With Elena Lipson, founder of the Divine Self-Care Circle Membership and the top rated, Meditations & Musings Podcast. Join us for this powerful conversation about how to slow down and get centered during these intense, unprecedented times.

If you are feeling off-center, or out of balance, learn ways that you can create greater awareness and alignment in your life, and put the practice of self-care front and center as the daily anchor to keep yourself on track.

Elena invites listeners into the experience of being fully present for themselves in order to create more intentional, more fully expressed lives. We discuss the importance of grace, flexibility, awareness, healing, and having a practice that fits for you.

What does it take to be more joyful? To be more deeply compassionate? To process our anger in healthy ways? Elena shares insights on addressing generational healing within families, the influence of the collective conscience, and important questions to ask ourselves in the context of current political and societal dynamics, which overlays so much of life currently.

Finally, we discuss what “doing the work” really means, and the power of going within to shift and transform our relationships around difficult conversations and dynamics related to others, and how to transform anger and discover the underlying issues that are at the heart of so much. More than anything, the responsibility is ours to do the work, and Elena will provide you with so many tips and tools for the journey!

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Biggest takeaways (or quotes) you don’t want to miss:

• The importance of having a practice that sustains us from day to day, but especially during times of crisis.
• How to reach new levels of compassion.
• The importance of being playful and flexible when exploring establishing a daily practice.

Check out these highlights:

3:00 The funny way that Elena and I met.

15:13 Why it’s so important to have structure in place before shit hits the fan.

15:38 Elena, on “Who enters my circle and why?” Listen to her walk through her  H.O.M.E. acronym.

21:17 We always have stress. … But if we have to prioritize self care in times of stress, how do we set the tone for the day, for ourselves, our family, the environment?

25:38 “If you tell me that you don’t have the time, I hear you, but do YOU hear you? You don’t have 3 minutes? 5 minutes?” If you don’t have the time to create a daily practice / anchor, something else is going on here.

26:30 All the ways you can do it. 🙂 [This part is brilliant!]

32:49 “When you heal yourself, you heal generations forwards. And when you do the work, you heal generations back.” …. How to reach a greater level of compassion.

42:23 The willingness to be uncomfortable is essential (to doing the work).

49.30 If you can move that anger, underneath it is always a real sadness … (that has gone unloved, or gone unexpressed).

54:53 Any time you are changing anything about your day, you are going to be bumping up against unconscious patterns, which are a force to be reckoned with.

How to get in touch with Elena:

On social media:

https://www.instagram.com/elena_lipson/

https://www.facebook.com/divineselfcarementor/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/elenalipson/

FREE GIFT FOR LISTENERS:

Head on over to Elena’s website here or grab here workbook here. 

Elena Lipson is the founder of the Divine Self-Care Circle Membership and the top rated, Meditations & Musings Podcast.

As a retreat leader, speaker, writer, Inner Self-Care Coach and podcaster, Elena loves to work with busy women and inspire them to drop the False Agreements ™ and redefine the hustle in exchange for creating a life they love with her Feminine Metrics of Success™ : Pleasure, Play, Ease, Grace and Trusting Your Own Pace.

Through her speaking, writing, retreats, and online programs, Elena wants to help busy women drop the hurry mindset and become the #1 asset in life, business, and the bedroom.

Elena Lipson has lived in Russia, NYC, California and today happily enjoys the green trees and fresh air of the Pacific Northwest with her husband and son.

Signature Offerings include: The Divine Self-Care Circle, 66 Sacred Rituals, The Meditations & Musings Podcast You can find Elena’s writing in Tiny Buddha, Huffington Post, Business Rocks Magazine, Business Heroine Magazine, and Coco Eco Magazine. Visit Elena online here: www.elenalipson.com

You can also check out her 2021 Divinely Aligned Circle here. 

Imperfect Show Notes

We are happy to offer these imperfect show notes to make this podcast more accessible to those who are hearing impaired or those who prefer reading over listening. While we would love to offer more polished show notes, we are currently offering an automated transcription (which likely includes errors, but hopefully will still deliver great value), below. 

GGGB Intro 0:00
Here’s what to expect today.

Elena Lipson 0:02
Where to go. I like it’s constant fight, flight or freeze. It just is because we know intellectually that there is a danger out there. We know intellectually that there are people suffering, we know intellectually that it’s not business as usual. And so we have to figure out how to function within that we have to especially those of us, who are committed to personal development committed to inspiring others committed to helping us so it’s such a natural part of our DNA. We really have to come to our own center and say, how are we going to show up now?

GGGB Intro 0:39
The adventure of entrepreneurship and building a life and business you love, preferably at the same time is not for the faint of heart. That’s why Heather Pearce Campbell is bringing you a dose of guts, grit and great business stories that will inspire and motivate you to create what you want in your business and life. Welcome to the Guts, Grit and Great Business podcast where endurance is required. Now, here’s your host, The Legal Website Warrior®, Heather Pearce Campbell.

Heather Pearce Campbell 1:07
Hello and welcome. I am Heather Pearce Campbell, The Legal Website Warrior®. I am an attorney and legal coach based here in Seattle, Washington. Welcome to another episode of Guts, Grit, and Great Business. So today, I’m so excited to have my friend and somebody I really admire Elena Lipson on with us today. Welcome, Elena.

Elena Lipson 1:31
Thank you. I admire you too. And I wish we had lived up just a little bit closer. I know far enough away where it’s hard to get together. But

Heather Pearce Campbell 1:40
Yes, I’m so happy.

Elena Lipson 1:41
I’m so happy to be on your podcast and congratulations.

Heather Pearce Campbell 1:44
Thank you. Well, it’s so good to see you. For those listening, you’ll hear Elena but I will also be publishing the video interview series on my YouTube channel. So Elena and my story, we go back a few years, Elena was one of my early clients when I actually launched the Legal Website Warrior. And she is a fellow entrepreneur in the online space. She does amazing work and the fun story was actually about how we met I had a workshop like a weekend retreat that I signed up for an Atlanta and I ended up being like, what do we call ourselves bed buddies roommates.

