Cindy MacMillan: (00:00)
This is Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast episode 17. I’m Cindy MacMillan and today’s guest is Lynn Principe Golden.

Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for women with a big heart on a spiritual journey. Each week, join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well. 

Cindy MacMillan: (00:00)
Welcome back to Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast. Thank you for listening and get ready...it's time to hear some words of wisdom from today's guest.

Cindy MacMillan: (00:00)
Lynn Principe Golden is an End of Life Doula, Hospice volunteer and Life-Cycle Celebrant. She is the owner of Dearly Beloved Life LLC and is passionate about rites of passage, and believes that like birth, death should be held as a sacred event. She is certified through the Conscious Dying Institute where she is currently working towards being a Conscious Dying Educator. She lives in Dunedin, Florida with her 2 teenagers.

Lynn Principe Golden: (01:23)
Thank you so much, Cindy. I'm very excited to be here.

Cindy MacMillan: (01:27)
This is a really interesting subject to me, so yes, I'm excited to have you here, but I do want to start off with my signature question and that is what does exploring the seasons of life mean to you personally or in your business?

Lynn Principe Golden: (01:43)
That's a great question, where I stand now, I'm entering a new phase in my life and I'm nearing 50. I'm newly divorced, and I have children that are mostly grown. And what I realized is I'm becoming more clear about who I am and what matters most to me. And what I know is that I no longer have an end game. I don't have a place where I feel like, you know, when I think as young women, when we're in our twenties, we think, well, by 30, I want to be married or we have all of these to-do lists and I feel free because I no longer have those. So I'm in this space where I'm becoming more present and I'm living a life for myself rather than the one that I perceived was meant for me. So that's been very freeing. And as far as being an end of life doula exploring the seasons of life is really vital to our work.

Lynn Principe Golden: (02:31)
And I feel strongly that our dying is a rite of passage. Like you said, like birth, and it's a sacred event. It's a time to ask yourself different questions like what's given my life meaning or who do I need to forgive in order to feel more at peace? How do I want to be remembered? And these are conversations that are important to have simply because we're not guaranteed to live a long life into old age. So it's a great question. And believe me, I am a lot of fun to have at dinner parties because I love to get deep into these, these questions that you're asking.

Cindy MacMillan: (03:04)
That was a beautiful way of explaining the seasons. So thank you. And I really do want to hear about your journey of becoming an end of life doula. But first, can you just tell us what is an end of life doula?

Lynn Principe Golden: (03:18)
I would love to, it's not a simple answer because it does encompass a few things. So an end of life doula provides non-medical support and comfort to a dying person and their families; so much like a birth doula provides at the time leading up to birth and during the birth process. We advocate for the needs and wishes of our dying patients. An end of life doula provides education and guidance as well as spiritual, emotional and practical care from as early as initial terminal diagnosis through bereavement. So within the diagnosis through bereavement, there are many steps that we'll walk alongside you with. And the three main aspects of the doulas role are before death planning, bedside vigil and after death care. And the planning phase I'll work with my clients to identify their vision for what they want their last months, weeks, and days to be like we take into account their current reality.

Lynn Principe Golden: (04:15)
And then together we create action steps. So that practical, emotional, spiritual, physical, and mental directives are in place. So it's not just the advanced directives that we're used to, you know, going to the lawyer and who gets what; it goes a lot deeper than that. And the second aspect of my work, and to me, the most sacred part is sitting bedside during active and imminent death. This can be done alongside family members and friends, or to give them a rest. And these visits can include prayerful companionship, touch, the easing of breath, relaxation, forgiveness. And lastly, an end of life doula can help with after-death body care and rituals according to their care plan and their values, many wish to die at home. And all over the country, people are starting to change that conversation and become more interested in green burials, home funerals, and a lot of alternatives out there, and we can help provide information and support so that those things are possible.

Cindy MacMillan: (05:14)
Thank you, Lynn, when you were talking about talking with your clients about the last few months of their life, you're not necessarily talking about what their ideas for a funeral per se, but it's really about what those last few months are going to look like in terms of that holistic look. Right?

Lynn Principe Golden: (05:34)
Exactly. And that can include the funeral planning and that's something that I'm also a Life-Cycle Celebrant, so I can have those conversations, but that may, under the realm of the spiritual, that may be something that they want to make sure it's included. Maybe there are certain prayers or songs that are really meaningful to them. And those are the times we'd have those conversations. And that way the people that need to know the information we'll have that before the time comes.

Cindy MacMillan: (06:01)
Yeah, I was going to ask you a little bit later, but maybe right now is a good time. I had read, a survey, that said that 92% of Americans say it's important to discuss their wishes for end of life care. And only 32% have had that conversation. So how do you start that conversation? And I'm assuming you start that conversation, not necessarily with the client, but their family, or would it be with a client?

Lynn Principe Golden: (06:30)
Well that's actually a really hard question. I want to back up a little bit. I think that we live in a death-denying culture and I hear people say things like if I die one day, rather than when I die. and part of the issue is, Stephen Jenkinson wrote a book called Die Wise, which I love, he talks about death as being treated as a failure of medicine rather than of a sacred rite of passage. And so we've turned over, what's been innate in all of us and knowing how to care for our dying and respecting the cycle of life. We've turned it over to science. And so the medical model is greatly built to treat and save and cure, which is wonderful. And they do amazing things. But sometimes at the expense of providing curative treatments that can greatly decrease a patient's quality of life and the time that they have left.

Lynn Principe Golden: (07:19)
And so back to your question, it should be happening more often in the medical training that doctors and nurses receive. That's first of all, another piece of this is examining our language around illness. You know, often we refer to people who have a terminal illness and are being treated, especially with cancer patients, we use the words fighting. So these patients are fighting cancer as if only the brave and the best fighters can win. So we set them up to either succeed or fail. I mean, you know, that cancer does not fight fair. And so we put judgment on someone who's dying and expecting them to fight harder or not give up. When we set them up, we feel, they feel they've disappointed us somehow, if they lose the battle, quote, unquote, Stephen Jenkinson also talks about the idea that at the end of life, people are willing to do a lot of treatment that may be harmful because they want "More Time".

Lynn Principe Golden: (08:13)
And he uses the words that are "More Time is now". And I think about that a lot, you know, he asks the question, what are you going to do with your More Time? And so back to what you asked me, I think that those conversations can start really simply you can be asking, you know, where would you like to be buried? Or who do you want there at your bedside? Or where, where do you see yourself dying are simple questions that can start the conversation. And another thing that I think is really important, especially if we have elders that are still in our lives is to ask them a lot of questions, have them tell and retell their stories, ask them what do they regret? And what's given their life meaning so that we do have those deeper conversations and the doors opened. So they feel like the conversations are possible.

Cindy MacMillan: (09:02)
Thank you for going through that I really and truly feel those conversations are needed. Maybe even before we get to the end of our lives.

Lynn Principe Golden: (09:13)
I think we should talk about them with our children. Yes.

Cindy MacMillan: (09:18)
Can you share your story on how you became an end of life doula?

Lynn Principe Golden: (09:23)
I'd be glad to, it's a winding road, as most of our stories are. So I come from a large close-knit family and I grew up in the Maryland DC area. And to us family was everything. Our gatherings were large and multi-generational often including great aunts and uncles, cousins, all of our grandparents. So it wasn't until, so it wasn't unusual, I should say that when I moved to Florida 16 years ago, I had a great aunt and uncle that lived here. I moved here with my then-husband and my two young children. My Aunt Mary and Uncle Frank never had children so I started visiting with them. They lived in a condo in St. Pete; it was a tidy and perfectly preserved 1960s condo. Mary, she was a sweet Italian woman, she doted on my children, filled them with sweets.

Lynn Principe Golden: (10:16)
And then there was her husband, Uncle Frank, and he barely concealed his irritation with my rambunctious children. And they had been married for many years and I can say that Mary was truly a Saint. Mary's health began to fade she was admitted to a hospital, then rehab center. I started visiting more often with the purpose of reporting back to my family up North, about how she was doing. And we became really close in those last weeks. It was really the first time I'd been close to the dying process and she let me in and she let me accompany her on that path. She shared with me the mysteries that she was experiencing, the relief of never having to cook for Frank again, the pain that she was experiencing. And it was a really beautiful and profound experience to be there with her.

Lynn Principe Golden: (11:09)
I was inspired to become a hospice volunteer and a Reiki practitioner. And after Aunt Mary died, I inherited Uncle Frank. So, sharing all of the stories and challenges of being the caretaker to my Uncle Frank would be a whole nother podcast.

Cindy MacMillan: (11:24)
Okay. We'll have you back for that.

Lynn Principe Golden: (11:27)
Some good stories for sure. I will give you my short version. I cared for him for the next seven years until his death at the age of 94. And he was an intense and complicated man. He was sharp-minded, sharp-tongued, and he demanded that he make his own decisions. At one point, I had convinced him to move into assisted living because he had fallen a few times. He hated every minute of it and he said to me the words, I'll never forget, Lynn, I'm being treated like a potted plant.

Cindy MacMillan: (12:02)
Hmm.

Lynn Principe Golden: (12:04)
So caring for him, it asked a lot of me, but he taught me what dying with dignity meant. He loved me deeply, which I know then, and I know now, and I credit him for showing me what I'm capable of doing. That I'm capable of doing hard things. And he often said to me, Lynn, you've got grit kid. And ultimately this work found me. I believe I had the opportunity to plan a few funerals for family members and was deeply interested in the power of words and rituals. And a few years after Frank's death, I came across the work of Alua Arthur. She's an end of life doula. And I remember thinking, is this really a thing? It was like I made it up. It was so perfect. And I found the Conscious Dying Institute out of Boulder, Colorado. And I became a Certified End of Life Doula. I founded Dearly Beloved Life and became a Life-Cycle Celebrant.

Cindy MacMillan: (12:58)
Your words of what you said, he said to you I'm being treated like a potted plant. That's that went right to my, to my heart. Yeah.

Lynn Principe Golden: (13:08)
Yes. I mean, if you've ever been into nursing homes and assisted living facilities, you understand what I mean?

Cindy MacMillan: (13:15)
You mentioned being a hospice volunteer. What is the difference between an end of life doula and a hospice volunteer? And I know that you can really just speak to this from your experience, but could you talk about that?

Lynn Principe Golden: (13:27)
I love that. Yes, absolutely. So, I'm a hospice volunteer. I started about 13 years ago. I'm what you call a transitions volunteer and transitions are volunteers that come in at the very end of life as they're transitioning into, into the dying process. And sometimes they have only days or hours left to live and oftentimes they are alone or their family's not in town. So when I come into the space as a hospice volunteer, I don't know anything about them. I may know just their name, their diagnosis, and their age. I sit with them for two hours at a time. And I try to make those two hours as calming and meaningful as I can. I'll often read to them or play music. And again, I don't know anything about them. Sometimes I can get some clues as to what I see hanging in their rooms.

Lynn Principe Golden: (14:20)
Maybe if there's a crucifix, I'll pray or I'll play certain music that I think they may like. And I feel like we provide a very needed service as hospice volunteers. And I've learned so much during those visits, but what I feel like I can, what I can offer as an end of life doula, it goes a bit deeper. I want to give you an example of a doula patient I had recently, he was a 44-year-old man. He was dying of a brain tumor. His wife contacted me and she had never heard of what an end of life doula was but what she felt was missing from his hospice care was the emotional and spiritual support that they both needed during his dying process. So the first visit, when I went to see him, I talked to her for a long time about who he was and what mattered to him.

Lynn Principe Golden: (15:06)
We played music that he loved. I read to him his favorite stories. We saged the room. We lit candles. And I got to know who he was and what mattered to them. And then when I was there, when he passed his two young children were home, they were five and eight years old. And together we did some rituals that I think were very comforting and that's not even a good enough word, but I'll say comforting. We were able to anoint his body together with the children. They surrounded him with flowers and there was an ease that they had. They were able to come in and out of the room and love on him. And I became really close with the family. And in fact, I provided his funeral services the week later. And what I want to speak to about the difference to me, it's one word it's intimacy.

Lynn Principe Golden: (15:55)
I was able to connect on a deeper level in the way that his wife especially what she really needed and what she felt was missing. And I do want to say he got great care from hospice; they were there and they made sure he had everything he needed. But what he needed, what they all needed from me was something different. And that was the bridge that I feel like a doula can provide. And as of right now, at least here, hospices are not hiring end of life doulas. And I really hope that that will change. And I want to be a part of that change because I can see having doulas on every hospice team, how we can provide a bridge from the physical, to the spiritual and emotional and more of the comfort care that I feel like is missing.

Cindy MacMillan: (16:37)
Since you do both. I can see as you're talking and you're talking about that intimacy, how that would be a great addition to that hospice team. I read this quote and I want to read it to you. And it's from psychotherapist and author Francis Weller and he wrote; “Bringing grief and death out of the shadow is our spiritual responsibility, our sacred duty.” That almost sounds like what a doula does.

Lynn Principe Golden: (17:09)
Absolutely. I love his work, especially his work and his writings around grief. They're so inspiring to me and beautiful. And he talks about the different kinds of grief; we are grieving things that we, I don't think we ever named as grief, but he describes it perfectly and he is so profound.

Cindy MacMillan: (17:27)
Yeah, and I had not read any of his work. And when I was researching for this podcast episode, I found that quote and I felt like it was just perfect for me to read right now.

Lynn Principe Golden: (17:39)
Right. And what I tell people is that grief is a winding road and there's no one way that grief is supposed to look; it's different for all of us and some days are than others. I don't think that grief ends. I do think that we're forever changed by it because we do love deeply. And that's our birthright. If you love someone and care about them deeply, why would you want to forget them? So I think that it's just a matter of incorporating that into our lives and allowing the wisdom that that person had to continue to inform us even long after they're gone. And Francis Weller has some great talks and you can find him on YouTube. And he has one, I think it's called the Five Gates of Grief (2013). I don't know if I have that right, but it's definitely worth listening to.

Cindy MacMillan: (18:22)
I will go out and look for that and put it in the show notes. So what is the most rewarding part of your job other than everything?

Lynn Principe Golden: (18:30)
That's a great question because these are hard conversations to have. And like I said, you know, the dinner party people say, well, what do you do? And I think, hmm, like how much do I really want to say right now? Because you know, I get the blank stare. They, you know, the blinking eyes, but one of the things that most people say is, wow, that must be really depressing and that couldn't be further from the truth. I mean, there are moments of sadness, of course, and I do allow myself to feel those. To be selfish for a moment I feel that having death as my teacher has taught me so much about life. I've recently experienced my own heartbreak and a huge life change. And being with death reminds me of what really matters. It's given me so many gifts. I feel that I've witnessed so much magic being with those walking between the worlds I get to see through their eyes.

Lynn Principe Golden: (19:19)
And the first time was with Aunt Mary and when the last thing she said to me was Lynn everything's going to work out for you. And that was such a beautiful gift. And I laugh about it now, because I think I should have asked her to be more specific, but I've witnessed the healing of relationships and such deep love and forgiveness. And of course, there is suffering too, as I said, but that's taught me to be humble. And sometimes all I can offer is a hand to hold and a blessing on their journey. So those are the gifts that I receive from being a doula.

Cindy MacMillan: (19:53)
You talked about rituals a little earlier, and I just want to talk about that a little bit deeper. What is the role of rituals at the end of life? And can you give us an example maybe of one of your favorite rituals?

Lynn Principe Golden: (20:07)
I love to, I love to talk about this. My favorite ritual that I do and I do this one very often is the anointing ritual. The anointing ritual that I use was developed by my friend and mentor End of Life Doula, Trish Rux. I will do this anointing sometimes before death and sometimes after, depending, and depending on what the patient or the family wants. And I found that when I include the family members in the ritual, that it gives a sense of healing and calm to everyone that's present. I want to give a couple of examples; I had a doula patient last year who had two daughters by two different women and these women, they were grown, but they'd always lived their lives in competition with one another. And there was a lot of resentment and his dying wish was to have them both there by his side.

Lynn Principe Golden: (20:58)
And you can imagine that there was a lot of tension. And especially when the emotions are so high, the death of their father, who they both adored. When I did the anointing ritual, I gave them each a handful of essential oils and they stood on each side of his bed. And as I read through the ritual, they together anointed their father's body and the room was silent. And there was such a peaceful presence at that time. And when I left that day, after I said, my goodbyes, the two of the sisters were in the kitchen, sobbing in each other's arms. And I felt that the healing that was provided through that ritual was more than I could have ever expected. And I know that he felt that too. I've also used this ritual, as I mentioned with the gentleman who was 44, who died recently, his five and eight-year-old children anointed his body.

Lynn Principe Golden: (21:49)
And they loved being able to be part of that. It's a way of honoring the body and thanking it for carrying us through and sank goodbye. And if you don't mind, I would love to read you this ritual that my friend Trish wrote.

Cindy MacMillan: (22:02)
I would love that.

Lynn Principe Golden: (22:03)
Okay. Perfect. Is this a good time?

Cindy MacMillan: (22:05)
Yes.

Lynn Principe Golden: (22:06)
As your body is outwardly anointed with this oil. So may you be filled with love, may you be held in a state of grace, affirmed in all your goodness and may you have eternal peace of mind, body, and spirit. We start with the forehead: We anoint this body, that his journey through this life on earth. May you rest in peace. We anoint these eyes that have seen so much. May you rest in peace. We anoint this mouth that has spoken truth and love. May you rest in peace? We anoint these shoulders that have borne many burdens. May you rest in peace. We anoint this heart that has loved so well. May you rest in peace? We anoint these hands that have worked so hard. May you rest in peace? We anoint these feet that have travelled so far. May you rest in peace?

Cindy MacMillan: (22:53)
I can see where that would be so healing, just to have those words read with the family, there doing the anointing.

Lynn Principe Golden: (23:02)
Right, and I think that when we talk about the word healing; healing, doesn't always mean that the person is going to be cured and live. It's a different type of healing and it's available for all who are present at the time of death.

Cindy MacMillan: (23:14)
Thank you, for kind of clarifying that because yes, the healing and I almost want to use the word as you used earlier the intimacy of that ritual is, is more what I was talking about with that healing. Just feeling just a sense of peace. That was beautiful.

Lynn Principe Golden: (23:35)
It is profound.

Cindy MacMillan: (23:38)
End of life doulas can provide several services and you've really gone through a lot of those and Lynn the time has just absolutely flown by. Can you talk a little bit about your services and how people can follow you on your journey? And is there anything that I should have asked you that I didn't?

Lynn Principe Golden: (24:02)
No, I feel like you gave me the opportunity to talk about what really drives me and what I'm passionate about. And in terms of the services I provide, I talked a little bit about the planning, the bedside vigil and the after death care. I want to go into a little bit of detail if I can, about the planning phase and the services that I learned through Conscious Dying Institute. They were created by our founder, Tarron Estes; we call them the Best Three Months. It's a planning tool that she developed that goes way beyond advanced directives and includes the five domains of life that I mentioned, spiritual, practical, physical, emotional, and mental. And so with each domain, I'll ask questions that about what feels unfinished or not yet put in place or communicated. And together, we create a vision of what we could provide for them, how we could provide the best outcome and create action steps so that their vision becomes a reality.

Lynn Principe Golden: (24:57)
And a few quick examples: spiritually you could ask if they're interested in having a last confession or they want to go deeper into the study of a spiritual practice, that's always interested them? Practically ask, do they want to die at home? And what would you need to do in order to make that possible? Or perhaps you want your ashes to become part of a coral reef? Who do we need to talk to, to make that happen? In the mental domain asking what their legacy is and what projects feel incomplete? Physically, how much pain are you okay with tolerating in order to stay present with your loved ones? Are there alternative techniques that interest you? Emotionally - and this is a big one for most of us is what's been unsaid? And who do you need to ask forgiveness of? And who do you want to forgive?

Lynn Principe Golden: (25:46)
And who would you want by your bedside? And who do you want to say goodbye to? I offer the Best Three Months I can come together with groups or I'm offering a free online six week, Best Three Months course. And you don't have to be actively dying in order to create your vision of your Best Three Months. I've created my own and done so with some family members and it really is eye-opening, and it helps us understand what feels unfinished for us, what we can do to have those conversations so that our family knows exactly what our wishes are. And if anyone's interested in getting more information about practicing the Best Three Months with me, or have a group that they want me to address this with them, they can email me at [email protected] or they can check out my website dearlybelovedlife.com for more information. And the most important part of this I want to say is after you make these decisions and really get clear about what your vision is, is share the information.

Lynn Principe Golden: (26:44)
Because it doesn't do any good if no one knows exactly what you want.

Cindy MacMillan: (26:47)
Absolutely. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation 60% report that their loved one has a document describing their wishes for medical care. But what surprised me out of that 60%, only 48% knew where it was. So that's kind of like a little bit what you're talking about. Thank you. Thank you, for being here and going over everything. It just is, sounds so rewarding to me and I really appreciate you being here. But the last question I have for you is if you could turn back time and talk to your 18-year-old self, what would you tell her about the season of life that you're in right now?

Lynn Principe Golden: (27:30)
That's a great question. And I'm not one that lives with alot of regret because I can see in hindsight when each the challenge has taught me, but I think that as an 18-year-old young woman, I would remind myself to not be afraid to use my voice.

Lynn Principe Golden: (27:48)
And I think that's a big one for me.

Cindy MacMillan: (27:50)
Perfect. That is a perfect place for us to end. Thank you so much for being here.

(27:55)
Thank you so much, Cindy. I had a blast.

Cindy MacMillan: (27:57)
Thank you for listening to this week’s episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast. I really enjoyed talking to Lynn Principe Golden about her journey to becoming an end of life doula and I would love for you to share this episode with your friends and family. Visit our website, CynthiaMacMillan.com, and sign up for our weekly newsletter. Until next time, live inspired!

Cindy: (00:00)
This is Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast episode 15. I’m Cindy MacMillan and today I am being interviewed by my friend Debra Healey.

Cindy: (00:10)
Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for women with a big heart on a spiritual journey. Each week join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers, and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings, and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well.

Cindy: (00:40)
Hey friends, Welcome back to Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast. Thank you and I appreciate you for listening today as my friend Debra Healey turns the table on me and asks me questions.

Cindy: (00:52)
Debra is a nurse leader with a background in Home Health, Hospice and Hospital administration. She has a special interest in Patient safety and helping healthcare professionals handle stress. She holds several certifications in safety and stress management and currently works as a Nurse Consultant providing education that helps healthcare organization achieve a safe environment for patients while helping the healthcare staff handle the stress of patient care.

Cindy: (01:23)
Deb, thank you for interviewing me today. This is going to be a lot of fun.

Debra Healey: (01:28)
Yes, it sure is going to be fun, Cindy, turning the tables on you. So, Cindy, what does exploring the seasons of life mean to you in regard to your podcast?

Cindy: (01:40)
Deb, thank you for asking me that because I love that question. “What does Exploring the Seasons of Life mean to you” because I get a vast array of answers that are personal to my guests. Some of my guests have mentioned the Maiden/Mother/Crone. The Maiden is all about enchantment and new beginnings, youthful ideas and enthusiasm. The Mother is the next phase in a woman's life. She is fertility, abundance and growth, the gaining of knowledge. She is fulfillment—sexual, social, and emotional—and she is represented by the full moon. The Crone aspect is the final stage. She is the hag and the wise woman, the darkness of night, and eventually death.

Cindy: (02:28)
Some of my guests have talked about the seasons themselves: Spring is the season of new beginnings and a time when we feel energized to experience life in so many ways. In summer, we needn’t hide, hibernate, or bundle up. Life is an open book, with adventures waiting around every corner. Autumn is a time to be thankful for what we have experienced throughout the year and begin to wind down and prepare for next year. Winter is a time to analyze your actions. Think of the year that has passed. Understand what you have achieved and what you need to think about in the coming New Year.

Cindy: (03:58)
I was thinking of all those different aspects but for me Exploring the Seasons of Life means…let’s explore where you are right now because there is a cycle to everything and there are many seasons within the course of a lifetime. Deb, it has taken me a lifetime to really understand that. Maybe we are graduating college or getting married and having babies, maybe we are grieving and trying to make meaning after loss, maybe we have been cheated on or maybe we are the cheater, maybe we are an empty nester, maybe we are in the throes of a devastating illness, maybe we are lonely, maybe we are in the messy bits of divorce, maybe we are retired and wondering what’s next, maybe we and honestly the list can go on.

