Latest / The Rochelle Christiane Podcast / 186. Living From the Inside Out

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186. Living From the Inside Out · The Rochelle Christiane Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the emotional mastery podcast.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: I am your host, rochelle.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: I'm a holistic human design health coach and this is a space for human design and spiritual journey.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: It's not about being a master of your emotions, rather mastering the tools to self-wrangulate, to awakening yourself and remembering who you are.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Human design changed my life about five years ago and I've been learning and teaching the system ever since.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: This podcast is human design meets spirituality, meets astrology.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: You don't have to have a belief system to be here, just an open mind and curiosity.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: This is a journey of meeting yourself and awakening to your infinite potential.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Now let the magic begin.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome back to another episode.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: Today is Valentine's Day, as I'm recording this introduction, and astrologically it is a little bit sticky today, so take that as you like.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: I actually feel really great.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: So we all experience things differently and, of course, depending on where a query is in your chart, because Mars and Pluto are conjunct in Aquarius today and these are both the rulers of Scorpio, and so this is really intense.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Mars is more the immature expression of all of that energy, so it's frustration, it's anger, it's passion, it's intensity, but it's more the I don't know.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: Think about like the little brother of Pluto, whereas Pluto is like deep raw power, control.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: It's alchemization, but of course we have to go through like the muck to come out the other side and it's really intense.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: It's sort of like that energy that comes from deep, like everything that's been brewing really deep inside the bowels.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: Right, that's like you know, it's the ruler of the underworld, so it's all the deep, dark stuff, right.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: And so these two are walking together and they again both rule Scorpio, so they're kind of comfortable together, but in Aquarius, at zero degrees of Aquarius.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: So Valentine's Day might just feel a little bit.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe you can feel a little frustrated, who knows.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: But today's episode is really good.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: I speak with Colleen Kachman, who is a certified master life and recovery coach, who uses cutting edge strategies and nervous system regulation, growth, mindset, positive psychology and self directed neuroplasticity to help women reconnect with a higher sense of purpose so they can feel passionate and powerful again.
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: Through her own experience with alcoholism, colleen founded recover with Colleen after realizing that being sober is not a good goal.
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: Pursuing happiness instead of sobriety is the only way to reclaim your power.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: Once you realize that you can actually trust yourself, the only rule you need to follow is your own intuition.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: You just need to learn how to listen.
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: Colleen helps women bypass the stigma and drama that society associates with sobriety by focusing on what's really important our relationship with ourselves.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Her passion is to help women liberate themselves from the oppressive belief that there is something fundamentally broken or flawed about them, so that they can unlock a higher level of purpose, passion and power.
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: Colleen holds a Bachelor of Science in Education, a Master's of Science in Coaching and a Women's Functional and Integrative Medicine Professional Certificate.
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: Wow, I don't know why that word was so hard to say.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: This conversation was really.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: It was so beautiful and it was, as always I always say like divine timing.
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: But this I had this conversation right after I'd had a glass of wine.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: That sort of broke my year sobriety journey and if you've been listening you know I've been kind of exploring that I'm sort of back to being sober.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: So her whole she talks about being sober-ish, right, a sober-ish recovery coach, and I actually really love this because I feel like my relationship with alcohol has completely changed.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: I'm no longer using it to numb or avoid or use it for like escapist purposes.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: I was just having a conversation last night in Pisces season, because I have Jupiter and Pisces in my eighth house.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: Jupiter is expansion, it is also.
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: It just it expands anything that it touches, be it good or bad.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: Right, I'm air quoting.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: Pisces, of course, is everything sort of unseen.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: It's the subconscious, it's other worlds.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: It doesn't really like to be in this plane.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: It's super spiritual, super sensitive.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: And then the eighth house is ruled by Scorpio, so drug, sex, rock and roll, it's all the deep, dark stuff, and so I honestly get expanded by all that stuff.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: And so Pisces season is always a little bit interesting for me because I sort of dance between the escapist part of myself and the deeply spiritual part of myself.
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: It's like I bounce between these two.
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: And it's so good to know astrology because I feel like if you know what areas of life, of course, the sun is moving through and how it impacts you, I've noticed themes and cycles and really that's what astrology is right.
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: It's just tracking the patterns of where all these planets are throughout history and seeing what happens and how it physically impacts our actual body.
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: Right, and just knowing that sort of stuff is really helpful.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: But I've been going through this phase of sort of numbing out with reality TV and I haven't been drinking.
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: I had a drink in the beginning of the month, but I just I trust myself and I know that I feel better sober and so I'm sort of staying with that.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: Like I also noticed, my ego has attached the label of being sober and I think it's because it's like not normal and I feel a little bit like, you know, out of the box with it.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: But yeah, I don't know, it's just like really interesting observation.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: So I just I love that she talks about sober ish and really just changing your relationship with yourself, changing your relationship with the labels, because I think a lot of times we are slapped labels whether it's victim, addict, you know, whatever it is and we sort of think that thing becomes the thing that we can't escape.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: Right, we may be sober but we weren't addict, or we are an addict, you know, or you, whatever it is.
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: And so she sort of teaches you how to tune into yourself so that we're not attached to these labels that make us feel weak or defeated or a failure, you know, if we do decide to have a drink.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: And that was honestly one of the things that I struggled with when I had my first glass of wine after my year of sobriety.
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: I was like, if I open this door, does that mean I'm going to go back to the way I was before?
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: Because, in hindsight, I did have an issue with alcohol, and so I think that when you do give up alcohol, there is this stigma attached to it that well, I gave it up because it was a problem and it will always be a problem and I am a problem, right.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: And so releasing that and being like I can actually have a glass of wine and it doesn't need to be more than that is really powerful.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: And so we talked about sobriety and recovery, drinking culture.
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: We talked about how alcohol targets women, how to reintroduce alcohol if you want to drink, or to addiction.
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: I actually love this too.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: She talked about set and setting.
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: And so alcohol is a drug and, just like other drugs, like psilocybin or LSD or MDMA or whatever, there's a set and setting, and if you're doing it with intention, you can actually have a really positive experience.
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: And so, taking that set and setting idea and applying it to alcohol as well, you know, if you want to have a glass of wine in the correct set and setting, why not right?
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: We talked a lot about tuning into your body, tapping into your intuition, how to be social and sober.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: You know how we numb drinking as a disconnect from yourself, repairing the relationship with yourself, of course, and really navigating what that intuition is.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: You know what's trauma?
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: What's intuition?
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: Nervous system regulation, which is literally everything, everything like that.
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: The emotional mastery podcast right, this is what it's about.
