A speaker reflects on anxiety and depression during the COVID-19 pandemic, sharing how a bicep injury forced him to slow down. He offers practical advice on staying connected and managing mental health when everything feels uncertain.
Hey. Hey. Hey. Excited to be back chatting with all of you. I have not been live in quite some time. Been processing a lot, as many of you have been. But it was time to jump on and connect with you all and chat with stuff that is heavy on my mind and on my heart, especially as an empath, and see how you all are doing. So if you're joining me live, let me know that you're online, tell me your name, where you're joining me from. So. So I know that if you're watching the replay, let me know that you're watching the replay so I can circle back and say hi to you later. Thanks for joining me. Lots of change in all of our world since I was last live. Not just with everything going on with the virus and crazy times in our world right now, but also many of you saw on social media about my injury this year. I had a torn bicep, which I'll share about that in just a minute. But I'm excited to connect and chat with you. I think especially during these times, it's important to stay connected face to face, even though we can't do it actually in person, but on video. Thank you, Zoom. And Facebook Live and Skype and House Party and FaceTime and all the things so we can feel human and join each other. Hi, Susanna. I see you. And I'm doing Facebook and Instagram at the same time, so working on the eye contact here, but I'll do my best, so. Hi, Tara from Michigan. Hi, everyone. All right, lots changing in our world, so let me back up. First, I'm gonna tell you about this because I know many of you have been asking. I've done quite a number of posts about it, but some of you miss it. So when I was in Costa Rica on a vacation before all the craziness happening in the world, I decided to play by the waterfalls and jump in a Mayan ruin. And it was nothing unsafe, nothing crazy. And I was scared, though, because I'm scared of being underwater. I know. Weird fear, but it's my fear. And so I was holding onto this rock really, really, really tight. Like, holding on with dear life holding on. And I must have had my arm really straight, and when I jumped in, I tore my bicep. How do you do that? I guess that's how you do it. So it wasn't a crazy workout. It was just being really stiff and scared. I tore it. It hurt really bad. I didn't know I tore it. It looked like dented and mushed up. No, I Tore it went about my vacation, was really painful for like six days and then it stopped hurting. And the reason I've learned that it stopped hurting is when you tear your bicep or the tendon around it, it will literally curl up into your arm. And once it's unattached, it stops hurting. So that's why the pain stopped. But three weeks later, back in the us My bicep was looking funky, my arm was being really strange, so I went to orthopedic surgeon, had an mri. Sorry, had a. Yeah, an mri. And was in surgery the very next day that night, getting it reattached. So this is now part of my arm for 10 weeks. Fun stuff. I will be able to resume workouts at six months. So good times, fun stuff with nerve damage and all the things. And you guys, I know it's selfie image right now, so but it's my right arm, so I'm right hand dominant, so can't write, can't type, can't do my own hair. Just on my Instagram stories. Last night you saw my husband did my hair. Isn't that cool? So I've had to learn a lot of surrendering, which is so interesting because what's going on in the world right now, we're all learning that same lesson, right? About not knowing what's next. Discomfort, having to surrender and shift and change and accept. So I feel like I had about a two week jump on everyone with this happening, but here we are, we're all here. So thanks for joining me today. What am I to share? Today is sort of what I've been doing, what I've been doing, what some of my powerful friends that are thriving right now are doing to navigate through these tough times. And I'm hoping to support you with some of this because this might be common sense to some of you, but to some of you it's a stretch because it is really crazy times right now, like in history. This is gonna be something we remember forever. There's a lot going on in the world. We're scared, we're anxious. I polled many of you on my audience recently and you know, the two feelings that came up really heavy were anxiety and depression. Anxiety and depression. Any of you feeling those things, let me know in the comments if you are. I tend to be someone that goes to anxiety. I'm not an anxiety expert, but I'm an expert in feeling it. So I tend to go to that. And I know collectively when there's a lot of us feeling it. It's interesting what happens from that? Because if people are sharing their anxiety with others, it just keeps it going, Right? It keeps it going. So have really done a lot of reflecting on how to shift this and what's going on. And that's what I wanted to share with you and offer some insight today so we can support