Elena Lipson 2:20
It was like it was this funny moment where you know you go on retreat and I hadn’t done any local retreats in a while I attended I hosted retreats. And it was so interesting because you sort of go thinking you’ll have your own bed and your own room so okay, we’re gonna share the room but then bed to which I was so thankful it was you because we just had the best time laughing and I think it was more of like a personal us retreat weekend. Besides the yoga and other stuff we you know, really value our walks together and chatting and getting to know you. It was really fun. I’m glad I had that little bit of intuitive nudge to say, like, go find a retreat locally. And then it was just perfect timing. 

Heather Pearce Campbell 3:02
Oh my gosh, it was so fun. I know. So I remember obviously so much about getting to know you our mutual friend Gina who led the retreat and that’s about it. Honestly. 

Elena Lipson 3:14
Like I remember being in bed together and talking and laughing. I remember walking a lot. Thinking we should go to bed sleep.

Heather Pearce Campbell 3:20
No, I know. So it was really fun. But that was definitely like, there are times that I go to an event and I’m really clear like oh, I was here to meet a specific person right and for that event with you. So that was super fun. But for those of you listening, let’s get to know Elena a little better. She is the founder of the Divine Self Care circle membership and the top-rated meditations and musings podcast. Congratulations on that Elena. As a retreat leader, speaker, writer, inner self care coach and podcaster Elena loves to work with busy women and inspire them to drop the false agreements and redefine the hustle and exchange for creating a life they love with her feminine metrics of success, pleasure play, ease grace and trusting your own pace. Through her speaking writing retreats and online programs. Elena wants to help busy women drop the hurry mindset and become the number one asset in life business and the bedroom. Elena has lived in Russia, New York City, California and today happily enjoys the green trees and fresh air of the Pacific Northwest with her husband and son. So she has created the divine self care circle 66 Excuse me. 66 sacred rituals. That’s a tongue twister, the meditations and musing podcast and you can find her writing in tiny Buddha, Huffington Post business rocks magazine, business heroine magazine and Coco Eco magazine. You can find her online at elenalipson.com Elena, welcome. I’m so happy to have you here.

Elena Lipson 5:04
Thank you for that. So that was a mouthful. It’s like that’s a lot of stuff.

Heather Pearce Campbell 5:08
But I love it.

Elena Lipson 5:09
I didn’t like, you know, seven years of work into one, right?

Heather Pearce Campbell 5:13
A couple I Oh, I know. It’s tough to do. But you really I mean, I love what you teach on I love your work. I mean, even our conversation right before we hit the record button, right is like, all about like, how do we get life to slow down right now it’s so so relevant. And I’m sure for folks listening, especially women can relate to being pulled in 89 directions and having childcare issues right now in current circumstances and starting school here shortly, if they haven’t already with children, if they’ve got children at home, if you know if their kids have grown up, or they maybe don’t have children, they could be caretaking. For others, there’s so much that is happening. And on top of that, you know, some of us are running businesses and entrepreneurs. And so talk to me about what you’re seeing. Are you like, how is your own work going right now? Are you feeling a big uptick in women’s indeed, to address this area in their life?

Elena Lipson 6:12
Huge, I think, you know, as fascinating as the whole quarantine and shutdown happen. My actual work, life didn’t really change that much because I transitioned to working for myself from home years ago, back years ago when my son was born. And this is like my third iteration of online business and working from home. And prior to the quarantine, even my son had been homeschooling for three years, so that niggly didn’t change, right, and my husband works shifts, and he’s an essential worker. So he kept working. So like the structure and bones of our life didn’t really change. But of course, it changed, right, because even thinking back to our conversation and how we met and being in person and how just fulfilling that is and having that you know time to be with people that just of course disappears, and the outside world is unstable. And so what I’m seeing a lot of is this, having layers and layers and layers of letting go, how things should be layers of letting go, how we can create in a time where everything feels frantic. And it’s interesting, because even if your household is not chaotic, and it’s not, you know, it’s relatively peaceful, meaning you have resources, and you have work, and you’re sort of figuring it out, there’s still this real external pressure happening to have to choose your politics figure out how to help others how to be awake and aware and informed. And under normal circumstances, I work with women to help them heal and soothe their nervous system and so that they don’t develop or heal from autoimmune and overwhelm and all the stuff that I normally deal with the women, right. So under normal circumstances, whatever normal was for you, your life is already overwhelming and can be over scheduled and have, you know, I help women release and reduce and delete things so that you can actually make space to get present to hear yourself to be in tune with your body wisdom. But now, and even if you don’t have an acute thing happening in your house, even if no one’s sick, even if everything’s fine, even if you have resources, and a lot of people don’t and a lot of people do and everything in the middle right that your nervous system has no where to go like it’s constant fight, flight, fight, flight or freeze. It just is because we know intellectually that there’s a danger out there. We know intellectually that there are people suffering, we know intellectually, that it’s not business as usual. And so we have to figure out how to function within that we have to especially those of us, who are committed to personal development, committed to inspiring others committed to helping us so it’s such a natural part of our DNA, we really have to come to our own center and say, how are we going to show up now and I’ve seen so many different reactions I’ve seen, like, I’m completely done, I’m stepping back, no more social media, I don’t know, I don’t even know what to do with my work. Then other people who have felt more cold call to activism and are really getting out there and just really creating new ways of seeing taking time to listen and taking time to self educate.I feel really strongly too. That, even if you’re not like super head in the sand, and you’re not super activist, there’s still a place for you. And there’s still a place to go deeper within your own work and see what your value is. So and I think that really represents who I’ve been forever, whether I was working in technology or sales or training. My question was always how can I be more of myself and what I’m doing, how can I honor the connection? How can I show up with Without my stuff on me, right, so I can, what i what i call false agreements, which is actually a book in progress. I did because I, you know, it feels like a culmination of the work that I’ve been doing for a long time. And it’s really about learning to remove yourself from what I call false agreements, living by other people’s priorities, other people’s opinions, other people’s approval, other people’s expectations, the people pleasing way that we have been taught, and programmed and conditioned to be so that now when everything’s up in the air, it shows you really quickly how much of your life has been programmed to live for others to do what they think is right. And now more than ever, I feel like my mission is to remind people, especially women who I work with, to create that gap of time between seeing something and not being reactive, not blindly following, not just doing it because you’re scared or not sure. But really coming back into your center, and letting it go through your understanding of how you can show up and what is right for you. Because it’s just I mean, we can get into this whole political thing. And I’m, we can go where we want to go button. And I’m, what I’m seeing a lot right now is a lot of people who are off-center, and off of their own knowing. And so I feel like it’s my podcast and my membership and just my you know, the content I provide every day, that’s really where I’m focused and helping you remember, you do still get to have a voice, you still get to have your intuitive knowing more than you actually really need to tune into that because you really can’t, you can’t serve you can’t be an activist without really understanding why you’re even doing it. Right? Because the second something goes wrong. The second there’s too much pressure, you just crumble under it anyway, because you haven’t created that foundational, deeply rooted, knowing of why you’re doing what you’re doing.

