723: The Wild and Wonderful Sisterhood of Weird

Pretend for a second that the weirdest thing about you is the absolute best thing about you. For example, your social anxiety. Golden. Your tendency to overshare. Brilliant. Your fascination with neatly folding all of your socks. Incredible. Today we're going on an exploration in our minds where we look at something that we think is positively weird or alienating or just wrongly different about ourselves. And we're going to strive to see it through a whole new lens. If you were the kid who always felt left out, uninvited, made fun of, or you otherwise learned to hide parts of yourself, then let's reclaim this with love and wonder. Today we're going to play with reframing feelings about yourself so you can see what a true treasure you actually are. Flow Dreaming still kinda Woo Woo is just what it sounds like. An escape into the world of woo. Also a ride into you and how to feel happier with wiser and more self aware in every way. It's your ultimate journey into personal growth and inner power. We'll explore ideas like how your energy self influences the kinds of opportunities you encounter, or how your personal growth can drive your business growth, or even how that feeling of being stuck is really always coming from something else. We just have to figure out what. That's right. We're a dash of woo woo. A sprinkle of self care, a heap of problem solving and pattern busting, and a giant cup of encouragement. We're going to relight so much passion, purpose, self love and confidence in you that you practically stagger. I'm Summer McStravik, your host and welcome to Florida. Dreaming still kind of woo woo. That's right. Today we are going to own our weird. That is a phrase that I hope sticks in your mind like peanut butter and pops up again and again in the years ahead. We have been systematically disempowered over our lives and, and I know this is a general statement, but it's generally true. We've been disempowered by people and institutions and religions and culture and commercialization and family and friends and just everyone disempowered when it comes to you don't fit in. We don't like that. We. We don't understand that. So really, today's episode is about your own personal inner power and reclaiming and stopping what I call a power leak. And we're going to start with something that is personal to you, intimate to you, something that perhaps you took in and began to believe about yourself, began to make real, but something that probably wasn't there in you, that you did not originally think about yourself until some outside force or factor hurt you or told you something overpowered or overwhelmed you. So I know I just set out a big task for today. But you know how we do things here, we walk through it and the result is a feeling of deep inner self acceptance, healing, allowing yourself to be, to fully be and express yourself in any and all ways and allowing other people to love you and appreciate you where before maybe you just simply couldn't see it because all this stuff was in the way. Well, my friends, if this is your first time joining me, my name is Summer McStravik, just like I said in the intro and I have been teaching this gorgeous art and philosophy of Flow Dreaming for going on 20 years now. I have worked with thousands of thousands of people privately clients doing individual sessions or lengthier multi year work. I've been teaching the art of manifesting, co creating and what I call flow dreaming, which is teaching you in essence about how to manipulate the energies of life and the universe. And I use manipulate in the very best possible connotation. Notice right there. That's another one of those words that's been slandered over time. We're all, we're going to get rid of all those slanders today. But in addition, I teach you how to grow into your biggest, brightest, most full and finest being. Working with the universe, working with your own soul, working with everything that you are. So in service to this, I have been teaching and teaching and teaching and every one of these episodes is going to lighten up a different facet on the beautiful multifaceted crystal of your life. I encourage you to roll back through my archives. And did you know you can even subscribe to the first 10 seasons, 10 years of episodes that. Yep, that's right. Goes all the way back. You can find those on itunes or Apple podcasts if you are looking for where those are. It's. It's very inexpensive too, by the way. So with that, if you're curious, yes, I do work privately with you. You can reach out to me anytime. Summerloading.com I can also give you personalized recommendations on where to start on this gorgeous practice and teach you what Flow Dreaming actually is. Because today I'm not really doing that. I've done multiple, many, many, many, many episodes where I teach what the technique is and the rest of these episodes exploring through this wild and gorgeous forest of our lives together. So let's jump in. Owning your weird what does it mean? Well, I've expressed this before. I've shared this oh, off and on over the years, you know, many of you know, I was definitely the weirdest kid on the block. I mean, I was capital T, the capital W, weirdest, capital K kid on the block. My upbringing was different, just different. All I can say, I came from a multi religious household. I had parents of kids in the neighborhood who wouldn't even allow their children into our yard yet alone our house. All of this made me understand that I was not fitting in, that I was unlike the others. I was often told I was conceited, I was stuck up, that somehow they sensed that I was not the same. Because of that, of course, I never felt conceited or stuck up. That was the last way I wanted to portray myself, when all I desperately wanted at 10 years old was friends. But I learned very early to hide my intelligence, to. To put on the bubble head blonde Persona because people seem to like her so much more, to be unthreatening, to not share or showcase who I was, how I actually felt, or what I thought. And so I kind of learned to put on a costume for years and years of my life. Of course, I broke out by the time I was a rebellious teenager and went into my full goth period. Goth in the 80s, by the way. A little bit different than goth today. But think a lot of punk rock and black clothes and hairspray and just a general rebellious attitude. But really, there came a time when I decided that my weird was not a handicap. My weird was an asset. Of course, you know, I've gotten so much older and matured. I hope in some ways, not all, I'm sure, matured into a new way of understanding. You're weird now. I look at the weird as simply another facet of us. It's just one that maybe isn't as common or that people don't understand as well, or which has a much smaller audience, but an audience nonetheless. The weird becomes that part of you that makes you stand out, that makes you shimmer, that makes you shine with a slightly different colored light than everyone else around you. The weird is your distinction. The weird is often your superpower. The weird is often the part of you that challenges others in a good way. Today, part of my weird is my ability to look into people and to see and sense them, to understand them and read them from the inside out, to sort of describe to them their innermost thoughts and their soul, their thinking. Well, you can understand how that would have made little kids nervous to have a kid like that in the neighborhood today. People pay me for that because they come asking, who am I and what's going on? And what can you see in me and about me that I can't? Where am I stuck? Where am I blocked? I have other weirds, of course. I have a weird prolactivity of stating things bluntly and realizing later, well, I put my foot in my mouth, didn't I? And then I've also learned that I can just say right afterwards, you know, I probably shouldn't have said that. I hope that that came across the way that I meant it. But nonetheless, my weird shakes people and opens them to hear things that other people don't say, don't share, don't give to them. My weird prevents people from being cloaked in, what would you call it? Ignorance. My weird is also gentle and soft. My weird sometimes lets me give people too much benefit of the doubt. That's okay too. That's part of my weird. My weird is everything I've ever said in this podcast, all almost 800 episodes. My weird is putting myself out there to be judged, to be ridiculed, or to be loved. And not knowing. Not knowing who you are, how these words are striking your ears, what it could be lighting up inside you or turning off inside you right now. Do you get what I'm going or where I'm going with this? My weird does things. It's an integral aspect of who I am. Without my weird, I would be blessed. I would be a vanilla donut. I would be. What do they call it? Milk toast. I don't even know what milk toast is, but it's an old fashioned word and it means pass by able. And that's not who I am. That's not who you are either. I want you to take something in yourself right now. Think about an aspect of you that other people have criticized, ridiculed, put down, told you was stupid, silly, wrong, upsetting. Gather that piece of you. Go find it in you. Like shimmery shards of broken glass, a mirror someone shattered long ago. Yet when you pick this up, it does not cut your fingers. The edges are soft and rounded like tumbled sea glass. Maybe this is you feeling like I'm too short, I'm too young, I'm too old. People don't like the way I interact. People misunderstand my words. I'm shy, I'm not good in social situations. I can't speak up for myself. I have a weird hobby or fascination that other people don't understand. I look weird. My body, my skin, my face, my hair. Go ahead, pick up that thing. Maybe there's more than one. Put a little basket on your arm and collect all the weirds. Collect all the pieces where people shut the door on you, excluded you and said, you are not the same. You are not like us. Is it your culture? Are you feeling like fish out of water? Is it your orientation, your sexuality? Do you feel unaccepted by your faith or by your family? Take those pieces, hold them in your hand, and here's how I want you to think. Now, this is an energy exercise that we're doing here, my friends. Not a flow dream necessarily, but it's an energy exercise. The very fact of naming has historically, traditionally been the first step in reclaiming. If you go into any of the old pagan traditions, if you can name something, you gain power. You are naming your weird. You are holding it, and you are bringing it closer. And what you're saying to it, what you're doing with it now, is saying, I accept you. You're part of me. You are a beautiful and glorious part of me. Now, right here is where I want you to feel something. I want you to feel right now that you have been wrong all these years. Flat out completely wrong. When you've listened to these other people, when you absorbed this into your being, making a part of you seem like it was an alien or unwanted part of you. I want you to be wrong about that. Say, you know what? It was never an alien or unwanted part. It was never a weakness. It was never a liability. My weird has always been my strength. My weird has always been a source of power that I just at one point failed to understand. But now, now I'm bringing it back to me. I'm reeling it in. I'm spooling it back in like a fishing line back into my life. And I'm saying, I am ready for you now, and I am ready to understand your power. And I am ready to understand your presence. Because I know that source or God, my higher self, doesn't give me any part of me that doesn't belong. And I'm sorry I made you the ugly duckling of my own being. But you belong. And you hold something for me. You hold power for me. You hold something that will open doors for me, show me something, lift me, help me move into a next step or phase of myself. That's what you do for me. You. You are my weird. Weird. I want you to reclaim that word as well. Have you noticed how a lot of marginalized groups reclaim the words that have been used against them? They take the power back from the Insult. They make it their own and they change it. I want you to take weird and say, weird is my birthright. Weird is my glory. Weird and wonderful. Wonderfully weird. Wildly and wonderfully weird. And as you say that reach outward in your heart. Maybe you've already closed your eyes, but if you haven't, reach outward in your heart right now. Because there are others who are wildly, weirdly, wonderfully strange, just like you. And they're everywhere. They're sprinkling the continents. They're sailing the seas. They're in positions of power. They are in positions of no power. They're everywhere, in every industry. They are right around you, in your neighborhood. They are people just like you. The same streak of whatever it may be, just like you. You're part of a holy brotherhood, a holy sisterhood. Holy Sisterhood of weird. Yeah, that's right. And we welcome you in. Maybe my weird's a little different than your weird, but it's still wonderfully weird. Notice, too, the feelings that go along with that. Notice the feelings you have when you discover something fascinating, beautiful, different. Something you want to uncover. Peek inside. Get to know something that piques your interest. Someone who does not think like the rest of the pack. Someone who leads in a different direction. And you feel your heart tugging that way and saying, wherever you're going, I want to go too. That's you. That's your weird. Why have you been hiding it? Why have you been slamming it down inside you? It's released now. It's floating in you. It's floating above you. A magnificent limone light. Beautiful, serene, growing, expanding. This is something intrinsic to you. This is something that is distinctive. This is something that defines you against all the other snowflakes and flowers and fingerprints of the world. So why. Why would that gorgeous piece of uniqueness be the thing you hide? Hear this. The people who recognize this in you, they are your actual tribe. They are your friends. They are the people who understand you. They will be the people you lead. They will be the people you follow. If you have felt misunderstood or having to cover up some part of yourself, you have been stamping with the wrong herd of gazelle your whole life. Your herd is over there. Do you see that green grassy slope of weird? That's your group. And you want to be with them. Because that's where you feel at home. That is where you feel natural. That is where you feel expansive. That's where you feel like. Yes. And that's the exhale. That's where you start to say, so show me how to Use this superpower. Show me how to use this particular quality, this way of thinking, this neurodiversity, this gender, this culture, this perception, this sense, this whatever it is about you. Show me how to use it. Show me how to expand in it. I want my weird, and I want to be surrounded with the like, weird. The weird, like the ones like me knowing that, no, it's not going to be everyone's cup of tea, but that's okay, because I don't want to spend my life contorting myself into shapes that don't fit me to try to fit in to someone and someplace else. Because you know what? No matter how hard I'll try, I will never perfectly fit. And I'll feel exhausted and I'll feel worn, and I'll feel unseen. Far better to unfold myself and reveal myself in that shimmery pool of the wonderfully weird where I am. How is this hitting you right now? How is this going in. Sometimes my episodes can go in quick, a little more hard hitting, but I really want you to kind of crack open something that maybe you haven't had the thought or the courage to lift the lid on in so, so, so long. Because before it was traumatic or difficult or hurtful, but I want to give you a different way of lifting the lid. I want to give you a way to lift it. Knowing you have support, knowing you have encouragement, and you have, frankly, a gosh darn cheer team around you. Yes, they are there. Yes. When you reclaim a piece of yourself like this, what you're ultimately doing is you are withdrawing a piece of yourself, a powerful piece of yourself from what other people have done to it or suppressed it or captured it or cornered you into hiding it or degrading it or downplaying it. You're reclaiming that. You're taking a fundamental piece of your own inner power and pulling it back into yourself. Some of you might be thinking, this sounds a little bit like shadow work, Summer. Wow, I've never heard you talk about that before. Well, I talk about shadow work a little differently. I'm what I think of as a treasure hunter. I'm looking for treasure wherever I find it. And if I find a lost, abandoned piece of yourself someplace, that little weird suppressed child that you were, or maybe, of course, it happened when you were older, doesn't matter. But it's been marginalized, it's been left out. I can't help but say, reach out your arms, bring that poor thing back into your heart. Give it a hug. Most of the time when pieces and parts of us are sent away, marginalized, put down, cast out, sent to the land of bad weird. It's because they're powerful. Otherwise no one would really care. They wouldn't give it a second thought. But if there's something powerful about your weird, that's when people snap into attention around you and say, bad, go away. Don't confront me with this, I don't understand. Bad, go away. So there's a very good chance that your weird actually holds a degree of power. And I don't mean power over others. I don't mean power at all in the traditional sense. I mean power as in fortitude, clarity, truth, strength. Maybe it's a power that will provoke or reveal something to someone else. If you stand in front of somebody and you are in your power and that person looks at you, they may look away. If they don't want to see what you reflect. That is not your problem. That is the other person's. It is completely their choice, their power to decide if they want to see themselves and be revealed or if they want to turn their head and say, not now, not yet. So when you take back this wild and wonderful weird that you are, you're taking back something that is very personal, very powerful inside of you. Again, bring to mind that thing that you are reclaiming. I was the blank, blank, blank child. I was the blank, blank, blank person in my workplace. I was the blank, blank, blank partner on the partnership and dating market. I am the take it back. You are not any of those things. You are not. What you are may encompass whatever it is you say. Maybe you are an over talker. So what? It's wildly, wonderfully weird. You draw people out. You ask questions you shouldn't ask. Other people are challenged to decide, do I want to be in this or don't I? You are a walking example to people of what it means to share and not hide. You do so many things with this particular beautiful, weird quality of yours. And this applies to everyone. The shape of your body, the interests and hobbies you hold. Weird, weird, weird. Gorgeous, delightful, wonderful, weird. Are you starting to feel it yet? What I want you to do next is to let this feeling percolate in you, to let it stay in you, to let it grow in you, to notice the next time you retract and say, oh, I shouldn't say that. I have to hide this. Oh, I shouldn't act like that. I shouldn't show that. Oh, I can't say that. I want you to just stop for a second and say, why not. And you ask yourself in that moment, who am I protecting? Am I really protecting me from ridicule or hurt or rejection? Or am I protecting that other person from the very valuable thing of being able to sit in my weird and feel it and understand it and be changed by it? If you ask yourself that, you're going to recognize that maybe it's a bit of both. And then maybe you'll say to yourself, you know, it's kind of exhausting having to do this. I wonder if it's actually a waste of my energy to constantly cover and hide and deflect. I wonder. And I wonder who I'd be if instead I brought my weird back in, loved it, hugged it, expressed it, owned it, and said, you are perfect. You are my superpower. You are unique, you are gorgeous. And I love this part of me. I love you. I love you. That's what I want you to think. Now, if you want to follow up on this, if you want to do flow dreaming around this. And for those of you again who are new, Flow Dreaming is an emotional, energetic technique where we actually reshape our energetic selves. We reshape our emotional selves and we in fact end up communicating deeply and powerfully with the universe with flow, with our own path of ease and growth and development. When you practice a flow dream, it sounds a lot like an audio, like a, like a guided meditation. But it's more than that. I have a whole collection of them that you can begin working with to start using this technique to own your weird full self acceptance and love. One in particular that I'd suggest is called dazzling self love. But I have so many more. Just go to flowdreaming.com and you can find them there. I also have a mastermind that I invite you to where you will find a wonderfully weird sisterhood and brotherhood of people just like me and frankly, just like you. If you are a devotee of this podcast, then you found your. You found your clan. Come join us. So with that, I'm gonna leave you today to ponder and to think and hopefully we'll do a few more light hearted episodes after this. But every now and then I like to drop in a zinger to get you moving, to get you unstuck, to kind of peel you up off the ground and let you start moving again into that beautiful and gorgeous flowing future of yours and kind of give you a little kick in the. Kick in the behind. All right, my friends, much love to you. Please as always, reach out. I gave you my email earlier I love to hear from you. If you love this podcast, please give it a rating. I noticed that I haven't asked in a while and so no one's rated in a while. But it means so so much to me and I hope to see many of you in class this month. One of our beautiful workshops. Until then, until next week. I send you all my love may be in flow and may your weird be the absolute best thing about you. I love to work with you. One on one I get to see the most exponential growth. And those of you who work with me privately every month, I'm part coach, part mentor, part energy worker, and intuitive. What I do is beyond traditional coaching in many ways since I add in all kinds of information you wouldn't normally have access to and the results speak for themselves. I have hundreds of glowing testimonials you can read for yourself at my website or just reach out and ask me we began working together with an assignment assessment of your life, what you want and where you've been, where you're going. We focus deeply on patterns, blocks and what you plan to achieve or become next within yourself and within your life. Last, we're going to carry your desires right into the heart of the universe by flow dreaming together as I lead you in every session with a personalized customized flow drain. You're going to end up with dozens of these plus a plan. Now you've got two options. You can either take me for a test run with an introductory private session, or we can just jump in and explore what a longer relationship working together would do for your Life. Just visit flowdreaming.com search for private sessions and I really look forward to meeting you.