Break This One Habit and Watch Your Self Worth Transform w Davina Rankin – YouTube Dictation Transcript & Vocabulary

1.when i think back at it now i always kind of felt like i wasn't really enough everything kind of got thrown upside down i left my marriage i had to do a full 360 of my life and what i realized was that today's guest is an embodiment coach energetic healer keynote speaker and founder of the upgrade in the upgrade space her journey from public figure to deeply embodied leader has been one of radical transformation which we dive deep into joining us today is davina rankin i know that recently you have gone through a bit of a celibacy choice experience what actually led to you making that decision i was doing lots of work for you know zoo and ralph and fhm and i felt external validation i got from others the more confident it made me feel i always say it's um you know poor spiritual hygiene to allow everyone access to you and i think for a really long time of my life i was leaky with my energy i gave it to everyone and anyone who needed it now i'm like sorry no i say no to everything you said that you came face to face with some really uncomfortable truths about yourself would you be comfortable sharing some of those it's going to make me emotional [Music] um all right balancers i'm back at the pivotal conversation studio here on the gold coast and joining me today is the lovely deina deina welcome to the balance thank you so much for having me i'm so excited to have you here i think just based off the brief interaction we've just had before we jumped on air like i'm very excited to hear more about your story and and just connect with you deeper you know when you meet people and you just feel a click tribe yeah yeah yeah so i know that recently you have gone through a bit of a celibacy choice experience i'd love for you to share with us what actually led to you making that decision why did you make that decision and what that experience has been like for you yeah well i guess taking it all the way back my whole life when i think back at it now i always kind of felt like i wasn't really enough so you know growing up as a teenager i was always looking at the girls and the video clips and i worked in retail for a majority of like my teenage life so being surrounded by like mannequins that had like the perfect bodies and these big beautiful boobs and hips um i wasn't really that blessed so i had always kind of felt like i was a little bit you know one step behind so i felt and i saw myself constantly trying to you know be more or trying to find more validation or i guess trying to show up in a version of myself that wasn't quite me in order to be loved um so i found myself as soon as i got as soon as i turned 18 i invested in implants and i was so happy with them because i was like "yay i finally feel sexy i finally finally feel confident." um and i really threw myself into like modeling so this was like back in the day when like men's magazines were like a thing well there was like magazines um so i was doing lots of work for you know zoo and ralph and fhm and that kind of stuff and really i feel like i felt that the more external validation i got from others the more confident it made me feel um but i guess there was always a part that just i didn't quite feel whole so you know i constantly felt like i was chasing and chasing and chasing and that kind of showed up in so many different ways like with choosing the wrong people in relationships or the wrong type of men um friendships social circles just it things just never quite felt aligned for me and now i really understand why um but it wasn't until i gave birth to my beautiful daughter um that i gave birth to my daughter right in the middle of co so not only was it was like oh my gosh you're a mom now your whole life has turned upside down it was like you now have to just sit inside and like deal with it and not have any social interaction you've completely cut that external validation totally yeah and i was going through a huge thing so i think there was just years and years and years of different types of trauma and interesting things that have popped up over time that it had been so easy for me to distract myself from and then you know having such a huge life transition with becoming a mom doing it also through co i was also a new wife um too like in those few years i just found myself really coming face to face with some really uncomfortable truths about myself um that i had never really sat with myself and looked at my shadows and looked at my ways of thinking and looked at these cycles that were playing out in my life um and with that you know everything kind of got thrown upside down i left my marriage i had to kind of do a full 360 of my life and really start doing some deep internal work and what i realized was that i have been using everything else as a crutch in order to not kind of face my inner demons or my shadows so i when i came out of my marriage i really just wanted to devote a lot of time to myself and to my healing i didn't want to distract myself from it anymore i i was really excited just to sit with myself and just to pour this love and attention that i so easily was pouring out to others into myself um and i was really excited because i you know was able to just not date be celibate and pour all my love into me for one whole year and that was like a huge milestone for me um and now i'm like on nearly 2 and 1/2 years wow yeah yeah and um i it has been the most incredible incredible journey for me like i feel more like myself now than i ever have in my whole entire life i'm really i'm really certain and i'm really um i'm really grounded and i'm really know who i am which is really beautiful cuz i think my whole life i was trying to figure out who i was through different people through different experiences through different you know crutches but at the end of the day what i really needed to do was like ignore all of that and come back to me and it hasn't been a pretty journey but it has 100% been worth it yeah this is such a a running theme with so many guests where they kind of reach this point in their life and i think this is a part of our human experience right where we realize the layers that sit around us and we have to come to a point if we want to be authentic we have to work out what parts are really us and what parts are