The Well-Tended Life
The Well-Tended Life
Episode 71: Exploring the Pathways to Change with Lisa DeAngelis
In this episode of The Well-Tended Life podcast, your host, Keri Wilt, sits down with holistic change practitioner and author, Lisa DeAngelis. Together, they delve into the intricate and often challenging process of change. Discover the secrets to embracing change, the importance of self-awareness, and the impact of holistic practices like the Alexander Technique. Lisa shares her personal journey, transformative insights, and the tools that can help anyone navigate life's transitions. Whether you're facing a major life shift or looking to cultivate more resilience and adaptability, this episode is packed with wisdom and practical advice. Tune in for an enlightening conversation that promises to inspire growth and transformation in your own life. Don't miss out on this opportunity to learn how to live a well-tended life, no matter what season you're in.
****HEART TAPS FROM THIS EPISODE****
1.) A really great question to ask yourself is, where is my stretch zone? Where is that place for you where your fear and desires intersect that can bring you one little step closer to the live you want without overexerting yourself and snapping like a rubber band?
2.) Approaching the stretch zone requires compassion, patience and baby steps. The point is NOT to get tangled in our own weeds by trying to meet the occasion with desperation, panic or burnout.
3.) Healing and bringing awareness to your daily life, thoughts and actions is a personal responsibility. We may not get to choose the storms we endure, but we can absolutely choose how we weather them!
4.) There is so much more in our power than not, friends. And once we raise our awareness, we can begin to enjoy the harvest of all the seeds we've sown. It just takes a bit of tender, loving care.
Connect with Lisa DeAngelis:
Lisa's Book - Embracing the Unknown: Exploring the Pathways to Change
CULTIVATE U: A Life Changing 6-Week Virtual Masterclass
THIS IS YOUR SEASON. It’s time to CULTIVATE U: to water YOUR dreams, to unearth YOUR gifts, and finally tend to YOUR relationships, weeds, and needs.
Are you exhausted from watering everyone and everything else but you? Could your life, dreams, or relationships use some tending? Would you like to start living a life with less anxiety and more intention? Then click here for info on the next masterclass!
A Whole New Way To Journal
Interested in learning more about my life-tending journal process?
Click Here for Your Free Life-Tending Journal Template
Meet Me over at Modern Prairie
I am thrilled to announce that I have partnered with Melissa Gilbert of Little House on the Prairie fame’s and her company and community over at Modern Prairie.COM. Download the Modern Prairie App to Join Me the Journaling Circle, and Sign Up for my Free Journal Classe or to Join the Journaling Gems Club today! Can’t wait to see you there!
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Hey friends, welcome to The Well-Tended Life podcast. What is a podcast life? Let me start by telling you what it is not. A podcast life is not a set it and forget it life, nor is it a perfect life. It is though a life that is worked on every day in the sunshine and through the storms.
And the truth is what worked in our life gardens last year may not work in the next. That's why. Here at The Well-Tended Life p odcast, we're interviewing people who have grown and bloomed true in a variety of seasons and who are willing to share their well tinted wisdom and reed blocking advice with us.
Listen in!
Hello everyone. And welcome to the well tended life podcast. I'm your host, Curie Wilt, a speaker writer and heart cultivator who is on a mission to help you and me grow through any season. Today's episode as usual is inspired by a quote from my great-great grandmother's famous book, The Secret Garden.
And this one says, "Perhaps, he thought, my body is growing stronger. It was growing stronger, but because of the rare peaceful hours, when his thoughts were changed, he, his soul was slowly growing stronger too". And here's the deal. Like change can happen in so many ways, but not just in those rare peaceful hours.
And I'm wondering today, Are you good at embracing change when it happens? I don't know about y'all, but like sometimes I am, but other times I find myself feeling frustrated and resentful about the change, like walking around mumbling to myself as a reminder, like change is good, change is good, change is good, right?
Like just make it through. So I'm wondering like, what is the secret to change and where do we even begin? And luckily today's special guest, lisa DeAngelis knows firsthand how hard change can be. And in her book, she shares that there really isn't a secret formula to unlocking and mastering change because real change happens as a result of dedication to a product process.
And the result Of each of the choices we make and how they come to life. And I just can't wait to see what well tended wisdom she has to share with us today. So let's dig in. Welcome, Lisa.
Thank you so much. And I have to tell you, when you shared that quote with me prior to us getting together, recording and starting this conversation today.
It just got so much stirred up in me because it's an aspect of change we don't talk about is that we change really deeply from the inside out and it's easy to just think about change as the stuff out there. So I absolutely love that you started by pulling this thread of what does it feel like when our soul grows stronger too?
That's change. And I love that aspect of change that we don't talk about very much. So I'm so excited for this conversation and so excited , to see where we go.
Oh my gosh. Okay. Let's start from the beginning. Tell us who is Lisa, Lisa D'Angelo.
Gosh. I always joke with people. Do You want the elevator pitch version? Do you want the five year version? Because I feel like I could sit here and tell story after story. My life has been a series of best laid plans that did not in fact go according to best laid plans. And I have not been traditionally somebody who has embraced change.
And it's fascinating because meeting me at different points of my life, my evolution, each decade, I guess you could say if you looked back so far, I feel like I was a completely different person. And I think there's a little bit of something in our world culturally that says, you've got to figure out who you are and stay there because it makes everybody else feel a lot more comfortable when they can predict.
Yes. Yes. I even, I tell kids, I'm like, don't fall for that you have to be one thing, or that this has to be, like, that actually pigeonholes you.
Absolutely. So it's, so really, when we're at, when I'm asking myself, really, who is Lisa? Lisa is this multi hyphenate, creative, curious, person who has moved through the world, embracing as much of it as possible.
And that goes from my love of travel and my love of coffee to my love of like art and creative things. I was a classically trained singer. I usually laugh and call myself a former or reformed singer myself now, but I've worked in all sorts of different professional fields. I've done all sorts of different things.
And most recently I've added author to that list of things that can enhance. How I show up in the world. So I'm somebody who's just super passionate about looking at who we are in this world and how that leads us to who we want to become. And I know that's a very nondescript version, but , it's totally representative of who I am.