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: It's about nervous system regulation so that you can be a master of your emotions, a master of regulating your emotions, not to say that your emotions are going to stop, but being able to have the tools to cycle through it a lot more quickly and come back to yourself.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: Yesterday, I found myself in a little bit of a low and I noticed the looping pattern that my mind was going on of like, oh my gosh, I'm stuck, I'm never gonna get out of this, like I haven't done any work on myself, blah, blah, blah.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: And just how quickly I was able to detach from the mind and witness it and tell the mind you can do what you're going to do, but I don't have to believe the stories that you are telling me.
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: So I'm going to come back to myself, be the observer, you know, integrate my higher self and view from that lens, and I was able to cycle through that so quickly without avoiding the issue, like understanding the issue and then, of course, journaling on it and doing whatever work that I need to do on it, but being present with it and then being able to be the observer and it just like I cycle through it so quickly.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: And, yeah, so we talked about so much.
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: It was so good, so beautiful.
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: So I'm really excited for you to listen to this episode.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: I have something really exciting coming that I really want to talk about, but it is essentially you know five other women and myself that have collaborated on something that's going to be really amazing.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: Just astrology, human design, reiki, akashic records, genki's, so much.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: So again, like, get on that newsletter list and you'll be the very first to know.
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: Holistic Human Design Academy is coming back out March 1st, relaunching March 1st.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: So I will be talking about that more as it comes close.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: And every other way that you can connect with me and Colleen is down in the show notes.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: You can find me on Instagram at rachelchristian.
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: That's R-O-C-H-E-L-L-E, dot.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: C-h-r-i-s-t-i-a-n-e.
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: Tiktok is the same.
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: I'm not as active on TikTok, I'm trying.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: Youtube is at Emotional Podcasts, so if at Emotional Mastery Podcasts.
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: So if you prefer to watch the podcast.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: You can check it out over there.
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: And, yeah, everything else you need to know is below.
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: I thank you so much for being here.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: Rate, review, subscribe, share with a friend, because all those things really really really do help the podcast and I love you and I will catch you on the other side.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Emotional Mastery Podcasts.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: Today I have Colleen Cashman, who is a master life and recovery coach, and I am really interested in this conversation.
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: I'm really excited to have this conversation.
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: I have been about a year sober, so this sobriety journey for me, my you know, reflecting on my relationship with alcohol and really kind of like navigating that.
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: So when this came through, this just seemed like perfect timing and just a really interesting and great conversation to have.
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: Because what thing that you say and it's on your Instagram is it's not about the alcohol, and that's something I've really discovered over the past year.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: It's never is about the alcohol, right?
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: It's what's underneath that and when we're not facing that, it's just it's really important to like look beneath.
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: So I'm going to hand you the floor and let you introduce yourself, just sort of like any defining moments along the way.
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: Your story that sort of landed you here and we'll take it from there.
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: Great.
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: Well, it's so good to be here, rochelle.
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: So my name is Colleen and I was a heavy daily drinker at the time that I quit.
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: But part of recovery before I go into the story is recognizing the power of your story, and I no longer see my life as a before and after moment.
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: You know, I think one of the reasons why it's so scary to realize you've become addicted to alcohol and I'll dig a little deeper into that what that means is that what we think it means.
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: And so in the traditional recovery and sobriety community there is this idea that there's a before and after.
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: And for me, I had never thought of myself as an alcoholic.
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: I knew I had a drinking problem and the reason I think I had a drinking problem was because in our culture we have such a mixed message about alcohol.
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: You know, we are all raised to believe that alcohol is a sexy accessory, it's a treat, it's a reward, it helps you relax, it perks you up, it's like the magical elixir, and alcohol is put everywhere.
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: You know, we are the only instructions we are given for a drug that, if it was introduced now, would be a class two prescription drug.
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: It is highly addictive, but the only instruction we are given, as in our culture, is please drink responsibly.
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: And I was a responsible drinker.
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: I mean I had the Uber app.
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: You know I had seven kids, by the way, and my youngest is now in college.
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: So I'm kind of through that phase.
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: But I raised my children and I was an amazing mother with a glass of wine in my hand at most events.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: The culture of my family, the culture of my friendships all included alcohol, and that changed over time.
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: You know my first child was born in 1997.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: And I had no trouble not drinking.
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: You know I was a partier, as you might say, in college, but honestly I don't even think I would have labeled myself as a partier.
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: I went to parties, but you know I wasn't a heavy drinker.
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: I mean, I fell out of some porta potties, I'm not going to lie.
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: But you know alcohol was not an issue for me, it was just part of the college experience.
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: So I had my babies, I had no trouble not drinking.
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: When I was pregnant, I breastfed, I had four children of my own and when my first child was born, alcohol was not steeped in our culture nearly as much.
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: What happened in the early 2000s is that the big alcohol companies.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: And I'm not making this a conspiracy theory at all, but the big alcohol companies realized that they're marketing and advertising left women without, you know, a drink of choice.
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: So this is when we started to see the rise of the skinny margaritas and, you know, pink washing a lot of brands and we kind of just frog sitting in cold water.
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: We didn't realize that alcohol was being infused into more and more of our lives.
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: You know, when I first had my child I would have never thought that my yoga studio would be hosting yoga and wine events.
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: You know, or that when I ran a marathon I'd literally be handed a beer when I crossed the finish line.
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: So slowly alcohol came more into our culture and if we're not aware of the fact that alcohol is a drug, then it just becomes some.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: You know, we don't even say alcohol is a drug, we say alcohol and drugs.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: But in truth alcohol is a depressant drug with a very real set of side effects and consequences and effect is that affects your biochemistry and there's a withdrawal period.
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: Like I didn't know that.
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: And then, as COVID happened, the needle was moved by the big alcohol companies on normalizing drinking at home.
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: It was no longer socially a problem to have drinks at home.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: As I grew up, one of the big red flags for a drinker is do you drink alone?
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: Well, once we went into COVID, our social media feeds are just filled with recipes and memes about drinking on Zoom meetings.
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: So it was very normalized.
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: So I will tell you in my story now the importance of having a story.
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: I came to be addicted to alcohol for two reasons.
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: Number one I was ignorant.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: I didn't know that alcohol was a drug.
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: I had been raised to in the cultural where AA is a thing and there's a normal drinker and there's an alcoholic.
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: So I spent years Googling what's the difference between an alcoholic and a normal drinker and how do you know if you're an alcoholic.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: So I got caught up in the idea of what a normal drinker is and so I spent a lot of time ignoring the experience that I'm not having fun here because I identified as a drinker, and when it's at an identity level, then the idea of being a drinker who doesn't drink feels really punitive.
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: So I went into COVID.
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: My story is I was about five weeks into COVID e-learning, the stress, jobs, finances, all of this and we're all trapped at home and I tried to be a good drinker and drink through that, and what had happened was all of the parameters that kept me on track had disappeared.
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: As a mother with four and then three step kids, I was very busy.
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: I was driving kids around, I had to make all the meals, I taught yoga, hot power yoga in the morning, so I had reasons to limit my drinking.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: Oh, and I didn't tell you.
