4 | Finding Joy in Starting Small

Does everything feel a little heavy right now? Are you struggling with so many things that you don’t know where to begin making change in your life? I found myself in that exact place when Covid hit. So many things felt like they were falling apart, and there were never enough hours in the day to tackle my to-do list, let alone find a way to escape the weight of it all. 

This week episode highlights the importance of finding joy, even in the things that challenge you. It’s also a reminder to start small. That sometimes the things you think are impossible, just simply require you to take the smallest step forward and then another step and then another step and then another.

And if things still feel heavy search for the joy! Ask yourself if what you’re doing or where you’re going or who you’re with is bringing you the kind of joy that you desire in your life. And if it isn’t, give yourself permission to walk away! 

I also take a moment at the end of this podcast to chat more about my experience with Bodi by Beachbody! Find my affiliate link here:  https://solo.to/chachianni For a limited time you can save 25% on your Annual Bodi Subscription. You can also use code: CHELSEYMBODI for 15% off any supplements or equipment.

I’ll eventually do a deeper dive on Bodi and my supplements in a separate podcast. 

As always, thanks for listening! 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hey, it's Chelsea, and welcome to Permission to Rise, a podcast for women ready to find their voice, embrace healing, and rise into their fullest potential. If you're ready to stop shrinking and start showing up for your life, this podcast is your permission to rise. I'm going to start off today's podcast with a little disclaimer. I have a lot of things that I want to share with you. The wins, the losses, the good, the bad, the ugly. I also want you to know that I've learned a lot about my life. But I'm not a therapist or a certified life coach, and I don't have a surefire way or method or five-step program to help you change your life. What I do have are genuine, honest, raw, and real stories about what I've been through, what I've put myself through, and a lot of lessons and aha moments throughout. A lot of the things I have to talk about on this podcast are personal journals, and that's how I've categorized this podcast to start. This is my personal journey, and I hope you stick around to walk through it with me. If you decide this podcast isn't for you, or you don't like the methodology, or I'm seemingly all over the place and not organized enough for your liking, that's okay. I'm not for everyone, and I like to let people decide for themselves what they need best. Over the last few years, I've offered a lot of my friends advice, and some have taken it with open enthusiasm and open arms. Others have decided it wasn't exactly for them. They've taken different paths, and they're very happy they did so. So I don't discriminate your path and your journey to rising, to giving yourself permission to being everything that you are. It starts with you deciding what you need best. When I signed up for a life coach in 2021, there were a lot of people in my life who came back and said, Life coach, you don't need a life coach. I can teach you about life for free. You're wasting your money. Are you sure you're not getting scammed? Yeah. People thought me reaching out for help and finding someone to talk to was me being roped into a scam. Not everyone was enthusiastic and supportive. And while I can understand where they're coming from, I pressed on anyway, and I'm very glad that I did. That was the right decision for me. One major thing that I've learned is that your intuition will never lead you wrong. So if you're in the same boat where you desire to grow and you desire for more in life, it's worth a word of warning, and not the bad kind, that not everyone will understand or support you. But it's very important that you continue on anyway. It is vitally important that you decide what you need and that you press on. With that being said, let's get started. If you're not sure where to start, because believe me, I haven't been sure where to start with this podcast, you're not alone. This episode has been the most challenging one to finalize. I think I've started it 50 different ways. So bear with me. I think the best place to start is where this journey began. When COVID hit in 2020 and I was forced to go home and work from home during stay-at-home orders. How many times can you say home in a single sentence? It was a relief. I was honestly on the verge of a mental breakdown. And I don't mean I was having a really bad day, I was gonna burst into tears if somebody asked me if I was fine, kind of breakdown. Although that was a high possibility. I mean the kind of breakdown where your anxiety is so high that you're sitting in your bedroom on the floor at 3:30, 4 o'clock in the morning, rocking back and forth because you can't sleep. The anxiety is so high that you are wired. I was telling myself, oh my god, Chelsea, you have to go to bed. It's four o'clock in the morning. You have to work at 8 a.m. But if you go to bed, then you have to wake up in the morning. And if you wake up in the morning, then you have to go to work and then you have to do this and this and this and this. And I just I need out. I want out. I don't want to be here. I don't want to be in this house, I don't want to be at my job, I don't want to be in my relationship, I don't want to do my business, I don't want to be in this town, I need out, I need out, I need out. And this was happening multiple times a week. I was already averaging only about four and a half hours of sleep a night, and these nights only made it worse. My brain didn't know how to shut off. So it was always on. And when it shut off, it was at the most