In this episode of Prevention Over Prescription with Dr. K, we're joined by Dr. Melissa Sonners to explore the deep connection between self-care, stress management, and nervous system regulation. Dr. Sonners shares her journey through health challenges and offers actionable tools to find joy and balance in everyday life. From mindful morning routines to embracing silliness and understanding brain wave states, this conversation unpacks how intentional living, emotional health, and strong family connections can support personal growth and mental wellness.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The views expressed in the following program are those of
the participants and do not necessarily reflect the views of
SAGA nine sixty am or its management.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Welcome to Prevention Over Prescription, the podcast where we focus
on what truly matters, taking control of your health before
it takes control of you. I'm Doctor Cordial Karen mantang Ic, physician,
health advocate and your guide to living stronger, healthier and longer.
And each episode we'll explore how you can prevent illness
(00:39):
and describe through practical advice on nutrition, movement and stress
management and building a supportive community. Because prevention isn't just
better than prescription, it's the key to showing up as
your best self. Let's get started. Welcome back podcast Nation.
I'm telling you right now we are going to shift
(01:02):
from overwhelmed to calm and connected with Dr Melissa's honors.
So welcome to the show, young lady.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Thank you, Doctor k So glad to be here.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Oh man, it's a privilege seeing your content. I'm feeling
constantly inspired to take care of myself, to be more
kinder to myself, to focus on being a more centered individual.
So number one, just want to thank you out of
they gave Melissa, your content is gold, but I gotta
(01:36):
get your story. Like you're a chiropractor. You put this
focus on trying to get people in a better state.
And you know, first when you think of a chiropractor,
you think about trying to manage people's pain. I've definitely
seen a chiropractor from my ailing back. But yeah, how
did you get into this, Melissa?
Speaker 3 (01:57):
Yeah, I mean that's a loaded question. I think, just
to kind of me in for a second, to help
the audience know who we're speaking to and what we're
speaking about. Here. You know, this is really a conversation
that's so needed right now, I feel because we've all
reached a time and place where we're outsourcing all of
our power and all of our ability to feel connected
(02:17):
and regulated. And I love speaking from a nervous system standpoint.
So what I mean by that is like when we
all experience those human stressful emotions, which we all experience,
thank God, because it means we have a family, we
have relationships, we have a job, we have stress. This
is called you stress, EU stress. This isn't distress. But
(02:37):
you know, for so long, like in those situations where
I actually needed tools to help me regulate in the
moment where you know you've got three kids. I've got
three kids too, Like where I'm living in a very
high go go ghost state, which I know you can
relate to as an ICU practitioner, and I've got my
little girl in front of me, needing me to like
(02:58):
slow that down and be present, Like I can't go
get a massage and calm down and then be with her,
or in those moments that we've all had when like
you're running late and then of course you hit traffic
and then the coffee spills and then like in those states,
tell me how to regulate my nervous system without going
and jumping on my PMF MAT. You know, I come
(03:20):
from the natural health community, and I think there's so
many of these tools that we've talked about for you know,
decades that we've all used that are now reaching the mainstream,
which I'm so excited about, you know, whether we're calling
it biohacking, whatever we're calling it, but like the saunas
and the ice bath and all these things that can
help us reach a natural or a healthier state naturally.
(03:42):
They're incredible And at the same time I'm watching it
and I'm like, please, please, let there also be a
strong message that the most powerful tool we have is
in here, and the way that we access it is
through regulating our nervous system. And we can teach ourselves
how to do that in the midst of chaos, without
the ice bath, without the sauna, because that's when we
actually need it. And so for me, you know this,
(04:05):
the discovery came because I was a busy woman juggling
work and my children, and I got really, really, really sick,
and I think i'll share a bit of that story,
if that's okay. I had to create these tools because
what I realized is that, you know, once I got better,
I was just going to get back to a place
of being a you know, busy, healthy woman doing all
(04:26):
the right things, but feeling extremely overwhelmed by those right
things and healthy things, just being another item on a
very long to do list. And so I think like
a lot of us, especially women, maybe you guys do
this too, But when we're not taking great care of
ourselves as we're told we're supposed to do, or when
we're not able to put that auxygen mask on first
(04:47):
because we don't have time, we tend to guilt and
shame ourselves, and we think that we're failing. We're again
struggling and we're not doing it right, rather than realizing
we're sold system of self care that doesn't fit into
our busy lives. So that's this is my favorite conversation
to have because I think it's just such a perfect time.
(05:08):
We're all ready to take good care of ourselves. It's
just time to have tools that actually work for us.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
I don't know if it's too personal, but what happened
to you, Melissa?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Yeah, no, nothing's too personal. We can talk about anything.
So I was running the practice. So I know, I
live in Miami with my family, but I'm actually back
in New Jersey in our office. We're back to visit
family for about a month. So my husband and I
built this practice. It's an integrative health center. We've got
about thirty employees here. I was one of the main practitioners,
(05:40):
full patient load, also running the practice right helping manage
our amazing team. Thank god, we've got amazing staff. But
you know, playing the role of HR and manager, homeschooling
my three children at the time, working out and cooking
healthy meals, you know, like juggling all of the things,
and that's that's what mine looked like. And I think
(06:01):
we all have some version of that. So I was,
you know, trying to fit it all in. And I
wonder if anyone listening has ever experienced this. It's like
I kept hearing this little whisper throughout the day, like
I'm tired, this is too much. I can't and I
didn't feel that I had a choice. I had to.
(06:23):
And so if that voice presented itself in the morning
and like I wanted to sleep in a little bit,
I was like, I can't, I'm already behind. So instead
of listening to it and leaning in, I would have
caffeine so that I could. I mean, I still have caffeine,
just the intention is very different. If I heard that
voice at night, you know, like I've had a full
day in the practice and I'm tired, Or for someone
(06:45):
else it might be like they've had a full day
at work and they just need to put their feet up.
And instead I was cooking for my family, which I
of course loved, but like, wasn't nurturing myself instead of
being able to lean in and listen to that voice
because I didn't feel like I had the tools are
that I could, I would have a glass of wine,
no harm, no foul. But like my intention behind the
(07:06):
wine was to kind of like shut the voice, or
to feel like I was giving myself something while I
was serving everyone else. And so you know, I left
to say, we get these whispers and when we don't listen,
they turn into a screen. And so over time what
started to happen to me was I just started not
feeling right. I started getting really bad headaches, and like
(07:30):
a very healthy person, I don't really ever get headaches.
They started getting progressively worse. And then things got really scary,
like I started to not be able to handle my
kids' voices, like it was like nails on chuckboards. And
then everything kind of hit on one weekend we were out.
We used to have a sailboat, and we had the
kids out on the sailboat and my body it literally
(07:54):
just like pain went up my spine like one vertebrate
at a time, and I know my body really well.
It felt like it was systemic, Like I felt like
I got put into a massive state of fight or
flight that there was no trigger and I couldn't get
myself out of. I actually remember grabbing a glass of wine.
I'm like, I need to like calm this, like what
is going on? And it did nothing. And then I
(08:16):
was starting to like lose my lose my way on
the way to this office. We built this office fifteen
years ago. It's two miles down from where down the
road from where we were living, and I would get lost.
I would literally have to like pull out GPS and
I knew the address, but I couldn't find my way.
And I didn't tell anyone. I didn't tell anyone, you know,
I like whispered, like I feel a little awf lately.
(08:37):
Something's going on, like something was majorly wrong. And so
one day I said it to my husband. I was like,
something's really wrong, like I need you to take the kids.
And it's so funny, this is such a horrible story.
He's such a good guy and this sounds horrible, but
this is true because when we don't highlight how bad
it is, people don't understand. And so that weekend, when
(08:59):
we're on the Saale boat, but when stuff was really hitting,
I told him and he's like, well, I have plans
to go fishing with my dad, so how about you
take the kids home? You probably just have keto flu.
So I'm like, I feel like I'm dying, and instead
of you know, having someone help me take care of me,
I end up driving the hour back home with four
kids because we had a friend with us. Anyway, I
(09:19):
go to urgent Care. I demand testing. There's something wrong
with me. I need to get tested. The doctorate urgent
care also told me I'm a busy mom. I'm probably
just tressed. I should go home and rest. Anyway, I said,
I'm not leaving until you test me. There's something wrong,
and if you're not going to put it on my chart,
I'm not leaving your office. So he tested me. It
turns out I had lime disease and coupled with what
(09:42):
we realized leader is that we had massive amounts of
mold on the sailboat, and so I ended up with
a neurological form of lime. Physical testing revealed my symptoms
were tied to encephalitis and meningitis and then mold texas
the on top of that, and so I got really sick,
(10:02):
like I couldn't. I remember days where I couldn't formulate
an email like I couldn't, I couldn't think, and so
for me, because I didn't listen, like that's that's where
it led me in. I think we all have our
different version of that, you know. I think that our
body tries to give us these signals, and you could
call it burnout, or you could call it illness, you
(10:22):
could call it anxiety. Mine transpired in my nervous system,
which in hindsight is like the greatest gift because I've
always loved the nervous system, and it made the nervous
system for me like the canary and my coal mind
in a what is that in a coal mind? So
like I feel things very quickly and easily now that
(10:44):
irritate the nervous system. So it's become my quest to
figure out, like how do we regulate it in all circumstances.
And what I've discovered is these like really tangible tools
that take seconds that can move the needle. You and
I just had one. We were recording and internet shut down.
(11:04):
You know those moments where you go into fight or flight,
but it's not survival. You know, our nervous system is
still functioning as if all these things that happen in
our life threatens are survival when it's not true. And
so we've got to retrain the hardwiring. And those are
the tools that I've discovered and that I use now
in my life. And I'm not saying I don't get stressed.
(11:25):
I'm not saying I'm perfectly calm and always connected. But
what they've gifted me is the ability to easily know
when I do get out of alignment, how to get
back in seconds.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Wow. That's some powerful shit, yo, because like, let me,
let me be honest. We we've been having more and
more attention to the impacts of stress. Of late. We
had a family friend that unfortunately passed away and assuming
(11:58):
it was a heart attack in stressful circumstances, and we've
all been in those circles, in scenarios where stress has
gotten to us. Like I remember my personal story after
my old man passed. I was getting these heart competitions
and I thought I was I thought I was going crazy.
(12:22):
I thought there was something inherently wrong with me. And
I was explaining this to my one of our social
workers on Pilot of Care my other job wasn't Poet
of care at the time, and she's like, oh, this
is very typical of post loss or morning like You're
just it's manifesting in your body.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
It's your heart. Your heart was broken.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Yeah, yeah, And I'll never forget that I got it
because I went through all the tests and obviously nothing
popped up. But it was very eye opening for me
in terms of the impact that that stress and that
mind body connection is. And and I know your story, Melissa,
(13:07):
my story, there's tons of everyone has a story. And
if we could talk about the tools that we can
use at a day to day to kind of as
you in your words, realign, I think this could be
some powerful, powerful tool that we could give people. So ultimately,
where do we start, Melissa, Like, I mean, we've all
(13:27):
seen these tricks of the trade on on our ig
he and I mean I do some myself, but I
don't want to take away from your magic. What's some
of the ways that we could do this individually? You
are listening to Prevention over Prescription with doctor k.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
V today, it's a what SHO used to dribble down
n B E.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
What's turning them in a home and the turfance got
a dirt cheap for them, Plus if they were short
with cheese, that would.
