A Case For Audio Journaling

[Kevin Beal]

Intro

In order to retain things better, it's best to engage multiple senses. Writing is good because there is a touch and visual component, and when it comes to journaling and self knowledge, it's useful the way that writing out math problems is good for learning math.

 

Daniel Mackler has said that he really likes journaling by typing on a computer, which means that he can easily search for keywords later. I've known people (including the therapist I went to for 4 years) who swear that actually using a pencil or pen is massively better than typing. And I'm sure that there are pros and cons to both.

 

I have about 3 1/2 composition books full of journals, which is nothing compared to some of the other people on the boards (e.x. @cherapple). And I don't dislike it, but one thing I have a hard time with is how fast I write. I write in all capital letters which I prefer, but with that and the fact that it's by hand, I go relatively slow.

 

The Problem

This is a problem for me because I have a train of thought I want to follow, but in writing it down, I tend to lose the momentum of the thought as the writing lags behind. And when I catch up, I'm often pulled in another direction. Sometimes it's even frustrating.

 

I'm a pretty fast typist by comparison (I code for a living), but still, it's not as fast as simply talking. And I'm actively engaging in the activity of typing while I'm chewing through some novel thought. And I don't like to have anything distract me while I'm trying to process things. I will even turn off the lights and get comfortable in my bed and I run a rain generator in the background to relax me and cover up any ambient sounds like my roommate rummaging through the fridge or my cat scratching her litter box.

 

The Solution

Inspired by the donator only series about the Mecosystem (similar to parts work in IFS therapy) I decided to try and figure it out and see if what the all the fuss was about. My experience is apparently very different than what other people have reported on the boards, which I find very interesting (an example of how it works for me here).

 

After doing it for a while, I started to really like the format a lot. I talk into my phone with a voice recorder app and I just talk freely. I think also that it could definitely compliment therapy. With a therapist I want to get their feedback as much as possible, and not necessarily go on a stream of consciousness rant following my thoughts to the end. Although, that too sometimes.

 

Audio Journaling

I don't always want to do mecosystem work, but I do quite like the format. And I don't really care much for just writing what I did that day in my journal; I'd rather have it be aimed at processing something. (I also don't know how to use semi-colons). And there was something Stef said that struck me. He said something like "all the memories we have, we have for a reason. There are countless things we never remembered, so why the things we do remember?"

 

So what I've been doing is getting into a relaxed state like I described above and then turning on my recorder. I say that I'm just going to let the first childhood memory come up that wants to come up and then we'll explore it, keeping in mind that I remember it for a reason.

 

I've been finding this incredibly valuable. And way more satisfying that handwriting in a composition book.

 

An example of how this went for me was in exploring the following memory:

 

I'm around 8 years old, it's midday and the sun shining a bright white light into the house, and I'm sitting in the dining room watching my mother in the kitchen cooking or doing dishes (I can't remember) and she's singing and dancing to the oldies station being pumped out by this little black radio in the window with white paint speckles on the bottom right of it's face. I'm enjoying this a lot and I go into the kitchen for some random reason and my mom grabs my hand and pulls me into a spin, and I'm suddenly dancing with her.

 

This is one of my favorite memories. And thinking about it evoked bitter sweet feelings.

 

It stands out in contrast to the much more common experience of my mother which was not fun and not taking joy in my company. I remembered how I resented her in my early teens, and how I judged her to be shallow, avoidant, stupid and a whore for marrying my stepdads who were alcoholic deadbeats who she didn't seem to respect very much, but had some money.

 

I always really liked my younger sister, but my other sisters either bullied me or did other things I didn't like. The teachers I had were generally women who were not very bright and didn't try and earn my respect. And I had a "worldview" about women, that they are all, to varying degrees, like my mother, who was indifferent and inappropriate, or my sister who repeatedly humiliated me. And this presented a huge dilemma for me: I didn't respect women, more than that I often resented womankind, and I desperately wanted affection, and to be loved, and desired.

 

I started to see how this universal judgment about women had affected decisions I had made. On one side I would get a terrifying annihilation panic when approaching girls I liked because girls are dangerous, and on the other side I was overlooking girls' really bad qualities and how disrespectful they were toward me because,... girls are dangerous, and I should not expect much virtue from them, but desperately hope that I could get that affection I wanted so badly, and be desired and loved.

