Walk Together Fiercely
Walking Together Fiercely is a fun and bouncy podcast, hosted by Psychic Medium, Michelle Morrison and Naturopathic Doctor, Tara Drummond. Together, they bring forward numerous topics about well being, health, Spirituality and just being human in a diverse, busy and sometimes chaotic world. Celebrating our differences and the things we have in common, all with a sense of humor and compassion. With guest speakers bringing their amazing wisdom and talents forward, we are creating a safe space where we can talk about a variety of topics and learn and grow in positive and empowering ways. Being more in tune within, more intuitive and aware in all areas of life and living the best life you can live. Our intention is to create a beautiful community of amazing souls who want to hold one another up as we all walk our journey with kindness, laughter, compassion, love and joy. We are so glad you are here and we look forward to taking this journey with you!
Walk Together Fiercely
Celebrating Your Resiliency and the Journey of Self Acceptance
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Embarking on a journey of self-discovery can often feel like navigating through a dense fog, but what if you had a compass to guide you towards resilience and self-acceptance? Today we are speaking about resiliency and acknowledging just how resilient we all are. In this episode, we share our own deeply personal paths as we embrace vulnerability and take stock of how resiliency has shaped, helped, and keeps us moving forward.
Have you ever felt the harsh sting of body shaming or found yourself at odds with the 'perfect' standards set by society? In this heartfelt conversation, we confront these cultural and self imposed expectations as we look at where we are now and what we have learned and how we are so much stronger than we think. We highlight the necessity for a cultural pivot towards body reverence and recognizing our bodies' unique capabilities, offering a beacon of hope and empowerment for anyone struggling to find their footing in the world of body positivity and self-love.
If you have had to navigate challenges and perhaps even felt like for a moment or for a time that you were lost or didn't know what to do, you are so not alone. Sometimes the challenges can be seen as "cracks" or something that seems broken. Yet, that is how the light is seen. Resilience is a muscle, one that requires constant nurturing and strength within your own being. We invite our listeners to acknowledge their own resilience and join us in this ongoing practice, emphasizing the importance of self-compassion and the acceptance of life's uncontrollable events. We extend an invitation to our growing Instagram community @walktogetherfiercely, where the conversation continues and where each of us can find solace in the shared experience of walking together, fiercely and lovingly. Let's Walk Together Fiercely through Celebrating Your Resiliency and the Journey of Self Acceptance.
We would love for you to join us in our community! Find us on Instagram at: @walktogetherfiercely
Here you can be a part of the conversation! We love when you message us, when you tag us in your posts and stories, thank you so much for sharing!
For more information about Dr. Tara, you can find her on Instagram at: @drtaradrummond
For more information about Michelle, you can find her on her website: www.thebalancedsoul.com
Instagram: @michellemorrisonmedium
Facebook: @Michelle Morrison Psychic Medium
Welcome to Walk Together Fiercely. We are just so glad to have you here. We invite and we also thank you for being a part of our community. Thank you for choosing to spend some of your precious time with us. We know how valuable it is. I am Michelle Morrison. I am a medium and an intuitive and I support people to make beautiful spiritual connections with loved ones on the other side, with angels and spirit guides, and I love helping people tune into their own amazing intuition spirit guides. And I love helping people tune into their own amazing intuition.
Speaker 2:I am Dr Tara Drummond and I'm a naturopathic doctor and I'm passionate about empowering people in all aspects of health and well-being. Our intention is to create community and connection. We do that with open hearts, minds and a whole lot of love and laughter. The more we know ourselves, the deeper connection we can have within, which allows us to deepen connections around us.
Speaker 1:We feel so passionately about this. You matter, that you are so important and that you belong, and we are creating and connecting to the hearts and wisdom of our bodies, mind and spirits, nurturing and growing compassion, empathy and community. We know that we are so much better together, and so let's walk together fiercely through this beautiful, sometimes really challenging life as light warriors of love. Together, with open minds and hearts, we can create a community where we celebrate, play and thrive. Thank you for being here, play and thrive. Thank you for being here. Good snowy morning. We went from 21 degrees to minus three. We are recording this. It's April 16th, so by the time this comes out, it's probably the beginning of may, ish, or even in may, and, and so the snow will be long gone, god I hope.
Speaker 2:But here we are yeah, I drove, because michelle and I live in different parts of town. So I drove up the hill and I'm like, oh my goodness, they got snow up here, so at my house we don't have it. Yeah, but I walk up to your front door and you've got all these tulips ready to open and they, they're ready to open Covered in snow, entirely covered in snow, for little bunnies. They'll do all right though.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I mean you know, fitting, I guess, for this could be a little bit of a wonky conversation. Tara, I'll just be honest, because what we just decided to do for you listening, just so you know, we've just turned the mics on and we are just chatting and our conversation today, our intention was to talk about resiliency in our emotional intelligence series of you know things that can that help you to be more emotionally intelligent, and resiliency being one of those, and what I said to you was that I'm feeling broken open today. I'm feeling very cracked open because of the last few conversations that we have had, and I feel like all the mystery has been lifted. There are no more secrets, that pretty much everything is out there in the wide open for everyone to hear. And so we recorded a beautiful episode with Will Wise, the pro basketball player, who shared his cancer journey, and we shared our stories of sharing a similar well, the exact same illness, not similar, exactly the same, manifesting in different ways, and my shame around that. And then we spoke to Jen Messina, jen the dietician, which was one of the most powerful episodes for me that we ever recorded, and I think you feel very similarly, tara.
