Speaker #0Hi, welcome to The Pulse. I hope you're doing well. I'm your host Julie and in today's episode I just wanted to do a bit of a reflection, making it a bit easier. I'm on holiday so I want to make this one a bit shorter as well because holidays make for rests. As I shared at the very beginning of the introduction of the very first episode, I want to make sure that this is regular, that I do it in a way like the pulse of the heart. It's remained constant and therefore for me it was still very important to release an episode next Sunday. So I'm currently on Monday recording. But I also want to make sure that I take the time for myself as it is a week off and that I recharge. So I want to make sure that it's not a long episode, that I'm able to edit it quite quickly. That doesn't mean that the quality would not be good, but I just want to make sure that I also take care of myself. And it's a bit actually the subject of today's episodes. I read a book. I'm currently finishing reading a book. That is, it's a French book. So it's called Breathe. And it's not a self-help book. It is in some ways, but it's through an actual story. So the author is really talking about a man and what he's going through. So it's really like a novel type of books. But in a way, it helps you also reflect along. And through that book so far, I feel like I've, heard a few things that I would like to share with you and to exchange and maybe that inspire you a little bit as well as we are almost we are already in October actually and we are it's the time a little bit like it gets cozier though you used a bit more insights so we can also take the time to slow down a little to enjoy a bit differently every phase of the of the year can have a different type of enjoyment and I would really like to have that reflection session with you today. At the very beginning of the book actually the main character meets a Thai woman that is much older but also wider and in there at some point she asked him to to reflect on what his past has brought him and I think this is a good start because There is a lot that can happen in your life that can be negative, that could potentially, you would not see as something that has brought something positive or has brought anything into your life. But at the end of the day, I do believe, and it took me a while, that every single situation, everything that happened to you, it's not that there is a reason, but it can bring you something. And I think this is a bit different. We always say, like, I always hear people saying, there is a reason why this happens to you. And the someone like me who had cancer it's very difficult because I felt so angry for so long in term of like why do I have this what does this happen to me I do not deserve this in a way and I don't think anyone deserves cancer but in a way it's maybe switching the narrative this is what the book is also like telling you and more like what has almost like cancer in my case but you can take it Any kind of situation, if something hard happened to you or if you had to do a change, whatever topic, whatever happens into your life, try to turn it around into what it brings to you. And for me, one of the things that it brought me is to change some of the direction I had in my life. And at the beginning, it was forced in a way on me. But along the way, I also learned to better reflect, better think about what I do instead of just... going full on okay this is my career path this is how I'm going this is what I'm doing without having this moment of like is it really what I want to do is it really the direction I want to take and this reflection and the fact that I'm now always thinking about it has brought some burden I have to say an extra burden on my shoulder before it felt almost easier it was just like okay I follow the path that I think is is the one I determined from the beginning almost when now it's like... Every time I take a step or every time I'm thinking of something, I tend to reflect and be like, hmm, is this really the steps I want to take? Do I have a very thoughtless through? And this can be also challenging. So for example, with this podcast, I decided, and it was my pure decision based on everything that happened to me and what it had brought me, that I wanted to share my thoughts, my knowledge. I don't know, we'll see how many people listen, but I wanted to share. with people and that came in a way also from what happened to me from cancer, but also from my lifelong journey with sports, with my career. Also, all the negative things that happen and along this story in this, the future episodes, you'll hear more. And it's not because I will talk about negative stories that it has to be like, oh, poor me. It's more, this is from my, what I've learned from this. So to help you not replicate it or to help you already have that some knowledge that I didn't have at the time that it happened. That's a little bit of how I decided to do this podcast. And this came from... or my past experience. So it has a lot of positivity, but it's because in that case, like I thought it through. But as I was saying, even when I started it, at some point I was like, is it really the direction I want to take? And this constant challenge that I put on myself can still be hard, but I'm aware of it. And I take it also as part of my journey. So this was the first question that He was asking the book and I think it would be good for anyone. And I'm also, I mean, I put it in my little book. I always have a notebook in my bag, in my purse. And basically what I'm planning to do is to try to put it on paper, everything that happened, not just the main events, not just, I have like three, four events that I would say are more dramatic in some ways, but maybe these are not the only one that can go. What have they taught me? What have changed in the path that I took? I know there will be more. And how is this going to impact me is also critical. The second question that she was asking in the book, she was asking the man, is what is the way you could use your past and what has brought