Hello, everyone, thank you so much for joining me for another episode of the More Than You See podcast with your host, myself, Deborah Lee Smith, I'm so excited to have you here again. First off, I have to say thank you so much for everyone's incredible feedback from our first episode last week, I got so many messages about how much this episode made you smile, how much it helped you learn about your own mental health already. And this incredible feedback is exactly why I created this podcast. So I am so so glad that it is resonating with you.
Please continue to share your thoughts, your messages, I am open to any sort of feedback, any sorts of ideas that you want me to address on the podcast. I would be more than happy to dive into any topic that has to do with mental health. So please be sure to follow more than you see on Instagram or on Facebook, all of the links to that will be in the show notes. And if you also want to reach out to me specifically, I will have the links to my own personal social media as well. And I would absolutely love if you wanted to follow along with with my journey. I also feel like I have to say this because it is a podcast. If you are enjoying what you're hearing, please find us on iTunes rate, review, subscribe, all of those things help other people find this podcast. And it is really my goal to continue to spread self love and joy on these little Monday episodes as much as I can. So Your help is greatly appreciate it with that.
Okay, everyone. Um, so let's start the second episode of the More Than You See podcast where we talk about non traditional mental health resources. Again, I feel like I have to say I am not a therapist or a licensed practitioner of any kind. I am just a woman experiencing my own mental health struggles and sharing my experiences with you, the listener.
This week has been rough, I have to say that I am recording this on January 14, Thursday, we are a few short days away from the inauguration of President Elect Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, into the White House. I, for one, cannot wait for that to happen. And I have to say the last week feels like it is just added extra anxiety and pressure on top of everything that we're already feeling. And that's what I want to talk about today is just feelings in general, and the importance of feeling your feelings, and the importance of allowing yourself to fully experience whatever is coming up for you with what's going on right now.
Of course in future episodes, I'm really going to dive into what tools we can use when we feel those feelings. But for today in order to keep these episodes short and sweet, and to the point, I just want to really address the importance of feeling our feelings. And why is that why is it so important for us to feel our feelings?
I want to start with a very short little story. I was talking with my therapist about launching this podcast and how I was excited cerebrally, I knew that I should be excited, I knew that I should feel so excited. But I didn't. I just felt numb. I really didn't know how I was feeling about this experience. And that really made me sad. Because I knew that making this podcast was something that was going to bring a lot of, you know, hopefully some some happiness and some joy. And the fact that I wasn't really feeling the excitement of starting this podcast. I was I was like, okay, what's going on with that? Why? Why am I feeling like that? And so we really dived into it. And she reminded me that in order to feel one feeling, we have to feel all of our feelings.
And basically what was going on was that I wasn't feeling excitement, because I also didn't want to feel disappointment. I didn't want to feel like maybe I had failed. I didn't want to feel the potential negative aspects of my feelings. And so because I wasn't allowing myself to feel potentially disappointed. I wasn't allowing myself to feel positive in any way. And so she reminded me of the importance of... you have to celebrate and embrace both sides of the emotions. Because if you don't, you just can't have one emotion without the other.
And for anyone who's listening to this who's an actor, like I am, I feel like this is even more difficult in some ways, because we often are so used to disappointment. And this, this could, you know, this could resonate with you as well, no matter what your career is - what your goals are in life, if you're so used to leaning into disappointment, if you're so used to being disappointed by things, then it's very easy to just lean into that numbness, and not allow yourself to feel those feelings because you're just so used to feeling disappointed, and you don't want to feel disappointed anymore. And so you just shut it off.
And so when I was talking to my therapist about this, she gave me an exercise to do that I wanted to share with you all because I think it will really help especially with what is going on right now. She told me to create an intentional celebration. And what she meant by that was to - on the day that the podcast was landing, which was you know, last Monday - she told me to put it on the calendar, put stars draw hearts, make that day special, intentionally. And I did. The podcast came out, I ended up having a really wonderful bath. And just celebrated my wins by indulging in that self care, which is something that I struggle to do at times. And by really intentionally saying, I am going to celebrate that I am here, and that I have done something to be proud of, that really did allow me to feel my feelings more than the overall numbness that I was feeling previously.
So I would like to give you a homework assignment. You know, with everything going on right now with the inauguration coming up next week. Like I said, there are so many emotions going on right now. There's so much anxiety and stress and worry going on in the world. But I would implore you to choose a day, whether this is Inauguration Day, or some day next week, if you're listening to this in the future, choose some day in the future, where you're going to have an intentional celebration of yourself and write it on the calendar. Make it special for you, and do something to celebrate yourself. Because you are here, you are successful you are a human being who is thriving in this world, just by existing. And I want you to celebrate that today. And that's where I'm going to leave you today. Please go out there and do something to intentionally celebrate yourself. And let me know what you decide to do and how you decide to celebrate yourself and maybe what you're celebrating if you would like to share.
Again, you can find me on the more than you see Instagram and Facebook, all of the links to that will be in the show notes. And I just want to remind you, that you're not alone, that we're all feeling a lot of feelings, that there's so much going on in the world right now. And I know that as an empath, I certainly feel really distraught and stressed and tired and anxious and so many things. And I am reminding myself that it's important to feel those feelings so that I can also feel the positive feelings I can also feel joy and happiness and success and celebrate my own wins. I would also encourage you to share that intentional celebration, your win with someone in the community who supports you and who loves you. And to remind you that we are all in this together, we are all feeling our feelings together, and to practice grace and self love. That's just so important. And to remind you that we are all more than you see. I really look forward to chatting with you again next week. Thank you so much for listening.
