Grief Tips, Grieving Voices Guest, Mental Health, Mind/Body Wellness, Pet Loss |
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Welcome to another profound episode of Grieving Voices, where we explore the emotional intricacies of dealing with loss and healing.
Today’s guest is Denise Schonwald, a registered nurse turned nationally licensed therapist. With her holistic approach to care that encompasses mental, physical, and spiritual well-being, she offers insights into nurturing both body and mind.
In this episode:
- Discover how Denise transitioned from critical care nursing into mental health support.
- Understand why honoring commitments is crucial for personal trust and self-care.
- Learn about the high burnout rates in nursing – especially post-COVID – and how self-care can prevent it.
- Explore the importance of emotional intelligence in recognizing when you’re inflicting suffering on yourself through poor self-care choices.
- Gain strategies for managing anger effectively without damaging relationships or your own well-being.
- Delve into people pleasing: why we do it, its impacts on our lives, and how to establish healthier boundaries.
- Hear about grief’s “waiting room” – what keeps us there and how to move forward.
Denise’s journey from a nurse fascinated by the intricacies of human anatomy to a spiritual teacher and family mediator is nothing short of inspiring. She has woven her experiences into a tapestry that offers comfort and guidance to those navigating emotional turmoil.
Through her narrative, Denise uncovers an essential truth: honoring personal commitments is pivotal. When we falter on these promises to ourselves, trust erodes, leaving us vulnerable to self-inflicted suffering.
Self-care isn’t just about indulgence; it’s preventative maintenance for our souls—something Denise has embraced through meditation and mindful practices like Reiki. These practices have been instrumental in managing stress levels after witnessing patients’ crises firsthand as a critical care nurse and mental health professional.
Denise sheds light on how emotions like frustration are precursors to anger—an emotion many grapple with yet struggle to manage effectively.
RESOURCES:
*Denise is generously offering my listeners a free copy of one of her books. Reach out to her through her website to receive your FREE copy today!*
CONNECT:
NEED HELP?
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
- Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor
If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Insights on Personal Commitments and Emotional Management
In the labyrinth of life, we often find ourselves at crossroads where our hearts bear the heavy toll of grief. Today, I had the privilege to converse with Denise Schonewald—a beacon of solace and understanding in such turbulent times.
Denise’s journey from a nurse fascinated by the intricacies of human anatomy to a spiritual teacher and family mediator is nothing short of inspiring. She has woven her experiences into a tapestry that offers comfort and guidance to those navigating emotional turmoil.
Through her narrative, Denise uncovers an essential truth: honoring personal commitments is pivotal. When we falter on these promises to ourselves, trust erodes, leaving us vulnerable to self-inflicted suffering. It’s akin to constructing a dam without acknowledging the river—eventually, the waters will breach their confines.
She sheds light on how emotions like frustration are precursors to anger—an emotion many grapple with yet struggle to manage effectively. Her approach? Acknowledgment paired with therapeutic tools like tuning forks that recalibrate our emotional energy.
One profound aspect she touches upon is people-pleasing—a double-edged sword that while momentarily alleviating anxiety can lead us astray from our true selves. Clear communication and solid values stand as sentinels guarding against this tendency.
As someone who has experienced loss closely through my son’s grieving over his friend’s suicide, Denise’s insights resonate deeply. Creating safe spaces for expression and being present in silence are powerful acts of support during grief.
Nurturing the Soul Through Meditation and Mindful Practices
Self-care isn’t just about indulgence; it’s preventative maintenance for our souls—something I’ve embraced through meditation and mindful practices like Reiki which have been instrumental in managing stress levels after witnessing patients’ crises firsthand as a critical care nurse.
Wisdom and Practical Guidance
Denise reminds us that preparing for tomorrow doesn’t mean living in fear but rather simplifying life so we can face what comes with grace and resilience.
Her work goes beyond counsel—it provides hope anchored in real-world wisdom honed through years of helping others navigate their darkest hours.
And if you’re wondering about tangible steps towards healing? Engage with nature or nurture—a pet or even a plant—to foster growth amidst sorrow.
For those seeking more than words, Denise extends an invitation: visit deniseschonewall.com for resources including mental health quizzes and books designed not merely as reads but as companions along your journey toward healing.
The essence here is clear: Unleash your heart because within its beats lies untold strength capable of weathering any storm—with love serving as both anchor and compass guiding us home.
Episode Transcription:
Victoria Volk
00:00:00 – 00:00:38
Welcome to grieving voices. Thank you for joining me today and listening. And today I have Denise Schonewald with me. She is a dedicated registered nurse for over 30 years, a seamlessly transitioned into a nationally licensed mental health counselor and published author based in Sarasota, Florida. With a deep understanding of the emotional challenges faced by patients and their families, Denise’s holistic approach integrates mental and physical well-being. As a spiritual teacher and certified family mediator, she brings a unique perspective to her private practice, offering support to clients nationwide through virtual sessions.
Victoria Volk
00:00:39 – 00:00:55
Denise is committed to nurturing both body and mind, providing flexible and accessible care for individuals, couples, families and even young thinkers starting at the age of 4. Thank you so much for being here and also thank you for a copy of your book.
Denise Schonwald
00:00:56 – 00:00:59
Oh, terrific. I’m glad you received it. Welcome.
Victoria Volk
00:01:00 – 00:01:30
It’s insightful self-therapy, increasing your awareness about mental health and how to live a happier life. And I will put a link to that in the show notes, and we’ll actually be talking. I’ll be there’s a couple of things I have noted that I would like to talk about that you mentioned in the book, but first I’m curious what brought you into the nursing profession and you know, it’s in a way a healer profession. What brought you there?
Denise Schonwald
00:01:31 – 00:02:07
Well, I love how fascinating and sophisticated the body is. So I always saw myself in some sort of nursing. I considered just very briefly being a physician, but and I love also helping people. I did my specialty was critical care, and working with people who are very sick and dying is quite an honor and very stressful. And I just it was just a wonderful career until I was getting to the point where I was getting too old to do the grind of 12-hour shifts and call and nights and weekends and holidays.
Denise Schonwald
00:02:07 – 00:02:13
And so the transition for me to into mental health was an easy one.
Victoria Volk
00:02:13 – 00:02:19
What would you say to a young person who is just pursuing a career in nursing?
Denise Schonwald
00:02:20 – 00:02:58
I think a lot of people go into nursing, a lot of the young people that I meet, because it’s a wonderful career. I mean, you certainly have a lot of opportunities. You can certainly do very well financially. But what I really encourage them to do is not to forget that these are people that are going through very tough experiences. And I think a lot of times, we get caught with the clinical aspect of ordering meds and titrating drips and so forth, and we forget that these patients are going through something very very difficult, probably one of the most difficult things I’ve ever gone through, not only physically, but emotionally and sometimes spiritually.
Victoria Volk
00:02:59 – 00:03:18
What do you think is the highest indicator or greatest indicator of a nurse who will burn out in that career because they can be a very high burnout rate in that career as well, especially with COVID. I mean, you can you saw it. We saw it happening before our eyes.
Denise Schonwald
00:03:19 – 00:03:45
Yes. One thing when people are either physically sick or emotionally struggling, they pull energy. They only they’re thinking about themselves. They’re focused on themselves, rightly so, because they’re sick. And as healers and helpers, we understand that it takes a lot out of us to try to help them and nurture them, not only physically and emotionally.
Denise Schonwald
00:03:45 – 00:04:00
And when nurses and physicians and and mental health counselors don’t do their own work, so when we get home, we have to recover from that with self-care and exercise and rest, then we’re likely to burn out.
Victoria Volk
00:04:01 – 00:04:17
In your book, one thing I jotted down was, and I didn’t really think about this in terms of how we can inflict suffering on ourselves, but I think there’s actually a book. Oh gosh. The four agreements.
Denise Schonwald
00:04:17 – 00:04:18
Yeah. Love it.
Victoria Volk
00:04:18 – 00:04:35
Yeah. Yeah. But you mentioned in your book, the importance of honoring commitments. And when you think about the flip side of that, of dishonoring our commitments, and one of the commitments can be self-care to ourselves, right? Just self-care.
Denise Schonwald
00:04:35 – 00:04:35
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:04:36 – 00:04:40
But can you speak a little bit about the importance of honoring our commitments?
Denise Schonwald
00:04:42 – 00:05:10
If you think about relationships, the only thing that we can sort of we rely on with each other is trust. And when I tell you that I’m going to do something or you tell me that you’re going to help me with something and you don’t do that, that really betrays my trust. And so that’s difficult to recover from. But what I find more frequently is people, and individuals really don’t honor themselves. They don’t get enough self-care.
Denise Schonwald
00:05:10 – 00:05:34
They don’t, sometimes when I talk to patients about self-care, they say, I don’t have time for that. And I say, well, you’ll either make time for self-care or you’re gonna have to make time for illness because the body cannot sustain if we don’t nurture it. And I’m not really sure why as a society now, we’re neglecting our own self-care care for sacrificing it for helping others.
Victoria Volk
00:05:37 – 00:06:10
You know, there’s been periods of time in my life where I’ve been guilty of sabotaging my own self-care. It’s like in those moments of, like, extreme challenge or being confronted with something really challenging, that that’s when you need to double down on your self-care. And me personally, I think I’ve had to learn that lesson several times. Like, okay, this is when I need to really double down on taking a break and needing a mental break. And so I’m glad that you mentioned that in your book.
Victoria Volk
00:06:11 – 00:06:41
In that same vein, you talk there’s another aspect of your book where you talk about the importance of emotional intelligence. And I think as we develop that emotional intelligence, we have that obviously more self-awareness when we realize that we’re self-sabotaging our self, you know, our own self-care and things like that. What have you found in your practice has been helpful for people that you’ve worked with and even for yourself in developing emotional intelligence?
Denise Schonwald
00:06:42 – 00:06:57
Here’s a very easy way. 1 is notice, not judge. Notice how as an individual that we’re starting to act. Are we all of a sudden very irritable? Are we going to the refrigerator one too many times for more food?
Denise Schonwald
00:06:57 – 00:07:26
Usually, when we’re very stressed emotionally, we go for sugar and carbs just automatically. Watch how much we’re drinking. If we’re smoking, watch how much we’re smoking because the body is trying to balance. And if we’re not doing healthy things, the mind becomes very active, and we start reaching for things in the environment that are unhealthy, spending, too much screen time. It’s something that the body is trying to find ease.
Denise Schonwald
00:07:26 – 00:07:30
But, unfortunately, if the mind’s in charge, it’s likely not gonna be a good choice.
Victoria Volk
00:07:31 – 00:08:10
My personal go-to is anger. So when I’m, like, just this last week, last week was a doozy of a week. I had some credit card fraud on my website, and it’s like when I thought that the week couldn’t start off any worse, it snowballed. I’ve lost access to my business Facebook page. Like, it’s been just technical, like stupid stuff that, I actually like the Facebook page thing was my own stupidity, not realizing what I was doing, but it’s really created a lot of anger to come up inside me.
Victoria Volk
00:08:10 – 00:08:27
And I find that when I’m angry, and I would love to talk about anger more because I think it’s a really important emotion that we have. But when I find that I’m getting angry, I don’t eat. I don’t drink. I don’t want it. I don’t want people to even talk to me.
Victoria Volk
00:08:28 – 00:08:32
Don’t talk to me. I just I need to sit with my anger.
Denise Schonwald
00:08:32 – 00:08:33
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:08:33 – 00:09:01
And I know not everybody’s like that. Like, a lot of people will just that like you said, they’ll reach for the refrigerator or they’ll go shopping to distract themselves. But for me, it’s like I have and it I it doesn’t come out very pretty either. So, like, how do you reconcile that? Like, when the anger is coming out and up, it’s like and you have people around you and you don’t wanna be, you know, you don’t wanna be a jerk.
Denise Schonwald
00:09:01 – 00:09:01
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:09:01 – 00:09:07
What is your advice for that? Because I’m sure there’s a lot of people out there listening like, that’s me.
Denise Schonwald
00:09:07 – 00:09:25
Yes. One of the things, as a therapist that I do when I meet someone is I’m trying to figure out where they are emotionally. Like, where is their emotional frequency? It’s actually measured in something called Hertz. Anger is around a 150 Hertz.
Denise Schonwald
00:09:25 – 00:09:52
So it’s a low vibrational energy, but it’s got a lot of intensity. So anger, ego, jealousy, they’re all around the same sort of frequency. And when we get to that point, we likely are going to say something or do something. We can no longer hold it in. And after we say something or do something, likely, we feel either very guilty or shameful about how we just acted out.
Denise Schonwald
00:09:53 – 00:10:27
And then many times, we feel very sad and depressed. Both anger and shame and depression are take a lot of energy from the body, both very extreme emotions. For me, personally, when I want to say something out of anger or ego, let somebody know how I really feel, I remind myself not to say a word. Because even if I do, it’s not likely going to be well received. I will say, however, right now, I really don’t feel like I’m in a good place to talk about this.
Denise Schonwald
00:10:27 – 00:10:38
I would like a little time to, you know, think about it or whatever I wanna say just to give myself a little bit of space knowing that I’m going to very dangerous territory because I’m already pretty darn angry.
Victoria Volk
00:10:40 – 00:10:45
And it’s not even like I’m getting angry at people around me. They’re just trying to ask me a question
Denise Schonwald
00:10:45 – 00:10:45
Mmm
Victoria Volk
00:10:46 – 00:11:17
or they’re and I’m just so wrapped up in my own anger that I can’t even have a conversation. But you bring up a good point. I never I so one of the service offerings I have is, biofuel tuning with tuning forks. And so it’s interesting that you mentioned the hurts of anger, because I never thought personally to get out my tuning fork, maybe just come to my office, light a candle and you know, just strike my fork
Denise Schonwald
00:11:18 – 00:11:18
Yes.
Victoria Volk
00:11:18 – 00:11:19
Few times.
Denise Schonwald
00:11:19 – 00:11:35
Vibrational energy to go a little bit higher
Victoria Volk
00:11:21 – 00:11:21
Yeah
Denise Schonwald
00:11:21 – 00:11:35
to get through that anger. Yes. The other thing is underneath anger, and I when I work with little children who have anger issues, I pretend it’s an umbrella. And I say, what’s underneath the angry umbrella? I’m frustrated.
Denise Schonwald
00:11:35 – 00:11:50
I’m overwhelmed. I’m disappointed. And I try to give them some language so that it doesn’t just come out in door slamming or screaming or calling names. And I go, okay. Let’s let’s think about the what’s under the angry umbrella.
Denise Schonwald
00:11:50 – 00:11:52
It’s actually very helpful for me too.
Victoria Volk
00:11:53 – 00:11:59
I will probably remember the umbrella the next time because I’m sure this issue that I’m dealing with is not over yet. And so, I’m suspecting some more anger will pop up
Denise Schonwald
00:12:00 – 00:12:00
uh-humm
Victoria Volk
00:12:00 – 00:12:39
as a result, but, thank you for that. I also wanna talk about people pleasing, which you mentioned in your book too, because just this past weekend, there was a skit on SNL. Ariana Grande was on and it was a people-pleasing support group skit. And, you know, it was it kinda was making fun of the people pleasing, but it had it was interesting that SNL is addressing this on their show
Denise Schonwald
00:12:40 – 00:12:40
Mmmor
Victoria Volk
00:12:40 – 00:12:41
talking about it on their show in this way.
Victoria Volk
00:12:41 – 00:12:56
But, you know, what people were saying was, oh, no worries. You know, because they had their lines to say, and one of them was, no worries. Whatever you decide and, you know, what do you think? Well, I’m I’m okay with whatever you think, you know, and so it was kind of exaggerating things. Right?
Victoria Volk
00:12:56 – 00:13:25
But I heard myself in what they were saying in some of these things, like, no worries, you know. What is what are some techniques for people to stop themselves when to recognize again, it’s developing that emotional intelligence about people pleasing first, but what are some suggestions that you have for people to get out of that? First of all, why do we do it? And then secondly, how do we stop it?
Denise Schonwald
00:13:26 – 00:13:37
Well, the reason why we do it is when someone’s unhappy or they don’t have something, it causes us a lot of anxiety, and we want to go in and fix it. And I might say, well, I wanna do it because I wanna help them but what I really want to do is make myself feel better about it.
Victoria Volk
00:13:37 – 00:13:37
Mmm..
Denise Schonwald
00:13:38 – 00:14:09
And so we have to be careful of that. And so what I tell a lot of people is when somebody’s unhappy or some they’re going through something, you can be supportive without fixing it. Because sometimes when we please, every the other person gets very resentful and frustrated because we’re coming in and we’re trying to just rescue and take care of when that’s not what they’ve asked for.
Denise Schonwald
00:14:09 – 00:14:45
They’re just letting us know they’re upset about something or some situation. But what happens with people pleasers, if we can imagine drawing a circle, and inside the circle should be our personal values and ethics and what makes us different from the next person. What is it that we know to be true about us? And when we meet people, they will figure out fairly quickly what’s inside our circle, what our values are, and they will like us or not like us or align with us or not. Does it mean one’s good or bad?
Denise Schonwald
00:14:45 – 00:15:17
Just means we understand and we appreciate each other or we don’t. The people pleaser circle has a lot of gaps in it. And what happens with them, unfortunately, is they will fall prey to people who are very manipulative and controlling. Because somebody who’s manipulative and controlling, they’re masterful at finding a people pleaser. And so when the people pleaser pleases, they’ll walk away knowing that they really may not have wanted to do what they just volunteered to do.
Denise Schonwald
00:15:18 – 00:15:34
And then they get a lot of they betrayed themselves, and they also have supported somebody to be very manipulative and to be very unkind. And that is really hard on the body.
Victoria Volk
00:15:34 – 00:15:34
You can see why.
Denise Schonwald
00:15:35 – 00:15:35
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:15:35 – 00:15:45
So in the dynamics of friendship and when we think about grief and what I hear a lot too is and I know people that have had this personal experience, but when you are going through something really challenging and you’re reaching out to people and they’re not showing up in a way that you need them to
Denise Schonwald
00:15:46 – 00:15:46
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:15:47 – 00:16:23
or are asking them to, how do you reconcile that where I don’t know how I’m trying to ask this, because it kind of revolves around people pleasing. It’s like, what if 2 people pleasers? I guess. You know, if you’re 2 people pleasers, and then you one person has, like, a really difficult time and needs the other person, and yet they can’t they just can’t do it.
Victoria Volk
00:16:23 – 00:16:39
They just they’re not able to support you. And so how do you reconcile honoring where someone else is at that they just can’t support you in that time? Because this can happen with grievers too a lot. Right?
Denise Schonwald
00:16:40 – 00:16:40
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:16:40 – 00:16:47
Like, this is where friendships kind of can break down and break apart, because people aren’t showing up for you how you hoped.
Denise Schonwald
00:16:47 – 00:16:47
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:16:48 – 00:16:50
Yeah. Can you speak to that a little bit?
Denise Schonwald
00:16:50 – 00:17:36
And I think with people pleasers, I think sort of the fear is that they’re going to hurt or disappoint someone. And what I try to do is help them with language because you can express how you feel without being insulting or dismissive. What I have found with grief is many people get very uncomfortable with grief, and they don’t know what to say, so they will say something very insensitive. Not meaning to, but they can hurt your feelings because they just sort of speak out of fear, and then they say something that is very hurtful. So what I tell people is understand that it’s just a very uncomfortable situation, and a lot of people don’t really feel comfortable navigating it.
Denise Schonwald
00:17:37 – 00:17:56
If they’re offering something that you really don’t want or won’t appreciate, it’s thank you so much. That’s so thoughtful. Maybe next week would be better to drop off whatever, some food or something like that. It’s always complimenting and appreciating, but then also letting them know what would work best.
Victoria Volk
00:17:59 – 00:18:01
So you bring up boundaries
Denise Schonwald
00:18:01 – 00:18:01
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:18:01 – 00:18:03
in a way in a roundabout way.
Denise Schonwald
00:18:03 – 00:18:03
I do.
Victoria Volk
00:18:04 – 00:18:12
So, I actually wanted to talk about that because you have a great exercise for creating boundaries in your book. Do you mind sharing that?
Denise Schonwald
00:18:12 – 00:18:16
Well, is that about the circle? Is that what I talked about about the 2nd?
Victoria Volk
00:18:16 – 00:18:20
Yes. Yes. You did. Yeah. You did touch on that when it came to yeah.
Denise Schonwald
00:18:20 – 00:18:38
Yes. And so what I tell people when your circle is clearly defined, you don’t have to defend it. You don’t have to overexplain it. You don’t have to get nasty when somebody but people will test boundaries. They want to know, like, what you will accept, what you won’t tolerate.
Denise Schonwald
00:18:39 – 00:18:55
It’s very important that we all understand that. As a therapist, as you can imagine, I get a lot of good experience and practice with boundaries. People are can be very manipulative, and why can’t you do this, and why can’t you see me there? And I said, listen. I would be happy to.
Denise Schonwald
00:18:55 – 00:19:16
Unfortunately, I’m not able to do it today, but I certainly have time tomorrow or Wednesday. If that’s acceptable to them, they go, okay. Thank you very much. If it’s not, that means that they’re not that there’s no boundary there. They don’t they would prefer that I don’t have boundaries, and it’s not going to be a good fit.
Denise Schonwald
00:19:16 – 00:19:30
I don’t wanna support them to be manipulative and abusive, nor do I want to run myself to the point where I’m exhausted and I’m no good to anyone. So I honor them, and I also honor myself with boundaries.
Victoria Volk
00:19:31 – 00:19:52
I was just gonna say, and that’s where a lot of helpers get themselves into trouble is yeah. And it and that ties in with the people pleasing. Right? Where you just you want to be supportive, you wanna be helpful, and it’s often to your own detriment when you’re not recognizing or acknowledging that boundaries are healthy, and they’re good for both parties involved.
Denise Schonwald
00:19:52 – 00:20:18
They really are. And if we don’t have, boundaries, what we end up doing is have being very bitter and resentful. Because we feel like people are taking advantage of us, and they are, but we’re also allowing that. So we also have to take responsibility for that. And, again, it’s getting comfortable just having these conversations nicely and then allowing the other person to accept it or not.
Victoria Volk
00:20:19 – 00:21:05
Yep. Absolutely. What I like you what you said about grief too, you know, when you get to that point where all these things just kind of where you realize you need boundaries and you start honoring your own commitments and you’re recognizing that you’re a people pleaser and you’re doing all these things and you have all this awareness, you can find yourself in a lot of grief just because like you said, when you’re start implementing these things in your life and having these awarenesses, people can it can rub people the wrong way. And that’s where these, you know, friendships and relationships can deteriorate as a result.
Denise Schonwald
00:21:01 – 00:21:01
Mmm.
Victoria Volk
00:21:01 – 00:21:06
And there’s grief in that, especially if it’s been a long-time friend or whatever the scenario may be, or even a marriage or a partnership and, and things.
Victoria Volk
00:21:06 – 00:21:10
I like how you said grief is it’s like you can become stuck in the waiting room.
Denise Schonwald
00:21:10 – 00:21:10
Mmm
Victoria Volk
00:21:11 – 00:21:29
And so many people get stuck in the waiting room. And me personally, I was stuck in the waiting room Most of my adult life. I was a child griever and I, you know, you carry that stuff with you from childhood into adulthood and all the trauma and the mess and the baggage. Right?
Denise Schonwald
00:21:29 – 00:21:29
Mmm
Victoria Volk
00:21:29 – 00:21:42
You carry it with you into adulthood. And, I mean, only in the past 5 years, have I had this leaps and bounds of self-awareness and growth and reconnecting with my own intuition and my own knowing.
Denise Schonwald
00:21:42 – 00:21:42
Mmm
Victoria Volk
00:21:43 – 00:21:55
But can you speak to the philosophy you have about that and then about treating grief with medication and your philosophy around that?
Denise Schonwald
00:21:56 – 00:22:27
One of the things about grief, and I tell people this all the time, there’s no way of going around it. You have to just go through it. And you we’re we get so frightened of pain. But also with pain is I try to remind people, and this has been helpful in my own life, I try to look for meaning. Because what you said was so true about relationships, people that you think will show up for you sometimes don’t, and people that you think really didn’t even know you that well will show up.
Denise Schonwald
00:22:28 – 00:23:04
So grief will cause this major shift, and what you’re gonna get from it, hard to say. And it’s just something that that it just surprises me. But what I tried to find through my own grieving times is what how can I come through this a better person? One thing about with death, even back when I was in my critical care days, is boy I had such an appreciation for life and relationships and so forth. Also, for me to be more compassionate when other people are grieving.
Denise Schonwald
00:23:04 – 00:23:27
We tend to go to the funeral and maybe check in once, and then we go on to our daily lives. But yet, that’s when it’s the most difficult, you know, when things start to settle down. And so I’ve made myself a mental note to reach out to a lot of people that are grieving and suffering, just checking in. Not offering to help, not offering to just hey. How are you doing?
Denise Schonwald
00:23:27 – 00:23:33
Giving them that space to just speak their truth and how they’re feeling. It’s very important.
Victoria Volk
00:23:35 – 00:24:03
Do you find working in the mental health or the area of mental health and obviously with and things like that. Do you find because I’ve I’m feeling like, you know, there’s so much heaviness in the world. There’s so much sorrow and, suffering. Really? I mean, suffering.
Victoria Volk
00:24:03 – 00:24:03
Yeah.
Denise Schonwald
00:24:03 – 00:24:04
I agree.
Victoria Volk
00:24:04 – 00:24:53
It’s like, I feel like sometimes I just want to cocoon myself. And it’s like, you know, when you are work and when you work in this space, it’s like sometimes I think to myself, do people expect that I should do or behave or respond a certain way because I’m the grief expert or I work with grievers or the mental health expert, and I’m, you know, working with patients and families. And I know all this stuff, and I’m a helper. Like, how do you reconcile that for those listening, who are helpers, who are working in this space. Because to me, sometimes it is it feels like too much.
Victoria Volk
00:24:53 – 00:25:02
And that’s where I know I need to then maybe address some self-care within myself, but can you speak to that a little bit?
Denise Schonwald
00:25:02 – 00:25:32
It it’s very true. And so when you’re finding that it’s all so overwhelming and it’s so heavy, we need to go in and go, okay. What do I need so that I’m in a better, I’m sort of in a better fitness state to handle and to share space with this person who’s grieving? But, you know, at the end of the day, we’re all human beings, and it does affect us. Just because we don’t know this person or who’s lost somebody doesn’t mean we don’t feel that energy.
Denise Schonwald
00:25:32 – 00:25:57
That energy that their experience is pulling. They’re pulling from us because they want support and they want help and they’re they’re struggling and they’re suffering, and yet that’s gonna take a toll on us. You asked me before about medication.
Victoria Volk
00:25:49 – 00:25:49
Yeah
Denise Schonwald
00:25:49 – 00:25:57
That’s something as a nurse, I understand that sometimes medication is needed, but we also have to go through this grieving process. We’re not gonna get around it.
Denise Schonwald
00:25:57 – 00:26:12
We can try to numb it a little bit, but it’s very very painful. Some people can’t survive it. They’ve been married 50 years and their spouse dies. They tend to go right after them because it’s so heavy on the heart in particular.
Victoria Volk
00:26:13 – 00:26:29
Yeah. Thank you for circling back to that question. And even for me personally, it’s not even that I think you know, it’s not even people reaching out to me asking me but it’s like this I feel like this maybe a sense of duty in a way.
Denise Schonwald
00:26:30 – 00:26:30
Mmm
Victoria Volk
00:26:30 – 00:26:34
And then I feel guilt when I don’t. And so that’s a little bit hard to reconcile for myself sometimes.
Denise Schonwald
00:26:35 – 00:27:10
Well and sometimes you need to make sure you’re in a good space to like, for instance, if somebody’s people that don’t know that I’m a therapist, if they catch me at the grocery store, I’ll say something like, listen. I’m really sorry this has happened to you. Why don’t you give me a call so we can meet privately or something like that? I just don’t know that I’m in a good mental space to have this conversation, you know, standing in the and the deli guy or whatever and so forth. And so I understand that it’s important to them, but I also have to make sure that I’m in a good place because I wanna give them my 100% focus.
Denise Schonwald
00:27:11 – 00:27:15
And I’m not in a good place when I’m out doing errands and so forth.
Victoria Volk
00:27:16 – 00:27:19
Yeah. And that’s great advice for the helpers listening to this.
Denise Schonwald
00:27:19 – 00:27:25
Mhmm. Yes. We’ve we all, sometimes have to go through that challenge.
Victoria Volk
00:27:26 – 00:27:59
We had talked before we started recording, talking about grief. And one of the things I would like to talk about is supporting kids because we had, you had mentioned that you, there’s been a lot of loss for your children or your son over the years and throughout his school years and into adulthood. And I think one of the things that hasn’t really been talked about a whole lot from a mental health standpoint is supporting, kids who have lost friends.
Denise Schonwald
00:27:59 – 00:27:59
Mmm
Victoria Volk
00:28:00 – 00:28:05
And so can you share your professional and parental because it was also your son, right, from that like, the two halves of that?
Denise Schonwald
00:28:06 – 00:28:31
Yes. My son, who is now 28, probably lost 10 friends between 18 and 25, many to drug overdose, suicide. And you know, how do you and as parents, we wanna we don’t want them to suffer because they’re our children, and we wanna make it easier for them. But, again, this is something we gotta go through. We can’t go around.
Denise Schonwald
00:28:31 – 00:29:09
So all I have been able to do, and and the most recent one was just a couple years ago for my son, his very good friend committed suicide, This is to really sort of sit down and say, how are you doing? How are you feeling? Just because it’s an uncomfortable conversation, but it’s one that he needs the space to grieve. It can be very painful for me to hear it because he’s my son, and I don’t want him to suffer. But it’s also important that he know that I’m willing to sit with him in that time and in that space and be as comfortable as I can when he’s uncomfortable.
Denise Schonwald
00:29:10 – 00:29:11
So but it’s tough.
Victoria Volk
00:29:12 – 00:29:19
One of the common things that people say in grief is when people are asked, you know, how are you feeling? How are you doing? Most people say I’m fine.
Denise Schonwald
00:29:19 – 00:29:19
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:29:20 – 00:29:26
And in the grief work that I do, we say that fine means feelings inside not expressed.
Denise Schonwald
00:29:26 – 00:29:26
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:29:27 – 00:29:45
So it’s really just a mask. Right? That we say. So what are some things that you suggest then if you ask your son or your child or young adult or whether they’re 5 or 15 or 25 and you ask them how they’re doing or how they’re feeling and they say I’m fine, when do you press that?
Victoria Volk
00:29:45 – 00:29:50
Or how do you press that? And do you just keep asking until they say otherwise?
Denise Schonwald
00:29:50 – 00:30:00
Well, the other thing that yeah. I’m I’m very intuitive. So I’ll I’ll say something like, you know, how are you doing since you’ve lost such and such? And if they go, yeah. I’m doing really well.
Denise Schonwald
00:30:00 – 00:30:16
They seem to be very dismissive of it. I’ll say, listen. You know, if at any time you wanna talk about it, I’m I’m happy to have the conversation. Because it’s a little bit tough when you don’t wanna have the conversation, and somebody goes, well, just tell me. Just tell me or just share with me.
Denise Schonwald
00:30:16 – 00:30:37
And, you know, that’s also a boundary. But I like to sort of create the opening of listen, if you ever have a tough time with it, I’m more than happy you know, give me a call. I’m more than happy to talk to you and sit with you during this. But we have to understand that some people everybody deals with grief differently in their own way, and we need to honor that.
Victoria Volk
00:30:37 – 00:30:57
So what if you as the parent is uncomfortable with the topic of grief, period? And how do you get yourself more comfortable in having that conversation? Like, if you’re not confident in how you would respond or how you would support them, you may not be inclined to even ask. So how do you get to that point as a parent?
Denise Schonwald
00:30:58 – 00:31:17
Right. Well, so what maybe what you’re asking or what you’re suggesting is that the parent feels very anxious and very fearful of doing that. And so when we do that, we only think about ourselves. So we pull in and go, oh, I don’t wanna have this conversation. I don’t wanna feel uncomfortable and so forth.
Denise Schonwald
00:31:18 – 00:31:54
And what you were saying with your tuning forks to get your vibrational energy a little bit higher is for me to say, I’m okay to be uncomfortable to just open this space for this person to express themselves. And what I tend to do when I’m uncomfortable is I try to listen more than speak so that I don’t say something that I wish I hadn’t said. So I open the opportunity for conversation unless they don’t seem to wanna have it, and then I assure them that, listen. I’m happy to talk to you if you want to. If not, no problem.
Denise Schonwald
00:31:54 – 00:31:57
Just want you to know that I’m just checking in and hope you’re doing well.
Victoria Volk
00:31:59 – 00:32:09
Yeah. And you touched on it, but I think a lot of people think they have to have the solution, right or the fix it.
Denise Schonwald
00:32:09 – 00:32:09
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:32:10 – 00:32:15
And sometimes you just need to listen, and that’s maybe the best medicine is just to listen. You don’t even, you know, release that pressure from yourself to have to have to respond.
Victoria Volk
00:32:16 – 00:32:18
And just like like you said, just listen.
Denise Schonwald
00:32:18 – 00:32:22
Yes. I like to say, just checking in, see how you’re doing. So just it’s really light.
Victoria Volk
00:32:22 – 00:32:22
Mhmm.
Denise Schonwald
00:32:23 – 00:32:28
And if they say, you know, doing this well as can be expected, I’ll say, okay.
Denise Schonwald
00:32:28 – 00:32:31
Just want you to know I was thinking about you. Maybe that’s enough.
Victoria Volk
00:32:32 – 00:32:49
Right. What is one thing that you would like to scream to the world or wish that people knew about just grief in general, your personal grief that you’ve experienced? You had mentioned before we started recording, you have lost your parents, but what would you like to scream to the world?
Denise Schonwald
00:32:50 – 00:33:17
With any time someone comes into your life that I would say touches your soul, when they leave this earth, there’s going to be suffering and grief. That’s just a natural part of it. I try personally not to pull in and suffer by myself. These are times where I can connect with other people. These are times when other people will come in to support me, and I need to receive that.
Denise Schonwald
00:33:18 – 00:33:39
Certainly, with grief and any sort of suffering, there’s meaning. I think about my parents and some of the wonderful things that they taught me and left me as a legacy. You know, something’s not so great, but I can let those go. And to me, that’s very meaningful. My my sister and I talk about my mom all the time because she had some, like, silly habits.
Denise Schonwald
00:33:39 – 00:34:03
And then we’ll notice ourselves doing the same silly thing, and we connect, and we think of her in a positive light. I certainly, when I leave this earth, don’t want my children every time they think of me to burst into tears. No. I certainly know that they’ll grieve me, but I also hope that I’ve left a lot of goodness in them that they will think of me and smile, say some nice things. That’s my hope anyway.
Victoria Volk
00:34:04 – 00:34:14
I’m pretty sure my kids will probably say, you know, she was pretty weird. They say I’m weird now. So I take that as a compliment though.
Denise Schonwald
00:34:14 – 00:34:14
Yeah. Absolutely.
Victoria Volk
00:34:15 – 00:34:32
So throughout your career, I mean, as you know, a critical care nurse, like what were some of the things before you had these tools and before you went to school and back to school for mental health, what were some of the things that you personally leaned on and that you’ve brought into your practice and kind of incorporated?
Denise Schonwald
00:34:33 – 00:34:51
For me personally, self-care is key. I start every day with about 15 minutes of meditation just to sort of keep get myself grounded and sort of to find my center, if you will. I work hard, but I also take time. I exercise every day. For me, that’s something that I really need to do.
Denise Schonwald
00:34:52 – 00:35:11
Just just really helps me just disconnect for a little while. I’m very careful with my screen time. My first hour of the day, no screen time, and I shut it down a couple hours before I go to bed just so that I can my mind can take a little bit of a break. I’m a big proponent of acupuncture. Reiki, I love quite a bit.
Denise Schonwald
00:35:11 – 00:35:23
Massage, not saying you need to do these every week, but sporadically, depending upon how you’re feeling, incorporate some of these wonderful practices for just overall health and healing.
Victoria Volk
00:35:23 – 00:35:32
Did you start doing these things as you were a critical care nurse too in the within in the 30 years or just in recent years?
Denise Schonwald
00:35:32 – 00:35:52
I had a defining moment one night in the ICU. I was looking around at all of the patients that we had, and I realized some were just at the end of their lives. They were, you know, in their nineties and maybe had a heart attack and so forth. But most of the patients that we had sort of put themselves there. They neglected their body.
Denise Schonwald
00:35:52 – 00:36:19
They were stressed out. They were smoking, diabetes, and I made a commitment to myself that if I were ever in the ICU, it wouldn’t be because I did something to contribute to that. And then when I went over to mental health, I felt the same thing. I was like, boy, you know, we me included, and I really start to invested, invest more in my mental health. And I realized that when we don’t we’re not mentally healthy, we’re eventually going to become physically ill.
Denise Schonwald
00:36:20 – 00:36:30
And so I understand how important it is for me to manage. And this is my responsibility, my own stress and wellness, so that I can stay healthy and happy.
Victoria Volk
00:36:31 – 00:36:48
You bring up a good point in that. Well, it just brings up the feeling in me that you can have, let’s say you’ve been you have a there’s a couple they’ve been married 30, 40 years or, or even not. Let’s say it’s just been maybe 5 or 10, like or significant other. You don’t have to be married. Right?
Denise Schonwald
00:36:48 – 00:36:48
Mmm.
Victoria Volk
00:36:48 – 00:37:35
In partnership with someone. And you see these people just like one or the other, or maybe even both, just kind of going about life and just eating whatever they eat and drink whatever they eat, drink. And like you said, perpetuating these the disease that’s probably slowly manifesting until it becomes a flow full-blown heart attack or stroke or whatever the case may be that lands them in the hospital or in a medical crisis or terminal illness or whatever the case may be. And then one of them becomes a caregiver.
Denise Schonwald
00:37:35 – 00:37:35
Mmm.
Victoria Volk
00:37:35 – 00:37:41
So for those listening who may find themselves as a caregiver, who are looking at their significant other who has put themselves in that position and now feel maybe anger,
Denise Schonwald
00:37:42 – 00:37:42
Mmm.
Victoria Volk
00:37:42 – 00:37:42
resentment.
Denise Schonwald
00:37:43 – 00:37:43
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:37:43 – 00:37:46
And to reconcile that as a caregiver, like it’s like you’re holding the both the reality and the grief.
Denise Schonwald
00:37:46 – 00:37:46
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:37:47 – 00:38:02
The reality of what you’re looking at in the situation of what it is and how that person got there. And then also, but I love this person. I wanna care for them.
Victoria Volk
00:38:02 – 00:38:02
Like,
Denise Schonwald
00:38:02 – 00:38:02
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:38:02 – 00:38:05
I think that’s a really difficult challenge for caregivers.
Denise Schonwald
00:38:06 – 00:38:47
I agree. And what I suggest for people that are going through that is to consider having a therapist just to sort of, you know, catharsis or venting with somebody that can help us in coping skills can be very very healing. It’s just hard when we have to go through it alone, particularly when they’ve got some sort of, like, dementia or something like that. It’s you know, this is why these support groups are so important that we can sort of help each other. There’s no way of eliminating it, or it’s just getting some help to just sort of cope through it, cope with it, and also get other people that can help and support as needed.
Denise Schonwald
00:38:48 – 00:38:58
But I know my husband is is 15 years older than I am, and as his health has started to decline, I have reached out to my own therapist more frequently just for support.
Victoria Volk
00:38:58 – 00:39:15
Let’s say you see where the train is going, and they’re just not wanting to take the power back within themselves. They’re not taking ownership of the situation. They’re not doing what you would hope they would be doing. And I’m sure there’s a lot of people in this situation listening. Right?
Victoria Volk
00:39:16 – 00:39:21
What do you do in that situation? Because you can’t make somebody start working out. You can’t make somebody seek mental health.
Denise Schonwald
00:39:21 – 00:39:21
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:39:22 – 00:39:27
You can’t make somebody else do these things.
Denise Schonwald
00:39:27 – 00:39:32
Correct. And what what I see down here in Florida, we have a lot of people that obviously that retire and come down to Florida.
Victoria Volk
00:39:32 – 00:39:32
Mhmm.
Denise Schonwald
00:39:33 – 00:40:03
But what I see typically is that neither husband or wife or partner has really prepared for sort of the end or the latter stages of life. For example, they have 2 or 3 homes, you know, and they’re 80 years old. I mean, that’s and they’ve never really downsized and so forth. Then one or the other gets sick, and the one person is not only caregiving but now has the 2 homes, you know, 1 in Michigan and 1 in Florida.
Denise Schonwald
00:40:03 – 00:40:38
And so what I say to them is, as you’re starting to age, downsize and get something manageable, manageable for 2 or 1 because that may happen. But there’s some things that we can do regardless of what our spouse chooses so that we’re in a better position, maybe financially and logistically and so forth so that we’re preparing for this. But I can’t tell you how many times I’ve met with people that with the 3 homes. This is, you know, it’s really unreasonable at 80.
Victoria Volk
00:40:39 – 00:40:44
Like you mentioned though, you made a statement something to the effect of planning for retirement or later years or the golden years ho you know,
Denise Schonwald
00:40:44 – 00:40:44
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:40:45 – 00:41:00
that time period in your life, we you know, so many people spend so much time financially preparing for that, but you don’t think about what do I want my health to be
Denise Schonwald
00:41:00 – 00:41:00
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:41:01 – 00:41:02
At that stage.
Denise Schonwald
00:41:02 – 00:41:02
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:41:03 – 00:41:17
And what’s in my power and control to address that starting today so that when I get to that stage, I can enjoy it. Right. Because what’s the point of getting to that period of your life if you are sick and you can’t enjoy it?
Denise Schonwald
00:41:17 – 00:41:17
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:41:17 – 00:41:19
And I think yeah.
Denise Schonwald
00:41:19 – 00:41:57
And one of the things that I work with people in is when we become physically ill, depending upon what’s happening, that has started on the emotional energetic level. So certain emotions will play out physically. And what happens is, you know, we’re so afraid to deal with I don’t, guilt or shame or trauma or so forth, but eventually they manifest physically. I cannot tell you how many patients that we had in the ICU, and they would say, can you believe I’ve had a heart attack? And I would look at their chart, and I’d be like, you know, I sort of can.
Denise Schonwald
00:41:57 – 00:42:11
I mean, you have a lot of risk factors and you don’t take care of yourself. And yet, you know, we think that just because we don’t wanna recognize it or acknowledge it, it’s not gonna take have an impact on us, and it really does.
Victoria Volk
00:42:12 – 00:42:14
And everybody around them.
Denise Schonwald
00:42:15 – 00:42:29
Yes. Yes. And so I have to think, not only is it gonna affect me, but it’s gonna affect my spouse, it’s gonna affect my children. And you know, we have to take responsibility for that. But many people don’t, unfortunately.
Victoria Volk
00:42:30 – 00:42:44
No. What is one tip that you would give? I mean, you’ve shared a lot of tips, but what’s one tip that you would give to someone listening who is hurting, whether it’s watching someone else suffer who is grieving or whether they’re grieving themselves.
Denise Schonwald
00:42:44 – 00:43:02
Mhmm. Even when life is going fairly well. So we’re going through our developmental stages and so forth. At every stage, it’s a struggle, because we haven’t done it before. And once the kids go off to college or we retire or we get a new job or whatever.
