October 16, 2025 • 49 mins
Ever feel like you’re doing “all the right things” for your health and still spinning your wheels? We open up a different path with health strategist and Grace & Grit host Courtney Townley—one that trades perfection for practical skills and turns midlife into a launchpad rather than a slowdown. Instead of chasing one-off outcomes, we build the foundations that make change stick: honest awareness, smart organization, reliable follow-through, and the courage to realign without the drama.
We start by unpacking why the wellness rulebook fails so many women—especially at midlife. Courtney shares how a postpartum wake-up call revealed the blind spot in mainstream health: obsessing over weight while ignoring mindset, identity, and nervous system capacity. We explore integrity pain (that inner friction when your habits don’t match your values), the stress bucket model for simplifying life’s load, and why resilience is less about gritting your teeth and more about how you recharge. From micro-recovery breaks and nervous system respect to habit design you can actually maintain, the conversation offers tools that feel doable on your busiest days.
Midlife becomes a liminal space—between who you’ve been and who you’re becoming—where health serves as base camp for the climb of your life. You’ll learn how to reduce unnecessary stressors, add intentional challenges to build capacity, and parent your brain with useful thoughts that pull you forward. We also cover when talk therapy isn’t enough and how somatic support can unlock long-stuck patterns. If you’re ready to lead your health with clarity and grace, this is your roadmap to living full out.
Grab Courtney’s free Midlife Magic Quick Start Guide, keep an eye out for her book The Consistency Code (November 4, 2025), and connect at graceandgrit.com. If this episode helped you rethink your health story, subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review to help more women find it.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Cassandra (00:03):
Good day out there to all my listeners.
And I'd like to welcome you toIs Your Way in Your Way podcast.
And I'm your host.
My name is Cassandra CrawleyMayo for those new listeners out
there.
And I also want to share withmy new listeners what this
podcast is all about.
First of all, Is Your Way inYour Way is my book.
(00:26):
So I'm like, what better titleto give my podcast for those
individuals that are in theirway?
So this podcast is aboutguiding purpose-driven women who
are ready to get out of theirway.
It's time to go from yourlimiting beliefs, emotional
exhaustion, unclear purpose toidentifying internal blocks,
(00:48):
reconnecting with the vision Godhas for your life and moving
forward with confidence,clarity, and to live your best,
most fulfilling life on yourterms.
And I talk about topics relatedto self-improvement,
self-development, businessdevelopment.
And also a lot of the topicswill enable you to do some what
(01:10):
I call self-reflection.
Now I have a uh special guestcoming on today, but I'm going
to ask uh well, let me tell youthis.
First of all, the topic islet's live full out, redefining
health at midlife.
Now I have a question for youbefore we before I introduce
you.
Have you ever felt like nomatter how many diets you try or
(01:35):
how many wellness trends youfollow, you're still stuck.
Like you're checking all theboxes, but something is still
missing.
What if I told you that theproblem isn't your willpower,
but the wellness culture itself?
So today I'm joined by theincredible Courtney Townley, a
(01:56):
health strategist, behaviorchange expert, and host of the
Grace and Grit Podcast.
So let me introduce you toCourtney.
Hi, Courtney.
How are you today?
Amazing.
I'm so happy to be here.
I am so happy that you arehere.
And you know what, uh, mylisteners, Courtney's gonna help
(02:18):
us uncover why we've beenhitting the same wellness walls
and how we can start leading ourhealth journey with clarity,
confidence, and alignment.
So if you're not driving andyou're sitting somewhere, you
may want to sit down and journalthis, get ready to rewrite your
wellness story from the insideout.
(02:39):
So, what I'm gonna do first, asI usually do, is I'm gonna
share a little bit aboutCourtney's background so you
will be able to see why she isqualified to talk about this
topic.
She is a transformationalhealth strategist, host of the
Grace and Grit podcast, withover two decades of experiences
(03:04):
in health coaching, behaviorscience, and personal
development.
She helps women break free fromthe noisy perfection-driven
wellness culture.
She guides them towardssustainable, grace-filled
habits.
I'm going to talk about habitsnow, rooted in alignment and
self-leadership, not shame ordeprivation.
(03:27):
Her approach blends science andsoul, empowering women to
reclaim their health, theirconfidence, and their joy.
So, this to me is a perfect fitto is your way in your work
because it dismantles what Icall internalized wellness myths
and helps women realign withher truly, what truly serves
(03:51):
them physically, mentally, andspiritually.
So, and guess what, guys?
She is known as uh what I calla mover, a shaker, and a queen,
midlife queen maker.
How about that?
Wow.
So um Courtney.
(04:15):
Now you had you initially hadstarted with a program called
Butts and Guts.
Yes, it's a long way.
So this is like Grace andGrits.
Now tell us a bit about whatwas happening with you before
the butts in the guts thing.
Courtney (04:32):
Yeah.
Well, I grew up in the danceworld, so I was very much like
embedded and meshed.
All I wanted to do with my lifewas to be a professional
dancer.
Um, and I happened to go to theUniversity of Michigan on a
dance scholarship.
And as most college studentseventually figure out, I needed
to make some money to havespending money and put food on
(04:53):
the table and pay my rent andall the things.
And you know, you're kind ofwilling to look at any job when
you're that age.
And someone had proposed thatum the University Athletics
Center was looking for fitnessinstructors.
I had no fitness background.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
I'm a mover, I could teachpeople how to move.
Why not?
Right.
So I went to apply for the job,and the job just happened to be
(05:15):
titled Butts and Guts.
I mean, that title would notfly this day and age, but that
was like 30 years ago.
unknown (05:21):
Right.
Courtney (05:22):
So I did.
I started teaching butts andguts classes for the university,
and I fell in love with uhbeing a teacher of movement.
And after college, I went on towork for a pretty large fitness
company out of Canada, whichexposed me to a lot that was
happening in the wellnessindustry.
So I got to see like thenutrition and all the fitness
(05:44):
trends, and just I was justexposed to so much.
And that really lit me up thatthere was a path here.
Like there was a whole worldhere that I really didn't know
about.
unknown (05:54):
Wow.
Courtney (05:55):
So, long story short, I got a lot of education in
fitness.
I got a lot of education innutrition, behavior change
science.
I got very heavily rooted forabout a decade in fat loss.
And fat loss is a very sexytopic, right?
Like a lot of people are kindof obsessed with losing weight.
And please don't hear me sayingthat I don't think losing
(06:16):
weight can be very healthy.
Of course it can be.
unknown (06:18):
Sure.
Courtney (06:19):
But I noticed a trend when I was enmeshed in that
culture, which was people canfollow a list of rules and
regulations.
Anyone can follow instructions,and you can lose a lot of
weight, but can you sustain theweight loss?
And the answer was often no.
(06:39):
People couldn't sustain theweight loss.
And that got me wildly curious.
Why have people worked so hardto achieve an outcome that they
then can't sustain?
And that kind of opened up awhole nother box of just
curiosity and education for mebecause I really started to
understand the role ofself-image, how we see
(07:00):
ourselves, how we talk toourselves, what we believe about
ourselves.
Um, I started to understand themindset, our capacity to feel
difficult things or not, and howall of that was really um going
to determine if we maintained aresult or not.
And also the joy of theprocess.
unknown (07:21):
Yes.
Courtney (07:22):
You can I have followed a lot of rules and
regulations in my life that Idid not enjoy.
And if you enjoy it, there's noway you're gonna keep doing it.
Cassandra (07:30):
Exactly.
Exactly.
Yeah, that that's really good.
And you know, um, the healthand wellness industry has really
boomed.
Uh, like you said, oh my gosh,it's just a whole whole new
thing.
Yeah, and an individual say,okay, well, all you need to do
(07:51):
is exercise, you know, thatthat's very important.
Keep it moving, but you haveyou have defined it a little
differently, and what I mean bythat, um, you kind of because
you pivoted, you pivoted and youwent to grace and grits because
you had an epiphany.
What was that epiphany thatmade you say, okay, I'm gonna,
(08:14):
I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonnapivot a little bit and do this.
What what really happened?
Courtney (08:19):
Yeah, it was very defining for me.
So when I was about probablyaround 35, um, I had my son.
I gave birth to my one and onlychild.
unknown (08:29):
Uh-huh.
Courtney (08:30):
And it was a pretty traumatic birth.
Like it was, you know, he washealthy.
I turned out just fine, butthere was just a lot of um, it
was a difficult birth.
And I always say that somewomen really kind of waltz into
motherhood.
I more face planted intomotherhood.
Like I was not scared.
I just weren't okay.
(08:50):
I didn't feel like a naturalmother.
I kind of felt like my identityhad been really obliterated
overnight.
I didn't know what to do withthis adorable little child.
unknown (08:59):
Yeah.
Courtney (08:59):
So everything kind of like was really shaken up and I
was incredibly disoriented.
And I had, as you know, mostnew mothers do, I had a lot of
family and friends coming overto the house to meet the new
baby and see me.
And the topic of conversationwas consistently, wow, Courtney,
you lost the baby weight sofast.
(09:20):
Like everyone was hyper focusedon my body.
unknown (09:23):
Yeah.
Courtney (09:23):
And the fact that I was struggling in every capacity
to manage motherhood.
So mentally, emotionally,physically, I was a mess.
Okay.
I lost the weight fast.
So somehow that was worthtalking about.
And at that moment, I mean, Ithink I had had inklings that
obviously things were awry inthe wellness industry for a long
(09:44):
time, but that experiencereally made me pause and
recognize how strangely we thinkabout health and well-being.
Cassandra (09:56):
Yes.
Courtney (09:57):
In the world, and for women especially.
Cassandra (10:00):
Yeah.
Courtney (10:00):
And at the time, of course, most of my clientele has
mostly been midlife women.
And like I had told you before,I was seeing a lot of women put
all of their effort, time, andmoney into weight loss, but then
they were unable to sustain theresults.
unknown (10:15):
Yes.
Courtney (10:16):
All of that kind of came to a head where I was like,
hang on, there is a deeperconversation here that is not
being had.
And that's when I reallystarted to get into the mindset
work and the self-image work andthe self-coaching work because
I realized that we can keepteaching once-in-a-lifetime
transformation work, which to meis what fat loss is.
(10:38):
It's what weight loss is.
It's once in a lifetimetransformation.
That's how we sell it.
unknown (10:41):
Yes.
Courtney (10:42):
But what really makes us healthy as humans is learning
skills that help us to navigatea life of transformation
because that's what life is.
Life is consistenttransformation.
Me becoming a new mother, thatwas transformation.
Cassandra (10:59):
Yeah.
Courtney (10:59):
Me working my way through midlife, that is a
transformation.
Cassandra (11:04):
Absolutely.
Courtney (11:05):
Yeah.
