Emotions Untapped

#018 Embracing Vulnerability: Personal Growth and Emotional Healing with Ellie Laliberté

• Livia Lowder • Season 2 • Episode 18

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PART 1: What happens when a sudden upheaval in life becomes the catalyst for a profound personal transformation? Our guest, Ellie LaLiberté, an accomplished artist, entrepreneur, and Canadian author, shares her incredible journey of emotional healing and self-discovery following a significant breakup. Ellie opens up about the importance of recognising and releasing internal darkness to foster healthier relationships with oneself and others. Her candid insights into how spirituality and writing served as her guiding lights through this journey provide a unique perspective on personal growth, self-awareness, and the courage it takes to embrace vulnerability as a pathway to love and understanding.

Journey with us through the turbulence of unexpected life changes as we explore narratives of loss, awakening, and resilience. We reflect on the emotional challenges of a marriage breakdown and business failure, emphasizing the need for self-discovery beyond the confines of relationships. Ellie's experiences illuminate how patterns from past dysfunctional connections influence present relationships, and the necessity of mindful emotional analysis to break free from these cycles. As we share stories of rebuilding and adaptation, we highlight the power of journaling, writing, and the transformative practice of soma breathwork as tools for navigating internal chaos and achieving emotional clarity.

Ellie's experiences as a cycle breaker within her family speak to the struggles and triumphs of addressing generational trauma. We discuss how journaling and writing have been pivotal in her healing journey, leading to the creation of two inspiring books. Her commitment to personal growth through daily practices underscores the significance of introspection and self-expression. The episode concludes with a powerful account of how soma breathwork became an integral part of Ellie's healing process, offering emotional release and insight. Join us to uncover the wisdom and inspiration within these transformative journeys, and perhaps, find a piece of your own healing story along the way.

You can find Ellies books and connect with on social media through her WEBSITE

We love to hear from you! Please send us your feedback and questions via the text link at the top of the show notes, or DM us on Instagram

You can connect with our community, connect with us on social media and find valuable (FREE) resources on our website www.eqnation.org

Speaker 1:

Today I'm kind of like on the other side of a lot of it. I can't say that I'm completely healed. I don't believe that anybody can be completely healed. I think that we always have things. But I think it's the way that we look at our patterns that do still come up and that's where we find freedom. We're always projecting our own selves in someone else. We find freedom. We're always projecting our own selves in someone else, right? So for as long as you don't fix what is within you, you don't go and heal what is within you you cannot expect to have a sane relationship with someone else because you're not even having the same relationship with you. When you go through all of this darkness, you mean you need modalities like this to help you have releases. Like you can't keep all of this darkness. You mean you need modalities like this to help you have releases. Like you can't keep all of this darkness inside of you. You need to understand how to release it and sometimes you don't even know, like what these patterns are.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Emotions Untapped podcast. I'm your host, livia Lauder. This is the show where we explore the power of our thoughts, feelings and emotions and how they create our personal and professional realities. In this community, we dive into better understanding, using and managing these elements of ourselves so we can live healthier, better balanced and less overwhelming lives. You'll hear conversations with experts and thought leaders from a variety of fields here to help you gain insights, strategies and tools for building and upgrading your emotional awareness and regulation techniques, and there will be a couple solo episodes with yours truly. It brings me so much joy to share this information with you, to connect with you and guide you on your journey. If you're ready to start doing the work, you can download our free seven-step guide to improving your emotional health right now. Just go to wwweqnationorg. Now let's dive in.

Speaker 1:

Elie La Liberté is an artist, an entrepreneur and a Canadian published author. From an early age, she knew she was different and would do everything in her power to discover the truth of her being. Writing has always been a passion, as if it was her way of expressing herself fully Writing songs, journaling or romantic letters. It was her number one therapy and still is to this day. Now her writings feel bigger than herself and she's committed to help the collective raise to a higher frequency. Ellie shares her incredible journey of self-discovery through relationships and times of self-reflection and it's amazed me how many similarities there are on her journey as there are on mine. She has an absolute wealth of knowledge and insights and, in this conversation, speaks directly to those who are experiencing a big breakup, a big life change or an identity shift.

Speaker 1:

I hope you enjoy listening to this one as much as I enjoyed recording it. And, as an aside, this is part one. Part two will be available next week, so please enjoy. Ellie, thank you so much for coming on the show. It is an absolute pleasure to have you here today, thank you. Thank you for having me. It's going to be a really nice conversation. I think that we have a good flow going on in our previous conversation that we had the other day. Yeah, I agree, we really connected and it was just very easy to talk to you and very easy to just share ideas and bounce around back and forth. So, I agree, this is going to be fantastic.