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: The second reason I would say, besides ignorance, was that I was just privileged.
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: I didn't have to work a second job, I could manage my life with a glass of wine in my hand and there were no consequences to that.
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: So I wake up six weeks into COVID and I'm like I can't do this anymore.
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: And because we're all raised in a culture of AA and I had fought it so long because I didn't want to admit I had a drinking problem, because the story is if you have a drinking problem, you're an alcoholic.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: And so finally I was like you know what?
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: I'll say anything, just make this stop.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: So I called the AA hotline and immediately was ushered into a community of wonderful, supportive people.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: However, the ideology of that culture is that you have a disease that is lifelong, you can never drink again and you have to work on your sobriety because your addiction is doing pushups in the parking lot.
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: And so I adopted that mindset and it worked for me.
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: I stayed sober for the first year and then the second year, but what happened is, over time, the powerful, passionate you know purposeful version of myself started to say why am I defining myself by a drinking problem?
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: And I also went back to school.
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: So I have a master's degree in coaching myself.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: And then part of my recovery was I signed up for a recovery coaching program because I thought eventually I'm gonna be comfortable talking about this just too soon.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: And so I started to learn more about the nature of addiction and that it's not a disease Like that, is a cultural narrative.
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: In fact, it's just a habit.
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: And so I started to learn that taking on the identity of a sober alcoholic is actually what keeps people stuck in, that there's a nine times higher chance you're gonna go back and binge drink because, at the most vulnerable time of your life, you're being told you're an addict and that you are powerless over alcohol, and that, no matter how long you stay sober, this disease is always going to get you.
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: And the neurochemist, the brain science of this is that nothing could be further from the truth.
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: Brain scans of people six months to one year after a period of abstinence show that your cognitive function, your self regulatory ability, is stronger than in people who have never had to overcome addiction.
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: Because, like addiction, recovery is a learning process.
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: So full circle.
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: I now identify as a soberish recovery coach and I help women put down the alcohol long enough to like you and I discussed untangle all of the reasons we were drinking and the lack of coping skills.
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: Over time our coping skills atrophy more and more.
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: Alcohol becomes the solution.
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: That's a learning process, and then you just get stuck in that.
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: So breaking that cycle is a learning process, but it's not the end of the story.
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: And so now I help women both quit alcohol and then also reintroduce alcohol.
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: Because if you wanna go back to occasionally having a glass of prosecco at a wedding or something like that, and you pour alcohol on a belief that you can't control yourself or that your identity is somebody who struggles with alcohol, well then, right on cue, you're going to have problems.
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: Does that give you a intro?
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I love that.
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: It's really interesting.
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: I have so many things to say.
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: First of all, I think that idea that vision of like alcohol from childhood cause I remember watching my parents like drink with friends and things like that and always looked like so fun, like that was always the standard, right, like I can't wait till I can drink, cause then it means that like I've made it or I'm an adult and there was always that like idea.
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: And I think for me with my sober journey, that's been one of the things where it's like I can't tell my kids not to drink and then I'm out here getting drunk every weekend, right, it's like the modeling, the behavior.
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: If I'm not drinking at home, it's not going to be as much of a pull or a draw for them to want to drink because they don't see it every single day.
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: It's not like the standard of happiness, right.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: Or like being social is like that alcohol which is, you know, I mean we all do the best that we can with what we have, right.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: But I think it's really interesting that you teach women how to.
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: Then, if they want to reintroduce alcohol, how do you how to do that in a way that it doesn't become.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: You know that addictive thing or that label, and I like that.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: You bring that up because that was actually going to be.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: My question was how does that disempower us, you know, to be labeled as an addict, to be labeled as an alcoholic, and you went and answered that question.
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: So I guess I would be curious like how, how do you?
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: Because over the last month I reintroduced, I had some wine and, honestly, my body rejected it, like I remember I'm like, oh yeah, like I don't feel just one glass and I felt like hung over the next day, didn't feel good.
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: I was a little bit more emotional than I normally was and I was like, oh wow, this is why I stopped drinking, because I don't feel myself, I'm disconnected from my own body, even with that small amount of alcohol, which is, yeah, why I stopped drinking, because over time, over the course of my spiritual journey, I noticed that disconnection, right.
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: So how do you, I guess, empower women to reintroduce that and not have it be a thing?
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: Well, you know, a couple of things come to mind.
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: First of all, acknowledging that alcohol is a drug and that there's a difference between drinking, which is a sport, and having a drink.
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: So I would never pour alcohol on the idea that, oh, I'm gonna be drinking this weekend.
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: Like that whole language and how we talk about that is setting you up for a face plant and a hangover.
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: So then, if you are truly interested in having a drink.
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: So for me, my first drink was I was almost three years sober and my husband's mom died and in her home was a $450 bottle of wine and my husband brought that back home and we have adult children and so he opened the bottle of wine and he was pouring it for everybody and he didn't pour me a glass because of course, I've been sober and that's great and I said the words.
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: I'd been thinking about it because I had done the research and I knew that I was not going to fall back into addiction with just one glass.
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: I had already made the decision.
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: If there was ever a moment that it was appropriate and it felt right, it would be okay.
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: Because of one, I asked myself this question would I be okay if this is not okay.
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: Would I be okay if I don't like how this goes or if I wake up in two weeks?
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: What's our big fear, right, is that we're going to fall right back to those over drinking and addictive behaviors.
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: In fact, addiction is a process that you have to build over time.
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: So one drink isn't going to send you back there.
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: But I knew, because I had overcome the addiction, that I could do it again.
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: And if, by chance, it magically appeared in full force in the monster that they tell us in AA that it's doing pushups in the parking lot and one drink is going to send you back into the gutter, I knew I could ask for help and so I was very comfortable with that.
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: So my husband is pouring the wine and I was ready and I said you know what?
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: I'm not that sober and please pour me a glass of wine too.
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: I wanted to participate in this.
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: You know, alcohol is a drug and with any drug there's a set in a setting, right?
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: You know we talk about that with psychedelics, where there, if you put it into a context, a ritual with an intention and a desired outcome, the effects on your biochemistry are going to be much different.
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: So for me now, and of course I had speed bumps.
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: You know like well can I have two glasses of wine?
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: And, like you, you know, less than two glasses of wine sets me back for like two days.
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: So my experience of alcohol not my thoughts and ideas about alcohol like what is the right amount to drink?
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: Or, yeah, what does it look like to be a good drinker?
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: You can't think about that and, no, you experience it.
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: And so now I'm very in tune with my body and I would say at least half the time, if I'm poured a glass of wine, my experience immediately my body's like no, thank you.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: And I have a funnel in the kitchen because my husband doesn't like to waste good wine and so I will pour it back in the bottle.
