Your Joyful Order With Leslie Martinez

#93- Joyful Productivity: How to Peacefully Pursue Your Day with Samantha Hawley

• Leslie Martinez • Season 5 • Episode 93

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Have you ever felt overwhelmed by life’s constant changes and sought a way to bring peace and clarity into your daily routine? Samantha Hawley, our insightful guest and experienced journal coach, shares her transformative journey with journaling through life's ups and downs, including the struggles of being a first-time mom. Samantha opens up about how she shifted from basic affirmations to more cathartic journaling, helping her navigate emotions and find peace amid chaos. 

We venture into the early morning rituals that can set the tone for the day, where the concept of an "emotional brain dump" takes center stage. Samantha guides us through this practice, allowing us to unburden our minds and make room for personal growth. With intentional prompts, she encourages us to focus on emotional well-being, offering beginners tips on how to start journaling with purpose, clarity, and a touch of mindfulness. Our conversation doesn’t shy away from addressing the common obstacles to journaling, emphasizing that the benefits, like stress reduction and emotional balance, far outweigh the fears of starting. Her story is a powerful reminder of how journaling can be a steadfast companion in times of uncertainty.

Connect with Samantha: 
Website: https://www.samanthapenkoff.com/emotionally-empowered-site
IG: https://www.instagram.com/samantha.s.says/
Podcast: Journal Entries
Email: hello@samantha-says.com

Get your hands on my BRAND NEW SOAP JOURNAL- launching December 2. Click the link to the shop to get on my VIP list- https://shopjoyfulorder.com/password

Connect with Leslie:

Follow on IG: @yourjoyfulorderstyle

Website: https://www.yourjoyfulorder.com/

Email: lmartinez@yourjoyfulorder.com
to schedule- Speaking Events, Interviews or Life Coaching Sessions

Shop my SOAP the Gospels Journal on Shopify:
https://shopjoyfulorder.com/

Listen to this Episode on You Tube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsXoAYIM2mfclNtYiaOzIUw

Shop my Journal (Gratitude, Goals & Prayer Journal) on Amazon:
https://a.co/d/09Djvaw

Book a FREE 30 Minute Discovery Coaching Call: https://tidycal.com/joyfulordermedia/30-minute-meeting

Speaker 1:

Welcome to another episode of your Joyful Order podcast. Today we're diving into something we all strive for a way to be productive without the stress. We'll be talking about how to peacefully pursue your day, using the power of journaling to boost both your productivity and your inner calm. If you've ever felt overwhelmed by your to-do list or struggle to start your day with clarity and intention, this episode is for you. My guest, samantha, is a journal coach who has transformed her own life through journaling, and she's here to share how you can create joyful productivity in your own life. My intention for today's episode is to help you discover how small, mindful practices like journaling can create space for both peace and productivity in your life. As you listen, I encourage you to reflect on how you can approach your day with more calm, more clarity and more joy, using these tools not to only get more done, but to feel more grounded and present while doing it. Hey everyone, I'm Leslie Martinez and you're listening to your Joyful Order podcast. Each week, I will bring you joyful stories that will motivate and inspire you and, at the same time, bring order to your everyday life. Let's just say the show will be a mixture of preaching and teaching, with a kick of motivation from your girl here.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to your Joyful Order podcast. Today, my guest is Samantha Hawley, and she's a journal coach who has navigated the challenges of life transition, including moving eight times in 10 years, good Lord. She's gone through motherhood, career shifts, all while finding solace in journaling. Through this practice, she discovered her voice and began living more intentionally. Samantha now helps others using journaling to unlock inner peace and joy, especially during times of change. So she's here today to share how we can incorporate journaling into our routines to foster productivity and calm.

Speaker 1:

So welcome to the podcast, samantha. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be here. Yes, thank you, samantha. Now you gave me a very in-depth bio that I read and I was like, wow, samantha has gone through some stuff and I was just about to like share, you know the bio and how you gave it to me, but I'm like, no, I want her to tell her story because I think it's so significant into how you got to where you are now. So if you can just share a little bit of your journey because it's so inspiring, and then if you can also share with my audience how journaling became your go-to tool for navigating through some of the tough transitions that you've gone through.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah. So I wasn't always a journal coach and that's not what I set out to become. I did journal, you know, a while ago, did journal, you know a while ago, and journaling back then looked to me like I am statements, you know, affirmations like I am healthy and wealthy, and you know statements like that, or very basic gratitude journaling like I'm grateful for my health, I'm grateful for, you know, my family, things like that, and it felt good for a moment but it didn't make me like feel a shift or anything. But it did the job for like what I was looking for at the time. And then COVID hit.

