86: The Secret Power Women Are Suppressing—And How to Get It Back with Sheila Kelley

Foreign.

Hello and welcome. I'm Dr. Jen Simmons, a breast cancer surgeon turned integrative oncologist on a groundbreaking mission to transform the conversation around breast health. If you're seeking to redefine the way that you think about breast health, you're in the right place. Breast health isn't just an aspect of well being. It is health, integral and indispensable. Here on the Keeping Abreast podcast, we delve deep into the innovative ways to diagnose, treat, screen for, and prevent breast cancer. But it's more than that. It's about having the crucial conversations that empower, enlighten, and drive us all to a healthier place. As someone who has navigated the front lines of breast cancer treatment and now champions an integrative approach, I bring a unique perspective to these discussions with blending rigorous science with holistic health principles. Health is a journey, not a destination, and I am truly honored to accompany you on this path. Each episode aims to provide you with actionable insights and cutting edge strategies to take charge of your breast health and your overall well being. So whether you're here to learn about the latest in medical advancements or seeking tips on lifestyle changes that foster real health, they the Keeping Abreast podcast is your go to resource. Let's embark on this journey together, because when we talk health, every conversation matters. And now, stay tuned for this week's episode.

Buckle up, my friends, and be prepared to be blown away, because I have Sheila Kelly with me today. Now, I met Sheila at a dinner party and I sat across the table from her all night long, starstruck, because you will immediately recognize her as the movie and rock star that she is. And I summoned my courage to go talk to her at the end of the night. And thank God I did. Because you know how there's just some people who you are so drawn to? I mean, everyone is drawn to her. So I don't think that I'm special or exclusive here, but sometimes you just connect with someone in a way that you can feel their energy pulsing through you. This is that lady. This is that woman. And what she has done with her life and her career and what she's up to now is just going to blow you away and change everything for you. So, Sheila, thank you so much for coming today.

Oh, my God. It's my. My pleasure and my honor to be here.

I'm. I'm so excited. I've been so excited for our discussion, for. For what we're gonna talk about today. So let's just jump in with. I Know, you probably went to high school for performing arts or something along those lines.

Sorry, you glitched out there for a second. Oh, no, no, no.

Did you go to high school for performing arts or something along those lines? No.

Went to high school in Pennsylvania. And where. Public high school in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, called Hempfield High.

I don't know where Greensburg is. Where is that?

Nobody does. Nobody knows where Greensburg is. It is this little town about an hour outside of Pittsburgh.

Oh, okay. Western Pennsylvania.

Yes. All right.

I'm in Philly, y'.

All. I was in Philly when I was very little. I was your neighbor probably when I was in third grade. Wow.

Wow.

Okay.

So you, you started off your career as an actress.

Yeah, right. I'm still that.

And you were in a lot of movies. I mean, I can't even begin to name. And your career has taken quite a turn.

Quite a turn. That's a, that. That's putting it lightly. I, I think I, I, I tapped into source, and a calling was kind of put in front of me, and there was no choice. There was no choice. I, I had to follow the river of the light, so to speak, or the river of energy that was like, this is. This is where you need to go. This is where you need to put your attention. This is. This journey of S. Has changed your life so profoundly, and you know that it can help other women. So. Women.

Well, I, I really want to get into how you heard that calling, especially because, you know, my community are people who are worried about breast cancer. They've had breast cancer. They're. They're, you know, they have a mother or a daughter or a sister or a friend or, you know, someone who has been deeply affected. And your path really took you to a place of awakening and, and really bringing out that. That sensual self.

Yeah.

And, and how it defines you. And this is probably one of the things that women who go through breast cancer suffer from most is their sense of self, who they are, their feminine energy. I mean, it really gets dissipated by this whole process. And we talk about empowering these women, but we don't give them the tools to do it. So I would love to. I would love to hear about your awakening.

Well, there's so many, my love, there's so many awakenings. It's. I. Let's see. I. Living as a feminine, embodied creature in a masculine world is tough.

Yeah.

We have to toughen up. We have to man up. We have to. We have to leave our body behind. We have to shut our body down. To fit in, we have to create no access zones in our body. We do that and we put that on girls and women through shame. So we need to. That's where I was 25 years ago when I first founded this embodiment practice called S Factor. I was in a place where I thought it was fine. I thought I had full access to my body. I was an actor, I was a dancer. I could do the best choreography ever. But, but when I had the opportunity to do this film called Dancing at the Blue Iguana where I had to play a stripper, a professional stripper, I, I got up to rehearse for this film. I got up on stage to rehearse for this film and I didn't know my left foot from my right elbow. I didn't know my. I, I was shocked. I had been a dance major at New York University. I did not know how to find my overtly feminine, pleasure filled, curvaceous, sensual body. Gone where? I don't know. Down the halls of the no access zone in my body.

I, I just wonder. And you know, this might not apply to you, but we have this perception of Hollywood and the pay to play and how women get roles and how women are successful in this, in this field. And I mean, does that apply to you? Did you have to shut off part of yourself because it was a trade off to be successful in, in this world of acting?

