Focus On This Podcast

162. The Overlooked Key to Growth and Vision

Audio

Overview

Journaling is the type of activity that most people seem to recognize would benefit them, but they don’t know where to start. When do they write? And, more important, what do you actually write while you’re journaling?

In this episode, Courtney and Blake give you two questions that will jumpstart your journaling practice and get you going on the right track. Also, Nick gives Courtney a very important quiz.

You will learn:

  • What barriers people often feel when they start to journal
  • The importance of vision when it comes to journaling
  • The opportunities that journaling provides
  • That Courtney has a questionable British accent

To check out the Full Focus Journal, visit https://fullfocusstore.com/collections/journals/products/full-focus-journal-single.

To watch this episode on YouTube, visit https://youtu.be/DWjxMoiLKIg.

Check out The Accidental Diarist by Molly McCarthy: https://amzn.to/3T4vqES.

Join the Full Focus Community at https://www.facebook.com/groups/ffpthinktank.

Episode Transcript

Courtney Baker:
Hey guys. In today’s episode, Blake and I are going to be talking about journaling. And if you’re interested in getting a more robust tool to help you start the practice of journaling, consider picking up our Full Focus Journal. You can find it at fullfocusplanner.com. So Blake, I am curious to know, you’re an avid journaler, what is it that feels different in your life when you are journaling? Actually, as I say that question, is there ever a time you’re not journaling? How committed to journaling are you?

Blake Stratton:
I am committed enough to journaling that I don’t think about being committed to journaling, sort of like being married. I’m not actively thinking, “Oh my gosh, I better stay married today.” I’m just doing life with my wife, and it is just who I am at this point. Married and also journaling. So I don’t really think about, I don’t measure or track, oh, how many days in a row have I journaled or have I gone this long? But the biggest benefit, Courtney, of journaling is awareness. It’s awareness of who you are, what you’re going through, what you want, what you don’t want. If you’ve ever hired a consultant, and I know you’ve hired consultants for that work, I’ve hired consultants, I’ve worked as a consultant. The number one advantage that a consultant brings, we think we hire consultants and coaches for their knowledge and what they can teach us.
But the biggest advantage they bring to us is self-awareness, is awareness of our business, awareness of things that are assets that we didn’t know we were sitting on. Perspectives on our situation that we were so tunnel vision on one thing over here, We didn’t realize, “Oh, I have this resource over here.” And journaling is almost like you’re self-consultant or a coach, because you’re just turning stuff over and exploring, and you’re giving yourself space to discover, “Oh, what’s really happening?” And so what I would say is I notice if I feel lost, if I feel busy, if I feel consistently down in the dumps or just off my game, one of the things I’ll check along with sleep and this other stuff is, “Hey, have I been journaling recently?” And oftentimes the answer is no, I haven’t been journaling. And I start journaling some more.
And it’s like, “Oh, right, I have a little bit more self-awareness.” And with that awareness comes strategy. With that awareness comes some self-grace for what’s going on. Or with that awareness comes a perspective that is more empowering. And so yeah, as you can tell everybody, you’re like, “Whoa, slow down, Buster. I’m just trying to write down three things I’m grateful for here.” But listen, journaling, the more you make it a part of your life, I really do believe it’s just a… It’s like if you lived on an oil field or something and you didn’t know it. You don’t know how rich you are until you start journaling. And journaling is a means of discovering those riches of the past year. It doesn’t matter if you had a good day, bad day, medium day, there’s gold to be extracted and there’s wealth and wisdom. And with more wisdom comes more material wealth, but also wealth in other areas of life. So yeah, I’m a pretty big-

Courtney Baker:
Let me ask-

Blake Stratton:
Fan of journaling.

Courtney Baker:
Let me ask you this. So I recently, I feel like this is kind of what you’re describing, but I think I talked about this on the podcast before, but this year I’ve been meeting with a spiritual director and it is hard for me. And in that process there was something I was talking through that, it was this really wonderful thing that I was like, if I had not come and talked about this, I would not have even realized this wonderful thing that had been happening at all. And what I hear you saying is, I actually could have accessed that potentially through journaling. It’s just like the time spent, I never would’ve noticed this had I not been kind of processing through that with my spiritual director. And I kind of feel like that’s what you’re saying.
It’s like these realizations that for me it’s like I’m just going so fast, I’m so futuristic, focused on the next thing, that even the really wonderful things it’s easy to miss that are happening. Obviously there are the things like when you are down, but even the really great things, it’s easy to miss and that those are happening as well.

