Episode 7

Releasing Stress and Trauma with Nicole Field

I’m thrilled to be talking with Nicole Field today. We went to high school together and reconnected over social media, and now Nicole is a certified Pilates instructor and somatic healer. Those paths came from her own needs to heal her body and mind from trauma and injuries. 

Nicole had suffered from panic attacks since she was a teenager and found that teaching pilates and working against the equipment was grounding, but talk therapy wasn’t getting to the root of the problem. Now, she works with somatic stress release therapy to help her clients move the stress and other trapped emotions through the body in order to do what is needed to heal, then release.

Nicole will be offering exclusive packages to my clients to compliment their nutrition and lifestyle coaching work.

You can also find more info about Nicole’s Somatic Stress Therapy work online at https://www.wholelivingsomatics.com/, on social media @Wholelivinghealing and by email at wholelivingsomatics@gmail.com

https://www.wholelivingsomatics.com/

 

Check out her Pilates Studio in Colorado Springs in person or online at https://wholelivingpilates.com , and at @wholelivingpilates on social.

If you’re looking for support in reaching your health goals, schedule a free 30-minute Coffee Talk here to see if we’re a good fit to work together.

Connect with me on Instagram @joliverwellness! DM me the words “Nutrition Edit” and I’ll add you to my close friends list, where I share exclusive content. You’ll be the first to know about upcoming programs and early access to my waitlist.

Music credit: Funk’d Up by Reaktor Productions

A Podcast Launch Bestie production

Transcript
Jeannie Oliver:

Hey there.

Jeannie Oliver:

Welcome back to the Nutrition Edit Today.

Jeannie Oliver:

My guest is Nicole Field.

Jeannie Oliver:

Nicole is the owner of Whole Living Pilates Studio located

Jeannie Oliver:

in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Jeannie Oliver:

She has taught Pilates for over 17 years and is passionate about

Jeannie Oliver:

helping her clients reconnect to their bodies through movement.

Jeannie Oliver:

She now also works as a somatic healing practitioner focusing on

Jeannie Oliver:

somatic stress release therapy.

Jeannie Oliver:

Nicole see's clients both in person and remotely offering group and

Jeannie Oliver:

private sessions, and you can find her@wholelivinghealing.com.

Jeannie Oliver:

I'll also include her contact info in the show notes for you.

Jeannie Oliver:

We had a really great conversation today about getting in touch with

Jeannie Oliver:

your body and your intuition and how healing your emotions can

Jeannie Oliver:

translate into physical healing.

Jeannie Oliver:

I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I did, and let's jump.

Jeannie Oliver:

So welcome Nicole.

Jeannie Oliver:

I'm super excited to have you here today.

Jeannie Oliver:

Thanks for

Jeannie Oliver:

joining

Nicole Field:

me.

Nicole Field:

Thanks for having me, Jeanie.

Nicole Field:

I'm so excited to be here.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

I'm excited about our talk.

Jeannie Oliver:

There's so many things I wanna ask you and learn about and I was just

Jeannie Oliver:

thinking this morning like how cool it is, how we reconnected.

Jeannie Oliver:

So for those of you listening, Nicole and I actually went to high school together

Jeannie Oliver:

and lost touch for I don't know how long.

Jeannie Oliver:

? A long time.

Jeannie Oliver:

20 years.

Jeannie Oliver:

Something maybe like that.

Jeannie Oliver:

We should, I shouldn't even say it.

Jeannie Oliver:

It'll date us.

Jeannie Oliver:

and then I think, did we just reconnect through social media

Nicole Field:

somehow?

Nicole Field:

I think so.

Nicole Field:

I think over Instagram.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Don't think it

Jeannie Oliver:

has Instagram.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

So, so yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Really cool.

Jeannie Oliver:

And we're both pretty different people.

Jeannie Oliver:

I think we were back then and we've gone through a lot of growth and change.

Jeannie Oliver:

Probably some good, some bad and everything in between, but you have

Jeannie Oliver:

had just an amazing journey and you do some really, really cool stuff.

Jeannie Oliver:

So I'm excited to hear about it and yeah, I think it's gonna be super

Jeannie Oliver:

beneficial for your listeners clients.

Jeannie Oliver:

So I'd love to just start off, um, why don't you just tell us about

Jeannie Oliver:

yourself a little bit and how you got into teaching Pilates and then

Jeannie Oliver:

eventually the somatic therapy.

Nicole Field:

Yeah, Well, thanks again for having me and um, I just love that

Nicole Field:

we've reconnected and have so much in common in terms of like what we're

Nicole Field:

passionate about with helping our clients and the people that we work with.

Nicole Field:

And so, um, yeah, it's always a pleasure to talk with you.

Nicole Field:

So, here.

Nicole Field:

I was first connected to Pilates, um, in college, so I was a dance major and.

Nicole Field:

I had a teacher who, who really encouraged me to take Pilates.

Nicole Field:

She thought it would help me to connect to my center.

Nicole Field:

So I was always a pretty good mover, but I, I had a really hard

Nicole Field:

time connecting and feeling my, uh, solar plexus, my abdominals,

Nicole Field:

and that whole area of my body.

Nicole Field:

It was just like I had a real disconnect from them.

Nicole Field:

So I started, doing Pilates.

Nicole Field:

I couldn't afford to do private sessions, so I bought actually the Ma Winter videos

Nicole Field:

back in the day with Daisy Fuentez and she taught Pilates, the Pilates, Matt work.

Nicole Field:

And I literally had her book and I had her videos, and I would just

Nicole Field:

do these Pilates mat exercises and started to reconnect to my body in a

Nicole Field:

way that I hadn't ever felt before.

Nicole Field:

And.

Nicole Field:

A few years after that, I had my first son and after being, pregnant

Nicole Field:

and, you know, taking on quite a bit of weight with him, who's a large

Nicole Field:

baby for my frame , I was introduced then to Pilates on the equipment,

Nicole Field:

by, a woman named Pamela Pilson, who lived in my hometown of Ventura.

