Ep. 10 Designing a Life of Wellness with Jamie Conner | How to Create Spaces That Help You Thrive

Wellness doesn’t have to be another thing on your to-do list.

This week on Women in Bloom, we’re sitting down with sensory wellness designer Jamie Conner (@jamieonwellness) to talk about creating spaces that actually support your well-being.

🏡 Think home hacks.
🌿 Think wellness integration.
✨ Think simple shifts that help your environment work with you, not against you.

Let’s be honest: many of us know what supports our wellness, but integrating those practices into everyday life is where we get stuck. Jamie’s work is all about making wellness practical, accessible, and beautifully woven into your daily routines.

Join us as we explore how your home, your habits, and your surroundings can become part of your healing journey.

Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, YouTube, and wherever you get your podcasts.

Transcript

SPEAKER_06 0:05

Mother daughter puts another development podcast for women in the boom seat. And to that we stay. Anyway.

SPEAKER_05 0:23

There, there it is.

SPEAKER_01 0:25

All right. So, um, yeah, so we already had our warm-up call. We already did that. Yes. Jamie, we are so excited to have you on the call today. Well, on the podcast. I should not say on the podcast. It's the podcast. Um, so one of the things that drew us to you and your work was this idea of a wellness concierge that will come into your space and get you right. Get you right. I think um one of the things that we've done over the years, years, Eldris and I, I remember growing up, um, she was always moving furniture around. Yeah, always adjusting the space, always trying to like catch the sunlight because you know the sun does different things at different times of the year. Um a lot of paying attention to colors and textures. Go ahead, chime in, Eldris, because I know you like it. That was my thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:25

Yeah, yeah, no, no, no. Because I, you know, I like the seasonal change, right? And so the sunlight hits different. Um, but it also it's it's almost like that feeling that you get when it's time to go to school in September, like after a summer, like this renewal that comes like, oh, you get this excitement. And so moving um my environment helped does that for me just a little bit, but I like it. I like it.

SPEAKER_00 1:50

My mom used to do the same thing growing up all the time. Yeah, changing the furniture around.

SPEAKER_02 1:58

It's almost like you got a new place.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

It really does feel like that.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

Yeah, I was telling um, we were talking about it after we hung up with you the other day. So, for listeners, we for the podcast, we like to do just a 15-minute warm-up call so that when we actually do record, it feels very natural between us. First of all, we kept finding ourselves at moments during that conversation like, okay, save this is getting good. Let's save that. Like save it to the podcast. We need to have something, it was delicious, it was delicious too. It was delicious.

SPEAKER_02 2:33

I love that.

SPEAKER_01 2:35

It was so so we are placement and arrangement of furniture type people. We are natural light people, okay, scents, colors, textures, um all of that. So your work immediately drew us to you. And we just, you know, in the same vein of talking about wellness and wellness for women in particular, we like to focus on women of color because that's who we are. That's that's that's our work, that's our you know, soul work that we do. Um so can you tell us a little bit, number one, about yourself and how you got started on this journey and why this? Like there's so many wellness offerings. So, what about this was like? That's what I that's what I want to offer. This is gonna be my okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:27

Well, you know, like you were saying, growing up, Eldris was changing the furniture around all the time. So, almost how did I get started is like when I was born, you know, because every single thing in my life I realize now looking back and also like reading over old journals is one thing informs the other, informs the other. And so something that you think is probably insignificant leads you to that place. And my mother was rearranging furniture all the time in our house, too, and it was spring cleaning, or it was just to feel a new energy, a new vibe, or reset the tone. And it's like, like you were saying, we're doing these things intuitively, not knowing that this is really for health and wellness. It didn't have that kind of label back in the day, but that's what we were doing, and I I really think that everything that I do came from my mother's influence. And so I started being like, I was always like a helper person, you know. And I remember growing up that my mom used to go on these, she would go running around the track like exercising, and I would be in the bleachers, and I was like, Yay, mommy, you can do it. Go, mommy.

SPEAKER_01 4:58

I'm a Virgo, okay, okay. I get the concierge you see it.

SPEAKER_00 5:03

Okay, and also if you find follow like Chinese zodiac and stuff like that, I was born year of the dog, and it's water dog. So I know this is this is extra. You're gonna have to look this up after, but a water dog, if you can imagine like a golden retriever like tripping through the water, I and I really feel that in myself. It's like that helpful energy, like oh, beautiful. Let me be helpful to you. So I I think that's just a part of my energy and why I decided to do it in the way where I'm the concierge, I'm helping you, I'm making it easy for you, is my former career focused heavily on customer service and hospitality. I was in property management for a long time, and so selling apartments to people and being there to handle, you know, when they're residents at the community, you always want to solve something for them and give them the best experience. And so I just noticed that giving that high level of customer service has been kind of my thing for a long time. Even like I said, going back to the bleachers, cheering for my mom, making it a great experience, right? She can't just run, she has to have a good experience while running. That's weird. And so I want people to really feel it, you know, and um there's another thing out there. There's a lot of things out there today that are what I would consider quick fixes. And I I really like someone to have real lasting effects, and so you know, I think it's helpful to show people how to make it easy in their lives.

SPEAKER_02 6:58

No, that's wonderful. And I was just saying that there's an art to that, right? That that not everybody has that skill set or has that energy, right? So I can I can feel that coming from you and wanting to give people that. This is a beautiful thing, right? Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 7:15

It is, it is, and I have been talking about you to friends. Um, and every time I bring it up, they're like, I need her. Does she travel? I do, let them know.

SPEAKER_02 7:28

Wonderful, yes.

SPEAKER_01 7:30

One of the things that I wanted to ask you when we did our warm-up call, because I my friend was like, send me her information. She's like, because I need she's like, it's been six months that she's been telling herself that she wanted to do a certain thing, and she's like in her house, just like um, you know, to really get the space to where it feels right for her. And it's been months and months and months and months and months. She just purchased, and anyway, she wants your information, so I'm gonna send it.

SPEAKER_00 7:59

But please, um because it gets overwhelming doing it by yourself, and then you just end up kind of not doing anything because it just feels too big, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:10

And before you know it, the lease is up.