just taken on from other people's opinions or stories as as time has gone on i'm going to ask you more about celibacy i'm going to ask you more about the external validation but i want to know you said that you came face to face with some really uncomfortable truths about yourself would you be comfortable sharing some of those yeah oh god i don't even know where to start maybe even just just the biggest one that was the biggest epiphany for you or yeah you know i think the biggest thing was if you were to ask any of my friends or family they would be like "oh she's so confident she's so loud she's so outspoken like um she she must be fine um so i think the biggest part like yes there is a big part of me that is loud and extrovert and seemed quite confident but the biggest underlying thing was this sense of unworthiness i just never felt worthy um i always felt like maybe love was going to be fleeting so i had to show up and be more or do more or chase like i never felt like things were meant to come easily or naturally so i spent a lot of my time forcing like a lot of my relationships i literally made happen um which i mean look it's not a bad thing like if you want something go get it cool but like from what place are you chasing you know are you chasing because you feel like you need this in order to feel whole or are you chasing because this is something that's meant for you so i never really had that connection to self to quite understand you know in what direction i was going i think i just followed what i thought i needed to do or what i thought or who i thought i needed to be i never actually was guided by my intuition or my connection to self um yeah i was very busy there was a lot of head noise constantly and it feels really nice now because i i just be i really just be um and i feel genuinely so comfortable in my skin now um oh another thing that happened in that interim when i was a new mom and that whole thing i realized that my implants were making me really sick i've heard this happen to so many people yes so i that was another huge thing and i i realized that i was going to have to have an expplant so that was another huge thing that came up i was like well who the [ __ ] am i if i'm not like sexy with boobs like not only am i a new mom i don't know who i am but now i have to lose my boobs like it was actually i got flipped upside down and i'm so grateful because i feel like it really just threw me in the deep end it was like my body and the universe had been trying to tell me over all these years in like little subtle ways like "no you don't need to do this no like maybe think again." but then it was like "well you're clearly not listening to me i'm going to turn your whole world upside down." um yeah so i had to really practice radical self-love because i'm like no amount of vanity is worth my health now that i have this little baby like i'm not going to put my life at risk in order to be appealing anymore like especially if it just leaves you in this perpetual state of unworthiness right and feelings of not being enough i can definitely relate to your experience obviously i've had a very different one but in the sense of growing up thinking that this feeling of enoughness or worthiness will come from outside in and it's really actually powerful when you realize you make the shift and you realize it's an inside out feeling and you can find it in any moment and god it takes a lot of work and you have to practice it and and even once you're good at it like you still have bad days i still have moments where that those feelings creep up and i can notice them and i know what to do and how to navigate them now but it's such an important thing to learn and i think everyone's on their own journey and will have their own signs and experiences to get there but it's really important to find that self-acceptance i mean that's that's why i love hosting this show because i love sharing so many people's different experiences to inspire other people to find that within themselves so if we kind of circle back to celibacy how did that even come up as something where you're like this is going to be a part of this radical self-acceptance this period where i'm going to focus on myself like i mean i i guess in my circles anyway it's not something widely spoken about it's not something like healing journey so it came across that someone recommended like how did you come across it and then how did you decide like yes this is right for me yeah well honestly i think i accidentally fell into it because at that point of time you know going through a separation with a little one is tricky as it is i really didn't want to make any decisions that were going to jeopardize the relationship there um so that was really at the forefront of my mind and two i just had no energy i had no energy you know i the last thing i needed to have on my plate was trying to like date someone you know i i really just wanted to pour this time and effort into myself and into my daughter and into my growth like i didn't even really know what i wanted to be doing work-wise so things so everything has changed in 2 years for me um and i feel like by keeping my energy to myself you know that's sexual energy as well it's it's creative energy so i feel like by me just sticking to my bubble by me just pouring love into myself i was able to like create and i was able to birth and i was able to like have these beautiful new ideas um that i don't think i would have had the space for if i was being leaky with my energy and i always say it's um you know poor spiritual hygiene to allow everyone access to you and i think for a really long time of my life i was leaky with my energy i gave it to everyone and anyone who needed it or if i could help out or if i needed to feel more important or more needed i would just and i'm like i'm done i just want to focus on myself and um yeah it's it's honestly amazing what can happen in a year when you pour all of your energy into yourself it's beautiful and not having to think about anything else except for you and your well-being and your daughter and your business and what dreams you have if you're not yet taking collagen you might be missing out on one of the simplest ways to support your hair skin and joints i recently learned that by the time you hit your 20s your body starts producing less collagen every single year that's