Heather Pearce Campbell 12:06
Well, it’s I mean, there’s so much we could dig into there. For me personally, like my experience during this super intense time, right. And life was still kind of intense before that. I mean, I’ve got a little buddy, you seven just turned eight, the last couple of weeks, my kids have turned eight and three, and they’re, you know, really busy and full. And I did have some built-in childcare several days a week for my daughter. But I work from home, right? There’s a lot of juggling happening around here. And especially in the midst of COVID it has just felt like crazy town most days, honestly, like I laughed because there was a period where literally every day for it felt like months. I was like if I don’t massively FUBAR somebody else’s schedule. Like, I feel like I haven’t done my job today, you know, that was just becoming the norm. And so a couple things that I’ve done, because things have felt out of control. I’ve been totally off balance at times where there’s just more that needs to happen in a day than there is day to do all of those things. And for sure, all at the same time. Right. And so, for me, I started doing something the end of July, because my schedule had been pre-booked for months. But starting end of July, I scheduled one untouchable date week where nothing gets scheduled. I was like, I don’t know how this is gonna go. I don’t know, I haven’t done this before. You know, I read about it in a book, I’m doing it. And so that’s provided a little cushion. But then the other thing that actually just started this week as I kicked off what I called the leap lab, which is just a personal passion project that came to me as an idea that you know, if I’m going to dig in and do the work, which they clearly need to do right now having been in this period of being soft balance, and why don’t I take some other women along for the journey, who may need the same type of thing. But it’s been really interesting, because even only for two days getting up and having the space which I haven’t taken the luxury of giving myself this whole time, right this whole time. It’s been this reactive, you know, kids and meals and family and work and just cramming it all in. And it’s like, I’ve totally been leaving myself out of that picture, which we all know does not make for a sustainable life. And yet like the activation power of putting like the activation energy it requires to put yourself back in the picture. That was a tough hurdle to get over how how do you help women recognize that they’re at that point of needing really clearly to make a shift and doing what it takes to create that. I feel like there’s so many ways we convince ourselves to just stay in, you know, stay in the the rat race or whatever, stay in the chaos because it can just feel like so much and particularly when you talk about these layers That are added on right now, the political stuff, the, you know, all of the social unrest, there’s so many ways that I want to be showing up that I feel like I just cannot fit them all in.

Elena Lipson 15:12
Yeah, you know, one of my big goals is to have women have these structures in place before shit hits the fan,

Heather Pearce Campbell 15:19
Right. And this is what I was gonna ask you doesn’t have to be a practice it to me, I think the answer is it has to be a daily practice.

Elena Lipson 15:27
Yeah, yeah. You know, I think I’ve been doing this work for a long time helping people change. And this is why I came up with the acronym because I started exploring, like, who enters my circle and why. And I came up with this acronym called home, they come home, he is they’re having some sort of health issue, usually autoimmune. I can raise my hand for that, too, because that’s how I started my journey. Oh is overwhelmed from all the things going on in their life, all the all the yeses that they’ve taken on that no longer serve, but they’re still they’re creeping in all the time. And this motherhood, motherhood, it’s all it’s all this spiritual journey, right, rolled into one. And then he has entrepreneurship. And I think taking that leap into self empowerment is really a spiritual journey in itself. If you allow it to be, right, yes. And eventually, if you don’t allow it to be, it still becomes that because it is still one of the things that will challenge you more than anything to not more than anything, but it’s one of the paths that really, you know, it’s a transformational path for sure. Because you have to really dig in and discover all of your limits. And so coming home and one of those combinations, you hit a wall, and one of those things like things are going along just fine. And then maybe you’re you decide, oh, well, now that I’m a mom, I want to work for myself, because I want the freedom. And so you start taking on more and more, and then boom, your health is suffering. So like some combination of those things starts to happen. And one day you see me talking about self care, and you’re like, Oh my gosh, that’s what I need. You don’t even know you needed it. So I think as a as a human being, we don’t usually change unless something unless we’re going away from pain, like something is something is wrong, your relationship suffering, you’re tired of being constantly in lac, you want to change something your health is, you know, unbearable, or you’re just something’s off, like a lot of women have this like something’s just off. And, and I think for women, I’m in my mid 40s. Now, but I think for a lot of women somewhere in somewhere around their 30s and 40s. And I’m not in my 50s. Yeah, so I can’t speak to it. I can only speak to where I am, right where I’m where I see. But I do have women in their 50s in the grip as well. There’s, there’s these layers of awakening that happen where you have lived enough to be able to look back and say, What was I thinking? When I did that? Who Was I being what, what part of me allowed me to betray myself like that? Or to say yes, when I met No, or to say no. And I really met Yes. Like, you start to see the ways that you’ve been inauthentic and misaligned. And so I Yes, for sure. The short answer is yes, it’s important to have a practice so that you are constantly aware. And we’re also very human. So a lot of us won’t change unless unless something is like breaking down something sharp comfortable is torn like loving is comfy, you see a better chair over there. But it would just say too much energy to go there. But unless it’s like something sharp sticking up, you know, you won’t go. So that’s why when I when I thought about how to teach self care, I have like it’s well, it started as a 12 week program. It expanded into a six month program, it moved into a year-long program. And now it’s a membership ongoing, and I have had them in there from the very beginning, who are still there and still do the same 12 core pillar topics every year. But when I started reverse engineering, what really works and how do people start and what’s most important is that tiny little daily anchor of practice is what helps you to start making those little shifts. And so the thing that I’ve been giving away for years and teaching at retreats and the thing that actually women come back and they’re like, this is the thing that actually changes everything. And when I don’t do it, it actually changes everything for the negative. So that’s why I teach my magic morning practice as the daily anchor for checking in with yourself or being in your body for connecting to spirit and something bigger than yourself because we all wake up, especially now with like, that little o shit moment. Like oh, either What did I do? What do I have to do? What did I say yes to like there’s there’s those little thoughts that we wake up with. And when you have an anchor practice in place that you just build in as a habit. It allows you to have that check in with yourself and it becomes the score on shakable non negotiable way to connect with you to say like, Oh, I, what do I need today? Maybe today is a day where I need to put in some pockets of quiet where I need to put in some play. I haven’t left in a while, like maybe I need to take my kids somewhere today to just have fun. Or maybe I need to call a friend or maybe I need to voxer with some girlfriends and you know, peers and have a conversation like you really have an ability to check-in. So I think like I said, the short answer is, you could start any day like today is a great day to start. Tomorrow’s a great day to start. But and also, I think I do chat with some, you know, peers, friends who are in the same sort of situation. And the word we’ve been using a lot lately is just giving ourselves grace, you know, for not being able to function the same way we did six months ago or a year ago. One of the first things that I did, intuitively without really even thinking about it until until I was about a week into it I realized I was doing it was I stopped setting the alarm in the morning. Because I felt like I just wanted to wake up when my body woke me up instead of being pulled out like my nervous system was so stressed not Yeah, stress, the stress is not the right word. Because we we always have stress. But it’s almost like it was it was so on high alert. overload. Yeah, that the alarm was like a little too much like it just didn’t need to hear it. You know, I still woke up around the same time maybe give or take 3040 minutes. But it was just a different entry point into the day. And then it made me question things made me question what is most important if I had one thing to accomplish today that I had energy for and this morning hour, you know that I have time for work that I’m making time for work? What would it be? How do I then because I do believe that you know, women in the home, set the tone, we set the tone for the day, we set the tone for our family, we can walk in and be pillars of strength, but we also need to have a place to be vulnerable as well. So how do I nourish that? How do I nourish safety in the home? How do I nourish the environment? So I think that we were being asked of a lot right now or a lot is being asked of us right now. And not that we’re not always being asked them, you know, in general. But I do think that there’s opportunity right now a huge, huge opportunity. It’s like you we’ve taken the snowball, you know of our lives and shaking it not the snowball, but what snow globe globe? It’s been shaken up. Yeah, even if you’re not directly affected, which How can you not be at this? Right, right, right. We all have to wear the mask, we all have to go out if you’re choosing to any of you’re not choosing to you’re still engaging with it, you’re either resisting it or you’re doing it, you’re still in relationship to what’s happening. So how can we not be affected? So I think we have to, we have to check it and we have to have our own relationship with what’s happening. We have to talk about it, we have to process it somehow.

