Awakened Conscious Conversations
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Awakened Conscious Conversations
Breaking the People-Pleasing Cycle
Have you ever achieved something you thought you wanted, only to feel strangely empty? This profound conversation with CBT therapist Ludovica Colella uncovers the hidden cost of living by other people's rules and the liberating journey toward authentic self-expression.
Ludovica shares her personal awakening after realizing her impressive achievements as a therapist in London weren't bringing the fulfillment she expected. The breakthrough came when she recognised she was living according to an inherited timeline and expectations. This revelation sparked her transformation from people-pleaser to empowered coach helping others break free from similar patterns.
We dive deep into what Ludovica calls the "Good Girl Syndrome"—the societal conditioning that teaches women to be accommodating, non-confrontational, and self-sacrificing at the expense of their authentic needs. She explains how people-pleasing is essentially a form of self-abandonment that often begins as a survival mechanism in childhood but continues shaping our adult relationships in harmful ways.
Whether you're struggling with perfectionism, feeling disconnected from your desires, or simply exhausted from trying to make everyone else happy, this conversation offers a compassionate roadmap to reclaiming your authentic voice and living from a place of genuine self-worth.
Ready to break free from people-pleasing patterns? Subscribe to Awakened Conscious Conversations for more transformative discussions that will help you live with greater authenticity and purpose.
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Hello everybody, I'm your host, the Gentle Yoga Warrior, and this is Awakened Conscious Conversations podcast, and joining us shortly, all the way from Italy, is Ludovica Colella, and Ludovica is going to talk about something that she is an expert in and that is today. We are going to talk about breaking free from people pleasing and people pleasing is something that I can relate to. When one is trying to navigate one's path and people expect things from us which we don't necessarily want to do, or commitments that we don't necessarily want to have, and taking into account one's own feelings and the person's feelings, it can be quite a tricky road to navigate, so that's why I'm especially excited to speak to Ludovica on this subject matter. Before Ludovica comes online, I would just like to share a bit about this wonderful person. My only regret is that I was going through my research and I realized that Ludovic is also an author of the Feel Good Journal, and I've only been able to read a little bit of it and it seemed brilliant so far, and I think it's one that I'm going to put on my Christmas list for some of my friends and family. It looks an exceptionally brilliant book, because I think the reason I think it looks such a good book is because we spend so much of our life trying to people, please people, and it's not always to our own benefits to do such a thing.
Speaker 1:Ludovica will be able to explain a bit more, but I just want to give you a bit of backstory about Ludovica. So she has been a CBT therapist for over 10 years in the mental health field. I know that she began her career working for the NHS in London and she has since expanded into a life of coaching and Ludovica is deeply committed to empowering individuals to liberate themselves from the grip of perfectionism and people-pleasing tendencies. I think it's changed that we were brought up as girls to be like, oh, don't rock the boat, kind of like, please, everyone, be a good girl, be happy, smiley, and that we have to be kind of perfect all the time.
Speaker 1:Or we kind of got this the world from the Victorian era where Lisa Cole woman had hysteria and they would put them in mental hospital, all these awful things they would do to women. It was like an illness, female hysteria and all that kind of thing. And maybe, I don't know, maybe it's echoes from that time when we were kind of worried to be ourselves in case we were kind of cascaded for it and I'm very excited to hear what Ludovica has to say on this matter. Dear listeners, without further ado, ludovica Tolela yes, ah, fantastic, I was a bit nervous about the pronunciation of that. So thank you, ludovica, thank you Perfect pronunciation.
Speaker 1:Oh, thank you so welcome to the show. I have been very keen to get you on the show, especially the field that you're an expert in. So, dear listeners, as I said earlier, we're going to talk today about breaking free from people pleasing, and I think it's something that we can all be very guilty of for all numbers of reasons. But, dear Ludovica, would you mind explaining your journey so far and what inspired you to talk about this today?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a very interesting question, because I could talk about so many things, so many breakthroughs, so many examples, but essentially, at some point in my life, I realized that I was living a life according to other people's rules. And you know, when you have that huge goal of yours that you really want to achieve and you think, oh, when I will get there, I'll be so satisfied with myself. And then you get there. And you get there even before the time that you planned before, like you had even the resources, but you get there, uh, and after all the the hard work, you think, is that it? You know, is that, is that how I'm supposed to feel? Because obviously, happiness was there, but it was short-lived, it didn't give me that sense of worth, satisfaction, value that I was expecting to receive. And so I started asking myself some questions like what was I hoping to feel by getting here and who is this goal? Um, who's this goal, basically? Who talked me into this? Because I love my job and I really don't imagine myself doing anything different, but I had this idea of a timeline that I had to achieve by 30 years old.
