Show notes – 

Shannon & Christine talk about Social Wellness – What is it? Why do we need it? How has the Pandemic been messing with us all?

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I am Shannon Mitchell, a black millennial business owner, the founder of ShealoGlo, an all-natural handmade shea butter company. I am a champion for your self-care, business care & intentional wellness

and

I am Christine Gautreaux, a white social justice advocate, an international speaker, coach & published author who helps you upgrade your self & community care.

Together we are Women Connected in Wisdom a Podcast grounded in the 8 dimensions of wellness 

Join us and special guests for weekly intentional conversations about how to be wise in business, relationships & wellness.  

www.shealoglo.com

www.christinegautreaux.com

Connect with us on FB, Instagram & YouTube for our live shows on Wednesdays at 5 pm ET & head over to Mighty Networks and join our community at https://women-connected-in-wisdom.mn.co/

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 0:44
Right? Oh my gosh, it is a miracle that we went live today

Shannon M. 0:53
we got to be consistent, you know, that’s one of the words for this year for me.

Christine Gautreaux 0:57
Right i i love it. And then you know, tech happens. So you were saying your Shayla glow owner you know, I don’t know if you know this that you have me trained every time Shayla glow, I have to put it on. Because my is just so loving it. So I was on a call with somebody earlier today. And somebody brought up Shayla glow. And I was like, hold on. Just like every time. So yeah, oh my gosh. Let’s take a deep breath. And just get grounded and get present. I know you and I were having tech issues before we got on. So let’s take another deep breath and let it out with a focus sound like showing Toutatis in our last podcast

I don’t know about y’all. But today has been something else. Like I

Shannon M. 2:07
I’m not the only one. I was tripping for.

Christine Gautreaux 2:12
The energy today that weird, my friend. Like it’s weird today. I have had technical issues. I missed connections. My friend Carolyn Renee, who I’m hoping will be on our podcast one day, she’s the founder of Whoa, when helping others advance out Mercury in Retrograde and how the planets and all that and I don’t know it well enough to explain it. But what I know is when I’m having one of these days, I’m always like, Hey, is Mercury in Retrograde? It currently. So whatever that means? It’s messing with me today. I know it’s about sometimes communications get messed up. Sometimes tech doesn’t work, right. And I’ve been having all that today, how’s your day going? It’s been good.

Shannon M. 3:08
It’s been not as many missed appointments like you were saying. But it’s definitely been interesting things happening in a different order than they usually do. And the energy just kind of being, for me personally a little anxious, you know, but the way I usually fight that is by getting stuff done. And we’re here live despite difficulties, like you said, and so you know that that always makes it better after the anxiety, but we’re good we’re making it through.

Christine Gautreaux 3:36
Well, you know, today we made the conscious decision to not have a guest because you and I wanted to talk about this topic. And a you know, generally the podcast is about the eight dimensions of wellness and we talk about all the different dimensions, and today’s is social wellness. So you want to cue us up with that definition and why talk about it today?

Shannon M. 4:01
Yes, of course. So social wellness is going to be defined by developing a sense of connection, belonging and a well developed support system. certain goals for social wellness could look a list of different ways right but to give you a few. One is to develop the ability to create and maintain close friendships, feel comfortable interacting with diverse individuals, excuse me in groups, becoming aware of your responsibilities for the welfare of the different communities we talked about that right self care and community care is very important. The next point is understanding and accepting those with a different sexual orientation, gender identity, race, ethnicity, religion, socioeconomic status, life experience, etc. Understanding the concepts of sex and gender role stereotyping and explore appropriate sex and gender role behavior for yourself. Developing a global client Business by recognizing the interrelatedness of cultural, global and national issues and needs. And the last point we’re going to make you for today is work toward becoming a responsible world citizen.

Christine Gautreaux 5:12
Hmm, that definition came from Northwestern college, you and when you write it up, I really loved it. Like when you think about social wellness, you know, the first thing I think about is do we get to go out or not? Right, right. But more than that, I mean, it’s, it’s a yes and right. So many of this, these things that you just listed, have been so impacted in this last year. That’s true by a pandemic. I was on a call yesterday, Shannon, where somebody said, a therapist had stated most people are currently functioning at about 40%. Wow. Right. I don’t have the studies to back that up. Yeah, that was

Shannon M. 6:07
an important

Christine Gautreaux 6:09
conversation. But it’s when we were would you say you’re functioning? What’s your percentage? Right?

