Welcome to the Level Up with Katie B podcast, where performance meets spirituality and you get all the tools you need to unlock your next level of badassery in life and business. I'm Katie B, airline pilot, human design coach, side hustle extraordinaire and crazy cat lady and I know what it's like to have a vision for your life that is so big that it feels bananas. I know what it's like to be busy and still want to live an abundant and fulfilling life and I know that you have everything you need to achieve all of that without burning out.
I know you're going to bring your dreams to reality. How do I know? Because if I can do it, so can you. Each week I and a series of guests will share human design insights, manifestation secrets, energetics and mindset tools that you can use to start stepping into your power as the conscious creator of your most aligned life.
Buckle in baby, because it's gonna be a sweet, sweet ride. Hey good looking, what's cooking? Welcome back to the Level Up With Katie B podcast. Totally chuffed that we get to hang out again and you know what? Hold on to your butt because you are about to learn some life changing tools that you can use every day to help improve your relationships, your business and to be honest every single part of your life.
Today I'm chatting with nervous system regulation coach Amanda Joseph. Today Amanda shares her own journey through recovering from a dysregulated nervous system that to be honest, I think a lot of you are going to hear parts of Amanda's story and just be like, yeah, yep, I have been there. She's also going to share with you how you can recognize when your nervous system is dysregulated and most importantly what you can do about it.
Because I don't know if you know this, but when our nervous system is fried, life is hard. Creating is hard. Mum life is hard.
Business is hard. And so to know how to recognize it and then fix it, that shit will change your life. So I'm so, so excited that I get to share this episode with you.
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All right, my love, let's jump in to this amazing episode. Welcome Amanda Joseph to the level up with Katie B podcast. I'm so, so grateful that you have taken the time to come and chat and share all your wisdom because I just when I looked at your website and what you do, I thought, oh, this girl is talking to my heart, my soul.
I love like everything that you do. So welcome. And thank you so much for taking the time to come and yarn with us.
Thank you so much for having me. I know it's like a really busy time of the year, but I'm glad we managed to fit it in. Yes, absolutely.
So you were just about to tell me your business origin story because you are similar to me. We both have full time jobs. And actually, it sounds like our coaching is pretty similar as well.
So I'm really excited to hear kind of how you started your business and what the origin story was. Yeah, so I, well, I started my career in the corporate sector. So initially, I used to be a lawyer in corporate law, and I found that absolutely soul destroying.
And the only way I was coping with the corporate law was to work in like environmental sustainability charities outside of work. And then I was thinking, you know, this is really a passion of mine. So why not go do that full time.
So requalified. I'm now working in my full time job as a sustainability specialist. But what I was really finding is I'm working in really male dominated industries.
So construction, I started in mining and resources. And I burned out twice. So the first time I burned out like proper, I hit rock bottom was when I was 28.
And that got me reconnecting with a lot of the spirituality that I had practiced. In my early teen years into my like, early 20s. And then obviously, as soon as I hit the professional world, all those practices fell by the wayside as I got like consumed in the corporate rat race.
And then this burnout really had me questioning my values and what I was doing. So even though I was by then working in sustainability, which is like something that I'm passionate about, you know, living in harmony with nature, with Mother Earth, and all of that, what I was finding is it was still just there was something missing, because I kept pursuing everything that society was telling me, oh, once you get the house, once you get the guy, once you get this, you'll be happy. And I just never was happy.
I felt like this ravenous monster that just kept consuming things to try and fill this hole inside me. And nothing was filling it until I started that reconnection with my values and really started to do the meditation and the Reiki and all of that. And then I started qualifying as it because I was like, there's something missing.
And it's that connection to our spirituality, right? And then, as usual, things started to go really well. As I did these practices, I moved to Scotland, things fell into place in the most incredible way. And as we do as humans, when things are going good, we forget sometimes about the tools that help us get to those good spaces.
And so I started like, forgetting about some of those practices and kind of doing them half-heartedly in the background, but it wasn't really as integrated as it is now. And 2020 happened. And that was a real turning point for me because I hit rock bottom in a significant way.
So when I was 28, it was one thing, but 2020, I was 33 at the time. I lost my right to live and work in the UK. I was stuck in the UK, couldn't get back into Australia because we'd shut down our borders.
I had no job, I had no income, I couldn't get any social support, like social services support. So I had no money coming in other than my savings. Thankfully, I had a little bit of savings.
I was able to survive, but I was nine months unemployed for the first time since I was 15. Plus, I was locked in an apartment, a two bedroom apartment in Edinburgh. Very little social contact with people.
Everything was online because it was the midst of the pandemic. And for so long, I had been in this pattern of running and doing things. I was traveling everywhere.
So, you look at my Instagram feed and you'd be like, wow, she has an incredible life, just setting off every couple of weekends to a new destination, parties at Edinburgh Castle. It was a full life. But when you're forced into stillness, suddenly all the things that you use to distract yourself and escape from are unavailable.
