From Survival Mode to Feeling Alive Again What 41 Years of Life Taught Me

Today’s episode is a deeply personal one.

I’m sharing reflections from my 41st birthday…what it means to truly feel life again, to move out of survival mode, and to let yourself be seen, celebrated, and loved.

For a long time, I didn’t feel worthy of being celebrated. I pushed it away. I blocked it. I told myself I didn’t need anything… while secretly craving to feel seen.

But over the years, I’ve been learning how to receive. How to soften. How to let life touch me again.

This episode is about:

• coming back into your body
• finding beauty in the everyday
• allowing yourself to feel even when it’s hard
• and remembering… life is a gift

I also share a simple, powerful practice you can start today to help you step out of autopilot and back into presence.

What We Talk About:

• My journey with birthdays, worthiness, and receiving love
• How survival mode disconnects us from life
• The beauty of slowing down and noticing
• Letting go of perfection and embracing becoming
• Reconnecting with your authentic, creative self
• Why feeling is the gateway to healing and joy

Somatic Practice: 

The Art of Noticing

A simple daily practice to help you:

• regulate your nervous system
• reconnect to your body
• and start feeling life again

✨ Pause

✨ Breathe

✨ Notice one beautiful thing

✨ Let yourself receive it

Ask yourself:

“How can I let myself receive this moment?”

 Reminder:

You don’t have to change everything to change your life. You just have to start feeling again.

Connect with Me:

If this episode resonated with you, share it with another mama who needs to hear it Tag me on Instagram so I can connect with you and see what landed. 

Connect with me on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/healthcoachcori?igsh=MXRycGJnZnluZ3Nvag%3D%3D&utm_source=qr

