It's that breakthrough moment is when we move beyond the resistance, so if we can stay with it, staying with the resistance, and then we move through it and it doesn't mean it won't come up again. But if we can really embrace that, it's helping us. Did you grow up with this? Kids are to be seen and not heard. You do have a voice. And we want to hear it. If you have ever thought about sharing your story, speaking up, of course it's terrifying. Speaking is the number one fear most people face, but it doesn't have to be public. You could begin sharing your story just for your family. You might want to turn it into a podcast or a book, or maybe not, but the important thing is to start speaking, to start sharing your story. If this seems like something you want to do, and you want to just check it out, see if it's for you, go to www.coachlory.com and book a session with me. It's free. No tricks are trying to rope you in. It's just a way for you to explore what's next in using your voice to share your message, your story. www.coachlory.com. Has your life, your dreams been interrupted? Good news. It is possible to reinvent our lives. People are doing it every day, and some are brave enough to share the struggles, disappointments, and challenges. If you are looking for a new beginning, a do-over, or to rediscover your passion, maybe even find a new one, then grab a cup of coffee and let's talk. Interrupted. Act to reinventing your legacy with your host, Coach Lori. Cheryl Stelb is a spiritual coach, master healer, three times author and speaker. Cheryl, welcome. Thank you, Lori. I am so thrilled to be here on your interrupted podcast. Well, your life was certainly interrupted, but before we get to that, tell me about your life now, what you're doing, are you writing a new book? Because I can see the joy in your face that you love your lives. I never thought I would be doing the work I'm doing. Never. In my 20s and 30s, I had friends that became therapists, counselors, and I was just like, I don't know how you can work with people like that. I could never work with people. Don't want to work with people in that way, in the helping. And it's just the most fulfilling thing for me. And I do it through very practical spirituality and very, very practical, proven scientific, spiritual methods to really help people grow and evolve. I've actually authored three books, surprised myself, never thought of myself as an author. I did at one point in my life, really got the guidance and wanted to, my intuition was like, you really need to write a book. And I had so many people saying to me, you have to write a book. You really need to write a book. Third time, just finished my third book. That's very fulfilling, but it's when I'm working with women, mature women who have been spinning their wheels, who have tried everything to move beyond where they're just really feeling stuck, get beyond their blocks, and become the person they're meant to be is the most fulfilling thing I could possibly do. And I, you know, I teach in groups. I do a lot of things, but it is just amazing. I'm living up here in the mountains of Colorado. I have a grandbaby. So I'm enjoying the heck out of piece three, but you don't understand being a grandparent, I think, until you are one. And now I understand why my brother behaves the way he does with his seven grandchildren, etc. Life is just really rewarding. We still have twists and turns, but grateful, grateful to be me. When I was looking at your webpage, the word that really stood out to me and surprised me was breakthrough because that's in a way that's really a common word. And we see that a lot. But what I recognize with more mature women is we have sort of a different history and growing up of being seen, not heard, of not speaking. If we've had abuse, if we've had an abusive marriage, do we just shut up and take it? What really stood out to me is the work that you do to help women share their story, get the help, and speak their truth. And I know that your life was interrupted, and that's kind of what brought you to this work. So can you talk about that? Because this is the biggest need I see in women our age. Oh, yes, absolutely. And stems from the one type of trauma that we all have in common. And that is the ongoing trauma that's often silent, hidden, is we didn't have an emotional resource. Emotions weren't acknowledged when we were kids. It was survival. And this is this new trend toward emotions. I love seeing my granddaughter. She knows what sad is. She drops her head down. I feel sad. Can you help me feel happy again? And she knows she needs a hug? This is amazing. But we didn't have that. Most families didn't have it. And it's actually abuse. Emotional neglect is abuse. And it's ongoing. And what it leaves us with is this sense of uncertainty in the world. It's not so much what happened. Trauma is imprinted in the right side of the brain. And so there's other things that have happened. But it's one thing all my clients have in common. And so I helped them attract friendships relationships who are emotional resources for them and to become, of course, their own emotional resource. That was all my story. I ended up in an abusive marriage and had to end that. It became so clear to me. And I had the courage to do it even though I'd been thinking about it for a few years. I had the courage to do that. And that was my first big interruption in my life. Finding myself as a single mother with two children and so into the emotions. You need to feel what you feel. But then I just want to move into I had a second huge interruption, which really transformed me and my life to where I am today. And that was the epiphany, the guidance that I received more than once. But the first time I really received it, I did a one week long meditation retreat for myself at home by myself, for myself. And at the end of that, and I was in such a connected place to the whole universe, unity, consciousness, oneness. And then I got your spiritual teacher. And I had a meltdown. And the whole thing of who do you think you are? Who