Sense of Soul - Somatic Healing

Episode Date: December 30, 2022

Today on Sense of Soul Podcast, we have with us Victoria Albina. She is a Master Certified Life Coach, UCSF-trained Family Nurse Practitioner, Breathwork Meditation Guide and the host of the Feminist Wellness podcast.  While seeking answers to her own chronic health concerns, Victoria observed how stress physically manifested as gastrointestinal issues and decided to take control of it through the study of somatics. Inspired by the improvement in her quality of life, she decided that she wanted to help heal what she suffered from by working to address codependent tendencies in humans socialized as women. By integrating somatic practices and breathwork, Victoria now helps her clients work on their physiological responses to stress, enabling them to remain in control and self-advocate in challenging moments. Visit her website and use this link for free meditations and tools: https://victoriaalbina.com/senseofsoul Follow her journey: https://instagram.com/victoriaalbinawellness?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y= Listen to her podcast Feminist Wellness: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/feminist-wellness/id1454980022 Visit Sense of Soul at www.mysenseofsoul.com Do you want Ad Free episodes? Join our Sense of Soul Patreon, our community of seekers and lightworkers. Also recieve 50% off of Shanna’s Soul Immersion experience as a Patreon member, monthly Sacred circles, Shanna and Mande’s personal mini series, Sense of Soul merch and more. https://www.patreon.com/senseofsoul Thank you to our Sponsor  KACHAVA, Use this link for 10% off! www.kachava.com/senseofsoul  

Welcome to the Sense of Soul podcast. We are your hosts, Shanna and Mandy. Grab your coffee, open your mind, heart, and soul. It's time to awaken. Hey friends, if you're looking for ad-free Sense of Soul episodes, you can find them at Sense of Soul Patreon. Become a monthly member at any level. You will also have access to our monthly SOS Sacred Circles, our mini-series, merch, and much more. And it's a great way to help support our podcast so that we can continue to bring you inspiring episodes twice a week with our enlightened guests from all around the world.

Check out our Patreon. Today we have with us Victoria Albina. She is a master certified life coach, a nurse practitioner, a breathwork meditation guide, and the host of the Feminist Wellness Podcast. She has a passion for helping women realize that they are their own best healers so you can break free from codependency, perfectionism, and people pleasing and reclaim their joy. Thank you so much for coming on. I think we're gonna have a great conversation. But you know, it's always a pleasure to connect with other podcasters. Yeah, you know, because we're all in the same game and have the same, you know, mission, really just to spread the word and talk about stuff that maybe no one else has anyone else to

talk to you about. Right? Yeah. So let's do that. Let's start from the beginning. How did you get into this? So my journey, like so many of us started with being unwell myself. So I had digestive concerns my whole life that came with the intermittent depression and anxiety that happens when your gut's a hot mess. And I say hot mess with like love and care and not actual criticism because that's the way the science a hot mess. And I say hot mess with like love and care and not actual criticism because that's the way the science works, right? Yeah. So I was really sick and I couldn't find the help I needed in the Western allopathic world. Yeah. I just wasn't getting the care, the answers, the support, the guidance. And so I did what a nerd's nerd does.

And I became a functional medicine nurse practitioner. I became an herbalist. I started really diving deep into the science and the sacred around our wellness. And I was a primary care provider for many, many years and eventually started a functional medicine private practice in Manhattan. And in that practice really started to see the pattern that was emerging not only in my own life, but in my patients' lives,

where we collectively would get better and then there would be a stressor and we would remit, right? Our symptoms would come back. We'd get better and then there'd be distress and our symptoms would come back. And so again, like I'm a nerd, I'm like really into the science. I studied epidemiology and my master's in public health. I mean, like nerd, such a nerd. So I love patterns. My brain finds them. And the pattern was this on stress, distress, and trauma that lives within our bodies and hasn't gotten the support it needs to come to its own completion will continue to haunt us, right? Like hungry ghosts will continue to come for us and grasp at our coattails and say, I need your attention until that screaming, right? And that screaming looks like hypothyroid and graves. It looks like irritable bowel and

small intestine bacterial overgrowth. It looks like depression and anxiety and worry, right? Insomnia, reproductive issues. Like it just looks like what is so often referred to as just symptoms. And when you go into the doctor, they'll just treat the symptom and send you home. And like you said, it becomes this pattern, this loop that you're in, stuck in. When, you know, truly this is how my journey started because I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, anxiety, ADHD, like all the same here. And Mandy was too. And actually a lot of our friends, I didn't have it, but the thyroid issue. Sure.