Nicole Field:

And so I remember that first day getting on her reformer, which, um, if you're

Nicole Field:

not familiar with Pilates, a reformer is kind of one of the main apparatus

Nicole Field:

or pieces of equipment we work with.

Nicole Field:

Um, and it's like a mat with springs attached to it.

Nicole Field:

And you work with spring resistance.

Nicole Field:

And I literally just lie down on that mat, put my feet up on the

Nicole Field:

foot bar and started to press out with my legs, kind of like a squat.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

. And it just, something happened internally where I was like,

Nicole Field:

Oh my goodness, I can feel.

Nicole Field:

That internal connection of my abdominals, I could feel my body in a way that I,

Nicole Field:

even with the mat work that I hadn't experienced quite, um, so profoundly.

Nicole Field:

So I was hooked.

Nicole Field:

That was, um, back in 2001, I ended up, um, having another baby before I went

Nicole Field:

it and got, uh, certified to teach.

Nicole Field:

So I would, I went through the whole process of becoming, um,

Nicole Field:

comprehensively certified, uh, in 2005.

Nicole Field:

And, and what does that mean

Jeannie Oliver:

comprehensively?

Jeannie Oliver:

Sorry to interrupt.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah, so for Matt and the reformer,

Nicole Field:

or, Yeah, it's actually on all equipment,

Nicole Field:

uh, available within Pilates.

Nicole Field:

So we have a Cadillac, we have what's called a Pilates chair or wounded chair.

Nicole Field:

We have a spine corrector and multiple other small little

Nicole Field:

pieces of equipment that we use.

Nicole Field:

So yes, I was trained on all the equipment and then started

Nicole Field:

teaching, pretty much right away.

Nicole Field:

So yeah, that's how I got involved with Pilates.

Nicole Field:

. Um, in terms of somatic healing work that is a little, is a lot more recent for me.

Nicole Field:

So just within the last two years, after the pandemic hit, like most of us, stress

Nicole Field:

was encroaching in my body in a way that was familiar, but also unfamiliar.

Nicole Field:

And I, I all, my normal tactics of kind of dealing with stress,

Nicole Field:

weren't really seem to work for me.

Nicole Field:

and after doing about a year of really intense therapy and emdr, which was able

Nicole Field:

to heal a lot of trauma for me, I still felt like I had some things within my

Nicole Field:

body that needed to really be processed and released in a way that, um, talk

Nicole Field:

therapy wasn't really able to touch into.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

So, yeah.

Nicole Field:

Yeah, yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

I experienced the same thing.

Jeannie Oliver:

I mean, I did talk therapy for.

Jeannie Oliver:

I don't know, two decades off and on, I guess collectively.

Jeannie Oliver:

And it does help, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

It, it feels better.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's good to have someone to discuss our stuff with.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, but you're right.

Jeannie Oliver:

I never felt that sort of shift of, I don't know, call it energetic.

Jeannie Oliver:

So just the power that those memories or emotions had over me until I started

Jeannie Oliver:

doing some of the more somatic modalities.

Jeannie Oliver:

So, back up just a little bit, cause I'm gonna ask you more about this later too.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, how long ago did you start your Pilate studio?

Jeannie Oliver:

Yes.

Nicole Field:

Uh, I opened the studio in January of 2017.

Nicole Field:

Okay.

Nicole Field:

So it's about five and a half years ago.

Nicole Field:

Okay,

Jeannie Oliver:

cool.

Jeannie Oliver:

And then when you, um, and obviously, you know, you don't have to go into any

Jeannie Oliver:

super personal details about the trauma that you experienced, but I know that

Jeannie Oliver:

some of it was physical, some emotional.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, is there anything that you wanna share about that, that you feel is.

Jeannie Oliver:

Significant for people to know.

Nicole Field:

Sure.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

As I have this like thunderstorm rolling in.

Jeannie Oliver:

Really, I think we hear the thunder.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's kinda

Nicole Field:

dramatic.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

I've been aware of my trauma for about 11 years or so.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

As I was about to hit 40, um, I started to experience a lot of

Nicole Field:

physical symptoms that were, could not be explained by medical doctors.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

. Um, and that's when I started to realize my body was really trying to process, um,

Nicole Field:

some of the trauma that I experienced.

Nicole Field:

Um, I'm a survivor of two near death experiences, so, um, and when I say near

Nicole Field:

death, it's not like, Died and, um, you know, saw the light or anything like that.

Nicole Field:

That's just that I, I came very close to dying.

Nicole Field:

Um, so I'll just clarify that.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Um, one, the first was when I was 10 years old and in a, an accident where

Nicole Field:

I suffered a, a major head trauma.

Nicole Field:

And then the second one was after the birth of my third son, um, and

Nicole Field:

wear a hemorrhage and had to have an emergency hysterectomy to save my life.

Nicole Field:

Um, so that was at age 33.

Nicole Field:

And so as I approached age 40, a lot of these things started

Nicole Field:

to show up as physical symptoms.

Nicole Field:

I know.

Nicole Field:

So, And, uh, there we go, kinda almost.

Nicole Field:

And so, um, yeah, I, uh, I started to get curious about what would that look like

Nicole Field:

to really start to heal from my trauma.

Nicole Field:

. that's when I first started to do therapy.

Nicole Field:

And um, and then I looked at a lot of different modalities.

Nicole Field:

Massage therapy.

Nicole Field:

I did cranial sac therapy.

Nicole Field:

I've done sound healing.

Nicole Field:

I probably, probably, you name it, I've tried as a part of like,

Nicole Field:

that's, I need to, to heal from this.

Nicole Field:

but I guess like a couple years ago, the other piece, was just really understanding

Nicole Field:

and recognizing the childhood trauma that I had experienced as well.

Nicole Field:

both of my parents deal with some major like mental health issues.

Nicole Field:

Okay.

Nicole Field:

And so growing up in that sort of environment, it was very, um, unstable

Nicole Field:

in the sense of that we moved a lot and there was always, I was sort

Nicole Field:

of like, what's gonna happen next?

Nicole Field:

Like, didn't have a sense of feeling very grounded.