I think I had shut all those parts down much earlier even. I had shut down all of the things that are what I call the feminine geniuses. Because in a masculine world, those geniuses of the feminine are seen as weak, they're seen as too provocative. They're seen as your fault, not mine, all of that stuff. So I got to Hollywood and, you know, it's a boys club. It is a boys club. It was, it is, it always will be, it seems. And you know, it's, it's. Sometimes it feels like screaming into the void because no one, no one's making a change. You, you and I are trying to make a change, but we need women to listen. Because here's what I have to say to women. No one's coming to save you.

They do.

No one's coming to help you. There's no hero out there. You're the hero.

Yes.

And until you realize that and take action to be the hero of your own life, you're just going to continue to, to kind of be, you know, in line. Be in line. You know, don't wear a skirt that short. Don't speak like that. Don't provoke like that. Don't touch your body like that. Don't feel pleasure like that. You know, we. We shut our bodies down. I know. You know this. And what happens when we shut our bodies down with full of shame and we. We hold our truest emotions inside and they fester. Yeah.

And often manifest as illness.

Right.

And as dysfunction. And. And then we get into these cycles of even more shame and more guilt because what did I do to cause this?

Yeah.

Right. And it's crazy where this can go.

It is insane where we're all. It's insane. It's so frustrating for me because I feel like I have found a way out of there. I have found a way out of the matrix of no access to my body, no access to my femininity. And it was through doing this movie 25 years ago, I had to learn how to do certain movements and that my body was so frozen and so shut down and so shamed that I couldn't even do, like, gyrations or hip circles or I had to break down fascial and muscular patterning to open my body to her fullest expression. And when I did that, I found this whole world of, like, pleasure and ecstasy and beauty and femininity and softness and wisdom and badassness and ferociousness from the feminine. And it changed everything. Changed my life, changed my. My marriage. It changed the way I mother.

Yeah. But it's amazing because good girls don't.

Right.

And we all want to be good girls. And so we. We have literally created containments so that our bodies don't do that and don't move like that and don't look like that.

And.

And we've created so much shame around that. So how did you. How did you overcome that? And was this the impetus for the S factor? Your book.

A Hundred Percent girl. A hundred percent. How did I overcome it is. I had to actually be the bad girl. I had to let myself dive into what it meant to be a bad girl. I'm going to do the little quotes because it's not. I'm not a bad girl. I'm a phenomenal, miraculous, magnificent feminine creature. But I would never have said that back then because I had to be in the box. I had to be in the good girl box. Girl. You know, good girls don't do that. They don't move like that. They don't go to clubs like that. And I had to embrace the. I had to embrace everything that I had shut down. I had to reopen it all up. I had to reopen my sexuality. I had to reopen all of my emotions that I had held in all my life. And once I started to release these things and I had the wonderful excuse of being able to do this movie, and this movie was like, oh, I'm doing it for the movie. Well, you know what? It changed my life. It gave me access to all the places that society told me to put up a big, you know, big X sign and don't go there. Don't feel your breasts in public. Don't touch your neck and feel the beautiful curves and soft skin. Don't feel that emotion. Don't express that emotion. Don't wear clothes like that. The don'ts you have to overcome. The don'ts you have to push back. And until you do, until you. I truly passionately have believe this, and I've seen it for 25 years. If you're going to stay a mouse in the shadow, you're going to stay a mouse in the shadow of the masculine. But if you say, wait a minute, I'm greater than this, I'm more beautiful than this, I'm more powerful than this, and I deserve more than this, then you're going to venture out and explore all the parts of yourself that you've shut down and that is a rebirth. I, I said, we were just talking about Emily and I say, I told her it's like a jailbreak. It's literally like taking handcuffs off of your entire body and just breaking free of this idea that you are responsible for the way the masculine world sees you.

But that takes a lot of confidence and it takes a lot of courage.

It does.

So, so how do you get there? I mean, how do you go from being someone who is coloring within the lines, is doing what is deemed appropriate. How do you go from that to embracing your feminine energy?

Beautiful question. Really insightful question. Thank you for that. And it is, it is not easy. It is a heroic journey toward reclaiming the grail of your body. So it's definitely a heroic, big, beautiful journey. But I've created a step by, step by step process where an S teacher or I would hold your hand through the process of reawakening. And you start with simply in your breath. I'll be in a room, I guess like say a yoga type room. And I'll have, I'll be in the middle and women will be around me and we're sitting on our mats in a cross legged sit and you just start to use a tool called conscious awareness of intentional embodiment. And and people call that mindfulness, but I take it a little bit further than mindfulness into body fullness. So you go right into your breath. How are you breathing? Where are you breathing? Where are you not breathing? Here's how your breath is meant to come into your body. If you've ever seen a little infant, that whole little belly, just everything opens up and it takes the air in and comes out. So where is your breathing? Stuck. Number one. And then from the breath, we just begin slow, swaying movements to follow the curves of your breasts or your chest to the curves of your back, to the curves of your tush to the curves you want to discover and uncover and unlock the curvature, the natural, beautiful, feminine curvature of your body. So you start with breath into sway. And then from this way, you come into circles all over your arm, circle your chest, circles, your head, circles. And then as your body's moving and releasing and opening, you're going to start to seek pleasure in that movement. So as I'm swirling and swerving my body, I'm seeking pleasure in all of the different muscles that I'm stretching and strengthening. It's a complete different mind shift. It's, it's movement not to get strong and healthy. It's a movement to feel pleasure and ownership and to take up so much space.