Shannon M. 6:16
That’s a really good question. If I had to say a percentage, are we talking about social wellness specifically? Well, it could be overall, right? Honestly, I would say let’s say social wellness, since that’s what we’re talking about. And I would say maybe at a 90%. And I would say so high because I’ve been very intentional about one of my goals this year is having more family time, right. So that includes family, best friends, friends from college, just the close relationships that tend to get neglected. So I have time scheduled out till March, you know that I know, I’m going to have those conversations, I’ve been reaching out more intentionally having more consistent conversation. But it’s interesting that you bring up the therapist, because that’s exactly what I was going to talk about, you know, this, but our audience might not, you know, since Corona, excuse me happen. I made sure to talk to a therapist again. Because my mom passed away at the end of last year, the restaurant I was working at close down, I had to move out of my apartment, and all these crazy things were happening. And I said, You know what, let me check in on myself. I think I’m doing pretty well. But let me make sure I talked to a professional. And when I went through the list, this was actually something that was given to me as a goal is my social wellness, what does my social support look like? And so I’ve been really intentional about it. So that’s why I would give myself such a high average.

Christine Gautreaux 7:42
I love that. And I will give you a higher average, too. I was looking at this report, I think it came out of Australia, and the link in the in the show notes. But it was talking about the signs of being socially healthy, and clued having assertive skills rather than passive aggressive ones. Balancing your social and personal time being engaged with other people in the community. So far, I’m seeing a check, check, check, acting and social situations, to be yourself in all situations where I want to do, I want to unpack that one a little more about that. treating others with respect, being able to develop and maintain friendships and networks, creating boundaries and friendships to encourage communication and conflict management. Having a supportive network of family and friends, like you just talked about, and having fun in life. Yes. I mean, those are. Those are, those are the signs of being socially healthy. And some of those have been impacted by the pandemic, I would say all of them, but there are also ways to get around that Right.

Shannon M. 8:58
Right, right.

Christine Gautreaux 9:01
Boy, that one that really jumped out at me was to be yourself in all situations.

Shannon M. 9:07
And you know, I’ve worked on that. And it’s really interesting, because I didn’t know I needed to work on that I didn’t even know my perspective on that topic until I was working in a different locations. Right. So again, before Corona, I spent the last five years at Papa Joe at a restaurant and going to different locations, being promoted being in different positions in the different locations. I was kind of for a second there struggling with myself like you guys want me to be in genuine you want me to be fake on the floor, fake with the staff members. And I got a psychology degree to know people better and genuinely and to be genuinely myself. And so I had to realize that one I was assuming that they were asking me to do something a certain way and that was an expectation that I was putting on myself. So remove that boundary, right and then How do I change based on the situation that I’m in in my audience and still be myself. And so usually what I tell people is just like a love language or Spanish, right? I’m not fluent in Spanish yet, but I do speak a good enough a bit to communicate. And if I’m talking to somebody who only speak Spanish, and then I’m going to make sure I speak Spanish. And that’s not me being a genuine to myself, that’s me being a good communicator, and knowing what I need to do to talk to the person that I’m in a conversation with, you know, so learning that balance is something I had to practice.

Christine Gautreaux 10:34
Last year. I think that issue being authentic, because you can speak a little Spanish Right, right, right. It’s a really hard time on this. For the listeners that don’t know I have young adult children who are 18 and 23, which you know, nothing will make you more humble. But, you know, I’m from Texas, so I grew up speaking a little Spain, probably more Spanglish, then then Spanish. Yeah. And that’s what I took in high school and college. But since being in Georgia, I haven’t spoken it as much like, so. So I am rusty. And it’s how do you in? How do you do this? Right? And, um, it is the like, like, it’s my kids give me a hard time about it. But it’s like, I want to be authentic. And it is part of authentic. It’s part of my history, who I am. And I was just noticing we had a comment. My friend, Glenda is on this, which is fun. Hi, Glenda. And, yes, fun is what it’s all about. Well, not everything. But it’s so important,

Shannon M. 11:38
because important.

Christine Gautreaux 11:41
It is because we have to have fun in life. Now. Glinda is an artist and a singer, and really lives a creative life. And I know she has fun in life. Right? And Hi, y’all. Texas, showing out I love it. So yeah, it is it is important about showing up as ourselves. The thing that caught me on that is in all situations, right? Is that can be tricky. Because you and I often talk about social justice, we talk about how it’s different for people in this country. And, and I would even say also as women, sometimes it is tricky to show up as our, our full selves times. And I know that it’s healthy, but I think it can also be kind of tricky.

