#78: Therapy Beyond the Couch - The Power of Nature, Challenge, and Connection with Dr Kate Mason

What does it really mean to find your inner strength and embrace a new version of yourself after adversity, and how can stepping outside the traditional therapy room open up transformative change?

This powerful conversation explores how reconnecting with nature, embracing values, and facing life’s toughest moments can transform our approach to healing and personal growth. Dr. Kate Mason shares her inspiring journey through cancer, how it reshaped her career, and why therapy doesn’t have to happen indoors.

You’ll hear practical tools for the days that feel impossible: count small wins, lean on safe people, and return to your compass - adventure, connection, or freedom, whatever your values may be. We talk about post-treatment anxiety, the myth of instant transformation, and why vulnerability is strength, not failure. If you’ve felt lost through illness, divorce, menopause, or sudden change, this conversation offers grounded steps to rediscover purpose and joy, one walk at a time.

Highlights include:

02:52 Nature, Challenge and Values-Led Work

04:57 Kate’s Cancer Story and Impact on Identity

15:24 Challenge, ACT, and Weathering Storms

27:06 Firewalking and Trusting Intuition

This week's guest:

Dr Kate Mason is a Clinical Psychologist with over 20 years experience helping women reconnect with who they are and what truly matters. After facing her own life-changing experience with breast cancer at 35, Kate discovered the transformative power of being outdoors, stepping beyond our comfort zones, and reconnecting with ourselves and a community of like-minded women.

From cycling 250 miles from London to Paris to hiking 120km across the Sahara Desert and Cuban mountains, Kate has experienced first-hand how adventure and nature can spark deep healing and personal growth. That journey inspired her to create Women & Wild in 2023, a thriving community that blends psychology, coaching, and the great outdoors to help women rediscover their strength, purpose and joy. Her work has been featured in multiple media publications where she continues to champion the power of nature, connection, and courage as tools for lasting wellbeing.

Website: Women and Wild 

Instagram: @womenandwild

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The Hello Therapy podcast and the information provided by Dr Liz White (DClinPsy, CPsychol, AFBPsS, CSci, HCPC reg.), is solely intended for informational and educational purposes and does not constitute personalised advice. Please reach out to your GP or a mental health professional if you need support. 

Transcript

Meet Dr Kate Mason

SPEAKER_00 0:02

If you're looking to improve your mental health and well-being, then keep listening. I'm Dr. Liz White, a consultant clinical psychologist with over 20 years of experience. Whether you're a frazzled parent, a stressed-out professional, or finding your way through the challenges of midlife, you're in the right place. Through a mix of solo episodes and insightful conversations with expert psychologists and therapists, I'm bringing you evidence-based tools and strategies to help you navigate life's ups and downs with confidence, clarity and compassion. This is your space to feel seen, supported, and empowered. Welcome to Hello Therapy. On this week's episode of Hello Therapy, I'm sitting down with clinical psychologist and founder of Women and Wild, Dr. Kate Mason, for a truly inspiring conversation about healing beyond the therapy room. From her deeply personal cancer journey that she talks about to the empowering adventures she now leads, think hiking in the Yorkshire Dales or firewalking retreats. Kate shares how stepping into nature and challenge can help women reclaim their sense of identity, purpose, and joy. So if you've ever felt lost after a major life transition, struggled to reconnect with yourself, or wondered how to find real actionable ways to feel better, this episode is for you. So let's dive in. Kate, thank you so much for coming to the Hello Therapy Podcast. Do you want to let our listeners know who you are and what you do?

