Show notes –
Join Shannon & Christine for a chat about Emotional & Mental Wellness with special Guest Cynthia Phelps, PhD founder of InnerAlly.
This week’s resources and references:
Find Cynthia at Psychology Today
Mindful Self-Compassion Dr. Kristen Neff
Mindful Self Compassion Meditation Video
Nominate your Shearo Nominations (subject “My Shearo”) to MyShearo@shealoglo.com
Stillpoint: A Self-Care Playbook for caregivers to Find Ease, and Time to Breathe, and Reclaim Joy
Show Transcript –
NOTE: While it’s not perfect, we offer this transcription by Otter.ai for those who are hearing impaired or who don’t find listening to a podcast enjoyable or possible.
Christine Gautreaux 0:08
Let’s do this.
Shannon M. 0:08
Okay ladies, welcome to our podcast. I am Shannon Mitchell, a black female, millennial entrepreneur, the founder of shallow glow, a handmade shea butter company. I am a champion for your self care, business care and intentional wellness.
Christine Gautreaux 0:25
And I am Christine Gautreaux, a white social justice advocate, an international speaker, coach and published author who helps you upgrade yourself in community care.
Shannon M. 0:35
Yes. And together we are women connected in wisdom, a podcast grounded in the eight dimensions of wellness. Welcome, welcome to our show.
Christine Gautreaux 0:43
Absolutely. I was, you know, traveling last week, as our listeners know, if they listened to last week’s podcast. And you it’s always funny when people ask you about what you’re up to or what you’re doing. And you know, people don’t even know what podcasts are. And really happy, right? Well, you know, I got some relatives. But it was so cute. Because my 89 year old, Great Aunt Betty said to me when she saw me, she gave me a great big hug. And she said, Honey, I love what you’ve been up to. She said, I see you on social media. And I just love what you’re doing. Now, I don’t know how that stuff works. So I usually just give you a life. But thank you for the likes.
Shannon M. 1:33
On Betty, your Grandma Betty.
Christine Gautreaux 1:37
It’s great. Betty. So thank you, Aunt Betty. Yes. Thank
Shannon M. 1:40
you and Betty, I appreciate that. How was that for your your? We’re talking about emotional and mental wellness. How was that comment for your emotional limits? All
Christine Gautreaux 1:51
right, it just made my heart smile so big. Right? You know, we all need that recognition and to be seen and to be you know, of course, we want internal validation. But that external validation is sweet do when it comes to love. Absolutely. And, and I love my Aunt Betty, she was a world traveler in her day. And some of my favorite memories of Aunt Betty. No, this is going to age me a little because, you know, we’re different generations. But Aunt Betty used to live in the valley in Texas. And that was where they grew grapefruits and oranges. And this was back before like you got all the fresh produce in in the grocery stores like we do now. And so every time that he would come into town, she would bring giant like probably 40 pound bags of grapes, and oranges for the whole family. So I associate her with like sweetness and yummy smells and treats like just didn’t get until she rolled into town. And yeah, so I I adore her. She is She is amazing. She was a professor she was yeah, she’s she is definitely a wise woman. So we love it. How was your week i friend?
Shannon M. 3:14
The week was good. It’s been productive. You know, I like to, I’ve been focused on my time and financial consistency. So I’ve been looking at the systems getting ready for this third quarter that we’re about to head into and I’m excited about what I see. I’m excited. So getting everything ready.
Christine Gautreaux 3:35
I love that that is fantastic. Well today we’re talking about emotional and mental wellness, you want to give our listeners the definition we’re working from today.
Shannon M. 3:44
Absolutely. So according to the University of California, emotional and mental wellness is important to be attentive to both positive and negative feelings and be able to understand how to handle these emotions. emotional wellness also includes the ability to learn and grow from experience emotional well being encourages autonomy and proper decision making skills.
Christine Gautreaux 4:11
Love that Yeah. autonomy and proper decision making skills.
Shannon M. 4:18
So for me essentially at the age that I am right now right feel like coming into let’s say full adulthood I’m not a the considering your age I still consider me a young adult Don’t Have Kids Yeah, so there’s definitely not married yet you know definitely more experience to be had but autonomy to me says who you are as an individual and mental and emotional and mental wellness is definitely important for that or I feel like we we lean too far on other relationships and now you go into unhealthy codependency and everything that that can lead to you know, so for me, one of the things that stands out is the autonomy and then the proper decision. Making skills from that wellness. Right? Yeah.
