Episode 15, Season II: "The Power of Play in Healing, with Special Guest Lauran September"

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:11):
Welcome to the Love Dog Podcast. I am your co
host Raina Butcher here with our host, doctor Sarah Hinsley,
the founder and CEO of the love Doc relationship coaching
services and the Love Dog Podcast. You can find her
at the lovedoc dot com and on all social media
handles at doctor Sarah Hinsley.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hey, Hey, hey, hey.

Speaker 3 (00:30):
I'm super excited about our guests today.

Speaker 1 (00:32):
Me too, so interesting little fact before we get started.
First off, our guest today is Lauren September. Lauren is
my high school best friend. So today is a very
special episode for me and you guys get to see
how awesome I am and choosing these amazing two people
as my best friend.

Speaker 4 (00:49):
This is as close to NEPO baby as I guess.
I'm very excited for.

Speaker 1 (00:55):
Uh So, Lauren, just to give her a little background
on her, we met but between the summer of our
eighth grade and freshman year. No, yeah, you're right, yeah,
and we were just sort of like instant friends. Her
first cousin was my high school sweetheart. That's another episode.

(01:16):
But we we just you know, we've sort of been
inseparable for like thirty years, so we had like a
big chunk of I mean we've been I mean she
lives in La Yeah, she lived in she lived in
Chicago and then in LA But we've always managed to
stay in touch and always you know, keep our friendship alive.

(01:37):
So Lauren is a spiritual guide, creative consult and actress,
and author of her self published book, Playful Healing. So
today's episode, we are going to talk with Lauren specifically
around her career in acting, her time at Second City,
her experience with improv, and of course about her book

(02:00):
what led her to write her book. But more importantly,
we're going to talk and who knows where this conversation
could go. I'm really excited our free flow gangs are.
But we're going to talk about the power of play
and healing and that yes, and it's so gosh, it's
so important. And I like, I can think as I

(02:20):
get older and I think about what brings me true joy,
it's the times in my life that I'm with the
people I love the most and we're just doing playful things,
whether that's in nature, or whether that's traveling or whether
you know, Josh and I are out on a date
and we're really like just our most authentic, beautiful selves

(02:41):
and we're being playful and kind of like nitpicking at
each other. And I mean we this is basically our
how our relationship has been for the past thirty years,
is we kind of play with each other and we
at times I've wanted to punch you in the face.

Speaker 2 (02:56):
Over it, she has, I'd ever here in my sister.
That's again a lot of story, a lot of Native
American burns, I think.

Speaker 1 (03:06):
Okay, yeah, yeah, Indian burns, yes, Native American. Yes, we
have to be politically correct here. But so let's talk
first about your career. So you've built a career both
in acting and creative consulting. So how did you first
discover the connection between creativity, play, and emotional healing?

Speaker 2 (03:25):
O big question.

Speaker 4 (03:27):
The first of all, let me just say thank you
for having me. I'm really excited, big fan. Recently just
started to kind of learn about attachment theory, and I
just think it's really delicious to get in there and
kind of understand and it's just another tool and another
bit of information about how we can explore and learn
about ourselves. So, you know, I think I've always been

(03:50):
a very curious person and I've always cultivated a love
for creativity, and arts and exploration and expression. Those those
are kind of like the cornerstones of my life when
I look back through it all. And I've always been

(04:12):
very like a seeker. I've always kind of studied different religions.
I've always kind of been led by things that I
find fascinating and allow them to kind of take me
where they go, and I explore them to the depths.
And that kind of started with being raised Catholic and
in a very Catholic environment and a very ornate church

(04:34):
and kind of sitting in there and being like this
is interesting, this is weird. So like this is just
like okay, we do this. We stand up, we sit down,
we kneel, we do that.

Speaker 2 (04:45):
I have that in common.

Speaker 3 (04:46):
Yea.

Speaker 4 (04:46):
I was there so all this ritual, all these things,
and so I think and I was always kind of
a person who questioned things at the beginning, which was
very audacious. And my family never questioned ca but I was.
It came from a place of genuine curiosity, and it
was just like, so this is this is what this is,
this is what we're doing.

Speaker 1 (05:07):
Right. You're not saying it's bad or good. You're just like, huh,
this is You're just questioning it.

Speaker 4 (05:12):
No, I think it's important to question it and to
stay in a place of observation in life and neutrality
in the sense of like not attaching to good or bad,
just being like, Okay, this is this is where we are,
this is interesting, why do we do this? What is
that about? And kind of going deeper. So that kind

(05:33):
of is the foundation. Now. I was raised by like
a single mother in kind of rule Kentucky, So these
were things that weren't necessarily the norm, and so I
think right out of the bat I was like, right
out of the gate, I was like, what's going on here?

Speaker 2 (05:50):
And everybody was like.

Speaker 1 (05:52):
Oh, yeah, you were definitely per se the black sheep
of your family.

Speaker 4 (05:57):
Yeah. I think my mom was, and I think or is,
and I think I just carried the baton.

Speaker 2 (06:03):
Yeah she was. She took another level.

Speaker 1 (06:06):
Yeah, she was a musician her whole life in the
Lexington music scene for a very long time.

Speaker 4 (06:11):
She wasn't a musician until later and well like in
her twenties when she was asked to sing somewhere and
then she was like, oh I love this. So I
think that kind of created a safe space for me.
And then moving through childhood, trauma. Art became a place
for me to express, to heal, to be authentic, to explore,

(06:35):
to be big, to be bold, to be all these
things that I didn't necessarily feel comfortable being in real life,
or that I was shunned for, or that was like Lauren,
you're being too much or you're too loud, or all
the things that come with that. And so that was
really a safe space for me to to allow myself

(07:00):
to explore and to really get in touch with all
these things. And so when I look back at my life,
I can see that pattern building, and I can see
how that I've cultivated that over time, like it was
introduced to me, but I followed that instinct. And so
I think as I've gotten older, as I've experienced life,

(07:21):
as certain things have happened to me, or I should
just say certain things I've experienced, because nothing kind of
happens to you. You're creating it and you're moving through
that experience. I've always kept that thread, and I've always
maintained creativity, and I've always kind of followed my instincts

(07:42):
in that way. So when time came to go to college,
I didn't first of all, didn't want to go to college.
I was like, I was like, I'm an artist.

Speaker 2 (07:54):
Like Cirie, that's cute.

Speaker 4 (07:56):
You were like in Nelson County High School.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
And they're like, so what.

Speaker 4 (08:02):
But I ended up going to school for music and theater,
and then later just theater found my people, flourished, really
threw myself into that, and again it allowed me to
kind of expand into a space where I could explore,
be creative, and be all these kind of things.

Speaker 2 (08:24):
Unapologetically, unapologetically yes.

Speaker 4 (08:27):
And then when time came to graduate, I went to Chicago.
And then I was doing theater in Chicago and doing
very serious theater, and somebody was like, you need to
put improv on your resume because that looks good on
a resume, and I was like, okay, and I did,
and I absolutely fell in love. And I can remember

(08:51):
the moment I was sitting in an improv class at
Second City and you had to take so I went
through the Conservatory and you had to take all these
classes before you could even apply for the conservators. Very
fancy back then. It was like, oh, you're in the
Conservatory in Chicago, and I remember taking all these prerequisite
classes and being like, oh, this could save the world.

(09:16):
Like if everybody took this class. And I know that
sounds really hyperbolic, but a lot of it, a lot
of the founding principles of improvisation. The art form is
kind of Buddhist. It's about being present, it's about saying yes,
opening yourself up in these situations, collaborating, bouncing. You're in

(09:38):
a relationship with somebody on stage and you go out
on stage with nothing, and you're like, it's you and me,
And something that we say as improvisers before we go
on stage is I've got your back. And I think
this is like the most beautiful relationship, a ground of
you know, just fertile play to kind of develop that

(10:00):
way of like we're going to war tonight together and
there's the audience and it's just you and me and
we got to do.

Speaker 1 (10:07):
This, and I could see how that could serve you
in your in your own personal relationships.

Speaker 2 (10:13):
Big time.