And that's when I realized how dysregulated my nervous system was. And I started, as sometimes happens, you know, when the student is ready, the teacher appears. Somehow, I came into contact with more about nervous system regulation and it started clicking into place.
I'd been in therapy for like seven years, did a lot of the mindset work, felt really good about myself. But until I started doing the nervous system work, I didn't realize the absolute massive, incredible transformation you can get from this work. This was the key.
And so I became so passionate about sharing that with other people because we're surrounded by mindset, we're surrounded by affirmations, we're surrounded by, again, let's be cerebral, let's be masculine, let's stay in a head, neck up. But everything, all our stress, all our trauma, all our anxieties, all our limiting beliefs are trapped in our body. We're body first, 80% of the communication that happens in our body is happening from our nervous system to our mind, not the other way around.
So until we deal with that, we'll have some improvements, but not in the way that we want to see happening. So that's why I started this business up as Amanda Louisa Coaching, to really, for one, help women unravel that good girl conditioning that keeps us trapped, unravel all those limiting beliefs that keeps us playing small, feeling really empty and looking for external validation. But two, I want to see more women take up these leadership roles, step into that power, because we can see in our society, how much we're missing the feminine in how things are unfolding globally, how we're abusing and completely annihilating our life support system that is this planet that we have to live on.
And I think once we start reconnecting to our values, that simplicity, that beauty within ourselves and how deeply connected we are to the earth, the more we connect to that in a realistic way that feels safe for our nervous system, the more we have impact, the more we can change the world, the more we feel safe enough to step out and be seen and make those changes. So yeah, that's my story. It's so beautiful.
And the whole nervous system regulation thing has been, I think, a missing piece of the sustainable success puzzle, I would say, for a while. And the way you explain, there has been almost like a hyper focus on mindset. And I 100% believe in the power of changing your thought.
You can create a better life when you focus on the unconscious level of programming that we're working with. But our nervous system is just driving like these stress responses. And so many people are so detached from what's actually happening with our nervous system.
And I think that's really the key is like, most people don't even understand that what they're experiencing is a nervous system response, it is a stress response. And when you actually bring that down to sort of equilibrium, I don't know if that's the right way to say it, but then you're able to access the mindset tools, then you're able to actually do that work on the mindset. And I found that and you know, I was telling you before about the performance anxiety that I had with my day job.
One of the biggest breakthroughs I had was when I started using emotional freedom technique, which on a surface level kind of looks like a mindset tool, but it's not. It's like a nervous system energetic tool. And that shit will change your like relax your nervous system so quick.
And that was when I was able to then apply the mindset tools. Yeah, absolutely. 100% agree with you on that.
Mindset is super important. And you cannot change your mindset until you regulate your nervous system until you feel safe. Because what ends up happening is when we're in a state of dysregulation, our amygdala switched on, we've got cortisol, adrenaline flooding our body, what happens is our prefrontal cortex actually switches off.
So the part of our brain that is in charge of logic, reasoning, mindset work, like affirmations and changing your way of viewing things, it doesn't, it isn't on like it's offline. Yeah, that you lose the ability to critical think, right? Like your critical thinking is, you're almost incapacitated. Yes, absolutely.
And that's why, you know, when you were super stressed, we sometimes make really rash decisions that we end up regretting, because we're not doing it from a space of rash rationality, we're doing it from a response that is very, very ancient caveman days type responses. Yes. And that is why it's so important for women in business to understand this, right? Because a lot of our challenges, especially from startup phase, are like, you're trying to figure out your way through, you've potentially got caught up in modern pop culture manifestation rhetoric that will have you believe that if you just think positively, you'll have 10k months from your first month.
And then when that doesn't happen, you experience the stress and anxiety that comes with it, and you get stuck in a nervous system loop. You know, women in business need to understand their nervous system and take their power back in that way. So with that being said, like, how can we tell what are the signs that people can look for to know if they might be struggling with nervous system dysregulation? What do you see most often? So let's start with what the nervous system is.
It's basically the central command center within our bodies that is responsible for how we see things, how we perceive things, how we think, it regulates our basal temperatures, it regulates our hormones. It's literally the command center of our entire being. And there's kind of three parts in polyvagal theory that we look at.
It's the dorsal, which is our oldest form of nervous system or the oldest branch of our nervous system, really. It's about 500 million years old. And this is our shutdown response.
This is when we kind of go into depressive states when we have low motivation, when we're really struggling to actually be able to move and do things. So shutdown is the dorsal response. And we have the sympathetic response, which was kind of the branch of our nervous system that came into being around 400 million years ago.
And this is our fight-flight response. So it's probably one of the most well-known ones. That's when we're triggered into either reacting and defending ourselves or running away from a situation.
And finally, the newest part of our nervous system is our ventral vagal branch. And this is the branch that we use to connect. This is the branch that helps us change our mindset, see new opportunities.
This is the branch that is really about how we relate to people. And this was only created, I think, 200 million years or so ago. So it's a very new part of our nervous system.