inopportune times, like in the middle of my workday. I recall falling asleep at my desk more often than not. And that's no easy task when you have one of those exercise ball chairs. Let's just say I've used humor as a coping mechanism for so long that I used to make a joke about how I've perfected the nap from the yoga ball chair. That was about the only balance in my life that was working. When I came home, it was a breath of fresh air, but it wasn't all rainbows and sunshine. When I look back on it, I realized that it was a six-week period between when I came home and when I started to really focus on myself. A lot of things were happening and it felt like a lot longer than six weeks. I got to take a break from my job, which was a toxic work environment at the time, my mom, who is mentally and emotionally abusive because she was at work, and my boyfriend at the time, who was also mentally and emotionally abusive. Don't get me wrong, the first week I loved it. I painted my nails, I took a nap in the middle of the day, I started sewing masks, I really enjoyed having a little bit of breathing room and more sleep at night. But there was a solid three-week stretch where I was doing the very bare minimum to show up. I sat down and did almost nothing. And then I had to snap out of it because I used to play this game at work when I was bored and stressed and had a lot of things on my to-do list. The game where I say, if I was at home today, I'd be doing this and this and this, and oh my god, I could get so much done. And here I was doing absolutely nothing. I told myself, I'll be kicking myself if they call me back to work next week and I wasted all of this precious time. So I got up and I got to work. I finalized my decision to break up with my boyfriend, which is a whole other rabbit hole that we will go down at some point, but I decided that the good did not outweigh the bad, and I had to be done. At the beginning of the year, I made myself a promise that I was not going to do anything that did not bring me joy. That was the mantra that I had. It was my motivational script. It was the question I asked myself whenever I was making a decision. Does this bring me joy? Is this going to bring me the joy that I am seeking? And if it wasn't, then the answer had to be no. I also made a promise that I was going to eat better and start taking care of myself. I let myself go. I was the heaviest I've ever weighed in my entire life, and I was not happy about it. In high school, I think I weighed around 127 pounds. When I went off to college, I weighed about 132, always fluctuating down when I came home for the summer. But on average, as an adult, I weighed 135 pounds. And at my heaviest, I was maybe 146. But I've always dropped back down. At this point, I was almost 160 pounds. My clothes did not fit. I had to size up in things that I've never had to size up in before. And it wasn't about the size of the clothing, it was the fact that I was no longer comfortable with myself. When I sold Lularo clothing, I felt like I was throwing a dress or top over my body and calling it beautiful and wonderful because the clothing was so forgiving. But I desired to feel more comfortable in my skin and wear things that better suited my body shape and my size. And by wearing Lularo, I felt like I was finding an excuse to not do anything about it. Now that I had this boutique, I was so ready to be able to fit into other clothing or feel more comfortable. In 2019, I actually bought a pool pass in hopes that I could go swim laps and lose weight that way. I was a lifeguard and taught swimming lessons, and I know that the water is so great for your body because it's non-weight bearing, and you can get a really good amount of cardio in and burn a lot of calories and still feel like you're having fun with it. But I ran into some issues with my back that I had to correct, so I was a little hesitant to try something new. Early on in 2020, I had a lovely customer of mine who encouraged me to sign up for Beach Body. I did the two-week trial but couldn't figure out the workout cue, so I never actually tried a workout. But I said, you know what, fine. I'm a little busy right now, but I'll sign up anyway, because at the time it was only$100 for an entire year, and I know I've wasted more money over the course of my lifetime on other things. So I thought this is the way that I'll force myself to look at it at some point. Now seemed like the best time. So I logged in and did a sample workout for the Bar Blend program. I loved it so much, despite how completely out of shape I was, and I decided to begin the program and keep going. I knew that movement was not the only thing that needed to change. My diet also needed a lot of work. I spent the last four years eating out all the time. I went to my grandma's for lunch, and her food wasn't terrible, but I found myself overeating to compensate for the lack of sleep and stress that I was feeling. I still recognize that desire sometimes to just stuff my face and not stop. I wasn't very certain as to where to start when it came to food, but I decided to start with something small, and that's where I highly recommend you start with anything that you're trying to change in your life. My something small was the fact that I didn't drink a drop of water for days. I drank my Dr. Pepper and had my coffee in the morning, and that was it. I couldn't tell you the last time I had a glass of water. So I told myself that I was going to change that first. I decided to figure out how I prefer to drink water because it's not that I didn't like water, it's that it has to be done in a way that I would find enjoyable. I prefer to drink my water cold over ice when possible and through a straw. I know that I will sit there and drink anything excessively if I have a straw. So I snatched up a swig 32-ounce tumbler from my boutique and