Put Down The Scorecards

Healing can turn into a stage play before we even notice. We share, we overexplain, we chase validation—then wonder why peace still feels far away. This episode leans hard into a countercultural truth: your healing doesn’t need an audience. We unpack how to protect a quiet process in a loud world, where trends dictate timing and vulnerability becomes content. Instead of performing your pain, we explore how to curate safety, move at the pace of honesty, and let growth be measured by alignment rather than applause.

We dig into the lifelong dance between belonging and fitting in, especially as parents raising teens who want both authenticity and acceptance. That leads us into reparenting and “ancestral audits”—taking stock of origin stories on both sides of the family and finding grace for imperfect caregivers while choosing new patterns. Along the way, we demystify mental health by grounding it in daily alignment: thoughts, emotions, and behavior moving in the same direction. If they don’t, we pause and ask better questions instead of pushing harder on a public narrative.

We also examine friendship through a sharper lens: who stands with you during storms, and who celebrates you in sunlight without calling it bragging? That difference matters. Faith and personal agency thread through the conversation as well. Spiritual leaders and practices can be anchors, but they should empower choice, not replace responsibility. Then we name a subtle trap: the comfort of pain. Familiar hurt can feel safe, almost like a warm blanket. We talk about how to honor the lesson without living under it, using small, steady steps that keep you protected and moving.

To close, we offer six journal prompts designed to shift healing from performance to practice—questions about safety, pressure, belonging, inherited patterns, and turning pain into a doorway. Take one a day, be kind to what rises, and let awareness do quiet work. If you want company without noise, join our WhatsApp reflection space for listening and shared humanity. If this resonates, follow the show, share it with a friend who needs gentleness, and leave a review so more people can find a slower, truer path to wholeness.

