Life Conversations with a Twist
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Life Conversations with a Twist
Beyond One Path: How to Explore Multi Interests Without Burning Out with Stefanie Lauren
“You are a worthy human being. It doesn't matter what you have. It doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't matter who's in your life; you absolutely matter, and you are worth doing it.” —Stefanie Lauren
Ever feel like you're juggling a million dreams but can't quite catch them? What if your scattered interests were actually your superpower? Imagine turning your curiosity into a roadmap for an extraordinary life.
Stefanie Lauren is an entrepreneur and host of the Broken & Enough podcast. With over 20 years of corporate experience in retail and sports industries, she specializes in business consulting, mental health advocacy, and personal development coaching. Stefanie loves to share real-life insights from her journey of personal growth and business exploration to help others realize their potential.
Tune in as Heather and Stefanie get real about overcoming self-doubt, managing life's crazy energy, and finding joy in your own unique path.
Connect with Heather:
Episode Highlights:
03:01 Stefanie’s Journey: Lifestyle and Passions
08:47 Mental Health Journey
16:07 Tips for Balancing Energy and Priorities
39:00 Advice for Personal Growth
47:15 Supporting Businesses That Care for Their Clients
51:24 The Broken & Enough Podcast
Connect with Stefanie:
Stefanie Lauren is a multi-passionate entrepreneur and podcaster. She hosts the "Broken and Enough" podcast, which focuses on changing perspectives and personal growth. With over 20 years of experience in corporate settings, particularly in retail and sports industries, Stefanie is passionate about business consulting and supporting entrepreneurs. She specializes in embodiment work, mental health advocacy, and helping individuals develop healthier mindsets. Currently exploring virtual assistance and business coaching, Stefanie is dedicated to empowering others to find their authentic path and overcome personal challenges.
Heather Nelson: Hello everyone. Welcome to this week's Life Conversations With a Twist. I have Stefanie Lauren here. You're also another podcaster, which I feel like I have a lot of podcasters on my podcast. But this is our community, and this is what I love. So welcome to my show.
Stefanie Lauren: Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. I'm just looking forward to this chat. It's always good chatting with you, so I know it's going to be so good.
Heather Nelson: We can go so many directions. So Stephanie and I met through a podcast group, and we've been chatting offline, and then we're finally like, hey, we need to meet. I was just on your podcast, which is the Broken & Enough podcast. And now, you're on mine to chat more about your world and what you're passionate about. So yeah, we're going to dive right in. So tell everyone, the listeners, where you live, a little bit about your day to day life.
Stefanie Lauren: Oh, fun. So I reside in Southern California. And for anybody that's actually familiar with the area, I would say it's the Inland Empire. There's a multitude of cities. And anytime I name off the actual city like, what is that? Unless you live around here, so it's just easier to say that I live in the Inland Empire area of Southern California. And if you don't, it's completely okay. I'm about an hour from the beach, an hour from the mountains, an hour from the desert. Literally, a kind of century located where at any given day, at any given moment, I could be like, all right, cool. Hey, let's just go do this, and it's not terribly far away.
Heather Nelson: You're living like real California life. I meet so many people all over and they're like, oh, you live in California, and these beautiful beaches. Our beaches in Sonoma County are cold. You can never go swimming in them. It's foggy, it's overcast, but you live in the world of what California is supposed to be.
Stefanie Lauren: Funny, you say that because I'm a person where I love being like, I just think about the beach. I love being there, but I don't like cold water.
Heather Nelson: And people don't come to Sonoma County.
Stefanie Lauren: They were like, oh, it's 70 some odd degrees or whatever. And I'm like, if it's not lukewarm bath water, I have no desire to be in it. I'll walk with my feet along the beach or whatever. But there's something there at the beach. I've grown up at the beach with family members and stuff like that. Whole other story, whatever. But it just kind of is ingrained in me in a way where it's just so special to me, and I love being there. There's just some sort of deeper connection, just like a serene essence of it. Anytime, I definitely don't mind driving to the beach. A thing I'm doing later next week where I'm like, oh, yeah, let's go to Newport. I don't even care. But I hear your area is beautiful.
Heather Nelson: We'll have to visit each other. I might try to go down there, though.
Stefanie Lauren: Always up for traveling. I'm Southern California. What else? I'm a multi passionate individual that's the way I choose to describe myself. I've been in the corporate world off and on for probably over 20 years, but I also have a passion for the entrepreneur side of things, and that's something that's been on my heart for years. Ever since high school, I had the opportunity to do some business. What's the word for it? I don't know. It's like a business.
Heather Nelson: Management, business admin, business management.
Stefanie Lauren: Only two people from each school got picked, and I was actually lucky enough. And I have no idea how I got picked. To this day, I think I have no idea. I'm guessing teachers or something like, oh, yeah, I did it. And I was like, all right, cool. But we have to go to this local college for a week, and literally live there for a week and do some crazy, awesome business stuff. So my brain's always been in business. I shamelessly, humbly say, I just have a knack for certain things. I'll be in a conversation with friends. And sometimes, something just pops out where I'm like, how about this? Or my brain just kind of navigates around that, and it also helps that I've been in different business settings for the last 20 plus years, primarily retail front end, and also corporate end. But within the sports industry, it just kind of also satisfies that adventure side of me. So now, I don't know, I always had a knack for something business wise myself, and I'm still navigating what that looks like. Dabbling in the idea of, honestly, virtual assistant. But more on business consulting as well. I'm curious about real estate. I know you said that you're a curious person, I'm also a very curious person. I love to learn things that intrigue me. And I'm like, hey, how can I help? How can I do things? What information can I absorb in, decide what lights me up, and follow that.