why experts swear by supplementing it so a few months ago i started using one i actually trust the product is called collagen beauty by neutra organics and honestly i have noticed a very big difference in my skin and hair health 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the show notes and use the code the balance theory at checkout and by the way they do ship internationally so no matter where you're listening from you'll be able to use the code and try the products for yourself let's get back into today's episode yeah it's it's also just a really beautiful permission piece for me to be able to know that like i can say no to people i was such a people pleaser such a yes person um and i would feel deathly guilty if i if you know somebody wanted something from me and i didn't feel like i really wanted to do it i would still say yes can relate to that you know like and now i'm like sorry no i say no to everything and without an explanation too like i used to have to over i used to overexlain why i want to say no to people which is ridiculous but that's just you know the conditioning that we have we must justify it totally we must be good girls we must like do things for others we must say yes like we must be there but it's like you know i feel like when i say yes to myself i also allow other people the space for them to look after themselves too like i don't need to save everyone yeah yeah it's it's right because like in i look at my very close friendship group now and if one of them were to say "look i really need this night to myself." there is not a part of me that would be like "oh my god she's canceled on me." like because there's that mutual respect and and vice versa like if if i go to the extent of saying "hey i'm pulling out of tonight cuz i'm not feeling it or i'm tired." there's no judgment so it's really important to surround yourself with people that you know are on the same page or have people around you that are prepared to like match match your energy and like reciprocate those boundaries um one thing i'm sorry oh i was going to say well that's a that's a really good thing to talk about too like when you are on your healing journey and you do start saying no to people and you do start having boundaries and you do start flourishing or you do start you know having a bit more vitality or radiance about you people don't like it and they disappear they are gone skis and thankfully um you know i have such a beautiful group of girlfriends and they've seen me over all of my different eras and they love me no matter what but it's been really beautiful too to see like where i had been pouring energy in and where it's not reciprocated and i don't have any energy vampires in my life and if there is a space or you know a room that doesn't align with me now i'm like okay sorry like it just it's really nice you actually just naturally get rid of the vampires when you decide to step into your power yeah i i love this analogy of thinking of your energy like something that's leaking like something that's a reserved amount being very mindful who you give it to this is like this has been a journey i've been on the last 2 years i think especially since i moved overseas my life kind of hit the reset button across everything across the people i could see on a on a regular basis where i was training uh where i was living how i was commit button so it was like this really cool opportunity for me to reallocate my energy um even with who i'm staying in touch with right from australia it's like the people i used to have coffees with like where are they now you know like it's it was a really good forced cleanse for me and i think i really needed that because i was sitting in that leaky energy place where i would say yes to everyone and i felt so guilty if i couldn't be everything to everyone all the time and i just was nothing to myself you know i was i had a very very similar experience one of the things i wanted to ask you about which i'm actually very interested to hear in your experience so you talked about how you know you kind of had this external validation and you felt sexy when you had this praise and you you know this poster woman on the front of men's magazines and you felt really feminine and confident so now that you've kind of had a polar opposite experience right you have shared how you had an expplant you are now uh on this celibacy journey so it's like really quite the opposite how do you feel about your feminine energy now yeah well going back to the men's magazines and stuff i actually didn't feel confident i looked it right um i never felt confident but the praise and the validation still filled something for me even though i didn't feel confident you know and like surface level yeah yeah so my energy now i honestly love myself now like i would be so proud of deina i would be proud of me now if i was looking at myself in the future 10 years ago if i was to see this woman who is a mother and how she's showing up for it's going to make me emotional um yeah i would feel really proud of myself and like i this is who i want to be for my daughter and this is who i want to be for my friends and yeah like it's i it's also who i want to be for other women and that's why i love the work that i do like working in embodiment and en energetics and being able to be a safe space for other women to feel held and loved and accepted and not judged um because look i've done my fair share of judge judgment on myself and for other people over the years because i wasn't happy within myself so now being able to be in a place where i feel so secure and solid and grounded i'm actually able to show up for everyone in such an authentic and honest and caring and loving way like i have never been this kind or this loving or this supportive genuinely ever in my life but i had to walk you know the road myself in order to get here like i can't you can't be that person for other people if you're not that person for yourself first you know there's always going to be resentment for other women who are doing well if you're honestly feeling like you are not enough you know you can you can't be there for other people if you are coming from a place of lack or scar scarcity scarcity um it's just not going to happen so now i can see like wow it is worth it because how i can show up in the world for others now is so much more than what i could