Speaker 1:I felt broken open that day talking about body image, and I can sit here and say, absolutely, you know kind things to myself, I can take care of myself, I can do self care, I can. You know, I do all of those things. What that conversation taught me was that there was a layer of me that felt body shame that I wasn't wearing or allowing on the surface maybe, or maybe I didn't want to acknowledge it, maybe that's what it is, because there's literally, like it's, layers of shame upon shame, because there's shame and feeling shame about it. Right, like you know we're, you know we're working towards creating such body positivity and you know kindness and self-care and all of these things. And I'm thinking that, yeah, I'm absolutely, you know, walking the talk and I am doing all these things. And then it kind of hit me that day like a ton of bricks that I got a long way to go, still Like I have some work to do there, and that felt really way to go, still Like I have some work to do there.
Speaker 1:And that felt really vulnerable to admit that. It felt really vulnerable to acknowledge some of the ways that I speak to myself or some of the ways that I really feel, and you keep telling me there's so much power in that because we're not alone, that we all do it in our own way. It just feels like a lot. So I just feel like for me anyway. Well, I've shared all my authenticity now at this point, I mean, like there are there are no more hidden. There are no more hidden things in there. Like my shame is all on the table with these two episodes entirely, because that is exactly where I've carried. It is in my health and wellbeing and my body image.
Speaker 2:That's tender, it's very tender. Oh, that episode with jen, it stuck with me for the whole rest of that day like it was reverberating and all these little pearls through it. And, michelle, I honestly feel like that's going to be such a gift to women. But to everybody like who doesn't feel pangs of shame around our body or our body image and Jen's gentle voice around that, like I remember you saying when we stopped recording with her, the first thing you said was I've never left a conversation feeling better. Yeah, about my body, yeah and.
Speaker 2:I think now we're in the okay, we're gonna launch this episode, the world's gonna hear your tenderness and your shame and your vulnerability and I think it comes with this layer of grief of how many years we've shamed ourselves. Yeah, right, and I think it's. I love that it's come up and it's out there and it's going to be such a touch point, I think, for people um, I received a lot from the conversation differently about that, because it's just you feel like you're naked in front of the world well, all my dirty laundry is out there, right?
Speaker 1:yeah yeah no, it was amazing yeah, what I hope that people take from this is there is no perfection, right, it is all. Just, you know, doing the best we can. And you know, I guess maybe that is one of the things that I can say would contribute to my own resiliency is, you know, I hate the awareness sometimes, tara, like, sometimes it's just inconvenient. I don't want it. Um, it means that there is more inner work to do. Sometimes I'm just fucking tired, um, I am tired sometimes of experts and you know just all the messaging around. You know, and I felt so confused of late. You know, don't eat oats, um, don't, you know, this is bad and this is bad and this is bad. And I felt so confused of late. You know, don't eat oats, don't. You know this is bad and this is bad and this is bad. And I'm like, well, what should I eat? I don't know what I'm supposed to eat for breakfast anymore. Like, I'm so confused and I left that conversation feeling so much better.
Speaker 1:I thought that she really for me anyway, she really broke through a lot of that confusion and approached that from such a place of love and gentleness and such a place of almost like I don't know what the word I'm reaching for is, but it was like real. It wasn't like trying to be you should be like this, you should be like that. It was more an approach to how we are in real life every day. And her approach was, well, what is wrong with what you are doing? Like, explain to me how that is wrong. And I'm like, well, because I've heard all explain to me how that is wrong. And I'm like, well, because I've heard all the experts say that it's wrong.
Speaker 1:And I should be fasting and you know all all of these things that I should be doing, but when I do them, I am miserable, I am incredibly unhappy. It doesn't bode well for me for a lot of reasons. Well, maybe there's a lot more reasons for that. Like I am, you know my own person, my own body. I am unique, um, and maybe it's it's, you know, maybe my own intuition is actually what knows better, because my intuition is never going to say, not that I would ever even want to, but it's never going to say go eat 10 hamburgers, like that's never going to happen in a million years. Um, but my intuition is going to say it's a soup day, you know. Or, and it's a, you know, it's a, it's a curry day, you know. So what is wrong with that? Absolutely nothing. And you know, before I would have been like, okay, well, you can do curry, but no rice or, uh, no naan bread, or you know whatever the way that you talk to yourself and that just sounds terrible like to me.
Speaker 2:I'm like, oh my gosh, eat the naan bread, eat the rice. Like but yeah, that's what Jen said too. Yes, but this almost like punitive mindset that it needs to be like this ideal way, like that the experts and I think that this is such a beautiful reminder and ties into our topic of resilience today of like looking outside of ourselves for the answers and the advertisements I see and the body types that I see and the way I'm programmed. We're looking outside of ourselves for what is right and good, when I think that this is a returning back to our body, back to our heart, back to our discernment and listening to our body and if our body is hungry, feeding it Right.
