February 18, 2025 • 26 mins
Host: Celeste, The Therapist
Summary:
In this episode, Celeste, a seasoned therapist from Boston with over 20 years of experience in the mental health field, delves into the crucial role of awareness in personal transformation. She explains how becoming mindful of your behaviors can be the first step towards meaningful change, regardless of your background or the specific challenges you face. Celeste emphasizes the importance of not just listening to the podcast but actively engaging with the content throughout the week. Whether you're dealing with issues related to socioeconomic status, race, sexual identity, or any other area, this episode offers valuable insights into shifting the way you think. Tune in to learn practical strategies for increasing self-awareness and kickstarting your journey towards a healthier mindset.
Key Points:
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Introduction to Celeste's background and expertise
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The universal nature of struggles and the common themes in overcoming them
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The significance of awareness in changing behaviors
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Practical advice on how to engage with the podcast content for maximum benefit
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Call to Action:
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Follow Celeste on all social media platforms
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Watch the podcast with visuals on YouTube for an enhanced experience
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Click Here to Join the SHIFT Community
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Don't miss out on this insightful episode that could change the way you think and approach your personal growth!
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Website: www.stwyt.com
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Email: info@STWYT.com
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Follow Celeste: @CelesteTheTherapist
Celebrate this milestone episode by joining Celeste in shifting the way you think!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
Hey, hey, my name is Celeste. I'm a therapist from Boston and
I come on this podcast to help you shift the way you think. I've
been in the mental health field for over 20 years. I've worked with people
in so many different areas of their life. And so I have a
pretty good idea on how we get stuck and why we get stuck, which
is why I named my wellness center shifting the way you think. because
(00:23):
I do truly believe if we can work on giving ourselves
new information and shift our thought process just a little bit, it
can help us with how things are going. So
before we get started, I wanna remind you that when
you're listening to this podcast, it may be helpful to have a
notebook, take notes, and don't just let
(00:43):
this be the last time you look at this content.
Take time to look at this content throughout the week. A lot of the things
that I'm talking about is coming from my personal experience and
just my experience of working with people. Even though we come
from different socioeconomic statuses, different race,
color, sexual identity, whatever it is, I find that
(01:04):
a lot of the things that we struggle with, the theme is similar,
right? The way we can work on getting out of it is
very similar. And today's topic is about
being aware and how being aware of your behaviors is
the key to change. And regardless of who you are or what you're
struggling with, this topic can help you really think about
(01:25):
things differently. So if you've never
been here before, my name is Celeste, The Therapist. You can
find me on all social media platforms. If you're listening to me
on audio podcasts, this podcast does stream on
Zoom, not on Zoom, This podcast streams
on YouTube and I do some visuals to
(01:45):
help you, um, follow the content a little bit. So, um,
if you're not following me on YouTube, you can go to Celeste, the therapist and
find my YouTube links. I also have a wellness center
that's located in Stoughton, Massachusetts. So if you
want to work on different areas of your life, there's
workshops that we do There's somatic work that we we do and
(02:06):
if you're not familiar with somatic work somatic work is working
with the body a lot of times people aren't aware that a
lot of their stress and trauma and pain is stored in
their body and as a therapist I've always talked
to people about working on getting some
somatic work, right and And because people struggle
(02:26):
with not finding people that look like them in these classes It's
been near and dear to my heart to work on creating a
space so that people can have that and
so if you want to learn more about my Wellness Center, you
can go to stwy t.com again, that's
stwy t.com and you can Find
(02:47):
the events that are happening if you're a wellness provider and want to host an
event You can go to that website as well to find it
Alright, so let's talk about the importance of being aware When
you think about things that you're struggling with let's just
take for instance if you're bleeding, right? If you're not aware that
you're bleeding, how can you work on? Putting a
(03:09):
band-aid on and and not allowing that blood to drip
right also when you think about physical
health if you're struggling with some pain and
you go to the doctor and the doctor tells you that You know, I don't know what's
going on with you and you're in pain. Um, you might find yourself
struggling. So being aware of what's going on
(03:31):
allows you to make changes, right? If you can start to recognize
what you need, then you can begin to make changes. I
think a lot of things, a lot of times what's happening is sometimes
we're just so used to feeling how we're feeling going,
On with life the way we're going on with life and we don't think about
it any different. We have a lot of Automatic behaviors that
(03:53):
we do a lot of times is due to us in the
way that we've seen life happen, right? So there's a lot of patterns that
it's passed down from generation to generation a lot of times when
I think about different illnesses that are passed down like
diabetes high blood pressure a lot of people will be like, oh well that runs in
my family and And I'll say, you know, the lifestyle that you live runs
(04:14):
in your family, the way that you eat, the way that you sleep, the
way that you manage stress. And it's not like your caregiver
sat you down and said, hey, Celeste, I want you to live with stress. Hey,
Celeste, I want you to ignore the hard things that are happening. So
a lot of times it has nothing to do with a direct statement being
said, it's because of how you are in that environment. So
(04:36):
a lot of times we don't recognize that The behaviors that
we're having are automatic. So I'll just take
my physical wellness and the way
that I hold pain in my body. And if
you're a long time listener, I've shared this story before, but at
14, I remember being in the ER because I was hunched over
(04:58):
and my back was in so much pain. And I got
so used out. It was a lot of stress going on and
so I got used to the stress and not realizing how much
my back was impacted by the stress that I
was dealing with and it got to the point where I Went to
the ER and they didn't ask me about anything that was going on. They gave me
some pills That was it, right? So I remember that incident.
