Life, Health & The Universe - A Journey From Midlife Crisis to Midlife Awakening
Welcome to **Life, Health & The Universe**, the podcast dedicated to empowering women in their 40s and 50s to embrace a vibrant and meaningful life. Join us as we explore the intersection of health, wellness, and personal growth, offering insights and inspiration to help you navigate this transformative stage of life.
Each week, we dive into topics that matter most to you— from holistic health and nutrition to mindfulness and self-discovery. With expert interviews, relatable stories, and practical tips, we aim to inspire you to live your best life, cultivate deeper connections, and find purpose in every moment.
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Contact Nadine: https://lifehealththeuniverse.podcastpage.io/contact
Life, Health & The Universe - A Journey From Midlife Crisis to Midlife Awakening
The Birthday Revolution: Reclaiming Your Special Day - Author, Tamar Hurwitz-Fleming
When was the last time you celebrated your birthday with real joy and intention—not just candles and cake, but a moment to honour you?
As we get older, birthdays can lose their shine. Many women begin to downplay them, dread them, or let them pass unnoticed. But according to Tamar Hurwitz-Fleming, author of How to Have a Happy Birthday, that’s a missed opportunity for powerful transformation.
After living through her worst birthday (being forgotten at 18) and her most empowering (a solo birthday celebration in France at 20), Tamar discovered that birthdays aren’t just about age—they’re spiritual portals. These sacred anniversaries align us with our higher selves, offering a unique window for clarity, intention, manifestation, and even “birthday magic.”
In this soulful conversation, Tamar shares how birthday resistance often stems from early disappointment, fear of ageing, or a reluctance to prioritise ourselves. She invites us to reclaim our birthdays as sacred, personal rituals—complete with altars, wishes, and space to be seen.
Because how we treat our birthday reflects how we treat ourselves.
This episode is a celebration of self-worth, soul-timing, and the joy that unfolds when you stop waiting for permission to feel special.
You can find Tamar's full profile in our Guest Directory
https://lifehealththeuniverse.podcastpage.io/person/tamar-hurwitz-fleming
Welcome to Life, health and the Universe, bringing you stories that connect us, preventative and holistic health practices to empower us and esoteric wisdom to enlighten us. We invite you to visit our website, where you can access the podcast, watch on YouTube and find all of our guests in the guest directory. Visit lifehealththeuniversepodcastpageio. Now let's get stuck into this week's episode. How do you feel about your birthday? Do you let it pass you by, like I usually do, or do you dread turning another year older? Maybe you do some little things to celebrate, but don't make a big deal out of your special day, whatever relationship you have with your birthday. Our guest today, tamar Hurwitz-Fleming, is going to share how actually celebrating your birthday with intention can be transformational. After having the worst birthday experience ever, tamar realized it was time to make her birthdays happy. She's even written a book about it, so you can make your birthdays special too, tamar. Thank you so much for joining me today. I'm really looking forward to this conversation.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Nadine. I'm really looking forward to this conversation.
Speaker 1:Thank you, nadine. I'm looking forward to it as well. Do you want to start by just sort of giving us a very broad overview? We'll get into detail about the importance of celebrating our special day and some of the things that we can do, but do you want to kind of take us through just a brief overview of why you decided to write a book about this topic?
Speaker 2:Well, I've been paying attention to my birthday experience for decades and even when I was a child, I recognized emotions that were confusing that would come up. I recognized disappointments. I recognized even heartache that would happen. And, yes, I had the worst birthday when I turned 18. I recognized even heartache that would happen. And, yes, I had the worst birthday when I turned 18.
Speaker 2:My first year away at college, baby of the family, I didn't have any plans for my birthday except to receive the phone calls from my family that I knew were going to come. I'd run back to my dorm room. The phone calls never came. My family completely forgot my birthday and it was devastating to me because that's all I was expecting to do that day was receive the love from the people who loved me. But it didn't come and it really, unfortunately reinforced some negative ideas I had about myself. It made my heart break for myself because it was my birthday and it was an important birthday. And then, about two years later, when I turned 20, it was my junior year abroad, I was living in France. I woke up another momentous birthday. There was no one around and I said you know what, today's my day. I took the day off class I walked through town, I bought myself a fancy bottle of French perfume that I could not afford on my student budget, but I did it anyway, had some friends over later for cake and I ended up having the best birthday of my life because I took charge of it and I wasn't waiting home passively for the phone to ring. I wasn't waiting home passively for the phone to ring. I wasn't waiting for people to do for me what really I could only do for myself. So from that point on I started having good birthdays because I was in charge and I paid attention to them.
Speaker 2:But the reason for the book came probably 15, 20 years ago. I had a friend and I knew he didn't like his birthday. He said he didn't like his birthday. I didn't quite believe him. I thought maybe he didn't like his birthday because people didn't make a big deal about it. And so I showed up one day with a box of donuts saying happy birthday and he got mad at me. He said I told you I don't like my birthday. And I was really taken aback because actually he was serious. He didn't like his birthday and he got angry at me for even acknowledging it and trying to celebrate it, acknowledging it and trying to celebrate it.
Speaker 2:So I remember leaving holding the box of donuts and I knew he loved donuts, so I was surprised that he wouldn't even take the donuts, you know. And I remember walking away thinking, hmm, something's up with that, something's up with that. Why does he have so much emotion and pain around his birthday? So I started to think about it. I thought about my own experiences firsthand. I started talking to other people and I realized there is a book here, a self-help book, and I wrote it. There's no other book like it. It's called how to have a Happy Birthday and it really is a self-help book. It helps you take a deep dive into understanding why birthdays matter, why you might not like them and why you might even sabotage and get in the way of your birthday joy, and then what you can do to have a happy birthday.
Speaker 1:Cool. Yeah, I actually think that your book, I've read your book and I actually think it would be a great birthday gift as well.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes it is, but if you're going to give it as a birthday gift, you've got to give it early. You do Give it at least six to four weeks beforehand so that the person can put it into play, because otherwise you have to wait a whole year. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:It's really interesting. I'd never really thought about this before and as I was reading your book, I was able to reflect on my own experience with my birthday and I well, my birthday is on April Fool's Day, so there was often-.
Speaker 2:Humor is an important theme for you in this lifetime. Being lighthearted, finding the humor in things, that's an important theme for you.
Speaker 1:Right, but my experience was often that people didn't believe it was my birthday. They thought I was playing a practical joke. Oh, wow. Right, yeah, that happened a lot through my childhood and I remember my dad almost every year and I still to this day don't know whether it was an April Fool or not, but he would never say anything to me, like on the day of my birthday, and then all of a sudden, you know he'd go oh, it's your birthday.