Speaker 2:By that age, I have to achieve a certain number of things, and my goal at that point was to become a therapist, to live in London, have my own office and do my own things, like as a private therapist, and I achieved that by the age of 29. And so when I stopped after I achieved that, I thought there's something, there's still something missing. So it's almost like I was the you know, the hamster on the wheel, always running after something. And I had to do lots of self-analysis there when at some point I realized there was an inherited rule that I got from somewhere, someone in my family who was convinced that in order to live a happy life, I had to be just running after things, basically have the ambition, have the drive, do the be the best at what you do.
Speaker 2:And so I kind of lived my life in a state of survival, you know, running after the things that I thought I had to want in a way. And so after I achieved those things, I was like this is not mine, like I felt like a sense of disconnection like ever before. And it was a bit difficult because obviously you spent maybe 10, 20 years of your life thinking that's your goal and then, once you achieve it, you realize it's not. And so similar experiences happened also in relationships when I actually realized all these things that I'm doing, why am I doing them? Am I outsourcing my sense of value to other people? Am I expecting people to confirm that I am worth it, that I'm lovable, that I'm likable, that I belong, and so that's when I realized, actually, that it needs to come from within.
Speaker 1:That's a great journey and the way you were able to see, um, you weren't fulfilled and and actually we can go for all these things, but it does ultimately come from within. Why do you think so many of us are kind of people pleasers? I know that I have done in the past. I think, something to do with possibly sorry, possibly my parents or someone saying I'll be a good girl, like kind of keep all the peace, and things like that. But going back to my question, why so many people please us?
Speaker 2:I think there are lots of experiences that people can have that can lead them to think that other people are more important than themselves, because essentially, people pleasing is a form of self-abandonment. So I would start by saying that one of the first things that people experience or my experience, if there are people-pleasers are is a very conditional love from their parents. Now, I'm always very careful when I use this word conditional love, because In human form, I think all love is conditional. We love people because there are conditions. You marry someone, you sign a contract, so there are terms and conditions. So you have friendships because they are reciprocal in some ways. There is a give and take, so there are always conditions.
Speaker 2:But a parent can make these conditions really strict and really harsh and set very high standards for their children, sometimes without even knowing it, to the point that the child obviously doesn't have the ability to challenge the parent, so would just end up accepting whatever the parent is saying that's true and whatever rule they are giving the child and will almost blindly follow them and then build a personality, an entire personality, around those qualities. And this happens for men and for women alike, but I think that specifically for women, there is more of an emphasis towards self-sacrifice, uh, sacrificing for people around them. Um, you know, being nice, polite, accommodating, don't be a burden, don't shout, don't ask for what you need, uh, be non-confrontational, you know, just basically chill, just be less shrink, um, and I think, if we really want to take this further, I think collectively, this is a problem for everyone, so also for men, because also men have emotions, right, but when it comes to women, they are allowed to, they're more allowed than men to express their emotions, but at the same time they should give up almost anything to for the other, to care for the other. And there is this idea that women are wired for to care for other people, which, again, I think is problematic in itself because that would imply that men aren't, but I think that caring is non-gendered, uh. But there is this idea collectively, but also at level of, um, you know, the family, the society, that women should be just nice, you know nice, and do not, don't rock the boat, you know uh, which then it can in turn create women that I have what I call, but it's not like I call it that way.
Speaker 2:I think it's a thing, um, you know the good girl syndrome. So just be nice, be good and don't rock the boat. Everything will be fine, and it's not like that. Obviously, everything won't be fine definitely not.
Speaker 1:It makes you think of the time, you know, in the victorian times, where these are kind of like lock women up and this is called female hysteria, because if they didn't kind of conform to like being these quiet, good, well-behaved women, then there was something wrong with them, when really we're a whole range of our emotions, aren't we? And to kind of suppress a side of it, I guess that's what the good girl syndrome is. Is there anything else you'd like to add on the good girl syndrome at all?
