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Journaling and Mindful Productivity with Rachel Collins

• Carla Reeves | Creator of The Differently Coaching Experience

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If you’re navigating unexpected changes, facing challenges, or adjusting to a new normal, this episode is for you. Meet Rachel Collins—author of Insights and Inspirations: 300 Journal Prompts for Cultivating Joy, Mindfulness, and Gratitude—as she shares her journey of creating a mindful productivity system during a challenging season of life.

In this episode, Rachel dives into:

  • How journaling can help you find clarity and process emotions.
  • Practical steps to stay grounded during chaotic times.
  • Her mindful productivity system that blends visioning, time-blocking, and self-care to get things done with ease and joy.
  • The transformative power of carving out intentional time for yourself, even in the busiest of seasons.

Rachel’s approach is packed with actionable insights and inspiration, perfect whether you're a seasoned journaler or new to the practice. Tune in and discover how small, consistent steps can help you live with more joy, clarity, and authenticity.

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Learn more about Carla:
Website: https:/www.carlareeves.com/
Connect on LI: https://www.linkedin.com/in/reevescarla/
Connect on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@differentlythepodcast

Go to https://www.carlareeves.com/getunstuck.com to download Carla's on demand journaling workshop + exercise to help you stop spinning and start moving forward.

Explore Coaching with Carla: https://bookme.name/carlareeves/lite/explore-coaching

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Thank you for listening!

Speaker 1:

I'm Carla Reeves, and this is Differently. Whether you feel stuck in survival, navigating a change or seeking more for your life, may this podcast be your weekly nudge to take a risk to build a life that is uniquely bold, authentic and in alignment with your deepest values. What if you worried less about the bumps in the road and instead got equipped for the journey? Get ready to rethink what's possible. Welcome back to Differently. I know we have some new listeners, so I want to welcome you to the show. I'm so glad that you're here Today.

Speaker 1:

I'm sharing an interview with you and if you're in the middle of navigating some unexpected changes, walking through a challenge, adjusting or trying to find a new norm, this episode is for you. I want you to meet Rachel Collins. She is doing things differently. She created, from the trenches of her own life and navigating an unexpected season, a mindful productivity system that she's going to tell you all about. She's also the author of a book called Insights and Inspirations, which is full of 300 journal prompts to cultivate joy, mindfulness and gratitude. You can look forward to hearing some tangible ideas for journaling and how to do that through change and challenging times. How to stay grounded when life around you is anything but how to get things done with less stress and more joy and so much more.

Speaker 1:

It was really fun to talk to Rachel as someone who has experienced the power of writing and uses it as a vehicle for navigating her life. Let's get right to it. Grab your notebook and a warm cup of coffee. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. Hey, differently listeners, I have a new guest today, and we are talking about writing and journaling, which I absolutely love. But if you're not a writer or a journaler, don't worry this. Uh, we have a message for you too, because journaling is just a vehicle, and I think Rachel, my guest, believes in that too, and she teaches all about journaling for clarity, confidence, ease and joy, and she has something else really exciting to share. So, rachel, welcome to the show.

Speaker 2:

Thank you so much. I'm so glad to be with you today.

Speaker 1:

Likewise, and you're coming to us from where so?

Speaker 2:

I'm based out of Calgary, Alberta. I'm in Canada.

Speaker 1:

Awesome, and so tell why. Why journaling for you, Rachel, Like I want to just get right into it. Like'm so curious because I'm a fellow journaler myself. Journal junkie, as I say. When was your first experience of journaling? How did that even enter your life?

Speaker 2:

So I have been journaling since I was small. Pretty much as soon as I learned to write I started more with stories, but then, I'd say by the time I was a teenager, I've had a really steady habit of journaling at least a page a day, and I've continued that through most of my life, which has just been incredibly powerful because you can look back and see kind of trends, you can see your mindset, you can see certain themes pop up over and over and think, oh, my goodness, I should really deal with this. And so I just find an incredibly powerful tool for having a way to close my day and stay connected with with where I'm at emotionally.

Speaker 1:

That's amazing. So I know, when you reached out, we met through the podcast collaborative and you talked about a mindful productivity system and a book on journaling, and so I knew that we had to connect, because my listeners and my clients are all about mindful productivity and journaling is the vehicle that we teach and use to facilitate so many things in our life. So how did these all come together for you and what are you doing today with these as a bit you know inside of your business?