Which is amazing because we are all taught to be small.

Yes, Right.

We're taught to be small in every sense of the word. We should be thin. We should be quiet. We should, we should not be taking up space.

That's right.

This is so ingrained in us.

That's exactly right.

I, I, I know that women who are on a breast cancer journey have, have a tremendous amount of guilt about this because part of it is like, who was I to take up so much space? This is the world telling me to, to retract, girl. In fact, I think it's probably quite the opposite.

It is. I totally agree with you. I was living so small, and when I did this film, you know, I produced this movie, so some part of me knew that I was going to save myself. Some part of me when I, well.

There are no accidents. You know that, right?

There are. No, I totally agree with you, but I, you're right. And so when I did that film, it was an, it was literally a jailbreak, rebirth, whatever you want to call it, it was. I did not realize how expansive and beautiful and vibrant, powerful this world was until I found the vibrancy, expansiveness, and beauty within myself. No man could get me there. No lover could get me there. No adulation on this. On the big celluloid screen or the little TV screen. Nothing I'd ever experienced before could bring me to this place of magnificence but myself through my body.

Yeah. And I would imagine that place is filled with tremendous joy and, and fullness. Right. Which is so often what our bodies are clamoring for. What our, you know, so, so much dysfunction is rooted in, in you're not having your needs met, you're not being fulfilled.

You are, you're absolutely dead on. And I was just going to say where do you, where do you, where do women look for fulfillment? They can't feel it themselves. So where do they look?

They go external out there. Yeah.

There ain't nothing out there that says fun and brilliant and beautiful as the roller coaster of your own body. You know, the, the, the, the, the amusement park of your own body. We're always looking for something out there to fill us. And really you are the epicenter. You're the epicenter of your life. But you're not only just the epicenter of your life, you as the feminine are the epicenter of the lives of every creature around you. Every creature around you wants your light energy. They want to be filled up, right? I mean, cats, dogs, moms, dads, kids, friends, plants in your house. They all seek you, lean toward you for your light energy, your life energy. And women are, are because women are taught to be so small. It's not women's fault. It's the world that we've constructed.

Of course.

And I'll tell you one other thing you feel when you do that beautiful jailbreak is you feel relief. You go like you could just go, oh, my God, I knew it. I knew life was more than what I was living.

Talk to me about the difference between sensuality and sexuality. Because we so often, you know, we, we are judged and we judge.

Yes, right.

And we, we, we actually look down on women who use their sexuality and we put them in silos. They're dumb or they're promiscuous or, you know, we do that. It's absolutely true. So what is this separation? And does there even need to be a separation?

Number one, that very astute of you, is who separates the masculine or the feminine in the qualities of life? Look, when I talk about masculine, feminine, I'm talking about two distinct, non binary, but holistic spectral energies, right? So you could, you could just as soon use the words purple and green. Your purple energy and your green energy. Masculine purple energy is very steadfast. It's Grounded, it's rooted, it's singular in focus. It is mission oriented, it is externally focused. It is measurable energy. Feminine energy is multifocused. It is, it is mother nature in action. It is abundant, it is emotional, it is soulful. It is so powerful. That's your green energy, right? We all have masculine, we all have feminine because we live in an overly yanged masculine world. And we're always trying to, you know, be measurable and look outside of ourselves. We compartmentalize everything. I go to the gym to work out my muscles. I go to the shrink to talk about my feelings. I go here to meant to work my mind. You know, that is not the way of the feminine. The way of the feminine is holistic. It is literally mother nature. It is balmy and warm and then it's stormy and wild and it's emotional, it's sensual and it's free and it's expressive. And so when we talk about sensuality, sexuality, we talk about certain elements of embodiment. So if I were to break it down and, and, and look at it through my masculine lens, I would say that sensuality is turning on every single sense you have to the nth degree so that you are living in full abundance of your sensual sense of smell, sense of taste, sense of touch. You know, in class S, you part of the journey is turning all of the nerve endings that have been turned off back on. You touch yourself in myriad ways. It's so powerful. If you were to look at sexuality through the male gaze, that would have to do with more genital connection and maybe more erotic turn on.

I would imagine that it, I mean, I can even speak to myself.

And.

There it is very, very hard to overcome. All those boundaries that have put, have been put up for so long. And when those boundaries come down for people that do the work with you, I would imagine this is a very emotional time for people. Like, I could see people really having a tremendous rush of emotion going along with this process. Do you, do you find that 100%.

