Shine Living Community with Jessica & Jill Emich | 023

You know, and that also brought us into this multigenerational

healing and coming together, part of our Italian big Italian family

background as well. Because a big part of our mission is also

bringing the kids along and the family and the neighbors because And the elders. And

the elders. And, you know, we don't heal in a vacuum. And I think

for for children to see the adults, you know, healing and doing the work. And

for us to remember the wisdom that the elders have and

bringing them in, even if they're moving at a different pace, it's like we inspire

and lift the whole. And this is something we're so passionate about

bringing back to, you know, movement

and healing is just normalizing the

challenging times, the tears, you know, the showing

up as you are. Like, how incredible is that?

Welcome back to another episode of Resilient

AF with Blair and Alana. But today, we've

traded Alana in for two very, very special souls. I

actually think I met them maybe a year and a half or so ago, maybe

even longer. Who knows? Time's elastic. But they are two

of three triplet sisters. They're absolutely amazing.

We have Jessica. We have Jill. And they are

actually changing the world. And I'm so honored that not only are they in

Resilient AF Stories of Resilience, but they just met me and our community in New

York, and they got some really cool things they're working on. So,

New York, and they got some really cool things they're working on. So

their, relationship as triplet sisters

has taught them, what sisterhood really mat means and matters,

and how to navigate the world that's always comparing them to one another.

So I'll tell you a little bit about each of them. But in the show

notes, there's a really detailed bio about Shine Living Community, which is where they've, you

know, they've built that and they have a lot going on. So we got Jessica.

Jessica. Hi, Jessica. Jessica is the cofounder.

So she's the cofounder of Shine Living Community and the coauthor of

Eat Drink Shine. She's also a yoga teacher, a

meditation teacher, and an inspiring speaker. She's

the eldest of triplet shine sisters. Her mission and

purpose is to see life as the great transformer to

heal and awaken. She shines the brightest through family,

nature, and community. She owned and managed

community driven restaurants and gathering places for over twenty three years

in Boulder, Colorado. Shout out to Colorado. Some of my most favorite humans in the

world are there. Before she and her sister, Jill, co

created Shine Living Community as an in person and digital global

movement of health and wellness. She teaches yoga, meditation, breath

work classes based in several yoga traditions

to create embodied grounded practice full of self love

and self healing. She's a certified body awake yoga instructor as well as

a certified sacred yoga flow flow yoga

instructor and has a master's in holistic nutrition.

So Jill hey, Jill. Hi. Hi.

She's the cofounder of Shine Living Community and coauthor of Eat

Drink Shine. She's also a dance instructor, somatic breath work instructor, and

an empowering speaker. She's the middle of the Triplett

Sisters, and her mission and purpose in life is to encourage people

to explore and dig deeper into their unique selves so

they can share their gifts and passions from the heart. Jill owned

and managed community driven restaurants and gathering places for 23 in Boulder,

Colorado. Before her and Jessica co created the CHI Living

Community, which is the in person and digital global movement of health and

wellness. Jill teaches dance, movement, and breath work from

a somatic, which is an embodied perspective that is all

about connection and inner and outer strength. She's a certified

somatic practitioner and a certified breath work practitioner. She's also a

certified teacher in a various amount of dance styles. And if you follow

them on social media, they're almost always dancing. And, I'm

so excited because you're the first two of three triplets I've

ever had on this podcast. And I'm so glad to

be here. Yes. So, this is a mix of, like, audio

and visual. So if you feel like you wanna say who is speaking, for

those who are watching us, that could be beneficial or not. Whatever you guys

want. So you each have your story shared in our books, and the stories that

you shared are different. So why don't we start by just tapping

into, a moment of resilience or a story of

resilience that you you know, we wanna share, and we'll we'll talk about all the

things. Okay. So thank

you, Jessica. This is Jessica, I was gonna say. And thank you so

much for having us in the beautiful book you created. Such

an honor. And the story I bought to the book was

very and is very near and dear to my heart, especially doing the work

that I do in the world because it was around,

healing my autoimmune that I had going on.

Growing up, I was super active and super excited, a

gymnast, a yogi, a teacher and just

really embodied and playful and loving it. But I was also plagued

with some pain in my body and that pain over

time was just growing. And I was like, how is this possible? You know, I

had, as I got older my master's in holistic nutrition

and I felt like I was doing everything right. And so

all of these actions I was doing in the world felt like I should have

a super healthy body. And I looked healthy and yet

there was pain. And so it took me on this incredible

journey towards self love. Because what I was

recognizing is that I had a lot of these old programs playing in my

brain about not enough or, you

know, the things I was doing even though they looked healthy from

the outside in was more of like a self

punishment or like a not enough energy rather than this

energy of self love. And even around holistic

nutrition and eating healthy, like my recognition and

my come to was now like, Okay. This all,

I wanted it to be an act of self love. Coming from the heart.