Nicole Field:

So I think when the pandemic hit, it brought up a lot of those memories in my

Nicole Field:

body of like this very similar feelings.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

. Um, and it wasn't until, you know, really diving into that, that I understood the

Nicole Field:

roles I had played in life in order to make myself feel safe within my body.

Nicole Field:

Some of those things were healthy patterns Sure.

Nicole Field:

And sure not healthy patterns.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah, I can relate to that a hundred percent.

Jeannie Oliver:

I think most of us probably can if we're exploring it at all.

Jeannie Oliver:

So how did it manifest for you?

Jeannie Oliver:

Was it physical pain?

Jeannie Oliver:

Was it illness?

Jeannie Oliver:

Was it more than that?

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Uh, for me it really started, I actually had a lot of anxiety as a teenager,

Nicole Field:

but I didn't have the support or really people around me to understand what

Nicole Field:

that was about or what was happening.

Nicole Field:

So I was always just told.

Nicole Field:

You're okay.

Nicole Field:

Just calm down, , Right.

Nicole Field:

Calm down.

Nicole Field:

Those types of message.

Nicole Field:

Useful advice.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

Or pray more things like that.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

, none of which, uh, seem to work or make me feel calmer inside.

Nicole Field:

Um, I suffered a lot from heart palpitations when, and panic attacks.

Nicole Field:

So when those would come on, I would feel just so ungrounded and like, I just wanted

Nicole Field:

to like, come out of my body and, it was difficult to breathe, to catch my breath.

Nicole Field:

Yeah, that's kind of the best way I can explain what that felt like for me.

Nicole Field:

Um, as I approached 40, I started having those almost on a daily basis.

Nicole Field:

I would be on my way to teach a class and just having a full on

Nicole Field:

panic attack and somehow getting into that mode of teaching and shift.

Nicole Field:

To another person would help ground me and I would be able to kind

Nicole Field:

of, you know, work through it.

Nicole Field:

but it was such a common experience that I began to have a lot of insomnia.

Nicole Field:

I wasn't sleeping well, my hair was falling out and big clumps.

Nicole Field:

I was having even like neurological, like numbness down one of my arms.

Nicole Field:

so those types of scary issues, stomach digestive issues as well,

Nicole Field:

like the more anxiety I felt, the more unsettled I felt in my, um, stomach and

Nicole Field:

had trouble eating at certain times.

Nicole Field:

Or the opposite of that would wanna eat foods to comfort or

Nicole Field:

call my nervous system, you know?

Nicole Field:

So kind of swinging between those two

Jeannie Oliver:

states.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

God, I can relate to that too.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think, you know, gut issues and nervous system issues, anxiety

Jeannie Oliver:

are so, so commonly paired.

Jeannie Oliver:

Our gut and our nervous system can't really be looked at in a vacuum.

Jeannie Oliver:

They should always be looked at together because what's going on with us, you

Jeannie Oliver:

know, neurologically, emotionally will so affect our gut function.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, and you're right, people often experience, you know, one or the

Jeannie Oliver:

other, either emotional eating or, you know, not eating enough.

Jeannie Oliver:

It can fluctuate between the two.

Jeannie Oliver:

I've certainly been an emotional eater myself.

Jeannie Oliver:

I think I still am.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's just a matter of, you know, us learning how to manage that and take

Jeannie Oliver:

better care of ourselves around it.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, but yeah, I can, I can relate to some of those things.

Jeannie Oliver:

And the panic attacks is just, it's so scary, especially as a young

Jeannie Oliver:

person, you know, before you really understand what's going on and anyone's

Jeannie Oliver:

kind of acknowledging like, Hey, this is normal if you have anxiety.

Jeannie Oliver:

And you know, certainly when we were in high school, like that was

Jeannie Oliver:

not something people discussed.

Jeannie Oliver:

It wasn't common knowledge.

Jeannie Oliver:

Uh, it was.

Jeannie Oliver:

I don't know what I would say it was taboo necessarily.

Jeannie Oliver:

It just something that we had a lot of awareness around.

Nicole Field:

Yeah, I agree.

Nicole Field:

Or resources.

Nicole Field:

Like I don't think, uh, we knew how to get help for that.

Nicole Field:

You know, what that would even, what our options even were other

Nicole Field:

than maybe talking to a counselor, you know, that kind of thing.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah, exactly.

Jeannie Oliver:

So how did, would you say that like doing the Pilates itself was helpful

Jeannie Oliver:

for that aspect of what you were dealing with as far as like the anxiety itself?

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, did it help with panic attacks at all or was it more the working with your

Jeannie Oliver:

clients that would alleviate the symptoms?

Nicole Field:

Actually, it was both.

Nicole Field:

Which was super helpful to be in that, that career that I had access to both,

Nicole Field:

um, movement for me has always been kind of the way that I have self-regulated.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

Um, so even as a young child, I was really involved in dance, danced all

Nicole Field:

through high school, and looking back on it now, I can see how I can remember

Nicole Field:

how I'd feel before going in, taking a class, a dance class, and then moving my

Nicole Field:

body through all these different range emotions and feeling that these heavy

Nicole Field:

emotions actually have a, an outlet.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

For release.

Nicole Field:

Um, I could not, I didn't understand that that's what was happening at

Nicole Field:

the time, but I knew that I would always, I just kind of always felt

Nicole Field:

more settled after I moved my body.

Nicole Field:

And so it was the same thing for Pilates.

Nicole Field:

Pilates at the time for me.

Nicole Field:

Um, For many years, up until probably the last couple years, the

Nicole Field:

structure of it was super comforting.

Nicole Field:

It was like a container and I knew the order of the exercises.

Nicole Field:

I was familiar with the exercises, I and I, and that it felt very

Nicole Field:

grounding to work against springs.

Nicole Field:

And so it was a way, another way, where I could just move heavy

Nicole Field:

emotion or stress through my body.

Nicole Field:

And then the aspect of teaching that felt super grounded for me is just this,

Nicole Field:

like something happens when I get in that mode where I'm just in the zone

Nicole Field:

and I feel so hyper focused on what's happening that everything else falls away.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

And I think that's why I've done it for so many years and why I love it so much.