Speaker 2:no, I agree with you that it's a suppression, basically, um, and then it turns into women developing a distorted feminine, because, yeah, so they become like united dimensional. I don't know if you say that in english, I guess you do, but you know they become just for the other, when actually the feminine itself is not for the other, it's for itself. But the distorted feminine then, when it relates, it can go into manipulation and control and essentially this is what people pleasing is. So I try to control how you feel about me, what you think about me, just because I try to make you happy all the time. I make you a priority. I'm expecting you to do the same, but also, if you don't do the same, I'm disappointed, because why aren't you putting me as a priority, as I am?
Speaker 1:yeah, that's, that's. That's really interesting to hear, and and um, but very wise, because it is we kind of. It is upon manipulation, isn't it? People pleasing? And yet so many of us do it because it's like this learned behavior. So how would one get out of being that good girl syndrome? What was the one thing that they could do?
Speaker 2:the first thing that I would do is I would try to identify the main core belief. So we all have core beliefs, positive and negative. When it comes to people pleasing, usually the negative core belief can fall under I'm unlovable, I'm unlikable, I don't belong. Also, sometimes going to more like a perfectionism type of thing. So I'm incompetent, I'm not smart, I am not like. Other people are better than me. So this is like the summary of the main core beliefs. So first of all, I will identify what do you believe about yourself? What is your self-concept? How? Basically, when something goes wrong, let's say in your relationships, what's the first thought that comes into your mind? Like I knew it. I deserve this, I knew it. No one likes me, no one wants me. So these are all cues to dig deeper, understand what your core beliefs are and then, once you have identified your core belief which can also be, for example, I'm worthless, I'm useless. That's also. These are also very, very common ones.
Speaker 2:Um, sometimes people um stop at the level of I'm not good enough. This is a very common belief that people talk about, but it's not good enough. If we dig deeper and if we unpack that, there is always something more to that. So we really need to figure out not good enough in what sense? Usually, with people pleasing, there is a big emphasis on external validation.
Speaker 2:So again, the sense of self value is outsourced. So you, uh, I need that text from that person to feel better about myself. I need to get that job promotion to feel better about myself. I need to get that amount of money so I know that I'm worth it. Right, so that becomes um kind of shows up as a series of behaviors that are basically led by this belief system. So if the tip of the iceberg of the belief system is, let's say, I am unlovable, then we should start asking ourselves in what ways my brain is trying to make me feel lovable or make me feel loved oh, I like that, so kind of focus on the part, like the positive part yeah and then just kind of jumping into this past behavior.
Speaker 2:Yes, you will go into, because obviously, if you have a negative beliefs, like I'm unlovable, then your mind is already in survival mode trying to protect you from that. So what is it that you're doing to feel lovable? Um, one thing can be oh, I put other people's first, so I want to make people happy, for example. Okay, so I want to make people happy. Sounds like a very good rule to have in one's life, but that can be taken way too far. So when, when, how do you make other people happy all the time? What is it that you do? And then you start understanding. You know, making a list, literally, of all your behavior. So I don't ask for what I need, I try not to be a burden, I don't talk to people when I'm sad, I don't ask for help, I don't delegate. I make other people's priority. All the time, I adjust my plans for other people. So then you will see that lots of behaviors will start coming up that indicate what you actually tangibly, concretely do in your day-to-day life. And then, slowly, you start changing these behaviors. Obviously, you would start with the situation that feels safe with a person. Maybe that feels safe. So maybe we could start targeting behaviors. Like I never ask for help. Okay, is there a time that you could ask for help that feels low stakes for you, a person that you could ask for help that you know that will be there for you? And so we'll start with these small behavioral experiments.
Speaker 2:And when we do people, lots of other thoughts, other worries, other emotions will come up. And when we do people, lots of other thoughts, other worries, other emotions will come up. And then we can heal them. Because as soon as long as your trauma, let's say it's covered up by all these behaviors that now are forming these people, pleaser personality, quote unquote then it will feel like your life works because for your mind it works. You're surviving right. So that's what your mind cares about. You're surviving right. But in reality, in the long term, that's causing you lots of problems. You're constantly doubting your relationships. You never feel safe in your relationships. You always feel like you have to show other people things. You have to constantly perform okay in a way. And so when we start changing these behaviors, obviously anything that comes up like emotions anger, guilt, sadness, anxiety is a very common one. Obviously these were all emotions that were linked to your first trauma, and then we can heal them once we uncover them.