(05:21):
I remember what I had on I remember it took a couple of days for my
back to straighten up and it wasn't until I started my
wellness journey and I start to understand how much the body holds
on to pain and I started working doing yoga like
on my own on YouTube I couldn't afford to go to a Yoga studio.
I'm all about starting where you are and using what you have and
(05:42):
I remember when I was dealing with some stress I remember my back started
hurting and at that point I made the connection. I was like, oh
Celeste like when you're stressed when you're overwhelmed When
you're struggling, your back starts to
feel like something is heavy on it, right? And
it's like, why is it that as an adult is when I'm
(06:03):
learning this? There's no reason why we shouldn't know this. The
same way I know if I'm bleeding, I can go to the medicine cabinet and
grab a Band-Aid. I need to understand that when
my body is giving me signs, I need to understand that so I can know what
to do. But the issue is that Nobody's asking us
how we're feeling. We're not asking ourselves. We're not checking in with our body. Our
(06:23):
body will give us signs before our intellectual, like
our mind is beginning to give us signs. And so the
more that you understand that, the more you can work on
making changes. And so now at 42 years
old, I'm able to recognize like the pains in my back or
even my stomach to start to turn when I'm feeling anxious about
(06:44):
something. Then I'll start to have self-dialogue with myself and
I'll be like, it's okay. Everything's going to be fine. I literally
will soothe myself by the way that I talk to myself. That
inner dialogue that you have with yourself is so powerful and
so important because you don't realize a lot of times you're your
worst enemy. And you weren't born to talk bad about
(07:04):
yourself or to talk down to yourself. It was based off
of the experiences. It was based off of what was said to you, all
of those things. So it's not your voice that's happening. It's the voice of
everything that's happening, which is why giving yourself new information
is so powerful because it can drown out the noise of the negativity that
goes on in your mind over and over again. And
(07:26):
so when you think about these automatic behaviors that
are happening and how you just kind of make adjustments to
the pain, I really want you to become more aware and
really start to work through it. And so as we're talking about
this, right, and the importance of giving yourself grace
as you're trying to work on these changes, because a
(07:47):
lot of times we'll see the behavior and
then we will start to beat ourselves up for it. A
lot of times people don't want to take time to be mindful and understand what
they're thinking because they feel bad that they're thinking that
way. And I tell people, you know what, you're going to think that
way, that the way you're thinking it's going to happen, whether
(08:08):
you choose to get involved with your thoughts or not. And
so I really want to shift your mindset with reminding you,
like, it makes more sense to get involved with your thoughts, even
if they're hard to, like, comprehend and hard to
accept, because then you can work on change. Until
you become aware and cultivate that awareness, it'll
(08:30):
be really hard for you to work on creating change. So
I wanna like end with, so if you're new here, I
don't just talk about the issue, right? I talked about understanding the
importance of being aware, how we have these automatic behaviors.
Another example of automatic behavior is like people that
(08:51):
may smoke, right, to relieve stress, not realizing every
time I'm stressed, I'm lighting up. Every time I'm stressed, I'm going to the bottle. Every
time I'm stressed, I'm grabbing food because you've been doing it for so
long, right? And then becoming aware will allow you
to work on changing that pattern. And so I want to talk about
cultivating awareness because you may say, you know what, Celeste, you're right.
(09:12):
I don't pay attention to none of this stuff. I'm not aware of
what's going on and my behaviors and how I'm doing. All I
know is I want to change, but I'm not even beginning to understand how
this is taking place. So let's spend some time talking
about how you can work on cultivating awareness, because
this is a big part of how change is gonna
(09:34):
happen. So I really want you to really understand that. So
on the screen, as you can see, if you're watching me on YouTube, the first thing
is thinking about mindfulness meditation. So setting aside a
few minutes a day, sitting quietly can help you
get into a state of mindfulness. And it doesn't have
to be more than a minute. If you've never done this before, Just
(09:55):
take one minute, right? Increase it next week. Try two
minutes, then three minutes. I'm not asking you to sit down for 10 and
20 minutes like that. That's not really realistic. You want to ease
your system into becoming aware and having
these practices. When people get a heart transplant,
a lung transplant, And like literally their heart
(10:16):
or their lung is bad. And so their system is getting a
whole new heart that's way better than the one they have. Their
body can literally reject it because it's a complete shock
to their body. And so as the doctors are
putting that new heart and lung in, there are things that these people can't
do. There are medicines that they have to take to help work on
(10:37):
acclimating their system to this new heart and this new lung.
And that's what I want you to think about when you're working on change, because a lot
of times people are like, I want to do this. I want to do that. I'm like, that's cool. I love that
for you, but let's slow down and pump your brakes a little bit, because it's
going to take time to get there. And you don't want to overload your system.
Right? So as you're thinking about this idea of cultivating awareness,
(10:59):
I really want you to think about practicing mindfulness. And
working on doing that like a little bit at a time and
if you say it's less But when I sit down and I'm trying to be mindful my thoughts everywhere
great. That's great I love that for you because that's the
first step in understanding what's going on The second thing you could
work on with cultivating awareness is journaling Great practice
(11:20):
you could grab a notebook from the dollar store. I have a guided journal
called 365 days of intentional living where I actually
a new question every day. I asked you how you're feeling, right? There's
a ton of journals that are out there. But again, if cost is an issue
Grab something from the dollar store, a nice notebook, and
start your journey there. You can even go online and look up questions to
(11:43):
ask yourself every day. I can just give you the questions that I ask my
kids when we check in. We say, how are you feeling? What are you grateful
for? What did you do to prepare for tomorrow and what went well today?
