Rambles and Doodles Melinda Barbosa

In this minisode, Melinda rambles through her own ritual of journal selection, how she picks her colors, and the reason she treats her journals like a piece of art and an extension of herself.

With three quick (ish) tips, Melinda reminds us that building a habit and making meaning of our own actions allows us to create a full bodied experience when we are reflecting. 

Happy Journaling!

Melinda’s Favorites for Journaling:

The splurge: Top Drawer Ring Notebook Plain Paper

The I am writing so much that I need good, cheap journals: Muji Recycled Paper

The classic and easy to find: Moleskine Cahier Journals 3 Pack

Download this printable at no cost to get started with creating your own journaling ritual!


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Melinda opens with a story of losing her luggage on an impromptu trip to Montgomery, Alabama to see the Legacy Museum from Enslavement to Mass Incarceration.  Melinda describes the experience of visiting the museum (she suggests taking multiple days to slowly engage with the concept) and what that brought up for her about borderlands. She connects the impact of enslavement to her ancestors in Cape Verde and what that means as a white passing person.

She discusses the intentional creation of hierarchy in Cape Verde.  She names that she sits at the intersection of oppressed and oppressors. Melinda then shares where she got the concept of borderlands - from a poem “To Live in the Borderlands” by Gloria Anzaldua. Melinda explores this idea of mixed identity and what it means to sit on the borders, rather than pick a side. Liberation exists on the borderlands.

Melinda returns to the history of Cape Verde and how the intentional creation of hierarchy including a mixed race impacts culture and identity.  She asks how borders can be apart of our liberation and our understanding of how oppression is designed.

Melinda connects back to her physical appearance as a place of respite and a battle ground for race and gender.


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Recorded the day after the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, Melinda tells the story of the person who taught her how to breathe and returns to her breath to face the full truth of who we are as a society, and the courage it will take for us to face the violence and lack of care we give to human life. 

Melinda invites us to welcome our sadness as a teacher and a reminder that when horrific incidents happen, we have to be weary of how much we compartmentalize our lives, and the way it may be desensitizing us from the atrocities we are experiencing everyday. 

Doodle: Set a timer and free write following the prompt: I am sad today because...

Visit Rambles and Doodles for more information.


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Melinda tells a story of grief in her family and the deep healing it brings. She then defines trauma and names its impact on bodies and brains. Trauma gets us stuck, in our brains, bodies, relationships, and development. She connects this expectation of resilience and white knuckling to young people’s state of being now, in this time of ongoing trauma. Melinda explores her own “high pain tolerance” as a disconnection from the body, borne of physical abuse and fatness, and how the power of her brain is praised. She shares her practice noticing tension, even in moments of safeness. Melinda asks what is beyond relaxation and questions the cost of dissociation. She talks about her recent experience of returning to an amusement park, but this time for her first FULL experience. Bravery sometimes means the body did it, but the brain did not. Melinda explores healing as the ability to feel joy wholeheartedly.



The Doodle: Go on a play date with yourself. Do something fun and enjoyable where you have to use your body the best of your ability. Before the play date, write down the physical sensations you can feel. Do a full body scan of yourself. Noting everything as if you were a doctor.  Then after your play date, write how your body feels.

Play date ideas:


Go to a live performance of music, even if it’s not a genre you love (keep yourself safe). Dance and hum as you can.
Workout if that is something you find enjoyable. 
Make some art. Get your favorite art materials, a blank piece of paper, set a timer and make something for 20 minutes.
Go to a playground and swing on the swings. Go down the slide if you are physically able to.
What did you love doing as a child/young person? Return to that activity even if you know you’re not nearly as good at it now than you were as a child. 


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Melinda opens season two with a breath. She then introduces this week’s topic of healing - of healing intergenerational trauma. She tells a story going back generations of family, connection, and trauma.  Melinda considers what has been passed down in her family and how we think about what we want to keep or what we want leave behind. Melinda asks us to think about healing in a world where trauma is  something that happens to us and a result of oppressive systems.

Melinda’s mother was a breaker of patterns - changing how relationships are defined and the expectations of holding everyone’s humanity. Melinda names how even people perpetuating harm can still be breaking cycles. Melinda asks where are we be called to heal ourselves.

Next Melinda talks about what healing actually is and how liberation feels clearer. She expands our definition of healing to include how we related to and hold other people. Melinda was invited into a space to be a healer and shares how this experience helped her further understand what people expect from healing and what it actually is. She is curious about how healing is loving others and yourself fully.

Melinda invites us to think about healing as really about being in relationship and journaling as something beyond self discovery. More to come on relationships and journaling this season!

Doodle: what is one thing you wish you could tell your child self about what was happening around you?


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Episode Summary:  This is Rambles & Doodles, the research and development podcast about reflection, journaling, and self discovery. Melinda is back with Season 2 and ready for many more rambles and new journal prompts. 
Journal Prompt: Write a love letter to yourself. Start with writing to your body, then to your mind, and then to your heart. 

Follow @melinda.barbosa  on Instagram for more prompts, updates and more! Created, Hosted and Edited: by Melinda Barbosa Produced by: Marlees West(IG @_marlees)


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