Speaker 2:And so so there was always that kind of yeah, the joke kind of thing. Yeah, but you know, when we're kids we don't understand the subtlety of humor and irony. We're too literal as children.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and yeah, there is definitely a sense that you want it to be a special day, but I guess over time you just get on with it. You might do something nice or say happy birthday or have a couple of gifts, but it's not really anything different to your normal everyday life.
Speaker 2:You've probably heard plenty of these stories, right I? Have actually, and when we're children and so much of our birthday. I actually I believe there's a spectrum that we all exist on.
Speaker 2:It's whether birthday positive or we're birthday avoidant or we're somewhere in between. And I believe if you were to draw a line right down the middle, half of us would be on one end, half of us would be on the other right. And so a lot of our birthday issues, right, those of us that have a hard time with our birthday are generated in childhood Because, on one hand, we somehow understand that birthdays are special, we're told they're special, we see other people being special on their birthdays, so we know how special birthdays are and spiritually, they're the most important day of the year. They're the most spiritual day of the year, right, it's the day our spirit became manifest. What is more spiritual than that, than our birthday, right? And that acknowledging it, you know, we're just, we're very attuned, our spirit's wide open to us and we're wide open to it, whether we know it or not, on our birthday. But when we're children and we're so open and sensitive, as children naturally are, and we have this excitement, today's my special day. I'm the birthday queen. Today's my day, everybody, it's me, I'm here, I was born, and then we get met with, eh, or lack of enthusiasm, or forgetfulness, or okay, here's your gift, now get on with it. You know, we shut down. We're like anemones and we shut down and we protect our delicate, sensitive insights so that we don't get our hopes dashed next year. And so that is the beginning of the birthday avoidance, I believe. I believe it always starts in childhood. Of the birthday avoidance, I believe I believe it always starts in childhood. Maybe it doesn't, but for the most part, our feelings around our birthday do generate discomfort, based on how we're treated on our birthdays.
Speaker 2:I remember being very little, maybe five, and I got yelled out earlier in the day for something I did, you know, and maybe it was fair, maybe it wasn't. But that evening when the cake came and everyone was singing to me and happy for me, I was still hurting inside from what had happened a few hours earlier and I'm like wait, I'm not happy yet, folks, I'm still dealing with what I thought was an unfair, you know. And then I felt like I had to perform and be happy for everybody and that was confusing to me, like, wait, I'm not happy. I'm not happy right now, but you want me to be. You know, I actually have a picture of my dad, you know. I'm kind of my dad's like, trying to put a smile face on my face, you know, after you know, just be happy, and so I feel like there's a lot of stuff we don't really understand or pay attention to, but it's very, very deeply informs our birthday experience as we age.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's interesting, I've got two smaller children. Well, they're now Louis is going to be 11. I'm going to have to prepare to make that a special, special day and Winnie's nine. But they, they do have that kind of energy around it Like it's good and they, they talk about it like from the time, from the time their birthday finishes right, leading up to the entire year leading up to the next one. They're like, when it's my birthday, I want to do these things. So they're definitely got, they've got. You know we have an important connection to it. But, um, and you've done a good job as a mum you've done a good job as a mum to get them excited about their birthday?
Speaker 2:you have you. Have you treated your children very differently than it sounds like you were treated as a child?
Speaker 1:Yeah, but I think we still do. I have to own up to like kind of writing it off and like you have to do all of the things. You know you still have to go to school. You know you still have to do your homework and you.
Speaker 2:Yes. Yes, that's okay, that's real. That's real for them when you become an adult, then you can take the day off. You don't have to do your homework.
Speaker 1:And I think more of us should take the day off on our birthdays. Actually, Can you talk to us a little bit more about that the idea of it being the most spiritual day of the year, because I think that this is a real sort of flip of what we see when it comes to our birthdays, especially as adults.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, like I said, I mean I can't think of anything more profound than the day of our birth, except the day of our death, right, but we're not really around to celebrate that because we've crossed over at that point. But the day of our birth is the day our angels, our spirits, our ancestors waved goodbye from the spirit world as we entered the physical. And then our physical loved one said hello. Very powerful day of transformation, very powerful day of the genesis of the life. Each one of us is a miracle. The fact that we're here at all is a miracle. Everyone is a miracle, and so we are worth honoring and celebrating the fact that we are even here, that we have a life, that we have free will. We get to do what we will with our life. Hopefully, we're doing good things with our free will and being good people. And so when the birthday comes around, we are in alignment with the day, with the moment that our spirit took physical form, and that is the most spiritual day of our year.
Speaker 2:There is a true spiritual alignment, I feel it. It's as if well, it's like Stonehenge, you know, when the sun shines through, it's like your birthday. The sun's shining through perfectly on that day it's like the Spirit is. There's a real alignment there and if you open up to it and you invite it in and you tune into it, magic can happen. I've had so much magic happen on my birthdays. I've been open to it, I've welcomed it and when it came I acknowledged it and I just thanked the Spirits that were with me. And whatever my spirit guides God, whatever my ancestors, whatever the forces I don't necessarily need to contain it in a name my higher self but I can feel the power of the spirit on my birthday and it's transformative. I become very radiant on my birthday. Just the light is shining because I am so in alignment with my higher self and my higher spirit.
Speaker 1:Wow, yeah, a portal. It's like a portal, right? Yes, we're open to it, exactly.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly, and we have to be open to it. And so here's some things that your listeners can do, that I've done Turn on the radio, turn on the radio or turn on your play. You know, don't turn on some music and see what plays. One year I was driving. This is the year after one of my best friends, my cousin, died of cancer in his 60s. He died and I was with him and my birthday that followed. Just a few days later, I was driving and a song came on that I hadn't heard in years, but it was the perfect song for me to hear at the time. That made me pull the card by the side of the road and start weeping, just deeply, deeply weeping, with that healing kind of the tears that flow. So that was like a gift that came to me on my birthday. That completely aligned with him. A year later was my birthday. I was driving, I was going to the beach, turned on the radio, the exact same song played again I hadn't heard it since the previous birthday pulled the car by the side of the road and started weeping again, and I understood then, as I did a year earlier, that this was a gift from the universe, that this was really saying Tamar, this is for you, right place, right time, right song, and we can do that. We can make magic happen for you on your birthday.
