Flushing It Out

Ashleigh wrote “Swing” because it was her deepest, darkest secret.  She thought that there wouldn't be anybody in the world that could relate to what she experienced, so she wrote about about it to tell everybody. She thought, “Now I'm going to make this into art to share it.”  An artist understands that every person will experience art in a different way, and that's ok.“Swing” is a book about the story of her and her husband getting into an exclusive sex club in New York City and the things that happen at the club.  The book is meant to be a “bait and switch” though, because according to Ashleigh, the book is actually about “how easy it is to lose yourself in the roles that you think you should be playing for other people,” not about sex clubs.She coached figure skating, 150 skaters on 10 teams.  In a decade, she realized that she had been showing up for everybody else, but not for herself.  Her marriage was imploding.  She realized that she didn't have a firm foundation anywhere in her life like she thought she had.  All of us are looking to feel “filled up.”  Most of us have one or two ways of feeling filled up that aren't good for us.  Ashleigh found out that getting attention from other men was one of those things that made her feel good.  She got the attention and affection that she desired in her own marriage through other men that she interacted with at these clubs.  Growing up, she was the child who “never needed anything.”  She simply reached for another accomplishment.There are so many men who have connected with Ashleigh and to how she feels in the book.  Some people may assume it to be a creepy thing, but it ends up being the complete opposite.  Men describe her as being like a big sister.  The way she describes things in the book are “you and your partner,” so there's a universal aspect to it.  People just want to talk to her about their feelings, men included.Where do we get our information?  Our parents don't typically talk about sex in front of us, or finances, or any of the other things that cause us problems as adults.Hot sex is a side effect of a healthy relationship.  When we turn the iceberg on it's side, though, it's a way to get all of our communications and connections to be better.  The book actually started as a screenplay, but she couldn't finish it.  She got about halfway through and realized that people would find comfort in knowing the story actually happened after posting some things on social media and getting some positive feedback.  If we want to get to the place of radical connection, we have to go through the valley of honesty.  She thought that the only thing that was ever good enough was something that was flawless.  Anything less needed to be glossed over.  “Good or better” was the only way to succeed.  If you've had any kind of fracture in your relationship and you decide to stay together and work through it, on the other side of the fracture is a freedom to not be afraid of being imperfect anymore.Peeing can teach us something about how we should treat ourselves.  For Ashleigh, she realized that she needed to simply pee whenever she had the urge.  If she couldn't go, “Ashleigh needs to pee,” or “Ashleigh is hungry or tired,” she couldn't be trusted to make the good decisions about the other cues that her body is telling herself.  How do we know what we like sexually if we don't even listen to our bodies for the simple things?Ashleigh's book “Swing” is available anywhere books are sold.  Other ways to stay connected with Ashleigh are:On IG: @AshleighRenard“Keeping It Hot: The Workbook” - pre-orders available now!

Tiffany wants all women to have beautiful sex lives, which is why she loves to talk about sex.So much of what we're told is either black or white in church isn't really black or white.  One of the harmful things about the way the Church has approached sexuality is that it is approached as black or white.  Tiffany talks about a book called, “Out of Sorts” by Sarah Bessey.  It explains that kids need “black and white.”  A lot of people never leave the stage of blind acceptance, though.  The black and white answers feel safe, but they are only meant to be a ‘beginning.'  We need to be questioning the “why” behind the black and white answers.She grew up in the church because her father was the youth pastor at the church.  Her childhood was very sheltered and conservative.  She was homeschooled.  She never talked about sex and didn't even know basic body anatomy.  Even the word “vagina” was foreign to her.  She grew up afraid of everything, especially relationships between her and the boys she was interested in.  In college, she had a boyfriend.  When he put his arm around her, she knew that it felt good, but she felt incredible guilt and shame around how she felt.  She felt like in order to keep his attention on her and off of pornography, she needed to keep going further and further physically.  Still, they never had sex but the guilt and shame kept growing.  She felt like there was a wall between her and God.  Eventually, her dad broke up the relationship because she was honest about how physical their relationship had gotten with him.  The next few years, she struggled with hating her body and with relationships.  She wanted to be in a relationship, but all of her past struggles with relationships made it extremely difficult.  Eventually, she developed a mentorship with her pastor and his wife and started to share her thoughts and feelings with them, which started her healing journey.  She then ended up dating another guy who was really good for her, which was the opposite of her first relationship.  You can't have good sex if you aren't “in your body.”  She still had a lot of baggage around sex.  How are you going to enjoy sex if it's just “duty sex.”  She didn't know her body at all and she couldn't figure it out.  She need to learn how to be present in her own body to be able to enjoy sex and figure out how to have a good orgasm.  Sex is about being in it together.  It isn't a dictatorship or one person telling the other how sex should be.  We need to be on the same page as our partners.  Sex is not a duty.  It's all a mutual compromise.  Tiffany also mentions a book by Sheila Gregoire - “The Great Sex Rescue.” This book contains research based evidence for breaking down the myths that a lot of Christian women have believed about sex.  She sees nuance in how Christians view sex.  Without context, it is very hard to understand what the Bible has to say about the subject.   You can get turned on without judgment.  Learn to understand your body and understand what your body is telling you and take the time to understand what works for you as an individual and as a couple.Resource for listeners: “The Wedding Night Talks - How do you get from nothing to great sex.  Here's what you need to talk about… “You can find more about Tiffany at:tiffanydawn.netAnd on IG: @TiffanyDawnIQB

Kyra was kidnapped and sexually assaulted by an ex-boyfriend her Junior year of High School.  She was taken in the middle of the night and was transported to a field behind the local HS where she was assaulted in many ways.  She was put back in the car and made the comment to him “I can't believe I ever trusted you.”  So, instead of taking her home, he took her to the dump, where she thought she was going to die.Nobody in her hometown believed her.  He was a preacher's son and an athlete and on an athletic scholarship and nobody thought he would ever do such a thing.  So, she didn't know where to turn or who would believe her.She didn't see a therapist for any of this until nearly 10 years later and has been in therapy ever since.  Every week in therapy is a new adventure uncovering new things about herself.  If she had started therapy immediately following her trauma, she admits that she may not have gotten as much out of it.  She wasn't believed, so she didn't even believe herself.We aren't “dealing with things,” we're working through things.  She will never go back to her life the way it used to be.  There is before the trauma and there is after the trauma and you can never go back to the time before, you can only work to make the life after the trauma the best that it can be.  What's the new normal?  How has this trauma shown up in Kyra's life?  She is very up front about how things have affected her.    She is very open and honest about what has happened to her, at least at a high level, with prospective partners.  So many of them can't handle it and basically run away.  She realizes that this is not about her, it's about what they can or cannot handle.  Kyra shares a couple of examples of times with partners that involve how her trauma has affected her sexual encounters.   She didn't want to go to therapy because “broken people go to therapy.”  She was willing to share her brokenness, but wanted to seem put together all the time on social media.  This was because, according to her therapist, she needed to control the narrative.  So, she had to bribe herself to go to therapy.  She wasn't there to talk about her trauma, she was just there to talk about whatever the problem was at the time.  Of course, her problems seemed to point back to her trauma, so eventually she was able to talk about the things from her past and begin healing from these traumatic events.She cared so much about the person that assaulted her, she didn't tell the truth about what happened.  The night it happened, her dad told her to write down everything that happened.  So she went back and got a copy.  When she looked back at what she wrote down, so much of what she remembers happening wasn't in what she wrote down because she was still protecting him at the time.“Good sex can't happen until you learn to love yourself, and what you like and what your body likes.”  Society teaches us that a man's pleasure is the most important thing, but that's just not true.  Uncomfortable conversations are important to get the truth out there about sex.  They're hard to have, but they get better over time.Kyra can be found on IG: @kflatow09

When it comes to sex, where do we start?  How do you want to be approached and how do you want to hear “no?”  This is an important conversation we all need to have with our partners.  What makes sex meaningful?  How to hear “no” is a little more complicated.  Is it a simple “no,” or is there a reason behind it?  What words are we choosing, and what messages are being received with those words?  Having these conversations eliminates some of the superfluous issues that come from miscommunication around sex.What determines the end of sex?  Usually, it is after the man has an orgasm and this is the message we get at a young age.  Religion and family of origin play a part in this, too, when the message centers around the pleasure of the man.  So, then sex starts to become a chore, just like vacuuming the house.  So, why would women want to keep having sex or have desire for sex if that's the case?We need to understand what it is that we enjoy.  Ashley talks about “brakes” and “accelerators.”  A bad night's sleep is a ‘brake.'  When your partner is attentive to you, that's an ‘accelerator.'  So, we need to start understanding what helps our desire and what hinders our desire.  When your car is at a full stop, pressing on the accelerator doesn't automatically get it to full speed, it takes some time and constant pressure on the accelerator to get there.  It's the same way with sexual desire.Word choice is important.  If you don't feel “safe,” you should think twice about it.  She says, “if it isn't an enthusiastic ‘yes,' then it's a ‘no'” when it comes to sex.  Comfort is something entirely different.  How do we make sex both safe and comfortable?  How do we find desire and safe, comfortable sex?  We can start by changing things up and seeing what feels better.  Change the time, change the place, or change the position.  If you're having sex the same way every time, we're over-relying on comfort and it can start to feel boring and monotonous.  Comfortable and safe sex is fine, but a third thing that Ashley suggests adding if you have those two already is variety.What about when we get older or when our health starts to deteriorate or when our bodies start to go?  This is where exploring with your partner and figuring out what sensations you like versus what you don't like come into play.  It is about opening up the to the vulnerability of trying new things and exploring uncertainty with somebody who you're comfortable with.  The idea is to get more “yes's” than “no's.”  It doesn't have to be sexual in nature.  Jumping into the deep end doesn't have to be how exploration goes.  If you start small, you don't have to realize that something isn't for you when you're in the moment and it's too late.For those that may have had some sort of sexual trauma, Ashley says that the number one thing about improving sex is not to talk about it when things could get sexual.  Don't talk about it at night (or the time you're most likely to have sex), and don't talk about it in bed ( or the place you're most likely to have sex).  We really don't want to conflate the bad thing that somebody else did to you with the good thing that sex should be for you.  You can get it touch with Ashley at:ashley@blueharbortherapy.comblueharbortherapy.comAshley also writes monthly for Kiss & Tell Magazine:https://www.kissandtellmagazine.com/author/agrubbs/

So, how do we talk about sex and everything that goes along with it?  For Fox, you start by acknowledging that it's awkward.  Two people doing a very intimate physical act is very complicated.  Having humor about it can also go a long way.  So, we start by owning the fact that we don't have a lot of practice talking about these things and that it's going to be awkward until it isn't.Everybody is going to have their own experience with sex and it will depend on how sex was introduced in their lives.  It also depends on the messages people have received during their lives surrounding sex.We as humanity attach sexual connotations to so many things that should not be sexualized.  It is apparent in the commercials we see and other things such as children's swimwear and beauty pageants for underage kids.  This is one of the problems when it comes to understanding sex.For Fox, he suggests familiarizing yourself with what it is that makes you uncomfortable when it comes to sex.  Everybody has a limit, but how do we know what that limit is?  Of course, when there is sexual abuse in your past, this can be a very dangerous thing to do.  Talking to a therapist is always important to help each of us understand our own individual relationships with sex.  When we figure out where our limits are, it's important to own those limits in addition to understanding them.How can couples be more sex-positive?  Each person has their own experiences around sex.  The main thing is to avoid shame when it comes not only to our partner's experiences, but also our own.  Fox explains that consent is very important, too.  Quoting Planned Parenthood, he explains that consent is best when given with FRIES; Freely-given, Reversible, Informed, Enthusiastic, and Specific.  How many of us had a comprehensive class on sexual education before we got involved with sex?  How many of us had a class on finances before we started having to pay taxes?  These are important conversations to have, but most of us are not having them.  How do we give our kids the best head start on having a good relationship with sex?  We start by taking away the awkwardness and shame that we feel around the topic.  Also, we need to use the proper anatomical terms for our biological parts.  We need to normalize talking about these awkward things.  Not only do we need to normalize the awkwardness of all things in life, we also need to teach our kids to use their voices.  Samantha and Fox use the example of hugging.  If our kids don't want a hug from a grandparent or from a friend, saying ‘no' needs to be an option given to them and they need to know how to exercise their right to say ‘no.'Even telling kids that if something feels good in the moment, but doesn't feel good afterward, that's something that needs to be talked about.  So, how do we normalize these conversations with our children?  Well, it's only awkward of you make it awkward.  We need to be able to talk about these awkward things in a non-awkward way.  Then, according to Fox, kids need to be encouraged to explore themselves.  The more we can talk about these things, the more we can get rid of the stigmas around them.  We can take away the things that make sex taboo.Mr. Fox can be found at:Calm Fox CoachingFB, IG, and Twitter: @calmfoxcoachingOr visit calmfoxcoaching.com to schedule a free 45 minute call.

