Episode 36 - Connections

Transcript

00:00:04 Alison

Welcome.

00:00:04 Alison

To mental wealth, the podcast to invest in your mind. Here I will help you make sense of your mind and behaviours, giving you the tools to have your best life. There is so much to share, so let's get into this episode and explore another great topic.

00:00:22 Alison

So welcome to episode 36. And in this episode I have a very special guest and we're going to be focused on resilience, mental resilience, just kind of working around. How do we keep going when we are feeling a bit.

00:00:39 Alison

Low and a bit depleted, so I'd like to welcome to this episode.

00:00:42 Alison

Demarra, who is all the way in Michigan. Welcome to this episode.

00:00:48 Demarra

Yeah. Thank you so much for having me, Alison. I'm excited about the conversation today.

00:00:53 Alison

Brilliant. So tell everyone a little bit about you first, so we know who.

00:00:57 Alison

Who you are.

00:00:58 Demarra

Yeah, absolutely. So my name is Demarra West.

00:01:01 Demarra

And I'm founder of

00:01:01 Demarra

Be Well Beautiful Woman, which helps to support women and centering their healing and liberation so that they can lead and live on their own terms. And I offer a retreat to mastermind coaching and some virtual community support. And then I'm also author of Me Too: A Therapist’s Journey to Heal, Find Liberation, & Joy.

00:01:18

00:01:20 Demarra

So I connect therapy with a lot of other healing modalities to support women and the world in being well, both on an individual, A community and an institutional level.

00:01:35 Alison

Brilliant. So we can definitely say you're definitely qualified for us to focus on this topic.

00:01:41 Alison

So I like to kind of share some of the challenges that we might face. Again, just speaking up because we often feel alone, we we need to get rid of that feeling. I believe that if we can realise that others might be feeling similar to us.

00:02:00 Alison

Then you're halfway there.

00:02:02 Alison

And I think that's so important and I think you've got a bit of a story that you can share with us so that people can connect with you on that to get us started.

00:02:12 Demarra

Yeah, and. And so, you know, we're talking about how people can feel connected in a world where they often feel disconnected, particularly in the midst of a pandemic.

00:02:23 Demarra

Or the genocide, right that's happening right now.

00:02:26 Demarra

As we speak.

00:02:28 Demarra

And so, you know, I think that just acknowledging first and foremost that community is really important to our well-being. Research has shown time and time again that you know, one of the major indicators, the most important factors that comprises a life lived well is our social connections.

00:02:48 Demarra

And even in a virtual world, we can find community, right. And that's one of the things that COVID bred for us, right? All of the ways in which that we can find connectivity. And of course, being in person is not the same as being in the virtual environment. But we can find space like for example.

00:03:09 Demarra

One of the things that I do under.

00:03:11 Demarra

The auspice of.

00:03:11 Demarra

Be Well Beautiful Woman is a online community called 'be my sister's keeper' and so just finding where those communities may lie, we would be surprised at the like minded communities that are out there from scrapbooking to, you know, if it's an interest of ours, there's probably somebody.

00:03:29 Demarra

Out there that also has a similar interest.

00:03:32 Demarra

And so sometimes it's a matter of getting on Google or Eventbrite or our Facebook community and really leveraging those resources to find out where like minded community might lie for us. And even when we are in virtual spaces like.

00:03:50 Demarra

You know, we host many summits. I'm hosting my 9th one. Since the top of COVID called the Global Abundance summit at the end of January and these are free offerings. Free opportunities for people to get together and educate themselves.

00:04:05 Demarra

And to evolve in any way that they're choosing to. And that is a great way also to find community, right, because we don't know who is going to be in these spaces and where there may be opportunities for us to connect. And so if I'm in spaces like this, I might send a private message and say, hey.

00:04:24 Demarra

I see that you're doing XY and Z work. I would love to be connected with you, you know, not all virtual offerings provide that opportunity because they're not live in the virtual environment. But I'm just, I'm just emphasising the mere rad of ways that we may find ourself.

