Ship’s Log 08: Charting the Course with Terry Ludwig

A Quote:

“Happiness is my only function. And when I’m not feeling joy and peace, I know something has gone wrong—and that’s my opportunity to choose happiness again.” – Terry Ludwig

Episode Summary:

In this episode of Project Candor, Jeanne sits down with life coach and transformational mentor Terri Ludwig for a powerful conversation about resilience, reinvention, and the courage to rewrite your story. Terri shares how she unlearned the belief that life is meant to be a struggle and discovered that our thoughts shape our reality. From declaring independence at 16 to surviving abuse, building a six-figure design firm as a single mother, and ultimately stepping into her calling as a healer and coach, Terri’s journey is one of radical responsibility and deep inner work.

Together, they explore forgiveness, fear versus love, childhood wounds, and the daily choice to move toward gratitude instead of pain. The episode closes with a revealing round of Two Truths and a Lie—but the real truth woven throughout is this: happiness isn’t something we chase; it’s something we choose.

Guest’s Bio:

Terry Ludwig is a Certified Life Coach, RYT200 Yoga Instructor, Sound Bath Facilitator, Meditation Mentor, Transformational Retreat Leader, Keynote Speaker, Author, and lifelong Teacher/Student/Facilitator of A Course in Miracles. She is deeply committed to supporting others on their journey to happiness, abundance, and vitality in every area of life.

Drawing from the transformational tools she has implemented in her own life, Terry helps individuals who have experienced trauma, disappointment, and sacrifice to face their fears, release buried pain, choose happiness, and create lives they truly love. She empowers women to find their voice and step into their strength through her online signature courses, life-changing workshops, one-on-one and group coaching, immersive transformational retreats, motivational speaking, free Facebook communities, and her A Course in Miracles study group.

Links:

Email: terryjludwig@gmail.com

Website Link: https://terryjoludwig.com/

Facebook Link: https://www.facebook.com/terryjoludwig

Instagram Link: https://www.instagram.com/terry_ludwig/

LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/terryludwig/

Who do you know who'd make a great guest for the show? Email: info@projectcandor.com

Website:   https://www.projectcandor.com

Social Media

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ProjectCandor/

LinkedIn:     https://www.linkedin.com/company/projectcandor/

Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/project.candor/

YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@ProjectCandorPodcast

Transcript

Jeanne:
Welcome aboard Project Candor, where we look beyond the polish and brass of life and explore the true stories that carry us through it. This is a place for conversations that aren't rushed, that aren't rehearsed, and that don't need the glamour shots or the perfect angles. Here we slow down, we listen closely, and we let people share the parts of their story that often stay tucked below deck. Today, we're charting a course into a life marked by resilience, reinvention and more courage than most people ever realize they have. Our guest, Terry Ludwig is someone whose life reads like a map of what the human heart can survive and what it can become. Terry is a certified life coach, yoga instructor, meditation mentor, sound bath facilitator and transformational retreat leader.
For more than 30 years, she's helped people shift from fear to happiness through healing practices, mindset tools, and immersive retreats. Her journey began in a childhood marked by hardship, and the resilience she built is now the foundation of the work she brings to others. Today, she lives in Florida, guiding people to design lives filled with joy, abundance, and emotional freedom. Terry, thank you for being here. Before we sail into deeper waters, how are you feeling as we begin?

Terry:
Alright.

Terry Ludwig (1:31.726)
I feel great. Thank you so much, Jeanne. It's such an honor to be here with you. Thank you for sharing my story. ⁓ I love what you're doing here.

Jeanne:
thank you so much. ⁓ And I ⁓ think after ⁓ talking with you and reading your story, I'm just ready to dive in and hear the details, but ⁓ try not to share the two truths and a lie too much before we get there. ⁓ I do have some questions ⁓ as we begin. So you ready for questions? All right. These are out of left field. I didn't ask you in advance. So ⁓ if you stumble or something, can switch or whatever you want to do. This is all.

Terry:
Sure.

Jeanne:
Free conversation. ⁓ So for number one I had, ⁓ you talk about unlearning the belief that life is supposed to be a struggle. What sparked that shift for you?

Terry:
gosh. ⁓ I don't know if it was one single thing that sparked the shift. I think it was a series ⁓ of many things that ⁓ made me realize that life doesn't have to be a struggle.
So many times we're told, you know, it costs to get, right? Pain is what makes you stronger. It hurts to be beautiful. You know, I heard all of these things ⁓ as a young child growing up. No pain, no gain. ⁓ And, ⁓ right? And we're... ⁓

Jeanne:
That's what I heard. ⁓

Terry:
It's kind of programmed in our early childhood conditioning that life is a struggle. This is hard. ⁓ And if it's not hard, you're doing something wrong. You're not working hard enough. You're not pushing long enough. ⁓ So ⁓ it took me a long, long time ⁓ and ⁓ a lot of inner soul searching to realize that, wow, life can be a struggle if that's what you choose.
But eventually I learned my life is being ⁓ created by my thoughts. ⁓ And if I think life has to be a struggle, then yeah, life will be a struggle. But the moment I change my mind about that ⁓ and think life doesn't have to be a struggle, guess what? It's not. ⁓ And when I started seeing that playing out ⁓ in the world just by a simple mindset shift,
I realized that everything that I had learned as a child was not true and I had to unlearn a lot. Get rid of a lot of programs.