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: No, thank you.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: So when I work with women, I make sure that they changed their beliefs and their identity, not to be a drinker or non-drinker, or sober or not sober, but to be a woman who can take care of her body and listen to her own intuition at all times, if that makes sense and alcohol is a drug, it's not.
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: It doesn't mean anything about you and to get out of your head making the rules about it and just go into your experience, and when you listen to your experience you can't ever go wrong Like you can't.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: You can't screw that up.
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I love that and I love that you mentioned that setting, because I'm microdose psychedelics every now and again.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Right, and it is that very.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: When I do it, it's being intentional about, okay, I'm gonna sit and meditate and I wanna work through some shadow work or like whatever.
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: It is right, You're creating that space.
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: And so why is it any different with alcohol?
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: That is also a drug, and when I first had that first glass of wine after a year sober, those were the thoughts I had too.
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: Exactly like you said.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: It was like, oh my gosh, if I open this door, am I never gonna be able to go back?
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: But that was what I kept coming back to is like I did this for a full year.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: I showed up as myself, I was highly uncomfortable, I was very confronting because I noticed a lot of people and I'm sure we'll get into this, but like and how you navigate this but a lot of people that I would hang out with before just stopped calling me.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: I lost a lot of friends over that year because I wasn't drinking.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: And as soon as I had that one drink and people found out that I had had a drink or whatever, then it was like, oh, let's hang out again.
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: No, you didn't wanna hang out with me for the last year that I was sober.
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: That showed me a lot and I reflected a lot.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: I've changed a lot, right, but it is that mindset of you know, not being addicted to the substance, and I think it's similar.
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: I was in an abusive relationship and going through recovery of that.
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: You're a victim of domestic violence, right, and so I had to reprogram that where it was like I'm not a victim of this, this doesn't define who I am, and so I don't know if going through that sort of helped me navigate that sort of labeling of alcoholism where I was like I don't wanna label myself as that, but I think it's interesting too, because it's like what is an alcoholic right and I would never have considered myself that.
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: But when I stopped drinking, I noticed I was drinking to numb.
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: Right, I was drinking to avoid because I'm very I am a very emotional and a very sensitive person, and so being out with people where I'm picking up on energy, it's sort of like that drink allows me to block out all the stuff that's coming at me, because it just disconnects me, right.
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah.
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: So one of the things when I coach women that comes up a lot is well, how do I go to a party sober and how do I stay sober without drinking?
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: How do I?
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: I'm not gonna be able to do it, and the problem is an alcohol in that story.
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: The problem is you don't actually wanna be there or you're not really connected to other people, and so that is where it's really not about the alcohol.
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: You're using alcohol as a shitty coping mechanism or what do I say?
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: Compensation prize Is that important?
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: That makes sense.
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you're using alcohol to reward yourself to keep going in a way that's not aligning with you, and so if you need alcohol to get through an event or to get through the holidays, then you're not putting boundaries in and respecting your own self-care.
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: You're self-silencing and you're pouring alcohol in yourself to perpetuate the self-silencing.
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: So it truly is about a lack of connection, and over-drinking is a symptom of the disconnect from self.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: So when you look upstream to what's causing the downstream symptom of pouring alcohol on it, just like you said, you are disconnecting from your body, you are disconnecting from your truth, you're disconnecting from what you need in what any given moment, and you've just gotten out of the habit of prioritizing your own needs, and I teach that your needs are not negotiable, they are what they are.
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: So you can say well, I shouldn't be tired or I should feel better about sitting here and going through this conversation with these people To your point.
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: I found that a lot of my friends it was during COVID, so things naturally had.
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: We weren't seeing each other, so I didn't experience it quite as raw as you did, but I did notice that you know what a lot of those friendships had run their course.
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: Anyway, we were just getting together as an excuse to drink and for me I had become a person who needed more out of my friendships For a long time.
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: That served a purpose.
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: I was raising my kids like again, I don't demonize my story, I don't look back and say, oh, those friendships weren't valuable.
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: They were and they served a purpose.
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: But by the end we were just all getting together so we could have an excuse to blow through bottles of wine.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I sort of accepted that piece of myself too where my connections tend to be very deep and so if I need to have alcohol with you then it's sort of it's numbing that depth that I have to be surface level and that's not actually a place that I like to be.
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: And to your point, like that, those friendships I value them, right, like I value the place that I was in my life at that time, but I had outgrown them and I absolutely that's something I learned over time and so, yeah, I think that's a really important piece to it.
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: And as you're navigating sobriety, let's say you've quit drinking and you're reconnecting with yourself.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: And I know you talk about intuition a lot, which I think is really really important.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: And I think just in my last like couple drinks that I've had over the last month that's what I've noticed is that disconnect.
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: I'm so hyper aware now of the disconnect with my body and being able to.
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: You know, when I was drinking a lot, it was like I had I was not listening to myself, right, I was not listening to my intuition, like I would go on dates and then drink and like go home with somebody.
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: What I was like I never would have done that.
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: I didn't even like this person.
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: Why am I so disregarding my inner like guidance system based on alcohol?
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: So how do you then repair that relationship with your intuition, to then begin to trust it?
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: Because I think obviously you know, when you've severed a relationship for so long, it's so hard to like rebuild that trust.
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, how do you rebuild the relationship with yourself?
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: Well, the way you do that is the way you repair or enhance a relationship with anybody.
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: You have to spend time with yourself.
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: You have to listen to yourself.
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: One of the primary modalities that I work with is nervous system regulation, and so I call this living from the inside out.
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: You have to learn to read your own body language and then give a shit about the person, the body that you've been assigned on this earth journey to walk through life.
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: Like it's not complicated.
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: It's actually the opposite of complicated.
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: You know, if I ask you, what do you need right now to feel better, most of us would be like I need a million dollars and a bag, I need a better husband, I need a different career.
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: I went like no, no, no, no, no.
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: What does your body need right now?
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: And that's like babysitting a two year old.
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: You either need more stimulation or less, more food or less more sleep or less.
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: Like this isn't complicated.
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: And so developing an awareness of the state of your body in any given moment and learning to respond from the inside your experience of things I teach something like it's very simple.
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: It's like an anxiety.
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: It's an anxiety dial.
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: Think on your dashboard, the RPMs on your car, to become aware of your anxiety dial at all times.
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: And when it starts getting into the red, you have to stop, drop and feel.
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: What's bothering me right now?
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: What story am I telling myself?
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: What physical needs?
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: Maybe you just have to go potty and get some water and take a 10 minute break outside and get some sunlight.
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: But learning how to manage yourself from that anxiety dial instead of letting your brain drag you 100 steps and two days or one year ahead, sinking up that mind and body, so that you're no longer being driven by subconscious thoughts and stuff that you have not examined, but you're actually aware in real time of the like.
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: I use an analogy of a track, like a high school track, where they put up hurdles.