A hundred percent. And it's usually releasing old, stacked, frozen, accumulated emotional energy from years and years, years and years. So if, if, look, the human body, especially the feminine human body, is built to use emotion as energy to live by. Every single emotion is a biological tool of evolution. We are here today because of all the beautiful emotional energy that we listened to and we used and we funneled through our body to survive and thrive. I could give you an example of rage. Rage is a beautiful, healthy emotion that has kept us safe when there's threat. We use our rage to fight. We use our rage to survive. Right? We use our sadness to create connection and empathy and family. Tribe. Yes. All of these 10 I, I have, there are 10. In the work I've been doing with embodiment, there are 10 very clear, distinctive emotional energies that should be moving through every mammal, animal, through. There's five light emotional energies and five darker emotional energies. And they are all part of evolution, right? So when we are cultivated and civilized and we want to act a certain way, well, if you're sitting at a table and your father says, don't you cry, don't you cry, don't you cry. Well, you're going to do everything possible to not cry. And you're a little girl, and you're a little girl and you, you, you, you breathe, you literally, your tears are coming and you go, you inhale, you suck the emotion back in, you pull the tears back in and you let it land somewhere, maybe here, maybe in your jaw, maybe in your shoulders or your neck, and you squeeze it there and you hold it there because all your life your dad doesn't want you to cry. So guess what? You could become shaped in denial. Denial of life. So when we come into this practice of s. Of reclaiming yourself, I'm gonna, I'm gonna ask you to move these muscles here. I'm gonna ask you to stretch them and reach them and touch them and soothe them. And inevitably, when you are soft enough and your parasympathetic nervous system is turned on completely, you're gonna start to release all of that emotional energy that was trapped in there, holding your life force at bay. So you might weep, but not know why you're weeping. You might start laughing hysterically as you're doing some of this really sensual, sexy movement and not know why. But I don't, I don't. You don't need to know why. You can, you can go to a psychologist and unpack the story, or you can just release your body and let's know that that's just a release.

So I think that that, that's so amazing that that is actually what's happening. And years and years of therapy and trying to unpack this can probably be sped up by physically releasing this. And I know, I mean, I'm as guilty of this as anyone. It's interesting that you talked about rage and that rage is a normal and healthy and important, meaningful and important emotion. But so many of us are walking around in a silent rage because we were told, don't let it out.

Don't you be angry.

Don't cry. Don't scream.

Good girls don't cry. Good girls don't get angry.

Right. You look like there's no crying in baseball. Isn't that what Tom Hanks said? There's no crying. No crying in baseball.

Yes. Yes.

And so, you know, for many, many years, I walked around in a silent rage because it wasn't. I, I, I didn't feel entitled to feel what I was feeling.

Yeah.

Or to express what I was feeling. And so completely locked up inside my body, which manifested as, you know, I went through a very, very long and hard journey with illness. Very long and hard journey.

Wow. I didn't know that.

And so much of it was this rage locked inside of me.

Yes. Hello. I'm so happy to hear you talk about this because it is one of the tenets of S Factor is one of the geniuses of the feminine is what I call emotability. Our bodies should be like a wind sock, moving every emotional energy that comes at us through us. And what the feminine can do is transmute that energy into life and love. Right. Fierce love. Use your rage to love fiercely. Use your sadness to love deeply. Use your fear to love mysteriously. And these are all the things we do in class. This is what you do. As you learn this process of re embodying, you become such an incredible. You've become so astute at playing the instrument of this body to the fullest capacity that she has. Which is what you're talking about. Yes. It can. Trapping emotion in the body can do so many things. Dis Ease. Yes. And it just robs you. It literally is like a thief robbing you of your life potential.

It's, it's true. We're just so conditioned not to feel right. Even it starts so young when we hush the baby. That's right. Like, don't cry. Even though babies aren't crying to aggravate you, they're crying because they have legitimate need that is not being met at that moment. And it starts so early for us and the conditioning and don't feel. And I know where it comes from. I know that it comes from this, like, safety of the tribe where.

You.

Know, we are modern beings living on a very old gene code and we are genetically programmed to stay within the tribe, not to step outside. Because if you stepped outside and you were alone, you weren't safe.

No.

And even if there was toxicity within the tribe, it was still safety. And we, even though, you know, things have significantly changed and we no longer need that tribe mentality. It is ingrained in us 100%.

I had the honor of going to Africa, Tanzania a year and a year and a half ago to hang out with the Hadza tribe. And the Hadza tribe are one of the last hunter gatherer tribes living today. They're the one, they click when their language is like popping, like click, pop, click. I can't do it as well as they do it, but it was. You're exactly right. And some of the older folk, they used to, to get the baby to stop crying because the baby crying would scare away the prey, which is how they live, right. They would take a knife and they would cut deep scars right here down this cheek so that when the tears came it would burn so much that they wouldn't cry. And so they've stopped. I think they've stopped this because I was hanging out with a lot of the children and only one or two of them had these scars. But you can see the older folk definitely had these deep gadging scars, gouging scars. It is true. So much of evolution and civilization, those two things have totally. They've taught, they've taught us to betray the innate brilliance of the primal body. And even though we're super evolved now, we're so disconnected from our primal body. And that is exactly what S teaches is getting back into your primal body. Your body has wisdom that you haven't even touched yet. I can say that full faced certainty that I, I've seen it, I felt it, I've taught it. When you open up the oracle that is your body, you will ascend into the life that you deserve. Because your body is so primally brilliant. Your body's terrestrial, you are not. You were put in this body to take this soul's journey. So you got to let this body know. Do what she knows how to do. She knows how to find pleasure, avoid pain and conserve energy. Which is called the motivational triad of every mammal.

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Back to our show.