SPEAKER_00 8:12

Before you know it, you know, you didn't you sell the lease is up and you gotta start all over again.

SPEAKER_02 8:18

Yeah, but it's so good to be able to have um a set of eyes that are different from yours so that can see possibilities, and a lot because a lot of times you get stuck in either a process, a routine, or a pattern, and you can't see beyond that. Um, so you need someone to be able to say, hmm, what if you did this different, right? I can see where you could do, and then all of a sudden it's like magic.

unknown 8:48

Right.

SPEAKER_00 8:48

Yes, yes. And it's funny you say that because in my mind, like if I had to rename what I do in the way that it's in my mind, I think of it as fly on the wall because that's the first thing I'm doing. I said I'm a Virgo, I'm I'm very, you know, particular, you know, about this detail, that detail. And then I spent all those years in property management, so it's like I notice every single thing in every corner and you can't see it anymore, right? Right, it's blaring to me. Right.

SPEAKER_02 9:25

Isn't that the truth? You can't see it anymore, and all of a sudden somebody else points it out. You like, oh right, I didn't even know that. Jim, let me in there because I love that.

SPEAKER_01 9:39

I love that. I want to um quickly pause and you know, you kind of spoke of this, like your mother rearranging spaces and um something that you got from her. And I'm curious from our resident elder eldress in the space, what did it do for y'all? Like when you were what was there any like what brought that on? Is it just like I want something new, I want something fresh, or like you know, the kids are running amok, like I need to rearrange the space to to where it makes sense. Like, what was the motivator?

SPEAKER_02 10:15

Um, it for for me, a lot of times it was, but the seasons bring something different, right? So um in our our old home, we had like bay windows in the living room, and during the winter months, I would keep like the outer uh curtains drawn mostly. So you would get a little bit of sun, but with there's not a lot of sun in that place anyway. You get a little bit of sun, but in the summertime, I wanted all of the sun, so I would move the furniture away from that space. So it was it mostly had to do with um seasons for me, but sometimes I was just bored with it. Like I I I just need that that thing right there. I'm gonna kick, I'm gonna kick it one more time, right? It's gonna be in my way one more time when I walk by and it's gotta be moved. So it really depends, but I got a lot of joy from doing it. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:11

When my when my mom was doing it, she kind of expressed the same thing that she would get bored and she wanted to feel fresh and new. And it really, you are wow, you're really making me think of like everything growing up. And I grew up, my family was military, so we moved around a lot. And so every place, every new state, every new city, I was the new girl. So I I'm telling you, I didn't like the part about losing friends and starting all over, but I love the identity piece where it's like, okay, I get to choose that I'm gonna be this way now, right? Right. And that's kind of what the furniture moving around reminds me of because you change the identity of your home, it doesn't look the same anymore, it's not wearing the same outfit, right? It's not the same, and so you behave differently in the space.

SPEAKER_02 12:10

Yeah, yeah. I like that. I love that analogy. You you just you change you change the outfit, right? And you feel different when you got, oh, this is a new outfit, right? Right, fluff the pillows up a little bit, right?

SPEAKER_01 12:24

Truthfully, I found myself doing that after a breakup, like where I'm like, you know, I'm I have to crack the dust out of you know, some of these, the rugs, like I gotta, everything needs to get changed over because like I need, and even the sense, the the the smell of the environment too. I turned over, you know, and that's you know, the breakup and breakups make up that's in the past, but this is something that I used to do to like reset my space, you know.

SPEAKER_00 12:57

So that's so funny that we're all doing it intuitively or taught by you know our elders, but we don't label it this way, right? But we really are doing these things, like you said, relationship breakup, you cut your hair, you change your makeup, you you start going to different places, you change your clothes, right? Reading all about bring being brand new, yeah. Bring that new energy, right?

SPEAKER_02 13:24

New energy.

SPEAKER_01 13:25

That's the beauty, that's the reframes that we we just love to talk about um here. So um we do like kind of and we're we'll we'll kind of go into like the more like wellness focused questions, but did you have like an aha moment when you realized like, and it's okay if you didn't, but was there like a moment like, oh shoot, that's the missing piece?

SPEAKER_00 13:52

Um, let's see. I don't know if it was an aha moment. It's it's it's been more of like a progression and then a realization of oh, this is what I'm doing, as I'm searching for ways to label myself.

SPEAKER_01 14:11

Okay, okay.

SPEAKER_00 14:12

Because this has been a lifelong journey. And as I mentioned, my previous career in property management, and I got to the point where I wanted to leave that and do something else for business for myself. And I said, okay, well, what do I want to do? I'm like, okay, I want to make a living being me. Well, what is that? What does it mean to be me? And what are the parts about me that shine outward to other people that they would be attracted to and want some of?

SPEAKER_03 14:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:45

And so that's when I realized that it was in a wellness bubble and that I had been on this long journey even before I left that career of helping myself because I spent so long as a single mother. My son is an adult now and I'm an empty nester now. So I'm very proud of that journey. But there were things along the way that might push me to one thing or the next or the next or the next. So my wellness journey started off with learning about vision boards. Probably like maybe 15 years ago or so, I remember Oprah was having some sort of challenge and she was doing some vision board thing. And I'm like, well, what's a vision board? And so I learned about these tools that you can use to help, you know, further the transformations in your life. And so just piece by piece by piece, just starting with that, and then meditation. And then there was a young lady at my job who didn't eat meat, and I needed to lose some weight at the time. And I was like, okay, let me try that. So little by little by little, all of this information started to coming to me and doing the research, and we didn't have you know, Chat GPT or even that much of Google information at that time to tell us all of this stuff. So, you know, you begin to research it, and then just little by little it becomes part of your life. You start to watch documentaries and things like that. So it just it just developed over time.

SPEAKER_02 16:43

Yeah, it's like a beautiful transformation. I just wanted to ask, um uh, do you still not eat meat? I don't.

SPEAKER_00 16:53

I I'm a vegan or plant-based or whatever you want to call it, and I've been doing that for over 10 years now. So that's been a journey too.