Speaker 2:

For sure. So I have a recent book that's come out that I'm really pleased with, and it's 300 journaling prompts that are used for joy, mindfulness and gratitude, and so that book is called Insights and Inspiration, and that's been something that was a wonderful way for me to actually apply my mindful productivity system to publish it right, to write it and publish it. And the whole idea behind the mindful productivity system is that we have the opportunity to do things with more joy and more ease by focusing on what truly matters the most, and so when you can get really clear on what matters to you and why, it's easier to focus in and say no to things that don't fit into that. And so I knew that I wanted to write. I knew I wanted to do this, but it's incredibly hard for myself and for many other people to make the time to do that, and so I'll tell you a little bit of a story, if that's okay, around how I developed the mindful productivity system and then how I've used that in my life, and so just to give you a little bit of context, I work full time, so I'm a full time professional, I'm a mother and I have aging parents, and so I have responsibilities that way as well.

Speaker 2:

And so very busy lifestyle, very full days, and I had a family member get suddenly very ill and so, on top of everything else, I needed to layer in caregiving.

Speaker 2:

And when all this happened, honestly I just had a little bit of a you know, personal moment where I'm like there's not going to be any time for me in this right, and so the things that I love to do, the things like writing, the things like art, where's that joy going to be for me in having all of these responsibilities and just keeping the wheels going on everything?

Speaker 2:

And so what I figured out through this process is I didn't have to have a lot of time, but the time that I had I had to use really well and I had to make it meaningful, and I had to be able to just still have that time for me every day.

Speaker 2:

And so the way that I approached it is I used basically what I call mindful time blocks to center myself, so through either journaling or body awareness or deep breathing or meditation, but something that would really kind of anchor me in making the space that I had to work in feel a little bit sacred, and then I would layer into that focus and it didn't have to be a ton of time, but they say a minimum of 25 minutes, maximum of 45 minutes that I could make progress on something I really cared about.

Speaker 2:

And so, you know, I ground myself, make progress in this case writing, writing a book and then kind of close that out on the other end with a mindful session as well. And so, even though I had so much going on in my life because I was able to carve out that time every day, not only could I achieve what I wanted to do as a passion project on the side, but I could do it in a way that felt really good to me. And so that's how I developed the system. It was actually through, you know, wanting to make progress on things I really cared about, and I'm super happy to be able to share that with people now. So, you know, great, great experience for me, even though it was a very difficult time.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, oh, my goodness, so many things there. I mean just your situation and life circumstances. I feel like that's so relatable to so many of us and it is like you feel overwhelmed by everything that's going on and it feels like there's no amount of time. And so I hear this so often from my clients what did you have to? Because I think, what did you have to? Because I think, excuse me, in that situation we can feel powerless, right, we can feel powerless and just sort of at the victim of our circumstances.

Speaker 1:

What did you have to either set down or change in the way that you thought to realize that you could carve out this time when it felt like there is no time for what matters? Because I've experienced it. On the other side, when you carve out this time for what matters, the other time it almost like appears or reveals itself, or you find time where you move through things with greater grace and ease. But how, for somebody who's buried in the overwhelm, what? What did you have to overcome in your own mind or thinking to try that make that happen the first time?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I will say it didn't come easily. There was a lot of tears and getting there, I felt went through, want to say, at least two months where I felt, you know, just like all my energy was drained right, like everything I had was going into just keeping the wheels on the bus, going for everything I was responsible for and everybody I cared about. And I was just having tea with a couple of girlfriends and they could just like the tears were pouring out, right, they could just see how overwhelmed I was just having tea with a couple of girlfriends and they could just like the tears were pouring out, right, they could just see how over overwhelmed I was. And you know, one of them just said, like what are you doing for you, right? Like we care about you, what are you doing for you in this process? And so it really took kind of that outside perspective to go. I'm in this for the long haul, right. Like is not a short term thing, like this is not a blip, this is something I need to find a way to move through and still enjoy life. And in having that joy, I'm actually going to be better for other people as well, right.

Speaker 2:

And so you know, it's really hard to do that mind shift, to say, okay, I need to do things for myself, I need to do self-care, I need to really kind of put myself first.