Nature, Challenge And Values-Led Work

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Thank you for having me on. So yeah, I'm Dr. Kate Mason. I'm a clinical psychologist and have been for about 20 years or so now. That makes me sound really old, doesn't it? So yeah, I started out in the NHS, I've worked um privately as well for a number of years. And more recently, I created uh Women in Wild, which has come off the back of my own experiences of some pretty tough stuff that's gone on in my own life in in recent years. And I've used what helped me to try and help some of my clients as well. So my approach sort of blends psychology and coaching in the traditional kind of sense, but it adds in a sense of adventure and challenge, and a lot of it takes place outdoors in nature. So sometimes that might look like a walk and talk therapy session, sometimes it might be a group hiking retreat in the Yorkshire Dales or a paddleboarding weekend down a river, you name it, we we kind of cover it really. So it's kind of built around the idea that healing and growth doesn't just happen in the therapy rooms. Um, sometimes it might happen halfway up a hill, or just laughing and connecting with women around you that have been through something similar and just get it, or maybe taking some taking you out of something that is within your comfort zone and taking you on the other side of that, like a wild swim or just something that kind of reminds you and reconnects you with that inner strength, really. So I basically take therapy out of the office into real life and help women just kind of rediscover that sense of identity and purpose that I think so many of us at various life stages, for whatever reason, massively come away from. And I don't know about you, but in a lot of my individual therapy sessions, most people that I find that are clinically anxious or depressed, a lot of the time they have become so far removed from their values and what's important to them that they don't know who they are anymore. So a lot of my approach is like, well, let's find that. Let's find out who you are now. You know, people that have been through huge life changes, be it sort of a cancer diagnosis, be it a divorce, be it a loss of a job, kids fleeing the home and off they go into the big wide world, or navigating menopause, it's all big transitions that women experience. So I'm just trying to offer a different kind of sense. And uh I think it it comes down to that point sometimes of like it's so helpful to talk about things. Talking therapies are, you know, can be massively life-changing for people, but at some point we need to take that out and do something actionable. We need to do something, and if our values are aligned and we can do it with our values as our compass, if you like, then that can make that all the more powerful, I think.

Kate’s Cancer Story And Impact on Identity

SPEAKER_00 4:27

Yeah. And that's why I wanted to get you on because I'm super boring and I only do traditional on the sofa therapy or online. I've never done a kind of outdoors thing. So I'm really intrigued about that and about the process of that, which we'll get into. But the other reason I wanted to uh talk to you was you you talk about your cancer journey and how that has shaped the work that you do. So can you tell us a little bit about that? How what that's what that's looked like for you.

Finding Joy, Defining Values, Saying Yes

SPEAKER_01 5:00

Yeah, sure. So I was 35 when I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I was on maternity leave with my youngest at the time and found out a few days before his first birthday. So that year was just a bit of a blur, if I'm honest. I was, it was, I remember when I was diagnosed that that it wasn't just anxiety that I felt, it was sheer terror and it was it was beyond anything that I could explain, really, because in that moment when you hear those words, you've got cancer, you just think, well, how long have I got? And I was sort of, you know, I had a one-year-old, I had a two-year-old, and I just was thrown into the realms of, you know, chemotherapy, radiotherapy operations and all that kind of stuff. And it was really, really hard, really, really tough just trying to navigate being a new mum, but also dealing with something that actually really put my life into perspective of like, I don't know, am I going to see my kids grow up? So not only physically was that quite difficult with all the treatment and being done to for that sort of 12 months, but also sort of psychologically and emotionally as well. Like I'd always been the strong one. I'm the helper, I'm the the one that helps the kids with whatever they need. I'm the one that talks to my friends about what they need and and you know, my clients as well. And suddenly I just felt completely lost. I didn't recognise myself physically as well as emotionally, but I just thought, who am I? Like now this has happened. I was desperately trying to get back to the person I was, but I I had to realize that no, I'm I'm I'm a different person now, and I needed to kind of just reconnect with who I was, and I found that really, really difficult, a really long journey as well. I did, I did have some talking therapies, which was helpful. I had a counselor to kind of talk through the process of all that, but for me at that point, I didn't need to talk, I needed to do. I needed to find out and do something to sort of help me rediscover who I was, really. Um I spoke to a life coach and she asked me this question, and it I just burst into tears, and she just said, What sparks joy for you? And I was like, Oh my god, I don't know. I literally had no idea because I'd always put everyone else's kind of needs first. And as a mum, of course, that's what you do, isn't it? And I just genuinely had no idea. And so I started exploring my values with this life coach and realized that what gave me life, what gave me that sense of purpose and meaning was around adventure, around connection, and around freedom. And they became like a compass to me for the sort of person that I wanted to be and how I wanted to live my life going forward. So I started to just lean into those things and just started to say yes to things that were around those values and maybe no to some of the other things that maybe didn't spark that kind of joy for me. Yeah. So yeah, um, and I guess the first adventure for me, one night after a few gins, which is how all great stories start, right? I saw an ad for a charity trek for Copperfield, which is a breast cancer charity, and it was a trek across the Sahara Desert. So um we did some fundraising, and then I I thought, you know what? Sorry, I'm just gonna sign up. Like I wasn't, I'm not particularly fit and healthy. I think I'm healthy, but I'm not this you know, gym bunny that goes off and does, you know, goes off on runs and all this kind of energetic stuff. I'm I've got time for that sometimes. But that trip for me just kind of changed everything. It just reminded me of who I was, it reminded me that there wasn't my life beyond that cancer diagnosis. And I connected with this bunch of women that all had incredible stories, and we laughed until we cried, and we cried until we laughed, and it was just that wonderful connection, and also just of being part of something that was so much bigger than me. Like the doesn't care what you've been through, who you are, what you look like, how you show up. It's just it was just a really vast, and I think the connection for the nature part for me was really emotionally kind of like empowering. I was just like, do you know what? This I need to bottle and I need to allow other women to feel that because it was an amazing challenge, and it was great when we finished it, and the the the camaraderie and the connection and the the support that we all had for each other was just incredible. And I just thought, yeah, this was the most therapeutic thing that I could have done for me at that moment because I just came back with this feeling slightly more empowered and like a bit more clear about yeah, this is what I want to do. So that's what planted the seed for women and wild, really, because I just saw how powerful it all was.