, I'm the friend in my friend group. Who's going to say something that's totally out there and has some sort of connection to a larger existential. That's me. That's Lisa is I've always got some kind of some , big thread to pull that I feel like unlocks all sorts of other stuff.
And I love exploring the world that way.
That is definitely an amazing description of yourself. I loved every single bit of it. One of the things that , you didn't say about yourself is your journey that led you to become a holistic change practitioner. So I know when I read your bio, I was like,
what does that mean exactly? And how did you get there? Hey, what is it? And then how did you get from a singer?
Sort of a funny journey. So what is a holistic change practitioner? I always joke with people because in some ways it's the most simplest definition.
It's someone who helps you really look at the whole of who you are and incorporate change and growth in your life in a way that reflects who you are. Who you are in the moment, but also who you want to become and again, it's just blowing everything back a little bit. And instead of asking questions like, what am I doing?
We move to why am I doing it? And instead of saying, where am I going? The question becomes, how do I get there? And often what happens when we delve into these more holistic ways of viewing the world, we find that the answers don't actually become as important as the questions we start asking. But again, it's flipping everything we think about. think we understand about change on its head to say we actually gain more when we get rid of all of these fixed binaries and we embrace a fluid spectrum of living. And that's what holistic change really is, looking at what's sustainable, what's aligned with it. And that's what And how we actually move forward asking the right questions.
So that's really what a holistic change practitioner is. How I got there myself has been a fascinating journey. And it started for me with what's called the Alexander technique.
The Alexander technique. is a set of principles that helps guide conscious change, and it starts at the very physical body level. It's this idea that if we increase awareness about the way we physically use our bodies, we have the ability to make different choices. We don't just have to run through life screaming on autopilot and not having any conscious choice about how we're moving forward.
So increasing this awareness and expanding our choice. It lets us discover a different level of ease and efficiency, and then we're making the choices that are most aligned with our goals. And that's really the key, is we want to have choice. We want to have the freedom of choice as an option. That's a , beautiful thing.
So it really helps us reclaim how we do what we do so we can actually decide that we're going to get where we're going.
So what led you to. The Alexander technique. So take us back, like, , why were you introduced to this technique and how did you use it for it to be helpful?
So in my own life, the story shows up slightly dramatically because I was an 18 year old singer in college studying voice and I started having jaw problems. And that's really. a crisis when you're a young singer. And I went to a specialist who diagnosed a jaw issue on one side. And I had an injury when I was very young, , when I was a toddler.
And that's probably what caused the issue, that's actually not the important part of the story. The interesting part about the story is he said sure we can do reconstructive jaw surgery and we can go in and take everything apart and figure out what's going on and put it back together and cross our fingers and hope that everything works.
Again, on the other side, because there is no guarantee when you're really looking at how the body re functions. We don't know. We don't know what's going to happen on the other side. And it's just everything in me, really, I had that, whatever you want to call it, inner knowing, still small voice, everything inside me just went, no.
No, that's not the right path for you. But of course I thought to myself, okay, so what do I do? And I would say by happenstance, but I don't believe in coincidence. So the next thing that happened for me was that an Alexander technique practitioner showed up to one of my voice classes and she started working with us on these concepts.
And I thought, Oh, there's something to this. So I started going to her and working with her and to my surprise, she didn't work on my jaw at all. She was talking to me about my back. She was talking to me about my posture. She was talking to me about, and I thought, what are you crazy lady? You're not even listening to me.
The jaw is the problem. But see, that's where I was totally wrong. The jaw was a symptom of some really strong habits. That my body had decided were the way I moved through the world. And my whole experience changed when I realized that I had the choice to decide. And when I focused on addressing some of the other things about my body, the way I was standing, the way I was moving, what I was doing with the rest of my body when I was singing, All of a sudden, poof, the job problem, quote, went away.
And I still have it, it's still an issue that's there. But it doesn't ail me anymore because I've learned how to work with my system. And it unlocked a whole different level for me in my life because I thought, Oh my gosh, if I could change this, what else can I change? What else do I have the power to influence?
And it was like light bulbs started, it was really like out of a cartoon, light bulbs started going off for me going. If I have the opportunity to change this little piece of my life, about my jaw, what else could I change and influence about my life in the way that I want to do? And then, of course, that leads to the bigger, more existential question.
What do I want to do? Who do I want to be? And that just started to unlock a huge different exploration, because it was like I was, the blinders were taken off. And I was shown that I didn't just have to keep doing what other people told me to do or what I thought I should be doing. I really had the ability to make these choices for myself.
And now I started to have tools through this teacher, through my own training, through the Alexander Technique. I started to have tools and principles to come back to, to say, what does it feel like to be able to make a different choice?
I'm almost like at a lack of words because it is I think so many of us walk through life just blindly, like moving through, assuming that we don't have choices. And it's so not true. , and the fact that this. started with simple physical choices, not , and from what I gather and understand, this is not like you had to, work 12 hours, you had to work out for 12, 12 minutes and seven minutes or what this was about like how you were carrying your body.
Absolutely. Cause very simple, basic things. It also just reminds me that like our bodies are meant to function like in a certain way, like they, it takes care of itself if we take care of it.
That's so well, yes.
But we don't know that's how right like I feel like that somewhere in the doctoring system.
It became about more about medicine and less about working with what you got.
And listen, biologically, , this is important. If we had to think about every step we took or every single thing, if we had to actually give , our muscles the direction to help us, , we would never get anything done.
We couldn't have higher order, we couldn't have functioning. It's a tremendously efficient way for our body to, to create habits and patterns to move through the world. But the challenge becomes when we lose the ability to decide what we're doing. And the reality is the majority of us have no idea what we don't know.
And that's not our fault. And I think that's a really important thing to remember. , it's not your fault if you're doing something that isn't helpful to you long term. But it is important to recognize that once we have the awareness, we can do something about it. Recently, I came across a quote that has really stuck with me and I've shared it with a bunch of people recently, it's sort of like the wound is not your fault, but the healing is our responsibility.
And I think it's important. It's the same kind of thing. , it's not our fault if we just don't have the most optimal way of moving through the world, or we haven't yet known the best and most efficient way to tackle a challenge in our lives. But then , we can seek out the tools and resources if we approach it with non judgment, with curiosity, which is very hard to do.