Speaker 1:Basically oh, it's brilliant. I love. I'm really enjoying this interview.
Speaker 1:It's fantastic thank you, me too I do have a question from a viewer, mary, if I can read it out at all. I've got a question. She says that she works near the partner of her husband's friend. So everyone seems keen for her to be friends because obviously her husband's friend is her husband's partner, friend's partner. But she's tried but she doesn't feel that she is a match. And she's tried to distance herself but the person's not getting the hint. And now she feels stressed because she's trying to please all these people watching yeah, it feels like Mary.
Speaker 2:Everyone, everyone wants a piece of Mary, everyone wants something from Mary. Um, the nice thing about this question, I guess, is that the person understood that the other person had the need and tried to compromise. So, you see, often people pleasers just compromising or, let's say, adapting to the other person's demands as a first response, and in this case I mean we could say that it can be acceptable, right? If someone asks you, do you want to try and hang out with this person Because you know it's someone in our circle, whatever? Then fine, why not? But then something happens, right. So either things go well or things do not go well. In this case, mary's not happy, and so there's something about this relationship now that is triggering Mary out of balance, and this is now Mary's problem more than anyone else's. So you know, and Mary should treat this problem as her problem first.
Speaker 2:So how do I solve this? Do I need to set some boundaries? Am I abandoning myself, meaning, am I ignoring the way I feel just to please other people? And how could I set healthy boundaries and reiterate them, because maybe she, she will need to do that in a way that, you know, it's kind, not rude, but still is firm. So I guess at this stage, mary's already experiencing the difficulty, the challenge of being having pleased or having tried to please someone. Also, when we try to do that, we quickly find out that people are never really pleased and in the meanwhile we are not pleased, neither with the with the outcome, you know. So I would definitely definitely suggest to this person to check in with her emotion, do a quick energy check. How do I feel about this? What would I want that person to know from me? And set the boundary clearly with her husband, with her friend, with whoever she needs to set it, because she needs to protect her own space too oh, perfect answer, thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you, I'm sure you'll find that really helpful. Um, so I know, louis vicar, you said that you were, you went through these things, and then you, you realized that you wanted to work um within, and the turning point was you achieved, achieved these things. How did you, what did you navigate? Well, how did you change from then, from that point where you kind of you're sitting in your office, you've achieved everything you want, and how did you pivot it to work more within yourself?
Speaker 2:so I think you reach a point in life and it might be about your career, about your relationships in which you start seeing things that you cannot unsee anymore. So even when you try to ignore those things, then they come. They come nagging back all the time and honestly, I don't think I deserve that, because, after all the hard work I put to be happy like that wasn't something I wasn't available to be unhappy just to satisfy someone else's dream and I maybe didn't mention that before, I'll say it now my father studied psychology at 20 years old and he had to leave university at 21 because he had me. So for all my life, all he told me about was how wonderful studying psychology was, that he really liked it, that I would have loved it, he would buy to me psychology books, so he would really. He really encouraged me. In this case I'm saying because obviously I this job, but he really pushed towards it too.
Speaker 2:So in a way, I grew up with psychology books, like I was reading Freud at 13. What was I understanding? Nothing, really not much. But that's always been my passion, passion, um, and so once I achieved that in the city where I said I want to live here, when I was 13 years old. Um, everything in my mind should have, should have been perfect and it wasn't.
Speaker 2:And the and when I thought about maybe I should change place of work simply, maybe this doesn't fit me anymore, maybe I should, uh, study another kind of therapy, maybe this is not my type of therapy, maybe I should change CT, maybe I should change something about my life that I don't know what it is and I will find out. It's fine if I don't have all the answers, but when I asked myself these questions and I got chills so this is true the first thing that came to my mind was the first thing that came to my mind was now I need to tell my dad that was the first automatic thought. What would my dad think about this change? And so I started understanding that he was a very predominant presence in my mind, in my life, a lot more than he was supposed to be. Um, and so I started doing some work around that, which then involved also moving. Moving involved changing the modality of my work and involved also therapy going to therapy myself.