In this episode, Samantha talks with poet and author of "How to Bury a Boy at Sea," Phil Goldstein.  Phil talks about the struggles in his life caused by his childhood trauma that eventually led him to therapy.  Once in therapy, he realized that being a victim of childhood sexual abuse didn't have to define who he is.  He talks with Samantha and her husband, Jeremy, about the entire process and about his journey to healing.  Phil also discusses the process of compiling the poems he has in his book and Samantha takes a few examples of pieces he has written and talk about what they mean to her and Jeremy.  This is a heavy episode with such a great message, so listen in as Phil, Jeremy, and Samantha "Flush It Out!"

In this episode, Samantha talks with Jody Tompros, retired social worker/therapist and owner of Mindfulness Painting, and her husband, Thom Overton, who is a couple's therapist.  Thom discusses his book, "Can COVID Save This Marriage? A Therapist's Pandemic Diary," how it came to be, and how it helps people feel seen and heard.  Thom and Jody discuss previous marriages, issues they see in couples that have come to them for guidance, and whether or not sex can be the sole reason a couple stays together.  So, listen in as Jody, Thom, Jeremy, and Samantha "Flush It Out!"

In this episode, Samantha talks with the owner of Orchid Story, Rachel Nusbaum, about how we can all explore the art of writing to help us on our own healing journeys.  Her business, Orchid Story is coaching with a focus on writing as therapy.  Rachel tells us how writing has helped her and how it has helped so many others she has worked with.  She reminds us the work of writing can sometimes be an uphill climb, but it is always worth it.  So, listen in as Samantha and Rachel "Flush It Out!"

In this episode, Samantha talks with Internal Family Systems Coach, Corinna Coppola.  Corinne talks about her upbringing and why she eventually decided to get into Internal Family Systems (IFS) as a practice.  She talks us through the basics of IFS and gives us a foundation to go by if any listeners would ever want to explore this healing process.  So, listen in as Corinna and Samantha "Flush It Out!"

Danielle Brooks acknowledged all that was happening.  She dug into her childhood trauma.  She started to map out how some of the unhealed areas in her life shaped the decisions she was making.  Danielle realized that people get stuck in regret or in lost opportunities.  It was her 50th birthday and she was trying to figure out how to celebrate in the midst of the pandemic.  She didn't want to be stuck in “healing mode.”  She figured out that we all need to listen to our intuition and listen to ourselves.Eventually she stopped therapy and got out of the divorce recovery group that she had been a part of.  For her birthday, she decided to make “Top 10 Lists” instead.  Dealing with the trauma is necessary, but there was joy she found along the way.  She wanted to reconnect to the little girl inside of her.  She also struggled with “toxic positivity.”  She needed to be healed enough to know whether or not she was denying her own reality, but she also realized that it's ok to be a positive person in the world.Grief was important for her because she was a person who didn't have a lot of self-worth.  It took her holding space for her own grief and allowing herself to feel those feelings in order to turn that around.  Talking about it with safe people is important, also.  She found her “helpers!”Danielle says that taking the first step is important.  You may be surprised where you find support.  There can be a lot of healing when you become open and vulnerable.  This lightens your grief.We live in a youth-focused culture.  This makes it challenging to feel comfortable at your age.  Let yourself “be.”  Be where you are.  Be who you are.  Be the age you are.How do you do an “autopsy” of your own life?She likes to write, so she started with one question.  “When was the last time that I felt truly happy?” From the list that this question prompted, she started to dig a little bit deeper into those and went from there.  After that, she started to go back even earlier and did the same thing.  It created a “web of happiness” for her.  Danielle was living life like she could outrun her past; that she could achieve enough to close the door on her past.  She had rehearsed her vulnerability story very well.  It was a story of overcoming; a military career, getting a masters degree, etc. She told herself that she could “pray her way” out of her past.  But, she had never dealt with it.  She had to go back and reclaim the rest of her story.Danielle finishes her time on the podcast by mentioning a couple of books that have helped her on her journey:Crystal Evans Hurst's book, “She's Still There.”  Rediscovering the little girl inside of you.  This book helped her to be confident with who she is.  She is now embracing every aspect of who she is.“Everything Belongs” by Richard Rohr.  This book integrated her Christian beliefs with the rest of her life. She was able to tap into her spirit and expand her capacity to open herself up to her internal intuition.

Kerry Thomas is an organizing and productivity coach.  She has a lot of different passions, but her favorite is working with offices.  Kerry has some things she needs to get off her chest when it comes to people's “stuff” as they get older.  Let's start with, “what small changes can I implement now that'll make things easier for those we leave behind?”When you have the luxury of helping people through the process of decluttering over time, it can be good and bad.  First, she has seen success when the approach doesn't come from a place of judgment, but when you come at it from a place of improvement.  It doesn't need to come from a place of telling them what to do.  One thing that is helpful is when somebody else does the touching and smelling of clothes, especially.  There are a lot of emotions associated with clothing, so when you're trying to get rid of things, it helps to detach from the emotional side of things a bit.The more things you can do to tap into your subconscious (which is really “running the show”),  you are able to find the emotions around your things.  Feelings are fuel.  This is what's going to get you where you want to go.The reverse happens when we're trying to let go of things and get rid of things.  So, it's very helpful to have an accountability partner or somebody who can help you to avoid that.If you're the helper, it's important to honor the other person's wishes.  With any age, if you go into somebody else's environment, you can't tell what might be somebody's “favorites.”  Duplicates and triplicates are a great place to start when decluttering or getting rid of stuff.Kerry encourages people to do the 90 day test; have a box for the questionable things and let them sit for 90 days.  If you find that you still don't need those things after that time period, it's time to get rid of them.On thing she wants everybody to think about is that when we're going through and helping our aging parents to declutter, it can be a good idea to record the stories that come from the trips down memory lane. This happens often when you have the opportunity to help somebody sift through their stuff, and capturing those memories can make the experience worthwhile. One of the best things you can do for your loved ones is to let them know ahead of time what you want kept in the family, what you want to be donated to specific charities, or if you truly don't care where your things go, let your loved ones know.  If it's appropriate to ask the people who are aging in your life, please ask them that question.  Do the work before it's needed.Make sure you know what accounts are out there and make sure your loved ones have access to them.  This is important for end of life events, or if there's a memory issue.  You can find more about Kerry Thomas and Conquer The Chaos at:ctcorganizing.com*here you can find her TED Talk and other information.Or on Facebook: FB Group: “Less Clutter, More Peace”

Jill Perla is staying curious with herself even at the age of 55.  She believes that you should have grace for yourself and realize that new things are coming.  There's fear around the new chapter and there's shame in not knowing what your next steps are.  Things are shifting, and she's allowing room for that, but there's also fear there, and possibility at the same time.  She wants people to stay creative and keep an open mind, even as they age.  Sometimes we resist things that we should be embracingJill has been professionally painting for 12 years.  When she was younger, she would look at people who were 55 and think, “they're so old!” But now that she's 55 herself, she's realizing that this age is not that old and that there's a lot of time to still do the things she wants to do.She learns a lot about herself through her painting.  “Creative Kickstart” is a group that she leads where she teaches people how to do the thing that reconnects you with yourself.  For her, it was painting, but for others it could be writing, or hiking, or anything else, really.  Growing up, hobbies seemed something that was just silly to her.  Now, she sees them as a lifeline.  Hobbies can charge you up and bring you joy.  Jill encourages us to “never stop learning” and to “stay curious.”  We need to always be looking for those hobbies that get discouraged in adulthood for some reason.  When you stay curious, conversations are better and life is better.  If we can be curious in life, people are much friendlier and the world can be a better place.As we age, we tend to find roadblocks to the things that interest us.  The more we try, embrace ourselves, and have grace for ourselves, the more we will find.  There's a fear of failure that we push our children through as kids that we don't push ourselves through as adults.  The older we get, the harder it is to push through that.  What are ways we can engage our brains as we get older?  For Jill, it's finding ways to engage.  Any time we get an opportunity to use the opposite side of the brain we're used to using, it's going to help.  Take chances and don't feel silly when you do.  You can ask for help no matter what your age is.  Nobody knows everything, so ask for help.Don't feel guilty for fulfilling yourself because you're going to be more able to fill others when you're fulfilled.You can find more about Jill Perla at:jillperlaart.com*Join Creative Kickstart for a free 30 day trial

Heather Suri owns a Care Management Practice called Pathways In Aging.  Care management involves helping families create teams.  Their specialty is working with aging people.Older adults, in general, tend to have a different calculation of personal risk.  When you're in the closing chapters of your life, your risk is different from when you are a teenager.  A lot of times, adult children just wish their parents would go into assisted living because of the risks associated with aging in place, but the challenge comes in finding the intersections between what they want and what their parents want.One of the roles of a therapist is not to tell you what to do, but to find the answers that are already inside yourself and be willing to listen to and sit with those answers no matter how uncomfortable.  You are not responsible for your parents and all of their choices.  People who have capacity have the right to make decisions that we don't agree with.  Boundaries are important to be able to find peace in whatever situation you're in.Everybody's boundaries are going to be different, but you have to be healthy yourself before you can take care of anybody else.  You get to decide what your boundaries are.  Define what's right for you and respect and honor the boundaries that you set.One of the ways we can effectively work with our aging parents is by building a team.  Figure out who the team is that will help with your parents.  As the “sandwich generation,” we make everything our job, and it's exhausting.  Having a team will ease the stress and exhaustion.What is it that most families think they're “alone” in?  Is your parent safe to drive?  When do we know when cognition changes are actually dementia, and how do you navigate getting them help?  The answers aren't ever black or white and it always depends on the situation and the family.Sometimes the kids aren't the best messenger when it comes to having those hard conversations with the parents.  Sometimes there are other people involved in the older parent's life that can help when there could be a contentious relationship between a parent and a child.  Sometimes there's a lot of frustration and resentment between siblings because each member of the family has their own individual boundaries and bandwidth and the care will never be distributed evenly.  Be able to articulate what you need and understand the talents and gifts of the other siblings.We need to prepare our own kids for our own aging.  It's important to have the hard conversations with our own kids to prepare them.  Heather outlines some of the ways we can get started.Finally, remember that doing the best you can do is enough and it's ok to get help.Heather Suri can be found at:pathwaysinaging.com (phone, email, or book a consultation)