We also live in a culture , that's steeped in a lot of shame and a lot of judgment. So the moment that we step out of line, it's sort of like, Oh, you shouldn't have done that up. Is that really the best thing for you? Oh, that's not how we usually do it around here. And that's really detrimental thinking to letting us expand.
And so if we really, truly want to be expansive in who we are in the world and how we interact with other people, we've got to have the freedom to try things out and try things out in a way that says failing doesn't mean it's bad. Failing means I just learned something, right?
This information,
it's just information reframing that takes reframing. And , it takes giving ourselves permission. , it takes this level of being willing to be vulnerable and that's with ourselves and with other people in the world. And that's really where I think the juicy part of change lives. But also the super uncomfortable part because we're asking ourselves to try things we hadn't haven't done before and the idea of something being an unknown, something that isn't known to us yet is really interesting.
If I say, Oh, Carrie, the big unknown in your life. Where does your brain immediately go? It's oh gosh, what's going to happen? My mind conjures up some image of a galaxy , far away and it's all black and I can just see like the twinkling of stars. That's what the unknown feels like. But what if the unknown was just something we haven't done yet?
What if it's just the next step is a new unknown?
And the reality is it's all unknown, right? I, it used to drive me crazy, like they would, during COVID, they would say in these uncertain times, I was like, but when were you really certain? Like we really didn't know what was going to happen tomorrow.
We like to play these games where we feel like we're in control and , that we really do know what's going to happen tomorrow. But like you even said yourself, like your whole life is a series of best laid plans that never came to fruition. And so we don't really know there's no such thing as known in the future.
It's just what we think it is. And so I think for me, that's The big reframing is it's all unknown. So let's quit being scared about it. And like it, I think it allows you to sit in , , that seat of allowing change to happen.
And really looking at what our relationship with changes, because it's not just something that imposes.
We co create, we co create our experience and we can decide how we want to let ourselves grow and evolve. , we can have influence on that. And, I do want to bring up one thing, because I think this is challenging for people who are in challenging moments of transition, right? , when it's not something they asked for, when it is a really fearful moment.
Yeah. Drug gets pulled out from under us. This is not about toxic positivity. This is not about bypassing the hard emotions. This is about recognizing that grief is often right alongside of it. Of joy and there are these spaces where we say in order to open our hand, we have to let go of what was in it in order to receive.
Often we have to give something up and it isn't always a one for one, but there is this space of recognizing that I'm not trying to bypass any of the challenging moments, but I refer to it. Sometimes there's this idea of uprooted gratitude, right? If something gets totally uprooted, , I'm not asking myself or anyone else to sit there and be like, you should be happy about that.
We're just saying we are totally uprooted. We've got to find a way to replant. We've got to find a way to nourish ourselves so that we can get back to some sort of stasis. And , , that you have the ability to co create in that moment.
Hey, hey, hey, have you heard the news? I am so thrilled to announce that I have partnered with Melissa Gilbert of Little House on the Prairie fame and her company and community over at ModernPrairie. com You'll find me there most days. Teaching the topsoil of my life tending journaling practice. Leading an accountability and check in group called the Journaling Gems Club, which is designed to help you to not just get journaling, but to stay journaling.
All while building some community along the way. Or you can find me hosting and hanging out in a brand new part of their app that is dedicated to all things journaling. Sound like fun? Check out the link in the show notes to download the Modern Prairie app today. Then you can join the journaling circle and sign up for the class or join the club today.
I can't wait to see you there.
I actually was just interviewing a girl yesterday and , she said, I'm, she said, I'm repotting myself.
And I was like, What? And they were there. They're transplants, right? They're moving down. And she was like, I heard this term of repotting. And I was like, what a great, she was like, she's cause when you uproot yourself, your roots are exposed. To the oxygen, right? Like in, and you feel raw and it feels scary.
She was like, but , in that exposure, I now have these choices to make, right? Like, where do I want to root myself? What friends do I want to make? Where do I want to repot? What kind of a pot do I want to be? And do I want a big pot, a little pot, like whatever. But I loved that because I think it also, , it gave her some control in that.
In that hard change situation as well.
Absolutely. And I think this is a a good moment to just reflect again that I love. I love the plant analogies because they're just they're so rich. They're so ripe for this, this process. It is a process. Number one. We never see a seed all of a sudden waking up tomorrow and it's a bloomed flower, right?
It is a process. There is a total cycle to nature. Everything has its moments of growth. There are growing seasons. There are hibernation seasons, trees lose their Needs we to prepare for new ones, right? There are all of these beautiful analogies that, that follow that along. But one of the things I don't think we talk enough about is the resilience.
Of plant systems and structures. And that's an important quality for us as people that we forget. We naturally have resilience. Isn't something that some people have and other people don't. It is a quality of elasticity that we all have. Because we have all tried something and fallen or failed or, and gotten up and done it again.
And in fact, just by showing up every day, waking up and facing the world every day, we are a living act of resilience and surrender to the fact that we are not going to be put down by what happened yesterday. We're just going to keep breathing through it. And that's what our body does. Our body keeps breathing itself through another day, and sometimes that's enough.
Sometimes that's enough, and that gets us exactly to where we need to be. So I think there are some important analogies that we can pull from this idea of, yeah, being uprooted can be really unnerving for us, and it can be a space where we have a choice. And again, I'm not making , a, you can make a great choice right now.
, it, sometimes the choice is to just get back to functioning again. And that's okay. It's more than okay. That might be the goal for this process or period of time for someone.
Oh my goodness. Okay. So we've talked about holistic change.
We've talked about the Alexander technique. Yeah. What is the new paradigm transformational technique? What is that?
So I came across this almost by happenstance, but it's interesting because , it's so aligned with this, the other work that I have done. So I was very drawn to it, , but it's basically an energy work that supports self awareness and growth.
And the core belief system is that we can tap into an energy of love without conditions and non judgment and release And that energy is a , really powerful energy that we can give back to ourselves or help support others at any point through their experience. And it's not something that has conditions.