00:04:40 Demarra

In alignment with people which does require ourselves to put ourselves out there, right? I mean, I think that we idealise what it means to be in community, but it takes real work to build relationship. I just read a statistic that said that it takes, on average about 280 hours before we can really develop an intimate relationship with someone.

00:05:02 Demarra

The depth, the depth by which that it takes.

00:05:05 Demarra

To have a relationship really rooted in truth and understanding and acceptance, and that takes time and it takes real effort. So we have to first see the value in it and then be willing to do the work to align with it.

00:05:20 Alison

Brilliant. And I think all of that and obviously yes, we can talk a little bit about pushing yourself out your comfort zone to actually make that happen, but all of that, wherever those people are, wherever that connection is that we have you, as you rightly say we need. I always think of it as the glue.

00:05:36 Alison

Do to kind of in between all of the things that get us going, but actually all of that does shout at us that we're not on our own, that we can share experiences we can share some of this struggle. We have to feel strong to feel resilient, to be able to keep going.

00:05:56 Alison

Just to hear that somebody else.

00:05:58 Alison

Has had a similar experience, I think is something I talk about a lot because when I speak to my 1:1 clients so often they will really, genuinely think that they're the only ones who are struggling in the way that they're struggling.

00:06:14 Demarra

Yeah. Well and.

00:06:16 Demarra

It's just that's the fallacy, right? That.

00:06:18 Demarra

And I think that sometimes sadness, despair can it there's trickery in that right. It makes us believe that we're the only person. But I can assure you that there are tonnes of people out there that have had similar experiences. It doesn't necessarily mean that.

00:06:36 Demarra

A similar experience has the same kind of emotional effects, right? Because what we feel is going to be very individualised and it's complicated and it's multi layered and you could have two children living in the exact same household, having the exact same experience, but the way they see it and how they endure it and how they rise or not rise from it.

00:06:57 Demarra

It is going to be very much individualised so I don't want to minimise peoples emotional response to the triggers that can arise from isolation.

00:07:09 Demarra

But what I do want to invite people in to is to really re explore what does it mean to step out of the realm of being isolated and know that there are people out there that are waiting on us just like we're waiting on other people. You know, I I have this talk and and I reference often that people are our number one.

00:07:30 Demarra

Pathway by which we get our needs and our wants met that abundance ultimately comes our way, but we have to be willing to put ourselves out there and we have to be willing to ask for help to receive the.

00:07:43 Demarra

Help, to be.

00:07:45 Demarra

Vulnerable, right. And to take risk.

00:07:47 Demarra

Because you know when you're talking about relationship building, there is risk in that, right like.

00:07:51 Demarra

It can be hard.

00:07:52 Alison

Oh yeah.

00:07:52 Demarra

To be alone, but it can also be really challenging to build relationship. There's nothing like being seen and affirmed by someone else, and that is really the remedy by which one of the remedies by which that we heal.

00:08:07 Demarra

And that we rise.

00:08:08 Demarra

We're into our humanity.

00:08:09 Alison

Yeah, love that. And I think just being able to.

00:08:14 Alison

Keep hold and keep safe that vulnerability.

00:08:17 Alison

That will be.

00:08:18 Alison

There, if you're going to put yourself.

00:08:19 Alison

In any new.

00:08:20 Alison

Environment the brain. I often I'm always talking about.

00:08:24 Alison

When we haven't got a.

00:08:25 Alison

Reference it's going to give you an emotional response of don't do it, fight, flight, or freeze. It's going to probably tell you all sorts of things.

00:08:34 Alison

About why you shouldn't do it.

00:08:35 Alison

But, I think just knowing that that courage, that we need to take to be able to make that contact to that new group, give that Facebook message something or other, whatever it is, might be something that is holding us back. And I think it's so important for us to just explore.

00:08:56 Alison

That in itself, you know, I do hear people say, and I in fact, last week I only had somebody who he was explaining that he doesn't.

00:09:04

00:09:06 Alison

He was trying to read people he was trying to work out whether they liked him or they didn't, and he was. He was colliding. What was happening so he would send a message to somebody and they didn't respond for a week. And he was colliding those two things and adding together that that meant they didn't like him.