Shannon M. 12:36
Yeah. And I mean, and we talked about this on Monday on our manifestation Monday call, you know, a shout out to the manifestation Monday, ladies, and reading this book about anti well, not anti lynching, but about lynching in America, especially how I am it was dangerous to be potential filled and smiling in and smart and literate and speaking multiple language, languages, you know, so it definitely is a different conversation now. But that’s why I’m thankful that we’re having this conversation and talking about doing it in a well rounded way, right dimensionally, and all the ways that you should think about it. Because even as women, you know, when we talk about being self actualized, like Maslow talks about, right, there’s all these levels that technically you’re supposed to go through before you reach that, but we’ve been kept that survival. So based on that model, we would never reach self actually actualization and who we are in our hobbies, things we like to do, and love and belonging, which is where social wellness is. Right. So there’s a lot that goes under it, but I think we’re in the best spot to be able to talk about it.

Christine Gautreaux 13:48
Right. I agree, go into saying that she’s loving this dialogue. Thank you, Glenda. And she said, Hi, she earlier. So Glenda, and I belong to a group, a women’s group. That’s how we met Texas, that really created safe space for women to have these discussions to talk about, you know, how do we reach that self actualization? And some do you have to create that safe space in order to to have a place and I think that goes right in when we’re talking about social wellness, right? Sometimes it can’t be out on the street, because of safety reasons, but we can create those places, right? Yeah. And I wanted to bring into the discussion Shannon why, like some people say, oh, yeah, whatever, y’all you know, but this research study this was I mean, I know this to be true from my research was still point and about self care. But this one that I’m gonna put in the show notes, it talks about studies show that people with poor social interaction shins are more likely to die younger than those with high involvement rates. Research also linked the following health issues to poor social health. And I think this is huge, especially this year when so much social has been shut down. Suffering heart attack, chronic disease, mobility issues, high blood pressure, raised stress hormones leading to inflammation, cancer, poor mental health, anxiety and depression and poor systems. Like Holy guacamole Batman, like, you know, who needs this info is teenagers who are trying to talk them into going out more.

Shannon M. 15:44
This route, Mom, look at this list of things that would hurt my immune system. Yes.

Christine Gautreaux 15:50
But I think about, like how this year has been for so many people. And I’ve been having discussions lately with a lot of friends about the anxiety and the depression is rising. And here crackpot theory, as my friend Phil Porter likes to say, Oh, my crackpot theory is this. I know that our bodies have memories, and our bodies have stories and hold stores and we are all in this nation for sure. But across the world, coming up on a year anniversary, where the world shut down, right? So I think what’s happening is, is anxiety starting to rise, our bodies are having a sense of doom and gloom. They’re like, what’s what’s about to happen, and some of it is memory related to last year. And the fact that this is continued over a year. And, you know, we haven’t been able to be at a live concert in a year, I haven’t gotten to go to art festivals and go to street festivals, um, you know, are thinking about this the other day, when are we going to feel comfortable, you know, going to a concert, being down close to the stage crammed up strangers? First of all, let me back up and say I never really was comfortable about that. Because, like, pushing into me, and I’d had to hold this strong boundary. But um, you know, when do we get to do that again? And how is it affecting us? Our social health?

Shannon M. 17:23
Yeah. And you know, it’s interesting, because sometimes things not going your way, teach you how to beat teaches you how to be more adaptable, you know, so, there’s always been crazy stuff going on in my life. So now Coronas shut everything down. It’s like, wow, okay, well, how do I do this now? Like, there’s a problem? And what is the solution and not to be dismissive or to minimize anything, you know? But if there’s things that you’re interested in doing that you want to do, how can you do that? And the corona version of it, and I was having that same conversation recently, too. So when is it going to end? And when it does, and what does that look like, you know, some people still might have mask on, some people still might not come out. So it’s really interesting.