Denise Schonwald
00:43:04 – 00:43:33
I highly recommend I started to see a therapist every now and then back in my twenties. Because even again, when there’s nothing really particularly wrong, certain stages are very difficult for me. When my husband retired, that was a major change because he was home all the time. I’m still working, and it for me, that was a struggle. And I really felt like I needed somebody just to other than my sister and my friends, and that’s not their job, to be my therapist, but just talk through it.
Denise Schonwald
00:43:34 – 00:43:53
And I highly recommend everybody have a therapist, not just because I am one, because they’re very very helpful. Find somebody that you connect with and find somebody that can work with you when you’re really going through a tough time so that it doesn’t play out physically and affect your life and others around you.
Victoria Volk
00:43:53 – 00:44:09
Well and when would you rather find a therapist? When you are in the emotional throes of something and it’s like, feels very immediate, like stat important or
Denise Schonwald
00:44:09 – 00:44:09
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:44:09- 00:44:14
When you can kinda ease yourself into the experience. Because for a lot of people, they may not never have had an experience of working with a therapist too.
Denise Schonwald
00:44:15 – 00:44:27
Yes. And it may be take a couple till they find somebody that’s right for them. People will say to me all the time, can you recommend a good therapist? And I go, a good therapist is somebody that is right for you. So that’s very important.
Denise Schonwald
00:44:27 – 00:44:34
And you’re right. Let’s not wait till we’re right in the throes of crisis, and then we’re scrambling to try to find somebody.
Victoria Volk
00:44:35 – 00:44:49
What would you say to people who don’t really think therapy is for them because they just don’t wanna, like, just talk about I just don’t wanna talk about talk, talk, talk. Right?
Denise Schonwald
00:44:49 – 00:44:49
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:44:50 – 00:44:58
Like, what is your perspective of that? Like, do you core incorporate other things or, like, action steps and things into your practice?
Denise Schonwald
00:44:58 – 00:45:22
One of the things that I recommend for everybody is always have a self-help book around. I mean, there’s thousands of them, and I always carry a book with me. And I’m I read and read and read. And, again, 1, 2 pages at a time because I sort of have a busy schedule and so forth. But there’s always some advice and some keys and some ways to cope that can be very very helpful.
Denise Schonwald
00:45:22 – 00:45:33
So start that way where you start to just learn about yourself and emotions and how they affect the body and whatever you’re interested in meditation and so forth, and then move from there.
Victoria Volk
00:45:34 – 00:46:14
That has actually been one of the catalysts for my growth is reading self-help books because at least to you know, it’s like one book can lead to the next book to lead to the next book or you end up down this rabbit hole where you learn maybe a new perspective. And, you know, it just it really it’s like, you didn’t get to where you are overnight. You’re not gonna get to where you want to go overnight. So you might as well just take these incremental steps. And if it’s reading 2 pages at a time, like you said, I mean, that’s it’s has a camp compound effect,
Denise Schonwald
00:46:15 – 00:46:15
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:46:15 – 00:46:17
you know, just like grief and trauma, and it has this compound effect, but we can chip away at that.
Victoria Volk
00:46:18 – 00:46:22
I think by doing the things that you’ve talked about and mentioned,
Denise Schonwald
00:46:22 – 00:46:22
Mhmm
Victoria Volk
00:46:23 – 00:46:23
in this episode.
Denise Schonwald
00:46:23 – 00:46:43
Plus it helps us when we connect with other people. I can’t tell you how many times I’ll be out and about and somebody will say thank you for recommending that book. And I have no memory of and I go, what book was that? And they go, oh, this book, it was so helpful. I rec I gave it to my sister and this is how we the power of our ripple in a positive way.
Denise Schonwald
00:46:43 – 00:46:43
Mhmm.
Denise Schonwald
00:46:43 – 00:46:57
Other than complaining or you know, connecting with people just over problems, we’re actually connecting with people and recommending books and then talking about the books to each other and what we liked and what was helpful and so forth.
Victoria Volk
00:46:57 – 00:47:02
What is your grief and the grief that you’ve helped others work through taught you?
Denise Schonwald
00:47:04 – 00:47:26
I have a very good friend that lost her son at 16, so it sort of was a freak accident. And so now he’s passed away a little over 10 years. And I said to her one night, how do you deal with it now that it’s 10 years? You know, it’s not like it’s been 2 months and so forth. And she said, you know, she said, we’ll never get over it.
Denise Schonwald
00:47:26 – 00:47:50
She said, but we’ve learned to live peacefully next to it. And I thought that that was such an interesting way to describe. She said, you know, it’s just something that’s always gonna be there, and you have to learn to be at peace with it living next to you. It’s a wonderful question to ask people who are going who have are grieving 5 years down the road. Ask them, well, what is it like?
Denise Schonwald
00:47:50 – 00:48:08
Like, what is what are the challenges 5 years later or 15 years later and so forth? It’s something that not only is helpful for them and also helpful for us. I never forgot that that’s how she described it, and I thought that was so beautifully said.
Victoria Volk
00:48:08 – 00:48:21
One thing I talk about with my own experiences, so I lost my dad when I was 8 to cancer. So he was sick for almost 2 years before that. So I really didn’t have much of a childhood.
Denise Schonwald
00:48:21 – 00:48:21
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:48:21 – 00:48:28
Had to grow up really fast. And my grandma had died the year before that my mom, my mom’s mom, and then my sister moved away.
Victoria Volk
00:48:28 – 00:48:49
So there was just a lot of change and trauma and things happen very back to back in the early part of my life. And one thing I say to people is that, especially with children who experienced grief or trauma in childhood is that they’re gonna grow up with it.
Denise Schonwald
00:48:49 – 00:48:49
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:48:49 – 00:49:06
So and one thing I hate that people say is that children are resilient. Like, I can’t stand that when people say that because children don’t have a choice. And they just they may be just are able to adapt a little bit more easily than the adults because we don’t have a capacity at that young age to wrap our head completely around it.
Denise Schonwald
00:49:06 – 00:49:06
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:49:06 – 00:49:28
And so we, we adapt and how, because we’re imaginative. Right? As children were more imaginative.
Denise Schonwald
00:49:06 – 00:49:06
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:49:06 – 00:49:28
And so I created a lot of stories in order to adapt to my experience. And so people saw that as resilient and saw that I was fine and I was adapting well and but, you know, that stuff has stuck with you.
Victoria Volk
00:49:28 – 00:50:29
It you carry it with you and you grow up with it and it changes over time.
Denise Schonwald
00:49:29 – 00:49:29
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:49:30 – 00:49:49
And that’s what I want people to understand about child grievers is that it will never leave them. It is, you know, and there’s so many people too. Like, I can recognize when I come across an adult who hasn’t had probably a lot of loss in their life. They haven’t had an experience that has completely flipped their life upside down or completely changed life for them,
Denise Schonwald
00:49:49 – 00:49:49
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:49:50 – 00:50:06
it’s easier for me to see, you know, they and I think that’s what helps build emotional intelligence too is grief and trauma.
Victoria Volk
00:50:06 – 00:50:09
I mean, would you kinda say that in a way?
Denise Schonwald
00:50:09 – 00:50:23
Yeah. And I always think where I’m going through it, why me? And then I think, well, why not me? Yeah. Because we, you know, we think that that’s something somebody else should should experience. But I realized that it’s important for me to experience too because it’s very very painful.
Denise Schonwald
00:50:23 – 00:50:33
And it also helps me get have a new understanding of other people that are going through it. But you’re right. You have to learn to look next to it because it doesn’t go away.
Victoria Volk
00:50:34 – 00:50:37
Yeah. What gives you hope for the future?
Denise Schonwald
00:50:37 – 00:50:56
I absolutely love what I do, and I feel it’s very fulfilling. It’s also very challenging. And for me, certainly I my passion is I just finished my second children’s book. I write books. That’s sort of my ministry.
Denise Schonwald
00:50:57 – 00:51:07
I enjoy sharing what I know about mental health. I hope to help people live happier, more fulfilling lives. And so that is sort of why I’m here.
Victoria Volk
00:51:09 – 00:51:29
I love that. In the last paragraph of your book, I just want to read it because I absolutely loved it. It was one of my favorite parts of the book. Remember the mind does what you tell it to do. If you say, I choose to take care of myself because I’m worth it, your mind will be the best assistant you could hire.
Victoria Volk
00:51:29 – 00:51:39
It will help you flow through your day in with ease and less pain, suffering, and stress. Our perception is our reality. Make the choice to help others by first helping yourself.
Denise Schonwald
00:51:39 – 00:51:39
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:51:40 – 00:51:56
I think that beautifully wraps up our episode. But I do wanna ask you about one more thing because I found it interesting in what you also incorporate into your practice is Henry your dog.
Denise Schonwald
00:51:56 – 00:52:02
Yes. Yes. In fact, I keep snapping my fingers because he’s growling a lot.
Victoria Volk
00:52:02 – 00:52:03
He wants your attention, I suppose.
Denise Schonwald
00:52:03 – 00:52:12
He does. He does. Yes. I started my practice initially with a therapy dog by the name of Max, and he worked with me. He we had to put him down when he was 15.
Denise Schonwald
00:52:13 – 00:52:27
And you know, it’s just such a wonderful part of the practice. And so Henry is now his successor and people just love to come in. And of course he loves his job and that has been, it just helps people feel more at peace.
Victoria Volk
00:52:28 – 00:52:35
Since you brought up Max, can you discuss a little bit briefly how you navigated that pet loss of
Denise Schonwald
00:52:35 – 00:52:50
That was, that was a tough one. He was the dog that we got when the children were little, and now the children are all, you know, out of the house and married and often. And then he worked with me for years years years. And so, you know, when he passed, it was like I had lost to Lynn.
Victoria Volk
00:52:50 – 00:52:50
Mhmm.
Denise Schonwald
00:52:51 – 00:52:53
Talk about being in the waiting room.
Denise Schonwald
00:52:53 – 00:53:12
I mean, I didn’t I had Henry at the time. He was a puppy, and I just didn’t know how to move forward. And I had difficulty sort of sitting through a session and so forth. And and again, you know, he was a very important part of my life and and had to sort of work through that.
Victoria Volk
00:53:14 – 00:53:23
How did you work through that? Because I know there’s a lot of people listening that probably have experienced pet loss. I know I’ve talked pet loss has come up a lot in recent months for me.
Denise Schonwald
00:53:23 – 00:53:56
And there are times where I still struggle. I have this little picture that I kiss before I go to sleep every night and so forth. And I just, you know, he was, he taught me a lot. In fact, my first book, Healing Your Body by Mastering Your Mind, the reason that I wrote that book was I dedicated it to him because I felt like he was such an important part of the practice and I wanted his leg you know, I wanted him to live on. And so I sat down and I wrote the book and dedicated to him, and that book has been very well received.
Denise Schonwald
00:53:56 – 00:53:58
So that was one of the ways that I honored him.
Victoria Volk
00:53:59 – 00:54:02
Well, and I’m sure it was very therapeutic for you to write it.
Denise Schonwald
00:54:02 – 00:54:15
Mhmm. Yeah. I wrote a little bit at the end about how we got him and how we named him and how he was very instrumental in our practice and so forth. And so we’re a little bit about him, and people love that part of the book.
Victoria Volk
00:54:16 – 00:54:19
So how did you know that you were ready for another dog?
Denise Schonwald
00:54:19 – 00:54:45
Well, it’s interesting. He was getting older and I wasn’t sure that he was really wanted to practice with me anymore. We had a little dog door, which I do in my office, and he was starting to come in less and less. And I thought, you know, maybe I’ll get another puppy and see if he can teach the puppy how to be a therapy dog. But by the time the Henry came in, he really was getting very sickly and he just really didn’t live too much longer.
Denise Schonwald
00:54:46 – 00:55:02
And that was really tough too, having a puppy and then also a dog sort of toward the end of his life. But I just he was such a valuable part of not only my practice, but to me. You know, he was he was just a real special little guy.
Victoria Volk
00:55:03 – 00:55:07
Well, and I’m sure to your patients as well, the people that you worked with, your clients.
Denise Schonwald
00:55:07 – 00:55:18
Hundreds of emails and texts and cards after he passed. And and that just also reminded me of how important it is for us to connect to each other and support each other when we’re going through grief.
Victoria Volk
00:55:19 – 00:55:38
In a recent episode too, I was saying to I mentioned weird pet loss come had come up and I said, you know, even if people listening can’t, they’re in a place where they can’t have a pet or they don’t feel comfortable getting a pet because it’s maybe more care than what they can handle at the time or whatever. Just get a plant, get something to nurture,
Denise Schonwald
00:55:39 – 00:55:39
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:55:39 – 00:55:43
you know, give that, give yourself something to nurture. And even maybe that small thing can help you
Denise Schonwald
00:55:43 – 00:55:43
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:55:43 – 00:55:44
create some purpose
Denise Schonwald
00:55:44 – 00:55:44
Yes.
Victoria Volk
00:55:45 – 00:55:52
in your day. You know, if you’re feeling a little low, if you’re
Denise Schonwald
00:55:52 – 00:55:52
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:55:52 – 00:55:53
yeah.
Denise Schonwald
00:55:53 – 00:56:09
You’re very fulfilling. In fact, if when people sort of look me up after this episode, if they’d like to email me, I’d be happy to send them a copy of one of my books. That’s just a thank you for listening today. We’ve talked to us about some really great topics.
Victoria Volk
00:56:10 – 00:56:13
Yeah. And where can people find you to connect with you?
Denise Schonwald
00:56:14 – 00:56:33
My website is the best, deniseschonewall.com. In there, I have a little 10 question mental health quiz, which is also very fun to do, just to sort of see where you are. My books are listed. I have 3 currently. I’d be happy to send someone a copy of one of them if you email me.
Denise Schonwald
00:56:33 – 00:56:48
If you’d like an appointment, I’m licensed both in the state of Florida and nationally. So I see clients all over the United States. If somebody would just like to try a session and see how it works out, be more than happy. My calendar is online.
Victoria Volk
00:56:48 – 00:56:50
Wonderful. I will put the link in the show notes, and
Denise Schonwald
00:56:50 – 00:56:50
That’s great.
Victoria Volk
00:56:51 – 00:56:53
Thank you so much for everything that you shared today.
Denise Schonwald
00:56:53 – 00:56:55
You’re welcome. I enjoyed it.
Victoria Volk
00:56:55 – 00:57:01
Great. And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love.
Cancer Thriver, Childhood Grief, Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Mind/Body Wellness, Parent Loss, Pespective, Pet Loss |
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
In this heartfelt episode of Grieving Voices, I’m joined by the remarkable Kris Carr, a multiple New York Times bestselling author, wellness activist, and cancer thriver. Known as a force of nature and recognized as one of Oprah’s Super Soul 100 influential thought leaders, Kris shares insights from her latest book “I’m Not a Morning Person,” which delves into the raw emotions that surface when life falls apart unexpectedly.
Kris discusses navigating through loss and grief with humor and hope while providing readers with strategies to move forward. She opens up about her personal journey living with stage 4 cancer for over two decades and how it has shaped her approach to health advocacy.
The conversation touches on profound topics such as:
- The unexpected grief journey sparked by the death of her father.
- How old wounds resurfaced during this period.
- The importance of emotional literacy in healing.
- Tools she developed to manage anxiety related to ongoing cancer scans.
- Her transition from trying to cure herself to focusing on healing.
Listeners will learn how Kris transformed fear into proactive self-care measures that millions now embrace. She also emphasizes the power of naming our emotions as a step toward understanding them better.
Kris’s story isn’t just about survival; it’s an inspiring testament to thriving amid adversity by harnessing love, acceptance, and resilience. Join us for an episode that promises deep reflection and practical wisdom for anyone grappling with their own grieving process or supporting others through theirs.
RESOURCES:
CONNECT:
_______
NEED HELP?
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
- Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor
If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Navigating the Tumultuous Seas of Grief: Insights from Kris Carr
Grief is like an unpredictable storm; it can hit us with ferocity when we least expect it, leaving us to navigate through its tumultuous waves. In today’s blog post, we dive deep into the insights shared by Kris Carr – a beacon of hope and resilience in the face of life’s most challenging moments.
Kris Carr isn’t just another voice in the wellness community; she is a testament to living vibrantly even amid adversity. Her journey began with a stage 4 cancer diagnosis that would forever change her trajectory. But rather than allowing this diagnosis to dictate her life’s story, Kris turned it into an opportunity for profound self-discovery and healing.
Her latest literary offering, *I’m Not a Mourning Person: Braving Loss, Grief, and the Big Messy Emotions That Happen When Life Falls Apart*, isn’t just about coping mechanisms but also about embracing our vulnerabilities as sources of strength. It’s about finding humor amidst pain and discovering hope when all seems lost.
One crucial takeaway from Kris’ philosophy is understanding that **self-care is non-negotiable**. Whether facing illness or loss, prioritizing oneself isn’t selfish—it’s essential for survival and growth. This means acknowledging our emotions fully without judgment or suppression.
In particular, emotions like anxiety and fear often get a bad rap as being purely negative forces within us. However, as Kris illustrates through her own experiences dealing with these powerful feelings constructively can lead to personal empowerment instead of paralysis.
Moreover, anger—a frequently misunderstood emotion—can be constructive if we view it correctly. Anger signals something deeper at play beneath our surface reactions; injustice felt or pain endured demands attention so healing can occur.
Another poignant aspect discussed by Kris is how society has historically viewed grief—and especially women expressing grief—as unbecoming or taboo. Yet openly discussing such emotions paves the way toward wholeness and recovery—a message particularly resonant in times where mental health awareness is gaining much-needed recognition.
For those who find themselves in caregiver roles—often overlooked heroes—the reminder comes loud and clear: care must flow both ways for sustainability’s sake.
The act of writing itself serves dual purposes for someone like Kris —it becomes both cathartic release and personal reflection tool while simultaneously offering solace guidance others traversing similar paths.
Perhaps one most compelling points made during her interview was regarding language used around illnesses such cancer – traditionally framed battles waged against enemy within ourselves body seen battlefield casualties inevitable consequence warlike mindset approach disease aggression compassion holistic perspective needed here one treats their body ally need tender loving care opposed adversary conquered defeated at all costs
This shift viewpoint not only changes how individuals experience their illness but also affects societal perceptions surrounding diseases overall thus promoting more empathetic inclusive dialogue
Lastly let’s touch upon interesting tidbit revealed by herself – past involvement Budweiser Super Bowl commercials showcases versatility breadth career spanned beyond realms health activism authorship Indeed professional background advertising gives unique lens which view cultural phenomena such annual spectacle Super Bowl ads yet choice refrain watching year underscores commitment staying true authentic self regardless external expectations trends
As wrap up thoughts on enlightening conversation had between Grieving Voices host inspirational figurehead wellness movement encourage readers seek out additional resources provided kriscarr.com follow along Instagram @crazysexykris delve further into book available wherever books sold. Remember whether you’re bracing yourself against storms grief learning sail smoothly calmer waters wisdom gleaned voices experienced navigators invaluable compass guiding towards brighter horizons ahead.
Episode Transcription:
Victoria Volk
00:00:00 – 00:00:15
Hello. Hello. Thank you for tuning into Grieving Voices. Today, I’m excited to share my guests, Kris Carr, with you, my listeners. She is a multiple New York times bestselling author, wellness activist, and cancer thriver.
Victoria Volk
00:00:15 – 00:00:44
She’s been called a force of nature by o magazine and was named a new role model by the New York Times. Kris is also a member of Oprah’s Super Soul 100, a group of the most influential thought leaders today. Her latest book, I’m not a mourning person, braving loss, grief, and the big messy emotions that happen when life falls apart, shares what to expect when you’re not expecting your world to fall apart. It’s raw and inspiring, but has joy, humor, and hope too. This book gives readers tips and strategies to move forward and start living again.
Victoria Volk
00:00:44 – 00:01:04
Kris has helped millions of people take charge of their health and live like they mean it through her award winning books, blog, online courses, and membership communities. Thank you so much for being here and taking your time to share with my listeners. And I just gotta say, I loved the book. The movie we recommend.
Kris Carr
00:01:04 – 00:01:05
Sorry. You can’t really see it.
Victoria Volk
00:01:05 – 00:01:20
I loved it. I do have one question because I wanna make sure I ask this because I just I don’t remember reading the acknowledgments the first time., And so I just kind of peeked through now. What book on grief were you given by your friend, Jeanette?
Kris Carr
00:01:21 – 00:01:24
Oh, well, that’s Julia Samuel’s book.
Victoria Volk
00:01:25 – 00:01:26
Julia Samuel’s book. Okay.
Kris Carr
00:01:27 – 00:02:13
Yeah. And, one of her books, and that was my introduction to a world that I was resistant to enter. And then once I entered it, I realized, actually, this is the conversation that not only do I need for myself, but I wanna have with other people because it’s the most meaningful conversation that I could have. And I didn’t realize up until my most recent life kick just how grief was woven into, the nooks and crannies of my heart, my history, and how it was really something I was so afraid to touch, and yet it was holding me back.
Victoria Volk
00:02:13 – 00:03:00
In reading the book, I resonated with so many aspects of your story of re I, like, reconnected with parts of myself where, like, I was like, I could imagine myself back in time and feeling those similar emotions. And I have, like, a 1000000 and 1 questions, it feels like on my paper. But what you’re here to talk about though is the death of your father, which seems to have been the catalyst for you to explore grief in a way a deeper and more meaningful way than you ever had despite all of like, despite a stage 4 cancer diagnosis that you’ve been living with and all of that, like because there’s a lot of grief in that. And so to not really touch it until until recently. Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:03:00 – 00:03:04
It’s a very timely book, I’m thinking, for you.
Kris Carr
00:03:05 – 00:03:16
Oh, definitely for me. And I you know, it wasn’t the book that I set out to write. It I’ve written 7 books. This is my 7th book. And you know, there comes a time when your publishers are like, Sue, we need to write another book.
Kris Carr
00:03:17 – 00:03:47
And it had been a minute, and there was this idea that I should write something that’s more mass market, more appealing. I’ve written books for cancer patients. I’ve written books about plant based living. Apparently, I like to tackle difficult topics, vegetables and disease. And so anyway, there was these conversations about me writing something for a wider audience, and I initially went to that.
Kris Carr
00:03:47 – 00:04:09
You know, what’s that self help, aspirational, inspirational book that I could write? Which at some point, I will probably write. But everything in my body and in my being and in my heart was like, I can’t write that book now. I don’t feel that way. I’m not inspired by that conversation.
Kris Carr
00:04:09 – 00:04:49
I am hurting. And so this was my father was diagnosed with cancer in 2016, and he lived for about four and a half years with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. And during that time, you know, obviously, it’s a big life change for the whole family. But I was approaching my milestone of living with my own stage 4 cancer for 20 years. My we were in the middle of a global pandemic, so each and every one of us was hurting in a whole new way and losing people left and right, losing our jobs, losing our former sense of selves, losing our sense of safety and security.
Kris Carr
00:04:49 – 00:05:37
And my business was struggling because I had taken the steps to pull back so that I could be more present with my family. And what I realized is I hadn’t life proofed my business to allow me to do that. And so I was going through a very difficult time. And my initial response, even though I’ve been doing been in the wellness world for 20 years, and so I’ve done a lot of my own personal work and I’ve coached a lot of people in 20 years. Even though I thought I had done this kind of deep healing work when it comes to our mental health and heart tending, it was a big blind spot for me because my go to is to hustle, is to solve, is to fix, is to get the job done.
Kris Carr
00:05:38 – 00:06:09
And I was in a time and place where there wasn’t a way to get the job done. Right? It was a much deeper, more spiritual, more impactful journey that I would have to go on. I couldn’t check a box or get something behind me, much like living with cancer. And so instead of trying to push the river or hold back the ocean because I was afraid it would devour me, I decided to go through it.
Kris Carr
00:06:09 – 00:06:37
You know? And I remember the moment I write about in the introduction when the dam broke when I was sitting in a parking lot at CVS and my mother had asked me to go get more insured because it was the only thing my dad could tolerate. And I am at the aisle not knowing how many to get because I don’t know how much time he has to live and I’m not consciously choosing those thoughts. But here they come. And it was that moment of pushing it down and working harder and all the things that I do to avoid pain where I couldn’t hold it back anymore.
Kris Carr
00:06:37 – 00:06:53
And I was running through the CVS to get back to my car so that nobody would see me cry. And I get in, I break down all of the emotions coming out. And afterwards, I feel this quiet in the storm. I start to feel a little bit better. I feel a break from the fever.
Kris Carr
00:06:54 – 00:07:13
And I think to myself, where are other areas of where are the other areas of my life that I am holding back the opportunity to feel better by just allowing myself to be with the emotion. And that truly was the turning point for me to say, oh, I have to look at this.
Victoria Volk
00:07:14 – 00:07:19
One of my mottos is allowing myself to feel is allowing myself to heal.
Kris Carr
00:07:19 – 00:07:20
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:07:20 – 00:07:30
Pretty much embodies what you just shared. I think the importance of just allowing ourselves to feel what we have to feel, even if it’s to go into our car and have an ugly cry.
Kris Carr
00:07:31 – 00:07:44
You’re so right. And for many of us, we’ve never allowed ourselves to do that. Maybe we don’t even know what we’re feeling. We just know that there’s some sort of disturbance in the force. We’re feeling off.
Kris Carr
00:07:44 – 00:08:19
We’re feeling unsettled. And perhaps that’s old stuff. Like, when we were kids and we didn’t have the words to describe what pain we were experiencing, what discomfort we were experiencing, we may not also have those words as adults. And so it’s an incredible exploration process to even say, what if I just start by trying to identify and articulate what feeling is up for me right now? I don’t have to fix it.
Kris Carr
00:08:19 – 00:08:23
Maybe I could just give it a name and start it there.
Victoria Volk
00:08:23 – 00:08:34
On your Instagram, I saw you had a picture of yourself as a little girl, which prompted me to read the caption. Can you share a little bit about that for our listeners?
Kris Carr
00:08:36 – 00:08:38
About being a little girl?
Victoria Volk
00:08:38 – 00:08:38
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:08:39 – 00:08:41
Having what you the exercise of taking your a picture of yourself
Kris Carr
00:08:42 – 00:08:42
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:08:43 – 00:08:44
as a little as a child?
Kris Carr
00:08:44 – 00:09:17
You know, sometimes when we don’t know how to self-soothe, we weren’t given those tools. Many of us and our parents weren’t given those tools either. And certainly, we find ourselves in a time of mourning. Then if we don’t know what to give to ourself, I like to have that picture, and then it is the picture that I use up on my desk, or it’s, like, in my bathroom or it’s in my closet where I’m getting dressed. And to just check-in with her and ask her what she needs.
Kris Carr
00:09:17 – 00:09:40
And to allow her to say, what I really need is a little break. I actually need to play a little bit. I need to give myself more unstructured time, you know, because she’s still there. But all of the way that I put on masks or you know, I remember when my mantra was suck it up buttercup. Like, what a terrible mantra.
Kris Carr
00:09:41 – 00:09:51
Right? But it was one I followed. And if I’m willing to tend to her and say, I love you. I’m here for you. What do you need?
Kris Carr
00:09:51 – 00:10:04
I’ve got you. I can re-parent you. Then inevitably, I, adult Kris, start to experience the healing that comes from that.
Victoria Volk
00:10:04 – 00:10:31
Because in your book, you share how being a child of anxious parents. And because you mentioned it just briefly there a little bit, how that shaped you into adult life being a child of anxious parents. Because I have this theory that and reading your book, I’m like, okay. Well, that makes sense. Because I have the theory that a lot of children are carrying anxiety and fears that aren’t even theirs.
Kris Carr
00:10:34 – 00:10:34
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:10:34 – 00:10:37
That of their parents. And then I read that in your book and I’m like, okay. That’s kind of affirming.
Kris Carr
00:10:39 – 00:10:52
Yeah. I mean, we are these blank slates, and we pick up vibes. We pick up energy. We pick up behaviors. I think we come here, and we are then domesticated.
Kris Carr
00:10:53 – 00:11:28
And so much of what our job is in this lifetime is to unlearn and to come back to the original source, which is that self-love, love for self, love for others, love for life. And so naturally, if we’re raised by parents who are anxious, then anxiety is gonna maybe even go be one of our go to responses to things. So we’re kind of moving through life fearful. And anxiety really is a rumination about what may or may not happen. Right?
Kris Carr
00:11:28 – 00:11:42
It’s kind of taking fear and saying, I’m thinking ahead. I gotta cover my bases. I gotta have my own back. The world is unsafe. How can I get ahead of this situation so I can make sure I stay safe?
Kris Carr
00:11:43 – 00:12:14
And fear and anxiety serve a purpose. Right? I would say in the book and often try to remind myself that we can’t amputate any of our emotions and expect to be whole. So oftentimes, I think in our very black-and-white society, certain emotions we deem positive and emotions that we should strive to have and show, and other emotions we deem negative as if therefore, there’s something deficient about us for having them. And it’s sort of like saying, here are all the crayons in the crayon box.
Kris Carr
00:12:15 – 00:12:45
But, Victoria, you can only use blue, green, and red because all the other colors are bad. And if you use those colors, you’re bad. And you may be like, but secretly, I love yellow. You know? And so I think when we get a little curious about these emotions and what they’re here to teach us and show us, which we can talk about, then we can follow the breadcrumbs and understand how they work and why our brain uses them.
Kris Carr
00:12:45 – 00:13:00
Why did why are we designed to experience anxiety from time to time? How is it a benefit to us? How does it truly keep us safe? And how does it go awry? Right?
Kris Carr
00:13:00 – 00:13:18
What do I need to do when I’m finding myself spinning out, let’s say, before a CAT scan? I get checked every 5 years. There’s always gonna be some anxiety before I go in for my scan. This is the moment, 21 years later, when my doctor says, oh, it turned on. It’s finally aggressive.
Kris Carr
00:13:18 – 00:13:43
This is what we’ve been waiting for. And I’m I’m gonna have some anxiety, but I can develop some tools to soothe that anxiety. I can develop some tools to make sure that that anxiety doesn’t become a rumination that’s out of control that can even become almost like an addiction, like a hot spot that I’ll just go to. It’s almost like we’re going to the mental gym when we’re dealing with some of this stuff.
Victoria Volk
00:13:44 – 00:14:19
Those that may not be familiar with you and never heard of you, can you just briefly share? Because I know we’ve mentioned it, but we haven’t really said about your diagnosis. And then I’d like to move into how that anxiety and that fear played a role through your diagnosis and how that transitioned to when you became then a caregiver for your father. And then the moment that you realized, you know, the P there’s like 3, I have a note here. There’s 3 spiritual or 3 pivotal moments that led you to writing the book.
Victoria Volk
00:14:19 – 00:14:23
And so can we rewind and then fast forward a little bit?
Kris Carr
00:14:24 – 00:14:47
Yes. So, I was in a very different career and had very different hopes and thoughts and dreams for my life. And then on Valentine’s Day in 2003, I was diagnosed with a rare and incurable stage 4 cancer. And so the first doctor that I met with suggested a triple organ transplant. The next doctor gave me 10 years to live.
Kris Carr
00:14:47 – 00:15:30
The doctor after that suggested radical treatments that wouldn’t do anything. And it was that moment where I realized I had to become my own advocate, and I had to become, as I like to call, the CEO of my health. So as a CEO, the leader of our lives, it’s like, okay. I’m responsible for putting together the team, for hiring, for firing, for finding my second in command because the doctors work for me. And I was lucky, or actually just hardworking to find a great oncologist who knew the most about my very rare disease, who had his finger on the pulse of research, and who also had a wonderful bedside manner.
Kris Carr
00:15:30 – 00:15:46
So I was very surprised when he said, sometimes your disease can be slow growing. It can become aggressive. We just don’t know. We have to watch and wait. And while we’re doing that, we want you to watch and live.
Kris Carr
00:15:46 – 00:16:34
And I didn’t really know how to do that. So the first place I went afterwards was the grocery store because I figured vegetables were good, even though I hated them. And what I was truly looking for was some sort of control, some place to put my energy so that I could feel like I was participating in my well-being as opposed to participating in my disease. And that’s what started the work that I do first and foremost for cancer patients when I began and then later for people who are interested in not becoming patients, because I truly believe that self-care is health care and that we have more power than we think. And, again, it was this career is not something that I went into saying this is what I wanna do.
Kris Carr
00:16:34 – 00:17:05
But I think for many of us, our lives change in sometimes miraculous ways because of these warning signs or wake up calls that we have. And this is what I chose to do with my wake up call because, again, I live with stage 4 cancer. This is a marathon for me. And I’m very, very inspired to live every moment like it is my first, and I can’t wait to have another. And so where are we going after this?
Kris Carr
00:17:06 – 00:17:10
Where would you like me to take you after this? You had a 3 part question.
Victoria Volk
00:17:10 – 00:17:12
I did. I know. I’m I tend to do that.
Kris Carr
00:17:12 – 00:17:14
It’s okay.
Victoria Volk
00:17:15 – 00:17:26
Try to squeeze it all in. Just the anxiety of that.
Kris Carr
00:17:19 – 00:17:19
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:17:19 – 00:17:26
Diagnosis and the experience of going through that and then being hit with another rupture, as you call it in your book, of your father?
Kris Carr
00:17:27 – 00:17:53
So for me, like I said earlier, I am the person that’s going to pretty much try to put a plan in place. And I think it’s very helpful to do that. It’s one of the reasons why my work has helped a lot of people is because I help people and people who don’t wanna be patients just put that wellness plan together. But a lot of that came from my fear, and a lot of that came from my anxiety. So isn’t that wonderful, though?
Kris Carr
00:17:53 – 00:18:39
So fear and anxiety helped me out in a big way. The problem is when they take over and they shut you down, they paralyze you. They make it so that the only thing that you feel like you can do to cope is to numb because they’re just too big. And so that’s when all of our self-care principles and practices, the toolkits that many of us go through life trying to build, we wanna open the box and lean on a few of them, whether it’s through breath work, whether it’s with a therapist or a counselor, like, hey, these emotions are too big for me to hold on my own. Oftentimes there may be other things tied into them, past traumas, past grieves.
Kris Carr
00:18:40 – 00:18:59
One of the things that my therapist talked about and I wrote about in the book is she says, when the grief train pulls into the station, it brings all the carbs.
Victoria Volk
00:18:49 – 00:18:49
Mmm
Kris Carr
00:18:49 – 00:18:59
The stuff you thought you were over is behind you, and you’re just totally sideswiped. Brings up trauma. It brings up anxiety. It brings up shame.
Kris Carr
00:18:59 – 00:19:10
It brings up rage. For me, I went through a period where, you know, my number one emotion I was experiencing was not grief. It was rage. I’m like, where is all this hot energy coming from? Well, it’s old stuff.
Kris Carr
00:19:12 – 00:19:37
And so learning to live with stage 4 cancer for me is more of a mental game than physical game. It’s about learning how to work with my fear and anxiety as opposed to be overwhelmed by it because that those moments are going to come. I was talking to a patient the other day, and you know, I’ll go to, okay. I’m having this anxious moment. Let me get in my body.
Kris Carr
00:19:37 – 00:19:51
Because sometimes when I’m in a anxious spiraling out place, I’m having kind of an out of body experience. Right? So I could jump on my bike or jump in the water. You know what I mean? Like, right now, I’m in Florida.
Kris Carr
00:19:51 – 00:20:03
The ocean’s nearby. Like, why don’t you just go for a quick swim? And it’s gonna change the channel. It’s almost like we’re dogs with in brain rot, licking, licking, licking a hot spot. You know?
Kris Carr
00:20:03 – 00:20:13
What if the scan’s worse? And what if this and what if that? Well, in this moment, none of that is true. I like to say it’s not something until it’s something. So why don’t you get back to living?
Kris Carr
00:20:13 – 00:20:28
Or it’s been 21 years since I’ve been dealing with this. I know I’m gonna feel anxious. I’m gonna allow myself that day or the day before to go there. But before then, why am I wasting time? Now is it as easy as that?
Kris Carr
00:20:28 – 00:20:33
No. But for me, I’ve been able to work with my brain.
Victoria Volk
00:20:35 – 00:20:36
You’ve had a lot of time to practice.
Kris Carr
00:20:37 – 00:20:43
I’ve had a lot of time to practice. I’m like, come on. Let’s go for a bike ride. In this moment, how are you feeling? Pretty good.
Kris Carr
00:20:43 – 00:20:44
Let’s focus there.
Victoria Volk
00:20:45 – 00:21:07
So when there was kind of training ground for you, when this happened with your father, I imagine that you had to lean on a lot of those tools that have supported you in getting through your own diagnosis and the spiraling thoughts and all of that. And what did you learn about yourself through the process. And how did that change you?
Kris Carr
00:21:07 – 00:21:08
Thought
Victoria Volk
00:21:08 – 00:21:09
Your perspective, maybe of a lot of things.
Kris Carr
00:21:09 – 00:21:38
Very beautiful question. I mean, I think I’m still learning it. And, I think that it was all well and good for me to work with my own palate, which is me. But then when it come came to working with, you know, the potential of losing someone that I love very dearly, he’s my chosen father, so he adopted me. And that was really hard for me because what was coming up, what I didn’t realize was a lot of the old abandonment wounds.
Kris Carr
00:21:38 – 00:22:06
The core, you know, father wound was highly activated, the idea of losing him. Because whether I was conscious of it or not, what I was feeling was that he was leaving me. And that’s what happened the first time with my biological father. And that’s when you go, oh, I have an opportunity here to work with some really old stuff because he’s not leaving me. He’s dying.
Kris Carr
00:22:07 – 00:22:28
And I want to spend as much good time with him as I can. So because of that, it was inspiring to do the work and to go back into therapy. And and to initially, I was like, oh, no. Cancer’s not on my watch. You know, there’s one thing I know.
Kris Carr
00:22:28 – 00:22:55
It’s navigating cancer, and it’s not taking you. I got pissed and angry and called everybody I knew, and I got some wonderful people in my address book. The problem was is that he didn’t wanna do any of it. So the treatments that he was undergoing were really hard. So we could do enough to, you know, keep him as well as possible, but he wasn’t gonna do a full on lifestyle, save my ass technologies Kris Carr plan.
Kris Carr
00:22:55 – 00:23:38
And so I had to make peace with that and say, the best medicine that I can deploy right now is love and making sure that when I enter the room, love is leading the way and that the time that I have with him is filled with it. And so there’s a lot of gin rummy. There’s a lot of really wonderful times that we had. And I learned how to let go of more control, which was very anxiety provoking for me. And just to continue to show up with love even though my heart was breaking and breaking wide open too.
Victoria Volk
00:23:39 – 00:23:48
In this book, you really do speak the language of the work that I do in grief recovery, the grief recovery method. And you talk about how grief manifests in our lives and in our bodies and talk about keeping busy.
Victoria Volk
00:23:48 – 00:24:37
You essentially addressed the sense of grief and you essentially addressed them all like including stirbs or short-term energy relieving behaviors and these things that we do to occupy ourselves and distract ourselves from our feelings. And, and you’ve had so many years of sitting with and working through your grief before writing this book. Who were the people or the resources that have supported you and provided the information that gave you that new perspective. And I know you mentioned that book, on grief, but kind of even before that earlier in your, like, when you were diagnosed and as you were going through that journey, what were the things that helped you shift your perspective from, you know, woe is me to the self-driven mission?
Victoria Volk
00:24:37 – 00:24:43
Or was it just did perfectionism take over? Because I know you talk a lot about perfectionism in your book too a little bit.
Kris Carr
00:24:43 – 00:25:01
I don’t know. Maybe sometimes. Oh, maybe sometimes. But I think so I practice what I call the 5 pillars of wellness. So they are basically being mindful of optimizing what you’re eating, drinking, thinking, and how you’re resting and renewing.
Kris Carr
00:25:02 – 00:25:32
And all of that sits on a foundation of stress management because we know that stress is really the number one killer. And stress comes in all sorts of ways, including heartache. And so that’s the basis of the lifestyle practice that I teach in my books and in my community. And that all came from all of my research as a first and foremost, as a cancer patient, what can I do to extend my life? Is there any way I can participate and help my longevity, help my odds?
Kris Carr
00:25:33 – 00:25:59
And it’s really the basis of lifestyle medicine, which has been around for a very long time. You know? And so all of that work for 20 years now has certainly taught me a lot about myself and my body. The big turning point for me, I think, emotionally was on my 10 year cancer versary when, you know, one of the doctors had originally given me 10 years to live. And here I am making it to the 10 year mark.
Kris Carr
00:26:01 – 00:26:21
And everybody was so thrilled except for me because I didn’t think that unless it was behind me, I could really live my life. So I was very frustrated, very angry. And so I was trying to cure myself since the doctors couldn’t cure me. You know? And it wasn’t happening.
Kris Carr
00:26:22 – 00:26:54
But I also wasn’t my disease wasn’t progressing either. And so it was just something that I was having to learn to live with. And there are many things for everybody that we might not want, but we have to learn to live with. And for me, it’s cancer. And so I remember thinking in that moment when everybody’s celebrating but me that I have to come up with a better way because I could live my whole life with this disease and I could waste it all.
Kris Carr
00:26:55 – 00:27:10
Because I wasn’t truly living unless it was behind me on paper. I got that stamp of approval. You’re in remission. And what if I lived? A whole lot of years healthy and happy, you know, if I allowed myself to be.
Kris Carr
00:27:11 – 00:27:25
But I didn’t get that stamp of approval. And that’s when I started to think about the difference between healing and curing. And that curing may or may not happen. You know, it happens in the physical body. It happens for some of us.
Kris Carr
00:27:25 – 00:27:49
Doesn’t happen for all of us. There are a lot of people out there who are living really big, abundant, wonderful lives with chronic illnesses, chronic shit pickles, just chronic stuff. And that’s okay. But healing can happen for each and every one of us. There is no timeline, and it can happen even beyond our physical form.
Kris Carr
00:27:49 – 00:28:09
And so I started to move more in the direction of aspiring to be on a healing path and to be loving and patient and caring with myself. And that, to me, when you say, okay. Where’d you learn this? What are the most inspirational resources or what not? It was actually that mental shift that changed everything.
Kris Carr
00:28:10 – 00:28:30
There are incredible grief resources out there. Right? You’re one of those incredible resources. And it was a world I wasn’t very familiar with. And then when we get interested, when we get curious, when we start to, you know, do the research, buy the books, follow the breadcrumbs, we start to find the voices that resonate for us.
Kris Carr
00:28:31 – 00:28:54
But the principles are still universal. You know, and that is that or at least I believe they’re universal, that our emotions are energy, we can’t amputate them, we need to allow them to flow. When energy is stagnant, it’s not good for your physical body. It’s not good for your mental health. And emotions are also filled with information.
Kris Carr
00:28:54 – 00:29:10
So if we can become a little bit more emotionally literate and curious, then we can start to learn how to tend to these crayons, these parts of ourselves that make up the whole beautiful picture that is us.
Victoria Volk
00:29:12 – 00:29:30
I’d love to talk about anger a little bit. You talked about a lot about emotions, but and you mentioned anger, and you mentioned anger quite a bit in your book too. And I didn’t address my grief until 2019. And that was at that point over 30 years. So I had a lot of time to build up a lot of anger and resentment.
