Yoga is Union With Karley Kimbro

Your body might be smarter than your overthinking. We’re joined by Karley Kimbro, a yoga teacher and sound healer, for a conversation that starts with movement and ends with a bigger question: what does it look like to live in alignment with yourself when the world keeps pushing you into speed, stress, and self doubt?

Karley tells the story of finding yoga, going through teacher training during the pandemic, and feeling the “cosmic nudge” to leave a cushy corporate HR job to teach wellness full time. Along the way, we talk about accessible yoga for beginners, the intimidation factor of studios, and why yoga is more than flexibility or perfect poses. For Karley, yoga means union, and that opens the door to breathwork, meditation, sound healing, and even tarot as real tools for connection and self understanding.

We also break down what a sound bath actually is, how instruments like crystal singing bowls and chimes can support nervous system regulation, and why a sensory practice can help you rediscover calm when your brain is trained toward agitation by constant devices. Then we shift into retreats, softness as strength, and the sober curious journey including how to rethink sobriety without shame or labels.

If you’re craving a more intentional rhythm, better mental wellness, and practices you can actually stick with, press play. Subscribe, share this with a friend who needs a deep breath, and leave a review so more listeners can find us.

To learn more, go to mycreateharmony.com 

Transcript

Welcome And Set The Rhythm

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Welcome back to the Create Harmony Podcast. Let me tell you what you're gonna find here. In this space, we settle into an intentional rhythm, and it's one that helps us savor life's blessings and ground ourselves in gratitude. And today we get to expand that space a little wider. I'm gonna be joined by a guest whose work and presence reflect much of what we value here at Create Army. Connection, intention, and a deep respect for the rhythms that shape our lives. So wherever you are, settle in, take a breath, and join us for this conversation.

Meet Carly Kimbrough

SPEAKER_00 0:49

All right, welcome everyone. Today we have Carly Kimbrough, and she is a yoga teacher, she's a sound healer, she just knows all sorts of great things about how to bring healing energy into your life. And she's a super fun human being. So we are really excited about our conversation with her. And we have Megan also on the podcast today. So we are just really excited about all things create harmony today. And we will start out, Carly, just tell us like how did you start doing what you're doing, or tell us a little bit about the things that you do.

SPEAKER_01 1:27

You can give us do you want me to I'll run it back April 16th, 1993, 749. No, um and then on 1994, yeah. Yeah, and then and then when uh in 1996 when I was three.

Finding Yoga Through Movement

SPEAKER_01 1:42

No, um so I started practicing yoga in high school, um, where that sort of coming of age, like new in that sort of like first adult version of your body, just trying to figure out how things work. Um, movement was always really important to me as a kid. Like I was very naturally like athletic, very competitive when I went to high school. The sports that I um had played in middle school, middle school athlete is who you're on the phone with today. Um not even that. So you was like the basketball and volleyball team said losing records and me, classic Aries, I was like, no, don't want to do that. So I went into theater and performance, but still wanted to move. So I was doing like yoga when fit TV was still on the television, right? Which rest in peace wherever that channel went. Um, and then that fell off in in college, as most I think people's health habits do. And so I came back into the practice really um my first or second year out of college, found a studio in Raleigh that I really, really loved, worked the front desk there for the first for a couple of um couple of years, and then did my teacher training there in started it in the uh beginning of 2020.

