Redesigning Life with Sabrina Soto

Redefining Womanhood: Tara Marino's Journey Through Tragedy and Empowerment

• Sabrina Soto and Tara Marino • Season 1 • Episode 75

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What happens when life throws you an unimaginable tragedy? How do you find the strength to redefine your existence? Join us as we sit down with Tara Marino, the visionary force behind Elegant Femme, who shares her powerful journey from the heartbreaking loss of her firstborn son, Mason, to the creation of a global brand that empowers women worldwide. Tara's story is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and the transformative power of choosing how to respond to life's challenges.

Explore the intricacies of womanhood and the concept of pleasure beyond physical boundaries with Tara. We unravel the societal pressures that compel women to juggle multiple roles, often at the expense of their emotional well-being. Through the lens of archetypes like the "New Yorker" and "faux New Yorker," Tara sheds light on how these roles impact women's lives, urging a shift towards prioritizing personal joy without guilt. Tara's insights help us question the narratives that bind us and encourage a fresh perspective on balancing professional and personal demands.

In our enriching conversation, we discuss the essence of authentic femininity and the importance of simplicity, focusing on meaningful experiences over materialistic pursuits. With stories from Tara's own life, such as her sailing adventures and a love for significant possessions, we uncover the hidden beauty in life's simple pleasures. Tara's wisdom guides us toward reclaiming our power and embracing a soul-led life, paving the way for richer relationships and deeper personal growth. Listen in to discover how embracing your true self can lead to a more fulfilling journey.

Connect with Tara -- https://www.instagram.com/taraannmarino
Elegant Femme -- https://elegantfemme.com/

Speaker 1:

Hi, I'm Sabrina Soto. I believe the best conversations are with friends who are really able to open themselves up and share their lives, both the good parts and the bad. You're going to be listening to some of those candid conversations and hopefully gaining some insight to help you redesign your life from the inside out. Hi, tara, hi, sabrina, how are you Welcome to Redesigning Life? Thank you so much for being here. I am excited about our conversation. Tara Marino, you lead Elegant Femme and before we got started recording, I was telling you I wanted to talk about the feminine because I think it's such a huge topic in my personal life, in this time in my life, and I feel like it also touches a lot of people in their forties, mid forties. A lot of my friends are talking about how the feminine leads them throughout their life, and I know that's something that you stand for. So if we could, before we get started me asking you questions, can you tell my listeners a little bit about your background and who you are?

Speaker 2:

Like the ultimate question, right, who are you?

Speaker 1:

Who are?

Speaker 2:

you. You know it really is interesting at this stage in life. You know, you and I shared a little bit before. We're the same age and you do start to ask these questions again like who am I, why am I here, what am I doing? What's important, all the things? And I think for me, you know I am and have been just this woman that's on a devotional path of aligning the physical world and the beauty that I love, the quality of life that I desire, the dreams and desires of my heart, with a deep devotional to God, to my soul, and walking through the world to the best of my ability, with grace, with the opportunity to evolve and receive and prioritize what I really, really value. And, out of my entire life experience and, you know, the loss of my firstborn son, these real defining moments that, although we don't all share the same defining moments, we all have them.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Points in time where we choose. How am I going to live from this point forward?

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

So that was, you know, the birth of my company Elegant Femme, and for over two decades now, just living into each and every day remembering but Tara, I mean.

Speaker 1:

I think most people agree the worst pain that anybody could even fathom is losing a child.

Speaker 2:

I hope so. Yes, I hope there isn't anything.

Speaker 1:

It really is.

Speaker 2:

No, I really I feel like what I have come to understand with my experience is that we can't compare grief. It's like we all experience different types of pain and whatever, and it's not really different types of pain. It's pain that comes in different forms.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

And I really have learned over time that there is no comparison and and and. Yet, um, you know when you are a parent and you recognize how much love is poured into these souls that come through us. It is even now, as I sit here with you, 22 years later since Mason passed. I still can't fathom that it happened. We distance ourselves from that, thank goodness. I mean, that's one of the values of time that we do begin to see things differently. But that was also a cracking open for me and I would absolutely not be where I am today without that experience. It changed me, it birthed me.