Coming from like I'm doing this to nourish myself rather

than I'm doing this to look a certain way or to

act a certain way. And so it really came all the way back

to the intention that was behind everything I was doing. So

this obviously bled into every area of my life, my

relationships and everything I was teaching. And instead of,

like, teaching, you know, about

something, I started to teach from something, from my own

personal experience and journey towards health self love.

And that's when I healed. And now, you know, at 50 years

old, I feel healthier than ever, more vibrant than ever,

and more like in gratitude than ever because everything starts

and comes from the heart. And that's what I love to teach and share in

the world. And that's a place I love to connect with my community

from, like, letting it be messy and beautiful and

authentic. Thank you for sharing. And I think

that's such an important message, especially with, like, the stress

epidemic, the sitting epidemic, the, you know,

fast food problem. Like comparing epidemic. You know?

Like, even a lot of us in the health and wellness space, you know, there

can be like this, you know, about what we look like or what's, you know,

what someone else is doing and then coming back to the true

authentic, you know, energy that's, you know,

unfolding inside each of us is what really needs to come through.

And and what's really powerful about your story saying that this is the healthiest and

happiest you've been and you're 50. What if those

listening who aren't 50 yet can make those changes now so they don't have

to, like, you know, live in the place they are. And I think a lot

more people now are becoming aware that they even have an autoimmune

Yeah. You know, illness because there's so much more

information now. And then people get stuck on what do I do

now? How do I instead of managing it, what if you could heal it? And

so I'm excited. I'm excited. You healing

yourself because so often we're looking outside for the person or

the pill or the thing that's gonna fix me. And that's what I

really learned because autoimmune, it's it's the energy behind it is, you know,

this kind of, you know, your your body's

attacking itself. You know? There's an energy to that. And so then it was, like,

coming back to that energetic imprint and

shifting that. And that was all me. It wasn't anything

outside of me. So it's That's so cool. Yeah. And I think that's so cool.

Things that that I think of when Jessica tells that story is,

like, what what is health and what does health look like? And what Jess and

I speak to a lot in our classes, in our workshops, and in our

conversations just with each other, like, health really comes back to connection. It's,

like, doesn't it doesn't matter as much what you look at, but it's

look like. But it's like, how connected are you to self? And then how are

you connecting to others? Like, is it from a place of connection or a

place of wanting to be loved and seen and heard, which we all

want? But if we're doing it, not from a place of connection, it

really does put our body attacking itself because we're not in

alignment with who we are and who we're meant to be. And so which is

part of my story, which we'll get to, but it was like that

that trying to be all things to all people. And I I think

this is a beautiful bridge to your story. And I just wanna say, like, I'm

I've been on a different type of healing journey. But as I've

been healing my heart from ex like, extensive trauma and

grief, because I'm more in tune with my body and I'm

not medic self medicating. I'm actually learning about

various, I'd say, diseases that I didn't I knew I didn't know

I had, but things didn't feel right, like endometriosis. And I'm

pretty sure I have some immune like a histamine,

issue happening. And and it's all about, like, how do

I heal that? And I don't wanna live taking pills. Like, right now,

I'm living in a place where I'm taking an antihistamine before bed every

single night. Because if not, I wake up covered in welts.

Mhmm. And and so it's so interesting that you're bringing this up, and

this could be maybe we talk about this offline. But, you know, if you're listening

to this, like, it's that connection to self and self

love. Like, you have to start with yourself. And so I think that's really

beautiful. And, you know, Jill, I I I think this might be the perfect

time to share your story. Thank you.

And what I'll say about that too, and again Jessica and I talk a lot

about this, is really like visualizing and feeling your yourself

healing from the inside. Like it really does help support

the healing. So it's like instead of focusing on, you know,

the elements of what's happening in the body. Like really visualizing and feeling what

it feels like when it's well. Like if it's back pain, it's like, you know,

sitting with your eyes closed and visualizing yourself moving or dancing or

stretching or, you know, whatever the things that you love to do. And

start to almost feel it in your body and your body will start

to feel it from that place of connection. And it starts to heal itself and

come back to an alignment. And again, like Jessica says

what she did with her body so much with it, what was about that self

visualization and, you know, changing the story.

And so, my story that I'm so

grateful for because everything that's happening is happening for a reason. That's the other piece.

