If You Don't Slow Down, Your Body Will Make You

In this powerful episode of Ask Coach Dorie, I sit down with stress management expert, speaker, and 6-time Amazon #1 bestselling author Lolita Guarin to have a real, unfiltered conversation about stress, burnout, and the truth behind why so many high-achieving women are running on empty.

Lolita shares her journey from immigrating to the U.S. and chasing the “American Dream” to working herself into a life-threatening health crisis. What she discovered will challenge everything you think you know about stress.

We’re not just talking about being “busy.”
We’re talking about generational conditioning, childhood trauma, and a society that rewards burnout.

🔥 In this episode, we cover:

✔️How childhood conditioning creates a “burned-out personality”
✔️Why hustle culture keeps women stuck in survival mode
✔️The hidden signs your stress is turning into burnout
✔️How stress shows up in your body before you realize it
✔️Why self-care feels uncomfortable (and even wrong)
✔️The power of delegation and doing less—not more

Lolita’s CALM Process to take control of your stress

This episode is your wake-up call:
👉 If you don’t slow down, your body will do it for you.

💬 Ask yourself:
Are you managing your stress… or ignoring it until it manages you?

Book a call with Lolita:

https://beamazingyou.lpages.co/book-a...

On the call, we explore where they are feeling stuck, stressed, burned out, or unclear, and identify practical next steps that fit their situation.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:35

Hello and welcome to Don't Ask Me Shit, the podcast where we stop pretending, stop sugarcoating, and stop dancing around the real issues. I'm Coach Dory of Stress Management and Relationship Recovery Coach, here to help people heal from toxic family, friends, and romantic partnerships. This is a space for conversations that people avoid relationships, accountability, self-sabotage, healing, boundaries, you know, all the messy stuff that people don't want to talk about. So here's the deal. You can ask Coach Dory anything, but if you're not ready to do the work, then don't ask me shit because I'm not here to co-sign your excuses. I'm here to help you grow. So with that being said, let's dig in. Today, I have a very special guest on. Her name is Lolita. Please forgive me if I mispronounced your last name. Is that correct? Yes, of course. I don't think it matters what my last name is, as long as the message is good. Well, Miss Lolita is a stress management expert, speaker, coach, six-time, Amazon number one best-selling author, creator of the calm process, and story to impact mentor. She helps audiences move from stress and burnout into clarity, confidence, and self-trust with practical tools that can help you. You that you that can help practical tools that you can use right away. So welcome, um, Lolita. How are you doing today? I'm super excited to be here with you and chat. That's great. So um I want to ask you, you're um, you're an immigrant. And so how did you where where are you from? And how did you get into this work of stress management?

SPEAKER_03 2:27

So I came from Lithuania 26 years ago. And uh I came um, you know, to find that American dream with the the money tree is, you know, where you just go and pluck all the dollars, uh, because everything looks amazing in the movies, right? Oh no, but just all the all the jokes aside. I mean, obviously, I knew that's the land of you know opportunities if you want to work hard, and uh that's what I did. So I worked overtime and um got more work, and co-workers will come and ask me, can I do more? And I'll say, Yes, of course. And obviously, there's no time for any lunching because, like, whatever I find in a break room, cold pizza or donuts, that will work for me. And uh, only exercise I left, I did only go into the ladies' room. You know, that was my exercise for the day when I need to get up away from my desk. Um, but you see, what I'm saying here is nothing new. You know, when you really look in our society, that's how a lot of us operate. It's like we just work and then go home, go to sleep. And of course, uh, occasionally you have to take care of your kids. And then again, the same thing from Monday to Friday, and sometimes even involves weekends. But um, so I work to the point that um it really messed up my hormones. And any women listening in, they know that you want to be friends with your hormones, and uh that basically um really pushed my body to the point where I end up in the emergency room. And uh the doctor told me that this really has to do with stress. And I mean, I was in my 30s, and I'm like, you know, only old people get sick. I mean, I'm not supposed to be in an emergency room, you know. Uh yeah, so um then I started doing some uh stress management because obviously I realized okay, I need to start doing something, and I didn't want to just pop a pill and walk around like zombie because you know, it was not like I was anxious or something. I was like, oh, I'm just burnt out, you know, like this is looks like a normal thing, like everybody's dealing. And um, but then I realized I don't want to drink anything. And also, you know, when I was talking with few doctors, you're like, well, you just need to take this under control, like really look in your life. What is that you do? And bad nutrition and no exercise, bad sleep, obviously. And then I started applying what they call stress management bandages. Um, and it helped, it helped. And I became so passionate about helping other people that I became a coach. And um, but then there was one part missing. Um, I always felt like it was it was good what I was doing, you know. And anybody who you ask about stress management, and you yourself stress management coach, so you know, you have a plethora of tools that somebody can use. Um, and I remember was reading in the book how to get coaching clients, and the author mentioned something that I never heard of before. She said that her dad was alcoholic, and my dad was alcoholic too. This is the first time that I discovered that there is a terminology specifically for kids like me. It's called adult children of alcoholics. And you know, my dad was a lot of times functioning alcoholic, you know, he'll go to work and he comes back, but there were days that he will be coming back very drunk and he was very violent. So, what happened is that I grew up in the environment where I was constantly stressed and afraid, and you know, child needs to feel safe and seen and loved. You know, that's like normal human needs, and that was really not provided for me. And what happened, I uh to be stressed and hyper-vigilant, that was my threshold. So when I became an immigrant and I started working more, you know, all of those chains. Mind you, when I came to this to the US, I I didn't speak even English, you know. I I learned I knew other languages, but not English. So there were a lot of things that I had to overcome, not only uh working hard, but also the language, the culture, you know. I didn't know anyone here when I came. And that's when I added more stress into my system, and that's what the body said, I cannot take this anymore. And uh that's how I became a stress management expert, because you know what they say, if you uh done something for 10,000 hours that you can claim a label of uh stress and an expert. Since I've been stressing out since I was a child, I think I qualify to be an expert by now.