Pandemic Pressure Turns Into Purpose

SPEAKER_01 3:04

And so I think we all know, saying it without saying it, what happened in 2020. Um, and that had a direct impact on my training. We were um about to teach like our midterm. So, like the six, uh, eight month or so, six or eight month track of teacher training, we were at our midway point and it was like, okay, we'll we'll see you in two weeks, and like, oh, everything's just gonna get pushed back two weeks. Cut two, we were um home for a really, really long time. So uh how I got, I guess, to here now, like six years later, um was a lot in a large part because of the pandemic, um, that forced lockdown. And then that the way I took it was this just like uh inner spiral into sort of like who I am, what I wanted to do, how I wanted to show up in the world. I always knew I wanted to teach. So it was like that competitive, but also the performance elements of like in high school and just sort of naturally being that type of person. I I really, really felt called, um, particularly after I lost my job, um, in in the in the pandemic. I was like, oh, well, great. This is just now a pathway to teach. So even in all of the um, I don't even want to say climbing the corporate ladder, just sort of like really struggling to feel that what I did had impact in a corporate structure. Um, that just really made me more and more attuned to what I could provide and what I could do in a in a teaching capacity. Um, and and without saying too much, because I don't know if I'm allowed to, but I was approached by a pretty major fitness brand. And I'm looking at the bike right now. Um, but that happens, which is for sale if anybody wants it, any listener wants it. I was approached in 2024 to um audition with them. And obviously I didn't get it, and that was one of the biggest blessings of my lifetime, but it was also like the biggest cosmic nudge of like, hey, if these people are saying send us tapes, these people are interested, then what I can do really does have some sort of impact and there is some sort of pathway there. So in October of 2024, I left um like a pretty cushy, pretty like easy corporate HR job and started teaching fitness full time. Um, and I just recently launched my own brand, Carly Kimbrough LLC, um to to really just put my whole heart, my whole practice, everything into um into wellness and also like just connection. Because I think that's the most impactful part of it. Um, I don't know how long I went on there, but that's how I got here. And and believe it or not, I could have gone longer.

SPEAKER_00 5:49

It's all good. It's all good.

Making Yoga Feel Less Intimidating

SPEAKER_00 5:51

So tell us a little bit more about what the scope of Carly Kimbrough LL.

SPEAKER_01 5:56

Yeah. Oh yeah. So that's like one of my favorite questions to answer because there's like, what's your brand? And I said, Well, what do you mean? It's me.

unknown 6:02

It's me.

SPEAKER_01 6:03

Um, but it so what I want to offer really truly are just like my services to folks who might not be familiar with coming into a studio. So I guess running it back. Um as a I guess like a fitness instructor, if we want to make it that I have had the beautiful fortune of teaching in studio spaces that have not only fostered my growth, like where I did my teacher training, I'm also a lead teacher there. Um, I teach at another incredible studio in Raleigh. Um, and so the that's a pathway, right? There's barriers to entry, I would say, mostly just from familiarity. People are like, I don't know what hot yoga is, or I can't touch my toes. So people think that they can't do yoga, and then that intimidation piece of like, I'm gonna go up into the studio, everybody looks really nice, like I don't know what I was supposed to do or where. So, really, just sort of the work of my brand is to offer that um just through a different path of access and also really expand sort of what people's idea of yoga is, because it isn't just like a warrior two, it's that, but there's so much else in this sacred practice that people don't know. And yet there's a curiosity for. There's the the pendulum sort of shifted, or I think we're in a in a time where like people want to have those spiritual practices, not to clash with their systems of faith, but really to sort of instill faith in them and sort of like, what's our why? Like, why are we doing this? Why are we breathing, you know, in through the nose, out through the mouth? Why am I trying to put my hands down and my feet up? Like, what's the why behind it? And so, really just offering that as an aside so people can either, you know, yeah, you can book me for a bachelorette party if you want to, but and also all of these other um sort of tenets of the practice means to connect through breath work, through meditation, through sound healing, um, through tarot, which is one of like, I think the most fun parts of what I do, is that it's all yoga because yoga really, in its simplest translation, is union. So, what are the ways that help people come into the union of um this really, really beautiful and historic uh practice? So that's what I try to do with Carly Kimbrough as a brand and also with respect to the institutions, the places that I teach at, um, because I think that studios do such a great job of offering spaces and studios understand that they have contributors who have their own stuff too. So it's sort of like, how did I, how could I create something that was mine in a full container and also bring my practices, my interpretations of what other spaces are sort of looking for. Um, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:04

That's exciting.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

Yeah.

What Sound Healing Really Is

SPEAKER_02 9:06

As a recipient of Carly's sound baths, I can say that it's fantastic. I don't know if everybody has had a sound bath or not had a sound bath. The one that I had was, I think like either late last year or early this year. I can't even remember this time. Is a circle. I can't wrap my brain around, but I feel like it could be really interesting to hear you explain what it's on bath this time because I had no idea. And I just have some really cool neighbors who are like, I know this person who's gonna do this thing. Come to our clubhouse. Yeah. And I was blown away. Uh so if you want to explain that, I think that's amazing.

