Afleveringen
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Barb Higgins is a woman who has gone through many experiences in life. Yet the entire time, it's always felt like the world was against her. At every turn, she has been called out, sneered at and judged. It seems like the most "criminal" thing she's done in recent memory is to have a baby at 57 years old. Yet, this hasn't deterred her in the slightest. Today on The Taylor Way Talks, we sit down with Barb, a woman who's always marched to the beat of her own drum and someone who encourages others to do the same.
Who is this for…
People from all walks of life - regardless of race, social standing or upbringing - have all been judged one way or another. It's an unfortunate experience we all have shared. This episode is for those who have felt judged and strive not to let it define them.
Guest Bio
Barb Higgins is a CrossFit coach and podcaster who had a baby at 57 and lost her 13-year-old daughter years ago. She continues to use exercise as a way to process grief and helps encourage her audience to do the same. From her traumatic experiences, she was inspired to write her book, Motherland which focuses on her daughter's death and create her podcast, A Thousand Tiny Steps where she tells her extraordinary life story.
Guest Links
Instagram - instagram.com/barb_444/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/barb.higgins.96
A Thousand Tiny Steps - https://athousandtinysteps.com/
Molly B. Foundation - https://mollybfoundation.org
Motherland - https://motherland.mollybfoundation.org/About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
I am your host Dawn Taylor, and today, we are talking to Barb Higgins. So, warning right now, y'all are going to put your judgey pants on for this one because we know you're going to anyways. We are diving into a baby at 57. Feel free to judge. Before we get started though, let me tell you a little bit about her, because I want you guys to learn to love this guest and not just judge her for her life decisions. Okay, we're just going to put it out there. We're going to put that out there. Barb is a CrossFit coach. Yeah, that's right. And a podcaster who had a baby at 57 after losing her daughter that was 13 years old, years ago. She continues to use exercise as a way to process grief, and it helps encourage your audience to do the same. From her traumatic experiences, she was inspired to write her book Motherland, which focuses on her daughter's death, and it helped create her podcast A Thousand Tiny Steps, where she tells her extraordinary life story. She is a beautiful mom. She's a wife, she's all of these things. She's an advocate in her community, and she's probably a very judged woman in everyday life. And yes, she's okay with me saying that. You should see her big grin and her thumbs up when I said that. And you know what? We're going to dive into this today. Welcome to the show, Barb.
Barb Higgins
Thank you. Thank you so much for having me, Dawn. I'm excited to be here.
Dawn TaylorBring it on. You are so welcome. So what do you wish people were talking about?
Barb Higgins
I actually wish people were talking about all the things that people don't want to talk about, because until we really get honest with what we agree with, what we disagree with, and how we respond to those feelings and others, then growth and conversation and change can't happen. So, you know, being 60 now, I was raised that little girls were polite and followed the rules, you know, um, sugar and spice and everything nice. That was what little girls were. I always wanted to be a boy, which was snakes and snails and puppy dogs tails. And as a girl who is much more made of those things. Um, I just think that we need to talk about what we don't want to talk about. That's a very broad answer, but we'll get into it with my story and it will make sense.
Dawn Taylor100%. So before we get going, anyone who's listening, we're going to just put it out there right now. Barb and I discussed before we started today the fact that we're diving into heavy judgment. We're diving into that, and we're diving into the fact that we all make decisions every single day that are judged and what that looks like. So if anything that I say comes across as mean or comes across as judgmental or comes across as any of those things. It's not. And we did have a conversation about this prior. So, Barb, take it from there. And let's talk about what got you to having a baby at 57. Because that's nuts, girl.
Barb Higgins
It is nuts. I was told that the first time I went to a doctor about it. Um, really, initially I thought it was a trauma response to losing my daughter Molly. It was just several months after she died. I started having this strange dream that I was supposed to have a baby, so, I'm sorry. I went into traumatic menopause at 52 right after she died, and then I started having this wacko dream. So I went to the doctor, sort of for just my annual exam. And I mentioned that I was having a dream of having a baby. And what did she think? And she let me have it. That's foolish. That's dangerous. Don't do it. What are you thinking? You need therapy. And I was a bit stunned. Um. and I walked out of there and actually got all my medical records and switched practices, but, um, you know, I mulled over what she said and and sat on it for like, another month or so. But the intensity of the dreams were they just kept coming. So we could get into a dream specialist and analyze why was I having these dreams? 100 reasons. Going through menopause, losing a daughter, the chaos of my life at that time, who knows? Um, but I just sort of thought, well, this will give me something to focus on. That's life producing as opposed to hiding under my covers all day thinking about Molly, who was never coming home. Um, and so I just follow through all the medical steps necessary. Let me be clear. I was 52 at the time, 53. And the number of steps I had to go through at that age to even get approved to try was huge. Mammogram, EKG, bloodwork, full physical, colonoscopy and, um, hysterectomy, which is where they take a little piece of the inside of your uterus and test it. I mean, they make sure everything in your body is okay before you even begin the process. And the final thing you have to do is to see a psychiatrist. So I thought, I'm going to fail that one, right? You know, crazy, crazy, grief stricken mom in her 50s, but I didn't. I passed all those things. Um, and then we were in a medical malpractice lawsuit for two years. And so that sort of swallowed up our time. We had no money. Um, we were devastated. I wasn't living the healthiest life. I just put it off, um, and then once we had settled the legal stuff and life sort of settled down a bit, the dreams came back. And so I thought, all right, I'm just going to follow the dreams. And that's what I did. So, you know, it wasn't I didn't I don't come into IVF through infertility. I had no trouble getting pregnant. Um, from my three babies prior to Jack, I lost my first baby at 25 weeks to a heart defect. And then two healthy girls. Then Molly died, and now Jack. So the fertility piece wasn't, um, the issue for me. I didn't sit in that waiting room with those other moms who were so anxious about the pregnancy, working in a very different way than I was. My feeling during this whole process was if it didn't work, then it wasn't supposed to work and the dream was telling me something else. And I know that's what's the word. It's not hokey, but very, very different than the average woman in her 50s trying to have a baby. I have Gracie and I had two other babies. It wasn't like, “Oh no, I must have a baby before I die.” It was, I have to do what this dream tells me. I'll follow all these steps. And I learned, let me tell you, I learned a shitload of unbelievable stuff in the process and talk about judgments every step of the way. Yeah, it was a good process.
Dawn TaylorSo right off the bat, Holy cow. I love that they do all of that stuff prior to, right. I don't know what the process is here in Canada. Barbara's in New England, she's in the States. But in Canada, I feel like they wouldn't do all of those things. And maybe there's research that I need to do, but we're so like, “No, it's fine, it's okay.” Right. Like, as long as this is the decision you want to make, do what you want to do. And so, I actually have mad respect for the fact that they did all of that and they were like, “No, no, no, we're going to make sure that you're in the right headspace to do this and that this is actually physically healthy for your body.” Let's backtrack one minute. You're married. What was your husband thinking? Right. Because you're having this dream and I can just picture my husband. Okay? So, like, I can picture my husband in my 50s. And so for those of you listening that don't know my personal story, my husband and I couldn't have kids. And it wasn't an option to do IVF or adopt or any of those things because of the brain aneurysm that happened when I was 17 that, like, I couldn't carry. Eggs weren't an option. Like, it wasn't a thing. And we made the decision to not do a surrogacy route or any of those things because it didn't feel right based on life expectancy for both of us to do that. But I can't imagine now, like I just turned 44. I can't imagine if I went to him and was like, “I think it's time. I think it's time that we have a kid.” Like at 44, he'd be like, “What the hell is wrong with you? What did you drink? What did you snort? Did you fall on your head? Or are you having another brain aneurysm?” Like he would not be like, we're like, we're ramping up,
like. But he'd be like, “What are you thinking? We're going to be in our 60s before this kid even graduates.” Like, I can imagine where his head would go, especially as typically. And yes, I'm saying typically men are not quite as woo woo hokey spiritual in those ways as women are, that it would be like, “Go back to sleep and have a new dream.”
Barb HigginsSo I didn't say anything to him for several months. I went through that first appointment that made me angry. And then and then I found I went to a different OB that I had had prior experience with. And he was fantastic. He did bloodwork. He talked to me about all the different options, let me know that my local hospital only went up to age 49. I'd have to find a clinic that specialized in women in their 50s. I found one just outside of Boston. You know, he was super supportive. So I did 3 or 4 appointments and a lot of research before I said anything. And when I went for my first appointment at the IVF clinic that I chose, um. the doctor, Vito Cardone, this Italian. You know, he's probably, I don't know how old. He's in his 80s now, but, you know, definitely old looking and didn't walk real fast. But this thick, wonderful accent and I had done a ton of the physical testing already, all sorts of the physical testing. And he remarked two things. One, you have a body that defies your age. I wouldn't think that you were a 53 if I just looked at your medical chart and looked at the results of all of your tests and, you know, BMI and heart rate and bloodwork and the skin, you know, internal organ, um, integrity, all that, all of it. Yeah. Yeah. He just said, no way. What? I think you're in your 50s. So who are you doing this with? Because, you know, it's important that you have support. I said, well, I guess I should let my husband know, so yeah.
Dawn Taylor
That is funny. I love it went that far without even telling your husband.
Barb HigginsWe were, you know, we were living. We were all three people in the throes of traumatic, traumatic grief. We shared the house. But, you know, Gracie, my daughter and I, Gracie was 15 at the time. We slept on the living room floor on blankets and pillows for two years. We couldn't come up here, you know, upstairs, because everything reminded us of Molly. So Kenny slept up here in the master bedroom by himself. Like we were really just living parallel lives, you know, like we were all here, but really wrapped up in our own realities. So, Kenny and I didn't spend a lot of time sort of chit chatting. It was just trying to get through each day. Um, and so when I finally did say, “Hey, so I need to share this with you, it was probably the first.” It was probably like October, maybe even early November. Um, I said, “Hey, so I have an appointment on Friday with a fertility clinic.” And he just looks at me and I said, “Yeah, I've been having these dreams that I should have a baby. So, what do you think? Do you want to be a part of it? Because I'm perfectly happy to, you know, maybe I can adopt an embryo or find a sperm donor, or I don't know what to do, but if you want to be a part of it.” And he's like, “I'm in.”
Dawn Taylor
Wow.
Barb HigginsI mean, right away. He's a you know, we all have our strengths and weaknesses. And one of his major strengths is his ability to just be there with his kids. He has three children from a prior marriage. And then if Molly and Gracie, you know, then there were two children, you know, Molly and Gracie, and then Molly died and now Jack. So, you know, he's got six kids. Yeah. Well, seven, two and seven. So five here. Right. So, he loves being a dad and he's a good like, right now. He's like, on the floor in the living room surrounded by toys, you know, just doing whatever Jack tells him to do, you know, uh, having a blast. So, that didn't surprise me so much. Um, and he was also very willing to sort of let me let me drive the train, so to speak. Um, he just wanted to be supportive and helpful in whatever way he could. And so when we got all of the approval, he had to have a bunch of testing to, let me be clear. He had to have psychological testing. He had to have, you know, he was on kidney dialysis at the time. He was in late stage renal failure. Um, but that, you know, that wasn't an issue that wasn't a factor in, in, um, in us being approved or, um, sperm extraction for Kenny. Kenny had a vasectomy. So, um, you know, he actually had to have a little painful procedure too. How lucky for him, right? So they had to take, you know, extract the sperm. Um. And so he was approved for all of that, even being on kidney dialysis. So it's interesting that the implications put on you as an aneurysm survivor. Um, I'm not sure that that exists in the US. I'm not sure that would probably predicate you having a baby or adopting or anything like that. It's interesting. It's just interesting what different governments and countries focus on and how they how they control their women
Dawn Taylor
Really quick. How are his kidneys doing?
Barb HigginsOh, that's an amazing story actually telling it today. So you, your listeners can't see this, but I have a tattoo on my arm that says Hashtag Heart Molly B, which is what my shirt says, which is our foundation for Molly. And then the B stands for B the miracle. So Molly died May 7th and that was one of her friend. Rachel's birthday's May 7th. Um, and Rachel danced in her memorial service. Rachel was older than Molly, but, um, they all danced together. And Rachel died three years and a day after Molly and she died of anaphylaxis from peanut paste eating peanut paste and an egg roll. Went to a restaurant, ordered egg rolls. Was on life support. Same hospital. So our family totally helped that family because, um, everyone had been so good to us when Molly died. Same dance school, same theater, you know, all the same sort of connections. Um, we couldn't donate Molly's organs because they didn't know if her brain tumor was cancerous. When they realized Rachel was never going to wake up and they would have to remove her from life support, which we had gone through. Rachel's mom asked, “What did we donate? Molly's organs?” And I said we couldn't. And it was too bad because Kenny could have gotten her kidney. Yeah. And she looked at me and she goes, “Huh? Kenny needs a kidney. What's his blood type?” And I said, “Oh, positive.” And she went, “Mm, that's Rachel's.” So that was the end of the conversation. I wasn't there to get a kidney. So we're at the cemetery on May 7th, 2019. We get a phone call from Jen, Rachel's mom, to ask for Kenny's kidney transplant coordinator because they want to give him one of Rachel's kidneys. So Kenny has Rachel's kidney so that, the kidney that lives in in Molly's tummy. That is in Molly's funeral. Today is April 19th that we're recording. Um, and today is the day. Three years, five years ago today that Rachel ate the egg roll. So I talked to her mom a lot. You know, these kinds of, you know, uh. date markers and and reminders of what happened are hard to take year to year in the days lining up this year. So, Rachel's mom's having a really hard time, but kidney transplant. So that plays into our making Jack's story as well, because our first try, well, in the process of doing all the testing. So, we did all the testing, said, no, we can't do the we can't do the IVF now, we don't have the money. We haven't settled the lawsuit. We have too much going on. Dreams went away. Two years later, the dreams come back. We just, all right, let's do this. So I didn't have to do any of the significant tests over. I had to get bloodwork and another physical. Yeah. Um, and in the process of going off the 9000 antipsychotics, I was on, um, to not, you know, jump off a bridge because Molly had died and amazes me that I could be on all those medicines and function. But, um, it took me about three months to really go off all the medicine. So I have a mouth condition called trigeminal neuralgia, and I was on anti-seizure medicine for it. It's a nerve condition. And, uh, I had to go off. Of course, the medicine can't be, you know, now is 55, can't be 55. And having a baby and taking, you know, topiramate and all that anti-seizure meds. Yeah. And the face pain was I couldn't have carried a baby. So, I found a surgeon in New York City that can operate on your brain and fix the mouth condition. And so I said, “Look, I'm trying to have a baby. Um, you know, my neighbor went to you, and you fixed her mouth. Would you consider fixing mine?” And he said, “Sure, go get this MRI.” So I went and got this MRI and found out that I had three brain tumors in my head. So my daughter had died of an undiagnosed brain tumor. All the while I had brain tumors and didn't know about it. So, um, so I had to get all those taken out, which I did. So that neurologist, you know, he took tumors out in January and then cut my head open again to fix my mouth in April and signed me off. It was the day that Rachel was taken off life support. Kenny went to Boston to get her kidney, and I went to New York and got approval to have a baby after two craniotomies. So that was a big day.
Dawn Taylor
You've had a very boring life.
Barb Higgins
Yeah, no, not much. Nothing happens to meDawn Taylor
Because I always laugh because people are like, so your life's been insane. And I'm like, kind of. I guess maybe it's just been my normal. Yeah, so the other person I'm curious about in all this is your daughter.
Barb HigginsSo Gracie was kept out of this the entire time. Um, so my senior year, she didn't know it at all that I was going through any of this. Um, and then when I found the brain tumors and and, um, you know, she's a senior. Her dad's on kidney dialysis. Now, her mother's getting brain
cancer like this. Poor girl. “What the hell? Am I just going to be the only one left? Is everyone going to die on me?” That's what she thought. So when I got back from when the brain surgery and all this was done, I then told Gracie, “I want you to know that what I was trying to do was to have a baby.” And the only reason I found the brain tumors was I couldn't go through with an IVF pregnancy with that and take the medicine for my face. Um, so that's why I did the only reason I knew was I was trying to have a baby, so she got very upset with me. She was glad I found out about the tumors, but she was like, “What the hell are you thinking?” Just livid. “Am I not enough?” And of course, siblings that lose siblings are like the forgotten grievers. Sometimes it's their, you can't have big online support groups for kids because it's not safe. They have to be moderated by adults. Adults aren't kids, you know, like it's a really difficult thing. And we had a really good therapist for Gracie and really, really tried to take care of her, but. Molly was her everything. That was her day to day life. And so she was just in this sort of fog her entire high school time. So, I didn't want to upset her anymore. So when I got the okay to continue, I didn't tell her. Um. And people give me crap about that. My thoughts at the time were primarily that she had enough stress in her life. If it didn't work, she never had to know I tried again, you know, if it didn't work, I'd never have to tell her. Um, so she was a non-piece to this. Um, and, you know, I wasn't trying to replace Molly. It's like people with ten kids. You don't have your second kid to replace the first. You know, your third kid to replace the two. You know, you add to your family. You know, love multiplies. You don't have to divide your heart up. You just keep growing new spots in your heart for the next kid. And so, but she immediately felt like she somehow wasn't enough. And of course, it's not her job to be enough. It's her job to be Gracie. She's not supposed to be Gracie and Molly because Molly died. She just needs to be Gracie. But you know, all of her own insecurities and such. Um, so when round two came around. So here's the Rachel peace. The first try was in the fall of 2019, and it was Kenny's sperm extraction before the kidney transplant. Um, and then when we went back it didn't work and I thought, okay, that's it. It didn't work. I wasn't supposed to have a baby. But the nurse said, well, keep taking the ashtrays. Don't stop taking that. Just stay on that right now. And you have an appointment like in ten days. It was like a follow up. So I go down and I go in and I'm like, can we try again? And he sort of he comes, you know, waddling in like he does. And he sits down and he looks at me and I said, can we try again? And he goes, you'll have to twist my arm. And so I said, give me your arm. So he put his arm up and I twisted it, and he opened his drawer and he says, I have a list. And he goes, the first thing I'm going to do is you. And he points to Kenny, and he said, it wasn't you. You're not the reason this didn't work. I'm amazed it didn't. It was him. So he had another round of sperm extraction post kidney transplant. So, my doctor really feels like that was a big part of it. So he gave it all two times. That 30-second sperm extraction.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, it's like childbirth. Come on.
Barb HigginsYeah, yeah, I know he was funny. Oh, I have to go through that again. This is where I get judgey. I'm like, yeah, okay. Yeah. You do?
Dawn Taylor
Yes. Just one more time. One more time.
Barb Higgins
Yeah. So, um, but it was the finding the brain tumors. And then that led to being home and online when we found out Rachel was sick and because we were both because I was recuperating, Kenny was so sick. We just had a lot of time to help this family. And then we get Kenny, Rachel's kidney. And then. So that was in May and my IVF transfer was at the end of July. I was 56 when the transfer occurred. I turned 57 and found out I was pregnant on August 5th, and that was the day that I conceived Gracie in 2000. Why do I remember these things? I don't know, but I love dates.
Dawn Taylor
I’m a dates person, I do get it.
Barb Higgins
Yeah, yeah. And then we couldn't tell anyone. I called my local OB and he's like, “All right, keep your mouth shut. Say nothing. Live your life. Put it away. Forget about it. Stay healthy. Just do what you do.” Because, you know, the first 13 weeks. So, I didn't say anything to Gracie, still. Because again, if I lost the baby. It was something I would much rather have shared with her down the road at a time where it wasn't such a crucial piece of her happiness. As such, we had Covid two so she couldn't even go away to college. You know, she was right here sort of being a part of it all. And so when I got to the 13 week mark, I switch over from the IVF clinic to my local OB and he had to sign off, you know, like I had two embryos implanted. I really wanted twins. Not because I wanted to carry twins, but because I'm a 60 year old mother and I wanted Jack to have a sibling his age, you know, like, we have a million friends, and he's with kids all the time, so we're making that work. But my thoughts were Molly and Gracie just played together all the time, and I wanted that for him. That's not what happened. So, I think it wasn't supposed to, but, um, when I got to the 13 week mark, you know, that's when you stop. That's another thing about IVF. I thought you would, like, wean off the hormones. Nope. You get to 13 weeks and you pull off the patch and you throw away the syringes and you stop. You just stop and your body takes over or it doesn't. So, I got really nervous, and I was on the phone with my OB. It was that first phone conversation. I thought I was home alone and Gracie was home. So she overheard, so she's like, why aren't you telling me? And I'm like, oh sweetie. So he told me, don't say anything until you're 22 weeks pregnant. And I'm like, what? So talk about judgment. This is what he said to me. You are a person in our community that is out there. You've been judged for many things. I had a really public job loss. I'm one of those people that everybody knows and they love me or they hate me. There's no middle ground. And, um, he said, you don't need the judgment if anything goes wrong with this pregnancy and it's related to your age, all you're going to be is judged by everybody. So, keep it secret. Tell the people that need to know and insist that nobody say anything. So the only people that knew were my CrossFit coaches because, you know, I'm working out and at the gym, I was working out at the most. Two of the coaches were paramedics. And so I thought I went to classes when they were coaching. Like, I just made sure. But I worked out every day. I mean, I lifted weights, I did all the CrossFit workouts, you know, I didn't, as I got bigger, of course I slowed down and I made modifications. But, uh, yeah, I would say of all four of my pregnancies, this was by far the best one and the one I was the most fit. I gained the least amount of weight. Um, yeah, that was cool. But I didn't tell anyone.
Dawn Taylor
How did Gracie deal with it?
Barb Higgins
She didn't talk to me for a couple of weeks, and I just gave her the freedom to do that. I said, we have to put the pause button, push the pause button, and sit down and eat dinner. We live in the same home. Um, I'll go unpause. And if you need to storm off and slam your door, go right ahead. I can't, I can't tell you how to feel. Find someone to talk about this with. Choose someone to tell you. I'm not going to tell you how to cope with this. And so, she had a couple of confidants and, um. Yeah, she was just livid. And I think it also, you know, she was 19 at the time. I think it just grossed her out, you know, like, “Oh, like, that's just disgusting.”Dawn Taylor
I was going to say I was going to say there would be so many emotions around that. Right? Like rejection, abandonment. I'm not enough. I'm not right. Love might get taken away from me, but also like fear of losing another sibling. Like, what if this one also dies? What if there's so many different layers? But also that. Right? Like, ew. Yeah. Like my parents having a baby at this point.
Barb Higgins
And so during the remainder of the pregnancy, she was, I didn't, you know, I didn't do belly pictures and did all that stuff. I didn't incorporate her into that. Um, I didn't post anything on social media at all my entire pregnancy. I took a dive. You know, I have tons of pictures and videos, but I didn't post any of them until after Jack had arrived. Um, and then once I got through all of the testing and found out he was a boy and went through everything, one of the final things that I had to have was a fetal echocardiogram, and I lost a baby at 25 weeks. Well, I chose to deliver him. He was alive in my belly, but he was a frog baby. His heart was only two and one atrium, one ventricle backwards, upside down the arteries. It was just a mess. And it worked in the in the womb because he's drinking amniotic fluid. Once he came out, he would have just slowly suffocated and there was nothing they could do to fix it. Even in utero. And so I chose to deliver him. And he died before he, you know, I went into labor like eight at night with him. And he died at about 9:15. Just the contractions, you know, he couldn't even survive the contractions. So that eased my mind a bit. I mean, you know, you have such judgment about pregnancy termination. But I feel like I made the right choice for him. And the story gets better. So we delivered baby Gordy. And we donated his body to Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, and we got lots of feedback that they had that the autopsy was consistent with the fact that he wouldn't have survived once he was born. And they've been able to learn a lot, and that they had replicated his heart and were able to make repairs on infant hearts. Now, that would keep those babies alive long enough to get a heart transplant, like. So I felt like, okay, little baby Gordy was saving lives. And so I had to go for jet with Jack to have this big fetal echocardiogram at the same hospital, you know, 20 minutes down the road from my house. You know, 22 years later, I'm doing this right. So I'm in there and I'm having that fetal echo and the cardiologist comes in. And of course, I'm chatting away about Molly. And did you know because that the hospital's affiliated with the hospital where Molly died? And then I talked about baby Jack and this funny doctor with an accent. That was my doctor back then. And so the cardiologist comes in, she's a woman, and she starts asking me really pointed questions about baby Gordy. And I'm like, is there something you need to know? And she said, I think I performed the autopsy on that baby. And so she;s the one that extricated his little heart and worked with all those. So I meet her 22 years later, like on a Tuesday. And she came in because she covered for someone and she had gotten out of pediatrics because it was too stressful for her. Yeah. If she. And she wouldn't have. When she saw that it was a fetal echo and then saw my age, she's like, okay, I'll do it because it can't be a fetal echo because she's 57. And of course, it was a fetal echo, itwas me. So Kenny and I, I don't think we could speak for the remainder of the day, because what are the odds that this cardiologist from Philadelphia now lives in New Hampshire? And looked at my baby 22 years after doing the autopsy on my other baby?
Dawn Taylor
It's like so many cool little pieces of, like, closure for you.Barb Higgins
Big time. So, um, so once all of that was done, I started to tell people I still didn't post on social media, uh, because I didn't want it to get crazy. I thought there'll be enough media coverage once he's arrived, and I'll just save it for then. And I'm glad. I'm glad I did. It wasn't easy for me. I'm a I'm a Leo. Look at me, look at me. You know, I can be very ego driven. I have to be honest sometimes. And, um, it was hard for me not to say anything, but it was also somewhat comforting and soothing, and it saved me from the on the onslaught of of judgy people that, you know, and I bit a judgment in my family. Not too much. 1 or 2, like one of Kenny's children was furious, didn't talk to me for months and months and months. You know, and that, you know, that's their prerogative. They can do what they want. I can't control how they feel. They just took it personally somehow, like I was doing it to, I don't know, despite them. Like I think I'll have a baby to piss someone off. No, that's not, like that's why you get these reactions. We're better now, you know, we're cordial to one another now. And Jack is impossible not to love. So, you know, that's all calmed down a bit. But, um, for the most part, though, people were really, really happy for me. The people that were judgy were people that at that time, people that judge me like in my life, people that know me, the people that were judgy, were people that would judge me no matter what I did, you know? Yeah, I could find a cure for cancer. And they judge me, you know, it's there are people that are just like that.Dawn Taylor
Oh, there really are. There really are. So, you have little Jack. Is Gracie, is Gracie good with little Jack now?Barb Higgins
Oh my God. So that took about a millisecond. I came home from the hospital. Um, it was still Covid, so she couldn't have come to the hospital anyway. Yeah, I could just have. Kenny. Um, and so I have teeny tiny little Jack, and I'm sitting. I'm just propped up in bed, you know, and sitting with him, like, on my chest and everything. And she peeks around the corner, you know, the stairs come up into the bedroom and I so I just held him up and she just went and she just grabbed him and unwrapped him, checked them all out, held them, and that was it. I mean, she's number one even even the only reason I'm number one is if he wants to nurse, then he wants mum. But, uh, but otherwise he calls her sissy. Yeah. And this is it. That's sissy. She's number one.
Dawn Taylor
I love that. On how healing for both of you. So let's dive into this judgment piece for a bit. So you've alluded to like a public job firing and like a court case and all of these different things that have gone on. With or without all of those things, with or without having a baby at 57. We are actually just judged as humans all day, every day.Barb Higgins
Yes, we are
Dawn Taylor
And it's interesting. I mentioned to someone I was recording this podcast. I was telling you prior and asking permission to say this and. And you gave it. But I mentioned and their immediate response was, well, that's child abuse. And they were mortified at it. And I laughed and I said, okay, I don't know if I'd go that far. Like, I don't think it's quite that severe. And they're like, well, they're going to be that kid's going to end up an orphan, and they're going to have, you know, like they're going to be dead before you even graduated high school. And like, there were all these, like really, really big emotions and feelings around it. And I have to be honest, when you applied for the podcast, I had an immediate reaction like that. Like, “What the fuck? What is wrong with this woman?” Yeah, but also knowing that I was like, “This is interesting and I'm really curious.” I want the story behind it and what's going on and like we were talking about earlier. We get judged all the time for not having kids, right? I remember my own, like I had a sibling say to me at one point, like, who's going to take care of you when you're old? And I laughed and I said, your kids, because they're going to like me more. Was my response good for you? Right. And they were like, oh, well. And I'm like, who's going to take care of you when you're old? And he kind of looked at me. So yes, it was my brother. He kind of looked at me and I said, “There's no magic rule book that's like, oh, you need to have kids so that they take care of you when you're old, or how that's going to go down or how that's going to look.” You could have a parent who has a kid at 35 and they're unhealthy and sickly, and they die at a young age. You can have a parent who's 60, and they are beautifully healthy and active and actually know it because they've done all the testing and they've done all those things right. We attach judgments to anything and everything out of a place of fear, out of a place of “I think I'm better than you” right out of a “I wouldn't make a decision that way.” Right?
Barb Higgins
Yeah. I'm convinced that judgments come. When somebody is super judgy and very vocal about the judgment and there's anger behind the judgment, I always equate anger with fear. Um, you know, your fear of love, the two opposites, right? How you operate. And I used to feel very personally attacked by it. And I realize now that anyone that is vocally judgmental about something is really that's attached to something inside of them. So probably the biggest judgment I get is, um, how selfish it is of me to have a baby at my age, because how unfair that is for the baby. And so I listen like, okay, well, it depends on what you call fair, because most parents in their 30s have their children and childcare 50 hours a week because they're working full time, and then they get home and they're rushing around, and then they're in bed, and then weekends are full of things they think they have to do. So, to me, that's a crappy life for a kid, not the childcare places aren't wonderful, but you have a kid and, you know, 50 hours a week, you're paying someone else to raise them for you. So there's my judgment, right? Kenny's retired. Jack slept until 8:15 today. Yesterday he slept till nine. The other day he was up at 630. He wakes up. When he wakes up, he goes to sleep. When he goes to sleep. So all the schedule, your kids, people would say, you know, well, aren't you so lucky you can live that life? Yeah. When you're retired and financially secure, you can actually put your child first. So am I abusing Jack by having him at 57? Well, you know, when he graduates high school, I'm going to be that wrinkly person that everyone thinks is his grandmother. Okay, that's true, but his life right now is geared around what's best for him. He goes to an amazing preschool two days a week. They play outside all day. He goes swimming, he goes to little ninja classes, he has playdates. And who does all this? Kenny, who never got to raise his other kids because he was working 70 hours a week. He was never home for these things. His chunks of time with his kids, all of his kids were on the weekends when he had time. If you had time. Does it mean he doesn't love those kids? No. Does it mean those kids don't love him? No. But the number of times he's looked at me and said. I missed this with all my other kids. I never saw this, you know, and that to me, it's like, what a gift, what a gift Jack is in that regard. And how lucky for Jack. Like, my mother babysat Gracie and Molly, so my mother got to see all of these milestones, which eased my mind for the things I missed. I was teaching and coaching full time in public education. Um, and so, you know, my mother was with my girls way more than I was the first 3 or 4 years of their lives. I feel lucky because it was her. And she came to my home so they could play with their own toys and but I didn't see a lot of those things. I heard about things. So, you know, yeah, there's pros and cons to all of it. So when I, when I think of other older women having babies, I think, good for you. You've, you know, I've put behind me all my selfish years. You know, I'm done with the partying. I don't need to sleep around anymore. I don't care what I look like naked. Um, I'm not beholden to a job that I. If I'm not there, they might fire me. Oh, no, I'm not fighting for a promotion. I don't have to worry about a lot of those things. I pee when I sneeze. Doesn't matter how much I try not to. That's my biggest concern right now. So how lucky for Jack that he has a mother that has time to be with him and put him first. Instead of panicking about all the things out of my home that seem important to me. Judge that, right?
Dawn Taylor
That's awesome.
Barb Higgins
but I do get it. And I think sometimes we, um, you know, there's an age where you're still a mother and now you're mothering your parents. You know, like, I'm getting to that age where my parents are beginning to need more support. They're beginning to need more assistance and help. So it's like you start mothering your parents. And now I have this little three year old that I'm mothering, and I can see where this could become exhausting. If Jack wasn't here, Gracie would be my child. And while I do mother her, not in the way that I mother Jack. Um, I can see where people I could see where. Why would people's minds go there, like, how are you going to, you know. And I could see why they think Jack is going to have to take care of me at a young age. But my parents are 82 and I'm 60, so that's 22 years from now. So in 22 years, Jack will be 25. So I don't think it'll really hinder him too much if he has to visit me in a nursing home. If that's where I am, which I don't think I will be. I have incredibly good genetics in my family. Um, my biological dad died at 98. Um, my grandparents on my mother's side of the family lived late into their 90s. I have an aunt that's 102. She's still alive. Um, so I don't think I'm going to die unless I get hit by a bus. But I could, right?Dawn Taylor
There's no guarantee on any of that. There's no guarantees on those things. So that judgement. You have a podcast called Million Little Steps. And that's been one of your big things. And something that I say to people all the time is you can do anything and everything you set your mind to if you do three little tiny things. One is to have a tiny piece of determination. Second is no shame and third is one tiny step.
Barb Higgins
Yes.Dawn Taylor
One tiny action. And if you do those three things over and over and over and over and over, you could do anything and everything that you set your mind to. And the problem typically isn't the termination or what the steps are. It's the shame piece in the middle. And people can't overcome the shame. And I did an exercise years ago. I had a bet going with a kid. His mom wanted me to coach him. He was oh my goodness, early 20s. His mom wanted me to coach him. And he refused. He adamantly refused. And we got on a phone call one day and I said, look, I said, “Will you go for a walk with me?” And I happen to be in the city he lived in. And he's like, “Yeah, sure, fine, whatever.” And we went for a walk. And I said, if I can turn $0.52 into something worth at least $800, pretty shiny and sparkly by the end of today, you're going to coach with me for at least six sessions. Because I was trying to explain this concept to him and he's like, “What do you mean?” And so as a joke, it was my birthday weekend. And as a joke, I had asked my husband what he was going to buy me for my birthday, and he dug in his pocket, grabbed some change, tossed it upon my desk, and he's like, “Buy yourself a little something pretty.” And it was $0.52. And I was like, “Wow, thank you so much for your generosity.” And it was a total joke, right? And we were laughing about it, but I still had this money in my pocket I had thrown into my pocket that morning. I'd hopped on a plane, I'd flown there, and now I'm talking to this kid in this park. And I pulled this money out, and I looked at it and I said, “So what do you think we could do with it?” Because you're talking about, like bettering your life. Shifting your life. Advancing yourself in some way. Right? Demanding more of yourself than where you're at. And he's like, yeah, right. “What are you gonna do with $0.52?” And I was like, I don't even think you can buy a penny candy anymore. Like I just. Right, right. Could have filled half a little brown paper baggie with penny candies, right? But I said, you know what? Let's see, let's see what we can create. And this person was walking by and they're pushing a stroller in this park, and I said, excuse me. And they're like, yeah. And I'm like, my husband said. And I told them this story and not in a mean way, but my husband at all. But I was like, any chance you have something bigger or better that I could trade you for? For the $0.52. And she started laughing and she's like, ah, I don't know. She's like, I have a dollar. So in Canada, they're called loonies. They're a little gold coin. Yeah. And we have loonies and townies and bills and I said, that's amazing. And she's like, here you go. And I looked at him and I was like, we just doubled our money. We have a dollar. And I'm all excited. And he's like, it's a dollar. Like, you can't do anything with a dollar. And I said, but I just doubled my money with one tiny action and no shame. And as we walked around this park, we kept doing this and doing this and doing this and doing this and doing this. And people were like, what the hell's wrong with you, lady? And people are getting mad and people are judging what I'm doing and people are badmouthing me but people were also being nice about it. And people were like, you know what? Here, just take a dollar. Okay, here, take $2. Oh, I've got a few extra pennies you can add to that. Yeah. And as we're walking back this big trail, we were walking as we walked back to the parking lot where his mom was waiting. I said, look, we're going to put this on social media. I don't have this massive following. So it's not like I was some influencer doing this, but I said, we're going to put this on social media and you can follow me all day while I do this. It's 3:00. Let's see what we can get by the end of the day. I said if I hit $800, I was like, you're doing coaching with me? And he's like, “Yeah, good luck, deal.” My friend picked me up. Her two boys are with us, and we decide that we're going to take all this challenge, man. We went to businesses and asked if they had anything that they'd give us. We literally went to one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in town and like, knocked on people's doors asking them for things. At one point we had like $12 in change. We went to a dollar store and made it a candy Easter basket, so we'd have something more impressive to trade with. We kept going and going and going and going and going. We ended up with artwork. We ended up with Michael Kors sunglasses. We ended up like people, gave us the funniest things and the final item, and it actually sits in my desk as a reminder. And let me grab it so I can show it to you, was a pearl diamond watch.Barb Higgins
Holy crap.
Dawn Taylor
It's a gorgeous watch for anyone who can see this.
Barb Higgins
It's amazing.
Dawn Taylor
Stunning watch. The person's like, it doesn't work. But here, I'll trade you for the artwork you just got. And I said, cool. We took it to a jewelry store. It needed a $14 battery put in. It works perfect. I've never worn it. It just lives in my drawer as a reminder. But guess what the value of it was.
Barb HigginsWell, it's probably close. Well, probably a lot.
Dawn Taylor
It was on sale that day for $815. It was worth $800.
Barb Higgins
So you got you started with $0.52,Dawn Taylor
And it was shiny, sparkly and pretty, which was what my requirement was. People were messaging me and I'm talking. This went down over four hours, right?
Barb HigginsSo that story is a perfect illustration of why I call my podcast A Thousand Tiny Steps. And for me it came from a health lesson that I did. I taught high school health. And we would talk about relationships and choices and going through life. And my example was, you have two people, once a gold medalist in the Olympics, and one ran over his neighbor's kid with his car because he was drunk. And let's go back to when they were ten and they were best friends living next to each other. So when did these when did the first step of these realities happen? It wasn't the day they woke up. Boy number one didn't wake up and say, “Oh, today I'm going to go to Montreal, Canada.” And because it was a long time ago, and when the Olympics in Montreal. Right. “I think I'll do that today. I'm going to go win a gold medal and fly to the Olympics and win.” No, that's not what happened. And this boy didn't wake up and say, “Hey, you know, I think I'll get shitfaced and kill my neighbor's kid.” But these two realities happen. These things happen all the time. Watch the Olympics, people win gold medals. Watch the news. Kids get run over by drunk drivers. So when did it start? Let's back up. And so I would have them choose an event in their life and try to back up to see where the first step is. And sometimes it's a first conscious step on our part. And sometimes somebody does something that predicates our first step, that we wish we could go back and respond to differently. Does that make sense? So your story is is such a good example of what I would try to teach my students. Like look, so if you have a goal then take your first. Your first step was deciding to do something with $0.52. That's the size of the first step. The first step for anything you do is worth about $0.50, if that. And so then you've made that step. Okay, now I need a buck. What do I do? And that's your next step. All right. Now I need to double this. And that's your next step. It's all these little steps. So when I look at like, Jack's life, when I look at Molly's death, you know, I'm part of my reason for starting the podcast was to come to terms with how I was to blame for Molly's death? Because I'm her mother, you know, it's not lost on me that I'm supposed to keep her alive. And my life was very chaotic the year before she died. I was away a lot. Kenny and I were separated. My life was a disaster. And talk about self bereavement and shame. But in the process of walking backwards and sort of documenting all this through my podcast and being painfully honest, and a lot of people who listen don't like what I say, especially if they're part of the story. Um, but really, really coming to realize that sometimes we don't have a lot of control over those steps either, that sometimes we're on a path that can feel predetermined, and the steps lead us where they lead us. And, you know, it was like having Jack, am I supposed to have him or am I supposed to go through the process like, is the baby the reason, or is the process of having the baby the reason why the steps? Um, and that's a huge piece of life, I think.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, absolutely. It is. And I think that it's, like, I keep that watch in my desk as a reminder that every time I reach for a pen, every time reaching for like, lip gloss, every time I reach in to grab like, stamps, anything I look and I see that watch. And I think I could have tossed the $0.52. We often look at these little tiny things that happen and think, huh, that's not worthy of anything, or that step's not going to make a difference, or that step isn't going to actually make a change, right. And we underestimate the power of the million little steps, right?Barb Higgins
Oh yeah. Big time.
Dawn Taylor
Right. Side note I came home and I showed it to my husband and I was like, thanks for my birthday present. And he started laughing and he's like, why did I give you so much?I had known you could do that with it. As for the next year, he gave me $0.25. Yeah, there you go. And I was like, what are you going to get this year? Yeah, yeah. It was like, no,
that one's just going to go in my wallet. But in life, in health, in business, in everything, there is this idea and I, I am a big believer that it's because of social media, because of instant fast food, because of bank machines, because of just the way society is going. Right? Every single thing is so instantaneous. Every single thing is so quick, so fast, so easy these days. We don't have to take steps to get somewhere. People don't want to actually put in the hard work. People don't want to put the energy or the effort into it.
Barb Higgins
And we're losing our ability to have executive functioning, which is the ability to organize your thoughts into actions step by step by step. Little kids learn it. You put ten five year olds together and they're bouncing off the walls. And then slowly they learn that first you put your shoes on, then you hang up your coat, then you get your snack ticket. Then you go to your desk and then you go to, you start to learn the steps that are required to function.
Dawn Taylor
But we don't have that.
Barb Higgins
We don't at all anymore. No.
Dawn Taylor
And no one's willing to take the chance. I had someone of the day ask. They're like. Do you not age? And my husband's jokes that I have Benjamin Button and I'm just getting younger looking. And as I get older and I said, they're like, where 's your plastic surgeon? And I started laughing and I said, nobody. And they're like, what? And I was like, I hopefully get face cream on my face once or twice a week. Yeah, yeah. And they're like, no, no, no. But you do Botox, you do whatever. And I said, no. I said. But I'm really healthy. And they were like, what do you mean? And I said, I drink just water, coffee. I don't have juice, I don't have pop, I don't drink alcohol, I don't do any of those things. I'm sugar gluten free. I do pump and I do red light therapy and I do IV therapy and. I eat lots of anti-inflammatory stuff, and it was really funny because as I'm listing these things off, they're like, oh yeah, no, I'm good. I'll just get plastic surgery
Barb Higgins
Yeah. Oh, I'll just take ozempic and then I'll get skinny.
Dawn Taylor
Right? And I started laughing as you live. Yeah, I started laughing and I was like, you're hilarious. And they're like, what? And I said, I love it. You'd rather fix later than preventative maintenance now? Yeah. But that's our society, right? That's our society. So for anyone listening, I think one of the biggest things is literally those three steps though, right? Like one tiny piece of determination, no shame in one tiny action. Rinse and repeat. And maybe that's a really good way of looking at all of this, right? Like, maybe it's like one extra glass of water a day and that's where you're going to start. Or I have a friend who's a nutritionist and she talks about like, have something green at every meal, something I don't care if you eat like a leaf of lettuce, have something green at every meal. Right. That's it. Just that thing.Barb Higgins
Green Skittles do not count, right? Like you don't have M&Ms. I would have started years ago.
Dawn TaylorDo everything at 180 degrees overnight and do that. But it's like one tiny action at a time. But I often say to clients, you can't steer a parked car. It has to be moving. It has to be in motion, like do something, do something.
Barb HigginsI think back to our theme of being judged and living in a judgy society. I also think people judge people they're jealous of, and I think a lot of the judgments I get around having a baby in my 50s is from people, men and women that had not been able to have kids. And so they're oh, so make a mockery of it and go ahead and show the world that you can have a baby at 57, like within the IVF community. I actually have had minimal judgment within the community, but I am unbelievably careful always to acknowledge and honor the mothers that do this. And it doesn't work. I am fucking lucky, I just am. I have a ridiculous body that I'm lucky I live in because it matches my personality, which is active and athletic and competitive. Um, you know, I'm 60, but I do not look or act 60. My day to day life is nothing like 90% of my 60 year old friends. Most of my friends are 20 years younger than me. Um, but I think sometimes our immediate judgment, like when I get judgy, I'm good now at stepping back and saying, okay, why am I so judgy about this? 99 times out of 100, it's something that I'm insecure about. My insecurity comes into play judgment wise. Like, I get a lot of judgment. Um, I have a handful of friends that are really extremely religious. Some are super Catholic and others are very, very, very sort of fundamentalist Christian. And anything with birth control and messing with the divine nature of conception and childbirth and all, is just considered outright sinful. And so I get all, you know, they're careful sometimes because I've lost a child as well. And so are their friends. But it's just utterly clear that they think I'm this horrifying sinner because I had the audacity to create a child in a test tube, you know, a petri dish and grow it that way. And it's like, okay, but it's still a child, like like, I definitely believe in God. So I feel like Jack has a soul just like every other child in the world. And he's a beautiful person that's supposed to be here and watching him. I know he's supposed to be here. My job is just to keep him as not fucked up as possible. So whatever he's supposed to do, he can do. That's how I feel about it. Like, okay, let me just make sure he's relatively normal. Um, so, I think sometimes it's people that have endeavored to do the three steps, all those tiny little steps and not met with success or not, how they feel successful. And so it's just easier to lay blame somewhere else. So go ahead, get mad at me..
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. I'm not mad at all I agree.
Barb Higgins
Not you. Just people in general.
Dawn Taylor
And I think people are busy judging because of that. But also we have shame around it where we don't want people to judge us, so we're not willing to take the step. Yeah. Then once we get going, we're also like, but no, this is my path and now I can't get off of it because if I have to actually shift or pivot or move off of this path or change something that I'm doing, or adjust something I'm doing because this isn't working, our egos get involved.Barb Higgins
Egos function out of fear. Egos function, the fear of the anger level, not the level of love.
Dawn TaylorAnd so it is. It's looking even in business, in life, in marriage, in relationships and whatever it is, it's going, hey, what we're doing isn't working right. And it doesn't mean we suck or we're horrible people or we're failures or we're not enough or any of those things, but it's not working. So what is, what's working, what's not working? And how are we going to change it? How are we going to fix it? How are we going to adjust it. Yeah. And let's keep going. Let's keep going. And it's funny, I said something the other day to someone that I was a black sheep in my family in so many ways and not as like the bad girl or, I mean, I have tattoos, so I'm probably the bad girl, but. I was like, you know, I might be considered that, but I feel like the black sheep of my family often for so many of the life decisions I've made in so many of the things that I've done and the things that I've tried, like I've spent my entire life not feeling like I fit into the box of my relatives. And they said, yeah, me too. And I could not be more grateful to be a different color. And I laughed and I said, you know what? It's so true. Like, we could be a black sheep because we're the bad person, or we could be a black sheep because we think different, or we could be a black sheep because we are just different. And. I think that for anyone listening, if you are feeling super judged in an area of your life. Just keep going. Honestly, like, if it's not mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually, relationally, financially harming you or anybody around you. Rock on. Just do it, right. Like we get judged for how often we move. We get judged for vehicles we've driven. We've get gotten judged for not fighting the world when they said that we couldn't have a baby, we get judged for the fact that we moved and left and opened a trauma healing center and came back. We've been judged for jobs we've taken. I get judged for my gray hair every day like we had judged for everything.
Barb Higgins
And I also feel, not to make this a sexist sort of thing, but, you know men father children in their 60s, 70s, even 80s, all the time. And no one, no one says a thing. I mean, nothing, you know, nothing. They maybe judge them for having a wife young enough to be his daughter. But you know that that's a parent that is going to need diapers at the same age I am, you know. But they don't, right? They don't get judged for being an old father. Um, and it's also how we look at women who age. I think that there's, we were at Disney and I was nursing Jack. This was like a year ago. And I'm sitting there nursing him, and I'm not shy about it. I mean, don't flash my boobs, but I'm, you know it's clear. I was nursing him and this group of women walked by and they were sneering at me, like, with this look of disgust. I didn't get it at first, like I wasn't. So I'm looking back. Like what? And, uh. And this one goes, that's disgusting. And I'm like, nursing a baby is disgusting. And she goes, no, someone your age trying to make it look like you’re nursing a baby. So she thought I was like, fake nursing. Like, I don't know what she thought. I was just like, okay, well, he's my child and he's hungry, but thank you. And it was, she was grossed out by me nursing my child. So, you know, if I looked in a mirror while I was nursing Jack, I might get grossed out, too, you know, like, oh, God. But I mean, it was, we don't also celebrate how women age, you know, actors and athletes that are male and their gray hair is sexy and their wrinkles are distinguished. And we acknowledge and honor their aging bodies. And women spend thousands of dollars to make it look like we aren't aging. Okay, well, you know, I'm 60, right?
Dawn Taylor
My husband's getting gray hair, and it's looking so distinguished and good. And like, people are commenting on it and how good it looks. And I had someone literally at a business meeting offer me $1,000 to dye my gray hair so it didn't look so ugly. And had a woman in a salon tell me that my husband must be cheating on me, because no man would want to be with someone with gray hair at my age. couldn't stop laughing, both of them. And I'm grateful that I also, like you, have no fucks to give when it comes to a lot of those things, because I was like, I love that my hair. And I'll never forget this woman in the salon. I was with my sister and I was like, I love that my hair caused such offense to her.
Barb HigginsYes, she's the one that's like that.
Dawn TaylorI love that I hold this super power of gray hair.
Barb Higgins
And she's certainly never going to sleep with you,
Dawn Taylor
Like you and your gray hair. Wow. I wonder if her husband cheated on her by any chance, right or left for a younger woman.
Barb HigginsOr that happened to your parents or something? Yeah, that's exactly it. So. But we do. We are. We live in a culture that scrutinizes women in a million ways. And I feel like it's that way. I just did a recent podcast episode on advertising between men and women, and insurance coverage between men and women, and the judgment in the moral high ground to which women endure and have to be held in very basic medical things and social things, and advertising is 9000 times as much as the standard men are held to. And in it, it's mind boggling to me sometimes, you know, like just the judgment that comes to women that doesn't come to men for the very same thing. And you know, like a vasectomy is immediately covered by health insurance, and a tubal ligation needs medical necessity and isn't always covered by insurance. It's the same procedure. Snip, snip. That's what that is. And men can snip. Don't even need a referral. I'd like a vasectomy. No problem. I would like a tubal ligation. Well, you need doctor's approval. It has to be medically necessary, and we'll only cover half.
Dawn Taylor
Well, I'm part of it too, is like, why are we holding ourselves to the standard? And why are we, as women, so busy judging each other?Barb Higgins
Yes. Why don't we stop that?
Dawn Taylor
It's not the men that are judging us.My husband has said that to me before. Where like, I was holding myself to an unrealistic expectation when it came to even, like how often I made dinner or what I was cooking or different things like that. And he's like, I don't have that expectation of you.
Barb HigginsYeah, like, where does that come from? We accept we accept these cultural norms.
Dawn Taylor
He's like, you're torturing yourself, so stop it. I was like, oh yeah, we accept it.
Barb Higgins
We accept that we have to put up with it. We accept that. Oh, well, you know, that's life. Well, no, no it isn't. And there's a story about red ants and black ants in a jar, and they get along fine. And then someone shakes the jar, and then the ants start killing each other because each side assumes the other side created the problem. They don't know that it was an external force. I this is when I sound all wacky, but I do think sometimes that there are political agendas and social agendas that are created to pit us against each other. If the women are fighting each other, then nothing will get solved. Which is true. We're so if we're so busy fighting each other, then true social change can't happen because we need to be unified as women to do a lot of things. And I know that in my child loss journey, in my job loss journey, and in my having Jack journey, um, I've received very, very different and more intense scrutiny than Kenny. Yeah. Look at me. That's life. Wait a minute. You know.
Dawn Taylor
Barb. Thank you. Thank you for being so open to talking about this today, for not shying away from it, for having this conversation. I hope that for anybody and everyone who might be listening to this, take a step back and look at your life and where you are dimming your light, where you are holding yourself back, where you are making a decision to not step into your own and hold your space. Because of the fear of judgment, because someone is judging you. Because of all of those things. And no. Am I saying have a baby at 57? No, I think it's ridiculous, I said it.Barb Higgins
There are times,right? There are times I can't believe. I'm like, what was I thinking? You know what I'm saying?
Dawn TaylorBut maybe it's a really good day to grab $0.52 and see what you can do with it.
Barb Higgins
Yeah, I agree and see what happens. Yeah. And what got me Jack.
Dawn Taylor
And whether it's your health or what you can. You can curl up and die, right? Or you can do something with it, right? I always say the acronym for fear is like, if you can fuck everything and run or face everything and rise, and you get to choose which one you're going to use,that's right. You get to choose. So, Barb, thank you. Thank you for being here today. For anyone listening, I hope you heard something that hit home. I hope that you learned something from today's episode, but also maybe are going to drop a little bit of judgment on people around you that are doing something just a little bit different and outside of your comfort zone. Right? Join us again in two weeks for another amazing topic. Tell your friends. Tell people about it. Please share. Leave reviews. You know all the regular podcast things that I'm supposed to say right now. Check out the Show Notes located at the TheTaylorWay.ca for more information, but also for all the contact information for Barb, her podcast, and all of her stuff. If you want to hear more about her world and her journey, and subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts, thank you again, Barb.
Barb HigginsThank you Dawn.
-
Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Jackie Roby is a woman who has blazed her own trail and achieved many things in her life. However, she is not immune to the uncomfortable and unfortunate situations that plague the workplace or the family dinner table. The lingering trauma from these experiences has festered into doubt. Today, she unashamedly shares her story of how she was able to turn things around and overcome it. Doubt is a killer, and today, Jackie and Dawn discuss how to navigate around it and eventually slay it before it slays you.
Who is this for…
We have all dealt with traumatic experiences in one way or another. Most of them can be life-altering in many ways and can give birth to the voices of deception in our minds. However, there is a way to take your power back. It will take tremendous work but it's the type of work we owe to ourselves. For those looking for that next - or even first - step towards self-healing, this episode is for you.
Guest Bio
Jackie Roby is the Founder and CEO of Inspired Journey Consulting. Using the perfect harmony of Positive Intelligence, Human Design, and mental wellness practices, she helps people who have been abused shift from self-doubt to self-empowerment. Through mindset coaching, speaking, and facilitating workshops, she supports change in our inner and outer worlds. She is an international speaker, host of the podcast Through Inspired Eyes, and Chair of the Global Wellness Institute's Diversity Equity Inclusion Initiative. IJC's vision is to enhance cultural wellness in the workplace, grow emotional intelligence, healing, and self-love for a kinder, more inclusive world.
Guest Links
Inspired Journey Consulting - https://inspiredjourneyconsulting.com/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/inspiredjourneyconsulting/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/IJCpresents/
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackie-roby/
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyKLXBbqHkHISv9Zs8Hcyog
A Career Girl’s Guide To Being A Stepmom - https://www.amazon.com/Career-Girls-Guide-Becoming-Stepmom/dp/0060846836About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
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This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
Hey hey hey, it's me, your host, Dawn Taylor, and I am so excited to be talking. I'm like, is that the word? I'm honored. I'm excited. I'm crazy curious. All the things to be talking to our amazing guest today. Her name is Jackie Roby and she is this incredible, powerful international speaker, relationship mindset coach, chair of the Global Wellness Institute's Diversity Equity Inclusion Initiative, say that seven times really fast. She is a stunning Latina Bostonian who is a powerhouse. She is a wife. She is a mom. She is all of those things. And she is gracing us with her story today, but also diving into a really hard topic. And that is where trauma leads to doubt and how that shows up, where it shows up, and all of those things. So check out, like always, how to get ahold of her and to learn more about her in our show notes located at TheTaylorWay.ca and yes, I'll say that again at the end, but for now, welcome to the show,
Jackie.
Jackie Roby
Thank you so much, Dawn. I'm so thrilled to be here and just, I feel such a kindred spirit with you.
Dawn TaylorThank you. We were, I was just in Boston and we were just talking prior to starting the podcast about crazy parking there. And there is no parking, but also that they had the best gluten free pizza I've ever had in my entire life at a place called Otto's. If you ever go to Boston, eat at Otto's. But you and I had met prior to this, and we really dove into what we wanted to talk about today. And that's really not just trauma. Everyone has trauma, but how it leads to doubt. And so let's start with your story. Where you want to start, and how different traumas in your life have led to different doubts and how those show up for people. Because I really, truly believe that people don't know this and they don't fully understand this about their lives.
Jackie Roby
Yeah, absolutely. Well, you know, as we both know, there's big T trauma and little T trauma and all of them are going to be important if I look back on my life. Even in chapters. One thing that stands out is always abuse, and so abuse is the big trauma that I've experienced consistently throughout my life, starting when I was three years old. I was sexually abused by my grandfather. And that went on for four years. Later on, I found myself in a romantic relationship that was emotionally and mentally abusive. So it, you know, that's qualified as domestic violence.
Dawn Taylor
Mhm.
Jackie Roby
To the point where when we broke up, I had to get a restraining order. I remember being in this relationship and we had a conversation around cheating. And he said to me. “If you ever cheated, I would kill the guy and I would kill you.” And when I was in the depth of this relationship and I was 19. My thought was, oh, he loves me so much and I would never cheat. So whatever. Eventually I was able to see my way around. In corporate, I found myself being. Abused in a sexual manner. As far as, like, sexual harassment goes with older male colleagues. But smiling, keeping my mouth shut, playing along, just so that I kept everybody else comfortable. And it's so interesting that you mention being a mom when we started, because I don't fully identify in that way. Because I'm a stepmom. And yes, I know the depth of it. And for a long time I was fighting for a mom title. But the type of judgment that has been placed on me simply for having this role in a child's life is so intense. That it fed that fire of doubt. So, I started my healing journey. 22 years ago at this point. So once I left that abusive relationship, once I got through, I thought, I don't ever want to find myself in this kind of relationship again. So what can I do differently? How did I participate and that's when I learned, right? I started this journey and I learned about red flags, and I made sure I was never in an abusive romantic relationship again, which I wasn't. But what I found throughout the years is I continued to be an abuse of relationships in different scenarios.
Dawn Taylor
I was going to say, can we can we even, sorry, can we backtrack a little bit? That
abuse when you were young. I've heard over the years. It's interesting. Yeah, but you were so young. How did that affect you when you were older? Minds like that. Right. So for anyone who's listening that's been abused, you're all like, what? I know, I know, but I've heard this. I have heard this from many, many people, even in my own personal life that can't figure out how abuse affects somebody. On this topic of how it leads to doubt. How did that abuse play into the first abusive relationship in your life? What doubt did that create for you.
Jackie Roby
“Am I worthy? I am not worthy enough to be loved.” So if someone's paying attention to me. That must mean that I need to keep them there. What can I do to keep them there? What can I do to keep them happy? And the fact that I wasn't protected that when I tell this story now as an adult and so many family members say, that doesn't surprise me. Why wasn't I worth protecting that? And then the ones who say, who gloss over it. “Oh, well, just keep going.” Right. Well, we're going to keep going as if nothing happened.
Dawn Taylor
Head under the sand. Just buried a little deeper.
Jackie Roby
Well, now. You spent a little bit, you think, am I making this up, this happen, right? What? It's not a big deal, huh? I thought it was a big deal. Okay. Maybe I shouldn't have said anything. They seem a little uncomfortable. Did I make them uncomfortable? I did that. Oh, God. It's all my fault now. And it just keeps going like that. So now you're wondering. What's real? What's not? What's good, what's bad? The rules have been thrown out and you've been shown by others that whatever you were saying or doing or trying to stand up for yourself or whatever it was happening in your experience. They're telling you it doesn't matter. So it makes you question your reality.
Dawn Taylor
Oh my gosh.
Jackie Roby
Your thought process.
Dawn Taylor
I've often said to people, it's not the abuse that caused the damage. I was sexually abused by an uncle when I was 14, and I've often said that and they're like, what? And I'm like, no, no, no. What he did was horrible and wrong. And yes, it caused its own set of problems, but that I could process and that I could heal. I haven't healed the rest, but it was the fact that no one believed me. It was the fact that people turned it against me. I got a letter from his wife saying that it was my fault and I should have said “No!” louder. And admitting that he had done it, saying this had happened to other women in her life, and she just thought that people wanted her husband and that I shouldn't have dressed so slutty. I was like the most proper 14 year old effort, like it was, that it was those things. But it wasn't rape, right? It was those things that people said to me after and their actions and you know, in Canada, we had this whole thing. It was like we were taught in school. It was like, I swear it was on a TV commercial. It was like, “Say no and go and tell someone you trust.” And I'm sure anyone Canadian who's listening is laughing because you heard that. And like, we all know that because we gotta pound it into our heads. But when you say no and go and tell someone you trust and then they don't do what the school book
said. Right. It was the doubts of that. It was the “I'm not worth fighting for. I'm not worth protecting. I'm not worth hurting a family relationship.” Right. I remember coming home and I'd finally charged him four years later, and I came home and my mom actually punched me for going to the cops. Like she was that mad at me that she struck me for going to the cops and saying something. And I remember just standing there and being like. Wow. “Do you know the damage this will cause to the family is what was said to me over and over and over.” Right? Like it's your fault. Right, and that doubt in your head, but also like the people that love you the most, are going to hurt you the most.
Jackie Roby
Yeah. And that's the thing. It's the worst part of it. I think if you expect the people to protect you, to stand up for you, to be there for you, but to then turn it around. And make it your fault or it makes them uncomfortable. Yeah, I talk a lot about how you kind of get this messaging of shut up and take it.Dawn Taylor
Oh my goodness. Yes.
Jackie Roby
Yeah, it happened to you.
Dawn Taylor“But he's a good man.” It was my favorite.
Jackie Roby
I remember during the beginning of the healing around what happened with my grandfather. I was in my 20s. And part of the healing was telling people, and I was terrified that they would hate me. I was terrified that I was the one responsible for breaking up the family. Even though number one I wasn't. Let's be real. And the family was already on their own path. But for me, it just kept ringing. Everything is my fault. And that is the self-doubt. That came with it. So that's what it became in everything. Every action I take. There's this mean person in my head saying it's your fault. And you're not worthy of unconditional love.
Dawn Taylor
And then what an interesting, when you go from that, people often ask like, how did I end up in this abusive relationship? How did I end up in this position? And I was like, let's backtrack. How were you shown love as a child? What? What did that even look like? Because those core fundamental years. You wouldn't have even known. I'm guessing at times if it was right or wrong, good or bad, what was going on, right? Because often we don't. I'll never forget a client saying to me one time, and I've said it out loud myself, was like, the brutal part of sexual abuse is sometimes it feels good. And then that causes all kinds of crazy emotions in your head. So did I ask for it? Did I want this? Is this something that I pursued? Right? Like those voices in your head around that doubt of like, what even happened? Did it happen? Did it not happen? Right. But as this small child for this person, like a four year old or three year old. They're
just like, “Oh, grandpa loves me. He's hanging out with me. Oh, he's touching me.” Right.
You know it's wrong. But you wouldn't see those red flags going into a relationship later in
life.
Jackie Roby
One thing that I remember was dissecting how my family gave affection. I’m a Latino. We are affectionate people. There’s hugs and kisses. And every time you saw somebody you greeted someone. Give them a hug, give them a kiss. Give them a hug. Give them a kiss. Kiss on the lips were normal. And I remember his being wet.Dawn Taylor
Oh, interesting.
Jackie Roby
And it makes me kind of shiver. Still thinking about it. But after, when I started to learn about red flags and boundaries, I set those with my family like nobody gets to kiss me anymore. No. I don't want it. So, I didn't know when to say no or how to stop. And I need to know that. And then when I met my husband and he had a five year old daughter, I was really mindful of that. I will hug her, but kiss her, I think there's a certain age where you need to stop doing it. Like, let's think about her having her own boundaries. It became really important. So, that way you start to understand. I don't want to say rules, but we're right and wrong isn't a question mark. Yeah. You can say my life will look better and different and stronger because I know what's good for me and what's normal.
Dawn Taylor
And I'm allowed to know what's good for me.
Jackie Roby
Oh, I would never have been allowed to not kiss a relative. Oh, gosh. No.
Dawn Taylor
Hug them, kiss them. Sit on their lap. All the things.
Jackie Roby
When I started to talk about it. I had an incident with him when I was 21, and so this was right after court, right after starting the healing with that ex and after my college graduation.
Dawn Taylor
So, in the middle of the depths of the hell of your trauma.
Jackie RobyYeah, I am with him alone. He's cooking me lunch. He takes out a picture, a school picture of me from sixth grade that he's carrying in his wallet and shows me, “Look what I have.” And, you know, not really being cognizant of what was happening. I remember saying to him and thinking like, “Oh, I hated that picture.” Right? Something silly and “Oh, I have newer ones.” or I don't even remember. We end up sitting on the couch, and I remember feeling like I was sitting closer to him than I wanted to be. And he had his arm around me and was kind of touching my shoulder and it felt uncomfortable. And then he grabbed my hand and he was rubbing my hand, and that felt uncomfortable. And he was doing something to my ear and that felt uncomfortable. And then he took my finger and put it in his mouth. And I froze. And then I will tell you, to this day, I don't remember how I got out of there. But I did. I don't remember what happened next. I just remember eventually saying, “I've got to see my parents. They were there expecting me.” And I left to go tell them. And the first thing they said was, “Well, had he been drinking?” And they said no, but it doesn't matter. And then it was like examples of when he made other women feel uncomfortable. Mom. And then we saw them for dinner that night. And we just kept going with life. And there it is, again. So if I use my voice. Still doesn't matter. Must have been my fault. Not really important enough. Might as well just shrink. Who cares what I have to say? And it just keeps lingering. And I don't know about you, but I found during my healing that while we were able to finally look at traumas and say “Those weren't my fault.” And know that I can confidently say I didn't do that. That wasn't my fault. I can see abuse. I have a superpower for it. But that didn't actually help the other areas of my life where I continue to doubt myself. In every decision that I made.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, 100%. Because your doubt. That doubt. It's interesting. It's like, um, if you were to take, like, a prescription, right? It kills all the bacteria in your body. Not just the good, not just the bad. It kills all of it. And that's often where people don't understand how trauma works. It becomes like a new lens on a camera, a new lens on glasses of how you look at anything and everything now in your world. So when people ask like, yeah, but the trauma happened when I was a kid. That's not showing up now in my relationships. It's not showing up in my work that's not showing up. And I'm like, oh yeah, it is. Yes, it is. And so with doubt. Right. Like that's a big one, is you doubt yourself or “Am I good at what I do? Do I know how to do what I do? Am I allowed to stand up for myself? Am I allowed to charge that much? Am I allowed to?” Right? And it shows up in all these other weird ways.
Jackie Roby
And it has you spinning. It has you spinning. You know, when I became involved with my now husband and I had never wanted kids. And I was so nervous because I'm like, “I don't want to mess this kid up.” I want to be really careful. I researched everything I still do to this day.
Dawn Taylor
Was it due to the abuse of why you didn't want to have kids? Am I allowed to ask that?
Jackie Roby
Yeah, absolutely. I actually think it had more to do with what the dynamic in my nuclear family where my role in the family that was established for me was to keep the peace and keep everyone comfortable no matter what was going on with me? And I think because of that, I didn't want that for my future. So, I wanted freedom and that parenthood didn't look like freedom to me.
Dawn Taylor
You didn't want the responsibility of having to manage one more person and their emotions and their reactions, and having to be someone with them.
Jackie Roby
Exactly. And so everything I did, I would research. I read a book when we first got together, a call The Career Girl's Guide to Becoming a Stepmom. Love it. Highly recommend it.
Dawn Taylor
In the show notes.
Jackie Roby
It's amazing but everything I would say I remember, I would then follow up with my husband. “Did I say the right thing? Was it okay? Was that what I should have said?” I wasn't really sure. Maybe I won't say anything next time. Like this went on for years. Wow, years of me doing that.
Dawn TaylorThat makes for hard relationships.
Jackie RobyYeah, yeah. And we had judgment, as I was saying, that came from everywhere. Including from the child itself who was being injured, of course. Right. Like that's kind of the natural one you expect, but it came fromm certain friends of his. “You should be doing it this way, or you're so great this way, or you can't say that.” Or oh, you know, every single avenue. I was being watched. And it just further enhanced all of that stuff until I started to take my power back and work on my own self-doubt that now I can stand and say, I don't care what you think. I know in me what is right. And if I am off in something that I do or say I am human. And I talk through it, I. Don't shove things under the rug like, I'm creating a healthy, wonderful, happy, peaceful space that supports mental wellness and breaking cycles of generational trauma.
Dawn Taylor
Amazing. So in the doubt, you got out of the relationship, you start to realize all the red flags, all of this stuff. Then you walk into corporate. You've graduated, you're excited. Probably like most people, when they're in those early stages of healing, you're like, “I've got this. This will never happen to me again, because now I know.” And then you end up in a corporate situation.
Jackie Roby
I will tell you that I spent my career in that I found myself in industries that were more lenient in that behavior? I started in casinos.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, goodness.
Jackie Roby
And each time it took me, it probably took me a good ten years into my career to recognize the pattern. Because I thought it was just the individuals. Right. The bad seed, right? But not recognizing the pattern of it. The culture that nine times out of ten it was older men, the power struggle. How I felt powerless. And how I didn't fight back. Where if I had any attempt at doing it, I felt so scared. And I eventually ended up being the one leaving.
Dawn TaylorSo how much of that do you think is, and I mean, some of it has gotten better with all like the MeToo movements and everything that's gone on. But how much of that do you think was a trauma response in how, and I say it from you and I both and I've also dealt with some corporate stuff in, I hate to even use these words, but what we attracted, right, because of the trauma that we had, how we took it as a trauma response. And how much of it. Is actually just a normalized thing that we were taught to be okay with.
Jackie Roby
Well as women weren't we just taught trauma responses?
Dawn TaylorChildren of the 80s and 90s. I'm so very sorry for how our parents taught us.
Jackie Roby
Um. So appease. Was the one that I would utilize the most in those scenarios. Mm. And I for a long time didn't realize that was a trauma response at all. I just thought I was a nice person. So, eventually, I set boundaries for myself to never, never, quote unquote, find myself in that. position.
Dawn Taylor
I love that you said boundaries for yourself, because people often think boundaries are rules for other people. And it's like, no, no, no, they're for us.
Jackie Roby
Yeah. Like I don't go out. You know, I'm always back in my room by a certain time. I don't do after work cocktails. If I do, I have one and done. I can do business just as well during the workday as I can at night. There are just certain things I wouldn't do anymore. Yeah, and, even my first one. My first job though, they were just. Bullies. I didn't put myself in scenarios with them. I say, put myself. God, look at that, I'm blaming myself.
Dawn Taylor
I was gonna say, look at the language. It runs so deep in us.
Jackie RobyIt's so deep. Yeah. I don't know if I could give it a balance. It's honestly just been such a lifestyle.
Dawn TaylorInteresting wording on that. It's true, though, isn't it? I remember. So years ago I was working for an oil field company, and I was the EA in the office doing the thing and having a POS and dealing with guys and dealing with billing and all this stuff. And it was a fairly large company. And the guys were great, except one who decided he wanted to follow me home and stalk me and say inappropriate things and push me into walls and incredibly, incredibly inappropriate. And it got to the point where there were other guys that worked for the company that knew what he was talking about doing to me. They started following me home every day from work. They
wouldn't let me be in my office alone. When he was in the building and he was one of the supervisors, they wouldn't they would just make sure, like one of the guys in the shop would just, like, happened to be in the hallway every single time they saw him walk down towards my office as almost a protection and they went to the boss and said something. I finally went to the boss and said something and I was like, “Look, he's literally parking outside my condo. This is not safe.” And my husband worked at a town a lot and I was like, I feel unsafe with this man. He was 30 years my senior and I was like, this isn't okay. And I was told I needed to figure out my shit because he made the company money and I didn't. So, they weren't going to get rid of him. And I remember standing there and man, I wish the me of now was in that position because things would have gone down very differently. But, I remember standing there and looking at this guy and going, “Okay.” And I went to my office and I packed up my stuff, and I just walked out
and I phoned my husband and I was like. This is before I had a cell phone and I phoned my husband and I was like, I'm going on a really long road trip, I'll be back on a mentally ready, but I need to, like, process what just happened. And he was like, “Okay, go.” But my husband's always been very big on like, “No, no, you can stand your own. You don't need me to step in and protect you. Like, you're fine.” And, you know, as I was walking out, this idiot still tried to pin me in my office. Nobody said anything, and a group of guys, like, surrounded me, grabbed my box out of my hands and walked me to my car. And one of them followed me half, like, back to my place again. Because of it. And, you know, it's that messaging. It's another job where I worked for an accounting firm, and one of the accountants would always make me squat and bend over in front of him. He'd, like, purposely set files on the floor for me to pick up.
And I remember thinking like, really? But it was also the PE teacher in high school that, like, to follow all the girls as they jogged and he'd walk the line in front of us as we did jumping jacks.
And act like nothing was wrong. And I've had conversations with some of the teachers in high school since they were like nothing about what he did was appropriate. And we are so sorry. Right. This has been ingrained in us our entire lives. And it's interesting that at no point.
Now, would I go to the cops on some of that? Yes. Now, would I hire a lawyer and charge people for some of these things? Oh hell yes. Would I go to the labor board? Yes. Would I go higher up above the chain to higher up management owners? The company? You better believe it. Right. Because now I have a very loud voice that I am not afraid to use it in those ways, but, like you said, it was a lifestyle. Right. It was a lifestyle of just “Suck it up. It's not a big deal. I need my paycheck every other Friday. And he's just a pig. Oh, it's just how guys think. It's just how guys are.” Right. And if I would say signs and the doubts, the doubts that come with that, though, that literally spread into every area of your life.
Jackie Roby
Exactly. It extended. To any kind of poor treatment. I was treated horribly by a female boss who, you know, when I tried to bring an idea to the table, said, “If you don't like it here, you have an option.” And I went to HR and after the investigations and the conversation, they said, “Well, she didn't mean it. We need you to be able to work with her, though. Yeah. Can you do that and communicate?” “Oh, I've told you something's not okay. You're still not doing anything to protect me. Did I do that?” And I spent so much time spinning. In that role, thinking I must be doing something wrong. How can I be better? How can I do something differently? How can I navigate? It must be me. How much stress and time would we save? Anxiety. Potential. Future. Wrinkles. By working on this piece of it. And as business owners, it happens all the time. And it's not that it's going to go away. I want to be really clear about that. But we can quiet it and we can recover quickly.
Dawn TaylorWe totally can. I had a situation in New York when I was there last summer where someone tried to attack me. And. It was. It was very interesting because my husband's always been very fearful of me traveling alone, and I do a lot of it. And it was a very dangerous situation, and I hadn't followed my rules of when to be back at my place and when to walk, where to walk, time of night to walk, you know, like 11:30 at night in Columbus circles. Probably not the smartest idea from a Broadway show. Like just going to put that out there if you're traveling alone. But I
was walking past a guy and he said quite quietly, but loud enough I heard it. “Oh, I can't wait to fuck you up tonight. And where I used to freeze and I used to just panic. I was like, oh hell no. And I turned and he had like 4 or 5 buddies that were all, like, closing in and circling around and pretending to play on their cell phones. There's not a ton of people in that corner right then, and I like chest to chest with this dude. And he was probably six two, six three like a big, big dude.
And I went chest to chest with him and lit him up. “I was like, really? Are we doing this?
Are we really?” And I totally, like, got up, like up in his grill. And I was like, “Really?” And
he was like, he started stuttering. And I was like, “What is wrong with you? You need to call your mother. Get some therapy.” I totally just lectured him on the street corner at on the Saturday night. And I was like, oh, wow. And I just turned and kept walking. And this guy comes running up behind me. He has his phone on because he's about to call the cops because he was watching this whole thing go down. He's a local. He was probably like in his 60s. And he, like, chases after me, like follows me to Whole Foods. I was running into him, grab some groceries and he's like panicking. “Do you know what just happened?” And the manager comes over and they're having this whole thing around me. And I was like, “What?” And he's like, and finally he got his breath. And then he looks. The manager goes, “You should have seen this guy's face. Like that was not what he was expecting.”Oh, yeah, there was something else that happened earlier that night. I was just done right. Like, I was just done with all these men in their actions.
And I phoned my husband and he's like, “I don't know if I should be laughing right now. We're flying down there and forcing you to come home with me.” He's like, “But I'm really proud of you and glad you can, like, hold your own in those situations.” Right. And it was a really powerful moment for me in so many ways. And yeah, it's a funny story. Whatever. I went back to that corner. A week and a half ago, and I stood on that corner with one of my girls, and we stood there and I'm like, this is where that happened, is in this exact spot. And she's like, are you serious? And I said, yeah. Like right here. And she's like, how does that feel? And it was this wild flood of emotions of, that happened. Like that could have been really bad. Nothing about that should have ended the way that it did. But at the same time, I was like, I didn't doubt myself. I didn't doubt my abilities, my capacity. I doubted nothing in that moment, I turned into a powerhouse. And it was this really big moment of like, look how far I've healed. That I didn't freeze, that I didn't just stand there and panic.That I could stand my ground. And that was so incredible, that moment.
Jackie Roby
And you would have had every right to do any of those things,
Dawn Taylor
100%, 100%. I could have absolutely frozen. I could have just stood there. I could have collapsed, I could have cried. I could have done all of those things. Right. That is a very, very normal response. But to have my voice be able to be heard to that level and to not doubt myself in that way. It was incredible.Jackie Roby
Yeah. It's beautiful.
Dawn Taylor
Right. Like, that was such an incredible moment, and it might sound really funny, but I'm almost weirdly grateful it happened. Because it did prove that my voice mattered, and that when my voice came out that it made a difference.
Jackie Roby
I love that and thank you. That moment is such a gift. Thank you.
Dawn TaylorI think this doubt and it's interesting as. And I'm not saying men don't feel this as well, but as
women, especially women raised in the 80s and 90s. Right. I was raised in a culture where it's just like, “Forgive and forget. Act like nothing happened. But he was a good man. You're
okay. You're fine. It wasn't that bad.” And all of those things that caused me to gaslight myself. Right It wasn't even that everybody else was gaslighting me. They just didn't believe or they didn't know how to deal with it, or they didn't know how to process it, or they didn't know how to respond or react because they just didn't. But their reactions and whatever went on caused me to do the gaslighting and almost hold myself in that position of continually justifying other people's behaviors but also believing that I had to take That it was appropriate. Right?
Jackie RobyAbsolutely. And you know when it comes up in ways that you just don't see coming. Like having to get everyone's buy in for an idea. And if you get one negative, that's all you think about. And it's like that negative is proving the story, the negative story you've been telling yourself.
Dawn TaylorIt's not that book of proof. I often talk about how we have a book of proof, and it's like this book of proof of every single thing that we have ever done wrong. Mhm. Every negative conversation, every time we return down, every time we failed a test, every time we bombed at something, every time we sucked at parking, every time we, you know, every single time we screwed up, we have a book of proof. And it's almost like every page is a situation. And then we just add checkmarks to it, and we're constantly seeking out proof that we are that person, that we suck and that we that we are that that action, that behavior. And like you, I was bullied more from a female co-worker than I ever was men, honestly. But which is a whole different issue. But, it's interesting that we don't ever look for the book of proof of every way we've ever succeeded, every way we've thrived, every way we've overcome, every time we've done something right. The fact that, how many years in now you still struggle to be a mom? When we live in a world of such disconnect that I would hope that every kid would have multiple people that love them to that level, whatever the title is. That you would doubt that because of how you were raised, because of the abuse and all these different levels that like, that's so heartbreaking that we can't just be us, that we can't just love, that we can't just show up in the way that we want to show up because we're so afraid of somebody else's judgment.
Jackie Roby
And one of those big ways it shows up is people pleasing. You know I spent so long write this, this rule making everybody comfortable. No matter what. It doesn't matter. The comfort of everybody matters. I treat them with kindness too. Everything stays in the family. Take care of this. Take care of that. Keep the peace. That I found myself in a career that was basically a trauma response. I was a sales person.
Dawn Taylor
And constant rejection,
Jackie Roby
Constant rejection, constant keeping people happy. You gotta make them happy. You gotta make them happy. Constant proving my worth. And your targets hit your numbers. And you're only as valuable as your last sale. That I desperately wanted so many people to like me. That when somebody didn't. I could probably still count for you, the people that have not liked me. And. But it bothered me so deeply. Because I could not understand. “They're supposed to like me. What am I doing wrong? How could they not like me? What is they don't like about me? Is there something that I need to change?” Like, it became something almost an obsession. Until one day I turned to myself and said, “Do I like them?”
Dawn TaylorIsn't that the truth?
Jackie Roby
Yeah, I think that's the more important question. But that's all built in with that drama and doubt.
Dawn Taylor
So for people listening and I hope you guys still are. I know this has been a heavy episode today, but also I hope that you're seeing yourself in this to go, “Oh my goodness, that'sme. I've done that. What is the boundary I need to put in place, or where do I need to start hearing my voice?” Please don't. Challenge your voice by walking in dangerous areas. But
what would you tell someone are the first steps to healing that? To
stopping the doubt, to even seeing where the doubt is showing up in the first place.
Jackie Roby
So I use the system I call magic. And it starts with mindfulness, and mindfulness is such a big word and it means so many things. But one of the ways that I teach it is by getting back into your body. Because when you do that. You're actually building new neural pathways in your brain to get away from the fight flight, freeze reaction, and you're allowing that pause. And you're starting to notice. And that's the part of mindfulness people talk about when they say be mindful, right? You're noticing. But if you do not slow down, you can cannot notice anything. So one thing I would say for someone is if you're having a moment where you just kind of feel in you that maybe it's just ickiness, right? Just pause and take three deep breaths in and out of your nose. And if you can close your eyes, great. If you can't, that's cool too. But just do those. Give yourself just that 10 seconds of pause. And it can be a game changer. For responding instead of reacting. We're starting to see a little differently. Make it a habit. Practice makes progress.
Dawn TaylorWhen I think, I often talk to people about how often it's even. Just like you and I use this line all the time. It's like no judgment, just curiosity. And nobody can make us feel a feel. So if we are feeling something big, if there is a big emotion coming up, that means there's roots behind it. Right. The bigger the field, the bigger the tree kind of idea. It's like, “Oh, okay, what's going on
here? What is causing me to feel this way? What is causing me to do this?” And at a moment with a relative, a few years ago, as he stood in my kitchen and lectured me on a relationship in my life. And I was like this little kid frozen in spot. And I remember standing there and almost like stepping out of the situation and watching it, like I'm watching like a play on the stage in front of me. And I was like, “Where did she just go?” Like, where did you just go, Dawn, that caused you to freeze in this moment? And I still do this, if this comes up for me, is I allow myself to go there and be like, who did you just have to become to be safe? Because that's often what it is, right? It's a protection mechanism that's shown up at some point in our life that's caused us to behave or react in that way. It has nothing to do with the other person. The other person is the other person, and we can just choose if they're in our life or not. That's fine, but we can't continually just put our healing on everybody else around us and be like, you need to change in your behaviors, need to change, and you need to shift and develop and all those things so that I can be okay. No. I hate to be the bearer of bad news. It's not their problem. Right. As crazy as that might sound to someone. And so for me, it always goes back to this little girl like I always go back to, and it depends on the situation, who it is. But when I can see it from her perspective and be like, okay, so she's feeling unsafe right now. Okay, that makes sense. You know, so much that's like maybe. And in those moments you can be like, okay, okay. So I went back to her. Okay. So what is the protection mechanism that she needed to feel safe. She had to shut up or she had to people please. Or she had to laugh or she had to get the perfect grade, or she had to do something to feel like she was managing the emotions of the people around her. Right, or she had to shut up because your child and you should be seen and not heard. Or she had to shut up because there was a man speaking, and she had to show respect because it's an uncle or whatever it is. Right? Okay. Interesting. Is that situation still current? Is that protection mechanisms still needed? Or is that something that I can work on releasing now?
Right.And I think that's for me where it's really been powerful, to in those moments to be like, “Hey, wait, I'm not a weakling anymore. I'm not that little girl who's trying to protect, but is a child who doesn't have the skills, the abilities, the words, anything to do, anything different in the situation.” Right? “But, how cool that I'm a grown ass adult, right? Like I'm a 44 year old woman who can.” I don't need to be frozen in that moment. I can stand up to the bad guy in New York, right? Because I'm not that 14 year old in that bedroom with my uncle who didn’t say no, right? I'm an adult now, and I have a voice. And I don't have to protect anyone's family or their feelings or their emotions. Like, I don't need to freeze. I don't need to shut up. I don't need to do any of those things.
Jackie Roby
What I love about that is that it's still honoring that little girl, saying you needed that.Dawn Taylor
100%.
Jackie Roby
And you needed to do that you know, when you find yourself in those moments? Oftentimes for me, it's what's happening in your head, right? Wasn't that you start to say mean things to yourself. There's this mean messaging and that starts to bring up the questions or impact decisions that you're making. We're not making, um, a question that I ask myself. I have my clients ask themselves is “Whose voice is it anyway?”
Dawn TaylorYours or someone else's.
Jackie Roby
Many times. It's someone else. So that's, put that in there.
Dawn Taylor
Totally. Jackie. You're amazing. Thank you for hanging out today. Thank you for your vulnerability. Thank you for talking about hard things.
Jackie RobyThank you. You've created such a beautiful, safe space. And I've learned from you and. I'm honored to have been here.
Dawn Taylor
You're welcome. For anyone listening, I know this was a hard one today. Or just a deeper topic. Not even that it was hard. It's real. It's reality. It's life. I just want to say reach out. Reach out if you need anything at all. Jackie is an amazing relationship mindset coach. She does all kinds of crazy cool things, and I hope that if you heard something that hit home today or shifted something in you, that it's a positive, not a negative, that you can start to see where the doubts showing up in your life, is it in your relationships? Is it in your parenting? Is that in your work? Is it in right down to what you're wearing? It doesn't matter. Where is the doubt showing up in your world due to the traumas that have happened in your life? And do you need to doubt it to that level? Or could you actually start stepping up and standing in your own and being okay withit? Join us again in two weeks for another amazing topic. Please tell your friends. The more they feel understood, the better. And check out the show notes located at the tailor Rekha. For more information and all the contact information for today's amazing guest, subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts. And Jackie, do you have one last thing you'd love to leave our listeners?
Jackie Roby
I would just love to leave you with the thought that you teach people how to treat you and it starts with how you treat yourself. So you're worthy of more.
Dawn TaylorHundred percent.
Jackie Roby
People will love it or hate that one. Just saying.
Dawn Taylor
I love it. Thank you so much, Jackie. See you guys again in two weeks. -
Zijn er afleveringen die ontbreken?
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Nick Klingensmith is a man with an inspirational story. He is someone who's always found himself on the throes of misfortune. One look at his life and you would think "unlucky" is an understatement. He has lived with diabetes, had multiple bouts of cancer, suffered an accident that left him with herniated discs, and lost many of his closest friends as well as his beloved pets. Yet despite all of this, he stands before us today ever persevering. He has chosen to not let these tragedies define him. Today on The Taylor Way Talks, we'll get to know Nick and his mentality against victimhood and how he was able to move forward despite all that’s tried to weigh him down in life. We are so much more than the things that happen to us.
Who this for…
We’re all different people from different walks of life. Thus, we also come with different thresholds and capacities when it comes to handling life’s problems. One tolerable inconvenience can be another person’s worst nightmare. This episode is for those looking for motivation to get out of the doldrums. Rising through adversary happens with one small step at a time, and as proved by the life stories of both Dawn and Nick, we are all so much more than the tragedies that befall us.
Guest Bio
After being thrown out of a Las Vegas hotel in a drunken haze, jeopardizing his career and relationships, Nick Klingensmith had to make a change. A 4-time cancer survivor, type-1 diabetic, and recovering alcoholic with herniated discs, nerve damage and sleep apnea, he defies it all when he finds Obstacle Course Racing. Refusing to accept his limitations, he’s completed over 100 Spartan Races, 6 Major Marathons, several Ultras and scores of other obstacle and endurance events.
Guest Links
Stride Motivation - https://stridemotivation.com
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/stridemotivation/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100069207242260
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/nklingensmith/About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
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This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Dawn Taylor. And today. Oh my goodness, I have found my equal, as he laughs. Today, I get to talk to the amazing Nick Klingensmith and I hope I said that right. I met Nick and I just have to say that it's very seldom that you find someone that you're like, oh, so we're kind of twins and we've had very similar lives and really wild ways. Not in positive ways, but wild ways. But it made me so excited to have this conversation with him today. So excited to have you guys get to know him and meet him. So the topic today is Die Hard: The Man With 15 Lives. So before we get started, let me just give you a little bit of information about him. So, after being thrown out of a Las Vegas hotel in a drunken haze, no, that hasn't happened to me. But I have been kicked out of hotels in Vegas. Jeopardizing his career in relationships. Nick had to make a change. He's a four time cancer survivor type one diabetic, a recovering alcoholic with herniated discs, nerve damage, and sleep apnea. He defies it all when he finds obstacles with his, um, he does like obstacle course racing. He has done over 100 Spartan races, six major marathons, several ultras, and scores of other obstacle and endurance events. This guy is fighting hard for his life, and I hope that you guys love this episode as much as I do. Welcome to the show, Nick! And what do you wish people were talking about?
Nick Klingensmith
Don, thank you for having me here. And I'll tell you what I wish people were talking about. I wish people were talking more about reasons than excuses. I wish people were talking about more about what do they want to achieve rather than what's wrong with their life. I want to hear more optimism. I want to hear more positive stories. I want to hear more hope and inspiration. I can't be the only one talking about this. And life happens. Life happened to you. It happens to me. It's happening to somebody right now, at this moment. And it's not fair. And it will never be fair. It's too easy to make excuses for ourselves why we can't live our best lives, why we can't do certain things. When I'm coaching individuals and we start talking about the thing that they want in their life, and we talk about it at a really high level, too, like a vague vision of purpose. As soon as we try to make the conversation real, I should just say, shut up before they say anything, because what's coming out of their mouths is the immediate excuse, the defense. And it's instinctive. It's reactive for them to immediately put out there. “Oh, but.”
Dawn Taylor
Okay, so let's backtrack a bit because you and I have both been in that position. Right. And for some of this thing right now who's like, “Yeah, cool. Nick, thanks for saying shut up.” Right. Who's offended? Who's offended or hurt or what do you mean? There should be more positivity.
Nick KlingensmithI'm not telling anybody to shut up who wasn't paying me to.
Dawn TaylorBut you know what I mean. But it's still, and I've had this conversation with so many people, right? But you aren't in my life. You don't know what I'm going through. You don't know what my story has been. Let's backtrack a bit. Let's backtrack a bit to what your story is. Where did it all start?
Nick KlingensmithI wish I could tell you it started with cancer, but it didn't. It probably started when I was six years old, and I didn't give this event enough credit until like six months ago. But when my dad left, first of all, I grew up on an island. Okay, he didn't, this is not an after school special, all right? He probably moved down the road, but he left me with a mom who didn't have the capacity to care for me or to love. It's just not something that was in her and, you know, when you're a six and seven year old, you may not know how to survive on your own yet, but you can learn that you are on your own. And that's how I felt. I had a side hustle by the time I was in the second grade. I knew I had to fend for myself. I was an expert at TV dinners and French bread pizza, because I knew that was the only way I was going to eat. I knew the neighbors who would feed me. I knew the town, like the town shop owners who would entertain me and feed me like I had to build a network just to be able to survive. And this was all at a very young age. And this is the thing. I thought it was normal because why would you think otherwise?
Dawn TaylorBut seriously, like we all have that where it's like, but this is my normal.
Nick KlingensmithThat's it. Right. And why would you know any other way? Like when people ask me what it was like growing up on the vineyard, I'm like, it's all I ever knew. It's like, that's where I grew up. But about a year and a half after that, my dad came and took me out of school one day and he's like, “Yeah, your mom gave you up.” And now you're going to go live in a we're going to go live with his new fiance and her two daughters, and this new house on the other side of the island. The next morning, I wake up to hearing chairs being thrown. Just a knock down drag out, I am exaggerating on the drag out. There was no physical violence, but my dad and his fiance got into a huge fight and she threw us out. So in one day, one day, this third grader was kicked out of two houses by two different moms within 12 hours of each other. I never realized the impact that had on my life, and that from that moment on, I felt like I wasn't deserving of love. I always felt like I had this hustler, like, inside of me, and that I had to. I grew up not trusting and therefore I didn't trust or I, also, it was hard to trust somebody who doesn't trust. I continued to isolate myself because whereas a lot of people might feel this sort of fear of rejection or not fitting in or not being good enough, and they might respond by being people pleasers and perfectionists. And I went the other way. I put up my defenses, I put up my walls. I became independent and gritty.
Dawn TaylorMe too.
Nick KlingensmithBut there's another word for that. And it's called victimhood. And that's what it is. And it works for us for a while because we needed it. All right? I needed that demon to help me survive everything that I had been through. It was the only one who was there for me. I needed that exterior to protect me from other people hurting me. Adults that I would theoretically trust who would betray me. I needed that for a long time, but eventually it stopped serving us. And it becomes a prison cell and it just fills with poison. And what again, was once there for survival becomes the thing that isolates me from other people.
Dawn Taylor
So, let's pause there for a second. That character trait in you. What were the positives of it?
Nick Klingensmith
The positives of it is that you learn to fend for yourself. Um, you know, if you think that you are alone, you do, everything is a choice and you have a choice therefore, to say, woe is me, poor me. Nobody's here for me. Nobody's giving me something, or you can do what I did, which is go to work at 13 years old and make money and make my own money, and make sure that if I needed stuff, I could pay for it. And it gave me the work ethic and grit and really just the persistence to be able to pay my own way through college, uh, working full-time the whole time I was there. There's a lot of benefits because it gives us these tools and resources that we might not have, that we might not have otherwise had. So I was able to use it for a positive. I just didn't know that at the same time, it was also making me cynical. I was also fearful and I just wasn't willing to admit it to myself. So, a lot of these things continue to separate me from the world. But I was successful, right? I had these ambitions for my life. I had this vision for my life. And so I did use all those things. And I felt like I was tough and I felt like I had overcome stuff. And I had been through, you know, some early childhood trauma and like, yeah, I'm making it through. But as I become an adult and I'm about 25 years old, that was the first time I was diagnosed with cancer. And so this victim mentality, it festered and it continued to grow. I just didn't recognize it because every time I saw myself as a victim, I rebelled against what I saw. I felt like I was being victimized by cancer, and I didn't like what I saw. I didn't like being the scared little kid. So I grew defiant against cancer, and it was like me versus cancer. What I later realized, though, is if you have a me against the world attitude. That means you're seeing the world as your adversary, and you're seeing that you are being victimized by the world. It's another way of perpetuating this victimhood mindset that keeps us the victim. This is one of the hardest things, I think, for a lot of people to hear, because most people and I can see it in your eyes, too, saying I'm not a victim. But how many times do we feel that something's unfair? It can't be unfair unless we're being victimized. And so when we cultivate that over the period of all those things continuing to happen to me, I got diabetes and I wept. All right, I got cancer again and I was just exhausted from it. Why is all this stuff keep happening to me and happening to me? And as you do, you begin to lose more and more of the power and control in your own life. You feel like that you've lost control over your own decisions, responsibility is freedom. Feeling like all these things continue to happen to me and I don't have any say so over them. No wonder a lot of people get stuck, because it is hard to overcome that. The world is a big place.
Dawn TaylorWell, and it is. But I want to challenge you on this too is when something is done to us. Yes, we can go into a victim mentality of oh woe is me. But I also believe that we are not taught how to process. We're not taught how to deal with it. We're not taught any of those things.
Nick Klingensmith
100%.
Dawn TaylorSo, like looking back, even at my own life. Like I had so many years of like, “What the hell is going on? And why is this even happening to me?” But I guess I'm just going to, like, buckle up and keep going because I don't really have an option or a choice.
Nick Klingensmith
What else to do? Right?
Dawn Taylor
Right. And it wasn't even a defiance. It was more of a like, either I curl up and die or I figure how to fight this. So, right. And I don't think that that's always victimhood. I don't think that it's always victimhood. I think that there is a time and a place where it is victimhood and people are just like, “Oh, woe is me.” and they don't do anything about it. But I think the challenge on this is to attach the word victimhood to all of it, I wouldn't agree with because if you don't actually have the skills and you're trying, right, you are trying so hard to fight for yourself when you're trying so hard to fight for your health. Mental. Emotional. Physical. Spiritual. Relational. Financial, whatever it is. And you're stuck, but you're still fighting. I don't think you can tell those people that they're living in victimhood.
Nick Klingensmith
So I agree with what you're saying, but I'm going to give you a little more perspective on on why I think that it's a slippery slope because it is. If I was robbed at gunpoint. Right. Clearly I have no choice. I am a victim of that incident. Tomorrow, if I let it impact the decisions I make in my life, if I let it interfere with the relationships I have in my life and the actions I take, I am staying a victim. Just because we've been a victim doesn't mean that. I mean people are victimized. Absolutely. I was victimized by cancer. I'm not saying like, yay, I got cancer. Like I'm allowed to take that day and be pissed and sulk and process. Absolutely. But everything that happens after that is a choice. And therefore, just because it was unfair doesn't mean that people are not choosing to stay in that victimhood, and it's how we handle it from there. And it is when we look at this, the guy who robbed me. How much more power am I going to give this dude than what he already took from me? Everything else after that is a choice. And by the way, I'm not saying it's an easy one, okay? Because I didn't wake up and say. “Well, I've been a victim. Well, here, I'll just stop.” For me, it was a temper tantrum. That's how it started. And it was. It was this defining moment where I realized I had been a victim. And I believe it's one I told you about. And, you know, I discovered obstacle course racing. I was introduced to the sport in December of 2016. And. It wasn't something I was interested in. I had no no interest in making myself uncomfortable. I was in a great spot in my life at that point, too. I was two years sober. Uh, I was a VP of sales, running a team of maybe 90 to 100. We were kicking ass. I had a new girlfriend. That's my now-wife. I was managing my diabetes. I had a house, car, pets, and I had just decisively beaten cancer for the fourth time. And that's when my boss had walked into my office and asked me to do a Spartan Race. And so I went home that night, and that's when I discovered the problem was that I already was uncomfortable because I had been victimized by so much and I hadn't processed it yet. I, as a matter of fact, when I got cancer that fourth time, that was the first time I ever got it sober. I hadn't processed any of the stuff I had been through yet, and so even though I didn't feel like I was under attack at that particular moment, I was still living under that victim umbrella, because all those things happened to me, and I had failed to use find a way to use them as a power. And over the next several months, I'm going through. As I got more and more into obstacle course racing, I just started making these better decisions for myself. You know, we were talking about health earlier, right? To wake up one day and say, “I'm going to start being healthy.” Well, that's probably going to fail. That's a big switch. All right. What are the switches we can make? I put a video out this morning. I'm like, “You don't even have to give up your favorite dessert. Just drink more water.” Start there. All right. Like you don't have to go sign up for a gym. Just take another walk. You don't have to stop watching Netflix. Just take a walk around the block. Like, let's take these positive actions for ourselves. And good habits are a gateway drug because when waking up early to exercise helped me with more time with my dogs in the morning, it also gave me a reason to start going to bed at a regular time. And at 36 years old, I gave myself the first regular sleep cycle I had ever had. I wanted to keep racing, so I was stretching. I wanted to feel better. So I started eating better, drinking more water. I wanted to be mentally tougher. So, I started meditating and that's when all my worlds collided, like my sobriety, my mind, body and spirit. And that was also when I realized that I liked who I was becoming. And it was apparent to me that I was changing because of the way other people responded and the way that other people were treating me and reacting and acting around me. And it felt so good. And then it hit me. Literally hit me. I pulled up to a red light and I got hit from behind by a car that was going full speed. My Jeep got pretty banged up. Uh, I got five herniated discs and nerve damage from that accident, which, I went home that day and my cat of 12 years died. About ten days later, the woman who hit me died. And although all I was doing was sitting at a red light, that was really hard, and it is really hard to know that the last thing that happened in her life was me. And I immediately found myself back on the couch, just like I was that night after my boss had asked me to do the race and I thought I had an undiagnosed injury, so I wasn't ready to start activity yet. I was really sad. Of course, I was telling myself that I was the bad guy and that everything, you know, I somehow made all this stuff transpire, right? All this self-talk that just came pouring down on me and I wanted to quit. I wanted to give up, but kind of like you said. What does that mean? I kept going to work the next day. You know, I kept getting up and showering, I kept eating, I kept taking my dogs for walks. Like, you're still living that life even though I wanted to quit. And so the next thing I did was I put a race on the calendar, and I went outside to train for it, and I was just flat, I didn't have that thing that says I want to overcome stuff. I was just so beaten up from it. And I was listening to this motivational speaker who's given this talk about, like, being a victim or being a survivor.And that's when it occurred to me, is I didn't see the difference because people have been telling me what a survivor I was my whole life. And then I'm like, what does that even what's the benefit of that? Like, yay, I'm still alive. Things suck and I'm miserable. Yay! So that's when I decided I don't like my choices. And I don't want to be a survivor, because I also realized at that point that I hadn't overcome any of my adversity. I had only survived it. And in order for me to overcome it, I needed to make a choice. And I didn't want to be a victim anymore. And so literally, like a rebellious teenager throwing a temper tantrum, I said, “I'm going to do all the dumb shit I can. I'm going to do things that diabetics should not. I am going to make sure I am sticking the middle finger up to cancer every single day. I am going to continue my sobriety journey and help other people recover from alcoholism. I will not be defined by my adversity, but rather my triumph over it.” And what started as a temper tantrum turned out to be my moment of clarity about being a victim, and that I had been, and that I allowed myself to stay in that victim mentality. Now, since that day, right, I've lost my dog. I've lost people that I care about and love. I've lost friends to cancer. I've been injured. They're bad. Things happen. All right. And like, uh, even last October, I injured myself in a Spartan race, mile 12 of a 30 mile race, badly injured. And I wasn't going to be able to run or workout or anything for a while. I drove to the airport. What was me on the plane? I was mad anybody who would respond to my messages was just getting anger and I do have a process. And my process was, it takes me about a day and a half. And in that day and a half I was the victim because this had happened to me. But after that is a choice. And that's my point, is that at some point it does become a choice and we don't have to stay there.
Dawn TaylorYeah. So if you've never learned how to do that. Because you were raised by victims. You were surrounded by victims. Everyone around you is and that's actually just the normal behavior. Right, is no different than the family that like, drinks Coca Cola at every single meal. And then you grow up as an adult and you don't realize that that's actually abnormal and probably not super healthy. And I think that's that's a big problem, is a lot of people don't even realize that they are because that's just how it's always been. And that's how you talk and you complain and that's what connects you to people. And it bonds you to people. And that's what's so hard about walking away from your trauma in that way. Right. So what would that look like for somebody going through something? Because it's not as easy for most people as to just be like, “Okay, I'm going to just do this and I'm going to just fight through this and I'm going to overcome.” Right. Those of us, myself included, that are defiant, right? We are defiant. We're good at that because we can just put it in a box and we can figure it out and we can move on. But those repressed emotions, I'm going to tell you right now are not healthy, right? But also for the person listening who's like, “Hey, wait.” A day and a half. Really, though, you're just going to get over something that fast.
Nick Klingensmith
Hold on, let me touch on a few things before I lose it all, okay? Because you got, there's a lot to unpack there. Um. I'm gonna start with that one. Number one doesn't mean I'm over it. I'm just choosing to move beyond it. Like, II can't tell anyone else how to process things in their life. I don't know what they've been through. I don't know their frame of reference, right I don't. So, I'm not over my dog dying. It happened three years ago. I will probably never get over that. But you still move forward. And it's still a choice to move beyond some of the things that have happened to us. So, the other thing that we, just the other part that you just said that was, oh man, there was so much to unpack there. There's a book and I'm sorry, a guy you used to work with many years ago. My old boss used to have us read all these business books. All right. And the CEO was this cranky guy who made a very good point one day, and he's like, “I'm tired of reading this crap.” He's like, we're like, what? He's like, “These guys didn't wake up and have an idea, write a book and then turn it into a great company. They got lucky, they made some good decisions, things panned out, and now they have a story to tell. So they wrote a book about it.” I want to read the book about the guy who was intentional about the things that they did. Well, that's not me either. I'm the guy who went through all this. All right. And then I wrote a book about it, and that was the act. That was actually what helped me to see everything different, because in a two year period I wrote this book, which at first is the version that I wanted everybody else to read, the ego defense version, the one where I don't get vulnerable, the one where I'm not a victim to anything. The second version, though, is the one where I had to cut out 37,000 words and I had to start getting honest with myself, and I started seeing things differently. And the reason I bring this up is because another word for this is called journaling. And I can't tell you just how much I learned from it. But throughout that process, I now am able to answer that question of resilience as a process. So, I didn't wake up and say, “I'm going to be resilient.” Just like you didn't wake up and be resilient like you had to go through it to get through it. Yeah, we are trained right. It's the opposite of the coke at dinner, every time we had to go through it, we're still alive. Now you can make a choice to do and, you know, people like this all the time who do not get off the couch, metaphorically or literally. They will not live their lives. And they cite 75 reasons why not. They are making a choice to stay in victimhood. I won't believe another scenario, because any excuse that somebody wants to give me, I'm going to highlight somebody in my life who has it worse, who lives their life better by choice. So it does come down. And that's actually the second thing that I will teach with people that I'm coaching on. The second thing is acceptance. Accepting our starting line, accepting that these things have happened to us, that they have occurred, accepting that I'm diabetic. Accept them, that I have cancer. Accepting that I have to go to doctors in order to survive. That I sleep with a machine since I was 26 years old, that I have nerve damage that acts up in the craziest of ways whenever it wants to. I can complain about it all the time and live in that victim mentality. Or I now have a process and the process for me, and this is what was gifted to me throughout my journey, and I mean gifted because it came to me when I was writing my book, literally like that. I found my purpose. My purpose is to overcome every obstacle and inspire others that they can, too. I will say that to myself before every single challenge that I face now, when my fridge breaks in the middle of the night and I'm like, how are we going to, great, we're losing all our food. I don't have $1,000 to go buy a new fridge today. My purpose to overcome every obstacle, inspire others. They can too. So this is the challenge. When I busted my hamstring, the way I got moved beyond it is on day two. I said, well, now I get to learn how to rehab a hamstring injury. I'm in it for the long game, so I the first thing people will be helpful to them is let's find out what your purpose is. And also the people that I'm coaching, the reason they're coming to me is a lot of them. They're not lost. They've achieved something. They've hit thresholds of success and achievement in their life, and now they don't know what to do. They've lost that purpose because it involves, you know, I'll be 45 in 2 weeks. And I think, “God, I'm almost there.” You know, I'm just going to say it, Dawn. I will not be the starting second baseman for the Boston Red Sox.
Dawn Taylor
What?
Nick Klingensmith
I know.
Dawn Taylor
I think you need to accept that.
Nick Klingensmith
And so I think it's probably okay that I let go of other things that I wanted when I was seven years old, too. And when I was 21 and when I was 35, and how when I was 40, the purpose evolves. And so once we find that, the second thing we work on is acceptance, and a lot of that is taking responsibility. Now, it's not my fault I'm diabetic, but I'm responsible for my diabetes. I'm responsible for living my life. This is the only life I get. If I choose how to spend it and like, keep my mind in it. And by the way, I get this because. I was the most cynical person, and if somebody told me, “Just think positive.” I might have dropped, kicked him on the spot. And when somebody says, like, you know, “Everything happens for a reason and just think positive and it'll all work out.” Like I was like, “You're so naive because bad things happen.” They happen to me. You just don't know. That's how I would respond and I would become resentful towards other people. But here's something I kind of thought about that I've learned now, right? Let's say that I submit, I'm doing some sort of a test, okay. And in five days from now, I'm going to get the result of this test. I can spend those five days thinking negatively and tell myself that I'm thinking logically and rationally, and I'm preparing myself for the worst. But really, throughout those five days, I am living in my head about every bad scenario that might ever happen. And there is a true physiological impact to that. I run by heart rate. All right. So if I'm running with like my zone two heart rate and I'm running at like, 140 beats per minute. I'm chilling and casual. If I start thinking about something negative, I look down. I'm at 150, 155. I'm not going any faster. It's the physiological response to the negative. So I can choose to spend those five days that way, or I can choose to think positively. I can visualize positive, outstanding, awesome, bigger than my wildest dreams, outcomes. I can say everything's going to work out and if it doesn't it'll work out in the long run. I can say that over and over again and at the end of those five days, the result is going to be the result. Am I naive if I think positively and it turns out bad? Maybe. But over those five days, I wasn't making myself sick. Yeah. I'm happier for those five days. I'm just happier. That's it. I'm sleeping better. I'm more capable, and I am more capable of moving beyond whatever the bad thing that has happened in. And so, positivity is a choice. And by the way, it's not one that you just make once. So to those who are saying it's not that easy, it's no it's not, it's not easy at all. None of what I'm saying is easy. I don't pretend any of this. Keep in mind, I lived it and I talk about it all the time. So I am 100% confident that I'm right on what I'm talking about. But don't don't confuse any of that for a finger snap. It's an all the time process. It's hard work to do. This negativity is easy. You blink your eyes. Negative thoughts.
Dawn Taylor
We're genetically wired to go to the negative. That's literally how we're wired. One thing that has worked really well for me, but also it goes all the way back to brain aneurysm day is someone asked when I realized that I could actually just fight through it, and I'd somehow figure it out. And it's a very pivotal moment where I was out of the hostel. I was supposed to be in there for months. I had been let out at two weeks because I was fine. Like, not fine, but I was good enough. I could go home in a wheelchair with the heavy meds and figure it out and rehab what I needed to after. And they sent me home and I was laying in pitch black in my bedroom. Grade 12, right? It was just April of grade 12 was when it all happened. So just imagine like you're the end of your grade 12 year was super fun. And trying to go to prom, but you're in a wheelchair. Things like that. But, my husband who was my boyfriend at the time. He came over and I was laying in the dark. Curtains, clothes, everything, and, like, just miserable. And he's like, “Hey, a bunch of us are going to the lake. Do you want to come?” And I was like, “No, I keep puking because my pain is so great. Like, seriously, like, do you get what I'm going through right now?” Like, I just had a brain aneurysm and and part of it was that I like, they'd shaved half my head and I felt ugly, and I had doubled my body size on steroids, and I felt fat and gross and nothing fit. And like everything, everything about it was just really, really hard. And I'm just 18 and he's like, well, “You can hurt at home or you can hurt at the lake.” He's like, “At least the lake is prettier.” And I'll never forget his wisdom in that moment, as like, we were kids, we were just kids, right? And I remember looking at him going, oh, how are you? And I was like, okay, that makes sense. So I started getting up and I was like, but babe, everyone just looks at my head and they just look at the giant scar across my face and he's like, no, no, no, I got a fix for that. And he had bought like, an old man, like, boat hat kind of hat. But then he had also gone to the dollar store and bought a whole bunch of really hideously ugly tattoos. Giant, giant tattoos. And he covered my legs in these disgusting, like, skull and motorbike and thorns. And he covered my legs with these hideous tattoos. And he's like, “There, everyone will be looking at your ugly tattoos and your legs instead of your head. Let's go.” And it was just this simple little act, this simple little thing that was so minor and so. Really nothing if you think about it. But it was this shift in my head, right? It was this complete psychological shift of I can hurt at home. Or I can hurt at the lake. Which one's prettier?Nick Klingensmith
There's, you know, a lot of the cliche expressions that we see out there. They're cliche for a reason. Choose your hard. You know, on Sunday, my wife and we're going to go to the park and do a workout. And, uh, between her sinuses and allergies and migraines and my sleep apnea and diabetes, both of us were just feeling crummy on Sunday morning. But we weren't sick. You understand? Like I'm not David Goggins. Okay? I think rest is important.
Dawn Taylor
We actually need more rest that we're getting.