Victoria Volk
00:29:31 – 00:30:12
And so to allow those floodgates to open, it was like, you know, if we imagine ourselves like a tea kettle and this pressure just keeps building and building and building, and if we don’t release that pressure, it like, we literally are dying from the inside very, you know, slowly and just deteriorates our bodies. And like you said, it’s stress. It’s physical stress, emotional stress, mental stress. Imagine that as is your body like a tea kettle. So allowing that rupture in that way, a good rupture, that’s a good rupture, you know, but you have, there’s a part I wrote here and we act out instead of crying out because anger feels powerful while grief feels powerless.
Victoria Volk
00:30:14 – 00:30:25
And you talk about caring for your anger and your grandmother had a motto, don’t cure the darkness, light a candle.
Kris Carr
00:30:25 – 00:30:25
Mmm
Victoria Volk
00:30:26 – 00:30:34
And I absolutely love that. But in talking about anger and the wisdom that anger has for us, what has anger taught you?
Kris Carr
00:30:36 – 00:31:13
My anger is very powerful, and my anger helps me to be a fighter when I need to fight. And it has protected me. It has inspired me. There have been so many moments, even as a female entrepreneur, when somebody has told me, you know, pipe down, ambition is not appropriate for women, Be satisfied with what you’re getting, even though I know other people are being paid more for the same work, where I relied on the wisdom of anger to say no. Right?
Kris Carr
00:31:13 – 00:31:41
And so I don’t want to vilify it. And yet, I definitely need to learn more about it because it’ll be a go to emotion for me if I’m not careful, thoughtful, inquisitive. My grandmother also used to say that emotions like anger and grief specifically were unbecoming for women. And she came from a very different time. Right?
Kris Carr
00:31:41 – 00:32:14
And so the chapter on anger is called Becoming, Unbecoming. And when I started to explore it more, and I have in my own therapy for many years, but actually starting to explore the mechanics of anger, almost like, you know, you’re approaching a research project, is that many people say that it’s a signaling emotion. Right? And it’s signaling to something else. It’s like the tip of the iceberg is what you see, but underneath of the iceberg is so much bigger.
Kris Carr
00:32:15 – 00:32:30
And so what is it signaling? What is it trying to point out to us? Sometimes it can be injustice. Sometimes it can be extreme pain. Like anger is saying, oh, this is not okay.
Kris Carr
00:32:31 – 00:33:10
And anger is also very protective. And so for me, if grief was something that felt so scary and so destabilizing. You know, there’s a reason why we go into fights, light, or freeze because it’s like a physical manifestation of us protecting ourselves. If an emotion like grief feels so unstabilizing to many of us because, again, we don’t necessarily have the tools for this, especially because we live in a grief-phobic society. Right.
Kris Carr
00:33:10 – 00:33:29
So few of us know how to talk about these things or want to talk about these things because we’re afraid of how people will react. Then an emotion like anger is going can easily step in and help you out. You know, like, oh, I’m starting to feel these emotions. I’m starting to feel out of control. I start to feel so uncomfortable.
Kris Carr
00:33:30 – 00:33:42
And then all of the stuff that can bubble up as a result of that, people will judge me. People won’t like me. People won’t wanna hang out with me because I’m a big downer. Boom. I got you, buttercup.
Victoria Volk
00:33:44 – 00:34:05
There was one part too where you where you talk about making yourself small. I can’t remember exactly how, how it went, but just to the, what you were just saying, how we make ourselves small, especially when we’re trying to express anger and then we’re told you’re too much or you’re too loud or, you know, be seen and not heard and all of these messages that we receive more commonly as little girls. Right?
Kris Carr
00:34:06 – 00:34:06
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:34:07 – 00:34:25
Do you see yourself as I mean, would you describe yourself as a child and like a free spirit, kind of wild, kind of like a poking the bear questioner, initiator of things, maybe initiator of other people? Do you just would you describe yourself like that?
Kris Carr
00:34:26 – 00:34:58
I think as a child, there was definitely a free spirit and a very creative little soul, and very imaginative, very caring. Somebody who’s I hopefully still have those traits. Very connected to animals in nature. And I don’t think I was a bear poker because I think I was very shy and very kind of like, I gotta figure out feel my way because the world isn’t safe. It wasn’t until much later in life that I became a bear poker.
Victoria Volk
00:34:59 – 00:35:17
Yes. Okay. That’s what I was gonna get to because when you start coming into your own. Right? Because you had a lot of grief in your childhood. So I just I saw myself in your story, and that’s why I asked that because, yeah, I just I felt like we’re kindred spirits in a way.
Kris Carr
00:35:17 – 00:35:41
Yeah. Oh, well, that’s wonderful. I mean, I think the more we don’t know if you feel this way, but the more work that I’ve done to heal my heart and befriend myself and really, like who I am. And I think one of the greatest things that you can ever experience in this life is the joy of your own company.
Victoria Volk
00:35:39 – 00:35:39
Mhmm.
Kris Carr
00:35:39 – 00:35:41
And I really wanna park on that for a minute because people don’t talk about it enough.
Kris Carr
00:35:42 – 00:35:53
I mean, getting to a point where you enjoy your own company is so big. We come here alone. We leave her alone. And we live in an epidemic of loneliness. We do need each other.
Kris Carr
00:35:53 – 00:36:00
We need community. We need support. We need our people and our true blues. But, damn, we need ourselves.
Victoria Volk
00:36:00 – 00:36:04
I think it goes back to what you said about self-soothing,
Kris Carr
00:36:03 – 00:36:03
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:36:03 – 00:36:04
our ability to do that.
Kris Carr
00:36:05 – 00:36:30
I don’t think any of that matters unless we can do that, because all of it was temporary. You’re always gonna reach outside of yourself.
Victoria Volk
00:36:11 – 00:36:11
Mhmm.
Kris Carr
00:36:11 – 00:36:30
And then when a relationship ends, it’s gonna be so destabilizing. Because you never had that relationship connection with yourself first and foremost. And so to go back to your question, when did it when did I start to come into my own?
Kris Carr
00:36:30 – 00:36:49
It was more so when I said, I don’t really care what other people think about me. I don’t wanna be a jerk. And but I’m less interested in what other people think about me and more interested in that relationship and what I think about me and my ability to enjoy my own company.
Victoria Volk
00:36:49 – 00:36:56
I actually I’m glad you said that because I actually had, are you someone who enjoys alone time?
Kris Carr
00:36:56 – 00:36:57
Why?
Victoria Volk
00:36:57 – 00:37:18
Maybe you even need it, because that was actually one thing I wrote on there because I love my alone time. I need it. I love my own company. But this is a great segue into having more 4 legged friends than 2 legged friends.
Kris Carr
00:37:19 -00:37:19
Mmm..
Victoria Volk
00:37:19 – 00:37:22
And the fact that you, don’t have children, but you had you know, buddy or dog, you talk about losing buddy your dog.
Victoria Volk
00:37:22 – 00:37:33
And I just kinda wanna talk about if you are open to sharing about the importance of the importance that animals played a role in your healing and as you were grieving.
Kris Carr
00:37:34 – 00:37:54
Yeah, they always will. They’re so a big a big part of my life. And I’ve had a lot of fur children. And you’ve you know this because you are in this world. And so I remember the first time that I got the concept that the other side of grief is love.
Victoria Volk
00:37:54 – 00:37:54
Mmm
Kris Carr
00:37:55 – 00:38:23
And the more that we love, the more we’re gonna grieve. But who wants to go through life saying, oh, no love for me because I don’t wanna feel that pain? So taking on all these incredible companion animals, you know that at some point, you’re gonna have to say goodbye to them. And several of my fur children were very instrumental at certain points in my healing. My first my cat.
Kris Carr
00:38:23 – 00:38:33
My dedicated my second book to my cat. My cat was the first person I told I had cancer, Kristal, I’ve got cancer. What are we gonna do? Right?
Kris Carr
00:38:33 – 00:39:00
And so she was a big part of that early journey. And then Buddy was a big part of making peace with not having children. And then here comes this big old hound dog who is, you know, near death, emaciated, we found on the side of a mountain while we were hiking and nursing him back to health. And thinking, wow, there’s love all around if I just choose to open to it. It might not be in the form that I think.
Kris Carr
00:39:01 – 00:39:21
And it’s in this case, it’s a big old hound dog. But boy, do I love him. And life is still good. And, then most recently, my dog, Lola, who is probably my number one soulmate. And so she was there throughout my dad’s journey and she passed after.
Kris Carr
00:39:21 – 00:39:45
And I think she stuck around because she knew that it would be so big for me. And I couldn’t lose them both at the same time. So we have all these opportunities. And the reason why I write about pet loss in the book is because I was actually shocked by a lot of the grief books and grief literature that didn’t either include it or dealt it dealt with pet loss in a way that felt very diminishing?
Victoria Volk
00:39:46 – 00:39:58
I actually just developed a pet loss program.
Kris Carr
00:39:50 – 00:39:50
Oh.
Victoria Volk
00:39:51 – 00:39:58
But it hasn’t launched yet. And, because I’ve had clients that I’ve worked with where they were seeing, it was a single woman. She didn’t have children.
Victoria Volk
00:39:58 – 00:40:17
She didn’t have a spouse. Her family were in another country. Like she came here with knowing nobody and that her dog was her everything. And so people don’t understand or even think about grief when it comes to pets. But it’s like, we can just go out and get another pet and the things people say.
Victoria Volk
00:40:17 – 00:40:29
Right? And it just yeah. It’s so this is why I started this podcast so people can learn. Right? So people can learn through people’s stories of the import of all the different ways we grieve.
Victoria Volk
00:40:29 – 00:40:39
But even if you’re listening to this and you, for whatever reason, can’t have a pet, get a plant.
Kris Carr
00:40:40 – 00:40:40
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:40:41 – 00:40:44
I see a plant in your background. I have one right on my shelf here. I started actually, that was one of the things I think naturally came up for me.
Victoria Volk
00:40:44 – 00:40:52
And as I was starting my healing was I just started accumulating plants left and right. Like, you know, it’s nurturing something.
Kris Carr
00:40:52 – 00:40:53
Uh-huh.
Victoria Volk
00:40:53 – 00:40:55
You know, I think get a plant.
Kris Carr
00:40:55 – 00:40:55
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:40:56 – 00:41:00
Think of yourself as a plant. Like, what does a plant need? It needs water.
Victoria Volk
00:41:00 – 00:41:13
It needs sunlight. It needs I think it goes back to what is that, doctor Emoto with the water and the rice, the rice experiment where you talk to it. And, I mean, you could talk to your plants. You talk to your pets. Right?
Kris Carr
00:41:13 – 00:41:14
Oh, yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:41:14 – 00:41:41
But none of those things, like, judge, analyze, or criticize you. So you can say whatever you want. And I think that’s the different dynamic of that relationship is that and why the bond is so deep for so many people with their pets is that they feel like you said in your book, it’s like it’s like Christmas morning. Every morning, every day that you your dog sees you, it’s like you could be gone 3 minutes. Like, I can leave and be gone for 3 minutes.
Victoria Volk
00:41:41 – 00:41:51
And my dog, it’s like Christmas morning. I was perfectly how you said that. So, yeah, it’s I think it’s one of the most minimized losses, and so it is something that I’m looking to address. And
Kris Carr
00:41:51 – 00:41:53
I’m so happy to hear that.
Speaker 1
00:41:53 – 00:42:00
So I’m glad we talked about that. Let me look on time. Okay. So I’m just gonna can I just do, like, a quick run through of questions?
Kris Carr
00:42:00 – 00:42:02
Oh, yeah. Of course.
Victoria Volk
00:42:03 – 00:42:11
Okay. Maybe these aren’t gonna be quick answers. I don’t know. Let’s see. I loved how you said life is a terminal condition. We’re all going to die.
Victoria Volk
00:42:12 – 00:42:24
But how many of us truly live? And acceptance helps get you there. And I think you’ve really touched on that quite a bit, not as much of the acceptance piece, but I guess I’ll ask you this. What does acceptance mean to you?
Kris Carr
00:42:25 – 00:42:48
Acceptance for me means that I accept who I am and what my needs are, and then I have my back. I’m not trying to be somebody I’m not. I’m not putting myself into a box that was not made for me. And, that’s a piece of it, but also accepting when I’m going through a difficult time that this is what’s happening. I’m not sugarcoating it.
Kris Carr
00:42:48 – 00:43:08
I’m not trying to slap on an affirmation, even though I think affirmations are very helpful. I’m accepting that this is where I am so that I can do the healing work. That perhaps some of that healing work will help me get to another place. But if not, I’m giving myself which exactly what I need, which is some heart tending.
Victoria Volk
00:43:09 – 00:43:14
And even if just for that moment, you feel better, I mean,
Kris Carr
00:43:12 – 00:43:12
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:43:12 – 00:43:14
that’s a win.
Kris Carr
00:43:14 – 00:43:15
It’s huge win.
Victoria Volk
00:43:16 – 00:43:49
As your dad was going through his cancer treatment, I’m just curious on this because I just I spoke with another end of I’m trained in the end of life doula. And I spoke to another gentleman just recently. And the big conversation was having your affairs in order and just preparing and all of that. And so I imagine, like, when you got your diagnosis and when your father received his, was that something that had you already is that something that you’d, like, made a mission to take care of, like, get your affairs in order? Is that something that your dad made a priority when you first diagnosed?
Kris Carr
00:43:50 – 00:44:14
When I was first diagnosed, I didn’t wanna get my affairs in order. And I had there was a lot of frustration around my unwillingness to get my affairs in order. And it’s one of the reasons why my biological father left my life again.
Victoria Volk
00:44:09 – 00:44:09
Mmm
Kris Carr
00:44:10 – 00:44:14
So I met him when I was 18, and he split again when I was not long after I was diagnosed. And so and I was partly around that.
Kris Carr
00:44:15 – 00:44:33
And so for me, it was like I will do this on my own timeline when I’m ready. I’m not ready to talk about this. And I’m not going to have it forced upon me. So, but, you know, obviously it’s helpful to have these things in place. It’s something that I’m working on now.
Kris Carr
00:44:34 – 00:44:55
I’m 52, and I really wasn’t ready to do it. And for me, it was a psychological block. And now it feels like, you know, my husband and I get on a turbulent plane, and we own our business together, and we run everything together. And it’s sort of like, jeez. Still a little stressed out that we don’t have.
Kris Carr
00:44:56 – 00:45:29
I mean so it’s like, let’s Just take care of some of these things, especially because it makes whether you realize it or not, it brings you more peace and clarity and what not. It’s also really important as our life does become shorter, because dying is a big job. It’s a big job. And we, as a culture, we are the first to throw the big parties and get all the gear and the showers and what not, for when a baby comes into this planet. And it’s a wonderful celebratory event.
Kris Carr
00:45:30 – 00:46:07
But dying is very complicated it takes a lot of energy and it leaves a lot of tentacles and yet it’s so scary for many of us that we don’t have somebody to walk through it with. And that’s when a lot of stuff can happen, I think, in families too. A lot of undue stress and tension and discord and even, you know, estrangements and whatnot. So my dad and I talked about it a lot. At first, it was hard to talk about though, and I wasn’t sure if he wanted to talk about it.
Kris Carr
00:46:07 – 00:46:24
And so I approached it very delicately. Is this something you’d like to talk about? And the answer was yes. And I worked on it with my therapist because I was afraid that I would fall apart and make things worse. And I said, I am willing to talk about these things.
Kris Carr
00:46:25 – 00:46:34
I might not always keep it together. There will be tissues. I might say the wrong thing, but I’m willing to show up. And he was grateful for it. And so we did talk about that.
Kris Carr
00:46:34 – 00:46:55
We did talk about his fears. We did talk about his wishes. And we talked about what he wanted at his celebration of life. There were absolute tears. When hospice came, they told us with him in the room, you know that this is not curative.
Kris Carr
00:46:56 – 00:47:11
We are making you comfortable. Here are the stages of what will happen. This is what will happen as your body starts to shut down. This family is what we’re teaching you and how to support. I’d never had candid conversations like that before.
Kris Carr
00:47:11 – 00:47:34
It was terrifying. I was grateful that we were in the middle of the pandemic because I had a mask on, and I would just pull it up really high. So that nobody could see that I was like, my lips were quivering and I was crying under the mask and whatnot. Because I was so scared to have that conversation. And I know people who, you know, whose loved ones have said, I’d really like to talk about what I want you to have.
Kris Carr
00:47:34 – 00:47:43
And they shut the loved one down and say, I don’t wanna talk about this. This isn’t positive. Oh, don’t worry about it. You’ve got plenty of time. La la la.
Kris Carr
00:47:43 – 00:48:07
That’s all coming from that person’s own discomfort, which I honor. But for the person who’s dying or struggling with mortality that you know, may have less time than you, it can be very isolating, create a lot more loneliness and a lot more discomfort. So it’s these opportunities that we have to really, like, grow up and show up.
Victoria Volk
00:48:08 – 00:48:11
Grow up and show up. Suck it up, buttercup.
Kris Carr
00:48:14 – 00:48:22
You know, you don’t want to. Like, I didn’t I really didn’t wanna put on my, like, big grown up panties, but I was like, I can do it now. When are you gonna do it?
Victoria Volk
00:48:23 – 00:48:32
But it is. It’s it’s the ability to okay. These are my emotions. I’m just gonna park them to the side before I walk in the store so that I can be fully present and give my loved one what they need.
Kris Carr
00:48:33 – 00:48:33
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:48:34 – 00:48:36
And so that they feel heard.
Victoria Volk
00:48:36 – 00:49:09
And that is very difficult to do. And I think when you save those conversations for the death bed, that time could be spent having rich, meaningful conversations. And so I think it’s the importance of us planning for ourselves ahead of time so that we can have those deeper conversations and we’re not worried about the logistics after we’re gone. I think that’s the biggest service we can give our loved ones that we have power to do, I think.
Kris Carr
00:49:09 – 00:49:25
Yeah. The second intention so I wanna just I’ll remind that you’ve when everyone listening, the first intention that was helpful for me, I throw it out if it’s gonna be helpful for anyone else, is to lead with love. You know, like, I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to show up.
Kris Carr
00:49:25 – 00:49:50
What would love do? What would love say? What does leading with love look like? And then just do that. And then the second thing is an intention that I set for myself, and this really helped me in the difficult conversations that I thought I would literally implode or come undone or just like, evaporate in my chair because they were so scary and big and hard in my mind was, how do I minimize my regrets?
Victoria Volk
00:49:51 – 00:49:51
Mmm
Kris Carr
00:49:53 – 00:50:11
What’s it gonna take for me to minimize my regrets? Am I gonna regret that I didn’t have the courage to have this conversation when my loved one wanted to have it? Yes. I am gonna regret that. Is that fear of that regret bigger than my lack of courage right now?
Kris Carr
00:50:11 – 00:50:14
Yes. There’s your answer.
Victoria Volk
00:50:16 – 00:50:19
The answers are in the deeper questions, really.
Kris Carr
00:50:19 – 00:50:20
Not easy.
Victoria Volk
00:50:21 – 00:51:03
You talk about caregiving and giving versus receiving, and being I loved how you said this, but being a giver you felt like nothing could ever be taken away from me. And you said, listen to the whispers before they become roars. And so just the act of like caregiving versus giving. And, you know, I think just in reading your story, reading the book, which I highly recommend everybody does because there’s so many layers to yours to your book that I would love to cover all of those in this podcast. But can you just speak to a little bit for those who are in the caregiving role and people who have always been the giver, giver, giver, giver, giver, giver, and then they find themselves in the giving role.
Victoria Volk
00:51:03 – 00:51:24
And then like yourself where you’re diagnosed and then you’re having to receive and the challenge of that. And then you’re having you’re you’re needing like, not needing support, but being faced with this grief of a different kind of grief right, with your chosen father. Again, here, I’m asking like, 3 questions in 1. Can you just speak to that giving versus receiving a little bit?
Kris Carr
00:51:25 – 00:51:42
Yeah. I think it’s helpful for each of us if we struggle with receiving, to really get to the nugget of the why. Because the nugget of the why has freedom for us. And for me, it was actually really as a result of writing this book. Because when you write, you have to figure shit out.
Victoria Volk
00:51:43 – 00:51:43
uh-huh mmm.
Kris Carr
00:51:43 – 00:51:57
You have to be able to articulate it. You have to be able to understand it. It’s not just an esoteric feeling or vibe that you have. And for me, I was like, wow. It wasn’t until I wrote that sentence that pieces of me came together.
Kris Carr
00:51:58 – 00:52:15
Yeah. And I knew that somewhere, but I didn’t really understand it. And it goes back to that core trauma of loss, of abandonment. So if I’m the giver, nothing can be taken from me. If I receive, something can be taken from me.
Kris Carr
00:52:16 – 00:52:32
So what does that hit? Big core wound for me. So if we if not everybody struggles with this, but if you do, you know, like, get to the heart of the tootsie roll pop. And you’d be surprised what’s there. And the oh, I can spend some time with this.
Kris Carr
00:52:32 – 00:53:00
And then it becomes easier to receive because we need to receive when we’re going through these difficult times. We need self-care practices. We need to keep our well not full because that’s not possible. But not running on empty that you’re going into burnout and then, you know, adrenal issues and physical illness and all the stuff that comes with it. So we’re not looking for perfection here.
Kris Carr
00:53:00 – 00:53:41
I have the full tank, and I’m all spiffy, and I’ve just had a lifestyle makeover, and I’m living my best life. It’s, like, not gonna happen when we’re going through a difficult time. But, boy, do those difficult times make us grow and evolve and become people we really wanna be. I think just to button up self-care, understanding why we might have resistance around receiving, and then as caregivers, making sure that we’re putting our masks on and we’re taking care of ourselves so that we can be as resilient as possible, as stress hardy as possible, because it’s a roller coaster. And I always encourage people to come to the day with as much as they possibly can.
Kris Carr
00:53:42 – 00:53:44
And we can’t do that when we’re on empty.
Victoria Volk
00:53:45 – 00:54:10
You talk about having 2 intentions for the book, like, for the audience, those reading it and for you to normalize conversations around the different emotions so that people feel less alone and crazy and that to heal the deeper parts of yourself as a result of this writing. And you kind of touched on one of those. But what did you learn about and heal for yourself while you’re writing it and since the book has been out?
Kris Carr
00:54:12 – 00:55:20
You know, you write the book and then you think it’s one thing, and then you talk about the book and it becomes something else.
Victoria Volk
00:54:20 – 00:54:20
Mmm..
Kris Carr
00:54:21 – 00:55:04
And, so the whole process is very illuminating. And I’d say my biggest growth edge has been my willingness to talk about really difficult things, even more difficult things than my own diagnosis. And you read that vulnerability is a strength, and it can be a meme and a TED Talk and all the things. But then I think for me, until I really allow myself to go to a more vulnerable place, And I did push myself in the book to tell the stories the way they were and not a polished version that would be more appropriate for Instagram, that I did find a real strength in that.
Kris Carr
00:55:04 – 00:55:17
And the strength in that vulnerability isn’t a hard strength. It’s a soft strength. That strength and that softness of vulnerability, something I’m still exploring and experiencing but really enjoying.
Victoria Volk
00:55:19 – 00:55:21
Do you have any regrets?
Kris Carr
00:55:24 – 00:55:51
My dad wanted to have a celebration of life on Zoom while he was still alive, in addition to the celebration of life that he had and we had when he was gone, and I couldn’t do it. And I said, I can’t do that. I can’t do that. No. And it didn’t happen, and I regret that.
Victoria Volk
00:55:55 – 00:56:01
Is there anything else you would like to share, or do you have a little bit of time where I can ask a few more questions?
Kris Carr
00:56:02 – 00:56:06
Yeah. I can definitely do a little more time? Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:56:07 – 00:56:07
Okay.
Kris Carr
00:56:08 – 00:56:09
Maybe 5 minutes or so.
Victoria Volk
00:56:09 – 00:56:18
Okay. Let me just look here. I wanna make sure I’m picking the one I wanted to pick. Oh, yeah. This is one thing you hear a lot.
Victoria Volk
00:56:18 – 00:56:34
Like, especially after people pass away. They lost their battle to cancer or they’re losing the battle. Did you have moments that you felt this or was this outside messaging? And what do you think about this messaging?
Kris Carr
00:56:36 – 00:56:58
I think every patient is different. It is not my preferred messaging for myself because I live with cancer, so I don’t see that I’m warring with my body. I think that I have cancer in my liver and both of my lungs. Those organs need more support. Those organs are struggling.
Kris Carr
00:56:58 – 00:57:16
Why am I gonna beat them up? Why you know what I mean? I wanna learn more about them so I can care for them and see what they like and what they don’t like. And, again, going back to that part of, like, amputating parts of ourselves. I was worrying with my body way before cancer
Victoria Volk
00:57:16 – 00:57:16
Mmm..
Kris Carr
00:57:17 – 00:57:20
of you know, other things I didn’t like about myself or my weight or whatever it was at the time.
Kris Carr
00:57:21 – 00:57:36
Just always in a fight with my body. And it’s like, gosh, this body does so much on a daily basis to keep me alive. Things I could never even wrap my mind around. It’s a miracle. It’s like I wanna be on the side of my body, not fighting against it.
Kris Carr
00:57:36 – 00:58:07
So that, again, does not work for me. I think my biggest pet peeve is when people who don’t have cancer use cancer metaphors. Like, I don’t get triggered by a lot of things. I’m not a you know, I’m not a I don’t really walk on eggshells or things like this, but it does bother me when people use cancer metaphors of like, that behavior is a cancer or that person is a metastasis or you know, a lot of folks use that. And so I would say, don’t do that.
Victoria Volk
00:58:08 – 00:58:08
Mhmm.
Kris Carr
00:58:09 – 00:58:13
Doesn’t feel good for people who actually have cancer.
Victoria Volk
00:58:13 – 00:58:23
Right. Thank you for sharing that. What is something about you that many people don’t know? It’s not in the books. You haven’t said it before.
Victoria Volk
00:58:23 – 00:58:28
I guess you answered maybe the one regret. Maybe I have I don’t know if you’ve said that before, but
Kris Carr
00:58:28 – 00:58:43
No. I’ve never said that before. People don’t know about me. Well, I have said a lot of things about me because I do use my stories. My teaching method, I like to teach through stories.
Kris Carr
00:58:44 – 00:59:02
Well, I have been into Budweiser Super Bowl commercials.
Victoria Volk
00:58:47 – 00:58:47
What?
Kris Carr
00:58:47 – 00:59:02
In my previous career as an actor, and as somebody who did a lot of TV commercials and a lot of advertising, I was into Budweiser Super Bowl, bowl commercials.
Victoria Volk
00:59:03 – 00:59:04
That’s pretty cool.
Kris Carr
00:59:06 – 00:59:07
That’s cool.
Victoria Volk
00:59:09 – 00:59:17
Too bad it couldn’t have been, well, the Budweiser well, it was I thought the best one this past Super Bowl was the Dunkings. Dunkings.
Kris Carr
00:59:18 – 00:59:27
That’s amazing. Yeah. Yeah. I usually watch the commercials because it was just, like, a very big part of my career but I didn’t watch them this year. But this really is kinda like the Oscars of advertising.
Victoria Volk
00:59:27 – 00:59:27
Yeah.
Kris Carr
00:59:28 – 00:59:28
So
Victoria Volk
00:59:29 – 00:59:39
that’s that’s very cool. Okay. Well, I will leave it there. I think that’s a fun. We’ll leave it on a fun note.
Kris Carr
00:59:39 – 00:59:39
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:59:39 – 00:59:53
And, because if I ask another question, it’s gonna be a deep run, probably. So you just have to read the book, my friends, because all the questions I’d probably ask her in the book. Anything else you would like to share, though?
Kris Carr
00:59:54 – 01:00:08
No. Thank you so much. This is a beautiful interview, and I’m so appreciative of the places that you took it. I really love having these transparent, honest conversations. Again, going back to how have you grown?
Kris Carr
01:00:08 – 01:00:16
What have you learned? And these are the conversations I wanna have. So thank you for allowing me to have one with you and with your community.
Victoria Volk
01:00:17 – 01:00:26
Thank you. I purposefully did not watch any of your other podcast interviews or listened to anything else because I just wanted to stay in my own lane
Kris Carr
01:00:26 – 01:00:26
Yeey!
Victoria Volk
01:00:27 – 01:00:29
because I can’t let’s see. Like, I have so much did you see the highlight?
Kris Carr
01:00:29 – 01:00:31
Oh my gosh.
Victoria Volk
01:00:31 – 01:00:59
I don’t know why I do that screen like that, but there’s so many. I’ve highlights and doggy ears, and it just really I really enjoyed the book. If people are uncomfortable with grief, I think it’s a wonderful story. You again, like you said, you I think teaching through story is the best way to share information. It’s something I think I personally need to do more of.
Victoria Volk
01:00:59 – 01:01:20
And so thank you for writing this book. I think it’s wonderful for people who are going through something that can maybe see a different perspective through a lens of someone who’s been living it for so long in so many different ways.
Kris Carr
01:01:17 – 01:01:17
Mmm
Victoria Volk
01:00:17 – 01:01:20
It’s a great example of grief and the many faces of it. So thank you.
Kris Carr
01:01:20 – 01:01:21
Thanks, Victoria.
Victoria Volk
01:01:22 – 01:01:24
And where can people find you?
Kris Carr
01:01:24 – 01:01:34
You can find me at kriscarr.com. You can find me on Instagram at @crazysexykris, and the book is available anywhere books are sold.
Victoria Volk
01:01:34 – 01:01:42
And I will put links in the show notes. Remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love.
Death/Dying, Grief, Grieving Voices Guest, Pespective |
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Are you truly living if you’re ignoring the inevitable end? This question might feel heavy, but Greg Barnsdale doesn’t shy away from it; he has built a movement around it.
Greg is not your typical undertaker. With his diverse background as a Certified Financial Planner, Certified Executor Advisor, and death doula – topped with personal experiences that have tested his own mortality – he brings an unparalleled perspective to life’s final chapter.
In this episode:
- Uncover the life-changing benefits of adopting a ‘mortality mindset.’
- Learn how planning for the end can actually enhance your present.
- Hear about Greg’s transformative journey from near-death to advocacy.
- Explore why families must break the silence on this taboo topic before time runs out.
Did You Know?
Despite being an expert in end-of-life matters himself, even Greg faced procrastination regarding his arrangements. His candid story will challenge you to think differently about tomorrow.
After penning a book on end-of-life preparation and facing his brain tumor diagnosis, Greg has become a vocal proponent of what he calls the “mortality mindset movement.” He shares his insights into why embracing our inevitable end can lead to profound benefits like stress reduction, family harmony, and emotional resilience.
Greg’s diverse background, from directing funerals to advising on estates, gives him a unique perspective on why having those tough conversations about death now is critical rather than in times of crisis. His own brush with mortality served as a stark reminder that life is unpredictable and planning ahead is key.
We also delve into how societal views on funerals are shifting towards more personal and intimate commemorations. Plus, Greg offers practical advice for both simple DIY estate planning and when to seek professional help for more complex scenarios.
His message? Don’t wait until it’s too late – start talking about your end-of-life wishes today. It’s not just about ensuring peace of mind; it’s about living fully right up until the last moment.
RESOURCES:
CONNECT:
_______
NEED HELP?
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
- Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor
If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Embracing Mortality: Living Fully by Planning for the End
Death is a subject that many of us prefer to avoid. It’s uncomfortable, it’s frightening, and it often feels very distant from the vibrancy of daily life. However, Greg Barnsdell—a man who wears many hats as an undertaker, financial planner, certified executor advisor, and death doula—argues that acknowledging our mortality can be one of the most profound actions we take toward living a meaningful life.
In this episode of “Grieving Voices,” Greg shares his personal journey with mortality after being diagnosed with a brain tumor. His experience has led him to become a vocal advocate for what he calls the “mortality mindset movement.” This philosophy encourages individuals not only to accept their inevitable end but also to prepare for it in ways that leave behind a positive legacy.
The Unseen Benefits of End-of-Life Planning
Greg emphasizes how planning for our demise can offer unexpected gifts:
– **Reduced Stress:** Knowing your affairs are in order provides peace of mind.
– **Family Harmony:** Clear directives alleviate potential conflicts among loved ones during times of grief.
– **Financial Resilience:** Proper planning secures assets and ensures they are distributed according to your wishes.
Despite these benefits, procrastination is common. Host Victoria confesses her own hesitation on this front—an admission shared by many listeners.
A Life Unexpectedly Intertwined With Death
Greg’s career trajectory took an unplanned detour into funeral services when his dreams of becoming a helicopter pilot didn’t pan out. Through his varied experiences in both funeral directing and financial planning, he gained unique insights into why preparing for death is crucial—not just at life’s end but throughout its entirety.
He advocates having candid conversations about death within families before crisis strikes. These discussions prevent confusion and strife during moments already heavy with emotion—the grieving process becomes slightly more bearable when there’s clarity about final wishes.
Personal Loss as Powerful Motivation
The sudden loss of Greg’s mother was pivotal; she had thoughtfully prepared for her passing which greatly eased her family’s burden during their time of mourning. Her foresight served as inspiration; even those seemingly healthy can have their lives change—or end—instantly due to unforeseen events or health issues like falls or illnesses.
As someone who has faced my own health scares head-on—including surgery related to my brain tumor—I understand firsthand how quickly one’s perspective on life (and death) can shift when confronted with one’s vulnerability.
My book aims not only at inspiring others but also serves as my testament—to urge people not just to think about these matters but to act upon them while they still have agency over their decisions. Yet ironically enough, I found myself facing down my own advice shortly following its publication when I was thrust into confronting my mortality anew through illness—it reinforced everything I preached about early communication regarding end-of-life choices.
Legacy Isn’t Just About Assets – It’s About Intentions
I’ve learned through both professional encounters and personal trials that appreciating each day isn’t merely platitudinal—it requires action so you may influence your legacy positively posthumously. Discussions around wills or medical directives should find space amidst family gatherings rather than waiting until necessity demands urgency—and potentially breeds conflict.
For some individuals without complex estates or familial ties such estate planning might seem straightforward enough to tackle alone—but caution should be taken here too because oversights could result in significant emotional strain later on if plans aren’t thorough.
Living intentionally means recognizing every day offers opportunities towards crafting the narrative you wish left behind once you’re gone—that includes making informed decisions around funerals too which increasingly lean away from traditional practices towards personalized memorials reflecting individual beliefs preferences whether religious cultural otherwise.
Finally sharing knowledge via social media platforms like TikTok where viral videos spread awareness quicker than ever before helps bridge generational gaps ensuring messages reach wider audiences faster than traditional methods would allow thus helping demystify topics previously shrouded by taboo silence fear misunderstanding alike.
So remember preparation isn’t pessimistic—it acknowledges reality embraces certainty empowers control creating lasting impact beyond measure securing tranquility amidst uncertainty embracing every moment fully along way.
To learn more and delve deeper into these concepts consider picking up “Do Not Ignore Your Mortality” available online through major retailers including Amazon connect further via LinkedIn, Facebook searching for either author name book title respectively let conversation continue grow evolve together society whole better off knowing ready anything comes next no matter what may be.
Episode Transcription:
Victoria Volk
00:00:00 – 00:00:14
Welcome to another episode of Grieving Voices. Today, my guest is Greg Barnsdell. He is an unusual undertaker. After years of stressing to others, get your grief get your excuse me, Get your affairs in order.
Victoria Volk
00:00:14 – 00:00:39
And finally publishing a book to inspire others, he was diagnosed with a large brain tumor. Faced with a death sentence, he opted for surgery. He’s now emerged with an extremely compelling message shared by few others. As a certified financial planner who is also a certified executor advisor, his perspectives are unique. As a death doula who has published a well received book regarding the importance of planning and ahead.
Victoria Volk
00:00:39 – 00:01:16
His message is gaining solid traction. He stresses what he calls the mortality mindset movement where followers uphold their living legacy and becoming the best versions of themselves and ultimately leave their last legacy as the best one possible. His claims include the fact that end of life planning reduces the stress of aging, improves family harmony, creates greater emotional and financial resilience and increases social capital and improves court efficiency. And a growing number of people firmly agree. And as an end of life doula myself, I wholeheartedly agree as well.
Victoria Volk
00:01:16 – 00:01:35
But have I personally done my own homework? I will admit that I have not. I think about it a lot, actually. Like, just even the fact that when you have a business, right, like, it’s even more important that I mean, I was just thinking about it the other day. I’m thinking, oh, my gosh.
Victoria Volk
00:01:35 – 00:02:02
Like, if because I have an 18/17 and 15-year-old. And if I something happened to me, and I’m just thinking about my business and all these accounts and different like auto like this, all these autopay stuff I have, like all of this stuff, like, oh, my gosh, That’d be so overwhelming for my loved ones. You know, incredibly overwhelming. And my husband is not, like, tech-savvy at all. He would be just completely distraught.
Victoria Volk
00:02:02 – 00:02:21
So I know a lot of it would fall probably on my middle. And she’s only 17. Yeah, I need to get my act together too. So thank you so much for joining me today and maybe encouraging all of us to finally get our affairs in order and doing some planning ahead.
Greg Barnsdale
00:02:23 – 00:02:41
Well, thank you for having me Victoria it’s a It’s a tough topic, isn’t it? And it’s something that a lot of us don’t want to face because we just assume that each day will carry on and tomorrow will be the same as today and yesterday was. It’s not an easy subject to think about.
Victoria Volk
00:02:42 – 00:02:46
How many years have you been working in the death space?
Greg Barnsdale
00:02:46 – 00:03:39
Well, I’ve worked in a number of different roles, back in the, I’m almost 60 now. But when I was, almost 20, I joined the, funeral industry. I wanted to be a helicopter pilot actually, but didn’t have enough physics, so I ended up being an undertaker, which was a bit of a shift. And I worked at that for a decade in large and small funeral homes and really enjoyed it, and my family were not in the industry at all. It shocked my parents and my sister when I told them that I wanted to be a funeral director, but that’s what my guidance counselor had actually recommended in high school. So, I enjoyed that industry, and then I actually changed, kept my funeral director’s license and actually joined the financial planning industry, and enjoyed that for quite a number of years too.
Greg Barnsdale
00:03:39 – 00:04:20
I gained the certified financial planning designation and I always knew that the experience that I had in the funeral industry and dealing with families at the time of a death, and also helping many people pre-plan ahead of time, for their funeral, would somehow I’d be able to create something that would help people. And All my financial planning clients knew that I was a funeral director as well, and I was always eager to speak to them about putting plans in place and updating their life insurance make sure they had a current invalid will and all those things so that if something happened, their family would be in far better shape than they otherwise would.
Victoria Volk
00:04:21 – 00:04:35
I wanna go back to that guidance counselor. What do you think it was that he or she saw in you that recommended or suggested that? And what was it in you that was like, oh, yeah. I think I would like that. Just curious.
Greg Barnsdale
00:04:36 – 00:05:04
I don’t know Victoria, but I suspected it was the fact that I was a rather quiet person. I still am. I’m very much an introvert as opposed to an extrovert, But I think it was that and maybe my interest in medical issues and science and those sorts of things. But in this smaller high school that I attended, I think I was only the second student in its history to join the funeral industry, actually.
Victoria Volk
00:05:05 – 00:05:24
Once you got into it, though, like, it does definitely take a special person, Right? So what do you think it is about you though, that you were so successful in that endeavor? You know, because so many people, especially at 17, 18, like, they’re lost. They don’t have a clue what they wanna do.
Victoria Volk
00:05:24 – 00:05:36
And, you know, you kinda just pluck something out of the air and hope it sticks and off majority of the time, it doesn’t. Right? Like, it’s yeah. So right. That’s a grief too.
Victoria Volk
00:05:36 – 00:05:49
Like, a loss of hopes, dreams, and expectations for your life. Like something that this other thing you wanted to do, but you fell into this and it turned out it worked for you. But
Greg Barnsdale
00:05:43 – 00:05:43
Yes,
Victoria Volk
00:05:43 – 00:05:49
What is it about you like? What makes a special undertaker?
Victoria Volk
00:05:49 – 00:05:55
I guess when people are looking for someone who they’re entrusting, really,
Greg Barnsdale
00:05:55 – 00:05:56
yes,
Victoria Volk
00:05:56 – 00:06:03
their loved one, their morning experience to, like, what are some things that you recommend that people look for?
Greg Barnsdale
00:06:04 – 00:06:42
Well, it’s a compassion for other people and what they’re going through and having empathy with those people and knowing how to help them and listen to them I don’t think I had any special unique skills going into the funeral industry but as I joined it and worked with others and learned about the industry, I actually enjoyed it, which to some people may sound a little unusual but working in that industry gives employees or workers in the death care industry a lot of personal satisfaction knowing that they’re helping people on the worst day of their life.
Victoria Volk
00:06:42 – 00:07:52
It is one of the worst days of someone’s life. Right? It is an experience that on oftentimes it’s unexpected and it’s and like we were talking before we started when we started recording, It’s overwhelming. It’s just a completely overwhelming process.
Greg Barnsdale
00:06:52 – 00:06:52
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:06:52 – 00:07:08
And to be able to sit with people in that time of need, Did you have a lot of experience with death prior to that?
Victoria Volk
00:07:08 – 00:07:20
Like, had you had what had what were the lessons and what were the beliefs and things that you had about death and experiences that you had before you went into that industry?
Greg Barnsdale
00:07:22 – 00:08:36
Well, one of the more significant, events in my life was the death of my grandfather, of a heart attack, actually, just prior to me attending college to become a funeral director But other than that, I didn’t as I said, I didn’t have any family in the funeral business I didn’t have any direct ties to the industry. But, a good friend of mine actually in high school ended up working for this small town funeral home, cleaning on a part-time basis after school. And behind the funeral home was an ambulance service which used to be quite common years ago but, anyway, I would go and visit my friend Mike occasionally at the funeral home and then I got to know some of the staff and some of the ambulance attendants and then it just seemed like an interesting atmosphere to learn more about and then I inquired about going to college that was my plan B as I said because the other occupation didn’t work out for me so I ended up going that route and I’m so glad that I did because I worked in the industry for quite a number of years and I still have my funeral directors license So it’s been almost 40 years now that I’ve been a licensed funeral director.
Victoria Volk
00:08:36 – 00:09:01
What are some mistakes, learnings? I hate to say mistakes. I think everything is a learning experience. But what are some things that people need to understand about that process and maybe some tips that you can provide people when they’re going through something going through a loss and find themselves having to speak with someone like you.
Greg Barnsdale
00:09:01 – 00:10:10
Right. Well, the most top of mind thought that I have really comes back to this book that I’ve published.And the primary message of this, Victoria, is for people to try and embrace this whole aspect of the fact that ultimately we will die, and it’s important vitally important that we get thinking about this and plan for it. There are so many people and I saw this in both the funeral industry and when I worked in that industry I don’t anymore I’m promoting this book full time but when I also worked as a certified financial planner and also as a certified executor advisor as you mentioned in my bio, I’ve seen so many situations where people have been reluctant to plan, they’ve been reluctant to talk to their family members or in some cases they go I suggest they talk to their children about educating them on what they want and where their will is and the plans that we’ve been putting in place financially, etcetera. And in some cases, the children don’t wanna talk about it or they’ll say things like, oh, dad, don’t talk about that. You know?