So it doesn't have to be nothing specific, but
if you're not used to writing and journaling, it'd be nice
to just have some regular questions to ask yourself to
(12:05):
get yourself into a groove. And then you might find yourself going
off on your own. There's no wrong or right way to journal. It's what
works for you. But creating that practice will get
you more in tune to the moment. And as I said, the
questions that I asked my kids, a lot of those things allow them to get into the moment.
and allow them to work on gratitude and
(12:27):
paying attention to what they're feeling, right? So those are very intentional
questions that I'm asking my kids. The third
thing is self-reflection, right? So at the end of each day, just take a
few moments to reflect on how everything went. What did I
do today that I'm proud of? What can I have handled differently, right?
That self-reflection daily is important. If you're like, I
(12:48):
don't want to write, okay, that's fine. I'm not trying to force you
into one direction or another. I'm just trying to help you figure
out what direction and try something. And
so even if it's in the shower, if you're taking a shower every day, you're taking
a bath, in the bath, let that be the time to reflect. If
it's in the morning, What do I have going on today? How am I
feeling? Right? If it's at night, how did today
(13:11):
look like for me? What do I need for tomorrow? Really being
mindful of it. The next thing, cultivating awareness, my
favorite body scan. Our body's going to give us signs before we
do. There's a book that's really popular. The body keeps
the score. The body holds on to pain. That's why
I'm so into somatic work
(13:31):
and the body work and these classes that I have at my
center because I really want people to get more in tune
to Understanding what their body is feeling a great
way to do it. That's free, you know in this podcast We're going to talk about the
free ways. You can get your life together is YouTube You
go on YouTube and you type in five minute body scan meditation
(13:54):
I promise you a ton of them will come up and it'll have you sit
in and it'll be like They'll be like sit straight and they'll be like unlock
your jaw and the next you know, you play thing I even know my jaw was unlocked and
then they'll be like Relax your shoulders. And if you can see me, I'm
like, I put my shoulders down you well, I think I didn't know much I promise
you you don't realize just how wound up you are because
(14:15):
you're so used to being wound up and The
next thing is mindful breathing. Another one of my favorites,
like breathing free. We have access to it. So underutilized.
So throughout the day, just taking moments to focus on your breath. There
is again on YouTube, that's free type in breathing circle, two
minute breathing circle, and the circle will go in
(14:37):
and out. Right. And it'd be like, breathe in, breathe
out. Oh my God, that felt so good. Like literally, like
just taking those breaths can help you get into the moment
and release so much. A lot of times we have labored breathing.
If I'm feeling stressed, I can feel myself not
breathing, right? If I'm around somebody that's like stressed and
(14:59):
I'm like, all right, let's just take a deep breath, right? Cause I'm just an energy
person. So really being mindful of your breath
and making intentional time to breathe. Another way
to cultivate awareness Setting intentions setting
intentions and at the beginning of your day is so powerful So
for example, you might say today when I notice some stress, how am I
(15:21):
gonna respond? Right being mindful of
your intention so that you can work on creating
change The thing is is we don't got attentions. We're waking up
in the morning and We're hopping on our phone. We're going to social media and God
knows what you're gonna see every day on social media You got a freaking brace yourself nowadays
You know, no matter how much you curate your feed some of that crap
(15:43):
is gonna get in there You're gonna have conversations with
people and so I need you to understand do I want to set
my intentions with starting my day with the crap that's going
on in the world and not being intentional and or do I
wanna take time to be intentional and start my day with me?
I don't even have, my phone is not in my room at night.
(16:03):
My phone goes to another room. I let the
alarm wake me up, right? And I'm not jumping on
social media. I have so much going on.
I wear a lot of hats, mom, wife, wellness owner, manager,
like I do so much and I can't afford to
not be intentional about my life and my day. And,
(16:25):
you know, I was talking to somebody about why
I'm so intentional because I've been in this field for over 20 years. I've
worked in the ER. I've worked in group homes. I've worked in
so many different places and I've watched people lose their
mind. I feel like we play Russian roulette with our mind because
we're not intentional. about our day-to-day and what we need and
(16:46):
what we have to do for ourselves. And so I really want you to
be mindful, just because you may not be able to see what's
happening in real time, your system is breaking down when
you're not intentional. And in
2025, as I said, if you listen to the previous podcast, this is a really hard
time especially for me because like I'm
(17:08):
grappling with the reality of what is happening and
also walking people through what's happening and it
feels really heavy and so my intentions and
the way even with my self-care practices since
my watch was like a few days ago was like oh you
you have a 12-day streak of moving your body like
(17:29):
I didn't even realize just how much I've been leaning into
my moving of my body practice, right? It's not
just the gym, right? Because I just want to be intentional. You don't need a gym membership to
move your body. You can dance in front of your TV to music, right? Sometimes
I walk up and down my stairs and I've
really honed in on it. When things are out of my control,
(17:52):
I'm really big on looking at what's within my control. What can
I control that it's going to allow me to grow? Right? Because sometimes
when people, things are out of their control, they may, they may find themselves
eating more. Right? And so I really want you to be mindful of
what can I do for myself. So setting intentions is
a great way to cultivate awareness. Seeking
(18:14):
feedback is another way. So if you have like trusted family or
friends, I'm not talking about, no, just regular Joe Schmo. I'm talking
about people in your life that you love, that you have a reciprocal relationship
with. You can ask them these questions and ask them like, you
know, what kind of blind spots do you notice I have? Or
is there anything that you see in me that you think I could work on? This is
(18:35):
really great, right? Obviously, if you have a therapist that's helpful or a coach,
but I'm talking to people that may not have that. Asking
somebody in your life that you trust is important.
