Full Transcript
0:00:00 – Speaker 1
Welcome to the Fully Expressed podcast with Karenna. I am your podcast host, Karenna Soto, and today I’m going to provide you with a few tips on how to know what’s the next step in your healing journey, or how do I identify what that is for yourself.
Depending on where you’re at on your healing journey, this episode is going to be perfect for anyone that is just starting. Maybe you’re finding yourself overwhelmed of like I don’t even know where to start, or I don’t know what to do. Or it’s going to be really, really helpful for someone that has been on this for a really long time. Maybe you’ve been doing the inner work for a while. You’ve been deep diving into just learning more about who you are, but you find yourself up against the wall of like I don’t really know where else to start. You know, or what’s the next thing that I can work on, or what’s been coming up for me. So this episode is really going to help answer that lot of those questions. So go ahead and listen in, all right? So before I dive into giving you all the tips around, what’s the next thing that you can tackle on your healing journey, or what does that mean to you at this time? One. I want to give you a little bit of light into my personal healing journey and what that really looked like.
You know, for me in my initial phases of quote unquote this healing journey or learning more about myself, I really dove into learning a lot about myself. It all started on the, on the couch of my best friend and learning about the enneagram and learning a little bit more about this personality test and the results that I got and what they meant and what they meant to me and gave me so much insight into how I show up, why I show up and where that came from. That really ended up pushing me into and kind of initiating more than anything into this space of consuming a lot of information. So I was consuming a lot of information from different books. I was reading podcasts, instagram posts, I mean anything like that. I was consuming Instagram lives and coaching programs I mean, if you guys knew how much money I’ve invested into coaching programs and then really all started to continue to kind of support me and serve in a way of showing me new information and applying that new information to my life. As well as a part of applying it, going through the undoing that came from a part of applying the information or the being with the parts of me that were attached to the information that I was taking in.
So a lot of me starting to become aware of my ego, my mind, my self awareness, you know, learning about anxiety, learning about attachment theory in relationships and attachment styles and communication styles, and you know this list of lists of things that I honestly drank from the fire hose. I loved all this information. I’m like, ooh, I was low key, obsessed, low key, wanted to learn more and more and more because it really taught me so much. A part of that was also hard to absorb, hard to understand. There was some resistance to some of the information that I was taking in because I was like, no, that’s not who I am. And as I started to work through it was like, I see, I understand now what everyone’s talking about.
So I went through this initial awakening and as I continued on this path, the next phase of my journey, I wanted to kind of really lean into being with the different parts of me that were just coming up all the time and really leaning into, I would say actively and proactively, almost finding the parts of me and I really want to lean into what I mean by proactively. So there was this part of me that was searching to find parts of me, to fix parts of me, to quote unquote, heal parts of me, to do more on doing right. I was like, well, if there’s, if there’s all of this that I’ve learned about myself, what else more is out there? And at that phase I will be honest and transparent that it wasn’t necessarily coming from a very healthy, grounded and loving and open hearted space. If anything, it was coming from a place of like, well, in the more healing that I do right, if I heal more parts of me than the more healed I am, the more worthy I am, the more enough that I am.
And it’s kind of hard not to receive that or not to let my ego take that on. And the reason I say that is because, especially when you’re on social media, especially when you’re in this world of personal development, maybe you surround yourself in communities where everyone’s growing right. It can almost turn into well, if you’re not growing, if you’re not healing, if you’re not doing any of the work, are you cool enough, are you good enough, like, and it’s very interesting how it can actually be something that’s there to support us, but then, when it turns into this, it can actually be more unsupportive and destructive in a way. And so, instead of continuing to lead my healing process from a place of I feel unworthy or I don’t feel like enough, or I want to be accepted by the personal development community, or I want to be accepted by my friends that are doing the growth work or whatever, you know, that’s all coming. If you feel the energy behind, it kind of feels a little reachy, it feels very much like well, if I can reach onto this and hold on, then maybe, maybe I’ll be okay. There’s this like idea of like, then I’ll be good enough, then I’ll be worthy enough. And and that’s where I was like we can’t, we can’t be doing this work from that space, and that’s when a lot of things ended up kind of switching from me, right.