have ever thought i could have before that's really beautiful and i would actually love to dive deeper into the work you do now because one of the things that i get a lot of comments for that people love about the show is um how practical tips really do come out of the conversations we have so one of the things i'd really love to ask you this shift from looking for external validation to really being able to sit with your own self-love what are some practical things that you either teach or that really worked for you that help with that transition yeah i think sitting with yourself is one of the most terrifying things that one can do really if they haven't done that before and you're talking literally like sit there and like meditate like when you say that what do you mean well even just like say if you have just come out of a breakup being at home by yourself without drinking without dating without distraction distraction or eating um literally just being able to sit in whatever emotions are arising is really uncomfortable because we live in a day and age where we are pumped with distraction like we are not doing the same thing for longer than 10 minutes at any given time where all all over the place so i remember when i first started going to yoga and i would arrive in the room and i would see like the yogis on their mats and they'd be like breathing and stretching and they'd be like taking up space with like their pre-stretches and i would arrive and be like "okay like i feel so [ __ ] awkward sitting here like i don't want to make any noises like when's the lady going to come in and start?" and that was like right at the beginning of my journey and now i go to my yoga class and i arrive and i'm like "okay what feels good?" and i like let my body ease into the moment and i realized i'm like "wo it's funny how much more okay i am with being in my body now than what i was before i used to feel so uncomfortable being in my body it wasn't the room or the yoga class that made me feel uncomfortable it was me being me that made me feel uncomfortable that i wasn't able to relax in a room full of strangers um so just being able to feel what is coming up in your body is one of the toughest things that one can do so embodiment is you know becoming curious in what your body is telling you having like seatic inquiry what is this feeling that i have in my chest right now sitting in front of erica like what is this okay maybe i'm there's a little bit of fear of being heard here am i going to say the right thing am i going to offend someone just being able to sit in and take notice of what's coming up for you without judgment and just knowing that whatever you're feeling is actually okay we don't need to fix it sometimes we just need to acknowledge it really interesting and so i mean cuz obviously like a lot of people talk about things like meditation and journaling is there anything quite niche or specific you've done whether it be a specific practice or way of doing things that you found quite useful that you could share with the listeners yeah i've journaled every single day since the 22nd of the 2nd 2022 that was the first day that i wrote in my journal and i was like "oh my god." and i was pretty i started journaling because i felt that there was too much going on in my mind i was kind of in a crossroads of my life i wasn't sure what was going to be happening um and ever since then journaling has been such a powerful tool for me every single day some days i journal about things that i'm worried about other days i journal about my wins and how great life is some days i journal in the morning to figure out you know what my day is going to look like how i'm going to tackle any obstacles that will pop up um some some days i journal at nighttime to just offload everything from the day so i can start my day fresh the next day but writing things down and having the perspective of being able to you know look at your day or your thoughts on paper is a really powerful tool and it gives you a lot of clarity i find and it's also a really great way to set yourself up for success as well yeah there's a reason so many people talk about it you know it wouldn't be as widely spoken about if it wasn't a valuable tool and i think with journaling it's one of those things where you can just like do what feels right for you like there's obviously specific ways you can follow but people also just free free right which is just a way to like brain dump right my therapist calls it brain dumping which is quite useful you can do it on your notes on your phone too if you don't have like a physical journal like it's just a way to expel what's in your mind yes um so for someone listening who resonates with what we're saying they maybe currently feel they are or have been through many years of seeking this external validation what's like a simple first step they can do to start shifting back into their own self-care their own self-love m i would honestly recommend journaling to start with because it's a really great way that you can see what works in your life and what doesn't so i was starting to notice you know in my journal the days that i would have my bad days i would be around specific people interesting you know you can start picking up on those cycles and and then i would realize the things that made me feel really good um so it's just a nice way for you to kind of have a bit of a compass because you know at the beginning of your journey it is hard to figure out what it is you actually like or what it is that you've been told to like um so yeah it's hard to distinguish what's you and what's the layers of you exactly so journaling is a really great way for you to start to figure out okay what do i like what do i want to explore um and then i think too this is an interesting one but i love i am so in like i'm very funny with my instagram and i only follow people that i genuinely have an interest in um and i feel really awkward when i meet new people and they're lovely but i don't follow them back because i'm like i appreciate you but i really just want to surround myself when i am distracting myself on social media yeah i want to make sure i'm looking at the right things and i'm looking at things that are in alignment to what i what i'm interested in now so i kind of went through and did a massive cull of my instagram cuz i was kind of following a