 

I've raised my standards considerably in the past few years and I don't take much shit from people, including women, but this part of me is still alive and kicking. And I had never seen so clearly how these things related until audio journaling about it (and then talking about it with @Joel Patterson).

 

I think that the reason I remembered that event in the kitchen with my mom was because events like that one did a lot to shape my expectations about girls and dating.

 

Questions

I don't know anyone else personally who journals this way. Even people who do mecosystem work tend to do it on paper. Have you tried journaling like this before? Have you tried taking this approach to processing your past by starting with random memories? Are there other targeted approaches to journaling that would be good with this format? Do you journal in some way that isn't handwriting or typing or audio?

 

I'm really curious. I've been experimenting with ways to level up with my work on myself, because the route I perceive as standard doesn't work for me as well as I'd like.

 

Thanks for reading this ridiculously long post, and I'd love to know what you think

[J-William]

I've been audio journaling for quite a while, I originally was dissatisfied with it because audio is a pain in the ass. It can't be easily searched, even if you know what you want and more or less where to find it.

 

I started using dragon naturally speaking a while ago and that really kicked it into overgear. I can just talk to my recorder and let the program process it into text later. The text isn't perfect but it gives a way to search the audio.

 

If I'm sitting in front of my computer I can dictate and be sure the results are accurate. The feel and speed of that is different than just talking, but I find it works well for journaling because I can see what I just said and take some time to think about it.

I've not really tried just journaling with the recorder in a nice comfy spot. I take it with me when I'm taking a walk or riding my bike or going somewhere in the car... It's not the best for journaling since my mind can really wander in that situation.

[GYre0ePJhZ]

Thanks for a good read, Kevin!

 

I was journaling by writing on a computer and by hand for the last 4 years, but I switched to audio journaling a month ago and I really like it.

 

Writing is more frustrating to me because I think I censor myself more, I get stuck up on grammar or sentence structure, and it is not as much fun as talking. I am sure there are many other reasons, but I think audio journaling is more effective and easier to get into because it rests on our genetic disposition to communicate orally. Steven Pinker outlines evolutionary psychological reasons for this is in his recent book, which I have only read some reviews of, but it is supposedly there.

 

Sometimes I play the tape back to myself to investigate how I process and create stories about my past, present and future. I find it uncomfortable to do so at times, but I do get value out of it.Thanks for the tip about Mecosystem/IFS therapy. Will try it out!

[MysterionMuffles]

Awesome thanks for the input. I audio journal too and used to think it was weird. I did it mainly because I once felt I didn't say as much as I knew I could have in social settings so I did it to start feeling comfortable hearing my own voice. This was 4 years ago and now I can't shut up around people lol. I don't do the IFS kind of conversation that much anymore, I just speak freely about what's on my mind letting myself go in different directions. I used to take an hour doing it or more, but I realized it was ineffecient especially when it comes to relistening. I go in too many different detours on my train of thought so I've learned to give it some structure. What I do now is find a specific route to walk around my neighbourhood that would take me 30 mins to circle back to my house, and in at the beginning of those 30 minutes, I decide on 3 things I want to talk about and spend roughly 10 minutes on each thing.This has forced me to be more concise in my thoughts and not go on too many detours and having done this really helps me figure out what I really want to write about in my actual journal. These recordings get deleted as soon as I relisten to them unless I was really on fire and it was worth the re-listen some other time.

 

Re-listening to myself verbalize those scattered thoughts are always interesting, especially when I'm really expressive. It helps me appreciate what others may or may not like listening to when I speak because I notice when I get bored or enthuse by my own speech.

[MysterionMuffles]

Writing is more frustrating to me because I think I censor myself more, I get stuck up on grammar or sentence structure

 

You might find value in my article about letting yourself write freely and the importance of not censoring yourself when journaling. That is if you ever decide to hand write journaling again.

 

 

I'm around 8 years old, it's midday and the sun shining a bright white light into the house, and I'm sitting in the dining room watching my mother in the kitchen cooking or doing dishes (I can't remember) and she's singing and dancing to the oldies station being pumped out by this little black radio in the window with white paint speckles on the bottom right of it's face. I'm enjoying this a lot and I go into the kitchen for some random reason and my mom grabs my hand and pulls me into a spin, and I'm suddenly dancing with her.

 

This is one of my favorite memories. And thinking about it evoked bitter sweet feelings.