you to inspire others? And I think this is also a very valuable... question which in a way I feel like I've already done that for me but it's also important to know what does this mean because it doesn't mean that you have to inspire others you have to inspire the world you can sometimes also inspire one other person with your story with what your your past has taught you can be used for one other person or multiple people but reflecting also how what you've learned can help others in a way and this is something that I truly believe in that we should help one another I do understand that it's not easy for everyone but I would also fully advise you to do that similar reflection and it's not automatically to make it up front to the world everything that happened to you or to broadcast it in any way but it's also to think, okay, has this part of my path whatever it is as how what this had brought me and can I help someone else not to have to go through the same thing in a way and I can sometimes be one person really think about this but I thought this part already was quite useful as an overall reflection and I think this is really a good time of the year we are winding down it's close to Christmas going too fast but I mean I love fall season you But I would say, yeah, maybe it's a good time to reflect. And I'm also, I mean, it's not fall right now where I am. I'm on holiday, so I have still like summer feels. But I would definitely advise you to have those moments of reflection. One thing by looking into what your past brought you is also allowing you time to first kind of... rest for a bit and and think about it then reflect basically on for example how you you took a certain situation and i can tell you there are plenty for me where at the moment where i took them and the way i viewed them were traumatically quite negative but i know that it's okay but at the same time now I reflect and the fact that I took it that way also allowed me and taught me something and it's allowing me to reclaim my story I cannot change the way I react at the moment when I reacted right I cannot rewrite the past but I can reclaim my story in terms of what did that bring me I give you a simple example imagine I lost all my grandparents and I'll give you the simple one the first time. I lost one of my grandparents when I was in the US and I could not go back home. It was very difficult. It was the first time I was losing one of my grandparents because the only others that I lost was before I was born. So it was a big shock. It was very emotional for me and I had to deal with the emotions. But also afterwards, this really the way I felt for weeks, for months, made me decide. because I was in such a... I was emotional like a normal person I'm not saying it was that I couldn't live or couldn't do anything but it was one of the reasons that made me decide to go home and you could see it in a way of like okay I lost my grandpa and because of him I lost my grandpa I was so upset I had to go home so it's because of the loss so it's a negative impact it's like this affected me so much that it impacted all my other decisions but the other way I can view it was like okay he had an amazing life yes I was heartbroken when he passed away but because I was heartbroken it taught me how important for me it was to be there to be closer to my grandparents or to my remaining two grandmas for the remaining time they were there and therefore while I was so happy to be abroad and my grandpa and my grandmas and both of them everyone was so happy for me to to live abroad and to be far away. I decided for myself that I wanted to go home, to experience it differently, to be closer to family for a certain period of time. That doesn't change the fact that I moved again, but it allowed me the time to figure out how I wanted to live and how I wanted to handle the next couple of years with my remaining two grandmas. And that was really something that has impacted me. And while I could focus on the negative, I lost my grandpa in the worst possible time. couple of months before graduation was horrible but I can also be like okay yes it was horrible at the moment when it happened and for the next few months but it allowed me to be even closer to my grandmas for the remaining time and I was already close to all my grandparents but I just wanted to give you that example and I think it's this is the part that I'm still struggling with with the book that I'm reading is you I think it's very difficult when something bad happens to you to think it in a positive way. Maybe the more the little problem on a day-to-day, maybe you can already switch your mind. Was it teaching me? You know, for example, I'm on holiday, it's raining on day two. So was it teaching me and to take it positively, to not being like, oh, I wish I had a sunny day and getting upset. So I'm learning from that. When it's such a big experience like this, like a loss or something else, it's difficult not to take it negatively at the beginning. And I think it's hard to think, oh, there is a reason for it, or let's see what you teach me. But long term, I think you can find a way to take the learning out of it and to figure out how has this changed you or what does this brought you. And that allows you to reclaim your story. It's important to have those moments of reflection in order to reclaim your story that is not only about the negative moment, but about like those negative moments brought me somewhere. And I'm not saying that it's easy because I have still moments today where I get upset to what happened in my life. I still struggle and this is why literally reading this book has been a bit healing or part of my healing journey and I'm far from finished. But I just wanted to share, as I am in the process, I just wanted to share with you what I've seen and what I've read so far, because I don't want to wait until I'm finishing to read a book or I don't want to wait until I've read like 10 books or done the whole reflection to share with you my thoughts. I thought it was important for me to do it already today. The