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Written on September 30th, sinking deeper into the couch by the minute, typing like a gremlin, knowing "this too shall pass."

Hi Global Minds

First off, an important announcement.

After five transformative years running JoClub, my journaling community, I've made the almost impossible decision to sunset our membership program as we know in 2026.

Many people have asked why.

After all, this company has changed thousands of lives including mine through writing and reflection.

We've traveled the world on retreats, we’ve collectively written endless pages answering deep prompts, we’ve gotten dream jobs, quit bad gigs, gotten out of toxic relationships, found our people, reclaimed our childlike joy, and journaling session after journaling session, we reminded ourselves that to thrive is to do the important things.

Especially when it means that we need to do it scared.

In these five years of a grand experiment, I not only saw how hungry we all were for connection, but saw first-hand that journaling with a group of strangers had mystical healing powers.

Our members call this phenomenon "JoClub Magic."

But as I reflected on why JoClub was born back in 2020, I realized something important:

JoClub was never meant to be permanent.

It was meant to be meaningful.

As we grew, we needed more resources to meet members' needs, I saw that scaling bigger would mean losing the magic that makes it special.

So instead of diluting what we've built, we're honoring it by giving it a beautiful, intentional ending.

Because the opportunity cost of holding onto something you know has reached its end is often more damaging than letting it go.

If you've been waiting to experience the JoClub magic, this is your invitation to join us for this final chapter.

As a Jo's Journal subscriber, you get 25% off your quarter of journaling with the world to wrap up 2025 with clarity and community when you use this link.

In 24 hours, the doors for the quarterly membership will close… not to sound dramatic... but forever.

We'll be journaling together until 2026, creating the best season finale of this particular story.

And then, well, we'll have to script the next brilliant chapter together.

Thank you for being here.

Now, onto today’s Jo’s Journal.

I'm in a state of endings.

Last week, I submitted my final Master's project that I worked on for three years.

After five years of consistently building, I've decided to close the JoClub membership.

And most profoundly, my grandfather, my Vô, passed away, ending an era that rooted me to Brazil in ways I'm only now beginning to understand.

It's a lot of goodbyes all at once.

Vô lived until 92, but he was such a bull of a man that I never imagined my world without him in it.

How could I?

He was my compass, my living proof that impossible dreams aren't actually impossible.

Growing up poor in Brazil, he dreamt of traveling the world by collecting soap wrappers.

Yes, soap wrappers.

​Each one had facts about countries in faraway places, little rectangular paper portals to worlds he couldn't access.

He collected enough of them to create a makeshift map of the globe he'd someday sail.

And sail he did.

As a broke kid of a Portuguese immigrant, he showed up at the docks of Rio asking for work.

Any work.

He started as a ship cleaner, scrubbing the floors and studying at night, eventually becoming a highly decorated Marine and pharmacist on board.

From soap wrappers to actual oceans.

From dreaming to doing more than he could ever imagine.

A few years ago, I sat in the kitchen with him and a scratch off map to scratch all the places we’d collectively been around the world.

The man circled the globe in dizzying fervor in his decades as a Marine.

Together, we had most of Europe, South America, Africa, and North America polished off.

He told me the rest of the map was now my responsibility.

Travel and the possibility of achieving the impossible bonded me to him.

The last time I saw him in April, feeling as though it’d be my last long conversation with him, I acknowledged that my inheritance from he and Vó, grandma, is far greater than anything physical, it’s their builder’s mindset that I infuse into everything I do.

He stopped and absorbed my confession with care.

In many ways, him and my grandmother struggled their way to a better situation for their kids, and grandkids.

Then my mom moved us to the States to do the same for us.

And now I'm in Belgium, continuing this intergenerational relay race of sacrifice and possibility.

What people rarely admit is how painful it can feel in the midst of the build.

It's hard to wake up and do what needs to be done when you're in visa limbo, stuck somewhere, mourning losses, facing failed launches, and making videos that can't seem to find their groove.

But when I think about my grandparents' drive to give us more opportunity, I know they must have had terribly difficult days too.

Yet all I saw were the fruits of their labors.

Now I'm the one hunched over, diligently gardening for the next iteration of the family.

And while it’s unglamorous down in the dirt, something tells me the next harvest will be ripe with beauty.

I just can't see it yet.

And that's the thing about necessary endings or loss, they create space for beginnings we can't yet imagine.

If you lose friends, opportunities, money, it's the universe forcing you to stretch the limits of your creativity and find another way to survive and eventually thrive.

To collect soap wrappers until you have enough to make a map of where you're going.

I don't know exactly what's on the horizon for me, for JoClub, for any of us.

So I'm collecting my own version of soap wrappers now.

Little pieces of joy.

Trusting that they'll eventually form a map worth following.

So now you tell me, what endings are you facing? What space might they be creating for something new?

With gratitude for this chapter we're in together,
Jo

P.S. If you want to be part of JoClub's final chapter, don't miss this last enrollment, we'll make it count.

It's bittersweet to close these doors, but I'm excited to journey with those who join us until 2026.

Other goodies to make this week above average:

💼 If you're in career limbo like me, I put together this 21 day Career & Calling challenge that I'm about to take now. It's got 21 pre-recorded video prompts, a prompt pack, and exercises to help you map out where your joy might be leading you. Check out the challenge here.​

🧠 Language tip of the month, I've been rusty with my languages and decided to assign certain mediums to certain languages for the month. So for instance, I read in Dutch, watch shows in French, and follow creators in Portuguese. Try it out and let me know what happens! If you need more language learning ideas, check out this language challenge.​

🎞️ If you want to watch my Master's final project, I finally stopped procrastinating, and finished the pilot of my travel show, Translated, to 90% completion. The last 10% is only possible with your help. I'm collecting feedback, I need 20 more submissions before I can re-edit the pilot with all the feedback necessary. Watch it here (passphrase: jopilot) and let me know what you think here.​

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Need more time to align with your goals and strategize how to grow your big ideas? Learn more about JoClub.​

Catch you on socials 🏄🏾‍♀️ ​​​​​​

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