Nick KlingensmithI do what I do because it's how I pursue physical fitness and activity. Right? That's how a lot of the mindset stuff manifests in my life. But I'm not about “go hard” all the time, like I'm just trying to be a better me and help others to be a better them. But there was no reason we couldn't do it. And I said to her the same thing, I'm like, “You're going to feel like crap anyway. Let's just go.” And the thing is, we both went and after the workout we were both feeling better. But you know, I was sick the week before though, so it's like when those things, there's a difference between when you just, what's going to help you get closer to your goals. And sometimes rest is what's required. But sometimes it is that perspective of like, I can wallow in the self-pity here. I can maybe take some action in my life. Action inspires action, progress inspires progress. And I also remember, uh, when I had my first cancer surgery, I had a scar all through my neck here, and they use this glue to keep it shut. And so it was glossy and gross. And if you didn't, I mean, it was just glue and it was kind of dry, but you couldn't tell. And I didn't know what was scar tissue. I thought it was all scar tissue. At first I was like, “My God, how am I ever gonna leave the house here?” Yeah. And this, I write about this in my book, too. But my friends and I were going to a Jimmy Buffett convention. This was up in New England back in like 2005. It was about four degrees outside, and they had it in the hotel down in Goat Island in Newport, Rhode Island. And, you know, we're in Hawaiian shirts and stuff. And I was like, I don't want to talk about this. So as we go to this thing, anytime somebody would start to mention about the neck, one of my buddies would chime in with “Shark attack, helicopter accident!” We just started telling lies and I'm like, man, they do not tell you to duck before you get on the helicopter like all this crazy nonsense. And we said it was such, uh, I don't know, uh, glib, maybe. Confidence, I don't know, whatever. People were like, wait, what did he just say? Like, nobody really asked me about the cancer. So, there's some humor that we can use to apply to these situations, too. And that's another way that I have gotten through. A lot of it is I do find ways to make, to laugh at the situation and, you know, something else, so that's been a great metaphor for me, is I love running ultras. These are the 31 mile obstacle races because anything can happen. That's a long day. All right. Depending on the course, that could be an 8 to 15 hour day with the ailments that I have. Even that, even just somebody who doesn't have anything is still huge.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Nick Klingensmith
Yeah. There's so many different things. They could have nutritional issues, bowel issues. It could be a thousand degrees out, it could be five degrees out. They could get injured. Just who knows, right. Like, that's what life is. All this uncertainty with obstacles ahead that you know they are there. You just don't know what else are ones that are going to be there. And I'm never going to win these things. That's why I like doing the ultras and the long runs, because it's mental endurance. It's literally training me for life and the hard stuff that comes. And when you said earlier about getting through it, that's what kind of ultras are sometimes, like, I have stumbled through the fire, to the finish line. Yeah, my medal looks the same and it is rewarding though, and when you find out that you can suffer and come through the other side, then you can embrace it like a superpower. And I remember what I was going to say earlier when you talked about unpacking. Uh, when I talked about unpacking was this, I think a lot of the reasons that we do stay in the victim mentality when we do is because we do feel unique. “Nobody knows when I'm going through.” Well, when I share my stories, people share their stories back and I don't feel unique. I've been through so much, and yet I feel like I am just another bozo on the bus. I don't think I'm special, and therefore if I'm not special, my problems aren't special. It means I'm not alone. It means I actually have community. It means people. We can have conversations like ours and knowing that we have different experiences, but they're so crazy experiences and we have a connection because of them. And when I air these things out, they lose power over me. And when I use it to help other people. I have claimed that power. And now I'm not a victim to anyone or anything. So there's a lot of ways that we can use these things. But I do think, and this is why. It sounds like I'm judging those who are staying in the victim mentality, but I'm not. Because it's their choice, their life, because it is helpful sometimes. Again, like when I'm going through cancer, I don't want to feel like it's no big deal, right? Like I'm in the fight of my life. It's okay to feel that way. I also think it's really important that people understand - it's okay to not be okay. It’s exhausting pretending that everything is okay.
Dawn Taylor
It's okay to not be okay. And I know if you listeners have listened to any of my other podcasts, they've probably heard me say this before. I had someone to give me a review on, it was the 47 minute temper tantrum right? The pity party where I often tell people I'm like, “No, no, no, you don't have to find the positive right now. You don't have to forgive. You don't have to find it.”
Nick Klingensmith
I didn't wake up like this.
Dawn Taylor
I don't have to find the gratitude. No, you don't have to find any of that. But you can also give yourself permission to be really freaking angry. And so I found that that was so helpful to me. Going through stuff is yes, things get thrown on me all the time, whatever. It's life. That's just life. Like when Covid hit, people were like, oh wow, Dawn, this is a universe hold my beer moment. And I was like, yeah, pretty much. It's, I get to choose though, right? My emotions aren't in charge of me. I'm in charge of them. I get to choose how I'm going to feel. Nope. I choose how I'm going to feel. I get to choose how I'm going to process. I get to choose all of that. But I'm not talking toxic positivity. I am the first person to rage. I'm the first person to scream. I'm the first person to stop my feet. Process your anger. Process your negative, like, allow yourself to feel those feels. But, I think what we're both even saying is like, don't unpack there and move in. Like go through it, the feeling, go through it and feel it, live it, breathe it for a second. And maybe you need a day and a half. Maybe you need six weeks. Maybe in a year. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. Whatever it is that you need in order to process whatever happened to you based on your situation, your ingredients of your life, what you've gone through. Right, but then choose that. You're like, okay, I'm going to actually choose one thing today that could better my day, that could better my life, that could make it more enjoyable, that could bring me a smile, that could help me release this.
Nick Klingensmith
That's actually the first thing is priorities and discipline. Because we for me, literally my day is planned from the moment I wake up until the end of the day. Not saying when I go to bed like, I have to because if I have too much idle time, the doubt seeks in, the negative seeps in, the wishy washy seep in. And it's not rigid. I'm the one designing it. Okay, but like so I'm waking up and I'm immediately starting, you know, I'm saying my prayers, drinking my coffee, starting my workout. And it's all pre at 430 in the morning. You don't have a lot of room for error or cognitive thinking. So I need routine to carry me through something that sucks. I don't enjoy waking up early and doing that, I don't. I enjoy being fit and active. I do enjoy working out and training. I do not enjoy doing so at 5:00 in the morning, but that's when I can do it. So the reason the worst 15 minutes of my day is when I come into my office here and I sit down and I plan the day because that's when the anxiety exists, is in that 15 minutes. And the rest of the day, I have priorities that I set that are aimed at accomplishing my goals. And I say priorities, not just objectives, because we can't be everywhere, can't be all things to all people. I have to say no to a lot. There's a lot of things I want to do. A lot of people I want to, like, talk to. There's like different things. Everyone has a new suggestion on how I can improve my business and they’re right, and I want to run them all down. But you can't. I have to say no to certain things. I'm doing this now. I'm focused on this. When doubt comes in, I'm like, “Hey, you take a number. I don't see doubt on my schedule.” I have to keep working. When imposter syndrome comes in, I'm like, I don't care. Like, dude, you set the podcast. It's not your decision whether or not Dawn's going to like you. You just get on there and be your best. Like, you move through the steps and focus on, you know, the parts that, uh, and focus on the parts that I can. Um, the other aspect, though, is that by, it's like I said, it's not every minute of every day because like today it is. But by the time I come home for dinner, that's when I get to relax. And then literally I turn the rest of it off to. So there's no room to stay in it. There's just, I'm taking action because eventually. Like I said, I can't tell you how long it takes you to process something. But I can tell you that you need to keep taking action anyways.
Dawn TaylorBeginning of Covid, I was doing just like a Facebook Live every single day for an hour with free coaching for people if they wanted to show up. And one of the things that someone got mad at me for and then someone else was laughing really hard at, was I was like, today your goal is to put on some damn pants. That's it. That's literally your goal of the day.
Nick Klingensmith
It's funny and true.
Dawn Taylor
Right? And when I talk to people about overcoming stuff. So here's where I'm going to get Nick to close his ears, is any of my clients that are listening to this are like, “Oh, he hasn't worked through his trauma and things, which is why he has to have all that in full time and full schedule.” And yes, Nick and I can talk about that outside of this or we can laugh about it. But here's the thing - I wouldn't recommend being that scheduled because it's now just masking everything else. That is my, whatever you think on that, we’re good, but, find one tiny thing. Maybe it's literally that you're going to focus on the fact that you're going to, like, brush your hair every day. Maybe you're going to put on mascara every day. Maybe you're going to put on pants every day. Maybe that's where you're starting. But when you're overcoming something, when something has come your way and it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter if it's cancer, doesn't matter if it's a thyroid disease, it doesn't matter if it's a sexual trauma, it doesn't matter. It does not matter what it is. Reach out and ask. We live in an era where you can literally ChatGPT yourself through therapy. Like, it's ridiculous what you can do right now, but you can also Google, you can search, you can listen to podcasts, you can find people that have been through what you've been through, get the support. But you have to take one tiny step. One tiny step and one tiny piece of determination, but without also understanding that it's very scary to walk out of that mentality. It's so exciting because people will. Like, you might lose friends over it and you might lose your community over it. And there's fear. There is fear attached to that. And you can't out-willpower your protection mechanisms. Right. So if that is what's going on, you can't willpower them. So reach out, reach out and get some support on this.
Nick Klingensmith
Let me clarify one thing and then, uh, the schedule thing, right? That's not about ignoring trauma. That's about ignoring the noise. Because excuses are noise.
Dawn Taylor
My brain's like, “Yeah, but if you deal with it, you don't have the noise.”
Nick Klingensmith
Ah, but let me finish. Because that's if you stop every time you have that feeling, you will accomplish nothing.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, for sure.
Nick Klingemith
So it's about how to stay focused and productive towards my goals and towards my purpose. That said, that's, yeah, if you ignore it, then you're going to get drunk like I did for ten years. The way that I overcome and process, that is what we're doing right now. And it's what you said, which is talking about it and voicing it and understanding it and getting other perspectives and also not feeling alone and isolated by doing so. So those are two very different things too. And those take time. Like I said, I didn't even realize the impact on my parents’ divorce and all that stuff until like six months ago. So, of course, I'm going to continue to work through that. And I'm not ignoring that trauma. At the same time, I'm looking at my clock trying to think of an example. But if this was like two, if this was 2:45 right now eastern or whatever, 15 minutes before we were about to get on this call, no, I don't have time to sit there and think about, you know, I wasn't loved enough as a child, woe is me. How do I get through this? No, I have things in front of me that I am trying to achieve. I have people's time who have taken to be on this with me. I have to be able to say, “This is going to have to wait a minute.” And it's about priorities and discipline, because otherwise I am still letting that control me. That said, I am not trying to ignore things. I mean, I'm talking about stuff that I've never, ever talked about before or thought about before, and I don't feel scared of it. I don't feel. It's vulnerability, but it's making me feel less vulnerable.
Dawn Taylor
And that's beautiful. And thank you for clarifying a little bit of that. So let's shift this for a second. So everyone listening is like okay, wait a second. Die Hard: The Man With 15 Lives. Here's my question. Because this is something that I've been working through over the last few years, is when we live in a world full of statistics. Statistics around the chances of getting cancer again. The recurrence of things. When you've dealt with death and faced it, the amount of times that you and I have. How do you not live in fear? So I know for myself, we always joke that we live in a town called realistic denial. Right, with the roads are pretty in, the schools are nice and everyone's kind and lovely, and in that place we just continually live and we just pretend that nothing's wrong. Because we kind of have too, right? We also are big believers in taking care of our health. And I mean, it's literally when you guys listen to this, you should probably ask me how my seven-day water fast went, because I'm not talking publicly about it, but I just put it out there and I'm on day one of a seven day water fast because of the science behind the fact that it could help me not ever get cancer, right. So, I do a lot of things to benefit my health and to increase my statistics of living. But there is also the reality of it where it's like, I have a will and I have an enduring power of attorney, and I have life insurance, and I have all those things because I'm not an idiot. And I know that based on my health history, there is a very strong chance that something could go on, because that's just what's happened with my body. How do you deal with that when you have the diabetes and you've had cancer four times and you have the herniated discs and all of those things.How do you deal with that?
Nick Klingensmith
I love the James Dean quote “Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today.” Um, because absolutely my dreams take me up to about being 85 years old, give or take. I've had to. Depending on when in my life you would have asked me this question. I will answer in different ways. You got to understand that I want to live a full life, I absolutely do. But I am not afraid to die. I have long accepted that I will probably not live to be that old. And that's also why I am so less concerned about the years of my life, and so more concerned about the life in my years. That is why I pushed through so many of those things. And yeah, the amount of times I wake up after a bad night with sleep apnea and just wanting to die. I don't want to let it rob me of any more of the precious days that I have. And so I look at it like that is how you push forward. And some days, sometimes you just don't.
Dawn Taylor
Some days you actually just shut off your phone.
Nick Klingensmith
You're like, yeah, I'm surviving today. And like I said, embracing the suck doesn't mean ignoring it. And there are going to be those days. I'm human too. I don't want them to take too many from me because I don't expect to live forever. There are times where I feel like I have been afraid of dying young, and maybe those feelings will come in again. But mostly it's feelings of like, I'm not using my time well, like that's what it boils down to. Or I'm not making the decisions that I feel are in line with who I am and what my purpose is. There were times, though, where honestly, I got really cocky. Um, I figured I was. Yeah, I just figured I couldn't be killed. And to be honest, I'm not entirely convinced of the opposite of that yet. But I think I really justified my drinking and my selfish behavior and my reckless behavior so long from being born out of that victim mindset. And therefore, I would have told you, you know, 12 years ago that I don't care when I die. I know that's not true. Now I very much care, you know, like I will. I absolutely would be upset if they're like, yeah, you're gonna die tomorrow. Like so much I'm trying to do, but it's so far beyond our control. So I take measures to make sure I'm getting the most out of my life, for sure. That's why I care about my fitness. I don't need to be winded when I'm walking up a flight of stairs anymore. And you know, I don't need to wear knee pads walking around the house, a knee strap like I used to because of inactivity.
Dawn Taylor
Mhm.
Nick Klingensmith
I think it's also varying times to when I was single I didn't care well, I don't have kids, but I have a wife and dogs and responsibility and like you know it's our family and our life and I'm like I want to make sure I have reasons to live. So it's definitely been an accordion-like thing for me but I also couldn't let that fear hang over my head anymore. So whether or not I mean it, I had to convince myself that I wasn't afraid.
Dawn Taylor
I give myself, so something I started years ago as I give myself one day a year to be terrified. So, I have like a day, a year that I'm allowed to grieve hard, that I'll never be a mom. And I have a day, a year where I'm allowed to grieve really hard, what the brain aneurysm took for me. And. It allows me all year when something comes up. So when a feeling comes up or an emotion comes up, or, I'm like, ooh, I'm going to grieve that really hard on insert date here kind of idea. And it gives me this weird way of going, no, no, no, I'm not ignoring this. I'm not pushing it away. I'm not trying to convince myself of something different. I'm not trying to tell myself that I'm actually totally okay with this, that there are still some hurts around this or irritations, but it's okay because I've actually set aside time to deal with it. And that's actually been a really big one for me.
Nick Klingensmith
I call it moving beyond sadness and. I get sad, I get sad about random times. Um, I'm an alcoholic man. There's a lot of growing up I still need to do, and I'm not totally understanding all the emotions that I have all the time. And I'm processing that and learning them, and I denied them for so long. But sometimes this disease is trying to kill me and it won't tell me. And so literally, I might wake up tomorrow sad over something that happened 30 years ago, not know why and it makes me feel like I just, utter depression. I'm a terrible person. Like all those feelings just kind of come down on it. I don't know how to stop being sad, but I move past it, I move and eventually it loosens up some of that hole. And again, I'm talking about me because I don't know if normal people have the same type of emotional dysfunction that I was just talking about but I assume more people have it than you'd realize.
Dawn Taylor
But it's often the thing that I can say this all the time is like, emotions aren't permanent.
Nick Klingensmith
They're just feelings, literally feelings that are based off of stuff and they're not permanent. And that's a hard one sometimes that, you know, like I'm literally might be engulfed with sadness over losing my pets tomorrow morning. I don't know but I still have calls to make and I still have responsibilities. Yes, I want to lie on the couch in the fetal position and feel bad. That's what my feelings are trying to tell me.
Dawn Taylor
Schedule a day. That's the day you give yourself permission to do that.
Nick Klingensmith
I know. I need to put that one on the calendar. Usually it's when I watch Field of Dreams or something, which we just did. So I got a good cry out the other day. But yeah, these are two things that have helped me tremendously, both with sadness, with anxiety, with victimhood, with feeling unfair, with just basically unhappiness. Number one, go play with a dog. You
just can't be any of those things when you're staring at a smiling dog. It's it's scientifically proven, physically impossible. I made that up. But go play with it.
Dawn Taylor
According to Nick.
Nick Klingensmith
Yeah, four out of five people on the internet agree with me that go play with the dog.
Dawn TaylorI like it, I like it.
Nick KlingensmithThe second thing is help another person. Yeah, there's nothing better that gets you out of self than by focusing on someone else. And that doesn't happen. I love what you said earlier, right? The start small applies to this to let you want to blow somebody's mind, let them out into traffic. Um, you made somebody else's day. You inspired humanity in them by like, you doing that simple, small act of letting somebody out into traffic. People don't do that. I live in Florida. They're all trying to kill each other here. I don't know about you.
Dawn TaylorFlorida is where we make fun of, that's what we make fun of. Crazy people that live in Florida.
Nick Klingensmith
Buy a cup of coffee for the person behind you in line. Think of that. Pick up a piece of trash that wasn't yours. Return a cart at the grocery store like these little small acts about just taking you out of your problems yourself. Listen to it, get it on and call them for conversation with someone else and just listen to them. Don't judge. Don't try to give advice. Just let them get it out. Sometimes that's all anybody needs. Or if they need advice, be willing to be vulnerable and share your experience. But, whenever I get really jammed up when I was at my job like five, six years ago and I really didn't like it anymore and I was, like, just tortured inside on the way to work every day, I'd say, “Who can we help today?” At least 400 people in that building, somebody one way or another, whether it be giving him sales advice, giving them a lead, giving them a ride, giving them a high five, I don't know. But helping other people get us out of our own heads, even if it's temporary.
Dawn Taylor
No, I love that. People here have heard it before. One of my big mottos in life is “How can I love you even more right now?” I owned a restaurant years ago, and you'd get some of the crappiest people and my staff are all young, right? They're all teenagers and often the customer would be so crabby that I'd walk over and I'd pull them offline, and I would step in and serve the customers, and they'd start getting mad or grumpy or whatever. And it was like, “No, I'm going to kill you with kindness today.” and I have the next, like three minutes and 48 seconds or whatever the time limit was on making the dish that they'd ordered. To shift your entire mood, to shift your day to jar something in the use of you are no longer on the same path. And that is my motto. That is my mission. And it became a thing that I created with my staff and like, “No, you have from the minute they start their order, I think like a subway-style right to the minute they get to the till to have them crack a smile at least.” And if you do, we're all going to turn and high five. Even in front of all the customers, right? And we'd have like 4 or 5 of us. And, you know, we did things like every time someone ordered a griller, which was one of the wraps we'd all break into, like, “You ordered a griller!” and we'd like to go to the Thriller dance and all these things, but it became a whole thing where it was like, no, no, no, you have no idea. You have no idea what happened prior to them walking in. You have no idea what's going to happen prior to post them walking out that door. So how do we make an impact and make a difference? And it was very interesting to teach my staff that, but also the people that came back. And we're like, “Hey, I was having the worst day of my life. And by the time I walked out of here, I felt like I was going to be okay. And I just wanted to say thank you.” And so yes, people need to.
Nick Klingensmith
It is amazing that the small act of humanity by another person can really shift things for us. And so why not be the kindness? Why not be the person who's the catalyst? And I would do what I do for a living for free if I could.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. If we didn't have bills to pay,
Nick Klingensmith
I absolutely would be a speaker and I would absolutely coach people on their goals. I thoroughly enjoy the work and it's how I get to give to the world is how I get to help others. But it's not philanthropy. It's not. It helps me with my view of the world. It helps me to overcome the negative stuff. It helps me to die hard. It helps me to focus on positivity. Itt helps me. I'm happier because of it. So it's not philanthropy. It's just another way of being selfish, I guess. But who cares because I'm benefiting others in the process?
Dawn Taylor
Right. I love that, Nick. Thank you so much for hanging out today. Thank you for being on my podcast for talking about this. I mean, if nothing else, people, if you think you've had the worst life, you haven't met Nick because he's probably been a little harder. No. And I mean that in the best way ever, right? Like we always think that ours is the worst. And sometimes I remember someone saying that and being like, “There's always someone else who's like, had one more illness, one more disease, broken one more bone.”
Nick Klingensmith.That's how I feel with, you know, again, I meet a lot of people like me. And one thing I would say though, is I always tell people not to compare.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, there's no comparison.
Nick Klingensmith
We have our own frame of references and yeah, we talked about this offline before that. Yeah. The person who stubbed their nail. And that's the worst thing that ever happened to them in their life. I'm sorry that happened to you. Like, what you went through is real. And that's another thing that I think we should all accept is that it's okay. This happened. It's real. Don't compare yourself to someone else.
Dawn Taylor
There's no chart.
Nick Klingensmith
But we still have to keep moving forward anyway.
Dawn Taylor
You do, you do. Thank you, thank you, thank you so much for being with us today. Thank you for hanging out. I hope that's something you heard today. Hit home a little bit. Join us again in two weeks for another amazing topic. And please tell your friends, the more people that feel understood and heard and seen, the better. Check out the show notes located at The Tailor Waka. For more information on Nick and for all of his contact information. You want to follow him and check him out and all of his crazy races that he's doing, and subscribe now on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Thank you again, Nick, for being here today.
Nick Klingensmith
Thank you. -
Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Caleb Nelson is a man who in one way or another, has always been exposed to cults. Whether it be the church he grew up in or the fitness group he joined, it's always seemed to follow him wherever he'd go. Today on The Taylor Way Talks, he takes these experiences along with Dawn's fascination with cults and brings forth an engaging and hard-hitting conversation about the danger that cults present even as they keep their true nature under wraps.
Who is this for…
If you have ever encountered suspicious behaviour in a community you are a part of, it may be time to assess if they express cult-like tendencies. It's never too late to be inquisitive about it and to start asking the tough questions. This episode can serve as an icebreaker for those who are interested in exploring the topic of cults and suspicious behaviour within communities. It's important to be inquisitive and ask tough questions, and our hope is this episode can help inspire listeners to do just that.
Guest Bio
Caleb Nelson is the founder of Naked Sunday Studios and host of the Naked Sunday Podcast. As a Performance Coach, he helps impact-driven entrepreneurs and business leaders overcome burnout through holistic lifestyle transformations. With expertise in weight-loss, functional fitness, stress management, and personal growth, Caleb empowers his clients to "Look Better Naked Inside & Out,” developing both physical and internal well-being. Caleb is dedicated to creating generational health and fostering a legacy of wellness for the future, striving for World Inner Peace.
Guest Links
Naked Sunday - https://nakedsundaystudios.com
Instagram - https://instagram.com/nakedsundaystudios
BITE Method - https://freedomofmind.com/cult-mind-control/bite-model-pdf-download/About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Dawn Taylor. And today. Oh my goodness. Okay, so you guys are gonna enjoy this episode so much. I get to talk to the phenomenally hilarious, funny. I don't even know how to describe him. Caleb Nelson. He is the founder of Naked Sunday Studios. Hosted the Naked Sunday podcast. You should go on his podcast. You have to be naked. No, I'm totally kidding. You don't. I didn't have to be naked. He's a performance coach. He helps impact driven entrepreneurs, business leaders overcome burnout. He is all about looking better naked inside and out. And he is just an incredible human being. And we've had so much fun hanging out off and on over the last few weeks. And today we're diving into “Are You In A Cult?” Yeah, that's right, we are. Before we get started, I just want to put a heads up that we're going to be talking about some religious stuff today. We're going to be talking about cults. We're diving into all of the things. But I hope you take the time to actually listen to this and to get to know Caleb, because he is just a really, really incredible guy. Welcome to the show, Caleb.
Caleb Nelson
Well, thank you for having me and getting me blushing right off the rib and we already laughing our asses off before we got on here. So I mean, let's just keep the ball rolling. Here we go, here we go.
Dawn Taylor
Right. So, Caleb and I were having a conversation a while ago about how there's cults all around us. So if you don't know me in my personal life, I'm, like, weirdly obsessed with cults. Like, been to some crazy called headquarters, done some probably dangerous things, but we're just not going to talk about that because my husband might shoot me if he knows. But
we were talking about cults and how we look at them as just like the big cults, right? The big name ones that we see on TV or the news or those sorts of things, but really they're all around us. And the reason why I got into this topic is you were raised in a cult. So tell us. And you live literally down the road from, like, Nexium headquarters, which is kind of wild. You’re just surrounded by these things, aren't you?
Caleb Nelson
It seems so. Follow me.
Dawn Taylor
Right. But wanted to dive into this and like, what is it like being raised in a cult and what is the mindset behind it and all of those things and how to know if we're in them? So tell us a little bit about your childhood and what that looked like for you.
Caleb Nelson
Mhm. So I grew up in the Unification Church otherwise known as the Moonies. Um, they were really known for their mass weddings, it was, what, 70s and 80s? And my parents, my parents were in it. They had, were in one of these weddings. They were actually in the Guinness Book of World Records for the largest mass wedding. And they were married in Madison Square Garden alongside a few thousand other people. Um, and they also had arranged marriages. And when I talk arranged marriage, I'm like, this dude was like you and you person, like, you to go talk like that's going to happen. There's some other conditions and other stuff like that. Apparently that went on beyond that. And I was. I am considered like the second gen or second generation. So my parents are first generation and I was the spawn of then I was supposed to have followed suit with what they called the blessing or the matching, have the matching and then get the blessing. The matching is of course, being having your mate chosen for you. And then the blessing would be, you're getting married. Um, I'm sure it goes without saying. I did not follow that path. But that was, that was the kind of the overarching concept of what I think about when I look back, um, I should tell everybody this because I'm here at a place in my life I'm incredibly grateful for how I was brought up. Um, the ultimate things that I dealt with in my life were real talk, first world problems. Um, and I have an incredible relationship with my parents now and my siblings and all that. Um, but when I look back on it, this construct around an arranged marriage, when I really look back at the things I've struggled with in my life. I believe one of the greatest ways to receive love is in the form of a spouse. That decision was completely left. I was completely left out of that. That paradigm. My opinions, my choices, my wants, my needs, my individuality like I was left out of the discussion. So that's led to an interesting life of figuring out, like, who am I in all of this? How do I receive love? Where do I fit in all of this? And some constructs around a lot of subservience to things and issues with authority. Kind of classic stuff that comes from people who rebel from those types of things. I think my scenario was a little more unique in the sense that, you know, I still went to public school. Until I got to see a different way that life happened. It wasn't just like I was in some commune somewhere doing just those things, I wasn't. That was not how I grew up. Um, so I would go to, like, church on Sundays or things like that. Um, but it definitely had the classic rigid, dogmatic belief structures similar to what you think of like a very rigid, like, Catholic kind of. Yeah, upbringing, a lot of shame and guilt around like or just restriction around things like the opposite sex or no dating. No, no, no to those things were permitted. So, I was more or less functionally mute, at least the way I look at it from a socialization standpoint, I couldn't talk to people other than about, like, sports or school. I really didn't know how to talk to adults. God forbid I had to talk to the opposite sex. That was just not happening. And there was just such a fear and a misunderstanding of that, it was so foreign to me. Um, that was at least how I experienced things. Um, and as I've gone along, as you said before, I look back and I look at some of the things I've struggled with that moved into the fitness field and my career. I started to see the wrinkles of, well, this shows up. These constructs show up in everything and almost everywhere, from people's nutritional plans to how people's jobs to how they go about their marriages. Like we're all in these very rigid dogmas, these stigmatized structures that do mostly nothing other than to separate each other and to alter other people, and also in their inherently separate you, your individuality, from yourself. And there's a long intro to my thoughts around how I grew up. That was ultimately how I experienced it for myself.
Dawn Taylor
Totally. So let's break it down just a little bit. For people that have never heard of the Moonies or the Unification Church, I'm sure the majority of people have seen, like, the images of the mass weddings and that sort of thing. What was the base of the beliefs?
Caleb Nelson
Uh, so it is rooted or based in Christianity. But what was believed, and this is my recollection, is that Jesus was not supposed to die on the cross and instead was supposed to live on, have a family and show the world how to live. And the belief or the state. Yeah, I'll lean into that in a second. The belief or the stated element around this guy, Reverend Moon stated that he was the next coming of Christ, and that he went on and fulfilled the mission and liberated people and so on and so forth. Inherently, when I think about that from a logical standpoint, I look at how most people behave nowadays. I believe a lot of people behave like martyrs. And they look to follow that model like I'm supposed to be dying for things. And I think it's like, think of the classic mom who plays martyr. And it's hard not to like, hate on moms like,mom. Love you. And I get it. It's like, but I did all these things for you, and I sacrifice all these things for yourself. We have all these people living this way, but not a lot of people know how to live for their family. They don't know how to live or the next generation. Um, and why? I've seen some of that stuff. Why I think it's so important that we address some of this is that, I'm obviously, I spent a lot of time on things like, the health field and the wellness field. You see so many people destroy themselves. But are not realizing that what they're modeling as success for the next generation is merely how to destroy yourself, not how to live from abundance, and then teach that and generate that into the next generation. Um, so that was a framework that I've questioned a little bit. So I wouldn't say, I wouldn't say it's wrong. And, you know, everybody has their religious beliefs. But that was something that just that slightly different perspective on that. Now, when I took it outside the context of the, the church or whatnot, I see that and go, well, there's a lot of, there is some merit to that statement, how people need to perhaps rethink the way they're existing in their life. Because if all like success is deemed dying for everybody else's sins, well, you're always playing martyr and you're not actually allowing other people to realize their potential. Um, so I think there is something around that. But all that to be said, I did also see the problems that come with some gurus, some dude saying I'm the next coming. Here's how things are kind of going out. I saw plenty of people living in poverty and not having to make. That kind of stuff just stripped lots of all the classic things, like weird things, all the classic stuff, like, here's this guy, why is he living so lavishly? And all these other people are living this way that I still remember. There's a couple events I remember going to, and for the record, this was part of me. Struggling with, dealing with my own stuff around abundance and receiving good things is that I saw this disparity. And there's this one event I still remember, like it was on the stage. And I think one of his kids was like singing or just like this whole thing, but it was just very the contrast was so powerful. And that has stuck with me like, well, this this doesn't seem right. Something seems off here. I feel like there's a misappropriation of this. Now, that's not to say people who are successful in their own way, like everybody should think. I believe in capitalism for a reason. You work and you do the extra thing and you provide more value. You should be rewarded for that. Um, but when it's under the guise of “I am here to save you.” As opposed to I'm going to give you some tools for you to save yourself. It's a very different conversation because it's not putting people above the other. It's saying, “Hey, we're both humans. How can I support you in this?” Those are some things that really stuck out for me. And I could see the abuse of power. I could see how people would just give over their life savings to all this stuff. And then, you know, they're kind of left to their own devices. Um, and that's not everybody. I made plenty of great relationships through that. The flip side is I also saw the power of community, and that you can get a lot of people doing a lot of things. And they did some like people did some great things, like I saw them, my mother, incredibly charitable, incredibly giving, incredibly loving. And she has friends that do the same thing. It's just, I think that there's something that people don't understand, community, if things at the top are not sorted out. That guilt and shame that I was talking about, that othering if you are if you're not following the path, you're kicked out and like, screw you. There's that shunning element of that you feel like you're not. Like you don't belong anymore. So again, classic kind of stuff.
Dawn Taylor
I don't say that's so much of why people join in the first place. Right. Is this epidemic of loneliness and wanting to be part of community and wanting to be part of something, and we see it everywhere. So I'm sure you've heard of the BITE model. Sorry. Have you heard of this?
Caleb Nelson
I have not.
Dawn Taylor
The BITE model and we'll link it in the show notes. But it's the BITE model of a theory. Authoritarian control. And it goes through like how to know if you're in a cult and how they go about it to like get you in. It's very, very interesting. And they go through a whole thing on like, it's behavior, information, thought and emotion. And it lists a bunch of things because it says, you know, like we're all part of things all the time that you could be like, oh my gosh, that's a cult. But other things you're like, no, no, that actually hits a few too many of these on this list. And it's very interesting, these lists, I'll send it to you. But like, behavior controls like regulate individual's physical reality dictate where or how and with whom the member lives and associates or isolates. When, how, and with whom the member has sex. Types of clothing and hairstyles. Regulates diet, manipulation and deprivation of sleep, financial exploitation, manipulation and or dependence. And it goes through a whole bunch and it gets into like some pretty harsh stuff. But information control, right? Deception, withholding information minimizing or discouraging access to non cult sources of information. Right. So like the Internet, TV, radios, books, articles, encouraging spying on each other. Thought control requires members to internalize the group's doctrine as truth. Might change your name or identity. Um, emotional control, which goes into manipulation and narrowing the range of feelings. Teaching emotion-stopping techniques to block feelings of homesickness, anger and doubt. Making people doubt themselves. Very very interesting list. And yeah, we're going to take it all in the show notes. If you want to go check this out and go find it for yourself. But when it comes to that. What's interesting is, so for years I've studied cults. I've read books on cults. I've gone to cult headquarters. Like I went to the branch of the Davidians, rebuild compound in Texas, and was chased off with guns. Like, I've done some really, really crazy, stupid stuff around cults, but the thing for me is always comes back to at what point have we lost us? And let go of a piece of us to allow someone else to control it. Right where we actually stop being critical thinkers. Right. So the mom who hands her kids over to like, someone to abuse them or marry their child at nine, ten, 11 years old. When you hear of cults that were like the, you know, drink something and poison everybody, like, where does that fundamental like, “Wait a second, this isn't okay.”
kick in. And you see it all the time. And people in my life joke that I like. I'm too obsessed with cults. I see them everywhere around me where I'm like, “Oh no, no, that networking thing is a cult. Run for your life. That fitness program and how they're doing i, tthat has a way too many cult-like things about it.” But if you think about it, it is everywhere around us. Right? So when you're raised in that where you're, you know, taught how and this could even be a family like your family can be a cult in and of itself in the control that they have over you. Right? So when you look back at your childhood and your youth and obviously you've walked away from it and did not have an arranged marriage or any of those things, but in the conversation you and I had had. You would then went on to do, like, some fitness stuff that you were like, “Holy crap, this is also a cult.” Where have you now seen all of that stuff later in life?
Caleb Nelson
So, I'll give you this. We'll tap into what you just talked about. So. I found, I want to first hit on what you're talking about. Epidemic of loneliness. I think that's what ultimately brings people in. But I would go to that. Like, it's not just what I think loneliness. I talk about like a spiritual loneliness. I don't feel connected to something bigger than myself, which I'm like, you feel empty. You don't feel like you are enough. Which inherently is the problem. And when I think you join a cult with, like this, the more rigid and dogmatic I have seen a structure, it's the more I've realized that the person in power actually feels very much the same way. You can see it with the CEO, you could see it with a religious figure, you can see it with any one of those things. The more they feel empty on the inside, they're using this external perception of like, “I have a lot around me to fill that void.” And again, you can see that anywhere. You can see it in any structure. And that feeling of like, “I have strength because I have numbers makes it feel good.” But if you really, like, the second, you don't fit into the complete narrative, there's the problem. After high school, so I made my separation at 17. I made a whole big stink about it, and I left the thing and kind of started.
Dawn Taylor
Can I ask, what did that look like for you? Because a lot of cults when you leave, even like, like Amish communities, things like that, like you leave, you are ostracized. You're shunned, like you hear all these stories. So what did that look like within the Moonies?
Caleb NelsonThe beauty of my situation was that I on the outside was living a fairly normal life. Most people nobody knew, like my friends in school, did not know. I had a couple friends that were in the church that also were like my close friends around me. But you know, on the surface nothing really changed other than like I just stopped going to church stuff. Now, I also knew I was probably, I subconsciously definitely could tell my father no longer bought into all the stuff. Um, and that was probably, I don't know, maybe I was ten, 11, 12 years old. I could just tell he stopped going to church stuff and whatever. And I've had also, in that a very powerful example of two people, my parents. I'm speaking of two people who think very differently about the world, have a common goal and a common purpose, and they could still have a successful and happy marriage. Each of them have uniquely told me that. So fast forward to when I'm 17, has all great stories that there was a girl and I wanted to date this girl. And you know what? I look back and like I should, I was like your model kid. I did great in school. I was an athlete. I didn't cause problems. I just did. And it was pretty easy for me. I could just check the boxes of your All-American white boy and, so you think like, oh, this guy wants to go date girls. And I probably must have thought this way. I wanted to be responsible. I wanted to be respectful. My parents, the eldest of four kids. I do have a deep appreciation for revering your elders and thinking bigger about “It's not just about me here.” So I still remember. I sat my parents down. Nothing had happened. Um, I was like, listen, there's this girl, I want to do this. And this is I want to talk to you about it before I made a decision, um, or before I was pursuing it. And so the effect of, like, there's going to be consequences. And it was really like, hey, I was cut off from the money that I was saving up and stuff. And they just ultimately, I know they just wanted to protect me, but there was an emotional, like arm's distance very quickly. I just didn't talk to them. Probably around three months. I still live there at home, like I wasn't living in a commune so, my personal experience, I didn't have that. There's plenty of other people got different experiences around that. Like, I think my parents both lived in a communal setting for quite some time, but in my experience, the gift I had was on the surface, they kind of just continue to live a normal life, but I just didn't have a real relationship with my family and I already still, and growing up. I felt this way for my entire life. I just don't feel like I'm kidding. I feel like I'm an outsider in every place I'm in all the time. Um. Yet I always desire community. Go figure. Why? It would be a great little cult follower if I agreed with what was going on at the top.
Dawn Taylor
I was like, I can send you a list of cults if you need a new one to join.
Caleb Nelson
Sign me up for the new thing! So, my identity was a lot to strap to, like being an athlete at that time in my life. Um, I cared a lot about training and all those other types of things and so much to like, I won best body in high school, and after I talked about, like after I left the church, I started talking like I could talk about other things. And I won most chains like silly things. But like, symbolically, I look back like this kind of is a platform for the rest of my life, like wellness and then changing and evolving. But in college, I lost that sense of identity and did the class of college thing and kind of got out of shape. But then I found CrossFit my junior year and, you know, in many ways, CrossFit became the new little cult that I followed. Um, and with all things, it has trade offs and it has lots of things. But, um, we were pretty dogmatic about how we got about it. I bought in full bore. I found the sense of community. I found it wrapped around competition. I was good at it. I could get accolades, I could get prestige. I could like my version of of the American Dream. I was checking all these boxes and that's where I started my career. Um. But, you know, it got to this point where there was also like the food, there was like it was the way and it was like, you're all in or not. Um, but when I opened my first gym with my business partner. We. It was, um, so Albany, where we were the first place we ran that place, like a frat house. It was wild. Um, it was great for growth, but that area was definitely what I call more transient. You didn't have a lot of people like staying there. And then I opened my second, my first location with him in a neighboring town called Clifton Park. And that's more of a bedroom community the more families. And I started to notice there was this distinct difference in the people we were serving. Now, my background was more like my, I studied kinesiology in college and a lot more like rehab and mobility and that kind of stuff. So my perspective on how I approached even CrossFit and athletics in the first place was already different, but I was starting to notice the difference in what people cared about. And I could not have communicated to anybody then, but I was starting to feel this divide within myself of like, “Where am I going with my life? I don't really give a shit about the points on your scoreboard because of how much you lifted today. I really don't care.” I don't. And for that, like. I used to live and die by my programming and thought it was like, the most important. Like the way I thought about food was just like this narrow box and like, it has to be paleo or then it has to be zone. It has to be. I've tried all the crash diets. Um, but you could see the same thing. It was just a longing for that. And it was very powerful. And there was a lot of great things we did. Um, but I still remember when he and I had a split, and I realized that when I look back, it's because I was evolving into the next phase of my life. Unceremoniously. Mind you, it was really a dark time in my life, but opened the door to a lot. There was the same kind of rift, all these people that I thought I had connections with, I did not have connections with. That was - It was us versus them. It felt like a cold war for about a year, like the between the two gyms. It was just a weird time. Um, all of this to describe it. There was this rigid belief on, like, how does it have to be done? As opposed to here's some tools. They happen to be like fitness training tools. And there's some concepts around food and there's some other conversations where we were having, we were talking, we brought in some people about leadership and things like that. “Here's some tools.” No different than any other self-help personal development stuff that you will see out there, which I think a lot of people really struggle to hear that. No, like, this is stuff that is kind of universal. Go to almost any other program. They're going to have the bones of all the stuff you're talking about.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, totally.
Caleb Nelson
Religious things. So that's where you get, I started to see, like, there's this dogmatic thing. And don't get me wrong, I was still operating from scarcity. I turned into a bit of my own cult leader in my second gym. Because this is my way. Fuck everybody, I'm showing you all that I'm right. I want to be the man. Believe you me, I've had to pay a heavy price learning those lessons. Yeah, but there's a saying in, like, the health field, in the fitness field, trying to change somebody's diets. Like, trying to change their religion because of all those concepts we just talked about their diet, their lifestyle is wrapped up. And it's not just the food on the plate. There's a communal aspect. Think about family dinners. There's a culture that shows up on the old beliefs what's good food, bad food? How much? What's right, what's wrong? Did you come from a war-torn region? Did you have food scarcity? All those types of psychological things are wrapped up into that.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. So much.
Caleb Nelson
This happened to be that version of a fitness called all this to also remind everybody I'm still friends with plenty of people on CrossFit and all those other stuff. And a friend of mine like, like is higher up in the CrossFit thing, but I no longer could be bought into that because it wasn't. It was more about the vehicle than it was about here's some tools. How do you want to use it? That was at least my expression and interpretation of how it was going down. But I see, like the gift in all of everything where I'm describing here is. I can see the trickle down effect to the people at the bottom of any organization, that being usually the clients or the staff. Yeah, because you have to just listen to like three sentences that they're saying and like how they talk about stuff. Is there an individual ownership? Do they think critically about the things or is like, is this the way and the only way? And like my friends always joke like, “Caleb, you got culty eyes. So like you're born to be a cult leader.”
Dawn Taylor
That is so true, you do have culty eyes.
Caleb Nelson
You gotta make fun of it. Because you know what? It's right there. A born cult leader, apparently. So that was, I should say, that's actually been one of my biggest fears in life is like, once you know that these are tools and often you're talking about building influence and they're very powerful. How are you building community? Well, community is very important if you're going to build a business. Guess what you're trying to do. You're trying to get people to buy into some concepts. And then especially if it has to do with anything in the personal development space. Now you get talking about ethics and morals and identity and all that stuff. It's a fine line that everybody walks with in this. Um, and I share that because I realized where one of my greatest failures in the past was operating from scarcity, that I did not feel like I was enough, so that I quickly slipped into the same thing. And I think and I share that because people get that way about their politics. They get that way about their religion. They get that way about their food. They get that way there about their business. And everybody has the capacity to be that. And I did. And often it's done under the guise of, well, I'm just trying to help people. Oh, yeah. Not realizing the other damage that you're doing to other people in the process. And you can't make everybody happy. I'm not saying that. But the intention and the understanding and the introspection that comes around that is, I think that's the important thing that that entire soapbox rant led into. And I don't even know if I properly answered the original question, so I apologize if I missed that one.
Dawn Taylor
That’s okay. One of the things that kept popping up into my mind is also the fact that we don't. No one feels like they have an identity anymore.
Caleb Nelson
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
And you and I talked about this on your podcast when you're like and like I had this conversation that day with someone where it was like, “So who are you?” And I was like, “ah, I'm scrappy and I'm a fighter and I'm sassy.” And they're like, “No, no, no, what do you do?” And I was like, “Sorry, I thought you asked who I am.” And they're like, that's a really different answer. And I said, well, I have spent a lot of years removing myself from the labels that were put on
me. Right. And the labels that I put on myself. And so much of these, like so much of the struggle I see right now, is like, “But who am I and why am I here?” And I don't know those answers. And I honestly think that a big struggle is that we don't have an identity. Most people do not have an identity outside of external factors. They don't know who they are. They're not comfortable with themselves. So when somebody can give them an identity, it feels very safe.
Caleb Nelson
Yeah, let's unpack that. So I stumbled across this term spiritual fitness not that long ago. And. lends itself exactly what you're talking about. When you think about spirituality from this lens, its identity and purpose, much like what you said, like, what am I doing with my life? But what am I grounded in? And just like you said, it's so convenient to fall into somebody else's label. Because you're like, oh, these are the expectations. This is society's expectations.
Dawn Taylor
They give you a set of guidelines and rules that you live your life by that makes you feel safe.
Caleb Nelson
And of course the problem there is climb that ladder and then you realize it didn't scratch the whole itch like great, you won the game of being the best of this external thing.
Dawn Taylor
Oh. There's always another level, another course, another point system.
Caleb Nelson
And you see people chasing that. I'm sure you've seen it like every coach is like, “I'm just cert chasing or I'm credential chasing.” Or, you know, whatever the thing is, and that's the crash diet lifestyle in and of itself is like, I keep jumping from one identity, one structure to the next, not taking a moment like they're all kind of the same thing. How do you integrate that? How do you integrate the real you into that? And I think the hard part is if I'm not an external label, I'm not this group, indexed group identity thing, then who am I? Well, one of the things that I've done with that and that was probably one of when the whole creation of Naked Sunday really happened, it was asking that question. I think that's a real spiritual awakening. Like, I'm tired of that. And it takes a lot of exhaustion to get there. Um, but to truly self-actualizee, you have to really say, like, “Who am I? And what do I care about? And what am I? What's the foundation of my soul?” And for me, one of the pillars of that, like, is core values. I believe if you define yourself by your core values, that's intrinsic definition. Let's take that one step further, though. I think most people go about defining core values quite poorly.
Dawn Taylor
And I was going to say.
Caleb Nelson
Well, maybe you've had the same experience. I've done it more core values exercises than I care to recount. And there were nice. I feel good for a few minutes, but it always summed up like, here's a sheet of paper with a bunch of words on it that sound really nice, and they're all great
Dawn Taylor
Or can't grab you yet.
Caleb Nelson
But inherently there's somebody else's words. And when I really investigated how I answered those exercises. I was always looking for words that inherently the social group I was a part of at that time would deem acceptable and would approve of me for sharing. Those are my core values, which makes sense when I say that out loud. Um, but same problem. I'm still finding a way to just look for other people for approval.
Dawn Taylor
Still all external.
Caleb Nelson
All external. So when I really got down to like, what? How did I solve this for myself? I created what I call it the anti value method and it starts with “What do I hate?” And sounds weird because all everything in my life is all love and peace, love and rock and roll. Like I like to be happy. I really don't hate anybody in my life. But this vehicle of hate is so powerful because I'm sure you've had this when you with your coaching clients like so what do you want? They will list off 15 different things that they don't want before they even closely approximate a concept. Narrowing in slightly, maybe possibly on what they do want.
Dawn Taylor
Always.
Caleb Nelson
So of course, like it was like staring me in the face the whole time. I was like, somebody can tell you what they hate real fast. And that's because it's a survival mechanism. What is disgusting to me, what repels me, what makes me angry? It's making it angry real fast. Um, and if you leverage it properly, that's really powerful. So, my example is always these things that drive me nuts. Shitty table manners just drives me up the wall. People that don't hold the door say please and thank you. Little things like they are small, symbolic, neurotic things to me that say I don't respect - blah.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, people that are rude to servers or cashiers or that is one of my biggest, like, I have gone for coffee or lunch with someone and I'm like, “Oh, hell no.” Like, never seeing this person again. Won't work with them, won't give them my business, won't refer people to them. And I've had other people be like, that's a really weird standard that you're holding people to. And I was like, and that's okay. But I'm allowed to think that, and I'm allowed to judge based on that. If I want to give you my business.
Caleb Nelson
1,000%. So, and I think that's what people struggle with is that it's scales. Like it could be some egregious thing. But fundamentally you often see this, the classic, uh, the way you do one thing is the way you do everything. Now, that's not a universal thing. But hey, if you don't speak to this person this way. Yeah, like in generalities, it often works very clearly. But the powerful thing underneath, defining like a list of things you hate, you can find a common theme. And for me, underneath that, okay, it was disrespect. So my anti value was disrespect was the opposite of that respect. Oh, okay. Now, here was the funny thing. Once I learned that like, okay, my first core value is respect. I had to then go evaluate my life and say, where am I not respecting others? Where am I not respecting myself? That one illuminated a lot of things for me, namely because I learned that most people won't define their core values or spend the time to do it because they don't want to be held accountable to their own shit. Because once you say it, you're like, oh my God, no, I'm just, oh, I was not. I didn't take care of my health this week. I just, like, threw that thing to the side. I wasn't respecting the thing that I was supposed to be getting done. I just spent all my time complaining and bitching and moaning about this other person. Like, I am doing exactly what the other person is saying. I'm and I'm upset about in a different way, but it's the same thing. That's really hard. But I think the beautiful part about that is at a minimum, you start to get clarity on “Oh, this is what I care about, and this is the foundation upon which I stand.” And I can start with things like, I'm going to hold the door for somebody. I'm going to start with saying please and thank you to the waitstaff. I'm going to just, little things like that. And it's more, it's more an expression of your true, authentic character than it is about grandiose things. And I am, this thing. It's like, no, I show up this way, this is who I am, and I think of that as you, but you bringing that up, I think that that identity piece like, oh, that's, that's who I am, that's the foundation from which I live. That's the foundation from which I operate. Makes it a lot easier to go about your life and I'm sure you felt the same way, but once you become that, it's very obvious for you. You start telling me that I'm like. I understand exactly what she's talking about, those things like somebody being a dick to somebody like that and like, oh, it's like, why are they raining? Why are they raining on your parade? I'm like, you say that? I'm like, she's got standards. All right. Cool. Somebody like me, but like, I'm going to take one more step closer to her because you have thought about that. Because you have the standard. You become a magnet for that type of thinking, for that type of behavior. And if you like how you feel when you do those things, go figure. You're going to like how the other people operate because they do the same thing, or at least their intentions are coming from the same place. Go figure. The community you actually create resonates authentically with you, and you're very happy about what shows up in your life.
Dawn Taylor
My values is, one of the things that I, um, created that I do a lot with clients is this whole thing. I'm like figuring it out and like, what is your purpose? Why are you here? What is it you want to, what is the change you want to make in the world? To put it in cheesy wording, right. But then figuring out those values and then branding it, which then, like you said, like, it dictates so many of your decisions in life, but also who enters into your life so minor, do it different, give it away, be it all, do it on purpose and love even more. And there's things that are attached to that. But it's even like, give it away. And every time, even as a company, like I had a meeting with my accountant yesterday going over my corporate year end and she's like,”Oh, do you have any donations this last year?” And I was like, “Oh yeah. And I pulled this like a stack of receipts.” Right. And she just shakes her head and starts laughing. And then I'm like, give it away, give it away, give it away, give it away. Now you got to give it to a stranger, right? Because that's jokingly what we do even in the office in our marriage when we give things away. But that's so tied into my values of who I am as a person, who I am as a business owner, who I am as a wife, and as a friend. Right. And I think people really need to dig in and do that work to figure that out for themselves. But going back to this identity piece. I honestly think one of the reasons why people are so terrified to figure these things out is because then it actually holds them responsible. And when we can just follow somebody else and leads be led by somebody else, then we can blame them for our failings. I remember being part of a networking group, and anyone listening that knows I won't name them because I'm sure I'd get in trouble. But they're worldwide and very popular, and I was part of this networking group for about five years. And, you know, it was great at the beginning. It was great for, like, meeting people and meeting other business owners and doing all of those things. Then it was like, oh, but now you have to do training and now you have to do weekly training, and now you have to have continuing education units. And I was like, look, I do schooling constantly. I'm reading constantly. Like, I don't want to do your stupid program with your, like, leader. And then I'd get in trouble and I get written up for saying no. And I was like, “Oh, this is a cult.” And then it's like, no, no, no, you're going to volunteer for stuff. And we're going to do more training and more training and more training, and they're tracking everything. And I was like, “No, this is just kindergarten for business owners. Right.” And it was this moment of, I'll never forget the day I was talking to this woman. She'd owned a business very successfully for a lot of years, and at this point, she had volunteered for so many higher up things within this networking group. Her business went under. Yeah, under the guise that she was like, no, but this is building my business and this is bringing me clients and this is. And I'm like, “No, no, no, all your hours are going into volunteering for somebody else's for profit business. Like, do you realize that?” And I just remember sitting there and thinking, “Holy cow!” Like, at what point are you looking at your books and going, no, no, it's okay, it's okay, it's okay that my business is going under. But if I volunteer five more hours, maybe I'll get another client. If I go to one more networking event, maybe I'll find some more clients. And it's everywhere. It's everywhere. And every time I see it in a coach where it's like, “No, you got to sign up. Just one more, one more, one more workshop, one more thing, one more, one more, one more.” And I'm like, “No, no, no, I want to help you. I want to teach you the tools. And then I'm going to punt your ass out of the nest, and I'm going to be here to catch you if you fall. And I'm always here if you need anything, but, like, I'm not your cult leader. I don't want to create a codependent relationship.” Right. But at the same time, I have to own. If I fail, same as I own. If I succeed. And I think that's a big piece of it. I think that people are just desperately needing something. I talk to people all the time that have like, left that networking group. We're so happy to get away from the toxicity in the drama and all the garbage. We went with it and they're like, yeah, I think I'm going to go back. And it's like, because you don't trust yourself to be a business owner on your own. Because you don't trust yourself to be able to build relationships outside of someone telling you who to talk to, who to have coffee with, who to meet with, who to refer to. Because we are so uncomfortable in that we need a label. We need a label of what we do, who we are, who we hang out with, what our priorities are. And that, it breaks my heart. It honestly breaks my heart for people.
Caleb Nelson
Well, first and foremost, you get bonus points for Red Hot Chili Peppers references. I'm a big fan, so bonus. Sign me more up with you. Let's go.
Dawn Taylor
I have a program. No, just kidding, I love that, I have a program.
Caleb Nelson
That was really good. That was really good.
Dawn Taylor
No, but yeah, I do, I sing that all the time. Every time I give money away or like I write a check for something like, I was doing another donation or something this morning and I'm like, give it away, give it away, give it away, give it away now like, but it's branded and it's memorable and I'll never forget my value because I get to sing it every time.
Caleb Nelson
1,000%. And it also tells a story, which ultimately that's what people remember. I’m taking a wild guess and knowing which networking group, but they're all kind of the same thing. There's the same shtick. And I've actually, I'm loving that you said it like it's kindergarten, but like, I was like, it's networking for beginners. Like there is value to having a structure. Most people don't know. It's the “Hey, this is the only way.” And it's pitched that way. And I find that is scarcity based selling. Because if it's that good, somebody staying around because it's already making them the money, like almost immediately it would make them the money because you're that good. You'll follow through. And I think something that's important we're talking about here, and I think it's important to be held more in this coaching space. Is more, more or less. Especially in podcasts. Are we empowering prospects with the tools to improve their BS detector? Something like saying, my job is to put myself out of a job, like I want to kick you out the nest because that was the point. If we're creating the co-dependent relationship or if you become the crutch. That's the problem. That's that whole martyrdom thing that we were talking about before. It's just a whole, it's a new thing. And I think a lot of people don't understand how problematic that becomes, not even just for the client, but actually for the coach or the business owner. As somebody who operated from that for a while, you start to realize now you have all these people that are so dependent on you to make any decision. It's exhausting. It's so tiresome. And then you start to become resentful but not realizing, wait, you created that relationship in the first place because you operated from that, and it's usually, oh, I needed to make money or need to do it. So you pitch the scarcity based solution. Overpromise and underdeliver.
Dawn Taylor
Of course, afford to not work with me. That's my favorite line from the coaches.
Caleb Nelson
Yeah. Yeah, you hear that stuff, you know, and I'm sure you get the same, like, the best clients are the ones that are like, yeah, I get it. And I didn't have to do a wind up for a sales pitch. It's like, and I'd love to actually get your take on this. I feel like just mostly coaching in general, like in its most basic sense, is you're paying for a relationship. You happen to be the person that in some way, shape or form approximates the goal that I'm after. I appreciate the way you talk about it, and I'm willing to go on this journey, but you're putting it back on me like you're basically you're just going to hold up a mirror for me and that's it. It's really not that much more magical than that. The magic is the fact that they go on the journey with you, which that doesn't always, like, people are afraid of doing that as opposed to like, I got this 18 step program and I'm just like, really? Or I'm just a human being. And maybe we mostly just need to talk this thing through. And I'm not some codependent child, and I can think for myself as an adult. And if you treat somebody like a child as opposed to like, you're an adult human being. That perhaps just feels overwhelmed. And if we can help settle things down a little bit, ask them good questions. Like you, you know the answer that I think that that's such a tragic thing where you see it, especially in the coaching space, like basically telling your client they don't know, they don't know themselves. Well, you're only going to reinforce that behavior and the way you treat them, because if that's what you believe as opposed to they they have all the tools. Their life circumstances and ironically, their own success has got them to a place that they feel so overwhelmed that they're forgetting that the basics worked for them. Their true essence, their true beingness, their true identity isn't shining through. But when they were just only having to work on just being themselves, that's when all that's when the initial success started to happen. They just lost it along the way. I think that's just such a different energy about that, whether it's building a business or losing some weight or having a better marriage, whatever it is, it's the same construct that it just helps. And I appreciate having somebody who's of sound mind and body or whatever it is that's going to hold some space for me. It doesn't have to be much more magical than that, but that is very magical that somebody is willing to be in a meaningful relationship with you and allow you permission to be yourself, as opposed to trying to be your next cult leader, be your next guru, and be like, “I'm going to tell you how to live.”
Dawn Taylor
I'm here, and I'll send you an email about your new wardrobe is with links to my Amazon account, right?
Caleb Nelson
I haven't seen that exactly done yet, but I'm sure it's out there.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, it's out there. But yeah, it's funny you said that. One of the things that my clients and I mean my business card says ass kicker hope giver on it. And I had a guy in here yesterday and he contacted me. Like right around Christmas. I think it was like Christmas Day and he needed some support or something. Can I get a session with you right away? Had no idea who he was. Had never had a conversation with them. He's like someone said the old “Challenge me.” And I said, okay. Because, I mean, I let him have January 1st. I was like, why not? I'll be up here like, it's fine. I can walk downstairs and work. I challenged him because that's what he needed. That's what he asked for, right? He needed someone to devil's advocate everything because he's like, I am so stuck in my own way of thinking. I need someone to challenge me on it.
Right? Well, last week he randomly reached out again and he's like, ah, my brain is stuck on some things. I need you to challenge me again. And it was so cute because as we were leaving, he made the comment and he's like, I like that you don't just sit there and let me talk and you make me stop and think. And even when I'm like, I don't like what you're saying. You're like, I know. Which is probably why you need to hear it. He's like, but you don't tell me what to do. And I said, well, no. I'm like, no, that's not my job. My job isn't to tell you what to do. I can give you some ideas and I can guide, like, help get you to the point where it's like, “Okay, here's our action plan of what you need to do.” But you still have to do it, and you have to get to the point where you know that that's what you need to do, right? And yeah, I've met enough people now where I'm like, oh, so you do this to heal yourself in your own sessions with your own people? Which I'm sure I'll piss somebody off and I'm going to get a nasty email. Send it to [email protected]. I think that that's a big piece of it. And it's also like this constant desire for external validation that you are doing okay, that you are enough, that you are worthy of this life, that you are worthy of all those things. Right. So you create that, you create those systems. You create those processes, those procedures within your business to be like, no, you need
me. And that's, I think that people need to like, if I was to give one word of advice to anyone listening to this, that's like, huh? Am I in a cult, right? I would check. I mean, go to the BITE model, check the list and see how many items you're having to deal with. But also, are you consistently trying to measure up to a standard someone else has set for you? Are these your expectations of yourself or are they someone else's? Right. What is their intention behind it? And also what is your intention behind your actions? If your intention behind your actions is to please them, is to get to a higher level, is to make them like you, to make them love you, to feel like you're part of a community, to feel like you're accepted somewhere. I think you need to take a step back. Right, but also what they're telling you, what they're teaching you, what they're preaching at you, whatever wording you want to use on that. Is it something that's causing harm in your life, in your relationships?
The amount of people that I know that have ended up divorced, have ended up leaving families, have ended up walking away from relationships because that's what their guru tells them to do. When really, they're not that unhappy. They've been convinced they're that unhappy.
Caleb Nelson
Yeah, I resonate with everything you just said, and I agree, I've seen that. And the feeling or the thought that came to mind. Like from a difficulty standpoint, if somebody feels this chronic anxiety, I think that's the thing that one, if that's all you're feeling all the time, every time you think about the stuff you got to do, quote unquote, right, I have to do this laundry list of whatever. That is, and sometimes you're creating it for yourself too. It's not everybody else's fault. Sometimes you - why did you create this laundry list of stuff that you think you're supposed to have to do to be successful? Okay, yeah, maybe it's actually you're from your childhood and your mom told you you had to live this way, or your dad or whatever, and you just kept. You kept shuffling that stuff forward into your life.
Dawn Taylor
Totally.
Caleb Nelson
And so many people just get themselves so damn busy doing everybody else's stuff, they forget to, like, live out their dream. Of course, they don't feel good about themselves. Of course they've forgotten. Because you are, as you said before, with the thing. Like you're volunteering all your time for somebody else's dream. Now, if it genuinely is your dream, and it really does fill your cup and it's exactly what you want. Knock yourself out.
Dawn Taylor
Right.
Caleb Nelson
But there's a different sense of ownership in that. And you can acknowledge. I see it, this is the best way for me to do it. And I enjoy, like, that's different. The same way I would say. You know, not everybody's meant to own a business, but everybody can operate from an entrepreneurial mindset. If you're taking ownership of all the consequences, the trade offs, the benefits, that's great. Some people like being part of an organization and saying, like this job and this role within this space that's best suited for me because I know myself. That's awesome. That's okay. There's nothing wrong with that. But it's the ownership and the understanding. And it's the same way of saying. You know, some people say everybody needs a coach and maybe but, like, some people might say, like as opposed to saying, “I need a coach.” Just saying “I know that I operate best when I have somebody who holds space for me. I just know that about myself and I get through problems faster and that's worth it to me.” It's a different way of approaching, I suppose. “I need somebody to, like, help me through, like I can't.” And they're just, like, crippled with their own stuff. You're probably going to go seeking a very short term solution, and you're going to get your. Don't be surprised when the person that shows up at your door sells you some snake oil and like, start the process all over again. There's just a difference in that, I think. I actually be very curious about your take on this. I think everybody eventually grows through that cycle. Everybody's got their own level of pain, of feeling like they're subservient to everything else. I think there's a new fear, though, when you start to really want to sit with “Who am I?” question of who do I really trust now? Who do I really let into my life? I'm so used to being burned by all these false gods. I find value in community. I find value in connection. I don't know where to start. I just don't trust that. I guess kind of what I'm bringing it up is going. I think especially some of the things you said about this, help somebody better understand how do you make a better choice when you are going out and seeking support or guidance or communal connection or any of those things? Because, like, I feel like that's when you're you're. Your trust in the greater good ultimately comes to its lowest low.
Dawn Taylor
100%, but that's where. But that's where. When it's all external, you're setting everybody else up around you for failure and yourself up for disappointment. It makes sense, right? When everything out there is external, it's no different than having expectations of somebody. And then they fail them and you're like, what? And you're so angry and it's like, no, you put an expectation on someone that they didn't agree to meet. And you set them up for failure the minute you put that on them. And I think that's where it comes back to, so I laugh because, like I met you. In the funniest way ever. Our mutual friend Denise, who's maybe listening to this. Hey, Denise. I went to a different culty networking group that I refuse to go to because they're so culty and they drive me insane. And if you're not part of it, you're dead to them. Like, they're so rigid that way. And everyone will tell you like it's a one year buy in, and then people will start referring to you and want to get to know you. And I'm like, oh good grief, what is this? I'd been invited by someone who wanted to talk, and he had a client in the room that wanted me to come be part of it and give a feel on a few people. I was like, whatever. Fine. Three hours in. Then I was like, I want to stab myself in the face with a fork. Like, I can't do this. Like I can't listen to one more sales pitch. I can't listen to one more shaming from the stage like I actually can't. Like I'm crawling into my skin. So I look to my friend I was with and I was like, I know she's like what? I was like, I can't like, this is actually killing me. Like, no, I can or I'm going to get myself into trouble and say something I shouldn't to someone. I know this about myself. So, I got up and I was, like, walking out right after lunch and this thing was going to, like, 5:00. And I'm walking out and someone chases me down to introduce me to someone. And it was Denise. And we start. We're like, oh, hey, how are you? Whatever. And I was like, I gotta get out of here. I apologize right now because nothing I say is going to be appropriate, but like, I gotta fucking get out of here, like, right now. And she starts laughing and she's like, oh my word, thank you, me too. And I was
like, that's a kindred spirit right there, right? I think it's about finding people again, going back to the values, right. Finding people that think outside the box, finding people that don't commit hardcore to something, finding people that like we joke with in my company that we call it a no toes policy. Where it's like nobody is stepping on anybody else's toes. So if someone needs to step in and take something over or they can do a better job, amazing. No toes. So no one's ever offended. Nobody's ever hurt. No one's ever getting mad at anyone over that. And I think we need to do that in friendships and in business. Right? It's like, hey, if I want to go to 45 networking groups, nobody's going to be like, oh, you go to another one other than this one, right? If I want to have more friends, nobody's jealous because the people you connect with go “ Hey! I like that you get yourself and you know yourself and you're confident in who you are, what you are, what you provide.” You know. And that is where there's such beauty in that. And I think that's where you really have to start. And so for myself, my inner circle might be really small, but there are no toes. Nobody ever is jealous because I hang out with one person more than somebody else, or I didn't call them for too long or whatever. Like they're, there's no toes. It's not an issue and I never have to worry about it. But because of that, I know I'm not constantly trying to be someone for someone. And that's when you find yourself having to chameleon, find yourself having to change who you are, what you wear, how you show up, what you eat just to fit in. Holy red flag.
Caleb Nelson
I like that thing you just brought up about the networking thing. I remember that it's common, a lot of networking groups where you're like, you're fitting like this, you know, specific category in our group. Like, what if they're like and then you're supposed to refer to that person. I'm using this as a general concept, obviously, but I always found that to be, like, did anybody go and check if they're really good at what they do or didn't? Did we really check on their core values?
Dawn Taylor
Not at all.
Caleb Nelson
Are they really checking in on my stuff? Like, this is a two way street and I see it the same way as. It's almost like being in the States. Like, and I went onto this with Denise on my podcast. Like insurance. Entering the treatment room with a doctor and a and a and a patient. Like when you let, you're letting some third party dictate what's going on between them, like a relationship is an interest between those two people. Like, let them sort it out. Sometimes you need somebody to, like, mediate, but not to, like, solve the problem. That's different.
Dawn Taylor
Kindergarten for networking.
Caleb Nelson
You can't. And again it's valuable because you just, in the beginning you don't know what you don't know. And you need to do the rest and you need to do stuff. And that's why I think, all these things have value. Every system has value because it gives you some order and some structure and some focus. Until it no longer fits that. And I think that's what most people lose, like, I still follow many of the general principles during my CrossFit days. Some general things, certain foods I learned.
Dawn Taylor
Not all consuming. I think that's where it becomes an issue. When it's all consuming, when it's like, no, no, no, I'm going to take 14 of your courses and I'm going to spend eight hours a day doing this and it's going to harm my relationships. Oh, and I'm going to go to every single retreat, and I'm going to read all your books, and I'm going to listen to your podcast, and I'm going to do all these things, and I'm going to wear your clothes, and I'm going to have the same haircut as you. And it becomes us trying to become the person, not learn from the person.
Caleb Nelson
It's such a different approach that like what we're talking about the other way is that saying, here's some tools. Use this. Do with it what you want. Like this is what I've learned. There's a casualness by that. And I think. For anybody listening like that. If you're ever hearing stuff and the person's like, listen, I'm good either way. If it makes you happy, cool. If it doesn't work for you. Also cool. That's usually a great sign. Like, okay, maybe you can like maybe the next step is appropriate and that person is not. You know, I joke a lot about stuff with sales and things like that. It's like, I'm not going to propose to you on the first date. Go figure. Range marriage kind of background holds some water there for me. Like we're not we're not going all in right off the ribs. Like you said before like “Oh, my god. I'm going to give you my first born and like my life savings.” Because that's buy in for this. And that works for some people. But there's also the survivorship bias, like look at this one person who went from rags to riches doing this path, not talking about the 90% that crashed and burned and their success rate was not great. And you see that in online coaching space a lot all the time. But it's again, not that the system is wrong mathematically. It was like, but you didn't think about who exactly is the person you're going on the journey with. Do they really align with everything you say? And are you really learning how to hold space? And much like you said before, is this a person who's doing this to solve their own problem? Or they hold space for you while you're figuring it out for yourself. That intention is incredibly powerful, and it's very subtle to shift. But if you're not aware of it, 3 to 6, 12 months, maybe a few years down the line, it's going to be, there's going to be a sharp ending to that and it's going to be pretty uncomfortable. So, I was loving everything you were saying about that, because I think it's so important for people to have that type of awareness around the language that surrounds it.
Dawn Taylor
I have people that, and, this is a recommendation I always make to people when I do a consultation with someone and I'm like, look, I might not be the right fit. I won't let people sign up right away. I'm like, no, no, no, you need to sleep on this. You need to think about this. You need to make sure you can afford it. And they're like, really? And I'm like,
yes, yes, you need to take a minute. I will make you take a minute. But. I will talk to people and I'm like, “Hey, if you are interviewing other coaches, if you are interviewing other people to help with some of these things, can you do me a favor?” And they're like, “What?” “Ask them the hardest thing that they've ever overcome. What is the greatest trauma that they've overcome and how did they do it?” And they're like, “What do you mean?” And I said, “If they can answer that question and you're not okay with the answer, probably not the right fit.”
Because most people are coming to me for trauma work, right? And even in the business consulting side of my business, where I'll help business owners build things out, I'm like.
Just ask to see someone's financial statements. Ask to see some of their systems, processes and procedures. They're like, really? And I'm like, well, yeah, because if they haven't been there, how are they going to guide you there? The business coach whose business is failing?
I get a lot of flack. I get a lot of flack for this because I'll say this to people. I've had people try to sell and I'm like, cool, how much are you making a year? They're like, what do you mean? I'm like, if you haven't leveled up from where I am, why am I hiring you to get me there? Because you obviously don't know how to do it. Sorry. I'm hiring you to help me with staff when you've never actually had a staff member. I don't care what you read in a book. I don't care what you did in a course, I need to know that you've actually lived it and you've walked your walk.
Caleb Nelson
There's a different level of “I know what it feels like.” It's not what I know. Like you said before, you can read it in a book or you can have a piece of paper on the wall if you don't know what it feels like. There's a whole different, when you just brought up staff. That's a burden that people don't think about. If you don't know what it feels like, rent's coming due and you got people and mouths to feed. And it's not just them. They got kids or they got family or whatever. And you're like, oh, how do I make these decisions? And you're like, you never sat with that, right?
Dawn Taylor
The added stress. I was like, don't you tell me how to manage my team when you haven't done the Thursday night shit. I have payroll in the morning and I don't know how I'm going to pay them. Up until you see. But when you've had like I've had staff, I've had a huge payroll, I've done those things right. So I'm like, I know that feeling. I know the responsibility of the weight of that on your shoulders. And how that can cause you struggles in your own business, right? Like.
So yeah, really make sure that you know what you're getting when you hire someone or when you join something, or you're part of a community or whatever it is, pay attention to that. What is your intention with being there and what is their intention with setting it up?
Caleb Nelson
You know what I really liked about what you said to that? I think it really sticks out for me is that you're not in a rush to take them on. And I think that is where, you know, many people think sale is a four letter word. But that's only if you don't go about it ethically. If you're in a rush and you're desperate to take somebody on why you're desperate, like, are you not even competent? What you got to do? You got to sell them into the, like, all this stuff. If you're not willing to let them take a week. Not to mention, you know, let's think of the thing beyond that, their buyer's remorse is a real thing. If they're chill and they come in not like when they make a decision, they get really high internally. And then the next day, if there's a big drop off, that's a problem. If they come in and they lay down the money and it and they feel calm and cool the entire time, there's not a big buyer's remorse. They feel confident that like there's a there's a I feel hopeful. I'm not in a rush. I don't like it's and not only that.I feel like it. It sets the tone for how the entire relationship is going to be. My emotions are not going to be throttle all the time. When I go to this person, I actually calm down and I feel calm the next day. Well, if that's how you want to feel in your life, which go figure. I would recommend to a lot of people because you make better decisions. It's probably how you want to do it. I wanted to make sure we highlighted what I heard there because I thought that that was. I think that that was really important for people to hear that if somebody is trying to sell you the moon and then, you know, you should take out this credit card right now and they can sign over your house and all this stuff to pay for this program, like this one time. You know what?
Dawn Taylor
There's only eight spots. There's only one left. Guys, this is just sleazy sales. And we
could talk about this all day. And you and I both know that. If people want to know more about Caleb, if people want to know more about any of this stuff, check out our show notes. Please follow him. And also, I'll be posting when my episode with him comes out where we deep dive into a whole different topic and really, really oh man, it's a good one. I'm just going to put that out there. We had an incredible conversation, including the fact that I hate the words “hold space for somebody” and what the meaning is behind that.
Caleb Nelson
And I use it a couple times a day
Dawn Taylor
If you can see his face right now. Right. But we dive into stuff, we dive into stuff, and our trauma really shows up in our lives. So thank you. Caleb, thank you so much for the time today for joining me today. I hope it's something that you heard really hits home. Um, if you're in a cult, please leave. Please, please leave. Contact either of us. We will help guide you out of it and how to fix the chaos after, but also join us in two weeks for another amazing topic, check out the show notes located at TheTaylorWay.ca. For more information and for all the contact information on how to find Caleb and his culty eyes, and subscribe now on Apple, Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Thank you again, Caleb, for being here.
Caleb Nelson
Thank you.
-
Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Dr. Jody Carrington has seen the scene play out many times in her sit-downs with her clients. They all seek to be happy. After all, who wouldn’t want that for their own lives? However, many people interpret happiness as the only good emotion a person should ever experience. Dr. Jody and Dawn both believe that life is more than just happiness, and it’s the experience of other emotions that make our humanity whole. In today’s episode, they dissect what it truly means to be happy and what difference it has over being satisfied, fulfilled and complete.
Who is this for…
For anyone who has struggled to make sense of the complexity of human emotion, it can be difficult to juggle everything - good or bad. As these emotions pass through us, we’re sometimes left with more questions than answers. This episode of The Taylor Way Talks is for those of us who are after the recognition, regulation and control of our emotions as we make our way through life’s highs and lows.
Guest Bio
Dr. Jody Carrington is a renowned psychologist sought after for her expertise, energy and approach to helping people solve their most complex human-centred challenges. Jody focuses much of her work around reconnection – the key to healthy relationships and productive teams. As a bestselling author, speaker, and leader of Carrington & Company, Jody uses humour, and all she has learned in her twenty-year career as a psychologist to empower everyone she connects with. In her latest book, Feeling Seen, she dives into what it takes to reconnect a disconnected world. Jody’s message is as simple as it is complex: we are wired to do the hard things, but we were never meant to do any of this alone.
Guest Links
Instagram - https://instagram.com/jodycarrington
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/drjodycarrington
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-jody-carrington/
Everyone Comes From Somewhere Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/everyone-comes-from-somewhere/id1
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Dawn Taylor. And today I have the honor of talking to the amazing Doctor Jody Carrington. So what are we going to be talking about today? Happiness should not actually be the end goal in life. I know, I know, right? So let's all be offended by that. Before we get started, I just want to tell you a little bit about our guest so you guys can be as pumped as I am about this. Doctor Jody is a renowned psychologist. She does courses and written books, and she's a leader of Carrington and Company. She's funny as hell. She's sassy, she's unconventional and authentic and real and she's amazing. She's had a 20 year career as a psychologist, and she's all about, how do we connect? How do we connect to people, our culture, everything, anything and everything within that and that we're not meant to do this world alone. And so I personally saw her speak at an event a few weeks ago and may have kind of harassed her after I've been like, “I want you on my podcast and I want you to talk.” So here she is. She actually said yes. And welcome to the show, Doctor Jody Carrington.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Oh, Dawn Taylor, come on. I am so excited to be here. And I am, and I'm very ready to have a heart conversation that you're so good at around here. So let's do it.
Dawn Taylor
Thank you. So everything in life is these days. It feels like to me is totally guided towards like this toxic positivity self-help. And it's like, “Oh, I'm not fulfilled. Oh, I'm not happy. Oh I'm not whatever.” So let's get divorced one more time. Let's shift my career again. Let's change everything again. More plastic surgery, more, more everything. Right? Because we're so just determined that happy has to be the end goal. What are your thoughts on that?
Dr. Jody Carrington
Well, I mean, let's come out of the gate hot. Um, all right.
Dawn Taylor
We're going to start real quiet. We're going to start real gentle on this one
Dr. Jody Carrington
I love it, I love it. Listen, um, here's what I know to be true to the core of me that I have not met a human that does not have the capacity for good. And I think so many of us, I mean, I talk about this often, you know, I have assessed and I've treated over a thousand people in this country, and I've never not one time a bad human. I've met a lot of people that have lost access to the best parts of themselves. And how we lose access to the best parts of ourselves happens in places where, you know, unprocessed experiences or traumas or stories that live in our heads, that, you know, we haven't had the chance to work through or process or really question because they've stayed pretty stuck in, in the way of operating every day. And one of those things that I think stays pretty true to many of us in this country is the need to be or the expectation that we'll be happy. And, you know, as a child psychologist, I've often asked parents, you know, what is your one wish for your child? And many people will finish this sentence like this, “I just want my baby to be happy.” And I mean, I've said that too. As a mum. I have three kids, you know, our twins are 11 or well, this is 13 and like it is the most difficult job on the planet. I just, I worry much more about them than I worry about anything else in, you know, in my world. And I really just want them to be happy. And I think the elusiveness of happiness for all of us these days leaves us very concerned that we're not doing it right. The vast, the biggest feeling that so many of us feel these days is loneliness. And loneliness certainly is not synonymous with happy. Um, when we see an increase in anxiety and depression, particularly in our kids, we’re like, “Oh my goodness, they're not happy.” Here's my wish for every human being. Is that we have the capacity to feel all the emotions because happy and sad, depressed, guilt, shame, remorse, all of those things are just that. They're just emotions. And when you have the capacity to feel them all, the script to feel them all, you will be among the most healthiest in our planet.
Dawn Taylor
I love that you say that.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. The issue is you can't. We don't have a script for futility or loss or sadness. And when we really just focus on keeping everybody happy, particularly our kids, giving everybody a medal or letting people down softly or whatever the deal is, we lose the capacity for our ability to handle futility, which is part, you know, conflict is part of every healthy relationship. One of the greatest predictors of couples that make it and couples that don't in the marital space that Gottman have come up with this after 45 years of research. It comes down to this. It's not how much sex you have or, uh, how much you fight or you don't, or how much money you have. It comes down to one thing - your capacity to repair, your capacity to sit in with those emotions. Not if but when shit goes south and you can't teach your babies, uh, you can’t tell them how to do it, right. You got to show them. And so our ability to lean into those all of those emotions, not just, stay hellbent. Unhappy is so important. And so here's your full permission to do that.
Dawn Taylor
So I often use the metaphor of a rainbow, where it's like we're so focused on feeling like, I just want to feel passionate and excited and and success and all of these things all the time. And I'm like, yeah, but that's like having one color to a rainbow. It's beautiful because it has all of them. A piano is amazing because it has multiple scales and when played together and used together is when it creates the most beautiful music.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
And I think access to all of them and the ability on how to deal with them. And we've become so scared of our negative emotions, that we run from them. We run from them constantly medicate ourselves from them. We're so scared of them. I remember a client years ago, she's like, “Dawn, I can't sit in my heart, I can't, I can't.” And I said, “Okay, so I want you to do me a favor.” And she goes, “What?” And I said, “I want you to set a timer. And I want you to just feel it. The thing that you run from that makes you drink a bottle of wine. I said, I can sit on Zoom with you while you do it if you want, but I want you to just sit with it. Just sit with it and feel it.” And she's like, “what if it kills me?” And I was like, “here's the cool thing no emotion has ever killed a person.” That's right. Oh, and I said, but we also have to remember that no emotion is permanent. They're not permanent. And I said, “So just sit with it. Just sit with it and play with it like a train driving through it, going through the station.” And just like let your thoughts go where your thoughts go in your fields, go where your fields go and just see what happens and look at it with no judgment, just curiosity and just in awe of where it goes. And I said, and see what happens. I said, set a timer on it. Set a timer on it for like an hour. Just like I'm going to sit there for one hour. I said, you've watched a bad TV show for an hour before,
Dr. Jody Carrington
And I would say an hour's way too long. So here's the interesting thing is that very few of us have the capacity to be still for 20 seconds. What I think is really critical in this moment, right. Is that so many of us, we're the first generation of parents, we're the first generation of humans that have had this much access to data to noise. We never get a break. So, you know, I have to ask. I think we asked this question, you know, where do you charge your phone? And so many of us, you know, me included by our beds, which means that, you know, in the middle of the night, if you wake up, the capacity just to sort of replay the day or feel the emotions or figure out what you're going to do next is so easily thwarted by just scrolling Instagram even at 3:00 in the morning, and then in the morning when you sort of get up and you think about your day and it makes you feel like, oh, Christ, so you're gonna just check your emails or do the things that kind of interrupt that thought process. And what happens in this moment if we think about even just, you know, one generation ago, our bodies are not. Scripted for this quite yet. And so the necessity of introducing this concept of even just seconds in a day, right? Seconds in a day of dropping your shoulders of, you know, I for a very long time, I've talked a lot about, um, the concept of meditation. So eastern philosophical practices have long been the place that has, um, touted some of the healthiest practices on the planet that decade after decade, century after century, we always go back to. And it often comes back to the very basics, right? Which is that when your body is in a state of calm, you have access to the best parts of you. And when we are in our most dysregulated state, we lose access, not our ability. We lose access to the best parts of ourselves. So when we have so many opportunities to get away from, that will take it. Because the hardest thing we will ever do is sit in that stillness. So if we know that to be true. If we know that is the fact. If we know that even in this one generation, we're completely out of practice in that regard, our expectations of ourselves, just to be able to do this for five seconds. 20 seconds and, you know, I mean, after the talk that you were at. You know, I often have this conversation about all I want you to think about is putting the word “shoulders” on a sticky note, put it on your computer, on your bathroom mirror, um, because the body keeps the score. Bessel van der Kolk has written one of the finest books on trauma. It's called The Body Keeps the Score.
Dawn Taylor
Oh. It's amazing.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. And and it often talks about the importance, right, of how you can cognitively work through anything you want. That's irrelevant to me. Completely irrelevant. The definition of trauma, of course, as you know, is not what happens to you.It's what happens inside of me as a result of what happens to you. And so we can spend a lot of time on the logistics of what happened to you, which is always very important part of the story. But what matters most to me in this process is what happens to you when you think about these things, when you go still in your body, and can you get into the state of just dropping your shoulders? So when you see that cue, you know, shoulders, all I want you to do is you sort of suggested to your client is just notice, just notice what is in that moment. Because oftentimes there is no fix for it other than to reconnect the mind and the body. And so when you do those two things, um, you put your body back into the state of emotional calmness or emotional regulation that then opens up all the access to the best parts of us.
Dawn Taylor
I started a practice years ago. And side note with that client, she did that and she called me after laughing because she's like, it just kind of came and it went and the emotion went with it. She's like, that was really weird. And she started it as a regular practice to just like sit and sit with her feels to get comfortable with them. And I was like just kind of rumbling them, like, invite them in to hang out, like you're having a coffee date. So yes, I challenge people to try, but I started a practice years ago where I turned off all my notifications on my phone at all times, so it doesn't matter. Even if I glance at her, I look at it. I think the only one that still pops up is for garbage day, because I need that one, and it's once a week, but there's no notifications and I don't remember the last time my ringtone was
On. Idon't, and I offer my clients unlimited texting and emails and different things, and they know my hours that I take those and stuff, but I'm like, no, no, no, because I can then choose. When I look at it, I can choose when I go to it. And I would challenge anyone listening to do the same thing is even acknowledging those moments of when you walk into the grocery store and you're standing in the lineup, instead of picking up your phone to scroll. Just look around. Right. Look around and just. Just sit there. It's a safe way to just hang out with yourself. In a totally different way. But just like standing in a lineup at a grocery store.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, I know, and it is, you know, driving in silence is another one that is really scary for people sometimes. I saw this meme not very long ago or was like that, you know, we saw this guy at Starbucks the other day and he was like, no phone, no computer, no nothing. He was just sitting there drinking coffee like a creep. And I was like, right. So, like, we don't have a plan for that. And I think that, you know, again, I think it's just those little things that, you know, sometimes can feel really big to sort of engage in a meditative practice every single day, to be able to do those things. But I just want you to think about, you know, getting your body back into that state of emotional regulation that can just be so critical in this time of busyness and overwhelm.
Dawn Taylor
So can you define emotional regulation from your standpoint? Because everyone there's all these like verbiage in terms out there that a lot of people just don't understand. But
they go, aha, yeah. Aha, I know what that is. And they actually have no idea - to you what is emotional regulation?
Dr. Jody Carrington
How not to lose your friggin mind. How to stay calm in times of distress. So the greatest capacity for, I think, the most successful leaders among us, when we are pushed up against the wall as parents, is that we will all the time emotionally be feeling incompetent and overwhelmed. The ability to regulate emotion is something that is in our bones, because as human beings, we all start in exactly the same place. We hear the very first sound that any of us feel is the heartbeat of our moms. And I often say, whether she's alive or you have a relationship with her or not, your capacity for emotional regulation is in your bones. It's that capacity to slow down in that rhythmic exchange. Often what we do, with the crying baby. So it's a universal response to a crying infant when they're losing their mind. If you have never, regardless of age, race, religion, socioeconomic status, gender identity, if you come upon a crying infant on this globe, you are biologically wired. If you are regulated to pick up that baby and engage in a rhythmic exchange, even if you've never, ever had a baby, if I watch a grandpa or an old papa, you know who hasn't changed a bum in years? Or maybe never? Uh, you put a crying infant in their arms and very quickly there's a rhythmic exchange that happens often, huh? Uh, and that's in our bones. Because when we're most distressed, what we don't need is somebody to tell us what to do. We need somebody, the physical presence of another to show us. And we never, ever outgrow that. And the more disconnected we are. So we're the first generation of people that are so wildly disconnected.
Dawn Taylor
Horribly disconnected.
Dr. Jody Carrington
So the response then often is we're in a mental health crisis. And I actually don't think that's what's happening. I think we're in a loneliness epidemic because this is an appropriate response to being very disconnected from other people. And so the response then isn't, you know, we get very worried. Is it the government or what is the administration going to do or how are we going to superintendent, you know, the president of the organization? Uh, we're not going to live that long, um, to be able to see, um, the rest of us catch up because we're playing by a set of rules that was established for a world that no longer exists. And, we have changed so dramatically in this one generation, and technological advances aren't the problem, it’s how we use them. That is the issue because despite the fact that we're neurobiological wired for connection, the hardest thing we will ever do is look into the eyes of the people we love and we lead. And now we've been given so many exit ramps that we will take them, and we're losing skill in the ability to just be kind, to slow down long enough. And so we won't have the senior leadership positions held by the vast majority of leaders these days come with that set of rules in their bones. And it wasn't bad. It used to work. But the point is, now we are leading people who feel so empty and unseen that being able to initiate a relationship first approach of being kind and not tolerating bullshit in that order is sort of the new set of rules that we play by often around here. And, um, you know, when I wrote Feeling Seen, it was often about this conversation of, you know, rules still apply to everybody. If everybody gets a medal, it's a waste of time because we need a script for futility. But the issue is kindness, the capacity to engage in relationship first with your kids, your partner, particularly with the ones who don't seem to deserve it because the ones who need it the most are the hardest to give it to.
Dawn Taylor
Always. Always. It breaks my heart when and I have clients online. I have clients in person, probably like you do. It breaks my heart when someone contacts me in. The first question they ask is, are you willing to see me in person?
Dr. Jody Carrington
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
Yes, yes. You can come to my office. They're like oh okay. And that it breaks my heart and it breaks my heart for a lot of industries and a lot of things. And I think that with the disconnect over these last two years, like working from home is amazing and yet it's created more disconnect. My husband and I were talking while we were driving yesterday. We drove two hours to hang out for three with his brother and wife and kids because we're like, no, no, no, we want to connect. I want to play with your toddler. I want to wrestle and tickle and hug and cuddle. And, you know, he made a comment. He's like, “I love that you didn't even go check your phone once or pick it up once.” And I said, “Well, no, because I don't want her to think that I live on my phone.”
Dr. Jody Carrington
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
Right. I want her to know that Auntie Dawn is the one that'll go to her room and giggle and tickle and wrestle with her and throw her on the bed and laugh and hug her and play like that is what I desire her to know me as.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Right, right. Yeah, right.
Dawn Taylor
Not another parent watching TV or another parent on their phone or another parent. That's not a bad bash to anyone who is doing that. But there is a lack of presence. There is a total lack of presence happening. And yeah, what are some ways that you can see or just some easy, tangible things for people as saying that could be like,” Oh, there is one tiny shift I could do in work at home, with my kids, with my spouse. To engage in a different way.” Because often the loneliest people are the people that are the busiest and have a million friends and family members and people everywhere, and they still feel completely alone.
Dr. Jody Carrington
You know, it's interesting. It reminds me of this conversation we were having this past week around artificial intimacy, the new AI. And, um, you know, there's lots of conversation, a beautiful book that was initiated, you know, has initiated many of these conversations called Artificial Intimacy. And it's really this concept of, you know, we have a thousand friends on Facebook, but nobody to feed our dog. We have, you know, we chase a million likes in the run of a day. But like, you know, when I come home and I need to get my kid to hockey practice, it's like, who do I call? And I think that, um, I think what is so critically important is fostering those relationships in your community on purpose, and also the thing that makes it quite easy for me to remember this sometimes is that the bar is so low. So it's not just you and me, you know, feeling this, right? You give somebody a compliment in the line at the grocery store or at the hockey rink, or you buy somebody's coffee in the lineup behind you at Tim Hortons. Right? It is remarkable what will happen. And in order to do those things, you see sort of like this 007 trick, because in order to do those things, you have to be emotionally regulated. And so if we make it a goal on our part to be able to sort of build our own community up, to be able to be the one that, you know, gives out a compliment, even on our shittiest moments in the days that we feel like we don't, you can have an awful day for the vast majority of your day. Feel every bit of it, but your only job is to give two compliments a day. I know when you switch into that mode, you're pulling your prefrontal cortex on, and it is allowing then us to build the communities, to build the connections in a community and some of the healthiest among us, like if we look at the data, um, Susan Pinker's written a beautiful book. She's a Canadian psychologist, and she talks about how in the blue zone. So some of the most you know, the centurions, the ones who lived beyond 100 years in a healthy way. Um, the greatest predictor of longevity isn't necessarily. In fact, it's not how fat you are or how much you drink or, um, how much you smoke or don't smoke. The greatest predictor of longevity is social reciprocity in your community. So people in the blue zone, for example, uh, on the island of Corsica, off of Italy, they live close together. Uh, their access to steel, to their daily functioning, like going to the post office. They get bread, fresh bread every day. They go get their milk. And they have to not necessarily have a bunch of close friends, but they have the social reciprocity with people that's checking on them. Hey, I didn't see you come by for your milk today. Uh, how are things going? Or did you make it for coffee or did you do those things? And so those social engagements become some of the most important things. And now that we can do many of these things post-Covid, in particular from home ordering our groceries, you don't have to go to Costco because there's too many people, which means we don't take our kids on Costco trips, which is a rite of passage. You should have a meltdown in Costco with your toddler at least three times, you know? And like all of those things become really critical because you can't tell somebody how to navigate those experiences. You've got to show them. And I think that on purpose choice to be able to play cards with your neighbors on the weekends too. I was too tired to go to the movie, or we're too tired or whatever. Being able to sort of do some of those things, not all of them, but some of those things on purpose, will serve the next generation well, because the concern for me isn't necessarily us. It is so much about what the babies coming behind us are watching.
Dawn Taylor
I love that you said on purpose. Right and doing things on purpose. It's so hard to naturally, so I come from a background where and for anyone who's read my book or knows anything about my personal story, I was born to a mom who tried to miscarry me her entire pregnancy. So I struggle with bonding a connection. My entire life. It's just been this ongoing battle that I've had my entire life. And one of the things that I have done is I have an on purpose in my calendar of like, “No, no, no, I'm going to make time not just for a zoom date with someone, but I'm going to like, I will drive to your house.” I will, like, let's meet somewhere and do something that's spend time together on purpose. But I track it. I make sure in my calendar that there's so many connection points in a week where it's like, no, no, no, I need this. Like I need this, scheduling dates with my husband. I mean, we've been together 28 years. Do we still need to schedule dates? Probably not, but yeah, we do, because the disconnect can happen. And you know, we're walking into 20. Yeah. We're almost at 28 years together on in like two weeks. Which is incredible. And 24 married in May. And we just had a conversation about it where we're like, no, we need to like, schedule time together again because we're both passionate about what we do, and we both have careers and we both have lives, and we have totally different hobbies. And we now have like time blocked in our calendars. And he's like, I hate that it feels so awkward, like it's an appointment or a meeting. He's like, but we have reconnected more in the last two months of doing that than we have in probably the last year. Yeah, because it's intentional actions. Intentional behaviors. We're doing it on purpose, right?
Dr. Jody Carrington
Good for you. Yeah. That's amazing. I mean, I struggle with this all the time. And I think that, um, I think that's part of it, you know, is, is really that idea of we're also exhausted. So being able to schedule things on purpose, even a bit in and of itself feels like I can't even do that. Like I'm failing at that too. It's almost like another expectation that we also can't get right, you know, so I, you know, I think it is so critically important in this space to, to give ourselves some grace. I am amazed all the time at how much rest it takes to compensate for what our bodies are set to navigate this season. So, we have so much. Our kids have so much access to us now, which is, I mean, beautiful in so many ways. But it's also, I know when we have a phone, we have our Apple Watches on all those things. If I miss a phone call, I'm going to get buzzed on my wrist. Right. And our parents also never had this much access in previous generations. Right. And so in the run of a day, I can, you know, in an hour, I get a phone call from the school saying, you know, mom, I'm feeling anxious. I don't know what to do about these feelings, which I love. I created this monster. And then my dad, who's struggling with dementia, is like, hey, I just don't know how to get the curling on. Okay? So if we think about just one generation ago, we talk about this, you know, often when our parents would go to work, they would go to work. It would be very difficult to get a hold of them. If there was an emergency, for sure. There would be very many channels that you could do that. But at the end of the day, a 40 hour workweek made a lot of sense because things were done. Nobody could get you, your clients, your patients. Your customers couldn't get you once you entered the threshold of, you know, the sanctity of your home. And many of us now work from home, many of us, you know, check our email before we get up, even though we say we won't, we get something in the middle of the night and we're like, you know, we want to be really helpful because, you know, this is where our identities live as first responders or as clinicians or teachers. You know, we fall in love with the people that we, you know, serve in this regard, because we're worried about their safety and their physical well-being and their emotional well-being and all those things. And so there is a cost to that, that we haven't quite negotiated yet, because when we still consider it necessary to be at work on Monday morning at 8:00 and to work until 5:00, um, we have not taken into consideration then that, that we actually don't get to then seeing into our families or go to hockey practice or go home and make dinner because we're doing all the same things, um, way into the evening. And then in an effort to regulate our systems, we feel like we've earned the right then to, like, watch Dateline for two hours before bed
Dawn Taylor
And we're like socially acceptable thing these days.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Which I mean, again, makes complete sense to me if you understand the inundation of our system. So it's not the problem of, um, I think that sort of the development of technology, it really is what we do with it that becomes really critically important. When we have many exit ramps, we'll just take them.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, we absolutely will. We sat down. About a year ago, we sat down and my husband and I both have very busy careers and we work a lot and there's an intensity to it. But he is so phenomenal at shutting off when he shuts off at the end of the day. Like his phone's done, his work is done, and he's good to go until the morning. And he hobbies like he's got hobbies, he's got his things. And we had a conversation. And one of the things he said to me, and this is something that I am constantly looking at within myself, is like, what are the expectations I've set for myself? Because those came from a standard that I set based on a situation. Right? And often he's like, I look at them and I'm like, okay, what are the expectations that I am putting on myself right now, or that I'm allowing society to put on me right now that no longer match my capacity? That no longer match where I am in life, right? And one of those was like, make a home cooked meal every day. Right like that was one of mine. But again, being raised by German farmers and my parents like that was what you did. It didn't matter. What was the expectation? Yeah. Pancakes. It didn't matter. You still made a home cooked meal every single day. Like we laugh about it as adults now, my siblings and I were like, there was always like a plate of cut up cucumbers and a plate of cut up tomatoes to make sure you had your veggies. And like, all of like the carb, the starch, the meat, right. Or the veggies. And we were laughing about it. And I sat down and I looked at him and I was like, I don't want to do that anymore. I don't have the capacity. And what it's doing is it's making me not enjoy it. And I'm not happy about cooking anymore. And I love cooking. But because it's like this rushed expectation, it's no longer enjoyable. And he's like, so don't cook. And now he laughs to me. And my inner circle knows, like I make one meal every Sunday and then I make another one on Friday to last for Friday, Saturday, Sunday. And then I make another one on Sunday. But I am now at a point where, like, I've done this for over a year now, I cook two times a week. And I'll eat that same meal for lunch and dinner and just add, like, a new hot sauce to it, or shift something about how I eat it. But it's this beautiful gift I've given myself to be off a little bit. And I think it's even just those simple things. So simple things, at the end of the day where, like one of my team members, she refuses to put emails on her phone. She refuses. She's like, nope, nobody can email my cell phone. I don't ever want to look at it. Yeah, she's like, so if I'm not at my computer, I cannot check an email.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, brilliant. And it's really and it's like, it's so many of those things that we've never even thought about doing.Because like, oh my God, can we do that? Is that allowed? that allowed? That's awesome.
Dawn Taylor
Right. And it's laying out those expectations, this thing with those expectations for ourselves, but also the people around us to be like, no, I'm not available at two in the morning.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yes, yes, yes.
Dawn Taylor
I'm not going to answer my phone call at 10:00 at night. I'm not going to respond to a text. Sometimes people laugh at me. They're like, is your ringtone ever on? I'm like, very seldom. If I'm like in a shopping mall, separated from people I'm with, and I know we're going to call when we're done. Yes, I'll turn it on. But other than that, it lives off all the time because otherwise it was that constant, just constant ding ding ding ding ding, right?
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, 100%. And I think that like, I think I think so much of it is, you know, we can always sort of not, not make the excuse. But I think for many of us there is that real expectation that, you know, we do have to be available for our children or our aging parents or, you know, we're on call because of our job. And I think that, like, accessibility is also not always a bad thing. I think it's a little bit about, you know, do we have the counterbalance to be able to do that on purpose? Because I think if you shut off all of your things and you spend the vast majority of your time wondering, are you missing something? Um, it's also not a benefit. And so I think the idea is also with respect to whatever works for you, doing that on purpose, because I think, again, it's that that concept of, you know, even this week, charge your phone outside of your bed one night, one night outside of your bedroom, one night, if you know, if it's like, no, I'm on call for the volunteer fire department or, you know, I'm my kids got the car and I don't want to okay. Like if it's going to be more difficult to not do those things, then don’t.
Dawn Taylor
100%.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Right. And I think that it's these easy little things that - not easy. I shouldn't say - um, tiny little switches to our, you know, 30seconds of dropping your shoulders, breathing deep, letting your gut out, wiggling your toes, doing those things that sort of get our body back in alignment, you know, which is really, I think, where the self-care rhetoric came from, their very prescriptive way of, you know, move, um, you got to work out, you got to do yoga, you got to drink your kale. And part of the deal is that if you do all of that with your shoulders up, it's of no benefit. And so the purpose of sort of moving our bodies, um, whether it's, you know, you're training for an ultra or you're, you know, going for A1K walk outside. When you do those things on purpose. And so many of us exercise with the point of getting through it. Right. So we got to we got the show on, or we have the best playlist that can just make us like, totally zone out and like, oh shit, good. There we go. We got the five minutes. I think what's so critically important is how we do some of these things on purpose. And I'm not saying I mean, certainly this is, you know, my time to watch my show was on the treadmill or whatever the deal is. But like being very conscious of what is happening to your physical body, just even a little bit more than you did yesterday, um, can make all the difference.
Dawn Taylor
I love that you say that. It's because it is right. It's doing it because you love yourself, not because you hate yourself.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. Isn't that true? That's a great line.
Dawn Taylor
These things aren't supposed to be about punishment.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, yeah, but they have for so long, though, and I think that's the thing that we really need to just sort of acknowledge is that, like, it's okay if that's what you feel like in your bones, because for so many of us, me included, it still is that bias that is very deep, right? And I think that you can't address what you don't acknowledge. And so this I think, you know, this conversation around just do it this way or just do this more often is so hard for so many of us to consume because it is, again, this is what everybody seems to be doing. It's not what everybody is doing. Everybody does not do this perfectly. And, you know, I would even argue your husband struggles despite the fact that it is like, yep, I shut it off. Yeah, it's almost physically impossible to do that sometimes. Right. And so I think the expectation that people actually can do that and maybe there is an anomaly, maybe there are those things. But I think we have to be very conscious of the fact that it is difficult for everybody, and the vast majority of our consuming of what other people are doing is a highlight reel on social media, which makes it look as though you know, you're getting all your workouts in and you're drinking green in between them. And you know, nobody's also like and I had 17 Oreos as soon as I got off the treadmill, you know. Right. And you know what I mean. I think those are the things that and you know this. Right. Like I think particularly on our platform on my podcast, it's really this conversation around, you know, vulnerability begets vulnerability. And it's not about sort of, you know, Brené Brown has talked beautifully about vulnerability isn't like a vomiting of self-disclosure. It is really that there is this time in our lives where sometimes it feels like it's undoable. There's this time and there's sometimes, moment to moment that it feels like, you know, parenting is hard, marriage is hard. All these things. And I think the acknowledgement of that creating safe enough spaces to acknowledge that sometimes while we then also celebrate the wins, is such a balance that I think for the rest of our generation, we're going to have to work really hard at.
Dawn Taylor
I always laugh. If we did all of the things that they told us we needed to do to stay
healthy. Right? Like, if we all did all of the workouts every single day and we journaled and we meditated and often with friends. I'm like, cool. Who told you to do that? Yeah, it's always my
first question. And they're like, what do you mean? And I'm like, was it somebody with no kids is telling you to do all these things, and they don't have to deal with kids in the morning? Is it somebody who, maybe this is their full time job is all they do is self-help. Or they like, do self-care all day. Is it? Who is telling you that? Do they have your situation, your metrics, your body? Your stuff going on?
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, right. 100% 100%.
Dawn Taylor
Right. And that's where it is. So like, we need to like settle into our bodies and to actually sit with them and be like, know what works for me? Yeah. Not for somebody else. For me, meditation in our normal way doesn't work, had a brain aneurysm at 17. My brain vibrates at three times the pace of an average brain. When I close my eyes, it doubles. Meditation is torture for me, right? It's like watching strobe lights and going to a rock concert all at the same time. But I love to sit and play Lego. And the action of doing that is very meditative to me, and it totally calms me. Right, but we're so busy attaching a judgment to everything. And this is a right versus a wrong, a good versus bad, instead of like, no, let's just get really curious. What do you need? And if you did it out of love. Like I said, I often tell people it's like, no, no, no, do this because you love yourself, not because you hate yourself.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Right? 100%. Yeah. Yeah, I love that.
Dawn Taylor
If you loved your body enough to eat healthy, what if you loved yourself enough to say no. What if you loved your life enough to make a change? Yeah. Instead of doing it with the intention of like, I hate this, so I have to fix this.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, 100%. I think it is. It is always this journey. And I think that's the point, right? Is that we don't arrive. We had this conversation, you know, and I often have this quote over my shoulder from Ramdas. Actually, often I do in this moment. Uh, a philosopher and a Yogi. And he just said, I mean, this is our job here. We're all just walking each other home, and it's probably the most profound sentence in the human language for me, because it really grounds me back into this place of, like, even after we do all the things, even when we fuck it up, even if we took wrong turns and felt as though we made bad decisions, which many of us or all of us will, we're just here, walking each other home. Nobody gets out of here alive. And in some moments, in fact, in the exact same moments, you can be a walker and a walkie in need of somebody walking you while you were doing that for somebody else. And some of our legacies, our most profound legacies, will be in the moments when we are walkers for other people. And so as parents or teachers or first responders or best friends moms, um, those are the things that I think we get most proudest of is when we are in a state of emotional regulation for another human being, and it often doesn't involve fixing it because we can't, you know, when somebody buries a child or tells you that they they have cancer or, you know, some of those big moments where kids are saying, like, you know, I'm scared to go home tonight or, you know, whatever the deal is, I think it's not about having the answer. It is about the physical presence of another human being doing that concept called walking. And, um, and I think that's my favorite thing about this season is that, um, the world is isn't just such need of you and of what you, um, can offer to the people in your community, your friends, your best friends, you know, all of you listening. This is the time in our respective lives that we can write our legacy so beautifully. And it really just so much involves showing up for ourselves and for each other.
Dawn Taylor
So our motto in our marriage is how can I love you even more right now? And I think that without boundaries it can be harmful, but with healthy boundaries in a marriage or a relationship at all. Right? Even with the people closest to me, it's often like, no, no, no, it's not. How do I love you? How can I love you even more right now? And sometimes that is buying them a coffee in a lineup. Sometimes it is just being there when they are having a bad day. Sometimes it is, you know, giving the support when they need it. Right?
Dr. Jody Carrington
Right.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. Right. It is. It's the walking. You're just walking everyone home. Right. And. I don't know. It's a really powerful statement in our household. Yeah.
And our actions and our behaviors and all of those things.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. I love it.
Dawn Taylor
So going back to the beginning of happiness isn't the destination. Why do you think that our society is so stuck on this idea that we're supposed to just be happy all the time?
Dr. Jody Carrington
Um, I think that it is probably the most regulated state is, uh. It's predictable. We know what to expect from other people. Uh, they tend to be the most communicative in those states. And I think it's the desired outcome. I mean, it's what behaviorism is built on. I just want to get you back to this place of compliance. And, uh, I think that's why, I mean, again, it feels the best in our body from a neurophysiological perspective. And I don't think it's wrong to want. To get people there. In fact, it is what I would like most often. Um, for the people that I love but I think that's not necessarily synonymous with what is required for us to be the most well-rounded human beings. So I don't know that the desire to get back there will ever change. I think the permission to, you know, sort of feel all of the emotions, um, is the conversation that becomes most important.
Dawn Taylor
Is it that but also understanding that, so we were talking earlier about how like even in my hardest year of my entire life, there have been some doozies. I started tracking years ago what my mood was every day, and I was like overarching at the end of the day, what was my day? Was it like ten? This is the greatest day of my entire life. For one, I actually have a shovel and I'm digging the hole in the backyard. Right, like I'm out. Where am I sitting? And I marked every single day for 3 or 4 years and actually, I still have it. I marked what my number was at the end of the day. And it was like, no, no, no, not in the moment. Just as an overarching at the end of the day, maybe work went horrible, but personal was amazing. And then I was like, no, it was an all right day. And the fact that in the hardest year of my life, one of the hardest years, it ended at a 6.5 average over the course of a year. And I remember talking to a friend about it and I said, we there's this idea that we have to live like either were in like the zero to 3 or 4. Where it's like depressed, not functioning. Life is hard and horrible or we have to be in like the eight, nine, ten. Where it's amazing. And I said, sometimes life is really awesome between the like four and
seven. And that that's actually where we spend a lot of our lives. And it doesn't mean that we're sad or that we're depressed. We're actually just kind of calm. And that we're okay. We're actually kind of good.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. The negativity bias has long been a concept in the world of, you know, psychological understanding that really comes back to this concept that we will pay most attention to when things are not going well. And I think that, you know, it is this phenomenon that equally or easily takes over for all of us. And the concept then of being able to balance that to the best of your capacity, you know, a good friend of mine, and has written a book called um, Find the Joy. And it really is this, this idea that when you are, you can't hold to emotions, um, in your head at one time, one will always win. So you're going to mixed emotions, but one will always slightly overtake the other. And the idea is that when you are focused on all the things that are going wrong, what you will inevitably miss is all the things that are going well. Because you can't selectively numb. You can't just, you know, exercise excessively to get rid of the bad emotions. You will also then lose your capacity to hang on to the good. You can't drink effectively to just, you know, dampen the bad emotions. You will also dampen the joy. And so the concept of being able to, you know, even call into awareness and negativity bias becomes really important when we want to shift the narrative. And I think when we use words like always or every time or, um, I'm never lucky or I'm always in this bad place really lends itself to, you know, no room for another narrative. And so just really watching, I think the way we speak about our children and our use of technology, our concepts, you know, um, becomes really powerful in the way that we sort of see the world, um, because it can really dictate how we think it is.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, yes, 100,000%. Yes. I remember sitting, so I got diagnosed with this crazy rare thyroid disease about two years ago, and I sat in an IV chair five days a week, up to eight hours a day getting treatments. And it was brutal. And I remember a friend sitting there with me one day, and he was laughing at me because he's like, you still can crack a joke through the tears, through the pain, through whatever. And I said, you know what? This is a blip. This is one little blip in my life. But so much of it is good. Yes, this sucks. And I'm going to fully own the fact that this moment sucks and this moment is hard. But how amazing that I even have an opportunity to do this and that at some point, this moment too, will end. And I won't be sitting in this damn chair anymore.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
Right. And I don't know, I think I've always been not a glass half empty or glass half full, but cups are refillable. That's how they work.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Mhm. And I think this is so true. You know I hear parents say this often or you know when we're in this place like um, you know when our babies are little and you know, we're getting up 2 or 3 times in a night or, you know, at the beginning stages of any diagnosis or whatever those things are. I mean, I think that's the whole point. And you might have even said this earlier, is that, you know, the emotions are temporary, but it is so hard to believe that to be true when you're in the middle of it. And I think both of those things can hold space and reality. Right. Like I think I think it is supposed to feel overwhelming and exhausting. That's okay. Um, and it is also, uh, temporary.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, I always laugh that my success rate to date, to overcome every hard thing that's come my way has been 100%.
Dr. Jody Carrington
You got it.
Dawn Taylor
To date every day I thought I wouldn't survive. Every moment I thought I wouldn't survive every trauma I went through. Right. Like success rate to date is 100%. So what makes me think that this is the one that'll take me out?
Dr. Jody Carrington
So far, so good. Yeah, you got it right.
Dawn Taylor
And that's that's always where I go to is I'm like, no logistics wise, the math says I'm going to survive this thing too.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, yeah, you got it right.
Dawn Taylor
But yes, people in my life laugh at that. Jody. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you for being here today and hanging out with us. Is there anything else that you want to leave with our listeners? Any little last minute thing?
Dr. Jody Carrington
Oh my gosh I don't know I mean I, I just, thanks for, you know, thank you for having me. I appreciate your work. I think that, you know, oftentimes it is the necessity of just having places to land when you need to get regulated again. And, um, I mean, I would love your community to be a part of ours. And I think that access to resources and being able to understand that we're not doing this alone is probably one of the most important things these days. So, yeah. That's it.
Dawn Taylor
So for anybody listening, we are going to link everything Jody in our show notes located at the TaylorWay.ca, all the books that she recommended, all of the quotes that she recommended. There's a full script of this entire conversation there. If you need to read through it, highlight it, whatever you need to do with it, please check out TheTaylorWay.ca and join us again in two weeks for another really cool topic. Thank you, thank you, thank you so much for hanging out with us today. And Jody, thank you. Doctor Jody Carrington. Thank you for the work that you do.
Dr. Jody Carrington
Thank you, Dawn Taylor.
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Jo Peters is a woman who wears many hats. She is a coach, speaker, author and TV show host. But most importantly, she is proudly a woman. In all her years of existence and with all the years of experience she's had, she knows that societal expectations are through the roof for her and her fellow women. The game may be rigged but Jo is here to prove that women can make their own rules and forge their path to success. In this episode of The Taylor Way Talks, Dawn discusses with Jo the freedom one can achieve with knowing when enough is enough.