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Now, so many women suffer from body shame and going through a breast cancer journey does not help because at the very least, these women have surgery that either mutilates their breast or removes their breast. And also, not only does it do that, but it also significantly changes the meaning of their breast, the revealing of the breast, the the sensations of their breast, the function of their breast. So for women who already suffer from body image issues and it's a lot. Yes, it's a lot. Most women are not happy with Their bodies, no matter what you see on the outside. I mean even. And I hate to say this, like I'm embarrassed to say this, but I don't like to look at myself naked. I'm, I'm like running away from my husband because I don't want him to see me because I don't want him to see what I see.

Right?

Because I'm so conditioned. Thank you, mom, for focusing on my imperfections.

Right?

Like fix it, make it perfect. Fixed it, make it perfect. Fix it, make it perfect. And it's never going to be perfect. But I have all that shame about my imperfection. And you know, I realize in the scheme of things, like I'm really good and I'm really fit and I'm really healthy and all of that. And still I have body shame. I am always so. It's a horrible word, but I am jealous of women who look at themselves and see nothing but beauty because I, I don't have that can.

Okay, you need to come work with me.

I know I do.

Miss this.

This whole interview is just a guise from my own personal therapy.

Girl, I will, I will turn, I will help you turn it all around. Because listen, one of the things you.

But if I feel this way, I know there are tons of women that feel this way. Yes, I know. I cannot possibly be unique in feeling this.

I felt that way. I was a serial body abuser. I'll just let that land, right? I was terrible. I wanted to destroy my body until I found this pathway back to the primal, to the animal magnetism, back to understanding the beauty of every single scar and mar and, and, and stretch mark and cellulite. Finding the beauty there instead of all of the imperfections. This is man made. This is a man made phenomenon. You are not going to find the women in the Hadza tribe that looking at their body and criticizing any of it. They live through their body. You're not going to find a wild lioness going, oh God, I don't like my flank. Oh, my paws are very pretty. Because it's, it is, it is almost, it is almost a suicidal intention for all of us women. 80, what is it? 88% of us aren't happy with our bodies. We are, we are, we're self defeating. And the reason that in my studies and in my work that self defeat comes from the external judgments of your body. We talked about your father at the dinner table and you're four years old and you're crying and he says, stop crying. You don't look pretty when you Cry. You look ugly when you cry. You don't look good in that dress. Every negative thing you've ever heard eventually comes into your own psyche, your own neural pathways, and you start to self abuse. You self judge because you don't want to call yourself out the way that your father did. You want to fit in. You want, you want to fit into the tribe. Because if I get outside the circle, I might die from a saber toothed tiger. So it's, it is very. You're right. It's a very, very convoluted, tangled rat's nest that we gotten ourselves into. And with complete certainty, I know that you can untangle it and get yourself out, because I did. And I've seen hundreds of women that I've taught do the same thing. But you mentioned your husband chasing you around because he thinks you're beautiful. He thinks you're beautiful. Am I right?

He absolutely does.

One of the greatest things I learned when I was researching for the role before I started as Thatcher is I would go to clubs. I'd go to strip clubs. It was very intimidating, but I would go to strip clubs. And I was first, I was watching the women and I was just in awe of the overt beauty of the way they moved. Their curves, their sensuality, their touch, their emotions. And after about you know, 18 visits, I started watching the men, watching the women. It didn't matter what age the women were. It didn't matter what size the women were. I saw 250 lb. Stripper that was ri. That was riveted. Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous. Because she was so confident and so beautiful. And her body, she moved her body so beautifully. But those men, they don't give a flying banana about cellulite or stretch marks or dimples or mars or. I learned to love my body through watching men love every single woman. And then I realized, oh, this is all part of the game of keeping me shut down. No access. This is all just. I've just taken all of my mom and my dads and my, my siblings criticisms, and now I'm doing it to myself. So when you're able to, to turn that needle the other direction, the. Well, the song that it plays is so beautiful.

Yeah, I'm. I mean, I feel it from you. I felt it from you from the moment I met you. And you know, it's like my Harry met Sally moment. Like, I want what she's having.

Yeah, yeah, it's. And it's accessible. It's right here. It's right there. It's simply in your Breath. It's simply slowing down enough and using the tool of conscious awareness, of intentional embodiment to seek pleasure. Put your hand somewhere right now. Put your hand somewhere on your body, wherever you want to put it, and just focus in on that.

It's so hard for women who have been so locked in to not kind of feel shame around it.

That's part of the journey, my love. Remember the bison. Remember the bison. When a storm is coming, they don't run from it like the other animals. They turn and they go through the storm. That's exactly what I'm saying, is you got to go into the shame, loves. You've got to break the mold. You've got to break the pattern of the shame by going in. So putting your hand right there. I don't care where I put my hand, right here in my chest. And I'm just going to feel the warmth and the heat emanating into my chest. And then I'm going to focus on my chest being touched by my hand, and then slowly just start to stroke it. Like maybe even a maternal, loving, nurturing touch. And then it almost. Almost wants to bring tears to my eyes. How. How that is. I can feel it.

I absolutely feel that it's so beautiful.