SPEAKER_02 17:02

Well, it shows on your skin. You look oh listen, thank you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Thank you. And I first I was like, dang, she looked so young. And I was like, Well, you said you were vegan. I was like, that makes sense. That makes sense. I recently um I've been dealing with chronic illness for the last three years. So I've been I've had to exclude a lot of things from my diet. And with everything that I exclude, my skin just I'm like, this is this is that like um correcting your skin from the inside out. Because I didn't know I was allergic to all these things. Yes, I can tell immediately when I accidentally eat something because I start getting little pimples and stuff like that, like little dark spots and stuff like that. But child, when you eat right, your skin will pay you.

SPEAKER_00 17:50

Yes, it will. And listen, I'm so glad you said that because I get that comment all the time about my youthful appearance. So thank you, first of all. But yeah, I I love that you said that because I need people to understand that beauty is not only skin deep and that it's okay to be concerned about the way that you look. You're because your personal appearance says a lot about who you are on the inside, and your health on the inside and that surrounding you radiates on the outside. So it's almost like a calling card, or the the the skin, the appearance is the message, is notifying others and yourself when you look in the mirror, what is going on on the inside.

SPEAKER_01 18:48

Talk about it, Jamie.

SPEAKER_02 18:50

You are a preacher now. So somebody could say, Oh, uh, I'm I want some of that. I don't know, I don't know what that is. Whatever that is, I want some of that.

SPEAKER_01 19:00

Right. We have um we talked with an esthetician a few um months ago, and she was talking. We were we were talking about beauty and all the different things, and it it came up this idea of like, you know, well, it's there's a lot of like emotional things that go into whether or not you feel beautiful. It's not just like everything that's on the external, but it's also okay to like care what your like your what your bare face looks like because like like you said, it's an indicator of what's going on inside. So like your skin is like almost like it sounds almost an alarm, but it's hard to know that the alarm is sounding if you're if you've constantly been eating and taking in, or maybe stressed and anxious and uh you know not really sleeping um enough. All that is like it begins to show in your appearance first. I mean your energy levels, of course, but then also like what's happening on the outside, like you know. So thank you for saying that too.

SPEAKER_00 20:03

Yeah, the body knows best, the body knows sometimes what we use our intellect to override. Yes, you know, we can tell what we are feeling, and it just I remember one time I was so stressed, but I was so used to being stressed that I couldn't feel it. And I was visiting with my mom, and she's like, Why is your head shaking like that? Because I had this thing where I was, you know, shaking my head back and forth like this, and I didn't even know it. I guess I was so worked up and my nervous system was going that I was just shaking, and I didn't even notice. I was asking her, what was she talking about? Right, right. Like, what do you mean I'm shaking my head? But apparently she said, You're going like this. You know, she started shaking her head back and forth, and I was just shocked. Like, wait a minute, am I?

SPEAKER_01 21:02

The only thing that we don't talk about is when you carry that level of stress because the ultimate alarm is a stroke, and people don't draw that connection between I'm running like this constantly for years, and then all of a sudden, you know, you have this major health um scare. And like the high levels of stress just it can take you there. Like, you know, I don't want to scare people, but I'm just like, no, when you're stressed out, you need to go touch grass.

SPEAKER_00 21:35

Okay, literally. I'm not that's not a figure of speech.

SPEAKER_01 21:39

You need to go touch grass, look at your favorite book and a cup of tea and call out a word.

SPEAKER_02 21:44

Yeah, I said, but you know what? You you when when you can feel that level of tightness, right? And what's a lot of times what happens to us as women is we feel like, okay. Well, I gotta get to the next thing. Well, let me, if I can finish this, I can stop the tightness. But but they the things pile up on top of each other, and you go from one tight space to the next tight space until you're all wound up like that. And the home is supposed to be the sanctuary, right? Right. Which is why it's so bad. I want to bring us back because it's so important. It's so important. We all we all into the having a stroke territory and all the stuff. Right, right. We've gone everywhere. But this is why your home is is so important that it's a it's really the space that you it's the retreat. It is the retreat. It is the retreat. Yes, I do love that.

SPEAKER_03 22:51

Home is the retreat.

SPEAKER_02 22:52

Home is the retreat.

SPEAKER_00 22:53

Yes, home is the retreat. You know, it's where you recover. And so it's just important to have that set up for you to be able to come down from the day, right? Right. And come and be in your your personal space.

SPEAKER_01 23:11

Yes. So Jamie, why are practicality, integration, and utility so important on a woman's wellness journey?

SPEAKER_00 23:23

First of all, if it's not practical, it's not going to get done. Because we're going to find something else that we feel is more important than that.

SPEAKER_01 23:37

It's going to be the psychology of it. Take us through there. Because seriously.

SPEAKER_00 23:44

If it feels too hard, if it feels overwhelming, especially for women like us, for black women, for hardworking women, you know, for career women, for mothers, for people who have so much in their backpack, so much on their plate, so much carrying around, we continue to put ourselves on the back burner. And so this is the reason why people reach for quick fixes because we need it done and we don't need it to interrupt the rest of our flow. Right. That's how we think, you know, that oh, well, when I go to sleep, I'm I'm gonna rest. Not knowing that your body's going through all of these different integrations while you're sleeping. And so it has to be practical so that you will actually do it, that it actually feels like a part of your everyday life. And the integration, I really believe in immersive wellness. So when I say immersive, ubiquitous, that means it's surrounding you, it's all all around you. You cannot escape from wellness. And so this is the way that I arrange my home, that I teach other people to arrange their home and their space, even their office space, everywhere around you, so that you have no other choice. Yeah, and it and when you have no other choice, it's easier, it's easier for you to do.

SPEAKER_01 25:12

Yeah. And it sounds like through design, it becomes something that you want to do because it's I guess when it's immersive, you it's so prominent, it's like it it almost is naturally occurring. You know what I mean? Like it's just more natural, it's not like you have to go out of your way because you're in it. So it's like breathing. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_00 25:40

For instance, let's let's say you you decided to go on a trip to Greece, and there was no fast food there where you went whatsoever, and there was no real transportation, you had to walk everywhere that you went, so you are dropped into this world, and your only option is to walk from place to place and eat whole food that is prepared slowly by someone, right? Imagine this scenario, and so you automatically adapt to that environment, right? Yeah, so you're going to start seeing the effects of that environment because you have no other choice, right? So the people around you are doing the same thing, they're eating the same thing, you have no other options of what to eat, you have no other option of the sunlight, or you know, or walking because that's what everyone else is doing, or that's the only way to get from point A to B. Right, right, right. These are the only options that you have. And so one of my favorite people to follow is this guy named Dan Butner. And he's a researcher, National Geographic Fellow, and him and some other researchers developed the idea, the concept of the blue zones, if you've ever heard of that.