Christine Gautreaux 5:05
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think about, of course, I’m thinking about family of origin and things like that. I just went, and you know, you, you realize where your stuff comes from when you come home, right? So I think about that, and I come from an amazing family and every family has stuff to come from, every family’s got stuff that creates and, and creates who we are as people. And whether we do or not, or acknowledge it, I think is important when we’re talking about emotional and mental wellness. And, you know, before I jumped on this call, I mentioned to you and our guests that I just come from a therapy session, because, you know, I was trained as a therapist, I believe in therapy. And boy, I know like when I go home, I’m you set it up, so I can process things. And I can talk, I can figure out how am I with this? How am I with that. And I’m also the age and the generation that I’m a sandwich generation, I’m still finishing raising my young adult children. And I have parents that are aging. So caregiving on both sides, and so getting support around that is also to process that right to process. What that means and how we navigate those relationships, I think is absolutely emotional and mental wellness. Absolutely. And I am totally psyched to talk to our guests today. Oh, no, definitely one of my favorite people on the planet. I just Are you ready for me to introduce her and to get her on?
Shannon M. 6:44
You know, I’m gonna say yes. I don’t even know why you ask every week.
Christine Gautreaux 6:50
Do you want to talk about before I bring him on?
Shannon M. 6:53
You know, we don’t always talk. But we were kind of women connected wisdom. So let’s introduce our guest.
Christine Gautreaux 6:59
Let’s see who we’re connected to today. I love it. So um Cynthia Phelps, PhD, is a researcher, international speaker, coach and founder of inner ally, a company that builds evidence based tools to improve resilience and well being she teaches about the power of having a kind and compassionate inner voice, and guides people to explore their own emotional landscapes to create customized inner support language. Dr. Phelps has 25 years of experience in digital interactive design, and has been developing technologies from online classes, to mobile apps to help people learn to change their behavior. You can join her and others in practicing at her Facebook group inner allies, or email her at Cynthia in ally.com. And we’ll be sure to put all of that on our show notes and our websites. But right now we want to call to the stage my friend, Dr. Cynthia Phelps. Oh, hey, Dr. Cynthia.
Shannon M. 8:09
Dr. Phelps is just
Christine Gautreaux 8:14
fine. We are so glad you’re with us today.
Cynthia Phelps 8:21
Thank you, I’m glad to be here.
Christine Gautreaux 8:23
So we’re talking about emotional mental wellness. And this is to me, when I think about who is the expert in this field, I immediately think about you. So and your company inner ally. So will you tell folks a little bit about inner ally, and in the work you do in the world?
Cynthia Phelps 8:45
Sure. So um, inner Ally was kind of born from an experience that I had where I was reading a research article, actually. And it was about this topic of self compassion. I had never really heard of it before. It comes out of a body of psychology literature, that is called positive psychology where instead of studying people who are sick, we actually start studying people who are thriving, and then we figure out how to help others thrive. And when I read about this research, I had this like both like sinking feeling like Oh, my goodness, like, I don’t know anything about self compassion. This was the topic of the research article. But then I also realized that it was something that was going to really change my life. And so that’s kind of how I started down this path on in an inner ally, the company I created, and as I began to read more research, I took classes I actually became a certified teacher in something called Mindful self compassion, which is a eight week research based program that was developed by Dr. Kristin Neff and the clinician Chris Girma. And when I was in that class, and studying the self compassion for myself, one of the things I realized was that even though I knew all about self compassion, how it worked, I really didn’t understand the inner voice. It was almost like, I knew you could be kind to yourself. And, and I could do that with like, how I made decisions and how I lead my life. But my inner voice was still like a mean girl. And, and I didn’t even really understand the idea of like a compassionate inner voice until I heard Kristen, tell a story. We’re in the middle of class, she put her hand over her heart. And she spoke to herself. And she said she was experiencing a difficult situation. She was actually in the grocery store with her autistic son who was having a meltdown. And she put her hand over her chest. And she just said to herself, something along the lines of Oh, darling, this is so hard. I’m sorry, you have to go through this. And I remember, my mind was like, what? You can talk to yourself. And I was like, instantly, I realized, like, I was missing this huge piece of the practice of self compassion. And so that’s when I was like, Okay, I like to think of myself as a pretty smart person. And for me to to not understand this critical component of it, I just thought, oh, my gosh, there’s other people out there. They’re like me, and I want to fix this problem.
Christine Gautreaux 11:53
I love that. I love that. And I love the intention of speaking to ourselves kindly. Like I like to say to friends, I’ve probably said it to both of y’all. And I know y’all repeated it back to me. Sometimes it’s like, Hey, don’t speak to my friend that way. Right? When I hear my friend saying something that’s not kind to themselves, right? Shannon even called me on it right for the show, because I was running around like a maniac trying to find something and talking about how much of a message I was, and she’s like, Hey, are we talking about her allies today? Be nice to my friend.