00:09:26 Alison

And it was holding him back.

00:09:27 Alison

A lot. I don't know what your thoughts are on that.

00:09:32 Demarra

Yeah. I thank you for raising that because I think that so often the very thing that we long for is the very thing that we repel that repels against us because we can be so desperate for connection that any sign of rejection can be the affirmation.

00:09:52 Demarra

That the world you know, is a lonely place, right? And it can affirm the very thoughts that we have. So the first thing that I want to say is that we have to be mindful about the thoughts that we have on a regular basis around connection. What do we tell ourselves?

00:10:06 Demarra

Are we telling ourselves that there is an abundance of love in the world, that people are the right people are out there waiting for me that you know in time I'm going to find those connections because the things that we tell ourselves is the things in part, that we manifest. The other thing that I would say is that we want to think about relationships.

00:10:27 Demarra

The respective to alignment, right?

00:10:30 Demarra

And So what I would say is, is that the person that doesn't respond to us, if we can accept that, that simply is not the right person for the right time and cause, sometimes not even forever. Essentially right. Sometimes it could be circumstantial, and that person can come around later on in life. But if we can just accept things for exactly what they are, and I usually use like the rule of three.

00:10:50 Demarra

So if I reach out to someone the first time, I don't hear back, I will reach out again because life happens. And then if I don't hear back again, again, life happens and then I will typically reach out the third time and then the third time will tell me.

00:11:04 Demarra

That the timing is either this person is not right for me or the timing is simply not right and I'm just gonna let it be because what I believe is that.

00:11:13 Demarra

The people that.

00:11:14 Demarra

Are waiting on that we're waiting on are also waiting on us essentially, but it does take time to find them. And the other thing that I want to say is.

00:11:24 Demarra

You know something that Brené Brown offers in her work on vulnerability is that the way that vulnerability works is that it's like we're putting our toe in the water.

00:11:35 Demarra

Eventually. So if I put my toe in the water, Alison and I reveal something about myself and you don't reveal something about yourself, then I can know that that is not where I wanna put my toe in the water until you begin to put your your toe in the water. So a lot of times when we're desperate for connection.

00:11:55 Demarra

Either and, and we're afraid of what

00:11:58 Demarra

Will happen in.

00:11:58 Demarra

The midst of connection we can either do two things.

00:12:00 Demarra

We can either hold back and not reveal parts of ourselves which prevents us from having depth with people, or we can reveal way too much about ourselves too quickly and it can scare the person that's across from us that we're trying to build relationship with, right? So it can either come off as that.

00:12:20 Demarra

We're not open enough or we are too open in the process.

00:12:25 Demarra

And the way that we can buffer ourselves in the midst of that is by using that toe in the water analogy, right. And I'm literally building a new relationship with someone right now. And that's what it's like. It's like a ping pong match. Right. I'm sharing a little bit about myself. They're sharing a little bit about themselves. I'm scheduling.

00:12:45 Demarra

Right. And then they're scheduling so that there is this reciprocity, that it begins to exist, this rhythm, if you will, right. A lot of times we can't even get to that space of rhythm because we're too extreme in the midst of building relationships.

00:13:00 Alison

Yeah, I think so. And I think it's.

00:13:02 Alison

It it's navigating, isn't it? If you are looking for new connections.

00:13:07 Alison

Which obviously we've identified helps us be resilient, helps us get through life if we are.

00:13:15 Alison

Like you say, like the rule of thumb is a great thing. But sometimes for me it's about just working out what's what actually is right for me. Is it do I need to really pursue this person because

00:13:26 Alison

There's something there that is right for me. Is it that they're wrong for you because their world is full of something else? It's there's all these little things that I think we need to navigate, but so often the human brain will make up.

00:13:42 Alison

The answer, but there isn't really an answer. I often say to people you know there could be so many reasons why somebody doesn't do something or somebody does do something and when we get locked into that idea or we've made-up in our minds.