Speaker 1:

His death birthed me for sure In what way of just maybe realizing what, how to prioritize the things in your life. Or can you explain to me how you say that a lot in your business, like it, cracked you open. Can you verbalize or explain to us how that happened?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean again. Mason died in my arms, so this was the most cathartic yet poetic thing I could have ever imagined. And about a year after he passed away, I was surrounded by lawyer papers and asking the question that we all ask why me, why me, why me, why me Very easy question to ask and also, at that point in time, because I was so wrought in pain, it was also a very easy question to answer and that my ego was like well, because you did this or you did this, you're not a good person. This, you deserve this. I mean, it was a, a default of um, feeling like I wasn't enough and that I deserved this kind of pain in my life, and gifting myself the space in that moment to hear a different response inside, which was stop asking why, why you, and start asking how? How are you going to respond to this?

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

Because the why wasn't getting me anywhere.

Speaker 1:

It was only true and it wasn't true.

Speaker 2:

It wasn't true, but my ego is very, very quick to fill in the blanks. As we do right, we think why if we could understand why something happens to us, it's going to be the healing moment. If God would have come down and told me why, in that moment, it still wouldn't have been enough.

Speaker 2:

It was not, so that's what I mean cracked me open the question of how am I going to respond to this? And through that initial questioning inside, I started to regain my power. I never really lost it, but my awareness of my power that I did have choice in this moment, that my life really was not happening to me, that I could be a co-creator in my life, and it was that point in time that I started journaling, I started creating, I birthed what are now known around the world as the fem types, and I healed myself through that journey and it became my business.

Speaker 1:

So you created an, you created elegant femme. It was birthed through the pain. What did you find? How, I guess, did that journey lead you there?

Speaker 2:

So for me, what's also really important is that Elegant Femme wasn't created because I thought I'm going to create a big, beautiful business. I'm going to create an eight-figure global brand to change the world. That's how this will mean something. It started with my own healing. That was what it was all about. I had no intentions of doing anything else with it. So each day, after that point in time that I just shared with you, I started journaling and just opening up myself to different kinds of questions I think the easiest maybe not easiest way to hear it, but really channeling, journaling, channeling, hearing these points of healing and I came up with three aspects the Indy, the Frenchie and the New Yorker that I needed to embody each day, and each day that I did, I felt different. Okay.

Speaker 2:

Tell me about the three types, journaling with these different aspects. So that voice at first came through with such a tiny whisper. It's like stop asking why and start asking how. And that voice I identified with the indie. The indie femme type is the being aspect, the aspect of us that resides in a state of peace, of calm, of inner knowing, awareness of our value and our self-worth, supports us in increasing our capacity to receive our intuition right. All of this was pouring through me. So every day I was like, okay, I need my indie, I need my indie femme type. What does that look like for me today? What's going to reconnect me with who I know myself to be? Maybe it's journaling, maybe it's meditating, maybe it's hot lemon tea, like. What kind of reflection do I need in the world to prioritize who I really am?

Speaker 2:

Shortly after that came the Frenchie femmeemtype. So I want to paint this picture. I was 26 years old, had pregnant body, c-section scar, freezer full of breast milk and no baby. I hated my body. I hated everybody, everything, everything. So even taking a shower was like painful for me from a not only physical but mental perspective. So the Frenchie came through as a femme type that has everything to do with beauty internal beauty and external beauty, body image and relationships. So each day doing a little something that prioritized pleasure over trying to fix something in the world was the Frenchie Femme type.

Speaker 1:

Okay, wait, give me an example of what would give you pleasure, Because I think a lot of people probably say I want to incorporate Frenchie in my life every day. But what did that look like for you?

Speaker 2:

So it is going to be different to every single person. And this is actually a very big question for women, cause, although women say I'd like to prioritize pleasure, then you ask them she's like, well, you know, once, once the kids are taken care of, or once all the work's done, or I don't even know what I want anymore, because I'm so used to prioritizing everybody else that when you ask me that question, I'm like, oh, so it's going to look different for everyone. And for me it started with, honestly, even just taking a shower right.