Cynthia Phelps 12:33
That’s actually one of the very first things that I teach people when I work with them, either one on one or in classes, is to use that metaphor of Okay, so what if you heard a friend saying this to themselves out loud? What would you say to them to comfort them or to build them up or support them in the moment? And so that’s really important, it’s a it’s a great way to get yourself started.
Shannon M. 13:01
Yeah, what I like about what you said is, I think that I’ve thought about how I speak to myself, right? I think I’m encouraging you got this, or you can do this that’s on it. That’s on my checklist. I write it in my planner. But I don’t think that there’s been this space of, hey, I’m sorry that you’re going through this. I know, this is difficult. And maybe I’ll I will comfort somebody, if I knew somebody else was going through that, like you said, I hadn’t even thought about that. So it’s a good thing to think about. So if people are quick, because I know this is part of what you do, right with your work with your company. How do you help people move over from speed? I call it speaking to themself Crazy, right? You’re talking to yourself crazy, to have more self compassion? What does that transition look like?
Cynthia Phelps 13:52
Right? Well, um, you know, the first thing I say is, it’s really a practice. And so if you think about, we kind of adopt our inner voice, usually in childhood, either from a childhood caretaker, who maybe was, you know, said things that were, you know, kind of mean, or, you know, whatever was right, or maybe the person taking care of us was actually mean to themselves, and unkind to themselves. And so we unconsciously kind of adopt this language for ourselves until we realize we have the opportunity to like, look at that and assess it. And so, you know, mindfulness of actually like what is going on in your inner voice is really a key step. And so, you know, in addition to teaching kind of self compassion, I also teach mindfulness on a regular basis and lead meditation, and those that really helps you because if you’re not paying attention to how you’re speaking to yourself, you really don’t have a fighting chance of showing Changing it or shifting it. You know, in compassion, if you look at the root word, it’s actually come possio It means suffer to suffer. And so passion is really, the response to suffering. And so when this language is really the most effective, is when you’re having a hard time, you know, when you sit down to write that copy for your business, and that inner critic comes up, and it was like, Who do you think you are to be running this business? Or, you know, you said, Ah, you say something in a meeting that embarrasses yourself, and you’re, and then your inner voice is like, Ah, you’re such an idiot, I can’t believe you said that. Right? Like, so what we really discount is that the these voices, these critical or harsh voices that we have actually cause suffering, like, that’s a layer of suffering, on top of the suffering of making a mistake. You know, and so, I think that’s a really important point. And then, I guess, one of the things I also help people to understand is it speaking to yourself with compassion is not the same thing as speaking positively. Like, sometimes is, right? But, um, one thing that’s really important is that when you’re speaking to yourself kindly, that you actually work with that language until it works for you. And so, you know, you might have had this experience with like, an affirmation something like, you know, I am strong, I am healthy, I am wealthy, you know, one of those types of things, and then, you know, if you’re having a good day, those really work well. But then sometimes, you know, you don’t you just lost a client, or you, you know, the check didn’t come or whatever it is, and you say, I’m wealthy, and your inner critic is like, Haha,
whatever. Right. And, and so that’s, that means that that inner voice, that that kind of positive inner voice isn’t serving you at that moment. And so part of the process that I do work with people is to consider how to kind of soften that voice, work with the inner critic to to make it so it’s not quite so easy for it to to, like fight with. And then also, just really kind of craft it to what’s going on in your personal situation at the time. And so, you know, just a simple example, is like how you start your phrase, like your inner phrase, like, if you’re going to be using it as a mantra, or as a way to treat yourself when you’re experiencing some suffering is, if you instead of using always the I Am, blah, blah, blah, you can soften it with a Mae eye. And so, so instead of saying, I am wealthy, if that’s not working, like if that doesn’t feel right in your body, and your inner critic is all upset about it, then you can say, May I take steps to be wealthy. And you know, another thing too, with language that comes out of the research is that if you have had trauma in this area, in your life, maybe around finances, one of the ways that you can speak to yourself in a way that’s most effective is to use third person, so the inner ally kind of characters that I have work, but you can also just say something like, Cynthia, you have what it takes to build wealth, where I’m like, either using my own name, or I’m using that you are, or you are able type, beginning of the phrase. And so these are some of the things that can really be helpful to get someone started on inner language.