Nicole Field:

And also why I'm really loving this somatic work because it's kind of

Nicole Field:

that same attention that, I'm able to give to my clients in those sessions.

Nicole Field:

And for me it feels very safe and very grounding to offer that space for others.

Nicole Field:

Um, I'll be honest, as a Pilates teacher, there have been times where it hasn't

Nicole Field:

always felt super peaceful and grounding.

Nicole Field:

In fact, I had to kind of give up teaching group classes, um, for a

Nicole Field:

while during the pandemic just because the amount of energy coming in to a

Nicole Field:

group class felt overwhelming for me.

Nicole Field:

Sure.

Nicole Field:

And so I took some time to, um, step away from group classes and

Nicole Field:

really focus on one on one cause that's kinda what I needed as well.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

So that was interesting.

Nicole Field:

. Jeannie Oliver: Yeah, that is interesting.

Nicole Field:

Well, I can relate.

Nicole Field:

I feel the same way when I'm working with my clients.

Nicole Field:

It's just that one on one time is so, the connection with someone else

Nicole Field:

and being able to completely focus on them, it does feel really grounding.

Nicole Field:

And even though there is energy output there, it's.

Nicole Field:

Also nourishing for us, Right?

Nicole Field:

So yes, but that's really beautiful that you can bring that into

Nicole Field:

that space and support others and also feel, feel supportive.

Nicole Field:

I think everyone wishes we had a career like that, right?

Nicole Field:

, if all of us should be so lucky,

Nicole Field:

I feel very grateful for that.

Nicole Field:

Yeah,

Jeannie Oliver:

yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's a blessing that goes in both ways, both directions.

Jeannie Oliver:

So give us, if you will, an overview of what Somatic work

Jeannie Oliver:

actually is and how it works.

Nicole Field:

yeah, I think somatic work is kind of, could,

Nicole Field:

can be a big general term.

Nicole Field:

So I'll kind of focus more on like what I do and the app that I'm

Nicole Field:

using, um, to work with clients.

Nicole Field:

So I've been trained in a, um, technique called somatic Stress release therapy.

Nicole Field:

So that is really just.

Nicole Field:

Connecting with a client, creating space for them to be able to come

Nicole Field:

into their body and check in and see what area, what part of their body

Nicole Field:

might be wanting more attention, might be wanting more care, might be

Nicole Field:

wanting to even communicate to them.

Nicole Field:

And so during that session, we'll spend time just kind of focusing on

Nicole Field:

that, listening in to, and feeling into those sensations, what that might

Nicole Field:

be experienced for each individual.

Nicole Field:

And then, and then we ask the body with that sensation, what and how does the

Nicole Field:

body wanna move or move that stressor or emotion or whatever it might be through.

Nicole Field:

Um, sometimes it's not possible to do that.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

because of trauma or it's just too intense.

Nicole Field:

And so we back it off and we do a lot of boundary work, containment work.

Nicole Field:

Um, It's really important for clients to feel very safe within their own

Nicole Field:

body to even start somatic therapy.

Nicole Field:

And so depending on what's going on with the person, uh, we approach it that way

Nicole Field:

and we, it's very client led and I am just a guide and a witness to be there

Nicole Field:

to help them to process some of the stress or thing or stuck emotions that

Nicole Field:

might be held in their body and to help them come into better relationship with

Nicole Field:

whatever is there, whatever is present.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

. So, um, not necessarily, it's not necessarily a practice of like

Nicole Field:

pushing stuff off or throwing stuff off or casting it away.

Nicole Field:

It's more of like, how can we be more present with what is there

Nicole Field:

and what is showing up for that person right in that moment.

Nicole Field:

So,

Jeannie Oliver:

Every single session Identifying it and

Jeannie Oliver:

accepting it to some degree.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

And even that process alone can be, can take some time.

Nicole Field:

Sure.

Nicole Field:

I know for myself, it took me a while to feel like my, my body was a safe

Nicole Field:

place to inhabit that all the sensations that I felt, that were challenging,

Nicole Field:

that I can be with them, you know, because for a long time I just wanted

Nicole Field:

to like, I wanted them to go away.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

There are, That's

Jeannie Oliver:

an instinct.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like, let's just move away from anything unpleasant.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like unpleasant equals bad.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think that mindset shift of going, Okay, it's just what it is.

Jeannie Oliver:

And maybe it's my body trying to tell me something.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Actually I think that's a really important piece of, if we can look at

Nicole Field:

it, our bodies is neither good nor bad.

Nicole Field:

they just start our bodies.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

And the incredible things that they do for us every single day

Nicole Field:

to carry us through this world.

Nicole Field:

Yes.

Nicole Field:

We can start to shift that and to see it as, magical in a way, what is

Nicole Field:

there, What is it trying to communicate?

Nicole Field:

How can we get more connected body, mind and spirit versus just being

Nicole Field:

kind of cut off and compartmentalized?

Nicole Field:

So the work that I do is just kind of helping to facilitate that process.

Jeannie Oliver:

I love that.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think that's such a gift for people, because in our world of western

Jeannie Oliver:

medicine, we put everything in a vacuum.

Jeannie Oliver:

There's the heart guy, there's the, you know, lung specialist.

Jeannie Oliver:

There's someone that does, you know, women's health, there's B gyn and then

Jeannie Oliver:

there's, you know, the neurologist or.

Jeannie Oliver:

Whatever.

Jeannie Oliver:

And we look at these different things in a vacuum, and obviously those

Jeannie Oliver:

people play very important roles.

Jeannie Oliver:

I mean, obviously if I, you know, tear an acl, I want a good orthopedic

Jeannie Oliver:

surgeon working with me on that.

Jeannie Oliver:

I don't necessarily want someone that's, you know, a natural path addressing that.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like I, we need those different specialties.

Jeannie Oliver:

But I also think that what gets missed in the larger picture is the fact that

Jeannie Oliver:

everything is so intertwined and that we're a whole person and everything

Jeannie Oliver:

is constantly working in, in concert.

Jeannie Oliver:

And, being able to kind of recognize what's going on.