SPEAKER_00 7:02

You said a lot of things there that I didn't even consider that would be um hidden stressors that we, some of us in the states, wouldn't even have to deal with. I mean, I didn't even think about the stress that's coming from not speaking a language and not understanding the culture. So that I'm sure even compounded the stress that you were feeling. Um, let's go back to the childhood conditioning a little bit. Um, how do you think that the childhood conditioning really shaped how you responded to your stress as an adult?

SPEAKER_03 7:36

So when we think about for those who are listening, uh uh if you were born in a different family, you're probably very different adult right now. Right? If you were born in different culture, you probably will appreciate the different things that you're appreciating right now. So it's all about you know, children always learn from an example, and so generational trauma that I discovered that is what's really causing our stress because we carry this stressed out, burnout personality that we learn from our parents. Wow, and they learn from their parents, so it's going from generation to generation, and then we can say, Well, well, this is stupid. Why would you why would you carry you know stress the way you act, and you know, when they think about my parents, and you can think about yours, and those who's listening in, you can think about whatever you came from. I don't know, but my parents never told me that they need to sit down and calm down and do breathing exercises, and I should not overwhelm myself.

SPEAKER_00 8:51

They didn't teach you how to deal with big feelings.

SPEAKER_03 8:56

You wanna you wanna shut up, sit down, and you're gonna do what I'm telling you to do.

SPEAKER_00 9:00

Right, right. So I can see how that when you're when you're now as an adult dealing with big feelings, you just sit down and shut up. You don't know how to work through them. And so that's that's that's good. Um why do you think so many high-achieving women normalize these patterns, though?

SPEAKER_03 9:24

Because that's what we saw uh when we were growing up. And uh you know, even if you don't pay attention to uh childhood, even right now, when you look at our society, everywhere is this hustling, hustling culture, right? Everybody's pushing, pushing, pushing. You need to do more and more. And uh what really explained very well uh when I first time I heard the Dr. uh Gabur Mate, I'm sure you know who that is, um, and maybe I'm even pronouncing his name, but uh wrong. But he explained very well. It says, um, in our society right now, we are eager to be so productive because what happens is when we grow up in an environment where we are not loved and seen and appreciated for who we are, just the way we are, without doing anything, then we learn that we need to earn the love and appreciation, we need to be productive. And as you know, we are you know tribe people, we are herd animals, we need to belong to the group because then how this is how we survive. So then, if the rest of the group is is saying that you need to be productive, you need to be, you know, going after your goals, you you need to be in this hustle society, you will be afraid to say something against it because you feel that you'll be excluded. But also, when you if you come from that kind of childhood that you uh learned and your parents were kind of teaching you by the example that you need to keep on push yourself to the point of exhaustion, but you still need to deliver, you will think that this is totally normal. And then this hustle society telling you that, yeah, that this is normal, this is what we reward, then you know you'll be going to the point that you're not just exhausted soul, but you actually will make yourself sick.

SPEAKER_00 11:14

Wow, that's interesting. You just made a cut. I never thought about that as far as that herd mentality. My children, they went to uh the middle school that they went to, they were, I think they their mascot was tigers. And a group of tigers were an ambush. And so whenever one of the students did not behave accordingly, and it could be anything, they were actually de-ambushed and put over to the side. And so when you said that, I can picture us as a societal, as a society, when we don't do what other people and it it could be corrective behavior. I mean, they were doing things that they weren't supposed to that got them de-ambushed, but that same mentality, if we don't do what everyone else wants us to do around us, we get de-ambushed, and nobody wants to be ostracized. So yeah, we I can see where we've learned those types of behaviors or learn to go with the flow, do what everyone else is doing while we were growing up.

SPEAKER_03 12:23

And when you think about in in incarceration, right? Those uh who did bad things, right? When they get in the fight inside jail or prison or whatever it's called, what do they do? They put them in isolation because this is what we count as the worst thing that can happen to you. I be to be isolated.

SPEAKER_00 12:43

Wow, so that I could so that shows up in us too as high achieving women doing what everyone else does because you don't want to be isolated. Wow, that's interesting. Um, I had another question right behind that. Uh so you talked about even how your stress turned up um in your body, and the doctors didn't know what was going on. Can you share what some of those symptoms are things that they say was normal, but you just knew that something wasn't right?

