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This week's life note, the importance of taking oneself out for coffee every once in a while,

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especially when life gets a little bumpy.

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Welcome to Life Notes from Chair 17,

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a podcast dedicated to sharing life stories,

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wisdoms and inspirations as we navigate life's journey,

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post chas to share thoughtful perspectives and insights from her own life journey.

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As well as those of special guests, contributors tune in for thoughtful conversations about lessons,

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learned wisdoms, gained experiences,

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had and inspirations shared.

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Find us where you get your podcasts and be sure to hit follow or subscribe.

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So you never miss an episode. Now enjoy this week's episode.

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All righty. Welcome back in friends to another episode of Life Notes from chair 17.

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I'm your host ch and I thank you once again for finding me in this little corner of the podcast universe.

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As always, I want to thank our returning C 17 ers really continue to appreciate your support and tuning in each week.

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And if you happen to be a new listener tuning in for the first time,

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warm welcome to you, you might have found us in a variety of different ways I'm learning.

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So it could be via major podcast platform.

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Could be from our website live notes from J 17 podcast.com might be via social media.

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However, you found us though. Thank you for wanting to check us out.

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We hope that you like what you hear and you will want to continue to tune in.

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Also special thanks actually to a handful of international listeners that have tuned in recently from Canada Sweden,

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Belgium, Brazil, Singapore and the UK,

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I saw those countries show up on a recent listener demographic map.

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So I'm actually really quite touched by that for the international support and for the listening and just so everyone knows,

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I, I don't know specific listeners in towns and cities.

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I get a very general, we're a part of essentially countries people might be listening to so first real set of international viewers and I appreciate that very much.

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And I have to say there are a lot of you out there that really did like the previous episode that we just did with our good friend,

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Nathan, our share the chair episode as we talked about his journey to becoming a yoga therapist.

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If you haven't checked that out yet,

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please do, I do know that it runs much longer than our typical episodes.

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So uh you might have to make some time for it,

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but there are a lot of really lovely wisdoms and inspirations and just good vibes in that episode.

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And ironically,

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it has also inspired this episode and sidebar,

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Nathan. Now, I think by my count and if you're listening,

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Nathan, shout out to you as always friend.

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He has inspired, I think I'm counting three episodes now or at least had a hand in the theme of them.

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So he first inspired a mind shift,

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I think with our 2023 recap episode.

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And he gave me a much needed perspective to help me reframe uh 2023 which was a very difficult year.

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Obviously, second episode was his episode that we just did and it just aired.

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But now it's with this episode, which I am affectionately referring to as our coffee date with ourselves episode,

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the theme of which emerged out of something that he talked about during his episode.

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And as we have long said on this podcast,

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timing is everything. So when I actually recorded the chat with Nathan,

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it was just prior to realizing that I was actually in need of doing a bit of a self check in for myself and a bit of self care given,

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I had hit a bit of a rough patch,

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let's call it. And so when he talked about the idea of taking oneself out for coffee,

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which could be either literally or figuratively,

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it, it really resonated as did the general concept behind that gesture,

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which is taking a pause and asking ourselves,

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hey, are we OK? Because I don't know if we are.

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And as he was talking about it,

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I started to think about it. And then as I reflected on how much I really enjoyed hearing him articulate that vision.

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It made me start thinking, how many times do we actually do this or even do we actually do this?

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Now, I do want to give credit to those of you out there who do have a wellness practice.

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Let's call it that allows you to check in with yourself to truly gauge how you were doing really seriously props to you.

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If you have been doing that for a long time, if you just started it,

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it's a really healthy thing to have,

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in my opinion. And in the opinion of a lot of,

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I would say wellness experts and wellness doctors,

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right? But I do know there are quite a few of us out there that just go.

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Nope, I'm good. I'm fine and press on when we are anything but fine because again,

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we've probably been conditioned to do this or told to do this or,

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you know, made to feel we can't acknowledge our down moments or our down days.

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And in my opinion,

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and I'm I'm sure I'm not going out on too much of a limb here as we focus a lot more nowadays on people's mental health and their well being the era of this Alden Day thought of,

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you know, buck up buttercup and just deal with it.

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It really can be a lot more harmful.

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There are sometimes when that is appropriate.

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And, you know, we don't want to spiral into a lot of self pity or something to that effect.

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But when you're really having a tough moment,

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sometimes that isn't the best advice to give somebody.

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And sometimes you do need to take the space to acknowledge that.

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And I recently found I,

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I could not take the buck up buttercup approach and put on a mask and pretend like this very sad and painful thing that I was going through and had been re triggered was somehow not affecting me.

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I literally could not pretend it wasn't.

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And I had to stop myself and ask the question,

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hey, are we OK?