Speaker 2:Um, and my relationship with my father changed to a point that now is non-existent anymore, because that's when I started setting boundaries about. You know what I want and my desires, um, and when people relate to you, uh, in a way that in a controlling way, they can't really accept your freedom of choice, um, that's just the only thing, that the only option that you have is to do that. But I want to say to people please are listening, not to get discouraged, because that's also I mean, it's difficult, because one of the worries that we have as people pleasers when we stop being so accommodating, is that people will hate us, will abandon us and no one will like us. This isn't true. The good relationships in your life will improve and thrive. The bad relationships, the toxic relationships, the controlling relationships, these are the ones that you're not going to be a match to anymore, so these will leave your life oh yeah, and this is what happened to me basically
Speaker 1:wow, but it's very brave that you did that, but also it it's very authentic and sometimes that sometimes people think because it's apparent that you have to kind of put up with things that aren't in alignment, but it's if we're going to be completely authentically ourselves and everything has to match and if not, we're just compromising ourselves. So I think it's very brave and and thank you for speaking so candidly about that and, um, dear listeners, I, I, I mirror that in the sense that, um, the people that are meant to be when we're authentic ourself will be in our lives, and the people that that I want to be controlling or whatever they, they won't be in lives and and that's okay. I think that's okay. I think that's okay, that's, it is okay. It's just to completely be ourselves. So, people, pleasing is like a response to trauma, is. I guess it stems back to childhood, is it? Or it could be any age, I guess I think it's very.
Speaker 2:It's um. When we talk about belief systems, you know they form around seven to ten years old. So we always as therapists, of course, but in general we we know that childhood experiences are always very significant. So anything that happens between that age or before 10 years old, it will shape the way you think about yourself and about other people and about relationships. But also, I guess, other things can happen later on that can make your people pleaser.
Speaker 2:It can be a very demanding job that forces you to basically abandon your life completely and kind of puts you in this again hamster wheel of having to perform all the time. Hamster wheel of having to perform all the time. It can be an abusive relationship with someone who every day tries to make you feel bad about yourself and then you feel like you have to please them to get that validation, or it can be anything else. It can be a peer experience. It can be bullying, for example, where you start thinking at some point that people don't like you, so you have to be different from who you are.
Speaker 2:But there is always a time in which we disconnect from who we are because we think that's the right thing to do for the survival in that moment, and probably in that moment was the right thing to do for survival. And then we carry that behavior because in the meanwhile we feel, the brain feels like, okay, so this was good at that time, when we needed the mask of people pleasing, when we needed the good girl mask, we wore it and we survived. And so then we carry that with us, we carry that with us and and the whole personality gets built around that.
Speaker 1:Um, so it can be different experiences, I guess, but what they all have in common is the self-abandonment part right, and that's where the people pleasing comes, because we've abandoned a part of ourself to kind of fit into the mold of what's happening and the child didn't. We carry that through into adulthood and that's where someone like yourself, ludovica, that can help people kind of untangle that and and and find find themselves. Is this something you wish everyone in the world knew, and what is it I?
Speaker 2:wish that everyone knew that the mind is not so logical and the emotions are not so irrational. Ah that's what I think.
Speaker 1:So logical and the emotions are not so rational. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah well, I'm a psychotherapist, right? So you wouldn't expect maybe this from a CBT therapist that is heavily reliant on. Let's reframe your thoughts, let's look at balancing your thoughts and having more functional thoughts, and it's important to do that at some stage, specifically when we're talking about clinical depression or clinical anxiety clinical anxiety, but then um, in my work as a coach, instead, I realized that the mind thinks all the time, right, so that's the I see the heart beats the mind things. So the quicker you can learn to detach from it, to come back to your center and be grounded and stay with your emotions, with with your body, the quicker you learn to do that, the easier your life will be. Because if that's the number one skill that I think everyone should learn, is to detach from their mind.