Who this for
In the hamster wheel of life that we're forced to run on endlessly, it can be hard to figure out when enough is enough, and in turn, when we've finally had enough. This could lead to burnout and affect our mental health, vigour and connections with people even without realizing it. Though this episode primarily focuses on the female perspective, people from all walks of life can learn something valuable from this episode. If you are someone who has always wanted to live life your way and free yourself from people's unrealistic expectations, then this episode is for you.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Jo is an experienced and passionate leader, speaker, coach, transformational trainer, mom, wife, and friend. Not to mention, a bestselling author of two books in seven countries. She enjoys helping women to discover how to have it all without doing it all, finding the best version of themselves and understanding that it’s never about the money, the food, the kids or the husband. Instead, it’s always about them and the inner work they need to do to be able to live the life of their dreams, the life they totally deserve to live. Jo has over 17 years of experience working with Fortune 100 companies like Goodyear & PepsiCo, and leading personal development companies like Mindvalley. She has coached and trained over 15,000 people on 4 continents and in more than 25 countries. Jo has spoken in multiple universities both in the US and internationally and is frequently a podcast guest where she shares her knowledge and experience in a broader way. She is also the host of a TV show, MOMFIT with Jo Peters, that reaches over 1 million views every week.
Guest Social Links
Website - https://jounicorncoach.com
Facebook - https://facebook.com/jounicorncoach
Instagram - https://instagram.com/jounicorncoachThanks for listening!
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
TRANSCRIPT
Dawn Taylor
Hey, hey, hey, I'm your host, Dawn Taylor. Okay, one day, I'm just not even going to say that because. Hi. You know that obviously, if you're listening to my podcast. Anyways, today we are talking to Jo, the unicorn coach, and our topic is when is enough enough? And if that's right, we are probably potentially going to piss people off and we are okay with that because this is a topic that really needs to be discussed. Before we get started, let me tell you a little bit about this absolutely phenomenal human being. Jo is an experienced and passionate leader, speaker, coach, transformational trainer, mom, wife, friend, and probably way more. Not to mention, she's a best selling author of two books in seven countries. Guys, she's kind of a rock star. She's all about, like, inner work, figuring out what you need, following your dreams, helping people live and really figure out, like, that they deserve to live. She's over 17 years of experience working with fortune 100 companies like Goodyear, PepsiCo. So not just your everyday coach, not just your everyday person who hasn't lived the the life or walked the walk. She was also, she worked with a leading personal development company like called Mind Valley, which we've probably all heard of. She's coached and trained over 15,000 people, you guys, on four continents and in more than 25 countries. She's spoken in multiple universities, both in the US and internationally, and is frequently a podcast guest, where she gets to talk and hang out and share some of her knowledge. She also, because she's bored and has all the time on her hands, is the host of a TV show, Mom Fit with Jo Peters that reaches over a million views every single week. So, if you're not intimidated, I am. But this is who I managed to get as a guest on my show today. So here she goes. Welcome to the show, Jo.
Jo Peters
Thank you so much for having me. I am super excited to be here and talk about the things that nobody else talks about. And let's go to normalize that for ourselves and others.
Dawn Taylor
Right? So we had met, I mean, within the last week we talked. And for anyone listening, I interview everyone who goes on my podcast. We have like a 15 minute ahead of time to be like, what are we going to talk about? Is this the right fit? Is this a conversation that really needs to happen? And you and I both were like, oh my gosh, when is enough enough? As a society, but more importantly, from who we are as women. Right. Like, at what point is 0 do you not need the big huge job? At what point do you not need to have all these huge expectations? So let's dive into this. What is some of your background that got you to where you are and doing what you're doing?
Jo Peters
The background is that I was for a lot of time, almost a decade into that. I call it the hamster wheel, where I was all into hanging on into the society, keep asking for more, keep working more, keep reaching more and more, more, more is more. More is more. More is better. More is, um, what you want, and I start feeling that emptiness in my heart of, I had everything that society was telling me that I should have, like $4 million per year, uh, beautiful house, all that. And that was still pushing more and more and more. But I still was like, “Is this it? Like, is this really like what is going to happen in my life for the rest of my life?” And back then I was still working, um, for corporate America. And one of my mentors was at that moment, the president of Lilly in the United States asked me that question and said, “I want you to know, I want you to answer me this. And if you don't know, that's fine, but I want you to work on it. How much is enough?” He just talked about it in the financial part. But you were like, how much is enough money in your bank account for you to say, I'm good? And then I look at him and I smile and say, like, “Well, I don't know.” And he will, I will. That is the first answer that you need to ask, because if you ever wonder why me or Jeff Bezos or all these billionaire, multi-millionaires, you are like, why do they keep working? Why do they keep hustling? This is why. Because we never answered this question. And when you don't have clear what is enough and how much is enough, then it will you get in the hamster wheel of feeling that is never enough. You will always have another month. You will always have another year. And that is based on a society that is mainly designed from a patriarchal standpoint, from a male energy standpoint. I was today preparing for the show. I was listening to an audiobook. And they were saying how they are statistics on what males versus females do with power and well, and how males by their brain are designed to collect it, to accumulate it, to create generational wealth than for females is more about impact and creating community and supporting others and helping others. That is part of our DNA. And if we don't put that in the mix of really “What is enough for me?” Not in a silo, but as a whole human being as a whole female, as a whole multi passionate person that wants to be there for her kids and for her partner and for her friends and for her business or her company. Then that is when we as women, I think, get into the hamster wheel and go into burnout. And then I say, it's not possible having it all. I'm done. I'm quitting. I'm closing the company. I'm divorcing. Uh, whatever it is, that explosion of time that happened, when we get into the will of more and more and more, and we don't have that clarity of what I really want in life. And having that permission, you and me, we're talking about this to accept that it could be different than others, than what means enough for me is different than what means to you. And hey, we are going to support each other. We are going to love each other. We are going to cheer for each other. And the only thing that we're not going to do is just start comparing ourselves and doubting why what you want and what enough for you is different that what it is for me because we are freaking different people, right?
Dawn Taylor
So, diving into this. So, Barbie movie just came out a little while ago and there is so much controversy around it. Right? And at the same time, it’s America Ferrera who did that talk about, like who we have to be as women and what has to happen. And I was talking to a friend about it and I said, you know what? Say what you will about the movie, but that is how the majority of women think, and that is really the pressure that we have put on ourselves. Let's be perfectly honest here, and I don't care if anyone is upset about that. I believe we have put that on ourselves. We have 100% put that on ourselves, right? The majority of men are not expecting those things of us. Right. And I remember the day that my husband looked to me and I was all stressed out because I was overwhelmed. And, you know, he was finally home every night for dinner. So I had to make dinner every night. And I was like, working full time. And I'm trying to take care of the house. I'm trying to take care of everything. And we had been in a situation for years where he worked out of town, so he wasn't home every night. So, I deal with the car and I deal with the oil changes, and I deal with the garbage, and I deal with the laundry, and I deal with paying the bills, and I deal with everything because he's not home a lot. And all of a sudden that shifted. And now he's home every night for dinner. And I got really angry. And I walked upstairs one day and I looked at him and I was like, “Oh, what? Now you're going to ask what's for dinner?” And he was like, “No, no, I'm actually not.” And I was like, “You know, this isn't fair. I feel like this just isn't right. And I'm working more than you are. And now I have to make dinner every night.” And he's like, “Whoever said that that was an expectation of you.” I remember looking at him and being like you. And he went, no. He's like, you can actually never cook me a meal again for the rest of your life, and it wouldn't change my love for you. He's like, you have an expectation on yourself of what dinnertime needs to look like. You have an expectation on yourself about the fact you have to make a brand new, fresh meal every day. He's like, stop. He said. Because you're torturing yourself and then getting mad at me for it. And it was such an aha moment for me of like, oh, the stuff that I talk to clients about every day, right? You and I both do. But we do have these insane expectations. And am I saying that men don't ever put these on us? No, because they do. Right. But how many of them are actually just from us? But then tying that also into like, this hustle culture that we're in. Right. We're both in this coaching industry. And I was literally just at a networking event and they were talking about like seven steps to a seven figure business. And I looked at the guy next to me that has a product, product based business with multiple locations. And I looked at him and I said, what are the chances a single person in this room ever hit seven figures? And he started laughing and he goes. “Probably pretty low.”
Jo Peters
2% for females. For women in the United States, only 2% of business owners that are female reached seven figures.
Dawn Taylor
Right? And he started laughing. And he goes, what are you thinking? And I said, well, is it? It's interesting that it's like, oh, here's your seven steps and all the things you need to do to get there. And I said, but when I look around this room, I see moms, I see caregivers of elderly parents. I see single dads. I said, when do we give ourselves permission as a society to know that we don't actually have to hit seven figures to be considered a success? That we don't have to push, push, push, push, push that we can lower our goals. We can actually lower our goals to the point where we're sitting at a really stable, healthy level and just kind of go and we don't have to consistently be in this hustle and this drive. All the time. And he looked at me and he's like, hmm. He's like, “I'd love to see you get up and ask this room that.” And we just laughed about it, right? And the day continued and the speakers kept talking and I was thinking about it in regards to our talk today. Right. And this podcast episode. Because when is enough enough?
Jo Peters
And I think that I think that goes into what I'm seeing and what I believe goes in two main reasonings. The first one is, um, absolutely is imposed by us. And I think that goes into what I call hashtag the good girl syndrome. And that good girl syndrome is that brainwash that we had in watching when we were two years old where our toys were kitchens and what we saw with our mothers and our grandmothers. So that good girl, just complying, of being people pleasers, of believing that our worth is attached to our performance, to what we do. And then when we take that, that culturally for generations is being how women are created, and we mix it with the huge screw up that we have right now in the business world, in the leadership world, where all that system and structure that the world run right now on was designed two, three, 400 years ago by literally white males for white males, because 400 years ago there were not business owners like you and me, see, and I think that part of that is that we are still trying to play and win that game. That is a game that never was designed for us, that never was created for us. That doesn't take into consideration all the other variables that we as females had. So, I really think that we are set for failures in the beginning, because when is enough enough? We don't even start thinking about that in a holistic perspective of what my life as a woman is. My life as a woman is not just my career. It's not just my business. I remember, uh, a conversation that I had with a client that came in a coaching session, very dysregulated. And she was like, because we were talking about five-year, ten-year vision into planning. And she was like, well, I don't have five years. And then I was listening to this, uh, coach, very famous person saying that you should have a ten-year and make it happen in six months. And I'm like, okay.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I heard the speaker talk about that today.
Jo Peters
And I would be like, mhm okay. Who else do you hear saying that? I want to ask you the same. And then she named like two more people or two more people and they were all males. And I say okay do you ever hear a woman, a woman and especially uh, maternal woman either taking care of their elderly parents or taking care of children, saying the same? And then she talked for like ten minutes and say no. So, like, do you know why? And then you're like, no. And I said, like, because those males that are saying that in stages and in courses and in groups, 99.9% of them had a wife or a mom or a maternal person that take care of everything else so they can get one focus. Just go and make it happen. 99.9% of us females don't have that privilege because we have homes, because we have parents, because we have children. So I think that is matter of us to start dropping that good girl syndrome and expectation and say, okay, first, it's going to be very clear how I want to live and why in the three main areas of my life, how I want my health and my wellness to be, how I want my relationships with my children, with my partner, with my in-laws, with my family be and then what is the level of finances that I want to have? The lifestyle that I want? For some of us, could be “I just want to be in the middle of the field raising chickens and goats. And that will make me the best, happiest person in the world.” For somebody else to be going and traveling for three months. We need to have clarity into who we are first and what makes us happy as a whole. And then from there, I start making those conceptions of “This is what enough is, this is what enough is, this is what enough is.” in those areas of our life. And then from there, I start working as an engineer backwards,
re-engineer backwards from what I want backwards into. Okay, so now what I have to do, do I really need to work 100 hours if this is what I want? Uh, probably not. So we don't need to get to that point of burnout where we just as women try to send everything to hell and burn the village with us.
Dawn Taylor
I was going to say, when women burn out, we're like, I'm going down in a flame of glory, and I'm going to burn everything in my path with me.
Jo Peters
Someone like that, like The Hunger Games, like if I, I if I burn, you burn with us.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, 100% like you're taking down the village. Yeah, totally. I love how you worded that right. I always called it like a build back schedule. So like I had a new I have a new client starting actually tomorrow. And her and I were talking about it and I said, “So what do you want to make in your business?” And she said, “What do you mean?” And I was like, “What's your number?” “Well, no, it's about helping people.” I'm like, “No. What's your number?” She was like, “What?” I was like, “You wouldn't be doing a business or running a company if you didn't want to actually make some cash. So maybe that's not your focus and that's not why you're doing what you're doing,” I said. “But you need something tangible and measurable to know that you're hitting your goals and you're actually succeeding at it.” And she said her number. And I said, “Okay, what are your rates?” And she told me and I was like, “Cool, you're never going to hit it.” I can tell you that right now. She was like. “What?” And this is just in our consultation. And I said, “You physically can't.” Like, do the math. One plus one has to equal two. Like, you can't. You won't hit it unless you're willing to work 18 hours a day, seven days a week, because the math doesn't work. So, what are your priorities? And one of the metaphors I have to use is like - so you have like an egg carton and you have enough spots for 12 eggs. Okay. What are your priorities? What is taking up? What amount of space? Is it travel? Is it time with friends and family? Is it working out two hours a day? Is it money? What is it? You have to figure that out. Right before you set your goals, before you do any of that stuff. And I know for me that was a big one, is my goals in 2024 are way less than they were in 2023. And when I told someone that they were like, what? That doesn't even make sense. Like, why would you want to decrease your income for the next year? And I said, “No, no, no, it's not about decreasing it. I figured out my level, my numbers off where I'm comfortable with, where I'm happy with, where I can live the lifestyle I want, where I can have the retirement I want. And I can still have time for my health and still have balance and still travel and still do all of these things.” So, why am I pushing so hard for more? Because I don't actually need it. Right.
Jo Peters
I think that is about what we were saying. And you know that because you know the number, because you are clear going back into you need to go into that feature and say, “okay, got to be clear into what enough is in my health, what enough is in my relationship, what enough is in my finances.” Because from there you come back and say, okay, so how much? What I need to do, what I need to adjust. The problem is society brainwash is giving us into that hamster wheel of oh, having more is going, is almost like I will be happy when I have money I will be happy when I be. This is the perfect sample. I will be happy when I'm a millionaire. Yeah, you can be a millionaire with $1 million or with $999 million. You are still a millionaire. So, when you're going to stop, are you going to stop at 1 million or you are going to go until 900? So, it's about that clarity. And I think that is also very important to know us and in our personalities. One of the things that I work a lot with is with archetypes and, and is so important that we honor that because the reality is depending on who we are, is going to work differently for all of us. One of my clients is super funny because she is an alchemist onto, like flow, and she was very frustrated last year with how that she was living on. Now, everybody else that was coaching her was like, well, fine. Uh, another house and get a commitment. And for a year, like the regular thing. And then she started working with me. And I was like, “What do you want?” And then she was like, “I would love to just jump from place to place.” She's been for the last seven months and had houses for the next eight months ahead, to where she's completely living in the house that she wants. And the model that is working for her is she's housesitting for these amazing houses so she doesn't pay rent. She lived there for free. She lives in beautiful houses that are hers for month to month. Will that work for me? Will not work for me. Do that work for her and make her feel completely happy. Yes. So why? She will need to jump into the wheel and say no until it's not my house. And I put a down payment and I get a mortgage for 30 years, then it's not going to be really successful. Bullshit.
Dawn Taylor
Thank you. My husband and I had this conversation the other day and due to a bunch of circumstances, right, we're renting right now and we're not owning a house. And we were talking about it because we're like in about two years, like we've been talking about, like building a house and having an acreage. I'm having a property and all these things. We're planning this out now and we're dreaming about it. And I looked at him the other day and I was like, do we want that? And he started laughing and he's like, I don't even know if I do. Like he's like, so much of me desires that. And I want the privacy and I want this like I want all the things he's like, but I love the freedom that we could give 30 days notice tomorrow and move. Like, we could pack up our entire lives and leave, and he's like, we're not going to. We both have very solid careers here. We both love what we're doing. Like we have people, our life is here. He's like, but man, that freedom. He's like, I freaking love knowing we have it. And the amount of people that have judged us for not owning a house and made really snide remarks about it. And I'm like, but that's not my measure of success, is owning a house. And then when I tell people I'm like, actually, I've owned four properties, I've actually owned four. So I can already check that box. I've owned condos, houses, duplexes. Like I can check that box perfectly fine. And now I'm renting again. You know, I had a mentor years ago. I wasn't the right fit. He wasn't the right fit. I wasn't the right spot on my business, to be perfectly frank. Now, I could take the whole I would totally love to be his mentee, but he wasn't the right fit at the time. But one of the things that he said to me one day, because he was the guy, he was the guy with like multiple multi, multimillion million dollar companies flying in his private jet to his different plants and his different corporate headquarters all over the world. Like he was this crazy, amazing man. And I asked him I was like, “So when do you know you've made it?” And he said, “Let me give you the best advice I ever got.” And I said, “What's that?” And he goes, “Seven things. Find seven measures of success.” And he said, “And it doesn't matter what they are.” He's like, “One of my measures of success was the day that I could go home and have lunch with my wife if I felt like it. And I had that freedom. One of my measures of success was when I had the cash in my bank account to buy, like a Toyota Corolla car. Cash. He's like, not even a fancy one. Like I didn't want, like, a Lamborghini or a Ferrari like. But I could walk into a dealership. With cash and buy a car. One of them is when I could go to every single sporting event for my son. In a single month, and I wouldn't miss one of them if I chose to.” And he's like, “I'm not telling you the rest because some of them are very private.” he said. “But come up with your seven things. Your seven things that you've made it.” And you know what one of mine is? When I can turn off my alarm clock and sleep in if I want to. Right.
Jo Peters
When I go to, well, you were saying with your husband. And then, him, I will pay you $1,000 right now that if you reach out back to him. And that is probably one of the main differences between why so burning out for us females versus males? Because they have all those measures of success. And my dear sister, the last thing that they are thinking is how they can do all of that by themselves. Oh, they are always thinking. These are the measure of success. This is what is going to be here, okay. Who can help me with this and this and that? So, their brain works like that? Ours. Not so. We are like, these are all my measures of success and I'm going to do it all. So I'm going to still work full time in my business and then um, go to the do the game with my kid and then stay until midnight to catch up and then and then and then and then. And that is part of of that. Don't drop the ball.
Dawn Taylor
Men don't think that way. They're so quick to hire a staff. They're so quick to delegate something there, so quick to walk away. My male clients are the ones that are like, no, it's fine at 90% if someone else is doing it, because I don't feel like putting in the extra ten and figuring it out myself. They are so quick to do that and women are like, no, I can do it. I just have to add more hours. I just have to get up earlier. I have to stay up later. I have to just find the time. I remember the first time I hired a house cleaner. My husband and I were having this argument. So we've been together 28 years. And we were probably, oh gosh, probably about five years into marriage. And so I've been about eight, nine years into our relationship. And we both worked full time. We both had crazy hours. We had so much going on. And he looked at me and he goes, “Dawn, take care of the house. I need the house to be cleaner. I can't handle the chaos and the dirt in here, and I can handle doing it on my day off like I've one day off a week. I'm not cleaning. Figure it out. I need you to take this on.” And I was like, “Yeah, cool.” I hired a cleaner that day. He didn't know. He did not know. I hired a cleaner for almost 18 months because she came when he was at work. I've said nothing. You just went into the budget. We dealt with it. He was so happy. Our house was so clean. But then I was like, “No, you didn't say I had to deal with it. You said I had to take care of it.” And maybe that's like the post aneurysm masculine side of my brain that I love so much. I was like, “No, no, no, I'm not adding one more thing to my plate. But I sure as hell will hire someone else to do it.” Right. And all of a sudden I was away on a business trip and he ended up off for a rainy day. He didn't work that day. And he's wandering around the kitchen and the door opens and the cleaner arrives and he was like, “Um, hi, lady. Who are you?” She's this woman, like in her 50s, and she's like, “I'm your house cleaner.” And he was like, “Sorry. What?” She's like, “I've been cleaning your house every Monday or every Tuesday or whatever it was for like a year and a half. Like, I have a house key.” And it was like. Okay. And I'll never forget that phone call I got right. And he was so shook but laughing so hard. And he's like, “I love that you just didn't accept it and take that. Right. And I think we need more of that. We need more of that where it's like, wait a sec, I can't do everything. Maybe I need to hire a VA to help with something. Maybe I need to hire a cleaner. Maybe I need to hire an assistant. Maybe I need to look down, look at my expectations that I have of myself. I figure out, are they mine? Are they somebody else's? Are they a coach that I've hired? Are they a parent or are they like, whose are they, and am I okay with them?
Jo Peters
Like. I love that you put that example because I tell my my clients and my friends that like, I was talking with somebody in Puerto Rico in January and she was thinking about, again, very successful, her and her husband, working kids. And as we are being talking to the default everything. And she was talking about a housekeeper and I said like, “Hey, that is going to be the best decision of this year for you. And let me tell you something else. It's not going to only make the house better, it's going to literally improve your relationship with your husband. It's really going to improve your sexual life because it's one less stress for both of you. One last thing for you guys to argue, to fight, to discuss.” So, the best investment ever is that and I one of the things that that always because I'm up here perfectionism recovery that I see in a lot of women, including me, is part of that fear of
dropping the ball, of delegating is “They are not going to do it as good as I do it.” So, then I have to do it all. And for the female audience that are here, if you want to hear something, that you may be pissed, but it's okay. Like I like to hear, that is what we're doing here. A lot of people complain about not having health at home, with their partners, with their kids, because yeah, we can hire and there are people that are saying, I'm just starting my business. I cannot hire yet you still have people in your house that can help you. One of the reasons why they don't help is because. Whenever you ask somebody to do something for you, and after they do it, you go back and do it again. Or told them that was not the way, this is the way. That is when you are screwing things. My standard is 100%. What will be good enough? Thinking about grades. The best grades? Hundred percent with what grade I pass the course? Do I have 50, 70, 80? And then? Can I be okay with that? Can I be okay with that? Can I ask my husband, take care of the laundry? And even if he doesn't fold the sheets and the towels like I do. What is the end goal? Is the laundry clean? Okay, let it go. Like Frozen said, “Let it go.” So then you can take care of the things that really, like you were saying, are your priorities, your freedom, the things that make you fun, because we only have 24 hours a day, I truly believe we can have it all. What we need to stop thinking that we can do is we need to stop thinking that we can do it all. We cannot do it all. That is a recipe for burnout. That is the recipe for breaking marriages. That is the recipe for creation, for depression, for meltdowns. You cannot do it all. You are not supposed to do it at all. You were supposed to live in a community that help you. Let people help you.
Dawn Taylor
Well. And for the generations where like, we literally had a family cookbook growing up, you know, when they said, I don't know if they did this in Puerto Rico, but these who do these like fundraisers or things where it'd be like the family cookbook and everyone would pitch in their five favorite recipes and they'd make these cookbooks and sell them. It was like a thing in the 80s and 90s. So every church group had one, every sports team had one, every family had one. Like, I swear, when my mom passed away, we got rid of like 20 of them because we're like, we don't know these people, we never use these, right? But the one that was for my family literally said in it, your actions equal your worth. And we were raised, right, especially babies of the 80s and 90s, 70s. Whatever. We were raised with transactional love, where it was like, “I will love you if you perform.” That is when you'll get attention. That is when you'll get love. That is how this works. Here's the thing that is not how love works. So if that is a struggle that people have, that is something they need to heal. That is something that people need to heal desperately. And I was like, go to the show notes. You have both of our contact information. Pick one of us and heal that, right. Or find someone else. But I think that that's such a big piece of it. Is. But, if I can't do it all, then I'm not enough. Then I'm not accepted. Then I'm not loved. Then I'm a failure. Right, then I'm all of those things. And I was talking to a client this morning and she's like, she's a big challenge coming up for herself this fall. And she's like, “I'm just so terrified of failing.” And I said, “Okay, define failing.” She said, “What do you mean?” I was like, “What has to happen for you to fail?” She's like, “I don't even know.” And I said, okay, “So you do know that that is the same as me being angry every morning and being terrified or being angry every day because I didn't turn into a unicorn in my sleep.” Like I'm just so mad. Like it's that logical. I was like, you're terrified of something you don't even have a definition on that isn't even real. And she started to laugh about it. And we were having this conversation about it and I said, you know, I said, how many times in life do we not do something because we're scared to fail and we don't even know what it would mean to fail. Right. And so when we have like this transactional love that we were raised with. So now we have to provide we have to show up, we have to do all these things. I was at a the networking event I was at at lunch today. And this woman beside me, she's like, I'm so stressed out. When I asked how she was doing, she's like, I'll be honest, I'm totally stressing out today. And I was like, okay, what do you need to take off your list? Different. What do you mean? And I was like, well, stressed is just overwhelmed. So what is it you're overwhelmed with? Because overall means that we put too many things on our list, or we've allowed other people to put too many things in our list because we have unhealthy boundaries. So what are you taking off? Actually, she kind of looked at me and she was like, “Oh.” Now I was like, “So what specifically is making you feel stressed?” And she's like, “I don't even know what to make for dinner tonight.” She's like, “Dawn, it's 3:00 and I don't know what to make for dinner tonight.” And I said, “Is there a grocery store between here and home?” And she went, “Well, yeah.” And I was like, nobody ever died from having cereal for dinner. “Buy a jug of milk and a box of cereal, slap it on the table and say, enjoy dinner.” And she started laughing and she was like, “But I can't.” I was like, “Oh, you grew up in the 80s, you know that? We ate pancakes way too many times and macaroni and cheese way too many times, a pizza pop too many times. And I said, guess what? We all survived and we're all here.” I said, maybe you need to look at your expectation that you have on yourself the standard you've set for yourself when it comes to meals, and re-evaluate if that standard still lines up with the position you're at in your life.
Jo Peters
I love that because I love how we are getting back into the root. And that is the part of the difference between the hardware and software and that when enough is enough. What is enough? What is enough? Goes back into fixing that software. That mindset of understanding that we are worthy not because of our performance. We are worthy not because of what we do, not because what, how we act. We are worthy. When you start thinking the possibilities
Dawn Taylor
I saw something the other day, the scientists did this thing on it, and it was in the New York Times. And it was it's like less than 0.00001% chance that you're actually on this planet. It's mind blowing that we are even born.
Jo Peters
I like 64 million things need to happen for that specific spermatozoa to come into the egg to make you. So, when we start going from that perspective of, oh, separating our worth from what we do, separate our worth from our performance, then we start having that clarity to define those expectations, to define those healthy boundaries, to define who we want to be and to start defining, now that I know that I'm worthy and I'm enough, just because I'm breathing now is going to define what enough means on these areas in my health, in my relationships, in my finances. And then from that perspective of confidence, claim what we want, because that is the other part. From that, we were talking about the good girl syndrome and the people pleaser that affect everybody. But I truly believe that a lot more females, and that is that fear of speaking up, that fear of saying exactly what we want because that transactional love that you were saying and because we are, and this is something fascinating. When I was in Africa with the Hadza tribe that is one of the oldest of humanity. I saw this, our minds evolve a lot faster than our DNA, than our physiques and female versus male. If a male gets exposed and eliminated and everybody in the tribe took him away, the male will have a lot more chances to survive because the male, our ancestors’ males had that training and that happened to hunt and to hide. If a female does the same, a female will not last more than a week. So, that really is literally a real subconscious reptile brain survival fear of if I speak up, if I ask for what I want, if I get out of the norm, if I create my own path. The risk is they are going to exclude me. They are going to put me away. Our molecular DNA doesn't understand that now in 2024, even if everybody else is glued to you, you still are not going to die in a week. But your ancestors did and you are having that generational pressure. So it's a lot likely for us to speak slow and let it go. And don't make drama and don't speak what you think.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, don't be too much, don't be too much. Yeah.
Jo Peters
And it's not. Don't be too much. But it's still keep going, going, going in the wheel. So is all these controversies for us that is minor of us to say enough. It starts with enough. It's enough of me trying to play a game that was not designed for me, that I will never set to win. So how many times you will play a game, any game where since the beginning, it will say “Alert!” No matter how many times you play this game, you will literally never have the chance to win the game.
Dawn Taylor
You will lose every single time and go, yeah.
Jo Peters
You will be like, yeah, right. Let me pick another one of the million options that are here, because I'm not going to waste my energy here, but that is what we do every day. So instead of that is. Create a new option and start believing that you are worthy of living your life on your terms, on what makes you happy now? Not What society is doing now, what the influencers in social media are doing now, what Beyonce is doing now, but what makes you happy because your uniqueness will be fulfilled and be a full soul, sparkling light to your surroundings with something that is unique for you, and it's okay for us to honor that. It could be being a full time mom dedicated to kids and having 12 kids. Bless your heart if you are one of them, because with one I almost lost my mind. For other ones, it could be running a business. For other ones, it is about us accepting that we are unique. That is not a cookie-cutting that your path, is okay, that will make you happy. It's okay for you. That is nothing wrong with you because you don't want that, or because you didn't achieve that, or because you don't have this hunger for more.
Dawn Taylor
Right. Yeah. It's so funny, I. I know you and I got so passionate when we talked in our initial 15 about this topic, because we're both like people doing, and it was like I today this woman, um, she looked over and she's like, “Oh my gosh, your ring is amazing. I wish I had a ring just like that. Like, that's the most beautiful diamond ring I've ever seen.” And I said, “Oh, 24.99 on Amazon.” And she went. “What?” And the guy sitting between us starts laughing and he goes, “Are you serious?” And I said, “Yeah, I needed a ring door to networking events because guys are creepy sometimes. And she goes, you seriously bought that on Amazon? That looks so real. I was like, oh, I'll send you the link. You should get one too. And she couldn't stop laughing. And she's like, that is amazing. And I was like, I don't need a $25,000 diamond to make me feel worthy. Right. And so for anyone listening who's thinking like, okay, so I have unrealistic standards in my life, for standards I can't meet so constantly don't feel like I'm enough. Right? One of the things that I would look at is, as like a tangible of what to do is, when was the standard set? What was the situation that happened to cause you to create the standard in the first place? Was it how you were raised? Was it a trauma? Was it marriage? Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter what it is. But what was the situation that created the new standard? That then created all these expectations you've put on yourself and others. Now look at when it was set. Are you still in that position? So if you have a standard, for example, of like how clean your house has to be and your meals have to be, and how much you travel and what your body looks like, and all of these things. But it all was set when you were 19, were 20 and first living on your own, and you were single and ready to mingle and just dating. And it was all good. And now you're 35 and you have two kids or three kids and a dog and a husband, and you're volunteering for something and you have a job. Totally different recipe and you're expecting the exact same result.
Jo Peters
I think that part of that is, and that is another one of my hypotheses on what I work in this, I call it our
pregnancy syndrome, and that is because we give life, even if we choose to not be moms, our body is still with all the systems and all the memory to do it, and our body knows that you cannot go to labor at four months pregnant or five months pregnant, because the chances of your baby to die
are huge. That is why our body is trying to keep it as much as possible until 40 weeks. Because as more ready to completely done is as higher the chances to live. The problem with that is we take that to everything else. So we are like, this project needs to be completely perfect before I launch it. Everything has to be done. Choose this path at 19. It needs to be like that for the rest of my life. And then we need to, probably two of the biggest lessons there are. The first one is it's okay for you to change. I actually change and adjust my vision and my goals on a yearly basis. I don't change them completely, but every year I'm like, “Okay, is this still aligned with who I am? I grow a lot in this last year, what changed? What of these serve me? What of these is not serving me? What of some of these things that I thought that I want? Now I'm realizing that I don't want.” And then feel free to take it off. And and having that assurance that you don't need to make a plan and keep the same exact plan for 65 years. You make a plan. And one of my favorite quotes from military is “A plan is worth it and works until the war starts.” And that's it. Whatever you are deciding is going to work until you start facing things in life, and then you adjust, and then you face and then you adjust. It is a journey. It is a dance.
Dawn Taylor
It's always organic. It shifts and changes and grows and adjusts. And sometimes we don't. Right? Like we don't hit our goal that month. Well, okay. But that's because something major was happening in your life and you didn't have the capacity to put into your business that month. That's okay.
Jo Peters
And is part of that, of that flexibility of adjusting, because first you don't know what you don't know. Second, sometimes we think that we want something and when we get it and we are like, uh, or I will tell you the first time that I get, uh, for shoes, I was so excited. I was like, yes, it's going to be an upgrade. Italian handmade. Yeah. I wear the freaking shoes that were like, I don't know, $600. And I'm like, they're not that comfortable. It was okay. Instead of beating myself as an “Oh no, but you bought them. You need to wear them. But shame on you.” Or like, no, I learn. Now, I know that that brand is not good for my feet. It could be good for other feet, but not for me. It's okay. And then the other one that I think is important is it doesn't have to be perfect before you try, I always put this example on women applying for jobs. A woman will not apply for a job if
she doesn't have one qualification.
Dawn Taylor
I would have like 75. That is their dream list.
Jo Peters
A woman that is 99% good for a job will not go because it's not 100%. The statistics show that male in the same scenario apply. And as for the reason that job, if they meet only 50% and they're like. If I'm 50% enough, I will figure out the rest. And that is some of the attitude that we need to start thinking on defining what enough is. Oh, I have 50% of this figured out. Okay, that's good enough. Let's do it. Let's start seeing it. Let's start living it. And adjusted to have that clear path of feeling worthy and understanding what enough is for us.
Dawn Taylor
Totally. I often use the metaphor of like, you can't steer a parked car. Sometimes you just have to like, get it and start driving like, you got to start the damn car, get on the road and then figure out where you're going. But man, you can sit in that car all day and you're not going to get anywhere in your garage. Right. Just start. You have to build the momentum and just start. Because once you're going, then you see what else is out there and what's on the road. And you're like, oh my gosh, here's a shift, here's the pivot, here's something I want to do different. And here's something I love. Here's something I don't, right. But you can't just sit at home and dream.
Jo Peters
Or wait until you have the perfect path and the perfect GPS route to maximize everything, because you're saying, you are going to stay in your garage for the rest of your life with the car in park and not even turn off. But, uh, having that, um, curiosity and I will say, going back into what you were saying of our expectations and our, conditional, transactional love, knowing that it's okay to make mistakes, that it’s okay to try something that didn't work and say, you know what? It didn't work, and let's go figure it out. That doesn't make you unlovable. That doesn't make you not enough. That doesn't make you worthy, that makes you human.
Dawn Taylor
I was just going to say it makes you human. I'm laughing because our. When we started this call, I was at this thing and I was like, no, I have tons of time to get home and find the file and find all my stuff on my computer and the bio and everything I need to do, because there's like ten minutes of setup at least prior to recording a podcast. And I'm making tea. I'm like, good to go. And then I come running downstairs, I get caught in traffic like nothing worked out the way I needed it to. I come downstairs, my computer's dead. I have to, like, plug it in and get it charging. And I show up like three minutes late and I'm like, apologies. I'm not usually chaotic, but I am right in this moment. And now I need to find all these things. And we just laughed about it. Had this totally human moment. You're like, “Oh no, you're fine, take your time.” Right. I'm calling my assistant in the middle of it being like, “Where's this file?” And Jo and I were just laughing about it because we're like, we're just human. And it's a moment and it's fun and get it back together and right. And even in that, the overwhelming feeling was like, we both gave me grace. Neither of us were judging it. Neither of us were mad about it. There was nothing like, “Oh, I suck, and I failed, and I'm embarrassed and I can't believe I did this and I'm - why are we even recording this? And now it's going to be an extra four minutes.” It was funny. We laughed about it. We joked about the fact that Jenny's amazing and we need Jenny in our lives. My assistant. Seriously, she's like the wrangler of the shit show most days. But that was this beautiful conversation that happened. And as women, we could give ourselves and give each other that grace. Right. And I think that if more people in general adopted that, to be like, “Yeah, you know what? I'm three minutes late and I don't know where anything is that I am laughing at it.” Right. Oh, and there's so many of those lessons in life like, oh, no. my new CRM decided to email every single person in my entire email list saying that they were all accepted to be on my podcast this last week. Yep. It did. All 900 people got told that they were accepted, including strangers, including people where I had, like, donated money to a fundraiser and I had their email in my CRM like it was so hilariously bad, like brand new clients that hadn't even started yet. They're like, “What? I have to tell my story on your podcast? I haven't even heard of trauma work with you yet.” And while we were freaking out, I was laughing so hard and everyone in my world is like, how are you this calm about it? And I was like, Because as technology and it screwed up and we're just going to own it and laugh about it and just put it out there. And so we did. We sent her an email to everyone being like, hey, you probably got one, right? You probably got it being like, uh, technology, forgive me for this mistake. Like, just delete the previous email unless you want to be on it and then feel free to apply. Right. But all of those moments, all of those moments where we beat ourselves up, where we feel like we failed, where we feel like we suck. Are just these beautiful moments where it's like, “No, you know what? I'm killing it at 65%.” And that is such a beautiful number. Like killing it.
Jo Peters
Well, I will tell you back to the example of of the grades. Like, we all went to school, we all went to college. Tell me, how many people now are like, “um, tell me, what was your grades in high school? Tell me, how was your your grade on college? No, the only thing that they matter was do you pass or you didn't pass? And guess what? You have a title. So you pass.” And at this point is how much easier our life will be if we go into that part of it doesn't have to be 100%. If we pass, if we have to be 60%, 55%. I was hearing today somebody talking about politics and leaders from countries with only 52%, if they they get 52% of the population saying that is the way, they rule it. Good. And then we are here saying it has to be 100 and if not, the sky is falling apart. It's not. It's absolutely not.
Dawn Taylor
Oh my goodness, I am loving this conversation with you. If you were to empower people with one last thing on, enough is enough. What would it be?
Jo Peters
Embrace the things that you are not planning that happen. And knowing that the things that you don't have control over are not defining your worth. They are a mild step, mild rock towards the path and I promise you 100% of the are the ones that going backward are going to be the hugest. That's life. That's going to be able to help you to share, is the story that you're creating. So you can learn the lesson and say, hey, you know what? A year ago, I was in this show and my baby came and I had to breastfeed and almost didn't finish the show because he was interrupting us. How I react to it, how I process it is what is going to create the journey. So, uh, 65%. It's enough, right?
Dawn Taylor
Thank you. I want to challenge anybody and everyone listening to this today. What is one area, one area of your life that you could release, that you could release 35% in? And figure out what that new metric is. Figure out what that's going to look like for you, and how can you actually let that go knowing that it is more than enough. You still passed. You still get your gold star. You still get your sticker. You still get your points. Whatever it is, whatever it is, if you need a report card, I will send you a report card saying that you passed okay, that you have leveled up to the next level in your life. You have passed. But thank you, Jo. Thank you so much for hanging out with us today. Thank you for sharing your wisdom, your beauty, your knowledge, everything else. I hope that everybody starts following you and they reach out to you as well. People listening. Please, please, please, I hope that you take in every single word of this today and start to see in your own life where you are holding yourself back. Because enough is actually enough. Join us again in two weeks for another fun topic. Tell your friends. Share the podcast with people if you're willing. And if you want to know how to get Ahold of Jo the Unicorn Coach, check out the show notes located at the TheTaylorWay.ca for all of her contact information. Links to all of her fun stuff, everything else, and subscribe now on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. See you guys in two weeks.
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Dawn Taylor has kicked all sorts of ass in her lifetime. She’s beaten death, and helped clients all over the world make improvements in their lives in different, meaningful ways. However, this doesn’t mean she’s invincible. She still very much has her own fears, ones that she’s struggled with almost daily. On today’s episode, we are joined by Dawn’s right-hand woman, Jenny Ryce, as the two reminisce about their amazing vacation together. More than just a vacation though for this was where Dawn learned to face her fears and conquer them.
Who is this for…
Fear is a very human emotion. It can sometimes be there to protect us from harm. However, when left unchecked, fear can end up crippling us and keeping us away from things. With that in mind, this episode is for those who are looking for a nudge in the right direction when it comes to conquering their fears. It’s never too late to stand up to your fear and it’s never too early to take action so you can live the life you want.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
I'm your host, Dawn Taylor. And today we are talking to the amazing, fabulous, wonderful me. No, seriously though, we are talking to me today. Jenny is going to be taking over and putting me in the hot seat because something really, really massive has gone down in my personal world over the last few months that I have overcome. And if you've read my book, you may have read a line that said, "P.S. you might want to talk to a therapist about this." And yeah, some big things have gone down. And when Jenny and I were in a meeting one day, she's like, "You know what? We really need to share this with your podcast world." So, I hope you love this episode. I hope that you feel a little bit inspired from it. And yeah, we're going to let Jenny take over. For those of you who don't know, she is the CEO of the Taylor Way and more importantly, she's one of my really good friends. So take it away, Jenny.
Jenny Ryce
Hey everybody. Thanks for showing up. And Dawn, as always, for letting me steal your seat in the Taylor Way Talks podcast world.
Dawn Taylor
Oh. You're welcome. Maybe?
Jenny Ryce
I know you might regret it.
Dawn Taylor
I was like, Will I regret this decision? You just don't know.
Jenny Ryce
You just don't know where we might go down the rabbit hole.
Dawn Taylor
Pretty much.
Jenny Ryce
Thank you guys, everyone, for showing up and and taking the time to listen to us today. Dawn and I were talking about something that was really, um. really fascinating. We were digging into the topic of fears. Right? And how do we face our fears? Because regardless if they seem rational or not to other people, when when we are anchored in our own fears, there's no talking through it. There's no, you know, zero logic. And, uh, Dawn and I were blessed. She took me on a really fun, uh, retreat getaway for for, I think, what were we on 10 or 12 days or something?
Dawn Taylor
Oh, yeah. It was a full 12 days.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah. Fun. So we road tripped in Texas, and then we were really blessed to get on a cruise and go to some really beautiful places with palm trees and and ocean, right. When you're on a cruise ship, you're on the ocean. And we're going to dig into why that's important in a minute. But one thing I wanted to ask you, Dawn, before we got into it, I want to talk about fear itself, just so that the listeners and people that might be sharing this, this conversation with other people. I want to get clear on the definition of how you see fear, so that everybody's going to see it differently and understand it. So when we talk about facing fears, what does facing your fears mean to you?
Dawn Taylor
So, our bodies are wired for protection, right? So they will not let us totally feel unsafe. And I say this often in talks is like there's a reason why we can't hold our breath to die. It's
because your body will do anything to protect you and protection mechanisms. So, typically fears show up when something happens, right. So, for this conversation, when I was playing in the creek, in this creek and going over these waterfalls and a half empty air mattress when I was 12 and smashed my head at the bottom on the rock and went under and wasn't coming back out, and someone had to jump in and rescue me, right? Brought on this massive fear of water and having my face under the water. My husband playing a practical joke on me. We were dating in high school by filling the bottom of a backpack with snakes and asking me to grab a pen created this massive mess. That one's a big one. I'm still working on that one, but a massive fear of snakes for me. Right? Having a dog chase you or whatever. Right? Like fears come from a time in our life where something in us was really, really jarred. And then we attach a story of everything that will happen after it. Right? So it's like every time I go into the water, I'm going to feel like I'm drowning. This is now the new belief. This is the fear and the acronym "Future Events Appearing Real." Right, where it's like this is a fear of what could potentially happen. But my brain is convinced because it appears that it's actually real.
Jenny Ryce
Can you do that acronym again in case people didn't actually catch that? Can you just, like, I want that to be hammered in like hard.
Dawn Taylor
Future Events Appearing Real. So, not just like an idea that it might be real, like it's actually appearing, that it's real. You are fully believing that it's going to be real, even though it's a future event that hasn't even happened yet.
Jenny Ryce
Right, so future event we're in the we we you know we're going to dig in the past today because we're not doing it as we speak. But before we were going on this trip, you had expressed especially this fear around water. I mean, you tackled a bunch of fears. Let's be honest, on this trip that we were together.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I totally did.
Jenny Ryce
I, you know, I mean, I would love to think it was all me and hanging out with me, but let's be real. That's not the truth. I might have been a really good wingman for this, but the bottom line is when you're tackling fears, a lot of it comes from your own internal strength and resilience. So when we were talking about going on this trip, I'd love for you to share. And if only share what you're comfortable with, some of the reservations you are having about maybe some of the the excursions that I was curious and excited to to try. And it opened up this dialogue. Would you mind sharing with our listeners what that was?
Dawn Taylor
Oh for sure. And, you know, I'll say anything. So, backtrack a little bit. The drowning thing when I was 12. So, I fully went in, I fully went under. And one of the hardest parts to admit about it was that I remember very distinctly not wanting to fight for myself. So, if you know anything about my past or if you've read my book, "P.S. I Made It." There is a chapter. There's fun. I mean, if you've read it, you understand that I had a really insane life, but I remember not wanting to fight for myself and thinking, this is my out. Like it's time I get to go now. And so that in and of itself was really, really hard. But it also attached that meaning to now, water, ever. And so from then on, I didn't plan leaks in the same way. I didn't plan rivers in the same way. I refused to go in the ocean. If I did go in the ocean, it was very, very shallow. I was not getting my face wet. I might be the only person I know that's done. Things like gone to Laguna Beach and never stepped foot in the water in two weeks, right? Just wouldn't do it. Put me in a pool, I'm fine. But even then I did like, lane swim with a paddle board so that I wouldn't have to put my face in the water. I've even gone as far as to like. I struggle in the shower, getting my face wet. And it makes me feel panicky immediately. So a couple years ago, and in order to see these, you're going to have to ask for them. But we will put some in the show notes on my website, TheTaylorWay.ca - few years ago, I did a photo shoot while trying to overcome my fear of water and forcing myself to sit in the fear of it. And Jenny, you've seen them there. They are jarring. They are jarring photos. So that's the one warning, if you go look at them. But. I wanted to see what that looked like for myself, and to also have them to share with someone else if they ever needed to see them. So I put myself in a bathtub and forced myself to go under the water and hold it past the point of comfort and allow myself to face that in and the biggest thing was allow myself to face it and acknowledge if that feeling of not wanting to come back up showed up. Right? Because I think that, no, it's not even a nice thing. I know that behind the scenes, that was the big piece of it was, would I still have that feel? Would I still, at this point in my life, having healed so much and gotten where I am and build who I am, would I still have that moment of my head under the water thinking I could just not come back up? And how would I deal with that? And it's no different. I've talked before my social media on here and stuff about how, you know, if I get really, really, really sick and all of a sudden I can't eat for a long time, this little like wiggle in the back of my brain is like, "but you could just stop eating?" Right. And I always tell clients it's like, it's not about if that voice is going to come up or not. That's not even part of being healed. It's what you do with it that matters. So I had done this and faced this so that I could now put my head underwater. I could actually do that. And in January, I went on a trip with my husband and my nephew, and I actually swam in the ocean for the very first time in my life, fully swam, put my head under the water, got smashed by waves, everything else. But, there were still more fears around it. So when you and I started talking about this trip, all of a sudden it's like, let's go on a tandem bike ride through the jungle, let's go snorkeling. Let's go hold sloths and animals. You were asking me to do all these crazy things, paddleboarding, right? All of these crazy things, and I panicked. I really, genuinely panicked, right? It was like, I can't do those things, right. It's so many biases, so many biases that I even had on myself. If, like, I can't ride a bike through the jungle because there's no way I could do that and that that wouldn't even be a thing. And I'm too fat and I have bad knees and I, like, right to the same with paddle boarding. But I mean, that had its own like attachment to the ocean, peace in the water and everything else to snorkeling, because that's literally like face under the water for a really long, extended period of time. And when you and I first started talking about it, I know I explained some of this to you and like my fears, but I'm also a big believer that your fear is a fear because you're refusing to face it. And as long as I don't face them, it gives them power. 1s And I don't want anybody or anything to have power over me. Right? So part of my working on my snake fear, I used to not even be able to see a photo of a snake at all and where I'd panic. And I've actually been watching Survivor because there's snakes shown slithering like nonstop through the entire episode, and I'm forcing myself to watch it and pause it and look at them and be okay with that and feel through those feelings in my body. But I also did things like went to Utah and hiked a trail that is known to have rattlesnakes, and they give you a big talk before you walk it for safety. And I not only walked it, but I did it twice. To face that fear, right? Was it easy? No. Was I like, the entire time? Yes, but. But it was still facing it. And I think that's why I said yes to all of the random things that you wanted to do on this trip that terrified me. Because the more of my fears that I face. The less external things have power over me and control over me.
Jenny Ryce
I love that because it's true? Right. It's hard work, but it's true. So you mentioned a few events that occurred on our vacation. So we want to bring some humor into this as well. So I think. I think we're going to go in chronological order, if that's okay with you.
Dawn Taylor
That's good.
Jenny Ryce
Um, and you brought up some really valid points, is so we're we we've booked this excursion and we booked it. So like, many entrepreneurs were super busy. We're multitasking, you know, we're doing the things we're trying to get ready. And we booked this one excursion.
Dawn Taylor
Okay, so for two non-drinkers, we joked our entire trip that we drunk booked our excursions. Okay. Like the things we booked that we never would have had we been thinking more clearly.
Jenny Ryce
Well, I'd say we wouldn't necessarily have booked them, but we may have put different ones or may, like - so this is the funny part you guys. We're, we're sitting down in bed, we're getting ready for excursion number one. It's like you know, we're going to wake up in the morning and we're heading out at like eight in the morning. When we get into dock, we're unloading and we're hitting the bus and we're doing the things. So I say to Dawn, can you read and tell us if is there anything we need to pack? Is there anything, is there change rooms because we're going to go. We're going on a trek through the jungle. And that was it. For those of you that don't know what that is, it's basically a natural hole in the ground where water comes in. And these are these beautiful oasis, the natural pool, basically surrounded by beautiful scenery, etc., etc. we're like sold. Didn't even read it. Just book it. Let's go. So, Dawn's reading out loud to me. 1s That she's like, um, we're going on a tandem bike through the jungle,
Dawn Taylor
So we have to ride. There's no bus.
Jenny Ryce
Okay, so for those of you, Dawn, you express this, which I, I really valued. What was your initial, I want you just to reiterate that your initial, because this wasn't we didn't decide determine this three weeks ago that we were going to ride this tandem bike.
Dawn Taylor
There is not a chance in hell that my fat ass, lumpy body is going to get on a tandem bike and be able to ride through the jungle with my bad knees. That was my very initial reaction, and I was like, you're going in the front because I'm going to be in the back of my feet sticking out, and I'm not even going to pedal, and I'm going to die of heat exhaustion in some damn jungle, bike seat up my ass. That was my initial reaction.
Jenny Ryce
But what I loved is when I said to you, so this is when, you know, we do some of that self-loathing, right? It's like, I'm not capable. I'm physically a certain way. I'm, you know, the all the things I'm like, do you feel strongly enough that we should change this? And you know what I loved? You're like, no. And I said, awesome. Because honestly, if we can bike there, we can walk there. Worst-case scenario is we will get off our damn bike and we will walk it into this location that we're going right. And I had my own fears creeping in. I was like, oh my gosh, when was the last time - I've never been on a tandem bike. I felt this kind of responsibility to make sure we got to a location and, you know, like, am I going to have the balance? I'm 53 years old. I want to do this, but random, you know, I knew I had the physicality to do it, but I was like, oh my gosh, am I going to get Dawn there? I took on this mantle. That was my job. to get you, like I got very dramatic. My crazy helmet on and so we roll up, you guys to this amazingly random location.
Dawn Taylor
Very authentically, stereotypically poor Mexico. We're going to just put it that way
Jenny Ryce
To the point where I said to the gentleman, is there a washroom I can use at there where we get our bikes and our helmets? He's like, actually, ma'am, I would wait until we get to the cenote. There's nicer outhouses there for you. I wouldn't use the one here. And I was like, okay, like I'm going to hold it.
Dawn Taylor
But oh my gosh, you guys just have this mental image. Okay. There's what, 16 of us? And in this little tour. We've ridden the bus forever to get out to this area. We're on this property. Beautiful flowers, altars, things, everywhere. It was stunning. And they give us our bikes and our bike helmets. Do we have bike helmets?
Jenny Ryce
We got helmets. Till on the ride home you didn't have yours on.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, mine was not on. Right? I look like an absolute doofus. And it wasn't really on my head. Like, had we fallen, I would have actually just died. Um, because I haven't ridden a bike since I was 12, and I'm now almost 44 and we get on our tenant bike and we're like, just going to ride around a little like parking lot area. And it is like the most potholey parking lot you've ever seen in your entire life. Like it is worse than anything. Like that's probably like the worst ride of the entire thing was the parking lot of the road leading up to the jungle piece. And we get on this tandem bike, not realizing my handlebars. So I'm in the back, my handlebars are broken, and they're attached directly to Jenny's seat. So every time I move my handlebars, her entire seat turns with it. And it's natural that when you want to turn, you're trying to turn your handlebars. And we're on this tandem bike. We were laughing so freaking hard. Other people could hardly ride their bikes because they were laughing at our laughing at ourselves. So, we finally like trade in our bike, get a better one that's not broken, and then we start this ride. And if we didn't die laughing the entire time, it was the -
Jenny Ryce
I mean, I'm still laughing. My face still hurts. I still have the muscles from, you know, this was a few weeks ago and and what I love to is we're doing this pothole road and, you know, trying to stay on the bike and balance. And, you know, the best part is, is when we rolled up to this place, we made the commitment that we were going to just be present.
Dawn Taylor
100% all in.
Jenny Ryce
And then whatever happens from, you know, whether we get scrapes and bumps, whether we bail, whether we walk, whatever it is we're going to, we're going to take this on and we're and I'm, I'm pedaling. I'm like "Pothole!"
Dawn Taylor
It's like, it was like a comedy routine. That was absolutely hilarious.
Jenny Ryce
But of course, we didn't realize, again, we're talking third world country experience to a degree. Right? Our handlebars. So at this point this is the better bike and we're in the bike doing the things down the path. And we realize the handlebars actually aren't secure. The front steering,
Dawn Taylor
Oh no, they're not secure.
Jenny Ryce
Like pivoting back and forth. So, anyway, the cool part was, is not only do we survive it. When I looked at you and I said, "So who's leading the way home?" And you're like, "I'm in!"
Dawn Taylor
Oh, yeah, we fully did, we fully did.
Jenny Ryce
You're like, I'm driving on the way home and. I would love for you to share what it felt like to prove to yourself that when you trust yourself, go for it. What did it feel like?
Dawn Taylor
You know what I think more than anything, it's not giving a shit what anyone else thinks.
Right? It was a piece of, it was a split second decision of, what are the judgments of other people that are going to happen if I do this? If we fall, if we screw this up, if our bike breaks down and we're standing on the side of the road, whatever. Whatever it was. And the minute that came up, I was like, "Oh, hell no. I am not going to stop myself from living because of a judgment from somebody else."
Jenny Ryce
Amen.
Dawn Taylor
And that was the feeling that kind of went through that entire day, because from there we then went to the ocean. And this little area, and we're swimming and we're doing our thing, and I'm in the ocean and we just got run over by boats because we went outside of the area that we were supposed to be in, which was probably really dumb.
Jenny Ryce
Slight little rebels, just saying.
Dawn Taylor
Oh my gosh, they're like, stay within this cordoned area. We're like, I see a hole in the fence, let's swim underneath it. Like, literally we were like breaking out, like we were in jail. It was very funny. But again, when I wanted to paddleboard because this is a massive fear and a judgment I'd put on myself and all these things. And when even the instructors were like, "Hmm, yeah, no." And I was like, "Uh, yeah, actually I am. And watch me go." Right.
And throughout that entire day. And this was something that was really interesting, is from that excursion to another island that we went to, was it Honduras? In Roatan Island? We did this excursion where we drove like buggies that they called buggies. We drove buggies through the through the jungle again, horrible steering. The thing died every 30 seconds. We had to restart it like, it was an epic shit show. And covered in mud and you couldn't. I've never had mud on my body that you couldn't actually get off. And it dyed your skin. Oh yeah, it was wild. But like, we did that and then we went to, um, this nature preserve, and we held sloths and fed toucans, and I've got a very healthy fear of animals. So that was facing it, another fear. And we did that. And then we went to the ocean. And there were similar people. Some of the same people were on this tour as the previous one. And we saw some of the same people, and they started to comment on how what we were doing was inspiring them to do things.
Jenny Ryce
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
And it was when we got to the ocean at that resort and the water was, the beach was beautiful, but the sand walking in was disgusting. It was like slimy mud that you had to walk through. But there were coral reefs, what, 100 feet out? Yeah. Or so. You had to get to this like slimy, sludgy -
Jenny Ryce
I had Dawn floating so I could push her along.
Dawn Taylor
Because I'm terrified of seaweed. Like petrified of seaweed. Did not face that fear at all. Okay, I didn't face that one.
Jenny Ryce
You did, because there was a place that you had to put your feet down.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I did it. I was not happy, though. We did scream.
Jenny Ryce
People will come rescue you.
Dawn Taylor
Yes. And people just kind of figured out that I had to be pushed everywhere. So I am, like, very, very buoyant. And so I kind of stay, we're really high up on water and you could just, like, shove me like a beach ball.
Jenny Ryce
Dragged her around.
Dawn Taylor
You totally did. It was hilarious. You dragged me all over her. shoes on.
Jenny Ryce
So, let's be clear. I had water shoes on. She's on, and you did not. That is true. It was easier for me to step in the back.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, okay, guys, this dirt was so gross. Like, it was so disgusting that 99% of people did not ever set foot in that ocean. But we went out and there was this other, there was like a mother-daughter group. They were on the same cruise, and we had seen them around a few times, and they ended up joining us out there, and I decided to face my fear of snorkeling. And we got out there and anything, so because of some of my traumas in the past, anything that's constricting on my face or feels like it's holding me down or there's like any panic, if not breathing or like tightness around my neck had anything causes like sheer terror, panic in me. And so when we put the snorkel mask on because it was the full face one where you don't have to have like the separate piece in your mouth. I thought I was going to die.
Jenny Ryce
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
And I don't even know how to describe the terror. That is probably the only word for it that went through my body in that moment. And I put it on, and I think I yanked it off right away and was like, okay, we're doing this. But here's where I want to challenge people. Yes, it was terrifying, but it did not kill me.
Jenny Ryce
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
It did not kill me. And I say this all the time. I have statistically to date overcome every single hard thing that I've been faced with. Every single day that I thought I would not make it through a day. Every single hard thing that I thought was going to kill me, every single thing that I was like, nope, I'm not strong enough to do. This girl is still here. Which means I have actually overcome all of those things. And so that is this belief that constantly runs in the back of my head is this the thing that's going to take out my average? Because right now I have a 100% success rate. Is this the thing that will actually wreck my average? And if so, what makes this one so much bigger than the other ones, right? And I refused to have floated that far out through that nasty ass dirt. It was a very entertaining day, to not suck it up and try it. Right? And to not face that terror. And I'm talking like debilitating, body freezing, heart racing. If a medical doctor was there, they probably would have said I was having a panic attack. And I was like, no, fuck it. I put that mask back on and I went. I put my face under the water and I just did it. I just did it. And as my heart's racing and I can hardly breathe and I'm panicking, I was like, "No, stop. Breathe through this. Because no feeling is permanent." Right? Like there's no feeling on this planet that is actually permanent. So this terror can leave too. And so as I just like floated and breathed and then I like went far away from you guys because I was like, if I'm going to have a full blown panic attack, I'm not going to do it right in front of all these people from a cruise ship. But I went and I did it. And then I popped out of the water and I took the mask off, and I looked around, and then I did it again, and I did it again, and I did it again, and I saw a lobster. And then I forced myself to hold my breath and go under the water to get a better view of it, which was not comfortable because I because of the panic at the beginning, I didn't I didn't ever, like adjust the mask to be what it needed to be for my face. There's water coming in like -
Jenny Ryce
You were borrowing my mask.
Dawn Taylor
Like, nothing about this was setting me up for success other than my sheer stubborn determination. And I came back and I stood up and I went to take the mask off and I couldn't get the clips, so the whole thing just came right off my face. I was like, nope, nope
nope, get this thing off my face. But I don't know if I could have been more proud of myself in that moment.
Jenny Ryce
I was going to ask, what did that feel like?
Dawn Taylor
It felt like I had overcome a pain. From when I was 12. Right? That that little, that girl, that young woman, that 12 year old girl that didn't ever believe I could go back into water did something that I have fought so hard for so many years. The amount of times I've signed up for snorkeling and ever gone. The amount of times that I've tried and could not even get my face near the water and I just was like, oh no, I can't. Sorry. Right? And in that moment, I could have made every single excuse in the book, oh, I don't have a mask. And okay, we tried to find me a mask. Like we spent hours driving around, phoning stores, all of these things to try to find a mask prior to so that I could get one fit for my face, that it would work like I was willing to put the money out to face this fear. And we couldn't, like anywhere. We went to more Dick's Sporting Goods stores and you could imagine and just could not find what we needed. And surf stores, like, we went to all the places, but, it was this moment of sheer pride, like, so friggin proud of myself, but then excited to live. And that was really cool. Like the feeling of not just like I faced my massive fear but like I faced my massive fear, so what does this now crack open in the future.?
Jenny Ryce
Well, and that's what I really want to touch on. I do want to get back to our paddleboarding story, but I want to keep going on this train just for right now. What do you feel? You shared a lot of things with me in that moment about what this meant for you. And that's your story to tell.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, no, you can say it,
Jenny Ryce
but I want to hear from you. Like what? You felt that cracked open. Because facing our fears, sometimes we think, well, what's the point? Yeah. Like it's way more comfortable to stay in all of this, right? Yeah. So what did it mean? For you to all of a sudden, "Hey, not only can I swim in the ocean, I can put my face under the water and be under the water." Like, what did that crack open for you? And what does that future look like?
Dawn Taylor
You know, one of the biggest is, my husband and I have very, very different hobbies. And one of our struggles in traveling together is he's a water baby. He just wants to play in the water all the time. He wants to body surf and scuba dive and snorkel and swim. And like the boy, could live in the ocean. And we have had very divided, separated vacations for 24 years of marriage because I couldn't do it. I couldn't do it. And he had made a comment on our previous trips, so we had gone on a birthday trip with our nephew in January. And he had made a comment when I was we were in like in Saint Martin in the ocean. Another cruise. Love cruising, by the way, but on another cruise
Jenny Ryce
I'll endorse that as well.
Dawn Taylor
I'm like, I'm like a crazy cruise lady. But he had made a comment. He's like, I might actually enjoy traveling with you now. And not that he hated traveling with me. But it wasn't fun for him. It wasn't enjoyable because he wanted to go do these things and have these adventures and do these excursions and live. And I was too busy letting the fear kill me on the beach.
Jenny Ryce
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
Right? And all of a sudden it was like, hey, wait, you mean we could actually have fun together? We could have adventures together. We could try these things together.
And even just that. That was the day. So we had no internet, cell service. Like we didn't have any of that on the cruise. And that was the day that when we got off that beach, I turned on my phone and paid the obscene amount of money per minute to phone my husband in tears and tell him that I had actually snorkeled. And not just once, but twice. And I did it. And I want to do it again. And I'm excited. And that has connected us. And I mean, it's something so silly, but that has connected us and made us so excited for our next trip.
Jenny Ryce
Which is incredible, you know, because I think about when we were at the cenote which kind of will lead us back to the paddle board story. When we were at the cenote, there was a gentleman with us because he was by himself, because his family, that was not his family. His family couldn't do the bike riding and wasn't interested in going snorkeling or They had no desire. You could tell he was having fun. And it was lovely because he latched on to us and we got along great. And it was wonderful to, you know, meet somebody new and chat. But it did cross my mind that this, this gentleman would probably enjoy much more being with his significant other or his partner providing, and again, I love and honor that people are willing to still do the things that they love to do and not, you know, force other people to, to participate. Because of course, there's no joy in that either. But to see your face light up when you're like. How did I get those dawdling? It was amazing. Absolutely amazing. And I was I was honored to witness it and to be a part of it. And, I loved it, I loved it.
Dawn Taylor
I don't think I ever thought I would, if that makes sense. Right? Like, even being able to have a shower and put my face under the water has been such a shift over the last few years. As ridiculous as that might sound. But it's giving myself permission to live. And our fears, our fears are not "Should I wear this?" I always look at it as like, you can fear something once and it's like a little baby fear. And then our brain attaches more meaning to it and more meaning and more meaning and more meaning. And it becomes a bigger story and a bigger story and a bigger story and a bigger story. And it becomes this, like, out of control thing where we are so scared of it. That we will kill part of ourselves to not feel the fear again. We will literally stop living in areas of our lives so that we don't feel that fear again. And to have had so many experiences over these last couple of years of pushing myself to drive past a certain point, forcing myself to walk with snakes. Forcing myself to go to like, even our local zoo and go into the reptile area and, like, stand there and stare at snakes. Like, I don't think you understand the fear in me unless you're terrified of something that I feel. But when I can sit there and actually, like, breathe through it, talk my way through it, feel wherever the feels are in my body. Give myself permission to feel them and but also release them and be okay every single time that happens. It builds that muscle in me, that muscle in me of like, "No, no, no, nothing's going to scare me and nothing's going to hold me back." And it has made me so excited to live. Like, I don't even know how to describe it. Like, I'm so excited to live. My poor husband is going crazy with my like 295-day countdown to the next time I get to swim in the ocean. And he's like, "Oh my word. I never.: he's like, "In 28 years of being with you, I never thought this is who you'd be."
Jenny Ryce
Well, I love it because we've kind of created a monster in a really good way.
Dawn Taylor
She's a monster.
Jenny Ryce
Okay, so let's let's let's visit back. We've just gotten off the tandem bikes. We get on to the we've done this two note. We've had lunch.
Dawn Taylor
We've the Jaguar Orange bus.
Jenny Ryce
Right. We get on this groovy bus and they're playing the coolest old rock and roll. It was actually a really good time.
Dawn Taylor
It was very entertaining.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah. So we get to the beach. We again go out past the, you know, we're out in the zone doing the things and, you know, maybe going out a little farther than we're supposed to, but, you know, and you're like, “I want to try paddleboarding.” Uh, so we swim back in. And like you say, you get a little bit of resistance.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I full-on, like, asked to paddleboard. He did an up and down and was like, well I don't know if you'll be able to and I was do you remember? I was like, “Because I'm fat?” and the poor guy's face. And I was like, “Oh, cause I'm fat. Okay, cool, cool. Good, good.” Right?
Jenny Ryce
And you know what? What kind of frustrated me as there was another lady that would not stand up on the board. No, because I think that was the same response that she had had to. You know, had we been there, I think we would have been able to change that for her. Um, so we get you a life jacket. I grabbed the paddle board. I'm like, “Screw you, dude.”
Dawn Taylor
Well, because we had to, but we kind of waited until they weren't there. Yeah, they took it off. They walked away to go get lunch. Yeah. And I was like, “I'm doing this.” And I grabbed everything and we just went like, yeah.
Jenny Ryce
And so what did it feel like? So here's the thing. And the reason I want to bring this up, especially for those listening, we've all had that.
Dawn Taylor
All of us.
Jenny Ryce
You might be too overweight. You might be too skinny. You might be the wrong gender. You might have the wrong hair color. Like people will make us feel we're not capable in our hearts when we feel like we can. And when I say capable, I mean to try. You might not be good at it. Nobody can expect to be good at anything when you try it for the first time. Yeah, but to try, you're all, everybody's capable to try, right? Yeah. We'll get the paddle board in the water. We've got your life jacket on because, of course, those are the rules, which is smart. Okay? I'm an advocate for making good choices. Safety is everyone's responsibility.
Dawn Taylor
I was like, what up? I'm fine, I float.
Jenny Ryce
Well dude. Honestly. So we get you on the board. And you're like, I'm standing up, I don't care what happens. And I'm like, hey, can we just get you a little deeper? So if you do fall off, which is possible, you're not going to hit the bottom. So we get out there, right? What I love is you're screaming at me. “Let go, let go!” Unbeknownst to you, I've had let go.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I think at one point I, like, threatened your life with the paddle if you didn't let go. And I was like, kind of like I was like a defiant toddler on that board.
Jenny Ryce
And so I was just there just really as moral support than anything. Because it takes a minute. If you've never been on a paddle board, it's all about core strength and balance. And if you've never done it, you don't know to go from sitting on the board, which really you should be kneeling on the board to standing. There's a precarious time, right? So I was not actually holding the board. Well, in your world, am I? I told you I was holding the board, but I have my hands on either side of the board ready to grab it. So if you needed to, it didn't flip because I was like, we need this girl to have like, we got you got to get standing. Once you're standing,
Dawn Taylor
Jenny moms me a little. She takes care of me.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, just a little. So I knew, though once you got standing, it's like your confidence would kick in and away you go. Because falling off when you're trying to stand sucks. It's like then you got to climb back on and do the things. So yeah, I love it. You're ripping me a new one in a fun way about like, look.
Dawn Taylor
And keep in mind again, these are all the same people that have been laughing at us all day, all day because we're sassy with each other. And yes, I was totally screaming at you in the middle of the ocean.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, which was so good. So I let go. And what happened? All paddleboarded.
Dawn Taylor
And didn't fall once. Thank you very much.
Jenny Ryce
Not only did you not fall. The really cool thing was, is the smile on your face would have literally lit up a whole room. Have we been in a dark room. And the pride. You're like, I am doing this. I have the coolest video of you doing it like you nailed it. And I have to tell you being on a paddleboard. Yes. You see these people doing dog poses and all those kinds of things. Generally speaking, your body's in a weird shape. When you're on a paddle board. Your knees are slightly bent. You know, you got like, it's not the sexiest view, right? Like you're out there for the world to see, right? And you were killing it. And I love that about you. And what was really powerful is this couple, um, a mom and daughter saw you paddleboarding. And what happened?
Dawn Taylor
They got up into that, too.
Jenny Ryce
Exactly.
Dawn Taylor
And they had also, and they had a million excuses why they couldn't. My one leg is shorter and I can't. And I'm too heavy and I'm too tall and I'm too this and I'm too that. And the minute they saw me up there, they were like, “Oh, if she can do it, we can do it.” And the amount of times that you and I heard that on that trip.
Jenny Ryce
It was unreal.
Dawn Taylor
It was so interesting. And so I think that's part of this is not only I know we've rambled on our stories for a long time now, but it's not just about facing your fears. Face your damn fear so that the world does not have this control over you anymore.
Jenny Ryce
Absolutely.
Dawn Taylor
Face them. Just get in there and face your fears. Right? Do the scary things. Because really, what's the worst case scenario? It proves that you should have been scared of it. Cool. Now you're scared of it some more and you have another fear. Whatever. You're fine. Right? But
like. 99% of the time you can overcome it and it's no longer scary and it holds no power over you. And it's you taking your power back, piece by piece by piece, that we have given out our entire lives, right? But more importantly. When we face our fears, it does give other people permission to do the same.
Jenny Ryce
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
Because they see us doing the hard things. They see us doing that. And that's not why I did it. You and I both know, Jenny, that at no point was I doing it to have anybody even acknowledge I was doing it. And when you asked me about recording this, you're like, I want to record a podcast on this because you face some big fears and biases, and I think people need to know this. And I mean, give me shit as much as people. What about not posting more of my life on social media? I don't do these things for accolades or recognition. I never have. I do these things because deep down I don't want to feel the fear anymore.
Jenny Ryce
Mhm.
Dawn Tay;pr
Right. And I want to change that in my own world and. 1.3s Yeah, it was really, really interesting. The I was telling someone, I've never been on a trip where, you know, we're getting off the cruise ship and there were probably 25, 30 people that were like, so, like, so excited. But there were so many cool moments where we challenged people. We nudged up against people, we showed them. It was like, no, this is this doesn't deserve to be scary to you.
Jenny Ryce
And I think what really anchored into and why I thought this was really important for us to talk about and share. Plus, it's fun to reminisce and I hope you guys have enjoyed the shenanigans. And that was the title of our trip.
Dawn Taylor
Oh my gosh, there were so many shenanigans. Ask us one day about renting an electric vehicle in Texas. That's a whole nother story. I was like, if you want that story, you need to like, message me. Oh my gosh, not recommended. We'll put it that way.
Jenny Ryce
It's not only again creating the space for other people. So when you show up for yourself and you step in and you do things that are uncomfortable, like you were just sharing on, as you create a space that provides people to do the same. And I don't know how many times I heard on the trip, if I didn't have you there to support me, I wouldn't have given that a try because I was helping random strangers do things, and not because I'm a superstar, but because I wasn't afraid to try myself and I was willing to help people I don't know try. So, it's not always about just facing the fear. It's finding ways to, like, expand on that and create a safe space for people to try. Because really like, the worst that can happen is you decide. Actually, this really isn't for me. And that's not the worst thing. There's an acceptance then. Like you said, it was a really cool experience to leave that cruise ship with all these people that were drawn to us. Not because, okay, we're a good time. Let's be real, right? Like we are hilarious. We're a lot of fun. But we were open and people felt connected and heard. I mean, yeah, people wanting to learn how to play cards, people joining us to play cards. Where do you, where do you go?
Dawn Taylor
People are asking how I got the food I got on my plate and how to order it like that. Like the weirdest. We had the funniest experience with people just really curious about
us.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, and connecting with people on a different level. So when we step outside our fear and we allow ourselves to experience it in different ways, again, you are not the same person. And we have this conversation when we realized we had booked these things. And these excursions.
Um, unbeknown to me, everything we booked pretty much. There was one component we knew was to be true, and then everything else was like.
Dawn Taylor
I don't know how we did not pay any attention. Like, I know we it was like our brains filtered out everything except one little baby thing in each excursion. We're like, that sounds like fun. And then we ignored all of the rest.
Jenny Ryce
All of the rest. And what was really cool was that. It changed our way of being, right. And and it may be invalidated other ways that we are naturally, it was pretty, pretty unique. And for me, what I took, especially when we went to the chocolate farm, when we drove in Belize and we were at that chocolate farm, and they were giving us an opportunity to actually, like, create chocolate by hand and tortillas like the old fashioned way.
Dawn Taylor
In a Mayan village.
Jenny Ryce
And nobody would get up but me. I was like, and then I was talking to the because the one young lady she was, it was her 30th birthday. Was it something like she. gorgeous soul. You could see it in her eyes and she's looking at me. We're talking. I'm like, you are never going to get a chance to do this again. I think you need to get up and do this. And she did. And then it got her sister to get up. And I don't share that in a sense of, oh, look at me, like you. It's this. That's not what this is about. It's about cracking the door open for yourself and holding it open for other people. Right? Don't be ashamed to be proud like you standing on that paddle board and, like, literally cheering yourself like you were like, yeah, that's like dad. And like, we were watching.
Dawn Taylor
Screaming on the paddle board and cheering, right? I am, I'm doing this. Oh, I was so salty that day.
Jenny Ryce
It was so fantastic. And then literally this woman's like, “Jenny, will you help me?” And I'm like, absolutely. And she did it. And you know what she said? And I think you were there because we were snorkeling with them. That they went on a different excursion the day we went to the chocolate, she said. I actually felt safe and empowered on her next excursion because they were actually doing a paddle board, which was more of like a, wasn't quite a traditional paddle board, but they were going out with manatees and she's like, “And I could go and relax and enjoy myself because I knew I could do it.” And I was like, “Yes, yes, Queen, you can do it.” So we can do things to hopefully inspire and and spark you guys to, oh my gosh, don't live in your shadows. Hey, let's live, right.
Dawn Taylor
Just live. If I can put my face under the water after what I went through and that amount of time of a debilitating fear, so can you.
Jenny Ryce
It was an honor to be a part of that and to you know, laugh with you, hold your hand whatever it needed. Right. Like scream with you cheer all those kind of things. It just allowed me to
Appreciate the courage that it takes to do that. Don't get me wrong, I have to battle my own fears. I got my own stuff too, but we touched on a lot of things on that trip that you weren't comfortable with.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, so many. Right?
Jenny Ryce
So, you know, that's why I just really wanted to highlight the change in you from that has been. monumental, right? It's literally like changing your belief system, right? You've changed your belief system. And it's been life changing.
Dawn Taylor
And it has. And I have no regrets. No regrets. Was it scary? Yes. Did I wreck a pair of shoes? Lose a skirt? I mean, there was some damage. Did we get some sunburns? Being near the equator. Like, yeah, there was a financial cost. There was a ring. And yeah, there were some moments. There were some moments. But, man. If you could bottle the feeling of knowing you overcame something. Like, if I could bottle that and give that to the world, I would.
Jenny Ryce
That's the Willy Wonka golden ticket, right? So to sum this up. When we think about, you know, excluding the trip. Our time together, when you sum up. 1How would you sum up what you overcame in the outcome? When we finish off with our audience today, what are some of the key things you want to leave with them so that when they find themselves saying yes or no to something. Because of an inherent fear or, you know, whatever might be holding them back, whether it's judgment, all those kind of things. What do you want to make sure that the audience hears from you as we finish this, this episode?
Dawn Taylor
Nobody else actually cares. So, being out there in a bathing suit, standing on a paddle board.
Yelling at you, but nobody else there cared. Not a single other person was like oh. And you know what if they were. I didn't know about it.
Jenny Ryce
I would say they were cheering for you, to be honest.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I think that that entire beach was cheering for me in that moment because they could well, they were listening and laughing and they could see and hear it. All right, guys, I was salty. It was funny. I should have had my own comedy show that day, but like, nobody else actually cares. It's us.
Jenny Ryce
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
Right? And failure is not falling in the water. Failure is not any of those things. Failure would have been sitting on the shore and watching everyone else do it and not attempt. I think lowering my expectations of it. I went in just being like, whatever happens, happens. And, you know, it's funny at the end when I was like, speed paddling in because I was like, oh, I'm going to go in really fast. And you guys were all like, so afraid. And then I was like, I'm fine, and got in and jumped off the paddleboard and kind of just walked over and very sassily was like, and I did it to the instructor guy. You know, it's those moments, those feelings of like, “No, I did it.” And it didn't have like, no, I wasn't doing yoga on a paddle board. And no, I wasn't paddling out into the waves. And I was like, no, I wasn't doing those things. I had a very low expectation of how it had to be in order for me to succeed at it. And I think that's something I would want to leave people with, is like, when you look at any of those things, what's your success rate like? What's your tangible of, when you can measure that you succeeded at it and the moment where you're like, no, I kind of sucked and failed at that. That was really bad. Figure that out for yourself. So going in, you even have a tangible number on that for yourself or an idea on that for yourself. And for me, it was if I could actually like, go in a circle and get back to sure, I had succeeded. If I fell off and I did all those things right. If I fell off and couldn't get back on, that's what I needed to, like, walk away and be like, yeah, okay, let's not fight this losing battle anymore. Face them. There's so much less scary than you could possibly imagine. There's so much less scary. And what is the actual worst case scenario of what would happen if you did it again? Right? Like, what was the worst case scenario? I was going to fall back into the water I had just been swimming at. There was like 3.5 ft deep.
Jenny Ryce
Worst case, you're getting wet again.
Dawn Taylor
Worst case, like, that was it? Right? And often our worst case scenario. We forgot to look at that and think, huh, I could actually overcome that. I don't deal with that.
Jenny Ryce
You know, I'd like to just interject and share. You know, you didn't go from being terrified to put your face under water to getting on a paddle board. You allowed yourself those baby steps of nurturing yourself to get to the point where you can have a shower with your face under the water, and then in your bathtub exercise
Dawn Taylor
Baby steps to the bus, bub.
Jenny Ryce
Right. And so again, you set yourself up for success. Yeah. By healing and working through those stages. And then when it came to Paddleboard Day, it's like, okay. I just want to stand up. Anything above that's gravy.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, totally. Just had to prove I could. Right. And then now it's like, yeah, you're going to. There's no doubt in my mind you'll be paddleboarding again. None.
Jenny Ryce
Oh, yeah.
Dawn Taylor
Because now it's just a matter of okay, now I want to actually get good at this craft. I want to also, going to be doing a hell a lot of snorkeling in my future.
Jenny Ryce
It's so exciting, right. Thank you Dawn for sharing your truth and your vulnerability. It's hard to sometimes admit where our fears live and the beautiful thing is when people meet you, right? They have this vision of this strong, put together entrepreneur, successful. You are a force in your own right with a vulnerable, gushy center. Right? You're like a Cadbury egg.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I always joke that I'm an armadillo.
Jenny Ryce
Okay, right.
Dawn Taylor
I'm like a really tender tummy. A big, hard shell protecting it.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah. So allowing people to see the truth of that right is. It's helpful. And we saw that in real time in action. So thank you for allowing me to ask you these questions, for allowing me to reminisce with you and for allowing me to be part of that journey. I was super blessed to be the one that was able to participate in that and be your wingman through all of that.
Dawn Taylor
Thanks for being there. Thanks for being there. And now I yes, yes, I have a trip to book, a trip booked to go snorkeling with my husband. He is so excited. But I just want to go play in the ocean. Yeah. So for everyone listening, thank you. Thank you for hanging out. Thank you for being here. And I really hope that you beat a fear of your own in the future. Join us again in two weeks for another topic. And tell people. Tell people about the podcast. We can get a few more listens, but check out the show notes like hidden located at TheTaylorWay.ca. Yes, we will include a few photos of all of this. Crazy. We'll see if I approve one of my paddleboarding. But if nothing else, send me a message through my website, through my Instagram, through wherever. Send me a message and let me know of a fear you have in your plan to overcome it. Or if you have, I would love to celebrate every one of you and a fear that you want to overcome. Subscribe now on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcast. And if you love the show, it would mean the world to me if you leave a rating and review. See you guys later.
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
As a father to three kids and a youth coach, Andrew Hovelson takes lifting up the next generation seriously. However, as he’s begun to notice in life, modern-day marvels like technology, social media and current-day philosophy and life lessons seem to be messing up our kids. In this episode, Andrew tells us how he believes we should support today’s youth and give them both the practical skills and the mental fortitude they need to push forward in life.
Who this is for
Imparting knowledge to young people and giving them the time and space to grow through their trials is no easy feat. As adults, some of us can be impatient and even be insensitive to what they’re going through. With that in mind, this episode is for those who wish to know more about how to navigate being more involved with the youth in their lives.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Andrew comes from a unique background of art and business. He graduated from the Guthrie Theater magna cum laude with a BFA in Acting. He also holds a MFA in Acting from NYU Tisch School of the Arts’ Graduate Acting Program, which accepts 1% of applicants. He has appeared on Broadway, Film, and Television, and runs the top life coaching company for teens and young adults worldwide, Southwestern Student Coaching.
Andrew has a passion for students, education, and entrepreneurship. He lives with his wife and three young sons in Hell’s Kitchen, NYC, they aptly named “The Testosterone Factory.”
Guest Social Links
Southwestern Coaching - https://southwesternconsulting.com/coaches/andrew-hovelson
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/andrewcoaches
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-hovelson-9661a38a/
Thanks for listening!
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
TRANSCRIPT
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Dawn Taylor, and today I have the privilege and the honour of talking to you, Andrew Hovelston. If you don't know him, you need to. So who is Andrew? Before we get to our topic, Andrew is an actor. He is a passionate guy in art and business. He graduated from Guthrie Theater, magna cum laude with a BFA in acting. He also holds an MFA. I don't even know what that is, but we're going to ask, acting from NYU TIsch School of the Art graduate Acting program, which only accepts 1% of applicants. This guy is impressive. He has appeared on Broadway, film, television, and runs the top life coaching company for teens and young adults worldwide, Southwestern Student Coaching. He also has a passion for student education entrepreneurship. He lives with his wife and three young sons in Hell's Kitchen, NYC, which is New York. Manhattan, New York that they aptly named the Testosterone Factory. Because if you've ever been to New York, you know the apartments are not large. So, I cannot even imagine living in one with three kids. But today, guys, we're going to have a bit of a controversial topic today. So, I hope you listen to this all the way through and listen to it with an open heart, because I am incredibly excited about this. We're going to talk about how you're screwing up your kids. And how we as a society are screwing up our kids. So, Andrew, take it from here. Welcome to the show.
Andrew Hovelston
We should have a little disclaimer, along the bottom or, you know, that pops in here that says Andrew does have three kids himself. So, he is in the active process of screwing kids up with everyone else who's listening.
Dawn Taylor
And I don't have kids, so I really I guess I'm not allowed to have an opinion, but I work with the kids that are getting screwed up when they show up in my office as young adults. So, you and I had, we met through an event we were both at forever ago, and we've been having this amazing month of conversations. Talking about mental health and kids and youth and, you know, just life in general. Business owners, all things, just all the things. And one of the topics that came up when you're talking one day was how we're actually screwing up our kids. And we talked about how parents don't want to hear this. And I said, you know what, let's do a podcast on this. Let's talk about this. And also like in that give some tips, but also some like, hey, in this way we are. And I even say like we collectively as a society. We are screwing up kids. So talk to me about your thoughts on that. Oh, really quick before we start, what is the MFA? Is that a master's in fine arts? Oh, okay. Wow. Impressive.
Andrew Hovelston
It's, uh. I always lead with that in my bio because it gets the hook. And then we ended up not talking about acting at all. We end up, rightfully so, talking about the next generation and coaching kids. But it's a lot of shiny objects for, you know, people in social media, short attention span to go. I guess I'd better listen to this guy.
Dawn Taylor
Maybe because he actually has some letters.
Andrew Hovelston
It's some letters behind his name. Yeah,
Dawn Taylor
I love it. Well, Mr. Letters behind your name. Let's talk about how we're messing up our kids. So what we were just talking about prior to even hitting record is this toxic positivity that is going on in this world right now. And this complete bullshit idea on we should just all be following our hearts. Well let's, let's just go there. Let's just go there. What are your thoughts on this?
Andrew Hovelston
Yeah. I mean, my thoughts are. I have many, many thoughts. My overwhelming thesis and hypothesis are different. But my hypothesis on the grand experiment of life, which is parenting is you need to follow your heart when you can pay for it. That's it. Full stop. Follow your heart when you can pay for it, and when you can learn how to do it with great mental health.
Dawn Taylor
I'm not disagreeing at all.
Andrew Hovelston
One of the biggest challenges, uh, I find. In my time coaching kids is that they are stuck between two worlds and have no navigation on how to bounce back and forth from them. The first world is from their parents, their grandparents, people that are 10 to 20 years older than them. So sorry, 20 to 30 years older than them.
Dawn Taylor
So it's like, whoa, what? Yeah. What kids are you working with?
Andrew Hovelston
All right, well, I grew up in a small town. I. I grew up in a small town. Sometimes that ten gets pushed to, you know, 18 years older. But let's go 20 to, you know, 20 to 30, maybe even 40 years older than that. Right. It grew up in a different time. It was a time where, where 401 K's, where pensions existed, where the cost of living was exponentially lower than it is now. Um, at least in America, where the labor protections were far greater. Where if you didn't have labor protections, your ability to negotiate a living wage in a job was more, um, where even if you took a chance on yourself and your business and your passion when you failed, if you failed, it was far easier due to just the simple economics of life to pick yourself back up numerous times and multiple times. It's not that way right now.
Dawn Taylor
Not at all.
Andrew Hovelston
And and so kids are on social media all the time, which I think is awesome. My wife is an absolute badass, and she runs an awesome online fitness business. And I am a huge fan, I follow a ton of entrepreneurs online who have taught me a ton.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Andrew Hovelston
The reality is that when a social media influencer or not even an influencer, somebody who runs an absolutely great company comes on and they say follow your passion. More often than not, what that is equated to with young people is just putting your passion online. Literally put your passion on Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook. And they're not saying learn how to monetize it. They're not saying, I actually built a personal brand after I built a supplement brand, or after I built the long and boring work of building a plumbing company. Right. Or being a professor for 40 years. Right. And now I have this knowledge as a professor, and somebody taught me how to film myself. Or real estate. You know, that's huge online right now. Real estate.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, ridiculous.
Andrew Hovelston
Just be a real estate millionaire. Sure. Absolutely. You can, you can, you can buy a house for a million bucks now and then. Can you deal with your toilets and termites and tenants? Right. And so a 15 year old just thinks, no, I'm going to put that online and become a YouTuber. Okay.
Dawn Taylor
Mhm.
Andrew Hovelston
Or a Twitch streamer. Right. Because that's my passion. Well the reality is that that's what you see as your passion. If you're going to be a Twitch streamer or a YouTuber, your day to day life is much different than playing video games. It's investing in the tools in order for you to sound good. To look good. It's being okay with a 15, 16, 17, 18 year old brain when you film 12 hours of you playing Grand Theft Auto and you forgot to click record. And the work is now, you think your life is over. And, or I'm an artist. I'm an actor. Right. Follow your passion. I love following my passion, I followed my passion also. Part of my passion was having a marriage and having three kids and their realities that come with that, which means you need to have money coming into your bank account. Now, that doesn't mean that you have to earn the money. It can come from parents who support you or family money that supports you, right? Or a cash windfall that supports you. But unless we talk about that with young people, the simple follow your passion for young people gets incredibly disoriented. Disorienting because I coach them. Right.
Dawn Taylor
Andrew Hovelson
Mhm. Um, let's say a young actor, right, moves to LA and says, well, my parents told me to follow my passion. I'm supposed to follow my passion, but my passion, I'm not passionate about that. I can't pay rent at the end of the month. I'm not passionate about that. I'm really lonely and the rest of my friends are going into a job every day and have a social life that is just a byproduct of working. I'm not. I'm not passionate about that. I thought, following my passion of creating characters in my mind and my body and my spirit was going to be enough. And it's like, well, it's a lot like a marriage, that it's not enough to just follow your passion.
Dawn Taylor
Well, can we talk about two with that? Then becomes this massive feeling of rejection and I'm failing and I suck and all of those things. And then not only that, but then we have this world of people out there. And, I mean, I did an entire podcast on - is the self-help industry harming more than healing? So people know my thoughts on this if you've listened to that episode, but
then we have this whole world of like, no, you just have to be at a higher vibrational frequency and know you just have to be aligning with it, and you just have to fill in the blanks and it's magically going to flow. And I don't agree. I don't agree with that. I talk to people every single day. I talked to someone a little while ago. He literally quit a major job. He's had one client in five years trying to build a business. “But no, this is my passion.” And I'm like. What are you like? Go get a damn job. Like, when did, j-o-b, when did having a job become, like, the ultimate failure in life? And almost this thing to be looked down on instead of hey, you know what? Based on everything from my mental health to my need for security, to my dreams, for my future, to my responsibilities. I actually really just want a paycheck. And then my passions can be my hobbies, my passion can be my side hustle, my passions can be those things. And I truly believe that we are not even just screwing up our kids. We are screwing up ourselves with this. I talked to a young business owner this week and I said, seriously, do me one thing, if nothing else. And he was like, what? And I said, do not make yourself your business. And your business yourself, I said, because then what happens is your worth becomes your business. And if at some point in your life you can no longer do it, you don't want to do it. It doesn't work for what you're doing. You can make your resume up and go get a job and be fine. And he's like, yeah, but what about you? You've been doing this for nine years. And I was like, yeah, and I could get a job tomorrow and be okay with that. And I think that's like, we are screwing that up. We're not teaching anyone responsibility anymore.
Andrew Hovelson
I mean, that's the big thing, right? Is that in our coaching, um, with Southwestern Student Coaching, is that you can follow your passion, but. But far more important. Then your passion or following or the suck it up mentality, right? That's the other thing that we're killing our kids with is just suck it up. I don't care if you don't like it, suck it up, suck it up. And the kids are like, oh, I guess I don't even have any room for passion now, and I just have to suck it up and do stuff I hate for the next 50 years. And that gets disorienting, because then they talk to their friends, they go online and they see, well, these guys are all following their passion. My mom, dad, uncle, brothers, sister have been really successful, and what they're telling me to do is suck it up. And so what's in between? Well, what's in between for us is, passion has to become. It has to become the not the toxic positivity self-help. But the executive skills of what is self-talk is the discipline behind choosing the words you say to yourself and believing them. What is the discipline behind how to set a goal and achieve it? I don't care if your goal is I need to go get a job at Taco Bell, or if your goal is I need to start a little dropshipping business or lemonade stand because that's my passion. None of that matters. The outcome does not matter.
Dawn Taylor
It's the skills that you're developing.
Andrew Hovelson
It is the skill set you're developing. It is 120,000,000% the skill set you're developing. And that goes for top performers. We coach Utah Olympians. We coach people from MIT grad school. We coach people that are high schoolers that are headed into Ivy League schools. And we coach a bunch of people that are unmotivated and on drugs and alcohol. Right? What's far more important than any of the results that they get is their ability to seal with challenges and shorten the time in which they forgive themselves. Learn and then go take action again. So a kid that gets his first C or her first C and spins out of control. Spins out of control like their life is over. Because we've told them to suck it up. Right? And you didn't work hard enough if you didn't get the results that you wanted, is the exact same problem as follow your passion and get all F's. But at least you're following your passion. Because it's not teaching the discipline, the skill set and habits and the mindset that they can go do whatever they want. Go be an engineer. Go be a plumber. And if you want to learn how to, you can make a lot of money just being a plumber, not just being a plumber. That's pejorative. Uh, you can make a lot of money being a plumber if you want to make more money, but also have a little more stress. Build yourself a plumbing business. But you're no longer a plumber. You are now a business owner, right? And so don't look at the guy in your hometown that says, just be a plumber and make millions. You have to figure out how to build that plumbing business, and that takes a different set of skills. And we're not telling that to our kids. I'm saying plumbers can make a lot of money seeing social media. People can be millionaires. Right. We're saying, just go play your French horn and you'll be successful. I live in a building. There's a lot of French horn players here. Success is relative. They might be super happy. I don't know if they have the money they need. I have no idea. Right. But I hope that is not too, I hope that's tangible enough. That were really, really, really messing up the future generation, um, by not giving them a path to run on. I always think of this vehicle ability and mindset, right. And I think about that in business more. But how have we been able to translate that to coaching to 320 kids in nine different countries? Right. What is the vehicle in which you're going to learn the skill set or how I talk about it is what is the framework in which you're going to learn the skill set of overcoming adversity, learning how to succeed with good mental health, and being kind to yourself. Now it could be a chess club. It could be the football team, right? It could be learning how to be valedictorian. But, you need a framework in which to learn those things, and the framework doesn't matter. You just have to have a framework and it can't be only 1 or 2 frameworks. Follow your passion or suck it up. Those aren't frameworks.
Dawn Taylor
No, it's interesting. I was talking to some have a lot of nieces and nephews that I have really cool relationships with, and it was probably four years ago that my one nephew was like, oh, I don't want to be an adult. And I was like, what do you mean? He's like, oh no, I'd rather just kill myself. And I was like, oh, hi, can we have a conversation? Like this is extreme. And we did. We've had so many conversations around this and thankfully he's come out of this headspace. But we had a really interesting conversation. He's like, no. He's like, why would I want to become my parents? And I was like, explain, like define that. What do you mean by that? And he goes, well, look, he's like, think about it. He goes and everyone online is talking about this right now. He's like, yeah, my parents have a job and they're doing their thing. But then they complain about it all the time and bitch about it all the time, and they're miserable at the end of the day. And it doesn't matter how hard you work, you never have enough money. And he's like being an adult really looks miserable. Why would I want to do it? And I remember thinking about that, and we spent hours talking about this and how we could shift this and how we could change this. And I said, you know. Because he's like, you're happy in your work. He's like, how did that happen? And I said, you know, a couple things. One is I stepped out of the expectations that people had of me. And I wasn't afraid to fail.
Andrew Hovelson
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
And I said, I don't know if it's because I had failed so much in my life. I had fallen down so many times in my life that it didn't become scary anymore. Sure. But it was like, yeah, why not? It's not going to fall again. Cool. I know how to get back up. And I think that is a thing that we're not teaching our kids either. Nowadays. Like you can't even fall on a you can't even fall on a playground anymore. I don't know how the state says, but Canada is like, no, no, no, we're gonna make it all foam and we're gonna make it all soft and gentle because we don't want anyone to get bruised. We don't want to get hurt. Right? Like it's gone so far in the opposite direction. It's like we're going to swoop in and rescue you. Anytime there is a problem, anytime there is a discomfort. We don't ever want you to have to face adversity. And I think that our kids need to know that they need to learn how to grieve. They need to learn how to fail. There's consequences for action sometimes. And no, you didn't finish your homework, so you did get in trouble in class. And I'm not going to call your teacher to rescue you. That's just your reality.
Right?
Andrew Hovelson
Yeah. Part of what gets really challenging in parenting. Um, and from the parents that I work with and, you know, parenting myself is that the kids from, you know, about ten years old to maybe 24, 25, have a different idea or definition of what failure is. And while I 1,000,000% believe maybe to a fault, right, that they need more and more and more and more failure and more challenges and more challenges. What we do as parents that we really screw things up on is not acknowledging when they feel like they've had a major failure. Right when there and then. And then giving them the tools. This is the most important part. We all screw up on, is absolutely giving them the tools to recognize, to not discount their failure, but to recognize that next time they can change it. So my eight year old and we're screwing our kids. I mean, I'm gonna screw my kids up, right? But it was like, it was like a valuable lesson. I was like, um, our philosophy in our household is that even in third grade, we're not going to tell you, um, we're going to make sure you get your homework done. Right. Your eight year old brain can remember to do it. But you know what? If you forget that folder on the table, right? Or underneath a chair? That's not our responsibility. It's really not. And what we can help you do is right after you get your homework done, we will remind you the first couple times to put it right in your backpack because that's definitely going with you tomorrow to school. But it's not my job to remind you every single morning because then your pattern is I don't have to think about it right when I get it done because somebody else, mom or dad, it doesn't even matter. You can replace any adult or any brother or sister who will remind me to go on to the next step of my homework, which is actually bringing it to school to turn it in. Okay, long story longer, uh, I'm like, this is amazing. I'm a genius parent. This is like going to my kids who are going to be so successful and whatever they want to be. And, uh, he, you know, my eight year old forgets it, and we're on our way to school and he mass hysteria, he's like, I can't, it's my life is over. I will never, my teacher is going to get so mad and I can never and I get to school and I'm like, all right. And I'm trying to be like, okay, what did we learn? You know, and we'll implant this into your brain. Now, you'll remember it when you're 18 and when you're 38 for bigger challenges to solve. Get to school. And as teachers like what went on and I was like I actually don't know what there's something just besides the homework. And he goes you didn't sign it and I can't, you didn't sign my homework and now I'm not going to get credit for it. And she looks at him or the teacher, she goes, oh that's it. He's like, dude. Get into class. And it was just a breaking of his pattern. And where I kind of look back where I screwed up, is that not I would have never told him to have his homework again. Right. But I could have got down and been like, that really sucks. Do you feel like your life is over? Huh? You know what, it might be, but we're not going to know until we go talk to your teacher. And I think most parents let's forward ten years and their kids are 18 and they're not turning in their homework. Right. You're saying your kid is a failure or you're talking to your son? Why don't you turn in your homework? You're lazy. Right? Why don't you turn in your homework? You're never going to be able to do anything, right. Why don't you turn in your homework? See, I told you, if you just would have turned it in, your results would have been different. When really what we've missed over the last eight years, from 10 to 18, is all of those little times, those tiny little times where that kid didn't raise his hand in class or he or she had another, that kid, even for the popular kids in school, say you're stupid, right? For them. And they're afraid to take that risk and fail. Um, because of how they're going to be judged. And we didn't catch that stuff early on enough. That's saying life is going to be hard. And, you know, this time that you got that B or you got that B, um, you can get an A next time. But it might not just be hard work. It might be some different things. You might need to go ask your teacher for some help, reason you might need to think through the fact that, excuse my French, but you're not a shitty person. Right. You're just around five kids who make you feel terrible about yourself. That would be hard for me to get in any two. And acknowledge that and then say, you know what? You know what, Billy? Johnny? Rachel? It's not going to help you. To blame them. If you want what's the tools that we need to do in order to get that? And if you don't want the A, fine. Or not, fine. I mean, you know, you choose your parenting style if you don't want the A, fine. Um, but what we need to do here is if you get a D and you feel bad. And part of the reason is that you're having a horrible time at school. What can you do to not have a horrible time at school and the results will speak to themselves?
Dawn Taylor
But I have to wonder, like, not even wonder. It's, we don't create critical thinkers as a society anymore. No, we haven't in so many years. And so we expect our kids. We expect these younger generations to process, to think things through, to try things in a new way, a different way. They don't know how. They actually don't know how because nobody has to fight for an answer anymore. I have 72 spices in a spice store. I love using spices when I cook, and I had a 22 year old in my office that day and they're like, I heard you have a crazy cool spice drawer. And I laughed. And it's beautiful. It's very organized in alphabetical order and laid out beautifully, like it's a masterpiece of artwork. And I said, yeah. And they looked at it and they're like, oh, this is life goals. And they went, you know what? I don't even know how to use those though. And I laughed and I said, I said you know what you do and. And she was like. And I said you just play with them.
Andrew Hovelson
Yep.
Dawn Taylor
And she went, what do you mean? And I said, you can Google how to use spices together. You can Google combinations. You can do that. Is that. Or you can open the lid of one and open the lid of another and hold them both under your nose at the same time and smell it and see what happens. Does it smell amazing, or does it smell nasty because you grabbed like, cinnamon and pickle seasoning or something, right? And it's like, oh, that's really bad. Okay, so put one down and try something else. But we don't live in a world that pushes, “Just try it.” Try it and see what happens. Fail, fail. Have it make something that's disgusting, laugh about it, and then try again tomorrow. We don't live in that world anymore. Where it's like, no, if that is making you that miserable, if it's that gross, it's okay to throw it out. It's okay to quit. It's okay to walk away from something. I mean, there's a fine line. There's a fine line of like, no, it doesn't make me happy because you're not actually learning a skill set in that of, like, sometimes there has to be a little bit of like. No, you need to face some discomfort.
Andrew Hovelson
I mean, my theory on this. Right. But whether it's right or wrong, I'm a, you know, I'm still I'm still young enough that people listening to this will be like, man, that guy doesn't know anything, and I'm okay with that. But my theory on this is that, pre-social media pre-pandemic and even pre, you know, probably ten years ago, the rise of the, um, of the idol worshiping of entrepreneurship. I'm an entrepreneur. Right. So, but the rise of entrepreneurship is that the failures often would happen outside of your occupation. So they gave you the safety and framework in which to like to go date someone new. And then you got to be like on and like that. And then you would just tell them on Saturday morning, I didn't have a good time on Friday night, so we're not going to date anymore. And that would be okay, because Monday morning you had some stability of going back to your job. Right? Or maybe I want to be a woodworker. And then you put up the shelf in your house. Nobody knows that you put up the shelf in your house. You just decided after your, you know, your job as a middle manager at Target Corporation that you wanted to be a woodworker. So you put up the shelf in your house in Minnesota and then you put, you know, the nice china on it. And a week later the shelf fell over and you were like, oh, dang. Number one, I didn't enjoy putting up that shelf. And number two, I really suck at it. I don't want to get any better at that. But you know what? I still get to go back to my job on Monday or Tuesday.
Dawn Taylor
Still have that safety, that security, that paycheck.
Andrew Hovelson
Exactly. But now the failure and the trying and the, you know, the challenges are wrapped up in. If I don't succeed now, I can have the outsized returns and therefore I have nothing tomorrow. And I hope that makes sense. But there has to be as your, you know, as you're a kid, you're it's a lot like an entrepreneur from 10 to 25. You have to try things, make mistakes, try things, make mistakes, try things, make mistakes, try things, make mistakes and how to school. However, when anyone feels about the school system right, my kids go to public schools. So that's where I'm coming from. But we coach unschooled kids, home schooled kids, uh, public private charter school kids. So I'm a fan of all of it, right. The one thing about education across all of those barriers, it is a consistent it's a constant of getting slightly better every single day. And so it gives a framework in which kids can fail. And succeed. What they don't realize is part of there terror that we are screwing them up with as adults, right? This has never been part of my narrative, but many adults who say, Hey, you need to do x, y, and z. The framework of their narrative is when they were 18 or 22, they did the same thing. They're in the same job, right? They had the consistency in which to bounce against. Right. And kids are terrified of what happens when I graduate and I'm 18. I don't have that consistency.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, it's so hard. It is so hard on kids right now. And we haven't, we haven't been taught like. 1s I was talking to a friend the other day and. And she's like, I don't know, Don. I don't know when we're talking about business stuff. And and I said, you know what's amazing, and I said, you've really just lived like 12 years as an adult. That's right. What do you mean? And I said, well, 0 to 20 is kind of like your formative years. For easy math, I was like, those are your formative years where it's like, you're in school, you have parents making sure you're fed and you have clothes and you have food on the table, hopefully, and all these things. Right. And so those are your formative years. I said, so you've really only lived from 20 to 30. And I said, and at this point, the fact that you're unhappy with where you're at or you're worried about your future or all of these things, I said. You still have 30 to 40, 40 to 50, 50 to 60, 60 to 70, 70 to 80, 80 to 90, 90 to 100. Because of modern medicine we are living healthy into our hundreds. Mhm. Yes, you may have screwed up one life that ten years real hard. I was like, you have seven more.
You have seven more of those. Think about that for a second. And she was like, huh? And I said, so you could screw up like another five and still have two good ones. I said, but you're not a tree. Move. In the words of I think it's like Charles Duhigg that says that, right? And it's like, you can shift, you can change, you can adjust, you can pivot, you can do all of those things. And I know so many business owners that have shut down companies in the last couple of years and just been like, no, I want a job. Like I want someone else to worry about the clients coming in the door. I want someone else to have to pay the insurance and someone else to carry the stress, and someone else to manage HR and someone else to do all those things. I just, I just want a job.
Andrew Hovelson
Yes, I want to. And I am seeing this 5:00 so often right now. I want to go to happy hour. If I partake in that on Saturday morning, I want to get up and go to a runner's group. You know, on Tuesday afternoon I either want to go to I want to go to Bible study or I want to play, you know, I want to play rec basketball and I don't care if it doesn't make me millions tomorrow. You know, one of the, here's something that I really think about often. And I'm not sure how we solve this, but Gary Vee, however anyone feels about him, right? He's loud. He's been.
Dawn Taylor
He's a love it or hate it guy.
Andrew Hovelson
20 year olds. Gen Zs are not lazy. They're not lazy. They have options. And I agree with that. And what I think people are seeing when they see lazy is that those adults that are saying they're lazy don't remember options. They don't remember options when they were 18, 19, 20. They said they don't remember. They say I didn't really have any options. I was going to work in the family farm or, you know, my dad was running a Northwestern Mutual insurance business.
Dawn Taylor
So I had to step into the family business.
Andrew Hovelson
Yeah. Or my mom was in sales, right. Or HR. And so I just did that. I didn't have any options. And then they translate that. And so I went to work. Right. That's what those adults. So I went to work and something that I maybe didn't exactly love, but I just went to work. And they're translating that to an 1819, 20, 22 year old who has options there saying you're lazy and where we've failed as parents. Is to help them critically think about which option to take at any given moment, and then be okay with the consequences. Maybe it succeeds, maybe it fails. And, um, and we'll help guide you as elders in this tribe of homo sapiens to, uh, to really the next phase if it doesn't work out. You know, the best thing that any young person could ever do is go try a bunch of businesses. Have them fail. Go work at a bunch of startups and get laid off. Right?
Two things can be true that the best thing somebody could ever do is when you're 22, start a financial practice for the next four years and just do it and just do it. And if you like golf, close a lot of deals on the golf course. You know and retire with money if that's what you want. And build your family and be home at night. And all those things can be true at the same time. We've just had a huge gaping hole in our ability as parents and as elders in this tribe of humans. Help people to help young people understand. What goes into their decision making? And so because we don't understand that and we're not evolved enough, um, as adults to understand how to help them think about their way of thinking, we call them lazy. That's it. We call them lazy, and we're screwing them up. We're screwing them up because they've heard that they're lazy from 15 to 25. And it's just not true. It's not true. You know, go to college. Great. I've gone to seven years of higher education. I believe in college. Right. But go to college and they say, great, are you going to pay for college? And then you say, well, I haven't been able to do that because of the economy the last 20 years and the higher education costs. And they're like, okay, so why should I like - Did you graduate college with debt? Well, yeah, I did. How much was it? It was 20, 20 grand in debt and I worked my tail off and they're like, well, I could-
Dawn Taylor
Why would I want to do that?
Andrew Hovelson
They're thinking, why would I want to do that? And they're all thinking. They're also thinking I could pay off 20 grand in debt, but I'm not stupid. I could also graduate with $200,000 in debt. Like, you're not comparing apples to apples. They're asking, no, you have enough money saved for me, mom and dad. Well, I don't, so. Good luck. They're like, so stop, stop! Help! Help me! They're begging for some help on some critical decision making skills and tools that they can put into their tool rather than judgment about, uh, the habits that they have.
Dawn Taylor
You know my nephew a few years ago, and I'm so freaking proud of him for this. We were talking and we were driving. We went for a drive and he's like, I don't know what to do. Like, I hate school. I don't know what to do when I graduate, like help. And so we're driving around and I started just pointing out jobs. And I was like, we're driving down the street. And I said, okay. I said, here's part of it. If I say we're not taught what our options even are after high school, we're not taught this. And I said, what careers do you know of? What jobs do you know of? And he listed, like aunts, uncles, parents. And like, maybe like the teacher, the lawyer or the doctor, you know, like you're basic 5 or 6 that a teenager even knows about. And I said, okay. So I pulled over on the side of a street in a residential area and I said, okay, that bench right there, somebody was the graphic designer that created the ad that went on it. Somebody does the wrapping that actually created the signage that put it on there. Somebody else works for the city that maintains it. And he's like, oh! And I said, now let's look at the house. I said, you have the landscape or you have the landscape architect. You have the contractor, the builds that you have, the plumber, the drywall or the mud or like. And I started to like. list off just like all the different kinds of careers. Just sitting right there in front of someone's house in a residential neighborhood. And I said, this is what you don't understand. I said, there's 10,000 or more, 100,000 whatever types of jobs you could have. When you start asking people what their careers are or what their parents did, you're like, that's a job. Like, who does that, right? There's all these. like, crazy careers out there. And I said, so instead of thinking about what you want to do, what is the lifestyle you want to have? And he was like, what do you mean? And I said, do you want the same lifestyle as your parents or an uncle that you know, or of us? Or do you want to be able to buy a pair of shoes a month? Do you want to go on trips? What kind of house do you want to live in? And we started talking about these things, and then we went to a restaurant that had, um, like the kraft paper on the tables to draw on for kids. We sort of mapping it out, and I was like, okay, this is the kind of cost it's going to be for a mortgage for a house like that or rent. This is the kind of cost it's going to take for you to travel. Okay. So, now whatever income you make, you're like, all your taxes are coming off of that because we live in a place of high taxes. Canada. And I said, so this is the kind of money you're going to have to make. To have the lifestyle that you desire to have in your future. And he went, oh, is it okay, so now let's break down what kind of jobs you could do. I said, but then let's also look at do you want a job that just pays you a set amount? There's a natural ladder climb? Or do you want a job where your, like, action is equal how much you're going to get paid. Yeah, because those are two very different things. And I said, do you want, like, way more time at home with your family? Do you want way more time? Like do you want the hustle of the work? I said, these are the things that I think we need to be talking to our kids about. And so he was like, no, I like this, and I like this, and I like this. And we started having these conversations and I said, okay, so now what skill sets do you need to have to thrive in that industry if you're going to be in sales and dealing with people? I said, here's what you need to know. You need to know teamwork. You need to know customer service. You know how to manage difficult people. You need to know how to schmooze and talk to people. You need to know how to pick up a phone call you need. Right. And I said, so where can you learn those skills? And then we started mapping that out and I was like, you need to get a job at a restaurant. And he's like, what? And we were sitting in Boston Pizza and I was like, apply for a job here. And he goes seriously? And I was like, look around. I said, you're going to have to learn how to deal with hustle. You're going to have to learn how to deal with it when you're tired. You have to push through. You're going to have to learn how to deal with the person who screams at you, because there's lettuce in the salad that they ordered and you're like, are you for real, moron? You order this right? I was like, you have to learn all those things. Like, those are all skill sets you can develop. I said, now you tell the boss you're willing to learn anything in any role. I said, and then what you're going to do is I said, you're going to I said, this is my recommendation. You now go and you show up in a decent outfit. I said to every single real estate office in this city and you ask if you can volunteer. And just learn. And you will gift them a couple hours of your time of day to just learn that. Here's the thing, his passion is in real estate. But he is still, he is killing it in his first year or first two years of real estate compared to most people in the industry. If you look at the average over across Canada, he's killing it with his numbers. But guess what? Even killing it with your numbers, he still needs a job to pay his day to day bills.