Christine Gautreaux 18:07
So we talking about adaptations. So Joe, and for the pandemic. And for listeners that don’t know, Joe’s my husband of 26 years, and one of our things that I always say is better than marriage therapy is that we dance. So before a good we go to Zumba together, or we would go out dancing together. Like that has been our thing for as long as we’ve been together. And all of that kind of got shut down. And it’s part it’s part of our social, it’s in part, our relational wellness, but it’s also a part of social wellness, because we have friends that we with, we have it’s you know, it’s being out in the community. So we have found a great group called Social dis dance, which is done coach named bear Herbert. I’m gonna butcher her last name, I think it’s her but H E R, B, E R T. It, it’s so it checks a lot of boxes for us because it’s, it’s virtual. So it’s endemic safe. It’s with people all over the country. And they have the theme every week. So if you want to dress up you can so I think today’s theme was sea creatures. So enjoy, jump on in dance, and and then they you give tips to the DJ. And they donate that to bipoc organizations that are doing social justice work. So it’s like, check check, like you got the social justice, you’ve got the connection and the dancing. But I will tell you about I’ll just be fully transparent about it really arrived last week. So Joe was traveling for work. And I had called him up and said, Hey, why don’t we have a date? Let’s meet on social distance. Right? He was like, Oh my god. Right? So we’re different places. He’s I think in Tennessee at this point, and I’m in Georgia, and we log on and we hadn’t set expectations ahead of time. And you know, I teach zoom classes. So like, I got, like, how do you connect with somebody on Zoom? Right? Because that’s, and that’s one of the things I teach about is how do you have meaningful connection on Zoom or on this virtual platform? And I wasn’t thinking about him not know. And the other thing I was thinking about is him being on his phone instead of on a computer because he was in a hotel room. Right? Right. See me, he could just dancing his butt off. And I am feeling like the girl who went to the, to the dance, and her date completely ignored her, so. But I was not a happy camper. So that we had to have a whole discussion about it. But um, you know, I think, yes, things are adaptable, and we can have those social connections, there may be a little more communication needed around, like, how do we do this? And what feels good for everybody, you know? But super fun. Like, yeah,

Shannon M. 21:12
and it’s really important. And that’s something else that we hit on to write boundaries and communication. Like, for me, I love the fact one, I wouldn’t have thought about a virtual date, right? You guys usually do it, I love that he’s out of town, I might have just counted it as a missed a mistake this week, because our schedule looks different. But I love the fact that you guys are willing to hop online in different states to spend time with each other. Right? So I definitely give Joe points for that one. And and then outside of that, something else that this article you were referring to talked about that I really liked was setting boundaries and toxic relationships, and how sometimes a good relationship can people change, you know, so it can move and then be different. So sometimes like that, you know, it’s as simple as I’m used to this. And this, this is a conversation I have all the time, I didn’t think about the other person’s lack of reference, or things that they might be thinking about, which would make it completely different, you know, so it’s really important to have clear communication, to have realistic standards, and, and not unnecessary expectations, because that gets in the way sometimes, but then to set boundaries and talk about it and keep going.

Christine Gautreaux 22:23
Well, and one of the things that jumped out at me, it talked about social wellness was I’m going to scroll back up here. So I say it the right way, creating boundaries and friendships to encourage communication and conflict management. Like what happens when things go awry. Right. Yeah. You know, my first response was not to pick up the phone when he called me. And I was upset, right? That’s honest. Yeah. But then, you know, I ended up trading in this stuff to go Yeah,

Shannon M. 22:54
it’s not gonna.

Christine Gautreaux 22:57
And a lot of it’s a little passive aggressive. So what would we write? And so so what I ended up doing is picking up the phone and saying, Hey, I’m not sure what was happening tonight, but I just need to let you know how I’m feeling and, you know, we worked it but that being willing, when something doesn’t go right, and, and one of the things I appreciate about our friendship, Shannon and our collaboration is you like you check in with me, you do a really good job about checking in and asking some of those questions, and then giving me the opportunity to check in and ask those questions like, Is there anything better? Or how are we are, you know, and, and I really value that, like, you have brought several things to me and gun if you really know how this landed.

Right, and I’m so grateful for it. Um, I was reading an article, I can’t even remember where it was, but it was talking about social justice work, it was talking about racial equity, it was talking about being a good ally. Then it said, not only do you want feedback, you crave it. Because it’s the only way you get better like it. And I think that’s true in relationships. And in free. You know, you don’t want it all. You don’t want constant like every time you talk to somebody they’re telling, you

Shannon M. 24:32
know, you’re not gonna want to talk to them. But

Christine Gautreaux 24:35
I’m having that basis of trust to be able to say, ouch, that landed wrong, or, like, I don’t think you intended it this way. But this was the impact and I think if everybody in the world could do that a little better, and listen to each other, you know,