SPEAKER_01 9:52

Totally. So um and what's cool about that too is that the the person who connected you was someone who I had helped facilitate their teacher training. Yeah. So it's like really like the like yoga and its many, many ripple effects bring us literally into this moment, which is union. It's it's the coolest thing. Uh and like I feel like I'm like just screaming like yoga is union everywhere. Um and it's like it's it's in everything. It doesn't have to be, you know, arms overhead. Sound is a a deeply truly a deeply indigenous practice in that it is of the earth. Um, so a sound bath or a sound journey, sound meditation, anything that we're working with instruments um is really to attune to the frequency of our very bodies. So earth has a magnetic resonancy. That's why they'll say, like, you know, forest bathing, which is just like standing in the woods, not just standing in the woods, it can be very, very profound. You're you're allowing your body and the resonance within your body, particularly water, to attune to the magnetic frequency of the earth, right? So when it comes into sound, like our body's constitution is what, like 70% water. We're made of all of the earthen elements. Sound travels quickly through water. Sound or water in terms of our energetic body is what governs our emotions. So what sound does is it literally tunes us into this alignment and awareness, this process of our emotions without like thinking about it, which is really, really cool and also really, really challenging where we're sort of in a culture that's like uh mute it, you know, suppress it, don't feel the feelings. And me, Pisces Moon girl, I'm like, let's feel that feeling. So um, where sound comes into play is that it's a it's a subtle body practice because you're laying down and your eyes, so long as it feels safe, are closed. But the crystal bowls have a certain hertz like frequency. The Tibetan bowls have a different one and they're higher, lower pitch. Um, my favorite thing to play are like little seed chimes because you're like, what is that? Yeah, you're like literally you're like, what is this? And it's just almost sort of feels like rain. Um, you could throw in a rain stick in there if you want to, you throw in an ocean drum. There's so many different instruments that you can play that help regulate your nervous system and regulate your like the energetic web of your body, and you're literally just laying down. I say to people, like, you can have a really nice nap, in which case the snores are free sounds. I have had very profound like visual journeys. I've also just been like laying there, kind of mouth open, like feels nice. So you can kind of have a range of experiences. And what I always say is like the medicine is there, you just have to be the present to take it. So if you do fall asleep, your body needed sleep. If you have like a vision of, oh, I'm on a mountain and I see my grandma, like great. If you're just sort of like, us, what's happening here? Great. Because again, it's it's creating these little moments that you can connect with, whether in the immediate or you know, like here and now where you're like, I didn't know what to expect, but it felt really good. That's a good thing. Like we're allowed to feel good, and and we have to remember that.

SPEAKER_02 13:21

Yeah, there was probably Sally to paint this picture for you, like maybe 10 to 14 of us. And we dressed up all in golden girls themed clothes. Oh, wow. Even we always have a theme and an activity. And so half of the people were in robes with curlers in their hair, just laying down, and nobody knew what to expect, except for a handful of people who have already experienced it. Yeah. And so it was really cool to hear like the range of people's experiences, but I will say that nobody was like, that sucked. Everybody was like, that was really great. And maybe it wasn't profound for every single person there, but everybody, I everybody the next day was like, slept like a rock, best sleep of my night my whole life. I don't know what Carly did, but it was fabulous. So it was really, really interesting. I just felt really at peace during it. It's really pretty to hear it as well.

SPEAKER_01 14:17

And and that also hits on something too. It's like we as women, or like women identifying people, we're Venusian creatures. So that means that like we are of Venus. We are we are here in a sense to appreciate beauty. Yes. And so it's like there's not, there's also nothing wrong with being like, sounds nice. Sounds good. Right. And and I think like you have you have mothers, you have partners, you have these people, all of those people in that clubhouse, which was phenomenal. Because it was like on the one hand, people are eating meatballs, and then on the other hand, they're golden girls, like, where do I need to lay? And I'm like, girl, anywhere. Just like lay down. Um, but that too, that sort of tending to self and like feeling that beauty of just through your senses, like having a sensory experience, getting to be sensual, not in that way where we think of sensual of like sexy, but just sort of like, oh, I'm experiencing life in a different way.