Speaker 4 (10:15):
Yeah, I mean it's it's honestly, when I got into improv,
I was like it just felt right. I was like,
this is everything, this is the most incredible. I mean,
this is what we're doing in life. Yeah, we're just
showing up. Nobody's telling us, and we got a kind
of a handful of rules and you're like, go, what.

Speaker 2 (10:35):
Do you want to create?

Speaker 4 (10:37):
And there's nothing that allows you other than intimate relationships,
a way to really go deep within yourself. Yeah, because
you get put on stage and you can't rely on
anything you've previously relied on. The masks drop you know,
you know, you can get into improv classes and you
can see people's stuff.

Speaker 2 (10:56):
I mean, see that core.

Speaker 4 (10:57):
Yeah, you see how they rely on humor. You know,
you see how it becomes an identity. You can see them,
you know, just their.

Speaker 2 (11:08):
In sior anxiety, their anxieties I had.

Speaker 4 (11:12):
I had a teacher once tell me in improv class,
I was pretty far along. I had already gone through conservatory.
I was also doing IO at the same time, which
in Chicago at the time, that was like a big thing,
like when you get bit by the improv bug, you
that you you know, eat, sleep, and breathe it. And
so I was doing two programs at the same time.

(11:32):
And Second City is more of like short form improv
character based. You're improvising to write, So you're improvising and
then you're tweaking and you're creating sketches, and then you're
presenting that as theater iowe was like jazz improv. It
was like, you're going up there and this is the
art form, and I just remember being like, oh man,

(11:54):
this is incredible adrenaline Russ. It's adrenaline rush so intense,
you know, I mean, there's just Honestly, I know it
sounds hyperbolic, but I think everybody should take an improv class. Yeah,
you know, I think everybody should study it at some point.
I think it's so important. I mean, I've worked with
children and like they love it. It's the basis of everything,

(12:16):
and it allows your inner child to come out. It
allows you to go maybe be vulnerable and deep in
situations with people other than romantic relationships because you're looking
at each other in the eye and you're like, let's
just create.

Speaker 2 (12:29):
And it's extremely vulnerable.

Speaker 4 (12:31):
Yeah, and you're watching people. Every sense is heightened, so
you're looking at somebody's body and you're reading it and
you're going, Okay, so I'm going up to do nothing
and I start doing this right, and so you look
at it and then you're creating based off of another person.
So it's just the ultimate volley.

Speaker 3 (12:49):
I am so trying to figure out right now, and
of course this is me being left brained. What parts
of the nervous system are activated right when this has happened. Yeah,
I'm going to say, because okay, because present moment is
ventral vagel safety, right, safety can only like present moment
connection only happens in safety. And you're talking about the

(13:10):
present being very alive. But also you're talking about being
hyper vigilant, which is a fight or flight state, right,
and like then there's probably some state of maybe dissociation
from your own personal reality and absolutely right, And so
that's dorsal veagel. And we know that like fighter flight

(13:33):
and dorsal veagel can be activated at the same time,
but I've never heard of like really all three like
all three states can't really be So you're oscillating between
these states very quickly, which that to me is freaking
fascinating that the human brain can oscillate between all of
these nervous system states to create this art. Wow. To me,

(13:57):
that is like I just have chills, Yeah, because to me,
like you know, I'm thinking about the nervous system and
how it works and the science behind it, and just
thinking about how the flexibility of you as a human
having to have that level of flexibility to do that
so quickly and to be so adept at that and
then to enjoy the process, well, I.

Speaker 2 (14:18):
Think it shows how malleable the brain is.

Speaker 3 (14:20):
So malleable. The brain is so malleable, And that's what
I try to tell people all the time who are
stuck in these horrible, failing relationship cycles. It's like, no,
this is fixible because your brain is malleable, because your
brain is flexible. You're stuck in one pattern now and
you don't know how to get out of it. But
I do know how to get out of it, and
I have the tools for you to help you get
out of it. And that's why all of my coaching

(14:40):
strategy is so focused on somatic processing and mindset and
just really pulling in all of these things that we
know shift and shape the brain. Right.

Speaker 1 (14:52):
But the power of play back to the whole point
of this episode is that in terms of healing, and
I think the connection here is the scientific theory behind
how the brain works and what scientists know about the brain,

(15:12):
and what you just said and how fascinated you are
with it really connects to what you said about everyone
should be doing this because this is how we teach
our brain how to go in and out of these
states in a way that is completely present in the
present moment. You're saying, Hey, I can switch from this

(15:33):
to this, and I can go here, and I can observe,
and I can you know, I can do all these
things and I can watch and then.

Speaker 3 (15:38):
The brain is yoga for the brain. Yeah, that is
what I think is coming to mind for me. It's
like yoga for the brain. Like, yeah, you learn the flexibility,
and you learn the transitions, and then you learn how
to hold it at a certain point, I'm sure, and
probably based on feedback, right of like your audience.

Speaker 4 (15:55):
Well, you're feeding off the energy of the audience, you're
feeding off the group. And you know, there's different forms,
so I'll speak to just like long form improv, which
is basically like theater jazz. You get up and we
were doing a thing called a herald, which is a structure.
So we gave we gave it a structure, and you
can create whatever structure you want, but it's like a

(16:16):
three act structure, and in between the acts you have
kind of uh, these very ephemeral brainstorming mind melding group
mind kind of exercises, and that's what we would call it.
You kind of sync up with your troop. And so
what you're doing is you're all going out there on
stage and you're creating spontaneously. You're feeling the audience, you're

(16:37):
feeling each other, You're you're building a three act play,
and you're calling things back. I mean, it's you're you're
playing at the height of your intelligence. You're on you're
firing on all cylinders and it's magic.

Speaker 2 (16:54):
Yeah, and it's and.

Speaker 4 (16:54):
It's like it's one of the most incredible highs. And
it also is where you can just like demolish yourself too,
and you can get off stage and be like that bomb.
But then also the feeling of it bombing, we turned
into play and we turned into like gold because if
we bombed, then we would go harder into that because
everything was a game, and we made it a game.

(17:17):
And so a big part of my book, so I
went through pretty intense what a lot of people would
call spiritual awakening, but what I like to really call
it is my whole life I've been remembering and I'm
here to remember. And so there have been kind of
these guideposts where I've hit and they've kind of elevated

(17:38):
in my conscious expansion and so about and a lot
of those have come from relationships or failed relationships or
moments where I'm like, what the heck came out of me?
And that what was that? And it kind of propelled
me into another level of dimension of myself of remembering
the totality of myself. And so I feel like playful

(18:01):
healing that was a big part of what I was doing.
Is just like firing on all cylinders, allowing magic to happen,
being present in the moment, and then just evolving to remember,
I'm creating everything that I'm experiencing, and I can create
whatever I want, and I can bring play, and I
can bring levity, and I can bring laughter, and that's

(18:24):
medicine to our souls, to each other, to relationships. And
so it was just this kind of aha moment where
for me, the metaphor of gamifying life of like, we're
just playing here. It's not that serious.

Speaker 3 (18:40):
Yeah, And my husband says that all the time, He's like,
hold on, I took myself too seriously.

Speaker 2 (18:44):
For a second.

Speaker 3 (18:45):
Life should not be so serious, it shouldn't be so hard.
And I was raised in a household where there was
always a problem, and there was my parents did not
know how to function without having something to worry about,
to complain about, to you know, be upset about. And
I have tried so hard, at part as a part

(19:06):
of my healing journey to shed that and to be
in gratitude and to be in the present and to
get out of the spirit of fear and to just
like just really experience joy. And it was so foreign
to me, and I honestly, I've only been able to
experience joy for like the last five years since I've
been on this healing journey. I don't think I experienced

(19:27):
much joy in my life before that. And my husband,
as his way of coping with trauma is very humor based,
and you know, he had a little bit of that
defense mechanism of humor, right, to avoid some vulnerability, right,
And then part of his healing journey was to not
use humor as a defense mechanism, but to embrace humor

(19:49):
for what it was, which was playfulness and being light
and being free and being funny and just actually having
enjoyment and embracing joy. And so he like, when I
start to slip into more of that, I have to
have a problem, right, sort of those old pathways in
my brain. He is able to really bring me out

(20:10):
of that and bring me into joy, and he'll crack
a joke, he'll I mean, of course, he's vulnerable to
my feelings, and he knows when it's appropriate to give
me validation or to be that active listener for me,
or to just be a comfort and give me that
code regulation. But a lot of times he reminds me, Sarah,
life isn't all that serious anymore. Like, you have lived

(20:32):
through some of the most serious things that can happen
to a person, and you've survived it. So let's not
let this small thing like weigh you down, right, Like,
let's come back to joy. And I love that about him.

