May 12, 2026 • 23 mins
In this episode, we’re reframing stress through the lens of Traditional Chinese Medicine, nervous system health, and personal growth. Stress is often talked about as something inherently bad, something to eliminate, avoid, or “fix.” But the reality is more nuanced than that.
Stress is a normal part of being human. We need challenge, activation, movement, and periods of intensity in order to grow, evolve, create, and move forward in our lives. The problem isn’t stress itself. The problem is when stress gets stuck in the body and we lose the ability to move with it, process it, and integrate it.
Through both clinical examples and a Chinese medicine perspective, this episode explores how stress can actually become supportive when we learn to work with it differently. We talk about nervous system activation, stagnation, growth, awareness, and why some of the most transformative periods in our lives are often the most uncomfortable.
This is a conversation about learning to build capacity, strengthen awareness, and relate to stress with more intention instead of fear.
In This Episode:
- Why stress is not inherently “bad”
- The difference between activation and perceived threat
- A nervous system perspective on challenge, movement, and growth
- Why we actually need periods of activation in life
- How stress can support personal and spiritual growth
- The role of discomfort in transformation and change
- Why some of the most meaningful seasons of life are also the hardest
- A Chinese medicine perspective on stagnation and why “stuck” stress matters
- How stress that doesn’t move through the body can contribute to pain and illness
- Clinical examples of how stagnation shows up physically and emotionally
- The importance of awareness and “training the noticing muscle”
- How we can learn to move with stress instead of fighting against it
- The relationship between stress, resilience, and capacity
- Why healing isn’t about removing all stress from your life
- How challenge can become supportive when we learn to work with it differently
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Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Tao of
Humaning, where we explore thephysical, energetic, emotional,
and spiritual aspects of what itmeans to be human together.
I'm your host, Dr.
Christine, and I'm so thrilledyou've decided to join me for
today's conversation.
In today's episode, I want totalk about stress and how it is
(00:23):
that stress can be a friend inour lives.
Oftentimes, stress is presentedor translated in our worlds as
bad.
Stress equals bad.
And we as humans will dowhatever we can to avoid this
feeling ultimately of stress orthis experience of being
(00:47):
stressed, right?
And what I talk with patientsabout a lot is, you know, what
does that feel like in yourbody, right?
So for a lot of us, that's goingto be very different.
Some people will feel stress inthe digestive system.
Some people will feel stressmore in the chest and like heart
palpitations and things likethat.
Sometimes people will getflushed.
(01:08):
You know, there are thesedifferent physiological
responses that we get.
Those on their own aren'tnecessarily bad.
Um, but we have this tendency tothink about stress as something
that we either need to avoid orwe need to fix.
And I would argue that stress isstress can be viewed as a tool.
(01:31):
And, you know, it's one of thosethings that I always tell
patients, I'm like, if I couldremove stress from your life, I
mean, I would just have a linedown the block every single day,
right?
Um, I can't remove stress from ahuman's life, right?
I can, we can shift how our bodyresponds to stress.
(01:57):
And a lot of that starts withhow we orient towards that
experience.
So if we're immediately sayingno and pushing it away, right,
there's immediately going to bea tension and a constriction,
right?
And we've talked about this alot in different episodes, but
ultimately the energy, the qi inour body wants to flow.
(02:22):
And so the more that we can worktowards, consciously work
towards being open and having aposture of huh, and a bit more
wonder in our lives, the moreeasily the energy is able to
move through us.
And we're gonna talk more aboutthis in a bit because it is a
(02:44):
nuanced thing, right?
Like not all of the stressesthat we experience in life are
pleasant or fun, right?
That's not what I'm saying here.
I am saying that when we arechallenged in life, that is a
wonderful opportunity topractice how we're showing up,
how we're supporting ourselves,how we're reaching out for
(03:08):
support from our communities ornot, right?
Like, how are we actuallyshowing up in those moments when
we feel really stressed?
Does that make sense?
Because stress is such a humanexperience, right?
Even if it's not like hunter,you know, I think historically
even stress was something thatwas always there.
(03:29):
It was just different kinds ofstressors, right?
But they probably, I don't know,had a lot of parallels,
actually, now that I'm saying itout loud.
But parallels, you know, ofbeing able to eat and being able
to have a place to live andbeing able to be in
relationships with other humans,right?