Eileen Grimes is the author of "The Us Journal," which is a parent-child joint journal that encourages the kindling of an authentic connection with your child.  Eileen has a masters in education and her passion is in healing relationships and encouraging connections.  Eileen reminds us that we need to be curious about who our kids are.  When our kids are young, they are dependent on us for care and we are in tune to their needs.  We then become accustomed to meeting certain needs.  Eventually, though, our kids become their own autonomous people.We as parents tend to want to control the relationship.  We tend to feel like we need to be "everything" for our kids, but we have to realize that we're not the only thing they need.  Our kids need other outlets, especially to talk about things that they aren't going to want to talk about with their parents.Parenting is not prescriptive.  Every child is different and we need resources for each unique one.  That's something we need to understand.  As parents, we can't parent each child the same way we did for another one.  Eileen describes us as our own little islands.  She wants to teach kids how to build bridges to other islands, including with their parents, but also with others.  This will give them freedom and access to life.When her son was born, she knew that she wanted to build a bridge to him to keep him from the hurt and pain that she had gone through in her own life.In the beginning of the pandemic, she wrote her own eulogy.  First, she wrote what would be said about her up to that point, then she wrote another one that was what she would want to be said about her at her death.  This is where the journal that she wrote came from, "The Us Journal."  So, what are ways to get curious about your kids and connect with them?  The three words that Eileen loves when it comes to connecting with children and being curious are “tell me more.”  Asking open-ended questions allows them to guide the conversation instead of us.  We can give up control.  That relieves stress for us where we feel like there has to be a lesson or the conversation needs to go in a certain direction.  It opens up a door that allows us to be listeners in the conversation.  The other thing is to “be silly.”  There's a feeling of relaxation and comfort in being silly together with our kids.  It's also important to get on kids' eye levels when you're talking to them.  It decreases the idea of aggression.Finally, have a growth mindset and always be prepared to learn.  This is the best way to teach your kids and give them the tools to deal with future relationships.  We can give them the tools to say, “I am a part of this relationship as well.”  Boundaries are also important.  We need to set boundaries for them, but they need to be able to set them for us, too.“I don't know” is important for kids to hear.  Sometimes it's important for them to figure things out with you, and it's also important for them to understand that you don't have it all figured out. More information on Eileen can be found in the following locations:www.lovedasyouare.coOn Instagram: @LovedAsYouAreCoShe would love to hear from people who are using the journal!

R. Featherstone, MSN PMHNP WHNP PMH-C, is a nurse practitioner in the Richmond, VA area.They inform us that flexibility is the key to parenting.We all have a vision of who our children will be before they're even born and we tend to lay out our hopes and dreams for the child.  This vision isn't challenged until the tween stage when the parents' values get challenged.  It's at this point that there's grief there for the parent.  There's a cognitive dissonance between what they thought they were going to get and what they actually got.  Their children may not meet their vision.For LGBTQ+ children, this is a huge disruption to all of the things that parents were expecting.  It means that the lives of the parents and the child have new challenges.  So, we have to acknowledge the grief.  It needs to be processed and understood that what is happening is different than what was expected.  It's not that anything is wrong, and there's no fault, but at the same time, there's a major disruption in the lives of the parent and the child.“This isn't about you:”  The child's identity isn't about doing something to the parent; there's no fault.  Touchstone events become an entirely different and new experience.  Where you may have originally expected you would be taking your daughter to buy a prom dress, you may be taking your son to order a tuxedo instead.Parents aren't yet used to respecting the autonomy of children who are making the decision to be LGBTQ+.  They aren't autonomous age-wise, but nobody, regardless of age, can be told how they should feel.  Children, regardless of identity, deserve a blanket universal acceptance from a parent.  "We will love you and accept you no matter what."For parents, it's important to stay curious.  Great questions to ask your child are, “What does this mean to you?” or, “How can I support you best?” Give them the autonomy to disclose their identity based on where they feel safe.  Allow them to selectively control how they come out.People now have more options to describe their gender.  Kids today have better terminology to use.  The idea that all of these new terms are confusing our children is untrue.  These new terms are allowing our children to have their autonomy and choose for themselves where they should be.You can never undo whatever you do or say the moment your child first comes out to you.  It's like a first impression. Cultivating a safe environment for your kids is very important.  If they feel safe and comfortable around you, they will feel like they can talk to you about almost anything.  For instance, asking about pronouns when you meet somebody is a great way to communicate that you accept them, support them, and want to learn more.The best advice Featherstone has for parents is to “work on your poker face.”  Samantha describes is as, "be cool! be cool!"Nobody should be parenting in a vacuum.  Parents need to have other parents to talk to about the things their kids are doing or involved in.  There are conversations that should be between parents, and not between the parent and the child.Featherstone talks about how we balance seemingly opposed ideas.  It's both-and, not either-or.We also need to have reasonable consequences that mimic what happens out in the real world.  We need to talk about values when we discuss consequences with our kids.  If expectations are unclear and a teen feels like they're chasing a moving target, they're going to get really frustrated.Finally, they talk about The Trevor Project.  Teens that are forced to grow up in a body that doesn't match their gender identity is traumatic.  Allowing teens to explore these options saves lives.  “It is not benign to deny who your child is.”  

Dawn Geschiere is a life and empowerment coach and owner of Yes To Life Coaching.  She is the parent of 5 adult children and has lots of experience to share with us.The term “no regrets” pulls us into a “guilt,” and when we do have regrets, we already have the idea that we want to have no regrets.  It's impossible to have no regrets and when we struggle to achieve that goal, we wind up stuffing all of our “stuff” down with expectation of getting closer to “no regrets.”So, if we live our lives believing we should have no regrets, are we setting ourselves up for failure?YESBecause we are believing something that just isn't true or real.  It turns into a toxic positivity where you think you can get to a magical place.Each time we wallow in the shame of regret instead of just listening to that voice inside our heads, we get stuck.  We can't undo the mistakes that we make, but we can learn from them.We need to allow ourselves a little bit of time with those bad decisions and we need to listen to our regrets.  What is it telling me?  What is it showing me?  Don't feel shame, at least not for very long.  Don't wallow in guilt and overcompensate.  Instead, let the regret become your teacher.  Process it, own it, be with it, let yourself feel guilty, see what it teaches you, and then move on.If your child is developmentally there, you can then talk it over with them.Our emotions reveal our humanity.Sometimes we set ourselves up with the expectation that there's a “right” way to parent.  I think we can all agree that there's no “right” way or “wrong” way, but there are parents out there living in that binary world.Our parenting is just a big series of science experiments.  Sometimes the experiment goes well, and sometimes it doesn't happen the way we hoped.  What you feel matters and what your child feels matters.  There's some dependency there, but your children are separate beings.  We get to guide them on their journey.  They're going to mess up, and so are we, as parents.  There's a side to “striving” that is harmful to us.  It makes us uptight and brings a sense of pressure and stress to our kids.  We end up striving for something that isn't even attainable; “no regrets.”What if we just stayed present when things went wrong?  What if we tried to work through things with our kids?  We react and then we regret how we reacted, and that's ok.  So, how do we allow regret to be our teacher?  We process through it.  We own it.  We realize that we made a mistake and learn from that mistake, and it's a continuous process.  Is it a big deal?  Is it a big regret?  Is it a pattern?  What is it showing me?  We're going to learn how to move forward and be better for it.  You can find more information on Dawn Geschiere and Yes To Life Coaching in the following locations:Dawn's Monday Mamas - FB Group and then also “Member Mamas,” which is a pay-as-you-go option.email: dawn@ytlcoaching.comytlcoaching.comDawn's Breast Cancer Journey: https://www.caringbridge.org/signin?returl=%2Fvisit%2Fdawngeschiere%2Fjournal%2Fview%2Fid%2F61f2a6166f88d6721a8ce740

Amy Slenker-Smith is the owner of Simply Enough, a company that encourages and helps people de-clutter their homes and lives.Over the course of her life, Amy realized if she just had less stuff, she would have less stuff to take care of.  She was a really “organized hoarder.”  She was organized, but there was a lot of stuff.  For her, life is much better with less, though.Your family of origin is going to guide how you relate to your stuff.  Amy's mom was a collector and that was the example that was set.  You'll either mimic what you learned or you'll do the exact opposite.  For Amy, a switch flipped one day.  She saw how "stuff" was taking time and attention away from her son.  “Do I want time with this infant that took so long to happen, or do I want random stuff from Target?”  That then led to the binge.  She started to get rid of all of her stuff.  She realized how much the stuff was getting in the way of her relationships, not just with her son.  The fewer toys your kids have, the more they will play.  This is a counter-intuitive idea, but more stuff for kids starts to become overwhelming.  There's a difference between a "play room" and a "toy room," and Amy describes the difference.  Change does not happen overnight.  Healthy boundaries around her mom buying gifts for her son.  This was the pattern that was set, but that pattern was broken, so boundaries needed to be put into place.  Even after she got rid of the stuff, there was still clutter in her calendar and in her health. Was there time for a break?  Was there time for exercise?  Was there time for her family?  Her husband flipped that switch for her.  He told her (in a way that she could hear it) that she needed to change her priorities.You can find more information on Amy Slenker-Smith and Simply Enough in the following locations:simplyenough.netOn Instagram and Facebook: @simplyenoughamy

Elena explains that she is a guide who nudges you to find your own liftoff.  She asks questions to get people to the nudge, but it's about you finding your own joy, value, and truth.Our judgment of our bodies starts when we are so young.  All of her experiences growing up caused her to be her own worst enemy with her body, but it took all of that to give her the opportunity to love her body, too.  When she got into her yoga practice, she discovered that the body changes daily and she started to fall in love with her own body.  She explains that your body is your “home base.”  It knows so, so much, even before the brain does.  The body knows stuff!  There are energy systems inside our bodies.  So, to understand when we naturally find “home” in our body and the places where we haven't been kind to ourselves we get to know sensations and find answers within ourselves.So, how do we start the journey to release the shame we have about our bodies?  The first step is to decide that you want to be in relationship with your body in a new way.  It's a light switch that you have to keep turning on.  Next, get rooted, get curious, and be alive.Yin Yoga is about allowing the body to speak to you through sensations.  The beauty of it is when we sit with our breath and get curious.  She likes to call the sensations that come to us “benevolent messengers.”  These are the body saying, “knock knock, I want you to pay attention to me.”  "Release what it is that no longer serves you" is a great sentiment, but it's really hard to release anything if you don't know what it is that no longer serves you.  Once we can learn to listen to our bodies, we can get to a place where we feel more alive within our bodies and we can then tend to that “aliveness.”We take in energy, we absorb it, and we allow the leftover energy to be released.  Moving with the intention to give something permission to move through us is something we should aim for.  How are we treating our bodies?  Are we nourishing them?  Are we offering our bodies what they need rather than what we think they should have?  Poet June Jordan is quoted: “We are the ones we've been waiting for.”  The body has everything we need and crave already inside of us.  