Jeanne:
I think a lot of us go through that, but I don't know that we reached the decision or the, the pinnacle that you reached to say that it doesn't have to be painful. think a lot of people get stuck ⁓ in expecting the next pain to come. don't know. ⁓ but you would know that from a lot of your counseling and so forth. You became, ⁓ this just blew my mind independent at 16. When you look back at that young girl, what do you wish?
she had known.

Terry:
⁓ Mmm. ⁓ Wow. ⁓ So much. I wish she had known ⁓ that ⁓ love, real love, doesn't come from out there. That real love has to come from in here.
And that little girl didn't know that. She had fallen into the Cinderella fairy tale that her Prince Charming was out there somewhere and she just had to find him or she just had to attract him. ⁓ And I spent most of my life doing that. Yeah.

Jeanne:
Wow. Yeah, you know, it's crazy. ⁓ You know my husband, ⁓ he's crazy. ⁓ But, ⁓ you know, he told me one day, Jeannie, life is not a Hallmark movie just because we're not going to that big retreat up in the mountains with our whole family and having the big turkey dinner around the big long nine foot table ⁓ doesn't mean
that we're not loved, that we're not having fun, that we're not doing the things we want to do. So I get what you mean. When you finally realize love comes from inside and from the people around you, or even if you don't have good people around you, it's still, it depends on you and not a Hallmark movie ⁓ or something else.

Terry:
Right, ⁓ yeah, I think most people confuse love with need. ⁓ And when they say, love you, what they're really saying is, I need you. I need you so that I can feel safe. I need you so that I can feel worthy. But that's not love. ⁓ And when you realize you can only truly love another when you have love to give,
then you can experience what real love is. And the only way you'll have love to give is by going inside, doing that inner work, loving yourself, filling yourself with love, so that when you go out into the world, that's what you are. You are love embodied. And you can share that love with everyone. ⁓

Jeanne:
Yeah, that's fantastic. I love the way you put that. And I know, and I don't want to give away too much of, ⁓ of other things that you're going to say, ⁓ but you are a very positive person. So I know in your neighborhood, you have started a positivity club and have a positivity page. And is that part of, ⁓ of
your current business or is that just something that stems from what this question about a 16 year old girl finding love within herself and wanting to share that?

Terry:
You know, that actually stemmed from my husband, believe it or not. ⁓ He was so fed up with the negative posts he was reading on Facebook, ⁓ especially within our community, right? Our community Facebook, ⁓ like the posts that we have that we're all a part of. And he said, my gosh, I'm sick and tired of hearing all these people complain and, you know, just finger point at everyone.

Jeanne:
Amen. All right. ⁓

Terry:
He said, it would be so great if we just had a group for just positive thoughts. And I said, ⁓ well, let's create that. ⁓ Let's make that. ⁓ So that's actually where that stemmed from was, ⁓ I think it was during COVID even where everybody was inside on Facebook just ⁓ all day long. ⁓

Jeanne:
haha
Alright.

Terry:
And so I said, well, let's optimize our environment. We'll create a page where it's just positive. And then that ⁓ mushroomed and we started having get togethers and community ⁓ charcuterie board get togethers, which was so much fun. And the only rule was if you come to this party, you must have your thoughts above the line. ⁓ They've got to be aligned with positive thoughts. No complaining.

Jeanne:
⁓ very good. ⁓ Another question. ⁓ You've described moving through identities like victim, survivor, warrior. What helped you step out of those roles and into healing?

Terry:
I think stepping out of those roles was part of the healing process. ⁓ And I didn't realize it until I had gone to the next role. So ⁓ in other words, there's something called the map of consciousness that was developed by ⁓ Dr. David Hawkins, which actually measures the energetic frequency of emotions.

Jeanne:
Okay.

Terry:
And those emotions live within our bodies. Our bodies are energy. ⁓ And ⁓ when we are in alignment with a certain energetic frequency, we can see where we are on that map of consciousness. And I could see so clearly ⁓ during times ⁓ in my evolution where initially I was in that victim stage, right? ⁓ And I could then see where I had moved out of the victim stage into ⁓
warrior. But when you go through those stages, you're still attracting what you are. That is the law of attraction. Like attracts like. So ⁓ being a victim, ⁓ I attracted ⁓ other victims who also like to victimize. Being a warrior,
I attracted a lot of war, right? Because here I am fighting, right? I'm a warrior. I'm going to fight and stand up for myself. Well, I attracted war from everybody. And then being a survivor, right? Then you ⁓ attract surviving problems, issues. OK, I'm a survivor, but now I've got more things to survive. And at some point, you just realize, I'm so tired. I just want peace. I want happiness. And when you make that decision, ⁓

Jeanne:
Hmm.