Speaker 2:And we discussed in that episode the importance of food in that mental, emotional way in that connection in that episode, the importance of food in that mental, emotional way in that connection in that and I just loved her gentle perspective. I got so much out of that episode and really this is highlighting for me how our mind and our patterns and our programming, it's so normal and comfortable to us.
Speaker 1:that's right that we might not even notice that we're doing it. That is exactly right. I don't think that I even noticed that I was doing it. It was just my way of almost being yeah.
Speaker 2:Just normal in your being. So now that it's cracked open and it's cracked something inside of you, you shared earlier that you're getting these new glimpses of gentle Absolutely, and that's exciting. Yeah, and that's what I hope our listeners listening to that episode that they walk away. Because I walked away and that's what was resonating with me after for a long time was this more relaxed, gentle ideology about, like more, feeding my kids, and that I felt like I'm doing. All right, I'm doing well. Yeah, instead of thinking that.
Speaker 2:I'm not, because my, my mind and my shame will be that perfectionism right and it'll kind of go into that way and then I've never done it right, I've never done enough, it's not so. My ego will chip away in that way and I love that we're talking about the shame of this, because our shame can just be this little stick that beats us down and, like you said earlier, you feel shame about feeling shame and I'm like because I shouldn't feel shame and I've been trying to heal the shame.
Speaker 1:You know, for all these years I've been working on healing any kind of shame. When it comes up, heal it. Yes, I didn't know, yeah, that it was in there on that level, that deep and so that has been a hard realization yes and when? Yeah. And then I'm like well, fuck, I'm not, I'm still like, I'm still not doing it right damn, I'm imperfect.
Speaker 2:And a working project?
Speaker 1:well, this sucks exactly, and so it was just such a awakening of I guess, to, like you know who are Tara, who are they?
Speaker 2:Yeah, right.
Speaker 1:Like. You know what I mean. Like the they. Well, they say and they would think like, who are the they? And why am I letting what anybody else thinks about multiple endocrine neoplasia and having to go through thyroid removal or the way that I feel about my body? Why is anybody else in my head? They haven't entered there. They didn't like knock on the door. I have given them permission somehow.
Speaker 1:You know, by listening. You know to so-called experts speak and this is where you should be and this is you know. This is. This is the weight category that you should be in. This is exactly what it should look like if you're healthy and if you know those who are a few pounds over that, ooh, you're jeopardizing your life expectancy, like all the stuff. You know how it goes, everyone knows how it goes, and so then you're sitting there and I was telling you that when I was filling out my admission form for the surgery that it said that I was at the top end of my weight category for my size, height and age and that I need it literally said on the admission form be careful, take it easy there, that's so then you're hearing from the experts that your body is imperfect.
Speaker 2:I know that's so.
Speaker 1:Then you're hearing from the experts that your body's imperfect, I know, and so like I'm, you know, filling out all of this work, signing away my life and well-being, and then, on top of that, they're like you're not, you're not, uh, you're not in an overweight category, but you are this and that's a problem for you, and it's just like that's really awful. Now I really feel shitty. Thank you, yes I would.
Speaker 2:Now I am sick and shitty. Just let's add another slathering of shame to my shame okay, I have a couple little points here, because for me, when I add shame on top of shame or like you're saying in the I should do this, should do this. Experts say I should, should, is always to me that guilt is creeping in. And when we've got the shame and guilt creeping in to me, I know that I'm listening to the wrong voice.
Speaker 2:I know that my ego is getting in there and telling me all these ways I'm not good enough and I need to be better. And I applaud the vulnerability that we've walked through in the last few weeks, michelle, because how do we dissolve shame? We shine light on it like it can live and breed and feed and grow if we keep it hidden. Yeah, and how many people out there have felt shame about their body, that it's not good enough, that it's the wrong size like and the bmi charts, and that I would like to kick that to the curb, because there's so much more to a body than the BMI like, than our, our height and our weight, because my husband I think he's obese or morbidly obese on the BMI, because he's so tall?
Speaker 1:yeah, he is.
Speaker 2:It doesn't take into account his height you can put in his height, but it's very skewed once you get tall. He is supposed to be under 205 pounds to be healthy, so he's very. How is that even possible? I know he would be a stick, but that's where BMI is skewed. Holy he'd be emaciated. He'd be a thin guy, yeah. Like and I'm not saying that he doesn't like whatever.
Speaker 2:We don't need to pick apart any bodies, but BMI is not the be all, end all so that when somebody's not medically trained, they look and the doctor, who's supposed to be the expert on health, is telling us that we're too big.
Speaker 2:We believe that because they're medically trained and I just I love highlighting Jen's message that you're, there's nothing wrong with your body, like that, your body's not a problem. And I just think if we can return to this like reverence for our body, whatever the shape or size, and start saying little bits of nice things and we've talked about the affirmations before and you asked are you doing, are you doing these? Like, uh, talking nice things to my body, and I actually dropped off of it, um, and I'm pulling it back in now because I can see the benefits of it. And it was so interesting to me because you said I can say all these nice things about myself but you would never speak towards your body.
