Sisters-in-Service
Are you a women veteran who feels unseen and unheard? Do you struggle with finding your purpose after service? Sisters-in-Service is a podcast that gives women veterans the platform to talk about those exact issues and more. Hear from other veterans, military spouses and Veteran Service Organizations (VSO) just like you that have overcome their transition from the military. Every Tuesday this podcast encourages women veterans to stand up and be counted because as a group we have a voice. From your host - Cat Corchado - The Voice Connecting Women Veterans
Sisters-in-Service
Revitalize Your Midlife Symposium - Day 4: Embracing Playfulness and Joy in Midlife with Yvonne Marchese
Unlock the secrets of a playful and vibrant midlife with the inspiring Yvonne Marchese! Yvonne, the host of the Late Bloomer Living podcast and author of "In Full Bloom: A Guide to Aging Playfully," joins us to share her wisdom on embracing change, growth, and joy as we age. You'll discover how adopting a playful mindset and engaging in joyful activities can transform your habitual thinking about aging, rewiring your brain for creative problem-solving and mental well-being.
During our enlightening conversation, Yvonne highlights the importance of rediscovering the joy of play, drawing on the natural learning processes experienced in childhood. She shares practical steps to combat internalized ageism, such as making a list of activities that bring joy and revisiting childhood hobbies. Listen as we explore how to break free from midlife mindset barriers by engaging in new and playful activities, like learning a musical instrument, and the profound impact this can have on your mental health and creativity.
Framing midlife as an awakening rather than a crisis, we delve into the "U" shape of happiness and the strategies to integrate play into daily life to counteract constant productivity. Yvonne offers invaluable insights for entrepreneurs juggling multiple roles, emphasizing the necessity of self-care, gratitude, and maintaining a playful spirit. Join us for an empowering episode that challenges misconceptions about aging and encourages everyone to live midlife to the fullest with joy and vitality.
Welcome to Sisters in Service podcast. Most of you know me as a strong advocate for women veterans in being recognized not only as veterans but also as women who are changing the world through our passion of serving even after service. This podcast is my passion, by telling all the stories of military brats, military spouses, active duty and veterans, not to forget the veteran service organizations that help us along our transition journey. I want to thank you in advance for listening. I hope that you will join me. Every week, a new podcast and episode comes out every Tuesday, so I hope that you will join and I hope that you enjoy. This podcast is brought to you by Small Space Pilates. Are you ready to get fit and fabulous from the comfort of your own home? Look no further than Small Space Pilates. With live online Pilates and strength training classes, a video library and a no perfection allowed policy, you can achieve your fitness goals without ever leaving your house. Click on the link for your complimentary week and start your journey to feeling fabulous today. Bye, welcome everyone to day four of the Revitalize your Midlife Symposium.
Speaker 1:I'm Cat Corchado, the host, and I wanted to do this symposium as a way to empower and enlighten everyone. Listening, you know through this thing we call midlife. Well, this June it's summertime, we're doing our vacations, but it's also my birthday month and, yes, I celebrate the whole month. But it's also about a reflection of my why, and that is that everyone has the right to feel good in their body and my quest to be a lifelong learner. So midlife is a time of reflection, growth and, most importantly, opportunity. It's a stage where we can harness our experiences, embrace change and step into the best versions of ourselves with confidence and grace. My mission in creating this symposium is to provide you with the tools, insights and inspiration needed to navigate this exciting chapter of your life. So if you walk away with one golden nugget of info from this week, then I feel this symposium was a success. I'm thrilled to have Small Space, pilates and Sisters in Service podcast as sponsors and bringing the benefits of fitness into any home, regardless of size, and to ensure that everyone can find the space to improve flexibility, strength and mental wellbeing. But if you cannot join, us live. For those of you that are wondering, there's no need to worry. Every moment of this symposium will be available for replay. Whether you're seeking strategies to enhance your health, fitness or overall well-being, this symposium is your gateway to a midlife filled with vitality and joy. So I am thrilled to introduce Yvonne Marchese.
Speaker 1:She is the host of the Late Bloomer Living podcast and the Age Agitators Club for Women. She's an author, speaker, professional photographer, mother and wife on a mission to explore what it means to live playfully at any age. Her book In Full Bloom A Guide to Aging Playfully, reached number nine on Amazon's midlife bestseller list. So yeah, yvonne is a roller skating, paddle boarding age agitator who believes that midlife is filled with possibility and that it's never too late to pursue a dream and that the stories we tell ourselves have tremendous power in our lives. She's also yep, there's more. She's also co-host of the Salty Sisters live stream, a roving reporter for Good Morning, entrepreneur and contributes articles to Cool Life entrepreneur and contributes articles to Cool Life, a platform that is normalizing aging for midlife women. Oh, and just in case you don't know, she's my friend, yvonne, welcome.