whole heap of people that were hot or like gym people and things like that and i was like i don't think that's me anymore what is something that i'm interested in so it was more the holistic side of things more health and wellness side of things more like natural hacks and stuff so you know we do spend a lot of time on social media so if you can clean it up and make it like informative and educational then yeah it'll just make that growth a little bit easier cuz at least you're distracting yourself with things that you find beneficial 100% and it's one of those it's an easy thing to do because we're so programmed to just even i like you know you just open your phone you go on instagram sometimes you don't even think about it yeah if you can curate that environment which is one you spend a lot of time in you know environments are not just physical places and not just physical people it's also the way we consume then that's a really good way to start subconsciously programming but i want to set a challenge for anyone listening who has been struggling with this external validation feels like they're not as connected with themselves maybe it's a phase maybe it's something they've been going through to try journaling for a week just try it and the reason i say that is i mean for me personally like i don't journal but i meditate right and i think whatever your thing is there's no right or wrong it's just carving out space to notice your thoughts and how you're feeling so if you don't allow for that space we just distract ourselves like really like sometimes i sit at home and i'm like i'm itching like i need to vacuum i'm going to cook i'm going to order this oh let me just check this email you know you just want to get up and go so having a practice like that anchors you first thing in the morning or last thing of the day so a 7-day challenge for anyone listening who feels they really need this like just commit for seven days and just see how you feel you know i think it's only going to be beneficial and you know as women it is our superpower to be able to feel and to be able to lead with our intuition to be able to lead with our feeling and we've been so conditioned to you know live our life with strategy and like it's all this cognitive stuff and of course it's going to feel really overwhelming but now i genuinely live my life that if it doesn't feel right then it's not right even if it might look right and there's some things like when i have to give an answer as to why i'm saying no it's like look i know it looks good but something just doesn't quite feel right about it and the more that you sit you know in your feelings and the more you sit in your body and you have awareness around what is a yes and what is a no like that is let that be your compass women are such amazing feelers and we have just been kind of numbed out to fit into you know societal norms or standards or strategy but when you can lead especially if you're a businesswoman or an entrepreneur like if you can have a heart-ledd or an intent an intuitively led business that is what's going to hit to you know your clients or the consumer but even just being a woman or a person in general when you are a felt person it's magnetic you can't you know you can tell someone a mile away that is embodied in who they are and what they believe because you're like "oh i don't know what it is about them but i love them whatever they'll say i want to listen to you know um i don't feel like she's trying to sell me anything because i feel that from her i feel her energy i feel her love or i feel her grace." so being able to come back to you know your felt senses and being able to have that connection with self you'd be so amazed at how that can guide you in the most divine ways yeah definitely i i've actually recently felt this in my journey where i i was briefly telling you before so worked as a corporate lawyer for like five six years and the corporate world was never for me and i kind of thought i'd be done and dusted with law um you know and and just find something else to do but 12 months ago i you know and through this podcast i've been doing a lot of work on myself embodiment understanding my own intuition trying to be the most authentic version of myself and i always kind of looked at my career as this very corporate clinical thing like i never really bridged those two things together and so when i left my corporate job and i started offering my legal services as a consultant right so now i have a bunch of clients that i do projects on with them um on a on as a lawyer i actually am able to show up as the same person and i show up as a host as a friend for my family i put the same energy into it and the way that has catapulted into success in that business is not something i could have imagined because i just thought that being a lawyer you know it has this very corporate stereotypical rap to it you know people wear suits it's really not me at all i would much rather meet my clients over at my favorite cafe where i know the waiters and everyone's really warm and get to know what they like about their lives not just a single project we're working on every time i share that i have a podcast they're so interested they follow they ask me for ones to listen to whereas before i used to be so scared even bringing it up cuz i didn't want anyone to think i was doing anything but work so it's really interesting when you give yourself permission to be more than one thing yeah to fully be authentic in every single area like to actually be able to say you know i show up the same for my friends that i do in my job like with the same energy and the same amount of care and it's genuine it's not forced it's really amazing what happens like i really couldn't have foreseen the success that came with that but it's just put me in this place and i'm so grateful where i just feel so much alignment and i feel really grateful that i didn't do away with law you know and i found a way to make it work and kind of create the real like i really loved the work but i hated the environment it was in so for me it feels like i've picked up the work and put it in an environment that works for me yeah so it's really powerful when you just don't know you know like i was sitting in so many jobs in the past thinking i hate this i don't want to do this for the rest of my life like why am i even here like