Speaker 2:

But once I was able to make that shift, what I found is I actually showed up better at work, I showed up better for the people I loved, I showed up better in all of my responsibilities, and so it can feel a little bit selfish to kind of go. You know, I want, I need to put myself first, but it is incredibly powerful and I really do believe that it makes us better in all aspects of life. Right, that you, you need to really connect in with your heart and you need to stay true to yourself. And, honestly, I also had to say no to a lot of things, right. And so, getting really clear and what mattered to me and why, is what empowered me to start, you know, telling people, sorry, I may have done that thing for years, but I'm not doing it now, right, this is what's important to me now and this is why, and so it just allowed me to, you know, really get very focused on fewer things and do those things better.

Speaker 1:

Listener, I want you to go back and rewind just a little bit of what she just said, that literally taking this time for herself allowed her to show up better in every area of her life, and I can't say that enough.

Speaker 1:

Like I've experienced that too, I've seen that with my clients and it's so often people think that this is selfish and I often say that it's actually one of the most generous things that you can do is to like take care of your own inner world and thought, life and emotions, because then you don't dump them everywhere else and you don't make other people responsible for them. You actually are taken care of. So you can show up and take care of people and be more generous of people and be more generous. So I love that message so much. I think self-care I kind of resist that whole word because it's often such sort of surfacy kinds of things and I love that you're sharing a message that it's really a self-discipline of taking that time to take care of yourself so that you can go do all those things you want to do and have the impact you want to have and be sane and well while you're doing it.

Speaker 2:

Yes, and actually find some joy right in the moment. You know, I I think it's so easy to get to get overwhelmed and to be thinking ahead to like here's everything I have to do, right. And I don't know about you, but for me, like when I start doing that, it just feels like things are piling on right, when, if I can be more mindful and present in the moment not all the time, but at least for blocks of time it just is freeing, it just allows me to not be carrying everything at once and really just have a time that feels good. Yeah.

Speaker 1:

A hundred percent, and when you're present, I find that you have. I have everything I need. I'm I'm not because I'm not lost in my head, um, and I can be more focused and my work is deeper. My work is richer, All the things, yes, okay. So you spoke about something else that I think is important. It's like knowing what's important to you, and I also know that you talk about vision being such an important thing, and I do the same, so I'd love to hear from your standpoint what is vision? What does that mean, and how do you get clear if you're not clear on what is most important?

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So the way that I approach this is I basically wanted to ground everything in a long-term vision. So I didn't want to be kind of caught up in, like you know, all the to-do lists right. I really wanted to be thinking more holistically and long term about what I wanted life to look like, and so what I recommend is developing a 10 year vision and to make that well rounded. So what are the things I want to be? How do I want to feel? What do I want to do? What do I want to have in terms of not just material things, but relationships, experiences terms of not just material things, but relationships, experiences and so, really, you know, thinking through kind of what do I want life to look like in 10 years and how do I want it to feel as I'm getting there. And so I went through that process.

Speaker 2:

I have a number of prompts that I use to develop that to you know, really flesh out those different areas and then wrote it up as a vision statement, and that's a vision statement that I keep posted. I read it every single day. It's my bedrock, right. So if I'm having to make decisions about where to spare my time, I can look at that and I can think, okay, like, how does this fit with my long-term vision right? How does this help me move me in the direction that I want to go? And so I just find it a really powerful tool and then I'll visualize that as well.

Speaker 2:

So I don't know if you're familiar with the work of Shakti Gawain, but I love when she's doing visualization, was writing about visualization, how she would always close with like this or something better, still right for the highest good of all concerned. And so it allows, while you have a vision right, while you have some clarity, it allows the possibility that things will shift and change. And so I think you know, reviewing that vision statement on an annual basis to make sure it's still true, it's still authentic, and then really using that, you know, as that North Star, as that foundation for decision making, is just a really good practice and a very nice way of having some authenticity around what matters and why.

Speaker 1:

Music to my ears. Our messages are very similar. So I'm curious did you have a vision? Did you do that when you were in that state of kind of being overwhelmed and knowing you were going to be a caregiver and have a job and all these things? Was there a vision? And like is that when you created a vision? Or had you had one before? Like, how did that look at that time?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so it is something that I have have been doing for years, but I had to remember in that moment of crisis how powerful that is and to do it again right, and there were, honestly, transparently, like there was, a lot of worry at that time that maybe life would look very different.