Speaker 2:Hello my salty sister. How are you? Are you feeling salty tonight?
Speaker 1:Girl. That made me tired. Man, you've got a lot going on. I was like what?
Speaker 2:I need a nap.
Speaker 1:So, Yvonne, I know that you've been on this platform not this platform, but on this quest about play and about age agitating. Why have you decided that this is so important, the play part. Why is that so important to you?
Speaker 3:That has been something that's been revealing itself to me over time and probably you know it's been there. I just didn't realize it was the main thrust of what I was trying to get at. For a while now I've been talking about embracing the idea of being a beginner, but when I wrote my book, the In Full Bloom A Guide to Aging Playfully the In Full Bloom A Guide to Aging Playfully, I really started thinking about playfulness as a key that we can tap into to rewire and refire the habitual ways that we think about aging. Think about aging and yeah, so I believe play is a key to live in our best life.
Speaker 3:Here's the thing is that when we're born, it's natural as babies we learn Everything that we learn to do as a baby we do through experimentation and play. That's how we learn to walk, that's how we learn to talk. Babies do baby talk. They make the funny noises, right, and it's just. It's just for fun. But what's happening is they're learning the whole time and there's nobody, there's no teacher there standing at the front of the classroom for them saying you know, repeat that, repeat that.
Speaker 2:Because they can't. No, it's just natural.
Speaker 3:That's how we're wired and animals are wired the same way. That is how we learn and fire all these synapses in our little brain and all of our little chemistry going on in here. Is it just happens? It's like it's kind of magical, you know. And then as we get older, our parents, our teachers, they start to try to keep us safe. Understandably, it's a big, scary world right. And they start to say, hey, it's time to toe the line, it's time to grow up, it's time to get your work done. You need to sit now, you need to focus, you need to do all the right things. And so we start to go down that road. You got to be productive and the thing is, is we let go of the playfulness and just go? That's not valuable anymore.
Speaker 1:Do you think that we even realize that we let go of the playfulness?
Speaker 3:I think it sneaks up on us. I think it snuck up on me. I am a recovering perfectionist. I'm a person who will go, go, go. I've always been that way. I mean, my mom used to say you're burning the candle at both ends and I'd say, well, I operate better that way.
Speaker 3:You're reading off the list of things there and I do operate better when I have more things to do. But what I've come to realize is that I wear busyness as a badge of honor too. If somebody asks me how I'm doing what I'm doing, I'm like, oh busy, I'm busy, busy, I'm busy, and it is this badge of honor. And I started thinking as I started embracing meditation more. What about just being me, that's in there to exist and to have some fun? What about that? What about following our impulses?
Speaker 1:Well, I think there comes a time at least for me, I don't know about everybody else where you start to understand that you kind of really like who you are as a person and you don't feel like you have anything to prove. And I think that when you play and we'll kind of get into some ideas for that that you're not thinking about what's due tomorrow, you're not thinking about paying a bill. When you play, your mind is at rest and it's kind of like you're just having fun. You know it's, it's, it's the equivalent for me of going to like Disney world.
Speaker 1:I'm the biggest kid there is. I'm pulling my husband Come on, hurry, come on. But you know that play that you, you know you're never too old to have fun. And I think that it's just important for you know, for us to realize that it doesn't have to be a big deal, but that those moments where you can just sit still and just be or maybe look out the window, you cannot be mad, upset or think about anything. When you're looking at nature, when you're watching animals play, I dare you anybody listening try it. Watch puppies play, I swear you can't be mad or upset at that.
Speaker 3:That's why I'm always sending you silly dog videos, Kat.
Speaker 1:You always do so, yvonne. When a lot of people, especially adults, think about play, they think about playing as in children, but when we think about us as adults, is it the same thing as it would be for a child or is it different?
Speaker 3:Well, here's the thing I want to go back to one of the other things that I'm very much about with what I'm talking about around the idea of aging, and that's internalized ageism. We have been fed in our culture a whole lot of myths and negative perceptions of what aging is and what that looks like. Becca Levy wrote a book. Dr Becca Levy wrote a book called Breaking the Age Code, and I want to read a quote from it how people thought about she did studies and these studies have been replicated hundreds of times, by the way but how people thought and approached the idea of're thinking about what it means to age. She also found through studies that if she would prime people in the studies with negative the negative myths and biases around age, they had a whole procedure for this very scientific and biases around age.