And that that's just right here. So just imagine as you break down and you take. You. You decide, okay, I'm taking this journey of deep embodiment, and I'm gonna touch every single part of me, and I'm gonna find all the beauty and the emotion. I might touch a part of my body and feel fear and. And want to shrink, but then I'm going to soften into that touch. So you can even start just with this, just with self touch. There are like 18 different ways to touch your body. You can touch it with nurturing, you can touch it with tickling, you can touch it with stroking. You can touch it with. With deep pushes and massages. You can touch it with compassion. Touch your body. If you are suffering from breast cancer or you have had surgery, touch your breasts. Oh, my God. The warmth I feel right now coming into my breasts is so powerful. Oh, taking my breath away a little bit. Right? And I'm. But I want them to feel how much I love them. I want to move fluid through them. I want to touch them because, as you know, I told you, I have a lot of breast cancer in my family. I myself had the check too, gene.

Yeah.

So breast cancer is very, very. I'm very familiar with it, and I am very comfortable talking about it. And Soothing it. Soothing the body that maybe has had been touched by it. Yeah, soothing the bodies that don't want to be touched by it. You've got to begin to move the fluids and unlock the body and release the emotions and let the movement break free so that you can.

That's a really hard part for people, especially in the area of breast cancer, because they want to dissociate themselves. Yeah. They want to believe that the cancer is something other. It's an alien. It's.

It's.

It's not a part of them. But breast cancer is a part of you. And it's the part of you that's saying that I need something different. I need a different kind of love, a different kind of attention, a different. A different kind of atmosphere, a different kind of environment. That's what's happening.

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. So I'll. I have two brothers with cancer, three sisters with cancer, a mother and her sister and her other sister. So when my brother was ill, he also had the check too. I said, have you talked to the cancer? And he goes, no. I said, have you touched. It was his stomach. He goes, no, I don't want to touch it. I don't. I don't scared of it. And I'm like, he had done exactly what you're saying. He had dissociated his. His whole body. He'd already left his body before he left his body. And to me, your body, everybody's body is just crying out to be adopted by you. It's just crying out to be seen, felt, and heard. One of the things I teach is that in this journey of. Of reclaiming your body, you need to separate yourself, your mind from your body and let your body be seen as a gifted child. Let your body be seen as your. Your most favorite puppy or dog you ever had in your whole life. A creature apart from yourself, so that you can begin to see your body with deep compassion. You would never say the shit you say about your body to your child. If your body was your child, if your body was your dog, you would never rip it apart the way you do. And if you did, you would. Child services would take that child or that dog.

No, you're right. You're right.

When you start to look at your body as this innocent, beautiful, emotional, alive creature, it doesn't have a cognitive mind. It just wants to serve you, keep you alive and help you find pleasure and avoid pain. That is what your body is trying to do. Just like an animal, your favorite dog or cat or even a Child.

Right.

So starting to look at your body separate from who you are so that you can wrap that beautiful body in so much love and gentle nurturing and compassion. My God, your body will just start to flourish.

Yeah. And I would imagine that this is a tremendous path to healing on every level.

100%. 100%. Yes.

So you have this wonderful course.

And.

Addresses all of these things that we talked about today. Can you tell us a little bit about the course and what happens there and who this is for? And yes, this.

I have three online courses and the one that's coming up is one of my favorite. Is my favorite, don't tell my other courses, but it's called Rise in Love and it is about. It's literally the journey you and I have been talking about. It's the understanding, the cognitive understanding that you have two minds. A critical thinking mind, which is your masculine mind, and a magical mind, which is your feminine mind.

The.

The critical thinking masculine mind believes the body is here to serve. It has an obedient body, bullies the body, shuts the body down. It's the one that wants to not cause everybody to criticize it. So it criticizes itself.

Sergeant.

Yes. And the critical thinking mind is always looking for a problem. And if there isn't one, then you become the person problem. My ass is too big. I have cellulite. I have stress. That's the critical thinking mind. It's the journey from the critical thinking mind to the magical mind, the feminine mind that believes that she is there here to serve your body's experience. Your magical mind always asks, what does my body want? What does my body want? Before I take any action? Here, eat this food. What does my body want? Will will this embolden and strengthen my body? This chocolate cake with ice cream. It's a very. It's getting so tuned into your body that you're like, no, no. My body said no. Give me some honey with strawberries. So that's the first part of the journey. And then you deep dive into your. The masculine and the feminine and. And how to understand our masculine counterparts in the world. How to understand with compassion and love and empathy those that are different than us. So learning and then understanding that we of the feminine are what I call mystical feminine creatures through the body. The body is a mystical feminine creature, and you need to treat her like a mystical feminine creature. And your masculine counterpart needs to treat her like a mystical feminine creature. She's the. She's the oracle, man. She's the one that knows she's got the gut instincts. She's got the emotional connection, she's got the sensuality. She is so tuned in. And she should be who everyone looks to for guidance on this planet. The mystical, feminine. And then we'd move. We find your dance, the dance of your feminine body. And so the class is two hours, once a week, every Thursday for three months. And it's with me. And then we have guest teachers come in and it's truly beautiful immersion into the rebirth of freeing your body and becoming as expansive in your body, in your heart and your mind as you can become.

And is this an online course?