each other around this. Does that sound good? Okay. And just to rewind a little bit, I'm 48 years old and I share my age a lot because of what I do for a living, that I help women age in reverse. Many of you know that, but I share that also because I've been through a lot of times in history where there was massive, massive setback, anxiety, scarcity, being frightened, being scared and feeling out of control. And we all made it through to the other side in a great space. And just to give you a little rundown memory lane for many of you do remember this. Some of you might have been too young to remember it, but 9 11, I lived in Washington D.C. at the time. It stopped our country cold in its tracks, especially if you lived in D.C. or New York City. Never knew if life would return to normal. It just really changed a lot of our careers, changed a lot of our visions. A lot of scary things happening back in those times. And you know, a lot of us have bounced back from that. Right. It really defined a place in history. Bounce back a year after 9 11, I was living in Northern Virginia area. And if you remember on the news then there was a sniper attacker on the loose. Like, literally this guy was going around shooting people with his sniper. Totally random. And I lived in the neighborhood, the area that that was happening in, and we were on lockdown in our homes for three weeks. Never forget that. It was so scary. You couldn't go to the grocery store or the gas station. The things that are open now because you were scared you'd get shot by a sniper. So huge, huge anxiety and scarcity being scared came up, came from that. And then fast forward a little bit. 2008, 2009. Remember what was going on then. A huge crumble in the financial market, in the housing market. Lots and lots of people losing their jobs. A lot of people had made a lot of money with mortgages and housing and flipping homes, and all of that was done. A lot of depression was setting in. A lot of things changed. The reason I'm bringing up those right now is a lot of blessings came from those pain. A lot of people that you see as leaders today that share that, teach that motivate you, they created what they created because of those hard times, their pain in those times became their purpose. Some of you know my story, some of you don't, but 2008, this was me. This was me. I just had my daughter. Sorry, 2007, I just had her. Gained a lot of weight, depressed. I lost my home that year. I was hugely in debt. I was going through a divorce. Worst depression I'd ever faced in my life. Completely miserable. A completely different person. But my whole life pivoted because of that pain. I ended up changing myself internally. I changed a lot of you because of that. My business was born. Natalie Jill Fitness was born because of that. I impacted hundreds of thousands of you. I've helped many of you personally get your life back. A lot of amazing things came from my hardships because I walked through it. So. And I'm not alone with that. There's a many. There's many leaders that you follow. There's many motivational people you follow, people that you view as successful people. Mentors. They became who they were because they walked through hard times. Innovation, creativity, amazing solutions come after hard times. I share that now because right now a lot of us are feeling very heavy that there's no hope or this is very scary, what's going to come from this. And I want to share that. In pain, in setbacks, there's also creativity that's born. There's also people that end up thriving and helping so many others. So amazing things can come from that, too. Okay? So I want you to know that I want that to be a knowing that you have, because it's very true. So here's what I want to want to share with you today. There's things that you can do right now to shift. If you commented, if you said, I'm feeling anxious, I'm feeling scared, I'm worried, because I know a lot of you were there, and I was definitely feeling that, too. There's a lot of things you can do right now to start shifting that. Do you want to hear what they are? Would this support you? Because being stuck and feeling anxious and feeling depressed and not taking action and just feeling, you know, really hopeless with that, that doesn't fix anything. It doesn't fix anything. But there's some things that you could do so you could come out on the other side in a very different place. And these are things that me and my husband have definitely been doing ourselves. And these are things that many of my friends, they're walking through right now. So I hope this helps you. So the first thing I want you to know is honor your feelings. Like, it's okay to feel. So if you need to have a crying fit, if you need to take a shower, let the water be. Do it, but honor your feelings. So we tend to, as adults, mask our feelings a lot. Like, we either think we can't have them, we have to hide them, or we turn to things to mask them, like extra sleeping or, you know, or drinking or some people turn to prescription drugs or drugs or whatever to mask feelings. And when you mask