Speaker 1 (20:42):
Yeah, as someone who's witnessed your journey from sort of
like beginning to now, because I haven't witnessed all of Lauren's,
but I've really witnessed yours.

Speaker 2 (20:53):
By my side, I can attest to that you.

Speaker 1 (20:56):
Are your most playful and easy going self when Donald
is in the room.

Speaker 2 (21:04):
Yeah, when Donald is in the.

Speaker 1 (21:06):
Room, then Sarah is able to sort of let her
guard down, not be so in rigid Sarah world, not
be so black and white and see those more colorful areas. Yes,
he really brings that part out of you.

Speaker 3 (21:22):
I mean, I think, and it makes me feel so safe.
And I think because of that safety again, and joy
only happens when your nervous system feels safe. And Donald
has been such a part of safety in my nervous
system because I created safety by myself. But then you're
tested when you get into a relationship. Can you maintain

(21:42):
that sense of safety when you have someone that, of
course is at some point going to trigger you right
and shine a light on what you still have left
to heal. And he brings out just he brings out
the best of me in such an important way.

Speaker 1 (21:58):
I think that the reason why we've been able to
maintain our friend friendship like we have over the past
eight years is because I think, maybe you know, we
saw things and we tend to like lean towards that
shadow part of ourselves that we don't necessarily see in ourselves.

Speaker 2 (22:12):
And so like there's I mean, guys, we can attest here.

Speaker 1 (22:16):
These are my two best friends, and they're like they
bring big brain energy to the world.

Speaker 3 (22:21):
And I'm just.

Speaker 2 (22:22):
Over here, like lude did you did you?

Speaker 1 (22:24):
I say words wrong, Like I ain't got the vocabulary
these two got, like Okay, So I'm just like, so
I feel like I'm so drawn to people like you
all because I mean, let's be honest, and I'm not
shaming myself and saying this, you're smarter than me, but
I am very playful and I like to play. And

(22:44):
I think that when we became friends, you saw that
part of me and you were drawn to it, and
it was the same reason you were drawn to Donald.

Speaker 3 (22:53):
Yeah, you and Donald are actually very similar, very similar people.

Speaker 2 (22:56):
Yeah, very similar.

Speaker 3 (22:57):
Very similar to Gabby too, which is very interesting. Gabby,
my daughter is very artsy. She wants to be in
Her dream is to go to NYU and be an artist,
and had that dream, like that dream, you know, the
and the fact that I have like very little artistic
side to myself, I would say, like my whole, my

(23:18):
whole gig is this left brained piece, right. That scares
me because I'm like I always just think starving artists, right,
and like how are you going to support yourself like
selling paintings or whatever. And then I go this gallery
in Key West and there's like a bag of crumpled
up skittles for like four thousand dollars, and I'm like, well,
maybe it could happen, right, Like maybe I just don't

(23:39):
know that art is whatever you want it to be,
and people are going to be drawn and feel things
from things that you wouldn't expect.

Speaker 1 (23:48):
Right.

Speaker 4 (23:48):
Art is powerful because it's audacity and what you're saying
of that, Yeah, so what you just kind.

Speaker 3 (23:56):
Of audacity is a couple bag of skittles.

Speaker 4 (23:59):
It's somebody that's this is I have the audacity to
say this is what I'm feeling and I'm expressing, and
that's enough, and somebody is going to come and value
it because I value it. And so I think something
that's so powerful with women across the board, and I
think it's for both men and women, but I think
we've been societally conditioned to not have audacity. And this

(24:22):
is why I felt safe as exploring myself in art
was because it gave me permission to be audacious.

Speaker 3 (24:29):
My daughter's so audacious, but she has to hold it
back and I think it makes her miserable.

Speaker 4 (24:35):
Of course, because it's a mask. And so there's so
much that I just want to get into what.

Speaker 2 (24:39):
I know I just said. I'm so excited I'm very.

Speaker 4 (24:42):
Excited because I would say, like to go back to
what you're saying. The connective tissue here that I would
observe is that you're authentic. You allow yourself to be imperfect, messy, unintelligent,
which I would not call you.

Speaker 3 (24:59):
Oh my go and so like, you're so smart right.

Speaker 4 (25:01):
Now, I'm smart, right, But it's because you are putting
what intelligence means in certain parameters, right, and we fit
these parameters in certain ways, and you look at that
and you're like, but I'm not those you are. We
wouldn't be sitting here with you if you didn't this whole.

Speaker 3 (25:19):
Exist with the codes of that would happened because I
would not have been bold enough and creative enough to
bring it to life right and I would not be
organized enough because I am a CPTSD trauma survivor with
the ADHD component of CPTSD that, honestly, even all the

(25:41):
healing in the world never you. Your nervous system is
never completely the same. But there's great things about that too.
There's beautiful things about that that allows me to deeply
connect with people who have also been deeply traumatized on
a very visceral human level and just just my brain
is going back to my daughter. I have to get
you in the same room with my daughter. I have

(26:01):
to she has to see something else besides me, because
I think I piss her off so much because I'm
just I go back to this, like, you have to
support yourself, you have to be able to do this.
You do this this because that's how I was. That
was my perfectionism, that was my scarcity mindset from my
childhood trauma of not having stability and and so. But

(26:24):
then there's this part of her like she's super into
k pop. Okay, super into k pop?

Speaker 4 (26:29):
Who isn't okay?

Speaker 3 (26:30):
You know, well me, I've been to a few concerts now.
But she wants to have this like she wants to
wear the K pop streetwear, but everybody in her school
is like decked out in the Lululemon basic like white
girl energy, right, And so she feels this tug of
war between I want to be this badass streetwear like

(26:55):
K pop queen that's like dancing in my bedroom like
she's a phenomenal dancer. But yet she feels this the
pressure to fit into the mold of acceptance. Right, and
then she she said, I want to go to NYU
and be an artist. I want to live in this
big city and be an artist. And I cringe because
that feels scary to me. So I feel like this

(27:17):
need to protect her from that, when really that's holding
back her authenticity. Because what you just said about authenticity,
it is the most regulating thing to the human nervous system.
And I've said it it's a million times and I'll
say it again. Being your authentic self is where you
are most regulated and where you feel most safe if
you are around people that accept that authenticity, right, because

(27:39):
there's also this social barometer that is so important for
your self esteem. Like we can't take everybody else out
of the equation either and pretend like you live in
a vacuum where social comparison and human judgment don't play
a role, right, And so that balance, Like I just
I'm amazed right now of like I'm seeing the flaws

(28:00):
and my parenting in real life.

Speaker 2 (28:02):
Guys, I knew.

Speaker 4 (28:06):
We gotta walk that back because I gotta there's so
much to unpack.

Speaker 3 (28:09):
There because unpackaged.

Speaker 4 (28:10):
So here's what, here's what I want to kind of
go back to say, as the foundation of everything, everything,
I'm going to talk about today is we are all
walking each other home. We are all reflecting the vastness
of our being. Every single person you have in your

(28:31):
life is mirroring to you more of who you are
and what you're striving to unlock, and really starts with
just giving yourself the permission to unlock it. There's some
part of us that doesn't feel safe if we give
ourselves that permission, because we've attached something to whatever we've

(28:52):
defined as unsafe. So, for instance, you've grown up in
a household where the language was we're uh.

Speaker 3 (29:00):
Fear, fear, catastrophizing.

Speaker 4 (29:04):
Everything, right, And I can, I can so relate to
that because that is that's the language of my mother,
you know. So it's she doesn't know how to connect.
That's how she connects with people.

