Ep 6 | Healing Is Not Becoming The Best Version Of Yourself

“Okay, I need to say this - healing is not becoming the best version of yourself. Healing is letting the worst version of yourself be loved. So many of us have turned healing into becoming this super perfect version of ourselves that is bondage right. That is anxiety waiting to happen. Healing is saying, every single version of me deserves love. Deserves tenderness. Deserves grace. When we can get to a place where we can see and empathize with every version of ourselves even the version of ourselves we can sometimes be ashamed of, that’s when we know we are walking in the path of healing.” - Kobe Campbell, LCMHC

I talk a lot about becoming your future self and show up as the person you want to show up as. That includes going on a self-care journey and learning how to heal. Learning how to not reject parts of you that you may not like or you feel ashamed about. It is learning how to shift your perspective about your experiences and how to think new thoughts and process your emotions. It isn't about being a perfect version of yourself. It's about elevating who you already are and accepting all of you.

Accepting the good, bad, ugly, messy, dysfunctional, weird, things about yourself. It's about letting yourself be seen and heard and understood. Self-care is about building your emotional resilience, nurturing your self-trust, and building your confidence and self-belief up. It's about learning, failing, making mistakes, and separating your feelings from your goals. Sometimes we mess up or say something stupid or immature - everyone does because no one is perfect.

Show yourself some love and grace and give yourself some TLC - tenderness, love, and care. You've got this!

Kobe's healing video: https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8m3MV5P/

PunkRockTeacher's feelings video: https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8m3X7aY/

Website: https://merittrollinsbrown.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/merittrollinsbrown/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@merittrollinsbrown?_t=8hC2ICTEGIY&_r=1