Speaker 2 (13:56):
Work with them, and we got rid of that tern
for them.
Speaker 1 (13:59):
What stream us live at SAGA nine sixty am dot C. Hey, Hey, hey,
welcome to.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
Good Welcome back to Prevention over Prescription Radio on SAGA
ninety six.
Speaker 3 (14:17):
Yeah. So there's two main things I want to talk about,
and I think we take a deep dive into each
one because I really want your listeners to walk away
from this time that they spend listening to this podcast
with knowing exactly what to do. And I don't want
it to just be another podcast telling them to gratitude
journal and to breathwork and to you know, all these
outside in things like this is real and this is
(14:37):
going to be about shifting and retraining the hardwiring of
your nervous system. And this is going to change everything.
So the first thing that I suggest that they do
this is going to sound really silly, but just bear
with me here. Think about so, I call myself an
alignment guide, right, like, when we can get into alignment,
That's the word I'm going to keep using in this conversation.
(14:57):
When we're in alignment, that's when we feel our best.
That's when our nervous system is regulated. That's when we're
in a flow state. That's when you know whatever you
believe that's when you're connected to God, you're connected to source.
You can hear your own voice again, your inner wisdom.
This is you know, we're surrounded with knowledge. Let's get
back to our inner wisdom so that I know what
(15:20):
do I need in this moment? And I get that
answer and I know it's true enough and I can
follow it, because that's where we stop needing everything outside
of us that we don't have access to. So think
about what is one word that perhaps describes we can
do this too, Perhaps describes like a state that you
find often that you don't like. For instance, if the
(15:44):
listener is someone who easily feels anxious or like, for me,
I used to always feel stressed, Like no matter what
was going on in my life, I would feel stressed.
So think about a word that describes a state that
you feel often. I'll use stress in this conversation for me.
Is there one that maybe resonates with you?
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Yeah, stress is a good one where or I can't
think of the right word otherwise, but where you feel
like you're on edge, or you've got to be doing
that one mess and you're missing out on something, or
you there's something you're forgetting, there's an email you forgot
to respond to. Motherfuckers are going to get super angry
(16:26):
at you because you didn't. You didn't approve that meeting invite. Like,
I don't know what you would call that stress.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Let's call it stress. Yeah, let's call stress. Okay, So
everybody take a moment and like write down your word,
Like what is your word? Because what we're going to
do is we're going to establish a new word in
a minute, and doctor K and I will speak from stress.
But maybe, like I said, yours is anxiety. So that
is your current aligned state. And so what that means
(16:55):
is that you know, as you experience joy or freedom
or ease or whatever it is, you will tend to
find yourself back into alignment. And your alignment is stress.
So like for me what that looked like, and for
what a lot of people, how we put ourself into
that yuck? Aligned state is the questions that we start
(17:16):
to wake up with. So like the things you were describing,
I would imagine you'd wake up with questions like what
do email? Do I need to get on? Who's waiting
for me? What am I supposed to be doing? Right?
We're very much we've become human doings.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
What I'm not forgetting?
Speaker 3 (17:33):
What am I forgetting? For someone who maybe has some
feelings of anxiety, it's like, who did I hurt? Who
did I upset? Why did I say that yesterday?
Speaker 2 (17:42):
Right?
Speaker 3 (17:43):
And so we especially in the morning, the first thing
I want people to do is start to listen to
their questions before your eyes even open. Do an internal audit.
And the audit starts with listening to the questions that
you're asking yourself. And this is we're in part one
of this, but part two is going to be I'm
going to help you understand the brain waves that you're
(18:05):
in because this is this morning time, this is your
subconscious and you're training it. And so like for us,
it's you know what am I missing? What do I
need to be doing? So you start to listen to
what those questions are. This is actually your theta brain wave.
I'm just going to pair the brain waves in right
now too. This is your theta brainwave. We basically we
go through a variety of brain waves in our day,
(18:28):
and as long as we're working with them, we will
find alignment, we will find nervous system regulation. They're like
gears in a car, right, And so you wouldn't wake
up and go into third gear, like you wouldn't get
in a car and go into third gear. You ramp
up slowly, right, And so many of us when we
wake up first thing in the morning, we're going into
(18:48):
third gear by asking those kinds of questions. Where do
I need to be, what do I need to be doing?
Blah blah blah. That's that's beta, that's that's a brain
wave of like doing this. But we're burning out, we're frying,
we're feeling frazzled because we're hitting it first thing in
the morning. That's third gear. We got to warm up
to it. So in this morning time you start to
you start to listen. That's the action step. You listen
(19:11):
and pay attention to questions that you're asking yourself. And
we're going to start to put in other questions. We're
going to do a question audit and that's all you're
going to do in the morning. First thing. So you
and I have the word stress as our old aligned state.
So let's think about what do we want our new
aligned state to be. What do you want to feel?
What do you want to come to during the day
when you get pulled out of alignment. Mine's fun. I
(19:34):
always want to find fun.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Yeah, Like I think of joy, I think of lightheartedness,
like just like back to who I know who like
who I am, which is a like deep down a
fun go lucky, just love to laugh, you know, and yeah,
(20:04):
just trying to bring more joy, laughter and ease.
Speaker 3 (20:07):
I love that. I love that joy. Let's is it okay?
If we make it joy? Fa you that matches your light? Yeah?
I like that one. So other great ones people tend
to choose when I'm walking them through. This is like
freedom or calm or connected. So let's use joy. Okay.
So for you in the morning, doctor K, as you're
waking up tomorrow and as you're maybe hearing these questions
(20:29):
that are coming through you, where do I need to be?
What do I need to do? I want you to
insert specific questions like how can I find joy today?
How can I create joy today? And I know this
sounds like super silly, but this is this is literally
how we win the day. And when we win the day,
we win our week, we win our month, we win
our life. So you're in theda brain way first thing
(20:53):
in the morning, and this is when you're the gateway
to your subconscious is super open, and so whatever we
do in THETA, we are hard wiring into our nervous
system for that day as our aligned state. So when
we wake up in beta in stress mode, when we
hop on our emails, when we ask ourselves the stressful questions,
when we go right into the do we are training
(21:14):
our a migdullah, the part of our nervous system that
controls like what we do all day. This is the
state that you want to find. So no wonder we
find stress or chaos or anxiety. So instead, what you're
going to do is you're going to train it to
find joy. And you're going to do that in Beta.
First thing in the morning, you do not get on
your devices. You do not look at white or bright
lights because that'll pull you right into Beta. You are
(21:36):
going to stay super chill in your bed. If you
have any light around you, make sure it's like red
or amber light, so it's super subtle and eases you
in and start to ask questions about how you can
bring joy into the day. So I'm going to ask
you that, now, how could you bring joy into your day?
Like realistically, what micro moments of joy could you fit.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
In that I feel a little bit emotional think about this.
I don't know, yeah, like it's, uh, you're catching me
on a bad day too. But it's when I think
about how to bring joy, I think of the kids,
like the first thing when I see them, like some
(22:20):
form of contact, like I mean, they get I have
three boys, so it's it's always a little bit trickier
with them. But some kind of contact hug even just
like you know, some form of like handshake even, but
you know, touching the boys giving love to Mama bear
(22:41):
like maybe like a quick dry hump, like I mean,
I look back at some of the happier moments in life,
like I'm as a good appreciate from the last come
(23:04):
I'm pretty ridiculous and I love the random comedy and
just just trying to bring more laughter to the day.
So just being adding a lens of silliness, you know something.
It's easy in the morning now I think about it.
Forgive me I from going on a little bit too long.
(23:25):
You can cut me off, but you know, you get
the right tune on, Like if you get the right
tune on, that can get you come on. Like I'm
not shy to like Bookie in the morning. I get
joy out of moving the body sol exercise. Usually that's
the first thing I'll do my morning's like core routine,
just to hop off with my back and then usually
(23:46):
do a workout in the basement. What else can you do?
You mean first thing? Or it just I forgot the
question already.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
I mean you've nailed it already. You've nailed it.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
Yeah, I think and just smile more like I usually
uplift people, like like I think I have that superpower
like if if you you and iron in the same
room together, you're gonna leave there more like You're gonna
leave there more happy, lit up than before. If when
(24:24):
I'm at my when I'm at my best, and that
that lifts me. Yeah. So I think any of that
I think, would would would would be, would lean towards
that joy.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
I love that. And how much extra time do those
do any of those things that you listed take you?
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Yeah? Not much. It's just it's a matter of being
intentional and having in front of mind.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
And can I ask how old your kids are?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
They? Turning thirteen, turning eleven almost seven?
Speaker 3 (25:06):
Oh cute, Okay, minor similar ages I've got just turns
nine almost thirteen and fourteen. Oh right, So as a parent,
I want to ask you this and for any parents
in the audience. And if you don't have kids, then
you know your loved ones or your fur babies. So
when you are out of alignment, because your new alignment
(25:28):
is joy and that's you, Like I could, I could
see it. I think anyone who's watching this can see this.
You are joy when you're out of alignment and when
you're in stress. How many of those beautiful moments with
your family and your loved ones do you miss?
Speaker 2 (25:42):
Oh yeah, yeah, there's no doubt about it. It's yeah, no,
you you miss out. And I means maybe how do
I get the emotional part is twofold that one day
you realize how much more you can be offering and
the nature of my job unfortunately leads to like it's
(26:05):
hard to turn off the stress at times, and but
also the idea that sometimes you just feel far away
from it, if that makes sense, like you feel far
away from the that alignment with joy, which yeah, I think, yeah,
(26:26):
that's probably what we drew a little bit of a
club man who are listening to Prevention overook description with doctor.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
K from.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Stream us Live at SAGA nine sixty am dot.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
C a welcome back to prevention over prescription radio on
sogging that see.
Speaker 3 (27:06):
Yeah, well, thank you for sharing that, because I think
that probably most people listening can very much relate to that.
I think we can. It's really easy to get pulled
into success and our careers, and I'm definitely, I one
hundred percent struggle very much to be fully present with
my family and it's the most important thing. And you know,
(27:26):
as a woman, you're constantly hearing like enjoy every moment.
It goes so fast, and so then we double beat
ourselves up and it's it's hard, and we're all doing
the best that we can. But for me, when I
got sick, what I realized is like everything that I
was being told would help me be more present with
my children took time away from them. It took more
(27:49):
time away from them to go do the massage so
that I could calm down and turn off work. And
I still do all those things because I think there's
a place for the macro tools and then there's the
micro But I'm a huge fan of like what I
call micro dosing, but I don't necessarily mean micro dosing.
What people are talking about microdosing. These days, I'm in
a microdose connection so that I can be at least
(28:12):
hopefully ninety percent of the time present with my children
when they're in front of me, and that I can
also be connected and present with myself and forgive myself
in the moments where I don't because we're human and
that's going to happen. But I think you know what's
really powerful, too, is talking to our children about it,
like I really missed that moment, or I'm sorry that
I reacted that way. You know, that's my stress. Don't
(28:33):
take it on because I think we role model for
them how to do it when they experience it. We're human.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
That's a good point though, about like we do role modeling,
and in an era too right now of all the devices,
all the things, like it's been in so many ways
even more important to be as present as we can be.
Speaker 3 (28:58):
Yeah, and it kind of be harder. So I like
to use the word practice. We're practicing, and every day
we practice, and every time we say our word, we're practicing.
