The Lie that Gratitude Means Silence

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
So for me, Ola sopam and welcome to our Mergarito,
the place where we showcase the brands that believe in
us and help us make the show possible. Let's meet them.
We all know this. Talking about money is not always

(00:26):
the most comfortable. Better, our friends from save Ladies make
it easier and now and Espanol, you don't have to
feel the pressure to translate for your mama or your tias.
Because savid Ladies has their whole site and nuestro yaora
they can easily access their free resources like Taietes Glasses,

(00:49):
is La Lina, Gratis Bara and bunts their free financial
helpline and then the pace connect that with a trusted
financial expert. Whether you need financial guy in English or Espanol,
savid Ladies is here to support you. Visit save ladies
dot org. That is s A V V Y l

(01:10):
A d I E S dot O r G. But
I'm besat your financial freedom. You know what's frustrating losing
your wallet, and you know sometimes what's even more painful
realizing your almost full punch card from your favorite govesito
spot is now gone. But at least even when your

(01:32):
govecito points have vanished. At Bimo, if you lose your
debit card, they'll print you a new one instantly at
a local branch. Plus, you can use your phone to
freeze your debit card to prevent any unauthorized transactions. Learn
more at bimo dot com. Conditions apply accounts provided in
the United States by Beimo Bank and a member FDIC.

(02:00):
Welcome back to Kava compam and on the comparts sin
sansura and in a very bilingual way. Okay, lock in,
pull up a chair. This is gonna be a good one.
I think, and I truly believe this is a good
time for you and I to have some cafecito and

(02:22):
some real talk. Imagine or take yourself back. You just
got promoted, You're making more money than your parents ever dreamed.
Uf You're sitting in your car rehearsing how to tell
your mom without making her feel like you've forgotten where
you came from. Sounds familiar because somewhere along the way

(02:43):
you learn that gratitude and ambition cannot coexist, that being
thankful means staying quiet about what you still want, and
that honoring your parents sacrifice means never asking for more.
Say well, no, your whole life, you've heard be grateful
for what you have after everything we've done, Who do

(03:07):
you think you are? And these could be things that
you may have heard or you may have created in
your head. And the unspoken message underneath all of that
is your desire is a betrayal and that your voice
is disrespect is culture. So today we're calling it what

(03:30):
it is, a lie yo, and this isam be a
MENI there, let's get into this gratitude and voice. They're
not enemies. It's a cultural conditioning that taught you they
are and that is what's actually stealing your joy. And

(03:53):
I'm telling you this because I went through it myself, Loyes.
Being grateful does not mean being quiet, and probably you've
been suffocating under the weight of gratitude that demands or
your silence. We're going to reclaim what gratitude actually means,
and we are going to give our selves permission to

(04:14):
actually want more and be okay with it. Let's start
with la with the truth is that your parents are
parents are familiars. We're not wrong to teach us gratitude
because we have to also honor the fact that they
survived things we cannot even fathom. They crossed borders. They

(04:36):
cross borders literally, they cross borders metaphoric, metaphorically metaphoricame andleno.
They work jobs that broke their bodies so we could
all have choices they never had. When they say be grateful,
they actually mean it with every fiber of there being,
because for them, gratitude is not just an it's armor,

(05:01):
its protection. It's the thing that kept them going when
dolo iste of falling apart, when they lost their culture,
their language, when they had to adapt and assimilate, and
so that's all it was. What happened is that somewhere
between their sacrifice and your success, gratitude became something else.