So instead of being against it, it's like really leaning into it. And what is

this trying to teach me? And for so long, I

was, you know, I was the middle of the three sisters. And like you were

saying at the beginning of Blair when you were introducing us, people were always comparing

us. And so I was always comparing myself. Like I thought that was the

normal thing to do. And even when I even got further into it, I

realized, oh, it's not just because I'm a triplet. Like we all do this. We're

all comparing ourselves. And when we're comparing ourselves, you know, we all have a

different story. So we all fall short. And so it quote

unquote, because really it's like we're all getting what we're supposed to be

getting for our own unique teaching and for our own unique

experience of why we were brought into this life at this

time. I mean, that's how deep it goes for for me and for us and

for this work we do. And being the middle,

comparing myself, I, always felt unworthy.

I always felt like I felt short. You know, Jessica, like this was

my story. Jessica got married first, then Jennifer was married. I was

single. I was, you know, in my forties and running a

restaurant. And I was so burnt out. And I had no idea what I wanted.

So what I did was I made myself into what I thought everyone else wanted

me to be. So I would in every relationship I would be who I thought

they wanted me to be. In every, you know,

friendship I would do that, in the restaurant I would do that. And it left

me feeling so depleted. And, you know, around the

time that I turned 42, I was just like so sick of it. I

remember I was walking around my neighborhood by myself. It was

around Christmas time, and I was looking into I wasn't, like,

peering in, but I was seeing people's, you know, houses with the

Christmas trees and the family gathered around having

dinner together. And I felt so alone. And I'm like, how is it possible? Like,

I'm one of triplets. I have an amazing family and all this stuff. And I

feel so alone. And I was like, I,

I like literally, like, I was like, this is it. And so I started doing

things to get really outside of my comfort zone. You know, you think like running

a restaurant is out of your comfort zone, which which it is. But it just

was like, it was feeding my, you know, people pleaser.

And so I started traveling by myself, traveling out of the country by myself.

I started taking dance classes and

the teacher that was teaching said, I really think you should come teach.

And I was like, no. I would, you know, not my thing. But then I

said yes because I'm like, this is my year of saying yes. And

I, got, you know, certified. And then I got certified in different

modalities and became a choreographer. And I started to really find myself

through my body. And I started really connecting to

myself. And then I was, like, started to see what I was doing.

This people pleasing. This, you know, jumping my own ship at any chance to

feel seen and heard. Instead of being in alignment with who I really

am. And I really started to love myself. So it's similar in the way

of worthiness and coming back to self love and connection.

And it changed my life so completely. And, you know, and I did. I met

the guy in my dreams. It's like, we're all, like, big eye roll. I get

it. But it's like I did. You know? And he came in just to the

right time when I didn't give a can we curse on here? I don't want

to. But I didn't give a, you know, I was just

like, I don't need it. I have me, and I just want to have a

love affair with myself. But then he showed up. And he showed up and

he saw me and I saw him and I knew. And he just supports me

in me, you know, exploring who I am. And,

you know, he's like my biggest cheerleader besides my sisters. And,

it's just so fun. Like life has become fun because it's this it's self

exploration and it's, you know, bottomless. We, you know, I'm learning

about myself all the time through the tools and techniques that

Jessica and I teach together. And we're inviting others to do the same. So the

cool thing about it, it's we're not teaching from a teacher student

per se. I mean, it's really about power with. And I really

think, and we talk about this a lot, Jessica and I, the way forward is

not power over or power under because that's exasperating

this worthiness thing. It's really about power with and really

amplifying the energy within and around us through community.

And when we do that together through, you know, dance and

through yoga and through through breath and through, you know, community

experiences, dance parties. It's just like the best. It's the

best and and we learn so much about ourselves and each other and

it's it's just feels very authentic and enlivening.

And what I love about that, and thank you so much for sharing,

is you stepped outside your comfort zone to

really find who you are. Yeah. What you love. And it

took you being uncomfortable to find comfort. Totally.

And and and it's really interesting because now I'm like it's

like I, like, I I just tried out for a dance troupe at

50. And A dance troupe, like a cheerleading troupe? Not just

cheerleading. It's more like hip hop lyrical, like and it's out of my style

of dance, but it's like I was like, I'm gonna do this at 50.

I'm gonna do a performant like, I'm gonna do rehearsals and do a

performance. And I tried out, and I got onto the troupe

and I had my first rehearsal last night. And I was like, I can't believe

I'm fucking doing this. I was so happy because I was just like, I'm gonna

I know I'm gonna learn more about myself through this. And so I'm just showing

up fully in my life, through our work

together and in my personal life. And, yeah, unfortunately, the

comfort crisis is real. Yes. Oh, you know, I

love this so much because a lot this is what I

noticed because you guys live your authentic lives. Like, I've only known you

since living your authentic lives, so I didn't know you before.

