In Episode 01 of the Healthy Healing Mastery podcast I’ll share my story with you….on how I always believed that the ticket to “success” was financial freedom, but after building a thriving business, I was realizing that maybe that wasn’t the full truth. I also get into how life took a turn and flipped upside down – but now realize that it was a blessing in disguise as it redirected me to my life purpose of inspiring others to live a life that is true to them. One where they feel passionate, fulfilled and in alignment with the truth of who they are and what they desire most.
Health & happiness,
Deborah xo
Full transcription available at the bottom of this blog post.
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FULL TRANSCRIPT
Hi ladies and welcome to the redefining your success podcast. I’m Deborah Lobart, author of freedom, lifestyle and six steps to a healthier you. This podcast is all about self mastery, paving your own path and creating your version of success. Because success can mean different things to different people. We’ll dive into inspirational and practical lifestyle shifts in order to navigate your way back to your true nature and best self. If you’re ready to walk this path together and make your life exceptional, grab that celery juice, and let’s begin. Hey, ladies, welcome to my latest passion project. The redefining your success podcast is finally here. It’s actually been something I’ve been wanting to do for the last three years but kept putting it off because I didn’t know how to do it. Like all the behind the scenes techie stuff, but better late than never right. So I wanted to dedicate this first episode to tell you a bit more about me and my story and how I went from this thriving successful business owner to being chronically ill with mystery symptoms for the past five years to embracing my true self and feeling happy, happier, and more fulfilled than I’ve ever been before. Which is actually quite interesting. Because when I reflect back, my passion as an eight year old child has always been the world of health and wellness. Like I was that kid that woke up at six in the morning, not eight in the morning, but 6am to do my morning workout. Like I was that discipline. And I was that into fitness I like I don’t know if you guys remember that, that show the 20 minute workout. But it was like my all time favorite show. So I worked out five days a week doing that. And I was naturally interested in things like gymnastics, and dance and jazz. And I was able to do some of those things as a kid, but not everything. And I didn’t want to have any limitations. I wanted to basically do it all but being the youngest of four children. And you know, having this big family, we had a budget. So basically, making a lot of money became my mission when I finished university because I didn’t want to have to worry about a price tag, like I want freedom financially. So I did that. But I found myself job hopping from one thing to the next, always looking for the next best thing that paid more than the last job. And I found myself in this vicious cycle of never having a job for more than six months. And I was so stressed out about it. Like I felt like something was wrong with me, I couldn’t understand why I didn’t enjoy working a nine to five job like everybody else. And I would look around me and all my friends were perfectly content with their jobs. But I wasn’t like I hated having someone tell me what to do. And just to give you a little bit of context, like when I graduated from university, I had about $20,000 worth of student loans to pay back. And I ended up taking a job as an assistant manager at a local health club. And I was selling gym memberships. And I actually loved it. Like I love the atmosphere and love the vibe I loved the people that I worked with, I loved being able to sneak a workout in like during a lunch break. I just loved everything about it. But I had it ingrained in the back of my mind that I didn’t go to university to work in a gym, like I needed to get a job that had a fancy title. So you know, I thought I’m going to work at a gym temporarily. But it can’t be like the thing. And I was told to work in real estate or you know, you should become a mortgage broker. So, Funny enough, I got a job as a mortgage agent. And within about a week I realized this is sewn off for me like this is completely out of alignment. Like I hated it. And then I found network marketing. And that’s where everything started to change for me. So I want you to put yourself in my shoes just for a second, you decided to do something that 95% of population would actually say no to like just so that you can live a life on your own terms and have the potential to earn an uncapped income. I don’t know if that sounds appealing to you, but it sure as hell did for me like I thought it was brilliant. I was the only thing that I was skeptical about was, is this really true because if it is true, like I want to do it, I thought it was incredible. And once I did my research and I realized like it was a legitimate business model. I jumped in, never looked back. And I worked my ass off so that I can work my way up the ladder. Because I had this dream of creating financial freedom because if I create this financial freedom then I’m going to live happily ever after. Ever is going to be amazing. So like, how many times have you guys said something? Like when I get that thing, then I’ll be happy. So for me, it was what I make a lot of money, then I’ll be happy. So basically, I worked hard I hustled, I said yes to everything and everyone I booked my calendar up, it was booked solid with meeting after meeting after meeting. My business was number one priority ahead of my family, if you can believe it, because my thought process was, you know, if I do really well in my business, then my family is going to be taken care of. And so it was my priority. And I said no to, you know, things like Halloween with my kids, because I was, I was working all the time, like I had my phone attached to my hip. I had zero balance, like my mind was on overdrive, always constantly thinking of the next thing that I had to cross off my to do list. My life was chaotic. But I persevered. And I made it to the top 3% of income earners. And I was excited. Like that