Wild Adventures and Lessons from Solo Traveling, Part 2

Have you ever wondered what it would look like to completely let go — of the rules, the routines, the pressure to perform — and just be? In this episode of Fuel the Fire, Shanon picks up where she left off in Part 1 of her Hawaii solo travel series and shares the lessons that literally rewired the way she moves through the world.

Whether you're stuck in diet culture, disconnected from your intuition, or just running on autopilot and craving something deeper — this episode will meet you where you are.

What You'll Hear in This Episode:

🌺 The childhood dream worth revisiting Shanon opens with a challenge: go back to the younger version of you. What did you love? What did you dream of? The answer might be pointing you toward something you've been ignoring.

👙 What it really means to feel free in your body After years of bodybuilding, powerlifting, CrossFit, and using her appearance to validate her worth as a dietitian and business owner, Shanon finally experienced body freedom — on a beach in Hawaii, in a bikini, surrounded by strangers. She shares what made that possible, and why she believes weight loss can never be the goal if you actually want lasting change.

🌿 Why nature is the most underrated nervous system reset Spending time outside isn't just relaxing — it's regulating. Shanon breaks down why she believes we are part of nature, not separate from it, and how even five minutes a day outside can begin to shift how you feel in your body.

🧭 Learning to trust your intuition (finally) Shanon shares how she reconnected with her intuition through practices she learned from a spiritual mentor she met in Hawaii — and why she believes self-trust is the root of everything: your health, your relationships, your sense of direction in life.

🪡 Acupuncture and breathwork as real pain medicine In one of the most memorable parts of the episode, Shanon tells the story of getting a tooth infection in the middle of her trip — with no pain medication that worked for her body — and using meditation, breath, and eventually acupuncture to manage it. The results were immediate and undeniable.

🚶‍♀️ How to stop taking other people's behavior personally Shanon shares a wild story from her hostel that turned into one of her biggest lessons: when someone projects their pain onto you, it truly has nothing to do with you. And knowing that changes everything about how quickly you can let it go and move on.

🌅 The simple ritual that grounded her every single day Sunrise. Sunset. Outside. That's it. Shanon explains why she never missed it — and why she believes it's one of the most powerful things you can do for your body and mind.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to another episode, Firefam. This week I'm recording this on video, so hopefully, I can share snippets of the episode on social media. I haven't recorded episodes in a bit because I just wanted to focus on getting comfortable speaking in front of the camera. There's definitely a part of me that feels like maybe I act a little bit different or I don't flow as efficiently when I am on camera because I'm thinking maybe a little bit too much and being a little less flowy. I'm almost like a little too focused on maybe how I look in front of the camera, that I'm not in my natural flow state when it comes to speaking. But I'm actually feeling pretty good right now. So hopefully this is maintained throughout the episode. And yeah, it's something that you get to be with me and grow with me through. So I'm hoping that in a few episodes from now, a few months, a year from now, I look back at this and feel like, wow, I've become so much more confident in front of the camera and I'm able to speak more eloquently. I've been listening back to some of the previous episodes and really taking some notes on how I'm speaking, little things that I'm doing, so that I can improve. My goal is to really be able to take this onto a broader scale. Ever since I was young, I've always pictured myself being a motivational speaker. There are many different things that people imagine for themselves, but something I would do is just like walk around my room with a pretend microphone going through speeches that I would theoretically say if I were on stage as a motivational speaker. And I want to revisit those dreams. I feel like as kids, we actually have a lot of dreams about what our soul truly desires. And then we become adults. As adults, we start to think a little bit more about the practicality or the financial implications of career choices that we would make. And we tend to actually detach from some of those innate gifts that we have. If there's anything that you take away or journal on from this episode, I hope that it's this. Start to look back at the younger version of you. If your parents are still here on this planet, take time to ask them about how they were with you as a child and how you were as a child. Maybe what your favorite toys were, maybe things like what you used to really like doing. It's hard to remember all of those things. You might already have some memories coming back just from hearing me talk about this and say this. I hope you find something in there, some kind of nugget, whether or not you can turn it into a career. I don't think everything that we dream of and hope to be is necessarily something that we have to do as a means of making money. It can at least be something that you incorporate on a weekly, daily, monthly, annual basis that just pure purely brings you joy, something that you can just flow and do, something that you've always dreamt of. Give yourself the opportunity to do it. Life's short. We're so worried about people judging us. We get so caught up in our finances that we don't pursue things that