Speaker 1:

So, ellie, you are an artist, an author, and writing has always been your therapy. You're a businesswoman through and through and super passionate about uplifting others, which I love, and the last six years have been full of growth and healing, and I'd love for you to start by just sharing with us your journey. Yeah, sure, so well, I can say that the last six years have been pretty rough, in a sense, where I had a lot of rediscovering to do about myself, because, previous to that, I was in a relationship for about 12 years, since the age of 19. And so I was very open to spirituality since I was 21. And that's where I started my spiritual journey. But, um, you don't grow as much when you're in your comfort zone as when something happens to you very, uh, spontaneous, where you realize, um, yeah, that you have to love yourself completely because you're actually now left on your own, and that's what happened to me back in 2018. Um, I got, uh, separated. Uh, it was, it was a shock because, um, as much as I understand now that we're just not in alignment with each other anymore, we were growing our separate ways for, maybe, you know, a good two years.

Speaker 1:

I was someone who was very I've always been very loyal and, you know, I I liked the simplicity of my life, and so I didn't feel like it was even a possibility that I would leave my marriage, and I was married, for I was married for six years in that relationship and what had happened was that we had a business together and we had never been in business together only for the last year and a half. We had decided to start a business and we thought that it would have worked. But unfortunately it really went. If I can say this in a French way, it went to shit pretty badly and that tested us. It tested my ex-husband as well.

Speaker 1:

He wasn't an entrepreneur, he was, you know, it was his first time having a business in his life, so he didn't have the same, I would say, strength as I did in the emotional sense. I was used I've been an entrepreneur since the age of 21. So I was used to having the ups and downs of what it means to have a business, having, you know, periods where it's lower and periods where it's a little higher, and then just being satisfied with what comes and you never know, if you've been business, what's going to be your next month and and so I was used to that to be unstable in that sense. But he wasn't, and so he didn't take it really well and it just so happened that, yeah, very suddenly he decided he wanted to leave me and in the midst of our you know, of our business, of our loss of the business, like we just had nothing left. We had to close down the business really quickly. We knew that it was coming, but still like we needed to close it down, and that was back in April 2018. Like we needed to close it down, and that was back in April 2018.

Speaker 1:

And in the middle of the month, yeah, we kind of I kind of knew that he wanted to leave me, and so that happened and that left me in the shock, complete shock. I was already freaking out a little bit, even though it was very strong, and I, you know, I do get back up quickly when something falls. Even though I was very strong and I, you know, I do get back up quickly when something falls, I'm not the one to stay in my situation and, you know, just not do anything about it. So I had ideas, I wanted to get back up quickly. But, yeah, when that happened now I was kind of like oh, wow, okay, now I'm hitting rock bottom, because this is like I've never experienced, that.

Speaker 1:

I've experienced kind of like lows in business and things like that, but losing my marriage suddenly, when my husband was kind of my rock in this as well, where I was, you know, relying on him for, yeah, emotional support, like any couple would do. And then he was just, yeah, it was kind of like he just gave up on me, which was like, wow, okay, um. So that was a very big emotional shock to me and I do believe that it was a another awakening, another level of awakening in my spirituality, because now it meant that I needed to understand who I am on my own for the first time in my life. And so, yeah, that was pretty intense, and back then I was 31. And so I had to start from scratch.

Speaker 1:

So not only did I, I was left on my own, but I also didn't have any more money. I was left on my own, but I also didn't have any more money to my name. Like there's everything. We just went, you know, to, like I said, just hit the fan pretty hard. And so I was, you know, on survival mode. Even though I was in shock, I needed to figure out my things really, really quickly, because I had a house to pay and everything. So I started a business within two weeks, you know, because I was on that survival mode. But it left me to show the strength that I had and the resilience that I had, although it didn't give me the chance to grieve what was going on.

Speaker 1:

And in that process, I also lost my two dogs that I had for 11 years because I needed to give them away, because I couldn't take care of them anymore, because I decided I would use my own home to start my new business, which was an Airbnb business and that was making me pretty good money. But the thing is that, yeah, it was unstable for my dogs so I had to give them to my parents-in-law back then. So that was another big loss in the same kind of month. And then, yeah, I didn't have that time to breathe and I realized that, you know, maybe two years after I was so much on survival mode and just wanting to get out of that state, I would say, of shock, that I just did everything to distract myself in that sense and I didn't take care of me all that much, and so I went back into relationship really, really quickly. I'm a big rebound.