 

It stands out in contrast to the much more common experience of my mother which was not fun and not taking joy in my company. I remembered how I resented her in my early teens, and how I judged her to be shallow, avoidant, stupid and a whore for marrying my stepdads who were alcoholic deadbeats who she didn't seem to respect very much, but had some money.

 

I always really liked my younger sister, but my other sisters either bullied me or did other things I didn't like. The teachers I had were generally women who were not very bright and didn't try and earn my respect. And I had a "worldview" about women, that they are all, to varying degrees, like my mother, who was indifferent and inappropriate, or my sister who repeatedly humiliated me. And this presented a huge dilemma for me: I didn't respect women, more than that I often resented womankind, and I desperately wanted affection, and to be loved, and desired.

 

I started to see how this universal judgment about women had affected decisions I had made. On one side I would get a terrifying annihilation panic when approaching girls I liked because girls are dangerous, and on the other side I was overlooking girls' really bad qualities and how disrespectful they were toward me because,... girls are dangerous, and I should not expect much virtue from them, but desperately hope that I could get that affection I wanted so badly, and be desired and loved.

 

I've raised my standards considerably in the past few years and I don't take much shit from people, including women, but this part of me is still alive and kicking. And I had never seen so clearly how these things related until audio journaling about it (and then talking about it with @Joel Patterson).

 

I think that the reason I remembered that event in the kitchen with my mom was because events like that one did a lot to shape my expectations about girls and dating.

 

 

I'm really sorry that your mother and sisters treatment of you twisted your view of women. That's a huge realization to have, wow. Pursuing girls because you simultaneously crave affection with the addition of them being dangerous, that must have been a disorienting and confusing experience when you've gotten into relationships. You want them around, but you don't Sounds like an unresolvable ambivalance. 

 

And the thing about dancing with your mom randomly...it's bittersweet memories like that that soften the anger just a little bit. Like for me, I will always appreciate when my mother and I used to pray together from a prayer book because it's what got me started on reading and it was a great bonding experience before she turned into a tired resentful bitch who threatened to put me on the streets at 7 for not obeying her.

[GYre0ePJhZ]

You might find value in my article about letting yourself write freely and the importance of not censoring yourself when journaling. That is if you ever decide to hand write journaling again.

 

Thanks for the tip! I really like what I have read from your blog and I subbed you

 

Sympathies to both you and Kevin for your experiences with your mothers.Why do you delete the audio recordings after one listen? Do you do the same with your written journals?

[MysterionMuffles]

Thanks

 

I delete them because my phone only holds 5-7 hours of audio and I take it up real quick. And they're so several and long that I don't think I would ever keep them. I do them and delete them as more of a narrowing on what I DO want to write and keep permanent. I don't write in my journal often, but when I do, I have a clearer picture of what I do want to explore in more concise detail than the scatterbrain fashion of me walking and talking for an hour and a half.

 

I've been considering getting an SD card for more space and keeping them but I'm not sure yet.

[GYre0ePJhZ]

Ah, I see. So a question of memory and them being too long to be useful later on. I have been keeping them so far, and thinking about listening at them now 1 month later is an uncomfortable thought. I think I will re-listen to it though because it creates this feeling.

[Three]

 

Hey, Kevin! First off i just wanted to compliment your post. It found it well written, enjoyable to read, and easy to read. Every sentence was focused, concise, yet stuffed with purpose and meaning. I can relate to Daniel Mackler's preference to type. I really enjoy typing because I can look up words to better express what I'm trying to communicate. Also, my hand writing is really sloppy and so, in order to write something which I will be able to go back and read I have to write slowly. Going straight to typing also allows me to copy and paste it on the boards if i find it worth sharing. And while it's true that many of my board posts start as written with a pencil, typing saves me the step of retyping it. I also had a sister who humiliated me. After I read where you mentioned your sister I felt angry. You didn't deserve that. The impact this has had on me was tremendous. Because the abuse was normalized, so many women I've chose to stay around have also teased and humiliated me. Anyway, I just downloaded audacity, so while I iron clothes i'm going to give audio journaling a try.I'm glad to see your gaining momentum in this area! Take care. -Joel

[cherapple]

How interesting that you posted this today, Kevin, and I came across it tonight. You even tagged me. Unfortunately, nothing in the system notifies me.

