November 12, 2025 • 18 mins
Have you ever felt like your body is working against you no matter how hard you try to heal?
In this episode, I’m diving deep into what it really means to live with chronic pain. We’ll talk about what’s going on in your nervous system when your body refuses to relax, why the pain isn’t your fault, and how to start creating a sense of safety from the inside out. You’ll hear how radical acceptance can help you stop fighting your body, find compassion for yourself, and start building real strength in the process.
You might want to listen if:
- You feel like your body keeps betraying you.
- You’ve tried everything to feel better but still feel stuck in pain.
- You catch yourself feeling guilty for not being able to push through.
- You want to understand how your mind and body can work together to heal.
- You’re ready to stop fighting your body and start trusting it again.
FIND OUT MORE!
- Grab Your Copy of the #1 Best Selling Book --> Dance of Attachment
- Apply for FREE Podcast Coaching with Jenn
- Join our FREE Community! Speak Honest Facebook Group 🧡
- Become a Speak Honest Member and access all you need to become secure.
- Schedule your Free 30 min Attachment Assessment with Jenn Today!
- Watch Jenn on the 🔴 TEDx Stage!
- Visit www.speak-honest.com to learn more
- Follow Jenn on Instagram: @speak_honest
- Like the episode? Please write a review, your words help others find us!
DISCLAIMER: Speak Honest podcast content is informational, not professional or medical advice. Jenn is an ICF relationship coach, not a licensed therapist. Consult health professionals for specific concerns. Client opinions do not reflect Speak Honest’s stance. We aim for accuracy but are not liable for errors or outcomes from ...
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Hello everyone, and welcome back to another episode
of Speak Honest.
I am Jen Noble, your go-torelationship coach, and on
today's podcast, we are talkingabout something that doesn't get
enough attention, and that ischronic pain.
You know that feeling when yourbody just won't let you rest?
When no matter how much you tryto stretch or breathe or just
(00:22):
relax, something deep inside ofyou stays tense.
Chronic pain isn't justphysical, it's also emotional
and mental, and it's exhausting.
And for so many women, thisbecomes a vicious cycle.
The pain shows up, you tense up,fear kicks in, and then your
nervous system goes straightinto survival mode.
(00:43):
So you start to wonder if yourbody is working against you or
if you'll ever feel safe in itagain.
But before we get started, ifthis is something you've been
struggling with and you want acommunity of women who truly get
it, then I would love for you tojoin our free Facebook
community.
You can go to Facebook and justsearch up Speak Honest, Secure
Attachment, and ConfidentCommunication for Women, or you
(01:06):
can just click on the link inthe show notes.
An insider community, you'llfind so much love and support
for anything you're goingthrough.
This is where you can ask yourown questions about your life or
relationship, and I can diveinto it right here with you on
the podcast.
So as you're listening totoday's episode, I want you to
think about this.
Have you noticed that the harderyou try to control or fight your
(01:27):
pain, the worse it gets?
Do you find yourself living inconstant anticipation of the
next flare-up?
And have you ever blamedyourself for not being able to
just think positive or pushthrough it?
If any of those sound familiar,then I want you to stay with me
because we're about to unpackwhat's really going on in your
body, why chronic pain keepslooping back, and how to begin
(01:50):
breaking that cycle gently andcompassionately.
A listener reached out recentlywith a question that I know so
many of you can relate to, so Iwanted to take some time to
unpack it in a full episode.
And she's been living withchronic pain for years, and she
said she feels completelytrapped inside of her body.
(02:11):
She's done therapy and she'stried everything she can think
of, but nothing seems to help.
She wrote in and asked me, Jen,how do you start to feel safe in
your body again when you dealwith chronic pain every day?
Like, how am I supposed to feelokay with this?
I'm not okay with it.
I hate the pain.
How do I love my body if I alsohate it?
(02:34):
First, I just want to send lotsof soft, gentle hugs to this
listener because I know thisfeeling oh so well.
Because I've had my ownstruggles with chronic pain and
disease.
It's something I've dealt withsince being diagnosed with PCOS
back in my early 20s and lateron with fibromyalgia, and I
remember spending years tryingto do everything I could to heal
(02:57):
the pain.
Every diet, every supplement,every medicine, every mindset
shift, all because I believedsomething inside of me was
broken and needed to be fixed.