(05:26):
That bridge between their sacrifice and your success. There's this,
I imagine it like a little invisible thread that unites them,
and gratitude became a tool of control. It's a way
to keep you small and a reason why you've been
feeling like you can't speak up. Yotraes, I'm saying all
of this because I felt to myself, but I haven't

(05:48):
been the only one talking about it. In her groundbreaking
work Borderlands, La Gloria and Saint Doin writes about what
it means to live between two worlds. How first generation
folks like us straddle the borderlands constantly exposed to the
Spanish of our families on one side and the Anglos

(06:08):
insistant clamoring on the other. That we learned to code switch,
to translate to be just brown enough or Mexican enough
at home and just American enough at school. And in
that constant translation, that's where we lost the permission to
behole in. Gratitude, of course, became the bridge we had

(06:33):
to cross perfectly, never complaining on the Mexican side or
your countryside, never appearing ungrateful on the American side, or
to get you know, just be grateful, always grateful, silently grateful.
Ijoma Guarlo a time when I told one of my

(06:54):
ideas that I was just having a hard time and
I was in complaining. I was just like, you know,
running a business is hard, and I was in the
middle of that transition. I feel like I've been in
a transition for a long time, but I was dealing
with some stuff at the time, and I was like,

(07:16):
you know, it's hard to juggle everything because I have
to not just run the business, but also I have
to wear a ton of hats and I have to
wear the marketing hat and the sales hat. And we
had just gone into like it was this weird spot
in twenty twenty when you're like, I don't know, are

(07:37):
we going to stay in business? Are we going to
fully transition to online? It was like just weird. And
I was like, I'm feeling a little bit like drowning. Better.
You know, I wasn't complaining. I was just speaking truth.
And instead of comfort, what I got wass you have
opportunities a lot of people wish they could have. You're

(07:58):
you a citizen, you have your business, you can you
speak English? Oh so? And I mean she wasn't wrong better,
she wasn't hearing me. And in that moment, that's when
I realized that gratitude wasn't an invitation to share my truth.

(08:22):
And it was that wall that kept me from being seen.
And I know that my Thea has loved for me,
and I know that in fact, she wasn't trying to
hurt me. She was just speaking from her own experience
and her own survival and from a place where complaining
was a luxury. We've been taught we couldn't afford, just

(08:44):
like therapy, at some point lo treksk. What worked for
her survival was now asking me to abandon my truth.
So let me be clear here. There's a difference between
genuine gratitude this is an emotion the honors what we
have received, and wepinized gratitude this is a tool that

(09:05):
silence is what we need. Genuine gratitude says I see
what you gave me, and I'm grateful, thank you so much.
Webinized gratitude says, after everything I did for you, how
dare you want more? You see the difference. One creates
connection and the other one creates compliance. You want to.

(09:27):
For so many of us first gen's eldest daughters, second,
even third, I've worked with f clients At our third generation,
it still passed on because we learned that being great
ungrateful or being called ungrateful is the worst thing that
could happen, worse than being wrong, actually worst than failing,

(09:49):
because ungrateful meant we had forgotten where we came from.
So there was this like underlining connection of gratitude and
you roots in a way, and being ungrateful meant we
were betraying the sacrifice that allowed us to be here.

(10:12):
So that made us stay quiet. We smiled and we
said thank you. Even when we felt like suffocating, we
smiled and we did the things when we knew we
couldn't do it all. We smiled and we didn't speak
up at meetings, because be grateful you have that job. Also,
doctor Rachel Yehudah's research on intergenerational trauma shows that children

(10:37):
of trauma survivors often report feeling traumatized by the expectations
placed on them. Okay, let me repeat that in case
that was not clear. Children of trauma survivors often report
feeling traumatized by the expectations placed on them that they
are they feel. Children of trauma survivors feel they are

(10:59):
the reason they're parents survive, which creates a whole set
of accomplishments they now achieved. Talk about pressure and does
it sound familiar? Actually, so give ourselves permission to take
a breath here and just kind of like process this.
When I read it the first time, I was like, oh, well, no,

(11:21):
wonder because what it means is that we're not carrying
our own dreams. We're carrying the weight of every sacrifice
our parents made. Our grandparents made, every border they crossed,
every insult they swallowed every dream, they differed, and gratitude
became the rope that tied you to that weight. And

(11:42):
this is of course not at all saying that parents
were cruel or the family want to hurt us at all.
We know they did the best they could with what
they had. However, survival taught them that safety meant silence
and that was past onto us. So we learned the same.