Speaker 3:They had a whole procedure for this very scientific and so they would prime people to show them some words on a screen that went by too fast for them to actually identify and then they would talk to them about. They would put them through tests on the next end of that test. So people would walk more slowly. I mean really Like it affects how fast you're walking, it would affect their ability to solve puzzles or test taking ability, different things like that because you have primed yourself. So my thought here is and when I read her book I find oh, that is the evidence that I need for play being something. It's the opposite way of priming yourself, it's priming yourself. I recommend for people to prime themselves with examples of people who are aging with vitality. Fill your worldview with examples of people who inspire you and fill your daily experience with the things that make you happy. Daily experience with the things that make you happy, because why not?
Speaker 1:Why not? Exactly why not? I think we just have to. I think it's more of a. I agree exactly with what you were saying, but sometimes we, we, we not only forget to play, we forget how. Yeah, what is it now? What is play?
Speaker 3:What is play? So there's a difference in play between what we do when we're kids and what we do as adults. So, as children, play is unplanned, spontaneous. There is no purpose to it, there are no rules, it is just just. Let's just make this up, sit with the two-year-old, sit with the three-year-old. There is nothing. They will surprise you, right, as we age. Instead of it being unplanned, we plan it.
Speaker 3:We feel guilty, even if we've planned and set aside time to play. I don't know about you, I do, and that is something that it's a journey that I'm on to try to break myself of those habits, that habitual thinking of, oh, I should be doing something productive. The other difference for adults in play is that it's structured and it's competitive. Oh well, if you're playing a sport or you're playing something competitive, that seems to be okay. As an adult, it's also skills-based and productive. So as long as you're learning something, then okay, because there's this idea that we have that it's self-indulgent and that it's a waste of time when it is completely essential. And if we can convince ourselves that play is essential to our health, then maybe we stop feeling guilty about it, then maybe we start doing it more, maybe we stop feeling guilty about it, then maybe we start doing it more.
Speaker 1:I think, when we, you know, when I think about playful, it's those things that brought me such joy as a kid when I think, and that is that a place where people could start those things that you know that you really like to do. For instance, I love to play jacks and I love to roller skate, and those are two things that I really want to incorporate back. But even getting on the floor and you know, playing with your grandkids, you know they're like come on, nana, get on the floor, you know, and even something like that, you realize that there's so it's so encompassing. You just get all involved with it and all of a sudden afterwards you go, wow, I've had such a good time. So where do people start when they're you know, they think I need to incorporate some of this in my life, but I don't know where to start. Where do you start with this? How do you start to get some play?
Speaker 3:I say start making a list. Just get yourself a blank piece of paper and start making a list of the things that you do, that you enjoy, where time seems to slip by you and all of a sudden you're like, wow, what just happened? Ooh, write that down. Write that down. I call that making a playlist like a music playlist, which I also just happened. Ooh, write that down. Write that down. I call that making a playlist like a music playlist, which I also recommend, by the way. I recommend having your own feeling good playlist. I have one and I turn that on and every single time those songs come on it is like a home run man. I put it on in the morning while I'm making my breakfast, I'm dancing in the kitchen. My husband comes in and he's like okay, because I've got earbuds in.
Speaker 2:He can't hear. He's like what are you listening to?
Speaker 3:But it really gets my day going, you know. So make a playlist of the things that you enjoy, that you can tap into. If you like to take little dance breaks, if that is something that makes you feel good too, put that on your list. If doing certain kinds of exercise activities, you know, and when I say exercise I mean playful exercise, not the working out kind that you may feel like you know, but for me, roller skating, for me that's playful, I do it and it is exercise, but it is also just play. Paddleboarding for me is complete like oh man, I get so relaxed when I'm on my paddleboard, you know.
Speaker 1:I think also it's not. You know, when you're working out, you think about oh, I'm burning calories, I'm doing this, you know, get my heart rate up, et cetera. But when you do something like roller skating and I can vouch for what Yvonne is saying when I put my roller skates on afterwards I just go oh, so much fun. That's all I can think about. It was so much. I wasn't thinking about squat. Okay, Actually I can't think about squat cause I'll fall. I'm just going to say, however, it's when you get to that point where you you said, wow, that was such a good time swinging, I can't go buy a swing set. I love swings.
Speaker 3:I love getting on the swing.
Speaker 3:I mean, just those types of things are just yeah, if you live close to water and you like to go for a walk on the beach or if you just like to get out and walk, for me I go and I call that play. You know, it's not what you would think of as traditional play, but getting out it's different than getting on a treadmill in my house and walk, walk, walk, walk, walking. Getting outside and kind of exploring, I'll stop, I'll take pictures of flowers. It's, it's, you know, it's just breathe. Today I was passing honeysuckle bushes and the smell was like oh, it always reminds me of my grandma.
