XO Conversations

Special bonus episode with Para-athlete Candice Combdon! ⁠ 

If you've been listening to the XO Conversations podcast, you know that the format is very different. ⁠

This is not the typical episode style because we wanted to share the entire conversation. ⁠  Candice talks to your host, Rishma Walji, about being born with spina bifida, her childhood and decision to amputate as an adult, how she started in tennis and her approach to sport and being an athlete. They talk about accessibility, struggles, getting out of your comfort zone and so much more.

Connect with Candice:

@candice_combdon⁠

Connect with Rishma

Website: livingxo.com

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Engage & Connect:

• Want more insights, tips, and personal stories? Subscribe to our newsletter for exclusive content and updates on upcoming episodes.

Gifts for Listeners:

1. Take your first step towards an extraordinary life with our FREE resources. Check out our free quiz at livingxo.com/quiz and plot your current decision-making process. Discover actionable steps to move closer to your goals.
2. Grab my FREE gratitude challenge: livingxo.com/gratitude
3. Download my FREE handout 5 Must-Ask Questions before making a decision livingxo.com/questions
4. FREE workbook to help you figure out what you really want (not what you think you should want): livingxo.com/mygoals

p.s. If you found value in this episode, please share and leave a 5 star rating and review on your preferred podcast platform!

In this episode you'll learn practical ways to create meaningful memories that will last a lifetime.  Join host Dr. Rishma Walji with her guest Rishma Govani as they discuss love, family and making meaningful memories. 

Summary: When we think about living a full life, it's about the things we experience. The people we connect with the memories we make. After all, it's the memories of our lives that make us who we are. There are ways to make those memories more meaningful to you. There are also ways to create and recall happy moments more easily. In this episode, we talk about family bonding, connecting with those you love, and how you can intentionally build a richer 'highlight reel' of your own life.

“Wow, what a life. It’s an inspiration. And I’ll never look at that dash the same way again.”

Questions We Answer in This Episode: 

• How to make memories that will last a lifetime
• How memories work in your brain
• Intentionally creating more happy memories with your family

In This Episode We Discuss:

[00:03] Guest Rishma Govani’s love story 

[03:40] How having a joy for life and trying new things can make every day count. 

[06:35] How memory works in the brain in the brain. 

[10:26] How you can be more intentional about creating meaningful memories with your family. 

[13:06] How to enhance your brain's ability to store and recall positive memories. Try new things, Make Traditions, Tell a Story, Use Props, Create a Sensory Experience, and Recognize Peaks and Struggles.

[15:44] Purposefully creating new things to look forward to.

[17:38] A beautiful tradition to celebrate love and each other. And an idea for how to create your own story and tradition with a partner or family or someone you care about. 

[19:30] How to remind your brain about the highlights and memories that you want to savour. 

[23:21] A way to help you become fully attentive and fully present in the moment, which will help to solidify the memory into your mind. 

[25:00] Kids book about traveling, food and diversity. 

[26:50] How ups and downs of life contribute to memories and memorable emotions. 

[37:46] Recap of the ways to help yourself create and remember moments and memories that will last forever. 

Connect:

• Rishma Govani’s book Sushi and Samosas
• Aly’s tribute video

Mentioned:

Miek Wiking: The Art of Making Memories

Find Out More:

About Your Host, Rishma Walji

Instagram: @_livingxo_

Website: Livingxo.com

• Workshops
• Clarity Journal
• Connected Parent Journal

Engage & Connect:

• Want more insights, tips, and personal stories? Subscribe to our newsletter for exclusive content and updates on upcoming episodes.

Gifts for Listeners:

1. Take your first step towards an extraordinary life with our FREE resources. Check out our free quiz at livingxo.com/quiz and plot your current decision-making process. Discover actionable steps to move closer to your goals.
2. Grab my FREE gratitude challenge: livingxo.com/gratitude
3. Download my FREE handout 5 Must-Ask Questions before making a decision livingxo.com/questions
4. FREE workbook to help you figure out what you really want (not what you think you should want): livingxo.com/mygoals

p.s. If you found value in this episode, please share and leave a 5 star rating and review on your preferred podcast platform!

If you have trouble with meditation, feel like you're always getting distracted or can't sit still and clear your mind, but want to, this episode is for you.

Join Dr. Rishma Walji as she explores meditation and her own journey towards reaching a meditative state. She talks about the brain and how things work (in an understandable way) and how she has extrapolated the science to make it apply to real life.  She's not advocating 'hacking' meditation (because of course meditation is awesome and beneficial), but she is offering a clear way to 'hack' how you can get better at reaching meditative effects if you're normally a person who can't meditate. 

Her unique take makes meditation more accessible for people who would normally find it hard to practice meditation on their own, in traditional ways.