Transcript

After A Heavy Conversation

SPEAKER_01 1:13

Hello, mindful partners. How are you doing? Especially after those deeply heavy conversations I had with Ola. Of course, he came here as Sean Daudu, the author, and we talked about his book, When Love is Not Enough, and What You Need to Feel Whole. I know it was heavy. At some point, Ola did shed some tears. Well, he said he doesn't know what that was coming up to be sex. And I know there is a lot to unpack with that, and I hope that you get your copy. Especially now that it feels as if even healing, the most um humane thing, has become performative. I, however, am inviting you to embrace the truth that has become the hallmark of the season, and that truth is your healing does not need an audience. Yes, there'll be some of us who would have to be performers so that we could hold your hands through healing. However, the basic truth remains that your healing does not need an audience. So I'm inviting you as we get into this episode to breathe in. You know that you do not have to perform here. If you have followed us thus far this new season, this season seven, you know that I have been thinking and exploring ways how we, that is you and I, can own our healing processes without sacrificing our inner peace on the altar of public perception. The truth, it is near impossible for us to not play to the gallery of public perception. You know why? Except you want to totally jettison the relational currency of the time. While this is an uncomfortable truth, it can also be well managed that you become your own AI algorithm that is curate what gives you peace and share what makes you feel safe, embrace the healthy fear of missing out. And there's a trend, one week in, one week out, it's a reality we have to manage in the phase of you know it, societal narcissism. Alright, this is going to be quite difficult, you know. It's going to be difficult as we all need a place to belong and fit in, of course. If you missed that episode on belonging and fitting in, just go to uh anywhere you listen to podcast and subscribe to mindfully to Michelle, or I'll just add the link here. But while we were exploring, I was exploring the idea of social narcissism. I did talk about uh the strengths of belonging and fitting in, and like honestly, do not think that we can have one without the other. There will be times and situations and events that will require for you to fit in, yet be your authentic self, and there will be times that belonging is what will feed your soul, and I hope I'm praying that your ratio will be 90 to 10. Raising teenagers who are trying to find their place in the world has made me view belonging and fitting in with fresh lenses. My children and I have conversations that hopefully I believe make them sing and heard, but I unwittingly think that I have also created a world where they might stand out and like a sore thumb to but I find myself saying to my children that while they need to be authentically themselves, they also need to understand that they will interact in a world that is far removed from the realities of the four corners of our home. They will meet people who definitely were domesticated differently than they are, and maybe make them question what and who they are. It's not very different from how I was raised, to be honest. Only the approach was far, very far removed from how I'm raising them, with both good and not so good consequences. It is true what they say. If done properly, your children can help you reparent yourself. Sometimes healing shows up as parenting better than we were parented. I don't even want to go into that right now because that, if you know me well, parenting and all conversations around that is a place I will sit down with or like you say, stand for a long time. But I repeat again, just for this moment, sometimes healing shows up as parenting better than you were parented. The title alone grounded me. I really just wanted to see what it was that she was trying to talk about. And let me tell you, while this book gave me some perspectives on how to give grace to not just my parents and authorities, it helped me view ancestral audits in a very different light. What is ancestral audits is just generally taking um uh uh taking cognizance of the stories of origin, and if you're blessed, the stories of origin of both sides of your family from your father and your mother, and this can well should help you reparent yourself, retrain yourself, or rebirth yourself, you know, to me shake kind of thing. That is on one hand, on the other hand, it had me questioning why we have become so loud and again performative. The intention here is not to generalize, I say that often, but I know that it comes off that way because we do not have adequate, I believe, adequate words to uh to explain and explore the things that we is in our that are in our heads. So we all generally fall under the fallacy of hasty generalization. So it is important for me to constantly say to you that the intention here is not to generalize because I am learning along with you. Yes, I might be the one behind the mic, yes, I might be the one doing the research, and I hope you're doing your research also, but I'm also learning as I share with you. The intention is to be a kind of mirror that can help you view yourself, and indeed the thoughts that make your inner work and your outer world seem off balance. That's euphemism for your mental health or your mental well-being. Uh, of course, the if you know mindfulishi uh well enough, you know that the goal and objective is to demystify the languages and thoughts around mental health narratives. And we have said a couple of times mental health or keeping a mental uh keeping yourself mentally whole um is simply the thoughts that come up for you in your head, the emotions that come up for you with those thoughts, are they in alignment with your person, your vision, your behavioral traits? If they are not, maybe you should then begin to sit down to answer personal questions that will put you in a balanced view, at least for a time. If we took a poll and judging by the amount of literature and reels and researches on reparenting oneselves and healing emotional patterns, I dare say more than a handful of us had our voices taken from us even before we could articulate the happenings in our world. The adults in our lives, authorities, handed us a way of to view the world, of course, from their own wealth of knowledge at the time. Domestication, as Don Miguel Ruiz calls it. The jury is out as to whether this is good or bad, that is domestication, and let's be honest, every so-called um untoward thing or something bad, and I'm very careful using the word bad, hence the word unto word, that has happened to you has contributed to the tapestry, the beautiful quilt of you, of who you are today, the good, the bad, the ugly, the not so good. The real question then becomes what you are doing with these stories? Are you recreating them to serve you or to hurt you? In other words, are you repeating survival or are you choosing healing? You have heard me use the aphorism over and over. I'm sure you're beginning to think to me that is so broken record, but I'll use it again. Tibi la daye. Simply meaning the good and the bad is what make up existence. We definitely will prefer the ratio of good and bad to favor the good, and maybe that's why we struggle to acknowledge or embrace the bad. And until recently, and I don't think we're truly or totally cured of it, Nigerians thought getting an insurance cover over anything, especially life insurance, was unwittingly called an evil by name to themselves. We all know that that isn't true because to be on the side of eternity and uncertainty predisposes you to the good and the bad. So, why do we not prepare for the bad? Insurance. I understand that a person can be so hit with more of their fair share of bad in life that the brain literally gets tired of predicting positive outcomes because the results of their hopes, the positive outcomes, keep hurting them. So they just shut down. And well, very recently I saw a meme that captures this truth. Life is too ironic to fully understand. It takes sadness to know what happiness is, noise to appreciate silence, and absence to value presence. To our credit, I think for the most part, we understand this irony of existence. What we struggle with, what we struggle with is the fact that we do not have tools to navigate what we consider dark. It is easy to share good news and wonderful experiences, but sharing the dark parts of life gives or makes us so uncomfortable and scared of uncertainties rather than see the bad as a part of living. And that is just one side of the coin. There's also the other side where we are all careful with whom we share good news with.