Cindy: (04:24)
No season is perfect, but when we embrace every season of our lives fully, and stop resisting, we become more alive. Henry David Thoreau said, “Live each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each.” And I love that because it reminds me that there is beauty and learning in every season regardless of which one we are in.

Debra Healey: (04:25)
Cindy, that was a beautiful answer. And I have listened to every single one of your podcasts. And what I love most about them is how authentic you are and the authenticity that you bring out in each one of your guests. And I think you've just beautifully explained to us the seasons of life and those messy bits in between that, you know, each and every one of us, in this human experience, uh, have experienced all those happy times and sad times. And I think exploring those seasons and really living within each season is what your podcasts bring and what they mean to me.

Cindy: (05:10)
Oh, thank you, Deb. Thanks so much.

Debra Healey: (05:12)
So should we move on to inspiration? Cindy, what inspired you to make this podcast in the first place?

Cindy: (05:22)
This is a really interesting question for me. So, Deb, it was somewhere around the 2008/2009 time frame I was in a Training Program and at the end we were to visualize our future and what we wanted to create. For me it was a center of learning where people came together for personal growth + social change. It would feature leaders and teachers from around the world. The economy crashed and that is another season of my life for another time but in a nutshell, I was laid off and started commuting 1.5 hours each way to the only job I could find. I stumbled on this thing called podcasts. I thought well instead of a physical location I can do a podcast…let me learn how to do that. So it has been a journey of learning how to do a podcast and now having my first 15 out. So that was what inspired me to start the show as well as obviously going through all the different seasons in my own life.

Debra Healey: (06:39)
Right. And I know we've sure had some great talks about that.

Cindy: (06:43)
Yes we have.

Debra Healey: (06:45)
So, you know, now that you have started your podcast, can you give us a quick overview of what you expect your listeners will get out of the podcast that you're putting out there?

Cindy: (06:57)
Yes, absolutely. I really narrowed this down and I've kind of struggled because when you listen to all the experts out there, they tell you to niche down. So I have had a problem niching down, loving all kinds of different learning, but I, I have gotten to the point where I really feel like the show is for women with a big heart on a spiritual journey because I'm interviewing coaches and spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings endings and the messy bits. I really want the show to focus on self-love, well-being, and mindset, because I really and truly do feel that once we change the inside and the way we perceive life, that's when the outside changes as well.

Debra Healey: (07:47)
Right. And you've shared a lot of that with me, you know, as we've become friends over the years of how, you know, you changed the inside and your outside changed and also your whole, your whole life really changed. So, you know, from my perspective, you bring that to your listeners and that part about niching down. You know, I think those seasons of life, like we say, Oh, we want to work with 40 year olds or 50 year olds, but we're all in those seasons of life, no matter what our ages and all those messy bits oh boy they're in every season.

Cindy: (08:25)
Yes they are.

Debra Healey: (08:28)
So I'm moving on to another question. Let's see. What have you learned from starting these podcasts?

Cindy: (08:36)
Deb, I have learned so many things. The podcast is truly a labor of love for me.

Cindy: (08:43)
1. That I really enjoy the creative process of producing a podcast and that when people who were already podcasting said it is more work than you think, believe them. You will need to be dedicated to continually be putting out new episodes. 2. The power of yes: Deb, the women who said yes to me, who raised their hand, in the very beginning of my podcasting journey showed me that saying yes is truly a leap of faith. The majority of the first 15 women I interviewed did not know me at all. It reminds of the book Year of Yes: How to Dance It Out, Stand In the Sun and Be Your Own Person - by Shonda Rhimes. Have you read that one?

Debra Healey: (09:36)
No, I haven't.

Cindy: (09:37)
I recommend that.

Debra Healey: (09:39)
Oh, I will read it.

Cindy: (09:41)
So, yes, the power of, yes.

Cindy: (09:44)
The third thing I've learned is: The power of no: I have asked women to be a guest on the show who said no. I learned not to take it personally because that was a perfect example of self-love. If it wasn’t the right time for them it wasn’t the right time for them. Period.

Debra Healey: (10:02)
Yes. And I know you talk a lot about self-love and acceptance, so that's a really important feature. And I think in every one of your podcasts that I have listened to, there's a common thread of a message of how important it is for us to look at ourselves and see ourselves as others see us. I remember one time we talked about how, um, we can be our own best friend talked a lot about that one time. And I think that that is a common thread that comes through in every one of your guests that you bring out in that guest is, is the power of self-love and how it is okay to put yourself first and maybe sometimes say, no.

Cindy: (10:44)
So that's number three. Was that power of no, four, okay, Deb, I get to talk to amazing women. They, you know, I'm learning from them. I stay in this positive place, you know, after talking to them and listening to their stories. And sometimes, you know, the things that they say to me might be something that I've never heard of, or I've never thought of. So I'm looking at things in a total different way. That's one of the things I am enjoying so much is getting to talk to amazing women like you.

Debra Healey: (11:19)
Well, thanks, Cindy.

Debra Healey: (11:23)
This has been a lot of fun. I've learned a lot more that I thought I knew everything about you developing these podcasts, but I certainly have learned a lot more of why this is your heart's desire. And you know, I'm really proud of you because I've, um, really watched you grow from something that was an idea while you were driving to a new job to, you know, having really 16 podcasts already completed and put out for people to listen to. I put them all on my Facebook page. Um, you know, every, every time I listen and, you know, for any of your listeners, I would, I would encourage them to do the same because the messages are so important to especially women right now in the times that we're in.

Cindy: (12:11)
Thank you, Deb. I appreciate that so much now. And I do want to mention one other thing that I've learned because it was it was actually; it was a tough one and I had to sit with it for quite a while. And that is, you mentioned that you've listened to the podcast. And I so appreciate that. I have friends that I would send the podcast to who just dismissed it. They didn't even listen. It was nothing to them. And I was really feeling hurt because I thought, Oh, that's my friends. They know how important this to me. Why wouldn't they support me by just listening and giving me feedback? I love that feedback that you give me whenever you listen to a podcast. And what I really had to learn was that it's okay. My podcast and my friendships are separate. They do not have to commingle and that it's not for me to judge what they listen to. And that was a really big learning piece for me. But once I got that piece it set me free.

Debra Healey: (13:21)
Right. Well, what you're just mentioning to me is all of that about self-acceptance. And I think you and I have talked about the book, The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom (A Toltec Wisdom Book), which, you know, The Second Agreement: Don’t Take Anything Personally is one of them, you know, because it's usually not about you, it's about them. And you know, also sometimes there's a lot of, I guess I would use the word fear that they, you know, the, you don't, you're not ready for that information. Right. And also accepting where another person is coming from. Because, you know, in these times that we're in where we're so divisive in the world right now, I think where we can be kind and more gentle and accepting that not everyone has the same, opinions or, you know, the same, life or interest. And that's okay. That's what makes us great as human beings.

Cindy: (14:20)
Absolutely. So those are the, really the five things that I can say that I've learned that like really made such an, an impact on me. And I want to bring those through in future podcast, because I think those were great learning experiences.

Debra Healey: (14:36)
Yes. And I know you have some future podcasts plan that are going to be exciting.

Cindy: (14:42)
Yes I do. Thank you. Oh, all right, Deb. Well, I think this has been fun. Have you thought this been fun?

Debra Healey: (14:52)
Yes. I think this has been a lot of fun. And I do have a last question for you because it's the question that you ask all of your guests. So I think it'd be fun to hear what your answer is. And maybe I could give a little bit of an answer too. So Cindy, if you could turn back time and tell your 18 year old self, what would you tell her about you in this season of life that you're currently in.

Cindy: (15:21)
Now, I know how my guests feel when I ask that. Okay, If I could go back and talk to 18-year-old, Cindy, I would tell her everything's going to be okay. You think that the season you're going in right now is going to last forever, but it's not. You are going to have so many experiences. You're going to do things that right now at 18 you cannot even imagine that you will do; at 18 you cannot imagine what you will do. I would tell her, keep your love of learning that's going to serve you well in your years to come. Be kind and keep loving your family. Yeah, that's what I would tell her.

Debra Healey: (16:08)
Well, I think that's a beautiful answer. And I did think about a little bit about that myself. Do you mind if tell you a little bit about that?

Cindy: (16:16)
I would love to hear it.

Debra Healey: (16:17)
My 18 year old self, because you know, when you talk about the seasons of life, I am in my mid-sixties. So I don't even like that word crone, but I love the season. I love the season of life that I'm in right now. And it's one of my happiest seasons ever in my life. So looking back, I would say I've gained wisdom about all my life events. I look back on them and I would tell even my 20, 30, and 40-year-old self, not to worry so much. Don't worry because the happy parts and the sad parts, it's all going to be part of what we'll look back on what I look back on now that has brought me to my present moment.

Debra Healey: (17:08)
And so in the season that I'm of life that I'm in now, I look towards a grateful mindset. I'm grateful for everything that I've experienced in my life and the wisdom that I've gained to just be, and to take each day as they come and be grateful. I know that sounds a little bit corny, but it is, you know, that when you look back on everything that happened to you looking back on it, I mean, when you're in the middle of the messy bits, you don't know, you don't know how things are going to turn out, but when you look back is when you can say, Oh yeah, I understand that now. So that's what I would tell my 18, 20, 30, and 40-year-old self is don't worry. It's going to be okay.

Cindy: (17:57)
Deb, I love that because yes, when we're 18, like you said, 20, 30, 40, whatever that worrying about what's going to happen is in hindsight, you know, it's not worth it.

Debra Healey: (18:11)
That's right. And you know, we've talked about, I'm very interested in finding balance in life and stress and especially helping people to, deal with the everyday bumps that, you know, we all experience. And if you can just, take that deep breath and say everything is happening exactly the way it's supposed to unfold and for my greatest good, which is pretty hard to do in a lot of, you know, intense moments. But if you can achieve that, it does help you get through those messy bits to see the sunshine that's on the other side.

Cindy: (18:49)
Oh, thanks, Deb. I think this is a perfect place to end. I appreciate you from the bottom of my heart, coming on the podcast and interviewing me

Debra Healey: (18:58)
And I appreciate giving me the opportunity to interview you. It's been an honor.

Cindy: (19:03)
All right. Thank you.

Cindy: (19:05)
Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life. I had fun being on the other side of the microphone so to speak and hope you enjoyed this episode of finding out what was behind my desire to start a podcast. I loved the questions Deb asked me and really appreciate her being on the podcast. I do plan on having different friends interview me from time to time…it’s just a fun way for me to tell my story. .

Cindy: (19:05)
I would love for you to share your favorite episode with your friends and family. .

(19:05)
Visit our website, CynthiaMacMillan.com, and sign up for our weekly newsletter. Until next time, live inspired!

“You would be surprised at the healing power of a simple “I love you” from a dying parent to a child or vice versa. This is not always easy, of course, yet a lifetime of mistakes can be undone through forgiveness even at the end of a life.” ~ Alberto Villoldo

Cindy  (00:00):

This is Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast episode 16. I’m Cindy MacMillan and today’s guest is Shannon Davis.

Cindy  (00:08):

Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for women with a big heart on a spiritual journey. Each week, join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well.

Cindy  (00:38):

Hey friends, Welcome back to Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast. Thank you and I appreciate you for listening. I can't wait for you to meet my guest today. Shannon Davis is a Peruvian trained Shaman and Medicine Woman, Hospice nurse and owner of the Chacana Spiritual Center. Shannon provides healing to her community with classes, counseling, private sessions, group events and speaking engagements.

Cindy  (01:05):

Welcome to the podcast. Shannon. I'm so excited. You're here.

Shannon Davis (01:09):

Thank you so much, Cindy. I'm really excited to be here. Thank you for inviting me.

Cindy  (01:15):

Well, let's go ahead and we'll start off with my signature question. What does exploring the seasons of life mean to you personally or in your business?

Shannon Davis (01:24):

That is such a beautiful question.

Shannon Davis (01:27):

As you mentioned, I'm a Peruvian trained shaman. So I look at this from a medicine woman perspective and the seasons of life. I can't help to think of the triple goddess phases, the maiden, the mother, and the crone. Now I'm 44 years old; so I'm somewhere between the mother and the crone. As I step forward into this journey, uh, the maiden is the beauty, the new life, the youth, the self-confidence, the self-expression and the self-discovery, such a beautiful part as the feminine energy steps into this world. The mother is the nurturer. Has responsibility, adulthood, and fullness of life, and I've got one, one foot in this door and one foot walking into the crone. And the crone. It's a beautiful place. Really. They're all beautiful. And I really look forward as I'm stepping into the crone energy, stepping into her power becoming the wise elder governing over, aging and endings, helping with death rebirth and prophecy. And I can absolutely apply this to The Chacana Spiritual Center as I'm a Peruvian trained shaman. And one of my greatest joys is to help people overcome death because death concepts, as we're spiritual beings, having a physical existence. So I opened up a Center to help people not be haunted by death and to lead a life of joy. That's my answer.

Cindy  (03:07):

Thank you. Thank you very much. And I do want to talk about the Center, but can you talk a little bit first about your journey to becoming a Shamanic Practitioner and just kind of tell us what is a shaman?

Shannon Davis (03:24):

Absolutely. When I was growing up, I saw movies about shamans and we don't know what everybody else knows. And as I have stepped into this healing path, I learned that actually only a small part of the population has ever heard of what a shaman is. So yes, a shaman is so many things. It's actually hard to put into words, but I'll give it my best try. One who commutes with God. One who commutes with universal energy. One who could pick up a rock and listen to the energy that rock is speaking to them; to speak to a tree and ask the tree what does it need from me? How can I help you heal? And to apply that same fundamental, universal knowledge to the human body, where I am listening to my client's human body and asking it, what do you need to step into your healing?

Shannon Davis (04:24):

A shaman makes order out of chaos. They are one who empowers people and gives them their power back. It's always my goal when I have students who step into shamanic training is to, you know, they'll come to me and they'll want me to heal them. And I tell them right away, I can't heal you, but I can give you the tools to heal yourself because you are the greatest healer for yourself. So a shaman helps people step into their joy and I think you also asked how did I step into my shamanic path?

Cindy  (05:05):

Yes, absolutely. And I, and I love, I love how you described what a shaman is. That is so beautiful.

Shannon Davis (05:11):

Thank you. That's, you know, that's just spirit developed as I'm experiencing, because if you look at, you know, you look at Webster, it talks about a shaman and it, again, I'm sure what the people who were writing this in Webster said, well, where do we start? And it says one who goes into trance work and talks to the cosmos and the heavens and the earth. And it's all of the above. Thank you. My journey.

Cindy  (05:37):

Yeah. I was going to say and your journey and what led you on that path?

Shannon Davis (05:43):

Let's see, in 2000, I don't always remember dates Cindy, right? But in 2000 I was very pregnant with my second daughter. So that was a, this is stuck in my head forever. I was very pregnant and there was this brand new called the internet. Right. And right. And we were all we're seekers, right? We're all seekers of knowledge. We are the, if we, if we are not knowing that we are spiritual beings, having a physical existence, where the oldest scholars in the universe, we come here over and over to seek knowledge. So here I am eight months pregnant. And there was a new show called Crossing Over with John Edward and he is a medium. It was very entertaining but really got me questioning everything I ever thought I knew. I did not grow up with a structured religious practice. So the things I had heard I did not resonate with. I thought there's no way that if there's all-loving God, that he would punish me or anyone else and send them to damnation of somewhere that is so scary. So for some many years, I said, I was an atheist because I just didn't know what to believe. And here I am pregnant and I'm watching Crossing Over with John Edward and I go to the internet and I go into those things. Do you remember chat rooms?

Cindy (07:06):

Oh yeah.

Shannon Davis (07:09):

That was really popular then. So I go in a chat room, a spiritual chat room, and I asked, what do you think of, you know, what do you think is after, after we die? This was very fascinating to me because this meant if what John Edwards was saying that there was no reason to fear death, right? There's no reason if, if, if people were coming through from the afterlife, why was everyone on the world fearing death? And I wanted to know more. So I started asking questions and somebody led me to Sylvia Browne's website. Now Sylvia Browne is a similar medium. You know, the same line of work as John Edwards. And I absolutely loved everything she said it absolutely resonated with me. And now I know why - because it's called remembering - when you start reading things or hearing things that you know is true. It's like, I've heard this before, but you haven't heard it in this human life.

Shannon Davis (08:04):

You're remembering it. That's called awakening. Your spiritual awakening, you remember. So this is when in 2000 I had my spiritual awakening. My best friend came over because she actually, well, I'm sure we align this on for a reason. She came over and said, I just learned how to do angel writing. Do you want to learn? And I'm when you have your spiritual waking, you're like, yes, I want to learn everything. And she sits down and it seems like 30 seconds, but I'm sure it was 10 minutes or 20 minutes, angel writing. And I'm, I'm having conversations and divinity answers through this, this beautiful technique. And I just remember her being amazed and saying, you know, we, it took us hours to learn this. And that's when I started realizing that I had innate gifts that were being awakened. And I always had these gifts and I just always thought everybody else had these gifts too.

Shannon Davis (08:57):

I didn't identify them. I didn't title them. But that's when I started becoming aware that - now I would put the word empath. Okay, so 2000 I had my spiritual awakening and I start several paths becoming a white light healer, a Reiki healer, a hospice nurse. I went to college, I became a hospice nurse, and becoming a hospice nurse was a vital part of my awakening of my path to becoming a medicine woman. I'm getting chills, remembering it's coming through. I remember being in the room the first time I was with the patient who passed away. And that is very sacred, Cindy, for a family to invite you in while someone they love is leaving this earth is as sacred is when someone invites you into experience birth. It's a gateway either coming in or going out.

Shannon Davis (09:52):

And I remember as a nurse you were trained to put your hand on someone's chest and feel their respirations. You know, that can tell you a lot about where they're at with their journey and maybe how close they are to their passing. But my hand seemed to be right above their chest this one day, it wasn't touching their chest. And that's when I felt energy for the first time it was breathtaking. I didn't know what I was feeling. It felt like current. So it felt like static electricity as this beautiful spiritual being, having a physical existence was trying to leave their body. But they were stuck at the moment. They were, you know, they were because their whole life, as humans, we're told don't die, you know, do everything you can to fight, even, even when it would be the kind thing, you know, to, um, stop treating a particular condition because it's, it's harming us.

Shannon Davis (10:45):

We are taught from birth by our society to fight death. That day I learned a lot about energy, about people transcending. I could feel spirits leaving the body, um, after more experience, because I was gifted that opportunity. I don't know, you know, dozens or maybe a hundred times to be in the room when someone was passing. During my hospice experience, I met a woman who I was training. I was a hospice nurse. And you know, you in this room, spiritual world, we have code words like essential oil and meditation and prayer. And here I am, the white lightworker and I'm just kind of stumbling my way through this thinking, you know what? I'm going to one of my favorite spiritual centers over and over taking the same classes because I don't know what else to do. And I get in the car with this woman who I just adore.

Shannon Davis (11:38):

And she says, hey, I know you said something about meditation. Would you be interested in coming to a moon ceremony? And I'm like, that sounds kind of cool. What is that? You know what, tell me more, I know enough to not be scared, but not enough to know anything about what I'm walking into. And so I go, and this experience is this, this ends up being my master, my teacher, Debra Willow Fire Woman who studied from Alberto Villoldo, who is founder of the world-renowned The Four Winds Society who brought Inca Peruvian shamanism to America. So I go to Debra's center that I'm at the time, it's not here in Melbourne, Florida anymore, The Center for Healing Arts. And so I remember going, and there was a lot of people and there was a fire pit and there were people waiting in line and they were waiting for this woman.

Shannon Davis (12:30):

She was dressed in all black and she had this long white hair and she looked very, um, intimidating. Okay. She looked very intimidating and she had something and everybody wanted it. So everyone's in line. And my friend knew that I was interested and she said, go, go, go, go, go up there. You know, it's free of charge. Moon Ceremonies are always free to the community. And I said, well, what is she doing? And she said, okay, it's like a psychic reading. And every, you know, most people know what a psychic reading is, so I said, okay. So I wait my turn and it's very private. And now I'm looking in this woman's eyes and she is as if she looked right into my soul and ooh, getting chills, she's got some kind of tobacco she's smoking. It looks like a cigarette. And she says come here.

Shannon Davis (13:20):

And she blows it on me. And so now I know she's clearing my energy field. Like we use sage. So she clears my energy field and then she says the most amazing thing to me that has meant something different about every five years in my life, since. And that was, and she looks me right in the eye, almost a point, but with love. And she says you are going to step away from the masculine and into the feminine. And that, you know, she said some other things, I don't remember what they were, but that was the most, um, monumental thing that someone has said to me that develop the rest of my life. Because I thought at first, when I got a divorce, this must be what she's talking about, masculine, feminine. And I'm thinking, man, and woman, and then I'm still a nurse.

Shannon Davis (14:09):

And I think, oh no, a year later, I think she, she must be talking about me and this doctor that, you know, he's very intimidating. Then several years later, as I stepped into the medicine way, the path of the medicine woman, I realized what she was talking about are there's two, there are two universal truths about masculine, feminine energy. The masculine energy is your analytical. It's your task-oriented. It's your science mind. It has nothing to do with men. I have masculine energy in me and I have feminine. And so do men, we should have give or take about an equal amount. And then the feminine is where your power is, men and women, your power to get things done, to step into the ethers or spirit to create just like a woman creates in her womb. The womb is the darkness. The man's seed is the light.

Shannon Davis (15:02):

You need both. We have to have the masculine-feminine, but the power was in the masculine. And that is the story of how I became a medicine woman. Because next thing you know, I don't know why, but I'm circling the Center and I can't seem to leave. And she finally says to me, I think you need to come to something I'm teaching soon and that's Munay Ki. I don't even ask what it is I just came. I just felt so. I did. And my friends were saying, why are you going to this? You know, we were all white light healers. I, I just, I keep asking spirit. And they said, I'm supposed to go to this. Well, Munay Ki means love in action. It's a Quechua word, which is a Peruvian Inca, shaman word for love and action. And I received nine angelic downloads through my training in Munay Ki and those nine angelic downloads upgraded my DNA. It healed the past karmic wounds of all my ancestors before me, seven generations. And after opened up all my healing abilities. And most importantly as a healer gave me protection, that led to Mesa; after Munay Ki, then you are invited if you have your shamanic calling. And I was receiving my shamanic calling. I remember sitting by my phone thinking I have to wait for my shaman to call me. And that was another spiritual lesson; is why are you waiting? All I had to do was call her.

Cindy (16:20):

I love that.

Shannon Davis (16:22):

Yeah.

Shannon Davis (16:23):

Oh my goodness. When someone is getting ready to have a, and this just came to me kind of, as we were, as you were talking, when someone comes to you to prepare for a shamanic session, what is it that they should be doing? Or they should be asking themselves? I mean, I'm kind of stumbling here, but you know what I'm saying? What should they be thinking and then asking?

Shannon Davis (16:52):

I feel like I'm tracking you. You know, I understand the energy of what you're asking. I, um, when I first talk to someone and they, and I don't know them yet, I'll ask them, have you ever received any kind of energy healing before? So for this particular person who's not received a shamanic session, I'll say, have you received a white light healing before? And I do get a lot of yeses from that. So we'll go with that scenario. I'll say, okay, it's the same beautiful angelic love, you know, the Reiki, the white light, it's that love that I use, but just so you know, to prepare you, it is hands-on healing, modality. I will be, I will be shifting into your energetic and helping you release the emotional wounds that you have pushed into your subconscious and you push them there because that's how society taught you to deal with things that come up when things are tough for you, you push them down.

Shannon Davis (17:52):

So I prepare them and I, and I let them know. So that way, when they come in they're okay, this is going to be a little different than my previous experiences. I also advise them, please drink plenty of water, because all energy healing, you need to be able to release and water will help you release any toxins that any kind of energy work brings up. I ask them to wear comfortable clothing and most importantly, come with an open mind. It is a, it is a very different, yet beautiful experience to have a shamanic healing session. It's my energy and your energy connecting. The shaman uses that trance work to go within this, within the space of the person within the DNA, within the cells. And we're looking for whether it's physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual healing. We're not looking for anything, but the energetic we're looking for the reason, the energetic reason why something has happened in your body or spiritually between you and a friend or a loved one. And I just look for the energetic reason and I heal that or bring it out and then fill that space with love. And these are things I tell any client.

Cindy  (19:06):

Thank you, I think that listeners would be interested in, you know, how to prepare for a session. So now I want to talk about the Center that you recently opened, The Chacana Spiritual Center. What does Chacana mean?

