Not By Chance Podcast
It’s hard to define what a successful and happy family is, much less how to achieve one. Dr. Tim Thayne, a thought-leader in teen treatment and parent coaching, shares inspiring best practices gleaned from decades of his own and other expert’s work related to intentional family living. Whether your family is in the midst of a major struggle or you are looking for fresh ideas to help you prioritize and enhance your home life, this podcast is for you.
Not By Chance Podcast
Pen to Paper: Journaling as the Most Cost-Effective Tool to Boost Mental and Physical Health
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Roxanne Thayne has decades of experience in writing in a personal journal and teaching writing and history. But more recently she has identified the benefits as a mother. Both for herself and in how it has effected her children who use it. Learn how such a simple practice can strengthen both mind, body and relationships.
Hi, everybody, thank you for joining me again on the not by chance Podcast. I'm excited today to be able to introduce you to my wonderful, beautiful, amazing wife, Roxanne. She's got a passion that she's been doing for a very long time. That turns out to be maybe it's why she is as healthy as she is. And the topic that we're going to cover today, the title of it is journaling as the most cost effective tool for boosting mental and physical health. So you might be questioning that title or that that the statement, but I think Roxanne is going to convince us all that, that that's true. And and I think if Roxanne had come on in, I'll have you join us here. But I think if Roxanne gets me to start journaling, that will be amazing for her because she's been trying to do that for a long, long time. Pretty much.
Roxanne Thayne:30 years. 30 years plus,
Dr. Tim Thayne:yep. But I'm excited to have Roxanne talk to us because she's a true expert on the subject. Roxanne's background is secondary education and history. She's an avid writer, and author. She's authored and co authored three books at this point. And she's also one of the founders of a publishing company called rooftop publishing. So she's got the background on writing, and has personally experienced this that we're going to talk about today. So thanks, Roxanne, for coming on the show today. I think it'd be great if you could share with the audience. What did you become? Or when did you become aware that journaling was important?
Roxanne Thayne:Well, I know I have beat you to death with this topic. And I've only converted one of my children to it as well. But I, I was just 12 years old when I was at church one Sunday, and the lesson for the young women was about the power of journaling, and keeping a personal history. And I don't know what it was because most of my teenage years, I don't think I remember anything except maybe when people would bring doughnuts to church. But this lesson, for some reason, just went straight to my heart. And it made me sit up and take notice. And I don't know what that inspiration was or why this one stood out to me. But I decided in that Sunday, I was going to write every day, for the rest of every Sunday, sorry for the rest of my life. And if I think back about it, my dad, who was also a history professor, was really good at journaling. And I think he tried to go daily. And in the end, it ended up weekly. And I have this vivid image of him sitting in his den, and calling out to the family saying, what did we do Monday. And we'd all sit there and rack our brains and say, I think that we went blah, blah, blah, blah. And it'd be quiet for a minute, then we'd hear what did we do on Tuesday. And really, that is how his journals ended up was just basically a daily log, which as I read those today, as an adult, myself, I am exhausted by what they got done. And I can't feel so sorry for myself anymore, because every parent has always been busy. But there wasn't a lot of feeling in his journals. In fact, his he's passed, he passed 11 years ago, I've been reading through his journals. And when I come across something that was a tragedy in his life, or a time where he was really passionate, maybe angry about something, I can hear his voice for the first time. And those moments are really gold to me. And so I don't know if it was that lesson, or if it was just modeled for me or what, but I felt like it was very important for me to keep a record of my life. And I've had several instances since growing up where I have been. I have seen that it has, you know, molded my career. But it has also taught me things as a mother, as I've read back about how I was as a teenager that had been kind of embarrassing. I'll tell you a story about that a little bit later.
Dr. Tim Thayne:Okay. So how many journals do you have right now? Just curious.
Roxanne Thayne:I used to keep big ones. And I think I probably have five of those. And then I moved to little notebooks and diaries. And then I later moved to writing my kids letters on Sundays if they were away from home, and that became my journal. I've also done Christmas newsletters every year, kind of recapping the year.
