The Brighter Podcast
With honesty and vulnerability, best friends BatSheva and Chelsea open up about their trials, triumphs, and spiritual journeys, inspiring and empowering you to live a brighter, more fulfilled life.
Based in Missouri with her husband and sweet puppy, Chelsea is an RN, holistic healer, plant medicine purveyor, coach and community leader. BatSheva, who lives with her 4 children in Los Angeles, is a Yale grad, coach, actress, singer/songwriter and screenwriter.
Tune in each week and light up your own path to self-discovery, love, and growth.
Find us on Instagram or TikTok @brighterandbrighter.life and drop us a line! We love to hear from our friends and listeners.
Want even more? Feel free to look for BatSheva at www.the-confidence-coach.org or seek out Chelsea over at www.Soulscription.life where you can also purchase ceremonial grade cacao.
The Brighter Podcast
#10 Is A Daily Journaling Practice Right For You?
In this episode of The Brighter Podcast, Chelsea & BatSheva dive deep into the power of journaling—from morning pages to voice journaling, intention setting, and everything in between. 📖🖊️
💡 Is journaling the right daily practice for you?
💭 Have you ever tried voice journaling to process emotions or unlock creativity?
Tune in as we share our personal experiences, challenges, and favorite journaling techniques that have truly transformed our lives. Plus, don’t miss our Daily W’s—a snapshot of our wins, wows, and wishes for the day!
🎧 Listen now and let us know: What does journaling look like for YOU?
#TheBrighterPodcast #Journaling #MorningPages #SelfGrowth #DailyWs #Mindfulness
Hello and welcome back to the brighter podcast. My name is Chelsea
BatSheva:and my name is Batsheva,
Chelsea:and my life is so much brighter. Thanks to Batsheva.
BatSheva:my life is so much brighter thanks to you, Chelsea,
Chelsea:We love to come on here and share our stories, our tools, techniques that have helped us in hopes that all of these things that will help to make your lives brighter. And today we're going to be sharing Another tool that we like to refer to as journaling, but before we dive into that, let's all arrive at the space, taking a few deep breaths together, really coming into the present moment. So taking a nice deep breath in the nose and exhaling out the mouth. Another deep breath in and exhaling out, last breath, and letting that go.
BatSheva:So we are here to invite all of you to ask this question of yourselves, is journaling the right daily practice for you? Is this a tool that's going to help your life get BatSheva: brighter?
Chelsea:And I will say that this tool has probably been the most challenging for me to implement into my daily life. I have tried several different ways. And it just is the one that I have the most resistance to, but in the same breath, I also know that the things that I have actually written down have come to fruition, whether it is immediately or a week, a month, a year later. Anytime that I've actually put it on paper, it has come to life. And so there, I really do feel like there is an insane power that lies behind the pen.
BatSheva:So I'm wondering if you're talking about writing your wishes and dreams and goals, though, because when you said it comes to fruition, I mean, when I think about journaling, It's kind of just like whatever I need to dump from my brain that it's not usually intentional and I think that makes it easier for me because I've always been someone who loves to journal and gets a lot out of it and I admit I was re inspired several times each time I read and did the workbook by Julia Cameron, The Artist's Way, and that's the underpinning of her entire book. It's this three pages a day, the daily morning pages. Even when I didn't do them in the morning, I was not going to wake up and do them before I had to get up. I couldn't wake up early. back in the day, these days I do them in the morning. but yeah, even when I did them before bed or whenever, I really loved them and I felt like they were a tool somehow creatively, mentally, therapeutically. But for me, yeah. In that context, it was just like a brain dump, you know what I mean? Chelsea: And maybe that's the reason why I faced some resistance with it. I know that whenever I first started journaling, I didn't really understand the concept and I thought basically it was just like a dear diary type thing. I would just write out like all the things that happened today and stuff like that.
Chelsea:And it felt like. What is this really helping me with, you know, I didn't really feel like I was working through anything more so just like reliving or taking notes of like what had happened, which I guess if you're like looking back on things, then that's one thing, but out of all the things that I was reading about and. Watching about journaling and people telling me these stories of how it, you know, it changed their life. I was just like, I don't feel like I'm getting that out of it. And it really wasn't until I had done a challenge on the Insight Timer app. It was like a morning ritual challenge, I think. And one of the things, one of the courses, I guess, or one of the days it was the flow, right? And I think it's very similar to what you're describing as the morning pages. you sit down, you set a 10 minute timer, you. Get your pen or pencil and you put it to the paper and you don't pick it up until the timer goes off. And if there's nothing that's going, if there's no thoughts or anything that come to your mind, then you just write, I have no thoughts and you continue to repeat, write that until something does come up. And so I think that like what you're saying as far as like dumping or, you know, releasing things, that I felt like I got a lot out of, but I have not continued it on daily.
