Sarah Watkins is a Certified Life & Wellbeing Coach who helps women feel more clear, confident, and in control of their habits, health, and life. A few years ago, Sarah found herself in the middle of a major health crisis. She was suffering debilitating pain, feeling lost and feeling powerless. Her life was at a standstill. Nobody had answers. And no one was offering her any hope. That is when Sarah chose to take full responsibility for her own body and begin to help it to heal. That choice led Sarah to become certified as a Life Coach, a Culinary Nutrition Expert, a Plant-Based Cooking Instructor, and a Health Coach. And as her health slowly began to improve, Sarah began to regain trust and belief in herself. She found answers, she was free of pain, and she became empowered, which fueled a passion to help other women also overcome their personal challenges to be able to achieve their goals and dreams.
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IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL HEAR ABOUT THINGS LIKE:
- What caused the debilitating pain that brought Sarah’s life to a standstill.
- How each of us can create a life that fits who we become as we age.
- The 4 P’s that keep women stuck: Perfectionism, People Pleasing, Procrastination and Past -Programming.
- Sarah’s powerful story of healing from debilitating illness to rebirth.
SOME QUESTIONS IRENE ASKS SARAH:
- Does liking who she is help a woman think on purpose so that she can live with purpose?
- What are some of the buffering and destructive behaviors that numb heavy, uncomfortable emotions and keep a woman stuck in a holding pattern?
- How doers conquering the 4 P’s help a woman to become clear, confident and in control?
YOUTUBE INTERVIEW:
https://youtu.be/HTWFePKZ_6c
CONTACT:
Email: hello@sarahwatkinscoaching.com
WEBSITE:
www.sarahwatkinscoaching.com
SOCIAL MEDIA:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sarahwatkinscoaching
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahwatkinscoaching/
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Watch the episode here
Listen to the podcast here
Sarah Watkins: Rebirthing Herself After A Life Filled With Devastating Pain And Grief
I’m delighted to have this opportunity to interview Sarah Watkins, a certified life and wellbeing coach, who helps women feel more clear, confident, and in control of their habits, health, and life. Sarah will be speaking to us from the Canadian province of Manitoba. A few years ago, Sarah found herself in the middle of a major health crisis. She was suffering debilitating pain, feeling lost, and feeling powerless. Her life was at a standstill. Nobody had answers and no one was offering her any hope.
That is when Sarah chose to take full responsibility for her own body and begin to help it to heal. That choice led Sarah to become certified as a life coach, a culinary nutrition expert, a plant-based cooking instructor, and a health coach. As Sarah began to personally implement what she was learning, she began to see changes in her attitude, habits, and health.
As her health slowly began to improve, Sarah began to regain trust and belief in herself. She found answers, she was free of pain, and she became empowered, which fueled a passion to help other women also overcome their personal challenges to be able to achieve their goals and dreams. Sarah is an inspiring role model for grief and rebirth because after experiencing that debilitating pain, grief, and powerlessness, she has rebirthed herself into the grounded 51-year-old woman she is this 2021, happily creating her future, 1 small choice and 1 small step at a time.
I’m looking forward to this great conversation with Sarah about her healing journey to become a life and wellbeing coach, the shift within her that led to her rebirth, and how she now coaches women who feel stuck and unfulfilled in their lives. This is surely going to be an inspiring and uplifting interview. Sarah, a warm welcome to the show.
Thank you. I feel like I already know you.
I wanted to say this to our audience. Sarah and I met on our Zoom for the interview, but she tells me she’s been following the show, which is wonderful. I’m so thrilled to hear that. Let’s begin our interview with this question. Sarah, what was your life like before you got so sick? Please share what caused that debilitating pain that brought your life to a standstill.
I was 45 and I was feeling good. I was what I thought was healthy. I was living my life I thought doing all the right things, eating well, exercising. I was maybe partaking a little too much in wine. I enjoyed my red wine a lot. I had wonderful friends. I had gotten out of quite a stressful long-term relationship. When I left that relationship, I left with love, but I knew that it was time for me to walk away. I’d been single for about a year and I had started a new relationship.