Speaker 1:

And I was this girl I remember saying that today I'm like, yeah, I was like I don't think that I need to stay by myself. I'm not one of these women who needs time for herself. Like I can get back into a relationship like this and life just, yeah, life was laughing at me back then because it showed me that I absolutely needed to be on my own for a good amount of time because I was so much in my pattern. Still, you know what you think, that you've been in a relationship for like so long and and then you get out of it and you're like, oh, I've got this.

Speaker 1:

I was in a relationship for 12 years. I know what it is to be in a relationship, but you have no idea, because we don't know ourselves. Like at the beginning of our 20s, it's rare that you see someone who knows who she is or who he is, because you're so young and you just came out of, you know, high school and then, whatever you know, you don't have the maturity yet. Really, go and dig the uh, sorry, dive deep into your, your soul, really, you know. So I was like, oh yeah, I got this and went into back into a new relationship and that relationship was extremely toxic, it was insane. It was a year, it lasted a year and a half, but it was on and off all the time and it was driving me insane and and I I swear to you like, looking back, there are times where I was like, wow, I was really acting insane in that relationship because I years that I didn't even know I'd never heal.

Speaker 1:

It was kind of other patterns of my, you know, teenage years where I was a little bit more, you know, here and there with boyfriends and just not knowing again how to stay alone. And it's just life was like you have some extreme healing to do and I'm going to do everything. And you know, like it's kind of like life was like just taking everything away from me so that I could learn to be, to live, kind of like a, an impersonal, impersonal life, that's how I'm going to say it. And, um, so at one point I knew that I was in some patterns now and even though I had read all the books and all, I had all all of the knowledge and everything that you have to do when you're in spirituality and spiritual, I needed to really have a reality check and to have someone else just come into my life to coach me. And it was the first time back in 2020 actually, when COVID hit. That was another awakening for everybody, obviously. But but, um, when 2020 hit, I also had uh, you know I had to learn that I would be very isolated back then because I had decided to not get vaccinated, so I was going against a lot of people in my life. That was really against my choice. And again it was just kind of another thing that was going to make me just really understand my power and stay who I am, or even to rediscover big time who Ellie is. And you know, just stay in my power as much as I can.

Speaker 1:

It was difficult because, yeah, again I was choosing a path, a different path from most in there, but I didn't want to be uh, you know, I wanted to respect my choice and I didn't want to be in fear because that that was for me a big thing. You know, I've always been very resilient and I I was not wanting to participate in that fear, so went into a very big healing journey on my own again in what I call now a sanctuary that I had chosen, really just unconsciously. I went to a cottage on the side of the lake. I always wanted to live there. I just didn't imagine myself living there on my own, but I believe it was a necessity and I went there for about a year and this is where I've done the most healing.

Speaker 1:

I was alone. I had periods where I had suicidal thoughts in that time. It was a very, very dark time, but it was a place where it was a time where I really had to be on my own to have that strength to go and do that healing. But it was there as well where I had that coaching. I was in a coaching program and this is kind of what I want to say to people is like, when you go into your darkness, it's okay that you go into your darkness with other people that are going through the same thing as you. And this is exactly what had happened is I opened up myself to be coached for the first time in my life, put my ego down and I said, okay, I do need help. And I was coached.

Speaker 1:

And this is where the biggest beautiful journey of healing began for me, because now I had a community that I could relate to. I knew now that I was not alone in this. It was kind of like a new world that has just been rediscovered, you know, because I do come from a small town and I didn't have a lot of people around me that was like me, you know, I thought I was really, really different. And so these people from all around the world, we were just all really doing this work together and that was really really helpful because you could be vulnerable with people that are ready to be vulnerable with you as well, and there's just so much power in community. And so, yeah, that's where I started my healing journey, like the real, real healing journey, and went to my patterns, emotional patterns, and just rediscovered so many things that was very well hidden from me from my childhood and where all of these patterns, even in relationship, where does that come from? I was all hidden very, very nicely, you know. And so, yeah, it was a rough ride, but it was all worth it.

Speaker 1:

And there are levels as well, I believe, and I call them Dark Night of the Soul. So that one back in 2020 and 2021, was pretty much a Dark Night of the Soul, but I've had another one after only, you know, it's not too far away, but it was back in 2023, it was another level of surrendering. We can talk about that when we're going to talk about the book. But yeah it, it was back in 2023. It was another level of surrendering. We can talk about that when we're going to talk about the book, but yeah, it's been quite a journey of just remembering who I am and sticking to that version, that new version of me, and just really going into myself to go and hold my inner child. So yeah, it's pretty much what I've been going through in the last six years and I do believe today I'm kind of like on the other side of a lot of it.