We have clothes in our closet that trigger us because we aren't at that place anymore, and we need to start demanding new things from the clothing we put on our bodies.  We have been on autopilot for so long.  Wardrobe has always been a connection to “self” for Cristina.  There's a connection to “who am I” and that's how she related to style.  When we show up as our best selves on the outside, it's important to make that connection.  You “dress for the interview” or dress a certain way if you are going to a specific event.  That connection exists, but in our everyday lives we aren't making that connection.  Essentially, we aren't "ourselves" every day when we just throw "whatever" together in the clothes we wear. What does “dress-up” mean?  We have been told from a very young age that there are appropriate ways to dress for certain occasions.  What do you think it looks like to look “put together?”  8 times out of 10, the appropriate clothing already exists in your closet for any situation.Who am I and who do I need to be?  How can I align with what I already have?Start with your favorites and write down why they are your favorites and why you feel this way.  This is not to replicate the look, but to replicate the feeling when you're choosing new clothes.

Becky Upchurch is a clarity and mindset coach.  She, like so many people, grew up conflating weight and health and believes that people having weight and health issues has been normalized over time.  She believes that so much time and energy is wasted on focusing on the wrong things when it comes to these things.  Becky talks to Samantha about taking baby steps when it comes to our own weight and health.  Baby steps don't feel like you're doing very much, but it assures that you're taking manageable steps and that you keep moving forward.  Over time, major changes start to happen.Becky reminds us all that we can love ourselves NOW.To get Becky's Body Acceptance Guide, click here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qtJRKR7LhoCAbrSRarc23KhXaXvH6FHc/copy

Every woman feels like they need to apologize for their body and they feel like something that's broken.  It's not a matter of anybody having anything that is actually broken, it's the world around us giving us bad information.  Debbie was put on a diet at the age of 6 and got the message that certain bodies are good and certain bodies are bad.  So, Debbie had an eating disorder growing up and got a really good therapist for that and worked very hard to work through those issues.  She still had issues with how she felt about her body, though.Eventually she moved to LA to become an actress, which didn't pan out the way she had hoped it would.  Instead, she became a physical trainer where people came to her and she got to witness the struggles those people had.  Feeling like your body is broken is not a symptom of your body being broken, its a symptom of the broken world we live in.  You don't change the reality of the situation by denying it, you have to own it.  It's A truth, not THE truth.Our culture praises women for aging gracefully, but shames women who do things to their bodies to hide age.  How do we reconcile these things?  What is the “correct” way to think about these things?  There's no “right size!”  Not only that, but we all compare ourselves to others.  When we make a space for multiple truths to be true, we release our tight hold on what the narrative is and open space for new narratives.Good vs Bad - what's the problem with positive?  Because if you don't have positive, you have the polar opposite; negative.  So how do we have a healthy relationship with our body today?  Having a relationship with your body is like having a relationship with any person.  There are highs and lows, but you have to be committed to growing with them.

This week, Samantha sits down with Lana Lechkina, a quilling artist and owner of Just Quill It.  Lana was born in Russia and lived in a small town.  Dentistry at that time was rudimentary and her first experience with a dentist was horrific and involved a drill and her cheek.  A traumatic experience at this age has caused her to have anxiety around dentists even to this day.  She explains that even now, when she visits a dentist, she understands that the stress associated with the visit has its complications.  She metabolizes the anesthesia faster because of the stress and understands that it takes a little bit more for her, which causes her to be knocked out for a couple of days, at least.  The smells, the environment, and all of the things associated with a dentist's office trigger her anxiety, no matter how logical she knows she can be.So, for Lana, she likes to give herself small tasks.  She counts the colors in a piece of art, or she will count the number of patterns on the wallpaper.  This allows her to distract herself from what is happening and calms her down.  She knows that she doesn't want to have the doctor talk to her, because that could possibly distract them from the work that they are doing in her mouth.  She has tried all sorts of suggestions, but now understands that the best tool for her is to distract herself.  Counting is her best tool.  The dental assistants helping to redirect her attention is another great way for her to give a distraction.Quilling is something that Lana picked up initially as a hobby.  She didn't have the ability to draw or paint, but when it comes to creating intricate works of art with small strips of paper, she discovered a talent.  Eventually, her friend convinced her to have an event for her art and it has turned into her full-time business.  Then, about 3 years ago, her father was diagnosed with brain cancer.  He lost the ability to do anything on his own, and it began a 33 month long journey that was very hard and ended with her not being able to be there during his final days because of COVID.  Quilling calmed the stress associated with this situation, also.  For Lana, art is a way of escaping.  It's about beauty and elegance, not just in art, but in life.  If she can just help one person, just a little bit, she knows sharing her story will be worth it.If you would like to learn more about Lana or about Just Quill It, you can find more information at:Facebook: @justquillit  Just Quill It, the Art of Paper FiligreeInternet:  justquillit.com

This week, Samantha talks with DeDee Cai, owner of coaching and consulting company Fit To Profit.  DeDee helps business owners create the right mindset.  She says that 80% of business is mindset and 20% is strategy.  We are the driver behind our businesses.  DeDee loves working with moms who are business owners and helping them manage owning a business and having a family and has a passion for financial independence for women.For DeDee, her journey started when she was graduating from college.  She questioned the typical path women are “supposed” to take.  When she graduated college as a psychology major, she decided that becoming a psychologist wasn't necessarily for her.  She didn't know what she wanted, but she knew she didn't want to simply “follow the steps.”  So, she tried out many different jobs, but what she discovered was that none of them felt like the right fit for her.From the outside, she was energetic, friendly, and loving, but what was hidden on the inside was depression.  She was depressed and fighting suicidal thoughts.  All of the “doing” was helping her cope with her feelings.  She didn't feel good enough.  She didn't feel worthy of love, she felt like a burden, and she felt like nobody cared about her.  Looking back, she understands that everything happens for a reason.  For her, it was her parent's divorce that made her face new choices and challenges.  She and her mom opened a restaurant together and even though it did really well, she still had to ask herself “is this it?”  The answer was ‘no.'  Her new job, as successful as it was, took up too much time and was causing stress in her life.  To de-stress, she eventually ended up finding yoga.  Through yoga, she felt more alive and incredible for the first time.  She didn't know how it worked on her, but she needed to figure it out.  She took yoga training and was learning not just how to teach yoga, but was also learning so much about herself.Eventually, she realized she needed to “break up with herself.”  The way she treated herself wasn't acceptable anymore and she had a realization that "she wasn't who she was."  For the first time, she was beginning to accept that certain things were a part of her and that she had the power to overcome them.  Her yoga practice started and she was studying health and wellness and expressing who she was.  This was the moment she discovered coaching and finally discovered what she wanted to do.  She was still busy, though, and wasn't paying attention to the voice that was in the back of her mind telling her that she needed to start a coaching business.  Then, she lost her best friend to suicide at the same time as her own wedding.  Three days before her wedding, she was attending a funeral for her best friend.  It was this moment in her life that solidified in her mind that she was going to start her coaching business.  Her friend had suffered with depression just like she did, but now she realized that she didn't have to suffer the same fate and she didn't want anybody else to suffer the same fate, either.  This became her responsibility and mission.  This is the way she honors the memory of her friend.It was only when she was willing to bring light to the dark and take her power back that she was able to "break up with herself" and find what she had always been seeking.  That's when she decided that things didn't have to be the way they were.To find out more about DeDee Cai and her coaching business, visit:www.fittoprofit.comDeDee is also working on a book: "The Overcomer" - stories from entrepreneurs about overcoming challenges

This week, Samantha talks with Cecile Blot (pronounced “blow”), about the challenges of starting a travel company, weathering the hit that the pandemic gave to the travel industry, and getting out of your bubble when it comes to travel.  Cecile is a travel advisor and the owner of Boundless Travels, where she creates unique bespoke travel experiences.She has never really had a traditional life and travel has been a part of her life since she was very young.  Since then, she's had the travel bug, going to different destinations between jobs.  Her friends would ask her, “when is it going to end?”  The answer is, “never!”  She lived a very non-traditional lifestyle and ended up using that to her advantage. After years of consulting here and there after having moved to the Washington D.C. area, her mom asked her why she didn't just become a travel agent.  So, the idea ruminated for a bit and she decided to do what she could to learn what it takes.  Of course, after realizing that nobody would take her on, she decided to start her own business.  This takes a lot of “building the plane and flying the plane at the same time.”  Since then, she was building and building her business and by the start of 2020 she had gotten so busy she almost couldn't keep up with it.  Then, the global pandemic happened.  The word of 2020 became ‘pivot,' but in the travel industry, that's a lot harder to do, especially when the majority of people aren't traveling.  Today, things are starting to pick back up, especially with vaccinations, but things are still different.So, how can we use travel to heal during this crazy time?  According to Cecile, getting excited about something like a trip can be a great way to shift your mind away from the craziness and depression that has come from the pandemic.  Even just planning a trip and the anticipation of the trip can bring people so much joy.How else can travel be healing?  Cecile encourages people to get out of their comfort zones.  Everybody is different, but for Cecile, “true” travel doesn't include gated resorts where you travel to a different country and never leave the resort.  Everywhere you go, you can take your bubble with you, but sometimes you need to get out of the bubble.  This is the only way to really understand the kindness of people around the world and challenge your own biases toward certain places and certain people.  “Travel opens your heart and your mind.”Getting out of your bubble is also the best way to get great stories.  Cecile recounts a story where she had just crossed into Laos and the only way to get to the place they were going was by river.  There were two options, the fast boat and the slow boat.  Of course, they wanted to take the fast boat because it would take way less time.  The story that Cecile tells about trip has to be heard to be believed.  The lesson is, “always take the slow boat.”  Looking back at that story is something that she will always remember.  She got out of her comfort zone and it didn't turn out the way she thought it would but the memory will remain with her forever.  Cecile explains, “You never want to do things more than when you can't do them.”  She believes that the pandemic can be an opportunity for people to grow.  This could be something that can make travel better and the travel experience as a whole better.  Over-tourism has been a problem in some places, and this has been a very unique opportunity for certain places to reset and become what they were before tourism started to be a problem.How can we get out of our bubbles?  Cecile suggests that you should have a professional plan your trip so that you are set up for success.  Be smart about it.  Also, if you're just getting back out there after being cooped up for a while because of the pandemic, take baby steps to allow yourself to get re-acclimated to travel.  Start small and work your way back to the exotic trip you may have been planning before it all stopped.To find out more about Cecile Blot or to talk to her about your next trip, you can find her at:www.boundless-travels.comOn Facebook - Boundless TravelsOn Instagram - @boundlesstravels