Christine Gautreaux 18:58
I love that, Cynthia, because you know, I’ve worked with clients that the I am statements are too much for them at the moment, like they can’t, they can’t make that leap. And so it feels like an incremental step. And it’s, you mentioned your inner ally characters, and I want you to talk to our audience about it. And because I you know, I’ve been a huge fan of these cards, even before they were born, like I have been on the get these out to the people train. So I want you to tell Shannon in our listeners all about your inner ally cards, and how we use them, and I’d love for you to draw some for us today to
Cynthia Phelps 19:37
awesome, I would love to do that. So the inner ally cards are based on two things. One is the self compassion, which we’ve been talking about. And so they can serve as guides to help you develop your own language by giving you by seeding you with some phrases that they that are already there that you can modify, makes it so much easier. Another piece of research They’re based on his something called schema therapy. And this is essentially a way to understand ways that people are displaying maladaptive behaviors. And so that term is just essentially means like, how are we behaving in ways that are not serving us. And so these are some of the things that can cause problems in our lives and make it you know, less than delightful to be us. And so the inner allies are based on kind of the opposite of those maladaptive behaviors. It’s kind of like, well, what do you really need emotionally, to be able to thrive in life? Like, what are you missing? Right? That that is causing you to have that maladaptive behavior? What did you not get in childhood. And so I call these core emotional needs. When I’m talking about the inner allies, I call them super powers. But they’re really important because it is how you figure out what it is in you that you really need to nurture to thrive. And we’ve all have different experiences, from you know, birth on. And so it’s important to kind of get an idea about what core emotional needs work for us. And so one of the ways you can do that there’s a quiz on my website, who’s your inner ally that you can take. And that’s that inner ally.com, I’m sure put that in the show notes. But that is actually research base to quiz if you take it, so they’ll help you sort that out. And so this is what the cards look like. And so if you look
Christine Gautreaux 21:41
at them, Cynthia, for somebody that may not be watching, but that maybe
Cynthia Phelps 21:45
that’s doing the audio, okay, so their business size cards, each of them have a character on them. And they’re very typical characters that you might find in like an adventure or in, you know, some kind of video game, you know, they’re archetype characters, basically. And they’re paired each with a core emotional need. And so there are 16 of them. And so right now I’m holding the captain. And that core emotional need is freedom. And so here’s what’s written on the car for the captain. So this is a little description, says, I am free to make choices that serve me, I help you set boundaries that lead to self respect and healthy relationships. And so this is all about kind of plotting your own course in the world, like being your own captain. And it’s one of the core emotional needs that that people can nurture for themselves. And so there’s, there’s no wrong core emotional need for you know, you can use all 16 to make your life better. And if you’re watching this on the video, this is the back side of the card, and you can see that it has lines on it. And the idea behind that is that this is really about you crafting that custom inner language that really works for you and not just having to use something out the box.
Christine Gautreaux 23:17
I love that so much. And I’m also on your website taking the quiz because I’ve never done that before.
Cynthia Phelps 23:24
Even possible, you haven’t taken the quiz.
Christine Gautreaux 23:27
Right? I know we’ve done workshops in person before, and I love you know, there’s so many that I love in that deck, but the grandmother is one of my favorite cards. I know she’s one of your favorites to the artist, the healer, like just, y’all if you get a chance, go to Cynthia’s website and look at the cards and take the quiz. And and Yeah, cuz they’re not to me. You know sometimes, cuz I’ve been doing self help stuff for a house, you know, since I can read because I love it. Right? I love taking quizzes, I love doing different things. And it’s fun. Your inner ally cards are a way to play with that inner critic and play with like, I always kind of asked myself before I draw one. Who do I need today to be the best version of me. And it never feels it pulls it up. I read it. I’m like, Oh yeah, let’s go for it. So it’s like having a ride along buddy in your pocket, you know? Like,
Cynthia Phelps 24:39
and that’s really what how they’re designed is to really just be a guide for you and a support system for you. Because for me, and I think for a lot of other people, when we start doing self help stuff, a lot of times it’s awkward. And when I try to try to first speak to myself in this kind or nurturing voice like Kristen had in her story. You know, it just like felt wrong, I felt like I wasn’t, didn’t have permission to do it. And so this system really helps you kind of get over some of those humps. And you know, one of the things that I can do for your listeners is I can provide you with the PDF of these cards. And so let’s make sure we make that happen. Oh, thank
Christine Gautreaux 25:27
you. Yes. Really awesome. Shannon, I know you have some more questions.
Cynthia Phelps 25:35
We want to pull do and pull a card for Shannon?
Christine Gautreaux 25:38
Yes, let’s do it.
Shannon M. 25:39
Let’s pull a card. All right,
Cynthia Phelps 25:40
let’s see the shuffling the deck. Shuffle. And oh, you got on my feet, I would say that one of my favorite cards.
This is the innocent. And so her superpower is actually acceptance, self acceptance. And so she is very powerful. Even though she looks like a small girl playing on this card. She’s super powerful, because she is the opposite of perfectionism. And so she says, I accept myself the way I am. Even with my imperfections. I help you set realistic standards for yourself, approaching challenges with curiosity and play. So if you have any challenges coming up the innocent, you have the opportunity to not just see it as a goal or a task, but actually as something you can get curious and playful about.