do you think you are? And it was just the biggest thing for me to overcome. And I became chronically ill. And before the show, we're talking a little bit about that, a couple amazing women, how I had to get through that, because Western medicine didn't serve me. Western medicine made me more sick. So I had to find my own healing. And what I could see is my own resistance to being seen and heard, to being understood and to shining my light the way we're all meant to. I was so conditioned. No, no, no. That's not okay. I was in such dissonance of understanding the truth, really stepping into that. And here I am super healthy. And I did overcome that and stepped into that. And that's why I do the work I do today. And I do think that's where women get stuck when they start to get seen. It feels so wrong. And I love it that you walk through that ahead of us so that you could say, reach your hand down and go, Hey, you're going to make it. We can do this. The illness thing is something that I don't think people really connect that some of their chronic pain and illness. It's not that it's in your head, but it's connected to that resistance. I love that saying what we resist, persist. So kudos to you for doing the work. I just admire that so much because that's where a lot of people go, I can't do it. It's too hard. It's too painful. I don't want to go back and feel all that. And the whole thing is, it's not that hard. It's so worthwhile. And you just need to touch into it and we'll get into that. The resistance, a number of women who come to see me, they know they're meant for more. They have a certain amount of success in their career, but they just, they're like, I know I'm meant for more, but I'm not sure what it is. Many think they have to leave their corporate job or have a huge career shift, which is absolutely possible. And I out and I definitely help women through that. One of my clients, Ginny, at a seven figure business, it was her fifth business, hugely successful, completely unhappy, exhausted, miserable. She discovered she's a spiritual leader. And now she leads people on private retreat on her land in Texas. And she's developing a healing center. So she did a complete shift. I have an interesting story of one woman in corporate America makes a ton of money. She doesn't tell me how much, but she always says, Cheryl, I make a lot of money hard for me to leave my job. And there is a certain amount of satisfaction, but this sense of something's missing. I know I meant for more. This is, this is, I'm not maximizing my potential. She's in my advanced group. I could see how she's moving toward it. She's discovering it piece by piece. Doors are opening for her. She's starting to get, she had her boss's boss, had a conversation with her, asked her what her plans are. And she shared some of what she's learning through our working together and how she could see benefiting the company and doing some trainings and leading meditation. And I'm like, oh yeah, you're getting there. And I have to keep my mouth shut because I'm waiting for, you said the word breakthrough. She needs that breakthrough moment. The last time we met, I'm teaching them how to do chakra readings on each other. So she did her chakra reading. But what she read in the other, she could see in herself. She got all hot and sweaty. She was just dripping wet with sweat, doesn't have hot flashes yet. A little too young for that. Absolute fear, fear, fear, fear. And she could see herself leading to this large corporation, leading these meditations to help them grow and evolve and help the company grow and evolve. And she was just shaking. I'm like, yes, that's your breakthrough. That's when you, you feel your greatness. And it's our old patterning that's getting in the way. That's the resistance. And so that's, that's that moment in time that you can't change. And it is, we start to break through, we start to break through all those barriers in the resistance. And sure, we have all the stepping stones we need to go through. But I know how to hold women's hands through that because I've been there more than once. Still, at the end of my third book, from block to powerful, I couldn't believe it. I'm like, after all the work I've done, I read my final draft and I was so proud of it. I just love my book. And then I got, who do you think you are to write about power? Seriously? Seriously? Oh, there's a piece down deep there somewhere I need to find wherever that came from and heal that. And so of course, I move beyond it and just embraced. It's that breakthrough moment is when we move beyond the resistance. So if we can stay with it, staying with the resistance, and then we move through it, and it doesn't mean it won't come up again. But if we can really embrace that, it's helping us. Two things that stand out to me. One is we grew up in a time, the more mature women, grew up in a time where we believed whatever happened with your brain and was the way you are. So if you had a brain injury, but now we're in a time where they've discovered neuroplasticity, these breakthroughs can happen. So part of the resistance might be that this is the way I am. What I recognize with your work is maybe we can do it alone, but it's so much better if we have a coach, a healer, somebody to walk through it, a group, there can be an isolation when we're resisting that we retreat. Get away from that. Can you talk about there's community? We don't want to be isolated, but also that fear. That fear is so paralyzing. Community helps trying to do it alone is really next to impossible because we can't see ourselves. We can't see ourselves. I still need somebody. I'm like, I have one of my long-term clients. I said to her, can you help me see what I can't see? Is there anything I'm missing? And she helped me find it and try as I may, and I've practiced that this well over 30 years of doing this. We all need somebody. Humans need each other, period, whether it's in community. One-on-one is great because I help people go back into their subconscious, and I'm there with them. I remind them of