Like I said, it really is without conditions and , it's unlimited. It blows scarcity. Out of the water when we say what if there is just an energetic force of just there for you? Support, love, non judgment, what if we were just able to sit in spaces where we didn't have to hold on to the fear, it wasn't real, we could just really say, this is a space where it's safe to dive into what this is, and it will refuel you.
So I came across this and , It's been a lovely addition to my work just helping to support others through this transfer of energy that I believe exists all around us at any given moment, right? We're all exchanging energy every time we interact with each other. And again, we have the choice about how we tap in, what we tap into.
Are we plugging into a way of moving through the world that is skeptical and full of fear and full of judgment? Or are we choosing to plug into the resource of love without conditions, of non judgment, of this idea that we are free from fear. What can we choose next?
And I wouldn't you say, I would say fear is the one thing that for me, I refer to them as weeds, right?
The things that are blocking you from doing the things that you're meant to do. , fear is one of the biggest weeds , that pops up in people's lives, , that keeps them stuck, right?
It also is an important indicator, I think, because fear is healthy. It gives us feedback, right?
But fear controlling us or fear driving the bus is what is really challenging. There is a great part of the book, The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks. I don't know if you have read it or have referenced it recently, but , it's a fantastic book. But there's a part where he talks about the difference between fear and excitement.
is our breath. And it's this beautiful sentiment of saying fear is when we're holding our breath and excitement is when we're actually breathing through it. And if we think about fear and excitement as two sides of the same coin, because what really happens when we're afraid, the same things as when we're excited.
There's just a different lack of fuel behind it. And fear is a constrictive emotion. And it says freeze, hold, don't, danger, any of those things. And excitement goes, new, interesting. I don't know. I've never done this before, but , there's some crossovers there, right? Fear is also, I haven't done this before.
New, different. It's just framed really differently. So I love thinking about fear. Fear in this way to say again, fear is not fixed. It's not just because fear is there. Something is not possible. It is something to look at because , it's a message. It's an important message, but it is not the only message.
And I believe everything in the world. We can shift it. , we can flip it on its head. And that's one of my favorite things to do in general in my work and in the way I view life is to say, really, is that how it is? What happens if we turn it around and put it upside down and through a filter and now what happens?
Are we looking at the same thing? Are we talking about the same experience? That's how I really feel about fear. And again, don't get me wrong. I have sat in some major fear spaces that have been , really challenging, but there are also moments of saying, what am I really afraid of? And that's an important question for me in those moments is to say, where, what is this fear leading me toward?
And sometimes the biggest steps or the biggest breakthroughs happen right after we feel the most fear.
Yes.
Because breaking through is a painful, difficult process, and it definitely is safer to stay where we are. It's definitely the safe, conservative choice to just not do the thing. We risk not knowing what's on the other side.
We risk not being able to experience the full spectrum of who we are in the world. And I think that's where it becomes an interesting, again, for me, it's about relationships with these they're emotions, but , they're also states of beingness, right? And I think that gives us the opportunity to work through them in a really interesting way
and embrace them. I love the term. I love what you said. Fear gives us feedback. I think that's a research for sure. Something I'm going to stick in my back pocket already today.
Friends, let me ask you a few questions, and I want you to answer them honestly. Are you exhausted from years of watering everyone and everything else but you? Does it feel like your gifts, dreams, and passions have been locked up tighter than the secret garden? Do you struggle with everything? Things like anxiety, jealousy, busyness, or maybe fear.
Would you like to see more joy, goodness, and growth in your life? Listen, if you've answered yes to any of these questions, I am thrilled to tell you that the fall session of Cultivate U has just been announced, and it begins September 18th. Now, what is Cultivate U? Cultivate U is a six week online journey where I'll walk beside you and teach you new ways to water your dreams, unearth your gifts, and And finally tend to your relationships needs.
In this live group experience, you will dig deep and discover a garden shed full of perennial tools that will help you to cultivate your best well tended life for seasons to come. Want to learn more? Check out the link in the show notes or head over to the well tended life. com.
All of this amazing work. Clearly you have done your own work and you have been working with lots of people. And I think there comes a moment and I always say you go through what you go through so you can help other people's grow through it.
Other people grow through it, right? You have done this, you have, you decided to write it all down in a book and not all of it, but create a book. So tell me about that journey. , what led you there?
I always felt like I was going to write a book. I love saying what, who, what kind of an artist are you?
, what kind of creative are you? Everyone has , some creative outlets. in them. And writing has just always been really easy for me. It has come really naturally and it's always been something other people have commented on. Oh, you're such a great writer. Oh, you're this. But the idea of writing a book , is a really different thing.
And actually, the book I thought I was going to write , , was a different book. It was still about change, but it was going to be called Points of Intersection, where change, choice, and opportunity meet. And I was really interested in these moments. when people hit an intersection point in their life, and they make a choice, and it takes them in one direction or the other, , and how that sort of affected their life journey.
And as I started writing, I just thought, no, , that's not quite it. That's not the aspect of change I want to talk about, is when we come to this crossroads and we're making a choice. I think we need to blow it back a little bit and talk about, what is change? , why should we even change? And then, what actually does it mean to change?
And then, how do we actually become changed? in a sustainable relationship with change. And so , that's how the book evolved itself. And I say it like that intentionally because I, books have their, a consciousness of their own, for sure. Like I said, there were some days when I thought this is what I'm going to write, and that is not what ended up happening.
So that was a really fascinating journey, but I just also realized that I could have tried to do the How to change in five easy steps or change for dummies, but that is not the kind of book I want to write because that's not the kind of person I am. This book had to be a reflection of who I was and who I am is just saying ?
What does it feel like when you have the ability to build your own pathways? To embracing your next unknowns that unlock who you want to be in the world and I do really think we are in co creation of our evolution. And that is a really, really important thing for me when I work with people is to say, this is not we're not working on a fixed path.
Situation it is always up for discussion and it is always up for exploration and that's really where the fun is. That's really where the fun. But so many people don't feel like they have permission to stop doing something or start doing something or whatever. Like , they. They do feel like it's a fixed path.
