Life on MY Terms

What are the benefits of running (and movement, in general)?

I decided to sit down with Elizabeth Knight to get the answers to that question - and more. She is a health coach, health researcher, and nurse practitioner who made a career shift over the past two years due to burnout (self-rescue accomplished!). Elizabeth is also a trail runner with a passion for using movement and athletics to improve physical and mental well-being. In this episode, I sit down with Elizabeth Knight to discuss:

ABOUT ELIZABETH KNIGHT

Negative stress happens. And yes, it can get the better of us.

But as we move through life at the pace society seems to think it normal, we often begin to collect coping mechanisms to deal with the stress versus taking time to find a solution to the stress - to truly find radical acceptance in some cases.

Coping usually involves adjusting to or tolerating negative events or realities while you try to keep your positive self-image and emotional equilibrium. Coping occurs in the context of life changes that are perceived to be stressful. Psychological stress is usually associated with negative life changes, such as losing a job or loved one. However, all changes require some sort of adaptation. Even positive changes — such as getting married or having a child — can be stressful.

Here's where coping can become extremely unproductive (and harmful) - the negative coping mechanisms.

Did you know that has humans, we are all predisposed to relying on negative coping skills?

So don't beat yourself up. In this episode, I am going to unpack negative coping mechanisms and offer solutions to solving your stress, working towards radical acceptance, in some cases, and thinking about how to create a lifestyle that offers resilience against stress.

FROM THE EPISODE

Eating disorders. Disordered eating. They are both very serious and are a silent epidemic that affect all genders and races. And as a country, we have a lot of work to do.

Don't believe me? Here are some stats:

Phew - I think that is enough. The sad truth is, regardless if we ever move into anorexia or bulimia, most every, single human has suffered from body image challenges that have caused us to hide or start making changes that aren't ideal. This episode today comes from noticing a huge trend among listeners. And I knew just the person to chat with. Erin Washington.

Failure is NOT FINAL! Failure is GREAT!

(What, Amy?)

Failure offers each of us the opportunity to examine what worked or what didn't even more so than success. It can foster your critical and analytical thinking skills, allowing you to innovate, redirect and try another way to execute something the next time.

It's time to move out of the fixed mindset that often holds failure as a means to NOT move forward towards our goals. Instead, we're going to break out of the failure-fixed mindset and chat about growth mindset shift.

Don't be afraid of failure. Embrace it. This episode will help. Let's go!

CONNECT WITH ME

IG: @lifeonmyterms_podcast

Email info@personalbestcoaching.net

FROM THE EPISODE:

Do you find yourself saying any of the following statements regularly?

"I am nothing compared to that person."

"No matter what I do, it never seems to be enough."

"If I work harder maybe they will notice me more."

"Nobody 'liked' or 'commented' on my last Instagram post, and now I am totally doubting myself."

"I can't seem to do anything right."

If you are nodding your head "YES" to any of these statements, you may be struggling from within to love yourself, and value your worth. We all tend to struggle with self-love, self-worth, and self-image. That's why I decided to chat with author and mindset coach, Denise Marsh. In this episode, Denise provides tips to reframing the way that you treat yourself so that you can live a life for you, loving yourself first.

ABOUT DENISE MARSH

Denise Marsh is the author of Do It For Your SELFIE!: A Guide to Loving Yourself, Redesigning Your Life, and Getting Aligned from Within, and founder of R.A.W.: Redesign & Align from Within, LLC. As a Transformational Mindset Coach and speaker, Denise works with women to increase their self-love and self-awareness so they can feel more confident in making their dreams and desires a priority. She mentors with passion, guiding her clients to effectively strengthen and elevate their mindset to new heights.

Droves of nurses, hospital workers, teachers, and principals are leaving their careers. When we compound the stress that is happening is these service fields, in particular, with the pandemic and school shootings, there is no wonder that the compassion fatigue that has always been present is quickly escalating to burnout. The bigger problem: these open positions are not getting filled leaving critical shortages around the world.