Dr. Tim Thayne:So some of your journals are digital at this. Yeah, they are time. But you also still write quite often. So you're doing both right. Yeah. And some writing
Roxanne Thayne:and I've learned that people don't really care as much about those daily logs. I mean, it's interesting for Time to but then after that, they just really want to know how you're handling the stories of your life. And so I've tried to do a lot more of that, because I think that that's gonna be way more valuable. We'll talk about that maybe
Dr. Tim Thayne:at the end, I'm gonna have you kind of think give people tips like that. Yeah, like how to how to make journal writing really powerful and impactful. And, and helping the next generation and so on. Okay. But let's, let's go to, you know, this bold statement you have here, where you say it's the least expensive tool for supporting mental health. And why is that,
Roxanne Thayne:and after I said that, I was like, Oh, someone's gonna write in and say, really, because the sun is free. And, but, but journaling can be something as simple as using a pen and a spiral notebook, which are like five for $1. If the, you know, back to school shopping, and, and you know, in the treatment field, we've got people who need to mortgage their home to seek treatment for their kids. And so if there's something that we can do that can be free, and really has no side effects, and doesn't stress the family system at all, then we need to be promoting it. And I believe that journaling is one of those things.
Dr. Tim Thayne:It turns out actually, in the mental health field, that journaling is seen as, as a really powerful therapeutic tool. So, so it's being used out there, in all kinds of ways. There are apps to help you journal, there's, you know, clinical tools, there's, you know, therapeutic assignments often asked for journaling to happen, it's so I think you're definitely, you know, being backed up with with clinical research.
Roxanne Thayne:Yeah, medical research, too. And this is what's so interesting. I think we've all known that in therapy, they use journaling quite often and narrative therapy, rewriting your stories to have a different outcome. But well, what I was kind of excited about as I was preparing for this podcast was that they're actually showing that there is physical benefits to journaling. In fact, in one study, they took asthma and arthritis patients and instructed them to write for 20 minutes each for three consecutive days. And a number of them were told to write about the most stressful event in their lives. And the others were just to write about what they were going to do that day. And almost all of the patients showed really significant improvement in their symptoms. And you would think that if they were writing about stressful things, it would get worse, they would become more inflamed, and it would not be helpful. But what was most interesting is that those who wrote about the stress improved more than the other participants. Why do you why do you think that is?
Dr. Tim Thayne:I mean, it's interesting, I mean, in some ways, I think acknowledging to yourself, especially, that you had certain difficult emotions, and all of that labeling, it makes it so it's not as powerful. Like, it's like you capture it, you by labeling it, it's not this mystery experience that you haven't explored and kind of controlled by labeling it, right,
Roxanne Thayne:you've had to face the monster and, and, and string it down to size. And then you can get rid of it, you can, you know, you hear about people burning their journal pages, or writing letters, and then burying them or whatever. But you're releasing that and you're releasing those toxins from that stress, which is going to boost your immune system. So really, it can have the same kind of effect as exercise to do the mental work to let go of those negative emotions is freeing. And
Dr. Tim Thayne:so tomorrow, instead of the 200 pushups I was going to do, I'm just going to mentally do 200. And wonder how that would
Roxanne Thayne:write about it. And let's see what happens. Yeah.
Dr. Tim Thayne:Awesome. So so so there's definitely, you know, when you think about the whole self, you got the spiritual, social, emotional, and physical. And, you know, that's a new one on me, I wouldn't have thought that the journaling would actually help me on that physical side, I could see it easily on the spiritual, social even because of working out relationships, maybe without having to confront somebody or talk to somebody. And then of course, the emotional you're getting it out, but physical.
Roxanne Thayne:Yeah. And I think it's interesting to mentally when you can look at what you've written. Sometimes you can say that makes sense, or that is utter nonsense. You can really it just, it's in black and white, it's on the paper. And you know, for those of us who sit at computers all day long, which I do, it is really important to consider writing hand with pen to paper. And one of my favorite writing experts or coaches is Julia Cameron and she wrote a book called The artists way and it's very famous and it's been around for decades. If you haven't looked it up, go look it up. Actually the first book I got hers was the right to write. And she talks about morning pages, which are to be done longhand, three pages in the morning, before all of the responsibilities and to dues of the day kind of crashed down on you. And it's just a stream of consciousness. And I think the most important thing that she teaches is that there are no rules. And that's really strange. For some of us, we want to write an attention grabbing first sentence, we want to put it in bullets and have an organized outline. But if we just let thoughts flow, we will be surprised by what our subconscious has been working on while we were sleeping that night. And about the things that will rise up and bubble up his priority for that day. I mean, I have just been amazed at myself time and time again, where I start out with something like, I'm so tired, I don't even know where I'm going with that. I'm just always tired in the morning, I'm so tired. And then I start writing. And pretty soon I'm seeing things come up about a child I'm concerned about or about a situation or something I need to learn to let go of. And that's not what I set out to do. But that's what my body's telling me, I need to let go up or I need to work out. Yeah. So one of the things that I'm really hoping parents will think about this summer, as you're planning activities for your kids swim lessons, you know, equine lessons, whatever it is that you'll also make space for a journal, and a pen. And time, you know, getting out in nature and being somewhere where there is no distraction, especially from technology. And using a few minutes just to record what's flowing through your mind is a gift to your child, and it would be a gift to you as a parent, I think you'd both come back to the house together, feeling like a renewed sense of well being and peace. And so I would highly encourage you scheduling that in with all of the skate parks and everything else that are on the agenda this summer.