And it's interesting, , when I first started reading about your book, I was like, wow, she's tackling like a big subject because I think most people really do resist change, right? They avoid it like the plague. , they seem to try to , Get comfortable and stay comfortable right like that seems even in work right people get to a certain point and then they're like, I'm going to retire and I just want to live comfortably like nobody's thinking in the big change world, and I was like, okay , , what do you tell that person?
, what are, that is afraid of change? And is there is there something they can start to do now to start overcoming that? Absolutely. First of all, Having so much compassion for all of the emotions that come up around this process , is the number one thing. The second we try to say you're not welcome to the party and you're not welcome to the party, that's when we start getting into a little bit of a challenging space.
Because when it's , you're not welcome here, this, you're not welcome here, that resistance really creates all sorts of angst in our system. We don't know what's It's going to happen from there, but one of my favorite concepts in the book. There are many, but one of my favorite concepts that I work with people a lot is , this idea of what I call stretch, and a lot of people will cite the adages or the quotes like, Fear everything you want lies outside your comfort zone and fear is the road to change and all of this kind of stuff and I don't think it's quite like that because I think we are in our comfort zone and we have to understand where our panic zone is.
Because if we move too far too fast, it's not actually productive for us. It's like a rubber band. You, , if you try to stretch it too far, it'll eventually snap. We don't want to be in a panic mode. But what we do have to figure out is where our stretch zone is. The stretch zone is where learning happens, it's where shift happens, and it's where the change can happen.
And we have to actually figure out what that looks like for us. Like, where is the edge of my comfort zone? And where is the edge of my panic zone? And my stretch zone might be , really narrow. But the cool thing about it is that it's like a muscle. We can exercise it, we can practice it, and over time, it gets stronger.
I tell this story in my book of one of my good friends. I have a lot of good friends that have run marathons, and I give them a lot of credit, because running a marathon is not something I aspire to. I'm not, I've never been a runner. But I have so much appreciation for the process of what happens when you train for a marathon.
For a marathon, for example, because you're on this journey where you're doing slightly longer runs and then shorter runs, and then you have rest days. How fascinating. We don't just continuously go on a grind until we get to marathon day. But what's so interesting is that what's really happening is you're being stretched.
You're , gently, and that's the key word. You're gently expanding what the boundaries of your body's limitations are, and you're making yourself more comfortable so that in the beginning, running 12 miles might have been really difficult. That might have been a panic space for you. By the middle, You're fine running 12 because you're running 18.
But most fascinating thing is for people, and this may not be all marathon trainers training, but the friends I've had, the first marathon that they've run, when you actually get to the marathon day, you have not run a full marathon yet. That is the first time you're being asked to move to that level. And there's something interesting about this concept of stretch because that is really where the juicy stuff happens.
So I think it's really important for people who are struggling with change, who are resistant to change, is to just not worry about the change. Start mapping out what it feels like to leave your comfort zone. And if you're not a runner like me, sometimes it's just actually putting on my shoes and going outside for a two block walk when I really didn't want to.
Sometimes it's just putting out my shoes. Let's be honest, if I'm being really, really clear with myself, right? But even that sometimes, It starts to stretch me. I start to get just a little bit more comfortable being outside my comfort zone, but not panicking myself, not throwing myself into that space.
I think in general, and as women, we do a really good job of pushing ourselves too far too fast, and there is a risk there. Because when we have those experiences, our system goes eek. That's scary. And the reality is, that's, that's true. That's important feedback to listen to. Because moving too far too fast is not always the way to achieve what we want to achieve.
It may not be, it may not be great when we're sitting there thinking, I would really like to accomplish this in six months, but it is important to respect our own boundary levels of how fast we can move. And again, this idea of mapping out our own stretch zone and then working on strengthening it is a really important one.
And anyone who's done anything physical has some experience. And I think that can be really, really helpful for people struggling is it's just day one, just start mapping out where your zones are and how big is it right? Describe it, really figure out, like, how does it feel to live a little bit more in my stretch zone?
And then how does that allow me to shift and change?
I love that and I love that analogy. I, I personally have experience with running, couch to marathon and I was fascinated by, I'd never run a mile. I ran a mile and then you get done with one mile and you go. Oh I could do two and then , you go out and you run two and then you go if I could do two, I could do three.
And then somehow your brain, once you hit that next thing just like somehow tells you, you could do a little, you could always do a little bit more. It was but I never thought about it as training my brain to stretch myself. I, it was such a great reminder of You don't have to go from one extreme to the other.
But I , I think, I'm a go big or go home girl. So , I typically probably throw myself into the panic mode before. And, just that reminder that it's no, just take 1 step outside of your comfort zone. And then that 1 step will lead to 2 and that 2 steps will lead to 3. That, that's, it's such great information and your reminder that like when you do go too fast, like it's actually, we think it's a good thing.
You're like, I'm just going to go. And then it's actually, it can be detrimental. I love that. It can be challenging. I wanted, I would love to make one more distinction about that too. And this comes from the work of of a woman named Farrah Store who wrote a book called the discomfort sound, , which is another great book, but she talks about.
These BMDs, Brief Moments of Discomfort, that are the transitory doorways to change. And I think it's really important to discover the difference for yourself of the brief moment of discomfort of doing something different and hard and new, and what's on the other side. Because the thing on the other side is rarely the hard, fearful, uncomfortable part.
It's that brief moment of doing it. It's like when you have to decide that you're going to say hello to someone you don't know, and that, the idea of pushing send on an email, or saying hi, that's the hard part, and it's very brief. Once you've done that, you're on the other side of it. So it's also very important, I think, to ask yourself, am I really fearful of those brief moments?
of the discomfort getting to the other side? Or am I actually afraid of what's on the other side? Because that's the fear and excitement thing. Most times on the other side, it's actually exciting. But the fear space is that brief moment of transition, of threshold. So those threshold moments become really important to say, what if this is just a really brief moment of discomfort to help me get to a place where I get to dive into the excitement?
Good. It's a great way to reframe it. You talk about pathways in your book. , what are a few of the pathways to change?
So I talk about some of the tools for change and I already started referencing a few of them, but I reference a tool arc because we need fluid tools. If we're going on a fluid journey, we need these things.