So, instead of searching for new information as a way to prove that I wasn’t enough and that by healing these parts of me that I would be enough, it really started to lean into well, what’s what’s present for me in my life right now, and before I even did that, I just want to share something that really, really helps me and as a tool that I teach a lot of my clients as a tool that I use them every day. It’s actually a part of my language funny to say that’s part it’s. It’s called parts work. So parts work has helped me really almost identify the different parts of me within me and become more of the observer, become more of the witness of what I’m thinking.
For example, let’s say I’m having a hard conversation with my partner and there’s this part of me that there’s this part of me that’s scared of having that conversation. There’s a part of me that knows that’s important to have a conversation. There’s a part of me that feels like if I say this, then they might not love me or accept me. There’s a part of me that knows that this is genuinely true. There’s also a part of me that wants to express this, because by expressing this I know that this would be really healing for me. And so what I just did there, from what you guys just listened to, I was able to identify the different parts of me that are coming up in these situations, and that’s really parts work.
Right, we have multi-diventural humans, we have multiple parts to us, and if you look at someone’s system, someone’s mind and the way that I think in the thought process there’s multiple layers to someone’s thought process. There’s multiple layers to someone’s habit. There’s multiple layers to why you do the things that you do. There’s multiple layers that come up when you are facing a difficult time or you’re facing a part of you that you don’t feel good about, or there’s a part of you know a difficult conversation in your relationships, or you are starting to recalibrate your relationship with relationships, right, like if you’re going through that recalibration period, there’s a lot of parts of you that come up to the mix. Right, and what I have genuinely learned with parts work, it’s learning how to be with all parts. It’s learning how to be with the most present parts at that moment and learn what they need and want.
In that time and throughout that process, I have learned that it’s not a matter of actually putting these parts aside or making them feel less than, or making them feel bad, or wanting to hide them in the closet or making sure that they never come up again. It’s been actually the most healing and the thought has been more like how can I love these parts more? How can I give them what they need and want? How can they give them space to express themselves. And through that process I have started to fully embody more loving all of these parts of me.
And so now this work, this healing journey, doesn’t come from a place of like I’m not enough or I’m not doing enough, but it’s coming from a place of like I love all parts of me so much that I want to give them all a space to express themselves. I want them to not feel anxious when they’re showing up, for example, or not wanting to shut down and run away because they’re scared. I want to show them that I love them, that I see them and that I hear them, and so that that is already coming from a loving, open and heart centered space. That I think is very important when you are on this healing journey. And so that was just a little tip bit that we’re going to throw in there, but kind of bringing it back to like. You know, if you are in this space of, let’s start like with we’re just starting this healing journey, something that you can start. Let’s start with the mind. So, if anyone knows, I believe that there’s two ways of approaching transformation. You can do that from the mind and you can do that from the body. It’s not one or either, or it’s a matter of leveraging both.
So the very first things that you can start to ask yourself and ask yourself these questions is what’s been present for you in your life right now? What has been coming up for you in your life? What has been coming up for you in business or in your career? What has been coming up for you in your relationship? How does life feel to you? How does business feel to you? How does relationship feel to you?
And then, once you’ve kind of identified that and started to give yourself kind of an overlook of what that is, I want you to ask yourself the question of like which one seems to be taking up the most space on my mind these days. Is there a part of your life that feels distant? Is there a part of your life for you in relationship or in business or just in general, that feels anxious? Is there a part of you that you’ve been avoiding or ignoring, that you know is asking for you to be present with, it’s asking you to understand more of? Is there a part of you that you want to dive into? But then you also know that you’re scared to, and so, after answering those questions. Just get really honest with yourself and get real with yourself and start there. You know you get to kind of see this and you know the next layer to this if you wanted to dive into is just check in with your body. Let’s see how your body is feeling in these different situations.
So when you hear me say or ask those questions, it’s probably possible that your body already gave yourself some kind of a signal or some kind of reaction. You can either feel the anxiety coming up to your throat, your chest or going straight to your belly, or you’re wanting to get off this episode because it was too triggering for you and anything like that. Those are signs and I’m not using it as a way to call you out or anything. It’s just. It’s more of making you aware of what could be potentially happening. You’re asking yourself these questions. Just check in with your body and see how your body responds to this. If it starts to contract, get anxious, numb out, want to run away, want to avoid, there’s a lot of resistance to it, those are usually really good signs of places that you could start this work. You can start doing your healing journey and then from there, all right, my love.