Dr. Tim Thayne:And let me let me give it another little plug here. Because, you know, what we're trying to do as parents is we're trying to really give our kids skills, skills that are universally helpful, you know, and, and what's happening when you write in the journal is you are actually practicing what we call metacognition, you are thinking about your thinking, you're becoming aware of how you process thoughts and feelings. And as you as you as you examine that, and you have to kind of bring it back to mind to do that. And that fundamental skill. That's where self awareness comes. And that's where we start to connect dots from this to that. And as young people, they haven't done a lot of that yet. And so maybe the one of the most important things they could do is write in a regular journal so that they could practice metacognition. Yeah. And, you know, go think about what that would do for a young person. Yeah, you know, they're encountering things all the time. And they just have these impulses, or they have these, these emotional experiences where they become dysregulated imagine them writing about that later. After the emotions gone, and thinking back on it and noticing how they process that emotion, how they maybe didn't process the emotion and and now doing it after the fact, you're starting to canal connect dots to events, to maybe thoughts they didn't even realize they had to, to these emotions that take over. Yeah, and and now they've got some control over that. So besides capturing some really cool stories, and having a history and all of that, I believe, you know, as I think about this more, there might not be a better tool out there for developing identity and, and self consciousness of self and what you will do, yeah, and
Roxanne Thayne:self soothing. Let me just share a quick story. So one of our kids as a young adult now, but he ran it recently, a few weeks ago, ran into his first real heartbreak, who he hadn't seen for years. She didn't see him, but it flustered him. And he came home and he is our best journal writer. And he wrote about that experience in his journal and was able to process that experience seeing her for the first time after these years and realize that you know what, he really was over her, and he didn't hold any grudges, and it was fine. And he's able to move on and that was an added benefit. You know, he started out maybe because he liked handwriting and had beautiful handwriting and then he you know, went to therapy and learn Did that skill and we encouraged him in that, and he would share things he'd written with us as as parents. And he would go back and reread it and found a lot of strength in it. One of the stories that I was going to share with me is, you know, I'm a personal historian, I got my degree in history. And I've always been interested in history and her stories, what makes people who they are, I don't need the dates. I don't need, you know, the battlefield, the battles and the chronology. But what I want to know is what stories made this person who they are, and how did they get to where they are in life. And I think that we're missing too many of the common man's stories. You know, I love documentaries. I love memoirs, I love biographies. Those are my favorite kinds of, of books to read. But we're getting some of the most amazing leaders and we're losing a lot of the of the common man. And what we want to see is our life experiences mirrored in their life experiences. So this was a couple of years ago, but I had pulled out my journal from when I was a senior in high school. And I was reading the last page, which was coinciding with my graduation. And I had my daughter who was kind of draped over the chair behind me reading over my shoulder Well, as I was reading this, I just kept flushing over and over because I was so embarrassed at how immature I was, how self centered I was, how everything was mee, mee, mee, Mee Mee, he said this, you know, I got that somebody complimented me this way, and was just so focused on myself. And as I was reading it, I realized, these were the same things that I was so frustrated with in my child, who was also a teenager, and all these things that I thought I was never that way, I found out, firsthand account that I was exactly that way. And it was then moved from, he's a jerk to that's kind of stage the age and stage. And I gained this new understanding for that. And so I was grateful for that. But as I'm talking about, you know, this idea of seeing yourself in other people's stories, I also had an experience, just before the pandemic hit, I had read my great grandmother, Jo C's personal history, and she was a delightful writer. But she wrote about her experience in 1918, with the Spanish Influenza, and how sick their family was, and how people would come and put a pot of soup on their back porch, knock on the door and run because they were so fearful of getting this horrible disease, which did take get so many people in think there was 75, out of the small town. And when that pandemic hit our home, this COVID pandemic, we had people dropping off food to us. And I wanted to drop off food to them, I felt this new connection to her and her story. And I also felt like I couldn't complain, because she had the experience of losing children. And when I think about the experience, where she cried all night, knowing that her three year old baby was laid out on the back screened in porch to keep cool until they could be well enough to go bury her that winter. I thought I don't, I don't have anything to complain about, just because I'm isolated. And it was a great strength to me, if she can go through that I can go through this. So it really did help my mental state in that situation this summer.