Andrew Hovelson
Course he does. Of course he does.
Dawn Taylor
Yes, because he has to build this. He has to build it. And he's young and he's still all these things. And I was like, at no point does that make you a failure. At no point does that make you less than. At no point does that devalue you. I was like, if you need a part time job on the side for the first five years while you build this, rock on, and you're going to be way less stressed out than anybody else who's like, but no, I hung my shingle and now I have a business card and business will start flowing.
Andrew Hovelson
It's, you know, it's two things, right? The, the. A huge mantra in the personal development field is success leaves clues. We've all heard it over and over and over and over and over and over. All right. We, you know, if we're talking about the kids and parents and, you know, aunts and uncles, what you did, there was a great service that you gave them way more clues than can just be found on a pamphlet. Right. Success leaves clues, as in. Hey, do you have a significant other that you want to be with? Right? Well guess what. Your hours are going to be 14 to 16 hours a day. And also, the part of the success is you need to get her on board with that. We've all heard that right. Let's say, you know a young person. Let's say they're a young mom or a young dad that happened accidentally or not, accidentally or success leaves clues. Just follow my passion or just go grind like you're your nephew in the real estate space. Well, who's going to take care of those kids? How are you going to keep the roof over your head? Part of the clues that you need to do is then you need to go model young people that have kids and who took care of the kids. Do you have parents there that allow you then to go work hard? Do you have a second job? What are you juggling? Right. So the success leaves clues. And then the other thing that that translates to, I talk a lot about in my coaching is, is the juice worth the squeeze?
Because you know what? I'd love to I. love to sell the dream. I think you can do whatever you want. As long as you put your mind to it. And you get around the right people and you, and you have the right self-talk, right? The squeeze is there. Or sorry, the juice is there. But is the squeeze worth it? Yeah, right. If you don't want to read a ton of books and put a lot of things into action, don't be in the self-development space. Yeah, right. Is the squeeze there? If you want to be a doctor. Right. But you don't like sciences. And your parents are doctors. Don't
go. What are you doing? Don't do it. My business partner has it. He's got like. It's such a funny story. It's endearing every time he tells it. His parents were famous opera singers in Germany. Okay, so well-respected careers. German opera singers are paid by the government quite a bit, and they have really good standard of living. Okay. And he tells a story about. He was in seventh or eighth grade sometime, and his mom was like, you know, what are you going to do for your job? Or maybe he was eating at 1112. It doesn't really matter. And he's like, well, I'm I'm an opera singer. And she goes, she goes, Adam. You don't show up on time to your voice lessons. You don't sing in the choirs. You don't warm up every day, right? You scream on the playground with your buddies. Like misuse of your voice.
Dawn Taylor
She's like, all the things you should not be doing.
Andrew Hovelson
I appreciate that because I'm your mother. But you don't want to be an opera singer because the squeeze is not something that is enjoyable to get the juice.
Dawn Taylor
Mhm. I love that. I love that so much. And I think these are the conversations we need to be having with kids. We need to be having these with teenagers, with youth. And really look at like, what are the skills that they need? What are the tools that they need to have? What are the. character traits that they need to have to be successful in anything and everything that they do.
Andrew Hovelson
Here's one of the here's a big tip for any parent that is listening or aunt or uncle that's listening. Okay. Students 18, 16 to 25. are getting stories inputted into their brain. Most of the time it's from Google and social media. A lot of the time. It also comes from parents or family members. Okay. One of the biggest, biggest, biggest benefits you can give your kids is to tell the stories right of what happened to you when they were your age. Now here's the key. We all have heard when I was your age, I did this when x, y and z. You cannot present it like that. Think of it as presenting them with a Google search or a menu. Here are the actions that I took. Here were the results. You go and figure out how you feel about it. Not when I was your age, I was grinding and you're not grinding, so you're not going to be successful. It's hey, you know, when I was your age or when I was not even your age, when I was in 10th grade, right? What happened to me is that we were in a really small town. Okay. And I could play all the sports. I could do all the arts. Right. And I realized that my friends were actually much better athletes than I. And I had to start this process of what was my identity? And when I was a junior in high school, I had to leave our subsection basketball game to go to an audition for college. That was a really, really big deal for me. Okay because I had to say no to something else. Yeah. Right now, young Billy. Bobby. Johnny. You don't have to do that. But do you have any questions about that? Because that was my experience of a high score. And then you follow that up with “Do you have any questions about that?” Right. And then you share. What's your experience right now? Because they actually might be much more aligned with you as parents. They just might have a different framework that they're seeing their experience through. And it might be socially, it might be an extracurricular club. It might be a teacher that they're like, I don't even like social studies. I love math, but this social studies teacher gets me going every day. But you have to ask. You have to share stories. So, let me be really clear. I can get on a rant. You share stories with them of your time when it was their age with zero judgment of what their time should be. Right? Ask them if they have any questions about the story, the menu that you've laid out. Right. And then number three is. What's your experience in life? What can you relate to? What can you not relate to? And then shut up. Shut up.
Dawn Taylor
Thank you. Sweet Jesus. Shut up! They know you're successful. They can see that you guys go on more vacations than their friends, right? They know that you work until midnight and that you've missed some games, right? And that there's no judgment in that. They know that, you don't have to retell them, that that's what it takes in order to be you. Shut up. And shut up.
Dawn Taylor
I love that. Just shut up. One of, the only thing I would add to that is. I've often talked to our nieces and nephews and the kids in my life about where we thought we were going to be when we were 15 and 16 and 17 and 18 and 22 and 25 and 30. And where we've ended up and how different those are and how at different points along that path. This is something that my husband and I do at least once a year. As we sit down, we should do it on our anniversary. And we talk about like, hey, when we started dating, and for us, like I'm talking like 1996, like it's a long time ago. And it was like when we started dating, where did we think we'd be? What was our future? What were our goals? What were our dreams? So, what do we think we were going to be after high school? What do we think we'd go to school for, training for? And then what do we actually do? And all the million pivots along those years to be like, hey. If this one doesn't work, or if you think this is your giant goal, in your dream. It could change 5000 times between now and when you are old. And that is beautiful. And that is totally okay because some people my husband made a comment yesterday or two days ago. He's like, I swear God put me on this earth to hold your feet to the ground.
Andrew Hovelson
Sure.
Dawn Taylor
He's like, I literally think that is my job in this world is to hold your feet solid on the ground. And I laughed. But if you know me, my personal life is like, yeah, that sums me up. And I was, but I was always the kid where, like my brother and sister, chose a career. They did it right out of high school and they're still doing it to this day. My dad did the same. Like that was just my life. My aunts and uncles, my cousins, like everybody, they've all had one singular career and have not ever deviated from that plan.
Andrew Hovelson
I find that, uh, extremely envious. I am envious of that, of them.
Dawn Taylor
Well, and I have that sometimes I have that. But I also think if you're not that person, like, I wish I had had someone in my life that was like, it's okay if you don't have a ten year goal. It is okay if you change careers at some point. It is okay if you think you're going to go right and you end up going left, all of that is actually okay. Because that's one thing that has always caused this weird feeling of like, I don't fit in in my world. Because I've shifted so many times, but that's what makes me, me.
Andrew Hovelson
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
And so I think that that's part of it too, is like, talk about those things with kids, those conversations that I have with my nieces and nephews. Are so interesting and so valuable when we have those conversations of like, you know what? That's amazing. And I love that for you. But at the same time, hey, guess what? Sometimes that plan will not go according to plan. Sometimes it's going to totally fall apart. Sometimes you're going to make a really silly decision. And somehow you're going to actually make it out the other side and you're going to learn so much from it, and then you're going to thrive in something else. And that's okay. And you know what? That one might suck too. But then there's another one. And sometimes that's totally normal and okay. And I think we need to teach our kids that. We need to teach them that, that it's like, no, you might hate this job. This might not be the thing for you. I hated working at a clothing store in high school because I was like, no, that dress looks really awful on you. Try a bigger size or try something different. Like it didn't match my personality. But I loved working like a service desk at Zellers because I like the sassiness of it, and I liked the people that came in and yelled over Pokemon bedding, and I thought it was hilarious that I was the one who had to call the cops, and someone was stealing jeans and running out the front door. And, you know, like, that matched my personality in a totally different world.
Andrew Hovelson
Absolutely. Love bartending here in New York City. I loved it, I got to watch sports. I got to talk with people who loved to watch sports. I got to do my version of manual labor on high volume sports bar. You do not stop at 12 hours.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, not at all.
Andrew Hovelson
People are like, why don't you run a restaurant? And I would be like, there is nothing I would love to do less than do what my bosses and their bosses had to do. That sounds absolutely miserable, when what? The outside world, you know, find yourself in the story, what the outside world thinks and what kids think about their parents is, oh, you love to bartend, so you should be in the restaurant industry.
Dawn Taylor
No, no, I really like to bartend.
Andrew Hovelson
Yeah. That's it. It was great. I got to go home at the end of the night where they were freaking out about the electricity, and I said, hey, your ice machine doesn't work. I'll be back in time for brunch. I see you later.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, it's so true. I even now I've had friends that own stores and restaurants and different things and I, I'll go and help.Like if someone's like, I'm like, I'll come on a till, like, I love that. Like, I often joke about that I'm going to be the 70 year old, like running a cash register somewhere and doing that because I'm like, why not? It's awesome. Like that's something I actually genuinely enjoyed.
Andrew Hovelson
Yep.
Dawn Taylor
And I think, yeah, I think we need to look at our kids a little bit different. Andrew thank you, thank you, thank you for letting me take up so much of your time today.
Andrew Hovelson
Thanks. This was fun, having me. Thanks for having me. I could talk about this stuff for hours and hours and, uh, the beauty, the beauty dawn of anyone that's listening. I said this at the beginning is the jury, and the verdict is still out. Because I have a 12, eight, and a four year old, and we'll see how badly I screw them up, and then we'll come back and we can, we can roll this.
Dawn Taylor
We can record this again. Life lessons. Yeah. My new life lessons abundantly. So totally for anyone looking to connect with Andrew and the amazing work he's doing with you, you can totally check out our show notes located at the Tailor Waka for all of his contact information and how to get ahold of him. Thank you again for hanging out with us and for the listeners for staying tuned in for this whole thing. And also, we'd love to hear what part of this really shifted you, triggered you, or made you think different about how your parenting or how you are behaving or acting as an uncle grandparent, whatever role you have in someone's life.
Subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcast. And if you love the show, leave a reading or a review and your I can't wait for our next coffee.
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Dawn Taylor hosts renowned Canadian painter Giselle Denis on the podcast. They explore Giselle’s career as an artist and how her passion for art combined with hard work and will power gave her the necessary drive to succeed through years of struggle to gain recognition.
Giselle shares an analogy that has guided her life as she was able to realize success: the analogy of starting her journey as an aircraft carrier on the ocean carrying far too much and moving too slowly. She streamlined her life’s boat by removing distractions and things that weren’t serving her so she could move with more agility into artistic success.
Dawn and Giselle discuss why Giselle believes it’s of the utmost importance to be yourself in whatever you do and not strive to copy someone else’s success. Giselle explains some of her early art career struggles and why she doesn’t coach other artists. The episode is a unique portrait of the hard work behind a prominent artist.
About Giselle Denis:
I connect to people in a unique way through my Live Painting Experience. Art has always had a way of breaking down barriers. Time and again it has provided a place where strangers can find common ground and open the door to communicate with one another. I paint Hope. My message is Hope. My story is Hope and my vision is all about Hope.
I have a goal to raise $1 million for charity. My live painting for charities has raised over $765,000. One of my paintings sold for $50,000 for Little Warriors. I donate 100% of the money raised through my paintings.
I couldn't be happier doing what I love and sharing it with the world. Thank you for reading and for showing interest in my journey.
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Resources:
“Smart Women Finish Rich: 9 Steps to Creating a Rich Future” by David Bach
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Dawn Taylor - The Taylor Way: website | facebook | instagram | linkedin
Giselle Denis: website | instagram | youtube
TranscriptDawn Taylor 00:09
Hello, hello. Today on The Taylor Talks podcast, we have the amazing Giselle Denis. She's a world renowned artist, she's a mom, she's a wife, she's a business owner. And this woman has more drive and hustle than most people I've met in my life. But stick around as we're gonna dive into the topic of the grind behind the beauty, what it actually has taken her to get where she is, and some of the amazing things she's learned along the way. I walked away from this recording was so many new strategies for my own life and things I want to change in my own business. So really hope that you enjoy this one as much as I do. So, after the show, listen for instructions on where to find a super fun giveaway. It might even include some of her art.
Dawn Taylor 00:53
Hey, hey, hey, welcome to The Taylor Talks. I am hanging out with, as you heard, the amazing and beautiful Giselle Denis, the world renowned artist. So conversation that Giselle and I've had over the years, is how easy it looks from the outside. And there's this whole girl boss mentality right now, this, like, it's just so simple and have alignment and flow, and it's just so beautiful and easy. And the hard conversation we want to dive into today is that's not realistic. That's not the reality of it. That's not actually how most businesses are built. So Giselle, let's dive into it. Tell us a little bit about yourself and how this all started for you.
Giselle Denis 01:48
That's a loaded question. So I've always been an artist, I grew up in an artist home, and just always, always painted. And I started selling my work when I was about 14 years old. I learned realism and I was doing portrait work. And that's how a lot of artists start out selling their work, is, you know, finding a niche. So for me, it was portraits and pencil, and my work doesn't look anything like that now, but I learned really young that people wanted to buy something that I made with my own hands. So that was very appealing to me, I loved to do it anyway, and if people were gonna hire me and give me money to do something that I love with my hands, like, that's amazing. So I just kind of kept going with it. I went to college and studied music for four years. And when I finished college a year later, I got married. And then it was like, okay, now what? What do I want to do? And I just kept going with my art, but as most people know, art sales can be few and far between. And I didn't know how to, like, make a respectable adult income, like, what do I do? So I thought, I'm going to have my own little house cleaning company for a year. I'll work my own hours and the rest of the time I get to control when I work, when I can paint, and I thought I'll do that for one year. And it turned into five years. I know.
Dawn Taylor 03:09
You mean you weren't a millionaire in the first year?
Giselle Denis 03:13
I worked really, really hard. I I didn't hate cleaning, always. But near the end there I was getting a little frustrated with oh my gosh, it's been this long, like, when am I going to stop doing all this? So I thought how about I try - because I was selling my work in between in every single, like, any kind of art show I could find I would do. And I just really exhausted myself. But I had more energy back when I was younger. So I thought okay, if I was making $1200 bucks a month house cleaning, and I thought to myself if I could make $1,200 in art sales every month this summer, I'll quit cleaning just for the summer and see how it goes. And then I never looked back. I did it. I was able to do it. And then more, my clients all said, like, you're not gonna come back cleaning. And they believed in me, like, I hoped they were right. And I didn't look back. As far as income and sales go, it's been a roller coaster. It's not consistent. It's been more up and down most of the time. But people don't realize when they first, like - yeah, like you say before, like, live here - people think, like, oh my god, she got famous overnight or something. And obviously, most of the time it doesn't look that way. I've been married 19 years. And that's when I house cleaned for the first five years. So I quit cleaning and have been doing art full time for 14 years. And so it's been 14 years. It's not, like, it hasn't been five years, it hasn't been 3, it's been 14. And I bet you probably about year 10 is when I was like, okay, I'm making a respectable adult income now. That's how long it took.
Dawn Taylor 04:55
Okay so let's just pause on that for a sec. Like for anybody listening thing to this: 10 years. Like it took 10 years to get to the point where you were like, I'm an adult making a real income. And those were 10 years of just, like, okay, so only because I've been on the inside a little bit of your business, like, I've sat in your studio and wired paintings and filled out spreadsheets and, like, I've done some of those parts. So I've seen the crazy. I've driven with you to Calgary to hang art in lobbies of skyscrapers, like, I've done a little bit more behind the scenes than probably the majority of people have with you, right, but, like, this isn't you just sitting at home listening to music and being like, well I'm painting and this is all lovely. Like, talk about like the work that actually went into it. Like, what kind of hours have you put into this? What has the drive been? Like the drive but also like the grunt, like, the you know what I'm talking about. Like the hustle that's actually had to go into this to get where you were at the 10 year mark.
Giselle Denis 06:07
I think that thing that's kept me going is the chutzpah, the passion and love I have for what I'm doing. I love to paint, I can't see myself doing anything else ever with my life. I don't know, I just finished this huge, my biggest commission of my entire career, they were pieces that I made for the Sherwood Park Community Hospital. And they were 8 feet by 16 feet, the first painting, and the second painting was 8 by 6 feet. And my husband, when he watched me make them the whole time - not as a creep, but as like he was videotaping me, taking pictures, and documenting the whole thing - and he said I can't believe how much will it takes to do these. And I've never actually heard anyone put it into words like that before. I'm like, yeah, like, of course. But from someone watching me do the work and him setting, like it's exhausting just setting me up for the work. But he can see and feel how much will it took. So I think I have a strong will in me that... like, don't get me wrong, before I ever made any money, like literally $7,000 a year for a long, long, long time, I was happy. I was doing what I loved. I mean, my husband had a regular income. So he was able to, like, carry me through all those years of making very little. I always hoped that I would be where I am now. But I never would have imagined even as much as how well I've done now. But it has been a struggle. I hadn't had any help. It's funny when you want an art gallery to represent you, to help your career at the beginning when you need the help, my experience has been really, like, they're just not helpful at all. Nobody wants you when you're nobody. And then some people start wanting you when you're somebody but when you're somebody finally you don't really need them. Like do I need a gallery in my own city right now? I don't need a gallery in my own city. I could really love to, it'd be cool. I'm not even really actively looking right now for a gallery in another city. Like, I kind of cycle through my sort of seasons of okay, I'm going to try and submit to these other galleries to get some representation in a different city. But I found the most success for me has been going to that city for whatever purpose and you build your audience one person at a bloody time. One person at a time. So I just got back from Saskatoon painting in a charity function. I was just invited to come and do this piece for this room, there's probably 800 people in the room. So lots of good advertisement. I have a goal to raise a million dollars for charity. So that was another thing to, like, we just come up with clever ways to get my name out there, my art out there. I've done as best as we could with what is follows the alignment, with what aligns with our values and our desires, and what we want to do. Another thing that's really helped me is I like to talk about, have you heard my boat analogy?
Dawn Taylor 09:03
I'm... maybe, but please share it with us again.
Giselle Denis 09:05
Picture your life, or I would picture my life as a boat, an aircraft carrier, like the hugest boat that you can imagine on the ocean. And an aircraft carrier has helicopters and a landing pad for helicopters, planes. It's got places for the army, it's just this monstrosity of a city of a boat. Okay? And it moves very slow. And it has everything on it, everything and everyone on it. And as I've kind of moved along the ocean of my career, I was like, oh, this is not working for... I'm sinking and I'm drowning. So how can I pare it down and take everyone's... take the people off the boat that I don't need, the things off the boat that I don't need, the expectations, the, you know, things that people put on your boat. They didn't even know how it got there. How did that even get there? It's weighing me down. So I I've taken off all, as much as I can, as much as I've, now I have a tiny speedboat with the things that I decided this is what I want to do. These are the things that I've decided that I have intentionally put there to help me go along my way, and I go much further, much faster. I'm happier, I'm not weighed down by other people, other things, just the world around me, it's been really hard to do that. And you let people down. People are, you know, for the most part... I mean, I don't usually hear about stuff like that, but I would expect that, you know, you disappoint people. Because it's just, like, I don't have the capacity to have the world on my boat. So I just want this small little boat and go, and people who really love me will understand and know that, like, it's just I have to, otherwise I'll die. I hope that makes sense. I hope I'm saying it right.
Dawn Taylor 10:53
No, that's a beautiful analogy.
Giselle Denis 10:56
Yeah, it's really helped. You know, when you kind of decide, and it's hard to know at the start. Like, most people probably do start off their lives and their careers that way, like, I want to do everything. And another example would be like, why doesn't she paint...? Why does she just paint flowers? And I'm like, well, if you really dig into it, it's not the only thing I paint. But, like, why don't you only paint this, like this just flowers or just nature? And I was like, well, okay, here's the how I say that: if you paint everything, you'll be remembered for nothing. So if your business, for example, if you, you know, if you're a coach, cool, but what specifically do you coach? The more you, like, narrow it down, you have a niche... the best advice I've ever been given, I went down to San Francisco and I heard about this like an art critic kind of guy, but he's really interesting. And so I went down and hired him for a couple hours just to sit down and talk with him about like, you know, if I'm missing anything, I really would love to know what your opinion is on my life and my career, what I'm doing. And as far as moving forward, like, do you have any tips for me? And he basically said, you know what, I think you're doing the right, you're on the right track. I paid him to tell me that you're doing a great job. He said, the best advice he said was, find something that no one else is doing and be the best at it. Yeah. Cool. I like that. So, you know, for me, you know, one thing is don't compare. I do my hardest. And it's a daily decision to not compare myself to other artists, other business people, women, anything.
Dawn Taylor 12:34
Women are the worst at that.
Giselle Denis 12:37
I just, like, okay, don't make apologies for who you are. And what does be who you are really mean? And so I've been able to, like... I mean, social media is great and stuff for work but, like, I try not to use it too much for my entertainment. And it's just, like, helped me go what, you know, live painting, for example, it's not for everybody. And so many artists say oh my god, I want to be like you, I just want to paint like you, I want to be, I want to paint, I want to be live painter just like you, teach me how, teach me teach me teach me... and I'm like, oh my God, frikkin people. I'm like, you don't want to be like me. Why would you want to be like me?
Dawn Taylor 13:15
Okay, say that again, you don't want to be like me.
Giselle Denis 13:19
You don't want to be like me, why do you want to be like me? I am me. I already exist. There doesn't need to be another Giselle. There doesn't need to be another Dawn. There needs to be... you have a responsibility as a human being, as a artist, entrepreneur, businesswoman, whatever it is you do, you have a responsibility on this earth to pull out the best parts of who you are and be that person. Because the world needs you to be you. The world doesn't need you to be another me, like, you know. Who's your favorite artist, like who, like, people always ask me that. Like, who is your role model, who's your, all this stuff, and that stuff's cool... but, like, I don't intentionally try and paint like anyone else. Like, I love Monet. I love Van Gogh, of course. But I don't sit there and, like, try and copy their paintings and paint like them. It's just like, take a scene that you love and paint it what that looks like to you. And however those brushstrokes come out onto your canvas, let that be your voice. Let that come out how it comes out, and don't try and, like, when there's little things that, like, the nuances of how you hold your, seriously, people want me to, like, literally.... They want, like, I'm gonna do it exactly like that. And I've seen like really disturbing copies of my work that they're trying to sell, and I'm just, like, guys, like, stop. Just, you know, do... it looks bad.
Dawn Taylor 14:45
So let's dive into that for a sec, though. When people are trying so hard to copy, and lots of people have said over the years, right? Like no, no, they're copying you, like, take it as a form of flattery. I often look at it as like, it's actually genuinely sad to me. Like, where have we lost ourselves? Where have we, as a society, gotten to this point where we can't be original anymore? Right? And the failure or the fear of all of these things behind it, where it's like, no, no. Like, what is it? What is it about that, do you think? And being that insecure?
Giselle Denis 15:20
Insecurity. They don't want to put the time in to figure out, you know.
Dawn Taylor 15:25
Oh, there we go.
Giselle Denis 15:26
Right? They want the easy way, like, well, I just want to, like, you know, I want to have 11,000 followers on Instagram, and I want to be famous and paint in all these places, and do, like, then go ahead. Like, go figure out how you're going to do that. Go figure that out. But, like, one of the ways, for example, I decided not to do that I've been ridiculed for is I don't coach other artists. I have no desire to do that. Here's a funny story. I had a lady who was insistent that I see her for coffee. We're going to meet for two hours, she's going to give me $150, she's going to e-transfer me right away. And we're going to talk, and I'm going to coach her for two hours. And we're going to be on this date. I was like, okay, there's no way that's happening. And oh, did you just tell me what I'm worth?
Dawn Taylor 16:15
That is so funny.
Giselle Denis 16:17
What? You can keep your $150. No, we're not meeting. I don't do this. Because it's one of the things that I took off my boat ,like, no, no. I've never coached artists. I can talk to you about things. But as far as like, I get an email almost a day about from an artist who wants me to basically coach them and tell them how I've done everything. Tell me everything. Tell me how you've done, how did you get to this, and I want to know everything so I can do it, I want to be just like you, I want to do all the things just like you. And, like, I don't know, flattery to me isn't appealing at all. I'm just like, I don't know, like I just say, you know, I would have to spend months with you to figure out what your end goals are. I bet you don't even know the answers to those questions. There's a whole shit ton of work you got to do before I could even sit down and talk with you. Could I do all that? Yeah, I could quit my job and coach. I could quit my job and teach. I could do all these things. And I'm like, but I don't want to do that. And I decided that's not what I'm doing. This is what I'm doing. And that's what I'm going to continue doing. Sometimes, like, you know, little things come up. And I leave space for those things. Because I'm not so like, no, this is exactly how my day goes, or this is exactly how my year is gonna go. I don't plan out all the... exactly. I want to leave space open for... if I fill everything up with all this unnecessary things that I let people say that I should do, it's such a frickin waste of time. And to do what, for what, to accomplish what? Exactly. So I can hold your hands? I can hold your hand through this whole thing? And I'm not, you know, I'm being maybe a little bit too... this is just years of people trying to, like, suck from me. And I'm just, like, if I feel like you want something from me, I don't, I have no time for you.
Dawn Taylor 18:08
So, no, but like, here's the thing. This is literally what this whole podcast is about, is the conversations that nobody's having. Right? And the conversations that people are scared of, or there is shame attached to them, or frustrations. Like, this is literally what this conversation is about. And not even just like the rant about it, but, like, no no no. It takes hard work. Like it has taken you so much work and so much effort. Like, I remember one point in your career, and I hope it's okay to say this, you were like, I don't remember the last time I had a day off. It's been literally, like, months since I had a day off. Because all week, right? It was like painting and painting and emails and building frames and canvases and supplies and, like, all of the million things that had to happen. While being a wife and a mom and you have an acreage, you have to take care of all the things. But then it was also, like, what Wednesday you'd start prepping for the weekend of like going to an art fair, or going to a street thing, or you're at a craft fair, you're at a thing right? You hang it all up and then sit there for 12 hours and tear it all down, like, I did a weekend for you. Right? It's exhausting and the energy of the people, and the energy of all that stuff. Like okay, a) people appreciate these damn makers out there that are actually putting their time and energy and effort into this. And yes, it might cost more than an Ikea painting. It should. Like it should cost more because their blood sweat and tears have gone into it, right? But with that--
Giselle Denis 19:41
And then just because you're an artist, people think they can barter with you. Because you're an artist on the street or an artist at a market or an artist in the studio, they think they can barter with you. And you're, like, a lot of artists let that - that's a whole other story - but a lot of artists let people do that. And that's really the word, you let them. You have to decide, like, you put a value on that piece of work, and you have all your reasons for putting that value on there, but if you aren't confident in that price you put on there, you will get pushed around. Like all the time. And people will, it'll get around, word will get around, like, oh, no, she'll have a studio sale in like three months. Every year she does big studio sale, so don't buy from her till then. And you'll get 70% off at her blowout sale. Or yeah, you know if you talk to her you can get a deal. Like, it's like... and I never have studio sales. I don't have sales. My prices only go up every year. Right? That's it. And my paintings aren't, and I see other artists work out there who've been doing a lot way less longer than me... way less long. Maybe there's a better way to say that? Who have not been doing it near as long as me, and you're charging like twice as much as me, and I was like, oh, okay, okay, cool. Like, fine. Like, if you can get those prices, cool. Go for it. I've chosen to have my work priced at a certain level. And then every year it goes up. And... anyway, that's a whole other story. Can I just say too how much I hate 'Boss Babe? I hate that. I hate girl boss, girl boss, boss babe. And I have my reasons why I hate all that.
Dawn Taylor 21:20
It is my biggest pet peeve. Like, I hate it too.
Giselle Denis 21:24
I had to do, like, interview questions for this other thing I'm answering questions for. And one of the questions asked was, what has it mean or what does it mean for you being a woman in business, or I forget exactly how it was worded. I gave all my answers and at the end - oh, and not to mention, like, my entire life being sexually harassed. And I just stopped. I'm like, it's okay to say, but you asked me for the truth. And it's the truth, man. If you're a woman on the planet, you've been harassed probably most of your life. Like, probably most women can say that. And that's one thing people don't talk about either. And so the one reason I hate about boss babe and being, you know, I don't like, I mean, I'm a woman, I'm she/her, like, you asked my pronouns, and people are asking your pronouns now, this is so new, the world we live in. But I just, like, I don't know. For me, I'm like, I don't know, being a human... this is what it's like being a human. Why do I have to, like, always say, like... why do we always have to say, like, because I'm a woman. It's tough because I'm a woman. Like, yeah, no shit, like, of course, of course. But I don't like to be like... it's like when people say to me, like, oh, that's such a masterpiece of a painting. And I'm like, no, it's not. It's not a masterpiece. I made a great painting. It's kind of just, I'm going off on a little bit of a rabbit trail. But like, the masterpiece thing. It's not a masterpiece. If everything I make is a masterpiece, then nothing's special. Nothing. I would say 1 out of 100 paintings stand out. And, you know, so I don't know...
Dawn Taylor 23:07
I like to think I own at least one or two of those. I like to think that I do. I own a few your masterpieces, I will say that.
Giselle Denis 23:16
The thing is because you connected to certain pieces. You can't, nobody can connect to every single one. Right? It's not possible. And, like, for you, like when you coach someone, there's usually probably a little sliver in there where the person's like, oh.... like they have their amazing hour with you, or time with you, but then there's usually some snippets that are like little gold nuggets. And that's why people go to you. Because only Dawn can present those gold nuggets. Because you're you. And you found your niche, you found, you know, what makes you connect to people and you are given these, like, moments of insight to their lives in those moments. And that's what they come for. And not everybody who needs coaching is gonna go to Dawn, because the ones that are supposed to come to you will come to you. And it just works that way, like the universe brings them to you.
Dawn Taylor 24:09
So for all of these people... and thank you, I love my niche market. Like, I love working with people with, like, business and trauma, and the combination of those, or just one or the other. Like, I love my niche market. So, for someone coming to you - because it's gonna happen, right - people will always come to you and be like, teach me, tell me what to do. Right? Do you have a recommendation on how people can approach you? And what they can say that actually matters.
Giselle Denis 24:43
Do I have a recommendation?
Dawn Taylor 24:45
Yeah, like if someone comes to you, and they're like... no, no, no. But for someone to come up to you and just be, like, hey, I really respect you and your work. I followed your journey. Like, it's really cool to watch. Like, is that something you want to hear versus, like, wow, must be nice to have such amazing, like so many followers, or do you know what I mean by that?
Giselle Denis 25:10
I'm not sure what you're getting at exactly.
Dawn Taylor 25:12
Sorry. Like when should people not say when they approach you? And what should people say?
Giselle Denis 25:17
No, I'm not like that. I'm not... because I really do think that everyone, 99% of people that say something to me aren't trying to be dicks. They're not. They're trying. They're not. They don't, even though they might say something that I'm like, what the hell? I would say most of the time, even if they said something weird, I'm like, I try to give them the benefit of the doubt. There's a few in there that have been like, oh, that was fully aggressive. So no, I mean, honestly, it's all it's a whole. It's just, it tells the story. And I try and have very few things surprise me anymore. So if someone says something that triggers me, I just like learn to deal in the moment. And just go okay, at this point, like, I have an answer pretty much for everything. It's very rare now. And is there anything that someone shouldn't say to me? No, bring anything, anyone can say anything they want. And I can just laugh inside now at this point, even, like, it's very rare, like people won't be like, oh, I hate that. Like, they'll be normal people and turn the corner and talk behind my back, like most people would, right? Like, if someone's gonna say something stupid or mean, like, oh, my kid could do that. Or you start painting these, Tiffany, you could paint all of these and sell them. Like, people say all kinds of things, I just laugh and I'm like, whatever. So no, like, it's kind of funny. It tells the story. And I go home and write about it in my journal that eventually I'll turn into a book, you know, of stories of my life or something. I'm not exactly sure... that I've kind of.... I have all these snippets and I'm going to work with an editor one day. I'm not thinking it's anytime soon. I have too many projects on the side that I'm slowly sort of...
Dawn Taylor 25:51
You're like, my boat is not big enough for this right now.
Giselle Denis 27:08
Yeah, exactly. I don't like it when people lie to me. That's probably my biggest trigger. Like if someone, I met someone recently painting live, and the entire time he came... the story was, we talked, he's like, that would look really nice in my house. And like, oh, cool. You know, what do you, where do you live? And he's telling me he's got like, eight houses. And then I'm like, oh, cool, where are your eight houses? And they were all over the world. And I'm like, well, what do you do? And he's like, well, I'm, I thought he said loyal. I'm loyal. I'm like, do you think I'm hitting on you right now? I'm not hitting on you. Like, no, he said no, I'm royal. Oh, like, royalty? I didn't even know what he was saying. He's like, yes, I'm royal. I'm like, oh, oh, well, I don't even know what to say next. I'm like, what does that mean exactly? He's like, I'm from the royal family, the queen is my ninth cousin or some story. Anyway, we talked for a really long time. I found out later after, I sat down and googled him after he left, because this girl I was talking to said like, I call bullshit. Like that's not true. Anyway, we googled him and found out he goes around lying and saying, making up these stories. Anyway I'm off on a tangent. I don't like when people lie to me. Don't lie to me.
Dawn Taylor 28:28
There's no need.
Giselle Denis 28:31
I don't have time for lies. I don't know why lying makes me crazy.
Dawn Taylor 28:36
Oh, that's too funny. Reading is huge for you. And over the years, you have had some amazing books that have like, influenced your life in everything from sales to just life in general. Would you have a couple you could recommend to people?
Giselle Denis 28:56
Oh shoot. I'm really bad at remembering the titles. One of the first books that really got me into reading business books - it's so ridiculous - it's from the 80s and it's like, 'Zig Ziglar's The Art of the Sale' or something like that. It's a really stupid title. Yeah, I saw it at a secondhand store and I bought it, I was really intrigued. But I learned a lot, I was able to, like, you know, sift through the crazy talk and actually find some really good like gold nuggets that I kind of learned. And after that I really started like digging into, like, how to sell your art, like, how do you do this? And I was already really good at talking to people. But I've read books on, like, tons of of books on art sales, tons of books on running a business, conversations, how to have conversations with people, but really like... shoot, I can't, I have to go grab it. I don't remember any titles in the moment.
Dawn Taylor 29:47
If you'd be willing to send me, if you'd be really willing to send me some, I'll just include them in the show notes for people that are curious about maybe, like, what your top five are.
Giselle Denis 29:54
Okay, yeah, I'll do that. I'll send those.
Dawn Taylor 29:56
What are you reading right now?
Giselle Denis 29:58
Right now I'm reading, it's called 'Smart Women Finish Rich'. And it's really interesting because a lot of different stories that women would share about, like, their husbands passed away, and they had zero clue about their finances. And if you don't know where things are, like, it's really scary how you can just become like, almost destitute, because you didn't, like, you didn't organize stuff, you didn't know where things were, and you didn't know whose name things were signed under. And anyways, so it's really important for, I just want to think about that more and go, okay, like, where are our investments and what, you know, I know what some of the things but not answers to all of it. I don't want to be caught, like, not knowing information that was easy to know about, as far as like planning for the future. Because my husband, Neil quit his job last March, to work with me full time. So things we have to think about, like, for planning for the future, like, it looks a lot different now when he works for me and doesn't have a typical, what do you you call it, benefits and stuff with a normal job? I wish I could remember some book titles. I'm sorry.
Dawn Taylor 30:59
No, no, that's okay. I'll get you to send them to me. And I'll put it in the show notes so that people can... we'll put some links and stuff so that people can access them. And they know what some of your favorites are. So knowing now, looking back at all of this, is there anything that you would do completely different?
Giselle Denis 31:19
I would believe in myself earlier. Having confidence is something that, you know, people would.... my teachers and stuff would tell me, like, yeah, I can see you have the thing. It's just, like, believing that you can do it. But I guess that just I don't know, some people, it just takes years to believe that you can do it. Would I do anything different? Probably. I mean, would I go and take a music program at the school I went to at this, like, would I make that same choice now? No. I mean, but I don't regret it. At the same time I don't regret any decision I've made. I don't know. Not really. I mean, I love where I am now. And I loved where I was then. And all the choices I made, good or bad, wrong or right, got me to where I am now. And I don't want to say a whole lot of regrets. Just like... yeah, I maybe would have bought an acreage sooner, but we couldn't. I couldn't have done that back then.
Dawn Taylor 32:16
But even that, from the outside the acreage, I mean, it's stunning, your property, your house, they're beautiful. But you also bought it when it was like a run down condemned, like....
Giselle Denis 32:33
Almost, yeah.
Dawn Taylor 32:35
Literally, like it was brutal. And you guys put blood, sweat and tears to renovate it and create what you have.
Giselle Denis 32:44
Yeah, I am glad we bought it when we did. People thought we were crazy because the place did need a ton of work. Would I do all that over again? Yeah, probably. I'm glad I don't have to. Like at this point I think this is our forever home. We're now building an extension to our house, to my home, that's a studio space that's attached to the house. And it's a bit of a disaster right now, and it's hard because, like, when you're living in a mess, you're like, oh my gosh, but I've never... at no point was I ever like I wish I never did this. I don't think any, you know, as far as career choices and stuff, I don't think, no. One of the things I wrote down to talk about today was saying no, saying no to things. That's more about the boat thing. About, like, what I chose to have on my boat. But one of the things - back to the confidence thing - okay, one thing, not one, but this is an example of one of the things I would have done differently. I was painting - I think I told you the story - but I was getting ready to paint at a charity function. The lady in charge turned out to be, like, just unstable is the polite word. Crazy. You know, when I tell this story, and I won't say names or anything, but at the event, just as I'm about to get started to paint, and she like ripped up, like at me, and starts yelling at me. She just turned crazy. I'm like, what is, why is this lady yelling at me? I don't, like what is happening right now? And I didn't know how to deal with it at the time. I went to my car and cried. And I hadn't finished setting up, and I called Neil, and I'm like, I don't know what to do, this is what just happened. But she literally yelled at me and then hit me. She, oh, like she hit me, and I was standing there like in shock. And I didn't know what to do. So I put my things down. And her team came down the stairs to kind of welcome me, oh Giselle, and I told them what just happened as I'm like having a panic attack. And they were like, they didn't even know what to do either. They were like, oh my god, oh my god. And I'm, like, I need a minute. And I left and went to my car, called Neil, told him what happened. He's like, leave. This is what you do now, you leave. You do not stay there. And then I talked myself into staying. I'm like, I committed to being here today, I said I would be here, I'm here, I'm just going to do it. And that was, I don't know, six, seven years ago. Would I do it the same way now? Oh, hell no. I'm not, I'm not like diva person. But now I would say, I am leaving, goodbye. And I would, no explanation, I would pack up my things and leave, no matter what, because I will not be abused. That was, and now to this day, when I see that person in a public space or at a function, you've been with me at these functions, at... there was one. And I have panic attacks. And I'm working through how to, I've seen her now at a number of different functions since. I bet you she doesn't even remember what she did. I try and tell myself that, but it's just like, God, I don't, I don't know how to... sorry, let's have a session with Dawn.
Dawn Taylor 32:45
I'm like, call me. Actually, you should call me. I have some, I'll give you some strategies on that.
Giselle Denis 36:02
I just like need a way out. Like, you know, there's a few people in this world that if I was to bump into them, I need a way to, to deal with this situation. I don't know, I just don't know, I don't know what to do. That's like, I don't want to be wrong. But I also don't feel like I need to be their friend. So it's just I have nothing to say to you and then walk away. Like having that sort of, to how do you deal with conflict or difficult situations that, yeah, it's very like, does anyone else, like, listening, have you had those scenarios where you're like, you see this person who literally major triggers you and all your emotions like surface? And you're just like a different person in that moment. You're shaking, like physically, you're sweating? You can't... that's what happens. And I don't know what to do with that.
Dawn Taylor 36:57
We'll talk. I'll call you. Yeah, but that is, that is something like we aren't taught how to do that. Right? We're not taught how to deal with conflict. We're not taught how to grieve. We're not taught how to do any of those things. And that's, again, like, that's what this podcast is about is like, let's open up these conversations. But it's, let's have the hard conversations. Let's open it up to be like, no, this is maybe what things look like on the outside but like, I've put - right, you said like, since you were 14, you started selling art. You've been married for 16 years, and 14 of them you've been a full time artsist. Or 19, sorry, but like it took you 10 years before you started to actually make some money at it. Right? Like all of those aspects of it. Like that's what I want people to see and hear, is like--
Giselle Denis 37:45
The hardest part through the whole thing has been people. Dealing with people. That's been the hardest thing. And people are great. It's the few that are awful, that stand out, that make you go, I don't know what to do right now, in this moment. And it's really scary feeling... like, I'm not a control freak. I'm not, I've never been, that I know of, been labeled that way. But I don't like feeling, like I don't like when my body feels out of control. And when I don't know, I've had a few interesting, you know, very strange... but when you're dealing with the public, when you're with the public a lot, and crowds of people in places and spaces that are just, like, funky part of town, you know, you just deal with, you know, things come up and you're like, I don't know, I've ever been in this situation before. What do I do right now? Yeah, it's very, it's very interesting. Anyway,
Dawn Taylor 38:41
No, I love it. If you were to give, if you could have a billboard anywhere with anything on it, to get a message out to the millions, when it comes to, like, business, what would it be?
Giselle Denis 38:53
Don't quit just yet, maybe. Because, I don't know if I've ever felt like quitting. Maybe keep moving forward. Maybe that's a better way to put it, keep moving forward. Because things are gonna come up little burps, little things, little glitches, people, you know, scenarios. And it can be super devastating and very frustrating. And you wait and wait and wait and wait and wait for things. Like you say people think, oh, this happened overnight for her. And it's like, no, it didn't. And sometimes you get a surprise phone call, and like I'm going to a function tonight, I got a call a few weeks ago about winning a Strathcona Art and Culture award. And I'm like, the lady called to say I won, and like I did what? I won what? And here's a sad story. I was nominated - quite a few years ago, 2016 maybe - for a mayor's art award. And at the thing you're there and I was live painting in the lobby. It was a function, huge thing at the Winspear Theatre, and on the list in my category, the guy is up there reading, and you got your thing and you're following along, and in my category of like 15 people listed, there were two Giseles. Okay, there was me and this other girl. And the guy is reading through the list, and he read, I am not kidding, the other Giselle's name twice and didn't read mine. I wanted to sink into my chair and then through the floor, I was so embarrassed that my name didn't get read. Is it super small and stupid, so insignificant and dumb? Yes. But in that moment, it meant everything to me. And to not have my name read and have that tiny little one second of a shining moment, I was so devastated. So when I got this call three weeks ago, hi, Giselle, you won this art award. I was triggered. With, oh, shit, I don't want to go to that. Like, I don't want to go to that. Please don't make me go to that, bad things happened at those things. So the girl called a week ago, who called me the first time, hi Giselle, I just want to confirm the pronunciation of your name. And I called her back, I'm like, dude, you have no idea. If for one second, you felt this is a waste of time calling all the nominees asking them how to pronounce your name, let me tell you a story. And I told her that, and I said, can you imagine you in that moment, how you would feel if your name didn't get read at this thing that you got all dressed up for, spent two weeks stressing over? You're sitting there in the moment, and they don't say your name at all. They didn't even mispronounce my name, they didn't even say my name. And she was like, oh, my God. Like, I know. In the spectrum of the world of what's going on, does it matter? No, no. But in that one little moment, it did matter to me. And we had a good laugh. And it's not all, most things, Dawn, that I painted for and had these what look like shiny moments on my social media. A lot of the time I get overlooked, forgotten. You know, people treat me like crap. The ones that treat me good stand out. So I like do their events again. But most often, I get overlooked or forgotten. Just like what the heck. So you just have to go, you know what, it's probably just human error. Or maybe someone was jealous. Maybe it looked legit, got forgotten. And you were the unfortunate name that didn't get, you know, so there's been so many over the years. And it's just like, you know what, push through. I'm not doing it for them. I'm not doing this for them. Doing this for me, and my family. And at the same time, my painting, I do my art because it's not about me. This is not about me, this is for the, this is for what I'm putting out there. So all the little things that come and that distract me, and, you know, because really, in those tiny little moments of feeling like crap and insecure, I'm feeling insecure. And that's on me. So it's like, okay, so what do I do with that? Can I, do I'd let it devastate me for two weeks? Or do I just, you know, keep moving forward? Keep moving forward... just don't get distracted by dumb things. Most of the time people mean well, and the ones that don't, you don't want them around anyway.
Dawn Taylor 43:21
Right? No, it's so true. All right, let's finish off our time together today by super silly, rapid fire questions, just to get to know you in a different way. So what is something you spend a silly amount of money on?
Giselle Denis 43:39
Clothes. Yep. I love clothes. I need lots of, I need outfits for functions a lot. Like, an unusual amount of function clothes. And so I, yeah, clothes. It's bad. But it's not, because I need them. And then you wear them a lot. And then you're like, I don't want to be seen at that same event the next year wearing the same thing. Like I literally go back what did I wear the last time I was at that thing? Like, it's kind of a show? Like, I'm on a show. And I'm like, oh my gosh, like it's kind of this thing. And I like an excuse to buy another outfit.
Dawn Taylor 44:15
I've been with you. I've been shopping with you. What is your secret guilty pleasure way to decompress? I like when people are like I meditate. I do deep breathing exercises. I'm like, No, I watched Love is Blind.
Giselle Denis 44:33
Oh, I don't know that one. My favorite, I love to play music. We haven't talked a ton lately about what my life looks like right now, but I studied music and so I've been writing songs and I write so many songs. I have a new sound system in my house right now that was like given to me. Like, a $5,000 sound system. I'm just storing it for this new friend I made, but yeah, I love to play music. So I'm writing music, playing music, singing. I love to go for walks to decompress. That's a big one, going for walks. It's like my way of meditating. I love meditating. I fall asleep. But playing music is very, like, therapeutic for me. And then just sitting and petting my cats. And yeah, I like shows too. I don't watch very many shows. Once in a while, I'll get into something and then I'll binge watch it. You know, every night I'll watch an hour or whatever, but I'm usually way too tired. By evening, to watch anything--
Dawn Taylor 45:30
I don't think people realize how hard you work, and the hours.
Giselle Denis 45:33
Like we try to watch, like, literally a one hour TV series in the evenings, and most of the time I can't even get through the one hour. It's really bad. So it's, I wish, but I just, I can't, I get like I gotta go to bed. I gotta go to bed. Yeah, that was not a rapid answer. Sorry.
Dawn Taylor 45:51
No it's okay. What is a purchase of $100 or less that has most positively impacted your life like recently?
Giselle Denis 45:59
$100 or less?
Dawn Taylor 46:01
Something little. Maybe it just made you super happy? Maybe it... mine was an alcohol ink pouring class. That's turned into like a complete addiction. Is there something that you've bought that just like has completely been a happy thing for you?
Giselle Denis 46:19
I can't think of anything. Next question.
Dawn Taylor 46:24
Do you, what is an unusual habit or absurd thing that most people wouldn't know about you?
Giselle Denis 46:30
Absurd habit.
Dawn Taylor 46:31
Or just thing.
Giselle Denis 46:32
I love cats. I know people who are dog people hate that. I don't know. I love cats. I love, I've... oh, oh. Well, I love, I learned how to bake bread. Like I'm way late to the game with this whole everybody making sourdough. But I learned not sourdough, normal white bread. I really love making bread. Oh, what did I just buy? I just bought something to do with music. It was $100 something to do with music. What did I buy? Was it a microphone or something? I'm sorry, I'm bad with this.
Dawn Taylor 47:07
You're killing it. I want to thank you so much for being here, Giselle. This has been an absolute blast. We do need a coffee date again soon to catch up. And hear some of your music you're doing. Thank you for being honest about what it's actually taken you to get where you are. The whole analogy about getting people off your boat, getting rid of the aircraft carrier, is so powerful. So for anybody listening, please please please go check out the show notes we might have a treat for you. Talk to you guys later.
Dawn Taylor 47:38
Thank you so much for hanging out with Giselle and I today. I hope that you are now looking at what you need to have on your boat. And that you're around again for our next episode in two weeks where we have another amazing guest for you. Check out the show notes located at TheTaylorWay.ca for that free download, but also for all of her other contact information and that beautiful photo, I promise it's good. Subscribe now on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you loved the show, it would mean the world to me if you would leave a rating and review.
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
For our episode today, we will be talking to Tess Jewell-Larsen. Tess is a woman who was raised with the philosophy of getting as many things done as quickly as possible and “sleeping when you’re dead”. While this is a mentality that would undoubtedly help with productivity, it can also lead to burnout. She shares with us how she ended up on the path to mindfulness and is here to spread the idea that rest does not make us weak, but it’s what we need to make ourselves even stronger.
Who this for
In our meeting-filled and workload-centered world, it can be hard to set aside time for ourselves. However, as this episode proves, we can all use some rest in our lives whether it’s ten minutes to destress or even a whole day of sleeping in. With that in mind, this episode is for those of us who deserve to unplug from the fast-paced hustle and bustle of life, which may very well be all of us.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Tess Jewell-Larsen empowers women professionals, entrepreneurs and juggling-it-all’ers to go from exhausted and overwhelmed to balanced and thriving. Tess is a certified mindfulness coach, somatic healer and a Yoga Therapist in training. Tess emphasizes breath support, mindful movement, stress management, nervous system resiliency, mindset and lifestyle shifts, and taking small steps that build up, so that her clients feel more joyful, balanced, and optimistic, and thrive no matter what obstacles come their way. Tess is also the co-host of the podcast The Happy Edit, a podcast that dives into what it means to be happy and how to build a foundation for happiness through different lenses.
Guest Social Links
Email - [email protected]
Website - www.tytoniyoga.com
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/tessjewelllarsen/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/tessjewelllarsencoaching
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/tessjewelllarsen/
The Happy Edit - https://www.tytoniyoga.com/pages/thehappyeditpodcast
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
TRANSCRIPT
Dawn TaylorI am your host, Dawn Taylor. And today I get to talk to an incredible woman. Her name is Tess. And what is our topic? Rest doesn't make you lazy. It does not mean you're a lazy person. So before we get started, I really want to tell you a bit about her so that you can be as excited as I am. Tess is a rock star. She's a powerhouse. She's also nuts because she's probably at a weird time of day in talking to me, but that's okay. She is a certified mindfulness coach, a somatic healer, a yoga therapist in training. She helps people heal. She also has her own podcast, The Happy Edits. It really dives into what it means to be happy and how to build a foundation for happiness through a different lens. And honestly, it all comes down to what most of us as business owners or humans or parents have done is we've all burned out. So let's dive into this topic today. Welcome to the show, Tess.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Uh, well, thank you so much for that intro, and thank you for having me. I'm really excited to be here.
Dawn Taylor
You're welcome. So when you and I first met, so for people that are listening to the podcast, one of the things I do is if I don't know the guests in advance, they've just ask me on the show, we hop on a quick like 15 20 minute zoom call to like meet, connect and figure out what we would talk about, really like kind of what our topic is going to be, but also make sure that I'm okay with it for my listeners to be really honest, right? Like to make sure it's a good fit. And we had such an incredible conversation talking about burnout, talking about what rest means, and this bullshit idea that rest means you're lazy. And that there's like this weird guilt and shame attached to it. And, I mean, I experienced this every day when people find out I nap all the time or that I, you know, book Lego building into my schedule or things like that. They're like, why? Like it's so interesting. The judgment is almost like this weird condemnation slash jealousy that comes with that. And so I was so excited about this topic today. Like this is so needed. So let's start with your story. Like where did this all start? Where did this come from? How did you grow up with your beliefs around this? I'm going to let you take it from here.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
So, uh, yeah, let's talk about the growing up part. Um, that's where it started. So I grew up with the phrase “you can sleep when you're dead.” Um, that was like the motto that my dad literally said all the time. And he got it from his dad, you know? So it's. It's been in the family for a while. Yeah, it's just very much this idea. You know, you've you've just if you stop, if you sleep, then you're lazy and you're not doing everything that you can be doing. Um, and not, you know, one side, it's not necessarily bad because, you know, it's good that you have that push and you're doing things with your life, but on the other side, it can lead to, um, not listening, what your needs actually are. And, um, in my own case, burning out, um, I was very much a product of my upbringing and just trying to do too much and also doing things not necessarily that lit me up that, you know, gave me satisfaction. I was just doing them because I kind of what I thought I had to do and, you know, have that job and provide for my family and, you know, do all those things. And, through doing that, I kind of started to disconnect from what I really wanted from things. Yeah, like I said before, like lit me up and helped me, like, cultivate my creativity. And so I was really cutting back on those things because I was doing something that I didn't enjoy. And burnout can happen if you do something that you enjoy as well. But this is just my experience. And, um, the more I was cutting out from myself, the more I stopped listening to what I needed more. I stopped listening to hey, like, it's okay to take a break, it's okay to take a nap, for example. Um, and I really stopped listening to, you know, what I wanted out of life, and I just kept doing because I thought, you know, this is what I'm supposed to be doing. And in over
the course of several years. It was like progressively getting worse. And not that I noticed it really. At the time, I wasn't really paying attention to it. I was like, oh yeah, I'm having another panic attack. What's that? Um, or like, why am I becoming so negative? Or why aren't I, why am I not doing anything that, like, is creative anymore? Um, you know, those things I didn't notice it, right? And I didn't notice. I eventually started noticing. I think one of the first things I started noticing was like, the breakdown of my relationships. Like my marriage was not awesome. I wasn't reaching out to my friends as much. I wasn't connecting with them as much. And as I mentioned, I was having panic attacks and they were becoming more frequent. And I was like, this is weird, but not really putting the two and two together. Like, what is that equal? Um, and then in 2020, thank you. Covid, with all the other extra additions going on globally, and in my own personal life because of, you know, effects of Covid, um, I ended up majorly injuring myself, to the point I couldn't move.
Dawn Taylor
Oh my goodness.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
And I mean, and when I did move, I was in so much pain. I'd like to say it was exactly that point that it was like. Yes. This is where I need to stop. It didn't, you know.
Dawn Taylor
No it wasn't. There's always like another level of burnout. Yeah. The bottom.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
It really got to the point where I just like, I mean, it was just, I wasn't in a good place. And I realized I was trying to do all these things, and I wasn't stopping because, you know, I was thinking, well, I have to do this for my family because my husband wasn't well. And, you know, there's lots of other things going on. And I was like, you know what? Um, I'm just going to keep pushing. I'm going to keep pushing. And then it just got to the point that I couldn't anymore, um, physically, mentally, emotionally. Um, and that is when I realized that I had to make drastic changes in my life. Um, so I sat down with my husband, and we came to the conclusion that in that moment, the best thing for me to do is to quit my job, which was terrifying. Um, and I know that's not available for everyone. In my case, I'm very fortunate to have that opportunity to be able to do that. Um, but I needed to have that complete wake up call and that complete change to be able to start like a new foundation. Um, and that doesn't have to happen for everyone. I'm putting this out there like it was, that was what I decided to do. And that was my situation. Um, but it's really been a journey since then of like, okay, how do I put myself back together? So physically, how do I get my body back? Um, how do I get to the point where I'm not,
like in tears every time I try to move, um, where I'm not gasping for breath every time I, you know, shift. Um, and, you know, our bodies are very much connected to our mental state. So obviously, you know, part of that like that, you know, pain management had to come from my, you know, supporting myself mentally as well. And so learning how to do that as well. Um, and it's been, you know, I studied a lot, I trained a lot with some amazing people from all over the world, which was a benefit of Covid, that was then available to do that online with, with some pretty amazing teachers. And, um, yeah. So, you know, that led me to, to studying mindfulness and somatic healing and yoga therapy. Um, and it's been a fun journey because. So I quit my day job, um, started putting myself back together. I started teaching yoga. In that like I was sharing my journey, you know, like, oh, these are things I'm learning. This is how, you know, I'm supporting myself. Um, and the students coming to my classes, they were like, oh, that's really interesting. And then they started bringing that into their lives and like, hey, Tess, like that really works. That's amazing. Um, and then they would share it with their friends. And so it was this really fun ripple effect to watch, right. Like it was, like, something that I was learning that I was able to share with others. And they were then able to share it. And I was watching this growth of this little community around me, um, that was really healing themselves through the pandemic, through, you know, the different craziness that was happening in their own personal lives. Um, and I realized that that's what I wanted to do, that that was like my passion was to help be that supportive guide and resource and really to help people heal, as you mentioned at the beginning.
Dawn Taylor
Which is so cool. So let's backtrack a little bit because I really want to dive into, like, burnout what burnout means, how to even recognize it. So, just on like the Mayo Clinic. I was doing some research on this because I have burned out so many times, and one of the things I have to tell people is like, no, you need to start watching for this, and you need to have like a red flag system for yourself on burnout because we can. I don't burn out because I'm miserable in my life. I burnout because I'm so passionate about what I do, and I'm so excited that I just want to do all the things right, and then it causes me harm, and I burn out and I crash, and it becomes this whole issue, right? And it's like, why are you burnt out again? How did you get there? And for me, honestly, it often comes, like end of the year or beginning of the year with shifts and changes and just not having capacity anymore. Right. But I was at the Mayo Clinic and it was just like burnout. Like, even just some questions, right? And it's like, are you becoming, especially around work? Are you becoming critical and cynical at work? Do you have to drag yourself to work and have trouble getting started, or are you becoming very irritable? Um, do you lack the energy to be consistently productive? And I mean, this is even at home. Right? Are your sleep habits changing or are you having unexplained headaches, stomach or bowel problems that are physical ailments? Are you finding it hard to concentrate? Are you feeling disillusioned with your life? Are you using food, drugs or alcohol to feel better or to not feel? And so many of these I see every single day in clients. We do live in the same world, right? We live in this world of people that we have a million shoulds. What we should be doing and how we should show up. And, you know, the old Pinterest wife mentality or like the perfect husband or the perfect dad, or the perfect mom or the perfect friend and the perfect everything. And I was talking to a friend yesterday and he's like, you know what I love about you? And I said, what's that? And he goes, I love that we haven't talked in weeks, and I never question that. You're still my friend. I never question that. He's like, but you're also the very first person that always is like, no. I don't want to. He's like you were so fast to, like, not go to the event. Say no to the party. Like you're just like, no, I don't want to. I don't have the capacity for that. And I said, but part of that is like when you burn out. It is so much faster to go there again. It's like you've created the pathway. And so what? The second time it's like a way easier path to follow, and the third time it gets easier, and the fourth time it gets even easier and it becomes a really slippery slope.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Yep. Right now it does. It does.
Dawn Taylor
How all of a sudden you end up there again. And I know for myself, um, probably my worst burnout I've ever had, I was doing what I love. There was no question about it. But it was, you know, I always worked Monday to Saturday. I always had clients six days a week. And for years, like, I'm talking like seven years of my business. I worked at six days a week, which now I'm like, that's insane. Of course I needed more time off doing what I do, right? But then it was like a client and I was due to an emergency situation. Like I'm talking like lawyers and cops involved kind of thing, right? It was an emergency situation and the only time they could escape from their situation they were in was on Sunday. That was the only day they could get out of it to come and work with me. So of course I'm going to say yes, come, come on, a Sunday doesn't mean I stopped working Saturday. I decided on Sunday and it's right.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Yeah, exactly.
Dawn Taylor
Right. And then it became one client and then a second one, and then a third one, and then a fourth one. And at one point I had gone 12 weeks without a day off. And I actually fully lost my ability to talk. I definitely had migraines. I couldn't form coherent sentences, I couldn't talk. It was about a week before Christmas. I had booked my schedule all through Christmas with no time off, and my husband is the one who actually sat me down and was like, I'm contacting your clients. We're canceling everything for the next two weeks because you can't actually do this anymore. And I was like, yeah, how did I get here? Like, how did that happen? And. I think that's the piece that people miss is that often we got there with the best of intentions.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
I think so, I think so, and like you'd say, like, you know, it can happen when you're passionate about something. It can happen when you're not passionate about something. You can get there in different ways. And it's about taking that time to be aware so that you can see what those red flags are. And if you don't know, like in my case, like I had no idea, like I didn't put the two and two together. Like this is a red flag. That's right. I mean, maybe I should have, but like panic attacks all the time. Not really a, you know, in a happy flag, right? But at the same time, it didn't, like I'd struggled when I was younger, I had struggled with anxiety and I just thought, oh, well, you know, it's just, you know, rearing up again.
Dawn Taylor
Isn't that wild?
Tess Jewell-Larsen
And it's, you know, but it's it's that our bodies are created in a way that we, you know, we have these experiences and we're designed to be able to, you know, kind of keep memory of that, whether it's a conscious or a subconscious memory. And so when something similar comes back, like everybody goes, oh, well, this is how I respond to it, right? Like this is how I get away. This is how I protect myself. And it's doing that because it loves you. And so it's like part of stepping on a burnout is rewiring that response so we don't go back into it. So it's not that slippery slope. And it's not an easy thing to do. It takes time. And I think so often when we go through burnout, we don't fully continue that process. So like we get to a point, we're like, oh, I'm fine. And then we go back to what we were doing before and we don't continue that work of checking in, allowing ourselves those active rest moments. You know, those moments where we just tune in to us and just be, right. And those moments are incredibly important because we have, you know, if you look at it like the nervous system. You have the sympathetic nervous system, which is designed there to be an acute response to get you out of a situation.
And we tend to stay in that in a much longer, more sort of persistent response, which is not a good thing. And that's where that, you know, the inflammation happens. That's where the poor digestion happens. That's where the, you know, the headaches come from the, you know, maybe you have other things going on physiologically with your body, increased pain awareness, you know, things like that. Right. So it's when we're able to shift, we're able to take those moments to allow the body to down regulate into that parasympathetic response, that calm, rest, digest response, that the body goes, oh, okay, I don't have to continually stay in this hyper, you know, vigilant response. I can rest. And that is super important. That's important for our long term. So both are good. And I think, you know we have this sort of thing in our society a lot. We're like oh you know, fight flight freeze. It's not a good thing to have. No no no. It's a very good thing. Like your body loves you. That's what it's protecting you.
Dawn Taylor
It’s literally a protection mechanism.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Yeah. And so it's like rewiring that. So we're not constantly staying there like when we're noticing, hey, I'm in that mode okay. Noticing it with awareness. Compassion. Like don't beat yourself up for being there. It's fine. You're there okay, but what can I do now to come back into a more restful state, meeting yourself at that point and taking those small steps to lead back into a more balanced, homeostasis state.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, the conversations you and I could have on this. This is literally what I talk to clients about all the time. Right? And we do. We fight. I was saying to a client yesterday, I was like, you know, we're so busy fighting our protection mechanisms because we're so mad at them and they're making life uncomfortable or they, you know, they're not appropriate in this new moment in our lives. And I always say to people, I'm like, you can't out will, you can't willpower. You can't stubborn your way past your protection mechanism because they're literally they're designed to protect you and they're your safety mechanism in your body. And this client was like, okay, but explain. I said, it's the same reason why you can't hold your breath to commit suicide, like, or to have death by suicide, you literally can't like your body will force you to breathe. And he's like, okay, that's a very blunt way of putting it. And I said, but think about that for a second. These little protection mechanisms, you could have been in a situation where you had to duck and cover all the time, or you had to, I often see when someone was raised by an alcoholic, is they become very, very good at reading emotions and smells and sounds and tastes and everything. Right? Like they can tell by the way their parent drives into the driveway. They can tell by the sound of how they open a door. They've attached a meaning to everything, which is now this incredible protection mechanism as a child. Well that's amazing. If you stop and think about it, it's phenomenal that our bodies at the age of like three, four, five, six, like they can develop this incredible skill. The problem is that now, when you're safe and you're not living there anymore and you're outside of that, you're still reading into all of those things because this is your new way of thinking and living and breathing and sleeping like, and you do that. But we get so busy judging it that we can't sit back and be like, hey, what if I just got really curious about this? And I really looked at this in a different way, because you have to really close the loop on that. You have to close that loop of, as you know, of like, no, we have to go back there and heal that. So that you can actually move forward without needing that safety, without needing that protection mechanism again. So with your, I'm not even diving into your work because for anyone listening, you know, this is like a hard-no sales podcast, right? This is not what this is about. But also, like Tessa's info is in the notes, if you want to talk to her, in the show notes. But for you, your big signs of burnout, as you said, like you very much physically felt it. When you went back and looked at it. Were there red flags that you could see over the course of an extended period of time where it was like, oh, this is the moment I stopped doing my hair, or this is the moment that I started eating out more often, or this is the moment that I came home and didn't want to do the laundry at the end of the day, because I really just wanted to sit and veg on the couch, but my intentions behind it weren't the same. Can you look back now and see a bunch of those red flag moments? Because I think it's one thing to talk to people about, like when you hit burnout, it's a whole other to gift them like, hey, here's some red flags you could be looking at in your own world, and you could start seeing to be like, oh, maybe I'm on this pathway to burnout and I don't actually want to be.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Yeah, yeah. No. Definitely no. I definitely look back and go, you know, okay, this is a red flag there. And I guess I wasn't one of those was being negative. I am not a negative person. Naturally I'm a very happy go lucky. Like let's like, you know, um, let's look at the positive side of things in general, right? Yeah. Um, and, and I would shock myself how negative I was getting and how, like my response was to go in for the kill rather than to just kind of process and, think about, okay, what's going on here and then move forward. Um, and I really started noticing that first with my relationship with my husband, because
shockingly, that didn't go very well. You know, there are lots of other things going on at the time. So, you know, I didn't fully process like what it was. But yeah, and looking back, I can say, yeah, that was a huge red flag. Um, another was like I used to, I used to write all the time, like, I loved writing and then all of a sudden I didn't. I didn't like, I didn't write in a notebook. I didn't write anything. Like I didn't want anything to do with writing. And I was like, that's weird. Like, and I started thinking about, like, I, I don't write at all anymore. Why is that? Oh, well. And then moved on. Right. But like looking back, I go, that's another huge red flag. Like I didn't, I didn't want to write. I didn't want to be creative, I didn't I, I sing a lot to myself. I didn't sing to myself at all for a really long time. And it makes me happy. So like, why wouldn't I do it? But I didn't. And actually, my husband even mentioned, like, you never sing while you're cooking anymore. What's up with
that? And I was like, I don't know. Maybe I just don't want to anymore. Yeah. But, you know, so like it was, it was things like that that I was really like looking back, I go, yeah, that was a huge red flag. That was another huge red flag. Um, and, and as I mentioned, panic attacks like the fact that I was increasingly having panic attacks and I was like, the kitchen was my place to have them. I'm not really sure why, but, um, I don't know, maybe I felt supported in that area. I don't know.
Dawn Taylor
I was gonna say you were safe in there.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
I felt safe so I could release. I would just be curled up sobbing, not being able to breathe, just
not seeing anything, you know, just really like everything, which is black and just, like, on the kitchen floor and in, like, cuddled between cabinets, yeah, really dark areas. And it was just, you know. That should have been like the biggest red flag. And yeah, and it wasn't like, you know, like looking back there. Yeah, there's so many things. But it's so like if you're listening to this and you're going, okay, like one of those things. Yeah, I connect with that like take a moment to process that. Right. Like, you know, maybe it means something else, but also maybe it means that you're, you know, you need to start listening. Maybe you're feeling, you know, you are disconnected from self. Do you notice if you're hungry? Like that's something that's important as well. Like for that introspection. Like do you notice you're hungry. Do you notice your thirsty right. Do you, do you notice those other bodily-like functions that we should be, you know, really obvious to like? Do you notice you have to pee or are you, like, bursting to pee by the time you finally, like, realize it? You know, like this is important too, because when we start disconnecting from those, you know, those mental things, we're also disconnecting from physical. And so when we start to bring that awareness back little by little, little by little, right. It's not like all of a sudden everything turns on and it shouldn't. We need to stay within our window of tolerance. Um, because then it gets messy. But like, you know, it's, it's little by little becoming aware of these things. You know, it's noticing these patterns that we're holding in our body. And then
once we start noticing them, that's when we're able to say, oh, okay. What is something that I can do to pause that? What's something that I can do to start to shift it slightly to then have, you know, that navigation go a different way?
Dawn Taylor
You know what? I often do an exercise with clients where, and I do it for myself because my burnout there were very, I have very, very specific things that are very tiny things. But there are my red flags. They are my biggest red flags. And one of the things that I do is I tell people around me about these red flags. I'd be like, hey, if you do this, ask how I'm doing. If you see me doing this action or not doing this thing, I need you to say, how are you doing? And yeah, one of the things and this could be an exercise even for someone, this thing is like, I have a list of like, from the minute I wake up, like the time I wake up all the way through, do I go to sleep? I write like when life is amazing and I'm thriving. What does it look like? What time am I getting up in the morning? Am I wearing clothes right? Am I showing up to my work meetings in pajama bottoms with a nice top? Or am I actually like putting on pants? Right? Pants is a big one. Like am I putting on pants is a weird one for me, right? Am I wearing mascara? Am I putting, doing my hair and makeup? Am I remembering to shower at least every other day? Am I right? What am I eating for breakfast? Am I drinking coffee? What am I listening to? What am I reading? What am I watching like, am I eating? What am I? My regular routines of dietary stuff that I know makes me feel amazing. And I go through this giant list of stuff. Right. And then I compare it. There's three columns to column one is that, column three is like when things are at their worst, what am I doing? Yeah, right. So if it says it's best, I'm waking up at 630 or 7. When it's at its worst, I'm getting out of bed at 830 or 9. Right. Okay. Well, there's a big gap in between those two because we don't go from like, amazing to burnout overnight. There are a thousand tiny steps that got us there. And on that journey there are so many red flags. Right. And so what I do for myself is then go, okay, so now I'm listening to like, music every morning here. I'm listening to like, a crime podcast. Okay, here I am, you know, doing my hair and makeup every day and stuff. Fancy. If you've ever met me, you know that I'm very, very minimal. I'm like mascara and I fill in my eyebrows and that's about it, right? But, like, if I'm not even doing that. Right, like what's going on? And it's interesting because I started to pay attention. And hilariously, some of my big ones are the first one ever to go for me is my kitchen. My kitchen becomes messy and at the end of the day, I don't clean it because I am not obsessive. Because that's not the word for it. I'm very habitual. Like I make sure every single night the kitchen's clean in the morning. Like everyone in my house knows this. Like, the first person to make coffee empties the dishwasher while they're making coffee, because then it just keeps this, like pattern going and our kitchen never becomes a disaster. So if you ever come into my house and my kitchen's a mess. I'm feeling overwhelmed. Something's going on and it's a one degree shift. It's a one degree shift off my normal pattern. But weirdly, some of my other ones and some of my biggest are, if I stop wearing earrings or if I stop wearing mascara. Those are two of the ones that go really, really fast. And then it goes like, this. Sleeping in in the morning and then it starts to spiral from there. But they're like this simple, simple thing. And I've had friends like middle of the year where we're like on a zoom call and they're like, get close to the camera. Are you wearing mascara? Because they can tell I'm not. And they're like, what's going on? Because I have allowed and this is a vulnerability piece like I've allowed other people into my life that go, no, you've requested us to call you on this. If we see this action or this behavior. Yeah, like I had a friend come over. It was about a year ago, and she's like, okay, kitchen, earrings and mascara. We need to talk because she's like, what is going on with you? Right? And it was just like, I was really struggling for a few days. I was dealing with some health stuff and I was just having a really rough week. But for me, if I don't catch those fast enough, I can spiral really hard, really fast. And so I would challenge people to do that. And that middle column is your red flag. So that's like, okay, I didn't wear mascara for a day, or it's like, no, it's a weekend and I don't feel like it. That's fine. But on Monday morning, did I put it on again? Yeah. And that's your awareness column. That's your awareness column of like when I hit this wake up time, if I look at my alarms on my phone and I'm at this time consistently, I need to just be aware of this and see what's going on. Right. And that's often where I recommend someone starts when they're feeling like they're like, how did I end up here again? And I'm like, well, because you don't know what your flags are to get like, to stop you. Right? And figuring that out. So then with that. Rest does not mean we're lazy. Let's jump back to that topic of like, okay, now you've burnt out, now you have figured this out. Good luck slowing down because the people around you are going to judge you. And really stupid meaning to things that should not have meaning. So talk to me about that topic because you were. You would recommend that as the title is like rest does not mean you're lazy.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Yeah. So, I mean, I think this leads into that, right. Like I think so often, those points where we have those red flags is because we're not taking the time for yourself that we need. And, you know, that can show up in different ways, like you're saying, maybe putting on makeup in the morning, you know, maybe you don't for several days in a row. Why? Is it because it's a weekend and it's fine. It's not that big of a deal? Or is it just because you can't do it because you just don't have the energy for it, right? So it's like that. It's, in my opinion, it's always about coming back to that awareness and saying, okay, so how am I feeling right now? And rest can look different. It doesn't have to always look the same. And I think this is a really important thing. I think when people hear rest you're like, oh, well, that means that I need to like, take a nap or I need to just do nothing. Or maybe, maybe that's exactly what you need, but maybe your rest is not paying attention to your work and you go for a walk. Maybe your rest is meeting up with a friend because you haven't met up with a friend for a really long time. So it's about really checking in with yourself and asking, what do I need? What am I not giving back to myself right now? Um, and, and meeting yourself where you are. Because I think if, you know, if we're, like, really high up here and we're, like, all over the place going straight for that, like that low key moment is probably going to be really jarring to your system. So taking that time to meet your
system, yes, where it is, and take those small steps to come back into that more balanced state, that more restful state. And so it is really about that, you know, and I think that your exercise is great. Like having those, those things, you know, you have those three columns in your list. And I think I would I would personally add to that like a because, you know, maybe more of my background is, you know, very physical with yoga and, and that but like somatic healing but like, how am I feeling like when I am doing these things, how am I feeling in the body? Like, do I feel open and spacious? Do I stand straight? Do I, you know, in the good column, right. Like, you know what? What is happening in my body? Do I have good bowel movements? You know, you know, like all looking at all of these different things, right? How am I feeling? And then it's, you know, okay, when I'm in these, like in the, the lower states and I'm like in your example, you know, uh, you your kitchen is really dirty. Okay. When I walk into that kitchen, how am I feeling? Like how am I holding my body? Am I like turning in, am I, you know, feeling like my abdomen is crunching? Do I feel tight in my chest? You know, like noticing these feelings in the body? Okay. Where can I make that shift? How can I start bringing that spaciousness back into my body? Maybe cleaning the kitchen will be a benefit. So maybe that is my rest moment. Maybe my rest is like taking that time to clean part of the kitchen. Maybe not even the whole thing. Maybe just washing whatever is in the sink and not on the counter. Right?
Dawn Taylor
Or, you know, putting 15 minutes at a timer.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Yeah. Set a timer. Exactly, exactly. And it's, it's about these little tiny things that we can do for ourselves. And I think so often, you know, when we go, especially when we're in that burnout state, like we feel like we have to do, as you mentioned, I should do this, I should do that, I should do this, I should do that. And we have a list a mile long of things that we should be doing. And then we beat ourselves up about it because we don't get it done. And then when we go into, well, I need to heal, I need to recover, I need to step out of this burnout. Well, I should be doing all of these things to heal and to recover.
Dawn Taylor
Gosh, that list is just as big as the list that got us there in the first place. I always laugh so hard at that where it's like, yes, well, now you have to journal and you have to go for a walk every day and you have to meditate and you have to this and you have to that. And I'm like, that's just actually more tasks on your to do list.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Exactly.
Dawn Taylor
Like what actually motivates you? What fuels you, what fills you up, what causes you to have rest, but also with that like sometimes rested thing? No. And just not. Sometimes rest is simplifying a meal. Sometimes rest is scheduling a nap into your day every day so that you recharge sometimes. Yeah, rest is actually having a bubble bath, but sometimes rest means we need to go see a doctor, sometimes rest as we need to actually supplement our bodies. Because burnout has hit so hard, we've literally drained our body and shot our adrenals and we need outside support. Like, I think there's this fallacy of like, because so many people believe our actions equal our worth. Yes, because of where we were raised, because of what our parents were like. Because. And they did the best they could, honestly. Like they just learned from their own parents. But because of that, there are these obligations constantly. But then, like we were also raised with “sleep when you're dead.” Right?
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
But yeah, like I was talking to somebody about Christmas this year. And depending on when you're listening to this, it either has just passed or it's coming up, but we were talking about Christmas and they're like, oh, it's just so exhausting. And I was like, only because you make it exhausting. And she kind of gave me this look and we were just having a coffee connection date kind of thing. And I said, I'm not stressed out about Christmas at all. And she's like, what do you mean? She's like the presence and the decorating and the food and the blah, blah blah. And I was like. Yes, but what if that is actually what your people want and need and love and thrive on? And what if that is what you should do? Because that's what they're doing in a hallmark movie. Or how you were raised. And that's what you have to do, right? I think that it. A huge piece of this is number one. Take a damn nap if you need it, right? Find time to eat a healthy meal. It doesn't have to be fancy. Some of my healthiest meals are when I'm feeling overwhelmed or I have too much on my plate because I live on salads with rotisserie chicken and some other veggies thrown in. And I just. And I'm like, good to go with these, like super quick easy meals. That's okay. Sometimes it's saying no I'm not going to make a full turkey dinner because that actually is really time consuming and I don't want to stress out about it. And I don't want to financially, mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually, financially stressed out over Christmas this year. Yeah. Hey, what if we just don't?
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're saying that, um, this year. So I live in Spain for listeners. Um, I'm, I'm originally from Oregon, but I live in Spain, and I've been here for like almost 15 years now. And usually every year we have some sort of Thanksgiving, Friendsgiving meal, and I, you know, spend a lot of time cooking. And we all also have friends bring dishes from different countries because we have a wonderful community of friends from all over the world. And, um, it's really fun. But this year I just did not have the capacity for it. And we were talking about it, my husband and I, and I was like, I just can't. And I feel super guilty because I know people are expecting this and people have asked about it, but I can't right now. I have so much going on and I just don't have the capacity to spend all that time cooking. And so he was like, so let's just go out for a meal, like, let's just go out for lunch. Then, like, that's not a big deal. People can join, they can join. And if they can't, they can't. Yeah. I was like, can we do that? It's like, of course we can do that, you know? And it's like, I'm in this role that I, you know, constantly am like coaching other people about these things. And I was like, you know, I have like people
expect this of me. And it's like, oh yeah. Like it's not that big of a deal. The whole point of this, you know, getting together is to be together. It's not about my cooking. It's not about, you know, all these other things that I'm putting on myself. So I think it's, you're exactly right. You know, it's about sort of noticing, like what is true in the situation. You know, what is valid there and what are we adding extra that we don't need to. And how can we reach out to our support system to support us? So if you know what is true in that situation is you need a nap, please go take a nap. If you need to take two minutes to do a little like progressive relaxation and release the tension out of the body or shake it out, right? Do that. Do it. The fight flight freeze response that's stuck in your body. Let it out so that that calm, rest, digest response can pick up and say, actually yeah. And so rest doesn't always have to look like one thing. And it's like you're saying, you know, it's so important that we really meet ourselves where we are and take those steps from that point. And it's not about adding more. It's not about doing all of these different things. It's about that one tiny step, that one tiny shift that we can make that makes all the difference moving forward.
Dawn Taylor
Well and preventative maintenance. I remember hearing a speaker years ago that was talking about the fact that he booked his time off and his calendar before anything else when he did his goals. And it was like, no, my time off goes first. Like downtime, vacation time, whatever goes first. Then it's my time with my family. Because I need number one to fulfill number two. And he worked his way down his list. And I'm not saying this in a way of oh my goodness, but I work 8 to 8 hours a day or ten hours a day or 12 hours a day, and I can't book that in and I can't this and I can't that. Yeah. You can't. It's saying, no, I'm not going to go to family houses every single weekend of every single month of every single year. I'm not going to go to every single party. I'm not going to do every single activity. I'm not like, it's finding it outside of it. Maybe it's even on your lunch hour. Instead of scrolling your phone or working through your lunch hour, sometimes you actually just go for a walk or you just go out into nature. If there's anything nearby, like a tree, like whatever it is that you can do. I know right?
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Pugs are great, they're amazing, and trees are good too.
Dawn Taylor
But it's finding those little beautiful bits of time. I was talking to a friend last weekend. We were hanging out of town together, and we were laughing because, like, we were having a lot of conversations on, like, work and life and business and all of these things. And she's like, oh my gosh, so many events in December. And I thought about it after and I was talking to my husband and I said I had this weird moment of like, I don't have any events in December. And he's like, no, because everyone in your life knows you're gonna say no. So they just stopped inviting you years ago. And I started laughing and I was like, does that make me a horrible person? And he's like, no. He's like, but you actually get to enjoy December every year and you're not burnt out by the time Christmas comes because you haven't done all the things. Mhm. And so I was laughing about it because then like his staff Christmas party next week and ye,s we're recording this end of November and you know his staff party is next week. And then the week after, you know one of his old co-workers who owns a company invited us to his staff Christmas party because he really wanted us there. And it wasn't even like a given that we would go like, he's like, if you want to, you are invited. Like, I'd love you there, but. Right. And my husband was like, are you busy on this day? Would you be open to going? Because, you know, it's like I am the first person to be like, no, nope. I'm good. Right? Yeah. And I challenge everybody listening to this. I challenge every single person to look at your calendar. And take out 1 to 2 things a week. Knock them out. Take them out 1 or 2 things a week and find 1 or 2 things that you can add in that are like your preventative maintenance.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
To stop you from burning out, what are your 1 to 2 things of rest? Is it sitting in your car while you listen to your favorite song every day in your driveway or in your garage before you go in? Is that your moment of rest? Is that when you come home from work? Is it going? And just like laying down for ten minutes and having a power nap for ten minutes to breathe? Is it waking up half an hour earlier in the morning to, like, sit and just have a moment while you sip your coffee? Yeah, all of these little moments add up. So for our listeners, is there anything else that you want to add, or are there just like a few quick tips that you could give people?
Tess Jewell-Larsen
I think my tip would be and it's what we're talking about. But I think my tip would be. Take that time to really be mindful of what is going on. So at one point every day it can be. Any time of the day, right? See what works for you. It could be in the morning. Could be the afternoon. Could be in the evening. You could put this as something I tell my clients, like put a sticker on the back of your phone as a reminder. Right. And take that moment to check in. Ask yourself, how am I doing? How am I doing physically? So noticing, like, do I have any aches or pains? Do I have any tension anywhere? Um, do I feel open? Do I feel at ease? Right. Just whatever comes up, just acknowledge it. No judgment. Just notice what's going on mentally for me. How am I feeling mentally? Same. No judgment. Just noticing. How am I feeling emotionally? Once again, no judgment. Just noticing it. How am I feeling spiritually? And I don't necessarily mean spiritual as in divine. I mean spiritual as and like connection. Do I feel connected to self? Do I feel connected to the world around me, to my partner, to my community? Whoever? Right to nature. Check in with those four things. And then ask yourself, is there one thing that I can do for myself today?What's that? One thing. And it doesn't have to be a lot of time. Ten minutes. What's that one thing that I can do to get back to myself today?
Dawn Taylor
Love it. How can I love on myself even more today?
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
We're so busy loving on everybody else. So sometimes we need to take a moment and just love on ourselves. Definitely, definitely. Right. And I think we're so busy setting New Year's resolutions and we're so busy setting new goals, the new everything. And prior to recording today, I told you that I just, like, shut down like two whole sections of my company. I walked away from them and was like, nope, that's not what I want to be doing. That's not how I want to be serving. That's not how I want to be working with people. The one on one trauma is my jam like that, and some corporate like that is my jam, and I'm going to just stay in my lane. And it was interesting because part of that came from a few different conversations over the last few weeks, but also my husband looking at me and going, when is enough, enough? Like, what is the driver behind all of this? He said. Because it's never been about money. He's like, but what is the driver behind all of this? To do all the things all of the time. Like at what point have you earned your rest? At what point have you, you know, and, it was the most incredible conversation. Anyone who knows my husband is laughing because he's a man of few words, but mass wisdom. Right. He's very shy, he's very introverted, but he also has a wicked sense of humor. But he is also the guy that all of a sudden will say something and you're like, oh, I needed to hear that and listen to that.
Tess Jewell-LarsenYes, yes.
Dawn Taylor
Right. And that was part of his thing. He's like. He's like, you're not loving those. They're not working for you anymore. And he's like, but also like, why? Like what is making you do that? And it just is amazing how making the decision was so powerful. And going back to the word that you use, like the guilt that we feel for things. I challenge people to look at like, what is your expectation that you have on yourself? And is it yours or is it somebody else's?
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Oh yes.
Dawn Taylor
So if you have an expectation of yourself, of how hard you have to work, or when you have to work, or how busy you have to be, or the fact that you can't sleep till you're dead. Because guys, by the way, your body will find a way to get a nap. Whether you give it one or yes.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Sleep is important.
Dawn Taylor
Your body will find a way to slow you down if you need it. Right. Whether you get a cold or a flu or you get sick or you get panic attacks or whatever it is like, your body will create safety for you in that way. So it's way more beneficial if you do it yourself first. Mhm. Right. But really look at those. Right. But look at those expectations and be like is this my expectation of me or is this somebody else's expectation of me? And if this is someone else's. Do I want to meet this? Is this something that's actually important? Something I need to be doing for myself? Or is it because I'm scared of disappointing them? Problem number one. But then the second is like, if this is my expectation of myself. Where did this come from? Right. Where did this come from? What happened in my life that a situation happened, that I created a new standard for myself, that I then had to create expectations in myself and really take a look at that and go, is this still appropriate in my life today? Does this still match my circumstances today? And that's a really easy way to start to see those things for yourself and go, no, you know what? I had a standard for how I kept my house, or I had a standard for how I kept my physical appearance, or I had a standard for how much it worked. But it was based on my life. Pre kid's pre-health condition pre age pre-menopause pre whatever it is.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Mhm.
Dawn TaylorRight. And that was a beautiful standard that I set for myself at that point. But maybe it's time to shift and pivot that a little bit, because my new circumstances don't actually match up anymore.
Tess-Jewell Larsen
Yeah, and that's okay. Right? It's okay to shift those things. It's okay to. Right. As I've said, you know, meet yourself where you are. That's fine. There's nothing wrong with that. And I think
when, when we take that time to kind of forgive ourselves for, for buying into those ideas that like, oh, I have to do this, I have to do that, whether it's right, someone else's opinion or our own and, you know, forgive yourself. It's okay. Meet yourself with grace.
Dawn Taylor
No judgment, just curiosity. The line I use probably 100 times a day with people. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Tess, thank you for hanging out with us today. Thank you for being on the show and sharing your amazing, beautiful wisdom with us in all of these areas. I hope that for someone listening today that if nothing else, you got given permission to go have the nap. Permission to, like, take that five minutes to yourself in the bathroom. Take the ten minutes to have a hot bath if you need to at the end of the day, but also to say no, and to realize that, like, the preventative maintenance, the maintenance of this is huge. Please, please, please join us again in two weeks for another fun topic or hard topic. And tell your friends the more people that feel misunderstood, seen and heard, the better. Check out the show notes located at TheTaylorWay.ca. We're going to have all of this information so you can reach out to her if you're looking for any support in any way. And also to follow on her journey when she lives in Spain, which is one of my favorite places in the world. Subscribe now on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen your podcast. And if you love the show, please, please leave a rating and review. Thank you, Tess.
Tess Jewell-Larsen
Thank you.
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Today on Taylor Way Talks, we get to speak to Paul Young. While the world knows him as the author of the groundbreaking best-seller The Shack, today he gets to talk to us as an MK - missionary kid - born from having a third culture, as well as a man of God who tries his best to make sense of the world. Paul believes that the love of God can come even from one’s darkest moments and in the most thorough processes of deconstruction and today, he gamely shares his revelations with all of us.
Who this for
Paul by his own admission has lived an imperfect life. Yet, he’s persevered and risen above it thanks to the belief in a perfect God. For anyone who’s ever questioned their faith and the purpose of God in their lives, Paul’s story is an inspirational look and one that could help us to be more introspective. Furthermore, for anyone interested in what it’s like growing up as a missionary kid and being exposed to various cultures, this episode gives us a glimpse at that very unique life.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Paul Young, author of The Shack, Cross Roads, Eve and other books, was born a Canadian and raised among a stone-age tribe with his missionary parents in the highlands of what was Netherlands New Guinea (now West Papua). He suffered great loss as a child and young adult, and now enjoys the “wastefulness of grace” with his growing family in the Pacific Northwest of the USA.
Guest Social Links
Website - https://wmpaulyoung.com
Facebook - https://facebook.com/wmpaulyoung
The Shattered Soul - https://wmpaulyoung.com/the-shattered-soul/
Thanks for listening!
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Dawn, and today I get the privilege to talk to the amazing Paul Young. You guys would know him as the guy that wrote The Shack. If you haven't seen the movie or read the book, you desperately need to, but today we're talking about a different section of his life. Today we're going to talk about being an MK and how to keep your faith. So, MK for laymen’s folks that were not raised in a church is a missionary kid,
Paul Young
Or it can be called a third culture kid because it’s a different culture. Yeah. And third culture means that you belong to a group that is different from your passport culture and the culture that you grew up in. And so you don't fit in either anymore. And so, you know, when I'm, when I meet a missionary kid, the third culture kid, we instantly have a bond. Instantly, I was, uh, I was with, uh, Bill and Gloria Gaither in the Midwest, where they live at one point. And there was a gathering of about, I don't know, 150 people. And somebody asked me this, during the Q&A, um, as because it was in the US, Canada would be a Q and R, and because we Canadians don't have all the answers.
Dawn Taylor
I love that you say that you're a Canadian. We literally went to the same high school.
Paul Young
So they said. You know. What was it like growing up as a missionary kid and why do you have this, this attachment to other missionary kids? And I said, oh, let me explain. I said, we've got probably 40 missionary kids in this room, and I'm going to ask one question and count to three. And wherever they're seated, they're going to answer it. And I said, okay, ready? So here's the question. What's the hardest question anybody ever asks you? And all over the room, you know, without exception, they called out. “Where are you from?” Because we don't know how to answer that question. Are you asking me where I currently live? Are you asking me where I grew up? Are you asking me what's on my passport? Are you asking me? You know all of that. Where are you from?
Dawn Taylor
So very different. So let's backtrack a little bit. So you were born in Canada?
Paul Young
Yep, a year old.
Dawn Taylor
Raised among a Stone Age tribe by your missionary parents in the highlands of former New Guinea.
Paul Young
Now West Papua.
Dawn Taylor
Okay, so then had this crazy great loss as a child, young adult. And now, I do want to ask you about the statement you now enjoy the wastefulness of grace with your family in the Pacific Northwest. I think it's just a sort of Portland, if I'm guessing. Right.
Paul Young
Just north of Portland. Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
Okay. And he's the author of Lies We Believe About God, the New York Times bestsellers The Shack, Crossroads, and Eve. You've got kids and grandkids and a marriage, and I've heard you speak on the sexual abuse that you dealt with as a child and a lot of different things, but today we wanted to go at it from a bit of a different standpoint of when you're hurt within your beliefs., right? So when the hurt comes from within your faith and your culture. How do you maintain that? How do you come back to it and what does that look like? So, the first time you and I met was at a Little Warriors Luncheon. And then I was like, hey, I want to have a zoom call with you. Can we have coffee? And you actually said yes. Like he actually said yes. And I'm like, yeah, why not? But then when we connected, we realized that we actually went to the same high school and knew this same kind of neck of the woods area and some people, which was a really fun connection that we both grew up in Terrace. But let's talk, tell me about your story. From
the little boy and what that looked like.
Paul Young
So. A year old. We go to the Highlands of New Guinea. New Guinea is a very unusual place. It has over 800 unrelated language groups. Wow. So, like, they're still looking for the Tower of Babel there somewhere, and, uh, but 800 unrelated, like the tribe north of us. Danal was a was an, um, ours was a non tonal dialect, like English, but theirs was a tonal dialect, like Chinese. And, uh, right next to each other with no common languages, no trade languages, nothing separation by swamps or mountains or rivers or whatever. And so, you know, everything our, our tribe was in the valley, uh, the Barling Valley called the Cannibal Valley. That was the nickname because they practiced ritualistic cannibalism. And so it was a big tribe, 40 to 60,000 members over about 100mi². And, um. One of the biggest, New Guinea as a whole, is the second largest island in the world. And, uh, and so. People don't know it. It goes from right off the equator up to glaciers. And people don't know that there's all this diversity, um, in the middle of that country. Yeah, middle of that island. So Dani it was my first language. My first real language. It was the first language that I, I could speak fluently. It was my dreaming language. So I felt like a Dani because my parents were very much doing the work of God. And, uh, so I was basically raised Dani and, uh, which I, I thought was great in so many respects. And, um, even when I was in their, in their villages and I heard conversations about whether they were going to kill my parents or not, I never felt any fear. And, um, I, I wasn't, I wasn't white anyway. I mean, really, because you get color blind about yourself in that sense. And it wasn't until boarding school when I was sent to boarding school at six, did the actual realization that I was white happen, and that was a shock. But, you know, when I think about the sexual abuse, it began in the tribal culture, and I don't know, I don't know whether it was just endemic to the culture or whether I was targeted or not. I'm just not sure about that. But when I was sent at six to boarding school, I was targeted, there's no question about it. And, uh, and boarding school was not a safe place, but I was, I had already disassociated from my parents. I didn't have any sense of their parental relationship with me. And, uh, I'm the oldest of four.
Dawn Taylor
So let's talk about that for a second, because a lot of people don't understand that as a missionary kid, the majority of missionary kids are not raised in the village, in the culture, in the town, with their parents. The majority of them are sent away to boarding school. What does that mean?
Paul Young
Well, in our world, as a missionary, you raised your own support, but it was a requirement that you had to send your kids to a boarding school. That means at six, they put you in an airplane and they send you to the coast. In our case and it was a school from first to eighth grade. And, you're by yourself, you're just a school full of kids. And your dorm parents or your those who ran the school, things like that. And it's kind of crazy, but. Usually the dorm parents and all those. The ones who are over the school weren't those who weren't very good missionaries. And but there was no sense. And even when my parents the year before we left became dorm parents, there was no connection. I mean, at that point, they were the parents of, what, 30, 40 kids? And so there's no sense that you're connected to them in any other way than everybody else. Um, but going to, you know, being pulled from your world, your tribe, your color into a place and dropped into a world that you don't even know how to make sense of. And think about it. Six years old. It's a baby. And now they've got to figure out how to survive. They've got to figure out how to deal with the abuse that takes place. Because you got to find a way to survive. You know, and when the big boys would come and molest the little boys. At six. That was the only sense of belonging you knew. So boarding school was dangerous. There was, you know, f a girl wet her bed, she was forced to wear a diaper and sit in a highchair. You know, for meals. And she could be in seventh grade or eighth grade and, uh, you know, there was one of the kids that was quite rebellious and in their estimation, and he spent probably most of his elementary school in lockup. But there was a day where he was forced to lay on the concrete slab we had, and all the kids were forced to kick him as hard as we could. To communicate what a piece of garbage he was.
Dawn Taylor
You know.like you're sent there for, like, your parents are there to do such a beautiful thing. Like they're genuinely there to do something beautiful. Yeah, but that had to hand you over to that.
Paul Young
And so my parents went with the best of intentions. My mother's a nurse, and she knocked a disease right out of the Central Valley. You know, they had a disease called yaws, which is like leprosy on steroids. But it had no resistance to penicillin, and it was a horrible disease, a horrible disease. If you ever saw pictures of it, you just go like, that's like the worst thing you've ever seen. And, she knocked it out the, um, and then she became the one they'd come to if they had, you know, arrows stuck in them, you know, because their warfare was bows and arrows. It was a Stone Age culture. So they had no metal in it at all. And so that's one of the reasons they didn't kill my parents because my dad had brought him a whole bunch of steel axes, which were much better than the stone ads that they used. Andvso they decided just to rip off as many steel axes as they could rather than kill us. But again, I didn't ever feel in danger except from the witches. They were a little scary, but they were all old women and couldn't run very fast. Yeah. And, uh, but, um, you know, so there's, there's all these layers of trauma that was going on and the sense of abandonment. You know, I have a memory. And it was probably just before I went to boarding school. Where my dad, my mom guilted my dad into letting me go on a trek with him into the jungle. And he was mad about that. And as soon as we got out of sight of the compound, he just took off. He just took off and I couldn't catch up. And all I remember is running and running as hard as I could. And I don't know if I ever caught him. I don't know, I don't have a memory of ever catching up, but, you know, there's just things like that and the trauma of having to leave the culture itself to go to a place you didn't know or understand. That's six. Yeah. I mean, who would send their kids away at six? You know, I've got my kids, but I got grandchildren now, a whole bunch of them. And one of my daughters, one of our daughters, is pregnant with grandchild number 16. And. When you look at a six year olds. Like they've got no capacity. They don't understand anything. And, to basically be abandoned to that world. You know, it's a crushing thing. And I've talked to, you know, MKs all from different parts of the world, and they experience the same sorts of things. And a lot of them are really struggling to integrate into any part of the world, part of it, but part of the beauty of MKs. And let me say this. As they carry a gift of being able to cross cultural divides. They see things from outside the box of a particular culture that they find themselves in, because they're not in it. And so they have a capacity to see the things which don't make any sense for, um, where people just accept them without challenging the assumptions. And so as, as MKs or third culture kids. Become healthy. They become gifts to the world. And you'd be absolutely amazed at who in the world is helping solve problems that have a background as third culture kids. But you gotta get through the crap, you know, you have to find a way to come to wholeness. And that's a long and arduous journey for many of us.
Dawn Taylor
It is, and for so many reasons. Like, it's one thing to deal with sexual abuse
when you're in a healthy home environment.
Paul Young
Yeah. Which I wasn't.
Dawn Taylor
Which you weren't. So you dealt with abuse in the village, then you get sent away at six. You're now dealing with this rejection and abandonment.
Paul Young
I already had a very furious dad who wasn't a healthy man.
Dawn Taylor
So now you add that on to it. Right now, you go to this environment that's not only abusing you, but they're teaching you like I can't even imagine. And what that psychologically would do to you?
Paul Young
I have this when people ask me, is there anything you don't like to eat? I always say sauerkraut out of spite, you know? And people go like sauerkraut out of spite. And if they want to hear the story, I tell them about the day that some nice-loving Dutch person sent 50 gallons of sauerkraut to the boarding school and when they arrived, the people who ran the school, the dorm, parents and stuff, they they knew that this was brand new to all of us. And so we had a meal and uh, they put a bunch of sauerkraut on our tables and on our plates. And the thing was, if you ate all the sauerkraut before, you know, if everybody ate the sauerkraut on their plates, then they would cancel school in the afternoon, and we all go to the bomb hole. It was a, World War II was fought in New Guinea a lot. And so there are these bomb holes, and the water from the mountains would come and fill them up, and they became swimming holes. And so, yeah, it was great. And I got caught throwing mine down the toilet. And so everybody in the school got to go swimming. And a woman sat there with a wooden spoon and all the leftover sauerkraut and hit me every time I would take a bite and swallow. I spent the afternoon that way. And I must have been seven by then. Probably seven. So I don't like sauerkraut out of spite.
Dawn Taylor
No, I wouldn't either. So you lived there for how long? How many years did this abuse in all forms take?
Paul Young
Yeah, we came back when I was, um, right around ten years old, and we came back to Canada and, uh, Saskatoon in the middle of winter. Um, and, yeah, it was a culture shock. Went to a mall for the first time. And it was just like there's little doors. People went in and came out different, you know, the elevator, and we couldn't figure that one out. And there was an African American man that came through the mall, and we jumped him, four kids talking to him in Dani and wondering why he's not talking back because he's the closest thing to home we'd ever seen. And, um, so there was all this culture shock, and I moved around. We moved around a lot. My dad became an itinerant pastor at 13 schools before I graduated high school. And, uh, a lot of things were broken, porn addict by 12. And, uh, and because, you know, I had no capacity to trust a relationship. So porn is, you know, the imagination of a relationship without the risk of a real one. And, um, and so my cover skill, my survival skill was to tell a story like, which is another phrase for lying. I became a really good liar. I had already done that. My dad had beat that into me. And um, and you know, with so here's, here's what my history had done. Um, my relationship with my dad had communicated that I was a piece of shit. My sexual abuse communicated that I was a piece of shit. My abandonment communicated the same thing my experiences at boarding school communicating the same thing. We came back to Canada with no explanation and so we had to make stuff up. Moving around communicated the same thing. The self-hatred that came out of things like the porn addiction was just evidence of my theology that I grew up with that communicated the same thing. So I had a theology that says, you have, you're totally depraved. You know, it's like Luther said, we are snow covered dung, you know, piece of shit theology. And, um, so God looked at me the same way. And that was a huge hurdle. But you know, I look back at my childhood and for all the crap that was going on, there was such beauty. It would reach out. Not just in the land. But in the moments. And in the stories I was reading and in, you know, the tribe, the Dani tribe. The reason that I even became a follower of Jesus is because the tribe did. I was part of the tribe. And they did it at great cost and not because of the missionaries. Actually, the missionaries told them it wasn't a good idea because their immediate response was to build a burning pyre, a fire that was 100 yards long, three feet wide and three foot tall of all their weapons and all their spirit worshiping stuff. Not at any of the encouragement of any of the missionaries that were just there. Response of heart. And even at boarding school, you know, there were those moments we had this we have this, um, seed that had wings, you know, and you could fly them. It would just float, like, you know, it would just do this thing and float like this. And there were these huge butterflies, and there were these birds, you know, the bird of Paradise and other birds that were just absolutely magnificent and, you know, in the midst of the trauma, in the midst of the Indonesian soldiers getting drunk down in the valley and shooting up the little church that was on the property from below, and, uh, lots of snakes. They scared the crap out of me. But lots of them. And big ones and very poisonous ones. So in the midst of all this, there is, I didn't grow up blaming God for all the damage, I grew up loving Jesus. Even in spite of all this, and a little terrified of God the Father, because he looked just like my dad. But there was something beautiful about Jesus. And so that was the through thread. Jesus was the through thread. Even though He was pretty disappointed in me most of the time. There was still a real affection there and and a desperation because I couldn't, you know, turns out I'm pretty smart. And so, you know, in my teens, I was already reading, you know. Hermann Hesse and, uh, Pascal and Jacques and really heavy thinking sociologists and philosophers and stuff like that. And I couldn't find an alternative that really held water. But man, was I mad at the church. Really had a chip on my shoulder for a lot of good reasons. And somehow, and this has not been a common thing for missionary kids. Somehow I managed. Now I put Jesus on the fence a couple different times where it's like, you know, and I always ended up having to do things, you know, that being a part of something that was beautiful, a healing of somebody's heart that was that Jesus was absolutely essential part of that. And, and that would be a problem with my intellectual, you know, distance from God. It was just like, oh, crap. And, um, and, you know, I didn't know what else to do. So I left home as soon as I could. I was 16 and started working really hard, many jobs, and then went to Bible school because I didn't know what else to do.
Dawn Taylor
Where were you looking at that point?
Paul Young
So Terraces, where I graduated. Right. And, uh, I worked at the radio. I started doing that when I was 16.
Dawn Taylor
Little small town, northern British Columbia.
Paul Young
Well, what's funny is I go in there and, uh, and they and I said, can I get a job? And they go, like, do you have any radio experience? And I go, no, but I've, I've been in the play at Caledonia.
Yeah. And, and uh, I actually played and oh my gosh, they did Our Town, I was the town drunk and the evolutionary professor, I played both those roles and, uh, as. And I'm the preacher's kid in town, so. But well, we had a situation last night. Our rock n roll disc jockey who is really good left his mike open and he was dealing dope over the mic. So they said, we're going to train you. So I got 24 hours of training and I was on with nobody to oversee it or anything. I got to be the worst. Couple days, you know, radio broadcasts. I think it would be so hilarious to listen to those and but, you know, I worked hard, worked at many different things. Was a Hot Springs lifeguard at the same time, was doing construction work and, you know, really, really hard stuff, and then went to Bible School to see if I couldn't find something that made any sense. And I am so grateful. Inside of all my fury. Um, there were people that just showed up at the right moments. Most of them are women, frankly. Like Ruth Rambo, who is the president of the school's wife. And she'd slipped and I found out later, much later, that she did this to a lot of kids. She and her husband had been missionaries in the Philippines, but she would slip me a note or a book or a tape and, uh, and it would help. It would keep the movement going. But man, did I have a lot of deconstruction to do. And it took me a long time and part of the problem was you could intellectually come to a position. And you can see things, but it doesn't impact the integrity of your life. You can't, you know, coming to an intellectual position will not heal you and your world on the inside. It will not heal the broken places. And, uh, and I know, I know a lot of folks who are trying to make a change in terms of an intellectual, rational position, hoping that it will change. The things that are broken in them.
Dawn Taylor
The trauma didn't happen to our brains. It happened to our bodies and the clients all the time. Right? Is when you're scared, you don't go, I am scared, your brain has this like I'm scared moment, okay? No. Your body physically feels the scared. Yeah, right. When something happens to us that happens there. So I was, I spent some time googling you, my friend, and
I was reading an article that you wrote for something. We'll take it in the show notes so you guys can read it. I also found it on your website called The Shattered Soul and it was really interesting. I love your words that you put to this. And. The Shack, which we'll get to later, is the book that you wrote that a lot of people, I think, took the wrong way. I know there was a lot of–
Paul Young
Those are my people, right? No. Not quite. My people would be those who didn't actually read it and are still mad about it. Right?
Dawn Taylor
Oh, it cracks me up. And I remember I remember hearing about that right. And hearing this whole thing. And you write about it and I'm just going to read this for the listener. You can read The Shack as a story, but my intent was always more than that, a parable laden with metaphor. It is a true story, but not real. The shack itself represents the house on the inside. The people help you build. It is the human heart, the uniquely crafted soul that can so easily be torn from its moorings and left to flounder in the waves of a storm tossed world. Some of us had good help building the house of the soul, but many of us did not. For us, this inside place became a shattered hovel, a barely habitable dwelling of which we were intensely ashamed and into which no one would ever be invited. Here we stored our addictions and hid our secrets. It was the house of shame and pain, held together by a webbing of lies, and protected by an ever growing array of survival skills and defensive mechanisms. And we believed that God hated this place even more than we did.
Paul Young
Yeah. Pretty much.
Dawn Taylor
And those words. I read those and I went, oh, isn't that so? The things that happen to us, the things that have been done to us. Our shame, our guilt, our hurt, our pain. All of these things. And yet we choose to either curl up and die or choose to fight.
Paul Young
Yeah. Yep. For a bunch of us. You know, suicide is a is a common companion because it's the last way to run away. And we've spent our whole life running away. Yeah. And, uh, but it's the last way to run away before you hit the bottom. For a lot of us, and for some folks, it's the way to stop the pain. Um, and, uh, but for me, it was the last way to run away. So there were more than a few times that I'd just about call it in. And, uh, and I'm grateful that I didn't. So, you know, part of the implicit question here is. What was the trigger that made me start to look honestly at the damage, you know, and it's different for different people. For me, it was Kim catching me in a three month affair with one of her best friends. And that just crashed my world. And it was, oh, the shame was so profound. But the question was even deeper. And that is you can either kill yourself or do you think there might be a way to change? That was the question. And, you know, I'm thankfully married to a very, very strong willed, emotionally healthy, furious woman.
Dawn Taylor
I love that you have furious in there.
Paul Young
Oh my gosh. You know, I look back, if it hadn't been for the intensity of Kim's fury, I probably wouldn't be here. In fact, I know I wouldn't be here. And, uh, it was the intensity of her fury constantly like it took her and I 11 years to heal. 11 years. Yeah. And in a world where it's so easy to give up. I don't know why I didn't because the first two years especially were absolute hell. Um, absolute hell. I remember driving with the family through from Banff down into the Valley of BC, and I had a half an hour of peace. That's the only peace I remember in the first two years. And, uh, and I was working hard. I pulled the yellow pages off the shelf and, and looked under counselors. Not because Kim required it, because I needed to find some help, and I knew I couldn't. I couldn't come to healing alone. Everything about my life was about isolation, everything. And I didn't realize that isolation is always disempowering. So, you know, I started with the A's and worked my way down. And I found Agape Youth and Family Services in their box over here. They said, we specialize in sexual abuse histories. And Kim didn't even know about the sexual abuse. I mean, she didn't know anything. In fact, when I had my first conversation after she caught me. And said, I'm at your office and I'm waiting. Oh, and I know I'm at your office and I know and I had to make the decision whether to kill myself or go and face her, which I couldn't actually face her. You know, literally, I, I couldn't get my eyes off the floor because you can't take the risk of that disgust in the person's eyes. Who you are in front of. Just won't shatter everything. So, she talked for four hours just laid into me and at the end of it that's when I said. If we're going to do this, I need to tell you every secret I have. Because secrets have been killing me my whole life. And naively she said, bring it on.
Dawn Taylor
And having no idea what she was walking into. How long have you guys been married?
Paul Young
Um, 13, 14 years. Right in there. Because Matthew had just been born. He was like six months old.
Dawn Taylor
So how many kids did you have at this point?
Paul Young
Matthew was our sixth child.
Dawn Taylor
So you had six little kids at home?
Paul Young
Yeah, our oldest was. 13. Almost 14.
Dawn Taylor
So life's already hard just based on the fact that many kids and there's not much parenting going on.
Paul Young
Yeah, yeah. And, Kim's I mean, she comes from a huge family in which there is a high degree of health. You know, all the boys in their family knew how to raise children. They, you know, from the time they were little, they knew how to change diapers. They knew how to. Yeah. You know, all of that. She has five sisters and two brothers. And her and her five sisters are called the And may the force be with you. She was born in Minot, North Dakota. You know, there's no 50 shades and nothing. And I am very clear about this. And she would say there's lots of things that she did wrong during this period of time. And I would say I don't care. And I would say to anybody that Kim saved my life. She literally saved my life. I actually hit the bottom. When you're around somebody who hasn't hit the bottom, they will always point a finger elsewhere. They won't deal with their stuff completely. They will always find a way to make it somebody else's problem, in part, which may be true. But when you're going to face it when you get to the bottom, you don't care. You don't care who did what, it's about, is there a way to heal? Is there a way to change? And that when I went and met Scott, who was the therapist. The first question I asked him is, well, I told him all my situation and I said, can you help me? He's the first person I ever said those words to. Wow. And, you know, here I am, 38 years old and had never said to anybody, I'd worked off a persona. You know, I had such a shamed, drenched view of myself. You know, the affair wasn't about love because I didn't have that capacity. The affair was porn in the flesh is what it was. You know, it was my vacancy of soul that projected itself onto another image and somebody we knew very well and somebody whose kids who loved us. And so the damage was monumental. I still am in such deep gratitude and incredible regret. Not shame based regret, but grief based regret. And of the damage that I did and some of it's still not reconciled all these years later. And it's a timing thing and I'm not I'm not in charge of that. But one day, I said to Scott, can you help me? And he said, yep, I can, but it'll take a year and a half. I said, I'm in. He goes, he laughed at me. He goes, Paul, everybody says they're in when they're sitting in your chair after a couple of months, they'll feel smarter and more in control and they'll bail out right before the really hard stuff. And turned out I pulled this guy out of the Yellow Pages. He had graduated from Prairie Bible Institute. He had worked with a lot of churches in which sexual abuse was, you know, amongst the elders of the leadership and stuff like that, including I didn't find this out until later, including one that involved one of my uncles. And, so here I am, pulling a guy out of the Yellow Pages in Portland, Oregon. And it's a setup. It's totally a setup in the best possible way. And it took, I worked really, really hard. I almost killed myself about four months into it because it was getting too hard. And it got intercepted by a couple of people who did not know what was going on at that time in terms of my struggle and saved me and then went back to Scott. Nine months into this, he says, Paul, you're done. And I'm like. What? Like, you said, it was going to take a year and a half, and he goes. We have never seen anybody work this hard and stick to it. And it was life or death. Desperation for me. And Scott and I became friends, which is a great gift, too. So, you know, you look at all this, the intellectual stuff. I had to dismantle and rebuild a lot of that. But that's not what changed me. It's not what caused this massive shift in terms of my inside world. It was suffering and crushing and choices, and hurt that I inflicted and pain that I needed to deal with. It was that side. And a lot of people hide their deconstruction for all their internal messes, right? So they think they can think their way into health. Not going to happen. Not going to happen. I got a great poem. Friend of mine is an Aussie and uh, David Tennyson. He says, if you must deconstruct. Take every part. Weigh, measure, keep and discard necessary things. Take all the time you need, but do not camp in the ruins. Discuss discoveries, but do not raise monuments to your brilliance. Brave as you may be instead. In time, build something new. Take the remains. Sorrows and pains. New friends you've gained. And build something new. Allowing the wise few to remind you. There is a time to break down. And a time to build up. It's called “If you must.”
