Queerly Attached

From Fear To Episode Four

• Kyleigh Weathers • Season 1 • Episode 4

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After six months of silence, I’m back to share why fear kept me from podcasting and what I’ve learned about perfectionism, self-acceptance and choosing courage. A luna moth’s chaotic first flight showed me how to release the pressure to be perfect. Or blame it on the new e-bike. 


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Speaker 1:

Queerly Attached is about healing the trauma to make room for the joy. Queerly Attached hey friend, welcome back to Queerly Attached. Welcome back. It's been six months. We're not even going to shy away from that fact. Let's just talk about it. In fact, this isn't going to be a shaming session. I just really want to share what's been going on for the last six months with me, with Queerly Attached.

Speaker 1:

I'm just one week away from turning 42 years old and this morning I decided that I didn't want to keep choosing fear today. I've been choosing fear every day for the last six months and, while I often found myself feeling hold off and isolated, I also was experiencing my emotions in a different way than I ever have in the past, and I've learned a lot from that, and that's what I want to talk about. That's what I want to talk about. How about this stat? 90% of podcasts do not make it past episode three. So I want to just give some credit to the fact that this is obviously a very human experience that is shared amongst millions of us podcasters. There's something about getting past that third episode. Lots of excuses, I can blame tech, I can blame audio. Lots of excuses, I can blame tech, I can blame audio, but the facts were. After those first few episodes and after having these amazing experiences with these guests that I was interviewing with, I just got paralyzed by my own fear of what this could grow into. So that's why I've been part of that 90% for the last six months, but wallowing in the fear of what could possibly happen if I put out even just one more. So I've decided hey, I've got an opportunity to choose courage and I'm going to do that.

Speaker 1:

So here we are, episode four, blasting past the 90%. I got a new bike. Let's start there. I got a new bike. I have not been able to ride a bike since my spinal cord injury Not really ride in a way that doesn't end up jacking my backup. So I have been on the hunt for an electric bike. I got an early birthday present and I now own an e-bike. I've had it for one week now and it took about the second morning for my butt to remind me. Oh, this hurts, this is an uncomfortable thing and my body and my muscles are definitely aching by the third day. And this is an e-bike. I can't imagine what would happen if it was a regular bike. My fitness is well, so my butt hurting on this bike? I'm thinking of that old saying about you know, just, it's as easy as riding a bike, just getting on again. And I was like, yeah, but I don't feel like anybody talks about how your butt hurts. I mean, I was up late Googling best, fattest seats, most cush. How can I trick this thing out so that my butt will never scream again on this bike? That's pending delivery right now as we speak. But riding this bike kind of made me think about this podcast idea of like what it's like to get back on and get back into that, and I'm sure there's going to be some growing pains. It's funny to me that it's the butt, but okay, that's just the metaphor, but you get it. There's going to be some growing pains for me getting back into this thing. There's going to be some growing pains for me getting back into this thing. I do in fact have interviews pending waiting in the editing wings and this podcast episode here is really just me kind of trying to stretch my wings a little bit. Great segue.

Speaker 1:

So I get home from my bike ride this morning. I come up to my apartment. You won't believe what I see. At first I mistook it for a post-it note, like just a giant post-it note outside my door and I was like, oh man, what are they getting me for now? Well, it wasn't a post-it note, it was a giant luna moth bright green, neon, just gorgeous just sitting there at 830 in the morning and I quickly Googled like what is this? And it was a luna moth, and apparently they're more nighttime and it was surprising to see it there just basking in the sun right by my door. So of course Google like hey, what's the like spiritual significance of seeing a moth, and lots of talk of emergence and taking flight, and that all kind of resonated. But it wasn't until the moth flew away that I knew that that little thing was there for me because its first flight was what I ended up getting to witness, and I know this because the first flight was bonkers.

Speaker 1:

This thing took off quickly, plunged over the lawn headfirst into my bike, bounced up, hit my car. I felt like it was a way of saying I'm definitely here for you, I'm going to go hit all your shit out here. It bounces off the car, off the carport, flies straight up, and then I see it just dive and it wasn't like a graceful, like, well, buzz Lightyear's what came to mind? Right, you're not flying, you're falling. Right, this thing, just like it like crumpled to the ground and I was like, oh shit. And then all of a sudden it just took off again and then you saw it, like figure it out, it was flying, it kept rising higher and higher and I lost sight of it over the tree line. Now, that was a beautiful thing to see, but to see it hit all of my stuff on the way out was like all right, okay, okay, there's a lesson here to be had. What's the message here? And I want to share with you a little bit about what I took away from this moth.

Speaker 1:

This idea of perfect has plagued me my whole life. I was raised Mormon and I was also raised in a military household. My dad was a colonel and he definitely was like whatever you're picturing of that military dad, that's him. And that, mixed with this high-demand religion, made for a pretty strict household and one that felt difficult to like find your identity within because there was so much expectation and so much talk of potential. It was like capital P potential right alongside purpose. And as I started to figure out how to stay safe in a house like that. I learned to hide. I learned to hide parts of myself. I learned how to stay quiet when it was necessary, I learned how to show up with a smile when that was necessary and I learned how to perform. There was a lot of performance, and when I mean performance, I mean like we were like the little Von Trapp family, like people would come over and we would come down. Literally me and my brothers would file down the stairs and then sing for the people. It just felt like we were meant to have this look of perfection and it was a crushing weight. And it hasn't been truly until this last six months that I realized how much of that weight was has driven my actions.