So transformation is a baked-inpart of our experience, but
we're missing so many of theskill sets that allow us to
navigate that with ease andgrace.
And so that is what I wanted tolearn.
I want to learn the skill setsthat no matter what the
transformation, how can I helpwomen navigate it without so
much, without all theunnecessary suffering?
Cassandra (11:27):
Mm-hmm.
So let's talk about, I'm notmistaken.
Did you say there were fourskill sets?
Yes.
Courtney (11:34):
That I teach I teach four primary skills.
Yeah.
Tell us about that.
So I teach these four skillsets.
I call them like the skills oftransformation.
But the first one is awareness,you know, and it seems so
absurdly simple, right?
Like awareness.
Aren't we all aware?
Not really.
A lot of us are awake, butwe're not aware.
(11:55):
We're not paying attention tohow we're thinking, we're not
paying attention to how we'retalking to ourselves.
We're not paying attention toour behavior or why we feel what
we feel.
We just dismiss a lot of bigemotions because we don't have
time for them.
So awareness is really, Ialways say it's like lifting up
the rug to look at the dirtunderneath.
unknown (12:15):
Yeah.
Courtney (12:15):
Right?
Like if you're in a cleanhouse, you gotta lift up the
rug.
And so to me, that's whatawareness is.
It's shining a light on thethings you would rather keep in
the dark.
That's what awareness is.
And we don't like it becauseit's not comfortable.
It's sexy.
It makes us kind of look at theparts of our life we'd rather
(12:37):
nobody ever saw.
unknown (12:38):
Yeah.
Courtney (12:39):
So we it's really easy to hide from that work.
And I think a lot of peoplehave mastered that skill of
hiding from that work.
So awareness is kind of thatfirst invitation.
You can't fix what you don'tface.
So that's what you're looking.
Cassandra (12:54):
Right.
Courtney, let me ask you thiswith your clients.
Yeah, what are some I saycommon denominators of
individuals that like what aresome of the things that they
like keeping in the dark thatthey don't want to expose that
you're finding?
Courtney (13:10):
Yeah, I I think uh so many things, but I would say
some of them um are certainlythe like the language they use
to talk to themselves and aboutthemselves.
Right.
So the self-narrative, theydefinitely hide.
They're embarrassed to talkabout it because they know it
sounds so demeaning anddisrespectful, but we have to
(13:32):
change that tape.
unknown (13:33):
Yes, okay.
Courtney (13:35):
Their life is governed by that tape.
So I would definitely sayself-narrative, I would say um
like making mistakes, right?
Like we've all made mistakes inour life.
Uh, we've all messy bits of ourlife, we have areas of our life
that we don't give muchattention to.
Maybe it's a relationship,maybe it's uh, you know, maybe
it is fitness, maybe it is ournutrition, and there's shame
(13:57):
there for a lot of us, right?
That I should be doing better,I know better.
What's wrong with me?
Cassandra (14:02):
Right.
Courtney (14:04):
But your life, you just have patterns in your life
that have allowed you to hidefrom this work, and so now we're
just gonna call you into thatwork.
unknown (14:12):
Uh-huh.
Courtney (14:14):
Um, so yeah, I would say those are some of the big
ones, right?
It's just our decisions thatwe've made, the self-narrative.
I would also say buffering, thebuffering patterns, which is
the things that you do to avoidthe work.
So instead of feeling sad orstressed, are you pouring the
wine and eating the chips?
Cassandra (14:35):
That's right.
Courtney (14:36):
Right?
That's right.
Instead of going after that newjob that you really like it's
on your heart to go after, areyou just Netflixing at night?
So you never have time to workon your resume, right?
Like we hide in those ways.
Cassandra (14:50):
Procrastination, all of it.
Courtney (14:52):
All of it.
Oh yes.
A couple hiding habits.
Like when we're being called tobecome more expressed, when we
are being called to put morelife into our life, is
terrifying because we don't knowhow it's gonna turn out.
So it's easier to hide.
It's easier to not feel theemotions, it's easier to not be
brave and take those risks.
(15:14):
And so we just hide.
We hide behind the behaviors,we hide behind the
self-narrative, we hide behindum pretty much anything and
everything.
Cassandra (15:24):
Right.
Courtney (15:24):
Do not have to do that work.
Cassandra (15:26):
That's right.
Avoidance, huh?
Courtney (15:28):
Yeah, and the only person who suffers plus.
Cassandra (15:31):
Right.
That's right.
That's right.
Okay, what are the other threeskills?
Courtney (15:36):
Yeah, so we start with awareness, and then the second
piece is once we become aware ofwhere some of the gaps are,
where some of the work needs tobe done, we have to start taking
initiative to organize our lifein a way that allows us to be
more thoughtful about thosethings.
So I call it the practice oforganization, right?
And there's a lot of thingsbaked in the practice of
(15:58):
organization.
You cannot clean your entirehouse at one time, you can clean
one part of one room at a time,and health and well-being is no
different.
Where do you want to start?
And here's the thing, just forpeople listening, you do not
have to start with diet andexercise.
This is the stress.
So I like to explain to peoplethat you probably heard this
(16:22):
analogy before, but I like tothink of stress as a bucket.
Okay.
And there's a lot of thingsthat contribute to our bucket of
stress.
unknown (16:31):
Yeah.
Courtney (16:31):
How you eat and how you move are two of those
things.
Cassandra (16:34):
Yeah.
Courtney (16:35):
It's also your emotional health, your mental
health, your relationshiphealth, the environment health,
spiritual health.
All of those areas have thecapacity to add stress to our
bucket.
unknown (16:48):
Yeah.
Courtney (16:48):
Now, when you have a very, very full bucket, that's
when problems start to come in,right?
Because we can only tolerate somuch stress.
The body is only built tohandle stress.
So I always say that health isreally an exercise in two
things.
Number one, we want to reduceunnecessary stressors.
(17:11):
Now, unnecessary stressors arethe negative self-narrative, the
buffering behaviors, um, theuh, you know, not moving your
body, not putting yourself tosleep at night.
Those are all unnecessary.
Cassandra (17:25):
They don't meet absolutely.
Courtney (17:28):
But simultaneous to that work, we need to be leaning
into stress on purpose to buildour capacity.
So this is things like goingafter that career you're really
passionate about.
Cassandra (17:41):
Yes.
Courtney (17:42):
Going on a date so you can find a relationship that
you want to be in.
Cassandra (17:46):
That's right.
Courtney (17:47):
Doing the work of changing yourself narrative,
going to a hormonal specialistto find out how you might be
able to better support yourhormonal system.
Cassandra (17:55):
Exactly.
Courtney (17:56):
So it's not just about removing stress, it's about
adding in intentional stressors.
And those two things togetherare what to really amplify the
health of a human.
Cassandra (18:09):
That's good.
Courtney (18:10):
So here's another way to think about it.
Like I mentioned the stressbucket, right?
The stress bucket, we have allthese stressors coming in.
We need that bucket to beincredibly strong.
Because if it has holes in it,if it has a crack in it, if it
has a leak, then we start tosuffer even more.
unknown (18:29):
That's it.
Courtney (18:30):
I look at the stress in the bucket as the unnecessary
stressors.
Cassandra (18:33):
Okay.
Courtney (18:34):
And I look at the strength of the bucket itself as
the intentional stressors.
Can you strength train to makeyour body a little more
resilient?
Can you practice so you're alittle bit less reactive today
in your eatings?
Cassandra (18:45):
Yes, absolutely.
Absolutely.
Courtney (18:48):
And the bucket.
Cassandra (18:50):
Exactly.
And that reminds me of, I don'tknow why.
Um, you know, you you allthat's in a bucket and you have
holes and cracks in a bucket,and then it all comes out and
you're empty.
You have nothing left.
Like the tank is drained.
That's it, you know.
So that's that's a part, andall of what you're talking about
(19:14):
is how you would define health.
Yeah, you know, all of that isuh all of that is part of it.
So yeah, and so what are thewhat are the last two ones?
Courtney (19:26):
Yeah.
So the last two, that so thethird one we talked about
awareness, the practice ofawareness, the practice of
organization.
Then we have the practice tofollow through.
You can make all kinds ofpromises to yourself, you can
get really organized.
Like how many women do you knowthat spend a whole day planning
their week, but then they don'tfollow through with any of it,
or they don't follow throughwith any of the things that are
for them.
(19:46):
That's right.
So I would say the practice offollow through is where I do
most of my coaching.
It's probably the bulk of mycoaching work.
Okay, two well, I would saythere's three primary skill sets
baked into it.
Number one, we have to respectthe nervous system.
Your nervous system can allit's meant to oscillate
throughout the day, it's meantto go through periods of stress
and recovery.
(20:07):
Stress and recovery all daylong.
But where do most women live?
They live in stress, stress,stress, stress, stress, and
crash at the end of the day.
Cassandra (20:15):
Exactly.
Courtney (20:16):
We've got to fix that because our brains don't
function and our hormonal systemtakes a huge hit when we are
oscillating between periods ofrest and recover and stress,
right?
Most that we should have theoscillation.
So we've got to respect thenervous system.
We have to parent our brain,which means we need to think in
ways that are useful to us.
Cassandra (20:36):
Right.
Courtney (20:36):
Telling myself I'm a jerk and I'm incapable, not
useful.
Telling myself I have someskill sets to learn and I have
some gaps in maybe what I know,that could be useful.
So it's not lying to yourself,it's just thinking in ways that
actually encourage you to showup to do the work.
And then the third part offollow-through is you're gonna
have to feel hard things.
I cannot prevent that for you,and no one can prevent that for
(20:59):
you.
So it's build your ability tobe with difficult emotion and
not run away from it becauseyou're going to get frustrated,
you're going to getdisappointed, you're going to
get sad and stressed and all thethings.
And in those moments, you caneither retreat or you can just
experience.
And I'll tell you what,experiencing has a lot less
(21:21):
suffering attached to it.
And I know that sounds like theopposite, but when I feel sad
rather than eat my emotions,yeah.
Cassandra (21:36):
Exactly.
Courtney (21:37):
And the final of all of it is just the practice of
realignment.
We're all gonna get, we're allgonna trip up, we're gonna make
mistakes, we're gonna giveourselves one too many
permissions because that's allyou and take those moments and
and think about them in a waythat makes you want to quit.
Or you just consistentlypractice realigning.
(21:57):
And that's what success demandsis that you realign and you
realign and you realign time andtime again that all friends.
Cassandra (22:07):
Right, right.
And you know, everything youtalked about, the four skills,
it's like when you don't havethose, you're actually in your
way.
You know, a lot of people arelike, What do you mean?
Am I is my way in my way?
Just kind of think about it.
And as we were speakingearlier, we talked about if you
want to live your best life,which health is part of it, you
(22:30):
got to get out of your way.