actually bring us joy or passion. I hope you give yourself permission to do that in some capacity. Right. So today we are getting into the additional lessons that I learned on my trip to Hawaii. So I have a couple different lists that I want to share with you. Last week, when I shared my list, I only got through point one and it's subpoints. So maybe this week we'll be maybe just like a little more focused on my talking points. And that way we can get through everything that I hope to share with you guys. There could be a part three. We'll see how it goes. We'll see how much your girl wants to yap today. And let's get into it. Last week I talked about the lessons I learned while solo traveling, specific traveling specifically, what I would do without anyone's influence. This, in and of itself, is such a major lesson. And it kind of touches into what I said. So if no one was watching, money didn't matter, and you weren't worried about pleasing anybody, what would you wake up and be doing with your life? That is something many of us do not ask. We're so deep into adulthood that we forgot we even have choices. We don't give ourselves to pivot permission to pivot. We make things feel like they're going to be so much harder. It's going to feel like an upheaval, like you're just ripping away your identity to sometimes do these little things that truly bring us joy and make us happy. You're allowed to be a little bit selfish sometimes. Doing what you want to be doing and following that nudge naturally is what is best for your soul. We can oftentimes get caught up in feeling like we can no longer pivot because it's going to affect so many people or we're going to hurt people in the process. As a human, as an empath, it's good that you are thinking about these things. However, if you are going against the natural essence of your being, making the shift to follow what's truly authentic and what your internal navigation system is asking you to do naturally through the laws of the universe will bring not only you, but them to a closer place of center. Because who knows, it might feel really scary to make a decision that you know you need to make when it affects someone else. But you are also liberating them through making that decision just because you choose to be the first one to say something does not mean that you're not doing the right thing. It's harder to break inertia doing that, but it will send you both on the right path. And that can be so many different things, whether it's staying in a friendship, staying in a romantic relationship, continuing a job that you've been in for so many years, you know, continuing to show up to do a service for someone. It can look like many, many different things. It doesn't have to be like a flip a switch and tear your life apart to follow it. It can be small little bits, little nuggets that you start to incorporate, small choices that you make daily that can get you there. So jumping back into my list, I have points two through seven to share with you today. Point number two is how badly I craved freedom in my body. I craved freedom in my own skin for so long, and I didn't know how to get there without being worried about how I looked. Being a dietitian and then becoming a bodybuilder and then going through my powerlifting era and then doing CrossFit. I was always very focused on not only my performance, but actually how I presented to other people. I felt like if I didn't look a certain way, people wouldn't respect me as a dietitian. I felt like people wouldn't respect me as a bodybuilder. Of course, if I looked a certain way, I was so, so self-conscious during that era. And I used my body to validate my self-worth because it felt like if I looked good, then I can convince people that I have my stuff together. And then going through those different phases, getting deeper into my career, becoming kind of like the face of my business really pushed me further into this idea of just being obsessed with my image. It started to get to a point where I felt really stuck. I was getting exhausted. Year after year, I would have these thoughts in my mind about like, when am I going to get to stop counting calories and measuring all my meals? When do I get to be someone that just sits down in a future state with my husband and my children and just eats a meal without worrying about what's in it, how much I ate, that I could just naturally guide myself. And I wouldn't be obsessed with being the leanest version of myself or like I had something to prove to the world. I craved that freedom to just move without worrying about my roles, without moving, or without worrying about the way that my clothes were laying on my body. It mattered so much to me because of all of these stories I was telling myself around my career, around my, I don't know what you would call it, like it's not a career around fitness, but you know, the way I was a competitor, all of these things, I felt like so much pressure. And also, again, I was so afraid of people judging me in friend groups, in family situations, people talked about bodies all the time. I felt like people were always around me, I should say. Like the people in my circles were always worried about trying to get skinnier, trying to get leaner, kind of like self-deprecating jokes. And I didn't know how to get out of it because I was so absorbed in that. And I thought that because of the career choice I made, being a competitor, that I was just stuck in this forever. But at the same time, I had hope that there would be a different way of living. I just didn't know how to make that transition. Part of what I did in Hawaii that felt really good and what really helped me was the fact that I was going somewhere where I really knew no one. I wasn't worried about making a