SPEAKER_00 10:21

Oh, that's just such an amazing story, and I'm really curious about your thoughts on what is it about that you know, that experience that you had in the Sahara Desert, you're obviously trying to translate that into these the retreats that you do in Women and Wilds. What is it that is the sort of healing part of it? Is it the sort of all being together? Is it something else? Can you describe the process of that and things that you do in your work?

Sahara Trek And The Power Of Community

SPEAKER_01 10:51

Yeah, I think for me, there's something about nature that's got this incredible way of just grinding us, like without even realizing it. You know, when you're out walking, I get my best conversations out of my kids when we're out walking the dog because we're kind of next to each other, you know, we're not face to face that sometimes can feel a bit overwhelming for some clients. Um, and it's just this vast open space that you are you can just talk freely. Um, and obviously with the motion of walking and hiking and that sort of thing, like your body naturally regulates, your breathing steadies, unless you're obviously going up a big steep part, but um, you know, your stress hormones start to sort of reduce, um, your brain starts processing emotions in a much gentler way. And I think it it frees up that part of our brain that quite often will shut down when we're in that fight-flight response. But when you're out in nature and those stress hormones start to sort of dissipate a little bit, it opens up that reflective part of your brain to just think and and and reason and rationalise. And and in addition to that, obviously, you know, when you're out and about in nature in a group, there is that element of connection, that camaraderie, and that sort of thing as well. For those that may feel actually strict one-to-one therapy, might feel a bit invasive or they might just struggle, they might think they've got to do it right or saying certain things, but actually when you're out and about in nature, there's something quite freeing about that. Yeah, um, and I think, yeah, I think especially for sometimes like mum, busy mums, high achievers, you know, sitting in that therapy room can feel quite intimidating. Um, but get them outside, get them out away from that sort of face-to-face. There's no pressure, it's just movement, air, and just that lovely space, I think.

SPEAKER_00 12:34

And I'm guessing that oh well, I don't know, it'd be interesting, interesting to get your thoughts on this. So walk and talk therapy um versus like like doing a hike or a retreat or something like that. Would you say there are differences there? Because obviously in a in a retreat or a hike scenario, you're you're facing challenges, I'm guessing, and that and there's something about the challenge that helps you develop or or see your own coping strategies.