Speaker 1:

I can't say that I'm completely healed. I don't believe that anybody can become be completely healed. I think that we always have things, but I think it's the way that we look at our patterns that do still come up and that's where we find freedom, because we kind of know now what's going on inside of us and we can have a lot of self-compassion and this is what I very much developed within me with all these years. Incredible, wow. Thank you so much for sharing that and just being, you know, open and vulnerable. I know it's sometimes difficult to to share these things because we're kind of going back to that place, but the level of relatability that I have with you is pretty insane, like I feel like my journey has been very similar in so many ways and I've written down a few things just as you were talking, to reflect back on, you know, one thing you said was hitting your rock bottom was like another level of awakening, and I think that's so important for people to understand that when you find yourself in the deepest, darkest moments you can. You know it's rock bottom, like you're going up from there, and sometimes we have to reach that bottom in order to turn things around for ourselves. And it's kind of where we really get faced with all of the parts of us that perhaps we've been avoiding up until that point. Right, and that's usually why it comes up, because we're now at a place in our life and it's time that, like you said, the universe brings it to us and it's okay. You're ready now. You're ready to face these parts of you that you haven't faced.

Speaker 1:

Um, and I was curious as well when you had said at first, you know you didn't give yourself a chance to grieve, grieve the loss of the, that long-term relationship, that marriage, would you say that your time in the cottage on the lake, was that, finally, the time where you kind of gave yourself that space to do so? Or did you or yeah, I was gonna say or did you never really give yourself the chance. Uh, yeah, it was pretty much, I would say, in that time, because now I wasn't in another relationship. That would just, you know, distract me again from that. Because this is a thing, right, sometimes you go a relationship and it happens to everyone, really, and we were very unconscious of this. But it's important to realize what we're doing.

Speaker 1:

But most of the time, someone who has not been on their own ever, that's always been in a relationship. They tend to do to continue to be in another relationship as quickly as possible to replace the last person, thinking that that is going to fix it. But the thing is is that, like, that's a very dysfunctional pattern, unfortunately, and what it does, it's just it always becomes. It's more of the same because you don't take the time to see as well that it's not just the problem was not necessarily the relationship. You know the other person.

Speaker 1:

Most of the time the problem is you in that relationship and your own patterns and your for yourself to build your own relationship with yourself. You're not going to be able to sustain a relationship with anybody else because you have not seen these patterns within you. So you're always projecting these patterns on your partner and chances are you're going to be attracting for sure a partner who is exactly who has these same patterns as you, exactly who has these same patterns as you, because you know the law of attraction. It doesn't lie we attract who we are in that sense, and we're always projecting our own selves in someone else, right? So for as long as you don't fix what is within you, you don't go and heal what is within you, you cannot expect to have a same relationship with someone else because you're not even having the same relationship with you.

Speaker 1:

So you know that was really what was going on for me. I wasn't grieving my relationship because I always wanted to just fix it with somebody else. But yeah, that was not the way to go about. I couldn't go through my greeting processes at all because that was always a distraction. So the other person was a distraction to really just go and do that greeting process. Yeah, yeah, and it was interesting how you reflected back to like.

Speaker 1:

Your thought process at the time is oh, you know, I'm good, like I'll just jump into another relationship and like, oh good, I got this, got this, and lo and behold, you know that was quite the opposite of what really needed to happen, but you eventually learned that lesson and, as you mentioned in your book, which I pulled a couple of passages from which we'll talk about a little further in the conversation, but just one thing that you do mention in there in one of your letters, is that, you know, everyone is a mirror, like every other person that we interact with is a mirror, is a reflection of ourselves. So when we, you know, everyone is a mirror, like every other person that we interact with is a mirror, is a reflection of ourselves. So when we, you know it is, I do think there's value in having those relationships to the point where you can start to understand your patterns, right, like if you're. These patterns are coming up and repeating themselves in this relationship, and then the next one, and then the next one. That's kind of the time for you to tune in and go okay, this is a pattern, I recognize it as such. But, as you mentioned, the way to kind of heal that and I don't want to use the word fix, but kind of overcome that challenge and overcome that barrier within yourself is to, as you describe, you know, spend time on your own and face that on your own. Otherwise it's it's like the universe keeps showing us these lessons until we're, you know, ready to learn them, right? So if you're someone listening to this, we're like, oh, you know, all the guys I date are, you know, like this and I don't get why I keep attracting. It's because you have a lesson to learn. We'll be right back after a quick break.