Terry:
you attract peace and happiness. So ⁓ it's an evolution of the soul to move up that map of consciousness. And there's times when we're up there ⁓ being loved and being happy and all of a sudden, boom, we're back down, right? Because we live in the world and we're exposed to what happens in the world. So we've got all of these choices ⁓ of what we can do with our mindset when bad things happen.
We can choose love or fear. All of our thoughts are aligned with either love or fear. That's it. Two choices for all of our 60,000 thoughts a day. And once we make that choice, that choice creates our reality.

Jeanne:
Yeah, I like that. I wondered if you did any work when I was ⁓ reading through all your information with, say, foster kids or adopted kids, because I think being in that space myself in the past years, they are ⁓ very much falling into the victimhood. And I understand why, but ⁓ I just think a lot of your work could be very helpful in that area. And I don't know if...
if you do that with your horses or ⁓ other times that you work with people, but they are in desperate need of getting out of the victimhood role.

Terry:
You are absolutely right. And ⁓ that is an area I have gotten into. I have been asked by different groups to come in and work with children, young children of that age, whether they're teenagers, ⁓ even younger children, just to get that mindset in place, right? Because it's so important to have those tools to build on. Many of these kids, like myself, did not have those tools growing up, right? We didn't know we had a choice. We thought we were the victim of the world.
because that's all we experienced. ⁓ But yes, to answer your question, I do work with youth, ⁓ troubled youth. I've worked with troubled youth groups. ⁓ And it's so rewarding just to see when you see that aha moment where they're like, ⁓ I have the power to create my reality. Wow. Just to see that light bulb go on, that empowerment.
⁓ And then ⁓ when they realize, ⁓ everything's my responsibility. ⁓ Right. ⁓

Jeanne:
Yeah, well, I had that kind of, I had that revelation at some point too, when I had to start paying bills after college. ⁓ now it's all my responsibility. ⁓ Yeah, I didn't like that too much, ⁓ but I took it. ⁓ But I want to keep going because we want to get more information from you. So you ⁓ built a successful design firm while raising two kids alone. What did that chapter teach you about strength and about limits?

Terry:
Bye! ⁓

Wow, that was ⁓ really interesting. I think being a mom, first of all, you get this superpower, right? Because ⁓ you've got these kids who depend on you ⁓ and it stops with you. That's where everything stops. And I was going through a divorce and ⁓ my husband wasn't financially giving me any support. And I knew that these two kids needed me to be a mom.
because now we're in a divorce situation. They needed me to show up big and give them all the love and all the attention I could give them, but I also needed to be the provider. So I ventured out to ⁓ open up my own interior design firm and I had a lot of anxiety back then and a lot of unhealed early childhood trauma. So I was ⁓ going out into the world with that. ⁓ And I think a lot of that ⁓

Jeanne:
Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

Terry:
⁓ journey helped me to face those ⁓ fearful parts that lived inside of me and do it anyway.
because we don't have a choice, right? We've got children that are depending on us. ⁓ We can't just say, you know what? I'm a little too afraid to go knock on that door. And my mama voice kicked in and said, you go knock on that door. You've got kids at home ⁓ that need you to stand up and be the provider. So I was afraid and I did it anyway. And I honestly don't think I would have done that if I didn't have two children who depended on me. I don't think I would have had the motivation to step outside of my comfort zone like that.
because that was way outside of my comfort zone. ⁓ But I did it. ⁓ every day ⁓ going out there and ⁓ learning as I grew my business, I had no idea what I was doing. I mean, I ⁓ could design kitchens and baths, but I was promoting myself as an interior designer. I had a good eye for design. I will tell you that. was part of my gifts is to be able to see beauty and bring beauty to life. And I learned a lot about listening, listening to my

Jeanne:
⁓

Terry:
clients listening to what their needs were. And here's the funny story, after 25 years of creating beautiful ⁓ supportive environments for my clients, what I ended up realizing is my greatest joy was helping my clients with their mindset.
Because as I was learning how to expand and heal my early childhood wounds, I was sharing all of that with my interior design clients. And I would help them create these meditation spaces in their houses and I would give them books. would show them, I would direct them to podcasts to listen to, to help them with whatever was happening in their life. was helping them to empower themselves to, to rise up on that map of consciousness, to understand

Jeanne:
Hmm

Terry:
⁓ why they were in this place and where they could go from there. ⁓ And I realized, gosh, this is my passion. ⁓ And that's when I decided to leave that business and go full time into life coaching.

Jeanne:
Yes.

Terry:
after my children were ⁓ grown and I put them through college and bought my own house. I had built my interior design business into a multiple six figure firm and we were doing great so there was really no reason to shut the doors ⁓ other than...