It's online, absolutely.

It's.

We zoom in from wherever you are in the world. And I've been doing the zoom courses for like four years now, going on five, and they're phenomenal. We can move together. You can even more clearly see my body moving or the teacher's body moving so you can understand the, the. The kind of. The structure of the movement and how to free your body and how to find the fullest expression. So it's been an incredibly wonderful transition from in studio classes to virtual classes, and Amazing.

And this is even for the person that, let's say, got your book, the S factor, and was blushing. This is most on nearly every page.

Most importantly for that person. Most importantly for that person. Be the bison.

Yeah, absolutely.

Be the hero of life.

So I'm going to make sure to link to that course. Great. And people can sign up online and you've been very, very generous and you're going to give my listeners a discount, which is so wonderful. And I really do hope that people can take advantage of it because there is so much healing to be had. And this is a really important journey that most people do not take. And, you know, they, they think about having surgery and they think about the conventional treatments and, you know, they're asking me what to eat and what to supplement with and, you know, they're asking me for my sage advice all along the way. And they're not acknowledging the thing that puts. Brought them to that state in the first place. And they're not releasing what is holding them in that state.

Wow.

That's what makes it so important. And these are not conversations that are happening often enough.

Yes, yes. I hope your sage advice will now include get up and dance. Move. S factor.

We have to allow. We have to allow ourselves to feel, to emote, to, you know, and we've become a culture that is only getting worse in terms of emotion and expression and that kind of thing in that yes, there are, there are voices, some of them being silenced on social media and things like that. But think about what we're doing to our faces. Think about all the Botox and the things that are preventing us from expressing.

Right.

With all the, all the new standard of beauty and all the frozen faces and, and the standardization of the face.

Right.

Where everyone gets, everyone gets the same Botox and filler formula. I don't know if they get the.

Same nose and they get the same lips and they get the same cheekbone implants and they get the same. You know, we got to learn from our male counterparts. They're brilliant. Listen to the song Humble by Kendrick Lamar. He said he's so sick of all this plastic looking women. Give him some cellulite, please. Give him some stretch marks. He sings about it, he raps about it. It's brilliant. I'm like, stop. Perfection is the, Is the mar. Perfection is the stretch mark. That's perfection. This plastic Barbie doll thing, that's just deadening. That's just deadness. You said it. It's frozen. Your face is frozen, your body is frozen. How are you living? You were put on this planet in a body to have an embodied experience of your soul. But if you shut it all down, your soul is in there going, hello, help me. I want to express myself. Help me.

Yeah, and this is the way more.

This is the way I. Yeah. It's powerful and we know that.

And if, if you are really going to live.

Right.

And. And that becomes a crossroads for many women. Right. When you get, when you get a life threatening diagnosis, you are at a crossroads.

Yes.

And if you are really going to live, this is such an essential part of life because most people are not. Most people are staying very tight within that shell, within that tribe, within that. Within the confines of what we're told is okay. And not allowed to truly live.

No.

And don't give yourself permission to truly live.

Yeah.

So this is absolutely a road, a permission to live life.

100%. That's beautifully said.

So we started to talk about relationships and how so many women are locked inside of these relationships where they're just getting little crumbs.

Yeah.

Like little bits of love. And even they can be married to abusers and you can, you can even recognize the abuse. But because they dangle the crumbs in every now and again, you stay. And you, you. You sometimes stay because there's safety in that.

Right.

The people talk about the devil, you know.

Right. Yeah. The devil, you know, and the patterns, you know, you know you know, the patterns. But one of the things I. I have found in, in my teaching women for 25 years and my own journey is that when you, when you do the rebirth and you do the jailbreak and you get regain access to every part of yourself, you get to this place where you are self sustaining, you can fill every need you have for love. And you don't need love from your partner the way you used to. That, that is, that is sa. That saved my marriage. You know, I was needy. I was needy because I didn't have it within. You know, I was looking out there to be filled. So I. When I found this journey and I found how fucking badass and bold and magnificent and beautiful I was, then all of a sudden I didn't, I didn't go to him for fulfillment. I found it here. Because what I have learned a lot is that the masculine doesn't love us the way we want them to love us necessarily. They love us the way they know how. If you're with an abuser, there's no excuse for that. Get out of that. But if you're with a man who just knows how to give crumbs, that's okay. If you are able to fill yourself up with absolute and utter joy, pleasure, delight, dance, connection to other women, you know, that is, by the way, the original tribe, right? It is. You're absolutely right. Yeah. It's the circle of the feminine. And we'd have the fire in the middle, the children in the middle, the older women in the middle. And the women would be in a circle and we would protect each other. I looked over your back. You looked over my back. The men would come back after 15 days out on a hunt, throw the meat in the middle, leave, go back out of the hood. Crumbs. Big, huge chunk of meat though. Crumbs of love. But that's okay because we don't need them for feeling value and feeling.

It wasn't until you really found all of this self fulfillment that that was okay. And it changed your marriage. Right. From looking to him for love. Yes, to you. You had everything that you needed and it was a want thing, Right, Exactly.

I. Our marriage was very. Look, we've been together 35 years. I'm madly in love with this man. I want to devour him sometimes in love, sometimes I want to just shoot him. But we have such a passionate, beautiful, loving, deep, profoundly historical relationship. Right. But the first 10, 15 years was very rocky. And it was rocky because I didn't know how to fill myself up. I was Living small. I was living in this small body. I. This small breath. I was taking up littlest amount of space I could. And I needed more love. Richard. Richard. I need, I need, I need. And that's like, that's like, you know, kryptonite to a man needy. At least my man, he was like.

Oh no, every man, every man needy.

And then I. And then I was like always looking around. If there was another man, was there another man that would fill me up more? But then I found this movement when I did this film. And I found this embodiment and I found this sisterhood. And I found emotional freedom. And I found that. Oh my God. Within me was everything. I was seeking from him and more. I found within myself ecstasy of aliveness, of just being alive. Freedom. I was huge. I was as big as the universe. I wasn't a little mouse anymore. So it changed everything. But I'll tell you, there's When I teach women and women start to morph into their greatest potential. Men show up in four different ways. I call them the A, the B, the C and the D men. So the D man is a dominator. Toxic dominator. Toxic dominating energy. Basic tenant is that the world revolves around my pleasures and what makes me feel good. That toxic demon creates a D woman, which is a D. Disenfranchised, docile, small, aching woman. Woman aching for more. The seaman is what I call the compromised masculine. He's the masculine that has over given and over pleases everybody and everything. And somewhere along the way has given his virility over to society, to a job, to a woman. And the women that he cultivates, the kind of energy that he calls in is a masculine. A woman who has been told not to touch her feminine but to cultivate her masculine. And then you've got the B man. And the B man is what I call the boy man. And he's like the skateboard dude. And he's 49 years old and still working as a busboy. And he doesn't want to pay rent and he want. And he's. He doesn't. He's just like woo. He's really exciting to be around cause he's so funny, but no sense of masculine virility and responsibility. The other side of him is A is the B woman, the babe, the baby, the helpless one, the girl, the one that has grown up to learn that she's completely and utterly dependent on the toxic demon. And then you have the A man that is an awakened masculine that understands his virility, his Power, his purpose, his mission. And nothing is going to distract him from it. Not love, not anything. But he sees the feminine as a magnificent, beautiful, vibrant. He wants her to be more and more and more because he understands that she's the mystical feminine creature. And when she becomes fully lit up, her light feeds him like ambrosia. And he has to, by the rules of the jungle, he must get as big as she is, if not bigger, to provide for her, to protect her, and to hold her in his masculine energy. So he knows it's going to be tougher, but he knows he's going to get greater. And the A woman is a completely realized, awakened, fully expressed, fully radiant powerhouse of a woman who is still living in the beautiful softness of her femininity. Doesn't have to man up to be powerful, but lives in the soft, beautiful, emotional, strong, powerful, feminine presence that she has. She's this. She's the light of the universe. She's the mystical feminine.

Well, let's hope that we can see more and more of that.

Yeah.

Because that's really the goal.

Yes.

Right.

And that is life. That is life. To embody that.

Imagine the world, though, if you had amen and A women and not all the, all the other drama, all the other iterations. It's so beautiful. I just, I want to say one last thing. That's so powerful. The Baha', I, they, they speak of the great bird of humanity, and the great bird of humanity should be flying us forward into the future, into greatness, into beauty, into evolution. But the great bird of humanity is only flapping one wing, and it's the masculine wing because the feminine wing is tucked inside and atrophied. So the great bird of humanity is spiraling and circling and can't move forward. And that's the D man and the D women and the C men and the C women and B and B.

Right.

And what needs to happen now is that beautiful right wing, that feminine wing, needs to unfurl and begin flapping so that we can move forward into the future.

That's beautiful. That is beautiful, Sheila. Thank you so much. Where can people find you?

You can find sfactor.com you can find Sheila Kelly S on Instagram, you can find S Factor official on Instagram and follow us and talk to me. I, I write all my responses. I love my little Instagram. But I, I, yeah, find me and come say hi.

Amazing. And we will make sure to link to your.

To your course.

Thank you.

In the notes. Rise in love. And if you liked this, please comment send us a comment. We'll we'll send you an answer and share this with someone who needs to hear it because I know that you know someone that needs to hear this and know that I will be back next week, same time, same place. It's Dr. Jen. Bye for now. Oh, also, I want to remind you that if you do have someone who is going through a breast cancer journey, make sure that you pick them up a copy of my book, the Smart Woman's Guide to Breast Cancer and we'll see you next time.

Thank you for joining me on this episode of the Keeping a breast podcast with Dr. Jen. I hope you found the discussion informative and empowering. Remember, breast health is health, so by staying informed and taking proactive steps, you have the power to optimize your well being. My team and I encourage you to apply the knowledge gained from today's episode to make positive changes in your life and share what you've learned with others. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to our podcast and leave us a review. Your feedback and support mean the world to us and help us to reach more people who can benefit from these conversations. Stay connected with me on social media where I share additional resources, advice, updates and announcements related to breast health. You can find me on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. Dr. Jennsimmons and remember, my Jen has two N's, so until next time, remember to stay proactive, informed and confident in your breast health journey. The key to your health is you.