Number eight, you can limit distractions. So
reducing multitasking and the distraction in
your life. So social media is a big one,
(18:56):
right? So limit the time you have on social media. Please
limit the time. I can't stress that enough. If it's 5.05, look
at your time and say, okay, it's 5.05. I'm gonna stay on for 15 minutes, 20 minutes. Like,
what are you gaining from being on there? A lot of times, social
media becomes so addictive because it allows you not to focus
(19:17):
on what you're really feeling and what's going on. And that's why when it's time
to go to sleep, you can't go to sleep because what's happening is your mind
is scrolling from all the crap that you've been seeing and that light
is keeping you up. And then now you call yourself going to sleep,
but your mind wants to keep going. And then forget your social
media. What about the other problems and things you're not dealing with? Because
(19:39):
they feel too hard. You think just because you go to sleep,
your mind's going to go to sleep? No, it's waiting for you to answer the question. It's
waiting for you to finish that task. It's waiting for you to live
the life that you're supposed to live. And a lot of times, I
feel like our mind and body knows what we're capable of. And when we're not living
to the standards of what our mind and our system knows
(20:00):
we're capable of, we're gonna be struggling with so much anxiety and
so much having a hard time sleeping and resting. When
I was opening my wellness center, when I was starting my podcast, when I was starting
my business, all of these things that I started, I wrestled
with myself because I felt it in my spirit that
I was supposed to be doing these things that I'm doing. And I get really,
(20:22):
I get filled with gratitude and emotion when I think about
the time that we're in and the space that I have to offer for
people. It's like, geez, what a time to have
this wellness center for people to be able to
come and feel safe and feel seen and release
stress. I feel so grateful that I was
able to follow my heart and my spirit and
(20:45):
allow myself to do this regardless of the hardness that
it felt. It was very hard emotionally creating
this because this is way out of my element
of what I'm used to, right? It's not something, you know,
put me in a system and be a hard worker, but you want me to create the
system and create the thing? Been a huge challenge,
(21:07):
you know, um, so if you follow me on social media, I talk about that
a lot on my Instagram stories. And
then the last two is engaging in new experiences. This can be helpful
for cultivating awareness. Um, so you could try something like
a dance class or hiking a new trail. So these new
experiences can help you become more aware of your reaction and behaviors and
(21:27):
unfamiliar situations. Like I've put myself in hiking, gardening,
cooking, right? Like I think the little things that I've
done and really cultivated it really gave me confidence as
well. And then the last thing I wanna say is like really
practicing self-compassion, being kind to yourself while
you're on this journey. You know, I tell people all the time, like
(21:49):
you're with yourself 24 seven. So if you're with yourself
24 seven and that voice that is in your mind is always negative,
How are you going to make changes if you're beating yourself up all the time? Forget the
world, forget being black in America, forget everything that's
going on. If your own voice is not positive, how
will you begin to create change? It's really hard to do.
(22:12):
So I really want to encourage you to work on cultivating a
self-compassionate voice. You know, one of the things I think,
you know, as a therapist, I feel like the
way that The colonizing way that you're
taught is to diagnose what's wrong with you, not
what happened to you. I don't remember that being part
(22:34):
of the curriculum, what happened to you. I'm not big into diagnosis.
I'm not big into... labels, because
what I am big into is hearing somebody's story and
helping them make those connections. When you make those connections,
you breathe different. You're like, oh, okay, that makes sense. But
because we're not making those connections, we're not being aware of
(22:55):
what's happening, how could we work on change? And
so I wanna challenge you, right? Like as we're ending this
session, I really wanna challenge you to work on becoming aware
of what is and what's going on in your life without
judgment, with grace, right? With self-compassion. The
(23:17):
voice in my head, you know, I don't remember ever having
a voice of negativity, but I was always in survival mode,
always thinking like the worst case scenario, because if I'm going to stay ready
to be ready, because if something happens, I'm ready. I remember that feeling.
And it wasn't a good feeling to be in that space. My system
was literally breaking down on me. And so
(23:40):
having that voice where I am saying, it's OK,
Celeste, where I'm telling myself, oh, don't worry.
It's going to be OK. Try to get into the moment. My voice is
so much more compassionate to myself. And
that's what keeps me going. I'll say, OK,
if this doesn't work, it's OK. We'll go back to the drawing board. Have
(24:02):
that compassion with yourself. We can be our own worst enemy.
So I wanna encourage you to take time out to figure out,
okay, what does my life look like with
awareness? What are one of these things that I'm gonna try to take on
to work on cultivating awareness? Because when I
become aware of what is going on, I can create
(24:23):
changes in my life. So don't
forget follow me on all social media websites. I always say
like if you can Work on believing in
yourself and having faith you can work on creating change because
if you have faith in yourself Nobody can take that from you. Also.