Heather Nelson: I think one thing that I love, and where you and I connected, and my listeners will probably agree, is that we are both multi passionate people. I literally people go, Heather, you do 5000 things, how do you do it? You want to learn because you're like, is this something I want to learn? Is this something that is going to be fulfilling for me? Is it something that I'm gonna kill it at is? I can't wait to have this conversation because people always ask me, and I'm like, see, I'm not the only crazy person out there that is curious to try all these different things.
Stefanie Lauren: Yes. It's a blessing. I wouldn't say it's a curse, it's a blessing. But it's one of those things where it's like, okay, you have to learn to manage your energy and yourself to know, okay, am I over exerting myself? Is it okay to be multi-passionate? That's something I really want people to know. It's okay to be multi-passionate. There's not a right or wrong way to do it, but just checking with yourself like, okay, I'm okay extending myself to multiple things to explore and see what comes up of it. But also, checking with myself, my energy levels, my mental health. I'm also mental health passionate. That's part of my journey, and just making sure that I feel whole, I feel in alignment with what I'm doing at this moment. And that's okay to change too. You might decide one day like, hey, you know what? I don't want to do this anymore. Whether you just don't like it, or it's like, hey, you know what? My energy is lit up more.
So in this other direction, that's okay too. You can come back to something else, or you can decide, I think it's not my thing at all. I kind of dabbled in it. It wasn't as exciting as I thought. I like this over here like, it's clearly okay to change. And something I used to tell myself when I was just thinking about life, career and stuff like that, I'm like, people can have multiple long term careers in the span of that working age, or be like, you work to your retired age, 65, 60, whatever it is nowadays. And so you can have a lot of long term careers. However, you can also have multiple careers. They don't have to be long. I think like 10 years. But nowadays, three and five years is also long for some people. You can do a lot of things, and you can test little things while you're doing something else, and just decide where you want to go and what you want to do with it. And something that I like to tell myself, I'm like, if I don't try, I don't know what door is going to open. Or I don't know what door is going to shut. And that helps me decide, is this really for me right now? Or maybe not at all? Or is this actually for me in some capacity? And I'm still exploring to see what next door opens, what next opportunity opens that continues to align with that path.
Heather Nelson: One of the things that you had mentioned is energy. So today, I'm gonna focus on this part of my business. Today, I'm gonna do my podcasting. Today, I'm gonna work on this client. For me, that helps me plan out my week. But then there's some days that you just wake up. Well, there's some days when you wake up and you don't want to do anything. And then there's some days that you're like, especially sometimes with the podcast, I'm like, I don't want to get up. I don't want to have these interviews. You don't have the energy for it. But then it's like, God, when you show up and you actually do the things, I'm like, I'm so glad that I showed up because I wouldn't have had this conversation, or I wouldn't have met this person. It's funny how those things go, but I think it's like listening to yourself. There's some days where I'm like, I am tapped out. I don't want to do anything. Or I've exhausted myself all day. I have all these things to do when I get home and I'm like, you know what? I don't want to sit here and do a puzzle. Or I just want to sit here and do absolutely nothing. And so talk to me a little bit about your process of listening to your energy, listening to your body, like exploring what you're passionate about, or leaning into a business, or leaning into a podcast, or leaning into a bigger vision for yourself.
Stefanie Lauren: Yeah, wow. It just so much comes through with it. I'll dabble in a little bit of my personal story. Mental health has always been really important to me. A quick snippet of that, and we can dive in deeper at any point you would like to. I've always known that something was different, or I felt off. I can even tell you how many years it's been like that. I've had the house, I've had the career, I've had the relationship, whether they were happening at the same time or different parts, different seasons of my life. I've had a lot of it, and I still have this internal something. This internal battle where I just feel off. I just feel like something is not aligning, something's not right. I don't really know. Of course, it turns into like, okay, something's wrong with me, something's not right. I feel broken. I feel like there's something that doesn't line up. How does everybody else do this? So probably almost three years ago now, something in my life catapulted where it's like, it didn't matter externally what was happening. A lot of things did happen that were crumbling in essence. But for me, I don't think it was those specific things. It was more of finally waking up inside and saying, you know what? I don't want to continue to feel like this. There has to be something going on. But part of it too is I started having physical symptoms.
I had to be very transparent. I had this flaky scalp that just appeared out of nowhere. My body would be twitching primarily when I would actually finally relax, to go to sleep or something. Or when I was watching TV, my body would start twitching. It wasn't just like a subtle twitch. It was almost like ping pong, not ping pong, pinball machine. When you actually do whatever, it goes all over. That's what it felt like in my body. Even having this irregular period where I'm like, okay, I keep having more and more symptoms, and it's starting to scare me. What's coming next? Because each one is more severe. When I actually went to the doctor, did the whole thing every time, all they said was, oh, it's probably because you're stressed. Oh, it's probably because you're stressed. And aside from medication, their only other advice was a well balanced diet, balance your exercise. And I want to say that there was something else in there. There were three pillars in life, and I can't think of a third one at the moment, hormones, so that's what it ended up being. I didn't know that. And I didn't know that even from my doctors. They ran all this test, the traditional, normal tests, and they're like, okay, you look fine. Everything seems fine. That's all I was getting. I was also offered antidepressants. And to be very honest, I was very torn about it. I'm having thoughts, but nothing to the point where I'm actually going to act on it. But I just feel so dark. I feel so deep, almost like nothing's giving like, what's happening? What's the point of anything?
