Business Innovators Radio - Navigating Anxiety: The Path to Self-Confidence with Tiffany Lukasiewicz

Episode Date: July 20, 2026

The conversation between Dr. Tamara Patzer and Tiffany Lukasiewicz captivates the listener by delving into the profound journey of self-discovery and empowerment that defines Tiffany’s life. Tiffany, an author and advocate for women, shares her experiences of childhood bullying and the resulting struggles with self-esteem and identity. From her early days of feeling invisible and pressured to conform, she evolved into a beacon of strength for women navigating similar challenges. The pivotal moment in her life came when she recognized the importance of embracing her authentic self rather than succumbing to societal expectations. This transformation is not merely a personal victory; it reflects a broader narrative of empowerment that resonates deeply with women seeking to reclaim their voices and assert their worth.Through her recently published book chapter, ‘Stand Tall, Roar Loud, Live Fierce,’ Tiffany invites women to acknowledge their inherent strength and embark on their own journeys of self-acceptance and self-leadership. Moreover, the dialogue transitions to Tiffany’s innovative ‘Embodied Lioness Framework,’ a transformative approach aimed at helping women break free from cycles of self-doubt and anxiety. Central to this framework is the practice of somatic healing, where the connection between the mind and body is emphasized. Tiffany elucidates how understanding bodily sensations can lead to emotional release and empowerment. She addresses the common misconception that healing entails the suppression of negative emotions, instead advocating for a holistic understanding of emotions as integral to personal growth. This framework encourages women to recognize and regulate their feelings, ultimately fostering a healthier relationship with themselves and those around them. The conversation culminates in a powerful message that encourages women to embrace their inner lioness, affirming that it is never too late to embark on a healing journey toward confidence and self-leadership.Read the book https://www.amazon.com/ALPHA-QUEENS-RISING-Where-Purpose/dp/B0GCVDSRRB Women Innovators with Tami Patzerhttps://businessinnovatorsradio.com/women-innovators-with-tami-patzer/Source: https://businessinnovatorsradio.com/navigating-anxiety-the-path-to-self-confidence-with-tiffany-lukasiewicz

Women Innovators. Interviews with women with big messages and big missions, sharing their stories to inspire you to live your passion and step up to make the world a better place. Here's your host, Tammy Patzer. Hi, everyone. This is Dr. Tamara Patzer. And I'm really excited because I am interviewing Tiffany Lucas Savage and she is the author. of stand tall, roar loud, live fierce in the Alpha Queen's Rising book that was recently published. And before we start our interview with Tiffany, first of all, welcome Tiffany.

Thank you for having me. I want to tell you a little bit about Tiffany and then we're going to talk about what Tiffany is doing now and how she got to where she's going and what she has become and what she's becoming. This is a really exciting time not only for me, but for Alpha Queens Rising because Tiffany will also be speaking at a live event in the very near future. So let me just tell you a little bit more and tell you about Tiffany. Some girls learn early that their existence is negotiable, that they can be wanted but quietly, seen, but not too much, loved, but only if they make themselves small. Tiffany, Lucas Savage, learned that lesson long before she ever fell in love.

She was a kid with short, curly, strawberry blonde hair and a body made for motion. The kind of girl who ran hard, played hard, and felt everything loudly. The teasing sharpened, a deep voice, big forehead, kids found targets and they just took aim. The message landed. If she drew less attention, she might. draw less pain. She tried to blend into the background. School didn't make anything easier. Dyslexia made letters scatter and assignments slow. Instead of support, she was labeled. By third grade, she had been a kid who learned differently, but she was seen as a problem.

Her parents didn't realize how much she was struggling until the year ended. Tiffany, let's talk about not then, but now. Tell me what happened in terms of what is happening now. How do you help women now? Yeah, for sure. So now I help high functioning women stop spiraling and lead their lives with confidence so they can build stronger relationships, show up as present mothers, and succeed in their work through what I have now labeled as the embodied lioness framework. So you help these women who are extremely capable, but what is happening inside of them? Why don't they trust themselves?