I decided I want to fix my teeth. I decided to put braces on my teeth. That’s when everything went right downhill. I ended up getting an allergic reaction to the metal braces. They said, “This is typical. Some people react to the metal.” I knew I was chemically sensitive to certain things. I thought, “Maybe I can tough this out and it’ll calm down,” but it didn’t. I finally asked them, “What can we do?” They changed the metal braces to ceramic little posts or whatever. We tried that, but that didn’t work.
Meanwhile, you can’t sleep. You’re in pain all the time?
I couldn’t eat. I lost so much weight. My face started swelling. I lost part of my ear because it all peeled off so much. It was crazy. I had chronic fatigue and I also had this rash that started on my bod.
Very romantic for starting a new relationship, too.
What happened was that relationship ended up disintegrating because I wasn’t myself. I couldn’t even talk. Being at work, trying to speak. When the rash started, that was the end of it for me. My skin was peeling off my body. It was terrible. I couldn’t function. I couldn’t get dressed. I went to dermatologists. I got the braces off.
Give me my crooked teeth, but the braces are coming off.
That’s what I said. I said, “It doesn’t matter now.” They’re saying, “Your teeth are going to be worse than ever.” I’m like, “I can’t handle it. This is what it was going to be right now.” I got the braces off and I thought things will settle down, but they didn’t. They got worse. I knew Western Medical wasn’t going to help me. They wanted to put me on topical steroids. The rash was everywhere.
That’s so upsetting.
My whole life changed. I didn’t know who I was anymore. I couldn’t see people. I couldn’t exercise. I could no longer do the things that I enjoyed, even walking, because sweating was debilitating. It’s so emotional, even thinking about it.
Did you have family and friends who were able to help you or you were completely alone in this crisis?
I’m sorry. When I go back there, it’s very painful.
This is what is making this interview so special because you’re so authentic and you’re telling everyone what happened to you. It was terrible.
When I finally decided, I was going to fix it on my own, I was like, “Forget it.” Everybody’s telling me there’s nothing you can do. I said, “I cannot live like this.” It was to the point where I couldn’t live. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to get emotional.
That’s all right. I can so relate. That’s horrible.
That’s good because I had an emotional release, which is always a good thing for the body.
An emotional release is always a good thing for the body. Click To Tweet
Which points to about healing. That’s so important for us to do that. The fact of the matter is that you’re so in touch with yourself now that you realized what happened, which we all witnessed was an emotional release from your pain, which is a blessing.
Yes. It’s funny because I still have them randomly at the most inopportune times. It’s like, “Whew.” I needed to release whatever was still holding on because we all hold on to stuff. As they say, emotional issues end up being issues in the tissues. When you hold onto things that have happened to you, past trauma or debilitating pain, it’s almost like post-traumatic stress. Grief, when you lose a loved one and then you don’t fully process all that pain, becomes a chronic condition.
It can show up as all sorts of different issues, especially body pain that’s undiagnosed. If you’re dealing with any pain and you’re not sure why, you got to think about, “What am I holding onto that could be causing stress or tension?” Some people will have weird issues showing up because they’re not fully processing emotion. We’re trained to shove down our emotions. I was always trained to be strong.
You were one of the people who held everything in?
My healing journey was when I decided to take control. It was like, “I’m not going to read to the doctors. I’m going to have to figure it out on my own.” That’s when I went down that other road.
They were going, “She’s crazy.”
I didn’t even tell them. I was like, “Forget it. I’m going to figure this out.”
You had no idea what you were doing to start to try to change the trajectory of what was happening to you.
I was feeling hopeless and dark. It was a bad period right there. My family was great, but there was nothing they could do. There was nothing anybody could do.
Everyone must have been very upset.
I wasn’t seeing anybody. I isolated myself. I was like, “I don’t want to be around anybody.” Sometimes, we also need to do that. You have to go within. I isolated myself a little bit too much, but at the same time, it gave me time to figure out what was important to me. My health is number one now, above everything. There are lots of things that I prioritize, but without our health, we have nothing.
