Strive for Peace and Balance

The Unlikely Gifts Podcast brings you the second episode of its special-edition series of 10 podcasts called Monday Afternoon Club with Diane & Amy. 

Host Diane M. Simard is joined by co-host Amy Fairchild, a professional singer, life/success coach, and project manager consultant to discuss the second chapter, titled Strive for Peace and Balance, in Diane's new book about healing forward from life's emotional scars. 

Topics they discuss include:

• How Amy believes that giving ourselves grace gives us peace
• The pain of rejection
• How Diane's breast cancer helped her come to terms with the rejection from her father when she was 6
• Our tendency to want to "fix" everyone
• Ways to understand emotional trauma in middle age

Their on-air chemistry has been described as "clean, middle-age inspirational fun with a wealth of positive, thought-provoking messages that will leave you anxious for more." 

Diane's Links
Personal website
Facebook
LinkedIn (personal)
LinkedIn (Unlikely Gift Productions)
Diane's book

Larry's Links
Larry's Sorta Fun Stories podcast
Collage Travel Radio
LinkedIn

Amy's Links
The Encourage Project website
The Encourage Project podcast
LinkedIn

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:04

Hi, and welcome to the Unlikely Gifts Podcast. I'm producer and editor Larry King, and it's my honor to introduce co-hosts Diane M. Samard and Amy Fairchild on this episode of the special 10 editions called the Monday Afternoon Club with Diane and Amy. Relax and enjoy the fun as these two firecrackers chat about the principles that keep them both grounded and share the amusing, memorable events they both insist really did happen. So now, here, let's bring on the stars of the show. Here's Diane and Amy.

Diane M. Simard: 0:45

Well, welcome back, listeners, to the Unlikely Gifts Podcast, special edition Monday Afternoon Club with Diane and Amy. I'm your co-host, Diane M. Samard, and with me is the only person I know who could pass herself off as human champagne. My bubbly co-host, Amy Fairchild.

SPEAKER_01: 1:03

I love that description so much. Thank you, thank you. I am thrilled to be here. And I really, really, really cannot wait to dive into today's topic.

Diane M. Simard: 1:12

Yeah, so uh today we're gonna be talking about two of my favorite topics, peace and balance. And I've gone to great lengths in the past year to find both. And I know you feel strongly about peace and balance too. So let me put something out there. So I believe balance is achieved when the weights of life are placed evenly apart. Miss Amy, what are your thoughts?

SPEAKER_01: 1:37

I absolutely agree. And I would add that I also believe that when we can't quite get those weights evenly placed rather than freaking out and getting anxious and spiraling, it's really giving ourselves grace that helps us create that peace in our lives. You know, and then and further, actually, I really believe in investing and directing energy into those things that support us rather than hobble us. I believe that's absolutely vital.

Diane M. Simard: 2:10

Well, thank you. Cause I uh again, much of our time together is going to be talking about how our lives have changed symbolically. And now at this point in my life, I am constantly weeding out the heaviness that bogs me down and holds me back from getting where I want to go. And I'm just really sensitive about that. So my heaviness includes people that don't reciprocate, events that don't inspire me, or even content that doesn't offer new ideas. And I'm always searching for efficiencies, plus, I find comfort in making lists of things that I want to explore or get to later. And it's like my brain is always on simmer, like before, right before that boiling point. So, with that, I I have a simple question for you. Do you find people like me to be stimulating or exhausting?

SPEAKER_01: 3:01

I find people like you to be extremely stimulating. And it's because we're so similar. I I'm absolutely a list maker. I tend not to have a whole lot of patience for um what I feel are folks who don't reciprocate. And so I find them stimulating. And I can also appreciate, though, to be fair, how there are people who might find folks like us exhausting.

SPEAKER_03: 3:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 3:28

But but that's really what's so interesting about today's topic. I mean, you can help people with that.

Diane M. Simard: 3:33

Thank you. Yeah, no, it's I I know I'm not for everybody. And for the longest time, I've always tried to to accommodate people and what they wanted from me. And it's like, no, I just have to be me. That's that's the best I can do. And that's the most helpful, that's the healthiest for all of us, right? So, so I appreciate that that commentary, but let's dive into chapter two of my new book, which again is launching this fall, and it's about healing forward from life's emotional traumas. So, right now, the working title is Heal Forward and Break Free from Emotional Pain.