And, you know, I'm, I'll be 40. So I'm a little like, I'm a different

decade, but my generation and I'm I'm thinking your

generation. Like, we're told to do certain things. Go to school,

get a degree, find a partner, get married, have kids, push buttons,

work forty hours a week, do the soccer mom thing, whatever it mom

thing, whatever it might be. And, like, we're actually not meant

to conform. Yeah. And it's interesting because

I wanted the what I thought society wanted me to have,

and then life unfolded. And all of a sudden, I had this, like,

uh-oh. What's my purpose? Who am I? And it took a

full, like, shattering to rebuild. And this time

doing it on my terms. And, like, what if someone listening now hears your

story, and they're like, you know what? I'm just living

someone else's life, someone else's purpose, what someone else thinks I

should be doing. I, yeah, I spent ten years in med school. Now I'm a

doctor, but I I hate it, and I just wanna open a cat cafe. Like,

open that cat cafe. Exactly. Absolutely. And you

built this whole community. Like, let's first of all, let's talk about this. This is

what I thought was cool because I like my music. Very

excited. I have a bunch of concerts coming up. But you started off this, like

like, restaurant party, like, music, like, community

hub, like, physical hub. This is the restaurant you're talking about. Right? Like, it was

I love it. Talk about that and how that evolved

into what you have now, which is Shine Living community.

Well, it's so cool because we grew up in a big Italian family. Our mom's

one of 12, and we're, you know, two of four kids,

and everything was always happening around food. We were

always connecting. We were, like, making up. There was births. There

was deaths. And so food was always celebratory to us and food

always represented community. And so like

coming out of, you know, high school even, we were always like, one day we're

gonna open a restaurant, open a restaurant, open a restaurant, And we were naive enough

to actually do it right after we graduated from college. We opened at 24

years old and we just wanted to get the party started and the community started.

And so, you know, opening this restaurant,

we wanted to do food that was really serving the public. So

something that we did, and this was even like twenty five years ago, it was

farm to table. We were going out to the farms. We were like supporting

local. We really understood the connection of

food, and and part of this for us was really offering from the

heart. So we did, like, farm to table food, and then we would throw

these parties, like, these dance parties and DJs. Like, they would literally,

like, take the white table cloths off the table. An hour later, people were, like,

dancing on the table. That's my jam. So cool. It was so

cool. So cool. And we were dancing on the table, you know, with them. Totally.

Yeah. And you brought in and you've had, like, big muse like,

you've had, like, a lot of musicians came here. Was there, and Modest Yahoo

was there and, like, you know, rising Appalachia was there

and Love them. I mean, so many, like,

so many. I mean, you know, Trevor Hall, Xavier Red. I

mean, we started a lot of peep Gregory Allen Isaacoff, who's from

Boulder, Colorado. A lot of them started off in our venues, which which was so

cool. So it was like it was I mean, it was it was it

was iconic. It was the place to be right at the heart of Boulder,

Colorado. And it was like a wine bar too. So it was cool because you

would have, you know, these really, like, buttoned up, like, men next

to these, like, hippies with, like, dreadlocks, like, drinking wine, you know.

It was just, like, all walks of life coming together to

celebrate. And that's the interesting thing. It was celebrating our uniqueness

because it was people sharing their gifts on the stage and all this beautiful

food from the farmers that they grew with their hands. And it was, like,

really, really beautiful. And we continued with

this for many years. I mean, a little over twenty years.

And then, you know, even during the pandemic when we

started to question everything because they were, you know, having all these

crazy rules and the six feet apart and all the things and everything we loved

about the business was now being broken down and broken apart. And it

was actually such divine timing for us because this was also

happening internally. Like we had given so much. We

had, like, almost like wring the life out of it. You know what I mean?

Because we were there. We were there all the time. We put our heart and

soul into it. And we were growing and we were changing. And now we were,

you know, in our mid 40s. And so, you know,

through the pandemic, we stayed with it. We wanted to be a place for people

to come. We'd be on the patio. We'd be dancing. We'd have the kids there

because they were being, you know, homeschooled at the time when things were closed

down. And they were in the kitchen with us. They were Bartending with

us. Bartending with us. My seven year old niece were, like, the bartenders. She would

just measure stuff out when it was her school. Love it. We were making shelter

helpers and boozy margaritas. And and they were, like,

making, like, beautiful hearts and putting in every single to

go bag, together we rise on a heart. Like, you know, and

that also brought us into this multigenerational

healing and coming together, part of our Italian big Italian family

background as well. Because a big part of our mission is also

bringing the kids along and the family and the neighbors because And the elders. And