Speaker 3 (29:16):
My mom too. And so even my husband said, as
soon as you get with mot your mom, you just
start pitching right about something because because that's how you
feel safe, right, And that's how you connect with your mother,
because that's ultimately what you want, is that love and connection.

Speaker 4 (29:29):
And so you're going to adapt to her needs because
that's what our inner child is doing.

Speaker 3 (29:35):
Yeah, and I know that it's right and it's but
because of all of my unhealed bears.

Speaker 4 (29:40):
Sure, but again you're you're filtering that through a lens
of negativity because we live in a dualistic world, which
we live in a far more colorful world than just
black and white. However, of cognition, when you see that
one is present, it automatically means the other is present.
So when we say, oh, it's this negative aspect, but

(30:01):
look at what it's created an artist.

Speaker 3 (30:04):
Oh my gosh, my daughter is so talented.

Speaker 4 (30:06):
But that's an aspect of you to show you you
have created an extension of yourself. To look at the
totality of yourself and go, okay, so I don't give
myself permission to be an artist right now in this
in my mind space, but you created one.

Speaker 2 (30:23):
And we're creating art right now.

Speaker 4 (30:25):
To show yourself how capable you are of that is
that is, that is there. She is there as a
gift for that, and she got there because of the
restrictions that were placed on her, that were created by you.
And so when we talk about creativity, and some of

(30:46):
the most incredible things happen when we are in restriction. Right,
Sometimes when you have an unlimited budget, creativity suffers if
you have six ninety five and a shoe string, so
you're gonna figure something out.

Speaker 3 (30:58):
Yeah. That makes me think of like Apollo thirteen when
they had to rescue Apollo thirteen and they were like,
here's what's on, here's what they have available, and they
dumped it on a table and they were like, oh
my god, how are we supposed to like land the
spaceship with just these items? And they freaking figured it out.

Speaker 4 (31:13):
I do because we are built that way, creative.

Speaker 2 (31:18):
We are human beings.

Speaker 4 (31:19):
This is what's so fun about being a human being
is that we are adaptable, We are creative, and we
thrive under a restrictive and oppressive thing. Things get born
out of oppression all the time. Now I'm not, you know,
advocating a pressure.

Speaker 3 (31:35):
My whole entire life and existence and brand came out
of oppression. Are a tra beauty.

Speaker 4 (31:40):
Everything gets created out of this because it's the pressure cooker.
It's what creates a diamond.

Speaker 2 (31:45):
Right.

Speaker 4 (31:45):
Pressure Over time, we get sand on a beach because
water continuously flows in a pattern, and these things birth
and create. And this is from our sacral This is
where this is magic. This is the essence of what
we're doing in reality is creating and art and improv

(32:08):
and theater to me was an extension of that. And
now that I'm older, I look back on it and
it was my soul was pulling me towards ultimately realizing
this about us and unlocking the magic and giving myself
the permission to do that in a place that felt safe,
because a lot of what's happened to us when we're children.
Whether you think you've had a trumpmatic childhood or not,

(32:29):
you have absolutely have because you're adapting to the needs
of other people, Yes, and you don't have the tools
with the language to understand that that's what's going on.
So you're creating patterns and ultimately you are conditioning yourself
to create belief systems to keep yourself safe. And being
an artist is challenging that, getting curious about that and

(32:52):
playing with that and knowing that you're ultimately, Like what
I write about my book is you're safer than you
realize here and we've just taken an idea of what
safety is and we latch onto it for dear life.
We cling. And so when you talk about healing, a
lot of that is allowing the grip to release and

(33:12):
allowing ourselves to breathe in and to breathe out, to
wax in, to wax out, Like you know, it's the
pattern of nature itself, which the tide will come in,
the tide will go out. And this is the most
beautiful thing of just what we're doing here as just
being and there's no wrong way, there's no right way,
and we're all giving each other permission to explore that

(33:34):
and to go deep into that and help each other
walk each other home, which is to the ultimate realization
that you are far more complex and powerful and you
have complete agency in your life to shift the perspective
of how you're experiencing your reality at every moment. So

(33:56):
like anytime you get caught into those negative loops, remember
that the opposite is true. So like where you see
something negative, there's something beautiful hiding there. You're just not
allowing yourself to see it, or you're focusing on this
thing because you've conditioned yourself to right and that's all
it is. It's just a pattern, and you've learned your
parents' patterns. And so this is when we talk about
generational healing, it's it's really looking at these programs and

(34:20):
patterns and getting curious and questioning them and going, is
this actually how what I want to experience life? And
that's actually such a.

Speaker 3 (34:29):
Huge part of what I teach. Yeah, that's so different.
All A huge part of it my program is that
perspective shift and that reframe and that mindset of knowing
that you have this lens that has been deeply shaped
by your experience, but reality is so much bigger than
your lens.

Speaker 4 (34:49):
Oh, absolutely right, And don't live at yourself like and
just like have fun with.

Speaker 3 (34:53):
It, and if you step outside of that lens, what
you discover about your reality might be so different than
what you saw you thought it was when you were
in the parameters of just that lens, which comes from
your past, which comes from the things that you have
experienced previously. And so wow, that is so interesting because
I honestly went into this podcast thinking I'm not gonna

(35:14):
have anything to say because she's so creative and I
am so not creative.

Speaker 1 (35:19):
And then I knew, Guys, I just want you to know,
I knew. I knew that well, I mean, how could
I love you both so deeply? You know?

Speaker 3 (35:30):
Awesome?

Speaker 1 (35:30):
I mean other than how awesome you both are I mean,
there are so many reasons why I'm drawn to both
of you in the ways that I am, you know,
and how and why our friendships are so deep as
deeply connected as they are. You know, I feel deeply
connected to you. I feel deeply connected to you, and
you know there's a reason for it. Now, if you

(35:52):
looked at you guys on the surface in terms of
of your healing journeys, or even how you approach healing
to maybe speaking of a very limited lens or a
scope of one person looking at it, they may think, oh, wow,
that's night and day. You know, even Rachel. I was
talking to Rachel on the way here, and my sister
she was like, oh my gosh, Lauren, and sayha can

(36:12):
be more different?

Speaker 4 (36:13):
And I was like, and I could not disagree with that,
but like I disagree with that so hard.

Speaker 1 (36:17):
Yeah, and then you get you get these moments like this,
and then you really you you take away all the
things that maybe you previously thought, and you discover, wow,
we're all very similar.

Speaker 3 (36:31):
Yeah. You know what's similar. We are both captivated by
the human experience. Yeah, and we're curious about it, yes,
very curious about it. We allow ourselves to go to
the depths right to really go.

Speaker 4 (36:42):
And that's an artist, my friend. You are an artist.
And I think we have to kind of remove these
things that we think that this is the number one
thing that I get when people, when I coach people
or when they come to me and they're like, well,
I'm just not an artist, like I don't draw, I
don't say, and I'm like, well, that's a very limiting
idea of creativity.

Speaker 2 (37:01):
First of all, you've already limited yourself.

Speaker 4 (37:03):
So like, let's blow past all of that. You get
to define what creativity is to you. You get to
define what.

Speaker 2 (37:10):
Art is to you.

Speaker 3 (37:11):
That's the cool part about art.

Speaker 4 (37:13):
You know, it's subjective and it's it's you just have
to have the audacity. You just have to have the
audacity to be like, this is something that I like
and that's enough, and I find it interesting, and you
know what I'm going to be So I'm going to
be so safe in my own knowing of myself, my body,

(37:34):
of my experience that it will find its audience right
someone out there. It will speak to them, even if
it's just one person.

Speaker 3 (37:42):
That guy with that made the Skittles bag, because it
was like a giant skittles back, you know, like a
party size bag and it was like crumpled up. And
then it was like I don't know what they sprayed
on it to make it like hard, but it was
like it had hair, you know, like you spread hair
spray on it or something. And I was like, maybe
he just tastes the rainbow and he was just on
that high and like, you know how much joy.

Speaker 4 (38:03):
And maybe he's like this is a commentary on consumerism,
because this is what it's meant to do, is it's
elicited a conversation.