SPEAKER_01: 4:05

I love it. And before we dive in, though, you know, it is Monday afternoon club. Uh-huh. What's your choice of beverage today?

Diane M. Simard: 4:12

Oh, today it's just plain old iced water with lemon. And um, I literally drink at least a quarter of it every day because we have such low humidity here on the front range of Colorado that I have to stay high hydrated or I get these like throbbing headaches, right? Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 4:30

Yeah. I will say I don't, I don't miss that part of it. I I do miss the dry weather. You know, when I moved back to Arkansas from Denver almost seven years ago now, it took me quite a while to adjust back to being into humidity. I mean, my hair, my hair, number one, yeah, did not like it.

Diane M. Simard: 4:48

Lots of pony, lots of ponytails.

SPEAKER_01: 4:50

Absolutely. My skin loves it though. My skin loves it. And thank goodness for water. Today um it's it's cucumber in mine because I found out recently I shouldn't um have citrus because I have rosacea. I was so sad faced. So mine's water, water with cucumber. Okay. But back to chapter two. So I think I even sent you an email that the intro to chapter two was one of my favorites. And in that intro, you refer to your quote, unreasonable quest for balanced perfection, end quote. It makes me feel important to do that, quote, end quote.

Diane M. Simard: 5:27

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 5:29

Share some of the reasons why that has been such a strong influence in your life.

Diane M. Simard: 5:34

So um, I'm one of those women who's had um this huge influence because of the daddy-daughter relationship stuff. Um, that of course started when I was very young, but it's impacted me my whole life. So I'll just share a quick story about that. And when I was six years old, um, and leading up to that point, I was my dad's like the apple of his eye, and his only biological child, he spoiled me rotten and pretty much had nothing to do with my siblings, and I feel really bad for them now. But that's the way life was. And I thought it was great. He was my hero, my rock star. When I was um like three and four years old, I wouldn't eat unless I was sitting on his lap. It was pretty ridiculous. Yeah. And but then when I was six, he at the time was a rural mail carrier to farmers out in the country. And it and it was a good job for him. But the this happened, this freak thing happened. And so he always drove an international scout and he had the windows down, right? Because he had to put mail in the mailboxes. And so he got sprayed by a crop duster, because this is where the heart of corn country in central Nebraska. He got sprayed with DDT by a crop duster accidentally, and and that really happened. And so that turned into a disability for him. And all of a sudden, he had this horrible depression that came on. Now, at the time, I I certainly wasn't old enough to really understand what was going on, but all of a sudden, he had to go spend six months in the psych ward of the Veterans Hospital in Lincoln, Nebraska. And he left very abruptly. And I was just, I was so lost because my protector, my hero was just gone and no one was talking. And I feared he would never gonna come, was never gonna come back. I thought he was gonna die while he was in the hospital. And when he did return, he be he returned home very aloof, heavily medicated. He was not the same person. And it felt like he had literally broken up with me, and it became um I would, and everybody had said because he was depressed, right? And so your daddy's never the same, but he's depressed, just leave him alone, let him do his weird, creepy things, like keep all the blinds closed. And I just didn't understand, but the pain of his rejection of me was so excruciating. I was I was crushed. And as a result of that, I went into this mode where I just tried to fix everything. I tried to fix him and make him happy and make him smile again, and I became an overachiever, and which meant everything from you remember the 4-H days growing up. I took every project I could, I I played the piano till my fingers bled, and I I just was I just was doing stuff right to get his attention and his love back. But he was in such a dark place that he was never the same again.

SPEAKER_01: 8:38

Oh my gosh. I I can only imagine how lonely that must have felt. I mean, particularly for a little kid, for a six-year-old.

Diane M. Simard: 8:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 8:47

And and what's so what's so sad about that too is that as humans, we create stories when we're rejected. And we create so many different kinds of stories if we haven't been told the truth uh about rejection. And it causes, as you've just outlined, a lot of downline impacts on our lives. Why do you think it's so difficult for us to deal with rejection in general?

Diane M. Simard: 9:13

Yeah, I I think it's because all of a sudden it just like it just changes, or or you realize this is not our relationship's not the same. What did I do? Because again, I had this tendency to blame myself. And as I always say, my daddy broke up with me when I was six. And I I never I didn't fully get over it until I got breast cancer. Wow.

SPEAKER_01: 9:39

So I I can't even connect those dots. What's that about?