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: You have to jump one hurdle at a time.
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: You have to learn how to live one thought, one feeling, one situation at a time.
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: And the reason we get so overwhelmed is we're telling ourselves this story that we have to go faster and we have to do all these things at once.
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: And I will tell you on the other side of this scale, I actually go really fast and I'm really productive and I get a lot of stuff done, but the way I was living before was that I thought I had to do all the things so that I could feel better, and I would not give myself permission to feel OK if I didn't check all the boxes.
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: This is standard perfectionism.
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: And now, living from the inside out with a regulated nervous system, I know I always need to feel OK so that I can do OK, like I have to feel better first so that I can show up and not be driven by subconscious, self-limiting, self-sabotaging beliefs that are keeping me in stress and overwhelm and not setting boundaries and not telling my truth.
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm yeah.
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: How do you so for people who have anxiety to the point of a very physical response, like like raising hearts, sweating, shaking, like that sort of actual, like really physical response to their anxiety, where it's not just like in the mind?
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: How are you like, how do we regulate in that moment, or do we have, to like, take a complete step back?
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: So there's two things there I have adopted as much as possible.
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: I am human, life is life, right, but I have adopted a hard and fast rule that I will refuse to operate on a dysregulated nervous system.
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: I don't care where I have to be and I don't have little kids, okay.
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: So it's different these days, but I no longer allow myself to continue on the belief that I just need to push through and get all this stuff done and get through this day, and what we think that means is then everything's gonna fall to shit.
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: But in fact I can regulate my nervous system now in 30 to 60 seconds because anxiety is coming up, because there's something in me that there's a problem and our emotions are not the bearers of bad news.
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: That's what anxiety is, kind of a belief that needs to be addressed.
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: Your anxiety is not telling you the truth that there's some scary, awful thing that you need to worry about.
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: Your anxiety is telling you what's in your subconscious.
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: Your anxiety is an invitation to clean house, to weed the limiting beliefs, to address the fears that you're having.
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: You know, one of my favorite analogies is if you have small kids and they wake up in the middle of the night screaming because they're having a nightmare.
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: They think there's a monster under the bed.
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: Do you run out of the house and be like, ah, there's a monster under your bed, I gotta get out of here.
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: That's what we do to ourselves when we start to have anxiety.
• 36:21
  Speaker 2: We, instead of flipping on the light and comforting the child or the inner child or the inner teenager or however, what family systems you wanna work with, instead of looking at the thought that's creating the anxiety, we believe it and so shifting when you have anxiety, to realize the problem here is anxiety.
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: Anxiety is not gonna create a solution where I have to go into my brain and think and overthink and rethink and conduct an opinion poll with all the people in my life.
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: Anxiety is an invitation to first regulate your nervous system and then expose the story that's creating the identity or that's creating the anxiety, and then go into that story and decide what is true and what is not true.
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: And then the third thing, quite honestly, is to realize that the skill that you have to learn is the ability to manage your mind.
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: In these moments when you have anxiety, you have to turn off the story, like I often promise myself.
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: You know what we will think about this as soon as I feel better.
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to abandon the story.
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: I'm not gonna dismiss it and say, oh, there's nothing to worry about, you're just being crazy and overreacted.
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, I'm just not gonna think about it.
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: On a dysregulated nervous system because our thoughts match the frequency of our nervous system.
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: When you are in a state of stress, by definition, biologically you have a negative mindset, a myopic focus.
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: You have worst case end of the world scenarios playing, because stress is designed to keep you alive.
• 37:55
  Speaker 2: And so if you're trying to solve problems in a state of stress, then you are just perpetuating that dysregulated nervous system.
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: So if, like I always say, look around, okay, is there a monster chasing you?
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: Do you have to move right now, like if you're alone in your room and you're experiencing anxiety.
• 38:15
  Speaker 2: The threat is inside your mind and understanding the difference of where the threat is coming from in your environment versus in your mind allows you to shift focus.
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: Then you move into nervous system regulation.
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: Two-year-old self-care what do I need in this moment?
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: And the ability to realize it's in your mind requires a commitment to say I'm not gonna think about this.
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: You have to learn how to manage your mind and not let your brain drag you into anxiety.
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: Do you or can you share like one specific tool that might help us with that mind, all the stories that happen, or like that regulation, like within that moment, because I think that is huge and our mind can often, I mean, it's so easy to spiral out with that, especially when the emotions are involved, and it can be like the cycle right, this like ping pong thing like back and forth between the emotions in the mind.
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: Obviously, if you're not regulated, you never assist.
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: Your mind is gonna always be playing off that.
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: But if there's something that people can do, like in the moment, to sort of calm that down, yeah, so with nervous system regulation, I rely a lot on polyvagal theory and it's notice and name.
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: Notice that you are experiencing stress and you know it's a lot easier to do this on a scale of one to 10, if you wait till your anxiety or stress is on a 10 and you're in a full grade panic attack like that.
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: It's a lot harder to calm that down than if you are aware and connected to your body and you notice, oh, something's, there's a blip on my radar, like, and you start to pay attention to it.
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: So you notice and you name, you name the emotion and let's just keep it broad right here.
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: And this is anxiety.
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: You notice that you're experiencing anxiety.
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: Then what you're doing is you're re-diagnosing the problem.
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: You're moving out of the story and into the state of your nervous system.
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: So instead of focusing on okay, I need to overthink this and make a list and talk to so-and-so and revisit old stories and create all sorts of stuff, no, I need to stop thinking.
• 40:18
  Speaker 2: That's what I need to do.
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: Then the way I teach this is to understand that anxiety, or to think of anxiety as an episode and that it's not permanent.
• 40:30
  Speaker 2: One of the biggest mistakes that we make is that we think in this moment that the way we feel is the truth and how we always feel, and we forget that five minutes ago we felt different and tomorrow we're gonna think and feel something else.
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: And so to recognize your emotional states as states of consciousness, and to learn how to navigate from that anxious state of consciousness into the calm state of consciousness and this is point A and point B it's a skill.
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: First, you have to notice that you're there and second, you have to have the tools.
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: What is triggering you to go into anxiety?
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: Well, there is an opposite road called glimmers.
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: What glimmers bring you back to that state of feeling safe and calm and connected and big picture thinking.
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: So you have to get familiar with how these states feel in your body and stop letting your brain tell you the experience.
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: Everybody is listening right now, like think of the last time you felt like I got this, I understand, I'm okay, it doesn't matter what happens, I'm going to be able to handle it.
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: Like you remember feeling like that.
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: So that's the feeling that you wanna go back to.
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: And then I teach that you need to practice overcoming anxiety and see it as an episode and then the only way to get better at it is to mark your progress.