(12:03):
So now let's talk about what actually happens in your
body when someone says be grateful and you feel your
throat close up pretty metal. This is not weakness. Let's
just clarify. This isn't you being too sensitive, and this
is your nervous system doing exactly what it was trained
to do. And we know this that our bodies are

(12:29):
designed to speak up when they notice danger. Doctor Stephen Porges,
who developed polyvagile theory, explains that our feelings of safety
emerge from internal physiological states regulated by the autonomic nervous system.
What does that mean, Well, basically that your body has

(12:50):
this alarm system that is constantly scanning for information for
external factors. It's our soulviual engagement system. It's a part
of us that connect us with other with other people,
and it only functions. I mean, it functions all the time,
but it also signals to us when we feel safe.

(13:13):
What it means, in other words, is that basically, when
you were a child and you expressed what you wanted,
what you needed, what you felt, and you were met
with don't talk back, cla or things like after everything
we've done for you, yo. I was like when I

(13:35):
was writing this, I was trying to think of all
the things that I heard, like barscan you should be grateful?
Or worse, even the silence treatment or the luck you know,
that mom luck or that parent look or even that
grandmother look of like did you need to look at you?

(13:58):
And you're like, oh so that look of silence, disappointment
and even we droll with withdraw. No, what happened is
that our nervous system got filled up with that information
and it learned the signals. It learned patterns that speak

(14:20):
in my truth equals is a threat to belonging equals.
It's a survival danger. So the thing about your nervous
system is that your body doesn't care if you're five
years old or you're fifty years old. It doesn't care
if you have success, if you are independent, if you're accomplished,
if you live by yourself, or you're still live with
your parents. When the old patterns get activated, your body

(14:44):
responds the way it learned to respond. The body always
goes back to the familiar. The body will always go
back to what the body knows how to respond to.
And so if we are so used to the silence,
the disappointment, the shaming of it, then when anything feels

(15:08):
close to that, this is when we notice our voice shakes,
our throat titans, We second guess ourselves, We rehearse even
conversations before we have them. You kind of like plan
over overthink, and plan out walking into that meeting. And
this is not because you don't know what to say.
This is simply because your nervous system is unconsciously sending

(15:30):
signals of danger that discourage social engagement behaviors because it's
basing it on prior evidence. Here's where it gets really
specific to first gen daughters eldest daughters. US psychotherapist Pete Walker,
who coined the term funning, describes it as a response

(15:53):
to a threat by becoming more appealing to the threat. Okay,
so fun types seeks say, by merging with the wishes,
with the needs and the demands of others, acting as
if the prize of admission to any relationship is forfeiting
all their needs, rights, preferences, and even boundaries. Gomos, are

(16:19):
we resonating here. I'm so grateful, mom, thank you so much.
Of course I don't need anything. Of course everything's fine. No, really,
I'm so happy. And meanwhile, inside you're thinking, I'm actually drowning.
I need a lot of help. I'm scared. I'm at
the verge of burnout, and I don't know if I
can keep this up with myself. But the thing is

(16:42):
that very early we learned that protesting leads to even
more frightening parental retaliation. So what we do is we
relinquish our fight response. We delete no from our vocabulary.
Because when we remove no from our vocabulary, we become helpful, pleasing,

(17:03):
and grateful. And this is fawning. And it's not your fault,
and it's it's not even your parents' fault. It's just
the perception that our body created when we experience what
we experience and what we learn to survive so physiologically,
so you have even more clarity on what happens in
the body. When someone brings up sacrifice, this becomes the

(17:28):
trigger point. This becomes like the alarm turns on. So
I think of it like a smoke alarm in your house.
And you know the like they're so sensitive. Sometimes they're
so annoying because like I can't even have incense in
my house, Like the very like moment a teeny tiny
bit of smoke touches that thing, it starts going off.