Speaker 1:No, I never addressed my body. That's what I didn't really realize, Like yeah, I didn't. I mean, yes, I can say thank you to my feet for carrying me all these steps and getting all these steps in today, or my hands for being, you know, doing so many things and things like that, but no, like not. Not my skin, not my, my tummy, not my stretch marks, no, Wow, she has a tummy and stretch marks people.
Speaker 2:What a right. You and everybody else, and I think that that's why your courage and your resiliency is all worthy in this month. We're talking about resiliency today, so I would like to. I can't. I think that we both felt vulnerable coming into this because it's like that imposter syndrome imposter syndrome, imposter syndrome. Who am I? Who am I to talk about resiliency? I feel absolutely the opposite of that at times, yeah, and then we have moments where we return back to our center and I think that's resiliency.
Speaker 1:Oh, I think having this conversation is resiliency in of itself, dara, because you know like I mean, resiliency is is your ability to walk through challenges and hard times, and maybe it's moments, or it's something that is much, much bigger perhaps, but it is your ability to kind of come back to, like you said, that place of center, to be able to, you know, get through a challenge, to you know whether that's, you know, is going as far as saying rise above it, but I think rising above it is like keeping your self intact. Your, your ability to keep moving all of those things is your resiliency, and I know that I have that, I know that you have that, I know that we've shown each other over the course of our friendship that we have done that so in so many ways time and time again.
Speaker 1:So I don't know that we've shown each other over the course of our friendship that we have done that in so many ways time and time again. So I don't think that we're imposters speaking about it. I just think that this is just a really vulnerable day and that I, right now, I definitely am needing to rely on that resiliency to be able to bounce back because, yeah, like I feel like a raw onion just cut in half right now Not even peeled, I mean totally cut in half.
Speaker 2:And they'll see that onion. It stings a little bit, tara, it just stings a little bit. It's making my eyes water. Yeah, when I sit with, like when I sit with the word resilient, I can actually even feel a twang of shame within myself, like kind of oh, like, who are you to speak of resiliency? And when I sift through that voice and I go down into my heart, I think that resiliency for me is the ability to return to love.
Speaker 2:Ability to return to love, and I, over and over again, whether it be moment by moment, hour, like sometimes it's needed multiple times in a day, sometimes it's quite effortless but it's when those big things come, those huge waves of sadness or the shame of feeling exposed and vulnerable, and or you get afraid and you want to shut down you, you want to disconnect, you want to all these different things, I think the resiliency within myself is can I return to my heart and can I show up loving again?
Speaker 1:Right, because I think that we could let fear run the show and I think we could let ego run the show Fear and ego would love to run the show, but I just know that life sucks when they do Mm. Hmm, yeah, and I think of your tulips.
Speaker 2:They do Mm-hmm, yeah, and I think of your tulips out front and the resiliency I think the snow will be melted when we are done with this on them, but those poor beauties covered in that icy snow and some days feel like that and I think the resiliency is the continually showing up and that we need support in. We need people, we need people to mirror back to us right, uh, and that's where community and that's the heart of this podcast is like walk together fiercely, that when one person trips and stumbles, like we have a community to pick each other up and to continue forward and to keep choosing love and like loving ourselves and loving our body. And yes, it's been a couple very beautiful, vulnerable episodes we've yeah, we've released and yeah, that's for sure.
Speaker 1:I mean, our intention was to show up authentically, you know, to, you know, create community, as you said, and and to share. I guess you know it. It just feels different when you are yeah, I don't think that we walk around, you know, taking out a newspaper ad um, sharing all of our shame and vulnerability, all the time?
Speaker 2:no, not at all, but I think you're, you're choosing to shine light on this and other people then get to go. Oh, me too, like I feel that too, and I think that when we liberate ourselves from that shame of our body, we get to then like that's that?
Speaker 2:marianne williamson quote we then get to like, liberate others as well and we can shine our light. And like zach bush, dr zach bush talks about the evolution of humans and he talks about how we are going to completely get rid of the vibrations of fear, guilt and shame at a cellular level and if we can do that, we can carry on, and I think that you're right on point.
Speaker 2:Like we are letting go of this vibration of just walking around feeling shame for the body that we're in opposed to celebrating being alive, because, at the end of the day, does it matter how big our ass is? Does it matter how much our waistline is or our breasts or our all these different things like I would love to have a magic wand, and I think that this is like the start of it is talking about it having the uncomfortable conversations, sharing our shame bits. Like I would invite people to normalize these little bits and have these conversations with your trusted friends and or reach out on Instagram and chat with us or find a therapist, or whatever it may be. I think that sharing is part of the medicine, because if we keep this inside of us, that shame, and every time we look in the mirror, we say something mean to ourself and we just let that perpetuate. I think this is an invitation to do things differently. Yeah, and that's resiliency, isn't it?
Speaker 2:It is resiliency, to be adaptable and to change and to not hold on to the old ways of being.