fool of myself. I needed that so that I could just show up and start to experiment with the version of myself that I wanted to be, the person that I really was. And to be able to feel free in my body without being worried about judgment. I was like, these people I will probably never see again. So it doesn't matter. I'm just gonna show up in the bathing suit that I want to be wearing, go on the beach, not worry about it, not be sucking it in, not trying to contort myself, not being worried about how others are perceiving me, just existing in my body in the freest form and putting myself in a position where I could be seen. Being in front of people, being witnessed in your own skin brings this deeper level of vulnerability and taps into something a little bit different than just doing mirror practice, like when you're really looking at yourself in the mirror. Being able to be witnessed in it really cracked something open in me and helped me really dissipate the fear that was built up around being seen in such a vulnerable state. And I really do think that like being seen in a bathing suit is something very vulnerable, like especially in a bikini. It's like I can't hide any bit of myself. I can be seen by anyone exactly as I am. And I really needed that so that I could fully feel free in my skin, in my body, do my hula hoop, swim in the ocean. I felt so liberated. I genuinely believe if we focus on weight loss, many of my clients know and I go over this. Like I used to be really triggered by the thought of weight loss for a while when I was on my healing journey with my body. I just didn't want to hear it. I didn't want to hear about other people wanting it. I didn't want to counsel people on it because I felt like it was missing the whole point of life. Now, really, what I teach is that you can't go into the goal of weight loss with it being a goal. Like for let me explain that a little bit further. So if you go in solely wanting weight loss, when that is your driving force, you tend to make decisions that are not actually quite as healthy because you're really focused on changing that number on the scale. When you approach it from the way that we approach it at Fuel the Fire, which is prioritizing healthy choices and really tapping into your mental and physical health, you will naturally experience weight loss as a byproduct of having different goals that actually move the marker. Most weight loss programs, and especially weight loss drugs, do not address the mental emotional piece of what it takes to become the healthiest version of yourself. And that is what is so key to us at Fuel the Fire. You have to address the deeper layers. Otherwise, even if you do experience weight loss, it does not stick because we haven't addressed the deepest root of what's actually causing it. So if you just snip a weed from the top, that weed just keeps growing back and growing back and growing back. And that's exactly what it's like to be on a weight loss journey, where we gain and we lose and we gain and we lose. And then we end up being in a space where we never actually felt that good in our body. We never really felt like we got into this space where we felt free. We felt restrained through most of that journey. We felt limited. The goal is to feel free and liberated in our bodies. That's what we truly desire. That is what is going to resonate on the deepest level. That's what really feels good. So that freedom is something that I finally let myself experience. I did not weigh myself the entire time that I was there. I ate whatever I wanted. I did not hold back. Um, I walked around a lot. I didn't go to a gym once. I just did some yoga sometimes on the beach by myself, but pretty much was like walking everywhere. And through that time, I just felt so good in my own skin, just being able to feel the sun on it, not being worried about what anyone thought. It just, it was so liberating. I loved that. Point number three, I realized how much I actually love to be in nature and that it was more than what meets the eye. Being in nature is actually something that's amazing for your nervous system. It reminds us that we're human. When I spend too much time inside, I almost forget that I'm human. It feels like I'm trapped in a little hamster cage and I'm just like running on a wheel and I'm getting tired and tired. And sure, I'll stop for snacks and whatever and get out and like drink a little bit of water, and then I just get back on the wheel and I'm stuck in this little cage. I don't even realize that I'm in a cage. I lose sight of it because I'm so busy doing, doing, doing, running on that wheel that I'm completely detached from the essence of my being. When I go outside, suddenly it's almost like something is awoken, awakened in me. I'm not sure. Grammar is not my strongest suit working on that fire fam, but something opens up in me. I feel so relaxed. I feel the sun on my skin. Even if it's cold, I will still go on walks in the coldest days of winter here in Pennsylvania. For me, it's about experiencing the fresh air, realizing that we are actually a part of nature. We are not separate from nature. We are it. We are all created from God. Like these flowers are from God, this grass is, this air is, the clouds are, we are, we are all part of it. And when we're too disconnected, some kind of energy gets stuck, gets trapped in us that actually needs to be awakened, that needs to move through our bodies. Being outside is such a big part of that. Even if it's just five minutes, I know that everyone lives a very different life and you have to do what works for you. But make it be a choice that is such an easy yes. You don't have to overcomplicate it. If your goal is to get outside more, start with five minutes a day. Something that is such a