I’m jumping in here real quick to tell you about the fully expressed community, because the women that are in this group are phenomenal and if you’re listening to this and you’re a lady, a female, or know someone that is female or lady that is on this path of growth and wanting to continue to evolve as a human being and find their fullest, authentic expression in their relationships, in their life, in their business and relationships, and want to be surrounded by a community of women that are dedicated to doing the work themselves, I want you in this community, I want to invite you into this community. I really think that being surrounded by other women that are on the same path, that just get you, that just totally understand where you’re coming from or where you’re going or where you want to go and wherever that path is, and create such a safe space for you to be held in that and encouraged in, that is so important for our healing. If you find yourself feeling an ounce or a sprinkle of anxiety or overwhelmed or just uneasiness with the thought of being in a great container, about talking about very vulnerable things, I just want to encourage you and remind you that I totally understand, I totally get it. It can be edgy, it can be scary to open yourself in that way, but in doing so you end up creating so much more healing. I’ve had some of the biggest breakthroughs being in containers that can hold me and being surrounded by other women that are also on this path, because I feel like I’m seen and understood, and so I truly want to invite you into giving it a chance. I’m also offering one month free if you leave a review of the podcast, and then you will get access to the next second Wednesday to join us. So go ahead and leave a review and I will send you the invitation to see you so you can actually get a taste of what it feels like to be within the community.
Again, come join us in the Mutfully Express community, where you only don’t hear from myself and get teachings and somatic practices and meditations and guiding and network nervous system regulation, but you also get to learn from renowned practitioners, healers, coaches etc. That are doing the thing in this world and they have gifts to share with you about what is available to you, and you get to take that and crack the code for yourself and how that applies to your life and how that applies to your relationships and how that applies to your business and your brand, your career, etc. Because for all of us women, I really do envision a world, not only for the betterment of ourselves, of why we live on this earth, but as well as our community, as our collective, as the human being, a human population, really bringing and opening arms to the woman that is slowly expressed, that is living in her power, that is so confident and bold and, as well as such, in her feminine and vulnerable and soft and open to creating that space. And so here we’re going to be surrounded by other women that want that and that create that and that burning desire to be on that path. So come join us, leave a review of what I’m doing for the next one for free, and I hope to see you there.
One thing I also want to share is that, when you are in this process of identifying where to start, I want to tell you that most likely, if you start in one air of your life, so if you just start with the relationship that you have with yourself, it’s also going to impact and have an impact with the relationship that you have with someone else If you start to work on it from a place of your business and your career, and what’s been coming up for you there, I’m almost 100% positive that it’s also going to come up in your relationships or in your life in a different way. So when we have these inner wounds or these things, these habits, or, if you want to think about them as unhealthy tendencies or unhealthy relationships to the parts of ourselves, think of it as a root of a tree. The minute that it is, it’s there, right, it starts to create new roots into other areas of your life. It starts to create this pattern that you can just see play over and over in all areas of your life, and so I say that with like, you don’t have to start with this work of attacking everything, but just as tack one area of your life, whether you want to start with the anxiety that you feel in a romantic relationships, or you want to start with the anxiety that you feel like when you’re with your friendships, or if you want to start with the parts of you that are being held back in your online business or in your career. Maybe you’re not expressing yourself fully, and that’s really present for you right now. Just start there first.