Speaker 2:And let's visit the topic of resiliency in children, Because I think that sometimes that might be easier to think of, because I can have more gentleness with my children than I can sometimes on my adult self. So when I'm being extra hard on myself, I think how would you respond to your children Like this if this was your daughter as an adult, what would you say to her? You wouldn't tell her that she's not good enough and hasn't done enough and stupid or whatever we talk about right. So when I think of that, it reminds me of my sister, who reminds me that we are raising children to walk the path of life. We're not going ahead of them to pave this path and to protect them and to bubble wrap them like we are raising these children to have that resiliency and that's so tender and like.
Speaker 2:As a mother. This is such a great reminder because I would love to put my elbows up and my mama bear energy and I'd love to protect them from any hurt that comes their way, any mean words or anything that. I would love to be able to just completely dome them with protection and never let them feel this adversity, and that's not realistic. They're going to fall off their bike and they're going to skin their knees, they're going to get mean comments to them, they're going to have a friend that ignores them or a. There's going to be all these things in life and I need to let go of that and wanting to control that for them. Let them have their experience and be that gentle, safe space where they can come, we can talk about it, we can reset and I think that that's resiliency.
Speaker 2:So can we have that for ourselves? That when we feel like the world's like beaten and battered us, can we return home and have that like remothering energy where we can fall into mama's arms and maybe it's not our own mother, because I'm sure it often isn't but lay on the ground, lay on the earth, and that is where, when I break, I break to my kitchen floor right and I let the earth hold me and I know that I'm being a crying baby held on the belly of Mama Earth, and Mama Earth doesn't judge her belly or her stretch marks or her anything belly or her stretch marks or her anything I think I just melt back into, like the vulnerability just knocks me and can make me melt and I I'm just reminded of that and every time you step up off of the kitchen floor after crying, that's resiliency.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, and being able to show those emotions to me is resiliency, because I can't hold on without letting the flow of the emotions right, without clearing the shame, without clearing the fear. If I held on so tight and we're talking about this series of emotional intelligence if we held on so tight to all of our emotions and I don't show sadness or grief or anger or whatever, that all gets packed in me and that is where it does not feel good and the body gets out of balance so I think that I, your vulnerability makes me smile and it feels almost inappropriate, but it's that.
Speaker 2:It's a gift. It's that there's somebody listening on the other end crying as well because they feel fat, and that they can leave that conversation feeling better about their body than when they started. So I'm going to thank you here for anybody that had that experience with that episode, because I did.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. I cried that whole day after we were done and you left. I was just like, oh my gosh, yeah, it was like crying away the years of that and you didn't even know that it was really there. It was so subconsciously in there deep.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and now you've got to sift through all, because you're going to bump up against those old voices as the new ones make way.
Speaker 1:Right Spirit will always say that it will never bring you what you're not able to handle. And sometimes I'm like, oh yeah, but I know that things always come at the right time for healing. And so when you were sharing about Zach Bush, talking about the the time, I thought that is interesting, and interesting that it's in the month of april, which we knew was going to be a bumpy month, and you know, some of that fiery energy kind of coming up. I guess I maybe looked at that more on a global level, not such an internal one, right and isn't that amazing but isn't that what it was supposed to be?
Speaker 2:yes, as you change the vibration of your individual cells, like yep, yeah, it's what's outside, and going on inside and it's a powerful, transformative time. And I think, yeah, if we can let go of the old way and holding on to it and just make this space and that's what grief does to me like grief just opens up and it lets go and we're gonna feel sad for all the times that we were mean to ourselves and right, we've got to process all of that exactly and we can almost feel shame for that exactly.
Speaker 1:Let's not let it creep back in, let's not let it creep back in.
Speaker 2:Is the thing that spirit gives it to you, like you're saying, when you're ready, it's like your life was at a sturdy enough spot that it's like, okay, here's another layer of your onion.
Speaker 1:You didn't even know this one you didn't even know the layer was there. That's the exactly what I'm saying. I'm like I wasn't even really aware that layer was there and then when it got like it was like the mirror got put right up into my face and I'm like, oh fuck, oh damn it, there's a layer and now you get to clear it, which is exciting.
Speaker 2:Now you get to clear it. Oh, and it's going to take resiliency to walk through it. That's for sure you get to almost, uh, fall back in love with yourself in a new way.
Speaker 1:Baby steps girl baby steps.
Speaker 2:I feel like I want to give you homework, but that's inappropriate.
Speaker 1:We're not in that relationship.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh oh boy.
Speaker 1:Well, I think that resiliency is the ability to kind of withstand that adversity and then bounce back and then, you know, even thrive within those challenges, and so that's what I'm digging to the bottom of the barrel, or fear of judgment from myself or from others, and you know what I am inside of myself, and I know the truth.
Speaker 2:That's what matters.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I know that I'm working hard, that I am not just treading water, that I am swimming and that I am willing to put in the work to heal any of these things on any level as they come up and they come forward.