Speaker 3 (38:13):
We stood there and we were like, what was the
meaning behind this? Like what what? And it was like
four grand And I was like, but I could make
if I want, I could have done that, Like I
could replicate that, but it wouldn't be the same, it
wouldn't have the same meaning. Like whatever this person was
feeling when they did that clearly like it came from something,

(38:36):
you know what, Like the value of something is what
you perceive it to be, right, It's all about perception.

Speaker 2 (38:43):
Perception is everything.

Speaker 4 (38:44):
It's control how you perceive things, and that is an
enormous amount of power you have in the world to
create and to experience and so like, even if it's
just playful, like even if you he or she the
artist created that to just fuck with us, right, can

(39:05):
I say that?

Speaker 3 (39:05):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (39:07):
Okay, so we put the eye that's just like the
fun of it. Because the deeper I go into my journey,
and the deeper I go into myself, and the deeper
I explore, the more humor that I find. And in
the cosmic joke of like it, maybe they're just you know,
it's just they're just mess. It's not that serious, it's
not that serious, and yet it is. And that's the

(39:28):
paradox of what we get to understand and balance. And
that's really cool and really exciting. And so when we
talk about reframing things or when we're in a state
of fear or whatever, I try to always teach people
to look at something and go, how exciting, Oh my gosh,
my mom just done?

Speaker 2 (39:47):
How exciting?

Speaker 4 (39:49):
What does that mean for you? Like yeah, and that's
an extreme example, but my relationships falling apart, how exciting?
How exciting? Because now you get to go to another
level of the game. Now you get to explore a
different level of yourself, explore a different on a level.
This is an opportunity.

Speaker 3 (40:06):
See I see that in couples because I'm on the
other side of the journey, right I'm on the other
side of experiencing extreme tragedy and trauma and rebuilding myself
and finding the love of my life and knowing that
even if I knew it was going to play out
exactly the same, I would go in ahead and I
would do it, and I would feel it and I would.

Speaker 2 (40:24):
Live it because this is the fertile ground.

Speaker 3 (40:26):
Because it created this exactly and I every single day
of my life, I say thank you God for all
of these blessings. I don't know why you have blessed
me in this capacity. I literally have the perfect life.
I have the body I want. I have the husband
I want. I have the kids that I want. I
have the house that I want, I have the money
I want. I have the faith that I want I've
always wanted.

Speaker 2 (40:44):
I have it all.

Speaker 3 (40:45):
And so I'm looking at God and I'm.

Speaker 4 (40:47):
Like why and I don't, and God goes, why not? Honestly,
I mean, because that's the playful part of life is
Like they look at it, they try to describe meaning
like why I.

Speaker 3 (41:00):
Had to be open to it though, because before it
was like, it will never happen for me. I am
so broken. I am so that I have all of
these things that have happened to me. I'll never get
over this pain. I've been so abused, poor me. I
was in the total victim mindset and I couldn't see
beyond all of my pain and all of my tragedy.
And when I finally said, you know what, fuck it like?

(41:20):
There is literally a fuck it moment. It was like
a fuck and I was, you know, I just decided
to have faith one day. It was like it just clicked.
I just decided that I didn't want to be that anymore.
And I didn't know how I was going to get there.

Speaker 4 (41:33):
And that's what it looked like that I just decided, aside,
it was enough, and you take one step.

Speaker 3 (41:38):
Towards that distress, right, And I mean, I'm not gonna lie.
God had a huge part of it. I mean God
spoke to me on a level I had never heard before.
I didn't even have a real relationship with God. It
was a fake relationship with God. It was like a
for show relationship with God. And then I had a
real relationship with God. But God is who said? But
who said? This is who you have to be. I
didn't say that I made you to be anything you

(41:58):
want to be. That feel you know that you know
that it that will serve the greater good, right, And
and just knowing that I could serve the greater good
and put something out there and create like this beautiful
thing from this awful thing, like it clicked your trust yourself.
And so when I when I have clients that come

(42:18):
to me and they're like, I'm gonna be I don't
know if I can get divorced, and they're in this
horrendous relationship, and I'm just like, but you don't know
how much power you have to create something so much
better than this.

Speaker 2 (42:32):
You're just afraid.

Speaker 4 (42:33):
Well, it's you know, they're zoomed in, yeah, and they're
not zoomed out, because when you zoom out, you can
see the larger thing happening, right, But when you're zoomed
in and you're in it, you this is this is
life or death, right. You're you're in your root chakra,
You're you're in survival mode, and so everything you've all
the identities and structures, you're clinging to this understanding of

(42:57):
what you think life should be and if you just
open up, you allow things to come and like you
allow abundance in right because right here you can't money
can't flow to you, love can't flow to you. Nothing
can flow to you. You have to relax into it
and believe allow us everything. That's the number one thing
in my book. So at the beginning of my book,

(43:19):
I said that here's the rules of the game, and
the first rules there are no rules, but everything is allowed.
Everything is allowed. It is a radical way to shift.

Speaker 3 (43:29):
You just need to hook you up with my book. Agents. Yeah,
you need to write a second because it's like you
have to allow yourself and other people to be who
they are because a lot of where we're coming in
is from resistance.

Speaker 4 (43:41):
We're in resistance to the things. We're in resistance to
the change. We're in resistance to the person being whoever
they are. We're in resistance to whatever is happening because
we think that's going to keep us safe. And that's
what's happened is in a childhood is we build a
little bubble or walls around us because that does keep
us safe. But you outgrow those as you age and

(44:03):
it can shed it. You shed it right, and you
need to like let those walls down. But it really
is when you think about it from an energetic wo
woo standpoint, which is also quantum physics. And this has
been it's only going to be more proven as we
continue with quantum computing, and I will feel very vindicated
for Honestly, I'm just like, yeah, time, I will be vindicated.

(44:32):
It doesn't matter because I'm not identified with uh, the
idea that I have to be perceived a certain way
or I don't cling to it or I don't. That's
deep work that I've done with myself, which is just
like I'm going to allow you to think.

Speaker 2 (44:46):
Whatever you want.

Speaker 4 (44:47):
People are going to create a reality or an identity
around you anyway, like your sister being like they're so different,
that's because your sister sees me a certain way and
I will never and whatever I do in life, she
will only because that's what she's decided, and she's kind
of locked me in at a time frame in my
life where I couldn't be more different, right, And so

(45:08):
now I've lost.

Speaker 2 (45:10):
From a place of love allowing Yeah, I want.

Speaker 1 (45:13):
To bring this full circle because something I want to
pull into this that I think will be valuable for
our listeners and specifically for people who are searching for healing,
is really how the couple can heal through play. And
I think it's really important. I mean, and there's books
on it, you know, but ways to implement play within

(45:34):
your romantic relationships I think is really really important because
you know, speaking on and y'all can speak more on this,
but speaking on bringing the inner child into your romantic relationships,
I think is a big piece. And so Lauren, first,
I just want to hear from you in terms of
your experience, you know, within your own relationships and what

(45:57):
you've experienced in life. You could go all day, yeah,
but you know, how would you what would you say
to our listeners in terms of real, concrete ways they
can implement just basic play into their everyday life.

Speaker 4 (46:13):
Okay, So I talk about this in my book, and
I don't specifically talk about relationships playful relationships in the
book because I focus on you because you have to
have that foundation before you can really get it. And
this is this is where Sarah and I like it
overlapd the Ven diagram right overlaps because it's the same
thing you have. It's all about learning, giving yourself the

(46:37):
foundation and learning who you are before opening yourself up
into that way to other people, because inevitably we get
into these relationships and then all that comes to service.

Speaker 2 (46:47):
Right.

Speaker 4 (46:47):
Wow, the thing, there's a couple of things that I
talk about in the book, which are exercises. It is
vitally important for you to be spending time with your
inner child, to be sitting and visualizing, having conversations, having dialogue,
because inevitably something somatic's gonna happen, You're gonna get triggered.