Greg Barnsdale
00:10:11 – 00:10:34
I get it that people are uncomfortable with, so much of this, but in overcoming that uncomfortableness in the short term and talking and planning around what we want in regards to our end-of-life experience and for our legacy, etcetera, makes it so so much easier for those that we love after we’re gone.
Victoria Volk
00:10:35 – 00:11:06
Considering there’s so many different ways that people leave this their physical bodies, you know, tragic accident, cancer, you know, where you have maybe more time and maybe with, with the diagnosis, maybe you don’t even have a lot of time. Sometimes people pass
Greg Barnsdale
00:10:50 – 00:10:50
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:10:50 – 00:11:06
really quickly after a diagnosis. Is it advised that people find someone, an executor or a financial planner? Like, what are the steps that you recommend people take if there’s if they’re yes. I read your book.
Victoria Volk
00:11:06 – 00:11:12
Do not ignore your mortality. I wanna do this. I wanna get started. Where do I begin?
Greg Barnsdale
00:11:12 – 00:12:20
Well, the first initial steps should be speaking with those that you love, those that are closest to you about what you want to have happen. And within my book, I list some of the, questions that I think are good effective questions. And people tell are telling me that after reading my book, they’re inspired to get talking to their family and pull out their will and read it and really lean into this which is awesome I’m that’s really was the whole intention of this book that I want to share with as many people as I can because this is so desperately needed but that is the very first step, Victoria, is to speak with our family about do we want to be buried and if so where is where are past family members buried or do we want to be cremated or do we now people have the option of actually being recycled of all things so that you know the the funeral industry the death care industry is slow to change but it is changing and people need to know what their options are but if we don’t communicate with others about how we’re feeling in our values and what’s important to us, it did it stalls.
Greg Barnsdale
00:12:20 – 00:12:21
It doesn’t get going.
Victoria Volk
00:12:21 – 00:12:51
What do you think are the aside from not maybe the individuals themselves or the loved ones who just don’t want to talk about it? And then something happens and then, you know, there’s all this overwhelm happening within a family. And then you got dynamics. Right? Family dynamics
Greg Barnsdale
00:12:40 – 00:12:40
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:12:40 – 00:12:51
where I mean, I’ve seen it personally myself in people I know in relationships where, you know, the parents pass or the last remaining parent passes, and they didn’t have the stuff lined up.
Victoria Volk
00:12:51 – 00:13:01
And there’s so much in fighting
Greg Barnsdale
00:12:54 – 00:12:54
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:12:54 – 00:13:01
and relationships just deteriorate and blow up because of lack of planning.
Greg Barnsdale
00:13:02 – 00:14:03
Right. And ironically, Victoria, end-of-life planning are not only reduces the stress of aging but to answer to come circle back to the point the very important point that you just raised as we talk with our family about our legacy and what we want to leave behind and who gets what, etcetera, and if the cottage should be left or the the cabin should be left in the family home and who’s gonna buy it and who’s gonna use it or the family business or whatever it tends to that higher level of communication in regards to something that is truly in our heart about our legacy and who we are and what we leave behind tends to improve family dynamics and family harmony, and I get what you’re saying. I too have seen it within my own family. You know? It it’s so prevalent in families all over the place it seems but and is there such a thing as a normal family anymore?
Greg Barnsdale
00:14:03 – 00:14:20
I don’t think there necessarily is but you’re you’re exactly right At the time of a death and afterwards, especially if the affairs have not been organized thoroughly and discussed thoroughly, it can often result in a frustrating mess.
Victoria Volk
00:14:20 – 00:15:04
I wanna kinda talk a little bit about and if you wanna share any personal story around this or examples of stories that you’ve seen, be feel free to, but I just for people listening, I wanna just bring this to the topic of grief. And when you have a loved one that passes, and we’re talking about that dying that family dynamic, and you can have 4 people, 4 children that grow up in the same household that have very different relation. Every single individual in that family will have a different relationship with that parent. You don’t always know as the other siblings or other family members what that relationship was like. Your parent could have had a really close relationship with a niece or nephew that they almost considered like a child.
Victoria Volk
00:15:04 – 00:15:45
Right?
Greg Barnsdale
00:15:05 – 00:15:05
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:15:05 – 00:15:45
That they include in the will, and then the children are kind of don’t get something that this other individual got, and they don’t understand it because they don’t understand that relationship. They didn’t know the dynamics of that relationship.
Greg Barnsdale
00:15:30 – 00:15:30
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:15:30 – 00:15:45
And I think that’s where so much of this infighting happens is that we’re bringing our perspective of our grief and our relationship with that person and that individual who passed and just emotionally vomiting all over each other is what we end up doing and projecting our own emotions about this loss and what this means for me and what this means for them. And, you know, they were always the favorite and they’re getting everything.
Victoria Volk
00:15:45 – 00:16:04
And it was all these whatever the perspective was about the relationship, it’s going to just completely manifest at this really old emotionally overwhelming time, which is to your point of why it’s so important for us to plan ahead. Anything you would like to add to that?
Greg Barnsdale
00:16:05 – 00:17:16
You’ve hit the nail on the head, Victoria. It’s the aspect of ignoring these sorts of things and doing nothing is very easy to do in the short term I think putting off these types of topics is is the easiest thing to do and we’re all procrastinators at heart and we can all be doing things better, I think, to a degree For those that do ignore these types of things and don’t have the conversations the chance of them dying and leaving a mess of frustration and bitterness and a lousy legacy and family in fighting is incredibly high plus the fact that more money is typically spent in regards to settling the estate could very well be that a good amount of money is spent on lawyers’ fees to sort out the bickering and the fighting and the and I was speaking to and I was on another podcast, host session last week and he ended up spending over $50,000 in legal fees to sort out his situation that’s why he wrote a book and it took over 7 years to settle the estates of his mom and dad. His brothers and sisters no longer speak to one another and he ended up having a heart attack in the process.
Greg Barnsdale
00:17:16 – 00:17:55
So you know that’s just one story of many but the overriding solution to all of this is to face our mortality and accept the fact that we’re not going to live forever. And at some point, we may become frail and unable to make decisions for ourselves. So it’s also important to have something set up like a medical directive or a power of attorney as we call them here, in Canada to have someone speak for us if we can’t make those decisions and it’s not easy to set that up either because again, we have to face the fact that we might not be able to speak at some point.
Victoria Volk
00:17:56 – 00:18:40
I’m glad you brought the conversation there because I wanted to talk a little bit and bring a little bit more of the end-of-life doula,
Greg Barnsdale
00:18:01 – 00:18:01
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:18:01 – 00:18:40
background that we both have into the conversation because my father had been diagnosed with cancer and I think 16 months or so was how long he lived. He wasn’t given that long, but he lived that long and we ended up in the nursing home. And, you know, now there’s so many much more like hospice and home health. And there’s so much more of those resources available now that there weren’t back then. But I didn’t understand one thing that shocked me when I went through my end-of-life doula training was that it is possible to have a death experience that you want, like, I did not even believe I didn’t even know that that was possible.
Victoria Volk
00:18:41 – 00:19:27
Like, you can decide what kind of music you want to be what you know, if you want music played, if you who you don’t want to come see you. I mean, and making sure that you have someone, you know, like the gatekeeper, right?
Greg Barnsdale
00:18:46 – 00:18:46
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:18:46 – 00:19:27
You have a gatekeeper that, you know, make sure that your death experience is what you want it to be. And once you pass, do you want to be washed and all of these things that I hadn’t even considered that it just really opened my mind to, do you have any personal experience with because I personally have not utilized that end of life doula in my area, just because I it’s a very rural area. And I’m still trying to determine what that service or what that offering would look like for me personally, in my area.
Victoria Volk
00:19:27 – 00:19:32
But do you have any personal experience that you would like to share or talk about in that regard?
Greg Barnsdale
00:19:33 – 00:19:59
I’m glad you brought that up, Victoria, because this too is critically important. And you’re exactly right. I think the vast majority of the population is not aware of these sorts of things. And that’s why these specialized types of podcasts like yours, that is so vitally important for people to tune into if they’re interested in this. It’s funny how I just said if they’re interested in this but if their hearts beating they should be interested in this right?
Victoria Volk
00:19:59 – 00:19:59
Right.
Greg Barnsdale
00:19:59 – 00:21:15
But when I last year maybe it was 2 years ago now when I completed my hospice training as a hospice volunteer, one of the things that they had asked us as part of the exercise and the training was to, write down how we wanted to die. And in all my training as a funeral director, I never had to do that. I had to fill out my own death certificate and those sorts of things and write lots of practice obituaries in my initial training and so on, which was helpful for that role. But I had never been asked before how I wanted to die, and it seemed like such a bizarre question and some of the people in the room were saying well I want to be on the golf course or I want to be doing this or I want to be doing that and it’s something that I think we should all consider at some point because you’re exactly right we do have those choices now and we in Ontario Canada where I am, I’m seeing and hearing of more and more hospices being set up all the time and when I wrote this, created the research the manuscript for this book that I published last year I realized that there is such a massive demand for people needing to volunteer for hospice.
Greg Barnsdale
00:21:16 – 00:21:29
There’s all kinds of facilities and services all are more and more all the time, but there is such a demand for people who unfortunately are dying, who are being admitted, and and they just need someone to come and speak with them.
Victoria Volk
00:21:29 – 00:21:57
That might just be the prompt I needed. Thank you for that. It’s not just about like how you want to die or what that process is that you want it to look like. But like you said, it’s very important that you have someone that you trust in, in that will have your best interest and will be steadfast in and committed to following through with what your wishes are. If you cannot speak, if you get to where you cannot speak.
Greg Barnsdale
00:21:57 – 00:21:57
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:21:58 – 00:22:25
And that’s a really difficult position to be in, and it’s not for everybody. And then, you know, but if you, as the person who’s, you know, preparing that transition has chosen that person, other family cannot argue that, right?
Greg Barnsdale
00:22:20 – 00:22:20
Right.
Victoria Volk
00:22:20 – 00:22:21
Like other family,
Greg Barnsdale
00:22:21- 00:22:21
Right.
Victoria Volk
00:22:22 – 00:22:25
they, you know, that’s and how much distress and grief and in fighting will you eliminate by just simply choosing that person yourself?
Greg Barnsdale
00:22:25 – 00:23:26
And that fiduciary, as they’re called in that role to speak on your behalf, may not necessarily agree with your wishes of what you want if you’re, incapacitated and can’t speak but he or she has to speak up for you at that time which again is vitally important but as an example if I have in my power of attorney that I don’t wanna be put on life support and I would rather just die well my wife would have to speak up for me even if she didn’t necessarily agree with that and I had a conversation recently with my elderly father he’s almost 90. My mom died 4 years suddenly, and actually flatlined in front of me in the hospital which is another story but, my surviving father has recently decided that he wants to establish a do not resuscitate order so if something significant happens to him, he would rather just die. And that’s, again, a tough conversation to have, but we’ve had the conversation between he and I and my sister.
Victoria Volk
00:23:26 – 00:23:55
And let’s talk about your mom because I imagine that was very traumatic at the time and you didn’t have time. Right? You didn’t have the time to say all the things you wanted to say. And, you know, like what in the work that I do become emotionally complete, you know, as you maybe would have if someone was terminal and maybe you had a little bit more time in that process, but to have those deep and important conversations. So what would you like to share about that experience and what you glean from it after that?
Greg Barnsdale
00:23:55 – 00:24:28
Well, I guess the biggest thing, Victoria, is the fact that life can change on a dime. You know, my 82-year-old mother was rather active. She was an organist in a church and she had she was the organist at the local funeral home that I had worked at in this small town and she helped work for that funeral home for decades as the organist and she was out Christmas shopping with her girlfriend and after lunch she actually slipped and broke her hip ended up in the hospital broke her wrist as well and her mom died this way ironically in
Victoria Volk
00:24:28 – 00:24:28
Hmm
Greg Barnsdale
00:24:28 – 00:25:24
very similar fashion years ago but, we said to her mom you’ll be fine you know we’ll get you some physio they’ll be you know fix your wrist and it’ll take some rehab and such but you’ll be at home again with that in no time and then I was visiting her the next day she flatlined and here I was sitting there studying for my next estate planning exam and, and she flatlined all these nurses and doctors came in they started aggressively doing CPR and then they put her on life support and she died the next day so and it all seemed like a bad dream and just because I’m a funeral director doesn’t mean that I’m immune to the same types of feelings and turmoil etcetera. It was painful, incredibly painful, But I was so grateful that she had taken the time years ago and we had she and I had numerous conversations about what she wanted, primarily, I think, because I was a funeral director.
Victoria Volk
00:25:24 – 00:25:30
The burden that took off your father as well at the time, because here he how long had they been married?
Greg Barnsdale
00:25:30 – 00:25:32
Decades. They were married in 1960.
Victoria Volk
00:25:32 – 00:25:35
You know, so he lost his lifelong love.
Greg Barnsdale
00:25:35 – 00:25:35
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:25:36 – 00:25:46
In an instant. And imagine that’s like losing a limb, you know, you feel like you’ve lost a limb and a part of yourself and the overwhelm that that brings. Right?
Victoria Volk
00:25:46 – 00:25:55
So I’m sure that your presence and what your education and knowledge was a gift to them. And in that time too.
Greg Barnsdale
00:25:56 – 00:26:44
Yeah, well I think it certainly made it easier to a degree but it still seemed like a bad dream and so many people would had commented at the time of the funeral about how it was just so hard to believe that she was gone. And I’ve heard families say this so many times when I worked in the funeral business, that you know here we were sitting down in a funeral home arrangement office discussing you know all the details about the upcoming funeral in the next few days and when the body is going to be released from the hospital after the autopsy and all those sorts of difficult conversations that I had to have with families as a funeral director and quite often they would say things to me like I certainly never expected this to be part of my day today
Victoria Volk
00:26:46 – 00:27:02
My mom is gonna be 81. She still works. She still can get around and, you know, doesn’t need a walker or a cane or anything like that. And I feel like I would probably be thinking the same thing to myself. It’s she was out shopping, right?
Victoria Volk
00:27:02 – 00:27:09
Your mom’s out shopping. I mean, I could totally see that with my mom. And one of my mom’s greatest fears is falling on ice.
Greg Barnsdale
00:27:09 – 00:27:09
Yes,
Victoria Volk
00:27:09 – 00:27:36
And breaking a bone and breaking her hip and she will not go to work. She will stay home if it is really icy. Or if there’s been a lot of, you know, weather the day before a couple days, which is like she that is one of her greatest fears. And rightfully so because just like you illustrated, it’s like you think that they’re gonna recover and, you know, they’re gonna walk out of the hospital. And like you said, just need some physical therapy.
Victoria Volk
00:27:36 – 00:27:47
And, you know, a lot of people break bones and it doesn’t end their lives, you know? So I imagine that, yeah, it was a shock.
Greg Barnsdale
00:27:47 – 00:27:53
Yeah. For elderly people, for them to suffer a broken hip can often mean their demise, unfortunately.
Victoria Volk
00:27:54 – 00:28:11
The healing process right. Is not as quick and it’s, you know, you can, you’re more apt probably to blood clots and things like that. That,
Greg Barnsdale
00:28:12 – 00:28:12
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:28:12 – 00:28:21
Yeah, but this isn’t the only thing that happened to you that kind of just flipped your world upside down in an instant. I mean you’ve had other things too and one of those was I think I mentioned that in your bio a little bit was your tumor.
Greg Barnsdale
00:28:21 – 00:30:09
Yes, as I jokingly say to my wife who has asked me for years, Greg do you want to get a tattoo, And I’ve always said no now I can say I have a tattoo I’ve got a 6-inch scar up the side of my head from having this non-cancerous tumor removed that too was a shock and as you said in the bio Victoria I have worked in and around death much of my 40-year career in various roles including a supervisor for one of the largest mortuaries in all of Canada actually so I’ve seen a lot but after taking years literally many many years to publish this, finally publishing this book with a message to help inspire people to plan ahead accordingly for their situation because everybody’s situation is so different 2 months after I published the book with a professional publishing firm I get diagnosed with a brain tumor which seems so incredibly ironic. Her key thing about this was my general physician who told me about this didn’t tell me if it was cancerous or not and I assumed it was cancerous but he said I’m waiting to hear back from an ear nose and throat specialist he should be calling me back here today and they want to set up an appointment with you as soon as possible because he showed me on the MRI in his computer it’s a large tumor and this all started from a ringing in my one ear so if you know of anyone or any of the listeners have tinnitus or tinnitus I think it’s called in one ear that’s the kicker it could be a brain tumor quite often people have tinnitus in both ears and that’s not indicative of a tumor but MRIs are more prevalent so they’re noticing these more and more all the time mine was an acoustic meaning hearing neuroma and as I said it was large they removed most of it almost a year ago.
Greg Barnsdale
00:30:10 – 00:30:23
And the recovery has been really good. I’ve been very happy with it. I’ve lost all the hearing in my left ear, which was a known, risk going into this and quite likely. But I’m I’m willing to put up with that. But they removed most of the tumor.
Greg Barnsdale
00:30:23 – 00:30:30
There’s still about 20%, that they couldn’t remove because it’s tightly wrapped around a number of facial nerves and my brain stem.
Victoria Volk
00:30:31 – 00:30:33
Yeah. I actually have ringing in my right ear.
Greg Barnsdale
00:30:33 – 00:30:35
You should get it checked.
Victoria Volk
00:30:35 – 00:30:40
But I was in the military too. So I’ve always just chalked it up to that. Thank you for that.
Greg Barnsdale
00:30:41 – 00:30:44
You’re well. I hope I hope I hope it’s all clean and you’re good to go.
Victoria Volk
00:30:45 – 00:30:56
Thank you for saying that. But brings up the question then, how has that changed your perspective on your health? How has this experience changed that perspective of your health?
Greg Barnsdale
00:30:56 – 00:30:57
I’m kidding.
Victoria Volk
00:30:57 – 00:30:59
Yeah. You’re being funny. I got it.
Greg Barnsdale
00:31:01 – 00:32:04
Well, actually, it’s inspired me to look after myself even more. I truly do think, Victoria, that there’s a higher power at work in my life that has given me a second chance because as I said, this tumor was non-cancerous. Then the recent MRI that I had is seems to be indicating and I’m still waiting to hear from the neurosurgeon actually but in the copy that I have from my interpretation of it as a lay person it seems that the tumor is not growing so I’m doing everything I can to look after myself and my wife is after me to a hearing aid but I think I’m getting along pretty well without it and I don’t want to put up with the hassles of a hearing aid at this point anyway but it’s truly given me I guess a greater appreciation of end of life issues because when I got home from that visit with the doctor my general physician, and he said, you’ve got a large tumor. The specialist is going to be calling you. I didn’t get you I was home 20 minutes later, in my vehicle and walking into the house and my cell phone went off and it was the secretary for the specialist office saying Greg, can you come in Monday morning at 9 o’clock?
Greg Barnsdale
00:32:04 – 00:32:22
We wanna see you. So I thought for sure I was doomed and it was cancerous my wife was working from home that day so I didn’t want to ruin her day with this terrible news that I had. So I didn’t tell her all day. And then I didn’t wanna ruin her dinner Thursday night. And then I didn’t wanna ruin her sleep Thursday night.
Greg Barnsdale
00:32:22 – 00:32:47
And then I didn’t wanna ruin her Friday. So I ended up telling her Saturday morning as Celine Dion’s My Heart Will Go On is playing in the background as we’re having our coffee and tears are coming down my eyes, and she said what’s wrong? So I had to tell her. So I did I had to face my own death after decades of telling all kinds of other people get act together and face this thing.
Victoria Volk
00:32:47 – 00:33:15
My husband loves Celine Deon. But that I mean, I was just I was kinda in the moment as you were saying it, and it’s like, anyone listening, just see yourself in this scenario. Like, just see yourself in this scenario and what would you do and what do you need to do to get your act together? Do not ignore your mortality as the title of your book states, and it’s a great title. It’s very direct, and it’s poignant. And, again, I haven’t gotten my act together.
Victoria Volk
00:33:15 – 00:33:28
I actually have a folder that includes this is really sad. So I actually I don’t even know where I got it. I think from the Veterans Administration, my husband and I are both veterans. And I think at one time, they were given these to the veterans. I’m not even sure.
Victoria Volk
00:33:28 – 00:33:37
Maybe we ordered it. I can’t even tell you. But it’s a folder that has all the documents that you would need to prepare,
Greg Barnsdale
00:33:38 – 00:33:38
Right
Victoria Volk
00:33:38 – 00:33:47
you know in advance. Actually, I do think we probably ordered it. But have we gone through them? No. Because I think we’ve actually probably had them at least 10 years.
Greg Barnsdale
00:33:48 – 00:33:48
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:33:48 – 00:34:00
At least. And, you know, now it’s like, okay, well, we’re kind of pushing 50. Probably, you know, but you think you always have more time.
Greg Barnsdale
00:34:00 – 00:34:01
Yes.
Victoria Volk
00:34:01 – 00:34:03
I think you always have more time.
Greg Barnsdale
00:34:04 – 00:34:56
I said that phrase a number of times to people, and we got a chuckle out of it as my craniotomy, my brain surgery was approaching and I was you know trying to get making sure all of my beneficiary designations were up to date on my insurance policies and pre-arranging for my cremation to take place with a buddy of mine who runs a crematorium and all those things to make it easier for my family and I jokingly said to a few people as my surgery was getting closer and closer, you know, hoping that I would survive it. Most people do survive these craniotomies these days, but it’s still rather, concerning when you’re the one going under the knife. Right? So I wanted to make sure that my affairs were truly in order, and I was so happy that I had them all in place. You know, I had to tweak things a little bit, but I would jokingly say to people, I thought I had more time.
Victoria Volk
00:34:56 – 00:34:56
Mhmm.
Greg Barnsdale
00:34:56 – 00:35:10
And it it’s so very true. We all think that. Right? We think, as I say in the book, we’re so many people just are wanting to avoid this, and they just make the assumption everything will be fine.
Greg Barnsdale
00:35:10 – 00:35:19
I’m gonna be here tomorrow. I don’t need a will anytime soon. I don’t need the life insurance anytime soon. I’m gonna be fine. It’s we need to do this now.
Victoria Volk
00:35:20 – 00:36:13
I’ve always wondered why you know, when it comes to your health, it’s like, why does it always take like a heart attack or you know, this health scare or something to like, wake people up to actually give a damn about their bodies and the one, you know, meat suit that they’re given in this life. And then, but also to, I can say that with this, it’s like, you know, you always think you have more time. What does it take for us to get our act together and put these affairs in order and make sure that we’re making it as easy as possible for those who are left behind, regardless if we’re 40 or 70, or 80, or 90. And, you know, and people, you know, if you live that long, then people say, Oh, you they lived such a long life, or they had a long life, or they had a good life. And I imagine people said that probably you heard stuff like that with your mom.
Victoria Volk
00:36:13 – 00:36:24
And it’s like, no, she probably had another good she could have lived another 10 years. You know, who knows? Yeah, I’m sure your mom thought it too. She always you know, you think you have more time.
Greg Barnsdale
00:36:24 – 00:36:24
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:36:24 – 00:36:44
And that’s just not. I mean, if the world has not proven to us enough through COVID, and just life itself and people that we know and the majillion bajillion scenarios that can happen. What’s it gonna take for us to wake up?
Greg Barnsdale
00:36:44 – 00:38:02
Well, you’re exactly right. The last 3 years with with COVID especially has really changed the world to a large degree and a large number of people actually decided to get their affairs in order through COVID because they saw how, how delicate life is and I think had a greater appreciation for it because it was so top of mind, especially during the height of the pandemic and who could have ever predicted that But when you come through the experiences that I have working directly with the dead picking up the dead arranging for the dead and also in the role of a financial advisor as a life insurance specialist inspiring people to set up the insurance that they need to make sure that their families will be properly taken care of based on their goals and objectives and all these sorts of things that’s really why I wrote this book to be honest with you. It’s a very brief conversation starter to get people thinking about communicating and the basics of funeral and cremation and burial planning and very basic information about estate planning and then the last chapter has to do with the medical directives and all of us are at risk of being incapacitated at some point. So it’s really just it doesn’t get into a lot of detail.
Greg Barnsdale
00:38:03 – 00:38:17
It’s really just targeted towards getting Canadians and Americans thinking about these the very fundamentals of getting moving with this and leaning on other people who can help, and there’s lots of them out there.
Victoria Volk
00:38:17 – 00:38:42
What is one piece of advice that through the passing of your mother and that experience and then your own health scare, like, what is one piece of advice? Because I’m sure there was obviously some grieving, obviously, with your mother, and maybe even to with, you know, your own health scare. Is, was there any grief that came up for you during that time? I mean, even after you knew it was not cancerous.
Greg Barnsdale
00:38:42 – 00:38:53
Well, for my mom, certainly. But in regards to my situation, Victoria, I guess there was. I I don’t know. It’s hard to say. It said I’ve been in and around death for so many years.
Greg Barnsdale
00:38:53 – 00:40:02
It was a wake up call for me, but as I said, it was a huge relief knowing that I had my affairs in order and as I stress in the book a lot the people who are forced to get planning these sorts of things when there is a health diagnosis which is not overly rosy like cancer as an example I’ve seen so many people try to organize what I call and many other people call it the same thing deathbed estate planning it’s rushed it’s inappropriate it’s extremely delicate well maybe inappropriate I should take that back but when someone is in a hospital bed and they’re and they’re not doing so well, we’re always, you know, bringing flowers and writing uplifting cards to get well soon and all those sorts of positive messages. The last thing that people typically want to talk about is you know , mom did you have where’s your will? Or dad did you want to be buried or cremated? You know, we don’t have those types of conversations with people when they’re in a hospital bed or to ask them if they wanna steal or a wooden casket.
Greg Barnsdale
00:40:03 – 00:40:15
That’s taboo. Right? People don’t do that. And I totally understand why they don’t want to. But that’s why it’s so vitally important that these conversations take place when times are normal.
Greg Barnsdale
00:40:15 – 00:40:18
Time is plentiful and minds are clear.
Victoria Volk
00:40:19 – 00:40:30
Thank you so much for bringing that up. That is actually a huge takeaway that I had from the end-of-life training that I had is that instead of having those conversations, even if you know, you have to have them.
Greg Barnsdale
00:40:30 – 00:40:30
yeah
Victoria Volk
00:40:30 – 00:40:51
And so instead of talking about fond memories, or having deeper conversations with your loved one, about things that you want them to know, or that you feel in your heart you need to share. Instead, you’re having to ask what color casket do you want? Where is your will?
Victoria Volk
00:40:51 – 00:40:54
You’re taking up that time for logistics?
Greg Barnsdale
00:40:55 – 00:40:56
Yes.
Victoria Volk
00:40:56 – 00:41:00
And things that, like you said, could have should have,
Greg Barnsdale
00:41:01 – 00:41:01
yeah
Victoria Volk
00:41:01 – 00:41:23
You know, and you get into that could have could have would have situation after the fact. And that’s the tragedy, I think, to have what you call deathbed estate planning
Greg Barnsdale
00:41:18 – 00:41:18
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:41:18 – 00:41:23
is that time is spent not having the most loving, fruitful, meaningful conversations and honest conversations.
Greg Barnsdale
00:41:23 – 00:42:13
Yes, yeah. Yeah, that’s very true. And I think the best times, Victoria, to have these types of meaningful deeper conversations is when families are together you know I often think of Thanksgiving and how we it’s quite I think prevalent with a lot of people to get together at Thanksgiving and think talk to each other and so on about what they’re thankful for in their life well it wouldn’t that be a great time to maybe bring up the whole aspect of our legacy and our life and what we’re thankful for to have but what we’re thankful to leave as well and to set up our loved ones for success instead of bickering and fighting and all the turmoil that can take place if we don’t bring these these things up.
Victoria Volk
00:42:14 – 00:42:34
And that’s a great point too. It’s why not have those deeper conversations when we’re all coherent, when we’re all healthy, when we’re all together and make the most of that time. It’s it is not just about planning for your death. It’s living more intentional
Greg Barnsdale
00:42:33 – 00:42:33
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:42:33 – 00:42:34
in your life.
Greg Barnsdale
00:42:35 – 00:42:58
Yep. And that’s another part that I had realized as I was creating the manuscript, was that psychologists and various different articles within that community are so more frequently saying now than embracing our mortality, actually helps us live a more meaningful life and be in the in the present moment, and I think that is very true.
Victoria Volk
00:42:59 – 00:43:12
What has all of this taught you? All of your life experience, your grief, the industries in which you’ve worked. What has your grief in these areas taught you?
Greg Barnsdale
00:43:13 – 00:43:56
Appreciate every day you have. It can change quickly and I’m sure you know I’ve met a lot of people who have and this is kind of funny to say and I joke about it in my book I’ve met a lot of people who have died who I’m sure didn’t expect to die in that day, who probably who very who I’m sure thought that they had so much more time ahead of them, yet here they are at a funeral home or a mortuary, and now the family’s, having to deal with their death, and they, you know the deceased has no input in this. The time to have the input is when you can and that’s why I’m using the slogan now, plan while you can. And I think that that’s an appropriate phrase too.
Victoria Volk
00:43:56 – 00:44:16
Well, and for as individual, like, what have your say, I think that’s an important
Greg Barnsdale
00:44:16 – 00:44:16
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:43:16 – 00:44:19
perspective to share with people is do you wanna have a say?
Greg Barnsdale
00:44:19 – 00:44:19
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:44:19 – 00:44:24
And what happens with you when you’re if you’re hospitalized or after you die or in the process of dying and you can’t speak? And do you wanna have a say? I think a 100% of people would say a resounding yes.
Victoria Volk
00:44:25 – 00:44:26
And yet we don’t take
Greg Barnsdale
00:44:27 – 00:44:27
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:44:28 – 00:44:30
We take 0 action. We take 0 action on that.
Greg Barnsdale
00:44:30 – 00:44:30
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:44:30 – 00:44:37
Yaeh. I think that’s the mind-blowing message here for people.
Greg Barnsdale
00:44:37 – 00:44:39
It is. Yes. Yep. Yep. I agree.
Greg Barnsdale
00:44:39 – 00:45:52
And you know what, Victoria? Over the last year and a half, roughly, I’ve been reaching out to a lot of people on LinkedIn who have similar who I’m assuming have similar interests from emergency room nurses to, lawyers to doctors, other financial planners and other funeral directors and even members of the faith community too about this message that I’m promoting. And I’ve told them, you know, ever since I published this book and I’ve been talking about and trying to create something that would really inspire a lot of people, and it took me a long time to really get to the point where I realized that writing a book would be a good way to do it. But the the support that I’m getting on this is actually quite strong, and it’s inspired me to start a movement, and I’m calling it the mortality mindset movement and maybe I’ve looked online I haven’t seen anybody else promoting quite this way but I’m hoping that more people get behind it but I’m referring to the mortality mindset movement where followers uphold their living legacy by becoming the best version of themselves and ultimately leave their last legacy as the best possible, And I think you had referenced that in my bio.
Victoria Volk
00:45:54 – 00:46:09
No. And I love that. And I have one I thought of another question. And so people listening to this, they might think, oh, well, it’s gonna take a lot to you know, I gotta hire this person to help me do all this. And, yes, I wanna do this, but where do, you know, where do I start?
Victoria Volk
00:46:09 – 00:46:19
And I know you mentioned in the book, it’s kind of like just kind of like an overview of all these different topics.
Greg Barnsdale
00:46:19 – 00:46:19
Yes
Victoria Volk
00:46:19 – 00:46:24
But for someone listening, like, can is this, like, a DIY thing? Like, can I, cause you know, I got this folder, and I got all these documents? Right?
Greg Barnsdale
00:46:24 – 00:46:24
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:46:24 – 00:46:26
And I just need to sit down and do it, and I just haven’t done it.
Victoria Volk
00:46:27 – 00:46:48
Is it something that can be a DIY thing and then you just need it notarized or you need it just something like that? Or do you do you have to, in air quotes, have to? Or is it recommended that you go with an expert, estate planning, financial planner, like all these different pieces? What do you have to share about that?
Greg Barnsdale
00:46:48 – 00:48:10
You can see me shaking my head here. Yes, you can. It can be a DIY project, Victoria for people that have a straightforward situation. Again, something that I try to clearly explain within my book to help educate people about when they should go beyond that and perhaps speak to an Estate Planning Lawyer and perhaps a financial adviser and or an accountant. But I when I wrote the book, I wanted to keep it as straightforward as possible because it’s a tough subject in itself to even talk about so everybody’s situation is different but if someone is has a fairly straight forward type of lifestyle where they do not, they’re not paying child support they’re not paying spousal support they don’t have any business ownership issues they don’t own property in another jurisdiction another state or another country so their situation is fairly straightforward it can very much it can be a DIY project but it comes down to communicating with your family and researching somebody these things online to get to know how things can be set up properly but for those situations where somebody has ownership in a business they’re paying child support and they own a cabin or a cottage in another state or province or country or whatever, they should be seeing a lawyer.
Greg Barnsdale
00:48:11 – 00:48:24
And I know a lot of people are literally to engage a lawyer because of the perceived cost, But avoiding that can actually result in a higher cost after the death than if the person had have engaged lawyer in the first place.
Victoria Volk
00:48:25 – 00:49:00
As you explained and illustrated in that one story you shared where it cost him $50,000 you know, in 7 years of his life. And I imagined in that 7 years, it was a lot of stress and lost time at work and lost productivity and his life lost vacations or whatever. What is the, you know, it’s not just the financial cost, it’s the emotional cost of, you know, your physical self cost and everything else that probably went into that too. So thank you for making that distinction. And sharing that.
Victoria Volk
00:49:00 – 00:49:05
Is there anything else that you would like to share that you think is important that you didn’t get to share?
Greg Barnsdale
00:49:06 – 00:49:41
Boy, it’s, I think we’ve covered pretty well the bulk of what I’d like to say here, Victoria. But other than stressing the fact that anybody listening to this should really try to lean into this. I know it’s not easy, but you can also leverage opportunities when someone else, a friend or a family member happens to be sick or if someone’s been hospitalized or someone that , you know, they bring it up that someone, a friend or something has passed away. That’s a good time to bring up your situation and say well, you know, did you know that I have a will? Or do you know where I keep my will?
Greg Barnsdale
00:49:41 – 00:49:51
You know, if something happened to me, and then just get talking about these things with those that you love and care about so that they’re aware of what you’re thinking.
Victoria Volk
00:49:51 – 00:50:27
Every time someone who my family knows passes away, I asks a specific person where her and her husband would want to be buried if they have talked about that, if they had planned that yet, because, you know, religious affiliations change over time. People, you know, may not go to the same church or they might and this is kind of the situation. And then family is actually buried, you know, out of state and they’re somewhere else. And, you know, they might be out of state or somewhere else. And so every time this happens, I ask, have you talked about this?
Victoria Volk
00:50:27 – 00:50:39
Do you know what you’d want to do? Because I know, especially, you know, like their kids would be just overwhelmed with that whole thing. I just I know they would. And every time the answer is no. Don’t know.
Victoria Volk
00:50:39 – 00:50:46
Not sure. And, you know, so it’s like one of those things where it’s like arrggh, but then at the same time
Greg Barnsdale
00:50:46 – 00:50:47
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:50:47 – 00:51:04
I haven’t gotten my crap together either. So it’s like calling the kettle black, So I don’t push it too too hard. But, again, it’s just one of those things. Like, I like you said, that’s a great opportunity to bring it up and maybe just share what you would want. Maybe share what, you know, what you want to happen with you.
Victoria Volk
00:51:04 – 00:51:35
And, you know, for me personally, like, give my organs away. Like, I don’t need them. Like, what good are they to me? And I would rather them, you know, that’s the legacy that I would love to be able to give is life to somebody else like, wow, like, how many people you know, that’s an opportunity that I see it as an opportunity. And, you know, someone in my life is like, adamant that that’s, that’s no, but, you know, I made sure my husband, and it’s on my license, I’m a donor.
Victoria Volk
00:51:36 – 00:51:53
So, you know, it’s just that’s a small action people can take too. It’s you know, if you wanna donate your organs, put that on your driver’s license. You’re stating that that’s your wishes. And, I mean, that’s at least one small piece you can do right now, today. Change it on your driver’s license.
Greg Barnsdale
00:51:53 – 00:51:53
Yes.
Victoria Volk
00:51:53 – 00:51:54
That’s what you want.
Greg Barnsdale
00:51:54 – 00:53:07
And I think a lot of people, Victoria, don’t realize how needed organ donation really is and tissue and organs can actually be donated regardless of one’s age but the other point that I wanted to bring up that you had mentioned a few minutes ago was the fact about funerals and people being buried out of state. Here in Canada we’ve seen this trend for a number of years and I’m quite sure it’s also a prevalent trend in the US as well. Is that a growing number of people don’t see the value in a traditional funeral anymore and they’re opting for other types of ceremonies to take place which are much more casual perhaps in a legion or at a hall or something instead of a traditional 2 days of visitation in a church or a funeral home and then a funeral procession to a cemetery that just isn’t happening as much anymore we seldom see a funeral hearse on the road anymore here in Canada and I’m sure it’s the case there where you are too but if people don’t want to have a funeral it’s important that your family knows that.
Greg Barnsdale
00:53:08 – 00:53:30
If you want to be cremated or if you want to have your organs donated or any of those sorts of things unless those conversations are meaningfully had it’s going to cause stress at the time of the death and it’s so easy to resolve that just by being I guess, a little more courageous and having the conversations while the opportunity exists.
Victoria Volk
00:53:30 – 00:53:39
What are the topics that generally people avoid like the plague? Politics, religion, death. Right?
Greg Barnsdale
00:53:39 – 00:53:39
Yes.
Victoria Volk
00:53:39 – 00:54:07
And so you’re not telling people if you don’t want a funeral. You’re probably not telling people, oh, I’m not this religion anymore. I’m not this faith, or I’ve completely gone away from going to church. And this I’m choosing this other path, which is happening a lot more to a lot more people are leaving the church itself, regardless of what religious affiliation it is. And so that does change how you want to probably be buried and what kind of ceremony you’re wanting to have.
Victoria Volk
00:54:07 – 00:54:10
And again, you wanna have your say.
Greg Barnsdale
00:54:11 – 00:54:11
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:54:11 – 00:54:22
You can’t have it after you’re dead, so you might wanna have those conversations as soon as possible because as we’ve talked about on this podcast, you don’t know how much time you have.
Greg Barnsdale
00:54:22 – 00:54:23
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:54:23 – 00:54:54
You think you have more time, but that’s not necessarily the case. And now that we’ve depressed everybody with that sobering thought, which I hope just prompts people to action. That’s really what this you know, why I wanted to have you on is to share your story and also to, you know, maybe light a fire under all of our butts to get our act together. And so thank you so much for sharing, your wisdom and your knowledge with us today. And where can people find your book?
Greg Barnsdale
00:54:55 – 00:55:16
The easiest place to find my book is through my website donotignoreyourmortality.com and on all the pages are reminders as to where people can buy it. But it’s available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble. It’s available in physical paperback form, audiobook and ebook and in all the major retailers.
Victoria Volk
00:55:18 – 00:55:25
Amazing. And thank you again for being here. Is there anything else you would like to share? Where can people where are you on social? Are you on social media at all?
Greg Barnsdale
00:55:25 – 00:56:37
Yes. Yes. I am that actually this was another quick interesting point that I’ll briefly mention to you 2 days before my brain surgery my stepdaughter says to me Greg we should take that video that you recorded just after you told mom you had a brain tumor the Celine Dion moment I went out to the truck we were gonna go to the mall to pick up whatever to kind of clear our minds after I told her I had a brain tumor and both of us assumed it was terminal because it was Monday morning, remember, that she was going to come with me to see this ear nose and throat specialist where he said don’t worry about it, Greg, it’s likely an acoustic neuroma and it’s non-cancerous. So that relieved us immensely. But on that Saturday morning about, I don’t know, half an hour or an hour after I told her I thought sitting in the truck waiting for her to come out I would do a little recording on my iPhone not knowing if I would ever share it so I just explained I just told my wife that I had a brain tumor and if it’s cancerous I’ve got some very serious decisions to make and that’s really all I said it was very brief so that’s what my stepdaughter wanted to put on TikTok and we did and it blew up It’s now been viewed over 1,700,000 times.
Victoria Volk
00:56:37 – 00:57:00
Wow. I don’t have TikTok, but my daughter does, and she’s always showing me different things on there. But, yeah, I mean and that’s a great way to get your this message out. I mean, if people are listening to that, I imagine they’re wanna follow-up and hear how your story played out. And did that give you some traction in sharing this message?
Greg Barnsdale
00:57:00 – 00:57:38
Well, it did. It didn’t result in a lot of, book sales, but it resulted in a lot of a fair amount of attention. And I’ve added some other videos that that a whole supplement, this whole message of mine and I’m on all the other major platforms as well but on TikTok my handle or name is author mortality and anybody will see Greg Barnsdale on there in the various videos but yes I’m on LinkedIn I’m on YouTube and Facebook etcetera and if so if anybody does a search for do not ignore your mortality and my name Greg Barnsdale that they’ll see me.
Victoria Volk
00:57:39 – 00:57:42
And I will put the links in the show notes for people to get to connect with you as well.
Greg Barnsdale
00:57:42 – 00:57:42
Thank you.
Victoria Volk
00:57:42 – 00:58:08
And thank you so much for your time today and sharing. I enjoyed this conversation and I, the one action I will do today, I will do this today, I will take out my folder with all of my documents, which is in the safe, and I will take it out as a reminder to myself to get crack a lacking.
Greg Barnsdale
00:58:09 – 00:58:10
Good. Good for you.
Victoria Volk
00:58:10 – 00:58:13
Thank you for lighting the fire under my butt today.
Greg Barnsdale
00:58:14 – 00:58:16
You’re welcome. Thanks for having me.
Victoria Volk
00:58:16 – 00:58:21
And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love.
Childhood Grief, Educational, Grieving Voices Guest, Life with Human Design, Parenting, Pespective |
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Are you ready to embark on a journey that could transform your understanding of purpose, parenting, and personal healing?
This week on Grieving Voices, I welcomed Alexandra Cole, a former corporate consultant turned human design coach. After a decade in the Fortune 500 sector, Alexandra pivoted to guiding individuals and families in finding their purpose through human design—a system that combines astrology, I Ching, Kabbalah, and the chakras.
Born in London and raised in Amsterdam with an education from Princeton University, she now resides in Santa Barbara with her husband and young son. Her journey into motherhood inspired “Thriving by Design,” a toolkit designed for parents to understand their child’s unique traits.
Alexandra shares her personal story of loss—losing her mother at age ten—and how it shaped her emotional world. She explains how understanding one’s own human design can be instrumental during grief and aiding parents to align better with their children’s innate designs.
She discusses the five energy types within human design: Manifestors (initiators), Projectors (guides), Generators, & Manifesting Generators (consistent workers who need joy-based work). Each type has different ways of investing energy for fulfillment and purpose. The conversation also delves into parenting aligned with your child’s energy type—such important information and particularly helpful when parenting grieving children.
This insightful discussion highlights how embracing our inherent nature according to our human design can lead us toward more authentic and aligned lives.
If you’re curious about how your unique blueprint can shape your way forward—in joyous times or challenging ones—I encourage you to learn your human design and listen to this episode because sometimes the most authentic path is the one that is tailor-made just for us.