So there was all of these same things that everybody was talking about getting diagnosed with. And of course, we're like in our 30s. You know, we have full plates on our schedule. You know, for myself, I had a lot of loss. I was very stressed. It was a lot of stress. And I remember writing this long list of symptoms and giving it to my doctor and her looking at it going, we can't get to all of those. And I was like, but all of those are very real. Like I took the time to write them out because they're so real to me right now. I mean, it was at the point where I couldn't even hug people. It hurt. You know, I felt like a bus had hit me every morning. And I had random stuff to like restless leg syndrome. I mean, I just had so much stuff. And I was on so many meds. I'm talking like the big brown bag. Oh yeah. I remember I was having memory issues and that was a new symptom. So I called my doctor and I'm like, listen, I think now I have Alzheimer's. So what I did, I said, I want to stop taking everything. Right. And I want to go to get therapy, like mental health, to find out what the root of this.

For some reason, I just thought that maybe that might work. Sure. Your intuition. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think it's really important in these conversations that we do two things. A, number one, talk about the mind and the body as

one, right? Bring in the psychosocial, bring in the nervous system, polyvagal theory, bring in stress, distress, and trauma as a root cause of our physical manifestations of what lies within the body unattended to. And simultaneously, right? Because we can get very like white wellness industrial complex real quick and just go towards, it's all mindset. It's all like about your journey and forget to call out the systems that are poisoning us, right? Forget to call out Monsanto, forget to call out the toxins in our food, in our air, in our water, right? Forget to call out the fluoride in our water. There's so much that is on the spiritual plane, but there's so much that's on the physical plane. I had a parasite, right? So sure, it was stress, distress,

and trauma totally that kept me sick, but your girl had a parasite. My daughter just showed me this trend on tiktok oh no did you see it no i don't go on there well i don't either but she showed me well actually she was showing me there was something you could take and it makes you know you oh no what that is and it looks like worms in your poop helmets it's usually that's just the mucosal lining of the gut. Oh, I mean, we can get back on track. We should look at the poop later.. And the other extreme is it's just a spiritual journey. But actually the truth is somewhere in between. I needed to find the parasite, murder the parasite, and then heal my limbic system, heal my inner children, understand my nervous system and its activations and its collapses.

And most importantly for me, do the somatic work where soma means body and somatic means a reclamation of the body or return to the body. I had the opportunity to do all of that to come to the healed whole self that I know myself to be now. But it has to be holistic, right? Or we're just gaslighting ourselves. Yeah. Yeah. And you know what I think also is we align with it. We have to understand it and know it has to be something that we're involved in. Like, you know, I felt like oftentimes when I've been diagnosed and then prescribed, I really don't know what it's doing. I really don't know what it is. I'm not involved in the part that's supposed to be mine. Right. Right. And I think that is evidence of the patriarchy, right? It's this daddy doctor and that doctor can be of any, any of the many, many,

infinitely many genders. And it's just that like paternalistic framework that says, doctor knows best, right? This is, you are patient, you are in this role. So you have to do what we say. And that's the beauty. And that's part of why I shifted out of being the person in the white coat. So I never was energetically the person in the white coat, but there I was, right? From that to really my coaching practice is profoundly based in embodiment, presence, intentionality, choicefulness, and somatics, coming back to the body. Because when I'm coaching someone somatically, I don't know nothing. There is absolutely nothing. I'm a guide. I'm support, right? I know the evidence-based best questions to ask, but the clients, the person being coached is the boss, right? They know what's

next. They know what's true. You're not taking their power away from them, which is often, I think, you know, how I feel when I don't know what I have. You're not going to take the time to explain to me. You're just going to give me the word and this drug to take. And I feel like in that moment, I have no power, really. Right. Right. Which is part and parcel of that system. So in my work, I focus on supporting humans socialized as women to overcome codependent