SPEAKER_03 13:20

So it uh the stress really this the stress caused the inflammation, and then all of that added into the hormones in my body that were just not balanced anymore. So what happened is that it impacted my cycle to the point that I will bleed all the time, and it will maybe be a few days when I wasn't. So when I went to emergency room, the doctor told me that if I would have not come that time, I would have not survived till the morning, I would have bled to death.

SPEAKER_00 14:01

Wow. So, what are some of the other warning signs that even working with your clients and things that you would tell women to and people in general, but women to look out for where they need to kind of pay attention to the their stress levels?

SPEAKER_03 14:20

So uh definitely we need to do find something that happens before it's your body says that you need to stop. So, you know, when we feel like stressed, then of course, you know, you that the regulars like, oh, you don't have enough sleep, but then again, that can give caused by some other things. Also, those who have kids, I mean, are you kidding me? You get seven to eight hours of sleep every night. I'm like, when does that happen? You know, when you retire, maybe you know, so it's like when somebody brings up the sleep, I'm like, I'm just gonna roll my eyes or whatever. But um, what really you need to pay attention, uh, how to know that uh your stress is getting to the point that is uh is is going to burnout territory, and the burnout will cause you physical things, is when you start being annoyed, you know, when you start like you get annoyed with things, you lose your patience, you start being snappy, you know, like when you know, like somebody cuts you off in traffic and you immediately like trying to, you know, you're gonna hunt them down, and you know, um, when you snap at people that you love, you lose patience because that's mean you don't have the bandwidth anymore to carry the load. So that is, I think the ones um what you even even if somebody they can say, um, oh, it's not me. You know, like when you act like like you feel like you're normal, you and then somehow something sh happens that you don't even recognize yourself. You're like, I can't, I can I cannot, I mean, why did I talk like that? Why, why, why got all you know triggered here? Somebody said something, and then I like told him take them wrong way, and that's not like me. And yes, because that is not like you. This is the version of you that is stressed out and burnout, and now you are in defense mode. And then also when you you also start paying attention when you feel completely hopeless, when you think, like, you know what, I just had it, I'm not gonna do anything anymore. I'm just gonna have my phone and I'm gonna scroll to the Instagram or something to the videos, and I'm not gonna stop because I want to leave this body because I feel I cannot take it anymore, so I'm just gonna withdraw.

unknown 16:40

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 16:42

And you know, everyone can have their own different things, but I think when you notice something that now changed the way you react to things, what it used to be, now that's the time for you to start paying attention for sure. And you and I have clients who come to me, you know, and they say, um, they're like, okay, you need to fix my my stress. I might, you know, I my stress levels of, you know, like my I talk about my doctor, you know, and the blood pressure and all of this, fix fix my stress. And um, so now I'm I'm gonna give you an exercise to do or a device that will be very easy to see. And I invite uh the listeners to do the same exercise. So now let's imagine that you come for a stress management session, and now I'm gonna tell you actually, that's a very good advice. The advice is every hour, well, okay, for a few hours, I guess, um, you put an alarm on your phone, and um whatever rings, like an you know, alarm, like a reminder, you stop doing whatever you're doing, of course, if it's safe, if you're not driving, and all the disclaimers, and then you do nothing for one minute, not much, just for one minute. So, when I just said that, what do you think?

SPEAKER_00 18:01

What is that gonna fit? One minute, it and and one minute is not a long time, but it's like with nothing, nothing, no thinking, no nothing. I got a little nervous. It's like, what is my body getting ready to tell me?

SPEAKER_03 18:17

You see, because this this is this this thing of we don't even allow ourselves to relax. So when somebody comes to me and they uh and they ask me to help them, and I tell them, okay, this is what you need to do, I am not even looking what they're gonna say, but what their reaction happens. So I'm happy that you share this with you. I mean, with us. Many also tell me, only one minute, what is it gonna do for me? Um that's this is stupid. I never heard of such a stupid thing. So we find all of those excuses, you know, or somebody can uh I heard they said one minute is not gonna help me. I need something more serious.

SPEAKER_00 18:55

Right. Well, see, but I'm looking to you as the expert. So if you say one minute, I know you're getting ready to teach me something profound. It's like something's getting ready to happen here.

