I'm going to talk about why the capacity to check in, feel, and stay present to the different layers of your experience, without immediately trying to make them different, is the foundation for self- care, healing, and deep fulfillment. More to come on that. First let's settle in with the sound of the bells. So, this align that I shared with you at the beginning of the episode is actually an idea, not a direct quote, but close to a direct quote from my book, Stop Missing Your Life. I posted them on social media yesterday and wanted to expound upon it here.

So I'll share it with you again and then break down the different layers of it. The quote is, "The capacity to check in, feel, and stay present to the different layers of your experience, without immediately trying to make them different, is the foundation for self-care, healing, and deep fulfillment. The foundation for self-care, healing, and deep fulfillment. Let's take a look at that. So first this capacity to, to check in, to feel, to stay present to the different layers of our experience without immediately trying to make them different.

Notice what you feel in relationship to that. Does that resonate on some level? Do you feel connected to that ability to be able to check in, to feel, to stay present to the different layers of your experience without trying to change it, without judging it or making it wrong, but simply holding space and making contact with this dimension of yourself? Now, maybe you feel like you have that capacity to an extent. And I think all of us do, to an extent, to check in, to say, Oh, how's it going, Cory. What am I feeling right now? We can stay present to it a little bit. But I also think we all have a threshold with that.

There are certain dimensions of our experience, you know, emotional experience, or parts of our personality or insecurities or vulnerabilities, sadness, grief, or even pleasure, joy. Some of us cut off our own pleasure. That's a really common one. So, how far can we take this to, to hold, to be present to the different layers of our experience? And I would argue that the depth to which we can take that is directly related to the depth of our own capacity for self-care, healing, and deep fulfillment. And let's break that down a little bit.

So first, self-care. We' re only going to be able to take care of ourselves to the extent which we're able to show up for ourselves. We won't be able to really understand what our deeper needs are without being able to be present to the deeper layers of our experience. On the surface level, we might be aware, okay, I'm hungry right now. And we can respond to that.

But if we're really disconnected from our bodies and we've just been working so hard, like grinding ourselves, but we're so used to that and so used to not checking in with ourselves, like, what do I need right now? As soon as we slowed down just enough to maybe be able to sense into that, into that exhaustion, we might be so conditioned to not feel that, that we quickly reverse it and go right back into what our old pattern was. Subsequently disconnecting from ourselves and essentially disassociating not being present to those deeper layers of our experience. And therefore not being able to take care of those deeper levels, which is also related to healing. At least in the context I'm talking about it here, like deeper, psychological healing, emotional healing, dramatic healing. All of the trauma literature will, will show that in order for traumatic energy to start to get released and reintegrated, it needs a degree of presence.

It, it can't be cast out into the shadows of our awareness. It can't get reintegrated through dissociation. And a good trauma therapist will help a person make space for their experience to move closer to their experience, the uncomfortable parts of it to start to feel it and stay present to it, the intensity of it, so that the intensity can start to dissipate. And that's how reintegration happens. A very basic overview of it, of course, but starts with this ability to be present to our experience without immediately trying to make it different.

And this doesn't have to just be traumatic experiences. It could simply be unresolved sadness that's been lingering beneath the surface, waiting to be experienced just enough so that it can finally start to pass. Or even things like a negative self-concept that you hold toward yourself of not being good enough or not being worthy. Often the foundation of being able to shift that is first being able to be honest with the part of us that feels that way or the different layers of ourselves that feel that way, to hold space for that, with love and compassion, which is imbued, at least for me, in a moment of presence. And then often seemingly miraculously, that inner voice softens a bit and our relationship to ourself shifts.

And then how we think about ourselves starts to shift, all by being able to stay present to these different layers of ourselves, different parts of ourselves. So self-care, healing, and then deep fulfillment. Right? You can have a lot of different forms of happiness, like happiness of getting what you want. That's certainly a form of happiness. The happiness of pleasure.

That feels good, that sensory experience can give us a lot of, well, a certain kind of happiness. There's also a more substantial, I, I would argue it's a more substantial, deeper kind of fulfillment that comes when we feel deeply okay in our own skin, our bodies, our minds, our ego as ourselves, or however you identify yourself. The more we've made peace with and have befriended all the different dimensions of our humanness, the more we start to experience this really profound and cozy kind of wholeness where we're no longer running from ourselves. And there are many different layers of running from ourselves. It's not like you're someone that doesn't run from yourself or you're someone that's like totally at peace with yourself.

Like there's such a continuum. There, there are still parts of myself, a lot of parts that I'm actively resisting still and working to make peace with. Parts that are insecure or parts that are uncertain, parts that I don't like as much as other parts of myself. And my practice is about like sensing that resistance, making space for like first being present to the resistance. Because fighting the resistance is just another form of resistance.

And then seeing if I can stay present to whatever's behind it. The thing that I don't want to be there, the part that is insecure, that doesn't have everything figured out, that wants to be in control, whatever I might be denying. And so checking in feeling, stay present, staying present to those different layers of my experience, welcoming all of them in, not necessarily indulging in them, but just acknowledging their place in, in this moment, the reality of them being there. And when we get more comfortable doing that, something in it's just starts to let go and we experience the wholeness of ourselves, the fullness of ourselves, the parts that we enjoy and the parts that we resent, but we no longer resent them as much. They are, they've been welcomed in, into the family of who we are.

And I describe it as a coziness. Cause I don't know any other word to use, but you just become your own best friend. It's like you have your own internal blanket to snuggle into. And maybe that sounds fluffy or weak or whatever, but it feels good. It feels good.

And life is hard enough. It's enough difficulty out there, and now people are going to cause us stress and pain. If we're adding another layer of that for ourselves, by constantly beating ourselves up, fighting our own experience, it's going to be a bumpy ride. So I'll say this one more time, the capacity to check in, feel, and stay present to the different layers of your experience without immediately trying to make them different is the foundation for self care, healing, and deep fulfillment. As you go about your day today, just see if you can practice this.

Checking in, feeling, staying present to all of who you are. Notice where you do that easily and where you have more struggle. And hopefully this can help a little bit on your daily journey to practicing human. Great being with you. Until then, take care.