BatSheva:that is exactly what the morning pages do. And I love the timer because, or whether it's three pages or the 10 minute timer, It gives you a framework and you know, there's going to be an end. And just like you said, if you get stuck in the middle, you could just write, I don't know what to write. I don't want to write, or you could write all of a sudden affirmations, maybe mantras that you're happened to be working with that, that I'll sometimes you'll just stop everything and just write a prayer or just write mantras. And creatively it is also an incredible method to help unblock the unconscious and the subconscious by just doing exactly that. Thinking anything through, I do think that is the danger of those really beautiful journals that they sell in Barnes and Nobles and that, you know, really all of us who do the self help work, let's call it, if we're aesthetic, we tend to love things like that, like beautiful books that also contain deep wisdom or beautiful journals where we can write our gratitude lists and our desires and our thoughts and our dear diaries, But I think the danger in that is that it causes the daily practice of journaling to become too precious. I feel like there is a place for those kinds of journals. If it's like a new moon inspiration and dream. List that you would write and I know you do write that because you've inspired me to do that on like a new moon or a full moon, but for a daily practice, I almost recommend what I do. I literally go to the dollar store and I stock up on these cheap ass spiral notebooks or those old school composition books and I keep them everywhere that way I don't hold on to my journals either after which is. Something I want to give every one of our listeners permission to do is not fucking hold on to the journal when you're done with it, you just can bless it and let it go. You can even burn it if you have access to a bonfire, because the idea is that. You're not necessarily writing your notes for your memoir, although it may feel like that. It's an alchemy. It's an alchemy that what Chelsea said is true. Using your hand to get those thoughts down. There is magic in that. There actually is. But once it's there, I would argue many of us, if not most of us, don't still fucking need those notebooks. We don't. We we might want to just for fun, but on the other hand, you know, clutter. It's not our friend.
Chelsea:Yes, definitely keeping in clean space for clean, energetic field, clean mind, clean body. The other practice that I started doing whenever I was out in California on a nursing assignment was journaling before my night shift. That one I actually held on to the longest and I would actually journal , I had learned from another teacher mentor that, you know, journaling your intentions for the day instead of just , like the morning pages kind of dumping, it was , Setting intentions, but also just putting it out there, whatever you wanted to feel that day, or if there was something that you were anticipating for me, it was going into work and to take care of patients. And so I was almost like a prayer or an intention blessing of what I wanted, how I wanted the shift to go. It's worked really well for me and it felt really good to set that out there. Like kind of set the tone for the shift, set the tone for the evening. so that I did stick with for a while as well. BatSheva: I feel like I would love that because it's just sounds, yeah. Like you said, very intentional and the ritual of it. And to consciously it's, it reminds me of our daily W's, right? in a sense, yeah, I guess it was, it, for me, the daily W's are more of a, like a recount of the day. Whereas this was like the start of my day and I was kind of just like putting it out there. So I guess it's kind of like the wishes. The night from the night before, like, this is what I wish to happen today.
BatSheva:And then, you know, following that up. yeah, I think there's room for. Both of the modalities that we're talking about. And I think as a daily practice, the brain dump is like super therapeutic and helpful. And then I think as more of like a ritual or an intentional practice or a prayer, as you said, I love this concept of putting something in place in the schedule that's actually help us to have, like, to kind of stay on track, stay aligned with our goals and our values. There's another technique that I had never even thought about until the woman who I meet with. She's kind of my coach. I've been meeting with her for years. She's in Australia. I found her on insight timer. She did a bunch of meditations that I loved. I reached out to her to see if she would Tailor a meditation to me because I was going through a really hard time in my marriage and I wanted comfort. I wanted individualized comfort and she wound up reaching out to me and saying, well, I have clients. If you want to book a session over zoom and, you know, cut to three and a half years later, I still meet with her. We have our, tune ups every couple months or so. Medha, Murtaugh, and if anyone wants to find her, but she was the one at the time she had a podcast and she introduced me to this. Super fucking cool tool that I later gave the name of voice journaling to, I never heard that word used or that phrase, but that in my observation was kind of what she was doing cause she was talking into her voice memo in her phone to herself and it was like the brain dump, but it was verbal and it was really powerful because she allowed herself to feel all the feelings and say all the things just like you do in a journal. Like you don't hold back and you. Use every curse word in the book and you say all the mean things and, you know, the fuck you God phrases that people say, never say that, you fucking say it in your journal and you say it voice journaling and by doing so again, the alchemy occurs because by doing and saying the very worst thing or the very most like witnessing within the most painful thing that, you know, You would ever allow yourself to consider, or you wouldn't allow yourself normally to consider, but if you let it come up, boom, it transmutes and we