Jeanne:
Wonderful. You had a lot of staff too or ⁓ was it just?

Terry:
I had two full-time designers that worked for me. I had probably a dozen contractors that were subcontractors. had a lot of contacts in the industry. I also did project management. So I would, you know, design a project and then I would get all of the different, ⁓
contractors and engineers and architects in place if that needed to happen. And I would have weekly meetings and just make sure the project went all the way through to the end.

Jeanne:
Wow. All of those people ⁓ depending on you to move this train forward and you still have two kids you're having to take care of. So that's amazing. Amazing. I'm scared to death to sale anything. Yeah. I do all kinds of stuff, but if I have to go out there and sell it, sell it, forget it. ⁓

Terry:
Yeah. ⁓

Yeah, well, I didn't feel like selling. ⁓ It felt more like helping, if that makes sense. You know, people ⁓ had a desire.

Jeanne:
It does, but they didn't know what they were getting when they got ⁓ connected with you. They didn't know they were getting all this extra peripheral help and support. That's, that's what I'd like to find in someone that I work with.

Terry:
Yeah, they didn't. And I'll tell you what, once I left that career and came down to Florida, my phone did not stop ringing and people would beg me to come and do their projects. ⁓ And I would say, ⁓ I ⁓ have to say no because I understand energy and how energy works. And I wanted the universe to know that all of my energy was now being funneled into this. And I didn't want there to be any confusion.

Jeanne:
⁓ that's a testimony.

Okay.

So ⁓ for someone who's out there listening and gets stuck in fear, is stuck in fear right now, what's the first small step you would encourage them to take?

Terry:
Well, fear and love cannot coexist. So as soon as you choose a loving thought, fear is gone. And the best, easiest way to do that is gratitude. I would say, think of three things you're grateful for and many nights and many mornings. That's what got me through the day was just three things. And sometimes it would be easy as easy as I'm grateful. have this water, right? ⁓ I'm grateful. have a pillow on my bed.
And I remember one morning looking outside and there was, couldn't think of a third thing I was grateful for. And I looked outside and there was a couple of squirrels playing in the yard and the sun was shining and I giggled and I said, I'm grateful for the joy that those two squirrels just brought me. Yeah, right. ⁓

Jeanne:
Yeah, ⁓ I watch these videos now, Magnus does. What are you, 12? ⁓ I may be in my mind sometimes I am, but there's a Japanese ⁓ YouTube channel that just has animals that come in and cuddle each other. A duck, a cat, ⁓ a ⁓ rabbit, ⁓ a chicken, a rooster. And if the cat's cuddling the hen,
then the rooster gets all mad. And I just sit there and watch that and laugh and think that is just so joyous that all these animals are coming together. So ⁓ I can't wait to meet about this girl. ⁓ I took it off at another direction. ⁓

Terry:
No, but it's true. Anything that can gladden your heart like that and bring you joy. ⁓ Love casts out fear. So that's ⁓ it. ⁓ You could get up and go for a walk. There's so many amazing podcasts now you can listen to. ⁓ Abraham Hicks has a great one for... ⁓
understanding the law of attraction. There's great podcasts. ⁓ There's great sound bath ⁓ YouTube videos you can tap into to help your ⁓ energetic frequency raise without even thinking about it. Really just letting your mind ⁓ let go ⁓ and allowing the music to do it for you.

Jeanne:
Okay.

Yes, we have to explore that a little bit more. ⁓ So what does happiness mean to you now? Now that you've reached this level in your ⁓ evolution, what does it mean now?

Terry:
Yeah, I mean, I think ⁓ the simplest way to explain it is happiness is my only function. ⁓ And when I'm not feeling joy and peace, ⁓ I know something has gone wrong. ⁓ And that's my opportunity to stop ⁓ and choose happiness again. Yeah, because once you have happiness, you become a magnet to attract more happiness.
And again, it goes back to the law of attraction. ⁓ if you, whatever you share, you strengthen. So when you're in that place of love and happiness and you share that, you're strengthening that.

Jeanne:
The first like, you know, I don't know, happiness is, my parents were just very happy people and very loving people. ⁓ And, ⁓ but I remember Snoopy to remember, think the first post about happiness is was always with Snoopy dancing. ⁓ Yeah. So I don't know. It's just, ⁓ you just have to force yourself sometimes. And I think that's what you're saying is like, you know, you gotta stop and say,

Terry:
Yes, that's right, I remember that.