Speaker 1:

I hope you're loving the show so far. The personal development journey can feel lonely sometimes, but it doesn't have to. We are here to help each other succeed at figuring out this whole growth thing. So come be a part of the conversation at wwweqnationorg. There you'll find links to our free community, which is full of valuable resources to get you feeling unstuck, less stressed and more connected to yourself and the people around you. And if this podcast does bring you value which I'm sure it will chances are it will do the same for someone else in your life. We are all about bringing value to the collective. So share this episode directly with a friend or pop it on your socials with your biggest aha moment from today's show, and don't forget to tag us at Livia Lauder. That's L-I-V-I-A dot, l-o-w-d-e-r. Right, let's get back to it. For sure, and even when you think because that's what kind of happened to me.

Speaker 1:

I was, you know, I was on my own for a long time. When I started to do that healing, I said, okay, I'm going to just stop dating. And even my coach at one point that was very funny because she needed to be direct with me, because I can be very stubborn myself but I remember her saying like Ellie, you need like I'm going to be straightforward with you Stop dating. Because I was, I was in my pattern of lack and I was like I just gotta meet someone. I'm just so tired of being on my own and I miss that vegan relationship. And she was like you have to stop dating. Like just stop it. And I was like at first I was like who is she to tell me to stop dating? She was so right.

Speaker 1:

And you know, at one point I do believe that I thought I was ready. I was ready for a relationship and then, even back in 2023, the beginning of 2023, I had met someone and I had this. I thought it was a very big connection to this person. I had this. I thought it was a very big connection to this person and this is why, in my book, I've been very much able to articulate this very well because I experienced it so much and this is where you get to be. You're not ready for the relationship, but you're ready to see your pattern in somebody else and you don't need to be in a relationship necessarily with a person to see that.

Speaker 1:

But you like, what had happened to me is that I had an attraction to someone and I thought that it was a very strong connection and I was like, oh my God, like what is this connection? I couldn't even understand it myself and I said that was love. Right, but that was not love. That was just someone who was an old version of myself that was right there to say, hey, my role in your life is to come and show you all of the patterns that still are there. And, yes, you've been through them, but now I'm going to show you how are you going to deal with them when you're in a relationship with someone else, you know. And so what I was attracting again wasn't someone that I would be falling in love with. I was just attracting that old version of me through that person so that I could see all of this without actually having to be in an intimate relationship with someone, just to really. You know, it was so at the time it was really confusing to me because I was not understanding anything.

Speaker 1:

But when, once I went through again another stage of death of an old self this is really what was going on it was kind of like. It was kind of like an old version be me just reappearing to say, okay, now it's time for you to let me go, but I have to show you that we're not compatible anymore. Suddenly, you're going to be in your face. What are you going to do with it? And so that was extremely painful for me because that was just, I feel like that was the last I'm saying, this was the last I'm saying this, and I hope that it was the last kind of phase of this old version of me that really needed to die that just came back up and said like, let's go, we're going to go through all of the patterns through when you're going to see this through someone else. So you're really just going to be looking at yourself through that person and I want you to have compassion because you're really just connecting to you, to that old self that needs to now leave, and so, yeah, so sometimes it's not going to be through an intimate relationship, it's going to be through, maybe a friendship that you feel like should be a relationship, but then you realize like, oh, wow, okay, there's a lot of friction here, there's a lot of chemistry, but again, that chemistry.

Speaker 1:

Where does that chemistry come from? Because I was used to having that chemistry from dysfunctional relationships, from the the me that was dysfunctional also in relationships, so it wasn't really good chemistry. It was just something that I was familiar with, which my body felt, which my cells felt, I guess, which my you know felt like it was natural. But this is where the ego likes to kind of just be really there and say like, ah, like, am I going to win again, right? Ah, like am I gonna win again, right. But yeah, and it's like, oh, you're, you know, and this is where the, the mind agility comes from. You know, like I've practiced this so much to be able to look at my patterns and see what shows up and analyze them and investigate everything and be like, okay, this feeling sound, it feels very familiar, but it's making me feel like shit. This is not normal. I should be feeling great around this person that I say that I feel like I love, but I don't. And why is that happening.

Speaker 1:

So it was very, very interesting to me to go through that journey without even being intimate with someone, but feeling it like it was a relationship on my end, right, because I just had all of these oh my God, all of these familiar patterns just wrapping me again and making me see that they needed to heal and they needed to be seen and be listened to, and that's why they were so loud through someone else, and so you know that person. Today I realized like, thank you, thank you for coming into my life because you were, your role was so big. You know, it's kind of like his role was I'm gonna be in your life, but I'm not gonna be intimate with you. I'm not gonna be in your life but I'm not going to be intimate with you. I'm not going to be one of those guys who's going to have you know, who's going to actually play the same game with you, but I'm going to be strong enough so that you feel all of it. And then you can realize that this is not love, this is not compatibility, this is not good feelings of chemistry. This is not good feelings of chemistry. Is this just you still being so comfortable or feeling like it's very natural to continue to be feeling those feelings of an old version of yourself that really needs to die now.