Speaker 2:

I feel like everybody has a COVID story right Like what happened in their life at that point. And for me I was pregnant during COVID, I had a COVID baby and one of those eight moves that you mentioned was from Maine. I was living in Maine with my husband at the time and we had moved down when I was seven months pregnant to the Outer Banks and we didn't know anybody in Maine or the Outer Banks, but he had gotten a job down there and we didn't know anybody in Maine or the Outer Banks, but he had gotten a job down there and that is where we had our son Griffin in October, and I remember I was a first-time mom no friends or family or any support down there and I also owned my own business and it was just like overwhelm is such a broad term but it was just this like mental and emotional and even physical, like explosion on the inside. From the outside I appeared calm and fine and happy, but internally I was like what is happening? There's so many responsibilities and so much going on and so many emotions behind each and every one of those tasks too, and I like needed to get it out, but I couldn't verbalize it even at the time. And so I remember I was sitting on the couch with my partner and I excused myself. I was like I just need to journal for a little bit and I grabbed like a random notebook that I had lying around. I locked myself in our spare bedroom because I was like there's something going on inside and I don't know if I'm going to cry or scream and I didn't want him to walk in on me. So I locked myself in.

Speaker 2:

I wrote vent sesh at the top of the page and I just I think I wrote for three pages, just like venting about work and being a mom, and like all the responsibilities and trying to balance it, and then relationship stuff too, of like arguments that we may have been having, or like the, the silent treatment that I was getting at times, and like what I wanted and what he wanted and all the things, and there were no solutions. That came out of journaling. But it was potentially the first time that I was really honest with myself of what I was going through and what I wanted almost, and I let my walls down of like that positive Sam that I always was. I was always like the optimistic person and I let it be OK to not be OK and it felt so good and so freeing. And so that's when journaling took a completely different spin for me, more than just like the I am statements and this simple gratitude.

Speaker 2:

And then from there back to my story. In January we had moved back to my hometown for more support and then in July my partner and I separated and we got divorced. It actually ended up being Valentine's Day the following year. It was a happy divorce. I was the one that chose to leave, but he actually moved down to Florida that September. So when my son was 10 months old, I got full custody. So, speaking of peaceful productivity, I mean, so much got added to my to-do list, like the all of that responsibility too.

Speaker 1:

So, yeah, from that point on, it's just been me and my son and the businesses that I run and managing all of that, with the help of journaling too, wow, I like I'm just hearing you and literally I'm getting chills because you've gone through so much in just a short amount of time moving, having a baby and then going through a divorce and that's definitely a lot to take in, I know. For me personally, like I share so much here on this platform, journaling is not new for my audience, first and foremost because I know the power of journaling. Also, it's just always nice to get people's different perspectives and I love how you shared that you did a vent session, like you literally wrote vent session, because I call them like my cry to God sessions, because I will write those out sometimes where I'm like God, I just need you. But I love that you I might reframe those as like I'm just venting right now Because I, like you, I'm a very optimistic person, you know, hence your Joyful Order podcast, like it's all about bringing joy and order. But I can have those days where I'm just like I need to vent. I don't feel that it's fair to unleash my venting to certain people, even my husband my husband gets the worst, your spouse typically gets the worst of you and the best of you. But I don't always want to vent and sometimes those frustrations were about my spouse or my children and I don't want to unpack that to the people that I trust, you know, and I don't. I don't want to go to my best friend or, you know, my cousin or my sister and just bent and lash out about my spouse or my family.

Speaker 1:

So I have gone to my journal and written some crazy stuff. You know, just like you, where you're like I got to just write it out. Some crazy stuff. You know, just like you, where you're like I got to just write it out. And the freedom that comes from that, right, sam, like it is just wow. So for someone that is just starting journaling, what would you recommend is a simple practice to just simply begin their day peacefully. You shared a couple you know, the I am statements, the gratitude, but for someone that wants to go the little step further, where is something that they can start? I love?

Speaker 2:

this question, and so I now call I don't call it event session anymore. Well, let me rephrase it there are event sessions, but on a day to day, especially for somebody just starting out. If you need to vent, feel free to call it a vent sandwich, but I call it an emotional brain dump. If somebody is listening to this and they want to get started and they don't journal, quite often there's probably a lot on their brain, and so I find it really helpful. Rather than to start organizing right away, which is what a lot of people do, they immediately I'm like okay, I'm overwhelmed, or I'm stressed, I have a lot on my plate, let me organize. And they skip over the piece of like well, what's causing those feelings? And like let me process that, or at least let me honor that Right. And so that's what the emotional brain dump is. It's like let's just get it all out on paper, and what that's going to do is a few things. Number one it's going to truly get it out of your brain, out of your heart, like and you're going to see it, and you're going to see what are the trends. Like you might say the word overwhelm five times and you're like okay, clearly it's the overwhelm, or you might mention like a person's name, a bunch of times Like oh, oh, I didn't realize that, like that conversation that I had with that person three months ago is still impacting me and so you're just going to find words or or sentences, things that will you will help you pick up on things to process and to journal through, either right then and there, or just you can flip back to this brain dump on a rainy day when you were like, okay, I want to like really get through this, move through this bigger emotion and that's like where you can start. So, emotional brain dump Also, you can't do this right or wrong. Sometimes it is just like free write sentences and paragraphs, but sometimes it is like bullet points and to-do lists. There's like five or seven different ways of journaling. One is free writing, there's bullet points, there's letter writing, so any way, shape or form that it comes out is perfect.