feeling of being happy was great, because now I was able to afford the lifestyle that I’ve always wanted to live. And I was able to get all the materialistic things that I wanted. But to be perfectly honest with you, this feeling didn’t last very long, this feeling of being ecstatic and happy, it didn’t last very long. And slowly, that feeling started to fade off. And I started to feel like pissed off and like, angry and let down. And I just didn’t understand why I was feeling that way. Now, Tony Robbins refers to this as the angry achiever. So I’m curious if this resonates with you, right? Like, what is your version of success? Is it money, like when you make a lot of money, you’re gonna feel successful? Is it joy? Or is it like a combination of the two, because I once heard something that really hit home for me once I experienced this feeling of being the angry achiever. So I went to this event back in 2014, with Tony Robbins, in Florida, it was like a five day event. And he said, success, without fulfillment, is the ultimate failure. Now, this was a huge breaking point. For me. It was a moment where my belief that money was the answer. It started to shift. And I found myself realizing that money isn’t everything, right? Like there’s so much more that’s more meaningful than just money and materialistic things. And I thought to myself, like I want to do things, like write a book, I want to impact more people like in a different way. But I chose to ignore all of this for the time being, because I really did feel grateful for the life that I was living. And I did think to myself, like how can I want more like I should be happy as is. So I hid these feelings for a while I just suppressed him. And then life took a turn. And it literally flipped upside down. So what I’m going to explain to you in the next few minutes, basically set the stage for what’s been going on for the next five years. So up until my life currently, I literally went from healthy and happy or so I thought to experiencing about 25 different mystery symptoms. And the first day that it happened was back in October of 2015. So it was the fall. And I was heading into a grocery store to grab some snacks. Because I had some guests that were coming over later that day, when all of a sudden I was taken over by this dizzy feeling. I felt really dizzy, I felt lightheaded. I felt nauseous, and I felt like my vision was like blurry. And I felt disconnected from everything that was happening around me like the people and almost like things were happening like in slow motion. It was such a scary feeling. And I’ve never experienced anything like that before. But I thought you know why, like, whatever this is, I’m just gonna, it’s gonna go away like the next day. But the next day came and I was taking my son Bobby to school and it didn’t go away, like, things started to actually get worse. And I entered his school and I was taken back by like the fluorescent lighting. I just felt so overwhelmed by it. And you know, the conversation that I was having with Bobby’s teacher, I felt like disconnected from what she was saying. I felt so off and so weird that I was so scared I just want to get out of there as quickly as possible. And that marked the start of basically just my journey of trying to figuring of trying to figure out what was wrong with my health. So my life went from like business meeting to business meeting to doctor appointment to doctor appointment, and I went To all different kinds of specialists, different doctors, naturopath, conventional doctor Reiki, I went to psychics, like I did everything you possibly could imagine spending so much time and so much money. Thankfully, I had the funds to pay for all this, through my network marketing business that I had the time it allowed me the time to heal, to do all this. Now, this is where I realized a very harsh truth. And I don’t know if you guys can relate to this. But I realized in those moments that doctors don’t have the answers to everything. And our healthcare system is flawed. Like, I’m sorry to say, but it is flawed. They don’t address the cause of what’s going on. Like I literally just wanted to know one simple little answer to one question, why, why Why were these things happening? I just want to know why. How could someone be healthy one day, and then Ill The next day, like what happened where that just suddenly happen? completely out of the blue, where I’m experiencing about 25 different symptoms. And I was told, you know, I was anemic. So I addressed the anemia, and then symptoms were still there, then I was told you have gut issues. So I fixed that. And then I still had the symptoms, then I was told you need to go on a paleo diet. So I did that still didn’t go away. Then I tried a keto diet that I was asked if I was stressed. And then I was told maybe you need to go speak to a psychologist. And I’m like, why? like none of this made sense to me. It was just so like, so odd. And this was another lesson. After spending so much time and money, I realized that I need to put like, my faith into my own hands and just be my own doctor and trust my own intuition, because I knew that none of what I was being told was the truth. And I truly felt like nobody had the answer. like nobody really understood what was going on. So and just to give you an idea of some of the other symptoms I was experiencing, I had debilitating fatigue, to the point where I couldn’t get out of bed for months at a time. I had debilitating brain fog, like my memory was poor. There were like moments where like words weren’t flowing out of my mouth. Like I felt confused and disoriented and feelings of just being really dizzy like weak, like I needed to lie down all the time, I felt depersonalization. This was something that I self diagnosed myself just from going on Google. This was like that feeling of being disconnected from like everything around you. I suddenly had anxiety and panic attacks that would wake me up in the middle of the night. I had swollen eyelids every single morning, One morning I woke up were like one I was completely shut. no apparent reason, just completely out of the blue. I had joint pain. One day I woke up like I couldn’t move. Like my whole back was in pain for like three days, then it just suddenly went away. It was