This week, Samantha talks with newborn and family photographer, Dana Graham.  Her whole life, Dana just wanted to be a mom.  But, in Northern Virginia, the idea of just being a mom is hard, especially when her husband was working for the government.  Dana felt lost in her professional career and didn't have a clear-cut path.  Then, a Facebook ad came up in her feed about photography.  One thing led to another, and she has been able to create a full-blown and fully-booked photography business and has a podcast for moms who feel trapped in the corporate world and are looking for a way to get out and follow their passions.  She understands that she isn't the only one who felt that way and wanted to create a community of moms that can support one another through her podcast.She has to remind herself sometimes that she started her photography business so that she could spend more time with her kids.  There are phases in life where you are pulled one way rather than the other.  This is the mindset shift she has had to make because she knows what will work for her.  Dana wants to grow her business, but along with that comes more time spent on her business and not her family.  So, she has to be able to set goals and label those specific goals.  To her, time is the most valuable thing, so goal setting has to be done with time in mind; where time will be spent and with whom the time will be spent.  Now that she is moving internationally, this will be even more challenging because her business is referral-based and she is moving to an entirely different country.Values are a broad topic.  For Dana, she wants to surround herself with moms who have built businesses and value spending time with their family.  She wants to involve her kids in her work and she wants to have them involved and around while she works.  This is what she values and wants people she works with to understand that it will be a reality with her.  How did she get into photography?  It was a targeted ad that came across her Facebook feed.  She had just had photographs done with her baby.  It was something that she could start for a very low cost and she knew that she loved making babies laugh, so it made sense for her.  The only hang-up was a seemingly saturated market.  At the time, she was so desperate to make it work, she knew that if it didn't work, she would have to go back to the job that she knew was taking her away from her kids and keeping her from seeing them grow up.  She describes the leap to leave her job and become a photographer as the most savage decision she has ever had to make.Dana and her husband's savage decision to leave the security of her job for her to pursue photography has shown her that a lot of times these types of decisions work out for the best.  Making that decision and having it work out has given her the courage to make more risky decisions.So, what's the biggest lesson Dana has learned along the way?  It is separating her own mindset from the rest of the world's.  Everybody has a different opinion about everything, so when you're making decisions, you need to make decisions specific to yourself.  Nobody knows you better than you, and when you can surround yourself with people that are aligned with the way you think, you can get much better advice from friends.  She believes you should spend more time in your own head than you do in other people's heads.  Also, confidence is hard to build.  Dana believes that if you can just do something, whether it ends up as a mistake or not, or whether or not it becomes a failure, you will gain confidence.You can also apply to your mindset the fact that other people have already done what you want to do.  You can find those people via social media or other means and be willing to expand your circle to include those people and open up those new possibilities and get some encouragement.  Her podcast is a place where moms come to tell their stories and where women can come and find a community of moms that have done things differently.If you want to find more information on Dana Graham, her photography, or her podcast, visit:danagrahamphotography.comOr on Instagram: @dana_graham

This week, Samantha talks with the President and Founder of Storybook Treasures, Denise Corbo.  Storybook Treasures is a nonprofit with the mission of “putting books into the hearts, hands, and homes of children in need.”  Denise was an educator for over 30 years, but she says that teaching found her.  She doesn't describe herself as being a good student growing up, and school was hard for her.  She took cosmetology (vocation education) in HS, but her teacher told her that she needed to go to college instead of learn cosmetology.  So, she eventually had to make a shift in high school to take extra classes and summer school to prepare for admission to college.  Then, once in college, she graduated in just 2.5 years.Denise says, “I have a plan, but God always seems to have a bigger plan.”  Doors close, so she then has to ask herself what to do next and make the pivot to figure out how to get it done.  She negotiated with her mom to get into a private school, graduated in 2.5 years, and out of school she became a cosmetology teacher.  It is her journey that has enabled her to be a better teacher to her students.  How does she keep pushing through to doing big things?  She is a perfectionist, but she has learned to forgive herself.  There's a growth mindset associated with how she reacts to situations.  Her journey has included teaching cosmetology for 5 years, then getting her masters degree in K-8 education.  She was then required to do student-teaching.  After her student-teaching the principal offered her a job as a first grade teacher.  It wasn't her ideal spot, but she decided to go for it.  Storybook Treasures started in her kindergarten classroom.  When you teach, you have to meet the challenge of getting all of the kids where they need to be in order to meet a criteria set for all students.  Children all grow differently and they all develop at different rates, and she didn't feel good about telling the parents of some of the kids that they weren't up to “standards.”  When you read a book to a child in the classroom, that book immediately becomes a hot commodity for the children and make a connection to it.  She found that when she had multiple copies of her favorites in her classroom, the children were able to make connections to the book; connections that just can't be taught.  So, Denise decided to create treasures to go along with the books that gave the kids another connection to the book.  All of these connections helped the kids with retelling and literacy on a level that she had never seen before.  Of course, there were challenges as Storybook Treasures started to materialize.  There were issues with childrens' attention during class, so she shifted again to get the “treasures” to be something done at home.  Then, she found that the parents were reaching out to her to figure out where they could get the books.  She calls it the “Happy Meal” effect.  At the end of the year after starting the idea of using "treasures" to go along with the books, she discovered that one hundred percent of her students had aced their literacy tests.  This solidified the idea that Storybook Treasures was a great idea and set her on the journey to getting a non-profit set up.She took on a job driving a limousine so that she could pay to start her own non-profit.  She was called to make it happen and she made it happen.  Her husband couldn't believe it, because he had just finished telling her that they couldn't use more of the family funds to get it all started.Throughout it all, Denise has had a can-do attitude and any time she was faced with a challenge, she met it head-on by learning what she needed to learn to allow her to meet her goals.Where can you find out more about Storybook Treasures?email:denise@storybooktreasures.orgWebsite:storybooktreasures.org

This week, Samantha talks with Sarah Shores, owner of Warrenton Wellness, a wellness center offering blue light therapy.  Sarah talks about her journey from doing engineering work for the US Coast Guard, to contracting Lyme's Disease, to starting her own business offering Blu Rooms in Warrenton, VA.  Sarah had a very active lifestyle running marathons and riding horses and spending a lot of time outside, but everything came to a halt when she discovered that the difficulties she was having physically could be attributed to Lyme's Disease.  This was all after seeing many doctors to diagnose her pain.  Eventually, the pain and the fatigue got to the point that she couldn't function using conventional medical methods.  At the time, Blu Rooms were only available on the West Coast, but she took a chance and decided to travel out there and try it out.  She immediately felt relief of some of her symptoms and eventually decided she should open up a center here where she gets clients from all over the East Coast.Sarah has come to understand that if it wasn't for her Lyme's, she wouldn't be where she is today doing what she loves, helping people.  She enjoys constantly exploring new areas in her own mind, including healing herself.  There is an analogy about neighborhoods that she shares with some of her clients.  It is an analogy that is originally attributed to the founder of Blu Rooms, JZ Knight.  She explains that the Blu Rooms allow a person to get away from their environments and gets them to a meditative state where they can get in tune with themselves and to a calm state where you are free of stress.  This place where you can go in your mind can be seen as having a path to it that is there, but is overgrown with weeds.  On the other hand, the stressful place we often find ourselves in our mind has a clear, paved superhighway that leads to it.  Now, she feels like she is able to make a difference in the world one person at a time by offering this blue light therapy that has been so helpful to her.It's worth a try to see if it works for you, according to Sarah.  For her, it was worth a try and just from trying it she found hope.  It's a unique place that allows you to escape for a bit.  A lot of times, we aren't able to find the time or the place to escape and relax.  It is a mental reset.  Samantha then talks about her experience and what you can expect if you visit Warrenton Wellness.So, how is Sarah doing today?  Very well.  She's gotten back into exercising and has her energy back that she lost during her bout with Lyme's.  She will be 61 years old in 2021, but for her, that's just a number.  She's got energy and she's got too much she wants to experience to think about losing time.  She's creating her own path now and is getting back to the best version of herself she can be.To find out more about Warrenton Wellness, Blu Rooms, blue light therapy, and Sarah Shores, or to make an appointment, you can visit:warrentonwellness.comOr call Sarah to chat at: 540-216-2524

This week, Samantha talks with Dr. Alyssa Adams, clinical psychologist turned intuitive business coach, about exploring yourself.  Samantha and Alyssa met each other on a “speed networking” event and since then, Samantha has wanted to have her as a guest to "flush out" her journey.  Alyssa and Samantha talk a lot about being shockingly honest and how a person who decides to do something outside the box can embrace that journey.Alyssa got her doctorate in clinical psychology and went the “traditional” route for a while, but then she found herself burning out.  She was doing a lot of clinical work and was exhausted from that.  Then, she took a position as the director of integrated health, but she was working constantly and burned herself out even more.  Then, she left that job and went to a leadership/administrative role in the same company to take a step back from client-focused work, but it brought a whole new set of complications.  Eventually, she came to a “career impasse,” which led her to coaching.  This got her back into the client-based environment and allowed her to work her own schedule.  She started learning to love all of the different aspects that come with coaching and with being an entrepreneur.  She needed to learn sales because she had no sales background.  As she got into that, she started to realize that there was a helpful aspect to sales that she could really connect with; that she could provide people with something that they needed.  People get stuck in these boxes that we make for ourselves.  If you do these specific things, you'll achieve this stuff that you believe you want.  But what if that's not what you want?  You need to be aware of when you've taken on an identity that doesn't fit you.  Let's say we've achieved what we thought we wanted to achieve.  Then what?  Alyssa would argue that you need to “let yourself explore.”  That you need to shift to a new excitement by exploring what excites you.  You are then paying attention to the parts of you that have been ignored for a long time.  People tend to litigate and then re-litigate with themselves to keep going in the direction they're going.  What if you decided to pick a “thing” and that was the “thing” that you would work towards your entire life?  Is that realistic?Alyssa goes on to say, "Most people are not paying that much attention to me or what I have to say."  There's freedom in that mindset which allows us to just be out there and be ourselves without having to worry about what other people are thinking.  Everybody has their own thing going on in their head.  If we do get into these patterns about how we talk to ourselves and think about ourselves, we just need to notice it and it'll break those thoughts up and allow us to explore more.If you're ready to take a “next step” into doing something a little bit non-traditional, Alyssa says that it will depend on what that “thing” is, but the first step is to explore what it is that you want to do and why you feel that pull.  Take some steps to get some clarity to understand the “why” and then take action.  The process is iterative, according to Alyssa.  If you can do the “thing,” you'll get a lot of information back from that which will help you adjust and become better.If you want to learn more about Dr. Alyssa Adams, you can find her at:Web: dralyssaadams.comIG: @dralyssaadamsPodcast: The Uncommon Couch - found on your favorite Podcast platform