Shannon M. 26:46
Yeah, yeah. And that’s genuinely how I look at learning. Now. You know, I think that as adults, learning and going through new situations, can be anxiety provoking, it could be overwhelming, and it causes a lot of emotions, depending on what the situations are. But if we look at it as not a loss, but a lesson, and what is it supposed to teach me? For me personally, it does help me stay playful, but I love that I got the little girl. Because when I was little, I did not want to be called a little girl. I’m not a little girl, you know, no little kid wants to be called Little. But doing this podcast, I realized maybe it was because I didn’t like the way they described girls. Maybe it was because the way that they describe little girls, you know, so I really like the car. I like the car that you pay for me. And the idea and the cards themselves in general. And especially the fact that they’re based on research, I appreciate you, making sure that it’s again, backed by science and backed by things that work. And that actually helped.
Cynthia Phelps 27:49
Thank you, Shannon.
Christine Gautreaux 27:51
So I just got the results for my quiz. What does it say? Shocked, y’all. You’re, of course I got the healer. So who is the healer? The healer has the power of self care. They incur? Yes, to help balance one’s need for sustainable wellness. There she is, oh, God, there you go. Oh, yeah, that he read cards that I use all the time. And so you know, this is my work in the world with self and community care. But you’re gonna love this, because it’s the words associated with a healer, self respect, mutuality and self kindness. And we all need to take care of ourselves. The healer is here to encourage you to take excellent care of yourself. Sometimes it’s necessary to care for someone who is sick or needy. In fact, it can feel really good to sacrifice or take care of others. But sometimes we can experience guilt or resentment when we forget to take care of ourselves. The healer remind you that you have to care for yourself if you want to be effective in caring for others. So yeah, she rides with me often.
Shannon M. 29:07
And it’s so important, especially when I think about your book, Christine Stillpoint. And again, I love the research behind it and the numbers the statistics you ladies give, but when it was talking about caregiving having an effect on the caregivers body up until three years after the caregiving is done, and you know, most time for caregivers, it overlaps with different people. So if that healer, the healer is not being intentional about taking care of herself. That’s just like, like you said, Cindy, adding on the layers of you know, the way that the situation could be harming you. So I love that.
Christine Gautreaux 29:47
Right? It’s so true and so many you know, one of the reasons we wrote that book is because professional caregivers are often the worst about caring for themselves. It’s like doctors and nurses who you see small or eating junk food? Like it’s, you know, it is one of the pitfalls of that profession is we get so busy taking care of other people that we don’t check in with ourselves. So I love Cynthia that you have a card in there that reminds us like, Hey, you.
Shannon M. 30:21
Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, healer, heal thyself. I like that. And Christy, I know you. You said I have more questions, you know I do. So Cynthia, we just talked about professional caregivers, right, what I think about our caregivers that aren’t professional, that’s the biggest industry that’s underpaid when we talk about people taking care of homes and sick relatives and new situations. So, on your website, it talks about burnout. Could we talk a little bit more about that, and what that looks like to have a healthy balance with what you’re doing and not being burnt out and self compassion at the same time?
Cynthia Phelps 31:02
Absolutely. You know, one of the things that’s really important for anybody who is a caregiver, you know, is to buy Christine’s book No. Totally. And I understand, you know, in life, we take on challenges, often, sometimes they feel like they’re thrown at us, you know, sometimes we feel like we’re stuck in them. And in those places, what we kind of forget about is that we really have a lot of autonomy. In practice, we have like 100% autonomy of how we speak to ourselves in our head. And so oftentimes, caregiving comes with a chunk of suffering, either you’re feeling the pain of the person who is in pain that you’re caring for, or you’re feeling that suffering, or you are burnt out, because you have too much on your plate, you didn’t sign up to be a caregiver, and here you are, right. And so that is kind of the pain of life that is a that’s inescapable, to a certain extent. But one things that we do, especially with our inner voice is like, we take that meaning here, and then we add another layer of suffering over the top. And that is how we speak to ourselves. And so, you know, if you’re a caregiver, and you’ve taken on the role of caring for someone in your family, and you’re telling yourself this story, like, I can’t believe that I’m stuck caring for this person, and you know, where you are saying words to yourself that, like, you would never say to somebody that you would hire any care for the person, you know. And so I think that one of the things that we can really do to not only kind of help us avoid burnout, to a certain extent, is to really use that mindfulness of what is our relationship with ourselves around caring for this other person. And what does that sound like. And if you get if you dig in there, you know, sometimes I like to say it’s like a box. And so you kind of have to dig in and see some of the suffering that we have created for ourselves. And, and kind of take it out and work with it a little bit. And so that’s where using inner allies to help you create some kind and supportive language that is in works in the opposite direction, right of the inner like, critic or the the one that’s just a bummer on the inside. And that can be really helpful. Because, you know, one other quick point is that when you practice this, you know, self compassionate language is inner ally language, it’s important that you know, that you’re supporting yourself, and it’s not necessary that you like crush the inner critic or throw it out or you don’t have to have a combative relationship with it. You can kind of just be like, Oh, I see you and I’m aware of you now. You know, sometimes I like to use the metaphor of like, putting it up on the shelf. And so it’s not here, you know, it’s kind of over here and then building some other language up that’s in there as well. So that’s a you know, that’s one thing that I would say you know, that the inner ally language can really help you as a caregiver. And it all happens on the inside of you.