Yeah. So a lot of these women, they constantly spiral. They overthink everything. And they really don't trust their own decisions. They seek out other people's opinions of themselves for everything that they want to do. They have to ask other people for advice before trusting their own suggestions. So a lot of people, they do work in like, let's say, mindset. that therapy, self-help, how does your Lymus framework help people? And what is the root issue behind

it all? And we will go through your framework. But I kind of want to set a foundation so our listeners can understand. Yeah. So my main focus is somatic healing. So it's listening to your body. And it is different because I teach women how to listen to their body and really understand where in their body, they feel those different emotions. And the body remembers what the mind forgets. So it is important to look inward when healing because your body doesn't like, your body doesn't always hold on to everything. So your body listens to what your mind forgets. And so your mind can tell you all of these things, make you second guess yourself and make you focus on other things. But if you really focus inward, your body will tell you all the answers.

So your body has all the answers. Can you talk about that a little bit, not in clinical terms, but in, let's say, plain English terms. What is your body, the nervous system regulation? What is that that you're helping them to address and to recognize? Yeah. So the whole goal is to be able to go in and out of. different emotions. Somatic healing isn't about not feeling emotions at all. It is normal to feel stress. It's normal to feel anxiety. It's normal to feel happy, sad. And as humans, we are allowed to

feel all of those emotions. A regulated nervous system has the ability to feel those emotions, acknowledge and accept the emotion, and then you're able to use tools to get back into a regulated state. So a regulated nervous system goes on an up and down chart rather than just staying happy all the time or anxious all the time. A regulated nervous system goes up and down all day and able to feel those emotions. So we're technically getting good at feeling our emotions, not feeling, not feeling them at all. So what women have done is, I call it stuffing. Is that an accurate term where you hold down all of those feelings just so that you can survive. Is that equivalent? Yeah, for sure. So that is what most women do. They suppress their feelings. They push them down,

hold them down, kind of pretend like they're not there anymore instead of actually feeling the emotions. They think that they're being strong by suppressing their feelings and moving on with their day. But what they're not realizing is their body remembers every single thing that they've gone through. And even though they feel they're suppressing those feelings and their minds forgetting the feelings, their body is holding those feelings somewhere in your body. Okay. So I want to go back to you that little curly-haired Annie, the big voice who was teased. And in your book, let's just say that the chapter that you wrote in Alpha Queen's Rising, number one, it was real and raw and authentic. But it is the story so many people share because when I read it, I got the goosebumps.

And to me, the goosebumps is my body telling me you're recognizing something. So I want to ask you a little bit more about the chapter you wrote. And then we're going to talk about the lay in its framework. So in your chapter, you actually talk about that you used to feel like you had to disappear. And I guess blend in to whatever. and then you had this realization that you didn't have to disappear anymore, that you could roar instead. What does that mean? What happened where you have that wake up call, hey, I do not have to be blank.

I can be the lioness. I can roar. Yeah. And so like I mentioned, my anxiety and low self-esteem began at a very young age. I was bullied throughout grade school and I just lost all confidence in myself. I looked to others for someone to be proud of me. I was always looking for, I want this person to be proud of me. I want to make this person happy. And as I grew up, it led into relationships. So it allowed me to, to get into relationships with, you know, guys I probably shouldn't have been with because I thought I didn't deserve better. I thought this is what I deserved. This is all I'm going to get. And even though I,

in my mind, I had all these high standards. I suppressed all of my feelings and was like, well, this is what I deserve. And it ended up getting into a pretty bad relationship with someone who still constantly belittled me, constantly tore me down. And I thought, thought that was normal because of grade school. I was bullied all the time. And so my self-esteem was like, well, this is true because this is what I've always been told. So I didn't think anything was wrong. And one day I woke up and I just changed everything. I told myself, I can't do this anymore. And if I want any chance of moving forward with my life and in a positive direction, I have to leave this relationship. So I ended up calling off my engagement two months before I was supposed to get married.

And I took several solo trips to really help clear my mind and I was going to therapy. Then I found my now husband. And even though I had a better mindset because of therapy, I was still holding onto all of my anxiety from those past relationships, my past trauma. And I knew I had to work on more than just my mindset before I pushed the work. one I knew I was supposed to be with away. And that is when I found somatic healing. And it completely changed my life. And I, as I mentioned earlier, I still feel all those feelings. I still feel anxious. I still worry sometimes. But now I have the tools to regulate my nervous system quicker. And it has completely changed my relationship with my husband. And now I have two beautiful daughters.