Shannon Davis (19:24):

That is a good question. We like to have fun with it because it is an interesting word and it's fun.

Shannon Davis (19:28):

So Chacana is a very sacred symbol that the Inca Peruvian shamans use to explain the universe. Okay. And they got this ancient symbol or the secret symbol from a constellation. Okay. So as we have the North Star to follow home; in the Southern hemisphere, which is where Peru would be, they have the Chacana constellation. So imagine, you know, thousands of years ago, the angels are giving downloads to these Inca shamans and you've got all this energy, but humans, we've got to put energy into words so people can understand. And a lot of times we like to use symbols so people can understand. So they look at the stars and they see this symbol and they say, yes, this guides us home. So that's appropriate that this will guide people home to their joy because joy is where we really should be living. So I used, I thought, and prayed and journeyed on what do I call my beautiful shamanic healing center. And I've always felt called, you know, very close to the Chacana. So we called our center, The Chacana Spiritual Center.

Cindy  (20:46):

Perfect.

Cindy  (20:47):

The perfect name for your Center. I know that you have got to have learned so many lessons about opening up your Center during a pandemic.

Shannon Davis (20:57):

I'll try to keep this short, but it's a very interesting story is right before the pandemic happens, Cindy, my sweetheart, my boyfriend got very sick and we had to go to Miami and we didn't come back for 30 days. Now he's doing much better today. But during that time, the pandemic happened. During that time, I was walking away from my full-time job and trying to open up the Center. When we got back, a day later, my mom passed away.

Cindy  (21:31):

I'm so, sorry.

Shannon Davis (21:32):

Thank you very much. Thank you. And it was a lot obviously, I mean, we are having a human experience and at the moment it was a lot. And first of all, I have such a beautiful community and they supported me as if angelic hands lifted me and my sweetheart up and held space for us to create The Chacana Spiritual Center. So the first thing I did was gave time to myself and my sweetheart to heal. And I took several weeks because spirit kept telling me Shannon, the Center will open. Don't you worry about that? You just take care of you and your sweetheart and heal. So we gave ourselves time to work through our emotions and it was beautiful. Cindy, one of us would cry and hold each other and then the other one would cry and hold each other. And then we'd look at each other and say, are you okay?

Shannon Davis (22:29):

I'm okay. You're okay. And the beauty in that of finding a life partner, that we could experience this all at the same time and come out and still open The Chacana Spiritual Center. It was such a lesson, so many spiritual lessons in everything, especially the pandemic. So what I learned about the pandemic is, or from the pandemic was to slow down. I learned that, we are all in this storm, you know, a nice little metaphor of the pandemic is it's a storm and we're all in it, but we're all on our individual little boats, our own little lifeboats. And Shannon's lifeboat had her sweetheart and her mom and the Center trying to open. And she had to each time something came up, I had to say, am I going to react in love, or am I going to react in fear? And if I react in fear, I'm not going to punish myself.

Shannon Davis (23:26):

I'm going to learn from that. And the opportunity to react from love will then circle back around and I'll have that choice again. I feel very lucky that Curtis and I reacted in love most of the time and was able to step forward. And the biggest lesson I learned, I like I started to say was, take your time. And spirit kept showing me a red rose and spirit said, Shannon, the rose doesn't come out of the plant fully bloomed. The rose comes out as a bud, and you enjoy that, bud and you look at that and you think about it. And if I could refer to it, as it's maiden phase, it's just starting life. It's starting to express itself. It's young and youthful, and it has so much beauty and so much potential. And that's where we're at right now. And then one day we'll move into the mother phase of the Center and the adulthood and the fullness of life.

Shannon Davis (24:27):

And that will be beautiful. And I will not sit in the future. I'll sit in the now and then one day we'll enter the crone phase, the full bloom of the flower of the Center, but what comes with the full bloom of the Center or whatever we're going through in life is the end. Right? And so I'm not looking to start in the end. I'm looking to start in the bud because the end, and I don't want to fear the end because the end does not; death does not mean, something bad. Death is a doorway to the next chapter in life. And if that next chapter happens to be going home to heaven, that's just a chapter. So, that was my lesson. Cindy is slow down and enjoy the process.

Cindy  (25:12):

That is the lesson for us all, isn't it? Because we all have these really busy lives and we're kind of being forced to slow down.

Shannon Davis (25:21):

Yes. And we see it on, I see it on my Facebook. I have so many beautiful people sharing. You know, here they are spending time with their children and life. You know, life literally took that schedule that had every day of their life scheduled out. They had to be at work. They had to be at all. The, a lot of people were saying, I kind of feel guilty, but like, you know, all my children's sporting events are canceled, but yet we're spending all this time together as a family. And I'm learning who my children are and my husband is. And they're grateful for this time. That's the, yeah. That's the blessing in COVID.

Cindy  (25:54):

I want to talk about your workshop, A Healing Journey Through Grief, which I highly recommend. I attended that and I just found it so rewarding for myself. And I was going to ask you, and I don't know if I should be asking you this right now.

Shannon Davis (26:11):

Feel free. I am tracking you. It's okay. I can do it. Yeah.

Cindy  (26:15):

Can you give one or two tips to help someone dealing from the stress of grief from a loss?

Shannon Davis (26:22):

Absolutely. Sister. Absolutely. It's my greatest honor to help people and just to share a few about my own, is I on a physical level? Of course, I miss my mother, but on a spiritual level, I'm so honored that she felt that I was ready to take on that role in our family's life. I get my chills again, you know, that she knew that the grandmother was gone and now the mother is gone. And that makes me the grandmother and the mother. I am a grandmother. And, it's my pleasure to answer that question. That is one of my first, my very first, workshops. One of my other teachers, I mentioned Debra Willow Fire Woman earlier, but Cheri Hart, the owner of a Aquarian Dreams is one of my spirit mamas. And she saw something in me and she said to me, one day, Shannon, I really want you to teach at my center with you being a hospice nurse and a shaman. I know you can put together a grief class. And of course, like, what does a child do for their mom? They go, Ohhhh, I don't think I can do that.

Shannon Davis (27:29):

What my mama, Cheri Hart wants Cheri Hart gets. So, I put something together. So it was a mix between some counseling, but mostly a hands-on activity to give you, a coping mechanism and a lot of talk about the spiritual. But what I'm really feeling called to tell you about is that we are all right now on this earth, especially with COVID, especially, but there's a lot of tragedies in the world. We are all having loss; we are all experiencing some kind of loss. You know, people of course experienced loss to the loss of a loved one and a friend, but financial loss, stability, relationships, the loss of your freedom, the loss of your business closing. So first of all, everyone listening, I learned this as a hospice nurse. I would like to give you permission to grieve.

Shannon Davis (28:23):

If no one has said that to you yet, you don't need my permission. But if you needed to hear that, I give you permission to grieve because that's something that I haven't heard yet. People are healing at such a rapid level. You know, we all have our own words to describe something. And Shannon's words to describe the whole entire world going through the COVID experience is it's like a shamanic awakening for the whole entire world. And it is not without its difficulties and its lessons and people are and have had much loss of something. So your tears, you are a spiritual being, having a physical experience and someone in your life may have told you, you know, Cindy, I always ask if I can use someone in the crowd. So may I use Cindy. Someone might've said to you, Cindy, Cindy, don't cry. Don't cry.

Shannon Davis (29:18):

Don't be sad when you were sad. And what they were really saying was Cindy, I really uncomfortable with you crying. I'm uncomfortable with my own emotions. So I can't possibly be comfortable with your emotions. So please forgive the person who said that, because please know that they are just doing what they've been told to do. You know, we've, we've trained each other. Um, how, you know, society through TV, through how our parents talked to us or our friends talk to us. And I would give you permission if you need to hear this too weak to have that physical experience because your tears are healing, okay? Your tears are healing and allow yourself to feel your emotions because that's another myth that society tells us is to push our emotions down deep and don't look at them. When we don't do that we actually allow ourselves to process what's going on in our life.

Shannon Davis (30:14):

So we allow whatever it is that's burdening you, whatever. If you have guilt, if you have sadness, if you have anxiety, allow that to look you in the eye. I use a lot of metaphors because you know, serpent an archetype. So like a serpent comes up and looks you in the eyes and kind of stares at you. Allow your emotional wounds. Emotional wound means trauma, stress things you worry about, allow it to come up, look at you. You look at it and say, why are you bothering me? What is it about you that's triggering me because I'm ready to heal and allow the tears to come out and try to work through it. And of course, there's always professional people in this world, um, there are psychologists, there are counselors, there are shamanic practitioners. There are so many levels of help that if you are, you are feeling like you cannot get through this alone, ask for help, ask for help.

Cindy  (31:13):

Shannon, All my life. I was told that you know, don't cry. You're the strong one don't cry. And so just you saying that actually makes me want to start crying right now.

Shannon Davis (31:26):

I'll cry with you if you need to cry, cry.

Cindy  (31:31):

Gosh, that was wonderful.

Shannon Davis (31:33):

Good. Thank you.

Cindy  (31:34):

If you could turn back time and talk to your 18-year-old self. What would you tell her about the season of life you're in right now?

Shannon Davis (31:42):

Oh boy. Okay. If I could turn back time and talk to my 18-year-old Shannon, I'd be awfully attempted to explain to 18-year-old Shannon, how to live a more conscious life. That way it would prevent the suffering that she had to go through and prevent the suffering that she felt like she caused other people, but I wouldn't do any of that because I choose to, um, I don't want to choose to influence anything that might have brought me to the life that I'm living now. And now I'm on my healing path and I may never have been the healer, healing others, if I had not gone through my suffering.

Shannon Davis (32:24):

I would have been tempted. But, it's like a butterfly.

Shannon Davis (32:30):

I think I'll stay in the now because I'll tell you, Cindy, my life is beautiful and I love, I love, I love the, I love the me now.

Cindy  (32:38):

Thank You. Thank you.

Cindy  (32:40):

I want to know and tell all of our listeners all about your Center, about your workshops and your services, your website, how can people find you?

Shannon Davis (32:50):

Thank you.

Shannon Davis (32:51):

So kind, I'd be happy to give you some information. We are in the heart of Melbourne, Florida, we are on Sarno Road and that's 2299-B Sarno Rd Melbourne, FL 32935. And we have a website https://www.chacanacenter.com. You can find us on Facebook; we're the only one.

Shannon Davis (33:29):

And, we are on YouTube

Shannon Davis (33:32):

Chacana Center. We're on all the social media I'm losing which ones in my mind and our store phone number is 321-610-1698. Now, uh, let's see, what do we do? What don't we do? We say we love doing so much fun stuff. We a see personally, I do healing sessions as you asked earlier. So I do private shamanic healing sessions and I've never seen two shamanic healing sessions ever look alike. They go from what is something similar to a Reiki experience with illumination to soul retrievals court cuttings past life healings, um, death experiences. So death will not haunt you and more. I do life and business coaching. My favorite motto, if I can share with everyone, give you some free advice for your businesses is: "Always do what is right for yourself,

Shannon Davis (34:30):

do what is right for your clients and do what is right for everyone involved" and you will have a beautiful business, you know, whatever kind of energy you're looking for, whether that's money, travel, it will come to you. If you always do what is right for everybody involved. We also provide classes. That's what the bulk of what I do is I'm a teacher. I teach shamanic training, which is the Munay Ki, which means love in action. I teach the Mesa, which is to be a shaman, journey classes and medicine wheel, and, um, all kinds of divination. We have tarot readings, psychic readings, and sound crystal bowls. And we have about 30 teachers give or take who also circle through the center and teach their own beautiful techniques. So yeah,

Shannon Davis (35:18):

Come on down and visit us. We'd love to have you. And I guess on top of all that, we have a beautiful

Shannon Davis (35:23):

crystal store and smudge store. So anything that we are teaching, we try to sell what you need. You know, if you're a shaman and we sell everything to shaman needs and Reiki, healers need and so forth.

Cindy  (35:33):

I was going to ask you if you had had a retail piece to that and people can just stop in. Okay. Thank you so much. And I will make sure all of that in the show notes so people can easily get to you. Is there anything, any parting words that you want to leave us with?

Shannon Davis (35:51):

Absolutely. Could we close in a prayer?

Cindy (35:53):

Absolutely. Thank you.

Shannon Davis (35:56):

Sweet, sweet God, energy and angels, spirit guides and allies. I ask you to come forward and be present in the lives of everyone who can hear these words and everyone they can share with, to circle them with love and raise her vibration and give, have them be aware of the potential that they can step into that life is filled with challenges and every challenge has two choices, love or fear, and to not, to not punish ourselves when we choose something we deem as the wrong choice, but to learn from it and just move forward blessings to all. Oh, thank you, sister. Thank you.

Cindy  (36:38):

Thank you. That was beautiful.

Shannon Davis (36:41):

Have a wonderful day, Cindy.

Cindy (36:44):

You too.

Cindy  (36:46):

Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life. The audio was a little scratchy but the conversation was so good and I wanted to keep it real. I enjoyed my conversation with Shannon and I especially liked it when she was said, "You are going to step away from the masculine into the feminine.”

Visit our website, CynthiaMacMillan.com and sign up for our weekly newsletter. Until next time, live inspired!

This is Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast episode # 14. I’m Cindy MacMillan and today’s guest is Ellen Stewart.

Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for professional women over 40 who are trying to be everything to everyone and forgetting themselves in the process. Each week, join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well.

Welcome back to Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast. I seriously appreciate that you are here because I am so excited to share my conversation with Ellen with you.

Ellen Stewart is the Pushy Broad from the Bronx.  She is a Certified Empowerment Coach and a Recovery Coach as well as a proud member of the International Coaching Federation. Her unique Pushy Broad, Bronx born, coaching style is part drill sergeant and part cheerleader, always in your corner, helping to push your success forward.

Ellen Stewart has two shows airing on Transformation Talk Radio and podcast stations everywhere.  One is called Recovery Recharged with Ellen Stewart and the other is called Pushy Broad from the Bronx: Everybody Need a Little Push. 

 Welcome to the podcast. Ellen, thank you so much for being here.

Ellen Stewart  1:35 

Cindy. It's my pleasure. Thank you so much for having me. Delighted.

Cindy MacMillan  1:40 

What does exploring the seasons of life mean to you personally or in your business?

Ellen Stewart  1:47 

I love that term, Exploring the Seasons of Life. It means a couple of things. First of all, it reminds me, and I don't know if I'm dating myself but you said your podcast is 40 and above so I fit into their category. It reminds me of a book that came out in the 70s. Gail Sheehy's book Passages.

Cindy MacMillan  2:06 

Yes, I remember that.

Ellen Stewart  2:08 

Because it was really the first intuitive look at how people and especially women, go through different stages in their life, go through different circumstances, and most importantly, different mindsets. We seem to be thinking about different things at different stages of our lives. And we go through that process. And I really do think that certainly has happened to me. So it's a personal thing. I mean, I'm certainly not the same girl I was in high school, or in college, or in, you know, as a young adult, and I'm grateful for that. I think it's an evolving process in our seasons.

Cindy MacMillan  2:51 

Absolutely. And Ellen when you and I first made contact I was thinking about going down the empowerment road - down that path with you. And then you mentioned something to me about recovery, and how that would be something unusual and different for my podcast. And I really think that's the way that I want to go today because I think that is so important. What led you to become a Certified Empowerment Coach and a Recovery Coach? Can you walk us through your story?

Ellen Stewart  3:26 

I'd be delighted. I think my first encounter was to decide to be a recovery coach in this way. I am a recovering alcoholic, an addict. I have 34 and a half years clean and sober. And I'm very proud of that.

Cindy MacMillan  3:42 

Congratulations.

Ellen Stewart  3:43 

Thank you. It started back in 1985. And I was married to a musician at the time and maybe even way back before then in the 70s. I was married to a musician and that was kind of like sex, drugs and rock and roll okay in the 70s. So, drugs were there all the time, and that's just me, you know, the hippie and all of that stuff. And then when I finally decided to get clean and sober, I found that even though I stopped drinking and drugging, my mindset did not change. I found that I was still thinking like an addict and an alcoholic. I was rushing into things. I was impulsive. I was not listening, not following a program, I had no sense of spirituality. I was still making bad decisions. I was still doing dumb things. That's the truth.

So then I'm 20 years in recovery, and then all of a sudden I switched careers because I was in the travel industry and I switched careers to the mental health industry and started working for treatment centers. And after I started working for alcoholic and drug treatment centers, I realized that by helping to bring clients to treatment. That was one thing. But when they came out of treatment, they were like me, they didn't understand what to do. So just not picking up a drink or a drug is not enough. It's understanding that we have to change the way we think, feel and act. And because of that, I decided that this was a way for me to help someone. So when people come out of treatment, I decided that I would be a recovery coach, and that's how it started 16 years ago.

Cindy MacMillan  5:29 

Addiction is not just drugs and alcohol. Addiction can be sex, it can be shopping, it can be a lot of different things. It can be eating. So when you were talking, I immediately was thinking about the mindset around all those and recovery.

Ellen Stewart  5:49 

Exactly. And that is exactly what a recovery coach does. My philosophy is very simple. You need to put a new idea into your head when you want to change negative thoughts. It's called changing your cognition, putting a new idea into your brain by putting a new idea into your brain, then you begin to feel something differently. So cognitive change breeds emotional change. So when you begin to feel something differently, then as a consequence, you act on it differently. So cognitive change breeds emotional change breeds behavioral change. You know, I lived a long time you know, thinking I can't change the way I feel I can't change the way I feel. If I feel this way, then there's nothing I can do about it. I'm the Pushy Broad from the Bronx and I can tell you right now, that's a bunch of BS. It is that is so not true. You can change the way you feel about anything at any time. And the way you do that is to get some more information into your brain change the way you think about something. Your thoughts control your feelings, not the other way around. If you let your feelings control your thoughts, then your emotional intelligence is zero.

Cindy MacMillan  7:06 

What is just one tiny way that we can take that first step to change our thoughts?

Ellen Stewart  7:14 

There you go. Well, the one thing that we can do to change your thoughts when it comes to changing a negative habit, whether it's thinking that we're drinking too much, or we're eating too much, or we're involved in a habit that we would like to change is to be aware of the fact that something is not the way you want it to be. Awareness is the key. If you're not aware of the fact that you're drinking too much, or you're eating too much or you're doing something negative to you, you will never change. So the first step is awareness. And the second step is to verbalize it. If you don't start talking about it, if you don't start reading up on it, if you don't start getting a coach or a therapist around it, someone like the Pushy Broad you can't get it...you've got to share it, you've got to get it out there. And the third thing is you have to process it and move forward. Which means that it takes work, understanding how it goes. So those are the big things. That's where we start.

Cindy MacMillan  8:11 

You know, when you were talking about awareness, this is something that just popped into my mind. How before we went into quarantine was how often when talking to a girlfriend the conversation would lead to let's go out for a glass of wine and when you do that two or three times a week, well something to be aware of.

Ellen Stewart  8:32 

Yes, it really is and you really have to, to watch it because things can get away from us. Look, one of the things I do on my Recovery Recharge podcast on Transformation Talk Radio is to provide us with some statistics; take-home alcohol sales, alcohol sales now in quarantine. I know Cindy this is staggering; have risen 500%.

Cindy MacMillan  8:56 

That is staggering.

Ellen Stewart  9:00 

500% my god, so it doesn't matter where you're when you're doing it, it matters how often and how much about everything, right? We all have to eat to live. But what matters is how often and how much you are. We all have to spend money on something, right? We have to spend money on clothes and on food. That's fine. We all do that. But it matters how often and how much.

Cindy MacMillan  9:28 

Ellen, you're, you're hitting all my buttons because I've been working at home for eight weeks now (at the time we recorded). And that refrigerator is just a little too close.

Ellen Stewart  9:41 

Oh, God, I so understand. But we're so human. I get it. Okay, I get it. I mean, I have a thing with food as well. The first two weeks I'm in quarantine I decided for some reason that I had to stock up on everything. Not only the normal stuff, everybody, right like the toilet paper and the paper towels and the tissues for some reason. I mean God Almighty I wish I had stock in like Charmin or Scott or something. I mean, who knew that toilet paper would be the thing. But, but here I am thinking to myself that for some reason I am a single woman I live by myself, but for some reason now when I ordered my food because I'm here in New Jersey now and you know, New York and New Jersey were hit the hardest. And we couldn't go to the supermarket and everything is on order, and I'm still ordering my groceries. All of a sudden, I decided that this one single woman who is a size six should all of a sudden now buy the family pack of everything.

Since when do I need a family pack of a box of cereal, right? I mean, I couldn't have enough cereal for the next four months, the way I bought food, but we feel like we must nurture ourselves and when we're feeling this kind of stress and anxiety, this is when our nurturing kicks up, but sometimes in a very destructive way.

Cindy MacMillan  11:01 

Yeah, when you said that about nurturing Yeah, I'm getting that. I want to ask you, is there a culture of silence around addictions?

Ellen Stewart  11:12 

Oh my god. Yes.

And that's one of the reasons why I'm constantly bringing this to everybody's attention, as the Pushy Broad from the Bronx, it's time to speak out about it and not to live in this in this secretive situation. People that are in the rooms are in recovery. It's not a cult. It's not something that nobody knows about. Everybody knows about it. And the more you get it out there, and the more you talk about it, and the more you tell people like I tell people, I am proud to be in recovery. If I don't have guidelines and rules in front of me to manage my entire life, then I would be a wreck.

And I'll tell you something, most of the people that I know that are in long term recovery are telling me like I am that I am going through COVID-19 a little bit more stable because I understand what it's like to live in the moment, I understand what it's like to live just for today, I understand what it's like to let go, let God I understand what it's like to take one day at a time and manage my stuff. So some of the practices and principles that we have learned in recovery are extremely poignant for exactly what's happening today. So I'm grateful for that program.

Cindy MacMillan  12:30 

I was just going to say because most of us do not have those, did you call them rules or guidelines?

Ellen Stewart  12:39 

Guidelines. Yes, we call them steps, but they are guidelines for living and they're not just subject to not picking up a drink or a drug. Because there's so much more to life just because you decide that you are going to go on a diet or you're going to stop eating cake candy and ice cream, doesn't mean that you still don't want it in Your brain that the brain feeling doesn't go away. You have just decided behaviorally to abstain. That's what happens. But the behavior will go back to the habit. If you don't change the habit in your head.

Cindy MacMillan  13:17 

You know, I'm thinking about my ex-husband, he stopped smoking when our daughter was probably five years old. And we went through a divorce not long ago, and he got remarried and started smoking. And I'm thinking to myself, Oh, wait a minute, I was taking care of you. You quit smoking for almost 30 years, what's going on?

Ellen Stewart  13:45 

Well, you know, people do things for so many different reasons, but you know, the fact that you said I was taking care of you is something that I would I would consider strongly and reconsider in your next relationship.

The one thing that I found, especially being an empowerment coach is talking to women about taking care of themselves. And that's also something that we learn in guidelines in recovery, the focus of attention is on ourselves. I had two husbands that I was taking care of, until I just said, you know what, I'm tired of this. Alright, I went through one marriage and then had many years being single, and then went through another marriage. And I said You know what, marriage is just not what I want to do. Alright, because I was too busy taking care of everybody else and not, and not learning how to take care of myself. But even in a committed relationship, we have to understand what it's like to take care of ourselves. So and that's what happens when we're in recovery. And when we stay in recovery, and whatever it is, whatever you're going through, you must change the way you think about something in order to change how you feel about it, and then change how you act on it.

Cindy MacMillan  15:04 

Thank you, Ellen, thank you. Can we talk about what addiction looks like at the various seasons of a woman's life? You know, the 20s is so different from the 30s, which is so different from the 50s. Is there something going on at each decade of our life that makes recovery different?

Ellen Stewart  15:30 

I think so in a lot of ways. I think that I think sometimes the older we get, the more mature we are and understanding that it's true recovery. Again, just emphasizing the fact that it's not just about not picking up a drink or a drug. And believe it or not, people do have a propensity for addiction, which means there is a brain pattern that is different for somebody that has addiction that doesn't or has the propensity to have an addictive brain and that happens early in life. So my propensity for addiction came at me at 14 years old and I started smoking pot. It's the truth. So people start younger and younger and younger. And parents understand this and they realize it. So at that point in time when the brain is so new and not even developed yet, we're looking at this for different things. We're looking for instant gratification. We're looking for fun for adventure for escape, which is, which is a major component of this and in many, many ways that carry on no matter what decade of life we are in. There's no question that the whole format is the same. But the reasons for doing things sometimes they're slightly different, right? Our stressors, the older we get in our 20s and 30s and 40s. We may be worried about our, our careers, we may be worried about who we are as women, we may be worried about how we're gonna keep our husbands Happy New or whether or not we're going to get married whether or not we're going to have children. So there are different circumstances that lead to that kind of escape. I think that's most of it. How we do it seems to be the same, but the reasons why we do it are different.