Jeanne:
before I get the negative out and bring my happiness back in. So what does that mean to me? Whether it's the squirrels, whether it's my crazy videos, ⁓ watching animals cuddle each other, or just that you're happy that ⁓ your husband is home after a hard day. ⁓ For people out there listening, this could be just as simple as ⁓ the kid got a C. ⁓ This would have been my happiness when my son was taking.
a lot of courses at ⁓ the high school and he'd come home with a C in math and I would be ecstatic. I ⁓ was like, well, that is just ⁓ way up from an F. I'm so happy. ⁓

Terry:
Yeah. The other thing too, to realize is that ⁓ when you're, when you're ⁓ just going for the happiness, right? ⁓ There is a question as to why is there, why am I not happy? Right? I think that's important work to do too. ⁓ Most of ⁓ our unhappiness stems from some early childhood trauma that we have all experienced. I don't care what
your circumstances have been as a child. There was a moment where you were fearful of something, right? You might've had the best childhood, but maybe something happened along the way that put that idea in your mind that, I'm not good enough. ⁓ My brother Johnny's better than me. I'm not good enough. I need to be better, right? Any of those thoughts of unworthiness, they start to stew and they start to create
a safety net to protect you, right? And in mine, when I was younger, is I'm afraid and I'm not safe. So what did that create? I became small. I became quiet, right? And until we're willing to go inside and look at that wound and heal that wound completely, that is going to keep showing up in our adulthood and it will sabotage our life. So
being small and quiet as an adult, I would have never gotten out and knocked on doors. I was terrified to go out into the big world and knock on a stranger's door. That was, that was really, really, really scary for me. ⁓ So ⁓ part of facing that fear and getting the affirmation that, ⁓ nothing bad happened. Actually something good just happened. I just got a new job from that, right? That was an affirmation.

Jeanne:
right, yes. I just met somebody that I want to be friends with for a long time. That's another one.

Terry:
Right, ⁓ right. ⁓ And so those things keep us small and keep us from getting out in the world. Or, I'm not good enough might make you a super achiever where you are ⁓ burned out trying to be the best in the room because that little wounded child is still telling you you're not good enough. So you're working harder and longer and you're climbing up that corporate ladder.
But you know what? You're burned out. And when you get home, you grab that wine. That's the first thing you do is because you need that relaxation. You need that relief. And then before you know it, you're an alcoholic. You're burned out. You're an overachiever. You're drinking too much and your family is falling apart because you still feel like you're not good enough. So finding that bottle of happiness ⁓ is not, ⁓ it might be a

Jeanne:
Right.

Terry:
short-term ⁓ pleasure, but it's not a resolution. The resolution is really doing that inner work, going back and finding out what is that story and recreating that story. And that takes a little bit of work. It takes some ⁓ consistency and a lot of self-love because we actually reparent ourselves.

Jeanne:
Right.

Terry:
⁓ And there's a method for that. I have a whole online course that does exactly that.

Jeanne:
⁓ that's good because I know a lot of people could benefit from that. ⁓ grew up and ⁓ I don't want to get all into me, but ⁓ I did lose my parents, my mom at 16 and my dad at 24 and my grandparents were already passed on, but ⁓ music was always in my life from a childhood on. So that's the way I got my happiness. ⁓ Just to put a song on that meant something. ⁓
that would pick you up. But I think I had to go to the doctor this morning and sitting in the traffic. I don't want to tell all about our neighborhood, but oh my gosh, getting on to 210 was just killer. And you know, the hospital is just like, you could throw a ball over there, it feels like, but you're in there for 20 minutes.

Terry:
you

Jeanne:
And they put on songs and I was just having a great morning because boss gags came on singing that song, Georgia. And then next was Bill Withers with lovely day. And I was trying to see if I could hold my voice while he said day. Yeah. I don't know. I got to count how long he holds his voice. ⁓ And then I got back and I knew we were having our podcasts recorded and I was just like,

Terry:
That's amazing.

Jeanne:
It was a great day today, even though I complained about the rain. You already heard that. ⁓ But I get what you're saying. And I know a lot of people, they need that outlet and they need somebody to help guide them to that outlet. And you're really good at that. Very good at that. ⁓ So ⁓ here we go into the next part. We've covered some powerful meeting ground together here. I love everything you've been saying about what you're doing.

Terry:
Yeah, yeah.

Jeanne:
And now we're going to lighten things just a bit. I don't know though, your stories are wild. ⁓ We're going to light things just a bit before we head back to shore here. ⁓ It's time to play two truths and a lie. You sent over three story headlines ahead of time ⁓ and I'm going to display them on the screen here. Two are true and one not quite true, but I'm going to take a guess at which one I believe ⁓ is the lie or the not true.
And then for people playing along, they can also guess it. Don't tell us as you talk through the stories. However, for people listening, they can't see the screen, so I'm gonna read off all of these headlines. So give me a second to share my screen for those visually looking.

Jeanne:
All right, so the first headline ⁓ that you sent was, Terry escaped from a moving car and went from terror on the highway to a triumphant recovery of emotions and life success by embracing forgiveness. That's the first one. Number two, one day during her life travels, Terry accidentally joined a secret Himalayan meditation monastery. ⁓
I say this ⁓ is so funny to me and nearly became their new yoga leader. I don't know. That's wild. Number three, finding herself independent at the ⁓ young age of 16, Terry built a life of her own long before most kids learn to drive. All right, Terry, I'm going to turn it over to you. But I first, I'm to take a wild guess that number two isn't a lie because
That was just, that's just so wild. But, ⁓ start with number one and tell us that story.