Speaker 2:Thoughts are rarely logical. They are most often biased, conditioned by our experiences, influenced by the environment, so logic is not really part of the picture. I'm telling you as a therapist, the amount of negative thoughts that people have that they think is logical is crazy. Like negative thoughts, by definition, are extreme and, um, inflexible. So how can they be logical? But then we spend most of our time worrying about things and having negative thoughts, and so it means that we are in the present or, it's sorry in the past or in the future. We are not in the present, so we are disconnected from the current reality. And in the current reality. That's when you can listen to your emotions, your intuition, you're knowing it's in the here and now. It's in the here and now when you can actually get connected to your truth.
Speaker 1:It's not in your thoughts, it's in your body and your presence yeah, and we live in a world that's designed or rather it's kind of going away to take us out the present, because sometimes, rather than kind of be with myself, we'll get distracted by, like our phones and things like that. And I think whenever I've gone off on one where my mind's gone off like a wild horse and then if I just sit down and breathe and then it kind of brings me back because, like you said, it's not logical Just because we fought something doesn't mean that's the actual reality and, like you said, we're biased from our past thoughts. So I'm mindful of the time. I've got two more questions for you, if I may. Thoughts. So I'm mindful of the time. I've got two more questions for you, if I may. What is the one course of?
Speaker 2:action one could do today to make their life better. So I would maybe go back to what we were talking about before. You know the behaviour part. If you identify yourself as a people pleaser, then you feel about relationships in a certain type of way. Relationships are challenging because there is the self-abandonment and the self-sacrificing, but sometimes it might not be immediate or, let's say, immediately understandable for people or easily identifiable.
Speaker 2:So what I would do is I would grab a piece of paper, write wherever area of your life you have a problem with which could be work, family, friendship, love, loving, relationship, romantic relationships and I will write what do you believe about yourself for each of these areas that you put down, what do you believe about the other for each of these areas that I put up, that you put down, and what do you believe about the topic in general? So, when it comes to love, for example, what do you believe about yourself when it comes to love? What do you believe about other people when it comes to love, and what do you believe about other people, about um when it comes to love? So other people obviously intend um, involving both people who relate to you and other people in general. So some people come up with ideas, like people are selfish, for example, or people only care about one thing, like no one is able to love nowadays anymore. You know these very extreme beliefs that people might have and might impact on the way they relate. Um, and then another thing.
Speaker 2:The third question is what do you believe about this specific topic? So what do you think what you believe about love? And that usually, uh, brings people back to you. You know their experience of love, their first experiences of love, which was obviously parental love or caretaker's love. It could have been peer group love, but also what they witnessed, so how their parents loved each other. So that could be a first experience of love, and so it can entangle many things of the past that actually are showing up in the area. You're subconsciously, you're unaware of it, but actually are showing up in the area. You're subconsciously, you're unaware of it, but they are still active in that, in that area, because our beliefs always impact on the way we behave, whether we know it or whether we don't know it. They always have an impact. So, in, if you, uh, if you have, if you're finding a certain area challenging, it means that you're also in some way participating subconsciously to that dynamic. So you need to find out your part oh, it's, this is really helpful.
Speaker 1:And then if they write it down, then they can look at it, I guess, and then if something comes up again, kind of refer to that and think actually is this yeah well, this is like.
Speaker 2:Oh well, that's brilliant yeah and then if you, if you then do this exercise and you look at your belief system in any specific area and then you see your situation, your concrete reality, then you can link things and kind of get that breakthrough. Actually, this is a perfect belief system for the type of reality that I'm experiencing right now. So that needs to be the link how your beliefs actually then link to your realities.
Speaker 1:Oh, it's a great way to knit it all together, as I say. So, ludovica, I know that if I'm a listener and I want to work for yourself, I know you've had a book out which you can talk about as well, but what is the best way? If I'm listening now and I think I want to work with ludovica, how can I reach out?
Speaker 2:and so I have a website which is lu-colecom, so there there's lots of information about what I do. You will have access to my newsletter, my social media and also there is a contact form, so you can just literally email me from that contact form. I am experiencing a bit of issues with Instagram. I think my profile has been hacked, something like that. Yeah, I don't have it. It still exists, but I don't currently have access to it. But I also have that. If people want to follow me on, there is ludovica, underscore, colella, underscore coaching, so you will find me. Right now I'm not very active, but I will fix the issue soon.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's hopefully being hot, but yes, hopefully I'll get fixed very soon. You've got a book out. Uh, you, I wish I. I. I must confess I didn't realize until before I sat down. So I usually read my guests book. So I will have a look and it looks fantastic. Could you explain a bit about your book briefly?