Cindy MacMillan  17:21 

Yeah,  I of course, I've gone out and partied with my friends at 18 and 19 years old. And when I got pregnant with my daughter at 22 or 23, I didn't drink but occasionally until I was about 40. And I had a very stressful job. So I understand what you're saying those the stressors change in those different decades.

Ellen Stewart  17:54 

They do change and then you know later in life, the 50s and 60s, you maybe become an empty nester, so now you don't have something to focus on anymore, the kids are gone and you're like, what am I going to do with myself? And who am I if I'm not a mother, you know so so we begin to do that sense of introspection, and then maybe we become bored or we become retired and we don't know how to reinvent ourselves. So, now we're drinking just to pass the time and to stave the boredom. So there are many different reasons depending upon where we are in life. But the way addiction hits us, is the same.

Cindy MacMillan  18:37 

What do you say to someone in the midst of recovery, to help them develop now I'm going to use the term self-compassion and forgiveness? You might choose other words.

Ellen Stewart  18:50 

I like your words, Cindy, I like your words. And it's a very interesting question.

When because people in recovery their first instinct is to try to apologize to the world. Okay, yeah, the first instinct is to say I'm sorry, I was such a screw-up. I'm sorry, I did what I did. I'm sorry that when I drank, I was not a good person, or I wasn't a responsible person. And the whole world is asking for an apology all the time. And part of what we learn is that we do have to make amends for our behavior because actions have consequences. There's no question, but the way we change is to realize that forgiveness is the kind of forgiveness that we give ourselves, self-care, and self-compassion. Addiction is a disease.

There is not one addict or alcoholic on the planet that would have chosen to have this. It's something that we that's in our brains, it's something that shows up on a brain scan for whatever reason, because of the environment because of circumstances because of genetics because of its hereditary of a myriad of things. And you can read about all of them on the American Society of Addiction Medicine page or journals, which is a division of the American Medical Association. It's all documented. It's all science but understanding that we did not choose to give ourselves this disease. And because of that, we have to give ourselves a break. It doesn't mean that we should be irresponsible around it. But it means that we need to forgive ourselves.

Because it starts with how we forgive ourselves. And I always tell people, especially in early recovery, to treat yourself like you're a little puppy. Just be patient with yourself. Little puppies are all over the place, okay? And they're peeing and pooping everywhere and they're running around and they're just saying hi to everybody, and they're wrestling and they're biting and they're licking and they're doing all these things and that's what you're going to be doing in the beginning because you're like, Oh my god, what's happening here? Just be calm and easy with yourself and telling yourself It's okay. Love yourself today.

Cindy MacMillan  21:16 

Love yourself today. That's for all of us. Yes. What new belief behavior or habit would most change a woman's life on her road to recovery?

Ellen Stewart  21:31 

Well, that's a good question.

Cindy MacMillan  21:33 

 I was gonna say, and you've gone over so many. But is there is there one that just kind of like, this is this belief, this behavior would just help help someone so much?

Ellen Stewart  21:47 

Yes, I really do believe so. And that's one big mantra that we know we learn, always. One. Day. At. A. Time. There is no way that you could do anything without projecting into the future. Okay? The one mantra I talk to my clients about is we cannot regret our past and we cannot predict a future that has not come yet. One day at a time, live in the present, my constant mantra is, wherever your feet are, that's where your brain has to be. Right here right now I'm having a wonderful conversation with you. If I turn around and think I'll never be able to stop smoking, or I'll never be able to lose those 10 pounds or  it's going to take me so long to do this or, or there's no way that I could think that I'll never have a glass of wine again for the rest of my life that is doomed to failure in every sense of the word. What gets you through is to focus on the next minute. And then after the next minute, focus on the next five minutes. After the next five minutes focus on the next hour. Today, what can I do today? To keep myself healthy, to live the way I want to live? To find myself the most productive and loving and caring human being that I possibly can?

Cindy MacMillan  23:20 

Ellen, I am just taking notes after notes after notes. Everything you say I'm like, Oh, yeah, that's it. That's it.

Ellen Stewart  23:29 

Well, it's all it that's, that's for sure. I wanted to say something, Cindy, because especially through COVID-19 right now, there's so many stressors going on, and people are going through so much stuff and it's something that you know, you and I have talked about too. We're going through a lot of stuff. This is not normal stuff. This is abnormal. So we are learning to struggle with things and we're learning to put things in perspective and we're becoming much more introspective in our lives, and because people are struggling about a myriad of things, including maybe trying to get help for someone that is struggling or if you're struggling yourself if you go to my website Pushy Broad from the Bronx, I'm doing a free 30 minute session with me Pushy Broad from the Bronx, you get a free 30 minutes to talk about what's on your mind. If you're struggling or you're stressed out or you want to find help for someone that's in the throes of addiction, or you need just some good guidelines to stay in recovery. Either one of those things Pushy Broad from the Bronx, take advantage of the stress free, free 30-minute session with Pushy Broad from the Bronx.

Cindy MacMillan  24:44 

Now is that on your homepage?

Ellen Stewart  24:47 

It's on my website homepage.

All you have to do is find pushy broad from the Bronx, and there's a whole big link right in the middle of that says COVID-19 free 30-minute session. Click on that and make a call or book a call with me, I also have a toll-free number that is available to you at any time. And that is 800-889-1757 leave a message. So if you don't have access to the to the web or you know, you know, you know, do those things, whatever 800-889-1757 and leave a number for me to call you back. And we'll do the 30-minute session over the phone. So that's available to

Cindy MacMillan  25:27 

Ellen, thank you for giving us your number and, and telling us what that link was. I have a couple more questions that I'm wanting to dive in a little bit with you. And you're talking about COVID-19. How does isolation and sheltering at home affect someone's mental and emotional health? One I want to talk about that in general and then the other when they're actually going, trying to overcome an addiction.

Ellen Stewart  26:00 

Well, first of all, I want everybody to look at it positively, there is no better time than the present to do the stuff that you really want to do. There's no excuse. You don't have to be distracted by a whole bunch of things, right? We have to be distracted with ourselves, we have to be a little bit more self-absorbed, and try to do the things that we never thought we had the time to do. I don't care if it's something as small as now I'm going to clean out the shoe closet that I've been thinking about for the last two years, but I found myself too busy to do whenever, whenever it is making an accomplishment that you didn't have time to do before. And when it comes to something that is a compulsion or an addiction, we understand that whatever that is, it's not a positive thing. It is a negative thing. If you're exercising too much if you're eating too much, if you're drinking too much, if you're sleeping too much it whatever it is, if it whatever it is to excess is too much. And whatever that is, you understand that it doesn't fill you with joy. It doesn't fill you with happiness. It provides you with negativity it promotes escape, it doesn't promote moving forward. It promotes stagnation, depression, anxiety, stress, all of those things are never negative emotions. And you have a chance to either heighten and nurture that feeling now and COVID-19 or you have a chance to turn it on its head and dispel it. So decide, most of my clients say to me now there's no better time to get clean and sober than right now. So make that your positive mantra. You have a great chance to work on yourself. And there are so many different tools. The Pushy Broad can give you some tools if you want to work with me one on one. If you want to call me and I can get you started. There are many things to look for online. The web but understand that what everybody's feeling right now is normal and natural. But it doesn't mean that you have to stay in negativity. There are lots of things you can do to affect positive change.

Cindy MacMillan  28:13 

One of the things I'm doing each evening because I am in the house all day I only go out once a week to the grocery store is that each evening I'm going for a walk just to get that fresh air to get out of the house.

Ellen Stewart  28:28 

Exactly. Get outside of your comfort zone Do whatever you want to do. I'm not exactly a big I've as a kid I was a big outdoors person and right now, believe it or not, I'm learning to plant things I never liked to planting before but I'm learning to plant things and I'm like I never thought I would be doing this.

Cindy MacMillan  28:47 

So you're turning into a gardener?

Ellen Stewart  28:49 

I guess which was you know it was hard in the Bronx living in you know, a tenement building five stories up and I you know, I moved from there to New Jersey which I where I have a house and a backyard Now and still, you know very close to New York because Bronx girls can't be too far away from New York City you know, we start to hyperventilate if we're too far away. So I'm really really close at this moment. In fact, my town can see New York from the river so I could still feel you know, feel my peeps in the Bronx. But now I'm trying to do something that's a little bit different. Something new learn a new skill.

Cindy MacMillan  29:29 

That's what I'm doing here with this podcast.

Ellen Stewart  29:33 

And it's working Cindy, it's really working.

Cindy MacMillan  29:36 

Is there anything that I should have asked you but I didn't? Around recovery or just in general, anything that you would like our listeners to know.

Ellen Stewart  29:49 

I just think in general, I think you've covered everything. I just want to remind you that there is help available there and you should remember Pushy Broad from the Bronx because you can find me on the web or you can, you know, make arrangements to do that and understand that recovery is not only about not picking up a drink or a drug, it's about changing the way you think, feel and act. And one more thing, that if you know somebody that you're trying to get help for, or you don't know how to manage this, if you're a parent that doesn't know how to talk to your child, or if you're a husband that doesn't know how to talk to your wife about this problem, or vice versa, the families of the recovery of the people that are struggling, need a lot of help, and I'm here for you. I understand the other side. So please, please, please turn to me for some help.

Cindy MacMillan  30:41 

Ellen, well, but you tell your 18-year-old self about the season of life you're in right now.

Ellen Stewart  30:49 

Wow. That the season of life I'm in right now. I would say a couple of things.

Education is really really, really important. Never stop learning. That's number one. And number two, money is much more important than you think. Doesn't mean that you have to have a whole bunch of it. But you have to know how money works.

Cindy MacMillan  31:12 

Hmm. Okay.

Ellen Stewart  31:14 

And, and I would also say that, like I said before living one day at a time, stop worrying about what you're going to grow into what you're going to be how it's going to happen. what your plan is, for the next 5 years, 10 years, 20 years. That's, that's not going to get you anywhere. Wake up in the morning and say to yourself, what's my plan for today? And then the rest of your life is going to be wonderful.

Cindy MacMillan  31:43 

It's beautiful, absolutely beautiful. How can people follow you? Now we've given out your 800 number, but can you just tell us all the other ways that people can follow you?

Ellen Stewart  31:56 

All the other ways? Yeah, okay.

All you have to remember is Pushy Broad from the Bronx okay you put in the web  Pushy Broad from the Bronx my website will come up you can follow me on Facebook Pushy Broad from the Bronx I'm very lucky then I have about 42,000 Facebook fans so please please be one of them. I also have a wonderful group called the Letting Go Tribe. So we talked about that and that you can find from pushy abroad from the Bronx you can be invited free to join that. And you can also follow me if you don't have if you don't go on the net. You can go on your phone to https://www.transformationtalkradio.com/ I'm listed as Pushy Broad from the Bronx with Ellen Stewart. And you can find my podcasts online as well.

Cindy MacMillan  32:48 

Thank you so much for being here with us and I'm going to tell you, I love Pushy Broad from the Bronx. That is great branding all the way around.

Ellen Stewart  33:00 

It’s something that I own I'm a born and raised Bronx girl and I was always considered the Pushy Broad from the Bronx. Because Bronx girls are Bronx tough. And I was outspoken. I would always say what I meant in a very direct manner, straightforward, no BS. And that's why, you know, my approach to coaching is part cheerleader and parent drill sergeant, because I think you need both and that's what Bronx girls bring. We bring it. So I own that.

Cindy MacMillan  33:27 

You know, when you're talking, I was just thinking, Oh my gosh, yes, because I'm a southern woman. And I can sometimes tend to sugarcoat, and I don't think that's healthy in any way for the person you're talking to. or yourself.

Ellen Stewart  33:43 

Well, it depends. Okay, I worked for a Nashville company for eight years and I love I love the south and I love southern hospitality. I don't think there's any better hospitality in the world. But I have certainly learned the meaning behind bless her heart.

Cindy MacMillan  34:05 

Ah, all right. Well, thank you so much.

Ellen Stewart  34:08 

My pleasure, Cindy.

Cindy MacMillan  34:12 

Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life. I enjoyed my conversation with the Pushy Broad from the Bronx, Ellen Stewart, and I especially liked it when she said, "We cannot regret our past and we cannot predict the future that has not come yet."

Visit our website, CynthiaMacMillan.com and sign up for our weekly newsletter. Until next time, Live Inspired!

Cindy MacMillan  0:00 

This is Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast episode # 13. I’m Cindy MacMillan and today’s guest is Lindsay Kimmel.

Lindsay is a women’s advocate, a nurse, a cancer survivor, a daughter, wife, and sister. She is the culmination of all the experiences in her life and she will never let her cancer diagnosis define her and her goal in sharing her story is to create a lifeline for young people diagnosed with a disease that changes their life. 

Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for women over 40 who are trying to be everything to everyone and forgetting themselves in the process. Each week, join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well.

Lindsay, welcome to the podcast. I'm so excited. You're here today.

Lindsay Kimmel  1:09 

Thank you so much for having me. Cindy. I'm honored to be a part of this project.

Cindy MacMillan  1:13 

Yeah, I'm really happy to have you. And I know that we've changed our date for the interview a few times. That's what makes it even more exciting.

Lindsay Kimmel  1:22 

Exactly. We're finally here.

Cindy MacMillan  1:25 

We are here. I want to start off reading a line from the book Sacred Circles written by Robin Deen Carnes and Sally Craig.

 “Telling stories is a way of gaining access to the truth. When women start telling their stories, they begin to hear themselves echoed in the stories of others. They start to feel less weird and less isolated, and they begin trusting themselves.”

Lindsay Kimmel  1:58 

Yeah, that definitely rings true for me. I love. Love that.

Cindy MacMillan  2:03 

So Lindsay, what does exploring the seasons of life mean to you personally?

Lindsay Kimmel  2:08 

Well, from a general perspective, we know developmentally that human beings go through different stages of their life depending on age, some expected and some unexpected. But I thought about that question. And I think for me and exploring the seasons of life are important. What stage you're in is, obviously whatever you are working through, but for me, the hardest part I think of stages is the in-between the transition between maybe more of a messy bit and more of a stable bit. But I've noticed that I am able to have a lot more peace, internally, if I'm more accepting of change and just aware of the fact that impermanence is part of life and going through those stages is just basically more palatable when you are able to come from that place. And I think that's the important part for me is how I deal with the kind of recalibration of change.

Cindy MacMillan  3:15 

Thank you, Lindsay. Can you just tell us a little bit about what your life was like before cancer?

Lindsay Kimmel  3:22 

Yeah, so life before cancer was definitely better.

There's no denying that I don't want to put a bow on top of everything that I've experienced, but there has been a lot of good that has come out of it as well. I think you know, when you go through a tragedy, you kind of put rose-colored glasses on when you think back on the future, or on the past, you really kind of you forget how much suffering and how much pain you endured prior to that. And, and I do think that suffering is suffering and your threshold of what you know is kind of your marker for how much you're able to endure. And humans are very adaptive. I've been very adaptive through this process and I'm able to my spectrum for pain and anxiety and uncertainty is obviously exponentially grown. But that is not to say that I didn't experience hardships prior.

And basically, when I was a teenager, I started to really struggle in school. And I grew up in a family with two intellectuals, PhDs, the expectation was very high. I grew up in a community of, you know, high achieving peers, and I really was not able to perform at that level and I kind of became a chronic underachiever, you know, instead of doing the work to figure out how I learned and how to make myself a better student, I kind of rebelled against everything that my parents wanted and the community that I was in wanting. And at that same time, I also really was going through puberty and grew, boobs very quickly developed a female body basically before I was ready, and I didn't know how to be in my body and I got a lot of messages in society and in my home about what it meant to be beautiful. And to be a woman, I kind of felt like I had to make myself smaller in order to fit in somehow. So I did develop an eating disorder kind of as a way of controlling all the things that I feel like I couldn't control in school and in my life, and I really struggled with that through my late teens and early 20s. And it wasn't until I started working with an incredible therapist that I started to really mend a lot of those broken parts inside of me.

It was through college and then later nursing school that I realized academically I'm actually very capable. And I just had to learn how to learn and accept that maybe it wasn't going to fit into the mold of what you know, standard education was expecting. I really healed a lot of those pieces inside of me both, you know, with my, with how I felt intellectually but also how I felt in myself and my self-worth.

So yeah, I mended a lot of that. I was set up to marry the person that I had been with for eight years and we were living in San Francisco, I had gotten my dream job in labor and delivery as a nurse. I, you know, was set to get married to him in a 200 person wedding in wine country a month before I was diagnosed. And, you know, we were planning on having children and having a pretty conventional life. I wanted more, a house in the suburbs, more kids kind of the American dream was what I was setting myself up for. And it was really also the first time that I felt like not that I do believe at this point that there is a metric for where we should be as human beings, but in terms of my community and peers, I was in the same place as them for the first time. That's kind of how it felt as I was right where a lot of my friends were. Yeah.

And then I was diagnosed. So I have done a lot of looking back through this process. And I do realize that there was a lot that I had to live through in order to set myself up to deal with something like this. I think it is a result of how much I went through that made me way more resilient and way more adaptable through cancer.

Cindy MacMillan  7:41 

Can you just tell us what kind of cancer you've got?

Lindsay Kimmel  7:44 

Yeah, so I have a salivary gland cancer, which is very rare, less than 2% of cancers, men over the age of 65, who smoke. I've never been a smoker and I'm not a man. So you know, they really know missed it for the first six months, I went in to the doctor about five times, I would just walk over to the clinic and they kept telling me it was TMJ. I was experiencing some pain on the right side of my face by my jaw. And it wasn't until the sixth time that I went in and really basically yelled at my doctor and said, I need to see an ENT something is wrong.

From there, I got diagnosed pretty quickly, but at that point, it had already infiltrated my facial nerve; in the surgery to remove the cancer they had to have my facial nerve cut. So I have right-sided paralysis on my face and only partial movement, so I'm unable to smile and it definitely made this whole process even more intense because I was left with a permanent deformity that I could see in the mirror. Not only was my life internally changed, but externally to the world. I also looked different and that was just a whole nother piece of this, especially with my history and with, you know, the way that I've dealt with putting myself together in a way that looked good for the world for the first time, I couldn't really hide behind that it was like all the broken parts of me or somehow now exposed. So that was another really intense part of this diagnosis. And since then, you know, it is a Stage IV diagnosis and it has spread to two different places in my body.

At this point, I've had two further surgeries and I'm currently on two medications and a clinical trial that has kept the cancer away. So you know, what I'm hoping for now is just more time and you know, as long as I can get with these medications, it's pretty incredible honestly, that I am alive now based on where it's spread and the surgeries that I've been through. They've been pretty intense.

Cindy MacMillan  9:56 

So Lindsay, you were diagnosed at 31; is that correct? And you're 33 now. So when you talk about not being able to smile and everything, how has that further impacted body love and your image?

Lindsay Kimmel  10:14 

Yeah, that's something that I'm currently actually really exploring right now. I really got to a place I actually recently heard Glennon Doyle; she's an author and a speaker that I really love. She shared a video and she was basically talking about what she felt like body love was and that really resonated with me.

She said, you know, I don't feel like you can love something if you don't trust it. I think that I know, I really felt like that was something I had worked through, you know, I had really felt like I could eat what I wanted to eat, I could move how I wanted to move and I could kind of intuitively let my body fall where it was going to fall and that required not buying into diet culture, or feeling like I had to fit again what society had expected of me. But I really did trust my body, I trusted it to want to get up and move to have days where it didn't and to find that balance.

And I think with any kind of health diagnosis, all of a sudden that is brought up in really different ways because your body on some level does feel like it's failed you like this thing was able to come in and infiltrate your body and it didn't do what it was supposed to do to take care of it. And so I think that is something that I am working through now.

You know, in the cancer world, there's a huge emphasis on diet and what you should and shouldn't eat and cancer causes or you know, sugar can further you know, that it can cause the cancer it lives in eats on sugar, so processed foods aren't good and you want to obviously feed your body in the best way you can.

 I also really do believe more in intuitive eating. And I think a good analogy is if you're a drug addict and you're diagnosed with cancer, even if cannabis, and you know, marijuana products could help with nausea and pain, because of your history, you can't do that. That just is not something you can explore. And I think the thing that I've accepted is I can't start to tell myself what I can and can't eat because it kind of retriggers all of those neural networks in my brain that you know, start saying, Okay, well then it's just it is a kind of a compulsive way of thinking and it's really seductive because it would be nice to control things to feel like oh, I could keep myself alive if I just ate cruciferous vegetables and no carbs. That would be a quick fix, but I also truly don't believe that that's fully true for all people.

And I know that it just creates more disarray and havoc in my brain than it does peace and that in and of itself is not healthy for your body. So I'm really trying to learn to love what my body has been capable of which is go through these incredible surgeries. I mean, my first surgery was 18 hours. And I had a part of my lung removed and I had a craniotomy, where they actually opened my skull. And my ability to kind of bounce back from that and heal and to respond from these medications is a new way and a new version of trusting my body, just kind of knowing like, wow, it can get through incredible, incredible hardships, I mean things that a body shouldn't have to go through and it's continuing to not only be able to move and you know allow me to do all the things in my life that I need to do, but it has, it's continuing to help me heal and stay healthy.

So I think that shift is really big. And I think the way that I see myself in the world and what is beautiful at this point has changed for me. I'm really more cognizant, you know, even though I believe that I was an empathetic person before and I was a nurse and I was aware of sickness and disability, but I, I really do see beauty as something different, that it doesn't need to be symmetrical or to fit into a mold that it can actually be how you carry yourself and who you are in the world. And you know, how deeply you love and how you connect with people, people that are aesthetically very beautiful from the outside can start talking to you and become very ugly very quickly. So I think my whole idea of what is beautiful has changed too.

Cindy MacMillan  14:08 

I think that's, I want to use the word beautiful, but I think that is a beautiful way of looking at life that we don't have to fit in that mold. Absolutely. Yeah. So after you were diagnosed, and you did kind of go through the story, a little bit of what happened after your diagnosis, but what was some of the lessons that you've learned from cancer, especially in your relationships?

Lindsay Kimmel  15:32 

Well, lessons learned from cancer. There's a long list there, but I will say that what I'm getting more comfortable with now is, like I said before, not putting a bow on it or not having to have a happy ending. And I think allowing myself to acknowledge the pain and the suffering that I had been through without ending it with and I'm grateful for x y&z. I think, you know, human beings really do want tragedy to end in a better way. I think it's just a natural inclination that we see other people suffering and we say, oh, but you know, she still ended up having a child and she's married. And this happened. And I think the truth is, it's been really dark and really hard. And I have been challenged in ways that I never saw happening or couldn't have dreamed up. And I have learned so much about myself and how resilient I am and the depth of what it means to love. And I think being a really, you know, competent, independent woman prior to this, I didn't have to ask for help or rely on other people and you start to really learn what true vulnerability is; you know, being on the bathroom floor covered in sweat throwing up from chemo like who would you just text and say, there's a key under the mat come inside, I need you to just rub my back. And that is really different than even saying, you know, it's a kind of, there's a depth to how much you're showing people and that is really raw. And it's really where love is. It's really where you kind of realize what it means to be in connection and how much we need that as human beings.

And so, I have learned a lot about how much we need to ask for help and how important it is to have a group of people that you feel safe enough to show all of those messy bits to. And I'm really lucky that I have an incredible family and an incredible group of girlfriends and a husband who's been there and an amazing sister. So I have been able to really be held in those darker places, but it made me realize how much I don't expose and hadn't exposed in my life prior to this diagnosis, even though I had really deep connections, there were still parts that you leave, you know, covered up. And you just can't do that after something like this. And that's really a beautiful part.

Cindy MacMillan  18:27 

Just knowing that you had someone, Lindsay, that you could text and say come in and help rub my back you are a lucky woman to be able to have that in your life.

Lindsay Kimmel  18:42 

Definitely. Definitely.

Cindy MacMillan  18:44 

So cancer shakes everyone up. And talking about death takes courage. What do you wish people knew?