Speaker 2:

Overing my body, putting coconut oil on my body, wearing beautiful lingerie, taking walks, identifying songs and music that I loved, you know, sitting with a beautiful cup of tea anything. There's not just physical pleasure in the world. Again, our minds tend to go okay, what's going to turn you on? Pleasure is so much bigger. So it's not just the thing itself that is going to be pleasurable for us. Behind that, it's gifting ourselves permission, as women, to prioritize pleasure, to not feel like we have to earn it. That's right. We have to check off everything else on the to-do list first, and then maybe then it's okay for us.

Speaker 1:

That's me.

Speaker 1:

Yeah for sure. So yesterday we shot here that we had filmed here in the house and I was talking to my boyfriend on the phone and he I had to be on camera. I had to actually be camera ready and, tara, I made sure that this house. I actually started ironing my duvet cover because I needed everything to be perfect in the house before anybody walked in. And then I came last. I didn't even get ready until everything else was done and I realized that's my life. I've I have prioritized everything else and then I will only gift myself the pleasure of a bath or once everything else is done. And I think a lot of us do that. A lot of us put ourselves last constantly because we do have so much on our to-do lists.

Speaker 2:

We do. And also we get addicted to the two, to the, the. We get addicted to it as a point of value which brings forward the final fem type, and that is the new yorker. And the new yorker is really interesting because when we first hear the new york it's like, oh, I get her. She's the badass walking on the street. New york, she's getting everything done, she's the powerhouse. The foundation of the new yorker, energy is allowing. So if we look at the india's being, the Frenchie as enjoying and the New Yorker as allowing, allowing ourselves to take the aligned action that's most congruent, which is very different than what we call, inside of elegant femme, the faux New Yorker. The faux New Yorker is I have to get everything done on my to-do list. I'm going to add something to my to-do list just so I can check it off, because my value and my self-worth are associated with how much I do.

Speaker 2:

And given that it's never, ever, ever done, I am going to do, do, do, do, do myself into exhaustion, into adrenal fatigue, into resentment, which is actually what happens, with a lot of women not saying we can't see results in that way. We can. We all know that. Right, this is the overly driven embodiment of a woman in her phone. New Yorker, it's like a high, it's super addictive, it's super tense to go into that energy.

Speaker 1:

We get rewarded for it.

Speaker 2:

We do to an extent.

Speaker 1:

You're right.

Speaker 2:

Because what's starting to happen now and more and more women are talking about this is there may be some external results and awards that feel good, and that again, it's not black and white, but our egos get very, very addicted to this. Look at me making a lot of money, I'm doing a lot of things, I'm important in this. Again, there's nothing wrong with it. But when it's a sacrifice for our well-being, in the end we actually still don't feel fulfilled. We don't come into elegant femme, right, and then we're like what the hell is going on? Tara, I did it right. I did the plan. I've been working so hard, I'm getting so much accomplished, I have the big job, I have the letters after my name.

Speaker 1:

I'm working so hard.

Speaker 2:

I'm getting so much accomplished. I have the big job. I have the letters after my name.

Speaker 1:

I'm making this a match of money Like I'm not happy. I'm not happy, what's?

Speaker 2:

happened, yes, Like okay. Well, where's your Frenchie Right? I don't have time for her. I don't have time. I love what you're saying. It all sounds so nice. It sounds so nice, but you don't understand my life.

Speaker 2:

That's right, I have this to do and that to do and this to do and that to do, and we forget the ability that we have to respond to our lives. It goes back to the very first question of like, how, how am I choosing to live my life and how am I going to respond to it? Because of them not feeling fulfillment, if I'm not feeling enjoyment and if I'm feeling like I need to be the last on the list, all that we're breeding in the world as women is resentment, and that's not true. It's not all we're breeding, but I'm talking about from that viewpoint.

