: 35:29

Yeah, my favorite offering right now is this beautiful group journaling program I have. I call it the Journaling for Growth Membership Program. It is a monthly membership program where we journal in around and through a different topic each month so that we can grow in that area. So this month, in January, we're focusing on habits. Next month we're focusing on relationships of all kinds. We've got the year mapped out and it's a beautiful way to both journal by ourselves, with curated journal prompts, and to journal in a group of like-minded people who are also interested in learning and growing, in a group of like-minded people who are also interested in learning and growing. And these group journaling sessions that I run just are beautiful spaces with beautiful people where we learn only from our own journaling but from what others share and what we discover through the process of sharing and giving.

Speaker 1: 36:27

If we go to your website and that's good things come to those who journalcom, I'll put that in the show notes. Where, if we go to your website and that's good things come to those who journalcom, I'll put that in the show notes. Where could we go to learn about that program?

Speaker 2: 36:36

I believe it is in work with me up at the top. My website needs a serious overhaul but if you scroll down there's a link to book a discovery call. So yeah, really the best way is just find me on LinkedIn and tell me you're interested in working with me, so I have that group program. I also work with folks one-on-one to really create custom journaling practices that start with what do you want your journaling to do for you and help you create that path to get there. So really, that's the. I've got some things that are interesting and fun on my website, especially my newsletter. I've got a newsletter that I've been creating for the last couple of years. It's a beautiful archive of all kinds of journal prompts and ideas and resources that comes out each Monday morning and I love to bring journaling resources, inspiration, prompts right to your inbox to really help you think bigger than the little box and imagine what journaling can look like for you.

Speaker 1: 37:40

Great. I just submitted my name and my email because you have inspired me, amanda, to get going with journaling again, and maybe not even just one journal. Maybe I have one journal for my business, mellor Marketing, and then maybe I start a journal with my husband and maybe we jokingly use it as the log, but maybe we can communicate with each other through there as well. He's not listening in right now. He's going into work late because we've got some bad weather here, but he's in the other room so he can surprise you. So, amanda, this has been such a delightful conversation today and I want to offer you the opportunity. Any final comments for us on this topic of journaling and how it can be more powerful than we think.

Speaker 2: 38:18

Yeah, I just want everyone to think a little bigger, to think about what you want your journaling to do for you and really be able to thoughtfully craft a path that will get you there, because good things come to those who journal all kinds of good things and you deserve it. You deserve all of the good things. Yeah, pick up your pen, open your keyboard and start typing.

Speaker 1: 38:45

That's awesome. Great advice, savannah. You've inspired me. Like I said, I've been thinking about it. I'm like I'm going to wait for the talk. And one big takeaway for me and I'm curious for my guests go into comments and tell me if you have any big takeaways. One big takeaway for me was that I can choose. The goal of the journal is to help to document my business journey and even though right now I'm about seven years into being self-employed, I can still reflect upon where I came from and where I want to go next, and I loved that thought. I feel like you gave me permission not to think about journaling the same way I did when I was in high school and college, which was more on a personal level. You gave me the opportunity to think about using it at a business level. So, amanda, I just want to say thank you for that and I'm looking forward to getting back into journaling again. Amanda, I just want to say thank you for that.

Speaker 2: 39:29

And I'm looking forward to getting back into journaling again. Yeah, I can't wait to hear what you discover and how journaling helps you, brenda, so thanks for having me today.

Speaker 1: 39:37

All right, awesome. And, by the way, for our viewers and listeners, I just put a comment up on screen. If you enjoyed the discussion, please do us a favor. Amanda and I are self-employed, so we don't get performance reviews anymore, so if you enjoyed the conversation, we'd love to hear from you. Drop a comment below and let us know if you enjoyed this. We would really appreciate it. And also, here's a little LinkedIn tip for all of you.

Speaker 1: 39:59

If you have not yet posted on LinkedIn this month, maybe in the past year or maybe at all, this is your time. As soon as the video is done, playing here on LinkedIn, you'll see a little share button at the bottom. Go ahead and click on share and then you can share that video along as a post. You'll get a opportunity to type in some thoughts along with that. If you do, then share with people why they should watch it and also tag in Amanda and me if you could. You'll use the at sign to tag us in. Just start typing in the name and then go up here in a little dropdown. When you tag us or mention us in your post, we will get notified and I know that Amanda and I will both comment back from there.

Speaker 1: 40:36

So, with that said, thank you all so much for watching, and I want to just encourage you to come on to my show, listen in every Tuesday. Today's a special edition. We did a 9.05 am I'm typically on Tuesdays at 12.05, bringing in a variety of topics to help you to be enthusiastically self-employed. With that said, have a wonderful day and we will see you on LinkedIn. Take care, thank you.