Diane M. Simard: 9:43

Yeah, yeah. So so um interestingly, it was while I was doing research for my first book about my can't my breast cancer experience that I uh ran into a dear cousin of mine at my niece's wedding. And I was in the process of finishing my book, and I was struggling with uh my my father was uh a key figure certainly in my life, and I was really struggling with how to portray him because of the fact that he and I never uh really we didn't not get along, but we never connected after he came home from the VA hospital. And um he passed away in 1997, and we just never we never got back on the same level, and I I always regretted that and and I wished we had. So I asked my cousin if she had any thoughts on that. She goes, you know, let me ask my dad, who is now my only living uncle remaining. Her father um had been a uh college counselor his entire life. And so she sent me an email several days later and she said, Hey, I talked to my dad. And of all things, she said, Dad suspects that your father, my father, had what we now call the post-traumatic trust distress order or PTSD and from the Korean War, which came on 15 years after he was stationed in Korea. And so it may have had something to do with getting sprayed with DDT, we'll never know. But there was something that happened that triggered him when I was six, 15 years after his war experience that caused him to launch into this horrific bout of PTS, what we call PTSD today. And so I found that out because I was writing this book about my breast cancer experience. And so um that's why I named, I titled the book The Unlikely Gift of Breast Cancer, was because that was one of many self-discoveries I made from a lifetime of uh just wonder and regret and disappointment in my father. And I finally was able to come to terms. You know, he had been gone for a long time, but but but again, it was it was a gift for me to finally say something other than me was the cause of his behavior and why, you know, as I say, he symbolically broke up with me.

SPEAKER_01: 12:04

Oh my gosh. It is an incredible gift. It just is. Yeah, what a long time to receive. Yeah, and what a long journey, right? Um you you children and you've you've said this, you know, children are so sensitive and aware and they're so open, and they have such a belief that anything they receive is truthful. So I can imagine, you know, getting those kinds of messages when you were a little kid, you grew up with that truth, that even though it may not have been reality, and and being able to get insight to come to some form of I'll call it peace around that. Yeah. Particularly at this point in your life. That's really, really wonderful.

Diane M. Simard: 12:45

Thank you. Well, I um again, because of that experience with my father throughout my whole life, this fear of this dread about rejection, it it's like it got permanently tattooed in my memory bank all the way from childhood. And it took me the next 50 years to heal from it. And and thank God I finally did. And because otherwise this would have just been weighing heavy on my mind. And again, as it ties to this chapter, this book, it allowed me at long last peace. And again, I I assume that's what what happened. It's just my way of accepting that this makes all kinds of sense now because of his behavior, because of his similarities to the symptoms of PTSD.

SPEAKER_01: 13:33

You you changed the story. You you got new information and you had new learning about it, transformative learning, like we talked about in the previous episode. You you learned new information and created a new story. I love that you did that. What I what I also found interesting in the book is that you also write about how you despise disorder and you cannot tolerate per what you call perpetual dysfunction. Yet yet you keep you kept kind of ending up in those situations in your career that were pretty dysfunctional. Um, I I kind of, I mean, I know you're a smart woman, but I wondered, are you a glutton for punishment or what happened there?

Diane M. Simard: 14:12

Oh my gosh, right? No, that's a great way to put it. I well, for the longest time, I honestly thought, because I had this like, okay, it's all my fault, everything's always my fault. I thought all the dysfunction that I encountered was payback for something I'd done wrong. And it wasn't until recently when I finally understood where I belong in this world that my survival mechanism was to be the driver in conflict resolution. I was always jumping in, trying to be the peacemaker, trying to fix things, and that was everything from people to conflicts to problems and business and everyone else's unhappiness. And I just I just thought that that was what I was supposed to do, was to fix it. And of course, that includes my father way back in childhood. And then, of course, when I couldn't fix the messes that other people created, I felt like a complete failure.

SPEAKER_01: 15:08

That's a huge load to carry. Yeah. Failure in any form is a huge load to carry. And you must have felt like you were drowning in dealing with the messes of everyone else.