feelings, you just push them back down. It doesn't do anything. But when you actually release feelings and you let yourself have that good cry you share with a girlfriend, you get it out of you, it's gone. So share your feelings. I'm going to encourage you to get that out. Share that out. Get that out, get that out. Okay, get those feelings out. The next thing, stop obsessing about the news. And I'm going to say it like, yes, it's critical to know what's going on in the world. We need to know what's happening in the world, but we don't need to obsess over it. Like, check in once a day, Have a family member that's not having anxiety check in with you. Check in and know what's going on. Be aware, but don't obsess over it. Obsessing over your Facebook feed, obsessing over the news, obsessing over what, what ifs, the worry, the everything going on that does not help us. You cannot personally control or fix any of that. So obsessing over it just makes you feel stuck, anxious, depressed. All the things I'm not telling you to avoid the news. I'm just telling you not to obsess over it. Gosh, I found myself doing it. I was scrolling my personal Facebook every day, obsessing over it. Like getting lost in articles and fat. And it was changing me. It was in. And when I realized, like, this is not serving anyone. Me doing this does not serve anyone. So what stopped? I literally said, I'm not doing it anymore. I check in once a day at sources that I want to check, like factual sources, just to know what's going on, to be aware. But I'm not obsessing over it. So I'm going to encourage you. If you're feeling anxious, if you're feeling depressed, stop obsessing over the news, stop validating it with everybody, and stop that. Because it's not serving anyone and it's not going to fix anything. You obsessing over it. That's huge. The next thing right now, during this time, decide what you want for your life. During this time, what do you want a year from now? If it's a year from now and this has passed a year from now, what do you want to reflect back on and know that you use this time for? What do you want to decide right now? Just like I've coached so many of you in weight loss and fat loss to decide. I've coached so many of you to decide that you're done with the excess weight, you're done with being unhealthy, you're done with whatever. I'm going to ask you the same thing. What do you want to decide right now that you want to look back and say that you did? During this time, did you learn another language? Did you learn how to diversify your income? Did you learn a new skill? Did you become a better mom? Did you spend more time with your children? Did you get closer with your family? Did you use this time to meditate, to do yoga, to walk, to take care of yourself? Did you learn use this time to learn a new skill? Decide right now, what is it you actually want to come out the other side on this? Because if you're not making that decision and you're just letting the day happen to you, then you're living in anxiety and worry and fear and it's not fixing anything because you can't control that. We cannot control personally right now what's happening with this virus. We can't control personally what's happening with the hot hospitals. We can control staying at home, and you should. We can control keeping ourselves as safe as best as we can. We can control being there for others. We can control all those things, but we cannot happen. We can't do it. So decide right now. How do you want to use this time? What do you want to use for this time? Decide. What is that? Learn another language. Learn another skill. Diversify your income. I'll tell you that three, three years ago, when I had a setback personally in my life with my business and with my marriage, I had a bunch of things going on three years ago. I made a decision right then and there. What I deciding was that I was one, diversifying my income. I was going to have five different places that income was coming from. I decided that right then and there. I decided that I was going to change my relationship with my husband. I made these as decisions. And that's what I also decided right then. I was going to learn how people leveled up and created everything from nothing. My podcast was born from that time. I decided I want to know, how do people level up and create everything from nothing? So that's what I did. I decided that. So I'm going to ask you after this, live or right now, decide what is it that you want? If it's a year from now and you look back on this time, what did you decide you wanted to use this time for? Okay, the next thing. Take on your day. Take on your day. Like, listen, if you're starting your day every day with, like, oh, my gosh, what's going on in the news right now? And how am I going to feel today? That is not taking on your day. Taking on your day is getting up at a normal time. Do your dang makeup and your hair so you feel good. Get dressed. If I can do it with one arm, y', all, you can do it with two. Put yourself together. Create a schedule. Do your day. If you're laying around on the couch