Speaker 1:

Okay, can I? This is going to be a little controversial and probably going to regret saying this, but I feel like that's a story of my life. I feel like we are in this really tough spot where we're fighting for our rights to be equal, right and but the the but on top of all of this, we, as women, we have more responsibility than than we realize. I guess, yes, we can have equality in the workplace we should and be boss babes and all the things that we're trying to do, and we still have the mother role A lot of us have to play and that takes a lot out of us. And so I feel like we're we're all trying to be the boss babes in work, but we forget that we still have to be the mom and the partner and all of these other, and it's heavy. It's so heavy on us and I was talking to a friend of mine the other day about it even in school.

Speaker 1:

Okay, my Olivia, I have a little eight year old. Olivia's dad and I are. We're no longer together. We get along, thank goodness. We co-parent wonderfully together, and if anything happens to Olivia at school, they call me first, right, don't? They always call the mom first. So that's just one example of just a little bit more weight is put on us as moms to be there first, and maybe that's going to change. But where things stand now, moms still have to do more and it's just becoming heavy and I feel like a lot of my friends are burnt out because of it. And do you feel that in the clients that you coach that it's just as women we're becoming burnt like burnouts because we're just doing too much all the time?

Speaker 2:

For sure, for sure, and I mean this is where the operation of being in the phone, new Yorker, with the exhaustion and the weight that we feel we have to carry, and yet the big thing that's available to us is the point of choice that we forget. We get so easily into this like I just have to do this, I have to do this, I have to do this, and we can make both of us a very logical case of well, yes, we have to do it, because if we don't do it, who else is going to do it? We have to do it. And so what you're sharing I think is really beautiful. If we look back to like World War II, where women were coming into the workplace right, if you remember that famous poster I think her name was Rosie where, like that girl with the bandana and she's like kissing her, you know, she's like we can do it A really beautiful point in time where women were called into what you're talking about, this equality of. Look at us, we can do it, we can do it. And above that ad actually originally I did some research on it it says are you doing all you can? So, again, at that time, I think this was really beautiful. It was a gorgeous upliftment for women in many ways.

Speaker 2:

But I feel like the pendulum has gone too far. We have taken this idea that we just because we can, we're supposed to and that we should, and we have bought into the misunderstanding and the illusion that some of these other activities, like building a business, making money, working outside the home, they're all beautiful. Yes, we can do it. We have devalued, I believe, the feminine aspects and the feminine roles that are just as important as these other ones and we have. Again, we can all look at like point fingers of this is society or this is a no, we, it's us, it's our choice. We have bought into the illusion that that's more important and yet we don't want to let go of the motherhood role. If that's a calling for us, again, it's not a have to.

Speaker 2:

If it's a calling we get to reprioritize what we really value and take a really good look inside authentically and ask ourselves what's really bringing us fulfillment.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

And really some value, some of these things that I mean. I remember really early on in elegant fam before Elliot fam, excuse me I was in real estate and my first house I sold. I got like an $18,000 commission and this was like in 2000 and I don't know like four, four, like a while ago. This was a lot of money back then and I remember putting clothes in the dryer and thinking like a little proud of myself and then all of a sudden thinking why am I doing this laundry? Now I have to do everything around here, going into total martyrdom and being like then I'm making a decision. I'm not doing laundry because I was seeing it as not as valuable as making the money.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

So I feel like and I hear everything you're saying and I so relate and I really feel like there is a big opportunity for women to remember and value themselves differently in what it is they are choosing to participate in, and recognize that we actually don't have to do it all and have a really authentic conversation with ourselves around what are we really wanting?

Speaker 1:

Yes, yes.

Speaker 2:

A hundred percent. A hundred percent.

Speaker 1:

I can tell you probably. You know I lived in New York. Funny, I was in real estate too before I got on HGTV. But when I was in New York working I worked so much I probably worked seven days a week, all like for the years five years that I lived there and from the outside you'd be like she's killing it, like I was the top. You know I couldn't. I was doing everything right and I was super successful, but I was so not fulfilled and I felt empty and I felt really lonely in my life at that time. Looking back, and it's hard when you're in the race, you know, when you're in the forest it's hard, but I think it comes probably with maturity to realize that soft is strong and you don't have to hustle all the time to create a beautiful life, don't you? I mean, isn't that, didn't you? Didn't it take time for you to realize that? Cause it took me 47 years to figure that out.