how did i end up in this so for anyone feeling that like all these experiences lead you to where you need to be and they give you a point of reference for what's not right for you which is equally as important as those moments that are right for you yeah so i just wanted to share that cuz you're right like when you actually show up that way in all your areas equally you know and you can just be yourself and not have to turn it on and off depending on where and who you're with it's really powerful the way it magnetizes you know yeah and another thing quickly touching on that is when you do practice a more embodiment and you are able to sit in those uncomfortable feelings more and more that actually gives you more capacity to be able to enjoy the really good yummy feelings as well so like when you go through like when you are being heart led and you have like these bad days or these bad moments or these lessons that pop up but you're able to sit with it and be like okay i understand that's cool we can keep going your window of tolerance expands so when you actually allow yourself to feel the bad and to process the bad and to sit with the bad then you're also allowing yourself to be able to marinate in the really good and like i'm telling you when you are in alignment life feels really [ __ ] good but what we don't talk about is that some people have been so used to being within their comfort zone that when things start going good and things start feeling good they want to self-sabotage so embodiment and sitting with yourself and journaling and understanding what's popping up in your body is a really good way for you to be able to also have the capacity to deal with everything that comes with being in alignment as well because when you are in alignment it feels so good some days you're almost like why hasn't something gone wrong yet but it's like you know things can go wrong all the time or every day it's a bit of a roller coaster but you don't really notice it that much because it feels good doing what you're doing and being in alignment and you just have a different perspective too it's like i think like being in alignment is not that everything's rosy and perfect all the time it's just that you appreciate the es and flows of life you know it's all a part of it which is i think it's important to call out too yeah yeah i would love to dive into more like your the the transition of you going into motherhood because obviously that's one i'm about to embark on how did you find your experience with your identity becoming a mom and then your sense of self i mean i know that was like bubble wrapped in a lot of other things you were experiencing at the time but for new moms people that are moms that feel maybe they've lost themselves or are worried that that will happen can you share a little bit about your experience and thoughts around this yeah i well becoming a mom i completely lost myself but what i did realize was how mean i had been to myself because like i had this little baby with me and i was kind of you know with raising her i was also raising myself essentially it's like i had been reborn and i was kind of going through it and i'd realized because i struggled quite badly with postnatal depression um so realizing like how negative my thoughts had been was something that i was like wow i had been really beating myself down for many years so i actually through you know co i brought out a series of holistic kids books which were all about like affirmations um so the first one's called empowered moo second one's mindful moo and the third one's love within moo because i realized that if i had only just had these tools and understood this at a younger age or if my parents understood this and the importance of you know positive self-t talk positive body image positive selfimage um maybe the way i had or the decisions i had made through my life may have been different but then you never would have released those books you wouldn't be sitting here today exactly so it's it all it was all divinely planned and it was all meant to be and so although i lost myself for a moment through motherhood i also found myself in a really big way wow truly found myself um it didn't happen overnight and it wasn't pretty but i yeah it if she hadn't come along i really am not sure if i would be the person who i am today that's pretty incredible isn't it yeah yeah there's something very special about our babies and what they the gift that they are yeah that's i always say i'm actually very excited to learn from my kids like i think they teach you a lot because they're just so pure and innocent and they take us back to a time before a human is conditioned you know and they just know how to be and enjoy and have feel joy in their life and and she thinks i'm the sexiest thing in the whole entire world she's always like "oh my god mommy you look so good." like you were just oh like she pump pumps me up like you wouldn't believe and i'm just like wow like i wish i looked at myself the way you look at me you know like the way that they look at everything is just so beautiful and now i've been a been able to put those glasses on and just look at life at what it is like why have we over complicated it why are we putting so much pressure on ourselves like we're allowed to play i think that was the biggest thing i just didn't allow myself to soften or play or be connected with myself or with nature or with others truly cuz there was always such a fear of being seen or being heard or being left um so yeah it's just they're amazing they are amazing and i i say i think one of the best tips of advice that i can give to mothers is like to allow yourself to be a kid with them too like you don't always have to be in the mom role like allow yourself to play as well that's beautiful and so with all this work you've done kind of on yourself your own journey how has that kind of influence the way you you parent like are there any specific things that you do with your 5-year-old now that are a direct byproduct of the things you've learned and kind of tweaked for yourself yeah yeah for instance this morning like she was getting dressed and the necklace wasn't perfect and she absolutely cracked it and i really admire the way like at first when tantrums started happening or you know big emotions started happening i didn't know what to do this is prior to my own work but