Diane M. Simard: 15:20

Well, it's a great way to put it. Um, thank you. That's very eloquent. And honestly, I I recognize now, and and my husband, Rainy, and I joke about it, but I'm happiest when there's order and structure and schedules and answers and solutions and all of that. And I've known that about myself my whole life, but I always found myself smack dab in the middle of bedlam. And and I hated it, but I was just so stubborn that it was always difficult for me to walk away. And and I just couldn't. I was like, I can do, I can fix this, I can do this, I'm gonna try something different. I was always bumping my head into walls and becoming very frustrated. And, you know, people don't really care. It's like, well, she's you know, whatever, she's trying to do what she does. But I I'm curious now to turn the tables on on you a little bit here. Since Amy, you're a success and a life coach. What is it, in your opinion, about human nature to want to fix everything and everyone else? Am I a nurturer? Am I an optimist or naive or just plain crazy?

SPEAKER_01: 16:26

Well, actually, you might be all of the above, depending on the context, right? Right. And and and it's all perfect. Any of those are perfect. And what I've learned is that wanting to fix people comes from a place of fear.

unknown: 16:42

Okay.

SPEAKER_01: 16:42

Fear of failing others. And and frankly, it's it comes from a place of fear of looking at ourselves. You know, if I believe I'm fine and it's everyone else who needs to be fixed, then I'm busy picking out all your faults and trying to fix them. I can't possibly have time to look at my own. Right? I can't possibly have time to to understand what's wrong with me and fix me because I'm fine. And and I put fine in the in the proverbial air quotes, right? And so wanting to fix others distracts us from fixing ourselves. We're afraid to look at ourselves sometimes. And and sometimes that's okay. You know, you get to a place which you did. You get to a place where you feel comfortable looking at yourself and sitting in that discomfort and moving it forward. But but when it becomes a perpetual response to shoving fear down, fixing everyone isn't isn't necessarily uh a benefit to you.

Diane M. Simard: 17:41

Yeah, thank you. No, it's really that's so interesting. Um of course, I one of my other faults I call it a fault or a trait, but I I just am just such a perfectionist. Like I'm always just striving. We need to have results to me, um impact and accomplishment for the longest time meant fixing things, getting back to this state of what I call equilibrium. And but I'm always attracted to the messes. And and and what I've what I've learned to your point about fear is that many of the unique behaviors, questionable behaviors of others that really challenged me, their stuff is often driven by fear too. Fear of failure, fear of abandonment, whatever that is. And so it it really was uh, and I I credit certainly middle age and wisdom and some traumatic experiences of my own to just recognize that, first of all, it just I I have to back off. It's none of my business, quite honestly. It's not my right, it's it's not my place to try to help others find that state of equilibrium. And again, because of what happened to me last summer with getting laid off, it's because I gotta fix myself first, right? And and that was a big deal. I I hadn't seen myself as needing fixing, but I really, really did. I had to just let go. It was I was living in chaos.

SPEAKER_01: 19:10

Well, and it in and about fixing yourself in at least the United States, in our culture, we are conditioned to serve others, put others before ourselves at all times. Many of us have been conditioned that way through through our culture, through our our spiritual practices, what have you. And and and we never got the rest of the message. And the rest of the message is you put others first only when you yourself are full. You have to be filled up, you have to be functioning, you have to be in a place of authenticity and peace and compassion in order to be able to assist anyone else. Right. You know, they tell you on the airplane, put your mask on before assisting others. That's the exact same thing. Until we fill ourselves, we can't possibly offer anything to anyone else. Um and when we don't do that, it brings up something that's you talked about in the in the chapter at the end of the chapter, you you began the conversation around conflict, which is inevitable in in most situations. And so what is it like to feel so internally conflicted for so long?

Diane M. Simard: 20:15

Yeah. Wow. So now our in a reflection, I believe I was in the wrong place at the wrong time for all the wrong reasons. Just it was just all out of whack. It was out of balance. I didn't fit in, didn't feel accepted. I didn't understand myself at all. So it was all about me I needed to get back in touch with myself. And I I felt depressed like I was a failure and I blame myself. And yet those who knew me best kept telling me to walk away and break free and to stop carrying the weight of ever everyone else's burdens. And I just I just couldn't get there.

SPEAKER_01: 20:57

I I think what you described is a fairly human experience for many people. Not everyone has experienced it but many people have and what I understand and talking with you and having read the book and and all the time we spent together is that your bout with cancer changed that.