Speaker 2:Another story which is much more superficial was a few years ago. I was hanging out with some friends for the weekend and we were playing a card game I had never played before. There's 13 rounds and the way you win is you get luck with the cards you're dealt and the choices of what you keep and what you let go. 13 rounds. I won the first round. Yay, it's my birthday birthday magic. I won the second round. Oh, look at that birthday magic. I won the third round.
Speaker 2:I won 11 out of 13 rounds that night and everybody was like dropping their jaw and I wasn't. I said it's the birthday magic, I just knew it was. And a few days later we played the game again and, of course, I only won twice out of 13 times, like a normal person would. But I love demonstrating the birthday magic for other people that were skeptical. Right, I was so birthday positive and birthday magic, and it was proven in front of everybody, because you can't win 11 out of 13 unless there's some sort of magic going on. So be open to it, let the magic come, and as we open and receive the magic on our birthdays, we affirm it so that more can come. It's like a positive feedback loop.
Speaker 1:Beautiful. I love it. Yeah, it kind of starts to make you feel a bit more excited about the prospect of what you're going to do on your next birthday. And I love the fact that you affirm it's birthday magic, because then you're kind of, yeah, you're, you're sending out that vibe to like I'm here, I'm receiving it.
Speaker 2:Bring on some more. Yeah, exactly, it wasn't me. It wasn't me. I wasn't making the lucky cards come to me, I couldn't. It was the birthday magic doing it and that's what I was trying to.
Speaker 2:That's that's such an important ingredient in our birthday. Joy is the spiritual ingredient. You know, so much of our birthday is about the balloons, the cake, the gifts, the parties, and a lot of us are left feeling empty, believe it or not, like yeah, we had fun, but something's missing. For those of us that are deeper souls because some of us are deeper souls than others and for those of us that are more internal and more spiritual, there's sometimes a feeling of like okay, I should have had a happy birthday because on paper it looked good, but something is unfulfilled. And to me, that's the spiritual part, and that's why one of the things I do on my birthday eve and I recommend everybody give this a try, it's a very lovely ritual that I've been doing for the past years Birthday eve is a thing Think of Christmas eve.
Speaker 2:In the same way that the spirit of Christmas is alive and well on Christmas Eve, so is your birthday. This birthday spirit comes on birthday Eve. Create a birthday altar in your own honor, put up a happy birthday banner, bring in some flowers, some crystals, photos of yourself from childhood, items that you love, photos of your parents, if you want, little candles. And in creating this birthday altar on your birthday eve and putting up this happy birthday banner, it's like turning on a light switch for the birthday spirit to enter and to fully be present. And then in the morning of your birthday and this is what I do in the morning of my birthday I sit before my birthday altar and have some quiet moments with myself. I give thanks to my spirit, I give thanks to me. I'm so grateful I'm me. Thank you for letting me be me. Whoever you are, I love being me. Thank you. You know like, align with yourself, give gratitude for yourself, and when you start your day in a spiritual manner like that, where you tune into the angels, the spirits, whatever your ancestors, you, you get grounded so that you can enjoy the rest of the day.
Speaker 2:I've sometimes had birthdays where I didn't do that and I feel like the day got away from me, like the bus left without me and I was always trying to catch up, like wait, where am I through all of this? Where am I so having some quiet spiritual moments, and it could be anything you want. It doesn't have to be in front of your birthday altar. You could be writing in your journal, you could be doing yoga, meditate, walk, sit outside with your tea in the morning, like whatever it is. Having that quiet moment with yourself in the morning is a wonderful way to start the day from a spiritually centered place.
Speaker 1:Lovely. Before we get into more about how we can create some excitement around our birthdays, can you go into a little bit more about why people might sabotage your birthdays?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so birthday sabotage is a thing. The chapter two of my book is all about the birthday blues, and I made it the second chapter because it's such a big thing for so many people. A lot of people don't like celebrating their birthdays. We already talked about the disappointments in childhood that we had. That protects our heart from opening up to any kind of hope or expectation. So we just don't want to do it anymore. So we ignore our birthdays, or we don't want to get older. Let's face it Birthdays mark age. It's another year older, especially when we hit milestones. I'm 59. I'm going to be turning 60 in January and let me tell you it's a big milestone. I feel like I won't be middle-aged anymore. I'll be entering my senior years. That is serious. That is significant. I'm not arguing with it. I'm not fighting it. I'm just acknowledging that life is finite and I have less ahead of me. The good news about that is it makes me want to live my life more intentionally than ever. Right, that's the nice thing about knowing you have less time. It's like I don't want to squander it.
Speaker 2:But the people that don't like aging are often it's typically women. As we hit middle age, as we enter our menopause, perimenopausal and menopausal years, we start to feel like we're invisible. We start to feel like we're losing our power, we're no longer attractive. Maybe our body is changing in ways we don't recognize, and there's all sorts of ways that aging can make us feel less than excited about counting the years ahead. And so for those women that feel that way and those men that feel that way, I just want to suggest you know, there's two aspects to aging that can be quite difficult Our own personal experiences of it, like our body changing, our self-image changing, but also society's narrative around it. Now, the good news is we can control both of those things.
Speaker 2:If society says that, as a 59-year-old woman with graying hair and with wrinkles, I'm less powerful, I'm less attractive, I'm less desirable, society can say that about me. Society has every right to think that about me. It's my choice whether I accept it or not, and I decided a long time ago that nobody gets to define my worth, nobody gets to give me my power. It's mine to decide and to empower myself. I'm in charge of me and what I think about me.
Speaker 2:So, societies, societies, the stuff we see through the televisions and the social media and the magazines, you know we see a lot of women working really hard to look very young and that's a choice that women can make. And whatever choice you make, beautiful, it's your choice, make it. But I don't want to ever myself make a choice based on fear that if I don't make that choice I will be lesser than Right. I don't buy that, I don't agree to that and I actually think that aging powerfully, aging out loud, is important to role model for younger women. Like hey, it's okay to have wrinkles, it's okay to have gray hair, white hair. I mean, look how beautiful your wife is. I mean I'm looking forward to the day when I have a head of hair like that.
Speaker 2:You know, no-transcript self-image and your own feelings about yourself. You can change that. You're in control of you. I'm not saying it's easy, but you are in control of everything about you, mostly, mostly. I mean there's certain things that happen that we can't control, but you can control your attitude about it. But you know, take charge, be empowered. That's a big message of my book.
Speaker 1:I love that and I think it's a very poignant message for women in their midlife as well, because we do hit a pivotal turning point and we start to question more about who we are, what life's all about. Yeah, did you have one of those pivotal moments or a process of where your attitude did change towards those kinds of things?