it. I'm with you. You're not alone. I hear what you're saying. I understand. It's very, very important to ask for help, to say, hey, I need to move through this and find someone you really resonate with, and fear is normal. And there's a lot of evidence out there right now that fear comes from the amygdala. It's normal. Our brain is wired to help us survive. For me, I learned decades ago Susan Jeffers wrote the book Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway. I just learned to feel through my fear. Just feel it because it'll move through. So that's quick and relatively easy. It's the emotions that are underneath the fear. So I like to do what I call follow the emotional thread, or the emotional track to go down deeper and deeper because in our subconscious, there is layers of emotions. And it's proven that trauma, I said it's imprinted on the right side of the brain, but it's stored with physical sensations and emotions. I help people with sexual abuse, all sorts of things. It's not through linear memories. So you're never going to remember the whole thing in detail. If it's real trauma, sometimes the brain wants to fill in the gaps and makeup stories. And that's not useful. But it's releasing what we feel physically in the body and those emotions. So that's where we get to the very bottom underneath the fear. And then there's always going to be subconscious beliefs with those. And what I have sort of coined are the four subconscious beliefs that are at the root of all things are one, I'm not lovable, two, I'm unworthy, I'm not enough, or I'm not good enough, and I don't matter. And the woman I was telling you about, she saw me on a video on an interview when I named these four and I had them I was leading a brief little meditation. And she said, as soon as you said, I don't matter, I burst into tears, feeling the intensity of that. And then she reached out to me. And those four things, I think there is a difference from women who come from trauma with those four, because I've seen people do a lot of work on, I am worthy, I am enough, I do a lot about I enough. But to look at it as four things, because one of those will resonate, those four things, I think are so important initially, but they're also circular, and they come back to haunt us. So let's use that, I don't matter, I feel invisible. So what happens, you do the work and you release it. So the trauma, the block is like energy that's stuck in you. So you feel a bit of it, you do the work, okay, it's released, and then you feel like you matter, and it's wonderful, and life goes on, and you keep growing. So then what happens, you get to a place where you may step forward in your life, or become a higher level person, the woman who you've always meant to be moved to a new level. And then I always say, whatever kept you from doing it before will come up. So then this serves you, it's the deeper layer. So yes, you can say it's cyclical. I like to say it's a deeper layer. Same thing, either way it goes around and around, but you're going deeper this time. It's not the same as it was before. It's a different layer. It feels different. So now you've touched into the one thing that's getting in your way right now, from moving to the next level of your life, or maintaining that, sustaining that, it's looking at that and doing the work you did before at the deeper layer. So to me, it's ongoing. I haven't stopped 31 plus years. But we still, sure, you're at a level of fulfillment in your life and happiness and everything that you're enjoying. And the ideal is that you keep becoming more, and you fulfill your soul's journey and your mission. And this is part of it. So it's going deep. The deeper we go, the higher we will rise. I love that. Another thing I come up against a lot of times women will say, I missed it. I'm too old. It's too late. I feel that at times myself, I'm too old. How long am I going to work? I'm 63. I just turned 63. Sometimes I get that, and then I move into I just feel into it. How true is this for me? How much truth is in this? Not much. Not much. Nowadays, we can do whatever the heck we want. The number one thing that I value is growth. So whether I'm doing this work or loving up my grandbaby, I'm going to find a new way to grow, or whether it's traveling and meeting new people, or whether it's doing more podcast interviews, meeting amazing leaders like you, I will continue to grow. I remember my grandma telling me that when I was in my teens, Cheryl, you need to always be growing way back then. My grandma was so wise, she was the coolest grandma on the face of the earth. I tell you, it's that growth. So we're never too old. And I love to read stories of women who reach retirement and they've retired, but they have a whole new way of living. And the work we do, being in unity consciousness, part of the universe, part of God, doesn't have to be a career. It doesn't have to be a business. It's how well do we love. It's how we are in the world, how we relate to others, what kind of even little difference can we make in someone's life? Doesn't have to be. So yeah, we're never, never too old. How many people have written their first book at the age of 80 plus? You haven't written a book. You may do it at the age of 85. The older you get, the more we have to share. I teach podcasting. And I say, push record. It's not that I think everyone should podcast. I don't believe that. But if you have a message and you're not going to write it, say it. Even if you pick up your phone, you tell one story a day, one story a week about your life, your legacy, do it. Push record, leave it on your phone. And the wonderful thing about podcasting, I can go for a walk and listen to you and your guests. And it's just so easy. We've been in the information age for a very long time and it's kind of blown up with us. But we can have whatever knowledge we want now. It's the stories, the understanding of another person were relational beings. There's so many women, I'm sure that relate to my story of going from feeling very disempowered to feeling empowered. And