And every morning when we take two minutes, two minutes
to focus on joy and lay in our bed and
ask ourselves that intentional question. We're practicing and we're not
(29:19):
showing up perfectly because that's not what practice is. But
the more we do practice, the more when it's game time,
we can show up the way that we want to
show up because the work has been done. So we're
training our nervous system so that I can easily go
from here to hear. Our nervous system is very malleable.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
And you know, as you're saying this, Melissa to it's funny.
I maybe it's just a bit of a an aha
moment right now. It's I made reference in the morning.
I heard my back years ago. And so you go through,
as you know, as a chiropracticor you go ups and
downs between having those black flares. And so the first
(29:58):
thing I do in the morning is my core exercises
to prime those muscles so that they're they're going to
be ready to go there protecting. And I'm thinking that's
the same thing with the joy, Like you primed, When
you primed on it, you're going to see it more,
You're going to be more ready to bring that energy.
(30:24):
So I really I'm really embracing this.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
I love it. I'm so glad, I'm so glad, so
there's actually a part of our nervous system. It's called
the reticular activating system. It doesn't matter what it is,
it's it's basically a filter. I mean, you know all this,
but for the listeners. You know, if you've ever experienced
like that, that situation where you know, maybe you decide
you're going to buy a red car and all of
a sudden, there's red cars everywhere that you never saw before,
(30:50):
or you know whatever, it is like you're you're now
looking at something that you never looked for before. We
are surrounded with so much sensory information that our brain
has to filter out, but we can teach it what
to filter. And that's what we're doing here too. Like
you said, we're priming, and so as you're priming your brain,
filter in THEATA in the morning, because again that's the
(31:14):
gateway to your subconscious. So I'm all about time efficiency.
You're going to get twice as much done in a
quarter of the time, because we all need more time.
What you're going to start to find is opportunities for joy.
You're going to start to find pockets of time and
instead of checking for who needs you on the email
in every moment that we all do. I mean, I
(31:35):
catch myself at a red light checking my emails, like, jeez, God,
can we give ourselves a break instead? How can I
find joy right now? And putting on for me it's Aerosmith,
putting on Aerosmith in the car and like rocking out
and I'm driving anyway, Like why not find joy and
play and fun. It's not changing anything that we're doing,
but it's completely changing the way.
Speaker 2 (31:56):
That we do it. I love that, I think, Yeah, no,
I I just love it because it's one of those
I'm all about eighty twenty, like the small thing you
could do that can have a huge impact.
Speaker 3 (32:14):
And.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
This is one of them. This is what I'm here,
And so you're converting me, Melissa.
Speaker 3 (32:23):
I'm just reminding you to get back. This is like
you said, this is who you are. I just think
you know, this day and age, we don't have at
least I didn't have the tools to get me back
to me. I had the tools to help me get
to everybody else, to try to be everybody else, to
try to do what everybody else was doing. But like
(32:43):
we've got it all here. I don't mean to sound
woo woo, but like it's all here and we're all
different and unique and beautiful. And when we can get
back to our own selves and our own light, like
that's it, everything else comes through so much easier. Like
we've all had those days where you're like, God, that
day was just like a really good day. It was
a really good day. And then what do we do
in those moments? I don't know, this is what I
(33:04):
used to do. Was it that I had a really
cute shirt or really cute shirt on for that podcast?
It was the shirt. Was it that I was having
a good hair day? It must have been the hair. No,
you were in a flow state, you were in alignment.
You just didn't know how to get there intentionally, and
now you do. So now those days can happen whenever
you want, or if they don't, you at least know.
(33:25):
Like I definitely have days where I'm just running around
and I choose to live the old way. I choose
it's a conscious choice. But that's the difference. I'm not
a victim to it. I'm not wondering why my life
is no longer my own. I get to the end
of that day and I'm like, screw that. I don't
like that anymore. Tomorrow. It was a fresh start. I'm
doing it the new one. So it's a choice, you
(33:47):
know how to get where you want to get.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
And this totally it's consistent with what we've been trying
to preach. What we have in the book is take
the power back. We all have a certain level of
agency and this can help us keep us accountable. Like
we we often feel powerless when it comes to many
(34:12):
things in life, and this in terms of our mindset,
that energy that we're going to bring to the on
a daily basis, it's empowering.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Mm hmm. Absolutely. Yeah. So I've got like a guide
for anyone who wants, you know, more info. We can
definitely share more here. I have some more little tidbits,
but then if we can, we'll link some resources below
for anyone who wants to deep dive. This is one
hundred percent one of my favorite tools. People can message
me like, I'm very active in my DMS or in
(34:44):
my communities. This is what I'm here to do, This
is how I'm here to serve. This is one hundred
percent what changed my life. So the next thing we
would go through in the day, I'm just going to
list out all the brain waves their data. That's what
we wake up in. Then we go to alpha then
and then delta. And so people who meditate for years
(35:05):
and years and years work to get into a state
of theta, and specifically even more so alpha. Alpha is
our flow state. Alpha is when we're completely present and
time ceases to exist. It's like when you completely lose
yourself in something. We did this all as a kid.
This is we lived in alpha, but a lot of
times we've kind of forgotten. I know, I have like
(35:27):
very much a part of me that's a timekeeper and
like got to do this and then that. And so
you know, alpha is a beautiful flow state and we
don't even have to try to get in it. We
naturally are in it when we wake up just after theta.
And so you know, as I was teaching this in
my community for a few years, the question I would
get as I talked about, you know, this is less
(35:48):
about what we're doing and more about what we're being.
Everyone's like, Okay, but what do I do? Tell me
what to do in alpha? I'm like, no, Alpha is
like not doing, but okay, what do I do? So
your action step in is to listen. So that's to
listen to that question and then create a new one.
Your action step in alpha is to connect. I like
(36:09):
to think of ALFA as like our heart space. And
so for me, what this looks like in the morning
is I get out of my bed and I go
to what I've called my sit spot, and all the
women in my community we've created a sit spot. And
so your sit spot is just a place that you
go in the morning before your beta brain kicks in.
It's kind of like, you know, for anyone who's wanted
(36:29):
to start a workout routine early in the morning, and
you're going to start on Monday, it's like Sunday night.
You put out your workout clothes so that when you
wake up in the morning, you know you don't talk
yourself out of it. You just got to walk to
your clothes and get to the car and get to
the gym. So the sid spot is the same thing
to help keep you out of beta, to help keep
you from going on your phone and your emails and
thinking about your to dos. So for a lot of people,
(36:51):
this sit spot is just like the couch. I've upgraded
mine over the years. I've got like a really beautiful
pump mat in there a grounding mat. I've got a
red light in there that I love. That's therapeutic. In
the things that are really important in your sit spot
are to not have like traditional lighting, the white and
blue light from our screens, from our phones and in
(37:13):
our homes, we'll pull you right out of theta and alpha.
And so even if it's for like two minutes five minutes,
we want to really maximize our time in this state.
And so you can do this really inexpensively. I mean
you can literally take like a house lamp and go
on Amazon and get a red light bulb and put
that light bulb in your sit spot. I've got in
(37:36):
our bathroom we have like a red light night light.
My phone, all of my screens, I've got the ability
to triple quick and do a red light filter. We
can link a video on that blow if anyone wants it.
And then also a candle is a really good thing
to have in your shit spot because a flickering flame,
this is really interesting. A flickering flame will put you
(37:59):
into a stata alpha at any point in the day,
any point you could be here and you could look
at a flickering flame and you're dropped down into alpha instantly.
So think about like, if you've ever sat at a
bonfire or looked at a fire in a fireplace, it
chills you out right. And it's so interesting to me
that there's flames in romantic restaurants because ALFA is our
(38:20):
connector and our flow state and our heart opener. And
I don't know if that was intentional, but it's pretty cool.
So what happens is the frequency of a flickering flame
is the same frequency as alpha when we drop down
into alpha brain waves. It's a low frequency. And so
what happens when we look at that flame is something
called mirror neurons, which is what like babies use a lot.
(38:43):
You smile at a baby, the baby smiles back, they
read your face. That's mirror neurons. Mirror neurons in our
brain will mimic and match that frequency of the flame.
So if you go into your sit spot and you're like,
this is great, I heard this thing on this podcast.
I'm going to try to you know, sit and and
not do, and all of a sudden you're like, but
the emails, but the but the to dos, but the
(39:05):
blah blah blah, Like that's where the candle helps because
it kind of like tricks your brain into chilling out
for a minute. Lastly, a great spot for a journal,
Like I have a journal there and this is kind
of where I write out maybe all the crap that
came up when I woke up that I heard, you know,
kind of coming through me. This is where we give
(39:28):
a platform to our voice instead of everybody else's. So
like this isn't necessarily where you're listening to someone else's podcast.
This is where you're listening to you. I'm stressed about
this day because I'm mad about yesterday, because like, whatever
it is, it doesn't have to be pretty. You can
literally like shred it and burn it. But this is
where you start to hear yourself again. I think a
(39:50):
lot of us have become experts at distraction, so we
don't feel something, we feel something that doesn't feel good,
and it's like, well, let me get on my email,
let me get on socials, let me get it a
quick dopamine hit, and so we bury these emotions that
are actually insights into like a lot of clarity, and
they're not that scary when you just start to create
(40:10):
space for them. They're like a kid, like to me,
it's like a kid, like a kid who's really upset
or crying, or it's like they don't necessarily need you
to fix it, they just need you to be with them,
and then everything kind of transpires. And when we try
to bury them, it's like someone an author, Nancy Livin
wrote about it this way, It's like trying to hold
a beach ball under the ocean. And what's going to
(40:32):
happen is it's going to pop up at some time
that's probably not convenient. So whether that's like anger or
frustration or jealousy, when we try to push it, it's
just it's just waiting, you know. And that's when someone
cuts you off and you're like, so alpha is the
next phase, And I recommend people, do you know ideally
(40:53):
it's like fifteen minutes or a half an hour. I
I just like to be realistic. For me, sometimes honestly
it's two. And sometimes when I go for two minutes,
I end up there for twenty. So it's whatever we got.
But it's just the point that again like gears in
the car, that you're starting in beta and alpha before
you attack your day. Then beta is the next one
(41:13):
that's like our main to do We all live in beta,
so it's very familiar. The main action step I say
in beta is there's two things. One put your phone in,
emails on, do not disturb. This is like your hardest work.
This is like the most focused. And then the second
action step is to take microdoses of alpha and beta.
So for doctor K this is in the busyness of
(41:35):
the day. You know, I don't know how much time
you have or how many breaks you have, but like,
everyone's got a pee, So when you pee, how can
you make it fun? Like are you singing a song?
Are you listening to a song? Just not checking your
email and not checking the phones, like doing something for us.
Maybe when you pee, you're drawing circles with your instream.
Speaker 2 (42:00):
Think about me when you do it, my last name,
Uh you know, I mean, but make sure it's a
long stream. But yeah, it's uh yeah, there's.
Speaker 3 (42:11):
So many things, but this is like all about like
the sillier and the weirder you feel doing it, like
you're nailing it. There's this one lady. I just gave
a talk in Tennessee and oh my god, I loved her.