the elders. And, you know, we don't heal in a vacuum. And I think

for for children to see the adults, you know, healing and doing

the work and for us to remember the wisdom that the elders

have and bringing them in, even if they're moving at a different pace, it's like

we inspire and lift the whole. And this is something we're so passionate

about bringing back to, you know,

movement and healing is just normalizing

the challenging times, the tears, you know, the

showing up as you are. Like, how incredible is

that for the children to see? You know, I'm raising a

teenager, a 14, an 11 year old and I'm like rebirthing

through that experience too. And seeing how the world is now through

social media and, you know, her being a competitive

dancer and all the things. And I'm just like, again, falling

in love with myself and having so much

compassion for my journey and what brought me to the place

that was challenging and then bought me out of the challenge. And so it's

just so inspiring. And one thing I'll

say too is, you know, as we were transitioning from the restaurant, like

Jessica said, we were like, we were still gathering, but we were gathering

outside, and we were moving, and we were dancing, and yoga ing

together, and breathing together. And we

said it's time that the, you know, the four walls now we say the

four walls reside inside our heart. And it's like we we need to get beyond

these four walls. We need we wanna make this a global movement, and

we want to create it our own way without, like, you know,

the pressure of the rules and the regulations of what was happening at that time.

And then also just, like, you know, there was so much overhead

and 50 employees. And there was just, like, when

you're a restaurant tour, it's like you become an expert at troubleshooting. And I felt

like that's what I was doing. I was like, you're in survival mode all the

time. All the time. You're in, like, fight or flight, like, all the time. You

know what I mean? And we were so ready to create from a different place.

And we're so grateful for the restaurant because it helped us learn so

many things. I mean, I can't even believe even though it's such a different, you

know, company, it's like the mission's the same. But obviously, the the

modalities are very different. But we bring in every piece of the restaurant,

like holding space, creating space, creating the vibe, creating

the energy, bringing people together. Like, it's something we're really

good at. Dancing in community, sometimes still on tables.

On the freaking tables. And so it's so funny because I went into the play

one of the places that we used to, own, like, the building where

we were, and there was a sign on the wall. And it said no dancing

on the tables. And I'm like, that is so funny because I know people still

go into that building remembering when we were there, and they try to dance on

the tables. Like, we created memories, and we still are.

And so we love what we're doing, and we just released, our

second edition of our cookbook. Yes. We have it here.

Eat Drink Shine, the second edition. And I feel like this is who

we are now. And the first time we went through a publishing company,

and we did it their way. And the second edition is us doing it our

way. And, so, yeah, it has over a hundred

recipes, lifestyle tips, tools, techniques, and it's very,

family driven and family friendly as well.

Oh, I love it. And, like, you don't just have a cookbook. Like, you have

this whole community with, like, in person virtual events. Like,

let's talk some clothing, very vibrant, beautiful thing. Let's talk a little

bit about that because if if anyone listening is like me, they've already fallen

in love with you guys. Oh. It's your epic. And, like, yeah,

we might not be, like, eating farm to table food and dancing on tables at

your venue in Colorado, but, like, I'm in Canada. Now I can be a part

of your community without having to show up to a physical establishment. So, I mean,

I'd love to just, you know, give a high level so we can, you know,

let people into your world. So Jess and I are, like, I mean,

huge believers in the fact that everything is energy and everything's

frequency. So what we're creating with Shine Living Community is it's a frequency.

And it's a frequency of, like, really coming into

the greatest version of yourself through anchoring within and really getting to

know yourself and expanding from that place. So we talk a lot about anchoring

and expanding and we do this through, dance,

yoga, meditation, breath work, nutrition, community,

family, and it's multi generational. And we live stream at

least once a week on Wednesdays for our freedom movement method class,

which is a ninety minute class. It can be, you know, this is on

Wednesdays, but on the, digital studio we have anywhere from twenty

minutes to, you know, an hour and a half for these freedom movement method. But

it goes from dance yoga to meditation and it's, you know, a

modality we created the freedom movement method. And it's

so fun and deep and juicy. And

so people can join us from all over the world live streamed for that and

also live in person in Boulder, Colorado. And then on the

digital studio, we have all those modalities of classes,

plus we're launching programs, evergreen programs that

are on there. And we also do global retreats and

workshops. So there's a lot of different ways to get involved.