Without our health, we really have nothing. Click To Tweet
Were you holding down a job during all this time, too?
I was holding down a job for the first year of that. It got to a point where I was at work and the clothes that I was wearing were so painful. I was working, but it was like dragging my ass out of bed, dragging myself to work. Finally, one day I knew. I’m like, “I can’t do this.” I put in leave and I went on disability for a year. I didn’t work for a year and didn’t get paid either because my insurance wouldn’t cover it.
So much for disability insurance. I then ended up whatever. It didn’t matter. I had to be off work because I couldn’t physically work. After a year, I was lucky enough that they allowed me to work at home. Even though, I was still in a lot of pain and stuff, being able to work from home made it much easier physically for me. That was a gift because I could get paid again.
To attend to your healing and you could start to do what you needed to do for yourself.
What I did was I started looking for other solutions. I started working with a Chinese doctor who did traditional Chinese medicine, acupuncture, and herbs. She was wonderful. She helped me a little bit. She was good too, from my mindset. We would see a few little steps forward and then everything would flare up again. We were never getting to the root cause. I tehn found a naturopath who was pretty good as well, but that wasn’t helping.
I then decided to take a health coach course myself. I signed up to become a functional health coach so I could discover my own solutions. I then realized a lot of it could be my food sensitivities and everything else. I then decided to become a culinary nutrition expert to figure out how to start eating. I was like, “I’m going to go all gluten-free, all dairy free.”
Maybe it was a coincidence that the braces came on and your body was responding to something else, right? It might not have to do with the metal.
From doing more digging into my health coaching, I found an environmental specialist doctor who was a naturopath. That’s when I started doing heavy-duty detoxing. We did an environmental assessment. Based on my history, it would appear that I’d had a number of mold exposures. I’d been around a lot of other chemicals. I used to be a truck driver.
I was around the diesel fuel a lot and we were transporting hazardous material. In another lifetime, I owned a three-bay garage with my boyfriend. I was always in the garage there, around all the fumes. All that stuff fills up in our systems. If we’re not able to detox it, then we can get sick. Your cup can fill up. For me, the braces were the tipping point where my immune system said, “What is going on? We can’t take it anymore.”
I also realized that I’d been working in a toxic office building. I knew there was mold in that building because I would smell it when I would go in some days like in the summer when it was humid. I’d always been sensitive to everybody around me wearing perfume and cologne. For years, I’d been begging them to make it a chemical-free environment, but they never did and nobody understands. It’s hard for them to understand when you’re going through that.
They think you’re a cuckoo. You’re not, but they think you are.
They all thought I was a nut job. I would be at work feeling so nauseous some days, but I put up with it. My system was building up and those braces put me over the edge. It took a lot of digging.
What did you find out? What was it that start giving you the relief?
I’ve been rash-free now for a year. That’s how long it’s been.
Is that because you did the detox the way you did?
I went through different stages. I didn’t find her until almost two and a half years into my journey. Up until that, it was complete utter hopelessness and pain. I then started taking my courses and applying all the different things. When I found her, I was doing infrared saunas. I was doing vitamin therapy. I was doing hot cold hydrotherapy showers. My environment was already pristine and clean. I started using air filters. I got filters on my water, shower, and everything. I’m taking a lot of herbs and support. Completely healing my gut because a leaky gut is a big thing when you have chemical sensitivities.
I have also been using these specific superfoods that are very organic and pure and a product that helps to heal your gut while also, eliminating glyphosate, which is everywhere in our food nowadays. It’s known as Roundup. Glyphosate is a chemical and it’s on our food. It’s in our water. It’s on our lawns on golf courses. It’s everywhere you go. For me, it’s important to continuously keep this detox going because I refuse to go back to where my body was. My body will never have that rash again. That’s my mindset.
I don’t blame you. Be sure when you get a little older to get that Shingrix vaccine also so that you don’t have to deal with that rash and trigger you some stuff.