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Because I don't think we are. Let's think about that and it wasn't to ask someone else this question or a friend or a partner.

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No, it was asking me directly of myself and it was really clear when I did that I wasn't and for a variety of reasons,

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some of which I had some control over and others I didn't.

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And so it got me reflecting about this other concept that Nathan talked about,

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which is self care is a lot more than let's say,

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just taking a bath or getting a massage. Now that is not to speak negatively of that.

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Those can absolutely be a part of a self care routine.

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But I would say,

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and he did it and said it probably more articulately than I can caring for and about oneself,

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especially when we are not in our best moment or having a rough patch really does become a combination of efforts.

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Perhaps it's different therapeutic efforts,

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but also perhaps it's different self owned efforts.

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And that can be both on a physical level as well as mental or an an and,

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or an emotional level. And one of those self owned efforts is really working to be more in tune with ourselves.

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I think when something doesn't feel quite right,

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it's that little voice that has always talked about our gut instincts.

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Our good friend Colleen Coleman talked about this a lot in her episode.

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It said inner dialogue that is perhaps sounding some sort of alarm,

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but of which we, for whatever reason,

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get really good at ignoring because again,

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we don't want to seem like we're not ok or because it's easier for us to focus on making sure someone else is ok,

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whatever the case we may be,

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we end up deflecting, maybe deferring,

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maybe detracting or misdirecting until we basically can't do that anymore.

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Something happens, something's triggered,

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something boils over and it comes to the surface oftentimes at least for me in a really rough way.

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And I feel like you're kind of left in this clean up on aisle four situation,

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right? It's just kind of a mess.

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Perhaps again, you might try to move on or suppress it,

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but only to have it reveal itself again and again and again,

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and yet if we just decided to indeed take a moment and take ourselves out on a coffee date or a walk or just sit on the bench,

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something where it's really just me, myself and I having an honest conversation about what is going on in that moment or moments.

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It would be a lot more helpful, I think.

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And it's something that, I don't know that it always comes naturally to us to give ourselves that space and grace to be ok when we're off.

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But certainly as I get older and as I talk to more people and learn more about practicing and being mindful of,

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of true head to toe wellness.

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It's really an important thing to do. And I talk about that a lot throughout several episodes on this podcast,

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this idea of this space and grace to be in the moment and especially when something is going not fantastic.

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It's really easy to be in the space in the grace when it is,

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but much harder when it's not.

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And if like me, you might be prone to that negative talk track,

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it always seems to show up more.

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So when things are a bit off the rails and it does become a really conscious effort to step in and start the positive talk,

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like just stop it.

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Right. Stop, seriously, stop it.

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You're fine. This is enough,

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you're enough and it's going to be ok.

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Right. Flip the talk track, flip the story stop the negative,

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start the positive and have that willingness to,

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to really look myself in the eye or look ourselves in the eye and go what is this really about and why aren't we?

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OK? Right now, there's a great example of this that was portrayed last season on the show Station 19.

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I've loosely mentioned the show before in our eagle eyed episode.

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Eagle eyed inspiration episode. And specifically,

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that was in relation to taking a bit of inspiration from actor Stephania Mampi Nao,

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who plays Dr Katarina de Luca on B Station 19 in Grey's Anatomy and sidebar recap.

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If you don't know what Station 19 is.

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It is a show centered around a group of Seattle Firefighters.

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It airs on the ABC Hulu Network here in the US.

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I'm not sure where it airs uh internationally.

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Uh and it is a spin off of Grey's Anatomy.

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It has been praised for both the diversity and representation of its characters and storylines and it's dealt with some pretty tough issues,

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some sensitive issues and some heartfelt issues,

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very timely issues. Uh And I,

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I recently came to it, I was not an original fan.

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Um Meaning I I was late to the party on it but in watching it and in the context of Nathan's episode and in the context of something I was going through,

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there is a story arc that developed with the character of Lieutenant Maya Bishop who is played very by the very lovely and talented Danielle Savy,

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where Maya had to resolve some long standing mental health issues related to what amounted to be a difficult upbringing with her father and her denial of those issues.

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And long story short,

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Maya had essentially deflected,

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deferred, shut down, shut out everything to the point where she could no longer do.

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So. Now, spoiler warning if you're listening right now and you are kind of going home.

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I want to check that out. You'll probably want to binge watch the show and maybe come back to listening to this podcast episode unless you're OK with spoilers because we're going to talk a little bit about it,

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not a ton but a little bit. And if you really want to do the Short uh Shortcut Binge,

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you would watch season six since that is the season in which this really came into full view after being sort of slowly developed over the previous seasons.

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But essentially for Maya, what happens in the end is as part of her healing process,

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she had to sit with herself and in herself to do so.

