(Video) Everything You’re Feeling is Valid and Welcome
I sat next to a young college student on the plane the other day coming back from Kripalu. I listened as she talked about her fears and anxieties around her career path and “What’s next?” When I got up to leave, I asked her, “Cristina, what is the hardest part for you in all this?” She replied, “That I don’t feel validated or seen. Every time I bring up my worries, adults start talking about how much harder things were when they were 23. It makes me feel even worse.”
Yes, exactly. This week I’m focusing on emotional self-care, sharing what I’m hearing from men/women around the U.S. right now and offering up a reminder to help us all feel it, so we can heal it.
Watch Everything You’re Feeling is Valid and Welcome (2 min.):
Every week I offer up a reminder or question to help us slow down and live from the inside out. This week’s intentional living focus is on emotional self-care and the importance of feeling seen and heard.
We are not self-improvement projects; when we remember to meet ourselves where we are and honor our journey, it helps us invite in more self-acceptance.
Feeling overwhelmed? Pause and check-in. Here are 3 suggestions to support your emotional well-being:
- Carefully choose friends/mentors who have the emotional and spiritual maturity to hold the space for what you are sharing; they should both allow you to show up “warts and all” while also seeing the highest and best in you. Be choosy.
- Remember one of my favorite mantras: many things are true at once. When looking at big life stuff, it’s easy to get in an all-or-nothing mindset. This rarely serves us; cultivate the ability to see more than one perspective (read how to become comfortable with polarities).
- Journaling can become a great tool for self-awareness and insight. Even just taking a few minutes each morning to reflect and write your answers to: How do I feel? What do I need? What do I want? (read about other tools for self-awareness). Writing is invaluable to helping me access the 30,000 foot view.
Your journey is sacred. It’s uniquely yours and offers opportunities for enormous transformation. Our greatest growth comes from staying awake, alert and present to what is unfolding moment to moment while inviting in self-compassion. I see you, I hear you, I honor your experience. Every emotion has a right to life. I look forward to supporting you in developing new ways of being in 2024.
WANT SUPPORT FOR EMOTIONAL SELF-CARE? HERE ARE FOUR OPPORTUNITIES:
Morning mist rolling off of the French Broad River. Living so connected to nature makes me feel incredibly alive!
- *ONE SPOT LEFT.* Oct. 26 – Jan. 26 ~ Cultivating Grace, Power & Intuition: A Women’s Self-Renewal Program. An in-person 13-week journey/experience in Brevard, NC, 45 min. from Asheville. This experiential program meets for 8 Thur. evenings from 6:30-8:30 p.m. Open to women of all ages. Learn more/register.
- December 21st, 6:30-9 p.m. ET ~ Sing to Me Sweetly: An Evening of Poetry, Song & Stillness ~ A LIVE Winter Solstice virtual retreat ~ Circle up with a kind, warm circle of women. This will be recorded. Learn more/register.
- January 19-21st ~ Sing, Dance, Pray: Romancing the Beloved at Kripalu Center for Yoga & Health (Berkshire Mountains, MA). Filling quickly! Learn more/register.
- Wild Souls Nature Adventures (based in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Western NC): authentic movement classes, community song circles, full moon hikes, meditation workshops, women’s circles & more. New offerings are listed each week; have me design a custom experience for your team/friends. Join us Sunday, Oct. 29 for Wild Souls Authentic Movement class near Asheville, NC. Learn more.
Subscribe here to Live Inside Out, a weekly blog written by mindfulness coach/author/speaker and self-care evangelist Renée Peterson Trudeau. Passionate about helping men and women find balance through the art/science of self-care, Renee has been facilitating high-impact, interactive workshops for Fortune 500 companies, national nonprofits/conferences and organizations/teams worldwide for 25 years. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Fast Company, Good Housekeeping, US News & World Report, AARP, Spirituality & Health and more. She and her team have certified more than 450 facilitators in 10 countries around the globe to lead self-renewal groups/retreats based on her pioneering self-care curriculum. She’s the author of two books on life balance including the award-winning The Mother’s Guide to Self-Renewal: How to Reclaim, Rejuvenate and Re-Balance Your Life. She and her husband live in Western North Carolina and Austin, Texas; her latest venture is Wild Souls Nature Adventures. More on Renee here.