Blake Stratton:
Is part of the resistance to journaling, I wonder if this is the case for you, Courtney, but when I’ve coached people or encouraged them to journal, I’m thinking of one person in particular recently. She’s just like, it’s just so much effort for me to write. And I just encouraged her to start. You can start seeing rewards and then you’ll probably more likely want to be writing. If you do some other forms of journaling, you can record yourself. I do this all the time, I go for a walk, I just start talking. You can use photos, I have a journal category that’s just, it’s Felicity and I post a photo of her from recently, and then I look at that photo and I just write down something that she’s doing. “Oh, today she says the word video vidivo.” That’s like a thing she does. And it’s adorable. And pretty soon that’s going to go away. But I just document it. So there’s other baby steps you can take, I guess if it feels daunting to write.

Courtney Baker:
Yeah, no, I think for me it’s not writing. I actually love actually writing. It’s just time. It’s like prioritizing it in a way that at the end of the day or the beginning of the day, there aren’t other things that aren’t… Now obviously I’m at a, I would say a very… There are a lot of factors or a lot of external things needing my focus at home and at work. So I have a two year-old, it’s not for the faint of heart friends, but obviously this is just a season and seasons change. But I think that’s really my thing is just the time and trying to prioritize it in a way that it doesn’t get shuffled out.

Blake Stratton:
So one way to make the time factor less of a issue is to start small and with a plan. And so if you listening want to start journaling more and you’re coming up against the, I just don’t have the time, part of what can make it easier, usually the time thing is kind of an illusion. And not to say it’s not real, you’re not busy. But when you think about, hey, journaling can take literally five minutes, 10 minutes, you can journal when you’re waiting in line somewhere or when… It doesn’t have to take long, but not knowing or not having a plan for what to do is this big mental barrier. And you could spend 10 minutes going, “Well, what should I write about? I feel daunted by this.” So that’s what we’ve got for you today. Just two simple questions, categorical questions you can start with to begin journaling more consistently.

Courtney Baker:
Welcome to another episode of Focus on This, the most productive podcast on the internet. So you can banish distractions, get the right stuff done, and finally start loving Mondays. I’m Courtney Baker, cracking up at the professional journaler Blake Stratton. Man you’ve got to go see on YouTube the crazy things that Blake Stratton does on these podcasts. If you haven’t already.

Blake Stratton:
There was probably some music playing under you just now, but just so you guys know, that’s the magic of podcast editing done by Sir Nick here. And so I just dance to nothingness, but the music in my own heart, which you have a song in your heart as well, dance to the beat of your own drum, so on and so forth. Okay, Courtney, let’s get to it. We want to make journaling easier, simpler. The way to do that is to have somewhat of a plan going into it. So here’s two questions or really categories of questions if you want to think of it that way, that you can use to start with. The first question is, Where am I? Where am I? Floating on this blue marble through nothingness? No, where am I? This question’s about grounding yourself in the present moment. Just document, think about if you were an accountant, just taking an account of what’s going on in your life right now.
I feel sad right now. I’m feeling happy right now. My job is really busy right now, just writing down the things that are happening. It may feel like a waste of time because you say, “Blake, I already know where I am.” But trust me, simply by writing down these things, you’ll notice what you notice first. And then a cool thing you could do is you can even direct your focus to notice other things. You could say, “What’s going well right now?” For instance. “What am I enjoying right now? What are some positive aspects of my job right now?” This work will help you become more self-aware with that question. Where am I?

Courtney Baker:
I love that because I think it’s helpful to just see ourselves and again, “But we know.” But we actually don’t, like what I said earlier, there are a thousand things taking space in my life. It does take a moment to kind of reorient, to have a moment to find myself and see myself. Somebody recently said the most basic foundation to kindness is human acknowledgement. And I think that’s true for ourselves too, of just having the moment to acknowledge ourselves. And so I love this first question of just saying, “Where am I? What am I thinking or feeling?” And I know for some people that’s easier than for some others of us to hone into. It takes a second. So I love this first question.