perfectionist and people-pleasing thought habits, a constellation of experiences that I call emotional outsourcing, right? Our emotions are outsourced to others. And I define codependent thinking as chronically and habitually sourcing our sense of wellness, worth, and validation from everyone and everything outside of ourselves instead of from within. Yeah. Chasing it. Chasing it, grasping for it. Okay. Is this the word interdependence that you often talk about? Okay, good. I was going to ask you about it. Yeah. I don't even know that word. Yeah. So codependence is I need, need graspy, right? I need you to validate me or I cannot possibly believe that I'm good enough, that I'm okay, that there's anything right about me. So I'm going to believe that everything's

wrong with me and I'm going to continue to be a chameleon and a shapeshifter and not be present in my own body towards the goal of getting you to tell me I'm okay, that it's okay for me to be alive. And so interdependence is when two autonomous humans meet with the goal of mutuality and reciprocity. So it's a podcast where folks can't see my hands. Codependence is your fingers and meshing, your palms squishing against each other, pushing back and forth, tit for tat. You didn't support me. You didn't do that. You, right? Push, push, push, push, push. And interdependence is your fingers gently meeting, right? Is this coming together? I love you. You love me. I trust you. You trust me.

I trust you to take care of you. That's not my job. And I trust you that when you ask me to take care of you, and I trust me that when you ask me to take care of you, I will show up from love and not obligation, right? You're so smart. You are a nerd, aren't you? I'm such a, I'm such a nerd and I'm a word English is my second language. And I'm just like many ESL kids. I'm like, so into the languaging because language, right. Humans are meeting, making machines and language is the vehicle through which we create lived experience. And so the specificity of our language matters deeply and creates a different felt experience. That vibration and how, you know, we're receiving it from each other. So wait, so what is your first language then?

Español. I'm from Argentina. Wow. Okay. Very cool. Wow. Okay. So the very first thing that we discovered in therapy was the codependency. And actually, I mean, it was like my face right there in the definition, you know, poster child. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. If I may, I'm curious, how did that show up for you? If you want to talk about it. If not, I can talk about how it showed up for me. I would say that how it looked for me. So the martyr was worshipped. Not anymore. I broke that shit.

I broke that shit. However, I couldn't wait to be the mom that did everything and did nothing for herself and served everybody. Like, I've been waiting to do that my whole life. And then I got there and I was like, dude, dude, I lost myself. I mean, I didn't even have a self and I was trying to be better at not having a self and being selfless and all that. And it just didn't work out. It turned into pain. It turned into, you know, feeling like a bus hit me every day. Right. Yeah. So that, you know, I definitely had a lot of relationships where I was enabling, you know, I'm going to fix you. Oh, the fixer energy. It's such a powerful urge,

the fixer energy for so many reasons. One, it creates dependency because if you're fixing, they need you. You won't be abandoned. You won't be rejected. Duh. Right. You know all this, the how to do, you know how to pay the bills literally and figuratively. So one that right, that rejection wound can breathe a sigh of relief. So our human subconscious seeks two things, significance and connection.

That's it. That's what we want as humans, right? And what is beneath significance and connection? Safety, which is the primary drive of the nervous system. So we've got the prefrontal cortex, the executive function part of the brain aligned with the limbic system, aligned with the nervous system, bada bing, bada boom, go for it. Whatever's going to make you feel significant, connected, safe, whatever was modeled for you in childhood as the pathway to there, that's the framework for living. And I looked for it outside of me, right? I was trying to find it outside of me. That was a big thing coming in. So what did yours look like? Yeah. A lot of fixing, a lot of like early in

dating being like, well, you know, I really don't love these 27 things about this person, but don't worry. I'll fix them. It was really interesting. I was coaching with a friend recently because you know, coaches trade with each other all day long and we were doing some parts work. So similar to internal family systems, the work of Dr. Nick Schwartz, looking at the parts of us, which is a thing I bring into Anchor, my six-month program. We talk to our parts all day long. It's so fun. But I had this part that did not believe I was worthy of love. That was unattainable for me in a romantic setting that I could never really truly have it. And so that part made me settle and made me say,

this is good enough. This will do because this is right in front of me. This is quote unquote easy. Of course, there was no ease to be found there. All those relationships were deeply frictive, but that part was like, oh, okay. There's a human around and a human will keep you safe and a human will be fine. So good to be there to be with this human, even though from jump, you're like, I don't like this. And like, I call my friends and be like, I don't have so many doubts and questions, but I'm going to stick it out. Right. And so that led to, I mean, I'm a Leo there's that, but this like unending loyalty to people who treated me like crap that was coming from that codependent settling part. So that part

is what's called a manager in internal family systems. And it was protecting what's called an exile. So a part of my psyche that was too scaled and like hit away. And so in working with that manager and giving it a new job, we were able to go in and be in a different kind of conversation with that exiled part and do what's called unburdening. Let it release the burdens it was holding on my behalf, so that care for it, love it. And now I don't settle. And what was really interesting is I was dating people who were like, not the right call, right? Like that's super great for me. And it would get to a point where like, I was super unhappy, super questioning all my calls with my friends were like,