Speaker 2:

You know everything is resolved itself. It's good, but you know I had to picture, you know, if life looks really radically different. You know how do I, how do I have a new vision right for life going forward, and so I think the willingness to kind of revisit it, change it, is critical, Not constantly like you want it to be something that's really, you know, foundational. But I think I got a lot more clear in, you know, how the people in my life that I love fit into that vision right, and how important it was to really kind of be there and support them, and so, and how important it was to really kind of be there and support them, and so you know, the visioning is not just about me. It's about kind of the circle around me as well, of where I want to be there for people and how I hope they'll be there for me, and so definitely a practice that I had before, but what that felt like in a moment of crisis and how I used it in a moment of crisis was a little bit different.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I um, there was years of my life that I felt powerless and kind of at the mercy of the external world. And, um, having a vision is how I created so many things in my life, you know, not being in a state of where there was no evidence of that, but in my heart I knew something else was possible. And if I could envision it and kind of hold it in front of me, like you're saying, and read it every day I do the same thing Even when there's no evidence of it it gives you access to who you're going to be today. So, and then, when you show up that way consistently, that starts to ripple to the change. And you don't have to wait 10 years, right, like some of those things start to get realized sooner and your experience shifts in the process of it.

Speaker 2:

So powerful experience shifts in the process of it. So powerful, yeah, that is, that is absolutely, that is so wise and you're right, like, if you doesn't have to take 10 years, right, like, don't be attached to that timeline, because when you're thinking that way and you're open to opportunity and you know you're looking for things that align with that vision, opportunities start popping up, right, and so you see them because you have that vision where otherwise you might not. And so I think, incredibly powerful words that you shared to you know, allow things to happen more quickly if they can.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and it's like it gives you purpose here and now. I Because it's like these circumstances may be terrible and I may not have control over a lot of those things, but what I can control is me and who. I want to be in this situation, and that's what you're talking about is having a vision gives you that, and that's really powerful, because a lot of times we feel powerless in whatever's happening. But that's where you can, I guess, come inside and use these tools that you're talking about to find places where you do have power and control to influence some of it. Yes, yeah, absolutely some of it. Yes, yeah, absolutely. Okay, so let's talk for a minute about being overwhelmed and stuck, because a lot of my listeners um, well, we all feel that way. Right, like it's. I think it's an ongoing process of like I'm overwhelmed, I'm stuck, I'm not. I'm overwhelmed, I'm stuck, I'm not right. Um, how does the mindful productivity system help people manage themselves in these different situations that we find ourselves in?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so describe a little bit about it and then kind of like how I think it's helpful for people to apply it. And so the first foundation we've already talked about is having that long-term vision. The next piece is using that long-term vision to basically discern what it is that you can realistically accomplish that fits into that in the next 90 days. And so the reason for 90 days is it's a long enough time frame to really accomplish something, but not so far out that you don't get started Right. And so basically taking those things from your vision, deciding, okay, what can I realistically achieve in the next 90 day you know window and then basically executing on that by having at least an hour a day. That's that system I've described, as you know, having a mindful grounding activity, having a focused working session where there's absolutely no distractions, and then kind of closing with a mindful activity as well. Um, that is kind of what moves you through, and making sure that every single day there's an opportunity to kind of make progress against those things you've identified. Um, the I have done as part of that as well, as I highly recommend an evening ritual, and so that's a lot where the journaling comes in, because at the end of the day, you want to be able to look back and celebrate like every small success that you had, so that you know you're making progress and you can acknowledge what you've done right.

Speaker 2:

If you haven't taken that time for yourself and you haven't worked on the things you're truly passionate about, that kind of fit with your long term goals, then doing that journaling as well is a really eye opening experience to kind of go, okay, what's getting in my way, what's blocking me, what's stopping me?

Speaker 2:

Why am I not doing that?