Diane M. Simard: 21:14

It really did yeah it's such a turning point for so many people and and um I have to pause and say it it was a major trauma in my life. That's how I view it now but what cancer did it it forced me to take a long look at who I am and of course facing your mortality which I did for an extended period of time it will definitely do that to you. And going through that and and recognizing and honestly having the time to kind of to analyze my life and what all had happened and and certainly journaling which led to my first book I realized I I finally accepted actually who I am why I am and why I needed to try and stop fixing everybody and focus instead on healing myself. And again because there's um so much physically from cancer to come back from but certainly it was such an emotional journey for me that I was ready to heal forward from that. And also I I recognized I needed to use my God given talents that at the time it just seemed like I was wasting them away and and then shift from trying to fix things and instead bring hope and healing and educational resources to others. That was the answer. And because of going through cancer, I finally got to that point.

SPEAKER_01: 22:43

So was that something that kind of came into view slowly or was there a specific moment or a specific event when you had that shift and made that discovery?

Diane M. Simard: 22:55

Yeah thank you. So there were actually two moments um during cancer treatment and I'll I'll just share those both of those real real briefly the first one was um I had such horrible nausea because of of chemotherapy that I um wanted to do something. I had friends that wanted me to smoke marijuana but my my medical team said don't mix the two you know you're you're on some very powerful drugs. So I signed up and I had some acupuncture sessions with a dear friend who's an acupuncturist and I thought okay that's like holistic as it comes and healthy well what it did was it um unleashed all this energy through my body and we had a really wet spring in Denver the year um that I went through breast cancer and so my allergies were in full gear and it was I was laying in bed one night after having had an acupuncture treatment the day before and I rolled over and I unlodged the crystal in my inner ear that keeps you balanced. How ironic that we're talking about balance and I I went into this whopper bout of vertigo like um unbelievable I was sicker from that vertigo experience than I ever was during chemo. And um I had to get to the hospital and it was um I just couldn't move off the bed and I just was perpetually spinning. Oh my gosh I had an out of body experience and never had one of those before and it was because I was I literally was fighting the grim reaper I th I wanted to die. It was so miserable and I looked over at a picture of our chocolate lab on the wall and I thought about joining him in heaven because he you know and and and then an angel spoke to me and said you need to capture this and tell the world what this is like that has nothing to do with cancer and you are in the battle of your life and literally I will save you from this but you've got to get to the hospital and you have to promise that you're gonna write it in a book. Oh my gosh. Yeah is it was it was like the freakishly most powerful experience. So that was number one and then number two um I still wasn't done with chemo yet but I had lunch with my good friend Cheryl and all I did was complain about how lousy I felt and I just wouldn't shut up. I just went on and on and I'm like she goes like just stop Diane she goes start living your life as though you don't have cancer and she stopped me dead in my tracks and I shut up finally and then I was driving back to the office and I was in my sports car and this freakish thing happened. I was driving along you know thinking about her words and then I realized I was in a car race with a a Porsche a Lamborghini and a I can't remember what the third car was anyway three other men driving their sports car and me a middle aged woman with breast cancer and we're racing.

SPEAKER_01: 25:44

Oh my gosh.

Diane M. Simard: 25:45

Yeah and and I screamed something that I can't repeat here at the top of my lungs and and I just said cancer I'm done with you basically and it was it was a signal it was a sign and and then we stopped racing and I drove into the office and and it was affirmation again from that same angel that you got to keep moving forward yet you have to put this behind you and get over cancer and get on with your life and and it changed everything.

SPEAKER_01: 26:14

Oh my gosh I have goosebumps yeah I I want to know why you weren't arrested.

Diane M. Simard: 26:19

Yeah well it it it's just yeah and we really didn't we just I don't know it we we were on the backside of Centennial Airport kind of in the middle of nowhere and it was no one was in danger. We weren't we weren't really driving that fast. It was just you know ha ha one o'clock on a Tuesday afternoon everybody's being stupid and but it was like this epiphany moment. And so I I just I realized I needed to stop being ashamed of my differences and and to just embrace the fact that I'm you know middle aged and I have a sports car and I love drag racing with a bunch of men.

SPEAKER_01: 26:56

I just I love it I'm glad you got over yourself after lunch that day so to speak. Yeah exactly because now you're an author you're a leader in intersecting mental health and cancer I mean I brag about that all the time about you and you are an advocate to heal forward from traumatic events.