And what we find is when we're starting to get triggered into dysregulation, one of the key tenets that I teach my clients is interception. So interception is awareness of what's happening within our bodies. And once we learn that, once we feel safe to connect in with our bodies and become really aware of what's happening at any given point in time, we're much better able to catch ourselves before we go into a full-blown state of dysregulation.
So what you'll see is normally you might find when you're first starting to feel dysregulated, social contact becomes a little bit hard. You might be feeling like a bit burdensome of catching up with friends or responding to a text message. Everything feels just a little bit like when it comes to connection, you want to maybe isolate a bit more.
And that doesn't matter whether you're an introvert or an extrovert. This is across the board. You'll just find that even for your level of interaction that helps you feel energized, you're even lower than that.
So that's usually the first sign that there's something going on in your nervous system that you're starting to feel overwhelmed because being around people, socially connecting with people is starting to feel a little bit too much for you. So that's the kind of first sign that you'll start to see. The second sign is usually if you're in fight-flight mode.
So in fight mode, you might find yourself being a little bit more aggressive. You might find yourself passive-aggressive, snappy. You could be, you know, banging things around a little bit, overreacting to situations.
So I don't know if you've ever had this experience, but like, if you're feeling okay and you stub your toe and it hurts, you're just like, damn it. But you're able to come back to center. Have you ever stubbed your toe when you're having a really shitty day? Suddenly it's like a meltdown, at least for me.
It happens. It's like the whole world is ending and I'll have a tantrum like a three-year-old. And so this is a good sign that you're in fight mode, that like there's something disrupting your nervous system and you're starting to feel really anxious and like you want to lash out.
And it could be through your words. It could be through how you interact with people. It's just a little bit more aggressive.
It sounds like that, like short fuse, you know, actually, when you were talking, it reminded me of like, look, I'm going to be honest, every now and then I get a bit road ragey. When I'm in that sort of like dysfunctional nervous system regulation, often it's to do with lack of sleep or because I've let my, you know, my daily rituals slide a little bit because life's been busy and, and, you know, someone pulls in front of me and I'm like, what the fuck? And then you're like, okay, just chill, homie. Like love and light, love and light.
I am, I am very, very road ragey. And you know what, like, and it's also really important to acknowledge when that happens, like if we're cut off, we're reacting to a situation that we think is dangerous. Obviously, if someone's just jumping in front of us and we're slamming on the brakes, everything going through our mind is, oh, I'm in danger.
So of course your natural reaction might be, but what's really important at that stage is to allow yourself to maybe vocalize whatever you're feeling or to, to acknowledge, yeah, I'm feeling stressed out. This has just happened, but don't unpack and live there. Don't like, you know, slap the gas pedal and tailgate the gas.
Yeah, exactly. That's like, that's going a little bit over and really getting into that amygdala response, that cortisol adrenaline response to like fight. So that's happening in our nervous system at that particular point in time.
Well, what I think is really cool though, is that what you've just described is like those responses, those reactions that you know are not your normal sort of response. You know, you probably like, I am probably quite a chill character for the most part. And so when you have that outward reaction, it's almost like, oh, sweet.
Okay, well that's my body, my nervous system actually just telling me like, I've got some dysregulation right now. I probably need to sort that shit out. Absolutely, yeah.
And it's trying to keep us safe. Like the core purpose of our entire nervous system is to keep us safe, is to keep us alive. It has kept us, you know, going for however many million years humans have existed.
So like that's its purpose. That's what it's there to do. And we develop so many maladaptations or unhealthy coping mechanisms because in the years our nervous system is forming, which is usually zero to seven and then sometimes up to 14, we're learning how to respond to our environment by mirroring our primary caregivers.
And let's face it, most of our primary caregivers didn't have access to the amount of knowledge and tools and information that we have about our mind, our nervous system, our bodies and our psychology as we do today. So they did the best they could with what they knew and often what they knew wasn't very good. So how we exist today is really in response to those adaptations that we formed in childhood.
And thank goodness we know with neuroplasticity that we can change those adaptations. And that's the brilliance of nervous system regulation work. And yeah, so going on to like witnessing whether you're in flight mode, some of the things that you might identify to identify whether this is where you're sitting and where your nervous system is at is jumping from task to task.
So if you can't sit down and finish one task and you're constantly like moving from one thing to another, it's a little bit like ADHD at this point where you're like there's a thousand thoughts downloaded into your brain. You can't seem to finish a sentence. You're trying to multitask, but not very well because reality check multitasking is actually a myth.
Nobody can do it. It doesn't exist. So, you know, you're trying to send an email at the same time as like, you know, writing something else and you're trying to do all the things and nothing is getting done.
And usually at this point in time, you could feel really your forward in your body. So you might find your posture is actually leaning in a lot more hunched shoulders, like you're getting ready to run. And that's a feeling that's in your nervous system because it needs to complete that cycle.
It's feeling like it can't get a lot done. And so your natural response is to flee. So those are the kind of signs that you're in flight mode.