So I knew I wanted to spend someextra special time on this topic
today, during the podcast, tospeak directly to anyone who's
out there and feeling that sametug, where you want to love your
(03:20):
body, but you're alsoridiculously frustrated with it.
That push and pull can beexhausting, and I want you to
know that you are not alone inthis.
It messes with your mind andyour confidence and your
relationships and your sense ofjust who you are.
It's this constant back andforth between wanting to love
your body and feeling like it'sbetrayed you.
And that's such a mind game,right?
(03:42):
You want to show yourselfcompassion, but the frustration
is so loud that some days youjust want to scream.
So today I want to break thisdown into three parts.
First, why the pain isn't yourfault.
Then I want to talk about how toradically accept your pain
without giving up.
And finally, how to find purposein your pain.
Because if we're going to livewith it, we might as well make
(04:03):
it mean something powerful,right?
But before we talk aboutanything else, we have to start
here.
The pain is not your fault.
And I know you've probably toldyourself it is at some point in
time.
Maybe you've wondered if it'ssomething you did wrong, if it's
because you're stressed out, orbecause you didn't meditate
enough, or you didn't eat cleanenough, or walk enough, or stay
(04:25):
positive enough.
Listen, I used to think thattoo.
But your body is not punishingyou, it's protecting you.
When pain lasts for months oryears at a time, the nervous
system itself can actuallychange.
Researchers call this centralsensitization, a process
basically where your brain andspinal cord become
(04:48):
hypersensitive to pain and othersensations.
The Mayo Clinic describes it asa structural, chemical, and
functional rewiring in thenervous system that makes it
react to even mild inputs as ifthey were dangerous.
In this state, your bodyamplifies pain signals and can
even create new pain wherethere's no ongoing injury.
(05:11):
Isn't that mind-blowing?
Think about that for a second.
Your body is not inventing pain,it's learned it.
Neuroscientists have this sayingI talk about all the time,
right?
Neurons that fire together wiretogether.
So the more often the brain hasto respond to pain or threat,
the stronger those neuralpathways become.
(05:33):
Over time, your body gets reallygood at protecting you.
A little bit too good, though,and it sometimes forgets to
stand down.
It's like an overprotectiveparent.
It means well, but it's notdoing exactly what you need it
to do.
But that's your body doing whatit was designed to do.
And yeah, it's reallyfrustrating when you're in pain
every day.
It can feel like your body'sturned against you, but what's
(05:56):
really happening is your nervoussystem has forgotten what safety
feels like.
When we stop blaming ourselvesfor the pain, something shifts.
Shame keeps the body tense.
Compassion helps it soften.
So the next time you catchyourself spiraling, instead of
asking yourself, what's wrongwith me?
I want you to try askingyourself instead, what does my
(06:19):
body need right now?
That one question changeseverything.
It tells your nervous systemyou're listening instead of
fighting.
Because your body isn't broken.
It's freaking brilliant.
It's doing exactly what it wasbuilt to do, keep you alive.
(06:39):
It just needs a little helpremembering that it is safe to
relax again.
All right, now that weunderstand the pain isn't our
fault, the next step is learninghow to live with it.
Not as our identity, but as ourreality.
And this is where radicalacceptance comes in.
I first learned about this ideaof radical acceptance from Tara
(07:00):
Brock.
She's a psychologist andmeditation teacher who wrote the
book of the same name, and itabsolutely shook my entire
world.
She defines radical acceptanceas recognizing what's happening
and allowing life to be just asit is.
And I'll be very honest, thatthe first time I heard that, I
rolled my eyes.
(07:20):
I thought, yeah, sure, fine.
I'll just accept being in painevery day.
Sure, that sounds great.
But the more I lived withchronic pain, the more I
realized she might actually beon to something here.
Radical acceptance isn't aboutliking what's happening.
It's not pretending the pain isfine or even that it's great.
It's about telling the truth.
(07:42):
This is what's here right now.
And then meeting that truth withcompassion instead of
resistance.
Because when you fight the pain,you're actually feeding it.
The nervous system hears thatinner war going on and it stays
alert.
But when you soften, when youtake a breath, and you say,
(08:04):
Okay, this hurts.
And I can still hold myselfgently through it.
You're teaching your body inthat moment that it is safe in
real time.
You're showing your system thatthe threat isn't as big as it
actually thinks it is.
And Tara Brock talks about thetwo wings of radical acceptance,
and those are mindfulness andcompassion.
(08:28):
Mindfulness is clear seeing,naming what's here without
judgment.