Speaker 2:

And so I think ending the day, you know, with journaling, with gratitude, with kind of getting really clear as well on what is it I want to, you know, do tomorrow, is just a very nice way of consistently staying focused on what matters to you. And, of course, you know, having an accountability circle or a circle of support, you know, having an accountability circle or circle of support, you know, or accountability buddy, all of those things as well, can really help you stay on track. And so that's kind of the. The mindful productivity system is, like you know, from your long term visioning to kind of your daily focus, and in my life it's just made such an incredible difference in terms of feeling good about what I do and getting better at kind of estimating what's realistic to do in a day, right. So I don't know about you, but sometimes you'll be like I have these delusions of everything I'm going to get done and it's just allowed me to really scale that back to like what is realistic and then feel good about what I've accomplished.

Speaker 1:

Oh my gosh, that is. I mean, that is so true, I can't tell you. I mean, in my own life I have I my husband laughs at me because I I'm very good at overestimating what can happen, and sometimes it actually happens but and then so often at the end of the day, feeling like you haven't done enough or you didn't make progress I can't tell you how many times I hear that from people or I felt it myself, right, and then the list as an entrepreneur, never goes away, and even maybe not as an entrepreneur, right, our list doesn't go away, but there's like this illusion that it's going to and if we just work harder and do a little bit more, we're going to get there. And I've had to come to grips with, like, that list is not going away and it's up to me to do what you're talking about to end the day, to close the day, to take stock and I think that that is such a key piece that you're talking about of taking stock of what did happen.

Speaker 1:

Right, because we're so good at like what didn't happen and feeling terrible.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we beat ourselves up a lot, right. So first of all we're like, okay, I'm going to do everything, and then, when that doesn't happen, we focus on okay, all that stuff, I didn't get done right. Versus like what did I do Right? How did I make a difference? That's where I also think, like the power of saying no comes in, and so sometimes I'm looking at my list, it'll be like no, that doesn't fit my priorities right now. It doesn't mean it won't ever. But you know, I just need to be really clear because I only have so much time and I want to feel that I use that time well, right.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, use that, feel like you. Use that time well. I think that's so key. When you there was a question I had and it slipped what you were just talking about and do you, do you take stock every day, like at the end of your day, do you sort of take an inventory to see?

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So it's not like a long period of time, but I'll kind of take 15 minutes every evening and I'll do like one journal page in there, cause I find that really, you know, just kind of connects me right with with how I'm'm feeling, what you know, where I want to go, what's next like. I just find that a really you know very good way of kind of processing is what I would say around that, and so it's like one page of journal. I'll usually do a little bit of a meditation and then I'll do gratitudes, so three gratitudes as well, just to kind of close out. And so all of that, you know, just kind of allows me to close the day, you know, in a way that feels good and it kind of transitions into what is it I want to do the next day as well.

Speaker 1:

Well, and I can only imagine that that exercise right there probably allows you to kind of close the day, close your mind, sleep better, Because I know if I don't do that then my mind is still going when I get in bed and I feel like sometimes it can wake me up in the middle of the night thinking about those things.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so I remembered what I was going to ask you, and it was about kind of narrowing the idea of what like your expectations for the day, so that you can feel good about what you're doing. Say a little bit more about that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So this is where I would say, like I don't kind of do this with my full to-do list, right, like I still have a to-do list on the go, and that's separate from this. What it really is is about knowing that I have some time for myself and that I'm using that well, right, and so you know whether, if I have to fit in groceries and all these different things you know that's the reality of life you need to do that, right. But I don't want my entire day to all of a sudden being work, grocery, childcare, you know, and it's gone, right, it's just disappeared, right. And so what I've done for myself is I basically have put an hour in my calendar every day. That is my time, right, and that is. And then that time that I have is where I can start, I can make those choices right around how I want to use that to move my vision forward.

Speaker 2:

And so I think the discipline of like having that in your calendar, making sure that you have that time, you know that you know if you have one million errands to do and you know that there's an hour that's non-negotiable, that is yours right, that you're going to make progress on something you truly care about. You have to choose, you have to be selective. And you say you know what I can do the or I'm ordering the groceries online right now I'm not running to the grocery store. Or I'm delegating something to somebody else, or I'm asking for help. Right, because then you get realistic about the fact you just can't get it all in your day and you're not going to. I'm not doing it at the expense of having time to work towards the vision that I care about.