no-brainer that you absolutely will not stop yourself from doing and can't come up with an excuse as to why you can't do that. Even if it's sitting, you don't have to go for a walk. Even if it's like sticking your face to the window, it doesn't matter. Start to get connected to the elements of nature because the more I did that, the better I felt in my body. And I swear my body was feeling better. I have pictures, like when I started my journey in Hawaii, I actually had a lot of acne on my face, which I was so embarrassed about. I hated it so much. I always wore so much makeup on my skin to hide those blemishes. When I was in Hawaii, I really pretty much like wore no makeup the entire time. And my skin got so much better. And I attribute it to being in the sun. I attribute it to relaxing. I attribute it to finally paying attention to my nervous system and finally taking the pressure off of myself to perform. I had maybe like a handful of client sessions while I was there that I did virtually, but it was, it was basically like a couple a week, if that. I don't even know. But I closed my business at that point. So so much of that pressure, the feeling of people relying on me, me thinking I had to do so much, provide for people around me. It was just all gone. And that's not realistic for everyone, for most people. Like I may never get that chance to let go of all of that ever again. Or, you know, not to say never, but I'm not telling you to quit your job. I'm not telling you that's the answer to your problems. Maybe it is. But you don't have to go to that extreme to start to remove those pressures from yourself. It comes back to rewiring some of those thought processes, which is part of what I did down there. Being in nature really just helped me, again, become calm. And through these meditative practices that I did when I was outside, I was able to remove some of the emotions that were tied to a lot of my thoughts. So I was talking with another client about this very recently. I think I've touched on this in previous episodes, or yeah, because this happened maybe like a week or two ago. But the idea that meditation has to be like sitting there and not thinking, that's actually not what it is at all. It's being able to witness your thoughts, let them pass by without attaching any deeper meaning or emotion to them. That practice, I think, is a bit easier to do in nature for me personally. I can do it inside, but doing it outside also allows me to focus on the feelings of the wind on my skin, the sounds of the birds flying by and chirping. It gives your mind something more relaxing, more calming, more natural, something that we are one with. That opens us up to something that is so different than the experience of what you can have inside. So find some time to get outside, friends. All right. Point number four. I learned how to trust my intuition. This was a surprising lesson. It was something that I know that I deeply craved. I felt that I was so disconnected from my intuition and from my body going into that trip. I didn't really understand why I was doing what I was doing at all. Though sometimes intuition in general can feel like that because you don't always have an exact reason. You just have intuitive nudges. I couldn't hear them though. I my voices in my noggin were so loud that they made me question everything that my intuition was trying to communicate with me. And I believe that all of us are intuitive beings. Yes, naturally, some of us lean into logic a bit more, but we all have intuition. Many of us don't take the time to learn how to tap into our intuition because it's not something that Western society really talks about or prioritizes. So being able to get into that space where you can silence the outside noise and be fully present in your body is what allows you to start developing that piece of intuition. While I was there and I talked about this in the last episode, I met a spiritual mentor when I was looking at these birthing stones, when I took that journey and found like a tiny group that was going one day. There was a spiritual teacher there. And so I learned more from her about how to start to practice learning to listen to my intuition and making choices based off of it. This was really powerful, and I still use those practices today, almost on a daily basis. If not daily, it's definitely weekly. Things that helped me come back to center, ways to actually tap into my intuition and ask it questions so that I could have more specific clarity. If this is something you're curious about, I love to work it into my sessions and use complementary practices to help with that. During the time that I was in Hawaii, I was actually working on my life coaching certification, which also came with nervous system regulation practices, intuitive practices, ways to tap into the subconscious mind, which are all such great complements to the health journey. I actually think that if we centered our health journeys around these types of things, we would all be much healthier. Truly, and this is something that has shifted my health. I had so much resistance towards my body because I was trying to control it instead of allowing my body to speak to me through my intuition to guide me to what I truly needed, what no one else could possibly tell me outside of myself. I no longer was outsourcing my. Guidance and looking to other people for validation on my choices. I was the one making the choices. It was my intuition. It was me being able to be connected to God and to realize that God is within me, speaking through me, channeling through me. This shifted the way I lived my life completely. I came back from this trip a different person because I completely rewired my navigation system by having my intuition be the guiding force. So