Blake Stratton:
The second question is, where do I want to be? Where do I want to be? This question is great for casting some vision for your own life. It could be any domain in life. It could be where do I want to be in work? What’s my goal this week? For instance. Where do I want my personal health to be, my friendships to be? And orienting yourself towards the future naturally cues your brain to think of some fresh ideas. The other thing I like about this question, Courtney, is it can be hard to think of what do I want? It seems like an easy question, but my coaching clients were having such a hard time with this. I actually created a tool just to help them figure out, I call the desire warmup. And the whole purpose of it is, it’s hard to sometimes think about where do I actually want to be? Because I’m so aware of what I don’t want. Well, I don’t want to be here and I don’t like this about my job now, and I don’t want this and this is frustrating me.
This question will get you out of that negative focus of here’s what I don’t want. And into a more positive life giving focus, vision oriented focus of what do I actually want?

Courtney Baker:
I love this and I feel like this might be helpful this time of year to start thinking about more because I think so many of us set goals at the beginning of the year and sometimes it’s like a crash landing into like, “Oh gosh, I got to figure out what I want in this whole thing called a life.” And we’re kind of lost. But I think if we were more intentional of maybe taking this next quarter and having a little more time to prepare for that, it’s actually going to make goal setting for next year even easier, or maybe even more successful because we’re not trying to do that vision for my life in such a short timeframe. We’ve actually been doing it over a series of months.

Blake Stratton:
Yeah. And you could even take this question on a daily or weekly basis in a sense, if you’ve ever done a weekly preview, part of what you’re doing when you set a weekly big three is you’re answering the question, where do I want to be? You’re saying, “Okay, well what do I want to have accomplished?” Right.

Courtney Baker:
Help me with this, because so much of this is, I feel like the weekly preview helps me with some of this. It’s almost like that is my checkpoint. And so can you sell me a little bit on basically adding this layer of how do I go? Because I definitely see the power in that weekly preview of taking or really kind of these same steps, but how do I get into maybe more daily or weekly form of journaling? It’s really not that big of a step, but it’s always been a challenging step for me.

Blake Stratton:
When do you set your daily big three? You do it at the end of the day, right?

Courtney Baker:
Yeah.

Blake Stratton:
One very simple thing you could tack on to that existing, because you’re looking at your task, you’re being very tactical. Looking at the task, looking at the calendar. Okay, here’s my daily big three. One simple thing you could do is, completing these tasks is important to me because… And then what you’ll naturally answer is this question, where do I want to be?

Courtney Baker:
Yeah.

Blake Stratton:
Well, it’s important to me because this thing’s been stressing me out a lot and when I finish this, it’ll be behind me or I want to complete this because if I get that done, then the rest of my week’s going to be easier. Or if I have this conversation, then my relationship with this team member is going to improve and X, Y, and Z. Just that simple question is going to attach some of your… You’ll discover your personal values, because maybe the same types of thing come up every day. It’s like, “Oh, it seems like I’m really concerned with this thing.” Right. So that would be a simple way, Courtney, to just tack a single journal question on top of an existing ritual that you’ve already established of setting a daily big three.

Courtney Baker:
Okay. And that counts. [inaudible 00:15:36] that I could deal.

Blake Stratton:
That counts.

Courtney Baker:
Okay. All right. Guys, I’m about to be a pro journaler too. Watch out.

Nick Jaworski:
Okay, Courtney, I thought today would be a great day you work for Full Focus, you love yourself a planner. I thought it’d be a great day to talk about the history of planners.

Courtney Baker:
Oh gosh. Okay. Yeah.

Nick Jaworski:
With a little quiz that we’re going to talk about. This is taken from an author named Molly McCarthy, who actually wrote a book about the history of the planner in America. So that’s from Molly McCarthy. I’ll put a link in the description. So I’m going to give you five years in each side of this question. What year was the first daily planner published in America?

Courtney Baker:
Okay, I’m going to say 1890.

Nick Jaworski:
Okay, that seems very reasonable. Will it shock you to find out it was in 1773? The first daily planner. So in 1773, this is a direct quote, “Robert Aitken, an aspiring publisher and revolutionary era Philadelphia published what he claimed was America’s first daily planner, offering his customers a prefabricated layout, not unlike the planners of today.”