Heather Pearce Campbell 23:11
Well, and I love I mean, this this point, because for me, like in the legal work that I do, I try like the equivalent of what you do in you know, your personal life, spiritual life, business life of stopping people from getting to that really painful spot, right? I can totally relate to that, from the standpoint of like, the work that I do is also trying to prevent people from getting to that really painful spot and putting the prophylactics in place in advance to support their journey rather than cause them to have a big catastrophe. And yet, like it was really interesting, because when I was getting ready even to just do the work myself, and I recognized in a hurry that I needed to do it, but I still wasn’t carving out the time to do it. Because it was like life and my schedule had kind of taken on this momentum of its own. And there was so many pieces of that, that I felt like I couldn’t control or influence even, you know, I look at even my son’s schooling and I just felt like we were put out to pasture. And there were hard choices that had to be made about like does eat and schooling come first or does family peace come first right and choices that we haven’t had to make before. And in talking with girlfriends and this idea of like, Okay, if I’m going to start a morning practice, which I needed to do for a long time. But the reality is there have been times I’ve been able to do that COVID my work schedule shifted so that I was working much later at night which made it possible for me to get up first thing really early before kids are awake. And yet it’s still been hanging out there and when I talk to other women about it, they just be like, I don’t even have the time to think about that. It felt like one more thing to layer on. And for me, that was the sign like, it’s the thing that you need when you reach the point of like, I don’t even have time to think about it. I don’t even have time or the capacity to even think about self care. Like that is clearly a point where that is the thing that you should be prioritizing.