SPEAKER_03 27:05

Oh, we watched that. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 27:08

So you know, you understand that the blue zones are these places all around the world where people live a really long time, or they have historically to 100 years or better. And you notice these commonalities between these people. And I went to one of Dan's lectures, and someone asked him, okay, if you had to just pick one thing, just one of the things that you can do to change your entire wellness, and maybe this is that aha moment that I had. And he said, your environment. That was the answer. And strong for people who cannot pick up and move to Greece, right? Who cannot pick up and move to these areas where the wellness is all around them and the people's way of life that they don't even realize that they're participating in wellness, it's just the way that they live. So if you can't pick up and move, you have to pretend that you're there, yeah, all around you.

SPEAKER_01 28:13

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:15

You got to convince yourself that you have to manipulate your environment. You have to manipulate your environment. Yeah, what you what you put yourself around is what repeats in your world over and over again. Yeah, the way that the brain works is the same way that the social media algorithm works, actually.

SPEAKER_03 28:38

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 28:38

So I wouldn't be surprised if they did some research on the brain to decide how the algorithm is going to work. Because the way that the brain works is it feeds you what it knows again and again.

SPEAKER_01 28:53

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:55

So the classic example that everyone always uses for this is you know how once you get a car, a certain type of car, now all of a sudden you see that car everywhere. Yeah. It's because now your brain is trained to pay attention to that thing. Your brain says, alert, I recognize that thing. Now I know what category to put it in. Let me show it to you again every time. Right. Okay. And there it is again.

SPEAKER_02 29:24

And there it is again.

SPEAKER_00 29:25

There it is again. There it is again. So just like the social media algorithm, the more you concentrate or look at something, share something, the more time you spend with it, that is what is going to be in your algorithmic bubble.

SPEAKER_03 29:40

Right.

SPEAKER_00 29:40

It's the same way in life. The more time you spend on wellness, in nature, doing things, you know, the way that nature intended it to be, pulling those things around you, taking advantage of natural sunlight, eating whole foods, being around other people who believe in this lifestyle. That is all that you will see. It'll feel like, wow, everyone's doing this. Right. No, it's your bubble.

SPEAKER_01 30:09

Yeah, yeah. I'm calling that in. See, I need it. Call that in.

SPEAKER_02 30:15

Yeah, because the opposite is also true.

SPEAKER_03 30:18

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 30:19

If you can you, if you put focus on the negative, more of that will walk into your space. Yeah, yes.

SPEAKER_00 30:25

It's like you put in an order, it's like, oh, that's what you want to see. That's what you want to do.

SPEAKER_02 30:30

Let me give you more of that.

SPEAKER_01 30:31

Here's more on a platter. Yes. Jamie. Wow. You talked a little bit about um when you're in an immersive environment, the people around you are doing it. You know, so I naturally went to like sheesh, like, how do you control for like when working with clients? Or is this something that you control for like the folks that they're around? Like, what if their spouse loves McDonald's? You know what I mean? Like, or like you have dietary restrictions and like your spouse doesn't. So they're constantly bringing in dairy and gluten, and you can't eat dairy and gluten, and it's just like, like, okay.

SPEAKER_00 31:16

Well, two things, right? Thing number one is going back to that identity shift. You have to decide who you are, and you have to say, I don't do this, I do do that, and so it's not an option for you. Like, for instance, I'm vegan. If someone, oh, what if someone brings meat? I don't eat meat, so that's not an option for me. Now, of course, that's gonna be extremely difficult for somebody just starting out, but baby steps, right? And and my husband actually, he eats all the meats, all the meats, all the dairy, and our diet is very far from each other. But you just have to decide, everything is a decision, and then if it's Monday and you did it on Monday, and then Tuesday you fell off the wagon, just get back on the wagon Wednesday and just know that you are influencing everyone around you because my husband started moving towards what I was doing. More plant-based, yeah. The more, the more he saw me do, the more he saw that I was dedicated to it, the more he saw that I was serious about it, that I wasn't budging, he started coming in my direction. So my energy came stronger. But I never said that he shouldn't eat meat or anything like that because everybody's body and health conditions are are different. Right. And so I just say in my lane, and I have the left side of the refrigerator, he has the right side of the refrigerator. But sometimes we have these products that overlap because I've given him the exposure to to try different things, and now he eats dairy-free ice cream and notice oh, when I eat dairy-free ice cream, I'm feeling a lot better. You know, better in my stomach. Yeah, I'm not getting the bubble guts after. Maybe I should listen to her. So for him, you know, I became the surrounding environment for him. He couldn't escape it. Yeah, he had to see what I was doing, he had to see what I was using, he had to see what I was bringing in the house. And now, so after the you know, five and a half years that we've been together, it wasn't on day one, but now he's cooking way more than he's ordering DoorDash, like he used to. You know, he is inserting a lot more vegetables, a lot more whole foods, and even trying plant-based things. Like I said, the ice cream. I've seen him try dairy-free cream cheese, and we have this meal delivery service that we get. So it's just it's the constant exposure, I think. Yeah, and you just you just have to be okay with the person that's closest to you not doing the exact same thing as you. You have to be okay within yourself, yeah, you know, to to do it for yourself.

SPEAKER_01 34:33

I always tell people when people are like, oh, you know, because people will be like, oh, your skin looks great. And I'll be like, no dairy, no gluten, no added sugar. And they're like, What a lot? All of that, what and my thing with them, even when I used to like work out, I don't work out as much as I used to, but even when I used to work out, I used to tell people like it just commit to a two-week habit. And if you don't find it any easier to do after committing for two weeks, then you've proven me wrong. But I bet a hundred percent that if you can commit to two weeks, it'll be easier every day after day. I feel like those two those two weeks are the hardest in establishing a habit. Like 21 or 22 days or something like that. But I always say rock with it for two weeks because like if you can do that, then you can get that two-week badge in your in your heart and know that you got a two-week badge, and then you'll realize, like, oh, it's definitely not easy, but it's not as hard as I was making it out to be.