Like those are all things thathave stress sometimes built into
(03:52):
them.
Um but going back to, you know,in terms of like how we show up
with it, it's like that ideathat not all okay, hold on.
I'm gonna rewind mentally herefor a second.
The, you know, sometimes wethink of stress as bad, right?
(04:12):
But stress is actually necessaryif we are looking at this as
activation, right?
So a lot of times I'll talkabout having this oscillation or
this movement and flow betweenperiods of restfulness and then
(04:32):
activation, and then that peaks,right?
And then we'll move back downtowards rest, right?
Stress will oftentimes highlightwhere it is that we tend to fall
out of balance.
That's really useful, especiallyif we're looking at refining our
wellness practices, or we'relooking at, you know, chain just
(04:56):
changing different habits,growth mindset, like all of
those things are going to behighlighted in those moments.
And so I've talked about thisbefore, right?
You want to build these musclesideally before you need them.
Because if you're in a moment ofintense stress, right, like you
just lost your job, right, andyou're worried about being able
(05:19):
to provide for your family, youknow, those kinds of things are
really challenging to startimplementing a new, you know,
mindfulness strategy, right?
You can do it.
I've seen people do it and I'vesupported people doing it, and
you know, it it's possible.
And the people that I see havingthe most success with working
(05:40):
with stress have almost umtrained for it.
Not almost, they really havetrained for it.
The ones that I see doing reallywell under times of stress have
actually trained that muscle.
I found that to be true formyself.
I used to be much more affectedby stress and emotional upsets
(06:00):
and things like that.
And now, you know, I still canfeel upset or whatever around
stress, but I'm much faster tocome back to center and to be
able to, you know, call insupports, to call in my own
resourcefulness than I was, youknow, 10 years ago, remarkably
better at it, actually.
(06:24):
So we have these growth periods,right?
And even the conversations we'vehad here around puberty,
perimenopause, right,postpartum, even pregnancy, all
of these times in our life thatare periods of big
transformation and change, thoseare all considered stressors,
(06:45):
right?
So it's and they're also amazingat having the other, our next
kind of evolution of ourselvesshow up at the other side of it,
right?
I think remembering part of itis remembering that stress can
be beneficial.
There's a couple of books that Ireally enjoy on this topic,
(07:07):
actually, and I share about themwhenever I talk about stress
things.
Um, one is by Kelly McGonagall,and I may mix them up because I
didn't actually write them down.
Um I believe they are relatedand they are the McGonagall.
McGonagal is their last name.
One is called The Upside ofStress, and the other one is
(07:30):
called Super Better.
Super Better?
It's a yellow hardcover book.
I can totally see it.
Like it's sitting on mybookshelf right now.
Um I can put those in the shownotes for you if you want to
reference them.
Um, two really good books uhlooking at how we frame stress
(07:51):
and how we work with it.
And that's something that I talkabout a lot in clinic is being
able to, you know, have thesemoments where we're slowing down
and we're actually seeing andreally feeling the sensations of
stress.
So I'll always ask people, wheredo you feel it in your body?
(08:14):
Right, because that's going tobe great information for us
about where we want to support,right?
And being able to have thattactile experience of it also is
really grounding and helps tomake things feel less
overwhelming, actually.
And being able to just havethese conversations with people,
(08:36):
I think is also really helpfulin that you know, lessening of
overwhelm because you'veremember that you're not alone
in feeling these stresses.
Um I think remembering that, youknow, there is something new
that could be being forged,especially in the really bigger
(08:59):
stressful moments.
You know, who you are when youcome out the other side of that,
you know, quote unquotestressful time in your life can
be pretty rad.
And I think allowing that futureversion of ourselves to actually
kind of pull us to or pull usthrough the stressors um can
(09:26):
actually really help becausewe're remembering that there's
something bigger, like there's areason why these growing edges
are happening, and being able tostep into something new is so
valuable.
And I think what I see a lot inin my experience is that stress
(09:46):
becomes less beneficial when wewhen it becomes stuck.
So coming back to traditionalChinese medicine, right, we say
that where there is stagnation,there is pain.
Where there is pain, there isstagnation.
And so everything really isbased on this idea of flow and
(10:12):
smooth movement of energythroughout the body.