Transcript

Meritt: 0:00

Welcome cuties. Whether you are just now starting a self care journey or you are a veteran seeking Inspiration for personal growth. You are in the right place, my friend. In this episode of Cue the New You, we will dive into how becoming your future self isn't about becoming a perfect version of yourself. It's about a journey of not only self care but of healing by embracing and loving all parts of you. So join me today as we explore some practical tips that could spark the transformation that you have been waiting for. So let's cue the magic. So I had a video go, I guess viral over the weekends. Um, I don't really know why it counts as quote unquote viral, but anyways, it got a lot of views. But it was a simple b roll video of me at the beach, but it had a powerful message as the dialogue The message was said by Coby Campbell LC MHC and you can find her over on tik tok at Coby Campbell underscore and I'll I'll link her video in the show notes, but She says quotes Okay, I need to say this. Healing is not becoming the best version of yourself. Healing is letting the worst version of yourself be loved. So many of us have turned healing into becoming this super perfect version of ourselves. That is bondage, right? That is anxiety waiting to happen. Healing is saying every single version of me deserves love, deserves tenderness, deserves grace. When we get to a place where we can see and empathize with every version of ourselves, even the version of ourselves we can sometimes be ashamed of, that's when we know we are walking in the path of healing. End quote. Now I want to talk more about this because this is 100 percent true for me. Self care is about caring about yourself mentally, physically, and emotionally. And becoming your future self isn't about becoming a perfect version of yourself. It's about accepting yourself where you currently are, where you started, and who you want to be in the future. Self acceptance is vital when you are trying to improve who you are and improve your mindset or habits. It's about accepting all aspects of yourself, even the ones you feel ashamed about, and not rejecting parts of yourself. Self acceptance is a foundational element for creating a fulfilling and intentional life. It provides you with greater emotional intelligence and self awareness. That is necessary for navigating challenges and obstacles, building positive relationships with not only yourself, but with your family, your friends, coworkers, et cetera. And it fosters a resilient and authentic sense to self. And you aren't constantly doubting. yourself and you aren't constantly doubting who you are and how you show up. And for instance, you aren't always going to have social anxiety. You aren't always going to think to yourself, why did I just say that? Or why didn't I have to feel like I needed that extra drink? Or what did I do to make that person not like me? Meaning something is wrong with me. When we are hiding parts of ourselves, it's hard to change certain thoughts, feelings, and habits because we aren't being our full selves. And you may be thinking, well, who I was back in the day still torments me and I'm ashamed of myself for how I acted and what I did or what I didn't do. Rejecting parts of ourselves can stem from a variety of things. It could be from social and cultural expectations, shame and guilt, conditioning and upbringing, fear of rejection, traumatic experiences, perfectionism, comparing yourself to others, and I talked a little bit about compare and despair, um, a couple of podcast episodes ago. Or, just lack of self awareness and lack of knowing you have the power to shift your perspectives of your experiences, thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. As we grow up, we are more susceptible to what our family, friends, and society thinks about us. Sometimes, certain traits or behaviors aren't acceptable or supported, and we feel like we have to suppress certain parts of our personalities or styles to feel accepted. and avoid judgment or conflict. And suppressing certain parts of ourselves leads us to question whether we are quote unquote right or not. If they claim I shouldn't be loud or opinionated or dress this way, then maybe they are right and I am wrong. And the more you think something and feel a certain way, the more you think that's something and feel that certain way. And when we get older and our prefrontal cortex is start to develop more and we gain more critical thinking skills Then we start rebelling because all the things we have suppressed for so long starts coming to the surface Oftentimes it can create a power struggle between parents and kids because parents want and expect their kids to behave a certain way Or maybe dress a certain way, but the kid is an individual who may Not want the same thing as their parents, who may not think the same way as their parents, who may not have the same style as their parents want them to have. The more you suppress The more you can dissociate or compartmentalize, and this can lead to stress and feelings of not enoughness, and you end up mentally, emotionally, and physically exhausted. When there is a constant struggle with family, society, or with yourself, you can reduce emotional resilience and avoid the acknowledgement of processing your emotions in a healthy manner. And that can disrupt your sleep patterns, and y'all know I'm about getting some quality sleep and working on that nighttime routine and that morning routine, but not getting enough sleep can lead to developing unhealthy habits, you can start repressing trauma, which turns into its own can of worms when you are trying to heal, it can increase sleep. It's anxiety and decreased self esteem and your confidence, and you will eventually have to find ways to cope with all of this pent up self rejection. I've talked about fear of rejection before and how we are all pre programmed with our primitive brains and thinking in survival mode all of the time because of our ancestors and how we can move past this. By getting out of our comfort zones and learning how to think differently and getting comfortable with the feeling of rejection. Getting comfortable with those uncomfortable feelings. It's definitely easier said than done. However, it is so liberating when you are on this journey and you start noticing the next time you want to try something new. And there is little hesitation or you get excited to wear that new outfit. And you feel, you start feeling