It’s a crazy story because everybody I talked to is like, “I’ve never heard of that before. I’ve never met anybody who’s had an allergic reaction to braces.” My orthodontist was in shock. He’s never come across it before. He thought I was nuts. I’m like, “Everything is connected to the braces.” The braces did that triggering thing.
I did research on it and there’s a lot of these things happen. It’s a risk that should be given to people when they go in for these treatments because we don’t know what’s in the metal. That’s what my dad said. He goes, “There could be so many different types of things in metal.” Even when they say it’s titanium, we don’t know what’s in there. Is it cadmium? Is there a lead? I don’t know exactly.
I know people who have metal sensitivities. I know people who have sensitivities to scent. It’s not crazy. Now, you’re getting yourself better. You are rash-free. How does learning to like who you are help a woman to think on purpose so that she can live on purpose?
How I got healthy was thinking on purpose. I wasn’t sticking with a lot of these habits, like eating and everything else and I was still drinking. Red wine was my coping mechanism. When I found the life coaching part of it, that helped me to change my entire thought process around what was going on with my healing process. That’s when I realized that I had to start thinking differently to get a different result. I had to stop sabotaging myself in any way. Although I was doing lots of things, there were still some things I needed to improve on. I believe that there’s a biological connection between what we’re thinking and what’s happening in our bodies.
I had to start thinking about who I wanted to be in my future self. Who was that person, that healthy woman, that woman who was in charge of her health, in charge of her habits? Every single thing I did had to align with my goal of having a healthy body. Detoxing my liver. All those things had to line up. In order to do that, I had to think on purpose. I had to plan ahead. I had to be thinking from a space of who I was in the future, not who I was feeling hopeless and powerless. It was a combination of things that I had to do. Thinking on purpose is everything if you want to create a result. It doesn’t matter what the result is.
That involves a lot of self-love, which is also a big lesson for us. You’re worried about everyone else in your life, but how about you? A lot of things hinge on you and people don’t realize the importance of taking care of themselves so that they can be there for others. You need to be there for yourself, which is exactly what you did. You didn’t recognize it as love in the beginning, but it became a form of self-love.
The big thing too with healing, losing weight, or changing anything in your life is having a good connection with who you are, with your body, especially. A lot of times, we have our head, which is one thing and then we disconnect from our body. It’s like we hate our bodies. “I hate my thighs. I hate my legs. I hate my arms. I hate this. I don’t like my big feet. I don’t like my teeth,” whatever it is.
Life Coaching: One of the big things about healing or losing weight or changing anything in your life is having a really good connection with who you are.
It’s like you’re talking about all the parts of you as if they’re not you. You are all connected and every part of you has to be the same and loved. Otherwise, how are you going to heal or improve it? We think we can beat ourselves into a better body or a better life, but you have to nurture yourself into a better body and a better life. You can’t beat yourself into those things.
That’s such an important thing for you to say, Sarah because I hear a lot of people, especially women, and I’m guilty of it too, saying, “I don’t like this part of me.” Your body is what’s passing your soul, which is who you really are. This is your vehicle. You need to take good care of it. While you let go of all these toxic health issues, were there any toxic people you also let go of? Was that part of your getting better or that was not an issue for you?
I did a lot of thinking when I was by myself a lot. I realized I’ve been in a lot of relationships where I was always the person taking care of the other person. I had left that relationship that I had been in before I got sick. It was very stressful. I don’t like to call any relationship toxic. I chose to stay and I chose to be in that relationship with a person. If I’d looked at things, I would’ve known that that relationship wasn’t in alignment with who I wanted to be or how I wanted to live my life and I should have left.
I was talking to myself saying, “You need to help him. You need to do this.” I was doing it. It wasn’t him that was a toxic part of my life. It was me making that choice to stay. I’ve made those choices my whole life. I’ve made my choice. I don’t hold any grudges about any of my past relationships. I’ve grown from all of them. I look back at all of them. Even if I was cheated on or whatever the case may be, I’ve never been a person to hold grudges that way, but I’ve always taken on that role in all those relationships, where I feel responsible for the other person.