And so this happens too withstress when we think about, you
know, if we think back now to astressful time in our lives, and
we think about how we showed upin that moment, and you can
really see like where it is thatyou've that we felt stuck and
(10:37):
where we felt flow.
And this isn't to say, so I getasked this a lot because a lot
of times people will hear theseideas of you know framing stress
as possibly even useful, maybeeven a friend from this crazy
podcast I was listening to.
(10:58):
Um, you know, people will hearthat and then go through
something stressful, and thensometimes it feels when it's
messy that you're not doing itright.
And I'm here to say that is notthe case, right?
It doesn't have to look acertain way.
I don't know anyone who goesthrough big change and
(11:18):
transformation and you knowlooks all zen and uh quiescent
all of the time, right?
It's like sometimes it's messy,and the messy is actually really
great because that means thatit's not stuck, right?
It's almost harder when you seethat lack of movement, right?
(11:42):
Because sometimes the liketears, right, or the screaming
and crying, whatever it isthat's like needs to happen,
like that feels messy, is whatactually needs to happen to move
the qi and move that stagnation.
Because if it gets stuck and itdoesn't allow to move either
with us or through us, thenthat's when we start to get
(12:05):
stagnations in you know, invarious channels in the body or
in different systems that cancause issues according to
Chinese medicine down the line.
Does that make sense?
Comment below if that does notmake sense.
I'll talk more about thisbecause it's super interesting
to me.
Um yeah, I think as humans,sometimes we really beat
(12:30):
ourselves up for the messystuff.
And I think the more that peopletalk about real spiritual growth
and real transformation and reallike meeting life where it is, I
just think it makes it more themess more normal, which it is
normal, right?
(12:51):
Like, of course, on the otherside, like we all want to have
more harmony and more peace andmore ease and more moments of
like calm and zen.
But going back to what I startedto say earlier is like we also
need the activation pieces,right?
We need to be able to get up andrun when the tiger is actually
chasing us, right?
(13:11):
We need to have that activationunder threat.
We want that, right?
You don't want to just standthere and be like, I'll zen if
you're being really chased by atiger.
The the nuance comes in learningand reminding your system when
you're actually being chased bya tiger, right?
(13:32):
We talked about that in the lastepisode about overwhelm and how
a lot of times taking ininformation through the news or
social media or something, ournervous systems often are
perceiving more threat than whatis actually in our current
sphere of reality.
(13:54):
And part of this is like, okay,being comfortable being able to
be activated, right?
And have those moments of moreintensity and then under threat,
and then also being able to havethat activation aspect also when
you feel safe.
And that looks more like beingmotivated, being inspired, you
(14:18):
know, moving forward withthings.
It's that like spring energythat we've talked about here
before.
That's healthy activation undersafety.
We need that, right?
We need both.
The same way that we need moreof the parasympathetic under
safety, right?
Which is that rest and digest,right?
(14:39):
We need that.
And it's not wrong if you'refeeling activated, right?
I think part of it part of thepiece that really gets sticky
for people around stress is thatthey should on themselves.
So this is your reminder.
Do not should on yourself orothers.
(15:00):
Let people have theirexperience, let yourself have
the experience.
And it doesn't have to look acertain way, right?
There's no awards forperfection.
Perfection, I would argue, isnot even a real thing.
So I think being human involveshaving all aspects of being
(15:21):
human.
I talk to moms about this a lot,especially new moms.
There's so much pressure to beable to be, you know, to get it
all right.
I don't even know what thatmeans.
That's why I like kind oflaughing because I don't think
that's real.
But you see all of these curatedfeeds, you know, on social media
and all of these, you know,people who seemingly have things
(15:45):
together, right?
That's like a ch that's whatthey've chosen to show you.
And I yeah, I can just feel whenI talk to a mom and remind her
of her own humanness and remindher of the value of that
(16:07):
humanness, sharing thathumanness with her children.
I can you can just feel thetension like start to melt away,
right?
Like, oh, and people will saythis a lot of like, oh, you make
things like that are really hardin life feel so normal.
And I I've had several differentpeople say that to me.
(16:29):
I'm like, well, because they arenormal.
Like we're I don't know anyhumans that are just like
glossing through life, you know,for 75 years, 80 years without
having these ups and downs.
Like we're this is we're meantto come here and have our ups
and downs and have our mess andhave our joys and have our
(16:51):
hearts burst wide open, youknow?