more confident or you get more excited than nervous when coaching a new client because you're trusting yourself more and believing in yourself more. And you start to uncover parts of yourself that you have locked away and you start letting those parts show more when you get out of your comfort zone. I said last week I was doing this free business class and someone commented. About how they feel as though they can't coach without drinking because they like themselves better when they are drinking. Like that their persona is, I guess, more energetic and confident. And this resonated with me so much because I struggle with social anxiety. And I used to think that I'm a better version of myself when I drink in social situations. It gives me that liquid confidence, or liquid encouragement, liquid courage, whatever that is. And I end up being a social butterfly. But that also got me into trouble, and I had to deal with negative consequences from my actions and the older I got, the more hungover I got, so I decided to cut back on my drinking about three years ago. And went a little over two years without a hangover. And, like, this was during COVID quarantine days, too, and homeschooling my three kids. And when I went to social events after, like, when we could after COVID, um, I waited to drink alcohol. Whereas previously I would have pre gamed and then gone out and then drank at the event. Because I felt like I would be boring, or too quiet, or no one would talk to me because I was just being nervous and didn't want to talk to people. And I certainly had to get used to, feeling the social anxiety while still being nervous. Speaking to people and meeting new people. So, I was socially anxious and still talking to people and meeting new people. And the more times I practiced that, the more my anxiety went away. Little by little. Every time I pushed myself to strike up a conversation with somebody who I didn't know that well. It became easier and easier and I still have moments of shyness and I still get nervous but I'm not beating myself up over saying the wrong thing to someone. That's just who I am. I am weird and I say weird things sometimes and I say stupid things and illogical things and immature things sometimes but like who I feel like we all do that, like, I don't know. In cutting down on my alcohol consumption though, it helped me have the time to build my self esteem up and my confidence up. Because I wasn't relying on an external resource to build myself up. That had to come from within. I'm not chasing being perfect anymore. Like, my house is not perfectly clean 24 7. And that's okay. If people come over, and it's not clean, it doesn't bother me as much. Now, if it's like, you know, a holiday party or a birthday, then yes, things are gonna be clean. But if, you know, my kids friends come over, and we haven't picked up yet, It's okay. It also helps bring up a lot of things I was scared of feeling and scared to relive or revisit And I love thinking about our brains being like a house. You have this room with family memories this room that stores all of your go to recipes But we all have a room or rooms that we keep The lights turned off in and the door to it locked because it's scary going into that room It's like going into my old basement in my old house in Ohio It was dark and dirty and I didn't like going down there I don't even like walking to my outside trash can at night Because of the small strip of woods that separates my house and our neighbor's house When it's dark outside And sometimes our cat comes to me when they hear me open the back door because they want inside that night. So I often hear rustling and, I don't know, my brain's like, oh gosh, there's a person. But that hasn't happened and we've been here for five years. Anyways, if you are, if you are walking through your mind's home, I guess we can call it, how many doors do you have locked? And why do you keep them locked? We have got to give ourselves more grace and forgiveness. I often hear people saying, Well, what would you tell your best friend in this situation? Or, what would you tell your kid? And it's usually something encouraging. You are supporting them and loving them, even after they did this thing. So why do we not treat ourselves with that same respect, in that same way? Why do we not speak nicely of ourselves to ourselves? We are so quick to judge ourselves and to feel shame because that's how our brains and bodies are used to reacting. Instead, we need to start responding to ourselves. Questioning, why am I feeling this way? How can I forgive myself after saying that or not doing that or feeling not good enough? Instead of dwelling on your mistakes and spiraling into self pity, focus on the lessons those mistakes can provide. Consider what you can learn from the experience and how you can grow from it. This is how you start accepting the parts of you, you have been rejecting. When those rejections come out, it's loving yourself enough to face how you feel and to really process those emotions. Who you are today isn't who you have to be the rest of your life. You are not stuck in life. life. You have the power and resources to change your life, and you have to be willing to try, learn, make mistakes, and you keep trying, learning, failing, and making mistakes. Sometimes our actions can affect others, like my kids. I don't yell that often anymore, because seriously, I I get get a headache when I do. When, as before, I can yell and not get a headache. So, my body and brain have learned to respond differently. My husband would probably still agree with me on this, but I used to be really hard to apologize because of how much shame I felt because I did something wrong and I didn't know how to communicate effectively while trying to process my emotions. I try really hard to apologize when I know I hurt someone now, I don't, I often don't communicate with my husband when he makes me mad and that makes him more mad, which strains our relationship. I believe I've gotten better at this, but we are both working on communicating and both going through our own self care journey separately. And I catch myself now apologizing to myself. Saying things like sorry for not moving you body today and then I take action to remedy that because I've noticed when I'm not taking care of myself and I notice the how I feel and I notice the environment and the dynamic of the environment around me is just off because I'm not taking care myself and breaking