Speaker 2:did change towards those kinds of things. Yes, yes, it was after my cousin died. I was in my early fifties and I watched him take his last breaths. He was 68. He had pancreatic cancer for about a year after diagnosis that he lived and died and he was one of my best friends and I'm so mad he's not here anymore Like he should be here, you know, and it really still hurts that he's not.
Speaker 2:But after he died something changed in me and I looked at my life. I had a perfect life, right, I had the perfect apartment in San Francisco, I had the perfect job. I had the perfect husband I still do and yet I was, I felt, stuck and stagnant and his death was like gave me permission to just sort of run off a cliff and fly. Run off a cliff and trust I would fly, not fall. It was coinciding. I know you're into astrology, I'm an astrologer as well, I won't go too deeply into this but it was coinciding with Pluto transiting my sun sign. Pluto was transiting my sun sign and Pluto. When Pluto transits, it's time for big shock of awakening and change and growth, like let go of what's decaying and let renaissance and renewal happen. And so it took a period of years. But I made some big choices to leave my job, to leave San Francisco, to start a new life elsewhere, and it works. But I had it took, in some ways it took a death of a beloved person to wake me up to where, like, something's not right in my life. It's it, just it, and I had a great life, but I just felt stagnant. And it can be really confusing to people, and we know people that have great lives and then all of a sudden they kind of go off the deep end and they like chuck it all and go do something weird and we think, oh my God, they're crazy. What have they done? They were actually following the calling of their spirit and their joy. Let's applaud them. Let's let them be role models for us to have courage to change our lives.
Speaker 2:And this is something about the birthday that's really important For those of us that don't like aging. I often think it's also related to the fact that we might not be living a life as fulfilling as we want to be, because it's another year past without being truly fulfilled. And if that's the case, then use your birthday as an opportunity, like a personal new year, to ask yourself am I living the life I want to be living? And if I'm not, what can I do in the coming year? Not five years, not 10 years, just the coming year. What can I do to help turn up the volume on the kind of life I would rather be living?
Speaker 2:We all have the power to do that, and so that's again our personal power to make our lives more fulfilling. That's under our control. I'm not saying it's easy. Some of us are in unhappy marriages. We feel stuck. We're in jobs that we need for financial reasons. We don't feel like we can leave. I get all of that. So I don't want to sound insensitive to people's realities, but I do want to encourage people to say you are in control of your life and open your eyes bigger and broader to see where can I make some adjustments to be more fulfilled, to be more happy, and use your birthday as a way to do that.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's a really important point. I think about living a fulfilling life, and I think that that's a really great segue into looking at some of the ways that we can actually celebrate our special day, because you know, we've talked about why and you've given us some tips and pointers, for example, um setting up our altar, um, but let's yeah, let's have a look now maybe at how we start to um make our birthday super special. What are some of the ways? That we can do to prepare.
Speaker 2:Sorry, I've interrupted yeah, no, that's okay. The first thing that we can do to prepare Sorry, I interrupted, yeah, no, that's okay. The first thing that we can do is actually make a decision that we want to have a happier birthday than we've had before. For those of us that are birthday avoidant and are willing to practice having a happier birthday, are willing to experiment having a happier birthday, that's the first choice that has to be made a willingness to show up for yourself on your birthday and to put yourself in the center of your day so that it can be as happy as it can be. So that's the first step.
Speaker 2:The second thing is that you need to plan for it Like it's a major holiday, much in the same way that we don't wake up on Thanksgiving day here in the United States and say, okay, what's for dinner and who's joining us? You plan in advance, and so your birthday is a major holiday that deserves advanced planning. So, ideally, you're going to take the day off work or any other responsibilities that you have. Maybe, if you're a parent, you can get some child care in place to give you a few free hours of the day to yourself to do whatever you want to do, or you take the day off work, but you plan in advance so that it's not an inconvenience to your team that you're gone.
Speaker 2:For the day that you decide what it is you want to do, you'd, like you know, start thinking at least a month in advance my birthday's coming up what would be fun for me, what would delight me, what is something I haven't done before that I've always wanted to do? Or is there this wonderful restaurant you've been wanting to go to, or your favorite restaurant you want to go back to? You know you have to make a reservation for that. Often, you know, do you want to get a massage treatment at the spa? You have to make a reservation for that. So that's part of the planning that goes into.
Speaker 2:Having a happy birthday is making sure that you're setting yourself up for success. Much in the same way. You don't go on vacation. You don't go to Paris and just show up Some people do but usually you're planning in advance right when you're going to stay and the day you're going to go to this museum or see that site. So it's the same thing for your birthday. You have to treat it with the gravity that it deserves by planning for it so that you can actually have a happy day.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Yes, I'm really kind of buying into this, but also, at the same time, there's these little thoughts that are dropping in about my own experiences and what I think about my own birthday. So it's like, yes, yes, yes, I want to do all of those things, but there's also that other part of me that's like oh, it sounds frivolous to take the day off work or you know, to spend all of this time. That's all part of that conditioning, isn't it?
Speaker 2:I know that Well and I'm really happy. I'm sorry you haven't enjoyed your birthdays and I know in April 1st it was challenging for you. There's still yeah, yeah yeah, like I've.
Speaker 1:I don't feel like I haven't um enjoyed them, but on the other hand, I still do have that kind of like no, I'm not taking the day off work, for certain, I never take the day off work on my birthday, right, because that? Because that just sounds like me, you know, making too much of a fuss, I guess.
Speaker 2:And how dare you put yourself in the center of your life one day a year and say today's my day. Everybody, you can all wait. How dare you, how dare you? Who?
Speaker 1:do you think you are?
Speaker 2:Who do you think you are celebrating yourself one day a year? Right, that's my point. You are magnificent, you are a miracle, you are divine incarnate. You deserve to take the day off work, to press the pause button on everything and say today is sacred, this is the day I celebrate me, and this is what I'm going to do to raise that energy, to celebrate myself and to have a great day. You get to do that. It's a choice, but you do get to do that and you're allowed to do that, and that's what I'm here to say. We all get to do that. It's just one day a year.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think that it's really kind of interesting, like what you were saying about making a plan, because within that plan you can kind of reflect on how those feelings of like what does it? What does it actually feel like to to put myself in the center of this- situation. And if I don't feel like I'm worth it, well then, that's a point of reflection in itself, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Exactly, exactly. That's why the book I wrote is actually a self-help book, because when you start exploring these barriers that you have to yourself, to honoring yourself, to celebrating yourself, and that comes up for you, that's a good thing to pay attention to.