This week, Samantha talks with Havilah Vangroll of Have Strategy Coaching.  Havilah is a nutrition and health coach specializing in teaching the “how” to have a healthy life.  Food and nutrition is what she loves, but she has also learned over time that she needs to focus not only on these things, but the person as a whole.  She understands that having difficult conversations around food and nutrition with your family can be hard, too, so if they aren't on board with your health-oriented goals, she wants to help with that.Havilah began acquiring her skills when she was a child because she was raised by a mom who was really into health and food and nutrition.  She grew up not realizing that other people weren't learning the same things about food as she was.  When she started her own family, she didn't know how much of a challenge these things would be for her.  Her son had food allergies growing up and both he and she herself ended up with bad acid reflux.  She wasn't doing well with her own stress, her daughter was sick, and her son had issues with what he couldn't eat, and something was wrong.  It turned out that she needed to cut dairy out of her diet, which helped with her acid reflux, but it didn't solve the emotional side of things and her stress.  Havilah explains that serotonin, melatonin, and all of these hormones are produced in your gut, not your brain.  So, it isn't emotional eating, there's a physiological response to food that happens in your gut that makes you feel happy.Havilah is a stress starver (not eater), which is a problem just as much as stress eating.  Just after getting her son's acid-reflux under control, her daughter began to struggle with brain tumors.  She has since gotten them under control, but the struggle that she endured mentally has taught her more about herself than anything else.  All of these things got her into personal development.  She started out being a cooking coach during the first break she got from her family stresses.  This came from a place of wanting to help people understand the basic principle of how to cook and how to connect to food in a different way.  Eventually, though, she needed to find a way to “function forward” when her daughter went through a second bout of brain tumors.  The second round brought clarity to what was good, right, or indifferent in her life and in her family's life.  On top of all of this, she was dealing with her father's liver failure and a catastrophic achilles injury that kept her from being able to walk.  This got her into a dark place.  It was then that she realized that she needed to get into a healthier headspace herself.  So, she had to get back into self-improvement.  This caused her to get into a more whole-self approach.  The goal with her and her coaching wasn't just to work on the outside parts of people, but to work on the inside parts.  She thinks about it as having to get through a concrete wall to be able to get to those inside parts.Havilah is a person who gets stuff done, but there's a cost to that “get it done” ability, and that's an emotional disconnect with herself.  This then causes a disconnect to her own spirituality, which got her into a very dark place.  She had to hire a mindset and vision coach to get her out of that dark, sticky place.  Havilah can't do it all and doesn't have it all figured out.  It was hard for her to figure out that she didn't have to do everything by herself.  You always have a choice about how you respond to the things that life throws your way.Havilah's Hot Takes: have a morning routine and a nighttime routine that best serves you. The nighttime routine should set you up for success the next day. If you want to lose weight, sleep well.  You can sleep yourself slim. Journal.  It's a “hamster wheel exit.” Calm the chaos in your brain if you want to be productive Plan your meals Find local sources for food if you can and if you can afford to Get to know your farmers and know where your food comes from Standardize meals How to get in touch with Havilah:Email - thatcookingcoach@gmail.comFB - HAVe Strategy Coaching

This week, Samantha talks with empowerment coach, Kristin Zucaro about how to have difficult conversations.  As an empowerment coach, she helps people breathe through people pleasing and perfectionism, setting and honoring boundaries, and finding their life's purpose.Kristin became a coach because of a wakeup call she received back in 2019.  She was a total people-pleaser her entire life and through college.  In 2012, she received a diagnosis of thyroid cancer.  She beat it and got right back onto the corporate horse.  Then, she received a diagnosis of melanoma, a non-life threatening form of cancer in her case.  This time, though, she took it as a gift.  This time, she wouldn't be returning to the corporate world and pursued her career in coaching.Difficult conversations aren't an “if” but a “when” they happen.  Kristin's coping mechanism used to be to avoid the conversation completely.  She wasn't taught and didn't know how to have difficult conversations when she was growing up, so her goal now is to give people the tools, support, guidance, and the listening ear to prepare for them.Her tumultuous childhood didn't give her the tools to go deeper because she wasn't allowed to talk about the things that were happening in the house.  She details the events of her youth that caused her own trauma and caused her difficulty in having difficult conversations.  She also loosely attributes her thyroid cancer on her suppression of the truth growing up and not talking about the things actually going on in the home.Kristin has formula for having difficult conversations. For example, Kristin's intention with the podcast interview was to “be assertive.”  This is how she decided she would show up.  If you know that you have to approach a difficult situation or conversation, if you can commit to being intentional, you can try to stick to it.  Then, after you have your intention, you can contemplate where the other person is.  You can make an attempt to put yourself in their shoes.  This is empathic, but also allows you to anticipate difficulties in the conversation before they happen.  Finally, she says to use “I” statements instead of “you” statements.  This allows you to find common ground with the other person.  “I noticed that” or “I observed” are statements that you can use to disarm the other person and have a difficult, but productive, conversation.  If you get to the point where you start to get into “you” statements, it's time to take a pause and pick up the conversation later.During their conversation, Kristin and Samantha agree that "all we can do is work on ourselves and be the best person that we can be and set healthy boundaries."  As parents, Kristin says, it is so important to work out our own stuff so that we can be our best selves for our kids.  She realized that the best example she can set for her kids is to model difficult conversations with her husband in front of the kids.  Over time, it will teach them how to have disagreements in a healthy way.If you want to get in touch with Kristin Zucharo, you can find her and her podcast at:Instagram: @kristinzucaroWeb: kristinzucaro.comPodcast: on Spotify and on her website - “Curiosity, Courage, and Truth”https://www.kristinzucaro.com/podcast

This week, Samantha gets to be a “nerd by proxy” with Dr. Erika Michalski, EDD.  Erika is a self-proclaimed nerd, and founder of "Strategically Authentic."  Samantha talks with her about the science behind authenticity and satisfaction.  Erika also runs the instagram site @consultantbarbie, where she wants to encourage people to be a catalyst for their own evolution and then how to coach the people around them.  "Evolution" is her preferred term because it's all about what you keep as you move forward and what you change, whether by choice or not.  For Erika, authenticity is understanding who you are in the middle of the chaos and knowing how to stay in alignment with who you are.  But, don't blindly follow one track and never pay any attention to anything else.  You don't want to miss any opportunities to evolve!  If you only read things that you agree with, you can't evolve.  We can't make informed decisions if we are only selecting information we agree with or align with to be in our space.  Erika loves to celebrate, too!  Celebration is validation and they work in tandem.  Existing in the moment of the accomplishment is how she defines celebration.  When people have different levels of celebration, it needs to match the magnitude of the accomplishment and it needs to honor the contributor, not the celebrator.To close, Erika goes into the neuroscience of satisfaction. The crux of all of it is you have 4 neurological channels that contribute to your satisfaction, and they all work independently of each other.  #1 - Maintenance of Positivity: When we have positive emotions, how do we maintain them?  What do you choose to do to maintain positivity?  How do we invite positive energy to move forward to the next project?#2- Recovery from Negative Emotions: How do we recover from negative emotions?  Negative emotions are going to happen, so how do we move on and release them?  That is a very different concept.  To quote Ted Lasso - “be a goldfish.”  This means we need to let go of the things that we know we don't want to repeat.  #3- Tune Out the Noise: This may be the hardest one.  It's about your ability to focus.  It is inviting your brain to stop.  For some people, it's meditation.  For others, it's the end of a yoga session.#4- Doing Acts of Service for Others Without Expecting Recognition: This is the idea that when you're above ground, you get to make another person's life better.  When you post about something great that you've done, you're already getting that neurological reward.  Then, you don't get the long-term satisfaction, which has a different depth.  You cannot seek satisfaction from external sources.  It won't work.  What you can get from external sources is pleasure, but pleasure ends at the completion of that act.Erik ends the podcast with a thought that we hope every Flusher can get behind.  She says that "everybody should get a license and a therapist when they turn 16."You can find Erik Michalski on Instagram at:@consultantbarbie

This week, Samantha talks with the owner of Conquer The Chaos Organizing, Kerry Thomas.  Kerry understands that organization is so much more than what people realize, which is why she is so passionate about helping entrepreneurs with organization.  She believes that "the more organized you are, the less time you waste."So many entrepreneurs have undiagnosed ADHD.  Our world is almost set up to bring out those traits from people.  There’s no time for resting in the entrepreneurial world.  This is why she is passionate about helping entrepreneurs, because she understands the pitfalls of entrepreneurship and how the world can work against entrepreneurs.Kerry says that your level of organization is going to ebb and flow throughout your life.  You have to be able to give yourself grace to allow yourself to function sometimes.  It doesn’t have to be perfect.  Pinterest, for example, is great because of the inspiration you can find from it, but your house doesn’t have to look like Pinterest.  Sometimes “perfect” is stressful and sometimes it is peaceful.  It depends on the person.  Kerry doesn’t care if your hangers match.  She has been drawn to people who feel overwhelmed and helps them to get their head above water.  She wants people to be comfortable in a way that works for them, not what appears to work for other people.The feeling of being a failure feeds into your emotional clutter.  Kerry wants to simply reverse this flow.  Then, once you start to declutter, you actually start wanting to organize.   Anybody that has done self-work knows that once you start to work on yourself, you make space for more things to come in and you find that you have more energy.  Part of the good energy is simply re-taking your space.  On another level, though, everything is made up of energy, including our clutter, and this can de-energize us.  Kerry offers three areas to look at, in general, for organization: home organization, office organization, and internal organizationHome - Have routines, designated spots ("everything needs a home"), and talk with the people you live with to figure out what works for everybody in the home.  For Kerry, the kitchen counter was designated as a “no clutter zone” in her house.  Start by speaking up and not holding resentment inside.Office - Look at the information flow.  The information that comes in; where does it come in, where does it go, and how does it get to the next place it needs to go?  Figure out where the blockages are.  Internal - Kerry helps people develop a toolkit (journaling, meditation, movement, vision boards, etc) for internal organization.  In general, though, her tip is to “make the decision.”  Change is the result of action, and action is the result of decision.  She understands that sometimes it may take people years to make decisions.What happens when you don’t make your decisions?  You get overwhelmed.  You get stuck.  You don’t have to stay there long, though.  One of Kerry's favorite sayings is "what get’s scheduled gets done."  Another one is also, "do what works for you."You can find Kerry Thomas at:ctcorganizing.com(Her TED Talk is on the front page)The best way to connect with Kerry is through her Facebook Group - "Less Clutter More Peace"

This week, Samantha talks with wellness and success mentor and owner of Wise Oils Wellness, Athena Scalise Waitt.  Athena previously worked for NATO and worked for a non-profit called “Reef Relief.”  She was working in organization and managing people, but also the aspect of working for the greater good.  Growing up, she wanted to be a lawyer for women’s rights, and has always been an advocate for the environment.  Looking back, she didn’t know it at the time, but these things were manifested.  At a young age, she was connected to her value system.Now, Athena is still working now in a way that continues to lean into her passions.  As a part of this, Samantha and Athena explore the concept of the “mental vision board” as a guiding light.  Athena has a strong faith, which is a part of her own mental vision board.  The faith value is a big part of the “value pie” for her.  It was her children that got her back into the faith.  She didn’t want to force feed her children something just because that’s what she knew, so she went to a bible study to figure out what she believed herself.  She had a stroke in 2005 and breast cancer in 2007, and her faith gave her a completely different perspective on these things and also allowed her to witness to her faith with others.Athena says that no matter what you believe, you are not meant to live life alone.  Our biggest hurdle in life is comparison, which is the "thief of joy."  For five years, she struggled with fatigue due to recovery from surgeries, but she couldn’t say that her neighbor was doing better than her.  Still, it affected the way she was able to be a parent to her children, but she had to be kind to herself and have compassion for herself.We have to find ways to ground ourselves and get back to our “true compass,” which is the value system that guides us.She’s been on a wellness journey since she was 12 when her mom introduced her to the idea that she was responsible for her own decisions.  So, she’s been on the path of making informed decisions for a long time.  Most people don’t realize that they need to invest time to actually make informed choices.  So, when the pandemic hit, she was well equipped to help people get solutions into their hands right away.  Fear was a driving factor for people over the past year, and it can manifest physically in our bodies in many different ways.  She likes to get people in touch with their emotions, because there’s a direct connection to emotions and the body.  Getting back into touch with their bodies and get back to a sense of balance is what Athena wants most for her clients.She believes that we have to be proactively involved in the solution, no matter the problem.  Sometimes people just want an answer to their problems, but she believes you have to be proactive in your own healing.  You have to want to heal yourself.  Cancer is a part of her own story, but it isn’t who she is.  It has been 14 years since she got her diagnosis.  But, she doesn’t want to consider herself a “survivor” on a daily basis, she considers herself a "thriver."  It’s these root emotions that we need to get to the bottom of.  Then we start to unfold the ways to do the work ourselves.  There’s no judgment for people that can’t get to that point, because everybody is different and on their own path and we’ve all spent time there, but that's the goal.Whatever she’s doing, as long as she’s living into her core values of integrity and authenticity, she knows that she is enough.  Young mothers often have so much self-doubt and self-criticism that is steals the joy of their experiences.  She hopes that the next generation is able to break apart from the norms that shaped the previous generation of women to be a certain way.  It wasn’t just norms dictated by men, but also women who were taught a certain way and feel like the next generation should be the same.“It’s never too late to start being yourself.”Athena believes that we are evolving as a society, and her daughters are evolving as women, too, which excites her for their future.  Her children area always schooling her, also. This is great because she also understands that we need to be humble enough to understand that our children can teach us things.  Athena Scalise Waitt can be found in the following locations:wiseoilswellness.comFB:Wise Oils WellnessInstagram:@wiseoilsEmail:mywiseoils@gmail.com

