The Peaceful Home

Episode 31: You are Enough Exactly as You Are with Dr. Zoe Shaw

May 26, 2022 Pamela Godbois
The Peaceful Home
Episode 31: You are Enough Exactly as You Are with Dr. Zoe Shaw
Show Notes Transcript

In this week’s episode, Dr. Zoe Shaw is revealing all of her insight on navigating difficult relationships, especially those foundational relationships, like the one between you and you. Dr. Zoe shares her own struggle with shame and the path she used, and what she teaches other women to embrace life and move beyond shame. 


Dr. Zoe Shaw is a licensed psychotherapist, motivational speaker, podcast host, life coach and fitness fanatic. She is a mom to 5 and a wife. She is passionate about helping women who struggle in difficult relationships, especially that sometimes difficult relationship with themselves.


After 15 years in traditional psychotherapy practice, Dr. Zoe jumped off the couch and now helps women using a different modality with a mix of virtual therapy, coaching services and programs, through a lens of psychology, faith and a dash of feminism, designed specifically for women struggling in difficult relationships. Dr. Zoe is the author of the Ask Dr. Zoe Column in the Grit and Grace Project women’s magazine, She has been published in Oprahmag.com, Recovery Today magazine, Forbes and is a frequent contributor to Your Tango. She writes about helping women redefine their Strengths.


If this episode inspired you in some way, take a screenshot of you listening on your device and post it to your Instagram Stories and tag us, @pamgodboiscoaching and @drzoeshaw.


In this episode you’ll hear:

  • Dr. Zoe shares her journey with shame and the work to find the courage to move forward and heal. 
  • She explores the foundation for confidence and strategies to move through the fear. 
  • Dr. Zoe speaks about the benefits of doing hard things, and how being afraid plays into this. 
  • We explore the therapist’s battle of showing up authentically, and showing up for your clients. The differences between what we learned 20 years ago in school and what is happening today. 
  • Dr. Zoe shares about her 360 self-care philosophy and what that looks like for you. 
  • Reminding us all, that “you are enough!” exactly as you are, you do not need anything else to be enough. 



LINKS:

Dr. Zoe’s Website: https://drzoeshaw.com


Dr. Zoe’s Instagram 


Connect with me:  Instagram, Facebook, and Tiktok


If you’re like “I love listening to Pam chat with guests.” Then head over and write a review! We really appreciate your support and it helps us to keep growing!!  https://pamgodbois.com/ApplePodcast Thank you so much for listening to this week’s episode. Be sure to tune in next week.



The best thing you can do for yourself and your kids is effectively regulate your nervous system. And a great place to start >> to wire the brain for gratitude. Research tells us that gratitude increases happiness and a peaceful mindset. Make the shift and watch how things in your life start to change. Sign up today! www.pamgodbois.com/gratitude

On this week's episode of the out of your mind podcast, I had the opportunity to sit down. With Dr. Zoe Shaw. Uh, mom, a licensed psychotherapist, a life coach and author, and so much more. Zoe wants you to know the, you are enough exactly. As you are. Through her own story of shame and courage. Zoe shares her go-to method to love yourself exactly. As you are. So let's dive in

Pam:

Zoe we thank you for coming and being willing to be on the podcast and sharing your story with me, saying very excited to

Zoe:

have you on you're welcome. I'm thrilled to be here.

Pam:

So we were chatting a little bit before we hopped on and you have. You're doing a lot of things. There's a lot that you're currently creating. There's a lot that you currently already do. And I would love for you to share with our audience, what has brought you to this place? What's the story? What's the story of doctors, Zoe Shaw. How did you arrive here?

Zoe:

A story. Yeah. My story is in some ways like academically, it's a super straight story. I went to high school. I love psychology in high school. I knew I wanted to be a psychologist since as early as I can read. My mom was uh, well, she loves psychology and she had me very young and I went to school college with her and sat in classes with her. And I think, I like to think I stoked my, her psych classes in, you know, I mean, I was little, so what did I know? But I went on a very straight line, undergrad, masters, doctorate. I went straight and that was academically. And then there's like life, right? So my life story, when it comes to H where, how I've gotten to where I am has been very secure. It's circuitous. I couldn't say that word today. gosh, it's like, where do you start? I grew up in a very non diverse white farming community with a lot of Mennonites and I had a lot of self-esteem issues. Given my color and my identity and what that meant for about who I was. I ended up getting pregnant at six 15 actually, and I. My parents sent me away to a unwed mothers home. And I had a very interesting experience there and I placed my child for adoption. And that kind of began my shame story because I went back home and pretended like everything like nothing happened. And so I quickly learned a lot about shame and secrets. Didn't have any kind of understanding about. Expected me psychologically. I think maybe I had a little bit of an understanding because I was so interested in psychology. But yeah, so then I started to live my life. I got married very early as a kind of redemption thing. I think growing up in a very fundamental Christian environment. That was the thing you did, especially if you had sex early you wanted to redeem yourself and so. I got it. I've been married since I was 19, met my husband at 18. We had a very, really unhealthy, dysfunctional relationship in the beginning and it took me a number of years. Kids I've had four children since then. My, my first daughter after the daughter that I placed was born with a rare genetic disorder called Prader-Willi syndrome. And in that whole process of having a child and not knowing she was going to live and then recognizing she was going to have some very severe debilitations, I felt that I was being punished for having given up my first daughter. And so I. I lived with a lot of that shame, a lot of the guilt, a lot of the secrets and. It really wasn't until my father died. And when I was in my late thirties that somehow some things started to change for me in addition to being overwhelmed and burned out in my work and just life piling on top of me, I started my own journey. Learning how to stand up for myself, learning how to love myself, learning how to forgive myself. I'm learning how to not be a people pleaser and be authentic and speak up. And I really did a huge self-transformation despite the fact that academically and career-wise I was doing well internally. I was really suffering. And so. As I learned to really come into my own and. To get rid of, or I should say integrate my shame story, surrender to my shame story. I really began to feel driven to help other women. And so I kinda jumped off the couch where I was just working as a general practitioner, in a normal, private practice. And I jumped off the couch and really started writing. Which had always been a passion of mine, which I didn't think I could ever do for a number of reasons and started speaking and started helping women and developing courses. And so that's how I got to where I am. I used my knowledge of psychology to help women through a journey that I've been through myself.

Pam:

How did. So you talk about doing the work of self-love and forgiveness and those foundational things that we need from a

Zoe:

resiliency standpoint, big words, but like, how

Pam:

did you do that work? Because I'm sure there are people listening, going, oh, shit, that's what I need to do. Like how, what did your work look like there?

Zoe:

It was a, years, long process and of course I'm still on that journey. I'm over the hill, I'm in a really great place on that journey, but we're always still on a journey. You know, I think it started with fig with really getting to a place, unfortunately, which I don't want women to get where I just felt like I can't do this anymore. I am overwhelmed. I'm burned out. I don't want this life anymore. Something has to change. I got to that place, which I don't think I needed to get to that place. If I had been more aware if I had not been in denial if I had a little more self-love I wouldn't have gotten to that place. So I also think that my father dying facilitated a big part of that because I so much was attached to their idea of what my life should look like and holding these secrets and his death allowed me to not have to hold a secret anymore. The reality is I didn't have to hold this. But I chose to, and I believe some of the stories that had been put upon me. And so part of his, his death allowed me to do that. I now know, and I can talk with other women and teach them that you don't have to wait for somebody else's, idea of who you should be to go away before you start to show up as who you are. And so it really was. I mean, when we talk about steps, I mean, I got deep into self-talk. I read so many books. I began to understand and look outside of myself as if almost I were the therapist looking at the construct. Right. Because when you step outside, it's all so very clear when you're in it. You can't see it. And I also got my own therapy, a lot of therapy I'm actually outlining a lot of those steps am of my shame journey and the book that I'm writing. It's not one single thing. It's a lot of things piled on top of another and it's really learning how to self care. It's learning how to talk to yourself, sit with yourself, feel your emotions, right? What you think It's a lot of work, but it's so very rewarding and, I mean, we could talk about, okay, so for a woman who's out there and she's wait, that's me. I recognize that I have a lot of shame. I recognize that it's influencing my relationships. Right. I recognize that it's influencing my confidence to be who I need to be in the world. One of the first things that I would ask her to do would be to start writing. And start speaking the truth to herself at least and throw it away, your password, protect it, whatever you need to do, just start speaking the truth to someone. And eventually you need to start peaks speaking the truth to other people. I mean, start to speaking the truth to yourself, and eventually you need to start speaking the truth to other people, but it starts first with yourself because often we're telling ourselves a whole bunch of lies that were told to us. Yeah.

Pam:

Yeah. And one of the things that we had. The spoken about before I hit record was the work that you're doing with women that really actually helped them facilitate a healthier, I guess, healthier could be a term. We use a relationship with self. Right. And what does that kind of work that you're doing with women? What does that look like? Or what are your thoughts?

Zoe:

Yeah, all of my work really is helping women facilitate a healthier relationship with themselves. Often women will come into my practice or call me or email me and it's about somebody else. This person is doing this to me. We're having this difficulty in the relationship. We often, as women are so outside focused, we want to fix other people. We want to fix the people we're in relationship with. I found for myself. And I find that when I work with other people, when we turn it and word, and we look at ourselves and we address the things that we need, that we aren't getting met and these relationships when we're able to instead, except the people outside of us and interact with them as they are not as we want them to be. And love ourselves. We have a much different relationship, with people and as we change, I mean, I, we talk, I talk a lot about systems, right? So relationships are systems as we change. Any part in any part of a system, if it changes the rest of the system has to react, it's just physics. And so as we change, our systems will change and it doesn't mean that our people are going to be perfect. No, because our job is to accept them, which is so hard. We want. Issue we have in relationships is we want people to be someone that they aren't and we keep getting disappointed when they show up exactly as they are. And we think maybe next time he'll get it right. Maybe next time they won't hurt me. And then we show up and they do the exact same thing. And we're disappointed again, when what we really need to do is go wait, okay, what am I doing here? Who am I, why am I needing this? How can I honor what I need, but how can I expect them to continue to show up exactly as they are?

