Thrive with RA
Thrive with RA
Harnessing the Power of Community When Transforming Your Health
I know you're investing time and effort into adopting an anti-inflammatory lifestyle to have less pain and more energy. So, I also know how hard that journey is if you feel all alone in it. If you've ever felt like everyone around you doesn't get it; doesn't understand the journey you're on, and is struggling to support you the way you need, you're not going to want to miss this episode!
My guest today is Susan Loggins, the visionary behind s.i.t.s.haven in Tomball, Texas. Susan recently opened her gorgeous retreat space to serve those looking to bring people together for transformations.
In our chat, we dive in to talk about community and why it's an important consideration in your health journey.
The reality is, that when making dietary, lifestyle, and mindset changes, the people in your community can be a game-changer. They can rally around you and lift you up or keep you stuck.
Listen in and learn how connecting with like-minded people can help you move the needle faster than going at it alone.
Happy listening!
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power of walking into a room where you don't know other people and yet you're able to have that connection because you put yourself in the room with a community of like-minded people. Anything is possible when you believe that it's possible, when you open up your mind to being able to come together, and I think that that is one of the things that really was cemented in me. I'm Dawn Laughlin, certified health coach and fellow RA warrior. It wasn't all that long ago that I was in this place where I was fearful of the uncertainty of my future, wondering when my next flare would come or wondering when the pain would let up. Fast forward through many trials, errors and lessons learned, and you'll find a gal who is stronger, healthier and more confident in her future than ever before. Yes, I still have RA, but RA doesn't have me. I believe our lifestyle, food choices and mindset greatly impact the way our bodies handle rheumatoid arthritis.
Speaker 1:I created the Thrive with RA podcast to explore the science-based ways to realign your health. Through these three pillars and so much more, We'll be navigating both the messy and the blessings that come from living a life with RA. Each week, you'll get a good dose of education, inspiration, encouragement and hope as you take small steps to improve your health and overall life. If you've been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis or are still trying to figure out if the symptoms you're feeling are indeed rheumatoid arthritis, you are in the right place. My friend, let's get started. Well, hey there, friend, Welcome back to season three of the Thrive with RA podcast.
Speaker 1:I'm kicking the season off with a special episode, an interview with one of my dear friends, Susan Loggins, who just opened up a gorgeous retreat venue called Sits Haven, located in Tomball, Texas. Today, Susan and I sat down and talked about the power of community. When you are working toward goals of any kind, the community of people around you is everything. It has the power to help you move the needle or keep you stuck. So grab your favorite cup of tea, green juice or smoothie and listen in as Susan and I dive in to talk about all things community.
Speaker 1:Hey everyone, so welcome to the live we're doing here from Sitzhaven. I'm with Susan Loggins, who is the owner and the founder, and it is so exciting to see this gorgeous retreat space and I thought that we would come here. This is a space that I'm going to be using here soon for an event coming up on August 24th and I thought that it would be amazing to come and share some time with Susan to hear more about the? Um, the retreat space, why, how it became, how it came about, and then, um, just talk a little bit about the power community, because that is so powerful, it is so transformative when you were looking to make different types of changes, and so we just thought we would bring that to you and talk a little bit about all of those pieces. So, Susan, thanks so much for doing this with me and sharing your time. I'm so grateful for you.
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm so grateful for you, dawn too. We've shared many life-changing things together, and to have you and your community here in this beautiful home I'm just beyond excited.
Speaker 1:Yes, rightfully so. You have put together an incredible space that I think is going to serve so many for years to come. Yes, and so I would love to hear a little bit about how you, how you came about in this journey, a little bit about your past and what led you to becoming a retreat space owner.
Speaker 2:What led you to this decision? Sure, sure, I've always been into sports growing up, you know, and always like lifting weights and things like that. And then I got into some personal training of others and then I became more of just a group fitness coach, and so I've always been into health, wellness, the mind and just trying to live your best life and with that, the power I have found through the others that I have connected to in those different communities. It has projected me to where I am today.