00:13:57 Alison

What that analogy is or what that scenario is, we get ourselves into all sorts of troubles, and I think for me it is about choices. It's about making sure that we make a good choice for ourselves, not put ourselves in situations that are unhealthy. But equally putting ourselves forward. Sometimes, you know, I know I've got some friendships.

00:14:18 Alison

That you might feel like you're doing a bit more of the hard work, or it might be that they might be chasing you a little bit more, but it's about choices, isn't it? It's about being able to make a good choice for yourself and not put yourself in something that is unhealthy.

00:14:32 Demarra

Yeah, and. And there's a couple of things I want to reflect back about what you shared, I mean.

00:14:38 Demarra

Defining the kind of friend that we want to be, how we want to show up in relationships is really critical and how we want people to also show up in relationship, right? Because this is where good boundaries are put into place.

00:14:52 Demarra

For ourselves, because really, the only way that people know how to treat us is the boundaries by which we enact in respective to that relationship. The other thing that's critical is about placements, right? You know my mother.

00:15:04 Demarra

Used to say.

00:15:05 Demarra

To me that.

00:15:07 Demarra

You know, first and foremost, people come in our lives for reasons seasons and lifetimes, and most people aren't actually here to stay. They're here to serve as our spiritual teacher. Or you're here to serve as theirs, or vice versa, and that even the people that are meant to stay, there's placements irrespective to.

00:15:23 Demarra

Who they are.

00:15:23 Demarra

Like so often in relationships, we want people to be.

00:15:26 Demarra

Everything to us, but that's not actually how relationships work, and if we can really meet people exactly where they are. I have a friend, for example.

00:15:37 Demarra

Who, if I reach out to them, I know that they're going to respond to me. They're they will always show up. They will always respond, and this is not also somebody that I'm gonna break bread with. We're not gonna sit down and have dinner. We're not. That's not where our placement lies. So I could say, oh, well, this person is not a good friend to me because I can't rely on them to go out and break bread.

00:15:58 Demarra

But actually they're a very good friend to me. But this is where what our relationship is. So if we can really accept people where they are and the role by which they are supposed to play in our lives and the role by which we're supposed to play in their life.

00:16:14 Demarra

Then it allows more harmony to exist in relationships and then.

00:16:19 Demarra

We are able.

00:16:20 Demarra

To level set our expectations irrespective to that person. The last thing I want to say, Alison, is that you know the four agreements talks about that we really shouldn't take anything personal, right, so.

00:16:34 Demarra

Whether a relationship begins or a relationship ends, I think there's learning in all of it, but there's also an acceptance that comes along with the fact that I and I alone, am responsible for my actions, and this person is also responsible for their acts.

00:16:52 Demarra

And so no matter how they see us, because in one breath someone could be celebrating us singing our praises. And then in the next breath, they could actually be writing us off and saying we are the worst person on the planet. Right. And so it's so important for us to be.

00:17:09 Demarra

At home with the truth of who we are so that we don't allow the perspectives of others, whether they invite us in or they not, or they don't, or they see us in a way that's not true, that actually deters us from knowing the truth of who we are.

00:17:24

00:17:26 Alison

I love that and I love the fact you've highlighted.

00:17:29 Alison

The big one of the biggest challenges that we face as humans is that we take things personally when it's actually somebody else's behaviour, somebody else's reality, and it's not actually connected. And it's interesting that you say that because the person who was just referring to before who I hope will listen to this podcast, that was what he did.

00:17:49 Alison

Every single action that these new friends that he was making was was doing he took.

00:17:56 Alison

As personal to him and it's it left him feeling very unsafe to then be able to try again or try somebody different and then he obviously feels like he's not. Then people don't like him. People are interested in him and of course it's not that at all.

00:18:12 Demarra

Yeah. Well, and the therapist in me.

00:18:16 Demarra

Knows that what this person is probably struggling from, and this is the case for adults, right? Because at one time adults were children.

00:18:25 Demarra

He is trying to repair whatever was broken from his childhood, irrespective to relationship, irrespective to him, feeling worthy and validated. And so this is why validation and worthiness has to be an intrinsic locus of control.