just so odd. I had hair loss, I had like jumpy vision. I don’t know if that makes sense to you. But just really, really strange things. And the hardest part about all of this was trying to hide this from my kids. Like when I think about it, like I just I get emotional because I really tried to hide this, I didn’t want to make them scared or worried. And I put on a smile. Like I faked it a lot of the time. But there were moments where I couldn’t hide it because I was unable to get into bed. And you know, sometimes my daughter would come come up to me and she would ask like, Can you play with me? And I couldn’t. I physically couldn’t. And I would just start crying. It was so heartbreaking. And the other hard part was just having to say no to social events, and people not believing that anything was wrong with me. Because physically like I looked fine. And yeah, I would just say no to, you know, birthday parties, milestone parties. And it was just so hard because I really, really wanted to be there. And I wanted to be with my friends and people thought like, I just didn’t want to be around people. But it was so far from the truth. I was just going through my own little struggles behind the scenes. And I didn’t like talking about it to people because it would make me cry. Like I couldn’t talk about it without crying. And it was the reason why it was because nobody was giving me answers. So I was just scared. So I didn’t even know how to explain what it was going through. And I didn’t want to be questioned Oh, what’s going on? Oh, maybe you should try this. And maybe you should try. Like I didn’t have the energy to even talk about it. So yeah, that went on for a while. And then in January of 2017 it’s like the universe was really Working in my favor because I got this random email that landed in my inbox. And it was from basically a business coach who is also a psychic. And I thought, this is like a complimentary 15 minute call, I thought I’m going to jump on this call, maybe she has some insight into like, what’s going wrong, like with my health. And so I jumped on the call, and I connected with her right away, like she was just amazing. And she didn’t really address the symptoms. But she immediately dove into the fact that what I’ve been doing career wise has been the stepping stone for me to step into something else. And she said that there was just so much more inside me that needed to come out. And I needed to step into my full potential and start living my passion. And I was so I was lost. I was like, what, like, it didn’t quite make sense what she was talking about, because I thought I was going to be doing this like for life. And yeah, and she just told me, You know, I see you building this lifestyle brand and inspiring others to live this exceptional lifestyle. And whatever she was saying, like didn’t fully make sense, because I was in the mess, like I wasn’t feeling well. And I was still doing network marketing. And I’m still doing network marketing as a matter of fact, but I didn’t take a break at that time, like I was actually still kind of working. And I got off, I call and she sparked something inside me and I felt so lit up that almost the symptoms like kind of disappeared, because I felt so excited for like the first time in so long. And something shifted like internally within me. And this was a sign and it was the catalyst to start something new, something that I love without thinking about how much money was going to pay me. So this was another powerful lesson. For me. It was a time where I thought you know what I get to choose what I want to do with my life. I’m going to choose what I want, not what I should do, because someone else said so, right. There’s a big difference there. choosing what you want, will make you happy choosing what someone tells you to do, or telling you Oh, you should do this will make you miserable. It’ll disconnect you from your true nature as to what you’re meant to be doing. So when I thought about my conversation with Amber and I remembered what Tony Robbins said about success without fulfillment is the ultimate failure. I thought, okay, you know, what, enough is enough, it’s time to listen to me. Now, you know, what do I want to do? What should I what like what would make me happiest? And my gut said, to just start blogging. So I hired a web designer, and I started sharing snippets of my journey and things that I learned. And I love doing it because I started getting messages from random people that I haven’t heard from in so long. They’re like, you’re so inspiring. Like, I loved what you just wrote. And I was making a difference to people. And I felt excited by it. Like I felt fulfilled inside, I felt different. Now, what I’m going to tell you next is one of the most pivotal moments of my whole story. Okay, so shortly after my call with Amber, which was in January of 2017, in April, so just a few months later, I had my company convention for my network marketing business, it was slowly approaching, and it was held in Las Vegas. This is where it’s held every single year. And I would go every single year, like I never missed a conference, it was the biggest convention of the year 20,000 people would go and I would preach to every single person on my team that you have to go like, if you’re serious about building a business, this is a must, which is absolutely true. You know, if you’re serious about building a network marketing business, you absolutely absolutely have to go because that’s where all the training is held. And, you know, you learn to master the industry. But I felt different that year, and I no longer felt compelled to attend because I was no longer feeling aligned to what I was doing anymore. Like my heart wasn’t in it. And I had this inner tug of war going on. Like I felt obligated to attend. And I felt guilty if I didn’t go because I had like 50 people going for my team. But deep down inside, I knew that if I was going I wasn’t being honest with myself, but I chose to ignore those feelings. And I just, I booked like a last minute flight to Las Vegas, even though my gut was clearly telling me not to go. And when I was sitting in the arena, they were doing the product launch. I felt like a fraud. I felt like I was hiding something pretending to be excited, because you