SPEAKER_03 15:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:16

Not through the eyes, but through the feeling, which is so cool and and I think deeply needed.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

And

Breathwork For Nervous System Calm

SPEAKER_00 15:23

very powerful. I mean, I've one of the really powerful things I think is that we, because of the habits we've formed with our devices, we've drained our brains to be at least a baby step, sometimes a leap into agitation. And having new patterns that your brain can connect to and think, oh, I know how to get there because I did that in the sound bath is super powerful. That's how you learn to have more and more and more and more of that in your daily rhythm. Totally. Your brain can then recognize it and go toward that, you know.

SPEAKER_01 15:55

We need a frame of reference. And so that's also the thing, too, of where you're like, oh, what's the point of the business? Well, it's just another Carly Cambro is just another frame of reference. It's just another access point. And that's reductive in a way, but also it's sort of like I don't ever want someone to feel as though healing or wellness or whatever you want to call it is out of their reach. Like accessibility is so fundamental to me because I I mean, like when I did my training, this was all we could do. This was the way to connect for the later half of it. This was the way I taught for the later half of it. And so, actually, for like over a year, I was teaching over Zoom. But that also increased access for people who had to move home, who couldn't afford to manage a big membership, but they could do a $5 rental video. You know, so it's if we open up the to quote, to quote, well, not my boyfriend anymore, because he might be someone's fiance, but to quote Harry Styles' aperture, like let's the light in. It's like, let's open up the aperture for what people think is possible by giving them a new frame of reference.

SPEAKER_00 17:04

Yeah, I love that.

SPEAKER_02 17:06

I will say that yoga for me, running is never accessible. Um, my husband, huge runner. Well, when we started dating, I was like, I'm gonna be a runner too. I could never run. And then, you know, I really, really leaned into my yoga practice instead. And I'd always I'd done yoga since college, but at that point when I was really leaning in, I learned to breathe.

SPEAKER_03 17:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:35

And then after that, I could run weirdly, because I've been holding my breath while running. Like, no wonder I was horrible at it. Yeah. And don't get me wrong, I'm not a good runner, still don't really run. But like I could run a 5k if I trained for it because I can I don't hold my breath for 30 minutes. Before I couldn't because I was literally holding my breath for 30 minutes. So like yoga taught me to literally just breathe. Breathe.

SPEAKER_00 18:01

And that's so funny. I don't run because I don't want to. I mean, I want to do a yoga. I'd rather, much rather do yoga. Choice. It doesn't feel right to my body, but yoga does.

SPEAKER_01 18:13

It feels amazing. Right. Um, no, and that's the that's so powerful too. It's like, who's a good runner? And also who's a bad runner? Like, hey, I'm doing it. I can get away if I need to. Um, you bring up something too interesting, Megan. I was on a retreat. I was leading my first like solo retreat uh like through my brand this weekend. And oh, you want to talk about like just let me hold a group of eight women just right here and just give them little forehead kisses because we all just need to be held. That's my promo for retreat or any any Carly Kimber offering. It's just um but I was talking to one of my friends who is a runner and she's training for the New York Marathon. And um, we've gotten, I won't get into her business. I'm sure there's like some sort of HIPAA between a yoga teacher and her student and friend. But um, she had she had had a pretty profound experience in uh one of the practices that we had done. And I just looked at her and I said, How's your breath? And she just looks at me and she goes, bad. And I loved that honest answer because it was like, Yeah, her nervous system was really, really like spiked up. And so one of the things that became this recurring joke, because this is like a beloved friend, and also it's just like, how's your breath? Yeah, better. I okay, like better, not good, but better. So it's just that attunement into the breath because it that, oh, you want to talk about a technology, your breath can like get you into the field, baby. Like you wanna you wanna go, you want to talk psychic on your next episode? We'll talk about breath work because it stimulates the pineal gland, which like literally puts our prefrontal cortex online to just like open up the aperture. But if we're not breathing or if we're stuck right here, there's so much compression and fear lives right here, right? So if we can't breathe because we because not because we did something wrong, just because we don't know how, there's such a limit put on to us. And that also on the same side of that coin, running is hard. Oh, yeah. I mean, I literally ran today and I texted my friend. I was like, Remember when I used to do this a lot? Yeah, why do I choose this on a daily?