Speaker 1:I love that, yeah, and that's where Susan and I met is through a local gym here and immediately drawn to her because she has this beautiful light about her and just really helps. She believes in you and helps you kind of reach those next levels. That's why I just love the fact that she had this calling to open the space and so share more about that, like how how did you come about to open?
Speaker 2:Sitzhaven. Okay, so, you know, I did a couple of years back, I did a um, a whole workshop where you just found yourself, basically, and I, I thought, you know, here I am in my sixties and I, I need to do something, you know. So I just kept searching and searching and searching and, uh, my mom, um, she passed away a few years back and then I was blessed with a wonderful inheritance and it just about that same timing, um, this property became available. And my husband was like, we need to buy the property. I'm like, well, we don't need to buy the property. And he's like, yes, we're going to do it. And so I said, okay.
Speaker 2:And so then, um, in the mornings, I, I sit and I journal, you know, and I just think, and after I got my inheritance, I was like, well, what am I going to do, um with it, and what am I going to do with the space that we've just bought? And the God was yelling at me, you know, retreat, you know. And so then I went to church that day and the same thing happened again in church and I said, here, you hear you Right? And so I came back and I told my husband. I said, oh, I know what we're going to do, and he's like, oh my God.
Speaker 2:You know, he was thinking well, we're just going to, you know, clean it up and maybe put it on Airbnb, and I was like no, no, we need to do something.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, because, again, as Dawn and I were talking about, community is huge. It's always been a big part of my life, even growing up, we were always in that that tight community group. Growing up, you know, we always had each other's backs and supporting each other. And so I want We've had each other's backs and supporting each other and so I said, you know, that's me, let's just keep it going. Yeah, that's amazing.
Speaker 1:Oh, I love that because it is. It is truly about bringing people together, having a gathering space where people can kind of connect, yes, learn and grow together, absolutely so, with that, what would you say is your biggest hope with Fitzhapen? With that, what would you say is your biggest hope with?
Speaker 2:Fitzhapen, that the community realizes that there is a space here right outside of Tomball very local, you know, cypress, not too far, woodlands, not too far that you can come and you can hold your meetings here with all your business people. You can come and bring one of your clients here, you know, and do one-on-ones. There's spaces for all of that which we'll show you later, but, yes, there are spaces where you can just be one-on-one or you can have a little bit larger groups. It's not the huge groups, you know, but it'll be small, more intimate groups and, again, sharing the community and helping each other, working together, building each other up. I feel like that's just super important in the world that we're in today, that we even just going a little bit further and saying even us, as cis women, we need that, we need that community and that support of each other.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, because so much of what I do, as you all know, is help guide people through change and there is this miraculous level of power that comes in when you are doing that with community, whether you are doing it in a small group or you are going to a workshop or retreat, you are coming together with like-minded people that really enable you to, as you said, come alongside each other and stand there and hold space, help others feel heard and seen and share things that have worked for you. In the things that you do, like I know for us in the gym, if one of us has an ailment going on, you know everyone kind of rallies around them and helps figure out like, oh, try this or try that, I found this works, whatever. Right, you are working together when you are in that community and it's so powerful to find those organizations, those groups, those spaces that bring community together A great thing to look for?
Speaker 2:Absolutely yes.
Speaker 1:Your name, Sitzhaven, is such a sweet name. Can you tell us a little?
Speaker 2:bit about that. Get a little emotional, a little emotional on this. One of the coaches that I worked with, who was helping me with my website and the name. She was saying well, what was your mom's name? Well, her given name is Barbara Selena Pitchford, and so Selena. She said that's what most people called. Her was Selena. So she said let's look up the meaning of Selena. So I did, and it is star in the sky. And so then I was telling my daughters about it, and my oldest daughter, audrey, she said oh yeah, oh. She said mom, um, let's do it like an acronym, okay. And I was like, oh, I love that idea. And we did it all lowercase. So she's here and she's shining down on us. I literally have chills all over me, sorry.
