Today we’d like to introduce you to Paula Puffer
Hi Paula, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
I’ve always been interested in writing and photography since I was young. After my mom passed away in 2010, I started to explore with more kinds of creativity – art journaling, different photography techniques, bullet journaling, and collage. Writing and photography were my core activities for sure, but I worked with other mediums as well.
When Covid happened, I was taking an online business class. I was looking to share my personal activities. I originally wanted to take some of my photographs and make puzzles out of them but that prohibitively expensive. I then found that one of the companies I looked had a card making division and I created a Affirmation and Journaling Deck that people could use as prompts for their personal journals. This is was the genesis for creating my site juicyjournaling.com.
The next deck I created was a Money Stories deck so that people could the stories they had around their financials. As someone who came from family where financials weren’t discussed when I was growing, the work of this deck meant a lot to me and really changed my personal stories around money.
Since then I’ve added stickers to my store as well. Now, I am working on adding monthly journals as well as workshops and online classes.
I believe that journaling has the potential to change your stories, your beliefs, and your trajectory. I’ve added stickers to my store. And small monthly journals just went live on my site.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Not all journeys are smooth. I believe they meander a lot and your journey can have a lot of stops along the way.
In 2022, I learned that a dear friend, mentor, and colleague, Dr. David Gradwohl, had passed away suddenly from heart attack at the age of 88. The last time I had seen him was in 2019 and we spent time talking about our experiences in Morocco and what we had been up to since the last time we had seen each other. David always had a joie de vivre that made him larger life. His death hit me harder than some of the other passings in my life. At the time, I also was struggling with some hip issues. The combination of these two things, made me realize that I had to take better care of myself. I began getting chiropractic treatment which immediately helped reduce the physical pain. And eventually I started therapy to deal with the emotional issues that needed to be addressed. I wanted to live a better life.
I think another big turning point were changes in my professional life (I work in Oil and Gas) and I realized I needed to identify as more than just my job. I used my journaling to explore what was important to me. I also used other techniques like mind mapping to see patterns between the generations of my family in terms of relationships and financials. I feel like between changes personal habits and discussion with my therapist, I’ve made some great progress towards not repeating generational issues.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
By day I am data analyst and technical trainer in the Oil and Gas industry. I’m trained as a technical writer. Over the years, I’ve gained other technical and knowledge about natural gas pipelines, writing software requirements, and databases. For my work in Oil and Gas, I’m most proud of the work I do to help my internal and external technicians to get their compliance documents into the system. My technicians know that if they call, if I don’t know the answer, I will find out who does and let them know.
By night (and on the weekend) I use my mad set of graphic design, web design, photography, and writing skills to do a variety of personal projects. I manage the social media and web site for my brother’s farm in Iowa (https://pufferroskefarms.com), I am currently finishing the redesign of juicyjournaling.com so I can do online workshops and offer classes through the web site. I’m also working on several series of monthly journals based around topics that helped me gain more insight into my life as well as helped me to make needed changes. I believe in the power of positive thinking. I also look at the opportunities I have in front of me to change my life. My friends and family respect the technical knowledge I have and my research skills. They respect and encourage my creative skills as well.
If you had to, what characteristic of yours would you give the most credit to?
Being willing to admit I don’t know it all. I am willing to learn as well and I’m not afraid to ask for feedback on a project or piece of writing. When I created the Affirmation Deck and the Money Stories deck, I went through 4 or 5 development rounds before I had a product I was happy with.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://juicyjournaling.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/juicyjournaling
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/juicyjournaling
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@juicyjournaling
Image Credits
Paula Puffer