Lindsay Kimmel  18:55 

I think, this is an incredible question and it's something I spent a lot of time thinking about. I think end of life and conversations about death are things that as a society we are really scared of, and it's pretty uncomfortable. And it's usually not until someone is, you know, get sick or a tragic thing happens in a family that you realize, okay, we need, to talk about this and I have realized that it's actually better to go in prepared and to know exactly what you would want or what a loved one would want. And because it does create a sense of control.

And I think people feel so helpless when someone is in that place. I remember when my grandma was dying and I wanted to play her music and I wanted to use the essential oils that I have to, you know, I just wanted her to be as comfortable as possible. And I realized like, I don't know what kind of music she'd want to listen to, or does she like lavender? Or would that be too intense for her? And she couldn't answer me. And I was just thinking it'd be it would have been so nice to have had really a specific conversation about what exactly you want and that is so individual and some people really say, you know, I'm okay with dying in a hospital and some people feel like I absolutely want to die at home surrounded by the people that I love.

But I think that those conversations are really important to have and I have realized that as a cancer patient, I think especially being young doctors are going to fall back on continuing to offer treatment and continuing to come up with options and I have heard stories of people you know, being in treatment or having a you know, going through really intense chemo regimens up until 2 days before they die, and I think those quality of life conversations are important to what do you want in that last period of your life? And how much time do I have so that I can make decisions about how I want to spend that time and they are very uncomfortable and you do have to be ready.

You have to know who's ready to have those conversations. And again, only you will intuitively know who in your family or when they're ready to sit and listen to that, that I do think they do offer a sense of peace and some form of certainty even though death is obviously an organic process, about the way that you'd want it to be in what you'd want it to look like. And, yeah, I think that they're really important conversations to have and they're not things that we usually talk about.

Cindy MacMillan  21:53 

You know, you mentioned music, and I remember a few months ago, I went to visit my dad, he lives Arkansas, and I started asking those types of questions. You know, because I said, you know, Dad, what kind of music do you like?

Lindsay Kimmel  22:09 

I love it.

Cindy MacMillan  22:09 

What's your favorite song?

You know, when you live so far apart from each other, you do lose something being so far apart from your family and he sat there and he thought for a minute and then he gave me a Charley Pride song that he liked and it was so interesting because it wasn't one that I would even have ever in my wildest dreams thought he you would like. Those conversations, yeah, they are important and you do have to know when to have them as you said, and it's really sometimes intuitively knowing that.

Lindsay Kimmel  22:45 

Well and also on how and when to have them with your doctors, you know, and being able to trust you know, I really have a relationship with my oncologist where I see him as a consultant. And you know, ultimately, at the end of the day, I am, you know, the leader of my health and my life and I'm using these people as resources. They can prescribe medication, and they have done an incredible amount of research. But, you know, I think at the end of the day, if you're really tapped into what you need intuitively, they're just going to be there to offer support.

And so I've had really real conversations with him about and it's an open dialogue, you know, you tell me, and we'll continue to talk about prognosis and a timeline and what my options are and what I want so that I can make those choices and currently I'm on a clinical trial, and there is no way of being able to tell me how long I have because it's a clinical trial. And so I've really appreciated that he said, you know, we'll continue to see and we'll continue to explore this as things unfold. But I can't give you a timeline right now. And I appreciate that because I also think it can be harmful if you don't know. And again, it's all predictions, but if you don't know, and then you tell someone they have a month, and really, they could have six months or a year, but people end up kind of digesting that in a certain way. So it's really a dance that you have to do and you have to have really open communication with your doctors. And I think that's something that not a lot of people know, or they just take their word for it and that's a danger for sure.

Cindy MacMillan  24:45 

Thank you so much for saying that because I am one, whatever doctor I go to, I also use them as a resource, but I also do my own research. And I come in with ideas and sometimes they tell me no, you know, we're not going to go down that path. And sometimes they'll say, you know, you've got a good point there. And mine is not cancer, I have thyroid issues. So I'm always researching thyroid and different ways to, I don't know, heal it, work with it. And, I do know that some people, it's whatever the doctor says, that is what they go with. I just, I just really feel strongly that people need to be their own health advocates.

Lindsay Kimmel  25:32 

Absolutely. And really trust what's going on in their body. I think even as a nurse and as a health care provider. I trusted my doctors. When I started going to the doctors with that jaw pain. I knew something more was going on. I kind of innately felt that but I didn't trust myself enough to say, to argue with them. It wasn't until it got so bad that I really had to fight for it. But yeah, I think all the time about how different it would have been, had I said, you know, no, this feels wrong. And I want to look at it further. So yeah, I think it is such a powerful lesson.

And, you know, I think you have to really trust your own intuition with your body and go with that, especially as a woman in our medical system. I think, unfortunately, I think they fall by the wayside and they lose their voice a lot. And there's real pain going on there. And it gets lost.

Cindy MacMillan  26:32 

Right, absolutely. Lindsay, how have you rediscovered life in the midst of being in this really messy bit?

Lindsay Kimmel  26:41 

Rediscovered, I think I hit on this earlier that when you go through a tragedy or a crisis or a diagnosis like I have, there's a whole reorientation of your life. And I think I'm really working with right now kind of going from the crisis to more of a chronic issue, I, I really have had to ask myself because I get scans every two to three months. How much life can I live between each scan? And it's really, instead of being a long frame, I'm looking at the short term right now. And you have to kind of keep it there. I realized, you know, late at night when you're lying awake, you can start to jump to well, what about next month or what about in September and it's kind of like a constant reframing and bringing it back to right now. So it's really just holding myself and being really compassionate about what I need and learning how to take it back to the present over and over and over again. Yeah, I mean, I think that's exactly where I am right now is just being here now.

Cindy MacMillan  27:58 

That's a good lesson. For all of us to be here now, and to have that self-compassion. If you could turn back time and talk to your 18-year-old self, what would you tell her about the season of life you're in right now.

Lindsay Kimmel  28:14 

I mean, it's I think it's pretty simple. It's probably the same thing I'd say to myself now, which is, you are enough just because you are here and you are alive. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with you. You are flawed and you're human and you are deserving of all of the love.

Cindy MacMillan  28:16 

Thank you, Lindsay. Beautiful, absolutely beautiful. How can people follow you on your journey and support you?

Lindsay Kimmel  28:42 

And so I have a blog that I've just set up, it's called Not a Blessing.

Cindy MacMillan  28:49 

Okay, Not A Blessing.

Lindsay Kimmel  28:52 

And I do have an Instagram and a Facebook account. I am not currently very active on those. But I think the blog is the best way to find me. Or if you want to directly reach out, I am open to conversations. And I am here to hold space for all of the messy bits of life. And it's one of my favorite things is conversations like this. So you can also email me at [email protected] or call me directly.

Cindy MacMillan  29:22 

All right? Not A Blessing; is that NotABlessing.com?

Lindsay Kimmel  29:27 

NotABlessing. It's on Squarespace. I will send you the actual link so you can put it on the podcast, too.

Cindy MacMillan  29:35 

Absolutely. I'll put that in the show notes because I know there were people that are following your story. Thank you so much for being here. It has been a pleasure.

Lindsay Kimmel  29:47 

Thank you so much, Cindy.

Cindy MacMillan  29:49 

Thank you. Okay.

Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life. I enjoyed my conversation with Lindsay Kimmel. I loved our whole conversation but especially liked it when she said, “How much life can I live between each scan.” That’s a great question to ask ourselves; how much life can I live?

Visit our website, CynthiaMacMillan.com, and sign up for our weekly newsletter. Until next time, live inspired!

Update, Lindsay is still working on her website for the blog so keep checking back.

Cindy: (00:00)
This is Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast episode # 12. I’m Cindy MacMillan and today’s guest is Lori Burke.

Cindy: (00:08)
Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for women over 40 who are trying to be everything to everyone and forgetting themselves in the process. Each week, join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well.

Cindy: (00:16)
Welcome back to Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast. Thank you for being with us today and I am so delighted to share my conversation with Lori Burke with you. Lori Burke is a certified Clinical and Transpersonal Hypnotherapist. She offers a variety of advanced hypnotherapy protocols and services to help her clients with overcoming fears, anger, and resentment; breaking undesirable habits and developing new, healthier ones; resolving self-limiting beliefs; programming for professional success; getting to the root cause of anxiousness; stress management; raising self-esteem and self-confidence; spiritual exploration, and more. .

Cindy: (00:39)
Lori, welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast. I'm so excited to have you.

Lori: (01:31)
Oh, well thank you so much. I'm happy to be here.

Cindy: (01:34)
I'm really interested in hypnotherapy. So before we start, can you go ahead and just tell us what does exploring the seasons of life mean to you personally or in your business?

Lori: (01:47)
Well, the seasons of life to me are the phases that we go through that highlight those times of change in our lives, times that make an impact on who we are. And I think we hit those pivotal points in life, those points where we start another season and head down another path and we maybe move towards a new way of thinking or of being. And I think every season has its opportunities and lessons. And depending on how we handle those lessons, we can either look at them as opportunities to grow or we can struggle with them.

Cindy: (02:26)
Thank you. And you're so right about those seasons of life being those opportunities to grow if we just change our mindset around those. So I'm really fascinated by your story. Can you walk us through how you went from being a software engineer to a clinical hypnotherapist?

Lori: (02:46)
Yes. I actually get a lot of shocked looks from people when I tell them that I was a software engineer before becoming a hypnotherapist. It all really began about 10 years ago; I was a software engineer at the Kennedy Space Center and my life was pretty much running on autopilot at that point. Everyday kind of looked like the day before and one day my husband and I decided that we wanted to try yoga. So here we were, a couple of left-brain people, neither of us had ever stepped foot in a yoga studio before and neither of us was really sure what yoga was. And we had seen pictures of people in all these bendy positions and decided that we needed something maybe a little more on the beginner level and preferably something private. So we contacted a local yoga teacher, took some private yoga lessons, and she would talk about things that we had never heard of before.

Lori: (03:52)
And it was then that we had realized that there was this whole other side to life that we hadn't been aware of. I was pretty left-brain and I love the science behind a lot of the mind, body, spirit, metaphysical stuff. And I found Dr. Joe Dispenza's work and Dr. Bruce Lipton's work absolutely fascinating. And if you're into any of Dr. Joe's work or any of Bruce Lipton's work, you know that they talk a lot about reprogramming the mind. And I love that description, reprogramming the mind and they provide a lot of scientific background on it and their books and workshops. So I just ate that stuff up. I mean, I absolutely loved it. Well, roundabout 2012, I went through some of my own personal turmoil; some of those messy bits you talk about. And I ended up seeing a therapist and then I saw another one and then another one.

Lori: (04:51)
And I just couldn't quite get to the point of feeling better by talking about my issues over and over. And I knew there had to be something deeper going on, but I just, I didn't know what. So someone had suggested to me that I try EFT, which is Emotional Freedom Technique, and some people also refer to that as Tapping. And they gave me the name of a wonderful practitioner in Pennsylvania. So I worked with this practitioner for a while and we did some really good work and I learned a lot about being able to clear out old emotions about healing, old emotional wounds. After that experience, I became so open to all these alternative modalities out there. Well, one day, totally by accident, I landed on a website about either hypnosis or hypnotherapy. And it really caught my attention because it was right in line with that whole reprogramming of the mind that Dr. Joe Dispenza and Bruce Lipton talk about.

Lori: (05:58)
So from there I decided to enroll in a hypnotherapy program and learn more about it. Not really from the intent of changing careers. I was just really interested in it. Well, I got about halfway through the program and I realized at that point just how powerful this work can be. So at the end of the program I found myself at a major crossroads in my life. I was working at the Kennedy Space Center, which is arguably one of the most exciting places to work and I worked with a really talented team of software people. They were just really good people and I got paid really well to do what I did and yet I was beginning to feel at that point like I had a deeper purpose. Like there was something else that I needed to be doing and when I put together my life experiences, the things that I've been through in life together with my hypnotherapy training and then the training from Joe Dispenza and Bruce Lipton's work, I knew that I had a lot to offer people and I also knew that if I didn't pursue this, it would be like having a tool that can help people, but like I was withholding it because I was afraid to leave my own comfortable situation.

Lori: (07:20)
I also felt somewhat of an obligation to pay it forward because others had helped me through my rough times and now I felt like it was my turn to do the same to pay it forward. So I was at that point of making a huge step. Now I have to tell you, I was in my mid fifties at the time and you know, some felt that it was just a little too late in life to be making such a drastic change. True to my adventurous nature. I did it anyway and I've really never looked back. It's just been incredibly fulfilling to be able to participate in life transformations of my clients and I just, I just feel so honored that they allow me into their personal lives and into their pasts to do this work. It's just really fulfilling.

Speaker 1: (08:11)
Lori, what I like about that story so much is one you making that leap in your fifties but two you saying that you, are very left-brained and yet you were open to all these different possibilities.

Lori: (08:28)
Absolutely. I mean, I still love the science of just about everything, but I think that yoga experience really showed me that there is another side to life. And in some things, I feel like science hasn't quite caught up to it. But it doesn't mean it's not there. It's, it's just one of those things that you need to, you know, take a leap of faith and have some belief.

Cindy: (08:53)
Yeah. I love that. Can you tell us exactly what a hypnotherapist is and why that works?

Lori: (09:01)
Sure, sure. Um, it's probably helpful, to begin with, a good definition of what hypnosis is. A lot of times clients come in for their first session and even at that point, they're just not quite sure what hypnosis is or what hypnotherapy is. And they usually associate it with what they've seen on TV or what they've seen in the movies or on a YouTube video. And that's not what I do. So what's hypnosis? Well, hypnosis is a naturally occurring altered state and we all go in and out of a hypnotic state on a daily basis when we wake up in the morning and when we fall asleep at night. It's that sweet spot between being fully awake and being asleep. It's, it's like being in the zone, so to speak. And it's that state where if you're doing something creative that takes all of your focus, like painting or sculpting or knitting, something like that, you may be so hyper-focused that you don't even notice if someone walks into the room and starts talking to you.

Lori: (10:10)
So that's an example of a hypnotic state. If you're driving up the highway and you kind of zone out and then you realize that you missed your exit five miles back, that's a form of hypnosis. And when you're in that state, your subconscious mind becomes open and accessible, which is where the reprogramming occurs. And that brings us to hypnotherapy. Now, hypnotherapy uses the hypnotic state, that state of the opening up of the subconscious mind to apply tools and techniques to communicate directly with the subconscious mind. Where that reprogramming takes place. So in my practice, I generally use a light to medium state unless a deeper state is required to apply these tools and techniques. Now, while someone is in hypnosis, they're fully aware and they're fully in control and they would never do or say anything that they would not normally do or say or anything that goes against their moral code.

Lori: (11:14)
I know a lot of people have questions or concerns about that in the beginning. The only time that they're not fully aware is if they become so relaxed that they do fall asleep and that does happen occasionally. And when that does happen, I have to kind of nudge them and bring them back to a lighter state so we can continue with our work. But the client does hear everything that's said. And the reason that hypnotherapy works so well is that it can uncover and access the root cause of most issues. That being the memories, the emotions, and beliefs that reside the subconscious mind. See normally during a conversation, the conscious mind is on full alert and it doesn't allow access to the subconscious mind, at least not from a reprogramming standpoint. It's like having a read only file on a computer and there's a little guard at the gate of the subconscious mind that prevents that. But in hypnosis, the conscious mind and that little guard at the gate are relaxed and that allows me access to the subconscious mind and that allows the reprogramming to take place, which is why it works. So well.

Cindy: (12:30)
Lori when you're working with someone and you ask them a question is it because they're so relaxed, they're able to answer and answers are able to come forth easily. Is that it?

Lori: (12:45)
Yeah, and sometimes when you relax the conscious mind, the analytical mind, the stuff starts to come up from the subconscious mind a little more readily. I know I've worked with several clients who initially they don't even remember a memory that's causing their problem. But as we start to work through it and all this stuff starts to come up and then they're able to make that connection, I usually tell them when we start working together, it's like having a champagne glass where the bubbles initially stick to the side of the glass. But as we go in there and we start to stir things, some of those bubbles are going to start to come up. And those are things that come up out of the subconscious mind as we do our work.

Cindy: (13:30)
I liked the way you described that those bubbles come up. Yeah. So how often do you hear, I don't know who I am?

Lori: (13:41)
Actually. I hear that a lot from women who have been in the role of a mom or wife or daughter, and suddenly that role in the way that they knew it goes away. Um, children become more independent or they leave home to start their own lives. So my client's role as a wife may go away due to divorce or death. So you know, you can have the empty nesters that create a void. You can have a divorce or death and that creates a void and suddenly they're standing there in a bit of an identity crisis. Really. And I've also seen this happen with women who have had the same career for many years. Suddenly their job goes away or they decide that they're going to retire and it creates a void because they confused who they were with what they did. You know, somebody may say, um, you know, who are you? And they'll say, Oh, I'm a software engineer. Well, a software engineer isn't who you are. It's what you do. And if you ask people who are you, many times people will have a response that includes a job title and or role. So when they get to these points in their lives, they may feel stuck. They don't know how to move forward. A role that they've fulfilled for many years is no longer there. And they come in and they say, I, I just don't know what the problem is. I just don't know who I am.

Cindy: (15:11)
Yeah, I absolutely understand where they're coming from when they say that because I've been there myself going, well, who am I? You know? Yeah, but you're right. Most times when you talk to people it is their roles that come up. Absolutely. How do you work through that with them; through hypnotherapy?

Lori: (15:37)
Yeah. A lot of times they'll come into midlife and they'll have a lot of emotional baggage and if they've been distracting themselves with fulfilling a role, they may not even know that that baggage is there. Although I've had quite a few women come in and they have things like chronic fatigue syndrome, which means they're tired all the time. But with no real cause and emotional baggage can be pretty heavy. So one of the major things that we do is to help them to unload that emotional baggage and to go back and take a look at things like their self-limiting beliefs and figure out where that came from so that we're able to get in there and resolve it. And then we go ahead and we, you know, build up their self-esteem and their self-confidence. And get some goals in place. So they unload what they had from their, you know, from their past, from their childhood. We get them on stable ground, we turn around those self-limiting beliefs and, and we offer them some new beliefs. And when you have healthier beliefs in place, that causes some pretty healthy and uplifting emotions to go with that. And somebody who feels good and believes good things about themselves can move forward with confidence.

Cindy: (17:03)
Well thank you, for explaining that to us. What are some obstacles that you help women with in your practice? I know we talked a little bit about self-limiting beliefs. What are some other things that you help women with?

Lori: (17:19)
Yeah. Most of the common issues they come in with are anxiety, depression, insomnia and weight issues. They're feeling stuck. They're feeling like they're unable to move forward in their lives. And the overwhelming majority of those issues began long before they showed up in my office. In fact, most of them are the result of those emotional wounds that we just talked about from childhood. And when I explain this to clients for the first time, I usually get the, Oh, you know, it can't be that I've only had this issue for the past five or 10 years, but a lot of times it's hard to identify the root cause of a problem just by looking at it from the surface or from the conscious and analytical viewpoint. So many times the client just can't believe that their issue is coming from something that occurred in childhood.

Lori: (18:13)
But as we start to clear things out and we start to get some of these things resolved, they see and feel the difference and they're able to start making that connection. So it's, it's really a learning and self discovery process, as far as those feeling stuck or not being able to move forward, that has a lot to do with fear in one form or another. And for the most part, we tend to live our lives in our comfort zone. And this is the zone where life is pretty predictable and the likelihood of any surprises is pretty minimal. And as long as we live every day, like the day before, we feel relatively safe. But unfortunately it can also result in that feeling of stuckness. You know, maybe my client wants to write a book or start a business or change careers or get out of or into a significant relationship but just can't seem to move past the fear of, of doing that. So with hypnotherapy we uncover and resolve the root cause of that fear. You know, sometimes it's low self-esteem or low self-confidence that we need to look at or maybe there's something in her early childhood that led her to form beliefs about herself or about her circumstances. And then we get back into those self-limiting beliefs and resolve them. And once those limiting beliefs are etched into the subconscious mind, they pretty much stay there until they're reprogrammed or transformed.

Cindy: (19:52)
It almost sounds like you are helping your clients connect the dots.

Speaker 3: (19:56)
That's exactly it and it's really about learning and a self-discovery process. Yeah.

Cindy: (20:03)
In the last three to five years. Speaking of beliefs in the last three to five years, what new belief, behavior or habit has most changed your life?

Lori: (20:17)
I think the number one thing, the number one thing that really changed the course of my life was realizing that you are never too old to change course. And I tell my clients, if you're still breathing, it's not too late. It can take, you know, some preparation or some extra training or some extra planning of some sort to make these huge changes in your life depending on what it is, but it's not impossible. I had done some research on people who either switched careers or had become famous or successful even after they were 50 years old. And what I found was really, it was interesting that it was really encouraging too, the first person that always comes to mind is Louise Hay and she did, she didn't publish her first book until she was 50 years old and in fact, she didn't start Hay House Publishing until she was in her sixties so that was really encouraging. You know, we don't have to work and work and work and then hit that retirement age and then, you know, it, everything goes on autopilot from there. I mean, we can continue our lives, you know, the excitement goes on. It's not too late.

Cindy: (21:39)
I consider myself a lifelong learner. And so I feel like when you stop learning, it's almost like you stop living or you become on autopilot as you're saying.

Lori: (21:51)
You certainly stop growing. You know? And sometimes the fear keeps us from putting ourselves into potential situations where, you know, what if this happens, what if that happens? And you know, the thoughts about it can be worse than actually going through it. So allow yourself to grow. You know, you, you may make some mistakes along the way. That's okay. We're all human. But without those mistakes, you don't have the learning and the growing and, you know, I think we should keep life exciting. Yeah.

Cindy: (22:24)
What you just said, allow yourself to grow. I love that. So Lori, if you could turn back time and talk to your 18-year-old self, what would you tell her about the season of life that you're in right now?

Lori: (22:40)
I would tell her she's got a lot of seasons to get through until she reaches the one I'm in now. So I guess I would, first of all, I would encourage her to always follow her heart, to stay adventurous and to enjoy and appreciate the seasons along the way. Even those challenges, those, what you refer to as messy bits, especially those messy bits actually, because that's where the greatest lessons are learned and that's where the most growth occurs. Um, so it's, it's hard to see that sometimes when you're young, but yeah, of course, I would tell her all of this and then she would roll her eyes and smile because being in the season she was in at 18. It's hard to imagine being in the season I'm in, in my late fifties.

Cindy: (23:31)
Right. So is there anything that I should have asked you, but I just didn't know to ask you anything that you want to tell us?

Lori: (23:40)
No, no, you're pretty thorough. Pretty thorough.

Cindy: (23:44)
Well, I really appreciate you being on the podcast. That means a lot to me. So how can people follow you on your journey and support you?

Lori: (23:52)
They can check out my website, LoriBurkeHypnosis.com and I'm also on Facebook. I'm on two places, Lori.BurkeCHT or LoriBurkeHypnosis, and I've begun to post some just some very short clips on subjects that are associated with hypnotherapy or hypnosis in some way or associated with the work that I do. I occasionally have workshops and I'm hoping to do some webinars in the future, you know, and I would certainly post those on my website as well.

Cindy: (24:30)
All right, well thank you very much. I appreciate you being here.

Lori: (24:34)
Thank you so much, Cindy. It was such a pleasure.

Cindy: (24:37)
Thank you.

Speaker 2: (24:38)
Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life. I enjoyed my conversation with Lori Burke and I especially liked it when she said, " It creates a void, because they confused, who they were with what they did.” .

(24:54)
How many times have we confused who we are with what we do? I listen to the Karen Kinney Show and get her newsletter. She said, “peacocks are the perfect representation of embodied authenticity and confidence - which is way different than arrogance. Peacocks don’t think they’re special. They simply go around looking and being exactly how the Divine made them.” So isn’t that what we should do…simply be who we are. Visit our website, CynthiaMacMillan.com, and sign up for our weekly newsletter. Until next time, live inspired! 

Cindy MacMillan  0:00 

This is Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast episode # 11. I’m Cindy MacMillan and today’s guest is Connie Viveros.

Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for women over 40 who are trying to be everything to everyone and forgetting themselves in the process. Each week, join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well.

Welcome back to Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast. I appreciate that you are spending time with me today and I am so happy to share my conversation with Connie Viveros with you.