SPEAKER_00 18:18

She has a friend who she calls Mr. Schadenfreud because he seems to love when things go wrong. So in hard times, he's always there. He's always there in hard times, gives the shoulder to lean on, he's giving advice. But in good times, he's nowhere to be seen. And so what happens is it creates this horrible sort of codependent relationship that you want to keep the hard times because that wonderful human being is always there, so you never want to let go and you become codependent. And so you realize that there's something called a fair-weathered friend who's only there in the good times, but be equally cynical and suspicious of the foul-weathered friends who's only there in the hard times because somehow it makes them feel good about themselves, but they're not there for the good times. And so you realize what's the what's the value of good time versus bad time? You and I have friends that in hard times we would call them, but I would bet money that you have even fewer friends that you want to text out of the blue and say, I won an award. Right? Think about that. Like, if something goes wrong, I've got a group of friends, probably, I've probably got a uh, you know, a dozen people I could say and say, I need your help. Things have gone horribly wrong, I need your advice. But if something amazing happens to me, that number probably shrinks down to four. That I'm gonna text out of the blue and go, something amazing happened today, and not feel like I'm bragging, not feel like I'm trying to overwhelm them or prove them that I'm better than them, but knowing that they will be so happy for me. And so I've started thinking that maybe a friend isn't just the person who's there for you in the hard times, but the person you can go to in the great times.