I started filling it with ice water and popped in a stainless steel straw. Within three days, I had kicked my pop habit. Now, every couple weeks I would treat myself to my Dr. Pepper, but I found myself desiring it less and less because I didn't like how bloated I felt and I didn't like how full it made me. That's the beauty of making change in your life. I found this to be true over and over again in other areas that once you make change, it's hard to want to go back. This podcast is called Permission to Rise because when we want to make change in our lives, I think sometimes we find one million excuses, and sometimes those excuses involve an expression that you're not allowed to do something, or that you can't because somebody else has already decided you can't or shouldn't, or that people are going to look at you differently or not understand or support you. But if you want to make any change in your life, you have to put in the work. You can give yourself permission to do something, but then you actually have to do it. Your desire to make change in your life needs to be greater than your desire to stay within your comfort zone. You also have to decide that this change is for you and that no one else's opinion matters. I can tell you with absolute certainty that nothing about Beach Body was comfortable. I wasn't used to working out, let alone doing a five-day-a-week program. So I didn't do five days a week, Monday through Friday. I did two days, took a break day, did three days, took a break day, and I kept at that until I finished the eight-week program in about nine weeks. I was so proud of myself, and I said, man, this is about the time that you quit. You do a program, you're so proud, you say you'll get back to it, and then you don't. So what if we don't quit? And I started the program over again. And I did this three rounds over until an ankle injury due to my flat feet caused me to have to take a break. It was seven weeks of torture because at that point I'd already realized that the workouts were extremely helpful to my mental and emotional health. I was more than excited to get back to it seven weeks later, but it was very slow going. The lesson here is that even if you start making change in your life and you have to take a break or you have to slow down, as long as you keep going and you know where your intentions are, you can continue to make change. I've taken breaks throughout the last six years. I've fallen off the proverbial wagon, but I always get right back on because I know how much joy it brings me. And I know how much consistency contributes to my results, even if it's taking more time than I wanted to. The phrase beauty comes from within is absolutely true, at least in my experience. But I know that in today's world, most people tend to be very surface-level-minded, and what you see in the mirror and what others perceive about you from a physical standpoint can be completely misleading. I started working out because I didn't like the number on the scale, but now it's less about the number and more about how I feel within myself during each and every workout. Yes, I see the results physically, but I feel them more from within than what I see in the mirror. I say this because I don't want you to think that your something small has to be your food or your fitness level, but it was where my journey started. It was one of the first few things that I did to pour into myself more love, respect, and discipline. And it's paid out in more ways than I can even describe. So if fitness or a workout program isn't for you, maybe getting out in nature and finding ways to move your body in different spaces is where you start. This is the end of today's episode, so if you need to cut it short, go right ahead. I don't want this to sound like a huge ad platform. I know that not everybody will find a program like Body to be helpful to them. Everybody has their own method, and I encourage you to find what works for you. But I want to dig a little deeper into why I love body while I've been on the subject. So I've typed up and recorded an official ad for my Body by Beachbody affiliate promotion, but I'm not sure I want to use it quite yet. I want to take a moment to tell you about body because it has profoundly changed my life. I use Beach Body and Body interchangeably because the program itself used to be called Beach Body. However, they've rebranded to just the word body with an eye. I actually worked at the gym in college. It was a work study job, and I would oftentimes work the checkout counter or sit at the cardio desk. I made a few attempts to go to the gym and actually started doing things a few different times, but it never really amounted to anything and it never lasted more than a week. I didn't like people watching me work out. And I still don't. I also think I was very intimidated by the boys in the weight room, and I really didn't know what I was doing. I didn't also want to do the work to figure it out. That's one of the reasons I absolutely love Beachbody because I can do workouts on my own time, in my own home, and I don't actually have to build a program. I turn on a video and go. Traditionally, I've also not been a fan of the whole hoorah, let's go workout programs where you're led by an instructor because some days I'm just not in the mood for the pep talk. I'll tell you that when I first started Barblend, I was pissed off and angry after having broken up with my boyfriend. I recalled doing the first four weeks, not in an aggressive state of mind, but just frustrated with everything. And I was putting that energy into something that I could physically feel. I was very pessimistic about her cheerful attitude and the whole motivational card deck that she would pull something from. And I was very much like, yeah, who cares? Whatever. Don't need to hear it today. By week five, I swear