I'm wondering if because I know that there's been a bit of a spike in ADHD diagnoses in the last five or six years in particular. Do you think there's a connection? Do you think it might just be dysregulated nervous system issues? Absolutely. And, you know, there's a really great there's a few great articles by Gabor Mata.
He is a doctor who specializes in trauma therapy, and he talks a lot about not only addiction, but also about the increase in diagnosis with ADHD and how a lot of the similarities between a very dysregulated nervous system are mirrored in our ADHD diagnosis. And we're just medicating because, again, we live in a society that wants the quick fix as opposed to the slow movement that you need in your nervous system to be able to shift things. We want a quick fix.
We want to patch somebody out so that they can go back and be a productive member of our society. Right. Like that's the world we live in.
And so, yes, people are medicated. And that's not to say that sometimes we don't need the medication because sometimes you do. So that's not an anti medication rant or to say that the medication can help you to a certain extent.
And if you do this work along with it, there may be an opportunity to not have to rely on that so much. Or there may be an opportunity to bring yourself back into a more healthy base point so you don't need to rely on things. But then again, you know, that's up to you and your trauma informed therapist to work.
Yeah, for sure. But you know, what's really interesting, Amanda, is that I actually found nervous system regulation support structures that I had incorporated into my life. Don't take that long and have a huge positive impact.
And I noticed positive impact almost immediately. So, you know, I think for anyone that might be wondering whether they might have ADHD tendencies, like you could at least experiment with nervous system support things first just to see if that helps. Right.
And then obviously, and in conjunction, as you said, with a qualified therapist. But then maybe you have more clarity as to whether medication is the way to go or not. But what are you like? What are some really simple nervous system support structures that people can apply into their daily life? Yeah, absolutely.
So, again, it comes back to that interception point. So first identifying where you are at in your nervous system. Are you in a sympathetic state? Are you in a dorsal shutdown where you're feeling so, so overwhelmed? What ends up happening in our nervous system is obviously, you know, you release cortisol adrenaline because you're triggered by something that's happened in your environment.
You feel overwhelmed. But unfortunately, in our society, we don't complete the cycle by coming back into a ventral state. We kind of just continue on this cycle of increasing adrenaline, increasing adrenaline.
And then what ends up happening is we go into shutdown because our body can only take so much of that energy moving in our body without it being released. And that's why you find sometimes when you're really overly stressed, you might need to sleep a lot. Like I don't know if you've ever experienced that where you're just like you've been so stressed for such a long period of time you collapse.
That's when you're in dorsal shutdown. And unfortunately, this is one of the points in time where it can. And I speak from experience and trigger warning here.
I'm talking about suicide. I was at a point where I had a lot of suicidal ideations because during that 2020 period, even though I was trying to do a lot of the work on my own around nervous system regulation by what I was learning because I didn't have any money coming through. I ended up in a state of real bad, like low dorsal freeze.
And that's the point where you experience real depression. And that's where your mindset can have suicidal ideation. I was very lucky that I found the therapist that I am still working with today.
She's a trauma-informed therapist and she she helped me through a lot to move that out. But it was slow work. And yes, it shifted things like you can see shifts happening quickly.
But over a period of time, if that makes sense, it's small actions done consistently consistently to see the results. So coming back to some of the the work that we can do to prevent us from getting to a stage where we're in such a level of overwhelm. Our breath is really important.
So one really simple thing you can do if you find yourself in, especially if you're in a sympathetic state, which is the fight flight mode, you're wanting to like run and move is focusing on a longer exhale because that signals to our nervous system that it is safe. So you can breathe in for full, hold for two, release for seven and do that five or six times until you feel that energy really start to slow down. What I really like encouraging people to do, especially when they're in a sympathetic state of fight is to move that energy out of our body because what ends up happening is we we try and do a lot of other things.
But the energy is trapped in our muscles and our actual body. So when we can do an energy like a movement, it really helps. So some movements that really help is, for example, like pressing our hands against the wall and really pushing with our whole body whilst focusing on our breath and focusing on how that energy feels as we're trying to move it out can be a really nice way for our nervous system to process the cycle and complete that cycle of dysregulation when we're in a fight mode.
It's so cool. I've never heard that one before. There's so many that are really embodied and it's so funny because especially when I first started working with clients and we start doing a lot of the embodied practices, women were so trained to be out of our body that it takes a lot for them to go, oh, OK, I'm going to do this.
This like we're so self-conscious. I know when I first started doing this work, I was like, oh, I don't want to be in my body. But, yeah, like the more we can feel our way into our body, really connect in with that, so much of this becomes like second nature.
We respond to what's happening within us with so much more ease. We don't get to a point where we're like, yeah, we come down centre. Yeah.
Yes. One thing that I learned when I was sort of going through my journey to overcome performance anxiety was body shaking. And I just loved it.
And then I love dancing as well. But sometimes when I was like really freaky now, it was like dancing was too much of a stretch. Right.