Speaker 2:

Once you have that emotional brain dump, then, to peacefully pursue your day, that's where I would get a little bit more specific and ask some specific questions. The first is how do I want to feel today? And sometimes people journal at night. So if you're doing this at night, just reverse it and say how do I want to feel tomorrow? And get specific Do you want to feel peaceful tomorrow, or do you want to feel accomplished tomorrow? Do you want to feel courageous tomorrow? What is that emotion that you want to feel?

Speaker 2:

Another question that I like to ask is what will bring me joy today, or what will bring me joy tomorrow, being really intentional before we even organize our to-do list, because that's always going to be there for us. So really intentional, with these feelings. And then what is one goal that if I do just one thing out of the full list that I would feel really good about accomplishing today or tomorrow? And then I do like a top three task list that sometimes I do get to all three, but I like to circle that one where, like, if I do this one thing and I did this all the time with my son too, before he went to daycare and he was at home with me and he was napping I would always ask myself, like, okay, he's napping, it might be for two hours or 20 minutes.

Speaker 2:

If I got one thing done during this time, what would I feel the best about getting done? And sometimes that was working on a project and sometimes it was doing dishes or something. So it really varies based on the season of life that you're in and what your priorities are and all of that. So those are a few of the questions that really helped me make it more than just a to-do list and like day-to-day stuff and put some intentionality behind it.

Speaker 1:

I love it, absolutely love it, and my audience is not hearing any of that for the first time and I love that you are reiterating it because, coming from another fellow coach and someone who specializes in journaling and you are working with clients on this like you see the benefits of this practice, like I call it a brain dump and learning to prioritize and finding the patterns right. That's what you want to see. Like, what are the patterns that you are seeing there? You know, is it that you're overwhelmed? Is it, like you said, that there's a certain person where you are maybe haven't processed the emotions behind a certain event or something that has happened? And that's what, like I tell you know, when I'm coaching also, it's like okay, well, let's see what are the patterns that we're seeing there and addressing those to you know, help.

Speaker 1:

Now, I think the bigger problem of this and maybe you can give some recommendations to this, samantha is a lot of listeners are probably like oh, I've tried to do that before and I just don't have time. That is a big thing. I don't have time in the morning to sit and process my brain down. I don't have time to sit and process my emotions. What would you say to somebody who has that challenge I'm going to be a little blunt, since this is where, like, we're listening to my or it's my audience that's talking right now I call them excuses, like they're just excuses that you're not making the time. But what advice would you give those people that are challenged in that area of saying I just don't have the time, sam?

Speaker 2:

I think it stems from the lack of experience. When you don't journal, there's a lot of fear, I think, of what might come up and you just think it's going to take a lot of time and your first journal entry might take a lot of time. I actually usually suggest typing out your first journal entry instead of writing it, because you can type faster. There is actual research on the benefit of writing, so I do suggest writing, but for that first entry it's like, yeah, just do that brain dump, type it out like just get it out there. But then there's also research on the fact that you can like reduce stress and overwhelm and boost your immunity actually and heal faster physically and all of this stuff just by journaling. Five to 15 minutes, three to five days a week. So a few things. One, it doesn't even have to be every single day, it's about five to 15 minutes, and one of my things with journaling is I set zero expectations. So I know that there are some people that set a timer and they journal for a certain amount of time. I don't, because I don't want to be like sitting there looking at the timer of like okay, I have to keep going or whatnot. But I eventually got really curious of like, hmm, how long is it taking me in the mornings? And for me it's about six or seven minutes.

Speaker 2:

And so what I did was I created a digital journal because I kept hearing that the time thing and that people weren't starting because they were writing and people like they got hand cramp, like people will come up with a lot of excuses. I was like you know what? All right, fine, and the prompts I gave you guys, like the how do you want to feel is very, very basic, very simple. But I turned it into a digital journal and what I did was I put a song for each day I only did four days too and there's a song so you can play it and journal while you listen to it. And each song is less than five minutes because it's like you just need to start and like and then you're going to keep going, right, and so, yeah, the time thing, just start and like, see how it feels, and you're going to want to keep going. It's this like fear of what's going to come out and the fear that is going to take so long. Then that keeps you from starting and even trying it.

