Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to wok F Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet your Girl Daniel Moody. Pre recording from the Home Bunker. Folks,
Speaker 1: it has been an extraordinary time. We are living in
Speaker 1: extraordinary times, and you know, I want to share on
Speaker 1: today's episode some of the ways that I have found
Speaker 1: it helpful to manage the overwhelm. And it is it
Speaker 1: doesn't you know. Here's what I will say. There isn't
Speaker 1: a person that I have spoken to. There isn't a
Speaker 1: family member that I've spoken to, a friend, or a
Speaker 1: clerk at a store, or an Uber driver that I
Speaker 1: have spoken to who hasn't shared, even for a moment,
Speaker 1: their bit of overwhelm. I've gotten out of ubers over
Speaker 1: the last year or so, and when I get out,
Speaker 1: the drivers all exclaim be safe, be well, you know,
Speaker 1: stay healthy, stay safe. These are like salutations greetings that
Speaker 1: we didn't have, right, Like when you think about when
Speaker 1: people sneeze and they would say gazintite or God bless you.
Speaker 1: That dated back to you know, the height of the
Speaker 1: plague that when people sneeze they were like close to death, right,
Speaker 1: so you were saying, you know, God bless you and
Speaker 1: keep you It's interesting to me as the times become
Speaker 1: more and more extraordinary, and I mean extraordinary in their wildness,
Speaker 1: like ten years ago, five years ago, we could never
Speaker 1: predicted where we are now or what we have all
Speaker 1: collectively experienced. And by the way, you know, what I
Speaker 1: find so unsettling, I think sometimes is the fact that
Speaker 1: the media would love us to believe and pretend that
Speaker 1: COVID never existed, That over a million people didn't die,
Speaker 1: that every holiday season that you're sitting down and there
Speaker 1: are empty spaces at your tables that were just all
Speaker 1: supposed to be okay with that never to have really
Speaker 1: talked about it beyond the one collective day of mourning
Speaker 1: that the Biden administration ushered in before the inauguration, that
Speaker 1: that was the only honoring we've done. And it's still
Speaker 1: wild to me because what we know, right is that
Speaker 1: hurt people hurt people right, That wounds that go unhealed, untreated,
Speaker 1: bump up against other wounds until everyone around you is hurting.
Speaker 1: So one of the things that I had the just
Speaker 1: tremendous ability to participate in over the year the last
Speaker 1: couple of months of the year was a commitment to
Speaker 1: care class that I was taking and I won't even
Speaker 1: call it a class. It was more like a gathering
Speaker 1: with other black women led by a somatic healing coach
Speaker 1: to teach us how to get in touch with our bodies,
Speaker 1: our feelings, and the way that we hold emotions in
Speaker 1: our bodies, and that when we are in certain conversations,
Speaker 1: certain places that we just move with just our brain
Speaker 1: but don't really think about, why did my shoulder rise,
Speaker 1: Why do I have this not in my stomach? Why
Speaker 1: am I feeling sore? Why am I waking up exhausted.
Speaker 1: Our bodies provide us with signals right to alert us
Speaker 1: to the fact that something is not right, something is blocked,
Speaker 1: something is not sitting well. And through this healing gathering
Speaker 1: that I was doing at the end of the year,
Speaker 1: I learned so much about how I hold energy, how
Speaker 1: I hold negativity, how as I've been able to not
Speaker 1: just recognize and move through because this isn't just about
Speaker 1: let's say, getting a massage, which is lovely and great,
Speaker 1: but that's not it. It's really about becoming in tune,
Speaker 1: closing your eyes, deep breathing, sitting with yourself inside of
Speaker 1: your body. And you know, I realized as I was
Speaker 1: in these gathering settings that that is a luxury, and
Speaker 1: it shouldn't be. It shouldn't be a luxury to be
Speaker 1: able to wake up and sit with yourself, to be quiet,
Speaker 1: to stretch, to breathe, to come into your day, to
Speaker 1: really unpack and learn your body, your emotions. As my
Speaker 1: mother says, the issues that we hold in our tissues,
Speaker 1: the tissues in our body. Because, as I've said to you,
Speaker 1: and if you've been listening to this show for quite
Speaker 1: some time, dis ease in our bodies create disease. So
Speaker 1: when I talk about really trying to work to live
Speaker 1: and be and exist in flow, it isn't just about
Speaker 1: letting things roll off your back. It's recognizing that life
Speaker 1: is yang and yang. Life is always going to hold
Speaker 1: both grief and joy. But learning how how our bodies
Speaker 1: signal to us gives us the greater skill set and
Speaker 1: awareness to navigate what will inevitably become rough seas right.
Speaker 1: But if you are a skilled person who is not
Speaker 1: caought off guard but starts to see like, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I can see how this can turn. So what do
Speaker 1: I need to do? How do I need to breathe?
Speaker 1: How do I need to approach this situation. Is there
Speaker 1: is this real? Is this a story that I'm telling myself?
Speaker 1: What is in my control and not within my control? Right?