 

I was just talking to my coach today (I've transitioned from therapist to a coach, in order to do something different) about having thirty journals. I have the intellectual part of self-knowledge down, but I still have work to do in the area of applying it.

 

I have done a small amount of audio journaling, mostly while driving in my car. I think it's time to do more, to hear my voice (as RJ points out) in the moment. I've experienced plenty of my handwritten voice(s) on paper, which can be such an isolated format of self-expression. No one sees my journals except me, but people hear my voice every day, and I'm still uncomfortable speaking it at times. What a better way to increase my comfort with my voice than to use it directly with myself every day, or even when I wake with insomnia in the middle of the night. 

 

The more I think about making this change, the more good reasons I can think of to do it:

• The practice of hand-journaling was begun by the sad part of me that wasn't heard, but that hoped "someday" someone might read my journals and "hear" me, after I'm gone. :-(
• Writing and amassing thirty handwritten journals was a "proof of existence," a need which came from not being allowed to exist — but it was a paper existence.
• Handwritten journals are still somewhat of an isolated existence. No one else reads them. I can write and stay in my head.
• The more I hear myself in spoken voice, the less dependent I become on others to hear my voice.
• The more I hear my voice, the less scared I become to hear myself. (The fear I feel of my own voice really belongs to others.)
• Writing is a physical experience; some call it a flowing, meditative motion. (I don't like typing for long periods — the frozen feeling of my fingers being glued to a keyboard, my eyes staring straight ahead at a screen, into a bright light.) But speaking — that involves even more body presence. I could do it while walking, dancing, lifting weights, between sprints, doing housework, or lying in the dark — many more options than sitting to write.
• The more I hear my voice, the more I gain a literal and physical understanding that "it's opposite land now." I don't have to be quiet anymore. I don't have to hide who I am. There is no danger in speaking. There is no danger in existing — not with myself. 

I've made huge strides in recent years, but I think voice journaling may take me to another level, just when I am ready for it. I'm going to start tonight.

 

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and experiences, Kevin, at a serendipitous time for me. I'd like to hear more about how it goes for you and others, and I'll update with my experiences after I've been at it for a while. 

 

Cheryl

[MysterionMuffles]

Yes, hearing yourself back on an audio journal, you can hear the pure emotion in your voice. It becomes easy to tell what you're really passionate about and not really passionate about. Listening back also gives you the chance to get bored at your own thoughts and see which ones you really do put thought and consideration into voicing. That helps weeding out the excess and finding the flowers in the field of weeds.

I feel like hand writing cuts that excess down a bit. It's more concise because it's impossible for your hand to keep up with your mind, so that's why I think once in a while it's good to REALLY slow down and hand write word for word what you really want to think about, as I may the case in my blog post.

[_Michael]

Thanks for starting this topic Kevin. I searched web for audio journals tips and to get others experience on it. 

 

I use my phone to record my dreams when I wake up in the night. And I write them down on morning. But I find it inefficient, becouse this take too much time. So I search for someting that will help me. I dont know how to get the best of it. I was thinking maybe I need to delete recordings, and let transcriptions stay, so I dont need to think about them both exist. I also thought about writing them down on computer, so I dont need to waste time in the morning to write them down from recordings.

I wonder how you deal with dreams?

 

I find it inspirational to journal for 30 minutes in a row and take 3 topics. I think I would try it out. 

 

Kevin, as to your family experience. 

I am sory you were bullied by your sisters. I know the pain, how annoying and hell it can be. My older brother use to tease and humiliated me alot.  And other siblings treated me as less of a family member, who deserve mocking. I think that this affected me that I have hard time to resist teasing today in many situations, even that I am much older now. 

 

Rainbow Jams. I am sory you experience this with your mother. She dont have right to turn that way. I can relate too. Mine at some point just let go and lost interest in family. And she used to tell me that. That in the past she care about my siblings, but now she dont care anymore. That my father drinking made her that. She use to make them birthday partys and invite friends of my siblings, and she just dont care about me... great mom! She become that woman who just want you to behave and care for her, and I hate her for doing that. She dont have right to do that to me, or rather to not do for me that she did for my siblings. 

[Kurtis]

Thank you so much for this excellent post Kevin.  I'm sorry to hear about your childhood experiences  

 

 

I started to see how this universal judgment about women had affected decisions I had made. On one side I would get a terrifying annihilation panic when approaching girls I liked because girls are dangerous, and on the other side I was overlooking girls' really bad qualities and how disrespectful they were toward me because,... girls are dangerous, and I should not expect much virtue from them, but desperately hope that I could get that affection I wanted so badly, and be desired and loved.