(47:08):
And the first thing I do is I allow I
say thank you to whatever happened that's triggered me deeply.
And I mean that even if I don't in that moment,
I know I'll get there. So I say thank you.
I give myself the space to process whatever's going on,
and instead of intellectualizing it, I sit in my body

(47:30):
and I go, where is this in my body? What's
the story that's coming up? And sometimes I have a
full on conversation with the little girl inside me. I
allow myself to whatever age comes up, and then I go,
I get curious about that, and I go, okay, interesting,
so eight year old me is coming up right now? Okay,
let's talk to her, what's going on with her? What's

(47:51):
the story that's coming up with her? Where is this
in her? In my body? What does she think about this?
Because she's created some sort of story here.

Speaker 2 (48:01):
Or you've.

Speaker 4 (48:03):
You've absorbed it from your surroundings, and now you think
that story is what's happening and it's the truth. Yeah,
And it's like there's actually an expanded truth going on
right now, and you are bringing an old pattern of
behavior into the moment. And the gift is is that
this has been activated in your body for you to
explore that playfully. I allow that to you know, I

(48:29):
go into that. I feel whatever I feel. I allow
all those emotions to come up. I allow myself to
be weird and silly if I need to move or
be or whatever. Orry sometimes, Yeah, Like the first time
I ever connected with my owner child, I sat down
on a bench with her and she was four years old,
and I said, what do you want to say to me?
And I swear to God, this is what I saw
in my mind. I saw a little four year old

(48:51):
chubby Lauren in this dress that I had that was
almost very similar to this, And she stood up on
the bench and she put her fist down like this
and she goes and I didn't know what to do
with that. Yeah, but I was so taken aback because
she wanted to be liberated. She wanted to be free,
she wanted to be wild, and that's what I took

(49:13):
in that moment. She wanted to howl, she wanted to
just be maybe an animal. I don't know. It was
her communicating to me without words.

Speaker 2 (49:23):
I think she wanted I want. I think she wanted
to be loud, she.

Speaker 4 (49:26):
Wanted to be Yeah, she wanted to be free.

Speaker 1 (49:29):
I can remember so the very first inner child experience
I had, which I was I was doing.

Speaker 2 (49:34):
An actual practice through this course I.

Speaker 1 (49:37):
Was taking, and it was, you know, I met myself
and it can be any version of your inner child,
of course in this field, you know, this field, this
beautiful field of flowers, and so you're meeting you know,
younger self in current form and giving that younger self
whatever they make, whatever was lacking at that time.

Speaker 2 (49:57):
And I remember I had.

Speaker 1 (49:59):
Never experience like there were totally new sensations that I
had never experienced before.

Speaker 2 (50:04):
I'm talking like violent cries, because it was me meeting like.

Speaker 1 (50:10):
Three year old Reina who was just so precious and
beautiful and like in this vision, she's like running into
my arms. Oh I still it still makes me emotional,
and you know, and and again, it's such a beautiful
experience because.

Speaker 2 (50:26):
It it teaches you what you what you yearned for.
You know that at that time. But the beauty of
it is is that you know that you can give
it to yourself now.

Speaker 4 (50:37):
And that's everything. Yeah, And that's the relationship to cultivate,
in my opinion, before anything else.

Speaker 2 (50:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (50:45):
See, this is interesting because I felt like in her
child work didn't help me very much and it was
not something that I could really connect to because I
don't have a lot of memories from my childhood, and
people who have had certain types of childhoods or certain
things happened to them, a lot of times their hippo
campus does degrade, and especially if they've had trauma later

(51:06):
in life, it wipes out like memories. And so I
would try to connect with my inner child, but I
don't remember a lot about her.

Speaker 1 (51:15):
Vision was completely made up. Well, yeah, vision didn't really happen.

Speaker 3 (51:20):
It didn't feel authentic to me. It didn't feel great
to me. But it does help a lot of people.
So I'm open to who it does help. But for
people who come to me and they're like, well, I
don't remember my childhood, so it doesn't feel like I
can connect because I don't remember.

Speaker 1 (51:36):
Do you think that's a But to me, like, that's
telling that's telling you something, right, that's telling you to
pushed past it in some ways, Well.

Speaker 4 (51:44):
I'm going to stop you there because I don't know
if it's to push past it, yeah, help, But I
would reframe it by saying how exciting. Yeah, yeah, how exciting? Right,
you get a blank paper to write what.

Speaker 3 (51:57):
I've told people to do to sort of get around them,
And the somatic work that I do is to just
sit with your body and let your body tell you, yes,
what it is you need. If you can't think about
what little eight year old needed right what is it?
What is the feeling telling you about what you need
right now?

Speaker 4 (52:17):
Where is it?

Speaker 3 (52:18):
And where is it in your body?

Speaker 2 (52:19):
Yes?

Speaker 3 (52:20):
And yeah, it don't make yourself so bad if you
can't like. And so I've had a lot of people
be like Inner child Work changed my life, and then
I've had people being like it didn't do anything for me.
And as one of those people who were like really
tried it and didn't find a lot of relief from it.
I think it was because I had so much trauma
in my marriage that was so severe, you know, physical abuse,

(52:41):
sexual abuse, just the gamut that, like my hippocampus has shrunk.
So like, I look at pictures of myself and my
childhood and I'm trying to remember things, and I just
can't grab a hold of a lot because I think
I had way more trauma. I mean, my childhood wasn't perfect,
but it was good and and I wouldn't consider it
ridiculously traumatic. But my marriage was very, very traumatic, and

(53:05):
so I know that maybe maybe I couldn't break past
a certain point, maybe I couldn't push past a certain
point to be able to get the full benefit of it.
So I don't discount it for people and say like, oh, no,
that doesn't work, don't do that. I'm just like, I
know what you mean when you come to me and
you say you don't remember a lot and that it

(53:25):
doesn't feel like you can connect. So instead, let's just
connect to the present and what it is now. Because
your subconscious remembers even though your conscious doesn't remember, So
that's sort of the bypass, at least for me.

Speaker 4 (53:38):
I also like, let's blow open what inner child is.
It's not just sitting in your mind's eye and talking
to younger folations. Right, we can take this to be
let's cultivate imagination and let's cultivate play. So like something,
I brought you guys these today, So I have my

(53:59):
sparkle freckles because for me this is makes me feel
fun and light and playful, and it makes me think
of like playing in makeup, and that's always something that's
always been very fun for me. And so for me,
this is like a small way of like being playful,
like and coming on here and being playful when I
brought you guys like I have like little jewels and stuff,

(54:21):
and that's just one door we could open, right, And
like a way of doing inner child work is allowing ourselves,
as serious adults on a very serious podcast, to talk
and just play. Yeah, And like by play, I mean
allowing yourself to just explore and create and do and

(54:43):
be silly and do whatever you want. And maybe it's
challenging yourself to think about was there anything? Is there something?
Is there a toy that I'm drawn to, like going
into a toy store and being like.

Speaker 1 (54:55):
Well, well the bear was build a bear was always
something I wanted, Like I would have never gotten to
experience build a bear as a child, right because we
like one, it didn't exist too. My mom would have
been like absolutely, not that silly, I'm not paying for that,
like no, And so I kept expressing, you know, to Josh,
like I want to build a bear.

Speaker 2 (55:13):
I want to build a bear.

Speaker 1 (55:14):
And it really was my inner child speaking like I
and you know, he planned this beautiful date one day
and took me to build a bear, and it was
just this, I'm just and I'm sharing this experience because
this is another way, right to explore your inner child
and just be really playful and fun and not feel
like it's silly, right, like it's an easy thing to be.
Like I've even brought the build a bear on set

(55:35):
before and have had her sit with me. Her name is,
her name is Sherbert and so, and she's a rainbow
and she's beautiful and because it just it brings me comfort,
right when that, of course, the day itself brought me
a ton of comfort. But even now when that stuffed
animals around me, like I'm like, I have no shame
in admitting that I'm.

Speaker 2 (55:54):
Forty two years old and I love stuffed animals.