(17:49):
That's how sensitive. You're a migdala is and your a
migdala is. That sensor is a detection center. It's a
protector of you that will always and forever scan for danger.
So if you get a little bit of smoke that says, ooh,
this could be familiar, somebody talks about sacrifice or that

(18:12):
comes up somewhere, then de amygdala says danger, danger, danger.
Your body then prepares to respond the four different types
of responses fight, flight, freeze, or fawning. We know that fighting,
like speaking up, got us in trouble as a kid,
many of us. We also know that fleean flight, running

(18:35):
away was not an option because how there you abandon
the people that sacrifice so much. So the default for
us usually is fawning. This is when we become agreeable, apologetic, grateful,
and we minimize what we need and perform thankfulness. Now
this could apply to you. Some of you might be like, no,

(18:57):
I'm a fighter. I will speak up, but think about
how much much trouble you got into for doing so.
Of course, what I share it's not going to apply
to everyone, because I'm also pulling a lot from my
own experience and how I personally and a lot of
my clients that I work with created the pattern of fawning.

(19:18):
And the irony here that happens is that the very
behavior that kept you safe as a child is now
suffocating you as an adult. It's kind of wild to
think about it, so it could apply. Thinking about the
five wounds of kaya culture, we're talking about the wound
of silence and how you could be overcompensated or undercompensated

(19:38):
in the wound, and in this case, we're talking mainly
for those undercompensated who will tend to fawn, but you
can also fight. How this could show up for you
as an adult. Think you're in a meeting, you have
an idea, it's a good idea, but before you speak,
your body will like before you even think about it,
Like this is so subconscious that you don't get to

(20:04):
clock it because you're thinking about your idea. While you're
thinking about your idea, and while you're like overthinking to
how you're going to say it, your bodies are ready
doing the math. You're a Magdala's like, wait, let me
just scan for information and the amygdala what actually is
processing is if I say this, are they going to
think I am too much? Are they going to think

(20:26):
if maybe I am too ambitious or maybe I'm so
ungrateful for my current position? Who do I think I am?
And I've seen this happen even with CEOs, and this
is not imposter phenomenon. Actually, I would say that this
is your nervous system, remembering the last time I wanted something,
I was told to be grateful for what I had,

(20:47):
And so speaking up equals criticism equals danger. So what
you do? You stay quiet? I think there's a difference
between the impost phenomenon, And maybe people might argue that
it's like it's connected too, but it's not you doubting yourself,
like you know that your idea is good, but it's
that signaling from your amigdala that says, hmm, you might

(21:12):
get in trouble for this, So you stay quiet, and
you let somebody else share your idea, and you perform
gratitude for the opportunity to even be in the room.
And then you go home and you wonder why you
feel so empty, And then you come to me and
then we talk about it, and you're like, why did
I nurse not speak up? It's happened many times. And
what I want to tell you is that your body
is not broken. Your nervous system is actually doing an

(21:35):
incredible job of keeping you safe. That's the role of
the body, that's the role of the amygdala. The amygdala
is actually on our side because she wants to make
sure you're safe. You know, she wants to keep you
safe based on the information that has So that's the
thing that we want to remember about our bestie, the amygdala.
She decides on her actions based on historical data. The

(22:00):
challenge is that the information, the historical data that she's
pulling from is outdated, because what kept you safe at
five years old, it's now keeping you small as an adult,
and the compliance that protected you from your parents' disappointment
is now preventing you from leaving your truth, from being
in your power, from speaking up and sharing your story
that's so needed, and the funding that earned your approval

(22:23):
is of course now costing you so much power. And
the gratitude that was supposed to honor the sacrifice, well,
that has now become the cage. So the first step
to healing this pattern is not going to be to
force yourself to speak up or just being more confident.
So this is a pet peeve of mine when I
hear people like just brainwish yourself into confidence. No, ma'am,