00:18:46 Demarra

Right. We have to know for certain that we're worthy in spite of the way that people in our lives have harmed us in spite of the way that maybe parents didn't care for us, didn't nurture us, didn't right. And so, you know, even though we might be thinking, well, that was the past. That was like, he was a kid.

00:19:05 Demarra

Well, whatever doesn't get repaired. We just carry it into adulthood, right?

00:19:10 Demarra

And so, you know, my hope is, as you said, that they are listening and they can hear the words that they are worthy simply because they are here on the planet and they're worthy of love. And they're worthy of connection. And as they do the work to heal themselves, they will find that they will be able to attract that place.

00:19:31 Demarra

Because we can't attract more than what we feel worthy of and and even if we attract it. And if it comes into our life, we can't sustain it, right? Because the only way, the only thing that is self-sustaining is what comes from within and permeates out.

00:19:48 Alison

Brilliant, I love that. And I think it is really important that we've touched on these things, particularly for me when I do hear and I think you do too, a lot of people who are finding themselves, we talked about being lonely or just not feeling like they're fitting in. And actually some of the reasons behind that.

00:20:08 Alison

Are totally outside of ourselves and some of the reasons for that are that internal.

00:20:15

00:20:15 Alison

Work that we need to do, and I think you know, people will do strange things. People don't behave the way that you might. I mean, I think that was something else that we talked about in our session last week, and I know it'll speak to other people is we might have a way that we want to do friendships.

00:20:34 Alison

But not everybody will do that. And and I think you touched on it, didn't you? There's an expectation then that others will do the same. So then you're instantly disappointed. You instantly feel it's a personal attack and actually they're doing it differently.

00:20:50 Demarra

Yeah. Yeah, well, and what you've just raised, Alison, is is also this invitation for us to consistently be in our power, right. And to know that we can't really control the movement of other people even when we set boundaries up, we're inviting people in to meet us, irrespective to the boundary. But let's say they don't meet us.

00:21:12 Demarra

Then we get to decide, right? What are we gonna do from this place? If this person's not being able to fulfil this request that we have of them right. And again, it's not personal. So when we decide that we're gonna let relationships go because they're not rising to the level that we expect of them.

00:21:32 Demarra

That's also not personal.

00:21:34 Demarra

And we're what we're inviting in then is the alignment, right. Because the more that we say yes to things that we don't want simply because we want connection, right or the more that we are desperate in the midst of longing for connection that people actually run from because they can feel that level of desperation.

00:21:55

00:21:56 Demarra

So and you just said it right, we have to know at any point in time, what is this about? Where is the lesson in this for me? What am I being called to rise into, what needs to heal in me so that I can create the connections that I really long for because people will do all kinds of things to be seen.

00:22:17 Demarra

And to be heard and to be supported.

00:22:19 Demarra

Right. We have a biological need to be a part of Community to be connected to other humans. And yet if there is something lacking in us that's preventing us from doing that, just that, then the invitation for us is to heal in that so that we can have these connections.

00:22:40 Demarra

That we are truly, truly worthy of.

00:22:42 Alison

I love that. I think.

00:22:44 Alison

So good to hear you say that too. It's probably reassures those of us in the UK.

00:22:50 Alison

That it's just.

00:22:51 Alison

The same over in America, you know.

00:22:54

All over.

00:22:54 Demarra

The world.

00:22:56 Alison

Yeah, sometimes we have this idea.

00:22:57 Alison

That you know Americans have got it all sorted and those few people in the UK haven't, and it's just so healthy to hear you sharing your experience as well. I think that is a good reminder.

00:23:07 Alison

And as you say, it's, it's multifaceted, isn't it? When we're looking at connections, we're looking at how do we get them. We're looking at what is.

00:23:13 Alison

It that we need.

00:23:15 Alison

And where are we going to get it from? One of the things that I like to talk about and you've touched on it, Demarra, is when we say yes to something that really we don't mean, it's not the right thing. It's not gonna serve us. I call these 'dirty yeses'.

00:23:32 Demarra

Yeah, I love that. I've never heard it framed.