Diane M. Simard: 27:18

I love that so much that um you know traumatic events that accumulate over a lifetime well yeah it only took about 55 years but I I do I feel like I finally figured it out right and and there's such joy in that and to me middle age can be so liberating and I know it's not for everyone some people don't like getting older and it's happier for me because I I did my homework I spent time processing and weeding out the things that were draining me dry without giving anything back in return. And I just continue to seek peace and I I disassociate myself from those things that are just a drain that don't reciprocate and and it's not my fault right and I'm just honest like we just don't jive I don't get you you don't get me and that's cool. Go ahead and live your life your way that's your right I'm just gonna stick to to my peeps to the people that get me. It's it is I mean it is that simple.

SPEAKER_01: 28:23

I love it. I describe that to people as not everyone likes chocolate ice cream. Yeah that's okay I'm chocolate ice cream not everybody likes chocolate ice cream I am okay with that and there there's one thing I'll say about middle age because we're we're close to the same age and and you know people are can complain about middle age and I I do not want to discount the feelings that can come kind of or can come up with that. And at the same time there are some people who don't get the gift of living that long and that's not to shame people into thinking about it differently it's just to get them to get a little curious about what could make middle age a little bit better. You know um one of the things that you said was you spent time processing.

Diane M. Simard: 29:08

So so I'm curious what's one piece of advice you would give someone who's just beginning that journey of processing of getting to know or and or understand their trauma so it is um I would say if if if you're a writer like I am to write it down or if you're a speaker however you can express yourself most efficiently what you feel most comfortable doing and for some it may be really really difficult but to just start to start speaking to yourself in the car to start writing it down. There are so many wonderful tools now that allow you to do that. And and what it did for me through my journaling was I owned it. I started to acknowledge it first and it's not in a shameful way it's just putting yourself out there and the self-disclosure about how you see yourself. And that was the first step for me and it was a huge first step and then acknowledging it's not my place it's not my job to fix everybody else things happen and I'm so sorry I will absolutely be there to support but I can only do that if I'm okay with me. Yes. Yes and I and I get I and I get good with myself first. And let me just say we are so blessed to have you Amy here with your background and your training about these topics because I have to tell you go back and listen to any of her uh Encourage project podcasts Amy gets into these types of topics it's just it's so uplifting it's so wonderful and it's so healing. So thank you I'm so grateful for you.

SPEAKER_01: 30:56

Thank you. That makes me have happy tears between the two of us we have a lot going on you have way more right now going on than I do.

Diane M. Simard: 31:06

And if people want to get in touch with you, what's the best way for them to stay updated on everything that's going on in your world absolutely so the best way is to go to my website dianemsimar.com where you can sign up for my monthly newsletter uh that comes to your email inbox on the second Sunday of every month and it provides all types of information about mental resource mental health resources for cancer and plus again I I do tease about what other writing projects I'm working on. And then when you sign up for that newsletter you're also going to receive my free monthly blog which is quite short. It's called Middleaged Moxie where I share a lot of observations about things that happen to me in everyday life. And then of course there's I'm on Facebook and LinkedIn but again the best way to to keep in touch and to get all the as I say the good stuff the best stuff is to go to my website which is DianeMsomar.com.

SPEAKER_01: 32:01

I will say I actually went through your website again a few days ago because I hadn't looked at it in a while and because you've added some cool new things and stuff. And I gotta tell you folks you will not be disappointed everything out there is something that if you can't use it today you will use it in the future and I I just love it. Your content is fabulous.

Diane M. Simard: 32:19

Again and right back at you I'm I am so grateful to have you as part of the Unlikely Gifts podcast um Monday afternoon club edition. Thank you. Do you have any final words of wisdom?

SPEAKER_01: 32:30

Well thank you so much. I do I do as as you wrap up today's episode take a few minutes get curious you know today we've been talking about peace and balance what area of your life feels most out of balance and to be fair you don't need to solve it today. Just begin to create awareness and then before the end of the day take just one action big or small one action that brings you a moment of peace maybe it's a cup of coffee maybe it's reading a page of a book or listening to 10 minutes of a podcast do one thing that brings you a moment of peace well that that's fantastic.

Diane M. Simard: 33:10

Great advice is always and and you are truly a gift in my life trust me and and again as all of our listeners and I'm so grateful to all of you. So in closing please remember to nurture your mental health and your physical health and don't ever forget there's an unlikely gift in every circumstance I'm Diane M. Simard and this is the Unlikely Gifts Podcast