up level and we feel better and we release, we have freedom. And I started to use that technique here and there, and then I started to use it in my coaching program, and it's definitely an underpinning of the W method that I. Teach and coach. The reason I share it is because right after my ex husband told me, you know, that he wanted to see other people, so basically he wanted a divorce, and I couldn't believe it. I was in super shock. I wound up screaming, crying, sobbing, shrieking, et cetera, into my voice memo, because I didn't really have any friends at the time. My siblings, I also wasn't ready to share that with anyone I think it was the mortification, the humiliation, the shock, everything that comes with that kind of new information that you're not ready for. but you are your own safest person in space and. You know, shoulder to cry on and I having seen Medha do this technique, having observed her and heard about it on her podcast. She shared so raw and authentically I did it myself and I had the most incredible experience. Maybe like one of the most incredible experience of my life because in about what looked, I looked back and it was about seven, maybe nine minutes of voice journaling and I had, I was in my detached garage. Nobody was around. So I really allowed myself the freedom to say and speak and cry whatever I needed to. And I didn't know where it was going. I just thought I have to do something because I'm so upset by the end of that like short, relatively short time. I was, Talking to myself, like from the beginning, the beginning, Oh, this is all my fault. And I always do this. This is the pattern. Look what happened. And I, I should never have married him. And I got into this and, you know, blah, blah, blah, all the things. But by the end I was saying to myself, No, it makes sense. You know, it's, it's of course you learn so much and you, you gave so much and look at you now and look what you went through and look how you survived and look what you learned. And I was like, Holy shit. When I was done, I felt comforted. It was a revelation. So voice journaling, I'm not sure how it would work for someone to do it every single day, but as a technique and a tool, like a therapeutic tool that we can use for ourselves. I love it.
Chelsea:Wow. I love that I thought like the vision that I just got of you being out in your garage doing that. Because for me, sometimes just sitting there and speaking is difficult. The times that I've found it most easiest is when I'm in the car. I get a lot of ideas in the car. There's actually, Sarah Blakely, I believe. The Spanx lady. I heard that she drives around in her car for like an hour before she Goes to work because that's whenever she gets all of her ideas and inspirations is like driving in the car. And even though she's Only like five minutes from work. She'll drive around have the commute or maybe she even works from home sometimes but she'll still go for a drive to have that time to commute I find myself getting tons of ideas whenever I'm in the car and obviously you're not writing while you're driving, So the voice journal has been really helpful for me in that time. And now that you mentioned about being in the garage, it makes me think I'm, I feel like I'm a mover. Like whenever I'm moving, things are flowing to me. And I think that this is something that you experienced maybe on your walks. But if I was just walking around, like in the living room or in the house and able to stand up and talk about it, because sometimes I think that that's another thing too. It's like whenever I go to sit down to journal or to write, that's whenever it is more difficult. Or I feel like maybe that's what writer's block is, is where whenever you're Whenever they go to sit down to actually write something, then it's the blocking. At least I know that that's what I've experienced. So I feel like you know, voice journaling while driving or voice journaling while walking around and not having to have a pen and paper, that definitely sounds a lot more doable and manageable for me. Do you journal all the time in the mornings or do you do more so like just whenever you have time throughout the day?
BatSheva:I journal every morning, but I have this beautiful window between when I get my youngest son ready for school. And then I have about 10, 15, 20 minutes between when he's just like eating his breakfast and like chilling and everything's packed up and ready. And then when we actually have to leave to drop him at the school bus. so I usually have like the from 645 until about 710. And that's my journaling window, at least Monday through Friday. I usually skip Saturdays. For me, it's kind of a different kind of a sacred day, the Sabbath, Shabbat. sometimes I will journal just in the middle of the day? but So I love that window for me that the discipline and kind of the structure really helps me stay on track with it. but in general, yeah, I do always journal at least I would say about six days a week. I do, I do three pages and I've done it for a couple years now and before I was reintroduced to the Artist's Way, which is what I start, I, after the separation with my ex husband, I dove into like every spiritual tract that I resonated with, especially the ones that I had resonated with years and decades before, like just to re fresh myself and reinvigorate my heart and my soul. And the artist's way was just like one of the best. Before that, during my marriage, I would go through fits and spurts of journaling. I mean, anyone who has little kids or even a full time job knows it's really tough to make it work in the morning. So I would often do it in the afternoon or the evenings. And it wouldn't be like a whole year consistently like it has been for the past two years with me now. I think that's definitely the phase of life I'm in now. I love it. It's incredible, but I appreciate that it's like a privilege considering the way my life is set up right now. I made it happen for myself, but I'm also in a different place from when I had little babies in a full time office job or coffee shop job. You know what I mean?
Chelsea:So when would you say you, you like for you to use the voice journaling? Is there a specific time that that is more of your strategy for journaling versus the morning pages? Like the morning pages, I'm just trying to figure out, I mean, for me. whenever I was doing that, the flow writing that one day, I mean, it was only one day. you know, it was just like a lot of things came up and it was like things dated back to my childhood that I had been like, I was like, where did this even come from? But like, if I think about like sitting down and writing it, I don't know if it would be like, My to do list, I'm a very to do list person. And so like, would that be what came out of my morning pages? It's like, Oh, these are all the things I want to get done today. Or is it like thoughts from the night before or, you know, like if you're upset about something, is that when you lean more towards the voice journaling or like when you're in the car or just kind of like, how would you describe to our listeners or and to me, the difference between the two and how you choose?
BatSheva:No, I think it's a great question and I think, you know, Definitely each person can find. What works best for them. So I would be really curious to know if you or if anyone Were to try a daily voice journaling practice and give yourself a time limit. I think it could be shorter than 10 minutes I think because you know speaking is so much quicker than writing it could be let's say, you know a three minute or a five minute Voice journal. I, I would be so curious to experiment with that. But I have to say in my own experience in my own life, the brain dump type of journaling, the 10 minute flow writing that you describe, which sounds genius. Um, the morning pages, uh, from Julian Cameron, any version of that. I think that will include the to do list. It will include last night's, you know, leftover thoughts and feelings and venting. It will include hopes and dreams. It will include everything in between. Greeting yourself, talking to yourself, because you got to fill up the space. And like you said, sometimes things pop in from the past or family, and it feels kind of significant that those things come up too. But yeah, things actually gifts are given during that time frame, especially if you're every day, every day with it, or as often as possible. Whereas the voice journaling, and I will say for me, voice journaling works because of the voice memo. I like to talk to myself out loud. Since I've learned voice journaling because I've noticed it is powerful and I'll remember things more if I say it out loud versus if I just think it, but I don't know what it is. It's like the having the vessel of the journal to receive our thoughts and feelings. The voice memo app is like a vessel to receive, you know, what's in our heart, soul and mind. And for me, I do. Yeah, the car is a good place to do it. I do find that. It's more sporadic, but I do it to keep myself company and or comfort and console myself. And sometimes I'm so happy and joyful that instead of necessarily reaching out to a person, I'll just remind myself first to voice journal it to myself because I'm consciously building a closer and better and more beloved relationship with myself. Because this is what I'm trying to share with others and what I've experienced so far. So I. Always want to deepen that relationship with myself. So I use voice journaling a bit intentionally for that.
Chelsea:I love that. And let me ask also, whenever you sit down to do the morning pages, is there a, Is there a first line that usually comes out? Like, are you, I think that you just said like greeting yourself. Like, are you like, ah, good morning. Like you're like writing to yourself or is it you just sit down and it's different every time?
BatSheva:It's so funny that you asked that question. It's a great question. Um, I date it. I, I always date it. And then I just launch and it's never, I mean, once in a while I'll say, hi, me, it's me. That's usually how I greet myself with a voice journal. Hi, me, it's me. Um, I always greet myself and I always. Say bye. Love you. Bye. Like, cause I don't know. I feel stupid. Otherwise, like somehow that makes it more normal. Um, don't ask, but writing maybe cause I've done it now for so many years on and off journaling. I just dive in and I start to just talk to myself. Like just, you know, I, after the date, ah, you know, I'm so tired. I'm so happy I have this window. I mean, I, it's almost like talking out loud to myself and. I mean, I could literally, do you want me to get my journal? Like, should I grab it?
Chelsea:Oh my gosh. You totally should. Because you know what? I literally was just thinking I have my five minute gratitude journal and this two minute mornings that I bought for Hunter and I was going to go and get them both and show them on the screen. So yeah, let's go grab them and
BatSheva:Let's yeah, we can. Okay, cool. Love it. Love it. Love it.
Chelsea:So perfect, like perfect timing. I was literally thinking, I really want to run upstairs and grab those. So.
BatSheva:Amazing. All right. So. You want to go first?
