Ep.41 Self Love

Looking to get out there and feel the in your hair. Chevy EVs have you covered like the Blazer EV with bold style that's sure to you away and with Silverado EV towing is a breeze with the capability to hitch up and tow with ease and Equinox EV helps you keep moving along like with confidence Chevrolet together, let's drive.

When you hear the word love, what comes up for you? I think love is definitely something good for you.

Hey friends, thank you for listening to.

The All Things Good for you podcast. Join us as we explore ancient traditions, modern tools and practices in the world of health, wellness and personal development. I'm Amy Christiansen, your host and your curated mind coach.

And I'm your co host, Brian Bowen, founder of Integrative Health Inc. And Better Human Company High Performance Coaching. Are you ready to take control of your life and start feeling enthusiastic, empowered and limitless each and every day for a life well lived, let your curiosity.

Flow with all things good for you. Hey gang, it's Amy. Today, Brian and I are going to be starting in between our longer podcasts. Just either Brian and I usually individually, sometimes maybe we'll pop on and do a short one together, but we are going to have just single short podcasts where myself or Brian will pop on and just talk about something that's interesting or intriguing or has come up for us, of course, falling underneath the all things good for you podcast goals. And this is going to be the first one. So welcome to our first little short podcast. So it is the end of the week of Valentine's Day. So February 17th and Valentine's Day, of course, was on the 14th. I don't normally make a big deal out of Valentine's Day, but it does get me always thinking every year about what what that is about and how we celebrate things and how we use things to remind ourselves. For me, what popped up with my clients and with some personal introspective habits that I take every year, is that it's not so much about love. I want to ask, I guess. First off, when you hear the word love, what comes up for you? Love? Is it a romantic vision? Is it like a scary heavy breath where you feel like it's something that you have to work for or you have to perform for? Is it just sex? Is it something that feels scary? Is it a burden? Is it something that you get from someone? Or is it something that you're always providing for somebody else? It's Is it something that seems out of reach, something that you're in lack of or you're afraid of losing, so you're doing things and clinging to things. Doing something to make sure you don't lose love. Does love feel like another checklist requirement? Does love feel extravagant? Or is it something subtle? Do you think love is supposed to be effortless and easy? Maybe you think love in general is silly. Maybe it's something that when the word love comes up, you're just scoff and walk away. You don't even address it. Like, I'm not even gonna go there. Yeah, I think. I think when we feel a word, it reveals to us what our education has been, whatever our experiences have been. And I think when we think about the word love, it gives us a little insight to what we think of the phrase self love. So for me, I think we can't attain love without first addressing self love. How does the word love make you feel? And then when you put the word self love into that, how does the same reflections and feelings and thoughts about love show up for how you might feel about yourself? Do you feel like you're a burden? Do you feel like it's something you can never be enough for? You feel like you have to constantly working to get love for yourself? Is it extravagant? The only time you feel self love is when you have to do something extravagant. Is it a topic you don't even talk about? Is that unacceptable? Does self love actually immediately equate to selfishness, sacrifice? Maybe. Maybe it's the only way you're operating. Maybe you don't know how to think about anything other than self love. All of these things I think are reflective of how we develop relationships, how we treat ourself, how we treat others, how we expect others to treat us, how we allow people to treat us. I think it shows up in the jobs we take, the adventures, the amount of money we can make. I think when we look at self love, then love, it really defines what we're seeing in our life and how everything is showing up. So I think self love shows us our results. And I think when you go back to where did we develop this space, I think we have to look at even just the Body Keeps the Score. These are a couple books. The Body Keeps the Score is a great book and the Soul of Shame is another great book they go back and talk about. These authors are showing research that shows we start to develop the ability to know if we're loved, quote, unquote, accepted or cared for or safe in our infancy. As far as watching a parent's eyes dilate or connection with eyes and hands and affection, which may or may happen to anything to have done with us at the time of infancy. But we pick up on these behavior cues and we start learning to behave and respond and look for ways to be loved, be safe, be accepted in very early childhood. And we learn ways to work around that. Some people, whether that was a. It was a direct education or a direct message or it was an indirect message. So sometimes, unfortunately, we did. Some people receive messages directly from our parents that tell us that we're not good enough or we're not safe or money is bad or wanting something is selfish. But there's often more times it's indirect. And children are incredibly impressive at the deductions and the assimilation of information that we take and we make mean something. We interpret it as parents angry when they come home every day. That must mean they're not happy to see us. We're adding to their stress or their pain. Maybe it's even innocent as a parent getting comfort from spending time with their kids and feeling that their kids are loved and good, then the kid could learn. A child can learn that as long as I'm happy and I'm doing well, my mom or dad will feel good. And so that child learns to become a people pleaser. Or they learn that mom and dad already have enough stress that me expressing what I want or what I need or my frustrations or me being angry about something is just making it worse. I learned to shove those feelings down and not express what I need. Maybe you grew up in a space where money was a challenge and a stressor and so you learned either money was bad or the want for things was bad, that the norm was to live in lack and sacrifice or something was never going to be managed and obtained, or when you got it, you blew it because you'd never have it again. And point being, we get all these messages when we're growing up and that becomes a development of habit and choices and thinking processes. And I just think we have to look back when we do self love to go, what are the messages that we rightfully or directly, indirectly received, that we adapt it as truth? And how does that show up in our choices today? How does that show up in how we talk