(22:48):
that's not how it works, because the first step is
recognizing this is what my body learned. You want to
create that awareness around you to say I am whole
as I am with what my body learned from before.
And just like my body was able to learn this,

(23:09):
I can also teach my body new things because the
amygdala needs new data, It needs micro moments where speaking
your truth does not result in abandonment, when wanting more
does not equal betrayal, or your voice feels super safe

(23:32):
to be an existent and share. And the work is
to first create awareness. It's never to force, it's never
to push through. You can't heal yourself through reformations. You
could actually, but it might take some years. And so
how we do this is through gently, consistently showing the

(23:55):
body that is safe to want more, that is safe
to ask for more, that is safe to feel whole
and grateful and accomplished at the same time. So here's
your invitation to give yourself permission to accept it. And
then we're going to move into this mantling. The biggest

(24:16):
lie you've been caring, the lie that you have to choose.
There's a lie that we all kind of carry deep
underneath into her heart that says you can be grateful
or you can want more. The lie that says you
can honor your parents sacrifice, or you can chase your dreams.
The lie that says you can be a good daughter

(24:37):
or you can be ambitious. That is a false binary
and it's destroying you. Many times. What I have seen
is that people will push through it because a lot
of my clients they come to me and they're like,
you know, I am accomplished. I have the business, I
have the career, and when I go home, oh, it

(25:00):
just feels so bad. Is this push and pull that
you're constantly dealing with. But let me tell you what
actual signs of gratitude says. Because it's important and because
you know it's important for me to quote people that
have done the work before me and have actually studied it.
So Doctor Robert Emmons, the world's leading researcher on gratitude,

(25:22):
defines it as having two parts. First, we affirm that
there are good things in the world, and this doesn't
mean life is perfect or that we ignore complaints and burdens. Second,
we recognize that the sources of this goodness come from
outside ourselves. So notice that this is not a definition.

(25:44):
Nowhere does it say and therefore you must stay small,
and therefore you can't move, and therefore your voice is betrayal.
It doesn't say that. In fact, doctor Emmons's research shows
that gratitude allows us to participate more in life, to
notice positives and magnify the pleasures we get from life.
We celebrate goodness instead of just adapting to it. This

(26:07):
means that gratitude is actually about engagement instead of compliance,
and it's about appreciation instead of silence. So the reframe
that I invite you to try on simply try it on,
is your ambition honors the sacrifice by not wasting opportunities
they created. Your ambition honors the sacrifice by not wasting

(26:32):
the opportunities they created. Because our parents didn't sacrifice so
much so it could stay place small. They didn't cross
borders so we could stay silent. They didn't break their
back so we could break our spirit trying to be
grateful enough. They sacrificed everything so we could be free.

(26:54):
And freedom means you get to want more, You get
to speak your truth, you get to build on what
i they gave you on top of it without guilt.
Let me tell you a story about a client who
was making a lot of money in her business, and
on paper, she had everything. Everything she had the success,

(27:15):
she had, the business, she had, the Instagram account, she had,
the car, the purse, everything. At the end of the day,
she was miserable because every time she celebrated a win,
she heard a voice saying you but I could get
his mess. Why do you need more? So she stopped celebrating.

(27:39):
She downplayed her success. She performed gratitude while secretly resenting
the very achievements she had worked so hard for and
the fact that she had achieved them. Frankly, that alone
as Latina is a big deal. And so when we
start working together, I asked her, what do you think

(28:03):
your parents actually wanted for you? And once she thought
about it, long lung pause, that literally came to her
from her heart, and her answer was they wanted me
not to struggle the way they did because they were
her parents were young parents, They cross borders, they sacrificed everything.

(28:29):
And I asked, are you struggling and her answer was
I'm not, and I feel so guilty that I'm not
a survivor's guilt. There was the guilt of not suffering.
So what we did is we worked on a reframe.