Now this next step, and you can either use this or this next part. You can use this, whether you are new to the healing journey or this is something that you’ve been doing for a while. Right, you’ve been doing the inner work, you’ve been studying yourself, you understand yourself, you’ve seen some breakthroughs, you’ve seen some trans, some transformation, but then you’re like I don’t really know where to focus on. And I think this is really helpful, especially because the inner work, the self healing journey as long as you’re open to it, it will be a part of your life for a very long time, as you continue to express yourself, as you continue to evolve as a human being, as your soul continues to just crack wide open with the different experiences that come your way. Right, this is something that is so beautiful and it’s a beautiful gift to all of us because it’s a part of our evolution, and so I say that with, like, this next thing that I’m going to share is going to be such an important I want to say, almost like skill set that you will learn how to integrate slowly into your life, where this inner work and this self healing doesn’t necessarily have to become this massive task, or it’s not necessarily has to be super scary, or it’s not this huge mountain that you get to climb. It’s like almost like you’ve gotten your steps in, you understand how to do this, you get to walk through it and you get to just repeat it as new parts of you come up. So I want you to leverage your body in this instance.
So, as you know, as a somatic practitioner, I really do love using body based therapy, or body based and body mentors and practices, because our bodies actually hold a lot of our subconscious mind. It continues to hold a lot of the emotional charges that we felt throughout our lives. Remember is a lot of the wounding that we might have. Experiences has in prints of our past experience, both the good and the ones that were harmful, both the ones that we received and the way that we didn’t receive, and so our body is just this intelligence that we get to get to be with and bring on board, and it’s probably one of the most complimentary tools to anyone’s. Healing is really not only getting your mind on board right, so your mind might consciously understand, become aware of all these things. But how do we get your body on board? How do we get your body to move with you and your transformation. How do we get your body to recognize the thought and then also be the thought right? It’s not so much of just knowing, it’s in the actual being of our parts of us and our evolution and our expression and our evolution that truly, truly gets us the next step.
So I want you to do a quick check in and just ask yourself how has your body been feeling lately? Is it feeling nourished? Is it feeling at peace? Is it feeling grounded, or does it feel anxious? Or maybe it feels really disconnected and really far away? What does what does it feel like? Does it feel like it’s with you? Do you feel like you’re in your body, or do you feel like you’re out of your body?
The next question is how does your body feel when you are in a romantic relationship or when you are with your romantic partner? Does it feel safe? Does it feel grounded? Does it feel confident, or does it feel anxious? Does it feel like it wants to run away? Does it feel like kind of numb almost, or disconnected? How does your body feel when you are in the workspace, in your career? Do you feel anxious? Do you feel connected? Do you feel alive? Do you feel joyful? Do you feel a sense of ease when it comes to work. How does your body feel?
Now I’m going to take the same questions and ask you how does your body feel when you’re having hard conversations? Is there a specific topic that comes up that your body gets super anxious? You can feel almost like there’s like a frog in your throat or your heart starts racing or your belly starts to feel like super sick, like you can just feel the emotions in your gut, or you just feel really heavy. Or does it feel like you want to run away, or do you in fact feel pretty confident, pretty grounded and so on, and so you’re starting to get my just here is like you can start to use your body as a way to show you where is there an opportunity or where is there an invitation for you to learn more, where is there an invitation for you to see that next part of you, to get a little bit more curious about, to start understand these parts of you that are coming up. Maybe there is more inner healing there, maybe there is some more parts of you that want to be expressed in those areas, and a lot of the times our body will speak to us. You can feel the body when it feels open and joyful and connected and alive, almost like everything, feels like it’s in harmony.
But when that gets out of place a little bit, that’s where we start to feel disconnected, that’s when we start to feel numb, that’s when we start to feel like we’re just doing day to day the same thing over and over again, that’s when we start to feel anxious and contracted and unsafe. And so I want you to get a little curious about how your body is feeling in these moments. And then this is really going to give you your next step these answers as they come up. And so how can you do that from an integrated space? So let’s say you’ve already. You’re living your day to day. You’ve been doing this in our work, you’ve worked with the therapist, you’ve worked with the coach, you’re just kind of doing life and you have the tools to help you manage Anything that might come up for you, and you’re just curious about what that next step looks like for you in your healing journey.
As soon as you start to feel your body feel anxious in certain situations or contract again Anything that I had shared, where your body just feels really freaking uncomfortable. That’s an invitation for you to dig a little bit deeper and get really compassionately curious with what is this? Where is this coming for? What’s coming up for me? What does that feel like? And that’s probably a place where I would. I would learn a little bit more and dive deeper. And so, again, the purpose of this podcast episode was really just to give you some tools and some insight into what could be the next step in your journey, as well as where would be a really good place to start.