So tool arc is adaptability, resilience, and courage. And those are things we all have. But don't always tap into. So I think it's really important to do this pathway of where can I strengthen and enhance and really trust the tools that I have. , that's a huge pathway. Stretch is a huge pathway.
Permission is another enormous pathway. And sometimes it's not. ourselves permission. Sometimes it's really giving others permission because we learn secondhand. And this is a really important thing to remember is when we see someone else doing something hard, it actually tells our system, I might be able to do that too.
Sometimes that permission is a little like secondhand and we get it from that way. And the last one I'll mention is just this concept of perspective. We always have the ability to shift our perspective. And I refer to it a little bit as like a camera lens, zooming in and zooming out. And if we know that we tend to be really zoomed in on something, what happens if we zoom ourselves out and take a different view, because it gives us a different opportunity for input and feedback.
Likewise, if we're really out there all the time and we're zoomed out and it's hard for us to focus, what happens if we just try zooming in and we're just Narrowing just a little bit so we can just highlight something that we want to delve into, that we want to give resource to, because then it gives us the opportunity to go deeper.
But when we have this ability to use these stretch, permission, perspective, apply our tools, like levers, It lets us all of a sudden create this big working machine of Oh, a little bit more stretch. Oh, give myself permission, shift my perspective, bring in a little courage. Here's a little bit of resiliency.
All of a sudden it becomes this like living, breathing thing. And change is this, Ooh, what can I do next? How can I use my tools and resources to build this next pathway forward? So I love looking at it like that. And , that. Me creates a lot of fun and freedom into the process , of what change really is.
Oh my gosh, it's so good. Literally just reading your table of contents in this book, y'all, like you can, you, girls, like you flip to the first, you flip to the table of contents before you buy a book, you just do. All the things that she talked about are like listed in this table of contents.
And that was the first thing I did. I was like, Oh, this is going to be good. This is, and you can also tell that it is that you have packed it full of actionable tools that can actually help someone. There are a lot of books out there that just talk about things. But it looks like you have really packed these full of tools.
One of the chapters though that stood out to me is chapter 14, which is about gratitude and you call it the constant gardener. So we are the well tended life here. So we do need to talk about this. Tell me a little bit about , what that, that story is.
Gosh, I would love to sit here and tell you, gratitude is like a switch that we turn on and turn off and we just get to have it all the time, but the truth of the matter , is it takes nurturing and it takes , this tending to, and , the best analogy I could come up with is this idea of what it's like to be a constant gardener, to be tending to gratitude it is something that we are growing.
In our lives. And it's one of the keys for me in creating change as a lifestyle. One of my other chapters that I, I loved naming , was it's not a diet, it's a lifestyle, right? And we've all had fad diet phases in our lives. But the truth of the matter is, if you're really trying to make a change, sustainable.
We're talking about a lifestyle change and gratitude as a practice, as something that we are actually creating to enhance our lives, much like a garden is something that we are constantly going to need to give some energy and attention to. And that can start as small as developing a daily practice. Or looking at some of the things around us, or just really saying, did I remember to water?
It hasn't been sunny recently. I need to put a lamp on this plant, whatever that is. And really telling ourselves that this is so much more Then just fix it and forget it. Gratitude is not a checkbox that we check off. It is something that we actually cultivate in our lives.
And I think that for me is this idea of what is a secret garden inside us? That for me is gratitude. And it unlocks so many other things. Things that I would have been totally remiss in the conversation about change is to say that this idea of gratitude of symbiotic relationships of living in harmony is so important to what it means to change and what it means to live in change.
And I think gratitude. Allows you to flip the perspective on anything, right? , you can be grateful for the storm that just blew in because you can, when you're practicing gratitude, you can see what the storm has left behind or what the storm has blown away.
Gratitude. Changes the way , I think your mindset, the way you see the world when you're, when you train yourself to look for I call it in my practice, I call it the goodness for which we're grateful for, you are, you're training your brain to, to seek it, to seek things and to see things that you're grateful for.
And I feel like it just. It helps it come back to you and gosh, I shared the story in that chapter, a story in that chapter. I was so grateful that she let me share it, but about a very young woman who had diagnosed with a brain tumor at 27 and she realized through her healing journey , that she had really not been living her life.
She had been not present, not aware. And one of her takeaways , in her healing journey was. Finding three little wins every day. And it became this practice of gratitude that was so deep. And so again, , it's this moment of saying like gratitude isn't all, rainbows and roses.
And it really is digging in deep to understand who you are and what choices you make in a world that isn't always easy to see where we're going. And I think that is something that has really stuck with me. Thank you so much for sharing this idea of like goodness, the goodness of being grateful, right?
This really is , what goodness can it bring to our lives? And it's so enlightening. It's so enlightening.
So enlightening. This interview so far has been so amazing and enlightening. I can't wait to dig into your book. Over the holidays. I haven't set aside to work on and read. I'm so excited because , I do think to that there, there is a reason for us to really lean into.
Change. We're actually coming into a time in our world where actually things are getting easier, which sounds crazy. But with AI and the way technology is change, growth only happens when we're able to be, we're able to change and we are flexible enough. And it's important that we are actually Stretching and seeking these things.
Otherwise we're going to get , we're going to get stuck. Was it Wally? , what was that? The movie where everybody's on a conveyor belt and they're drinking their big cups, their big gulp cups and all of that we need to get good at change. We need to not be afraid of the big unknown and all of those things.
If we really do want to live our best well tended lives and in the years and seasons to come, I absolutely believe it and no garden is sitting there going. No, please don't. I'm not going to change right? A garden is Let's go. It's time for a new season. I'm going to do all of these things, right?
They are, they're, it's a part of of life and it's a part of our lives if we would just embrace it. So I'm super thankful that you've been sharing with us today.
And now it's time for my favorite part of the interview, because it's inspired by my life tending journal practice. But let me be clear, this is not your grandma's journal. It's more of a growth chart, reflection diary, planting reminder, observation deck, and research notebook all rolled into one. And when used daily, this journal practice is a life guarding game changer, guaranteed to protect you.
beautiful purpose filled blooms in any season. Now it's by far the most important tool in my own personal life gardening shed. And I want to gift you a free journaling template today. So check out the link in the show notes or head over to thewelltenderlife. com and download it and get started today.