Speaker 2:That's a good thing to investigate and to work through and to heal Because you deserve. You deserve to celebrate yourself on your birthday. Everybody does, and anytime we say no, not really, that's something for us to look at. And I can promise you that when you heal that voice that says I don't deserve to sell it, why put up the fuss on my birthday? When you start to heal that voice and transform it, other areas of your life will heal as well, because it's all connected yeah, yeah, it's, uh, yeah, really interesting.
Speaker 1:I think it's also where you probably know from you know people who have gone through your book and done the workbook and started to experiment with their birthdays that perfection doesn't necessarily need to be perfect the first time, but the more you practice this, the better it gets and the more you kind of get to delve into what are the things I actually truly do want, compared to what I think I should do.
Speaker 2:Exactly, yes, exactly. And you know every birthday is going to be different. Your best laid plans can go awry. My birthday this year, when I turned 59, it was January 9th. It was just two days after the big fires in Los Angeles started and my family had bags packed ready to evacuate.
Speaker 2:It was a very painful, heavy time that affected me personally, you know. I mean there's always bad stuff happening everywhere, but when it affects you personally, I. It definitely impacted my birthday energy. There was a gravity in the air that I could not shake. I didn't want to shake, it was just there. So I worked with it, I acknowledged it, I worked with it and that that this, this, you know, the year I turned 59 is the year the fires were raging, and so sometimes that's just life and that's okay. You know we don't, we're not going to have perfect birthdays, but we're going to do our best to enjoy our birthdays the most we can, based on what we can control, and that's all we can do.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I think that that that popped up for me. That's probably something that goes through people's minds when they're celebrating birthdays. We do have access to so much information worldwide. There's a whole bunch of terrible stuff going on in the world that we're exposed to all the time. Who am I to be celebrating myself when there's so much going on? Like people can really take that on, I think.
Speaker 2:And I have a lot to say about that. I have a lot to say about that, and what I want to say is this throughout human history, bad things have been happening. The difference now is that it's broadcast 24 seven and we can access it online. Go, find as much tragedy as you want right now you can. And so there's something artificial about the way that that news comes to us from faraway lands with real time grief and sorrow and horror for sure, and I'm not suggesting we're not compassionate and keep our heart open, but I am suggesting that it is an artificial onslaught of really bad bad experiences that are happening to humanity that we can do nothing about in our physical body, where our feet are planted.
Speaker 2:If someone were to get hit by a car right in front of me, I would be able to take my body and run towards that person and help them. That would be my instinct. Let me do something, let me throw my body into the solution. Right? If there's a fire, I can run away, but when I'm watching it on television, there's nothing I can do except get emotional overwhelm and short wiring like ah, ah, ah. And then my life. It's like how dare I have a good life. But how dare you not have a good life when your life is good? It is a blessing, it is a gift, and how dare you squander it out of some idea that your suffering is helping those other people who are suffering? It's not. You're just adding more suffering into the universe. That's not helping the universe.
Speaker 2:Raise your joy, amplify your joy, express your gratitude when your life is good, because for today it is good. My life is great. In this moment. I want to amplify my joy. I'm enjoying this conversation. I don't know what tomorrow brings, and if tomorrow brings tragedy to me or to my loved ones, I will deal with that then.
Speaker 2:But if everything's good, right here, where my body is, you know things are good. There's no. Everything's good. Let me embrace peace in my body and let me amplify my joy. That's been my motto for the past two years. It's not always easy, but I have taken an active. I have severed my attention from the bad news because I saw what it was doing to my psychic space. It was crowding me out, it was making me feel heavy and it was making me feel depressed and anxious, when I actually have a really good life. This incarnation, this incarnation is a good one, how dare I squander it? How dare I Once again? How dare we? How dare we, when something is a gift from the universe, how can we not hold it and cherish it and be grateful for it and blow it even more into being right?
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I love that and I just want everyone to switch off the mainstream news forever and watch things like this right. Go onto YouTube and find some uplifting stuff. Listen to podcasts that give you hope and joy and make you, help us to realize and remember that we have a choice.
Speaker 2:That's right and that we do have when we put our attention, and there are far more good things happening on the planet than bad things. It's just that the good things don't sell advertising.
Speaker 1:The news channels don't choose to show us the happy stories. Yeah, that's right. Great, amazing, all right Cake. Do we need cake and do we need presents on our birthday?
Speaker 2:That's your choice. That's my whole point. If you can't stand cake and you want ice cream or you want a muffin, you get to choose that. If you don't like getting presents, you get to choose that. But here let me say something Don't fool yourself into thinking, oh, I don't want presents, I don't want cake, as actually what you do want.
Speaker 2:Because sometimes that's a defensive mechanism, like no one's going to give me what I want. I don't want to set myself up for vulnerability and rejection I'm asking for gifts and they're not coming, or I don't get what I want I just rather actively defend against the disappointment by saying no cake, no presents. So I want to say that, because those are some ways we sabotage our birthday joy, because self-sabotage happens subconsciously For those of us that don't believe we can have a happy birthday, don't believe we're worthy of a happy birthday, we set it up, we, we, we, we self-sabotage. It's a very powerful thing that we do. So I'm just flagging that. So I if, if, if you really don't want cake, don't have cake. But you know, a cake is a wonderful ritual, especially with the candles. It's an opportunity for you to focus on your birthday wish. Hopefully you've been thinking about your birthday wish and affirming it like what you want to manifest for the coming year, and then you blow out the candles and that's your ritual moment for putting your wish into the universe. And gifts, you know. You know gifts are great when there's something you want. So if you know you want something, communicate that to the people who you think are going to give you gifts.
Speaker 2:Let's say you're having a birthday party. I'll be turning 60 in January. It's a big deal. I'm not going to be having a birthday party. I'm actually going to India with my husband. That's going to be my 60th birthday celebration. I'm super excited. But if I were going to have a party and if I did not want gifts and there's a certain point, it's just I have everything I need. I don't need more stuff, you know, and there could be husband. He buys me stuff, maybe whatever that I love, but it's a trinket at the end of the day, because what he gives me every year on my birthday is a love letter.