The monthly membership is an easy way and it's just $39 a

month or you can purchase it for the year for like $30 a month in

total. And you get everything. Access to all of it. The

live, freedom movements, live virtually, all the classes. And

it's an ever growing library. There's already over a hundred classes on

there and there's all different times. Meaning, you know,

like Joe was saying, twenty minutes to hour and a half. And

it's really deep. Different types of breath work, and it's also really

fun. And you can invite the whole family along as well. Yeah. Jessica's

daughter even teaches some classes on there. Her her daughter that's a professional

dancer teaches some stretching and different things of

of, you know, for for kids. And we're just

we love it so much. We're so passionate about it. And like Jessica said,

it's like ever growing. And like our this is what we were born to do.

Like everything has led us to this point. And we really believe that

we were built for these times. And these times are calling for us to

go within to really recognize the healing

capacity we have that, you know, we are our own

medicine. And like being our authentic self is

really what is going to heal us in these times and show us the way

forward, connecting to our hearts and moving from that

place with each other and with ourselves. We're gonna start to see

solutions to these problems that we're seeing in the world. And this breakdown that

we're seeing is, you know, we talk about this all the time. It's

like it's it's necessary for this breakthrough to what's

coming. And we believe that what's coming is so much more beautiful than we can

imagine. So we feel very hopeful and really,

excited and, really fired

up. Yes. Oh, that's so beautiful. I had to write that I had to write

this down. Like, we are our own medicine Totally. On

so many levels. Like, you know, I think it's so

easy. Like, it's lazy. People like to blame. Yeah.

People like to point fingers and blame and and not take accountability and not

step into their power to take their healing into their

own hands. And you have to want to feel better.

You you're you know? And feel better. And sometimes it has to get

so bad outside of you, almost like there's nothing to hold on to

anymore. Yeah. You have no choice but to turn the gaze

inward and like it's so freaking cool when we start to

recognize how powerful we are. So much more powerful than we've been

taught, that we've been shown many of the times. And so this is the

time. This is our time to step in and step up and it's, it's,

it's deep and it's beautiful and it's possible. And we're seeing it,

like, ripple so far and so wide right now.

And it's it's beautiful. It's I I love that.

And I just want people listening to understand, like, you don't have to hit a

rock bottom to to start this. Like, I, you

know, I'm just for personal experience. Like, my rock bottom, I've had a few.

One, I dated an abusive alcoholic, and I had to really look at my life

when I fled that relationship and was homeless. I I was homeless for three weeks,

then met my now husband, eventually. But my

mom after my mom died, that was a serious serious

rock bottom. I I was so ungrounded. I couldn't even, like,

I was a shell. Yeah. And that's when I really started

a spiritual awakening and going within and realizing the power I had to

heal. And it took me going down a real nontraditional

route of healing because traditional route stopped working. Like, there's only

so much an antidepressant or traditional therapist can, you know,

do for you. And then when I chose sobriety six

years ago, that was the real gift because I had

to feel and you need to feel in order to heal. But you don't

have to hit that rock bottom. You can, you know, have support

from Jill and Jessica and the Shine Living community. You're what

witnessing out there listeners, viewers, everything, everyone,

like, the power within them. You know, we are the medicine.

What these two inspiring women have built is

testament to that. It's so possible, and it's never

too late. And it truly is this, like, you don't have

to hit rock bottom. It begins when we start to feel, as you said,

like having this somatic experience of the wisdom of the

body. Because sometimes people don't realize they're just living from their

mind all the time. And we're missing this whole

beautiful experience of embodied wisdom, which we all have

flowing through us all the time. And so it starts to,

you know, when we start to feel, we start to

understand the language of the body and the unique wisdom that's coming through

us. And then life becomes a grand adventure. You know, all of it, the

highs and the lows are all part of this awakening. And

exactly. And sometimes I think the hardest part for people is like, where do I

begin? And the thing to remember is, first of all, it takes

practice. So it takes like really, you know, committing to

retraining the pathways into the brain. And and so that's what we do

through our work and through these classes and through the digital studio that you could

do in your own time at any time is is really just retraining

the pathways in our brain and in our body towards healing and

towards empowerment and towards self wisdom. And when

you're doing it in community, it amplifies. And so whether we're doing it in

the same space or we're all doing the same practices together, it really

starts to amplify the healing. And it's been studied, it's been measured.

And so it's like to find this inspired community

and have not only accountability with each other, but to amplify the results,

I think is incredible. And it's so available.

And and, you know, it's like you you start to think about who you're

surrounding yourself with and how it feels to be around the people that you're with.

Because we take on each other's energy too. And the stronger that

we get in our own unique being and who we are, the less we are

affected by what's happening outside. And and we start to

realize that we create our experience of life rather than being the

victim. Like you said, we become the creator. I love that.