Speaker 4 (55:56):
Yeah, but it doesn't even have to be something childles right, Like,
it can be anything. It's you want to pay attention
to what makes you excited, where your energy expands, that
you get a lot of energy that like builds you up.
Because anything that's like creating energy in your body is
absolutely where you should the direction you should be going into,

(56:19):
because there's something there and that can unlock and allow
yourself to kind of move and go and get curious
and follow wherever it takes you. And it's little things
like that that are me connecting with parts of myself
that are like I like bringing this into my life
and this is tactile and this is interesting and so

(56:41):
like an exercise I have in my book is like,
what were games you played as a child? Well, maybe
I don't remember the games I played a child?

Speaker 2 (56:49):
Okay, Well what do you like?

Speaker 4 (56:50):
Now? What kind of movies do you like? Like you
are the Nancy Drew of your life, Like you're getting
in there and you're figuring out these things and that
is so fun. It's like when you start dating a person,
you're like, oh, what do you like, what are you
into do that with yourself? And this is going to
unlock things and it's gonna you're gonna start to remember

(57:12):
or you're going to start to create something even better
that maybe you didn't have much.

Speaker 3 (57:16):
I really really, really, really really want to create a
trauma informed beauty line. Love that because and this is like,
but it feels so scary because I'm so not creative right,
Like so I'm just like I feel almost frozen with it.

Speaker 4 (57:31):
But you got to stop saying that now, I know,
because it's a decision. You said something earlier that I
could not agree with more.

Speaker 2 (57:38):
I know it is a choice.

Speaker 3 (57:39):
It is a decision, and I know that. Yeah. Here,
it's like I know that. But then you know those
old pathways light up that are like, no, you can't,
you don't have time. What if you lose money? That's
too risky, right, And I'm just like, okay, spirit of fear,
like walk yourself out the door, because there are so
many crazy things that happen to your body when you
have been traumatized that all the healing in the world,

(58:01):
emotional healing in the world, don't necessarily fix. Like you
need a little bit of support. Right, your body needs
certain things to thrive again, and you have to know
what to be able to give it for it to
thrive again, like one of the And this is a
silly example maybe, but I think for me it feels big.
Is like when you have had emotional trauma, your skin

(58:22):
barrier breaks down, and so you get things like perioral dermatitis,
which is something I've battled off and on, so has Reina.
You know, your skin just does weird and wonky things,
and your skin needs to be nourished and healed and
loved for what it's been through, like it went through war,
and like the way it's reacting isn't.

Speaker 2 (58:41):
And it's our largest organ.

Speaker 3 (58:42):
It's our largest organ. And so I want to create
something that is in everything I try. I'm like, shoot
that has nice cinemide in it or whatever, And that's
not what my skin needs right now. My skin needs
something clean, something organic, like it needs nature. It needs
these is really so yes, even is an acid right? Nature? Honestly,

(59:09):
I don't. I don't personally know of any beauty that
is trauma informed basically knows what happens to you at
a cellular level, for your with your skin with your scalp,
with you know, your nails, with all of these things,
and how to recover from that, and I keep picking
and choosing little bits of things. It's like, I have

(59:30):
to have a dab of this because if I used
too much then it's then my skin will go crazy
because I'm in you know, I've talked about like the
last year of my life was honestly one of the
most traumatic years because of somebody who decided to try
to break up my marriage and try to ruin my life.
And she didn't succeed, but it took such a psychological
toll on me. Even with all of these resources I

(59:51):
had to cope, my skin was still like, Nope, you're
right back in that abusive marriage. Like my my body
was like because you know, trauma lives in the body, right,
so it was like, yeah, you're right back here, about
to get your ass kicked by this two hundred and
sixty pound man. Like that's what it felt like. And
so my skin is in trauma rebound, which is really
really common, which is an over activation of the immune system,

(01:00:13):
you know, once you feel safe again, And so I'm
like trying to find something for my skin and nothing
breaking works because I'm like, I know what actually my
skin needs. I've done enough research to know the ingredients
that it needs. And I'm going to be like in
my homemade lab right with like my stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:00:27):
See, and this is your opportunity, I think to be creative.

Speaker 3 (01:00:30):
I don't have to be playful. Like that's really playful.

Speaker 4 (01:00:33):
Like you know, I make my own beauty products for
myself and like I love it. It's very you know,
I'm in that kitchen and I feel like it's like
little potions I'm and I'm creating and it's very freeing
from me. We should collab and like I mean, look,
I'll say, the best thing that you could ever do
for yourself in all, in every situation, from internal to external,

(01:00:55):
from your skin to everything, is cheegong. Chigong will change
your life. It will change your energy. You will glow
from the inside out. It will heal a lot of
things because it's your life force energy. And when you
focus on that, you are starting to create internal shifts
and quantum shifts from the inside out. And you know,
I think it's.

Speaker 2 (01:01:15):
Look, there's a lot on like body movement.

Speaker 4 (01:01:18):
What's cultivation of life force energy?

Speaker 2 (01:01:20):
Cheat And you don't have to break that down.

Speaker 1 (01:01:22):
So what that actually looks like in like tangible form, Like,
it's a lot of I mean, I've watched people do it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:28):
It's a lot of like.

Speaker 4 (01:01:30):
Body movement, right, but we're looking at it from the
outside of your like looking at it as movement. It's
internal shifts. It's you're focusing on the internal and you're
shifting expressing through body movement through poses that unlock certain
energy lines in the body that allow flow. Because when
we're coming back to trauma, this is a restriction of flow.

Speaker 3 (01:01:52):
You have.

Speaker 4 (01:01:54):
Traumatized, right, Like your body goes with your fashion.

Speaker 3 (01:01:56):
I remember your fashion.

Speaker 4 (01:01:58):
So it's allowing things to move to flow, and again
it goes back to allowing it goes back into flow.
It's opening up these pathways that because your body is
trying to protect you, of course it is, and so
it's just allowing the body to relax and to move
into that. And that's how you're reconditioning the body.

Speaker 3 (01:02:20):
Right.

Speaker 4 (01:02:21):
You know, you have three you have three planes to
really focus on. You have your physical, your mental, and
your emotional. And when you talk about self mastery and chiegong,
this is all of those things and all of them
are holistically connected. They all feed into each other and
so we don't just necessarily want to When we're talking
about healing, healing isn't getting rid of our pain. It's

(01:02:43):
it's changing a pattern.

Speaker 2 (01:02:45):
Yeah, and the pain could.

Speaker 4 (01:02:47):
Be there and that's okay, but like, let's allow that
pain and know that we're stronger than that and we
don't attack, like attached to it.

Speaker 3 (01:02:55):
You just said it, allowing it, allowing, right, allow it
to be there.

Speaker 2 (01:02:58):
We're not going to control.

Speaker 4 (01:03:00):
We're gonna People.

Speaker 3 (01:03:01):
Are so motivated to avoid pain, and what they don't
realize we'll do everything is the healing is in the
facing it head freaking on and just allowing it to
move through you and then it moves out of ease, right,
and so it's and that is exactly what I teach.
Oh my gosh, how are we so similar?

Speaker 4 (01:03:19):
You know, it's at the end of the day, because
it's it's it's it comes down to two things, which
is energy flows out, energy flows in. Uh, we're constantly
in that pattern. So we have to remember when we're
doing when we're working on our you know, somatic healing,
mental healing, emotional healing, surrender is the best thing you

(01:03:41):
know when people get into car accident judgment and they
come out unscathed because they were relaxed or they were drunk,
because they were relaxed, their body was relaxed. They're not
in a state of tension.

Speaker 1 (01:03:50):
Right.

Speaker 4 (01:03:51):
This is the pattern that you're It's constantly happening. It's
constantly happening in your relationships because the pattern that's being
created is I'm afraid, I'm gonna hold on, don't do this,
don't behave this way, don't all these ways that our
mind creates. But in essence, it's this and this is

(01:04:11):
this and this and that's our heart, isn't it.

Speaker 3 (01:04:14):
Can I pay you to have like coffee sessions with
my daughter because I think she would relate to you
so well, and she sees so much more of just
like this mom lecture, analytical, protective side mama. But she
needs like a like a mentor that like is just

(01:04:34):
so like it's what I teach, but in her language,
right yeah, right, it's what I teach other people, but
it's in the language that I think would resonate with
her and from someone that's not her mother, right, And.