Speaker 2:He gets a card, he types it out, he cuts it and pastes it, and every year I get to hear how much he loves me. I know how much he loves me through the rest of the year, but when he writes it down in such a poetic and meaningful way, it touches my soul so deeply. It's the best gift I could ever get, and that's our ritual. That's our birthday ritual. So gifts can be what we want them to be, but we can ask. We can ask for them, because I'm going to be in India on my 60th birthday. I've asked my husband already. I said look, you know what I want. I want you to go to some key people in my life family and friends and I want them to make a video, a birthday video for me, that then I will watch on my 60th birthday. So that'll be a way for me to commune with the people that I love from afar, and I think that's a lovely way to uplift my day. But I have to ask for it and he's got to make it happen amazing.
Speaker 1:Um, I I had, um my mother-in-law here. She turned 76 or 77 just a couple of weeks ago and we made her a cake and she got to blow out the candles and she was so thrilled. It was like no one had done that for her for so long and it's like she didn't even know how to blow the candles out it would but you know it was such a small token.
Speaker 1:My daughter made the cake. She's nine and you know it was. It was pretty low-key, it was just a cake after dinner, but yeah, it made it. I feel like it may. Uh made the world.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I meant the world to her, sorry it did, it did the it did the fact that it was homemade, the fact that you made the effort and surprised her with it, and she was delighted because she hadn't been celebrated that way. And she didn't know. She didn't read my book, she didn't know that you're actually supposed to take charge of your birthday and make it be what you want, that you get to be in the driver's seat, to be in your full glory. She didn't know that and whatever her childhood experiences were and her life experiences were, she didn't have any expectations on her birthday for celebration. So I'm just so touched that you did that for her and how meaningful it was, and just the effort of someone making something goes so far. You know that your nine-year-old daughter baked the cake. That's the gift right there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. What about buying ourselves a birthday gift?
Speaker 2:How does that fit in fume? I'd been eyeing, but it was too expensive. And then on my birthday it was like you know what, if not now, when I actually can buy this for myself? I deserve to buy this for myself and I'm not going to feel guilty about it. I can make, do, I can scrimp and save for the rest of the month. I can do it and I did. And it felt so joyful and so self-affirming to actually buy myself something I wanted. And I think there's something powerful in taking the time to ask yourself what do I want to give myself? What do I want to give myself? That's not a new pair of running shoes, right, but something that's actually going to delight you. So even asking yourself the question is a healing act. Some of us don't even know what the answer is, and then giving yourself permission to give that to yourself is another healing act. That again starts to set the motion in a positive way for self-fulfillment that could happen for the rest of the year.
Speaker 1:Yeah, beautiful.
Speaker 2:I also like buying my birthday present on my birthday. Like if I don't know what I want to do on my birthday, maybe I'll go antique shopping and look to find something. I don't force it if I don't find it, but usually I do find something I want to buy and then that thing that I buy always represents my birthday from that particular year. So it can be a fun. It can be a fun activity to do on your birthday is go birthday gift shopping for yourself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I got given some money for my birthday this year from my parents and um, and I was kind of like, oh, what can I buy myself? And I did buy myself a few little bits and pieces, but then I I actually booked my whole family in to do a pottery course, just a class, because I thought you know what birthdays need to be celebrated. Yes, there is that individual like time and space for yourself, but also like being able to share it with the people you love is a really great experience as well. So, yeah, it was really fun and just yeah made it, just made it feel a bit more special to do something together.
Speaker 2:And yeah, and I mean I and I want to be clear, and I'm so glad you said that I am not implying that birthdays need to be solitary, right On the contrary, whatever you, on the contrary, whatever you want, and it sounds like that was a wonderful way to spend your birthday money with your family and having fun. I love that idea. I mean, I find I've had solitary birthdays that have been very fulfilling. I've also had some that have been lonely. It's good to have people around, absolutely, but it's your choice.
Speaker 2:Turned 50 this year and all he wanted to do was travel alone, go on a trip by himself. But his family and friends wanted a big party for him. So he had the big party and it was his 50th birthday. He had a big party and he wasn't particularly happy and I suggested to him well, perhaps because he was trying to please the other people to fulfill their needs, right, you want this? Okay, I'll give this to you he could have had his birthday party a week earlier and then gone by himself on his solo trip on his birthday. The birthday is a really special right? It is the special day. So do what you want, but know that you get to do what you want, whatever that is, and that's the whole point that I'm trying to make you get to decide what you want to do, and it's all good if you want to do it, yeah.
Speaker 1:What are some of the ways that we can know we're on track with making our day special? Obviously, your book is a huge tool and the workbook that goes with it. Can you sort of show us some or tell us some ways that we can know that everything's on track? Everything's on track?
Speaker 2:That's a great. No one's asked me that question. I love that question. So the first way you know you're on track is if you're listening to this conversation right now and feeling a little excitement, feeling a little excitement.
Speaker 2:Right, there is your first sign that you're going in the right direction. And then, as your birthday comes and you start to think about what you want to do and you start to get excited about the possibility of what you can do, that's another sign that you're on the right track. Right, the anticipation Much in the way when we were children and we anticipated Christmas if we celebrated Christmas that buildup that we should be feeling that with our birthday as well. That's a sign that, like, yes, the excitement is building. And then just the experience itself right, you're going to know how you feel when your birthday comes, your birthday eve, your birthday day. And I just want to suggest once again to be mindful of the subconscious ways we can sabotage our joy. We think we're on the right track, but we still don't quite believe we deserve it. And so, the night before our birthday, we pick a fight with our partner. We just, we, just, we just criticize the way they dried the dishes and it just drives me nuts and I can't take it anymore. And I got to tell you you're not drying them, right? Whoa, where's that coming out of? Where's that coming from? It's coming from our subconscious, we're not quite believing that we deserve unfettered joy on our birthday. We want to bring the energy down, and so we do. And then suddenly our birthday is not so great after all. I tried but guess what? It didn't work because subconsciously we sabotaged it.
Speaker 2:And, like I say, chapter two in my book is all about the birthday blues and the ways we self-sabotage to raise the awareness around that If we're not aware we're doing it, we can't stop it from happening and we can't call it out when it does happen. But let's, you know, our birthdays are sacred. We get sensitive, like it's not business as usual this past year because my birthday's in early January my husband, you know and after the first of the year it's time to do taxes. My husband wanted to talk about taxes like the day before. I'm like you know what.
Speaker 2:This can wait a few days, this is not urgent. I don't want to talk about taxes the day before my birthday. It's not a stressful conversation, but it's like I'm in the process of raising my energy as my day is coming. And it took self-awareness to actually say time out here. And I get to say time out here and he totally understood. And we talked about the taxes days later. Not a big deal, but being aware of how you might be slipping into a conversation that is more fraught than you would want it to be the day before your birthday is something to be mindful of, and you can have your boundaries up and say, hey, let's table this until after.
