There's a common misconception that artists have a monopoly on creativity...But the very act of making waves - no matter the career - is a creative one. The Chase Jarvis Live Show is an exploration of creativity, self-discovery, entrepreneurship, hard-earned lessons, and so much more. Chase sits down with the world's top creators, entrepreneurs, and thought leaders and unpacks actionable, valuable insights to help you live your dreams in career, hobby, and life.
ABOUT THIS EPISODE:
You’ve heard the phrase, “you’re the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” Relationships are significant because they influence and shape our experiences, success, and repetitive cycles that hinder our performance in other areas of life. However, when we learn to navigate relationships with mindfulness and compassion, they can also be rewarding and bring us closer to who we want to be.
Sheleana Aiyana holding her book "Becoming the One"Sheleana Aiyana is driven by her immense desire to help people create more conscious relationships and come home to themselves. So many of us live under persistent low-grade anxiety that stems from unhealthy or dysfunctional relationships. On a recent episode of Chase Jarvis Live, Sheleana shared insights on how to begin your own journey.
Healing from Childhood Trauma
When you suffer from childhood trauma, your life and spirit are eternally changed. Those who experience trauma, abuse, or neglect early in childhood are more likely to develop major psychological and emotional abnormalities later in life, altering who they are and damaging their capacity to form loving and nurturing connections.
Childhood trauma limits and stifles our potential in unforeseen ways. It’s easy to build barricades when our hearts are harmed at vital growth periods, and finding the healing we need is more complicated.
Healing childhood scars is one of the most challenging tasks we can do, yet it is essential to a happy life. If you want to embark on a healing journey and move on from your past, you must first confront it – boldly and one step at a time.
Coming to an understanding
You must first acknowledge your childhood trauma in order to resolve it. Trauma may bring up a lot of strong emotions, and unless we learn to manage them, we’ll simply repeat the same destructive cycles that keep us trapped and unhappy.
Refusing to confront our past traumas allows them to fester like a sore, remaining in our bodies as a subconscious force that wreaks havoc on everything from our job prospects to our personal relationships.
Everyone’s experience of childhood trauma is different. Still, a few key events tend to have the most significant enduring impact on those of us who are unlucky enough to be exposed to them.
Trauma knows no bounds; it may attack anybody at any moment, but it is more destructive when it strikes during our adolescence period.
Celebrating your true desires
In a world of social media, a culture that often places a premium on looking your best, adopting and maintaining an actual positive image is often a difficult task.
On a previous episode of the show, Lisa Bilyeu spoke about the importance of celebrating your desires and tuning into yourself. She went on to share some tips to help you do just that. By taking the time to celebrate your desires, you can better understand what it is that you truly want in life.
It is not uncommon for us to spend a great deal of our lives striving for perfection in various areas such as academics, business, and personal relationships. Unfortunately, it is also commonplace for us to fall short of our goals and feel inadequate as a result of this.
There’s no denying that, deep down, we’re all looking for some self-love. We go through most of our lives thinking that we need someone or something else to provide us with what we can only give ourselves. If we want to be truly fulfilled, we need to realize that only we can provide that love.
Assessing unconscious contracts from family dynamics
The way we relate to ourselves is the basis for all our other relationships. But we don’t get much instruction on how to do this. We learn from our early family experiences or from what our culture tells us about love that it’s not safe to open up our hearts and be vulnerable. So we build up walls to protect ourselves.
Sheleana’s book, ‘Becoming the One’, takes us on a journey through the world of belief systems and unconscious contracts that we make in our family systems. In a family system, everyone plays a role and has made agreements (both spoken and unspoken) about what is acceptable and what is not. What we are allowed to have, what we are not allowed to have, and what do we believe.
What do we think about people who speak up and are bold and courageous? We might have internalized judgments or fears about them, but depending on our culture, there might be some strict rules around speaking up or being different.
So the first step is always looking at where these beliefs came from and changing them if they don’t match our current realities.
Every day, we make choices that shape who we are. Some choices are big, like what we do for a living, and some choices are small, like what we have for lunch.
But each choice we make contributes to our overall identity. Aligning your daily actions with your values will bring you closer to yourself.
How to get out of unsafe relationships
In the same way that honesty, open communication, and trust are apparent hallmarks of a good relationship, there are also evident indicators of an unhappy relationship.
While unhealthy relationships might be different, they generally leave at least one partner feeling apprehensive, unhappy, agitated, frustrated, and/or stand-offish. In situations when there has been mental or physical abuse, dishonesty, a lack of balance between words and action, or even emotional manipulation, the feelings are most frequent.
First, determine whether you want to leave the relationship or if there is still something worth fighting for. Even if you know the relationship is unhealthy, you may be hesitant to admit it because you don’t want to lose the person you care about. You may have spent so much time with them that you don’t want to leave your comfort zone. Admitting that a relationship is unhealthy is a big first step.
Second, cut off communications. Some may find this challenging, but there should be no communication for some time following the separation. Do not answer texts or phone calls. Do not meet with your ex to discuss the reasons for the split, “simply say goodbye,” or to provide “closure.”
Finally, and maybe most critically, seek some professional support. This isn’t an indication that you’re insane or mentally ill. You may feel that the experience you’ve had is due to anything you’ve experienced in the past or something mentioned during the relationship or break-up.
This is something that has to be discussed. It’s also typical to second-guess your choice to terminate a relationship, and an objective expert may assist you in working through these emotions.
Enjoy!