You were a caregiver and you didn’t practice self-love in your relationships?
I did focus a lot more probably on making the other person happy, and that drains you. You’re not filling your own cup first. You have to fill your own until it’s overflowing and then that overflowing you can hand to the other person. First, you have to get your fuel tank, whatever it is, full. You then have so much more to give. When ours is empty and then we’re giving it to everybody else, it’s like, “There’s nothing left.”
Life Coaching: You have to fill your own cup until it’s overflowing. That overflowing you can then hand to the other person.
What are some of the buffering and distracting behaviors, which you probably also practice that numb heavy, uncomfortable emotions and keep women stuck in a holding pattern?
This is all part of not processing. I had that huge emotional release. We push down our emotions and those are the emotions that feel uncomfortable, whatever they are, even if it’s boredom. We don’t like feeling bored. We grab the remote. We flop down in front of Netflix for three hours. When you’re on the couch watching Netflix, then you want to go grab a bag of chips or maybe pour a glass of wine and you want to numb out. Some of the typical behaviors are very acceptable. Drinking, overeating, snacking, too much TV, Netflixing, shopping, especially click shopping. It’s so easy. It’s a good way to get a quick dopamine hit. For some people, it’s porn. It’s whatever gives us that quick hit of dopamine.
It’s a way to almost press that escape button on your life for 1 hour, 2 hours, whatever the case may be. There’s nothing wrong with any of it. I would say porn, you need to limit. Drinking, you need to limit. All of these things, you want to do them in moderation. How are you using these behaviors in your life to distract and buffer? Once you can be honest with it, you can decide what’s the long-term gains or losses of this behavior in the moment because we don’t think about it sometimes that way.
It’s so hard sometimes for us to face ourselves. It takes a lot of courage. It’s easier to hide behind those things.
I’m single and a lot of single women or even empty nesters too. Men, too. Single women, anybody who’s alone. When you have those feelings of boredom or you’re alone with your thoughts. I’ve always been pretty good being alone, but I was forced into pretty much. Long before COVID, I was in isolation. You are forced to get real with yourself. It doesn’t have to be a bad experience. One of the most powerful things is learning to love your own company.
Be in your own company. Go for a walk without a show and allow your brain to focus on nature and your feet hitting the ground and the feeling of your muscles and your breath. That’s when you start connecting body and mind. That was very huge in my healing, as well. I had a body-mind yoga teacher, who was amazing that helped heal the body-mind connection, which is pivotal to your healing journey.
Sarah, tell us about those 4Ps that keep women stuck, Perfectionism, People Pleasing, Procrastination, and Past Programming. It’s so hard to face yourself, especially when you’ve got all those old tapes in your head.
This is where I feel like so many of us have because I always label myself as a perfectionist, but it’s funny. I call it the 4Ps because I see these four things keeping us stuck in our lives. We’re in these holding patterns and it’s because of the Past Programming. The three Ps, the People Pleasing, Procrastination, and Perfectionism come from the Past Programming, our belief systems.
What we sometimes miss is this are behavioral patterns. It’s not who we are. We take on those patterns as who we are. I’m a people pleaser. I’m a perfectionist. I’m a procrastinator. As soon as we separate that’s a behavior and that’s a choice, it’s always past programming. You have to question yourself, “Why do I have these beliefs?” When we’re born, we have none of these behavioral patterns. We’re free and easy.
Children are completely free. People insert into these kids or they tell them who they’re supposed to be, what they’re supposed to think what’s bad and what’s good.
We don’t care about being judged. We cry, we stomp, we dance, we play, and we don’t worry about what people are thinking. It doesn’t matter if it’s perfect or not. I want what I want. I don’t care if she’s tired. I need to be fed. We’re not people-pleasers when we’re babies. Procrastination doesn’t exist either because they want what they want and they want it now. Depending on what environment we grow up in, everybody has different belief systems.