Dawn Taylor
It's beautiful.
Paul Young
So Kim and I are now married 44 years. We're the best we've ever been. And it just keeps getting better. But we lost some things because of my choices. And, uh, and it is smashed into my kids. And in terrible ways, and it took time for that to heal. But now I have grandkids, and one of the great unexpected beauties of having grandchildren is as you grow, your capacity to love increases. And I've been able to love them in a way that I didn't have the capacity to love my own kids. And they know it. But they watch me love their children in ways that I couldn't love them. And it's healing things that are still left to be healed in my own kids and in my relationship with them.
Dawn Taylor
You know, what I love about that is we are so quick to walk away, so quick to, we will hold people at the point in our story where our story kind of stopped with them, right? Or where there was a really hard pivot point and we will hold them there. Yeah. And we forget that people keep growing and they keep changing and things adjust and shift. And we have to give people a chance.
Paul Young
Absolutely. And ourselves, you know.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, and give ourselves so much grace. I often have described my life as beautiful, horrifically beautiful, and beautifully horrific.
Paul Young
I think that's right. And yes, um, you know, part of this journey is destroying my really ugly view of God. And taking the risks that God was as at least as good as I wanted God to be, at least as good. And it turns out that that's just scratching the surface. You know, I have people, my people who write to me and they, they write and they say I'm terrified to take the risk that God is as good as you say and you're wrong. Right? So they've already built in a God who's untrustworthy and, you know. I think the human, deepest longings are little windows into the nature of God. And if those are our deepest longings to be truth tellers, to be kind, to be good, which I think we are all already are being made in the image and likeness of God. But if we can find those deepest longings. They are sometimes grime-covered, but they are windows into the nature of God that is at least as good as our longings.
Dawn Taylor
Did you ever struggle with. and I hear this often with people that were raised, raised in any religion that they were raised like God the Father, that he's like our dad. And that for me, that's something that I always bump up against is like, I can't think of God in that way because then I think of my dad, right? Right. And that's not that's not okay. Yeah. And so, you know, with drawing some of the wording of that and shifting some of the beliefs on that because I hear that constantly from clients.
Paul Young
Yeah. You know, it's interesting. I was having a conversation with a friend and she was talking about she had an incredible father, an incredible father. And so she challenged the bad theology right off the bat because God would, was at least as good as her dad. Right? And the theology didn't even didn't even allow for God to be as good as at least her dad. But for a lot of us. God is anything but. The father is anything but good. And so there's a split inside what we would call the Trinity, you know, three persons, one essence. And so you've got multiple gods and and you've got a god of the Old Testament who is the father. Then you've got Jesus, and you know, who knew where the Holy Spirit was. We weren't Pentecostal or charismatic. We got the Holy Bible, who needs the Holy Spirit? And so so we had we had God the Father. Who is this? I got a letter from an MK and she says. When I grew up, I really couldn't define what the difference between God and Satan was, except that Satan was more consistent. And so here she is trapped in this. You know, you didn't know whether God got up on the right side of the bed today and was all based on your performance. So, it was all moralism and behavioral control and all that kind of stuff. And so, God the Father is the one that was going around killing babies and things like that, because you have to accept that the Bible was absolutely inerrant and infallible and that everything that they would say about God commanding the destruction of whole, you know, committing genocide was true that that's what God actually wanted. And then you got Jesus as the sort of commercial break. For Dove or, you know, something nice. And then you got, you know, we're back to our regularly scheduled programming when you hit the book of Revelation. I mean, there were parts of that that took me a long time to take a hard look at and go like, this cannot be true. Yeah, this cannot be true. And so I don't believe any of that. I don't believe that. I believe that Jesus and God the Father, Jesus says, you've seen me, you've seen the father. I and the father are one. I mean, there's no distinction in terms of character. Um, and there's just this absolutely union of the father, son, and Holy Spirit. So, that means that God submitted to those who wrote about Him, wrote about God. And that is part of the goodness of God, is that God submits by nature. You know. So, there's so much there is so much to disentangle and even all the crap that's going on, really horrendous stuff in the Middle East. We're still entangled as Christians in really bad theology that is wrapped up in the Middle East and, uh. And it's like, come on. But I see changes. I see changes. And it's very, very encouraging that people are beginning to hear for themselves and people are beginning to say, nope, God is at least as good as my best longings. At least. And of course, it's like I said, it's only scratching the surface, that's what I tell people. I wrote God is as good as I know how, and I know I just barely scratched the surface. It takes a lot of work to disentangle yourself. Especially when you've been taught that this is how God looks at you. So God tells you you're a piece of garbage, and then you find out that you're made in the image and likeness of God, so that patience is who you are by nature, kindness, who you are by nature. Pure of heart is who you are by nature, and so is self-control. Both things, all of these come from the inside out. Those two things are what destroyed my porn addiction. That I am pure of heart and that I am self-control, not self-discipline, that's an outside in kind of thing, and it only lasts as good as you can have the energy to maintain it. And so it always breaks down. But. I haven't had an issue with.looking at a woman as an object or anything as an object. For 30 years.
Dawn Taylor
It's amazing.
Paul Young
It is. And? And it shouldn't be. It shouldn't be amazing. It should be normal. It should be normal. And it's because we bought into all this. You know, when people behave in destructive ways when people think it's okay to kill people. Because they think God kills people. They're not talking about the reality of the nature of God they're talking about how they think about themselves. You know? If they act in ways that are destructive, they're telling you what they believe about themselves. Because as a person thinks so, they are as they think in their heart about who they are. The ways of who they are are an expression of what they think. And so we have to find the truth that I am kind by nature, that I am loving by nature, that I'm patient by nature. All the things that are true of God are true, true of me in terms of character.
Dawn Taylor
It's so easy to just buy into what we've been taught.
Paul Young
Especially when it's all fear based.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, 100%. Right. And from Christianity to like every culture, every race, every religion.
Right? It's so easy. We are so brainwashed.
Paul Young
Yeah. You know, I was having this conversation. Really good conversation. And it's like above every culture sits the kingdom of God, that which is right and true and beautiful and good and caring and confronting against that which is in us that is not of love’s kind. It is a furious fire, but the fire is not aimed at us. It's aimed at everything in us that is not of love's kind, that prevents us from being fully human and fully alive. But there is a culture of Christianity. And there's a culture of Islam, and there's a culture of Judaism, and on and on and on. And in those cultures, conversation with a Muslim friend. And it's like, you do realize that there are people in Islam that are, that live in the same ways as anybody that's involved with the kingdom of God. And we don't have, there are things about culture that are beautiful, but there are things about culture that are horrendous. Genocide is horrendous in any culture. But as missionary kids, this is what our parents were sent to do, to move a Muslim from their culture to our culture. Not to encourage their growing into becoming those who express the kingdom of God. Right? So it's a shift from culture to culture, and as a result, we destroy culture. We pull people out of that which is beautiful to them and try to, it's like bringing a Muslim into the Christian culture from the Muslim culture. And it's like, you know, we committed genocide against the Muslim culture. And they brought art and science and music and all these beautiful things into the world, and we're going to annihilate the culture. I was having this conversation with a 16 year old girl who is Buddhist, and she was a foreign exchange student in the United States, and read the shock and got upended by it. Very Buddhist family. Loved going to the temple with her grandmother, who's very Buddhist and she's nominal Buddhist. Like a lot of young people in the West are nominal Christians or whatever. And her family, the family father with whom she was staying is a friend of mine, and she didn't know it. And so she had said a couple of weeks before she left, she said, you know. I would, if I was in bucket list. I would love to meet the author of The Shack that was on her bucket list. So he calls me and says, would you like to meet with her? I go, are you kidding? Absolutely. So we met at, um, Saint Arbucks down by the airport, the patron saint of staying awake in church. And so it blew her away, right. And we started a two hour conversation. And at the end, she's like, oh, man, can I ask you a question? Um, I love my youth group at the church, and they've started to say something that's bothering me. I like what she goes. They said that now that I'm a Christian, that they're praying for me, that when I go back home that I would take a stand, you know, for my Christianity. And that's bothering me in my heart. And I don't know what to do. And I said, oh, this is an easy one. She's like, this is an easy one. I go, yeah. She goes, what do I do? I said, don't be a Christian. Be a Buddhist follower of Jesus. Because Buddhism is a culture. Right? Don't vacate your culture. Just be a follower of Jesus inside your culture. And she goes, you're allowed to do that. I said, yeah, I know Christians who are followers of Jesus. And, uh, she's like, oh, the weight of the world went off her shoulder. And she said, so what do I do when my grandmother says, let's go to the temple. I said, ask Jesus, because you're not going to be going somewhere where God is not already and you're not going to be going with people or meeting anybody in whom God knows did not already dwell. So I would think that the Holy Spirit will whisper to you and say, yeah, let's go to the temple with your grandmother because that's that's loving your grandmother. And so, you know, you can trust love. You can trust love. No, we like religion because you don't have to trust God. You just have to know what you're supposed to do. There is, there is a new way to think about the world, but trust and control are opposed, and love and fear are opposed. And the Scripture says there's no fear in love. There's just no fear. So if there's something that is fearful. It's not love. Roger Zack, who lives in southern BC, is a theologian. He's written some things about how do you relate all this to children? And he teaches children of the three things. The first thing is there is a thief. There is an enemy of the human heart that will always steal and and and kill and destroy. And that's a Scripture. And so anywhere in Scripture you find killing, destroying and stealing, that is not love, that is not God. And the second thing is that God has submitted to His own people to write about him, to write God's story. And so they're going to write all kinds of things that are not good. They're even going to say that it's God who comes to steal and kill and destroy. And, uh. so any time you find there, and the third thing he says, look for Jesus. Look for Jesus. And we both know this little girl named Anna. And Anna likes to find the hard, raunchy parts of the Bible, right? She just has a radar for things. And so she was reading about the destruction of Jerusalem in the Old Testament, and it was bad. I mean, they were killing and eating each other. And I mean, it got really bad and all of that stuff. And so. She's like, okay. Obviously that's the thief, that's the enemy. Because all of this killing and destruction and all of this theft of life and so that and yet the writer's kind of intimate that God was the one who commanded all this. And she's going like, okay, nope. Not true, not true. They wrote it like that, but that's because they didn't see things clearly. Third, where was Jesus? Her answer was phenomenal, she says. Jesus. I mean, Jesus was in the tears of Jeremiah the prophet, right? Who was weeping over the destruction? Jesus was in the tears of Jeremiah the prophet. And Bradley goes, so how did you come up with that? And she said, in the New Testament, when Jesus stands and he knows that Jerusalem is going to be destroyed, he weeps. Right? I mean, it's like, we need to learn that. That's the way of looking at things in which love is distinct from fear or destruction or harm. And we need to look for where Jesus is even in our deconstruction journey. God is not a thief. God does not cause harm. That God does not take away life. God is life. And yet lots of our brothers and sisters write out of their cultural Christianity as if God is a destroyer. And we need to say where it's Jesus and all this. And the answer is with us, in us. Even in this hard deconstruction. And we need to remember the story is not over.
Dawn Taylor
That right there. The story is not over. I think for anyone in the scene today, if you got nothing else out of this, I know some people are going to be like, wow, Dawn, that was a heavy G this episode. I'm okay with that. No issue with that at all. This lousy listener. I've no problem. The biggest thing was, it's not the end of the story and listening. It doesn't matter how traumatic your childhood has been, how hard it's been, how horrible your parents were, how broken, how broken you are. You were how much people broke you. However you want to word it, the story is not over
Paul Young
And do the next right thing. Don't future trip your process. Don't future trip your fears. Stay present. Do the next right thing and you don't have to have the God language involved in this. You know, in the deepest of your heart. I would think that you would agree that there's something bigger than you, even if it's just love. And so do the next right thing. Stay present. Do the next right thing. Love the person who's in front of you. Respond to the next right thing that is actually in front of you. That's the only real world there is.
Dawn Taylor
It really is. It's we, before we even started recording today, we were talking about how right now, like, there's a lot of really heavy, hard stuff going on in this world, but also statistically, what were you saying statistically right now? Can I get you to repeat what you said?
Paul Young
Yeah. And you can look it up on the web and just look up something like the world now compared to a hundred years ago, or is the world now better than the world 100 years ago? And you'll come up with a whole bunch of stuff and it consistently is. Yes, the world is better now. Less human trafficking, less disease, less war. And so, you know, we get invited to be worried about things that we actually have absolutely nothing we can do to control any of it. And because we have instant news and communication, what used to take folks two months to find out about, we have it in a microsecond. And you're getting all this news that supports the commercial industry because because blood cells and fear cells and you don't realize that a gal that I met two weeks ago who spent five years in prison because of her addiction, has come out and is now she started with 20 returning citizens, that is, those who are coming, exiting out of the prison system, returning citizens, which I love. And she started with 20, in a placement company because nobody would look at them because they were felons, because her requirement was you had to have spent at least five years in prison before she would help you. And yeah, so she was taking the felons and the worst, you know, the worst offenders according. to the system. And she now has a placement company that is placing 26,000 and in five years and with companies and I think around 70% of those she places temporarily are now working as permanent employees for the companies that she has placed them with.
Dawn Taylor
There's so much beauty. There's such beauty in this world and things that people are doing and changes people are making and. for anyone listening. You can make a little shift. You can make a ripple.
Paul Young
Yeah. She's five years clean and sober. Her brother is six months clean and sober. I mean, these are real people fighting real dragons and doing the next right thing.
Dawn Taylor
Thank you. Thank you for hanging out with us today. Thank you for talking about this. Thank you for being open and vulnerable and emotional and all of the things talking about life. But thank you for doing the next right thing.
Paul Young
You're so welcome. It's been an absolute honor to be with you. Love to everybody out there.
Dawn Taylor
For everyone listening, please, please, please, if you haven't read The Shack, if you haven't watched the movie, do it. Be offended. Doesn't matter. But pay attention to what the actual story was behind it before you just dive right in and get mad. Please tell your friends. Spread this podcast around. People need to hear it. Especially for MK kids that really need to hear a story of hope, a story of resilience, and of someone who dug in and did the work. Who did the work to heal. Loved hearing about the marriage. All of it. All of it. I have no words for you, Paul. Check out the show notes located at the taluka. We are going to link Paul how to get ahold of him, websites. The article thing I read, we'll link it all. We're going to link it all in there so that you guys can have access to all of that. And please subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcast. See you guys soon.
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Our guest today, Doina Oncel, hasn't lived an easy life. Yet despite all the challenges she has faced from youth to adulthood, she has risen above it all to become a true inspiration. She shares the ups and downs that she’s experienced in life and how it’s helped her in the line of work she does. As she reveals her life story, we’re made aware that the concept of homelessness can affect just about anyone and that we should never stop being grateful for the blessings we receive. Most importantly, she and Dawn come from a place of compassion and encouragement, mutually agreeing that the hand we must always extend to the less fortunate is that of a helping hand.
Who this for
For many of us, homelessness can be a tricky topic to talk about. It can be hard to associate or empathize with the homeless especially if we come from a place of financial security. For anyone who’s always sought out a perspective from the other side and yet was always too afraid to ask, or for anyone who’s always wanted to help out the homeless yet doesn’t know where to start - this episode is for you.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Doina Oncel is a changemaker, founder, innovator, social entrepreneur, and a licensed financial advisor/broker, building communities and helping families with access to financial literacy. Doina works with women and families to help them build a legacy through financial education leading to a world of wealth.
Doina was named the 2021 WXN Canada's Most Powerful Women: Top 100 Award Winner. Nominated for the 2021 Top 25 Canadian Immigrant Award and the 2020 WomenTech's Global Awards in the Women & Diversity in Tech Ally of the Year; Nominated for the Premier's Award by George Brown College.
Doina is named a Role Model for Canadians by Barbie's "You can be anything" campaign; Named Trailblazer by Women in IP Institute of Canada
Guest Social Links
Email - [email protected]
Instagram - @doinaoncel
Facebook - www.facebook.com/doina.oncel
Thanks for listening!
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
TRANSCRIPT
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Don Taylor. And today I have the privilege and the honor to talk to the amazing Doina Oncel. And yes, I asked her how to pronounce that to make sure I got it right. So today's topic is to homeless and back. Before we get started, though, let me tell you a little bit about our guest so that you can be as excited about her as I am and how honored I am to even have her here today. Doina is a changemaker, founder, innovator, social entrepreneur, and a licensed financial advisor and broker. She builds communities and helps families with access to financial literacy. She works with women and families to help them build a legacy through financial education, leading to a world of wealth. But some cool things that have also gone on for Doina is she was named the 2021 Wcn Canada's Most Powerful Woman Top 100 award winner. She was nominated for the 2021 top 25 Canadian Immigrant Award and the 2020 Women Tech Global Awards, and the Women in Diversity in Tech Ally of the year. And she was nominated for the Premier's Award by George College Brown. Guys, this girl is not collecting dust and she's not bored or boring. She was also named a role model for Canadians by Barbie's You Can Be Anything campaign and named Trailblazer by Women and IP Institute of Canada. So keep all that in mind as we talk about how she ended up homeless. Welcome to the show, Doina. I am so glad you're here.
Doina Oncel
Thank you so much, Dawn. I appreciate you having me here and I'm really excited to share my story.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I'm so excited. I'm excited to dive into it. And for those listeners, you've already heard me fumble a lot of words. Forgive. I've had a cold for the last week and I was like, there's no way I am canceling any of my podcast recordings this week, so there might just be some fumbling words or a little bit mumbly today. But, Doina, we have this epidemic really right now, and I know it's global, right? But especially in Canada, where we're seeing this at a higher rate than ever before and more being talked about it around being homeless and the judgments, the ideas, everything around it. And you are so open talking about what has all gone down in your life. I want to dive into this and really get a different perspective on it. But also, listeners, we're going to go into like how what do we need to do about this? Like how can we shift and change some of this and support people that we know that are homeless? So let's start at the beginning. You were how old when you came to Canada?
Doina Oncel
Oh, I was 19 years old when I came to Canada. I came from Romania. And, um, actually, what a lot of people don't know. And I think it's important for me that they do know. When I grew up in Romania, the first 16 years of my life, it was, I grew up in the communism regime. And then I've seen the revolution happen where the the communist regime was kicked down. And then three years later, I came to Canada. So it was very new and refreshing. So there's so many things that were happening for me at the younger age where I feel like, yeah, I kind of build resilience. But then yes, I when I came to Canada, I was it was a lot of new things, new, um, like after the revolution in Romania. So like a new life then coming to Canada, a new country. So there's a lot of new things happening for me around that time. So yeah, I was 19 when I came to Canada and, I'm not sure if this may be important, but I didn't speak a word of English. I didn't even take English in school. The only thing I knew, I think I learned about two weeks when I got here. I knew "Hello. How are you? My name is Doina. And goodbye.: So people will be talking to me. They'll have a whole bunch of sentences, you know, saying stuff to me, and I'll just be nodding. Yes, yes, yes. Then I'll be like, goodbye at the end. But I have no idea what they're saying. So that was my first two weeks in Canada.
Dawn Taylor
Okay. So did you come to Canada on your own or do you have family with you? Did you have friends with you? Did you have
any?
Doina Oncel
Yeah, I came well, my father was here before I came to Canada. He was here. So he brought my sister and I. My younger sister and I brought us here in Canada. So he was the only person that I knew. So, mind you, one, when he left the country, when he left from Romania, I was ten years old. I was still a child. And then when I came to Canada, when I arrived here, I was, I would like to say a woman, you know, 19, almost 20. I was a woman. So I was a, you know, basically for the half of my life, he wasn't around and half of my life. Half of my life, I had him around then, and after the later half, I didn't. And then when I came to Canada, I was a completely different person. So there are so many stages that he missed from my life before I got here.
Dawn Taylor
So you came to Canada. The place of dreams and freedom and jobs and life and living this completely different world here. So you got married, had kids. Tell us a bit of your story of where you were and how, like how life started to progress for you as a young woman new to Canada that then resulted in becoming homeless.
Doina Oncel
Well, actually. So, we're going to go back to when I just came to Canada. So I came to Canada. I was here with my dad. Uh, he brought us here, both my younger sister and I lived with him. He was married. He had two children. And his wife, then my stepmother was not very fond of us being here. So, actually, I lived we lived with him for the first ten months in Canada. And then she said, we can't live with him anymore. So we had to literally pack our stuff. And then, um, living somebody's living room for, for a week until we were able to find a place to stay. Yeah. So that was the first time I was homeless in Canada. So new immigrant, young, young women right out on the streets, not speaking very well English, trying to figure out life in Canada and your culture knew everything. Then we finally were able to find a place to stay. Um, and then after that about another year and a half later. Uh, we were homeless again, but my sister and I were homeless again. We're trying to go back and stay with my dad again because he said his marriage is not working well. So, he came back to us and said, can you come and stay with me so that we can, you know, I can finally be a father, so to speak? And then we just said, okay. Yeah. So I guess you are our father. We didn't have anybody here right in in Canada. We needed to have someone. So we said, okay, fine, we moved in with him, and then, we just decided to leave because things were very, very tough. It was so, like, really, really tough. Like, he was abusive. I would say abusive, as in, like he was trying to, the word would be abusive. It could be whatever people want to give the meaning they want to give. But basically he was trying to, um, keep finances from both my sister and I. So we not have enough money to be able to move on. Um, he was tracking all, like, everything that we spend just to make sure that, you know, if we were working in any money that we make goes towards the exact expenses. So, not be able to have anything, uh, for us to be able to build a life, you know, the dream, the American, the Canadian dream, the North American dream that we wanted, we couldn't do it. Uh, but also, to make matters worse, he was trying to, um, basically like, because when, as I mentioned earlier, whenmy dad left, I was ten years old when I came to Canada, I was 20, almost 20, 19 years old. And so he didn't look at me as as a child. He looked at me as a woman and he was trying to molest me. And so I have to take my sister. And we had to leave. And then I stayed. So, the second time when I was homeless, I went and in the shelter, the homeless shelter with my sister, and we stayed for about a week. We basically run away, I took my sister, we ran away. Uh, we went to inside the Ministry of Family and Children's, inside the building. And I said, we need help. We need, you know, this is what's happening to us. We can't take this anymore. And they just, uh, you know, this amazing woman. And if she needs to listen to this podcast. Barbara, she took us on as if she was our mom. So, she really took care of us, you know? And she was, um, I would say she was very... Her words meant a lot to me because when she said, you know. You were one of these young women that I wish my daughter will be inspired by, because when we were living in the shelter, it took me one week to find a job. It took me one week to find a place to stay because in back of my mind I said I didn't come to Canada to live like this. I came to Canada for better, and there's no way I'm going for worse. Because back home I had a mother that was taking care of us. We had a place to stay. We had everything we needed. So then coming here, you know what I mean? But yes, Barbara took care of us, you know. You know, she would come and visit us in the shelter. And then me, I was like, I need to know how to get out of here. You know how to find a place, how to find a job. And I remember when I was in the shelter, um, way back when. This is 25 years ago or more. Um, yeah, about 25 years ago. Um, we were not allowed to use the phone. All the time. We had to sign up to use the phone in the shelter, and then I would just be like sitting by the phone and just in case somebody missed the time, and then they were late and they couldn't use the phone, I want every opportunity I could get. And I had a newspaper back then when we used to read newspapers, and I was to circle all the jobs, all the places to stay, and I would just go in and I use my charm, whatever, I don't know, I think I had charms but she, I would get jobs, I got a job, I got a place to stay and I got a job. But because I also went into, into welfare, in here in Ontario where I am is called Ontario works all over Canada is called welfare. So I was on welfare and I went to my caseworker and I said, I need you to help me find a job. What programs do you have? What is, you know, what do you have available? And they had a program where they were offering training dollars through any employer that would hire someone from Ontario Works. And I would just go to every employer. And I said, there's this program, I'm in Ontario works. I'm on welfare, and there's this program that is offered. And if you hire me, you get money for training. So ,that's how I look before they hire me. So then I got the job. Um, but I lived in for one week. It was very devastating and very embarrassing because,
you know, as a young woman coming to Canada, yes. I didn't have family and stuff, but then the community where I come from, the Romanian community was not very welcoming to me. Right. It was, I felt like I was like pushed back by everybody, you know, especially the Romanian community. Right. They were like, we don't want to have anything to do with you, because look at what you're doing to our culture, our, you know, to our people. And it felt like they were blaming me for standing up for myself. So, you know, being in that situation, to be honest with you is really, really tough. And I could understand why some people could like, you know, go into a really dark phase into their life having to go through that. Oh. After that, I came to Toronto. I lived in Vancouver. Back then, that was when all of this was happening, was in British Columbia. Then I moved to Toronto, and then I moved here because I wanted to stay away from myself. I want to start aresh. Um, that was like 20 years ago. So I said, I want to start fresh. I want to have a new life and start all over. And once I come here, I didn't get married, so I have my children, but I wasn't married. I was just, you know, I wanted to have children. And then because I thought, you know, being by myself in this country, I thought if I were to have children will be, will be giving me some company, but more like the love that I needed to have that I wanted. You know, I believe that everybody that's going through trauma, to be honest with you as women, you know, sometimes and in my case, especially with my first daughter, I had her because I thought, if I will have a child, I'll be loved unconditionally, not knowing how hard it is to actually raise a child. Right? So and then when I have my second daughter is when I experienced domestic violence, and that's when it was really, really harsh. I mean, being a young person new to Canada and being homeless was one thing, you know, feeling like it was the cause of a circumstance that was in not necessarily, you know, and plus it was mostly just me that I could, I will have to push through. Right? Just for myself. But now as a mother, when you have children, is really tough because so that time was the hardest part for me, being homeless is because. My youngest daughter was six months old and my oldest daughter was six years old. And then I experienced domestic violence. I had no money. I was $60,000 in debt. I was a business owner. Because I know a lot of like we mentioned earlier, sometimes you look at people that are homeless and then you judge and you think, oh, they might be there because they want to be there because they, you know, I was a business owner. I had a business that was making about $10,000 a month profit. This is15 years ago, 16 years ago. Right? And I was still broke. I had $60,000 in debt because I was with a partner that was alcoholic. Like, he would drink thousands of dollars that would go into the liquor store. Right. And instead of actually going into the household and the business and I was going, I was actually going through postpartum depression, and it was hard for me to keep track of things that were happening. Uh, you know, I used to, I didn't have his support. All right. I didn't have the support to actually get help for myself. I took it on myself. But then I didn't actually have that, you know, like, it's, I'm sure that a lot of people identify with this when you are alone, when you don't have help and support, and especially as a young mother, you are with a partner that is not supportive. You know, you have a business, but you don't have control of the money. You know what I mean? It's like it feels like it's things were just going down like, you know, the sand goes through the fingers, right? This kind of, I felt like my life was going at that time. And yeah, it was tough. It was tough because I feel like how could I be in this, in this situation. And actually while things were still holding up by very thin thread while I was in that relationship, I had so many people around me, they used to come to the house and like, you know, we have parties and we have, you know, things every weekend and spend thousands of dollars on, like alcohol and food and music and, you know, have a good time with me and a young baby and like, go through postpartum depression. And it was hard to say no to all of that. But people come to the house and enjoy themselves. But when I eventually went to the homeless shelter, like the abused women's shelter. Nobody was around after that. As soon as I got into the shelter, I used to call the same people that would come to the house and be like, hey, I want to hang out. Because for me, in my mind, I'm like, I want this to be temporary. This can't be my life. I come to Canada for this, right? It can't be my life.
Dawn Taylor
You're like, I'm here again. How did I get here again?
Doina Oncel
Yes! So then I used to call them. I say, you know, let's hang out, like, can I, it's just me. Let's go to the park and stuff. And they're like, are you still, you know, are you still in the shelter? I say, yeah, like, oh no, no, no, let's hang out once you move on on your own place because I don't want to catch anything. And I was like, what? Like, seriously? Like, what would you catch? Homelessness? Homelessness is not, you know, transferable. It's not like, what would you catch from me, really? I'm still the same person. You used to come to the house and used to have a good time. Like I'm still the same person, but now I just need more. I know I need help, you know, there were very few people actually in my life around that time that were, you know, they really. They were supportive without taking my dignity away. Right?
Dawn Taylor
No, no, no pause right there, though, for a second. That statement right there, though they were supportive without, there were very few people that were supportive without taking my dignity
away.
Doina Oncel
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
I think that. So, so many thoughts. And I'm I'm looking at even as you're talking and looking through it in my head, as someone who's never been homeless, someone who's ever had to go to a shelter, someone who's never had to make those decisions for my family, to save my family, to protect my kids, to save my life. Right, right. And I remember years ago when I owned a restaurant, um, we brought lunch once a month to a women's shelter. And my some of my staff. I remember having conversations with him about it and going, no, no, no, nobody wants to come here. Nobody wakes up one day and is like, wow, I really think I should go to a homeless shelter or a women's shelter. They have gotten themselves into a position or decisions have been made, but somebody else has caused something to go on in their life that has gotten them to this point, and this is actually a step up for them.
Doina Oncel
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
They were. And. I remember one of my staff members going, what do you mean? This is a step up? Like they're homeless. 1s And I said yes, but they had to leave a very violent or toxic situation to go here. Right. But the fact that people around you took your dignity away. Do you think that's one of the biggest struggles that comes with being homeless or ending up homeless or whatever is like, your worth in regards to what you have, what you've done, who you are, all of that is stripped away, but your dignity is taken away with it.
Doina Oncel
Yes. When people make you feel less than because now you're not where they what they expect you to be, or even what I expected to be, I didn't expect. That's not my like you said, that wasn't my dream. I didn't wake up and say like, oh, I can't wait. You know, I'm just going to check in the homeless shelter. I'm going to be there with my kids. And then we're going to depend on everybody else around us for survival, for food, for everything, for shelter. Right? That's not that wasn't my dream when when people were coming across. And they're making me feel even worse because. And those are the people I thought were my friends. Um, and I remember even before I checked in the shelter because, so what's really, um, I would say funny, but like, funny, you know, like, not the ha ha way, but funny as, like, how life works, right? It's that I just finished before my abuse, I just finished, I went to George Brown College, the one that you mentioned earlier. And they, they nominated me for the for the Award, you know, about ten years later. But, um, I studied the assaulted women's and children's counselor advocate program. So I study social work with the feminist perspective. My job was to was supposed to be me helping women as the one that I was right going to abuse. Coming new to Canada, experiencing barriers. That's what I was supposed to do. And I feel like I was my first case study. Really. But I didn't, you know, I still could not, even though I studied this stuff. And I remember, uh, and when I finally put my stuff in storage, and I had my kids in the car and I was driving, I said I was calling people, and I said, I need a place to stay for a night or two nights until I find something to get myself together. And people were like. Well, this is not a good time for me or I don't have space. Mind you, I didn't know these people's places. What they had, like what they live or anything. They used to come to my house every weekend to have a good time, but I didn't know.
Dawn Taylor
I was gonna say they were enjoying partying at your house.
Doina Oncel
Oh, yeah, there were that. Just that. But then for me to actually, I didn't know where they live. I had no idea. I just know they live in a different city or an area. But I've never been to their place, and I was asking for help. They're like, oh, this is not a good time. I don't actually have space. I don't, you know, and I remember if you're like, what am I going to do? You know what I mean? Like, I don't want to be here. Like, how how do I look my kids in the eye and say, look, you know, this is where we are. It's it's really not that, you know, a dream come true. Um, it's it was it was really, really tough and then while I was in the shelter, when I was asking people, I said, can we hang out? They'll say no, because I might catch something from you, which was kind of ridiculous. But there's a couple of people, like one one friend in particular. She has a daughter that was very close to my oldest daughter in age, you know, like two days apart. And we met in the park before all of this happened. And she used to come like, hey, my daughter wants a play date. Can you come over with, you know, with your daughter so they can play together? She never would be like, oh, I want you to come over. I want to see you. I want to spend more time with you because I don't want you to be in that environment the whole time. But she used to make it in a way that, you know, we're still the same. You're still the same person. She never made me feel like I am less than just because I live in a shelter. And she would make me food. And, you know, because she knew that I love her cooking. So she would make me food. And, you know, it was it was a little bit of normalcy. There was another friend of mine that had a restaurant back then, and he used to just say, hey, come over, you know, come by the restaurant because we have, you know, there's a new item in the menu, so I want you to try it out. Little did you know that was after I moved out. Like, you know, while I was in the shelter, I was still going in and visit. But then after I moved out for a couple of years after, he still be like, come over and just have some. We have this new thing on the menu. I want to test it out. I want you to tell me if you like it or whatever, just making it sound like, you know, I was like such a celebrity or whatever, I don't know, but, if I wouldn't go to either his restaurant, I won't have food to eat. I will feed my kids. But that's all I had, right? Like to just buy food for the kids. And then I would just go eat at his restaurant. But he never made me feel that he's doing me a favor or that he's feeling sorry for me. He didn't have that pity, you know? I was just somebody that he appreciated. And he, you know, he knew what I was going through, but he didn't want to make me feel like I was, you know, less than, you know, he added value like this. These people, this especially these two people, they they made me feel valuable. They added value to, to me, you know, during that time. And it's it's really tough. And I'm going to share another story because we're talking about how people feel when you, you know, when you are homeless. One thing I remember while I was living in the shelter, I used to. But my kids in the car and I used to go visit my mom and we used to drive, and, um, there was a there was one intersection closer to where my mom was, and there was a homeless guy asking for money at that intersection. Every time the red light would stop, people in the car would give money. At first I didn't have. I remember right before I moved in the shelter, I took the empty bottles from the alcohol, from my ex and I took it at the liquor store and they give you money, they gave me was worth $5. And so I'm like I'm going to give my, with really good intention. But I feel like this $5 is the reason why I am who I am. Because the alcohol was the reason why I was where I was. Like, I didn't want to use the $5 for me, but I want to give good energy to those $5 and pass it off to this person. So I gave him the $5. I said it was my last $5. I didn't have money, but I said, I want you to have it. And he was very grateful. And every time, like after I moved the shelter, I used to bring it to kind of, kind of pop some, you know, some desserts, some, you know, some food. And I'll just pass it on because I don't have money. But, you know, I would just eat less and I just want him to have some food too. And he was very grateful. And then one time I remember I was, uh, a few cars back, you know, and there was a car right by him. And he was sitting there and it was very polite. He wasn't like, oh, you know, like, you can tell that this man was very gracious, very graceful for
whatever.
Dawn Taylor
He wasn't aggressive.
Doina Oncel
Absolutely. No. And he these people in a very fancy car. What they waited for a little bit and right before the light turned red. Right. They took a whole bunch of change in back in the day when we had pennies. And it's like a lot of pennies. A lot of change. It took and just threw it at him and then they drove off. And the man just went to pick up the money from the ground and he was still saying, thank you, thank you, thank you. And I'm just like, I was so mad because I'm like, why do people have to treat people less fortunate that they are with that much disrespect? Do you know that it could be that you could be that person there someday? You never know. I mean, and even to this day when people talk about homeless people, oh, homeless people are there because, you know, they just make poor life choices. And like, yes, that may be true, but then do you know that that could be you someday. Yeah. Like to be anybody. And when I say tell people like I was homeless, you're looking at somebody that was homeless. Like, you probably don't see this now, but I was so like, no way were you? Yes, I was, because it doesn't matter who you are, it could be anybody and you could just be in that circumstance. You're only like one life decision away. Or it could be either, not even you that makes that decision. It could be the economy. That whatever's happening right now with people not having jobs getting laid off. And there's nothing that you know that they can do, they could be homeless with the with what's happening in the real estate industry, the mortgages, you know, the rates go up double and people are losing their homes. That could happen to anybody. Right. So. I just wish people would stop with stop, right.
Dawn Taylor
There's so many, there's so many judgments about itm around it. And it's an interesting conversation to have with people when, yes, there's drug issues and alcohol issues and a lot of mental health issues tied to many, many, many people that have been homeless. But I remember when economy was crashing years ago. I mean, probably like 10, 15 years ago, one of the big crashes that happened and they were interviewing people in a tent community in the States, and they were talking in a lot of them had lost, like it was like their retirement had been taken away and like a Madoff scam or something like that. Right? Like they had lost everything. They couldn't afford to feed themselves anymore. They couldn't afford their mortgage because of the way the rates went. And it wasn't even that they were financially irresponsible people. It was that there at that point, there were no jobs. There weren't there? There was nothing. Right. And they were struggling so hard. But I remember one couple that they interviewed. I'll never forget it to the day I die. The looks on their faces of shame. And they had kids that they could have told and they're like, no, our kids don't even know. Yeah. This couple in their 70s and their own children had no idea that they were living on the streets.
And they were like, no, we go out and we look for jobs every day and, you know, we're pounding the pavement, but we're trying to find money to, you know, pay for printing resumes and all of those things. And I think that right now, being homeless, there's so many things like that that people aren't looking at is. One is how hungry you are, right? Like think about how your brain doesn't function fully when you're hungry. Right. When you're hungry, you aren't thinking clearly to begin with. Right now. Be hungry for days and days and days and weeks and weeks and weeks on end.
Doina Oncel
How do you get a job when you don't have a address?
Dawn Taylor
Don't have an address?
Doina Oncel
Do you have address to get a job to put on the resume? You need an address, right? You can't get an apartment or anything else, or you can't find anything. Address? Uh, whose address can you use? Like, really? And especially if you are too embarrassed or you don't know how. There's no judgment onto the decisions that people make, right? Uh, how to whether they want to tell people or not. Like, that's not something that you. You know, you everybody feels comfortable talking about right to share with people. Um, so we don't want to judge. We don't want to judge, of any people start drinking alcohol and taking drugs or whatever. That would be a coping mechanism for whatever the circumstance they on. This is not some this is not us too judging to say, oh well, I didn't do it. I could just say, yeah, me, I would say the first time when I lived in a shelter, it took me a week to find a job. And it doesn't mean that everybody else had the same outcome like me. It's not that they didn't want that, but they had different, there were women that I had babies. How could you find a job in a week when you have a baby and you just know daycare, there's no you know, there's so many reasons why people are, or some people move faster than others. For me, I feel like I was lucky because I found some people that were a little bit ahead of where I was, because I decided to to find the people for me, my my people versus like looking up to everybody, uh, as to who's going to help me, people that I already had in my life before. I'm like, obviously they're not here for me and they're not going to help me. So I decided to find my my circle. Right? And then that helped me because those people are believed in me. They saw something in me that I didn't see myself. I consider myself lucky, so I found them. Not everybody has that right, because sometimes you could be in a community where, you know, it could be in a community where you are around people from the same country as you, and then you can't make a move forward because people are going to look at you different. You you're really concerned about what they might think or what they might say. So you put a facade for them. Uh, you know, or you might be around people that they just do drugs and then they just know the, the next thing that you, you know, likely are to be doing because that's what you have around. There's there's no way for us to judge again, as a coping mechanism. My coping mechanism when I was in the shelter until I found my own place, until I found myself like, I'm ready to go now was I used to go out all the time. I used to just go and buy cheap clothes and go out dancing, like, you know, I get my mom, watch my kids, I'm out. Yeah. You know, and until one day and I'm like. My aha moment. Well, I had two aha moments. One is when I was in the shelter. I remember sitting at the dining room table. We just had dinner, and I was holding my younger daughter and my on my lap. And then my oldest daughter, you know, she was sitting by me. She was having fun with her friends before she had dinner. And then she stood by me. And, you know, she was happy she ate something that she liked. I think it was. And then she said, you know, mom, I love you so much. She says, when I grow up, I want to be just like you. And I was like, whoa. I realized that, you know where I'm at in decisions that I'm making. And you know what? I'm going through life. I can't tell my kids. Do better if I'm not doing better, right? So that was my motivator. Not everybody not everybody has that. So for me, that was it. And then, the second time was when I was I told you my mechanism was going out dancing 3 or 4 times a week, I would just be going out and dance until whenever and then come home and go to work, find something to do and, you know, to make money to pay the bills. But I remember that one last time when I decided I can't do this anymore was when I bought a ticket already to go out. And then right before I left, I looked in the fridge and I saw there's no milk. So I'm supposed to because my kids are still young. They all drink milk every day. There's no milk. And all I had in my bank account was $10. And I was like, okay, so I need to change my life because I. How do I get to go out and buy a drink for myself? Like, you know, I feel like I had to make a choice. Like, do I buy a drink for me or do I buy milk for my kids tomorrow? You know, so I'm like, I sat down and luckily this was on a boat. And I feel like, you know, I look at things as though, like this was to happen so that it can force me to sit there and think. I was on a boat, so I don't swim. I couldn't even jump in the water to swim to the shore to go home. I was on and so I just felt that, you know, I need to change my life. I need to do something for my kids. I can't have them. I can make these choices. Yes, I like going out. I love dancing. Well, who doesn't? Right? I love dancing, but I when I go out, I want to be able to not feel guilty that my kids don't have food, you know what I mean? So I had to make that decision. I was stuck there for like an hour and a half, I think it was or two hours on the boat. And then it forced me to sit down and think. And my friends were like, come and dance. I'm like, no, I just need to sit here and think. And then when I got home, I decided I'm going to do something. I need to change my life. And that was, you know, but again, there that was my story. Some people could have their, you know, something else that could keep them out. Or it could be, I believe, that we have in our life. We have people that are either pushing us to go to the next level to where we supposed to be, or people that are holding us back.
Dawn Taylor
Yes.
Doina Oncel
Right. So I was lucky that I had my kids. That kind of I feel like I need something for them because it was. Sometimes it's easier when you do something like when you change your life for other people versus for yourself, right? So for me, it was my kids. I needed to change my life for them. And then there are there were also people that when I started changing my life, they were like, well, um, who do you think you are now? You know, or you forgot where you come from. You know, or you think you're a big boss now, so you don't want to hang out with us anymore. You don't want to do this. I'm like, it's not that I don't want to hang out with you. It's just that I have I decided to have different priorities, which are, you know, and I decided to be around, um, not around people, but around circumstances to make different decisions that will get me to where I want to be. You know, that was my. That was my You know, next step thing.
Dawn Taylor
Which is amazing. So the second time you ended up in or third time, the one the time you ended up homeless in the shelter with your daughters, how long were you homeless for that time?
Doina Oncel
I was there for three months. I was in the shelter for three months. And as we were mentioning earlier, it was a step up for me. At first it was a little bit like, I can't believe I'm in this situation. And nobody, you know, nobody took me in the house and like, this is the worst thing happened to me and all that stuff. But then I decided to allow what was happening, to just let it happen. I said, I'm here because I'm supposed to be here, and I'm supposed to learn as much as possible. And here are and especially that I studied this in school, right? I thought, here are the people that are supposed to help me. Because if I am ever to go out there in the world and help women like me in my situation, I need to see what that's like, right? I need to feel it. I need to know because, you know, we have a lot of people, a lot of, um, therapists. And they come and says, yeah, I know what you mean, but they don't actually know because they know.
Dawn Taylor
They don't actually know.
Doina Oncel
Right. So for me, I feel like I'm here because I'm supposed to learn. So when somebody who tells me. I'm, you know, I'm going. You know I'm poor. I'm a single mom. I don't have, you know, a place to stay. I don't have food, I have this. And if I say I know, it's because I know I've been there, right? So. But those three months that I was there, you know, were really pivotal for me because I decided to let other people help me. The people that were working there the best that they could, you know, help me. Like, I, uh, these services were designed for people like me to help me. They will not, um. There's nothing to be embarrassed of, you know, uh, although some people were making me feel bad. Oh, this is where my tax money are going. Yes, because I pay taxes too,
like, I go to work. You know, I went to work. I pay lots of taxes. I'm planning on going back to work. I'm going to pay taxes. So, uh, I'm not going to feel guilty for using a service that was designed for me. You know, it was there for me to use, right? So. And plus, being in that environment was it also allowed me to see that I'm not alone. Allowed me to see that there's other women. And I have seen women that were there, from newcomers to women that were born in Canada, women that had no education, women that had education, women that had that will stay at home moms previously and women that had their own businesses. So it doesn't matter. Right? It it helped me see. It doesn't matter where we come from, we could all end up in the same place. And that place. Allowed me to see that I'm not alone. There's other moms like me that are going through, or some women who were single. They didn't have kids, but they were, you know, and it doesn't matter who who you are, you can end up here, right? Um, and the culture didn't matter. The economic status didn't matter. Everybody was there to get the help and support that they needed. And I just, you know, allowed for all that to be. This is what it is. And, you know, and then it also being there. I, for lack of a better expression, I took advantage of that time that I was there to find myself. You know. How do I find myself? What is it that I want from life? And then what my daughter said to me that when I grow up, I want to be just like you. That was a wake up moment for me. I'm like, who am I? What am I here, you know? What do I want my daughter to see? Both daughters. What do I want them to see in me, you know? And I took that as being the the moment to change my life, basically. Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
Which is amazing. So what are some key things that. Okay. A couple thoughts. Couple thoughts here. Number one is the story about your daughter saying that to you. I said that to my grandma one time when I was quite young. I was like, grandma, I want to be just like you when I'm older. And she went, oh, shoot, I better shape up. And I'll never forget it. Like she. It was the cutest little statement ever from my tiny, petite little grandma. 1s Um, sometimes it's too hard to look at ourselves to figure out, like, I need to heal me. For me. I need to do better for me. I need to push harder for me. Sometimes that's way too hard to do. And I know even in my work as a trauma specialist, often what I'll tell people is like, find someone else to do it for. If you can't, if you can't do the work right now for you. Yes, find someone else. And they're like, Don, that's backwards of what everybody else says. And I'm like, oh, I know. But often when we have been so beaten down and don't believe that we are worthy of more. We don't know how to fight for ourselves so we can fight, you know, for our dog, or we can fight for our neighbor kid, or we can fight for our children or our, you know, someone else in our life that you're like, I need to be better for them. I have to be mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually, relationally, financially healthier for them. Yes, often that's a big help to like get people over that initial hurdle, right? To be like, who am I fighting for? Because they they don't have that. They don't have that in them anymore. Right? But the other thing is I wanted to ask is what? So having lived in the shelters and having done that, it's easy to go, well, no, I'm not going to give money to a homeless person because they're going to just spend it on drugs, which is the line that you and I have talked about. Like, we hear this all the time. Or like, no, look at them. They have a cell phone, right? They must have money because of that. Well, guys, if you can see doing his face. These are the beliefs and the judgments that come with. Not understanding. Right. And the whole purpose of this podcast is like, no, no, no. Yes, yes, there are people out there that are just rough and there are people that are choosing what they're doing, and there are people that are just very far gone and drugs and alcohol and don't desire anything better for themselves. But that is not everybody and that is not the majority.
Doina Oncel
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
So, for what are some easy, tangible things that people could do to support people to love on the homeless, to give them, give them that leg up that they might need in order to get where they're trying to go in life.
Doina Oncel
Well, first let me just say the reason why I was like, oh my God, I had a reaction to what you said because, you know, people don't understand that just because somebody has a phone, it doesn't necessarily mean that they bought it or that even works properly.
Dawn Taylor
Oh my gosh. Right. So but again we talked about like you have to have a phone number to get a job. You have to have a phone number. Like I've often thought like that would be one of the best things you could do for the homeless is to hand out cell phones with pre-paid calling cards on them. Like, yes, give them an old flip phone with some minutes on it so that you can actually do this something, but it doesn't necessarily mean that it works, you know, properly.
Doina Oncel
So it might be an old phone it must have been donated to from another organization that they were part of, like an A program that they went to. You never know. Or could it be that the one thing that they have left from their previous life. So why judge you know, again it comes with judgment, right? People use the, the judge, saboteur not just on themselves but on to others about what they are. Yeah. The thing is, though, is something that I learned from my grandmother is that when you give to people, you give freely because you feel that it's the right thing to do whatever they do with whatever you gave them, it's on them. If they're using it for good or bad, that's on them. It's not on you. You're not here to judge. And I'm not saying that they can, you know, I support drug use or anything like that. Absolutely not. But if you can take on a person and say. You know, because you're asking me, how can we help? What can we do? We can ask them. Sit down and talk to them. Have a conversation and, you know, figure out, like, what do you want? I had when I moved from the shelter, I decided I wanted to do something good. I wanted to find a man that people throw money at him. And I couldn't find him anymore. He wasn't there anymore. But then I want I started, I got a job, so I was working, and, I would go into this, this mall where this homeless guy would come. He opened the door, hoping people will actually give him money. Here we are. We go to this really expensive place, and we have people that were hired to open the door. We give them a tip, but then we have a homeless person that opens the door for us, and we just judge them because I'm not going to give you money because like, no, let's not do that. Because, you know, they're working for the money when you think about it. But then I saw him there for a couple of months and I whenever I had change, I would give him money. I would, you know, I'll give him $1, $2, whatever I had. And then it was around the holidays and I noticed that he was he was still in a t shirt. Like the holidays mean like winter time. Yes. So he was in a t shirt and very, you know, he didn't have much clothes. And I said, I started talking to him. I said I didn't want to assume, hey, I want to give you some clothes, you know, and then I, I talked to him and I said, hey. You know, I started with the conversation. I was, you know, back in the day, you know, when I was I was having a hard time and I started to talk to him about me being homeless. And I lived in a shelter and stuff, and I'm like, I don't know your situation. I don't know where you are, but, you know, I just kind of want to. Let's talk, like two people. I got him coffee and we were having coffee and we're talking and then, you know, and I said, if there's anybody were to do anything for you to help and support you, what would you want? Well, what would that be? He goes, oh, I need, I need jacket and and clothes for winter. He, you know, he just needed clothes for he was worried that winter is coming. He has no, no clothes. And I say, okay, well what size are you. And he told me size. I went to Goodwill because I didn't have money. So I went to Goodwill. I bought secondhand stuff. I gave myself a budget like I do with everything else. And I said, okay, I only have like $20. What can I buy for $20? And I bought like a pair of pants, a sweater, a jacket, and I believe it was, I went to the dollar store and I passed out like a scarf and stuff, you know, because I want to get something new. So I gave him that. And, you know, I went the next day, he was like, oh my God, he was in tears again. The way to support is to ask, to ask people. Like, what do you need? Because some person we think we might do and again, we might come with good intentions to give someone something or to help them in a way like, oh, here, I'm going to buy you, But that's not what they actually need. They might need they in their mind, you know, they might need clothes or they might need, um, a contact or where they could go and stay because a lot of homeless shelters, and especially for men, they're not always available. They have the the limits. Right. You can only stay here for like 1 or 2 nights or, you know, you can come back here after, you know, after 30 days or whatever. You can go to this different shelter if you want to take showers and some. Then again, it comes with limitations, which is something that everyday people don't know. They think, just go to a shelter like go and stay there. It doesn't necessarily mean that it's available. So we want to talk to them and ask them like what you know, if if you know, if you need if you were to need any help right now, what would that be? Right. Um, and again, some people might say, no, I don't want anything and just walk away. Simple as that. Don't don't say like, well, I'm trying to help you and you don't want it, and you're a loser. Just walk away. Just be be kind. I think the most important thing we need to remember is to be kind. Right. Everybody.
Dawn Taylor
People in my inner circle know I'm a bit of a giver. I like to give, give, give, give, give. It's kind of a toxic trait of mine in a lot of ways and but also beautiful. And I know one thing that I started doing years ago was if I pulled up to like a gas station, there were homeless people there. I often don't have cash on me. Right. So it's not easy just to be like, here's a $5 bill or a $10 bill, or go buy or sell something. I'd say, hey, can I pick you up anything while I'm inside? Do you need anything? Right. And I remember um one gentleman I was in the Okanagan and Canadians know that is in British Columbia. And um I was there in this man looked at me and he goes anything. And I went, yeah, anything. What would you love? He just wanted a cup of hot chocolate like he had drank at his grandma's when he was a little kid. And when I handed it to him, he just started crying and he asked for a toothbrush and toothpaste. It's like, I don't know if they have it in there, but I just want to feel clean teeth again. And I was like, yes, yes,
I can get this for you. And so I ended up buying a few sets of that and gave it all to him. And I was like, go share this with your friends. And he was like, thank you. And I think it's something so simple that, you know, you don't need to hand them cash. You don't need to do that. I owned a restaurant years ago, and there was a homeless man that lived in the back alley, and I asked him one time, I was like, can we like, can we feed you like, is there anything that we can do? And he refused to take. He had such pride. He refused to take. And I said, what if I hired you? And he kind of gave me this funny look, but he would wash all my restaurant windows, right? He'dome and do the most incredible job. And I would pay him with food and cash, and he would wash them once a week for the longest time, and then he would disappear. And then he'd come back a few months later, and then he would do it again, and he disappear for months on end, and then he come back. And this is just like our pattern. And I remember talking to a friend of mine who volunteered at a homeless shelter years later, and she said, that was his pattern, is he had way too much pride, but he knew he needed to work for his drug money and his alcohol money. And then he'd go on a bender and then all of a sudden he'd be like, okay, no, I'm back again. I can do this. I can stay sober. I can do what I need to do. And he'd earn all his money again, and then he'd end up back on a bender.
Doina Oncel
You might have been like, to be honest, you, when you look at that, right? If you wouldn't have had that support, he could have been just ending up disappearing forever.
Dawn Taylor
Well, you just don't know exactly.
Doina Oncel
For those times when you're offering him the help and support like he would. You know, you might have been something that will even get him out of being high says, you know what? I need to get up because somebody's waiting for me to wash their windows instead of looking at the other way around. Right. We can look at it, say, because there's many people that could get into that situation and because they have something to hold on to or somebody that they know that you're willing to have you. And for him probably was like, okay, you know what? I've had enough of this. Like, this person is waiting for me and she was good to me. You probably show some some sort of kindness where it helped him get out of zone when he was high or, you know, drugs or whatever the case was for him. Or maybe he was somewhere else. We don't know that. We just know that, you know, he would come back and you could have been the lifeline for him at that time.
Dawn Taylor
And you just don't know. And I think for a lot of people, it's whether you're donating to the food bank or you're donating to a shelter, or you're volunteering at a shelter, or I know lots of people that do the large Ziploc bags in their car, and they'll always have a few that have, like, you know, a $20 bill and some snacks and different things in them. I think there's just a piece of compassion. And when you've had your dignity stripped so hard so far, and you have right, people judge out of fear. People judge from a place of fear. And I find the biggest one is like, it's a fear that like, what if I could also end up there, right? So it's easy to judge someone else for being there. It's easy to judge someone else, you know, for being broke or for having too much debt, or for going through a divorce, or for having to leave an abusive relationship or all of those things. But at the core of it is like, what is it about it that scares me so bad?
Doina Oncel
Um, yeah.
Dawn Taylor
Right. And so based on that really stepping out and going, no, no, no. Maybe I'm not comfortable walking down the street and handing out food to the homeless, but I'm comfortable donating money to a food bank where I know they can go and get food.
Doina Oncel
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
Or to, you know, anytime we donate anything to like to give away for like second hand stores here Edmonton, there's a place called Hope Mission and it's a place for it's a second hand store, but all the workers are volunteers and all the money goes to feeding the homeless and clothing them and housing them and giving them that leg up. You know, it's making a decision to go out of your way to find an organization that really hits your heart, and your heart feels safe donating. Right? When I had the restaurant, it was easy to have this man cleaned my windows. He wasn't violent. We didn't feel like we were in danger. We had a lot of cops come in and eat there, and I asked them, like, do you know anything about him? And they're like, no, he's totally safe. Like you don't have to fear him in your business. Because some people were more scary. So I could do that. I could deliver meals to a shelter, I could do those things right. That was my comfort level. But I think to just walk past somebody and judge and throw money through pennies, not even money, pennies at them, I know. Right. Or to do that, it's beautiful, I love that. I love that we're giving people some ideas on things that they can do and they can support, because it could be, it could be. You that ends up there. It could be your next door neighbor that ends up there. It could be your friend. It could be your friend. Your grandchildren. Right? Anybody from your family could be. Yes, absolutely.
Doina Oncel
And if we donate money to a food bank, they actually able to buy more for if we were to go to a store. Right. And we can, you know, store they have like donate for the food. I'd much rather donate money to the food bank than to the store, only because the food bank is able to buy more. Like they can stretch a dollar more.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, they can.
Doina Oncel
Right. So then plus I'm all advocating about employee people employing people. And when you're saying there's a secondhand store, there's a lot of second hand stores here that hire people that are that come with a record or come with, um, from welfare. You know, they give them the second chance and I'm all for that. I support that so much because it's like, if we don't have these programs, you know, it's hard for people to come out, you know, out of circumstances that they enter. Right, I have seen somebody post actually on, on Facebook post and said, I want to, I want to, I have some clothes and I want to donate. I do not want to give it to a secondhand store to sell them for money. I want to donate it directly to the, um, a homeless woman. There's a pros and cons to both, right? Yeah. The pro for that is that you give it directly to that woman. But then you have to find that homeless woman that has the size, you know, your size and all that stuff. So you have to do the research yourself. Or you can donate it to, um, a homeless shelter. Some homeless shelters don't want to take a lot of clothes because of the bedbugs. So they want to make sure that, you know, they much rather, you know, get the money and they can buy the clothes, or you can just donate to the second hand store, and somebody could buy for low cost. Right? And actually employs the woman that is homeless that you want to support her directly. She might get a job there. Right? So when you think about it that way versus thinking, I don't want to do this because, you know, you know that I have a charity, right? Like I started a charity to support girls in and to get into STEM. I'm very big on employment and the next generation because I really feel like I don't want women to feel like they have barriers. And if I can do anything in this lifetime to break down barriers, as many as I can as one person that I am. And I've had a conversation with somebody in the past say, well, before I donate to charity, I want to make sure that, you know, it goes directly to the people that it supports. And my thought process and being that I started a charity, being that I worked in the system, people have been in the system. I can tell you this, the most important thing that you can do is support the charity to hire people, the best people, because those best people are the ones that support people directly. Yeah, right. Um, and the nonprofit sector, we don't pay people enough. Right? And they end up leaving. So then what we do is the cycle. Yeah, they burn out. They can't pay their bills. They end up. They end up low income like the ones that they're supposed to help. And so what they do, they leave. And then the people that are here supporting, needing the help because the way that, you know, being what I study and being in where I am with the work group, is that the way to support people is you have to build trust with people when someone is vulnerable. You can come up and say, hey, I want to do this for you. They don't know who you are, you know, why would they let you help them? Right? So you have to build trust first. They have to know that whatever you said are you going to do for them. It's actually helping. And sometimes someone that is is homeless. They might test you out and you can come up and they can see that you judge them, they can feel that you judge them. And that's why they don't want your help. Right? But if we pay people enough to be in the sector, in the nonprofit sector, to support them, to support the most vulnerable population, you know, it's without saying, well, and I don't want to donate money because I don't want, you know, these people to get paid. Why wouldn't you? You go support businesses that make profits in millions of dollars, but you don't want to support the nonprofits. It kind of makes no sense to me, right? I'm all advocating for support. The nonprofits, support the charities. Are they just because they hire trained professionals. They have people like me or other people that have gone to school to this is their passion. They want to make the world better. And then what are we doing as a society? We say, no, we shouldn't get paid. Like, you know, people in the corporate world, we should pay you less money because you're not worth it. That's not the message we want to give people, right? We want to turn around and say, I want to support you because you get to support the vulnerable, the ones that I care about. Right? So just find a charity that you think supports them, who you want to support. Right?
Dawn Taylor
And there's so many. This morning just on Facebook this morning, I saw a thing called Help Portrait Edmonton where they're going in and they're doing like hair, makeup, wardrobe for photos. And it's for vulnerable people, homeless people in recovery, elderly refugees.
Doina Oncel
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
Right. For photos, for things. There's, um, I'm blanking on the name of it, but it's like a dress for success. And it's downtown Edmonton, and I've seen it where you can go and you can get outfits for like job interviews if you're homeless.
Doina Oncel
I got stuff from them.
Dawn Taylor
You can do things like that. So you can help in so many ways, find a way that you're passionate about and support. Doina, I want to thank you so much for your time today. Anyone who's interested in her charity, please check out our show notes located at the TheTaylorWay.csyou under the podcast link. You will see everything there, who she is, what she's doing, all of the magic of everything that's going on. Thank you so much for being here today.
Doina Oncel
Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it, and thank you for doing the work that you do with your podcast. It's so important to have more people hearing about what's happening out there in the world, and then hearing from the people that have been through it or are working in this field. I think it's so important that what you do. So thank you for
that.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, thank you. I'm honored to do it. And I love the conversations I get to have with people every day. So join us in two weeks for another topic. Maybe one day I'll go weekly, but probably not. But please tell your friends. The more people will feel understood, seen, heard, healed. The more people that can lose a little bit of their edge of judgment, the better. Check out the show notes, as I said, located at the TheTaylorWay.ca. For more information and for all the contact information for Doina, subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you love the show, please, please, please leave a rating and review. See you guys later!
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
2024 is here and it’s now time to close the book on 2023. However, sometimes it can be really overwhelming to start a whole new year. What should we expect? And where do we even start? On this episode of Taylor Way Talks, Dawn shares some practical advice you can apply to your goals, relationships and professional life so that you can make sure your best foot’s always forward for the new year and beyond.
Who this for
If you are someone who’s always had a hurdle when it comes to making the most out of your 12 months of the year, then this episode is for you because you are not alone! Even the host of this very podcast feels the same way at times. With that in mind, this episode is a look at some tips, tricks and words of wisdom as to how we can learn to take control of 2024 and all the years to follow.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Thanks for listening!
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
TRANSCRIPT
Dawn TaylorHey, hey, hey. It's me. Dawn Taylor, your host. And today we have a different episode for you. So, you guys get to hear me be interviewed today. Except for this one is planned. This one's a little bit more planned, but we really wanted to put this episode out for you guys, so I hope you enjoy it. And welcome to the show as the host, Miss Jenny Rice.
Jenny Ryce
Thank you so much, Don, for having me. And it's always fun to be on the other side of the mic. I love doing the interviewing, to be honest. It's my favorite part. So, thank you for asking me to take this role on and hijack again the Taylor Way talks. Really appreciate it.
Dawn Taylor
You're welcome. So take it from here Miss Host.
Jenny Ryce
So, we're rolling into a new year a whole new year. We, you know, you hear the terms new year new, new you.
Dawn Taylor
I may have thrown up a little.
Jenny Ryce
“Did I actually vomit in my mouth?”
Dawn Taylor
I may have. I may need a break right now. I need to stop this.
Jenny Ryce
So what I wanted to talk about, because you and I have had lots of conversations outside of obviously this recording about, you know, what does next year look like? And the biggest thing that we touch on is we kind of need to close out the current year, you know, what does that look like? So when you're rolling into a new year, you're at the back end of, you know, the year you're in. What are some things that you do to set yourself up for the next year?
Dawn Taylor
So, a couple of things and I'm going to start right on December 1st. So one of the things I do on December 1st is I sit down and look at my calendar for the month, and I really determine, like, what is it that I need out of this month? So this month, because I'm taking some time off in January. I was like, no, no, no, I'm working like I am working hard and I'm just going to, like, plow through these three weeks knowing I have time off at Christmas. Well, that was different this year because I know things are happening in January, right? Some years it's like, no, I really, really need to breathe a little bit more this month. And for me, it's often how - do I end my year? Do I want to end it like a freight train speeding through a city? Do I want to end it gracefully? Do I want to end it with excitement, with passion, with fun? Do I just need it to be really calm and quiet? And a lot of that is based on what the previous 11 months have been. Right? And so with that, one of the other things that I look at is like, do I want to work on my Fridays? Do I want to work Friday nights? Where can I add in this gift of time for myself throughout the month so that I can go and do things? Some years I just want to drive around and look at Christmas lights a few nights a week. Other years I want to go to concerts or shows or plays or things. So, I'm really big on setting an intention for my December. I think it's so easy to get caught up in the mayhem of it. It's so easy to get caught up in, like visiting and menus and feeding and parties and doing all the things that have to do them all perfectly, and watch all the hallmark movies and bake the cookies. Right? Like, there's such an intensity this month that
I actively work to, like, take away the intensity. That is one of the first things that I do. The second thing that I do is I look over my year and think, okay, what worked about this year? What was amazing about this year? What sucked about this year and what could I change in the new year? To make it a little bit better. So I find that waiting until January 1st, second, third, fourth.
The new year comes in just as fast. As September seems to every year. Right? It's never gentle. It's always like I go because everyone's been somewhat shut down over Christmas. A lot of people have slowed down in December. They're not doing meetings as much or networking as much or working as much. And no, January hits and everyone hits the ground running and it's mayhem. So, I try to look at this stuff at the beginning of December or like mid-December, and I just block time on my calendar to do it, to really look at like, okay, what all went down this year? So, how do I do this? One of them is I actually go day by day through my calendar. And I like to do this either, like, middle of the month or I'll do it depending on if I have a house full of company. Like this year, I'm scheduling this on the 31st because I have no people in my house and I will have had a few days off. So, on the 31st in the morning, I go down to my office and I sit with my calendar and I have a piece of paper beside me and it's like, dos, don't, change. And or whatever words you want to use. And what that is, is like, hey, that that is something I did last year there was amazing. Maybe it was, go for coffee with that person. Maybe it was that networking group. Maybe it was that training that I did. It doesn't matter what it was, but it's like I need to do more of that next year. That was something that was amazing and valuable for me. The don'ts are like, are you for real? Did you actually do that thing again? It's the lesson that we're learning in it. And maybe it's launched. The thing that ended up sucking. Maybe it's going to business with somebody and you're like, why did I go into business? I mean, I don't like going into business with someone, and this isn't something I've done, okay? If my business partner is listening. No, that's not you. But like, it's really about looking at it and going. What has been amazing. What hasn't. Right? You know that networking group that you go to when you're like, that sucked. Like, why did I do that? Why did I go to that thing? But then you catch yourself a few months later, someone invites you and you're like, yeah, okay, go again. And then you walk out of it again, going, seriously, how many times do I have to waste my money on this before this is actually too much, right? Honestly, I can tell you right now, one of mine this year, there's a few different things like that that are going to be involved. But one of them is like the level of travel I did this year for work. That needs to shift, right? And yes and no. It has been amazing and I've loved every second of it. But I also burned myself out doing it because really, I was trying to fit a year's worth of work into six months.
Jenny Ryce
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
Right. So in the new year, what do I want to do different? What do I want to shift in that way. And that's where I look at it and go, oh, you know what? There was not enough of that activity in my calendar. There wasn't enough of that activity in my calendar because I put everything in it. Even friend dates, breakfast dates, all of those things. I can see that. So, a couple of years ago. When I was doing this, I realized that I didn't get enough friend time. And because I'm an introvert. Because I feel everyone feels because I have, you know, maybe a lower capacity for people than some people do. And especially with the thyroid stuff. Right? I realized that I was like, man, it'll go months between seeing people. And I'm not okay with that. So, one of my intentional behavior shifts I did that year was I picked five people that I contacted and said, “Hey, I want a regular set time with you every month or every other month.” Can we put it in our calendars, first week of January? Like, can we just book this in?
Jenny Ryce
And I can actually contest because I was one of those people.
Dawn Taylor
You were. It's true,
Jenny Ryce
I remember. I remember you reaching out and saying. And I'm like, yes, yes, we can do that.
Dawn Taylor
Right?
Jenny Ryce
And we just always work together. Just for the record.
Dawn Taylor
Like, you know, it's only been like a year, right? So like in our friendship years. Right. Like that was something that I was very intentional about. And I would challenge anyone listening to this to do that. I have built the coolest relationships with people, and there has been way more connection that's happened because it's intentional, because we set that lunch every single month or every two months. We set the coffee, we set the half hour zoom, we set whatever it is, and it just becomes a regularity in our calendar. And now a couple years into this, some of them, it's like, “Oh, I can't this week or no, I can't or and it's not a big deal.” It's not a big deal because you know, you have another one booked, but you're also now not having to be like, oh shoot, it's been three months, four months, six months, eight months since I've seen this person I really, genuinely like and love this person and I want to spend more time with them. And so, that was one of the things that I shifted. That has been one of the best decisions I ever made. And I am thinking now of like, who do I want to fill those spots next year? Who do I want to fill those spots and build deeper relationship with? Right. So that is one of the things that I do. Another thing that I do is I look at all of my wins of the year. Write all of the wins, and it doesn't matter if it was just like I got through a whole week without having to cancel any sessions because I was feeling so sick, or I got through like I actually went to every chiro appointment. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what it is. Or like I hit my financial goal with my company or I, you know, I did something really, really cool. I crossed an item off my bucket list. I look at that massive list of wins and I give it a number, I give it a weight. And so maybe it's like, wow, I got I did like a 92% this year. Like I crushed it in this area. Guess what? I do the same with my failures. I do the same with the things that I've bombed on, and do the same with the things that I sucked at. Right? And I look at those and I'm like, okay, as long as the wins number is higher than the losses number, I'm really, really proud of myself and happy. But then with that, that is something that I'm as I'm going through that list, right. If it's like, oh, you did 72 consultations and got four clients, what are you doing wrong in these consultations or whatever, the numbers are, right. That actually gives you your patterns. It gives you your shifts and behavior. I'm like, oh, that's something I need to look at. That's something that I need to do different. And for anyone who doesn't have a business, this is no different in your personal life. It's like, what do you need to shift in some of those areas? And then another thing that I do is I go through all of my photos. I scroll on the 31st of every year. I've done this for as long as I can remember. I go all the way back to the beginning of January the previous year, and I scroll every single photo. It gives me an amazing opportunity to delete all the screenshots of the things that I think I'm going to do that I'm never going to do, because who doesn't have a thousand of those? Oh, I'm going to make that recipe. Oh, I'm going to go to that concert. Oh, I'm going to Google this later. Yeah. No we don't, we really don't. So that gives me an opportunity either to be like, yeah, okay, I need to save this one or no, I need to actually like run for my life and just delete these. But it also shows me that in the mayhem and the chaos of the year and everything that's been going down, but it shows me all of the highs. It shows me the adventures that shows me the amazing meals that I ate. It shows me the laughter with the kids that I hung out with, with my nieces and nephews. We forget. We are so quick to forget every single thing that happened throughout our year. And because we are on our cell phones, we actually can, like we could go back and look because we snap photos of everything these days. Right? And it's always entertaining. I often will bring my husband in on it, or I'll like, shoot a text to somebody and be like, oh my God, do you remember doing this thing? And it shows you all of these amazing moments. All of these amazing moments that happen through the year. And honestly, it's one of my favorite things that I do all Christmas Break, is one of my highlights.
Jenny Ryce
I love that. So for those of us listening, the value in reflection is so important. And I think actually that's our, you know, our biggest topic on the blog posts that you've written this month for December is reflection. And taking the time, honoring yourself and taking the time to review that. So. What I loved is you talked about dos, don'ts and, you know, need more ofs and all those kind of things. But one word that hasn't popped up yet is shoulds. Can we dig into the shoulds? Because, you know, shoulds can be absolutely detrimental to your well-being.
Dawn Taylor
Mhm.
Jenny Ryce
And I love your take on it.
Dawn Taylor
For sure. So. Honestly, a lot of the should show up in that don't do this again column. It's the shoulds that show up in the failures. It's the should the show up in the. I can't believe I wasted money on that or I spent money on that, or I put that much time and energy into that, or I launched that thing or whatever it is. I visited those people again. I had that coffee date that I shouldn't have had. Right? It's that's where the shoulds really show up. So when I'm looking at those and I mean this is something that I've, I'd like to say that I've gotten really good at over the years. And, I mean, I still have my moments where I suck at this and I, I say yes.
Jenny Ryce
Oh my gosh, Dawn, are you human?
Dawn Taylor
What? No, no! I have really, really hit this point where I trust my gut and if I'm like, what am I doing? Like, why am I doing this? One of the first questions I ask is like, should I be doing this? Is this somebody else's expectation of me? Or is this my expectation of myself?And if it is my expectation of myself, is it a good expectation of myself? Is it a positive expectation of myself? Is it created from a place that I'm okay with having this expectation? Right? I should visit people everywhere I go. I don't. I don't. I'm going to just put that out there. I will travel to cities and never call a person that I know in the city. And it's not because I don't love that person. It's not any of that. It's knowing why I'm there, my intention behind why I'm there. And do I have the capacity to see people? And often I don't. Some people I totally do. Some times I totally do based on what my schedule is, but I have given myself permission to just not. Right? I should show up at a lot of different events that I don't show up at. I should support friends with lunches and with things that they're doing in events that they're hosting, and all of those things. But one thing I've realized is that I should. Yes, yes, I should. But I also could phone that person. I could share their content. I could share that event with other people. I know there's 100 other ways I could support them. Knowing that if I show up to that event with no capacity, knowing if I show up to that event burnt out, knowing that I'm actually not going to, it's not going to benefit anyone.
Jenny Ryce
When you think about your journey to honoring this should. Because when we think about that word, it's it's like you're obligated, like you're putting an obligation with that word, like you should do this and you say, now it's easier, which I admire because I'm fortunately moving into that place in my life to where I'm very aware of my shoulds. What are some beginning steps that you would recommend for people that are still literally shooting themselves into exhaustion or shooting themselves into? And you know what that sounds like when I say it fast, like shooting those selves into, you know, commitments that they don't want to be a part of and all those kind of things. What was your foundation, your starting point to kind of move into a new habit around that.
Dawn Taylor
So, one thing I did, and this is very much the logistical piece of my brain, is I sat down and looked at like business work, like business life. Right? Client life, which is very different in my brain because there's the working in my business and the working on my business, which are two very different things. And then my personal life. And then I kind of broke that even down into categories of like family, friends, home. And health. That's always one of my health. Always is on my list. Right? And then how I looked at it, at how I started looking at it. So, from like a business standpoint will say is clients. Should I open up a Saturday? Because that's the only time that a client might be able to come and see me. Yeah, I probably should, because that would be good and blah blah blah blah blah, right? Will it be beneficial to my client when I burn out because I've been working Saturdays, will I be able to actually show up at as 100% in that moment? No. So, now am I actually serving the client, or am I going to cause more problems down the road because I did a session when I shouldn't have? Right? I had that situation this fall where I, almost in a bullying way, had someone bully me to coach when I was really sick. And then it turned out really bad for everybody, myself and them. And it ended up being kind of vicious. And it was really horrible. And I knew better. Like. And I said to you, like, I 100% knew better. I should not coach when I'm sick. So what the hell was I thinking? Right? New rule moving forward. Zero work when I'm sick, right? But with that, it's it's setting those boundaries and rules for yourself and looking at - no, no, no. Why did I set this rule for myself in the first place? What was my intention behind it? It's not. To harm someone is to protect myself so that I can do what I want to do. Right. The million networking events? Is this actually going to benefit my business? Is this something that's going to benefit it? Do I love the relationships and the friendships in there? Yes. But if somebody is actually my friend or there is a relationship there, they should be being bumped into my friend column that I'm spending time with in a different way. Right? Or is it just showing up in that room constantly because it's like, oh, hey, visibility, visibility, visibility. Right? And desiring that. Because at some point you have to acknowledge to yourself that these are business acquaintances and business friends. It doesn't mean they're your friend friends. And yes, they can cross over. But really looking at like, what is it I need out of this networking event? If I'm going to go, that's a problem. If I'm going because there's referral partners in the room because there's an ROI on this event, then it makes sense to go. Right? And acknowledging that just because you say no, it's not you rejecting those people, it's not you rejecting the event. It's not you rejecting those friends. It's saying to yourself, like, this does not make sense in my business right now. And as a fellow business owner, somebody else should be able to understand that potentially, right? If they have that business sense or they have the emotional intelligence or they have what it takes to be like, no, I totally get it. I understand why you only show up once a month instead of twice a month or no, that makes sense. We can't do lunch every single week as entrepreneur business owners, because you need the time to do other stuff in your business, right? So, that is a big piece of it. Then when it comes to the personal side of it. A lot of it. And maybe these are just like big boundaries of set up over in the past. But, I was raised in a house where every single time we went on vacation, it was with family. Every holiday included traveling to family. And nobody was happy about it. It was like, yay! We get to play and have fun! But then we also listened to our parents bitch about it for the entire four day drive home. And we would, like drive across Canada and listen to this. And it became a thing with my husband or myself that were like, no, every other time. And we started with like every three times or every four times that we're going to do something or we have a long weekend or we get to have a break, we're going to not go visit them. We're not. We're just not going to go visit family on those weekends, and that's okay. Right? Because we are a family too. And that's allowed. Right? That's allowed. We were talking last night. We host every single Christmas is at our house
and we love it. It's gotten to the point where we absolutely love it. So we hosted my family one year, his family one year. And now that there's adult nieces and nephews, they want to come every year. So we're working that into things and around things and. And I asked him this morning, literally over coffee, I said, do you think there will come a time when you and I decide that we want to, like, start our own Christmas tradition? Of something we do. And he's like, what would that even look like? And I said, I don't know, but not having kids, right? Because we couldn't I was like, what if we started where it was like, everybody can come up to the 30th, but on the 30th, every year we hop a plane and disappear for a few days and maybe we like, go on a cruise, maybe we go to the mountains, maybe we go explore somewhere. Maybe we go to an all inclusive whatever that would look like, and we start our own tradition. And it was a very interesting conversation to have because that was part of it was like, but, you know, everyone comes to our house like, we should be here longer. And. And I was like, no, by putting in a healthy boundary, a healthy plan for us. That's not us rejecting someone else. It's just putting a parameter on it. It's just shifting it a little bit to make it so that all of us are happy. And that's okay. Like that's actually 100% okay. So I would start there. I would start with people that are like close to you that, you kniow, love you. And say, your friends having a Mary Kay party. Say your friend is having a temperature party. So your friend is hosting some party at their house for something. And you're like, man, I just can't, like, I know I should go to this, but I actually just can't this week. Phone them and go, hey! I love you, but I can't. If you have the budget for it, you can be like, I'll order something anyways to help with your party or I'll do something like that. But you know what? I just can't this week and start there. Start with save people. When people cancel on me, I'm always like, Rock on, well done. And people laugh. They're like, you're the easiest person to bail on. And I'm like, yes, because I fully understand that and I understand the need for that and the, like. You are holding a healthy boundary for yourself and you are protecting your mental, emotional, physical, spiritual, financial, relational health. How would I like I could never get mad at you for that. Like way to go. And like I am the first person to be like, yes, way to go! So if you need to practice, cancel on me, right. Book something and cancel it. We can do this. But start there. Start with those things. The things. Or if it's like a group or a thing that you're like, I genuinely hate this. Like this makes me angry. This stresses me out. This causes me problems. That was a really easy one to bail on. And you know what? One of our like, little I probably shouldn't put this out there, but I'm going to. One of our little things is I have a friend and a husband that allow me to blame everything on them.
Jenny Ryce
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
There are times when I'm like, Chad, I need you to tell me that I am not allowed to do this thing. And he will literally look at me and go, you are not allowed to do this thing. And I go, thank you.
Jenny Ryce
We sometimes need that permission, right?
Dawn Taylor
I've actually fully jokingly written permission slips for clients before.
Jenny Ryce
I love it.
Dawn Taylor
And they're like, it's like I. Dawn Taylor hereby grant you permission to not, whatever it is.
Jenny Ryce
Whatever it is, whatever it is you feel obligated to.
Dawn Taylor
Because sometimes we need that. Right? So I, I will I will full on use the blame card if I need to.
Jenny Ryce
So when we think about, you know, that should word really. There's so much, um, compromise. Set up into that word. So when we think about what you're sharing and what's really valuable and what's highlighting for me is who are you saying yes to and who are you saying no to, and becoming very clear on what's more important, because you say yes to everything. You're saying no to something.
Dawn Taylor
Totally. And by choosing yourself, you're not rejecting someone else. And I want you to hear it. Like I've said it before, I'm gonna say it again. Like I love you, but I love me more. Does not mean you're selfish. It does not mean you're evil. It does not mean you're a bad person. It does not mean any of those things. It's actually giving yourself permission to choose yourself sometimes.
Jenny Ryce
Absolutely. So let's let's play with a fun word. So we did the should word do it. Hey can we say resolution.
Dawn Taylor
Oh fuck. Sorry if your kids are listening
Jenny Ryce
Talk to me. What's your what's your philosophy, belief system, thoughts? I mean, you did drop the f-bomb so I have a pretty good idea of where this is going to roll. Let's talk about new year's resolutions.
Dawn Taylor
A lot of people need the new year, new me mentality because it's like a starting off point. It's a jumping off point and it's like, okay, this is the thing I'm going to do. Cool. Go for it. If that is what you need to make a shift in your behavior. Go for it. To make a resolution. Number one. The majority of our habits were formed out of a protection mechanism. Positive or negative. They were formed out of a protection mechanism. They were formed for a reason. So to just massively shift your habits and your behaviours overnight, not going to happen. It's not going to happen. So people will decide. I mean, anyone who's ever worked in a gym knows that this is a thing. People will decide they're going to go from zero to here overnight. I'm going to go from never cooking to cooking three meals a day, seven days a week, overnight. I'm going to all of a sudden start going to the gym five times a week or seven times a week. I'm all of a sudden going to quit all of these behaviors that I have been doing for as long as I can remember. Bullshit. It doesn't work that way. There's a very small percentage of people that can actually make a decision and shift their entire behaviors overnight.
Jenny Ryce
Mhm. Agreed.
Dawn Taylor
Very tiny percentage of people like probably like a 3% kind of number. Like it's very, very hard to find these unicorns that can actually make change in that way. If you can. Kudos to you. I can when it comes to food, when it comes to anything around like food, eating very like there's a lot of categories in my life. I can actually do that, but there's some that I can't. And when I
look at why it's so hard for me to make that shift or what the struggle is, it's always because of a protection mechanism. Always, at some point in my life, the habit that's already there, the behavior that's already there, saved me, protected me, made me feel like I was in control or made me feel safe. So we set all these New Year's resolutions and then we fail. And then we feel like crap because we failed so hard. So here's a few things that I love around New Year's. What is one behavior shift I could make this year? And some years I'll do like one a month where it's like, okay, what is a behavior shift I could do? Maybe it's before I'm allowed to have a second cup of coffee. I have to drink three cups of tea and a water. It doesn't matter what it is like. It could be something super simple. One of my own here is like. Phone someone instead of responding with a text. Which I know drives people crazy, but you'd be amazed how many people actually love the connection of a voice. Right? Sometimes it's like one year, one month. I was like, I'm going to start fueling up my car every Sunday. So that I don't feel stressed out. Middle of the week when I'm out of gas and I'm running to a meeting and I don't have time to stop and fuel up. Do you see these? Like little tiny, tiny micro shifts? You could choose one a month all year and completely shift your entire world over the course of a year. But then I also choose New Year's resolutions that are really easy to accomplish, and then I celebrate the hell out of them every year that I won. So I am now eight years strong, having not done heroin.
Jenny Ryce
Way to go!
Dawn Taylor
I know, I know, my New Year's resolution every year is to not do heroin.
Jenny Ryce
Well done.
Dawn Taylor
Heroin free since 1993 or whatever. Joke about it. And I know that sounds ridiculous, but it's like this is the year. This is the year. I'm not going to do it right, and then I win. This is the year I'm not going to kill anyone. Right. My New Year's resolution is to wake up every single day. And you know what? I have succeeded 100% of the time.
Jenny Ryce
And when you don't succeed, the question is, will you even know?
Dawn Taylor
No. Right. So I will set these ridiculous New Year's resolutions. To make myself laugh. So that in like February when people start talking about like, so do you succeed on any of your New Year's resolutions this year? I'll be like, yeah, killing it on all of them. And people will look at me and be like, seriously? And I'm like, oh yeah, rocking it. Right. Sometimes people will then ask me like, what are your New Year's resolutions? And I'll tell them and they're like, oh, for real, but I think that we need to give ourselves way more grace. Um, I think, again, we need to look at, like, why are we setting this New Year's resolution? Like, what is it? What is the importance of it? Because let's be really honest, when we want something, we make it happen. When we want something, yeah, we get it.
Right. If you really want those concert tickets, you will find a way. Like we will do everything in our power to make something happen. So if we're not ever managing to meet our goals for a year, if we're not managing to meet our infamous resolutions. Do we not have an emotional attachment to it? Does it actually hold no value to us? Do we not think it's important enough? Because
I'm going to bet it's more of that than anything.
Jenny Ryce
So when you think about, you know, you were sharing, which I really valued too, is, you know, there's a deeper rooted reason why we're doing things that we want to shift in our lives, because at some point they were super valuable. They held a purpose and a meaning or like you say, protection. So if you if you are trying to shift something that's so deep rooted, do you have some suggestions on how people can move into positive action?
Dawn Taylor
So, one thing is looking at where did it start? Right? What is the earliest time in your life that you remember that action or that behavior? And I know it's like a Tony Robbins statement, but it's like when the pain of staying the same becomes greater than the pain of the change. And it's really allowing yourself to look at that. We underestimate how damaging some of our actions and behaviors are. 8 or 9 years ago it's been a long time. I really should figure out the date. 8 or 9 years ago. I was super, super sick
with fibro and my muscles were seizing. I was writhing on a couch all day. I was still somehow managing to work part time, and I remember begging my husband and tears like sobbing and begging him to put a pillow over my face and kill me. Because I was in such excruciating pain. And I didn't know what to do with it. I had no idea what to do with it. This was about, yeah, this is about 2015. And he sat there with me and he's like, Dawn, this isn't living. And I said, no one, I don't know how to function in this level of pain all day, every day. And he read a book. And it was talking about, like, all these dietary shifts and all these things. And he said to me, he's like, would you be willing? Because a friend had told me about it, but I couldn't even like, I was like, I can't even comprehend how to start. Like I need someone else to read the book and give me the cold notes. So he did. He audio, listened to this book, gave me the cold notes, and he's like, are you willing to make a massive shift in your diet? And I said, whatever, whatever. I went sugar, gluten, dairy, alcohol free overnight, literally overnight. And it was. And I think, no, we added the bulletproof coffee in, but so it was like a totally different way of drinking coffee. There were like three meats, five veggies, and that was about it. And high fat, like, it was the most intense dietary shift ever. And very, very hard to shift that hard to. And people were like, how the heck did you pull that off overnight? Not only did I pull it off overnight, but I held it for six months without a single cheat. Like not even a slight nibble. Sniff. Nothing. Cheat. And I'm talking like I hosted Christmas with 15 people at my house and did baking and turkey and all those things, and then made my own food on the side. Like I held firm to this, and people often asked how. And I said, it goes back to the pain of staying the same is greater than the pain of the change. Right? And so even now, I can eat some dairy and I'm fine. It just makes me feel kind of gummy and gross sometimes, and it just doesn't sit super well. I can eat gluten if I really want to. It's not going to kill me or even harm me, but what it does is it makes me feel like I drank a bottle of NyQuil. So, I wanted to try sourdough because I've been doing all this research on how flowers work in your body and everyone's like, oh, if you have a gluten intolerance or allergy, like try sourdough because of how it's made and blah blah blah. I'm with all these flowers,
so I tried it on the weekend. I just had two nights where I didn't sleep well. I had two days where I was weirdly gassy. TMI. But let's be honest, that's what was going on. I had two days where I just kind of hurt, like my inflammation level had gone way up from it. So my little aches and pains, right? Definitely reared their ugly head. Was it a big deal? No. Could I eat flour today? Yeah. But guess who started there Monday really freaking tired because I haven't slept properly for two days. Right? So when we allow ourselves, my husband has a statement called follow it through to its natural conclusion, he uses it all the time with his guys who work in critical thinking and then training. And I think when we if we were to allow ourselves to actually look at the decisions we're making today and be brutally honest and follow it through to its natural conclusion. What would that look like? If I make this decision now, it's not bad. It's not horrible, it's not super damaging. But what is it going to cause? What will that look like in a week and a month? In a year? Six years? Ten years? Right. How does that play itself out? And I think we need to do a whole lot more of that to be like, okay, where did this originally start? Where is this coming from? Why do I want to make this change? What about this change is important? But if I don't make this change, what does that look like for my life?
Jenny Ryce
Exactly.
Dawn Taylor
I can sit in a room of people and they can all be eating stuff around me. I can bake for them, I can cook for them, and I don't eat
it. And I was at an event about a month ago, and they came around for the dessert order, and my friend was there and she just whispered what dessert she wanted. Knowing full well I would just order it and then I'd pass it over to her because it was part of the meal. And other people around me almost had this, like, weird, like guilt and pity of like, oh my gosh, this has to be so hard for you. Maybe we shouldn't be eating dessert. And I was like, no, I'm so okay. How is it? Is it amazing? Like, I get so excited on other people's behalf. I'm like, oh, is is it, is it really good? Not because I don't think it's amazing or it's tasty or it's good. It's I just don't want it because my brain doesn't go to today, my brain goes to, how am I going to feel in two days, four days, six days, eight days if I'm not sleeping well now, what happens if I am losing a little bit of sleep every night? Am I going to have energy? Am I going to burn out? Am I going to get sick? Am I going to be able to show up in the way I want to for people in my life, what does that look like in a larger scale? And that is what allows me to be so solid in the decisions that I make.
Jenny Ryce
You know, and it's really profound because, um, you and I actually ended up not for the same reasons, but I did a massive over the night food, no alcohol shift, and I was in the same boat for I didn't start introducing things that were not good for my body for about 8 or 9 years. And rigid. And what I found was fascinating. And so I share this for for the listeners out there, because Dawn expresses as well, it's uncomfortable for other people when you make choices about your health because they are looking in their own mirror. And especially around if you've ever decided to quit alcohol. Drinking alcohol. And it's interesting when you're an alcoholic and you don't drink, people have an understanding. They can grasp that, right? They can support that and get behind that. But when you quit drinking just because you don't want to drink anymore, it's uncomfortable for people. It's extremely uncomfortable. I mean, I remember people like, oh, well, let's try this. I'm sure you can have this. Or and I'm like, no, I'm good. I'm not, you know, like literally I'm not drinking alcohol anymore. I'm choosing my health over alcohol and it's been fascinating. I probably, I can't even, I think I haven't had a drink in almost 13 years, but that's not true. I've had one sip of alcohol and because the waitress gave me the wrong drink one day and I took a hot swig of soda water and I looked at my husband, I'm like, I'm pretty sure that's your vodka. I was like, oh. Um, but other than that, intentionally, I have not had, you know, anything to drink. So I've had a sip of alcohol, of course, you know. Um, and the reason I share that is my uncomfort level to move me into that action, like you said, was greater than the change. Life is hard. You know, people say, who's your friend? It's hard to be healthy. It's hard to be unhealthy. What's hard? Right? If you're a smoker, it's hard to smoke because you got to get smoke breaks. You got to spend all the money on your cigarettes, all those things. You got to keep yourself clean. All of that. When you quit smoking, it's hard. But you're not in the hospital. The struggle is there, but it's like you are picking your health. It's all hard. So choose your hard. Choose your hard.
Dawn Taylor
Well, and it's so. It's always been very interesting to me. How much judgment there is on the health choices I've made, but also like the work choices I've made and all of those things. And I mean judgment on all of it. I have relatives literally mock me for how I eat or mock me for how organized my house is, like it's it's constant. It's just this constant hilarious mockery, judgment, and especially the alcohol, especially the healthy eating, especially some of those things. And I always have to stop myself and be like, it's very sad to me. That they feel that threatened by me not engaging in their decision for themselves.
Jenny Ryce
Misery loves company is a term for reason, I know,
Dawn Taylor
but it's also like by me choosing this, I'm not saying I disagree with your decisions. I'm not like it isn't about that. It's actually me just saying no, that doesn't work for my body. So I'm going to do what my body needs. Yeah, and I wonder what life would look like if more of us did that, if more of us, instead of succumbing to the peer pressure of everybody around us instead of choosing what everybody else is doing because that makes us happier, that makes us comfortable, or that makes us whatever. Our house is really funny right now because I am eating my normal whatever way. And my husband is eating carnivore. So we are eating completely different. Neither of us cares. Neither of us is judging the other person. Neither of us is saying anything. We're just like, whatever. This is what works for both of us. Like I tried carnivore for six weeks. Felt like death. He feels amazing. We are so out of touch with ourselves and our needs and our wants and our desires and honestly like people get out of your heart and into your head. Stop buying into this bullshit story of like, just be heart-centered and follow your heart and listen to your heart, and your heart will guide you. You know, our hearts are really fickle. And they get us into a lot of trouble. And one of those is our heart doesn't want to be hurt, and it doesn't want to be rejected, and it just wants to be loved and all those things. That's beautiful. But then that's what causes us to also eat something we shouldn't to connect to someone or it's, you know, drink something that we know is not good for us because we don't want to say no one rejects somebody. Right? And the more you can really figure out who you are, what you are, what you desire for yourself, and really what you want is your blueprint for your life, the easier all of those decisions are. And what's even more amazing is how when you make those decisions. Yes, you're going to have people to walk away. You're going to have people that are irritated or frustrated or pissed off with just judgey pants. But you also, in turn are giving everybody else permission to do the same. I had a friend say to me last week, he was like, he's like, man, he's like, you're like the best friend. And I was like, oh, a lot. We disagree with that. And he laughed and he goes, no. He's like, I love that you hold so firm to your boundaries. You know who you are. You know what you are. He's like. But you also like get busy and disappear for six weeks at a time. And I know you still love me and I know you're still there. And the minute I call you, you're like, it's like right there again. Like you're right back to just you. And he's like, I love that about you. He's like, you're one of the few people in my life that I don't ever have to question when it comes to that.
Jenny Ryce
Authenticity.
Dawn Taylor
Right? So be authentic. Throw the New Year's resolutions out. Figure out what it is you want out of this Christmas. If you don't want to do all the stupid Christmas shit, don't do it. Right. If you don't want to meet everyone's expectations, don't. I mean, I'm not saying intentionally hurt people or intentionally harm people.
Jenny Ryce
No. Absolutely not.
Dawn Taylor
It's not about that. It's not about that.
Jenny Ryce
But it's also like, really, you can live authentically true and still be kind in your delivery to others. it's no, it's a one word sentence.
Dawn Taylor
I was joking with a friend this week that next year I'm going to plan a Christmas party for solopreneurs. I love it, and it's going to be like our staff Christmas party, but then we're going to cancel it the day before. So that everybody has an evening off. 3.2s Just, just everyone gets like, everyone can stay in their room. Everyone just gets this gift of time. And it'll be like with your ticket, you got a free skip the dishes gift card or something. And it's like, just go, like, ordering your favorite or go pick up takeout or whatever it is you want to do, but just, like, say no.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah. So, okay. I can't believe how fast time's going here. When we think about what we've talked about and we recap, you know, we've talked a lot about living in our truth and, and, you know, looking at the shoulds versus like standing in our own strength and, and choosing us. And we've talked about resolutions and we've talked about, you know, um, reviewing and reflecting. Last question before we end our episode today together. As you move into the New Year and quote unquote, the new you. Because let's be real, you will be a new person next year because you're going to be very different from who you are today. As your year progresses, what would be the advice you would give yourself stepping into the next year.
Dawn Taylor
Stay in your lane.
Jenny Ryce
Can you elaborate on what that means?
Dawn Taylor
Stay in your lane. So if you want to focus on health. For the new you, right? Don't pay attention to what everybody else is doing. Figure out what works for you. If you want to shift what you're doing for work. You don't have to be a business owner. You don't have to start a business. Maybe you just want a new job. Maybe you just want a new career. Maybe you want structure. Maybe you own a business and you're like, you know what? I'm really sick of this. I think I just want a salary where I get paid Monday to Friday and I like, don't have to think about it. Stay in your lane. Focus on your story. Focus on your journey. Focus on who you are, what you are, or what you're wanting to do and what works for your family. So if you were a single person, you got your lane. If you are married, do you have another driver? Right? So, really sit down together and figure out, like, where do we want to go? Not based on what anybody else is doing. Because what's working for them does not mean it's going to work for you.
And don't be afraid to have people very confused by you. It's actually kind of fun.
Jenny Ryce
I think it's pretty profound when we think about the reality that anything worth doing usually is needs requires a little bit of work. There are no quick fixes out there. And I'm telling you guys right now, those of you that are listening, if someone's promising you a quick fix, they're on their agenda, not yours. Yeah, right. Like, it takes time. It takes work and it takes, you know, falling off the wagon and jumping back on.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, come on, we've all read the front of the paper at the checkout line. You can lose £40 in ten days.
Jenny Ryce
No, you just take a pill. It's super easy.
Dawn Taylor
Come on.
Jenny Ryce
Honestly, Dawn, thank you so much for letting me hijack the Taylor Way talks. It's been wonderful, as always, to connect with you in this way I love I mean, I'm blessed I get to have these deep conversations with you on a regular basis, so I appreciate you letting me do it today so we can record it and hopefully provide some inspiration. And some action planning. For those of you that are listening, and we appreciate all of you for being here and taking the time to connect in and listen. We know that the greatest gift that you have in your life is your time. So we appreciate you. Dawn, I'll pass it back to you. Thank you so much.
Dawn Taylor
One last thing. If you don't want to set a single goal and just float next year, do it.
Jenny Ryce
Amen. That is a goal, is it not?
Dawn Taylor
Totally. If you want to do none of the things we talked about,
Jenny Ryce
I'm going to do nothing. That's my goal.
Dawn Taylor
Amazing. Do that. No. Thank you guys so much for being here and for being part of this podcast. And listening in the viewers means so much to me. We will be back again in two weeks. We have some amazing episodes here planned over the next few months that I'm really, really excited about, and possibly an interview with my husband and I on marriage and what it's like to be married to me. Yeah, that could be very entertaining because he doesn't hold anything back and we won't edit. If we can convince them to do it. But yeah. Thank you. Thank you for being here, for showing up all of the things. If you want to leave a rating and review, that would mean the world. You can subscribe anywhere where you listen to your podcast, and we can't wait to see you again in a couple of weeks. But as you all know, show notes located at the TheaylorWay.ca. If you want links to anything we talked about,
talk to us later.
Jenny Ryce
Dawn, I'm going to add one last thing. We talked about something today that we talked about digging in and. Looking at reflection and if people are trying to change habits, if you are listening right now and you have a habit you're desperately trying to change and you've tried and tried and tried. Please reach out to Dawn. She will take 30 minutes of her time to talk to you because if if you haven't been able to move forward, you might need some support. So, the link will be in the show notes. Dawn is amazing at what she does. Take 30 minutes. It could change your life forever. So thank you so much.
Dawn Taylor
Thank you. Talk to some of you soon.
-
Why you would want to listen to this episode…
From the outside looking in, Scientology is quite mysterious. It can’t help but pique any outsider’s interest in this mysterious phenomenon. Is it really as bad as the media says it is? For Katherine Spallino, an ex-Scientologist who was indoctrinated into the religion upon birth, the answer is a resounding yes. In this episode, Katherine shares with us what it was really like growing up in the world of Scientology, and how fortunate she is to have escaped, now living a life where she is able to make choices for herself and can truly be free.
Who this for
For anyone who’s ever been curious about the inner workings of Scientology, our guest Katherine tells her harrowing experiences growing up and leaves no stone unturned. It’s an in-depth look at the world of Scientology behind closed doors as this episode serves as a way for anyone curious to finally get some answers. What really goes on for Scientologists and the lives they live? If you’ve ever wanted to find out then this episode is for you.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Katherine grew up on a secluded ranch within the cadet org, the Church of Scientology’s Sea Org school for children. At a young age, Katherine began to journal about her day-to-day life, capturing the thoughts and experiences of a child coming of age in a cult. Katherine’s background offers the rare opportunity to tell the story of the hundreds of children who rarely saw their parents and were indoctrinated to become future Sea Org members. Katherine is no longer a Scientologist and lives in Minneapolis with her husband, happily raising three rambunctious boys.
Guest Social Links
Email - [email protected]
Instagram - https://instagram.com/thebadcadet?igshid=OGQ5ZDc2ODk2ZA%3D%3D&utm_source=qr
Facebook - https://facebook.com/katherine.spallino
Book link - The Bad Cadet: Growing Up in the Church of Scientology's Sea Organization
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C1TCQ1KQ?ref_=cm_sw_r_mwn_dp_VS1P60F6NT3JH38G45CJ_1
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Dawn Taylor. And oh my goodness, are we going to have an amazing conversation today. Today we are talking to Katherine Spino. What is the topic? Oh, I don't know, maybe Scientology. So before we get started, I want you to know that Katherine is safe. We did have a conversation prior to this recording to make sure, because we've all seen the stuff on the TV and the news and the media and the celebrities on how they can go after you and harm you and all of that fun. And she is safe. So just we're going to put that out there right away. But we're going to dive in. We're going to dive into what her childhood was like being raised in the Sea Org. What should it do to get out all of the things? So yeah, without further ado, I introduce you to the most amazing powerhouse and positive human. Katherine, welcome to the show, Katherine.
Katherine Spallino
Hi. Thanks so much for having me. Um, love your words. It's funny because I've been reading your book and it's like, I feel like there's so many similarities in us. Like, we're both like, we're, you know, go getters, I guess. So, like, excited to talk to you. And we could delve into, I mean we have different lives that have happened to us, but like how you can overcome it or come through it and still be a strong, generally happy person,
Dawn Taylor
Right? Forgive Catherine's audio. She has a little bit of some congestion going on, so bear with it guys because this conversation, so Catherine wrote a book about her early years of escaping Sea Org. So for anyone who doesn't know what is Sea Org?
Katherine Spallino
So this is the inner circle of Scientology. It's like you could picture, like, a priest or nun. It's like, well, they actually work for the Church of Scientology. They're not just parishioners. And my parents were working. They signed what's called a billion year contract. So, a billion years of their lives to work for the Sea Org. And in doing so, they dedicated my life. I was a baby born into the Sea Org, to work for the Church of Scientology. So from the time I was a baby, I was like, “Yep, this is what I'm doing.” Or, like, six years old. I could actually remember these memories of knowing I'm going to join the Sea Org. This is what I'll be doing. So that's the Sea Org basically is run military-style kind of. And there's a commanding officer and there's, everybody has jobs and they have to do the jobs all relate to distributing Scientology to the world or to the public. And my parents, because I was in a Sea Org, they sent me away by the time I was eight years old to a boarding school that was only for sea children to raise these children to be future members. So we're like little mini-soldiers, and they consider children, adults in small bodies. So I wasn't really treated like a child.
Dawn Taylor
Before that, you were even sent away to the ranch, so for anyone listening, the link to her book is in the show notes, contact, whatever. Like it's all in the show notes. You guys need to read this book. It's intense and it's wild. So, let's break down a little bit of like, what that was like. So even prior to that you were really like, so going out to the ranch, which is the school, you were even still like, you lived on a different floor than your parents in different buildings. So you hadn't been sent away yet, but you were already very divided from your family at a very young age, like, weren't you six?
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. So the book is called The Bag. Didn't even say that. Sorry. It follows me because I'm what's considered a cadet. As somebody who joined the Sea Org. By the time I'm six years old. I'm not quite a cadet yet, but I am separated from my parents and live in a dorm with other girls and have a dorm mom who's not my mom. And ironically, my mom is a dorm mom for other kids, not for me. So I would just see her in passing. And that is until I'm eight years old. And I would see my parents only on Sunday mornings for a few hours when they had what's called CSP time, which is like cleaning your room time, do your laundry, and also hang out with your child while you're doing these things. It's not like you would go out to breakfast together or anything, so sometimes you would get ice cream after laundry. That was a treat, you know? But by the time I'm eight years old, I get an actually, to be honest, in the book you find out I'm actually nine years old, but I thought I was eight. Like, that's how little connection I had about my life. And I get sent to the school that's an hour from Los Angeles, north in the mountains, and I'm just with other children, and we all have jobs. And like, this is how we are operating like little mini members at this school that's called the Canyon Oaks. it's like half school, half work. Like I'm also working out on the fields or I'm working in the galley cooking food for the other cadets, um, things of that nature.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, it was like a full job. Like you're gone away from your family. And one of the things that, one of the statements you made at one point in the book was talking about how, like, you just, like, craved this, like even seeing your mom across the room. And having that acknowledgement of like, even hoping to catch her eye. And you like, lived for that. You lived for those moments. But then when you go out to the ranch, you also got paid and you found out that you no longer got a paycheck because you didn't even have, like, you didn't have any of the government ID saying that you would ever even been born. Parents had never gotten that. So you then worked forever, you know, with no money, like you had no money, yet expected to act like an adult. And, you know, not having underwear or shoes or any of those things and nobody really caring.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. As an adult. I look back, I'm like, how is nobody like, you know. Hey, here's some shoes for you. Hey, let me get you this. Hey, you're not getting paid. So instead, we'll provide you with this. But instead, I was just, like, left to my own devices and in my journals, which I use to write my book. You could see this, like, shame I have for myself. Or I'm, like, embarrassed. But I have to act like I don't care that I don't have shoes and I can't afford to buy underwear. Like, I feel like it's my responsibility. I don't feel like it's anybody else's. Even though I was nine, ten, 11 years old. And it's very strange to look back on, um, for sure.
Dawn Taylor
Well, and especially now that you're a parent, right? Like, you're out of it and you're a parent. That must be just wild to look at and look at your own children and think, how, how did that come to be? So when, let's backtrack a ways, right? When did your parents join Scientology?
Katherine Spallino
My mom was like I would say, early 30s and my dad a little bit older than that. And they met in New York City. So, she ran into somebody on the subway who she'd gone to high school with, who was into Scientology. And they're like, this is amazing. You gotta check it out. And my mom grew up in a very Pentecostal household, super strict. She had to wear, like, long skirts. I find this all out later when I'm in my 20s, but this because I wanted to understand why she found Scientology and she was so restricted. And she she said when she found Scientology. She felt like it. One of the things they told you is freedom. Or like knowing yourself or freedom of truth. It's just like what they like, tell you all the time. Like, you know what? You know, it's all about empowerment. And then later on you find out that it's not really the case. But for her, she felt like that was like her salvation in a way like this. She could finally find independence. And my dad, I actually don't know. He was like, I've lost close to my dad, so I just tended to not have these conversations.
Dawn Taylor
Your dad was gone, like literally across the tree from you the majority of your childhood. He was in Florida and you were in California.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. And so at least I got to see my mom, like, a lot till I was like eight like or a lot as an in passing. And then I do know from talking with her, also my 20s, that she didn't nurse me for the first 12 weeks. So I think that, like, skin to skin care probably also really bonded us because I have still to this day, a lot of love for my mom. Um, yeah. And we could talk about what's happening with my parents currently if you want to. Or we could come to that later.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, we'll come back to that. So growing up as a cadet. You're this little army girl, right? Your rebelliousness. It started to show up. It started to show up fairly young. From the anger, the outbursts, the randomly running away one day and somebody bringing you back. At what age? Some about two thirds of the way through your book. At what age did you start to go, hey, wait a second. This isn't okay. How did you come to that?
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, I was an avid reader and would read all the time, and I would be like, wait, they don't have to go work in the fields, or they get to see their parents every day. Like these comparisons, like Ride Sweet Valley High or even Goosebumps or, you know, all of them have a backdrop of a family. Baby-Sitters club. I was reading all of these books and I was like, that's kind of unfair. You know, like, I want to be able to just like, be able to hang out with my family and they do things for me, or they're taking me to soccer or things like that, because I didn't even have, like, sports, you know, like it was just P.E. and I was really just do whatever you want at sometimes we go like rollerblading or we did have horses, so we would go horseback riding. You got to, like, sign up ahead of time because it was only like four rideable horses, 200 kids. So, it's not like you could do that all the time. Um, so it was very these little, like, moments when I would be reading and I'm like, oh, that looks more fun, or that kind of want to do that. But then I also have this big goal, because what I've taught for the time of a child is like, I love Ron Hubbard, who's the creator of Scientology. And he's telling me all the time and everything I'm reading and everything I'm hearing from the grownups around me that we're saving the world like our little group of kids, like we're going to be the executives in the Sea Org of Scientology, and we're going to save the world. So it's like, I'm like, oh, bummer. Like, I can't do these fun things that people do in books because, you know, I got to save the world. So it's like the soft talk where like, every time I want to just like break out and go have fun and like, go, I'm like, maybe I could go to a regular high school. Maybe I could try to do this. And then it's and then like, somehow get talked myself back into staying or someone says something to me like, hey, let's get you some auditing, which is what's the Scientology processing to like, help you be better, be a better cadet? I'm like, oh yeah, I'm not a good cadet. I always get in trouble. Maybe this is the reason. And then it turns out I don't like that. But then there's like another distraction where they're like, oh, all of you guys are getting to get to go now, actually join the Sea Org. I'm like, oh, it's finally happening. Maybe I'll really like being in the Sea Org to this constant like up and down of self- regulation or like my true self wants to come out and then, like, push myself back down to try to stay. And I'm thinking that there's something wrong with me that I keep wanting to leave, you know?
Dawn Taylor
At the core of you. You knew. So we're going to pause on the how you finally got out in one piece. What is the core? So for someone listening, I know, you know, looking from the outside in, someone's like, for real. Did you actually think you were going to save the world? Like, how do people actually believe this stuff or think these things or like, buy into that, right? Like, how have you been so conditioned to buy into that, to not know that it's wrong or not know that it's not okay to have someone take your kids away or not know that, right? Like, even if you're of the leaders to the children at the ranch was not appropriate. It wasn't okay. It wasn't good behavior. Do you know what I mean? Like, yeah. What are the core beliefs of Scientology? Where did it show up? When did it show up like some of that? So people can understand that more and what the conditioning process even looks like?
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. So from the time I'm like a baby, it's like I've been always going once a week to this place called the Ron Hubbard Life Exhibition, and it's in Hollywood Boulevard. You could check it out. And it's just this big exhibition about the man who invented Scientology. So from the time I'm a baby, think of this man like a god. They don't call him that. But he's done so many things. He's incredible. So everything he says is true. No matter what. You can never invalidate what he says. If you do, there's something you don't understand. So that's like a really core part of me from the time I'm a child. Like, this person knows everything and can say, like, make the world a better place. It's like always what the goal is. And then for my parents, I don't see them, but in my mind I'm like, oh, because they're trying to save the world. Like my dad was an OT three supervisor and OT three, there's like all these levels that Scientology has and OT three is like on the top level. So I know he's teaching, like, amazing things. Now. It turns out OT three is about when the aliens get introduced in Scientology's doctrine. But. you don't know this when you're like really little. So when I was little, I didn't know anything about aliens. Most people I knew in Scientology, even growing up when we were like, late teens, don't know anything about the aliens because it's top secret. So, when that stuff like the South Park um, TV show comes out where they're like making fun of the aliens, we're like, they just made that up. Like, that's not at all part of Scientology. And I didn't know it was like, that's, we are only being told certain information from the time, our young age and that that is what the technology we have that Albert Hubbard invented about. It's like a lot of self-help stuff at the beginning, which do make sense, like communication and how to, what to do if you do something wrong, how to fix your, like, make up amends. Things like that are basic common life things that he wrote out. But then so, you believe all that stuff. But then on top of it, they begin to layer on the counseling and the auditing and all that indoctrination begins to follow. So, even though you're like, how could my parents just send me away from the time they first begin? It's just like basic level learning of Scientology, but as they get more into it, they're more and more, like, told, like, this is the salvation right of earth. And you've lived. They believe in reincarnation. You live so many lives. Like, can you dedicate all of your lives to save Earth now? Like, it's such a big thing to be a part of, to be proud of and then like, dedicate your own child to it as well. Thinking to my mom and she thinks I'm getting sent to a safe space. She grew up in the poor area of New York City, so she knows I'm not gonna be around gangs that are on drugs and she knows I'll be growing up in Scientology, which is like the most amazing, to her, technology. And she never got to the OT three stuff. Like to this day, she still doesn't know about the aliens. You know, so it's like, it's wild that you would be like, but why don't they progress up the bridge to know that stuff? It's like they, they, they kind of just stay in this, like, lower level part of Scientology. And then they're just enforcing getting other people to Scientology. And then some people get up to those higher levels and then maybe they go, it's too late now. Like now I have to believe in aliens, I don't know. And there must be something that happens.