Christine Gautreaux 34:53
I love that Cynthia, I love I love when you’re saying having intention around it and even noticing cuz I’ve worked with people and have friends that didn’t even realize they were criticizing themselves. I was. Yeah. And it’s like, we mean, like, I’m being mean to myself, because they don’t, they don’t realize that it’s harsh language or that they’re being unkind or that. And, you know, sometimes I catch myself, like somebody will say, you’re being really hard on yourself. And I’m like, What do you mean? Because I’m not saying it in a mean way. But I’m, like, expecting too much of myself. Like, it would not be something that I would ever say to a friend, like, you’re not doing enough or you, oh, you only worked 14 hours? You didn’t put in that, you know, that you said, you’re like, what? That’s crazy dog. Right? Like she hasn’t said. And so having really just the paying attention to start with, about what is what is that inner voice that is driving the bus that we may not even be paying attention to.
Cynthia Phelps 35:58
And here’s a here’s a quick tip, when you do raise your awareness around it, like trying to avoid adding an extra layer of judgment, right? Like, try not to, like be like beat yourself up for beating yourself up, right? Like, this is your moment to give yourself a break. Right and, and to and to consider a different path. I like the metaphor of self compassion. It just cracks open the door to having a different relationship with yourself a different possibility. Like if that’s not shove you through the door, like say a positive affirmation might try to
Christine Gautreaux 36:37
you know, I love me a good positive affirmation
Cynthia Phelps 36:42
right through the door. You know, in some days, those work, right? So I don’t,
Christine Gautreaux 36:46
yeah, yeah. And it’s a good thing like to have. I always talk about having different tools in our toolkit. Like there are a lot, I am really grateful to have a lot of different tools in my toolkit, that I can reach around and pick out what worked for that day or for that moment or for that situation. And I definitely consider your inner ally cards part of my toolkit. I use them with my clients, and I use them for myself. You know, I usually have one sitting up in front of my desk for this is what I need for today, you know, or the week I sometimes I pull one for the week, but yeah, Shannon, you look like you had a question.
Shannon M. 37:26
I did. One. Can you hear me? Okay. Yeah. Okay, perfect. So you said something, Cynthia, let me see, you know, I take copious notes that I wanted to hit on. We prevented our Now we talked about that. You said you have 100% autonomy of how you speak to yourself in your head. I love that. But that is not what my question was
Christine Gautreaux 37:50
that Oh, okay. So I want can I say so really? Well, because it extends to the definition, when it talks about emotional well being encourages autonomy, and proper decision making skills. So what you’re talking about with self compassion. And with that we have 100% autonomy about how we speak to ourselves, feeds right into the emotional wellness.
Shannon M. 38:19
Yeah, yeah, and how we think about it. So that leads to my question, right? The mindfulness versus self compassion, I want to make sure that I understand the difference. So in my mind, right now, mindfulness is being able to see things when they happen, right? You’re aware of what’s going on, you catch yourself, when you’re doing certain things, whether they be self sabotage habits, or talking to yourself crazy, or whatever it is. And then self compassion, like you said, is that that piece where the voices are there when you’re actually suffering, right? Because of the root word of compassion? So is that the difference? Mindfulness is all the time being aware? And then self compassion is coming in on the pain point.
Cynthia Phelps 39:04
Yeah, I think that the Yes. And so mindfulness is a pretty passive thing. You’re kind of being in this state of awareness you are you have an ability to direct your attention, but you’re not really doing anything. And so compassion is really this urge to see when you see suffering to make it better. And so you know, it’s really easy for us to understand that you know, we, you know, are out somewhere and we see a little kid fall down in front of us and skin, their knee like it’s super easy. You just go up to them and be like, Honey, are you okay? Let me scoop you up. And let me see like how it is how are you know, like, we have this innate urge to help each other. This is like how we are wired so that we can be social beings. And so it’s like about Taking those types of thoughts and actions, and support, and kindness, and then turning that in towards ourselves. And so I see self compassion as being a an active practice. I love it. Yeah.