SPEAKER_02 20:25

Yeah, we're not seeing any runners out there. We're just we love you. We're proud of you. We like to support you.

SPEAKER_01 20:32

Uh-uh. I do it, I do it for my mental health.

SPEAKER_00 20:37

There we go. I love it. I love it. Well, I would love

Retreats That Make Space To Soften

SPEAKER_00 20:40

for you to say a little bit more about your retreat experience. You said you led your similar retreat. I'd love for you to say yes.

SPEAKER_01 20:46

So, or have you well, I'll ask, I'll answer the question with the question have either of you experienced retreat before? Yes, I have not. I know. Um, so my retreat style, and this is from having taken one that was very much like it, and then having taken been on a retreat where they were like, we're teaching 90 minutes twice a day, we expect you to be there. It's vegan food, and it's like, God, I've never been more sunburnt and ripped after seven days of my life. But my um again, from being like a very competitive person, I love the opportunity to soften. Because I think that's one of the most uh difficult and uh like nurturing, like important practices that again women, female identifying people can can have because of the the world that we live in that is screaming at us that we're not enough. Um, and then the world that we might have in our inner world that's that's doing the same, right? So people are like, this feels really affirming. And I'm like, yeah, because you already knew. You already knew you needed me maybe to channel it, maybe to be a conduit for that. Experience, but it was you. And so that's what I love on retreat is that it gets to be fun. It gets to be, there's like some sort of fitness element involved just to move your body to feel well. And then we get to connect in all these ways.

SPEAKER_00 22:13

Yeah, I love that. One of the things that we always talk about is a lot of the resources that we develop are coming back to the peace that is already within you in your mind somewhere deep, deep, deep. And you know that there's peace there, but you maybe have not remembered how to access it. Yeah. And all of this is very resonant with that. So I love that. Yeah. Yeah.

Sober Curious Without Shame

SPEAKER_00 22:35

So one of the things we talked about when we were chatting with you before we were on the podcast was the fact that you were at some point sober curious and then took a few steps in that direction. So I would love for you to talk about that a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 22:48

Yeah. Yeah. So I uh so much of my like, I think story is like, yes, there was the Carly pre-pandemic. And then we call her big before, like, you know. Um, but and also like that was um when I did my teacher training, when I stopped drinking, and also for those familiar, for the listeners familiar, that was the start of my Saturn return. Um, which we have a Saturn tattoo. And again, maybe that's episode two or three when we go astrology, right? Um, but truthfully, I just I knew um I couldn't do this was, you know, six years ago, I was like, I can't live this sort of life that I want to live, and like be going out every weekend and not feeling good about myself. And just like, you know, there was there was a lot of, I think, shame that I had put on myself around my habits. And then when I talk about it with my friends, they were like, we were all doing that. Everybody's been 23 before. Um, and so that that was sort of this mirror for me, at least in my first like couple of years of just deciding not to drink, which was the easiest thing. Like I did a dry February, people do dry January. So I stopped drinking in February of 2020. COVID hits in March. I move in with my parents for a little bit, and then I was just like, well, I'm not like, we don't have anything here. Like, there's not, there's no no instinct or will for me to do this. And then I had when I moved into my own apartment and even this house, it was like, well, I'm not going out. Like they're telling me to stay inside. I'm gonna stay inside. So the conditions were set for like there was zero temptation, and it was very, very easy for me to give that up. And then, because right away, that connection piece of my practice, my sadna, which is like my daily practice, and like journaling about it, and then in therapy, sort of like working through like what was younger me trying to hide by trying by like releasing those sort of inhibitions, not to quote Natasha Bettingfield while I talk about my sobriety, but um, it it just became this well for me to go deeper and deeper into. And now it's six years sober in March. I celebrated on the equinox, but um it it really just came through of like, I can't do what I want to do living the way that I'm living. Not to even say that how I was living was quote unquote bad, it wasn't in alignment with me. And that has been a big journey to get there, to go out of the I was bad. No, it wasn't for me.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

And so, do you have any advice to people who might be considering that journey? Do you have any words and you want to share?