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Unlocking the Power of Human Design in Grieving, Parenting, and Self-Discovery
In today’s fast-paced world, where change is constant and life often throws us curveballs, understanding ourselves and our loved ones can sometimes feel like deciphering an enigmatic puzzle. But what if there was a blueprint—a design—that could help us navigate these complexities with greater ease? Enter Human Design, a revolutionary system that combines ancient wisdom with modern science to offer profound insights into our personalities.
Recently on Grieving Voices, we had the pleasure of hosting Alexandra Cole—once a corporate consultant for Fortune 500 companies who has now found her calling as a human design coach. With her international background and diverse experiences shaping her approach to coaching, she shared how human design has become an invaluable tool for personal growth during grief, enhancing parenting techniques, and managing life’s myriad challenges.
The Transformation Journey: From Corporate Consulting to Human Design
Alexandra’s journey from advising corporations to coaching individuals speaks volumes about the transformative power of purpose. Her work through “Thriving by Design” demonstrates how aligning one’s career with their inner calling can lead not only to personal fulfillment but also make significant impacts on others’ lives.
Understanding Ourselves Through Grief
Grief is unique to every individual; it shapes itself around each person’s energy type. Alexandra emphasizes that knowing your human design can reveal personalized paths for healing when you’re navigating loss or adversity. For example:
– **Manifestors** may need solitude to initiate their own grieving process.
– **Projectors** might seek deep understanding before they can find closure.
– **Generators** require activities that reignite their spark amidst sorrow.
– **Manifesting Generators**, much like generators but with added complexity due to their multifaceted nature.
– Lastly,** Reflectors**, whose sensitivity means they deeply mirror those around them—and thus may absorb collective grief which needs careful navigation.
By recognizing these patterns within ourselves based on our energy types in times of mourning or crisis—we allow space for compassion towards self-healing journeys tailored just right for us.
Parental Guidance Enhanced by Human Design
Parenting is arguably one of life’s most challenging yet rewarding roles—and here too human design offers remarkable guidance. By acknowledging each child’s unique energy type (be it Manifestor or Reflector), parents are better equipped at fostering environments where children thrive authentically rather than conforming them into ill-fitting societal molds.
For instance:
– Encourage your child when you see them light up doing something they love—this physical response signals alignment with their true nature.
– Recognize that while Generators have abundant energy reserves—they must be wary not becoming ‘yes people’, overcommitting themselves away from joyous pursuits
– Understand Reflectors’ need for supportive surroundings given their heightened sensitivities reflecting back the health—or dis-ease—of communities around them
This knowledge doesn’t just cultivate healthier relationships between parent-child dynamics; it paves the way toward nurturing well-rounded individuals grounded in self-awareness from early stages onward.
Better Relationships Through Energetic Understanding
Human design isn’t limited solely to introspection—it extends outwardly enrichening relational dynamics too! Partnerships benefit immensely when both parties respect differing energetic requirements (imagine respecting your partner’s need for dynamic mornings versus quiet evenings). This framework fosters deeper empathy & effective communication leading towards harmonious co-existence amid diversity in temperaments & preferences alike!
Resources at Your Fingertips
Alexandra provides multiple avenues through which anyone interested can delve further into this transformative field:
1) Personal sessions via alexandracole.com
2) Wellness products including customized reports at thrivingbydesign.com
3) Her book “The Purpose Playbook”, guides readers towards living out authentic purposes
These resources serve as tools aiding one along paths whether seeking solace during grief-stricken times or simply aspiring towards more aligned living overall – all underscored by honoring inherent uniqueness above external expectations thrust upon us!
As we wrapped up our conversation filled with gratitude & enlightenment —it became clear why nurturing individuality holds paramount importance across facets ranging from parenting strategies down even unto embracing personal narratives woven uniquely within tapestries called ‘life’.
To live authentically—isn’t just sound advice—it’s foundational ethos empowering thriving existences no matter what storms come ashore!
Episode Transcription:
Victoria Volk
00:00:00 – 00:00:27
Thank you so much for tuning in to grieving voices. I’m very excited to, bring a guest. We haven’t had a guest in a little while here on the podcast. And today, Alexandra Cole is joining me. She is a former corporate consultant turned human design coach after a decade of helping fortune 500 identify and articulate their why she pivoted to help individuals, families, and couples do the same.
Victoria Volk
00:00:27 – 00:01:18
She uses human design as a tool to help her clients pursue their purpose with more clarity and confidence. Alexander is passionate about translating insights from her clients, human design charts into actionable strategies for optimizing their relationships, well-being, careers, finances, and family life. She was born in London, raised in Amsterdam, educated at Princeton University, and now lives in Santa Barbara, California with her husband and 2 year old son. Becoming a mother inspired her to create thriving by design, a collection of tools, cheat sheets, and online courses designed to give parents insight into their child’s unique sensitivities, preferences, and gifts, as well as tactical tips for how to support them. Alexandra is happiest when moving her body, eating good food, exploring new places, and in deep conversation with new or old friends.
Victoria Volk
00:01:19 – 00:01:35
I love that. I love deep conversation too. And I love human design, and I honestly can’t even remember how I got into your sphere, but I did. And you share the same name as my middle Alexandra. I love the name.
Victoria Volk
00:01:35 – 00:01:53
Beautiful name. But there was something I found interesting when I was looking into, I don’t know, I opened an email, then you you know, you get down a rabbit hole. And then I found your wellness. The wellness design report or well by well by design report. And that’s how we kind of connected.
Victoria Volk
00:01:53 – 00:02:30
And I’m just thinking, like, gosh, this would be a really good topic for to bring on the podcast for people, especially particularly grievers who, you know, sometimes you just don’t know what you need. And this well by design report can be a good place to start. Like, if I just wanna feel better, how can I feel better that is aligned with who I am and how I was created and how I was made? Right? And, and I absolutely love also the idea of arming parents with information and knowledge to help them be let’s see.
Victoria Volk
00:02:30 – 00:02:37
What’s the word I wanna use? A more aligned parent for their child.
Alexandra Cole
00:02:32 – 00:02:32
Yeah. 100%
Victoria Volk
00:02:33 – 00:02:37
Based on their child’s design. Right?
Alexandra Cole
00:02:37 – 00:02:37
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:02:38 – 00:03:00
Because if youngest is 15, if I would have known what I know now about human design, about my own design, about my kids, All 3 of them are manifesting generators. I’m a manifester. Like, I was exhausted. Like, motherhood, like, totally exhausted me to the point where, like, you can question, like, oh my god.
Victoria Volk
00:03:00 – 00:03:02
What did I sign up for?
Alexandra Cole
00:03:03 – 00:03:12
I can only imagine. I have one little manifesting generator, and that’s already a lot. I can’t imagine having 3 of them running around.
Victoria Volk
00:03:12 – 00:03:16
And they’re all, like, the first 2 or 18 months apart and the yeah.
Alexandra Cole
00:03:16 – 00:03:16
Wow.
Victoria Volk
00:03:16 – 00:03:20
Yeah. I had 3 under in 5 under 5 years. So
Alexandra Cole
00:03:20 – 00:04:21
That’s impressive. Especially as a manifester, that is incredibly impressive. And, I mean, I would also say too, from a grief perspective, I think both of us lost a parent very young in life. And if I had understood my design better or if, God forbid, anything like that ever happens in my immediate family, having human design as a tool to just better understand a child’s emotional world and how they’re designed to navigate these types of major traumas and just life changing events, especially when it comes to kind of your environment and how that shifts. It allows you to show up in a much more kind of supportive way for that child because you know exactly kind of what their patterning is and how to, yes, align with that and support that in how you are tending to them and caring for them.
Victoria Volk
00:04:21 – 00:04:39
I really wanna get to your story in how you got to where you are in with human design and how this all came to be. And so would you please take us back in time and to that loss and how like, what transpired in the in between?
Alexandra Cole
00:04:40 – 00:05:22
Oh, man. That loss was early on and probably well before, obviously, human design even was at all in my kind of frame of reference, but I lost my mom to breast cancer at age 10. I’m the oldest of 3 kids, and at the time, we were living in the Netherlands. And my dad did an incredible job of kind of stepping in and trying to play Mom and Dad, we were surrounded by an incredible support system. So all things considered, I look back and can only feel grateful in a way for having experienced it in the way that I did.
Alexandra Cole
00:05:22 – 00:06:25
But nonetheless, right, at 10 years old, experiencing such a huge loss, especially as the eldest child, I think, forced me to grow up very very quickly and forced me to kind of grapple with some of these, like, bigger life questions, a lot earlier on than the average 10 year old, let’s say. So I think I was quite a mature teenager in terms of my life experience, but also kind of, like, my way of connecting and understanding others. And especially when it came to my emotional world, I was very aware of all the emotions I was feeling. I just didn’t necessarily feel like it was appropriate for me to express those anymore because I wanted to be strong for my family. So for a good 8 years, I shut down my own kind of emotional response and probably a huge part of that grieving process.
Alexandra Cole
00:06:26 – 00:07:01
Until fast forward at 18, I moved from the Netherlands to the United States, and my mom had actually studied in the United States. So it was kind of a little bit of, like, following in her footsteps. And I get here, and within the 1st year, I fall madly in love with this American man. And it was the first time since losing my mom that I had this huge fear of losing this individual and the impact that that might have. And it kind of actually opened the door for me to experience grief because I was, 1, I think, far enough removed from my family where I felt like I could do that.
Alexandra Cole
00:07:01 – 00:07:55
And 2, I had this trigger of someone I cared so deeply about, and the thought of losing him was, like, such a kind of miserable like, the the pain was, like, so great associated with that that I allowed myself to finally grieve, and I think I cried. Like, basically, I made up for those 8 years of not shedding a tear. And this poor man, who I’m now married to, so I can I can say this? Like, he was incredible, but he probably didn’t understand everything that I was kind of processing and going through at the moment itself. Anyway, fast forward a few years, I graduated college and picked the path of least resistance in the sense that I very much went down the road that I felt like everyone expected me to and that I felt pressured to in a way, which was a very kind of corporate path in management consulting.
Alexandra Cole
00:07:56 – 00:08:29
And I kinda had most of my life planned out. I was a very kind of a logical, rational thinker when it came to kind of where I thought I was heading. And maybe that was also part of all of those years of kind of shutting down that emotional world even though my emotions, especially according to human design, are my most trustworthy inner compass. I just wasn’t listening to them. A few years into that career, a friend of mine asked me to help her brainstorm a new business idea that she had.
Alexandra Cole
00:08:30 – 00:09:09
And I would meet with her before work. I would meet with her after work, and I was doing 12 to 16 hour days. So this was like a commitment to meet with her, but I became so passionate about what it was that she was working on to the point that she eventually asked me to leave my job and cofound this company with her. And I think I thought about it for maybe a few days and felt this full body just yes in response to it. It was a complete conviction that this was what I was meant to do, and it came from this place of genuine excitement and passion.
Alexandra Cole
00:09:10 – 00:09:28
And it was such a departure from how I had lived my life before, which was very much kind of like, mind oriented that the fact and I did. I ended up leaving my job, starting this company with her, and we had no clients. We had no track record. We had no funding. We had no experience.
Alexandra Cole
00:09:28 – 00:10:07
Nothing. We made it all work, but it was a few months after that that I reflected on this this leap and how I was able to make it with so much confidence and conviction when really there was, you know, no logical reason to do so. And it set me on this path of self development, trying to better understand what that was inside of me and why I finally allowed that to make the decision instead of the kind of rational brain. And that’s what ultimately led me to discover human design, which told me, like, hey. Listen.
Alexandra Cole
00:10:07 – 00:10:52
You’re actually here to listen to your gut, to listen to your emotions. And the more I started leaning into that, the more myself I felt. Like, I had I realized that for those past, like, 10, 12 years, I had been kind of a you know, trying again to live up to this expectation that I thought other people had of me, of who I needed to be for them in that moment, and had lost the essence of who I was along the way. And so that’s really what human design allowed me to do. And after several years of just kind of using it to heal myself and to allow myself to grieve in many ways, I started using it with other people, friends and family at first.
Alexandra Cole
00:10:52 – 00:11:14
And over the course of a few years, it kind of blossomed into this side hustle and then something more than a side hustle. And now here I am working with clients every day, helping them better understand, you know, the most aligned use of their energy and how to become a more authentic version of themselves.
Victoria Volk
00:11:15 – 00:11:56
I’m curious too for you. I’m sure I already know the answer. But what if what human design has helped me to is to better understand the environment in which I lived with the people that I shared it with. Right? So for instance, especially a parent, you know, if you don’t have their exact details, you know, birthplace and things like that, it can be a little difficult, but what did that give you when you, when you started to learn more about human design and, and for being so young and losing your mother, did it help you to really get to know her in a way that you couldn’t because she’d passed, you know, through her human design?
Alexandra Cole
00:11:57 – 00:12:06
Such a good question. Yes. It did really help me with that. And, also, it helped me see certain parts of myself that I share with her. Right?
Alexandra Cole
00:12:06 – 00:12:47
And also understand why certain aspects of her are so memorable to me and other parts, you know, you it’s it’s hard for you to understand unless someone else kinda tells a story and you’re like, like, oh, right. I guess she was like that too. One thing that human design really helped me understand, though, is the fact that so my dad is also an emotional. He’s an emotional manifesting generator, and my brother and sister are non emotionals. And so for people who aren’t familiar with human design, what this means is that both my dad and I experience the world first and foremost through our own emotional lens.
Alexandra Cole
00:12:47 – 00:13:34
Like, we have this inherent emotional bias about how we are experiencing everything around us. And we feel our own emotions first and foremost, and they’re very much supposed to inform how we operate. My brother and sister, they feel other people’s emotions first and foremost. So their kind of experience of the world is more shaped by other people’s emotions, and they sometimes have a harder time distinguishing where they end and where someone else begins. And I think with if you think about our kind of family unit, obviously, my dad is going through an insurmountable amount of grief and was making a concerted effort to actually share that grief with us.
Alexandra Cole
00:13:34 – 00:13:43
Right? He took the approach of, I wanna be open with my kids. I wanna talk about how sad I am. Right? And so he did that.
Alexandra Cole
00:13:44 – 00:14:09
But because both my brother and sister are open emotions, they were incredibly sensitive to that. So they picked up on everything and then started kind of absorbing it and carrying that weight. And I think as a 10 year old, I intuitively saw that and decided, you know, there’s not there’s no space for another emotional in this family. Right? Like, I can’t do that same thing.
Alexandra Cole
00:14:09 – 00:15:00
So I’m just gonna kind of, like, shut mine down so that my dad can have that space and we can kind of all absorb or at least maybe even with my siblings. Like, I’m gonna try and shield them from my dad’s emotions, right, instead of add to that kind of, like, fire hose effect. Like, recognizing that and the role that made forced me to play has been really helpful, not just in kind of making sense of kind of my journey, but also making sense in my relationship with my dad and why certain things that he does trigger me so much. Right? And so I think those that, especially in these past kind of 5 years in becoming a mom, I’ve reflected on this a lot, and human design has definitely been, invaluable in that process.
Victoria Volk
00:15:02 – 00:15:05
And how has that shaped how you parent your son?
Alexandra Cole
00:15:05 – 00:15:37
So my son is also an emotional, and my husband is a nonemotional. So I think just knowing what I know about human design, the biggest takeaway here is that kids, a lot of it is nature. Right? They come into this world with a certain set of patterns and behaviors and sensitivities. And as parents, there’s this tendency to want to kind of manage and control that.
Alexandra Cole
00:15:37 – 00:15:55
And we think that’s that we’re protecting them in a way. Right? We think we’re we’re setting them up for success. But, really, what I’ve learned is that the best thing you can do as a parent is kind of do less. Like, step back and allow them to kind of grow into that little human they’re designed to be.
Alexandra Cole
00:15:55 – 00:16:40
And having their human design chart makes that much easier because you can kind of see, oh, wait. Actually, they’re living their design because especially when who they’re designed to be might be different from you or opposite from you in terms of how their emotions work or how they’re designed to communicate or make decisions. We only know what we know and we look at the world again through that kind of, like, biased lens. And so when you’re raising a child, it’s really hard to let go of that, and human design has allowed me to do that. So, for example, when my son has an emotional reaction to something, and he’s a very emotional child because his first reaction is always gonna be this, like, big emotional outburst.
Alexandra Cole
00:16:40 – 00:16:48
My husband’s response to that typically is, you’re okay. You’re okay. You’re okay. There’s no need cry. No tears.
Alexandra Cole
00:16:48 – 00:17:10
No tears. Right? Like, that’s just because he is not emotional, so he doesn’t understand the significance of allowing yourself to kind of feel those feelings. I, on the other hand, and now I’ve also, you know, not trained, but coached my husband to respond in a similar way, I will just give my son a big hug and say, let it out. Let’s ride this emotional wave together.
Alexandra Cole
00:17:10 – 00:17:34
Right? Like, tell me what you’re feeling. Tell me what happened. Right? And I don’t ever try to shut that down because I know that this if I start to kind of manipulate his emotional experience, he is gonna lose it’s like losing a limb, right, for him because it’s such an important way of how he is designed to make sense of the world.
Alexandra Cole
00:17:35 – 00:17:50
And if he doesn’t feel like he can trust it or he feels like it’s wrong to respond emotionally, he’s gonna do what I did for 8 years and pay the price. So that’s just one small example of how I’m using this as a parent.
Victoria Volk
00:17:50 – 00:17:57
And when it comes to grief, that is a massively important example. Massively.
Alexandra Cole
00:17:57 – 00:17:57
Yes. Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:17:58 – 00:18:15
And if you if your child is a manifester, good luck to you. Oh. I know. You know, I’ve learned, like, I was probably just an some sort of enigma to my mother. Like but you know what?
Victoria Volk
00:18:15 – 00:18:23
I learned that my mother was is a projector, which I was like, woah. That makes sense.
Alexandra Cole
00:18:24 – 00:18:47
Yeah. That makes so much sense. And that’s one of the things that I love about human design is it does give it allows you to see other people in a much more objective way, where you can start to understand, oh, this is why I must have been so challenging for my mom. Right? And it is just it doesn’t excuse any behavior.
Alexandra Cole
00:18:47 – 00:19:25
It just gives you a different lens through which to kind of witness and observe and see the things that happened, because, yeah, as a manifester, right, part of what you’re here to do is to trigger people, like, in a way. Right? Like, you are here to challenge people. And sometimes that can feel really uncomfortable. And if as a parent, you’re not cut out for that or you don’t know how to handle that and you’re not aware of where that’s coming from, it can be really challenging.
Alexandra Cole
00:19:25 – 00:19:41
And she would just have wanted to kind of shut your manifesting tendencies down. Right? Or in an effort to protect you, she’s like, you can’t be this big. I need to, like, I need to limit this person. I need to kind of, like, you know, encourage them to control it.
Alexandra Cole
00:19:42 – 00:19:52
Exactly. Exactly. When, really, what a manifester kid needs to be able to do is, like, do their thing. And with complete freedom, throw a tantrum. Right?
Alexandra Cole
00:19:52 – 00:20:12
Like, let it out, get angry, and move on. But if you tell them, like, you can’t do that, that’s not appropriate, That manifestor is gonna grow up to be a shell of who they actually could be. Because, again, they don’t trust any of those, like, inner voices that are communicating to them constantly or trying to.
Victoria Volk
00:20:13 – 00:20:27
Amen to that. I can tell you wholeheartedly. Because I first discovered human design, like, a little over a year ago.
Alexandra Cole
00:20:20 – 00:20:20
Wow!
Victoria Volk
00:20:20 – 00:20:26
So it has been like yeah.
Alexandra Cole
00:20:27 – 00:20:27
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:20:27 – 00:20:53
Mind blowing. So since we’re on this topic, can you quickly run down do a rundown of, like, the child You describe the child manifestor because that’s what I am. But can you quickly just kinda describe the other types, energy types.
Alexandra Cole
00:20:40 – 00:20:40
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:20:40 – 00:20:53
Children, for people who are listening, who may feel like there’s I I think this can help with conflict within parent child dynamics. So I think it’s I’m glad the conversation went here.
Victoria Volk
00:20:53 – 00:20:53
So.
Alexandra Cole
00:20:54 – 00:21:20
Absolutely. And as I describe it too, this also applies to adults, and to inner children. Like, a lot of the time when I talk about when I, you know, share content through that parenting lens, I get responses from people that say, you know, this helped me so much to heal my inner child Mhmm. And trauma that I experienced as a kid, just understanding what that, like, little version of me must have been experiencing in that moment. So there’s 5 energy types.
Alexandra Cole
00:21:20 – 00:22:13
And just kind of at a very high level, this whole system, human design, essentially, it’s based on your birth time date and place and the energetic frequency that was present in the exact moment you took your first breath. And you wanna imagine it’s like you were imprinted with this energetic frequency. And the chart itself is like that, like, blueprint to how your energy is designed to operate in the most authentic and the most effortless way. Right? Like, when you are listening to that blueprint and operating in alignment with it, there’s this element of flow to life where you’re still gonna encounter challenging situations, but you’ll move through them with a sense of confidence and conviction and trust in your own kind of inner authority to be able to overcome those things.
Alexandra Cole
00:22:14 – 00:23:12
So the foundation of this system is something that we call an energy type, and I often describe it as, like, the outer layer of the onion where there are so many more nuanced layers to the system that get into an incredible amount of detail in terms of, you know, how you’re designed to eat, the types of environments that are most supportive for you, how you’re designed to communicate and emote and all those things. But the first piece to understand is your energy type. There’s 5 different energy types, and each type has a slightly different way of investing energy in order to get the greatest return on that investment in terms of fulfillment and purpose and reward. So we talked about the manifestor and the manifestor little kid. Manifestors, their energy is designed to be quite extreme in terms of highs and lows.
Alexandra Cole
00:23:12 – 00:23:55
Like, they’ll have these, like, huge creative emotional bursts where literally they can go for days on this, like, energetic high, and then it’ll come crashing down and they will need to rest, reset, recharge. But, ultimately, that’s because manifestor’s role in this world is to initiate, to create things, to challenge that status quo and initiate newness and novelty. And so you need a lot of, like, powerful energy to do that, and you also need to not give a damn about everyone else around you. And that’s that triggering piece that I was talking about. And that’s why when you meet a little manifestor kid, they’re just off doing their thing.
Alexandra Cole
00:23:55 – 00:24:04
Right? Like, they get this urge. They need to, you know, dig a hole in the garden. And they just grab the shovel, and they just start digging. Right?
Alexandra Cole
00:24:04 – 00:24:27
They’re not here to ask for permission. They’re not here to look for validation. They’re just here to follow those urges and convictions. And as a parent, again, that can be really triggering because we’re told we have to control our kids, and our kids’ behavior is a reflection on us. And so when that kid just grabs that shovel without asking and starts digging, your immediate reaction is, hey.
Alexandra Cole
00:24:27 – 00:24:54
You didn’t you didn’t ask me. We can’t just do that. Right? And so you can imagine how that leads to a lot of pressure and conditioning for that child to not be themselves and to adapt and adjust. And suddenly, these manifestors start to ask for permission and look for validation, which prevents them from starting the magical movements and things that they are supposed to.
Alexandra Cole
00:24:54 – 00:25:37
So that’s the manifestor kit. Then the second kind of, group I’d like to talk about are projectors. So projectors make up about 20% of the population, and projectors are very much the kind of guides. So if manifestors are here to kind of initiate and be the spark, Projectors are here to refine and guide and optimize. And so projectors actually have a much more moderate ebb and flow of energy, and they are really most effective when they can focus on one thing at a time and dedicate themselves to something for a short intense burst of time, and then they too need to kind of rest and reset.
Alexandra Cole
00:25:37 – 00:26:15
So projector kids are the types of kids that, one, are gonna be fascinated by how things work and kind of optimizing or understanding how to, kind of improve or better something. Like, they love fixing and solving things. And they’re gonna be able to kind of sit quietly working on a puzzle or with some type of toy for that, like, kind of short intense burst of time. And then they’re going to need to kind of rest their mind and sit back and almost observe. Right?
Alexandra Cole
00:26:15 – 00:26:50
There’s a there’s a lot of power for a projector in just being free to observe instead of there being pressure to actually create or output. Projectors sometimes, though, because they have that ability to see how something can be done better, they can come across as quite critical. And if they tend to kind of share their insights and observations without being invited to do so, it can come across as a little bit of a, like, know it all. Right? Or, again, overly, like, a glass half-empty kind of thing.
Alexandra Cole
00:26:50 – 00:27:44
And so for projectors, the name of the game is really learning to wait for that invitation, to wait to be recognized, to wait to be acknowledged, to wait for someone to kind of celebrate your ability to problem solve or your natural gifts that all projectors have and kind of invite you to share those. So if you have a projector child, really being mindful that, like, all they want is for you to see them clearly and for you to invite them to share their gifts. They’re not here to go and initiate in the same way that manifestors are. They’re really here to be a little bit more passive until you invite them in. And they also are gonna need a lot of alone time, and they are going to do best when they have your 1 on 1 attention as opposed to, you know, bigger groups of people, which can be quite overwhelming for that projector initially.
Alexandra Cole
00:27:44 – 00:28:34
Now we get to the largest cohort of people, and that is the generators and the manifesting generators. So these two groups together make up about 70% of the population, and that’s because this group’s energy is very consistent. These generators and manifesting generators are here to almost act as, like, the motors of society in the sense that they have this ability to apply themselves in a very consistent, persistent way to things. And they don’t have that ebb and flow as much as the manifestors and the projectors do. Now for generators and manifesting generators, it’s really important that they are applying that energy to think that excitement excite them and bring them joy.
Alexandra Cole
00:28:34 – 00:29:01
So for them, it’s a really kind of physical response that they will feel towards something. Even, you know, if you have a generator, a manifesting generator child, pay attention to what their body does when they are loving what they’re doing. Right? Whether it’s they’re eating their favorite food and you hear them just go, like, mmm, they, like, start making noises. Or my son, when he’s doing something that he really enjoys, he starts to rock back and forth.
Alexandra Cole
00:29:01 – 00:29:28
Right? Or he does this, like, happy dance. It’s a very physical response. And so as a parent, pay attention to where what gives your kids that physical response because that’s a clear telltale sign that they’re meant to do more of it, that it’s a great use of their time and energy. When generators and manifesting generators are forced to do things that don’t really excite them or light them up, it’ll be quite draining.
Alexandra Cole
00:29:28 – 00:30:35
But because they have that consistent source of energy, they don’t necessarily hit that point of burnout like a manifestor or a projector will. And so what’s really hard is that most adult generators and manifesting generators have been conditioned to basically be these martyrs that say yes to every request, do a lot of stuff for other people because it makes that other person happy, and they happen to have the energetic capacity to do so. But they’ve lost touch with what actually brings them joy and what excites them. And so they’re operating at, you know, 50 to 60% of their full potential, and that full potential can only be accessed when they prioritize their own joy and excitement. And so as a parent of a young generator and manifesting generator, helping them recognize that, helping them realize that, like, they don’t have to say yes to doing what other people want them to do, and it is completely valid to prioritize their own needs and what brings them joy, even over yours as the parent.
Alexandra Cole
00:30:35 – 00:31:11
Right? Like, that’s a really important lesson for them to learn. The slight difference between these two types is that whereas generators can be a little bit more focused in their application of energy, manifesting generators are nonlinear beings, and that they have a little bit of that manifestor erratic nature while they will move very quickly from one interest to the other, and they love a variety of things. And they’re like I mean, with my son, for example, I’ve learned to never clean up after him because I think he’s done. And I then, as the generator mom, I’m like, okay.
Alexandra Cole
00:31:11 – 00:31:34
I’m gonna start to organize and clean this up. But, actually, he wants to circle back to it an hour from now after he’s, like, pulled out another 5 other toys. Right? And when we’re on an airplane, I have to have, like, you know, 20 different activities versus if I had a projector child, maybe I just need 3 and he could play with each for an hour. My son needs to just, like, constantly cycle through things.
Alexandra Cole
00:31:35 – 00:32:16
So that’s the generator manifesting generator, and then the very last type is a reflector. And reflectors are just as the name suggests. They’re like these magical unicorn snowflake kids that are highly sensitive and really designed to reflect the health and well-being of whatever community that they are a part of. So they are the product of their environment in many ways, And a reflector is like a mirror. So, if you have a reflector in your family, looking at them and how they’re doing and how they’re showing up and what their health and well-being is like is going to tell you what’s going on with the rest of the family.
Alexandra Cole
00:32:17 – 00:32:44
Because they are constantly absorbing everyone else’s energy, emotions, fears. Right? All of that. And in a way, they are then reflecting that back to you. And so for reflector children, it’s really important for them to understand how to manage this hypersensitivity because it can really throw you.
Alexandra Cole
00:32:44 – 00:33:12
Right? Because you can be feeling totally good, and then one person walks into the room. Right? Or one kid comes to class that day and is dealing with something really, really and you don’t even know what it is, but you feel in your body suddenly this grief or pain or anger that isn’t yours, and yet you’re still experiencing it as if it is. And so that’s something that is a lot for a little child to handle.
Alexandra Cole
00:33:12 – 00:33:57
And you might notice that reflectors do get sick more frequently. They do feel overwhelmed a lot depending and they’re very sensitive to environment, people as well as just, like, the energy and the vibe of the setting that they’re in. So as a parent, the best thing that you can do with a Reflector Child is teach them that a lot of the time what they’re experiencing isn’t actually theirs to carry. Right? And, also, be super mindful of, like, what are the environments and people that they seem most at peace around, and how can I make sure we’re spending most of our time in those types of places and avoiding the people that seem to, like, have the greatest triggering effect on them?
Victoria Volk
00:33:58 – 00:33:59
That was a lot.
Alexandra Cole
00:33:59 – 00:33:59
I know.
Victoria Volk
00:34:00 – 00:34:00
Thank you so much.
Victoria Volk
00:34:00 – 00:34:15
No. In a good way. In a in a good way because I hope people listening can are reflecting on their own lives and take from what you shared and apply it. And, hopefully, they already know their body type or their energy type.
Alexandra Cole
00:34:15 – 00:34:16
Energy type.
Victoria Volk
00:34:16 – 00:34:38
Yep. And or have their design. Right? They know their design. And if you don’t, I’m gonna put a link in the show notes where you can find that information out and then come back and listen to this again and find your children’s human design and listen to this, like, 2 or 3 times if you have to really take in what was shared because I think it’s so important.
Victoria Volk
00:34:38 – 00:34:49
The stuff that we I can’t even imagine being a reflector. Like, that just sounds so exhausting to me. Do I even know a reflector? I don’t even know if I know a reflector.
Alexandra Cole
00:34:50 – 00:34:54
I mean, they’re 1 only 1% of the population. So it’s possible that you don’t.
Victoria Volk
00:34:54 – 00:34:57
Well, in manifestors are, like, 9%. Right?
Alexandra Cole
00:34:57 – 00:34:57
Mmm.Yup
Victoria Volk
00:34:57 – 00:35:08
So we’re kind of a rare breed too in a way, but no. Thank you so much for all of that. It’s just good for me. I’ve heard it, you know, I’ve heard it in other ways. And it’s when you hear it a different way, it’s just yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:35:08 – 00:35:27
I really love that. So thank you so much. I wanna go back to, like, your story though, and, like, how this all kind of played out, like, so with your relationship so when you first met your now husband, did you know his human design? Were you into human design? Not not at that time.
Victoria Volk
00:35:27 – 00:35:28
Not yet.
Alexandra Cole
00:35:28 – 00:35:30
Nope. Not yet at all.
Victoria Volk
00:35:30 – 00:35:30
Yeah.
Alexandra Cole
00:35:31 – 00:35:56
Yep. And it’s been I I often credit human design to, you know, the fact that we still have a thriving relationship now 16 years later. Because neither of us were really planning on meeting our person that young. We still wanted to do a lot and travel a lot. And we, especially him, needed a lot of freedom to explore all those things before we settled down.
Alexandra Cole
00:35:56 – 00:36:29
So we didn’t get married until 10 years after we met, and then we took another few years before we had our son. But learning about his human design allowed me to be such a better partner for him because up until I learned about it, there were certain aspects. So he’s a projector, right, which, like I said, projectors need a lot of alone time. And I remember so distinctly, even in college too, you know, we’d have these, like, free afternoons. And my immediate response was, great.
Alexandra Cole
00:36:29 – 00:36:50
Let’s go do something. And you could tell he did not want to. Sometimes he kind of appeased me, but most of the time, it’s like, I just I just kinda wanna be by myself in my room. And I could not understand, and I would take it personally. So I would assume, oh, he’s not into me or he’s not into me as much as I’m into him.
Alexandra Cole
00:36:50 – 00:37:25
Right? And when I discovered that he was a projector, it all made so much sense. And I could finally stop taking those things personally because he would just sit in his room and watch a movie. And in my head, I’m like, well, I could just watch the movie with you, but it wouldn’t have been the same. Like, he really needed to be in his own aura, his own energy in order to fully recharge from the just busyness of being in college and playing a sport and you know, the whole social scene and life, like, that was really important for him.
Alexandra Cole
00:37:25 – 00:38:27
And I wish I knew in college because it would have saved me a lot of anxiety. But especially now also, you know, becoming parents and understanding, for example, that for a projector, starting his day slowly is really really supportive and allows him to show up more fully as a dad and as a partner later on in the day. Whereas for me, as a generator, I kind of wake up and immediate this is not true for all generators, but for me, I kind of have this, like, you know, steady current of energy that I can use as a parent. And so I take the majority of the morning shifts because I know that then later on, if I need him around dinner time, my husband’s gonna be present and ready to go. But if I or on the mornings where he does have to do the, you know, 6:30, 7 AM wake up, by the end of the day, he’s shot, and he needs more of that solo time to recharge.
Alexandra Cole
00:38:27 – 00:39:12
So it’s just learning to understand that and then not comparing his energetic outputs, right, to mine because they’re incomparable, and one isn’t better than the other. It’s just different. So when he has a solo weekend, for example, my husband knows that he can only be on, quote unquote, as that parent for 2, 3 hours at a time comfortably before it starts to become really really difficult. So he will, in advance, make sure he’s got his parents that are gonna take a little window, that we’ve got a babysitter that might take the little window to set him up for success. Whereas I am much better able to just kind of grind it out for 48 hours.
Alexandra Cole
00:39:12 – 00:39:36
Right? And for me, the more important thing is making sure that throughout the day, I get to do things that excite me and bring me joy and that I get to take my son to, like, my favorite coffee shop or treat us to, you know, a delicious dinner or get an hour at my, like, favorite Pilates studio. Like, that’s much more important to me and is not at all significant to my husband in that case.
Victoria Volk
00:39:36 – 00:39:45
I love that. What’s interesting is that I learned that my husband and I, he’s like the male version of me. We’re both
Alexandra Cole
00:39:45 – 00:39:47
Is he also a manifestor?
Victoria Volk
00:39:47 – 00:39:51
4, 6 emotional manifestor. Exactly.
Alexandra Cole
00:39:49 – 00:39:50
Wow.
Victoria Volk
00:39:51 – 00:39:51
He and I both.
Alexandra Cole
00:39:52 – 00:39:53
What are the odds? Like, that
Victoria Volk
00:39:53 – 00:40:12
Like what are the Odds? I 20 years. 20 years. But just knowing the things that I know, like, I’ve been kinda digging into the gates of love, which really has I mean, we have a lot of these, what are they called?
Victoria Volk
00:40:13 – 00:40:14
The gates of compromise?
Alexandra Cole
00:40:14 – 00:40:16
Yeah. Compromise channels.
Victoria Volk
00:40:16 – 00:40:41
Yeah. We have, like, 5 of them.
Alexandra Cole
00:40:18 – 00:40:18
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:40:18 – 00:40:41
And so just learning about those has been really eye opening and, like, just how he, like, you know, he’s he’s such a giver of of love and affection and, like, being the provider. And and when he’s not feeling like he’s getting something , getting that in return, like, the equivalent of that, like, he can feel a little bit of
Alexandra Cole
00:40:41 – 00:40:43
Taken for granted. He got anger.
Victoria Volk
00:40:43 – 00:40:43
Exactly. Yeah.
Alexandra Cole
00:40:43 – 00:40:43
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:40:43 – 00:40:53
So as a manifestor, anger is not our self theme. So when I feel myself getting angry about anything, it’s, oh, what what’s going on?
Alexandra Cole
00:40:54 – 00:41:22
And that’s another really good one to be aware of in partners and in kids too. Right? Because each of those energy types I just described has, you you know, what Victoria just mentioned, this not self theme, which is basically what comes up when you are compromising on your natural energetic pattern. And so for manifestors, that’s anger. So if you notice your child getting angry, your manifestor kid, it’s usually just a sign that they’re being limited in some way.
Alexandra Cole
00:41:22 – 00:42:05
They’re being forced to not listen to that, like, urge that they want to follow or pursue. And for a generator or manifesting generator, it’s gonna be frustration. So if you notice your child getting frustrated, right, or feeling more of that, like, stuck, that frustrated energy, that’s usually a sign that they’re being forced to do many thing too many things that don’t light them up, that aren’t exciting to them. And as a projector, the not-self is bitterness or a lot of the times it comes across as resentment. So if a projector is, you know, not being invited or recognized enough or they feel like they’re pushing themselves too hard beyond their energetic capacity.
Alexandra Cole
00:42:05 – 00:42:29
Right? They’re not given enough time to rest and recharge. They’ll start to get resentful about that. And then reflectors, the final one is disappointment. So if you notice that a reflector is, like, constantly disappointed in themselves or in the world and they just feel let down, that’s a sign that they probably, aren’t in the right environment.
Alexandra Cole
00:42:29 – 00:42:44
Right? That they’re not surrounded by the right people and that they are not able to or that they have absorbed far too much of everyone else’s energy and don’t really know what to do with it or can’t figure out how to let it go.
Victoria Volk
00:42:44 – 00:43:04
So how has this information helped you specifically? Because I’m sure you’ve had more grieving experiences since your mom’s passing, but how has the losses you’ve experienced since then? Been in how do I wanna word this? I think you know what I’m getting at. But, like
Alexandra Cole
00:43:04 – 00:43:04
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:43:05 – 00:43:05
How do you use
Alexandra Cole
00:43:05 – 00:43:08
How do I use human design to support that process?
Victoria Volk
00:43:08 – 00:43:17
Yes. And where would one look at their human design to see where like, where are some areas for people to look in at their human design when it comes to grief?
Alexandra Cole
00:43:17 – 00:44:00
So it’s helped me in so many ways, and 3 come to mind immediately. The first being the energy type piece, and this is mostly around how to support yourself best as you go through that grief. So, again, for me, I know I’m going to feel most like myself and most energized when I am creating enough space to do things that light me up and bring me joy. So even in the face of well, especially in the face of grief, that becomes that much more important, right, to carve out that time for myself. And for projectors, for example, rest becomes that much more important that you’re not pushing yourself.
Alexandra Cole
00:44:01 – 00:44:32
And for manifestors, like, honoring your energetic ups and downs and your desires in that moment and letting go of what other people think becomes that much more important when you’re going through grief. So that’s one. The other piece is that emotional center that we already talked about. So I know that for me, it’s really important for me to allow myself to feel my feelings and to ride that wave. And I can now almost enjoy that process in a weird way.
Alexandra Cole
00:44:32 – 00:44:47
Right? Because I know it’s gonna I know that wave is gonna crash at some moment. Usually, there’s this wave like pattern to emotions, which I think also very much mirrors grief, right, where it kind of, like, comes rolling in. It builds. It builds.
Alexandra Cole
00:44:47 – 00:45:05
It builds. Then there’s this crescendo moment where you’re feeling so much. And then, eventually, that wave crashes, and you kind of find yourself bobbing at the surface in more of kind of that cool, calm, collected space. And you’re still feeling, but the charge has disappeared. Like, it’s less overwhelming.
Alexandra Cole
00:45:06 – 00:45:30
And so understanding that pattern has helped me a lot because I can kind of gauge where I am on that wave, and I can know, okay, it’s gonna crash soon, and that’s the place where I really wanna sit and reflect for a little bit. And be like, okay. What is what is this feeling trying to tell me? Because I know for me that the feelings are always trying to communicate something. So that’s another piece.
Alexandra Cole
00:45:30 – 00:45:55
I allow myself to really sit with things more as opposed to feel like I need to act or do something to resolve it. I know that that wave pattern is gonna continue to exist. Whereas, if you are an open emotional or a non emotional, so that emotional center is what we call undefined and you know you’re more sensitive to other people. If you’re going through grief, you might actually wanna isolate a little bit more. Right?
Alexandra Cole
00:45:55 – 00:46:36
You might actually wanna remove yourself from the other grieving people because you it will almost overshadow your ability to kind of sit with your own grief because you’re gonna be feeling everyone else’s and then feel pressure, right, to respond to that or do something about their grief. So that’s a really helpful insight. And then the last thing that I’d say is looking at profile. So there’s this element in human design called profile, which speaks more to your personality and really to the how, to, like, how you approach things in life. And there’s 12 different profiles, and each profile consists of two numbers.
Alexandra Cole
00:46:37 – 00:47:14
And each of the numbers in the profile represent, like, an archetype that lives within you. So when Victoria was just saying we’re both 4 6 manifestors, the 4 6 is her profile and her husband’s profile. Each of these numbers also can tell you a little bit about, like, how you might process grief most effectively. So really quickly, the number one is known as the investigator archetype. So these are people who will want to know as much as possible and get into the research and feel most comfortable when they have all the data points and all the information.
Alexandra Cole
00:47:15 – 00:47:40
Right? So, for example, when it comes to grieving, these might be the people if, let’s say, it has something to do with an illness. Their immediate thing is I’m gonna research everything that, like, possible about this particular illness and, like, what the statistics are saying or they might delve into, I want to understand like the science behind grief and, like, what the different stages are. Right? Like, that’s very much the, like, one line.
Alexandra Cole
00:47:40 – 00:48:46
The 2, number 2 line is the naturally gifted person. It’s the person who, kind of picks things up very easily, intuitively, and naturally, doesn’t really need to study anything, but just knows in their bones certain things to be true or how to do certain things, Twos benefit a lot from alone time and having the ability to kind of in a safe cocoon-like space do their thing. So in times of grief, a 2 might feel like they really they just wanna, like, close the door to their bedroom and cry or journal or whatever that might look like, but they might feel this need to wanna do it themselves and to really get, like, fully absorbed in their own process and whatever feels good to them at that moment in time to move through it. Threes are like the experimenters. Threes are the the people who learn best through trial and error and throwing stuff against the wall and seeing what sticks.
Alexandra Cole
00:48:46 – 00:48:57
So if you’re a 3 and you’re grieving, you might try all the different things. You might try a certain form of therapy. You might try journaling. You might try painting. You might try meditation.
Alexandra Cole
00:48:58 – 00:49:22
Right? And you just keep kind of, like, whatever you hear about or whatever sparks your interest, I encourage you to experiment with it and see if it supports you and feel supportive. Because the only way you’re gonna figure out what is going to help you through this grieving process is by just trying a lot of different things. And you won’t know just from hearing it from a friend. Right?
Alexandra Cole
00:49:22 – 00:49:39
And just because it worked for the friend doesn’t mean it’s gonna work for you. You’ve gotta try it for yourself. Then there’s the 4. Fours are the relationship oriented people who are very sensitive to the quality of the relationships in their life. They’re very gifted connectors.