Pam:

Yeah. Yeah. I

Zoe:

love that

Pam:

idea of and I say that often as well, is that The struggle of looking at maybe it's your relationship with a spouse, maybe it's relationship with a child or a friend or a parent. I love my mother dearly, but there are times that she makes me want to beat my head against the wall. Yeah. So you're not hearing what I'm saying, and I have way less of that now because of my own work that I've done. But I recognize like, all right what about this as me? And what about this as her? And then what do I own and what do I let go of? Or what do I accept about her? And so how would you help someone that is stuck in that struggle within a relationship? Whether it's. I hear this a lot. I love him, her, whoever them, and I want this relationship to work. But they're not giving me what I need. Like then what do I do? Where do I go? What am I first steps?

Zoe:

Right. So the first thing is to ask yourself, what do you need? What exactly is it? Behaviorly cause often they'll be like I want to be cared for. I want to feel like he cares about me. I want to feel loved. I want to feel understood. That's very vague. And if you tell somebody that everybody has their own lens through which we see the world, and if you tell someone that's what you need from them, they may try to give it to you, but they have no clue what that actually looks like because you haven't told them. Right. And so they can often be. Putting all this energy into the relationship doing the very wrong things. And you said you're sitting there feeling unloved and they're sitting there feeling frustrated. So the first thing I ask is let's put it in behavioral terms. What are the things that you need that person to do to make you feel that way to get that need met? Right? So then once we put it in behavioral terms and we can look at, okay, have you requested. Have they done it. Are they able to do it? Are they capable of doing it? Is that something in their wheelhouse? Right. So once we get the behavior straight and we make sure that you are actually communicating it accurately, then we actually know, okay. Yes, they are not willing to meet that need, or they are not able to meet that need. And then when that's the case, then you've got to ask yourself, is this a relationship I can be. Without that need being met, not can he change, will he change? It's really asking about what's going on right now in the relationship, right? Because that's where you, the next step is acceptance, except that this person can't meet the need. So then the question is, how do I get that need met? Because what we don't want to do is push it down and say it doesn't matter. And the relationship is more important and act as if you can live without.'cause usually that just leads to bitterness and resentment and frustration, and a lot of other yucky feelings that aren't productive in our relationship. And so then your goal, your job really is to get that need, need met for yourself and figure out in what healthy way can you do that outside of the relationship?

Pam:

This just had me thinking about. The spinning this inward, right? Think about is women often were like, I'm going to eat healthier. I'm going to exercise. I'm going to take care of myself. I'm going to show compassion towards myself. I'm going to love myself more. And then weeks and months and years go by, and those needs are not getting met. How do you do this work with that relationship? Like how do you. How do you take the things that you just said? All of which I absolutely get and from an external perspective go, yeah. Yeah, that totally makes sense. And now I have to have this, do this with

Zoe:

myself. How do I do that? When we promise ourselves we're going to do things and then we don't and we try, and then we fail just like with anybody else in your life, you lose trust. Right? Because we have a real living active relationship with our. That is the same as any other relationship. And sometimes we forget that. And so as we lose trust in ourselves, then we start interacting with ourself as someone we don't trust and there's hurt, we hurt ourselves. And so we have to acknowledge that we have to write down the ways that we have, breached and jeopardized our trust by making promises to ourself that we haven't kept and that's real. And some, and that sometimes that happens in relationships. And sometimes it's because. We don't care, but sometimes it's because we're just human. Right. We can love somebody and still hurt people that we love. So your job then is to start building trust in small ways. And just maybe a teenager that you don't trust or a toddler that you don't trust. It's not really fair to ask them to do huge things. We give them little things right. To see if they can accomplish that task, to see if they're trustworthy in that task. And we do that in our relationships too, when people have taught us, hopefully if you're healthy, people have taught us that we can't trust. Then we don't trust them, but if we want to be in relationship with them, we have to work to build that trust. And so what you need to do is start building that by giving yourself small things. So, okay. Maybe you're not going to work out seven days a week. Maybe you're not going to lose 30 pounds. Right. But maybe you can set a goal and figure out if it's doable for you. And ask that question, be honest with yourself. Just I don't want to make a promise to my kid that I know I can't keep, so I'm careful to go. Okay. I, can I do that? Like If I tell her we're going to go to the park on Saturday, can I really do that? Otherwise I'm not going to say it because I want her to trust me. So maybe I will, tell her that we can go to the park for five minutes. If I think I can do that, but I'm not going to tell her. We'll spend the whole day at an amusement park if I'm not sure. Right. Start with a small thing, five minutes at the park, right? Start with the, let me commit to doing one small thing. Let me commit to walking for an hour, or I'm not an hour walking for 15, 15 minutes. And then also making sure that you're doing things that are enjoyable, that you're caring for yourself in a way that's not militant. Because that doesn't usually bode well in relationships. If you have someone outside of yourself putting something like that on you, okay. Maybe you can, if the consequences are huge, but we don't do that in relationships. We don't do that because it doesn't work. Right. And so you also have to be caring. And when. Self care. I do think about 360 self care. So self care is not just bubble baths and all the fun things and, getting your nails done, which is lovely. It's really about being a good mother to yourself and a good mother. Makes you eat your vegetables. She makes you do your homework, right? She makes you go to bed on time, brush your teeth, but she's also very loving. A good mother is she's a space of comfort. You go to her for nurturing. And that's what you want to aim to be to yourself. She's also forgiving.