You know, think aboutlisteners, what Courtney is
talking about, the awareness andand the hiding and the
procrastination.
This is too hard, you know,that negative self-talk.
That's that's a part of beingin your way.
I mean, come on, come on.
Courtney (22:47):
That's what I love about your show, and I love that
I was able to come on your showbecause it's one of the things
I'm constantly telling my owncommunity is when you're feeling
stuck, which is what your showis all about.
Yes, I truly believe thatthere's a gap for you in one of
these four practices.
You're either not aware, you'renot organizing and making
(23:07):
decisions, you're not parentingyour brain or feeling difficult
things, or you're not willing torealign yourself.
unknown (23:14):
Right.
Courtney (23:15):
So what's awesome, I always think of these four
practices as a circle becausecircles continuously, there's no
end, right?
That's how I think abouthealth.
You will be working on yourhealth as long as you have
breath in your lungs.
I hope.
I hope you will do that work.
Cassandra (23:34):
Yes, yes, yes.
That is so true.
Because you know, my mom usedto say when I was younger, and
this has stuck with me.
And she says, Look, if youdon't have your health, you have
nothing.
And I was like, What are youtalking about?
What do you mean?
And now I get it.
You can't live your you can'tdo the things because you don't
(23:55):
when you're sick, you you don'twant to.
I mean, you you just can't.
Courtney (24:00):
So this is important.
And I such a good point,Cassandra, because I I I really
I always say that health is notthe point of your life, it is
base camp for life.
unknown (24:12):
Yes.
Courtney (24:12):
So think of base camp at Everest.
People get to base camp andacclimate there so they can
actually do the hike or theclimb that they're there to do.
unknown (24:22):
Exactly.
Courtney (24:22):
That's what health is.
It's like as long if you canget the the foundation of your
health resilient enough, it willhelp you to make the climb of
your life.
And that is the point.
Cassandra (24:35):
Yes, yes.
And you know, um, that wordresilience, you know, I you
know, I've been dealing withants in my home.
I'm like, they are the mostresilient individuals.
And then, you know, there is aa quote that you that you read,
(25:00):
and it was an article in theHarvard Business Review.
Yeah, and you said this quoteyou will never forget that kind
of set the stage for you to doother things.
It was like resilience is abouthow you recharge, not how you
endure.
Why did that what was it aboutthat quote that stuck with you?
Courtney (25:20):
Because I think for me and for so many women, we are
we are very gritty, right?
Like we are we're hard workersand we are persistent and we
will hustle and we will we willliterally work ourselves into
the ground.
That is not resilience.
When you are exhausted andburnt out and depleted, that's
(25:45):
not resilience, that's thedoorway to disease and illness.
Cassandra (25:50):
Exactly.
Courtney (25:51):
So when you resil the the in that quote, resilience is
really that that recovery, it'sit's like baked into recovery
because the harder you push, themore of a demand there is from
your body to give it rest.
unknown (26:08):
Right.
Courtney (26:08):
And we are terrible at that.
We push, push, push, and weonly rest when we get sick, or
we have the two-time a yearvacation, or our kids in the
hospital, heaven forbid.
Like life forces us sometimesto rest.
That is not a way to becomeresilient.
Because what happens whenyou're pushing all the time and
(26:29):
then a family member reallyneeds you?
It demands more of you.
And if you don't have anythingin the tank already, exactly,
how is that helpful?
So a big part of the work thatI do with my clients is again
that oscillation of okay, youpushed really hard today at
work, you had these meetings,you you know, you did all these
things.
What are you gonna do to helpyour body recover from that?
Cassandra (26:55):
Exactly.
Right?
Courtney (26:56):
Are you gonna eat a nutritious meal?
Are you gonna put yourself tobed at a reasonable hour?
Are you gonna spend a littletime outdoors?
But what do we say to inresponse to those things?
I don't have time.
Cassandra (27:05):
Exactly.
I was just gonna say, I don'thave time to do that.
Courtney (27:08):
But you're not enough hours in a day, right?
unknown (27:11):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Courtney (27:13):
And we don't take the break because we can we tell
ourselves I don't have time.
But what I see in my own lifeand certainly with a lot of my
clients is when we push so hardwithout the breaks, we actually
become less productive, we'reless creative, we're terrible
problem solvers, and soeverything takes us longer
because we're not givingourselves the time to reset and
(27:34):
restore.
Cassandra (27:35):
Exactly.
Exactly.
I always say uh uh God is aredeemer of time because we do
this, we do that, and so I justdon't have time, I don't have
time.
So I always say that toindividuals that say they don't
have time to do this, but yetthey have time to do scrolling
(27:57):
on social media, they have timeto Netflix it.
I mean, you know, so it's it'slike, what are your priorities?
What is it that's gonna enableyou to start living your best
life on your terms?
What like we talked earlier,Courtney, they have to want it.
You can't you have to want whatyou want.
(28:19):
You can't just, you know, ifyou don't really want to get
healthy, you do the the wholegamut, the circle that you were
talking about, if if you don'twant it, you you don't get it.
Courtney (28:30):
But if you really want it, there's two things I want
to say to that because the firstthing is that I remember really
early in my career, I wanted itso bad for my clients.
Like I just wanted them to havethe world, right?
I wanted them to have thisfeeling of health that deserved.
And I remember having aconversation with a mentor of
(28:53):
mine, and I was really deflatedand disappointed because I had a
handful of clients at the timethat like they just weren't
showing up, right?
Like they weren't doing that,and I I looked at it as a
personal failure, and I wasreally beating myself up.
And and and I will never forgetthis.
My mentor said to me, Courtney,the day that you start working
harder than your client,probably the day you should hang
(29:16):
it up.
You can't because you can't runyour career that way.
You are here to educate andlead and inspire and you know
help them problem solve, butit's exactly what you're
speaking to.
You cannot do their work.
Cassandra (29:30):
Exactly.
Courtney (29:31):
And if you convince yourself that you can, you're
gonna burn yourself out andyou're gonna be a completely un
you know, useless coach.
That was like a really bigawakening for me.
But the other thing I wanted tosay in response to what you
said is that when people ask me,like, what's the problem you
really solve for people in thehealth arena?
I always say I help people tolessen integrity pain.
(29:53):
And integrity pain is the veryreal pain that we feel
internally.
It comes from living our lifeout of alignment with what we
actually want.
So we say that we want to wakeup with energy and vitality, but
we stay up watching thehundredth episode of our
favorite Netflix show.
unknown (30:11):
Yeah.
Courtney (30:12):
We say that we want to feel um like strong and
resilient in our bodies, but werefuse to move our bodies.
So integrity pain is thatinternal friction that if you do
not address it, it turns intodis-ease, right?
Dis-ease, which leads todisease.
So we all have integrity pain.
(30:34):
I don't want anyone listeningto think, oh, I have so much
integrity pain.
Like that's you know, and it'sa shame thing.
It's not, we all have it.
unknown (30:41):
Yes.
Courtney (30:41):
And none of us will probably ever completely resolve
every ounce of our integritypain in our lifetime.
But if we can reduce it just alittle bit, our health would
improve just a little bit.
Cassandra (30:52):
Yes, that's true every day of the game.
Courtney (30:54):
It's not about diet and exercise, it's about solving
your integrity pain.
Cassandra (30:58):
Exactly.
Exactly.
Um, you hit on a lot of things,and I I, you know, it a lot of
what we do is habitual.
It's just like we get in thecar, we drive, we don't even
think about it.
Um, you know, when you do thesame thing all the time, it's
(31:19):
really hard to disconnect andtry to do something different
because you've you've not doneit before.
So you talked about how how canwell how do you develop new
habits?
Like how can they developdifferent habits?
Courtney (31:37):
Well, it goes back to what we talked about earlier,
it's those four steps.
It's I have to becomehyper-aware of what I'm doing on
repeat that's basically harmingme.
And then I have to reallyconsider what could I do in this
in the scenario that actuallyhelps me?
So if every day you come homefrom work and you're exhausted
(31:58):
and you have an intention tocook a healthy meal, but you
once again order out and pour aglass of wine, that's right.
That's a pattern that'sprobably harming you.
So, what could we do in thesame scenario, still coming home
at the end of every dayexhausted, but that would make
eating healthier easier?
And I would explore a lot ofthose options with my clients,
(32:19):
right?
Maybe we figure out whichrestaurants could deliver a
relatively healthy meal.
We just get more considerateabout what we order.
Maybe we go to the store andget a rotisserie chicken that's
already been baked and we turnit into a healthy.
There's a thousand ways that wecan simplify it.
Cassandra (32:34):
That's right.
Courtney (32:35):
And then it's the the the the second piece of that is
the practice of organization,like that organ, right?
Am I going to go to the storeafter work and pick up that
rotisserie chicken?
Now, once I have the rotisseriechicken, am I gonna follow
through with eating it?
Because I bought it, it's in myand that's where some of that
parenting of the brain andexperiencing you know a little
bit of discomfort with somethingnew comes in.
(32:57):
And inevitably one night you'regonna find yourself ordering
pizza again or eating somethingthat you don't feel proud of,
and there's your opportunity toengage with the practice of
realignment again.
Cassandra (33:08):
Yeah.
Courtney (33:09):
Again, it's all about your resource availability.
So if you think about it, ifyou slept well last night and
you, you know, you your stressbucket isn't overflowing right
now.
Yeah.
You wake up in the morning andyou've got a lot of resources on
board, right?
You've got mental bandwidthavailable to you, you've got
energy, you've got time.
But as the day goes on, whathappens is all those resources
(33:33):
start to fade.
And so a lot of women will sayto me, I don't know what's wrong
with me.
I come home at the end of theday and I just eat like garbage
and I want to drink and I wantto veg out in front of Netflix.
And I'm like, this is not a youproblem.
I mean, there's nothing wrongwith you, right?
But your resource availabilityis so low that if you don't make
(33:56):
healthy habits easy, there's noway you're gonna engage with
them.
If I have a book, if I have todo like a huge effort to get a
healthy meal on the table aftera day of exhaustion, right?
I don't have the resources.
I'm not doing it.
Cassandra (34:09):
Exactly.
Exactly.
Courtney (34:11):
So again, how can we just become more considerate
about what's in the fridge andhow you prepare ahead of time
and where you might order foodfrom and how you might organize
your life earlier in the weekand earlier in the day.
So by the time dinner timecomes around, eating healthy is
an easy choice.
Cassandra (34:27):
Exactly.
That's where the organizationcomes.
You have to be prepared, youknow how exactly.
Exactly.
Um, doing that process though,when we talk about those
resources, and I want to talkabout um the quantitative, you
know, um resources.
(34:49):
Like, what about an uh a coach?