It's so powerful. So let's, you know, as we're wrapping up,

I'd love to share a piece of advice and maybe you each can, you know,

bring your experience. You know, you have

to know that it's time to start and, yeah, like, we need to start somewhere.

But what's something that our listeners can do today, like, at this

moment listening to this to begin on

the path? Do you wanna go with that?

Yeah. So, you know, often as as I was just

speaking to, like, we we're living from our brain. And we don't know the difference

between living from our brain and living from the wisdom of our body. But our

body's always speaking to us. So it's like, you know,

many of us may feel anxiety or stress when we're having a

challenging conversation. So like instead of the feeling of

anxiety or worry bringing us into kind of the

pattern of shallow breathing, like like, for me, it's like now

when I feel that feeling, it triggers me to say, oh, I

need to breathe. So stopping and breathing, and I

have a mantra that I say all the time. I love myself. I trust

myself. And it sounds so simple, but when we say this and

we let the energy of the words, like, kind of ripple through our system, all

of a sudden we're connected to more of a soulful,

self, more of a soulful experience. And therefore, it could bring

up a deeper part of ourselves. So we're not going right into our patterns. And

this is a moment to moment thing. Like, it doesn't need to be a formal

practice, like, where we need to hit the mat. We need to take an hour.

Like, this could be moment to moment. It could be when we're driving in our

car. It could be when we're in the grocery store and someone's pissing us off.

You know what I mean? Yeah. Stopping, taking a breath into our

belly. I love myself. I trust myself. And from that

moment and that place, something different will unfold. A new pattern

will be created. And then it's like, you know, turning

a ship around. It's it may it's like starts to happen

slowly and all of a sudden you're starting to contact a new version of yourself.

That's beautiful. So another

thing that I'll say really helps, as far as dropping out of the

mind and into the body is breathing through your nose and taking

long slow deep breaths and putting your hands on your

heart. So so often we're breathing through our mouth and and we don't

realize how, much this aggravates

not only our, nervous system, but also

our mental brain and breathing through the nose is so much healthier for us.

So as much as we can remember and again it's a practice and the more

you practice it the more you start to do it automatically. Because like

50% of us are more like our mouth breathers like all the time and our

nervous system is putting us in fight or flight. And so breathing through

the nose and then just an added, extra credit if you want is

like putting your hands on your heart. And really when you're

breathing, feeling the energy of the heart and breathing in

and out of the heart, like it's a lung, but in and out of

the nose and just doing this will start to balance your nervous

system. It'll start to balance your and harmonize your

energy and whatever it is you're working with, you'll start to

get more of a higher perspective, more of a bird's eye view

just by shifting your breath, like Jessica was

saying. And then also it also has so many,

healing just by nose breathing. I mean, it oxygenates

It it, helps the lung capacity, which is basically like our

gas tank for life. It, you know, it, you know,

filters the air that's coming into our body. It warms

up the air that's coming into our body. It opens up the pathways and

the nose and down. I mean, there's so many things that breathing through the nose

will will help and everything is, you know,

runs through our nervous system. So when we can start to balance our nervous system,

we'll see how our life starts to change and how instead of reacting to

everything, we learn to drop in and

really say what's happening here and what's here for me to learn rather than

living our life in fight or flight or reacting.

I love that sidebar. So this summer, spring, summer, and fall, like, we have,

a a summer home. It's like a trailer parked out in the in the forest

off grid. No cell service, no electricity. It's like

this coastal lush forest by a beautiful

white sandy beach lake, clear water surrounded by mountains. Anyways, as soon as I got

out there my very first time a few years ago, my nervous system relaxed, first

time ever. This year, I decided I'm gonna have flow

Fridays. I'm not gonna let anyone book with me. It's gonna be all

about what I wanna do when I wanna do it because I'm an over per

I mean, over performer. I guess so. I'm a overachiever, high performer, and

I've had a business since I was 23. So sixteen years of,

like, operating very, like, intensely and not realizing my nervous

system was shot. And so I was like, you know what? I'm gonna block off

Thursday afternoon so I can finish my work, go to the late Thursdays,

and be there till Sunday. So three nights where my nervous system

relaxes the most. It was so profound. I did that

for spring, summer, and fall. And to the point where people are like, your

energy is so different. You are so grounded. Like, what what's your secret?

I'm like, I prioritized my nervous system. Mhmm.

Yeah. I prioritize my nervous system. And what you're saying

is so like, I I mean, you you have more training in

this. I just have a lived experience of, like, I can't live in this body

anymore Mhmm. Yeah. To, like, oh my gosh. Like,

my day today is I collected sticks and then I disco tiled them.