Speaker 2:

I think I think we're all. For me, I'm always learning it, I'm always being reminded of it and I do feel like this is why I say that that the death of Mason was one of my greatest gifts, because I feel like I was gifted insight at a very, very young age, given that experience in my life where I witnessed first of all how quickly things can change in our lives and the difference in feeling in my body versus kind of the chasing energy of an external result that we think is going to bring us peace, calm, fulfillment, happiness, versus the real choice to follow desire, energy inside and the courage that that takes, but the level of peace and calm and serenity and true power that it activates inside of us.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

It's going to look different to every single one of us.

Speaker 2:

Every single one of us. It does take a lot of to every single one of us, every single one of us. It does take a lot of courage to say to ourselves like, wow, like you said with your story in New York, like everyone would be like, oh my gosh, right, she's the creme de la creme, she's got everything. But the feeling inside for us to admit like, okay, it might look like this on the outside, but inside it's not what I want. It's not what I want. I want a slower pace. So I'll tell you next week we're bringing my son to college in the south of France and then my husband and I are getting on a sailboat and we're sailing around the world. What we have slowed down our life so much. And I've been making these choices consistently over the past 20 years of like I just I want to do so much less in my life now. Now, I love it so funny. I know I want to do so much less in my life.

Speaker 1:

I don't know. I'm sure a lot of listeners know what I'm talking about, but there's an Instagram account called cheap old houses. Do you are you familiar with?

Speaker 2:

this? No, I don't know it.

Speaker 1:

account called cheap old houses. Do you? Are you familiar with this? So they post all of these houses from all over and they're really inexpensive and I constantly sending them to my boyfriend, like let's just live a simple life in this little house in the middle of nowhere, because I feel like I've spent my twenties and thirties just hustling, working my ass off to get where I am and now it's like the pendulum has shifted and I just want to read a book and put my bare feet into grass and just see the sunlight and just relax.

Speaker 2:

Yes, yes, it's yes and it's real. It's real. There's so much Like I could get super emotional about this, because there's so much that we feel in life that we have to do or that we're supposed to do, and I do think this has come with age for me.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

I really do see the world in such a different way, in that, really, the things we think matter and we know it, we know it inside always, but the embodiment of it makes choices that support it are completely different.

Speaker 1:

I was on one of my podcasts a few weeks ago. Danny Morrell was a guest and I was. For the first time I publicly talked about my psilocybin journey and I don't know if you've ever done a journey, but the first journey that I did, the thing that came through the most was that the things that matter and what was shown to me was my watch. I bought a Rolex. When I first got my big check in New York and they were saying the watch that you're wearing, it doesn't matter.

Speaker 1:

You all humans made a Rolex matter, yet it's just a watch and it was a symbol for everything in our life that we put weight on and labels on and that they matter and these materialistic things that don't matter. In there and the download was like we give you sunsets and waterfalls and beautiful moons and stars and grass and flowers and these, all of these things that are so gorgeous at your fingertips and you all care about a car and a watch and some stupid purse. And it wasn't even judgmental like that. I'm making it judgmental as a human, but it was with love. But all of that to say is we are all striving for these things, to collect these things, when, at the end of the day, once you get those things, you might be happy for maybe a day, and then that fades too. But what doesn't fade are memories and family and friends and and love and friendship and connection. That's what we should be striving for and we don't, and I've been guilty of that too.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think for me what the interesting conversation around, like the material things that I feel like yes, in some ways it's just a watch or it's just a purse, or it's just a purse or it's just a car.

Speaker 2:

However, what I have found for myself and this is where we talk a lot in Elegant Femme about external beauty and about the embodiment of the Frenchie that when we do gift ourselves permission to invest in things that we do desire, there's a spiritual growth component associated with that. I remember when I bought my first selene purse and it was at a depot, it was at a you like a consignment store, because that's what I could afford at that time. That was the level of permission I was willing to gift myself, because I had only received hand-me-downs my whole life. Anything brand name was a hand-me-down. The time that I walked into a selene store store in Paris on Avenue Montaigne and bought a real Celine purse was a spiritual moment for me, and it wasn't because it's just about a purse, it was the permission inside to allow myself to invest in something that had that value to me, that had a beauty, that had an appreciation, that had a quality.