Terry:
Sure. ⁓ Number one, I was sitting in a passenger seat of a moving car with a man that I once believed I loved, a man who had slowly turned my world into something very small and very dangerous.
And when I told him I was leaving, this time for real, something snapped in him, but that happened quite a lot. ⁓ And the rage came really fast. ⁓ He was shouting and threatening and he was, know, ⁓ violent blows were coming over toward my side of the car, ⁓ hitting me in the face and I kind of moved as far away from him as I could.
⁓ And he gripped the wheel even tighter and went faster. And he told me that we were both going to die. ⁓ And he was going to kill us before he'd ever let me go. And I remember time slowed down. I remembered the sound of the engine roaring and my heartbeat just pounding in my ears. ⁓ And the clarity just was rising in me like a lifeline. And I said, I am not dying today. And when we came through a nearby town,
He slowed down just slightly for a turn ⁓ and it was a second. And I just, I opened the car door and jumped out ⁓ and it was still moving. I kind of tumbled over the pavement and ⁓ I ran and I didn't look back. ⁓ I spotted a gas station and sprinted toward it. Like it was the only safe place in the world because at that time it really was. And

Jeanne:
You could still run after how fast was this car going?

Terry:
Well, he slowed down to probably, you know, 20 miles an hour at this point. So I, ⁓ I had learned, ⁓ you know, it's funny. I kind of credit this to my early horseback riding lessons. We had to learn how to jump off of a horse that was running. And maybe this was like why I had to learn that. ⁓ It was, it was kind of a dive in a, in a summer, somersault, you know, it was a,

Jeanne:
That's still fast when you're trying to get your feet on a pavement.


⁓ okay.

Terry:
forced dive in a somersault. Anyway, ⁓ I ran into this gas station and I ⁓ begged the attendant ⁓ to hide me someplace that there was a man chasing me and he didn't ask any questions. He pointed to a back office and I crawled under the desk and moments later my boyfriend stormed in demanding to know if anyone had seen me and the attendant was so calm and so brave and he lied and said he hadn't seen anybody and

Jeanne:
Mm.

Terry:
I was under the desk and I could hear every single word. He was searching the place and he just didn't think to look under the desk and I thought any moment he's gonna find me there. And I was trembling and I don't even think I breathed. Only after he left I was able to take a breath. And yeah, I called the police. I got help in a women's shelter.
You know, it's interesting because I went back several times. ⁓ I understand why women who suffered abuse go back. ⁓ And ⁓ I look back now not with shame, but with gratitude and strength I didn't know I had. And for all of the strangers who protected me and helped me when I needed it the most, even when I kept going back, because eventually I did escape ⁓ and I reclaimed my life ⁓ and I did have to have him arrested eight times.

Jeanne:
my gosh, eight times!

Terry:
for coming after me, even after that with an order of protection in place. But ⁓ fast forward 10 years later, I had this forgiving dream where I actually forgave him in my dream. And then it played out in real life where ⁓ we were together ⁓ and we spoke, ⁓ I said, I forgive you. And he said, I'm so sorry. And ⁓ I'll tell you, that was like one of the most amazing.

Jeanne:
⁓

Terry:
lessons of forgiveness and triumph and abuse that ⁓ I know of.

Jeanne:
wow. I can't even imagine it. Yeah, that's what, ⁓ you know, Christian faith that I have teaches you to forgive. But I mean, I'm not sure after that I would, I could do what you did and forgive that. It's so severely dangerous and so violent. don't know. I might be able to forgive in my corner years later, but not face to face. ⁓ that had to be really.

Terry:
Yeah.

Right. ⁓

Jeanne:
⁓ you know what cathartic, what is it called? Cathargic or whatever.

Terry:
⁓ Yeah, it was cathartic, but it was even more than that. It was such an affirmation of the power of forgiveness. ⁓ And, you know, to this day, I believe that that is why ⁓ I ⁓ can relate to so many women who are struggling ⁓ with this exact same situation of abuse. Because unless you've lived it, I don't think you could possibly understand it.

Jeanne:
Hmm.


you

Terry"
I don't think you could understand why, well, why do you go back? Why are you, what are you stupid? Like it's just what you do. You just keep going back because it's what you know and you're in that mindset.

Jeanne:
⁓ It's that codependency. You think it's gonna get better and you're gonna fix the person and you just, they'll get better, they will get better.

Terry:
Yep, and you have that need to help others because ⁓ you think that you're the only one that can help them. And what you don't realize is you're not helping, you're enabling.

Jeanne:
Yes.

Wow. So I don't know, ⁓ that sounds like that's true. ⁓ What about the next one? This one is the one I'm skeptical. ⁓

Terry:
Yeah, well this was really interesting. you ⁓ know, once I got through all of my interior design, I had healed my ⁓ frightened personality and decided to go into this ⁓ new ⁓ career and life choice as a life coach. My greatest reason for doing this is I wanted to travel. I wanted to travel the world and take people with me.