Speaker 1:Because what I can see, one of the things that was just not necessarily the intention but was the outcome of that conversation with Jen necessarily the intention, but was the outcome of that conversation with Jen, even when I look up my endocrine system, is that it doesn't matter what anybody else thinks, it doesn't matter what their opinion is or what judgments they put on my health or why I have it or the emotional connections to it, or what I must be doing wrong or what I must need to heal. It doesn't matter. Fuck them, fuck them all. I know what I need and that's what I'm going to do moving forward. And I felt like it's such a silly thing to say. I felt like I felt like a dragon egg, but been sitting in the fire and sitting in the flames and feeling the heat and then the egg opened and out came the baby dragon.
Speaker 2:Oh, you just gave me chills. We're in dragon month of dragon year and you have a dragon in your chart and you just hatched.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, that's how I feel, and so I felt like I'm approaching all of it differently from this point forward.
Speaker 2:Well, take good care of that baby dragon.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's really cool. I like that Michelle.
Speaker 1:Yeah, everyone's so ready with an opinion, hey, mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think back to five years ago I did like a six-month personal empowerment training through the Breath Integration Center. So we've had Lynn Aylward on here before. She was a teacher for me and I would say that one of my big takeaways from this training and when I say homework it would be some homework that I received in there and we've talked about writing nice things about yourself, which I am going to restart that, and I'm going to start that today because it was transformative for me and within that six months, I would say my biggest shift was at the start. If I walked by a mirror, if I got a glimpse of myself, it would always be the first thing, would be critical.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Probably followed by four or five other ones.
Speaker 2:I would look in the mirror and I would not say nice things to myself and at the end of that training and after doing these writings all the time to reprogram, to say nicer things, that changed for me and I can see a bit of a backslide where I'm like, oh, the first thing probably is a bit critical, but then it's followed by nicer things to like, make amends for that.
Speaker 2:So there is that shift in my psyche. But what I want to say for people starting this is when I started those assignments of acknowledging myself, acknowledging things that I liked or loved or proud of, I remember once wanting to do it on the all, all the realms like do kind of mental, emotional, spiritual, physical, and I wrote down once that I had nice hands and my, I felt kind of this, that gut punch of that guilt or that shame, like would other people think I have nice hands? Kind of I'm like, oh, like that seems so silly to write it and what I can tell that version of Tara now is it doesn't matter what other people think. If I think I have nice hands, I can write down I have nice hands.
Speaker 2:Or if I like the way my nail beds are or like things that we like, it doesn't matter. You could say I love my ears and other people might go your ears kind of stick out and I don't care what you think, Because the way that I speak to my body and the things that I like is what matters, right? So, if you would like to join me, I'm going to start writing 10 things a day that I like, love or are proud of of myself.
Speaker 1:Nice.
Speaker 2:And I'm going to include the ones that feel true. So I don't need to highlight my weaknesses or my flaws that I perceive, but to start highlighting all the good, because we so often don't see all the good yeah we point at the one weakness or we point at the thing we've done wrong. We we fixate on and we nitpick.
Speaker 1:The one thing that you did wrong is exactly what we fixate on.
Speaker 2:Yes, and that's what feeds these ego, this guilt, guilt, this shame, this not good enough. So to me, that resiliency, let's build that other side, let's build that ability of our heart to expand and open and have more love. And it really does start with us, yeah, Right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it really really does. Yeah, it really really does. Yeah. I think that you know everybody listening to this will have had challenges, come in different ways, from different places in their lives, and our challenges may be different. The things that we touch on, the comparative- suffering that can happen and saying that my challenge, oh, it's not nearly as bad as this person's. What do I have to complain about? You know that that has really harmed more than it has helped that kind of thinking.
Speaker 2:That's ego chitter chatter.
Speaker 1:For sure it really is, it's the you know and you know I. You know, I was brought up, um, in a family that was very resilient in a lot of ways, but in a different kind of a way than it suits me. So I'm, you know, maybe we each have different approaches to it, tara, I'd love to hear yours. For me, personally, I have to go through the feels. For me personally, I have to go through the feels. You know, if a challenging situation comes up, I it's not that I am I can be in a place where I'm instantaneously already not bothered. No, I am. I. I absolutely have. You know, I have some fears. I have some things that I'm thinking about. I have some curiosities. Maybe I have more questions, um, I have some like gosh curiosities. Maybe I have more questions, I have some like gosh.
Speaker 1:I'm not really sure how I feel about that moments. Where does this sit within me, you know? And so I really kind of go into the feels and for me, that can bring about you. It can bring forward fears, worries and doubts. It can bring forward all of it. But what I know to be true, at least for me, is that if I allow all of that space to come out in a period of time where I just absolutely, you know, go for the gusto and say what am I afraid of? You know what? What could go wrong? Well, listen, I'll give you a big, long list of the things that could potentially go wrong. I'll have them in there. But what I will come to recognize after that process is I will come back to a place of what's really important, what really matters. What is the next step? How are we moving forward? I can absolutely do that, but I find that I do it faster if I allow myself to just have that period of time with all of the stuff. That is maybe not so pretty.
Speaker 2:Let yourself go through that messy middle Exactly. Yes, yeah, I feel like I was raised more. You buck up and just carry on right Same.