going, what day is it? Being part of that problem, like, what day is it? I can't do anything. Scroll Facebook. Just see what's wrong in the world. You're not taking on your day, and that's not gonna help you get out of anxiety and fear and being scared and depressed. Take on your day. Create a schedule for yourself. I love this. Heidi said she went for an early morning walk. Listen to podcasts. Go back to those courses you bought. You haven't done. Many of you have my full reset. You haven't done it. Go do it. Take on your day. Create a schedule. This is the perfect time. You can prepare your meals. You can go for a walk. You can meditate, you can catch up with a friend. Prepare your day. Create a schedule. Get yourself together, but take on your day. That's going to help shift anxiety. Okay, next. Get outside. I don't care if you live where it's cold, where it's hot, you can social distance, but get the heck outside. It's amazing. What real vitamin D. The sunlight, fresh air, and nature for you. Even if it's just 15 minutes. Get yourself outside. Go stand outside. Go walk outside. Hike. If you can, keep your social distance. I'm not telling you to violate any of that, but get yourself outside. Your whole mood shifts. Just getting outside. Get outside. And if you have an opportunity to get near water, even better. But ground yourself on real earth. Get yourself outside. It completely will help you shift your mood. Okay, next thing. Connect with others. Do not isolate. Do not isolate. Depression is fed by isolation. This is critical. Y' All I've been depressed before. Depression feeds on isolation. Do not isolate. And if you are anxious, I don't want you to isolate either. But here's the key. If you are feeling anxiety, I don't want you connecting with other people. Feeling anxiety. That doesn't help. If it's feeding on each other, it doesn't help. Connect with somebody. That will help ground you. What I love about this time is there's so much technology. Like, you can connect with friends. You could do FaceTime, you could do Zoom, you could do Skype, you could do. There's a new app called House Party, Facebook Lives. But connect with people. See someone's face. Actually connect with people. I've really been enjoying every day. I've been FaceTiming with at least one friend. So it feels, like, real. You know, it's like, see them? I'm not just talking to them, I'm FaceTiming them. I'm doing Zooms with groups of girlfriends, which has been amazing. Like, you get six girlfriends on Zoom. It's a free app on your laptop or your phone, and you can connect with people. It's like you're sitting right together. But that connection really feels good and it will really help you with that anxiety and depression right now. So connect with others. This is really important. Do that. And then the other big thing I want to share is shift your focus when you find yourself in doomsday mode. In doomsday mode. Oh, my gosh, look what's happening in the hospitals. Oh, my God. Look what's happening with this virus. Oh, my God, my income. That's doomsday mode. Shift your focus. Shift your focus. Your body does not know the difference between what's actually real and what you are making up in your head. Okay? It doesn't know the difference. So why feed it worry when there's nothing you can do to control it? Like, there's literally nothing you can do to control that. So why feed it with that? Assume different things and shift your focus. You feel that way. Start a hobby. You feel that way. Go for a walk. You feel that way, pick up a book, listen to a podcast. And I'm not saying go listen to podcasts on this topic. Like, find something else. Find something from six months ago, but shift your focus into something else. You will feel like an entirely different person. So I hope this supports you. These are all the things that I've been doing you all, and I hope they support you. Let's see. I'm going to take questions. I love this. I'VE been reinventing myself to schedule, including with family. I love that. Eugenia, did I have rotator cuff surgery? No, I tore my bicep and had surgery on that. I shared that earlier on the video. Let's see. Denise, like you, I only check reliable sources. I love that. Yeah. And I have a. I am a key worker, so I go out every day. Can't afford to listen. Yes, I get it. You can't afford to be scared like that. Let's see. It is so scary. Okay. Hi, Maria. She's working in the hospital has been so scary. I'm. My heart goes out to you, Maria. I know that it's very challenging working in the hospital right now. By the way, you are. All this stuff that I'm sharing. I am not saying to ignore what's going on in the world. That's not the right way to do this either. I'm saying let's stop obsessing over things we can't control. Let's shift our focus. So I hope this helped you today, you all. I will jump on and do more. I was missing you all, so I wanted to jump on today. But I hope this helps you. And if there's any tips I didn't share that you're doing, please let me know so I can add them to my list here. But thanks, you all for being on with me today. Bye.