It's all part of this humanexperience.
And I think the more that we cantalk about these things, the
just more we'll remember, liketogether that we are here and
it's messy and sometimesstressful, and sometimes joyful,
(17:12):
and sometimes sad, and sometimeshard, and sometimes easy.
Like it's all okay.
It's okay to have all of thosethings.
And having this awareness, likefor me, the lens of Chinese
medicine really makes so muchsense.
I love the nature base of it, Ilove the fluidity and the
(17:34):
dynamics, like uh everythingthat I have learned in the past
30 years in my soul makes somuch sense.
And so I love being able to havethis space to share this.
So thank you for all of youlistening because it really
means a lot.
And it's also okay if Chinesemedicine is not your lens.
Like you might hear me talkingabout this now and be like, oh,
(17:57):
that's super interesting.
And you might, you know, go downa rabbit hole and you might take
a right turn and like go end upsomewhere completely different,
like fantastic.
unknown (18:06):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (18:07):
I had a teacher for a long time that would talk
about you know, human design.
A big part of it is exploringand discovering and learning and
growing and creating.
And those were, you know, thebasis of our design as a human
being.
And yes, there is an element ofallowing for flow in, and I will
(18:34):
put that that caveat to it oflike allowing for flow in as
much capacity as you can in thatmoment, right?
I had a dear friend who was sowise, she was a longtime
Buddhist practitioner, and youknow, she was going through
doing a lot of this inner workand really committed to growing,
(18:56):
and she would be going through atime of transformation, and she
would share about it because wewere in that kind of a a
community and friendship, andthat was lovely.
And she shared this practicewith me, so I'm gonna share it
with you before we sign out fortoday.
Um, she would check in withherself and she would say, you
know, are you doing okay rightnow?
(19:19):
And then she would pause and shewould give her system a minute
to respond, and she'd be like,Sometimes the answer is no.
And that was kind of it.
There wasn't a lot of story thatneeded to go along with it.
There wasn't a lot of like, oh,what does that say about me?
You know, I'm such a terriblepractitioner, like, look at me,
(19:40):
having a hard time.
Like, no.
She wasn't shitting on herself,right?
She was simply asking how shewas doing and then listening to
what the answer was.
And then she could do furtherinquiries and say, like, hey,
you know, what's needed, right?
Like, do I need to call afriend?
Do I need to take a nap?
(20:01):
Do I need to go work?
Do I need to play?
Whatever the things are, right?
But she started with thatquestion of, are you okay?
And then I was talking to herabout it, and she said it's such
a fun practice for her becauseshe's noticed over the years
that a lot of times if she'llask that question, and if the
answer is no, a lot of times ashumans, there's a tendency to
(20:25):
want to like make that the day.
And I don't know how else toexpress that.
But it's like, you know, you'reyou have a challenging
interaction with someone, right?
Out on the freeway or something,right?
Like you have someone cut youoff.
I don't know, whatever it is,there's like a stressor.
A lot of times humans will likemake that their personality for
(20:48):
the rest of the day.
Like, oh, this guy, like blah,blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah.
Right.
That's a lot of time.
You had this, you know,30-second, five-minute,
10-minute interaction, and thenthe whole rest of your day is
ruined because of that.
How come?
Right?
So she had this practice ofchecking in with herself, and
(21:10):
then she realized that if shewould then check in with herself
again later that same day, acouple hours later, she would be
like, a couple hours later, itmight be different.
I was like, Oh, that's so smart.
Like, you keep asking, right?
That's the part is to keepasking, like, what's next?
What's needed?
Like, how can I use this?
(21:31):
And just check in.
And learning to have that gracefor ourselves is such a great
practice.
Gosh, I really I work with momsa lot on this piece of like
having grace for themselves.
A lot of, you know, moms aredoing a lot of this inner work
right now.
If you were listening in one ofthem, like kudos, keep going.
(21:55):
Um, but doing this kind of workand raising small humans is
really No joke.
Like it is it is intense and itis constant.
I would argue motherhood is isone of the greatest spiritual
training grounds because it isconstant.
And you are being asked to showup for other humans while you
(22:15):
know you are healing things fromyour past.
You know, you might want to gocurl up in a ball and like take
a day and read and nap orwhatever and cry.
Like but it's not really anoption a lot of times, you know.