Speaker 1:There was no going through the fields, it was immediately just buck up.
Speaker 2:Yes, and, like of course, everybody like, there are people that are suffering way more, so that comparative suffering that can come into myself, where I'm like who are you like get a real problem, kind of thing right. And what I've learned is to honor that.
Speaker 2:my suffering matters to me and that is what matters to me so even if it's small, yes, and I'm sensitive and I feel things big I can feel this hardening within myself and that's where I can catch myself after a while and then I'm like, no, no, no, go into the softness, but I need, I need to work a little bit more to acknowledge and go through my messy middle. I need more support in that because and that's where I do these breath sessions every month and make sure that I'm right I've got this time honed out this is my time to just be present with whatever's percolating up because I can just keep carrying on and do the things with the kids and do the house and the vulnerability can kind of get packed in, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I think it's nice to know your audience in this place too, because not everybody is going to be able to meet you there, and what's not going to be helpful in those times is somebody who's going to say buck up and, you know, just get over it, it's not a big deal, or really that's not the end of the world, what. You know your audience and know that there's somebody in your life who's going to just say tell me more about that, or you know, that's okay, like you know, just let me give you, you know, let's just sit in this in a minute for a minute and let's be all right with this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, to create those safe spaces for your vulnerability.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Because you are so raw and exposed. Yeah, yes, yeah.
Speaker 1:And we all have different people in our lives and you know I so appreciate the buck up and get going people. I'm not trying to drag them down at all, I mean. I mean it's necessary sometimes.
Speaker 2:Yes absolutely.
Speaker 1:I mean yes, and I admire people who can do that. I'm different and this is my process and this is what I know creates success for me, and so that is part of my resiliency is I'm going to do what I know creates success. You know, maybe one day it'll look different. I don't know that, but this is where it is right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. I like that you can honor and give space for yourself to feel that messy middle and trust that you come out of it yeah feeling ground.
Speaker 1:I know grounded absolutely, I know, I mean there's. If there's one thing that my life has taught me, is that I will always get up and get going again and I will, you know, put one foot in front of the other and, um, not only will I do that, I will find all kinds of beauty along the way and find laughter and joy in that, but it's just. There's no way for me that I could sit here and say that 100% of the time. It's really pretty Right, like there's lots of little dumpster fires and messes in the middle.
Speaker 2:And isn't that being human? Yes, right, yes, yes. So we walk together fiercely through the messy middle, through the beauty, through the love through the and resiliency man yeah, so I appreciate my ability to do that.
Speaker 1:I know you do as well. There are a few fundamental principles of resiliency. You've really tapped into them already all through the conversation, the things that you've said, but I just want to name them, and the first one, of course, is gratitude, that you've been speaking so much about today, like that is a foundation of resiliency. Being able to find things to be grateful for, even if it is something just, you know, tiny to begin with. That is really, really important and I know for me, that is always going to be a place where I will redirect my attention or my energy and and begin sending it in the right direction and setting it towards a much more empowered state. Compassion, I think. Compassion for yourself, compassion for others, I think, compassion for yourself, compassion for others. Just like you said, you know, when you spoke about, you know, being able to have so much compassion for your children.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like when I'm having a hard time having it for myself, I can reframe it, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, re-put it there. Yeah, acceptance. I think that's huge. I'm like, well, fuck I know, I think that's huge.
Speaker 1:I'm like, well, fuck, I know. But, like you know, when you get a piece of news that you know this has happened, this or this situation has come up, or you know something has shifted, and you get news, there are things in this world that we can change or have control over and there are things that we cannot. So if someone we love passes away, I mean they have, their body has transitioned. It is no longer uh in physical, um, if, um, if you know something happens, um on the global financial market, for example, um if uh, the weather has a storm. We don't have control over these things, right, but they something has happened, something has occurred and we have to be able to come to a place of acceptance. This has happened?
Speaker 2:yes, and what comes up for me there is the word resistance, and I think that oh, I didn't say we weren't going to resist it.
Speaker 1:Well, that's what I'm thinking, like it, like resistance is where our suffering can really come up.
Speaker 2:That's right. And if I feel like I'm resisting something or I'm wanting to change it, the analogy I think of in my own heart I'm like you're swimming up river right now, tara, like just float. Why are you trying to swim up river? Right? And it's this resistance to what is and what I will remind myself in those moments is it is because it is Like it's out of your control. Yeah, it's done. So instead of swimming upriver, let's stop fighting and struggling and right and getting exhausted.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Let's drift yeah Right. So that's the acceptance for me.
Speaker 1:I don't know. Yeah, yeah, right, so that's the acceptance for me. I don't know, yeah, yeah, well, I like, is this, is this something I can control? No, this is not something I can control. Okay, it is what it is. It is what it is. Yeah, love that saying, yeah Meaning. I love this one because I know, for me anyway, it really helps me when I can bring meaning to the things that are happening. So my meaning from this conversation that I am taking is that I have acknowledged because I have, it has been exposed a new layer of shame that I didn't know was there. Um, so it has now been acknowledged. I need to bring meaning to that. Right, that's helpful for me, um, and so it's like um, deepening your understanding, um, relating it to your growth and transformation on some level, your soul evolution maybe, even perhaps your ability to change and transition and to grow and to evolve, I guess would be one part of it. And we don't do that without challenges, we just don't.