And it completely makes me a better mom also. And because as with kids, you get frustrated. you get annoyed, you get, you know, all those feelings. But having the tools to regulate your nervous system in the moment and not continue with the spiral, it completely changes everything. Wow. That is so powerful. So the lioness framework is that part of the toolkit? Yes, definitely.

So I have five steps in my lioness framework. And it's recognized, and that's the phase where you really start to understand your spirals, understand where it's sitting in your body, understand your survival patterns, and understand your self-doubt. And then you move into regulate. And that's when I really start to teach you the tools to use. And the reason why I do recognize first is because you can't regulate your nervous system if you don't understand where in your body your feelings are sitting and your tensions are sitting.

And so that's why I do recognize first, then teach you the tools. And that's when you really start to calm your nervous system. So anxiety and overwhelm really stop running your day. And then you move into the reconnect phase, which this is where you really start to trust your instincts and stop second guessing yourself. Then we move into rebuild. And this is where we start setting boundaries and learning where your yes sits and where your no sits when setting boundaries. And then lastly is the rise phase. And that's where you really start to lead your life.

with steady confidence, whether that's at work, at home, or in your relationships. And those are the five phases that I went through in my healing journey that have done amazing work for me. And it's really cool, too, is because my framework is set on 90 days. And every 90 days, you can redo the five steps. Because after the 90 days, you're a completely different person than you were at the beginning. So when you go back to the recognized phase, you view things differently. every 90 days you go through the five steps. That's so interesting because in Alpha Queen's rising, that expansion.

And so everything that you work on literally is about that identity shift and becoming a better version of you. And like you said, every 90 days, you can revisit and then whoever you are at that time. You're always expanding and growing and becoming that person. And it sounds like 90 days, I think, is a very reasonable amount of time and enough time because, of course, you have to. There's a lot of processing that happens. With that, what do most women say, where are most women feeling stuck? Yeah, a lot of time women notice where they feel the tension in their body and they say they have tightness in their neck or tightness in their shoulders, but they don't, they get stuck at what causes

the tension and what tools to use to help with the tension and to help regulate their nervous system. So it's interesting because most people, like let's say you have tension in your neck or your shoulders, you're going, oh, it's because I sit in front of a computer or I look at my cell phone too much. And I'm sure that aggravates it. But would you say that sometimes those tensions would be there even if you weren't sitting in front of a computer? That's just where your body is holding it. Yeah, for sure. Because when you are holding tension in your body, especially if it's in your neck, it changes your posture. So if you're, if you're, if you're,

If you're sad all the time, if you're not knowing how to regulate you all, you slump over. You hold your posture different to where if you're rising into the confidence person, you stand taller. You have a better posture. And that's where that tension can start going away because you're just holding yourself at a different standard. And even like walking into a room with confidence with your chest up, your shoulders back, you just feel. better about yourself and just changing your posture alone can help immensely with regulating your nervous system and that tension in your shoulders and your back and everything like that. So it kind of just all falls into place. That's really interesting because I, you do, you notice that when people

shrink into themselves and then when they walk into a room confident, other people, even if it's not 100% you know, noticeable, they feel it because that positive energy that that you have when you are, you have that confidence. What would you say is the biggest misconception that people have about healing and about the work that you do? Yeah. So the biggest misconception that a lot of people come to me are, they think it's wrong to feel certain ways. Like they shouldn't feel anxious. and they shouldn't still worry if their husband or something's doing something. They shouldn't feel these emotions. But that is not what healing's about at all.