Elena Lipson 25:19
And you know, I started when my son was really little as well. So I totally understand. I have friends who’ve got I’ve had clients actually, most recently, we’ve had like, massive challenge of homeschooling and having five kids from very little to teenage. And we were able to help her creative practice. And ultimately, if you tell me, you don’t have the time, and I can’t think about it, I’m I hear you. But do you hear you like, Do you hear what you’re saying to yourself? Do you hear yourself telling yourself that you don’t have five minutes, three minutes to honor to check in to set intention for the day, you can tell me that all you want, it does not take any skin off my knees like I promise you, I will still do my thing. But I’m telling you to wake up to the fact that if you’re not able to somehow create a daily anchor of a practice of self checking, and self honoring and self worth, there’s something else going on here, where you’ve been saying yes to too many things, something needs to be reevaluated. So and I don’t, I’m not like the masculine morning practice at all. I don’t care when you wake up, I don’t care when you do it, I don’t care where you do it. I don’t care what you’re wearing, when you do it, I want you to do it. Because you can do it in bed with your babies around you, you can do it while you’re making breakfast for your family, you could put all the music and dance together, you can sit down and give your kids something to draw with and you draw your journal, I can give you a million ways to do it. Because I’ve had every resistant type of woman tell me she has no time. And we create, we weave it in. Right, we leave it in, I’m not telling you to light 10 candles, close the door is like dance to three songs. I don’t care how you do it. If you have three minutes, I promise you just to notice when you do that moment, when you when you even acknowledge the fact that I’m going to figure this out for myself because my energy is worth it. I’m going to be the woman who makes time because if you’re like Who do you Who are you trying to be right? Are we just trying to like get through the day? Or are we actually tried to be intentional about how we want to be moms and wives and partners and business owners? Like do I want to work with a coach who doesn’t make time for themselves? Do I want to have someone like if you’re telling me that, you know, okay, so if you’re my attorney, but you have a messed up legal life, I’m gonna see that right. So for me, all I can do all I can do as a self care coach and an inner work coach is do the work. That’s all I can do. And I can tell you that there’s been days where I didn’t do it. Of course, I’m not a perfect human being. But what I have come to see over a decade, 12 years now of doing a morning practice consistently. And even through days of not doing it, I still consider myself doing it because I’m still in relationship with it. Like I know it’s there. I know for a fact that the days that I do check-in and make time to get still and write and whatever combination, it’s changed over the years. And what I do is change over the years is that I’m more present from my life. And I’m more present from my sadness, I’m more present from my fear, I’m more present from my joy. And here’s the misunderstanding. I’m not saying that you do the morning practice, and all of a sudden you’re a ball of sunshine wherever you go. What I am saying is, when you have a practice, you get to be whatever you are, like there’s days where you wake up, and you’re pissed off. And something you saw a headline, you read something, you had an argument, something’s unresolved, you have unspoken that have to be yet to be spoken out loud to people. But at least you’re acknowledging it because the thing that stops us from being fully expressed in general is thinking that we always have to be a certain way, optimistic on point on time, like we have to be all the things. That’s not true, nor can we be all the time. Like, for me, my journey has been learning to express anger and learning to express that truth of that. Thank goodness I married who I married because he’s like the rock he doesn’t care. Like I could. I don’t punch you but I could I find it so he just laughs You know, like, he lets me be that because for me, my work my life’s work until this point has really been to be expressed. Yeah, and not to be like Elena’s always so happy. That was me that really was that people wanted me around all the time. They want like no one wanted to fire me like I was always happy, resilient present constantly happy. My dad died back to work a week later because I’m me like, I just couldn’t I had learned to keep it all in. That’s how my auto immune issues came up. That’s how I learned to do this work. And so I’m not saying that do the self care, do the practice, and all of a sudden, become the joyful, happy spiritual, like being I’m saying in the real freaky woman with all the emotions, so you can show up to your work so you can show your children that all emotions are welcome. And that they’re, they’re welcome at the table, and that you’re not scared of that. Because it can be scary. If you don’t know how to deal with anger or sadness or fear, frustration, of course, can be scary. And not everyone’s going to be able to deal with it. But you yourself can come to it. So sometimes my journaling is like, really frustrated. And sometimes it’s really beautiful and spiritual. But it doesn’t matter what it is, it’s that I’m there for it, so that I can so if you because if you can’t see all your emotions and experience them, they’re gonna scare the heck out of you, in your children. And in your partner and in your in your close circle, you’re not gonna know what to do with it, because your body’s gonna, like contract from it. So it’s, it’s a lot, you know, it can be a lot, but also I think it’s, it’s the, it’s the work we have to do. Oh, say that a lot. But this is the work we have to do,

Heather Pearce Campbell 31:17
Yes. And regardless of you know, and hearing you share even about your background and who you were and what you put on and carried for a time, you know, the, I think the the joyful part of this work, even though it comes with sadness, and tears and anger, like all the all the themes, right, but the truly joyful part, I think, for me, like when I do dig in and do the work is being able to inhabit parts of myself, that had just been closed off, or that had just been ignored. You know, it’s that it’s like that fullness of really being all the parts of yourself. And all of us, I think in some way, in childhood, I think it’s just a natural occurrence in childhood, are told, or we interpret that we do need to cut off parts of ourselves or tamped down parts of ourselves or whatever, to just be able to survive or get along or, you know, appease somebody. And the older that we get, I think we have experiences that show us how poorly that serves us in the long run.

Elena Lipson 32:23
Absolutely. And I think it’s important to experience and acknowledge and I think we all we are in a space in life where a lot of people do have time and space to be, you know, exploring our own spiritual inner selves. And I do recognize that that’s not something my mom had time for in her life, or her mom had time for her life. And so, but the cool thing is, you know, have you ever heard when you say when you heal yourself, you heal, you know, generations?

Heather Pearce Campbell 32:53
Yes.

Elena Lipson 32:54
But here’s an interesting thing that happens is when you when you do your work, you actually heal generations back. And you can sort of hear that intellectually and say, Yeah, I totally get that. But I finally understood how that works. When I do my own work, and I understand deeply, deeply, deeply, where my stuff comes from, and that I forgive without her needing to apologize at all. I understand with compassion, where my mom’s stuff came from. And then I look back at generations I understand with compassion, where her mom stuff came from, I actually rewrite the story. Yes, it ripples back. And then when I tell the story forward, it’s not with anger or resentment, or more even sadness. It is with a deep compassion for my mom and her my grandmother and I don’t even know might know her grandmother, but I can I know where they were. And I know their life and I know that even though I don’t know them, I have compassion. So there’s no there’s no like, story around it anymore. I could just release it. And I can I can be surrounded with a history of like, they did the best they could. And so my as so will my No, my child and hopefully his children. So it’s a really beautiful thing we can do and also we become this this really I mean, I want to real friend, like I want to be with friends who have the capacity to be next to me when I’m upset. I’m tired of being the joyful one like screw it like I don’t need to be the uplifting one all the time. I am naturally it’s how I’ve been wired. Yeah, but not always and I want to know I want to walk away from like a conversation and feel like it’s okay that I wasn’t the bubbly, joyful, like did you know I’m not the butterfly all the time and that’s okay. And I and I do want to more and more have women around me who are just also All of themselves, and not just the parts they think are viewable in public.