SPEAKER_01 25:39

General advice is that if you've got an instinct or an itch, pay attention to it, notice your relationship to it, um, not in conflict with it, but like how can you maybe like link arms or even just sit down next to it? So I say I would say that for someone who's sober curious, for someone who hasn't taken a yoga class, for someone who's like, I don't know, should I buy this deck of tarot cards? I almost said carrot cards, whatever, whatever you want to do. Um, if you're getting a download, that's your body's intelligence talking to you. Because we live up here all the time. And the stories up here all the time are gonna be what we've seen, be what we've heard, and not even recent, like way back when someone said that was weird and then we stopped ourselves from exploring it. So if you're looking at getting sober curious, okay, let's get curious about what that means. And the beautiful thing is like you can always go down the path and turn and come back and this and that and this. Like, there's let's reframe that there's any steps backward. They're all steps on an inevitable journey. And I think that people need a lot. I I mean, I speak from that experience, people need a lot of help or support rather, of coming into that state of softness again, because we're so in defense. And I was that too, right? Of like, oh my God, what does it mean about me that I don't drink anymore? And what does it mean now that I'm sober? And like, how bad was I when I wasn't, and like blah, all of that stuff. And I still that still gets kicked off. Like, let's also drop the shit that like you're ever healed. Right. Sorry if sorry if you can't. I did a really good job not cussing until now. Um FCC doesn't come for us. Um, but yeah, it's just sort of like, oh my God, like, how can we just get a little less serious about this?

SPEAKER_02 27:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:42

I think one thing we talked about.

SPEAKER_02 27:44

Yeah. I think one thing we talked about too, Carly, before when we were prepping for the podcast was that when we when at least as a millennial, when we say the word sobriety, it normally there was a problem. Uh-huh. Right. We associate sobriety with like, oh, I have to do this. Like, like you don't have a choice. You gotta get clean. Yeah. It's like I either had a problem and I'm not capable of drinking, and so I'm sober now, or like I am, I can do whatever I want whenever I want to. Right. But I feel like there's the generation below us does such a better job of just doing whatever they want whenever they want to. Part of that, like you can be sober and not have a problem with alcohol. You might just choose to be sober because it makes you feel better. Right. And you might choose to have a glass of wine because that makes you feel better. Like depending on who you are and what your body can tolerate and all what you're doing.

SPEAKER_01 28:42

Yes, there is this sense of freedom that's really admirable from Gen Z because they'll like say, like, oh yeah, that's cool. Like, I'm going through that too. Whereas certainly for me, and and I and I've always lived in the Raleigh area. And so I don't know how much of it is like being in the South, but I also think it is a millennial thing. Like there's like millennial cringe, right? Which is like how we used to dress as though we were business casual at the club. Um, so there's a lot of like, I think, learned shame wrapped up in sort of these like identifiers that we have within ourselves. And so with the sobriety piece, because there's a fear of being labeled as you had a problem. Whoa, let's let's unpack that. Because, like, in what world are we gonna then shame people who do have maybe issues with that?

SPEAKER_02 29:35

Right.

SPEAKER_01 29:36

What would it be like for us to not live in fear all the time?

SPEAKER_02 29:40

Right.

SPEAKER_01 29:40

And just like, oh, I get to live my life in the way that makes sense for me. And others get to do that too. Sounds really simple. Communal practice. Everybody's gonna get online for that. Because I I have had conversations, you know, with family members who are obviously older, and they're like, well, you're taking away that label of sobriety from a person who needs it. And I hear that point, right? Of like, no, I'm not admitting that I had a dependency issue. I also don't know what I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 30:14

Right.