this was something that was such a huge lesson that helped me so much, not only with my health, but also in my romantic relationships, with my family, with friendships, with figuring out what to do with my career, with being able to trust myself again. Self-trust is the root of so much because oftentimes, again, we outsource our decision making to other healthcare providers or friends or family members, and we require them to be our sounding boards to tell us what we should and shouldn't do. That indecision causes so much pain in our body. It makes energy feel stuck within us, it makes us doubt ourselves, it actually creates this lack of trust we feel internally. And then we become dependent on others. When the goal is to really realize that we can be dependent on ourselves for our decisions, I still think being connected to a community is important. So I'm not saying that like you can do life by yourself. That's not the goal, that's not our purpose. I believe truly that other people hold keys to help us unlock each other and we really need each other because at the end of the day, we are all one. And once we realize that, we really start to connect deeper and we work together and heal a lot of the pain and suffering that we experience on a grand scheme level in the world within our country. The judgment that even passes on daily experiences moment to moment. It brings us closer as a society. And there are many people that are naturally driven and community focused, which is so beautiful. So lean into that. Lean into connecting with others in a different way rather than using them to validate us. We connect with others to help liberate them by showing up and trusting ourselves. So I think it's Michael Jackson, the song that's like, if you want to make the world a better place, uh I forgot the rest of the words. It's like, look in the mirror and change yourself or something. Oh my gosh. But yeah, it's something like that. Um, someone DM me and send me the song. I'll probably Google it after this, but I would love a message. Someone just remind me. I know that I'm seeing something relevant. You know what I'm talking about. I feel like everyone knows what I'm talking about. So we're gonna move on now. All right. Point number five: the power of acupuncture and meditation on pain. So before you think these are so outlandish, hear me out. If I had pain before, I would lean into taking some type of pain medication like Advil. So I discovered when I was doing CrossFit, um, I had quite a few injuries during that time period. I tried taking things like Tylenol and Aleve, and for whatever reason, my body had an atrocious reaction to them. And so I've determined that I am allergic to those things, which people think is insane. I feel like every time I go to the doctor or the hospital and they try to offer me Tylenol and I say no, I'm allergic, I feel like they look at me sideways because they think I'm trying to like get something else. But I'm like, please, no, just Advil. Like I react so weird to Tylenol. But I don't know. It's I don't think it's common because again, a lot of doctors like look at me funny when I say I'm allergic to it. But it's really the truth. Anytime I take Tylenol, I get this weird like rash on my body, my body gets really hot, all of my joints start swelling, and I'm in more pain. So that is just not it for me. Um, so at the time when I was in Hawaii, I got a gnarly tooth infection. The side of my face swelled up like a baseball, like a half baseball. And I looked very funny. Um, it was not a cute look for me, but I was like, wow, okay, I'm in a lot of pain. And initially I didn't really know what was going on. I was trying to do my best to sit with the pain. I was taking Advil because I was in so, so much pain. And again, at this point, it's onset. I didn't even know that it was a tooth infection because it was my jaw that was really hurting. But it was because that infection was like going into my jaw. So what I did was I would lay there with my max dose of Advil taken, still in so much pain, and it was hard to sleep at night. I started to actually meditate and breathe into the pain and welcome it. I know it sounds kind of funky, but I truly believe in the power of the mind. So I thought to myself, if I can speak to this pain, if I can fully embrace it, if I stop resisting it, it will actually work with me. And I did exactly that. I would breathe into the pain. I would say, please teach me the lesson. God, what is it that I need to learn from this pain that I'm experiencing in my tooth, in my jaw? What do I need to learn? I'm open to the lessons. Please show me, please guide me. I accept you. And I would just become silent and just focus on my breathing. I would really focus on breathing into the pain point that I felt. And this is something that I learned in yoga. I also learned it in my life coaching practices. I would breathe and channel energy into the space of pain and quietly listen for the guidance that I was receiving. It wasn't always super loud in the moment, but it reduced my pain levels significantly. And it allowed me to fall asleep. The first night I struggled so much. And then the second night, I was so desperate for relief that I was like, all right, let's see if I can truly use my mind and my body to connect to this and heal it. Because I think our bodies are so, so powerful. We do not give our bodies enough credit for what it's capable of doing. After this, this was really becoming my daily practice. Then I realized what was going on. Um, the spiritual mentor that I was connected with was like, You have a tooth infection. I know a really great dentist. I'm gonna take you to them and let's see what they say. I ended up needing a root canal. So I got that procedure done. And again, not