Pam:

Yeah. Yeah. And, I love that idea of putting it in the context of a mother, whether you're a mother or not, we understand what, even if maybe we didn't have the best relationship with our mother, we understand what we would have liked to have from a mother that, the ideal mother in your head, whatever that might be, whether it's you being a mother or whether it's you being mothered I love that idea because, I often say you wouldn't say this, you wouldn't say this, the things that you say to yourself in your head to your girlfriend or to your teenage daughter. Right. Because yeah there's, we're so harsh. So I love just that frame of yeah. If I'm being the best version of the mother that I would like to be to myself, what

Zoe:

would that look.

Pam:

I love that. Yeah. That's awesome. So you are writing a book.

Zoe:

Yeah. You tell us about that. Oh gosh. Yeah. I

Pam:

love that. I love this. I'm so excited to hear about it.

Zoe:

Yeah. So I wrote this little self care book, which is out and it's been out for a year now, which is fun and good. It's a year of self care, but my baby. Has been my memoir and I have been writing it for a number of years before I even started the self care book. And we're like, oh, we're on the precipice. My agent is subbing it right now. And we have editors interested. I'm going into meetings next week. And it's probably going to be more of a prescriptive Memorial, meaning like a memoir slash self-help. Really regarding my shame journey and helping women heal their relationships with themselves and their own shame journey. So I'm super duper excited about this book and the whole process of finishing it, rewriting it because you write it and then the editors get involved and then it becomes rewrites and things like that. But yeah, I'm super excited. How did you find

Pam:

the. I'm like, what's the right word. I don't know that there is the right word. How did you come to a place where you were trusting enough of yourself? You've done and are doing the work that you're wanting to lean into this because writing a book that is your memoir, that is your shame journey is vulnerable. And I don't know about your grad school and beyond, but my social work school, they were not like, you know what? I run around and tell everybody your story and be vulnerable. They were like, shut that shit down. Don't tell anybody anything.

Zoe:

Oh my gosh. I'm so glad you addressed that. Okay. I it's been 20 years, I guess, since I've graduated from my doctorate. Yeah. It's something close to that. And so, when I was in my doctoral program, there, there was no like internet, wasn't like huge, There was no virtual, anything. Obviously people found me still in the phone book, right. And the first time they came to my office was the very first time they saw me and I learned to be a blank slate. I, my early training was psychoanalytic training and so. I'm like, woo I'm in such a different place now, but that is how I was trained, was to be a blank slate, which means essentially I, as a person don't exist. Right. I'm just a board to bounce things off of. I'm like a, an academic board, I suppose. And so when I did jump off the couch, because I walked out that for at least 15 years in my practice. And when I started writing and blogging and podcasting and the very first, and I still had this sense of I'm doing this, and this is separate from my work as a therapist. Right. So I'm still the blank slate in therapy. And then I have clients showing. And sitting in my couch and asking me about my son and something that happened last week because I had podcast it and they'd been listening to my podcast and it was like, whoa, that felt so invasive. But I'm like Zoe, you're putting yourself out there. Right? And now these people come here and they think they know me and they know things about me cause I've been writing it. So I was living this dual thing, or I'm blogging in a very vulnerable way and doing all these things. Somewhere along the way I started to integrate it. And. I mean, I think part of it is just the world and the reality of our world. Now that the majority of people that come to me through Instagram, they, find me because they liked something I wrote or they resonate with a podcast I've been on or my own podcast. And so I now know that's the truth. And to be honest with you, the very first time I got on a stage. Shared my story. I was shaking. I was nervous. I had a vulnerability hangover, like nothing. But what I found is that the more I should say the very first time I spoke up at my father's funeral and I told my family that I had a child that nobody knew about and I brought her there and it was crazy. So that was huge. That was the breaking point for me. But as I get up on stage or, do a podcast or share. Two things. And this is something that I really want people to hear. If they have their own shame story as number one, nobody freaking cares. They really don't. They might talk about you for five minutes. It might be, it might be scandalous. Even if it's scandalous, they'll talk about you for five minutes and go on about their life. And this thing that you've been holding on and carrying this burden that is hurting you for so many years, nobody freaking cares. That's. And number two, the more you share your story, the more you help other people, and. The more value I feel in some way, your story has for the world, because if you have a story and you've overcome something and you've been through a lot of crap, and there are so many other people in the world that have been too, and you hold it to yourself, it's like you're stealing from people who could really benefit. I don't want people to get to the point where I. Before they start getting help. I don't even know if I answered your question now because I went off on a tangent, but it's been a process of learning and now I can share my story and know that, I mean, if someone judges me, I feel like that's a little bit more about them than it is about me. And I'm okay with.