She came up to me after and she was like,
I always wanted to be a Dallas Cowboy cheerleader. Like
I talked about, you know, the dreams that we let die,
and she was like crying in the front, so beautiful
(42:33):
and you know kind of like she let that one
go and it's like the dream that haunts her. And
I was like, girl, get on Amazon and get yourself costume,
like get it, like do it and put it on
and like let that be your microdose. And she sent
me a picture and she's in it. She's in like
one of those T shirt versions of the swimsuit with
like the six pack. I was like, yes, that is it.
(42:56):
That's it, Like why did we ever stop playing and
being silly? Why it's so much more fun. So she's
like doing her emails and doing her behind the scenes
stuff in her Dallas Cowboy outfit.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
We're listening to Prevention Over Prescription with Doctor k Live.
Speaker 4 (43:12):
Where the street ends in the basement apartment with one
of your friends and the tap chips all night, water,
torture and sink. The furnace is burning, but it's still cool.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
No radio, no problem. Stream is live on SAGA ninety
sixty am dot C.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
A welcome back to Prevention Over Prescription radio on Saga
nine sixty of it. I love it, And honestly, we
need more silliness. We need more word like taking us
(44:01):
ourselves less seriously, Like I.
Speaker 4 (44:04):
Love that.
Speaker 3 (44:05):
Like look at both of us in this conversation, right,
and hopefully anyone listening is resonating the same energy. And
then you and I go out into the world with
that energy, Like is not that one of the most
important duties that we have. Like nobody is coming to
save you. And I mean you are an I see
you practitioner, so you do come to save people. But
(44:27):
in general, like we are our own responsibility. And I
say it this way because when I say it this way,
it helps women actually make time for it. So it
sounds harsh, but I'm doing this to try to get
you to stop worrying about everybody else and take care
of yourself, Like your shit is your business. I'm sorry
to say it that way, but like, don't go out
(44:47):
into the world with all of your stuff. Spend five
minutes in the morning getting into a place of alignment,
then go out into the world. Think about every interaction
you have with like the target cash register person or
the gas station attendant. Like we're either snapping at people
and completely disconnected, or we're in a state of joy
(45:08):
and presence and we're actually connecting as human human beings again, Like,
that's how we do it. That's how we take the
big crazy stuff that's going on in the world and
we ask, how can I actually do something? What can
I do? You microdose it down to your family and
to you and your community and where you can actually
make an impact. I don't watch and scroll the news
(45:29):
a lot, because when I did that, it's like, well,
what can I do? Like how can I help? How
can I serve? And it gets so overwhelming and it's
like a Mother Teresa quote that I love. You want
to help the world, help your family, And it's permission
to be selfish. And I actually prefer the word self
with because when we can show up to the world
(45:51):
as connected human beings, everything else is so much more
beautiful and magical. And isn't that just like a lot
easier than the stuff that we're trying to juggle and accomplish.
In addition to all the stuff that we already have
to juggle and accomplish.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
I just feel like there's so many people that need
this money, Like I'm going to be sending this one
directly to my better half after this, because I mean,
we both obviously could use a little bit of rejuvenation.
But just as I think she's the crowd, you're talking to,
busy mother of three trying to a career. It's heavy, and.
Speaker 3 (46:31):
I you know, thank you, I mean, and I would
love to hear from her. What I ended up doing
is I created a community simple opportunities throughout our day.
When a woman goes in her closet and she's like that,
I want to wear that, but I should wear this.
Or when you're in the store and you're like, oh
my god, that's so fun, but that's not me, Like
grab that and wear that. And these are the ways
(46:53):
that this is self care. Like screw the massages, screw
the facials. Love all those things. I will still do them,
but that is not self care.
Speaker 2 (47:00):
That is it to do?
Speaker 3 (47:01):
This is self care.
Speaker 2 (47:03):
Yeah, and I must say Melissa to it. I feel,
I mean, this is the thing that you do as
you're older, like I've been more and more doing what
I feel is either right or it is more what
I want to do as opposed to what I think
I should be doing. Oh you know, you should be
wearing this suit and tie, even though you know what,
(47:25):
I wouldn't mind sporting magana can take cloth into this
into this event, because you know what, my mom and
dad would love this. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm
gonna bust that out, like little things like that, like
it just it just feeds your soul, feeds your heart.
And I think I personally want to see more people
(47:45):
align with who they are as opposed to playing this
playing the game, because I think for me, what ruined
ruined a lot of things. And and once again we're
just getting to know each other. But I probably you
and I are probably talking because of the pandemic and
some of the advocacy that we were attempting to do
during the pandemic for a more balanced approach keeping schools
(48:06):
open and that cancel culture. During that time, you had
to just walk the line soul so much so it was,
you know, you were afraid to speak your mind, and
like you had the filter was thicker than it ever
had been before in my life. And I think at
(48:27):
some point you kind of almost lose yourself to a
certain degree. So I think there's a bit of a
with this less of a woke culture where a lot
of us are just trying to come back to ourselves.
Speaker 3 (48:39):
Yeah, yeah, I definitely get that. I mean I felt
like my filter was I'm an EmPATH and I didn't
want to hurt anyone. And it was really hard because
as a natural practitioner, I was watching what was going
on and like it was very clear to me what
was going on and just very disempowering mess. And I'm like,
(49:00):
the viruses have been around for forever, like here's what
we got to do. But like people were so hurt
and so upset and so triggered by hearing that message,
and so I established a heavy filter. Not because what
I felt I was saying wasn't important. I felt like
it was more important than ever. But like the mpath
part of me was just like I did the Mother Teresa.
(49:22):
I'm like, Okay, I'm not gonna scream it everywhere. I'm
gonna I'm gonna do it in my home and I'm
gonna show you, you know, like it can be this
way and it's it's beautiful and like we are healthy.
But yeah, it feels really good to like let the
freak fly, freak flag fly again, flag fly, Yeah, Yeah,
(49:42):
and I think what happened in COVID too, is we
had like a massive I look at life like contraction
and expansion, and I think, you know, the world goes
through these pulses. I love the heart too, it's like
a heartbeat. And COVID really was a massive contraction and
everyone went was forced to go inward. And I think
(50:03):
we saw a lot of drugs and alcohol and relationship
changes and people who wanted to distract themselves out of
the inwardness. And I don't blame or judge anyone. It
was really intense times. But then what we're seeing now
is massive expansion. You're seeing people change careers, you're seeing
people move, you're seeing relationships change, and that's the natural rhythm.
(50:24):
And so as I relate this back to our daily
rhythm and the brain waves, what we're doing in the
morning is we're starting in an inward place. We're allowing
ourselves to have this contraction and to get back into
our shell and remember who we are before we go
out into the world. And when you do that, you
come out with massive expansion, You come out with open energy,
You come out magnetic and attractive because you've taken that
(50:47):
time and that can look like your community finding you
for women who are maybe lonely and isolated and don't
have like minded people. That can look like attracting the
right partner. That can look like attracting the right job
and career. I mean, we are energetic beings, and like,
whether you believe it or not, you are going to
be pulled to that kind of energy in someone. It's attractive,
(51:08):
it's it's light, right, and so I mean, I'll just
say it again, like to me, this is one of
the most important things for us to do. It's a
daily rhythm. It's like cycle thinking. You know, you brought
up your wife a minute ago, and I want to
touch back on the relationship because this is something you know,
so crucial to understand for the men listening for the
(51:28):
women in their lives, whether it's your sister, your mother,
your girlfriend, or you know you have a wife, or
you're looking to attract someone. This is how you support women.
Like you know, I think I'm going to generalize here,
but men are kind of like black and white. I've
been married and with my husband for twenty years. We've
been together for twenty years, and men in general, I
think are kind of black and white, and women are
(51:50):
seen as like kind of complicated, Like we're really not complicated,
but what we are is cyclical and we're rhythmic, and
so you can't just like turn us on and turn
us on off. Like there's a gradual for a lot
of things in the women world. And I think you
all can understand what I'm saying here without saying it.
But like we need a round. I tell my husband
(52:13):
four play all day, Like for play is all day.
For play is in how you look at me at breakfast.
Foreplay is in how you notice that I want a
coffee before I even ask for it. Like we are rhythmic,
and so when you can support a woman's rhythm through
brain wave alignment through honey, lay in bed, like just
give yourself a minute before hopping into your to douce,
(52:34):
Like how about you drink some tea and just sit here,
Like let me remind you to be in your femininess
for a little bit. Let me remind you to turn
off your emails in your to do is it night?
Let me grab you in the kitchen and like pull
you into alpha and let's dance together and be silly,
Like when you pull a woman out of living in
beta because we're very much living in an over masculinized world.
(52:57):
We've become career women and expert doers when our men
pull us out and help support that rhythm. Like what
you will see is unstoppable in the most beautiful, soft
feminine way. Like that is when you get your queen back.
And so for any man listening to this, understanding a
woman's brain brainwave rhythm as your own, it's the same.
(53:20):
And also, you know, cycle sinking is a super powerful
Jedi tool for every man to understand. That's knowing your woman's,
your your partner's, your love's hormonal cycle and helping her
align her rhythm to that cycle. So we're no longer
a mystery like, oh God, when is it coming? Is
she going to be you know, pre menstrual? What do
I say? What do I not say? Cycle sinking gives you,
(53:43):
like the code, it gives you the roadmap. So I
can break that down really simply too if people want it,
or we can share a resource, because I know we're getting.
Speaker 2 (53:55):
You got a hard stop. So listen, this is fucked. Yeah,
this has been juicy through and I think people need
more Melissa in their lives. So number one, Where do
they track you down? How do they get more more
of you? And of course we're going to tag all
the resources in the show notes.
Speaker 3 (54:17):
Okay, yeah great. I mean what I want people to
have more of in their lives is themselves, right, So
it's not me, it's themselves, but the tools I you know,
I talk about the tools a lot on my socials.
So my Instagram handle is be inspired Mama m Ama.
I have a podcast as well with the same name,
a YouTube channel where I share all these tools. My
(54:39):
website has a section on resources, so that website is
doctor Melissa Saunders dot com. Dr Melissa Saunders dot com.
If you go to the resources page, there's all the
free resources there. Grab the regulate your rhythm. That's this topic,
that's brain waves. But message me, email me, tell me
(54:59):
what you resonated with in this conversation. Tell me what
you want more of. How can I help you? My
dream is to be like tinker Bell. I want to
light everybody up, show them who they are again, and
like saunter off and disappear on my way.
Speaker 2 (55:12):
Well, Lissa, this has been fantastic. You're seeing me go
back and forth because I got a per real bad.
Speaker 1 (55:17):
But listen play do the oh good.
Speaker 2 (55:22):
Okay, but thank you so much. You are amazing.
Speaker 3 (55:26):
You're amazing. Thank you doctor Kay.
Speaker 2 (55:27):
If you enjoyed that, please leave us any comments at
quodcast nine to nine at gmail dot com. Leave a
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(55:49):
these things that we're promoting, all these things that we're
getting behind is on that preventative side, on that proactive side,
so that you show up as your best self. Show
up wrong, baby, Here we go. Let's do this all
right people. I hope you're feeling a little bit more
jumping your step after that episode. Thanks for listening. Talk
wissel Peace. Yeah, it's like, if you want to rhyme
(56:14):
with me, you don't even know what rod is. Look,
if you want to get clean, you want to get dirty,
you want to go left right, This is what we're doing.
Wants to knock us.
Speaker 4 (56:21):
That's just rock up forty one, drinking monos over who
you think of feet the strategies when you battle.