Dr. Tim Thayne:So not only, you know, should we should we write in journals, and and do that, for those reasons we talked about but should read other people's journals. And, and maybe if it's our ancestors, even more of a connection there of strength, you're gaining strength from that ancestor. And you know, in the in the philosophy of homeward bound we look at and try to identify who are all the people that could be supporters of a young person, in their in their journey in life, we call it the home team. And we've also often talked about, the ancestors are part of that. So you're, you're given us an example of someone's journal. Beak being really a strength you personally and you get to know your grandmother better that way. And also kind of borrowing some of her strength to go through the trials you're dealing with. So I love that. You know, as we as we, you know, one of the things I wanted to point out to everybody is that you really are a dedicated journal writer. I see your writing, basically, every morning, you call them your morning pages. Can you share just a little bit about your process? And because I think if we, you know, hopefully, we're catching the vision here of how beneficial it can be to us physically, spiritually, mentally, socially. But maybe, maybe share kind of the mindset or the process you go through to right now. and either what you write about how you get in the mindset of doing it. How'd you get into the habit? I mean, how can someone get into all those, those patterns?
Roxanne Thayne:Well, I think first of all, like I said earlier, you need to understand that there's really no rules. And if you want to keep this private, absolutely keep it private, it is your space for creativity. Now, I don't have a lot of gifts, as far as homemaking skills, or, you know, the things that people normally think of like painting and sewing and, you know, what, whatever those arts and crafts kind of gifts are. But I realized that writing is a joy to me, I'm surprised when I see what comes out of my pen. And fortunately, you and my family members indulge me and let me read to you some of the things that come out of my head and through the pen. And so I'd say that you need to prepare your space for it. You need to have utensils, tools, you know, the pens that you like the paper that you like the the cute notebook that you picked up, or the notebook that you've used for years, and you just keep replacing that filling you need, you need to have a place where you can be alone, and you can sync and you can let that those thoughts flow, it's very important to do that. But you also need to use prompts. Because sometimes, like I said, I use, I'm so tired every morning, and that gets a little stale. But if I've had a prompt, I've been amazed at what can come from it. And I'll give you one right now that if it's your first time trying this, that worked for me like magic, so I didn't have a therapist, but I had an experience where a family member kind of adopted something that I had created. And like I said, I'm not very creative. So like it's something that I've created, that's kind of cute or cool. I want to keep it as my own. And they weren't being facetious or mean, they were just kind of unthinking, and not asking my permission to use it. So I felt very passionate about it. I knew it was irrational. But one day I read this writing prompt, and I thought this is a great idea. So it said take one page and write all of your feelings about why you are right in this situation. So I did that I just wrote it out just as strong as I felt. Then it said on the second page, take the other side of this situation and write from that perspective. And I thought but but no, but I'm right. But I had to switch and think what could this person had been thinking when they adopted my creativity? So I wrote from their point of view, and then the third page, it suggested that you write neutral. And really it's writing like, does it really matter? It doesn't matter. There's no right and wrong. And when that was all done, I was done with that whole fight and all of that internal dialogue I'd been doing for, you know, a week, it was just over. And it was magic to me. And so I think that as parents especially, we have all kinds of dialogue, like next time that kid says this, I'm gonna say that, you know, it's all going on inside our head. Let's just go ahead and try that three page exercise and just see if it worked. If it didn't bring any new insight, did it relieve any stress?
Dr. Tim Thayne:That's fantastic. So I just want to summarize here, some of the things that we've learned here is that find that find that special place where you can be alone quiet to write, figure out what you want, explore, maybe a writing prompt makes the difference. Another thing you shared with me in the past that's helped me is do not edit While You Write Oh yeah, just write and not not try and edit what you're saying. And let it flow.
Roxanne Thayne:Because it's two sides of the brain, you have the creative side, which is the writing and you have the analytical side, which is the editing. And if you start to mix the two, you're just going to get frustrated and not enjoy that experience at all. Remember, not everything you write is going to be published. Two more
Dr. Tim Thayne:questions for you before we wrap up here. The first one is I want you to talk about the the journal you recently published. And tell everybody what what that's all about. And then I've got a I'd like you to think about what's a challenge you can give all of us who are reluctant journal writers, that was like the minimum amount of something that we could see results.