Compassion is the tenderholding, offering kindness to
what hurts.
And both wings are necessary forhealing.
So let's make this practical.
The next time your pain flaresup, which will probably be
(08:48):
tomorrow for most of us, maybeeven right now, instead of
bracing or rushing to fix it orget rid of it, I want you to
pause for a moment.
Notice what's happening.
You might say to yourself, Okay,pain is here.
That's the mindfulness.
And then I want you to ask, whatdoes my pain need right now?
(09:11):
That is the compassion.
Sometimes what it needs ismovement.
Sometimes it's rest.
Sometimes it's justacknowledgement.
Sometimes it's a pint of icecream.
It doesn't matter what it is.
You can even place a hand on thearea that hurts and just say
quietly, I know this is hard,and I'm here with you.
(09:34):
I know it sounds small, butthese are the micro moments that
retrain your nervous system thatyou are safe.
And here's the thing radicalacceptance doesn't make the pain
disappear.
What it does is make you biggerthan the pain.
It creates space between thepain and your identity.
(09:56):
So instead of I'm broken, itbecomes, hmm, I'm a person who's
experiencing pain right now.
And that subtle shift iseverything.
Alright, so we've talked abouthow the pain isn't your fault.
We've talked about how fightingit just keeps the body stuck in
survival mode, so we want toaccept it.
(10:16):
Now I want to go a little bitdeeper and talk about what
happens when you stop trying tofix it and start asking what
it's trying to teach you.
Once you stop blaming your bodyand start meeting it with
compassion, things do trulystart to shift, I promise you.
Now, the pain doesn't vanish,right?
We have to be real about that.
It still fucking hurts.
(10:38):
But it starts to mean somethingdifferent.
It's no longer this randompunishment from the universe
that's happening to you.
Instead, it becomes feedback,information, a clue.
And listen, I'm not here tosprinkle glitter on your pain
and tell you to find the silverlining of it.
Some things in life just suck.
(11:00):
There's no neat reason, nospiritual lesson tied up in a
bow.
But what I've learned, both inmy body and from coaching
hundreds of women, is that evenwhen pain doesn't have a reason,
it can still have a purpose.
And for me, chronic pain forcedme to stop performing and to
start living.
(11:21):
I used to think that beingstrong meant pushing through
everything, pretending I wasfine, staying productive,
smiling through the pain, all ofthat.
But strength isn't pretendingyou're fine.
It's staying present wheneverything in you wants to run.
It's saying, I hate this, andI'm still here.
(11:43):
The pain stripped me of all thefake strength I was hiding
behind.
It made me face myself in ways Inever had to before, and what I
found underneath was softer,more human, and more honest.
There's a quote that I love thatsays, When we are no longer able
to change a situation, we arechallenged to change ourselves.
(12:04):
And that line hits harder whenyou've lived inside of a body
that won't stop hurting you.
Because you can't always controlwhat's happening, even in your
own body.
But you can control how you showup in it.
And you can let the pain hardenyou, or you can let it wake you
up.
Maybe that's the purpose.
Maybe your pain isn't here todestroy you.
(12:26):
Maybe it's here to call you backto yourself, to slow you down,
to remind you you are not amachine.
Maybe your purpose isn't to getover it.
Maybe your purpose is to feel itfully.
Let it change you into someonewho feels more deeply, someone
who loves more honestly andrests without guilt.
(12:48):
Maybe your purpose is to stopapologizing for what hurts and
start honoring it.
Listen, the pain will changeyou.
That part is just not optional.
But what is optional is who youbecome because of it.
You get to decide if it makesyou bitter or if it makes you
(13:09):
bold.
You get to decide if it closesyou off or cracks you open.
When you start seeing pain as amessenger instead of a monster,
that is when healing starts tofeel possible again.
And for me, learning to liveinside of a body that doesn't
always cooperate has been messyas hell.
(13:30):
It's confusing, it's unfair, andsometimes it feels like it's
trying to ruin everything I careabout.
A few months ago I had thisdinner planned for about 30
women, and it's something I hadbeen excited about for weeks.
In the morning of, I woke up inso much pain I couldn't move.
It just felt like my body hadbeen hit by a truck, and yet
(13:52):
again it was betraying me.
And I'll be honest, the old mewould not have handled this well
at all.
In fact, the old me hasn't inthe past.
She would have fallen apart.
She would have cried for days,maybe even weeks or months.