Speaker 1:

I love that. I love the song. That's like you can get through one song of journaling, come on, that's really simple. And here's another one. And I want to know, as a fellow coach and stuff too, how you answer this one.

Speaker 1:

So another thing that I hear of clients or even just friends and people like, oh, I don't do journaling because I don't want anybody to ever read my journals. Like, what if someone finds my journals? What if, you know, the people that I live with find it? Or they say when I die, I am telling like their closest friend, my best friend or my sister or whoever, to burn my journals. And I just had this conversation because I was encouraging a fellow friend at church. We're talking about journaling. I'm actually having friend at church. We're talking about journaling. I'm actually having I'm starting a church community group called Soaping Through the Gospels and it's a Bible study and we are journaling basically. And my friend, she was like I don't journal because I don't want anybody to ever find my journals and I'm like I had to explain to her what the Bible study form of journaling was. I was like, well, this is really different. Like you're not, you know, you're not confessing your sins in here. You know, hey friend, I got some exciting news to share with you. I want you to mark your calendars for Friday, november 29th, as we're revealing something that will transform how you connect with God's word the Soap the Gospels journal. This journal will transform how you connect with God's word.

Speaker 1:

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Speaker 1:

Pre-orders are open December 2nd. Don't miss your chance to start your journey with the Soap the Gospels journal. Visit yourjoyfulordercom and subscribe to my email list to learn more. Joyfulordercom and subscribe to my email list to learn more. But what do you tell those people? That, just like you said too earlier, there's a fear of what they're going to kind of unpack. And that's definitely a true fear, and I know that there are fears that I have shared of me actually writing things out too, however, that fear that somebody's going to find the journal and read it. How do you address that with people?

Speaker 2:

Really asking what are you afraid that they're going to find and also what will help you feel the safest as well? And I can relate to that because, especially when I first started journaling, I was still with my ex-husband and I was like, hmm, he might see some things in here, and so I actually did a few different things. One I was I would hide my journal in a spot where I didn't think that he would find it, and then also, if it was very sensitive information that I really didn't want him to find, I would type it out on my computer in Google what is it? Google Docs and I would put it in a folder that said you know notes, or like untouched, you know something that did not say his name on it or something, and I would put it in there because I was like putting stuff in there anyways, to like keep track of stuff beforehand. So you could do that, you could try hiding, but that isn't enough for some people there actually is this is a very real fear, by the way. And so there's actually something called write and rip, where you write and then immediately you rip it out of the notebook and you rip it up, or sometimes people burn it. You could burn the actual piece of paper right away, or when you finish the whole journal, you could burn the journal. It's like a whole ceremony that you could do.

Speaker 2:

I'm actually not one of those people that goes back to read journal entries. I know some people like to do that to see like where they were a month ago or a year ago. I've probably only done that three times in like three years. Maybe If that is you, you probably wouldn't want to like burn it or ruin it, but if you're not, you know the purpose for my like transformative journaling is just that it's something cool to see how far you've come, but if it, you're gonna get the transformation no matter what, and that safety of nobody reading it is more important than like having this perfectly curated journal that's somewhere. So yeah, those are a few things that you could do I I love the write and rip.

Speaker 1:

I've never heard that before. I've told people tell your best friend to burn them afterwards or when you die, you know kind of thing.

Speaker 1:

And I actually just had a friend, so that same conversation that was two of my friends at church. We're chatting about, you know, journaling and I was sharing just the impact of that it's had on my life. And one of my other friends had said, you know, my mom passed away several years ago and she gave the responsibility of my aunt for all of her journals. She said my mom was the average journal and my aunt took all of her journals and I was always asking my aunt, can I have those journals? And she didn't give them to me until way later in my life and my aunt kind of kept me from reading them until she knew that I could kind of unpack what was in there. And she said, and there were some things that my mom said about, like me and my siblings that I was really shocked by. She had said, and I was like you know, that's one I love, the fact that her mother gave the responsibility to the aunt, but that the aunt held true to that responsibility and saying I'm not going to give these to your children until I think they are ready for them. You know, but like my, my journals sit on the shelf in my bedroom and if, if, at any time, any of my family wants to come and open them up, they can. I think there's more fear of them to open those up than there is, like me, fearing that they're going to open up, like in full transparency. I'm a very transparent person, so I don't think, like for me personally, there is nothing in there that I would that I either didn't already say out loud to somebody, or that I would be afraid to say like, look, this is what was going on, you know, because in all reality, I think it's important for us to actually process what we are working or what we're struggling with, you know. So if it's frustration with your children, if it's frustration with your spouse, if it's frustration with your mother, your sibling or whatever, I think it's important that for us to you know, as we journal, we kind of vent it out, so to say, right, we have those vent sessions where we can just unpack it all, but then journaling also helps us to start to process those emotions. And as we learn and grow on how to, in a healthy way, process our emotions, I think it's important for us to have those conversations with the people that we love, you know.