But with that being said, I also believe that, for me, I can't take my own life. That's just being very transparent. So I never had that extent, but it was more of just that internal darkness of, well, I'm here until my time's up. I believe in God, so it's okay until God says I'm done. But here I am continuing to wake up every single day, and it's almost more of a misery. And I'm like, okay, I'll just keep doing this. I did opt to try antidepressants. I was very neutral. I tried it, and I was like, okay. Maybe it's going to help me balance out a little bit so I can start doing other things. But what really ended up helping is after I started that, and I've only been on antidepressants for maybe about 9, 10 months before I decided to make the decision to wean off of them. Because it was never my intention to be on them full time. My doctor even said it wasn't her intention either. And in the meantime, I was at a women's conference. I've made friends with a girl there. I was watching her, like podcasts and stuff like that. And there was a lady there who did embodiment work, and I just kind of literally started stalking her on Instagram. And I was like, okay, cool. Start talking with her. She had a program. Got into that, and I started to get into what embodiment was, and the best way that I can describe. Because sometimes, people are like, what the heck is embodiment?
The best way I can describe it is just literally learning how to tune into your body. And I used to think I was self aware until I started doing the work. I was like, there's more to it. There's actually more that my body is saying to me. And that's where I transitioned. A lot of it was just very subtle. A lot of things were happening inside of me. I was doing things, thinking things where it's like this underneath coding, internal coding was happening, or I was uncoding. These conditions that I believed in my entire life. That kind of helped me decide, well, I'm supposed to have this. I'm supposed to do this. Society says this versus, what do I want that feels right for me? And that transitions into your question about energy and stuff is like, instead of looking at, I'm expected to do this, I'm expected to be a mother, be a wife, have a house, have a career. All these things, a lot of these things I don't have anymore because maybe it's not my time. There's a lot of things that are genuinely out of my control. There's only so much as within my control. But with that being said, it's like, okay, what can I do? What do I actually have the power of? I have the power of how I think. I have the power of what I physically can do. To be honest with you, just because I can lift my arm doesn't mean it's a natural reaction and a thing I can do, but it's not always guaranteed. So it's like, okay, what do I have control over? I have no control over what someone thinks of me. I have no control over what someone feels. If they hire me, if they don't like me, I have no control over all these things. I have no control. I'm going to get that house, or get that job, or get that client, or get that relationship I have zero control over. I can't just say, oh, I want it. I'm going to have it. There's mental tiny, tiny steps that we can take.
However, there's still no guarantee. The only guarantee is what I choose to do, and how I feel about it. And a lot of the internal work that I started doing is, how am I feeling? What am I feeling? All centered in a selfish way, but in a healthy way. It became like looking into myself and putting myself first, and that's kind of what I do with my energy and stuff. I've played around with different stuff, from time blocking. I've played around with different things, with just different types of things like to do lists, task lists and all this stuff trying to figure out what worked for me. And I hear all these stories of people like, oh, wow, it works for me. And they have such success, whatever. So of course, I'm trying different things. I'm like, it doesn't feel right for me. And there's also times where I've tried to do a list and then I feel guilty about it. I'm like, oh, I didn't accomplish this today. I'm not actually telling myself that I'm a failure. But that deep internal voice that we all kind of have that comes up where it's like, well, you didn't complete this. There you go again, not doing something, or you're not good because you didn't complete this. These subtle things that we don't even realize we're telling ourselves, that stuff comes up even like, okay, I didn't do this, whatever. I didn't mark it off. Sometimes, it's daunting to look at a checklist and be like, cool. I woke up today and I feel like trash. I have this list that if I don't do it, that should make me feel more like trash. And it's like, well, that's not fair to ourselves. I wouldn't say that to my best friends, but why do we say it to ourselves? And that's a huge thing.
I hear it all the time, but at the same time, it's not until you actually believe it. You can sit there Heather and you could be like, oh, hey, Stephanie, go ahead and try this. And I'm like, all right, sounds great. Because you can see maybe from the outside, that something just is going to work. But until I believe it, until I decide that it's right for me is when it's actually going to work for me. It's actually going to take action. So I've gone through different checklists. I've gone through different to-do lists. And at the moment right now, what seems to be working for me is usually on Sunday nights because I found this really cool weekly to do notepad. And I like that. It has high priorities, low priorities, follow ups, a note section, and it has each day with, I don't know, 8 or 10 little slots, whatever. But it actually kind of looks pretty too. I'm like, okay, this makes me feel good. What makes you feel good that you're gonna look at and enjoy, don't get me wrong, I've gotten caught up on like, that looks pretty and all this stuff, whatever. And then I'm like, it doesn't work for me. It just literally happened to align.
I'm browsing Amazon, and I was like, hey, that sparked an interest. Let me try it. And all my intention was, let me try it. And I got to develop my own little system because when I first got it, I was like, hey, okay, cool. Let me put in my high priorities, low priorities. Let me put all my stuff that I have for the week, and then let me go ahead and take time to put things in different blocks. It just didn't work. And the reason why, for me, it didn't work is because I would wake up one day, it wouldn't feel like I wouldn't do something. And then even though I've come a long way and I don't have those initial negative thoughts of, oh, I'm a failure, but it just didn't work. It almost exhausted me looking at it. Now on Sunday nights, I kind of go through because I start the new page, and I actually don't even fill in my priorities first. I kind of just sit there for a minute. I just kind of have a quiet moment to myself, maybe put on some music, and I just start thinking about, what do I want for this week? What do I want coming up in business, in personal life? What are my priorities this week? What do I have that maybe I'm like, okay, hey, I've been thinking about this for a while, and I actually feel like I'm ready to look at that. Or I'm ready to do this. Or hey, you know what?