Heather Pearce Campbell 35:05
Right, right. No, it’s so I mean, you gave me goosebumps with the part about healing generations back, I feel like for a lot of people right now, this is a really relevant conversation, because, you know, we’ve got really interesting dynamics happening. And I think a lot of it also is generational, like there are certain things that happened in our parents generation that clearly are unacceptable. Now, there are certain things that happened in our grandparents generation that are totally unacceptable now. And I feel like many of us are exhausted by the reality of that, right, and the reality of like, wanting to create a future for our children, that is a totally new paradigm. And there’s a lot of lash back, there’s a lot of hanging on to the old paradigm that’s happening in certain circles. And my sisters and I even recently have been in a very interesting conversation about peeling back the layers, like seeing the truth of who somebody is right now. And all the ways that we get to see that on social media and, you know, things that did not exist in generations past. And it’s really confronting, it really can be triggering to, you know, some of our belief systems and some of even our understanding of who we thought, for example, our parents were or who we thought they are. And so this unraveling, and the reason it gave me goosebumps is this part about compassion, right? So at first there, there has been a lot of anger, even in our family, and in our circles about the reality of who some people are showing up to be in the world. And this disconnect of like loving that person, and also having a really hard time with that truth. But then, being involved in a conversation, including getting feedback from other people who’ve known for example, my mom who passed away, you know, almost 20 years ago now, and my dad and like, are adding some richness to the stories and some truth that we didn’t know, as children, right? We’re shielded from certain things as we’re being parented and being raised. But ultimately, what I can say about it is that arriving to a place where you’re able to actually ask the question of like, oh, my goodness, what could have led to this being the outcome, or this being the set of beliefs that somebody holds, has ultimately given us a lot more compassion about, like, how things must have been even like, I look at my dad from a survival mode as a child, because they were very poor, I literally think he probably spent his entire childhood in survival. So he really views the world. In my perspective, it appears that he views the world in a doggy dog kind of way, just totally discordant with how my sisters and I, like want things to be. So it’s been a struggle to, like see his perspective and try to have compassion for that. But through this process of conversation and talking to other people about the realities of his life, as a child, the reality even of some parts of my mom’s life, and her dying young like, it’s, it’s so freeing to be able to reach a point of letting go of the anger, which is the initial trigger, and do the work and ask the questions of like, how do I get to a point of really understanding this human being as a person to be able to reach the point of compassion and release the relationship from that anger? And from that, really kind of feeling trapped in a way of not understanding it not fully knowing? Like, how did we arrive to this point, where I came from this family or this particular parent, and I see things so differently.

Elena Lipson 39:01
Yeah, absolutely. And I think a lot of that lives, like you said, for some people, I think, for all people, our families, history lives in our cellular level, you know, in our bones and our blood and yeah, see, we carry that. And so I do, we’ve had these conversations in our family, of course, I think, like all families have, and this real compassion and openness to the fact that, you know, there’s some people who are like, well, it’s not happening now. So why why can’t you just let it go? Why can’t you just like, be grateful for what you have? And I think corrupt gratitude and grief can live together. Yeah. And I think that the anger comes from about a very cellular, deep level. And even though it’s not happening right now, I think it’s still very much alive for people who have experienced it in their families. You know, whether it’s racism or wealth inequality or whatever it is. And we all have it. You know, we, my family came not from the US who came from a different country, we have a whole different layer of like our family history and trauma that my family experience in a different country. And so there’s a deep compassion even though I did not live here, generationally I grew up here, of course, it’s part of my story. It’s part of my child’s story. And I think at a very deep level, I think we do live in a time where we have so much choice and freedom and possibility that that was also true. The sadness that I have, that I think a lot of people have as well is that it feels like, because people are so shut down, or scared, or unwilling to look or it or unwilling to go deeper, even within themselves, that so many conversations get shut down. And that the easy thing to do for a lot of people is to go with a mass sort of collective consciousness right now. And I don’t know that that surfing, I don’t think anyone knows surfing. And I think we can all agree that it’s being engineered at some level. So that the truth of even what we need to work on, it’s being totally diverse diverted from what we actually need to be talking about, right? Like, it’s no longer we’re having a new conversation about racism, it’s no longer we’re having a conversation about the healthcare system. It’s none of those things, because we’re being so like, my question is always, like, who benefits from this? Who’s benefiting from this? Truly, are we benefiting from what’s going on? Our, you know, our brothers and sisters around the country benefiting or like, our color? Black people benefiting? or white people benefiting? Who’s benefiting? Like really who’s benefiting? Isn’t the democrat benefiting? Is the republican benefiting? Like so? It’s a really uncomfortable conversation and to get uncomfortable to have a conversation get uncomfortable? Because, you know, it’s like, you know, we don’t want to go on this whole tangent. You know, that’s not where, where we started. But I think but if I can tie it together, yeah. Is the willingness to be uncomfortable in your own emotions is actually part of it. Right? If I’m uncomfortable with my own anger, with my own grief, with my own discomfort, then of course, I can’t even have a difficult conversation with anyone else without feeling like my body is shutting down. And I have been in a place in my life where I couldn’t speak my truth. My real truth, like my angry truth, without feeling shaky, without my body feeling like, I gotta go. I can sit right now and have those different conversations within my family. It’s very tricky, because a lot of people aren’t willing to have the intimate conversation. It’s very much like, as soon as you trigger them, they’re gone. Or they’re yelling, or they’re like, there’s, you know, so it’s interesting. Yeah, interesting time, I think it is important to have good conversations and be honest with yourself. And you can only really do that when you when you really take time to even know what you think about it. Yeah, instead of just hopping on the whatever label train, you want to hop on.

Heather Pearce Campbell 43:24
Right, comfortable? Well, and I think, you know, the really, there’s a powerful point to be made, which is that you’re right, not everybody, like when I even think about the conversations in my own family. And I think a lot of families are experiencing this right now a lot of intense dynamics over what’s happening and different ways of viewing it is I agree, like, we’re actually not able to have those conversations at this point. And there have been like some roadblocks put up because they’ve gone so poorly. And yet, I feel like what is important is that people do still stay in conversation with themselves and still explore, like, how can you reach a point of compassion and understanding of the other person’s journey? It’s really tremendously difficult to do at times. Like, I’m not making any bones about that part. And yet, there have been even some recent breakthroughs for us where I’m like, Oh, I have reached a new point of understanding about what has led to where we are right now, even within my own family, that gives me a lot more compassion for stories that I didn’t know existed, realities and truths that were there that I didn’t know existed, right. And I think that there is a way for us to stay in conversation with ourselves even if that conversation can’t be had with another person for whatever reason, that will still lead us to that greater understanding. And, and still release that anger and release that tension. In the context of how we relate to somebody, because I think that’s palpable, even for them, even without the conversation, I think that’s palpable. And I think it serves all of us to do that work so that we can release ourselves and others. And I love what you so beautifully put about. Grief and gratitude can coexist. And this is the like, the beautiful complexity of life is that accepting, like we have these parts of ourselves of our own family that are hard to embrace and hard to love. And at the same time, we can be tremendously grateful for the gifts that we do have from that relationship from those learnings from our childhood, you know, even the hard part, right? And I think that is just really fundamentally one of the most beautiful truths of life and the benefit of doing the work.