know, the like everyone was cheering in the audience when like the new products were being launched. And I felt like it was pretending to be excited. I wasn’t excited. I just felt it felt weird. I felt like I shouldn’t be there. So I went up to my room and I was so emotional. And I was getting text messages from like team members saying, you know, are you coming for drinks tonight, and everybody was, you know, making plans to go for dinner and to celebrate the new products and everything going on. And I just couldn’t put it upon myself to go. And, like start explaining to people like what was wrong, because people would be able to tell, but clearly something was wrong. And I didn’t know how to even articulate, articulate what I was feeling or what I was going through. And it was in that moment that I decided to leave. And before I knew it, I was sitting on a plane. Back home to Toronto, I wasn’t even in Vegas for 24 hours, I was already on a flight back home to Toronto. And I felt so relieved. When I got on that plane, I felt like this huge weight lifted off my shoulders. And I felt relaxed. And I felt like this sense of inner peace. And I was just, I was so happy to be on that plane to go back home because I felt so uncomfortable, and out of place being there. And I didn’t overthink my decision, I listened to my heart This time, for the first time I actually listened to me. And when my husband picked me up from the airport, and he drove me back home, and I was with my family and we watch TV together on the couch, I felt so relaxed. Like I didn’t have my mind on overdrive, like it always was with like a million things to do on my to do list My mind was with them. And I felt present for like the first time in such a long time. And shortly after that things just started to flow like I was ready for that next stage in my journey. And so I signed up with the Institute for integrative nutrition to study the field of health coaching and follow my passion. And throughout this entire experience, I was documenting my journey because remember, my symptoms didn’t go away, I was still experiencing these symptoms. And so I started you know, I was documenting my journey about things that I was eating, how I was feeling after it was eating things I was recording any new supplements I was taking, you know, I would document who I was speaking to which specialist what they told me if I heard anything interesting. And I was just doing that, because at the back of my mind, I had it as a goal that I was going to write a book, like I just had this strong call to write a book because I felt you know what, if I’m going through this, there had to be other people experiencing the same thing. Like I can’t be the only one. And I and I’ve always wanted to write a book. And I’ve always wanted to make a difference in other people’s lives in some way. I just didn’t know how I was going to do it. But now with this new thing that just happened in my life, I thought you know what, I’m going to get to the bottom of this. And I’m going to share my experience. And I did write like I actually just published my book six steps to a healthier you it just launched in July. You can find that book on my website. And it’s it’s a memoir, it’s about my journey from being chronically ill to exactly how I was able to reclaim my health. And although I’m not 100% healed, after having about 25 different symptoms, and now I’m down to just a handful, like I’ve come a long way. So yeah, and here I am today launching this podcast, and I am just I’m so excited for what’s to come. So it’s it’s been quite the journey, I feel like my life has been one huge, massive puzzle. And, you know, all the puzzle pieces are finally coming together. And you know, I had so many question marks, but I finally feel at peace with where I’m at. And I realized that what I was after my whole life was true happiness. And although I was on the wrong path about how I was going to get there so that I could achieve that feeling. This entire journey has been a blessing in disguise, it tested my spirit, my strength to persevere and reach that next level of growth. It’s it’s what led me to my purpose. And I wouldn’t trade any of the struggles, even my rock bottom moments health wise. So if you’re finding yourself at a crossroads and you feel torn, or indecisive about you know what you need to do, or you have feelings of guilt, you know, doing something, just know that we always know what’s best for us. It may not be the easiest decision to make. But sometimes the hardest decisions are the best ones because what we resist persists. And we really never know unless we choose to have faith that everything will work out the way it’s meant to. Like it’s we’re going to still experience those negative feelings. So yeah Guess My only advice would be just to have faith. And you really can’t make a bad decision because we learn and we grow through all of the so called failures. So I guess my biggest takeaway from all of this, and my lesson in all of this is just to trust our feelings and our intuition. Because that’s how I base all of my decisions these days, like I feel into it. And I get my answer that way. And it’s been working for me. So I’m going to keep doing it. So that’s it, guys. That’s my life experience for you wrapped up in about 25 minutes. Of course, I have so much more to share. And I still have so much more to learn as I’m still healing. I’m not 100%. But considering I had 25 symptoms, and now there’s just a handful. I’ve come a long way. So stay tuned for my next episode, as I’m going to be going into much more depth as to the reason I got so sick in the first place and how I was able to finally heal after four years. So really looking forward to that. And yeah, I’ll speak to you guys soon. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen if you found value and learn something new today. If you could take a quick moment, head on over to iTunes, leave an honest review and subscribe to my channel. I would be forever grateful. And of course I’d love to connect with you. So please head on over to social media and find me at Deborah Lobart and I’ll see you next week. As always, my wish for you is true happiness and fulfillment always. Bye for now.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai