How Reducing The Stigma Of Mental Health Can Save Lives With Karena Dawn, Founder Of The Big Silence

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I find that the more I talk about my darkness and things I'm going through and it connects me deeper to people, then it opens up a where. Then I actually wake up in the morning with less anxiety, with less depression because I'm more open about it.

Hey everyone, welcome back to the Earn your happy podcast. Happy Holidays. It's the holiday season. It's one of my favorite times of the year. And it didn't used to be because I really didn't know how to go into the holiday season. I didn't have boundaries, I didn't have tough conversations. And we talk about this a lot on this show and that is on how to really cope with some of the things that we are all coping with. Whether it is anxiety, whether that is depression, whether that is overwhelm. And today I have the perfect guest on for anybody who is challenged this time of year. Karina Donon. She is the co founder of the leading women's fitness community Tone it Up. She has empowered millions of women around the world to live their their healthiest and happiest lives. And she is a New York Times bestselling author and she recently published her debut memoir, the Big A Daughter's Memoir of Mental Illness and Healing. A personal story of her mental health journey from crisis, addiction and depression to a life of hope, healing and happiness. In addition, she also launched her podcast called the Big Silence where she holds open conversations with psychologists, spiritual leaders, wellness influencers, public figures and offers thousands of listeners weekly guidance important mental health topics. You guys, she's really taking these conversations that are, you know, maybe you wouldn't be having or maybe there was a lot of stigma or shame around them in the past and we need to bring them to the surface. Cause the only place they can heal is in the light. So you guys, we're gonna be chatting all about her experience and her book and I hope that you love it. Cause she's just one of those, you know, special people who is taking something on, taking on a huge undertaking in order to get it out into the. And if you're one of those people who's struggling this time of the of year, there are a lot of really great contacts that she shouts out and within the show notes. So let's get started. Karina, I'm so excited to have you on the show. Thank you so much for coming on.

Of course. I was so looking forward to just hanging out with you. I know.

Isn't that the best part? I'm like, wait, we can record and hang out. I truly, like, I had a few podcasts yesterday that were like that, that I was like, okay, we're gonna take the first 15 minutes, we're just gonna talk, we're gonna catch up and then we'll hit record. So, yeah, it's so much fun and I love hearing about all the different things that are going on in your life that we are going to talk about, you guys. And it's fun for me with someone like you who is really multifaceted and multi passionate because if I haven't seen you for three months or six months, I'm like, holy hell, you different things, tell me all about them, how I can be a part of them.

Same with you, though.

Same, same with me. It's the exact same with me. So I kind of want to. For anyone who has not heard about what you're up to right now, you've recently written a book, an amazing book, talking all about your journey and really bringing mental illness to the forefront, making it a regular conversation, helping a ton of people not feel shameful if they've ever dealt with it, if they have it themselves. I would love to just hear. You know, when you're writing a book, it's typically because you want this message out in the world in a really big way. What was it like right before writing the book? Was it just like, why did this conversation have to come out right now for you?

Well, I always wanted to write a book, and only I would say for personal reasons, because, you know, the import importance of journaling and putting it all out there, putting it on the paper and being able to review it. So I grew up with a mother who was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia when I was about 12 years old. And towards the end of her life, she passed away in 2021. I was her caretaker along with my husband. And I just felt that it was finally, and this is actually five years ago, it took me five years to write this book because I thought she was going to pass away from this lifetime five years ago. And I just wanted to start getting it on paper.

But.

It wasn't. The story wasn't over yet. And so growing up with a mom who is diagnosed with a mental illness and my whole journey of overcoming and becoming the book was more of Me expressing what I was going through, but then also being able to help others because I realized the more that I speak about mental illness and mental health, the more that conversation is opened up. So my purpose has become to be a beacon to someone who is experiencing this themselves or a loved one and realize that it's okay. It's the same as any other brain disease or cancer or something. So I'm just. I don't know. I think my purpose, you know, you know me from toning it up. Lori. We know each other for. Since Miami back in the day.

Like, I think that was 2009. Really?

Okay. Yeah. Yeah. We were in a fitness competition together, and that's where we first met. Yep. No, just normalizing the conversation around.

Where do you think the stigma comes from? And what is one of the things that people can do, like, the biggest takeaway from this if they have somebody in their life who deals with mental illness or themselves, if they know that they are dealing with it, like, what is a way for them to make them realize it's something that should be talked about, I guess, frequently and get help around.

So first question, where does this stigma come from? It's our generation and growing up, and I'm 41 now, and growing up in the 90s, no one talked about it. It was upon. And so that's when someone, I always say, like little Karina, reverted back into herself and became. And created like a shield around her and shame. The stigma was because our society didn't want to talk about it. And it's a normal, absolutely normal thing. And then simple. Talk about it. Talk about it. I was just talking to Lori before we went and started recording about two friends that are gone this week and didn't survive. One of them in particular, a very young man who didn't survive through his mental illness. And I think that opening up the conversation can really save lives. And so I started the Big Silence foundation in honor of my mom, who never wanted to talk about it. And she actually got angry at me to even want to speak, that she was diagnosed with schizophrenia, depression, narcissistic personality disorder, all of these things. And then on her last two days in hospice, she said, you know what? Okay. I said, mom, you're gonna. You're gonna change lives.

Oh, my goodness, it's gonna make me cry. Is there ever a point? Should people go to someone they know? Should they go to a therapist? Like, because sometimes when. When people want to start talking, maybe it's not received in the. You know, because that. That could make someone Close up, right? If they go to somebody and they're like, oh, you shouldn't talk about it. I actually had a friend who. Not about this particular thing, but about something else that I needed to talk about. And I remember her saying, well, don't talk about it, and it goes away. And I remember, like, closing down for years around this particular topic, thinking that if we didn't talk about, it would just go away. And I. I'm thinking of you as a little girl, too, and maybe all of the different things that you did to even cope with having this conversation trapped inside of you. So my first one is, are there particular people that we should aim to go towards? And then what were you finding yourself doing because you weren't talking?

Anyone listening? Don't talk about it. It goes away. It doesn't. Because trauma is held in your body. But I believe that us as society, we are here to heal each other and walk each other through this process. It's not easy. It's not meant to be, and that's okay. And there will be the sad times and the happy times and the celebrations and the everything in between. Who do you talk to? Number one, a friend. Just reach out for help. Number two, a loved one. Number three, therapists. That's what there. There's therapy in the world. And actually, I'll throw this out here too. We have through the big silence. If you text Hero H E R O to 741741, there's free 27 anonymous counselors that can help you. I think the. Yeah, talking therapy is a beautiful thing.

Have you been not, like, the kind of therapy that I think, like, people would think of going and seeing your therapist all the time. But I feel like I've had more coaches and retreats around healing than I can count. And. And I've actually had probably someone, you know, I've worked with Christine Hassler, who felt like definitely coach in therapy, who I was able to talk through a lot of different things, and she was like, access to me through a lot of different parts of my life. So I guess I have had therapy.

Yeah, you have, like, so many different levels. Therapy could be meditating in nature in the morning. It can be actual, like, talk therapy. There's so many different forms of therapy, but I think it's so rewarding. And I think I remember back in my 20s, and I was dating someone before I met Bobby, and I told him I was going to a therapist. He was like, therapy is for crazy people. I'm like, no, I just need someone to Talk to so important to normalize, whether it's a therapist, a coach, a psychologist or anything.

It's crazy because I've lived in California for a long time. But when I am, I'm from the middle of the country. And I will tell you, it's not necessarily a normal conversation yet. In the middle of the country. It's not something that, you know, I was even just in a big group of people the other day and I was like, oh, this is. It just made me remember this is not a normal conversation yet. And so having that number to even text and start there is a really big deal because, you know, when I go back to California, we're talking about it at dinner, people are talking about it in groups. But I come here and it's very like, no, no, no, no. We're still not sharing our shit. We're still like, we're fine, we're good. So it's interesting.

Why do you think that is? Because I'm Indiana, my dad is a therapist. And.

Yeah.

That. Although, dad, if you're listening, I'll know. I know you'll get annoyed. Like, he didn't see what was going on in our own household and what I was going through in my own situation. But, like, what is it, like where you're at with your family and Chris?

I don't, I just don't think. And I'm in kind of a smaller town right now too. It's not a conversation that people are having here at work yet. They're not having it in friend groups yet. I just don't. I think it's, it's just not normalized yet. I don't think there's a lot of people here making it a normal thing. Yeah, it's really interesting. I'm not sure there's parts of the country that, that just aren't necessarily talking about it. I think it's still like the very old school way of thinking of like, you know, just, you don't, you don't share that with people. And it's definitely, obviously segmented. I'm sure there are groups here that are starting to do that. But in all the different places that we've been this week, I definitely find myself not necessarily even as open talking about certain things because it's very surfacey still, very much like you're not really going deep or sharing a ton about yourself, which is really interesting.

I'm going to start interviewing you. I'm so interested in that too, because.

Why?

Because I find that the more I talk about my darkness and things I'm going through and it connects me deeper to people and then it opens up a conversation where then I actually wake up in the morning with less anxiety, with less depression because I'm more open about it. And it's like, oh, me too. But then, okay, let's go to the gym and work out. Let's do something fun. Like it transitions into okay, we are human. So we have these emotions, we have this trauma. Generational trauma is a thing and okay, well, we recognize it, we give it a name. How do we move forward instead of that circusy that you were saying, just saying like for anyone listening, just talk about it, think about it. Like I, I literally in my years, and especially the past five years, the more I talk about it, the more joy, the more happiness, the more I.

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Okay, so my husband Chris was recently in a jam. He needed to send out a schedule and a bunch of information about some events he has coming up to a bunch of his high end clients and he didn't love the way that the schedule looked. He wanted it to look a bit little, a lot better. Really cool, really high end. And I was like oh my gosh. Well I think I have a fix for you. Let me go in and try to see if I can format this and make it look really pretty with issue. And you guys, it totally worked. It looked incredible. We put it in a magazine format. Issue is the all in one platform to create and distribute beautiful digital content everywhere. From marketing materials to magazines to flip books and more. I can honestly say it's my been a huge part of growing light pink. An issue essentially takes a boring old PDF and turns it into a beautiful engaging piece of content that can be distributed and formatted anywhere for anything. For example, we created our holiday gift guide and cocktail book that featured delicious light pink concoctions. And once we created the full books, we were then able to export them for Instagram and then for our email newsletter and then for Pinterest. It's amazing and so seamless you guys. The best part is is that ISSUU also works seamlessly with tools that you already use like canva, Dropbox and InDesign, and you can edit it very easily. Get started with ISSU today for free. Or if you sign up for a premium account, you're going to get 50% off when you go to issuu.com podcast and use promo code LORI. That's issuiss u-u.com podcast and use promo promo code Lori at checkout for your free account or 50 off your premium account. That's issu.com podcast with promo code Lori. For me, when I've just shared some different things, it's definitely been in more of a safe group that I feel it will be not received necessarily, but at least reciprocated like some reciprocate like a form of reciprocated conversation where I think that in the past with certain people or certain people in my family, they haven't known how to react so they kind of either shut down or change the subject. So I love that you're creating spaces with your big silence foundation where people can actually have a conversation where someone listens. It's reciprocated. So you guys will definitely put that in the show notes for you. So tell me about when you were growing up. Just your experience of kind of thinking, thinking that you had to hold it in and what were, what were some of the ways that that was manifesting in your life because you weren't really sharing, you weren't necessarily sharing about your mom to different people when you were young or how you were coping with it, were you?

No. So when I was young, say in high school or something, if I would share something, I would lose a lot of friends because no one was talking about mental illness. So my mother had, you know, as a schizophrenic and in and out of the hospital and dealing with all of this, it was a lot of, a lot of friends kind of backed off. So I wasn't sharing about it. And I went through the phase of okay, let me just go to raves and do drugs and you know, hide from it all. And then I think I had this, you know, aha moment which I talk about it in the book where after a three day bender I was woke up in a park or woke up or still up or whatever. And I was like something in my mind was saying, you are meant to be something better than wow. And this is early twenties. Karina. Something came over me. I'm a very persistent person and thank goodness at that point I decided to be persistent and wellness. Instead of doing negative things for myself, I had to change them. And that's where I got into fitness and triathlon surfing. Instead of going to the. If you read the book. Instead of going to clubs in Hollywood, I would wake up and work out and train and surf and go in nature. And then from there ended up, you know, building a big career in fitness and wellness, not only for the way that it makes you. I always say it's not a vanity thing. It's all about mental health with fitness. I mean, even to this day. To this day. You know, this week has been really hard for me. And I have. I'm a. I'm a trainer, but I have a trainer. It's like, therapists need therapists. Trainers, yes. And even yesterday I was texting my trainer, I was like, I don't want to work out today. She's like, all you gotta do is get in the car and drive. We'll sit on the couch at the gym, and that's an accomplishment. And then if you feel like it, we'll lift away. I'm like, okay, I can do that. And for you, being, you know, from the fitness industry as well, you can get that. It's like you just have to show up. And I feel like so many people are, you know, go on a tangent, but it's like an all or nothing mentality. Yep. And I think I've learned that even if you get halfway there, you're there. That's like, okay, I'll go to the gym and I'll sit on the couch. Then I got up and I lifted those weights and my ass is sore now. Good. And then all those endorphins are going. It's all a journey.

I feel like that was a huge part of my journey, was trying to figure out the all or nothing thing because it was so up and so down that that in itself was such an emotional roller coaster for me. Like, so elated one day, if I'm acting in accordance to this, like, it was so contingent based about how I felt about myself and my life. If I showed up to the workout and did X, Y and Z, and ate this well today and did these things for work, and. And if I didn't, it was like I would just beat myself up to the point where it was, like, so extreme that I just needed to show up a thousand percent every day. And I learned, unfortunately, not super quick, but in the grand scheme, I guess quick, but it was so unsustainable. Like, it is the most unsustainable thing to, like, mean coach yourself and to also have to be that, quote, unquote, like, perfect with your schedule and your routine. Did you have, like, a realization with that or were you that way as well? Or what did that look like? What did that journey look like for you?

I would believe in. Maybe in the beginning. I'll tone it up. It was like, go, go, go. All, all. But then the all or nothing stopped. And giving yourself the grace to be the in between, what did that look.

Like for you when you say give yourself the grace? Like, what did that conversation in your head look like in order to do that?

I think a lot of it comes from taking care of my mom and the stress around that and the recognition of. I also, you know, I was always like, very fit. Triathlon fitness model. This, this, this, and wanting to be a daughter and then taking care of my mom. And when I was taking care of my mom, I was like, oh, I'm gonna have the perfect relationship with my mom. And then that didn't happen. And then I was like, oh. And then I was under a lot of stress and I gained weight. But then I'm a fitness superstar, you know, and like, everyone talking about that. And then I was like, you know what one of my. My friend Amber actually mentioned? Actually, she. You know, Amber, she. We were hiking one day, and she's like, you know what? You're allowed to have seasons. I was like, oh, I don't know why. That was, like, so mind blowing to me. Yeah. Like, I am. I'm allowed to have seasons. I'm allowed to not be that beautiful flower every day. I'm allowed to be the leaves falling from the tree and then the rebirth and a long time to just be accept myself where I am in that moment in career, in my marriage, in everything to just. In my relationship with my mom, to just be. And. But in those times, also recognize and have gratitude for the fact that even alive and I get to do this and all the things that I've accomplished, not just career wise, it's not all that in my life. And so.

Oh, I love that. I love that idea with the seasons. I definitely lean into that now because when I find that there's something new like how you said, you know, I want to be right now, I want to work on my relationship with my mom, or maybe it's you, and you want to work with. On your relationship with Bobby, or maybe it's your real estate investing, and you really want to focus on that. There's only so much focus we can give to so many things. So I always think about like, okay, some things are going to give, like they're not going to be at 100% and that is okay because once this season is done, we're going to go back, we're going to assess and we can give attention to what needs attention. And I just feel like when you're a person who is somebody, if you're listening and you're like, I get things done, like I, I can reach my goals and maybe you're even a really high achiever or a hard driver, like you're not going to let those things fall by the wayside completely for the rest of your life. Like, I really do believe it's, it's pretty much impossible for the people who like have, have, you know, accomplished things or achieve things. Like you're going to go back to it, so you don't necessarily need to stress out so much over like that's, that's where I'm at in my life now. I'm like, that's okay. Just like you said, it's going to be a season, there's going to be time where if I want to get better over here, something's got to kind of give over here because there's only a set amount of energy in a day. And it's like, you know, giving your mom all of that time, especially something so emotional. There's going to be times in your life when certain things aren't going to be at the peak of what you want. I really watched my mother in law actually go through this when she took care of her mom and she also took care of her husband's mom. And you know, it was a season where so many things that she wanted to do like fell by the wayside and she just, she literally had to say, this is where I'm at right now. Like, this is just a season of my life and these things are going to come back or we're going to do this when this is done. But I have to be here. It's accepting what is, you know.

Yeah, I think that's really important. And even though, you know, Bobby and I have had a rough couple days or year, I woke up this morning and we were in the kitchen and I said, and Bobby was feeling really down and I just screamed at the top of my lungs. It's like before coffee this morning, I was like, bobby, it's a great day to be alive. And he's like, huh, I see it. And he's like, I was like, it's a great day to be alive. And then he said it, and I was like, just set the intention. Yeah. Like, we're fortunate here. I mean, not everyone's day looks the same and their seasons are not the same. But when you can just that recognition of, like, wake up and say, it's a great day. Mm.

How do you go back to the challenging times and. And dig for the gold and find the gift? Is there things that you do in order to, like, really extract the lesson from the tough stuff?

I would say that I never regret the way that I was raised because I think there was a purpose in what happened to my mother. What happened to my. My grandfather was also schizophrenic, and he committed suicide. And there's some reason that I have this, like, super hyper drive and passion to share the story, because it's a gift to learn through this of what happened to my mother, my grandfather, my family. And I feel fortunate. I wouldn't change a thing because I'm proud of the woman I became today. My only mission is to help others survive. Know that it's okay, whether it's themselves or a loved one dealing with a mental illness, just that they're not alone, and that together as a community and in society, that we can walk each other through this.

Oh, I love that. Before I move on to some other things, where can we get your book? And what's the best way to, like, really, if there's. If there's a loved one, if it is them, what's the best way to connect with you? And the Big Silence Foundation.

You can get the book anywhere that books are sold. If you go to thebigsilence.com memoir, I think, is the right link. We'll put it. I'll make sure you have that link.

Put it in the show notes. Thank you so much for coming on, and it was so much fun catching up. And we're gonna do this in person, hopefully sometime. And you guys definitely go check out everything that we're putting in the show notes and give her a follow on Instagram. The best thing that we can do for our guest is to let her know if this impacted you, if you're gonna forward this to someone you know, and if you have any questions or anything. So what is your Instagram handle for them, Karina? Dawn Arinadawn. You guys go let her know what you thought of this episode and what your takeaway was. So thank you so much for coming on. And until next time, earn your happy. Bye, everyone.

Sam.