SPEAKER_03 19:07

So the why I'm asking that question or giving this advice, like, hey, you should do this, is um it's about self-care. It's about honoring your needs. Because um, we get stressed out and burned out because we're not honoring our needs, the needs of rest of the need of not people please, of putting ourselves first, um, you know, and then so many people get triggered by putting yourself first, you know, like the self-love, so selfish. Oh, and you know, I tell you, one when I, you know, I got what I got from and then doctors tell me I need to slow down and you know, stress less, whatever. I've heard some opinions that there's somebody said, Oh my gosh, this is all you need to do, you just need to love yourself. And I got so triggered, I thought I'm gonna punch that person. Wow. And I I understand now now where they came from because where I when I grew up with this um childhood trauma of not feeling that I'm good enough to be loved and appreciated the way I am, um when somebody tells me I need to love myself, I took this as what there's another thing that I need to do, and I'm already doing so much, and I don't know how to do that. As if you were doing something wrong by not loving yourself, yes, and then I got very hopeless because uh, well, guess what? Nobody told me how to love myself, they they taught me how to hate myself, yes, but then it's like what the love is, and you know, and when we looked at the relationships, and uh I know why I married my ex-husband, because uh he really just showed exactly what my parents how they treated me. So for me, that was normal, that those are the relationships for me. Love was actually actually that was true. Pain, the pain that I took from them that you know I I felt I took that was love. Like, okay, do you they hurting me? That's mean they love me, right? Right. So it's very hard to love yourself or honor your needs when you've been told that it's the wrong thing to do, and especially women, we through centuries being told that we know we're supposed to sacrifice, we're supposed to be the martyrs, right? We're like constantly giving and giving and giving and giving. And how dare you to think about your own needs?

SPEAKER_00 21:43

Yes, you go from being someone's daughter to someone's husband to someone's wife to someone's mother, and it's never really ever about you. And so, yeah, learning how what is what is self-care, what is loving myself. I'm not supposed to do that, and you're such a whore. Mother, if you put yourself in before your children, and and that's not what self-love is. But yeah, we've we've been we've been sold a raw deal for a very, very long time.

SPEAKER_03 22:15

And I'd add a little bit more to this, especially when the women come to me and um you know they say, Oh, I don't have time, we're all of this, and I'm so stressed out. I have three businesses to run, and I have two kids, and I have aging parents. I mean, I don't have time for this. Give me something simple to do that I do it and get over it. And and and they always say, Okay, so when you're in the hospital, who's gonna take care of those kids of that business of those aging parents? Wow. So you really need to take care of yourself in order to give to others, you know, that whole of how dare you to be selfish, you know, like taking care of yourself first, like how selfish. No, you need to take care of yourself so you can take care of others. So if if somebody's listening in now and they feel uh ashamed of that they can take 15 minutes break, or you know what, just do and don't cook tonight, and you open a can of tuna and say this is what's for dinner, and stop people pleasing, this is what you need to do without feeling ashamed. Because, and here's another thing, especially about those mothers. Uh, like we said at the beginning of the conversation, we as children learn from our parents. So, you know, if somebody now listening in and they still have an issue with giving to themselves, but they do have kids in the house, guess what? You not taking care of yourself, you teaching your kids not to take care of themselves. So don't be surprised when your daughter gets married and then she's gonna be stressed out and burnout. Guess what? She just showing exactly the same thing what you taught her. So it's not only about you that you, you, yeah, who listening in right now and thinking, I'm ashamed of taking, I don't have time for this and all this. No, it's the way you behave. This is how other people around you taking example from you. And also when we start taking care of ourselves, even for any, you know, look, I say stress management should not be stressful, it doesn't have to be grandeur stuff because we think that stress is very big deal because it is. So the solution is supposed to be this big deal, but it isn't. So even if you do something small, and let's say that the same example of, you know, saying, you know what, guys, I am busy tonight. I mean, I'm tired tonight, so we're gonna eat tuna sandwich, and this is what's gonna be for dinner, and you're teaching your kids that of you know, I'm tired. This is what we're gonna do. So your kids are gonna learn, you know what, I'm gonna honor my knees, I am tired. But also, when we stressed out and burnout, you remember I told you about snapping at people you love and losing your patience and being annoyed. Imagine you're all stressed out and burned out, and your kid comes to you and it says, you know, like, hey mama, look at my pink picture painting I did whatever at school. You're so burned out, you don't have a bandwidth to give anymore. You're gonna snap at that poor kid. So then you're basically inflicting that childhood trauma. The poor kid's gonna think, mommy doesn't love me, I'm not good enough. And here we go.

SPEAKER_00 25:10

We're going through another generation, right? You know, my mother and I just had this conversation because um there was she's a single mom, worked in the corporate world, we're we're African-American women, so she worked a male-dominated field, she had a lot of things going on there. This is the 70s and 80s, and um she had it was in toxic relationships, and us children always realize that we enjoyed her way more when she was by herself, and you know, you kind of feel guilty because you don't want your mom to feel lonely or anything. But the part of the reason was because when she was not in a relationship, she didn't snap at us, she spent time with us, she was present, but whenever there was someone there and that relationship was rocky, she was not herself and she would yell at us. And it just dawned on me two weeks ago, it's like her nervous system was dysregulated. I didn't know that, she didn't know that because it wasn't common for and and and we've done a lot of studies over the years to understand that this was not something that was acceptable, acceptable or common then, but you're right. We do tend to not be ourselves and snap at our children and just people around us in general when we're stressed out, and then you even make a point about your self-care. You were talking about tuna sandwiches for dinner. I know I get a lot of flack because I use I I have my groceries delivered any chance I get, and so many times people are like, that's so lazy. You need to go in the store, you need to do and it's like, do you know the pressure that pushing an order button on my phone takes off of me? Even if I just order it and have one of my kids go pick it up, that's one less thing I have to worry about. I'm building my grocery list as the week goes along, and when Sunday comes, boom, submit. That's it. But we look at things like that, like you said, things have to be hard. I don't want to go to the grocery store. Having someone bring me my groceries, that's easy. That helps me, and I can relax and do other things that need to be done.