Speaker 1:Yeah, your workbook that goes alongside the actual book. Does that take you right up to those moments like the day before your birthday? Is it like a journal situation, or is it more of a planner? What's the content of the workbook?
Speaker 2:So the workbook is a journal that asks you some heart-to-heart questions. Think of it like a good friend sitting down and saying hey, why don't you like your birthdays? What's up? What's been going on about that? Let's talk about that. What are you afraid of losing as you age? You know what are some things that you had when you were younger that you actually don't have anymore. Let's call that out, right. When you were younger, that you actually don't have anymore. Let's call that out right. And what are some things that you have now that you didn't have when you were younger? Let's call those out too, right?
Speaker 2:Let's unpack the reasons why we don't like our birthday. Let's get conscious about what's going on and then, as we progress, let's clarify what can we tell ourselves? How can we change the narrative of what our subconscious is saying about getting older? We change the narrative of what our subconscious is saying about getting older, about our birthday experiences from the past. So it's a real self-help journaling exercise for you to gain more self-awareness around your birthday issues and how you can have a different. You can change the voice around that, change the narrative, change the story.
Speaker 2:The other thing, then, is that it then goes on to like go ahead and let's talk about what you might want to do. List your three favorite people that you rarely see. List the three funniest people you know, right. And so list your three favorite restaurants. List your three favorite desserts. List your three favorite places to visit. Because as you start listing out these things in a very simple format, you start to realize like, oh, you know, I love spending time with Jennifer, why aren't I spending? I want to spend time with her on my birthday. I never see her. I love her. She's the special person I want to share my birthday with and go out to lunch with. And so you start to pull out these ideas and these thoughts of like oh, oh, I want to do that on my birthday. So it helps you kind of get in the like, open up your thinking to what you could do on your birthday, so that you can plan for it and then enjoy the day.
Speaker 2:And then there's a part of the workbook about the birthday wish what do you want to manifest in the coming year, do you know? And also to help you craft your birthday wish, because this is important and it's also important how you think of your birthday wish. I love the birthday wish. It's like a gift from the universe, it's like a birthday present from the universe.
Speaker 2:So if I'm looking to meet somebody, let's say I'm single and I want to meet somebody. Instead of having my birthday wish be, I want to meet somebody this year. Let's expand a little further out and say thank you for helping create more social opportunities in my life this coming year. Right, because within the social opportunities, you might meet that special someone and you are in control of stepping into more social opportunities. Right, you can join clubs, you can go on hikes with groups, you can. You know, there's all ways that you can say yes to party invitations that you normally say no to.
Speaker 2:There's ways that we can take charge of helping make our birthday wish come true by thinking about what I want partnership. I want to meet that special person. Well, don't just fixate on them. Fixate on the larger community experience in which they could show up. I want to be. Let's say I want to lose some weight. Rather than saying I want to lose 10 pounds, we could say I want my body to feel healthier. I want to feel healthier in my body, right, and I, I there's so many ways I can do that. What? Regardless of what the scale says. So I feel like the birthday wish is something that you want to be thoughtful about so that you can actually succeed at it, right, because so much of it is under your own control, and so there, I talk about that in the workbook as well, and so I talk about that in the workbook as well.
Speaker 1:How do you kind of break that down in the workbook, like how to write those kind of wishes or affirmations? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I do, and one of the things that I do is you have to keep it in present tense, it's not future tense. Let's say I'm happily married, but let's say I'm single and I want to meet somebody. And let's say I forgot my advice about social gatherings. I'm just focusing on, you know, my partner manifesting, and I should. My wish should not be I will meet my partner. You know, like one day. You know, cause that one day is always in the future. But it's like thank you for bringing my partner to me now, like thank you for manifesting in the present tense. So I remember. You know. It's like, instead of you know, instead of putting up a note on the fridge, remember to feed. You know, don't forget to feed the goldfish. It's like remember to feed the goldfish. Frame it in the positive and in the present tense. That's my point. Words have power and how we think about things. You know, one day never comes. One day never comes. The future never comes, it's just a series of present moments.
Speaker 1:That's it. You talked about the like. Probably what six weeks out from from your birthday starting to plan? Would you go even further back than that Like? Can this be so, once you've done the work, but once, for example, and you get to your next birthday and you've created your special day in all of the ways that you've chosen and you've manifested your dream partner, do you start again right from the beginning on your birthday, start to create for the following 12 months, or is that too?
Speaker 2:soon. I think I think you do whatever you want to do. I mean, again, I'm going to analogize, chris, your birthday, with christmas. You know, christmas comes, christmas ends, you integrate christmas, you put your decorations away, yeah huh, you're actually kind of glad christmas is over, because it was a lot. And you know, I always say when I celebrate my birthday, well, I'm actually glad when it's over because I really showed up for it, I was fully full wattage. Ha, I'm happy it's behind me. Now I can get back into my real life and real self. In that sense, you know my, my mortal self, um, unless it's a milestone birthday, so I've got 60 coming up. As I've already said, I've really been.
Speaker 2:I did not know what I wanted to do. I did not know what I wanted to do, but I knew it couldn't just be any other day, it couldn't be a day at the museum and a dinner with friends. It needed to be something more significant. I finally figured it out and, as I said, I'm going to go to India and have my birthday there and I'm excited about that. That feels meaningful, that feels like the right way for me to signify 60. So, for milestone birthdays, do what you need to do to have that moment birthday right. But when I turn 61 or 62, I'm not going to be thinking about it in July I'll start because I'm not going to be feeling it. It's interesting I wrote my book mostly in the months immediately leading up to and immediately after my birthday.
Speaker 2:The inspiration for me wasn't there in July. When my birthday's in January, it was there. November, december, january, february, I could feel it. It was like a wave of energy that was building that I could tap into and all the insight and memory and experience was there for me. And that's how it is there's an energy that builds and you feel it.
Speaker 2:So I think my motto is do what you want, do whatever works, as long as you're giving yourself permission to celebrate yourself.
Speaker 1:and do what you want as long as you're giving yourself permission to celebrate yourself and do what you want.
Speaker 2:And you need to remember.