Connie Viveros is a professionally trained and Certified transformational life coach. She is an inspiring public speaker on transformation and a published co-author of two books. Connie is a longtime advocate for women’s rights and social-change philanthropy and leads personal development seminars and life-changing workshops in California and now online!  Connie‘s personal passion is connecting with women who also believe they can and must make a difference in this world – starting with themselves. She is dedicated to creating inspiring content and programs that empower all women to transform self-doubt into self-love.

Oh, Connie, I love that so much. Thank you for being here on the podcast today. I really appreciate it.

Connie Viveros  1:35 

Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.

Cindy MacMillan  1:37 

So what does exploring the seasons of life mean to you personally, or in your business?

Connie Viveros  1:43 

Well, Cindy, I think this is a great question. It is a wonderful metaphor for life as a whole, but also for honoring the seasons not only of life in general as we go from our infancy all the way to adulthood and then into our geriatric years, you might say I'm actually in my 60s. So I'm in that phase of my life right now, where I definitely feel is a cycle that is ended and both beginning. And sometimes I feel very strongly that this generation and this period of time on our planet is one of the first where we haven't really honored those cycles, those cycles of nature, those cycles of the moon, and I for one, what this means to me, is to honor that that is a cycle. It means we're not always in constant flow, that we actually honor that time where sometimes we retreat. We go into darkness, we go into the gestation period, and we grow something new, we plant something new instead of always being addicted to this concept of being go go go do do do and flow. Sometimes we need to retreat. And I love that that is really what your topic seasons of life means to me both in my life as a whole, as well as the cycles that I'm going through. And I feel very strongly that right now, I'm in a new cycle of my life, like birthing almost a reinvention of who I'm going to be in my for the next 30 years, so to speak.

Cindy MacMillan  3:30 

Thank you. So what are you birthing right now?

Connie Viveros  3:34 

Well, what I'm birthing right now, I believe is, and I really dislike this, this word, but I will say many of you might understand the triple goddess, which is the Maiden, Mother, Crone, and I'm choosing to call the grandmother stage. So what I'm feeling very called to birth right now is that wise woman, that wisdom, that keeper of the wisdom, I've gone through my maiden voyage I've been a mother I have raised three grown children, they're all adult children now. And I'm entering into that phase where that level of responsibility no longer I hold it as tightly and I get to in a sense; what do I want to do next? And that I'm choosing to call the grandmother, the wise woman, the keeper of the ancient secrets. And that's kind of flowing in now as I sit in my own gestation my own new birth and cycle of life of saying, what does that look like? How will my classes be this virus clearly has brought about a whole new paradigm in the way we deliver our work. They used to be commonly in-person workshops, and all of that has been reimagined to online. So it's shifting and changing and I'm seeing Oh, new possibility, new ways of growing new ways of working with women from afar from us. From much further distances.

Cindy MacMillan  5:01 

That's right. When you and I first connected about you coming on the podcast, it was right as the virus was becoming, I'm going to say well known and everything was changing. And we just had to, you know, reschedule the date because you had a lot of commitments and workshops at the time that you had to take care of.

Connie Viveros  5:22 

I did and I had to quickly you know, reimagine them and redirect them to an online format. And with that, Cindy, unbelievably, they have doubled in size and capacity. We would typically do workshops where I would attract 20 or 30, which is a good number to have in your workshop. So and online, they're bursting with 60 - 70 women attending in attendance, men and women but predominantly women been the energy of everyone is putting their work out there and people are looking and seeking and hungry for, you know, give me some content something to do while I'm in this situation. And as luck would have it, we were able to reimagine it and re approach with online to offer them

Cindy MacMillan  6:12 

You're right about people looking for things to do. You know, as I'm going, as I look on Facebook and things like that, I can see that people are starting to get I am going to use the word antsy, you know, because we have been at home now for about six weeks. So they're looking for those things to enrich their lives.

Connie Viveros  6:36 

Absolutely right. They've gone through sort of the existential crisis of the situation and now they're moving into some like to call it cabin fever. And it's kind of hard to sit on your hands any longer. You know, they've watched enough Netflix they've eaten enough food, they're really looking to create a, I would say routine and I know for myself, that's been really positive thing that I've been able to create a new routine inside this capsule. I can't go to the gym I don't have my girlfriend's to walk with. And so I've created my own.

Cindy MacMillan  7:11 

What intrigued me Connie was all your work around your nonprofit leadership and social justice work. How did you become interested in working for underserved women?

Connie Viveros  7:23 

Well, the story is long and winding. And it actually began Cindy, back in the day when we were both in community with Debbie Ford. And at the time, I was so enthralled by Debbie's work. So Debbie's work and the coaching really was first; that was the horse before the cart. We were invited during one of our workshops to help Debbie and her son Beau, who was 13 at the time to build a school in Uganda. And my hand,it was one of those spiritual impulses like my hand flew up in the air and it's like, wait, wait, wait, who whose hand is that up there? And it was okay, I'm in. And upon participating in that, Debbie, as you know, fell ill shortly after around 2009 2010, she was invited to go see the school that she had and her community had built. And she was not well enough to really travel to a third world country for so many reasons. And she looked around the room and said, Connie, why don't you go and I kind of looked over my shoulder like me, like,

Why? Why? Why are you picking on me? You know? Anyway, I thought to myself, I remember going home and getting in my car and driving home and saying, why not? You know, I could that would be a it would be a real act of service. And I love Debbie, as you know, and the work we did with her was just so, so deep and incredibly transformational. So I said yes, and upon that trip going to Africa and seeing the school that her organization, The Collective Heart was called at the time changed my life. It changed my life. I didn't know what to expect going to Africa. And there's a little bit of a story there. But I it's kind of long, but I won't tell you the details of that. But in the end, as I stood there in front of the school that we had helped build, there was a vision that I had seen previously in a meditation that was realized in that moment, and I didn't, hadn't connected those dots. And I went, Oh, my goodness, I'm meant to be here. I mean, this was a seed that was called into my life. And here it is. And it's remarkable. So I got on the plane, I came home from Africa from that trip and had a hard time reconciling that children by virtue of being born, you know, 6000, 7000, 8000 miles away their life circumstance, so entirely different and it wasn't okay with me. So I went on a quest, and I spent the next seven, eight years immersing myself in what more can we do? We are wealthy, wealthy, you know, society regardless of what country you come from, there's enough wealth there are enough resources that we have to be able to fix this. And first, it was children be educated, clean water clearly and girl, the empowerment of girls Cindy, became in my understanding through all my years of working in that and research almost, I think it's not, if not the number one of the top three biggest differences we can make to empower our world to move it forward where we create an equal and just society for all just by empowering girls giving girls a voice.

Cindy MacMillan  10:43 

You know, when you're telling your story, that's actually putting cold chill bumps on me because I love it so much. So is The Inspired Heart Foundation a culmination of The Collective Heart?

Connie Viveros  10:59 

Well through circumstances with Debbie's passing and her transitioning and leaving the earth plane, lots of stuff happened and changed. And yes, I came back to the States, I was spending years working in the realm of Africa and women here in the United States through building my own coaching practice began to say, well, that's great, Connie, that you work with girls in Africa and women in Africa. But what about here? We have so many problems right here domestically in the United States. And I said, I couldn't agree more. And that was the impetus. The seed again, that gestation piece that I said, All right, I'll take that on. And you're right, so we created a sort of a bifurcated empowerment program where it was half 50% domestic 50% International. And what I chose to do is take the work I was currently doing with women to help build their personal empowerment, self-love, self-confidence, value, and worth. And we transitioned that into a program for women who didn't have access. We women could pull out our checkbooks and pay $900 $1000, sometimes multiple thousands of dollars for a weekend retreat with a spiritual luminary. And yet there's this whole segment of our society who are living, they can't afford that. They can't afford a weekend off to sit in a women's circle and, you know, talk and feel uplifted and encouraged and, you know, nurtured by other women. And so that became the program here. Didn't think I had much to offer the low income at risk segment of my population. And yet, when we brought our first cohort of women together for a weekend, I asked how many of you have been to a woman's retreat, not a single hand was raised, and Cindy I just took for granted that you know this time in life, most women are participating and circles have some community of support. Not so not so.

Cindy MacMillan  13:08 

Maybe it's what you're doing online now. How are you bringing the women together? Because I'm getting excited listening to you. I'm thinking, man, how can I do this in Florida?

Connie Viveros  13:19 

Well, my goodness, we can absolutely collaborate offline after this call, let's let's definitely stay in touch. But it was in person. So if you know this segment of our population, the low income as at risk, they don't have as much access, access to transportation, access to technology, etc. And I knew intuitively that we needed to hold them in a very tight container. I mean, there were some women who came in the door on a Friday night. It was much like the work we did with Debbie it was a weekend and if I had let them go Friday night, they would never come back. And so we held them for the entire weekend. So Friday night, Saturday, and then we would release on Sunday. In that time, we create trust and intimacy and community. And by Sunday, crying hugging you are my sister, oh my god falling in love with and in truth, you know creating that environment where women feel they're not alone in their struggle, and it was huge and I was blown away I let spirit lead the way. And he put me she put me to work in a very, very big way and it's part of what I do, but it's one of the most rewarding.

Cindy MacMillan  14:33 

 I can see where that would be rewarding. Having your heart filled with so much love.

Connie Viveros  14:39 

Absolutely. It was already what I was doing. And and the impetus came in a workshop when one of my paying participants and I charge hundreds if thousands of dollars for my work said Connie, every woman needs that how can we make this accessible? And I said All right, I'll take on that challenge and most people who know me know, my middle name is you know, get it done. So you give me a challenge and boom, we get it done. So it's been very rewarding. We've had three cycles of cohorts go through the program. It's a nine-month long mentorship, as well as deep retreat, personal retreat, or transformation where we hold them, we do three retreats a year.

Cindy MacMillan  15:22 

For it to be nine months, that is some really deep work that you're doing.

Connie Viveros  15:27 

And we knew it had to be that model, only because they didn't get this way overnight. You know, many of them were coming in, in their from their late 20s all the way through their 60s. And you know that transformation does not happen overnight. And so we knew that the unfolding and unraveling was going to take place and the transformation was in their commitment and showing up for themselves. And at the end of these programs, the testimonials are just this. It's this you know, it'll bring tears to eyes to hear how they've changed and shifted their own lives and who they're becoming just by being given support and encouragement and someone to believe in them.

Cindy MacMillan  16:10 

And somebody just to listen to them as well?

Connie Viveros  16:12 

Oh, I mean, it's remarkable, someone to open their heart, another sister and to sit and hear their vulnerability and hear their challenges. I'll just tell you one little anecdote. One woman came to us a survivor of domestic violence, abuse, she had been in a long-term abusive relationship. And she always viewed herself through the lens of an abused woman as a negative as something that made her very weak. And she stood up in front of the group one weekend and told her story to a standing ovation and responses of you're so strong, you're so amazing. You're so resilient, and she said, I never thought my story was insensitive. In that moment, Cindy, she shifted her perception of what she had been through. And today you wouldn't recognize her from the woman that walked in the door.

Cindy MacMillan  17:10 

I love hearing those stories, because I think a lot of us also felt that way when we would go out to our weekend workshops with Debbie as well.

Connie Viveros  17:18 

Exactly. And you asked the question to me earlier in your email of you know, was coaching that led me to The Inspired Heart or vice versa? Well, it was the coaching that changed me that allowed me to see more women need to have receive this work, then the other way around, and if we can get this work out to more and more women and men, our world would be a very different, different place to grow up and live in.

Cindy MacMillan  17:49 

Well, I'm definitely going to be in touch with you though. What I can do here.

Connie Viveros  17:53 

Thank you. Thank you. I look forward to that.

Cindy MacMillan  17:55 

You work with self-love, transforming self-doubt to self-love. Can you give us maybe three ways that you do that transformation, to self-love, quite frankly, that we all need and that we all forget.

Connie Viveros  18:10 

Absolutely. And my pleasure and I would say it starts with the foundation. And I remember starting as a coach and I didn't necessarily step into the coaching arena and life coaching, thinking it was necessarily a spiritual practice. But over the years and I've been doing this now for well over 10 years and this was really Debbie's influence upon me way back then, is how deeply spiritual Shadow Work and transformation is, and it can change your life. Once we remove these layers of shame and guilt and fear. And so my first tip is developing a spiritual self-care practice and that can mean something unique for each and every person. And not necessarily just women. But what is self-care, it's meditation, its nature, it could be a walk in nature, it could be listening to deeply meditative music, dancing art, but find some way that you connect to something that is greater than yourself, that pushes you, you walk toward it until it begins to pull you in a way that inspires something within you. So that would be my first tip. And then a second-deep practice is to connect and find a community of likeminded advocates, people who are your champions. We all surround ourselves with so many different types of community. And I even know for me, I spent years trying to fit in, fit into my birth, family fit into my school environments, my college environments, I have friends that I met through my raising three children. And I never felt like I quite fit. And so for me when I finally acknowledged that, you know, I was a spiritual person, and I was going to go meditate and found people that were also pursuing that greater idea. I took this big deep breath and relaxed into likeminded people, people that encouraged me and motivated me and said, yay, you're doing great. And Debbie's community was a big part of that.

Cindy MacMillan  20:31 

Yes, you could just feel at home

Connie Viveros  20:33 

Absolutely. You can just feel your you don't know more pretenses. You're holding your breath trying to be someone or something that you just weren't authentically and I like Debbie's community because we could show up as our brilliant selves, or a hot mess, and we cynically and we were completely accepted. It always shapes it and, and we were celebrated in that way. And the third thing that I think is a very doable thing right now and it sort of is dovetails hand in hand in fist with the first thing is to unplug from technology. I know we believe that this is really our friend and in times like this, Cindy it's actually kept us connected to those communities we've needed. But I believe strongly that there are times and opportunities where we need to go off the grid, we need to completely disengage, put your cell phone away, I like to call it you know, technology fast where I will spend two sometimes an entire weekend where I won't turn on my phone, I won't engage because the inspiration and that is you know, the impulses that come to you from Spirit are in the silence and if we're constantly filling up our time with you know, social media and that syndrome of you know, comparing ourselves and FOMO and all I like to call it JOMO, the joy of missing out, so go for JOMO instead of FOMO. But really, it allows you to get tethered to that spiritual sense. And that's all part of you know, the underlying umbrella of creating a spiritual practice in your life that fulfills you and nurtures you.

Cindy MacMillan  22:20 

Connie, I do agree with you. Ever since I've been on Facebook, I don't know exactly how long that's been, let's say 10 years. At least twice a year. I can't remember what Facebook calls it's now I don't delete it. But I temporarily deactivate it a week at a time because I can find myself getting caught up in comparison. And I just don't want to do that. So I like what you call it a technology fast.

Connie Viveros  22:51 

Detox or whatever you want to call it. Yeah. So we do juice cleanses and food cleanses and exercise cleanses is really we have to do a tech a tech detox and they're finding scientific evidence that you know, we didn't know this when technology and the way in which Facebook came into our lives we didn't know it then because I think it surprised even the people you know, Zuckerberg and his team and all those that have come after him it's surprised them the level of engagement but it's turning into you know, manipulation at its finest in a way that we can't even fully understand and I think for all for us that are awakening and ascending in our spiritual work, we have to be aware and not let us pull us down the rabbit hole and that's really really important that it's become something other than what it once was. What Yeah, and it is getting kind of scary.

Cindy MacMillan  23:49 

We are this time has flown by, Oh, well. I want to get I want to respect your time but I want to get just a couple more things in. What do you wish you had known when you started out as a coach?

Connie Viveros  24:02 

Well, I think I would have liked to know that I was going to become a coach. I went into the work for personal reasons because I knew something deeper and something needed to shift in me internally. You said at the top of your show that you know when you change the insides external change, then Debbie was famous for saying that your outside circumstances are a direct reflection of your inner thought-forms. And my outsides looked really great. But I came to Debbie's work as kind of twisted up angry bitch, and I wanted to get to the source of that because I knew that wasn't who I wanted to be. And it was not allowing me to enjoy everything I had, and had I gone into the training, knowing I was looking to become a coach, I think it would have helped me understand the bigger picture of what I was doing at that time. And at the time I just said, I just want my own transformation. And then it turned into, oh my gosh, everybody needs this and how can I be of service?

Cindy MacMillan  25:18 

You know, I'm reminded, as you're saying that Connie when I went out to San Diego for the Shadow Process when I went out for that, I remember when I got on the plane to come back, that I would never be the same again.

Connie Viveros  25:32 

And we weren't what happened in those rooms. And I and I, again, this phrase, I think is overused and misunderstood. But that spiritual bypass, you know, so many of us are doing the spiritual bypass. And I think that Debbie created a container that allowed us to work our stuff out in a safe, holy container, where we didn't have to blather all over the world and our family and our loved ones anymore. We went in one way, and we came out another and we went home more loving and more peaceful. And over time, I know for me, it changed my life. And now my family didn't change my husband anything but my external circumstances didn't change. It was how I viewed them, and how I was at peace with the life that I had created for the first time ever.

Cindy MacMillan  26:27 

That's right. If you could turn back time and talk to your 18-year-old self, what would you tell her about the season that you're in right now?

Connie Viveros  26:37 

Oh, I would tell her she's loved and she's she matters and that she's doing just fine. And everything's gonna be okay. You're doing your absolute best and we appreciate and love you beyond measure.

Cindy MacMillan  26:54 

This is the perfect place to end because that is beautiful. But before we do finish up completely. How can people follow you on your journey? And how can they support you?   

Connie Viveros  27:13 

Oh, thank you for that question. Well through my classes and my workshops, my website is angelemerging.com and I offer spiritual mentoring and Oracle readings. I have a relationship with sort of channeled information and inspiration. And then my workshops. I have a meetup group as well called Angel Emerging meetup and it's on the West Coast and but like you said, we have online classes now. And then they can contact me by email, which is [email protected].

Cindy MacMillan  27:52 

And I will make sure to put all of this into the show notes so everybody can have your information.

Connie Viveros  27:58 

Thank you, Cindy, so much. And you asked how people can help it is just continuing to be the best version of themselves. And whatever they're bumping up against, get some help, get some mentoring, get some, you know, support for whatever it is you're going through. Very few of us can do it alone. Thank you.

Cindy MacMillan  28:19 

Thank you very much.

Connie Viveros  28:20 

What a pleasure to be with you.

Cindy MacMillan  28:24 

Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life. I enjoyed my conversation with Connie Viveros and I especially liked it when she said, " I had a hard time reconciling that children by virtue of being born 6,000, 7,000 8,000 miles away their circumstances were so entirely different and it wasn’t ok with me.”

Right now, we are in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s our turn to say, it is not ok and how can I help? How can I contribute and make a difference? What feels right to me at this moment?

Here are just a few things to consider:

• Donate to your local food bank
• Support local nonprofits
• Check on your neighbors
• Be kind
• Take care of yourself

If you live in Brevard County Florida consider United Way of Brevard, Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida, The Children's Hunger Project, or The Salvation Army of South Brevard County. There are so many wonderful organizations to consider. Just take action.         

Make sure to visit our website, CynthiaMacMillan.com. While you're at it, if you found value in this show we'd appreciate you simply telling a friend about the show, that will help us out. Until next time, live inspired!

Cindy: (00:00)
This is Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast episode # 10. I’m Cindy MacMillan and today’s guest is Deborah LeeAnn.

(00:08)
Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for women over 40 who are trying to be everything to everyone and forgetting themselves in the process. Each week, join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well.

(00:40)
Welcome back to Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast. I appreciate that you are spending time with me today and I am so happy to share my conversation with Deborah LeeAnn with you. As a teacher, mentor and dynamic example of feminine empowerment, Deborah has spent 25 years bringing positive change to organizations through Leadership and Staff Development Training, in corporate HR and as a small business and nonprofit consultant. Now she brings that deep experience to a wider range of women through the Authentic Leadership Academy, marrying the Art & Science of Women’s Leadership in programs that—Illuminate, Ignite and Inspire.

(01:23)
Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast Deborah LeeAnn! I'm so happy you're here.

Deborah LeeAnn: (01:28)
Oh, I am delighted and honored. Thank you for inviting me.

Cindy: (01:32)
I want to tell you, thank you for the centering exercise that we did before we hit record because I feel awesome and ready for this conversation.

Deborah LeeAnn: (01:43)
Oh, I'm glad I couldn't live in this these days without that practice.

Cindy: (01:47)
It was wonderful. So you know, you and I met eight years ago at a training in Colorado and a lot has changed since our first meeting. So I'm really excited that we're being able to do this on the podcast. So thank you.

Cindy: (02:03)
What does exploring the seasons of life mean to you personally or in your business?

Deborah LeeAnn: (02:08)
Oh, I have a draft of a book actually about the different quadrants of my life and how I explored each one and I, interestingly, I didn't really dabble. I went straight on into intellect for the longest time as my first early days and my business career. And then I feel like I hit this other season when I got married at the ripe young age of 37 and had my children at 38 and 40 and that opened my heart and it was a whole new place of being. It was a very different way of living. And then after that, when after going through a divorce, I went into a deep dive spiritually and explored out there I think on every single world religion and a lot of different teachers. The last piece that came to me, and it was around the same time I met you, Cindy, was around the embodiment.

Deborah LeeAnn: (03:11)
And that was the key for me. It was just the final piece that allowed me to integrate all of the others. So I feel like my seasons have been in those kinds of quadrants, but I'm a big believer in seasons. I use it as my editorial calendar on how I send my teachings out. I'm like, it's all about April and growth right now for me. You know, all the spring things happening. Believe also with a woman, you know, going from the girl and the maiden to the woman to the crone. I think I'm also entering that last phase of the crone. I don't like the name crone, but you know that teacher, right? That elder, that wise woman that feels comfortable to me and that feels like it is the role I'm playing. So I use that analogy kind of a shamanic close to mother earth kind of talk in various ways in my life. So I really love the name of your show.

Cindy: (04:08)
Oh, thank you. As I mentioned to you when we were talking earlier, I asked that question on every podcast and I love all the answers that I get. There's a common thread that runs through them, but yet they are different in some way. So thank you for sharing. And what does it mean to be an empowered feminine woman?

Deborah LeeAnn: (04:31)
Oh, I think I'm redefining that whole thing of empowerment that we heard about back in the nineties it was very much about appearing strong and being masculine and really, you know, going for it. And that even the terms lean-in kind of rubbed me the wrong way because it was very much about, I already was the workaholic. I already gave up my life for someone else's income. Right? And now I feel that redefining is coming back into the center where our power source is within, and it's not about the external validation any longer. So once we own who we are, warts and all shadows and light, then we can actually express ourselves in that way, which models it for everyone. And it also gives an invitation to, it's okay for you to be you because I'm being me. Those are just a couple of ways of how I describe what it means to be a feminine and empowered leader.

Cindy: (05:34)
You know, when you talked earlier about embodying, I'm really, I feel like I'm starting to embody that empowered feminine woman that I am. Absolutely. And it takes a while Deborah for that to happen, you know, for just women in general. But once you start there, it really feels good.

Deborah LeeAnn: (06:02)
Yeah. Yeah. And, and you can't go back. It's like once you've opened that Pandora's box, you can't close it.

Cindy: (06:08)
Exactly. So I'd like to ask you, in the last three to five years, what new belief, behavior or habit has most changed your life? Now I know we talked a little bit about the centering, and you said you couldn't live without that. Is there something else that you're doing that you can share that would help another woman as she's moving forward?

Deborah LeeAnn: (06:38)
Yes. I believe I finally realized that the work that I'm doing isn't necessarily for others. It's for me. And I feel that it allowed me to start expressing myself more fully and stop hiding. And I think that many women we've been programmed to stay small, quiet, invisible. I was anyway. And our culture does that a lot. So how do we overcome that and start being seen and start speaking our truth and start showing up as our full amazing selves. It took a lot of me believing that I could. And then somehow, just by continuing, I did these weekly things years ago, 2014 through 2020. I mean like four or five years in a row of doing a weekly five-minute weekly wisdom video blog. And I did that for years to no one. I mean I rarely had one or two people ever listen or watch it.

Deborah LeeAnn: (07:47)
It didn't matter because I was doing it for me, but now that is what has allowed some of my clients to find me. Some people to come and say would speak at a conference, you know, all of a sudden all of those things that I put out there are feeding me. But at the time I felt like I was talking to like like you know how you talked to the green light on your computer? Like nobody there so that there is, but I was doing it for me. So that's what I finally switched it. So it doesn't have to be that I have an audience, you know? And that's what all of a sudden I went, Oh, all the work I'm doing in the world. It's not necessarily for the world. It's for me to be expressed. And then that's what actually makes it in service to the world. So.