I have a shift community. It's free. It's online
(24:44):
and I wanted a space to get off of social media So
if you are not following me on the shift community You could check
the show notes or you can go to my website. There's
a link that you can do to sign up And it's a
separate it's an app. You can have it on the app go in We
have two spaces in there right now besides the discussion space,
(25:05):
but we have a gratitude space You can go in there and start your journey there
and write in what you're grateful for There's also
a healing your inner child space healing your inner child is a class that
I do in my Center every quarter, right?
I started it this quarter. The next one's gonna happen in April
I believe like so much of our Struggle is
(25:26):
because of our inner child and how we haven't worked on healing it
So I teach you what it is and how to work on that Like
cultivating it and allowing yourself to be more aware
of your inner child. So you're not letting your inner child create The
direction of your life or the lens of your life, but you can find
all of that on my website stwy t.com and
Hey, hey, my name is Celeste. I'm a therapist from Boston and
I come on this podcast to help you shift the way you think. I've
been in the mental health field for over 20 years. I've worked with people
in so many different areas of their life. And so I have a
pretty good idea on how we get stuck and why we get stuck, which
is why I named my wellness center shifting the way you think. because
(00:23):
I do truly believe if we can work on giving ourselves
new information and shift our thought process just a little bit, it
can help us with how things are going. So
before we get started, I wanna remind you that when
you're listening to this podcast, it may be helpful to have a
notebook, take notes, and don't just let
(00:43):
this be the last time you look at this content.
Take time to look at this content throughout the week. A lot of the things
that I'm talking about is coming from my personal experience and
just my experience of working with people. Even though we come
from different socioeconomic statuses, different race,
color, sexual identity, whatever it is, I find that
(01:04):
a lot of the things that we struggle with, the theme is similar,
right? The way we can work on getting out of it is
very similar. And today's topic is about
being aware and how being aware of your behaviors is
the key to change. And regardless of who you are or what you're
struggling with, this topic can help you really think about
(01:25):
things differently. So if you've never
been here before, my name is Celeste, The Therapist. You can
find me on all social media platforms. If you're listening to me
on audio podcasts, this podcast does stream on
Zoom, not on Zoom, This podcast streams
on YouTube and I do some visuals to
(01:45):
help you, um, follow the content a little bit. So, um,
if you're not following me on YouTube, you can go to Celeste, the therapist and
find my YouTube links. I also have a wellness center
that's located in Stoughton, Massachusetts. So if you
want to work on different areas of your life, there's
workshops that we do There's somatic work that we we do and
(02:06):
if you're not familiar with somatic work somatic work is working
with the body a lot of times people aren't aware that a
lot of their stress and trauma and pain is stored in
their body and as a therapist I've always talked
to people about working on getting some
somatic work, right and And because people struggle
(02:26):
with not finding people that look like them in these classes It's
been near and dear to my heart to work on creating a
space so that people can have that and
so if you want to learn more about my Wellness Center, you
can go to stwy t.com again, that's
stwy t.com and you can Find
(02:47):
the events that are happening if you're a wellness provider and want to host an
event You can go to that website as well to find it
Alright, so let's talk about the importance of being aware When
you think about things that you're struggling with let's just
take for instance if you're bleeding, right? If you're not aware that
you're bleeding, how can you work on? Putting a
(03:09):
band-aid on and and not allowing that blood to drip
right also when you think about physical
health if you're struggling with some pain and
you go to the doctor and the doctor tells you that You know, I don't know what's
going on with you and you're in pain. Um, you might find yourself
struggling. So being aware of what's going on
(03:31):
allows you to make changes, right? If you can start to recognize
what you need, then you can begin to make changes. I
think a lot of things, a lot of times what's happening is sometimes
we're just so used to feeling how we're feeling going,
On with life the way we're going on with life and we don't think about
it any different. We have a lot of Automatic behaviors that
(03:53):
we do a lot of times is due to us in the
way that we've seen life happen, right? So there's a lot of patterns that
it's passed down from generation to generation a lot of times when
I think about different illnesses that are passed down like
diabetes high blood pressure a lot of people will be like, oh well that runs in
my family and And I'll say, you know, the lifestyle that you live runs
(04:14):
in your family, the way that you eat, the way that you sleep, the
way that you manage stress. And it's not like your caregiver
sat you down and said, hey, Celeste, I want you to live with stress. Hey,
Celeste, I want you to ignore the hard things that are happening. So
a lot of times it has nothing to do with a direct statement being
said, it's because of how you are in that environment. So
(04:36):
a lot of times we don't recognize that The behaviors that
we're having are automatic. So I'll just take
my physical wellness and the way
that I hold pain in my body. And if
you're a long time listener, I've shared this story before, but at
14, I remember being in the ER because I was hunched over
(04:58):
and my back was in so much pain. And I got
so used out. It was a lot of stress going on and
so I got used to the stress and not realizing how much
my back was impacted by the stress that I
was dealing with and it got to the point where I Went to
the ER and they didn't ask me about anything that was going on. They gave me
some pills That was it, right? So I remember that incident.
(05:21):
I remember what I had on I remember it took a couple of days for my
back to straighten up and it wasn't until I started my
wellness journey and I start to understand how much the body holds
on to pain and I started working doing yoga like
on my own on YouTube I couldn't afford to go to a Yoga studio.