The biggest problem is we don’t know that we even have them most of the time. That’s why working with a coach, a therapist, or somebody, usually not a friend because friends will buy into your story. You want to work with somebody that can give you an unbiased opinion, look at the blind spots, and say, “You need to question this area or that area,” to pick out where your behaviors are not serving you.
Everybody has different belief systems. But the biggest problem is we don't know that we even have them most of the time. Click To Tweet
You’re saying that yoga coach or that guy who was the naturopath who also helped you with toxins were people who helped you. Now, you’re starting to provide that to other people who are seeking healing. From your experience, which is so important and it’s such a passion of mine to get people to stop suffering and to get into healing. When a woman becomes clear, confident, and in control by conquering those 4Ps, I’m sure it takes a lot of work to do that, but it is doable. How does each of us create a life that fits who we become as we age?
I say clear, confident, and in control because clear for me is If we’re driving somewhere, we have to know where we’re going. You’re not going to get in your car. Although, sometimes I do like to go for a drive. Usually, if you’re getting in your car, you have a destination that you’re driving to. You’re pretty clear about your plan. You know how you’re going to get there or you have a GPS, you have a map. A lot of times in our lives we’re not clear on anything. We’re not clear where our values are, especially in midlife. That’s when we need to question everything. A lot of it is based on our life when we’re twenty. We plan our life when we’re twenty. We get to midlife when we’re living a life that was designed way before. We’re a totally different person now.
I like to think it’s a good time to pause, look back, “That’s what’s happened. This is where I am now. Where do I want to go? How can I get clear on where I want to go?” and all the different points of your life. Your purpose, your relationship, your family, your finances, your habits, your history, friends, skills, all the things. Get clear on what you want and then you’ll figure out where you want to go. Confidence comes into it because you have to build that confidence in yourself. Not in your skills, but in yourself that you’ll try and try. Even if you mess it up, you get back up. You’re going to go again.
It’s okay. I can mess up and be okay and I’m still moving forward.
That’s the confidence I want my clients to get. Not about, “I need to be good at it, then I know I’m good at it, and then I know I can do it,” because then we always procrastinate. You have to have inner self-confidence. The control part is controlling yourself.
I want to say that about 400 times, not controlling other people, it’s about yourself.
It’s about having complete control over what you do as a person, what you think most importantly, knowing that when you’re choosing to think. Some days it’s okay to feel bad. Some days I want to have a crappy day and not stress out about it. It’s like, “I’m feeling blah and it’s okay.” Not trying to even control that some days because some days we need our decompress day. It’s like controlling how you react to others, controlling how you judge others, controlling how you have a story about your life. It’s having control so that you can take the actions that get you to that goal that you’re setting by being clear.
Life Coaching: It’s about having complete control over what you do as a person and what you think most importantly.
Another word for control, would you say being conscious of what you’re doing?
Yes, being completely conscious and aware.
What are the private, holistic, and collaborative aspects of your coaching that will help a woman to stop compromising and step fully into her personal power to create life on her own terms? She comes to you now. How do you help a woman to do that?
It’s interesting because everybody’s different and that’s why I coach privately. I’ve done some group coaching, but for me, I like to connect on a deep level with someone, especially if they’re feeling very stuck. Sometimes you need to dig in a lot. The first thing I always do is help them to figure out their relationship with themselves because you have to have a strong relationship with yourself in order to treat yourself better. If you’re not having a good relationship with yourself, we end up getting stuck in those buffering behaviors or making choices that aren’t necessarily serving us, staying in relationships, staying in jobs.
What if a woman says to you, “Sarah, I don’t know who I am. I’m a mess?” What do you suggest? How do you work with her to start to get a knowing to be able to heal emotionally, physically, and spiritually, to get to know about who she is? Is that what comes from your coaching to help her to dive into her background and all?
I am certified by the life coach school. Coaching is different from therapy. Therapy is a lot of talk therapy and we focus a lot on the past. In coaching, we focus on the moment. Who are you now? A lot of times we don’t know. We have to start digging down. Who do you want to be? Sometimes we think, “This is who I am.” It’s not because a lot of who you think you are right now is a belief.