SPEAKER_03 27:20

And so um, I'm sorry to interrupt you, but there's something that uh when I was interviewing about close to 200 um small business owners for when I was writing my book, stress while you work, um, probably seven, eight years ago. Um, the most successful small companies, um, they were of course making a lot of money, and the owners were telling me that they don't really stress much. So naturally, you know, I told them, well, of course you don't stress much because you have all this money. And they told me no, the everything changed for them when they started delegating. Yes, because you know, when we like if you know, like you go to any small uh not necessarily small, but any networking event, uh, there's always somebody and a lot of people who, you know, what they say wearing all the hats, you know, in an accountant, you in the marketing and the social media and everything, and you know, you're trying to make your business, so you're gonna do everything. And so those the successful owners that they told me, they said they really start delegating to other people things, and then they spend that time on taking care of their own mental stability, but also they start um doubling on the time that uh worked for them because they're the ones who knew how to do that specific thing. So let's say somebody was very good with sales, they were going and you know, doing double the sales, but then they hired an accountant who actually did the bills or the social security, social media and things. So now, when you give me this example, this is amazing because you, as a mom, you delegated your groceries to be delivered to you, and not that you helped your own stress levels, but you're also helping the economy because guess what? Somebody had a job because they needed to put all of those groceries in the bag and they go.

SPEAKER_00 29:17

I had someone tell me it was so weird because I never thought about it. They said that, well, I don't wanna I don't want to have someone bring me my groceries because I feel like I'm using them and making them my servant. And it's like you're giving them a job, and you just said that it's like if you're not ordering your groceries, they don't have work. So you are helping other people, even while you're helping yourself. While you're helping yourself at home, you're helping your children, you're helping your spouse, you're helping your family and friends because you're not a big stress ball stressing everybody out, and they have to either tiptoe around you or cater to you to make sure you're okay. And so, yeah, that's that's good delegation. So now that we've gone through all of that, the calm process. What is the calm process and how does this help people uh get back to regulated nervous systems?

SPEAKER_03 30:15

So I came up with this um four-step process. Uh, one I was doing a lot of stress management on myself, and I tried out different things uh to clients and realized um it's all about what is that we do with um about how we think about things. Because when you really think, the stress really starts in our minds, and it's like a train. You know, if you allow it to start rolling slowly and you will stop it, then you can manage the situation. But if you allow it to run through it, then it's just gonna pick up the speed when it's very hard to catch it, and then that's when you can see it in the burnout and in your body manifesting and stuff like that. So I'm invite now, everyone who's listening in, who wants to participate, of course. So think about some stressful situation. And it could be, you know, it could be simple, like you're sitting in traffic and you're late to work, or um it could be also a health scare, or could be you know anything smaller, but it doesn't matter. Um, so the column starts with the letter C, and C stands for control. And what you need to think about your stressful situation is what is um what can you control? Can you control people? No. Can you control the weather or politics or no? But you sure can control um, let's say you are, you know, started to exercise and you want to get in a better shape. Can you control that? Yes, you can control that. So then this is how you you first you decide can you control it, can you not? Now it can get very hopeless here because there are a lot of people who have so much stress about finances or the jobs or the other people that are involved in this. Then it's like, well, you told me that I cannot control people, so that's it. That's this is it. I'm just I'm feeling completely hopeless. No, hold on, because one thing that you for sure can control is your attitudes and then your actions that you will do that has to do with this specific stressful situation. So then you go to the letter A, and A stands for appreciation or acceptance. I believe that there's always silver lining in any situation, you know, and then somebody can say, How how dare you to say that, you know, like I, you know, my mother now has cancer, and don't tell me that this is fun, this is no fun. Like, how can what silver lining you talk about? But you know, there are so many uh cases that um you know we can find that when someone got sick, this is for them was that that time that they needed to take care, you know, for themselves. They this is the time when they actually got to read a book, when they uh really start appreciating of that they have family, that they have friends, and there's nothing you know that it puts you in a mood of um or in in appreciation that oh my gosh, I love this life and I want to have this coffee and then listen to birds chirping when you are in a place where they're telling you that you may not live long, then you really start appreciating, right? I don't know, this is very harsh example, but uh there are plenty of times that you know they say when something's taking it away from you, then you realize that you're really you know appreciating that. So in and even let's say you were applying for a job and you didn't get a job, and now you're like, oh my gosh, this is very stressful for me because I don't know how how I'm gonna find a job. But maybe in a and I love the saying, and I don't remember who I heard that from years ago, but it says, you don't know what you've been saved from.

SPEAKER_00 34:00

Oh my gosh, I say that so many times. It's wow, yes.