Pam:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think the bottom line with that question is that it was about how do you step into the vulnerability and especially

Zoe:

where shaking. Yeah

Pam:

exactly. Essentially from just thinking about the training that we both have around, blank slate. Nobody knows anything about you. I remember being in grad school and them saying don't have pictures of your family and your office don't have, I was like, Hey, great. Yeah.

Zoe:

It's yeah. And if somebody asks you, are you married? How many kids, you deflect questions like that, and the training really was well that's about them. They have their issues wanting to know that. And the reality is, like I said, the world has changed. And also, I don't know that was really great. Accurate teaching. Yeah. I have found that having a connection, even me with my own therapist and I've questioned myself as I'm, as I want to know about him, but little things that he shares with me or little things that I find out on the internet. Cause I might've stopped him a little bit. Connects me with him and I think that it enriches our work. Yeah.

Pam:

Yeah. I mean, I think from a therapeutic perspective and whether this is we're talking therapy or a coach or a teacher or somebody that you're working with, it doesn't really matter what the role is, but if you're entrusting your story, if I'm entrusting my story to somebody else, and I'm asking for them their guidance in some way to help on my transformative journey, it's beneficial and has a. In my experience. I am hugely I need to know who you are before I'm willing to share this information

Zoe:

with you. I don't know.

Pam:

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So it's just a fascinating place. I'm curious. Sometimes I'm like, you have to go back to school now and see what they're saying. They're probably saying this.

Zoe:

I'm curious about that too, because I mean, I see grad students who are now on Instagram and sharing their lives. And so I suspect that there's a different narrative going on. I think more it's about how do you do that? Because we live in such a social world now with social media, we can't we can't hide under a rock. Right. So I think I would imagine the narratives about how that's a good question. I want to find out. I need to talk to a grad student. I know. I sound like

Pam:

I'm a duck. All the people find that information out. Yeah, it's crazy. It's crazy. So, as you're talking about this and like this stepping into the vulnerability and embracing the, standing on stage and, writing your story into a book the, what comes to mind for me is. The not just the journey of getting to a place of being vulnerable. It's when we, I almost think about like my years in the trenches of working in community mental health, and nobody knew anything about me and I was a blank slate and don't tell anybody anything. I almost felt like that kind of transferred over into the rest of my life. And so that all the social connections that were in my life. Not really social connections in my life. I feel like we can't be one thing in one area and something else in another area and something else, another area because we're human beings. Right. And so I'm curious on your thoughts on that or your experience with that, with doing the work that you're doing with people, whether it's within the context of relationships, anything about. Yeah, you go down the whole path of mental health and apparent competence and that kind of stuff, but really I'm thinking about most of us, you can't be one person at work and one person at home doesn't work. Right. You have to slug through the inner shit, if you want to be the best version of yourself, essentially.

Zoe:

So do you

Pam:

have any like thoughts or tips or anything? On that integration stuff that you were talking about trying to integrate all aspects of your life together, like

Zoe:

personal and work life. Yeah. That's a good question. I think in the beginning I struggled not to be a therapist to my friends. It was very easy for me to just slip right into that role. And in some way it makes me invisible because they don't even realize they're talking about all their stuff and I'm not talking about any of mine. And I think that felt very safe for me, especially because I was holding big secrets, and I think that, I know that now there is a much I think it's both sides where there's an integration, both sides, meaning I'm more myself as a therapist and I'm more myself, with my friends. So it's gone both ways. Of course, I'm professional as a therapist, I'm a professional Zoe, I'm the Zoe that shows up that's about them and I'm there to serve. Not about me when I'm with my friends. It's equal. I want reciprocity there. There's no reciprocity in therapy. But what I do know and what I've found, whether I'm speaking or doing my work is that people connect to your authenticity. They just do. And we, sometimes we want to. Pull away from it. We want to be this thing that we think we should be. Whether, you're in business, right. Or, in my therapy, whatever work you're doing, we have this sense of, we have to be this, we have this icon, some comes into our mind about, I want to be like this person, and this is how I want to show up. But we can't do it perfectly because we're only ourselves. And when we do show up more of ourself, when we let that shine through, we actually have more success in our business. Yeah. But it's scary. And it's again, walking through, often people say I want to be able, and women will tell me this all the time. I want to get to where you are. Like, how did you get so strong where you could say these things and speak out and have courage. And I it's backwards. I did the things really scary. I knew that I had to save myself. And the more I did it, the more courage and more bravery, I developed, but it doesn't happen the opposite way. It's like saying I want to get in shape before I go to the gym. It doesn't work that way. You got to work through. Yeah. Yeah. I love that

Pam:

analogy because that makes sense to us. Right. We're like, of course I'm not going to get in shape before I go to the gym. That's silly. Isn't that? Why I'm going to the gym. Exactly. Yeah. Stepping out into the world is the things that you have to do, whatever that looks like, whatever that means, right? Whatever, stepping out vulnerably and authentically is what you need in order to build up. People often say to me women will come to me for coaching. I just want to be more confident okay, go ahead.

