Winning with Wellness

“Become comfortable with the uncomfortable” — Kim Wilkinson Growing up, we have not been taught by society how to manage our emotional health; from our emotional experiences, trauma, grief and every root of it all. We’re told to brush it off or just be strong and never fully feel our unpleasant experiences which results in them being unresolved. However, these ways are practiced unconsciously but little do we know that it affects and serves us in our adulthood. We were so conditioned to think, act and believe otherwise that we lose our authentic selves in the process. Kim Wilkinson teaches us to open ourselves to the hard truth of painful experiences. You can't fix change or heal what you're not aware of but when you become more aware of your emotions and the why behind things. Things make so much sense that everything becomes so much more clear within yourself and with other people.

Nicole Nykolaishyn simply explains that breathwork is basically breathing with intention. Breathwork is a very powerful and profound experience and tool for healing, building resilience, getting yourself grounded and even energizing. It’s a way of supporting the body holistically; from body, mind and soul. Hence, for Nicole, she considers this as a self-love approach in building self-awareness, self-empowerment and inner peace. As a proud mom, also emphasizes the importance of engaging with children to use breath as a tool. The best way to have children get into it is by keeping it fun and utilizing an energizing breath at the same time. “Our breath is with us wherever we go every day, all the time, we can utilize it in any moment we need. It’s a gift that healing can give you in that exact moment we need it.” — Nicole Nykolaishyn Breathwork sessions with Nicole can be done either individually or by group and in-person or online. Daily breathwork can be done in 5 minutes but sessions with Nicole can range from 45 up to 90 minutes where it is more of a transformational and healing type of practice. Breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth. If you want to feel energized and heightened, increase it with the depths of your breaths. If you want to feel more relaxed, slow down breathing out or exhale slowly. The key to breathwork is to do it in circular motions, meaning let it flow into your body without any pauses. Let it flow and feel connected with your breath.

Kathy Davis explained what plant-based means and that is she feels better when she eats more plant-based food. She states that plant-based is a definition of whole plant foods that are as close to nature intended. The biggest advice Kathy has for people switching to plant-based is slowly incorporating plant-based into their lifestyle and not immediately changing everything. Utilize what is already familiar to you and everyone in your family. How you create your transition plan depends on what you are trading, may it be time or even your budget. It’s all about finding the perfect balance between your plan and your current lifestyle.

Permelia is passionate about studying and understanding energy and vibration. People are all made up of vibration, which we don’t necessarily think about. We are our own electromagnetic field, which some people call an “aura”. It is part of who we are just as much as our physicality is a part of us. “The world needs all of us out there serving” — Permelia Parham

“Wellness means that everything is integrated into my health. My world is integrated, and what I think, how I feel, and what I speak are all the same.” — Gail Korpan For Gail Korpan, the hardest thing to implement putting herself first is setting the boundaries of saying no and just knowing that saying no is putting yourself first. Jenny, as someone who is service-oriented and champions others, is learning the process of putting herself first and giving herself some time to breathe. When asked if she can commit to a project for example she will respond with “I’ll have to get back to you” when she wants to say “yes” to things.

“Wellness really has to live in all of those three spheres of the mind-body-spirit triad for you to really have an aligned life.” — Sheetal Story Sheetal highlights her love for astrology to navigate energy. As of recording this podcast, we are on the dark side of the moon where the moon is losing light. So a lot of people are feeling tired and feeling like there's not a lot of energy in the air. Sometimes, we feel like we should be always producing or we should always have the energy but other times, we feel the extreme opposite like crying and that’s just part of the moon cycle.

“Wellness is awareness of what I need in every moment to feel better about who I am and how I'm portraying myself to the world.” — Susan Binnie Susan Binnie, as an empowerment-coach, strongly believes in removing the word “can’t” in other people’s stories. One of the biggest things to overcoming this is through Reframing. People need to change the way they talk to themselves; so instead of saying “I’m not strong enough to do this.”, say “ I'm able to do this. I've got this.” Get out of the stories you’re telling yourselves and give yourself positive affirmations of who you are and not put yourself in this imposter syndrome dialogue.