Shannon M. 25:02
Yes. And I once again, I 100% agree with that, I definitely take it as a huge compliment that you like those things about me. And I appreciate it because it actually comes from a place of people not doing that for me. You know, we talk about social justice, we talk about things. So going on. And if I’m transparent, which is what this podcast is about, that was definitely one of the reasons I stepped down. And the restaurant, you know, lack of accountability, lack of the opportunity to have a conversation when the conversation is had, there is no solutions ever, you know, so you might as well not have had the conversation, because there may be some pushback or attitude somewhere else, you know, especially as a kitchen manager, I’m pushing the whole restaurant. So as a teammate, if I’m not doing something, right, like you said, instead of being passive aggressive, actually needs you to lay it out, tell me, Hey, these are the things that you need to get better at, because this is the effect that it has. But when you don’t do that, it just seems petty and unprofessional. And you’re also not helping your teammate get better, you’re just belittling them. And it’s a it’s a whole nother thing outside of building somebody up and being constructive. Right.

Christine Gautreaux 26:20
Um, I was, I’m gonna pull it up on Brene Brown’s last podcast, cuz you know, I’m a huge fan of hers. I was lucky in that. As one of my grad school professors.

Shannon M. 26:35
I don’t think I knew that.

Christine Gautreaux 26:38
Steve Houston Go cougars was in a couple of her Women’s Studies classes. And so she even published her first book. Yeah, it was. Yeah, I’m a huge fan. And in her first book, Oh, I thought it was just me, but it isn’t. She and I think even in the Gifts of Imperfection, she talked about her red kitchen table. And I had an opportunity to sit at that table as one of her students, which is really cool. But I what I wanted to she did a podcast recently and had the garments on about relationships. And I they do such a good job of relations, relational wellness, which I know we’re talking about social wellness today. But I think it you know, there’s a lot of overlap there, right? Yeah. But here was the funny part about funny not funny, I kind of, I kind of cried a little and laughed a little, was exhausted a little. All that to say, so she had posted her podcast about the Gottman and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, like in a relationship and how to stop them and their antidotes. Right. So she posted this is her unlocking us podcast with Brene Brown. And it’s her 44th episode. So we know she’s got some experience under her belt. But she’s one of the top comments was a white male that said, hey, love this. But when I tried to find the episode on podcast addict, I discovered it’s not been loaded yet. I suggest waiting to announce it until an episode has been distributed. I’ll try to remember to check again in a few days. Thanks for having such an important conversation. Right.

Shannon M. 28:34
Thanks for having the conversation.

Christine Gautreaux 28:37
But this is what’s funny, right? It was it went out the night before, but she’s now exclusively on Spotify. He made that announcement and all of that. So where I kind of laughed, cried, all of that is as women. Like, here she is killing it. She is killing it. And here’s this guy telling her how she’s doing it wrong, where she went. Right but convenient for him or it wasn’t. And then there was a little passive aggressiveness in there too. So yes, Glenda, Glenda was saying her husband’s also an LPC. And she he loves the garments. Yeah. Check out that. Um, Glenda Yeah, it’s on her unlocking us podcast that just downloaded a couple of days ago, but it’s only on Spotify.

Shannon M. 29:31
Only on Spotify. Got it.

Christine Gautreaux 29:35
To the big times. Yes. Really? Glenda mansplaining. Right. Yeah. Oh, gosh. Yeah. It was like, oh, but that’s you know, that step. He’s and I know guys have a hard time when we say that. But it is that piece of social wellness. Right? It is that piece of That boundaries and respect. Listening.

Shannon M. 30:06
Yes. And the communication, you know, and it’s really interesting because if I had to rank, people’s awareness of the social environment, right, race would definitely go above gender. And we don’t even talk about race. We talk about it a lot more now. But there’s still so much more to talk about, than we definitely don’t talk about gender. So one thing I was thinking about when you were talking about holding space, I think that is the first biggest key, right with wellness in general, you holding space for yourself, knowing who you are, knowing what you like, knowing what you think is fun, right, Glenda and being able to hold that just like the box keeps it space, don’t try to fit into a smaller space for anybody take up the space that you need, you know, and in situations like this, it’s, excuse me simply just teaching people how to treat you, you know, and first, the way I’ve worked on that is by treating myself better. That’s why I lost 40 pounds and kept it off, you know, and I had to realize that the discipline wasn’t there. And I wanted all these things for myself. But I would say one thing and do something else, if people see you do that, they’re going to think they can walk over you and you walk over yourself. So of course, technically, they can’t, you know, but I’ve had to have, again, I told you ladies about the restaurant, I’ve had to have very intentional, professional conversations with people reminding them that I look forward to us working well together. This is what I need for that to happen. Please let me know if there’s anything outside of what I’ve been doing already to help you with that. Because sometimes, maybe they’ve never had the conversation with somebody because they’ve been able to live in this privilege space of not having to worry about anybody but themselves and what they’re interested in.