00:23:34 Demarra

That way I've.

00:23:35 Demarra

Had this conversation so many times, but I've.

00:23:38 Demarra

Never actually heard.

00:23:39 Demarra

It like that and I like it and I'm.

00:23:41 Demarra

Gonna use it.

00:23:41 Demarra

With your permission. But I will give you credit.

00:23:43 Demarra

For it, Alison.

00:23:45 Alison

Yeah, 'dirty yeses'. Because then then internally we feel cross. We feel annoyed with ourselves. We might feel annoyed with the other person.

00:23:53 Alison

So I think when we think about friendships, connections make sure that we are putting our energy into the people or into these things that are going to give us that joy that's gonna give us that resilience gonna give us, like you said at the beginning, give us that space. For like minded people who can help us.

00:24:13

00:24:15 Alison

Maybe show us things differently so we don't have to be the same as us, but just that safety, because otherwise you're gonna go around saying yes to things that you don't really want to do. You are not comfortable with, and they are reframed as a 'dirty yes'.

00:24:32 Demarra

I love that and well, and the only way that we can really know.

00:24:36 Demarra

Whether or not something is a 'dirty yes' is by how we feel.

00:24:40 Demarra

Right after we say yes, how we feel in the midst of executing whatever we said. Yes too, right. And I think so often we blame other people. It's, you know, I was just having a conversation with a friend of mine. And they said, well, why don't they stop asking me to do this? And I said, why would they stop asking you when they.

00:25:01 Demarra

Have counted on you to do it for.

00:25:02 Demarra

20 years. It's like, why would they? And if you want to not say yes to it, if you want to change this.

00:25:10 Demarra

Then you have to just stop, right?

00:25:13

00:25:13 Demarra

And, what was really striking to me is that when they stopped, they talked about the pain associated with not doing the thing that they've always done that has caused them immense discomfort, because now the discomfort is connected to the discomfort of the person they've been in service of.

00:25:30 Demarra

Right. And the shifting that we have to go through, I call those growing pains. Because even when we want to change something about ourselves.

00:25:41 Demarra

If we have become accustomed to doing it this way for however long we are going to have to become, we're becoming something different. Something new is emerging and that's going to cause us a level of discomfort as we get into the new way of not stepping into The 'dirty yeses'. As you said, right?

00:25:59 Alison

Yeah, yeah.

00:26:01 Demarra

And other people are going to be uncomfortable, but we will also be uncomfortable until that becomes a part of just.

00:26:10 Demarra

How we are, how we show up in the world right there. There's gonna be some challenges, right? Some in that contortion process.

00:26:20 Alison

Definitely, definitely. And I think you know, for me, I'm often.

00:26:23 Alison

Reminding us all that if you.

00:26:24 Alison

Do feel a little bit.

00:26:25 Alison

Uncomfortable. Good. Because it means that you are going to.

00:26:31 Alison

Expand that, you say growing pains. It means that something new is coming. We don't grow.

00:26:38 Alison

When it's comfy.

00:26:41 Alison

And actually sometimes saying no or being in the right space with somebody and making sure that it does work for you is possibly going to have to be a new habit or a new.

00:26:53 Alison

Practise for many people out there and I think it's so important because then we start to feel.

00:26:59 Alison

More aligned with.

00:27:00 Alison

Got to feel happier. I know that was my experience. You know, I was definitely a dirty yeser for a long time. I was helping.

00:27:08 Alison

Helping people. I was doing things that just weren't right for me whatsoever, and when I started to sort of say no or put myself in different situations, ultimately yes, it felt uncomfortable for a little while, but ultimately the happiness came because I was doing what's right for me.

00:27:26 Demarra

Yeah, yeah, I love that.

00:27:28 Demarra

And for people who you know are recovering, as you just talked about from.

00:27:34 Demarra

You know, just saying yes to things that they don't want to say yes to or saying no to things that they really want to say yes to. You know, it's such an ongoing body of work, right, because our default is going to want to be to please because there's something in us that is served by that.