to God, she was talking straight to me. Because I was starting to feel the effects emotionally. She would pull a card from the deck and I'd go, oh my god, I was just thinking about that yesterday. It's like she's reading my mind. And that's when I realized that I was starting to heal. There was something unraveling, a tension and anger or frustration that was literally coming undone through the workouts. I recently restarted Barbend and I'm listening to her motivational card deck, thinking, wow, this is what I was listening to at such a pivotal point in my life. These were the words that I was taking in even subconsciously. And I'm taking them in now, again, from a whole new level and perspective. I'm feeling all of the joy in restarting this program. I'm also realizing just how immobile I've become from all the weightlifting. I think I was so pessimistic in the beginning that I really didn't believe the kind of results I would see. I told myself, Chelsea, you're not gonna lose 10 pounds. There's no way. And I proceeded to clean up my entire closet. And by the end of my three rounds of bar blend, I lost 20 pounds. I was then drowning in all of the clothes that I had remaining in my closet. Those results alone taught me that consistency pays off. I was also very pissed because I had gotten rid of some really cute clothes that I couldn't have even dreamed of fitting back into, and all of a sudden now I had nothing that fit me all over again. If you've tried a lot of other things and you're still looking for something new, consider giving Beachbody a try. You can do all of the workouts at home on your own time, or take your tablet or phone with you and do them from virtually anywhere. There's minimum equipment. I think I've purchased a bench, dumbbells, slides, bands, and baud ropes over the years. There are hundreds of programs to choose from, anywhere from beginner to immediate to advance. Each program has how-to videos for some of their movements, a modifier, a sample workout, and extensions for an extra burn. I love that a lot of the instructors will give you step-by-step instructions on how to move your body or position yourself during certain exercise. They also typically have one to two different modifications, and they walk you through everything verbally in a way that I've never been walked through before. There's also access to some nutrition programs that you can learn how to use in combination with the workout program that you're doing. I haven't personally used them, but I do know that some of them have recipes, which are really great if you're looking to find new meals. Some of my favorite programs from the last six years are Bar Blend, MBF, and MBFA, Sure Thing, and Dig Deeper. Bar Blend is great for any beginner. It is a lower impact workout program. It combines dance, Pilates, yoga into a fitness format. I will say it has been a little humbling restarting it because I'm definitely not as limber as I used to be. Mostly, I think, due to the fact that I've done a lot more weightlifting programs in the last few years, so everything's just a little bit tightened up. I think the only thing that it requires is workout bands and one to two pound weights, but you can honestly do the program without them. You'll also want a chair or something that you can use as a balance bar. I used to use a dining room table chair at my mom's house. In my apartment, the only thing that I have right now is a standing platform that works just the same. Muscle Burns Fat and Muscle Burns Fat Advance, also known as MBF and MBFA, are a little more intense and are seven days a week. So I don't recommend starting with those if you're not used to working out. The only equipment that you will need are dumbbells and baud ropes. I bought mine on Amazon for like 15 bucks. They're basically these cordless jump ropes. As far as weights go, if you're very new to working out and new to weights, I think I started Muscle Burns Fat with like five or eight pound weights. So you really don't need anything extremely heavy. Now in that program, I use anything from like 10s to 20s. Sure Thing is a program that focuses on endurance and strength training. You will need slides for that workout program, which are relatively inexpensive. But I loved that I felt less breathless during cardio-intense workouts after that program. It really did work to build up endurance. I've really enjoyed lifting weights, and I've tried a couple different programs with weightlifting intensity, and the one that I love the most is Dig Deeper with Shanti. It does require a bench, but I bought one on Amazon for like$100 a couple years ago. It's one that will fold up so you can tuck it away if you need to. I have been a Beachbody coach and now an affiliate for a few years. I haven't spent a lot of time advertising it because it's not my main goal. There is a link in the bio of this podcast to my Beachbody website. I will also be posting it on social media and you can find it on permissiontorise.com. If you have any other questions before you sign up, please don't hesitate to ask on the Permission to Rise social pages or use the chat box on the website. I can even do a live on Facebook if we want to do a QA for any other questions you may have. Moral of today's story is that if you want to change, you have to go out and make it happen. We can find one million different excuses to not get the job done, like I don't have enough time, or I don't have the right equipment, or this feeling like you need to be perfect right off the bat. Those are all the things that our ego tells us to lower the volume and keep us stuck. Don't let your ego get in the way of making the best possible choices and change in your life. Whether it's a workout program, your nutrition, or just simply deciding that you want to take some time for yourself. Give yourself permission to live your life.