Speaker 1 (56:28):
Stream us live at SAGA nine sixty am dot C
The views expressed in the following program are those of
the participants and do not necessarily reflect the views of
SAGA nine sixty am or its management.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Welcome to Prevention Over Prescription, the podcast where we focus
on what truly matters, taking control of your health before
it takes control of you. I'm Doctor Cordial Karen mantang Ic, physician,
health advocate and your guide to living stronger, healthier and longer.
And each episode we'll explore how you can prevent illness
(00:39):
and describe through practical advice on nutrition, movement and stress
management and building a supportive community. Because prevention isn't just
better than prescription, it's the key to showing up as
your best self. Let's get started. Welcome back podcast Nation.
I'm telling you right now we are going to shift
(01:02):
from overwhelmed to calm and connected with Dr Melissa's honors.
So welcome to the show, young lady.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Thank you, Doctor k So glad to be here.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Oh man, it's a privilege seeing your content. I'm feeling
constantly inspired to take care of myself, to be more
kinder to myself, to focus on being a more centered individual.
So number one, just want to thank you out of
they gave Melissa, your content is gold, but I gotta
(01:36):
get your story. Like you're a chiropractor. You put this
focus on trying to get people in a better state.
And you know, first when you think of a chiropractor,
you think about trying to manage people's pain. I've definitely
seen a chiropractor from my ailing back. But yeah, how
did you get into this, Melissa?
Speaker 3 (01:57):
Yeah, I mean that's a loaded question. I think, just
to kind of me in for a second, to help
the audience know who we're speaking to and what we're
speaking about. Here. You know, this is really a conversation
that's so needed right now, I feel because we've all
reached a time and place where we're outsourcing all of
our power and all of our ability to feel connected
(02:17):
and regulated. And I love speaking from a nervous system standpoint.
So what I mean by that is like when we
all experience those human stressful emotions, which we all experience,
thank God, because it means we have a family, we
have relationships, we have a job, we have stress. This
is called you stress, EU stress. This isn't distress. But
(02:37):
you know, for so long, like in those situations where
I actually needed tools to help me regulate in the
moment where you know you've got three kids. I've got
three kids too, Like where I'm living in a very
high go go ghost state, which I know you can
relate to as an ICU practitioner, and I've got my
little girl in front of me, needing me to like
(02:58):
slow that down and be present, Like I can't go
get a massage and calm down and then be with her,
or in those moments that we've all had when like
you're running late and then of course you hit traffic
and then the coffee spills and then like in those states,
tell me how to regulate my nervous system without going
and jumping on my PMF MAT. You know, I come
(03:20):
from the natural health community, and I think there's so
many of these tools that we've talked about for you know,
decades that we've all used that are now reaching the mainstream,
which I'm so excited about, you know, whether we're calling
it biohacking, whatever we're calling it, but like the saunas
and the ice bath and all these things that can
help us reach a natural or a healthier state naturally.
(03:42):
They're incredible And at the same time I'm watching it
and I'm like, please, please, let there also be a
strong message that the most powerful tool we have is
in here, and the way that we access it is
through regulating our nervous system. And we can teach ourselves
how to do that in the midst of chaos, without
the ice bath, without the sauna, because that's when we
actually need it. And so for me, you know this,
(04:05):
the discovery came because I was a busy woman juggling
work and my children, and I got really, really, really sick,
and I think i'll share a bit of that story,
if that's okay. I had to create these tools because
what I realized is that, you know, once I got better,
I was just going to get back to a place
of being a you know, busy, healthy woman doing all
(04:26):
the right things, but feeling extremely overwhelmed by those right
things and healthy things, just being another item on a
very long to do list. And so I think like
a lot of us, especially women, maybe you guys do
this too, But when we're not taking great care of
ourselves as we're told we're supposed to do, or when
we're not able to put that auxygen mask on first
(04:47):
because we don't have time, we tend to guilt and
shame ourselves, and we think that we're failing. We're again
struggling and we're not doing it right, rather than realizing
we're sold system of self care that doesn't fit into
our busy lives. So that's this is my favorite conversation
to have because I think it's just such a perfect time.
(05:08):
We're all ready to take good care of ourselves. It's
just time to have tools that actually work for us.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
I don't know if it's too personal, but what happened
to you, Melissa?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Yeah, no, nothing's too personal. We can talk about anything.
So I was running the practice. So I know, I
live in Miami with my family, but I'm actually back
in New Jersey in our office. We're back to visit
family for about a month. So my husband and I
built this practice. It's an integrative health center. We've got
about thirty employees here. I was one of the main practitioners,
(05:40):
full patient load, also running the practice right helping manage
our amazing team. Thank god, we've got amazing staff. But
you know, playing the role of HR and manager, homeschooling
my three children at the time, working out and cooking
healthy meals, you know, like juggling all of the things,
and that's that's what mine looked like. And I think
(06:01):
we all have some version of that. So I was,
you know, trying to fit it all in. And I
wonder if anyone listening has ever experienced this. It's like
I kept hearing this little whisper throughout the day, like
I'm tired, this is too much. I can't and I
didn't feel that I had a choice. I had to.
(06:23):
And so if that voice presented itself in the morning
and like I wanted to sleep in a little bit,
I was like, I can't, I'm already behind. So instead
of listening to it and leaning in, I would have
caffeine so that I could. I mean, I still have caffeine,
just the intention is very different. If I heard that
voice at night, you know, like I've had a full
day in the practice and I'm tired, Or for someone
(06:45):
else it might be like they've had a full day
at work and they just need to put their feet up.
And instead I was cooking for my family, which I
of course loved, but like, wasn't nurturing myself instead of
being able to lean in and listen to that voice
because I didn't feel like I had the tools are
that I could, I would have a glass of wine,
no harm, no foul. But like my intention behind the
(07:06):
wine was to kind of like shut the voice, or
to feel like I was giving myself something while I
was serving everyone else. And so you know, I left
to say, we get these whispers and when we don't listen,
they turn into a screen. And so over time what
started to happen to me was I just started not
feeling right. I started getting really bad headaches, and like
(07:30):
a very healthy person, I don't really ever get headaches.
They started getting progressively worse. And then things got really scary,
like I started to not be able to handle my
kids' voices, like it was like nails on chuckboards. And
then everything kind of hit on one weekend we were out.
We used to have a sailboat, and we had the
kids out on the sailboat and my body it literally
(07:54):
just like pain went up my spine like one vertebrate
at a time, and I know my body really well.
It felt like it was systemic, Like I felt like
I got put into a massive state of fight or
flight that there was no trigger and I couldn't get
myself out of. I actually remember grabbing a glass of wine.
I'm like, I need to like calm this, like what
is going on? And it did nothing. And then I
(08:16):
was starting to like lose my lose my way on
the way to this office. We built this office fifteen
years ago. It's two miles down from where down the
road from where we were living, and I would get lost.
I would literally have to like pull out GPS and
I knew the address, but I couldn't find my way.
And I didn't tell anyone. I didn't tell anyone, you know,
I like whispered, like I feel a little awf lately.
(08:37):
Something's going on, like something was majorly wrong. And so
one day I said it to my husband. I was like,
something's really wrong, like I need you to take the kids.
And it's so funny, this is such a horrible story.
He's such a good guy and this sounds horrible, but
this is true because when we don't highlight how bad
it is, people don't understand. And so that weekend, when
(08:59):
we're on the Saale boat, but when stuff was really hitting,
I told him and he's like, well, I have plans
to go fishing with my dad, so how about you
take the kids home? You probably just have keto flu.
So I'm like, I feel like I'm dying, and instead
of you know, having someone help me take care of me,
I end up driving the hour back home with four
kids because we had a friend with us. Anyway, I
(09:19):
go to urgent Care. I demand testing. There's something wrong
with me. I need to get tested. The doctorate urgent
care also told me I'm a busy mom. I'm probably
just tressed. I should go home and rest. Anyway, I said,
I'm not leaving until you test me. There's something wrong,
and if you're not going to put it on my chart,
I'm not leaving your office. So he tested me. It
turns out I had lime disease and coupled with what
(09:42):
we realized leader is that we had massive amounts of
mold on the sailboat, and so I ended up with
a neurological form of lime. Physical testing revealed my symptoms
were tied to encephalitis and meningitis and then mold texas
the on top of that, and so I got really sick,
(10:02):
like I couldn't. I remember days where I couldn't formulate
an email like I couldn't, I couldn't think, and so
for me, because I didn't listen, like that's that's where
it led me in. I think we all have our
different version of that, you know. I think that our
body tries to give us these signals, and you could
call it burnout, or you could call it illness, you
(10:22):
could call it anxiety. Mine transpired in my nervous system,
which in hindsight is like the greatest gift because I've
always loved the nervous system, and it made the nervous
system for me like the canary and my coal mind
in a what is that in a coal mind? So
like I feel things very quickly and easily now that
(10:44):
irritate the nervous system. So it's become my quest to
figure out, like how do we regulate it in all circumstances.
And what I've discovered is these like really tangible tools
that take seconds that can move the needle. You and
I just had one. We were recording and internet shut down.
(11:04):
You know those moments where you go into fight or flight,
but it's not survival. You know, our nervous system is
still functioning as if all these things that happen in
our life threatens are survival when it's not true. And
so we've got to retrain the hardwiring. And those are
the tools that I've discovered and that I use now
in my life. And I'm not saying I don't get stressed.
(11:25):
I'm not saying I'm perfectly calm and always connected. But
what they've gifted me is the ability to easily know
when I do get out of alignment, how to get
back in seconds.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Wow. That's some powerful shit, yo, because like, let me,
let me be honest. We we've been having more and
more attention to the impacts of stress. Of late. We
had a family friend that unfortunately passed away and assuming
(11:58):
it was a heart attack in stressful circumstances, and we've
all been in those circles, in scenarios where stress has
gotten to us. Like I remember my personal story after
my old man passed. I was getting these heart competitions
and I thought I was I thought I was going crazy.
(12:22):
I thought there was something inherently wrong with me. And
I was explaining this to my one of our social
workers on Pilot of Care my other job wasn't Poet
of care at the time, and she's like, oh, this
is very typical of post loss or morning like You're
just it's manifesting in your body.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
It's your heart. Your heart was broken.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Yeah, yeah, And I'll never forget that I got it
because I went through all the tests and obviously nothing
popped up. But it was very eye opening for me
in terms of the impact that that stress and that
mind body connection is. And and I know your story, Melissa,
(13:07):
my story, there's tons of everyone has a story. And
if we could talk about the tools that we can
use at a day to day to kind of as
you in your words, realign, I think this could be
some powerful, powerful tool that we could give people. So ultimately,
where do we start, Melissa, Like, I mean, we've all
(13:27):
seen these tricks of the trade on on our ig
he and I mean I do some myself, but I
don't want to take away from your magic. What's some
of the ways that we could do this individually? You
are listening to Prevention over Prescription with doctor k.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
V today, it's a what SHO used to dribble down
n B E.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
What's turning them in a home and the turfance got
a dirt cheap for them, Plus if they were short
with cheese, that would.
Speaker 2 (13:56):
Work with them, and we got rid of that tern
for them.
Speaker 1 (13:59):
What stream us live at SAGA nine sixty am dot C. Hey, Hey, hey,
welcome to.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
Good Welcome back to Prevention over Prescription Radio on SAGA
ninety six.