taking any pain medication because it never makes me feel good. Even those like stronger ones that they prescribe after surgery. Again, when I got surgery on my knee, on my ECL, the pain medications they gave me made me so, so sick. And again, I don't know, like my body does not fare well with many pain medications. So, because of this, again, I really was trying to practice like breathing through this pain. Like I just had someone like dig into my mouth, remove a tooth, and like my nerves. So I was not feeling my best. And I had no pain medication. The spiritual mentor that I had, her husband was actually an acupuncturist. And he was phenomenal. So he actually took the time to really explain things to me when he would stick the needle in, he would take it out and be like, Do you actually feel that difference? And I was like, wow, that's insane. I physically felt the difference the second he put the needle in, the pain shifted, it went away. When he removed it, I felt it again instantly. And I was like, wow, I am now a firm believer in acupuncture. I knew that it had to be something that I looked into further because it's so powerful. I use like acupressure, tapping, EFT, emotional freedom techniques. So this is something that I incorporate into my practices with my clients. And it is based on these meridians that are in the body. It is an ancient Chinese medicine practice, and it is something that I believe really does have a place in modern medicine today, whether it's mental health or even physical health. These things can really help. I've been actually looking to get into a consistent acupuncture practice. So there is someone I've been scouting and I want to reach out to them soon. It's been on my to-do list. I've, you know, with all of the changes and all the things I've been adding to the business, it's been really busy on top of like trying to maintain my boundaries and make time for my partner and my family and my friends and like have a social life and be a person outside of my career. But again, these are just excuses. I need to just do it now that I've said it on a public forum, putting that my holding myself accountable. Um, so yeah, I'm gonna be making that call this week to get it scheduled because thinking back to that moment, it was such a game changer for me and it helped me so much when nothing else could, which is powerful. It's just a side note. I also have this feeling about giving birth. I've people always say that like giving birth is so terrible, it's so rough and such a painful experience. And I have absolutely no doubt that it does create a lot of pain in the human body. But I actually also believe that there's a reality in which we can transmute some of that pain into something that's a little more euphoric and making it almost like orgasmic. There are books that actually talk about this, people that teach this principle of an orgasmic pregnancy. And I know that sounds insane, but I am insane. Like I really believe this because of what I've already proven to myself about being able to transmute pain into something else. So, you know, I think if we're conditioned to think and feel a certain way, we experience it on an actual physical level. So if I tell myself that it can actually be something pleasurable, I 1000% believe that, you know, if I can't tap into it the whole time, I can still tap into it part of the time. I think I might be saying like part of the time because I almost still have this feeling of like people are gonna think I'm crazy for saying this, because anyone that I pitch this idea to thinks I'm a little bit crazy, which again is okay, because this is my experience and I'm over it. You know, like I'm just so over trying to mute my beliefs so that other people don't judge me. Because what is also happening, you know, me speaking this out, there are probably other people that have one, never heard of this, two, had curiosity, or three, or also think like everyone would think I'm insane. So I'm never gonna say this out loud and I'm never gonna pursue it because everyone that I have shared it with shot me down. This has happened to me a lot, but for some reason I'm crazy enough to look past people's judgments, which I will say is a gift sometimes. But you know, low-key, some people think I'm delusional, and that's okay, and I just have to live with that and accept that. They can think I'm delusional, people can think I'm crazy, but the people that are meant to hear this will hear it and hopefully it gives them an opportunity to connect with me. We can talk about it. I would love to hear your perception if you've read any books or experienced this yourself. I really want to talk to more people that have this thought. But anyway, that's just a little tangent. And we will come back to point number six. Don't take the actions of others personally. What people choose to do very often, even if it affects you emotionally, oftentimes has nothing to do with you. I'll use some specific examples. There was one story that I journaled about. I randomly met a human in Hawaii. I mean, I met so many humans, but I'm gonna tell the story about one specific interaction. Um, they were just like so excited to meet new people. So I had been in the hostel for maybe like three weeks at this point, and they came into the room. There was a lot of people that were changing. Many people that were in my hostel room didn't stay there for an extended period of time. I was the only one that stayed there for a full month. Everyone else was like a few days, one night. It would just, it would be random. It would kind of just be like a passing point. There were four other beds in the room. So I met quite a few different people. And one of the people that I met, you know, I'm like debating whether or not I want to tell