But moving, like fully moving, like shaking my body. And I watched some YouTube videos and learned how to do that. I mean, it's super simple, but it's so fucking impactful.
And I think actually that's quite a fun one to do with kids as well. Like I've seen my friends have done it with their kids. And it's a really fun way for them if they're having trouble understanding what's going on with their emotional world or anything like that.
And they're having a nervous system response. Like if you get them to start shaking their bodies, it's a really fun way to get them to like let that energy move through them. I found that really impactful.
Yeah, I love that one. And the other one that is similar to that is in flight mode, running it out. So standing on the spot, you can do this at work.
Like I can lock myself in the wellness room or in the toilet cubicle. And you just run on the spot until you feel that energy is processed out. So if you don't have the space to do a full shake, that's another one that is taking up, I guess, less space.
But you can still process that energy out a little bit more. So the spot and then you fold over and you like exhale. You did longer exhales for sympathetic deactivation.
When you're in a dorsal state, though, so this is usually when you might find yourself procrastinating. You don't have the energy to actually start tasks. You might be beating yourself up because you're feeling like you're lazy and you get these like stories in your head because you don't have the energy to move.
And I know when I was in a dorsal state, I struggled. Like I was getting told, oh, go, go for a walk. Go.
But I was like, I don't have the freaking energy to breathe, let alone get up off the sofa and go for a walk. Like, what are you telling me? And that's where this this is a really beautiful technique. So if you put one of your let's say your right hand under your left arm, put and then your left hand on your right shoulder.
And you just bring in a gentle squeeze. And usually I suggest to close down your eyes, bring your attention into into what's happening into your body and just hold yourself. So this is a hug.
And what it's doing is it's putting some pressure on your vagus nerve, which is the nerve that goes from your breastbone into your stomach. And what that does, that pressure actually helps you come back into a ventral state. So it's a sense of connection, especially when you don't have somebody there who's able to hold space for you.
This is something you can do yourself when you're in that dorsal state, when you're starting to beat up on yourself to just bring that compassion, awareness within. And so normally I'll say stay there for a few breaths, really feel into your like to the energy of holding your body in this moment and then just start bringing gentle movement in. So you can do like a gentle sway, breathing really gently.
And then just like here, you're starting to take longer inhales and shorter exhales because what you want to do is stimulate your energy. So you bring the energy up. I recommend going straight into a breath of fire or anything like that, because if you're in full shutdown where you're really like struggling to move, it's about really slow movement.
You don't want to rush it. So then do that gentle sway. And then that swaying gets more and more and then you can like stand up when you feel ready.
This could take 10 minutes. If you're not in a full shutdown, then it could take two minutes. And it's OK wherever you are to just allow it to be what it is without bringing that judgment into that space, because what's happening in your nervous system, it's been so overwhelmed for so long.
It's shutting down to protect you. So, yeah, that's a beautiful technique as well that I found really helpful. Yeah, it sounds amazing.
And that makes a lot of sense. Like if you're in full shutdown mode, not going from one extreme to the other. And it kind of reminds me of I remember when I was having a lot of problems with my mindset, my anxiety and stuff like that.
And I was reading things about being mindful and I was like, well, the last thing I want to do is be mindful right now because my mind doesn't feel like a safe place to be. And what you just described sounds like the nervous system equivalent of that. Like you can't go from zero to 100.
And that exercise that you just taught us sounds like a really beautiful way to bridge the gap and really find balance and then develop and build on from there. It's amazing. Yeah, it's such a beautiful exercise.
It's one of my favorites. And what I've been doing, especially because we're going into such a hectic time of the year and it's magical, but also a lot of us are going to be spending time with our families. And even if we love our families, sometimes we can trigger the shit out of us.
For sure. So I think nobody brings up your ability, like how far you've come in your self-development than the people that are closest to us and that know us the most because they really mirror back where we still have those triggers and those like internal stories about certain things. So at this time, what I've been doing is I've been bringing micro habits into my day, just a shift.
I love that. Because what I found is I've just changed jobs. I've just quit one job.
I'm starting a new full-time job in a couple of weeks. And in that lead up to the shutdown, every client wanted everything. And I was starting to get really overwhelmed, really grumpy with everybody.
And, again, like you said earlier, that's when our practices tend to get forgotten about. So I started bringing some in, and these might be really helpful for your clients as well, your listeners, is one that I started instead of just jumping out of bed in the morning, which I never used to do, but over the last three weeks, I started to just jump out of bed and like, what do I have to do? Actually, I think that's a sign. I think that's a beginning for me that I'm starting to get into nervous system dysregulation because I'm exactly the same.
Like, most of the time, I actually have this really beautiful, very quick morning ritual, which I'm interested to see if it's similar to yours. But as soon as I, like, shit starts getting overwhelming, I'm stressed, I haven't been, you know, doing all the things, like, the alarm goes off, boom, I'm out of bed. And, like, you don't even take a second to think about yourself before you're feeding the cats, feeding the husband, feeding the whatever, doing something for everyone else.