I haven't talked to them so and so, and I'm not sure I want to have a conversation while I want to calm down. That's on my list this week, so just feel what feels right for me, what's coming up, and just really listen and pay attention. What is coming up while I'm thinking about this coming week? Do I have hard set appointments, whether it's health appointments, or other stuff I planned a month in advance or whatever to go meet with a friend or whatever? Just observing with no agenda, with no, oh, my gosh, that's too much, or whatever. But just observing what comes up. I'm actually almost ready to start doing as if it wasn't midnight at night like, okay, if I had all the time right now, what would I do? Oh, hey, I want to go do this. I want to work on that. So just kind of deciding at that moment of what feels right for me, and then I kind of just fill out the Monday. And I was like, alright, cool. Tomorrow, Monday feels like this. And I started thinking, you know what? Maybe I haven't really been moving a whole lot the last couple days, and my body is aching. You know what? Movement's a priority. I'm going to put that in my priority list. As I start doing my stuff each night, because what ends up turning into is each night before I go to bed, I just take a few minutes. It's not super long. It could be two minutes, it could be five minutes, 10 minutes, whatever I feel like almost content with. I'm like, okay, I feel good with what has come up for me inside, and what I'm listening to, and what I feel right about. But each night, I kind of do the same thing, and I build out the next day. I'm like, you know what? Today, I'm going to do this. You know what? I'm going to wake up. I'm trying to get into maybe a set time to wake up, but that honestly doesn't always work either. But it's like a little bit of a privileged situation right now where it's like, okay, I get to decide what time I wake up, but I know what's also healthy for me.
There's days I have to get up super early because I have things going, or there's days where my body says, you need to sleep. Even if I try to get up at 6:00, 7:00 o'clock in the morning, it's like, huh, just kidding. You're sleeping. And you're like, oh, okay, you know what's best. But just really sitting with like, okay, what feels right? What feels like the right time based on what I want to do? Do I want to go for a walk in the morning? Because I'm really trying to maybe put in my movement, knowing that I'm going to be maybe in front of my computer for several hours that day, or the last couple days. Or I see myself sitting for the next couple days because maybe I'm studying something or diving deep into a project. Movement's important. Sometimes, it's a big movement. I'm gonna go for a walk for however long that is. That's an intention in itself. And then throughout the day, I can break up my stuff and actually like, okay, I've been sitting for a while. Let me get up and move around. Or let me do a 10 minute just Google something on yoga, and do a 10 minute practice or whatever. But I'm literally sitting with myself the night before going, okay, what feels right today? I was like, hey, you know what? I have this with you. I wanted to get a walk in. I knew I wanted to get a shower because I know it's gonna make me feel good. Because let's be honest, showers don't always happen daily, and that's just being very honest about it. What makes you feel good? If having that moment with yourself in the morning like, hey, I want my cup of coffee.
And that silence, if you have the opportunity, sometimes I get it. We don't always have the opportunity for silence. But I've realized that if I don't take time for myself in the morning in some fashion, that doesn't always look the same for the rest of my day. I end up feeling anxious. Everybody else that I come in contact with, it's not necessarily their doing, but I feel like I'm giving so much to them, and I never gave to myself so I'm conditioning myself, and it is a practice. There's days where I still feel like crap, but I'm pouring the whole thing. You pour into yourself before you pour into someone else. That's kind of what it is without even realizing what it is. I notice the days, and that's something that I've learned to pay attention to, and with the help of just being in an embodiment program for an extended period of time. You're just learning to pay attention to your body. If you're agitated, what's agitating you? Is it a person? Maybe it is. But why are you not setting boundaries to all these things? I'm paying attention to my world. I'm paying attention to how I'm feeling, what's coming up. It's not daunting, it can be sometimes. There's days when I don't want to ask myself a question. I'm checking out my own self like, I don't care, I'm just so done. But you get used to just asking yourself questions of, how do I feel? And that's how I manage my energy with my stuff. I have overarching priorities for the week. Different things I want to look into, different things I want to put my time into, and then I get to decide each night what I feel right for the next day. Almost envisioned like, I'm gonna wake up. I feel like this is probably what I want to do. I probably want to transition to this. But when I actually do wake up that morning, I also get to check in myself. And I have a very specific like, okay, I practice, I deal with just my own little breathing exercises. In the morning, I listen to music, and then I have a devotion time.
I read my Bible and I was like, that's just my little practice that sets me up. And in that time, if I feel like I'm just really just not feeling it. And you learn after a period of time, if you're avoiding something, or if your body's just saying, I'm so tired, I'm so exhausted, I just need some time. My brain just isn't into that task. Can I move it somewhere else? The beauty is, you have every right to get to decide. And that's kind of like the mental shift too. No one is saying, you have to grant it. We all have goals. We're like, okay, if I don't set some sort of deadlines, I may never get this business up and going. I may never study for that exam if I don't put the time in. You get to make that. For me, it's been an interesting balance because I can justify to myself why I don't want to do something all day long if I really want to. But if I think about what it feels to not actually accomplish something and I'm like, if I never get to do this, how would I feel in 2, 3, 4 months if I'm still right here, you know? That's okay if it changes. Right now, I might feel awful because I want to really get into this. I want to do this. I want to put the time in. But if something happens, life happens. There's a lot of things that we have no control over. Stuff happens that's why you continuously recheck in with yourself, recheck in with your priorities, your life, your balance. What is going on right now? I've been helping out my mom with some health stuff that she's been going through, so I have to prioritize that. Right underneath myself, my self comes first as much as possible. But that's something that I know my time and effort has to go towards helping her with her needs. So guess what? My season right now might look a little different where I don't give as much time to a certain avenue that I'm curious about, but can I still give a little bit of time.