SPEAKER_03 34:06

Yeah. So we don't see, you know, we we don't know what will happen. So if we have faith that this is actually all working out for us and um and not to be hopeless, like no, that I still can do some things, this is not hopelessness, but really acknowledging, and this step is very important also uh by that is allowing us to really ground and look at the thing and not run away because you cannot change anything if you're running away from the thing, right? So you really look at it and you say, Okay, this thing is in front of me, this is what it is. So then you have to move to the two other letters, L and M. And here I ask, uh, you know, is it better if we take a piece of paper and write it down? But of course, you can do this in your head as well. Um, and you making a list of all of the action steps that you're already taking that has to do with that stressful situation. So uh let's say someone who wants to get in a better shape in the bikini body by the summer, uh, what does that do now? Right? So you write it down, all right. Well, I'm I'm I'm eating now better, I'm going for a walk, and and then I'm drinking three glasses of wine with my friends every time I see them on Tuesday and Thursday and Friday and Saturday. Yeah, you know me. So then when you list all of this and you know, and uh everything that you you you can uh put on the paper, even small things. Um, I I even ask uh it's a good idea even to talk with your friend. If you really want to have an insight, you can ask other people around you what they think, uh, and point it to you what you actually do that you think that you're not doing or you're not even paying attention to. And so then you look at that list and you ask yourself, okay, what doesn't work for me?

SPEAKER_02 36:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 36:01

So, you know, that walking around the block and uh going to the gym probably is working for you. But when you think, how many calories does actually wine has, then you think, oh shoot, you know, I'm like shooting myself in the foot here. So, and here is I think is the core of the whole calm process, which is can be very, very triggering, and uh, and that is what's keeping us stressed, I think, is we need to really have enough courage to ask ourselves, okay, so I understand it's not working for me, and they call insanity if you're continuously doing the same thing but expect different results. But the key is why are you keep on doing this? And then you could look like, oh, you think I'm stupid, why would I continue doing this? But we do, yeah, and that is this part when we were just talking about the childhood trauma, about not about the trauma, let's say, but the patterns, the patterns that you learn how to deal with things. So if everybody's in your family having three glasses of and listen, this is an example. When I stopped drinking any alcohol, because I was actually on a diet, and I and I heard that that's not good to drink alcohol if you exercises and things, and uh, I went to my you know, multiple parties with my friends, and they got offended that I was not drinking anymore. They took it personally, right? Because, you know, the same that herd animal, you know, that the the tribe is like, how dare you to do something differently than us, right? And uh so it will it would not be working for me if I will be continuously doing drinking wine because I want the people, please. So this is what also brings a lot of loyalties. So we continuously doing some things, even if we comprehend that it's not working for us, but we keep on doing because we don't want to bring the loyalty to our parents, to our cultures, to our patterns that we learn, to even the identity of this new identity who I want to be, because I don't want to abandon myself. So it takes a lot of courage really to decide that you know what, I'm going to break those loyalties and I'm going to do what's good for me because now it's new me. Also, don't forget, right? Our brain loves to be safe. We're gonna continue doing the same thing, you know, until no matter what there's no way back, but because that's safe. We know how to handle it's familiar.

SPEAKER_00 38:29

It's familiar, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 38:31

Our brain doesn't handle new stuff, and then also has to do a lot of if especially if um if we want to do something new that it will improve our lives or will change the identity or something in our appearance or the way we act or our uh you know goals or something. We don't want to abandon our friends and family members, you know. We don't we want to take the we don't want to just leave the village, you know. We want to take the village with us, but we cannot take the village with us, so then we're gonna stay in the village, even if you know it's with suffering, we're just gonna suffer all together. Um, so we need to have enough courage to break those loyalties, but um, also most of the time, um, when you start doing something for yourself, we need to remember, like I said already before, by our example, we influence people around us. So then, you know, when you say, you know what, I'm not gonna drink those three glasses of wine and uh because it's not good for me, then somebody else in the group, and actually that happened to me. Uh, I had other two friends deciding that they now stop drinking as well.

SPEAKER_02 39:38

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 39:38

And then it became normal, like, okay, good. So you want to drink, you drink, you don't want to drink, you don't want to drink. But when you really think about it, this is how us humans are. Like, if you're doing something differently than I am doing, I'm feeling like I'm threatened.

SPEAKER_00 39:51

Right.

SPEAKER_03 39:53

And if we just agree of like you do you, and if it's good for you, you do it. We give permission to ourselves, then we'll be fine. But we, the adults who are in any stressful situation that inside we are still children that are looking for approval and validation. And when the authority will say, Yes, you can, then we can proceed.

SPEAKER_00 40:15

Wow, right.