Speaker 1:

Right to work towards the vision that I care about. Right that boundary and guarding that just small chunk of time, whether it's an hour, a half hour to start, I think is like that alone will start helping you feel better in your current circumstances. I feel like that is so important. If you took away one thing today, like just carving out some amount of time, when I was a new mom with babies my boys are young adults now, but I started writing, I would wake up early. I would wake up like a half hour earlier than I thought the babies were going to. That changed the way I showed up for the day.

Speaker 1:

I felt like I had, like this little bit of space in my life where there was not a lot of space, right, when you have babies. That was mine and I started to get excited about that time. And then I started to stretch that time and over my life I've grown that amount of time and know that it just it fuels everything, everything else. Oh my gosh, so powerful. Okay, you don't have to be a writer. I saw somewhere in your writing or your website or something about you know. You don't have to be a writer, and I tell people that too, like you don't have to love journaling. You don't have to be a writer, so I'd love to hear your vantage point on that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So I think when you're journaling, you're doing it for yourself, right, like this is not to share this is really to have that moment in time for yourself, to really connect in with how you're feeling. And so it's hard to know where to start sometimes, right, and that's where journal prompts come in, and so that's why I have my book available, which is the Insights and Inspirations 300 Journal Prompts for Cultivating Joy and Mindfulness and Gratitude, and I it's like a little bit of a tool. So if you're stuck and you're like I don't know where to start, right, I'm not a writer.

Speaker 2:

You know having something to reflect on is a great way of making sure that you know you're just not staring at a blank page, right, and so you know just a question a day, blank page, right, and so you know just a question a day. You know a page a day, a half page a day. But if the questions are the right ones, you know, if they're ones that kind of make you think and make you reflect, then it doesn't have to be a long process and you don't have to write for long, but it's truly kind of getting in touch with how you're feeling. So, yeah, I just I highly recommend. You know, if somebody's staring at a blank page, they don't know what to do. You know, have some journal prompts to work with, because it will ensure that you know you're kind of looking at a lot of different aspects of life, not kind of writing the same thing over and over.

Speaker 1:

Yeah I talk about. It's really not about the journaling. Journaling is just the vehicle to helping you get closer to what you want to feel, be, do, experience, and it is a way to manage your thoughts. We all have thoughts. We might not be a writer, but we all have thoughts and emotions that are, and beliefs and ideas that are maybe tripping us up in life, and journaling is just a vehicle to process and challenge those things and move through those things and all of that. I love that. Okay, so talk a little bit about the impact, because you've said this has had a tremendous impact on your life. So I would love to hear like, what does that tangibly look like?

Speaker 2:

to hear, like, what does that tangibly look like? Yeah, so what that looks like for me is that it looks like, you know, I've made the time to do things like publish. I've made the time to develop a course, um, because that's something that really matters to me. Um, I've made the time to, uh, go with spend time with family in nature, because that's something I've identified that really matters to me, right. And so, you know, I basically have been able to kind of really clarify, like, where I want to spend my time and then enjoy the time that I do have.

Speaker 2:

So I think part of it is really just a mind shift, because it's not that I wouldn't have, you know, spent time with family and nature before, but I just I'm aware of how that fits into, like, my long-term goals, and so I'm able to make that a priority, right.

Speaker 2:

So it's like, um, I know that I want to get healthy, I know that I want to get fit, I know that I want to, um, you know, connect with the people I love, and so something as simple as saying, okay, we're going to go on a hike today, right, and then going together with the people I love to do that it meets all of those objectives right.

Speaker 2:

And so I can kind of say, hey, I've done something that I said I want to do. I'm, you know, doing something for my benefit, you know doing something for my benefit, you know, and I'm enjoying it. And so it really, I think, is just kind of that mindset shift around, you know, feeling good about how we use our time, right. So, as an example, you know, maybe in the past I wouldn't have taken that time because I had so many other things on the go, or I would take that time but I'd be thinking about all those other things I was supposed to do. And I just find that this approach really frees me to say I'm here now, in this moment, and I'm going to enjoy it.

Speaker 2:

Right and I know why this matters to me, yeah that's so beautiful.

Speaker 1:

You're like you're just present and you've carved the time and so you're okay with it. Yes, so I'm curious. Going back to the challenging time, what difference did it make then when you were caregiving and doing all of those things?

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

So I think that there can be a lot of guilt, right when you're, you know, kind of going through kind of a bit of a crisis type situation, and so what it did for me during that was it allowed me just to have open conversations as well around what I needed to right.