Speaker 1:

So then it's no surprise, like my journals are going to be no surprise to my children or my spouse whatsoever. They're not going to read anything in there that they're like oh wow, because I've processed through that and I've talked to my children about certain things. Or I've talked to my spouse eventually, at the time when I was writing it out and I was like you know what You're like, I'm going to town Like no, because I know, I know that I'd rather write out and lash out in paper than to lash out in front of my spouse or in front of my children. So I will like unlash it in paper and that allows me like so much relief, you know, and then that then will allow me to kind of sit with it, pray with it, pray about it for a while.

Speaker 1:

That's how I process through it and then start to have the conversations as I need to work through it and I'm like OK, I let it out in the way that it was surfaced at first, but then I let it out that way. So now let me process and have the conversations in person. You know that that way. Does it always happen that way? Absolutely not. Do we lash out at each other 100%? Like yes, but not as often as we should, because we're learning to process those things in a different way. You know we're not perfect but, like I said, nothing in my journals are going to be of shock at all to anybody.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you know.

Speaker 1:

So, anyhow, that's what I just want to encourage people on that end, because I know, like the fear is real, the fear of processing through the emotions first off. That's a real and true fear. And the fear of what if somebody reads this real and true fear? And the fear of what if somebody reads this? And that's where you just, I think, have to dig deep and really say, okay, if. If there is a fear of having these conversations with people, um, it's re-evaluating one, how, like maybe boundaries, it's re-evaluating, you know, certain relationships like it. It really got me to, uh, journaling. It really got me to process a lot of stuff. You know it's a form of therapy, right, sam, it's a form of therapy yeah, yeah, I mean we know therapists use it and all that.

Speaker 1:

It's not just something that you know um, it just randomly. Oh, we do it Like no, there is science behind it, like you said. You know the science behind it versus typing it out.

Speaker 1:

There's a whole science behind it too. Now, this is one thing that I want to know, because I have a lot of young mothers that listen here, and I want to know how journaling has impacted just your approach to motherhood. You're still a young mom, as in you have a little one. You know he's. He's. How old is he? Three or four now? He's four. Yeah, he's four. Yeah, he's four. So how has your journaling impacted your approach just to motherhood and finding that balance? You know you're a single mom now, so how do you find that balance with your motherhood, your personal and your professional life?

Speaker 2:

As a single mom, there's a lot of things and a lot of emotions and a lot of things to balance. And I think you're right A lot of people don't want to even think about the emotion because then, like processing it means that they're facing it and they get there. They fear that they're going to get stuck in it. They think, oh my gosh, I'm feeling really resentful towards this person. Or I'm feeling they're facing it and they get there. They fear that they're going to get stuck in it. Like they think, oh my gosh, I'm feeling really resentful towards this person. Or I'm feeling really overwhelmed. Like thinking about it means that they're going to stay in that, when in reality, like allowing that feeling to happen and to feel it is the first step in releasing it. Like, and sometimes it's all you need. It's like allowing it and like being like oh, this is what I'm feeling, truthfully, and unless you experience it then it's hard to even understand. But like, sometimes it's just like it's like releases off of you. Um, but through journaling. That's how I've been able to feel more balanced is because I came up with a way and I call it my journal prompt flows, because I often don't start with just a journal prompt, which is when there's like one question. Typically, I found that a lot of times the prompts that I was coming up with didn't resonate with me, like on the day that I picked one, and it was a little bit more frustrating. So I was kind of just coming up with what is something that I'm frustrated with about myself, like maybe self-sabotage, like the way that I self-sabotage or something, or like something specific about motherhood, like I was ending every single day feeling so exhausted and I journal in the mornings and I was starting every journal entry like yesterday was hard or yesterday was exhausting or I am so tired, and eventually it got to a point of just like okay, like I get it, but what are we doing about it? You know what I mean. And so I started like prompting myself through it and like basically processing it in that way. So I stopped getting stuck in it and I started working through it and the way that I do that is honoring it and then kind of asking myself like what does that mean? Either from the sense of like what am I making that mean about me, or what do I think others are thinking about me A lot of times. We don't want to go there because it's like, oh, it doesn't matter what other people think, but it does. It heavily plays a role in what we do oftentimes. But often again, once you identify, like, oh, I think they're thinking this, we realize, well, that's just silly, it doesn't matter. But again, when we don't look at that, it has weight. Until we look at it and it's like, oh, it doesn't matter.