SPEAKER_01 30:15

Like, I don't know what my body would have been like had I not stopped drinking. I don't know what my journey would have been like had I decided, no, you know what, I'm not gonna do teacher training. I know my experience. And I think it's important to empower people into their experience with also the understanding that that's just one frame in a world of frames looking at the picture a different way.

SPEAKER_03 30:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:38

So yeah, it's like the the softening into this is me, and I create this tapestry of us. So the better I know myself, the better I'm able to really understand other people who are very dissimilar than me.

SPEAKER_00 30:54

Right.

SPEAKER_01 30:55

Union, it's the yoga part, it's like how we're living our yoga. Yeah, yeah. Because like, think about how mean we are all the time to one another. And if we just could breathe, like I would sure, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 31:10

Breathe before you honk that horn.

SPEAKER_01 31:12

Breathe before you honk that horn, breathe before you take a picture of my sign in my window and try to get me in trouble with my HOA. Like, just take a breath. Take a breath. Oh gosh, that's you know, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:26

So, yeah, that's exciting. Is are there other things that you want to ask Carly Megan? Uh, I those are the questions that I had for her. Do you have other things that you want to or anything else that you want to highlight, Carly?

SPEAKER_02 31:39

I have one more question for Carly.

Habits, Discernment, And Self Trust

SPEAKER_02 31:41

One thing I've been reading, I've been rereading Atomic Habits, which I find really, really goes well with some of the things we're talking about, like habits versus choices. When you're getting into yoga, like how long did it take you, or when you're making a change, whatever that happens in your life, like adding a practice, take a practice, whatever it is. Like, how have you been successful doing that? Because I, for example, I'm trying to not eat ice cream every day, even though I would on a girl's trip. Um, but it's habitual, like daily. Oh, daily, that is not your everyday habit.

SPEAKER_00 32:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:20

Right, right. Even if it is, I'm an enabler at my heart. So I'm like, girl, that's how helpful.

SPEAKER_02 32:25

It's like if it's not it, that's great. But just in general, like, how do you form new habits when you're it feels like you're super intentional about what you do? Um I love that. And I feel like if more people could be intentional, they would like eat that up, you know? Yeah. I mean, but you want to eat it up.

SPEAKER_01 32:49

A couple things, like one, but most importantly, eat that ice cream girl. We do not we are here for a good time, not a long time. Also, two, say literally, I last night I was like, I've had ice cream every day for six days. Yep. That's it.

SPEAKER_02 33:04

Do I need to stop by Dairy Queen?

SPEAKER_01 33:05

Something that's a record. Um I appreciate that the the perception of me is that I am intentional. And I do try to be that way. It's also that like me eating ice cream watching Survivor, I'm like, I'm not intentional at all. So I think there's maybe something to be said about like whatever you're seeing in in another is also capable. It's a mirror back to you, right? Um, and that's really simple and it's also really complex. The the thing that I uh maybe orient myself around, it's like, what are the rituals, right? Like almost like this. I think there's like a sense of reverence for me around like what I am doing to be intentional, to be have discernment between what serves me and what doesn't. So, like I said earlier on, like, yeah, like movement is fundamental. Doesn't mean that I'm always moving. Like, I I have had a more sedentary, you know, set of my life with like opening up this this business. I got another dog who why I had to get noise canceling headphones because she's like six pounds of just terror. But like you go through cycles where you feel my habits have dropped off. Okay, well, it's not just that this one habit is the one way to go. What's the path look like now? So it's sort of this like openness and uh trust like in yourself, which I think for me just has come from yeah, that dedicated practice of commitment to self of just like I'm gonna, I'm just going to trust myself even when it's hard. And it's and it's hard for a lot of it. Um, but in terms of advice for like setting habits, oh, what's a way that you can be with yourself rather than against yourself in it?

SPEAKER_00 35:03

Yeah. I liked the way you said like that having discernment about what serves me and what doesn't.

SPEAKER_01 35:08

What doesn't.

SPEAKER_00 35:08

And even sometimes I might have discernment about that and still choose to eat the ice cream. But yeah, yeah. But it's important to have that as a as a lens to think through like what is gonna serve me and what doesn't.