Roxanne Thayne:Sure. So at the end of 2020, I was talking to our printer from rooftop publishing, and we were talking about wanting to create something that would help people process what they had been going through. I mean, we beat this horse to death about what loss has happened in 2020. loss of jobs, loss of life, loss of health, loss of connection, loss of friendships. Loss of yeah, just financial security, things like that. And, and we were talking and I said, you know, really there's so many Silver Linings though that people are discovering from these dark days. And so we decided that we were going to create a job earned all of writing prompts that would help people capture their dark days. And then process those to find the silver linings. Because, you know, I talked about that Mama Josie and her experience with the Spanish Influenza, that is gold to me, because she actually took what the blessing was of that experience. And that was that, that she found the love of her community, and the way that they supported them and and helped them through that awful experience. And so we wrote this journal, where we start out with four pages for you just to journal all about the bad stuff. And then we talked about what are the things that are helping you kind of shift your mindset? Was there a quotation that inspired you that you read over and over? Was there a scripture? Was there a mantra that you used? What were some of the the kinds of things that people did for you? What gifts were given to you to help you through that dark? Those dark days? What did you need to change? What did you need to repent of and do better at. And then, let's journal about those silver linings. And if you think about that, if you were to hand your child, your dark days and Silver Linings journal, as a young mother or as a teenager, or as a college student, or as starting a new job, and they see that you had those same things that hard boss those relationships that left you devastated, they would want to know what it was that gave you strength, how you pulled through and that you eventually did pull through, we just need hope. And your journal can give that to people. And so it's called dark days and silver linings, rewriting our hardships for a brighter tomorrow, how can they find it? Well, you can just go to rooftop publishing.org. Or you can go to just my website, which is Roxanne theme.com. and order it from there.
Dr. Tim Thayne:You know, if you coupled some of the things together that we've talked about today, people writing down their most difficult moments, and how that actually helped them physically feel better. And then couple that with greater awareness after the fact and and finding positives in all of that. You kind of in that journal, you bring together two really therapeutic things at one time. And and so both are good to do. We've learned today through this this episode. So Roxanne, here's what I would love for you to do just really quickly give us a challenge, you know, what would help us and give us kind of specific enough challenge that we could accomplish it, and then should have some kind of positive outcome we'd be able to see,
Roxanne Thayne:okay, well, I I'd say just take that idea of a dark day and a silver lining. And write about that for three pages. Talk about an experience. And it doesn't have to be the biggest, ugliest, scariest, it can be something that happened today. Something that really ruffled your feathers or threw you for a loop and write about that, and then write about how you came out of that stronger, better, more insightful, more compassionate, and, and then go back and reread it, I would also encourage you to share it with somebody, someone that you feel safe with someone that you, you know, you're not asking them to edit. And you can tell them that before they read it, if you're not going to read it aloud to them say I am not looking for proofreading. Here, I'm not looking for editing, I'm just looking for how did this make you feel? I think that you will find that people are very touched with your vulnerability and sharing that. And they're strengthened by what you have captured what you've realized about yourself. And I would say if you were to do that for your child, what a gift to show that kind of vulnerability to a child that that kind of authenticity that they probably don't get because you're always trying to be the parent.
Dr. Tim Thayne:That's great. That's something I think we can all do. You know, you said three pages, the dark days, the silver linings in that share it with someone else. And and because it's a true principle, you know, and that's the thing about everything I love is you know, if it's a true principle, it will work. Yeah, it will work for everybody. It ends up being a universal and and so I think wherever we're at with our writing skills, or our insights and all of that wherever we're at this journaling process can help us achieve something that will will bring meaning to our lives and maybe greater awareness. So thank you for that. I think it probably is true that this could be the cheapest therapy you ever do is buying a notebook and getting a nice pen, not just a little cheap pen but a nice pen and get to writing and I would say After this little challenge, take the time to ask yourself what, what play should journaling take in my life and then prioritize it so that you start to get longer and bigger long term benefits and greater benefits in your life.
Roxanne Thayne:And remember, it's not just about your life, it's about the intentionality of what you're doing for those who follow you.
Dr. Tim Thayne:Thanks, Roxane for helping us all see the benefit of journal writing. And personally, I'm going to in my morning pages tomorrow morning, I'm going to do my dark days, Silver Linings entry. Let's see how that goes. And I
Roxanne Thayne:will check up on you. Okay, thanks.