Latest / Just & Joyful with Kristin Carver Smith / BONUS EP: Journaling as a Way to Process and Heal
Transcript
- Kristin Carver Smith: Hello, hello, and welcome to a very special bonus episode of Justin Joyful with Kristin Carversmith. I am of course your host, Kristin Carversmith or KCS as folks love to call me. I have a very special guest with me today for this bonus episode. Please welcome Angelina Burkholder, writer, executive producer of this podcast. Please welcome Angelina. Angelina, we're so glad that you're with us today. Angelina: I'm so happy to be here. It's always a treat to, I mean, we have so many conversations, but it's always a treat to be like, we're gonna hit record on this one and capture what we're talking about. Kristin Carver Smith: Isn't it so funny that we, so we've been saying that for a long time. Like we've been saying that we should have hit record on a million conversations, not just between ourselves, obviously, but also between a lot of the amazing individuals that we have had the privilege of working with at the new fashion co. And for those of you who do not know, Angelina was previously the president of the new fashion co and Angelina and I go way back. It's, it's officially. Angelina: Yeah. Kristin Carver Smith: 10 years, actually more than that now. Now it's 11, 11, which is just, what? Do you feel old? It makes me feel old saying 11 years. Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. 11, 12, yeah. I do, I do. I'm like, I've been out of school for long enough to say that I've been doing something for a decade. That's wild. Kristin Carver Smith: Can we just say out of school? Like I just, I don't know. It still feels like school was yesterday. So I love that. Angelina, I wanted to have you on today because you and I both share a love for journaling. We share a love for writing. And as folks who are listening know, writing has been so helpful and healing for me. is I've continued to process everything from the past year and a half. But even more than that, I would say I've been writing since I was seven, eight years old. I have so many journals that I go back to that I'm like, sometimes I'll, and I've held onto a lot of them. I love poring over them. I'm sure that you probably, the practice is not dissimilar for you. Angelina: Hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I have my, ⁓ my stacks of journals that I've toted with me from state to state and house to house. And, ⁓ you know, it's the, the older journals from the childhood and teenage years, they're there. I go back to those to sometimes memory check myself. but it's also, you know, it's a, ⁓ a way to just love on my younger self a little bit and be like, Hmm. You were going through it, weren't you? ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Wait, you said memory check, and I have to stop you there, because it's so good, because I do think that, I do feel like sometimes, without us documenting moments, we can have those, it's a lapse, or a write, it's like, our brain is storing so much information all of the time, it's like, I think of, what, Inside Out, where they have the memory, right? And it's like, Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah, we can't always quote unquote keep everything. And so I love that like, that you're very cognizant of the journals also provide this opportunity for you to check yourself. Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, because it's ⁓ I'm really fascinated by memory and we don't need to go down this rabbit hole. But memory is incredibly elastic. And it's you know, I think a lot of times about how can I trust my memory? Because I you know, the more you think about a memory, the more it changes. And so some of our favorite memories, it's like, are they actually accurate? Because every time we remember it, small little details can change and then that becomes the memory. And then you are remembering the memory of the memory. And ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Are you sure? Hmm. Mmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Ugh. Angelina: And there have been times when I've started writing about something and I'll go back and I know that it happened in a certain year. And I go back and look at my journals and I'm like, ⁓ it didn't happen in that order. But my memory, like if I trust just the memory in my head, I'm so convinced that it happened in this order. And then it's, you know, then I have my actual documentation that says, no, it didn't. And sometimes those details are, you know, not consequential, but it's, it's a, it's a fascinating thing. ⁓ again, that's a, Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Mmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Angelina: a rabbit hole for another day. Kristin Carver Smith: Well, we may have to explore that on a full episode of Just and Joyful. you touched on something that I think about when I was in the hospital. I was given a journal and... Angelina: Yes. Mm. Kristin Carver Smith: I think about like, have gone back to look at some of the things that I was writing and sharing and placing in those pages. And, you know, I had, I was given a journal when I started partial hospitalization, I was giving a journal when I started intensive outpatient. And so it's like, I've, I have these things that have served as a record, in some ways, ⁓ of a time where ⁓ Angelina: Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: I didn't, I feel like I was working on returning to myself. And so it's like sometimes I've gone