Speaker 1:No, that's a beautiful thing. That is the power of stepping into what you've been called to do so that you can provide an incredible place for transformation in lives.
Speaker 2:Yes, that's powerful. Yes, oh, I'm going to cry, I know.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay, okay.
Speaker 2:We forgot tissues. We didn't bring tissues. We didn't plan for that. Yes, we didn't. Oh well, yeah, we'll get through it. We'll do it.
Speaker 1:Oh, so good, so good. Well, you know, one of the things that we got to do earlier this year. That was incredible. Susan reached out to me and she said I found this place that we can go and learn about retreats because it's been on my heart for a couple of years. God's been working on my heart. But you bring people together in a retreat and I thought what does that even look like? And then my friend tells me she's opening a retreat space. Yeah, so that has been a journey. And she found this opportunity to go do a work exchange. So we went and did that earlier this year and what would you say? In that, it was an amazing opportunity to truly see behind the scenes as well as take part in all of the activities. So what would you say was the most surprising thing for you that you well, let's say this what was the biggest takeaway that you had from that weekend? Because the first thing, I came home.
Speaker 2:So the first thing I was like I came home and I told my husband, I said, oh, we need more property because then, because going there, there was so many activities that you could do and everything had such a profound meaning for each lady that we came across and what it would help them release and be just. I mean, you saw women come in in the beginning and they would be like this, and then by the end we were laughing Everyone, everyone was talking to everyone and they were all ages there, you know, the very young moms who had left their kids behind. One girl had never done anything like that, which I thought that was phenomenal, because that again it was that saying. It's like you know, if mom is not happy, ain't nobody happy.
Speaker 2:So, mom, you need that time. You need that to be rebooted, to be, you know, nourished, and not just by foods, just by the nourishment from other women and just spending time in nature. That I love that. We went out and we we picked fresh little wildflowers and they lasted forever. We were all astonished at how long they lasted. But the and so think, the biggest takeaway again, as our topic is was community how even people who had never met before in their lives they came together and by the end we were sharing with each other. We'd sit around the table and we made jewelry and just like I remember growing up as a little girl, I would see my grandmother. She would be in her quilting room and that's what the ladies. They would just be sitting there, quilting and just be in community. You know, talking and being in community, like you said, yeah, powerful.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that that was probably. That was one of the things that was another thought I would have. I think that that was probably that was one of the things that was another thought I would have. Yeah, it was surprising to me because I did. We were in the dining hall and in walks, this beautiful young woman and she sits down just very quiet, very reserved, very uncertain, and she had won the weekend from a giveaway and didn't know a soul, soul. So I think to me that speaks to things the power of walking into a room where you don't know other people and yet you're able to have that connection because you put yourself in the room with a community of like-minded people. Right, Anything is possible when you believe that it's possible, when you open up your mind to being able to come together.
Speaker 1:And I think that that is one of the things that really was cemented in me, because I knew the power of community but I just to see that in live action and see everybody hugging at the end and saying I've got your number, we're going to connect again, we're going to meet here again next year, all the things like it's so powerful to find these communities and really get plugged in. But I think one of the takeaways that I loved, that I really cherished while we were there, was being able to just walk the paths. It was April in Houston or in in um.
Speaker 2:Where did we go Marble Falls, marble Falls, but yeah, hill Country. I was trying to think about the name of it Hill Country.
Speaker 1:So Hill Country and it was beautiful. It was like the most perfect weekend Temperature wise. We actually had a big rainstorm come through. It was a little bit intense, but it just added to the atmosphere. But I think just being able to A, you're coming together as a community but you're also unplugging.
Speaker 2:You're unplugging from your phones, your connections, you're giving yourself that full time to truly fill your cup, yes, yes. And being able to see behind the scenes, since we both want to hold retreats and, do you know, have the retreats being behind the scenes? You saw, and it is. It's a lot of work, you know, and so being able to participate in that and see how that was run, and I really appreciate all the info that was just freely given. You know, I would say, well, where did you get this? Or how'd you do this? And it was just given, and I just really appreciate that so much because it it really helped me moving forward. Um, knowing that, okay, well, that's going to work there, and then I knew where to go to get just something as simple as sheets, right, I mean to be able to have a direction to go, being pointed at.