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello, and welcome to Watch Sunsets with Me. I'm your host, Corey Taylor, and I am so excited that you are here and that you found this podcast and that we get to be on this journey of life because we need one another. We need community. We need people who get us, who hear us, those who maybe have been through something that we've been through, and they're like, here's a way out. We need other mothers who are filling us, who are seeing us. We need a community. And that's what I want this to be: is a community of women who get it, who are there for each other. It's the ups, through the downs, through the highs, through the lows, and who are real and who are raw. And just fully wanting to and an experience of this life. Okay, today is my 41st birthday. Like, holy crap! How beautiful is it that I have had the opportunity to walk this earth to be an experience of this life for 41 years. Like it's a gift to be here that I think sometimes we forget because we get so wrapped up in maybe we're going through something hard or just life in general, or we feel like we're living on autopilot, or no, that it's a gift. It's such a gift. Um, I'm going to cry because oh my gosh, it's a gift. And I used to be like, oh, I don't okay, when I was little, I loved celebrating my birthday. Like I loved it. Oh, it was so fun. And then as I got older and kind of like went through things and started putting on my protectors and my masks and my like, oh my goodness, I was like, I don't want to be celebrated because I didn't feel worthy enough to be celebrated. And I didn't feel like I deserved it. And I didn't think that people would even want to celebrate me. And I was like, how embarrassing if nobody actually wants to celebrate me or nobody actually cares. And then, like, you know, it took the next layer of like, I would be like, I don't care if I don't get anything, I don't want anything. And then like my husband wouldn't get me anything because I'm like, I don't want anything. And I wouldn't really tell him what I wanted. And this is nothing on him, this is everything on me. Because he wanted to celebrate me and he wanted to like fully honor me on my birthday. And I would be like, and then when he wouldn't get me something, I'd be like, I would feel like, so you actually don't love me? And I'm like, why was I playing that like little trick and game on him? Why didn't I just like be like, yes, celebrate me and honor me? Because you wanted to and you love me. And then today I woke up and I was just like, I like and so the past like um since 2019, I've been working on letting myself be celebrated, letting myself be honored, um, letting people, if they want to celebrate me and honor me, and people want to tell me that I can be in receiving of it, that it's okay for me to receive and to give, and to not block that piece off of like letting others serve me and letting others love me because we need that. And so this morning when I woke up and I was like, I was like, I don't care in reality if I get nothing. Because the gift within itself is that I get to mother my four kids. Like, how beautiful is it that I get to spend my birthday doing something that I love so deeply, which is be a mother, and what a gift it is that I get to be a wife, and I get to like go outside and experience like Mother Earth, and I get to like feel the sun on me and see the flowers. I walk outside to check the mail, and there's a rose bush blue that blooms right by our mailbox, um, our rosebush, and I was just like, how beautiful, like how beautiful, like that I get to experience this, and I think it's because there was a time when I couldn't feel life, and I felt very disconnected from myself and from fully experiencing life, and so being able to feel it fully and to like inside my whole body, and just being 41 and knowing myself on this just this deeper level of this the growth and expansion and the shedding and the becoming and the like, oh my goodness, how am I going to get through this moment? And you you do, and the climbing the mountain that feels impossible, and getting to the top, and just like looking back and seeing what you used to think was like something so dreadful and hard, and seeing the beauty and the flowers that are growing over the scars, and just being like, oh my gosh, like life is a gift. Each day is a gift. Each day that I get to experience this life to the depths to the fullest, through the ebbs and the flows, through the peaks and the valleys. It's a gift. And I'm not here to say it's always easy because it's not, but it is still full of magic. And I can still feel the beauty, and maybe not in the moment, but the beauty always comes. Kind of like with the seasons when it's like cold and it's dark and it's gloomy, and then it starts turning spring, and and everything starts to bloom again, and you're like, there's the light, there's the warmth. It's always there, even in the dark, it's there for us to feel and experience. It's just sometimes harder to see and to feel. And so what a gift it is to something too is like celebrate yourself. That's something that I would wouldn't do and wouldn't allow myself to do, is to be in just celebration of all of who I am. And I'm not perfect by no means, and I'm not the perfect mom. You know, I feel like we're never gonna be the exact um idea of what we think like the perfect mom is, and the perfect person is, and the perfect wife, and the perfect daughter, the perfect friend. Like it's like impossible to become that perfect. But it's can you offer yourself so much grace as you are working on becoming and remembering her and being in that energy and being her? And that you're able to notice when you're like, oh, this is out of alignment. This is not like the truth and essence of who I am. And you get to come back into alignment and you get to grow through that and expand through that, and so celebrate yourself, like not even just on your birthday, but just like each day when you lay down at night of like, look at you did it, you did it, and maybe it was a hard day, and you're like, oh my gosh, you did it. Maybe it was like the most beautiful magical day, and you're like, oh my gosh, you got to feel and experience that beautiful magical day. And I don't really know where I'm going with this. Or I just I want to get back to like the real raw me, the creative me, the she's been she's been gone again. I kind of was muting her again, and I I miss her. I miss connecting, I miss expressing, and I know like this podcast isn't for everyone, and that's okay. We're not meant to be for everyone because like that's the duality of it all. Mother nature is that beautiful teacher of like there's duality and there's beauty in it all, in it all, like, oh, Mother Earth is so beautiful in her duality, and we look at like the sunset and we don't judge it from the day before, we're just like, dang, and today, like she's beautiful, and we look at flowers and we think, man, they're beautiful. And like the different grass that's growing in all shapes and sizes and lengths, and it's like, huh, like beauty. There's beauty and abundance all around us, and we're meant to experience it, and we're meant to feel it to the fullest, and we're meant to not just live life in this survival state because I thought that's what it meant