(28:50):
What of your ease is the evidence that their sacrifice
actually worked. What if your ability to make money without
breaking your body so hard is exactly what they hoped for.
What if your ambition is not a betrayal to them,
it's actually prove that you heard when they said we

(29:10):
want better for you. And then everything shifted for her
because she started celebrating her wins and she didn't feel
that she was betraying her parents because she was winning
and they couldn't. She was actually in practice of true,
genuine gratitude. And so instead of saying I should just

(29:35):
be grateful for what I have. You could say, I
am grateful for what I have, and I am choosing
to create more. Instead of saying, who am I to
want this when my parents had so much less? You
could say, because my parents had so much less, I
am building on the foundation they gave me, and I'm

(29:56):
going to make them so proud. Instead of saying, my
desire is respectful to their struggle, because we almost feel
like we're leaving them behind, But you could try to say,
my desire is the result of their hope and they
wanted this for me. Because the truth is, you're not
choosing between gratitude and ambition, or between honoring your family

(30:20):
and honoring yourself. You're choosing both because both are true.
And actually science supports this because doctor Emmon's research shows
that gratitude blocks toxic negative emotions like envy and resentment.
But notice that it doesn't block healthy desire, authentic ambition,

(30:41):
or truthful expression. Real gratitude will never ask you to shrink,
will never demand your silence, and will never cost you power.
Because what our parents' tautoes was survival gratitude, and this
is the kind that keep us safe by keeping us small.
So what we are learning now is sovereign gratitude is

(31:03):
the kind that honor is the past. What we claim
our future with pride, with gratitude, with honor, and with
a lot of respect. Let me say this straight up.
You are allowed to be grateful and ambition. We all are.
You're allowed to honor your parents' sacrifice and build your
own dreams. You're allowed to appreciate what you have and

(31:26):
ask for more. And it's not disrespect, it's actually integration.
Because what it means to live in the Borderlands to
hold both cultures, both truths, both realities without fragmenting yourself.
As we learn from Gloria and Saldua, who taught us
that being in the Borderlands means you don't have to

(31:48):
choose between worlds. You get to create our own third space,
the space where multiple truths coexist. Because gratitude is real,
your desire is real, and both could be true and
nobody needs an explanation for that. So how do we
practice gratitude without suffocating under it? How do we honor

(32:11):
our parents' sacrifice without abandoning ourselves? How do we be
grateful without being silent? Let's reclaim what grass yes actually means?
What do we say thank you and our family? What
are we really saying? For many of us, grass yes
became code for I won't complain, I won't ask for more.

(32:32):
I'm not going to disappoint you. I'm going to just
stay small so you feel that your sacrifice was worth it.
But what if grass yas could just mean I see you,
I value what you gave me, and I'm taking it forward,
instead of saying I'll stop here because anything more would
be greedy. But what if grass yes means thank you
for building this foundation. Now watch what I build on

(32:56):
top of it, and wait for me to build it
so strongly so I can bring you with But let's
break the difference of authentic gratitude and webinized gratitude. Webinize
gratitude uses guilt as motivation after all done, all I've
done for you. Webinized gratitude the man's compliance as proof

(33:16):
of thankfulness. It makes you makes you feel like your
needs are betrayal. It requires you to stay exactly where
they left off, and it's almost like this invisible pool
that we get. I often work with people who haven't
like it's really hard for them to make more than

(33:38):
their parents ever made annually, and that's kind of like
a ceiling that people have. I notice is, let's say
if your parents, If your mom the most she ever
made was thirty thousand dollars a year, When you start
making thirty thousand dollars a month, that's like the ceiling.
For some odd reason, that's not that's webinized gratitude because

(34:00):
it measures love by how much you sacrifice yourself. Now,
authentic gratitude is acknowledges the gift without owing your whole self.
It honors the sacrifice by using the opportunities they created.
It allows both appreciation and aspiration. It celebrates your growth