Elena Lipson 45:56
And the really cool, yes, absolutely. The benefit of doing the work is really being able to have the better conversations. And I just want to add something that with a little grace and compassion for everyone else who’s like, I don’t know, this sounds really hard. You could actually do the inner work with somebody without them there. Yeah, right. So take the example for the fact that my father died also a long time ago, and I was in my early 20s. And it’s really unexpected. And there’s a lot of conversations that didn’t happen, and he wasn’t there for love things like, you know, my wedding and my son being born and all the milestones, there’s a lot of resentment built up, and a lot of, you know, questions and answer from things that I wanted to experience. And I’m not everyone has lost someone who you know, a lot earlier than I have, and some, like, you know, whatever this isn’t like about me, boohoo, he died. That’s not what I’m saying. What I’m saying is, I was still able to do work, around tension or around regrets around anger that I had about things that had happened in life. And without him being there, you know, I was able to have those conversations. And also, for all of you, all of you out there who has someone have someone in your life who you maybe can’t have the difficult conversations with because honestly, truly, they are not willing to go there. And it just keeps getting stuck in a loop. Right? I can still do that work with the person in my life who’s not willing to go there. Because the work ultimately is not on them. That’s right, Mark is still on me. Understand what is upsetting me and trigger the word. You know, I sometimes I use it sometimes I hate it. More than anything, the real honest word is you’re getting upset by something, something’s upsetting you something that they’re you think they’re thinking you’re assuming they’re feeling, you can have the entire conversation in your head without them being there, right? Because you know them so well, right? Because we just know the other person so well, like they’re, we know the right thing. So we must take a step back and say if you want to have that conversation in your head, have it be honest with yourself about how many assumptions are being made about their reaction, which probably is true to some extent, based in the reality of trying to have other conversations. But really, if you can, like there are so many great exercises that we do in our virtual retreats and in our life calls, journaling exercises where you can actually have a conversation one of my favorite ways to have a conversation with someone who’s not there is when I’m driving. I like I haven’t done it in a while because I think I’ve worked through a lot with the people that are closest to me, I would have conversations with my mom. Like if I was if I knew something, I’m working through something or memory or like just something that I’m dealing with, I would just start driving on my own. I’d be like, Alright, Mom, let me tell you I like I would just do that I you know, it feels really silly at first. But after you do it, not drive safely. Of course, you could do it in your bathtub, whatever. Like you can do it wherever. I just have a real I like driving and thinking and like I get really inspired when I’m moving forward in space. But I’ve had really good conversations with my mom without her being there because it helps me to get to the depth of what I’m actually feeling. Anger is usually like the massive frosting on the cake. But what’s actually in the middle, underneath all these little like the cake right? But in the middle of the cake, there’s this juicy middle. That’s actually sadness, right. And it’s for the number of retweets I posted for the number of years of work I’ve done with other amazing women who are like experts in helping people navigate their emotions. I’ve seen it over and over and over again. Yes, you’re angry but if you can move that anger, through movement through physical like, release underneath that is always this real, like four year old six year old 10 year old 15 year old sadness that that has gone on love that has gone unexcited And when that comes up, it’s just like an entire physical release where you, you’re left with a really innocent, pure. And it’s not a one and done, over and over the thing. But at the more when you’re in that moment, you’re like, Ah, I’m human, you’re human, wow, like, you can really get a deep, deep sense of what is real, versus the layers and layers and layers of story that we have built up for protection for our own protection. It’s how we’re, it is how we human beings are wired, is our shared human experience, right? I’m not saying anything that you haven’t experienced, right? So I think that inner work, and the self care is a gift to yourself, and much deeper ways than just like, Oh, I feel so relaxed. Right, it’s great to feel relaxed, it’s great to take a beautiful bath, and release the energy, it’s great to do your nails and feel luxurious and worthy of the goodies. But on a much deeper level, it’s actually helping you as a human being, to connect with other human beings in authentic, real compassionate, which I think we’ve both said several times now, in a way, because if then you get to think like, oh, if I’m having this complex experience, maybe they’re having a complex experience, too. Maybe they don’t have the tools, maybe they’re not in a place of self awareness in the moment, you could really knock my place of I’m better than at all. That’s what you are ready to go through. And we’re all in our own, you know, exploration path, I could look at myself, and I thought I knew so much at 25. And 35, I was so smart. I was so like, wise, you know, and I was to that extent of who I was done. Yeah. And there was so much humility, in everything I’ve experienced since then. And I’m sure I will be humbled many times over in the future. So that’s the real inner work of self care, the energetic self care, the physical self care, the spiritual self care, that’s what I love, to teach and to share and to live. 

Heather Pearce Campbell 52:07
Well, and the, you know, the, it serves us in multiple ways, right? doing that work, even when people think I don’t have the time, I still have the energy, it feels like work on top of work. The reality is that, you know, I mean, even in a couple of days of like, getting up and waking up, even though it’s tough to do, like doing this group work that I’m doing right now, at 6 am, it really feels like a gift, it feels almost like a little bit like this magical thing that I’m giving to myself, that, you know, it shouldn’t feel that way. In my mind, I’m like, Oh, my gosh, this is the work that I need to be doing. This is the the common thread that I should be weaving throughout every day, not just crisis periods, not just periods that are super intense. And I say crisis periods, I mean, that in the bigger sense of, you know, kind of where we are in the world right now. You know, I’m very lucky to be blessed and have a healthy family and have work that I can do. And so I’m not saying that we’re in personal crisis, but it still has definitely been a period of compression. And yet the deeper work that you’re talking about, like serves us through times like that, and on a much bigger and longer timeframe. Right, absolutely. Like just our perspective, I think everything shifts and so I mean, I’m, I’m such a fan of what you do, I’ve often longed to be better at this particular aspect in my own life, even though I’m aware of it like I even like your reflection around even on the days that I don’t do the work. Like I’m aware of the work and I’m aware, you know the mean. And I think it’s really important to stay in that place of being aware and watching for ways to incorporate it into our daily life. And I really love just as a final point, I really love your share around how flexible it can be to actually create that doesn’t have to be because I think we put all of these shoulds on herself about it should look this way. And the way that I’ve read about other people doing it, like I should have an hour to sit down and have total silence and do all the deep thinking, you know, not doesn’t necessarily have to look that way. And so freeing to hear you say that in all the ways that you’ve helped women incorporate this yeah lives.