Practicing gratitude is something so simple yet so powerful and impactful to our overall health and wellbeing. UCLAs Mindfulness Awareness Research Center proved that gratitude changes our brain, specifically the gray matter of our brain. The gray matter is made up of the cell bodies of nerve cells which functions as an information processor. When the gray matter is able to process thoughts such as gratitude, it leads to a healthier and happier brain. More so, Chinese researchers found that high levels of gratitude were associated with better sleep and lower levels of anxiety and depression. A study at the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkley revealed that people who wrote their gratitude letters have a higher active function in their prefrontal cortex as shown in their brain scans. One of the best tools we can use for our overall health is a gratitude practice. This practice is something that could help us potentially heal and become the healthiest version of ourselves. When we say healing, it is not just healing our physical selves but also acknowledging other areas of our mind, body and soul.

SoulFlow™ is an embodiment practice that is done through movement, mantra and dance. It was developed by Andee Love. It is like tapping into that inner core wisdom that we have inside our soul but we don’t know what’s there. The process will take around 7-9 minutes. In the beginning of the process, people will be put into an intention and a little bit of meditation where we can get mindful of our breathing and start to get into that state where we start listening to what our body is telling us. Through music, the body will start moving and dancing. We need to turn off the mind and start putting into our soul and our heart and just allowing the music to move us. In this way, we start to settle into our nervous system and start to make new neuropathways.

Dr. Candice shares her thoughts on what wellness means to her, “wellness is at the center of everything we do, plain and simple.” Naturopathic medicine is not a cookie-cutter approach. It is different from the 10- or 15-minute visit that you might traditionally get. Another thing to note is Naturopathic doctors receive over 800 hours of training and in natural modalities. Providing these doctors, a broad resource when it comes to diagnosing and providing treatment. This is ideal for those seeking an individualized treatment or plan.

“Wellness is the promotion of body harmony for the individual. It is things that are within our environment. It’s how we experience our lives through all five of our senses.” — Kendra Irvine Ayurveda is an ancient wellness system that has been around for thousands of years. When you take the Sanskrit word, it translates to life science, meaning it takes into account the natural laws. We, as humans, come from nature and in nature, there are five elements such as air, space, fire, water and earth. Thus, as humans coming from nature, our bodies are also composed of these five elements.

This episode tackles how business and success connect with wellness. It is common for people to think that in order to be successful, we have to grind and hustle and force our way to get there. However, that becomes exhausting when we constantly overachieve, overcommit or overwork ourselves. It is a different kind of quality outcome when success came from certain enthusiasm instead of pressure and force. Start with creating awareness and recognition within yourself by asking yourself questions and answering them truthfully. Admit when you are feeling uncomfortable with things. Once that is settled, we can move from awareness to intention n or when something can be a responsibility or put into action. From that place, we can reverse engineer our goals. Set a vision that is different from your goal based on a feeling, in that way, you’ll have access to it every day. Create awareness, start an intention and enjoy the process. Forget the timeline and drop the pressure. Success comes in different times and forms for different people.

You can impact your mental health through your shopping cart When we are going to the grocery story and filling up our cart for the upcoming meals, many of us don’t think about what we are grabbing. If we think of what is in our shopping cart as the fuel for our daily activities we might start paying a little closer attention. To have healthy fuel doesn’t necessarily have to break the bank. Some foods can be great mood lifters and energy givers. But food choices need to become a habit in order to receive maximum benefits.

Let talk finance! In this episode of Winning with Wellness, Jenny Ryce and Kristin Fortier talked about how wellness and finance coincide and live together. Although this can be a touchy subject in people’s lives it is important to learn about it. Finance has a hold on our lives daily and financial wellness is a key piece to mental health.

We are our thoughts. Jessica shares with us the importance of owning and changing our narrative. Life is a journey as we evolve our mindset has to evolve. Wellness is a feeling and becoming very clear on how you want to feel will be a vital tool in creating change in your mindset and habit building. This creates a powerful connection to our bodies.