Jeanne:
Mm-hmm.

Terry:
and have them experience amazing life-changing practices in these beautiful places. And so I started exploring different areas and one of these areas was the Himalayas and I had this great opportunity, got a great deal and went there with a friend and
On this one particular day, my friend was busy doing something else that she wanted to do. And I said, you know, I'm going to go for a hike and see if this would be a great place to take my people. So I had gotten some information from one of the locals and it seemed to be perfectly aligned with how I empower others. And I was following what was thought of as a simple trail to this. was supposed to have this beautiful lookout point where you could the clouds and the mountains and it was supposed to be breathtaking.
⁓ And ⁓ as I mentioned, one of the locals had told me about it. And even though we were having a little bit of a communication issue, it still seemed like an easy hike for this particular area. And I figured it would be super. That's just so amazing opportunity to go take a look at it. ⁓ And it wasn't going to take long to get there. So as I went on this this hike, ⁓ the path led me to this ⁓ massive carved wooden gate that
the moment I approached it, it opened and I was like, what is happening right now? So I looked at it. Well, it seemed automatic at the time, right? Because I couldn't see what was behind it. And as I did look inside, there was a man dressed as a monk. So yeah, obviously it was a monk. And he said, welcome, we've been expecting you. And I was like, wait, what?

Jeanne:
automatically or you had monks behind it open it up?


⁓ I wasn't on the agenda. ⁓

Terry:
Right? But before I could correct him, he kind of ushered me into this really quiet courtyard area for tea where there were 15 monks there just kind of waiting in this circle for me. ⁓ And ⁓ I found out that they were waiting for a visiting yoga teacher whose arrival had been delayed. There was some storms and they assumed that I was her because I just kind of showed up at the same time.
So I was there ⁓ standing in front of the circle of monks and they were asking me about yoga. And of course I had already done a ⁓ yoga teacher training. It was for hot yoga, but I was actually doing my own kind of yoga that was more spiritual based. I was doing meditative yoga using the same. ⁓ Yeah, right. I mean, it wasn't a hot yoga per se because

Jeanne:
Okay. Hot yoga with monks. That would be weird. Okay. ⁓

Terry:
A lot of the moves are the same, the sequences are the same, but I do mine a little bit slower. So I ended up ⁓ leading them through this breath work session and guiding them through gentle movement and mindful breathing and ⁓ just ⁓ sharing from this pure instinct and heart because obviously the area was just so beautiful and breathtaking. was the perfect...

Jeanne:
Okay.

Terry:
ambiance and I'm so much about that anyways from my interior design. just, the moment I walked into this space, I was like, my God, I just, ⁓ I was meant to be here. So ⁓ when we finished the head monk kind of nodded and you know, thanked me, said that I teach with sincerity and ⁓ I explained that I wasn't the teacher they were looking for, but ⁓ apparently the teacher did arrive the next morning.
⁓ And I was able to meet her because I went back and she heard ⁓ what happened. ⁓ And we all had a great laugh about it. it was just, ⁓ it's a great reminder that sometimes the most meaningful experiences appear when you just follow a path, even when it's not the one you think you're supposed to be going to or not the one you think you're on. Because you're never, ⁓ well, you're never.

Jeanne:
Yeah.

That was destined to happen. There's no other way to think about that. ⁓ But you didn't have a yoga mat with you. Did they have everything for you?

Terry:
You're not aware you-
Yeah, I mean, they had all of that there. So it wasn't like I needed that. So you don't really need a yoga mat to teach yoga, but it's nice to have. But one of the things I've learned in my life is you're never where you are for the reason you think you are. And if you can let go of your expectations of why you're where you are and just have an open mind and allow the universe to find you.

Jeanne:
That's interesting.

Terry:
that happens in the most unexpected, amazing ways.

Jeanne:
⁓ Okay. ⁓ I think that one sounds, ⁓ well, I'll show my ignorance to geography. I don't know where the Himalayas again.

Terry:
They are in ⁓ Asia.

Jeanne:
Not to, they're not Tibet, are they? No. What's in Tibet? huh.

Terry:
You know, I'm not that familiar with a lot of those areas either, so I'm not sure.

Jeanne:
okay. I was just curious. ⁓ Okay. ⁓ So, all right. The third one, what did you, well, we kind of, that one's believable because you talked about it a little bit earlier. So I do want to say more about number three.

Terry:
Well, just, I think you mentioned that I had declared myself an independent minor at the age of 16. ⁓ My mother's alcoholism had made my home unsafe and my father had died when I was 11. So I had no real plan, just a deep knowing that I needed to take care of myself. So ⁓ I worked mornings as a co-op student at IBM and I looked older than 16 and carried myself that way.

Jeanne:
Mm.

You're an IBMer?