Zoe:

Just

Pam:

decide. You're more confident than you are. And they're like, ha, but

Zoe:

right. It is not it is. And that's the hard, scary part. It's I don't want to be scared is what they're really saying. I don't want to be scared when I'm doing this. And I'm saying, You have to be scared and it's okay. And it's beautiful when you've walked through that fear. That's where that sense of self-confidence comes because you've done something hard. Yeah.

Pam:

Yes. Oh, I love that so much that embrace that idea of. I say to my sweet 13 next week, 13 year old. And she said, and she'll be like, whatever, it's hard. Right? And I'm like, yeah. And the beauty of you being a human being is that you can do hard things let you grow. And she knows this. She's a black belt in karate. She's like starting a baking business, like gluten-free cookie. So she's, it's not like she doesn't know this. It's just in, in relation to math. Right. But she's having her math homework, she's having a meltdown about it. I'm like, you can do hard things and we need going back to that, like the mother that is there to support, we need that. Did we do that to ourselves. We need to stand up there on the stage, however, big or small the stages. It's not to be a stage like you're talking about stepping out onto a stage, but I think everywhere we show up, we're showing up on a stage,

Zoe:

right.

Pam:

Step out onto that stage. And. Remind ourselves, like you can do hard things.

Zoe:

Yeah. Good to do hard things. It's my mantra with my kids too. And they get so tired of hearing and I'm like, it's good to do hard things. That's great. Yay. They're like mom.

Pam:

Yeah. Right, right. So what kind of like work or what kind of suggestions do you have to. Get more practiced. I get at, I guess, at having those types of conversations with yourself, because I often feel, I often hear from I'm thinking of a woman in particular, I had a conversation with this morning where she was like, yeah, know I need you to be, I need to stop telling myself the stories that I'm telling myself, but then what, like, how do I do that? How do I get those stories that you're, you're saying these beliefs and stories I have about myself that have been in me for the last 30 years, how do I undo them?

Zoe:

Right. A lot of people don't even know what their stories are. They might have a vague idea of, I'm not being nice to myself or, I tell myself I'm fat or whatever, but the first thing I think people need to understand is that. Those stories often get developed really early. Right. And we think sometimes if we left a unhealthy relationship that we left our childhood, we've left to toxicity that we've left it. But what we don't realize is that what we often do is before we leave, we pack a bag of all the words and we take it with us. Right. So we don't leave it. We just bring it, we bring all the negativity and all the words, and we keep telling ourselves over and over again, and we don't even recognize it. And so what I asked my people first is what is it that you're saying to yourself? What is it that you believe that's negative about yourself? And often they can't tell me, they might tell me feelings. They might, tell me some things. But what I asked them to do is literally get a piece of paper, get a notebook. You need to, when you feel any kind of strong ish emotion, when you feel sad, angry, frustrated, confused, bitter, whatever is going on in that week. I want you to record for the whole week, the things that you notice, you're saying to yourself about yourself, about the other person or about the world, right. And then we can actually go and look at, oh, I'm saying that it's like. What is it? The confirmation bias. Right? So that's what I was thinking of. Yeah. Once you name it and you recognize it, you tell people, because I tell my people, you talk to yourself more than you talk to anybody else. You talk to yourself more than anyone talks to you, and that makes you your biggest influencer. And you're talking to yourself all day long. I need to know what those words are. So. Make it a whole list and we look at them and then we take that list and we do general cognitive behavioral aftermath, like refuting where we look at every single thing they're saying to themselves and we start to not just refute it, but then we start to create something more positive, really affirmations. And this is what always happens. Number one, people say I don't really believe that. As if that means anything I'm like. And so think about all these things that were told to you when you were young, that you tell yourself every single day, have you ever stopped and gone way? I don't believe this. This might not be true. You don't even question it. You just say it over and your brain believes what you tell it. So who cares if you believe it or not? You never cared about the negative things. So we're not even going to ask yourself, do I believe this? You're just going to say. Saying it right. And then the other thing I get is that didn't work. I tried it, I did my 10 affirmations a day. It didn't work. And I see that as someone saying, you know what? I ate broccoli yesterday and I didn't get healthier. So broccoli's no good for me. We don't we know that's not true. Right? We know it doesn't work that way. We take our vitamins and we don't expect that the next day we're going to be superwoman. We eat our vegetables and you don't expect that we're going to see this huge trend for transformation. But we know that over time, what we put into our body has an effect and it works the same with our brain. So you've got to start there with the actual things that you're saying to your. Yeah. Yeah.