Now we're going into the part of the podcast that I ask everybody the same questions because I do believe our lives are like a garden.
And one of the questions I always ask is for you to share about the life season that you're in or maybe you're just finished or heading into , and how does that, how does knowing what your season is impact and inform the way you do life today? Do you have kids under two and you're in a rush around season or , what does that look like for you?
I'm I just had a decade birthday. I turned 40 and in April. And it's been a really fascinating transition for me. I do not have littles. I do not have that on the horizon. And fascinatingly, it's simultaneously a season of embracing growth in a way that I didn't imagine and grieving loss of what, what my life will not be that I always imagined.
And so there's a lot of that happening for me right now and there's equal excitement and grief in interesting pendulum swings of going, I am so thrilled that this is my life and this is what I get to do. And I have moments of being incredibly sad that I won't get to do other things that feel like big things that I always thought would be a part of my story.
And so I really feel it's so important to listen to people and just really try to understand where they're coming from, because we don't all we don't all consciously choose. all of the things that happen in our lives. Sometimes things really do happen or don't happen to us , by virtue , of timing and opportunity.
So yeah, it's an interesting season of, , a lot of disparate but important balance points. For me as well. And so what, tell me how then , what are the things that are important for you to do or be or not do in the season, knowing you're in a season of transition. So I know when I was in a season of grief, for me, it was, I was not taking on a whole lot of projects because I wanted to make space and make sure that there was time, for me to just Breathe again, right?
When my dad died. What does that, how does that inform the way, how does knowing your season and knowing where you are in a transitional season, , how does that, how do you live a little bit differently knowing that? That's such a great question. For me, it actually has involved releasing the time constraints.
Is saying, I have to do this by this. I have to do this. By the time I'm , this needs to happen. What happens if time is just a made up thing and it's all in its right timing, right? I love the idea of giving up Kronos time for Kairos time and just really Stopping the clock time and looking at the idea of what is universe timing?
What is my best timing? And that's a little bit about authenticity. It's a little bit about listening to myself and respecting my pace, but it's also just this, what happens if I'm just not so beholden to other people's sense of time. And I think that's been really important for me is to respect my own cycles and blow out what it means to do it in the quote, right time.
Cause the reality is. I don't believe in right and wrong. We just make choices. And so there is no right time. It is just a time and we can choose to move forward and undo and redo , and, create , and take apart, destruct, right? So I think that's the cool part about it. , it's a lot about releasing time.
I feel like you just gave a blanket permission slip to so many women right now. I just, that was so good. That is so good. That's I can literally feel some like mind blowing moments happening as we talk. So good. Okay. Regular practices. Do you have any regular practices that might help us to live our best podcast lives that you do?
Reflection, I'm going to call it reflection, right? Sometimes I do writing, sometimes I do an archetype card pull, or I work with one of , my teachers, or one of my, but I think practices of reflection are so good, and I'm even going to insist that, Extend that to say, if you haven't looked at yourself in the mirror in a while, sit down with yourself.
A bit of reflection because it's another really great way to reflect. I have always struggled to be somebody who doesn't get bored. I get bored with really regular things. Routine is hard for me because I get pulled in a lot of different directions. And so this idea for me. Regular practice has blown out a little bit.
It's not one thing that I do, it's a concept I do. Reflection and gratitude are two regular practices for me, and those look all sorts of different ways. Last year, on December 31st on New Year's Eve, I wrote myself a letter to open up the next New Year's Eve. And I tucked it into the back of my planner, and I literally let an entire year go by, and then I created some space the following New Year's Eve.
To sit with that letter and open it and see what I had to say to myself, how I wanted to give myself words of advice or wisdom or ask myself questions in a different quote time, right? It was , really cool. All sorts of different reflection practices down to the actual mirror reflection, which I am seriously, if you haven't looked at yourself in the mirror in a while.
Sit with yourself. And I think it's a , really enlightening opportunity to say who am I right now? Do I recognize myself there? Sometimes I don't really recognize myself and I go, wow, you've changed a lot in the last couple months. We haven't done this in a little while, but it's a beautiful moment of coming back home to say Hey, listen, I want to know who you are.
I want to know who you are. And , that's really special. Yeah. And I think even looking into your own eyes. Is a really cool experience. I don't think we do that even getting ready in the morning. You're just you're looking at all the other things, but to be like, there's a person in there gosh, if you really want to push , your, stretch edge, right? It's do it naked. Look at your body. Actually, don't look at your body and say, what do I like? But just this is the body I have. This is me. And what is it to love that? To really say here we are together.
Because we move through the world all the time with ourselves. And I think it's , never far enough from the opportunity to get , a little more intimate , with who we are in any given moment. And it's, again, the permission to always show up and learn something new. Gosh, right? Yes, I love that so much.
Speaking of reflections this next part of the interview is actually from , my morning journal practice where we read, reflect, weed, seed and water every single day and the reflect part of the practice is the one we're going to do right now. I ask everybody, I ask anybody who does the journaling practice to look back on the day before to spot the joy, goodness and growth that is tucked into every single day because it's always there if your eyes are open to see it.
And so it doesn't have to be yesterday, but in general what's bringing you joy these days? Gosh at a , very core level, I, my Christmas tree is up and I twinkle light here, the lights turning on the lights and sitting in the, like the soft, , it just brings me so much joy to have that just gentle glimmer.
And so that's, yeah. There we go. Glimmer of Christmas lights. Perfect. I know. I'm the girl who like, literally, it's like usually February by the time I get my office tree down. Like it has no like Christmas , ornaments. It's just lights on a tree so I can convince myself it's a winter tree.
But yeah, there is something about those lights and I cannot wait. I'm going to put mine up this weekend. Second question is tell me about the goodness for which you are feeling grateful. These days, gosh, my relationships, my friendships specifically with so many amazing women in my life have just been giving me so much.
Goodness and joy and , deep, deep gratitude. I am just constantly in awe of , what these women around me are capable of, what they're doing and how they're showing up. And I think it's one of the most I'm getting emotional. I'm thinking about it. It's one of the, it's one of the most rewarding things is to watch someone shift and change and grow and be able to be a witness.