Speaker 1:

And so, yeah, it was kind of like a, a blessing in disguise, and I realize it now after almost a year, but it was another level for me of growth and surrender and so, yeah, it's very interesting of old parts of you. You actually talk about this in kind of the intro to your book a lot as well, as well as mentioning, you know, how, kind of from a young age, you recognize yourself as being the cycle breaker in the family. And you know I actually have a lot of people in my circle, especially friends back in Australia and whatnot, that we are those people. We are those people that are here to you, know heal the generational trauma, to heal our own trauma and really face that. And it's not an easy task to have bestowed upon you and you know it's really fantastic, just, you know, hearing you share your story and recognizing you have such a high level of awareness around all of these things and it's really beautiful the way that you, you know, do describe your journey.

Speaker 1:

And so I was curious that when you were in this coaching space, what was kind of the main modality of healing that they were kind of guiding you through or promoting, because I know journal therapy has been huge for you, so I was wondering if it was that specifically or if there were other things that you were working through as well, other strategies and tools. Yeah, so journal therapy actually was always, you know, my strongest therapy, because I started writing when I was actually started writing, when I was actually started writing when I was maybe 15, because I'm an artist, so I also sing and I would compose some songs. So I think that that was a way for me to express myself back then through songs, even though I would not share with anyone, but it was kind of like my little journal back then. It was composing songs.

Speaker 1:

And then when I started my spiritual journey when I was 21, I started to read a lot, which I didn't do at all during my, you know, any time in my life prior to my 20s, because I didn't feel like I was interested in anything until that day that I just discovered spirituality and self-development, cell development, and I was like so interested that now I had started to be interested in also just being more, yeah, kind of like a student, a wife, instead of being a student at school that I was really not good at because I was not like I said. I wasn't interested in much because I was an artist and I had a lot of struggle in my school years and was told I was slow and I never felt intelligent and anyways. That's another story of its own, but it's a lot of that that that comes with my childhood. Trauma is a big part of it. But, yeah, when I was 21 and I started to read, then I got really inspired to start writing about everything I was reading and, just starting that way into journal, I was journaling every single day and I'm still, by the way, journaling every single day. And all of that journaling just came to the writing of two books, which we're going to talk about after. But that was my strongest one and still my strongest today. It's very important for me to express myself in that way and I feel like when I don't write let's say it's been a couple of days that I haven't written it I feel it in my body because it's just for me, it's energy that is expressed out. It's not stuck in my head. Stuck in my head, yeah, and every day. So it's a way for me to have just my energy flow.

Speaker 1:

But when I started my coaching program, I learned about breathwork, soma breathwork, and that was something that I had never done before. Well, it was really meditated as well. So that was a really strong modality of mine. But the breathwork was very special to me and at the beginning I had a lot of resistance because I was so stuck on my. Well, I meditate every day again and I was like I meditate every day, I don't need breathwork, but is that going to do more? Did you know yoga? I've never really been interested in doing so much yoga, so it's not like I've had a lot of breathing techniques, but you know, in my meditation, for sure I know how to breathe in that sense.

Speaker 1:

But it was so different with some of breath work because now, what has had developed inside of me and which I was like really surprised that I even could do this, is that I could start moving energy within me. And it's really hard to explain because you can't really show anybody what's going on in your body. And you know people might think like, yeah, that's all in your head, but I swear to you it is not all in my head. It is just so magical what you can learn to do with your own body and your own energy inside of your body. You know how to control your breath and use. You know even parts of your body With some of the breath work we use, parts of our bodies which is in the lower chakras, so muscles that are there. You know closer to all of these areas that are sacred, areas of your body that you can use to really optimize your breathing and move that energy inside of your body.

Speaker 1:

And so this is what I learned through breathwork and through that coaching program was like it was a necessity for me while I was going through that healing journey, and especially at the cottage when I was there for a year, I had committed myself to do this routine every single morning for a year. I would wake up, I would go in a cold shower for three minutes right away when I wake up and then, right after my cold shower, I would work out for about 20 minutes and then, right after my workout, I would do my breath work for another 20 minutes and then a meditation for another 20 minutes and then journaling for another 20 minutes. Every single morning I did this for a while. Yeah, I was really disciplined. No kidding, I'm yeah, absolutely that's what I'm thinking in my mind. I'm like, oh yeah, you've got the discipline. Oh yeah, I was very disciplined because I wanted to heal so much of myself and it worked. I really. It helped me go through all of that darkness. It helped me sustain all of that.