Why Outdoor Therapy Works

SPEAKER_01 13:04

Yeah. I think there's a lot of symbolism out in nature as well. Like we are closer to nature than we realise, I think. And you know, whilst we're doing a group hike or some kind of group retreat weekend, we've done a firewalking weekend as well, where, you know, again, it's pushing yourself out of that comfort zone to stand on hot coals and broken glass and things like that. It's it's more about the general kind of feel, the more general kind of obstacles that we come across in day-to-day life. The individual therapy is obviously much more of a personal, maybe in-depth kind of approach. But this is just thinking about life and how stuff happens in life that is really, really hard and really challenging, you know, like climbing a hill, you know, battling a storm, you know, we we we can sit with it. And I do a lot of it, I love acceptance and commitment therapy, which is where my love for values comes from, you know, that's very deep rooted in that. And I think sitting with that uncomfortable, sitting with it and just allowing it and just noticing it. You know, someone said to me recently, Oh, do you have to call off your walk and talks if it's raining? I'm like, no way, we're out there. Like, unless it's dangerous, like the high winds we've had recently, we're out there, we're battling the elements because actually that's akin to life. You know, we can't stop the rain, we can't stop bad things from happening, but we can navigate it in a way that's true to our values and true to who we want to be. And I find that that's quite freeing. I think to be able to just gently notice these things that come in and recognize them for what they are for sure.

SPEAKER_00 14:34

And in in your journey, in your cancer journey, was there anything that surprised you about the way that you coped or didn't cope with certain things?

unknown 14:44

Yeah.

Challenge, ACT, And Weathering Storms

SPEAKER_01 14:45

I think initially for me, I couldn't cope with being vulnerable. I hated that, I saw it as a weakness, and I was like, oh, this doesn't feel right. And I realized that actually I'm not very good at reaching out and asking for help, which is ironic considering my therapist and we're like, let me help you, let me help you. Um I didn't I didn't always practice what I preach on that one, and I I did struggle. Um, but I'd also discovered that vulnerability isn't the opposite of strength, it is strength. Like allowing myself to lean on people and admit when I wasn't okay actually was strangely empowering. I think I certainly probably and many of us do fight so hard not to be vulnerable because we worry what the repercussions of that are going to be. But when you're forced to step into that space of vulnerability, like I was, you know, you it you allow it, I allowed it to sort of simmer and sit there and actually realize, you know what? I think the thought of being vulnerable was actually worse than actually being in that situation. I cope, I tend to cope with difficult things with humour. So there was a lot of taking the mick out of myself, and I used a lot of humour to get through, certainly my active treatment. So yes, to just joke with chemotherapy nurses about who wore the bold look better and you know, various stages of hair loss and things like that. And that's just how I how I sort of coped. But I also learned as well that it's those the small, consistent actions, even things like getting up, getting dressed, standing in the garden. If I didn't, if I didn't have the energy to go for a walk, just standing outside were often more powerful than any kind of grand fighting spirit moment, you know. It wasn't about being a hero. A lot of people would say, Oh my god, you're so strong. And I'm like, Well, what's the alternative? You know, um, so for me, it was about choosing to show up again and again and again, even when life felt really unfair. And even though I was terrified about the future, it was just trying to just little tiny actions that just kind of kept me going, really. And that's what I try and help my clients understand is that we don't have to have this massive life overhaul um or anything like that. It's just those small things that end up leading to the big things. I really love that analogy about, you know, when when they they show like an airplane taking off and they say that actually it only needs to adjust its course by what half a degree or a degree or something to end up in a completely different country. And I use that analogy all the time in my clients. I'm like, you know, getting up and doing a meditation once a day, is it gonna make all your problems go away? No, it's not. But actually, over time, if you meditate every day for three, six, five days of the year for just 10 minutes, that change is gonna be huge by the end of that year. Yeah, so just those small actions are super, super powerful.

SPEAKER_00 17:24

And I think in my work and working with uh people who have gone through the cancer journey, either themselves or with someone else, there can be so much anger and that kind of real sense of unfairness. And it's really easy, isn't it, to get stuck in that? And that then becomes um it can become quite difficult to navigate through. I'm really curious about how you did navigate the sort of you've talked about obviously the anxiety and the terror, but what did that show up for you and how did you move through that?