Speaker 3:Just awesome stuff like that. If you like to draw and even if you're not good at drawing, good at it, doodling different things like that If you like to color, if you like to watercolor, start making the list and then, the more you can make lists of little things that you can do that are small little activities that are quick and free, then if you're in the middle of your workday and you start to feel anxious or tired or frustrated, notice that and you can take a break. You can take a break, it's okay, and look for something on your list that's accessible and it calls to you in the moment.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I have a dance list too, and I've been caught a couple of times by my husband because he loves sneaking up on me you know, and he'll just sit there and watch me and I turn around. I'm like, oh crap, how long have you been standing there? I think the other thing I love I loved as a kid was was um coloring, coloring books, and I love the smell of Crayola crayons.
Speaker 3:Play-Doh. Do you love the smell of Play-Doh? I love the smell of Play-Doh too.
Speaker 1:Just squishing it in your hand like this. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Get yourself some Play-Doh.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so those types of things are just. You know, I'm going to buy me some coloring books. I don't know if I can find Crayola crayons, but if I can, I'm going to color the old fashioned way. I don't want it to be pretty, I'm just going to color the lines and everything. I don't care. So, yvonne, how can people integrate playful activities into their daily routine without feeling like it's an added burden, like, oh well, time to play.
Speaker 3:I got to do this. Yeah, you know, I thought about going skating this morning and I wasn't feeling it and I didn't. I just didn't go skating, so I went for a walk instead and I thought okay, and I and I was like, oh, there's some research I want to do. I was actually reviewing, um, listening to Becca Levy's book breaking the code uh, breaking the age code and so I knew I wanted to listen to that while I was walking. But you know what?
Speaker 2:I had my Feeling Good playlist on and good songs kept rolling up and I was like I'm going with the good feeling songs for a little bit, man.
Speaker 3:So I walked, I listened to my music, it was great. And then I got to the point where I was like, oh okay, now I'm done, now let me start that book, let's get into that and start doing the research. And so I'm walking and working at the same time. Think about how you can elevate your experience when you're working to. You can call it multitasking, maybe, but I like to. Yeah, I was multitasking, but I did the fun part first, maybe. Think of it as like having your dessert first.
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, yes please.
Speaker 3:Yes, please, right, ice cream cat, put a timer on and let yourself do whatever it is that you feel like doing, even if that's just sitting and being quiet for a few minutes and looking out your window.
Speaker 1:I did that today. I sat in my car. I had a few minutes before a client and I was just sitting in my car and I had the radio on. I turned the radio off and then I started noticing all the trees, I started noticing flowers, and it was just this very, very I don't know what to call it very serene moment. And again, when you notice stuff like that you can't think about oh, I got to go do this, I got to go do that, I got to sit here. It was just, oh, wow, look at that and I think that's important. So how can okay, here's a question Does playing or incorporating play? How does that enhance creativity and productivity in our personal and professional life?
Speaker 3:So there have been studies done that show. You know, really, essentially, I think the question you're asking here is why is play important? Here's the thing. So we have approximately 60,000 thoughts a day and 80% of those are negative and 95% of them are repetitive.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's why I'm tired.
Speaker 3:Exhausted right, and so much of the time we just don't even know that what we're thinking, we don't stop to pay attention to what we're thinking. We're being run by an automatic computer program that is based on things that we decided about ourselves and the world when we were young, and so those things go and go and go on, repeat ad nauseum, and what play allows you to do is interrupt the cycle and rewire the connections, like, if you can, if there's something that you want to learn and this is where it gets back to my idea of letting yourself be a beginner at something If there's something that you have always wanted to learn how to do. I don't have it here with me right now, but I am learning the ukulele.
Speaker 2:It's a very silly little instrument but it makes me happy to hear it and I'm not any good yet at all.
Speaker 3:And I pick it up and play, and I play a little bit every day, but I try to approach even now that goes into that structured skills based stuff right when it's like, okay, now we're getting into structured skill based play, but it's still fun for me, so it's like finding that activity that makes you learn something new, that gets new neurotransmitters connecting and learning things, and when you get into that creative zone you're relieving stress and it does help you to be more creative. So it's going to help you with creative problem solving. When you release that stress, it is really good for you Absolutely.
Speaker 1:You know, I also realized, you know, a while ago, realized a while ago, that for anyone who's and this could be anything it's a problem that's personal, it's a problem at work, it's something you're trying to figure out, and what I would do is I would get up and I said I'm just going to go for a walk. And I would go for a walk and I'm walking, and I'm walking, all of a sudden, by the end of my walk, I'm like, yep, that's what I'm going to do. I just solved the problem, because it takes all that excess, whatever is up here, and it's almost like it's fog or smog, and and when you and that's saying when you exercise, it happens when you exercise too, but when you play, it's like that residue just leaves, and then, whatever it is you're trying to figure out, it's like it's like right in front of your face. You're like, oh, yeah, of course, that's what it should have been, yeah, so I think it's super important.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and when you go to sleep at night, if you, if you can approach something that has maybe been stumping you, you know, as some sort of a problem, where you like and at the end of the night maybe ask yourself a question about that thing, that has that doesn't say, oh, why am I, you know, why does this always happen to me? That has, if you can reframe your question about the problem and ask like, how can I, how might, how could I figure this out, how could I do this thing that I want to see happen? And just ask the question and let go of it and go to sleep. Why wake up in the morning?