it would trigger the absolute [ __ ] out of me cuz i'd be like "oh my god this is too much i can't like but but what they are doing is so natural and normal and that is how we should be processing our emotions we should be like if we need to scream cool go scream if you need to shake it out if you need to sit on the ground and shake for a little bit or if you just want to cry like it's a process um and the reason we have you know stored traumas and stuff is because we're not allowing our body to complete a full process of feeling and emotion so that's why when you go into like a breath work or you know some kind of energetic healing your body starts moving in interesting ways because it's just you know doing that process and i just watched her this morning and she was like and then a real loud one would happen and i was like "wow you're amazing." and i just sit there and i'm like "do you need a hug?" and she's like "no." and i'm like "okay do you want me to go?" and she's like "no." and you know that she just wants to be held like she just well not literally but just being able to hold yes seen and heard and witnessed and supported um and it you know 2 minutes later she's like all right let's watch blueick like she's fine um so it's just a really beautiful reminder that like we're allowed to do that too we can go dance it out sing it out shake it out if we have to but like people feel so uncomfortable doing that for themselves they're like "no we have to be quiet." and yeah so just definitely allowing her to be big with her emotions and for us to talk about her emotions um and bring awareness to them in her body is something that i'm very very big on in our household yeah that's nice it just goes to show as well like how important you doing this stuff for yourself is for when that time eventually comes you know like for people listening i guess what i'm trying to say is whether you want to be a parent or not like it's it's really important foundation work to do for you because then i think even like you'll be a mentor for someone at some point whether it's siblings friends um you know even like parents now will kind of come to me for advice now that i'm a bit older and we have a different dynamic and so i think you working on yourself is a really beautiful way to then support other people as well you know it's just like an a byproduct that is just so beautiful yeah absolutely this is kind of making me think of i don't know why but in my mind i really want to ask you we you know we've talked about genuine self-love and and having these practices that help us do these things how do we know the difference with when it's genuine or when they're kind of just like band-aid fixes and things that were just ticking off like "okay cool i journaled this morning," you know yeah yeah well i think like genuine self love is isn't always pretty like sometimes it means like asking yourself some like questions like shadow work um going a bit deeper into maybe a cycle or bringing up something from the past that maybe we've wanted to forget about but in order to kind of move forward it's beneficial for you to sit with those uglier parts of yourself um maybe asking yourself you know what parts of this is true like am i narcissistic am i this can i show up like this some some days like just not always looking at the bright and bubbly parts of yourself and being like "oh you know i'll just have like a bath a magnesium bath and i'll feel better." but you know really working with your triggers like why is this popping up for me and what part of myself is this triggering you know and sometimes it's not really pretty m it's just that going a little bit deeper like a magnesium bath or a facial or like taking yourself to a retreat might not be that beneficial if you're dealing if you're dealing with some deeper traumatic things that are actually stunting your um evolution you know yeah yeah yeah yeah that makes sense like it's layered right and so those things that i kind of look at them like topical things they're beautiful and they can work so well when you do them in tandem with like the inner work totally um and the other thing that just made me think which is something i've really tried to understand and sit in the last few years is whether it's triggers or whether it's judgments so if i feel myself holding a judgment either about myself or about other people and often this one's interesting it's it's a judgment i think people will have about me it actually shows me what judgments i'm holding about the world right xy z you know if we go back to meditating if you let yourself sit in the curiosity of why do i you know think that it would be weird if i started a cooking page and people would start looking at me a certain way is it because i would think that someone is weird or i would be triggered by it so i think we constantly get these opportunities to be curious and learn about ourselves it's just whether you take the bite you know whether you let that then guide you and you be judgmental and you sit in that or whether you say actually i'm going to get curious on this and and get to know myself a bit better like that's something i've really tried to do to go deeper because the the it's sometimes scary right and you don't always get the opportunity every day or know like how to do that but just a a practical one for me is whenever i feel judgment or triggered is taking that curiosity down a notch rather than just being like "oh i feel so triggered." and sitting in that kind of top level frustration totally yeah absolutely and it's like it's work like it sucks yeah it sucks no one wants to be like "oh yeah like that's cuz i think like i'm a [ __ ] person or because i'm not good enough." like that's not easy to admit you know but it's important for your evolution totally yeah absolutely there's things that come up for me constantly especially with working with other people that i'm like why do i feel a way about this and then i'll go into i'll be like "oh okay cool." like just because you feel a certain way about something doesn't mean that you are that way it just means that you haven't had awareness around it before and you can change like you can change that you don't have to be that person um and coming back to celibacy um when it comes to self-love and self-care celibacy in itself can be like you know a band-aid of self-care and like