Tonia Misvaer of Erin Condren: How Journaling Helped Me Be More Calm, Mindful And Resilient
An Interview With Heidi Sander
Journal to remind yourself of what you’ve overcome.
It’s so easy, especially for women, to forget how resilient we truly are. Journaling about your experiences and lessons learned can help remind you of how far you’ve come, how much you’ve accomplished, and how capable you are of conquering any current challenges.
Journaling is a powerful tool to gain clarity and insight especially during challenging times of loss and uncertainty. Writing can cultivate a deeper connection with yourself and provide an outlet for calmness, resilience and mindfulness. When my mom passed on, I found writing to be cathartic. When I read through my journal years later, there were thoughts that I developed into poems, and others that simply provided a deeper insight into myself. In this series I’m speaking with people who use journaling to become more mindful and resilient.
As a part of this series I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Tonia Misvaer.
Tonia Misvaer is the CEO of Erin Condren, a lifestyle brand and leader in the organization space. Prior to her role as CEO, she served as Chief of Product and Brand Strategy. Tonia is passionate about paper and has spent the last two decades pioneering products for the stationery industry.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! We really appreciate the courage it takes to publicly share your story of healing. Before we start, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your background and your childhood backstory?
I grew up on a farm in a very rural part of Minnesota with my five siblings and parents. While I was never cut out for farm life (I still can’t drive a stick shift!), I did enjoy the idyllic setting it provided for my childhood; summers preparing for the county fair with my 4-H Club, card games on a snowed-in school day, canning with my mom and sisters in the fall. However, I found myself drawn to the city, from Boston to New York to the Bay Area, where I now live with my daughter, husband, parrot and pooch.
After practicing law for a few years, I quickly realized I didn’t really enjoy being an attorney and what I really wanted to do was create. I have been a stationery lover all of my life; so, I took a leap of faith and left practicing law to start my career in product development and brand strategy.
I’ve spent nearly two decades making amazing products with fantastic brands. I’m now the CEO of Erin Condren and get to create truly beautiful and functional stationery and organizing products that help others reduce stress, reach their goals, and live joyful, fulfilling lives through organization.
Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion about journaling. Have you been writing in your journal for a long time or was there a challenging situation that prompted you to start journal writing? If you feel comfortable sharing the situation with us, it could help other readers.
Maybe it was being a part of such a large family or because of my Taurus traits, I am a perennial people-pleaser. That, coupled with my tendency to be a hyper-competitive overachiever, left me anxious and burnt out. I realized I spent so much of my day making sure everyone else around me was happy that I rarely took a moment to find clarity and focus on the things I really wanted. I knew I wanted to change that but felt stuck.
That’s why I started journaling 15 years ago. I had to unplug and drown out the noise so I could focus on what I wanted to achieve. Journaling — raw, unrefined, simple, and not-at-all-pretty journaling — was my way to force myself to do just that. It worked, and I’ve been journaling ever since.
How did journaling help you heal, mentally, emotionally and spiritually?
Journaling gave me the permission to let go of things to which I didn’t even realize I was holding on; things that were holding me back. When I first started journaling, those things were almost always stress and anxiety. The physical act of transferring my thoughts, worries, feelings onto paper was (and is) such a powerful release. It not only offered insight into what was causing the stress and anxiety, but it also gave me power over it. On paper, my problems revealed their own solutions. Talk about empowering (and stress-reducing)!
Did journaling help you find more self-compassion and gratitude? Can you share a story about that?
I’ve always considered myself to be a fairly self-aware person, but journaling allows me to stay in touch with my inner observer (that calm, compassionate, quiet part of myself that keeps me centered). While it may sound a bit esoteric, this simple practice naturally leads to more self-compassion and gratitude. Introspective journaling is one of those fundamental tools that can be life changing.
What kind of content goes into your journal? For example, do you free-write, write poems, doodle?
I have three journals: I said I was an overachiever!
1. A one-line-a-day morning journal: This is where I declare my intentions for the day. In one line, I write how I want to feel, what I want to accomplish, etc. One of my business mentors almost always ends each of our calls by saying, “Make it a great day.” That is precisely what my morning journal allows me to do.
2. A bed-time journal: Before I go to bed, I do a free-form brain dump of everything taking up space in my head. It’s usually a bulleted list of things I’m excited about, worried about or just things I need to get done. I use this journal as a guide when planning out my day or week.