Jeannie Oliver:

I know that you and I have talked about the book before, Uh, the Body Keeps

Jeannie Oliver:

the Score and I know you've mentioned a couple other books that you found

Jeannie Oliver:

really helpful as you were learning in, in going through your personal

Jeannie Oliver:

experiences and journey of healing.

Jeannie Oliver:

And just that whole concept of your body receives information from every input.

Jeannie Oliver:

Every experience and it's somehow stored in a positive or negative way, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

But it's just stored and that's going to manifest or resurface in in some way.

Jeannie Oliver:

And often if we're dealing with health issues or pain, if we can actually

Jeannie Oliver:

tap into where is that coming from?

Jeannie Oliver:

Like, what is that about?

Jeannie Oliver:

And address it accordingly.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like we can see huge changes for the better and healing and growth,

Jeannie Oliver:

whether it's emotional or physical.

Jeannie Oliver:

So I think it's really important and exciting work.

Jeannie Oliver:

And especially with stress.

Jeannie Oliver:

I mean, obviously stress levels have been through the roof this last

Jeannie Oliver:

several years for us, especially in the United States, especially as

Jeannie Oliver:

women, Um, recently more than ever.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yes.

Jeannie Oliver:

But yeah, so it's, it's a lot.

Jeannie Oliver:

So what have you seen with your own health, your own symptoms, anxiety as

Jeannie Oliver:

you've started to do this kind of work both for yourself and with your clients?

Nicole Field:

Yeah, I mean, I think sometimes we, we look for these

Nicole Field:

big huge shifts or changes mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

Um, but if I look kind of over a period of time, the cumulative things that have

Nicole Field:

happened, um, or shifted for me it's kind of, it's pretty massive in that way.

Nicole Field:

But if you look at just one day, it might not feel bad.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

You know?

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

People

Jeannie Oliver:

look to see this big, sexy, like monumental shifts,

Jeannie Oliver:

but , it's the little stuff that adds up that's usually the most significant.

Jeannie Oliver:

Absolutely.

Nicole Field:

I think the thing that I'm really fascinated with right now is, I

Nicole Field:

sort of call this embodied boundaries.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

With women in particular.

Nicole Field:

And for myself personally.

Nicole Field:

So I think the more that I have come into this understanding of my own personal

Nicole Field:

boundary, or I call it even the container that exists, the energetic container

Nicole Field:

that exists around my body, the more aware I've become of that and also of

Nicole Field:

the ruptures that have happened mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

and the repair that's needed in those areas, just working through

Nicole Field:

those practices, have helped me so much to know, what's mine, what am

Nicole Field:

I responsible for in this world, and what have I picked up from other people

Nicole Field:

that I might feel within my body?

Nicole Field:

And what is then my responsibility outside of myself?

Nicole Field:

So really being clear about that, has, I don't feel a sense of heaviness in

Nicole Field:

the way I think I used to in a lot of my relationships and even in the client

Nicole Field:

work, as much as I've always loved that, it used to be very, you know, at

Nicole Field:

the end of the day, it would be quite drained just from being around so many

Nicole Field:

people all day and taking, and their energy and their, um, struggles and,

Nicole Field:

um, you know, whatever that might be.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

So learning, um, practices, embodied practices of how to maintain my own

Nicole Field:

personal sense of containment and boundaries, has really been life changing

Nicole Field:

and the work I've done with clients around that as well, has been very powerful too.

Nicole Field:

I'm really loving that part right now.

Nicole Field:

, Jeannie Oliver: Are there practices or

Nicole Field:

the beginning of your day, throughout your day, at the end of the day, For example,

Nicole Field:

I know when I used to work at the Lyme Disease Clinic, like just the ritual of

Nicole Field:

washing my hands after seeing a client, I used to have, this is like a, a more

Nicole Field:

woo woo thing, but I had an essential oil spray that was supposed to like, help

Nicole Field:

shift energies, whatever, and kind of, you know, give you a clear, fresh start.

Nicole Field:

And I would sometimes just miss that over my head if I didn't have time

Nicole Field:

to, you know, actually like get up step outside, have like a, you know,

Nicole Field:

visual and physical energy shift.

Nicole Field:

Um, but just those little rituals sometimes would really help.

Nicole Field:

And, you know, often just prayer was a tool for me.

Nicole Field:

Prayer for either my client or for myself at the end of the day.

Nicole Field:

Just kind of giving that to my higher power, the concerns

Nicole Field:

and things that I felt.

Nicole Field:

What are the practices?

Nicole Field:

Like?

Nicole Field:

How do you do that within this?

Nicole Field:

Somatic stress release therapy, Like what does that look like?

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

I loved all the things that you shared.

Nicole Field:

I do some very similar things as well, . Um, in terms of working with clients,

Nicole Field:

I, I've, over the last few months, I started to work with like Paul Santo.

Nicole Field:

So I will burn this sacred wood before and after a session, and it does have

Nicole Field:

kind of clearing properties, for energy.

Nicole Field:

And so just that sort of simple practice of lighting that and then letting the

Nicole Field:

smoke kind of cleanse the space and cleanse myself, has been very helpful.

Nicole Field:

I do have several essential oils as well that I use.

Nicole Field:

And those are great.

Nicole Field:

And washing your hands.

Nicole Field:

Any picture of just like, Okay, I'm, letting this sort

Nicole Field:

of wash off of me because our.

Nicole Field:

Our idea around helping people really needs to be in a, come from a healthy

Nicole Field:

place that we can help people most when we stay connected to ourselves.

Nicole Field:

And if we don't stay connected to ourselves and take on everybody else's

Nicole Field:

energy and problems and struggles, then it gets heavier and heavier and we're

Nicole Field:

less able to do what we're called to do.

Nicole Field:

So those practices and rituals I find them extremely important.

Nicole Field:

I take a bath probably every single night.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Just as a way of cleansing and up salt bath, relaxing.

Nicole Field:

but throughout the day, the somatic side of that, oftentimes

Nicole Field:

sometimes it's just like shaking it.