She would have made it meansomething awful about herself,
that she was broken, that shewasn't reliable, that she didn't
(14:14):
deserve good things, that shecould never lead anyone or
anything because she couldn'teven trust in her own body, so
why should anyone trust her?
But I've learned a few thingssince then, thankfully.
The first is that my pain isn'tmy fault.
My body isn't punishing me, it'sprotecting me.
It's doing exactly what it wasdesigned to do, and it's sending
(14:36):
me messages when something'soff.
My body is not the enemy.
It was just tired of beingignored.
The second thing I learned ishow to radically accept my pain.
That doesn't mean I like it.
That doesn't mean I'm okay withit.
It means I stop fighting what'salready here.
I can look it in the eye andsay, okay, pain is here.
(14:59):
I don't love it.
But I can be kind to myselfthrough it.
Because resisting it, shamingit, pretending it's not there,
that only keeps me stuck.
And the third thing is the onethat still surprises me.
When pain doesn't have a reason,it can still have a purpose.
Maybe that purpose is to slow medown.
(15:20):
Maybe it's to make me softer.
Maybe it's to help me findcompassion for myself and for
every other woman who's everhated her body for it not being
perfect.
That night when I had to canceldinner, maybe I even taught
those women something.
Maybe I showed them that rest isnot weakness.
That saying no doesn't make youunreliable, that honoring your
(15:42):
body is one of the most powerfulforms of leadership there is.
I used to think that strengthmeant showing up no matter what.
Now I know the opposite.
Strength is canceling the thingyou worked so hard on because
your body said no.
Strength is planning a walkingtour through a city, knowing
your back might give out halfwaythrough, but trusting that if it
(16:03):
does, you'll be okay.
Strength is learning that youcan't always change what's
happening, but you can choose tomeet it with compassion.
All right, that's it for today,my friends.
This episode was such animportant one because it's not
just about chronic pain, it'sabout what happens when life
(16:25):
doesn't go the way we plannedand how we keep showing up
anyway.
We talked about why the painisn't your fault and how to
radically accept it withoutgiving up and how to start
finding meaning and purposeinside of it.
We talked about what realstrength actually looks like.
Not pushing through, notpretending you're fine, but
learning how to listen to yourbody and lead from truth instead
(16:49):
of perfection.
And if this episode hits homefor you, I want you to know that
you don't have to navigate thisalone.
Come join us inside of our freeFacebook community.
Speak honest, secure attachment,and confident communication for
women.
You can find us on Facebook oryou can click the link in the
show notes.
It's where we talk about thesehard, beautiful, real moments,
(17:10):
the kind that don't make it ontoInstagram, but the ones that
shape who we are.
I'd love to hear what resonatedmost with you from this episode.
Just come say hi in the group,share your takeaways, ask any
questions you want answered onthe podcast, and connect with
other women who are learning tobuild stronger relationships
with themselves and the peoplethey love.
(17:30):
All right, everyone.
I will speak with you all nextweek.
Take care.
Hello everyone, and welcome back to another episode
of Speak Honest.
I am Jen Noble, your go-torelationship coach, and on
today's podcast, we are talkingabout something that doesn't get
enough attention, and that ischronic pain.
You know that feeling when yourbody just won't let you rest?
When no matter how much you tryto stretch or breathe or just
(00:22):
relax, something deep inside ofyou stays tense.
Chronic pain isn't justphysical, it's also emotional
and mental, and it's exhausting.
And for so many women, thisbecomes a vicious cycle.
The pain shows up, you tense up,fear kicks in, and then your
nervous system goes straightinto survival mode.
(00:43):
So you start to wonder if yourbody is working against you or
if you'll ever feel safe in itagain.
But before we get started, ifthis is something you've been
struggling with and you want acommunity of women who truly get
it, then I would love for you tojoin our free Facebook
community.
You can go to Facebook and justsearch up Speak Honest, Secure
Attachment, and ConfidentCommunication for Women, or you
(01:06):
can just click on the link inthe show notes.
An insider community, you'llfind so much love and support
for anything you're goingthrough.
This is where you can ask yourown questions about your life or
relationship, and I can diveinto it right here with you on
the podcast.
So as you're listening totoday's episode, I want you to
think about this.
Have you noticed that the harderyou try to control or fight your
(01:27):
pain, the worse it gets?
Do you find yourself living inconstant anticipation of the
next flare-up?