I’ll have them do a lot of thought work and then ask a lot of questions. Sometimes all you have to do is have someone ask you a question and you start thinking about it and all of a sudden, your brain will start looking for solutions. We are constantly asking ourselves the wrong questions, “Why am I so stupid? Why can’t I do this? Why do I always mess this up?”
Why am I so fat? What’s wrong with me?
Your brain will be like, “I could tell you. I’ll give you 100 reasons.” They always go from the past. You’re always predicting your future based on your past, but we don’t have to do that. Your past is over and your future is predicting your future. You can use your future to predict your future by looking at who you want to be and then making those choices to get there.
Life Coaching: You don’t have to predict your future based on your past. Your past is over. You can use your future to predict your future by looking at who you want to be and then making those choices to get there.
When a person is talking to you the way I am, I would think that your one-on-one is probably great for people because they feel very safe with you. You’re so authentic and real, and they can be honest and not feel judged.
I don’t typically open up. I’m in the back row. I’ll observe. I’ll read, but I would never want to be coached on camera or in a group setting. I want to be heard, seen, and understood. I want to be eye-to-eye with the person and know that they’re holding me in a safe, secure space. That is one thing that is important. Especially if someone’s new to coaching and they don’t know what the heck coaching is. They need that container, that safe space.
They’re not going to progress. They’ll resort back to the old defenses. It’s so important. You state that life is about savoring the moments, learning from mistakes, and embracing the entire journey. Could you share the story of someone you’ve helped to heal, who’s doing that?
The one girl who comes to mind is someone. She’s a bit older than me but in that midlife range. She’s always putting herself completely last in every relationship and entering into relationships simply because she thought she had to be in a relationship to be worthy. Her thought process was, if she was single, then there was something wrong with her and she had a pattern.
It sounds like past programming to me. Go ahead.
She had a lot of people-pleaser behaviors. In the end, she describes herself as a self-sabotager. It’s true. You don’t realize you’re self-sabotaging. A lot of what she was doing was putting all of the focus on those people in her life. A lot of times, the person she had finished with was a narcissist. She finished with him while we were together. didn’t know him personally but from all the behaviors. When you are in a relationship like that, it’s very hard to see that you’re being so manipulative, a narcissist.
Especially if you’re someone who has low self-esteem and self-confidence and you’re looking for validation, affirmation, and all that stuff and you’re trying to make somebody happy. It doesn’t matter if they’re cheating on you over and over again. They’ll start off being nice. You feel like you can’t get attention from them. You’re constantly trying to get that attention.
We helped her to see what was going on because you take the blinders off, take off those sunglasses, and start seeing. She built her confidence and was able to see that. She didn’t need to be in a relationship. If she wanted to be in a relationship, she could. She didn’t have to be in a relationship to be a whole healthy, happy person. That right there for me is the most amazing part of it.
You also probably helped her to learn who should she be in a relationship with that that was toxic for her.
I don’t usually use toxic except when it comes to chemicals. I like people to become personally responsible for their own behavior. I don’t think another person can be toxic to you unless you are not setting boundaries for yourself and you’re not being completely personally responsible for yourself and you decide then from there.
You take away the blame. You’re saying it’s your fault that you let this person in and you let this person manipulate you like that?
Yes. When you become so personally responsible that you’re making the choices, “I made that choice and that’s okay because I didn’t know better back then.” It allows you to feel more powerful and be like, “Now I see that this is how I want to be.” It’s not as if it’s even a bad thing. It’s like, “Now I know. This was very eye-opening for me. It was a learning experience.” I like to always look at things from never that things were a mistake because whatever happened, it happened because it was supposed to happen. What you don’t know, you don’t know at that moment.
I always say, “Look at your past self and thank her for going through all the things that she went through to get you to where you are right now because you’re smarter, you’re stronger, and you’re the woman you are now. Look to the future. Who is that woman who you want to be in the future?” Pull from her strength and skills that you know you’re going to have and start moving towards that. It’s always coming from a place of personal power.