I'm all about starting where you are and using what you have and
(05:42):
I remember when I was dealing with some stress I remember my back started
hurting and at that point I made the connection. I was like, oh
Celeste like when you're stressed when you're overwhelmed When
you're struggling, your back starts to
feel like something is heavy on it, right? And
it's like, why is it that as an adult is when I'm
(06:03):
learning this? There's no reason why we shouldn't know this. The
same way I know if I'm bleeding, I can go to the medicine cabinet and
grab a Band-Aid. I need to understand that when
my body is giving me signs, I need to understand that so I can know what
to do. But the issue is that Nobody's asking us
how we're feeling. We're not asking ourselves. We're not checking in with our body. Our
(06:23):
body will give us signs before our intellectual, like
our mind is beginning to give us signs. And so the
more that you understand that, the more you can work on
making changes. And so now at 42 years
old, I'm able to recognize like the pains in my back or
even my stomach to start to turn when I'm feeling anxious about
(06:44):
something. Then I'll start to have self-dialogue with myself and
I'll be like, it's okay. Everything's going to be fine. I literally
will soothe myself by the way that I talk to myself. That
inner dialogue that you have with yourself is so powerful and
so important because you don't realize a lot of times you're your
worst enemy. And you weren't born to talk bad about
(07:04):
yourself or to talk down to yourself. It was based off
of the experiences. It was based off of what was said to you, all
of those things. So it's not your voice that's happening. It's the voice of
everything that's happening, which is why giving yourself new information
is so powerful because it can drown out the noise of the negativity that
goes on in your mind over and over again. And
(07:26):
so when you think about these automatic behaviors that
are happening and how you just kind of make adjustments to
the pain, I really want you to become more aware and
really start to work through it. And so as we're talking about
this, right, and the importance of giving yourself grace
as you're trying to work on these changes, because a
(07:47):
lot of times we'll see the behavior and
then we will start to beat ourselves up for it. A
lot of times people don't want to take time to be mindful and understand what
they're thinking because they feel bad that they're thinking that
way. And I tell people, you know what, you're going to think that
way, that the way you're thinking it's going to happen, whether
(08:08):
you choose to get involved with your thoughts or not. And
so I really want to shift your mindset with reminding you,
like, it makes more sense to get involved with your thoughts, even
if they're hard to, like, comprehend and hard to
accept, because then you can work on change. Until
you become aware and cultivate that awareness, it'll
(08:30):
be really hard for you to work on creating change. So
I wanna like end with, so if you're new here, I
don't just talk about the issue, right? I talked about understanding the
importance of being aware, how we have these automatic behaviors.
Another example of automatic behavior is like people that
(08:51):
may smoke, right, to relieve stress, not realizing every
time I'm stressed, I'm lighting up. Every time I'm stressed, I'm going to the bottle. Every
time I'm stressed, I'm grabbing food because you've been doing it for so
long, right? And then becoming aware will allow you
to work on changing that pattern. And so I want to talk about
cultivating awareness because you may say, you know what, Celeste, you're right.
(09:12):
I don't pay attention to none of this stuff. I'm not aware of
what's going on and my behaviors and how I'm doing. All I
know is I want to change, but I'm not even beginning to understand how
this is taking place. So let's spend some time talking
about how you can work on cultivating awareness, because
this is a big part of how change is gonna
(09:34):
happen. So I really want you to really understand that. So
on the screen, as you can see, if you're watching me on YouTube, the first thing
is thinking about mindfulness meditation. So setting aside a
few minutes a day, sitting quietly can help you
get into a state of mindfulness. And it doesn't have
to be more than a minute. If you've never done this before, Just
(09:55):
take one minute, right? Increase it next week. Try two
minutes, then three minutes. I'm not asking you to sit down for 10 and
20 minutes like that. That's not really realistic. You want to ease
your system into becoming aware and having
these practices. When people get a heart transplant,
a lung transplant, And like literally their heart
(10:16):
or their lung is bad. And so their system is getting a
whole new heart that's way better than the one they have. Their
body can literally reject it because it's a complete shock
to their body. And so as the doctors are
putting that new heart and lung in, there are things that these people can't
do. There are medicines that they have to take to help work on
(10:37):
acclimating their system to this new heart and this new lung.
And that's what I want you to think about when you're working on change, because a lot
of times people are like, I want to do this. I want to do that. I'm like, that's cool. I love that
for you, but let's slow down and pump your brakes a little bit, because it's
going to take time to get there. And you don't want to overload your system.
Right? So as you're thinking about this idea of cultivating awareness,
(10:59):
I really want you to think about practicing mindfulness. And
working on doing that like a little bit at a time and
if you say it's less But when I sit down and I'm trying to be mindful my thoughts everywhere
great. That's great I love that for you because that's the
first step in understanding what's going on The second thing you could
work on with cultivating awareness is journaling Great practice
(11:20):
you could grab a notebook from the dollar store. I have a guided journal
called 365 days of intentional living where I actually
a new question every day. I asked you how you're feeling, right? There's
a ton of journals that are out there. But again, if cost is an issue
Grab something from the dollar store, a nice notebook, and
start your journey there. You can even go online and look up questions to
(11:43):
ask yourself every day. I can just give you the questions that I ask my
kids when we check in. We say, how are you feeling? What are you grateful
for? What did you do to prepare for tomorrow and what went well today?
So it doesn't have to be nothing specific, but
if you're not used to writing and journaling, it'd be nice
to just have some regular questions to ask yourself to
(12:05):
get yourself into a groove. And then you might find yourself going
off on your own. There's no wrong or right way to journal. It's what
works for you. But creating that practice will get
you more in tune to the moment. And as I said, the
questions that I asked my kids, a lot of those things allow them to get into the moment.
and allow them to work on gratitude and
(12:27):
paying attention to what they're feeling, right? So those are very intentional
questions that I'm asking my kids. The third
thing is self-reflection, right? So at the end of each day, just take a
few moments to reflect on how everything went. What did I
do today that I'm proud of? What can I have handled differently, right?