So anyway, um that is a reallyfun practice, thinking, you
know, checking in withourselves.
(22:36):
And if the answer is not theanswer that we wanted, like ask
again later in like half anhour, set a timer, check in with
ourselves, let's check in withour loved ones.
We could do this together, myfriends.
I love, love, love um being ableto share some of these thoughts
and ideas with you all.
And it's so fun to see like thesubscribes and the little things
(22:58):
come in, the little data.
Such like a a baby podcast, likea I'm like a newborn podcast.
So any likes and subscribes andcomments, so appreciated.
I see them all, and I'm sograteful.
And it really helps get my workout to new people.
And that's really such a gift.
(23:19):
So thank you for that.
If you haven't subscribed oranything, go ahead and do that
now, and then you'll getnotified when our next episode
drops.
Have a great week, guys.
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Tao of
Humaning, where we explore thephysical, energetic, emotional,
and spiritual aspects of what itmeans to be human together.
I'm your host, Dr.
Christine, and I'm so thrilledyou've decided to join me for
today's conversation.
In today's episode, I want totalk about stress and how it is
(00:23):
that stress can be a friend inour lives.
Oftentimes, stress is presentedor translated in our worlds as
bad.
Stress equals bad.
And we as humans will dowhatever we can to avoid this
feeling ultimately of stress orthis experience of being
(00:47):
stressed, right?
And what I talk with patientsabout a lot is, you know, what
does that feel like in yourbody, right?
So for a lot of us, that's goingto be very different.
Some people will feel stress inthe digestive system.
Some people will feel stressmore in the chest and like heart
palpitations and things likethat.
Sometimes people will getflushed.
(01:08):
You know, there are thesedifferent physiological
responses that we get.
Those on their own aren'tnecessarily bad.
Um, but we have this tendency tothink about stress as something
that we either need to avoid orwe need to fix.
And I would argue that stress isstress can be viewed as a tool.
(01:31):
And, you know, it's one of thosethings that I always tell
patients, I'm like, if I couldremove stress from your life, I
mean, I would just have a linedown the block every single day,
right?
Um, I can't remove stress from ahuman's life, right?
I can, we can shift how our bodyresponds to stress.
(01:57):
And a lot of that starts withhow we orient towards that
experience.
So if we're immediately sayingno and pushing it away, right,
there's immediately going to bea tension and a constriction,
right?
And we've talked about this alot in different episodes, but
ultimately the energy, the qi inour body wants to flow.
(02:22):
And so the more that we can worktowards, consciously work
towards being open and having aposture of huh, and a bit more
wonder in our lives, the moreeasily the energy is able to
move through us.
And we're gonna talk more aboutthis in a bit because it is a
(02:44):
nuanced thing, right?
Like not all of the stressesthat we experience in life are
pleasant or fun, right?
That's not what I'm saying here.
I am saying that when we arechallenged in life, that is a
wonderful opportunity topractice how we're showing up,
how we're supporting ourselves,how we're reaching out for
(03:08):
support from our communities ornot, right?
Like, how are we actuallyshowing up in those moments when
we feel really stressed?
Does that make sense?
Because stress is such a humanexperience, right?
Even if it's not like hunter,you know, I think historically
even stress was something thatwas always there.
(03:29):
It was just different kinds ofstressors, right?
But they probably, I don't know,had a lot of parallels,
actually, now that I'm saying itout loud.
But parallels, you know, ofbeing able to eat and being able
to have a place to live andbeing able to be in
relationships with other humans,right?
Like those are all things thathave stress sometimes built into
(03:52):
them.
Um but going back to, you know,in terms of like how we show up
with it, it's like that ideathat not all okay, hold on.
I'm gonna rewind mentally herefor a second.
The, you know, sometimes wethink of stress as bad, right?
(04:12):
But stress is actually necessaryif we are looking at this as
activation, right?
So a lot of times I'll talkabout having this oscillation or
this movement and flow betweenperiods of restfulness and then
(04:32):
activation, and then that peaks,right?
And then we'll move back downtowards rest, right?
Stress will oftentimes highlightwhere it is that we tend to fall
out of balance.
That's really useful, especiallyif we're looking at refining our
wellness practices, or we'relooking at, you know, chain just
(04:56):
changing different habits,growth mindset, like all of
those things are going to behighlighted in those moments.