Speaker 1:

And exactly when you go through all of this darkness, you need modalities like this to help you have releases. You can't keep all of this darkness inside of you. You need to understand how to release it and sometimes you don't even know what these patterns are. And with breathwork, this is what I've learned is that even through meditation, I couldn't even figure it out. But with breathwork, because it's energy and you're using this energy, you're moving this energy around. So all this dense energy that is stuck in your lower chakra, even if you don't know what it is, that is hidden, and it's been hidden for years and since your childhood there is something in there that is wanting to come out and it's just waiting for you to use your energy and use this breath to bring it out. And that means, yeah, you're gonna scream, you're gonna cry. You're not even gonna know, like right in the midst of your breath work. It's just it happened to me so many times where I was kind of like having this release and just being like I don't know, I'm crying, but it needs to come out. And then two days later you kind of get the epiphany of like, oh, this is what came out. So it might not happen in, like right in the midst of your breath work, but you will have that clarity because you will have moved that energy within you. So that was, yeah, and it's still very strong to this day. I do it. I'm not as disciplined as I was back then, but it's very important to me to have that modality at the tip of my fingers so that I know that when I do need it and I want to release something, I know that this is the way for me to release something within me the fastest. So that was a pretty strong modality, for sure, and I recommend that to everybody seriously. And this is what you've incorporated into your program, which we'll talk about a little bit later too.

Speaker 1:

But I'd love to talk about your books next. Um, you've authored two books and they were quite far apart in releasing. Is that right? Take us through that journey. Uh, the first book I wrote I was close to 27 when I wrote it. That was when I started my journaling, so I started to write a lot and at one point I was writing so much that I was like, oh, I think that I could actually write a book at one point, and I had been very inspired by this really cool author from the 1900s. His name is Joseph S Benner and he wrote the book the Impersonal Life. And that little book is like a really, really small book and it's all about. You know, through the entire book is a very direct approach and it's a way for you to kind of have a conversation with your higher self. And even though it was written in 1900, it's still very relevant, I would say.

Speaker 1:

You know, I read it not too long ago and I was like, oh yeah, that's why I was in love with that book. And it was very surprising for me as a 27-year old that I could actually understand that book because it was so deep and it's not things that I was used to be to read and personal growth books or spiritual books, and especially the way that it was written. And then also, you know, back in 1900, the wording is very different from what we the word the English that we read today, different from what we the word the English that we read today. So it was a challenge a little bit for that too. But for me, being an artist and being a writer myself, I was just really really, um, I guess, like impressed by but by all of it. Like my mind got really impressed quickly, uh, by it, because for me it felt almost like poetry as well. So I really love that book and it inspired me to try to write my you know my version of parts of like how he was doing it.

Speaker 1:

And so I wrote a first book it was called in French, it's called the Contre-Vinature de Pau, but I'm going to translate it which is when your true nature speaks to you, and I had just incorporated a couple of parts in every chapter. I would incorporate at the end of the chapter just that style of having that direct approach with the reader, which is feeling like you're actually reading yourself in a sense, where it's kind of like you that is speaking to you directly, your I yourself is speaking to you directly. And that book, it was just a dream. I didn't really have big intentions with that book. You know, I was in my 20s, I wasn't thinking that far away. I was just like I have a dream to write a book at one point in my life and I manifested that really quickly. Actually, it was surprising to me how fast that happened.

Speaker 1:

But the book didn't really go anywhere because it released when I got separated. So the same year that I back in 2018, the same year, like the same time, I swear to you. I got separated in April. It came and I think it got released in May or something, and so, yeah, I wasn't able to do anything with it because I didn't have the energy to push that. My energy was on survival mode and I needed to push my other business. I needed to do something that was completely different, just to be able to survive and have wind coming in. So I wasn't thinking about, oh, I'm going to be a published author and I'm going to push this work and blah, blah, blah. And also I do believe that back then it's not like today. Today, we have so many people that need to be. You know, we're in that phase where everybody is awakening, or a lot of people are awakening, and it's a really good timing, more of a better timing than 10 years ago, and also I didn't have a maturity, I believe, back then as a 27-year-old even though I was an old soul I don't think that I still had the maturity of what I actually wanted to do with this book and what I really the intention. I was really behind it, although I did sell a couple of copies and people were really happy with it, and then I seriously didn't think that I was gonna write another book At one point.

Speaker 1:

You know, through all of this journey, to me it was kind of like I did it and that's it, and I don't see myself writing another book, because it's kind of like I don't know what to write about. You know, because I was relying too much on my personal journey and I was always telling myself I don't see an ending, I don't see an ending book. So how can I write a book without an ending? It doesn't make sense to me. Like I wanted to write this you know, this book of like and I thought I was going to write a book about me a little bit more, and so it was kind of like I don't have anything positive to tell the world about my own journey and how I get.