SPEAKER_02 35:44

Right. Yeah, but I but but even you know, and I'm I'm speaking of myself, right? Two weeks is hard sometimes, right? And I I'll say that because sometimes, you know, I want what I want. And so a two-week thing, I like I might say two weeks, but I might not even do it three days. So, so so one of the questions that I had this. That's right, right, right, okay, and I know what I know me, right? I'm I got some some some elder years that I'm like, I I know right, I know I know what I'm gonna, you know, where I'm gonna um be strong and I know what I'm not, right? Okay. So I do make decisions based on that. But do you do you find um as you're working with people um about some changes that they need to make, either with their their diet or even with their home, do you find like their people are open to that? Like sometimes people might be a little defensive about moving stuff. What do you what do you think? What do you find?

SPEAKER_00 36:45

People are very defensive, you know, especially when they feel like that it's beginning to feel like something is wrong with them, or that it begins to feel like it's overwhelming. And you're right, some people can't make it the entire two weeks, they can't make it three days. Everyone has their different motivations. So some people want to get ready for a wedding, some people want to get ready for vacation, some people have want to get a revenge body because they broke up or something, and and sometimes you have to work with those different things, but I also work with the resistance because the resistance informs me because maybe that's not the right route for you specifically, right? So, for instance, I was working with someone, and we were talking about putting things on her calendar so that she can get more organized and timely with everything, and including putting herself on the calendar. And I asked her if she had, you know, a physical calendar for this, and she brought it out, she showed it to me. Yes, I have it, but I don't use it. Now, I'm not going to force her to use it. I say, okay, let's get rid of that then. It's not the way. Do you use your phone a lot? Yes, I put everything on my phone. Okay, let's work with what you like. Right. Because then you're more likely to be doing this thing long term if we figure out what you like and then take it piece by piece. Yeah, yeah. This just like we were talking about earlier, my health journey, being vegan, been doing this for 10 years, 15 years, you know, you don't start all the way at the end. Yeah. And so if you consider it just a temporary thing, and then you're not seeing the results that you're looking for, right? Right, then that is going to make you feel bad mentally.

SPEAKER_02 38:52

Discouraged, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:54

Very discouraged, exactly. And so I really like it when I get pushback from people because it's telling me how you need it. What you have going on in your life. You know, someone else I was working with, she would reschedule our appointments all the time or cancel our appointments and push it out further to the next day. So when I spoke to her, I realized I know it's important to her. I could easily say, oh, it's not that important to you because you keep rescheduling. But really, it's an indicator that she's continuing to put herself on the back burner because our sessions are for her. And I even had to point out to her that she's constantly checking her phone, checking her phone during our sessions, just to see, like, oh, what time is it? Am I getting a call? Is the session over? So I rearranged myself according to her. So now as soon as I come in, I say, okay, I'm setting a timer. Let's say our engagement is from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. I said, okay, I'm gonna set a timer for 40 minutes. So you know during this 40-minute block, you don't have to check your phone. You know, if the alarm didn't go off, we're within this time bubble. And it's almost like time extends because she knows that I'm in charge of her time and that when that timer goes off, it's not even time to rush out of the door. We still got 20 minutes left to close out, right?

SPEAKER_03 40:28

Right.

SPEAKER_00 40:29

So I I work with the pushback and let the pushback inform me what the person's struggling with.

SPEAKER_02 40:37

Right. And sometimes the pushback though, sometimes people need that evidence, right? So yeah, because this sometimes we say one thing and mean another, and our behavior will will betray us, right? And so sometimes we need someone else to say, well, here's here's what has happened, right? Here's here's here's how how this has shown up, so that we can take stock of it, you know, to have somebody give us that feedback, right?

SPEAKER_00 41:10

Yeah, and so that that is a lot of what I do is observation. I'm looking at you, I'm assessing your habits, I'm digging your business. I want to know, well, what's your morning routine? Okay, well, your morning routine starts at night. What did you do last night? What did you eat for dinner last night? Okay, let me show me the portions. I I draw out a circle on a piece of paper. Show me you had rice and beans. Where was the rice? How much the plate did that take up? How much did the plate beans take up? So I my rice and beans is your whole hand.

SPEAKER_02 41:46

So this is rice and beans, right? This rice to be right. Wait, this this rice.

SPEAKER_00 41:55

I want to know everything in your lifestyle. That way I know, okay, this is how we need to set up your house.

SPEAKER_03 42:01

Right, right.

SPEAKER_00 42:02

This is what we need to start because if I don't know all of those things, if I don't dig in and ask those questions, then I'm arranging your house the way I think it should go.

SPEAKER_02 42:13

Right, right.

SPEAKER_00 42:14

But really, that's for me and the way I live. And I'm 15 years in the game, right? You know? So you need your house arranged for what's going on in your life, you, your spouse or not, your children or not. Yeah, everyone's life is completely different.

SPEAKER_01 42:32

Yeah, yeah. Um go ahead, Jack.

SPEAKER_02 42:38

That's okay. Um, I was just wondering, um, of your clients, like, do you have like a um a really good success story? Like someone that you worked with, maybe they might have given you a little bit of resistance, but oh my goodness, look at look at what happened. You have one of those?