Elena Lipson 54:28
And I’d love to add just two more quick points that I think are really important to understand. I’m not telling you to do more work. And I actually I’ve been trying to consciously remove that word from the way I explain it. You know, it’s more like inner play inner exploration, because I’m not telling you to do more work. God knows we have enough work on our plate, right with all the things we’re doing. And the other thing that I want to just point out is that anytime you’re trying to change or add or you know something to your day, you’re going to be coming up against your subconscious Just patterns. And that’s a really powerful force. So, you know, when I, when I tell someone to experience the magic morning practice or have all these different tools that I can, you know, offer up in terms of how to do it. The tools are great, but your subconscious patterns are a force to be reckoned with. So when I say give yourself grace, really, really, really give yourself grace. If you’re trying to say like, Oh, I think I really think I want to try this morning thing and see what happens. Really just be playful with it. Understand that your inner resistance is going to be really great, like big, because because our mind loves comfort and know loves patterns and loves the predictability of how you do things. So I’ll tell you, a key to this is understanding that you already have a morning practice. Regardless of what you’re doing, there’s a certain way you wake up, there’s a certain way you brush your teeth, there’s a certain way, there’s a pattern to the things you do in the morning, because of years of habit. So when you’re trying to embed a new thing, your entire like inner, you know, structure is going to be like no doing this, I don’t have time to do this. So just you know, if you need ideas, I have a million ideas. On the magic morning practice, I just, I literally just about a month and a half, maybe two months ago, I created a whole new workbook with lots of really cool prompts. I created four different mood lists, playlists, with music, and I use them and love them. That like if you’re feeling they’re called a stone, activate grace and Central. So some mornings, I’m like, I can’t stop today. Some mornings, I’m like, ooh, is substantial. So you can really just be intuitive within the practice as well. But I give you all the tools to make it as playful as possible, as easy as possible. So that you can just kind of like open the door, see inside, if you like it, and it makes the rest of your day go a little bit more smoothly, you’ll want to try it again. I’m like giving you 20 things to do. Like if you have three minutes, I promise you can do it. So that’s that’s how I like I try to just sit on your shoulder a little bit, and just help you. Because you know, I want you to I want you to feel good, I want you to be on the deck and I am not invested in it, like do it or don’t do it. But if you do it, it’s gonna be fun.

Heather Pearce Campbell 57:28
Well, and I love, even the way that you presented and the playfulness. And I think we can get overly attached to like the rigor and the schedule and the structure because I think we hear so often. Not sure what that them getting like interference, like a little bit of sound interference. But David can hopefully get that out. I think we can get too attached to the structure and feeling like if we don’t do things a certain way, then we just don’t have the capacity to do them. And so what feels really playful about that, and for anybody listening, we’re going to be sharing her link in the show notes to the magic morning habit, which includes a printable workbook, the custom playlist that she just described. I mean, it sounds amazing. And what a lovely invitation even to start small to three minutes, like who doesn’t have three minutes to just test it out. Right? See where it goes. So where else do you like to connect? Elena will share that link any others that you want me to share as far as social media but tell us for a minute we you are.

Elena Lipson 58:34
Yeah, Instagram is the best place everything that’s current is updated there and it’s Elena_Lipson. Okay, there is another Elaine Lipson and it’s really strange because she lives on the east coast. She’s also a women’s empowerment coach. She has similar like dark hair, dark Owego, she has a podcast Oh, rise up. So I’ve gotten emails about her podcast to be guests on. 

Heather Pearce Campbell 59:01
Hilarious.

Elena Lipson 59:02
So it’s kind of a weird doppelganger thing, even though we don’t look, we don’t look really alike. But we are really similar backgrounds and our names are spelled the same. So Elena_Lipson.

Heather Pearce Campbell 59:13
Oh my gosh, that’s a funny sign now. Yay. All the wonderful Elena’s in the world. So what before we sign off? First of all, thank you so much for being here. I just feel like you have a slice of magic that everybody needs. Of course, what do you want to leave our listeners with either an idea or a thought and action item? How do you want to sign up?

Elena Lipson 59:39
You know, I think a big reminder that you get to design your life and that you are worthy of not doing it alone. So you know, even just spending this time with you whether it’s like I think we’re I know for me I’m craving togetherness and gathering and I met feeding my friends that Miss like meeting at restaurants, it’s so it sounds so petty, but it’s like my soul is just craving it. Which is why I actually love that I have the membership for seven years now six years now that you know, I do have a place where I can go and connect with these amazing women. But part of the reason I teach what I teach is because I feel like the more we can center ourselves, the more we can joyfully connect with others. Yes, and we are all worthy of not having to do it alone. And even if we’re even if it’s zoom, find some support, you know, for yourself. It’s really about supporting yourself and being worthy of being, being and living and doing life on your own terms.

Heather Pearce Campbell 1:00:47
Well, and I love the reminder that it is a choice we get to choose, we get to like, define it and design it our own way. And I think it’s easy to forget that we have a choice in that matter.

Elena Lipson 1:01:00
Define and design. I like that. That’s good, that’s a good tag somewhere.

Heather Pearce Campbell 1:01:05
You’re gonna have it I don’t know, those words just came to mind when I was reflecting on what you’d said. Well, Elena, thank you so much for being with us. Thank you for sharing your gift again. People can check it out at legal website warrior.com forward slash podcast, check out Elena’s episodes for all of her episode for all of the amazing links and a link to her magic morning habit. Elena, I so appreciate you wish we lived closer. I would totally love to go steal a coffee with you. Maybe someday in the relatively not too distant future. Absolutely. Okay.

Elena Lipson 1:01:41
Thank you.

GGGB Intro 1:01:44
Thank you for joining us today on the Guts, Grit and Great Business podcast. We hope that we’ve added a little fuel to your tank, some coffee to your cup and pep in your step to keep you moving forward in your own great adventures. four key takeaways links to any resources mentioned in today’s show and more see the show notes which can be found at legalwebsitewarrior.com/podcast, be sure to subscribe to the podcast and if you enjoyed today’s conversation, please give us some stars and a review on Apple podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcast so others will find us to keep up the great work you are doing in the world and we’ll see you next week.