Vulnerability, Humour, And Small Wins

SPEAKER_01 17:59

Yeah, I think there was a lot of periods where even from the off the back of some of the medication I had to take, like after I'd had a chemotherapy session, I had to take for a few days after a ton of these steroids to stop me from being sick. And it put you into this horrible, depressive law, it was awful. It just I just would not stop crying, and I got angry, really, really angry. Like, why me? I've just had two kids, they are gonna grow up without having any recollection of me because they're so little. Um and I just, yeah, there was that that kind of phase of going through that, but in between that, where I kind of didn't feel as I mean, I wasn't in that kind of pit. Again, I was just like, I've I've got to get through this. I've just you know, the first few months for me were like it's sink or swim. I just have to survive everything that I'm going through now. I just have to survive. So I didn't really think too much about the wider sort of context and life in general until I walked out of my last radiotherapy session, which marked the end of my active treatment. That was it then. And I walked out of there almost expecting some kind of like triumphant, this is a new lease of life. You know, I've seen it on the telly when people just change their lives and all of a sudden everything's wonderful. And that didn't happen. And I was like, what is wrong with? I was so angry with myself again. Like, what why aren't I like this? Why aren't I just embracing life now? I've got this second lease. Go and live it, go and do what you want. And of course, you're my mum of two kids. My husband works offshore, so he's away a lot. Life carries on, life is normal. Um, so for me, it was just kind of um focusing on the here and now and focusing, no, no, try not to focus too much about the future and whether it might come back or anything like that. It was every time I noticed that my mind was going bigger and and and too much down the road, I'd just kind of draw it back in a bit and just be like, what am I gonna do with today? What am I gonna do with the next hour? Because that's when the anxiety hit really for me, was when it had all finished. I was on that kind of um autopilot, I think, when I was going through all the yeah, totally. And once that subsides, it's a bit like you know, when um you you you suddenly you're on autopilot and then suddenly you stop and you go on holiday and you get ill. And you're like, God damn it, what why am I ill? I think that was the same for me, but like it opened the floodgates to all the anxiety that kind of came in then. But I just had to keep focusing on the how am I gonna get through the next hour, day, and and just work at it. And and then once I started doing some of that values work, which is around that time, I was like, right, what what value, what committed action can I take in the in the value of adventure? And I was like, right, kids, come on, let's grab the dog, we're gonna go on a different walk today, and we're gonna go and get ourselves lost, and we're gonna take a picnic and I'll try and do something a bit more spontaneous. And again, did it make everything go away for good? No, but it did help me in terms of gradually, it was almost like chipping away at a rock with a toothpick, and it was just gradually making movements. Um, when you're in it at the time, it doesn't feel like much, but actually over time it does it it expanded that psychological flexibility that we talk about quite a bit, don't we? In act.

SPEAKER_00 21:16

Um yeah. And I can tell you're an act therapist because you use lots of metaphors. Love a metaphor.

Post-Treatment Anxiety And Present Focus

SPEAKER_01 21:23

I love a metaphor, it just makes sense, doesn't it? I love them. Yeah, yeah, they're great, they're great. Yeah, and I think that's what lends itself to being outdoors, and maybe that's why I've I've moved some of my therapy outdoors, is because you know, if I'm trying to explain about thoughts, they come and they go, and we don't want to hook on to them, we want to be able to let them go. I'll be there with the whole le literally the leaves on a stream kind of analogy that we use in act as well. And I'm like, look, these are your thoughts. They're just you know, or we'll throw stick, I could throw a stick off um off the bridge, a poo sticks game. And um, and there's so many connections with nature that we can make we can lend to metaphor, which I think is really powerful.

SPEAKER_00 22:01

So powerful and and really real for people, like versus sitting in a room talking about metaphors, like it's very, very different, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 22:10

I imagine and people absorb things in different ways. I've got some clients that actually want to intellectualize it and they want to sort of understand it or they react pretty well to sort of um psychoeducational type stuff. Whereas other people, myself included, I want to go and experience, I want it to be experiential. So when we did the firewalking weekend, which is um walking on hot coals and walking on glass, another exercise we did was we had to break an arrow. So it was literally really like a wooden arrow, like this long, and it would they put the the tip of it into that that sort of indentation at the bottom of your throat. And the idea around that, the analogy around that was about trusting yourself and leaning in and trusting the process. Because if you faltered, it didn't bend and it hurt. Um, so it was about trusting your gut and just leaning in. And when you do lean in, keep going with that. Um, yeah, it was really powerful. And it could be that the walking on hot coals was again, all your instincts are saying, don't do this. But actually, how amazing would do you feel when you walk to the end of that runway of coals and think, I can't believe I've just done that.