We can say, or umaccountability partner, yeah,
you know, you kind of talk aboutthese are the things that I
want to accomplish, and I wouldlove to have somebody to hold me
accountable for it, becausethen what individuals say, I
don't have the money for acoach.
I'm like, okay, well, how howbad do you want it?
(35:12):
Well, I want it bad, you know.
So there are different thingsyou could do in the meantime,
but I always say neverunderestimate the investments
you make in yourself, yeah, andthat's what we don't do.
No, and that's critical.
We don't go out and buy dress,shoes, um, stuff we don't need,
(35:32):
but what about us?
Courtney (35:37):
It's so true.
And I think this day and age,it's like there's so many
different layers of supportavailable to people.
Like, for example, yourpodcast, Cassandra, it's a free
resource, right?
It's an entry point forsupport.
Um, you know, there's supportgroups that relative, you know,
have a very low uh most of themyou don't even have to pay for.
But then I think as we startgetting a taste of dipping our
(36:00):
toe into that pool, like we dipour toe into the pool of
self-development and reallydoing the work, we start to see
the benefit.
And then that makes us hungryfor another level of support.
Cassandra (36:11):
Exactly.
Courtney (36:12):
And I feel really fortunate.
I don't know why I've been thisway, but I think my whole my
pretty much my whole life, I'vealways had mentors and coaches
and teachers that I rely on.
And I have probably spent, Ishould probably have 12 graduate
degrees for the amount of moneyI've spent on support.
And yes, you could argue thatpart of it's my career, so it's
(36:35):
education and all the things.
It I would say what keeps megoing back is I see such a
radical difference in how I showup when I have that level of
support versus when I don't.
And so you know what?
If I know that I'm going toachieve something sooner and
with less suffering because Ipay for the support, I'm gonna
(36:57):
pay the support.
Cassandra (36:58):
Exactly.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, that's that's worth it'sval so much value in that.
Courtney (37:04):
It there is, and we you're right, we tend to value
material things, and you don'tsee well, you do see eventually,
of course, the thetransformation and all the
goodness that comes from workingwith a coach, but it is it's
like you're paying more for anexperience than you are for
stuff.
Cassandra (37:21):
Yeah, that's so good.
Courtney (37:24):
What's the point of stuff if you don't actually love
your life?
Cassandra (37:27):
Exactly, it's not gonna make you feel better,
maybe temporarily, but as youtalked about sustainability,
yeah.
Courtney (37:35):
I'd much rather live a very um minimal life so I have
the funds to do the things thathelp me to experience life.
Yes, but oh my gosh, if I haveto spend a whole day on Sunday
doing laundry, like I just feellike I have too many clothes,
and then I'm gonna get rid ofthings because I don't want to
spend my life that way.
(37:56):
I don't want to spend my lifemanaging my stuff, I want to
spend my life living my life.
Cassandra (38:02):
Amen to that.
Amen to that.
It's a more meaningful,fulfilling life, absolutely,
because life is short.
Courtney, I have a one anotherquestion because we talked about
our title.
The title is Let's Live FullOut.
We kind of we talked aboutthat.
Redefining health at midlife.
Courtney (38:24):
Yes.
Cassandra (38:25):
What age would you consider midlife?
Courtney (38:29):
I I always answer this question in a couple two ways.
Okay.
Like to quantify it, like Iwould say midlife is it could be
anywhere from like your late30s, probably up to your early
70s.
Like that's the rule of theroom.
There's also, I also like tothink of midlife as the liminal
space between who you have beenand who you want to be moving
(38:51):
forward.
I love that.
So it's not, it doesn't have tobe a number, right?
Like I run a community and Ihave outliers.
I have girls I have women intheir 20s, I have women in their
80s.
Um, but I think that they'reattracted to being in the
community because that's the waywe approach it.
It's like we're all doing thework of transitioning from who
(39:13):
we've been with all thesepatterns for the first however
many years of our lifetime, manyof which those, you know, many
patterns of which are hurtingus.
And we're we're reallycommitted to doing the work of
leveling up into the person wewant to be.
And that's good life.
You're just mid mid-versions ofyou.
Cassandra (39:32):
Yeah, I love that.
That's great.
That's great.
And we talk about um thetransitioning being so
challenging when it comes tobehavior change.
Why, why do you think why doyou think that's so challenging?
Because I loved it when you sayit doesn't have to be an age,
you know.
If somebody, you know, theythey used to always say for men,
(39:53):
they went out and bought amotorcycle.
Oh, that's midlife.
We went and bought amotorcycle, you know.
So why is the transition sochallenging once they like,
okay, this is who I am.
Now I've had this experience,and now I'm I'm coming into
myself and I'm realizing I'maware of what it is that I want
(40:15):
to do.
Why is that challenging?
Courtney (40:18):
I would say the number one reason is a whole lot of
thoughts.
We have a whole lot of thoughtsabout not making other people
uncomfortable with our choices.
We have a lot of thoughts aboutbeing judged by the outside
world that we fail, that thiscould be the wrong decision,
that I'm not the kind of personwho uh I mean it's endless,
right?
The amount of thoughts that wehave that keep us stuck, right?
(40:41):
Where we're at.
Like I think it's a whole lotof thinking.
Um, and I would say too, youknow, on a deeper level, um,
because you know, thinking is Ithink a deep level, but an even
deeper level is that nervoussystem that if you have
experienced a lot of stress andeven trauma in your lifetime,
yeah, it's probably moredifficult for you in some ways
(41:05):
to coach yourself into this newversion of yourself.
So that's where I would saylike everyone has a different
level of healing to do.
Um, but I would definitely beneglectful if I didn't mention
that I think um sometime ournervous system is actually
physically stuck because ofthings we've experienced earlier
(41:25):
in life.
And if that's true, I wouldreally encourage you to work
with a nervous system expert anddo some nervous healing, like
nervous system healing.
Because when our nervous systemisn't come isn't doing the job
it's meant to do, our weactually can't access our
prefrontal cortex, which is thethinking part of our brain.
It's the part of our brain thatlets us step into possibility
(41:47):
and do hard things and considerhow we want to live.
So if you are someone who feelslike you're doing all the right
things and you are consistentlystuck, yeah, I would say it
might be worth looking into somenervous system healing, um,
which is not my specialty, but Ido work with a lot of other
coaches and people who whospecifically do that work
(42:08):
because I do belie I do reallydo believe in it so much.
And it's I don't think everyonenecessarily needs healing on
that level, but a lot of peopledo, right?
Cassandra (42:18):
And and so when we know that we're stuck and we
know that we need help, we youknow, a lot of people go to
therapy for sure, you know.
So the nervous system person,what did you call that?
How would how would individualsknow it may be a nervous system
issue?
Courtney (42:38):
Um, I think honestly, if you've done a lot of therapy
and it hasn't helped.
Cassandra (42:42):
Okay, right?
Courtney (42:43):
Because think about therapy as like a top-down uh
exercise.
Like we're in our kids andwe're trying to think our way
out of a problem.
Cassandra (42:51):
Uh-huh.
Courtney (42:51):
But if you've been doing that work for a really
long time and nothing'schanging, I would say that
probably there is a um a feelingof unsafety in the body.
unknown (43:03):
Uh-huh.
Courtney (43:03):
Right.
And that you, so there it'slike somatic practitioners.
Somatic just means body, butyou can literally Google somatic
practitioners, nervous ceiling,nervous system healing experts.
I will tell you a shamelessplug because I I love her work.
Irene Lyon is brilliant in thisword, um, in terms of helping
to educate people about thenervous system and and what
(43:25):
happens in the body when it'sstuck.
Cassandra (43:27):
Okay.
Courtney (43:28):
Um, but yeah, if you've been doing a lot of
cognitive therapy and you feellike you're not getting
anywhere, I would say youprobably have some healing to do
on the level of the nervoussystem.
And not all therapists do thatwork.
Cassandra (43:41):
Yes, exactly.
Yeah.
And yeah, and that's somethingnew for a lot of my listeners,
just to hear that concept and toentertain or be open to that.
You know, you can get to apoint where you're just sick and
tired of being sick and tired.
I've tried this, I've triedthat.
Okay, so let me let me let melet me try this.
So that's why you sense valueand listening to podcasts,
(44:04):
reading, think about who's inyour community, who are your
resources, anybody there to thatto serve you that has your best
interest at heart?
Because what we're talkingabout, you cannot do it alone.
Yeah, period.
You can't do it alone.
Courtney (44:19):
And I always say, like, he I say this, I mean it's
partly joking, but it's alsovery true.
Healing is a team sport, right?
Like healing is a team sport.
You are not meant to go italone, you are meant to be
surrounded by community, you aremeant to be in the company of
people who can normalize yourstruggle.
Um, you know, it's it's not asolo effort, and yet that's part
(44:41):
of hiding, is that's what wedo.
We don't want to show peoplethat we need healing, and so we
isolate and we contain and wehide, and then it just fasters.
Cassandra (44:50):
That's right, that's right, that's right.
Wow, this is good.
This this is good.
We can't talk all day.
I know, I know, we could talk,but you have what I call a call
to action, and I love it.
Now I want you to explain to mylisteners, and it's free, they
like free stuff.
That midlife magic quick startguy.
(45:13):
What is that about that mylisteners can get from?
Courtney (45:18):
You know, it's really the uh midlife magic is really
uh kind of a culmination ofpodcasts that we have pulled out
of Grace and Grit that we justfeel like kind of summarize the
the the bare bones of kind ofwhat we've talked about, like
even on this show, it justreally gives you a great
overview of um redefining healthat midlife.
Like that's exactly what it is.
(45:39):
So it gives you some journalprompts and it kind of gives you
some some deeper questions toconsider.
So I think if someone is justin midlife and they they're
enjoying this conversation andthey want a little bit more um
to roll with, I think that thatcould be an awesome, uh awesome
thing for them to check out.
Yeah.
I think this is important, likethe four practices that we
(46:03):
talked about today, um, I callit the consistency code because
consistency to me isn't aboutdoing the same thing over and
over, it's about consistentlyself-honoring what is true.
That's what consistency is, andthat's what I teach.
Um, but I have a book out inNovember called The Consistency
Code, and it basically exploresall the those four practices.
(46:24):
So if like kind of into thatand they like they want to hear
more about that, uh the book isNovember 4th.
And I would just tell people tokeep their eyes and ears open
for it because uh greatresource.
Cassandra (46:36):
Okay, November 4th, 2025.
Congratulations to you!
Courtney (46:41):
Thank you.
Yeah, super exciting! It's beena long time coming.
You know, look, it's like it'sa whole thing.
So awesome!
Cassandra (46:49):
That's awesome, awesome.
How can my listeners get intouch with you, Courtney?
Courtney (46:54):
Um, the best place is really disgraceandgrit.com.
Just go to my website, you'llfind my contact form and the
things that I offer, thepodcast.