Can I listen to something on my walks? My walks change. Some days I'm like, I just need really upbeat music. Some days I'm like, hey, I want to listen to a podcast. Some days I want to listen to whatever that I'm studying, and that's what I've really learned because I've tried not to be very rigid. But I've tried the rigid aspect of, okay, I'm going to do this. I'm going to double stack my stuff and learn this while I'm doing this at events. That doesn't always work. I want the person listening to, no, it doesn't always work. And that's okay if it doesn't work for you. There's times when it just feels right for me and I'm like, hey, you know what? I feel okay listening to this module about what X, Y and Z are today while I'm walking. Other days, I'm like, I just want to listen to some music, and I get to pick the music that's going to make me feel good and also get me in the zone for what's coming up. I want to feel very present in my body. I don't want to be thinking about all these other business things or whatever that I have going on. How can I hone in my mind, my energy, my heart into what matters in this moment, whatever that is for yourself. For me, it's just checking in and giving myself. People always say, oh, give yourself grace. Yes, it is that. But it's realizing that you have every right to decide and change. I remember people saying something like that when I first started getting to it, and I'm like, yeah, that's great. It's one of the things that just happens on a subconscious level. The more you do it, the more it starts coming up. You're like, oh, I recognize this.
It sounds ridiculous, but like, Oh, I just want, like, a quick fix, whatever. Just tell us, dude, it doesn't happen like that. It's literally just like, like, that's why a lot of things are called a practice like, you just practice it, and at some point you just start like, it just clicks one day, and you're like, Oh, I had no idea. And now I just get it, you know? So just like, doing it until you as you feel that it's right for you. And that goes for anything, whether it's managing your energy, whether it's setting your task list, your to do list for your household, your business, your just personal, like, groceries, laundry, all that kind of stuff. It's just managing, like, just checking with yourself. That's kind of like what I sign up with, like checking yourself, and you can set up. And I have, at times kind of like, try to condition myself of like, hey, ask yourself this, or ask yourself that. A lot of it just comes really natural now where I'm just like, Okay, I'm feeling agitated. Like, what happened? Oh, it's because X, Y and Z, whatever. It's like, I'm just noticing what's filling up, you know, coming up for me inside my body, if I'm tense or if, and even, like, it's funny, because I think now sometimes I can notice those uncomfortable feelings before I notice, like, the joy and the happy and stuff like that ever where it's like, oh, you know what that I really did enjoy this. I really was excited about this. And, like, it really was well, like that. And I think it kind of goes it reminds me of, like, when people, like, look at reviews and stuff, people are so eager to complain about something, but they're not typically as eager to give a praise to compliment. It's the same thing with your body. You recognize something that's you possibly can recognize something that's more negative before you recognize the positive. Of like, oh, you know what I did do well on this or, Hey, you know what? I had a great time. I'm glad I stepped out of. House today and went and visited friends or whatever it is. It's just learning by yourself.
Heather Nelson: Yeah. I think that we don't give ourselves enough permission to do that. Especially as women, we have all these things that we have to do and prioritize, and we just have to do the things. But some days, it's okay to say that you don't want to. I've recently discovered that I hate Mondays. For some reason, I wake up Mondays super anxious. It's just this weird feeling. I'm like, I could either continue to wake up on Mondays and feel that way. That's not a great way to start the week, especially a day that used to be my favorite. And so now I'm like, okay, now I'm intentional about what I do on Mondays. First thing is I go on a hike in nature with friends that are gonna fuel me, fuel my cup. And then I do the activities that make me feel good, or the ones that bring me joy, or the ones that get me excited for the week. And so that's podcasting or going to lunch with a friend, or things like that. I think we can choose where we go, what we do, and who we hang out with. I think that's the most important thing. I actually wrote down, we get to choose how we feel joy. I talk about this all the time, we get so negative about we're busy, we're busy, we're busy, we're busy, we're busy. And I'm like, have you created a list of what brings you joy? And if you're feeling some kind of way, or you're irritated about something, or you feel frustrated about it, go to that list of things that bring you joy, whether that's going for a walk or listening to hip hop, or lighting a candle and reading a book in the corner of your bedroom. Whatever it is, when you're feeling gross or in a weird space, just go back to that list and choose joy.
Stefanie Lauren: I think that's so funny because there was a time and that I don't even know what brings me joy, because I'm thinking it has to be this big. Some people are just like, oh, you know what? I can sit down and read a book. They just know that that brings joy. Oh, I can go and do this arts and crafts, and it lights me up. There was a season where I had no idea. I want to remind the person listening that it's okay if you don't know. I have a blank that I'm like, you know what? It's just something about having that when I travel, I take it with me because it's a piece of home. It's a piece of comfort that I take with me that brings me joy. I start turning things into very little stuff, but I'm like, you know what? This makes me comfortable. Honestly, I used to have battles. I love traveling, but depending on the circumstance, sometimes traveling has not been all that fun for me. I turned into learning lessons where I'm like, you know what? I may not have control over X, Y and Z, but how can I bring comfort with me? Is it bringing my blanket? Is it setting my boundary of, hey, you know what? I have to, A, either get up earlier to do my morning practice before expectations start at this time. Or, B, I get to speak my boundary of, hey, I'm not available until this time while on this trip. It's still so important to have whatever makes you feel comfortable. Like I said, it could be as simple as a blanket, as a cup of tea. Like you said, a song or whatever. Turn on the music, and then you decide, oh, you know what? I really like the lyrics of the song. It's kind of uplifting for me. Save it to a favorite or whatever. And just something that just makes you feel joy for any reason.