SPEAKER_00 23:13

So I'm curious about that. What like what is the point of walking of walking on hot coals, like from a psychological point of view? Like, how how do you make those links for people?

ACT In Nature And Experiential Metaphors

SPEAKER_01 23:26

So it it's about stepping into the unknown, I think. And a lot of us will look at a situation and think, I'm not doing that, absolutely not doing that. Fear gets in the way. Fear is uh our biggest, and that's why a lot of the retreats that I do um do have an element of challenge, and I know that sounds really mean, but I just quite like nudging people out of their comfort zones. I was massively out of my comfort zone doing this hike in the desert. There was not just the hiking, there was the unknown of what the people were going to be like, there was the heat to deal with, bugs cannot stand snakes and spiders. I was like, oh my god, if something comes up in front of me, I'm out of there. So I think fear does get in the way of a lot of us being able to move forward in a values-driven direction. Um, so that was about, you know, sometimes again, trusting the process, getting into the right mindset. Um, and once you take that first step, keep going. And we did another one, which was walking on broken glass. And that that was all about if something doesn't feel right in your gut, in your intuition, take your foot off or find another way of doing it. So as you walked across the glass, there were part you you'd sort of place your foot on the glass first. If it felt a bit spiky and a bit uncomfortable, you take your foot back off and you'd just find another way. So again, it was very akin to in life, you know, if something doesn't feel right, trust your gut, trust here and take your foot off and find another way.

SPEAKER_00 24:55

And I can see how those kind of experiences help you find your inner strength, right? Like if you if you're if you feel like you're in in a hole and you're not, you know, you feel like your life um isn't great, you you forget, don't you, the strength and the courage and all that kind of thing. You for you forget that's you do have that within you. And and I think those experiences really draw that out if you can get past or or navigate through that fear and and as you say, take the first step and keep going. Is that is that one of the focuses of the retreat, um the retreats that you do? Is that finding inner strength?

SPEAKER_01 25:33

Absolutely, yeah. And it's um, you know, it's all in us, but we only really truly find out how strong we are when you're in the thick of something. You know, for me, it was when I was thrown into the realms of a cancer diagnosis. I was like, I've got to dig deep here and find it from somewhere, find some strength. And I look back now and I think, God, I can't believe I did that, you know. Um, and for many of the women that come as well, that strengths for whatever reason, whether it's through some adversity or a difficult relationship or anything like that. And people come with all sorts, all sorts of different experiences. Um, that strength is in us, in all of us, that resilience is with us all. Yeah, it's just sometimes it just gets buried over a bit, but we go with our heads, don't we? We think, oh, I can't do that, it's not something I could do. So it my job essentially on those retreats is I'm gonna chunk you into some really tricky situation, and you're gonna realize just how strong you actually are.

SPEAKER_00 26:29

Do you ever have people who don't do the firewalk or the walking on glass, or does everybody just do it?

Firewalking, Glass, And Trusting Intuition

SPEAKER_01 26:36

And do you know everyone does it, and I think it's because there is there's a whole day of kind of prepping up for that. The firewalk happens in the evening, so there's a lot of mindset stuff that we're doing, a lot of act-based stuff that we do during the day and that kind of gears people up. But I think also, which again, I think is something that's really lends itself to group work, whether it be inside or outside, is that is everyone kind of eggs each other on, everyone supports each other. You know, when I was in the desert, there was a day where it was just sand dune after sand dune, up and down, up and down, and as fast as you were trying to climb a hill, you'd slip back down again because it was just sand. Um, but everyone was there reaching out a hand, pulling each other up. And there's something about getting a bunch of women together that is therapeutic in itself. At that moment, I could I could just remove myself because these women are like, you've got this, you've got this, and they're all cheering each other on. Um, so we've had people that have got to the the the the start of the walk, the the runway, if you like, and you can see they're full of emotion because their fear is telling them not to do it, and everyone's there cheering them on, saying, You can do this, you can do this. And the moment they take that first step and they just keep going, they get to the end, um, and they just look back and just feel amazing for it as well.