SPEAKER_03 40:17

So then now we know we know what we L stands for limit. We're gonna limit what doesn't work, right? And if we have difficulty with that, then we definitely need to ask help for a therapist or coaches or somebody else who've done this thing um to help us to stop doing whatever we're doing, but then it's very important um to acknowledge something that we're doing well, and that's what the M stands for. It's for multiply. Okay, multiply what works, and you know, I've done uh dealt with a lot of people, they come to me and they say, No, nothing works, nothing works, and I said, Well, guess guess what? You are here talking to me, that is self-care, yeah. That is asking for help, yes, that is honoring your needs, so you just need to do a little bit more of that. Yes, and even we do something small, we need to reward ourselves, and we need to also give ourselves credit. And I love, I think there was Jack Canfield that I heard this first time. He said, write it down on the list of all of your achievements, even small ones, you know. This is nothing new, you know. Everybody's probably already know this, but have we done this? Right and really acknowledging of how you know how far we came, you know, and even when you were a child, maybe you didn't know how to read and write, and now you can, yay! And it looks like it's something simple, but there are still adults that don't know how to read and write. So if something looks so small to you, it doesn't mean that it's really small, right? So then you start multiplying of the things that works for you, and you know, and I say here, it's very important to do something every single day that makes your heart sing. And I always hear this well, you know what? I would love to go on a cruise and every single day. It's like, yes, you can, but if you cannot, you still can do something small, like read a book, for example. Let's say you you know, and they say, No, I don't have time for this. I'm like, how about you read one page? You know, if this is what you like doing it. And again, it doesn't have to be big. But what happens will you honor your needs, and this is what why this calm process is about. The moment when you go through this process is yes, it will be very eye-opening. Uh, you will uh sit there with you and really look at the beast, and you will identify scary parts uh that you're doing that don't work, it needs courage. Guess what? You go through this whole process, and you are taking control of that stressful situation. You're taking control of how you feel, you're acknowledging yourself and that you're managing it. Our stress most of the time comes from being afraid. How are we going to handle it? Is the unknown. What's gonna happen after that, right? Like, oh my gosh, I don't have a job right now. I don't know if I'm not gonna have another paycheck, I will be evicted from my house. We create those scenarios naturally that will happen in the future that we think we cannot control based on our past, because obviously you are human. There were some times that you failed and something didn't happen. So we believe that this is not gonna happen, you know, this the bad thing, the worst thing that the shoe will drop in the future, too. But when you go through the process and when you acknowledge that, you know, now I'm looking at it. What's happening is you honoring your needs, you taking care of yourself. That's mean you are building trust in yourself, and when you gain more confidence. Then you are not so stressed out what will happen in the future. Because you will trust yourself that you can handle it. So no matter what comes, you will be able to handle it. And that I think just going to the spouse itself, it's already helps you so much of thinking I'm grown up enough that I can take care of my stress levels, I can um honor my needs. And guess what? Nobody will die when you take care of this. You know, like it's not a big deal. You can do all this process and work with yourself, with your mind, and how you feel that doesn't even include the people because it's all about you. And this is where you can come from hopelessness when you maybe started a process. By the end of that process, you'll have hope because you will find a way how to get out of that situation.

SPEAKER_00 44:49

Right. So I'm not sure if you answered this question or not, but what would you tell someone that says, I just can't, I don't have the time, I don't have the energy. This is hard because the calling process sounds it sounds simple to me, and but I know that comes with a lot of um I don't want to use the word stress itself, but it does with that transformation, that transformative process, it it it requires you to dig and it requires you to be honest. And a lot of people don't want to be honest with themselves. What would you tell a woman that says, I can't even do that?

SPEAKER_03 45:30

So it comes from the lack of self-trust. Okay, it comes from a lack of having confidence that she will handle that. So I will then ask to have more confidence by reminding her, in addition to whatever I just said, that have uh uh things that show you that you can accomplish things, but I always recommend my clients also have another list. Um, the those memories, uh, that's ongoing list is and remind yourself when you were in the situation where things didn't look like they're gonna work out. You know, maybe you also had no job before. Um, maybe you were even the things, for example, you awaiting somebody to call you back and they're not calling you back, and you're stressing out, you know, like, oh my gosh, they died probably. That's what happened, you know. When you take what especially somebody with a traumatic life uh childhood experiences, they always think like the catastrophizing everything, you know, like yeah, is there's no grace, black or white, and it's like if it's not white, it's definitely by default it's black. And and you know, those moments it looks like oh my gosh, this is the end of the world, but then somebody calls you back or you get the job, and you know, and really honestly, when you really think about it, we are afraid of dying. This is all survival, but we are here, and if you are listening to this, you did not die. Right, right. So if you if you compile that list of things that there were some uh instances in your life that it looked like it's gonna go bad, but actually it didn't go bad, you know, you still survived, or even better, maybe you didn't get the job for this, you know, this company you applied, and later on you find out that they went bankrupt, like in three months. So then you'll be thinking, oh my gosh, you know, I will be working there and now I have to find another job. So, you know, it's also about that we don't know what we don't know. Um, but building confidence of saying, um, I will be able to take care of that change no matter what it will be. But also, it's very important to remember that we need to uh uh allow others to help us, and we should uh seek for help, and it's okay to be um helped and ask for help, and that is really can be a lot of uh triggering to those who grew up in the environment where they've been scolded for uh asking for help, or uh those children that grew up very, very independent. For example, I am only a child, and um my dad was alcoholic, so it you know, it's funny. I remember when I was a child, uh, you know, like a teenager, and the kids will say, Oh, you know, you only want child, oh my god, you're so freaking spoiled. And um, and and I'm like, No, I'm not spoiled because I have to do everything at the house. And you have a brother, oh, you have a sister, you can split the chores, right? You cannot split the chores. So when so when I grew up in that kind of environment that I I had to be very independent, uh I have difficulty as an adult now ask for help. For me, immediately it feels like wait, if I'm not gonna do it, who else is going to do it? Like, I don't trust other people, you know, and so I had to let go. And that's again, this is that delegation, you know, like allowing other people to do something. But this delegation not necessarily needs to be like, oh, big deal, but even something small. Like, for example, I I had a client just came to my mind. Um, she told me she, you know, she came to me and she said she was very stressed, she's running this business, and you know, she has uh two teenage uh uh daughters, and the relationship with them is very rocky, and you know, all of this. And then I realized that she was so independent that she wanted to prove that she can run the business, she wanted to prove that she's very resilient, you know. That's all of course she's not gonna show to anyone that she's weak because her husband was waiting to fail, you know, so he can tell her, like you see, I I knew you're not gonna make it. So there was a lot this facade, but also she was running herself to the ground. But when I told her that she should delegate some things, and we did like a small experiment, and I said, How about you know, and then she was she was saying, Oh, and then I need to take care of all the lunches and pack for everybody. And I said, How about you ask your teenagers to help you to pack the lunches? So you delegate something to them, and what happened, their relationship changed by doing small things here and there, because she gave something to them to do, and they the way they saw the way, like, oh wow, mom now trusts us.