It doesn't have to be like it lifts your spirit. But maybe you just feel so connected to the song, maybe that song is speaking exactly how I feel and I feel heard. And feeling heard sometimes brings joy. Like you were saying, as women, we don't prioritize ourselves. There is a stigma that we're supposed to do all these things. And I'm not a mother, but I get the privilege of seeing those around me. I'm surrounded by a lot of mothers and what they choose to do, and what they sacrifice at different times, and how they sacrifice themselves. It's such a beautiful thing that I haven't had the experience to witness. I'm not a mother, so I don't know. There's a lot of things I don't know, and all that kind of stuff. But it's such a beautiful thing to be able to raise a child from even the outside where I'm like, wow, that's such a blessing. But you are so important too. We have to pay health insurance, we have to pay taxes, all that stuff. We can gripe about it, but it's one of the things that just automatically comes out, like our paycheck depending on how you get paid. How would it be if we turned our own thing our own?
Going to retreats every week we do this, or once a month we do something that is to fuel you up, and that just becomes a condition of a non-negotiable of, hey, you know what? This fuels me up. This actually is my version of health care. Because maybe it's not recognized as society's health care, but we have to put our own little side money for that. If it's so important, it's equally as important. And I guarantee you, that's gonna actually trickle into your actual physical health. I'm not a doctor, but maybe you're not gonna end up in the hospital as early when we get older. Maybe you're not gonna have these health conditions because you took the time. I had to learn to regulate my nervous system. I don't even know what that means. And even now, I'm like, what are the tangible steps? There are no tangible steps because that's a lot of what my issues were. My hormones were out of whack, and it was my cortisol level, which no doctor tested. It wasn't till I was in an embodiment program, and it was recommended, hey, have these different hormone levels tested. We can review them and go from there, and see what would be good. But there's so many things that we don't do.
As women, we put everybody else first. Speaking as a woman and those mothers, they put everybody else first. If you just gave yourself the smallest amount of time, and there's so many women. I love them dearly, and they're my best friends. Tell your children that your bathroom time is yours. They're not allowed in there while you're going to the bathroom. You know what I mean? Give yourself some privacy. And as you set that boundary, you're also teaching them that, hey, taking care of their energy level, their mental health is so important, they're going to be that much better. They're going to be the best version of themselves. Learning these things from you as kids, we learn from those around us. As people, as human beings, we learn from those around us. There's that saying where it's like, okay, if you surround yourself with millionaires, you're likely going to turn into a millionaire. Because you're now surrounding yourself with people, you're going to start absorbing their habits. So set the tone for your family, set the tone for yourself, set the tone for your friends, set the tone for yourself. If you're that person that says, I don't have a family. I'm not in a relationship, I don't have anybody else to rely on. I have nobody else to answer me but myself. You still have to answer to yourself. So if you're not setting that as a habit, you're not creating that space where it's like, it's not a negative thing. I have to do this. I get to do this. I care so much about myself. I'm gonna go have a spa day. I'm gonna go get my pedicure, or whatever it is that makes you feel good. I know for me, a shower feels great. My hair is clean, I feel just so much better.
Heather Nelson: Like put makeup on, or you get dressed.
Stefanie Lauren: You get to decide for you what it is, and it can change from season to season. Sometimes it's going out with friends and actually having a specific date and time. Hey, let's get together. Leave the kids at home, leave the husbands or significant others at home. Whatever it is, let's have our own time. And I think it's so important treating it just as important as societal health care. This is your own version of it. If you take care of yourself in your own ways ahead of time, there is a likelihood, again, not a doctor, but you're going to prolong your life, you're going to be so much healthier, you're going to be able to enjoy what you have right in front of you because you're not so stressed out. I've been burnt out. I've been in all these things where it's like, okay, I'm just living my life for everybody else, but who am I? And you end up losing yourself. Like, I don't know what to do. If you don't make time at times, it's not going to happen.
Heather Nelson: From somebody who has gone through personal development, you obviously have been through it. I've been through it. I think a lot of it is either you've done it, or you haven't done it. Because once you've done it, you're like this whole beautiful, spiritual, happy world about setting goals and doing the hard things. You're just in a different mindset than somebody who hasn't because you've experienced that. What is your advice to the person that's still kind of stuck over there that hasn't made that leap. I definitely have. I'm so thankful I went down that journey, because I wouldn't be where I am today. But I also know that you have to be ready for it. There's so many people in my life that I'm like, oh, you need to go through retreats. You need to do this, but they're not ready for it. What is your advice, or your experience that you could tell someone who's still stuck over here to take that chance to get through that journey?
Stefanie Lauren: As you were talking, I was feeling the answer. What is that piece of advice? I have friends where they have different things. They have the societal stuff, but they still have their own internal things where they're not happy for whatever reason. Whether it's external because of the relationship, whether it's internal, just self worth and things like that. The one that comes to mind for me is you're worthy. You are a worthy human being. It doesn't matter what you have. It doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't matter who's in your life. Nothing outside of you, your just body itself. As a person, you absolutely matter, and you are worth actually doing it. I've been in that, and I was thinking about this too. Okay, you've done it, you feel the awesomeness. But there is that weird in between, it's more of like geared towards you're now in it, but there's still that wishy washiness of it's still so hard. I still struggle. It is not like, I'm gonna do this and be perfect at it, and never do it again. There are times when I feel like I thought I healed from something, and lo and behold, something else triggers it. And I'm like, oh, there's a deeper layer here. I now have to dig into that to help release whatever it is.