Speaker 3 (14:17):
Yeah. So there's two main things I want to talk about,
and I think we take a deep dive into each
one because I really want your listeners to walk away
from this time that they spend listening to this podcast
with knowing exactly what to do. And I don't want
it to just be another podcast telling them to gratitude
journal and to breathwork and to you know, all these
outside in things like this is real and this is
(14:37):
going to be about shifting and retraining the hardwiring of
your nervous system. And this is going to change everything.
So the first thing that I suggest that they do
this is going to sound really silly, but just bear
with me here. Think about so, I call myself an
alignment guide, right, like, when we can get into alignment,
That's the word I'm going to keep using in this conversation.
(14:57):
When we're in alignment, that's when we feel our best.
That's when our nervous system is regulated. That's when we're
in a flow state. That's when you know whatever you
believe that's when you're connected to God, you're connected to source.
You can hear your own voice again, your inner wisdom.
This is you know, we're surrounded with knowledge. Let's get
back to our inner wisdom so that I know what
(15:20):
do I need in this moment? And I get that
answer and I know it's true enough and I can
follow it, because that's where we stop needing everything outside
of us that we don't have access to. So think
about what is one word that perhaps describes we can
do this too, Perhaps describes like a state that you
find often that you don't like. For instance, if the
(15:44):
listener is someone who easily feels anxious or like, for me,
I used to always feel stressed, Like no matter what
was going on in my life, I would feel stressed.
So think about a word that describes a state that
you feel often. I'll use stress in this conversation for me.
Is there one that maybe resonates with you?
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Yeah, stress is a good one where or I can't
think of the right word otherwise, but where you feel
like you're on edge, or you've got to be doing
that one mess and you're missing out on something, or
you there's something you're forgetting, there's an email you forgot
to respond to. Motherfuckers are going to get super angry
(16:26):
at you because you didn't. You didn't approve that meeting invite. Like,
I don't know what you would call that stress.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Let's call it stress. Yeah, let's call stress. Okay, So
everybody take a moment and like write down your word,
Like what is your word? Because what we're going to
do is we're going to establish a new word in
a minute, and doctor K and I will speak from stress.
But maybe, like I said, yours is anxiety. So that
is your current aligned state. And so what that means
(16:55):
is that you know, as you experience joy or freedom
or ease or whatever it is, you will tend to
find yourself back into alignment. And your alignment is stress.
So like for me what that looked like, and for
what a lot of people, how we put ourself into
that yuck? Aligned state is the questions that we start
(17:16):
to wake up with. So like the things you were describing,
I would imagine you'd wake up with questions like what
do email? Do I need to get on? Who's waiting
for me? What am I supposed to be doing? Right?
We're very much we've become human doings.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
What I'm not forgetting?
Speaker 3 (17:33):
What am I forgetting? For someone who maybe has some
feelings of anxiety, it's like, who did I hurt? Who
did I upset? Why did I say that yesterday?
Speaker 2 (17:42):
Right?
Speaker 3 (17:43):
And so we especially in the morning, the first thing
I want people to do is start to listen to
their questions before your eyes even open. Do an internal audit.
And the audit starts with listening to the questions that
you're asking yourself. And this is we're in part one
of this, but part two is going to be I'm
going to help you understand the brain waves that you're
(18:05):
in because this is this morning time, this is your
subconscious and you're training it. And so like for us,
it's you know what am I missing? What do I
need to be doing? So you start to listen to
what those questions are. This is actually your theta brain wave.
I'm just going to pair the brain waves in right
now too. This is your theta brainwave. We basically we
go through a variety of brain waves in our day,
(18:28):
and as long as we're working with them, we will
find alignment, we will find nervous system regulation. They're like
gears in a car, right, And so you wouldn't wake
up and go into third gear, like you wouldn't get
in a car and go into third gear. You ramp
up slowly, right, And so many of us when we
wake up first thing in the morning, we're going into
(18:48):
third gear by asking those kinds of questions. Where do
I need to be, what do I need to be doing?
Blah blah blah. That's that's beta, that's that's a brain
wave of like doing this. But we're burning out, we're frying,
we're feeling frazzled because we're hitting it first thing in
the morning. That's third gear. We got to warm up
to it. So in this morning time you start to
you start to listen. That's the action step. You listen
(19:11):
and pay attention to questions that you're asking yourself. And
we're going to start to put in other questions. We're
going to do a question audit and that's all you're
going to do in the morning. First thing. So you
and I have the word stress as our old aligned state.
So let's think about what do we want our new
aligned state to be. What do you want to feel?
What do you want to come to during the day
when you get pulled out of alignment. Mine's fun. I
(19:34):
always want to find fun.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Yeah, Like I think of joy, I think of lightheartedness,
like just like back to who I know who like
who I am, which is a like deep down a
fun go lucky, just love to laugh, you know, and yeah,
(20:04):
just trying to bring more joy, laughter and ease.
Speaker 3 (20:07):
I love that. I love that joy. Let's is it okay?
If we make it joy? Fa you that matches your light? Yeah?
I like that one. So other great ones people tend
to choose when I'm walking them through. This is like
freedom or calm or connected. So let's use joy. Okay.
So for you in the morning, doctor K, as you're
waking up tomorrow and as you're maybe hearing these questions
(20:29):
that are coming through you, where do I need to be?
What do I need to do? I want you to
insert specific questions like how can I find joy today?
How can I create joy today? And I know this
sounds like super silly, but this is this is literally
how we win the day. And when we win the day,
we win our week, we win our month, we win
our life. So you're in theda brain way first thing
(20:53):
in the morning, and this is when you're the gateway
to your subconscious is super open, and so whatever we
do in THETA, we are hard wiring into our nervous
system for that day as our aligned state. So when
we wake up in beta in stress mode, when we
hop on our emails, when we ask ourselves the stressful questions,
when we go right into the do we are training
(21:14):
our a migdullah, the part of our nervous system that
controls like what we do all day. This is the
state that you want to find. So no wonder we
find stress or chaos or anxiety. So instead, what you're
going to do is you're going to train it to
find joy. And you're going to do that in Beta.
First thing in the morning, you do not get on
your devices. You do not look at white or bright
lights because that'll pull you right into Beta. You are
(21:36):
going to stay super chill in your bed. If you
have any light around you, make sure it's like red
or amber light, so it's super subtle and eases you
in and start to ask questions about how you can
bring joy into the day. So I'm going to ask
you that, now, how could you bring joy into your day?
Like realistically, what micro moments of joy could you fit.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
In that I feel a little bit emotional think about this.
I don't know, yeah, like it's, uh, you're catching me
on a bad day too. But it's when I think
about how to bring joy, I think of the kids,
like the first thing when I see them, like some
(22:20):
form of contact, like I mean, they get I have
three boys, so it's it's always a little bit trickier
with them. But some kind of contact hug even just
like you know, some form of like handshake even, but
you know, touching the boys giving love to Mama bear
(22:41):
like maybe like a quick dry hump, like I mean,
I look back at some of the happier moments in life,
like I'm as a good appreciate from the last come
(23:04):
I'm pretty ridiculous and I love the random comedy and
just just trying to bring more laughter to the day.
So just being adding a lens of silliness, you know something.
It's easy in the morning now I think about it.
Forgive me I from going on a little bit too long.
(23:25):
You can cut me off, but you know, you get
the right tune on, Like if you get the right
tune on, that can get you come on. Like I'm
not shy to like Bookie in the morning. I get
joy out of moving the body sol exercise. Usually that's
the first thing I'll do my morning's like core routine,
just to hop off with my back and then usually
(23:46):
do a workout in the basement. What else can you do?
You mean first thing? Or it just I forgot the
question already.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
I mean you've nailed it already. You've nailed it.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
Yeah, I think and just smile more like I usually
uplift people, like like I think I have that superpower
like if if you you and iron in the same
room together, you're gonna leave there more like You're gonna
leave there more happy, lit up than before. If when
(24:24):
I'm at my when I'm at my best, and that
that lifts me. Yeah. So I think any of that
I think, would would would would be, would lean towards
that joy.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
I love that. And how much extra time do those
do any of those things that you listed take you?
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Yeah? Not much. It's just it's a matter of being
intentional and having in front of mind.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
And can I ask how old your kids are?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
They? Turning thirteen, turning eleven almost seven?
Speaker 3 (25:06):
Oh cute, Okay, minor similar ages I've got just turns
nine almost thirteen and fourteen. Oh right, So as a parent,
I want to ask you this and for any parents
in the audience. And if you don't have kids, then
you know your loved ones or your fur babies. So
when you are out of alignment, because your new alignment
(25:28):
is joy and that's you, Like I could, I could
see it. I think anyone who's watching this can see this.
You are joy when you're out of alignment and when
you're in stress. How many of those beautiful moments with
your family and your loved ones do you miss?
Speaker 2 (25:42):
Oh yeah, yeah, there's no doubt about it. It's yeah, no,
you you miss out. And I means maybe how do
I get the emotional part is twofold that one day
you realize how much more you can be offering and
the nature of my job unfortunately leads to like it's
(26:05):
hard to turn off the stress at times, and but
also the idea that sometimes you just feel far away
from it, if that makes sense, like you feel far
away from the that alignment with joy, which yeah, I think, yeah,
(26:26):
that's probably what we drew a little bit of a
club man who are listening to Prevention overook description with doctor.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
K from.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Stream us Live at SAGA nine sixty am dot.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
C a welcome back to prevention over prescription radio on
sogging that see.
Speaker 3 (27:06):
Yeah, well, thank you for sharing that, because I think
that probably most people listening can very much relate to that.
I think we can. It's really easy to get pulled
into success and our careers, and I'm definitely, I one
hundred percent struggle very much to be fully present with
my family and it's the most important thing. And you know,
(27:26):
as a woman, you're constantly hearing like enjoy every moment.
It goes so fast, and so then we double beat
ourselves up and it's it's hard, and we're all doing
the best that we can. But for me, when I
got sick, what I realized is like everything that I
was being told would help me be more present with
my children took time away from them. It took more
(27:49):
time away from them to go do the massage so
that I could calm down and turn off work. And
I still do all those things because I think there's
a place for the macro tools and then there's the
micro But I'm a huge fan of like what I
call micro dosing, but I don't necessarily mean micro dosing.
What people are talking about microdosing. These days, I'm in
a microdose connection so that I can be at least
(28:12):
hopefully ninety percent of the time present with my children
when they're in front of me, and that I can
also be connected and present with myself and forgive myself
in the moments where I don't because we're human and
that's going to happen. But I think you know what's
really powerful, too, is talking to our children about it,
like I really missed that moment, or I'm sorry that
I reacted that way. You know, that's my stress. Don't
(28:33):
take it on because I think we role model for
them how to do it when they experience it. We're human.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
That's a good point though, about like we do role modeling,
and in an era too right now of all the devices,
all the things, like it's been in so many ways
even more important to be as present as we can be.
Speaker 3 (28:58):
Yeah, and it kind of be harder. So I like
to use the word practice. We're practicing, and every day
we practice, and every time we say our word, we're practicing.
And every morning when we take two minutes, two minutes
to focus on joy and lay in our bed and
ask ourselves that intentional question. We're practicing and we're not
(29:19):
showing up perfectly because that's not what practice is. But
the more we do practice, the more when it's game time,
we can show up the way that we want to
show up because the work has been done. So we're
training our nervous system so that I can easily go
from here to hear. Our nervous system is very malleable.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
And you know, as you're saying this, Melissa to it's funny.