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And that in her case, and in that story arc included having a conversation with the wounded child,

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essentially within her. That was actually the source of a lot of her,

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her pain. And there is a beautiful scene where the department therapist Diane,

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which is played by another great actor Tracy Toms essentially gives the aha moment to Maya that this little girl needs to know that she's ok.

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She needs to know she's enough, she needs to know she's just fine and she takes her through the exercise of actually having that conversation,

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meaning Maya talking directly to her younger child self.

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Now, on a TV show,

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this is filmed very beautifully both with the actor Danielle holding an invisible version of herself in her arms as she starts the conversation and then through the magic of a beautiful direction and then editing sequence,

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it transitions to showing her holding an actual young child which is young Maya.

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And so now it looks like Maya is holding a version of herself in her arms as she starts this healing conversation.

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And it's a really powerful episode.

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And for long, long time fans of the show,

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season six was a difficult one for a lot of people to watch,

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given the intensity of that particular story arc and what it puts Maya through.

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Uh Danielle was incredibly powerful in so many of the scenes that really required her to go to a pretty dark place.

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Maya really almost destroyed everything she held dear to her,

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including the beautiful relationship she has with her wife Katarina,

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which is played by Stefania and one of the best,

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I think LGBT Q represented relationships on network television.

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And I really like this example visually because it's literally what Nathan talked about regarding the importance of checking in with ourselves and talking to ourselves and helping to make sure we are ok.

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And also having that courage and willingness to do so.

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And in the case of Maya, she tried everything,

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literally, every single thing to not do that to the point where it nearly cost her her life because she was over exerting and over exercising and numbing herself into not dealing,

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which then caused her to have an accident and collapse.

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And while that is potentially or could be seen maybe as an extreme case.

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And obviously, it's a fictional portrayal we do know and Colleen talked about this in her own story uh as she found her path out of numbing herself through a difficult time after the loss of her father,

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we turn to a litany of other distractions and coping mechanisms to try to defer taking ourselves really out for coffee and just ask ourselves if we're ok.

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And very much like what I talked about in our ask the question episode,

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sometimes we do actually have to be prepared to hear the answer to that question because it may not be something we want to hear or expect to hear.

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And it may show us that we have some work to do on ourselves and as part of our self care routine.

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But if we do it, maybe just maybe we find the ability and that courage in a particular moment to go ahead and ask to say,

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you know what I'm not OK. And instead of running away from it.

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We sit with it, we work through and process it.

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We find a way through it. We lean into the support of those who care about us and want us to know that it's ok to not be ok for sometimes in our lives and that whatever it is,

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it doesn't haunt us forever or have unnecessary power over us forever and it starts to move out.

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Maybe it's not immediate or all in one go,

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but it starts, we don't numb,

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we don't deflect, we don't distract, we don't do harm.

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We start a process maybe of understanding and arguably of healing.

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And I leave it to my good friend, Nathan to once again,

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give us a really important negative life,

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wisdom and inspiration to help us see the other side of when we know we aren't ourselves.

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And then it doesn't have to stay that way. And then there are ways in which we can take care of ourselves when we aren't quite on our game.

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And we know something is off and it could be as simple as taking ourselves out on a coffee date or a walk or sitting on the bench and we can give ourselves the space and the grace to acknowledge that moment to be that container for ourselves and find the path forward within ourselves and for ourselves.

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And I like to think that if Maya had done this,

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perhaps her journey to healing would have happened much earlier and maybe been far less destructive.

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So take yourself out for coffee every once in a while because it's important and do it,

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especially in those moments when we do not feel like we are 100% at our best because it could make a big impact and maybe it's the first step in whatever a healing journey or a healing process looks like for you and it can essentially start a path to next special sidebar plug for uh those of you who are fans of Station 19 or maybe you're going to become fans of Station 19.

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Unfortunately, ABC has decided that this upcoming season is going to be its last,

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its seventh season. The incredible fandom though is trying to save the show.

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So if this little podcast episode has got you interested in any way,

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shape or form, go out and binge the series here in the States.

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So it's on Hulu, you can binge it. I'm not sure where it is internationally.

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Any viewership and additional support for the show can contribute to the efforts that this phantom is leading to try to save it.

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Maybe it will end up on another network. We're not sure.

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And I don't think they are either,

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but there's still a lot of hope that they could save it and it's a good show.

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It's maybe not for everybody. But if anything has interested you here,

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go take a look, check it out. Let me know what you think as always,

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please be kind to yourself. Take it one hour at a time,

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one day at a time and I'll see you next time.

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Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Life Notes from chair 17.

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Remember to follow and subscribe. So you never miss an episode.

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We'll see you next time.