all the details. I don't know if this person will like ever find this podcast. Probably not. So, you know, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna share it. I'm just gonna tell you all the details. So he was a good-looking fellow, and I'm sure he was someone that was used to getting his way with everything because he was that type of good looking, just to give you like a really clear mental image, just like a very fit, dark hair, blue eyes type of look that I think a lot of people would be like, oh, what a pretty guy. And at this point, I was just like, I am not here to meet men. I just want to exist and focus on myself. And I I don't actually really want to build any deep connections with anyone. I mean, sure, the little girly girl part of me was kind of like like really having to to shut down any kind of thoughts of like being romantic with anyone at that time, too, because you know, I I think I was always someone that was like, oh my God, maybe I'll find the love of my life here, or maybe I'll find the love of my life here. And um, I really had to work hard to shut that down and just be like, that's not the purpose of this trip. And so I was sticking to my guns and I knew that I really like I was closed off to it. He pops in and he's just full of energy. I'm sitting on my bed, I'm on the top bunk, mind you. He climbs into the top bunk, like this is within two minutes of him walking into the hostel. He gets on my bed and he's like, Hi, I'm Jesus. And I was like, Okay, hey, what's up, dude? And he just like starts telling me his life story, and we're having a nice conversation, and it's getting very spiritual and philosophical, which I love. I love getting into deep conversation. Then, you know, after maybe like an hour of this conversation, sitting on my top bunk in a hostel, like this is just so funny looking back, but we're sitting in there, and he's like, I can't remember the exact words, but essentially something of like, wow, like we are deeply connecting. It was almost like it was giving me like love bombing. Like, I feel like he was trying to like convince me that we could have been soulmates or something. And I was like, we would never work, period. And he was like taken aback by this. He thought I was absolutely insane for saying it because he's like, Are you not experiencing the same excitement that I am? And I was just like, I, you know, I'm like, this is great conversation and everything. But in my heart, in like, I really felt like this was just love bombing. Like, this person is so excited, they're tapping on all of these deep emotions, getting really raw, um, getting straight to these like deep spiritual stories, feeling a little liberated. And so you feel that heart-to-heart connection, which is nice, but that doesn't mean you're meant to be two people that fall in love and start a family. You can have these connections with people that are really deep that aren't romantic. And it doesn't matter what sex they are, right? It it just, I just knew in my heart that there were like red flags. I recognized these patterns. There were experiences, physical experiences in my body that I was having that matched unhealthy, toxic patterns that I had previously been in. And he kept kind of pushing for the deeper explanation as to why I felt like we weren't compatible. And I told him exactly that. And I was like, listen, I'm feeling something in my body that I felt in other dynamics that I knew were not safe. And I'm here trusting my intuition, and I know that I just would like to be friends and no further. And he was like, okay, fine, whatever. So we go through this experience. He's like, Do you still want to go on a hike? And I'm like, sure. I plan on going on a hike anyway. We can go together. One of my favorite parts about this character in my journey was that he told me that he was just like, he, he was paying for everything. And I was like, okay, like you really don't have to do that. That's like very kind. And he's like, Oh, it doesn't matter. I'm never paying this credit card back. And I was like, oh gosh. And I was just like so stunned because that was not the response I would have ever anticipated from anyone. Um, but that's why this story is just so funny and it makes it a better story. So later, you know, as we get further into conversation, we're going on this hike. I find out he's like telling this story about how his grandma was talking to him, and he was paraphrasing his grandma and goes, Oh, my grandma was looking at me saying, Michael, why did you do that? And I was like, I thought your name was Jesus. And he was like, Oh, oh, you caught me. Like, as a, I don't know. So his name was also not Jesus. For whatever reason he wanted to go by this. Um, so yeah, I just like you can only imagine the character and his importance in this story that really taught me about not taking the actions of others personally. Because further along into this, um, I think once he realized, I think he kept kind of trying to make something happen that was not going to happen because my door is closed for that. We got to this space and out of nowhere, like there are these really big rocks. And so Hawaii has some wild waters and a lot of like rocky cliff edges. There are these like slippery rocks that he wanted to climb up. And I was like, okay, you know, I'm a little scared. Like a little bit of fear was coming up in me because you could fall and it would not be pretty because of how high this was, and the wall, the walk, the rocks were wet. And I was like scaling the side of this cliff, and it was a lot, and I had no experience with this. And I was ahead of him, and he was like, you know, keep going, keep going. And then I was just like, you know, this is like a little bit overwhelming for me. I'm gonna take