That self-reflection daily is important. If you're like, I
(12:48):
don't want to write, okay, that's fine. I'm not trying to force you
into one direction or another. I'm just trying to help you figure
out what direction and try something. And
so even if it's in the shower, if you're taking a shower every day, you're taking
a bath, in the bath, let that be the time to reflect. If
it's in the morning, What do I have going on today? How am I
feeling? Right? If it's at night, how did today
(13:11):
look like for me? What do I need for tomorrow? Really being
mindful of it. The next thing, cultivating awareness, my
favorite body scan. Our body's going to give us signs before we
do. There's a book that's really popular. The body keeps
the score. The body holds on to pain. That's why
I'm so into somatic work
(13:31):
and the body work and these classes that I have at my
center because I really want people to get more in tune
to Understanding what their body is feeling a great
way to do it. That's free, you know in this podcast We're going to talk about the
free ways. You can get your life together is YouTube You
go on YouTube and you type in five minute body scan meditation
(13:54):
I promise you a ton of them will come up and it'll have you sit
in and it'll be like They'll be like sit straight and they'll be like unlock
your jaw and the next you know, you play thing I even know my jaw was unlocked and
then they'll be like Relax your shoulders. And if you can see me, I'm
like, I put my shoulders down you well, I think I didn't know much I promise
you you don't realize just how wound up you are because
(14:15):
you're so used to being wound up and The
next thing is mindful breathing. Another one of my favorites,
like breathing free. We have access to it. So underutilized.
So throughout the day, just taking moments to focus on your breath. There
is again on YouTube, that's free type in breathing circle, two
minute breathing circle, and the circle will go in
(14:37):
and out. Right. And it'd be like, breathe in, breathe
out. Oh my God, that felt so good. Like literally, like
just taking those breaths can help you get into the moment
and release so much. A lot of times we have labored breathing.
If I'm feeling stressed, I can feel myself not
breathing, right? If I'm around somebody that's like stressed and
(14:59):
I'm like, all right, let's just take a deep breath, right? Cause I'm just an energy
person. So really being mindful of your breath
and making intentional time to breathe. Another way
to cultivate awareness Setting intentions setting
intentions and at the beginning of your day is so powerful So
for example, you might say today when I notice some stress, how am I
(15:21):
gonna respond? Right being mindful of
your intention so that you can work on creating
change The thing is is we don't got attentions. We're waking up
in the morning and We're hopping on our phone. We're going to social media and God
knows what you're gonna see every day on social media You got a freaking brace yourself nowadays
You know, no matter how much you curate your feed some of that crap
(15:43):
is gonna get in there You're gonna have conversations with
people and so I need you to understand do I want to set
my intentions with starting my day with the crap that's going
on in the world and not being intentional and or do I
wanna take time to be intentional and start my day with me?
I don't even have, my phone is not in my room at night.
(16:03):
My phone goes to another room. I let the
alarm wake me up, right? And I'm not jumping on
social media. I have so much going on.
I wear a lot of hats, mom, wife, wellness owner, manager,
like I do so much and I can't afford to
not be intentional about my life and my day. And,
(16:25):
you know, I was talking to somebody about why
I'm so intentional because I've been in this field for over 20 years. I've
worked in the ER. I've worked in group homes. I've worked in
so many different places and I've watched people lose their
mind. I feel like we play Russian roulette with our mind because
we're not intentional. about our day-to-day and what we need and
(16:46):
what we have to do for ourselves. And so I really want you to
be mindful, just because you may not be able to see what's
happening in real time, your system is breaking down when
you're not intentional. And in
2025, as I said, if you listen to the previous podcast, this is a really hard
time especially for me because like I'm
(17:08):
grappling with the reality of what is happening and
also walking people through what's happening and it
feels really heavy and so my intentions and
the way even with my self-care practices since
my watch was like a few days ago was like oh you
you have a 12-day streak of moving your body like
(17:29):
I didn't even realize just how much I've been leaning into
my moving of my body practice, right? It's not
just the gym, right? Because I just want to be intentional. You don't need a gym membership to
move your body. You can dance in front of your TV to music, right? Sometimes
I walk up and down my stairs and I've
really honed in on it. When things are out of my control,
(17:52):
I'm really big on looking at what's within my control. What can
I control that it's going to allow me to grow? Right? Because sometimes
when people, things are out of their control, they may, they may find themselves
eating more. Right? And so I really want you to be mindful of
what can I do for myself. So setting intentions is
a great way to cultivate awareness. Seeking
(18:14):
feedback is another way. So if you have like trusted family or
friends, I'm not talking about, no, just regular Joe Schmo. I'm talking
about people in your life that you love, that you have a reciprocal relationship
with. You can ask them these questions and ask them like, you
know, what kind of blind spots do you notice I have? Or
is there anything that you see in me that you think I could work on? This is
(18:35):
really great, right? Obviously, if you have a therapist that's helpful or a coach,
but I'm talking to people that may not have that. Asking
somebody in your life that you trust is important.