SPEAKER_00 27:54

Yeah. I've worked with a lot of people who, uh particularly women, who feel like they've lost themselves, and you know, that can be through any experience, you know, chronic illness or some kind of diagnosis or menopause or divorce, and it can feel like you've you've shifted into like a new person, and there is this sort of hankering after the person that that they were. And I love what you say at the you said at the beginning of our chat when you said that it's that there's something about sort of not not necessarily looking at who you were because your experience in that adversity has changed you, yeah, and embracing that and sort of learning yourself again, I suppose. Is that something that comes through in your retreat? And I I'm curious about how you help women start to kind of rebuild themselves once they've come through or are going through something really, really tough in their life.

Reclaiming Inner Strength On Retreats

SPEAKER_01 28:52

Yeah, it's definitely something that that that sort of shows up, and that there's almost like a grief for that former you. Um, you know, or people might think, God, life was so much easier before I got sick. And actually, it probably wasn't, you know, there were still ups and downs. I can't that's one of the first things someone said to me was, you'll never be the same after this. And I was like, but I want to be the same. And actually, you know, that experience uncovered quite, you know, strength and and resilience that I didn't realise that I had. Um, that I couldn't probably go back to that person. I probably wouldn't want to go back. But we're comfortable with the familiar, aren't we? You know, we want to just go back to the like when life was simple, simpler time. Um so with the women that I work with, so some of them will come on the retreat first and then they'll work with me one-to-one. And sometimes it's the opposite way around. But that's where the kind of the coaching bit almost starts to blend in a bit then. So we've uncovered where the blockers are, we've uncovered maybe old stories that have kind of fueled some of those obstacles that are in the way now. And it's like, well, now what? So I try and help women to think, well, you these are your core values. How do you want to take these into your life? Who do you how who do you want to be? How do you want to be in this world? What how do you want other people to see you?

SPEAKER_00 30:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:08

You know, if I was making a documentary of you, what would I notice that's different now? Um, that kind of thing. So it's it might just start off by, well, I'm gonna put my trainers on and go for a walk every day and actually put self care on top of the agenda because that's that's been gone for years. Okay, great. What's that gonna look like? You know, it might just be small changes, like I said, that gradually build up to big sort of changes and new routines and things like that, and just helping them to uncover what environments they could put themselves in. Are there people from Their past that maybe aren't so good for them now. And do we need to put appropriate boundaries around that to make sure that you're protecting yourself? Are you a people pleaser? Were you a people pleaser? You don't want to be that anymore. Okay, well, what could we do to sort of protect you from that a little bit more? Saying yes in the meetings to taking charge of a project, you know, leaning in. It's that leaning in, isn't it, and saying yes. And quite often with values as well, what I find with clients is that they're scared to lean into it because they're worried about it all going wrong or you know what other people might think or say. But actually, the other side of that is something way more spectacular and way more amazing in life. But sometimes we do have to lean into the difficult stuff to get to the the good stuff as well. Life is not without its challenges ever, unfortunately. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:23

Um and I think with that also what can come along is that the people around you need to change. Like if if if you're changing and discovering who you really want to be, as you say, then the old you or the old patterns, relationship patterns, don't often don't work anymore. And that can be quite difficult, can't it? In terms of like if you feel like you've come through something, you've you've rediscovered something in yourself or discovered something in yourself, and then the people around you are still stuck in wanting you to be the person you were before. That can be really challenging.