I don't know, but this, but that I just wish, oh, if only right. That kind of energy. And then I'd stop exercising. I'd stop. I'm also part of the ADHD superpower team. Go team. We're the best. We're so amazing. But one of the things that is typical for us is forgetting to eat. And so that would arise for me when I was settling. I would settle for subpar self-care because it was part of this codependent settling habit, not exercising, not meditating, not journaling, not drawing. All of it would sort of go by the wayside as my focus would become singularly external on my date. I don't miss that person. You're describing a lot of me as well. I think back and think, oh, the struggle. It was such a struggle. And I'm struggling so senselessly.

I mean, once you figure it out, though, you're just, oh, my God, who was that? But it was me. It was me. In my framework, in my way of looking at the world, all of those parts and all the pain and suffering, I'm not negating that it sucked. But all of that, and I can negating that it sucked, but all of that. And I can only say this with hindsight, right? And I can only say it for me. Saying it for anyone else is really, frankly, disrespectful and not feminist and not loving.

But for me, in my life, I needed to go through all of that to become the woman I am. Does that mean that I'm like, oh, I'm so grateful for my stress, distress, and trauma? No, but kind of. Do you know what I mean? Like I would have liked to have gotten there without being in an abusive marriage. That would have been cute. You know what I mean? I used to feel so guilty about saying after my dad died, you know, I felt like he had given birth to me twice. Once in my life and once in his death. Because truly, I was very codependent to my dad. Yeah. I worked for him most of my life and provided most of my life.

So, yeah, I was very, not just codependent to him, but also dependent on him as well. And so when I had to just pick myself up, I had never done that before. So those moments made me stronger. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I love that. You know, a lot of people have a lot of judgment when you hear the word feminist men, especially. Yeah. So my journey this past few years has been about the divine feminine rising it's not something that I I sought after but I I feel like when we're talking about all these things it's a part of women now that we're able to we are able to say to a doctor, I want to know exactly what I'm taking. I want to know what this is for, you know, what's going on with my body and all these things we can speak. We have a voice now and we want to be heard in all the systems, because I think that the systems have all been against kind of women in many ways. Of course,

we're not the only ones against, but I feel like now we're at a place, you know, 2022, I look at my daughters and I'm like, yes. So what does the word feminist mean to you? Yeah. So it's a deep belief that all humans of all genders are of equal value, worth, and importance on this planet. For me, it is very intersectional and I will always credit my teachers. So that term intersectional feminist is the work of Dr. Kimberly Crenshaw, who is just absolutely astounding and amazing. And so intersectionality is really taking a broader and more expansive look at the intersections, right? So where does class come into this? Where does race come into this? Where does ethnicity, where does ability,

where does sexuality, where does gender, where does, you know, what are the multiple factors at play that set some people up to have a life of privilege and ease and some not. And what can we do to move this world towards not just more equality, but more equity, right? So we can all not just level the playing field, but recognize that some people need a stepstool, right? That it's not just making it equal. Some people need more help, more support, more care because 400 years of slavery, which continues in this country. I mean, don't get me started on the new Jim Crow, right? But get me started if you want to, right? humanity in each of us and then creating a just and equitable society that supports the free expression of all of us of all oh you know and i just can't wait till we get to the point where we're all other be like it's none of your business what i am you want me to check a box? I don't have enough time to speak with you about the many things that I am at a doctor's office or for political voting ballot or something like that.