Speaker 2:thank you, thank you actually that was a project that I did with my one of one of my best friends, but also at that time, but also now, uh, we were training, training together a cbt therapist and we decided to create a journal because we were both very big on journaling, and it's called the feel good journal, and so this journal has two parts. Basically, the first part is just a theory about cbt so how to challenge your thoughts, how to improve your mood by the things that you do. So mood management, um, just very general things about CBT, but, I guess, easily digestible. That's what we wanted to do. We didn't want to create a manual about CBT, we wanted to make it really light and fun.
Speaker 2:And then, for the remaining part of the book, there is basically 52 weeks of prompts. So every week you will have a theme like kindness, self-love, love or friendship, anything, self-growth, empowerment, and so you have three questions for every theme. And this is just a way of you know, because we love journaling so much. It's a way of self-discovery. It's a really easy step for people to take. Most people who come to therapy they say that the first step they take is actually journaling. So we find that was that could be, you know a nice way to introduce people to self-analyzing work or self-reflection work, let's say brilliant, and that's available.
Speaker 1:Amazon worldwide yes, yes perfect.
Speaker 2:And just before that it goes, any final thoughts well, no, I want to thank you very much to have me on your podcast. Uh, it was really you made me. You make people feel really at ease, so it was great. Thank you so much oh, thank you, ludovica.
Speaker 1:I really enjoyed having you on the show and um I'll put a link into your website, but your work is, you're very natural, your work is amazing and you're going to help a lot of people.
Speaker 1:Um, do stay tuned, listeners. As always, there's a meditation inspired by today, but the one and only ludovica colella. Yes, thank you very much. Top tips for the meditation is either sit nice and cross-legged on the floor with a nice straight back always nice to sit on a block or a cushion or that's not available for you you sit in a chair with the back nice and straight. The important thing is you're not slouching, and if you're doing something that requires your concentration, all you need to do is just pause this and you can reconvene the meditation at a time that is good for you. If you're doing the meditation, let's begin.
Speaker 1:So sit up tall, dear one and you're going to close the eyes and as you close the eyes, you imagine yourself walking to the edge of the most beautiful ancient lake.
Speaker 3:Perhaps you are now in the ancient isle of Avalon in the mystical town of Glastonbury in the UK, or any other lake be it one you've physically been to or one that's in your imagination, but just something that you can relate to.
Speaker 1:And as you walk to the edge of the lake, it's a very calm day. There isn't a ripple in the water and there's a faint mist in the air. But as you get closer, the sun has risen even higher in the sky and it casts some beautiful light upon the lake. And as you look into into the water, the water is the most crystal clear that you have ever seen this lake and you start to slow the breath down, taking in the surroundings taking in the moment and there's a natural seat right next to the edge of the lake.
Speaker 1:It can be whatever it is in your imagination perhaps it's some grass, perhaps it's a very comfortable large stone, something that you can sit on, and as you sit on the edge of this lake, you just watch the water, watch the crystal clear water flowing and being with very small ripples of water every now and again on this extra calm day, and you look into the lake and you see your reflection.
Speaker 3:and as you look at your reflection, you whisper the words I love you, I love you, I love you and you continue to tell yourself that, as you catch your reflection, that you love and honor yourself completely in the moment and you continue, and as you do that, you smile, even if you don't fully believe it yet.
Speaker 1:remember, as Einstein always says everything starts with imagination and if you imagine it, the self-love will be there.
Speaker 3:So I love you.
Speaker 1:And just think to the water as you reflect.
Speaker 3:You are perfect, perfect in every way you are alive.
Speaker 1:You are unique, yet you are part of a greater, greater plan a greater energy and just continue and say I love me, I love myself, I love you and the reason you say I love you and talk about yourself in third person is because it's your higher self telling yourself that you love yourself. And just for a moment, just feel how it feels to be held by the love of self-acceptance and then very calmly say thank you to yourself, thank you to your lake, and then just start to come back into the room, take some slow, calm, deep breaths in and out through the nostrils and go forth dear one, you wonderful being.