And so I've talked about thisbefore, right?
You want to build these musclesideally before you need them.
Because if you're in a moment ofintense stress, right, like you
just lost your job, right, andyou're worried about being able
(05:19):
to provide for your family, youknow, those kinds of things are
really challenging to startimplementing a new, you know,
mindfulness strategy, right?
You can do it.
I've seen people do it and I'vesupported people doing it, and
you know, it it's possible.
And the people that I see havingthe most success with working
(05:40):
with stress have almost umtrained for it.
Not almost, they really havetrained for it.
The ones that I see doing reallywell under times of stress have
actually trained that muscle.
I found that to be true formyself.
I used to be much more affectedby stress and emotional upsets
(06:00):
and things like that.
And now, you know, I still canfeel upset or whatever around
stress, but I'm much faster tocome back to center and to be
able to, you know, call insupports, to call in my own
resourcefulness than I was, youknow, 10 years ago, remarkably
better at it, actually.
(06:24):
So we have these growth periods,right?
And even the conversations we'vehad here around puberty,
perimenopause, right,postpartum, even pregnancy, all
of these times in our life thatare periods of big
transformation and change, thoseare all considered stressors,
(06:45):
right?
So it's and they're also amazingat having the other, our next
kind of evolution of ourselvesshow up at the other side of it,
right?
I think remembering part of itis remembering that stress can
be beneficial.
There's a couple of books that Ireally enjoy on this topic,
(07:07):
actually, and I share about themwhenever I talk about stress
things.
Um, one is by Kelly McGonagall,and I may mix them up because I
didn't actually write them down.
Um I believe they are relatedand they are the McGonagall.
McGonagal is their last name.
One is called The Upside ofStress, and the other one is
(07:30):
called Super Better.
Super Better?
It's a yellow hardcover book.
I can totally see it.
Like it's sitting on mybookshelf right now.
Um I can put those in the shownotes for you if you want to
reference them.
Um, two really good books uhlooking at how we frame stress
(07:51):
and how we work with it.
And that's something that I talkabout a lot in clinic is being
able to, you know, have thesemoments where we're slowing down
and we're actually seeing andreally feeling the sensations of
stress.
So I'll always ask people, wheredo you feel it in your body?
(08:14):
Right, because that's going tobe great information for us
about where we want to support,right?
And being able to have thattactile experience of it also is
really grounding and helps tomake things feel less
overwhelming, actually.
And being able to just havethese conversations with people,
(08:36):
I think is also really helpfulin that you know, lessening of
overwhelm because you'veremember that you're not alone
in feeling these stresses.
Um I think remembering that, youknow, there is something new
that could be being forged,especially in the really bigger
(08:59):
stressful moments.
You know, who you are when youcome out the other side of that,
you know, quote unquotestressful time in your life can
be pretty rad.
And I think allowing that futureversion of ourselves to actually
kind of pull us to or pull usthrough the stressors um can
(09:26):
actually really help becausewe're remembering that there's
something bigger, like there's areason why these growing edges
are happening, and being able tostep into something new is so
valuable.
And I think what I see a lot inin my experience is that stress
(09:46):
becomes less beneficial when wewhen it becomes stuck.
So coming back to traditionalChinese medicine, right, we say
that where there is stagnation,there is pain.
Where there is pain, there isstagnation.
And so everything really isbased on this idea of flow and
(10:12):
smooth movement of energythroughout the body.
And so this happens too withstress when we think about, you
know, if we think back now to astressful time in our lives, and
we think about how we showed upin that moment, and you can
really see like where it is thatyou've that we felt stuck and
(10:37):
where we felt flow.
And this isn't to say, so I getasked this a lot because a lot
of times people will hear theseideas of you know framing stress
as possibly even useful, maybeeven a friend from this crazy
podcast I was listening to.
(10:58):
Um, you know, people will hearthat and then go through
something stressful, and thensometimes it feels when it's
messy that you're not doing itright.
And I'm here to say that is notthe case, right?
It doesn't have to look acertain way.
I don't know anyone who goesthrough big change and
(11:18):
transformation and you knowlooks all zen and uh quiescent
all of the time, right?
It's like sometimes it's messy,and the messy is actually really
great because that means thatit's not stuck, right?
It's almost harder when you seethat lack of movement, right?