Alexandra Cole
00:49:40 – 00:50:21
They’re also people who, you know, get equally as lit up by social interactions as they can get exhausted by them, but it’s this, like, love hate relationship. Right? As you as you probably know, Victoria. So for fours, though, the support system is really really key when it comes to grief, making sure that you feel like you have those individuals in your life that you can vent to that are gonna show up for you, and being very aware of, like, what are the resources that I need, human resources as well as otherwise, in order to feel most supportive supported during this time. 5 is the problem solver.
Alexandra Cole
00:50:22 – 00:50:46
5 are the people who just immediately go into, like, fix it mode. Fives are also very much like, they feel a lot of responsibility. I have a 5. So you can see how, right, as a kid, my immediate reaction was, like, I’m gonna go into problem solving. I’m going to be the person that everyone in my family can rely on, and so that means shutting down my own emotions.
Alexandra Cole
00:50:46 – 00:51:33
So fives oftentimes have a lot going on below the surface that no one can see because they feel like they have to uphold a certain level of kind of responsibility, and they really hate disappointing other people. And they don’t like feeling vulnerable even though the vulnerability is actually the key for them. So for fives, finding even the one person or the one setting in which you can truly be vulnerable and allow that hard outer shell to kind of, like, disappear for a moment in times of grief is essential. Because in most situations, you’re gonna wanna be that, like, problem solver, and you can’t always be that. You need to also take care of yourself and your own needs in that sense.
Alexandra Cole
00:51:34 – 00:52:12
And then the last number, the 6, is the role model, and sixes are people who are wise beyond their years. They’re kind of these, like, natural advisers, very fair, very objective, and very reflective too. So for sixes as you’re going through grief, a lot of it will be reflecting on and observing kind of what’s coming up for me, what might that mean in almost like a bird’s eye view type of way. Right? Like, very much kind of, feeling almost like a little bit removed as if you’re looking at yourself going through that grieving process.
Alexandra Cole
00:52:13 – 00:52:45
But sixes might also, again, feel pressure to, play that role model part and therefore also not get, like, pulled under by their grief. And so it’s important for sixes to kind of still lean into that other number that they have because you always have 2 numbers in order to help them actually do that work because they’re very quickly gonna wanna go into, okay, what have I learned from this grief, and how can I now use that to support other people through the same process?
Victoria Volk
00:52:45 – 00:52:50
This has been gold. Just absolute gold. I how are you on time?
Alexandra Cole
00:52:50 – 00:52:54
I’m good. I probably should start wrapping it up though soon.
Victoria Volk
00:52:55 – 00:53:27
Okay. Oh, because I wanted to talk more about your story a little bit more, but, I wanna ask though quickly. So knowing what you know now, like, what gives you the most hope for the future? And, also, what is it about human design that you feel, you can bring into or how what would you suggest for Grievers to that’s not even a good question either. I’m trying to I wanna ask, like, a 1,000,000 questions right now because I’m I’m pressure root center.
Alexandra Cole
00:53:28 – 00:53:30
Mhmm. Just let it let it sit. You’ll get there.
Victoria Volk
00:53:32 – 00:53:48
Okay. What would you like to share? What do you think? I’m gonna just I’m gonna put it in your hands because you know human design far beyond my my capabilities. So what do you think is most important for people to know that you haven’t shared already?
Victoria Volk
00:53:48 – 00:53:57
And also the most important lesson and things that you have gotten from human design that you’re taking forward and that you’re utilizing in your life.
Alexandra Cole
00:53:57 – 00:54:28
I think I’ll keep it as simple and succinct as possible and say that the whole system of human design is built on this premise of differentiation, science of differentiation. Like, each of us is designed intentionally to be unique and different in terms of the way our energy works. And that, by definition, means that everyone is designed to grieve differently. Right? Like, there is no one size fits all approach to grief.
Alexandra Cole
00:54:28 – 00:54:59
And so I really encourage you to, you know, find some type of solace in that too. Right? That, like, just because, you know, something worked for someone else in your life and it’s not working for you, it doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with you. It just means that you haven’t found the most aligned way for you to process that grief. And a lot of it comes down to understanding yourself on this, like, whole another level and trusting yourself.
Alexandra Cole
00:54:59 – 00:55:44
And I think that, again, we live in a world that puts so much pressure on us to be a certain way, to operate in a certain way. There’s a very clear right and wrong way to do things. And as a result, we compromise on or shut down and ignore those inner voices that, as kids, are much louder and then as adults kind of fade away into the background. And I hope that the grieving process serves as a way for you to start to get to know those voices again, to start to hear them more clearly, to start to kind of shut out all the shoulds that you’re feeling pressure to live up to from the outside world and really tune into what do I need, what does my body want. Right?
Alexandra Cole
00:55:45 – 00:56:26
How am I responding to whatever it is that you might be facing in that moment in time? Because if you can allow the grieving process to do that, you will come out on the other end so much stronger and more aligned and in tune with who you are really here to be. And if nothing else, right, that the grieving process is such a powerful way of just, like, shedding more layers and coming closer to, like, that authentic self. So accept and embrace this idea that we’re all here to do things differently and use this as an opportunity to kind of get to know what that unique recipe looks like for you.
Victoria Volk
00:56:27 – 00:56:29
I actually have a program. It’s called do grief differently.
Alexandra Cole
00:56:30 – 00:56:33
There you go. I didn’t even know that. See?
Victoria Volk
00:56:33 – 00:57:09
But it is a framework, and it is evidence-based. And so as I’m listening to you, I’m like, I’ve seen this work for so many different types of people, so many different personalities, of course, so many different energy types. Right? And so it is like, it is very much about digging into the emotional climate within you. And it’s individualized because it’s it’s a framework that you apply to your grief, not to your neighbor’s grief, your mother’s grief, your sister’s grief, your brother’s grief, whatever.
Victoria Volk
00:57:09 – 00:57:21
And I think that’s why it works because it’s individualized to you in your experience. And I think that’s why it works. But thank you so much. I absolutely loved this. I seriously have loved this.
Victoria Volk
00:57:21 – 00:57:55
I geek out on human design. I’m still in my own explore more exploration and experiment to, of course, and I think that will be a forever ongoing thing. I am a huge proponent of anything that helps us understand ourselves better because I think the most important thing that we can give ourselves is compassion and grace. Not like a grace as a past, but a grace of just self-grace for being able to honor yourself, who you are in the moment, and given yourself that compassion that maybe you didn’t receive growing up. Because of who you were.
Victoria Volk
00:57:55 – 00:58:11
I love Human Design for that reason. Clearly, it’s been a gift for you in your grief experience. And I really, I would love to have you back sometime again, because this was so good. This was really so good. So I really appreciate your time today.
Victoria Volk
00:58:11 – 00:58:16
And, yeah, just so so many so much thanks to you for sharing.
Alexandra Cole
00:58:16 – 00:58:18
Thank you for having me.
Victoria Volk
00:58:18 – 00:58:32
I’m so impressed. Like, you just, like didn’t have to look up notes. Like, you knew it, like, the back of your hand. So I’m very impressed by that and impressed by you and everything that you shared today. Anything else you would like to share?
Alexandra Cole
00:58:32 – 00:58:50
No. I think that’s it. And just thank you for the work that you do too. I mean, I have there’s a special place in my heart for grief and finding frameworks and support to, you know, guide people through those moments in life. So thank you for the work you’re doing as well.
Victoria Volk
00:58:50 – 00:58:56
So how can people work with you? Because you have 2 websites. Right? You have 2 different websites.
Alexandra Cole
00:58:57 – 00:59:34
Yeah. I have 2 different websites. One of them is more just my personal website where you can book sessions, 1 on 1 sessions. Although I will say, because I’m about to have a baby, those sessions will pick up again in May or June, I would say. So that’s alexandracole.com. For all my other offerings and products, it’s thrivingbydesign.com, and that’s where you can find the wellness report or the well-being report that Victoria was talking about at the beginning, which takes your chart and translates it essentially into your optimal recipe for well-being.
Alexandra Cole
00:59:34 – 01:00:16
And we look at everything from rest and nourishment to mental and emotional health. So a lot of the things that we touched on today will come through in that report, but it’s very specific to well-being. It’s not, like, a broad overview of your chart, let’s say. I also, on that website, have something called Raised by Design, which is for parents who want to, at a very high level, understand their child’s design. It’s like a 20 page summary of just kind of the, like, main points that you need to understand with very tactical strategies for how to actually support your child in that way, in the most aligned way.
Victoria Volk
01:00:16 – 01:00:18
And that’s specific to your child’s chart.
Alexandra Cole
01:00:18 – 01:00:21
Correct? That’s specific to your child’s chart.
Victoria Volk
01:00:21 – 01:00:21
Gold, people.
Alexandra Cole
01:00:22 – 01:00:22
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
01:00:23 – 01:00:23
That’s gold.
Alexandra Cole
01:00:24 – 01:00:36
Yeah. So I mean, there’s a lot of other also free resources and different things on Thriving by Design, but those are 2 reports that I, you know, are worth calling out specifically.
Victoria Volk
01:00:36 – 01:00:37
How about the purpose playbook?
Alexandra Cole
01:00:38 – 01:01:22
The purpose playbook is my book that I wrote, you know, after that experience of just kind of leaving the corporate world and reflecting on, you know, what allowed me to do that with so much conviction and confidence. It doesn’t actually even talk about human design. It’s very much like a framework for helping people pinpoint, like, what their purpose and mission is in this life and how to go pursue it in a aligned way. So I wrote that book back in 2019, came out in 2020. So if you’re looking for more of the kind of step by step process to articulate and live out your purpose in life, that’s that’s a really helpful resource too.
Victoria Volk
01:01:22 – 01:01:27
I bet you could come up with a second book knowing what you know now.
Alexandra Cole
01:01:27 – 01:01:36
Maybe. I know. I know. It’s just such a big endeavor, and I’ve been you know, my biggest projects these past few years have been kids. So once I get past that, who knows?
Alexandra Cole
01:01:36 – 01:01:37
The next will be a book.
Victoria Volk
01:01:38 – 01:02:26
Quickly, the few things that from the ebook, I just wanna share from the well by design. For me, it was so surprising things were, exercise in the afternoon to cleanse my system, which I found I naturally tend to do that sometimes. I was very surprised to learn that I don’t need much food to, yeah, I don’t need as much food to feel nourished, which I was really surprising to me because I’ve just went through a coaching thing and, you know, a lot of it was like macros, and I had to eat so much food, so much food, and I had so much energy, but, you know, I could tell my something was waning at some I know it’s a point, you know, when it came to my digestion and stuff. So that was interesting. And not surprising is that I’m prone to overthinking, which but it’s so good too.
Victoria Volk
01:02:26 – 01:02:42
So I really highly recommend that people check that out. And I’ll put all of the information in the show notes, but I just wanted to quickly share that. Yes. The well by design report is excellent. I the raise by design, get your hands on it because, you know, your children are a product of your parenting.
Victoria Volk
01:02:42 – 01:02:42
Right?
Alexandra Cole
01:02:44 – 01:02:54
100%. Yeah. In a way. They’re they’re actually very like, they have their own makeup, but as a parent, you can either support or negate it. And that’s the key.
Alexandra Cole
01:02:54 – 01:03:04
Right? Like, we wanna actually, as parents, encourage them to become more of themselves as opposed to more of what the world expects them or wants them to be.
Victoria Volk
01:03:04 – 01:03:14
Yeah. No pressure.
Alexandra Cole
01:03:05 – 01:03:05
I know.
Victoria Volk
01:03:05 – 01:03:14
But I think when it comes to grief, right, this is why this information is so important and why I wanted to have you on. So thank you.
Victoria Volk
01:03:14 – 01:03:17
Thank you again. Thank you again for being here.
Alexandra Cole
01:03:17 – 01:03:19
Of course. My pleasure. Thank you for having me.
Victoria Volk
01:03:19 – 01:03:24
And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love.
Emotions, Energy, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Miscarriage, Parenting, Podcast, Pregnancy & Infant Loss |
Mandy Capehart | The Integration of Grief and Restoration of Self
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
In this week’s heartfelt episode, we dive into the complexities of grief with my special guest, Mandy Capehart – a trauma-informed certified grief educator and somatic embodiment life coach.
Mandy shares her journey through grief, which led her to establish the Restorative Grief Project, an online community dedicated to supporting grievers and those who stand by them. Her book, “Restorative Grief: Embracing Our Losses Without Losing Ourselves,” is a blend of memoir and practical guidebook that offers insight into managing loss.
We touch on topics like:
- The universality of experiencing loss
- Moving beyond minimizing pain
- Navigating uncertainty in times of sorrow
- How our upbringing shapes our understanding of grief
Mandy also delves into how COVID-19 has highlighted the need for greater ‘grief literacy’ – acknowledging that you don’t need death as a reason to grieve. She emphasizes validating experiences rather than dismissing them and discusses how she uses storytelling as a tool for connection and healing.
Moreover, Mandy opens up about personal losses such as miscarriages, providing raw insights into the emotional turmoil they entail while calling out common misconceptions surrounding them.
This episode is not just about dealing with grief but learning from it, embracing vulnerability, and engaging in deeper conversations instead of hiding behind social niceties or sugarcoated interactions.
This conversation provides solace and guidance for anyone grappling with loss or seeking ways to support others in their grieving process.
Key Takeaway:
Grief isn’t solely triggered by death; it encompasses various forms of personal loss and change. The conversation challenges us to confront cultural tendencies that often minimize these experiences or avoid deep discussions.
Mandy’s insights remind us that grieving is not just an emotional process but one that touches every fiber of our being – physically, mentally, and spiritually.
Your story matters. Your pain deserves recognition. And together, we can find pathways toward restoration.
RESOURCES:
CONNECT:
Episode Sponsor: Magic Mind | Use the code “GRIEVINGVOICES” to receive one month free with a 3-month subscription. This special promotion is only for January!
_______
NEED HELP?
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
- Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor
If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Victoria Volk
00:00:00 – 00:00:16
Thank you for tuning in to grieving voices., If this is your first time listening, welcome., And if you are returning and listening again, thank you for coming back. Today, my guest is Mandy Capehart. She is a trauma-informed certified grief educator and somatic embodiment life coach.
Victoria Volk
00:00:17 – 00:00:47
She’s an author, speaker, and master mindset coach located in the Pacific Northwest. She is the founder of the Restorative Grief Project, an online community of grievers and grief supporters looking for movement while they heal. Her own experience with grief left her searching for resources while offering empathetic long term support without minimizing the pain of the moment. When she found nothing, she created it for herself and for you. Her first book is Titled Restorative Grief, Embracing Our Losses Without Losing Ourselves was released in 2021.
Victoria Volk
00:00:48 – 00:01:19
And this is a memoir and a 31-day guidebook for managing grief and growth in the aftermath of loss, no matter how long it lasts. You can hear more about her work on her podcast, Restorative Grief with Mandy Capehart, or consider working with her 1 on 1 on her website. She has all the resources and I will put those links in the show notes. And she’s a storyteller through and through and always in pursuit of adventure, grace, and opportunities to express gratitude. No matter the medium, her work revolves around learning how to honor our process of becoming.
Victoria Volk
00:01:19 – 00:01:29
She currently lives in Southern Oregon with her husband, daughter, Border Collie Rescue Pup and way too many houseplants. Thank you so much for being here. I too have way too many houseplants. I am told.
Mandy Capehart
00:01:29 – 00:01:43
I know., Right. I mean, I loved houseplants before the pandemic, but it was an easy hobby for me. I think I was up to, like, 95 at one point before I just said, this is a problem. I don’t wanna just let these die, but I also don’t know what to do.
Mandy Capehart
00:01:43 – 00:01:51
And so we’re down to probably a solid 40 now. We’ve recovered. They didn’t die. They were lovingly rehomed, but yeah,
Victoria Volk
00:01:51 – 00:02:05
I have not counted mine, but I know it’s not 40, but I went from like 0 to just kind of like an obsession. I just kept buying and kept buying. Oh, I need another plant. I need another plant.
Mandy Capehart
00:02:05 – 00:02:24
Well, we needed the dopamine. We needed the immediate gratification of something beautiful in our home. We can justify it because plants clarify the air and there are so many collect. It’s like, you know, us elder millennials are, like, barely on the cusp of when Pokemon was, like, practically Introduced. We gotta catch them all.
Mandy Capehart
00:02:24 – 00:02:31
We have to collect every variety of Echeveria that exists. And until then, I will not be satisfied.
Victoria Volk
00:02:32 – 00:02:35
I know it’s like people walk in, welcome to the jungle.
Mandy Capehart
00:02:35 – 00:02:39
Yeah, exactly. It was very, humid in our home for a while.
Victoria Volk
00:02:40 – 00:02:53
I bet. But you know what?, Like you said, it puts oxygen in the air. And when especially living in, like, a rainy climate like yourself or like a snowy cold climate like I where I live and dry. I need all the nature inside.
Mandy Capehart
00:02:53 – 00:02:56
I can get everything I can. Yes. That’s right.
Victoria Volk
00:02:57 – 00:03:18
So we’re not talking about houseplants today. But if we were I’m sure there’s a podcast for that there’s a podcast for everything. That’s right. But today we’re talking about grief, which fortunately for you and I is becoming much more talked about and the work that we were doing. And I think COVID but a huge spotlight on that for everybody.
Victoria Volk
00:03:19 – 00:03:44
Like, hey, nobody has to die for you to grieve. Right? And so I guess let’s, I really want to start out with kind of your origin story as to what led you into the work that you’re doing today, because I know firsthand for myself and everyone that I’ve talked to on this podcast for every guest I’ve had, their work is really born out of their story. So where would you like to begin?
Mandy Capehart
00:03:45 – 00:04:35
Yeah, we’ve got this legacy as wounded healers. And when we get to that
point of recognizing where the needle moved for us, we can start to develop a way to, offer it to others. And so for me, I don’t remember a time in my life that I didn’t have some form of grief event, whether it was a person dying, a person moving away, divorce, relationship loss, illness. There was always something or someone leaving my world, my circle of influence. And so I, as a young person, did what we all do and stuffed it down and became very outwardly loud and big and vivacious and tried to live a very happy, playful life because I didn’t have the tools to navigate the loss I was experiencing.
Mandy Capehart
00:04:35 – 00:05:08
And that’s not to say that my parents didn’t know what they were doing because in a lot of ways they did, but at the same time, they were also very young when they had me. And so as we all experienced these losses together, including their, divorce when I was pretty young, I think I was 9. It doesn’t It just didn’t translate until I was older. And so, instead of giving you a list all the people I’ve lost in stories, I’m just gonna jump ahead because when my mom died in 2016, this month, it’ll be 7 years, I think. That right?
Mandy Capehart
00:05:08 – 00:05:30
Good math. It was pretty sudden. It was after after a few months of cancer treatment and unexpected, illness on top of that. And so I spent the next 4 years quitting everything I knew. I stepped down from being a worship leader of 16 years at my church.
Mandy Capehart
00:05:30 – 00:06:15
I pulled away from the career, I almost became a youth pastor so that I could move closer to being near her. It would have been the absolute worst position for me and all the children would have like perished under my anger because I was in so much pain, but I was willing to do anything to try and get close to her while she was going through, treatment. And I’m very grateful that didn’t happen. But I realized in 2020 when January started, I was starting the year with a miscarriage with the anniversary of losing my mom with a job loss and with a former employer, spreading gossip about me. And so I was in, like, trauma city all by myself.
Mandy Capehart
00:06:15 – 00:06:32
And then I’m starting to hear on the news about COVID and pandemics, and I became really guarded and angry about it. Like, hey, guys. 2020 is my year to have a mess. Everybody get it together. And in March, when our school shut down and I lost another job, I realized this is not the world I can live in.
Mandy Capehart
00:06:32 – 00:07:17
I cannot live in a world where there are going to be generations of untended grief and a complete lack of understanding and brief literacy. So I started writing my story down. That was where the book came from, over the course of a couple months, I just went through everything that I had experienced that was encouraging and positive to me, both within the of my faith and without it looking for pathways forward that were relatable to others, that could be relatable. Not just like this is what worked for me. So it will work for you, but creating more of an invitation into exploring what might be possible through these different methods of approaching our grief and ourselves differently.
Mandy Capehart
00:07:17 – 00:08:02
And as the book was finished, there was a wildfire in our town that destroyed 25100 homes. So I got firsthand an opportunity to not only share this work of my heart and to connect with people I knew who lost their homes and were now survivors of this wildfire. There were 3 people who died as well, but I also took that into this idea of what if I became a coach around the idea of what it means to grieve and to survive. And so I took my my personal background, my educational background, and poured it all into this, practice that I’ve built. And it just has transformed everything I expected my life to become.
Mandy Capehart
00:08:02 – 00:08:09
I always knew I’d be a writer. Right? We always have those threads. I always knew I’d be a writer. I’m very, people driven.
Mandy Capehart
00:08:09 – 00:08:29
So I always knew I’d be working with people. I never expected that I’d be working as a grief and trauma educator, showing up for people in their worst moments and sitting with them through the enormity of it. So that’s my quickest way to describe why I decided grief and death were the things I wanted to talk about all day long.
Victoria Volk
00:08:30 – 00:08:38
Kind of similar to my story. Started very young. How old were you when you had your first loss that you can recall?
Mandy Capehart
00:08:42 – 00:08:58
I mean, I was probably that I can recall would be my great grandmother. My grandparents are all I mean, every generation is at 10, 20 years, 19 to 20 years of each other. So I knew all of my great grandparents., Wow. And a couple of my great great grandparents.
Mandy Capehart
00:09:00 – 00:09:16
Wow. I’m sorry. It was my great great grandmother, Selma, who died when I was 3. And I have memories of sitting in her kitchen and being with her and having her read to me. And that I would say that would probably be the earliest loss I can recall.
Mandy Capehart
00:09:16 – 00:09:23
And at that age, what do you know? You’re 3 and great grandma great great grandma’s almost just not around anymore. We don’t have framework for it. But,
Victoria Volk
00:09:25 – 00:09:37
Yeah. Do you know what’s fascinating though? By age 3, we have learned 75% of our of our awarenesses of how to respond to life.
Mandy Capehart
00:09:37 – 00:09:40
Right? It’s wild. Like it’s in there’s
Victoria Volk
00:09:40 – 00:09:53
no conscious, conscious recollection and hindsight about that. But yeah. By that, we’re sponges. So how young were your parents when they had you?
Mandy Capehart
00:09:53 – 00:10:00
I think my mom was 20, 21. My dad was 24. Sounds right.
Victoria Volk
00:10:01 – 00:10:06
And you knew your great, great grandparents? Yeah. Wow. That’s fascinating. Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:10:06 – 00:10:07
Incredible, really.
Mandy Capehart
00:10:07 – 00:10:24
Yeah, I mean, my grandmother is in her eighties now and consistent. Like we’ve stopped correcting people. That is my mom. We just don’t correct anyone because people assume it is my mom because the age range makes sense.
Mandy Capehart
00:10:24 – 00:10:31
Right? And with my aunts, people assume that we’re sisters and I’m just like, you can have it. Take it. Like, sure. We’re sisters.
Mandy Capehart
00:10:31 – 00:10:41
It doesn’t bother me. It’s who cares? But it’s interesting the way that we perceive age gaps. That’s a whole other conversation, but anyway. Yeah.
Mandy Capehart
00:10:41 – 00:10:42
Young family.
Victoria Volk
00:10:42 – 00:10:58
What did you find yourself saying the most during COVID, to others? What was the story that was playing in your head over and over as you were kind of reflecting on your losses, as you’re writing your book, as you were working with other grievers and talking to other grievers.
Mandy Capehart
00:10:59 – 00:11:55
Yeah. I think a lot of what I experienced personally and also in the stories of others was this pain around being minimized and dismissed. So in my immediate family, I have an immune disorder in our family. And so we were really guarded and absolutely afraid of the unknown and the uncertainty of this pandemic and what would be happening. And we did lose people that we knew and where I would support others and be working with people around the fear of that was invalidating was through validating the stories that they were telling as well and through validating their experiences and helping them to validate and not minimize the enormity of their experiences, their emotions, their sensations in their body, like we as a people, and maybe just this is western culture.
Mandy Capehart
00:11:55 – 00:12:39
I don’t know. Became so quick to justify and minimize our responses for survival so
we could socially still belong or mentally not cave under the pressure of choosing all of these black and white dichotomous opportunities that were handed to us. I feel like there was so much of you’re either with me or you’re against me and, and that in and of itself is a distorted way of thinking, but it’s also such an eliminator of that gray space, that grief exists within. Right? We cannot navigate grief without recognizing it is all gray space.
Mandy Capehart
00:12:39 – 00:13:13
There really is no black and white. And so when I would come up against those black and white thinking patterns in clients and in friends and family members. It was an exercise in, do I wanna do this for a long period of time or is this just the COVID reaction to losing my job and having to pivot and having zero certainty for the foreseeable future. And so it really transformed into this understanding of, oh, no, certainty is the lie. Certainty is the addiction.
Mandy Capehart
00:13:13 – 00:13:32
What does that look like then as a griever and even as a grief professional to help individuals not minimize their fear of certainty or their fear of a lack of certainty, and come to embrace uncertainty and all of its beauty and all of its gray space and all of its opportunity, to find healing.
Victoria Volk
00:13:33 – 00:13:51
What were the lessons that you were taught about grief as you grew up within your family? Like, how did how did that because you had a lot of grief in your life growing up. Yeah. How was that shaped your belief before you knew now what you know. Right?
Victoria Volk
00:13:53 – 00:13:57
Like, what were you taught about grief and how to grieve?
Mandy Capehart
00:13:57 – 00:14:09
You know, not a lot. I think and keeping in mind, like, this is the early nineties. Right? Late eighties, early nineties. We, weren’t necessarily stiff upper lip people.
Mandy Capehart
00:14:10 – 00:14:21
We were very strong back. We can do this, push through it. There’s always a solution. You’ll figure it out. Just keep going kind of people.
Mandy Capehart
00:14:21 – 00:15:05
My dad still to this day says work smart, not hard. And so as a young griever, I can I translated that to It’s hard to grieve, so I will work smart by not grieving and just truly minimize my own experience so that I can do the task in front of me? And I think that that’s a pretty, pretty expected and universal response to grieve as a child, I also think I was watching my parents grieve. And when I was a teenager, I remember having a distinct moment of deciding, oh, my parents are human. So I’m sitting back here angry with them, grieving everything that they’ve gone through, that they’ve put us through trying to survive this ongoing grief experiences that we’re having.
Mandy Capehart
00:15:05 – 00:15:31
And yet I have failed to see them as people as well who are at that time 30. And I think now to when I was 30 and realizing, oh my God, I was no one knew what they were doing. I was a mess at 30. Even for as much as I had figured out, I was a immature trying to just prove that I knew what I was doing and I was valuable in the world. What if my parents were in similar boats?
Mandy Capehart
00:15:31 – 00:16:14
And so I think even grandparents and extended family members had their own opinions about grief. And there were some very strong, religious influences on part of our family, which was, of course, a different layer to how people wanted to navigate grief or not navigated at all., But I feel like it just wasn’t really a conversation to the degree that when my mom died, that following she died right after Christmas, not following Christmas. I went back home for the holidays and remember thinking this is gonna be either a mess or the most restorative experience we could ever have together. Like this is a definitive Christmas gathering.
Mandy Capehart
00:16:14 – 00:16:28
What do I wanna do about it? What do I wanna bring to this family? So the first night I brought bourbon and I got everyone really sick and hungover the next day. And we all pretended we weren’t hungover, which was in retrospect, my favorite thing. We were just like, wow, I don’t feel good.
Mandy Capehart
00:16:28 – 00:16:40
What did we eat yesterday? And I was like, guys, we drank too much bourbon. I don’t know why that’s unclear. Why aren’t we admitting? But that was such a perfect example of like, oh, we’re all grieving as well, and we’re not admitting it.
Mandy Capehart
00:16:40 – 00:16:54
Okay, It opened it up so that I was able to say, hey, this whole denial thing is not serving us. We’ve tried for a year to survive on our own. It does not work. And so now I’m going to start asking you guys some really vulnerable questions.
Mandy Capehart
00:16:55 – 00:17:10
And even if it’s just for me, if you need to believe that you’re answering those questions so that I can heal. That’s fine. But don’t shut down. Don’t pull back. And so it’s really become this family that I mean, still still grieving.
Mandy Capehart
00:17:10 – 00:17:31
Like I said off air, I have an aunt who’s in the hospital right now for cancer and her daughter is in the hospital as well for some medical crisis, that she’s been navigating. And these are not simple, small things. These are not I had a wart removed operations. Right? It’s still a family unit where we can say, this is horrible.
Mandy Capehart
00:17:31 – 00:18:13
How do we survive this? How do we hold each other In the midst of the uncertainty of if we’ll survive it or not, if our family members will be okay. So I think that, lack of grief literacy kind of articulated in my childhood is a big part of why now, despite the discomfort, despite the, pushback I get when I bring it up in certain situations when people just wanna have a good time. I don’t care. I’ve seen the benefit of pushing into those uncomfortable places and teaching both myself and my nervous system, how to remain aligned and resting even amid what feels like a threat to my health and my mental stability.
Mandy Capehart
00:18:13 – 00:18:21
Grief can disrupt all of that. And yet it can also be the doorway into like binding restoration in that area as well.
Victoria Volk
00:18:21 – 00:19:02
The thing I heard you say in I’ll say it how I heard it is that there’s this deep desire to have deeper conversations instead of all that surface level stuff. And, I’ve even found myself, I’ll be out and about mingling in the bar or whatever with friends and I’ll say something and they’ll look at me like, okay. Yeah. That’s, that’s too depressing. They’re kind of like, to be not to be the Debbie downer, but it’s like, let’s, I have friends too where it’s like, I don’t I don’t even know what their dreams are.
Victoria Volk
00:19:02 – 00:19:08
Yeah. But I know if I ask them, it’s like, why are you asking me that? Like, they don’t want to talk about it. Like,
Mandy Capehart
00:19:08 – 00:19:33
Sure. You know, I think often whether they wanna talk about it or they don’t have an answer or they haven’t gotten through the the layer of, but what if it doesn’t workout. But what if I can’t the uncertainty. Right? They their relationship to uncertainty is directly impacted by their desire to control the outcome and control their experiences.
Mandy Capehart
00:19:33 – 00:19:57
And I think those uncomfortable conversations, those deeper conversations are sacred ground. We’re asking someone to step forward and be seen and be known and to not have the answers. And certainly, it’s a collective approach. Right? It’s collective healing that I’m inviting people into when I say, share your deepest, darkest moments with me.
Mandy Capehart
00:19:57 – 00:20:14
Tell me what you’re afraid of, because guess what? You’re not only totally valid and being afraid of that. I’m afraid of that too. But now what do we perceive each other to be less than or weak or an trustworthy? Like, I don’t know.
Mandy Capehart
00:20:14 – 00:20:50
I see that depth and that willingness to be seen as such a a flag of safety. My aunt the other day, a different aunt was telling me how this family member in the hospital is the strongest person that she knows and gave all this evidence. And I responded, it takes one to know one. And I say that because you lost my mom, your sister, you’ve experienced heartache after heartache. And here you are In person, caring for our family members that are in the hospital all by yourself.
Mandy Capehart
00:20:50 – 00:21:13
And while I would, if I could drop everything and come to you, our lives are very different and she has that ability. What does that what does it look like to be supported by me right now? Like, you don’t have to be so strong all the time too. And I think when we can finally tell people that you don’t have to be strong, like you don’t have to keep being strong. I personally hate it when someone’s like, oh my gosh, you’re so strong.
Mandy Capehart
00:21:13 – 00:21:32
And I was like, no. What you see, because you’re not safe for me to not be strong, is the strength. You see the backbone. The soft tender side of me is available to people who aren’t going to disrespect or diminish me. And to be honest, I show that side to a lot of people now, but when I was younger, not so much.
Mandy Capehart
00:21:32 – 00:21:59
And I think being able to just call that tenderness out in people toward themselves, right? Show yourself your tender side. Be honest with how much you’re carrying and let’s see if we can’t offload some of that weight simply by Identifying and addressing it and letting it move through our life and our story and our experiences. So it’s not Debbie Downer to me to bring up like deepest, darkest fears in the bar. That is the moment of vulnerability that I can say, hey.
Mandy Capehart
00:21:59 – 00:22:14
Your walls are down and you’re with safe people, If I’m not a safe person, probably don’t invite me to drinks again, because alcohol is gonna make you say and do things you don’t want me to remind you of the next day. Otherwise, I must be a safe person because I’m here. So let’s just be real. K?
Mandy Capehart
00:22:14 – 00:22:28
Because we’ve got limited time. We don’t know what’s gonna happen tomorrow. Tell me what should tell me what hurts. Let’s talk through it and just bear witness to each other in a way that we’ve been discouraged from doing.
Victoria Volk
00:22:29 – 00:22:38
Yeah. I made sugar cookies recently and I was just thinking, yep. Just like sugarcoating. Just it’s it’s that. I mean, it’s a terrible Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:22:38 – 00:22:46
Literal sugar coating. That’s what we do. Right. And yeah, like you said, just to get real. Let’s get real.
Victoria Volk
00:22:47 – 00:23:03
I don’t want to gloss over something you said because, I feel like it’s an important lost to talk about because there’s not just you, it’s also your partner involved. But you had, shared that you had lost had a miscarriage.
Mandy Capehart
00:23:04 – 00:23:19
Oh, yeah. I actually don’t know how many miscarriages I’ve had. We got married pretty I was early twenties and our daughter was born when I was 30. And so we had years of infertility. We weren’t trying right away.
Mandy Capehart
00:23:19 – 00:23:51
But when we did start, just years of infertility and the undeniable pain that goes with that is when they come on and say like, oh, we’re not sure why everything about you is normal. I’m like, cool. Except that my body can’t do the one thing that like It was created to do okay. Like all of the uncertainty, every question and, anybody who’s ever experienced infertility knows immediately the question is like, what did I do wrong? What am I doing wrong?
Mandy Capehart
00:23:51 – 00:24:14
Is it because I did x y z. If there’s religious trauma on top of it, there’s all of that blame that comes along from a spiritual side as well. There was so much, built in. And then we so our daughter was born in, 2014 as a miracle. Like she was a surprise and I was terrified the entire pregnancy.
Mandy Capehart
00:24:15 – 00:24:25
And then a few years later, of course, in 2020, on New Year’s Eve, I knew I was pregnant. I looked at my husband. I’m like, I’m pregnant. And he’s like, really? Did you take a test?
Mandy Capehart
00:24:25 – 00:24:41
Are you kidding? That doesn’t make sense. How how do you know? And I was like, no, I just, I have a feeling. And I tested positive a couple of days later and started bleeding a couple of days after that and just sat with it because it was the one I knew about.
Mandy Capehart
00:24:41 – 00:25:23
It was the one I had a test, a positive, Oh my God. Is this really happening? Experience, especially 4 years after losing mom and realizing, like, the hope I had placed in that little pregnancy, it was interesting because I remember feeling very much, and this is similar to how I felt in the week after my mom died, feeling very much that, okay, I can safeguard and bear in mind. This is before I wrote my book or any of the like, started doing any of this work really professionally. I’ve been speaking publicly and leading a small, church in a bar for years up until then.
Mandy Capehart
00:25:23 – 00:26:28
But, and so I talked about loss and grief plenty of times, but this was really a moment where I again decided, okay, I can choose to numb myself and step away from the hope of ever having another baby from the fullness of what this means and what it doesn’t mean, or I can choose to really lean in to both the grief I’m going to experience from this and the stillness I need to heal because it is not a the misunderstanding of what a miscarriage does to a human body is so offensive is the best way I can put it. Like the lack of understanding people have about what actually happens and what you’re experiencing. I had to give myself a lot of permission to be tender and still, and unproductive. I’m extremely busy and productive when you were listing all the things in my bio was like, jeez, I have done so many things. Maybe it’s time to calm down a bit.
Mandy Capehart
00:26:28 – 00:26:44
But, anyway, the sensation even of having the pregnancy and knowing, oh, I’ve got untold number of miscarriages in my past. What do I do? Do I Dream. Do I hope? Do I pretend I’m not pregnant?
Mandy Capehart
00:26:45 – 00:27:02
Do I wait? Do I tell anyone? Do I panic? I chose hope I chose to lean in fully and say, I’m going to imagine our life with another baby. I’m going to lean fully in and completely invest.
Mandy Capehart
00:27:02 – 00:27:26
And so when, the miscarriage began, I had to tell my husband. Yep. I’m going to lean fully into the loss here too. And not just for me, although I will say his ability to support me has often been at the expense of him supporting himself. And that’s a, that’s a whole nother topic of how to help your grieving partner.
Mandy Capehart
00:27:26 – 00:27:43
Right. But it’s been a very healing journey for us to come back together and really talk About what that meant and what it means ongoing. And yeah, miscarriage is a very, very nuanced experience of loss.
Victoria Volk
00:27:43 – 00:27:54
What would you like to say and clarify for people about what you said, how the misconception about miscarriage and what it does to them.
Mandy Capehart
00:27:55 – 00:28:07
Yeah, it’s a good question. I think It comes back to that recognition that we are holistic beings. We are heart, mind, body, spirit. We are not just a body. We are not just a mind.
Mandy Capehart
00:28:07 – 00:28:54
We are not just the emotions that we feel. And when we approach ourselves from a disjointed perspective trying to heal, trying to experience grief. We dismiss the wisdom that we have carried from all of our other experiences into this moment where we could integrate them together and actually experience healing. And so I say that in regards to miscarriage because the emotional impact, the true emotions, the things I’m feeling in my heart, the thoughts I’m thinking about the miscarriage itself, about the loss of my future, about the rationale behind what happened and why about the debate internally. Is it a baby?
Mandy Capehart
00:28:54 – 00:29:03
Is it a fetus? Is it viable? Is it not? What will people say? What will people think like the mental fireworks that are just exploding left and right?
Mandy Capehart
00:29:03 – 00:29:25
And then that piritual side. And, in my framework, there’s sort of grief framework. Spirit refers to that connection to self, to others, relationally to the world, at large. And then if there is a spiritual practice to our sense of higher power. But all of those pieces have to be included, honored, and addressed when we’re healing.
Mandy Capehart
00:29:25 – 00:29:38
And I think with miscarriages, because there have been such again, black and white perspectives discerning. Okay. It’s just a scientific process. I don’t know if you’ve read Becoming Michelle Obama’s first book. It’s beautiful.
Mandy Capehart
00:29:39 – 00:29:50
She tells the story of her miscarriage and she’s very practical. She’s like, it it was just a clump of cells to me. And so and that’s how she moves through it in the book. And I sat with it for a long time because to some degree. Yeah.
Mandy Capehart
00:29:50 – 00:30:19
Totally. Just like not viable outside of me, scientific process. And like I said, I don’t know how many I’ve had. I had such irregular cycles that I’ve probably had multiple. And yet here I am choosing hope on the front of that and saying, if I don’t lean fully in with my emotions, with my mind and with my sense of connection to this little clump of cells, then I may miss out on the fullness of what this experience can be.
Mandy Capehart
00:30:19 – 00:30:57
I think when we discredit people who have babies and who can carry life and put them into this well, and you see this in legislation right now, everywhere. We’ve minimized their personhood as autonomous individuals. We’ve minimized their ability to advocate for themselves, which is because we don’t think it’s important. We don’t see the enormity of what life and giving life and going through all of the steps of that can be. So I think that the misconception of like, oh my gosh, you’ve had a miscarriage.
Mandy Capehart
00:30:57 – 00:31:13
I’ve had some too. That immediate centering of yourself in someone else’s experience when they share with you. Right. When they are real and vulnerable and honest is a reflection of that other person’s discomfort. Like, I’m not comfortable with you telling me that you’re hurting.
Mandy Capehart
00:31:13 – 00:31:25
So I’ll just say I’ve been there. We don’t have to talk about it. I’ve been there too. And that goes to all grief experiences. People center themselves and minimize pain easily.
Mandy Capehart
00:31:25 – 00:32:12
But I think, at the crux of it would be recognizing the individual experience of a miscarriage or infertility or pregnancy loss or child loss. They’re so complicated and nuanced because there’s every day a reminder that you’ve experienced this loss where I can say, oh, man, my memories of my mom come back probably every day in some way or another, or my grandfather or any of these people that I’ve lost. Those come up so differently than the miscarriages do because I have a little girl who’s constantly, she’s backed off now, but begged for a sibling for years every day. And how do you explain to a little girl? Well, mommy can’t.
Mandy Capehart
00:32:12 – 00:32:17
Mommy’s tried. You had one. Kind of. Maybe. I don’t know.
Mandy Capehart
00:32:17 – 00:32:35
And then you spiral again right down that same mental explosion of, I don’t even know how to think about this without hearing the input from judgmental voices and critical voices Oliver. It’s a long way to answer that question, but there’s a lot about it on my mind.
Victoria Volk
00:32:36 – 00:32:45
And you bring up a very good point in that for your daughter. That’s a grieving experience too of not having a sibling. Right? Yep. Maybe that’s a book you could write.
Mandy Capehart
00:32:45 – 00:32:58
Oh, man. The other day she, well, I guess it was a couple of years ago. I found a piece of paper she’d written on that said reminder, biggest reminder of your life. She was probably 6 or 7. Mom is willing to adopt a baby sister.
Mandy Capehart
00:32:58 – 00:33:13
And I was like, oh, child. Again, like, immune disorder, constant treatment happening in our house. So our lives are not simple. Adoption would not not that that’s simple, but no easy path forward on it. It was pretty hard to read that.
Mandy Capehart
00:33:13 – 00:33:37
And then fast forward a couple of years the other day, she was saying to a friend, hey, guess what? I’m an only child, so you should come to my house because we can do anything and there’s no one taking our toys. We don’t have to include any siblings. And I just thought, thank God she’s embracing the positive because I was not an only child and yet we were years apart. And so it felt a lot like I had both the best of both worlds, I think.
Mandy Capehart
00:33:37 – 00:33:41
So it’s interesting. Yeah, that would be, that would be quite a book.
Victoria Volk
00:33:43 – 00:34:00
And I think, in grief recovery, we talk about replacing the loss. Right. And so as children, one of our first losses is usually an animal or a pet, or let’s say a dog, and then the parents say, well, that’s okay, Sally. We can just go to the pet store and get a new dog tomorrow. You know, like, right?
Victoria Volk
00:34:00 – 00:34:24
And so I was just thinking about that, like, when she asked for a sibling, it’s like, well, maybe we can start with a puppy, but then at the same time, it’s, it’s minimizing, right? The loss of hope, dreams and expectations that she had for her life, sharing it with the sibling. Right? And that’s gonna be a grief story she’ll grow into tube. And like you said, it’s I think that would be a very important book.
Mandy Capehart
00:34:25 – 00:34:38
We have to move into that space of both and. Right? We can both grieve the loss of a sibling and celebrate the life we have. They don’t cancel each other out. They don’t negate.
Mandy Capehart
00:34:38 – 00:35:04
When we were, let’s see. I was probably 14 when my stepmom’s dog died, and we loved Riley. She was the sweetest black lab, and she was full of energy, and she ran in front of a vehicle and didn’t survive. And it was probably 6 months later and that my we were grieving and my stepmom was really like, I miss Riley so much. I want another pet, but I don’t know if I’m ready.