It's actually completely the opposite. Healing, as I mentioned earlier, is getting good at feeling. And what I mean by that is you get good at listening to your body. When you feel an emotion and where it is in your body and giving yourself grace, when you feel that emotion instead of, as we talked about, suppressing it. So a lot of our client, a lot of my clients come to me like, I don't want to feel like this anymore. I don't want to feel this. But the goal is to not feel like that anymore. It's to be able to regulate your nervous system quicker when you do feel like that. So what would you say when you're working with

someone, what is like the first internal shift that the women notice? So people first notice the tension lessons. That's a big one. So maybe their shoulders become less tense. And they're not focusing or it's because they are not focused on where the tension is in their body. That's the hardest part usually. And so your mind tries to take over usually before your body feels the emotions. So a lot of people, they don't, even though they feel it in their body, as I mentioned earlier, they don't know. why they're feeling it in their body. And so once they start noticing why they're feeling it in their body, that's when the shift starts, that's the first internal shift because they're not letting their mind control why they're feeling something. They're actually looking internal to the root cause of it. Wow. That's really interesting because as you're speaking, I'm thinking about how often my mind will, you know, tries to protect you. But your body, knows and the body and the mind will like some kind of times duke it out you know with yeah if your

body says no no matter what your mind says the body says no the body will win um in in the case so do you have um like some simple like 60 second reset that somebody could try yeah my favorite My favorite reset, it's called the cranial nerve reset, which it's smelling their favorite scent. And this is a good one because you can do it anywhere. You can do it in your car. You can do it as a morning reset, a midday reset, an evening reset before you go to bed. And what you're going to do is open your favorite scent. And it could be a lotion. It could be essential oils, a candle, anything. And bring it up to your nose. And as you're breathing it in, you focus on your breathing as well. So you breathe in for four, pause for four, pause for four, and then you exhale for four. And the reason why I love this tool is because it's considered a high payoff tool,

which means it's one of the fastest ways to shift a nervous system from survival to and true embodied self-leadership too. Wow. I like that. And most people do have favorite scents or candles or perfume or whatever it is that they like. that makes them feel good. Like what I personally like citrus, like lemons and oranges and things like that, because in Florida it just seems natural.

You have a lot of that like hanging out on the tree out in the yard. So what would you say would be a simple boundary phrase that maybe someone can say, to themselves internally or even audibly to help them just stay in their lyingness frame. Yeah, because setting boundaries is what I find very difficult for most people. And because a lot of people are, especially when they have anxiety, they're people pleasers. And they always just do what other people, you know, they either say yes when they don't to or no. So one of the boundary phrases I like to use, and I use a lot, is this isn't for me right now, but it is something that I can revisit in the future. And the reason why I like saying that,

because when we set boundaries, we also feel we need to give a reason as to why we are setting a boundary, but we really, we don't. We don't need to give a reason to why we're setting boundaries. And it's okay to not share your reason as to why you are setting a boundary. Because in reality, giving a reason of to why you're setting a boundary goes back into people pleasing and worrying about what other people feel. And so setting boundaries is for you. It is not for others. And so you don't have to give a reason. So that's why I just like one sentence, this isn't for me right now, but it is something I can revisit it in the future. It's super simple, but it acknowledges that it's not for you right now, but maybe in the future we can revisit it. Yeah. And that's, that's,

telling people exactly what it is. It's like, it's not for me right now, maybe in the future, but not right now. So as an Alpa Queen rising bestselling author now, what would you say is the most important message in the chapter that you wrote for the Alpa Queen's Rising book? I would say that the most important message is that there is something inside you that is ready to roar. And us women, we deserve to rise into the fierce women that we are truly meant to be. And that's something that I really want to resonate with women around the world because a lot of us, I feel are sometimes scared to let our roar out and to voice our people. opinions because maybe we're afraid of what other people might think of us. But that as I've talked about,

our body knows and that that roar is already inside you and it's just waiting for you to let the roar out. I love that. And everyone, just so you know, Alpha Queens Rising is available on Amazon. And it's a book that is printed in paperback in full color or you can get the Kindle version. and there's also an audible version in the work. So I just wanted to let you know that. So, Tiffany, is there anything else that you'd like to add? I don't think so. Like I mentioned, I just, I want every woman to know that they deserve to feel strong

and confidence and rise into true self-leadership and lead their lives with that kind of confidence. and it's possible. It doesn't matter how old you are. It is never too late to work on your healing journey. So everyone, it's time to work on that healing journey. And with that, Tiffany, how can people reach out to you? Yeah, they can follow me on Instagram.

You've been listening to Women Innovators with Tammy Patzer. To learn more, please go to Womeninnovatorsradio.com. And please do subscribe and share to spread the big messages and big missions to change the world.