Like it's kind of a one-stopshop.
Cassandra (47:03):
Okay, okay.
Well, we have to wrap thissession up, unfortunately.
Uh, I would like to thank youagain.
I want to let my listenersknow, I know without a shadow of
a doubt, that this podcast hasbeen so valuable to you and not
only to you, but think ofindividuals that are in your
(47:24):
community that could that wouldwant to hear this discussion,
this conversation, want to hearwhat it means to be what I call
less live full out.
Talk about the health that weredefining health at midlife.
Listen to the the the four umcrucial skills, which I think is
phenomenal.
And also remember get theirbook when it comes out in
(47:49):
November 2025.
And Courtney, again, thank you.
My listeners, thank you.
I love you guys, and as Ialways say, bye for now and God
bless you.
Thanks again.
Good day out there to all my listeners.
And I'd like to welcome you toIs Your Way in Your Way podcast.
And I'm your host.
My name is Cassandra CrawleyMayo for those new listeners out
there.
And I also want to share withmy new listeners what this
podcast is all about.
First of all, Is Your Way inYour Way is my book.
(00:26):
So I'm like, what better titleto give my podcast for those
individuals that are in theirway?
So this podcast is aboutguiding purpose-driven women who
are ready to get out of theirway.
It's time to go from yourlimiting beliefs, emotional
exhaustion, unclear purpose toidentifying internal blocks,
(00:48):
reconnecting with the vision Godhas for your life and moving
forward with confidence,clarity, and to live your best,
most fulfilling life on yourterms.
And I talk about topics relatedto self-improvement,
self-development, businessdevelopment.
And also a lot of the topicswill enable you to do some what
(01:10):
I call self-reflection.
Now I have a uh special guestcoming on today, but I'm going
to ask uh well, let me tell youthis.
First of all, the topic islet's live full out, redefining
health at midlife.
Now I have a question for youbefore we before I introduce
you.
Have you ever felt like nomatter how many diets you try or
(01:35):
how many wellness trends youfollow, you're still stuck.
Like you're checking all theboxes, but something is still
missing.
What if I told you that theproblem isn't your willpower,
but the wellness culture itself?
So today I'm joined by theincredible Courtney Townley, a
(01:56):
health strategist, behaviorchange expert, and host of the
Grace and Grit Podcast.
So let me introduce you toCourtney.
Hi, Courtney.
How are you today?
Amazing.
I'm so happy to be here.
I am so happy that you arehere.
And you know what, uh, mylisteners, Courtney's gonna help
(02:18):
us uncover why we've beenhitting the same wellness walls
and how we can start leading ourhealth journey with clarity,
confidence, and alignment.
So if you're not driving andyou're sitting somewhere, you
may want to sit down and journalthis, get ready to rewrite your
wellness story from the insideout.
(02:39):
So, what I'm gonna do first, asI usually do, is I'm gonna
share a little bit aboutCourtney's background so you
will be able to see why she isqualified to talk about this
topic.
She is a transformationalhealth strategist, host of the
Grace and Grit podcast, withover two decades of experiences
(03:04):
in health coaching, behaviorscience, and personal
development.
She helps women break free fromthe noisy perfection-driven
wellness culture.
She guides them towardssustainable, grace-filled
habits.
I'm going to talk about habitsnow, rooted in alignment and
self-leadership, not shame ordeprivation.
(03:27):
Her approach blends science andsoul, empowering women to
reclaim their health, theirconfidence, and their joy.
So, this to me is a perfect fitto is your way in your work
because it dismantles what Icall internalized wellness myths
and helps women realign withher truly, what truly serves
(03:51):
them physically, mentally, andspiritually.
So, and guess what, guys?
She is known as uh what I calla mover, a shaker, and a queen,
midlife queen maker.
How about that?
Wow.
So um Courtney.
(04:15):
Now you had you initially hadstarted with a program called
Butts and Guts.
Yes, it's a long way.
So this is like Grace andGrits.
Now tell us a bit about whatwas happening with you before
the butts in the guts thing.
Courtney (04:32):
Yeah.
Well, I grew up in the danceworld, so I was very much like
embedded and meshed.
All I wanted to do with my lifewas to be a professional
dancer.
Um, and I happened to go to theUniversity of Michigan on a
dance scholarship.
And as most college studentseventually figure out, I needed
to make some money to havespending money and put food on
(04:53):
the table and pay my rent andall the things.
And you know, you're kind ofwilling to look at any job when
you're that age.
And someone had proposed thatum the University Athletics
Center was looking for fitnessinstructors.
I had no fitness background.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
I'm a mover, I could teachpeople how to move.
Why not?
Right.
So I went to apply for the job,and the job just happened to be
(05:15):
titled Butts and Guts.
I mean, that title would notfly this day and age, but that
was like 30 years ago.
unknown (05:21):
Right.
Courtney (05:22):
So I did.
I started teaching butts andguts classes for the university,
and I fell in love with uhbeing a teacher of movement.
And after college, I went on towork for a pretty large fitness
company out of Canada, whichexposed me to a lot that was
happening in the wellnessindustry.
So I got to see like thenutrition and all the fitness
(05:44):
trends, and just I was justexposed to so much.
And that really lit me up thatthere was a path here.
Like there was a whole worldhere that I really didn't know
about.
unknown (05:54):
Wow.
Courtney (05:55):
So, long story short, I got a lot of education in
fitness.
I got a lot of education innutrition, behavior change
science.
I got very heavily rooted forabout a decade in fat loss.
And fat loss is a very sexytopic, right?
Like a lot of people are kindof obsessed with losing weight.
And please don't hear me sayingthat I don't think losing
(06:16):
weight can be very healthy.
Of course it can be.
unknown (06:18):
Sure.
Courtney (06:19):
But I noticed a trend when I was enmeshed in that
culture, which was people canfollow a list of rules and
regulations.
Anyone can follow instructions,and you can lose a lot of
weight, but can you sustain theweight loss?
And the answer was often no.
(06:39):
People couldn't sustain theweight loss.
And that got me wildly curious.
Why have people worked so hardto achieve an outcome that they
then can't sustain?
And that kind of opened up awhole nother box of just
curiosity and education for mebecause I really started to
understand the role ofself-image, how we see
(07:00):
ourselves, how we talk toourselves, what we believe about
ourselves.
Um, I started to understand themindset, our capacity to feel
difficult things or not, and howall of that was really um going
to determine if we maintained aresult or not.
And also the joy of theprocess.
unknown (07:21):
Yes.
Courtney (07:22):
You can I have followed a lot of rules and
regulations in my life that Idid not enjoy.
And if you enjoy it, there's noway you're gonna keep doing it.
Cassandra (07:30):
Exactly.
Exactly.
Yeah, that that's really good.
And you know, um, the healthand wellness industry has really
boomed.
Uh, like you said, oh my gosh,it's just a whole whole new
thing.
Yeah, and an individual say,okay, well, all you need to do
(07:51):
is exercise, you know, thatthat's very important.
Keep it moving, but you haveyou have defined it a little
differently, and what I mean bythat, um, you kind of because
you pivoted, you pivoted and youwent to grace and grits because
you had an epiphany.
What was that epiphany thatmade you say, okay, I'm gonna,
(08:14):
I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonnapivot a little bit and do this.
What what really happened?
Courtney (08:19):
Yeah, it was very defining for me.
So when I was about probablyaround 35, um, I had my son.
I gave birth to my one and onlychild.
unknown (08:29):
Uh-huh.
Courtney (08:30):
And it was a pretty traumatic birth.
Like it was, you know, he washealthy.
I turned out just fine, butthere was just a lot of um, it
was a difficult birth.
And I always say that somewomen really kind of waltz into
motherhood.
I more face planted intomotherhood.
Like I was not scared.
I just weren't okay.
(08:50):
I didn't feel like a naturalmother.
I kind of felt like my identityhad been really obliterated
overnight.
I didn't know what to do withthis adorable little child.
unknown (08:59):
Yeah.
Courtney (08:59):
So everything kind of like was really shaken up and I
was incredibly disoriented.
And I had, as you know, mostnew mothers do, I had a lot of
family and friends coming overto the house to meet the new
baby and see me.
And the topic of conversationwas consistently, wow, Courtney,
you lost the baby weight sofast.
(09:20):
Like everyone was hyper focusedon my body.
unknown (09:23):
Yeah.
Courtney (09:23):
And the fact that I was struggling in every capacity
to manage motherhood.
So mentally, emotionally,physically, I was a mess.
Okay.
I lost the weight fast.
So somehow that was worthtalking about.
And at that moment, I mean, Ithink I had had inklings that
obviously things were awry inthe wellness industry for a long
(09:44):
time, but that experiencereally made me pause and
recognize how strangely we thinkabout health and well-being.
Cassandra (09:56):
Yes.
Courtney (09:57):
In the world, and for women especially.
Cassandra (10:00):
Yeah.
Courtney (10:00):
And at the time, of course, most of my clientele has
mostly been midlife women.
And like I had told you before,I was seeing a lot of women put
all of their effort, time, andmoney into weight loss, but then
they were unable to sustain theresults.
unknown (10:15):
Yes.
Courtney (10:16):
All of that kind of came to a head where I was like,
hang on, there is a deeperconversation here that is not
being had.
And that's when I reallystarted to get into the mindset
work and the self-image work andthe self-coaching work because
I realized that we can keepteaching once-in-a-lifetime
transformation work, which to meis what fat loss is.
(10:38):
It's what weight loss is.
It's once in a lifetimetransformation.
That's how we sell it.
unknown (10:41):
Yes.
Courtney (10:42):
But what really makes us healthy as humans is learning
skills that help us to navigatea life of transformation
because that's what life is.
Life is consistenttransformation.
Me becoming a new mother, thatwas transformation.
Cassandra (10:59):
Yeah.
Courtney (10:59):
Me working my way through midlife, that is a
transformation.
Cassandra (11:04):
Absolutely.
Courtney (11:05):
Yeah.
So transformation is a baked-inpart of our experience, but
we're missing so many of theskill sets that allow us to
navigate that with ease andgrace.
And so that is what I wanted tolearn.
I want to learn the skill setsthat no matter what the
transformation, how can I helpwomen navigate it without so
much, without all theunnecessary suffering?
Cassandra (11:27):
Mm-hmm.
So let's talk about, I'm notmistaken.
Did you say there were fourskill sets?
Yes.
Courtney (11:34):
That I teach I teach four primary skills.
Yeah.
Tell us about that.
So I teach these four skillsets.
I call them like the skills oftransformation.
But the first one is awareness,you know, and it seems so
absurdly simple, right?
Like awareness.
Aren't we all aware?
Not really.
A lot of us are awake, butwe're not aware.
(11:55):
We're not paying attention tohow we're thinking, we're not
paying attention to how we'retalking to ourselves.