Mandy Capehart
00:35:04 – 00:35:30
I had found golden retriever puppies for sale in the newspaper like that weekend. And we were on the way to go. Like our weekend plans were, do we go get this puppy or do we go see this musician at the park? This musician that I loved and I was convinced if I just met him at 14, he would want to marry me and we would just have to have a long courtship because I was a child. I did not marry that musician, but I did marry a musician.
Mandy Capehart
00:35:30 – 00:36:00
But anyway, I, like, remember my stepmom saying, I’m not sure if I’m ready, but I guess we can go meet these dogs. And when we got there, they were in squalor. Like my dad got in this guy’s face and said, if you don’t just hand me this puppy at this price point That I’m saying, because the guy wanted 1,000 of dollars for these dogs that were being abused. He said, I’m gonna report you to the city for illegally, breeding these dogs and keeping them, abusing them. And of course we reported them anyway, but we took home this, the runt of the litter that was covered in its own filth.
Mandy Capehart
00:36:00 – 00:36:30
And, and my stepmom realized I was ready not to replace Riley, but to invite an opportunity to love another little Cue another little creature and an experience that reciprocated affection. Right. And so tucker moved in with us and was amazing until he died as well. But, it’s, it’s remarkable. We, I know that story is so different.
Mandy Capehart
00:36:30 – 00:36:49
I know most people who would have partners can tell you stories of their partners who’ve just brought home another pet or something like that and said, don’t worry. Now you don’t have to be sad anymore. And again, it’s that minimizing of our experiences. Instead of recognizing we can integrate the experiences together for a more holistic and restorative and healing experience.
Victoria Volk
00:36:50 – 00:36:52
I look forward to that book you write.
Mandy Capehart
00:36:54 – 00:36:55
Both hands. Got it. Okay.
Victoria Volk
00:36:56 – 00:37:07
Well, and I think I think your daughter would be a beautiful you know, she could almost see herself as the character in that book. Right. And probably help you write it. Yeah., She’s a brilliant little writer.
Victoria Volk
00:37:07 – 00:37:07
She,
Mandy Capehart
00:37:09 – 00:37:24
She could write it herself. I think that that’s part of it is recognizing too, like, that is also her story, and that is something that she deserves to be the one the authority of. And as parents, it’s easy for us to say like, hey, we’ve got the perspective. We’ve got the age. We’ve got the experience.
Mandy Capehart
00:37:24 – 00:37:55
We know better. And that’s one thing with our kiddo that we’re trying to raise her with is a sense of autonomy where she can push back on us. She can ask questions that are really hard when they come to mind and that she can walk away from conversations with unsatisfying answers and not not to the degree where mom and dad said so, and that’s why. But this, like, that didn’t clarify or that didn’t answer anything because mom and dad don’t have the answer. They don’t act they’re not actually infallible.
Mandy Capehart
00:37:55 – 00:38:23
Okay. What does that mean for me? And at the same time, she’s like, she’s 9. We’re trying very hard to protect her from the enormity of all the things and keep her young and keep her innocent as much as possible as in this stage, but, but giving her a chance to just have a childhood. Like, she experienced losing her nana, when she was 1a half, and my mom had moved across the state to help care for her when I needed to go back to work.
Mandy Capehart
00:38:23 – 00:39:18
And so we had a very special relationship that my daughter doesn’t remember. And I think she deserves to experience what that mean what she has carried with her from that loss in her body and how it shows up for her. I mean, anxious kids are a dime a dozen these days with how life happens around us, but it’s a very special opportunity for us to teach them differently than we were taught and to help them understand how to move through anxiety and stress and fear of loss In ways that we really needed when we were young. And that means getting really uncomfortable and not being able to just fix it or answer it away or explain it away. There’s a lot of when you’re older, I’ll go more in-depth, but for now, please take this information and hold onto it as fact and trust me that, I’ll share more later, but
Victoria Volk
00:39:19 – 00:39:50
So far, Mandy has shared some beautiful bits of wisdom with us all, and she’s going to continue in a few moments with some practical tips. But first, I just wanted to share a word from my sponsor, MagicMind. Consistently creating new content isn’t easy, and it does require a lot of focus and energy. And it can be hard to balance them. Either you have too much energy and you feel amped up and, like, you’re ready to bounce off the walls instead of feeling dialed in.
Victoria Volk
00:39:50 – 00:40:28
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Victoria Volk
00:40:28 – 00:40:58
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Victoria Volk
00:40:58 – 00:41:19
Let’s get back to the episode so Mandy can share some more of her wonderful wisdom with us. That’s a great lead to, into my next question in people listening, who are just really walking through a really difficult time. What, what is, what are some practical things that you can suggest to those people.
Mandy Capehart
00:41:19 – 00:41:43
Yeah. Well, absolutely. As a somatic practitioner, I am very, very hopeful when people are willing to pay attention to the sensations that are happening in their body. Like, we’re really quick to disconnect, like I said, our heart and our mind and our body and our spirit because we think we can think our way through a problem. If that were the case, we would have no more problems.
Mandy Capehart
00:41:43 – 00:41:52
So, like, that’s an easy dismissal. No, girl. You can’t think through that problem. No arguments against, like, the mental exercises., I get it.
Mandy Capehart
00:41:52 – 00:42:31
There’s value in them sometimes, but, ruminating takes it too far. So I think that keeping ourselves humble enough to say, maybe there’s something in my body that I can sense that will bring me some wisdom. There are a lot of somatic practices that I share, on my Instagram page and through my podcast and the work that I do, because I want these practical Habits to become the things that we go to first. Right? So in our neuroplasticity world, we know our brain can be we know that even just imagining a thing can cause our nervous system to react.
Mandy Capehart
00:42:32 – 00:43:16
And so if that is true, then the inverse is true of the way that we heal and the way that we can experience positive things as well. So if I imagine a bear is standing in front of me threatening my family, my nervous system is going to say, hey, holy crap. You should probably strategize and run away. And so the same is true of peaceful experiences and moving through loss and even restoring relationship with people that we’ve lost. And so engaging the somatic, the body, the nervous system in ways that, might feel a little a little, uncomfortable or maybe a little have some skepticism attached to it is one of my favorite ways to bring people in because the the Feel Your Feelings crowd, which we’ve all done that.
Mandy Capehart
00:43:17 – 00:43:42
And it was very popular for a while. It, for me, I witnessed it transform into good vibes only, which is probably like the one phrase that I would eradicate from the common collective, if I could. I hear good vibes only. And I see I what I actually hear is my neutral vibes aren’t welcome. My human existence isn’t welcome here.
Mandy Capehart
00:43:44 – 00:44:11
So, yeah, I would say start with recognizing going beyond just trying to think your way through a problem or let me just feel this and then I’ll feel better. That’s not true, but Your body is in internalizing and holding all of the things that you’ve experienced and to invite those things gently and very carefully with guidance to the surface and to get some wisdom and just some compassion for the things you’ve carried is really important.
Victoria Volk
00:44:12 – 00:44:21
I wanna ask something. You just mentioned it. You said restoring of the relationship with someone you’ve lost. Can you elaborate on that?
Mandy Capehart
00:44:21 – 00:44:42
Yes I can., Okay. So this is going to, might be slightly activating for people who have been In situations and I’ll say this just spiritually or even like religious situations where we talk about prayer or we talk about, afterlife. So bear with me. That framework is where I come from.
Mandy Capehart
00:44:42 – 00:45:20
Right? I have a strong background in different Flavors of Western Christianity. But where I’m going with that is this idea that If a person is removed from us often, whether through divorce breakup, literally moving away, or death, we often think, okay, I have to find closure and it’s going to look like whatever Hollywood tells me it looks like. So we get this idea in our head about what closure is, and we pursue that. And when it doesn’t work, because it typically does not work, we give up.
Mandy Capehart
00:45:20 – 00:45:55
We just think, okay, I guess that’s it. The truth is, if I can imagine a scenario where my nervous system will literally calm back down from a bear in front of me, then does it not stand a reason that I can imagine a connection to the person I’ve lost, a conversation with the person I’ve lost, not to deify them, not to put them on a pedestal and say they were perfect and did no wrong, and I’m the problem. And now I’m having better thoughts about myself. That’s not it. But to the degree where we can say, I’m gonna confront.
Mandy Capehart
00:45:55 – 00:46:16
Here’s an example. My mom with all of her heart led a very private life. There were things after she died that I learned about. There were things as she, as a teenager that I learned about that I could never about or ask about. At one point I was wrestling with something and realized, oh, this is connected to that story.
Mandy Capehart
00:46:16 – 00:46:41
I know about my mom’s life, But I’m not in a place where I can call my grandmother or my aunt or my dad. I don’t have capacity to have a conversation and have them worry about protecting her reputation or her experience. Right. She told me what she told me because she needed that was what I was welcome to be prepared YouTube. But what I knew had affected me and I was carrying it and I needed to process.
Mandy Capehart
00:46:41 – 00:47:19
And so I sat down and started to write a letter about I’m pissed off at you for not sharing and being honest, or I’m hurt that you didn’t share this, or I see that you’re human, but, like, why couldn’t you trust me? Whatever whatever the feelings were. What I ended with was this experience that ended up being verbal. I didn’t write it all down, but I was crying and feeling seen and held by my mom unable to respond. I wasn’t imagining what I ended with wasn’t this experience of, like high spirituality where I would say, oh my gosh.
Mandy Capehart
00:47:19 – 00:47:51
I’m healed from that wound with my mom just not disclosing something. I ended this cathartic expression of just not being able to be honest about what I’ve been carrying. All of the emotion of feeling untrusted and feeling unseen or feeling unworthy of hearing this hard thing in my mom’s life. Even the losses connected to it because, you know, I learn a piece of information and my brain goes to, well, what did that mean for me if that had happened? If it hadn’t happened now in the in between, what does it mean for me?
Mandy Capehart
00:47:51 – 00:48:10
All of those pieces that felt so open ended didn’t necessarily feel like closure. They felt like integrated. It felt like I could ask those questions and not fall to pieces. It felt like I could approach it with a sense of clarity but, yeah, there are still uncertainties attached. I’m not gonna have an answer that’s satisfying.
Mandy Capehart
00:48:11 – 00:48:33
I’m not going to resolve it. I, however, notice this piece of my mom’s relationship with me has lightened. When I think of that moment. When I think of that memory with my mom, that information withheld, I’m not having this sharp pressure. So part of somatic work is about learning to notice the sensations in your body.
Mandy Capehart
00:48:33 – 00:49:16
And sometimes it’s really hard to describe them, which honestly means that people are usually onto something there. And even now as I’m like talking about this, I can feel this like finger pressure, amount of pressure, like right behind my sternum, right around my heart. And it’s still less now than it was when I think about how I felt, what, 16 learning this piece of information and feeling trapped and not feeling Able to even talk about like, even as I’m thinking 16, my throat is starting to like get tight and want to close-up because I couldn’t talk about it. And I didn’t have that freedom to come into a place where it was a safe thing to converse about. So, yes, I have lost my mom and no, we never talked about it.
Mandy Capehart
00:49:16 – 00:49:59
And yet here I am talking about it in a way that I don’t actually need to imagine that she’s sitting there with me. You know, there’s this, practice called the empty chair in therapeutic Modalities where we invite the person to that chair, or we talk to the chair as if the person is with us. It doesn’t have to even be that activating because that is a hard Practice., It can be as simple as just letting myself be really honest and vulnerable with how what I’ve experienced is true and there were ugly parts of it. And I’m going to for me, vulnerability is accepting but those ugly painful parts are true and present and not trying to minimize or push them away.
Mandy Capehart
00:50:01 – 00:50:18
And I think You know, it’s a really difficult place to get to, but we don’t have to start with doing it in our own internal work. Right. We can start with an external relationship where we’re looking for a little bit of understanding or integration
when we know we’re not going to get answers at the end of it.
Victoria Volk
00:50:20 – 00:50:52
In grief recovery, we talk about and that really just reminds me there’s an exercise that we do where you do just that really. It, and, and it’s because you can have all these feelings and not get the closure. Right. And you’re stuck in emotional jail. But if you can get to that place through the way, the way you described, the somatic work that you do with people or through the grief recovery work with me, that’s that it’s possible, Right?
Victoria Volk
00:50:52 – 00:51:12
That is possible that that emotional energy, because emotions have energy, right? Can be lessened, enlightened, and worked through and filled with a fresh, newer perspective and maybe a whole lot of compassion yourself and the other person.
Mandy Capehart
00:51:12 – 00:51:35
Absolutely., I mean, emotions are energy in motion. They are literally little tiny vibrations that we’re sensing in our body that our brain is making a thought about, is making sense of, and then we spit it out and we call it a feeling, but it’s not. It’s you know, the feeling is the physical part. And the more we can allow ourselves to like, oh, maybe I misunderstand human emotion.
Mandy Capehart
00:51:35 – 00:51:53
Maybe I don’t know myself as well as I think. Maybe I’ve really protected myself from having to get into those vulnerable, uncomfortable feelings. Even this morning, I was talking with my husband, in response to 2 conversations yesterday about people who say, well, I’m not angry. I’m not angry. I don’t have a right to be angry.
Mandy Capehart
00:51:53 – 00:52:13
I have nothing to be angry about. I’m like, oh, but you do. You do have a right to be angry. You deserve to be angry, but also your relationship to anger might need to shift because if you’ve minimized it and disqualified yourself, you’re missing the fact that anger is a secondary emotion. And it’s really protecting you from those more risky emotions.
Mandy Capehart
00:52:13 – 00:52:41
There’s more vulnerable emotions behind it that maybe pointing to the fact that you’ve been invalidated or treated unjustly., Right? Our relationship to our emotions, but specifically, the uncomfortable emotions, is often so muted when we grieve that we don’t even notice we’re muting our access to the comfortable positive emotions at the same time. Right? We just we feel numb, and then we say, well, I don’t have emotions when No numb is an emotion too.
Mandy Capehart
00:52:41 – 00:52:57
Numbness is a feeling that has information for us. And we just get to a point where we’re willing to say, okay, well, what are you trying to teach me?, That then The floodgates open and it feels cathartic instead of just a fear driven. I’m never going to stop crying if I start. So I just won’t start.
Victoria Volk
00:52:58 – 00:53:25
I’m in a Voxer group with some, some friends, from all over the world. And I happen to have listened to one of my friends. She called it a rant and she was very she was angry about something and I heard it. And after I heard it, she had recalled it and I called her out on it and she’s like, I, you know, I just recalled it because you know, it, it doesn’t serve anybody. It doesn’t, it’s not helpful.
Victoria Volk
00:53:25 – 00:53:43
And I said, oh, wait a minute, I said, you have every right to be angry. Anger is a valid emotion. And it needs to come up and out. And unless you’re ruminating on it, and you’re telling every Tom, Dick and Harry the same story and you ruminating on it. Right?
Victoria Volk
00:53:43 – 00:53:54
Like, that’s not helpful. Like that doesn’t serve you. But to get it up and out and like, like, let that emotional charge go. Yeah. That’s helpful.
Victoria Volk
00:53:54 – 00:53:57
That’s serving you. Don’t minimize that. Right?
Mandy Capehart
00:53:57 – 00:53:58
Yeah. It’s like,
Victoria Volk
00:53:58 – 00:54:02
She didn’t mean she didn’t mean my permission. Obviously. Right. Right.
Mandy Capehart
00:54:03 – 00:54:29
Giving you having your permission to be a witness is a big deal, and I think we, you know, every time I hear someone say, oh, well, that’s not a helpful thing. Actually, it is. It’s helpful because it allows you to be honest. It allows you to be seen and known. And if you are translating that it is not helpful for you to be seen and known, then there’s a lot more work for you to do, not with any judgment attached, but just, hey, that sounds like a pretty painful belief that you’ve carried.
Mandy Capehart
00:54:30 – 00:55:11
What’s possible if it’s not true? What’s possible if the inverse is true that you are worth known being known and being seen, and your anger is worth expressing what’s possible for you. I can’t tell you how many grief clients I have that conversation becomes the focus for months because there’s so much to unwind around how we have minimized and invalidated our personhood and our humanity just to belong and survive in places where we’re not going to belong. This goes back to my community loss. I was telling you about like realizing that I only belonged in this large community because I made myself fit.
Mandy Capehart
00:55:11 – 00:55:25
I made myself take on the shape that was acceptable is why when I said I’m no longer going to look sound and act like you guys, do I still belong? They said, absolutely not. No. You don’t. Okay.
Mandy Capehart
00:55:25 – 00:55:39
Does that mean all that we shared was meaningless? No. But it does help me recognize pieces of myself that I sacrificed and decide, was it worth it? Ultimately, no. No.
Victoria Volk
00:55:41 – 00:55:44
But there is no failure in learning either.
Mandy Capehart
00:55:45 – 00:55:45
No. There’s like a failing.
Victoria Volk
00:55:48 – 00:56:08
Our best lessons come in failure, right? That’s why it’s not failure. I was at a wrestling term that my when my son wrestled me was just a young squirt. And on the back of the t-shirts for the wrestling team, this other team, they had, I can’t remember exactly how it was written, but something to the effect of failure is only learning. Yeah, absolutely.
Victoria Volk
00:56:08 – 00:56:11
That’s Yeah. I’ve never forgotten it.
Mandy Capehart
00:56:11 – 00:56:14
Just education. Just information., Yep. This information.
Victoria Volk
00:56:15 – 00:56:22
Is there anything else that you would like to share today. I feel like we could talk even longer, but I want to be respectful of your time.
Mandy Capehart
00:56:24 – 00:56:44
Let’s see. I think the last thing I would invite people into is just giving themselves permission to take up space, might look different than you think. It’s not saying, oh, I need a weekend away. I need to go to the spa. Giving ourselves permission to take up space means learning that self-care is simple.
Mandy Capehart
00:56:44 – 00:56:58
It’s accessible to everyone. Often I say the first step of self-care is a glass of water, right? You take for granted the fact that you can access clean water. So for the moment, you’re probably dehydrated. If you’ve cried today, you’re probably dehydrated.
Mandy Capehart
00:56:58 – 00:57:53
If you’ve pretended you haven’t cried today, or you’re not sad, you’re probably dehydrated. Just go give your skin some love, take a drink of water, a big glass, and start with this baseline understanding that the simple approach to who you are as a human, as my husband so eloquently puts it as a meat bag, as a body, go restore a little piece of that and see if it doesn’t change how you’re feeling because we, were, I think we complicate self-care and, and honoring the simplicity of our personhood because we’re mental creatures. We overthink things. We create robots and incredibly complex Mathematical systems to try and solve all the world’s problems when really, maybe we just need some clean water and a nap. I’m a I’m a big fan of that.
Mandy Capehart
00:57:53 – 00:58:03
So if you’re feeling a little like too muchness, clean water, a glass of water, and a nap is really, for me, a smart place to start.
Victoria Volk
00:58:05 – 00:58:14
I am gonna circle this conversation back to houseplants. Okay. Because this is the best., I don’t know. What what’s the word?
Victoria Volk
00:58:15 – 00:58:21
Segue. Segway. Thank you. And to bringing the conversation back to houseplants, because what do houseplants need?
Mandy Capehart
00:58:21 – 00:58:29
Water, sunlight, and something’s good. Absolutely. Yes. I love that saying that you’re basically a houseplant with emotions. Yes.
Mandy Capehart
00:58:29 – 00:58:45
Get some sunlight, get some water, get a little food occasionally, clear the cobwebs. Do you have fungus gnats? Alright. There’s a there’s a medicine for that. There’s a combination of care and, and lendliness and things you can do, and you’re going to lose some leaves.
Mandy Capehart
00:58:45 – 00:58:50
Yep. That’s a good metaphor. And it’s okay.
Victoria Volk
00:58:50 – 00:58:56
And if they start to turn and if they start to turn yellow, yeah. Check the soil, right? Yeah. I’m looking
Mandy Capehart
00:58:56 – 00:59:11
at the plants in this office right now. There’s probably let’s see. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14. There are 14 houseplants in my office right now. Half of them are happy and thriving.
Mandy Capehart
00:59:11 – 00:59:26
One of them is my oldest houseplant ever. It’s like 20 years old, and it has brown spots and it loses leaves all the time. And this year after like 20 years of owning it. It started a second sprout for the first time ever. I started asking myself, what am I doing differently?
Mandy Capehart
00:59:27 – 00:59:39
Because this is this is wild. It’s never done that. It’s just gone straight up and lost some leaves and had some leaves at the top. It looks like a weird palm tree. I can’t even remember what Parietal it is.
Mandy Capehart
00:59:39 – 00:59:58
And I realized, oh, I just started giving it more attention on a consistent basis. Not just the oh, God. I forgot to water. Because for all intents and purposes, as much as I wish I was, I’m a very My ADHD comes in strong. It’s probably why I had so many houseplants at the one point.
Mandy Capehart
00:59:59 – 01:00:20
I just don’t I’m not consistent with them. But when I realized I’ve just been consistent with this one recently and it’s beginning to thrive and new things are growing in it. I thought that, yes. That’ll preach. That is a metaphor right there that if we can attend to ourselves in a consistent and loving and simple manner, something new just might take root.
Victoria Volk
01:00:22 – 01:00:28
That’s a beautiful way to end this podcast. I knew this podcast could be about houseplants.
Mandy Capehart
01:00:29 – 01:00:31
You were right. You were a 100% right.
Victoria Volk
01:00:33 – 01:00:53
Oh, I trust that everything that came out to be shared was shared and I would love to have you back. I think we discussed this before we started to record about having you back on to talk about Enneagram and how that relates to grief and the different Enneagram types. And so I would love to explore that with you in a future episode.
Mandy Capehart
01:00:53 – 01:01:03
Absolutely. I love that topic. I think Enneagram work is so easily aligned with grief work and recovery and integration. So absolutely.
Victoria Volk
01:01:04 – 01:01:36
And I’m like I shared with you too, I’m deep diving into human design. And that’s, you know, comes down to your birth time and place and where, where the, where the stars were and all of that at the, at the time of your birth. And, it’s been a huge, I had a lot of shifts in my perspective towards relationships, just in exploring my own design. And, so it’s information. It’s another tool in discovering who we are and learning about ourselves, and how we show up in our grief.
Victoria Volk
01:01:37 – 01:01:38
Yeah. And otherwise.
Mandy Capehart
01:01:38 – 01:02:11
And also too, I just remembered as you were talking, I will tell you that anybody who wants to get like a head start on what grief and Enneagram work together can look like, I’ve seen the benefit of pushing into those uncomfortable places and teaching both myself and my nervous system, how to remain aligned and resting even amid what feels like a threat to my health and my mental stability. Grief can disrupt all of that. And yet it can also be the doorway into like binding restoration in that area as well.
Victoria Volk
01:02:11 – 01:02:15
And where can people reach out to you if they want to learn more?
Mandy Capehart
01:02:15 – 01:02:34
Yeah. So good. So everything is at Mandy Capehart. So my website, mandycapehart.com Instagram, Twitter, Threads, Pinterest, TikTok, but barely all the things, at Mandy Capehart. And then The Restorative Grief Project is my free online coaching group that is posted, excuse me, hosted on Facebook.
Mandy Capehart
01:02:35 – 01:03:18
And it’s just an environment where we can practice grieving together and practice supporting one another and learn how to respond when people hit us platitudes and and learn how to invite our beloved people into the world of grief support without criticizing how they’ve shown up or not shown up in the past. Like, this is an environment and a place where we just hold space for each other and learn what that means to practice breathing with intention. So, Yeah. I love getting messages and DMs and new connections online about these really uncomfortable conversations because they deserve. It turns out every single one of us deserves to have space to fall apart.
Mandy Capehart
01:03:19 – 01:03:21
So that’s the aim of all of it.
Victoria Volk
01:03:22 – 01:03:28
I love that. And I will link to all that in the show notes. Awesome. And thank you so much for your time today, Mandy.
Mandy Capehart
01:03:28 – 01:03:32
Yeah, absolutely. Victoria, thank you for having me. It’s been my pleasure.
Victoria Volk
01:03:32 – 01:03:37
And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love.
Cancer, Energy, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Mind/Body Wellness, Podcast, Reiki |
Kiki Tyler | Best Friend Loss & A Midlife Awakening
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
In the symphony of life, each person’s journey hits a unique set of notes, creating a melody that resonates with their experiences.
Welcome to another episode of Grieving Voices, where we explore the therapeutic and transformative power of sound healing. Today’s guest is the incredibly talented sound healer, Kiki Tyler, who takes us on a journey through her personal story of grief and how it led her to discover her purpose in helping others heal.
Kiki Tyler is a renowned sound healer known for creating immersive sonic landscapes that promote healing and self-discovery. She harmonizes body, mind, and spirit using various instruments through resonating frequencies. Her intuitive approach and extensive knowledge allow her to facilitate deeply restorative experiences.
In This Episode:
- Learn about Kiki’s transition from experiencing deep personal loss to finding solace in sound therapy.
- Hear the poignant tale of how losing her best friend inspired her to become a healer.
- Understand the importance of allowing oneself to grieve openly without societal pressure.
- Discover how grief evolves from sharp pain to fond memories that inspire growth.
- Gain insights into navigating friendship dynamics after loss and honoring those connections moving forward.
- Learn tips on how you can help loved ones cope with their losses based on real-life experience.
- How encountering multiple losses prompted significant lifestyle changes, including setting boundaries for better work-life balance.
- An overview of distance Reiki sessions and virtual sound baths – demystifying quantum healing across physical spaces.
Takeaways:
Kiki’s story encourages us to reflect on how we handle loss within our networks — supporting colleagues during their times of need fosters deeper connections and community strength. It also poses a question worth pondering: How do we honor ourselves and others amidst adversity?
Remember — It’s okay to feel and express emotions; vulnerability isn’t weakness—it’s human strength unveiled amidst adversity.
RESOURCES:
- Reiki
- Biofield Tuning
- Episode Sponsor: Magic Mind | Use the code “GRIEVINGVOICES” to receive one month free with a 3-month subscription. This special promotion is only for January!
CONNECT:
_______
NEED HELP?
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
- Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor
If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Victoria Volk:
(00:01:37 – 00:02:16)
Thank you for tuning in to Grieving Voices. Today, my guest is Kiki Tyler. She is a sound healer known for her transformative ability to weave intricate sonic landscapes that guide individuals on journeys of healing, expansion and self-discovery. With a deep understanding of the therapeutic power of sound vibrations, Kiki creates immersive soundscapes using an array of instruments, resonating frequencies that harmonize the body, mind, and spirit. Her intuitive approach, combined with her knowledge of sound therapy techniques, allows Kiki to facilitate deeply restorative experiences, helping our clients release tension, restore balance, and unlock their inner potential.
Victoria Volk:
(00:02:16 – 00:02:57)
Through her gentle and compassionate guidance, Kiki Sound Healing Sessions offer a sacred space for profound healing and inner alignment. Thank you so much for sharing that beautiful bio with me and for the work that you do because, clearly, it’s needed because who doesn’t need some inner alignment, right, these days in a world that seems very out of alignment? What I’ve come to know even for myself personally and majority of people who come to my podcast, their work is from a place of pain often from pain to purpose. Right? And, that’s what I often see.
Victoria Volk:
(00:02:57 – 00:03:02)
And so what led you to doing the work that you’re doing today.
Kiki Tyler
(00:03:03 – 00:03:31)
It was definitely from a place of pain and intense grief, and it was one that I was in denial from, very close friend of mine, we had been close friends, best friends for almost 9 years. Traveled around, did fitness events together. During 2020, she was diagnosed out of the blue with stage four lung cancer. Doctors gave her 2 weeks, and she said, I’m gonna hang around a little bit longer.
Kiki Tyler
(00:03:31 – 00:03:50)
I wanna vote this year. And she was she was stubborn. She hung around for a little over 4 months, which I got to spend a lot of time with her during the lockdown. We both were safe. She took hospice into our own hands and kind of just maintained and managed her pain, and she made it fun.
Kiki Tyler
(00:03:50 – 00:04:12)
Like, she had her own visiting hours. She used cat means, like, it was her personality through and through all the way up to the end. We’re actually coming up on her 3 year anniversary of her passing. She passed peacefully in her sleep on December 12th. And I was close to their husband and worked closely with him kind of just clearing things out, packing up for things, donating things.
Kiki Tyler
(00:04:12 – 00:04:30)
So through all of that, I didn’t realize I was in denial. I was shoving everything down and showing up for him. And plus the lockdown, and we couldn’t have the traditional funeral or life celebration or say any type of goodbyes. It was a very unique time for me.
Victoria Volk
(00:04:31 – 00:04:36)
I’m just trying to wrap my head around because she would have been quite young at the time.
Kiki Tyler
(00:04:37 – 00:04:37)
55.
Victoria Volk
(00:04:38 – 00:04:41)
I mean, I’m looking at you, and I think you look really young.
Kiki Tyler
(00:04:42 – 00:04:53)
Thank you. I yes. I’ll be 43 in March. But, yeah, she was like the older another older sister for me. We just it. It was it was great.
Kiki Tyler
(00:04:53 – 00:05:00)
She’s here in spirit. She’s actually one of my spirit guides. Purple she dyed her hair purple. It was one of her favorite colors. She was a huge Baltimore Ravens fan.
Kiki Tyler
(00:05:00 – 00:05:25)
And, usually, there’s purple, purple orbs or things when I’m doing healing sessions or when I’m working with my sound bowls. Like, I can always feel her here. So that was a beautiful transition, but, I’m kind of skipping ahead. I had all that denial, and I didn’t know what I would to do with it. I and then I went through anger, and a girlfriend had invited me to a women’s retreat.
Kiki Tyler
(00:05:25 – 00:05:37)
You know, what the heck? I’m tired of being cooped up. Like, I need to do something.
We were all safe and distanced. It was outdoors mainly, and that’s when I had my 1st reiki and sound experience.
Kiki Tyler
(00:05:37 – 00:06:05)
And we were we did a beautiful sunrise yoga world, and there were reiki walking around asking if you wanted to receive. And I was like, I don’t know what it is, but sure. And it was like the tap had opened, and I was just sobbing and crying, and it was the waterworks. I was ugly crying laying on the floor, but it was like this huge weight had been lifted off my heart and my shoulders. And I kinda opened my eyes, and there were tears coming down the practitioner’s eyes.
Kiki Tyler
(00:06:05 – 00:06:17)
Like, she was an empath, so she was feeling what I was feeling. And I remember connecting with her immediately afterwards. And what was that? How can I learn more about it? Like, I’ve never experienced anything.
Kiki Tyler
(00:06:17 – 00:06:39)
It was intense, but it was also very liberating. And the other woman was a sound practitioner, and she was doing, chakra tuning, like alignments with her tuning forks. And she was doing little 15 minutes, and I was like, sure. Let’s try it. And, you know, I had a headache from all the crying and dehydration.
Kiki Tyler
(00:06:39 – 00:06:55)
I was about a 5, 6 hour drive, so I had low back pain. I didn’t tell her any of this. She intuitively scans me, pulls out her tuning forks, and picks 3 that that she was drawn to work with and she’s playing them over me. Headache was gone. Low back pain was gone.
Kiki Tyler
(00:06:55 – 00:07:04)
I slept like a baby that night. It was amazing. So, of course, same thing. What was that? What did I just experience?
Kiki Tyler
(00:07:04 – 00:07:09)
How can I get more of it, and how can I share this with the world? This needs to be, like, mainstream knowledge.
Victoria Volk
(00:07:10 – 00:07:34)
My story too, I fell into reiki and it finds you. Right? I think when the student is ready, the teacher appears and then, that’s I kinda fell into it by accident too. I put accident in quotation. But I just wanna share this because I’m still thinking about what that would have been like for her and your your friend and to be, I mean, relatively young.
Victoria Volk
(00:07:34 – 00:07:44)
And to be told, you have 2 weeks. Like, 2 weeks? How many people I mean, like, what did she take that for an answer?
Kiki Tyler
(00:07:45 – 00:08:01)
It was hard. Throughout that period, we had just said goodbye to another dear friend of ours who passed from breast cancer who had made it through 3 different rounds of chemo. And they were also really close. She was going and she saw her friend do that. And that could have been an option, but it would have only given her a handful of months.
Kiki Tyler
(00:08:01 – 00:08:17)
And she saw what it did, and she’s like, that’s not worth a few extra months. Like, I want to be happy. I want people to remember me this way, and I don’t want them to see me whether it way like that. And I kinda wanted to go out on my terms, and we did different pop-up classes. We visited her apartment complex.
Kiki Tyler
(00:08:18 – 00:08:29)
She was just a really bright light, like, throughout the whole process. And she was there for me. She was there for other she was worried about every of it. She’s like, I’m okay. I’m not in pain.
Kiki Tyler
(00:08:29 – 00:08:53)
I’ve made my peace with it. Worried about my husband and my cats, but other than that, like, she reconnected with family, made sure that she saw the people she wanted to see, made amends with the people she wanted to make amends with. She was in a really like, I very strong. I have a lot of respect for her. I don’t think I I would handle it that way, but you don’t know until you’re in that situation.
Kiki Tyler
(00:08:53 – 00:09:19)
Between 2018 and 2020, we had lost 4 different instructor friends to cancer of some kind or another. So it’s we I always do the fundraisers when it comes around, whether it’s breast cancer, colon whatever it is. Sick. We go and we dance and we would be part of them, but that’s when I had a lot of people reach out and say, are you gonna do 1 in her honor or her memory? And the questions are, what are you gonna do?
Kiki Tyler
(00:09:19 – 00:09:35)
How are you celebrating? And a lot of people reached out to me because we were the we were the dynamic duo. Like, we would co-teach and and host a lot of events together. And I was like, guys, she doesn’t want this. She just wants to hang out with her friends, visit her, have a coffee.
Kiki Tyler
(00:09:35 – 00:09:56)
She doesn’t want like, if there are no medical bills, she’s fine. She’s not gonna need help with anything, thankfully, again, she was very blessed in that area. And she stayed at home, so she didn’t even have traditional hospice care. She had a nurse come once or twice a week, manage her pain med meds, and that was about it. But, yeah, very young.
Victoria Volk
(00:09:57 – 00:10:12)
You know, not a lot of people would have the wherewithal to choose to have a death that they want. And do you think it was just the work that she had been doing? Because she had been doing the similar thing as you, I imagine.
Kiki Tyler
(00:10:14 – 00:10:39)
I don’t I don’t know. I know she and I talked a lot when our friend Donna had passed, and it was really hard for both of us to watch and she was withering away. I mean, I don’t know the dosage of the chemo, but she was on her 4th round, and she had lost, like, 60 or 70 pounds. She would had very low energy. And I know Sonia was very much like, I don’t want that for myself.
Kiki Tyler
(00:10:39 – 00:10:54)
I don’t want my friends and family to see me go through that. I don’t wanna see me go she was just very clear on what she wanted and didn’t want, and she controlled the narrative of her exit and her final chapter.
Victoria Volk
(00:10:54 – 00:11:14)
And I think if we all can take anything from you sharing that is that if you have an opportunity to do so, to not be afraid to speak up for yourself. Right? Yes. Have the kind of death that you want to have. Because I know that can probably be very difficult for the for the loved ones.
Victoria Volk
(00:11:14 – 00:11:21)
Right? Like, do the chemo. Do the treatment. I want you know, I don’t want you to they don’t want their loved one to go. Right?
Victoria Volk
(00:11:21 – 00:11:24)
So I can’t imagine. I’m sure she got a lot of pushback maybe.
Kiki Tyler
(00:11:25 – 00:11:36)
She did. She controlled her socials and how people communicated, and I was kind of a little bit of a buffer. We talked about that. I was like, how can I help you? Even just announcing it and sharing with certain people.
Kiki Tyler
(00:11:36 – 00:12:00)
She told her close family, but she asked if I felt comfortable sharing with people and just making announcements to more of our closer circle. And I think that opened the door for people to reach out to me instead of her, but it was why isn’t she getting chemo? Why isn’t she fighting? I wish she would have changed her you know? And I know and understand now those suggestions recommend they were coming from a place of love, but also fear.
Kiki Tyler
(00:12:00 – 00:12:15)
Like, they didn’t want to lose her. And I don’t know what was going through their mind. I just knew what going through my mind. I wanted her to have the happiest transition possible. So if I can make that happen, and she didn’t want parties or she didn’t want fundraisers.
Kiki Tyler
(00:12:15 – 00:12:19)
She didn’t wanna go to chemo. Like, I wanted to honor her wishes.
Victoria Volk
(00:12:20 – 00:12:30)
Some people may be wondering after she passed in with the anniversaries and things, how do you personally honor her memory?
Kiki Tyler
(00:12:31 – 00:13:10)
I mean, she’s with me every day. It’s hard for me to teach a dance class where I don’t think of her. I actually had to take a break for about 6 months from teaching. I thought I was not gonna teach again because of how raw and real. The grief was once I finally did allow it out and up, but It brings me joy.
Kiki Tyler
(00:13:11 – 00:13:35)
It brings others joy, and that’s one of the things we both wanted to do together. And I used to not even be able to cry in public, and now I’m crying on a podcast. So progress, It’s okay. It’s okay to feel. It’s not a bad thing.
Kiki Tyler
(00:13:35 – 00:14:01)
It’s not a sign of weakness. I mean, I sat on the couch and I cried when we cried together, just absorbing the weight and the gravity of the news. I don’t think, as a society, we allow people that time to process. We kinda wanna rush through the pain. We wanna rush through the hard parts, and that’s where the most growth happened.
Kiki Tyler
(00:14:02 – 00:14:18)
I wouldn’t be where I am today. I wouldn’t have unlocked and reconnected with the gifts that I have, if I didn’t go through those experiences, not saying I want them or wish for them, but I needed to go through those shadows to really appreciate and honor the light.
Victoria Volk
(00:14:20 – 00:14:36)
That’s beautifully said, and thank you for sharing. And just so people listening, it’s not like you’re never gonna be sad. Right? Like, the sadness doesn’t go away. You still would rather be teaching with your friend.
Victoria Volk
(00:14:36 – 00:14:53)
Right? Like, that’s not gonna go away. But can you describe how it’s different now versus how the grief is different now than how it was maybe even after a year, you know, the magical year.
Kiki Tyler
(00:14:53 – 00:15:07)
Right. I feel like mine was 2 years, but that’s because I stunted my grief personal, and I was in denial. So, it does get I don’t even wanna say easier. It’s it gets different. Right.
Kiki Tyler
(00:15:07 – 00:15:18)
You look back and you remember things in fondness and the pain isn’t as sharp. You know? You miss them. Like, there are times I’ve gone to text her and I’m like, alright. I’m just gonna talk to you.
Kiki Tyler
(00:15:18 – 00:15:29)
You’re here. I know you’re here. You know? Like, I have voice memos or, you know, Facebook has the time hop or the time memories that come up. And I’m like, oh, that was such a fun dance.
Kiki Tyler
(00:15:29 – 00:15:37)
I’m gonna put that in. Like, I saw that. It’s for a reason. I miss you. I love you, and I’m gonna share it again.
Kiki Tyler
(00:15:38 – 00:15:46)
But, some days it just hits you, and you have this sharp memory and you just wanna hug them.
Victoria Volk
(00:15:50 – 00:16:22)
You know, and best friend loss, even friend loss, is something that I wouldn’t say it’s minimized, but it definitely doesn’t get the attention that other losses get, death of a spouse or significant other or a child. Yeah. Of course, a child or a parent, grandparent, or what have you., But friendships, how would you describe how what your friendship meant to you and the importance of friendship in someone’s life.
Kiki Tyler
(00:16:25 – 00:16:54)
That’s a really deep question. I have friendships on and I don’t even like to say levels. They’re just you have different people in your life, and you can go to them for different types of support, different types of advice. She was that all around girlfriend or sister that I could call, and I knew she’d support me. I knew she’d call me on my BS.
Kiki Tyler
(00:16:54 – 00:17:26)
She was not the I’m gonna tell you what you want to hear person. She’s like, I’m here for you, but we’re not gonna sit in this type friendship. And It’s been hard to I don’t wanna say replace, but to fill those shoes, and I avoided making new friends. After that, I still stayed close with my current friends, but there was this, is there ever gonna be anybody close to her? And it’s not to replace her.
Kiki Tyler
(00:17:26 – 00:17:55)
That’s not the intention. But when I started to make new friends, particularly in the the spiritual and the healing space, I realized there were more women out there like that and started to open myself up to deeper friendships and let them all back down because I don’t wanna get hurt again. And I was I was only blocking myself from those connections. And we’re we’re human. We’re people.
Kiki Tyler
(00:17:55 – 00:18:37)
We gather. We need that socialization. And as much as I love my alone time and I’m an introvert and I like to grab a book and snuggle with my cats, like, I also like to sit and have cacao with my girlfriends and, like, talk about really deep, cool woo woo stuff too and sound healing and reiki and, like, let’s feel better. What hurts? You know, and we just are all brainstorming instead of sitting watching dumpster fires and getting sucked into that lower vibe energy, and she was definitely that high vibe, alright, where you and the same she would do it with her students, and she was just genuine with every single person in her life.
Kiki Tyler
(00:18:37 – 00:19:00)
It didn’t matter if you were an acquaintance, she saw you once a week, once a month, once a quarter. Like, she would just treat everybody the same, and she’s she’s had a lot of admirable qualities. So I remember those skills and traits that she shared and showed me, and I honor her by emulating that. And sometimes think, what would Sonia do or say?
Victoria Volk
(00:19:03 – 00:19:24)
You know, so she had a spouse, has a spouse, who was left behind. Right?, Mhmm. How did what can you share with listeners on how, as her best friend, how you supported him and her family and if you have if you learned anything from that experience that you can share.
Kiki Tyler
(00:19:26 – 00:20:06)
Yeah. It was the 2 of them and their 2 cats, and her father had passed, and I believe her mother had, so I never met her parents. She was close with his mom, and she had just reconnected with her son. So he was starting to come back into the picture, and her son and husband developed a very fast friendship and started walking every week, where they spread her ashes. And I remember after we finally packed up and cleaned out a lot of her clothing and everything, and and cleared out that room.
Kiki Tyler
(00:20:06 – 00:20:43)
He as soon as his lease was up, he moved into a new apartment, which I mean, I spent 20 years in that place, so I couldn’t even imagine what it was like for him. But we had several, like, brunch dates, lunches, just messaging him and reaching out. He had a very good support system hit with his family and her son as well. And, he unfortunately passed of a heart attack earlier this year, which was they say it could be broken heart. I mean, it was tough.
Kiki Tyler
(00:20:44 – 00:21:07)
But I had reached out and we were seeing each other less and less, and I don’t know if I didn’t take that personally. I don’t know if that was too much of a memory for him, and he needed that space. But I promised her I would check in and reach out and at least do what I could on my side, but it was hard. It was hard for him. He would we try to make light of it, but, yeah, we sat and cried a bit too.
Kiki Tyler
(00:21:08 – 00:21:08)
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
(00:21:08 – 00:21:24)
After losing so many, you said 4 different friends in a short period of time, did that how did that make you did that cause you to change anything in your life or cause you to look at your health differently or your life differently?
Kiki Tyler
(00:21:25 – 00:21:47)
Yes. It really helped me create boundaries. And before that, I was very much a yes person, a people pleaser and a workaholic to the point where I wasn’t seen as much of my friends as they would have liked or I would have liked. And it was easy to say, oh, but I have work. But I could have basically said no.