This week, Samantha talks with business owner and mother of 3, Julie Nicholson Burke.  Motherhood was much more difficult for Julie than she ever imagined it to be.  Her oldest son has been challenging to raise, and then she also has twins.  So, when it came to running a business, she had to have patience.  This wasn’t being carried over to her kids, though.  She didn’t have patience for them the way she did for her business.  Her daughter reminded her that “we’re just small,” which was a harsh reminder that she needed to rethink how she treated her kids.There are parallels to parenting and consequences that Julie has been able to draw.  What was innate in her to parent her kids didn’t work.  She had to find different ways and different avenues to parents her children.  She had to press to get her son tested because she knew in her gut that something wasn’t right.  He was having difficulty in school socially and in most other situations.  Overall, it’s all been a long journey.  What did life look like before making the personal connections in her business?  Life before was chaotic.  She didn’t like being a mom.  It felt like no matter what she did, it didn’t work.  She thought that there was joy that came with being a mom, but there was just a lot of yelling and misunderstanding.  The shift started in roughly year 2 of her business when she was attending lots of training sessions.  She kept hearing the same message over and over again.  Direct sales is simple, but not easy, so you have to have patience.  So, after understanding this message, she realized it could be applied to her kids, too, with having patience with them.  Consistency with her business but not with her kids was a place where a big switch needed to happen.  She had to put up certain boundaries with her kids.  Through quarantine, the four of them would play a “catch me” game, but after a while, she was exhausted.  When she said that she needed a break, to her surprise, they were happy to go play by themselves in their rooms.  This boundary was well received and still gave the kids what they needed. With the addiction to technology that we all have today, as long as we can take some time to give our kids our undivided attention, even just a little bit of time, it goes a long way with connecting authentically with them.  She had her kids through IVF, so there’s a huge investment they’ve already put into their kids.  This made her seriously wonder why she was so miserable after becoming a mom.  She felt like she was being ungrateful.  She didn’t know there would be so much anxiety associated with parenthood, especially with twins.  For a long time, she could talk to her good friends and her family about how much she wasn’t enjoying being a mom.  She was a really great aunt, so it made sense that she would be a great mom, but it just wasn’t the same.The shift started by not caring what other moms thought.  In her business, she has to not care what the “haters” thought, but as a mom, it was hard for her to not care what other moms thought.  She has a very difficult son where she has had to just say, “we’re done!” and that's difficult for her because she’s the type of person that wants everybody to like her.  However, she had to parent her son very differently from other people, so it was really difficult.It took a lot of time and trial and error; of seeing the looks from other moms to learn how to not care.  No kid comes with a manual.  They’re all different.  Nothing works for one that works exactly the same way for another.  She believes that there should be a high level of compassion for children, but also for parents of children.  Nobody wants their child to be the ‘biter’ or the ‘hitter,’ nor do they want their children to be the one who gets bit or hit.  There has to be compassion for the child and the parents in any situation because there needs to be an understanding that the child is just learning and the parent is doing their best and that there’s no right or wrong way to raise a child because each one is different.The lessons you can learn in business can be applied to personal life and vice versa.  Everybody is always looking for the “secret sauce” for their business, but it always comes back to you being your own secret sauce.  Customers come back to you because you are the “secret sauce.”  As a mom, she needs to be the “secret sauce” for her children, too.  She doesn’t want her children to look back at their childhood and think, “mom yelled a lot.”  You can find Julie Nicholson Burke on:Facebook - search for:  Julie Nicholson BurkeJ. Burke for J. Elizabeth

This week, Samantha talks with founder of DC Fempreneur (DC Fem), Lisa Shapiro about what DC Fem means to her and how it has helped her not just professionally, but personally as well.  Lisa set out on her entrepreneurial journey when she gave up her regular corporate job to pursue something that she felt a need for.  She created a space where entrepreneurial women could form a community to help each other grow and to support one another.Lisa understands that what she is doing now is in direct response to her past.  She received two degrees in psychology and has put them to good use in understanding her story and in her conversations about women's empowerment.  These conversations tend to bring up conversations about her own experiences.  Understanding our past experiences and peeling back the layers help us to fully understand our current circumstances, no matter what they are.When Lisa created DC Fem over two years ago, she didn’t want to do it.  She had to be forced.  But, she knew that deep down, she was meant to do something different from what she was doing at the time.  She came to realize that entrepreneurs struggle on a daily basis to understand who they are and what they’re doing.  Still, on the outside, they come across as very sharp and put-together, which made her confidence take a hit.  This is why the "comparison trap" has come to be a daily conversation for Lisa.  She understands that other people have different voices and opinions, and that's ok.Even still, Lisa has her own “internal tapes” that play that reflect less than confident thought.  One of the only ways to break out of that cycle is to surround yourself with powerful women who have all experienced the same things and can lift you up when you need it.  The entrepreneurial world is full of women who support women.  It’s important to manage what we’re filling our heads with.  Including being mindful of who we follow on social media.  We also need a person who gives you “tough love” and somebody who you can find inspirational.  Lisa follows The Rock on Instagram because of his message and his energy of overcoming his own self-doubt.We truly are better together.  Building relationships is so important, because it allows us all to play to our strengths.  Creating this community has brought Lisa healing in her own life.  It was her safety net and her saving grace.  She’s ready to quit her business on a daily basis.  This is very common for entrepreneurs.  She had doubt when COVID hit and still has doubts, but overall, she created DC Fem for herself.  Lisa Shapiro and DC Fempreneur can be found online at:website: dcfempreneur.comemail: lisa@dcfempreneur.comOn Instagram and Facebook: @dcfempreneur

This week, Samantha talks with social media guru Karlyn Ankrom about being a dance instructor, the nuances of impostor syndrome, and the benefits and pitfalls of today's social media scene.  Karlyn's passion comes from her ability to help people tell their story in a micro-moment.  Today, this is done through social media.  When she pairs her passion with her love for writing, she is able to help anybody increase their presence on social media for any application, whether for a business or for personal uses.Impostor syndrome wasn't something that Karlyn was familiar with until she became a little bit older and more mature.  When she was a young dancer, she was brought up in an environment where everybody was treated equally, but she realized that she had limitations in what she could do.  Rather than force herself to do the things she wasn't physically able to do, she decided she would lean more into where her talents showed up.  This carried over into her business career in social media, which has a very subjective nature.  She hasn't struggled much with impostor syndrome overall because she has tended to lean into her strengths, even as an adult.When it comes to social media, she believes there need to be limitations based on each individual person.  For those of us that feel like social media can be a maze of ugliness and negativity, she says, "mute the people that make you feel like crap."  She once beat herself up about not being "as good as" another person for a bit.  Eventually, Karlyn came to the realization that there wasn't a problem with what she was doing on social media herself, but that different things work differently for different people.  It was through this experience that she was able to realize that comparing herself with another person was the problem.  Eventually, Karlyn became this person's cheerleader rather than being bitter about what she had considered a better approach.  It was simply different.  This, again, led her to examine her own limitations and lean into the strengths and talents she had herself.  Karlyn provides a couple of tips for youth on social media:  you can’t ignore social media because it’s woven into every aspect of life in the world today.  Everything has a hashtag now.  If we as adults have problems with the things we see on social media, imagine how hard it is for our kids. It’s important to know, as a parent of a young person who wants to get into social media, that they need to be able to handle what’s on the other side of the screen.  TikTok is like the ‘wild west” of the social media scene right now.  It, and any other social media platform, can be a bit overwhelming for some young people. Overall, Karlyn's message is that she would like to help everybody be their own authentic selves online.  This includes understanding our own limitations and knowing ourselves and our workflows.  For business owners, she says that people should step out from behind their logos, show the faces behind the business and show up consistently.  Your audience needs and wants to know who you are.Karlyn Ankrom and her business can be found at:ohsnapsocial.comand on social media: @ohsnapsocialkarlyn

This week, Samantha talks with Gresham Harkless, digital marketing consultant and host of the "I Am CEO" podcast.  Samantha was a previous guest on Gresh's podcast and he has spoken to over 900 CEO's and entrepreneurs to bring the knowledge and wisdom that each have to offer to his listeners.  Gresham got his entrepreneurial start at age 10 when he started a family newspaper. When he was a child, his father was deployed for a year overseas.  He and his mom would make care packages to send to him, and he included the family newspaper as a way to keep him up to date on all of the things happening with the family while he was gone.  Of course, in order to fund the newspaper, he sold subscriptions to family members!  You have to be able to fund the things that you love doing.He also believes you need to have grit as an entrepreneur.  He and Samantha talk about impostor syndrome and many of the other pitfalls that encounter people who are starting their business.  Gresh wants people to remember the human aspect of business, and that's one of the drivers behind his podcast.  There are human beings behind each and every business out there and they all experience the same ups and downs as everybody else.  We tend to forget that.  This is why he talks to CEO's of companies of all shapes and sizes.Samantha has one of her "Say That Again" moments when Gresham talks about aligning yourself with your business.  He said, "If you run your own race, you will never lose."  He believes that one of the pitfalls of entrepreneurship comes in the form of staying in alignment with your values and passions.  If you lose sight of these things and pay more attention to the things that everybody else says that you "should" do, entrepreneurs tend to lose their way and lose their passion.So, what is "in alignment" for Gresham?  The story of being a kid and starting a newspaper is where he likes to go back to.  Talking and interviewing people are what he enjoys, and so going back to the stories from his past and remembering why he loved doing the things he did as a kid keeps him aligned with his passion and keeps pushing him forward.Gresham also has a “Say That Again” moment when Samantha talked about “mining my past to find clues for my future.”  We need to be able to get past our own internal judges that work to sabotage our passions.  We need to be able to tap into our own inner children to remember where our passions lie and get us back into alignment.Gresh has two pieces of advice for entrepreneurs.  First, you need to "appreciate the progress and the process of starting a business.  It doesn't have to be perfect on day one."  Second, he likes to use the quote, "Don't tell me the sky is the limit when there are footprints on the moon."  Gresh wants people to remember that there are things that once seemed impossible, but that happen all the time now.  We need to be able to tap into our childlike views of the world so that we can stretch our own imaginations and limits.Listen in as Samantha and Gresham "Flush It Out!"Gresham Harkless and all things "Gresh," including his podcast and businesses, can be found at:iamgresh.comGresham “Gresh” W. Harkless Jr. is the founder of CBNation and Blue 16 Media. CBNation is a Business to Business (B2B) Brand focusing on increasing the business success rate by providing visibility and resources for CEOs, entrepreneurs and business owners.  CBNation consists of blogs (CEOBlogNation.com), podcasts (CEOPodcasts.com) and videos (CBNation.tv). Blue 16 Media is a digital marketing agency providing digital marketing services including web design & SEO to small to medium-sized businesses and organizations. He also is a graduate of the 2020 Leadership Center for Excellence Young Professionals Program ’16 and recognized by the Alexandria Virginia Chamber of Commerce’s 40 Under 40. CBNation.co (CEO Blog Nation) powered by Blue 16 Media (Web Design, SEO, Digital Marketing & More)