SPEAKER_00 50:17

Trusts me, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 50:18

They trust, she's trusting me, so I'm grown up now, we can do all this, and so a lot of pressure, you know, she let go by delegating things, and her relationship and the whole house life got better because she stopped being such an independent woman, you know, the martyrdom that I'm so strong and we can do everything, and I should be doing all of this. So it doesn't have to be so difficult, we can just do small adjustments here or there. But it's it's very important to work on that self-love and self-care and allowing other people to show up for us because when you really think about it, naturally we'll all want to help other people, you know. We what they say for those who giving help, uh, they gaining the giver gains more than the one who's actually receives.

SPEAKER_02 51:06

Yeah, yes.

SPEAKER_03 51:07

So we just need to kind of let go and and small things and we implement something, small thing is grows into bigger things, and the ripple is amazing because you know, people in our lives, we giving to them because we have something to give, and then we keep teaching them and giving permission for them to do the same, right?

SPEAKER_00 51:25

Well, tell us about your book. I see you have several. What's what which one would be most um relevant for this conversation that we're having today?

SPEAKER_03 51:38

I think the last one that they wrote, the calm process, also it comes with the workbook. So those who want to um dig deeper into questions about you know the stress and how they handle things. And um I, you know, uh a book before then that I wrote it was stress management for adult children of alcoholics, and where I really dove into like deeper in the childhood trauma and in a lot of why do we do things the way we do things. Um, and for those who want to have just small tips and tricks, like you just come pick up and you read up and put it back, uh, I recommend that correct stress while you work. And it's not only for work, but you know, like any stressful situation because they talk about the environment, the health, and and things like that. But if for those who really want to get some result, definitely I will say do the last book that they wrote, the calm process.

SPEAKER_00 52:31

And you can find all of those. Can you find all those on Amazon or do you have a website?

SPEAKER_03 52:37

Yes, so all of those books are uh on Amazon, but those who want to see all of my books and just kind of have a one spot when they can go and see all of them is to go to my website, be amazingyou.com, and there's a tab to get my books or get uh my a coaching session with me. And I also uh love, love, love inspiring other women to uh share their story and make impact in the world as well. So I do a story to impact mentorship as well.

SPEAKER_00 53:08

Okay, cool. Well, any last words? You you've said a lot. We've got a I've got my paper here, I'm got I'm getting ready to start my calm list, and you said control, um, appreciate or accept list and multiply. I'm gonna I'm gonna do that tonight. Um, I'm scared of that wine part, but that's okay. It's okay, because at the end it's gonna be helpful for me, right? So, is there any last words that you'd like to share with our listeners? Don't be ashamed of yourself.

SPEAKER_02 53:46

That's good.

SPEAKER_03 53:48

Yeah, I think we just need to allow ourselves to be us and love ourselves the way it is, even love ourselves and not loving ourselves because we've been taught to do that. You know, just just take one step at a time, a little bit have more grace and forgiveness toward yourself, and and we'll get there.

SPEAKER_00 54:11

Well, thank you so much. I appreciate you um being here today. Um, I'll have all of Ms. Lolita's information in the show notes and everything. So we'll make sure that anyone that wants to work with her, you can reach out to her. Um, with that being said, I just want to thank everyone for listening. Um, where the truth, this is don't ask me shit, where the truth might be uncomfortable, but it will set you free if you're willing to do the work. If something you heard here today hit home, please sit in it, process it, and decide what you're gonna do next. She gave us an incredible framework to help us walk through those processes of things that we want to change. So don't just don't just dismiss it. Um, let's do the work and let's get the freedom that we're looking for. And remember, you can always ask Coach Dory, but if you're not willing to do the work, don't ask me shit. If you enjoyed this episode, share it with someone who needs the real conversation in their life. And we will see you the next time.