I maybe it's just a bit of a an aha
moment right now. It's I made reference in the morning.
I heard my back years ago. And so you go through,
as you know, as a chiropracticor you go ups and
downs between having those black flares. And so the first
(29:58):
thing I do in the morning is my core exercises
to prime those muscles so that they're they're going to
be ready to go there protecting. And I'm thinking that's
the same thing with the joy, Like you primed, When
you primed on it, you're going to see it more,
You're going to be more ready to bring that energy.
(30:24):
So I really I'm really embracing this.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
I love it. I'm so glad, I'm so glad, so
there's actually a part of our nervous system. It's called
the reticular activating system. It doesn't matter what it is,
it's it's basically a filter. I mean, you know all this,
but for the listeners. You know, if you've ever experienced
like that, that situation where you know, maybe you decide
you're going to buy a red car and all of
a sudden, there's red cars everywhere that you never saw before,
(30:50):
or you know whatever, it is like you're you're now
looking at something that you never looked for before. We
are surrounded with so much sensory information that our brain
has to filter out, but we can teach it what
to filter. And that's what we're doing here too. Like
you said, we're priming, and so as you're priming your brain,
filter in THEATA in the morning, because again that's the
(31:14):
gateway to your subconscious. So I'm all about time efficiency.
You're going to get twice as much done in a
quarter of the time, because we all need more time.
What you're going to start to find is opportunities for joy.
You're going to start to find pockets of time and
instead of checking for who needs you on the email
in every moment that we all do. I mean, I
(31:35):
catch myself at a red light checking my emails, like, jeez, God,
can we give ourselves a break instead? How can I
find joy right now? And putting on for me it's Aerosmith,
putting on Aerosmith in the car and like rocking out
and I'm driving anyway, Like why not find joy and
play and fun. It's not changing anything that we're doing,
but it's completely changing the way.
Speaker 2 (31:56):
That we do it. I love that, I think, Yeah, no,
I I just love it because it's one of those
I'm all about eighty twenty, like the small thing you
could do that can have a huge impact.
Speaker 3 (32:14):
And.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
This is one of them. This is what I'm here,
And so you're converting me, Melissa.
Speaker 3 (32:23):
I'm just reminding you to get back. This is like
you said, this is who you are. I just think
you know, this day and age, we don't have at
least I didn't have the tools to get me back
to me. I had the tools to help me get
to everybody else, to try to be everybody else, to
try to do what everybody else was doing. But like
(32:43):
we've got it all here. I don't mean to sound
woo woo, but like it's all here and we're all
different and unique and beautiful. And when we can get
back to our own selves and our own light, like
that's it, everything else comes through so much easier. Like
we've all had those days where you're like, God, that
day was just like a really good day. It was
a really good day. And then what do we do
in those moments? I don't know, this is what I
(33:04):
used to do. Was it that I had a really
cute shirt or really cute shirt on for that podcast?
It was the shirt. Was it that I was having
a good hair day? It must have been the hair. No,
you were in a flow state, you were in alignment.
You just didn't know how to get there intentionally, and
now you do. So now those days can happen whenever
you want, or if they don't, you at least know.
(33:25):
Like I definitely have days where I'm just running around
and I choose to live the old way. I choose
it's a conscious choice. But that's the difference. I'm not
a victim to it. I'm not wondering why my life
is no longer my own. I get to the end
of that day and I'm like, screw that. I don't
like that anymore. Tomorrow. It was a fresh start. I'm
doing it the new one. So it's a choice, you
(33:47):
know how to get where you want to get.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
And this totally it's consistent with what we've been trying
to preach. What we have in the book is take
the power back. We all have a certain level of
agency and this can help us keep us accountable. Like
we we often feel powerless when it comes to many
(34:12):
things in life, and this in terms of our mindset,
that energy that we're going to bring to the on
a daily basis, it's empowering.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Mm hmm. Absolutely. Yeah. So I've got like a guide
for anyone who wants, you know, more info. We can
definitely share more here. I have some more little tidbits,
but then if we can, we'll link some resources below
for anyone who wants to deep dive. This is one
hundred percent one of my favorite tools. People can message
me like, I'm very active in my DMS or in
(34:44):
my communities. This is what I'm here to do, This
is how I'm here to serve. This is one hundred
percent what changed my life. So the next thing we
would go through in the day, I'm just going to
list out all the brain waves their data. That's what
we wake up in. Then we go to alpha then
and then delta. And so people who meditate for years
(35:05):
and years and years work to get into a state
of theta, and specifically even more so alpha. Alpha is
our flow state. Alpha is when we're completely present and
time ceases to exist. It's like when you completely lose
yourself in something. We did this all as a kid.
This is we lived in alpha, but a lot of
times we've kind of forgotten. I know, I have like
(35:27):
very much a part of me that's a timekeeper and
like got to do this and then that. And so
you know, alpha is a beautiful flow state and we
don't even have to try to get in it. We
naturally are in it when we wake up just after theta.
And so you know, as I was teaching this in
my community for a few years, the question I would
get as I talked about, you know, this is less
(35:48):
about what we're doing and more about what we're being.
Everyone's like, Okay, but what do I do? Tell me
what to do in alpha? I'm like, no, Alpha is
like not doing, but okay, what do I do? So
your action step in is to listen. So that's to
listen to that question and then create a new one.
Your action step in alpha is to connect. I like
(36:09):
to think of ALFA as like our heart space. And
so for me, what this looks like in the morning
is I get out of my bed and I go
to what I've called my sit spot, and all the
women in my community we've created a sit spot. And
so your sit spot is just a place that you
go in the morning before your beta brain kicks in.
It's kind of like, you know, for anyone who's wanted
(36:29):
to start a workout routine early in the morning, and
you're going to start on Monday, it's like Sunday night.
You put out your workout clothes so that when you
wake up in the morning, you know you don't talk
yourself out of it. You just got to walk to
your clothes and get to the car and get to
the gym. So the sid spot is the same thing
to help keep you out of beta, to help keep
you from going on your phone and your emails and
thinking about your to dos. So for a lot of people,
(36:51):
this sit spot is just like the couch. I've upgraded
mine over the years. I've got like a really beautiful
pump mat in there a grounding mat. I've got a
red light in there that I love. That's therapeutic. In
the things that are really important in your sit spot
are to not have like traditional lighting, the white and
blue light from our screens, from our phones and in
(37:13):
our homes, we'll pull you right out of theta and alpha.
And so even if it's for like two minutes five minutes,
we want to really maximize our time in this state.
And so you can do this really inexpensively. I mean
you can literally take like a house lamp and go
on Amazon and get a red light bulb and put
that light bulb in your sit spot. I've got in
(37:36):
our bathroom we have like a red light night light.
My phone, all of my screens, I've got the ability
to triple quick and do a red light filter. We
can link a video on that blow if anyone wants it.
And then also a candle is a really good thing
to have in your shit spot because a flickering flame,
this is really interesting. A flickering flame will put you
(37:59):
into a stata alpha at any point in the day,
any point you could be here and you could look
at a flickering flame and you're dropped down into alpha instantly.
So think about like, if you've ever sat at a
bonfire or looked at a fire in a fireplace, it
chills you out right. And it's so interesting to me
that there's flames in romantic restaurants because ALFA is our
(38:20):
connector and our flow state and our heart opener. And
I don't know if that was intentional, but it's pretty cool.
So what happens is the frequency of a flickering flame
is the same frequency as alpha when we drop down
into alpha brain waves. It's a low frequency. And so
what happens when we look at that flame is something
called mirror neurons, which is what like babies use a lot.
(38:43):
You smile at a baby, the baby smiles back, they
read your face. That's mirror neurons. Mirror neurons in our
brain will mimic and match that frequency of the flame.
So if you go into your sit spot and you're like,
this is great, I heard this thing on this podcast.
I'm going to try to you know, sit and and
not do, and all of a sudden you're like, but
the emails, but the but the to dos, but the
(39:05):
blah blah blah, Like that's where the candle helps because
it kind of like tricks your brain into chilling out
for a minute. Lastly, a great spot for a journal,
Like I have a journal there and this is kind
of where I write out maybe all the crap that
came up when I woke up that I heard, you know,
kind of coming through me. This is where we give
(39:28):
a platform to our voice instead of everybody else's. So
like this isn't necessarily where you're listening to someone else's podcast.
This is where you're listening to you. I'm stressed about
this day because I'm mad about yesterday, because like, whatever
it is, it doesn't have to be pretty. You can
literally like shred it and burn it. But this is
where you start to hear yourself again. I think a
(39:50):
lot of us have become experts at distraction, so we
don't feel something, we feel something that doesn't feel good,
and it's like, well, let me get on my email,
let me get on socials, let me get it a
quick dopamine hit, and so we bury these emotions that
are actually insights into like a lot of clarity, and
they're not that scary when you just start to create
(40:10):
space for them. They're like a kid, like to me,
it's like a kid, like a kid who's really upset
or crying, or it's like they don't necessarily need you
to fix it, they just need you to be with them,
and then everything kind of transpires. And when we try
to bury them, it's like someone an author, Nancy Livin
wrote about it this way, It's like trying to hold
a beach ball under the ocean. And what's going to
(40:32):
happen is it's going to pop up at some time
that's probably not convenient. So whether that's like anger or
frustration or jealousy, when we try to push it, it's
just it's just waiting, you know. And that's when someone
cuts you off and you're like, so alpha is the
next phase, And I recommend people, do you know ideally
(40:53):
it's like fifteen minutes or a half an hour. I
I just like to be realistic. For me, sometimes honestly
it's two. And sometimes when I go for two minutes,
I end up there for twenty. So it's whatever we got.
But it's just the point that again like gears in
the car, that you're starting in beta and alpha before
you attack your day. Then beta is the next one
(41:13):
that's like our main to do We all live in beta,
so it's very familiar. The main action step I say
in beta is there's two things. One put your phone in,
emails on, do not disturb. This is like your hardest work.
This is like the most focused. And then the second
action step is to take microdoses of alpha and beta.
So for doctor K this is in the busyness of
(41:35):
the day. You know, I don't know how much time
you have or how many breaks you have, but like,
everyone's got a pee, So when you pee, how can
you make it fun? Like are you singing a song?
Are you listening to a song? Just not checking your
email and not checking the phones, like doing something for us.
Maybe when you pee, you're drawing circles with your instream.
Speaker 2 (42:00):
Think about me when you do it, my last name,
Uh you know, I mean, but make sure it's a
long stream. But yeah, it's uh yeah, there's.
Speaker 3 (42:11):
So many things, but this is like all about like
the sillier and the weirder you feel doing it, like
you're nailing it. There's this one lady. I just gave
a talk in Tennessee and oh my god, I loved her.
She came up to me after and she was like,
I always wanted to be a Dallas Cowboy cheerleader. Like
I talked about, you know, the dreams that we let die,
and she was like crying in the front, so beautiful
(42:33):
and you know kind of like she let that one
go and it's like the dream that haunts her. And
I was like, girl, get on Amazon and get yourself costume,
like get it, like do it and put it on
and like let that be your microdose. And she sent
me a picture and she's in it. She's in like
one of those T shirt versions of the swimsuit with
like the six pack. I was like, yes, that is it.