Honestly, it's false. So a huge part of my journey is ancestry. I spent six years studying my ancestry and I probably helped over a hundred people with theirs. However, I'm French Creole, literally they're melting pot of people. Right. And I mean, it wasn't until the 1950s that we were even able to marry outside of our race because of one drop roll. So that's not long ago. No, it's really yesterday. And it made so much sense of why I was so codependent and where I was at today. So many people, if they did do their DNA, would find that they too also have all of these many different, beautiful nationalities and cultures within them that made them who they are today. And everything that happened prior to them, had it not happened, you wouldn't be here. So it lives in you. That's one of the reasons why, when I said that it brought me back down to the root, I was all up in the crown. Then all of a sudden I start having this like

major low back pain, you know, hips and all the things, but I feel like it's just the awareness. There's something there that needs to be addressed very deeply and you just need to talk to it. And I love how you mentioned loving on your body parts. We were just talking about this in a circle last night, how, you know, you can go through your body and just, you know, kind of give love to each part of your body, maybe the most lotion on each part and just say, I love you. That's the work, right? Is constantly scanning the body to see, not constantly, that's obsessive, but with intentionality within a sacred container, scanning the body to see what new information arrives that wants to be in communication with us. So yeah, sometimes that can really feel like

discomfort. Can you explain like what that might look like? Yeah. Oh, it's such a delight. So, okay. So stress, distress, and trauma activate the nervous system into a variety of states. The two main ones being sympathetic activation, also known as fight or flight, which is a state ruled by adrenaline, norepinephrine, and eventually cortisol. These are our stress hormones. What that tells us, our body feels that the world is unsafe. We go into sympathetic in the blink of an eye and the body is activated to run, to book it, to get out of there. A lion's coming. It's going to eat my face. Run, run. If that doesn't work, right? If we are unable to fight or flight, such as being a six-year-old being yelled at by a

caregiver, a person in an abusive marriage, right? Or you're talking to your boss and you can't tell them to F off because you don't want to lose your job or just having a conflict conversation with a loving partner can also activate this fight or flight system. If you're unable to fight or flight, you can't get out of there for whatever circumstantial reason, the body goes into what's called dorsal. So dorsal is the freeze response. This is I'm checked out. I'm disconnected. I'm not present. I'm not here. Right. Someone can just keep yelling at you and you just keep nodding along, but it's not, you're not hearing it. You're not present to it. Right. It's just filtering through a nervous system that loves you so much

that it's shut you down to the present time and place. Yeah. And so from sympathetic or dorsal, there is energy created within the body, escape energy that gets collapsed in dorsal, but stays within the body. Right? So sometimes you'll hear after a stressor, after a shock, people are like, oh my God, I was shaking so bad after the car accident. Right? And that's your body discharging that energy, right? Letting it out, moving it through. And when we don't get a chance to do that, to actually shake, to actually move what's called complete the stress activation cycle in the nervous system, that fight or flight energy, that wanting to punch someone in the nose or book it down the street, your body holds onto it. We say the issues are in the tissues in the nervous system world, meaning your quadriceps are

holding onto it, your shoulders, your neck, your belly, right? And so our emotions and that desire to save our own lives physically is what stays within us. And so what we do in somatic practice, and my training is through psychotherapy as a coach, just Pat Ogden's work and somatic experiencing, which is Peter Levine's work. And in both modalities, what we do is locate the place in the body where that stored energy is being held. And it's generally being held in posture, intention, in the musculature. It's not like there's like, oh, there's anger in my liver or like my elbow's full of sad. It's the way that you're carrying yourself through the world. And what arises when we drop into the body and invite the body, give the body permission and invitation to show us what

the what is. And the body will, it'll show us, right? A wave of blue grief will move through someone's chest and we'll go towards that grief and we'll get into conversation with it and ask it, how old are you? How old do you think your person is? What do you need? What do you want for her? What do you need from her? And in this conversation, we can figure out what kind of movement is needed by the nervous system to complete that activation loop, what any dorsal energy in the body might need so that it can feel truly rested, truly seen, truly heard. Like you may need to sprint around the block and that can be a visualization, right? It doesn't actually have to be physical. So you can sprint around the block either way and then get under

the covers. For example, I love how you said, talk to your body because, and ask the questions because I have come to this point in my life and I feel very grateful for it that when I have pain, I'm like, Oh, thank you. What do I need? What do I need? You know, my muscles will tell me, Oh, you need to drink more water or, Oh yeah, you, you need a massage, right? Or you need to stretch or you need to eat better. You need to meditate if you know, or you need to wear your glasses. I mean, your? Or you need to stretch or you need to eat better. You need to meditate, you know, or you need to wear your glasses. I mean, your body tells you what it needs a lot of times, or you need to go to the doctor. Yeah, absolutely. And we are taught by our family,