SPEAKER_00 42:58

I okay, I have this. There was this one guy that came to me, and I'm I'm usually working with women, so I love when I work with men because I find for some reason opposites will listen to opposites for some reason. So I love working with men, and he came to me because he was curious about vegan and you know, changing his health in that way from what he was eating, his diet. But he was, I think he ran like a smoke pit barbecue type of business. This man was in the business of meat. Of meat. He was in the business of meat, serving it, cooking it, eating it all the time. And all I did for him was I, and this was before I got into the home wellness. This was his lifestyle. And it all goes together. I wanted to know every single thing he was eating, every single thing that he was drinking, whether he thought it was bad or whether he thought it was good. I wanted to know every single thing that was going on with his health. He told me all of those things. And I just reflected back to him what the ingredients were, what he was eating. I shared with him some links, some documentaries, some information. And I just exposed him, right? And next thing I know, and I, and the engagement was short, right? Because I gave him all of this homework to do. And it seemed like this wasn't like a long uh engagement where I was working with him for months and months. He just took the information, he absorbed it, and he was like, wow, I don't know what I'm gonna do because I run this business and I make meat all the time. But after all of the information that he that we went over together, he ended up going vegan. He didn't do that business anymore. I don't know where his career went after that, but it was so impactful to him and he lost 30 pounds. Wow. So it really shifted his entire identity, his entire life, his whole way of being was transformed just from the information, just from the exposure, just from me holding a mirror to him and saying, You're coming to me because you want something. And this is what it's gonna take to be that guy who you really want to be. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:49

Who you say you want to be.

SPEAKER_00 45:50

So take it or leave it. And he took it. Yeah, yeah, who you say you want to be, right? And he he actually did it and changed his entire life. Business, everything, I'm sure, you know, it turned down to his family and everything.

SPEAKER_02 46:05

And this was what's beautiful about that is as he begins to tell his story, that'll be like a pivotal moment for him, right? Exactly. And did a whole 180, and now I'm I'm this. That's beautiful. Yeah, all for the better.

SPEAKER_01 46:21

A lot of times we don't realize, first of all, half the things on nutrition labels, we can't really understand what they are. Like, um, like when we're eating certain food, like so. For one of the things, my one of my dietary things is I can't eat corn. So, you know, there's a lot of different things on on nutrition labels that are corn derived from corn, but that's not telling you that it's corn. So it's like you don't know what you don't know. Like there's certain things that are just inflammatory to you and to the average human, and that you have because it's so normalized in our, I guess, agricultural food and nutrition type of where we live, then you know, people don't see that. Even the idea of eating a whole bunch of packaged food all day long, everything comes out of a package, is like something you don't realize and so I don't think I was um I think I was about 30 when I started to like think about the fact that all of our food is not is coming from like you know these kind of pre-packaged things. And then we're kind of going off topic, so I'm gonna get back on. But we went to the back of the box.

SPEAKER_00 47:34

But we're but we are on topic. We we are on topic because it's a lifestyle, yeah, it's everything that surrounds you, it's everything in your space, and part of the redesign of your home can be redesigning your fridge and cabinets, and sometimes that's one of the first things that I work on with people because they want to be hit with exactly what they want. And most people are I'm stressed out or I want to lose weight, right? It's it's it's usually one of those things. And so starting right there in that kitchen with that redesign, with pulling your fruit forward or new learning about the nutrition label, learning, you know, that it's in order of what it has the most of to the least. Some people don't even know that, realizing that everything on front on the front of the package is advertising. Even for instance, you don't think of this as design, but it's kind of a cross between design and organization and really the arrangement of things, right? So one person that I was working with, she thought that she was doing something good by inserting matcha instead of drinking coffee with a bunch of creamer. So we looked at her powdered matcha container bag, looked at the ingredients, and the first ingredient is sugar. Way, way, way down on the list, fourth or fifth is is where the matcha was. And so now we take that out of the coffee section and put that bag where her desserts are. See, even that's a redesign. Now you can still have it if you want, boom. But now it's over here where the desserts are, where it belongs. Right.

SPEAKER_01 49:31

It's so, like, I mean, it's so very because I just also say, like, I've went, I've gone to Starbucks and I get like the matcha from Starbucks, and my milk substitute, I alternate between almond milk and coconut milk. And the coconut milk always tastes sweeter, and I think I had assumed it's sweeter because it's coming from a coconut. And I one day decided to look up the label, and then there's dextrose in it, and there's all like um, you know, they that's like corn syrup and core, some other corn derivatives and stuff like that. And I'm like, it's supposed to be coconut milk, right? Coconut milk plus plus. Why is that in there? I'm just milk hybrid, right? It's a hybrid, it is a hybrid.

SPEAKER_00 50:18

So James, the industry, yeah, yeah, they need to use all of the ingredients that they have, they have to find ways to insert it everywhere. Oh my god, kill us.

SPEAKER_01 50:30

I love when I can look at the back of a label and it says, like, oh, apple juice, you know, blueberry puree, you know, like it's just like okay, boom, like that's it.

SPEAKER_00 50:40

Yes, I can read it, I know exactly where it is and where it came from.

SPEAKER_01 50:44

Um, Jamie, um, how can you tell when someone is ready for this change or like when they're not ready?

SPEAKER_00 50:57

I would say when they're ready, they they keep coming back, they keep trying, you know. You know, the biggest readiness sign is putting your money where your mouth is. That's proof that lets me know that you're ready, you know, that you don't give up.

SPEAKER_01 51:15

Yeah. And that you're ready to take something seriously. That you take something seriously. So we are rounding out. We went longer than expected, but I figured that would happen because we absolutely love talking to you on our warm-up call. Um, one of the things that we wanted to touch on that you talked about. So obviously, Women in Bloom is like a multi-generational podcast between um myself and my dear sweet uh mother, Eldris. So we like really do love this multi-generational thing. And some of the things that you talked about, you and your sister and your mom, um, I think the nickname is the cackling crew. The cackling crew. I think that's the nickname that you told us. And we were like, that sounds amazing. Because it's like the end when you can finally like the humor is all enmeshed in together, and the experiences, you've you've got a lot of the same experiences, um, but at different stages. So um, you know, we we wanted to talk about that a little bit if you're open to it.

SPEAKER_00 52:22

Yeah, yeah. It's me and my mom are both grown women at the same time, you know. Me, the Cacklin crew is me, my mom, and my sister. And so my mom has raised us to the point where, you know, we still have that respect for her and there's still that boundary, but we can chat about real grown woman things now. And it feels really good and really comfortable because I mean, I came from my mother, yeah, and so she's the person who I've known the longest in my life, right? And so, what better person to get advice from, to share things with, and let the information continue to trickle from her because she's continuously learning lessons and editing the information that she's sharing with me based off of her now experience. And my sister and I are learning new information as well and passing it up to our mother, right? And so now the information is is in a way, right? Yeah, and it feels really good. It it's the best friends that you'll always, always, always have.