Dawn Taylor
So, it's interesting. It's very calculated.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. It's like very intentional.
Dawn Taylor
incredibly intentional, where it's like we're going to start with like one degree of this and then two degrees and three degrees. Oh, you're bought in enough. We bet we could just, like, convince you of a little bit more and a little bit more and a little bit more and a little bit more until you're fully believing in aliens.
Katherine Spallino
And to be clear, like all these people in this, they believe everything they're doing is a good thing. Like they don't, there's not, like, somebody like even David Miscavige, the leader of Scientology, who's like a total whack job. Like if you read about all the stuff he does, he probably totally believes everything and probably is now skewed it in his mind where he's like the leader, like the Ron Hubbard of it, because Alan Hubbard died in the 80s and David Miscavige did a crazy coup and everything that the CIA members don't really know about. But yeah, he believes that Scientology, he probably actually truly believes that Scientology is like everyone's salvation. It's just, he's doing it as a pyramid scheme where they're like raising all this money and all that money goes towards either lawyers to sue people who are attacking Scientology or for buying land. There's so many churches, Scientology around in every major city, almost in the world. It's wild. It's like the Catholic Church or something, like they're putting their money into that. Um, but like my parents think when they're doing their work, my mom was a letter registrar in the end, like the last bit when I was in the Sea Org. And that's just writing letters to parishioners telling them. She just does that all day. Imagine that. Just every day, seven days a week, writing letters barely get time off, but your brain is going to just start being like, all like a loop, right? Like if you, like, have nothing to challenge you or stimulate you, you're going to just be like, I think this is how they keep these letter writers. They're just like working really hard, long hours, not a lot of time off. So not a lot of time to think and really think about what you're doing is my thought for why some people stay in the Sea for so long, because it's not a good existence. It's very, like, dull and boring and you get yelled at a lot and a lot of pressure to sell products of Scientology and so on.
Dawn Taylor
Okay. How do I say this? Sorry, need to think about that for a second. There's so much. like, I could talk to you about this all day. And for anyone in my inner circle, you know that I am, like, weirdly obsessed with cults and the idea and the beliefs and how they do it and how we just, like, lose ourselves in them. Right? So you're at the ranch?
Katherine Spallino
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
You get the call to now you get to move up to be like the full adult as part of this, at 14 years old.
Katherine Spallino
Yes. I've done certain qualifications called the A, B and C, which are low level eighth grade reading, math and writing. Like I wrote a long essay that was like 100 words. I could do eighth grade math and I could do, I think it was really like sixth grade math, to be honest. And then the reading was like vocabulary, eighth grade vocabulary words. And that's enough. I'm ready to be an adult.
Dawn Taylor
Which is wild, but also keep in mind like you're like, everyone is working for them. They're barely paying you, right? So like, nobody has money. Nobody has to even think about doing anything. And you literally are like living in their properties, living in their spaces, being fed by them, everything. There is a weird safety like that does make sense to my brain in some ways.
Katherine SpallinoYeah. So for some people it's very safe. Yeah, everything's taken care of. You also don't make decisions. Everything you want to do, you have to ask somebody. So there's something if you're somebody who doesn't like to make decisions and has anxiety, maybe it's nice to just always have to request permission for things or be told what to do. I don't like that as a person. Like innately. Told what to do all the time really bothered me. And it always seemed like this is like non-sequitur. Why are you telling me to do this? Like, that was my instinct.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, yeah. You'd have, like, attacks and like, lose it and swearing at them and stuff and getting in trouble and then having to be ignored and shunned from the people as part of the punishment. Right? Oh, no. Guys, you literally just have to read this book because there's no way we could fit all of this into an hour or even like five hours, right? So at 14, where did you go?
Katherine Spallino
So, at 14 years old, I leave the ranch that get sent to this. seeing this big blue building with the Scientology cross on the internet. That's where I was and that's where my parents lived. And that and so I go there and get put on what's called a boot camp but it's called the Estates project for us. And now I'm doing even more labor. Have to run everywhere and like, can't even get dessert after dinner because I have to get through this program. Like, so this is like a few month program where I'm just studying some Scientology courses. Some of them have already done before, before I could officially join the Sea Org. And of course, when I'm doing that, I'm like, oh, this is just like the cadet org, but worse in a way, because at least at the cadet org, we would sometimes go to the beach here and there. If they would like, we would have fun moments. Now they're stripping even more of the fun. So eventually I start acting out and I get sent back to the ranch. So this is like, you'll follow me on the journey in my book because there's so much, like back and forth with me as a child. Try to figure myself out, and they're trying to put me like a circle into a square or a square to a circle, and it's just not working.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, like not working at all. So this goes back and forth and back and forth and back and forth in the middle of this. So you also have siblings 1.1s that are part of this that you're never really seeing. And they're on their own journeys within this. So at what point did you get out of it? Because there's multiple things like you get out of the Sea Org, but then you had to actually leave Scientology, which are two very different things. So how did you end up and at what point did you finally go like, no, no, no, I have to get out of this.
Katherine Spallino
Um, so in the Sea Org, if you read the book, you're going to follow me as I like, keep going. In that same journey I'm talking about where, like, I'm trying to be good. I'm trying to be what's called in-ethics. There's a lot of words in Scientology that are totally made up. They have a big technical dictionary, and one of them in-ethics is being good and like listening and following direction. And I'm constantly being in-ethics, that being in-ethics. And it's eventually I'm just like I need to like. So, I'm also told the outside world is really bad. Everybody does drugs. They're promiscuous, like I'm told. Like where we are is safe and where out there as bad. But eventually a part of me is going to win out where I just want to have fun, believe it or not. Like, it's just like, I need to go have a life like, this is not a life here. And I have to figure out where am I going to stay, who will like, because my parents are in the Sea Org and I barely know their extended family. So how is that going to work? What will it be like? And I'm determined. Like I could do it. I won't be promiscuous. I won't take drugs. I could go have a life and still be a great Scientologist and donate all my money to Scientology. Like, I literally thought that was a good thing to do is like, give away my money to sign algae. And so when I'm in the real world, I experienced this culture shock, which actually does give you a second book called The Bad Scientologist, where I'm trying to be a Scientologist in the real world, and it's watching me sort through the actual life world and what Scientology says is the world, and having to sort that out and decide, wait, what is actually true? And luckily I have ,like, the brains to like, I don't know, you have to question things. And a lot of people that I grew up with, all of my friends, the half of them are still in the Sea Org, are still cadets, but most are 40 years old. They cannot have children in this year because that was another push for me to leave. I wanted to have kids and I do have kids, so I have three kids. Yay for me. I have a husband. I have a really happy life outside of it. So I got to find what I actually wanted, which was to go create a life for myself, be able to make my own choices, and have a husband and children. But how do I get there? It's because I have perseverance. I'm curious and I ask questions and don't just accept when people are like, this is the way it is. And I actually had something happen though, in the church where they made it even easier for me to leave because one of my brothers got really sick and they said, they pull me into the church and they're like, hey, you need to come into the church. I'm like, oh yeah, I'm going to come. You guys going to see how good I am, I'm only 20 years old. I have been working at the school that's affiliated with Scientology called Delphi Academy. I'm a teacher there. Like, you guys are going to be so impressed by me. And instead they sit me down and they tell me, your family cannot talk to you anymore. Your mom, your dad and your brother and your sister who are still in there because Philip is getting sick and we know you're the cause. And I'm like, what? Yes, this literally happened because there was something called the PTS person, which is a potential trouble source and a Suppressive Person. Um, my brother was getting sick, so that's a trouble source. Who's suppressing him? It's got to be a sister who left the Sea Org. Even though I was doing nothing wrong, saying nothing negative about it, I still was a Scientologist, and I believed in Scientology. I just wasn't really practicing it because I was having fun living my life. But at least I worked at a school that was doing Scientology studies and stuff. So in my mind, I couldn't, like, it still doesn't make sense. They screwed themselves over just with their own high horse. Like just horrible way of behaving where you just blame a random person for somebody being sick. Um, so then my parents can talk to you, me and my brother. And it was a few months of that. And meanwhile I met my husband, Ryan, boyfriend at the time, but he is not a Scientologist, and I was, he was able to be like, hey, you're not your normal like happy go lucky stuff. Like what, is something going on? You could talk to me about it. And having someone I could actually talk to and not worry about. So something else that happens in Scientology I know there's so much to unwrap is if you say something negative about Scientology, you will get written up like Big Brother, like 1984, George Orwell's novel. So I couldn't talk about what was going on with my parents, and my brother couldn't see me anymore. I had to hold in this pain because I didn't want to get written up. I also felt like maybe I did do something wrong, even though I knew I didn't, and my husband, boyfriend at the time was just like, you could tell me, I'll never be a Scientologist. Nothing to do with your religion. Just personally. I'm a Christian. It's not for me. And I was like, oh good. Like I won't ruin his chance for total freedom. And so I was able to talk to him and, like, unload everything and just hearing myself say everything out loud that my parents and my brother couldn't talk to me because Scientology was saying I was creating a sickness and my brother’s cancer was still actually, I still took a while. But saying it out helped me begin that process. And from there, I was able to absorb other moments in Scientology that we're not okay and how money hungry it is. And then I start to go on the internet because they tell you not to go on the internet, because everything on the internet is false. Media is always wrong. So, that's a sign for anybody who's in a cult. If that person or a group is telling you everybody else is wrong, they have the answer only you're probably in a relationship or in a group that is trying to control what you're learning. And so I began to go on the internet. I began to read books, watch documentaries. Highly recommend Going Clear on HBO or Leah Remini show The Aftermath. Two of my best friends were on that show, but that was, like, The Aftermath was way down the road. But Going Clear came out around then, and Janet Reitman's Inside Scientology. So good. So that was how I got myself out, was getting information myself. Yeah.
28:40
So. You're a kid with no access to family, no access to anything. Currently, to this day, you
don't have access to your parents because really, they're owned by the church.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, well, they think that I'm a suppressive person, so they don't want to talk to me anymore, which is so sad. So I actually managed to reach them because I've been doing interviews on there's a group called SPTV on YouTube. If anybody wants to hear more, if they're more visual, and that's how they like to learn more about Scientology, that's a great resource to go to. And Aaron Smith Levin was kind of like the leader from that. He was on The Aftermath show, Leah Remini, so I was on an interview with him and somebody he knew who had just rescued their mom from the Sea Org. I knew that mom who knew my parents and knew where they were, so I didn't know where they were. And so she gave him their number for that place because I had no phone number. Like, I couldn't even contact them. So, then I was able to call my parents and they acted like everything was completely normal. So, they did come back and contact me when my brother was sick. And then they left me again. They stopped talking to me again when one of my best friend was on Leah Remini show, so I'd been six years from that point. So they had met my twins. I had baby twins in that time. I had a three year old and they would come visit every year. And then after that, boom, it's just stopped after Leah Remini show. So, this was the first time a few months ago, and I talked to my parents and I told them, I love you guys. Like there's no reason for you to not see me. We could disagree on things. You could do Scientology and I would still love you. Come visit. And my book had not come out yet, and they were just like, oh, my book had come out when I talked to them. Sorry, because this was the interviews and my mom's like, yeah, I just have to talk to my ethics officer. So like, that's the control. Like, her brain's like, I can't just go see my daughter. Like, I have to make sure it's allowed. And then she said, are you still seeing your friend Marion, who was on the show? Marion Francis? And I'm like. Why does it matter? Like she's my best friend. Why would I cut her out? She's allowed to speak her truth. Like, please be my mom again, you know? And unfortunately, the next day, like, I tried to call again, the phone line was disconnected and now I can't get through to them. I'm like, oh my gosh. It's just sad because, like, they're just, they're in the 70s now. Like, let them go. Let them see their family. There's no reason to do this except for I'm evil. But you already said I was evil before I'd even done anything. Like, now I have this book out. Now, I'm speaking out on Scientology. Scientology is like asking me to do it, right. It's like I wasn't even going to do all this stuff. And then you take my parents away.
Dawn Taylor
You're like, and now watch me pay you back.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, like I was. I had this book burning percolating for years since I was 20, 21 when I was coming out of Scientology. But I was like, I can't publish it because I don't want to lose my parents. I know they would take my parents from me. And this book is not an attack on Scientology, right? It's just about me growing up. You just add your reading, the reader knows what it's like, what a child needs to grow up. And you see that I don't have that, but I don't have to tell the reader that. So it's not an attack on Scientology. So I was but still yeah, I could not write this book because my parents didn't want to lose them. And then I lost them anyway, because my best friend was on this show and I knew about it, and I didn't write a report about it. And they were like, you are on her side, so we can no longer talk to you. Like, that's just where they jump to.
Dawn Taylor
Just wild. Just like the deeper control, the better.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. And it's sad because so many of my cadet friends that I grew up with have lost their parents over the dumbest, silliest things like that. Like one of my friends wrote, wow, look at how many, how much Scientology pays ads for the Super Bowl. Interesting. And again, it's, like, totally like, does it really say like this is good or bad? You know, and like so many people, Scientologist friends like, underfunded. And we're like, I can't believe you wrote that about the Sea Org. And like, her parents stopped talking to her because her sister had said, I'm not a Scientologist anymore. Don't involve me in it anymore. And then because her sister did that, they also disconnected from her. And it's like the two separate people like, this is this family. Scientology is making family not important. They're saying the church, the church, they don't really believe in God, but they are saying that they are more important than your own family because you've lived so many lives. You've had so many families in the past. We're saving the world. What's more important, obviously Scientology.
Dawn Taylor
So, from what? So Leah Remini came out about it. She had her whole show, and she's talked very loud about how, like, they have tried to run her off the road.
Katherine Spallino
She was a cadet, too, by the way, in Florida. Yeah. You could keep going with what you're saying.
Dawn Taylor
No, but she's like, they've done everything in their power. Like from like career, her finances. Like they have done everything in their power to destroy her. And it's almost like the more they try, the louder she gets.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. I don't know, it's amazing. Right?
Dawn Taylor
Which is incredible. For
someone watching from the outside. I remember the first time, you know, you heard about random things around, you know, Tom Cruise and his wedding and then, like, not talking to his daughter after and his ex-wives and not having access to his kids or him ignoring and walking away from his kids. And you hear all these things and you think, yeah, but it can't actually be that bad. It's just celebrities and it's just gossip and it's just, you know. Some random tabloid.
What about that? I was going to say, like, is it actually that bad?
Katherine Spallino
Celebrities are actually treated better than, like regular Scientologists. Scientologists are under so much control, they will write up their spouse if they feel like the spouse is saying something negative about Scientology, they will disconnect from their own children. Um, it's really hard for them to turn against a celebrity because celebrities give them a lot of PR, good PR, right? Good public relations. And the money and everything. So when Leah Remini in her book, which I've read is amazing, Troublemaker. She was at Tom Cruise's wedding and she had the audacity, apparently, to ask where David Miscavige’s wife, is. Shelly Miscavige, who is missing. But missing is mean. She's just, she's okay with it, but she's like, basically getting rehabbed, you know what I mean? Like, she's shunted off somewhere out in the mountains, probably in Hemet, California, and probably okay with it because she's so indoctrinated to thinking whatever she did, which was probably nothing, was wrong. And so she's just doing like menial labor for the rest of her life. Right? But, Leah Remini doesn't know all this. She's just like, where did Shelly Miscavige go? And she's like, where is she? And somebody in the church yelled at her for even having the audacity to ask her that at a celebrity wedding. And then they had her pay for counseling, hundreds of thousands of dollars to fix what she did, to fix her brain. Because, like, why would you think you could ask a question like that? And, um. eventually she was just like, this is baloney. Like, I'm paying all this money and you guys still aren't even answering my question. And she started going on the internet looking for information. Like I said, it's like you have to look for information if somebody is telling you not to look, definitely go look. Right. So it is so true. And like the whole thing with Tom Cruise, with his girlfriends, like David Miscavige is like, obsessed with him. Those two are like, obsessed with each other. They're both egomaniacs. So they like, feed off each other. And I think David Miscavige was like, you need to get a girlfriend. I'm going to get you a girlfriend. And so they're like calling in Scientologists, girls that are hot or attractive and interviewing them before Tom Cruise meets them to see if they qualify to be his girlfriend. So before Katie Holmes, there was all these other actresses, too. Scarlett Johansson got called into, and they're like seeing if they're like, malleable, you know, like, would you be open to Scientology if Tom Cruise wanted that? You know, and a lot of them said no. And Katie Holmes had a crush on Tom Cruise when she was young. And it was like in a Seventeen Magazine and everything. So she was, so easily probably manipulated. Not her fault, you know, because like, this is a man she had a crush on when she was young, and now she gets to date him, and now he wants to marry her and he's in love with her. Like, what, a fairy tale. And then all of a sudden, she realized what control Scientology had around everything and got out. I'm sure she had to sign a huge NDA, but I bet she could get around it if she wanted to and tell what, like, really happened. But I also understand she's got her daughter. She probably wants to live her life.
Dawn Taylor
But in that there's, it is very interesting. It's very interesting how so many cults take away,
take away the family peace.
Katherine Spallino
Mhm. Exactly. And they make you dependent on the church as a family basically. But the church is not a family and they will shun you at the moment you do anything that's wrong or at least Scientology will and get this, so like Scientology has tax exempt status. So they get billions of dollars coming in and they don't pay any taxes. Isn't that just ridiculous?
Dawn Taylor
It's so insane
Katherine Spallino.
Yeah. And we could use that money. You know, America has so many problems right now with schooling with, like, mental health. It's like that money could be going somewhere else to help people and help families that are poor and who need extra assistance. Instead, it's just going David Miscavige.
Dawn Taylor
So everyone is. Well, I mean, everyone is very, very poor. Next to nothing taken care of. So how does the new money continually keep coming in just from new members, or do they have enough people working outside of the Sea Org that still continually are paying their money in?
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. So they have something called the whales, the big whale donors who, there are some big rich people who are on Scientology. Sterling something who invented like software that's used everywhere. ABC Mouse, you know, that, like, preschool learning. I don't know if you know about it, that's from a Scientology family. So there are these national huge companies, survival insurance, all Scientology companies who donate massive amounts. Nancy Cartwright, obviously Tom Cruise. So you have huge, huge wealth there. So that's always coming in. And then but from there I would say, I don't know if they're getting new Scientologists like, think there's so much bad media, so much, you know, negative press out there. A lot of people say when they walk into what's called an Org. It's always empty. Like there's not a lot of people there. So I think it's just like slowly shrinking. But they have all this money from like, you know, the past 50 years that it's still able to survive. But, I think it's just slowly going to start downsizing. But I don't know. We'll have to see. I don't actually know what's in the bank account.
Dawn Taylor
No, but it's, there is so much negative media on it.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
So for every Tom Cruise, for every person who's like rah rah rah rah, right..There's people like yourself that are walking away from it. There's people like Leah Remini, even like the Danny Masterson stuff that everyone thought he was going to get off. And obviously they couldn't buy the judge well enough.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. And there was evidence that Scientology literally told these women not to report this rape. And they covered it up for Danny Masterson because it's Danny Masterson. And they're like, and now guess what? Now that Danny Masterson has totally messed up their PR game, they've declared him a suppressive person.
Dawn Taylor
Really?
Katherine Spallino
His brother, his sister who are all at trial, his wife, who are all Scientologists, can no longer talk to him. Like now. He's probably just like, I mean, like, this guy's a rapist, so I don't care how he feels. But at the same time, I'm like, God, like, this just shows your true color psychology. Like you were standing with him and then you just cut him off at the knees. Like, what? He's down. But it's also like, you should have done that at rape. Not because now it looks bad that you were supporting somebody who did this when there was actual factual women who had come in and said, Danny did this to me, and they said, what did you do to deserve it? Go clean his car, make up the damage for what you did because he deserves what he wants. One of them is his girlfriend. So of course that's allowed. Not true. Women and men do not get to be assaulted. All because they're in a relationship if they say no. And then the other two were drugged and taken, you know, so, that type of stuff is so prevalent. My best friend who was on the Remini show, her dad abused her and nothing was done to him to be reported to the police. And then, like very little attempts to help her to deal with that trauma. So she just had to carry with that with her growing up. Um, these are just like little drops. There's so many stories out there. And like I was saying on SPTV, there's like all of these stories. Leah Remini show The Aftermath. Like, I have my book, if you're interested more in like, young coming of age memoir. It's very young teenager growing up. So if that's your vibe, it's light. So, that's kind of nice for people to just kind of like it's funny, it's a little different. But I'm just saying there's so many mediums for people to learn about what Scientology is. The reason why I want people to learn about it is because I'm tired now. You know, like my parents are being held basically like hostage from me. And there's like, nothing I could do except for what I'm doing now. It's just telling more of my truth. And then hopefully, maybe they'll be like, you know, these old people. Maybe they do have choices, because right now the old people are not just like, put in a nice retirement home. They're like, put in a crappy apartment, shoved together, communal showers, having to do cleaning stations, you know, and not possibly not getting good medical care, most likely not getting good medical care. So I don't even, I don't want my parents’ days to just be wasting away in this apartment building and Los Angeles and the seedy area of Los Angeles.
Dawn Taylor
Which is so devastating and it's so hard that you can't, I mean, it's so hard to convince a senior citizen on a good day to change their opinion on something. Never mind when they've already been, when they've spent their entire lives being indoctrinated, to convince them that what they're doing is not okay or not right, or they need to walk away or whatever. What about your siblings? Are they still actively involved?
Katherine Spallino
Luckily, my brother Jason is here in Minneapolis with me and we see each other occasionally. He tried to see my parents when he was just in Los Angeles, and he was literally told no, and he said he doesn't know where they are. So he just said, he went to the church. He's like, I want to see my parents. They're like, no, your sister's been declared a suppressive, me. And he's like, well, I'm not declared. I barely see my sister. And they're like, no, you can't see them. You have to do what's called conditions, which is like when you make up the damage for what you did because you left the Sea Org when he was 17 years old. So he's bad for doing that, supposedly. So he's like, oh, I did my conditions when I was 20. I never heard back. And they're like, he's like, so could I see them? I have to fly back to Minnesota tomorrow. And they're like, no. And you just didn't know what to do. So he just left. But it's like my brother is more chill than me. Think if I was there up and like, you're calling the cops, you know. Yeah. And I'm getting, I'm figuring things out. I'm like, trying to decide what my next steps are. Will file for elderly abuse. I need to make sure they're actually doing okay. Um, so I'm going to, those are all steps I'm trying to figure out. I'm hoping that if these people are in Scientology, they have what's called the organization. And they literally the people who sue you, who set private eyes to, like, go, like, go through your garbage or like harass you, follow you. I have luckily and have not gotten any harassment. I live in Minnesota, so it's further away from everything. But also there have been so many people coming out on YouTube speaking out that I feel like I've like kind of enveloped in like a little blanket of people, like there's so many of us now But I'm hoping they're watching this and not hearing me say elderly abuse. We're worried about our parents that they're going to start saying, let's let these old folks contact their children, because I'm not. Like I said, I'm not the only cadet who's lost their parents, who whose parents have disconnected from them and like starting to let that happen, even that's a small step of humanity which I would appreciate. Who knows?
Dawn Taylor
What are the chances? And I mean, I know this sounds horrible, but what are the chances that would actually happen when this is an organization that thrives on keeping them away, and it would almost be like losing some control of something that they are so firmly in.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, the odds are slim. But yeah, I told you, I'm an optimist.
Dawn Taylor
You totally are.
Katherine Spallino
I'll try, I still try. I'm like, maybe they will. And I'm like, have these ideas of maybe what, maybe I'll try to go see them. I don't have an idea of where they are, but I don't really. But I'm like, I could do some sleuthing. I don't know, I'm like, figuring it out. Um, it's also hard because I'm still here. I have my three kids who are all elementary age. I have my husband. It's not like I could just go take off whenever I want. Um, I think that they're like, okay, health wise from having that phone call with them. But I know, like they’re in their mid 70s. Like how many more years do they have. Uh, so taking it day by day, you're right. Like the odds of them being like, you know what? We're going to let them contact all their suppressive children. Yeah. Like that doesn't sound like, it's not at all, especially in their eyes. We really are evil. Like, they think I'm a really, really bad person, and it's like, well.
Dawn Taylor
And would your parents and I know this is, this is horrible. And maybe I shouldn't even say it, which is going to make me an outsider, but would your parents even be willing to talk to you because they're so convinced you're evil?
Katherine Spallino
Well, they were before, but they didn't know about my book yet. And then I told them on the phone, now they've probably been told I'm talking on the internet about all these insane lies I'm sure they're saying, but they're not lies. I have so many of my friends who are also cadets who could corroborate everything I've said, who've read my book, who've said it's all true. Um, so now my parents probably are dealing with that loss like my mom. So I have to, I try to think in their brain. I'm like, there's that cognitive dissonance. I know they love me. And at the time when they stopped talking to me, they probably thought it was temporary. Like, that last time when my brother was sick. Um, and then, you know, well, they're doing drudgery. Days go by really fast. They go really slow, but also blink of an eye. All of a sudden, six years have gone by. I wonder if she always thought she would see me. And now I think she's probably like, I don't know. She's probably thinking she's not going to see me again or her other child, and she lost. So my brother who got sick, and did die. So it's like you would think that would make them. He died of a bone marrow transplant.
Dawn Taylor
Was that Judson? Was that his name?
Katherine Spallino
No. Lucas. His real name is Philip. I don't mind saying my family member names, but, um, so he ended up passing away. So, you would think that would only make us like hold, she would hold us dear to her heart. But no. And my sister, so she's in her mid 40s. So I also try to tell myself she's got to be advocating for love. She's got to be looking out for them. I know my sister, she's got a strong personality in a lot of ways, but she was always a rule follower, which is why she's still from the time I was. You could see it in the book where she's always, yeah, So she knows what's going on. But I'm like, to me, it's so hard for me to just be like, oh, that person's evil. Like this person that I know. Like, it's just unless there's, like, facts and things that they've done. Oh, I've written a book. How does that make me evil?
Dawn Taylor
You know, but it checked the box, and they're rules of what makes you bad.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. And now, in their mind, it's okay that they no longer talk to me.
Dawn Taylor
Knowing what you know now of the loss, the grief, the shunning. Right? Would you still make the same decision you originally did to leave Sea Org?
Katherine Spallino
Absolutely. I'm, like, living so well and enjoying myself. When I was 17, living in LA, barely any money to put gas in the car to get to work. I was the happiest ever. I had my weekends, I had my nights, like to have nights and weekends to everybody seems like nothing, but I was used to it, my whole days being regimented from the time I was six years old. That to me, to be able to do whatever I want on the weekend, whatever I wanted in the evening felt like such freedom. And to know, oh, I can meet my husband somewhere out in this world. And like one day we could have babies. Like in the future, like it was, to me. Life was a blast. Even though I could not afford, like I had no health insurance, I couldn't even pay for my car insurance. I would, like, get pulled over and then I'd have a court fight. Like I had all this, like hard stuff to deal with at 17, supporting myself. And I was, and I'm so happy. I'm still so happy. Like life is hard now as a mom of three, like raising three kids, oh my gosh, they have made me doubt myself
Dawn Taylor
Oh, more than anything.
Katherine Spallino
And where I'm like, I thought I was going to be the most calm, patient mother ever. And here I am, unfortunately, screaming at them because they're not listening. I don't scream all the time, but it happens. And I hate when I do and I'm like, oh, and I know I'm only human. And I'm just like, I didn't expect this part, but I'm still, you know, even with those struggles of like, how do I raise my children through the different developmental stages? I have a therapist now who I could talk to about these things. And, okay, I'm encountering this type of behavior. What is this? How do I deal with that? You know, and I get help in that way. And my husband, who's my partner, we try to do fun stuff with our kids all the time. We take them to the zoo. We go to Michigan to watch a Michigan game because Ryan went to Michigan, like things like that. All of that always makes me grateful.
Dawn TaylorSo I want to backtrack a second. You said you're not allowed to have kids if you're in Sea
Org.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. So in 1985 they passed or like it was 1986. I was born in 1985, like a policy letter saying that basically children are a distraction and stop having them. So there is a high amount of abortions in the Sea Org because, you know, if you get pregnant, you would have to leave and they don't want you to leave. So, they convince you that it's better to stay. And remember, they've had babies, many lives, you know? Yeah. So they like these women have had abortions and there's actually think there's a lawsuit now where a woman had to abort her children, her two of her babies and now she's suing because she was like, I was under like duress to do that. And it's not something, obviously that you could take back, like, that's going to haunt you, especially if you don't, really didn't ever want to do it in the first place. Um, but I knew that. So at 15 I was like, but I really want to have kids. Like, by then I knew, you know, some people like, I mean, like some girls like, no. Yeah, I want to have children and some don't. And I was one of those who did know. And I'm glad I knew that, because that was also a very big reason of why was like, can't just leave at like 30 years old and go have a baby, like need to go create a life for myself, meet somebody, have a relationship and then have children. Um, but like my sister, I'm like, she's like in her mid-40s. I'm like, oh, that's like. I mean, she could probably still have a baby if she wanted, but I don't think she cares, like, to her, it's not important. You know,
Dawn Taylor
She's following. She's saving the planet.
Katherine SpallinoYeah, exactly.
Dawn Taylor
So that seems like such a funny rule to me. So what were their rules on relationships or marriage or any of those things? A funny because then you're constantly having to seek people outside of Scientology to bring them in and create built-in followers like you guys It just kind of created this natural order of like, no, no, no, we're in. This is just our life.
Katherine Spallino
Well, there are Scientologists who can have babies. So only if you work in the Sea Org. Or can you not have babies if you're, like, living in the regular world and just go to Scientology church, like on nights and weekends, you could still have a baby. So all those people are still having babies. It's just if you work in the Sea Org, they don't want to have to provide the space and the money to raise a child, because they did it for about, like, one whole generation of kids. And it was hard and they didn't do a good job and they think they were like and it was distracting and they were like, no more, no more babies. Um, so but yeah, regardless, like because another thing that's happening is like, you know, parents are disconnecting from their adult children, like, who are Scientologists, like regular Scientologist families. So that is still happening. So then those people are definitely not sending their kids to the church too. So, all this disconnection they're doing is just creating more and more cracks in this organization of, there's like my best friend who was in my wedding, who disconnected me all because of the show, like we were using that book, actually. So she'd be my second book. And we'll talk about that whole story of how she turned on me and turn om me and my parents lose. I lost my parents, basically. Not because of her, but because of the church is pressure on her. And she reported me for knowing about, being on Leah Remini show. She has lost me and like many other of her cadet friends, and yet is still marching along like, I'm still a Scientologist. It's still the right thing to do blindly, you know, cause she won't look at any news. Like, if I would bring up something to her. Like when? Remember when Danny Masterson's thing came out? I'm like, hey, did you hear about Danny Masterson? She's like, well, I'm like, yeah, he was accused of rape. And she was like, no, I didn't know because they like, put on blinders. I'm like, how do you not know what's on headlines like they literally can like wipe their own brain and like, I'll have conversations about stuff in Scientology that I didn't like, like, oh, Ron Hubbard is super homophobic and he has writings about it. And then I'll be like, it's so crazy that our good friend is in this famous band, but she's a lesbian and Scientology supports her. I'm like, isn't that like, contradictory? She's like, why would it be contradictory? I'm like, because remember, like it says this about gay people. And she was like, no, I don't remember that. Like, whoa. Like, she just like erases parts that they tell her to erase to make it right in her brain. That's how much like, because they do it themselves like they self-regulate themselves. Or like if they think a bad thought, they're like, I should go report that in session so I could get that fixed.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, that part of it blew my mind. Like the moment where your brother had done something and he told you in the hallway outside. Mr. Hammond, was that his name? His office? Just because he told you you got in trouble It made you an accessory. And it's like you were literally outside his office when he told you, like, how did that. The whole time. I'm like, this doesn't make sense as I'm reading it. Yeah. So one thought, one question is how do they determine, like how is it determined who's in the Sea Org and who's not?
57:41
Katherine Spallino
So the people who went into the Sea Org from our school were just cadet children, like our parents were in the Sea Org, and that was our purpose. But like regular Scientology kids, there are a lot of them who are going to Scientology schools called Delphi Academy that don't call themselves Scientology schools. They're like non, what's the word? What? It's like no religion. It's supposed to be welcoming to anybody.
Dawn Taylor
Non-denominational.
Katherine Spallino
Yes. Um, but they use the study technology of our own Hubbard and they use other little things, little like pockets of Scientology in there, but they won't call it Scientology. So they used to be heavily recruited. So Sea Org members would go to the parking lot. And I worked at the school, and I would see them talking to these kids and wanted to be like, don't go. You're living your best life because you gotta learn this. They did have a small life. They had soccer team and they would have homework and they would get to hang out with their friends. And like, if they get recruited, that's like at 14 or 15, you're working it as an adult and there goes your childhood. And as we all know, there's so much developmental learning you have to do as a child. So they would get a lot of Scientology kids. And in my book, you'll encounter me encountering those Scientology kids and being like, well, what was it like to, like, have a life and like, have a house and like, what is that like, why would you be here? I want to say, why would you be here? But I'm not allowed to ask that question because it's like a negative question. Um, but I've heard recently that they now try not to recruit children, anyone under 18, which is big because before they had 12 year olds, 13 year olds working, not going to school, or they would try to jab them through the process so that they wouldn't have to go to school. And now I think that because of they realize they're liable for a lot of lawsuits that they've stopped. So yay! Another win, I guess.
Dawn Taylor
So these are so much stuff, right? So when someone joins an everyday person. So say I decided I'm going to drive to downtown Edmonton, where I live and join Scientology, and I walk into the building. So I'm pretty sure there's a campus here, a church here, building, whatever you want to call it. I walk into the building and I say, hey, I'm here and want to join Scientology. At what point does that become now I'm just a member. Like I would be a member of any church. And what does that look like? Versus oh, now I'm actually going to apply for a job or I'm going to be recruited into Sea Org. Like how does what's How is, what is the difference and how was that figured out?
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. So when you're just doing services, when you pay money, you're public. So you'll be treated really well. They want you to come in nights and weekends. So your life kind of gets taken over by it and they're like, oh, you didn't get 40 hours of studying in this week. Like you need to make up that time. But you at the same time,
Dawn Taylor
So huge expectations on how much time you put in.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, but you're going to join. If you walked in and said, I would like to be a Scientologist, they probably might doubt you because nowadays that doesn't happen a lot. Like, hey, what is this all about? I'm curious. They might show you around and offer you, like, a $20 course, like super cheap personal values and integrity, just about valuing yourself and being true to yourself. Great facts. Right? So you might do this course and it might even be a correspondence course. You could take it home and just mail it in. They did a lot of that, especially during the pandemic. And then after that you're going to go to a little bit higher level. Communication is fun, learning how to communicate. And then you're going to go to like student hat. And then all of a sudden it's like $100, $150. Meanwhile you're meeting all these other Scientologists who are doing this. I think they're really upbeat. They could talk really well. You could kind of tell that I'm easy, like it's easy for me to speak. That is a skill I did learn from Scientology. Like, they teach communication sometimes to a fault, where it's like, you've seen Tom Cruise's video where he's like, I am the
Whatever, like there's a video of him if you look it up at a Scientology event and he's like, look so crazy. And I'm like, he's trying to be what's called tone 40, because that's a skill they teach you about, like being enthusiastic.
Dawn Taylor
Like jumping on the couch at Oprah and everywhere.
Katherine Spallino
Yes, exactly. Yeah. That's why he was taught was, like, a good thing and the world was like, whoa, dude. Calm down.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, well that's scary.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you're going to meet people who have this enthusiasm, who are infectious and fun, and they might even hook you up with a good job because they work for a good psychology company. And now you're, like, working in a company with all Scientologists. Everything's going great. You might start dating a Scientologist. Things are like kind of going your way. And then like, maybe you're like, oh, I don't really agree with Ellen Hubbard said about like, gay people being perverts. And they're like, somebody will, right? They're like, oh yeah, you'll have to, you'll see what it means, like if you keep reading. But meanwhile they might write you up and then you get called into the ethics officer and they might start like interrogating you about that and then get you to change your mind, or maybe make you realize like, oh, I shouldn't be looking at these outside sources because that's going to just create trouble for me. I should just only stay with what the church says. So that's like your beginning world and it slowly gets bigger. Like you get more and more drawn into that. Now let's say there's two members. Now, I hear that most orgs have Sea Org members at each org to the staff who are like, they work for the Scientology church, but they're not in the Sea Org, or they only dedicate like two years or a five year contract and then Sea Org members now too. They might be like, you are such a good Scientologist, like you're so good at it. Like, don't you want to like, help out more and you want to be part of the Org? So maybe you'll join staff and then maybe from there you might get recruited for the Sea Org. So, this is like from, like if you were just a normal person walking in, that could happen. Or you can remain a Scientologist because guess what? You start making more money or the company you're in sells and you actually get some money from that. And now you're like doing really well. But everything around you now is surrounded by Scientology. And if you do one thing wrong, you could lose it all in a blink. Or like you could lose your spouse because they did something wrong, like that. They have that much control. But you think you're happy. Like you tell yourself all the time, I'm very happy. Like this is the right thing.
Dawn Taylor
Okay. No, I've always wondered about that process. Because you do like there's the people in this Sea Org. But then. And it is like it's hard to understand from the outside. And that made it so
clear.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. And imagine like if you're kind of lost, if you're like just out of college, you can't find a job, your friends are kind of flaky. And then you find Scientology and these people are dedicated. They love you right away. You're welcomed right away. You have a social life, and they get you a job, like at a good company. I'm not saying that will always happen, but in LA especially, there's so many big companies in LA, a lot of celebrities are Scientologists, so you could get into an acting workshop with like famous like this, this guy who's like a Scientologist who does a lot of acting workshops and like, you know, like a lot of doors open for you too and think that's like that even for people who join other like, Christian groups, you know, like, oh, now I found my people. It's just how far are these groups going to try to control you? Some of them are really like controlling. It is a great social group or a great Christian youth group that helps you and kind of.
Dawn Taylor
I've also like, but I've been to churches that are like, oh, this is really controlling.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, exactly. Unhealthy and controlling. Where they'll try to tell you what to do or who to hang out with or what to wear, like, oh, that's not really helping you anymore. But if you join a group, whether it's Christian or like a science group or whatever, and it's like, hey, we meet every Thursday and we talk about these things, let's see you next week. It's like super casual or like we talk about this is our faith and this is what we believe. What do you think about this? Let's debate it. Like let's have conversations. Those are all healthy ways that can be in a group of humans, like social contact. Oh, but when you're doing it in a way where it's like restrictive, then it's no longer healthy. And then when you're breaking up families and so on, creating problems, or people are using credit cards to pay for services because they feel that need because they have to keep being on service like that happens to it. Scientology. Um, so I hope that gives an idea of like somebody who's like, not born in it, what it could be like for them, why they would want to join it. I don't think people are really joining nowadays because of that bad press. But if they did, maybe they could do a lot of self-talk of staying in it because of that relationship. They could form right away with all these other Scientologists where it's like a group, a new group.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, well. And I can see them like rebranding it.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, maybe they will. Or they'll be like, oh, no, it was only over there.
Dawn Taylor
Right. Just to make it something different or we knew had no idea. We knew nothing about that.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, I don't know if they'll do that, a rebrand that's interesting. I don't know, because everything that Ron Hubbard says is like, um, you cannot change it. So that's the thing. Like you can't really reprint it, although they change it all the time. They're reprinting books all the time and editing it, and they've taken out some of the homophobic comments, he said. So they do change it. So it's possible they could rebrand if they're already doing these little changes. Yeah, we'll see what they do.
Dawn Taylor
It'll be interesting to watch. it'll be very interesting to watch to see where this all goes down. And also it's so sad. Right. It's just incredibly sad that people are being treated the way they are. And being so sucked into it. So, the money piece of it, right? Because you said there's like billions of dollars coming in. If you Google anything about even like the properties that they own and all of that end of it. So is it just through like the little courses that they are getting money constantly, or is it like a lot of cults where it's like, no, you literally like almost sign over your paycheck to us?
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. It's like other cults where they're like, you're not required to sign over your paycheck. But once you get past those little courses, if you wanted to get counseling, auditing, it's called auditing, not counseling where you sit. And they have like an E-meter, which is like a lie detector, but they wouldn't call it that. And they process like your trauma. And then they even go past life. They tell you you can go past life and all that stuff that costs a lot of money. If you wanted 12 hours, it's like five grand of that. So if you're doing a lot of those, that's a lot of money coming in. And then on top of it, they ask you to be an international association of Scientologist member, which is a fee. It's like $200 a year. But then on top of that, you could be a donor, high level donor and pay more money and you could get like a trophy, you know, like that big fundraising thing. So, they'll raise money. Oh, that's another thing. All these lands that are buying all these organizations, that is done by fundraising, the church doesn't even buy them. So, like, wealthy people are paying for those buildings. It's like a lot of money being funneled from rich families or rich Scientologists and then little bits of money, and then also they run up people's credit cards, too. There's a whole scam. You could look it up, the chase wave about Scientology, where they are literally taking out multiple lines of credit on people, and people didn't even know, like Scientologists themselves.
Dawn Taylor
Oh my goodness.
Katherine Spallino
Were you even aware that registrars were doing that? And they're like, no, we thought you really wanted to do this course. Like, because these registrars who are sending them up for courses are under all this pressure to have their stats up every week. You got to get your stats up and they have pressure - sell, sell, sell, sell. And then they start to do illegal things like that.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. To get their numbers.
Katherine Spallino
Mhm.
Dawn Taylor
So I was just doing some quick googling and this was quite a while ago just on a history.com. And it says that there's more than 11,000 churches. And at that point they were welcoming more than 4.4 million new people a year. But also quite a few different websites are saying that there's it's estimated that there's under 40,000 worldwide at this point.
Katherine Spallino
Of Scientologists. So it's gotten less. Yeah, it's the numbers are definitely dropping.
Dawn Taylor
So it sounds like it's dropping quite rapidly.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, yeah. So I'm like. Yeah. I wonder. I don't know what's going to happen. Like you, my eyes are trained on it. I'm like, what's going to happen here? Like, I also want to know, like what's going to happen to my former best friend. Like when is she going to wake up or will she ever like, I just I'm like, this is going to be interesting these next ten years or so. Because Lina’s lawsuit, she filed a lawsuit about all that, the defamation, everything that's been happening with her. Yeah, she just did it, which is amazing. If she has so much evidence of the attack that Scientology againt character. If that could get passed or, like, she wins that lawsuit and she gets paid, how many other people could let it sue the church like it opens up the door. And that's like money bleeding wide open. And another, there's a trafficking one for work trafficking where 16 year olds were working on what they have a big cruise ship and we're like, working there. They wanted to leave and they could leave. That's another lawsuit. There's another lawsuit for a woman who was coerced with getting married. It felt like she was abused. Like there's like all these lawsuits started to come into fruition now with Danny Masterson's actually the evidence of the church being involved in covering up his rape like it's going to. That's a fact now in law, you know, like where they could refer to it. Lawyers.
Dawn Taylor
I was going to say that is a big deal.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah. So that's like all of these things are really good things. I was scared to speak out because I literally at the time, I, there wasn't that many people speaking out. And there was like maybe ten Scientology books. But right when I started speaking out all of these people randomly, it must have been like this random brain epiphany started speaking out on SPTV and having YouTube channels and telling their stories. And I'm like, wow. Like it's amazing. Like, it's so cool that all of these people are all adding our voices. Because you can't, like everybody can't be a liar. Eventually the church has to look inward. But the thing is, they have a despot at the top who won't listen. So, it's not a democracy in this church. So, if one guy refuses to change, that whole church is going to stay the same. So, like somehow David Miscavige either has to be kicked out, but how would that ever happen? Well, none of the people around him can even have any thoughts that they have. They're bad. They get like what's called sec check which is like a form of like, confessionals. I'm like indoctrinated. And then they even get thrown into, like, what's called the Hole. I don't know if they still do that because it's been all over the internet. It's like a tiny, crappy trailer and they're sleeping on the ground. These are the executives of Scientology being treated like that. How are they ever going to tell David Miscavige, hey, we need to make a change. Like we can't cause all these families to be pulled apart. We can't keep asking for so much money from people. We can't keep suing all these people like. So that's the part where I'm like, how? How will it happen? I don't know, but David Miscavige is like, people are trying to serve him lawsuits. And he's like trying to avoid lawsuits. If he ends up in jail somehow, that would be a big deal. You know?
Dawn Taylor
But then you have situations and maybe because of my, my weird-like passion or cults, but then you have situations like Branch of the Davidians in Texas, where they've rebuilt the compound and they're still active.
Katherine Spallino
Oh my gosh. Didn't know that they did.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, yeah. And actually saw it like these signs they've rebuilt. Like there's still people there. Like it's still active.
Katherine Spallino
And I'm sure they'll still be Scientologists or like practicing Scientology
Dawn Taylor
Right. Like Warren Jeffs is in jail. And like, there's still like, I went to Utah, I saw the compounds and they're still all totally serving him. And. And. Yeah. And mind-blowing to me where I'm like what?
Katherine Spallino
Like yeah, I think that it would just help break it down even smaller and further. But yeah, you're still going to have splinter groups who believe in Scientology. But a big part that could happen is if we lose that like tax exempt status, that's a big deal. That's a lot of money that they now have to pay towards back into the United States. And then also like not having less, if they have less control on these people, then we start to have more families getting back together and stuff. So it's just like baby steps. Even if, like, these small groups are practicing Scientology generally, like on its own, it's not that harmful. It's just teaching them these ideas and doctrines and stuff. It's when you're like, trying to create these rifts between families because you're not supposed to be declaring everyone a suppressive person, like they're taking some of these policies that don't have a role and just taking it to the extreme, like if you mellowed it out and you wanted to believe in aliens, fine. Like, believe what you want to believe, just don't have that harm. The harmful factor, right? Like, I don't care what people want to believe, as long as you're not harming people or making them have to believe a certain way or trying to control their thoughts, other people's thoughts, you know?
Dawn Taylor
Do you think it'll ever come out what is actually taught at those high
levels?
Katherine Spallino
It is out. You got to go on the internet. Okay, I'll got to look. Let's see all the levels. It's wild. It's really interesting, really like insane stuff. I'm like, oh God, I'm so glad I didn't do any Scientology processing. So I didn't get any of that. So yay for me. Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
Oh my goodness Catherine, thank you, thank you, thank you so much. I know we went way over our time for listeners. I mean, either you've already checked out because we went way longer than an hour or also you're going holy- can we ask more questions? Check the show notes in there. We're going to have the link to Catherine's book we're going to have. We'll get some links to, like, some of these YouTube channels, some of these places that she talked about, some of the documentaries, things like that. So you guys can go do your own research and you guys can watch and listen and read and, and know more about what's going on. But also it's not just Scientology. We're in your life. Are you stuck in something toxic? We're in your life for you. Too afraid to step out? Where in your life have you lost all control over your own thoughts, your own ideas, your own everything? Because let's be honest, all of us have been indoctrinated from birth. With beliefs about ourselves, with ideas about ourselves, with ideas and how life or family or things should go down. And it's not actually that different. You just haven't made billion dollar contracts. Yeah. Right. Right. So please, please, please check the show notes located at the TheTaylorWay.ca to make sure that you have access to all of that. But also if you're curious to dig into more, to see more, to know all of those things. Katherine, thank you so much for being here today and being so open to talk about this.
Katherine Spallino
Yeah, absolutely. And if anybody wants to know more or talk to me or chat with me, I'm on Instagram at @thebadcadet and they could shoot me a DM. I do talk with people and I'm happy to answer questions.
Dawn Taylor
Amazing. So again, we're going to have all of this contact information in the show notes, so please go check them out. If you know anyone who might be curious about this or might be in a situation like this, please forward this podcast to them so that they can have a little bit of information on it, and join us again in two weeks for another super cool topic and tell your friends. The more people that are learning, the less judgment. The more curiosity in this world, the better. So thank you, thank you, thank you. And subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts. See you guys later.
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Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Burnout is a thing that happens to all of us and it can happen at any time. A problem we all face is the difficulty that goes into identifying this negativity in our lives. In this episode, Dawn and her guest Ben Kraker discuss the possibilities from wherein burnout could spring from - such as being at work, serving the community or even with the people you’re with at home. From that burnout, Dawn and Ben bring some steps and suggestions to turn it into a place of contentment where we can focus on what matters and be grateful for the things that truly mean the most to us
Who this for
For those of you who have felt the sting of burnout before or are experiencing such a rut now, know that you’re not alone and that this episode is for you. It’s an occurrence that happens to people from all walks of life and this episode is an acknowledgment that burnout doesn’t have to last forever.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Ben Kraker serves on the leadership team of a diverse urban church that places a strong emphasis on mental health, addiction recovery, and the cultivation of robust community relationships. During the workweek, Ben fulfills his role as a Customer Success Manager at a locally-owned IT company, where he applies his professional expertise to support several prominent nonprofit accounts in the region. For the past decade, Ben and his family have proudly called Grand Rapids their home, embodying the city’s spirit of growth and rejuvenation. Ben’s personal journey revolves around self-discovery and overcoming his past, and he passionately advocates for mental health and self-worth. With 17 years of marriage to Andi, they epitomize enduring love and commitment while raising two teenagers they adopted from the foster care system.
Guest Social Links
Podcast - Real Men Hug https://www.realmenhug.com/ Redefining the narrative of masculinity
Facebook - facebook.com/benkraker
Instagram - @benokay
Thanks for listening!
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Dawn Taylor. And today we are talking to the infamous Ben. Okay, I don't know what makes him infamous, but that's just what we're going to call him today. Today's topic is from burnout to content. And I have to say, I'm so excited that I'm talking to a man about this today. Because women, this is a big topic these days, is talking about burnout and talking about trying to find this infamous balance that I think is garbage, but the infamous balance and trying to get to all those places. But today we're going to be talking to Ben about it. Before we get started, I want to tell you a little bit about your guests, our guest, so you can be as excited as I am. Ben, who are you? He is a leader of, well, he's on a leadership team of a diverse urban church. The place is a very strong emphasis on mental health, addiction recovery and the cultivation of robust community relationship. During the work week. He is the customer service manager of a locally owned company, where he applies his professional expertise to support several prominent nonprofit accounts in the region. For the past decade, him and his wife have proudly lived in Grand Rapids, where their home is, embodying the city's spirit of growth and rejuvenation. Ben's personal journey revolves around self-discovery overcoming his past. He is an advocate for mental health and self-worth, and with 17 years of marriage to Andy, the epitomize enduring love and commitment while raising two teenagers they adopted from the foster system. This could be part of maybe why he is so legendary and amazing and has such an incredible heart. Welcome to the show, Ben.
Ben Kraker
Thank you. Dawn. It is great to be here.
Dawn Taylor
I am so excited you arehere. So just a little bit of backstory. I was on one of Ben's podcasts quite a few years ago already, three years now. Yeah, it's been a while and I had such a great time with him and Mike and their podcast that they were doing - High Tech Ease. Right?
Ben Kraker
It was Threads.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, sorry. Threads. Wrong one. Whoops. Okay, I should know better. And we had such an amazing conversation. And so when I saw your application come through to talk today I was very excited about this. So tell us a little bit about what you wish people were talking about.
Ben Kraker
I wish that people, and more specifically men, we're willing to have the conversations about why they feel so pressured to do the things that they're doing, and to throw themselves in with such a huge level of involvement as if they have something to prove. I just see, you know, especially with men, it's the career that's usually the focus. And everything else takes a backseat to their career. You know, maybe for some, it's sports or it could be any different thing. But, people and men more specifically typically have something that they give all of themselves to. And I just look at that and I wonder, is that really healthy? Is that necessary? Do we need to be giving 110% of us all the time to all these things, and especially in the church context? One of the primary messages that I hear from the Holy Spirit as I read the Bible is "Come to me, and I will give you rest. Be still and know that I am God." And we read in Exodus, "You only need to be still because the Lord will fight for you." So, where do we come up with this crazy idea that we have to do all the things and be all the things to all the people? It's just, it's crazy and it's not worth losing your life to.
Dawn Taylor
Wow. So multiple thoughts on this. Number one is, having grown up in the church and being a churchgoer myself, right? They always say and being active in nonprofits and charitable organizations and stuff, they always say that the 20 carry the 80 right. 20% of people will always do the work for the other 80%. And I often have looked back at that and thought, to put it really bluntly, like, this is bullshit. Like, what is going on? Why is this the way it is? And and I see it in that way too. So can you give us some examples of. Of what you're talking about. Like when it comes to like sports, when you're talking about all these things, it is definitely a thing. It is definitely a thing when you say that, right? That people will become obsessed. It's an obsession with something. Give me some examples of this, even from your own life, if you don't mind.
Ben Kraker
Yeah, well, I'm not much of a sports fan. However, I get into things like cycling or kayaking and there was a summer where I don't even know why, but I made a goal that I was going to bike 800 miles that summer, and I would not allow myself to fail like, hell or high water. I was going to get 800 miles in and to this day, I'm not entirely sure why. Ihink maybe I was after a little bit of, if I'm honest, attention and like, kudos from people for doing a really hard thing. But what I've learned is that instead of doing these crazy things, I can just ask for what I need. And that's been a life changer. So that comes to mind. And then I also mentioned work. This was more applicable when I was in full time ministry. I just felt like 40 hours wasn't a thing. Like I felt like my role in life was to do ministry. 24, seven and maybe 40 of those hours happened in the church context, but it felt like ministry was my job and like my calling. So, I need to be doing that all the time. Like there's no room for me to get what I need or to rest or to slow down. Um, just this mentality of like, that's what being on fire for the Lord is, is constantly doing all the things and and yet missing out on those very foundational invitations from God that I mentioned that are throughout the entire scripture.
Dawn Taylor
So, secular or non secular, right. So, the audience but the audience that's not that aren't faith-based. Don't you stuff. You're no different. You're no different whether you're in the church or not.
Ben Kraker
I Left the full time ministry and work in the corporate world now. So there's definitely a lot of tie-ins. It's not an either or here. I think in the church context it's just a little bit more nuanced.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, but is it? I think like the minute you said the word calling. Just like, how much is that? Like, I have a mission. I have a calling, I have, I was just gone for a few days. I take off every quarter for a few days and just kind of run away and breathe.
Ben Kraker
It's awesome.
Dawn Taylor
And one of the things that really hit me on this last one was this urgency to be busy, right. And everyone's talking about is this whole balancing in the burnout and everything else. And one thing that's come to me lately is like, I love working. I love it. Do I feel called to be doing what I'm doing as a trauma specialist? 100%. Do I think that it is a gift I've been given? 100%. Do I think that I am making a difference in this world? Absolutely, right? Like, I love what I do, but I also have no issues with taking time off. I struggle to stop working because I actually genuinely like working. But I also know, like when I have to stop client working or to have a break. And there is a difference and. I was scrolling social media one day, and I'm literally sitting in a garden shed in Portland. Another story living in someone's mini house.
Ben Kraker
Pardon?
Dawn Taylor
Portland, Oregon.
Ben Kraker
Yeah. Oh, fantastic. I used to live there.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, crazy. Yeah. So I was sitting there and I was scrolling social media and I saw these posts. I'm like, if you really want to get ahead and you really want to reach your calling, and you really wanted this and you really wanted that, and not faith-based people, just very secular, popular people of the world. Right? Because this wording spreads everywhere, you know, turn off Netflix and turn on a podcast, stop reading garbage and read a business book like you should always be in grow mode. And. I don't know if it's because I'm kind of a defiant toddler at heart. Anyone who knows me in my inner circle knows that about me. I am very much a defiant toddler at heart still. There was a piece of me that sat there and immediately felt shame for the fact that I had just binged too much Netflix that day. And I had to really stop myself and be like, "Where did that shame just come from?"
Ben Kraker
Right.
Dawn Taylor
And it wasn't guilt. It wasn't guilt that I had, like, done something wrong or I had wasted time or any of that. It was shame. It was full on. I am a bad person and I made a bad choice. And it was. I sat there and I was like, whew, there's some big feels coming up right now around this. And I love when those feels happen. I know most people hide from them and try to mask them. I always look at them to think like, "Wow, what is this? Where is this coming from?" And if anyone's listening to this podcast for a while, you know my line that I use all the time, it's like no judgment, just curiosity. And I realized that it was so many of these people that I was following because yes, they're motivational and yes, they're successful and yes, they're super wealthy and yes, they're all of these things and they're doing amazing work. But there was a shame attached to me not doing the same. And I was talking to my husband about it and he's like, "We need rest." Like mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually. He's like, "We need rest." And he's like, "Rest is having a nap. Rest is watching too much Netflix. Rest is drawing a map of the top ten waterfalls in the Oregon area, and going on a road trip for a day, right, which I did."
Ben Kraker
You get to the coast? The ocean?
Dawn Taylor
I did. I went to Canon Beach like I did. I went to Tillamook. Just eat cheese samples. Right. Like I did those things. But it was interesting, this weird feeling of shame attached to it. Yet when I look around right now, the conversations I've had even in the last few days with people, so many people are burnt out right now. So many people are burning out right now. So many people have a ridiculous level of fatigue in their world. And whether it's collective trauma at everything that's going on in the world, or it's the fact that we're just all so freaking burnt out because we're working too hard and giving too much. I do think that that's something that we need to look at as a society is - Can I? Can I go at 75% and still thrive?
Ben Kraker
Absolutely. I think that's very possible. But if you were to ask Ben ten years ago, I would have laughed at that and said, "No, you need to give not only 100%, but you need to find some extra in your reserves and give 110%, because that's what you do if you're passionate about something." So, I think somehow we've twisted passion to involve like a certain quantity of something where passion should really be about the quality, not the quantity. Like we're, so we measure everything it feels like. And I think that just adds to the stress and burnout. We can't just be passionate about something. We have to, for me, the pressure to measure and log 800 miles, like, why couldn't I have just said I'm going to ride my bike this summer and I'm going to love it? I think we experienced the same thing in a career setting, and just in general, it just feels like we have to have a reason or a number that we're working towards or like, it doesn't count unless you achieve something with it. And so, yeah, I think the collective trauma and the burnout is a direct result of feeling like we have to live up to some. Expectation that we don't even know who said it, but we feel the pressure to meet it.
Dawn Taylor
Where do you think that started? Like I know where a lot of ours would have started. Right? And that was started with how we were raised. Started with, you know, I come from an Eastern European, like a German background, and it's like you help your neighbors and you help everybody, and you give, give, give, give, give. And boundaries aren't a thing. Boundaries. Why would you have boundaries? You know boundaries. Boundaries are walls. Boundaries are evil. You're blocking. No, no, no. Boundaries are the most beautiful thing ever. And, like, so I know where that comes from in my world. Right? The constant need to give above and beyond. And I think it's the above and beyond that's the problem is it's not just about giving because I, I still fully believe that we do need to serve. We do need to give. We do need to, you know, volunteer for things like 100% like I have six massive cases of printer paper sitting in my entrance right now because there's a charity in need. And I had paper delivered today. Right? But it's the difference between buying six massive cases and buying 50 masses of cases, and then posting everywhere about it, and then having to figure out how to get it to them, and then doing a photo shoot and then making it a big ordeal and then stressing out because financially I couldn't afford to buy 50 cases of paper. And but if I don't buy the 50 cases and now they run out of paper in the next five years, I'm at fault because I said like, do you know what I mean? It feels like that's like, maybe that's a silly example, but it feels like that's what we do.
Ben Kraker
It does. Yeah. For me, I think of two examples or two possibilities come to mind of the origin story. Um, in my life, I grew up in a family setting where I was very different from my two brothers. They were into the hunting and the fishing and the. They were both pretty sporty. Um, and then my dad shared a lot of those similar interests, and I would say my dad and both of my brothers, um, certainly don't have the same personality makeup as I do. Like, I realized that I am a rare breed. I'm a sensitive man. I wear my emotions on my sleeve. Frankly, I don't think my brothers and even my dad were comfortable with that growing up. So, what that does for me, and I'm sure for others who may be listening, is it creates this sense of obligation to meet somebody else's desires for you. It's like somebody else has, like, these conditions that you need to meet in order to have a relationship with them. And whether that's true or not, it's the feeling. And the feeling eventually motivates the behavior. And I very much saw that in my life. So that's something that comes to mind as an origin point, just not feeling at home in my family of origin, and then feeling like I had to set some arbitrary things to accomplish in order to be what my dad or brothers are and things like that. So, that's certainly one of the origins. And the second I would say is social media. Like, I think a lot of this is a recent phenomenon. I look back to the days before social media where if you're like, you wouldn't know what your friends were up to every single day. Every single minute of the day. Because they're not, I mean, there's nowhere to look. And so when social media hits the the scene, all of a sudden there's like this pressure to one up each other like, oh, so-and-so just went to the Bahamas. Well, now I need to go to Turks and Caicos or whatever it is, like there's this pressure to, to do better, to one up them. And it takes away from that sense of contentment, of just enjoying it. Um, and then like you were saying, like whenever a good deed is done, there's like this massive pressure to, like, record it and make a big deal out of it and put it on social media. And so much energy these days get spent on like hustling and making a name for yourself. And my question to that is, why do you need to make a name for yourself with people who will watch a video and then scroll on to the next video and not even think about you again? Like, why do we give so much time and attention and value to these fly by night people that will never really have a certain level of engagement with, because it's just something on our phone screen that we're seeing as we scroll.
Dawn Taylor
I love that you said that. It's. I have been. So if you've listened to my podcast episodes, there's one about why is it so hard to make friends as adults?
Ben Kraker
Yes, and that was a good one.
Dawn Taylor
You're part of that one. The broken relationship right between you and a friend. Yeah, and he was the one who was on the podcast with me talking about it. So it was amazing today to hear that you guys have prepared a lot of that relationship. And you have healthy boundaries now, and you've figured out what works for you. And it's working really, really well. But I have lost friends over this last year over the over many years, and I'm sure for a lot of reasons, I know I'm not a super easy person to be friends with and that's who I am. But I have had so many people in my life and I've noticed that, especially over this last year, get mad because I can't come to their event. I can't come to their party. I don't want to host a party for them. I can't show up at things that they're doing or whatever it is, whatever it is, because of my lack of capacity and the amount of pain that has come with that would blow people's minds, of when I say no, I'm sorry, I can't. And they're like, what? Like, what's wrong with you?
Ben Kraker
And we were friends, right?
Dawn Taylor
And I said, this is some of the day. I said, you know what? It's by me. Choosing me doesn't mean I'm rejecting you.
Ben Kraker
That's a very good point.
Dawn Taylor
I'm not. I'm not rejecting you. I'm not rejecting you by me choosing my health, by me choosing my my family, my husband, my, whatever it is. It does not mean I'm rejecting you. And people don't like that.
Ben Kraker
I don't know, I think I might push back a bit on that idea of rejection, like. I don't know. I would say it is rejection. And rejection is just part of life. Like you're not always going to get the dream job that you wanted. You're not going to, if you're in sales, you're not going to close the big deal all the time, like you're going to be rejected. You're not going to be able to marry the person of your dreams necessarily right away. So, I think when we say no to people, we are rejecting them. And it's okay.
Dawn Taylor
But is it the rejecting them? Or there is emotions being attached to a decision that shouldn't be based on the intention behind it? Yeah. I mean, like, if I'm being invited to, like, a KKK event. Yes, I am full on rejecting you by. Hell no. I'm not attending your event. That is a flat-out rejection because my intention behind it is. No. I need you to know that I am not okay with this. And I don't want to do this. Right. But by me saying no. "You know what? I know that we had dinner tonight scheduled, but my husband has asked if there's any way I can be home and spend the evening with him, because he's really needing to connect to me right now." I don't think I'm rejecting. And maybe that's something I need to really look at for myself, but for me, I would never take that as a rejection from somebody. I'd be like, oh, they're just not available.
Ben Kraker
Sure. Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
And they didn't reject. So have we become too sensitive? Right. We're maybe meaning right. Or we've attached a personal meaning to everything.
Ben Kraker
Yes, well, way to turn the table back on me, because that just reveals one of my tendencies, like I do take things like probably more personally than I should a lot of the time. And, you know, it can be to my benefit if I take things personally. Like I had a customer this week who had an issue with their phones, and I just listened and I empathized and was like, "Oh, that is rough. Oh, somebody left you a negative review because of their poor experience with your phones when they called. That sucks. That's not okay." So I so in some sense is taking things personally earns credibility. But I also see where you're coming from. Maybe it's not a rejection. Maybe it's just as you're saying, I just can't do, it doesn't have to be an emotion tied behind it. Not everything in life has a emotion anchoring it, and that's a really hard concept for me to grasp.
Dawn Taylor
I can see that. But it's, for me personally, I think that that is what, like I've had to put some of those boundaries in place to keep me from burning out.
Ben Kraker
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
Right?
Ben Kraker
Definitely.
Dawn Taylor
you know, it's no different than, like, no, I can't come to your event. I can't come to this networking event. And it's not because I don't love you. It's not because I don't support you. It's not because I don't want to be there, I actually can't.
Ben Kraker
Right. And sometimes that's okay. And you don't even need to explain if you can't.
Dawn Taylor
Right. And I think that that's where we actually need to just give ourselves more grace. But also look at that burnout piece to be like, "What is it that I am putting on my plate? What is it that I am doing to earn favor with someone?"
Ben Kraker
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
Versus this is something I love and I'm passionate about. Yeah. Think that's the other piece of the burnout is yes, we become obsessed right where it's like, but I have to go to every hockey game, and I have to go to every sporting event, and I have to play every single round of golf, and I have to write 800 miles on my bike, and I have to travel nonstop, and I have to do all those things. And the burnout 100% hits. The burnout hits because we actually just don't have the capacity to do everything that we're trying to do, right? And that obsession. But often like, and I talked to clients about this all the time is anytime we have like a big emotion to something or a big reaction or like a big action to something. What is it we're trying to. What is the need we're trying to meet?
Ben Kraker
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
Right. So are we needing someone to be like you did? Good, kid. Way to go ride your bike. Are we needing to feel loved or are we needing to feel accepted? Or are we needing to feel like we're part of something? Or are we needing to feel like we're part of a community? Are we like there's always a deeper emotion there that is attached to it. But I think because we attach those emotions to things, because needing that need met, then when someone else can't meet that expectation for of us or that we've put on them, we immediately go to hurt because we're not upset that they didn't show up at our event. We're not upset that they didn't, you know, come out to something. We're not upset that they didn't travel one more time to see us that month. We're actually like, "You don't love me. I'm not enough."
Ben Kraker
Mm. Yeah. You internalize it when it doesn't need to be internalized.
Dawn Taylor
No, it was all external. It was all just this big external thing. And I think that that's I don't know I think that's a lot of the burnout. Right. Definitely. But there's always somebody else that needs more or whatever it is.
Ben Kraker
Yeah. So taking what you said about unmet needs, do you think? Well, I guess what do you think? How do those unmet needs, what's the connection to social media? I think for me, I see a lot of connection there. Curious if if you see anything like you were talking about, if you got the 50 cases of paper, um, do you think there's an unmet need that motivates people to put it all out there on social media?
Dawn Taylor
Oh, absolutely. I think that people are I think a lot of us don't feel significant in our lives anymore, where we don't have, we were raised in a culture where you get a star, you get a star on the top of a paper for doing good. You get graded. You get graded every single day of your entire childhood until you're about 18, where it's like you literally get a mark. Where it's like, how good did you do? You get a gold sticker, you get a gold star, you get an attaboy, you win a trophy, right? You are. There is a tangible. There's a tangible checklist. There is a tangible way to acknowledge that you are important or not, or if you've done right or wrong or good or bad. And because we're raising that, I don't I'm not saying we need to get rid of grades. I'm not saying we need to get rid of all of those things. I do think, though, that there isn't any room in that for like, "Hey, what about like, who you are as a person? What about your heart? What about did you serve?" What about like, there's so many other things in that. The problem is we then become adults. And now the only significance we often get is from a significant other. Right, "I love you. You're amazing. You're great. Thank you, thank you, thank you." Whatever. If you're lucky enough to have someone that has the words of affirmation going on, sure, there's a vulnerability piece there. So now the minute they insult you, the minute they're mad at you, whatever. It hurts. So now you're not getting it there. And we don't have like, there's so many broken parent-child relationships. Like I remember someone asking me the thing I miss most about my dad. And I was like, "You know, I have done some really freaking cool stuff over the last 12 years, and I would love to just hear, like 'You did good, kid. Look, I'm proud of you.'" and we don't get that anymore, right? Like so many of us don't get any of those affirmations of like, "Hey, you matter. You're important. I'm really glad you're here on this earth." And so when we can put that out there on social media. And other people feed that to you, whether it's authentic or not. It still meets that need. So I think that's a piece of it. I think the other piece of it is there was a contentedness to life. When we only saw what we were doing and what our neighbors were doing, and what our friends or the people at church were doing in the small way, we saw it right when we only saw their houses, and we only saw their clothes, and we only saw how they ate, and we only saw their decor, and we only knew that they went camping every other weekend during the summer, because that was what they did in their tents, like, and that was it. That was that was their life. There was this beautiful content that, I feel like, yeah, we all kind of live this similar life. And, I mean, there was always like a wee hierarchy of like, oh, those people have a motorhome. We only have tents like, but the gaps were so much smaller because we didn't see what people were actually doing. And now with social media, right. You might see somebody. I mean, I know someone might get mad at me for saying this, but you have the people like the Rachel Hollis of the world who built this entire, like, cult following community of people around her, and being this marriage guru and everything is perfect. And then suddenly they're getting divorced.
Ben Kraker
Yeah, right. Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
And you end up with situations like that. So now you're watching somebody on social media and you're like, "Oh my gosh, they constantly travel and look at how amazing their life is." and look at how and we become discontent with our own life. "Oh, they're spouse's fitter than mine. Oh, they're eating better food than me. Oh, look at their brand new wardrobe. Oh, look at how they've renovated their house. I want to hang really, really fancy, expensive, crazy wallpaper in my house, too." Right? Because this is what we're seeing. We're seeing this everywhere. And because it's like we're constantly given proof, every scroll, we're given proof that we are not as good as someone else. Yeah, we're not enough.
Ben Kraker
Yeah. Sorry. Didn't mean to interrupt you. Interesting to me is The concept of Reddit, like there is a subreddit for absolutely everything on planet Earth, it feels like like are you into AI image generation? Oh, there's a subreddit for you. Cycling, health, different medicines, psychology, counseling, cities. Like, there's such a need for people to, like, have significance. And they, it's like they can't find that significance on their own. They have to have somebody else validate them for caring about the things they care about. And before social media, like if you were into rock collecting, you could just be into rock collecting. And it didn't have to become this huge thing that you join online communities about or, or post pictures of your rocks for all the world to see, and trying to convince them that you matter because you're a rock collector. You could just collect the damn rocks and look at them and find satisfaction and be okay with that. But, with the advent of social media and Reddit and everything else, it's like we have to. There's this weird pressure to find validation from other people, as if our own satisfaction from doing those things isn't enough. And that's just batshit crazy
Dawn Taylor
Isn't it? Yeah, when it is. I had a comment from some of the day and she's like, I love how she's like, "You're so just like, open and honest about what's going on in your life." Like, I'm the first person to be like, I think it was like my birthday post to my husband. This last year was like, "You're a pain in the ass. And at times I've hated your guts. Yeah, I love you more than anything. And I'm glad we fought for us." Right? But also I'm like, oh, there I go, off to IVs again. And this sucks really bad. And I cried the whole time. But you know what? It's keeping me alive. And it's keeping me healthy to, you know, someone laughed and they're like, "I love that you travel as much as you do, and you go to all these cool places, but you're so willing to show that, like, you're literally living in a garden shed instead of showing that you're like, at the Ritz-Carlton, right?" And I'm like, "Well, no, because I have a budget this big, like this little tiny budget for travel my husband and I have agreed on, and I try to get as much out of it as I can." But that also means like, I was gone for ten days and I think I ate one meal out.
Ben Kraker
Wow. That's impressive.
Dawn Taylor
I cooked, I was in Portland and I didn't even go to a single food truck.
Ben Kraker
I feel like you missed out on so much of the Portland culture?
Dawn Taylor
Oh, 100% I did, but it also was if I wanted to go for that long and I wanted to do what I wanted to do, it was like, what are my priorities and where does it matter? Because I don't need a photo of my food to know that I had a good time. I don't need a photo of those things, right? Like I was in New York for three weeks and didn't need a single slice of pizza.
Ben Kraker
Wow. Impressive.
Dawn Taylor
Again, I hardly ate out. I cooked all my food. I walked the 15 minutes every two days in about groceries and put them in my little backpack and walked back like, that's what I did. But, I also did so many cool, amazing things while I was there and did multiple Broadway shows and did all these cool things, but it was never about I'm doing this for a like. I'm doing this to brag about it. I'm doing this to make myself significant. I'm doing this so I can tell someone I did it. I'm doing this for... Right? And I think that's where, I don't know. I think as a society if we actually sat back. And we're like, "What do I want? What do I actually want? What do I actually desire? What are my actual priorities?" You know, I get asked to donate for charities constantly, constantly. I at times in my life have gotten 3 to 5 emails a day asking for money, time, resources, whatever. And I used to I had a very, very strict list of who I would donate to, what the like, the metrics that they had to hit for me to ever do a donation. And there's a pretty big list of metrics that I'd share with people if they ever were interested. But I really, really put time and energy and effort into that. And I remember one charity getting really mad at me for it. And I said, you know what's really interesting? And they were like, what? And I said, I could give, I could give to you all day, 100%, I could. I said, but if I give to every single person, I'm going to be on the other side needing charity because I will bankrupt myself, and I will end up on the street. And I will end up with nothing because I gave everything away.
Ben Kraker
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
People don't get that. People don't get that. So what was your breaking point? Let's go back to your breaking point of what made you hit. So you left the church, the leadership portion of the church, right?
Ben Kraker
Well, I'm still involved in leadership.
Dawn Taylor
Just not full time.
Ben Kraker
I'm not getting a paycheck for it. It's really the biggest distinguisher. And for some reason, like, that's what kind of flipped the switch in my head. I realized while I was still employed in the church that I was doing it because that's what I got paid to do, and I had to do it a certain way in order to get that paycheck. And so, though it may not have been in line with my passions, the way I was doing my ministry was. The expectation of the church because they're the ones writing the paycheck. So I better fall in line with what they want. And so what I found myself doing is like basically borrowing other people's stuff. That wasn't my own idea and finding what was going to fit for that context, and then doing it and striving so hard to lead a ministry based on somebody else's ideas. Side note, if you ever want a side hustle to get into, get into writing curriculum for youth group, because my goodness, there are just thousands of them out there. And churches pay so much money for VBS curriculum, youth group curriculum. It's just again, an indicator of how off base. This is so that was a breaking point there, realizing that I was essentially doing things to get the paycheck and not doing things that I really wanted to do because I was afraid it wouldn't be in line with the church or the organization that I was working for at the time. So I made the decision I will no longer accept the paycheck from a church, and that boundary has just created so many amazing opportunities in my life. I have one mentor in particular who is a bit old school in his thinking, and he'll kind of prod me. You know, you just are so gifted, like you would be an amazing pastor or an amazing fill in the blank like you should come back to the church world. Oh, and I'm just like, "You know, I hear you. I don't even necessarily disagree with you. Yeah,
but if I were to go down that road, I'm saying no to me in a lot of ways." And what makes my approach and my style and the the gifts that you're seeing in me, the thing that makes them come alive. Yes, there's obviously a divine aspect to it, but it's also because I've cultivated those things intentionally. I put the focus on developing strong relationships with people and hearing stories and creating a space where people feel safe to unload. And I don't necessarily preach at them. I don't tell them how to believe or what to believe. I of course, make it known where I come from, but I just have a welcoming, opening spirit about it. And as I have opportunity to, you know, I'll share my beliefs or whatever the case may be. But that's not my starting line. And I feel like if I were to go back into the church world, they get to define what the start line is, and then that just jumbles my whole style and approach and what makes me me. Um, so yeah, that was a big wake up point from the career perspective. Um, from a more personal but connected realm. This year has been a year of me realizing just how many unmet needs I have, and how I've so desperately tried to fill those by doing all the things when I could have just said from the start, "Hey! I don't feel very seen right now." Or "Hey, I'm just exhausted and I haven't had fun in weeks. I need to just get out and have some fun." Um, and so the way that came to the surface, it was it was kind of ugly. I was in a group meeting with some guys at church.
Who I feel completely comfortable with and as evidenced by my behavior in this particular meeting. But we were talking about Scripture passage that talks about how God will not allow us to be tested beyond what we can bear. I stop short of taking my Bible and chucking it up the floor. I really wanted to. But I said, "Guys, this is such bullshit. This does not make any sense. God does allow us to be tested beyond what we can bear. Like, I don't see a way out. A lot of times I don't see a way out. I just think this is complete garbage." And then I had their attention, so I kept going. And at that time, my family was walking through a pretty challenging season. And so this group as well intentioned as they were, they would say things to me like, "Oh, we're praying for you. We're interceding for your family. Like you're going to have victory soon." So after telling them that the verse was BS, I just looked at them and said, "I need you to stop praying for me. Like, at some point I need you guys to just step up and be the answer to those prayers that you keep praying. Like, I don't need to know you're praying for me. Like, do something." And then there was this long pregnant pause. And I think it's safe to say this individual is my best friend. I'll use that label. He just looks me square in the eye and he says, "Ben, I hear you. But you never tell us what you need. You're always so busy doing all the things. What do you need?" And it hit me square between the eyes. And I was like "Huh? Well. I'm exhausted. I'm having surgery next week. My family life is just really struggling right now. I can't remember the last time I had a fun night out, so I said I just need some fun." And what do you know? This friend, he's like, "All right, well, set Friday night aside. We're going to go have fun." And he set up a night of axe throwing. And then we went to a bourbon bar and had a flight of cocktails. And then we went and walked around downtown at the Art Prize. It's a big national art competition. So we went and walked around downtown, saw some exhibits, I just look at that experience. And yes, I was very passionate about the verse and what I thought about it. And yes, I certainly did tell my friends to stop praying. But what's behind that? What was behind that was me feeling like I had unmet needs and I never expressed them. So, it was almost as if I was allowing my anger and my frustration. To somehow fill those unmet needs. And it wasn't working. And then my friend is like, "Dude, for real, what do you need? And I told them and he made it happen." That was like, probably one of the most powerful, like life-giving things that somebody's done for me. Like, he heard me. He heard my cry I need, I need to just have some fun. I need a night out where there's no expectation or pressure. And he made it happen and he wouldn't let me pay. And there was a third friend who joined us. He paid for all the drinks and the food and just like. It was that easy. I just had to say what I needed.
Dawn Taylor
That is so beautiful. If nothing else, then I'm so grateful that you got that amazing gift.
Ben Kraker
It was such a gift, and it makes me wonder how many gifts have I missed out on because I'm so concerned with giving that gifts to others. Like, why don't I deserve that gift as well?
Dawn Taylor
I love you, but I love me more. Right? I have so many thoughts going through my head right now. It was she could hear how busy my brain is in a good way, but it's there's so many lessons out of that story, even for people. Listening is number one - ask. Don't assume that anybody actually knows what you need. Don't assume that by them being like, "hHey, I'm struggling." Right? Sometimes it's funny how I have friends that always say like, they're like, "You're the best person in the middle of an emergency." Like you'll just like, step in and do. And I always laugh and I said, you know, I was talking to a friend about this recently and I said, "Yes, I do. I step in and I do. I'm not the person who's going to sit with you and cry with you and grieve with you in that way. Like, I'm not always going to be like that soft, that soft person. I will be 100% if you need that, if that is what you need. But I’m also like the best,
nd then we went back to her house and I was like, "Okay, cool. Now let me teach you how to make a few easy meals that you can eat within your dietary restrictions right now." And she just laughed at me. She's like, "You're hilarious.' And I said, I think there's been so many times in my life where that's what I needed. Right where I needed somebody to be like, you don't need to figure this out because let me step in is like your logistics coordinator right now and figure this out for you and. You know, if we all did that for someone around us. Right? And not in a way of like, "I'm going to do this every single day and I'm going to give to the point of I'm burnt out again." Like, please, please, listeners, don't. This is not a quote adding more to your plate to burn out. But if you're in the middle of the burnout, if you're in the middle of the overwhelm, if you're in the middle of that. Look at what is it, if there is even one thing that somebody could do, ask for it. But here's the caveat on that. Allow them to say no. If they can't. Allow them to say no if they don't have the capacity, and then ask someone else. Right?
Ben Kraker
Yeah. There's such a fear of asking among, I would say, our generation. Like, asking it just means I need something and I don't want to be needy. I don't want to be. Like, I always feel like if I ask for help, if I say what I need, then suddenly the perception of me from those around me goes from a, you know, is this solid dude. He's always there in a pinch. He loves to help people. He's got a big heart. Well, if I say, "Guys, I need to have some fun." Like, my fear in that moment is they're going to see me as weak. They're going to see me as like, not having it all together and like. So, me asking is going to knock their perception of me down several notches, and I just don't want to deal with that. Like I want to maintain the level I have with them. I worked so hard to get there. But the reality is it's the opposite. Because when I ask for what I need, that increases their perception of me, because I've just been honest with them, and I showed them I was vulnerable enough to show them this is something I really need. And that does far more to build the relationship up than trying to fake it and be all things to everybody else.
Dawn Taylor
Always. And always does. So interesting. Like we are so scared to ask for help. I was going through some crazy treatments, but a year, year and a half, two years ago now. And yeah, it was it started about two years ago and I was, you know, 4 or 5 days a week, up to eight hours a day, doctor's appointments and IV treatments. And my body was shutting down like it was rough. It was a really rough time in my life. And one of my guy friends. One night he called me and he's like, what are you doing? And I said, just finishing off my IV, we're almost done. And he's like, okay. He's like, "What do you need?" And I loved it because he didn't ask, how are you doing? Hey, what's going on? How are you doing? It was none of that. He's like, "What do you need?" And I was like, "I don't even know." And I always I often talk with clients about the infant check. And it's like the minute we're going through something hard or the minute we're feeling overwhelmed, it's like, do the infant check. Have you pooped? Have you peed? Have you had water? Have you been fed? Have you slept? Are your clothes pinching you? Right. Like go through your list of your infant things to be like, okay, basic, basic needs. Not even like anything huge like basic needs. What do you need? And he's like, "Okay, drive to my house. Can you get to my house?" And I said, "Yeah, why?" And he's like, "Just come to my house." And I said, "Okay." And I drove over there and, you know, his wife and his baby were there. And he laid me on his couch with my head on a pillow. He put a blanket over me. He handed me his phone for one of my favorite restaurants, and I pick my order. He's like, just pick what you want, I don't care. Pick what you want. He's like, "So you're not feeling good. You just want your comfort sometimes." And he's like, "I know it's chaotic in my house and it's loud and there's like a hockey game going on in the background, and there's all that, like there's a baby crying." And like, there was all this mayhem, but he's like, "You're not alone. Just hang out. And when you're tired," he's like, "if you have the energy to drive home or back to the hotel where I was staying, he's like, you're good. If not, we'll drive you and drive your vehicle." And I have thanked him so many times for that, that in the middle of those times. It was like, thank you for just taking over one of my basic needs,
Ben Kraker
Right? It makes all the difference.
Dawn Taylor
It makes all the difference.
Ben Kraker
Ueah. And that same friend that asked me, what do you need? So that was the weekend before my surgery that I recently had day after surgery. He texted me and he's like, "Hey, I'm bringing us lunch. What do you want from such and such restaurant?" And I was like, "That's amazing. Thank you." nd so I thought this was going to be like an Uber Eats thing where he picks up the food and drops it off at my door. Oh, no. He came in with his backpack and the food and we finished eating, and he's like, "I got to hop on a meeting for work. It'll be about an hour. Is it okay if I use your office upstairs?" I was like, "Well, I'm not using it, so go ahead." And I'm like, this is really peculiar. My friend brought me lunch. He stayed to hang out and talk. He's upstairs in my space on a meeting, and he's going to come back down. And we're going to keep talking. What is going on? But it's the same thing he saw a need. I need to eat. I'm in pretty rough shape after surgery. So he just inserted himself in. The crazy thing about all of this is I let him were a year ago, it would have been so easy to say, hey, thanks for bringing me lunch. I'm sure you're busy. You can go on your way. So, yeah. Getting your needs met also requires you to be a little awkward sometimes, because that was that was awkward. I mean, who brings work stuff and lunch? And then, yeah, I mean, it's just like, what is going on?
Dawn Taylor
I would. I have no shame. I have zero shame. You know what? I love that though. So for somebody who is dealing with burnout. Whether it's from the church or it's from social media or it's from just life in general. What are some steps that you could give? What are some tips that you could give, some red flags? Something. Something to help them even realize what's going on?
Ben Kraker
Yeah. For me, the things that I did and this is going back to my friendship with Jason. When that fell apart, there were so many things in my life that were falling apart. And it was all because I had so many unmet needs and I was expecting other people to meet those needs, but I never told them what they were. And so that obviously, has an impact on relationships. I just needed a reset. So. I took myself off of social media, I put a post up saying something like under construction and just wrote a note signing out. For now, I need some space. So I did that and I actually stayed committed to it. And I think I was addicted because there were definitely just those withdrawals of, “Oh man, I got to get back on there.” Did pretty good resisting those for the most part. So that was number one. Just stop social media. Like your world, your life is going to go on. Even if you don't have access to your Facebook or your Instagram. And in fact, your life is probably going to improve, or you're going to see your life differently when you're not looking at it through the lens of social media and everybody else. So, that's the biggest one. The second was related to that, and that was silence or turn off all notifications on my phone unless they truly were urgent. Like, I would never silence my wife and my kids. But turning off notifications for all the messaging apps, I don't need to see them live as they come in. Like, I can set aside the time at the end of the day where I pick up my phone and check the messaging apps and get in touch with people, but I don't need to be notified in the moment when somebody reaches out to me and I don't even need to reply in the moment. So, turning off the notifications and giving myself freedom to not be bound to my phone helped a lot too. Those were the two foundational pieces, and by doing those things, I gave myself so much more mental space with which I was able to think about the things that I needed. I was able to voice the pain or the frustration that I was trying to mute by using social media and staying connected to people. Like, I journaled so much during that time and it was so transformational. So maybe it's not social media and maybe it's not the phone notifications, but I guarantee if you're feeling burned out in life, there is something that is overwhelming you and it's not essential. It's not mission critical and you can turn it off. So whatever that is for you. Turn off the demands. Turn off the things that cry out for your attention. Obviously, you can't get rid of everything. Parents, you can't mute your kids, unfortunately. But what are the things that can be muted? What can you put aside? What can you do to give yourself some margin? Because all those things that hold you captive are burning you out, and it's just not worth it.
Dawn Taylor
I 100% agree with all of the above. And especially with the things burning you out, are based on other people's expectations of us.
Ben Kraker
Well, man. Yeah. It's when this episode airs,
Dawn Taylor
it's going to be close. Well, probably close to Christmas. It'll be in the next couple of months. And one of the things that we did a couple of years ago with my husband's side of the family is his youngest brother and wife and kids come to visit, and they're not big Christmas people like, they don't love Christmas. And tied to their own stuff, right? Childhood vacations, different things. Just not, was never really raised in the normal. Like family gathering get together for Christmas in Canada kind of thing, right? It was always in Hawaii and different things that have slowed down. Now they have kids and. I sat down and I realized how overwhelmed I was feeling by Christmas and hosting, because we host every single year, and it's my family and then his family and then my family and his family. Right. And we host. And it's always like large amounts of people and food and long periods of time. And it's incredible. We love it. But it was feeling very, very overwhelming. And I sat down and phoned my sister in law and I was like, “Give me your two things.” And she was like, what was like, “What are your favorite two parts of Christmas?” And she went, “Your chip dip and games.” And I'm like, “Perfect, what are your husband’s?” And his was like, play, watching a movie or something and stuffing or I don't remember what it was. It was like his two things that he loved. And then my husband had his two and I had my two, and I was like, “Those are the eight things we're doing for Christmas.” so, I love lights on a tree, did not put a single decoration on. It was like the lights are my favorite parts. I'm not going to put anything else on it. So we had a decorated, we had like a lit tree and that was it because that was one of my things. One of my things was looking at Christmas lights after Christmas Eve service. So even though they are not church goers, we all went and looked at, like, we went to church. We went and looked at the lights and came back. But we didn't do a turkey dinner. We didn't do any of the big food stuff. We didn't didn't do any of the baking like we did zero presents. We took all of the things off the list that were the normal society's ideas of what Christmas looks like, and we had the best Christmas ever. And I talked to her a few weeks ago because they're coming again this year. And she's like, “That was the greatest Christmas. Can we do that again?” And was like, “Yep, let me know what your two things are and we can do it again.” But even last year, like I had 13 people in my house over and for ten days, we had a very full house, and my husband and I sat down and I was like, “You know, all the things that stressed me out are going to go. So I'm not going to make a turkey dinner.” And he was like, “what?” And I was like, “it's way too much time and prep and work. And that last half an hour before it gets on the table, and then everyone's exhausted and all the dishes that go with it.” And you know what? I don't think one person actually cared, but I smoked a brisket and we had mashed potatoes and cornbread and like, we had this amazing feast. I bought all the baking. I just bought a ton of baking from amazing bakeries through to my fridge and freezer. And I was like, “I'm not cooking, I'm not baking.” And we had a blast. We had so much fun. And it wasn't, the hours and hours and hours and hours of prep and cleanup and wake up early and go to bed late. And the chaos, the chaos that it usually is. And talking to my nieces and nephews about it. They loved it like we had such a good time and so especially this time of year. I find we need to learn how to say “No, not now.” And it might not be a no forever, but it's just right now. No. Not now.
Ben Kraker
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
And that's okay. That is okay. So really look at that. What are the expectatio ns? Are there expectations to go to a million parties and expectations to do all the family photos and expectations to go sledding and do this and do that and right. What if you just didn't? Right?
Ben Kraker
Normalize saying no.
Dawn Taylor
Normalize saying no and figuring out what your intention is behind the behavior that's causing the burnout. What is the need that's needing to be met? Are you doing it because someone else is expecting it of you? Are you doing it to make yourself feel good about something? Or are you doing it, right? What is your intention behind it? Your intention might be pure. Your intention might not actually be horrible.
Ben Kraker
There's no other way to get that intention, though that doesn't involve burning yourself out.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, And knowing that at the end of the day, you can actually choose the one. You don't need to feel shame for that.
Ben Kraker
Yes. You know, from the Christian perspective, so many scriptures get twisted. Everybody says, well, I need to love my neighbor. Like, that should be my priority.
Well, what's the whole verse say? It says, love your neighbor. How? As you love yourself. My interpretation is you can't love your neighbor if you don't love yourself. If you're not taking time to fill your own cup, how dare you try to fill somebody else's? You're just going to be pouring nothing into them and that's harmful. That just perpetuates burnout. So love yourself like it's okay if God loves you deeply and unconditionally. Perhaps we should do the same for ourselves and allow ourselves grace, and allow ourselves whatever it is we need to fill up that bucket so that we can love our neighbor. And there's another verse that I've heard used, talking about how we should think of ourselves with sober judgment and don't think more highly of yourself than you ought. It's those last three words that always get me. He doesn't say, “Don't think highly of yourselves.” It just says, “Don't think more highly of yourself than you ought.” Like there's a standard. It's okay to think highly of yourself. Just don't overdo it. That's all it's saying. It's not saying anything about rejecting yourself or rejecting who you are, or rejecting your needs in order to elevate other people. No, the baseline is it's okay to think highly of yourself. Just don't think more highly than you should.
Oh, I love it. You and I could talk about this all day, but out of respect for your time, let's do a few quick closing questions. If anybody wants to get a hold of Ben, though, we'll put his contact info in the show notes. If you had to describe yourself in one sentence, what would it be? A word, a sentence, a phrase, a quote.
Ben Kraker
That's a really good question. Um, I think I would go back to the, there was a personality test that I took. The fact that I have to go back and look at it is funny. I'll do the ones I can remember. Restore. Uh, connectedness. Um, those two for sure. Like, I see myself as somebody who has the ability to restore what's been broken to help people and chiefly myself to be able to identify in my own life. What are the desert areas that need to be transformed into wellsprings? And as I do that for myself, it enables me to do it for others. So restoration is a big deal. And then connectedness. I'm always looking for, how is this thing connected to that thing? Or what's the commonality between me and this customer that I'm working with at work, or this individual who just joined my group? What do they have in common with the rest of us? My brain is just wired for connection, whether it's relational or spatial connection matters to me because it helps me to realize that I'm not in this by myself, that I'm surrounded by some incredible people.
I would dare say even you, Dawn, I mean like. This is a pretty cool connection that we had here tonight. So restore and connection, I would say, are the two words that describe me.
Dawn Taylor
I love it. What is one thing you spend a silly amount of money on?
Ben Kraker
Uh, well, behind me, I have this little diffuser on my other desk over there. I love essential oils, and I love the smell. And this diffuser has, like, an LED light on it. And it shows the vapor as if it were like flames. Um, so I like things that help me, um, I don't know. I think things that I find cool, I spend a lot of money on Amazon is really what I'm trying to say, that just stand out to me as cool and novel. I love to collect those things. Amazing. And what is the last one? What is the number one place that you want to go on your bucket list item? Right now you're on your bucket list.
Ben Kraker
Um. you know, it's a place that I've been. But it's a place that I treasure and has such a special place in my heart. Sisters Rock State Park in, it's close to Brookings, Oregon. Think it's I can't remember the name of the city, but it was just a place that was introduced to me by a hitchhiker, of all people, that was driving to the coast, and they were like, “We have to stop over here.” And I was like, “Do you need to use the bathroom?” And she was like, “No, we just need to stop. I need to show you something.” And I was like, This woman is crazy. Why did you pick her up?” But we get out of the car and we take this trail down to these beautiful rock formations. Kind of similar to what you saw in Cannon Beach, but like times ten, like there's sea caves and there's just it's just magical type of place.
Dawn Taylor
And now I want to go there.
Ben Kraker
Yeah. So I just love it. I've been there probably 3 or 4 times and it's so out of the way like, there's no reason you would go to Gold Port, I think is the name of the city. It's just a little podunk city between Brookings and California and. But man, it's beautiful. So if I could find a way to get there quickly, I would go in a heartbeat.
Ben Kraker
Oh my goodness. Okay, so I don't know about everybody else listening. We're all going to be googling this place now and trying to figure out how to get there. Because I want to place, thank you, thank you, thank you, Ben, for hanging out with with us today and for the listeners. I hope that's something you heard at home that maybe shifted to something inside of you and that you reach out to myself, to somebody else, to a friend, to a pastor. Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter. Reach out and ask for support. Ask for help. Ask for what it is you need, and give people an opportunity to show up for you in ways you could never imagine. Join us again in two weeks for another amazing conversation. Please tell your friends. The more people that feel understood and seen and heard, the better in our world today. Check out the show notes located at the Taylor Waka for more information and for all of Ben's contact information. So that if you have questions about any of these things or just you're like, hey dude, what was that place again? And I don't want to listen to the podcast, whatever. Just if you need to reach out, there will be contact information there. Subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you love the show, please, please, please leave a rating and review. See you guys in a couple of weeks.
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Content Warning:
In this episode, we discuss some topics that listeners may find disturbing such as loss and trauma.
Why you would want to listen to this episode…
While we’ve seen it portrayed everywhere from movies to TV, the life of a military spouse isn’t exactly as it’s made out to be. However, today’s guest Jenny Ryce is nonetheless thankful for all that’s happened in her life. As a military wife, she shares her story of how she navigated through life and approached it with caution knowing her husband was out in the field protecting their country. She may not have learned to defuse bombs or crawl through landmines, but Jenny’s unique journey to self-discovery and parenthood is both challenging and compelling in its own way.
Who this for
If you've ever wondered what it's like to live with your significant other as someone who serves their country, this episode is for you. It’s a unique look at military culture and the adjustments Jenny and her husband had to make - from the limited ways of communication to parenting their children in an unorthodox way. It’s an interesting listen for those intrigued by military life.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Jenny Ryce is a PCC Accredited Executive Coach, speaker, podcast host of Winning with Wellness, bestselling author and the President of Business from the Heart Awards
Jenny is passionate about connecting others to the power of mindset and wellness. When she is not pursuing her professional passions, Jenny can be found spending time in nature, getting grounded and finding inspiration.
Jenny is the proud mother to two amazing daughters and the wife of a military veteran. You will often hear her say that they fuel her passion.
It is time to redefine your wellness and experience first-hand what Winning with Wellness can do. Jenny believes that you should always capitalize on your greatest asset, YOU
Guest Social Links
Website - https://businessfromtheheart.ca
Coaching Instagram - @jennyrycecoaching
Business Instagram - @businessfromtheheartawards
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
Hello, hello. I'm your host, Dawn Taylor, and today we are talking to my person, my girl, my right hand wrangler of this shit show. Jenny, I have been asking Jenny forever if we could record this episode because she has a really different life story than a lot of people, but one that I think that we're all very interested by, curious by. We've seen portrayed in books and TV and movies and all of those things. But to get a very real, vulnerable inside perspective is something different. So topic today, military wife and mom behind the scenes. So before we get started, I'll tell you a little bit about her so that you can fall in love with her the way I have. Jenny is a mom. She's a wife, she's a coach, she's an avid outdoorsman. I've never met anybody who gives the way she does, loves as hard as she does, or shows up for people in her world the way that she does. She is a coach. She has her own podcast. She is just a little powerhouse and she's the person that keeps everything going in my little world. So welcome to the show, Jenny.
Jenny Ryce
Thanks for having me. The last time I was here, you thought you're interviewing me and I took it over and interviewed you.
Dawn Taylor
I know, and I was like, okay, that's fine, but we still have to interview you.
Jenny Ryce
You have to do the podcast.
Dawn Taylor
So I've watched the show Army Wives. We've all like, seen the book, read the book, seeing the TV, seeing the movies, whatever, where it portrays life as an army wife or a military wife. Right? Okay. For starters, can we differentiate what the terms are?
Jenny Ryce
Well, a lot of things are very different from American, to the US. So, military wives get lumped in. You know, there is a border difference just between terms in reference to skill sets, ranking all those kind of things from American to Canadian. So, I'm a Canadian military wife. So, let's start with that. So our you know our roles and lives are very, very different. I have never watched an episode of Military Wives. It's one of those things, or Army Wives, I just can't do it. Probably because it would, I don't know, I don't want to judge. I haven't watched it, but I've seen like some of those Housewives shows and I can't handle watching people treat each other that way on TV. It makes me wild.
Dawn Taylor
So to watch, okay, so avoid it. It would also probably trigger you a little. Right? So you were not just a military wife of how many years has it been?
Jenny Ryce
So my husband and I, we've been very fortunate to be married for well, I always say I've been dating my boyfriend for 31 years and we've been married for 29, so we hit the 30, will be 30 years married next year, so, or in 2024 depending on when you happen to be listening to this episode. So we're we're very fortunate. You know, I'm one of the OG wives when we go to reunions and that there's the OG wife group and then there's the, you know, the ones that didn't make it, right. They're just as lovely, don't get me wrong. But there's only a handful of us that are OGs, for sure.
Dawn Taylor
Well, I'm hearing the little bit that I've heard about what life was like through all of those years where he was deployed and all of that. I can see why. I can see why there aren't very many of the OGs. But, you're not just that. You also have two adult daughters that are also in the Army.
Jenny Ryce
Yes. Okay. So these are some terms that we could we could share. Forgot to answer your question. See I'm not a very good guest. I'm great at interviewing, but I'm not a very good guest. So when we think of military, military is like the umbrella. So, the Canadian Armed Forces, the umbrella is military and there's elements within the military. So, my husband is Army, there's Air Force and then there's Navy. So my daughters are Navy, my husband's army. And actually, not only is my daughter's Navy, my nephew is Navy as well as my son in law is Navy. So we have a bit of a legacy going on. And yeah, we cornered the market in the Navy. And of course, there's always these jokes at the table about Army versus Navy, etcetera, etcetera. It was like, "How did I produce Navy? I'm Army." I'm like, "Honey, they didn't want to be in a trench. Come on now." So that that might help, so yeah. Overall encompassing military. If you say military you're covered.
Dawn Taylor
Hey, this is very good to know because how many times if I even said it wrong and you've explained this to me and I'm like, "Okay, sorry." Which one is the overarching umbrella one again? Okay. So, listeners, Canadian, if you were Canadian, it is just say military, just a military. They won't be too offended.
Jenny Ryce
Well in, you know we definitely, it's to Google it. There's just so much information about but also to within each element there's specific traits. So, my husband was a combat engineer. And what that meant is he's an explosive ordnance disposal expert. So, for those of you I've never watched the movie because I couldn't watch it with him because I knew he'd be like, "It doesn't do that. It doesn't." Anyway, watching movies where things blow up with your husband when he's an explosive expert kind of wrecks everything. So I know what doesn't blow up a certain way and what does move a certain way. So he's a mind specialist and an explosive specialist. So, there's every single element has different skill sets. So, in the Navy my daughters are one is a logistics officer and the other is an image technician. So, very different skill sets. But they're all under elements. So, just say military, it's easier.
Dawn Taylor
So, been knowing your husband's like the bomb guy and the bomb guy. The explosions guy. So let's talk about, like, I have so many questions. I'm guessing you know this, but. when you first met him, was he in the military?
Jenny Ryce
Yes. And it's so fascinating because I, so he lived in a military town. My grandparents lived in a military town, and I actually came to the live in the military town. Usually, when there's a base there, they call it a military town. In reality, there's a lot of other things that go on into town. In a town like Edmonton, there's more than just the military base in Edmonton. However, you know, when you're in the military world, it's the military town. So, I had never dated somebody in the military, you have to realize too, I was 20 years old when I met my husband. I was young, very young. I'd never dated anyone in the military. Didn't know the difference between dating somebody in the military and not dating anyone in the military. So, he was actively, he was relatively new. He had just come back from being in Kuwait the first time for I call it Bush one, Bush one, and Bush two. So he was in the wheat in 91, and he had just come back and we had met and we hit it off like a house on fire. He was like instantly my best friend.
Dawn Taylor
And hey, you guys, really quick. Yeah. Really quick. Her husband looks exactly like Shane on the last season of Love is Blind. Like, exactly like him. Okay, I'm not posting photos because he's real private, but you guys need to know that just you have a mental image as you're hearing this, okay? Keep going.
Jenny Ryce
So, yeah. So apparently that's what Dawn thinks. 1.2s So that's what he looks like
Dawn Taylor
Or Val Kilmer.
Jenny Ryce
When we were dating. Yeah. He looked like Val Kilmer from Top Gun. The first round. The OG of Top Gun and occasionally now he gets the John Dunn reference. But anyway, so I think my husband's a babe but that's, that's you know you guys can decide yourselves. So, yeah, I didn't know anything about dating a military person and okay can we talk about this term that people tell you? "You knew what you were doing." Nobody knows what they're getting into. Nobody knows. How can you know if you don't know? Right. I didn't know what it meant. I didn't know what being married or dating a soldier looked like or what that meant. So everybody, please, I beg you, not only give yourself grace, but give other people grace. Nobody knows what they're doing till they're in it. And even then, 90% of us are just scraping through and trying to figure it out to begin.
Dawn Taylor
How true is that?
Jenny Ryce
So yeah, I had and because I didn't live in said town, I grew up in a large city. I had no idea. I didn't know anything about dating a military guy. I just knew that we were like fast friends, and we had so many of the same interests, and I was madly in love with him. And it, like, it was one of those sparks, right? That hits. And I would move. I would move mountains for him. And I knew it. And I still I still feel that way today, which is really cool. It's not been easy though.
Dawn Taylor
Anyone who's been married for like six weeks, I'm like, "No, no, no." Yeah. It's not easy if we've survived this long. We've been through hell and back.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah. You've done you've slogged through the mud. Yeah, yeah. You've literally dug a trench or something.
Dawn Taylor
Like we've been in the trenches at this point. Yeah.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, totally.
Dawn Taylor
I do love that we both still love our husbands so much. Yeah. It's one of the coolest things of working with you is like, we just have this bond over that,
Jenny Ryce
Which is fortunate because I know in this day and age we're rare. We're very blessed.
Dawn Taylor
So rare.
Jenny Ryce
And when I say that, I say it. You know, with immense pride. But I also know it's a lot of work, like my husband's my job. He's one of my jobs. You know, I say this often, especially to my young ladies. And, you know, my oldest is in a relationship and married recently is. We spend our whole lives being trained on things. We go to school to be trained. We get a job, we get trained, we buy a car, we have a manual, all those kind of things. We are never educated and trained on how to be a good spouse, or how to be a good friend, or how to be a good daughter. None of that. It's all like, "Hey, you should just figure this out. So it's, being in a relationship is a lot of work. And if you don't put work in, you know, I always say the grass that you fertilize is green. People like, you know, it might look shiny and beautiful often, you know, over that other fence. But I tell you what, there's crab weed in that sucker, too. When you get up close, if you don't pay attention.
Dawn Taylor
I love that you say that because I often say the grass is only greener on the other side because there's a lot of shit there.
Jenny Ryce
It's true though, you don't like the good stuff, right? You take your time, you weed your garden, you nurture, do those kind of things. But be kind to yourself too, in relationships because you're learning. And one thing that I've learned is to remind myself and Scott and I work really hard on that, is to remember that we're tackling the problem together. It's not us against each other. It's like, "Okay, this is our problem. What do we need to do to tackle the problem?" Don't get me wrong, it took time to get to that process and to learn that. But again, I said I was so young, like, Scott and I grew up together. We built a life together, and if I look at my age now, I'm 52 and I'm not ashamed to say that I'm pretty proud of that. When I look at my life, he's been in my life longer than out of my life, if that makes sense. Right? So it's one of the gifts of digging in for the long haul is, you know, you learn the little things, you learn the this the smiles, you learn, you learn the "Oh, that's pissed him off." You don't mean nothing has to be said in this moment.
Dawn Taylor
I had one of those this morning where I was talking to a friend here for coffee, and I was like, "I should upgrade his seat on the plane for his trip he's on next week." And I was like, "Nah." And she's herself. And she goes, "Really?" I was like, "No, I'm mad at him." She's like, "Isn't he like 6'2''?" I was like, "Yeah." She's like, "You're going to make him suffer." I was like, "When we check him in on Sunday, I'll decide." She just started laughing. See where we're at. I know I was like, we'll see where we're at Sunday. All right, so you just come back. We're going to do, actually, an entire podcast. We're going to convince my husband to do an entire podcast with me where we're going to talk what it's actually like to be married and in a relationship that long. But, like the good, the bad, the ugly, the stuff that most people would probably be shocked that one of us will say, we're going to go there, we're going to fully go there. That's going to be coming out. Depending on when you're listening to this in the new year, it'll be in the new year in 2024.
Jenny Ryce
2024, depending when you're listening.
Dawn Taylor
Yes, 2024. But let's get back to this. So, you guys meet, you fall in love. And what does life look like?
Jenny Ryce
You know what? Life is actually really blissful. I mean, except for the fact that all of a sudden I'm in love with this man I never see because he's away all the time. That was a really hard adjustment, was, you know, figuring out, like, "Oh my gosh, I never see him because he was away quite a bit on training."
Dawn Taylor
What do you mean by away quite a bit? Like, what does that look like? Because for some people, being away from their spouse for a weekend is too much. I remember one time when Chad was gone for seven months and only home for three days in seven months, and I was like, "Yeah, that was a hard one." And people were like, shook by that. So for definition's sake, what does that look like when he was gone a lot?
Jenny Ryce
So I figured it out. I did the math once, and I would say for the first ten years of our relationship, he was gone eight months every year on average is kind of how it worked. Yeah, a lot. So he was either away training. He was either way overseas in a support role, whether UN peacekeeper or, you know, doing mind clearing. He was part of the ice storm going in and cleaning up that and helping with that. So, just, yeah, away a lot which can be, that's part of the stuff. When people say you knew what you were doing when you got on board, it's like, "No, no, I really didn't." You know, you don't know what you don't know. So, that was part of the challenging thing. It's interesting because I made a commitment when we when we started dating. When he asked me to marry him, which he came, he didn't want to ask me to marry him, which I didn't realize, of course, until he got back. When he got back from deployment, he was over in Bosnia and he got back in '92, and he asked me to marry him. And he's like, "I didn't want to ask you before I left in case something happened to me." Which unfortunately, in his line of work, if you make a misstep
Dawn Taylor
You don't get second chances.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, things don't go well. And unfortunately, we have suffered loss and and experience that firsthand. And it's challenging. So, when he asked me to marry him, I was like, "Hell yeah!" I said, "But only if you're in this for the long haul." I come from my parents, separated when I was six years old, and I wanted to be, I did not want to follow in that pattern, that footstep. So, I was like, "If you're all in, I'll do it with you. But we have to be all in." And he too comes from a split family and was like, "Yeah, we're only doing this once." So, I don't know if it was naivety or if it was, like, pure will or arrogance or what, but I was like, "I'm never getting divorced."
Dawn Taylor
I'm gonna say probably a combo of all of right. Knowing you, probably a combo of all of these.
Jenny Ryce
I'm like, I'm pretty frickin' stubborn and I'm I'm pretty driven and have high standards for myself. So I was like, no, this is this is a non-negotiable. Like, if you're my person, I've picked you and I'm in. And ine thing that was really hard about the separation, and I know you didn't ask this question, but I want to share it. One of the things that was hard, but also looking back from who I am today. It gave me space to become me. If that makes sense.
Dawn Taylor
100% it does.
Jenny Ryce
Right? So, because I was in this really deep relationship at a very young age. I could have easily swallowed myself up into that relationship, which in truth, I did. But, because we had those gaps in time, I had to really dig in and figure out who I was. And I had to be strong because like I said, you know, we did experience loss and trauma and and it isn't like, your husband just goes away and or your spouse or your loved one or your children or whoever it is, they don't just go away and go to work. And my husband is climbing around a minefield. Right? That's not a normal day at work for the average person.
Dawn Taylor
No.
Jenny Ryce
And so there's high risk. And you hear things on the news and it makes you, like, literally become paralyzed in fear because you're praying that the names you hear aren't your people. Whether it's your loved one, your best friends, whoever it is.
Dawn Taylor
So can we talk about that for a sec?
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, absolutely.
Dawn Taylor
So, Jenny and I were talking about this a little while ago. We were discussing, you know, data recording and stuff, and I said, "I wonder what most people don't realize is this is pre-cell phone, pre-emails, pre-FaceTime." Like, guys, this is pre-all of that.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, it was rough.
Dawn Taylor
All of that. And so, it's not like it is today where you're talking like your daughter can talk to her husband every day. And, they have cell phones like a Skype. And they can FaceTime and they can do all these things. Right? It's it was a completely different world. So, not only were you. I mean, of all the roles to have in the military, the guy that takes care of the bombs, right? The bomb guy. I'm going to just call him the bomb guy.
Jenny Ryce
He loves that. That's great.
Dawn Taylor
Okay. It's not the official name because I can't remember it ever. But, like, the bomb guy, that, when you watch the news, which we all know is not. always factual - is that a politically correct way to put it?
Jenny Ryce
You learn that real quick.
Dawn Taylor
You learn that super fast. Even back in '92. Right? But what was it even like to communicate with him? And when he did go for deployment, how long was he gone?
Jenny Ryce
So, he would, generally speaking, they would have to go anywhere from 6 to 8 weeks for pre-deployment training. So, they would take them to wherever, which obviously wasn't at home. And they would simulate and experience scenarios. et cetera, to be overseas. And then then he would come home, he would maybe have 2 or 3 weeks off and then it would deploy for six months at minimum usually. And in that scenario, we would get in the middle of the six weeks, six months. Part of me, he would get two weeks off. And whether I would come to him or he would come to me, we would get a two week vacation in between to connect. And then that would happen. So, I'm just thinking of this week. We got married in April, and then 20 days later he deployed overseas and
Dawn Taylor
Wow.
Jenny Ryce
So that was, you know, rough.
Dawn Taylor
And how far in advance do you hear about deployments, like, how much?