Courtney Baker:
This is so interesting because I think I fell to, I don’t know, it’s like when you think about previous centuries, I didn’t realize there would be so much… Many of the roles seemed repetitive in nature. Like, “I’m a farmer.” Or, “I work in a factory.” Or… There wasn’t quite as many roles that varied in their day-to-day life. I always think of that as kind of a modern adaptation of work.

Nick Jaworski:
Well, don’t you think that they also, they would look at our lives and go, “You just go into the office every day.”

Courtney Baker:
I know. Well, I think-

Nick Jaworski:
But whatever.

Courtney Baker:
Well, what I was about to say about my statement is, I’m sure George Washington was like, “Oh, a friend.” You have no idea. But I think it’s kind of my modern biased looking back like, “Oh, I’m sure they didn’t have as much…” When I’m sure they did have as much, it just was different.

Nick Jaworski:
Just a different. Now I will say, we’re going to talk a little bit about what these planners looked like, and they’re a little bit different than maybe how we think of them. But I will say this was-

Courtney Baker:
Like they didn’t have a daily big three?

Nick Jaworski:
They did not have a daily big three.

Courtney Baker:
What were they even doing?

Nick Jaworski:
They did not have a daily big three. It was called the Aitken Register. Wasn’t even a planner yet. So we’re going to talk about that.

Courtney Baker:
Okay.

Nick Jaworski:
The next question, we call them planners here in America.

Courtney Baker:
Oh gosh.

Nick Jaworski:
Nice to know we have the Full Focus planner. That’s the only one you need, of course. But what is the common term for them in the United Kingdom?

Courtney Baker:
Okay, let me think of that. My first thought was, it would be like your scheduler.

Nick Jaworski:
That’s not it, but it should be. I’m into that. That was pretty good.

Courtney Baker:
Thanks.

Nick Jaworski:
To be clear, that is not the answer.

Courtney Baker:
I feel like it’s going to be something like that. Scheduler, your daily, your… Or do you think they’re just maybe more on the notes and it’s just like, “It’s your calendar.” [inaudible 00:19:34].

Nick Jaworski:
It’s not calendar. Give me one more guess.

Courtney Baker:
Oh, wait, is it… Oh, wait, wait, wait. Is it a journal? Did they call it your journal or your… A log? Is it a log?

Nick Jaworski:
You’re further. You were so close.

Courtney Baker:
Closer with journaler?

Nick Jaworski:
You were so close.

Courtney Baker:
Okay. Oh, diary.

Nick Jaworski:
Diary. That is the right answer. I’ll put a ding in here.

Courtney Baker:
Yes.

Nick Jaworski:
Ding.

Courtney Baker:
Okay, thank you.

Nick Jaworski:
They do call it a diary over there.

Courtney Baker:
I got there with a lot of help, but I got there. Okay.

Nick Jaworski:
You got pretty close. Now-

Courtney Baker:
Not-

Nick Jaworski:
That’s going to connect to this next question. We should have a Full Focus scheduler. That’s the new product. That’s a hot tip for everybody.

Courtney Baker:
I love it.

Nick Jaworski:
Yeah.

Courtney Baker:
Let’s do it.

Nick Jaworski:
That sort of connects here to this other idea. Before a planner was used to plan the future, what was the primary goal of a planner? Sort of the lineage of the planner?

Courtney Baker:
Okay. I know it was basically to log the events of your day.

Nick Jaworski:
Yes. Now bonus-

Courtney Baker:
To be be a historical log.

Nick Jaworski:
Now, bonus points, why?

Courtney Baker:
Yeah. I don’t know. I’m kind of stumped on this. I mean, other than historical record or for… I mean, my next thought was like, is there any… This is…

Nick Jaworski:
You might be heading there.

Courtney Baker:
I’ve been doing too many contracts in my work right now, because I’m like, “Is there some kind of litigation or some kind of safeguarding that’s like, ‘Oh no, this is where I was, here is my official registrar of appointments.”

Nick Jaworski:
I feel like if I get too close, it gives it away. But keeping account is in quotes. That’s from our author here.

Courtney Baker:
Oh, were they running a… They were creating hypothesis and running experiments?

Nick Jaworski:
Well, that’s not it.

Courtney Baker:
I feel like Benjamin Franklin, Benjamin Franklin’s scheduler would’ve been off the charts.