Speaker 1: I look at it in turns terms of dealing with
Speaker 1: all of the layered crises and complexities that we've all
Speaker 1: individually and collectively been navigating for years now. I can't
Speaker 1: remember the last time, to be honest, right, that I
Speaker 1: felt truly, truly, truly truly about society, truly stable, truly
Speaker 1: like things are going to be okay. We'ven't felt this
Speaker 1: in a while. We've been on edge, which is why
Speaker 1: I'm talking today about the ways that I have found
Speaker 1: to help myself, and I hope that all of you
Speaker 1: are looking and finding the ways that will help you.
Speaker 1: But doing this work of researching, analyzing current events and affairs,
Speaker 1: making it digestible to all of my listeners and readers
Speaker 1: takes a toll, because I'm a person who, for way
Speaker 1: too long was unable to detach myself from the grief
Speaker 1: that was in the headlines and the life I am leading.
Speaker 1: So I was carrying all of this weight and sadness
Speaker 1: of the world with me everywhere like a giant anchor,
Speaker 1: and recognizing that if I did not learn how to compartmentalize,
Speaker 1: how to be an observer but not an absorber, and
Speaker 1: let me say that again, to be an observer but
Speaker 1: not an absorber, then I was not going to be
Speaker 1: able to continue doing this work. So for me, through
Speaker 1: the pandemic, I developed and began to hone skills that
Speaker 1: allowed me to center my peace and joy even in
Speaker 1: the midst of grave hardship. Physical movement going on walks
Speaker 1: for me is meditative. It's really hard in the winter,
Speaker 1: and I have to figure out other ways to release
Speaker 1: right because for me, I need a physical release right
Speaker 1: of movement that is both meditative, can take me out
Speaker 1: of my body but also drop me into my body
Speaker 1: in a real way. Cycle does that for me too,
Speaker 1: because I can zone out, just listen to the music
Speaker 1: and ride right. And like if I were a biker
Speaker 1: on a road, which I would never do in the
Speaker 1: city because I'm terrified of being hit by a car,
Speaker 1: but if I were to ride you can see how
Speaker 1: the road right for bikers avid bikers becomes incredibly meditative
Speaker 1: and you're just like in it. So for me, I
Speaker 1: need to be in physical movement that allows me to
Speaker 1: kind of drop out right of what's around me and
Speaker 1: really in side of my body. So that's one. Two
Speaker 1: is that I really shrunk my circle of friends in
Speaker 1: a serious way because I realized that we fill our lives.
Speaker 1: I was filling my life with a lot of extra
Speaker 1: fluff and stuff that didn't need to be and again
Speaker 1: through COVID, that all naturally got stripped away because you
Speaker 1: weren't able to, you know, take that dinner date, that
Speaker 1: coffee date, do you know this meetup, that meet up,
Speaker 1: that happy hour, And so those kind of extra layered
Speaker 1: people fell away. I no longer work in an office
Speaker 1: or in a studio. I work from home, and so
Speaker 1: again those kind of extra ness fell away. And for
Speaker 1: me that ended up being a really good thing because
Speaker 1: then who was left I knew were like my people.
Speaker 1: So who are your people? Not the people that just
Speaker 1: tell you that everything is gonna be okay when you know,
Speaker 1: for fock's sakes, it's not and we don't know. But
Speaker 1: that you can be real with, you can be raw
Speaker 1: with that can hold space for you, and you in
Speaker 1: turn can hold space for them right that you leave
Speaker 1: their presence feeling lighter, feeling better. Right. And that is
Speaker 1: again about connecting with your body, How do I feel?
Speaker 1: I told myself that once we were able to reconnect
Speaker 1: with people, I was no longer going to just say
Speaker 1: yes to things right like that. I was going to
Speaker 1: take a beat and see how the invitation felt to me.
Speaker 1: Does it feel heavy? Does it feel light? Do I
Speaker 1: find myself wanting to come up with an excuse as
Speaker 1: to why I can't do it, which means that I
Speaker 1: don't really want to do it, so then why am
Speaker 1: I doing it? Right? Funny enough, I was watching one
Speaker 1: of these like old you know, not really old, I guess,
Speaker 1: but like in comparison Christmas Movies for Christmases with Reese
Speaker 1: Witherspoon and I think Vince Vaughan, and I started watching
Speaker 1: it because I like to watch it like mindless Christmas movies,
Speaker 1: as many people do, hence why they're marathoning throughout the
Speaker 1: holiday season. But you know, they were talking to people
Speaker 1: in the beginning of the movie about like why they
Speaker 1: hadn't spent the holidays with their families in three years
Speaker 1: because both of them and mind you, a lot of
Speaker 1: these Christmas films, like if you look at them with
Speaker 1: a proper lens, you're like, wow, this is really fucked up.