Christine Gautreaux 31:59
Right. Use makes me think of some friendships I’ve had to put boundaries on. And one of the some of the most challenging work I’ve ever done. But some of the most necessary, you know, I grew up with that statement, like, what is it? For me once? Shame on

Shannon M. 32:19
you? Shame on me. Yeah. And,

Christine Gautreaux 32:21
you know, I remember this toxic friendship from years ago, where I just kept giving chances and chances and chances and you know, it was just so painful. And it was it was working. And I remember using the words, and this is how I did it and set the boundary was I wrote myself a list of what I wanted in a healthy friendship, and what, what I expected of my friends and what I expected of myself in a friendship. And so then I set boundaries on the friendship. I said, you know, I mean, this is how I want to be as a friend, and this is how I want my friends to treat me. And we’re not here right now. So I need us to be I think we were professional colleagues at the time. And I have a friendship until we can get to this place. Glenda is saying I think loving ourselves is so important. If we can’t ourselves how can we treat others with love and respect? Not being just us but truly loving who we are? Yes. And respecting ourselves, right? piece of it is loving ourselves in our whole beings like creative amazing, you know, quirky for me Spacey.

Shannon M. 33:45
Spacey sometimes Yeah.

Christine Gautreaux 33:49
Oh, right. And, and not just loving the pieces of us that the world says are okay. Right. Because every person I know, has a quirkiness to them. That is often my favorite piece about them. But they try to hide because they think it won’t be accepted or it’s not. You know, it’s not what EDS shows us is what we’re supposed to be. Yeah.

Shannon M. 34:25
It’s so interesting, because there was this time, I was going to my friend’s wedding, right? And we’re not friends anymore. What we’re talking about not being Whoa, changing the way the friendship looks right. And that’s something that’s not talked about all the time, friendships breaking up or looking different. And I remember we were sitting on her roof out in Virginia, she’s in the military was in the military, and we’re looking at the ocean and she was explaining to me why she didn’t feel like I had been there as her maid of honor. Right. And I had been calling her mom asking her if she needed anything. You know how I check in And she had said, no, no, it’s okay. Everything’s fine. So I had did everything that I could do, right. And she she asked me well, Shannon, Haven’t you watched any movies? On being a bridesmaid? I said, Are you serious? Is this a real question right now? I said, one, all of those women are white. Okay, like none of them look like me in my situation, and the things that I’ve had to deal with getting ready for this wedding. But again, we have to remember that the media is not a realistic representation of life, and should not be our only source of information.

Christine Gautreaux 35:37
And the other thing about that, I’ll speak to as a white woman with those, those movies, all those women magically have money. Like they can spend whatever they want.

Shannon M. 35:50
Yeah. All right. The best friends have weddings across the hallway from each other. Right.

Christine Gautreaux 36:00
Um, yeah. Glenda is saying that she love for us to have a future dialogue about changing friendships and relationships. Yeah, I think these are crucial. Because they do come in seasons often. Yeah, yeah, they do. hastens, and and they can be painful. I know. I’ve had some moments in my life. But I know that we’re almost at time. But before, before we start wrapping up, there were there was something that bubbled up with that last thing you said, Shannon, I was reading recently about I think in you know, it was either on Twitter or Instagram, it was one of those, you know, but it really struck me when the person said it. They said often when we talk about imposter syndrome, we are comparing ourselves to generational wealth. And I wanted to bring that into this conversation when you were talking about hey, remember, all those women in those movies are white, right? And lifers are all the money. And it was that dynamic about what they, you know, me, or any tells us that it be like our businesses should be or our friendship should be or this, and we’re comparing ourselves to things that are not realistic milestones,