Pam:

And then, just this idea of you talked about the cognitive behavioral, the restructuring pattern, the patterns with affirmations, just for those who are not aware of that, but that is like you're taking whatever the negative thing is. I'm fat, whatever the statement is, it's that you're become aware of and you're. Transforming that into something that is a positive message that you can be that

Zoe:

counters that's very specific, right? To the negative one. Yes, they counselors. Yeah. Yeah, I

Pam:

sometimes have people would be like so I was like, my, the negative story that kept coming up was that I'm not capable of losing weight. So then I just started telling myself that I'm loved and I'm like, that's cool. I'm going to combat the

Zoe:

first one has nothing to do with that. I'm glad you're loved.

Pam:

So yeah, I just wanted to highlight that is very specific. It is coming up with something that you can actually replace. And I love the reminder that I always say the brain is the. It actually reminds me of rose on the golden girls, right? Like gullible and we'll do the brain we'll do anything. We'll believe

Zoe:

it

Pam:

has no ability to discern if what you're telling is true or false in those statements. So true.

Zoe:

It is programmable.

Pam:

Yeah. Which is. It is because God, yeah, no shit. I mean, we'd all be a mess if that were not the case. Right. Right.

Zoe:

I mean, we're also a mess because thank God that it can,

Pam:

we can also, yeah, we can do that the other direction. And which leads to the place of, what, a lot of times we term healing or you can come to a place of where we are, our healing, our the old stories, the old wounds the old traumas. And being able to integrate the wisdom from that, which is amazing. Our brains. Our biology is amazing. I just can't every time I like started to think about it, my head goes down, this tunnel of these things get stuck in this black hole mind

Zoe:

blown. Yeah. It's so

Pam:

amazing. And I think recognizing Interestingly enough, I had this conversation. I'm thinking about women in particular have this conversation. I have two sisters and one of my sisters sent this like newspaper clip of like from the 1950s of like how to

Zoe:

keep your man happy or something.

Pam:

And I just think about as women, as female entrepreneurs or business owners, all of the things that were. Asked or expected to take on that are outside of the realm of like our business and what we're doing from a work perspective. But then all these other things, it's no wonder that. We struggle to make the time to do the affirmations or to be like, I tried it 10 times it was didn't work. That's not going to work for me. It was no wonder that we feel like we need a quick fix because there's so much we're carrying so much on our plates.

Zoe:

Yeah. I mean, we want a quick fix. We all want a quick fix in this quick world. But it is a journey, healing journey. I hate that term one because it's like, Cliche, everybody says it. But I think of it, it's like a life journey, like I've healed, right? I'm healed now. I'm just living a life journey and it think about it like as your body I don't think about my body and go I'm on a healing journey with my body. No, I'm on a maintenance journey with my body. Right. I'm definitely maintaining and I'm living, but we don't always have to be in a healing state because the healing, if we're on a healing journey, then that also implies that I'm still. And we're not always still ill. We have injuries. We have to recover from them, but we can actually just be on the life journey. Yeah. I love that reminder

Pam:

as well. Yeah, I think so often in the health and wellness space, I hear it over and over like healing, this and healing that, and I'm like, and I think it just has replaced the term fixing.

Zoe:

Yeah, I think so. I think,

Pam:

okay. Let's just say.

Zoe:

And then we want to do that. I mean, a lot of us do are in a place of being on a healing journey and that's okay. It's okay. I'm just saying it's not a lifelong thing. It doesn't have to be a lifelong thing. You can get to a place of maintenance.

Pam:

Yeah. Which is awesome. Yeah. I love that. Are there any other things, as we're, I'm trying to, I'm like rolling around in my brain, all the things we've talked about, are there any other things that you're really feeling like you want would love to share with my audience to. That's a good

Zoe:

question. I think we get so overwhelmed with self-help. I mean, I'm writing a self-help book, right? It's do we really need another self-help book out there? And and I think it's important. I love podcasts. I utilize podcasts. I love self-help books. I'm going to read them till I die, but there comes a time where. We have to stop just relying on seeking, right. And actually start just doing our own work and being you don't need more, I guess, is what I'm trying to say. You don't need to wait until you get that next bit of information, or until you understand a little bit more, you have enough right now where you are to start on whatever journey you need to start on, whether it's entrepreneurial journey, whether it is a self healing journey whatever it is you need to do. I see. Stop that let's work on that lie that you need more to get there. Yeah.