3. A journal for my daughter: I started this journal in the form of a letter to her when she was a few months old and have written in it every month since; she’s five now. In it I journal about what’s going on in her life, what’s going on in the world (like the pandemic), memories we’ve made together that I never want to forget and so on. As much as this journal is a gift to her, it is a gift to me. It gives me the space and excuse to stop and reflect on how amazing life is with her in it. Now that I think about it, it’s another form of practicing gratitude.
Whether you have one journal or you’re a bit extra like me and have three, don’t make it a big deal. That’s my one rule … just write (remember, it doesn’t have to be pretty) and stick with it.
How did you gain a different perspective on life and your emotions while writing in your journal? Can you please share a story about what you mean?
My journaling is a tool for self-reflection and self-improvement. I am a firm believer that one of the best ways to change the world is to start with yourself.
The journal to my daughter has especially shifted my perspective of what’s truly important. It’s too easy as a parent to get mired in the mundane and let your focus get stuck in a loop of day-to-day demands. Taking a moment every month to write in my daughter’s journal gives me the space and permission to reflect on what really matters.
In my own journal writing, I ended up creating poems from some of the ideas and one of them won an award. Do you have plans with your journal content?
I use my journal content daily, but only for myself (I’m pretty sure my nightly brain dump wouldn’t win an award)! Consistent journaling, particularly mining my own mind before bedtime, helps guide my plans for the next day. And when things don’t go as planned, I feel better prepared to pivot and push on.
Fantastic. Here is our main question. In my journaling program, I have found that journaling can help people to become more calm, mindful and resilient. Based on your experience and research, can you please share with our readers “five ways that journaling can help you to be more calm, mindful and resilient”?
- Journal to improve mindfulness.
If you journal like nobody’s ever going to read it, you can stay present and be totally honest with yourself. I am not a writer (words don’t flow easily for me); so, I don’t approach journaling like a writer. If I did, I’d still be stuck on my first few entries. Instead, I use it as a tool, a sort of meditation, and just write. Nothing grand, nothing polished, I just reflect and record. Simple journaling is a relaxing way to increase mindfulness.
2. Keep a work journal to stay focused and increase productivity.
I’m a believer in setting aside time to journal at work. (Since I already have three journals, I tend to write my work content in the note pages of my Focused Planner.) In your work journal, you can set your intentions and goals for the day or week, jot down ideas and lessons learned that you don’t want to forget, even work out problem-solving on paper before presenting it to your team. Whatever your work journal looks like, it’s an easy and effective way to unplug, reflect, and refocus whenever you need it. Keeping a work journal is also a great way to stay centered (and sane) amid a flurry of meetings, projects, and deadlines.
3. Journal to jumpstart clarity and creativity.
From Einstein to da Vinci, Frederick Douglass to Marie Curie, there are plenty of world-changing innovators that kept a journal, and for good reason. There’s something about writing down your thoughts, feelings, experiences, ideas on paper that helps you discover and develop your creativity and critical thinking (often drowned out by endless distractions).
4. Journal before bed to reduce stress and improve sleep.
If you’ve ever tried to sleep while anxious thoughts race through your head, then you know what an exercise in futility that can be. Personally, downloading my thoughts onto paper at the end of the day frees up my mind to let go and unwind, leading to a much better night’s rest.
5. Journal to remind yourself of what you’ve overcome.
It’s so easy, especially for women, to forget how resilient we truly are. Journaling about your experiences and lessons learned can help remind you of how far you’ve come, how much you’ve accomplished, and how capable you are of conquering any current challenges.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of peace to the greatest amount of people, what would that be?
I would inspire others to write one line to one person a week expressing gratitude for something they’ve done. Kindness is infectious, and we could use a whole lot more of it in the world.
We are very blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them. :-)
Honestly … if I could spend a breakfast with anyone, it would be my mom and dad. They still live on our farm in Minnesota; and while I do have the privilege of seeing them more often than many people who live apart from their families, some of my most treasured moments were spent sitting with them at our breakfast table. (And if Jane Goodall and Brené Brown could join us, it would be a breakfast to journal about!)
How can our readers further follow your work online?
Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued fulfilment and success with your writing!