Speaker 2:

Then my favorite part of my journaling process is just saying is that true? Is that, whatever it is, that you're going through that belief? Or even like speaking of balancing it all in our to-do lists and peacefully pursuing it, like, do you have to do all of that or can you delegate or can you do all of this stuff? And the next piece is the clarity Like, what is it that you actually want? Do you actually want to delegate some of those tasks? Do you actually want to rest today? Do you actually want to do what it is that you've been saying that you want to do for a long time? And then the last step is action and it's like micro steps. So you said that you often have conversations and so, like I use to go for my emotion and like lashing out, to getting to that conversation piece. I use journaling for all of it and you pray on it. So I feel like we look very similar and but we get to the same ending point where, like, we have that conversation and conversations are really big though for some people, and so the action steps at the end is more than just a conversation.

Speaker 2:

I kind of break up conversations into three steps. Number one is coming up with the outline of what it is that you want to say, like the main points. Because if you're like me, I start a big conversation. I'm like uh-oh, like what is my main point, like what was I going to say, like completely forget Right. And so that's like day one. One step is an outline. The second step is reaching out to the person and just saying, hey, I'd like to chat, and like setting up that time. Am I going to do it via text message or call them or email them, or like what's a pro? Or at dinner tonight or whatever is appropriate? And then the third step is actually having the conversation. So we get from this like feeling of whatever overwhelm of all that we have on our plate and to working all the way through it to then getting to action steps to how we actually want to feel or getting what we want, which is balance, and that peace and that joy.

Speaker 1:

I wrote everything down that you gave right now, sam, just so you know I am going to make some really good show notes for our audience, because this was just all so, so, so good. And I will be full transparency here. I don't journal in this way, and I know that I need to. I have journals that give me prompts and some of the stuff is in there, but I don't use that tool on a daily basis. On a daily basis, my journaling basically consists of, like my gratitude, my goals and then a prayer, and then I have like a Bible study journal that I write and then I just have, like I have a specific prayer journal where I keep lists of names of people that I'm praying for, and I come back often and I kind of I will update and say like, hey, that prayer was answered, this, you know, this person is better, or the situation got handled. And that's also like in the journal where I just have my event sessions, also kind of to say so I love that.

Speaker 1:

You know talking about like what are you frustrated about today? When you lash out, like, are these, these things true? Like what from this is true, and getting clarity, and then it's those simple prompts that I think can really lead you into a new direction and what it is that you are challenged with, what it is that you are processing, even the seasons that you're in. You know you're, you're. You're in a season where your little one, he's little right now. You're not going to be in this season long, you know he's. I have a 19 year old and a 16 year old right now. You know you're, you're in the thick of it, like you are in the serious thick of it because, four years old good Lord, I remember when my boys were four years old, I felt overwhelmed.

Speaker 1:

Every day I was frustrated, like I don't have me time. These kids are like leeches, like sucking the life out of me, like I wish I had these practices in place then, because I definitely would have approached motherhood so differently, so differently. I didn't start these practices until maybe about like seven, eight years ago, you know, and by then my kids were a little bit much older and things were, I don't want to say, easier, but some of the challenges that made motherhood overwhelming were a little less stressful during that time. Motherhood never gets less, you know, less overwhelming or less stressful. It's just different challenges in different seasons. So it is like you're kind of in that like still toddler preschool, you know you can't leave your child alone.

Speaker 1:

You, you can't retreat to your room to breathe because you're worried about what they're going to be doing out there. You know the same like if you're in newborn season and speaking to those young moms right now that are in those seasons right now, and you're in newborn season and speaking to those young moms right now that are in those seasons right now and you're like I want to implement this but I just can't because I don't have the time. There are small action steps, like you said, that you can take in this season to do this. And making it a priority is a big thing. You know your child eventually sleeps. A priority is a big thing, you know your child eventually sleeps. Bust out your journal then you know five minutes to do that. Now I want to just transition before we kind of wrap up a little bit.

Speaker 1:

Sam, we are in the gratitude season right now. As this airs, it will be airing just right on and about Thanksgiving time and I'm a big journaler for gratitude. I have seen how gratitude journaling has really transformed just my approach to the day and, on this topic of joyful productivity, I truly feel that me keeping a daily gratitude practice has allowed me to joyfully pursue my day in a great way. Now I always challenge because I think there's like surface level journaling also and then there's like deep right. I mean we can keep it.