that's my legacy. Whatever I can do to help women really find their true selves and true because truth is power. Who is the authentic you? Why are you here? I love that. I have a friend Susie Rosenstein. She calls it a party in your purse. I love it. Before we didn't know, if we were in an abusive relationship, we might not know. I remember there was a time where I read a book and I was like, I think maybe this is unhealthy. But now there is more. And like what you went through with abusive marriage is that we can now validate women and they can go, Oh, and they can feel like maybe now I can do something rather than the old way of just deal with it. Take it. You made your bed, you lie in it. Yeah, because traditionally marriages were just a way to survive. You had the husband hunted and the woman took care of the household and the children. And we had this way of surviving and it wasn't so much about love. And look at how many arranged marriages are in the world. But now we can look at the other person and what they're saying. And we can ask ourselves, how do how do I feel? How does this make me feel? Is this mine? Is this a wounding within me? Or is this their stuff? And we can sort through it. And if we need some help with that, we can get help a girlfriend, a mentor, a coach, a therapist. There's so many others available. And to sort through what is ours and do our own healing and empowerment. And it helps us not maintain relationships that don't serve us. So that can be even even with a friendship. I feel like there's a real epidemic on narcissism. And with narcissism goes co-dependence is the opposite in the two match they they meet. If you find yourself with a narcissist or somebody, you know, whatever. I mean, there's a billion diagnoses. What is yours? What is yours? What attracted I try and look at? What attracted this person to me and choosing whether to stay in relationship or not. And to set healthy boundaries and say, Oh, no, this doesn't feel good. I don't want to be treated this way. It doesn't work for me. And to have a conversation with the other. And if they continue, well, then they're choosing to not be in the healthy relationship. It's much easier to then walk away. But once you feel solid in it, because when our emotions are not recognized, we don't know how to use them. They serve us every single emotion we have helps us. So if we're feeling fear, if we're feeling anger, if we're feeling sad, if we're feeling neglected, we will continue to attract those people into our lives. However, we were treated until we process all of those emotions and then attract different people that treat us with respect and love and kindness, thoughtfulness, caring, it's up to us. I love that. The big takeaway is that one attracts the other. And if we do our work, then we'll have the strength to do whatever the next best decision is. I love that. Well, Cheryl, this has been so great. Before we go, I have two more questions. One is, will you tell me the name of your three books and how we can get them? They're all on Amazon. And the first one is heal your neck issues and let your throat chakra shine. The spiritual guide to moving forward pain free is all about being seen and heard and understood and really shining your light in the world. And then the second book client magnet, the coach's guide to attract ideal clients through spiritual awareness or spiritual practices came from the first book, I started working with coaches who weren't getting their clients. And I could see where their blocks were, you know, I do a chakra reading, oh, you've got this and this going on. But I also see people superpowers. I started helping coaches quickly attract their ideal clients because just like we talked about in relationships, we will attract people who match our wounds and we can attract people who match our greatness. So it's really quickly clearing the wounds that prevent us from getting those clients and really shining our light in who we are so that those souls that need us the most will find us. So that's client magnet. And then my most recent book from block to powerful. This is to me, my legacy book, you speak a lot about legacy. And it's the spiritual guide to unlocking inner clarity and authentic power. And it's a compilation of a lot of my favorite practices from various modalities. They're all workbooks. They have very powerful meditations that help you transform rather quickly. It's at the deepest level possible. I'm all about going deep. Okay, before we go, this has been so brilliant. What is it? You really, really, really want us to know that you are all powerful beyond belief, powerful beyond what you can imagine. I like to say ditch the goals. My major group, no goal setting allowed. You do not set goals. We let our goals come out of us. We let the truth come out because when we have blocks, we can't see our best goals. You can't see your ideal self. So no goals help you find it. And this third book has a lot of that in there. So stop setting goals, discover who you truly are, and the goals will unfold naturally, just like my client who now is stepping into leading meditations in corporate America. She didn't know, but it's never a goal. And where can we get that book? You can get that book on Amazon. It's available in Kindle, paperback and hard, hard copy. Cheryl, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom. And I love that you're not standing up here like I've accomplished this. You're like, I'm growing and learning and moving and come with me. It's an invitation. And I love that. Yes, I'm, I don't know that, like I said, I don't know that we ever get there. I love where I'm at. And I want to keep going. And I love working with people who want to become their greatest selves as well. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Lori. If you love this podcast, here's a big ask. Will you share with your friends and family, subscribe, give us a review, and a five star rating so that others looking to reinvent their lives will be able to get the help they're looking for. Thank you in advance.