right? Our ancestral lineage. We are taught by our family blueprint, by systems of oppression to turn away from ourselves and away from that brilliance. And somatic practice gives us the space, the modality, the guidance, the freedom, the care to go to there, you know? I have a question for you. You know, some people do like the DNA and they do like the medical. Now, see, I don't want to know that because I believe that if I do know that I may manifest it. However, I do see the opposite thing that if you do know that you have it, you can like pay extra attention to this system. And, you know, this might be a very important system in your body that you need to give extra care to.

Because they say, maybe it won't affect you unless that is prominent in your genetics. Yeah. And I guess I would say that that's where the mindset piece comes in, right? So what I teach my clients within Anchored, my six-month container, is that the mind is important, right? The intellect is important and the soma must of equal importance, right? We must hold them both lightly and in balance. And so that's where I think thought work comes in and you just get to decide, right? I'm always careful with manifestation languages from a political standpoint, right? Because if we're saying we manifested our wealth, did someone who lives on the street in Bamako manifest their suffering? I'm hard pressed to believe it, right? So I'm always really careful and thoughtful there.

And I do believe that we have conscious choice, right? And agency and can say like, okay, well, it looks like, I don't know, XYZ disease is in my genetics, but I understand epigenetics. But I just feel like so many people I hear, they're like, oh, I have this in my family. So I mean, I'm going to be dealing with that. It's like, why would you be dealing with that? You know, just because they have it doesn't a hundred percent mean that you will be dealing with it. Yeah. Yeah. I remember my functional medicine days, I'd have patients come in and they'd be like, well, you know, I have MTHFR. So I don't think our genetics are our destiny. And it's like, it's so terrible. So everybody in my family gets Alzheimer's every generation, right? And my mom's starting to like not. And so I feel like I have kept my cognitive health as a priority in my life. Right. So, but I didn't have to have a test either to know that I just looked at,

you know, all the women in the family. However, I don't want to accept that. So what I'm saying is there's some things in our genetics that seem to be, you know, so powerful throughout lineages that what can we do in our bodies? Like, what would you suggest to someone who had, you know, like I do? I mean, it was like great grandma, grandma, and my cousins were like, it's always the first daughter too. And you're the first daughter. Yeah. So I am not an Alzheimer's expert. I wanted to say that very, very clearly. This is not my field of expertise, but you could, we could use anything. You know what I mean? I just wanted to just say it clearly. I'm not like out here on a podcast being like, here's what you do about Alzheimer's. But I think you get to

again, right? It's, it's holistic. Decide how you want to think about it. What will your mindset be? Because there's an evidence base for understanding that the thoughts you have about your life impact your life. That's clean and clear. Right. And then look at the science. Gut microbiome plays a part in everything. Get a really good stool test and then take your probiotics and eat your fermented food and filter your water and filter your air without letting this become, you know, a second full-time job. And of course, meeting yourself wherever you can financially to start doing what's accessible. Even if it's, you know, you look at the environmental working groups, dirty dozen and clean 15 list, which helps us to understand this past year, what produce in the U S has the most and least pesticides and use that. And if, you know,

and if you shop at, you know, a fancy health food store, because you can afford that, get everything organic, absolutely everything. It's good for you. It's good for the planet. And if you shop at Walmart, because that's your option and you can just afford that your lettuce is organic, do that. That's a thin membrane. It just sucks up all of the pesticides. Do that, right? Do what's available for you. Do what's accessible. Do whatever little things you can to reduce your toxin burden, right? And then look at the evidence base for whatever is in your gene line around what supplements support that, right? So with Alzheimer's, again, not an expert, but I would assume CoQ10, right? Or ubiquin's, again, not an expert, but I would assume CoQ10,

right? Or ubiquinone before 35, ubiquinol after, perhaps the inverse. B vitamins, a huge part of brain health, right? Yeah. And I've always been low on B12. That's been a huge thing from when I was in my twenties. Right. So, you know, and then again, to bring it back to my work, really looking at the patterns of stress, distress, and trauma in your own life and how you are relating to self, because I cannot imagine that it has a supportive impact on brain wellness to not love yourself, to not live in your self-worth, to not believe you're important, to not take exquisite care of you, to put others ahead of you from obligation instead of