 

 

This resonated so directly to my own experience.  I am curious if your mother's actions (choosing bad men for her comfort at the expense of her children) had as strong a destructive effect on your self worth, as it did for me with my mother?  For me, this added another dimension to dealing with women (in addition to what you described above).  I too have raised my standards greatly in the last year, something to which I attribute greatly to my newly found self worth.

 

However, to stay on topic, I have not tried audio journaling, but you have inspired me to start.  I always struggle with the inability to write fast enough, and often stop writing because I would physically fatigue before running out of thoughts to capture.  I also think that audio journaling will enable me to journal more frequently as it will be more enjoyable to do.

 

After a recent call in to the show I was reminded how uncomfortable I am listening to myself speak.  I think listening back to my journals will help me work through this as well become a better speaker.  

 

Thanks again!

[Kevin Beal]

This resonated so directly to my own experience.  I am curious if your mother's actions (choosing bad men for her comfort at the expense of her children) had as strong a destructive effect on your self worth, as it did for me with my mother?  For me, this added another dimension to dealing with women (in addition to what you described above).  I too have raised my standards greatly in the last year, something to which I attribute greatly to my newly found self worth.

I had never considered it. I'm very curious in what way your mother making terrible romantic decisions affected your self worth, if you felt like sharing.

 

I don't mind if we drift from the main topic, being that it's been a year since posting it.

 

Having been surrounded with failed and failing relationships growing up, without any examples of healthy romantic relationships, it did make me think that this is what it means to be in love, and made me have relatively low expectations from women.

 

I'm not sure if it was my tempered expectations or my (historically) low self esteem, but I thought that whatever women/girls wanted was what goes; not something to be challenged. "Who am I to disagree?" <- old me

 

Also, you have giant balls for calling in. I don't know what call you took part in, but that takes courage. So, on behalf of the part of you that worked up the courage to call in, you damn well better not minimize it!

 

Thanks for reading, sharing your thoughts, and your kind words.

 

I wonder how you deal with dreams?

I'm very sorry that you were humiliated like that, especially by family.

 

I don't do a whole lot of dream analysis, actually. I do make sure that however I record them, I do it as quickly as possible because the more details I can remember, the better I can make associations, and make sense of what the symbols mean.

 

I recorded a video where I talk about a nightmare I attempted to analyze, here. If you're interested.

[Kurtis]

I had never considered it. I'm very curious in what way your mother making terrible romantic decisions affected your self worth, if you felt like sharing.

 

 

The causes that resulted in me having poor self worth possibly came from multiple actions/qualities of my mother.  Having identified all these potential causes has led to me healing this issue within myself, but I am not certain as to how much each one may have contributed. At this point I feel that it was a combination of things.

 

In response to your question, it was my mother's decision to bring my step dad into my life.  He was very abusive to me, but not to her.  This went on for nearly 10 years until I left, and she never did a single thing to protect me. I see this now as that she was getting what she wanted (not having to work and more babies) at my expense.  I feel that this was a big contributor to my lack of self worth that I experienced from my childhood.

 

However, there must be other reasons too, as I am currently trying to help one of my little sisters find her way to her own self worth and she was not abused by this man (her father) nor was she abandoned from an early age as my mother was a stay at home parent for her.  I know that my mother has not dealt with any of her childhood traumas, and has built massive walls of denial to avoid dealing with her own fears and insecurities.  So perhaps the answer is as simple as that a parents lack of self worth is transmitted directly to the children (through modelling).

 

I am starting to formulate a post that will be about this topic of self worth, specifically in looking into the effects on children who have parents that use them as "givers of happiness".  

 

Hope that answers your curiosity, feel free to ask away if there's something more.  

 

And thank you for your kind words and encouragement.     

My call was from the Wednesday show last week, second call about the connection between boundaries and fear.

[MysterionMuffles]

here's an awesome article outlining why we're geniuses or can become geniuses from audio journaling:

 

http://elitedaily.com/life/culture/people-talk-to-themselves/1105688/

 

It has more to do with talking to yourself out loud as opposed to audio journaling in particular, but this is helpful nonetheless.