This week, Samantha talks with blogger Danielle Ellis her journey of growth and healing.  Danielle is a mother of two daughters who delves into her own childhood in this episode.  She explains what it was like for her growing up with a mother who wasn't present, and father who wasn't around, and an abusive stepfather.  She ran away at 18 years old and joined the military to find some stability in her life.  How did she come to realize that she needed therapy and healing in her life?  It took a tumultuous second half of a 19 year marriage and finally coming to terms with the unhealthy boundaries that were in place and with her own ultra-independence.  The struggle within herself as this process played itself out was hard.  She needed to get in touch with her inner child; the little girl who never felt like she was enough.  This caused her to feel like she was solely responsible for keeping the family together.  The breaking point came when her daughter was in a mental health assessment at school and answered "yes" to being anxious, but said that she only felt anxiety at home.  This led to changes in boundaries and realizing that it wasn't appropriate for her to keep looking at other people's situations and thinking, "it's not that bad."Danielle believes that God doesn't intend for anybody to be abused in life.  But, even though she was abused, she understands that she has a redemption story in Christ.  People also need to understand that "spiritual abuse" is a real thing and that people can manipulate or misunderstand God's word.  There are times when Pastoral Counseling just isn't enough and that seeking professional therapy is, by far, the best possible course.  She says that wholeness is often missing from the conversation in religious circles.So, why is Danielle so open and vulnerable in the telling of her story?  Her story, and other people's stories, when told appropriately, help other people feel connected.  They can understand that they're not the only ones that have gone through hardships, even if our stories aren't all the same.  She has found a way, as we all should, to share her story as honestly as possible in a non-judgmental way.  It is in dealing with the "in-between stuff" where she has found that she began to trust herself and "follow the breadcrumbs."  There's lots of wisdom in Danielle's words and her redemption story is one of growth and healing, so listen in as Samantha and Danielle "Flush It Out!"Read more of Danielle's work at refreshingwords.medium.com

This week, Samantha talks with Michelle Coe.  Michelle is the owner of Blue Sky Phoenix, a marketing strategy company.  Michelle begins by walking us through her 10 year journey as an entrepreneur.  She moved from Western New York to Virginia and thought that if she’s going to move this far away from her family, she was going to make it worth it.  The move forced her to start learning about herself and how to do things on her own terms.When she started out in entrepreneurship, she quit being a business owner twice a week because it was really hard and got tired of dealing with the crap.  Eventually, it turned into once a week, then once a month, then a couple of times a year.  Now, she describes owning her own business as simply a feeling of “I’m really doing this.”  The imposter syndrome is still there, but she gets to share her journey with her clients and guide them through similar journeys.Michelle talks about finding your why with beginning entrepreneurs at the “Be The Change” foundation.  The entrepreneurial journey is not straight.  She talks about the freedom that she has being an entrepreneur and the flexibility found in setting your own limits and goals.  She talks about a book that she read a while back she was reminded of.  It was "Just Enough Light for the Step I'm On" by Stormie Omartian.  Michelle was reminded of this book when talking about the overwhelming thoughts of finding your “why” especially when you’re just getting started.  The idea is that if you could see the end and everything that you’ll have to go through to get there, you’ll be so overwhelmed that you’ll want to quit before you get started.  She talks about childbirth as an example of this.She continues by explaining what it means to go with the flow or get dragged through the hedge backwards.  When you go through something hard in life, do you go with the flow, or do you dig your heels in?  The questions she asks herself are, "is this going to matter in 6 months or a year?  Am I even going to remember this in a few years?"  Probably not.  It’s important to acknowledge both the dark and the light times in life.  We get the opportunity to look at the bad days and think about what we can learn from those.  We can look back at our experiences and get resilience.  Should business and personal life be completely separate?  Not according to Michelle.  She says that it depends on the motivation for being an entrepreneur, but for her personally, who she is is who you get.  That’s how she wants to do business and so for her, separating who she is as a person from who she is as a businesswoman is impossible.  Some people, she finds, are a mile wide, but only 3 inches deep, but she’s interested in going a mile deep with people if she’s passionate about it.Michelle understands that everybody is an individual and each person will have their own experiences and realities.  One person’s most important business advice won’t necessarily translate to another person, and in her case, “being in business to make money” wasn’t her main goal.  She ignored advice and still is in business and still pays her bills, so she has been successful without having money as her main motivation.  Her main motivation is “love,” and her motto in life and in business is “choose love.”  We all have a choice of whether or not to love each other.  We can’t control other people’s reactions, but we do have control over our own reactions.  We can choose to love.She ends by explaining that she never wants to stop growing as a person.  Whatever life throws her way, she just wants to try her best to go with the flow and not get dragged through the hedge.Michelle Coe can be found at:blueskyphoenix.comHead to the contact page and shoot her an email.

This week, Samantha talks with owner of Your-White-Knight restaurant consulting, Sarah White. Sarah is also described as a political "first responder," in that she sees politics as a place where so many people are running away from it and she is running into it to do what she can to make her voice, and the voice of the people she wants to represent, heard. She would like to bring her experience in the restaurant industry to the intersection of business and politics. So, in this episode, Sarah and Samantha explore the question of how to communicate with people when you know that not everybody shares the same opinion as you. Listen in as Sarah and Samantha "Flush It Out!"

This week, Samantha talks with life coach and owner of Selfish Mama, Tina Unrue. Tina writes in "Her Growth Collective" along with Samantha and a community of other women on Instagram each Thursday. Tina quotes Brenee Brown when explaining that "Her Growth Collective is a community that brings women together with the intention of growth." This episode begins by exploring Tina's journey from having a corporate job that was sucking the life out of her to becoming a life coach and working toward awareness. Tina and Samantha talk about Tina's "words of the year," potty training, forgiveness, personal growth, triggers, weight loss, finding your whole self, and kintsugi as they "Flush It Out," so listen in!

This week, Samantha talks with yoga instructor and life coach, Monica Fernandi about the "ABCs of Amazing Health." The ABCs are A; Attitude of Gratitude, B; Breathe, and C; Courage. Monica talks about her journey from Jersey Girl to Virginia native and provides insight to COVID and relationships. She gets into all sorts of her own slogans and beliefs, all of which can provide us with insight that can allow us to tap into our own strengths so that we can "Grow Strength Within." So, sit back and enjoy as Samantha and Monica "Flush It Out!"

This week, Samantha talks with Kari Ginsburg. Kari is the owner of Uproar Coaching, is a professional actor, and is the proud mother of rescue dogs. She walks us through her experiences with acting to explain how some of the lessons from the stage can apply to everybody's day-to-day life. Some of the topics covered by Kari in this episode include "the Funknown," her motto of "go big or go eff yourself," shared breathing, and tough love. Listen in as Kari and Samantha "Flush It Out!"

This week, Samantha sits down with Ed Johnson, executive leadership and mental fitness coach, to discuss Positive Intelligence (PQ). Joining Ed and Samantha this week is Bridget, one of Ed’s coaching clients. Bridget provides her perspective on what coaching means to her and what coaching has done for her. Bridget details her journey of self discovery not only through coaching, but through the specific lens of Positive Intelligence. So, enjoy this episode as Samantha, Ed, and Bridget Flush It Out!

This week, Samantha talks with blogger and podcast host, Amanda Huffman (links to the blog and podcast can be found in the show notes). Amanda opens up and shares her story of coping with PTSD following her deployment to Afghanistan. She shares some stories about how it has affected her life and how she has learned to work through it and heal. She reminds us that there is a power in sharing our stories and that, while it may be a frightening thing, we all need to be aware and accepting of others who try to share without brushing them off. This is a great conversation that exposes some of the truths around mental health and how we should be living in community with each other so that we can all have a chance at healing. So, listen in as Samantha and Amanda "Flush It Out!"

This week, Samantha sits down to talk with empowerment coach and general badass, Dawn Geschiere about living authentically. Dawn talks about her experiences in raising her own 5 children and the things that she learned that can help all of us currently in the craziness of raising kids. Dawn explains that we are all, including our children, naturally creative, resourceful, and whole, and that we, as parents, need to have a healthy detachment from our kids to allow them to grow into the individuals they are. Finally, Dawn talks about our own self-care and how we can't provide for our own families as we should if we aren't taking care of ourselves. So, listen in as Samantha and Dawn "Flush It Out!"

This week, Samantha talks with Karen McKevitt, owner and creator of "The Gift of Perspective Coaching." In this conversation, Samantha and Karen explore perspective. Karen explains how the transitioned from a corporate job to coaching and shares her insight on what perspective is, and how each of us can not only find it, but use it for our good. So, listen in as Samantha and Karen "Flush It Out!"

This week, Samantha talks with Mary Sue Dahill (“MSD”), the creator of Work Smarter Digital. Samantha and Mary Sue flush out Mary Sue’s transition from the corporate world to entrepreneurship and how the transition started with realizing that she needed to change some things about herself. She also talks about the importance of investing in yourself as an entrepreneur. At the end, MSD provides some extremely valuable nuggets of wisdom for women (and men) in the workplace. So listen in as she and Samantha Flush It Out!

This week, Samantha talks with Clara Wasserstein about perfectionism and her journey from being brought up in the culture of Hasidic Judaism to where she is today. With such a protected and conservative upbringing, she explains some of the struggles that came when she decided to leave the Hasidic Jewish community. She talks about how we all need to truly embrace ourselves and who we are, the need for support in our lives, how we should all strive to live in the space between black and white. Clara explains that we will all mess up in life, but what matters is what we do after we mess up. This conversation is a look at what we all can learn from someone who has left her entire life behind, everything she has ever known, to start over because she knew that things weren't what they appeared to be and she wanted a better life for her children. Take a listen as Samantha and Clara Flush It Out.

This week, Samantha talks with Marianne Clyde, retired therapist and founder of Be The Change. The conversation centers around what it means to find meaning in every day circumstances and in life overall. They talk about COVID and the challenges that come with that and Marianne shares a very insightful metaphor about a small puddle that forms off of a flowing stream. Finally, Marianne shares why it's important for people with a message to rise up and share. The amount of wisdom Marianne has to offer is astounding, so listen in as she and Samantha "Flush It Out!"

This week, Samantha talks with two-time New York Time's bestselling author, Susan McCorkindale. Samantha and Susan start talking about how COVID has affected them and countless others who are dealing with the mental stress associated with a pandemic. Susan shares her words of knowledge the best way she knows how; by celebrating her own flaws. The conversation ends with a discussion about grieving the loss of your plans in 2020 and how to "bounce forward" rather than "bounce back." Listen in as Samantha and Susan Flush It Out!