Speaker 1:Why are people so hesitant to even? I mean, do they just forget how to play? Or I feel like there's always this pushback like, oh, I'm too old, I'm too something, I can't, I'm too busy. Are those the types of things that you hear a lot?
Speaker 3:of busy. Are those the types of things that you hear a lot of? I think we have the voices of our parents and our teachers in our heads and eventually that turns into our bosses and the people around us. It's funny I have this podcast that I do, and I started it purely as a passion project because I wanted to talk about getting out of the midlife funk, how to break through this feeling that we tend to get.
Speaker 3:In midlife, there's actually a natural you shape of happiness that goes from when we're pretty happy to when we're generally speaking, there's a level of happiness and as we get into our forties, that starts to dip into a you and then we come out of it. A lot of people think that older people there's a misconception that old people are depressed. It's not really true. Old people tend to be happier. But we hit this midlife thing and it can feel like a crisis and I like to call it an awakening. I think that we are naturally predisposed to start getting in touch with everything that's been there the whole time, all the things that we told that little version of ourselves who wanted to do things. We've been telling them no, no, no, no, no. That's not okay for so long, and when we get to midlife, I think there's something inside us that says hey, wait a minute. I've been doing this and this and this and all the things that people told me to do my whole life, and I'm not happy. So what the heck?
Speaker 1:So we rebel, yet again rebelling.
Speaker 2:Oh yes.
Speaker 3:Yes, I love that they say menopause is like another puberty, right, they're like the hormonal changes that are going on. There's hormonal changes going on for men too and, yeah, maybe we're going through a little second rebellion in midlife.
Speaker 1:I kind of like thinking about that. It's like I'm not doing this anymore. I'm going to do this. You just get to this point where you're like you need something different the whole humdrum. I used to say to my husband all the time I feel like I'm in the matrix when we're going day to day, before we go forward. I want to do a small reset. So we're going to have just a little quick commercial and then we'll be back and we're back. So let's do a little reset.
Speaker 1:If you are just joining us, I am the freaking fabulous Cat Cortado and this is the Revitalize your Midlife Symposium. If you have questions for Yvonne, ask them in the chat, because we'll take a minute or two and answer questions. If you have any questions about playing, how to incorporate play into your life, and so, yvonne, when we are thinking about it because I think that's where it starts is what can I do? You know thinking about those things and I think I loved your answer about, you know, making a playlist, not so much music, but just. Oh, I feel like doing this today. But what if someone is really struggling on when to play that time factor? Is that a thing too? For that? That kind of stopped people from playing.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, it is. I think it's important to take a look at our schedules and build in the time for play, and it can be like. The nice thing about having that playlist is that if you think about it at any point in the time you're working, you can take a little break here and there. That is something that is accessible to anybody, even if they have a really busy schedule. And if you just take five minutes and give yourself time to breathe, or send somebody a stupid dog video, send something funny to your friends, send a funny little text, something to break up this, this, go, go, go, we just we have just built ourselves up around this idea of having to be productive all the time, idea of having to be productive all the time, and I think it really is letting yourself embrace the idea that it's important to your health. Oh, I need to change something, right? Do you find that your clients, that you have clients that come to you because something extreme has happened in their life and they're like I have got to start exercising?
Speaker 1:Their bodies are breaking down, yvonne, because of the constant stress, the constant go, go, go. And they say, oh well, you know, I am getting older. I'm like, no, no, how about laughing? How about? You know, I, I love baby elephants, I love puppies, you know, and I'll just, I'll go on Instagram and I just start. I'm like, oh, that's so cute, you know, and Yvonne will send me stuff, just anything where you take that break for just a minute, and I think we're so afraid of doing that. But if you don't, it's good. It's detrimental to your brain, it's detrimental to your body and it's detrimental to your health. I'm just going to put it there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there, if you could think of it as, um, this whole idea around play, being self-indulgent or, you know, feeling guilty about play. It is tied to the work ethic that we've all been brought up to admire in people. We want to be seen as people in society that are making a difference, that are moving the needle, that are, you know, put in your cliche here, and what that is is. It's just our egos at work to keep us looking good to other people. Start to feel like your opinion of yourself matters more. How you feel matters more than what other people think of you. Some of it's about learning how to draw boundaries and create that time for yourself. Are you somebody who is always saying yes to other people, to things that need to get done? If you're saying yes to something, you're saying no to something on the other end.