Speaker 1:To do it right, you need to remember. So yeah, maybe putting it in your diary is a handy thing to do in the calendar. Start thinking about my birthday.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can't help but think about my birthday when November comes around. Middle of November, thanksgiving, december, december 9th it's a month out and I know it and it's like if I haven't made my plans yet, I know that. It's like I need to get this dialed in. I can phone it in. I want to really make. I don't want to miss the moment because it's such a special moment when it comes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm the same when I think about my birthday, january. You know a new year because my birthday's on April the 1st and I know January always goes really quickly, especially in Australia, because we're in the middle of summer, february's a short month and then it's like only a month to go, so it always comes around pretty quickly. So, yeah, I definitely become more aware of it in the new year. Um, yeah, okay, celebrating partners' birthdays. How do we do that? What about if they're a little bit not that phased about it?
Speaker 2:Well, it's funny, my husband wasn't particularly phased about his birthdays until I showed up in his life and I'm like we're doing something. What do you want to do? So one of the ways that we can help our partners is to certainly be sensitive to where they are. You may suddenly become the most birthday positive person you know because of this conversation and you're excited and and that's great, and you can role model what that birthday joy looks like when your birthday rolls around. And if your partner is birthday avoidant or not, so into it, you got to be sensitive about that. But I suggest asking them about four to six weeks in advance hey, your birthday's coming up. I'd say maybe a month, let's just go with a month. Your birthday's coming up. Any ideas what you'd like to do? I would love to help you have a happy birthday. What sounds fun to you? What would you like to do? So start to ask questions, say I don't know, I don't know. Say, hey, do you want to blah? You don't want to do the work for them, but if they're slow to the gate, you want to help encourage their own creative input, their own thinking about it and then over time, hopefully they'll be. You know what I really want to go down to the racetracks and watch the horses race. There's a big race, great, let's do it, let's plan for it. So you know you can help them, but you can't make them.
Speaker 2:And the other thing I want to say about partners is that and I, I, I, I know stories and they, they actually they're sad to me where partners actually don't want to celebrate their partners. I know one woman who all she wanted was her husband to bring her a cake on her birthday and he wouldn't do it. And when I heard that, I thought, ooh, does he have resentments? He's not articulating. Do you guys need to go to marriage counseling? Like it is such a simple request that I refuse to do? Um, that I just thought, you know, like birthdays are sort of a litmus test on how the relationship is doing that If we're not actually excited to celebrate our beloved, maybe there's some things we need to look at. So I just want to say that.
Speaker 2:Also, the other thing I want to say and I say this with a with a full heart of compassion when I say this, but for those of us, because I know people that just refuse to celebrate themselves, and those people I have, pound for pound, identified as being the people that tend to run the victim archetype, where nothing works out for them, everything is someone else's problem. They have no power, they have no agency. They're the victim of their life, not the creator of their life. And so if you're running that tape I'm sorry you are. If you are, because it's not an empowered tape and you're always at the mercy of other people, not yourself you're not necessarily going to want to grab the wheel of your birthday either. You're not going to believe that you're worth celebrating, and, once again, I'm not worth this. The world isn't good to me.
Speaker 2:So I'm just calling that out, because birthdays can actually wake us up to our inner dialogue our inner stuff that's more subconscious in nature, and if we're willing to evolve ourselves and heal ourselves, let's use the birthdays as a powerful portal through which we can ask those questions, get those answers and make decisions about what we want to do, and that's how healing and evolution can happen in any given lifetime, on any given year.
Speaker 1:Yeah, do you coach on this? Do you have people that you take through this process?
Speaker 2:It's funny you say that because I have. I have not officially hung my shingle, but I am thinking of hanging my shingle and we can say it's official as of this conversation. Yes, I do coach. If anybody wants to contact me, they can go to howtohaveahappybirthdaycom and contact me and say hey, I'd love to coach with you and this is how I do it. It's about an hour, an hour and a half, about a month before your birthday, where we talk about what the issues are, we talk about what you might want to do, and then it's about a week or so after your birthday. How did it go? What did you learn? What can we put in place for next year? And hopefully, that's it. It's just two sessions before and after. So, yes, the answer is yes, I do.
Speaker 1:That's so cool because I think, like it really is a, it's not just well, it's not just about your birthday, it's a real personal development tool and a real opportunity to, yes, to delve into, like, what is actually going on in my psyche and how do I feel about myself. And the birthday is like, as you've um confirmed throughout this conversation is like the day that's all about us, like there's no one else in the world that has exactly the same time, exactly the same place, exactly the same, exactly astrology you know astrological map as us. That's right, um, yeah, and so that that's a really, it's a really significant time to to review how you feel about yourself.
Speaker 2:That's right, and you know, nobody, nobody should care more about your birthday than you and nobody should care more about my birthday than me. And as much as I love and adore my husband, he should care more about it. He should care more about his birthday than I do. Right, and that's just that's. That's the point. It's.
Speaker 2:It's a it's an intensely personal day. It's between you and your origins, your origin story, your spiritual source, and so how can we get into vertical alignment with ourselves? It is such an invitation to transform and to experience really the magic of the day. It's there for us, and so I just I'm so excited by it because I feel like I've stumbled into something. I mean, granted, it's been decades that I've been paying attention to it, but when it became clear like, oh, people don't know this, we need to talk about this, that's that really was you know how the book came into being.
Speaker 2:It's like we've got to talk about these issues, and I believe that when we celebrate our birthdays with intention and with planning and allow ourselves to feel the joy that's there for us and do feel the joy and feel that radiance that it heals us, it makes us kinder people, and I can think of no other way to help make the world a better place, one person at a time, than to have that kind of positive birthday experience where we settle some of that inner angst a little bit into some joy and into some healing. That's a good thing.
Speaker 1:I agree, I agree, and I think that that's a wonderful note to finish on. I'm getting excited about my birthday, and I only had mine a couple of months ago, so I've got a little bit of time to wait, but yeah, I'm definitely going to pay much more attention to my behavior leading up to it and how I plan for it in the future years. Thank you so much, tamar.
Speaker 2:That makes me so happy. Thank you, nadine, it's been a real eye-opener.
Speaker 1:Actually, I think just one closing note from me and then that might not feel as relevant to people because it just seems more out there or they can't really connect to it. But how can we not connect to that one day? That does actually belong to us, like it's a real yeah, it's an access point for people to self-improvement.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you know, to like ourselves a little bit more totally to like ourselves a little bit more and to treat ourselves like the birthday kings and the birthday queens that we are when our day comes around yeah, tomorrow.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for joining me. It's been really insightful and I've loved every moment thanks, nadine, my pleasure. Thanks so much for welcoming me, our listeners and get the word out there about all of the wonderful guests that we've had on the podcast. If you'd like to further support the show, you can buy me a coffee by going to buymeacoffeecom. Forward slash, life, health, the universe. You can find that link in the show notes. Thanks for listening.