Number eight, you can limit distractions. So
reducing multitasking and the distraction in
your life. So social media is a big one,
(18:56):
right? So limit the time you have on social media. Please
limit the time. I can't stress that enough. If it's 5.05, look
at your time and say, okay, it's 5.05. I'm gonna stay on for 15 minutes, 20 minutes. Like,
what are you gaining from being on there? A lot of times, social
media becomes so addictive because it allows you not to focus
(19:17):
on what you're really feeling and what's going on. And that's why when it's time
to go to sleep, you can't go to sleep because what's happening is your mind
is scrolling from all the crap that you've been seeing and that light
is keeping you up. And then now you call yourself going to sleep,
but your mind wants to keep going. And then forget your social
media. What about the other problems and things you're not dealing with? Because
(19:39):
they feel too hard. You think just because you go to sleep,
your mind's going to go to sleep? No, it's waiting for you to answer the question. It's
waiting for you to finish that task. It's waiting for you to live
the life that you're supposed to live. And a lot of times, I
feel like our mind and body knows what we're capable of. And when we're not living
to the standards of what our mind and our system knows
(20:00):
we're capable of, we're gonna be struggling with so much anxiety and
so much having a hard time sleeping and resting. When
I was opening my wellness center, when I was starting my podcast, when I was starting
my business, all of these things that I started, I wrestled
with myself because I felt it in my spirit that
I was supposed to be doing these things that I'm doing. And I get really,
(20:22):
I get filled with gratitude and emotion when I think about
the time that we're in and the space that I have to offer for
people. It's like, geez, what a time to have
this wellness center for people to be able to
come and feel safe and feel seen and release
stress. I feel so grateful that I was
able to follow my heart and my spirit and
(20:45):
allow myself to do this regardless of the hardness that
it felt. It was very hard emotionally creating
this because this is way out of my element
of what I'm used to, right? It's not something, you know,
put me in a system and be a hard worker, but you want me to create the
system and create the thing? Been a huge challenge,
(21:07):
you know, um, so if you follow me on social media, I talk about that
a lot on my Instagram stories. And
then the last two is engaging in new experiences. This can be helpful
for cultivating awareness. Um, so you could try something like
a dance class or hiking a new trail. So these new
experiences can help you become more aware of your reaction and behaviors and
(21:27):
unfamiliar situations. Like I've put myself in hiking, gardening,
cooking, right? Like I think the little things that I've
done and really cultivated it really gave me confidence as
well. And then the last thing I wanna say is like really
practicing self-compassion, being kind to yourself while
you're on this journey. You know, I tell people all the time, like
(21:49):
you're with yourself 24 seven. So if you're with yourself
24 seven and that voice that is in your mind is always negative,
How are you going to make changes if you're beating yourself up all the time? Forget the
world, forget being black in America, forget everything that's
going on. If your own voice is not positive, how
will you begin to create change? It's really hard to do.
(22:12):
So I really want to encourage you to work on cultivating a
self-compassionate voice. You know, one of the things I think,
you know, as a therapist, I feel like the
way that The colonizing way that you're
taught is to diagnose what's wrong with you, not
what happened to you. I don't remember that being part
(22:34):
of the curriculum, what happened to you. I'm not big into diagnosis.
I'm not big into... labels, because
what I am big into is hearing somebody's story and
helping them make those connections. When you make those connections,
you breathe different. You're like, oh, okay, that makes sense. But
because we're not making those connections, we're not being aware of
(22:55):
what's happening, how could we work on change? And
so I wanna challenge you, right? Like as we're ending this
session, I really wanna challenge you to work on becoming aware
of what is and what's going on in your life without
judgment, with grace, right? With self-compassion. The
(23:17):
voice in my head, you know, I don't remember ever having
a voice of negativity, but I was always in survival mode,
always thinking like the worst case scenario, because if I'm going to stay ready
to be ready, because if something happens, I'm ready. I remember that feeling.
And it wasn't a good feeling to be in that space. My system
was literally breaking down on me. And so
(23:40):
having that voice where I am saying, it's OK,
Celeste, where I'm telling myself, oh, don't worry.
It's going to be OK. Try to get into the moment. My voice is
so much more compassionate to myself. And
that's what keeps me going. I'll say, OK,
if this doesn't work, it's OK. We'll go back to the drawing board. Have
(24:02):
that compassion with yourself. We can be our own worst enemy.
So I wanna encourage you to take time out to figure out,
okay, what does my life look like with
awareness? What are one of these things that I'm gonna try to take on
to work on cultivating awareness? Because when I
become aware of what is going on, I can create
(24:23):
changes in my life. So don't
forget follow me on all social media websites. I always say
like if you can Work on believing in
yourself and having faith you can work on creating change because
if you have faith in yourself Nobody can take that from you. Also.
I have a shift community. It's free. It's online
(24:44):
and I wanted a space to get off of social media So
if you are not following me on the shift community You could check
the show notes or you can go to my website. There's
a link that you can do to sign up And it's a
separate it's an app. You can have it on the app go in We
have two spaces in there right now besides the discussion space,
(25:05):
but we have a gratitude space You can go in there and start your journey there
and write in what you're grateful for There's also
a healing your inner child space healing your inner child is a class that
I do in my Center every quarter, right?
I started it this quarter. The next one's gonna happen in April
I believe like so much of our Struggle is
(25:26):
because of our inner child and how we haven't worked on healing it
So I teach you what it is and how to work on that Like
cultivating it and allowing yourself to be more aware
of your inner child. So you're not letting your inner child create The
direction of your life or the lens of your life, but you can find
all of that on my website stwy t.com and
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