Speaker 1:Oh, I think we're connected, Yvonne, because I was just thinking that same thing, just as you were saying it.
Speaker 3:You know we're connected.
Speaker 1:Do you want to answer a couple questions? Yeah, sure, do you want to answer a couple questions? Yeah, sure, all right, so.
Speaker 3:Linda Bonnie says how can we start small with play if we feel like we have no time in our day? Put that playlist together, linda. Take a little bit of time and leave it out. Leave your playlist out on your desk somewhere so that if something strikes you in a little aha moment you can add to your list or have it in a document. I keep like 50 something tabs open in my computer.
Speaker 1:So I'll have a Google Doc. She does. I can vouch for that.
Speaker 2:That's true Squirrel.
Speaker 3:This is how my brain works, but I'll keep that open, you know, or keep the piece of paper open and have it there and think what's free, what makes me feel good? And if you notice yourself, like sometimes you know I'm making breakfast in the morning and we have Eastern facing windows in our kitchen and on those sunny days the sun just streams in, I mean, it's blinding. And sometimes I'll just stand there for 30 seconds or a minute just letting the sun come in through my closed eyelids and just feeling bathed by the warmth of the sun. I call that a moment of playfulness, because what I've done is I've just taken a moment from my prep for the day, from getting the breakfast ready, to just sit and appreciate something. What was it Debbie talked about yesterday was vitamin G. Yes, gratitude. Take a moment Whenever you get like.
Speaker 3:Sometimes joyfulness can kind of sneak up on you. You know, and I do believe we can cultivate joy in any moment, even when things are rough. I think we can find something, you know, some bit of beauty in the world to admire, some feeling, some warmth. Somebody touches you, somebody reaches out with a text and calls you. If you can start tuning in to the little things that happen by happenstance, that make you feel good, and write it down and then try to start being intentional about adding more of those little moments to your day. I think that's the way to sneak it in throughout the day. And here's the thing, kat.
Speaker 3:Part of my challenge to myself this year is to keep being productive, but also change my mental attitude towards the things that I have on my to-do list, so that I'm looking at it going. You know what? How can I make this more fun? It's like just a second ago, I said how can you, you know, go to sleep at night and ask yourself a question? How can I, you know, if you can ask yourself an implicit question that assumes that you've got the answer, on the other end, that you're that this person inside actually knows the answers, inside actually knows the answers If you can ask yourself, how can I? This is what I've been doing, because I'm working on how I talk to myself about money how can I make making money fun? How can I make making money fun? I think there must be a way. Oh, there is a way, and here's the thing. I do it a lot of the times. I'm a photographer.
Speaker 2:I love doing photography, taking photos of people is fun for me.
Speaker 3:You know not everything about it is fun.
Speaker 2:I still have to pay sales tax. Right, I gotta send out contracts, I gotta do the parts of the business that are like but the actual photo, part of it, the connection with people is fun.
Speaker 3:I hope I answered that I think they're.
Speaker 1:one of the things I just realized is my dog will sit here and kind of whine at me and he wants me to play with him, and so I'll just get up and we'll take five minutes of well, probably three minutes because he's older. But just play with him. It's a disruptor, it's a way to get up and just get out of that, whatever that zone you're in. And I know that Donna had a question of why play is so challenging for entrepreneurs. So challenging for entrepreneurs.
Speaker 2:It's challenging because we're the what is it? The chief bottle washer, the cook, chief cook and bottle washer. Thank you. I always say that it's like I grew up not speaking English, even though I did but I always get sayings wrong.
Speaker 3:So thank you for that, because we're trying to do all the things and we're not good at all the things. I'm good at photography, but I struggle with the business side of making a business run. I love doing the podcast, but I also have to market the podcast right. So there's a lot of things that we have to do as entrepreneurs and especially for solopreneurs. I think that's why it's hard. But the other thing that we need to remind ourselves when we are entrepreneurs is that we chose this. Nobody said go be an entrepreneur. So if we can change the I have to do this thing to the I get to do this thing. And you always talk about tapping into your why cat, remembering your why. If you can tap into why you're doing things and ask yourself okay, well, I have to do this thing or I get to do this thing that I don't totally like to do.
Speaker 2:But it needs to get done because I want to get to this other part. What if?
Speaker 3:we ask yourself what's the most fun way I can do this? I don't like to pay bills, so sometimes when I'm sorting through the mail and having to get myself organized, I'll put on my favorite music and I elevate the experience of having to do the thing right. So wherever you can pair up something that you like with something that you don't like, maybe that's one way to incorporate play.