the shame cycle. learn to take responsibility for your actions or inactions. Breaking the shame cycle is not an overnight process. It is a process that requires patience and commitment and help from others. And just like self care, it takes time. It's important everyone faces challenges and obstacles. Everyone has parts of themselves they wish they didn't have or wish they like this person more or be like this person. And your ability to navigate these situations and emotions can lead to emotional resilience, and self acceptance. My clients felt ashamed of who they were because of how they felt and looked. They wanted to look a certain way because in their minds that would make them feel a certain way, like happy or confident. When that is not true, they could have lost the weight and felt the exact same way so they get trapped in comparing themselves to others, wishing they could be different, etc. Why is this though? they are Caught in these traps. It's because they didn't change the root cause of the problem, which starts with your thoughts, your mindset. Because our thoughts influence feelings, and our feelings influence our behaviors, our actions, and our habits. And to think new thoughts, you have to become aware of what you are currently thinking. Are those thoughts originated from, not every single one, but the most recurring thoughts like I'm not good, um, I'm never going to be able to lose weight. Like those types of thoughts. To feeling your feelings, you have to learn how to process what you are actually feeling and actually feel that feeling and process that emotion. Another video I recently watched was, this person who came back from therapy and shared the therapist's advice and told a story about how it changed the way they felt, which then changed the way they responded, not reacted, she was, able to feel a new feeling by going back and forth with her friend over the phone trying to describe How they were feeling, instead of reacting in a sad feeling kind of way, which was their original feeling, they were able to sit down with the feeling of humiliation and respond in a way that aligned with them she kept going back and forth with her friend. saying, trying to describe the feeling and her friend would sit there on Google and be like, Oh, I think you're feeling this way, or I think you're feeling this way. They're like, no. And then they came to the realization that what she was feeling was humiliation. So she went from reacting in a sad way to responding with how she was actually feeling, which was humiliated. And she was then able to process that. Does that make sense? I will link this one this video for sure. I'll link both of those that I've mentioned in the show notes because they are really good But perfectionism creates an unattainable standard that can lead to self criticism and not good enoughness and this can lead to procrastination in avoidance Beating yourself up all the time and judging yourself will keep you in that self pity, negative talk, negative thought, negative behavior, mindset, and create a lot of friction. When you are always judging yourself or critiquing yourself, you aren't trusting yourself, and this can create a cycle of doubt and unfulfillment. It can be hard to make clear decisions and you always second guess yourself or you believe you deserve the life You are living because of the the things you have done or what happened to you in the past This is wrapped up into the victim based mentality Which I was in for so long you guys I felt that I had to punish myself in some way because of Expectations or I made a mistake but you deserve to be loved and cared for and Not just by others, but by yourself and for yourself. And becoming your future self is about embracing all of you. The messy, the quirks, the past, the imperfections. And all of this can diminish your motivation to do anything differently, because you can get caught up in this one mindset loop. So you start self sabotaging and you start doing things you want to be doing, like drinking before every social situation, because that's what you've done in the past. And self care is about giving back to yourself and carving in the time to do so. So give yourself some TLC, some tenderness, love, and care. Do y'all remember that channel, TLC? I used to watch What Not to Wear on that all the time. But healing is what helps fill the gap of who you currently are and who you want to be. Breaking free from self judgment and criticism cultivates a sense of self trust, love, and compassion. And the more we can cultivate self trust, love, and compassion, the more we start becoming our authentic selves, seeing all parts of us. And this is what I go over in my course. I break down each skill set so you learn about the brain and your thoughts and how to think new thoughts. with These exercises and resources to use, um, and then we go into processing your emotions and learning how to feel new feelings and getting out of your comfort zone and how to feel about yourself and how to shift the perspective of your past experiences that serves you in the future. And not being perfect. It's about making progress and developing your self trust and learning to love all parts of you and creating new habits and figuring out what habits aren't working for you anymore. And really diving into how you want to live your life in the future and how you want to show up in the world and who you want to be. And, um, and it's a six week course, and it's called Cue the New You,. And it's open for enrollment now, and we're gonna start the course in January, and then I'll probably do one in February, but I break down all of the components to help you learn how to care for yourself mentally, physically, and emotionally. And I love doing this work and I know you've got this. It can be hard. It can be overwhelming, but when you have guidance and when you have other people who are kind of going on their own journey, but then when you can come together how you're feeling or what you're thinking, you can connect with others who are kind of going through the same process. We are all on the self care, self love, self acceptance journey together, and let's lift each other up. Don't forget to share this podcast with your fellow cuties. And as we wrap this up, remember, you are worthy, you are deserving of love, deserving of tenderness, and deserving of acceptance. Cue the love, cue the healing, cue the new you. All right, until next time, stay radiant and resilient. Bye!