(11:42):
Because sometimes the liketears, right, or the screaming
and crying, whatever it isthat's like needs to happen,
like that feels messy, is whatactually needs to happen to move
the qi and move that stagnation.
Because if it gets stuck and itdoesn't allow to move either
with us or through us, thenthat's when we start to get
(12:05):
stagnations in you know, invarious channels in the body or
in different systems that cancause issues according to
Chinese medicine down the line.
Does that make sense?
Comment below if that does notmake sense.
I'll talk more about thisbecause it's super interesting
to me.
Um yeah, I think as humans,sometimes we really beat
(12:30):
ourselves up for the messystuff.
And I think the more that peopletalk about real spiritual growth
and real transformation and reallike meeting life where it is, I
just think it makes it more themess more normal, which it is
normal, right?
(12:51):
Like, of course, on the otherside, like we all want to have
more harmony and more peace andmore ease and more moments of
like calm and zen.
But going back to what I startedto say earlier is like we also
need the activation pieces,right?
We need to be able to get up andrun when the tiger is actually
chasing us, right?
(13:11):
We need to have that activationunder threat.
We want that, right?
You don't want to just standthere and be like, I'll zen if
you're being really chased by atiger.
The the nuance comes in learningand reminding your system when
you're actually being chased bya tiger, right?
(13:32):
We talked about that in the lastepisode about overwhelm and how
a lot of times taking ininformation through the news or
social media or something, ournervous systems often are
perceiving more threat than whatis actually in our current
sphere of reality.
(13:54):
And part of this is like, okay,being comfortable being able to
be activated, right?
And have those moments of moreintensity and then under threat,
and then also being able to havethat activation aspect also when
you feel safe.
And that looks more like beingmotivated, being inspired, you
(14:18):
know, moving forward withthings.
It's that like spring energythat we've talked about here
before.
That's healthy activation undersafety.
We need that, right?
We need both.
The same way that we need moreof the parasympathetic under
safety, right?
Which is that rest and digest,right?
(14:39):
We need that.
And it's not wrong if you'refeeling activated, right?
I think part of it part of thepiece that really gets sticky
for people around stress is thatthey should on themselves.
So this is your reminder.
Do not should on yourself orothers.
(15:00):
Let people have theirexperience, let yourself have
the experience.
And it doesn't have to look acertain way, right?
There's no awards forperfection.
Perfection, I would argue, isnot even a real thing.
So I think being human involveshaving all aspects of being
(15:21):
human.
I talk to moms about this a lot,especially new moms.
There's so much pressure to beable to be, you know, to get it
all right.
I don't even know what thatmeans.
That's why I like kind oflaughing because I don't think
that's real.
But you see all of these curatedfeeds, you know, on social media
and all of these, you know,people who seemingly have things
(15:45):
together, right?
That's like a ch that's whatthey've chosen to show you.
And I yeah, I can just feel whenI talk to a mom and remind her
of her own humanness and remindher of the value of that
(16:07):
humanness, sharing thathumanness with her children.
I can you can just feel thetension like start to melt away,
right?
Like, oh, and people will saythis a lot of like, oh, you make
things like that are really hardin life feel so normal.
And I I've had several differentpeople say that to me.
(16:29):
I'm like, well, because they arenormal.
Like we're I don't know anyhumans that are just like
glossing through life, you know,for 75 years, 80 years without
having these ups and downs.
Like we're this is we're meantto come here and have our ups
and downs and have our mess andhave our joys and have our
(16:51):
hearts burst wide open, youknow?
It's all part of this humanexperience.
And I think the more that we cantalk about these things, the
just more we'll remember, liketogether that we are here and
it's messy and sometimesstressful, and sometimes joyful,
(17:12):
and sometimes sad, and sometimeshard, and sometimes easy.
Like it's all okay.
It's okay to have all of thosethings.
And having this awareness, likefor me, the lens of Chinese
medicine really makes so muchsense.
I love the nature base of it, Ilove the fluidity and the
(17:34):
dynamics, like uh everythingthat I have learned in the past
30 years in my soul makes somuch sense.
And so I love being able to havethis space to share this.
So thank you for all of youlistening because it really
means a lot.
And it's also okay if Chinesemedicine is not your lens.
Like you might hear me talkingabout this now and be like, oh,
(17:57):
that's super interesting.