• 41:56
  Speaker 2: So each episode of anxiety, you wanna mark the duration of the episode, the intensity of the episode and then the frequency that the episodes come up, because there's no way that you're going to just stop being an anxious person Like that's the black and white perfectionist of thinking Some day, when all of this gets fixed, I will no longer deal with anxiety.
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: Nope, you have to learn how to deal with it one hurdle at a time.
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: So when you notice that you are becoming anxious, stop, drop, regulate your nervous system and then, as you become adept at that skill, you'll notice that you can clear all of your anxiety from your body in less than 90 seconds.
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: If you don't attach to the story and go with it, 90 seconds is all it takes to clear that fight or flight response of whatever has happened for you, and then learning what that feels like to clear it and come back to your body and then just start noticing oh look, it's been two whole minutes since I had to do that.
• 42:58
  Speaker 2: Oh, look, it's been two hours.
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: Oh, it's been two days.
• 43:01
  Speaker 2: Oh, it's been two weeks since I've had an anxiety situation.
• 43:05
  Speaker 2: And so you have to look at this not as a situation but as a journey, and that you are making improvements over time of dealing with your anxiety, and so the expectation is not that you're never going to have anxiety again or that this is a problem that you can solve.
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: It's a skill that you develop and you, over time, lessen the duration of each episode.
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: The intensity comes down.
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: Instead of a 10 out of 10, it's a six out of 10.
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: And you move it down over time and then you lengthen the frequency of those episodes.
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think we're in such a culture where it's like we want everything to happen now, right, and I think that's where we feel sometimes like we're failing if we're not overcoming our anxiety in like one setting, like, okay, I regulated myself, I feel better, and now, an hour later, I'm anxious again.
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: I've just failed.
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: And I think that understanding and realizing like it takes time, like all of this stuff takes time to really implement and get to that space I dealt with like crippling anxiety, right, and so it still comes up.
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: But it's the fact that it comes up so infrequently now, right, and so it's in those moments being able to be like okay, I like that you talk about.
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: Like because, again, that nervous system of like knowing I am actually safe right now, so like what is it really?
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: There is no external threat, where in the past, there may have actually been an external threat for me, right, but now there is none.
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: I'm in my room, I'm safe, I'm calm.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: Now we can do the work, right.
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: And I think sometimes, because that anxiety is so like an actual physical response, our mind is like no, no, we're not safe, because your heart's racing, you're sweating, you're shaking, like all of these actual physical responses right, and so I think that's yeah, that's really helpful to know like it takes time and to have compassion with yourself.
• 44:50
  Speaker 2: Emotions are the end product of past experiences.
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: When you are in emotion, by definition you're living in the past, and so just that awareness might give you the confidence to try something different with your anxiety.
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: The other thing that I think is really important is identifying as a person who has anxiety.
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: We talked about labels with the alcoholic label or being a victim of domestic abuse.
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: The other label that I think you can serve you because everything is neutral, so there's good and bad.
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: But the other label that I know I've had to deal with is this idea that I'm a sensitive person or an empath, or that anxiety is just part of who I am.
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: The difference here is a growth mindset versus a fixed mindset.
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: If you believe that you can't actually control your anxiety or that you are a person who will always struggle with anxiety, that will be true, as opposed to the belief of a growth mindset, where you believe that this is a skill regulating your nervous system.
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: You can learn how to do this, just like riding a bike or juggling, like I know.
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: If I wanted to juggle I could.
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: I don't have the motivation to juggle.
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: I know it's a skill.
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: I've learned a lot of physical skills in my life and this is one of them.
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: Managing your anxiety is a skill, and so changing at the core identity is to be from a person who suffers with anxiety to a person who's learning how to deal with anxiety, to a person who can manage her anxiety in real time pretty darn quick.
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: Just as you noticed, in that moment where you have crippling anxiety and you're like, oh, I haven't dealt with this for a long time, I've made a lot of progress.
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: You noticed the win there as opposed to a fixed mindset, which, if you noticed in crippling anxiety on a fixed mindset, you're like well, this is just who I am, this is how it always gonna be.
• 46:51
  Speaker 2: I guess I'll just give up.
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: It's not worth trying, it's too hard.
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: And so.
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: I think it also boils down at the identity level to identify as somebody who is learning and capable of learning this skill.
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: You're not hardwired to suffer this way.
• 47:08
  Speaker 2: It's just a conditioned response to your past.
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I will say, like sometimes there are moments when I experience it, that my mind does go back to that space of like, oh you know, here we are again.
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: I'm not gonna overcome it, but it's a very fast reframe now where I can then come back and be like, oh no, that's just the story, right, it is noticing that that is the story, it's not the reality, and then I can reorient myself to that, my actual truth in that moment, as opposed to just, yeah, taking that label on and I'll never like overcome this.
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: You know, Because I think the mind is powerful and I think you know from I don't know that you ever really as much as you work to reframe and reprogram your subconscious in your mind, I think it is the mind right, and it's still gonna work in the way that it always like knows how to work, and so it's coming back, I think more often than not right, and coming back to that space.
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: But yeah, what you spoke of is we have a default response, you know.
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: So you have reprogrammed your subconscious.
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: Your default response is to check yourself Like it comes up and you place it into context as an old way of responding.
• 48:21
  Speaker 2: You've learned how to respond differently to that initial surge of anxiety.
• 48:26
  Speaker 2: You no longer respond with oh my God, there is a monster under the back.
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: You now respond to okay, I know how to handle this, but it doesn't mean it's never gonna come up again.
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: You know, we are never gonna forget where we've been.
• 48:39
  Speaker 2: Our body is always remember.
• 48:41
  Speaker 2: So it is not.
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: The expectation should not be that you can rewire your subconscious in a way that those old patterns never come back up.
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: It's changing the way you respond to the invitation to go back into those old patterns.
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: That is fully reprogrammed.
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: And so going back a little bit to alcohol, disconnection with our body.
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: So if we're navigating this right and learning to trust our intuition and learning to trust our body and we're separating our mind from our intuition, how do we?
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: I guess the question is like how do you discern from, say, you're not nervous, not like anxious and your nervous system is regulated?
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: How do we discern from intuition and the mind, like yeah, I love that question.
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: So the truth is that you're in like we tend to think.
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: The belief is that intuition is telling you the truth.
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: Intuition is right, listen to your intuition.
• 49:46
  Speaker 2: But the truth is, all the truths can coexist.
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: And so, while your gut instinct, I think what it means to listen to your intuition is to acknowledge your body's opinion, that gut feeling.
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: But the gut feeling can be coming from childhood trauma or past abuse.
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: So it's not that your intuition is always right.
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: I think that one thing I would differentiate is intuition is a knowing that something exists without judgment.
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: So you're intuitively sensing that there's something to pay attention to here.
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: There's a red flag.
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: But the intuition itself in its raw form is just data.
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: It's not the judgment or the story, it's not negative.