to ourselves or talk to others? How does that show up in what we allow ourselves to think we deserve or that we feel that we can have or that we feel worthy of achieving? My encouragement to myself and my clients this last week was to really go and uncover and sit with one the words that came up, the feelings that came up around just the word love. Then reflect back on your childhood and get into some curiosities and some wondering about. Maybe you overheard a parent criticizing somebody about money. Maybe you heard your aunt and uncle when you were staying at their house for the summer, ask if you're still there. And it felt like I'm so unwanted but they just wanted to have a romantic evening without a little kid popping in. You know, had nothing to do with you but you overheard something that you interpreted and meant. Gosh, I'm not wanted. Where did those little things creep into our childhood that show up today as wounds or insecurities or non acceptance of ourself? And then how do we put that on other things? Existential relationships, jobs, material things to heal that space for us? I think when you look at where we're finding those things, you start to look at the places where we need to build true self love. And if anything you've got to find that balance. Yes, love is service and showing up for other people and being there for other people. But if it's all the time and you don't have healthy boundaries, it's going to become a detriment. Right. You're going to become overwhelmed and overextended and you're going to feel resentment and you're going to feel like you aren't loved and cared for to yourself. Yeah, you could go too far and become a narcissist. You can have narcissistic tendencies where you're so self absorbed with what you need and what you want that you're not paying attention to what other people need. Self love is a careful balance like any other type of love. Yes, it's discipline, but it's also patience and acceptance and compassion. It's pushing yourself and having growth but also letting yourself rest and let go of things. Knowing that you are more than your body, your bank account, your job title, you're more than the size of your home, the performance of your children. Yeah, your who are you? When things aren't going the way you've thought they are designed to go, can you step away from some of those things and still love yourself? Why or why not? So finding that balance in there guys, is an important process but we've got to be able to get to a good place of recognizing it isn't. It's not a one time achievement. Like we don't just find self love and then it's done. We don't just get a loving relationship and it's done. The marriage isn't the end it's the beginning. Getting the job isn't the job. Getting the job is the beginning of the job. You would never think, oh, I've got my job, I can just go and hang out now and it's just gonna do its thing. But we often treat ourself and our love relationships like that. When we can love ourself and we're in a good healthy place and we're more complete or completing because we're never truly complete, I think we can show up better for our relationships and then we're not putting that expectation on someone else. Sure. In love relationships, in the romantic partnerships there is a balance of helping each other out. I think good healthy relationships reveal to ourselves where we need to be more self sufficient in some areas and work on healing our own processes so we can show up more authentically and full for another person and just to be able to enjoy life. So I think wrapping it up as a short looking at ways you can develop a healthy self love and then being able to share that with another person or with other friends and it doesn't have to be with, with a romantic partner, hopefully it is. But certainly self love when we are single and alone is important. I think when we do have that space, we can call in other people with true self love. And that's where good authentic productive relationships come into play. But yeah, remembering that it's not a one time achievement, it's not a complete thing, it's a process back and forth. It's something we have to work with regularly. Having those shifting balances of shifting boundaries and watching for anything where it goes into a point of being neglectful or destructive, where we're slipping out of actual love process. And then because it had to be addressed earlier this week, that it's not uncommon for love to be immediately associated with the physical act of sexuality and sharing sex with another person. But let's maybe, for those of us and out there who maybe need to remember that sex is a physical act, it's not love. It is the result of having all the things we've talked about today. When we have self love, when we have patience, when we are inter dependent and confident and we have built these loving, kind relationships of showing up and hearing and building that trust and respect and honor with another human being, then the act and the physical act that takes it to a deeper bonding moment presents itself. For those of us or those of you out there who need to be reminded about that. No judgment at all. Just a side note that came up in one of my conversations earlier this week. That that's a separate thing and it's not the Avenue 2. It's the result of having true self love and love with another. Okay, Happy Valentine's Week my friends. Happy February. I hope this helps you maybe do some reflection. Hope it helps you find some spaces where you can do some growth and spurs on some good conversations. And I think love is definitely something good for you. So I hope you guys have a wonderful week and we will see you on the next podcast.

Hey friends, thank you for tuning in to the All Things Good for your Podcast. Please note any information, experiences, ideas or opinions discussed today are for educational and thought provoking purposes only and not intended as medical advice. If anything piqued your curiosity, please consult with your doctor or personal medical professional. And if you're enjoying All Things Good for your podcast, hop on over and leave us comment a 5 star review so we can continue delving in and providing great content. Thanks again and we hope you are inspired to stay informed and responsible along your health and wellness journey.

Looking to get out there and feel the in your hair Chevy evs have you covered like the Blazer EV with bold style that's sure to you away and with Silverado EV towing is a breeze with the capability to hitch up and tow with ease and Equinox EV helps you keep moving along like with confidence Chevrolet together. Let's drive.

Time is precious and so are our pets. So time with our pets is extra precious. That's why we started Dutch. Dutch provides 247 access to light licensed vets with unlimited virtual visits and follow ups for up to five pets. You can message a vet at any time and schedule a video visit the same day. Our vets can even prescribe medication for many ailments and shipping is always free. With Dutch. You'll get more time with your pets and year round peace of mind when it comes to their vet care.