Speaker 1:I have to tell you that when Debbie was talking about vitamin G and the gratitude, I don't call it gratitude, I call it what didn't suck today. That's what I call it, and I'm like, oh, because gratitude, it's like I'm searching. I'm like, oh, and what didn't suck today? Oh, this, this, this, this, this, okay, done. It just makes sense to me when I say it like that. So I think we had another question. Oh, jill had asked what's your go-to positive talk when feeling guilty about being playful.
Speaker 3:I don't know that I have a go-to talk about, you know, like a mantra around it, other than to say there is something that I put on my wall recently which is own it, and that means I'm going to own everything in my life, and that means I'm going to own how I feel, and that means I'm going to own how I feel. And if you're going to own how you feel, then you need to build into your daily existence the things that you love. So that's a way of owning it. So maybe that's helpful. I don't know if that resonates for anybody else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think you have to find a saying that you know or something that resonates with you, like you know what didn't suck today, that that just speaks to me when I say that. But also, you had talked about your why, and your why has to be so strong that when you're like I'm done with this, and then you read your why and you go, oh yeah, okay, let's do this. You know your why has to go. Oh yeah, okay, let's do this. Your why has to be super strong. And being an entrepreneur is lonely. But when we're working and then we come home and you get up and you go to get dressed, you go to work, you come home, you eat dinner, you go to bed and it's that I'm in the matrix. You're just Groundhog Day Like this. That too, that too.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we have to interrupt the Groundhog Day effect and the more we can do that, the more we win. When you start to do things for yourself that make you feel good, you start to see new possibilities in front of you. It changes everything because all of a sudden you're feeling good. Think about it. If you are just going and doing the next task and focusing and getting it all done, getting it all done, getting it all done, you start to go down this ditch of have-tos and it starts to make you feel heavy. If you can give yourself lightness, give yourself moments in the day, every day, of just a little here and there, sprinkle it.
Speaker 2:Think of it like sprinkling bubbles or fairy dust or something. You know what I mean, which sounds ridiculous. I know anybody who's like a serious person is going to be like she's just nuts. But whatever, I'm 56. I'm almost 56 years old. I'm sprinkling fairy dust.
Speaker 1:Hey, I'm sprinkling it everywhere.
Speaker 1:I think, also what what I like to do is sometimes put on something funny. It might be just something where I'm just going to laugh, you know, and, and and it lightens my mood when I laugh and I love to laugh, and so I think when we think of these little things, and it might take you a minute and you might have two or three things and then you think, oh yeah, I forgot about this one. You know, write down that list and have it handy. I wanted to talk a little bit about as we get older I've read studies and you can verify this that you know, it's harder for us to make friends. Okay, so sometimes you're like, oh, let's go do this. You're like, well, some people are like, well, I don't want to do it by myself, I want to go with somebody. So how important is it to involve your family or friends in your playful activities, or is it?
Speaker 3:I think that probably varies from person to person, depending on whether or not they tend towards being an extrovert or an introvert. I'm I am what I call an ambivert, so I kind of need both. I need, I do. I do thrive in certain social interactions, mostly one-to-one social interactions for me, that's where I thrive. In larger group situations not so much so when somebody invites me to a big group thing, I'm always kind of like, okay, and then I'll get there, and sometimes I'll have you know. Sometimes it's like, oh, that was so much fun, I had a great time. But then I need time to myself, like I love walking by myself.
Speaker 3:I'm not lonely Me too as long as you're doing things and you just have to. I think we have lost the ability to connect with ourselves, to even notice how we're feeling. We have been trained into treating ourselves like robots and we are not robots. We, you know. There's days of the week where I will have like an uber productive day and at the end of the day I'm like dang girl girl.
Speaker 2:Yeah baby, I got it all done. Then there's days where I'm like, oh, it was like walking through water all day, or I finished the day and I'm like I don't even know what I did. I know-.
Speaker 1:What did I do Exactly?
Speaker 2:If I'm the duck on the water. My little feet were going like this under the water the whole time, but I didn't go anywhere.
Speaker 1:I know you're like oh, it's not going anywhere. I've definitely had days like that.
Speaker 3:You know there are days when I just you know, I think it was Friday I realized that you know, I have been, you know, because a lot of photography work ends up on the weekends, different things like that and I thought, you know what? I have not really taken a day off recently, a real day off, and I had a few things to do in the morning Friday, and then I thought to myself I am not doing any of the things that are on my to-do list today and I'll get back to it tomorrow. You put down a boom gate. I did, and here's the thing I've designed my life so that I can do that. I don't have a regular job where I report to somebody else, where things have to get done, like if it was a Friday, I couldn't just be like, hey boss, I'm out, see ya, you know, but I did, I talked to myself, I'm the boss, and I said, hey boss, I'm out, see ya, I'll be back tomorrow.