Speaker 2:

I get that Watch that dance right, Because then it can become an addiction. Exactly that is my value, which is not what I'm saying at all I get that. The appreciation of things can be a spiritual evolution in the movement, in the growth, in the conversations that we unlock inside. But it is a beautiful dance because we tend to again go to two extremes Either, oh, I can't allow any of that in my life because I don't want to become overly materialistic, or I have to have everything, and that's who I am.

Speaker 1:

Yes, you're right, it is a balance. You're absolutely right.

Speaker 2:

Because then it becomes fun, because I love beautiful things, I love gorgeous purses, we're getting a gorgeous boat, but it is that discernment of, but that doesn't it's not who I am, it's what I'm desiring to experience, but it's not who I am. And when it comes to that point of but now I'm chasing or hustling or feeling like I need this money, these things in my life to make me who I am, then that's where we realize, like okay, something's out of sync.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, everything in life is such a balance, and I know you do coaching. So what do you feel like most of your clients? Is there a category that most women these days are dealing with that you see over time and time again with your clients?

Speaker 2:

I mean, it's really everything we've been talking about. There's over-identification with the masculine as a form of value, this idea that women are now coming into a space where they can verbally recognize that it's not serving them, but that permission of letting go of the addiction to the hustle, to these things as a point of value and to the idea that inside that's the only way to success things as a point of value and to the idea that inside that's the only way to success, that's what every woman inside of elegant fam that comes is unraveling to some extent. And then how do I gift myself permission to live into my beautiful soul, red life, to grow at the pace that I want to? So the other thing that comes up for a lot of women is if I continue to grow and evolve, I'm going to leave my partner behind. So that's another big conversation that we can do.

Speaker 1:

I'm going to leave my partner behind, so that's another big conversation that we can do. Yes, yes, that is. A lot of my friends are going through that, like they're evolving and they feel like their partner is stagnant. And how do you, how do you like, merge or even mend that separation?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's a really interesting, I think, dynamic between the masculine and the feminine, because what it typically starts at is is the woman starts to evolve and grow and she's having these amazing ahas and like openings and she tries to coach her husband.

Speaker 1:

Do not do that. Tell me, because I already know two people in my life that are going to listen to this and want to hear If you find a listener's finding themselves in a situation where they are ascending and I don't even want to put that judgment on it just changing. They are just changing and becoming either more spiritual or more health focused, or whatever the case may be, and their partner is staying the same. What do they do?

Speaker 2:

Okay, I'll say first what not to do, right.

Speaker 1:

Okay.

Speaker 2:

Do not try to explain to them or tell them what they should be doing to keep up with you.

Speaker 1:

Okay.

Speaker 2:

This is because it only creates more distance. Being really authentic with ourselves. We actually have a program inside Elegant Femme called Sensually Authentic. This is so, so, so important. We have to get really honest with ourselves. Are we in any way having resentment or holding our partner hostage, thinking that we need to get their permission or that they have to grow at a certain rate, in a certain way, in order for us to grow? We don't realize that we send out these like energetic hooks, like you're slowing me down. What's wrong with like? We have to get really honest inside.

Speaker 2:

If we are harboring any resentment around who they are, what they are, and projecting on them, that's the only we don't. We're not saying that to them. This is a conversation, an internal conversation inside. Then we need to get really, really clear on what we actually want and know that we are the only ones that can create it. In addition, with God, we have to take full responsibility for what we want in our lives and let go of any feeling that someone else is responsible for our happiness. When we continue to embody that, when we let go of the idea that someone needs to keep up with us, that's when we soar and that's when that relationship, that person will make a choice.

Speaker 1:

Okay, or they're just by just watching you watching it and you embodying it fully.