Yeah, that is exactly it. And that's exactly the same process that I was in mindlessly on automatic pilot, running through the list of what I had to, like, what was next step. So I wasn't even doing what I was doing with mindfulness.
I know, it's so crazy. Running on to, like, the 10th thing down the list. Yeah.
But what I started to do in the morning, as soon as my alarm goes off, I take a breath, bring myself into the space. So I really, like, feel myself being supported by the bed beneath me, feel into my body where it is, feel the cool air on my feet or wherever, like, my hands are outside of the covers. Really just breathe into that for, like, one or two breaths.
And then I start a thank you process. So I go, like, first I start with my heart, I'll put my hands on my heart and I'll go, thank you, heart, for beating through the night. Thank you for guiding me and being the compass through which I move through my day.
Then you'll go maybe to your lungs. Thank you, lungs, for breathing in such fresh air, for bringing clarity into my body, for helping me see things clearly and for helping me, you know, ground into every moment. And then you can go to your stomach and say, you know, thank you, thank you, stomach, for digesting food that gives my body the fuel to chariot me through the day and to, you know.
So just start thanking every part of your body. It'll take five minutes. But it's five minutes of starting your day with gratitude for the incredible work your body does without any thanks.
Like, your body is literally the vessel through which you're able to channel your magic, your purpose, your soul into this world and experience it. And so often we treat it like an afterthought that, you know, we often abuse, we, you know, go on crash diets and we, like, never ever tell ourselves thank you for the amazing work it does. That small shift, five minutes in the morning of just like a quick thank you rundown of like little body parts I feel like need a little bit more love and attention in that moment.
So revolutionary. Yeah. So I'll tell you my little morning ritual.
So it's so quick because, like, honestly, sometimes my alarm goes off at 3 a.m. And I set it as late as possible that allows me to get ready and get to work on time with no fudge factor. So this ritual takes me sometimes less than 60 seconds, a maximum of three minutes. But what I've started doing is I've got like a thermos cup, a special thermos cup that I'll put icy cold water in at nighttime before I go to bed.
And I, like, it's my magic potion. Right. So I'm calling it my magic potion.
And it's beside my bed. I always have water by my bed anyway. But this is different because it's got a sealed lid.
It's in a thermos. And it's going to be cold. So then as soon as I wake up, once I've, like, just taken a nice breath, then I'll get my magic potion, my water.
And I whisper into my water, thank you, water, for keeping me hydrated and giving me the clarity to function. You know, I'll just do, like, a little basically a spell. A spell for me.
And because water holds energy. Right. And then I'm nourishing my body and I'm hydrating my body.
And so I'm not only having gratitude for water, but I'm also having gratitude for my body and showing it that love by hydrating. And it's so — I don't even know where I came up with it, Amanda. I just was, like, I felt that I really needed to start my day in this way.
And so then after I've done that, so I'll sit and drink my water, just sitting on the side of my bed. And then so after I've drunk my water, I do a vagus nerve reset. And I don't know if you've come across this.
You probably do know it. But it's — there's some pressure points along just above your belly button and then behind your ear and then across your head. So there's some YouTube videos that you can look up to do that.
And it's really simple. It takes, like, 30 seconds. And I swear to God, like, it has been a game-changer.
Like, I feel so chill in the morning, even when shit's hectic. That is such — I mean, the way we start our day is the energy we take throughout, right? Like, when we start off on that kind of energetic autopilot, we tend to kind of stumble through the rest of our day. So just that 30 seconds that you're taking in the morning to whisper a little spell into your water is just telling, like, your body, your mind, the universe.
Energetically, you're putting it out there that you're ready for magic, that you're willing to call that in, that you're willing to, like, move through your day with more ease and softness. And God knows we need more of that. Yes.
And hydration. Or, you know, like, our brain function and everything. Everything is worse when you're dehydrated.
And, like, I — because, Amanda, I was the queen of, like, zombie walking to the coffee machine, hey? Like, still half-asleep, like, ugh. So this has been really amazing. Hey, so when we do take the time to infuse our life with all these beautiful nervous system support structures, like, why do we really care? Like, how is it going to impact our life? How is it going to impact our business? So in terms of how it impacts our life, obviously, when we're more regulated, it means our prefrontal cortex is turned on.
It means we're making decisions from a place of what we actually feel alignment with and what we're actually wanting to call in, because we've got the clarity in our minds to be able to go, this isn't aligning with what I want. This isn't, so I'm going to say yes to this. I'm going to say no to this, when opportunities come in.
If we're in a complete state of dysregulation, we're functioning from a place where we're fearful of not getting enough money. We're fearful of not getting the right clients. And so we say yes to things that don't actually align, which ends up cluttering our space energetically and not allowing the things that are actually meant to come in to come in.