SPEAKER_01 53:46

Yeah, yeah. Um, we I think the the information exchange going back and forth, like even right down to like planning the podcast, episodes, and stuff like that. There's always there's there's always some little tech that I have to, you know, like do a little mini five-second tutorial on just to, you know. Show LC, did you know you could do this? Do you know you can do that? But I think also like being an adult, and I think once I hit maybe like 38, I started to see my mother, Eldris, not as just mom or mommy anymore. It's like this is another woman, you know what I mean? Like, and start to see her personality, like what the things that she loves to do. Like, I think when we were younger, it used to be like mommy, you used to work, like you used to be on that computer from from sunup to sundown, out working and you know, be home at 11, you know, and then up at 6 a.m. working. But I think at 30 something, I realized that um my mother was doing purpose-driven work. So this is something that you love. So I I would not critique, you know, the fact that you are doing purpose-driven work. It's something that feeds you. And I think like as I got older, I began to kind of like, yeah, that that kind of beautiful season right now that we're in, where we're seeing each other as humans and not necessarily as the label.

SPEAKER_03 55:21

Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_00 55:23

We tend to, you know, put our mothers on a pedestal, but then when you get that age, 30s, and you know, now for me, 40s, and you look back at old pictures of your mother, and you say, Wow, she was younger than me in that picture. And I thought she had it all figured out, and and she's just a girl, she's just a girl with trying to figure it out day to day.

SPEAKER_02 55:48

Yes, those pictures will make you, hmm, like, wait a minute. Right, right. Isn't that something? Is that I'm older than she was in that picture, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 56:01

Right. That's and it's very humbling to do that because we put our our parents way up here on a pedestal, and we have so many expectations of you know our elders, and then we become an elder, right? And people start calling us miss. Ma'am. And then ma'am, exactly. And now, you know, people are looking to us, and we're responsible for the next generation, right?

SPEAKER_02 56:36

It's good, it's it's it's beautiful um to hear you say that. Um the especially because um there's just been a lot of of uh damage to mother-daughter relationships, especially in the black community. So it's when you see it, right? It's a beautiful thing to actually see and be a part of, right? Because I think I feel like they're in right order when you actually have that, that coming together of the minds of the adults, right? Not the child and the parent. Um, and because that relationship is always there, right? Yeah. My mother used to say, though, I don't care how old you are, I'm still gonna be your mother. And she was right about that. But that we also could see each other as human and have this relationship of respect with each other. It's a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful thing, yes. Respect is the word.

SPEAKER_01 57:41

So we are rounding out this uh episode and we like to do we're playing with our segments. So okay. We have a segment that we want to do with you, and it's okay, rapid fire round. Um, here at the podcast, our model is life comes at you fast, and to that we say bloom anyway. So yes, that's that's our mantra. So um, we'll present a common wellness bottleneck and invite you to give a quick response, a recommendation, or a reframe, if you will. Okay, let's go. Number one, too many shoes. What would you say to a woman whose entryway, closet, or bedroom is overwhelming, overflowing with shoes?

SPEAKER_00 58:38

I'd probably have her categorize them first, maybe by color or style, because I need to understand why she has that many shoes. Is it that they're not organized so you don't understand what you have, or are you searching for something that's missing? So I would probably guess that this woman doesn't have a signature style or like a capsule wardrobe or a look because she has so many shoes, and that is seeping into her wellness, because if you have so many, then you have to decide which ones you're gonna wear at each time. So I would help her reframe that look that she's going for so that she can easily pick out from those shoes and maybe not buy as many.

SPEAKER_01 59:29

I love that because yes, your style, you're not going through all that. Like you're right, you got your go-to's.

SPEAKER_03 59:37

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 59:38

Number two, overproduced, too much produce purchased with very good intentions that ultimately goes to waste.

SPEAKER_00 59:48

So she's buying things and it's like spoiling in the fridge. I would just again, this is this is somebody who is she's probably she's making these purchases because she thinks it's the right thing to eat. This is where my mind is going with this. Okay. I'm processing this in real time. She thinks it's the right thing to eat, but she's obviously eating something else if it's going bad. And then she's doing chopping on top of that. So we probably need to adjust what she feels is healthy and put it in a category of what she actually likes to eat instead of what she thinks she should be eating, because obviously that type of grocery shopping isn't working for her. She's not eating it, she doesn't want it. So we need to let her eat what she wants, the flavors that she wants.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:49

I'm gonna do the next one. Okay. Dusty dumbbells, fitness equipment purchase doing a moment of motivation that is now collecting dust.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:00

Okay, I would want to know where the dumbbells are and are they in a space that she spends a lot of time. So maybe we may take the dumbbells and put them in the living room where she watches TV all the time. So when she gets bored or there's some type of intermission on the screen, she can just lift a few weights and make it easy on herself, or maybe even change the color or the size. Maybe they're too bulky. She was overly ambitious and got 10 pounders when she should have got three or five and started there. A nice pretty color that's aesthetically pleasing to her. Or I would introduce her to something new. There's actually weights that look like a piece of sculptural home decor that you can put around your home that are pleasing to the eye. And you can put them in spaces that look beautiful, like home decor, but it's in your everyday space. It might be in your office or the living room or the kitchen. It doesn't look like, oh, I have a set of dumbbells in the kitchen, but it's now part of your decor. And when you see it, it reminds you, okay, let me just do a couple of wraps.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:10

Oh man. I'm learning something. I'm really learning. Do you want to do the next two? Okay. And I'm just done.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:23

These are things. I love this. I love hot seed. I love just rapping.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:28

You're doing wonderfully with them. And of course, these are things that are issues that we have, right? Okay, okay. Oh, excuse me. Okay. So um the next one is books but no worms, right? So shelves of books, um, self-health books, wellness books, uh, personal development books, a lot of things um that have not necessarily been opened. I don't that's not my problem. I'm just I want to put that out there.