Nicole Field:

I feel like excess energy, all that, you know, I don't have

Nicole Field:

time to do a 30 minute workout.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

Every I see a client , I might, you know, kinda bounce or jump or shake it out.

Nicole Field:

Or even this like movement, like with my arms, I'll, I'll reimagine

Nicole Field:

like my membrane around me, the safe container, and even like, kind of

Nicole Field:

imagine that I'm feeling the edges of it.

Nicole Field:

Oh, that's cool.

Nicole Field:

And then like, um, with gratitude, like I press my hand to, to the client in my

Nicole Field:

imagination, in my head, like, thank you.

Nicole Field:

And then I send you on with gratitude.

Nicole Field:

You know, just a way of, of having closure.

Nicole Field:

Oftentimes I need this with.

Nicole Field:

With family, you know, dealing with family huggers.

Nicole Field:

It gets so intense and I'm like, Oh my gosh, I need to, I need a reset.

Nicole Field:

Yes, I'm feeling everybody's ANGs or whatever it is.

Nicole Field:

You know, I have three teenage toys and aging parents.

Nicole Field:

And, um, so yeah, I, I'm grateful that now I think of doing that because before,

Nicole Field:

right, it would take me until I felt sick to my stomach, exhausted, burnt out

Nicole Field:

all these other things to go, Maybe I need to like release some of this stuff.

Nicole Field:

, Jeannie Oliver: right?

Nicole Field:

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

It, and that really is just such a practice, isn't it?

Nicole Field:

Like getting used to, Well, first of all, learning the tools and yes, having

Nicole Field:

that toolbox of ways to, you know, shake off energy, maintain your healthy,

Nicole Field:

Boundaries and self soothe as well, right?

Nicole Field:

. Yeah.

Nicole Field:

And so learning what works for us, learning those tools and then

Nicole Field:

having them at the ready is the key.

Nicole Field:

But it takes some time before we kind of just know to go to that practice

Nicole Field:

versus like, Well, I'm just going to eat a bag of cookies, or I'm just going

Nicole Field:

to, you know, for some people light up or have a cocktail or whatever it

Nicole Field:

might be that we're using to self.

Nicole Field:

So that's not serving us well.

Nicole Field:

Yes.

Nicole Field:

Because our body is constantly wanting to go back to that homeostasis.

Nicole Field:

Exactly.

Nicole Field:

Window of tolerance.

Nicole Field:

So of, of course if we don't have the tools available, we're gonna

Nicole Field:

go to whatever is available.

Jeannie Oliver:

Exactly.

Jeannie Oliver:

The quick and easy.

Nicole Field:

Yep.

Nicole Field:

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Nicole Field:

So, and that's not, I don't think that anyone should feel like bad about that.

Nicole Field:

I think that is just what your body is doing.

Nicole Field:

To try to help itself.

Nicole Field:

Exactly.

Nicole Field:

And it's not, you're not a bad person because you do these things, right.

Nicole Field:

It's just your nervous system trying to come back and do a state of,

Nicole Field:

um, regulation and throughout every day we're going in and out of that.

Nicole Field:

And really, the, the somatic work, that ideal helps you kind of increase

Nicole Field:

that window of tolerance and that capacity so that you come back to that

Nicole Field:

place of homeostasis or regulation a little sooner than you might

Nicole Field:

before by having tools and processes release the stress as it comes in.

Nicole Field:

Cause it will come in, It comes in every day.

Nicole Field:

Oh,

Jeannie Oliver:

absolutely.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

We don't have control over so much of that.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right.

Jeannie Oliver:

No, no, I totally agree.

Jeannie Oliver:

I think part of that too is just releasing, like understanding that

Jeannie Oliver:

as humans we need to regulate.

Jeannie Oliver:

Self soze, whatever you wanna call it, you know, and that's our natural sort

Jeannie Oliver:

of state that we're trying to return to.

Jeannie Oliver:

And so releasing any shame around that need?

Jeannie Oliver:

Yes.

Jeannie Oliver:

The self-soothe is really, really crucial because, and especially if

Jeannie Oliver:

we're talking about addictive behaviors, you know, um, and I include, you

Jeannie Oliver:

know, food and sugar and that too.

Jeannie Oliver:

I mean, that was my challenge for so much of my life.

Jeannie Oliver:

And so I think the shame drives a lot of those self-destructive behaviors.

Jeannie Oliver:

So if we can release that around it and just go, Look, I, I need a way to regulate

Jeannie Oliver:

my nervous system and calm down and feel better and self soothe, I just need to

Jeannie Oliver:

learn ways to do it that serve me well and that are actually healthy, that actually

Jeannie Oliver:

help with the problem versus masking that problem because then it can just grow.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right.

Jeannie Oliver:

Kind of fester there.

Nicole Field:

Yes.

Nicole Field:

Um, absolutely.

Nicole Field:

And I think like, It's oftentimes, um, we think of regulating our

Nicole Field:

nervous system as just being calm.

Nicole Field:

Right?

Nicole Field:

And that's not necessarily true.

Nicole Field:

You know, some students That's a good point.

Nicole Field:

You know, what, what we need and is to express something or vocalize something

Nicole Field:

or, um, move things through versus in order to get to a place where we feel

Nicole Field:

like we can find restoration mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

And, um, our stress response cycle is often thwarted because

Nicole Field:

of cultural ideas around that.

Nicole Field:

Is it, do we have permission to express or say, or do or think what, what our

Nicole Field:

body is actually asking for in the moment?

Nicole Field:

Oftentimes, that's right.

Nicole Field:

No, we don't have that.

Nicole Field:

Right?

Nicole Field:

So that gets suppressed within our body.

Nicole Field:

And how do we find opportunities?

Nicole Field:

To complete that stress response cycle so that we can come into not just the

Nicole Field:

state of relaxation, but restoration when we're in restoration, Right.

Nicole Field:

Our digest system, you know, all our body is working as a whole in the way

Nicole Field:

that it's healing or that is healing.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

That's a really important, important point to make because again, it's that like we

Jeannie Oliver:

always think, well, if my body is doing what it's supposed to do and I'm, you

Jeannie Oliver:

know, everything is okay, then I'll just feel happy and I'll feel good constantly.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's like, well necessarily, like it might be really uncomfortable initially,

Jeannie Oliver:

, um, but, you know, change is, is good.