We're not paying attention toour behavior or why we feel what
we feel.
We just dismiss a lot of bigemotions because we don't have
time for them.
So awareness is really, Ialways say it's like lifting up
the rug to look at the dirtunderneath.
unknown (12:15):
Yeah.
Courtney (12:15):
Right?
Like if you're in a cleanhouse, you gotta lift up the
rug.
And so to me, that's whatawareness is.
It's shining a light on thethings you would rather keep in
the dark.
That's what awareness is.
And we don't like it becauseit's not comfortable.
It's sexy.
It makes us kind of look at theparts of our life we'd rather
(12:37):
nobody ever saw.
unknown (12:38):
Yeah.
Courtney (12:39):
So we it's really easy to hide from that work.
And I think a lot of peoplehave mastered that skill of
hiding from that work.
So awareness is kind of thatfirst invitation.
You can't fix what you don'tface.
So that's what you're looking.
Cassandra (12:54):
Right.
Courtney, let me ask you thiswith your clients.
Yeah, what are some I saycommon denominators of
individuals that like what aresome of the things that they
like keeping in the dark thatthey don't want to expose that
you're finding?
Courtney (13:10):
Yeah, I I think uh so many things, but I would say
some of them um are certainlythe like the language they use
to talk to themselves and aboutthemselves.
Right.
So the self-narrative, theydefinitely hide.
They're embarrassed to talkabout it because they know it
sounds so demeaning anddisrespectful, but we have to
(13:32):
change that tape.
unknown (13:33):
Yes, okay.
Courtney (13:35):
Their life is governed by that tape.
So I would definitely sayself-narrative, I would say um
like making mistakes, right?
Like we've all made mistakes inour life.
Uh, we've all messy bits of ourlife, we have areas of our life
that we don't give muchattention to.
Maybe it's a relationship,maybe it's uh, you know, maybe
it is fitness, maybe it is ournutrition, and there's shame
(13:57):
there for a lot of us, right?
That I should be doing better,I know better.
What's wrong with me?
Cassandra (14:02):
Right.
Courtney (14:04):
But your life, you just have patterns in your life
that have allowed you to hidefrom this work, and so now we're
just gonna call you into thatwork.
unknown (14:12):
Uh-huh.
Courtney (14:14):
Um, so yeah, I would say those are some of the big
ones, right?
It's just our decisions thatwe've made, the self-narrative.
I would also say buffering, thebuffering patterns, which is
the things that you do to avoidthe work.
So instead of feeling sad orstressed, are you pouring the
wine and eating the chips?
Cassandra (14:35):
That's right.
Courtney (14:36):
Right?
That's right.
Instead of going after that newjob that you really like it's
on your heart to go after, areyou just Netflixing at night?
So you never have time to workon your resume, right?
Like we hide in those ways.
Cassandra (14:50):
Procrastination, all of it.
Courtney (14:52):
All of it.
Oh yes.
A couple hiding habits.
Like when we're being called tobecome more expressed, when we
are being called to put morelife into our life, is
terrifying because we don't knowhow it's gonna turn out.
So it's easier to hide.
It's easier to not feel theemotions, it's easier to not be
brave and take those risks.
(15:14):
And so we just hide.
We hide behind the behaviors,we hide behind the
self-narrative, we hide behindum pretty much anything and
everything.
Cassandra (15:24):
Right.
Courtney (15:24):
Do not have to do that work.
Cassandra (15:26):
That's right.
Avoidance, huh?
Courtney (15:28):
Yeah, and the only person who suffers plus.
Cassandra (15:31):
Right.
That's right.
That's right.
Okay, what are the other threeskills?
Courtney (15:36):
Yeah, so we start with awareness, and then the second
piece is once we become aware ofwhere some of the gaps are,
where some of the work needs tobe done, we have to start taking
initiative to organize our lifein a way that allows us to be
more thoughtful about thosethings.
So I call it the practice oforganization, right?
And there's a lot of thingsbaked in the practice of
(15:58):
organization.
You cannot clean your entirehouse at one time, you can clean
one part of one room at a time,and health and well-being is no
different.
Where do you want to start?
And here's the thing, just forpeople listening, you do not
have to start with diet andexercise.
This is the stress.
So I like to explain to peoplethat you probably heard this
(16:22):
analogy before, but I like tothink of stress as a bucket.
Okay.
And there's a lot of thingsthat contribute to our bucket of
stress.
unknown (16:31):
Yeah.
Courtney (16:31):
How you eat and how you move are two of those
things.
Cassandra (16:34):
Yeah.
Courtney (16:35):
It's also your emotional health, your mental
health, your relationshiphealth, the environment health,
spiritual health.
All of those areas have thecapacity to add stress to our
bucket.
unknown (16:48):
Yeah.
Courtney (16:48):
Now, when you have a very, very full bucket, that's
when problems start to come in,right?
Because we can only tolerate somuch stress.
The body is only built tohandle stress.
So I always say that health isreally an exercise in two
things.
Number one, we want to reduceunnecessary stressors.
(17:11):
Now, unnecessary stressors arethe negative self-narrative, the
buffering behaviors, um, theuh, you know, not moving your
body, not putting yourself tosleep at night.
Those are all unnecessary.
Cassandra (17:25):
They don't meet absolutely.
Courtney (17:28):
But simultaneous to that work, we need to be leaning
into stress on purpose to buildour capacity.
So this is things like goingafter that career you're really
passionate about.
Cassandra (17:41):
Yes.
Courtney (17:42):
Going on a date so you can find a relationship that
you want to be in.
Cassandra (17:46):
That's right.
Courtney (17:47):
Doing the work of changing yourself narrative,
going to a hormonal specialistto find out how you might be
able to better support yourhormonal system.
Cassandra (17:55):
Exactly.
Courtney (17:56):
So it's not just about removing stress, it's about
adding in intentional stressors.
And those two things togetherare what to really amplify the
health of a human.
Cassandra (18:09):
That's good.
Courtney (18:10):
So here's another way to think about it.
Like I mentioned the stressbucket, right?
The stress bucket, we have allthese stressors coming in.
We need that bucket to beincredibly strong.
Because if it has holes in it,if it has a crack in it, if it
has a leak, then we start tosuffer even more.
unknown (18:29):
That's it.
Courtney (18:30):
I look at the stress in the bucket as the unnecessary
stressors.
Cassandra (18:33):
Okay.
Courtney (18:34):
And I look at the strength of the bucket itself as
the intentional stressors.
Can you strength train to makeyour body a little more
resilient?
Can you practice so you're alittle bit less reactive today
in your eatings?
Cassandra (18:45):
Yes, absolutely.
Absolutely.
Courtney (18:48):
And the bucket.
Cassandra (18:50):
Exactly.
And that reminds me of, I don'tknow why.
Um, you know, you you allthat's in a bucket and you have
holes and cracks in a bucket,and then it all comes out and
you're empty.
You have nothing left.
Like the tank is drained.
That's it, you know.
So that's that's a part, andall of what you're talking about
(19:14):
is how you would define health.
Yeah, you know, all of that isuh all of that is part of it.
So yeah, and so what are thewhat are the last two ones?
Courtney (19:26):
Yeah.
So the last two, that so thethird one we talked about
awareness, the practice ofawareness, the practice of
organization.
Then we have the practice tofollow through.
You can make all kinds ofpromises to yourself, you can
get really organized.
Like how many women do you knowthat spend a whole day planning
their week, but then they don'tfollow through with any of it,
or they don't follow throughwith any of the things that are
for them.
(19:46):
That's right.
So I would say the practice offollow through is where I do
most of my coaching.
It's probably the bulk of mycoaching work.
Okay, two well, I would saythere's three primary skill sets
baked into it.
Number one, we have to respectthe nervous system.
Your nervous system can allit's meant to oscillate
throughout the day, it's meantto go through periods of stress
and recovery.
(20:07):
Stress and recovery all daylong.
But where do most women live?
They live in stress, stress,stress, stress, stress, and
crash at the end of the day.
Cassandra (20:15):
Exactly.
Courtney (20:16):
We've got to fix that because our brains don't
function and our hormonal systemtakes a huge hit when we are
oscillating between periods ofrest and recover and stress,
right?
Most that we should have theoscillation.
So we've got to respect thenervous system.
We have to parent our brain,which means we need to think in
ways that are useful to us.
Cassandra (20:36):
Right.
Courtney (20:36):
Telling myself I'm a jerk and I'm incapable, not
useful.
Telling myself I have someskill sets to learn and I have
some gaps in maybe what I know,that could be useful.
So it's not lying to yourself,it's just thinking in ways that
actually encourage you to showup to do the work.
And then the third part offollow-through is you're gonna
have to feel hard things.
I cannot prevent that for you,and no one can prevent that for
(20:59):
you.
So it's build your ability tobe with difficult emotion and
not run away from it becauseyou're going to get frustrated,
you're going to getdisappointed, you're going to
get sad and stressed and all thethings.
And in those moments, you caneither retreat or you can just
experience.
And I'll tell you what,experiencing has a lot less
(21:21):
suffering attached to it.
And I know that sounds like theopposite, but when I feel sad
rather than eat my emotions,yeah.
Cassandra (21:36):
Exactly.
Courtney (21:37):
And the final of all of it is just the practice of
realignment.
We're all gonna get, we're allgonna trip up, we're gonna make
mistakes, we're gonna giveourselves one too many
permissions because that's allyou and take those moments and
and think about them in a waythat makes you want to quit.
Or you just consistentlypractice realigning.
(21:57):
And that's what success demandsis that you realign and you
realign and you realign time andtime again that all friends.
Cassandra (22:07):
Right, right.
And you know, everything youtalked about, the four skills,
it's like when you don't havethose, you're actually in your
way.
You know, a lot of people arelike, What do you mean?
Am I is my way in my way?
Just kind of think about it.
And as we were speakingearlier, we talked about if you
want to live your best life,which health is part of it, you
(22:30):
got to get out of your way.
You know, think aboutlisteners, what Courtney is
talking about, the awareness andand the hiding and the
procrastination.
This is too hard, you know,that negative self-talk.
That's that's a part of beingin your way.
I mean, come on, come on.
Courtney (22:47):
That's what I love about your show, and I love that
I was able to come on your showbecause it's one of the things
I'm constantly telling my owncommunity is when you're feeling
stuck, which is what your showis all about.
Yes, I truly believe thatthere's a gap for you in one of
these four practices.
You're either not aware, you'renot organizing and making
(23:07):
decisions, you're not parentingyour brain or feeling difficult
things, or you're not willing torealign yourself.
unknown (23:14):
Right.
Courtney (23:15):
So what's awesome, I always think of these four
practices as a circle becausecircles continuously, there's no
end, right?