Speaker 1:Yes, Well, that makes me think of another amazing value of community is that you're able to to really lift other people up and help guide in that journey it's it's about.
Speaker 1:It's about supporting one another and not competing with that journey. It's about supporting one another and not competing with one another. It's not about, you know, for her, the owner, to be able to share so freely to somebody that is going to open up a retreat space, not in the same area, but just to give her heart, because that is her heart. When you come into a powerful community like that, I know one of the things I hear a lot of my clients say is they feel alone, they feel like they are not supported. That's why it's so critical that you connect yourself with community of like-minded people, because then you've got people coming around you that get it, people that are going to want to walk with you in that journey, to support you, even if they're not ready to do it, even if they're not really understanding why you're doing it. They've got your back and they're there for you, right and you can't get that just on the street.
Speaker 2:You know you can't. No, it is, it is, and putting yourself out there, you have to be willing, have to be willing to do that Exactly.
Speaker 1:Yes, oh, I love that so much. So where can everyone find you? Where can they find it Will?
Speaker 2:there be on your website lists of upcoming events or is it just the event people that come in and they do their advertising? Most people right now they will be doing their own advertising, but maybe in the near future I will work out a plan where it will show what's happening.
Speaker 2:Yeah, If it's open to yeah, Correct, and whatever's open to others. You know, because if you're on the Instagram page, you know and you see it, it's not going to show when, Dawn, when you're having your um event, that's coming up very, very soon. People, August 24th, August 24th.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:So, um, yes, so it's still again. Things are still a work in progress, absolutely, and you learn as you go. So that question had not been posed to me, so now it has.
Speaker 1:So now New things to think about right, exactly, exactly, and that's where it's flowing with your business and learning as you go.
Speaker 1:Yes, I just know that this is going to be the most transformative space and people are going to be flocking to it, because I feel like you can feel the energy, you can feel the positivity, you can feel just the calm when you walk up the beautiful walkway and the property is gorgeous. There's lots of space out there to go out there and really take time for yourself and find reflection, which is part of unplugging and really kind of doing that inner work, and so I'm gorgeous trees.
Speaker 2:You can just sit under a tree. That's just beautiful. Yeah, so exciting.
Speaker 1:Very exciting. I cannot encourage you enough to come check out the program and that's going to be coming here If you are local. The program I'm running on August 24th is called Release, renew and Revitalize. It is an interactive three hours. It's going to be an impactful three hours where you are literally reducing the stress physically in your body and also learning how to build resiliency so that you can start to feel better and stronger and more equipped to handle stress as it comes at you, because it's not going anywhere. It's part of our daily world and in 2024, I don't know about you, but the stressors that are out.
Speaker 2:there are a lot, and it's a reality.
Speaker 1:And when you're dealing with chronic inflammation, you already have so much inflammation in your body and if that stress is left to continue to build, you are continuing to add to the inflammation which then outputs in your joint pain, your fatigue, your, your, your mood, your anxiety, all the things.
Speaker 1:It's all connected. So if you are not doing something to actively reduce that stress and gaining tools that you can put in your toolkit, that you can then put into action when you need, then you're not helping yourself feel your best and truly thriving in your day-to-day life.
Speaker 2:I cannot thank you enough for this time.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much. I truly appreciate you. Yeah, I appreciate you too. Well, there you have it the ins and outs of why being in the company of the right people are important as you work to improve your diet and lifestyle. I hope that you found this episode super valuable as you continue taking steps to improve your pain and fatigue. If you did, would you do me a huge favor and leave a review when you do? It helps the podcast reach other RA warriors who are looking for support as they take charge of their health so that they can change the trajectory of their life. All right, my friend, I'll be back next week, Same time, same place. Bye for now.