to live. And like, you know, like we have to just constantly be like surviving because, like, look at look at me, I'm surviving. And it's like you can move through and survive and come out on the other side of things, but you don't always have to be in that state of survival. You can have build capacity to hold the duality of life in this beautiful, beautiful way where you don't numb out the pain or use things to numb out your experience or to disconnect, but to fully just be in the experience so you can feel the yumminess and the joy and be more in tune with that being your baseline and who you are. Survival mode's hard. It's hard. But when you recognize it, when you can be like, okay, how can I just be a little more me today? How can I just add in a little more of the magic today? That's when you start coming out of that survival mode. It's when you start looking and noticing the art of noticing. I love that line. The art of noticing, the art of noticing it all, the art of pausing, pausing, and I'm gonna do lots of pausing and reflecting today, and just being in awe and in pure gratitude that I am 41 and it is beautiful, and I'm just gonna allow my body to feel that and like who do I get to be, and who do I get to remember that little girl who like loved to create and to write and just spin outside? How can I be more of her? How can I bring more magic to my days and my years that I have to come? And who do I get to be each and every day? How do I want to feel each and every day? Even when it's hard, what do I want to anchor into as I'm feeling and moving through the hard? I love I love springtime. I love looking at the rebirth of the earth, the rebirth of all of us. Um how we get to be in the constant evolution of growth and expansion. And how I get to just celebrate being a mother today. What a gift that is. And I get to celebrate my mom giving me life and my my parents. Okay, so before you go, I want to leave you with something that you can actually take into your day today. Because I feel like we're full of so much information in out there that it's like, okay, we have all this information, but how do we start embodying it? How do we start becoming it? For example, like we have like you can look up workouts to do, you can chat GPT, what your macro should be. But it's like, why can I not embody it? Why can I not stay consistent with it? And that's where I want to really focus and help you and support you is becoming the embodiment of it. So it becomes something that you just are and something that feels good and nourishing in your life. So before you go, I want to leave you with this. It's something simple, but it's super, super powerful. And I kind of talked about it, but it's called the art of noticing. So at some point today, maybe it's when you step outside, maybe it's in your kitchen, maybe it's in your car, maybe it's when you're cooking dinner, maybe it's when you first wake up, maybe it's before you go to bed. I want you just to pause. Just, just pause and just be there for a moment. Take a slow breath in through your nose and exhale out of your mouth. And then just look around you. Maybe close your eyes. Maybe like connect deeper to like your different senses if you're closing your eyes. Like maybe you are cooking and you're smelling the food, or you're listening to your kids laugh, or you're feeling the like air on your face and the sun on you, or the moonlight. Wherever you're at, just notice. Maybe you're like looking at your child's face. And I want you to find one thing that feels beautiful to you, or that you can just feel so much love and gratitude for, or something that maybe something just comes to mind while you're here pausing, and you're like, ah, yes, that feels so yummy that whatever it is, no judgment. Just let it be. Not trying to be like, why am I thinking of this or what's going on? Just just connect and be. And as you notice it, take another breath and let yourself feel it. Let it land in your body. This isn't about like forcing something, but this is about letting your nervous system experience that there is beauty here, that there is safety here, and that life is happening right now in the being. More being in the doing. That's that's my message. But more being in the doing. Because we we are doers, we can't just sit and become stagnant. But how can we have more being in the doing? And then I want you to ask yourself, how can I let myself receive this moment? How can I notice it deeper? What would that feel like? And then just one more breath. And you can stay in that moment for as long as you want. Um open your eyes again. Because this is how we start to come out of survival mode, not by changing everything, but it by allowing ourselves to feel again, to create a new baseline, create more capacity in your life to allow the good in. Because most of the time we're used to running an autopilot and in survival mode, that allowing the good space in, allowing ourselves to pause and be because we are constantly go, go, go, go, go, go, go, especially now in this world. That just being and allowing in the beauty of the moment, kind of like our nervous system's like, what the heck's going on? So just soften a little. Obviously, if you're driving, don't close your eyes. But can you start practicing this? Maybe first thing when you wake up, maybe every time you step outside, maybe just a little moment of your day where you start noticing again, feeling again, being in your body, being in the experience of this life. Not from your mind, but from fully in the experience of reconnecting your mind and your body. Okay, that is today's episode. Um, it's going to release after my birthday, um, probably one or two days after my birthday. But this is what I was like, oh my gosh, I have to like get this out there. Um, I've been really working on when I get the nudge to just create, to create and not worry about it being perfect or like, oh my goodness, this is not what it's supposed to look like or supposed to be. Um, this isn't what they say is like marketing, you know, this is not marketable. Like nobody's gonna listen because it's not hitting the criteria. But I just want real raw humanists. I miss that. I miss, I'm tired of the Chat GPT, although it's a great tool for things. Like I use it for certain things. Um, I've talked about that in a previous podcast. Um, I think I think I released that one. Yes, I did. Um, but we also need that real raw human connection. We can't start losing ourselves in all this stuff. We have to remember who we are. We have to connect back to God, to nature, to ourselves, to our family, to the ones we love. Truly in connection. So, okay. All right. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for taking time to listen, to be in my world, um, to have this energy exchange with each other, this love, this energy of just connection and love. You are not alone on this journey. You are loved. If I ever leave one thing with you, it's you are loved beyond words. You can't even imagine. And if you don't feel that, take some time and maybe just be like feel how much you are by something bigger. If you're like, well, right now I don't feel it anywhere here. By something bigger. Notice that. Let that in. And until next time, I will catch you at the next sunset. Um take some time to watch the sunset. And yeah, thank you.