That's how I think abouthealth.
You will be working on yourhealth as long as you have
breath in your lungs.
I hope.
I hope you will do that work.
Cassandra (23:34):
Yes, yes, yes.
That is so true.
Because you know, my mom usedto say when I was younger, and
this has stuck with me.
And she says, Look, if youdon't have your health, you have
nothing.
And I was like, What are youtalking about?
What do you mean?
And now I get it.
You can't live your you can'tdo the things because you don't
(23:55):
when you're sick, you you don'twant to.
I mean, you you just can't.
Courtney (24:00):
So this is important.
And I such a good point,Cassandra, because I I I really
I always say that health is notthe point of your life, it is
base camp for life.
unknown (24:12):
Yes.
Courtney (24:12):
So think of base camp at Everest.
People get to base camp andacclimate there so they can
actually do the hike or theclimb that they're there to do.
unknown (24:22):
Exactly.
Courtney (24:22):
That's what health is.
It's like as long if you canget the the foundation of your
health resilient enough, it willhelp you to make the climb of
your life.
And that is the point.
Cassandra (24:35):
Yes, yes.
And you know, um, that wordresilience, you know, I you
know, I've been dealing withants in my home.
I'm like, they are the mostresilient individuals.
And then, you know, there is aa quote that you that you read,
(25:00):
and it was an article in theHarvard Business Review.
Yeah, and you said this quoteyou will never forget that kind
of set the stage for you to doother things.
It was like resilience is abouthow you recharge, not how you
endure.
Why did that what was it aboutthat quote that stuck with you?
Courtney (25:20):
Because I think for me and for so many women, we are
we are very gritty, right?
Like we are we're hard workersand we are persistent and we
will hustle and we will we willliterally work ourselves into
the ground.
That is not resilience.
When you are exhausted andburnt out and depleted, that's
(25:45):
not resilience, that's thedoorway to disease and illness.
Cassandra (25:50):
Exactly.
Courtney (25:51):
So when you resil the the in that quote, resilience is
really that that recovery, it'sit's like baked into recovery
because the harder you push, themore of a demand there is from
your body to give it rest.
unknown (26:08):
Right.
Courtney (26:08):
And we are terrible at that.
We push, push, push, and weonly rest when we get sick, or
we have the two-time a yearvacation, or our kids in the
hospital, heaven forbid.
Like life forces us sometimesto rest.
That is not a way to becomeresilient.
Because what happens whenyou're pushing all the time and
(26:29):
then a family member reallyneeds you?
It demands more of you.
And if you don't have anythingin the tank already, exactly,
how is that helpful?
So a big part of the work thatI do with my clients is again
that oscillation of okay, youpushed really hard today at
work, you had these meetings,you you know, you did all these
things.
What are you gonna do to helpyour body recover from that?
Cassandra (26:55):
Exactly.
Right?
Courtney (26:56):
Are you gonna eat a nutritious meal?
Are you gonna put yourself tobed at a reasonable hour?
Are you gonna spend a littletime outdoors?
But what do we say to inresponse to those things?
I don't have time.
Cassandra (27:05):
Exactly.
I was just gonna say, I don'thave time to do that.
Courtney (27:08):
But you're not enough hours in a day, right?
unknown (27:11):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Courtney (27:13):
And we don't take the break because we can we tell
ourselves I don't have time.
But what I see in my own lifeand certainly with a lot of my
clients is when we push so hardwithout the breaks, we actually
become less productive, we'reless creative, we're terrible
problem solvers, and soeverything takes us longer
because we're not givingourselves the time to reset and
(27:34):
restore.
Cassandra (27:35):
Exactly.
Exactly.
I always say uh uh God is aredeemer of time because we do
this, we do that, and so I justdon't have time, I don't have
time.
So I always say that toindividuals that say they don't
have time to do this, but yetthey have time to do scrolling
(27:57):
on social media, they have timeto Netflix it.
I mean, you know, so it's it'slike, what are your priorities?
What is it that's gonna enableyou to start living your best
life on your terms?
What like we talked earlier,Courtney, they have to want it.
You can't you have to want whatyou want.
(28:19):
You can't just, you know, ifyou don't really want to get
healthy, you do the the wholegamut, the circle that you were
talking about, if if you don'twant it, you you don't get it.
Courtney (28:30):
But if you really want it, there's two things I want
to say to that because the firstthing is that I remember really
early in my career, I wanted itso bad for my clients.
Like I just wanted them to havethe world, right?
I wanted them to have thisfeeling of health that deserved.
And I remember having aconversation with a mentor of
(28:53):
mine, and I was really deflatedand disappointed because I had a
handful of clients at the timethat like they just weren't
showing up, right?
Like they weren't doing that,and I I looked at it as a
personal failure, and I wasreally beating myself up.
And and and I will never forgetthis.
My mentor said to me, Courtney,the day that you start working
harder than your client,probably the day you should hang
(29:16):
it up.
You can't because you can't runyour career that way.
You are here to educate andlead and inspire and you know
help them problem solve, butit's exactly what you're
speaking to.
You cannot do their work.
Cassandra (29:30):
Exactly.
Courtney (29:31):
And if you convince yourself that you can, you're
gonna burn yourself out andyou're gonna be a completely un
you know, useless coach.
That was like a really bigawakening for me.
But the other thing I wanted tosay in response to what you
said is that when people ask me,like, what's the problem you
really solve for people in thehealth arena?
I always say I help people tolessen integrity pain.
(29:53):
And integrity pain is the veryreal pain that we feel
internally.
It comes from living our lifeout of alignment with what we
actually want.
So we say that we want to wakeup with energy and vitality, but
we stay up watching thehundredth episode of our
favorite Netflix show.
unknown (30:11):
Yeah.
Courtney (30:12):
We say that we want to feel um like strong and
resilient in our bodies, but werefuse to move our bodies.
So integrity pain is thatinternal friction that if you do
not address it, it turns intodis-ease, right?
Dis-ease, which leads todisease.
So we all have integrity pain.
(30:34):
I don't want anyone listeningto think, oh, I have so much
integrity pain.
Like that's you know, and it'sa shame thing.
It's not, we all have it.
unknown (30:41):
Yes.
Courtney (30:41):
And none of us will probably ever completely resolve
every ounce of our integritypain in our lifetime.
But if we can reduce it just alittle bit, our health would
improve just a little bit.
Cassandra (30:52):
Yes, that's true every day of the game.
Courtney (30:54):
It's not about diet and exercise, it's about solving
your integrity pain.
Cassandra (30:58):
Exactly.
Exactly.
Um, you hit on a lot of things,and I I, you know, it a lot of
what we do is habitual.
It's just like we get in thecar, we drive, we don't even
think about it.
Um, you know, when you do thesame thing all the time, it's
(31:19):
really hard to disconnect andtry to do something different
because you've you've not doneit before.
So you talked about how how canwell how do you develop new
habits?
Like how can they developdifferent habits?
Courtney (31:37):
Well, it goes back to what we talked about earlier,
it's those four steps.
It's I have to becomehyper-aware of what I'm doing on
repeat that's basically harmingme.
And then I have to reallyconsider what could I do in this
in the scenario that actuallyhelps me?
So if every day you come homefrom work and you're exhausted
(31:58):
and you have an intention tocook a healthy meal, but you
once again order out and pour aglass of wine, that's right.
That's a pattern that'sprobably harming you.
So, what could we do in thesame scenario, still coming home
at the end of every dayexhausted, but that would make
eating healthier easier?
And I would explore a lot ofthose options with my clients,
(32:19):
right?
Maybe we figure out whichrestaurants could deliver a
relatively healthy meal.
We just get more considerateabout what we order.
Maybe we go to the store andget a rotisserie chicken that's
already been baked and we turnit into a healthy.
There's a thousand ways that wecan simplify it.
Cassandra (32:34):
That's right.
Courtney (32:35):
And then it's the the the the second piece of that is
the practice of organization,like that organ, right?
Am I going to go to the storeafter work and pick up that
rotisserie chicken?
Now, once I have the rotisseriechicken, am I gonna follow
through with eating it?
Because I bought it, it's in myand that's where some of that
parenting of the brain andexperiencing you know a little
bit of discomfort with somethingnew comes in.
(32:57):
And inevitably one night you'regonna find yourself ordering
pizza again or eating somethingthat you don't feel proud of,
and there's your opportunity toengage with the practice of
realignment again.
Cassandra (33:08):
Yeah.
Courtney (33:09):
Again, it's all about your resource availability.
So if you think about it, ifyou slept well last night and
you, you know, you your stressbucket isn't overflowing right
now.
Yeah.
You wake up in the morning andyou've got a lot of resources on
board, right?
You've got mental bandwidthavailable to you, you've got
energy, you've got time.
But as the day goes on, whathappens is all those resources
(33:33):
start to fade.
And so a lot of women will sayto me, I don't know what's wrong
with me.
I come home at the end of theday and I just eat like garbage
and I want to drink and I wantto veg out in front of Netflix.
And I'm like, this is not a youproblem.
I mean, there's nothing wrongwith you, right?
But your resource availabilityis so low that if you don't make
(33:56):
healthy habits easy, there's noway you're gonna engage with
them.
If I have a book, if I have todo like a huge effort to get a
healthy meal on the table aftera day of exhaustion, right?
I don't have the resources.
I'm not doing it.
Cassandra (34:09):
Exactly.
Exactly.
Courtney (34:11):
So again, how can we just become more considerate
about what's in the fridge andhow you prepare ahead of time
and where you might order foodfrom and how you might organize
your life earlier in the weekand earlier in the day.
So by the time dinner timecomes around, eating healthy is
an easy choice.
Cassandra (34:27):
Exactly.
That's where the organizationcomes.
You have to be prepared, youknow how exactly.
Exactly.
Um, doing that process though,when we talk about those
resources, and I want to talkabout um the quantitative, you
know, um resources.
(34:49):
Like, what about an uh a coach?
We can say, or umaccountability partner, yeah,
you know, you kind of talk aboutthese are the things that I
want to accomplish, and I wouldlove to have somebody to hold me
accountable for it, becausethen what individuals say, I
don't have the money for acoach.
I'm like, okay, well, how howbad do you want it?
(35:12):
Well, I want it bad, you know.
So there are different thingsyou could do in the meantime,
but I always say neverunderestimate the investments
you make in yourself, yeah, andthat's what we don't do.
No, and that's critical.
We don't go out and buy dress,shoes, um, stuff we don't need,
(35:32):
but what about us?
Courtney (35:37):
It's so true.
And I think this day and age,it's like there's so many
different layers of supportavailable to people.
Like, for example, yourpodcast, Cassandra, it's a free
resource, right?
It's an entry point forsupport.
Um, you know, there's supportgroups that relative, you know,
have a very low uh most of themyou don't even have to pay for.