Nick Jaworski:
Scheduler. Okay, I’m going to just read this. His direct quote. “We know from the writings that Washington and his contemporaries saw their day books as a record of the past, documenting words and deeds that were ultimately accountable to God. Keeping account carried a dual meaning in this colonial era in which a diary, as planners are still known in British English, could serve both earthly and more spiritual goals.” That’s pretty cool. All right, last question. This is a little bit different. A survey from 2017 by DHM Research found that what percentage of people do not have a written plan for their life?

Courtney Baker:
What percentage? I’m going to say that it’s pretty high.

Nick Jaworski:
Okay.

Courtney Baker:
I’m going to guess right down the middle. Well, honestly, my first guess was to go right down the middle at 50%. I kind of think it might be higher than that.

Nick Jaworski:
I’m not saying anything.

Courtney Baker:
I know. I feel like I’m going to be surprised here. I’m going to say 60% of people do not have a written plan.

Nick Jaworski:
I’m going to give that to you. Put the ding in, ding ding, ding. It was 67% do not have a written plan. And for those who do have a written plan, of course they talk later about how having a written plan helps them visualize their future and feel like they are empowered to act on the goals that they have. And so these are a bunch of people who need a Full Focus planner Courtney.

Courtney Baker:
I mean, challenge to the listeners. Just think what we would be doing and achieving in the world right now. If we had 67% of the other folks planning along with us?

Nick Jaworski:
At least 1% of those people would be like, “I want to cure cancer.” Or something. You got to assume somebody would be like, “If I really write it down the things I actually want.” They’re going to come up with some pretty incredible things.

Courtney Baker:
This is where I’m actually… This is a legit idea for some schools, and I know we’ve had several schools and administrations specifically start using the planner with their staff and even with students. But it’s like it needs to be something you’re taught. How do I plan what I’m doing, what I’m trying to accomplish? How do I do that? That feels like such a basic tool, guys. I’m going to teach my kindergartner. What if I brought home a Full Focus planner to my kindergartner? I was like, “Okay. Here we go.”

Nick Jaworski:
You could. I mean, I famously was using and still use the student planner or the kids planner with my 13 year-old, and it’s very hard. Not because he’s not great, but it is a skill that you really have to develop and how do you break things down? Or how do you even know what a goal is? That’s something I found really interesting too, is that sometimes I’m like, “I know there’s things you want.”

Courtney Baker:
Right.

Nick Jaworski:
But I’m sure kindergartners have the same issue. But yeah.

Courtney Baker:
Well that is a part that you could teach even at a very early age of, “Hey, let’s figure out what’s something you want to pursue and accomplish in the next three months?”

Nick Jaworski:
It’s got to be short. Three months is like an eternity.

Courtney Baker:
That is true.

Nick Jaworski:
Three months.

Courtney Baker:
What do you want to accomplish tomorrow?

Nick Jaworski:
This week. Yeah.

Courtney Baker:
Yeah I like that, I think that is such a basic thing that I think all of us realize we had to figure that out on our own, along the way of how to accomplish the things that we want to accomplish. And I would say a lot of us, me included, we’re still honing that practice. You’re not ever there. It’s kind of a lifelong skill that you keep working at. So prompts to everybody listening, because I would say you’re probably on the road to get there.

Nick Jaworski:
All right, Well, thank you for playing our survey. Courtney, I’m going to give you the win on this. You got two out of four. Your prize is-

Courtney Baker:
I thought I got more than that.

Nick Jaworski:
You did not.

Courtney Baker:
Yeah [inaudible 00:25:55]. So today’s tip for leveling up your focus is to set aside five to 10 minutes to journal, and you can join me in making it part of your workday shut down. And ask yourself whether you could make it daily, weekly, or a monthly rhythm. But don’t be afraid to start small. By the way, if you’re looking for a bit more guidance for your journaling, you could consider picking up our Full Focus journal, which includes an eight question template to help you get started. You can find our journals at fullfocusplanner.com.

Nick Jaworski:
Thanks for joining us on Focus on This.

Courtney Baker:
This is the most productive podcast on the internet, so share it with your friends. And don’t forget to join our Full Focus planner community on Facebook. We’ll be back next Monday with another great episode. Until then, stay focused.

Nick Jaworski:
Stay focused.