Shannon M. 40:19
Okay. I think I have my wisdom and action. Christine, we talked about what we’re gonna do. I think I’m getting a little bit clearer on the difference.
Christine Gautreaux 40:28
Yeah, every week, Cynthia, we do a hashtag wisdom and action about what we’re taking from the week’s topic or our guest. And we say, Okay, this is what I’m doing with that this week. So when you think about wisdom and action, when you think about emotional and mental wellness, like, What is something you could commit to this week about wisdom and action? If you had to hashtag wisdom in action? Yeah,
Cynthia Phelps 41:00
you know, um, one of the things that, that I think is important for me is to use both mindfulness and self compassion, to keep an eye on my reactivity. So when people say things that kind of get under my skin, or, you know, if I know I’m walking into a situation where people have triggered me in the past, then then I think that would be a really good challenge for me to take on. Because I know I have some of that coming up. And and so one of the great things about practicing Mindful self compassion, and really, mindfulness is baked in as a component of self compassion, is that you get a chance to pause between the stimulus and the response. And so the so what I’m interested in practicing, you know, or even more so, is when something and when something is said to me, that makes me feel an emotion that I don’t want to feel anger or disappointment or sadness or frustration, then I would like to lengthen that loss. And be kind to myself, because what was said was something that hurt me in some way.
Christine Gautreaux 42:31
So your wisdom and action is lengthening the pause,
Cynthia Phelps 42:35
lengthen the pause? In love,
Christine Gautreaux 42:38
In love? Oh
Shannon M. 42:41
I really like it. I like
Christine Gautreaux 42:46
Here goes the train. Oh, I love that. Shannon, what is your wisdom? And sweet? What are you thinking about?
Shannon M. 42:57
I’m thinking about self compassion. You know, I’ve been really intentional about mindfulness, I think I do a great job at seeing stuff when it happens, even knowing why it happened, you know, a lot of times, but I can be like, the caring coach, you know, she’s gonna say it in a nice way. But she might not be nice. You know, like, she might not be, well, I’ll say she might not be compassionate, she might not be. I’m sorry that you’re going through this right now I understand how you feel. And it’s okay to take the time, she might not always sound like that. Okay, I see it. Now keep going in. And so the self compassion piece, whatever that looks like, I’m going to start paying more attention to it.
Christine Gautreaux 43:39
Right? I think my is I’m hitting the reset button. Because, you know, I just went back home for a week. And sometimes we fall into roles or patterns of behavior with our family of origin that we’ve gotten away from. And so I’ve reset button on that, and reset and being kinder to myself, and this week, and just being a little gentler with myself. I’m also out of routine. So I noticed when I get out of routine from travel, or you know, my sister and I were talking this week, and both of us are, how did she put it, she said, we are under socialized extroverts, and we’re getting back out as we reemerge, and she said it’s awkward. It’s really awkward. And it’s really weird. And how are the introverts doing or how are the people who were socially awkward before the pandemic doing right. Like they made me thrive, because they’ve been able to be online or find their people but I’m just gonna be kinder with myself as this reemergence happens and as this and when I am awkward, you know, when I forget how to behave out and it’s been a minute, so I think that’s, I think So, Cynthia, we are almost out of time, my friend. And we are going to definitely in the show notes, tell people how to find you. But how do you like people to best find?
Cynthia Phelps 45:16
Well, the two ways that I love people to find me is through the website, inner ally.com. And my emails on there, Cynthia inner ally.com. And that’s the way like, if you want to get that PDF we’re talking about with all these beautiful inner allies on it. That is the way to get that PDF is just shoot me an email. And then the other thing that is super fun is if you are on Facebook, we do have that group called inner allies, and I love posting fun and inspirational stuff that helps us to keep these practices up.
Christine Gautreaux 45:53
I can vouch for that, because I’ve been a member of that group probably since it started or almost started. And I love I mean really great stuff, y’all that will make your day and then she’ll post some research stuff that you’re it’ll blow your mind. You’re like, wow. So check that out. For sure. Thank you so much for taking time to be with us today. This has been such a good conversation. I feel like there’s so much like I I feel like I may have to go back and re listen to this episode, because there was so much juiciness in there. Yeah.
Cynthia Phelps 46:24
I’m so happy to have been invited. Thank you so much. Ladies,
Christine Gautreaux 46:28
you are welcome. We are going to send you and I’m sorry. It’s virtual, which means there is no chocolate and coffee. But I bet I know somebody. So see you later. Oh my gosh, how fun was that?
Shannon M. 46:50
I feel better prepared. I’m more equipped now. Yeah. Thank you, Cynthia.