Terry:
I was when I was 16.

Jeanne:
well, join the club. I was too. ⁓

Terry:
Right? ⁓ And I headed to high school after ⁓ my working day in the morning to finish my classes. And then to officially rent my first apartment, I added a couple of years to my age on my application. And the landlord believed it. And suddenly I was paying bills and trying to hold my life together. But despite the independence, I still carried those wounds, right, that we talked about. ⁓

Jeanne:
Right.

Terry:
⁓ the wounds of my past, I still lived with that victim mindset and I didn't yet understand and I attracted an abusive boyfriend, one I mentioned before. ⁓ And he moved in almost immediately and he had a drug problem, he sold drugs from the apartment and then he often came home violent. His jealousy was so intense that he once stormed through IBM security to confront me at work. ⁓ And then they threatened that if it happened again, I would lose my job. ⁓

Jeanne:
⁓ no, really?

Terry:
Here I was, 16, supporting myself, trying to keep my job, going to school, surviving a relationship. I had no tools to navigate. ⁓ looking back, I see that the strength it took just to keep going was remarkable. I just didn't know it then, but every hard moment was shaping ⁓ me for who I would eventually become. ⁓ And now I'm resilient and self-reliant and determined to build a life far beyond all of those early shadows.

Jeanne:
Well, I am glad you're safe and that, you know, ⁓ it sounds like the violence was pretty extreme. So I'm glad you are here today and you look great. So, ⁓ so which ones will I tell us?

Terry:
It's number two. ⁓ You were right. You got it right. ⁓ I should have probably looked a little bit deeper into the geography because I'm not ⁓ really that familiar with it either. But gosh, that'd be fun, right?

Jeanne:
⁓ okay. ⁓ I got it right.

okay. But you had it. Yeah, that'd be kind of cool. Did you have any kind of experience with teaching yoga to any monks? ⁓

Terry:
⁓ Not to any months, but I am a certified yoga instructor. I am ⁓ a certified hot yoga instructor and I do my own ⁓ spiritual practice with yoga. So I have a hot yoga room here in my home.

Jeanne:
Okay.

okay. Wow.

Terry:
Yeah, so I've, every morning I put on my meditation ⁓ track. Sometimes it's the Deepak meditation. Sometimes it's just high frequency music. And I go through my flow and do my affirmations and get my mind and body in alignment with the higher frequencies so that I can create my most successful day.

Jeanne:
But isn't it supposed to be hot in there? Like, do you have a heater? ⁓

Terry:
I have ⁓ far infrared heat lamps on the ceiling. I had them installed.

Jeanne:
So you do have, it is a hot yoga studio. ⁓

Terry:
Yeah, I can get it up to 120 degrees in there. Yeah. Sometimes during the summer, all I have to do is open my windows. ⁓

Jeanne:
You don't have to worry. I was going to say there's no reason and ⁓ sometimes of the season here in Florida, you don't have to worry about it. ⁓ well this has been so much fun. mean, you are such a, you know, happy and, ⁓ thankful spirit and you've just given us so much information about yourself and what you've gone through as well as, ⁓ just ⁓ how to have a happy life.

Terry:
That's right.

Jeanne:
if ⁓ you're struggling. So ⁓ I know people will wanna get in touch with you and I do have information and I'm just gonna go to this page here where we have all the information on how to contact Terry. ⁓ She has given us a great quote here, I'll let you say it and then tell everyone how to reach you.

Terry :
Yeah, I spent most of my life learning and then unlearning that life is a struggle and understanding that my true purpose in life is happiness.

Terry:
So feel free to contact me, reach out to me. I have online courses. ⁓ I have a six week online course called Live the Life You Love, which takes you all the way through undoing, understanding your early childhood trauma, ⁓ optimizing your mind, your body, your environment, understanding what and who you are, because most of us don't know that even. We weren't born with an owner's manual. I think most of us take better care of our automobiles than we do of ourselves.

Jeanne:
Mm-hmm.

Terry:
which is really sad. ⁓

Jeanne:
I'm not sure about that. think mine needs washing, maybe a tuna, but I know. ⁓ Yes! ⁓

Terry:
⁓ Well, at least we put the right fuel in it, right? ⁓ I mean, if we want it to run correctly, we don't put the right fuel in this ⁓ for sure, right? And ⁓ we just don't appreciate what we have. We have the world's most advanced computer system ⁓ right here in our mind, in our body. And ⁓ if we had to pay for it, we'd probably take a lot better care of it.

Jeanne:
Right. That's true. ⁓

Absolutely, ⁓ Well.

Terry:
But I have information on how to do all that and actually live a life you love.

Jeanne:
Okay, well Terry, thank you so much again for being here and spending time with us. ⁓ For those of you listening, I hope you will join again next episode to find out what the life is for another fantastic guest ⁓ because they're all different. Everybody's having their own fun out there. ⁓ I just love listening to what other people are doing. So thank you so much. Stay tuned. Bye for now.