Speaker 1:

And that goes with gratitude I shared with my audience so many times. You know, we all are grateful for our health, we all can be grateful for our faith, our family, you know. Oh, these are top level, surface stuff that every day we can be grateful for. But when I do my gratitude practice I look for really small things that we typically take for granted. I literally in my journal today I wrote that I was grateful for the smell of my citrus candle burning. I wrote hold on, where's my journal? Okay, never mind, I was going to open it because I'm like what else did I write about? I wrote how, oh, that I was very grateful for the lineup of the guests that I have for this podcast season, and then I got very specific with a couple of other things. So can you touch just a little bit about what you have learned on your gratitude practice of journaling and how that has kind of transformed your approach to journaling also?

Speaker 2:

I love your approach to gratitude journaling approach to journaling. Also, I love your approach to gratitude journaling. I still remember the last time we talked you had said that day you wrote something about a butterfly that you saw on a walk and some woman that was smiling or something. I still remember that. But yeah, and so, like I said in the beginning, mine used to be so basic, like you know, your health and all of that stuff, and then what I started to do after that was definitely get more specific, because it just feels better. You know, it feels so much nicer to be grateful about something that you can visualize, and so I would challenge myself to get specific about something. And so I still remember one day, when my son was still a newborn, he was like sitting in my lap as I was doing this and I said, like I'm grateful for, like my son's soft head or something, and I was just like laying my cheek on his head or something, and so I was doing that for a little while and then I realized I wanted to like take it to the next step, to like make it feel even better. So what I do now for gratitude is I visualize first, and so I close my eyes and I actually did a like a guided visualization on my podcast for it, where I close my eyes and I first just take a few deep breaths and then I go through my senses and I do this with either one moment or like two or three max, and I pick a moment and then go through my senses and think like who was there and what were the scents that were that I could smell at that point and basically I just relive that moment, re -experience it, so like I can still go back to that moment where my son was on my lap and I can picture the navy blue couch that I was on and I can picture the journal, and like I was sitting in the corner of that couch and I know where the staircase was and the house that I was in in the outer banks, and like I can picture my, my cheek on the head of his, and like just I can visualize it right, and then, after visualizing it, I would journal about that or even just like writing a little sentence. But after having felt it and like relived it, that feeling of gratitude stays with me for so much longer and I noticed that it also helps if it's about a person that you aren't with.

Speaker 2:

I did this a lot when I was away from family and it was with small moments too, like one of the moments I would go to often and you can use the same moment over and over again. I would use a moment where I went to the farmer's market with my mom and I was just visualizing like walking through the market and we both had our dogs with mom and I was just visualizing like walking through the market and we both had our dogs with us and I would just visualize like I remembered what she was wearing and I was walking behind her and I saw her dog and my dog and picking up produce and things like that and truly just reliving it. What scents were there? Did I pick up any fruit?

Speaker 2:

I remember like it was a hot day and I, when I went to go open my car door, it was hot, you know, and you almost like too hot when you touch your seatbelt. So things like that. And this can take as long or as short as you want. If you do one moment, it probably takes me like two minutes maybe. If I do three moments, which is the most that I do, it takes like seven to 10 minutes, but it just feels so cool and so good and it's just. I come out of that moment like so happy and like going into the next task that I have to do that day, feeling so at peace, no matter how important of a task that is.

Speaker 1:

I love that. Sam, I wrote that down and I actually kind of got emotional right now because, as you were saying, that, the visual gratitude of the senses, the touch like the smell, like remembering that, and how it allows that moment, or whatever it is that you are seeking gratitude for, to just stick so much. And later I got emotional because this morning, as I was getting ready, I was thinking and this goes back to the whole butterfly thing I had shared with you on our last conversation and this wasn't on this podcast, I think I had shared on your podcast or when we chatted I don't know, we chatted a few times, but I had shared that I had saw a black and gold butterfly which reminds me of my cousin that had passed away. And this morning I I did this not in intentionally, but when my, my cousin was sick in the hospital, there were a few moments that I really grabbed on to, and one of them was I went and, um, I had he, he was, he was really sick during this time. So I took a big roll of paper and I wrote some of his favorite Bible verses on there and I plastered them all over his hospital room wall and I said I want you to look at these and read them every day. And the verses that he gave me to write down were just impactful to me to know that these were the verses that he chose for me to write down. There were three or four different verses. It was three of them that were his verses and then one of them was a verse that I wrote for him.

Speaker 1:

So that moment of him telling me the verses as I wrote them down was something that I'm so grateful for. And then another moment and that's what I was thinking about this morning is he was sick and a nurse had came in. He hadn't eaten for days and he was looking to get a little bit better and they had brought him his first meal that he could actually eat in several days, so he couldn't mouth it himself and the nurse kind of left it there for him and just walked away and I was like, do you want me to feed him? So there was that moment where I actually got to feed him and that was me not knowing that that was going to be my last moment with my cousin. That was the last time that I saw him alive. And this morning I was thinking about that because I visualize that all the time. I visualize both of those moments, and they're things to be grateful for.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

I have written those things down in my gratitude journal so many times. I was thankful that I got to feed my cousin. I was thankful or grateful that I got to write these bible verses for him to look at. Um, and I think to every moment, like I. I actually can picture myself in the hospital room. The smell, um not the best smell.

