Today's episode starts by Joanna telling her story in how she began her own journey helping women to heal their bodies through food and lose weight. But right after that, she's going to jump into the meat of this topic, how we can understand ourselves and what's going on at the deeper level. She has a beautiful technique she's going to share with you.

In today's episode, Mesha shares her personal story about being 14 and pregnant. She also shares about heart-centered living and heart coherence: what it is, and the benefits to it.

Hello, I'm so glad you're here with me. We are talking today about how you can support yourself in whatever season it is that you're finding yourself in. I am personally in the middle of our summer, and three of my four kids, instead of being in school, are at home more of the time.

I'm still here. I'm continuing with Empowered to Thrive, but it's been a busy season with my baby being young and now with summer and my older three kids being home from school…. I’m gonna take a few mins to share something relatable, and give you a heads-up on what's coming in season 6!

Today on the podcast we are talking about compassion. Self-compassion and compassion in general. This is vital on the healing journey. If it wasn't modeled to you, and you dont even know where to start with being compassionate towards yourself or the other people around you then I'm really glad you're here.

We're going to be talking about the key components of the healing journey. And maybe you are already on the healing journey. Perhaps you're just about to begin it, or you're contemplating whether or not you should change the pace of your life, and incorporating more sleep and rest, in general, is super important to your healing.

This week we're going to talk about the benefits of going on the healing journey. Perhaps you're already on it, maybe you're experiencing some of these benefits, or perhaps you're on the healing journey dissatisfied or nervous. That may be the result someone else gets, but you're not going to get it.

Here is what my heart wants you to know. It takes time. There are ups and downs. But rest assured, you will start to experience some of the things you've been hoping for that you're hearing me or other people talk about. Oftentimes we can't even see the change that's happening within us. But other people can sometimes tell changes happening within you because of what happens on the outside.

We're going to continue the conversation, not specifically around emotional neglect, but around the idea of: Have you been traumatized? Is trauma still affecting your life even if you didn't go through anything big and obvious? And what I mean by that is, some people, don’t know they experienced abuse or they don’t recognize they went through a major life event that they were traumatized by.

I've heard from some people that they don't remember a lot of their childhood or they don't feel like they have any big major life events that get labeled traumatic that maybe they don't have any unresolved trauma, but yet at the same time, they're unhappy, living with intense anxiety, and struggling to manage through their days, so if you identify with that I want you to know there's a good reason for it. There is a reason always why we experience the emotions we experience. Our thoughts come and go, and emotions come and go, but there's usually an underlying belief and experience that Is the reason why we feel what we feel. So we don't have to give in. If you want to use that term for all of your feelings, you don't have to let your feelings manage you. You certainly don't have to believe every thought that you have but I do think it's important to know that what you're experiencing, is valid.

I'm going to share a little bit about my deconstruction. Now, if this is not at all of interest to you, you don't have a faith background, or you're just not interested in hearing these stories, do know we're not going to continue on this subject for a very long time, we're going to move on to other things soon enough, but for right now that this feels intuitive what I need to continue talking about. And I know there are those of you listening that can relate, that are on your deconstruction journey. And you, you know, you either grew up in a church community or you grew up surrounded by religion and you're not sure what's authentic to you. So I'd like to start there. I think it's most important to be authentic to ourselves.

Today's episode is a continuation of last week's episode where you're going to hear more from Tiffany Brilliant, she shares authentically and vulnerably. And, you won't want to miss this if you have a high value for authentic sharing. She's gonna finish talking about the deconstruction of her faith and going to give us an inside scoop on what it's been like for her to go on the healing journey. She's a very brave soul and there's much we can learn from her, so I hope that you'll enjoy and be sure to share with a friend that you think would also enjoy.

Today I have with me my friend and client Tiffany Brilliant. She's going to take us on a journey and share her story with us, how she came out of organized religion, and how spirituality and intuitive living are still a part of her life. Tiffany shares authentically and vulnerably so I hope that you will sit and embrace Tiffany as she shares her story. And if what you hear speaks to you or you think of a friend who would especially enjoy and appreciate hearing this episode, please share it with them.

Rest is such an important topic. Not new news. I know. But, do we live as if rest is important? Think about how cranky and irritable you might be before a nap or a good night of sleep, and then how you feel after it. Creating a lifestyle of rest is vital to the health of our motherhood and not just in motherhood, but for life in general.

It starts early… when we see our kids as people, people who need to be heard, understood, recognized and given a place it makes a big difference. 

Children are individuals. They’re people just like you and me!

Q: How do you see your kids? Do you see them as having something to contribute and valuable? They’re not going to become valuable at some point. They’ve always been valuable!

Today we’re going to discuss how to support your kids when you’re going through a difficult time. Maybe it’s a traumatic time. Remember, trauma is not about the event, it’s about how we interpret and experience the event. We can go through the same event and one of us feels like it was traumatic and the other feels like it was not.

Some things that I think are important that I’ve adopted as I’ve simplified my life and walked out of people pleasing and codependency, are knowing what you want the holidays to look like and then structuring your yes or no along those lines. So when you sit and ask what you want the holidays to be like, bullet point some of the values. Do I want it to be slow and low key? A time of connection? Spend a lot of money or not? Knowing what you value will help you be aligned with the season of life you’re in right now. There’s times we can be busy during the holidays and times we may need to slow it down and that may vary year to year.

Listen to my salad story and find out how that relates to the healing journey!

We are continuing the conversation about how you know that you are healing from codependency and people pleasing. I’m going to relay a story to you that happened at Panera Bread a few weeks ago. I wanted to get some work done so I brought my laptop with me and I ordered a salad with either a sandwich or soup. When I got my order, some of the lettuce leaves did not look fresh. In the past I would have thought to myself, “Ugh. I can deal with this. I don’t want to make a fuss or be an inconvenience.” Instead, I went back to the counter and asked them to remake my salad. I simply said the leaves did not look fresh and could you remake my salad.

Do you ever wonder if the work you're doing on the healing journey is actually changing and healing you? In today's episode we're going to talk about how you can know that you are moving in a positive direction!!

Do you want to find out how to grow your intuition? Today I will share some of my process that has helped me grow my own. If you're interested to strengthen your intuitive knowing, there are practical steps you can take away and implement!

Learning to love ourselves and really take care of ourselves changes life so profoundly. If we have a parental figure who is not emotionally capable of taking care of themselves or to take care of us, we can learn to put our own needs aside. We learn how to make sure everyone else is ok. If mom or dad isn’t angry, we feel safer. Sometimes as grown adults, the byproduct is that we don’t honor our own needs because we’ve learned so well how to put ourselves aside.