I find that so many people feel stuck in how do I start right, and that can, when you’re Overwhelmed and your mind doesn’t know what to do, can actually cause more of a freeze-trauma response. But right now, I’m giving you the questions and the tools and the practices that can help you move the needle forward. Right, I don’t know if you’ve ever heard this, but most of our life, we’re either moving forward or we’re living in the past. So sometimes, if we find ourselves stuck, we’re just kind of reliving the same past over and over again. Versus, if we get the opportunity to move the needle forward, then we’re actually living in the present and more in what’s next and what’s available To us, and so this is the invitation for you to find that next thing for yourself. And the last thing I’ll say and I think this is the most important piece to the healing journey and this inner work path is your biggest medicine is learning how to give yourself grace. Grace is the biggest medicine to the soul, to inner work. And so, however you move through your process and whatever is next for you in your process, it’s your process.
It doesn’t have to look like your friend that’s also doing the personal development work. Maybe they are moving into being more sexually expressed and you haven’t even, you can’t even wrap your mind about what that looks like. Or maybe they’re learning into integrating both their masculine and their feminine and you’re like we, I don’t even know what that means. Or you see them really leaning into their business and their career and their purpose and finding that space, and then you find yourself super overwhelmed with what do you mean? I have to do all this work and take it from me. Your body and these questions are gonna tell you what is that next step for you.
So, if you need to go back and listen to this episode, write down the questions and take that time for yourself, go do that, but your ego is gonna want to compare to the people around you, your communities, and Also, it’s gonna be really difficult to navigate social media, as you’re consuming so much information, and that’s a whole another episode that I think we need to talk about. But, when it comes to social media, can be very overwhelming of how much information is there. So I want you to take your power back and come back to your intuition and come back to Yourself and really start to create this inner knowing within you. By asking yourself these questions, by practicing these things and by creating this inner knowing, you will also create the sense of discernment, and when it comes to discernment, that means you’ll be able to make decisions and know what’s the best next step for you. And so, yeah, I feel like that’s really what we covered here today.
So biggest takeaways are just get curious with yourself about where life is. Ask yourself the questions, use your body as a way to kind of be the signal of well, there is a new door that’s knocking at my door and I need to. I want to go, look at it’s an invitation and Remember to give yourself grace in this process. Give yourself an, an opportunity, right, because the harder that you are on yourself, the further away You’re actually gonna be from your growth. And so many people think that if I’m harder on myself or if I push myself harder, we’re gonna get there faster, and that’s actually not the case. Going at your pace and taking it slowly and going to that process is, is gonna be the biggest thing that’s actually gonna end up moving you a lot faster. Trying to go fast could actually making you go slow. I know that sounds funny but it’s true.
And then, lastly, once you kind of identify what areas you want to work into and kind of feel into which ones are Really big ones and where you want support and you want to dive in deeper, you know, look specifically for that, find a resource, find an accountability partner, find a coach, find a mentor, find a therapist that can help you dive into that specific part of you that’s coming up for you right now, in this moment, in that area of your life, and search for someone that has the expertise to support you in that, because in that space, that’s where you can really help almost fast-track your Transformation, this part of your journey. If you want that, if you feel that that is supported for you, it’s always really nice when you have someone on your team with an unbiased opinion and is willing to help you and see you in your process. So if you’re anyone that truly welcomes that, I want to encourage you to also take the space to go. Do that, all right.
Well, I would love to Hear from you if you found this helpful, if you found that you want to share with me what came up for you. I’m so open to doing that. You can send me a message on Instagram at the fully express podcast is the handle for this and send me a message there. Or you can send me an email to at hello at Karen a soto calm, and all of this will be in the show notes. But I would love to hear from you and if you found this episode supportive, please go ahead and just rate this episode. Give this a feedback so I can go ahead and reach more people in this community, because I truly believe in supporting and encouraging and inspiring and Inviting every single one of you into your fullest express self and in your personal evolution, as we continue on this lifelong journey of healing and this journey of life that we’ve been so blessed with on this earth. So, sending you lots of love and look, keep an eye out for the next one. Talk to you soon I.