Speaker 1:If there were no challenges. And you know, as you said, you know it'd be lovely to bubble wrap your children, but if they didn't ever fall off their bike, they weren't learned balance. And I I don't. There's no part of me. That means, like you know, let your children get hurt. I don't mean that, but it is like the life is going. You know you're going to have a friend in school who's going to be unkind at some point, or a teacher, maybe, that you don't care for, or you know an adult who is angry at you or something like that. Like these things are going to happen, and so I think they happen to build our resiliency, to help us to evolve and grow and to understand more about ourselves in the world.
Speaker 2:Yes, we learn through all of these hardships, and I want to highlight here that you did such a beautiful like, painted this picture of that messy middle where it's like we need to go through our process before we come out the other side. When you say the word meaning, what comes for forward for me is to not rush that one, because that one, I think, is comes in hindsight more so. So if we're in our messy middle and we're seeking meaning or wanting to make a story of it, that is where my mind can cause me problems. I need to go all the way through. Let it sift, we don't need to jump to meaning.
Speaker 2:Oh, totally because I think that some people can like spiritually bypass, almost like where we don't actually go through the tunnel, go through the messy middle and the meaning and the lesson will be well on the other side so agree with that, tara.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I so see that as truth. I think the journey creates the meaning and you don't get the meaning without the journey.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so don't try to find the meaning in the messy middle. Yeah, because I think the ego is playing too much there. Right, totally is yeah, yes absolutely.
Speaker 1:And then you know, the final aspect of this is forgiveness. That can be a tricky one. Oh my gosh, right Touche, yeah, Touche spirit.
Speaker 2:This is where I would bring the eyes of how I see my children to myself and bring that compassion and reframe myself as an innocent young child doing their best, not having these high expectations of myself, of perfectionism or whatever, but forgiving that we didn't know any better yeah that we did the best that we could at the time, given the resources we have.
Speaker 2:And that phrase makes me roll my eyes so often, and it's true, and forgiveness is intertwined with acceptance for me, but finding that softness, yeah, beautiful. Yeah, resiliency is a tricky little one. We get to keep practicing. We apparently do Tara. We are still practicing our resiliency and that is okay. I'm sure it's like a muscle. You got to work it. We are working it. Yeah, we are working practicing our resiliency, and that is okay.
Speaker 1:I'm sure it's like a muscle you gotta work it, we are working it, yeah, we are working it, yes. Well, I think I feel better after the end of this conversation, before we began, because I was like I don't know if I can do this.
Speaker 2:We're not very resilient, we're just squishy. I'm like, no, no, I'm very squishy. Today, you can be squishy and resilient. Just like your tulips, you're going to have to share pictures once those open up that they survived this wild snow.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh yes.
Speaker 2:I'm sending so much love to our listeners, because don't we all have these tender bits? Yeah, thanks for listening to us.
Speaker 1:thanks for being my friend, tara love you thank you so much for taking time to be with us today. We're just so grateful that you are a part of our community and we just love that you are here and tuning in, and we thank you so very much for sharing this episode with your family or friends, and if you take a minute to just leave us a lovely little review, it really helps our podcast a lot, and we really, really appreciate that. Resiliency is a really big topic, and what is true is that being resilient isn't a fixed trait. It is something that you can grow and it is something that you can expand, and it doesn't mean that you'll no longer have any stresses or challenges, as we've spoken about today, but it does mean that you work through those challenges from a different kind of perspective and one that will ultimately be healthier for you and lead to your soul evolution and growth, and that is a beautiful thing. So thank you from the bottom of our hearts for being with us through this raw conversation today, and we are wishing you an absolutely beautiful day and week ahead.
Speaker 1:Let's take a moment for a breath of peace. Let's take a moment to check in that your breath can be used as a beautiful tool to help shift any awareness of tension, any strain or stress in your body, and I would invite you to take your left hand and place it on your heart chakra, at the center of your chest, and just breathing here for a moment. How is your heart Today? May your heart know that you are indeed strong, that you have shown your resiliency in many ways and that you can acknowledge that many different ways in your life, no matter what challenges you may be facing today, or perhaps even ones in the past. Know that all things shift and change and that nothing really ever stays the same and that this too will change, and that you have tapped into a community that surrounds you in support and love and that will help you is that you may know the beautiful truth of who you really are. Until next time, only love and light to you and only love and light from you.
Speaker 1:We would love for you to join us on our podcast page on Instagram at walktogetherfiercely. Here we can chat, have community, ask questions and lots of other extra information that you might not get on our podcast. For more information about us, you can find Dr Tara on Instagram at Dr Tara Drummond. For more information about me, michelle, you can find me on Instagram at Michelle Morrison Medium. All other information about me is on my website, thebalancedsoulcom. This podcast is recorded by Michelle and Tara and is edited and arranged by Sammy Lucan.