• 50:42
  Speaker 2: So if your intuition is negative, then that is probably an indication that you're dealing more with a dysregulated certain nervous system.
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: And one of my favorite questions to ask when my intuition comes into my awareness is what else could be true?
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: What do I want to be true?
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: Am I living in the past or could I create?
• 51:05
  Speaker 2: How could I think, feel and act right now to create a different result in the future?
• 51:11
  Speaker 2: Do I want this story to change.
• 51:13
  Speaker 2: So intuition is just an invitation to explore what it is that's in your subconscious.
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: It doesn't mean that what comes up for you is what you need to act on.
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: I think that's the biggest misconception I've had to get over.
• 51:27
  Speaker 2: Is that my intuition is telling me the truth?
• 51:30
  Speaker 2: No, my intuition is just knowing that there's something I need to pay attention to here.
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm so glad you mentioned that because I feel like for me that has been so much of my work over the last six years is understanding that sometimes what we label as intuition is actually just trauma response, right, and so I've learned that for me personally, what works for me is, even if I'm having a response from my body that's trauma-based, I still take a step back from the thing, I still listen to my body where it's like okay, this doesn't feel safe, so maybe let's like step back and assess what's actually happening.
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: But I've always that has always been a struggle with me of like intuition and like guidance, as opposed to just being that trauma response from the past without the anxiety like full blown surrounding it.
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: Right, because your body is still like you said, it stores memory, right, and so it's always coming up, it's always remembering things from the past and it's just like re, you know, just in the moment, knowing that you're safe, and then re-navigating from there.
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I love intuition, I love listening to my inner guidance, but my inner guidance is usually a call to pay attention, not turn right here because you know whatever.
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: And I also believe in divine intervention and I love playing with our guides and thinking that we're, you know, being helped by other forces, like.
• 52:54
  Speaker 2: I love all of that stuff, but I also always put it through a filter of okay, I'm gonna take that into consideration, I'm gonna explore, you know, and look at this in the big picture and not assume that because I had a gut reaction that that's the one I need to go with.
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, as I have, like on my spiritual journey, like just surrendered to like the universe and the things that are coming in, what I do notice is that being and this is one of the like amazing things for me in my year of sobriety, my emotions are so much more regulated, not to say I don't have highs, not to say I don't have lows, but they're not like full blown, like crippling lows and just like you know, like almost just like those super, super extremes where I feel like when things drop into my reality, when people come in, when situations come in, I can sort, I can like feel them in the moment.
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: But then come back to the space of a little bit more clarity, where I'm not like so consumed by the emotion that is likely due to the body trying to like detox from the alcohol, right, which just like completely always messes up again, like we said, we've been talking about like disconnection from body, where I can then view it from a little bit different lens of like huh, like curiosity, I guess non-judgmental curiosity, and I know that you had mentioned on being non-judgmental to all these things and so now it's like when things come in, no matter like how I respond the moment I can sort of like step back and be like, well, that's really interesting.
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: I wonder what the lesson here is.
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: You know, and not have to be like, oh my gosh, this is the thing, this is it and I have to do this thing or I'm I have to run away from this thing, right, and just to be able to view that from a different lens has been just incredible in my journey.
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: And so now, you know, if I do have a glass of wine and maybe I do feel disconnected my body, I still know I'm gonna come back to the space of knowing right within my system and curiosity and being able to navigate from there.
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: So it's so powerful to be doing this work right and to understand.
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: And you know, a lot of what I teach is that just being in the body, because I think we are like spiritual beings but we are here in a physical body for a very specific reason and we can't disconnect from that body, because that is part of the experience.
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: And when we are disconnected from it, that's when I think anxiety and all these other things you know come up.
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I have another word for it that really resonates, and it's abandoning your body you know, and that's why we tend to feel abandoned and unseen, it is not the people around us, it is.
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: You know, we're using substances or we're trying to control our environment, or we're trying to justify another drink or whatever.
• 55:17
  Speaker 2: We're trying to make a story and the bottom line is, in that moment, when we become disconnected, we've abandoned ourselves.
• 55:26
  Speaker 2: And that's where, even with alcohol, you know that I think we're talking a little bit about two different things.
• 55:32
  Speaker 2: You know you get a little heady buzz with alcohol.
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: That doesn't mean you're disconnected from your truth, it's just you have to really pay attention to your body and not abandon because you're in pursuit of a buzz or something like that, and just loving and caring for this physical vessel.
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: And when you become your own self safe place, even when you do have too much to drink, it is an invitation to come back to your home.
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: You know, working with women on various stages of sobriety or reintroducing, there is the next morning and I talk about, you know that moment you wake up, that's and realize, oh, I did it again or I shouldn't have done that, like.
• 56:22
  Speaker 2: That's the moment that in the present you can't abandon yourself.
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: You have to.
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: Beating yourself up is a form of self-abandonment, and then that's usually what compiles the anxiety and perpetuates then the cycle because you have something to escape.
• 56:40
  Speaker 2: If you're focused on creating an internal environment in your body that you no longer need to escape, drinking loses its appeal.
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: Are you familiar with human designer astrology?
• 56:52
  Speaker 2: So I have played with it, but I've never gotten into it and I know this has sent you my information, so I would love to hear more about it.
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I just think it's so interesting.
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: You know, as I like, you know, I ask people for their information so I can pull their charts before I do podcast interviews and I always like to listen to like these little keywords.
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: You know that like come up and so you're a Virgo, and so I noticed that you know that perfection, you know you said that word a couple of times and I think that's very much.
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: A Virgo can be a Virgo shadow, right, that idea of like chasing perfection and anything less than you become very critical and like judgmental with yourself.
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: And so you know, I mean, if we're talking about alcohol, alcohol can maybe, you know, in the use of it, sort of numb that a little bit.
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: Right, because I think we're always using alcohol for a reason.
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: Right, it's not just like you know, like this entire conversation, and then, with human design, you're a one, three emotional manifesting generator.
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: So you know, like you said, the speed, the quickness, you know, manifesting generators are very multi talented, multi passionate.
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: They're not just like a one thing and then they're done, right, it's, they're kind of bouncing all over the place.
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: But that emotional piece because I'm emotional as well, right, and I think the lesson for any emotional being like with emotional authority, is in in, in regulating the emotions and understanding the emotions and riding the highs and riding the lows and coming to that space of clarity.
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: And so I always just I just find it really interesting.
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: And that one three profile, it's like the investigator martyr.
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: So you like to research, you like to investigate, which is very much that Virgo energy, right, that, that analytical, ruled by Mercury sort of energy.
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: But then the third line is trial and error.
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: So you have to be like moving through the experiment of it to really then integrate the knowledge that you've taken in, Right, and so it's.
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: It's not just like a mental thing, it has the body has to come into play with that as well for you to really like fulfill your purpose.