And you might, you know, go downa rabbit hole and you might take
a right turn and like go end upsomewhere completely different,
like fantastic.
unknown (18:06):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (18:07):
I had a teacher for a long time that would talk
about you know, human design.
A big part of it is exploringand discovering and learning and
growing and creating.
And those were, you know, thebasis of our design as a human
being.
And yes, there is an element ofallowing for flow in, and I will
(18:34):
put that that caveat to it oflike allowing for flow in as
much capacity as you can in thatmoment, right?
I had a dear friend who was sowise, she was a longtime
Buddhist practitioner, and youknow, she was going through
doing a lot of this inner workand really committed to growing,
(18:56):
and she would be going through atime of transformation, and she
would share about it because wewere in that kind of a a
community and friendship, andthat was lovely.
And she shared this practicewith me, so I'm gonna share it
with you before we sign out fortoday.
Um, she would check in withherself and she would say, you
know, are you doing okay rightnow?
(19:19):
And then she would pause and shewould give her system a minute
to respond, and she'd be like,Sometimes the answer is no.
And that was kind of it.
There wasn't a lot of story thatneeded to go along with it.
There wasn't a lot of like, oh,what does that say about me?
You know, I'm such a terriblepractitioner, like, look at me,
(19:40):
having a hard time.
Like, no.
She wasn't shitting on herself,right?
She was simply asking how shewas doing and then listening to
what the answer was.
And then she could do furtherinquiries and say, like, hey,
you know, what's needed, right?
Like, do I need to call afriend?
Do I need to take a nap?
(20:01):
Do I need to go work?
Do I need to play?
Whatever the things are, right?
But she started with thatquestion of, are you okay?
And then I was talking to herabout it, and she said it's such
a fun practice for her becauseshe's noticed over the years
that a lot of times if she'llask that question, and if the
answer is no, a lot of times ashumans, there's a tendency to
(20:25):
want to like make that the day.
And I don't know how else toexpress that.
But it's like, you know, you'reyou have a challenging
interaction with someone, right?
Out on the freeway or something,right?
Like you have someone cut youoff.
I don't know, whatever it is,there's like a stressor.
A lot of times humans will likemake that their personality for
(20:48):
the rest of the day.
Like, oh, this guy, like blah,blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah.
Right.
That's a lot of time.
You had this, you know,30-second, five-minute,
10-minute interaction, and thenthe whole rest of your day is
ruined because of that.
How come?
Right?
So she had this practice ofchecking in with herself, and
(21:10):
then she realized that if shewould then check in with herself
again later that same day, acouple hours later, she would be
like, a couple hours later, itmight be different.
I was like, Oh, that's so smart.
Like, you keep asking, right?
That's the part is to keepasking, like, what's next?
What's needed?
Like, how can I use this?
(21:31):
And just check in.
And learning to have that gracefor ourselves is such a great
practice.
Gosh, I really I work with momsa lot on this piece of like
having grace for themselves.
A lot of, you know, moms aredoing a lot of this inner work
right now.
If you were listening in one ofthem, like kudos, keep going.
(21:55):
Um, but doing this kind of workand raising small humans is
really No joke.
Like it is it is intense and itis constant.
I would argue motherhood is isone of the greatest spiritual
training grounds because it isconstant.
And you are being asked to showup for other humans while you
(22:15):
know you are healing things fromyour past.
You know, you might want to gocurl up in a ball and like take
a day and read and nap orwhatever and cry.
Like but it's not really anoption a lot of times, you know.
So anyway, um that is a reallyfun practice, thinking, you
know, checking in withourselves.
(22:36):
And if the answer is not theanswer that we wanted, like ask
again later in like half anhour, set a timer, check in with
ourselves, let's check in withour loved ones.
We could do this together, myfriends.
I love, love, love um being ableto share some of these thoughts
and ideas with you all.
And it's so fun to see like thesubscribes and the little things
(22:58):
come in, the little data.
Such like a a baby podcast, likea I'm like a newborn podcast.
So any likes and subscribes andcomments, so appreciated.
I see them all, and I'm sograteful.
And it really helps get my workout to new people.
And that's really such a gift.
(23:19):
So thank you for that.
If you haven't subscribed oranything, go ahead and do that
now, and then you'll getnotified when our next episode
drops.
Have a great week, guys.
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