Heather Nelson: It's not like once you've done it, you're done. Even at my retreats, I host retreats. But I look forward to that experience more than anybody. Because it's not even just hosting it, but what am I going to get out of it from my own journey?
Stefanie Lauren: It's a huge leap of faith. If you don't start and don't try it, and I would say that probably a lot of people, myself included, end up start dabbling because you're listening to like a podcast, you're listening to a book, a friend maybe talks about it, and you don't know until you try it on. And the scary part, I think, for a lot of people is, speaking from my own personal experience and witnessing others, a lot of people are like, oh, my gosh, it costs money. Yes, things cost money, but it's how you view it. What do you value? Do you value your health? Do you honestly want to try and see how it turns out? Do you value that time? Because I can tell you, even vacations and all that stuff, it's so much fun. I've had challenges where I can choose to look at this as a negative thing, and then look back on the experience as the worst thing ever. Or I can say, that was challenging. Here's a learning lesson from this, and now I'm going to actually focus on the really good moments I had. So the same thing happens with your healing journey. You don't know till you try. It's going to cost money. Everything costs money. You'll be like, oh, it's free. It's not free because it costs your time, it costs your energy. And cost can be a negative word, so it's really turning your mindset around on the words you're using. I know, I get to do this. I get to explore myself. I get to learn who I am.
Again, it's scary. Well, I don't know who I am, so there's a negative connotation that comes up, but you end up getting too fine with yourself, what do I value? Am I worth it? Do I really want to continue down this route? Is there something I can do? There is. It may cost you money, it may cost you time, it may cost you energy, but the other side or the beauty of it, not even the other side, because sometimes it's an ongoing thing is there's so much you can gain from it of just learning yourself where you end up finding your voice again, you find your confidence. You find your own empowerment where you realize in a way like, I don't care what others think, I'm going to set this boundary. I'm going to say no, or I'm going to be firm on X, Y and Z because I know it's right for me. It's what feels aligned for me. It's what I value. You're not answering to other people, you're answering to yourself. It's one of those things where you get to the end of your life. Do you want to be jumping for joy that you at least tried and realized, hey, I tried this again. You can try 10 different things, and one or two actually might resonate with you. And even still, sometimes they don't always work right away. The first time you end up planting a seed, like you said, until you're ready, you have to be ready. It's almost on a subconscious level. You just have to get to a point where you're open minded. What is this something I'm willing to try? Is this something that I'm curious about? Could I see myself doing or exploring that? Just start asking yourself questions and become curious. I think the biggest thing is to become curious. When you start to become curious, you subconsciously open those doors. You open that mindset to what's coming next, to what the other options are, if this really feels aligned for you right now, to how do I get to set time aside for myself to invest in this situation, to ask myself these questions. It's like figuring out a way.
Sounds so vague sometimes, but it's literally just asking yourself questions without the negative, open minded of, do I value this? What does this mean to me? What would it look like? And play out the scenario sometimes. You can play out the negative scenarios, you can play out the positive scenarios, and then you get to decide, what do I want to do if I continue to live the life I'm on? Likely the one that says, no, I can't. I don't have time for this. No, I don't have the money for this. Then saying, you do the same thing, you're going to get the same thing, versus what if I tried something different? I can tell you right now, I didn't even know what to expect. I went into my embodiment program that I was in with one expectation, and what I got from it was a million times different. Not in a bad way. There's so much more to it that I never could even pinpoint to being like, oh, that was going to come from this. You don't know until you start. And then again, my whole philosophy in life is like, as long as I keep moving, I can move forward. I can move backwards. I can move to the right, the left, diagonal that allows doors to open and close, windows to shut, all these things for opportunities. But if I don't move, I won't even know that that door is open. I won't even know that that door is shut. Now, pivot and guide towards a different direction if I don't move, and it's okay to go backwards. Because sometimes, it also helps us go even further forwards.
Heather Nelson: I feel like we should just leave it there, because that is like such a good ending point. I do want to say though the word curiosity has come up in so many conversations lately about everything. It just seems to be the word of the year for me, or at least that's been talked about so much. But what is next for you? I know you're dabbling in so many different things, but if your heart could tell you, if you had to say right now where are you going, what are you passionate about now, what is to come for Stefanie?
Stefanie Lauren: I have to remember what's within my tangible control, because there's always big pillars where I'm like, yes, I want the house, I want the relationship, I want the career, I want all this. But in a tangible speaking thing right now, I think I'm excited to venture into helping other entrepreneurs. I said that I've always had a passion for business. It's always been on my heart, and I'm literally toying with ideas. I'm starting in a sense where it's like, okay, it's classified as a virtual assistant, but it's so much more.
Heather Nelson: I said it's like, you could be like a life coach for them, or an empowerment coach.
Stefanie Lauren: And that's exactly what's funny. You say that because that's exactly where I feel, like my heart, feel like my heart is pulling me. It may start tangibly in the back end, I'm helping art centered businesses because that's what really drives me. I thrive when I feel like someone's heart incident, they're caring for themselves, their business is caring for others. They're really helping the person develop in some sort of deeper way. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with learning a new tangible skill. I can learn this computer skill, whatever. That's fine. The message and the mission behind what someone's doing. I've had the privilege to be in a corporate world business. I've had the privilege to work with other friends who are starting businesses and stuff just comes out. I don't say that in any other way than just in a humble way. I almost word vomit. And sometimes I have to go, like, oh, wait a second, hold on. Let me make sure that comes off in the right way, because I don't want to crush someone's hopes and dreams. But it's more to have a conversation. Hey, have you tried this? Have you tried that? So it's a lot of just business consulting. I don't ever see myself as the front end person, but I see myself as the driving force that pushes and supports in the backside of things like that quiet little hermit. That's like doing all these things. I love connections. I love deep, genuine connections with people so I know that there's something brewing in there with life coaching, business coaching.