Look at your past self and thank them for going through all the things that they went through to get you to where you are right now. Click To Tweet
It’s so empowering. It’s wonderful. I have to ask you one question before I go to the next question. How did your teeth work out? They look fine to me.
I had a huge bunch of issues with my teeth. I had to have a tooth removed because the braces cracked it. I’m still having all sorts of issues, but whatever. I’m figuring it out.
The rest of you is okay.
I want to get a tooth implant, but right now, I have to get my body very healthy. I have to get bio testing before anything goes into my body. I will go to a biological dentist and I go to somebody that will use all ceramic implants, no metal. It’s a process, but it is what it is.
You do what you need to do. I’m sure there are people who are reading who don’t even know that there are dentists who are more holistic. You can find them, which is good information for them. What do you call the clarity call?
My clarity call that’s a complimentary call that I do for people, especially people who are new and are like, “What is a life coach?” When I found life coaching, I have no idea what it was. I ended up becoming a coach because I know how much it helped me in my journey. For me, life coaching is the bomb. Everybody should have a life coach.
Everybody should have a life coach. Click To Tweet
I do the clarity call to have a conversation like we are now. I would probably ask a lot of questions like you’re asking me. Sometimes I’ll be asking questions to find out if we’re a good fit to work together and to see where they’re stuck or what they want to improve. I always talk about building a relationship with yourself and then the other component is always having quality supportive habits. We might talk about what’s going on in their life, their struggles, their habits, where they are with themselves, and then decide if they want. It’s completely complimentary. It’s about half an hour usually and then that’s it.
That’s wonderful though. It’s a complimentary call and they can explore, make a decision, and get to know you. You can see if you have synergy with each other and all of that.
It’s important that I want to work with them and they want to work with me. I don’t want to work with people if they’re coming, “I’m not sure.” It’s like, “Are you all in? If you’re all in, let’s do it.”
Let’s do this. Are you committed to loving yourself, to helping yourself? What are the best ways for people to connect with you?
They can contact me right on my website if they want it.
Sarah Watkins?
They go to my contact and they can send me a message right through my website or they can email me at Hello@SarahWatkins.com. I’m on Facebook, Sarah Watkins Coaching.
Do you have any special offers for our audience?
I have a short self-discovery eBook that has a number of questions that helps you to have a little bit of a life awakening. I don’t call it a midlife crisis. It’s a life awakening. I lead them. I explain right in there what the 4Ps are. I give them some questions to ask themselves. They can go and download that. It’s SarahWatkinsCoaching.com/Rebirth.
What are Sarah’s tips for finding joy in life?
I’m going to go back to those first three tips. 1) Start thinking on purpose. Decide what you want to think. That means you have to question yourself a lot. Ask yourself questions when you start having a story about something. Question, “Could this be a story?” 2) Start building a relationship with yourself. Once you have that relationship with yourself, you can 3) Start infusing quality, supportive habits to create a quality life. I always say you have to have quality habits to create a quality life. That’s a solid foundation. You have a relationship with yourself and you have quality habits. Those two things together, with thinking on purpose will bring you joy.
Sarah, by overcoming tremendous suffering and grief due to debilitating pain, you are no longer feeling lost and powerless. Now, you’re a role model who empowers others to also transform their lives. What a true blessing and a gift you are as you continue to evolve and help others to evolve. I’m sure that many in our audience are now thinking about making that clarity call to you. I thank you from my heart for this inspiring and uplifting interview.
Thank you.
My pleasure. Here’s a reminder, everyone. Make sure to follow us and like us on social at @IreneSWeinberg on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. To be continued, many blessings, and bye for now.
Guest’s links:
- Sarah Watkins’ Website
- Email Sarah Watkins
- Connect with Sarah Watkins Coaching on Facebook
- Sarah Watkins’ Self-Discovery eBook
Host’s links:
- @IreneSWeinberg on Instagram
- Irene Weinberg on Facebook
- Irene Weinberg on Twitter
- Irene Weinberg – Grief, Rebirth + Healing Podcast on YouTube