Jeannie Oliver:

Movement is good.

Nicole Field:

Yeah, absolutely.

Nicole Field:

And then just knowing that for so many of us, we just have to go,

Nicole Field:

we have to take it really slow and gentle, you know, that, um, forcing

Nicole Field:

yourself to do this type of work.

Nicole Field:

In a really intense capacity, could backfire, you know?

Nicole Field:

So just like really listening, like giving yourself bits of, of permission

Nicole Field:

and then coming back to a source of safety or, or, um, groundedness

Nicole Field:

I think is really important too.

Nicole Field:

And that it's a process.

Nicole Field:

Everything, every thing we do to kind of move in that direction is helpful.

Nicole Field:

And it doesn't all have to happen in one moment, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

Yes.

Jeannie Oliver:

Oh, that's so crucial.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I just had a similar discussion with Amanda Gibby Peters, who's a function

Jeannie Oliver:

way expert, and she, we were talking about this exact thing that people

Jeannie Oliver:

love this like long like to do list.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like here's what you do to fix it, whatever.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's, and.

Jeannie Oliver:

So many of the women that I work with are very type A, they're very goal driven,

Jeannie Oliver:

data driven, and they're kind of all or nothing like either all in or not.

Jeannie Oliver:

And you know, I think for both of us, a lot of the work that we do is

Jeannie Oliver:

helping people, people find comfort to some degree in that gray zone.

Jeannie Oliver:

You know, where you're sort of, you're doing, starting with some things,

Jeannie Oliver:

starting small, doing what feels easy and accessible first, and then

Jeannie Oliver:

eventually building on that, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

Adding things in instead of trying to do all the things immediately, burning

Jeannie Oliver:

out, being overwhelmed, , et cetera.

Jeannie Oliver:

And then feeling like you've failed miserably because you've given it all up.

Jeannie Oliver:

And it's just sort of a, I think a fast track to failure when

Jeannie Oliver:

we try to do too much too fast.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right.

Jeannie Oliver:

It sounds like it's the same thing with this type of work.

Nicole Field:

Yeah, absolutely.

Nicole Field:

I mean, it's.

Nicole Field:

Again, that is even one piece of learning to listen to what is enough that

Nicole Field:

might, or how much can my body really process in each moment, you know, or

Nicole Field:

in each session that I do with clients.

Nicole Field:

Like just tapping into that and knowing when things might feel a little bit

Nicole Field:

more overwhelming, and how can we, how can we, um, penate from something

Nicole Field:

that's maybe a little more challenging, coming back to something that's not in

Nicole Field:

order to, um, help someone build that capacity to handle bigger stressors.

Nicole Field:

You know?

Nicole Field:

So it's really good to start with smaller things, you know, like I don't

Nicole Field:

have an example right now, but things that are not gonna be at a, at nine

Nicole Field:

or 10, maybe a four or five, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

Sure.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

That's cool.

Jeannie Oliver:

as a Pilates instructor and a studio owner, how have you seen

Jeannie Oliver:

your clients' trauma and experience present kind of in that setting?

Jeannie Oliver:

Do you see that present in that setting?

Nicole Field:

Um, yes.

Nicole Field:

I, I, I believe so.

Nicole Field:

Now, it's not always, we are not psychotherapists, . Right.

Nicole Field:

It's not, Of course, our scope of practice, unless you've done some

Nicole Field:

trauma informed work, it's not, that's not really our training.

Nicole Field:

However, I think anytime you're working with bodies mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

That might show up as, tension.

Nicole Field:

You know, like sometimes I'll be working with a client and they just feel

Nicole Field:

really tense and like, it's difficult to just find the flow of movement.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

, Um, and maybe that tension.

Nicole Field:

It's not my job to, to really figure out the origin of that tension,

Nicole Field:

but just to maybe notice it, right?

Nicole Field:

And can I create enough safety in my interaction and my teaching of this

Nicole Field:

client to allow their body to come into a little bit more of less tension

Nicole Field:

to build, to move a little bit more.

Nicole Field:

Um, so that's kind of how I approach that.

Nicole Field:

Um, sometimes people cry in sessions.

Nicole Field:

Yeah, it just comes up, You know, there's an emotional disease when we move

Nicole Field:

certain parts of our bodies, you know, we might hold a lot of emotion or pain

Nicole Field:

or trauma in our pelvis, our hips, or our neck and shoulders or whatever it is.

Nicole Field:

And if we get that area to move, um, there might be a, an emotional release.

Nicole Field:

And so I'm always trying to just create an environment where my

Nicole Field:

clients feel safe enough that they can, whatever is their experience is

Nicole Field:

allowed, whatever that looks like.

Nicole Field:

And, um, , there's no judgment for me, I find all of that extremely beautiful.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

And fascinating the way the body, um, can work through some of these things.

Nicole Field:

So yeah, it's just, for me, it's just noticing and just trying to,

Nicole Field:

uh, be someone that is a co regulator to them so they they have yeah.

Nicole Field:

The ability to maybe, maybe let go a little bit more than they did previously.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

A co regulator.

Jeannie Oliver:

I love that.

Jeannie Oliver:

I think that's a great way of saying that.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I ask you that because I've had really interesting experiences where

Jeannie Oliver:

either if I'm getting body work or I'm doing some sort of exercise and

Jeannie Oliver:

out of nowhere, I'm not necessarily even thinking about something.

Jeannie Oliver:

You know, upsetting or whatever, but just emotions will well

Jeannie Oliver:

up and I will start crying.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I remember in the past thinking like, what is wrong with me?

Jeannie Oliver:

Like, this is ridiculous.

Jeannie Oliver:

Where is this coming from?

Jeannie Oliver:

Get ahold of yourself, Jean, for God's sake.