Cindy: (08:35)
And it's also with you taking that action every week for years, that has also allowed you to become the woman that you are in your business. And like you said, how you're being found. Because I will say that I sometimes wonder, well, is anybody listening to this podcast and when I told my daughter that she's going to be 35 next month, she's like, mom, it doesn't matter if anybody listens. It's what you are putting out. So it's the same thing that you're basically saying.

Deborah LeeAnn: (09:10)
Yeah. Yes. Absolutely.

Cindy: (09:12)
So what is one characteristic that you believe every female leader should possess?

Deborah LeeAnn: (09:18)
Grounded confidence and who they are is more than enough. I mean they need to own that. It's one thing to say it, which is what I did for a number of years. And when it switched to actually being in my cells that I believed I am valuable, that it's totally everything in my life, my love life, my money life, my career, life, my relationships with my daughters, everything, my relationships with girlfriends. It's so amazing to me. How that little, and it was just a little thing, and I can't even tell you when that little chink fell into place and it went, ah, but I know, I know that it's, it's part of it was believing that I am worthy.

Cindy: (10:08)
Deborah, can you talk just a little bit more about grounded confidence? I mean, what, what does that mean? How, how do we even go about finding that?

Deborah LeeAnn: (10:18)
I think it's, this is where I feel it's extremely important to work with someone else, a girlfriend, a trusted confidant, a mentor, you know, if you have a boss or someone in the field that can support you. I had a number of coaches and spiritual teachers and eventually then girlfriends and support groups that had supported me that would say, you know, I see you working with global women leaders and I'm like, I know I want that. But the fact that I had that external validation, I needed to hear that. So it also is a reminder when you forget, which we all do, how fabulous you are to call that sister or that friend or that boss and go, okay, I know I did that. When I, after my divorce, I called my old boyfriend. I said, tell me how good I am. Tell me how amazing I am.

Deborah LeeAnn: (11:11)
He said, Oh my gosh. And he was great. He took me out for a whole day. We went out and had a ball running around visiting the sites in St. Louis and he just reminded me of who I am. And you need, we need people because we forget. So to have those folks that can help be reminders or tethers back to who we really are that allow us to be fully ourselves is really important. The grounded confidence is so different than pretending that you're confident. And that's the difference. And I think a lot of this fake it till you make it thing, it comes off as inauthentic, which is, that's another story for another day about why I named my business Authentic Leadership Academy and but part of it is because people couldn't know. They didn't know who the real me was, and once I found that piece and realized, Oh, this is me, and then owning it, and you take that ownership of how amazing you are all the way down into that space between your hips, below your belly button, your dantian, your power center, it's the center of your gravity and when you can breathe into that and let that fill you, that's how you will transmit in a way that sounds like grounded confidence because it is.

Deborah LeeAnn: (12:35)
It is actually based in your belief in you.

Cindy: (12:39)
So that's also embodying, right?

Deborah LeeAnn: (12:42)
Absolutely. It's the same thing, right? It's embodiment in a way that's beyond your knowing, your knowing is deep into your cells and into your full body.

Cindy: (12:54)
What do you think about meditation to get you there? Would that be considered the same thing as a centering exercise? Okay.

Deborah LeeAnn: (13:05)
My daughter goes for runs. That's her way of centering. It also helps her get in her body, right? You have to breathe fully. Your open chested so that you can so that your mind, heart, body, and soul are in sync. Yoga can get there, but everybody has to find their own way. And meditation scares people because they're like, I can't sit still, you know? So what is it that you can do to allow your mind to kind of take a back seat? And I had just written a blog about this, about my grandmother used to call it putzing. So for me, it's to go putz in the garden or to just futz around in the house. Kind of moving things around, shaking up the energy a little bit. My brain isn't on tap for that and it is, it's rejuvenating, it's renewing for me. So everybody needs to find their way. Meditation, I believe works. I believe even if you're sitting and looking out at a tree out the window, you don't have to have your eyes closed and all that stuff. But I mean just being still slowing down.

Cindy: (14:12)
I liked that you mentioned it's, it's really finding our own way because you hear so many the podcasts and the books that I read, you know, it's always about really one way, you know, sitting still in meditation and you're right, not everybody can sit still like that. So it's finding our own way

Deborah LeeAnn: (14:34)
It's definitely a pause. It's putting your life on pause, which is I think this pandemic is allowing us to tap into that. Right? We are slowing down and we are looking at our inner landscape. It's not about reading the New York Times. I mean slowing down is one thing but I can get lost on reading the news on my phone. That's not supportive. So what is a way that allows you to quiet your mind, quiet yourself and whatever that is? Sometimes for me, it's doing dishes, you know?

Cindy: (15:05)
Yeah. Love it. Thank you.

Deborah LeeAnn: (15:07)
Sure.

Cindy: (15:08)
What is one mistake you witness female leaders making more frequently than others? And Deborah, one of the reasons I keep referencing women is because the podcast is geared to and going out to women. And because you've been in that leadership role for so many years, I would like to speak to the women.

Deborah LeeAnn: (15:31)
Actually 100% of my clients right now are women. So I believe that women leaders are the ones that are going to change the world, right? So I'm so happy to have this audience. It's my favorite place. I think that the one mistake that very many women leaders do is they forget to be feminine. They try to play the game like the guys, they forget that they bring just as much, if not more wisdom by owning all of their feminine traits. And again, that's that integration and it's the being our whole selves. So if we're closing off some of our natural wisdom and abilities by shutting down and being so intellectual, then we're not able to really tap into our relational as much or our spiritual or what's our body is telling us. And each of those wisdoms is what, when you integrate all of those, that's what makes a feminine leader so powerful. Yeah. I think what happens is we trade off our very powerful brains. We'd rather have that because that's what gets us recognized and we trade off the relational piece. We trade off the connecting, the collaborative, the wanting to take care of others and bring others along just as much and that mentoring and developing is crucial for women right now, whether we're mentoring and developing or we're being mentored and developed, we need that from other women.

Cindy: (17:02)
Speaking of mentoring, do you think in the workplace that if you, let's say for example, work for someone that is very powerful in their field, that they can be a mentor from a distance or do you think mentoring needs to be one on one conversations, and I'm asking this personally for myself.

Deborah LeeAnn: (17:24)
I think it could be either, Cindy, I have found mentoring through like reading, like you talked about the Marianne Williamson book earlier. Right. I think of her as a personal mentor. It's like, are you writing this book for me? I think you are. And Danielle LaPorte and I've got a few others that I just so adore and I love their words and they speak to me on a deep cellular level and then there's that I may only see once every three years, but their wisdom is so important to my continued development that I appreciate that there's others that I see on a regular basis that I serve on boards with and so I have a more regular conversation with them. So it just depends. It depends on what they're mentoring you for. You know, if there's someone who might be teaching you how to run a meeting or if there's another whose their communication style is intriguing to you or their writing style, or if there's another who's like, how does she balance it all?

Deborah LeeAnn: (18:25)
She looks amazing. She takes care of herself and you know, she has this, you know, so that would be something I would sit with at the, at her feet and go, how do you do your calendar like that? But having someone who knows you on a day to day basis is really helpful because they can help say, you know what, this is an area that I'm seeing that you're sticking yourself in the foot. If you could stop putting the handbrake on this, this way that you're holding yourself back, you'll grow even faster.

Cindy: (18:58)
You know, I'm thinking about a woman that I worked with, it has to be at least 20 years ago. She looked fabulous. She was a fantastic leader and I remember saying to her one time, how do you do it all? And she said, I put me first in the calendar. That was the first time I had ever heard that. When she said, I put me first in the calendar.

Deborah LeeAnn: (19:23)
Yeah. And that's why she looked like that. Right. She probably took care of herself and ate well and exercised and still got it all done.

Cindy: (19:34)
And still got it all done. She sure did. Thanks.

Deborah LeeAnn: (19:39)
Sure.

Cindy: (19:39)
What woman inspires you and why do they inspire you?

Deborah LeeAnn: (19:43)
Oh man. I knew you were going to ask me this. Um, I have so many. There are people that, because they have an audience like Michelle Obama, when the fact that she's going on, you know, public television and reading books to children every day, there's, there's people who are doing good, just because they can. But there's also, like I said earlier, there's those authors, you know, Elizabeth Gilbert and they're so inspirational. I mean, when I read her book about lying on the floor in the bathroom, crying, thinking I'll never get up in Eat Pray Love

Deborah LeeAnn: (20:19)
I remember thinking, Oh my God, has she been, did she have a camera in my house when I was going through my, you know, it's like, so there are, and then to see where she has come, you know. J.K. Rowling, the way she wrote those Harry Potter books, which I read each one out loud to my children. So I got the download on that one. They were so spiritual and so well woven together and I'm thinking if I ever write a book, you know, so there's, I have thousands of women that I think are amazing. I think each woman has amazing gifts and once they tap in and start expressing them, I'm like, Oh, look at that. So, you know, I get excited about each one.

Deborah LeeAnn: (21:06)
Well, you know, and I think it's like w like we've just talked about, you know, it's just women in general. I think you said it earlier, they're just amazing. And as they, as they get older, they become more beautiful and more amazing in totally different ways. I, you know, there's days I remember being in my fifties and looking in the mirror going, who are you? I don't even recognize you. And I was starting to get gray and you know, all of these things were happening to my face and these new lines would show up. And now I'm 63 I'll be 64 this year. And I look in the mirror and I'm like, dang, you are cute. I'm like, I look so much better than my grandmother and my mother did it. My, I'm just like, I'm like, I have this love affair with myself, which is, it is true that we are when we come into our own, it's like that Rose that just keeps blooming and even if it gets a little tinge on the edges, it's still beautiful and has an amazing scent. That's, I believe that's so true. Cindy,

Cindy: (22:13)
You know what? Speaking of the Marianne Williamson book, it's called The Age of Miracles. I just want to read this line to you because I love it. "Midlife is our second chance. If you want to spend the years you have left simply reenacting the same dramas of your past, you can. The same script will indeed becoming around again for your review. It always does. But if you choose, you can take the script and give it an awesome rewrite, totally get on top of your material, and take a bow at the end that blows everyone away."

Deborah LeeAnn: (22:48)
Beautiful. I got chills. That was perfect. And I can't say it any better. It's exactly where we're at too. And so for you to connect with me at this time, you know, almost a decade after we first met, it's and so much has changed for us, both talk about seasons. I still don't think that I'm in my winter though, I'm in my fall, I'm in the abundance time, like where I'm gathering all of the fruits where all of the pieces are starting to come together and it's like, I, you know, I'm not quite at that big feast yet, but um, I know I've got a ways to go before I'm going to just be the wise woman and sit back and let you know and be in my winter. I'm not there yet.

Cindy: (23:32)
Episode 15 I am going to talk all about why I've started this podcast and about my journey. I'm gonna put myself out there.

Deborah LeeAnn: (23:45)
Yay. It's a big journey for you and for us.

Cindy: (23:46)
Yes. For all of us. What book has most influenced your life and why? And I'm thinking now that might not be a good question because I think you're like me, you love lots of books. But is there one in particular that is just or two that just really has spoken to you over the years?

Deborah LeeAnn: (24:08)
I think one of the ones that started turning me into me was A Return To Love. It was the first one by Marianne Williamson that I read. Oh, 20 something years ago. The very, very, very first book that I read for self-improvement back in 1980 or so was called What You Think of Me is None of My Business. And I refer to that phrase over and over and over again in my training. So I would say those two the basis. Now obviously I've got eight bookshelves just in the living room. I've got plenty to draw from.

Cindy: (24:51)
And you know, those two books I've heard of the Marianne Williamson book and I have plenty of others of hers, but I don't think I've read that one. I'll have to go back and have a look at it.

Deborah LeeAnn: (25:05)
A Return To Love.

Cindy: (25:06)
Yeah. Is there anything I should have asked you that I didn't?

Deborah LeeAnn: (25:11)
I think it's important to let everyone know that a lot of times we have to go through some dark nights of the soul or dark months of the soul or dark years of the soul. And I want, it's kind of like being in this time right now. It's what actually forges the strength of who we are. It actually squeezes out the becoming. There's something, it's like the birth right when we were all born or if you had the opportunity to birth a child, there's something really that pain delivers this most amazing, something new that the world has never seen. And I, I feel that that is important that everybody knows that that's a part of the process. It's a part of the seasons, you know, and I've, and I've had many, but now I'm learning to recognize, Oh this just means something new is coming. So it's hard because I judge it and I'm like, what is this? Is it depression? I want to analyze it, name it. And sometimes I just have to just slow down, be with it and allow and be curious. What's, what's coming forth. And this is another transformation; because they all are.

Cindy: (26:33)
Yeah, those dark nights of the soul, I was probably still in one when you and I first met and I have since come out of that is the way we learn. Yeah. I think you said it the other day when we were talking, I believe you said "nobody gets to skip day one". Maybe it wasn't you. I don't know. But somebody said that to me. I thought it was you. And I felt that is so true. Nobody gets to skip day one.

Deborah LeeAnn: (27:13)
Right. We all get to be freshmen again, again and again and again. Or in kindergarten. Sometimes I say.

Cindy: (27:21)
So our time is almost up and I want to be very respectful of your time, but if you could turn back time and talk to your 18-year-old self, what would you tell her about the season of life you're in right

Deborah LeeAnn: (27:35)
Oh, I would say we need to reprogram what great-grandma and grandma and mom have said to you about aging because this is a whole nother chapter of beauty and love and expansion and growth and excitement and fullness that we weren't ever shared. You know, all the old women in my family modeled that it was a time of pain and grief and sorrow and blah, blah, blah, and you know how much they fought it fought the aging. And I just, I want to be one of those people that's known as aging with grace and I, and I want every age to have its own significance. But this one has a huge significance. So yeah. So to look forward to it, it's a fun time.

Cindy: (28:28)
Thank you. Thank you for being on the podcast. I really appreciate it. This was a fun conversation.

Deborah LeeAnn: (28:34)
It was, thank you.

Cindy: (28:35)
Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life. I enjoyed my conversation with Deborah LeeAnn. I loved our whole conversation but especially liked it when she said, “It’s OK for you to be you because I’m being me.” You can find more about Deborah at DeborahLeeAnn.com.

(28:56)
Visit our website, CynthiaMacMillan.com and sign up for our weekly newsletter. Until next time, live inspired!

Cindy: [00:00:00] This is Episode 9 with Integrative Life and Cancer Coach Marisa Harris.

Cindy: [00:00:06] Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for everyday women who are trying to be everything to everyone and forgetting themselves in the process. Each week, join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well.

[00:00:35] Welcome back, everyone, to Exploring the Seasons of Life. I am excited about our guest today. Her name is Marisa Harris. Marisa has spoken and led workshops all over the world.  Her cancer experience has been featured in numerous newspapers and magazines, including The New York Times, Newsweek, Time, Spirituality & Health, For Women First, Healthy Living, Weill Cornell Medicine Magazine, and The Outpost Exchange.  She has also made television appearances on such networks as NBC, CNN, and Fox News, and on Discovering Health with Mehmet Oz.

Marisa: [00:01:16] Cindy, I am so excited and pleased to be here.

Cindy: [00:01:19] This is now my signature question. What does exploring the seasons of life mean to you personally or in your business?

Marisa: [00:01:27] So Cindy, when I think of the seasons of life, I think of a change that has taken place, a change that is, you know, bracketed between a beginning and an ending.

Marisa: [00:01:42] And each season, whether it's the season such as spring or a season of a new aspect of life that we enter into invites us or indeed commands us into to live in a new reality. And I cannot help but, you know, speak to today in the context of what is happening right now, because we are all experiencing a new season of life, a new reality that has been set upon us. And with this, we are all going through uncertainty and disruptions and turmoil and even the threat of death. And this new season has, in fact, a beginning date.

Marisa: [00:02:32] It's hard for me to believe that December 1, 2019 was the first case in this COVID-19 crisis. And the question that I keep asking, I think many of us are asking is when will this end and what will this end look like?

Marisa: [00:02:52] And then comes the question, you know, within this start date and within this end date, how do we deal with and I love what you call it; those messy bits in-between?

Marisa: [00:03:05] Just another thing comes up for me. I like going into cemeteries. I love looking at the tombstones. And I look, I look at the date somebody was born, the date someone, you know, died.

Marisa: [00:03:26] And I guess I glance a little bit at that dash in between, but I don't really pay attention to that. And when you spoke about those messy bits in-between, I think where our attention should really be is that dash. So right now, I think the invitation for us is how do we want how to live in these messy bits in-between right now? How do we keep the faith?

Marisa: [00:03:57] How do we keep a sense of well-being? A sense of inner power as well when we don't know where this road is going to take us.

Cindy: [00:04:10] Marisa, thank you very much, because that has been on everybody's minds. Right before we got on the podcast, I happened to turn on the news, which I'm trying very hard not to. And when it starts going through everything, you're right, we're in a messy bit and we're having to get through it. And I'm finding that we're all getting through this together. Little by little.

Cindy: [00:04:38] How did you first become interested in becoming a cancer coach? What's the story?

Marisa: [00:04:45] Ok, well, I'm not sure I really became interested in becoming a Cancer Coach. In fact, if someone had told me twenty-one years ago that Marisa, you are going to become a Cancer Coach, I would not have understood what they were even talking about. So twenty-one years ago, a new season was thrust upon me and it was April 21, 1998. You know, it had a beginning date, and everything changed on that day. I was told, Cindy, I have stage four pancreatic cancer. And I was told by these leading doctors that there was absolutely nothing that could be done for me, that I was medically untreatable, medically incurable, and that I would absolutely die in six months. I guess I had a very short dash, according to these doctors. After a couple of weeks when I was able to move out of that shock and feeling like I was already dead already, I asked an important question. I asked myself, does every single person with stage four pancreatic cancer or stage 4 cancer, do they all die in this very limited time? Does anyone ever get better? Does anyone ever live longer? And that just opened all kinds of possibilities for me. And it led me to go, it was 1998, the Internet was not as we know it. It led me to the New York City Public Library. And I with the help of this wonderful librarian, I read hundreds and hundreds of stories and studies about people who are living longer than the arts with Stage 4 cancer. And some of them were even getting better. And yes, some of them were dying, but they all seem to be finding more happiness in their lives.

Marisa: [00:06:52] And they had a different way of thinking and believing about their life. And they were doing so many different things that seemed to improve both the quality and the quantity of their lives. So I wrote down every single thing that they were doing, whether it was diet or exercising or prayer or acupuncture or journaling. I mean, that was just some of the things. And I decided at that moment that I was going to create what I called, in fact, it's still on my website, the Cancer Defense Program. I was going to build my defense resources so that I could hopefully live longer. You know, I had this vision. I wanted to see my three daughters grow up. I had this vision that I wanted that I could see myself dancing with my husband at each of their weddings. But I also made the decision that if I did have, let's say, less than a year to live, that I was going to use this diagnosis of cancer to make this the happiest time of my life, the most authentic time of my life. And I love what you are talking about in terms of, you know, what your podcasts are about because it is so much about our thinking and our believing and bringing our inner resources to the worst of circumstances. And when we do that and when we connect with fellow travelers and loving souls, life gets much better. So I started using all these tools and practices and I started feeling better.

Marisa: [00:08:41] And even before medically things changed, I realize that I have never felt happier in my life. I have never felt more authentically me.

Marisa: [00:08:54] And people were seeing that people who had cancer, people who were with me in the chemotherapy room, people who knew people who had cancer, and they were coming to me and saying, can you share with me?

Marisa: [00:09:09] Can you can you share with me what you are doing? I want what you're experiencing.

Marisa: [00:09:15] And I realized at that time that life was inviting me into a new season, not just my own personal experience, but how could I help people who were told that there's no hope for them. How can I help people live a life that was healthier and happier, regardless of what the experts and the statistics say?

Cindy: [00:09:42] I love that. And, you know, today as we're recording, it's April the 7th. So that date, April 21st is coming up. And here you are.

Marisa: [00:09:52] And here I am. Yes. And I thought back then, you know, that was it, that I was never going to have another birthday and never see another spring. So I've had many springs and many birthdays. And I've had wonderful moments like those messy bits in-between, which in many ways, I mean, I don't want to paint this, that it was just, you know, all lilies and roses. There were some really tough challenges along the way, as they are for the thousands of people that I have coached who have had a diagnosis of cancer. But there is also there's always that silver lining. We just have to look for it. We have to make it welcome.

Cindy: [00:10:37] Well, I love when you started off, you were saying you asked yourself that powerful question because it's asking those questions that we can sometimes get to the heart of what's really going on?

Cindy: [00:10:52] Yes. So what were your personal and professional challenges when you started becoming a Cancer Coach?

Marisa: [00:11:03] Well, it's sort of the same challenges that I was going through because when I started coaching; it wasn't a career at that time, it was more of just what I was offering. But I was coaching 6 - 7 months, you know, into this. And so I think my challenges were, how do we deal with the pain, the suffering that does come, how do we move from that place? I mean, I had a great life before. Many of the people that I got to know in the cancer world, they had great lives before. And there was a part of the subset that we want to go back to that life. Why can't we go back to that life? And I'm going to relate that to today, similar to cancer, a diagnosis of cancer affects so many different parts of your life. What do you do from an economically, financially? Well, the work that you're doing, I mean, it just your family, your children, you know, everything. And so says this virus. And we'll never go back to what it was like before December 1, 2019. And for all of us, for my challenge and for also for the people that I was coaching is not only that we can't go back, but what are some things that may have contributed to our getting cancer? And I say this not in a way of blaming ourselves or I did this wrong or whatever, but there may be some things that we have done that actually made the environment within ourselves more open to getting this.

Marisa: [00:12:56] So what are those things that we have to give up? And so the challenge for some of us is giving up foods that we still love and that we grew up with. And the challenge for me, and for so many of my clients, is losing all our hair. The challenge of cancer of losing part of your body. And they're dealing with all the other things that are still going on in their life. So those were a number of challenges. And then I think together and through coaching, we come up with strategies and problem-solving tools that enable us not only to work through most of the challenges but actually make us stronger. That actually makes us more resilient. I can maybe talk a little bit about that. And then I think the other challenge, which is for myself and with my cancer clients, is the challenge of allowing us to really step into that place of what if I were to die in a shorter period of time? We live in such a culture that we don't want to talk about it. We want to make believe it's not going to happen. We only want miracles. And we don't want to even think of the possibility of not a miracle. And yet an essential part of how to live a good life - is the ability to say what a good death looks like - if I were to die 6 months from now or even 60 years from now.

Cindy: [00:14:47] Marisa, I love what you just said also about not talking about death and what would a good death look like. That is so important. That just really touched my heart when you brought that up. What are the benefits of Cancer Coaching?

Marisa: [00:15:04] I will talk about it more from what I've seen in the now 17 years that I've been coaching. I don't know a lot of cancer coaches; I know lots and lots of coaches. So many things I'm going to say, Cindy, apply to all good coaching experiences and I think number one is the foundational benefit of being in a good coaching situation is that it offers us a safe place, a place where we can bring anything and everything we're feeling and experiencing. I know for me and this has been true for so many of my clients that we're afraid to really express all our fears and fantasies and I think especially the fears of the people we love because we don't want to make them more upset or afraid. If we keep on talking about how afraid we are, we're afraid people are going to run away from us or whatever. So this is a place where everything is welcome, that nothing is off-limits. It's a way of also really becoming more accepting and compassionate with yourself. You're going through a really, really hard time. And it's so important that we validate people's experiences. So I do both individual coachings as well as I do group coaching. And I think my group coaching is more about how do we create this safe and open place? But also within this, how did we bring in joy? So we dance together, we sing together, we pray together. We love each other. The other benefit of again it's coaching is that we have the opportunity to really explore what would we love our life to look like in whatever time we have left. You know, no one knows exactly how much time, but if we were living a life that really was a reflection of our highest priorities, what would that look like?

Marisa: [00:17:25] So with the coaching I do, we call the diagnosis of cancer, our permission slip to live the life that we would love rather than what someone else thinks we should love than, you know, and things like that. And then we ask the question, and this can be the challenging part. So what are the things that I'm currently doing that I need to let go of or alter or change because they're really not supporting my desire to get well again? And what are those things that I need to bring in more of; that broccoli or that cruciferous vegetables and more of the grassy kind of drinks that we drink and much and much, much more. So that's a big part of it. And then, as I mentioned before, is which I consider such an important part, not just during this journey of cancer, but for our whole life, is how do we develop and how do we actually nurture because we already have them those resilience skills so that when major challenges come our way, that we're able to get back up, get back on that road, that we're able to maintain or at least reach or regain our sense of well-being, our sense of effectiveness, our sense of faith in light of these major, major challenges. And there are. I mean, I work with twelve different resilience capabilities that everyone has. But for some people, some of that may be a little small and we just grow them.