And, we never know how we are perceived. , we don't know , what kind of influence we have on the people around us. And so to get reflections in relationship have, has been one of the, one of the most heartwarming, , deeply You know, gratitude filling places in my life recently. Let me ask you this.
Since you're talking about friendships, because I think there's a lot of people out there who say that they're lonely, but they're not cultivating friendships. And I do believe that friendships need to be cultivated, right? They need to be. nurtured and tended to just like any other relationship, but it's almost like TV or anything.
They make it seem like it should just be easy, but it is a part of that. How do you cultivate your relationships? How are you tending to them? How do you keep those bonds? Vulnerability is the quickest and hardest to connection. And, oh yeah, we're getting some New York city honking in the background.
Sorry if you can hear that. Connection , is born out of these moments where we choose to either go oh, I'm doing, I forgot, you can't see, sorry, where we choose to reach out and connect literally physically, energetically, or we revert back into our shell. And I think for a lot of people, it is.
easier and more comfortable to revert back into our own shell than risk that intimacy that comes from vulnerability. And so for me, it's this question of these brief moments of discomfort when I feel that little thing inside of me going, this is a risk. Do you really want to share this with somebody? I don't know.
What if they don't like you anymore? What if? Any of those voices that come up is to say that's not what this is about. This is about getting to what's on the other side. And so for me, I have really had to work over the years about getting comfortable sharing things that I feel like I'm not sure I'm ready to share.
I have a great friend and she and her husband have this lovely practice where they have a table of acceptance , in their marriage, in their relationship. And everything's welcome on the table, right? Which I love in general, but they always say the things we don't feel like we should put on the table are the things that most need to be on the table.
And so I think that's the thing I've carried with me to say the things I probably feel uncomfortable saying are the first things I maybe not the first, but are the definite things I need to make sure I'm asking myself. to say. And so for me in friendships that has looked like sharing before I feel like I'm ready, not being sure how someone's going to react to something, and letting myself be so pleasantly surprised when someone holds it with such tenderness and care.
And that has been a really interesting and important breaking point in developing these close intimate relationships , with people in my life that then, Create so much more. This is absolutely a situation where the whole is much, much greater than the sum of the parts. Oh my gosh, so good.
So good, so good. Okay, last one is growth. Where are you feeling growth these days? Where do you, where are you learning your life lessons and such? Hmm. This has been a, I've been on a really huge growth journey over the last maybe five or six years or so, so I'm actually going to, translate your question into a different kind of answer and just say, I feel like I have gone through a lot of the growing pains and now I'm experiencing Some bloom.
I'm in like some bloom to say, okay, I've gone through a lot of the pain of breaking through the surface and new leaves and the getting the roots going and getting a little dirty as those things happen. And really, but now I feel like, okay, , I think I'm in a phase where my growth is doing some more blooming.
And so I'm curious to see what that looks like. And I'm excited to just have , no, that I've done the work. To allow the bloom to be exactly what it needs to be. And that feels really cool. I can't decide what color I'm gonna open up to be like the petal. It's all in there. It's all been the stuff about the choices I've made in the past that have led me to where I am.
So I think that's really what it is. It's like letting the bloom happen and not, Self sabotage, not create these situations by which I'm not letting myself be visible and be like, Hey, I've worked really hard for this bloom and here we are. So that's what I'm going to say about the growth phase. I love it.
I love it. Lisa, thank you so much for coming on and sharing with us today. Tell people how they can find you, follow you, support you, all the things. Buy your book. Yeah, , I would love that. Thank you so much. My website is just my name, lisadeangelis. com. You can find everything on there. I'm on LinkedIn, Instagram.
You can follow me. I would love to connect with you. Grab a copy of my book as soon as you can. Carrie mentioned embracing the unknown. You can get it anywhere where you can grab books. And I'd love to give your listeners, the podcast listeners discount codes so they can get a 99 cent copy of my ebook off my website if they'd like to.
So yay. The show notes, , let's just make it secret garden. And we'll include that, when this episode airs. So anybody listening can go grab a copy for a discount if they'd like, I'd really love to offer that to your listeners. Awesome. Yes. Thank you everyone who has been listening to the podcast today.
I sincerely hope that this episode has inspired you to embrace change. And to stretch outside of your garden balls on a regular basis in order to live out your best well tended life. So until next time, y'all blessings and blooms. Thank you, Lisa. Thank you.
Oh, my goodness. Y'all, that was so good. Don't forget to check the show notes for my favorite heart tap moments from this episode. What is a heart tap? Whenever I read, listen to a podcast or watch a speaker, I'm always on the lookout for those like head bob heart tap and aha moments. You know what I'm talking about?
These are the things that cause your head to Bob and agreement, your heart to make that tap moment. When a much needed word of wisdom comes along or your soul to scream, ah ha That was the word I was looking for. So for each episode I like to share a few of my heart taps in the show notes with you, but I'm curious.
What are they? Are your heart tap moments from today's episode, run on over and direct message me your favorite moments, questions, heart taps, and more over at Instagram or Facebook today. And if you were inspired by this episode or maybe learn something new, make sure to share this show with a friend or post about it in your stories.
Finally, Could you do one more favor for me today? Will you take a minute and hop on over to Apple podcast and leave a kind and thoughtful review for the Tended Life podcast? This is how people find us. And every positive review helps to unlock the door for someone else to get in on the magic of life tending too.
Thank you again for listening and being a part of this Tended Life community. And until next time, y'all blessings and blooms.
In this episode of The Well-Tended Life podcast, your host, Curie Wilt, sits down with holistic change practitioner and author, Lisa DeAngelis. Together, they delve into the intricate and often challenging process of change. Discover the secrets to embracing change, the importance of self-awareness, and the impact of holistic practices like the Alexander Technique. Lisa shares her personal journey, transformative insights, and the tools that can help anyone navigate life's transitions. Whether you're facing a major life shift or looking to cultivate more resilience and adaptability, this episode is packed with wisdom and practical advice. Tune in for an enlightening conversation that promises to inspire growth and transformation in your own life. Don't miss out on this opportunity to learn how to live a well-tended life, no matter what season you're in.