Christine Gautreaux 46:55
I always feel that way after talking to Cynthia and I really do. I’m not just blowing smoke about these cards, y’all. I use them all the time. And I have been I was I got one of her first decks as a prototype. And I was like, everybody’s got to have these cars. I love cards. I love the tactile, I love being able to have something that I can see. And you know, different things that have been on my cell phone that have been, but I like just propping something up on my bathroom mirror or on my computer mirror. What stood out to you about the combo today?
Shannon M. 47:35
I mean, are you asking me for one thing or because you know I have a list?
Christine Gautreaux 47:41
Three, top three things that stuck out.
Shannon M. 47:45
So top three, number one, because this is like what is it? It’s like Toastmasters. She used one of the words, right? So because she used autonomy, I’ll say the top one is we have 100% autonomy of how we speak to ourselves in our head. It’s I love that you might not be able to
Christine Gautreaux 48:05
graphics, you’re gonna that was coming?
Shannon M. 48:07
Yeah, no, it definitely
is, so that one, um, what else I love when she was talking about what you need to be emotionally supported. You know, we talk about, again, this is why all eight dimensions are so important. This is why we decided to talk about one each week. And not just a few of them that people talk about most of the time, because I don’t think that we usually think about that if you if I’m thinking about support. I might be thinking about physically somebody needs somewhere to stay, or they might need something, or financially they need some money. Or even socially they might need to talk but how do you support them emotionally? I love that. And the third one, I would say that speaking to yourself kindly is not the same as self compassion. Because I was also surprised just like Cynthia when I heard about positive psychology for the first time and that was after I had my psychology degree. I said how do I have a whole four year degree graduated with honors in psychology and I had never heard of positive psychology before. And so I’ve been mindful of speaking kindly to myself. So to find out that that’s not the same as self compassion. Okay, we have some more work to do. You know, and I’m looking forward to it and I love the show. And I look forward to the cards. Flash cards are really helpful for a lot of people. So I look forward to getting those in some people’s hands too.
Christine Gautreaux 49:42
Right? Well, I bet I can hook you up my friends. So we will get we’ll get you a set of cards and these are beautifully done and the artwork is spectacular on them too. So yeah, colors are great. So you see them in person. Well before we jump off the here because I know we’re almost out Time. Will you tell us last week we talked about you announcing the Shea row of the month for the month of May. So will you tell us first of all tell our listeners what what a shea row is? And about our sponsorship flow? And then let’s announce the very winner.
Shannon M. 50:22
Absolutely. So if you do not know if you’re new to women connected in wisdom podcast, our sponsor is Shea low blow my shea butter company. And it’s exactly what we’re talking about wellness, right? We do all this stuff every day. We put on clothes, drink water, tried to get enough sleep, but did you put something on your skin? Were you intentional about how you took care of yourself before you went in took care of everybody else. So the mission of shallow glow is to help women be intentional about their daily self care, right in the Shay row is to honor women to give a free gift of self care to somebody in your community who you know, does a knockout job at doing all these things for everybody else. But she may need a little help doing it for herself and we want to honor those women. And for May our shero is Carolyn, Renee, Carolyn Renee, our guest on the show again, if you’re an avid listener, yes, you already know who Carolyn Renee is. But she’s a mother a business owner, let me see her stuff. She community she organizes things in the community in Eastpointe and supports activists and artists through her different projects and ventures that she’s on. So when she was on women connected in wisdom, she talked about the intergenerational wellness that she’s worked on and her family with her and her daughters. I love that story. And for everything that she does in the community, we’re going to honor her for me so if you would like to get more specific information about her company and the different things that she does, those women connected in wisdom calm her information is there and also follow Shayla flow her information will be there once we announce the winners, but you ladies are the first to hear it and if you have somebody that you would like to nominate to get a free gift of self care, email my shea Rhodes a Shayla glow@gmail.com and I’ll be sure to put her in the nominations for next month.
Christine Gautreaux 52:24
Right. I love that I love that Carolyn Renee was amazed it was picked for me because she’s the executive director over at arcs arts exchange and a business owner for women helping others achieve and she just gives so much to her community I’m I’m grateful that Shayla glow is sending her a care package. I think that’s awesome. Well, we are here again another week. Another awesome guest. A great conversation, my friends.
Shannon M. 52:58
And ladies, as always, thank you so much for joining us for downloading and tuning in. We’ll see you next week. And don’t forget, be well be wise and be whole. We’ll see you next week. See you soon.
Unknown Speaker 53:17
Thanks for listening. This has been the women connected and wisdom podcast on-air live on Wednesdays at 5 pm. Eastern via Facebook and YouTube. Be sure to like share and subscribe be part of the conversation and get connected at women connected in wisdom.com.
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