Speaker 1:

My choices have been made based off how to avoid that pressure, how much pressure there is in life, and as I've really detangled what that pressure means for me through my own private coaching and my own therapy, I've realized that it created a culture of hiding, a culture of isolation, and this time, instead of self-abandoning in the ways that I used to do, subconsciously right, this time it was a level of avoidance that I've never experienced before, and I've spent time thinking on that. My stake in life is that I don't want to self-abandon. I take that really seriously and as someone who used to be anxious, preoccupied, I'm very familiar with the chaos that can come when you believe your anxiety and you believe your assumptions. So that wasn't a choice I was going to make this time, but instead I just went hard avoidant, became really isolated in not my thoughts truly, in trying to understand why this was the pattern I kept finding myself in. You know, there comes a point when you start to see like you're the common denominator in the story and I have a coach who says, like don't use these things as a stick to beat yourself with.

Speaker 1:

And I used to joke and say I was cursed with introspection and insight. Uh, and I, I treated it like a curse. I would, you know, get to the bottom of whatever was going on in me and then just almost shame myself for ever getting to a place of shame myself for ever getting to a place of, well, depression. Really, it's depression when you just get so low that it doesn't feel like it's your story anymore and you're just this side character. And thankfully this time I had resourced myself in a way that I didn't get lost, in that I was able to continue progressing through it, even though it didn't look like what I thought it was going to look like.

Speaker 1:

The last six months did not look like what I thought they were going to look like, down to personal relationships falling through through and even my very near future. It's not going to be what I thought it was and that brings up grief. Of course it brings up grief. That's human nature, to not want loss when life just keeps lifing you. It doesn't take our choice away. We still get to choose how we're going to show up and I think when I started to own that this was a choice I was making to choose fear, to stay silent, to stay hidden, to stay safe. That's all those choices are trying to create is safety, but there wasn't joy in that safety, and I have experienced what secure safety is meant to feel like. It's peace, it's ease, it's content, it's being able to handle life and still choose joy, still choose love. It really is the opposite of fear and it doesn't take the pain away, but healing it starts with pain.

Speaker 1:

So this moth to me. I watched this thing fly and bounce around and just have the most pathetic first flight and I thought, well, who are you to call that pathetic? How do you know? That's not at all what it's just meant to look like. Who are you to judge that? And I just felt the pressure lift off me, like if I could stop judging my own flight path and just keep flying. Who knows where I end up right? Yeah, that's the choice. That's why now, that's why this has to be now, because I want to make a different choice today. And hitting record and hitting publish is a different choice. I've got plenty of B-roll, I've probably got 30 episodes recorded, but this idea of perfect, it chains you and it binds you, and for me, that's always played out in what's felt like paralysis. I really think that my spinal cord injury was a physical manifestation of so much of this for me.

Speaker 1:

And one week away from turning 42, at some point you just have to decide to drop the victimhood and that's challenging. That's a lot of in the coaching that I do one-to-one. So much of what I'm working with with clients is being willing to drop that narrative. What we make this stuff mean is so important, and because we're the ones that get to choose the meaning, that makes us the creators, and I keep being reminded that it's less about what do you want for yourself, but more of like who do you have to become? Who do I have to create? What habits do I need to create in order to become? And the only thing I'm trying to become is more and more of myself. So inviting more and more of myself in, including these parts who feel shame and who are judgy and who are protectors like inviting all of those parts back in. That is the walk. That really is the point of it all. My only goal for this podcast right now is to keep hitting record and keep hitting publish. I shared I have ADHD, so you know you've already consented to a little bit of a ride, but hey, well, I am going to end with the affirmation, because I do like that little setup that we have going Page 140 from this Affirmations for Queer People book.

Speaker 1:

I am not defined by the rejection I've experienced as a queer individual. You have faced adversity, but it does not diminish your worth. As a queer individual, you have faced adversity, but it does not diminish your worth. Your identity and value go beyond the opinions and actions of those who reject or misunderstand you. Embrace the truth. Your worth cannot be diminished by rejection. Embrace your authentic self and let go of the weight of others' judgment. Your identity is valid and beautiful, regardless of who accepts or rejects you.

Speaker 1:

It always feels like easier said than done, right, but as I'm reading that, I'm realizing like truly, the work is you accepting you right and not rejecting these parts of your identity that you don't think are valid or beautiful. Accepting all of me is the work, and what I've learned is, as I keep walking that way, I keep finding myself surrounded by individuals who are also trying to walk that way. That's probably you. That's probably you. I'm glad that you've stayed. If you just found me, I'm glad that you're here. I have an upcoming interview that I will be releasing this week with a local massage therapist here in the Kansas City area. She's queer, she is brilliant. I'm excited to release that episode here coming up. We'll see you next time.