Speaker 3:So I did work on Saturday. I got stuff done on Saturday, you know, but I knew that I'm getting better about recognizing when I need a break, and I think that's about giving yourself. It's like training yourself, it's like giving yourself a little bit of time for quiet journaling, meditation, walks, whatever it is that works for you to just turn off your phone. For you to just turn off your phone, get away from the screens, get away from your laptop and your computer and just let yourself be, so that you can start to notice how you feel. And then you'll start to notice how you feel when you're in the middle of doing things, and then you'll start to notice oh, I'm really enjoying doing this. Oh, let me put that on my playlist Because, even if it's work, maybe it's fun, maybe your work is actually play. How about that concept?
Speaker 1:How about that Right Next?
Speaker 2:level.
Speaker 1:I think it's interesting when you were talking about you know, hey, I've talked to the boss, I'm the boss, you know, and I I. It reminded me of something that says you know, if you see me talking to myself, I'm having a team meeting. I'm like, yeah, that's, that sounds correct. But also in taking you know, when you say take time for yourself, I have. You know, I'm going to talk about my Catitude Day, so my Catitude Days are Sundays. Catitude Day means I get to do whatever I want to do when I want to do it. My husband knows about Catitude Day. He's like, hey, can you and I go? Maybe I might get to it, I might not. You know there are one-offs where there are things that I need to do but it's important to you know, even get your family involved, like a certain time is is is your time. You're like, oh, mommy's in mommy's in her office, or mommy's doing whatever, daddy's doing whatever you know, and and taking that time for yourself, cause you know what's going to happen, you're going to be more productive.
Speaker 1:And I started taking time off of you know, going to the studio every day, and at first I didn't. I was like, is this really making a change. And then, when I was super productive on Monday, like you remember, you said you had those days when you're just like, boom, you're getting it done. I'm like, oh, this is really happening, this is, this is good. Okay, I get it. So I definitely understand. You got to give your body time to catch up to you, because I see so many clients where their head is here and their body's here and I'll say how's your body feeling? They're like, oh, okay, they don't even know. Are you sure? Right? Yes, awareness.
Speaker 3:Awareness. You have to start with awareness. That is the first step You've got. I'm shitting. I'm shitting on myself and other people right now.
Speaker 3:But I really do think you should. It's just essential You've got to make some time for you to get to know what's happening in here so that you can notice some of your 60,000 thoughts, notice which ones are on repeat. Your 60,000 thoughts. Notice which ones are on repeat. Notice whether or not they actually serve you. And by serving you I mean, do they make you feel good? Because if they're not making you feel good, then that's something to look at and go oh, that thought doesn't feel good. Well, is that thought even true? When you start to ask yourself if your thoughts are true, you're going to be able to poke all kinds of holes in your beliefs. I think Linda said I think I know there's not much room for play when we're focused on our getting it all done mode, when we get into that mode of getting it all done. So here's the thing question whether or not all those things on your list even need to get done.
Speaker 2:A lot of times when you do nothing, things resolve themselves right?
Speaker 3:Or does it need to happen today? Maybe it doesn't need to happen today, maybe that's just goes into the maybe later pile, you know yeah. Into the maybe later pile, you know yeah.
Speaker 2:So pick, pick one, or two for today, and everything else is kind of like maybe you know, yeah, so this has been.
Speaker 1:I love talking about this with you. You know it's, it's so much fun and you know, yvonne is one of those people that she puts. And you know Yvonne is one of those people that she puts, she's living this, you guys. Okay, she's, she's putting, she's experimenting on herself with play. But I want to thank you so much, yvonne, for being here. It's always so much fun having you on and and I hope you had a good time too.
Speaker 3:I did have a good time. I always love hanging out with you, Kat, and I have to say that when we took the little break and you played all the things I saw the things that are coming up for the rest of the week. I was like Ooh, Ooh, Ooh, menopause, We've got Dr Lakeisha coming.
Speaker 2:Ooh brain gut microbiome Sleep, oh my goodness.
Speaker 3:So I'm so excited for the rest of the week.
Speaker 1:We've got some juicy things coming up. So, speaking of tomorrow, day five, we're going to have Dr Lakeisha on talk about perimenopause and menopause, so you may think that you know everything. This woman is so well-versed in what she teaches people and we've talked a few times about perimenopause and menopause and she's just, she's fun y'all. I hope you tune in, bring your questions if you have any, and also, if you go to smallspacepilatescom, backslash, revitalize. All the speakers are there and if you click on their picture you'll go right to their website and you can find out even more about them and what they've got going on, what's happening and see if you want to be in their world. Yvonne's got some great things happening and I want to thank everybody for being here today and I hope that you will join us tomorrow. And, yvonne, again, thank you, my dear, for being here.
Speaker 3:I just want to say you are a rock star.
Speaker 1:Thank you my love. No-transcript.