back to those journals and even now, and it's fascinating to quote unquote see how far I've come, but also to like. Angelina: Mmm. Kristin Carver Smith: to go back to those moments and go like, ⁓ like that actually happened. Or I remember in the moment feeling like this feeling or this thought or this scenario or situation, I felt like that was so real and perhaps maybe it wasn't, right? And so I think that the practice and the purpose of this episode, I think is I'm so, there are so many folks who don't pick up pen and put it to paper or. Angelina: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: fingers to keyboard. Although my preference is pen, right, to paper. I know you're like me and like we love that old school pen to paper. just, and I know that there's a lot of research around that too of how helpful that is. And so, you know, for the folks who are listening and tuning in right now and who are like, you know what, like journaling is for, you know, my like teenage self or actually haven't done that in years, but like I've been noodling on it or Angelina: Yep. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: you know, perhaps you, you've procrastinated picking up the pen because it's, you feel like you're bringing, you know, expectations to it that it's like, you have to write a, you know, an award winning memoir in these pages and stuff too. So what would you say to them as someone who is like, you write all day, every day, what would you say to them? Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. That's a great question. ⁓ I think, firstly, ⁓ it always makes me really nervous for people when I find out that they don't do any kind of record keeping on their lives. I'm like, how are you going to remember? ⁓ It's such ⁓ a compulsion for me that I can't quite understand when people... Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Good. Angelina: don't have that compulsion. ⁓ Not saying that my compulsion is healthy by any means, because I'm sometimes to a certain extent, I'm like, if I don't write this down, it'll disappear. And that's not true. ⁓ But I think, you know, I think where sometimes people get stuck or get hung up on not being able to take to a page, whether that's physical or digital, is that there is all that pressure of what am I going to create here? And I think, you know, as Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Mm, right, right. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Angelina: someone who writes every day, there are very different ways that I write. So what I write in my journal, I'm not ever expecting anybody to look at that. And I go back and forth, yeah. And I go back and forth between telling my spouse that if I pass away, burn them. And then it's like, if I pass away, you can look at them, but then burn them. Or it's like, you know what, anybody can look at them. Kristin Carver Smith: Mm-hmm. It's just for you. Mmm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Angelina: ⁓ But it's not, you know, I'm not writing that for the intent of it being seen. And so the way that I write there, there's misspellings, there's, I don't even period things. you know, it's just like, I'm just almost writing stream of consciousness. So it's like the way that my thoughts sound in my head is what's coming out on the page. And ⁓ I just don't even let the editor in the room. So it's, you know, it's knowing if I enter into that practice with the posture of, Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Angelina: This is for me to get out of my, what's clanging around in my head. I'm getting that out so that I can, for me, oftentimes it's so that I can move to writing that will see the public in some way, or it can be, I'm so anxious about something and I just need to get it out. ⁓ I just stream of consciousness, write it down. And then there's this like, then it's out of my head and I'm able to sometimes move on from it. Sometimes it helps me to think about it in a new way. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. you Angelina: ⁓ brings clarity or just like gives me relief for a little bit so that can go and do ⁓ a different task. So I think, you know, we, there's all this pressure to write something really poetic or beautiful or prolific on the page. And it's like, just, just get the thought out of the head and on the page. And like you said, there's so much research that shows that when you actually physically write something down, something happens that helps you in the processing. it, sometimes it can turn into. Kristin Carver Smith: It's powerful. Physically, right? Yep. Yeah. Angelina: something like sometimes there's a line that comes up that I go back and then that is the start of a poem or an essay but I try not to put any of that pressure on my journal pages. It's just that is just for me to I can be who I can be petty. I can be angsty. I can be angry. I can be over the top joyful like it I just let myself show up on the page with whatever I'm feeling that day. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Mmm. ⁓ I hope that gives our listeners and viewers so much permission to, they don't have to bring their own editor to the writing room, to the journal room, to that space. Angelina: Hmm. Yeah. Kristin Carver Smith: It's so good and I'm really curious, are there times and seasons where, do you do that daily? Does your journaling look like a daily habit? Do you have a chunk of time set aside? Do you do that for five or 10 minutes in the morning? What's that look like for you? Angelina: Hmm, ideally it would be every day. ⁓ But I'm someone, I've learned this about myself, that I'm someone who, if you tell me I have to do something every day, I'm not gonna do it. I'm not gonna do it. ⁓ And I used to feel really guilty about that. I would get these journals that were set up for daily journaling and then I would get all, get so anxious because I missed a day and now that page is wasted. ⁓ And... Kristin Carver Smith: You Mm. Angelina: So I just had to be like, you journal when you feel like it. And sometimes there are seasons where I'm journaling multiple times a day, every day for a few weeks, and then I don't for a week or two. consistently it looks like I'm journaling probably about every other day, like a few times a week. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Okay, okay, that's helpful. I think, just think for... listeners and viewers, it's just when you are trying to start something that perhaps you've, whether it's you've been avoiding it, it feels new, it feels like a, ⁓ wow, like I've, you know, my schedule is insane, but I wanna incorporate this practice, like I know that this will actually be helpful for me. is helpful to hear someone else's very specific example of how this shows up in your daily life, and so I love Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: that you have also navigated the, I'm gonna do this every day, and what the implications of that have looked like for you, and you found, like, this doesn't actually do what it's supposed to do for me if I try to manage it and contain it in this specific way, and I think I can so relate to that too, of like, you know, wanting... Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: Let me like my day looks like this, this and this and it's structured like that. I don't know why I have to do that voice for it, but that is what comes to my... Yeah, she's rude. Like she's, I don't know. She's like a, I don't know, like a British drill sergeant or something. And it's probably coming up because I'm watching, I'm rewatching ⁓ the turn, Washington spies. So I've got a lot of the British on my mind. ⁓ Angelina: Yes. Yup. That's the voice that goes with it. Yeah. Yup. Mmm. Mm-hmm. Yup. Kristin Carver Smith: Nevertheless, I digress. I think what's really interesting and you touched on this earlier is that you are writing for yourself and also you have public works. You are an incredible essayist. are an incredible and super talented poet as well. And I have, you know, I've obviously bore witness to your gifts throughout the 11 years that we've Angelina: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: worked together and known each other and done a lot of life and all of the things. ⁓ But I'm curious, because I think we just live in this culture right now too, where people feel like they've got to share everything, that that equals authenticity. so what would you say to the folks who struggle with, yes, I'm gonna put pen to paper, but I like... Angelina: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: What about the part where I have to like share everything and show up authentically and you know, all of that sort of stuff online as well. Angelina: Yeah. Hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: Or how do you even discern that for yourself? Angelina: Yeah, yeah. You know, I, ⁓ it's something I struggle with because I write primarily personal essays and a lot of my poetry is, ⁓ some might call it navel gazing, but it's very ⁓ self-reflective, most of my work. And, you know, sometimes there are things that happen or memories that I go back to that I... Kristin Carver Smith: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Angelina: don't want to share or don't feel like writing and that can feel like, then I'm lying. Because if this is the medium that I work in and I'm not willing to share everything, ⁓ then am I being truthful? And I used to struggle with that a lot. I still struggle with it to an extent, ⁓ but I think where I've landed is that I ⁓ give myself permission to share everything on my private page, the private page being my journal. Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Mmm. Yeah. Angelina: Like there I can, you I can be my, if I'm, like I said, if I'm feeling really petty about something, I'm not, I'm not going to put that online, but I can, I can put it on the page and get it and get it out. And, ⁓ I think, you know, with something where you're trying to figure out, do I share this painful context or not? I'm always, I always go back to like, why am I sharing it? If, if I share it, is this going to help me heal in some way? If I share this. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Angelina: then okay, then it's worth exploring. But if it's just that I feel obligated to, then I ask myself, why am I feeling obligated? Is it because that person over there had a similar experience and they shared these XYZ details? And if I share a similar story, does that invalidate my experience if I'm unwilling to divulge the details? And yeah, think for me, I am really terrified of ever sensationalizing Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Angelina: my story or being reductive about my story and so I'm I just I trust my gut if my gut is clenched about something whether that's because I haven't healed ⁓ or if it's because it is my higher self being like that's not something to put out there I just listen to it and I don't and I don't I don't mess with it ⁓ there are times ⁓ where Kristin Carver Smith: So good. Mmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Angelina: You know, this in January, I did write about something that I thought I never would actually write and I put all the details in it and it lives and it's in a Google Doc, which is pretty scary because it moved past the journal. But I wrote it and then it's sitting there. It's, you know, 40 pages just sitting there. I don't know if anything will ever happen with that, but. Kristin Carver Smith: Mm-hmm. Mmm. Mmm. Angelina: I was, you know, after a decade, I was ready to take a next step with that story. But I'm not putting any pressure on myself to revisit it, to edit it, to even think about putting it out there in any way. But it just, felt good to take that next step in healing of writing the details. So I think, you know, for me, it's just always a gut check. Like, what do I personally feel ready to explore in my writing? ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Wow. Yeah. Angelina: And then do I have peace about other people seeing that? And if I don't have peace about that, it really doesn't matter to me why I don't have peace. I just, I trust that. And I'll explore that later. know, why is, why, where's the lack of peace coming from? But it, you know, for that moment, if it, if it really is meant to be shared, then I feel peace. ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Yeah. Yeah, wow, I'm hearing a couple of things. One, I'm hearing discernment. I'm hearing it sounds like, too, that you've done a lot of work on ensuring that you trust yourself so that when those moments come where we need to feel really solid about that, right, of like. Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: Do I trust my gut? Do I trust myself in this situation to do the thing that's best for me, to listen to myself, to listen to that inner wisdom that all of these things have helped produce? So it's like I'm hearing you say discernment. I'm also hearing you say patience. Because it sounds like too that I think because we do live in a world that moves Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Kristin Carver Smith: very rapidly that it feels oftentimes like we have to, once we decide, quote unquote decide that we're gonna share our story or some part of it or whatever, that we then have to move swiftly in that sharing. And I love this, again, very concrete example that you've given of how you took something that was just for you and. Angelina: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: it took a decade for it to make itself, for it to end up in a Google Doc. And that there's a lot of patience of knowing and trusting that if that is to ever move beyond the Google Doc in any form or fashion, you have the wisdom to know what that moment is gonna look like. And you're not allowing anybody or any, you know, cultural standards or... Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: undercurrents or whatever to pull you into moving at a pace and doing something before you're really ready to, right? And before you have the peace about it. And so I just, I love that. And I don't want our listeners and viewers to miss that of a lot of times it can feel like, again, when you're, I think about the stories, right? Cause a lot of folks who are listening right now are, Angelina: Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: considering sharing their stories or have already or are in the process of sharing and telling their stories, whether it's on stages, whether it's on books, whether it's in music, right? Or whether it's through podcasts or, you know, through their everyday work and conversations with colleagues or loved ones, all of that. It's like we're all telling stories all of the time. And we're all trying to parse through and discern like which pieces and parts of my context and my experience do I want to share and when. Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Kristin Carver Smith: and which parts do get to just be for me in a culture that says no, tell me everything, show me everything, transparency at all costs. And so I love that you're just modeling. Angelina: Mm-hmm. Yep. Yeah. Kristin Carver Smith: the alternative, like the sustainable, the like, it just, it, it feels just and joyful. Angelina: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Hmm. Well, thank you. You know, I think ⁓ I grew up in a in a Christian faith tradition and ⁓ I'm quite removed from that now, but there's so much about that practice that is still really ⁓ meaningful to me. And there's a verse that I really love. I think it's in Proverbs ⁓ where it says, Don't cast your pearls before swine. And that Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Mmm. Hmm. Mmm. Angelina: plays in my head almost daily, like weekly. And I think about that a lot in my writing of, I, and this is speaking in the context of publishing something or sharing something online or submitting for something, I always think about what's the potential fallout of this? Because I deal in personal essay, it's like, am I telling the story fairly? Kristin Carver Smith: Hmm. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Mmm. Yeah. Angelina: if anybody else is implicated in it, are they fairly implicated? ⁓ Even if they are, what could the potential response to this be? And I always think about, am I prepared to receive that response? And if the answer is yes, then I move forward. If the answer is not yes, then I need to either not share the story, alter the story, or wait. Kristin Carver Smith: Yep. Yep. Yeah. Mmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Angelina: And I, you know, it's just, it's one of those things where it's like, when you once, as soon as the story leaves your hands, as soon as you share it with someone, as soon as you post it, it is out of your control. And you have to be okay with that. People will receive it and read into it with their own context and their own lens. And that's the beautiful thing about storytelling is that it can transcend experience and, and age and background and social standing and ethnicity and, ⁓ Kristin Carver Smith: Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Angelina: That's the beautiful thing about it. That's also the scary thing about it is people will interpret from your story based on their own context. ⁓ so when you think about what you're sharing and you have your pearls that are so near and dear and tender to you, you really have to think about, am I ready to put this out there? Or is this something that I need to keep sacred for me? Kristin Carver Smith: Mmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and the internet can be swine. I don't know, I mean, I feel like, you know, we use swine less and troll more, but right, but it's like, I think, I'm so glad you're saying these things because I know that our listener has felt that tension, right? I think it's like, I almost feel like it's impossible to be a human right now and not feel that tension of. Angelina: Exactly! Exactly! Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Kristin Carver Smith: When do I tell and share what and when and what's the cost of that and how does it help me? How does it help someone else? And I love that ⁓ really what we're also talking about too is like two sides to the same coin, right? And it's kind of the essence of Just and Joyful as well, right? Is that there's something beautiful about it and there's also something difficult in that too. Angelina: Mm-hmm. you Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: And so ⁓ I'm so thankful for this conversation. I'm so I think this episode is so important. And hopefully, you know, our listeners will take away that there always gets to be a space again, whether it's a journal, which, know, Angelina and I, if you if you come chat with us in real life, just like on this episode, we will absolutely say like, please have a journal and a space that's just for you. And I feel like we're both testaments of like how Angelina: Please, Kristin Carver Smith: it actually has benefited our wellbeing in ways so seen and then ways unseen and just, our lives are better because our pen has made it to paper and we've made that commitment to ourselves. ⁓ And I hope that listeners will take away that that practice doesn't have to be something where, you know, I know that some folks might be listening to this Angelina and go like, but I'm not a writer. Angelina: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Kristin Carver Smith: And I love that you have helped illustrate for them that like you are, and yet in your own practice, you're not worried about punctuation, you're not worried about spelling, like you're not worried about sentence structure or saying the perfect thing or making sure that it's suitable for someone else's eyes other than your own. Angelina: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, that's my favorite. My favorite thing is when people tell me that, well, I'm not a writer, and then I'm just like, let's take a seat and let's settle in, because we're gonna talk. It's one of those things for me that I feel like if you're a human experiencing life, then you are, you are a writer. My hope is that more people Kristin Carver Smith: Yes. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Angelina: would play with that format and just take the pressure off that there, it doesn't have to go anywhere. You can even burn it immediately. You can write it and immediately burn it. The benefit will still come to you. There's just something about processing your life through the page that can be really powerful and really healing and just really illuminating. Even like, you know, if you get an angsty thought out and you're like, the next day you think, damn, that, oof. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mmm. Angelina: You know, that can be illuminating rather than it just clanging around in your brain. so I, yeah, I think everybody's a writer and I wish that everybody took the time, even if it's just once a week to put something on the page, burn it, if you will throw it away, keep it stash it, but just put it down. Kristin Carver Smith: Yeah. Yeah. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. I love that process for the page. So good. Well, Angelina, thank you so much for joining us today. ⁓ Where can people find your work? Where can people ⁓ read your incredible essays and your poetry? Angelina: Mm-hmm. Hmm. Yeah, I am so I write on sub stack. My sub stack is called from the hand ⁓ any of my writing that I do online I write under the name Angelina Dene. So you can find me Angelina Dene on Instagram or on sub stack would love to connect with y'all. Kristin Carver Smith: And y'all I have to say today's essay from the hand from Angelina. So, so powerful. I'm not gonna tell you what it's called. I'm not gonna give you any details. I'm just leaving it at that so that you have to, you gotta go read. You gotta find it. ⁓ Send us messages, all of the things once you dig in. Angelina, thank you so much for joining us. Angelina: Yeah. Hmm. Yeah. Thank you for having me.