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: So I don't know if that resonates, but I think it's just like so interesting as I listen to people and meet people and then I can place the, the energy, with the chart to it does and it's.
• 58:47
  Speaker 2: it's interesting because, of course, we all think our truth is the truth, Right.
• 58:52
  Speaker 2: But I say the thing I've learned through this process of recovery and coming full circle where it's no longer about the alcohol.
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: I understand that you can't think and know anything.
• 59:07
  Speaker 2: You can't think I'm never going to drink again or I'm always going to drink in this specific manner or any context of identity that we put ourselves in.
• 59:18
  Speaker 2: Like it.
• 59:19
  Speaker 2: To do that is to decide in advance to not pay attention to your body.
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: You can't think and know.
• 59:26
  Speaker 2: You only can know through experience of things.
• 59:31
  Speaker 2: And that is my new investigation, if you will.
• 59:35
  Speaker 2: And super scary and also cool that my knowing changes every single day, like what I know today does not apply tomorrow.
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: You know, I'm constantly happy to learn again.
• 59:47
  Speaker 2: I teach living from the inside out, like just dropping the assumptions of what you think is right or wrong and with the nervous system going better or worse, more or less, and just being willing to honor and not abandon your body.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: So I find that interesting that that might actually be an aspect of my soul or personality, or how can you describe it?
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 2: Is human design?
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: Physical, obviously, but where's the overlap with spiritual and physical?
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: So human design, like the way I look at it, it's like a blueprint to your soul, right, it is the combination of the mind and the body.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: And so we live in this illusion of separateness, right, that the two things are separate, but they're really they're one, right?
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: And so we have to take all of it into consideration.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: And so human design in itself it's not like it has both right, it's esoteric and it's spiritual, but it's also actually rooted in science, right, where it's got quantum mechanics and things like that incorporated in there.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: So I just love where it kind of lives in this middle space, right?
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: So it's like you don't have to have a belief system, you don't have to be super spiritual to believe in it.
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: You can be Virgo, analytical and understand the science behind the design.
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: But I think it's all adaptable, there's all options, like anything that you're any open centers, there's always space where we're conditioned in life.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: So you can have one chart and someone can have the exact same chart, and your life experiences make you completely different people in your conditioning.
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: And I heard something related to astrology, but I think it still applies.
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: It's like astrology the chart, the natal chart, it's like the framework of your house, right, you can paint it different, you can rearrange the furniture, it can look so different over the years, like completely different, but the framework is still going to be the same, right, and so that's sort of like the way that I approach astrology.
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: I don't know if that answered your question.
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 2: I'm like no, and I find it fascinating and I get into lots of different rabbit holes.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: You know I've gone down the Enneagram rabbit hole.
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: I just love learning.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 2: That's part of my chart.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: But yeah, that first line, it's the knowledge.
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 2: I love making sense of things and making meaning of things and, you know, seeing where I fit.
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: It's like we are humans have, we are spiritual beings having a human experience and I just love kind of the journey here on in Earth's school Like what's that next class?
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: Right, I know I love that and I think that's, you know, something that I had written down, that I didn't ask, but I think you touched on it is like releasing that.
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: I think for me and my journey right, releasing the shame on all of the shoulds and shouldn'ts and just allowing it to be was, like hugely important, but that in itself was a journey, right.
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: It was having to realize like, oh, wow, I feel really shameful when I wake up and I drink and I feel like crap in the next day or I feel a lot of shame for not being able to show up and or feeling anxious and superficial relationships or situations, right.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: And it's releasing that aspect of it to sort of like letting all of that go and like just being right, like you said, like being in the experience of it and the experiment of it, and it's like, okay, well, this is actually really interesting, right.
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: And a lot of times when I feel anxious, now I just take like a deep breath and I try and reframe.
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: I'm like I'm actually really excited to be in this moment, right, I'm excited to like be feeling this and like understanding where it's coming from.
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: Or if it's like meeting a person and I'm anxious like wow, I'm actually excited I get to meet a new person today, and it's not to discredit or disregard that level.
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: You know that, like anxiety that came up initially, but I think that reframe and then you know, if it's in a moment where I can't actually move through the process, in that specific moment being able to come back and then look at it, but I think that reframe, you know, and, like you said, just realizing this is all it's experience, right, and we are an Earth school and that's we came here, to be here, and I think there's a beauty in that.
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 2: And that's why it's so important for for you to do this work.
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: If, after a period of sobriety, you want to go back in to just making a decision in the moment like, what do I want to do?
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: Because waking up with that shame it's not about the alcohol.
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: In the past.
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 2: Those old neural pathways there are still in place, and if you don't actively anticipate and and look at the shame coming up as an invitation to heal, it doesn't matter if you had alcohol or not.
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: You're not a bad person.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 2: You have nothing has gone wrong.
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 2: There's something to learn here, you know, and so learning how to deal with the shame.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: Like you said in the very beginning, this isn't about the alcohol.
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 2: I would say it's much more about learning how to to love yourself, not abandon yourself, and how to respond when shame and we've also talked about anxiety when those things come up.
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 2: That's really what all of this is about, and for me, alcohol was the modality that brought, not modality, the medium.
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 2: Alcohol was the medium that allowed me to learn all of this.
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 2: So I have no shame about my past drinking.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 2: You know I've learned a couple lessons the hard way, but anytime I wake up and experience shame, that's an invitation, and anytime I'm experiencing anxiety, that's an invitation to become a whole person and to not abandon myself in that moment.
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: I love that.
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you want to make sure the audience, the listeners, take with them today?
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 2: I really think that's it, just the reframe of realizing that your emotions are a reflection of what's going on inside you not even how much alcohol you drink and becoming a growth mindset of.
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 2: I can deal with these emotions and it's the best thing in the world, like it is the most, it is the most sacred thing to be able to interact with your body in a loving, wise way.
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: I love that.
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: Well, thank you so much for coming on today and having this conversation with me.
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: Where can everyone find you and how can they work with you?
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 2: So I have a podcast, which right now it's named Recover with Colleen.
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: Probably by the time this episode aired, I am doing a relaunch and it's called.
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 2: It's Not About the Alcohol, that's my title, but my website, where you can always find me, is recoverwithcolleencom, and so you can find me at my podcast.
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 2: You can go to my website.
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 2: I do have a free masterclass.
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 2: If you are struggling with overdrinking and you want to quit, without making it mean you're an alcoholic.
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 2: You just want to pause and take some time to learn these skills that we're talking about.
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 2: I have a free masterclass that kind of explains what you need to do in order to make that shift.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: So that's recovercolleencom.
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: Okay, amazing, and I will have it all linked in the show notes as well, so everyone can just go and click it and follow you and find out how to work with you.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much for coming on.
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 1: Thank you for having me.
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 2: Make sure you subscribe to Myros for the new video constantly.