Speaker 2:

You can't, I can get really annoying Tara. You can't hold back. You can't hold back, but it's got to be a very clean energy. It's not again. We've got to look for the resentment. We've got to look for the places inside where we're waiting for permission We've got to look for. Are places inside we're waiting for permission We've got to look for? Are we holding them hostage in any way? This really beautiful embodiment of our own truth, our own power, without holding back, and they will see it.

Speaker 1:

Okay, I'm just going to give you an example. Let's say there's a husband and wife and the wife wants to become healthier and she starts working out, she starts losing weight. You can see her body transform and every day she comes home from the gym her husband's on the lazy boy, eating you know whatever and overweight and just really unhealthy. So how like it must get frustrating to see every day a physical like physically nothing's changing and obviously mentally nothing's changing and you're changing. So you're saying, yeah, don't say anything to them. Obviously he'll see that you are transforming, but like there's only so much you can take of you changing and wanting your husband or your partner, whomever, to follow you on this path of being healthy and they're not doing anything. So like for people who are listening and this is just an example but people do it spiritually in other ways, how do you deal with the frustration of watching that lazy boy person not moving?

Speaker 2:

Yeah Well, first we need to recognize that it's not about us, it's not a projection on us, because we do get really frustrated as if we're the ones that are supposed to control that situation.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

And we're not. That's where the frustration comes in. The frustration comes in that I should be able to fix that.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Speaker 2:

That is not where our focus needs to go. Our focus needs to continually go to I am honoring myself. Do we love this person? We love this person? We tell them we love them. Okay, if it's getting to the point where there is a clear gap, you will know. You will know if you are being called in a different direction and you are being called somewhere else in your life. What I'm saying is that trying to change that person in any way is not where the energy is going to be most utilized. It's only continuing to gift ourselves permission to go where we're being called to go, and that person will make a choice. Right, they're either going to join and live into the best version of them.

Speaker 2:

It's really difficult at times in any relationship whether it's in a marriage, a friendship, anything when one person starts self-actualizing and the other person is choosing not to. It's their choice, they really are choosing not to. And so I hear what you're saying and, yes, I feel like every relationship goes through this to some extent where, then, a choice will be made, but the choice has to come from that person. We know this, we know it, we know it, we know it. That person is going to say, okay, am I? Am I going this way? Am I going that way?

Speaker 1:

I just took a deep breath for my friends. I just took a deep breath for my friends who are going through this now.

Speaker 2:

And again I don't mean to sugarcoat it.

Speaker 1:

No, I get it.

Speaker 2:

Or like not, you know, honor the level of debt. It's just that I want to be really clear in the energy, because as women we are so trained to think that we are supposed to fix situations. We are ones to help people, that it's our obligation, our responsibility. If I was this enough or that enough, then the person would see this and they would do that. If I'm working out and I'm taking such good care in this example right Of my body, then obviously they see and they appreciate, like why aren't they doing? We put our power in the other person and in the situation waiting for that level of permission, recognition, and I know it's not simple at times but actually over time we start to feel the different energy in our body when we're pouring it into a situation that is not ours to fix at all and utilizing this we don't realize this is a little maybe like sticky to say but we don't realize that we're giving our power away and actually utilizing it as a way to stop our own growth.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

We're afraid that if we keep growing, we have the beautiful soul led life. Whatever our version of that is that we're going to lose people. So we have a tendency to blame people, to hold on to people, to get frustrated and resentful, thinking that I need them to get on board and all we're doing is subjugating our own power.

Speaker 1:

You're absolutely right, Tara. Thank you so much. Time to go.

Speaker 2:

Just for anyone listening. You know I get fired up. You know I get fired up with this.

Speaker 1:

I love it. I'm going to link to Tara's amazing podcast and her website so you can get in touch with her and her Instagram as well. I love this conversation because I think it's so timely. I feel like all of my friends and I are talking about the feminine and what does that actually mean and what does it feel like to live in it authentically. So I thank you so much for your conversation and your time today and again, everybody who wants to get a hold of Tara, I'll have it right in the show notes.

Speaker 2:

Thank you so much, sabrina. I love the time, I love the conversation as well, and thank you for your vulnerability and just the space to really have the real conversation.

Speaker 1:

Thank you.