next part. of the book that I thought was good. And as I said, I didn't finish, so I'm pretty sure there must be more learning in it. So that's if you're on, if you, I don't know if I'll put the clip on on social media, but in case I do, I'm showing the book. But one other reflection that for me was very interesting is how they mention in there, your body acts in order to show you and give you alerts and in a way it's like we know that With reflexology, your feet may hurt somewhere and that has a relation in some part of your body. But in another level also, your body being hurting somewhere or acting a certain way. So I don't know if you have a rash or if you have also sometimes like some headaches or different things. Usually it's a way to show you that something is wrong. It's an alert mechanism. And I'm the first one who didn't. see fast enough what my body was telling me and I'm pretty sure my body still tells me a lot of things but I think it's also a good time now to think about how is my body feeling can I can I do you know a physical check you know am I do I have any pain anywhere am I sleeping okay is my rhythm fine how is is my body aching in the morning am I feeling tense when I'm feeling tense when is it happening also depending on that I can I can learn that maybe there are some phase in the day or in my life where I am more tense or my body reacting in a different way and potentially it's telling me something and it's I won't have all the answers you know sometimes it's a it's a physical reaction one minute and then you're fine again but usually It's good to reflect in terms of what is your body telling you, because usually your body will tell you first when something is wrong. And I have multiple cases and I'll take the simple one. When I am heavily stressed, I start to have my stomach feeling crampy and I really feel like I almost, I'm going to throw up. And I'm sure I'm not the first person who has that. Like there's moments of worry, of stress where you have such reaction. So it's really... your mind is in the place and it's not feeling okay and your body is reacting to it and your body is telling you okay you're not feeling good so you need to take care of yourself and this is a moment where you have to think okay what can I change how can I interact better how can I remove that stress but you have to focus on that if you try to not take care of that stress then it's going to get worse. So for me... again a very simple example I know that before I go to the hospital I'm usually more stressed so my stomach is going to be feel like a nut I won't be able to eat and it's going to get worse and I'm going to cramp because I didn't eat so there is a whole rhythm that comes and what I've started to do in the last few years is to do some deep breathing exercise do a bit of meditation making sure I eat even though I struggle to still take small bites to make sure I still feel my body properly and then I try to acknowledge how I'm feeling I acknowledge the stress and where it's coming from and then I try to to take some some breathing yeah some breathing time along the way so the stress isn't going to be gone in two minutes so you I might do one exercise and then let it go and see how I'm feeling and then do it again. I will also bring a book at the hospital in order for me to not think too much about it. And usually my body will feel much better along the hours until I'm out of there. And this is again, I would really advise you right now to take the opportunities in the next few weeks to take care of that and look into. what is your body telling you and I hope your body is telling you you're doing super good but usually we all as human beings deal with a lot of things and a lot of moments that potentially create stress or create worries or potentially something is wrong in our body and it's important to be aware. So this is basically two days episodes and I know it might be a bit scattered But overall, there is two pieces, right? You need to have a moment for yourself to pause, to reflect, and then to reclaim yourself. That's really the objective. And you can view it, as I said, in two ways or two pieces that you can do. The first one is looking at your past, what happened to you. also potentially having a moment to reflect on what happened might help you better understand potential body ache etc so there is a link also between the two but the first one is looking at from your mind standpoint what you viewed as negatively to reflect on it and then to reclaim your story and then the next part as part of your pause that you should do at the beginning and really to take the time is when you reflect the first one is the mind as i said the second one is on your body how is your body feeling Do you have any ache, any problems in order for you to better understand what's wrong? And same thing here, it's about reclaiming your body and reclaiming your health and your physical and mental health through these two steps. I know it's a bit maybe messier than usual. I think it also took me some time to find the overall process of where I was going with this chat. because I'm still going through the journey and I'm sure there is even more to this pause, reflect, reclaim. But at the moment, I think the first part that I will be focusing on is really those two. So reflect, pause, because pause is critical, but also reflect on my past and how negative events have impacted me and how can I reclaim it and focus and reflect on how my body is feeling. I hope you liked it. I know, as I said, it was a lot shorter today. It was also a lot different than usual as it was maybe disorganized. But I also told myself that it was okay for one to have a disorganized episode and less structured and to just let it flow and it come as it is. I wish you a very nice day. like, comment. Tell me what you also do for yourself in order to fuel your mind and to help you not only grow, but also ensuring that your mental health and your physical health are all doing good. And I wish you all a very nice day or evening, if it is. Talk to you soon. Bye.