I decided to take some time to dig into compassion fatigue - what it is and how it differs from burnout (but also contributes to burnout). There was no better person than sitting down with a seasoned social worker to share the day-in-the-life of being an empath, managing stress when your job requires you to save the world.

CONNECT WITH ANNIE SCHODT

Welcome to listener Q+A. In these episodes, I work to compile the most commonly asked questions and answer them live on the podcast. I work to put them into a theme. On this episode, we are looking at "I can't" statements/questions.

This reframe is necessary because "I can't" statements are a part of "all or nothing" thinking. This type of thinking can cause a substantial amount of harm to your self-worth and growth. It will affect the way you feel about yourself by giving up or not even trying and others by comparing yourself, in return, adding pressure that doesn't exist.

Typically, this type of thinking will use absolute terms, such as always or never, good or bad, can or can't, and this results in many people not being able to see alternative outcomes. It can make it difficult, and in some cases impossible, to see solutions.

Get your notepad ready because there is a lot of action items and reflection to do in this episode.

LINKS FROM THE EPISODE:

There is so much content out there for personal growth (this podcast being one medium), but how often to do we take the time to actually process - to reflect, synthesize, and make plans for action in our own lives? This seems to be the missing link as to why we invest a lot of our time in personal growth but rarely see improvement.

I recently just attended the VIP event at the Jay Shetty Love Rules Tour. It was an incredible experience that had be reflecting and finding actionable takeaways for 10 days post event. They were very powerful ones - so I want to share those with you. Let this episode serve as a place for you to reflect, synthesize, and take action with next steps.

We are all chasing goals. Thinking up a goal is the easy part. Pinpointing the specifics of a goal, developing a plan of action, and then following through with that plan of action and pushing past the inevitable obstacles that will arise is a different story altogether. As you can see, there are many reasons why we fail to achieve our goals. But giving up is also the easy part.

A lack of self-confidence comes in many shapes and forms, and learning how to build confidence is an ongoing project for most of us – we are all a work in progress! Some of the best perspectives in how to build self-confidence comes from entrepreneurs as they are often faced with more struggles than successes as they chart their path. On this episode I chat with Sugar Sugar Wax founder, Salome Sallehy. Listen as she chats about mindset, taking risks, and balance.

Your life purpose consists of the central motivating aims of your life—the reasons you get up in the morning. When I was going through burnout, all purpose in my life had been lost. So I went through some self-discovery to find it.

Purpose can guide life decisions, influence behavior, shape goals, offer a sense of direction and create meaning. For some people, purpose is connected to vocation—meaningful, satisfying work. For others, their purpose lies in their responsibilities to their family or friends. Others seek meaning through spirituality or religious beliefs. Some people may find their purpose clearly expressed in all these aspects of life.

Purpose will be unique for everyone; what you identify as your path may be different from others. What’s more, your purpose can actually shift and change throughout life in response to the evolving priorities and fluctuations of your own experiences.

Questions that may come up when you reflect upon your life purpose are:

What are the benefits of finding your purpose and how do you begin to tap into it? I've got some answers to this week's episode. Take a listen.

FROM THE SHOW

What does it mean to be your authentic self? I mean, really be your authentic self. That means, who you show up for at work, in your personal life, and maybe even on social media. Your authentic self is who you truly are as a person, regardless of your occupation, regardless of the influence of others, it is an honest representation of you. It encompasses the values that you believe in and the person that you are.

We often leave our authentic selves at an exit on the highway as we breeze through life in the fast lane, trying to be the person others want us to be. That's why I love chatting with folks that are truly their authentic selves to their core, regardless of the audience.

Meet Latoya Shauntay-Snell - Endurance athlete, Chef, Content Creator, and best-in-class IG influencer. Her biggest achievements and failures are watched closely by the 77,000+ humans that follow her on Instagram. The thing that makes me so happy is that no matter what, Latoya always shows up as her authentic self. And with that comes some valuable tips that I am so excited she gets to share with all of you.

Listen to the episode for more.