When we are regulated or when we know how to regulate our nervous system, we can stay in those cycles where there is quiet without freaking out that our entire business is going to collapse or that we're not doing enough or that we end up in those, whatever your story is, whenever things are quiet in your business of not being good enough, of not doing well enough, of just never being enough. So regulation has absolutely transformed how I do business by just giving me the ability to stay in the liminal space. The liminal space is where the magic happens.
The liminal space is that space in between what was and what is going to be. And that's where creation happens, the darkness, the winter of our seasons. And what I found particularly with me doing the nervous system work and bringing my magic and my spells and my rituals into that nervous system work is I've grounded more into allowing my business to have its seasons and its cycles without making it a story about how I'm not doing well enough and I'm not as good as everybody else.
It's allowed me to allow space for the magic to happen. Trust in that, like that trustful, because sometimes, you know, you're falling and it feels like nobody's going to catch you, but then you land on something, like someone does catch you, right? Like the idea drops in, the right client comes in, the right next move comes in, but you've given yourself the space without collapsing in those moments of nothingness. Yes.
Oh, yeah, I have had the same experience. And I think what it really has allowed me to do is to trust myself, to take my power back, to not be handing over like every decision to fucking random gurus on social media, to actually create space to feel into what is right for me. Because I don't know about you, but I started my side hustle as a creative expression that was going to be joyful.
So like if I'm not able to think clearly, if I'm not able to listen to my intuition, then none of that can happen. And it's really hard to listen to your intuition. It's really hard to know what's right for you when your nervous system is tapped the fuck out.
Absolutely agree. And it's so easy to get caught up, right? Like we're surrounded 24-7 with social media and it's everybody's highlight reel. Like, yes, they're sharing whatever they're sharing.
And it's so easy to get caught up in the stories and to make that mean something about us. And like you said, when our nervous system is regulated, when we have that grounding, we can see things a little bit more rationally and not jump to conclusions as much. Yeah, it's a powerful tool.
Like honestly, it shifts your relationships as well because how you relate to others becomes less about you personalizing people's reactions and more about you being able to witness where they're at in their own regulation and meet them when they need to be met or hold your own space and your own boundaries when you need to do that. Again, you know, fearing that you're going to be left alone or because a lot of us are trained to be people pleasers and to ignore our boundaries and our own limits in favor of other people. Women in society are rewarded for being self-sacrificing.
So taking our power back, like you said, is hugely transformational and it helps you attract better relationships, more deep relationships, relationships that are reciprocal. And isn't that what we all want? Where we're seen and held and really witnessed and celebrated in the fullness of our humanity, which means, yes, sometimes we are messy and sometimes we're, you know, an art piece and we can be a work in progress and a masterpiece at the same time. So, yeah.
Oh, it's so beautiful. Yeah. Well, you know, one of the things that I think is interesting about this movement towards focusing on nervous system regulation is that it creates space for us to be messy and feel the messiness rather than I think when, you know, a few years ago when mindset was, you know, there was no real talk about nervous system.
It was almost, I don't want to say spiritual bypassing, emotional bypassing, toxic positivity type stuff. Whereas nervous system regulation actually is not, it's the opposite, right? It's not about not feeling the feels. It's not about not having the reaction.
It's not about plugging that shit down or stamping it down. It's actually the exact opposite. It's about, well, this shit needs to move through your body.
It's energy. It's like you get to move it through. You get to process it.
You get to integrate it. And so raging is part, from my perspective anyway, raging is part of nervous system regulation, like in a healthy, safe way. Yeah.
You know, and so I love that it, you know, we're moving away from this sort of toxic positivity. I know that's a bit of a thrown around phrase, but I think you know what I mean. I totally agree with you.
We did go through a phase in the mental health development kind of space where it really was about, oh, you can't feel angry. Or, you know, when you're in a negative thought cycle, you need to stop that straight away because that's, you're just going to attract from that space. But every negative emotion that we feel is a guidepost telling us where something isn't working for us.
Like when we feel anger, it means a boundary might be violated or, you know, we're feeling invalidated in some way. We're not feeling hurt. And that's your cue.
Your body's giving you cues to realign. Okay, so what do I need in this moment? How do I, how can I meet this need that isn't being met? What do I need to do to ensure that this doesn't happen again? But unless you're allowed to feel those feelings, instead of trying to like swipe them under a rug or like wash them away, you can't make the changes that you need to do in your life to get to where you actually want to go. If you're not listening to what your body is telling you in any given moment in time, like our intuition is embodied, right? Like we're feeling into what's happening in our body.
We can't tell where things aren't in alignment with what our soul's desiring, what we're here to create, what we're here to bring in. So, yeah, I think it's such a huge, huge piece. And thank goodness we're doing a lot more nervous system regulation.
We're learning a lot more about it. And on the flip side, as with anything in a generation where, you know, you can be a five-minute expert, we do have a lot of people that are jumping on the bandwagon because this is like the in thing. But it's more than that.
It's, yeah, just being really conscious about where you're getting your information from as well. Because there's a few misconceptions, as usual, around any of these practices. Yeah, it's such a good point.