And have you ever blamedyourself for not being able to
just think positive or pushthrough it?
If any of those sound familiar,then I want you to stay with me
because we're about to unpackwhat's really going on in your
body, why chronic pain keepslooping back, and how to begin
(01:50):
breaking that cycle gently andcompassionately.
A listener reached out recentlywith a question that I know so
many of you can relate to, so Iwanted to take some time to
unpack it in a full episode.
And she's been living withchronic pain for years, and she
said she feels completelytrapped inside of her body.
(02:11):
She's done therapy and she'stried everything she can think
of, but nothing seems to help.
She wrote in and asked me, Jen,how do you start to feel safe in
your body again when you dealwith chronic pain every day?
Like, how am I supposed to feelokay with this?
I'm not okay with it.
I hate the pain.
How do I love my body if I alsohate it?
(02:34):
First, I just want to send lotsof soft, gentle hugs to this
listener because I know thisfeeling oh so well.
Because I've had my ownstruggles with chronic pain and
disease.
It's something I've dealt withsince being diagnosed with PCOS
back in my early 20s and lateron with fibromyalgia, and I
remember spending years tryingto do everything I could to heal
(02:57):
the pain.
Every diet, every supplement,every medicine, every mindset
shift, all because I believedsomething inside of me was
broken and needed to be fixed.
So I knew I wanted to spend someextra special time on this topic
today, during the podcast, tospeak directly to anyone who's
out there and feeling that sametug, where you want to love your
(03:20):
body, but you're alsoridiculously frustrated with it.
That push and pull can beexhausting, and I want you to
know that you are not alone inthis.
It messes with your mind andyour confidence and your
relationships and your sense ofjust who you are.
It's this constant back andforth between wanting to love
your body and feeling like it'sbetrayed you.
And that's such a mind game,right?
(03:42):
You want to show yourselfcompassion, but the frustration
is so loud that some days youjust want to scream.
So today I want to break thisdown into three parts.
First, why the pain isn't yourfault.
Then I want to talk about how toradically accept your pain
without giving up.
And finally, how to find purposein your pain.
Because if we're going to livewith it, we might as well make
(04:03):
it mean something powerful,right?
But before we talk aboutanything else, we have to start
here.
The pain is not your fault.
And I know you've probably toldyourself it is at some point in
time.
Maybe you've wondered if it'ssomething you did wrong, if it's
because you're stressed out, orbecause you didn't meditate
enough, or you didn't eat cleanenough, or walk enough, or stay
(04:25):
positive enough.
Listen, I used to think thattoo.
But your body is not punishingyou, it's protecting you.
When pain lasts for months oryears at a time, the nervous
system itself can actuallychange.
Researchers call this centralsensitization, a process
basically where your brain andspinal cord become
(04:48):
hypersensitive to pain and othersensations.
The Mayo Clinic describes it asa structural, chemical, and
functional rewiring in thenervous system that makes it
react to even mild inputs as ifthey were dangerous.
In this state, your bodyamplifies pain signals and can
even create new pain wherethere's no ongoing injury.
(05:11):
Isn't that mind-blowing?
Think about that for a second.
Your body is not inventing pain,it's learned it.
Neuroscientists have this sayingI talk about all the time,
right?
Neurons that fire together wiretogether.
So the more often the brain hasto respond to pain or threat,
the stronger those neuralpathways become.
(05:33):
Over time, your body gets reallygood at protecting you.
A little bit too good, though,and it sometimes forgets to
stand down.
It's like an overprotectiveparent.
It means well, but it's notdoing exactly what you need it
to do.
But that's your body doing whatit was designed to do.
And yeah, it's reallyfrustrating when you're in pain
every day.
It can feel like your body'sturned against you, but what's
(05:56):
really happening is your nervoussystem has forgotten what safety
feels like.
When we stop blaming ourselvesfor the pain, something shifts.
Shame keeps the body tense.
Compassion helps it soften.
So the next time you catchyourself spiraling, instead of
asking yourself, what's wrongwith me?
I want you to try askingyourself instead, what does my
(06:19):
body need right now?
That one question changeseverything.
It tells your nervous systemyou're listening instead of
fighting.
Because your body isn't broken.
It's freaking brilliant.
It's doing exactly what it wasbuilt to do, keep you alive.
(06:39):
It just needs a little helpremembering that it is safe to
relax again.
All right, now that weunderstand the pain isn't our
fault, the next step is learninghow to live with it.