Kiki Tyler
(00:21:47 – 00:22:34)
So there was a lot more no. There was a lot more, I’m not gonna sub as many classes because I’m gonna spend quality time with my loved ones, whether that be family, friends, girlfriends, what have you. More more time with myself to dial into what I felt were my priorities and really sit with, are these mine? Is this something that was planted whether it be from Parents or other parental figure society. It doesn’t matter where it came from, but just really revisiting my belief system and just kind of checking things to make sure I wasn’t you know, we talked about alignment at the beginning of this, and it’s so quick and easy to get just a little a little off.
Kiki Tyler
(00:22:34 – 00:22:51)
But if you if it goes unchecked, now all of a sudden, you’re all the way over here. But if you catch it, it’s easier to bring it back to the center line. I mean, it’s like, we take better care of our cars and our instruments than we do our bodies. Right? You get that gotta get that oil changed.
Kiki Tyler
(00:22:51 – 00:23:11)
You gotta get this the all the fluids and everything fixed. When you have instruments or a piano that’s out of tune, you’re calling somebody to fix it, so it sounds right. But we often ignore our our creaks and cracks and, like, our body sending that signals. So just slowing down was a big thing for me because I was go, go, go, go, go. 100 miles an hour.
Kiki Tyler
(00:23:11 – 00:23:15)
Right? Don’t wanna stop. Don’t wanna think. Don’t wanna slow down. And it’s easier.
Kiki Tyler
(00:23:15 – 00:23:16)
You don’t have to feel.
Victoria Volk
(00:23:16 – 00:23:16)
Mhmm.
Kiki Tyler
(00:23:16 – 00:23:46)
And feeling that the feeling can be painful. And I avoided the pain, and I avoided the darkness, and I didn’t want to do the work. I kept telling myself, I’m not ready, but things like this hit you. And like you said, there were the 4, and then with her, and then I had this denial and anger, and I just I had shut down. My partner, like, you’re wearing a lot of gray and black where I always used to wear a ton of color.
Kiki Tyler
(00:23:46 – 00:24:11)
He’s like, you’re coming home, you’re reading, like, you’re not active. You’re not seeing people, and this is when things started to open back up when we could. He’s like, I’m worried about you, and that’s kind of around the same time the retreat happened. And that’s what led me like you said, the the teacher appears when the student is ready, so I took my 1st, Reiki Practitioner training level 1. And my intention was only level 1.
Kiki Tyler
(00:24:11 – 00:24:37)
Like, I really wanted to focus on healing me and getting better. But in doing the work and tapping more into my values and my sole purpose, I’m here for a bigger reason. My purpose is bigger than me. So continued to follow that path, and now I’m teaching and then same thing with sound. Just really wanted to learn and play for myself to heal and get into a better feeling place, but then started sharing it with girlfriends and, like, can you play for me?
Kiki Tyler
(00:24:37 – 00:24:55)
Maybe you should do this. Oh, this makes me feel better. I can sleep better. I’m not stressed. So and just if I was still in the same state of a 100 miles an hour and being a workaholic, I never would have heard these pulls and these tugs on my soul to go in the right direction.
Victoria Volk
(00:24:57 – 00:25:21)
We have to pause in order to hear those things. Right? You have to be able to so I everything you shared about, like, our body alignment and getting mislined and taking care of our cars better than we do our bodies and all of those things you said I just said in a healing session just a couple of days ago, 1st time healing session for someone. It’s like we don’t understand. Like, we haven’t we are energy.
Victoria Volk
(00:25:21 – 00:25:29)
We are an energetic body. And just you go to the chiropractor. You don’t think twice. You know? Get your Right.
Victoria Volk
(00:25:29 – 00:25:31)
Neck put in alignment, like,
Kiki Tyler
(00:25:31 – 00:25:32)
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
(00:25:32 – 00:25:41)
Connected. Everything is connected. And so do you use sound bowls, or do you use the tuning forks like you initially experienced?
Kiki Tyler
(00:25:42 – 00:25:43)
Both. How about
Victoria Volk
(00:25:43 – 00:25:44)
the count?
Kiki Tyler
(00:25:44 – 00:25:59)
The weighted forks were the were the first things I purchased. I loved them. I worked with them on myself. I’ve shared them with family and friends, and I pretty much mimicked what I went through and just got better at trusting my intuition of what forks use, doing chakra scans. Love the singing bowls.
Kiki Tyler
(00:26:00 – 00:26:20)
That was my next investment. I now have added flute, gong, drum. I’ve got a list of other things I wanna add, and it’s kind of just following that intuition and what I’m drawn to, what the people need. And many of my Reiki clients asked for me to play at the end or they’re like, can we do half and half? And I’m very a la carte.
Kiki Tyler
(00:26:20 – 00:26:46)
There’s no, like, regimented or cookie cutter. It’s you may have signed up for Reiki, but I’m feeling like I really need to play this goal for you while I’m sending Reiki, and they’re like, I’m here for it. So I’m a 100% virtual. I have had the opportunity to teach some small group in person sound baths, but everything I do has been over Zoom, and My clients love that. A lot of times, they’ll turn their screen off or they’ll have their phone next to them.
Kiki Tyler
(00:26:46 – 00:27:07)
So I’m looking up at the ceiling or the van, and then they’re like, thanks, Kiki. And they, like, turn it off, and then they’re already in bed. So they have the best night sleep of their life. A lot of times, they’ll get visions or answers things that they were seeking and setting intentions for throughout the evening. And I love the convenience of it because I’m, like, right in our back pocket with the use of a phone.
Victoria Volk
(00:27:08 – 00:27:13)
So how would you describe how do you describe to your clients? How does this work over distance?
Kiki Tyler
(00:27:15 – 00:27:17)
The sound or the reiki?
Victoria Volk
(00:27:18 – 00:27:31)
Both. Right? I mean, well, the sound. I mean but you can even do sound like, I do sound healing. I do the tuning forks, but I tell clients, like, you can go about your day, and I can conduct a session.
Victoria Volk
(00:27:31 – 00:27:55)
And but explaining that is re like, how like, I had the hardest time wrapping my head around it too when I first started. And I still honestly, I like, trip over my words, and I feel like I’m a blubbering mess when I try to explain because it’s so mystical even to me. Like, it’s so childlike. Like, it’s you know what I mean?
Kiki Tyler
(00:27:55 – 00:27:55)
It’s magical.
Victoria Volk
(00:27:56 – 00:27:56)
It is.
Kiki Tyler
(00:27:56 – 00:28:05)
Yeah. It is. And that’s and I guess I don’t question it. So for me, it’s like, I get the same thing. People ask, oh, what?
Kiki Tyler
(00:28:05 – 00:28:15)
Like, it’s quantum healing, and then you get another look. And I’m like, okay. So Everything that we’re talking about is very etheric. Right? There’s this etheric realm, different dimension.
Kiki Tyler
(00:28:15 – 00:28:36)
So I do the healing in that realm. So we don’t you know, time is not linear. It’s past, present, future. It’s all happening at the same time. So I’m doing, Akashic answer sessions right now, and it really I was talking about this with a woman last night, and she’s like, it just blew me away that you can go into my records, and I don’t have to be, like, present on Zoom.
Kiki Tyler
(00:28:36 – 00:28:42)
And I said, no. As long as your higher self gives me permission. Same thing with Reiki. Like, I need your permission. You need to reach out and request.
Kiki Tyler
(00:28:43 – 00:28:58)
I can’t just arbitrarily, like, pop in and do this work for you. And I love that the energetic space is permission-based. And it has a spiritual aspect, but it’s not religious based. That’s another Mhmm. Question that pops up a lot too.
Kiki Tyler
(00:29:00 – 00:29:14)
But you brought up energetic bodies. So we have 4. Right? The shamanic there there’s the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. So in the quantum realm in the ethers, we’re healing all 4 bodies because they’re interconnected.
Kiki Tyler
(00:29:15 – 00:29:33)
Mhmm. And, yes, you mentioned the chiropractor. That’s great for your physical, but you could have trapped emotions, and that could be causing the back pain. So it could have nothing to do with your spine whatsoever, and your spine’s gonna continue to get out of alignment until you work through these issues. So that’s where the reiki energy can come in.
Kiki Tyler
(00:29:33 – 00:29:57)
And, honestly, I just invite people to have their first session because after I experienced it, I didn’t question anything. And, like, once you whatever your intention or will is, it’s gonna happen. And if you don’t want it to flow, the Reiki energy won’t flow. And I did a group, self-love event with a woman. She was teaching the gentle yoga.
Kiki Tyler
(00:29:57 – 00:30:15)
I was providing Reiki and sound healing. And chatting with everybody in the beginning, there were 2 ladies and one was really she’s like, well, I’ve had Reiki before, but I didn’t feel anything. So we thought I was like, this is great. I love that you brought this up. Are you skeptical?
Kiki Tyler
(00:30:15 – 00:30:28)
Are you open? What are you seeking right now? Because if you don’t want me to send, even though I’m sending it to the whole room, you won’t receive anything. But if you set the intention, I’m tired. This is a self-love experience.
Kiki Tyler
(00:30:28 – 00:30:36)
I’m here to receive. You’ll get what you need. That could be sleep. That could be deep relaxation. You could get images, answers.
Kiki Tyler
(00:30:36 – 00:30:49)
You don’t even have to share it with me, and you will get what you need. And she was floored. She had been sleeping for weeks. She didn’t share this with me. But at the end, after I had gone around, she was one that fell asleep and was snoring.
Kiki Tyler
(00:30:50 – 00:30:58)
And she was like, I felt tingly. I felt hard cold. Like, I actually felt it flow. And I said that had nothing to do with me at all. I’m just the channel.
Kiki Tyler
(00:30:58 – 00:31:05)
You know, I like to tell my clients I’m the faucet, not the water. You’re the healer. You’re controlling. It’s your adventure. Right?
Kiki Tyler
(00:31:05 – 00:31:24)
You want a lot. You want a little. It’s too intense. You are in control of the tap, so you decide. And I do like to give people a heads up when I’m in so they know if they feel tired or something like they get really thirsty or they, like, get their energy sapped because it it can impact people differently.
Kiki Tyler
(00:31:25 – 00:31:41)
But I did 4 sessions on Monday energetically connecting, not over Zoom or in person and everybody I sent their notes and feedback to, they were like, did you do this at this time? I felt really tired at this time. Was it this time? And you know. You know.
Kiki Tyler
(00:31:42 – 00:31:46)
Your body knows. All of them. All the energetic bodies now.
Victoria Volk
(00:31:47 – 00:31:47)
Yeah.
Kiki Tyler
(00:31:47 – 00:31:47)
So I don’t
Victoria Volk
(00:31:47 – 00:31:48)
Know
Kiki Tyler
(00:31:48 – 00:31:50)
if that helps, but that’s one of the ways.
Victoria Volk
(00:31:51 – 00:32:25)
Yeah. Like you said, you just have to experience it, and that’s that’s kind of how I end the conversation too. It’s like, you just have to experience but I just wanna share with you a little something that I’ve been trying out. Speaking about trying things like Reiki or energy healing, I’ve been trying Magicmind, and they are actually sponsoring this episode. But even though that they’re sponsoring this episode, I would not tell you or share about it if I personally have not tried it, and I personally wouldn’t recommend it myself.
Victoria Volk
(00:32:26 – 00:32:52)
Seeing how well it’s worked for me. I would really encourage you to try it out as well if you’re having trouble being at a 100%. It’s been a total game changer for me. I can, in fact, tell on days when I haven’t taken it because I’m just a little bit more scattered. I have more difficult time getting into a flow, and my energy is kind of more like a roller coaster rather than like this steady, calm, focused energy.
Victoria Volk
(00:32:52 – 00:33:18)
It changes my energy. It changes my ability to let’s just say, get shit done. So if this is something that piques your interest, right now for January, they have a or buy a 3 month subscription, and you get a month free. This is only for January. It’s like getting an extra 20% off, which gets you to 75% off, actually, and this only lasts until the end of January.
Victoria Volk
(00:33:18 – 00:33:44)
So if you wanna give it a try, again, it’s not gonna hurt you to try it. And it actually tastes good, and it’s like 2 ounces. It’s got so many good things in it. Neuro tropics, what do they call them, adaptogens, some of the things, specifically lion’s mane mushrooms, ashwagandha, bacoba monnieri. I’m probably botching those, but it actually does taste good.
Victoria Volk
(00:33:44 – 00:34:19)
And I can tell in days when I haven’t taken it when I end up doing productive things that have me on the struggle bus those days, actually, kinda like today, if I’m being honest. So head to magicmind.com/jangrieving voices, and use my code, grieving voices, at checkout. And this is, again, for 3-month subscription. You will get 1 month free, only this January, to help you gear up to crush your 2024 New Year’s resolutions and get fully focused. Alright.
Victoria Volk
(00:34:19 – 00:34:35)
Back to the episode. What drew me to biofield tuning, particularly biofield tuning, was, just the science of it. Like because it really gets into the science of quantum physics and yeah. And I geeked out over that stuff. But
Kiki Tyler
(00:34:36 – 00:34:36)
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
(00:34:36 – 00:34:55)
To, like, succinctly explain it. I haven’t found my language yet. I’m still I think that’s still a work in progress for me because it still feels like child play to me in so many ways. I feel like a kid in, playing. It’s just I get a lot of delight from it.
Victoria Volk
(00:34:55 – 00:34:58)
And I just saw your face light up as you’re talking about it too.
Kiki Tyler
(00:34:58 – 00:35:01)
I know. I was gonna say that was not a succinct explanation. I kinda
Victoria Volk
(00:35:01 – 00:35:05)
Went off by a couple’s hand. And that’s how I get. Yeah.
Kiki Tyler
(00:35:05 – 00:35:10)
Yeah. I feel like Harry Potter and the 1st time I’m going to Hogwarts, I’m like,
Victoria Volk
(00:35:10 – 00:35:19)
Where else? You know? Right? Right? We have and this is the thing, like, as the person receiving, you it’s empowering.
Victoria Volk
(00:35:20 – 00:35:40)
It’s an empowering experience because it’s like like I you know, walking clients through a guided visualization. It’s like, woah. It’s like you’re introducing them to childlike play for the since they we just don’t do that as adults. Right? We don’t we have really difficult time just imagining.
Victoria Volk
(00:35:41 – 00:36:26)
Like, our imaginations just kind of, like, just it’s like our imaginary world just gets smaller and smaller and smaller. The more grief that gets put on top, stacked on top and trauma and societal pressure and all these things that happen in life. It’s like the child within us just gets kinda squashed, and this is, I think, what helps, energy healing is what reignited that within me. And I think that’s where My face lights up when I share it with people. And I love first time sessions, but I just I it’s like I get so excited for them to experience it, and it’s like, I just don’t know how to explain it.
Victoria Volk
(00:36:26 – 00:36:30
It’s just magic. You know? Like you said, like, it’s just magical. Yeah.
Kiki Tyler
(00:36:30 – 00:36:42)
Yeah. Yes. Magic is real, and that’s what I tell people. And I have a woman, I’m working with now, and it started off as a one off session. She’d never heard of Breaky or Acacia Records or anything.
Kiki Tyler
(00:36:42 – 00:37:08)
And after her 1st session, she’s and she didn’t consider herself creative, like, didn’t have that visual. But as soon as I dropped her in, she was having her own journey while I was sending her healing and tapping into her spirit team for guidance on her intention she shared with me. And she was like, I need more of this. One isn’t enough. And then we’ve been working together now for 3 months because it was like you it’s like an onion.
Kiki Tyler
(00:37:08 – 00:37:22)
Right? You heal one thing, and then something else pops up and something. You’re like, I didn’t realize that. So and then same thing on my journey. So went through a phase and stage of healing grief and got to a point where I was feeling okay, but I was like, there’s more work here.
Kiki Tyler
(00:37:22 – 00:37:41)
And now that I’m accustomed to where I’m going, my emotional values, and what I want, I dove in this time last year to an inner child work. I wanted to reconnect with my inner children. Pros and cons. Right? We’ve all had you know, wounds.
Kiki Tyler
(00:37:41 – 00:37:53)
There could be trauma. I mean, I think I saw a TikTok where he said, you know, if you stub your toe, that’s trauma. If you got yelled at, that’s trauma. Like, we don’t need there’s no scale or level. It like, your trauma is not bigger or smaller than mine.
Kiki Tyler
(00:37:53 – 00:38:10)
Like, let’s just acknowledge it. Feel it. And that’s the thing our inner children wanna be seen and heard. They wanna be given the space to feel so they can heal. And certain inner children I’ve connected with, I’m like, I pulled out my coloring books and have been coloring.
Kiki Tyler
(00:38:10 – 00:38:24)
I love to do puzzles. I’ve re I’ve always been an avid reader, but I’ve gotten back into, like, my fantasy and fun books. A lot of my inner children love that. And then I got to my angry teenage years, and we’re a little rebellious. And that I’m like, oh, that’s you.
Kiki Tyler
(00:38:24 – 00:38:45)
That that that’s you who wants to go and get in trouble. Okay. We gotta we gotta check that at the door a little bit as we’re an adult now. But just opening that box and reconnecting to all the pieces of you because, like you said, we we tamp that down whether it’s responsibilities or adult team or we think we should or have to. It’s what mask are we putting on.
Kiki Tyler
(00:38:45 – 00:38:55)
And just being free to be yourself and surrounding yourself with people that not only allow it and it feels safe, but encourage it.
Victoria Volk
(00:38:55 – 00:39:13)
As a kid, I was told I was weird. And as an adult, I wasn’t told I was weird again until, like, the last 4 years or so. And I’m like, alright. I’m reconnected. I’m good to go.
Kiki Tyler
(00:39:13 – 00:39:14)
I love it.
Victoria Volk
(00:39:14 – 00:39:39)
Letting my weird flag fly. I mean, it’s embrace it. Embrace your weirdness. Embrace what makes you you what would you say to people who you know, I’m a Christian. And what would you say to people who think that the work that you do or I do is not like devil work, but like this, I don’t know.
Victoria Volk
(00:39:39 – 00:39:51)
Like, we should be ashamed of ourselves or you know, because I I might pull, not a I don’t do tarot tarot, however you say it. I like more, what are the other ones?
Kiki Tyler
(00:39:51 – 00:39:54)
Oracle. Yeah., Oracle. Thank you. Yeah.
Kiki Tyler
(00:39:54 – 00:39:56)
Yep. I can’t even think of the day.
Victoria Volk
(00:39:56 – 00:40:15)
I mean, that’s that’s how that’s how, like, much I follow the rules. Right? Like, it’s just a card, and it’s more play to me. I like to just draw a card and, it’s amazing, though. It’s, I have a specific deck that I took I take it to events that I do.
Victoria Volk
(00:40:15 – 00:40:21)
Mhmm. And, I talk about grief. Right? That’s my that’s my shtick. That’s what I talk about.
Victoria Volk
(00:40:21 – 00:40:44)
And, it’s I had I would ask I would have conversations with people, and at the end of our conversation, I would ask, do you want me to pull hard for you. Like, what do you mean pull a card? Like, most people a lot of people don’t even haven’t even heard of what these are what the cards are or what they the purpose of them are. And I’m like, you know, it’s nothing sinister. It’s you know, this is you’ll get a message.
Victoria Volk
(00:40:45 – 00:41:00)
I believe that you’ll get a message that you need to hear in this moment. 1 by 1, time after time, completely applicable, like tears start flowing, and it’s a healing message for them. There’s nothing absolutely wrong with that. You know?
Kiki Tyler
(00:41:00 – 00:41:22)
I agree a 1000%. So I was raised in a conservative Christian household, and I have no idea what my family thinks about me, and that’s none of my business. If they wanna share, great. And, there but like you said, oh, she’s doing weird stuff again. And the oracle cards, the crystals, the tarot.
Kiki Tyler
(00:41:22 – 00:41:32)
To me, I view them as tools. Right? Just like a hammer or a crowbar. And the tool is not evil. The person who wields the tool can either use it for good or evil.
Kiki Tyler
(00:41:33 – 00:41:47)
Yes. Just like a hammer. It can be used to destroy or to build. And I love oracle cards, and I do offer them. And I even shy away from the deck and, like or the the guidebook that comes with the deck.
Kiki Tyler
(00:41:47 – 00:42:07)
I like people to tell me what they see because it’s not me. It’s not my message. And my goal is to help them really tap in to their own inner voice again because there’s so much noise and so many people telling, yes, what we should or shouldn’t do in society. And, now you should have a white picket fence. You should have the 6 figure job.
Kiki Tyler
(00:42:07 – 00:42:13)
You should drive this kind of car. Whatever it is. Right? But what do you really want? And I had a woman.
Kiki Tyler
(00:42:13 – 00:42:29)
She pulled the same she started pulling for herself from this deck, and we were shuffling it and cutting it, and she kept getting the same card. I was like, do you not like the message? Because it’s really the universe is trying there it’s it’s trying to tell you something. Right. I don’t know what it is, but it’s trying to tell you something.
Kiki Tyler
(00:42:30 – 00:42:37)
She’s like, I know. I was just hoping for a different answer. I’m like, 3 of the same after so much shuffling? That’s no longer a coincidence.
Victoria Volk
(00:42:37 – 00:42:42)
Right? I think even after the 2nd time, it’s like, okay. Better pay attention.
Kiki Tyler
(00:42:42 – 00:42:56)
I usually pull for myself for guidance before sessions. And with 1 client, it was, like, 3 weeks in a row. She and I were getting the same card. Even though I was shuffling while we’re talking and everything and I was and I was like, I pulled this card, and she was like, do it again. Do it again.
Kiki Tyler
(00:42:56 – 00:42:58)
So then I stopped pulling before her sesh.
Victoria Volk
(00:42:58 – 00:43:00)
Because I was like, I don’t know
Kiki Tyler
(00:43:00 – 00:43:10)
If we’re, like, the mirror. We’re at different stages, but, like, the messages we were getting were slightly different. But that’s the thing. We could both hold the same card and interpret it differently. There are colors.
Kiki Tyler
(00:43:10 – 00:43:36)
There are numbers. There are words. There It’s like what you see and what I see are gonna be 2 different things. And it’s I guess, in the olden days where you would look for omens or you would look for you know, birds would say things everything meant something and not in a bad way. It was just we were more tapped into nature and or everything around us because things were not going that 1,000 miles a minute.
Kiki Tyler
(00:43:36 – 00:43:38)
Didn’t hear? Yes.
Victoria Volk
(00:43:38 – 00:43:44)
We viewed death. Death was viewed completely differently. Right? Mhmm. Like, we spent time.
Victoria Volk
(00:43:44 – 00:43:59)
We took pictures with their dead loved ones. They would that’s have you seen this? Like, when your when your loved one passed away, you would take a family portrait with your dead deceased loved one. Like, we yeah. Death was done so differently.
Victoria Volk
(00:43:59 – 00:44:02)
Everything was done differently. Right? Yeah.
Kiki Tyler
(00:44:02 – 00:44:12)
Yes. And and there is evolution, and there are pros and cons. And I don’t know. I work in the I tell people I work in the light. So it can’t harm you.
Kiki Tyler
(00:44:12 – 00:44:31)
It can’t harm me. You’re in control of it. So I never it doesn’t bother me, and it cracks me up because I’m sure everybody’s getting these direct messages where it’s like, I was drawn to your energy and felt like you needed a reading. That could be a bot. That could be who but if you’re authentically in the energy space, you’re not reaching out to offer readings.
Kiki Tyler
(00:44:31 – 00:44:57)
As a person, you seek out who you want to read your energy and go into your records, provide you Reiki. It has to feel good to you, and you’ll know. For me, I get like a visceral gut response if I’m not meant to work with someone. Like, even going in certain metaphysical shops, I’m walking around and I can I’m like, there’s something in that corner that’s bothering me. I need to go to the different part of the store.
Kiki Tyler
(00:44:57 – 00:45:14)
It could be a crystal. It could be a type of method of physical media. Who knows? But I’m just like, just gonna listen to it. But before I got into this, I would have paid no attention because there were so many different signals going on that I wasn’t paying attention to.
Kiki Tyler
(00:45:14 – 00:45:21)
And we make excuses. Oh, I’m sitting too long. It must’ve been what I ate. I didn’t sleep well. And now it’s okay.
Kiki Tyler
(00:45:21 – 00:45:33)
What is that trying to tell me? Where is it in my body? What have I not allowed myself to feel? Like, the questions and the perception, I’ve shifted the lens in which I listen and also in which I view myself.
Victoria Volk
(00:45:35 – 00:46:01)
So what would be your tip to grievers who yeah. I’m really not I don’t wanna, like, learn Reiki or do Reiki or get into that spirit sort of practice or anything like that. But what would you suggest to grievers listening who may have lost a best friend like you did. What did self-care look like? Okay.
Victoria Volk
(00:46:01 – 00:46:15)
I’m really ahead of myself with, like, a bunch of questions. That’s what I do. But kind of wrapping it around the bow of self-care, but, like, something that people can do to, like, dip their toe in. Yes. Connecting with themselves.
Kiki Tyler
(00:46:16 – 00:46:37)
Yes. And be easy on yourself, and I know it’s easier to say than do, but let yourself feel and just be okay. Give yourself permission to let it all fall apart. Like, just have those ugly cries. Cry until you don’t have any more tears anymore, until your throat’s raw.
Kiki Tyler
(00:46:37 – 00:46:57)
Like, just that is a human emotion. If the emotion is coming out, it up, it wants to come out, and I kept shoving it down until it was overwhelming. So it got to a point where I couldn’t even get myself to start crying, so I was like, okay. What movies can I watch where I know it’ll start the waterworks? Right?
Kiki Tyler
(00:46:57 – 00:47:07)
And rent’s a rent’s a good one for me. Like, I always cry every time I watch rent. Like, I can go to certain parts of it and I’m like, oh, yeah. I’m definitely gonna cry. So that was a trick that worked for me.
Kiki Tyler
(00:47:07 – 00:47:39)
A lot more rest because emotionally, you were draining a lot of energy. I was I felt a lot of energy being drained whether it was to push the the emotion down or to actually allow myself to feel it. So if you need to take a nap, if you need to sleep in, if you need to take a day off from work, it’s hard not to feel guilty that first time, but I promise you it gets easier. And putting yourself first is not selfish. We every time we get on a plane, we’re told to put our mask on first.
Kiki Tyler
(00:47:39 – 00:48:04)
Right? If anything happens, you put your oxygen mask on first. But in real life, we tend to put ourselves on the back burner and take care of everyone else and wonder why we’re passed out on the floor. And crying isn’t a sign of weakness, which is a big lesson that I needed to learn the hard way, unfortunately. Crying is vulnerable.
Kiki Tyler
(00:48:04 – 00:48:11)
Crying is, like, are you hurt? Are you in pain? Yes. But the pain you’re going through, no one can see. You don’t have bruises.
Kiki Tyler
(00:48:11 – 00:48:44)
You don’t have scars. Like, you don’t it’s not like you go out in a fight and people knew you got in a fight and there’s some sympathy there. Let’s say you’re getting beat up from the inside and putting yourself first does get easier as well the more you do it, and the shame and guilt does move away. Because by taking care of yourself, you can then show up as the best first interview for everyone else instead of half full and or pouring from an empty cup. And then I found myself in places of resentment, yeah.
Kiki Tyler
(00:48:44 – 00:48:55)
And it wasn’t because of anybody else. My choice pouring from an empty cup and not refilling my cup for so long. Bottled up anger. You know, emotions can change. It wasn’t anger.
Kiki Tyler
(00:48:55 – 00:49:00)
It was sadness, but I wasn’t allowing myself to feel to heal.
Victoria Volk
(00:49:00 – 00:49:17)
What were the messages around grief that you received as a child since you had a really difficult time as an adult allowing yourself to cry. Is that something that you witnessed as a child? Like, the people around you didn’t express the show emotion?
Kiki Tyler
(00:49:18 – 00:49:37)
Not negative emotions, not dense, heavy emotions like happiness and joy and positive things. But If you were crying, something was wrong, what’s wrong? And or I’ll give you something to cry about. Yeah. That was a lot very common for that generation.
Kiki Tyler
(00:49:38 – 00:50:00)
I know for my brothers, they got different messages like suck it up, boys don’t cry. There were a lot of different things that I heard over the years, whether it was from coaches, in the sporting events, or parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles. It could have just been mainstream media. You know? It’s hard to pinpoint where it came from and that really doesn’t matter.
Kiki Tyler
(00:50:00 – 00:50:30)
It’s more, is that what I believe now? And kind of that unlearning. So when I say, like, allow yourself to tear it all down, like, rebuild what you believe and what feels good. And on the esoteric side, the woo side, like, the divine masculine and feminine, I was functioning very highly from my masculine, and I had suppressed a lot of my feminine. The crying, the flow, the letting things be instead of, like, the assertive, the action, the force, the push.
Kiki Tyler
(00:50:30 – 00:50:59)
So I did allow myself to be more in flow for a time and not so much action, which was really hard for me to retrain my it’s okay. There was a lot of guilt of me not acting or not showing up for other people. So that’s gonna happen, but you’re still in charge of whether you say yes or no. And saying no the first time is hard, but it gets easier. And now I have boundaries over when people have access to me.
Kiki Tyler
(00:50:59 – 00:51:10)
And that’s everyone, significant other, parents, like, whether I accept or respond to text messages, whether I call people back, and it’s really about me protecting my peace and my happiness.
Victoria Volk
(00:51:11 – 00:51:13)
Amen to that.
Kiki Tyler
(00:51:15 – 00:51:17)
Yay.
Victoria Volk
(00:51:17 – 00:51:23)
I was gonna say that old, what is what movie is it? There’s no crying in baseball. You could say
Kiki Tyler
(00:51:24 – 00:51:25)
Oh, League of Their Own?
Victoria Volk
(00:51:25 – 00:51:31)
League of Their Own. Yeah. They say it. There’s no crying in baseball, and you could say, there’s no crying in grief. There’s no crying in grief.
Victoria Volk
(00:51:32 – 00:51:38)
That’s wrong. That’s so wrong. Yeah. There can be crying a baseball. Like, maybe we need to embrace that message.
Victoria Volk
(00:51:38 – 00:51:59)
There can be crying a baseball. I don’t think I asked you this yet, but I’m curious. So I’m gonna ask it because there’s probably someone listening who’s probably curious too. Did this experience of all this loss of young people, young-ish people, I imagine, make you a little scared for your own health.
Kiki Tyler
(00:52:00 – 00:52:11)
It didn’t, but I guess that’s because I’ve always been very active. I’ve definitely made better food choices. I sleep more. I drink more water. I’ve always been one to get my annual physical.
Kiki Tyler
(00:52:11 – 00:52:29)
I love get that’s like my, report card for my health, how I’m doing. Like, how’s my blood sugar? How’s my cholesterol? I could have very easily gone down, and I think old me was very paranoid. Like, try to head everything off at the past that that people please, like, try to figure it out.
Kiki Tyler
(00:52:30 – 00:52:50)
But I kinda went the opposite way. And I was like, worry isn’t helpful. Like, it doesn’t do anything but stress you out, could reduce your time here, and it doesn’t prevent what could or couldn’t happen in the future. So I’m gonna still continue with my regular checkups and stay super active. I love to move.
Kiki Tyler
(00:52:50 – 00:53:23)
I’ve always loved to move as a young kid, and I’ve definitely made better eating choices and food choices, but it didn’t. I didn’t. I’ve a few of our friends in our circle have, and they’ve started to get more mammograms and get me, like and when I say the other end, I mean, like, probably overkill just in my personal opinion. Like, the I think there’s balance to that as well because you can get too much information and, like, get to nitty gritty, but find out what works for you. Right?
Kiki Tyler
(00:53:23 – 00:53:37)
What works for me might sound a little crazy to you, so that’s cool. Like, leave it. Don’t take it. But if you don’t get annual physicals, maybe think about doing that, you know? Find a primary care physician that you connect with.
Kiki Tyler
(00:53:37 – 00:53:54)
I actually changed doctors because I wanted one that’s more open to holistic remedies and not someone that’s gonna write me a prescription right off the gate. I am not very much into big pharma. And I’m like, well, why are you just giving me something for the symptom? We didn’t even talk for very long. So how do you know that’s the root cause?
Kiki Tyler
(00:53:55 – 00:54:13)
So I’m like, I have a whole list of things to share with you that my body’s been communicating to me. And I don’t know about you, but I live in my body. Yes. You went to med school, love doctors, but they don’t live in your body. So you have very specific information that you can share with them.
Kiki Tyler
(00:54:13 – 00:54:21)
So when you find one that you connect with and who ask the right questions and that is in alignment with you and what how you wanna take care of your body.
Victoria Volk
(00:54:22 – 00:54:37)
Step 1, pay attention to your body. Yes. So you have to pay attention to your body to recognize the signs. Right? And you’ve described many of them throughout this podcast you’ve described several of different signs of that our body gives us.
Victoria Volk
(00:54:37 – 00:54:49)
I believe you have. So Yeah. Just If it wasn’t there before, it’s something new? Take a look at that. Investigate.
Victoria Volk
(00:54:49 – 00:54:52)
Get curious. What gives you hope for the future?
Kiki Tyler
(00:54:52 – 00:54:53)
The alpha generation.
Victoria Volk
(00:54:55 – 00:54:56)
Do you say more?
Kiki Tyler
(00:54:57 – 00:55:18)
So I am one of 6. I’m an aunt. I have no babies other than my fur babies, and I’m really close to my nieces and nephews. So my youngest niece is 7, and she’s part of the alpha generation. And In spending time with her, she’s extremely curious, and she teaches me so much about myself and about life.
Kiki Tyler
(00:55:18 – 00:55:42)
And I love she’s tenacious, and she doesn’t take no for an answer. But when it comes to technology, her older brother, I guess he’s Gen z, he’s the one above that, they he’ll text me at the table. I’m sitting right across from him, and they’re more comfortable with text. My niece, not so much. She’s like, excuse me.
Kiki Tyler
(00:55:42 – 00:56:08)
Excuse me. And they’re bringing it back to what I call the old school ways, like looking people in the eye, having a conversation. She wants your undivided attention and spending time and watching her with her friends. So I know this is a small sampling, but it I’m seeing patterns and ripples, and it’s just very refreshing in there. I’ve done some research and read several articles too, but they’re the new wave.
Kiki Tyler
(00:56:08 – 00:56:25)
Right? They’re gonna bring things back to, like, the humanity of it., Just the Connection., Community, the connection, all the c’s., But they’re very curious, and they’re not afraid to ask all these questions.
Kiki Tyler
(00:56:25 – 00:56:38)
Like, you think she would have outgrown her twos or threes or whenever the why phase was., I was like, oh, she’s gonna be like me, and she’s gonna be a why person forever. And she challenges me. She challenges her mother. They’re so smart.
Kiki Tyler
(00:56:39 – 00:56:56)
They’re very, I don’t wanna say cynical, but they can they challenge things. Well, why if that’s this, but it doesn’t work here. Why? And they let they really keep you on your toes. But they’re very refreshing.
Kiki Tyler
(00:56:57 – 00:57:06)
And I enjoy spending time. I’m heading there. This weekend, we’re doing our cookie bake day. And, she loves that, like, tradition. They’re very big on tradition.
Kiki Tyler
(00:57:07 – 00:57:19)
And I don’t even wanna say rituals, but family traditions, like, what we do every year. Like, we’re like, oh, I don’t know if it’s gonna happen next year. What do you need? Oh, you’re getting older, so we’re doing this forever. Okay.
Kiki Tyler
(00:57:21 – 00:57:22)
Can’t say no to her. Right?
Victoria Volk
(00:57:23 – 00:57:37)
So perhaps around the anniversary of your friend Sonia’s passing, it would be hopeful and refreshing to spend some time around that energy for you. That’s self-care too.
Kiki Tyler
(00:57:37 – 00:57:47)
Yep. Absolutely. Yes. And she loves going there’s a metaphysical shop by them. They’re in Virginia, and we go together.
Kiki Tyler
(00:57:47 – 00:58:06)
And she’s like, this this crystal is calling to me. I think it needs to come home with me. And she saw me do some oracle readings for my sister, and she grabbed the deck went upstairs, and she has an American Girl doll. And she’s I go up, and I’m like, where did she go? And she’s like, oh, I’m just giving a reading to my dolls, and she had them all lined up.
Kiki Tyler
(00:58:06 – 00:58:23)
And she’s like I was adorable. They paid attention. They’re so observant. Like, they see and hear and take in everything like a sponge, and their perspective is so fresh and innocent. Like, it has not been tainted.
Kiki Tyler
(00:58:24 – 00:58:41)
And she’s not plugged into social media, so it’s still that fresh new. She’s not bombarded. She doesn’t have all of these different voices and things in her head coming her way, telling her how to think, act, breathe. It’s she’s just like, this is who I am. Take me or leave me.
Victoria Volk
(00:58:41 – 00:59:54)
And I think that’s the message that the youngest of the young need to be reminded of constantly, that they are enough exactly who they are. There was a quote I heard yesterday, when I’m I had a call yesterday with, Fellow Youmappers, Youmap coaches, and the founder. She’s always got something brilliant to say, but she said society judges you on what you do, what degree you have, the work you do. There’s so many different judgments that people can that people will draw just based on what you do and not on who you are. And so I think the hope for the future is that we allow the youngest of young to grieve exactly how they came out of the womb knowing how to grieve and allow that to keep going and to allow that to keep happening and to express themselves and to question and to let curiosity be their leader, and just always reminding them that they are enough just exactly as they are.
Victoria Volk
(00:59:56 – 00:59:58)
Yes.
Kiki Tyler
(00:59:58 – 01:00:10)
We all are, and we forget that. And that’s an amazing point to you bring up because this has come up with a couple of my clients. We tend to overtalk. We tend to overgive. It’s a compensation.
Kiki Tyler
(01:00:10 – 01:00:37)
There’s this un layer of unworthiness in multiple areas of our lives. It’s not always business or with products or it can be in relationships too, and you deserve to be loved just for being you, not because of what you do or the gifts or skills that you bring to the table. That’s like a cherry on top. That’s the added bonus. Whether you have them or not, you’re enough.
Victoria Volk
(01:00:39 – 01:00:48)
And I think that is the beautiful place to end today unless there’s anything else that you would like to share. Oh, wait. I actually have a question.
Kiki Tyler
(01:00:48 – 01:00:51)
Okay. 6 more.
Victoria Volk
(01:00:53 – 01:01:28)
What is the meaning that you feel you have drawn from your grief. How have you created meaning from your grief? And what would be your advice to other people in creating their meaning? And when I say creating meaning, it’s not like you have to do something grandiose or you have to, create a nonprofit or write a book or it’s none of that. It’s and it’s a very individual experience.
Victoria Volk
(01:01:28 – 01:01:48)
So I’m just curious how maybe it’s even not even creating a meaning, but how have you reframed? Maybe that’s a better question. Have you reframed how you view grief since your experience?
Kiki Tyler
(01:01:50 – 01:02:31)
Well, it has evolved. I feel like in the beginning, I viewed it as pain and something to avoid. And then, in that 1 to 2 year mark, it was memories, and how can I remember her and honor her, and then it has turned into purpose? I wanted that relationship, that friendship, that whole life, to me and it did on its own. Like, it I don’t it doesn’t need to meet for me to do anything for it to be anything better, but I wanted to reframe it.
Kiki Tyler
(01:02:31 – 01:03:09)
It’s exactly the word from pain to purpose, and it has had it’s a very pivotal moment for me. Yes, it happened during the pandemic, the shutdown, everything else, but I have now reacquoined that as, like, the midlife awakening instead of the shutdown or the pan like, we don’t have to be defined by our grief. We get to choose How we define it for ourselves and it changes in each chapter of our life. Like you asked me the same thing next year, it could mean something different. And that giving yourself permission to change your mind.
Kiki Tyler
(01:03:10 – 01:03:34)
I feel like we feel like we have to lock in and and get married to something, whether it’s an idea or a feeling or we can only do one thing. And we’re so multifaceted as human beings. It can be both. It can be painful and purposeful, right, and everything in between. And telling stories like this, sharing with others.
Kiki Tyler
(01:03:34 – 01:04:05)
I mean, if you came to me a year ago, I would not have thought this is the 3rd podcast I’ve been on where I’ve talked about her and cried, and that was not something I would have pictured for myself, but it’s helping others get through it. And just talking about it is also therapeutic for me. And each time it gets a little easier. And I think I’ve cried it all out and then someone asked a question or I remember something, and it’s like, it’s fresh, but it’s still beautiful.
Victoria Volk
(01:04:06 – 01:04:40)
And I think the key point in sharing the story, right, it’s not sharing what happened. It’s not like you’re reading a recipe card of that relationship or that experience and how the person died and all of that. Like, did so many relive over and over and over, if there was a traumatic death, things like that, depending on what they witnessed. It’s sharing the story, the emotional story. That’s where the healing is, is sharing the emotional story and reframing the meaning of of what that means for you moving forward.
Kiki Tyler
(01:04:42 – 01:04:55)
Yes. And that’s a good point as we feel like we get trapped in that moment of when it happened and we forget to live for ourselves. So grief is important. They were a part of our life. It’s a way to honor them.
Kiki Tyler
(01:04:56 – 01:05:23)
And this is about how we can continue to honor ourselves and move on with their memory with us. But thinking about everyone else in our life, like, they’re gone, but how many beautiful souls presently in the future are gonna impact your life? And you might be head down right now, but when you start to look up, they’re gonna be there.
Victoria Volk
(01:05:25 – 01:05:29)
And not to mention the impact that you have on other people’s lives.
Kiki Tyler
(01:05:30 – 01:05:31)
Yes.
Victoria Volk
(01:05:31 – 01:05:36)
And what kind of impact do you want to have? And that’s the choice we all have.
Kiki Tyler
(01:05:37 – 01:05:57)
Yes. We feel like we forget choice. Like, we feel like we’re forced into it. And sometimes just hearing someone say they did this instead gives you that sign, that permission slip, whatever it is you needed to hear or see or feel to make a small shift.
Victoria Volk
(01:05:59 – 01:06:01)
And that’s why I started this podcast.
Kiki Tyler
(01:06:02 – 01:06:03)
I love it.
Victoria Volk
(01:06:03 – 01:06:07)
Thank you so much for sharing with me and my listeners today.
kiki Tyler
(01:06:08 – 01:06:09)
Thank you for having me.
Victoria Volk
(01:06:09 – 01:06:14)
People reach out to you if they wanna learn more, connect with you? Where can people find you?
Kiki Tyler
(01:06:15 – 01:06:33)
Yes. So I am Kiki Tyler, Facebook, Instagram. Kikityler.com is my website. I love connecting with new women. I also have a group for healers, spiritual people, those that wanna learn and grow in their gifts, and I’d more than welcome to come into that community.
Kiki Tyler
(01:06:33 – 01:06:43)
And, yeah, love to hear from you and support you whether you’re in grief, have gone through it, haven’t been part of it, but want that community.
Victoria Volk
(01:06:45 – 01:06:49)
I dare to say we’ve all been a part of it. Yeah. We all grieve something.
Kiki Tyler
(01:06:49 – 01:06:51)
Yeah. Yeah.
Victoria Volk
(01:06:51 – 01:07:00)
And your gifts and your light is very much needed, and, we need more light. We need more light in the world, my friends. So thank you for being the light for so many.
Kiki Tyler
(01:07:01 – 01:07:03)
Thank you for having me.
Victoria Volk
(01:07:03 – 01:07:07)
And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life.