unknown 1:02:56

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:58

That was Jasmine's problem. That part must be hers. Because we got lots of books here, but these books are being read. But I do have some. I do have that. Let me let me be let me. Yeah, I own some of that. I own some of it. Okay. I'm gonna let you ride.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:13

I look, I I I'm guilty of the same thing. So what I would say to that person is we know what your intention is. If you have a bunch of self-help books, we know that that you want this in your life, right? But there's some reason that you're not getting to the books. So it could be changing the location of the books or choosing one book to take to bed with you at night so that you'll read it. Or we just say, skip the books. That's okay. Watch a YouTube video or put on an audiobook and stick it in your headphones, or do it, listen to it on your way driving somewhere, or while you're taking a hike, put it in your headphones so you can still get the information, or listen to a podcast from the author so that you can still get the information. So you have to give the person permission and let them know that it's okay not to do it the way that they think that it's supposed to be done, or the way someone tells them it's supposed to be done, and just work with what their personality and lifestyle actually is.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:24

Yeah, yeah. I'm guilty of um if someone says, Oh, this is a good book, oh I'm gonna get that book. I'm gonna get that book. And the the thing for me the kinds of books I like to read are not necessarily those self-help books. I like to read narratives. So I it could be self-help, but I wanna I want you to tell me your story, right? Because I can get I'm I can connect with your story instead of you know um a technical technical book. So sometimes it is how it's written for me.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:06

But yeah, okay, and yeah, it's okay to give away some of the books that you have or donate them to the little free library, or you can be a book collector, start displaying them, make make your books a part of your decor, they're out, put them somewhere else besides the bookshelf, make it a coffee table book.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:28

Yes, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:29

Just who you are, don't force, don't force what's not working, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:36

Good, good, that's good, very good advice. And the last one is um uh jasmine wanted me to put this on here. She thinks this is me, I think this her. Uh doom scrolling. We can share the the loan. Okay, we'll share. Doom scrolling. So the habit of endlessly consuming information while feeling increasingly disconnected, overwhelmed. Or stuck, but it's the it's this.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:04

Yeah, now that's a hard one. A couple of things. One, if you haven't already done it, we need to introduce you to one of those apps that tells you how much time you've spent on it. Because there's apps on your phone, digital well-being and things like that, where you can set timers and parameters, and it'll lock you out of the apps. They'll be gray. You can't get in unless you press on the button. So you can say ahead of time, okay, I'm only gonna spend one hour a day or two hours a day doing this thing, and it'll lock you out of that app after that until the next day cycle. So we can try something like that, or we can understand that the reason that you're scrolling is because something is missing. Maybe there's some level of boredom. Maybe you need to get out of the house and connect with people. Maybe you need to go on Eventbrite and find some events or meetup.com and find some events, or you need to join an organization, something to pull you out of the house, need to find a friend group to walk with or something like that. So I'm I'm always interested in why you are doing it rather than just snatching it from you. Because as soon as I walk out of the door, you're gonna go right back to it. So I need to understand why you're doom scrolling, how late you're doom scrolling, what it is you're looking at. Because you could be doom scrolling because you're bored and you live alone, and you also could be doom scrolling because you are looking for inspiration because you want to quit your job and you you hate your job so bad that you're looking at other people who have done the same thing and started business. So depending on why is gonna inform where we go from there. It's it's not a one-size-fit-all solution. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:02

And and that's a really good important point about why, but also what, right? Because I don't necessarily consider what I'm doing as doom scrolling, but I do spend a lot of time on games. And I I like to do crosswords, um, you know, Sudoku, um, a bunch of word games. I love a word game. Um but I'm also um getting more busy now. So uh so I can't, so I can't do do that. But I don't do scroll in terms of looking at a bunch of stuff.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:41

I don't think that's and games are good, games are intellectually stimulating to the brain, yeah, you know, and if you if you ever feel like see the biggest thing about doom scrolling is that we lose time, yes. So again, I'm a big fan of setting a timer because that awareness will help you decide. Okay, I set an alarm for just like when we were in college going to school, the class is 50 minutes, and then you stop and do something else. Okay, set an alarm for an hour now, the alarm went off, and you get to decide. Am I gonna keep scrolling or am I gonna pivot now? Because now I know how much time I've been on.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:20

Right, right. Nothing worse than looking at your time spent on your phone and seeing that you spent six hours on socials. And you ain't running a business. Okay, but that's just that's a part-time job. That's money. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:35

I remember I I downloaded this app on my phone to tell me about my phone usage, and it told me that every hour on the hour I was spending at least some time checking my phone.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:51

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:52

Every single hour, and there was a gap where I didn't check it, and I was asleep. So from the time I woke up to the time I went to bed, every hour, so every hour, it may not have been for the entire hour, but a few minutes with each when within each hour, I saw that, and that helped me change. So just seeing it was you know, eye-opening, right? Wow, okay, I gotta do something about this.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:20

Yeah, right. Wow. Well, we could talk about this. I mean, there's so many different ways and directions that we could go in this conversation. It has been an absolute joy to talk with you, Jenny. Um, you love this, thank you. It's been an hour and some change. And we plan for 30 minutes. So thank you for going with the flow. Make sure and rocking with us. Um as you know, we appreciate the work that you're doing to help women, obviously, to create lives that are aligned, um, intentional, integrated, supported, and realistic. I think that's one of the biggest things that I'm personally taking away is um practical, real, and um graceful. Like we're not beating beating ourselves up over we just doing an assessment and we're kind of right-fitting stuff to us. Um so last but not least, where can people find you on socials, website? Um, anything coming up that you want to share that you have going on? This is your, you know, my good business.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:32

Well, people can find me just by searching my name, Jamie Connor, with an E on all social media, LinkedIn, Instagram, you know, all those places. My website is jamieonwellness.com. You can find me there. And upcoming, I do have some speaking engagements. I'm going to be speaking at a women's empowerment uh conference um hosted by She E O. And you know, just to helping women, especially women in business, empowering themselves and putting themselves first and making putting wellness in the forefront. So look out for me everywhere. That's where I plan to be. The United States of America and beyond.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:23

I know that's right. Yes. Well, thank you. Um, and to our um listeners, we hope you enjoyed this episode, and we'll see you next week. Peace and blessings.