Speaker 2:

And so, you know, here's the things that I'm going to need, you know, to be able to do, to be there for somebody else as well, right, and so I think that just the clarity allowed me to have conversations that would support me. Then, having that space and it can be really tough, like when you're feeling overwhelmed, it can be really tough to get out of that spot. It feels a little bit like digging your way out. And so the transparent conversations I was able to have with people, because I'd taken the time to really think through what I wanted life to look like and what I needed in that moment, what I wanted life to look like and what I needed in that moment it just freed a lot of stuff that were obligations, that were maybe more expectations that I had of myself than others actually had of me, right, and so the power of that conversation allowed us to negotiate what's going to work for everyone.

Speaker 1:

It's going to work for everyone. Oh, that is. I love that so much because often we do. We have these rules and obligations that we've placed on ourselves and nobody else has put. It feels like. It feels like everybody's expecting that of us but they're not. And I have so many examples of clients like, actually, when they were willing to go into that conversation and say like you know what this having dinner on Sunday night, having you all over, is creating so much stress for me, and could we move it to a different time or a different day? And it's like their whole life changes just from that one simple adjustment. Yeah, amazing. And the clarity that journaling and writing through your thoughts provides to have conversations. I've had people clients talk about how writing on a regular basis allows them to communicate better and more clearly because they understand themselves better.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, absolutely, and I think too as well. Like if you find yourself every day it's like you're running into the same set of problems, right, you're writing and you're like realizing, oh my goodness, I'm ruminating on this, right, like it's the same thing coming up over and over. Then it's like, okay, I'm going to deal with that now, right, because I'm aware of that pattern. So I think that, really, that journaling is half of that is just to make us aware of those patterns of habitual thought.

Speaker 1:

That's so true, so true, okay, so tell us, um, oh, first of all, how about a couple, maybe a journal prompt or something tangible or actionable that you could, um, leave everybody with.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, absolutely. Um. So I would say one of the journal prompts would be what has brought me joy today. Another one would be how I've demonstrated self-care today. What have I done to care for myself? You could also do one around you know, how have I shown up today in a way that's authentic and true to myself? So lots of different ways that you can kind of approach things, but I think you know, starting with ones that are around your experiences of the day, it's just a really nice entry point.

Speaker 1:

Love that. Okay, so tell us all the places where we can find out about your course and your book and your website and all those good things, so people can see your work.

Speaker 2:

Yes, so my book is available for sale on Amazon and it's also you'll find a link to that from my website as well, and so my website is passionpurposetoday and I do have available through my website link a course which is a gift and it is called Mindful Momentum and what it is is four easy lessons around mindful productivity, and so if you kind of come out of this conversation, you know your listeners are curious. They want to find out more. I would recommend that free mini course is a really nice starting place to get into this, and I will be launching soon as well a what I'm calling a focus flow success circle, and so it's an accountability group. It's an online group, so if people are looking for support in this, that will be available through my website as well.

Speaker 1:

Amazing, and we'll make sure to have all the links in the show notes. So last question for you what does differently mean to you?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you know that is such a great question, but I think it's. I've used the word authenticity a few times and I think for me it means being willing to do things differently, to think outside the box, to be true to yourself, to be authentic, right, and so not to just kind of fall into the habitual patterns, you know, that are out there, right, but to really, you know, be able to think for yourself and then express yourself. That's how I would define it.

Speaker 1:

Rachel, thank you so much for joining me on Differently today. It's been so fun for me like I just feel like you're such a kindred spirit and we could sit and talk about these things all day. So thank you so much for sharing so many gems of wisdom and nuggets for people to take action with right away. So thank you so much.

Speaker 2:

Thank you. I really love your podcast and it was just such a joy to be with you today and really appreciate all the fabulous work that you're doing. So thank you for taking the time.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for tuning in to this episode of Differently. It's been an honor to share this conversation with you. You know, one of the keys to living fully is to take action when you're inspired to do so. I hope you found that spark of inspiration today and would you help us spread the word. Did someone you know come to mind while you were listening? If this episode could impact someone you know, please share it and pass it along. New episodes drop weekly, so tap that subscribe button and join us next time as we continue to challenge the status quo and get equipped to live life differently.