Jenny Ryce
Put it this way, we were supposed to be getting married in July and we had to reschedule. We had everything booked, planned, organized, and we rescheduled the wedding for April. And it turned out to be the most beautiful, small, well, small. I mean, 120 people turned out to be absolutely beautiful wedding. Nothing like we had planned and it was totally meant to be. So, you can, depends on the situation. Like, I was putting a roast on the table when the ice storms happened and he got a call and was gone an hour later. Deployment. Because of the pre training and all of that, we usually have a few months' notice.
Dawn Taylor
Oh okay.
Jenny Ryce
It could even be up to a year. It just depends on what's happening in theaters, what is another term, it's in theater. So depending on you know what the scenario is. And obviously this is a while ago. So, things have changed. Things are, you know, especially with the news and the media and things like that. But, back then, to make a long distance phone call just like normal to my family was $2 a minute. I mean, we were young, we had no money. So it's like you didn't, don't get me wrong, they didn't charge us in the military to get a phone call from them. That was not, I don't want that to be. But in those days, every ten days we would get, he would get a ten-minute phone call privilege. We never knew when it was coming. We never knew what time. And we never knew what day. And I can't even tell you when you miss the phone call what that felt like, because of course, you'd get a voicemail of "Hey." Because, back then you had the machine that you push the button and you go to voicemail. So, it was like a tape recorder.
Dawn Taylor
Little answering machines.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, but if we were fortunate enough to be home and get the call, it was absolutely magical and there'd be a delay. So you'd have to pause so the words would come through, and then so you wouldn't talk over top of each other. And we would always time it because the phone cut off at ten minutes. So, it didn't matter if you were in mid-thought or anything. You got ten minutes and when your time was up, it was up.
Dawn Taylor
Wow.
Jenny Ryce
And so there was nothing worse than not getting to say goodbye. So we always cut it, like 30 seconds short so that we could say goodbye. And at the time, that felt like such a gift, right? Because. So, I wrote him a letter every single night. Every single night. I wrote him a letter. And I would bulk send them and I did that up like pretty much every single tour he's ever been on. I wrote a letter every single night about what was happening, because communication didn't start really changing until near the end of his retirement. And then, you could email, I mean, that wasn't even an option back then. Like you couldn't even email. I mean, girl, I lived without a cell phone. Like, we didn't have those years. Yeah, we didn't have a cell phone when we were married. That didn't, those didn't exist. You had a house phone. And if you really like, with it, you had call waiting so two people could call you at the same time. That was it, right? So yeah, communication was challenging. It was challenging. But I'll tell you, nothing held you together like those ten minutes, telling you it was worth every second of it. But, when you got home and you missed that call, I'm telling you, nothing hit you harder in the gut than missing that phone call. It was gold. That phone call was gold.
Dawn Taylor
Now you wait another ten days.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, and that's providing something isn't happening that they can't call.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. So funny question. How did he decide who to call? Because, like, I'm guessing his mom wanted a phone call once in a while or, you know, someone like that.
Jenny Ryce
I was very fortunate. He was really close with his dad, and I was really close with his dad. So his dad knew that I was Scott's person for life, and I would just immediately phone and give all the updates, like, this is what he said. And occasionally when I couldn't answer, they got the call and they knew it and they were okay with it and they understood. But, you know, those are, parents are supposed to do that, right? They're supposed to understand. So, I was very fortunate that, yeah, his dad was one of my best friends. He was exceptional. I was very lucky. Very lucky that way.
Dawn Taylor
It's amazing.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
So deployments are happening. How often was he deployed?
Jenny Ryce
He was deployed, so what kind of tend to work out is he would deploy, this is an average okay. Like every other year, because of course he'd have to come home, he'd come home, and then there'd be courses that he would need to take, which of course were never in town. So, he would have to go to different posting locations for six months or eight months or two months or whatever for training in different areas to advance his his skill set and his career and things like that. So yeah. The deployments, if they were happening, were, you know, every other year, every couple of years, those kind of things, it really just depends. Unfortunately, the world was kind of really messy. I mean, it still is. Let's be real. But at the time in my life, when I was going through it, it was kind of messy back then. So, yeah. Yeah. So he was gone a lot, a lot. I remember. You know when one of the days when it was really hard asking myself like. "I am madly in love with a man that I never see. Is my life better with him or without him?" And it was. The answer was always, it's better with him. So the heartache when you can check that balance to that, it's like, "No, this is just, this is where I tap into my resilience and figure out who I am." And, you know. And figure it out. Like, you know, I've got to be okay in this. I've got to thrive in this. And what's cool now is my husband's in my life because I want him here, not because I need him. I figured out real quick, real young as a single quote-unquote single mom. Which of course, no disrespect to single moms out there. They work really hard. But I was I kept woman because my husband, even though I was single, was my husband. I still wasn't alone. Do you know what I mean? But I was alone a lot. Um. I could do anything. You ask me, I can do it. You tell me on. I'll figure it out. Like, the only reason I don't know is because I don't know yet. Yeah. Having to move. Have no friends or family. The middle of some town.
Dawn Taylor
Okay, so let's talk about the logistics of this. So you get married, he deploys within months or within a month.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
He's gone. How long was he gone? That first time?
Jenny Ryce
He was gone six months. They actually, the local newspaper did a did an article on us because back then, of course, newspaper was huge. And yeah, they, we were they did a complete article and then actually for a wedding gift or an anniversary gift, it was because it was after the wedding and anniversary gift. They came. I didn't realize they were at the, when he came home from that deployment. Okay. You want to talk, you know, have you ever had that feeling in your body where you tears come out of your face and you can't even stop it? Like, you're just like, your body just is, like, in release because you have, you don't know how much stress or fear or all those things you've held until that person, that bus came around the corner with them all loaded on it. And my face I couldn't, like. I wasn't even sobbing. It was just like pouring out of my face. And of course, what looks better than a young 21 year old?
Dawn Taylor
Let's hope you were a Kim Kardashian cryer.
Jenny Ryce
I was super popular with the paparazzi, and I don't even remember seeing them. All I remember is seeing him and grabbing him and not letting go. And when I think back, I remember seeing flashes because of course, back then it was all about flashing bulbs and all those kind of things. So, that was six months. That was a long haul. It was a long haul. I did get to go over and see him. We did our honeymoon in Greece. We met in Rome and that was the most beautiful two weeks. It was so incredible. But, it was really hard to say goodbye. Really, really hard to say goodbye. But, I'm so thankful for that opportunity. That was, again, something afforded to us from the military. We had to pay to go and all that kind of but we were given the opportunity and and military life is pretty amazing. If you if you align with the right friends and the right people and of course, the right spouse, right? Life is amazing if you align with the right spouse.
Dawn Taylor
But yeah, so he comes back six months, seven months into marriage, he comes back again because it's what we see on TV and reading books and magazines and everything else. I remember watching Army Wives, that's what I'll equate it to, because I always found that show so interesting and thinking like, "How would I react in those moments?"
Jenny Ryce
And I'll watch it just because I didn't even know it existed.
Dawn Taylor
It's very interesting, but it's.though, you know, there's all the different storylines. You know, some guys come back and they're fine. They're like, nope, that's Army. And now I'm home and it's like a light switch is flipped and they just get back to life and other guys come home and they have such complex PTSD and trauma and they don't know how to cope, and they don't know how to step back into civilian life, and they don't know how to deal with that without breaking any of his confidence, obviously, out of respect for Scott, because it's his story, is that something you had to deal with?
Jenny Ryce
You know what's so fascinating? And I think this is a statement that covers everybody. Nobody goes on deployment and comes back the same. Yeah. Nobody does. And I was super blessed to not only have Scott in my life, but I had some incredible inherited brothers because of Scott, some of my best friends. Actually, my house was a revolving door, so if Scott was overseas, all the buddies were over at the house like, and I was kind of their sister confidant. Nobody comes back from a tour without something. They never come back the same.
Dawn Taylor
There's no way. There's no way.
Jenny Ryce
There's no freaking way. Some, like you say, come back with it. Better equipped to compartmentalize the challenge. With that as an adult grown-up, now when you compartmentalize and you shove things in a box, we all know that that box blows up eventually. No pun intended, but maybe a little.
Dawn Taylor
I like to play on words. Yeah. Well done, well done. Jenny.
Jenny Ryce
Um, so what I learned because I was a safe home for so many that went overseas and came back is that I just had to create a space for conversation and because everybody came back different, if that makes sense, and everybody handled it in different ways. I had friends that were contemplating suicide. I had friends that were had attachment issues. I had friends that were couldn't go out in public and then I had friends who life's a party, and they were just living their best life at the time. I know this is kind of like a loose answer to your question. The key that I learned is create safe space, no judgment, and just allow people to share their stories and love on them. Because we're all put in situations. And again, I've heard people say, they say this about firemen and police officers and. It's like, well, they're paid to go into that burning building. They're paid to stand in front of that gun. If you seriously believe that, I challenge you to do what they do. I challenge you to crawl through a minefield. I challenge you and you tell me. That is an inherent part of a human being that isn't in everybody? I'm a wife and a mom and a best friend to these type of individuals. I cannot climb through a minefield. No, I can't do it. There's no fricking way. And I'm telling you, I can do pretty much anything I put my mind to.
Dawn Taylor
No, but it takes a different personality and a different mindset and a different everything to be able to do that.
Jenny Ryce
To be willing to switch off your own life value, survival mode so that you save someone else. Like their stories. I don't know if I'm able to share, but, and I won't with detail because for obvious reasons, but I know of stories where people that I care about deeply and not just my husband, but people I care about deeply that risked their lives to save people they don't even know. Yeah, children they don't know and they're not mandated to do it. It's not like they were ordered to do it. They did it anyway. That is a powerful, like, if you ask me, I'm proud to be a Canadian. Hell, yes. Yeah, because our Canadian soldiers, men and women are exceptional human beings. Are they broken? Unfortunately. It's the job. Unfortunately, it's a job. You can't see and experience that kind of trauma and expect to come out unscathed might not show up for 30 or 40 years, but it shows up always, always shows up. It always shows up and it changes your trajectory. I look at my life, oh my word. Did I ever think I was going to live in like four different provinces have two kids, one in B.C. and one in New Brunswick? I have a nine year gap between my girls. They were supposed to be two years apart. Like, I could never have predicted any of that and I wouldn't change a thing. It's so many things.
Dawn Taylor
So, a couple of things I want to talk about is kids. So your husband had a very. I don't know if different, but he had a different idea on what was and was not appropriate, on how and when and where and what and everything when it came to your kids, which is what resulted in the nine year gap.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah. So Scott was seriously like he knew because of his job. He's missing things in our our lives, right? Like, I can't remember how many anniversaries, he's missed or my birthdays or those kind of things, but we had lots of friends that missed the birth of their children. And he was like, "I don't care what happens. I am never missing my children coming into this world." And so hence the nine year gap you kind of got.
Jenny Ryce
You got a plan.
Dawn Taylor
Try planning around a deployment that could change or not change. So we, you know, we we thought we had the cycle figured out. He was set to deploy. We're like "Okay." You know and of course everything has to align. You don't just like tick the box and you're pregnant, right? Like, you know, things have to align and we we're we're like, "Okay, so this is the time bracket that we'll start trying etcetera, etcetera for number two." And we're like just coming up onto that time frame which would give, like, because of course it's got to work. Then you got to have, you got to, like, make the baby grow. Yeah, there's the timeline.
Dawn Taylor
There is.
Jenny Ryce
And then so he, in theory, should have been home when our second was born. So, they all of a sudden - nope. Deployment's cancelled. You're not going. You're slated on the next one. So, I was like, okay, no matter what we do here, you're not going to be home if we follow this, this path.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Jenny Ryce
So, before you know it, I don't know how many tours later, we're living in New Brunswick and. We're at a nine year gap, and I'm pregnant with baby number two at 33. So, because I was having my kids young, right? I had my first at 25. I wanted them young so that I can enjoy them and be fitful. You know what I have to say? This nine year gap thing, it rocks. People need to try this more often. I'm telling you, there's something magical about it because I raised my oldest, young, outgoing. Not that I'm not going now, but young and and free-spirited and all this kind of stuff. And then I have this mature wisdom about me for number two, although I do feel a bit, you know, that you see those memes. It's like the first broke the pathway for the young one to get away with everything. I'm like, "How could she not?" There's a nine year gap. Like, dude wasn't the same woman back then. Like, I'm like, "I'm sorry, kiddo. Yes, this was you." And it's interesting. The girls were raised completely different. This is the wildest part. So, our oldest lived the military experience. Her dad was away. Substantially, quite a bit. Missed a lot of the firsts. Actually. He only missed one of her birthdays, ironically enough.
Dawn Taylor
Wow.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, only the first one, which she didn't know anyway, so we're fine with it. He knew it. It was hard for him, but I'm like, "She doesn't even know, it's fine." And you know, she lived, she moved, I think, five different times. And then our youngest moved three different provinces by the time she was two and lived in three different homes, we moved to our final home, her dad has been home every single night except for the odd vacation or weekend or work thing. Totally raised completely different. Not only her parents older than her sister experience like older. She's never moved. She's lived in the same house, very different upbringings. So when people say, "Oh no, they've been raised the same." Hell no. No such cocky pop. Like, "No, they are totally different kids. Totally different, totally different." It's like, "Holy smokes." Yeah, they definitely. the military term? I'm not a fan of it. Military brat. She's definitely the military brat. And Mikayla is just the military kid as far as I'm concerned, because she, yeah, very different, very different. And I was young, like, when I had - I was 25. I mean, that's not young, but in today's standards that's young.
Dawn Taylor
Oh it is. Yeah. But it is like it is young. But especially knowing you're walking into really single parenting for eight out of 12 months.
Jenny Ryce
Well, and I didn't know that this is the thing, you know that's true.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. You didn't know that.
Jenny Ryce
And the crazy thing was at the time, the base we were at, we thought we'd be at that base because there was different positions he could hold within the base in his career. We thought we'd be at that base for years, of course, which was close to my family. I'm an identical twin right next, not next door, but an hour away from my twin, and the government decided to close the base. Scott was away. I had just moved us into our very first home that we bought. And I got this announcement that they're closing the base, and he phones me from a ditch somewhere in the prairies, and I'm like, crying. He's like, "What the hell's the matter?" And I'm like, "They're closing the base. We have to move." And he's like, "What?" And he's like, "I'll call you back." And that was one of the calls that I let them hang up from. I was like, yeah, the hell. Sure enough, the government had decided that they no longer needed the base where we lived. And so, unbeknownst to me, you know, we've just moved in and I have a baby on the way. All the things and I have to move away from my family and my support network with a six month old baby to your neck of the woods from the coast. And I'm like, I cried basically from the moment I left my dad because we'd been visiting. I left my dad's house, waved at my twin. I cried from that doorstep to the Alberta border. And I remember looking at that Alberta border and I said to myself, "Okay, sunshine. You got to toughen up. This is it. This is your life. Take it. Take it and run with it." And I had to, you know, being a 52 year old, I was told to shake it off, I don't know. I'm just a kid. Just shake it off, kid. So there's something super unhealthy about that.
Dawn Taylor
Parents in the 70s and 80s. Reason I have a job.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, exactly. Shake it off. And. Yeah. Moved to Edmonton with a brand new baby. And what was interesting is we were really close knit group, the engineers, and then we moved to Edmonton because it was so vast. Everybody spread out. So, everything we knew changed. We didn't have our social network that we were used to. We didn't have our friends and family that we were used to. It was very, very isolating, actually. And then we moved. We bought a house after 2 or 3 months living in the PMQs, which is the private military quarters, which you do pay for, by the way, people have these weird senses that the Canadian military gets all the free stuff. No, you pay for it. I'm just saying it's not your wage. Yeah, out of your wage. We pay for it. And it was fascinating because we moved into this cute little house in October. Maybe we moved in September. Yeah, we moved in in September and he went overseas in October. Well, I grew up in a big city. And you don't tell people that you're a single person by yourself, especially if you're a woman. So, I really had never experienced snow fall. And it was 1996. And if you look it's one of the biggest snowfalls on record for Alberta, Edmonton at the time
Dawn Taylor
Which is just lovely, just lovely.
Jenny Ryce
So I'm a B.C., B.C. girl from the coast and I've got yeah, I've got my, my brand new baby wrapped to me and I'm out there shoveling. And so, funny story, the neighbors. So I spent all winter out there, either at midnight shoveling when she was in bed or clearing all this snow. And we'll never forget when Scott came home and he was chatting the neighbors up because he had met them when they left. But I never said anything, so I didn't even think all these men and women on the streets are like, "What the hell is wrong with this guy? Like, he is an absolute jerk. Like, she's out there with this baby by herself doing all the shoveling." And so they thought they had no idea because I wouldn't say a word. And they thought he was just some absolute deadbeat. So? So when he's mowing the lawn, because of course, he left in October. Comes back in spring. Of course it was melted. And he's out there mowing the lawn and he's talking about the tour he's been on and blah, blah, blah. And they were all mortified that they didn't take the initiative. But, I wasn't going to tell them I was by myself. And yeah, so everyone thought he was a total jerk face until they realized he'd been overseas.
Dawn Taylor
That is so funny, right?
Jenny Ryce
Like, yeah. So when in doubt, you guys, if you see somebody and something seems off, ask them if they need something.
Dawn Taylor
Always.
Jenny Ryce
Like, I think of the hours I had to go out there in the dark. To deal with things by myself. Yeah, which is fine. I mean, again, I realize how powerful it makes you when you dig in, right? When you dig in deep and allow yourself to feel the stuff. Like, I was sad. There's a lot of times when I was in Edmonton for the first time. I was lonely, I was sad, I was in culture shock. No offense. Edmonton is flat and I was contained by mountains my whole life and the ocean. I grew up with my parents building a sailboat where they were pregnant with my twin and I. So like, I was in shock of where I was culturally, which sounds really weird because it's just a province away, but it was so foreign to me the first night and I ended up in Warrenville. Actually, I didn't even know where I was. We were at friend's house sleeping in Warrenville, and I cried myself to sleep. I was like, all I could hear was the highway. I was like, "What the hell, where am I?" That's awful.
Dawn Taylor
When we moved from BC, we always joked that like, our webbed feet dried out and we stopped being, like claustrophobic. But we almost felt the opposite for the longest time. Yes. When we got to Alberta, we were like. "This is not safe.".
Jenny Ryce
There's no boundaries.
Dawn Taylor
Like. It felt so weird to, like, be forever and drive forever. And directions were weird because you couldn't spatially, like, distance yourself to the hills. It was very weird. Like, I know the exact feeling you're talking about because moving here was so strange in that way.
Jenny Ryce
Except for the sky is so big, which I love that that is really cool. I remember feeling, which is a weird way to describe. I would say to people I feel claustrophobic, but in the opposite way, because there's nothing to ground myself like, yeah, I feel like I'm in that horror movie where you're running and then you flip and you're in the same spot again, like it was wild.
Dawn Taylor
It's a different feel. It is a very different feel that if you haven't done it, you you can't understand. But don't feel wrong.
Jenny Ryce
We loved our time in Alberta. It was amazing. We eventually built really beautiful roots and met some incredible people. But that first little bit was like, "Oh my gosh, where am I?" And I'm alone, right? I'm alone.
Dawn Taylor
So did you have your own career, your own schooling, your own training? Were you doing anything or was it, "No. I'm a military wife and I have to." Because really, you didn't know if you were moving or if a base was closing or if the deployments were happening or any of those things. I know, just I mean, not married to a military person, but married to someone who's schedule's different every single day.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
We spent years where he might be gone for a month. We'd get a phone call and he's home for two days. And it felt like it was almost like a responsibility. But also, let's be honest, something I wanted to do because he's my best friend and my husband and my lover and he's my everything, right? That I would drop everything.
Jenny Ryce
Everything.
Dawn Taylor
And so even now, even now that he's home way more often, if he's like, "Hey, can we hang out?" Like it doesn't matter. It does not matter. I'm like, the world falls away and all attention goes to him. Because that was our life for so many years. So, in this, you're building up this powerful way, in this resilience and these muscles and this, like, super crazy independence. So how did that work with, like, your own identity around having a career, having a job, having anything like that, but also that bounce back and forth between really single parenting and now co-parenting and that whole thing because, I mean, even in, so for Alberta, the oil field industry. Right? You talked to so many parents that struggle because it's like, "No, no, no. Like we have our boundaries and our rules and our systems and our processes and our schedules and everything is one way." And then dad comes home or mom comes home and it kind of throws all of it out the window, and it's all chaotic and exciting and fun and make it amazing. And that parent doesn't want to do the punishing, and that parent doesn't want to have to follow the strict rules, and that parent just wants to play. Right? So with both of those, how did you adjust to that?
Jenny Ryce
Well, why don't we talk about like the coming home part with the kids? Because that is such. And I think it's an important thing for any parent. It doesn't matter where you're going if you go away for a period of time. You need to, okay, so yeah, I'm going to share a little bit about the coming home because this is this can happen for any family. You don't have to be military. This is like a real thing. So many people work in travel nowadays. I had, we had a few house rules. My husband when he came home. His job was to be Dad. That's it. He was not allowed to discipline. He was not allowed to set rules. He was not allowed to have opinions. None of the things. He got to be a guest with our daughter and just enjoy her and be immersed in her. Because what's fascinating, when you go for a long period of time with a little person, they leave, you leave in there one way and you come home, they're another..
Dawn Taylor
Oh, 100%.
Jenny Ryce
So it's kind of like amnesia
Dawn Taylor
So fast.
Jenny Ryce
So, he would leave and she was crawling. He comes home and she's walking up and down stairs and he's freaking out. And I'm like, "Okay, so here's the deal. You have to trust that I have ensured that she's capable of what she's doing to this point.: So, his job was just to immerse himself in her and what was happening. So, that and that was like a two week period. So, if he was home for leave, that was two weeks. And he was just here to have fun and be with her and be with us. And yes, everything went, when your man comes home or your spouse or everything changes, you drop everything. You don't answer phone calls, you don't see friends, you do not work. You do like nothing happens. If you're fortunate enough, which I was to to be able to do that and coordinate that. But what we found is it allowed them a chance to reconnect without him having to be the bad guy all of a sudden, right? Like she already knows my rules. She already knew what was expected in the house, what wasn't. But he would be implementing rules that worked six months ago, not rules at work now. And it would allow him to learn through osmosis, watching and seeing what's the new way of being in the house. And we found for us, that worked really, really well because it allowed him to just observe and be, to enjoy. It's like you don't have to be the heavy. You don't have to be the guardian. You just got to enjoy, enjoy, be with her and spend time with her. And like, he's a TV guy, I can't really stand TV. No offense to TV people. It's just not my jam. I'd rather do other things. When he'd be there, they'd watch TV. You didn't see lots of TV in my house when it was me. I mean, there'd be some because, you know. You can't make it none, but there'd be some. But he loves watching TV, so that would be their things that they would do so it really helped their relationship though, because we were very fortunate. She never once shied away from him. Not once. She never once rejected him. She and I think it had something to do with the way we just allowed it to happen, right? It wasn't like, he tried to be the dad right away. He was always her dad, and that never changed. But he didn't have to do dad rules, if that makes sense. Right. And she. I was very blessed. She never really acted out about him leaving except one time and she was about four and a half. I think she might have been four. And I remember her being really upset and just kind of being nasty. And I remember saying to her and I was like, she's a smart girl. And I was like, "Honey, no matter how mean you are to me, your daddy is still not coming home." So, let's talk about how we can how we can make this good for us. Right? "I'm sad. You're sad, but being mean to me is not going to bring your dad back. Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter how many fits you throw. Doesn't matter what happens here. He is not coming back. We don't have a choice. But we do have a choice on how much fun we can have." And she never, but I've always been honest with my kids. I always tell them the truth and maybe don't tell them the adult truth. You know, do it in their terms. Now, they're adults, so of course they get adult truth. But back then it was always, you know, I can't bring him back, I can't. This is his job. People need him. We need him, but people need him as well. And we share him with those people. And we're lucky that we have him when we do have him. And they're lucky when they have him, when they have him. And she was able to grasp that really well. But again, every day we would draw a picture for dad when she was little. So I kept him very alive in her world, like it was, that is really, really important. And when I was sad, I didn't hide that from her. It's okay for her to see you sad. It's the truth. "I'm having a bad day. I miss your dad." Yeah, right. I remember she was having a bad day, and she was like being a little monkey. I call them punks. She was being a punk, and I was like, "Mom's going to lose her crap. I need a time out. This is going to go bad.: You know that feeling? Any parent. I'm sure you can feel this with me. Where the blood goes so far up into your face, you're like, "I'm going to fucking go."
Dawn Taylor
"I might actually kill someone right now."
Jenny Ryce
This might not go well. I'm like, I need to remove myself to my bedroom. I went to my bedroom, I shut the door and I'll never forget this. Oh my gosh, she was so sweet. I remember her coming to my door and literally we're talking seconds. I got a 32nd time out. Maybe if I was lucky. And she knocks on the door and she puts her little fingers under the door and she, like, wiggles them a little bit and it's like, "Mom, are you okay in there," And I was like, "Yeah, I just needed a timeout." Because of course, in that time frame of our lives, timeouts were how we managed. You know, that's how we manage things. So it's like if I'm giving her a timeout for behaving like that, I'm about to behave away. I don't want to behave because she's I just can't. We all get to a place in our lives where we become reactive by mistake. It's not what we want to do. So I was like, "Oh, I'm going to become like extra reactive here." And I don't know, I'm going to say something I'm regret or, you know, whatever. So I was like, I got to remove myself. But that 30 seconds and then little tap on the door and her little fingers was like, everything's fine. It's good. Right? It gave me enough to reset my brain and reset my nervous system and, yeah. So, my advice, create space and allow your kids to mold into the situation. This is their journey, too. You can't assume they're going to love their mom or dad or their their sister or whoever's been away. They're pissed. Possibly. They're possibly really angry and feel abandoned. Right? So that was part of my strategy. And I know it sounds weird to call it a strategy, but that was my goal was to keep him very alive in her life every single day. We did video recordings, so I would record little video messages. Not that we could send them. We had nothing to watch them on. But when he came home, he had this like little video archive of her chatting and, and so she would draw pictures and we would mail them with my letter that I wrote every day. And yeah, so there's ways to make it okay. And it's okay not to be okay, but don't fake it. Like living it. It sucks, but you got to live in it.
Dawn Taylor
So, let's go to the work piece of it, because you've had a very interesting career over all these years. At what point in all of this did it? I don't know if the right word is safe, but did it feel safe to even have a career or put that focus on yourself? Because I feel like that's also part of the identity, right? Is not like drowning into I'm a military wife and I'm a mom. But like, no, no, no, I want an identity outside of that.
Jenny Ryce
Well, and that's a really good point that you bring that up because that was one of the reasons why we and military, the PMQs were great, right? Because it was easy, convenient. You're in your community and your culture. It's fantastic. But we always, other than for investment purposes, obviously, because there's a whole financial piece attached to that. But we always tried to purchase a home outside of the base so that our girls would have an experience outside of military, if that makes sense, because we wanted them to have more exposure than just the military world, because it's pretty, like it's pretty.
Dawn Taylor
You know, all encompassing.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah. Like our whole life is military, which is fantastic. But we wanted them to have a little bit of a different picture. So fortunately, when I was dating Scott, I was actually going to hairdressing school. So unbeknownst to me, I developed a trade that was transferable, which was great. And I immediately when I went through hairdressing school, got my red seal trade, which meant I could work in every single province. This was before we were even serious about dating, but I was like, "Hm, this guy is my person, I need to be able to work everywhere." So, fortunately I had done that well in advance. But to answer your question, it was very challenging having a career because every time I moved, my skill set came with me, but my clientele base didn't. So, any of you listeners that are listening, if you're in a service business, you can understand how difficult that is to rebuild your business. And we would move on average every five years. So, it was very challenging. My resume got bigger, which was fantastic, and my skill set was bigger. But it didn't matter because when I move into a new town, I was selling myself all over again. Brand new rebuilding again, tapping into my resilience, learning so much about myself. And I think that's one of the reasons it led me down the pathway to education, because education in the beauty industry, I knew I needed more if that made sense. And it was I had to travel to do that work anyway. And by the time we had moved to New Brunswick, Scott was actually supposed to be teaching at the school, was going to be home for five years. And he's like, "Girl, it's your turn. Go see how far you can take this." So yeah, which was really cool. And. the only thing I wish I could have done was not been away as much as I was to do what I had to do. I didn't have to. That's not the right word - to do what I wanted to do, because it was kind of twofold. It really gave our youngest because of course, I didn't have number two at this point. We're talking nine year gap, right? So number one, got to have a lot of alone time with her dad and really, you know, connect in a way that they wouldn't have had I been home as much. When I say was away a lot, I was probably on the road, you know, 3 or 4 days a week kind of thing. So probably three, three days a week easily. I was on the road and I was working for a haircare company.
Dawn Taylor
But that's really from being home every single day as mostly the solo parent. Yeah, all of a sudden being gone that much?
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, it was wild. Super wild.
Dawn Taylor
What a shift for both of you.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, super wild and I think this is where I learned my skill set on burning myself out and still keep going, because I was never going to not make it okay.
Dawn Taylor
It's like a skill, but really damaging. Not a good one.
Jenny Ryce
No, no. I hope that oozed with sarcasm. Yeah, because I was not going to make it. Not okay in the house when I wasn't there. Like, I wanted to make sure that everybody felt loved, nurtured and cared for even though I was out doing my own thing. So that whole, like, you see those memes of the mom and she's a mom, she's, I mean, if anybody watched the Barbie, that monologue is probably it was written for me in that era. Doing all the things and, you know, and and on top of it, in my career, I was working for a really large haircare company. So I was on the show circuit. I was, you know, oh my gosh, I was on news coverage. I was doing like all kinds of things. So I was not only flying everywhere. I was doing all these like 12, 14 hour days and then come home and work behind the chair and do the mom thing, and the husband and wife thing and, friend thing. And so, yeah, I learned how to, there's some serious toxic, toxic skill sets developed for you.
Dawn Taylor
I always love that. one of my friends and clients said one time she's like "The greatest gift I was ever given was desperation." Like, you could do anything. Forced me to figure it out. And I always laugh at that because I've always said, like, "I wouldn't be who I am if I had not had the insane life I've had." It taught me how to dissociate in weird ways, and it taught me how to disconnect. You had to work too hard, and it taught me how to hustle too hard. And it taught me all these things that, they've been my greatest gifts and skill sets, and at the same time have been my double-edged sword of damage that I've had to balance out over these years. Right?
Jenny Ryce
Gosh. Right. Like I think, you know, I think back to when, you know, saying like, I can do anything. Every single house we moved in, I renovated the kitchen by myself. I am not a plumber. I am not electrician. I am not a carpenter. And I mean, I'm talking like every time, like the whole thing. I wonder what's going to be done next because I was like, I can do it, and I can't wait because I don't know if he won't be home long enough, you know, like, just figure it out. And back then we didn't have the Google Gods. Like, I legitimately had to like that literally, deliberately, even made up vocabulary, to make up vocabulary. You had to go and research it.
Dawn Taylor
Go to the library and take out books and figure things out.
Jenny Ryce
I had to talk to the guy at the Home Depot and be like, "Okay, so I'm thinking of ripping the ceiling out. Do you have any suggestions?" Oh, every house I owned. You know, the sunlight lights, big ass fluorescent bulbs behind a big wooden box.
Dawn Taylor
Double wooden boxes hung from your ceiling and made your room.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah. That would be phase one of the demo. Oh, came the light. Yeah. So I know that's off topic but it's that kind of stuff right. Like you just you learn to be. You learn to go for it. So, I mean, if I bring it all back, the key that I learned, though, in that time is, again. I can do anything if I really, really want to. So, now I look at things and like, "Do I really want to?" Where I used to say yes to everything to make it okay for everybody, right? People pleasing. I'm a recovering people pleaser. Super proud of it. Um, that would be, you know, part of the stuff that I inherited and learned as a young person in a young marriage, moving and all those kind of things. Those are some of the, you know, the darker sides of it, right? Like, I couldn't let anyone know I wasn't okay.
Dawn Taylor
It's good to be strong for everyone. Yeah, like you mentioned, landmines. You can't be weak.
Jenny Ryce
Oh, I got to be, I got to have my shit together
Dawn Taylor
So let's fast forward. Your husband's now retired?
Jenny Ryce
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
From the military. He was in for 26 years.
Jenny Ryce
25.
Dawn Taylor
He's been home for a while and is doing a civilian job who's about to retire, like retire, retire in the next six months, which I am so excited for him because I know how excited he is.
Jenny Ryce
Me too.
Dawn Taylor
But fast forward all these years, you spent 25 years worrying about your husband on all of his deployments. And now, your two precious baby girls signed up to do the same thing to you.
Jenny Ryce
So I have to say, Dawn, you're gonna laugh because I say to you, it's worrying. I'm fine, it's fine, I'm fine, it's fine.
Dawn Taylor
You say that all the time. And I laugh at you for it.
Jenny Ryce
Yeah, I'm like, it's fine. And of course, that is again dripping and oozing with sarcasm. My job as a mom is to support my children in their goals, dreams and ambitions despite the trauma it might give me. And they need to live their best life. And if that if that is their pathway and they feel they're going to do it serving. I'm very proud of that. I'm so proud of them. We were at a football game on the weekend and there was 26 of us there, and they asked all serving or pass serving members to stand up for the stadium to honor them. And I'm going to get emotional. These kids and my husband. And it was so cool because he was flanked by them. It was unplanned. And there he is. He's standing there and he's got his daughters on either side and my nephew with them. And I was like, damn, right? Like, damn, that is just like, the fact that they've chosen to put our flag on their back is a huge honor in a commitment to something beyond themselves. So if I have to worry a little bit and I have to keep the lights on and the candle burning, then it's the least I can do right there. Their job is to serve. My job is to fan their wings. And is it easy? Some days it's very challenging, but it's worth it because they don't tell you this part. Though it hurts no matter what they do, because they leave. It's like, so like, you know, they don't tell you. Like, I'm really blessed to have really amazing humans. I love my people. They're such good, kind, fun. We're dorks together. We have so much fun. Like, when when they have boyfriends or friends, they're shocked that how close we all are. They're like, "I never hang out with you." They're like, I've never seen anything like it. What's really cool is they they want that for their families and and, yeah, so we like each other. We actually genuinely like each other even though there's rules like, we're still, we're not the cool parents that are just, you know, fun times, good times. We have rules with boundaries and rules and so yeah, it's challenging. And then, of course, I have a nephew too, who's half-biologically mine because I'm an identical twin. So technically, we do share the same DNA. So, like, weirdly, I've always felt like he's, you know, a part of me too. But, yeah, so the worrying never stops. I just get really good at voicing my concerns and managing it. Yeah. And honestly, they got to live their life. Whatever that looks like. They have to. And I have to. You know, what makes me sad is when I hear people say, like, friends of ours, we were explaining what our youngest is doing as an image technician, and she's like, that is the coolest thing. I can't believe it. I really want to consider that. Like, this is amazing. And so I checked in with her the other day saying like, "Do you have any questions? Do you need any help? Like, are you seriously considering this?" And she's like, "My dad said, I'm not allowed." 1Well. And I'm like, "Don't put your fear on your children. Don't put your limitations on your children. And I don't care if they want to jump out of an airplane, okay? If they want to do stupid stuff like take a bunch of drugs and drive a car. Yeah, you need to, like, hammer the law down. I'm talking like, let them soar. Let them figure it out. They are going to find out what works for them and doesn't work for them." But the pathway to finding that out is who they become. Right? And I was crushed for her. "I was like, you just told this girl she has a glass ceiling. What the heck is wrong with you?" What do you mean? You told her no. What's broken in you that you got to put a boundary on her?
Dawn Taylor
On behalf of everyone I know that get told no all the time. Thank you.
Jenny Ryce
You're so welcome.
Dawn Taylor
I know we've laughed. It's been a it's been a very emotional journey in our office at times. You've worked for me, right? And we were friends prior.
Jenny Ryce
Yes of course, but yeah, like from a work perspective. From a work perspective.
Dawn Taylor
Right, and you know, walking through like the application and getting approved for your youngest and all the updates and the, you know, getting sent to base camp and graduating and first deployment, like, like all of the things, all of the things your daughter's wedding, finding out there, moving like I feel, like, I've been part of in this internal way, all the things as part of this.
Jenny Ryce
You have, girl.
Dawn Taylor
And, you know, we've shed the tears and we've cried and the worries and the sadness and the empty nest and the excitement and. And all of those emotions, and it has just been really, really beautiful to be part of it.
Jenny Ryce
Well, thank you for being a part of it. And that's so beautiful about having really deep, good friendships is you've never once said to me, "Well, didn't you know what you were doing?" Thank you. It's the question.
Dawn Taylor
I've had people say that to me over like, my husband's health. "Yeah, but you knew what you were getting into."
Jenny Ryce
Oh, but did I?
Dawn Taylor
I was 19. No idea what I was getting in at 19.
Jenny Ryce
Nobody's going to tell you what to do anyway, because you're brilliant and you're going to like, you know, you've know everything, don't you? Well, yeah. And we've often, we've often laughed about that. And yeah, you guys will have to listen to the podcast with you together, because recently, someone that we both know asked us separately if you could go back and tell yourself one thing about the other person, what would it be? In both of us said "Run, just run." and without the other person knowing?
Dawn Taylor
That is fabulous. And then we've talked about it after because I was like, I gave the worst response and it was one of my husband's employees, which was the funniest part. And I was like, but really? No, it's been amazing. Like it's we've fought through it and it's been phenomenal. But like, man, I would not wish that on any one of all the health stuff. But for either of us and the kids said that was what was interesting is like I said that on behalf of like myself being like, protect him from all the chaos he's going to have to deal with also protect myself, right? But yeah, like you've lived it. You've come out the other side of it, you're living it again and you still just support them. And I think that that's a really beautiful thing. Jenny, just wanted to say thank you. Thank you so much for allowing us to talk about this today and dig into this. And especially some of the strategies you used on how to keep that parent alive. I can imagine, even for parents that are gone for a week at a time or two weeks at a time, some of those strategies, some of those tools that you used would be so powerful. And allow those kids to love their parents in a different way when they come back.
Jenny Ryce
Well, it's my pleasure and I just want to leave with one thought. It doesn't matter if your person is gone for a day or six months, it still hurts. And people used to, say, well you know. Oh, but you've got so - and I'm like, it's still hurts. I miss him just as much. If he's gone for a day as if he's gone for six months. So don't devalue what you're going through because somebody else is going through something greater. And don't devalue what they're going through because you think yours is. Everybody's going through it their own way and just show support and love to each other. Right? It's compassion. Grace and compassion. Super important. Thank you, Dawn, for letting me share my story.
Dawn Taylor
You're welcome. I think I've always been curious, right. I've always been very curious what it was like and how long are deployments and what did you do to survive that and what does that look like?
Jenny Ryce
So, Ben and Jerry's ice cream and Survivor, when he went away. Seriously, it was the first time it ever came out. So I would have a girl friend over every week, and we would eat half a pint of Ben Jerry's ice cream, watch Survivor in order. Pizza like that was our, that was what we did.
Dawn Taylor
That is so amazing. I could tell that more. Girl, you and I need a Ben and Jerry's date soon.
Jenny Ryce
I know! We do!
Dawn Taylor
We do. All right. Thank you, thank you, thank you for everyone listening today and for hanging out with us. I hope that, if nothing else, you learn something from this. You took something from this. You understand someone in your world a bit different, or you could support them in a different way. Join us again in two weeks for another fabulous topic. And please tell your friends. The more people that feel understood, seen, heard, whatever it is, the more people that are just, I think opening up their eyes to different things, different life, different experiences, the better. Check out the show notes located at the Taylor Way.ca for more information and for all the contact information for today's guests. Because she's pretty dang fabulous and you should check out all her stuff and subscribe now on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you love the show, please, please leave a rating and review. Talk to you guys soon!
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Content Warning:
In this episode, we discuss some topics that listeners may find difficult such as ableism.
Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Bean Gill suffered an unfortunate predicament where she lost the use of her legs. However, she did not let that stop her from living life her way all while helping the people around her. Today, she is on this episode of Taylor Way Talks to help break stigmas regarding disabled people and dismantle the oppression towards them, whether it’s done purposely or subconsciously. At the end of the day, disabled people are people too, with their own feelings, wants, dreams and motivations and for Bean Gill, it’s high time the rest of the world recognizes that.
Who is this for
It’s a sad truth that disabled people are often seen as lesser people in society. A lot of preconceived notions exist and they are not given a fair chance. This episode is for anyone interested in the ups and downs that disabled people experience, and who wishes to learn more about them as individuals, rather than just their condition.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Bean Gill is an Indo-Canadian woman who has lived through many adversities. After being paralyzed by a virus in 2012, she found her purpose and co-founded ReYu Paralysis Recovery Centre, helping hundreds of Canadians reconnect their brain to their body, retrain their nervous system and most importantly redefine what is possible for people with disabilities. Bean has won many awards which have led her to her most recent project, being the star of CBC's docuseries called PUSH, available on CBC Gem.
Guest Social Links
Email - [email protected]
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/branzoid/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/Beanzoid/
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/bean-gill/
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Transcript
Dawn Taylor
Good morning. It is me, Dawn Taylor, your host. And today, we get to talk to one of my favorite humans. Her name is Bean Gill. If you do not know Bean, you need to. She's a movie star. No, I'm just kidding. But she does have a TV show. Bean is an Indo Canadian woman who has lived through more adversities than most after being paralyzed by a virus in 2012. Yes, paralyzed by a virus while she was on holidays. We will get into that a little bit. She decided not to just lay down and die. She came back fighting and she decided that it was time to, well, not even time. I'm sure she was doing this before, but she stepped up in a major way and she co-founded the ReYu Paralysis Recovery Center here in Edmonton, helping hundreds of Canadians reconnect their brain to their body, retrain their nervous system, but also to figure out what is actually possible for somebody with disabilities. She's won so many awards, spoken on crazy stages. She has a CBC docu-series called Push that you can watch on CBC Gem. I highly recommend you do. And she is here today. So we're going to have a super fun conversation on this. But we're here to break some ideas on a few things around disability. So what are we talking about today, Bean?
Bean Gill
I'm muted. Thanks for having me.
Dawn Taylor
No problem.
Bean Gill
Conversation. Um. Yeah. What are we going to talk about today? We're going to talk about all the things most people don't want to talk about. We're going to destigmatize sex, incontinence, bodily functions, having a disability, the attitudinal barriers that people have, the stigmas and biases and stereotypes that people have and hopefully break a lot of those down.
Dawn Taylor
100%. So let's start at the beginning, even just with your story. So, you and I met a couple of years ago. Someone had connected us with a zoom call, hit it off, and then we're kind of, how have we described ourselves? We're both like really motivated, driven business women. And so when I came back to Edmonton, you were very high on my list of no, I actually want to, lik,e meet you in person and hang out. And we had a blast at lunch. It's so much good food and I had such a good time. But we've also had some really interesting conversations around like where this all started, what all happened. And I think if you're open, let's even start there of, let's start with Vegas.
Bean Gill
Sure. Yeah. So 2012 is where the bulk of my story begins. I guess, um, you know, 2012 was. And hope remains the worst year of my life. That year in April, I left my ex-husband after he beat me up for the first and last time. You know, and then a couple of months later, my dad left our family, and that was decades in the making, but still really hard to go through on that day. And then two weeks later, I was in Vegas on vacation. Woke up on Friday the 13th and we were supposed to go to the pool that day. I, you know, went over to the window, open the curtain, saw that it was raining. I walked back to the bed and those four steps that I took would be the last four steps that I would take on my own. As I got into the bed, I experienced the most excruciating pain I've ever felt in my low back. Um, the pain was like a 20 out of ten. Very, very bad. And then I couldn't move my right leg. So as I lay there trying to move both my legs, only my left leg was moving. And then a couple of minutes later, it went prickly from my hip to my toes and like a kind of motion. And I was left paralyzed from the waist down. Within ten minutes.
Dawn Taylor
Okay. For you. For anyone listening. Hear that for a second? Like, trauma, like crazy. Probably finally on this trip, wanting to, like, rejuvenate, have some fun, find some laughter. And you literally go from standing and find to go to the pool to paralyzed in ten minutes. So, what happened? I mean, the medical reason for what happened.
Bean Gill
I mean, my story is super long and complex. And so if you want to hear the full thing, you can go to rambling with ReYu. That's our podcast, episode one. Um, but I left with a misdiagnosis of conversion disorder because they couldn't find anything diagnostically or physically wrong with me while I was in Vegas. And so, that condition basically means that you're so stressed out that your brain tells your body to shut down. Now, given my year and also the 30 prior to it, it made sense. Back then, I couldn't talk to you like this. I wasn't able to communicate my feelings. I could not speak my truth. I buried everything inside plastic, a smile on my face and said, ”I'm fine. Everything's fine.” And it clearly was not. Um, but one of the blessings of this misdiagnosis is that it forced me to see a psychologist and still see her to this day. Just saw her last week. And it's been one of, like I said, one of the biggest blessings because she taught me how to communicate. She taught me how to love myself. She taught me how to work through all of the trauma I've gone through and am going through and will go through because that's what life is.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. Oh. Preaching to the choir. Why you reckon we bonded in that, in a weird way of like, yeah, life's been hard, but we both have fought really hard to be where we are.
Bean Gill
Yes, we have. And then I didn't get my official diagnosis until three months after I was paralyzed. And my official diagnosis is transverse myelitis at t10 T11, which basically means inflammation of the spinal cord. And it can happen anywhere along your spinal cord. Mine happened at t10 T11, which is at my waist level, so my upper body is unaffected, thankfully.
Dawn Taylor
So, it was a virus that just hit your spinal cord and caused this?
Bean Gill
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
So I know people from the outside listening might think, “Okay, well, it's a virus. Can't you just take pills for that or antibiotics and you're fine again?”
Bean Gill
No, no. It's not that simple. The fact of the matter is, like our bodies are super complex, super, super complex. And the virus that paralyzed me, I believe it was the Epstein-Barr virus. EBV is super common. If you've ever had mono, you have it, right. Millions of billions of people have it. And there's many different strains of it too. Just most of the time it lays dormant in your organs and it feeds off of excess heavy metals and excess hormones. Um, those lucky ones like me, when we'll get to stage four. So stage four is when this virus senses a spike in your cortisol level, which is your stress hormone. And when it senses that spike, that's when it says to itself, “Now's my chance to go attack the central nervous system.” and it will attack either your brain or your spinal cord. And for me, I'm just like, “Man, like you couldn't attack something less vital, like my fat cells or something?”
Dawn Taylor
Can we manipulate this? Like we signed off on the design of this body, right?
Bean GIll
I have beef to pick with this engineer who signed off on this.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, that's so funny.
Dawn Taylor
You walk in. Can I ask, how old were you when this happened?
Bean Gill
I was 30.
Dawn Taylor
So 30 years old and all of a sudden, I mean, no different than someone getting in a car accident and all of a sudden being paralyzed. What were the biggest other than the obvious? I mean, like, I have to learn how to work a wheelchair and I have to figure that out. What were, like, the big stigmas and the hidden parts of it that nobody ever talked to you about or explained to you that would come with this diagnosis and new health issue?
Bean Gill
Oh man, how much time do we have?
Dawn Taylor
Much as you have.
Bean Gill
First and foremost would be like the attitudes, the attitudinal barriers that people with disabilities face. Of course, the physical barriers, right. Stairs, snow, whatever. But the attitudinal barriers is what really kind of took me by surprise. The judgment, the pity, the inspiration. You know?
Dawn Taylor
Can you explain that? Because you and I've talked about inspiration porn. It makes both of us very angry.
Bean Gill
It is. It's basically, you know, people coming up to you in the grocery store and saying, “Oh, my gosh, it's so good to see you out and about. It's great to see you out here.” And it's just like, so, you know, in the beginning, those kind of comments would destroy me. I would leave. I would want to go home. I would cry. I would feel less than. Now, I flip it back on them and, oh, my God, they let you out. They let you out. Did somebody congratulate you and give you an award for brushing your teeth this morning? Let me do that person today.
Dawn Taylor
That's awesome. And it's like, how do you feel? Does that make you feel good?
Bean Gill
No, no, it doesn't. But people say these things not to intentionally hurt somebody else, but to make themselves feel better because a lot of people don't know how to interact with people with disabilities. They don't know how to talk to them. They don't know what to do. And so they say what they are programmed to say, which comes from media and the media uses the medical model of disability, which is, “Oh, these poor people, they're invalids and they can't do anything. Let's call them vegetables. Right? Like, I just can't. It drives me absolutely bonkers. Um, like, do we need help? Sure. Sometimes. And do some people need help all the time? Yeah, they do. But that doesn't make them any less worthy of dignity and respect. So that's the biggest thing. And then add on being Indian, right? Layer of cultural stigmas and discrimination in my culture is If you have a disability, you are thought to bring shame upon your family. And, like my culture is one of the most toxic cultures because it's like everybody has to make sure our family looks perfect. If our family doesn't look perfect and the eyes of the community, we have failed. And so I'm here to point out all the imperfections in everybody's family.
Dawn Taylor
I have a lot of people in my world, from clients to friends that are in your culture, and it is 100% that.
Bean Gill
Yeah. And it's just like nobody's perfect. So where are these expectations coming from? Yeah, Colonialism from the British. That's where they come from. But I digress.
Dawn Taylor
It's okay. So for someone who is sitting back and going like, “Oh, I think this is me, I've been the one who's treated someone this way.” Let's dive into misconceptions. So if you have, if you looked at the title of this episode, you realize we're diving in, we're getting right to the root of this. Let's talk misconceptions.
Bean Gill
The biggest one for both males and females with spinal cord injuries is can you have sex? And if you're on a dating app or you're single and you're trying to meet somebody, that's one of the first questions you get. And it's just like, I get it. People want to know. People are curious, right? So that's why I'm open about these things because I want to dispel a lot of this stuff. Um, but yeah, most people can and you know, there's different ways of doing things. If you don't have any sensation, there's different parts of your body that do become erogenous. And that's different for each person because our bodies are so complex and actually very, very smart, right? Um, but yeah, that's one of the biggest questions that most people have, and we addressed that in season one of Push. My friend Brittany, her and her husband, he's able bodied, she's not. They do a video of the sex positions that they use and they're fully clothed, but they talk about and they show how they have sex. And you know, a lot of people want to know. So I'm glad she did it.
Dawn Taylor
That's awesome.
Bean Gill
Yeah. But there's just like there, that's one of the biggest things. And then there's also a lot of taboo around that, too. Right? And you know, I have had that conversation before as well of, we need to erase the taboo ness around pleasure and intimacy because we all want it. We deserve it. We need to have it. And it's more than just sex. You can find pleasure and intimacy in the foods you eat and the clothes you wear in the activities you do. So, just kind of breaking those down and giving people permission to explore these different things and different avenues and also breaking down their own. Like biases as to what sex is and what pleasure and intimacy means to them.
Dawn Taylor
So, what are some other taboo topics around paralysis and being in a wheelchair that people aren't, that we need people to be aware of?
Bean Gill
Sure. I mean, bodily functions. Right? So, a lot of people think, “Oh, you have a spinal cord injury or you can't walk. Oh, that's too bad.” But it's so much more than that. Like, our spinal cord controls our whole body. And a big part of that is temperature regulation, also bowel and bladder function. And I lost bowel and bladder immediately after I was paralyzed. And, as most people do. Um, and then so, you know, you're now using a catheter to pee, right? And to go to the bathroom, like, to poop. It's called digital stimulation and that's basically sticking your finger up your butt and stimulating the rectum for the poop to come down and out. And, you know, we talk about it openly now because. we're just so sick and tired of being made to feel ashamed of how we have to deal with our bodily functions. Every single living being on this planet, even amoebas, shit. So, why are we made to feel shameful and dirty and insecure about how we do it? So, that's why we're here, to dispel all these myths and to talk about these things so that they become normal, right? Like incontinence, like, so I can feel when I have to pee and when I have to poop, but I can't hold it. My sphincters don't work. And so when I need to pee, like, I need to pee now and you know. In the very beginning, again, if I peed myself, that would ruin my day. I would go home. I would cry, I would be mad. I would feel sorry for myself. Now, I'm just prepared for it, right? Like I'll wear pull ups. I will have extra pants on me all the time, extra underwear, all the stuff simply because this is a part of my life. And, if I could do something to fix it, trust me, I would.
Dawn Taylor
Isn't it interesting? It's being in a wheelchair. There's the obvious disability piece, right? That someone can look at you and go, “Oh, yeah, okay, that makes sense.” Listening, right? Like, even I didn't know a lot of this. And I'm like, Thank you, thank you for sharing because I'm a curious human. And also it's like, okay, that makes more sense to things, right? But I've often said, like, I was at a lunch meeting the other day and if I get a tickle on my throat, my sphincter on the other end doesn't work. So I don't have my upper sphincter on my, over my stomach, right? So if I get a tickle on my throat because of being on life support, because of the brain aneurysm, I can't just clear my throat or cough or drink and have the tickle go away. I projectile vomit like a party trick. It's the dumbest thing ever. And I've literally been walking through a grocery store with someone who just reached over calmly and grabbed like a box of crackers and just opened it and peeked into it and closed it and set it in my cart. Oh, like more times than you can imagine. I've had to do things like this or a bag of chips or a coffee cup or whatever. And I was at a lunch meeting and I just, like, I have to push on my throat. Like I have to literally, like, shove my fingers in between that little V piece and find where the tickle is and actually, like push my throat to scratch it. It's literally like, I have to scratch that, right? Yeah. And they're looking at me like, “What the hell are you doing?” And I'm like, My eyes are watering and I'm like, “I'm trying to not throw up on your face. Like, I just need you to know this.” Like, because, if this comes out, it's like a 1980s horror movie and it goes, Oh, my husband literally measured it like eight feet one time. Like, I like no, it's like projectile forceful vomiting. Oh, yeah. It's hilariously bad. But it was interesting because after I was done, he was like. “Just so you know, that didn't look super weird. Like if you've ever doubted yourself in public when you've had to do that,” he goes, “It just felt like you were checking your neck or your throat.” Like, it wasn't like this big obvious like, what the hell's going on situation. I just wanted you to know that. And I was like, “You know what? Thank you. Thank you for telling me that.” But is this weird? Yeah. Covid was fun, by the way, when every, like, cough meant you were going to murder someone. But it is a weird disability, and it's a complication that I now have had to deal with for the last 25 years that most people would never have to deal with and have no idea. And it's it always makes me cringe but laugh when a new client comes to see me and I'm like, “Just a heads up, this happens and I might have to get up and go puke and come back.” I'm okay. And I'm like, Oh my word. “Like, it's such a pain in the ass.” But it's just part of my reality. And I wish I don't know if I've ever really talked about that as being like one of my biggest frustrations because it happens everyday. Right. It's just this weird thing that I have to deal with, right? Yeah, It's these, like, hidden little complications that and that so many of us have that nobody talks about.
Bean Gill
And it's because of that. Like, I need to appear perfect, right? Like, I used to be a perfectionist and a people pleaser. And so, like, I've really had to dismantle all of that in myself to be like, “No, I am who I am and my body is the way it is. And I will always strive to be as healthy as I can.” That will always be my goal and my trajectory in life. But what I'm dealing with is my reality. And it's, I'm not alone in that. And so by sharing it, like, first of all, we created a huge community, right? Because now people don't feel alone, nor do they feel shameful or embarrassed of these things that all of us deal with. Yeah, it's important to talk about it and to destigmatize these things.
Dawn Taylor
It is so important. And that's why that's why I was like, “Hey, do you want to come on my podcast and talk about this?”
Bean Gill
Yes, yes, I do want to talk about this.
Dawn Taylor
So are there any other big, I don't know,. You know, those curiosity things that people like, the stigmas that people put on you?
Bean Gill
Yes. Okay. So another one was specifically with spinal cord injury is, people are like, “Oh, you're paralyzed. Oh, okay. So you can't feel anything. You can't move anything. Right?” That's what most people assume. But actually, the majority of people can feel and they can move. There is definitely a percentage of the population that cannot and I will not distract from them. They definitely can't feel, can't move anything, but the majority of us can. And so we need to, like, dispel that to that. Like, “Oh, you're paralyzed, you can't do anything.” That's not, that's not true. And then also, within the spinal cord injury world, your diagnosis is either complete or incomplete and have such a big beef with these words because so many people put so much of their identity on words. And what it means is what it's supposed to mean is a complete injury. People think your spinal cord has been severed completely in complete meaning and completely. But what it actually is, is the doctor will stick their finger up your butt. If you clench, you're incomplete. If you don't clench, you're diagnosed complete. Basically your sphincter function. But like I said, they wrap their–
Dawn Taylor
Okay. Can we pause on that for a sec?
Bean Gill
Yes.
Dawn Taylor
They seriously determine your level of paralysis based on your asshole.
Bean Gill
Not the level. The level is determined basically, like where your injury is. Yes, complete versus incomplete is they stick their finger up your butt and you clench or you don't clench. It's archaic.
Dawn Taylor
That is. Sorry. Like I'm blown away at that.
Bean Gill
Yep.
Dawn Taylor
Is that like, on any level? How is that okay?
Bean Gill
Because it was okay 50 years ago. It was okay 80 years ago. And these are the things that don't change. In 1920, there were researchers who said the central nervous system can regenerate. Those researchers were laughed at by the general research community. They were right. They were right. And these other people are the reason that this whole stigma is here is because they were closed minded. They couldn't see what these other people were seeing and their ego stopped them from opening their minds to what is actually possible. Our brain is very plastic. If you can learn to brush with your left hand, guess what that is? Neuroplasticity, you're learning so you can reconnect your brain to your body. You can do all these things because our brain is incredibly complex and incredibly intelligent.
Dawn Taylor
It is. So do you find and maybe this is super controversial and you can answer it or not, but I find and I had this conversation this morning with a client that, it's very hard to fight for yourself. It is very hard to step up and actually say, “No, I'm not okay, settling with where I am.” Do you find that in your community as well, that a lot of people will just curl up and die and be like, “Nope, this is my diagnosis and I'm done.”
Bean Gill
Yeah. Straight answer. Yes. And it's because. Okay, so people with disabilities are the biggest minority in the world. There's over a billion of us, right? And disabilities don't discriminate. You can be from any walk of life. You can be any size, any color, have as much money or have zero money, and you can end up with a disability. So there's such a vast array of people. And what I have seen through my last 11 years of living with a disability is that most people are sheep, right? Most people are followers, they are not leaders. And these followers will listen to these experts who are typically able bodied people about what they can or cannot do with their disabled bodies and the limiting beliefs from the healthcare system, from the media, from cultural stuff will get placed on these people and then they will start to believe it. They will start to live those limiting beliefs and they will stay within those confines of those limiting beliefs. I was there. I trusted my health care professionals. I actually lost all of my own knowledge being an x-ray tech working out since I was 12 years old. I forgot all of that and put all my trust in my health care professionals. Did they help me? Yeah. Did they help me? To the best of their ability? No. And it wasn't until I started taking true ownership of my recovery journey that I started that. That's when I started seeing actual growth and actual recovery. Because it is up to you. And now being in the role that I'm in now, like I get asked many times, “Do you think I'm going to walk again?” And my answer is always, “Do you think you'll walk again? Because if you think you will, you will. If you think you won't, you won't. It doesn't matter what I think.” But yes, I believe everybody can walk again because that's literally my business, right? You know? .
Dawn Taylor
No, and thank you for saying that, because it's, I talk all the time about one of my one of my biggest whys behind why I do what I do is trying to eradicate this bullshit belief that there's a socially acceptable level of broken. And that's just as good as we're going to get. Yeah, no. You're just always going to struggle with anxiety and you're always going to struggle with depression and you can't actually heal and you can't actually. And I'm like, “No. Fuck that.” Excuse my language, but fuck that. Like because so many people have bought into it and they've just settled in.
Bean Gill
And to these people, I say disrupt the system, ask your doctors, question them, do not take what they say as to be the definitive answers because they don't know. And now, I mean, I've been told that I'm a difficult patient and said, “Yeah, I'm going to make you work for all that money you're making.”
Dawn Taylor
That's awesome.
Bean Gill
I'm not going to believe everything you say. I'm going to ask to see the research papers. I'm going to ask to see all these things. And so now I had a terrible situation with a women's clinic here in Edmonton. And when I went there, the doctor, without even making eye contact with me, she has a clipboard and she comes into the room. She's like, “Hi.” She's like, “Okay, so you have transverse myelitis, okay? So you can't move and you can't feel, okay.” And then I was like. “Um, excuse me. Hi. I'm actually a human being sitting here.” and these are the things I actually said to her, and I said, “I can feel and I can move. I can't feel hot, cold or pain below my level of injury, but I can feel and I can move.” And then she goes on to say, “Okay, so go ahead and tell me all of the things you can't do.” And I said, “All right. But before I do that, I'm going to ask you.” And I opened up my phone and I open up my notes page and I said, “You tell me all the things that you can't do. Have you climbed Mount Everest? Are you an Olympic swimmer? Are you a marathon runner? Are you a mountain climber? Are you an archaeologist? So go ahead. Tell me all the things you can't.”. And she looked at me and I held eye contact with her for like a minute and said, “How does that make you feel? Do you feel good about yourself?” I'm like, imagine how that makes all of these other people with disabilities feel when you don't even make eye contact with them and you assume these things and then you ask them to talk about all of their limitations. And I will say that to every single doctor, you know, I will be joined by anybody. I'm not scared of anybody. Don't care how many letters you have behind your name. If you're a human being, you're on the same level as me, man. And you sit down when you talk to me. That's my attitude. Because like, you have to write like, what do these people know what you've read in textbooks, what the what big pharma has taught you?
Dawn Taylor
Oh, right there.
Bean Gill
I get very passionate about this because it's so frustrating. I've said to him, I've said to one of my doctors before, “Okay, remind me again how long you've had your spinal cord injury for.” Oh, you know I don't have one. I was like, “Oh, okay. And so tomorrow you have a spinal cord injury. Are you going to accept the advice that you're giving me today?” And then they usually break eye contact and said “Absolutely not. You're not going to. You're going to use all of your money. You're going to use all of your resources to find the best therapies around the world to help you. But why are you going to stop your patients from doing that to.” Go home and reflect on that. It's tiring having to be this person to question everything, to, you know, educate constantly. But if we don't do it, these stigmas continue, these stereotypes continue and we will not disrupt the system.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, and it's, you know, it's funny, as I was just sitting here, as you were talking and thinking like what stigmas and stereotypes did I think? 1.4s Growing up of someone in a wheelchair. From watching TV, from watching movies, from just life and people talking. I always for some reason, and I don't know why. Because like, I grew up with Terry Fox, right, Like, and those sorts of things. But it's like. I always had a stigma that in order to be in a wheelchair and have a physical disability, you also had to have a mental disability.
Bean Gill
That's a big one
Dawn Taylor
RIght? That those two were intertwined. And sometimes, sometimes they are.
Bean Gill
Sometimes they are.
Dawn Taylor
Right? But it's like, it's like when someone who doesn't speak English and someone talks to them and they just think if they talk louder, they'll understand them.
Bean Gill
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
And I think that as society we need to human better, like so much better And we do. We need to step up and actually get curious and go, “Hey, you know what? I don't understand your culture. I don't understand what it's like to be in a wheelchair. I don't understand what it's like to fill in the blank. Let me learn.” Yeah, let me learn so that I can human better with you.
Bean Gill
Yeah. It's creating those safe spaces for these conversations to be had. Right. And like, as people with disabilities, as annoying as it is, we are the ones that have to go out into the able bodied world and show people where normal people do. We're regular people. Whether we have an intellectual disability or not, we are still regular people who deserve respect and dignity. So disability etiquette is something that I talk about a lot, right? Because like, we need to perpetuate that and it's something just as simple as making eye contact with somebody.
Dawn Taylor
Okay. So give us some disability etiquette, okay? Give us some like, because I know like even when we went out for lunch, right, it was like it's a different thought of like, “Oh, we need to pick a restaurant that's really easy, that doesn't have stairs, that has space between tables.” Right? All those things. But yeah. What are some like, top disability etiquette things that people can walk away with?
Bean Gill
Some easy, easy, easy ones. First and foremost, making eye contact, right? So if you see you're walking down a mall or the airport or you're in the movies or you're somewhere and you see somebody with a disability, most people's innate reaction is to look away. Most people. But then we as people with disabilities feel ignored. We feel like we're not here, we're transparent, like you cannot see me. Do I not take up space? And I'm not worthy of taking up this space. So make eye contact. Just look at them. Crack a smile, right? Even if you're wearing a mask, you can still tell when somebody's smiling at you. Oh, that's all it takes is eye contact and maybe a head nod or something. Right. Now, that person like, to you in your day, a blip in the radar. Not even a blip. Right to that person. They now feel seen. And the three most basic things that humans need are to feel seen, to be heard and to be loved. That's it. And so simple. Simple. Make eye contact. Okay. Second, talk to them. If you want to talk to them, talk to them. But there's certain ways to talk to people, right? So one, of course, do not ever, never ask anybody, “Hey, what's wrong with you?” Don't ask them that.
Dawn Taylor
What? That's not appropriate.
Bean Gill
But a lot of people will. Because they don't know the language to use. And this is also like a very gray area of whether you should ask somebody about their disability story. Because, a lot of people it is very traumatic and a lot of people don't want to talk about the most traumatic incident in their life over and over, over and over again to complete strangers. However, totally, a lot of us are okay with it, too, right? So many of us don't mind sharing our stories. We don't mind telling people what happened. We're at the point now where we can make fun of it. We can laugh it off, however, so just be aware that you might run into some people who are super grumpy and don't want to talk to you and respect that as well.
Dawn Taylor
So what is the right language to use?
Bean Gill
Okay. So, generally you can say, you know, you see somebody using a mobility device, you could be like, “Hey, like, I see you using a mobility device. Would you mind telling me a little bit more about it?” Or if you see a parent with a child with a disability can be like, “Hey, like, I see your kid has a disability? I would love to learn more about my community and I love learning about people. Would you mind sharing your story with me?”
Dawn Taylor
What a beautiful way to word it.
Bean Gill
Right? Like when you come from that place of genuine curiosity. Like I actually want to know more about you. People will tell you too much, right?
Dawn Taylor
I can see that.
Bean Gill
But I've been asked. Oh, like. “So what happened to you?” And, you know, like, that's gossip. You're asking me so you can gossip about me? And that's the Indian community. Majority of it. Right. “Can you tell what happened? See what happened to these people so I can go talk about it with my family and with this person and that person?” Yeah. And in those instances, I'll still say like, “Yeah, a virus attacked my spinal cord.” And then they're kind of, like, because most people don't expect me to say that, they're like, “Oh, car accident.” or whatever, right.
Dawn Taylor
100%. Yeah,
Bean GIll
But yeah, it's honestly, it's your body language. It's your tone of voice. It's your Intention behind asking the question. It will come through when you ask it. So ask yourself, “What is my intention here? Is it pure? Is it to gossip? Why do I want to know?”
Dawn Taylor
Which is awesome. You know what? I. I don't know at all what it's like to live in your shoes or to live your life. But after the brain aneurysm, I was in a wheelchair for a few months. And had half a shaved head and had doubled my body size in a hospital on steroids and. Man. I remember at one point I went to the dollar store because it was so sick of people looking at my head. It was like, stop staring at the scar. Stop staring at the big shaved section, stop staring at it. And it was going into summer and I had my husband, who was my boyfriend at the time, go to the dollar store and buy the biggest, ugliest fake tattoos he could find. And I covered my legs in them because it was like then people are so busy looking at my legs, it won't they won't notice what's going on with my head. I was just like, got to love being 18. Dealing with trauma. Right?
Bean Gill
The technique.
Dawn Taylor
The technique I used. Right? Like, it actually makes me laugh. Even that I told you that I was like, I love that. That's what I thought was a good fix instead of, like, calling people on their shit, right?
Bean Gill
Yeah,
Dawn Taylor
There was such a stigma and there were so many looks. And like, I remember sitting in the vice principal's office crying one day because I was like, I don't even know how to get to my classroom. Because it's all stairs. Yeah. Like I literally cannot go up the stairs. And he's like, “Oh, yeah, okay. There is an elevator somewhere.” And I was like, “Seriously?” Like, This shouldn't be so hard.
Bean Gill
Agreed, it shouldn't be, but our society is still so ableist and mean. You know, people are talking about diversity, equity, inclusion all over the place since 2020. But. Talk is cheap.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, there's no action.
Bean Gill
It's cheap. There's zero action happening as to, like, people actually being inclusive I mean, there are some people that are taking action. I'm not going to just distract from them. They are doing the work. But there's a lot of people that aren't and big corporations are a big part of that, that they are not actually doing what they can to make things more accessible or inclusive. And it's just simple things that they need to do to make things inclusive to be, for example, I want a very prestigious award last year and they told me everybody else will be going up on stage to get their award and you're going to come in front of the stage and said, “No, I'm not. I'm going on the stage.” And they said, Oh, but like the ramp didn't work for this other lady, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, “Get a better ramp. Good for her. I'm going on stage, figure it out.” And I went on stage and like, you are not segregating me and keeping me lower and not even just like the metaphorical action of it, but like I'm physically lower. No, I will not take this. And for me, one of the hardest things to get over after being paralyzed and I'm still not over it, is having everybody look down at me and having me to have to look up at everybody when they talk to me. I can't stand it. Absolutely cannot stand it. I used to be the girl who would walk in with six inch heels, be one of the tallest people in the room, Command attention. And now people don't even see me. Yeah, it's really hard.
Dawn Taylor
So what is the safe, comfortable way for that? Right? Because it feels, I think, on my end, like it would feel condescending or minimizing. To, like, squat down in front of you. Yeah. And do that, right? Like, maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. It feels. like, childish. And you're not a child, right? I don't want to be like that. But if that is the right thing to do.
Bean Gill
Yeah. I think it's situational. Okay, so, like, what I usually say is like, okay, say we're having like, you're coming to ask me a question. It's 30 seconds.. It's fine. Just bend over and talk to me.. Or like, it's fine. I can look up and talk to you. Or if you are a very tall person, like if you are six feet and above and we're talking for more than a minute, like ask be like, “Hey, do you mind if we move over here so I can sit down to talk to you?” Like if there's no chairs around, right? Or I will see people are getting uncomfortable. “Like, do you want to go sit down?” I'll just ask them, like, “Do you want to sit down?” Because it does get awkward and people don't know what to do or people will. They'll take a knee or they'll kneel or they'll squat, but then they can't get back up, right. Then they’ve got their hands on my legs. They're using me. But it's happened a number of times.
Dawn Taylor
Okay, that's really bad but hilarious.
Bean GIll
And so we just kind of use your judgment, right? Like if you're having a longer conversation. Just go ask to sit down somewhere so that you can speak or like at networking events where it's loud and hard to hear. Like it's really hard for me to project my voice up to somebody who's six foot two. So it's really situational. And depending on, like, how long the conversation is, I've had people kneel down to talk to me too, and that's fine too. I mean, it's hard to offend me unless you say something racist. It's hard to offend me. So I will just kind of like, correct people and like, you know, most of my friends will do the same thing, too. Um, so, yeah, I don't know, like, it's kind of there's no right or wrong way to approach this and mean like, you're not super tall. So when we were standing and I was sitting, it wasn't that awkward of a conversation because you were like, right there.
Dawn Taylor
No, I'm real short. Tall for a hobbit. Oh, is there? Is there anything like I know one of my one of my personal struggles is I would love to host you and cook for you and love on you in my home, but I don't know how to get you in my home.
Bean Gill
I mean, wherever there is a problem, there is a solution, right? So myself, I am now able to walk up a few stairs. So if you can carry my wheelchair up for me, I can walk up the stairs or I could scooch over onto my butt and like, bum up the stairs and somebody else take my chair up and then I can hop back into my chair. Or if we have strong people around, they can just lift me up in my chair up the stairs. Right?
Dawn Taylor
Then I'm inviting you over because I love to feed people and cook.
Bean Gill
Yeah. Love to eat. So I'm down
Dawn Taylor
And have a quite wheelchair friendly house. There's lots of open space!
Bean Gill
I'm lucky and privileged to use a manual wheelchair. My wheelchair weighs like 30 to 40. Right. But somebody in a power chair doesn't have those luxuries. A power chair weighs a minimum of, like, 200. Right. So lifting one of those bad boys?
Dawn Taylor
Not happening.
Bean GIll
Not happening. Right? And so, you know, there's, like, different levels to this. Right? People have different levels of ability. Different levels of independence. Yeah. Um, if our city didn't love stairs so much, the authentic upstairs, we would be able to have more visible homes or have more zero entrance homes. Right. Um, and this is just a big problem that we have here and that we will continue to have until we have true inclusion with universal design.
Dawn Taylor
And it's true. We were talking before we got before we started the podcast, we were talking about, you know, even like for you to go to hotels or for you to go out and want to like hang out at a cabin somewhere or do any of those things, It's so hard to find places that are, that are available for you. that actually work.
Bean GIll
Yes, it is really hard. I mean there are more and more now thankfully, right, but yeah, they get booked up really fast and mean even take hotels for example. Okay. Hotels have to have wheelchair accessible rooms. They must by law, but they do not have to reserve those rooms for people who need them. I have called many hotels and even going to Mexico where you pay six months in advance to book a room, they will tell you that when you get to the resort that we cannot make sure we cannot hold the accessible room for you. Somebody else might be in it. And I'm like, “What? I'm literally reserving this room six months in advance. I've given you my money telling you I'm coming here.” And they still say you can't. And I've had like, you know, I've gone to other hotels, local hotels and stuff too, and been like, Yeah, like and luckily, like, I don't need a wheelchair accessible room. I can make a regular room work for me.
Dawn Taylor
But not everyone can. And that's not the point.
Bean GIll
No. And so, you know, I've had people, hotels say, “Oh yeah, we have two accessible rooms, but currently they're being used right now.” And I'll ask, are they being used by somebody who needs their wheelchair accessible room “Oh, no. Can you ask them to move to a different room?” “No, we're not allowed to disrupt.” Oh, you can disrupt my life. That's not a problem at all. But these are. This is covert ableism.
Dawn Taylor
So what are some awarenesses on that? Because I'm even thinking about that in regards to like it drives me crazy when people park in the wheelchair accessible spots at a grocery store.
Bean Gill
It's funny you say that because tomorrow morning we're hosting a protest. We're holding a peaceful protest against our accessible parking stalls being taken all the time because we are so sick of it. Every single day we find somebody parked in our stalls and the excuses we get are just ridiculous, right? Like, “Oh, I'm just doing in for a minute and just picking somebody up, dropping somebody off.” Uber Eats and DoorDash are the worst. They're the absolute worst. Um, and so, yeah, we're, we're going to, we're going to have a protest tomorrow morning and just kind of disrupt the system a little bit and say, “Well, we're going to take your spots. How do you feel about that?” Yeah. And so now what my friends and I have started doing is just like, “Okay, you're going to park here for just a minute. I'm going to park right behind you so you can't move. And guess who's going to get the ticket and the tow? Fine. It's not me. That's you.”
Dawn Taylor
That's awesome.
Bean GIll
And so that's what we've started doing is “Okay. Go ahead. You're going to be here for a minute. I'm going inside for a few hours. See you later.” Right. But also, people are violent and people get very angry. And so you have to watch out for your safety. It's the entitlement that people have. It's the privilege that people take for granted and don't check in themselves. And that oh well, this is my spot. Like go somewhere else. And it's just it's so frustrating. The bathroom stalls is another one, right? So going back to disability etiquette, simple things I say is don't park in our parking stalls. Don't use our bathroom stalls. And I'll show you a quick story with you as to why not to use our bathroom stalls. Okay. Like I said before, my sphincters don't work. So if I got a pee, I got to pee. Now, one day we were driving my mom and I was like, “Oh, I really got to go to the bathroom.” We saw a Walmart. So we pulled off, went into the Walmart and, you know, my mom pushed me into the bathroom and I'm wheeling by 15 regular stalls to the one accessible stall. At the end. I gotta a pee so bad I'm just wheeling, wheeling, wheeling. I ram into the door because that's how open most doors, right? I just ram into them. It's locked. Fuck. I look through the crack in under the bottom and I see two able bodied feet sitting at the toilet like. God. And so I'm sitting there, I'm like like kind of calming my breathing, relaxing my body, trying not to think about it. And, you know, 20 seconds, 30 seconds,. I'm like, okay. Then I knock on the door. “Are you almost done in there?” “No, I'm not. You're gonna have to wait till I'm done.” “Okay. Well, this is the only stall I can fit in, so you're going to have to hurry up here.” And this lady didn't. So I peed my pants sitting right outside the accessible stall, unable to fit in any of the other stalls. She comes out and not even a sorry or anything. And I gave her a mouthful. And then she goes to the sinks where my mom is, and my mom gave her a mouthful and I had to go into the stall where she took a giant shit. I have to sit in her warm shit smell to clean myself off. Is this dignified?
Dawn Taylor
Not at all.
Bean Gill
Accessible bathroom stalls are there for people who need them. Not for people because they want the extra space to take a shit. And the gray area is with kids. Right. That's a gray area because most, most accessible bathroom stalls, that's where the change table is to. Which is a big no no. If you look at the ADA and actual accessibility legislation, you cannot put that in there. But most people do because, hey, space, we only have big stuff. So why not just stick everything in there? Right? And like, I don't get mad at moms with kids because this is the gray area. Where else are you supposed to go? Right. But when I was just in Seattle's airport, it was magnificent. They had a giant accessible stall and then all of their other stalls were also accessible. They weren't all big. They were big enough. The doors were big enough for me to go in. They had grab bars in all of the stalls and they were big enough for a mom and two kids to fit in there as well. So that's a solution. Make everything accessible, stop retrofitting it for us to be like, “Oh, wait a minute, Let's, let's pop this in there, there, now it's accessible.” That's what our city of Edmonton is great at, is retrofitting retro fixing mistakes from 20 years ago. Oh, look, they have such a hard time thinking about the future. Like if we just thought about universal design right now, you won't have to go back and fix this in 20 years. It'll already be fixed.
Dawn Taylor
So as a business owner, what is something right now that a business owner could do? If they have a storefront property, they have a business, What is something that they could do?
Bean Gill
Um, first and foremost, talk to your landlord about the snow removal company that they have contracted. Make sure snow removal is done properly. Make sure that there is at least. Okay. So code says one accessible stall per six regular parking stalls. Anybody who does code, ook at like all these big Costco grocery stores. There's no code following there. Right. So making sure that there actually is a wheelchair accessible parking spot or two, is there a curb cut so you can get up onto the sidewalk to enter your building? Is that curb cut in the accessible parking stall? This is also a big no no. But a lot of people do it because to save space and to save time, a lot of snow removal companies will shovel all the snow off the sidewalk into the accessible stall via the curb cut and leave the curb cut filled with snow and ice. It's terrible. So people need to educate themselves as to what curb cuts are, why they're important, and then talk to their landlord. And the snow removal company about making sure that it's done properly. As far as accessibility goes, having an automatic door button for your exterior door of your building, it's a cost, that's for sure. It's about $3,000. But now you're opening up your business to so many people that wouldn't be able to access it. If there is a step to get into your building, think of constructing a plywood ramp and having it whether you can. If you can't leave it out there all the time, but you see somebody trying to come in, be like, “Hey, hang on, I got a ramp for you.” And pop the ramp out, help them up, leave it there until they can exit. And then now you are an accessible place and that person is going to tell all their friends about that. “Hey, look what these people did for me. It was amazing. They actually made it accessible.” Because too many times we get, “Oh, sorry. No, we're not accessible. Sorry for your luck.” And it's like, “Well, can we go a little bit further and try?”
Dawn Taylor
Right? Because how many people do you think like or do you know in Edmonton need accessibility?
Bean Gill
Oh, buddy. Mean just look at my client list alone It's over 300 people in my Wheelie Peeps group chat. We have like 110 people. But, like, statistically Edmonton as a population have a million. So guaranteed at least 10,000 people have disabilities at least.
Dawn Taylor
That's a lot of people. But it's not just the person. It's their entire family. Yeah.
Bean Gill
Think of moms and strollers, right? People don't think about moms and strollers and that that opens people's eyes up to be like, Oh, yeah, yeah. There's a lot of things we could do simply if everybody just was more intentional about it and actually put thought into their actions and as to why things are there. But again, that requires people with disabilities going into the able bodied world, accessing these services and making it known that, “Hey, I have value, I have worth, I'm here, see me, hear me, love me, accept me.”
Dawn Taylor
I adore you. I hope you know that. I love you so much, I. I want to thank you on behalf of anyone and everyone that thinks I know you have to. You got a bail right away. This is a busy woman. I hope you guys know how amazing this is that you guys even get to listen to being on this podcast because her schedule is nuts, bonkers, but so incredible. Like, you're changing, you're changing the world, and that is so huge and so powerful. And on behalf of anyone and everyone listening, I want to say thank you. Thank you for your vulnerability. Thank you for your honesty, your openness. Thank you for being willing to have these conversations. Thank you for wanting to challenge the norm. Right and what society is doing. I hope for people listening that your challenge, that your challenge to actually see this as a problem and even if it doesn't affect you personally, I bet my life it affects someone close to you. It is affecting people. And how do we as a society make it a little bit more inclusive.
Bean Gill
I think a big way in taking a step towards that is removing the gap between able bodied and disabled. Right now, there's a gap, right? Right. If you think about it, if you're out there and you're listening and you wear glasses or wear your contacts, guess what? You have a disability. Right. It is awesome. Classes are normalized. It's normal to have eyesight impairments. I don't. My eyesight is amazing. My legs don't work like they used to.
Dawn Taylor
Right. So why is, like, one socially acceptable and one not?
Bean Gill
Exactly. So let's lessen that gap. And that does. How many eyeglass places do you see? How many commercials do we see on TV for glasses and contacts and stuff? How many commercials do you see on TV for wheelchairs or prosthetics? None. Because that's a stigma. So let's remove that gap. Let's put everybody on the same playing field and then go from there. And then you'll see that, hey, we're no different.
Dawn Taylor
Well, I think even, pay attention to what your stigma is, what your, bias is, right? Like. It's so interesting. People were like, “Oh, no, I'm fine.” I have no issues. And it's like, “No, no, no. Get yourself into a situation where you're faced with it and then pay attention to what the thoughts are that go on in your head or what your ideas are on something or any of those things.” I mean, we've talked about this where the first time we met in person, I was like, I was like, “I've never even thought about this.” Like, is this weird to sit like this or stand like this or do any of those things? And I was like, “Oh my gosh, this is like, where did these come from? How did I learn these weird ideas? And I know where and how and why, right?” Like it's our childhoods and TV and movies and all of those things. But I think we need to all just, one little tiny change.
Bean Gill
Yeah. And then they get to dismantle it. Like I had to dismantle all of my stereotypes and stigmas that I had towards people with disabilities even after I became it. Right. Like, my thought was that they are a burden. They need help with everything. They are on social assistance. They're poor, they're fat, they're unhealthy, they're unsuccessful. They're unsexy. They're unstylish. Yeah. These were the thoughts that I had towards people with disabilities. And now I'm sitting here like, But that's not me. Not at all. So I had to unlearn all these things. I had to dismantle all of this and be like, “No, I can be wealthy, I can be sexy, I can be stylish, I can be successful, I can be fun, I can be healthy, I can be fit and have a disability.” Yeah, all these things.
Dawn Taylor
Because you're no different than anyone else. It's a choice. It is a choice. Oh, Bean. This was so fun. Thank you. Thank you, thank you. I'm watching the clock. We're hanging out with us today. And for listeners, I really hope that you learn something from this. If nothing else, say no when they want to put you in the wheelchair. Accessible hotel rooms say no when you want to go in the bathroom, don't park there. Like even these little things that you have no idea how much that could change someone else's life and someone else's day. Right? Smile, make eye contact, say hi. And if you do have weird judgments and weird things, stop being such a judgey pants. Get curious. And ask questions, right? Help people to help yourself understand people that are different than you. There's nothing greater than that. And just getting curious about people. So join us again in two weeks for another amazing topic. Please tell your friends and check out our show notes located at the TheTaylorWay.ca. We will definitely be putting information on how to contact Bean, her business, all of that fun stuff. And the show notes are there so you have no excuse. You can go read if you don't want to listen to every single thing that you recommended that you do. And please subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts. See you guys in a bit.
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Content Warning:
In this episode, we discuss some topics that listeners may find difficult such as life-threatening illnesses.
Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Sam Alexandra Rose’s life was forever changed when she was diagnosed with not one, but three different illnesses. Yet, instead of letting these cancers derail her and take her life on a tailspin, she chose to define her life on her terms. As proud as she is for being a cancer survivor, she is many other things as well, being an accomplished writer, avid charity supporter and a dear friend to those around her. Today, Sam shares her story with Dawn on how she’s learned to not just live alongside her illnesses, but rise above them, too.
Who this for
For those of us living without life-threatening illnesses, it can be difficult to fully empathize with any family members or friends who do. This episode is for those who wish to know what it’s like for people like them, and how just like you and me, not much has changed in how they live life. They still have needs, wants and aspirations, and this episode is for those who wish to be more receptive and sensitive to their loved ones.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Sam Alexandra Rose is a writer from Northamptonshire, UK. She is a three-time cancer survivor with a rare genetic condition, and a PhD student researching the connection between creative writing and cancer survivorship. Her poetry and prose has been published in over 70 literary magazines and anthologies, and her memoir “Gut Feelings: Coping With Cancer and Living With Lynch Syndrome” was released in January 2021. She works as a patient and public involvement manager for a bowel disease research charity.
Guest Social Links
Email - [email protected]
Website - https://writersam.co.uk
Instagram - https://instagram.com/writersamr
Facebook - https://facebook.com/writersamr
Twitter - https://twitter.com/writersamr
The CMRRD book on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CH23XH52
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Dawn Taylor. And today, I get to go talk to the lovely Sam. So, Sam is. What is Sam? Sam, by the way, has the greatest accent on the planet. Sam Alexandra Rose is a writer from Northamptonshire, UK. I'm really trying to read that, right, but it's an amazing name. Um, she is a three-time cancer survivor that has a rare genetic condition. And a PhD student researching the connection between writing creative or creative writing, sorry, and cancer survivorship, which in and of itself is crazy. Her poetry has and her prose have been published in over 70 literary magazines and anthologies, and her memoir, Gut Feelings: Coping with Cancer and Living with Lynch Syndrome was released in January 2021. So, if you want to find any of these things or access to Sam, please check out our show notes and I'll mention that again at the end. But, check out our show notes because you want to follow her. She works as a patient and public involvement manager for a bowel disease research charity, and she is here today to open up and to talk about a topic we wish people talked about and honestly, something that both of us have dealt with and are dealing with is - but we should be dead. And how do you live in that situation? So, Sam, welcome to the show.
Sam Alexandra Rose
Hi, Thanks for having me.
Dawn Taylor
You are so welcome. So what do you wish people talked about?
Sam Alexandra Rose
I really wish that people talked more about the realities of cancer survivorship and living with the genetic condition and how that makes us, just the ways that we try to cope with that reality. Um, in terms of, as you said, how long am I going to be here for? Um, being just so, um. Uh, what's the word? I've lost my words already! Being so. Oh, sorry. The word is totally gone.
Dawn Taylor
That's okay.
Sam Alexandra Rose
Ironically, the word word was impulsive. Yeah. And impatient about everything. And, yeah, just trying to kind of merge the two worlds of, like, the normal everyday world and the medical world that a lot of people don't know about.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, 100%. So my husband and I often joke that we live in a town called Realistic Denial because we still have to live in reality of the fact that we have conditions that could kill us tomorrow, that we are living on borrowed time, all of these things. But, we also have to live in this weird state called denial because we still have to be human and we still have to get out of bed every day and go to work and function and live and not live in that identity. So, let's start at the beginning for you. So, three-time cancer survivor. Talk to us about that. How old were you? When did you get diagnosed? What is it you were diagnosed with? You know, all the fun.
Sam Alexandra Rose
Okay. So I was first diagnosed with bowel cancer or colon cancer at the age of 22 back in 2010. And after I was diagnosed with bowel cancer, my consultant was like, “Well, you know, why has this happened to you so young?” We need to do some genetic testing on me, on my parents to find out what was going on. And it turned out that my parents have a genetic condition called Lynch Syndrome, which actually isn't very rare. But the thing is that a lot of people, apparently around 95% of people don't actually know that they have it, which is crazy to think that people are wandering around with this gene. Essentially, it increases your cancer risk for various types of cancer. Mostly it's colon cancer and it can increase your risk of colon cancer to up to 80%.
Dawn Taylor
Holy cow. That is a big number.
Sam Alexandra Rose
It is.
Dawn Taylor
And the majority of people have no idea.
Sam Alexandra Rose
No, no. A lot of people probably haven't even heard of it. Even those that have it, probably.
Dawn Taylor
So okay, so really quick, because I'm like, “What?” I could have this and I know about it. How do you even get tested for this?
Sam Alexandra Rose
So if your family has a high number of instances of people with bowel cancer or different other types of cancer, so, it's bowel cancer, um, like gynecological cancers like womb cancer and some others as well. It kind of depends on which genes are involved. Um, but I, actually, uh, when I went one step further and so what happened to me was I inherited lynch syndrome from both of my parents, which is a really rare thing to do. Um, and actually, they estimate that only 1 in 1,000,000 people have this condition. So what it is, is you inherit Lynch syndrome from both of your parents. So, it's like the odds of getting two people with Lynch syndrome together to begin with, who then have a kid who then has the bad luck of inheriting Lynch syndrome, not just from one parent, because you could potentially not inherit it from any of the parents like my sister did. She doesn't have Lynch syndrome or what I have at all. Um, but yeah, so what I ended up with was something called CMRD or constitutional mismatch repair deficiency, which is a bit of a mouthful. Um, but as you can imagine, if Lynch syndrome increases your cancer risk, then having it from both parents increases your cancer risk even further. And that's, that also involves things like brain cancer and brain tumors. And we found out actually that my brother also had CMRD, but we didn't realize at the time. So he died when he was 16. I was one year old back in 1989, so we know now that that was because of CMRD as well.
Dawn Taylor
Wow. Okay. There are so much we could unpack there. I can't imagine being your parents. And knowing that genetically, this is something that they gave you. And I don't mean that in a blame or anything like that, but I know my husband and myself like both of us having conditions that were genetic. That was one of our reasons. And when we realized we couldn't have kids on our own, we didn't want to do a surrogate. We didn't want to use our DNA because we were like, “I would never want to give this to somebody.” Right? And so, like, there's so many. Okay. I don't know where you're willing to go with this, but there's so many, so many directions.
Sam Alexandra Rose
I’ll go anywhere.
Dawn Taylor
So, okay, so let's start there. Right off the bat, like, how have your parents dealt with the fact? That they know that it was like their genetics that has not caused this, but do you know what I mean? Yeah. How did they deal with that?
Sam Alexandra Rose
I mean, we don't really talk about that side of it too much as a family. But, I do know that they do feel some kind of guilt, which of course isn't rational or anything, you know, because nobody can help what they pass on. But yeah, I think they do feel like a bit of guilt over that. But it's not, it's not really something that we talk about or dwell on too much. I think we just, we take things in our stride. Whatever happens, happens, you know, we just get on with it. Really?
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. And so for your sister who doesn't have this. Does she live in fear of it at all? Is there a way she could develop it at some point? Is she at higher risk or she's just healthy and good?
Sam Alexandra Rose
Dhe's just fine, which is I mean, she's got two children as well, which is great because it means that she didn't get it and therefore she didn't pass it on to my niece and nephew as well.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, which is wild. So what has your journey looked like having Lynch syndrome? You got cancer very young, right? Incredibly young. And what has your journey continued to look like?
Sam Alexandra Rose
Yeah, so I had that first cancer. I had my entire colon removed, which meant I had a stoma. I had, you know, like a colostomy bag for five months, just a temporary one. And then what they can do is always think that the science of it is quite cool. They can do a reversal in some cases. So, what they did is they kind of put the stoma kind of back in essentially, and they make a makeshift large intestine out of a part of your small intestine, and that learns to like absorb fluid in the way that a large intestine would, which I think is pretty, pretty clever. So, yeah, it's like essentially plumbing, plumbing me back together. So I've got, I'm kind of normal again. Or it's normal. Normal as I can be. Um, so, so, yeah. So that was in 2010 and then 2011 had the reversal, later in 2011, we had the genetic testing. And then that meant that we, what I had to have all kinds of tests every year because I'm so much higher risk. So, it's things like something called a flexible sigmoidoscopy, which is similar to a colonoscopy. But, because I don't have a colon anymore, obviously it doesn't go quite that far up. So, it's like a mini colonoscopy, really. Um, I have a gastro escapee every year, which is the camera down the throat and into the stomach and looking at the small bowel. Um, I had a CT scan once a year for just, like five years. I think that was just, like, related to surgery more than anything else, and a capsule endoscopy I have at the moment. And these, that sort of came later. But, the capsule endoscopy is when you swallow like a little camera, um, like, like a little sort of tablet and you wear a recording device that speaks to it and the camera travels down your throat and into your stomach and small bowel and eventually, like during the day, you like, poop it out. Basically. they don't want it back. They're very clear they don't want it back.
Dawn Taylor
That is really funny.
Dawn Taylor
So, yeah, it's like a less invasive way to have a look at, like, your small bowel and kind of the parts that the colon can't can't find. Um. So I had several years of all of these tests and kind of the fear of recurrence that comes with it and all of that sort of stuff. And then in 2018, I had my annual routine gastroscopy. Around the same time, I had an MRI to look at a completely unrelated problem. I was getting recurring abscesses, um, down below to put it politely. So, I had an MRI. Um, but when they looked at the MRI, they sort of, we never heard about the abscesses again, basically because what they saw was a problem. I can't exactly remember how they described it, but they said there was a problem with the lining of my womb. And all of this kind of happened at the same time. And the gastrostomy that I went to, they said that they found a polyp. They marked it as urgent, a polyp, I should say. It's just like a little sort of growth, like a tumor type thing that may or may not be cancerous. Some polyps are just just benign. Um, but they said that they found it and they sent it off for testing marked urgent. So, you can already tell. Well, that's not a very good sign. Um, we went on a family holiday, came back to loads of, like, voicemail messages from the hospital. Can you call us? And essentially I got two. I kind of got two cancer diagnoses within two days of each other, which, as you can imagine, was just absolutely horrendous.
Dawn Taylor
I can't even imagine.
Sam Alexandra Rose
Yeah, it was awful. So I had to meet my consultant at the hospital and they said, go meet him on the ward because he isn't in his office where he would normally be because it's not part of his sort of consulting hours which again, bad sign. Um, and he said, “Yeah, you have duodenal cancer.” So the name is a small part of the small bowel. Um, and I was kind of expecting it because they said, you know, the gastrostomy we've taken something with marked it as urgent for testing. So I was weirdly calm about it. Um, yeah, because I was sort of expecting it. What wasn't expecting was the next day at my gynecology appointment for them to say, “You have definitely precancerous and possibly cancerous cells in your womb.” And then they later confirmed that it was cancer. And then they were very surprised that I was relieved that I was that it was early stage cancer because they said, you see the pre-cancer or it's early cancer. And in my head I was thinking, “But what if they're wrong? What if it's actually stage three? Stage four?” You know, your mind just, like, goes into overdrive. Um, so when they said to me, it's early stage cancer, I was like, “Okay, good.” I'm not good. But, you know, they're like, “Wait a sec. What’s wrong with you?”
Dawn Taylor
“That reaction's not what we were expecting.”
Sam Alexandra Rose
Yeah, but it's like, well, whether it's precancerous or it's cancerous, you have to do something about it anyway, So, what difference does it make? So, yeah. And so after that, we, my partner and I went to a fertility consultant to talk about options, and they said that you could have surgery now, like have everything removed, you know, womb, ovaries, because there was a risk of ovarian cancer as well. Uh, do that, do all that now and get it done or there's this other treatment that may or may not work. Um, kind of remember the details of it now. And he, you might want to do this or you might want to hold off surgery if you want to try and, like, get pregnant first or if you want, because we don't have we didn't have biological children. Yeah, well, they said that you could freeze your eggs. Um, but in order to do that, they would be stimulating the ovaries, which could also stimulate the lining of the womb, which could in turn cause the cancer to grow. So, me and my partner kind of immediately both agreed. Well, we don't want to do any of that, you know? Yes, we kind of envisaged ourselves having children at some point. Um, but we were on the same page that we both didn't want to take a risk, so we just said, “Yeah, okay, total hysterectomy. Just do it now. Get rid of everything.” So that's what we ended up doing in September 2018. And then they said, “Once you've recovered from your hysterectomy, we will do a surgery to deal with the duodenal cancer.” And this was all quite a long time coming because that summer was very much two teams kind of fighting over me and trying to decide what they were going to do with me because I was quite an unusual case. And so, in November they did the Whipple surgery, which was removal of the head of the pancreas, the duodenal, because that's where the cancer was, the bile duct and the gallbladder. So, it's quite a big operation. They know they normally do it for pancreatic cancer and it was about an eight-hour surgery. Two hours of that was just, like, dealing with adhesions, you know, when, like, organs get, like, stuck together, they have to prise them apart before they can do anything with them. And that was two days, I think, in the high dependency unit at the hospital, sort of similar to the ICU and then another seven days in a regular ward. So, yeah, really difficult to recover from that. In November. That will be five years ago and I will hopefully be five years cancer-free if nothing happens between now and then.
Dawn Taylor
Okay, for starters. Holy shit. Okay, I'm just going to say it because everyone's thinking it. To deal with all of this at such a young age and then dealing with these massive decisions, cancers that are notm like it's very, it's not common to recover from some of these cancers, right? But then in the middle of that, you're fighting for your own life. You're fighting with, like, “Can I have kids? Can I not have kids?” Making that decision to make that final that you couldn't have both children, right? Like there's so many parts and pieces of this. so many parts. So, before we dive into that, what are the risks or the chances of you getting cancer again?
Sam Alexandra Rose
I don't really know. And I try not to think about it too much. Some things you just don't want to Google, I think.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I can. I can totally see that. I do want to say for anyone who is like, “Okay, how rare is this Lynch syndrome?” What, like, this is crazy. Um, according to the Cleveland Clinic in this state for cancer, Lynch syndrome occurs in approximately 1 in 279 individuals in the United States. So, just think about that number for a second. I'm amazed. I'm amazed that more people aren't being tested for this. But I also know I'm go,ing to talk to my doctor and ask if I can be tested for this, because that's just wild. So, now let's move forward a few years. You're recovering from three cancers in a very short period of time. And now it's time to live again, and some of you and I had talked about in our initial conversation before recording this today was that feeling of the life you thought you were going to have died. And I think anyone who's had any sort of massive health issue, anyone who's had anything in their life not going according to plan, understands very much what that feels like. But, when you're faced with death, it's very different, right? So when you're in a position where you could die in, you're literally fighting for your life with medical treatments. It's hard to live after. It can be incredibly difficult to actually live after. Let's dive into that.
Sam Alexandra Rose
I think it's difficult both in the long term and in the short term as well, because you have the long term of maybe life not turning out how you thought it would so for example, not being able to have biological children. But then also you have in the short term just trying to live day to day, especially when, okay, so the cancer may be gone. All three of them, but there's still the yearly testing that I have to have, all those different tests and and more have been added as well because of the CMRD. So I also have now a brain and full body MRI. So ,every six months I have a brain MRI and every year I have a full body MRI as well. And it's just that living, trying to live day to day when you get an appointment letter through the door saying “Come to see us for an MRI, come to see us for this capsule endoscopy, and also you have to drink bowel prep, which is completely disgusting.”
If you haven't had anything like this in Canada, it's awful. Yeah, it's horrible. And that's like a three day affair, right? So you have the bowel prep that you have to drink the day before and then you go to the appointment on the day. And then if you have sedation for your procedure, then you can't, like, drive for 24 hours afterwards. It is basically a three day thing. I'm just remembering when I had one at the beginning of this year, I did the bowel prep and I really wasn't feeling well and I was thinking bowel prep doesn't really usually make me feel this bad. Woke up the next morning. I feel absolutely awful. Gotta go to the hospital, like as soon as I wake up, basically, did a COVID test. I had COVID for the first time and I drank the bowel prep for no reason.
Dawn Taylor
Sorry, I shouldn't laugh, but having been there, I'm like, “Oh my gosh, everybody wants to bowel prep for no reason.” No one.
Sam Alexandra Rose
No. I can laugh about it now, but yeah, just, just remembering that. Yeah, it's this whole thing of, you know, tests may crop up at any time and say you're just, you're at work, you're just at your desk doing your job, and then you have a phone call, you know, come in, make an appointment or you're waiting for results. And it's just always at the back of your mind. So it's, yeah, the short term and the long term, I think.
Dawn Taylor
Absolutely. Have you struggled with letting people close to you? I know one of my struggles was I was so terrified that people would know me or like me or love me, and then I would die. Or that I was too much for people because of health issues, right? Where it was like, you know what, I don't want anyone else to have to be part of this. I don't want anyone else to have to be in the hospital or worrying about me or driving me for tests or surgeries or any of those things. And it, I don't know if this is the correct wording on it, but it almost became like a weapon for me over the years of just, like, holding people at an arm's length. Right, because it did. It really felt like if I let you too close, this is just going to get hurt. And then either you're going to reject me and abandon me down the road or you're going to lose me or something's going to happen and I'm going to get hurt. And that makes no sense. And I don't want to do that.
Sam Alexandra Rose
I think I'm really lucky in that my partner and I have been together for a really long time. So we met in 2006 at university, so we'd been together about four years before my first cancer diagnosis. We're still together now, and he's, he's brilliant. Um, but I mean, the thing that upsets me the most, if I think about it too much, is like, what if something does happen again and it's the worst outcome? And then I have to leave him. And that's just the thought of him having to manage with me not being here. That is the most upsetting thing.
Dawn Taylor
Has it changed? So my partner and I also, my husband and I have been together since way before the aneurysm, right? And he also is brilliant and stuck it out. You and I both chose very well. But what about with friends?
Sam Alexandra Rose
Yeah, it's. It's complicated, I think. Um. Sometimes, I think that people were my friends maybe a little bit more while I was unwell. And then once you're kind of okay and you know, well, they think that you're okay and recovered, then there's that drop in attention. And especially after my first diagnosis and my surgery, I spent a few years just feeling so sad about everything that had happened, afraid of what was going to happen next and I guess I really still needed people several years later to check on me and say, “Are you, you know, emotionally okay?” because I was not. But people don't know that, which I guess is what spurs me on to do things like come here and talk to you because people need to know that people who have had cancer or other illnesses, it takes its emotional toll and you've got to check in on people.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. And I think a lot of the emotional toll isn't immediate. I know for myself it always hits later, right? So I'll recover from whatever I'm going through, say, I'm feeling amazing in April or May typically it's, like, four months later. My cycle is four months and it's like four months later is when I'm like, blah. And I feel like that's when I fall apart and that's when I really, really struggle. And yeah, people that haven't, you know, okay, so this is something interesting because I've had this conversation recently with some friends is if you haven't been through it, yay, glad you haven't dealt with really traumatic health issues, right? But you also just don't understand, like, you don't get it and there's no way you can, but also from the side of the person who's dealing with a health issue. We need to step up and go “This is what I need from you. But part of that is also can you provide that?” Right? Like, do you have the capacity? Do you have the capacity to provide what it is I need in that arena, right? And I've had friends over the years that are phenomenal at the like, “Hey, I need you to call me on like every Friday and be like “Are you alive or are you good?” Right? And they're like “Done.” They'll put it in their calendars and like, that works for them and other people. It's like, “Hey. Can you not ever talk to me about my health? Can every conversation we have nothing to do with my health? Because I really just need to not think about it right now.” And they'll be like, “Yep, absolutely.” To people that go, “Hey. You're not well.” I know when I was doing some really, really heavy treatments about two years ago, I was in Edmonton a lot and people didn't know I was here. There were a few core people in my life that knew I was here, and it was very interesting how one of those, there was one night he called me and he arrives and I was like, “I'm just done now. Like I'm just on my way home.” And he's like, “Come to my house.” And I was like, “No, I don't have the energy.” And he's like, “No.” He's like “We're going to feed you. We're going to tuck you on the couch on a blanket, and you get to just lay there and just not be alone. But we'll ignore you.” And I don't know if I've ever told them how much that meant to me. Right, that it was like, “No, you don't have to show up in any way. You can show up in your pajamas. You can lay there and cry if you need to. Like, we're just going to make sure you're okay.” He's like, “We will take care of you. Like, we will drive you back to your hotel when you're done and you're ready to not be around people. But I just don't want you to be alone tonight.” And I showed up and was like, “Thank you”. There were no expectations of me. I didn't have to choose that. I wanted to eat. I didn't have to, you know, make any decisions. And I did. I literally laid on his couch under a blanket while him and his wife did their thing and their son was tootling around and, you know, I just laid there and watched whatever was on the TV and it felt so safe and I don't know about you, but we often hide how bad it is, and we hide where we're at with our health. So that we never feel like we're too much for people.
Sam Alexandra Rose
Yeah. And yeah, it's difficult, isn't it? Communicating about health, especially like with people that are close to us, but also people who are that little bit further away. I'm thinking about just like when a colleague says like, “Hi, how are you?” Which should be a completely innocent question, you know, there would be days where like either I'm thinking I don't have the energy to, um, to say, “Yes, I'm fine.” because I'm not fine. I just want to shout at you all the things that are wrong, but at the same time, also I don't have the energy to not lie and to, you know, go into all all of the detail as well. So yeah, it manifests in lots of different ways. But I had a similar friend actually, who let me just go to his house and sort of crashed there because I was at work. It was in 2018, so around the time of um, my second and third diagnoses and I was at work and I got like a phone call or some news or something that upset me. And I talked to my manager and she was like, “Do you want to go home?” And I said, “Yeah.” So instead of going home, I went to, um, or went to a supermarket to pick up some lunch. And then I went to my friend's house and he only lived about 15 minutes away. And he was like, “Yeah, sure, come over. I'm going to a job interview soon, but you can just hang at my house.” So I went over to his house. I told him a little bit about what was happening. Um, we hung out for a bit and then he went to his job interview and I just sat alone in his house, which, thinking about it now, was just a little bit weird. But I played on his guitar a little bit. I just sort of tried to have a nap on the couch and just waited for him to come home. And then we went to the pub and had a drink.
Dawn Taylor
Right? it is funny like talking about it and even that night, like it was probably weird that he invited me over to do that, but it felt so good, right? So closing off this area of this because then I want to dive into something more fun in this whole situation or quirky about both of us. For anyone listening who has a friend with a health issue. What do you recommend? What do you recommend for the significant others or the friends of someone who is in a situation like yours or a situation like mine, or dealing with a health issue where there is a lot of like, future fear, current fear, right? And also just like so much unknown, What do you recommend for them on how to support?
Sam Alexandra Rose
I think the problem with communication is that sometimes there's a lot of guessing and maybe it's a good idea to just ask the person, like, “Do you want to talk about this? Do you want advice on this? Do you want to be distracted? And should we just talk about something else or do something else?” Um. Especially when like, it's in the thick of it, so like just after surgery or something, when somebody's recovering for something or going through treatment, then, like, sending messages again, this is something that that my friend, the same friend did, sending messages and explicitly saying, “You don't have to reply to this. There's no expectation from my end for you to contribute. I'm just telling you about my day or I'm just checking in. Hope you're okay.” Um, yeah, I think that was really nice. And it's along the similar lines, isn't it? Yeah, Just just come and chill at my house. It's like the text equivalent of that.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, totally. And I think the one thing I would add to it is I had people actually get upset with me for not staying in good enough contact with them. And telling them what was going on and including them in things and incorporating them into that side of my world at that point. And that was really hard, and I remember, after when someone was like, “I heard you were here nonstop for medical treatments.” And I said, “Yeah, I was.” And. It was really interesting. The comment that came out of their mouth shouldn't have shocked me, but it did. They were like, “And you didn't even call me?” And I remember just I was like, “No, no, I didn't.” and they're like, “Well, I thought we were friends.”
And I was like, “I'm pretty sure that I was spending my time in medical treatments because my body was shutting down and I felt like I was dying and I didn't have any capacity for people.” Right? I had no capacity for people. And I think that changes on where we draw our energy from, right? As an introvert, it decreased my capacity. As an extrovert. I might increase someone's capacity to be like, I need people more, right? But I think, like, I know a lot of people really struggled with that with me because I've had conversations with people about it where I go internal, I cocoon. So, when I'm going through something, you will stop hearing from me. When I'm going through something, I will not reach out. I will not ask for help. I'm not going to tell you I'm struggling. Like, that's not my natural go to, my natural go to is I just curl completely inward and go, “Okay, now I have to take care of me and I don't actually care who's outside of that.“ Right? And it's not. It's not a rejection of the other person, right? It's not a rejection of you. It's me just trying to protect me in that moment. And so to understand as a friend or a family member, like what is your capacity? What can you handle? And if you don't have the capacity to send out a daily update on how you're doing, right? That's okay. It's okay that you don't have that capacity and I'm not going to ask it of you.
Sam Alexandra Rose
But there's too many people to update anyway on a regular basis.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, my goodness. There were too many. And, you know, it was interesting the people that were like, “Hey. What do you need right now?” And I'd be like, “Can you just check in on me, like, once a week? Just, like, send a prayer for me? Can you like?” You know, things like that. But I also had a friend that I remember one day there was like this crazy long day of IVs. Like, I was there for almost eight hours. And a friend called and she's like, “Can I just come in like, sit with you?” And I was like, “Yes. Yes you can.” And she just, like, crack jokes. And we laughed and we talked and like, I cried. And she literally just, like, held my hand. And that was the most beautiful thing ever. Because she was like, “Hey, this is what I want to do. Are you okay with that?”
Sam Alexandra Rose
And that was when somebody comes with an idea of how to to help rather than relying on you
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. “What do you need?” And you're like, “I don't know.”
Sam Alexandra Rose
Exactly.
Dawn Taylor
And my answer often was like, “Coffee. I need a coffee.” And they’d laugh. “Like, that's it? That's all you need?” I was like, “I don't know what else to tell you.” So, now let's fast forward. How has having a diagnosis like that cancer three times knowing you're such at a high risk, right? And all of these things in these shifts. How has it shifted your everyday life?
Sam Alexandra Roae
So, people say don't let cancer define you and all of that kind of stuff. I've kind of gone the other way. Yeah, I don't really like that sort of advice anyway for lots of different reasons. Um, I don't like, kind of being told that I might be doing it wrong somehow. As if there's a right and wrong way to do cancer.
To do cancer recovery.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, come on. There's a book, isn't there, that tells you how to do it perfectly? I'm kidding. I'm kidding.
Sam Alexandra Rose
Um, so. Well, in early 2019, after I'd recovered as I was recovering from my Whipple surgery, and I was just trying to fill life up with everything but the kitchen sink, I decided that I'd quite like to do a PhD. And so I'm currently in I'm about to start year five of six of my part time PhD. It is long. It's good. I'm enjoying it. Um, but yeah, so my PhD is in creative writing, so I'm writing poetry. It started off being about my cancer experiences, but also it kind of morphed into, well, I'm a writer. I've always been a writer, so naturally I've been writing about cancer since about 2012 when I sort of started to get to grips with everything that had happened. So, about 2020 when I was doing this, PhD came to the realization, I've been writing about cancer for about eight years. Actually, maybe I don't want to do quite so much of that anymore. But then the question becomes, “Well, who else am I apart from being a cancer survivor?” And that became a difficult question to answer, but that's that kind of writing about identity and trying to explore that. My PhD is not just a PhD anymore. Because of that, it's a whole like exploration of myself. So,, that's kind of the main thing, really. I mean, plus talking to people like this on podcasts and blogging and writing books. And it's quite funny since in the time between we had this initial conversation about me coming on and talking to you and today for me coming on and talking to you, I decided I wanted to write another book. I wrote another book and it's coming out on the 2nd of September because I work very fast now.
Dawn Taylor
You do! That's incredible. Okay. So we will put a link. I'm going to get you to send me the link for that book for where people could find it. And, we are 100% going to put that in the show notes. So, does it do you think it speeds you up, slows you down? Does it make you try different things? Like, I'm often kind of spontaneous, right? Because I'm like, “But I should be dead.” So today is borrowed time and I'm gonna have fun.