Not as our identity, but as ourreality.
And this is where radicalacceptance comes in.
I first learned about this ideaof radical acceptance from Tara
(07:00):
Brock.
She's a psychologist andmeditation teacher who wrote the
book of the same name, and itabsolutely shook my entire
world.
She defines radical acceptanceas recognizing what's happening
and allowing life to be just asit is.
And I'll be very honest, thatthe first time I heard that, I
rolled my eyes.
(07:20):
I thought, yeah, sure, fine.
I'll just accept being in painevery day.
Sure, that sounds great.
But the more I lived withchronic pain, the more I
realized she might actually beon to something here.
Radical acceptance isn't aboutliking what's happening.
It's not pretending the pain isfine or even that it's great.
It's about telling the truth.
(07:42):
This is what's here right now.
And then meeting that truth withcompassion instead of
resistance.
Because when you fight the pain,you're actually feeding it.
The nervous system hears thatinner war going on and it stays
alert.
But when you soften, when youtake a breath, and you say,
(08:04):
Okay, this hurts.
And I can still hold myselfgently through it.
You're teaching your body inthat moment that it is safe in
real time.
You're showing your system thatthe threat isn't as big as it
actually thinks it is.
And Tara Brock talks about thetwo wings of radical acceptance,
and those are mindfulness andcompassion.
(08:28):
Mindfulness is clear seeing,naming what's here without
judgment.
Compassion is the tenderholding, offering kindness to
what hurts.
And both wings are necessary forhealing.
So let's make this practical.
The next time your pain flaresup, which will probably be
(08:48):
tomorrow for most of us, maybeeven right now, instead of
bracing or rushing to fix it orget rid of it, I want you to
pause for a moment.
Notice what's happening.
You might say to yourself, Okay,pain is here.
That's the mindfulness.
And then I want you to ask, whatdoes my pain need right now?
(09:11):
That is the compassion.
Sometimes what it needs ismovement.
Sometimes it's rest.
Sometimes it's justacknowledgement.
Sometimes it's a pint of icecream.
It doesn't matter what it is.
You can even place a hand on thearea that hurts and just say
quietly, I know this is hard,and I'm here with you.
(09:34):
I know it sounds small, butthese are the micro moments that
retrain your nervous system thatyou are safe.
And here's the thing radicalacceptance doesn't make the pain
disappear.
What it does is make you biggerthan the pain.
It creates space between thepain and your identity.
(09:56):
So instead of I'm broken, itbecomes, hmm, I'm a person who's
experiencing pain right now.
And that subtle shift iseverything.
Alright, so we've talked abouthow the pain isn't your fault.
We've talked about how fightingit just keeps the body stuck in
survival mode, so we want toaccept it.
(10:16):
Now I want to go a little bitdeeper and talk about what
happens when you stop trying tofix it and start asking what
it's trying to teach you.
Once you stop blaming your bodyand start meeting it with
compassion, things do trulystart to shift, I promise you.
Now, the pain doesn't vanish,right?
We have to be real about that.
It still fucking hurts.
(10:38):
But it starts to mean somethingdifferent.
It's no longer this randompunishment from the universe
that's happening to you.
Instead, it becomes feedback,information, a clue.
And listen, I'm not here tosprinkle glitter on your pain
and tell you to find the silverlining of it.
Some things in life just suck.
(11:00):
There's no neat reason, nospiritual lesson tied up in a
bow.
But what I've learned, both inmy body and from coaching
hundreds of women, is that evenwhen pain doesn't have a reason,
it can still have a purpose.
And for me, chronic pain forcedme to stop performing and to
start living.
(11:21):
I used to think that beingstrong meant pushing through
everything, pretending I wasfine, staying productive,
smiling through the pain, all ofthat.
But strength isn't pretendingyou're fine.
It's staying present wheneverything in you wants to run.
It's saying, I hate this, andI'm still here.
(11:43):
The pain stripped me of all thefake strength I was hiding
behind.
It made me face myself in ways Inever had to before, and what I
found underneath was softer,more human, and more honest.
There's a quote that I love thatsays, When we are no longer able
to change a situation, we arechallenged to change ourselves.
(12:04):
And that line hits harder whenyou've lived inside of a body
that won't stop hurting you.
Because you can't always controlwhat's happening, even in your
own body.
But you can control how you showup in it.
And you can let the pain hardenyou, or you can let it wake you
up.