00:27:55

00:27:56 Demarra

And yet, we know that when we do that, we are not honouring the self, right. And so that work it has to happen over and over and over again. And because there's going to be times that even when we don't want to do something we still.

00:28:16 Demarra

Might feel inclined to do it right, because it's just a part of our psyche. And so, you know, it's, I heard, Joyce Meyer say many years ago. We have to think about what we're thinking about. So before we even say yes, unless it's like, yes or before we say no, unless it's like, oh, absolutely not pausing.

00:28:35 Demarra

The power of the pause is a thing that will always help to propel us into what is most true for us in this moment, right as we are ebbing and flowing, you know, between the state of being and the state of becoming, which is constant as we are working on ourselves, day in and day out.

00:28:54 Alison

Definitely.

00:28:55 Alison

I'm still learning.

00:28:57 Alison

I've been doing this for a very long time. I love the fact that we came on and we started talking about connections and how we needed to kind of reach out, find our tribe. My previous guest actually it was called Find Your Tribe.

00:29:14 Alison

And actually, then we've evolved into looking at some of the challenges that actually many people face around doing that cause it obviously you know, you'll often hear people say, well, it's it's easy for you to say, you know, go and find some new connections, but it's not. We have to be mindful of some of the things, some of it's internal, some of it's.

00:29:36 Alison

The external stuff that we've explored today and hopefully that's going to really help people listening in today to just remember that yes, you need to have good connections. Yes, we need to have people that we can trust. We need to have people who are like minded.

00:29:53 Alison

But there will be things that might happen and just paying attention to those and working with those might just get you to that group or to that set of people that are gonna give you something new in life.

00:30:08 Demarra

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And you know, just being mindful about the patterns.

00:30:14 Demarra

I I had this epiphany not long ago. You know, I've been divorced for about 5 years now. And you know, in the dating world, and I had this moment where I said, Oh my gosh, like.

00:30:26 Demarra

I'm attracting people who are not available. They may appear to be available. They may say that they're available, but that yet their actions don't align with this. So if that happens once, OK, twice OK, third time. And so the invitation is also to look at ourselves, right. And what is the pattern?

00:30:46 Demarra

Because of the pattern is has evolved in our life. That is the indication that we're being invited to change something within ourselves, right and.

00:30:57 Demarra

So if we can always look at within and say OK, what is this teaching me? What am I discovering? And we've got to be able to slow down enough right to know. OK, I want this and yet this is what is appearing in my life so that how can I change that? Right. What work is in me.

00:31:17 Demarra

That's going to help to get me to this place of connection that I long for and that I so desperately deserve.

00:31:25 Alison

Brilliant. I love that. I feel like that's a another episode on patterns.

00:31:29 Alison

That maybe we could have you back and you could come.

00:31:32 Alison

And talk to share that space.

00:31:33 Demarra

I'd love that.

00:31:33 Alison

Ohh, thank you so much for your time today, I know how busy you are and we've put all of your links into the show notes so everyone can look you up if they wish. But.

00:31:46 Alison

I really appreciate you.

00:31:48 Alison

Coming and giving us your wisdom and your kindness today.

00:31:51 Demarra

Oh my goodness. Well, it was such a pleasure, Alison, I'm glad that we talked about all the things that we did. It was a beautiful conversation, and my hope is that folks feel inspired and they've got some practical things that they can do to continue to put their toe in the water and build connections.

00:32:10 Alison

I love that.

00:32:11 Alison

Thank you so much.

00:32:15 Alison

Thank you.

00:32:16 Alison

For listening and sharing in this episode of Mental Wealth. Remember, you can subscribe wherever you get your podcast. My last question to you is what is the one small thing that you can take action on from this episode?

00:32:32 Alison

Message me on Instagram or through our website with questions you'd like me to explore.

00:32:37 Alison

You'll find the links in the show notes.

00:32:39 Alison

I'll be back with more tools and.

00:32:41 Alison

Tips to make sense of your mind in the next episode.

00:32:45 Alison

In the meantime.

00:32:46 Alison

Be kind to yourself. Bye for now.