Like that, you know, like Isn't it and isn't it true that, like, when

you started doing that over and over every weekend that it changed

your Monday through Thursday? Mhmm. And everything. You know,

like, you and everything. But, like, you started to work

differently and react differently and, like, you know, look

differently and feel differently. It's amazing what happens when we start to really

anchor into ourselves and really, you know,

feel into our nervous system. And the biggest thing was I took accountability.

Yeah. Like, no one's going to fix this. I have to fix this.

Like, there's no magic pill. I mean, like, there's temporary

solutions, but I'm like, wait. I'm an entrepreneur.

I am in control. I'm in charge of my life. I'm

in charge of my health, so I'm going to do this.

And you know what? Some of my clients didn't really like that. They

couldn't book a meeting with me on a Friday, or they would try and get

a hold of me. And so the people in my work world

changed. How I actually that's actually where I came to the conclusion of, like,

I, like, semi retired and shifted what I do and really started taking

the global resilience project seriously in the sense of it wasn't just my

passion project. It became a social enterprise in business, and it's

all because I was able to relax and I wasn't in survival mode.

Yeah. You Imagine. As well as creativity.

Yes. And, like, there's nothing more satisfying than

collecting cool sticks and, like, covering them in disco tiles. Like, I love my

disco. That's so cool. Yeah. But do that. And and and once,

like you're saying, you take control of it, and you you realize that you're creating

the, you know, the craziness or whatever. Like, the and

it's like nobody can take it away. Nobody can take it away.

And, like, or and if they do take it away, it's it's because you're giving

it away and you realize that. So you have a choice. Am I gonna give

it away right now? Or am I gonna hold on and anchor within? And like

it's a constant practice. And again, not saying that it's like, oh my god. And

then there it is. And there are now I have it for the rest of

my life. It's like, but like Jessica was saying, life becomes like I don't know

if you set a playground or something like that, but a grand adventure. And that's

the thing. Like, I'm like, that's such a brilliant statement because it's so true. It's

like then it's like, it life becomes the practice and life becomes the

medicine. Right. And so it's interesting. So my parents died. I was like,

I'm not gonna live a life I wanna retire from. I'm in charge.

I don't need to wait till this magic date to, like, do the things I

wanna do, especially because that date might never come because both my parents and my

father-in-law died before retiring. And all they talked about is when I retire, blah

blah blah. I'm like, uh-uh. And so when I car started approaching my

physical and mental health the same way and, like,

taking every aspect of my life into my own hands, magical things

unfolded. And you ladies are also, like, a huge

testament to that. And so all of your links are in our show notes. More

information about you're in our show notes. I wanna invite the, you know, the world

to and, you know, into your community, and I love what you're building.

So any final words before we wrap up?

Just thank you. I mean, I think thank you, you know, to you for showing

up in your authenticity and who you are and for seeing us and who we

are and just being able to connect here and, you know, the space

together. And we're so excited to meet you real time in New York.

Mhmm. I love it. I love it. It's it's great. It's great.

And, you know, this is coming out. This episode will be out after you

your program a new program you just launched. Yes. So so this

program is incredible because it's it's it's teaching us how to do a

morning practice thirty minutes or less. And we say that because

you can be a busy parent or an entrepreneur or someone who, like,

starts their day early. But recognizing that that morning

time is it's like maybe the most important thing you do all day.

So we have several practices that we teach that you can bring beyond the

thirty days and it's called coming home to the power of your heart.

So coming home to the power of your heart and it's grounding,

connecting to yourself. Again, it is the the most important part of

it. Healing journey is that connection to self and learning the language of the body.

And that's what we do through this program. And again, thirty minutes or

less in the morning, the best time you'll spend all day. And it's dance yoga,

meditation, breath work. And it's like recipes and a

little variety each day. So it changes up a little day. So you

can be excited about a new thing you're learning each day. And there's lots of

little extra credits in there, little tools and techniques to uplevel every

area of your health. I love that. Everyone that listens knows that I love my

mornings. I wake up, move my body, have a candlelit bath, pull an oracle card,

meditate, journal. Like, I'm all about my slow mornings because it's how you set

yourself up for the day. So kudos to that. I can't wait to check it

out. And so thank you for coming on our podcast,

and thank you to everyone who tuned in for another episode of Resilient

AF. We drop into your ears or your eyes if you're watching

on YouTube. Every single Tuesday, we're here

to remind you that you're not alone. It is okay to not

be okay. You got this. You're gonna get through it one

step at a time. And friends, just remember,

you are resilient AF.