a step back. And he was like, what a terrible, scared little leader you think you are. Like, just this random thing that he like turned and made it such a big thing, and kind of just like kept digging into me about how I was afraid to go further. And initially I was kind of like, okay. And I called him out. I was like, that is just not kind, and I feel not necessary to say, you know, like I like my legs are kind of short. This is hard. I've never had this experience before. And I think it's natural to feel fear. You know, fear is there for a reason. There are some things that we put fear into that we don't have to, but other times I think fear can be completely reasonable when it's protecting your safety. And it's okay to listen to that. And I was like, I'm not gonna push myself to a place that I'm so, so afraid for my wellness because of the words of someone else. What I really had to step back and realize was that this person was on their own journey and it had nothing to do with me. I just happened to be there and I was being projected onto. There were other things that happened. It was kind of like this turning point in his energy. Like I said, like once he was maybe feeling rejected, he started to say things to me to kind of like chip me down, right? And that's when I knew I was like, okay, this journey is over. This was a really important lesson for me not to take other people's words personally, to realize that a lot of what people say and do are just projections, or they're just so caught up in their own world that they don't pause or can't pause or have the capacity to do so to consider what you're feeling in those moments. And it was so easy for me to just like let that roll off my back. Sure, it stung for the first like minute or two, and then I realized, like, hey, this has nothing to do with me, and I am free to walk away from this right now. So I did exactly that. And I never saw or heard or talked to this character again. And I do believe that all of my lessons were happening so rapidly while I was in Hawaii because I was open to it. I wanted the trip to transform me. I wanted to learn quickly. And so I think these situations, like these types of dynamics and like different experiences were happening one after another after another because I wanted to learn. And so it was just like a whirlwind of different things coming up for me to heal. And release. So I'm very much thankful for those, even though they were uncomfortable experiences. They taught me a lot about how I want to show up and they highlighted these wounds that I needed to take a look at that I ignored for so long, that my ego built things around so that I could ignore for a long period of time, thinking that I was just moving past it when in reality I was just like building protection around it so that no one could touch that wound. But then when someone actually does and I feel that pain, I can then breathe through it again and release it. And when it comes to other people, not take it personally or let it mean something about me. Hey. I don't remember the specifics. But I can tell you I physically felt the difference of those experiences while being present for the rise of the sun and the set of the sun, which I did every single day that I was in Hawaii. That was part of my routine is to be outside during those times. I get up super early to do, again, some kind of stretching, have a little matcha and my masubi on the beach and catch the sunrise. And I did the same thing for the sunset. I finished every day on the beach, just being present for the sunset. I can't explain to you specifically why. It is beyond my logical comprehension. But if you can make it a practice to catch sunset or sunrise occasionally here and there, maybe once a week, daily is probably kind of hard. But it hits different. It does something for your body. It does something for your mind. The biohackers were onto something with this. Um, so I invite you to do it. You know, start or end your day in nature. And that will set you up for a good night's rest or a good day ahead. All right. So that is the end of my list. I'm so proud and impressed with myself, Loki, that I got through this. In I'm looking at the the time on this and it says 46 minutes. Um, adding the intro and outro will probably add a little bit of time, but you know, clapping for myself because I went way too far on point one last time. I tried to be more concise, which is part of what I'm working on. I love long podcasts though, so I'm I'm not gonna lie to you and say that I'm gonna start making them shorter and shorter. Probably not. I mean, maybe. I can never say never, but I love a long, juicy episode. I love stories, and this is my opportunity to share. So you can come along for the journey if you like it, and you don't have to listen if you don't. So there you have it, friends. Yeah, if you kind of felt lit up by some of this or this awakened something in you, and you want to explore a lot of this further for yourself, I invite you to schedule a free consultation with me to talk about my program Body and Soul Freedom. So, this free consultation, I'm gonna tap into a lot of questions, allow you to become much more aware of what's going on and the patterns that are contributing to these experiences so that it allows you to start waking up. That initial session shifts so many things, and I'm giving that to you for free. You get to have a one-on-one with me, and this might not always be the case. So take advantage of this opportunity while I'm offering it. Get a free one-on-one with me, and we'll talk about what the next steps for you can look like and possibly going even deeper with body and soul freedom so that you can liberate yourself on a physical and soul level. All right, until next time, fire fam.