self-preservation right but what goes into being celibate and maybe looking at your own uh self-love and self-care even that in itself isn't pretty like kind of going back into we're going to talk about a pleasure practice sorry guys um but coming back to myself and being like okay what do i even like how much performance have i been putting on for others it's like what how does it feel to be in my own body by myself through a pleasure practice and you know sitting back into my senses and things like that was so uncomfortable i call it like dearmoring um and that in itself was an absolute trip um you know just going back and figuring out who i am what i like what's normal what feels interesting um you you don't really have that kind of an opportunity when you're with different partners because you're too busy thinking like is this my good angle you know what is he thinking right now is this good enough for him is he going to call me tomorrow so like look celibacy is like the band-aid that can you know help with self- loveve and self-care cool but then what goes into the work that you do in your celibacy isn't always pretty like it's interesting the kind of you know traumas and emotions that actually get stored for a woman in her womb space and by exploring yourself can actually bring up like a lot of emotion and a lot of things that maybe you haven't wanted to address so that's a perfect example of like self-care and self-love but it's not even you know being celibate isn't always pretty or glamorous yeah no that's that's a really good call out and it's interesting it's just made me think like often you know when whenever you start your sexual experiences in life you just kind of are perpetually on this path like you may never actually stop to ask yourself those questions like and get to know yourself on that level because it's always like i don't know it might just be something you envision with somebody else so to actually then take this as like part of your own self-development and getting to know that like actually whether you're single or in a relationship would be extremely beneficial you know it's just another angle of getting to know yourself it's a it's um a high part of your energy it's it's a human need it's a part of evolution like it's a big part of life and so actually taking the time to understand yourself within that space i think is actually really interesting whether it's through celibacy or you know just actually taking the time for yourself and even seeing your own cycles around you know your own arousal or you know kinks or what kind of shame you have around you know whether it's masturbation or if you can't do it without watching porn or it is like a whole new thing in itself which is really fun to explore so much so that i'm studying sexology as we speak it's literally changed my life is coming back to myself and you know just figuring out who i am and what i like and i realize that we need to be talking about it more and we need to give women more permission to be able to feel embodied and to feel sensual and to feel okay in their body um because we are yes people and we're constantly trying to please and be everything for everyone else that when it comes time to us looking after ourselves we completely neglect it and i think there's something really powerful about a woman who's stepped into her pleasure and who owns her pleasure um it's yeah when you can unlock that side to yourself i feel like it completely can change your life like i know it completely changed mine um because i'm like "well what the actual [ __ ] have i been doing my whole life like life gets to feel this good why did i sit in mediocre for so long?" um yeah it was yeah that's so interesting so you're studying sexology so what is the most interesting thing you've learned so far well at the moment so i'm only right at the beginning of of it now so going into like nervous system and the brain the brain body connection the body mind connection um it's just so interesting and like our senses so yeah it's and the different ways that one can be aroused that we don't even think about there's so many different areas that are arousing for us that we are too busy in our life to even care about we just think that there's one way of doing things and that's it so there are so many different ways that we can bring pleasure into our lives um i think more than anything it's the embodiment part of it that i really love is being able to live fully and loudly and to be a sensual being i just feel sad that i was so numb for my whole life and that's not just you know numb down there i mean like numb in general i didn't allow myself to like sit and marinate and to feel calm or to feel bliss or i was just constantly running around and thinking my way through life um but yeah the embodiment side of things and being able to just feel comfortable being your authentic self is something that i just yeah i love and i wish yeah when i talk to different women too i think when you're embodied and you're calm in your nervous system you really allow people to feel calm in their their nervous system and to feel okay in whatever way they're choosing to show up right now um and that in itself can be so healing for another human because other humans aren't used to being like allowed to be themselves you know yeah well i'm excited to reh have a conversation when you finish your studies and you can give me all the tips and and download kind of what you've learned because this is such an interesting area i have a girlfriend studying it as well and i just think it's not something widely spoken about it's still like quite taboo but um it's something i'm i've definitely always been open to and and always interested to learn more about and as i said before it's important whether you're single or in a relationship so um very excited to see where that takes you but deavine i want to thank you so much for coming on the show today it's been um a real pleasure getting to know you and hearing your story and just being able to connect with you you have really beautiful energy and all the work you've done is very apparent um you just feel like a very grounded regulated human and it's been really nice connecting connecting with you today so thank you for your time thank you that's such a nice compliment no i really appreciate it and it's been an absolute pleasure love [Applause]