Speaker 1:

I came on the other side of it and like that I went through all of this and then I'm here like, yay, like if it was real, you were still in it. Yes, I was still in it. So I'm like, yeah, why would I even consider to write another book? Like I have nothing to say in that sense, right. And so I kind of gave up on the idea.

Speaker 1:

Um, but yeah, back in 2023, when I was going through another, like I said, another kind of big awakening, um, another level of healing, uh, that level of healing, that level of healing was very much a surrender experiment. So it was another level of surrender, but it wasn't the same thing as my healing back at the cottage, because my healing back at the cottage was about mostly my discovering. It was about discovery about who Ellie was really, you know, and that authentic self. How can I stay in that power? How can I, you know, really identify who is my default self and who is my authentic self, and how do I go and investigate and see what are the patterns and everything? And so it was mostly about doing that work, which was very, very difficult. But the other level of surrendering that I had back in 2023 was a level of disidentifying completely with that part of myself, with the old version of myself.

Speaker 1:

So the striver, the one who always wants to make things happen, the businesswoman that was always pushing and wanting to keep a business alive that I created through survival mode and then realized that I can't keep something alive that's been created from that energy, because that energy is not sustainable, and so it was all about just surrendering to life and saying like, okay, I know that I'm supposed to get out of this energy and everything seems to be dying with it, so what am I supposed to do now? And now it was the level of being kind of like I seriously don't really care what's going to happen, because I'm at that place where I have no idea, I do not know anything. It's like it was really crazy, and at one point, back in December 2023, I was alone for two weeks, and it was the first time I was going to be alone in a long time, because I had decided to go and have roommates for the last, almost last, last, yeah, last year, for the first time in my life in like five years, just to be able to, you know, just to get by a little bit better or whatever. But that was very difficult to live with someone else when you lived on your own for the last four or five years, yeah, so that was another level of awakening too. But, yeah, I decided, well, I, I decided I ran my roommate back then.

Speaker 1:

She was going on a trip for two weeks and so I said, oh yay, I'm gonna have the house to myself. We're sharing a house and it was beautiful. I was back in, you know, in the country. I had big mountains right outside of the backyard, like it was just incredible view. Seriously, I love that place and that house. It's very lucky to live there.

Speaker 1:

But, yeah, having that freedom of being alone for two weeks was like thank you God, because I really needed it and I had decided I'm not going to do anything, I'm just going to meditate my life away for those next two weeks and that's it. I don't want to talk to anybody. I don't want to talk to anybody. I don't want to go to parties, because it was kind of like in the time, like in the holidays, I'm like I just want to be with me, that's it, not do anything. And so I sat down, meditated.

Speaker 1:

It was I think it was I was the third day of that two weeks and I sit down and I'm like, okay, silent meditation. And I said it's been 30 minutes, I'm in silent meditation and at one point I get this clear insight that was not from me at all and it says, okay, well, you have another book to write and this is the title and this is the way that you're going to write. And I was like what Are you kidding me? And I was like what are you kidding me? And so, and so I immediately said, well, this is not of me. So I'm, I think that I kind of have, not that I didn't have a choice, but it was so strong within me that I yeah, I needed to do it and I didn't know where that was going to go at all.

Speaker 1:

Like, even when I started writing it, I knew I was going to write it in a specific way, and I do explain that in my introduction, where I'm like I wanted to I, before this, I wanted to to find an ending. I could never, I never wanted to write another book because I could never see an ending, and this time around I can't even see a beginning. So I'm like this is exciting to me, like it doesn't bother me this time, because I'm in surrendering, right, right, yeah, fully yeah. So that's what happened with that book, that new book, and it just came out. It took me a month. I wrote it in a month. That was out quickly, my mind. I had as well remember that my my goal was not to do much for two weeks. Well, I did a lot in those two weeks. In the sense I received a lot. I was writing for like four hours a day. So, yeah, that's why that book came out really quickly.

Speaker 1:

I hope you enjoyed part one of this conversation. Be sure to tune back next week for part two. That's a wrap on today's episode. I am beyond grateful for your participation in today's conversation. My intention is that the information shared here today has inspired you to deepen your understanding of your emotional health and that of the people around you. When you're ready to start sharpening your tools, head to wwweqnationorg and download our free seven-step guide to upgrading your emotional health. Our website is the best place to connect with our community and get access to free resources. You can also send us your questions through our social media channels linked on the website wwweqnationorg. All the resources from today's show will be in the show notes and, before you go, make sure you hit follow so you don't miss an episode. I'm Livia Lauder. See you next time on Emotions Untapped.