Demystifying Mental Health

Domestication And Agency

Good News, Bad News, And Friendship

SPEAKER_01 19:58

Let me let that sink for a moment. Don't worry, we'll get to the meat of this episode in a moment. But you see, this mutual suspicion we leave by, I may be wrong, came from certain adages in our culture. I didn't know about the world, but I know that I have I've heard such idioms in English. Um one of them is meaning we don't dry all clothing or pieces of clothing out in the sun, or it's relative or relative prob proverb tissue any bata a for boo, meaning when your yam se germinates, you cover it up. Don't get me wrong, before you you know, um Yoruba uh I'm Yoruba, so it's not like I'm trying to that's my that's my frame of reference, and well, that's where I'll go to if I have anything to um to if I need anything to explain something or if I need adages to be adverbs for me, all right? I I get the general philosophy of these adages, honestly, I do, because of course we need restraint, we need self-control, we need all of that, but just like everything that has good and bad sides, if not moderately done, it definitely will be bastardized, and these advert uh adages, in my own opinion, of course, you're welcome to question it and not agreeing, inadvertently make us very guarded, and then we do not know when to unguard again, like the urba adage says, we close our eyes and we wouldn't know when the good person would pass by because we have had so much of bad people. It is not like I have a solution or a suggestion to a religion because to be honest, to be honest, are you ready for this? Humans scare me. Yes, human beings scare me. Yet I'm in love with humanity, and I do my best to try to serve the best I can. To make this matters much more exciting, we hang most of our experiences on faith, on God, and everything in between. You know, you know, so you again, you know I'm not shitting or piecing on any religion of faith. You know I'm a person of faith, and I love God through Christ. Yet I am very aware that most of us have abdicated our personal agencies to the whims of spiritual authorities. Listen, this is not only in Christendom. This abdication cuts across all forms of religion or faith practices for Africans who are highly Tatemic people, and who would consult an oracle to get a glimpse of what could happen in the future on this side of existence? It is no surprise that putting your trust in the prophet, a pastor, or an imam is rampant. There are mediums through which you can get access to God, and I am not mad at that at all. I am not, because sometimes we do need a crutch, yes, in the spiritually complex life that we live in. Yet I am very weary because I think that faith should empower us, not replace our responsibility to heal or to be. Again, let me take a breath here and say that I am not pissing on anything. I am only trying to say that the fact that we have these mediums give us a tool. To navigate the unpleasant makes it easy for us to abdicate our personal agencies. Yet, there is a comfort that comes with pain. That calling it paradoxical doesn't even begin to explain that comfort that is in pain. So before we go to the next chapter, if you will, of this episode, may I invite you to breathe through your nose and just center this moment and out. All right. As I've said before, pain is one of the prevalent sufferings that humans have to go through. And because it's almost unavoidable, we mostly don't know how to respond to it or deal with it. The other characteristic of pain is that it is unexpected and can blindside you. Hence, again, insurance. So, how is pain comforting, you might be asking? I will share my understanding in a moment. Very recently, again, I saw a reel uh where Kirk Franklin, the artist, was trying to explore our relationship with pain. This is what he says. How is it sometimes that pain can be addictive? It can feel so good and it's hurting us at the same time. You enjoy it so much that it can create damage. Sometimes we allow the pain we've been through that we have found a way to make it a blanket and we are not aware of the damage we are doing. I'm asking you to please do not feed your brokenness more than you feed your spirit. When I heard this, of course, you know Kirk is very charismatic, and I probably didn't do justice to how he said it, but it felt so profound to me that it was it became a conversation starter with my husband, and when we were talking, he said, Well, there is comfort in pain, it hit differently. The comfort that comes with pain is in how we protect ourselves from experiencing the pain again. At the scent of a repeat of that pain, which we shouldn't learn from, we could, which could also be a trigger to the emotions, the pain left. We cower, we run, which is okay in a way. Because creatives use these pain points to create amazing masterpieces. Ego Van Gogh, and you know, him being posthumously diagnosed as bipolar, while others project this or these pain and pains through unwholesome acts and words that hurt themselves and others. The comfort in pain is that safe space, that safe place in the recesses of our hearts that we would rather be left alone. But maybe if we allowed ourselves with caution, because hey, you don't know everybody, you don't know who, you only know yourself, and sometimes you don't even know yourself. If we allowed ourselves with caution, most importantly, with the beginner's mind, a curious mind, a child's mind, knowing that there will be times that we will be pushed off the swing of life by playmates, and there will be other times when we will be pushed off the swing of life by people to whom we have no immediate affinity. Yet a pinpoint has been created. If we allowed ourselves to be vulnerable enough and be available in that vulnerability and remove the blankets we have made from our pain, perhaps, just maybe, we will be able to get into the arena of life and fight the battle that is raging against our authentic self. Maybe healing is not about being loud, maybe it is about being honest, maybe it is not about being seen, but about being whole. Your pain is not your enemy, your silence isn't your weakness either. And your healing doesn't need an applos. May I invite you to sit with me for just maybe three more moments, not to fix anything, but just to notice. With these questions, of course. Are you ready for them? Let's go. Where in your life have you been healing to be seen instead of healing to be whole? What parts of my story do I share because I feel safe? And which do I share because I feel pressured to prove growth? Where am I shrinking myself just to fit in? And what would it look like to belong without pretending? Quit emotional patterns did I inherit? And which ones am I brave enough to interrupt? In what ways have I turned my pain into a blanket instead of a doorway to healing? And finally, where have I given away my power waiting for healing to happen to me instead of through me? Of course, you could use this as journal prompts, and you don't have to answer everything at once. Take your time. Six questions you could take one day at a time to answer each question, but be kind to what comes up. Awareness alone is already healing. You're on your way. Trust yourself. And if you'd like to sit with me a little longer, all right. I've opened a mindful intimation space on WhatsApp. It's not a space for fixing, it's not a space for diagnosing, it's not a space for advice given. It is a space for reflection, listening, and shared humanity. You're welcome to join if and only if you feel supportive to your process. The link is in the episode notes. But whether you join the conversation, I would love for you to join the conversation, to be honest, because I want to learn from you two. But if you choose to keep it private, that's okay. Remember this your healing does not need an audience. Thank you for listening. Stay mindful, stay human, stay becoming. Love yourself, love your neighbor, love your country. Above all of this, love God. He is the essence of your being. I am Uluatumishi.