Shannon M. 37:27
right? Yes. And and it’s so interesting that you say that, because with the business, right, that I teach classes about and have helped people start working on their own businesses, what I’ve been seeing, and the articles that have been coming up is really, for example, Hey, Christine just made a million dollars on this ground breaking business structure. And she was the first one to do that. So what that tells me as a psychology person, right is, hey, really, it’s just whatever you do, if it works, they’re going to start talking about it. So mind your business and make sure you get your stuff together, and pay attention to what you need to and it’s not about always sticking to what people say, is the only way to do it, you know, and the biggest way that I’ve that’s helped me keep clarity and communication is remembering that there’s a difference between communication and confrontation. And that’s why a lot of this stuff is such a gray area, people are nervous to have conversations. And people are they have anxiety about sharing their real stories, which is why we don’t know the truth, because they think that it’s confrontational. But as adults, we have to learn how to sit down and have an uncomfortable conversation and get to the end of it.

Christine Gautreaux 38:41
Right? I love that you said because you know I was raised in the south. I was raised in Texas. I was raised nice. I was raised. Don’t talk religion, politics. And we for sure don’t talk about race, good gravy. And so I love that we are starting to have these conversations. And my inner play work. My body wise work tells me and teaches me that I work with other people that you know, we have tools, we can take deep breaths. Yeah. And be present in our bodies and pay attention. Like when you said the words uncomfortable conversation, like where does that live in our bodies? And how to breathe and through conversations, whether it’s conflict or whether it’s just uncomfortable, or whether it’s setting a boundary that we’re not sure which way it’s gonna go, right? Yeah. Yeah, we could have a whole show on that. No, really.

Shannon M. 39:41
I mean, that’s where we decided to start this podcast, all these things, you know, but what I will say is that especially with social wellness, again, things I’ve been working on are staying plugged into the community whether it’s manifestation Mondays with you ladies or my loved one close relatives that I want to make sure I don’t miss 18 years right? Doing that makes it a lot easier. And a lot of times, if I think about the worst case situation in my head before I go into a difficult conversation, and I’m nervous about it, it usually doesn’t go like that. It might not go well. But it usually doesn’t go that bad, you know. So my question for you 80s, is, we’ve been talking about social wellness, right? What is your wisdom and action that you’re going to be doing this week, so that we can raise that level of wellness from 40%? We need to re start raising that up. As we go through the year, what are you gonna do tell us on our Instagram, tell us on our Facebook, what’s your favorite part of the show was

Christine Gautreaux 40:43
right, I think my wisdom and action this week is going to be I need to call my aunt, I need to reach out to social connection, she showed up in my dreams. And I know, we’re a phone call. So I really, you know, you’re saying today you’re being really intentional about who you’re staying in touch with. Thank you for that. Because give her a call, and maybe even make a list, then what I realized is, you know, I’m working from home now, or living at work, whichever way we want to say it. But it’s, I, I did a lot of my calls when I was commuting or driving, right. And some of that, you know, I would get in the car. And I would check in on people. And I haven’t been doing that as much I realized over this past year. So I think for my wisdom in action for social wellness, I’m going to write a list of folks that that I need to just give a call to my friend, Diane is probably one of them, because I haven’t seen year. So we are so glad that you have been with us today Glinda and our participant. So for those that don’t know, if you follow our podcast on YouTube, or on Facebook, we go live on Wednesdays at 5pm Eastern time. And so you can come and be a part of the conversation. Because when you write your comments, and we can pull them up because of the platform that we’re on, and have you be a part of the conversation. And we love that we love having having our audiences be a part of what we’re doing. Yeah, so I have enjoyed our conversation today my friend as always, as always,

Shannon M. 42:34
yes. As always, I want to add one more just because I think it will help a lot of people. My wisdom and action this week is writing down some things to let go of and we’re gonna burn it on Valentine’s Day right? Love yourself and let go of it.

Christine Gautreaux 42:50
So really a good burning bowl ritual. I love it. The other thing by wisdom and action that is for physical wellness, not for social wellness, but my shallow glow, which is our sponsor, which I forgot to say my multi use butter mango madness. I love this stuff, my friend. Thank you for creating such a product that is delightful every time I use it. So we haven’t take care of ourselves. Right And y’all if you haven’t gotten your sweetie something for Valentine’s Day, and by the time this airs on on all the podcast places it will be past Valentine’s Day but anytime it’s worth it to get your sweetie up because it’s it’s it’s pretty awesome. Yeah,

Shannon M. 43:39
thank you so much. And don’t forget, be well be wise. And have a great week. We’ll see you next Wednesday.

Unknown Speaker 43:53
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.