(42:56):
That's it, Like why did we ever stop playing and
being silly? Why it's so much more fun. So she's
like doing her emails and doing her behind the scenes
stuff in her Dallas Cowboy outfit.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
We're listening to Prevention Over Prescription with Doctor k Live.
Speaker 4 (43:12):
Where the street ends in the basement apartment with one
of your friends and the tap chips all night, water,
torture and sink. The furnace is burning, but it's still cool.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
No radio, no problem. Stream is live on SAGA ninety
sixty am dot C.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
A welcome back to Prevention Over Prescription radio on Saga
nine sixty of it. I love it, And honestly, we
need more silliness. We need more word like taking us
(44:01):
ourselves less seriously, Like I.
Speaker 4 (44:04):
Love that.
Speaker 3 (44:05):
Like look at both of us in this conversation, right,
and hopefully anyone listening is resonating the same energy. And
then you and I go out into the world with
that energy, Like is not that one of the most
important duties that we have. Like nobody is coming to
save you. And I mean you are an I see
you practitioner, so you do come to save people. But
(44:27):
in general, like we are our own responsibility. And I
say it this way because when I say it this way,
it helps women actually make time for it. So it
sounds harsh, but I'm doing this to try to get
you to stop worrying about everybody else and take care
of yourself, Like your shit is your business. I'm sorry
to say it that way, but like, don't go out
(44:47):
into the world with all of your stuff. Spend five
minutes in the morning getting into a place of alignment,
then go out into the world. Think about every interaction
you have with like the target cash register person or
the gas station attendant. Like we're either snapping at people
and completely disconnected, or we're in a state of joy
(45:08):
and presence and we're actually connecting as human human beings again, Like,
that's how we do it. That's how we take the
big crazy stuff that's going on in the world and
we ask, how can I actually do something? What can
I do? You microdose it down to your family and
to you and your community and where you can actually
make an impact. I don't watch and scroll the news
(45:29):
a lot, because when I did that, it's like, well,
what can I do? Like how can I help? How
can I serve? And it gets so overwhelming and it's
like a Mother Teresa quote that I love. You want
to help the world, help your family, And it's permission
to be selfish. And I actually prefer the word self
with because when we can show up to the world
(45:51):
as connected human beings, everything else is so much more
beautiful and magical. And isn't that just like a lot
easier than the stuff that we're trying to juggle and accomplish.
In addition to all the stuff that we already have
to juggle and accomplish.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
I just feel like there's so many people that need
this money, Like I'm going to be sending this one
directly to my better half after this, because I mean,
we both obviously could use a little bit of rejuvenation.
But just as I think she's the crowd, you're talking to,
busy mother of three trying to a career. It's heavy, and.
Speaker 3 (46:31):
I you know, thank you, I mean, and I would
love to hear from her. What I ended up doing
is I created a community simple opportunities throughout our day.
When a woman goes in her closet and she's like that,
I want to wear that, but I should wear this.
Or when you're in the store and you're like, oh
my god, that's so fun, but that's not me, Like
grab that and wear that. And these are the ways
(46:53):
that this is self care. Like screw the massages, screw
the facials. Love all those things. I will still do them,
but that is not self care.
Speaker 2 (47:00):
That is it to do?
Speaker 3 (47:01):
This is self care.
Speaker 2 (47:03):
Yeah, and I must say Melissa to it. I feel,
I mean, this is the thing that you do as
you're older, like I've been more and more doing what
I feel is either right or it is more what
I want to do as opposed to what I think
I should be doing. Oh you know, you should be
wearing this suit and tie, even though you know what,
(47:25):
I wouldn't mind sporting magana can take cloth into this
into this event, because you know what, my mom and
dad would love this. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm
gonna bust that out, like little things like that, like
it just it just feeds your soul, feeds your heart.
And I think I personally want to see more people
(47:45):
align with who they are as opposed to playing this
playing the game, because I think for me, what ruined
ruined a lot of things. And and once again we're
just getting to know each other. But I probably you
and I are probably talking because of the pandemic and
some of the advocacy that we were attempting to do
during the pandemic for a more balanced approach keeping schools
(48:06):
open and that cancel culture. During that time, you had
to just walk the line soul so much so it was,
you know, you were afraid to speak your mind, and
like you had the filter was thicker than it ever
had been before in my life. And I think at
(48:27):
some point you kind of almost lose yourself to a
certain degree. So I think there's a bit of a
with this less of a woke culture where a lot
of us are just trying to come back to ourselves.
Speaker 3 (48:39):
Yeah, yeah, I definitely get that. I mean I felt
like my filter was I'm an EmPATH and I didn't
want to hurt anyone. And it was really hard because
as a natural practitioner, I was watching what was going
on and like it was very clear to me what
was going on and just very disempowering mess. And I'm like,
(49:00):
the viruses have been around for forever, like here's what
we got to do. But like people were so hurt
and so upset and so triggered by hearing that message,
and so I established a heavy filter. Not because what
I felt I was saying wasn't important. I felt like
it was more important than ever. But like the mpath
part of me was just like I did the Mother Teresa.
(49:22):
I'm like, Okay, I'm not gonna scream it everywhere. I'm
gonna I'm gonna do it in my home and I'm
gonna show you, you know, like it can be this
way and it's it's beautiful and like we are healthy.
But yeah, it feels really good to like let the
freak fly, freak flag fly again, flag fly, Yeah, Yeah,
(49:42):
and I think what happened in COVID too, is we
had like a massive I look at life like contraction
and expansion, and I think, you know, the world goes
through these pulses. I love the heart too, it's like
a heartbeat. And COVID really was a massive contraction and
everyone went was forced to go inward. And I think
(50:03):
we saw a lot of drugs and alcohol and relationship
changes and people who wanted to distract themselves out of
the inwardness. And I don't blame or judge anyone. It
was really intense times. But then what we're seeing now
is massive expansion. You're seeing people change careers, you're seeing
people move, you're seeing relationships change, and that's the natural rhythm.
(50:24):
And so as I relate this back to our daily
rhythm and the brain waves, what we're doing in the
morning is we're starting in an inward place. We're allowing
ourselves to have this contraction and to get back into
our shell and remember who we are before we go
out into the world. And when you do that, you
come out with massive expansion, You come out with open energy,
You come out magnetic and attractive because you've taken that
(50:47):
time and that can look like your community finding you
for women who are maybe lonely and isolated and don't
have like minded people. That can look like attracting the
right partner. That can look like attracting the right job
and career. I mean, we are energetic beings, and like,
whether you believe it or not, you are going to
be pulled to that kind of energy in someone. It's attractive,
(51:08):
it's it's light, right, and so I mean, I'll just
say it again, like to me, this is one of
the most important things for us to do. It's a
daily rhythm. It's like cycle thinking. You know, you brought
up your wife a minute ago, and I want to
touch back on the relationship because this is something you know,
so crucial to understand for the men listening for the
(51:28):
women in their lives, whether it's your sister, your mother,
your girlfriend, or you know you have a wife, or
you're looking to attract someone. This is how you support women.
Like you know, I think I'm going to generalize here,
but men are kind of like black and white. I've
been married and with my husband for twenty years. We've
been together for twenty years, and men in general, I
think are kind of black and white, and women are
(51:50):
seen as like kind of complicated, Like we're really not complicated,
but what we are is cyclical and we're rhythmic, and
so you can't just like turn us on and turn
us on off. Like there's a gradual for a lot
of things in the women world. And I think you
all can understand what I'm saying here without saying it.
But like we need a round. I tell my husband
(52:13):
four play all day, Like for play is all day.
For play is in how you look at me at breakfast.
Foreplay is in how you notice that I want a
coffee before I even ask for it. Like we are rhythmic,
and so when you can support a woman's rhythm through
brain wave alignment through honey, lay in bed, like just
give yourself a minute before hopping into your to douce,
(52:34):
Like how about you drink some tea and just sit here,
Like let me remind you to be in your femininess
for a little bit. Let me remind you to turn
off your emails in your to do is it night?
Let me grab you in the kitchen and like pull
you into alpha and let's dance together and be silly,
Like when you pull a woman out of living in
beta because we're very much living in an over masculinized world.
(52:57):
We've become career women and expert doers when our men
pull us out and help support that rhythm. Like what
you will see is unstoppable in the most beautiful, soft
feminine way. Like that is when you get your queen back.
And so for any man listening to this, understanding a
woman's brain brainwave rhythm as your own, it's the same.
(53:20):
And also, you know, cycle sinking is a super powerful
Jedi tool for every man to understand. That's knowing your woman's,
your your partner's, your love's hormonal cycle and helping her
align her rhythm to that cycle. So we're no longer
a mystery like, oh God, when is it coming? Is
she going to be you know, pre menstrual? What do
I say? What do I not say? Cycle sinking gives you,
(53:43):
like the code, it gives you the roadmap. So I
can break that down really simply too if people want it,
or we can share a resource, because I know we're getting.
Speaker 2 (53:55):
You got a hard stop. So listen, this is fucked. Yeah,
this has been juicy through and I think people need
more Melissa in their lives. So number one, Where do
they track you down? How do they get more more
of you? And of course we're going to tag all
the resources in the show notes.
Speaker 3 (54:17):
Okay, yeah great. I mean what I want people to
have more of in their lives is themselves, right, So
it's not me, it's themselves, but the tools I you know,
I talk about the tools a lot on my socials.
So my Instagram handle is be inspired Mama m Ama.
I have a podcast as well with the same name,
a YouTube channel where I share all these tools. My
(54:39):
website has a section on resources, so that website is
doctor Melissa Saunders dot com. Dr Melissa Saunders dot com.
If you go to the resources page, there's all the
free resources there. Grab the regulate your rhythm. That's this topic,
that's brain waves. But message me, email me, tell me
(54:59):
what you resonated with in this conversation. Tell me what
you want more of. How can I help you? My
dream is to be like tinker Bell. I want to
light everybody up, show them who they are again, and
like saunter off and disappear on my way.
Speaker 2 (55:12):
Well, Lissa, this has been fantastic. You're seeing me go
back and forth because I got a per real bad.
Speaker 1 (55:17):
But listen play do the oh good.
Speaker 2 (55:22):
Okay, but thank you so much. You are amazing.
Speaker 3 (55:26):
You're amazing. Thank you doctor Kay.
Speaker 2 (55:27):
If you enjoyed that, please leave us any comments at
quodcast nine to nine at gmail dot com. Leave a
five star rating. Follow us on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook,
Twitter at quodcast, Jump on our newsletter, jump on our community,
check out guid our nutrition, put in podcasts fifteen for
your fifteen percent off, the bundles and the supplements, all
(55:49):
these things that we're promoting, all these things that we're
getting behind is on that preventative side, on that proactive side,
so that you show up as your best self. Show
up wrong, baby, Here we go. Let's do this all
right people. I hope you're feeling a little bit more
jumping your step after that episode. Thanks for listening. Talk
wissel Peace. Yeah, it's like, if you want to rhyme
(56:14):
with me, you don't even know what rod is. Look,
if you want to get clean, you want to get dirty,
you want to go left right, This is what we're doing.
Wants to knock us.
Speaker 4 (56:21):
That's just rock up forty one, drinking monos over who
you think of feet the strategies when you battle.
Speaker 1 (56:28):
Stream us live at SAGA nine sixty am dot C
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