Pam:

Yeah. I love that. I love that. And that's a great reminder. It feels and maybe it's because a lot of the people that are. And connected with, or like myself have gone through the traditional, like my, like you, my educational journey was very straight. And so we've done this, we've got indoctrinated into this culture of learn more, get more certifications, become an expert in this thing. And an expert in that thing, an expert in all of the things that I often find Myself included until I realized that I was like whoa, stop. That this idea of I just learn if I just move, it could certified in this state, but if I just add this thing and maybe then people will find me more valuable in some way and want to, my business will grow or my, or I'll find a level of my life or whatever the thing is that we're That we're wanting

Zoe:

in our lives. Yeah. I hear that with my clients. I'm going to, when I lose weight, then I'll get on this dating app when I do this. And it's all about not feeling good enough. Right. And so I guess what I'm saying is you are you're good enough just as you are show up, just start showing up. Yes.

Pam:

Yeah. I love that message. You are good enough exactly. As you are right in this moment.

Zoe:

Right. And it's not that you're not going to grow and you're not going to learn. You're going to do all those and maybe you'll lose weight and maybe you'll get that certification but stop waiting because you're already good enough. You don't need that to be good enough,

Pam:

right? Yeah. That's awesome. Thank you. I love that message. Yes. That one. Yes. That one. Yes. And I feel like if you're going to develop a, if you don't have a specific thing that you're combating with your affirmation journey, then maybe that's where you start where you are right now. And that reminds me of this whole idea from a brain perspective that we can both be. Accepting and embracing that we are good enough exactly. As we are and still desired. Yes. Yes. This is not

Zoe:

choose Bakley. That's the space that I love to walk in. And part of that is embracing failure. Yes. That's you have got to get to a place where you can embrace failure and a lot of the things that I've done and started have been really messy because I didn't know what I was doing, but I learned, and I've grown from it. And I'm glad that I went ahead and started instead of trying to perfect it. First I heard, I think it was a woman on my podcast. Maybe she was telling me. The successful, C oh and, had all of these wonderful successes in her life. And what she told me was that her father at the dinner table every night made them tell them some way they had failed that day. And he would praise it. You don't wanna hear the good things. He just wanted to hear, tell me how you failed. And so she got into the habit. Wanting to try this thing, right. Let me see if I can do this. And if I fail, Hey, I got a great story. And so she learned to not fear failure. And what happened as a result? She's been wildly successful? Not because she hasn't failed, but because she hasn't feared it. And so she, she tries things. She takes the risks. She puts herself out there. And when you do that, you're going to get the good stuff. Even if it's a little messy at first. Yeah. Yeah.

Pam:

Thank you so much for that. I love that story too. Pretty cool. I'm like, I'm going to start doing that with my 13 year old.

Zoe:

I've done that a little bit with my daughter. Yeah. After I heard that story, I've been working on that with her, like great try. If you fail. That's awesome. You learned, what did you learn from it?

Pam:

Yeah, I've lived in fear, like early on in life. I lived in fear of failure and I think that me and my dad tried to help in that, but he did not do like my dream. So this is, you were like, I always knew I wanted to be a therapist. I wanted to be an Olympic figure skater. Oh. I was a competitive figure skater and I was like, this is my dream. And my dad, I was probably like 10, 11. He used to say to me, the only way you're making it to the Olympics is a by. And I was like, oh, and now

Zoe:

as a parent, he didn't really

Pam:

think about it at the time. As a

Zoe:

parent, I'm

Pam:

like, dad, he passed away a few years ago, but like sometimes I'm like, dad, how could you, because there is that, we don't realize the impact. And then that became the. Thank you.

Zoe:

That's what you bring with you. Yes, it's

Pam:

crazy. So even cause I think sometimes we think oh, you know my parents, we hang onto this. Like my parents loved me. They were good people. My parents love me. They were good people. They, my mom see or she's a good person and yet we still like, that shit still happens. Right. It does. So.

Zoe:

Awesome. That's what I call humanity. Rubbing up against humanity.

Pam:

Yeah. Yes, absolutely. So Zoe,

Zoe:

where can our listeners find you? Where do you hang out? So my hangout is Instagram. I'm there as much as I can be. So yeah, it's at Dr. Zoe Shaw on Instagram. You can go to my website as well, check out my podcast, which is stronger in the difficult places. You can find all of that on my website. Yeah, pretty much. You can find me anywhere at Dr. Zoe. Perfect.

Pam:

And they'll say link that stuff up in the show notes so that people can just click. We just love to click buttons. We don't

Zoe:

like to have to remember that and type that in.

Pam:

That's the way to make it easy for you. It is in the show notes. And so I just want to say thank you so much for coming on today, sharing your story, sharing all the amazing work that you're doing currently. And I can't wait to read your book when it comes.

Zoe:

Oh, thank you. Maybe you can have me back on and I can talk about it. Yes. I would love that. I would love that.

Pam:

So guys, if there's anything about today's episode or anything that you heard or anything that you want to speak to reach out to us about both Zoe and I are linked up in the show notes on Instagram.

Zoe:

So DMS

Pam:

Share that you're listening to the episode. Love to hear from you. And as always, I appreciate the hell out of you guys. I'm so glad that you're here and listening and I look forward to seeing you next week. Take care.