desire and giving from your overflow. I don't believe that living from a codependent perfectionist and people-pleasing framework is good for our mental or physical health. And the evidence base there as well is not insignificant. So really taking a holistic approach, mindset, nutrition, toxins, supplements, and how you live it. You know, are you interdependent more than you are codependent? Are you codependent more than you're interdependent? Are you holding yourself to perfectionist fantasy standards, right? And keeping yourself always chasing that next perfect? Are you people pleasing others while displeasing yourself chronically? Like baby, how you live it? That's what I would ask, right? And just get

really curious, compassionate, and caring around the answers you find there. You know, I always wonder too, just talking about, you know, the mind and the body, like, what would you rather, right? Would you rather the mind go first or the body? You know, you think about that because you see people who their bodies are in so much pain as they get older, but yet they have very sharp, sharp mind, right? But you have some, you know, like in my family always have healthy, healthy bodies, but yet they lose their freaking mind. But you see, and I always wonder that. So I'm always thinking, what would you rather just talking about the mind and body?

Obviously the ultimate goal would be to have the best of both. Yeah. Agreed. Well, thanks so much for coming on. I appreciate it. I love that you, you know, just educating, you know, all about this. Thank you so much. It really is my passion. I just know how much my own life improved by doing this work. And I see it in my clients every single day, just how deeply their lives improve. I do craniosacral therapy and somatic emotional release there sometimes. I love the energy work, but I do also see the need for body work. I mean, I've seen people release just from

just a Swedish massage, right? Yeah, for sure. For sure. So on the side of the podcast, that's your full-time job. Yeah. And I don't believe that I help anyone, but rather that I hold kind and loving space for folks to do the work themselves. Because like we started our conversation, right. And talking about power dynamics and hierarchy, then care structures that has to apply in coaching as well. I don't, I don't do any work. I hold loving space and I do ask the right questions, right? That support folks to come into their own healing. And then you so generously share this on your podcast. Can you tell everybody about your podcast? Yeah. So my podcast is called Feminist Wellness. And again, it's for humans of all genders or no genders. And it is the goal of the show is to support folks in learning about their psychology,

about the nervous system, about the science of our mental health. And one of my main goals is to give really powerful remedies, right? So it's not just like, like, here's what's, what's going wrong for you, buddy. Good luck. It's really every single show. What's the remedy, right? How can you begin to support yourself in a, in a new and powerful way? So that is the work and it's beautiful. It's free everywhere you get your podcasts. And I made a treat for your listeners. Awesome. What do you got? Yeah. So if you head on over to Victoria Albina, A L B as in boy, I N a.com slash. You want to guess what it is?

You got it. Keeping it simple over here. A Sense of soul. You can download a suite of free meditations, inner child guided experiences, and some orienting exercises for your nervous system, which is all pretty darn exciting. And it's free just to be of service and of love. And you can share where else folks can find me. Yeah, do it. Oh, great. Thank you. You can follow me on the gram. I give good gram at Victoria Albina wellness. And yeah, my six month program is called anchored. It is a somatic exploration of self return to self through the body. You can learn more at Victoria Albina.com slash anchored. Wow. I love that. And I, you know, I have to say I was just doing that inner child meditation because I mean, that was one of the

biggest groundbreaking things for myself, for my soul and body powerful. So thank you so much. That's so cool. And now it's time for break that shit down. We are most in our power, in our agency, in our choicefulness. We are most able to create the loves, the lives, though it's interesting my brain said loves, the lives we truly dream of from presence and presence in our minds, in our bodies, with our inner children, with our ourselves. And that is most possible when our nervous systems are regulated. And so doing this somatic work and the mindset work together helps us to truly be present in this, the wild gift that we have to have been born human, this go around. So if you decide to take on one wellness growth evolution practice in your lifetime, might I encourage and

invite you to make it the work of coming into presence? Oh, that's what my circle was about last night. So that's just amazing. I love it. Thank you so much. It was nice to meet you. You take care and have a happy holiday. You too. Thank you. Thanks for being with us today. We hope you will come back next week. If you like what you hear, don't forget to rate, like, and subscribe. Thank you. We rise to lift you up. Thanks for listening.