Chelsea:yeah. So for anyone that's out there, this has been the morning gratitude journal that I've been using. It's called the five minute journal and it is by intelligentchange. com and how it is is that you have, it has like a little. thing at the beginning of the day. And then it has three things that you're grateful for, three things that would make today great, and then a daily affirmation. And that's like the morning and you put the date at the top. so yeah, it's just like blank. So it's like, not like every single day. And then the down here at the bottom where it gets darker is the end of the day and it has three highlights of the day. And then it says, what did I learn today? And so this is the little five minute journal my dear friend Bryn gifted to me and that has been what I have been most successful with in journaling. And then this little journal, this two minute mornings, is a journal to win your day every day. And it has same kind of concept, the date and then I will let go of. I am grateful for and I will focus on and this is something that I had gifted my husband for us to do our little morning journaling together and Sometimes we do and sometimes we don't but it's always a goal to work towards for us
BatSheva:Chelsea, I feel like maybe someday we'll put out the brighter book and we'll have the daily W's that people can fill in their three wins, their three wows, and their three wishes. What do you
Chelsea:I love that idea. It's so perfect
BatSheva:All right, seed planted. But in the meantime, I'll show you. So I, I kind of, A little bit lied because I said I just get like the composition books and the notebooks and it's true I do that, but over the past year I've upgraded and I splurge and I buy these beautiful Books from rifle paper company and I still do not hold on to them I do throw them when I'm done. This one's like waiting, but you can see I've spilled it all So I'm just going to give you like an example. Ooh. Oh my God. So here you go. Sunday, December 7th, change me into one who trusts that there will always be money. It flows easily and it is easy for me to receive and gifted harmoniously with hand in hand with the divine. The perfect partner has already chosen for me. Okay. So basically in this case on that day, I just went right into my prayers and wishes from the divine, but let's contrast that. Um, let's see, let's see, February 2nd, yesterday. Oh, well we are out of the January woods. It seems as if February is living up to, living up to something. I have, by the way, I have the worst handwriting too, which it actually comforts me because I figure if a kid opens up one of my journals, they're going to be like, Oh, too much work to try to decipher it. So I felt like it was always like a safety mechanism for me to keep my handwriting like really bad. quite an abundant prosperous month. Okay. Uh, let's try like a different. Let's see if there's anything, like, one last, okay, recent, Tuesday, January 27th, 655, I'm guessing, yeah, that's a. m. Ugg and Oof, thank goddess, David V, that's my son, David V, woke me up. I wonder if I will have time. I need a nap today. Wow. Oof. Bummer. So, I mean, you can see it's from the ethereal, you know, change me into one who can, you know, feel abundant with the universe to the more practical and gratitude. Ooh, February. It's It's looking, you know, to be more magical month than fucking January to the most mundane. Like I'm exhausted and I need a nap. Luckily, my son woke me up or I would have slept all day and I
Chelsea:I love the three different versions. Yeah.
BatSheva:just keep going. Just race and race and race like literally nonstop and barely picking the pen up until the end. And I think it's. It's a beautiful and amazing practice for those of us, you know, who like are wired this way to enjoy writing a lot and some people actually type a lot and that works for them too. So don't be afraid of the computer. It doesn't make it worse. Any worse.
Chelsea:Amazing. well, I think that that kind of wraps it up. So is a daily journaling practice or voice journaling practice right for you? Let us know. Let us know what your experience is. Write us. Follow us on socials, connect to us in our Facebook community, and share with us your own tools and how they best serve you.
BatSheva:Awesome. But before we go, as we've been doing, we want to share with you. our personal Daily W's. A little snapshot. One win, one wow, and one wish. And I
Chelsea:So I believe it's my turn. let's see my win so far for today is that I was able to get an email sent. that has been on the to do list for quite some time. I had been waiting for a response from this nutritional labeling company, Nutritional Facts Labeling, and I received a response from them, and I was able to send it to them. Send them back the form that they needed. And so that is my big win for the day so far. And my wow for the day is that I am so grateful for my neighbor and beloved friend, Jackie, who is very. Technologically savvy and intelligent and all of her help and assistance that she gives to me so freely with these tasks.
BatSheva:Love her. Love Jackie. I don't know her, but I feel like I know her. Ha! Through you. Uh, and my wish, I have so many wishes, but the one that popped first into my head is the one I'll share. It's still about my band. Uh, I'm, because now we're getting the promo materials together, starting to invite people, and I'm just wishing that the whole event will be executed for the very highest of all of us and everyone involved, and that All the people and audience and fans who are meant to come and discover us and enjoy our music will be able to come and support us and be supported by what we are sharing. That's my wish.
Chelsea:beautiful. Well, until next time,
BatSheva:we hope that your day becomes brighter and brighter.
Chelsea:Yes. Talk to you soon. I love you.