Speaker 1: This is really toxic, So let's just suspend you know
Speaker 1: that for a moment. But what they did bring up
Speaker 1: is all the ways that people turn themselves into pretzels
Speaker 1: right in order to make other people happy, particularly during
Speaker 1: the holiday season. So they were talking to like, you know,
Speaker 1: colleagues at a Christmas party, and both of the colleagues
Speaker 1: were dreading, you know, they're seventeen pickups that they had
Speaker 1: to do at the airport. They're like sleeping on uncomfortable
Speaker 1: sofas and listening to somebody's terrible jokes and like engaging
Speaker 1: with family that they would rather not be with and
Speaker 1: they would rather just take a you know, a vacation.
Speaker 1: And then, you know, as Reese Witherspoon and her boyfriend
Speaker 1: are sharing, they're like, don't you feel guilty? Like you're
Speaker 1: just going off and doing your own thing, lying to
Speaker 1: your families. Don't you feel guilty? And they're just like,
Speaker 1: do I feel guilty about taking a vacation during the
Speaker 1: only vacation that I have for the year. No? And
Speaker 1: so I want us to, you know, think about Sure,
Speaker 1: there are always things that we have to do, but
Speaker 1: there are actually more things, I believe, you know, outside
Speaker 1: of work. In taxes, that we have a choice and
Speaker 1: can make a choice about how how we want to
Speaker 1: break bad traditions, toxic traditions, engagements and conversations and experiences
Speaker 1: that leave us wanting or feeling bad and remake them.
Speaker 1: Just because something has always been doesn't mean that it's right,
Speaker 1: and we each have the ability and the opportunity to renew,
Speaker 1: re engage, figure out what actually works, because sometimes doing
Speaker 1: the same old, same old doesn't. And of course we
Speaker 1: know that doing the same old, same old, but expecting
Speaker 1: a different result is in fact one of the definitions
Speaker 1: of insanity. We know, right, folks, that life is really
Speaker 1: precious and also really short, and so the questions that
Speaker 1: we have to be asking ourselves is how do we
Speaker 1: want to be living? How do we want to feel?
Speaker 1: And lead with that. You know, one of the books
Speaker 1: that I've mentioned before on this show, and if you've
Speaker 1: had the ability to listen to one of my other shows,
Speaker 1: The New Abnormal, I had the ability to interview one
Speaker 1: of the sisters, the co authors of Burnout, The Secret
Speaker 1: to Unlocking the Stress Cycle. Emily Nagowski and Emilia Nagowski
Speaker 1: wrote this book, and I had the ability to interview Amelia,
Speaker 1: and you know, everything is about whether you're into Western medicine,
Speaker 1: Eastern medicine, you know, metaphysics, all of these different things
Speaker 1: is about what is causing me my stress, how to
Speaker 1: get to the core of it, how to move through
Speaker 1: these cycles and stop them. And the holidays for a
Speaker 1: lot of people bring up a lot, a lot, a
Speaker 1: lot of stress. One of the things that she says,
Speaker 1: that they say in this book that I think is
Speaker 1: pretty amazing is about looking for your something larger. They
Speaker 1: write this, some people know exactly what there's something larger is,
Speaker 1: and others take years to figure it out. Amelia has
Speaker 1: always known, even when she didn't know, she knew. She
Speaker 1: has wanted to be a choral conductor since she was twelve,
Speaker 1: and here she is with three degrees in leading choral
Speaker 1: ensembles an impressive resume of conducting gigs. Emily stumbled from
Speaker 1: school to work to school again until looking to trace
Speaker 1: the pattern of the door she had walked through. She
Speaker 1: finally figured it out about twenty years after Amelia. Our
Speaker 1: experiences discovering the sources of meaning in our lives might
Speaker 1: suggest there is no predictable way for each individual to
Speaker 1: find it. For themselves, but the common thread is an
Speaker 1: inner voice that you can hear if you stop and listen.
Speaker 1: Everyone has it. Ask yourself, what am I doing when
Speaker 1: I feel most powerfully that I'm doing what I meant
Speaker 1: to be doing. If you're still struggling to recognize your something,
Speaker 1: larger research has found a few strategies that can help.
Speaker 1: Try writing your own obituary or less morbid a life
Speaker 1: summary through the eyes of a grandchild or a student.
Speaker 1: Osk your closest friends to describe the real you, the
Speaker 1: characteristics of your personality and your life that are core
Speaker 1: to your best self. Imagine that someone you care about
Speaker 1: is going through a dark moment in their life, which,
Speaker 1: as I'm saying, we all have been. They've experienced significant
Speaker 1: loss and feel helpless and isolated. As your best self,
Speaker 1: write that personal letter to support them through this difficult time,
Speaker 1: then reread it. It's for you. There are all different
Speaker 1: ways for us to be able to navigate this thing
Speaker 1: called life and to center ourselves and our joy and
Speaker 1: ease is not selfish. It is actually an act of
Speaker 1: resistance to the darkness. So I wish for you all,
Speaker 1: as we gear up to start anew to really think
Speaker 1: about who we are and how we want to be,
Speaker 1: because that is how we spread more light, more joy,
Speaker 1: and renew without the burnout. That is it for me today,
Speaker 1: dear friends on Woke a f as always Power to
Speaker 1: the people and to all the people power. Get woke
Speaker 1: and stay woke as fup.