I think we do kind of live in the era of street corner advice, you know, being flattered as expert advice. And, you know, I mean, look, let's be honest, podcasts and all the resources that probably you and I share with our community are part of that. And it's for everyone to be very discerning themselves about what is in their highest and best and what information, you know, and with support from qualified professionals.
I think that's so important for everyone to remember. And as well, because some people really need deeper psychological therapeutic support. And don't give your power away to podcasts and random wisdom on wisdom and quote marks on social media, because you deserve better than that, you know.
But what I do think, Amanda, is that the work that you're doing is well, the work that we're doing is really preparing people to learn how to trust themselves to be more discerning with who they give their power to, who they trust for advice and to recognize when they might need more support. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, that is 100% true. And it's really like being OK with asking for help, because I think some of us have a little bit of maybe inherited shame around needing that support.
And especially as women, we're so trained to do it alone and we're rewarded for being the multitasker, right? Like the superwoman who can raise a family and have the CEO role and do it all. But who ends up suffering the most out of that is you because you're not able to meet yourself in those moments. So being able to ask that support and to know when we need it.
And also that discernment is such a huge piece, because the more we connect in with ourselves, the more we can say when, yes, something is right and no, something doesn't really work for us. And I know even working with my own therapist, there are times where I feel in something and I'm like, actually, that's not quite landing. Like this feels more right.
And then we work through that. And that's exactly the same with like me when I work with my clients. I'm sure it's the same with you.
It's a relationship. I'm not here as your guru. Like that's a very old patriarchal structure.
We're learning from each other. I'm sharing my experiences, but your experiences come from your own lived experience in this world, but also your own intergenerational trauma, your own inherited behaviors, your own inherited traumas, your own inherited mindsets. So much of that has to be unpacked as well.
So we can all learn from each other. And that discernment piece is so vital in ensuring that it's actually what's meant for us in this moment in time. And it's funny because like sometimes you'll hear something and it doesn't land quite right.
And then you'll come back maybe a few months later, a year later, or even like a few days later. And suddenly it clicks in or drops into place and it like fits into the puzzle. But yeah, it's just having that awareness that not everything is meant for you in that particular moment.
And having that discernment is such an important part of your own healing journey because you are the magic. Like your healing is really inside you. Nobody else can do it for you.
Yes, we are part of the movement building a tribe of empowered women, and I fucking love it, Amanda. Yeah, I love seeing this change that we're seeing in this space as well. And yeah, that level of awareness within women especially, like people who identify as women, coming to join the table a little bit more without trying to fit into what patriarchy tells us we need to be.
Like more of that self-reclamation, allowing ourselves to embrace our shadows, be in our anger, feel the messiness of it. I love the mess. I think that's such a beautiful part of women and our energy and the way we create.
Like I always come back to Mother Earth, right? Like she's beautiful and she's nature, but she's also the volcano erupting. She's also the hurricane. She's also the messiness.
She's also decay, and that's such a part of the feminine that we have, that the patriarchy has suppressed over time, right? Like, no, the feminine is beautiful. It's the mother. It's the nurturer.
But no, she's also wild sexuality and embodied freedom and like, fuck yes, energy. And how often have we been told to hone that in, to quiet that down because it's shameful to be in our power in that way, but why? So yeah, there's a lot of play in this space at the moment that's happening, especially in my business. There's a lot of shifts in that, and that's why I've taken like a couple of weeks off to allow it to just unfold at its pace and see what it's becoming.
And yeah, so. Oh, it sounds amazing. Amanda, thank you so much for being here today.
Thank you for sharing all your juicy insights. It's just been an absolute, well, it's been a ride and I've loved it. I've loved our conversation.
I love how aligned we are in what we're doing. And it's so heartwarming to know that there's so many women out there that are creating such beautiful change and sharing such beautiful magic with the world. Yeah, couldn't agree more.
So where can we find more of your magic? Yeah, you can find me on Instagram. I'm at the Amanda Louisa. And if you would like, I've also got a free little download, which is like my five minute magic rituals, which you can just have.
So these are like like the body bliss that I went through earlier. There's like a mojo and a mug one. There's a gridlock blow up one five minute things that you can incorporate a busy day to really start shifting that nervous system regulation and how you show up and how you interact.
So that's that's not a little thing that you can do. That sounds amazing. Thanks so much, Amanda.
Have an amazing day. Thank you. I am just so happy that you got to hear that.
I'm so happy because I think so many of us don't even know that our nervous system can have such a profound impact on the way we experience our day to day life. So thank you so much for taking the time to look after you by listening to this podcast. Thanks for joining Amanda and I today.
All the links that we mentioned in the show notes, you can check them out. Don't forget doors to align and thrive are open at the moment. And I've got two beautiful spots available.
If you're even a little intrigued, you can click the link in the bio. There's so much more information on my website. So you can check it out there.
See if it's for you. And yeah, you know, I'd love to support you in that way. All right.
My love. Until next week. Take care.
Keep looking the shit out of life and I'll catch you in the next episode.