(34:22):
as proof that the work actually mattered, and a measures
love by how much you actually thrive. Now, doctor Emmont's
research shows that true gratitude involves recognizing that good things
come from sources outside of ourselves, but it doesn't require
us to forfeit our own needs or silence our own

(34:43):
voice as payment. I'm reiterating that because gratitude is receiving,
not owing. There are three ways to practice gratitude without
silencing yourself no matter who. We want to separate appreciation
from obligation. So the invitation here is for you to say,
I am grateful for what you gave me. Boondaa. Oh

(35:07):
that's a complete sentence. We don't want to add. So
I'll never want more. So I'll stay exactly here, So
I'll make my life about proving it was worth it. No, no, No,
appreciation stands alone, and it never wants sacrifice to be
tied to it. So separate appreciation from obligation and try it.

(35:29):
I'm grateful for what you gave me, no matter of
those honor their hope, not just their struggle. Because your
parents didn't just suffer. They also had so much hope.
If they didn't, they wouldn't have come. They hoped you
had choices, They hoped you would build something beautiful, and
they hoped you wouldn't have to struggle the way they did.

(35:51):
So when you honor their sacrifice, you also honor the
hope that fueled their sacrifice. This means succeeding, grown, speaking up,
taking up space, building wealth, living fully, and indulging in
this beautiful life we get access to. And that's not betrayal,
that's fulfillment of the hope. No mater tres. We practice

(36:13):
cyclical gratitude, so Here's what I mean. Gratitude does not
end with you. You're grateful for what your parents', grandparents,
your family gave you. You're building something you'll get forward.
Is this a c that's a legacy? Better? You don't
honor the sacrifice by staying stuck, You honor it by

(36:35):
continuing the building. This is where you want to make sure.
The three ways to practice gratitude without silencing yourself allow
you to feel more free, which is ultimately what your
parents wanted. Separate appreciation, appreciation from obligation. Honor their hope,

(36:57):
not just their struggle. And this cyclical gratitude. So let
me bring my own values for a moment. So I
have six core values, and in this case, when I
was writing this episode, I always go back to my
core values, and I often think about how am I

(37:18):
honoring those guiding principles that I choose to live by
even when I share an episode. And so grace, for example,
is one of my core values, and it means I
honor my parents, humanity, and my own because they did
the best they could with what they had. And so
am I even thinking past versions of me, past versions

(37:42):
of me didn't have the tools that I currently have,
so also present me doesn't have all the tools I'll
ever have in the future, and so giving myself grace.
This is why grace is so important, because it brings
me back to presence. Trust unfolding is another one of
my values. It means I don't have to have it
all figure out. I know I can be grateful for

(38:02):
where I am while trusting there's more coming, and trusting
also that things are going to happen for me, things
are going to happen in my favor. Wonder forward means
I get curious. One of my parents' biggest hope was
that I would be free, and what would that freedom
look like? I get curious about what did they imagine

(38:27):
for us, not just me as the eldest daughter, but
also like older kids, my siblings, even Anchored and self
means my gratitude comes from my core, not from my performance.
And I'm grateful because I feel it, not because I'm
supposed to prove it. And for a long time I

(38:47):
spent years trying to prove it, and now I thankfully
arrived at that place where I am anchored in myself
because I honor who I am, I honor my identity,
my voice my truth and my power and listen. This
is not perfect. We're still working on it, but at

(39:10):
least we've arrived at that place where I don't feel
like I need to prove something to whoever. And something
beautiful that happens is that for all of us, there's
wisdom in our culture that actually supports this the means.
And I've said it since I first started Kavakompam actually

(39:35):
because the thought that came when I first started the
podcast was I was like guadromas. At the time, they
were like so little. Now there's so many more. And
even back then, I had this feeling of like, I like,
there's already for people podcasting, like why do you want

(39:56):
to be the fifth the fifth one? And so immediately
I could hear my grandfather say, El Sol sala bartos,
the sun rises for everyone. I always ground myself in that.
Anytime I feel some comparisonitis, in some way, I bring
myself back to El soolsal Brados, and El Sool doesn't
shy away from blinding people. Actually, you know, El Sol

(40:21):
is gonna be bright a f and just shine. I
love the sun and El Sol boos including you, because
your light doesn't dim their light. Your success does not
erase their struggle. Your voice is not disrespecting their sacrifice,

(40:45):
but gel sol salle bartos, And that includes all of
us first gens immigrants, daughters of immigrants, second third gens,
eldest daughters who are tired of choosing between gratitude and
growth because we get both. So let's bring this home brain.