CONNECT WITH LATOYA

I started following Dr. William Li after my bloodwork came back, post stage 5 burnout, to see just how wild my results were. My white blood cells were through the roof, my body had begun to attack itself, leaving me with hearing loss in my left ear, vitamin deficiency, and auto-immune skin rash.

Immediately I was put on an anti-inflammatory diet to reduce this inflammation of the chronic years of unmanaged stress. It was then I started to believe just how much food had to do with my healing - and what I ate mattered a lot.

Dr. Li became a staple subject matter expert on the topic, sharing content on how folks can actually beat disease. So I thought I would chat more with him so that, together, we could spread this message.

ABOUT DR. WILLIAM LI

Have you ever been so stressed at the thought of continuing to work with an ineffective leader — a "terrible leader" — that you become physically ill? If so, you are not alone. I have been there. 7 times. 

Oftentimes, a terrible, ineffective leader will demonstrate behaviors such as low emotional intelligence, disrespect, bias, intimidation, lack of empathy, support, recognition, and self-accountability.

For all of you out there that may think running is not for you, think again. The health benefits alone are astonishing:

As a runner for over 12 years, I have seen it totally change my life for the better, bringing me a healthy outlet that has led to happiness, great adventures, and a ton of self-confidence. Today I chat with Dr. Duane Scotti runner, physical therapist, certified run coach, host of the Healthy Runner Podcast, and founder of Spark Healthy Runner where he helps runners get stronger, run faster, and enjoy lifelong injury-free running. We chat about just how powerful running is for self-confidence, as a spiritual outlet - and frankly that magic pill you may be looking for.

ABOUT DR. DUANE SCOTTI

How often do you look in the mirror and say “If I could just lose ten pounds, then I would be happy”? Unfortunately, the majority of American women and girls are dissatisfied with their bodies, and many take extreme measures in an attempt to change their bodies. For example, one study found that 63% of female participants identified weight as the key factor in determining how they felt about themselves – more important than family, school, or career.

But there's more. What about children that don't feel like they are even in the right body? A boy that feels like a girl? These are some intense issues to have to struggle with.

Body image issues can wreak havoc on your self-esteem and cause you to ditch your authentic self to be someone you are not - not to mention they can cause some BIG physical and mental health issues.

In this episode I chat with Registered Dietitian, Speaker and Author, Dalia Kinsey to better understand body image issues - and how we may change that for ourselves.

ABOUT DALIA KINSEY

Repeat after me: Burnout is more than just stress - it's a soul-sucking syndrome that can have you broken emotionally, physically, mentally, and spiritually.

Burnout can affect us all differently, but there are a ton of common reasons why we get burnt out. One of those ways is staying too long in a toxic work environment with a terribly toxic boss.

That was the reality for Lark Ericson. She was very optimistic when starting her new role as an RN for a Medical Spa until she started to suffer from a cycle of emotional abuse from her boss. This experience led her physically damaged as well as emotionally stripped of confidence and self-worth.

You'll want to listen to this episode, first-hand, to hear more about how Lark's burnout began, peaked, and what her healing journey looked like.

ABOUT LARK ERICSON

The gender gap in entrepreneurship leads us to ask: why are women less likely to start a business, why do women show less intention to be entrepreneurs, and what can be done to encourage them?

It's always great when you find a diamond in the rough. Haley Pavone, Founder and CEO of Pashion Footwear not only invented a totally new category in the women's shoe category but she also reminds women everywhere, no matter their age, they can succeed in following their passions.

In this episode, Haley and I travel through the journey of building Pashion footwear out of her college dorm, some of the hurdles along the way like launching the business in the thick of a pandemic, and what she wants to tell all of you ladies out there about being relentless in the pursuit of your goals and dreams.

ABOUT HALEY PAVONE + PASHION FOOTWEAR

A toxic relationship is one that makes you feel unsupported, misunderstood, demeaned, or attacked. On a basic level, any relationship that makes you feel worse rather than better can become toxic over time. Toxic relationships can exist in just about any context, from the playground to the boardroom to the bedroom.

This serious topic deserved some more insight from a real seasoned pro. In this episode, I sit down with Dr. Stephanie Sarkis and boy did she ever cover this topic well. We discuss what toxic relationships look like, how you may notice the signs, and most importantly, how you heal and recover.