Speaker 4 (01:04:46):
That's the big thing, right, because it's like it's you
you're too close.

Speaker 3 (01:04:50):
Yeah, I think we really wanted to talk about like
play and improv, but I think we ended up coming
back to what we usually do, which is like, well,
I feeling through through play and humor and allowing and.

Speaker 2 (01:05:02):
I mean energy.

Speaker 1 (01:05:02):
I have personally loved how this conversation has gone. I
think it's been insightful, it's been a light over. Well,
we have we we do have to wrap up going
we've been going for and and our day.

Speaker 2 (01:05:14):
I know our producer does. We'll just have to have
you on again. Our producer does have to leave shortly.
He has a life too.

Speaker 1 (01:05:20):
But so first, the most important thing where can people
find Yeah? Where can people find you?

Speaker 4 (01:05:26):
I have a stand store where I offer coaching, my
book I even do we'll do Chegong classes with people,
and that is artists phase, my wellness brand.

Speaker 3 (01:05:39):
We can put it in the show notes.

Speaker 4 (01:05:40):
Yeah, and so you can go visit my stand store
and and your book is there. And yeah, I have
like this new thing that I've put on my artist fae,
which is asked me a question. Yeah, and like I'll
send you a video and we'll just talk about like
one thing if you want to just do that it
can be anything.

Speaker 2 (01:05:57):
Yeah, I love that you were a fantastic stick.

Speaker 1 (01:06:00):
Guests, as I knew you would be, And so please
go check her out at artists Fay, which is like
your what do you?

Speaker 4 (01:06:09):
What do you?

Speaker 2 (01:06:09):
That's like your.

Speaker 4 (01:06:11):
It's like mynome to plume, So it's my it's what
I go up by. Artist Fay is a deeply personal metaphor,
which is like artists is from the Latin. It comes
from the MGM logo that I was always obsessed with,
which is artis gratia artists, and it means art for

(01:06:31):
art's sake, and Fay is to nature and play and
all of these things, Like fay comes from the fay
folk or fairy folk, and it really is about my
connection with the earth and nature and bringing that all together,
and that kind of encompasses my whole.

Speaker 2 (01:06:54):
Gifts that I want I offered to your world.

Speaker 1 (01:06:56):
Yeah, well, you both have so many gifts to give
and I am just so eternally grateful that.

Speaker 2 (01:07:05):
You two are my best friends.

Speaker 1 (01:07:07):
I mean, I know this isn't about me, but I
feel like people are gonna walk away from listening to
this podcast and be like, damn right, it is so
awesome just around herself by these two people. But so
I mean, I think it tells y'all a little bit
about me too, and hopefully you learned.

Speaker 2 (01:07:26):
I think they. I think this was beautiful because I
think people really saw a beautiful, vulnerable side of you today.

Speaker 1 (01:07:31):
I agree, and I'd love that, and I love that
for our listeners and.

Speaker 3 (01:07:35):
Because I'm a really complex person you can be.

Speaker 1 (01:07:38):
But at the same time, I think you're misunderstood by
a lot and so when but.

Speaker 3 (01:07:44):
Who's a lot who misunderstanding?

Speaker 1 (01:07:45):
People who don't matter, people who don't matter, honestly, people
who don't matter. But I think a lot of times
you're you're following and you're you're what you offer is
really really valuable, but it's also restrict and so this
really opened some of those new windows, really and where
the direction we want to go with really creating you

(01:08:07):
as a brand as a whole and really letting your
followers into this softer, more vulnerable, more real life just
Sarah right that we all know just made.

Speaker 3 (01:08:19):
A video again trying not to feel defeated, right because
I talked I made a TikTok about this yesterday I
was on Bethany Frankel's podcast just be you want to
talk about an authentic human, she could see a zero fox. Yeah,
And it's so cool that she's magnetics. It is, it's
so magnetic, Like her personality is so magnetic because she's

(01:08:42):
just like I am who I am, I want what
I want, and I don't really give a shit what
you think about it. And so here I am going
to just be the fullest extent of myself and nobody's
going to tell me how to do my life. And
there's something so amazingly cool about that. And I feel
like on TikTok, which is my big platform, is where
I started everything. The algorithm has boxed you in so

(01:09:06):
much like the changes to the algorithm has has put
such a box on you that maybe I need to
learn Instagram a little bit more. And then that's my
goal is to is to get more friendly with Instagram,
because basically Rain runs my Instagram because I was just
I was one year away of the generation that like
knows Instagram, right, Like, I grew up on the face
on the Book of Faces, and then hopped onto TikTok,

(01:09:28):
which I think a lot of people.

Speaker 1 (01:09:30):
And you got in on that window where you know
TikTok just kind of expanded and blew up and blew up,
and you had a niche and how it's like you're
kind of boxed.

Speaker 3 (01:09:38):
Into it and you're so much more. I'm so much
more again, I am a human being too at the
end of the day. And I'm more than relationship advice.

Speaker 2 (01:09:45):
Absolutely.

Speaker 3 (01:09:46):
I am life advice. I am messy, i am complex,
I make mistakes. I am a parent. I'm a lifelong learner,
which is something I pride myself in. Is like I
always want to be a lifelong learner. I want to
open myself up to so much more. I don't want
to be just like here's what I know and here's
the right way like today, like I know you come

(01:10:06):
from more of a like a just more holistic spiritual
perspective and I am like major team Jesus. Right, But
that doesn't have to clash, right, it can join forces
and be this beautiful like because like I'm not restricted.
I'm not restricted to block myself off from anybody who
is maybe like talks about chakras or whatever. You know,

(01:10:29):
I'm not being like no, I can't be a part
of that. Like no, I'm like teaching me more teaching
me something I don't know, because at the end of
the day, I believe that the laws of the universe
are also God's laws, So it doesn't conflict for me.
It doesn't conflict for me at all. And I don't
want to be boxed in.

Speaker 2 (01:10:45):
Right, And people do? People do? I mean even some
of our reviews are like.

Speaker 3 (01:10:48):
Oh, can you girls stop talking about Jesus first of all? No,
I think all this souls so other things as well.

Speaker 1 (01:10:55):
Right, this shows that we are open to expansion on
all levels. And because that's ultimately what we want for
our listeners, Like that is the mission.

Speaker 2 (01:11:03):
The mission.

Speaker 1 (01:11:03):
The mission is to rekeep growing, right, keep growing, reach
higher level right, reaching higher levels of consciousness, like that
is our whole mission. That's what we want for each
and every one of you. And I think that collectively
here you can get everything you want. Between these three
we can have a good.

Speaker 2 (01:11:18):
Time, you can learn.

Speaker 3 (01:11:19):
You need to bring a dude in though, yeah, yeah, we.

Speaker 1 (01:11:21):
Need we need a guy who knows, like we'll see,
we'll see. But anyway, so please go check out Lauren
September at artists Fay. Check out her book Playful Healing.
I'm going to read it yeah, and then of course
go check out doctor Hensley at the lovedoc dot com.
For all of our listeners, we offer a special promo
code for twenty seven percent off all of her courses

(01:11:41):
and her hybrid group with code love dot twenty seven,
So go check that out and please keep tuning in.
We love you guys, We're so grateful for you all.

Speaker 2 (01:11:51):
Thank you for listening.

Speaker 1 (01:11:52):
Oh we just we do weird. This is our favorite
thing to do. It's so like I feel so.

Speaker 2 (01:11:56):
I feel alive right now. I feel so good, like.

Speaker 3 (01:12:00):
To break out in a show too.

Speaker 1 (01:12:01):
Yeah, but I felt kind of like down in the dumps,
like walking in here, like I don't want to do this,
And now I feel liberated and good, and that's what.

Speaker 2 (01:12:08):
We want for each and every single one of you.

Speaker 1 (01:12:10):
So please keep tuning in, leaving us reviews, giving us feedback,
and until next time, peace, love and perspective.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Episode 15, Season II: "The Power of Play in Healing, with Special Guest Lauran September"

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Episode 15, Season II: "The Power of Play in Healing, with Special Guest Lauran September"

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