Rebuilding After Change With Values

SPEAKER_01 32:02

Yeah, yeah. And particularly for the people pleasers, wanting to be everything to everyone, and and and that is really hard, and that sometimes involves having some some difficult conversations and some honest conversations. You know, I'm not who I was before, and I am going to explore who I think that I am now, and you know, I want you to know that I still love and care for you, but I need to do this for me. And having those open conversations with them is is challenging, but mostly people are supportive of that. And those that aren't, again, a boundary needs to be put around that while you do live. You know, we do spend so much of our lives, I think, living the life, living our values according to everybody else's values, you know, right down from when we're kids, you know, we're brought up with our parents' values, aren't they, aren't we? Yeah. My parents were both teachers and they were hugely um that like they hugely valued education and learning and you know, that linearity of when you finish your your career, your sorry, your training, you then go into a job and you stay in that career and it's very linear. Yeah. So when I I left the NHS at the end of that that sort of that year of treatment, and I and again I just thought I need to do something that I want to do. I realize that actually that value of staying in that same role and and learning and education and all of that actually wasn't my value, it was my parents', but I just adopted it to be my own. You know, I adopt my husband's values or my children's, but we all do that, and then we get to a point in life where we're like, oh God, I don't even know what mine is anymore. So it is really empowering when we do suddenly go, I know who I am now and I know where I want to be, and I know what's important and what's valuable to me. But yeah, not everyone wants to come with you on that journey, and that's okay too.

SPEAKER_00 33:44

And I'm thinking about like what you're describing in your retreats, and I'm I'm wondering about whether there's something, there is definitely something, isn't there, about the sort of re maybe a reconnection with yourself. Right. So if you feel like you've lost yourself through whatever experiences that you've been having, it's easy to do that, isn't it? It's easy to just kind of focus on trying to get through the thing, whatever it is. And as you say, being in nature is just powerful within itself, but being around being in a group of women and having a challenge or challenges really does connect you with who you are.

SPEAKER_01 34:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:20

You know, the inner strength, the courage, the whatever it is, it's it's there's something really um what's the word? There's something really authentic about that. Do you find that on the retreats?

SPEAKER_01 34:32

Yeah, definitely. And you know, one of the tagline for women in wild is rediscover, reignite, reconnect, and reconnect the reconnect part is about reconnecting to yourself as well as other people. But actually taking that time to just step back and just notice what comes up and just reconnect with do I want to do this? Is this decision I'm about to make based on something that I want, or is it based on what other people need or expect of me? Um so I do, and it just it's the retreats just slow everything and everyone down, and there's a lot of sort of you know journaling going on as well, and then what's coming up for you right now, and um jot that down, what stories that connected to, which quite often are stories that we heard as as a child that are resurfacing, aren't they? Old wounds and that sort of thing. But yeah, the reconnection part, as I say, isn't just to the community, but it's also reconnecting to yourself. Um super, super powerful, definitely.

Boundaries, People Pleasing, And Support

SPEAKER_00 35:22

Yeah. So anyone listening to this who is in the middle of something, you know, is really going through something, whether it's I don't know, as I said, divorce, health issues, grief, whatever, what would you say to that person in terms of I guess words of encouragement or or any kind of practical steps that they could do to help themselves navigate that that difficult situation?

SPEAKER_01 35:47

I say, I mean, firstly, you don't have to be positive all the time. You are allowed to hate something and cry about it and get mad about it and still keep going. I think that's really important as well. But secondly, don't underestimate the small wins on some days. Just getting dressed and showing up for yourself is an absolute win. You know, I think people do tend to sort of look at the bigger picture too much. So actually, you know, certainly in my experience, just break it down. And if it's one of those days where you're feeling completely burnt out, completely overwhelmed, listen to your body. Don't feel that you've got to drag yourself out and go and be everything to everyone. And I guess finally, just you're not, you're not broken. You're just you're becoming, you know, this version of you might be tired and raw, but she's learning about what really matters. And that wisdom is something that no hardship can take away, really. And I think you know, once that dust settles, you're amazed at what you're capable of. You know, it's all in there, it just sometimes gets sort of buried over. So keep that in mind. And you know, if you need help, draw upon that help, whether that be from a family or a friend, that's it's obviously you know good for you, or whether that be someone impartial, like a therapist, um, and just helping you to just reconnect with who you are and what's important to you, because if you can do that, then everyone else around you benefits as well. You know, you're a much more open, authentic person version of you, and everyone benefits, everyone feels that positive connection.

SPEAKER_00 37:18

Um, so yeah. Kate, thank you so much for your time today. I've had an amazing time talking with you.

SPEAKER_01 37:24

It's lovely to be here. Thank you very much for inviting me on.

SPEAKER_00 37:27

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