ABOUT DR. STEPHANIE SARKIS

The inability to say NO stems simply from an eagerness to please. We struggle to say no because we’re scared of what will happen if we do…

What if we are not busy enough? What if we can't be everything to everyone? What is people get offended?

The thing is, when we constantly put others first we say NO to ourselves. Your support, kindness and attunement to the needs of others is admiral in one sense – but not when it entails the loss of self. You will never be able to become your true authentic self if you are continually bending to meet the needs of others. We have limited energy, time and resources and we all have a responsibility to ourselves to use them wisely. If we’re always giving out – and not taking anything back for ourselves – then overtime we’ll simply burnout.

Lucky for all of you, I sat down with Tanya Dalton to tackle this idea of chasing busy and trying to do all the things while keeping ourselves in the passenger seat of our own lives. She's got a lot of great tips and tricks to say NO more often, time tricks to ensure you are spending your time the best way possible and of course, how to jump into the drivers seat of your life.

The art of self-advocacy is crucial to your success in all areas of life, but especially in the workforce. Whether you’re just starting out or you’re well into your career journey, it’s important to make sure your voice is heard so you can amplify your accomplishments and get the help you need to improve on your weaknesses.

This can be exceptionally tough for women - juggling all of the responsibilities of personal and professional life. How do we take a moment, think about what we want in our career, and ASK for it?

That's why I decided to sit down with Kay Kay Smith - an exceptional power of positive energy that shares tips on how women can speak up for what they want in their careers - and in their lives. Kay Kay shares a lot about being our authentic self (it's deep!)

The internet defines burnout as a form of exhaustion caused by constantly feeling swamped. It's a result of excessive and prolonged emotional, physical, and mental stress. In many cases, burnout is related to one's job. Burnout happens when you're overwhelmed, emotionally drained, and unable to keep up with life's incessant demands.

Burnout expert, Eileen McDargh helps us understand burnout a little differently with a "put yourself first" approach. She also offers some tips and tricks to break-free from burnout and move towards break-through (bonus: enhanced resilience). If you are feeling rundown, "not yourself," or simply just need to set some boundaries and improve your stress management, you are going to want to listen to this episode.

SPOILER ALERT: Eileen shares a beautiful poem at the end about living in the present. You don't want to miss it.

ABOUT EILEEN MCDARGH

Eileen McDargh, CSP, CPAE, CEO (Chief Energy Officer), The Resiliency Group

Diet culture robs people of all sizes from their money, time, health, and happiness. It plays a major role in perpetuating eating disorders, food-body preoccupation, weight stigma, and fatphobia. And sadly, there is an entire industry that supports - and promotes - the feeling of constantly not being "satisfied" with who we are on our bodies.

That's what this episode is dedicated to - removing the shame and liberating folks to be comfortable in their own skin. I am sitting down with Intuitive Eating Counselors and Registered Dietitians, Autumn and Jasmine from Mendinground. Their words are so powerful and encouraging that you, too, can break free from this terrible diet culture mindset.

ABOUT JASMINE AND AUTUMN OF MENDINGROUND

Have you ever been so afraid of failing at something that you decided not to try at all? Or has fear of failure meant that, subconsciously, you undermined your own efforts to avoid the possibility of a larger failure?

Maybe you have tried something and did not meet the goal you set out for - so to you, it feels like failure.

Many of us have probably experienced this at one time or another. The fear of failing can be immobilizing – it can cause us to do nothing, and therefore resist moving forward. But when we allow fear to stop our forward progress in life, we're likely to miss some great opportunities along the way. And when we do "fail," there are lessons to be learned and a ton of opportunity to seek.

Hi everyone and welcome to the first episode of “Life on MY Terms. In this episode I want to share my story with burn out which is what lead me to start this podcast, explain to you what IS Life on YOUR Terms, give you a sneak peek into what to expect on the podcast week to week, and provide you some steps to start taking charge of your life.

New episodes release on Fridays.