SPEAKER_01 35:21

And then it's like that that then becomes sort of our meter, right? Of like, does it serve me, does it not? Is it gonna serve me right now? Okay, cool. Is the shame around maybe saying yes to this thing, is that gonna serve me? Is the guilt gonna serve me? Right. Is the is the staying still, is the fear? So it's relating to what's what's going on within us and around us rather than trying to fix it.

unknown 35:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:48

Because that's also I think the biggest thing, or one of the biggest things for me is like this uh softening into myself of I don't want to be so rigid and like strenuous to like strip away all of these layers. What if I got to know them?

SPEAKER_00 36:06

Yeah. And think I think when you ask when I when I use the lens to say, does it serve me or not? It makes me then wonder why was I wanting to do that if I knew it didn't serve me, which then leads me to more information about myself.

SPEAKER_01 36:20

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:21

So I think that's I think that's a great question. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:27

I also love the relentless dedication to yourself. Yeah. We're in a culture of putting other people in front of you, especially as women. Like I can't tell you how many times a day I have to focus on other people besides myself. Yeah. So remembering that I am an important person to myself is super, it's profound.

SPEAKER_01 36:53

Well, yeah, because it's like we're people first. And then when we remember our own humanity, we see it in others. So that I don't know what what to blame it on. Okay, like someone somewhere made it be like, oh, tending to yourself is selfish. Yes. And it's like, okay, well, you can't drive the car if there's no gas in it. You can't, you can't like make dinner if there's no food in the pantry. Like you have to be in relationship with yourself as a blueprint for how we relate to others. And I don't want to not jump off too far, but I think a lot of us are in a fractured relationship with self or even don't have access to that. And that's why we're scared. You know, that's that's why we're scared because there's this part of us that wants that attention. So tend to it and also tend to others. We're better informed on where we are in a collective when we know where we are in the collective.

Connection, Gratitude, And Goodbye

SPEAKER_00 37:55

We talk a lot about mental wellness on in a in a lot of our offerings. And for us, mental wellness has basically three parts self-care, connection with others and community, and grounding yourself in gratitude. I mean, if you do those three things well, it doesn't really matter what your circumstances are, you're going to have good mental wellness. That doesn't mean you're going to be happy all the time, but you're going to be very stable and grow, you know, grounded and mentally well. Right. Generally speaking. Right. Um, so I mean that really connects to a lot of the things that we're always talking about.

SPEAKER_01 38:30

So yeah. And that, like you said earlier, of um like around, you know, if someone is curious about this thing, there there is no investment in yourself. That's a bad investment. Whether that be with a like a financial resourcing or or an energetic and emotional resourcing.

SPEAKER_00 38:51

I love that.

SPEAKER_01 38:52

And so it like to me, I'm like, if you have the itch, get curious around it, open to it, receive it. You don't have to act on it, but what's it like to receive it? Yeah.

unknown 39:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:09

Because there's medicine there, there's magic there, like uh, universe, spirit, god, whatever you want to say it, it's on our side. Right. It's trying to talk to us. We have to be open to let it. And and that openness is you know dependent on our safety, but also it's like, okay, how do we move from threat to safety? Really simple. Connection, gratitude, breath. Like, yeah, all the things we talked about. Yeah, yeah.

unknown 39:35

For sure.

SPEAKER_00 39:36

Carly, this has been so great. I love this.

SPEAKER_01 39:39

Thank you so much for having us.

SPEAKER_00 39:41

So much wisdom with us, and we really, we really appreciate you taking time out. Oh my gosh. Chatting with us. I mean, yes. I feel like we could go on and on and on all day long. We really could.

SPEAKER_01 39:51

We really could. Um, I'm so appreciative of the both of you. Thank you so much for this. Um, it like, ah my God.

SPEAKER_00 40:01

All kinds of good goodwill towards your new endeavors, and we're so excited to form and shape itself in new ways. It's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 40:10

Thank you so much, ladies. I appreciate it.

unknown 40:13

All right.

SPEAKER_01 40:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 40:15

And I always say at the end of our podcast, and I'll just say it right here, I always say for our listeners, until next time. Peace.