Marisa: [00:19:14] And that makes us that's probably in some ways what's most needed today. So people really understand and what resilience is. And all the things that contribute to it. So there are two resilience, two of the many resilience tools. That are the ones that give us the energy to deal with the challenge when we're facing a major challenge. It requires much more energy from us when we're doing the same thing over. It doesn't require them much, but change and challenge requires much more. So the two basic resilience skills that all that fuel our positivity that we can see within the darkness, we can see some light within the challenge, we can see some opportunities. And the other one is. So one is looking out there and recognizing or making those opportunities and the other one is looking within ourselves and that's building our confidence. And particularly when a challenge is overwhelming, we tend to forget we have amnesia that we have over a lifetime. We have dealt with so many challenges and we have so much experience and skills and abilities and connections and resources and to pull them out and then see how we can use them.

Marisa: [00:20:41] And facing these challenges with sensitivity and there are many more. I talked a little bit about connection, and connections, reaching out to others, asking for help. This is so difficult for people, you know, that we want people to offer to guess what we need. And we have to be able to have the courage and strength. It takes a lot of strength to ask for help. But most of the time, people are very willing to help. And the more specific we can be, the easier it actually is for the other person. So there's that's another resilience skill. And so is priorities. That's what I said at the beginning. We work with that. There's so many things coming at us. And so to get very clear on those things that are most important or else we're going to get pulled in so many different directions. So those are just some of those resilience skills that we work on.

Cindy: [00:21:47] And you know what was coming up for me Marisa as you were talking; was when you were talking about asking for help. And I'm going back to what's happening now with the COVID-19, people being able to ask for help. And you're right. People are so willing to do whatever they need to do.

Marisa: [00:22:07] We see that. I mean, we see it. People are coming over, especially to people they see are having difficulties and saying, can I help you? Can I go shopping for you? You know, people are reaching out and calling people and leaving little, you know, sending messages to people. How are you doing? There's so much kindness and loving connection that's going on. That's particularly now, as you say, Cindy. It's even more important that we pick up the phone or send a text or message and say, I need help in this area. Can you help me? And then, of course, this is also a resilience tool, is being a source of help that goes both ways.

Cindy: [00:22:59] Absolutely. I just wanted to ask you this. What are just a couple of ways that we can help somebody that has cancer to be of service to them?

Marisa: [00:23:13] So it depends upon your relationship with the person. There was a huge study, Cindy, that was sent to thousands of people. How do you feel most loved? And they tallied up everything and the overwhelming number one reason and 10000 people participated and that is being listened to. So the most helpful thing you can do is listen to the person and don't offer advice. I mean, I just saw that last week on the group that I was doing, someone was saying, well, you should be doing this and you should be doing that. And that's not if the person wants that advice and wants help, let them ask for it. So that's some of us can just be a soft place, feel welcome place for that person to talk about what's going on. Then the other way that you can help people is, I mean, you know, again, it depends upon the situation. So if a person has young children and many, many of my clients do, and I also work a lot with spouses who are they're taking they're always women, the spouses who want to work with me because they're directing their husband's whole treatment.

[00:24:31] But if you know, they have young children, can I pick them up to school or take them to school in the morning? My little Johnny is on the same soccer team. You know, I'll take him and bring him back and forth. You know, I cook every night. I'd love to, bring some food over or cook some food. So you just you know, if you know the person, you'll have a sense of what might be helpful. It's what's very hard for a person who has cancer is when you say, well, tell me what I can do to help you. It puts them on the spot. They feel like they're going to ask so much. So it makes. Can I go shopping for you? Can I think for you? Can I pick up your children? Can I pick up medicines? Can I? I'm a great driver. I can drive you anyplace. You know what I think of practical things?

Cindy: [00:25:32] Yeah. So it's offering practical things that can help where somebody would be, not afraid to ask, but feel like they're imposing. And so if you make that offer that makes it makes it kinder.

Marisa: [00:25:48] Yes, and Cindy, when you asked me about challenges this is another one for so many people is asking for help.

Cindy: [00:26:01] In your coaching, how do you work with people around their limiting beliefs?

Marisa: [00:26:04] Well, first, everybody has limiting beliefs. It's worldwide. We see it, you know, with our politicians. So I think that's one of the things that which is just knowing that all of us believe in some ways that we're not enough, that we're not deserving, that we've done something in the past that somehow, you know, either cause. I mean, I. OK. Well, like I caused this because I was you know, I wasn't resting enough. It's such a stressful job. And, you know, the way I was. I mean, just this sense of blaming and everything. So how we work with this is, first of all, bringing it to the surface. I mean, these are wounds. And you know, it's similar to a real wound. You have to bring it to the surface, see what's going on. And the way to clean it out is first recognizing and being in a safe place of admitting. I don't really feel like I deserve to get well. I don't think I have enough to do these things, to change my diet.

Marisa: [00:27:16] So, you know, just all these other things and then really to shine the light of truth on it. Do you really think it's so? If you were your own best friend in this, your best friend, would you really think they don't deserve to get well? Do you really believe that they don't have any resources to make their life better and to identify some ways where? That's why I love the thing on confidence where they can recognize all the things that they have done, you know, that that makes them so deserving and so important in this life. You know, that so many people, even in the past, I mean, if we hadn't done some little things, people would not be as happy. Some people wouldn't even be alive. There were little things that we've done. So we absolutely deserve to get well again. But one thing that's related to it is that all our limiting beliefs under it there's a fear.

Marisa: [00:28:22] There's just fear that we're not good enough or the fear that even if we are deserving, the worst is going to happen. So a lot of my work is how do we befriend our fears and how do we give them space and time so that they don't permeate and take over our whole life, but we give it some space that we listen to and we put a name on it and the work we do. So like mine is fearful Fanny, because I had a very fearful grandmother. And let that fearful part of us just say I'm afraid I'm going to die. I'm afraid I'm never going to get well. I'm afraid. But that we give it a specific time, because otherwise that fearful part of ourselves is going to come to bed with us and it's going to be going to the doctor's office with us and it's going to go to the soccer games I take my kids to. So in a sense, it sounds like we're quarantining it. But then in that time, we give it a lot of attention.

Cindy: [00:29:28] Thank you for going over that and I want to be respectful of your time because this time is just flying by. So let me just jump to this.

Cindy: [00:29:39] If you could turn back time and talk to your 18-year-old self. What would you tell her about the season of life you are in now?

Marisa: [00:29:49] Oh, the season of life I'm in now and not the season that she was in as an 18-year-old. OK.

[00:29:58] The season of life that I'm in now. I would just tell that 18-year-old, you know, just trust in life and depending upon people's beliefs, trust in God, and trust in yourself. There is a wonderful, wonderful life ahead of you with a lot of messy bits but she'll get stronger, you know, through it. And there are wonderful, wonderful people along the way. And I'd also say to her, sweetie, get some help right now, someone who sees your greatness and your potential and will help you open your eyes to see all the gifts and opportunities that are in front of you.

Cindy: [00:30:47] Oh, I love that. Thank you, Marisa, so much. And how can people follow you on your journey and how can they support you?

Marisa: [00:30:57] Well, they can follow me by going on my website to learn so much more about me. And there is just a number of free programs, particularly on resilience, but also on how to deal with fair and how do you use tapping to really work through with the fear. That is all on my website. It's MarisaHarris.com.

Marisa: [00:31:18] And Marisa is spelled M A R I S A  H A R R I S.

Marisa: [00:31:25] Marisa has one R and one S. So it's MarisaHarris.com. My  Facebook sites are Marisa Harris and then the one that is more specific to this is Reimagining The Possible. If we reimagine the path of the possible, what would that wonderful dash look like? Oh, and then you can e-mail me at [email protected]. And Cindy, I would love to offer people a gift. Is that OK? Anyone who has a particular question or challenge they want to discuss or they just want some deeper understanding. I would love to gift you with a 30-minute conversation. And so just either email me or you can find a place to contact me on my website. But probably the best thing is just to e-mail me [email protected].

Marisa: [00:32:39] And I work a lot with the spouses and family members and also with people who are more interested in prevention as well.

Cindy: [00:32:48] Thank you so much. That's very kind of you. Well, again, thank you for being here. And I appreciate it. And I want to have you back on.

Marisa: [00:32:58] I'd love to be on. Yeah, I'd love to. I'd love to. Maybe come on with one of my clients and we can have a three-way conversation.

Cindy: [00:33:09] Yeah, that would be really interesting. You have a good evening and I will talk to you later.

[00:33:15] Thank you. And love to everybody and just blessings to everyone at this point. Thank you.

Cindy: [00:33:25] Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life. I enjoyed my conversation with Marisa. I especially liked it when she said, “How do we nurture our resiliency skills so that when major challenges come our way, we are able to get back up?” Visit our website, CynthiaMacMillan.com and sign up for our weekly newsletter. Until next time, live inspired!

Cindy: (00:00)
This is episode 8 with Mooniek Seebregts who is a Mom, Certified Master Coach, International Best-selling Author and Speaker.

(00:08)
Welcome to Exploring the Seasons of Life, a podcast for everyday women who are trying to be everything to everyone and forgetting themselves in the process. Each week, join Cindy MacMillan as she interviews coaches, spiritual explorers and celebrants from all walks of life about beginnings, endings and the messy bits in-between. Self-love, well-being, and mindset are at the heart of our conversations because once you change the inside, the outside will begin to change as well.

(00:42)
Welcome back, friend. I really appreciate that you are spending time with me today and I am so happy to share my conversation with Mooniek Seebregts with you. Mooniek is passionate about her mission to empower parents so they, in turn, can empower their kids. Through her highly acclaimed Great Parents Empower program, Mooniek gives overwhelmed parents the keys to feel confident, capable, loving and patient.

(01:10)
Welcome to the podcast. I'm so excited to have you.

Mooniek: (01:14)
I'm so excited to be here. Thank you.

Cindy: (01:17)
Well, thank you so much. My signature question is what does exploring the seasons of life mean to you personally or in your business?

Mooniek: (01:26)
If I talk about the parents' stuff, we have this idea that before the age of 40 we need to get some things going, get the job, get kids, hopefully, have a great partner and then it turns out that it is way more difficult. It's almost as if there is this big secret in society that says you have to do it, but as soon as you do it you're like, what did I do? How did I get here and what am I going to do?

Mooniek: (02:01)
I don't know what to do. That's basically what people think.

Cindy: (02:05)
Right. Well, thank you. So what season of life are you in?

Mooniek: (02:09)
I'm in the season of life that I am giving back. I went through a few stages in my life, try to try to figure all that out. You know, the partner, the kids, what do I want in my life, what profession do I want? I went through all that. Then I realized I now have some experience. I wish I had had this experience. And so my route, my path is to help the people that are in the middle of trying to figure it out.

Cindy: (02:41)
Thank you Mooniek. I loved that. One of the things that stood out to me when I was reading your website, and I loved this, there is a distinctive difference between being a parent and doing the parent. Being and doing what is the difference?

Mooniek: (02:57)
So this is one of the things that is a, I would say is a trap. Before you have your kids, you're thinking, oh this is going to be so fantastic. I'm going to be everything my parents weren't for me. I know exactly what to do. And then you have your child and then you're like, okay, so how does it work? And oh I don't know anything; I maybe know a little bit. And then we get so busy doing because we want to do all these things and we need to have the right foods in the beginning and we need to make sure that the kid sleeps. And then we need to run around and then we need to do our job and we need to be professional. We need to find the right babysitter or the right whatever, and then we need to find the right school and continue and continue, and then we need to do playdates and we need to find the right books because we want to be perfect.

Mooniek: (03:46)
We want to do it all right, and then we forget that actually maybe the most important thing to raise a human being, which is one of the most beautiful and almost sacred professions, I think in this world, we forget that it is the being that is the most powerful for our kids because they get us, it's almost like they soak us up and it's through us osmosis, that they get so much information. It's not really through osmosis, but that's what I always say. They get us, they get who we really are and what we're really saying, even if we're not saying it.

Cindy: (04:23)
Yeah. When you were describing that doing, that's exhausting actually, isn't it?

Mooniek: (04:28)
Oh, it's totally exhausting. People are overwhelmed and so stressed.

Cindy: (04:34)
Yeah, My children are grown so when I'm listening to different friends talk about all the clubs their children are in and all the different sports and everything, it's just, it really is exhausting.

Mooniek: (04:48)
It really is and for the parents it is exhausting and for the kids it is exhausting. And on top of that, I think that we forget, we parents, we forget that it is our task to help these little beings develop into the people that they are meant to be. And we have no idea what that is. We don't know who they are going to become. The smarter we are about pulling back a little bit and being the person you really want to be so that you can support your kid becoming who they are meant to be or can be, even if it's completely opposite of what you wanted - had in mind or what your ideal is.

Cindy: (05:33)
It really is being present with our kids. So what inspired you to start Great Parents Empower?

Mooniek: (05:40)
It's a lovely story. And it's a story of persistence. You know, Debbie Ford?

Cindy: (05:46)
Yes, I do.

Mooniek: (05:47)
A great leader in the self-development business. I was lucky enough to be educated, coached and trained by her and I knew that she had this course for parents. So when I was invited to do the course for parents, my first reaction was, no, I don't need that because I mean, who needs education when they are raising their children? I said, is it about development? And the answer was no, it's not about the development of the kids. So I'm kind of begrudgingly doing the first hour. And then I suddenly realized that these were the missing pieces because this was all about who I needed to be so I could raise my child. So it put me completely upside down, put, put, put the onus on me, who am I being so I can do to doing so I can raise this person in front of me. This little being this little girl. And basically I have raised my child this way, the way that the course teaches. When Debbie died the course was inherited by me and Martina, Martina and me and we updated it. We made it more 2020, the seven keys have all the tips and tools that you can use for the rest of your life. So we put it all together in only seven classes. 

Cindy: (07:23)
That is a beautiful story about how that came to be. I do want to get to your seven-class course in a few minutes. When people ask you, or let me change that around when you started asking people two questions, what is a great parent and what is your greatest challenge as a parent? What were some of the most common answers that you received?

Mooniek: (07:52)
They would immediately just steer away from the word great. Because we do realize, and this is true, that the more we're trying to be perfect, the more we cannot be perfect because perfection feels like a straightjacket. So most often people say, well, I want to be a good parent. But basically I am not a good parent because after seven o'clock I start yelling, because of my moods, I'm sure I damaged my kids because this kid is so different. I don't understand anything about this kid or because my marriage is so bad and I'm sure that has influenced. So parents on top of trying to do all these things for kids are also stressed about how much impact negatively they have on their children.

Cindy: (08:40)
And that makes sense because we do want to be, these great parents or good parents and when we're all stressed out we do worry about what that impacts going to be.

Mooniek: (08:52)
Yes. And so what I understood and what I'm constantly working on is that the more we can come from taking care of ourselves, the more we can come from the glass is full instead of half empty, the more we can come from. We are taking care of our own drama or our own shadow, our own imperfections. We don't lay it all on the kids because if we put it on the kids, they are so busy trying to take care of us that they cannot take care of their own development.

Cindy: (09:25)
Right. Yeah, absolutely. So what is the greatest challenge in being a parent? What do you consider to be the greatest challenge in being a parent? Is it our emotional health and the way it impacts our children?

Mooniek: (09:41)
I think that first of all, the myth that we have to have kids we should not buy into that. The second part is we should not buy into this myth that everything is going to be fantastic and we're going to picnic all the time and run through the fields and love each other so much because life is messy. But we do need to take care of ourselves. We do need to take care of ourselves, development of our hearts. If our heart is at war, we cannot be present. We cannot be the person, the rock, the banks. You know that the river can flow in. Our kids need to have the space to become.

Cindy: (10:23)
You described it so beautifully what you just said.

Mooniek: (10:32)
And so it is constantly taking a step back while being present, constantly being aware of your intention, constantly inviting yourself. Listen to yourself, to your wisdom. Ask yourself how are you doing? What do you need so that you can be the glass half-full instead of half-empty? I think one of the things that happen when we take care of people, whether it is our children or whether it is elderly people, is that we become so entangled with the care that we become so much part of the activities that there is very little left for us.

Cindy: (11:12)
I absolutely agree with you on that. And that is why one of the things that I want to talk about on the podcast each episode is that self-care that we need to do for ourselves.

Mooniek: (11:25)
Yeah. And for a lot of people, self-care sounds egotistical and you shouldn't do that. But it is how can you support yourself so you can support others? That's really what it is about.

Cindy: (11:38)
Absolutely. So I know you have a 7-class GreatParentsEmpower course that will help us discover a new way of parenting. Can we talk about that a little bit? Because that really sounded very intriguing. So what is that all about? Can you just talk about maybe a couple of the steps?

Mooniek: (11:56)
Every development starts I think with asking ourselves the right questions so we can get to the right answers so we can make our choices. So our course starts with an assessment and from the assessment comes some very interesting insights, with a lot of parents, we see over and over again that because they've been running so fast trying to do it all right. They are so entangled in the activities that taking the step back in the assessment already opens so many doors and then we pay attention to the common obstacles that we have when we think we want to go somewhere. So we help people to build a vision of who they really would like to be and how they would really like to have their family develop and then all the obstacles that happen. We pay attention to that in the course. There are a few, like for example one is that a lot of us parents are stuck in fantasy land. I was too, it's like you know what, this year I'm going to be this or that mom by February and then it's May and then it's June and I still haven't been able to get "there" because we are so wrapped up in the habits, in the bad habits or in the obstacles that we just repeat over and over again and one of them is that we repeat what our parents, how our parents raised us.

Cindy: (13:22)
And that's one of the things that we always say as we become parents, I'm not going to do that. I'm going to do it totally different.

Mooniek: (13:31)
But the thing is that parents get tired. There are a few instances, like a few years, for example around the year 10 or 12 or 15 that you see the parents check out because they're so done. They are tired from 15 years' time 24 hours being there for the child. So it's a long journey and if you don't have the tools and the tips, it is really hard to get yourself back up and take care of yourself so that you can take care of your kids.

Cindy: (14:04)
You said something just then and it just reminded me of what we're going through right now with the COVID19 when you said taking a step back and that's almost what we're doing right now. Taking a step back and reevaluating everything that's going on. And maybe part of that will be how we interact with our children.

Mooniek: (14:28)
I have to say that in my industry it's in my neighborhood. I have never seen as many fathers, especially on the bike with our kids. Fantastic.

Cindy: (14:38)
That's nice. Yes it is. I know my significant other and I went for a walk a couple of them nights ago and it was like the street, I'm not going to say it was full, but there was a lot of people we had not ever out walking. There was one other thing that I saw on your website that I wanted to ask you about. What does bullying, not listening, fighting, talking nonstop, not paying attention. What does that have in common and what can parents do about it?

Mooniek: (15:13)
So when we are wrapped up in our own emotional needs and we are wrapped up in the expectations of what we think society or culture or family of origin have for our kids it is very hard to sit down with our kids and look for the causes or the origin of what is really going on that this kid needs to have or is engaged in this behavior. And so where we come from is that the more we can take care of ourselves, the more we can actually love the person that we are. Despite all the things we don't like about ourselves, but the more we can be that glass half full kind of person, the more we can be instead of do the more we can just sit there and really connect with this kid from heart to heart.

Mooniek: (16:09)
Really just not talk all the time but just ask the right questions and be curious. So the more we've taken care of ourselves, the more we can give this to the children, the more we can follow who they are, what is going on with this kid, how do they need me to be so I can help him or her? Because there's a lot of loneliness in kids. There's a lot of sadness. There is a lot of stress in kids, but we don't know if we're too busy on our phones or in our professional life or in our, you know, whatever. We can be so distracted. They need us.

Cindy: (16:51)
I agree with you Monique on that. And thank you for saying that about a phone because one of the things that I have been doing since I have been working from home is at night when I am finished working; I am not being on my phone at all. Like I said, my children are grown but I am being present with my significant other. And again, I think that's one of the things that, that we're finding out right now about stepping back.

Mooniek: (17:19)
Yeah. You know, the other day I came across somebody who said, you know, he is a father, he said, you know, when I come home I'm tired from working and I'm glad that all my kids have a phone so I don't need to talk to them during dinner. And I was like, oh, what a missed opportunity. And this person had no idea that he said something so profoundly sad to me.

Cindy: (17:44)
He probably didn't even think anything about what he was saying, but that makes an impact, not even knowing what you're necessarily saying as well.

Mooniek: (17:52)
Yeah. And you know, if you think about it, our kids' brains are not grown until 29. There is so much that we don't know about ourselves that and we stay so complicated and so layered. There's so much to discover about ourselves. Who's going to help you discover yourself when you are a kid, if it's not your mom or dad, nobody has that much space for you to help you understand yourself. So I think it's a missed opportunity more than anything. It's a missed opportunity for the parents and for the kid. At the same time, we have these high expectations of our kids. We want them to be, you know, the next president or the next, this or that. So we have to help them get there.

Cindy: (18:40)
Absolutely. How can we make good decisions with our children? I'm thinking about the homework. I'm thinking about that and then I'm jumping over to thinking about them starting to date. Is there a way that we can help them make good decisions or is it, I mean it's all really coming back to us as parents about being there with them.

Mooniek: (19:06)
So the more interested I am in myself, the more I can use my heart, my head, my whole being. The more curious I am about the person that I am had I had the opportunity to make myself, it would have been a little bit more of this and a little bit more of that or a little less of that. Right. But we are who we are and so the more I can appreciate that the more I can do the same thing for other people. The more you know. So the inside so the outside, the more curious I am; I think it's the word, the keyword. The more curious I can be about myself. The more I can be about that little person in front of me. And so if I continuously show up as a curious person who is also a great role model, the more I can ask the question.

Mooniek: (19:55)
So what's up with this homework? What do you not like or how do you think you could deal with this? Yeah, it's, a lot six pages of the same math. Do you have an idea? You know, give them, help them to find their responsibility, their accountability, their solutions instead of us, you will do it at seven o'clock already and you're not done yet. How do you think you will, you know, what do you think the teacher will say that's old. That's old ways. We don't need to do that anymore.

Cindy: (20:29)
The more we are giving and loving to ourselves because we can't really give that if we don't have it within ourselves.

Mooniek: (20:37)
And I think curious, you know, stay curious.

Cindy: (20:40)
That's a great word and I'm hearing that a lot. So I think that's one of my words that I need to be working on. If you could turn back time and talk to your 18-year-old self, what would you tell her about the season of life you're in now? Or what would you tell her about your business now?

Mooniek: (21:02)
It's probably what I'm telling myself every day. Just do it. Be fearless. Be shameless. Shameless is my word. You know, it's so easy to say, Oh, I'm not going to do that because, and then my best self says, you know what, just do it. Be shameless. I mean, you never know who is waiting for the question or for the solution or the answer.

Cindy: (21:33)
Is there anything that I should have asked you? I know parenting is a huge, huge field. Is there anything that you'd like to leave us with I cannot believe at the time has absolutely flown by.

Mooniek: (21:51)
Yes, I think it is a beautiful thing to be a parent. It's such an opportunity for growth, for development and not to become perfect. That's not it. It's to enjoy, you know, to enjoy life. Who can I be, who can they be? How can we be together?

Cindy: (22:11)
Very nice. Thank you so much for being on Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast and I'm definitely going to have to have you back on. Thank you.

Mooniek: (22:22)
Thank you so much.

Cindy: (22:24)
You can follow Mooniek at Great Parents Empower and on her Facebook page Great Parents Empower. Mooniek has a fantastic 3-step tool for moms of school-age kids that will create the best connection with your children! 3 Powerful Questions to Ask Your Children that Spark Deeper Conversations and Transform Your Relationship with Your Kids! Here is the link: https://tinyurl.com/t2f5tm8

Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Exploring the Seasons of Life. I enjoyed my conversation with Mooniek. I especially liked it when she said, “You never know who is waiting for the question.”

After the interview ended and we were saying goodbye; Mooniek said Cindy – what does exploring the seasons of life mean to you? That was a great question Mooniek. I have decided episode 15 will be all about me telling you why I created Exploring the Seasons of Life podcast and what that question means to me.