(41:07):
Grateful doesn't mean being quiet. Honoring your parents' sacrifice does
not mean abandoning your dreams and your desire. That thing
you've been taught to feel guilty about isn't betrayal. It's
simply proof that their hope actually took root. You're not
ungrateful because you want more. You're not disrespectful because you

(41:28):
speak up. You're not too much because you refuse to
stay small. You're simply refusing to let gratitude become the
lie that keeps you silent. So next time someone says, ooh,
we'd be grateful, next time someone tells you just be
grateful when what you really need is to be heard,
take a breath, pause for a second, and ask yourself,

(41:51):
grateful for what? Grateful for? Foundation? Absolutely does that gratitude
require my silence about what I'm building on top of it. Absolutely.
Not grateful for opportunities created. Absolutely, Does that gratitude mean
I cannot create more? Absolutely? Not grateful for the sacrifice always.

(42:13):
Does that gratitude mean I sacrifice myself too? Absolutely? Now,
you can be grateful and voiced. You can be thankful
and ambitious. You can honor the past and claim your
future because both and is your medicine. So if this episode,

(42:33):
you know, hit you in the chest in some way
with lots of love, if you feel seen, if you
feel that exhale of recognition, maybe finally you have words
for what you've been caring. I invite you to take
the culture quiz that lets you uncover your wound, the

(42:54):
biggest one that you're caring, And this is the one
that's asking for your attention first, because naming it is
the first step to reclaiming it. And you deserve to
reclaim your voice without guilt. You deserve to hold gratitude
and desire in the same breath. You deserve to be
whole and your truth is your medicine. Never too much,

(43:16):
because the world needs women who know that being grateful
and being vocal are not enemies. They're both and and
that is what changes everything. Thank you so much for
being here. If you love this episode, please share with
your friends. Let's discuss it. Tag me, tell me what resonated.
Let's let's talk about it in the DMS. I love

(43:38):
doing that. Be grateful, but don't make it a weaponized gratitude.
Make it authentic to Gratitudeamus created by our small but
mighty team. Content production by Nancy Heimes, podcast management by Marulina,

(44:00):
Social media and marketing by Brenda Figuero. End meet your
host Vamcos. To keep the kavasito brewing and the healing flowing,
Join the Supporters Club for only five dollars a month
and access early episodes, behind the scenes vibes, and exclusive
minnesotes you won't hear anywhere else. Screenshot this episode and

(44:21):
tag me and share what resonated. I love seeing your takeaways.
Follow on your favorite podcast platform and subscribe to our
YouTube channel. Let's keep the conversation going with us on
social media at Kapa Compam podcast because your voice always
matters there. We love being on Instagram and Facebook. Gracias
for listening to Kafa Combam has spread ideas, move people.

(44:43):
Production for Bird episodes guest info or resources. Visit Kavakombam
dot com and if you're healing from Gadiahta culture and
don't know where to start, you can take the quiz
gafa Combam dot com, Ford slash Quiz for TIA Wisdom
and Kaarino just for you,

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

On Purpose with Jay Shetty

Ruthie's Table 4

The Joe Rogan Experience

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}The Lie that Gratitude Means Silence

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}On Purpose with Jay Shetty

Ruthie's Table 4

The Joe Rogan Experience

All Episodes

The Lie that Gratitude Means Silence

On Purpose with Jay Shetty