Engage & Connect:

• Want more insights, tips, and personal stories? Subscribe to our newsletter for exclusive content and updates on upcoming episodes.

Gifts for Listeners:

1. Take your first step towards an extraordinary life with our FREE resources. Check out our free quiz at livingxo.com/quiz and plot your current decision-making process. Discover actionable steps to move closer to your goals.
2. Grab my FREE gratitude challenge: livingxo.com/gratitude
3. Download my FREE handout 5 Must-Ask Questions before making a decision livingxo.com/questions
4. FREE workbook to help you figure out what you really want (not what you think you should want): livingxo.com/mygoals

p.s. If you found value in this episode, please share and leave a 5 star rating and review on your preferred podcast platform!

This podcast episode examines the key factors and science around creating new habits. We explore the missing piece, without which, we're more likely to fall off of our new habits and resolutions.

Follow along with your host: Rishma Walji, ND, PhD as she looks at habits a new way and explores why it sometimes takes longer to create a habit than we expect, and what we can actually do about making habits stick. 

XO Living website: https://livingxo.com

Brain and Worry Workshop: HERE

Clarity Journal: HERE

Engage & Connect:

• Want more insights, tips, and personal stories? Subscribe to our newsletter for exclusive content and updates on upcoming episodes.

Gifts for Listeners:

1. Take your first step towards an extraordinary life with our FREE resources. Check out our free quiz at livingxo.com/quiz and plot your current decision-making process. Discover actionable steps to move closer to your goals.
2. Grab my FREE gratitude challenge: livingxo.com/gratitude
3. Download my FREE handout 5 Must-Ask Questions before making a decision livingxo.com/questions
4. FREE workbook to help you figure out what you really want (not what you think you should want): livingxo.com/mygoals

p.s. If you found value in this episode, please share and leave a 5 star rating and review on your preferred podcast platform!

I don't want life to be ordinary. I want it to be extraordinary. The difference is just a little extra.

How do you define living a little extra? 

In this episode we explore how live a life that we love. Finding joy, connecting deeply with my family, feeling energetic, following my dreams, making an difference and having fun.  It comes down to lots of little choices, moments and insights related to personal growth and wellbeing.

But how can you make those choices when you have no time and never ending responsibilities? 

This is the journey of this podcast, finding ways to live a life that we love, one with 'a little extra'. 

It's not enough to know what to do, it's not even enough to know how to do it. To really be deliberate in life, you need to understand how things work and then you need to become self-aware so that we can find a way to make it work, for you. That's the key. Knowing how things work and then figuring out how to make it work for you.

In this podcast we talk about how things work in the body, the brain and in our emotions. Then we look at ways to make changes that will actually work for us, taking into account our lives, personalities, goals and challenges.

For example: 

Telling me to stretch feels like a chore and it's less effective than helping me figure out how to want to stretch, and maybe even turn it into a habit. 

Telling me to be more patient with my kids honestly doesn't feel great. and isn't as useful as offering me a strategy that I can use when I'm feeling less than patient. 

Telling me to meditate because I'm stressed about being busy feels impossible, but understanding how meditation works allows me to incorporate other ways of finding peace and calm that could be a bridge to real meditative effects.

Wanting or dreaming of a happy family is nice but what's more tangible is learning ways to help my brain store and recall happy moments more readily.

Meet your host:
 

Dr. Rishma Walji is a life strategies, emotion hacker, joy seeker and travel adventurer. She is also the founder of XO Living (https://livingxo.com)

Rishma ran a thriving healthcare practice as a Naturopathic Doctor and Acupuncturist for over 20 years, as well as earning her PhD and spending time in academic research and teaching positions. She now enjoys reading research for the purpose of using the insights to help her, and you, get the most out of life. 

So what can you expect from the XO conversations podcast?

A conversation that stimulates you, helps you see things in new and actionable ways, and sparks discussions on how to make small changes that will make a big difference in life. 

XO Living Website: https://livingxo.com

Engage & Connect:

• Want more insights, tips, and personal stories? Subscribe to our newsletter for exclusive content and updates on upcoming episodes.

Gifts for Listeners:

1. Take your first step towards an extraordinary life with our FREE resources. Check out our free quiz at livingxo.com/quiz and plot your current decision-making process. Discover actionable steps to move closer to your goals.
2. Grab my FREE gratitude challenge: livingxo.com/gratitude
3. Download my FREE handout 5 Must-Ask Questions before making a decision livingxo.com/questions
4. FREE workbook to help you figure out what you really want (not what you think you should want): livingxo.com/mygoals

p.s. If you found value in this episode, please share and leave a 5 star rating and review on your preferred podcast platform!