Speaker 1:

It's not a good smell, but the smell right, I'm sorry, I'm totally getting a mess right now. Um, no, it's okay because, as you shared, that though it just, I'm like, I experienced that today and it didn't even dawn on me that me going back to writing it down several times in my journal and visualizing every single thing, it's almost like each time I think about it there's something new that pops up in it. I picture something else. There was something that my cousin had said that in every time that I thought about it, each time that it comes up now, I'm like oh, that's right. He did say that, you know.

Speaker 1:

So the visualization is so impactful for you to going back to key moments, and I never knew that those moments were going to be the last moments with him, you know. But now that I have gone back to them so many times, because I look back at how grateful I am for those moments, it has allowed me to grasp onto those moments that much deeper and not much more. You know where. I'm never going to forget those moments, and it's easy for certain moments like that to pass, where we miss an opportunity to be grateful for them. We miss writing it down, we miss capturing it, you know, and sometimes it's great to capture.

Speaker 1:

You know, we're in a world where everything is taking pictures Like, oh, I want to remember this moment forever, you know. But how oftentimes do we actually go back to like our phone or even print the picture out Like? It's very rare that we do that right. I mean, I know I have probably hundreds and thousands of pictures and videos and stuff in my phone, so to go back and look for that moment it's a little overwhelming. But if I journal it and I like relive those moments in my brain, I visualize it. I don't need to go back to my phone to look for it, you know, and it's just so important.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for bringing that up, by the way. It just really triggered today. That's why I had that moment where I was thinking about the hospital room and I remembered something my cousin said that I hadn't remembered before, but because I come back to it, because I just think of how grateful I was for that moment. Sam, thank you so much for your time. As we wrap up, I have just three questions that I like to end with with all of my guests. So, the first being what is something that Sam loves to do that brings you joy.

Speaker 2:

Such a good question. I feel like, since my headspace is on gratitude and this is Thanksgiving time, something that does bring me joy is kind of like taking those mental snapshots of in the moment. Like the more you do the visualization gratitude, the more you almost like take those pictures to come back to in the moment, and it makes me be so much more present but also brings so much more joy to like this simple moment. Like at this past weekend I was in what my son calls the cave and it's just like this little place behind my house that is like overgrown and he just calls it the cave, and inside I'm just like, oh my gosh, this is like a time where he's being independent, which you know the leech phase is right now but he's like starting to like explore on his own. I'm like, oh, it's like a relief, it's so cool. So, yeah, like just being really present in like teeny, tiny moments brings me joy. I like that.

Speaker 1:

I love that, love it. Okay, what is a song or even like an artist that is on your playlist, that just gets your day going, even like your workout routine, and you hear that one song or that one artist and you're like oh yes, I'm ready to go.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I love Shut Up and Dance, but I also love the Taylor Swift song Shake it Off. Like anytime I have any sort of like emotion, I just need to literally like shake off through me. I play Taylor Swift.

Speaker 1:

I love it, love, love, love, shake it off. I. I'm like I love to dance through that one too. And then, lastly, what is a favorite book that you have on your shelf that you would recommend to listeners? That just really had an impact on your life.

Speaker 2:

I love the Audacity to be Queen by Gina DeVee. One simple quote that she says in there is how good can you let your life get? And that alone, especially in the context, it really opened my mind to so many possibilities. Oh I love it.

Speaker 1:

The Audacity to be Queen, I love it. I'm writing it down because I always look for book recommendations too. I have a bookshelf full of books, of recommendations, that I haven't read yet. I'm a book nerd and I'm like, oh, I just got to buy this one and then it will all sit on my shelf, but the goal is to eventually get to it. So I got to check that one out. But, samantha, thank you again for your time. Can you just share with my audience about your journaling community and just how they can connect with you?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so I have a journaling community called Emotionally Empowered, and it's for moms who are going through it, you know, and not afraid to talk about the hard stuff. I think that's the beauty of it that we all talk about the hard stuff, but it's also a very uplifting place. Like we don't, we don't get stuck in it, and so it's a really empowering community to be a part of. So you can learn more about that and just connect with me over on instagram at samanthassays. And even if you took anything away from this episode, I would love to hear more about anything that you came up with when you journaled, and also how your holiday is going too.

Speaker 1:

Awesome. So thank you again so much, sam, and for my audience, go and have an amazing holiday season and until next time, go chase joy.