But then I think as we startgetting a taste of dipping our
(36:00):
toe into that pool, like we dipour toe into the pool of
self-development and reallydoing the work, we start to see
the benefit.
And then that makes us hungryfor another level of support.
Cassandra (36:11):
Exactly.
Courtney (36:12):
And I feel really fortunate.
I don't know why I've been thisway, but I think my whole my
pretty much my whole life, I'vealways had mentors and coaches
and teachers that I rely on.
And I have probably spent, Ishould probably have 12 graduate
degrees for the amount of moneyI've spent on support.
And yes, you could argue thatpart of it's my career, so it's
(36:35):
education and all the things.
It I would say what keeps megoing back is I see such a
radical difference in how I showup when I have that level of
support versus when I don't.
And so you know what?
If I know that I'm going toachieve something sooner and
with less suffering because Ipay for the support, I'm gonna
(36:57):
pay the support.
Cassandra (36:58):
Exactly.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, that's that's worth it'sval so much value in that.
Courtney (37:04):
It there is, and we you're right, we tend to value
material things, and you don'tsee well, you do see eventually,
of course, the thetransformation and all the
goodness that comes from workingwith a coach, but it is it's
like you're paying more for anexperience than you are for
stuff.
Cassandra (37:21):
Yeah, that's so good.
Courtney (37:24):
What's the point of stuff if you don't actually love
your life?
Cassandra (37:27):
Exactly, it's not gonna make you feel better,
maybe temporarily, but as youtalked about sustainability,
yeah.
Courtney (37:35):
I'd much rather live a very um minimal life so I have
the funds to do the things thathelp me to experience life.
Yes, but oh my gosh, if I haveto spend a whole day on Sunday
doing laundry, like I just feellike I have too many clothes,
and then I'm gonna get rid ofthings because I don't want to
spend my life that way.
(37:56):
I don't want to spend my lifemanaging my stuff, I want to
spend my life living my life.
Cassandra (38:02):
Amen to that.
Amen to that.
It's a more meaningful,fulfilling life, absolutely,
because life is short.
Courtney, I have a one anotherquestion because we talked about
our title.
The title is Let's Live FullOut.
We kind of we talked aboutthat.
Redefining health at midlife.
Courtney (38:24):
Yes.
Cassandra (38:25):
What age would you consider midlife?
Courtney (38:29):
I I always answer this question in a couple two ways.
Okay.
Like to quantify it, like Iwould say midlife is it could be
anywhere from like your late30s, probably up to your early
70s.
Like that's the rule of theroom.
There's also, I also like tothink of midlife as the liminal
space between who you have beenand who you want to be moving
(38:51):
forward.
I love that.
So it's not, it doesn't have tobe a number, right?
Like I run a community and Ihave outliers.
I have girls I have women intheir 20s, I have women in their
80s.
Um, but I think that they'reattracted to being in the
community because that's the waywe approach it.
It's like we're all doing thework of transitioning from who
(39:13):
we've been with all thesepatterns for the first however
many years of our lifetime, manyof which those, you know, many
patterns of which are hurtingus.
And we're we're reallycommitted to doing the work of
leveling up into the person wewant to be.
And that's good life.
You're just mid mid-versions ofyou.
Cassandra (39:32):
Yeah, I love that.
That's great.
That's great.
And we talk about um thetransitioning being so
challenging when it comes tobehavior change.
Why, why do you think why doyou think that's so challenging?
Because I loved it when you sayit doesn't have to be an age,
you know.
If somebody, you know, theythey used to always say for men,
(39:53):
they went out and bought amotorcycle.
Oh, that's midlife.
We went and bought amotorcycle, you know.
So why is the transition sochallenging once they like,
okay, this is who I am.
Now I've had this experience,and now I'm I'm coming into
myself and I'm realizing I'maware of what it is that I want
(40:15):
to do.
Why is that challenging?
Courtney (40:18):
I would say the number one reason is a whole lot of
thoughts.
We have a whole lot of thoughtsabout not making other people
uncomfortable with our choices.
We have a lot of thoughts aboutbeing judged by the outside
world that we fail, that thiscould be the wrong decision,
that I'm not the kind of personwho uh I mean it's endless,
right?
The amount of thoughts that wehave that keep us stuck, right?
(40:41):
Where we're at.
Like I think it's a whole lotof thinking.
Um, and I would say too, youknow, on a deeper level, um,
because you know, thinking is Ithink a deep level, but an even
deeper level is that nervoussystem that if you have
experienced a lot of stress andeven trauma in your lifetime,
yeah, it's probably moredifficult for you in some ways
(41:05):
to coach yourself into this newversion of yourself.
So that's where I would saylike everyone has a different
level of healing to do.
Um, but I would definitely beneglectful if I didn't mention
that I think um sometime ournervous system is actually
physically stuck because ofthings we've experienced earlier
(41:25):
in life.
And if that's true, I wouldreally encourage you to work
with a nervous system expert anddo some nervous healing, like
nervous system healing.
Because when our nervous systemisn't come isn't doing the job
it's meant to do, our weactually can't access our
prefrontal cortex, which is thethinking part of our brain.
It's the part of our brain thatlets us step into possibility
(41:47):
and do hard things and considerhow we want to live.
So if you are someone who feelslike you're doing all the right
things and you are consistentlystuck, yeah, I would say it
might be worth looking into somenervous system healing, um,
which is not my specialty, but Ido work with a lot of other
coaches and people who whospecifically do that work
(42:08):
because I do belie I do reallydo believe in it so much.
And it's I don't think everyonenecessarily needs healing on
that level, but a lot of peopledo, right?
Cassandra (42:18):
And and so when we know that we're stuck and we
know that we need help, we youknow, a lot of people go to
therapy for sure, you know.
So the nervous system person,what did you call that?
How would how would individualsknow it may be a nervous system
issue?
Courtney (42:38):
Um, I think honestly, if you've done a lot of therapy
and it hasn't helped.
Cassandra (42:42):
Okay, right?
Courtney (42:43):
Because think about therapy as like a top-down uh
exercise.
Like we're in our kids andwe're trying to think our way
out of a problem.
Cassandra (42:51):
Uh-huh.
Courtney (42:51):
But if you've been doing that work for a really
long time and nothing'schanging, I would say that
probably there is a um a feelingof unsafety in the body.
unknown (43:03):
Uh-huh.
Courtney (43:03):
Right.
And that you, so there it'slike somatic practitioners.
Somatic just means body, butyou can literally Google somatic
practitioners, nervous ceiling,nervous system healing experts.
I will tell you a shamelessplug because I I love her work.
Irene Lyon is brilliant in thisword, um, in terms of helping
to educate people about thenervous system and and what
(43:25):
happens in the body when it'sstuck.
Cassandra (43:27):
Okay.
Courtney (43:28):
Um, but yeah, if you've been doing a lot of
cognitive therapy and you feellike you're not getting
anywhere, I would say youprobably have some healing to do
on the level of the nervoussystem.
And not all therapists do thatwork.
Cassandra (43:41):
Yes, exactly.
Yeah.
And yeah, and that's somethingnew for a lot of my listeners,
just to hear that concept and toentertain or be open to that.
You know, you can get to apoint where you're just sick and
tired of being sick and tired.
I've tried this, I've triedthat.
Okay, so let me let me let melet me try this.
So that's why you sense valueand listening to podcasts,
(44:04):
reading, think about who's inyour community, who are your
resources, anybody there to thatto serve you that has your best
interest at heart?
Because what we're talkingabout, you cannot do it alone.
Yeah, period.
You can't do it alone.
Courtney (44:19):
And I always say, like, he I say this, I mean it's
partly joking, but it's alsovery true.
Healing is a team sport, right?
Like healing is a team sport.
You are not meant to go italone, you are meant to be
surrounded by community, you aremeant to be in the company of
people who can normalize yourstruggle.
Um, you know, it's it's not asolo effort, and yet that's part
(44:41):
of hiding, is that's what wedo.
We don't want to show peoplethat we need healing, and so we
isolate and we contain and wehide, and then it just fasters.
Cassandra (44:50):
That's right, that's right, that's right.
Wow, this is good.
This this is good.
We can't talk all day.
I know, I know, we could talk,but you have what I call a call
to action, and I love it.
Now I want you to explain to mylisteners, and it's free, they
like free stuff.
That midlife magic quick startguy.
(45:13):
What is that about that mylisteners can get from?
Courtney (45:18):
You know, it's really the uh midlife magic is really
uh kind of a culmination ofpodcasts that we have pulled out
of Grace and Grit that we justfeel like kind of summarize the
the the bare bones of kind ofwhat we've talked about, like
even on this show, it justreally gives you a great
overview of um redefining healthat midlife.
Like that's exactly what it is.
(45:39):
So it gives you some journalprompts and it kind of gives you
some some deeper questions toconsider.
So I think if someone is justin midlife and they they're
enjoying this conversation andthey want a little bit more um
to roll with, I think that thatcould be an awesome, uh awesome
thing for them to check out.
Yeah.
I think this is important, likethe four practices that we
(46:03):
talked about today, um, I callit the consistency code because
consistency to me isn't aboutdoing the same thing over and
over, it's about consistentlyself-honoring what is true.
That's what consistency is, andthat's what I teach.
Um, but I have a book out inNovember called The Consistency
Code, and it basically exploresall the those four practices.
(46:24):
So if like kind of into thatand they like they want to hear
more about that, uh the book isNovember 4th.
And I would just tell people tokeep their eyes and ears open
for it because uh greatresource.
Cassandra (46:36):
Okay, November 4th, 2025.
Congratulations to you!
Courtney (46:41):
Thank you.
Yeah, super exciting! It's beena long time coming.
You know, look, it's like it'sa whole thing.
So awesome!
Cassandra (46:49):
That's awesome, awesome.
How can my listeners get intouch with you, Courtney?
Courtney (46:54):
Um, the best place is really disgraceandgrit.com.
Just go to my website, you'llfind my contact form and the
things that I offer, thepodcast.
Like it's kind of a one-stopshop.
Cassandra (47:03):
Okay, okay.
Well, we have to wrap thissession up, unfortunately.
Uh, I would like to thank youagain.
I want to let my listenersknow, I know without a shadow of
a doubt, that this podcast hasbeen so valuable to you and not
only to you, but think ofindividuals that are in your
(47:24):
community that could that wouldwant to hear this discussion,
this conversation, want to hearwhat it means to be what I call
less live full out.
Talk about the health that weredefining health at midlife.
Listen to the the the four umcrucial skills, which I think is
phenomenal.
And also remember get theirbook when it comes out in
(47:49):
November 2025.
And Courtney, again, thank you.
My listeners, thank you.
I love you guys, and as Ialways say, bye for now and God
bless you.
Thanks again.
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