Sam Alexandra Rose
That's it. And it wasn't until recently because and it's kind of what my second book is about, is kind of going from denial to acceptance because it has taken me a long time to accept that I have CMRD because just a couple of years ago, I wouldn't even be saying the words. I'd be just trying not to think about it. But yes. So, it's been a long time trying to come to terms with all of it and it's definitely made me more spontaneous, I think. Um, I mean, there's a few things that I've done that I probably wouldn't have done if I hadn't had cancer. And just kind of knowing, um, about comedy in the statistics because the average person with CMD gets their first cancer diagnosis at seven and a half years old.
Dawn Taylor
Wow.
Sam Alexandra Rose
So a lot of children unfortunately don't make it because a lot of it is brain tumors. And, you know, there's a high sort of recurrence and things like that. So it is kind of thinking, well. I could say I think I'll do such and such one day. Oh, yeah, I'd like to do that. Maybe one day isn't really in my vocabulary anymore. Because what if. What is one day? That's nothing, You know, that doesn't really mean anything. What if one day never comes? What about today? So that's why I've done things like, um, been in a hot air balloon. I did a fire walk one year. That was quite cool.
Dawn Taylor
Um, very cool. I've done it. It's amazing. I recommend it. I highly recommend it to everyone. Do a fire walk. At some point in your life,
Sam Alexandra Rose
Did you always have like, a really kind of motivational, like, speech and kind of team building thing before you did it?
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Sam Alexandra Rose
That's cool.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, yeah. It's crazy. It is so cool.
Sam Alexandra Roae
Yeah, I love that. I got the idea from watching The Office because it's my favorite TV show, and I just. I watched them doing a fire walk in one episode. I was like, “I want to do that. I'm gonna do that.” And that was it. And I found somewhere that was doing it. I was like, “Yeah, that's it. I'm doing it.”
Dawn Taylor
That is awesome. So, one last thing, and then I will let you go. I know it's very late at night there right now. You talked earlier, you mentioned earlier about the whole identity thing and I'm sure you see this all the time is people have a diagnosis and then they own it. It's like they wear it like a cape and it's who they are and what they are, not what happened to them and what's created who they are. And I will admit I've been guilty of that a lot in my life myself, right? You talked about the fact that you don't like when people say that, right? To not own that and not identify as that. Can you explain that a little bit? What are your thoughts on that?
Sam Alexandra Rose
Yeah, I mean, that definitely sounds like me, to be honest. You know, somebody who's just sort of taken it and kind of took ownership of it and I guess maybe made it who I am, but I guess in a positive way. And I suppose if you do that, then it's fine. I mean, essentially there's no doing things right or wrong at the end of the day as they're all just desperately trying to get by as best we can. Um, yeah. I don't really like when people say, “Oh, don't let it define you.” Um, because it kind of makes it sound like I don't have control or I do have control. I think it makes it sound like I do have control over the situation. And sometimes with cancer, you just don't. And yeah, again, I don't want to be told that I'm doing it wrong. I think that I have harnessed it in a positive way, but I do often think what would life be like if it wasn't for that? You know, what would I be doing right now? Because I work for a bowel disease charity, and that came about because of my patient experiences. So, that wouldn't have happened if I hadn't have had cancer, I wouldn't be, I might doing my PhD now, but it wouldn't it wouldn't be in my cancer experiences. It would be, I have no idea. Something else. So. And it's the thing as well. When people say, “Oh, you're so brave.” or “You inspire me.” “I think you're amazing.” All of this sort of stuff. And it's like I haven't done anything inspirational. If you're just talking about my illness, I've done nothing. I've done what I was told to do by the doctors.I've just existed. Don't compliment me for existing, but actually I think that it's what you do with it. It's like, yeah, okay. I don't think that I'm brave or anything for having gone through an illness experience. What I do think is brave is when I and other people take our illness experience and we talk about it, we write about it, we try to make other people feel better. By sharing our experiences, we create something beautiful out of it. We create anything, anything that we're happy with. Writing, drawing, crafting, whatever it is, and just try to spin something positive out of it. I think that those are things that people should be commended for. You get no credit for living. That's a quote from, sorry, but I can't remember who it is. It was a writer who was talking about writing memoir, and she was just saying, “You can't just write, um, your, your story kind of from beginning to end as it happened. It's like, what is the actual story within that? What's the angle? What did you take from it? You know, you don't get any credit for for living the story. You get credit for what you do with it afterwards.” I guess.
Dawn Taylor
I love that so much. Sorry. It hit me. It hit me in the feels when you said that in a good way of often when people are like, I don't know how you've survived, I don't know how you've done what you've done to even be here. I'm like, “I just did. I just kept living.” Right? What I'm so proud of is how hard I have fought to be who I am. How I've turned and how you've turned these things that we've been through into something beautiful, into something that can inspire someone or help somebody or be something amazing. And thank you for that. Thank you for that, because I think it's so true. I think it's so true. You know, I think of this every day. And when you and I first had our initial conversation. It's like, man, someone who's been through so much and you've turned it around. You didn't just curl up and die, right? Like you didn't take that as your identity as like, you're the cancer girl, and now that's it. And you've curled up and died within that and just suffered within that. And it's been a pity thing or a victim thing. You took that and you wrote about it. You're turning it into, you know, your job and your career and your future and all of those things. And I just want to say thank you. Thank you for sharing that with the rest of us.
Sam Alexandra Rose
Oh, thanks for giving me the opportunity to, yeah, come on. It's always really good to talk to somebody who just gets this kind of thing.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, more than I care to admit. I probably talked too much in today's episode is what I'll get told. And that's okay. Honestly, like, I love the conversation that we just had and how we both get it. We both just get it and don't know we're part of this weird club we don't want to be part of. And that's okay. That's okay because we're doing cool things with it. So, I want to thank you again so much like so, so much, Sam, for hanging out today. Thank you, listeners, for being here. And if you are owning your identity, if you are owning something that's happened in your life, it's not about doing it right or wrong. It's not about any of that. It's what are you going to do with it? How are you going to use it? It could be a gift or it could be a curse. It's a double edged sword either way. So what are you going to do with it? So if you want to find Miss Sam, check out the show notes located at TheTaylorWay.ca, and you can find a link for her new book. Oh, my goodness. I'm so excited. I will be ordering it. And for all of her other stuff. Find where she's published, read her poetry, support her. I know that it's always very appreciated when you guys connect with our guests. Join us again in two weeks for another fun topic, or hard topic? I mean, that's what the podcast is about. But honestly, share this episode to someone you know who has dealt with cancer, has dealt with a health issue that's really felt like they've lost their identity through it so that they can feel seen and heard and understood. Subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts and if you love the show, please leave a rating and review. Thank you so much, guys. See you in a couple of weeks.
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Content Warning: In this episode, we discuss some topics that listeners may find difficult such as drug and alcohol addiction.
Why you would want to listen to this episode
Max Larocque has lived most of his life as a fully-functioning addict. Smoking weed and drinking alcohol are things he’s wrestled with behind closed doors, however, he does so without sacrificing his most important priorities, such as work and fitness. However, during a crucial point in his life, Max discovered that as good as he was at hiding things - addiction was still an addiction. Today on the podcast, Max bravely opens up about his struggles and shares with us the steps he took, big and small, to lead him to recovery and take back control of his life.
Who this for...
Addiction can show up in many different faces and degrees of frequency. It’s not always the same for everyone and everyone who’s gone through it will deal with it in ways unique to them. For those who are curious about how addiction can manifest differently for people, or for those who are seeking out a voice like Max’s when it comes to detailing the road to recovery, this episode is for you.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Our guest is Max Larocque. He has been a fitness coach for a little over 13 years and has been a certified life coach for the last 6 of those years. Max is 2.5 years alcohol free and he has a dog named Lucy who is his entire world.
Guest Social Links
Website - www.maxlarocquefitness.com
Instagram - @maxlarocquefit
Podcast - The Squats and Sober Thoughts Podcast
Dopamine Nation (book recommendation) - https://www.amazon.com/Dopamine-Nation-Finding-Balance-Indulgence/dp/152474672X
Thanks for listening!
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
I am your host, Dawn Taylor, and today we are going to talk to Max. Max is a personal trainer. He is a dad to a dog. He's like, “Dad? Wait a second.” He is two and a half years alcohol-free. He's had a few lapses with some cannabis, but he's working on that. We are going to dive into life. We are going to dive into where this all started, where this all came from, and really dig into this topic of the fact that alcohol does not discriminate based on your appearance or based on what is showing up on the outside, right? What's going on behind closed doors can be so different. But we're also going to go a little bit deeper on this into what is really going on behind the scenes. He is also a fitness coach that for over 13 years he's owned his own company. He's a partner in a company and he does life coaching within that. So, if you want to contact him like normal, you know that you need to go check out the show notes. We're going to have all of his contact information there and how you can get a hold of him also with any resources we're going to talk about in the show. But let's dive right in. Welcome to the show, Max.
Max Larocque
Thank you so much for having me, Dawn. I'm excited. It's been a while since I've been on a podcast.
Dawn Taylor
I was so excited when you were recommended to me because I know this is a topic that people want to talk about. I don't know anyone who does not have someone in their life who is an addict or who was an addict or has dealt with addiction or they are themselves. And I think there's such negative light attached to it, but also just such a lack of understanding and knowing around the whole topic. So, let's dive in. I know I said we're going to just dive right into this. So, let's start with what happened to even guide you to have an addiction. Let's start there.
Max Larocque
So growing up, my dad was an RCMP officer and he really strived to move up the ranks as fast as he could, which obviously worked out well. My dad was a great provider, and in his interpretation of fatherhood, as long as he was a good financial provider, then that meant that he was a phenomenal parent. So, by no means is there any sort of blame or anything along the lines towards my parents, but the moves and the instability and the things that came with transferring across province to province, all across Canada, I think I moved seven times before I was twelve, was a lot. A lot, yeah, it's definitely festered into a lot of trust issues and things like that. Just because of the fact that I basically had no choice as a kid, if I wanted to stay somewhere, it didn't really matter. We were up and moving and I really had no say in the matter. So there was an aspect of that that was definitely underlying when I first started using cannabis, and a large part of it was kind of also, I can swear right, Dawn?
Dawn Taylor
Oh, 100%
Max Larocque
Perfect. Quick disclosure on that. I do use the word “fuck” a lot.
Dawn Taylor
I'm very okay with that word. And this podcast is rated R, so anyone listening, If you're really going to struggle with that word, it's just a word, keep listening because you need this information.
Max Larocque
And you know what? I do like to disclose that too. And I've softened up my views on this in the last couple of years because I understand that, again, if your only interpretation of the word “fuck” was from your parent, caregiver, loved one was super angry, maybe that meant something bad was going to happen, then I can understand why people think that the word “fuck” is such a bad word.
Dawn Taylor
Absolutely.
Max Larocque
But to me, it's just a filler word. So if it comes out, I'm not going to apologize. But I do like to give that forewarning just because I've had people misconstrue my messages. Like, “Wow, he's very angry. Why is he so agitated?” And it's really not that. It's just simply that, it's a word that comes out on a very frequent basis, and if I'm passionate about what I'm talking about, it's going to come out more. So, full disclosure, we'll get that one out of the way. But as mentioned with my original usage of cannabis, it was definitely a “fuck you” towards my dad. Because of the fact that my dad started with the RCMP at such a young age, he had a very skewed perception of, to a certain degree, life, because it was a very “This is how I did it, and this is how you're going to do it, and this is how we do it.” And there was a part of me that very much from a resentful standpoint, was kind of like, “Well, fuck you. I'm going to smoke weed, and I'm going to prove to you that I can be successful and I can be this and I can be that.” Just in spite of him. So that definitely stemmed that. Obviously, it escalated quite quickly into full on cannabis and alcohol addiction. So, kind of bit me in the ass a little bit, you could say
Dawn Taylor
it does that.
Max Larocque
Yeah. So dad was kind of right in certain ways.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, we won't tell him that. We won't tell him that. So, let's dive into that for a second and just backtrack a minute because I know someone is listening who's like, “Hey, wait a sec, I've moved my kids a million times.” I don't think it's always that it's moving kids a million times is the problem. It's the structure and the certainty that a lot of kids, especially actually need, and they all function very different with it. It's understanding that and then figuring out how to get them some support in that. But you had mentioned that you struggled with the trust as well, and so where did that come from?
Max Larocque
So, there was two moves specifically, one of which when we moved to Ottawa, we were supposed to be in Ottawa for good. And this was after our fifth move and fast forward a few years, there was some issues within my parents’ relationship, there was some infidelity and we up and moved from Ottawa to Edmonton as sort of a preventative measure or like, I guess sort of like an ultimatum. So that was a huge component because that was the first time that we moved somewhere and it was like, “Okay, we're buying a nice house, make good friends, we're going to be here for good.” And then to have that totally taken up from under you. Between that and then other things in childhood, it definitely created a lot of distrust within anyone who was above me. And I definitely do have sort of like a seniority complex in that sense too. There's a reason I am my own boss and have been for over a decade because I do not do well with, I guess, authoritative or authoritative measures. When people try to tell me what to do and how to do it. It's probably something that could be addressed on my end to some degree, but that definitely played a huge role in it. And then in terms of the trust side of things. So this is kind of a fucked up situation where my parents don't actually know that my dad had affairs. This is, like, 20 years ago. And so just in terms of my actual my own relationships, friendships, business relationships, partnerships, things like that, I've just always struggled with trust because of the fact that I've seen what it does to families, what it does to me, what it did to me, I should say, as a whole. And growing up in an environment that doesn't necessarily know how to communicate or express the quote-unquote negative emotions or the big emotions we can call them, and then also creating and setting boundaries. I was never actually modeled how to do any of that, so just a lot of things that happened over time and then didn't really know how to process any of that. And then that's where I just kind of leaned into addiction as I got older, because it was much easier to just numb out the world than it was to actually deal with learning how to sit with my negative and or big emotions. I don't really like to call them negative. It's just more or less that was what I was taught, was that they were negative, right? They were bad emotions. They're big emotions.
Dawn Taylor
Okay, let's pause on that for a second. Sorry for interrupting. How true is that, though? That we've been taught that all, and it's not positive or negative, good or bad, right? But it's like, all of your negative, big emotions, that's bad. Right? Like, we've been so taught that with part of that, though, even in your childhood and how you were raised and all that, the fact that everything was very black and white.
Max Larocque
Yeah. Right or wrong, very almost kind of military-esque, like, this is how you do it.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Max Larocque
No other way around it. This is black or white, and life just simply is not black or white.
Dawn Taylor
Never.
Max Larocque
In any way, shape or form.
Dawn Taylor
No, never has been.
Max Larocque
Especially nowadays. I think it's becoming more popularized. But just the discussion about people pleasing and how, again, as long as everyone around me is happy, then that's all that matters. And I was listening to one of your podcasts, and you guys were talking about “The Body Keeps the Score”. That was a really eye-opening book for me to read, too. My mom actually has crohn's, and being able to piece together some things from a timeline standpoint, it kind of scared me to the point where I was like, “Okay, there's some things that need to be addressed here that have clearly been underlying the service for a long period of time.” So, yeah, that was a pretty eye-opening book, to be honest. I think everyone should read that book at some point in their life.
Dawn Taylor
It is. And we will put the link in the show notes for sure. So what age did the pot you start?
Max Larocque
So not until I was 18, so actually it was after I graduated.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, wow.
Max Larocque
Yeah, I had tried a few times when I was younger. I didn't really get stones, so to be honest, I thought it was like, I think I was doing it wrong. I probably wasn't inhaling it, whatever it was, but I was just like, “Well, this is stupid. I don't even see why people would do this.” And then, fast forward, I ended up having an injury with my hand and one of my friends had bought a bong. So, for anyone who has smoked cannabis before, if you've ever smoked a bong, it's a pretty intense way of doing it. And if you smoke a bong, you're probably going to get pretty high. So I did, and that was kind of the first time I was like, “Oh, wow, this is nice.” I can just totally numb out pretty much everything on command. It was less detrimental than drinking at that period of time, too, because of the fact that I could easily be a functioning stoner. I could smoke all evening long, go to work the next day, really had no issues. It wasn't the same as being hungover and things like that. And then down the road, that led into the combination of the two to be a functioning alcoholic at that point. So I could drink less, smoke more, and then still be able to function the next day.
Dawn Taylor
So how long did that go on for before you realized it was a problem?
Max Larocque
About a decade, basically from 18 to 28.
Dawn Taylor
Wow.
Max Larcoque
Yeah. And it got progressively worse. There was periods of time, three to six month windows where it wasn't as excessive. Predominantly in the drinking, I smoked pretty much, I bet you, over a ten year span, I probably didn't smoke for 50 to 60 days of that entire ten years.
Dawn Taylor
Wow.
Max Larocque
Yeah. And the only reason why was basically I was on vacation and couldn't find it.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. Which is crazy. So were the people around you knowing there was a problem, or
was there just an avoidance of “Well, okay.” So, multiple parts of this right? It’s an avoidance because they don't want to deal with it, but also because there's such a socially acceptable level of being stoned and drinking these days that were they even realizing it was such an issue?
Max Larocque
Yeah. I mean, that definitely fed into it. I would say very much so to who you surround yourself with going to end up really dictating how you actually, what the choices that you do and don't make on a regular basis. So if everyone around you is smoking, you don't want to be the odd one out. Because that is one thing, is when you do cut alcohol out at the age of 28 or 30, whatever age you decide to do that at, you do become ostracized in our society. Unfortunately. It is slowly beginning to change, but that was definitely a huge component of it, and especially from the ages of 18 to 28, you're almost a weirdo if you don't drink and smoke. Right? It's almost more of the question of, like,
Why don't you drink? That's weird. Right. I still get that today. At the age of 33, after two and a half years of not drinking, you still get people like, “Why don't you drink?”
Dawn Taylor
I get it all the time. Personally, I did not ever smoke or drink, but that was due to control issues. Right. Where you wanted to take control, so you did that. I was the polar opposite, where, having dealt with sexual abuse and all kinds of trauma in my own childhood, I was like, “Nobody will ever take control over me. And that's even a substance.” So even to this day, it's hilarious. I have like my one cup of coffee in the morning and I will all of a sudden randomly decide I'm not having coffee for a week just to prove that I'm not addicted to it. Do you know what I mean? There's still that “Nothing will control me in that way.” It's quite funny to me. So I never did all through high school and I 100% struggled with friends partially for that reason, and didn't get invited to things and didn't get taken out to things. As an adult. I'm talking like in my thirties and forties, I have been bullied by relatives for not drinking at events.
Max Larocque
Yeah, it's crazy.
Dawn Taylor
I'm personally bullied and I'm just like, what?
Max Larocque
I'm personally not a huge fan of Christmas and or big holidays like that because essentially it's just a big drunk fest. And again, being the odd one out of the family that doesn't drink, it's not the most enjoyable time, to be
Dawn Taylor
Totally. No, not at all. And so yeah, I know that feeling. A drink once in a while when people are like and then they almost make fun of me because I'm having a drink and I'm just like, “Oh my word, you guys.”
Max Larocque
Well, see, and a big part for me too, and I've said this on other podcasts, I was kind of like a chameleon. And going back to the sort of the instability of moving all the time was that I got really good at making friends, but it was mainly around the fact that I was just a people pleaser and I put everyone else ahead of me and whatever I felt because I could fit in with any crowd. It just so happened that as I got older, I happened to fall into the crowd that was excessively drinking, excessively smoking, and because I didn't want to be ostracized and I didn't want to be that odd one out, it's like, well, I'm just going to keep on doing it and then next thing you know, they don't know what you're doing behind closed doors, right? So, if they're only smoking in a social situation, it seems normal. Well, if you don't know that when you guys leave, I'm going to continue to drink and smoke, that's more of a problem than they actually perceive or they actually see. So that was a big part of it. I would say the worst age of my drinking was 25 and that was because I had just moved out from a friend's house. So that was the first time living by myself. Like totally, totally by myself. So there was no, I guess, extra eyes on me even just from whether they would say anything or not. Nobody was acting. It was just the fact that I was behind closed doors and I had full choice and full autonomy to do whatever it was I wanted to do behind closed doors.
Dawn Taylor
So, on the outside looking in, what would I have seen had I met you? So you've been two and a half years sober. Had I met you, say, five years ago, what would I have seen?
Max Larocque
Absolutely no difference. From the outside looking in. To be honest, when I came out publicly, everyone was shocked. My parents were shocked when I came out. Everyone was shocked because I was so good at putting on the front. And my biggest thing was, especially being in the fitness industry, was I commonly felt like I was kind of on a pedestal, and as long as I looked a certain way, then no one would ever see anything was wrong. Right? I drove the BMW, I had a nice haircut. I've been in the gym since I was 14 years old. So, if someone looks that way and they have their Starbucks in hand each day, and they have their BMW and they had their stupid, expensive haircut, you wouldn't think anything was wrong. And that was my whole, I guess, objective behind that, was to make sure that no one would have ever thought twice about it.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. So when did it finally come to a head? What was the moment that you were like, “I might be in trouble.”
Max Larocque
So I was 30 years old. I was actually with my ex-girlfriend, and that was predominantly what prompted even the thought of looking inward and actually considering, like, “Hey, how much do I drink on a weekly basis? How much do I smoke on a weekly basis?” So we had just gotten my now-dog Lucy together, and she was definitely pushing in the direction of wanting kids pretty quickly. We hadn't been together for that long, for the record. So, there was a lot of pressure going from a lot of different directions. And at that point in time, I was about $40,000 in debt. I hadn't told her any of this because there was so much shame around the debt that that's when I first started thinking, like, okay, like, I hadn't even said this to her verbally. This was just in my own head was that, like, okay, she wants to have a family. I'm $40,000 debt. Haven't told her about it. “There is zero fucking chance in hell that I am bringing a kid into this world where I'm already swimming in debt.” I can't smoke, eat, socialize, or do just about anything unless I drink or smoke. Like, thankfully, I had some sort of subconscious awareness of no, fucking pump the brakes. You do not need to bring a kid in this world because this will just exacerbate all of the issues that you're currently dealing with. The issues that you're avoiding right now, they're going to blow the fuck up if you bring a kid.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, Max, come on. Yeah, that would have been the best thing for you to do, insert sarcasm here.
Max Larocque
Yeah. So, thankfully, whatever. I don't know. Again, subconscious part of me that just had the awareness to know because, I mean, a lot of people get themselves in these situations that, “Let's just have a kid and it'll get better.” No, it fucking won't. “Let's just get married and it'll get better.” No, it fucking won't. Whatever issues that you're avoiding right now are not just going to dissipate and go away. They're going to, by adding more problems, get worse and worse and worse and worse. And then if you do have children, you're not going to have the energy and or capacity to actually deal with your own shit, I think is a very commonly overlooked thing before having children, in my personal opinion, which will probably piss some people off, but that's okay.
Dawn Taylor
This is the words I use, “In my humble yet correct opinion.” Feel free to use that.
Max Larocque
Yeah, exactly. My opinion is my opinion. You're going to hate me. I've pissed off more than enough people in the last two and a half years. It's okay.
Dawn Taylor
No, I don't think much different on that. And I get in trouble with that, too. Yeah. Fix your shit before you pass it on to everyone else in your world.
Max Larocque
I know there can't be an actual test for it, but there should be one.
Dawn Taylor
Okay. You and my husband should talk about that. Quick side note, his line is always that everyone should be fixed upon birth and you should have to actually just go to a doctor's office to sign a piece of paper saying you're ready to have a kid. Even if there's no test, even if there's no one's going to stop you, you actually have to book an appointment and go. So it just pauses you in the moment to be like, “Is this actually what we want?”
Max Larocque
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
That's always been his thing. And everyone gets mad at him for it. He's standing by it.
Max Larocque
I'd have to say, I agree with your husband.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. You just reminded me of him. That's awesome. So you realize that this is a no go. So what shifted there? Because you are not, I'm guessing, currently with that girlfriend and you don't have kids, or else you just haven't told me.
Max Larocque
No. And also, I do have ADHD, so if I ever go on a tangent and then forget to come back, bring me back in and I'll be the same.
Dawn Taylor
It's okay.
Max Larcoque
Yeah. So that's what prompted that. And so this was April of 2020. So we had just basically gone into lockdown. Oh, gosh, five and a half weeks prior kind of thing. So we had just shut down our previous location for the first time, the first lockdown. And this was like in that first six weeks of COVID where no one had a fucking clue what was going on.
Dawn TaylorNobody did.
Max Larocque
Everything was changing. So, like, I still remember when the NBA, the NHL, everything like that closed down, where it was like, oh, shit, this is serious. This is a pretty big thing. And then again, fast forward, and it just was COVID. But at the time, I've been wanting to transition my business to somewhat online at that point in time. And when COVID hit, it was actually a really good time to do so because it was like, well, I'm making my $2,000 a month here on CERB, which has not really taken me too far here, especially when I'm $40,000 secretly in debt. So, now is the time. So, I actually hired a coach at that point in time for business coaching because I just had zero idea how to actually get myself online from a position of business. I already had an Instagram following and things like that. So, I hired a coach. And the first 60 days of that program was predominantly life coaching and sort of like looking at yourself first, because if you're going to put yourself online, one, it's quite exhausting. B, if you put out a fake persona of yourself online, it is inevitable that you will burn out in a very short period of time,
Dawn Taylor
Not gonna work.
Max Larocque
Because there's no way you can have this persona of who you are and then actually be yourself. So that was when I really started looking at how much am I drinking on a week to week basis. And this is where it's tough too, because with cannabis addiction, it gets very much downplayed. It's like, “Oh, it's just weed. You can't be addicted to weed.” Like, shut the fuck up. You can be addicted to just about anything, whether it be substance and or non substance addiction. Second of all, with alcohol, again, especially within that age demographic, it's like, “No, man, you're fine. You just like to drink, okay?” And people would downplay it over and over and over again. And it wasn't until I actually sat with it and it's like, okay, I'm breaking this down. So I'm drinking anywhere between, like, six and eight ounces of scotch a night, drinking between or smoking between one and two joints a night. So if I add this up, that's like over a 40 ounce of scotch a week. And that's just me. That's not including, like, if I went to my ex-girlfriend's parents for dinner and had some wine, if I went to my parents house, had some wine or some beers, that was just me. And then actually putting this on paper and seeing the numerical value attached to that, where I was like, “Holy fuck, I'm drinking a 40 plus a week and smoking about a quarter ounce of weed a week.” Yeah, okay. Of course there's people out there that have it worse, but it's not a competition of who has it, who doesn't have it worse. And I had that kind of fixated in my head that I would downplay the own severity of my own problem because it was like, “Oh, well, so and so does this, and so and so does. At least I'm not doing cocaine all the time. That was how I would try to kind of justify it in my head.”
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Max Larcoque
And so for me, when I wrote I actually wrote a post about it one day, and it was just the first time that I had actually acknowledged that I had a problem with it, and I hadn't posted it publicly again. I was still with my ex at the time, and quick story on that was that I wrote this post when she was at work, and she got home that day and I showed it to her. And that was the first time that I actually sat with the fact that I classified myself as an alcoholic and then we won't go too far in details of that because it's just a long blown-up story, but basically, her grandfather had pretty much killed himself with alcohol and so when I brought this to light with my own issues with drinking, it was like, “well, you're not an alcohol-alcoholic because you don't drink to the point where you're pissing your pants every night.” So that really fucked with my head, because I just wrote this piece. Yeah, I just wrote out this story, essentially, of my life and what I was actually dealing with. To then have the person next to me basically invalidate that completely and say that I'm being dramatic. This isn't as bad as I'm making it seem because of XYZ, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So, that really fucked with my head. And then again, long story short, I ended up posting it publicly because I got her, I guess, permission, you can say.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Max Larocque
But then that caused a whole fucking shit show of issues within our relationship. Her family tried to get involved and tried to say also that I didn't have problems, and yada, yada, yada. So, yeah, that blew up, and then we split in November of 2020. I took Lucy full-time, and that was the main reason why I got sober, was Lucy. So, she was the reason that I got sober and stayed. Again, not sober, but alcohol-free for the duration that it has been. So, yeah, Lucy was kind of the main driver because we had got her in August of 2020. And then that's when those thoughts started to come out more frequently and then once we split, that was when the responsibility was fully on me to take care of her and anything that happened to her or anything that happened to me was my responsibility, and I had to take control of that.
Dawn Taylor
Okay, I have so many thoughts on this. Number one is people, stop gaslighting people when they say what they're feeling and what they're going through.
Max Larocque
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
I had this conversation this morning with someone talking about trauma and how one person's trauma will resonate in their body and sit within the same as somebody else's that would be nothing. Right? Where you can look from the outside and be like, “Oh, no, that's on a scale, and this one's way worse than that one.” But your perspective is your truth is your reality, right? It's yours. And that is how you feel if someone says to you, like, “Hey, I'm struggling with this.” or “I think that I might be an alcoholic.” or, “Hey, I think I might be an addict.” or, “Hey, I think I need support in this.” Can we actually start stepping up as humanity and as society and be like, “Okay, if this is a problem, maybe I don't deem it a problem, but you do, so that means it's important.”
Max Larocque
Exactly. And from a severity standpoint, is everyone has a different tolerance to everything, right? In terms of how you tolerate stress, how you tolerate your alcohol, your drugs, your whatever avoidance techniques you're using, we all have different tolerances for it.
Dawn Taylor
All of us. All of us.
Max Larocque
We all tolerate trauma differently too. So depending on our upbringing 100%, the age that it happened, the communication we had with our parents and our caregivers, were we able to actually decompress some of that trauma and process some of that trauma at a young age? Or was it something that just sat there and then festered over time, then became a severe addiction, whatever it may be? So, everyone's different. Gabor Mate uses the big T, little T analogy, but it's like, again, trauma is your trauma. No one needs to understand it and no one needs to feel it the way you do. If you believe what it is, then it is.
Dawn Taylor
Well. And I've had people in the past say, like, “I feel almost guilty for doing this work, I feel guilty for spending this money, I feel guilty for taking this resource from somebody else who needs it more.” And it's like, “Whoa, no.”
Max Larocque
And it's interesting.
Dawn Taylor
Worse or better or easier or harder? Like, no.
Max Larocque
I always mixed up guilty and shame, too, and I'm sure you are very well versed in this, where it's like they feel guilty. Is it they feel guilty or is it like they feel shame around it. And is it like the shame that's actually preventing them from wanting to work through it and work on it and talk about it and actually bring it to light?
Dawn Taylor
Well. And even the definition right, where it's like, guilty is like, I did something bad. Shame. Shame is like, I am bad. Like, me as the person I am bad. Right? And so really breaking that down. So then you get a dog, or you have your dog, and now this is what helps you get sober. But was this just part of getting sober? Or was it actually like, no, now you have to do some recovery work on what got you there in the first place.
Max Larocque
So fast forward two and a half years to today, tthat's where I am now. So I actually recorded a podcast episode about this a couple of months ago, and it was me coming to terms with the fact that I had just transferred addictions to work. So, I had transferred all of my addictive tendencies to work and building my businesses. And I just used that as an avoidance tactic to actually sitting with those big emotions that we talked about. And this is one that is also super-layered because of the fact that we live in a society that actually promotes workaholism and celebrates workaholism. Even though it's taking away from your family, it's taking away from your physical health, it's taking away from your mental health, it's taking away from the relationship you could be building with your children, it's taking away from a lot of things. But because we live in a society that says, oh, my God, you make 200,000 a year, like, you are so successful. Well, define successful. If I make $200,000 a year but my wife hates me, my kids think I'm a shitty dad, and my physical health is declining rapidly, am I successful?
Dawn Taylor
Okay, let's just talk about that for a sec. Because this is a thing, so I've often talked about it, and I've. like. working with clients that have been in recovery, is when they talk about the fact that you do need to go home and not be with the same people, right? So that you're surrounded by it. So that you're surrounded, not surrounded by the drugs, you're not surrounded by the alcohol, and you have a new life to look forward to, right. But you have to find new people. I've often thought I can't imagine being the person coming out of rehab and pretty much being told, I have to go home and live a completely different life while still struggling with the fact that I'm trying to stay off of drugs and alcohol and all of these things, right. But, anytime I've worked with somebody who's addicted to food, addicted to work, addicted to shopping, addicted to these things, it is so hard because these are things that are required of us on a daily basis, right? You can't actually get through life without eating. You can't totally get through life without ever having a job and working, right? So then we transfer addictions to something that is actually just socially acceptable. It can be just as addicting.
Max Larcoque
I know. And it's such an interesting conversation of like, healthy addiction versus addiction or unhealthy versus healthy addiction. And a common thing you'll see is exercise, right? Where people all the time from drug and or alcohol use into exercise and all of a sudden you develop orthorexia where any food that's not, quote unquote, healthy food is then now deemed as bad food. And if you don't exercise seven days a week, then all these bad things are going to happen where it's like, again, you're just transferring addiction. So I'm not going to say that. Of course, exercise addiction as a whole is definitely better for you than slamming a bottle of Jack Daniels every night. For sure. I'm not going to deny that. However, it still goes to show that there's underlying either emotional scars, trauma, insecurities, self worth issues that have not been addressed because you're just, again, switching to exercise, which is a super common one. I always, kind of people who run like Ironman and Triathlons, where I'm like, “What are you running from?” Literally and figuratively, what are you running from? No one fucking wants to run that much who hasn't had some unresolved shit.
Dawn Taylor
I love that because I think it all the time and just don't say it
Max Larocque
Oh, you want to fucking swim 20 miles a week and run 100 and bike 200? Why? What are you running from that is making you want to do that? Now? I know there's definitely, I was dating a girl who ran Ironman and a lot of it was sort of reclaiming herself and reclaiming her power. She was actually a psychologist, so, again, very well versed and also has done a lot of her own inner work as well. So that was how she had done it. But I would argue that she's a pretty small percentage of people who are actively running and training for Ironman and marathons and things that are extreme to that nature.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, no, I can see that. So how did you overcome so we're going to backtrack to you, two and half years. How did you overcome the addiction and did you have any support in doing that?
Max Larocque
Um, well, if we're backtracking two and a half years, I would say I didn't overcome the addiction. I just white-knuckled it and just cut it completely raw. I just full-on cold turkey, stopped smoking weed and drinking alcohol. December 1, 2020. And like I said, just completely white-knuckled it, which worked for a period of time, but it didn't really work. Again, it worked for the period of time that I was able to white-knuckle it. But the thing is, you can't white-knuckle sobriety for that long. And this is which we'll get into later, the sobriety versus recovery conversation. December 1, 2020 hit, I had publicly stated I'm stopping drinking alcohol as a way to have the accountability with that, because, truthfully, as much as my family was supportive, they just don't get it. And they're also I have two older sisters, love them, love my entire family, but all very stubborn, hard headed individuals that really have no desire to have these types of conversations at all. And so I am definitely the outlier of my family. So, again, they were supportive. This is also, we're just about to go into the third wave of lockdowns here in Alberta. So really, any support that I did have was predominantly online because of the fact that I was secluded, which for that period of time actually worked out well. Truthfully, because of the fact that everything was shut down. Even if I wanted to go to a restaurant and drink or a bar and drink and whatever everything was for that period of time, it actually worked out well. I think it was December 13 that we went into the lockdown for the third time. And one of the things that I did as a way to not only have a layer of accountability, but to also start growing my online audience, to start coaching more people online, was that I said that I was going to do, the house that I was living at the time was living with some friends shortly after my breakup, and they actually had, like, a little basement gym. And so what I did was I went live every single morning at 09:00 A.m. For I think it was like two and a half months straight, because it was like, if I don't show up at 09:00 am tomorrow, probably for a reason. So I had stated it out loud that I was going to be doing a live workout each and every day. Everyone was already at home on lockdown anyway. So I was like, “Hey, well, I'm doing something positive for the community. It's a way to have that accountability for myself. It's a way to grow an online presence and audience. I'll make a little challenge out of it.” kind of thing. Whoever wins the challenge will get some free personal training whenever the gyms open up, whenever they do open up. Um, fast forward one week. It's now, December 20. We found out that we lost our current lease of the gym that we were at because fucking everything up. So that was the worst night in early sobriety ever because it was just like fucking just literally one thing after the other. In hindsight, it all worked out very well because it gave me enough time to actually establish an online presence. But basically from December 1, 2020 to about February 2021, it was pretty much just white-knuckle it. I worked out excessively. Definitely transferred to exercise, worked my ass off, posted every single day, went live every single day. Basically, did anything I could to distract myself in a more positive way to white-knuckle it and actually avoid a lot of the big feelings I was feeling for the first time in my entire life because that was the reality behind it. It was like, as an adult, since I'd been smoking and drinking since I was 18, I hadn't felt any of those emotions before. And for anyone who does cut substance in any way, shape or form, they're fucking scary the first little bit. They're fucking scary when you've never actually sat with some of these emotions before.
Dawn Taylor
Can we also say, though? As a man, even just as a man in general, men aren't taught to have emotions.
Max Larocque
We aren't.
Dawn Taylor
And it's seen as weak, and it's seen as pathetic, and it's seen as all of these things. So did that play into that at all? Where it's like, oh, shit, there's feels. If you were watching the video right now, he literally just got uncomfortable and had to shift and adjust himself, as I said that.
Max Larocuque
Oh no, not with my ADHD. So for me, it was like so my dad, again, was an RCMP officer. He specialized in bloodstain pattern analysis, which, short term way of describing that my dad was CSI. So my dad saw the worst of the worst of the worst. My dad literally saw mutilated children, dead bodies on a regular basis.
Dawn Taylor
Like, horrible.
Max Larocque
Yeah, horrible. Like the worst of the worst. So my dad, when I first got sober and I told my parents and I sit them down and I told them what had been happening for the last decade, my dad's exact words were, if I've seen a fucking shrink five times. And I remember looking at me being like, “Do you not think it's kind of fucked up that me at the age of 30 has seen a, quote unquote, fucking shrink more than you have, and you have literally seen the worst of the worst of the worst. Does that not seem a little fucked up to you?” And it was just, whoa. When me and my brothers were kids, we didn't talk about things and we just learned to not talk about anything, really? So that was a huge proponent of it. And I know that I'm very sensitive and I'm much more accepting of my sensitivity now because of the fact that you were labeled as, like, weak or quote unquote, you were a pussy growing up. Not to offend people, but that's a word that was common.
Dawn Taylor
No, but that was the language back then.
Max Larocque
That was a very common word. Especially like I was born in 1990, so I'm 33. So very much like late 90s, early 2000s, things were much less, how do I describe it?
Dawn Taylor
Politically correct.
Max Larocque
Yes. 100%.
Dawn Taylor
And I think you have to be a 90s baby born in 1980. I lived through even the 80s.
Max Larocque
You get it.
Dawn Taylor
Nothing politically correct in the 80s. Yeah. Anyone born after 2000. I think it is definitely different.
Max Larocque
Yes, it is. Of a different world. Even just in terms of cell phones and things like that. Like, just everything about it is way different. So, again, very much I was a hockey player, so even more so you don't talk about that kind of shit, hockey pussy if you do. So, I'm much more accepting of the fact that I am super sensitive now. And I don't look at it as, like, a weakness now. I actually look at it as a way to be able to actually develop more relationships, especially with the clients that I work with online and from a coaching standpoint was if I didn't have that sensitivity and I guess empathic powers tha,t we could say, that I wouldn't be able to connect with people on the level that I do. And I know a large part of me staying sober and this is very much I don't really agree with a lot of the stuff that comes from AA. There's definitely aspects of it that work for people. And again, not to say it doesn't work, but it has helped thousands, it's also not helped even more and I think-
Dawn Taylor
Damaged so many people.
Max Larocque
I think that's a thing that they tend to downplay is the fact that you just end up retraumatizing a lot of people with the approach that they take. And that's actually what my psychologist said. Like, the white knuckle approach of like, yeah, it works for a period of time and depending on what your rock bottom looks like, maybe you do need that white knuckle approach for a little bit. Maybe just to kick the substance, just to get out of your system enough to actually create more bandwidth totally to actually work on yourself, then it can work. So that was a huge component of that was just, again, the discomfort with actually being able to feel and address these emotions. And because of the fact that I grew up with the, I guess, male presence being predominantly there as a provider, that's what I shifted into. So, as I started transitioning online and growing more online, my entire life for the last two and a bit years has revolved around work, work, work. And it was my birthday this year, so April 2023, that I was in Canmore, and I lapsed with weed, and then the floodgates opened again. So, for me, it's like, once I start, I just don't stop. And for me, I don't know how familiar you are with Gabor Mate. And Gabor Mate, I love his work. That guy is the man. But it's that question of it's not why the addiction, but why the pain. The last two and a half years has been the most financially lucrative years of my entire life. Businesses. My businesses are doing phenomenally well. So it's like, why the fuck do I keep going back to numb out using weed if my life is as good as it is?
Dawn Taylor
What's your answer for that?
Max Larcoque
That's what I'm in therapy for right now. So we're definitely working through some things that I don't really have the answer for right now, to be entirely honest with you. We're working through some pretty big emotions with that and just some big things that happen. So I'm doing EMDR twice a month right now and then I've actually recently started doing breath work once a month. A client of mine from two years prior, she's a hypnotherapist, and she's doing breath work seminars now. So she's coming to my gym once a month and doing breath work seminars. So between the somatic central nervous system work, that is the kind of brought up with the breath work, combining that with the EMDR, it's been a fucking heavy two months, to say the least. Yeah, you kind of say I'm like balls deep in the actual, in the work of it healing right now. So, truthfully, there's a lot of things that even the realization that I had just, it's funny because I've talked about sobriety versus recovery on podcasts before, but never realized that hypocritically, I was doing the same thing, but I was using work as my outlet. And then once I slipped with weed again, it was like, look, obviously, if things are going as well as they are financially, I'm the happiest I've ever been. I'm the most stable I've ever been. Why do I keep going back to my drug of choice, which is cannabis?
Dawn Taylor
So, talk to me about this recovery versus sobriety, so that people fully understand it.
Max Larocque
So, when you look at sobriety, sobriety, in my opinion, is just the fact that you don't use substance, so you don't drink, you don't smoke, you don't use in any way, shape, or form. That doesn't mean you're healed or you are actually taking care of your shit. Because I learned this by doing a little bit of AA, and then actually a lot of it was too was seeing it in Facebook groups, so quickly going back to early sobriety with COVID was like, I was joining Facebook groups because there was a lot of Facebook groups that were predominantly about, like, addiction, addiction recovery, alcoholism, blah, blah, blah, blah. And seeing the toxicity in some of those groups was, like, extremely eye opening to the point where it was, you know, introduce yourself to the group, blah, blah, blah, blah. Remember literally having people be like, smoked weed for fucking ten years. Like, okay, I did heroin for 13 years. And it's like, “Okay, I didn't realize this was a competition of who had the more severe addiction and not.” and that was early on. I was like, “That's fucked up.” Just weird way. And that was the sort of distinction between sobriety versus recovery. Whereas sobriety, okay, you don't use substance, but that doesn't mean that you've actually done any sort of work on yourself. Oh, you're sober, but you still cheat on your wife. Interesting, you're sober, but you still neglect your children. Interesting, you're sober, but you still neglect your physical health. Interesting, you're sober, but you closet binge eat every day, multiple times a week, whatever it may be. It's like, okay, so you're sober from substance. That doesn't mean that you've addressed any of the actual underlying issues, whether it be a self-worth issue, which predominantly is something that I'm working through right now, is the lack of self worth. And I think lack of self-worth definitely drives a lot of addiction in our day and age. But, so the distinction is, for me, my interpretation of recovery is where you're actively taking the steps to be an active participant in your recovery. So, whether that be through CBT therapy, talk therapy, EMDR, hypno, like, whatever is going to float your boat. If you want to go do Reiki, you want to go do energy healing, you want to go do a little bit of this, a little bit of that, I don't give a fuck. As long as you're doing something that aligns with you that is going to actually get you to the root cause of why you have this pain in the first place, that in my opinion, and again, that's just my opinion, so take it or leave it. But in my opinion, that's when someone is actually in recovery is when they are taking the action steps to be and stay sober.
Dawn Taylor
I've always looked at it as the recovery, like recovery is you're actually working to recover from what caused it in the first place. Right? At like a very basic, basic standpoint. So can I ask, where are you at in your sobriety right now?
Max Larcoque
So I am three weeks sober right now.
Dawn Taylor
Nice!
Max Larocque
Three weeks sober. Like officially, officially sober. Sober for three weeks.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Max Larocque
I feel better now. Two weeks ago. It sucks because when you cut weed, especially, one of the biggest things is like, you don't sleep. So you definitely to go through pretty bad wave of insomnia. Your appetite goes to shit, especially if you start, this is an interesting discussion, too, is like weed addiction. When people try to downplay it, it's like, “Oh, no, I'm not addicted. I'm not addicted. It's just weed.” And it's like, okay, how much of your daily food intake is when you're stoned?
Dawn Taylor
Oh, interesting.
Max Larocque
Interesting. I actually eat about 95% of my daily food intake, if not more, when I'm stoned. Yeah. Okay, so let's unravel this a little bit more. You may think weed is not an addiction, but if you can't eat food without weed, now, it's that combination of, like, there is the weed addiction. There's also the underlying disordered, eating and or eating disorder as a whole that hasn't been addressed. And one thing I talk about is, like, reverse engineering addiction. So when people try to downplay, I'm not addicted to weed. “Can you go a week without it? Can you sleep without it? Can you eat without it? Can you socialize without it? Is it affecting your finances, which is then affecting other areas? Everything.” You start to unravel it and kind of reverse engineer it, and it's like, “Oh, shit, I'm financially stressed, but I'm smoking $100 a week worth of weed.” Well, okay. Are you also making good decisions when you smoke weed? Are you eating good, healthy food on a regular basis, or are you skip adding shitty food, which costs way more money, which is then furthering your financial stress? And that's where I don't know if you've read the book Dopamine Nation by Dr. Anna Lemke, if you haven't, highly recommend it. It's a phenomenal book, but she does a really good job of breaking down the dopamine pathways. And when you're chasing dopamine and you typically don't just stop at one thing. So, for a lot of people when they smoke weed, they get that massive rush of dopamine. Well, eventually that starts to crash. And depending on your tolerance of weed, if you smoke weed for a long time, your tolerance is here and then it crashes pretty quickly. So, okay, what are we going to get that back up? Either going to smoke more weed or you're going to mix in some alcohol. You're going to mix in some porn. You're going to mix in a whole bunch of ticks. You're going to gamble. You're going to online gamble. You're going to online shop. You're going to do pretty much anything you can to get as much dopamine in your system as possible. And what's really interesting is she uses an analogy of, like, a seesaw. So if you spend, let's say, the hours of 05:00 P.m. Is the time you go to bed in this massive dopamine overdrive, when you wake up, wake up at homeostasis, you wake up in a dopamine deficient state. For anyone who's not familiar with dopamine, it's one of the neurotransmitters that provides motivation. It gives us drive. It gives us incentive to do things and accomplish things well. This is where addiction is such a bitch because a lot of the times and I'm sure someone will resonate with this when you're in addiction, there's very often that when you're high or drunk, whatever it is, you have these thoughts of like, “I don't want to do this anymore. I hate this. I hate that I do this, I hate doing it.” In general, that's when dopamine is high, when dopamine is low. So when you wake up, first thing in the morning in a dopamine deficient state, so your drive, your motivation, your desire to do pretty much fucking anything positive for yourself that day is starting way behind the eight ball. So, that's where do you think if you're starting in this dopamine deficient state, do you think you're going to have the, I guess, like awareness or the capability to make good choices that day?
Dawn Taylor
Well, you've also fried out the coping mechanism, portions of your brain with the drugs and alcohol.
Max Larocque
Exactly. So now you got to start chasing real dopamine, and real dopamine is not nearly as satisfying. Yeah, exogenous dopamine, I guess we can look at it, right? There are definitely ways, like cold showers, a hard workout, anything like that, that does promote that. But at the same time, if that's not part of your day to day life right now, who the fuck wants to hop on a cold shower first thing in the morning? Like, truthfully, it sucks. It sucks for a reason. Because there is that pain-pleasure balance, which she also uses the same sort of seesaw analogy for. But it's super interesting when you start looking at things like that. And that's why when people say like, “Oh, weed is not addiction or addictive, my phone's not addictive.” it's like, again, can you not use that substance and or non-substance addiction for a few days, for a week, for two weeks?
Dawn Taylor
Oh, gosh, even an hour. For some people.
Max Larocque
Nowadays with social media, it's like you see people freak, like they're in the Starbucks line and they literally can't wait 35 seconds for their coffee without looking at their phone because they're so either A, addict to their phone or B, insecure in their own skin that, God forbid I have a conversation with a human being beside me. I'll just put my face down and just look at my phone, pay attention to anyone around me. That's a whole different other topic. People are weird after COVID.
Dawn Taylor
People haven't recovered super hot, we'll put it that way. Yeah, they haven't recovered at their finest. So for someone listening who's like, “Oh shit, I think I might be in addiction.” What is your number one recommendation or even your top couple recommendations on where they can start?
Max Larocque
I mean, the big biggest thing is awareness of the fact that you are struggling with addiction in the first place or awareness of the fact that you are struggling in some way, shape or form. Whether you want to label it as addiction or not. I know some people think of addiction as such a negative, harsh connotation. If you don't want to label it as addiction, that's fine, but label it that, it's something that needs to be addressed because it is taking away from other areas of my life. Andrew Huberman has a really interesting definition of addiction and it's basically the narrowing of your pleasures. So, when you start to ask yourself these questions is you know, weed, for example, is like, okay, do you spend the majority of like, thinking about when you're going to get high, how you're going to get high, the process of that, what does that look like to you? So, then you've actually lost sight of other things in your life that actually you did derive pleasure from. Because now, unless you're stoned, you don't even like doing those things anymore. And that is addiction in a nutshell where when you are an addiction, that's all you focus on and you'll still do those activities. But I got to get stoned first. That's a big one. I got to get stoned and then I'll go watch the movie, then I'll go do this, then I'll go to that, and it's like, how about we just take that away a little bit? In Dopamine Nation, she's got a really good acronym for kind of bringing light to addiction can't remember to come completely. But the D stands for distance. So actually creating distance from the addiction as a whole. So whether that be, let's say, weed, for example, I know when I first cut it, I had to throw out my bongs. I had to throw out all my papers. I had to throw out all the paraphernalia that went with the addiction. Because if I had it in my house, well, even if I don't have the weed in my house, I'll just drive down the street to a weed store, buy weed, because I still have papers, I still have a bowl, I still have all of these things that I can quickly access to get stoned. So, distance is really important, objectives where you actually objectively look at that. And that's kind of the whole reverse engineering thing. So you keep saying you're stressed about finances. Well, how much is weed costing you? Right? And starting to create objective, looking at sort of data around that of like, where is this helping me and where is this hurting me? So you can create a list. And that's really eye opening for people, too, because commonly the negatives will drastically outweigh the positives. And that's where it kind of gives you that insight of looking at it logically than less emotionally. Especially when you're in addiction, you will find any way possible to justify why you should smoke,
Dawn Taylor
Always.
Max Larocque
Why you need to smoke, why you deserve to smoke. And it's just like, again, that's your monkey the whole monkey mind thing of like, that's your monkey mind telling you that because of course the monkey mind wants that. Dopamine you've? You've used that substance for how long now? Of course, your monkey mind tell you that you deserve this or you need this, or you want this. So, creating distance is big. Can't remember the rest of the acronym, but again, super good book.
Dawn Taylor
We'll post it in the show notes.
Max Larocque
Yeah, and I think part of it too is just the education that comes from that book as a whole. Because if you can understand how your brain works a little bit more, it'll allow you, I guess more, just insight to addiction as a whole and how you can create barriers with it and things of that nature that can be super, super helpful. A big thing she talks about too, which again, I think I didn't mention this with AA, but radical honesty, right? Being radically fucking uncomfortably honest with what you're doing behind closed doors. Because that is the reality is even if you have a close network of friends that are there to support you, help you, they're living with you and they sleep in your room with you.
Dawn Taylor
Totally. They have no idea what you're actually doing.
Max Larocque
And even then, how many people have closet addictions that are just going to go to the bathroom really quickly and buck a line of coke and it's like people don't necessarily know that all the time. S,o only you know what you do behind closed doors. So again, whether that be harder drugs, whether weed, alcohol, food, like, porn, online dating, whatever distraction that you're trying to use, you have to be uncomfortably honest with yourself about the situation at hand.
Dawn Taylor
Well, then I'd say from there, if you need support, right, reach out. Family, like, go to AA, go to rehab, talk to your medical doctors, do the work.
Max Larocque
Being open minded to various ways, that can help you, right? And a lot of people, older generation has it. “Well, if you're going to get sober, you have to go to AA.” Don't. You could read books, you can just do online. You can do anything to get sober. And that's the big thing, too, is like, do whatever the fuck. That's why I use the example like, you want to go to Reiki, you want to go to this. Do whatever feels right for you. That's going to keep you on the track of recovery, because it doesn't matter. Well, my dad went to AA and it worked for him. Who cares if it's not going to work for you because you don't align with the messaging in AA? Find something and be open-minded things, that's going to work for you.
Dawn Taylor
Well, I know for myself, for other health stuff, I do a lot of IV therapy, and one of the ones I do is NAD. And that's used in rehab facilities because it regenerates your cells so often. I'm sitting in a room with people that are recovering addicts. Because they heard about it and it's made the biggest difference. And it's an IV therapy. You don't know. So ask for help, ask for support, ask the questions.
Max Larocque
And that is the cool part of the world we live in is there's never been more resources than there currently are.
Dawn Taylor
No, they're everywhere. And 1s there's a few positives that came out of COVID and one of them I've often said is it got people to start searching for stuff, right? Because we were on lockdown. All of a sudden, online business was available. All of a sudden it's like, “Hey, wait, I want to try a weird treatment that I heard about or I read about, and I'm going to Google it and try to figure out where someone is in the world that does that.” And it's created a community outside of our community.
Yeah, in a very different way, and not just through video games.
Max Larocque
Well, I've said this before, too, and this was funny because this was one of the first takeaways from my first session back in EMDR was like and my psychologist did not use these words, but this is my interpretation of it, but slow the fuck down if you find you're someone that you are always on the go. And again, this is where the whole non-substance versus substance addiction talks in about, okay, so you play on three different rec leagues. You have this hobby, this hobby, this hobby, this hobby, this hobby. If you're someone that does not allow any time to just sort of sit with yourself, that in itself is a problem. And so what COVID was good for was the fact that it actually forced everyone to slow down. Now, the sad reality of that is that for certain people, a lot of addiction for a large demographic of the population, it actually, actually furthered addiction. It furthered abuse, it furthered all kinds of things as well. But again, it all kind of ties back to like when you slow down, you can actually sit with these things and understand like, “Oh, there is some big emotions under the surface that I didn't even know about because I'm just so fucking busy.” And that's where, again, workaholism is such a common one, right, of like, I work, work, and then people perceive me as successful because all I do is work. But you come home every night and you're miserable and you just feel the need to scroll social media for hours and live your life through other people's life. Are you that successful? Or define successful.
Dawn Taylor
And to some people, yeah, but 100% you need to look at it and define it. Max. I always ask a few fun questions at the end, unless I forget because that's just who I am. and the people in my world laugh at that. And so. I'm going to ask you a few fun questions before I let you go and get back to your amazing career you have. And for anyone listening, if you want to find Max, we're going to have his info in the the show notes so you can find those. So, quick silly question is, what is the secret guilty way that you decompress? Come on, you know, it's Real House Five, so I'm just kidding. It might be.
Max Larocque
Hell's Kitchen is a terrible, trash TV show that I actually, for some reason, I don't know why, but I love that show. Hell's Kitchen. Just awful. It's so bad. But I don't know why, but it's entertaining.
Dawn Taylor
It really is.
Max Larocque
You know what? That's an interesting question, to be totally honest. I know we're kind of keeping it lighter here, but that is thing with recovery is you have to start trying things to see what you enjoy, because the reality is, I did things to fit in for the majority of my adult life. So I'm trying new things where I'm rock climbing. I'm doing different activities to be like, what do I actually enjoy doing? I'm not just doing things to fit in
Dawn Taylor
Outside of orkin pot everyone else's hobbies.
Max Larocque
That was my life forever. So I'm just doing a lot of experimenting with that. I mean, I spend the majority of my free time with my dog, to be blatantly, honestly, honest. But, yeah, I mean. Guilty pleasure would probably be like Hell's Kitchen, something like Light, like that. I still do work a lot. Like, as mentioned, I'm definitely working through that or working on that, kind of, as we speak. So I don't have a great answer for that because
Dawn Taylor
That's okay.
Max Larocque
A lot of my decompression truthfully is, like, reading got a real big bookshelf over there that I got built not. But yeah. So I find it fascinating. And again, a large part of that, too, is just because it helps me connect with people on a different level. Yeah, I love reading. That's probably a guilty pleasure of mine.
Dawn Taylor
Awesome. I like it. How would you describe yourself in one sentence?
Max Larocque
Right now? The word of the day at my session last week with my psychologist was agitated.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, interesting thing.
Max Larocque
Yeah. And it's not the most positive word, for sure, but that's like genuinely speaking, just in terms of where I'm at with my own recovery
Dawn Taylor
Right now in life. You're an agitator.
Max Larocque
Genuinely speaking. Three weeks, completely sober. Wouldn't say I'm proud of that being the word that I would describe myself, but that is probably the most accurate word to describe myself. And my family as a whole is just constantly and consistently agitated with every little thing. And that's not the word that I want to describe myself with. Hence, me being, as mentioned earlier, balls deep in the working on myself. A season of my life, we can call it.
Dawn Taylor
You know what, on behalf of myself and everyone listening, though, I want to say congratulations.
Max Larocque
Thank you very much for that.
Dawn Taylor
I've overcome some drugs myself, and mine was a medically induced drug addiction, but I was eating 25 percocet a day and 40 milligrams of BuTrans patch for nine months. And so, again, yeah, had a pretty good addiction going on and totally medically-induced, but I had to come off of it in order to have a surgery and stay off of it. And I cold turkeyed. And I know how hard that was. And I know how hard it was to stay off of it and to stay in recovery even to this day. I have days. And so, congratulations.
Max Larocque
Well, thank you. I was going to say, if you don't mind me asking, what was your three months like of that?
Dawn Taylor
Of recovery? It was interesting because it was so I cold turkey dolphin for anyone listening who doesn't know, BuTrans is legalized heroin like, it's a patch that they give you typically in the hospital, if you like. My grandpa had Butran's patch when he was dying cancer, and he had, like, five different cancers, and it was in his bones. And so they had given him a small dosage of it. I think it was five milligrams. And I was on 40. Yeah. And it pretty much knocked him into a coma. I'm talking like I was on mass doses. I should have actually gone to rehab to come off of it. They put you into a medically-induced coma and I cold turkey. And so part of it was I'd gone on the meds and the drugs because I was in such excruciating pain, and I needed it till surgery because I was blacking out from pain and nothing touched the pain. It was so big. And so they were worried about my heart stopping from the pain level being too high. So they kept bumping up and bumping up and bumping up and bumping up what I was on, trying to get the pain under control, because they're like, “We can either deal with you coming off of drugs, or we can deal with you dying from a heart attack. We have to figure out how to keep you alive.” So when I finally got the surgery, I went cold turkey two weeks before surgery date, because I had to be two weeks clean so that they could put me back under to have surgery, and so those first three months were brutal because I was also recovering from a full radical hysterectomy and couldn't use painkillers and couldn't use anything, but the pain was gone. Like, the excruciating pain was gone. So I felt amazing, but I still would find myself in my car, driving around, determining if I was going to actually go find someone on the street to buy drugs from.
Max Larocque
And had you done a lot of, I guess, inner work leading up to that part of your life?
Dawn TaylorI
had. So I had done a ton of work already at that point, and so it was interesting because it wasn't an emotional addiction, it was a physical addiction, but there was a weird shame attached to it. There was weird guilt attached to it. There was this lack of understanding attached to it, but also, like, “What the hell is this feeling?” And now I have to overcome this, and, oh, no, I write about it in my book, like, fully hallucinating, pulling out my hair, scraping the drywall off the walls. I was a solid ten days of that. Like, full hallucinations for 10, 12 days before I felt even human.
Max Larocque
Holy shit.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Max Larocque
That's wild. Well, thank you for sharing that. I wasn't sure if you want me to ask.
Dawn Taylor
I don't know. No, I'm totally comfortable talking about it because mine wasn't people. And I think part of it is people do assume that most addiction comes from something hard that happened in someone's life and from a trauma. And it isn't always like, how many people out there are medically addicted to prescriptions, right? But then comes an emotional addiction in the middle of it. But also, there was a grieving process. I had to go to my grandpa's funeral like that. And I don't remember large portions of it. And I hid it from everyone. Nobody knew. People in my life didn't know. And so that was really hard. But then I still catch myself. And being brutally honest, I still catch myself some days. I was with someone a little while ago and they were taking T three’s or Percocet or something for something, and I saw them shake one out of that bottle. And if every ounce of my body didn't just be like, “Yes, I want that.” I think my husband was even there. And he kind of looked at me and I was like, “Fuck! Still?” It's been nine years. And I still had that moment of like, “Oh, but I wouldn't give for that.” Then I was like, no, because life is worth living, and I know I can't keep recovering from that.
Max Larocque
Yeah, it goes to show the environmental triggers and just how like something huge, someone opening up a T Three bottle, how that can trigger that, and then just being aware of that when you are. I would say. in an early sobriety is super important. Because if there are certain environments that you should shouldn't be in, then do not fucking put yourself in them.
Dawn Taylor
For me, it was like last fall, I had a double ear infection and I had to fly. And so I went to a walk-in clinic because the meds weren't working. And I was like, “Can I fly or am I going to rupture my eardrums?” And they were like, “Probably rupture. But here's like five things you can do to hopefully minimize it. But you're going to be in excruciating pain. We'll give you some meds to take care of it.” And he starts writing out a prescription for oxy, like, not even batting an eye because he knew the excruciating pain I was going to be in. And it took me a second. And I am very far into feeling very mentally healthy. And it took me a second where I was like, “No, sorry, I can't take that. But I'll get some Tylenol and Advil at a drugstore.” Yeah. And he was like, “Don, that's not going to be enough.” And I was like, “It'll be okay.”
Max Larocque
It'll be enough for you, right?
Dawn Taylor
Like, it'll be enough for me. And I still probably won't even take that because meds scare me a little, right? But in those moments, right? And that, for me, was a moment where I was like, “Oh, okay, so if that still nine years later, could elicit that little muscle response of like, but it's only, like, five, I could probably just enjoy those for the next week.” Like, right? Even that, I was like, “Okay, do I need to make sure that I go with someone to a doctor's appointment?” Do I need to make sure that when I went to my pharmacist that day, I was like, “Can you please put a note on my file that I am not allowed to have hard narcotics?”
Max Larocque
Going to say it's almost crazy that they don't ask that first. They just don't even look into the history of things. Like you said, they don't got an eye. They just write the prescription.
Dawn Taylor
Right? But for me, I was like, “Oh, I need to actually go do something about that, because that was a weird feel.” Right? And it doesn't happen often, but I think that people also need to be aware of that is someone could be sober for how many years? And that one split second that something happens and your whole body is like muscle memory, you're just like, “Oh, that would feel good.”
Max Larocque
And that's the interesting part with the central nervous system and just how responsive your central nervous system is. And that's important to be aware of what your body actually feels like in certain environments.
Dawn Taylor
Totally.
Max Larocque
Because then you can start paying attention to, you can call it your intuition, whatever, but it's like when you have that gut feeling, it's there for a reason.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, 100%.
Max Larocque
And I've talked to people about that since, because I'm very vulnerable with my clients and stuff, too, on what I'm going through. And just like, if something pops up, it's like, no, I wasn't going to, but man, did I think about it, right? So let me walk you through how I processed it. And for me, and I would challenge you even three weeks in doing the same, is I made a list of all the things in my life I had to live for, right? People in my life that it was like, “No, I need to be able to look at that and put a value on that.” What does that actually look like for me of continuing to live, continuing to thrive, continuing to be happy, continuing to be sober, right? Continuing to work on my mental health? What is the value that I'm going to attach to that versus the value of doing the opposite.
Max Larocque
I know I've heard sort of the analogy of like, instead of looking at, what are you taking away? It's like, what are you gaining?
Dawn Taylor
Totally. Because if I look at it, what I'm taking away, I can justify the hell out of it.
Max Larocque
Exactly. Right?
Dawn Taylor
Always.
Max Larocque
Exactly. So it's just putting that more positive spin to it, of, like, again, I'm gaining this, I'm gaining financial security, I'm gaining stability, I'm gaining control of myself, I'm gaining blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever it may be. But taking that lens to it instead of just the deprivation side of things, of I'm losing
Dawn Taylor
Totally. And, yeah, it's been interesting. So thank you. Thank you, Max, for joining us today. Thank you for hanging out, for being so vulnerable and open and honest, especially so quick into recovery. I'm smiling because I'm like, wow, you signed up to talk about this when you weren't even sober. And I love that. I love that, though, honestly, you don't have to be through it to talk about it. And I hope today even helped you to just have this conversation. And so for anyone listening, I hope that you heard something that can help you, support you, that gives you a little bit of insight. If nothing else, read a book and understand the people around you different. You're not alone. So join us again in two weeks for another amazing topic. Tell your friends. Share this with people, because I don't think we know anyone who has not been affected by addiction in some way, shape, or form. Guys, even your cell phones. Check out the show notes located at TheTaylorWay.ca. For more information and all of Max's contact info, subscribe now on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you want to listen to your podcasts. And if you love the show, I would love it if you'd leave a rating or review. See you guys later.
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Content Warning: suicide
In this episode, we discuss some topics that listeners may find difficult such as suicide and loss.
Why you would want to listen to this episode…
Kyle Dube knows a lot about young people from his experience as a father and a man dedicated to helping youths. Unfortunately, his world changed when he lost his youngest son. Today, he opens up about his struggles with handling loss and grief and his passion in urging people, both young and old, to be relentless in their purpose and in being there for the people they love the most.
Who this for...
Suicide has many societal stigmas and today’s episode goes above and beyond in not only discussing these stigmas but also tearing them down. For those who would like to know more about what to say or do in the face of tragic events, or for those who wish to understand the unique point of view of a grieving person who’s chosen to be as strong as ever before, this episode is for you.
About Dawn Taylor
Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver, life strategist, trauma specialist, and all-around badass. Dawn's journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from traumas such as issues related to infidelity, overcoming addiction, working through PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.
Connect with Dawn here at The Taylor Way: Consultation Call | Website | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Get to know Dawn on a deeper level through her book! Order Here
P.S. I Made It, is a powerful story that grabs you through its lack of pretension and honesty. Every page reveals another layer of curious wonder at both Dawn’s life and the power of hope that moves within each of us. Dawn’s hope is that you use this book as a resource to deal with your struggles. Share it with someone who needs it. We all want to feel like someone understands what it’s like to suffer through something and – come out the other side. She describes her life as “horrifically beautiful and beautifully horrific.
Guest Bio
Kyle has lived in the Edmonton area his entire life and has been dedicated to working with youth for over 30 years. Kyle has been with YOUCAN Youth Services since 2002. In that time, YOUCAN Youth Services has grown from a one-person office to being a leading organization in youth work and transitional youth employment programming. Kyle is learning to understand grief as he, unfortunately, lost his youngest son to suicide in April of 2021. It is a profoundly devastating journey that he is on, as he learns to navigate life without his son Luke.
Guest Social Links
YouCan Services - www.youcan.ca
Twitter - @kyledube
Relentless Podcast episode with Dawn Taylor - https://www.youcan.ca/relentless-series/dawn-taylor-from-damaged-teen-to-confident-ass-kicker/
Thanks for listening!
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Views Expressed, Legal and Medical Disclaimer
This podcast (including any/all site pages, blog posts, blog comments, forums, videos, audio recordings, etc.) is not intended to replace the services of a physician, nor does it constitute a doctor-patient relationship. Information is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should not use the information on this podcast for diagnosing or treating a medical or health condition. If you have or suspect you have an urgent medical problem, promptly contact your professional healthcare provider. Any application of the recommendations in this podcast/website is at the listener/reader's discretion. The views and opinions expressed are those of guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or policy of Dawn Taylor, The Taylor Way and or its Associates. The before mentioned are not liable for any direct or indirect claim or loss.
Transcript
Dawn Taylor
Hey, hey, hey, guys. Welcome to the Taylor Way. Wait. It is me, your host, Dawn Taylor. And we're going to just give you a heads up today on this episode. As you know, if you've listened to my podcast before, you know that we're talking about the things no one talks about. We're diving deep into topics and some are light, some are heavy, some are a little bit in between. But a warning on today's is we are going to be talking about suicide. We are going to be talking about grief and loss and all of those things. And if I get emotional, bear with me. If my guest gets emotional, bear with him. Um, but this is a very important conversation that needs to happen. It's an incredibly important conversation that needs to happen. And so today we are going to have it. So before we dive in, I want to tell you a little bit about our guest. Kyle is an incredible man who has lived in Edmonton his entire life. And he is, he's dedicated to working with youth and he has been for over 30 years. Like, that's insane. He has been with You Can Youth Services since 2002, and in that time it's grown from a one-person office to being a leading organization in youth work and transitional youth employment programming. He is slowly learning to understand grief as he unfortunately lost his youngest son to suicide in April of 2021. And it is a profoundly devastating journey that he has been on and as he learns to navigate life without Luke. So we are here today to talk about this, to dive into the stigma around it, the grief around it, and the fact that love is really fucking hard sometimes. So, let's welcome Kyle to the show. Hi, Kyle.
Kyle Dube
Hey, Dawn. Thanks for having me. It's good to be here.
Dawn Taylor
It is so good to have you here. It's these topics, right? It's topics that we wish people talked about. So, right off the bat. We're going to just dive right into this. I'm going to tell you guys right now, if you're listening to the show to hear what happened, how it happened, all of that stuff, shut it off and walk away because you're not going to hear. I've said from day one, this show would never be about a sensationalism thing. But let's start with when this happened and what it was like to go through it and how you heard.
Kyle Dube
Yeah. So, um, I've been on a, you know, I've been on a couple of podcasts before and done a couple conversations about this. As you know, Dawn, and the way that I kind of started is, um, April 4th, 2021. Um, it was Easter Sunday and it was a very normal day in our home. Um, it was during the midst of COVID and, and we probably shouldn't have had my in-laws over because of all the restrictions, but we did.
Dawn Taylor
A little rule breaker.
Kyle Dube
Yeah. And it was just a normal day in many aspects. And my, my wife and I, uh, we're here. I have three sons, um, Liam, Jax and Luke. Liam, my oldest was home. Jax, and my middle was playing in the WHL at the time, so he was actually out of town. And Luke, my youngest, was home and we just spent the day visiting and then just doing our normal things and went to bed. Um, so I always start that way just to say it was just normal. Everything. Everything was just so exactly what we were so used to. And, um. Easter Monday. I woke up. Um, we're prepping because my middle boy had a game that night. Uh, so we were going to all watch it together and that some time when we all went to bed, my youngest son, Luke, who was 16.5 years old at the time, uh, took his own life. Um, and it was the day that, of course, changed our lives forever. It changed the lives of many forever. And it was the absolute worst day imaginable. And that's when, um, what I'll call my grief walk began. And, and it was. It was just the absolute worst.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah. So you get hit with the worst news of your entire life. The thing that no parents ever thought that they would have to deal with.
Kyle Dube
Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
One of the things that we had talked about in advance and discussing this is the stigma that's out there on death by suicide. Right? And the fact that it's there's shame attached to it and guilt attached to it. And people have this idea that “Oh, well, they must have been on drugs or they must have been drunk or they must have been dealing with something horrible or there was some insane trauma or whatever else.” And you guys were just like this normal, happy, loving family. I mean, you do youth work like you, like you would have seen the red flags kind of idea, right? And you had no idea.
Kyle Dube
Yeah, so, I like to think we were, you know, and don't like to think. I know we're a really good family. Yeah. My wife and I. And you're going to hear the word relentless a lot as we talk, because, as you know, I use that word a lot at my work. I use that word a lot in my life. And we were relentless parents, um, very involved in all three boys’ lives from their schooling activities to their education, to their social lives. We have a great village, you know, great grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, friends, incredibly involved in a lot of different things in our community. And. Luke, oh, truthfully, none of my boys have dealt with addictions. They haven't dealt with what I would consider to be heavy mental illness like health issues. Mental illness issues. And Luke, from everything, I mean, you know, for our 16.5 years with Luke was, was a pretty normal dude. Very, very athletic, you know, did well in school, had a great group of friends. Um, and truthfully though, could be up and down. But I would suggest that that's like every 16.5 year old, you know. And you're right, I've taken suicide intervention training three or 4 or 5 times in my career, you know, I've dealt with this type of stuff in my career. And although Luke had been down for a couple few weeks prior to him taking his life, there were no massive red flags. There was nothing that made me stop in my tracks and be like, “Oh my goodness.” And we were doing all the normal things that we would do for all three of our boys if they were going through a bit of a down spiral time where, you know, given a little more attention, a little more love, more talking, all that tech stuff. And there was a darkness within Luke that we obviously did not understand. We didn't fully see it, and he obviously couldn't fully express it because he was talking to us. Um, but he couldn't fully express the depth of what that was and what that looked like for him and you know, well, I say that this was a shock of a lifetime. That's the understatement of my life. And I would suggest that that would be the same for pretty much everyone that knows us. You know, there are certain situations that you know of. I'm sure that that I know of where, you know, if somebody were to die by suicide, you never want to say, “Oh, that's not surprising.”
Dawn Tayloe
But, let's be honest, it's that feeling of like, “Oh, it's not a shock.” It's not a jarring shock often.
Kyle Dube
Yeah, I think that's a good way to put it. A jarring shock. I think it's always shocking. But I think that the jarring shock for probably a small amount of people, though, is, you know, it's but that again, we didn't see any of that. And so there is, um, there is shame associated with suicide, right? Because, listen, there's so much guilt that we go through, Dawn, that it's incredible. And that's going to be with us forever. I have a thousand questions and they'll never be answered. They'll never be answered. And that's a very, very difficult way to live life. But, where my heart breaks is, obviously for us. My wife, my other two sons, all our village. But my heart breaks mostly for Luke. Obviously it would because he was in so much turmoil and pain internally that he ended his life and it's a pain that's indescribable. I literally cannot describe the pain that we go through every day from April 5th, 2021.
Dawn Taylor
So, for anyone listening to this who is considering taking your life, who knows someone who is. Please, please, please, please, please share this with them. And I want you to hear these words. So, right before we started this conversation, now I'm going to get emotional. I was telling Kyle that I have been there and I remember laying in a hospital bed when they found me and they saved me, and I lived in, every part of me believed that I had failed. And I was so angry. And if you've read my book, you know that I talk about this in there and hearing Kyle's words, even for me, feel like hearing a father's words to a child, of what they went through and what that looks like. And I just want to challenge anyone who's listening, like, hear that. The vulnerability of what he's even saying, right? Because it is an indescribable pain when you lose someone like that.
Kyle Dube
You know, it's the way I described the first, I'll say 2 to 4 weeks. And you may have heard me describe it this way before, Dawn. It's like when you watch a movie and it's some movie and a bomb goes off. And the people that survived that bomb there, there's a ringing and there's their ears and it's confusing and they don't really know where they are. And they're disorientated. That's kind of what it was like for the first month until that fog cleared, but I'll be honest with you, I still feel that way often. There's times where both my wife and I will say to one another, we just can't. It's almost. it's you know, we're almost two and a half years in and it's still surreal. It it it. It's still, none of it makes sense. And you really feel like we cannot believe that this is our lives right now, and grief is a very, very hard thing and grief is something that I believe I had an acquaintance. You know, grief was an acquaintance of mine prior to dying because I had lost some people in my life. And it was hard. But until you lose a child and, you know, people say, well, “You know, you can't compare.” Well, you can compare. You know, I lost my mom not even a year after Luke to cancer. She was 67. She shouldn't have died. I love my mom so much. And truthfully, I don't think I've started to process it yet because my mom, who I loved so much, is not my greatest loss. You know, Luke's death, the loss of a child. It's the unnatural order of life, right? And unfortunately, with suicide. Um, you don't have something to blame. Well, that's a lie. Some suicides, you do. You know, maybe it's addiction. Maybe there was an overdose. Maybe, whatever. Maybe it's heavy mental illness, whatever that is, but it's not. You know, a very, very good friend of mine lost his son in the Humboldt crash and he said, “Kyle, I don't know who where you put your anger.” Because for him, he you know, the way for him, it's he was putting it all at a truck driver or a trucking industry or whatever. I have a friend who lost his son to cancer. He puts all of his anger towards cancer. Um, Luke wasn't bullied. Luke wasn't sick. Luke didn't have addictions like. I don't know.
Dawn Taylor
None of the normal.
Kyle Dube
No. And this is some of the stuff that you and I've talked about where I almost feel at times like a hypocrite saying be relentless with your kids because we are relentless with our kids and we were with Luke, and yet Luke still took his own life. But, I still think the strong message is you have to be relentless with your kids. You have to be. And you know what? Let's not even say your kids. Let's say anybody in your life, anybody in your life who you have that. And you know who you think might or might not be doing well. Show up. Show up, be relentless. And that as a parent, you know, let's be honest, a lot of young people, they don't want to talk to their parents. That's normal. You didn't want to. I didn't want to. But I think that we have to be annoying. We really do.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, I like that. Yeah.
Kyle Dube
They don't want. They don't want to talk to you. Oh, well, still knock on their door. Bang on their door. Go lie on their bed. Go talk to them. Even if they don't talk back, eventually it's going to sink in. And we did all that stuff. Yeah. And it's it's. Yeah. So I'm kind of rambling here, but–
Dawn Taylor
No, no, it's okay. Oh, don't ever apologize. It's grief. It's words. Don't apologize for them. Break down what relentless means to you.
Kyle Dube
I think there's some basic things around like, you know, just don't ever give up. You know, when you fall down, you know, you get back up. Um, show up all the time. Be there all the time. Much easier said than done. Right? It is. I think a great definition of it is, be a pain in the ass. You know, I really believe that that is being relentless. And you can take any aspect of your life and be a pain in the ass relentlessly. Um, you know, at work, you want to do better and work well, be relentless, you know, again, show up, do your best, all that type of stuff. But I really do believe it is pursuing a relationship in a healthy way. You know, and pursuing it because it matters that much. Now, that's what I believe it is. And interestingly enough, Dawn, the most relentless thing in my life is grief.
Dawn Taylor
It's not leaving you alone.
Kyle Dube
It'll never leave. It will never quit. That's what being relentless is. You never quit and grief will never quit.
Dawn Taylor
Grief is an interesting one. It won't ever quit. But we get bigger than it.
Kyle Dube
Yeah. I'm not there yet. I think for me, what it is, is learning to adapt your life around it, right? It's like a chronic physical pain where you have to adapt your life around that and you just end up getting used to it, really. But that's what grief is to me is learning to adapt your life around it. Because, listen, two and a half years in, there have been some shifts. There's a lot of things that I'll say I and we can do now that we couldn't do a year ago. Yeah, there's still a lot, there's truthfully, there's some things I can't do now that I could do a year ago, which is interesting. But there's, there's different shifts, but it's because we're learning to live with it. You know, there's a song, I forget what it's called and, oh, I forgot to call. But the lyrics are essentially the only cure for the pain is the pain. And that's it. You just, it's a grind every day. I wish somebody could say, listen, on, you know, March 15th, 2029, you'll feel so good. You'll feel the way you felt that on April 4th, 2021, the day before Luke took his life. But that's not going to happen because if that were to happen, then I go, “Okay, put my head down, grind it out. Let's go.” But that's not going to happen. You know, I've read that the depth of your grief is the reflection of the depth of your love for that individual.
Dawn Taylor
Yes, it is.
Kyle Dube
And that makes sense to me, you know? I mean, listen, there's tragedy all over the place. There is. But if you're not connected to it or you don't have that love connection to it, it kind of doesn't affect you, right?
Dawn Taylor
Not in the same way. Not even close.
Kyle Dube
Yeah. I mean, you just kind of. The world moves on, right? But when you're in the midst of this, your world doesn't move on. How do I move on from my sweet, beautiful, perfect Luke because he was my boy.
Dawn Taylor
He was your baby.
Kyle Dube
How do you move on from that? You can't. So what we're trying to do is somehow move forward by still carrying him but it's really hard. And then there's all those things that go with it. And we can get into this if you want. All the things around the guilt. You know
Dawn Taylor
You're willing to go there. Let's go there.
Kyle Dube
The living constantly with the “If I would have done this, I should have done this. Maybe I could have done this.” Like all these different things. I literally think back to, okay, when he was, when he was three years old and this happened, maybe I should have reacted this way instead of that. Like you literally question every single thing you did as a parent. Everything. That's hard.
Dawn Taylor
Have you, so some of the stigmas, right? So many of the stigmas attached to suicide are that, right? Is that there's, you know, a judgment from the outside and I've heard this before from people where there is a death by suicide, which is really a death by mental health. That, you know, people on the outside are like, “Oh, wonder what happened in their family? Wonder what was going on with their kid? Oh, I bet you they were not good parents or whatever.” You know, like you hear those things. And I've often said that like my parents struggled with me, but my parents were phenomenal parents. They were amazing parents. They were amazing grandparents, amazing friends and family. Maybe not to me, but everyone else, right? And it wasn't that, like, I actually truly to the core of my being believed that I was doing them a favor. Like it was an act of love from me, right? Which is what's so wild. Right. And so when I heard that before, you know, or even like when a celebrity dies in that way, you know, all of the judgments and the stuff that's attached to it. And I'm like, “No.”
Kyle Dube
It's interesting because, you know, you and I have talked about this a little bit where I don't know if we've been judged. You know, I'm assuming I've been because I'm assuming, um, listen, we've all been there. We've all heard of somebody dying by suicide. And right away you kind of go into this, “Oh, like, why? How?” Like you start asking all the questions, too, and then you really start analyzing, like, you know, where they come from, what happened in their lives, all that type of stuff. And so I'm assuming maybe that happened to us. But honestly, if it has, I haven't experienced it. And I don't know if that's because. I refuse to be judged. You know, And I'm not trying to be all like, “Oh, I'm so strong, I won't be judged.” But I just. I just look at it and I and truthfully, part of my attitude is and I know we can swear on here, part of my attitude is if you want to judge me like, “Fuck you, like, go ahead.” You know what I mean? Yeah.
I know even though we all blame ourselves. And even though I blame myself and a lot of people go, “Well, you can't blame yourself.”
Dawn Taylor
It's easier said than done, right.
Kyle Dube
Like, rationally. I know it's not my fault. I know it's not anybody's fault. Yeah, but emotionally, that's almost impossible to for me anyways to separate the two. But I know that when Luke, of course we had, you know, people were being notified the school Luke was in grade 11 and they reached out to us and said, “How do you want it?” Because I don't know. I didn't know any of this. Um, or maybe I did, but I was in such a fog that they would put out, like, a notice, right? Like school, division wide. If a child dies, they do that. And they asked us that. They asked us the language. Like if we were okay. If they put the words like how he died, the word suicide. And we huddled up and within like a minute we're like, well, yes, like, my question was more like, “Well, why wouldn't she?” And maybe that's just the way we are. Like, we wouldn't like to think we wouldn't judge others for it, but our initial thought was “No. Like, we're not ashamed of Luke.” I'm so proud of my son. I'm not ashamed of him. And I'm not ashamed of what he did, and our next thought was maybe this will get people talking. You know, maybe this will actually have parents, you know, you've seen it many times. I've done it and said it whenever young people have died or I'm like, “Well, I'm going to hug my kids a little tighter tonight.” I think that's great. That's good. But you got to do more than that. Suicide is not an easy thing to talk about it, like who wants to talk about suicide, right? I think it's so important for families to discuss it. Not every day. Not like, you know, hey, every day at supper. Let's talk about it. But I think it's good to be checking in with your kids and with people in general. I really do believe that. And so that's another reason why we said no. You let people know that Luke died by suicide and then we kind of went a little bit public with it. On social media and stuff like that, and it honestly wasn't a garner attention to us or garner attention to, you know, it was more garner attention around please go talk, go If you are suicidal, go talk to somebody or if you know somebody that you think might be go talk to them. And yeah, but there is that stigma and that shame, right? There's all that person screwed up. And I agree with what you say. Suicide is death by mental illness. And obviously Luke had mental health issues that we did not recognize.
Dawn Taylor
Can I say, not even that you didn't recognize, but that he did really well?
Kyle Dube
Yeah, I think he did. I think he did. I've met other people who have been in your situation, Dawn, who, um, who attempted and it would be a similar story. I thought I was just going to rid the world of something bad. You know, like, I thought this would be better for everybody else and if that isn't mental?
Dawn Taylor
Oh, it's mental illness. It's 100% it's mental illness. But I also think that we are, some people just internalize and some of us do just keep secrets. I remember when my book came out and talking to a few people, one of my family members was like, either I was the worst - It was my brother. He's like, “Either I was the worst brother or you were the world's greatest secret keeper. Which was it?”
Kyle Dube
Right.
Dawn Taylor
And I said, honestly, probably a bit of both. But I'm an incredible keeper. Secret keeper.
Kyle Dube
Yeah, it's an interesting way to look at it because, um, Luke was a pretty quiet guy, you know? I mean, Luke was hilarious around here. Like, you know, Luke would talk and talk and talk and talk it with his buddies. He would talk, but for the Luke, Luke was, as he went into his teenagers anyways, he just became more introverted. But not abnormally. Oh, and I mean, my oldest boy is quite introverted, yet he's one of the funniest people I've ever met in my life.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, that's introverts. We're hilarious. You just got to get us comfortable.
Kyle Dube
That's so interesting that you would say us introverts, because people, in my opinion, don't know who's an introvert and who isn't an introvert because I would not look at you as an introvert. Right? So, you know, but I would say you could look at Luke as, as he was an introvert, but that, that's a strength. You know, I also used to have. And I really did have the attitude that, well, suicide was weak and selfish.
Dawn Taylor
There's a stigma around it.
Kyle Dube
Huge stigma.
Dawn Taylor
Huge, massive stigma around it.
Kyle
And I guess it took my son, taking his own life, too. Luke was not weak. Luke is one of the strongest, most bullheaded people I've ever met in my life.
Dawn Taylor
You really mean he was your son?
Kyle Dube
He was my son. Luke was so relentless. If Luke wanted to do something, he was relentless. He was strong. And you know what? Was Luke selfish? Yeah, because every 16 year old is selfish. But if Luke would see, if Luke would see the carnage and the aftermath of what has happened here? Luke would have never done that. He just because Luke wasn't selfish. So again, I look at it, it was described to me this way, and I like the analogy of it was, it's a brain attack. You know, it's, it's like a heart attack or, you know, his brain failed him. His brain failed him and he couldn't not see past that moment.
Dawn Taylor
You know, can we just pause there for a second? Because I think more people need to hear that is even when it comes to mental health, when it comes to any of this. He had a brain attack. Right? Like, his brain failed him. And if you're lucky enough that in your depression or in your dark place or in your trauma or in your, whatever that you do, reach out to someone and you do find someone that can work with you and you do. You do find that glimmer of hope that allows you to fight for yourself. You're actually lucky. Like, you're dreamily lucky. Because a lot of people don't believe they're worth fighting for. A lot of people have had that ingrained in them. A lot of people have been gaslit to believe that we're actually okay when we're not, to believe that we're not broken when we feel broken. You know, I think that more people need to look at it as a brain break, right? It's like a heart attack, but in your head.
Kyle Dube
Right, and also looked at it where like, you know, I'll use me as an example. I'm not the healthiest guy. I smoke. I'm, you know, got some extra pounds. I could lose some, you know, some would say I'm a heart attack waiting to happen. Well, if you think about it that way and then you just think about mental illness. Well, Luke knew that he wasn't doing well. And then like a heart attack. You don't know when it's coming? No. And I actually, talking to a couple other people that I know that have gone through this, it just happened. It was just, you know, they obviously planned it out and this and that, but it was like. There was no for them. There was no turning back. And that, to me, is a brain attack. Yeah, it really is. The brain failed them and believe that that happens to many people. We take their lives, you know, that are not strung out on drugs or completely hammered or, you know, that's what I believe, and it's brutal. It's brutal.
Dawn Taylor
So how has it shifted? Your relationship with your other boys. How has it shifted your relationships with people closest to you? When this deep, crazy love has hurt you so hard.
Kyle Dube
How?
Dawn Taylor
Yeah, I think there's been over these last two and a half years for you.
Kule Dube
Yeah, I think there's a few things to unpack there, I think, with, with my other boys. Um, and, you know, I'll never tell my wife's story or my other boys story because–
Dawn Taylor
Absolutely not.
Kyle Dube
Because I can’t understand what they're going through. Right? Like our relationships were, were very different with Luke because, you know, father to son, mother to son, brother. But as far as the other boys go, I mean, we are hypersensitive now. Oh, what's happening in their lives and. And that that's hard. Like, it can at times almost be I don't want to say debilitating, but it does turn into a thing where, you know, it's just a constant worry. Because, again, like, this wasn't supposed to happen to Luke. And so it and that's a tough way to live, and I actually feel bad for the boys sometimes because think it's probably a tough way for them to live knowing that mom and dad are literally, you know, mean they're 20 and almost 22 now and, you know, there's times where you feel like there are three and five years old because you just want to. You want to be at every single moment of their lives to make sure that they're okay. And so that's tough. Um, you know, I check in a lot with those boys and they're very gracious with me because I'm sure they just want to say, “Shut up, dad, Like, get lost.” But they're very gracious. Um. It's just very hard for them. It's very hard to watch what they've gone through. You know, they were 17, almost 18, and you know, 18, almost 19 when this happened. And their lives are changed forever. You know, my boys were very close. I mean, we had we had all three of them in three years and nine days, you know, And now, you know, they're brothers. They did brother things, They fought, they did all that stuff. But. But but they were very, very close. And just, yeah, but as far as others go, I mean, I don't know. Like it's interesting. I have to step back often, Dawn, because I have to step back and go, “Okay, Kyle, that is relevant to that person's life.” Like, that is the worst thing that's happening in that person's life. This is the way I'll explain it. I would say that my empathy levels, uh, have increased profoundly for other people. And yet they've decreased. Not profoundly, but they've decreased some as well. And the reason I say that is because I see I see a lot of people just differently, people that are going through different things. But, one of my best friends, his mom, has Alzheimer's and like, full blown Alzheimer's. Like, it's just so sad. And I see him differently and and and probably even more so I see his dad differently because they're grieving the loss of this amazing woman who's still alive.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, it's like a death every day. Yeah.
Kyle Dube
And so I really see them differently after Luke died because of the grief part. Now, I also see some people differently whenever they're bitching and moaning and complaining about something in their lives. And I'm like, Are you just sitting there thinking sometimes? “Is that seriously what you are talking about here? Like, give me a break.”
Dawn Taylor
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
Kyle Dube
But, but, I have to step back and go, “No, that is the worst thing in their lives at this moment.”
Dawn Taylor
And at times I talk about that with clients where my clients are like, apologize for coming to me because I feel like other people have it worse. And I'm like, “No, no, no, no, no. There isn't a chart. There isn't a comparison. Your truth is your truth. What you've been through is what you've been through and how it affected you is how it affected you.”
Kyle Dube
Right, but maybe I'm just a bit of an asshole sometimes because I know.
Dawn TaylorWe all have those moments. We all have those moments.
Kyle Dube
Do that all the time. Sometimes I'm like, “No, that really isn't anything to be that upset about. Like, suck it up and, like, give me a break.”
Dawn Taylor
Okay. My one is the, the. When someone compares the death of their animal to a child or a parent or someone, and I'm like–
Kyle Dube
And I've had that a few times. Yeah.
Dawn Taylor
And for the for the pet lovers out there, I'm sure you're mad that I just said that. And a lot of people fully believe that you grieve them just as strong of your family. I can't agree.
Kyle Dube
I'm here to tell you that it's actually. It's not the same. And our dog. We have our dog because of Luke. Luke was relentless in us getting a dog and running, is the most special. Um, she is everything to all of us. Yeah. And so I understand the deep, deep love of a pet. I fully understand it, but it ain't the same. Like it just so I've had a few people do that, you know, things that get said or done. It's all around the topic of what my wife taught me. She learned it somewhere around grief illiteracy, ad and being grief literate or grief illiterate. And that's what I spoke of earlier, where, prior to Luke dying, grief was an acquaintance of mine and after Luke died, it is just literally embedded into me. Like it's it's weaved all through my every fiber of my being now, and prior to Luke dying I was illiterate and truthfully am still grief illiterate. And what I mean by grief illiterate is when people say things to you, when people compare and say, “Oh no, I remember losing our dog.” It's just such an illiterate thing to say to someone grieving deeply or things like. You know, people will say, “Oh, I understand.” And it's like, “No, you don't.” But on the flip side of all of that. We don't get mad at people. Like it hurts us, to be honest with you. But they're not intentionally trying to hurt us.
Dawn Taylor
No, they're not.
Kyle Dube
People don't know how to handle grief. Our society has no clue how to handle grief. And I know this because meither did I. And truthfully, sometimes I still don't. I've right after the two year with Luke, there's a there's a person I know, and they lost their child to suicide. And I knew this person. And this, the mom reached out to me to let me know via email. Dawn. I had no idea what to say to her. I had no idea how to respond to her. Because, so I'm grief illiterate still, right? And think the reason I didn't know what to do or say is because, maybe my grief literacy has led me to realize there's nothing people can do or say. Literally nothing. So when people are grief illiterate, you kind of can't be mad at them. You know, you can't be upset with them. I would just encourage people that if you don't know what to say or what to do, that's okay. Then just don't say anything. No, when I say that, I think it's good to show up. You know, here's something to– sorry, this is turning into the educational piece of what to say or do to me.
Dawn Taylor
That's honestly, I always ask, like for someone listening, what recommendations would you have on if someone in their life is going through this or someone you know is going through this? What would you say?
Kyle Dube
You know, this is about grief that I'm talking about, but it's really about anything when someone's going through a hardship.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Kyle Dube
And I've done this many times, is where you drop the “Let me know if you if I can do anything for you or let me know if you need anything.” Guess what? I'm not calling you to tell you what I need or what you mean because I don't even know what I need or what you can do. Now there's some different things like, you know what? Maybe you could cut the grass for me or maybe you could, but I'm probably still not going to do that. So, here's the one thing that I would suggest is that if you are supporting somebody who's grieving deeply. For whoever, whatever that loss was, whoever that loss is. Just do it. If you think they need a meal, just do it. If you think that they would love some chocolate chip cookies, just bake it and drop it off on their front door. If you think that they need some groceries, if you think that they need whatever, just do it. And because guess what? If they don't need it or they don't want it. They just won't use it or they won't eat it or they won't do it. But does that matter? I don't think it does.
Dawn Taylor
No, not at all.
Kyle Dube
Not at all. So that's something that I would say. Yeah, I would say that. And really just show up. Just show up and maybe you just show up and you don't even talk. You know, maybe you just show up. I had people that literally just showed up and just sat with me. And that was, that was needed, and they didn't have to do a lot of talking. And maybe while I'm a talker, but maybe they were listening. Maybe they, that's all you have to do, and I would also encourage people to continue to do it. Because, show up. Continue to show up because, like, we said earlier, the world keeps moving, Right? And so what happens and I think, you know, this with all the work you've done is is that support which was overwhelming how much support we go, we're very blessed.
Dawn Taylor
But it disappears really quick.
Kyle Dube
It fades away. And then it's. It's pretty isolating. Yeah, it's pretty lonely. And I'm a very social being. Um, have a lot of incredibly, incredibly good people in my life, but kind of self-isolate a bit now because I almost feel like, well, I don't know if they, I don't know if they want to hang out. Like, just I don't know. It's just. It's all weird. Everything changes.
Dawn Taylor
Everything's just weird after,
Kyle Dube
Right? Everything changes. And, you know. So just keep showing up and don't have the expectation that that person is going to respond to you quickly or even respond at all. Just keep sending a heart emoji. Just keep sending text messages, voice messages, whatever that looks like. And, you know, we had a few things that happened. Those don't happen for a bit now. Um, and I don't know who. We have no idea who would do this, but, um, and I won't get into all the details of how we do this internally as a family, but we do five hearts. Forever five. And just randomly on our front door, like we have our front door and then like to the side, there's like a kind of a window, like, you know. And just randomly because you know how windows get dusty and stuff like on the there would be five hearts in the window. We have no we have no idea who. It happened about 4 or 5 times. No idea who did it. No idea when they did it. Yeah, but I'll tell you. It was pretty special, you know? Um, so, I just encourage others that if you're supporting people who are grieving, definitely just keep showing up, just keep showing up and and accept their moods and accept their ups and downs.
Dawn Taylor
Whatever their capacity is.
Kyle Dube
Right? Because at the end of the day, it's not about, you know, that's a big thing that I've learned. I've always kind of felt that way. But after Luke's death, I've really, you know, you can look inwardly or you can look outwardly and you can love inwardly or love outwardly. And I do my best to love outwardly as much as I can, because it ain't about me. You know it isn't. I do want others around me to feel comfortable with our situation and feel okay about our situation. So, I do my best to try to accommodate that for others. It's exhausting,
Dawn Taylor
I can see that it is.
Kyle Dube
But it's important to me and. You know, I mean, the whole idea of love. You know, we talked about my other boys earlier and what that does to relationships around love. My boys in school had a teacher in grade six and won't bring names out but as you say, I thought it was funny. I love, love, love, love. And I'm like “Yeah, whatever. That's so cheesy.” But at the end of the day, we all love love. We all love to be loved. We all love to feel love. I don't know about you. Like I love giving a gift. Probably more than receiving a gift.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, always. Yeah.
Kyle Dube
Yeah. But when you love that hard. Be prepared for the pain to be even harder when the loss happens. And that's a tough thing to wrap your brain around.
Dawn Taylor
Don't let that be what holds you back from loving hard,
Kyle Dube
Right? Right. But. You know, you like to talk about things on here that other people don't want to talk about.
Dawn Taylor
Yes, I do.
Kyle Dube
I'm going to tell you right now that sometimes. Not all the time. I don't even know if I'm going to say it anyways. Whatever. I'll say it. There's there's times that I wish I had never met my wife. Because then we wouldn't be going through what we're going through right now. There's times that I wish I never had kids. Because then we wouldn't be going through what we're going through right now. Now, is that a selfish thing to say? Yep, it is. And some people will know that's not.
Dawn Taylor
It’s real. It's real.
Kyle Dube
But it is selfish. It is like, God, I'm not going to sugarcoat and say it, but. But I'm also okay to be selfish. Sometimes grief is selfish. I'm okay to be selfish, but there are moments. Not a lot of them. But there are moments where I'm like, “Yeah, I wish none of us wish that this was our life that we're living.” And so there are times that if I'm brutally honest about it. And I adore my wife. My wife is the greatest, and the hardest thing for me, other than losing Luke is watching my wife. It is so, indescribably painful to watch what she's going through as a mom, because I actually do think it's different, mom and dad. I really do believe that. And it's not it's not to belittle pain from a father's point of view. Or any of that. But didn't carry Luke for nine months. I didn't give birth to him. I didn't.
Dawn Taylor
it's different. It's just. It's just different
Kyle Dube
It's just so hard. It's just so hard to explain. And, one thing I'm very and it's a maybe it's a weird way to put it, but, I'm so proud of of the four of us, because on April 6th, we all got up and we showered and got dressed and we tried. And we have literally all got up and showered, and got dressed and tried every day since
Dawn Taylor
Which is incredible.
Kyle Dube
And I don't know how. I really don't. I would love to just sleep for six months. But we can't. I guess we could. And I'm not judging for anybody who does.
Dawn Taylor
I've tried. You can't actually sleep that long.
Kyle Dube
Yeah, that's right. I'm not judging anybody who, you know, there's different vices that people get into.
Dawn Taylor
Everyone has their own way of dealing and healing and grieving
Kyle Dube
But somehow we've done that. But again, when you love that hard when loss happens. I actually look at it like that feeling that you get from truly being loved, right? From your partner or for me. From my kids. The pain is 100 times worse.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Kyle Dube
Well, how do you say worse? Not worse. Because love is so good.
Dawn Taylor
It's harder to deal with a loss.
Kyle Dube
How about this? I feel that love, but I actually think that I feel that pain a million times more than I felt the love. And I think that that's what, and I've said it before in a couple other things. What I missed the most is the love and the exchanges of love. That's what I miss the most. And it's all those exchanges of love that you have with loved ones that nobody even knows about. You know, the little looks, the inside jokes, you know, just all the little tiny things. And I could list you a thousand things that I miss. And it's hard. And there's certain things that I, you know, that I have a hard time with. Luke and I used to watch Jeopardy. I know. So nerdy. We'd watch Jeopardy when he was a little boy. We'd watch it. I mean, I always thought I was pretty good at Jeopardy, and he would try really hard, and we just beacon one another and tease one another. And If I'm flipping the TV and Jeopardy's on, I cannot watch Jeopardy anymore. You know, with little things like that, you know?
Dawn Taylor
You know, so having not I've never lost a child. I'm just putting that out there. This is not a comparison. But it's interesting, having lost my mom in 2008. And I actually talked in your podcast about that as well. But a few of the things that were cool was when the shift happened, you know, we talked about like 2029, if the magic could happen that you've all of a sudden would feel amazing. I have often said to people that the grief, the loss doesn't go away because they're still lost. They're still gone. Right. But, there was a shift that happened where I could shift it from “She's gone and I'm grieving that and it hurts so bad.” to “How do I honor that different? And can I have a little piece of her back by doing those actions and activities?” So, by going to do our favorite things, right, by going to the greenhouse or planting the garden or, you know, watching the Jeopardy show or, you know, my mom and I bought each other Christmas City every year. It was this dorky thing. We'd both find a CD and then we'd buy each other a copy and we'd send it to them and mail it to them or give it to them. And the amount of years that went without buying a Christmas CD or refusing to listen to Christmas music and it took a really long time, I'll be honest. And I had hurt with my mom, right. But the year that I was like, I'm going to buy a Christmas CD and I'm going to do this and it's going to hurt like, fuck. I'll be honest, it was a very big moment for me. But I did it and I could find a little piece of her in it and laugh about it and think how funny it was. And one year I bought her, like, the Christmas CD, and she was like, “What did you buy me?” Like, she was so mortified at how bad it was. Sorry, Bonnie. And, you know, I got an opportunity last year to actually go see them in concert. And is it because I love Bonnie? No, but I went and I sat there and at times just cried, thinking of, like, this is the kind of thing I would have done is bring my mom to a Bonnie in concert to trick her, knowing that she would have just been, like, really done. Like, “Why didn't you do this?”
Kyle Dube
That's the thing, is you were able to cry but laugh and have those.
Dawn Taylor
But there's been an interesting shift, right? And I'm excited for the day that some of that shifts for you. And it might not be for a long time, but where you can do those things again, where you could sit and watch the show and have the cry and laugh about it, and then guess at what he would have guessed or what he would have said and and still feel like you're living with his legacy and a piece of him in those moments and also finding someone and this would be my one recommendation for people listening is, as much as it might be hard if they want to talk about the person, talk about them. That is probably one of the hardest things I dealt with was even in my grieving and in my healing of our relationship and my healing of stuff, I still needed to talk about my mom. And it felt like nobody wanted to talk about her and it felt like she was forgotten about and no one would discuss her. And I finally found a couple people that engaged me in that, and even if it was so hard for them and they'd comment on that sometimes and I'd be like, “Thank you. I know how much this means to have this conversation.” and we would just just laugh about or talk about or compare stories and, and just like invite her into current life.
Kyle Dube
Yes. Yes. So it's interesting that you bring this up because I'm really struggling with that still. I shouldn't say. Still, I've been struggling with it the whole time and I think I'll continue to. And so when we talk about stigma around suicide, um, a big fear that we have is people are going to forget Luke. Because, if someone dies with natural causes or someone maybe dies unnaturally with, you know, a car crash or an accident or whatever. Quite often their lives are celebrated right there. What we've realized is that, this is my perception anyways, and you need to know this is my perception that I think people, some people look at Luke this way because this is a way that I'm still struggling to not look at Luke this way is that he was a sad 16.5 year old boy who died by suicide. And that's not who Luke was. Like, If you would have known Luke. I've already talked a bit about him, right? Like, that's.not who he was, and we didn't have a service for Luke because it was during COVID and we could literally have ten people there.
Dawn Taylor
Oh. Which made it even harder because you couldn't have a celebration.
Kyle Dube
We couldn't. And it's not even the celebration. It would have been no celebration for us. Like that's that's maybe it's not even a stigma when someone dies by suicide. How do you celebrate them? Like that's, I'm and I believe that you can like, don't get me wrong, I'm actually going to start, I'm doing some work on myself. I'm going into a, uh, therapeutic type thing that I'm going to start here in the fall where it's about reintroducing yourself. It's all based on suicide, but reintroducing yourself to your loved one. Because I need to celebrate Luke. I need to do those things that you just talked about. Eventually, I really believe that I do. And but, you know, you hear of, whatever, celebration of life services or whatever. If people that take their lives like, quite often, even at the service, that's all talked about and it's just so somber and so sad. And again, we didn't even have a service. So truthfully, we don't talk about Luke very much. And I don't want to say that because we do, but not in the way I want us to get to a point where we're going all “Luke would have laughed his head off at that.” All “Luke, remember when Luke did this?” And we do a little bit of that. That's where a bit of a shift is. That's happening a bit. But I want it to become embedded into our daily life.
Dawn Taylor
So, can I challenge you on that?
Kyle Dube
One thing I was going to, was we love when people send us a message or when we're talking to people when they say Luke's name. Because then we're going, “Okay. They haven't forgotten Luke.” You know, we've got a family friend. I'll say your first name, Gina. And she's just the best. She's our friend's daughter. She's 20 years old. And on the fifth of every month, the fifth of every month since Luke died, she sends my wife and I a message saying, “I'm thinking about you. I love Luke so much.” And I'm telling you, Dawn, it means so much to us that she does that. And I think mostly because she says Luke's name. Because a lot of people in our lives, we just don't talk about Luke Now, let's be honest. We also don't talk about our other kids constantly.
Dawn Taylor
Yeah.
Kyle Dube
Right? But the sad part for us is when we get together and we actually don't even do it that much anymore. And this is a reason why, because when you get together and we hope that we'll be able to do it more in the future, but when you get together with people that you've kind of raised your kids with. While you give updates on all the kids, you know? We have no updates to give Luke. Luke is 16.5 years old forever now. And that's hard. That's hard. What's your challenge? What's your challenge?
Dawn Taylor
My challenge would be start with one tiny thing and whether it's always, you know, a favorite food that he loved at Christmas when you guys are together or something like that. I started it because my mom passed away when her grandkids were quite young. And so I started in a way of my mom loved doing puzzles. So, I always have a puzzle going on the table and everyone used to laugh at me for it, and now it's become a regular thing at Christmas. And I just make, like, funny comments about it now. The kids are doing it and it's really funny because it's like they act like they know Grandma because they've heard me talk about grandma so much that I'd be like, “Oh, you can't start in the middle. You have to sort the edges first. Grandma would not be impressed.” Right? Or laughing about silly things like, “Do you remember when Mom got mad because we did this at the table and she put literally dish soap down our mouths because that was what she like?” She was just so angry and held us down and did that.
Kyle Dube
I grew up with soap in my mouth a lot too.
Dawn Taylor
Right? But, like, it's just little things, and it started for me, of every single time I'm with my siblings or my nieces and nephews that I would try like one time a day, just one time of day to somehow incorporate a mom's story.
Kyle Dube
Yeah, no, I like that. And, like I said, it's something that even subconsciously, obviously, it's come around a little bit more. Um, truthfully, my wife's better at it than I am. I'm hopeful that what I'm going to do here in the fall will bring me to a better space that way. But again, Luke's identity needs, it needs to shift for me. And because it's because I know that that's not who Luke was. So that's tough, you know? And again, it's the stigma around suicide. You know, there's terms that we don't like, I really appreciate how you the language you use when you talk about suicide because neither of us have said the C-word yet.
Dawn Taylor
Oh, yeah.
Kyle Dube
And I'll say, in case people think that, I'm talking about another word. The term committed suicide. It's a horrible term because it's actually a criminal term and we struggle with the term suicide prevention. Because it's like, for us now as a mom and dad or brothers or grandparents and whatever. It's, oh, suicide prevention. I guess we should have worked harder at preventing this.
Dawn Taylor
I was going to say, there's such a shame attached to it and it makes it seem like it's always preventable.
Kyle Dube
Right? And at the end of the day, we are a great example of how it isn't always preventable. Because obviously if it was, we would have. And I think it's Australia that have really worked hard to change their language of even like national campaigns and all that type of stuff where suicide is complicated.
Dawn Taylor
So that's a good way to word that.
Kyle Dube
And it is it's it's. Incredibly complicated. So Luke's birthday, the two hardest days of the year for us, or April 5th, the day that he died, and September 30th, which is Luke's birthday. And, well, what's September is Suicide Prevention Month. So, all September on all the social media is like, it's just constant suicide prevention. Listen, I'm a believer in the cause obviously. I just wish that the language was a little bit different, you know? I do. If it can happen to our family. Not that we were perfect. Not that we are. We're not a perfect family. But, I do believe we're a good family. And we're a family where again, it's that saying of like, it takes a village and we have this incredible village. But if it can happen to us with the village that we're involved in, it can literally happen to anybody. And my hope is that anyone listening will really sit back and reflect on that and and try to do everything they can to be relentless. And again, I use the word relentless. I mean, we met because I have a podcast, the relentless podcast
Dawn Taylor
You do, and I was on it.
Kyle Dube
You were. And people should go listen because your story is as the way I describe it. Unbelievable. Because it's almost unbelievable, and the podcast is not about Luke, and so it's based around because we use this word at my work all the time. All my youth workers are relentless youth workers. We are relentless with these at risk, vulnerable young people that we work with. And again, it's what that description of relentless is, we show up for them all the time. We're we are literally banging on doors when they're not showing up to jobs or appointments. And like we are, that's what we do as parents, Jeanette and I. And that's what these young people need. So, that's a plug for you can use services, you know, please do check us out.
Dawn Taylor
We will put all the links in our show notes for anyone who needs to find Kyle, you can find them.
Kyle Dube
And that Relentless Podcast is just bringing people like you want and so many others to talk about how they've had to be relentless in their lives to get to where they are today. And there is a two part episode on there with me and Chris Joseph, very good friend of mine who lost his son in the Humboldt crash. And because of the most relentless pressure in our lives is grief. But, I can't, I heard it said this way and I say it this way. I don't believe I'm ever going to be proof. But I can't, I've got to do my best to make sure grief isn't beating me. How about this? At least all the time. It can't be beating. And because it is relentless. So, I need to be relentless in my life. I need to live. And I need to love. Some days it's not easy. Some days it's easier. But that's what I have to tell myself all the time. In order to get through this, I have to live and I have to love. Um. But please, listeners, this, I don't know. I think it's a common thing to say about many things. Suicide does not discriminate. It doesn't. Mental health. Mental health does not. Mental illness does not discriminate. And I'm just begging you to be relentless in your own life. Be relentless in the lives of others. That's it.
Dawn Taylor
Thank you, Kyle. Thank you for being here. Thank you for being so vulnerable. Thank you for sharing Luke with us. Your precious, amazing son. I am so honored that you hung out with us today and that you shared this with us and for the listeners. I hope you got a kick in the gut on this one. I really hope you did. Not that it just hit home. We've all been raised with these stigmas. We hear these stigmas around us, we hear them in the news, we hear them in the media, we hear our friends talk about them. And I hope that this episode will challenge you to step up, stand up and change your language on things, change your stigmas and ideas on things, but also don't be afraid to speak up to those around you.
If you want to find Kyle, he's the executive director over there and doing amazing work in this city. Please check out our show notes located at TheTaylorWay.ca for all the contact information for Kyle, his podcast. We'll post the episode I did there so you can go listen to that. It's a very cool episode. We dug really deep on some stuff in my world and it was really powerful. Join us again in two weeks for another topic. And please, please share this with people in your life that need to hear this. Subscribe now on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts and if you love the show, leave a rating and a review.
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