Heather Nelson: Sometimes as an entrepreneur, I've worked with a lot who just need that extra push, that extra cheerleader, and that extra like, hey, bad day, shake it off. Let's move forward. I used to call it a hype girl. I'm your hype girl. I'm just trying to move you forward. But I think so many entrepreneurs need that boost of confidence. Then also reality check. You need to pull yourself together and move it forward. So yeah, there's a lot of that work.
Stefanie Lauren: Thank you. I appreciate that because I love getting that feedback too. Because sometimes, other people can see things that you don't always see in yourself. I really appreciate that feedback. That's beautiful, because I feel like that's where my heart is at. I want to support you in some way, and it's not just tangible tasks. It's that mental side. It's that, hey, I'm struggling to remember. Okay, cool. Let's look at what you have on your plate. How do you want to get there? Here's some different ways. Sometimes, you just need that person to bounce an idea off of or say, hey, I have all of this. I need someone from the outside to help me get where I think I'm going to talk through stuff. Like I said, I think there's just something in my journey that's taken my mental health, my healing journey along with my business interests. It's always been there. And something beautiful is brewing where I'm like, I know something is coming, and I would love to say that it is some sort of coaching in that sense. I'm always open to ideas, and I'm open to people or just like, hey, this is where we see you. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So that's where I'm at. I'm excited about just seeing what happens, where it goes. I have a few people that I am working with right now that I already see where it's going, and I'm just so excited because I'm just like, okay, yes, something is coming. And I know as I continue to move forward, the bigger picture is going to unfold where I have these visions where I can see stuff coming. I can see this grand thing. And I'm like, okay, I'm right here, right now. This could be where this bigger picture is playing out.
Heather Nelson: Tell the listeners a little bit about your podcast, and where they can find and listen to you and all the things.
Stefanie Lauren: Yes. So my podcast is called Broken & Enough. And for me, the whole concept is changing and building a perspective that serves you best. Something I like to say is it's not better, it's not worse, because then we look back on ourselves and we have judgment of, oh, my gosh, this version of myself. I'm better now because of this version of myself. Well, guess what? Now you're saying a version of you was not good enough. You weren't up to par or whatever. Guess what? That version of you is still a part of you, but you are in a different season. So it's like changing that perspective. Building that perspective where it's like, okay, I can look at something and go. I can look at it this way, A, B, C, D, all the way to Z, which of those perspectives is going to serve me? And also deciding like, okay, sometimes it's taking an extra layer back. Or it's like, hey, my past is fogging up my lens where I'm looking at something with a certain tone or a certain expectation. It's like, well, that comes from my past. And sometimes, that's not always good. So it's really just creating that healthy perspective that serves so that we can be that individual that we so deeply desire to be. That we can be that entrepreneur, we can be that mother, a father, that family, or whoever it is, that individual that we desire to be. A lot of that coming from my experience comes with perspective on how I looked at myself.
I know there's such a big shift that's happened in myself and in others where it's like, oh, my gosh, think positive. Because guess what? In some situations, there's no positive. But what I have learned is there is a learning lesson that comes from a challenge, or a learning lesson that comes from a negative, and that's what I get to take from it. Not just, oh, think positive. Everything's pretty good. Because, guess what? Sometimes, when you're in the deep thick of it beyond, if it's an external situation or an internal mental situation, you can't see that. But you get to decide and say, is there something else that I can take from this? Is there a learning lesson? Is there a boundary? There's all these things that you can take from it and look at it differently. What's going to help propel me into that version of myself that I want to be? Because if I hold on to this other one that I initially have that feels very heavy and very negative, I'm sitting exactly where I'm sitting. I'm not going anywhere. But can I look at something different? This is how I can either, A, never let this happen again. B, when the situation comes up, how can I handle it? So there's a lot of different things that we can look at in a multitude of ways, and also realize the lens that we already have. You could have twins.
The most scientific way to test things as twins or whatever, they're relatively the most similar, but they're still going to have their own lens. They're still going to have their own perspective. Everybody has their own perspective. And I learned that even in communication, I might be describing something to you, but your brain is thinking something else because of your life situation. So it's really having that dynamic communication, that conversation and that clarification of like, hey, that's what you mean. Okay, cool. I just took something you said in a whole different way because of something else that I was believing from my past. A person plays so big in every part of our life. I just think there's so much value in it. And we don't talk about mental health enough sometimes, or we feel very shameful about talking about it, and it's what ends up making us feel like we're not enough. We're broken. There's something wrong with us. Well, there isn't anything wrong with us. Maybe our perspective was broken. Maybe the way we grew up, that perspective was broken. What we learned, what we decided to try on one day and didn't even know subconsciously like that, that lens is broken. Let's put a new lens on there. Let's find a different lens that's going to serve you best in the season you're in. And as you continue to grow in the multi seasons that we constantly have that overlap, because nothing's linear like there are so many different lenses that you get to try on and you get to put there and go, hey, what lens do I get to wear today that's going to actually serve me best?
Heather Nelson: So good this conversation today. Thank you so much for being here. I'm so glad that our paths have crossed, and that we've got a collab on our own podcast. I can't wait to see where your business takes you.
Stefanie Lauren: Yes, thank you. Thank you so much. I'll also provide you with the different links and stuff so you can add them into the show notes, so everybody can just connect.
Heather Nelson: Awesome. Well, thank you. Have a wonderful Friday. Recording this on a Friday, but thank you again for being here,
Stefanie Lauren: Of course, thank you.