Maybe that's the purpose.
Maybe your pain isn't here todestroy you.
(12:26):
Maybe it's here to call you backto yourself, to slow you down,
to remind you you are not amachine.
Maybe your purpose isn't to getover it.
Maybe your purpose is to feel itfully.
Let it change you into someonewho feels more deeply, someone
who loves more honestly andrests without guilt.
(12:48):
Maybe your purpose is to stopapologizing for what hurts and
start honoring it.
Listen, the pain will changeyou.
That part is just not optional.
But what is optional is who youbecome because of it.
You get to decide if it makesyou bitter or if it makes you
(13:09):
bold.
You get to decide if it closesyou off or cracks you open.
When you start seeing pain as amessenger instead of a monster,
that is when healing starts tofeel possible again.
And for me, learning to liveinside of a body that doesn't
always cooperate has been messyas hell.
(13:30):
It's confusing, it's unfair, andsometimes it feels like it's
trying to ruin everything I careabout.
A few months ago I had thisdinner planned for about 30
women, and it's something I hadbeen excited about for weeks.
In the morning of, I woke up inso much pain I couldn't move.
It just felt like my body hadbeen hit by a truck, and yet
(13:52):
again it was betraying me.
And I'll be honest, the old mewould not have handled this well
at all.
In fact, the old me hasn't inthe past.
She would have fallen apart.
She would have cried for days,maybe even weeks or months.
She would have made it meansomething awful about herself,
that she was broken, that shewasn't reliable, that she didn't
(14:14):
deserve good things, that shecould never lead anyone or
anything because she couldn'teven trust in her own body, so
why should anyone trust her?
But I've learned a few thingssince then, thankfully.
The first is that my pain isn'tmy fault.
My body isn't punishing me, it'sprotecting me.
It's doing exactly what it wasdesigned to do, and it's sending
(14:36):
me messages when something'soff.
My body is not the enemy.
It was just tired of beingignored.
The second thing I learned ishow to radically accept my pain.
That doesn't mean I like it.
That doesn't mean I'm okay withit.
It means I stop fighting what'salready here.
I can look it in the eye andsay, okay, pain is here.
(14:59):
I don't love it.
But I can be kind to myselfthrough it.
Because resisting it, shamingit, pretending it's not there,
that only keeps me stuck.
And the third thing is the onethat still surprises me.
When pain doesn't have a reason,it can still have a purpose.
Maybe that purpose is to slow medown.
(15:20):
Maybe it's to make me softer.
Maybe it's to help me findcompassion for myself and for
every other woman who's everhated her body for it not being
perfect.
That night when I had to canceldinner, maybe I even taught
those women something.
Maybe I showed them that rest isnot weakness.
That saying no doesn't make youunreliable, that honoring your
(15:42):
body is one of the most powerfulforms of leadership there is.
I used to think that strengthmeant showing up no matter what.
Now I know the opposite.
Strength is canceling the thingyou worked so hard on because
your body said no.
Strength is planning a walkingtour through a city, knowing
your back might give out halfwaythrough, but trusting that if it
(16:03):
does, you'll be okay.
Strength is learning that youcan't always change what's
happening, but you can choose tomeet it with compassion.
All right, that's it for today,my friends.
This episode was such animportant one because it's not
just about chronic pain, it'sabout what happens when life
(16:25):
doesn't go the way we plannedand how we keep showing up
anyway.
We talked about why the painisn't your fault and how to
radically accept it withoutgiving up and how to start
finding meaning and purposeinside of it.
We talked about what realstrength actually looks like.
Not pushing through, notpretending you're fine, but
learning how to listen to yourbody and lead from truth instead
(16:49):
of perfection.
And if this episode hits homefor you, I want you to know that
you don't have to navigate thisalone.
Come join us inside of our freeFacebook community.
Speak honest, secure attachment,and confident communication for
women.
You can find us on Facebook oryou can click the link in the
show notes.
It's where we talk about thesehard, beautiful, real moments,
(17:10):
the kind that don't make it ontoInstagram, but the ones that
shape who we are.
I'd love to hear what resonatedmost with you from this episode.
Just come say hi in the group,share your takeaways, ask any
questions you want answered onthe podcast, and connect with
other women who are learning tobuild stronger relationships
with themselves and the peoplethey love.
(17:30):
All right, everyone.
I will speak with you all nextweek.
Take care.
Popular Podcasts
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.