Jeannie Oliver:

You know, I hear that, that inner critic, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

And now it's, you know, having people like you and my life that I've been

Jeannie Oliver:

lucky to work with, be they body workers or, you know, fitness instructors.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, God, even doing some of my like, online workouts at home, my home

Jeannie Oliver:

gym, I'll find like sometimes I'll just be doing something and it's so

Jeannie Oliver:

much fun and I'll have this total, like I'll just burst into tears and

Jeannie Oliver:

all this emotion will just come up.

Jeannie Oliver:

I'm doing some ridiculous cardio workout.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like, what is that?

Jeannie Oliver:

But it's so profound and I think that it's really exciting, to be

Jeannie Oliver:

able to offer that, that safe space.

Jeannie Oliver:

For people.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think it gives them an opportunity too to be like,

Jeannie Oliver:

Oh, this is stored in my body.

Jeannie Oliver:

This is something that I can actually, like.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's empowering to some degree to know like, all right,

Jeannie Oliver:

maybe not be in control of it.

Jeannie Oliver:

But I think that wound, we're able to acknowledge that something's there,

Jeannie Oliver:

then we can go, All right, this is cool.

Jeannie Oliver:

I can deal with this now.

Jeannie Oliver:

Versus just having something that's so buried so deeply we

Jeannie Oliver:

don't know what it's about, where it came from, what to do about it.

Jeannie Oliver:

We just know that like, shit feels bad and we don't feel good, and that's

Jeannie Oliver:

manifesting in one way or the other.

Jeannie Oliver:

And so I think that that's super exciting.

Jeannie Oliver:

And you know, you and I have talked before about partnering software,

Jeannie Oliver:

different services to my clients.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think that it's something that, you know, I would love

Jeannie Oliver:

everyone to have access to because.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yes, therapy is wonderful.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's great, but I think it's one piece of the puzzle and I think that our

Jeannie Oliver:

physical body is a huge piece of it too.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah, and like you said before, like movement, exercise and even, I think

Jeannie Oliver:

especially like building strength.

Jeannie Oliver:

Mm-hmm.

Jeannie Oliver:

, there's something there that is so healing.

Jeannie Oliver:

I mean, obviously we know that it's good for stress management.

Jeannie Oliver:

Great.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

But I'd love to hear from you too, like what you feel is the role of, I don't

Jeannie Oliver:

wanna even use the word fitness, but I think movement, getting in touch with

Jeannie Oliver:

our bodies, strengthening our bodies.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like what's the role there in our overall healing outside of the picture

Jeannie Oliver:

of like, you know, aesthetics and being in shape and looking a certain

Jeannie Oliver:

way, weighing a certain number.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

that's a great question.

Nicole Field:

I think.

Nicole Field:

There's something really empowering when you can start to build a sense

Nicole Field:

of connection and strength within your body in order to function through life.

Nicole Field:

And that might be like very simple things.

Nicole Field:

Like some of my clients wanna be able to go up and down

Nicole Field:

their stairs without hurting.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Or some of my other clients wanna hike a fourteener in Colorado here, . Right?

Nicole Field:

Those are different goals, but they're both can be really powerful

Nicole Field:

when our clients start to feel their sense of capabilities.

Nicole Field:

So I think so often our voice that we hear in our heads is, I can't, we're

Nicole Field:

always thinking about what we can't do.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

, Jeannie Oliver: that's what

Nicole Field:

we negative for me is what I heard for so long.

Nicole Field:

You know, that that negative, um, self talk.

Nicole Field:

And even when I have clients come to me that are dealing with

Nicole Field:

a lot of injuries, Um, pain.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

the focus.

Nicole Field:

We try to focus on what their body can do and build from there, because it, that

Nicole Field:

shift is so healing and once they start to, to see a bit of success in one area

Nicole Field:

and they feel that in their body, Yeah.

Nicole Field:

It's like, it's so empowering.

Nicole Field:

I'm like, Oh, I did this a month ago.

Nicole Field:

I could not Right.

Nicole Field:

Get out of my car without my hip popping, or whatever it was, you know?

Nicole Field:

Now it's like I'm doing this functional activity and I'm, and I feel great.

Nicole Field:

Last month I was at my parents packing up their house, lifting extremely like

Nicole Field:

heavy boxes, and I just, I haven't been able to do intense work like that

Nicole Field:

because my body was in such a protective mode for so long until I got to a place

Nicole Field:

where all of those pieces started to come together that I could really.

Nicole Field:

Start strength training working with, Right.

Nicole Field:

And then connecting that into the Pilates work that I do as well.

Nicole Field:

And to be in a place where I can do things that I, I never thought I

Nicole Field:

would be able to do is like amazing.

Nicole Field:

And same with my clients, you know?

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

But sometimes we have to heal these other things to get there

Nicole Field:

and that's okay too, right?

Nicole Field:

Need to take a gentle approach in order to reach our goals.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right?

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah, definitely.

Jeannie Oliver:

I think that speaks back to, you know, my goal with all the work that I do and

Jeannie Oliver:

what I know is important for probably our listeners and all of the clients who

Jeannie Oliver:

I work with, is that personalization, meeting you where you're at and being

Jeannie Oliver:

able to say, You know, I don't have to do X, Y, and Z, or, You know, ABC

Jeannie Oliver:

because Susie down the street does this, or this works for my husband.

Jeannie Oliver:

Or you know, whatever bandwagon there is that people think that

Jeannie Oliver:

they should be following that isn't necessarily going to work for them.

Jeannie Oliver:

But people try to do that and that's when they get injured or they just

Jeannie Oliver:

get frustrated or they do something that doesn't serve them well.

Jeannie Oliver:

You know, nutrition wise, they end up feeling worse and then they just get

Jeannie Oliver:

discouraged and just throw it out.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think that this is another modality where people can go, Okay,

Jeannie Oliver:

I'm getting in touch with my own body, my own emotions, what's gonna actually

Jeannie Oliver:

work for me where I'm at right now.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think developing that self acceptance, I think self love can come

Jeannie Oliver:

way down the road and that can be a lot of work, but that self acceptance and just.

Jeannie Oliver:

um, awareness, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

? Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Starting there.

Jeannie Oliver:

And it can feel really scary and uncomfortable at first, but as we

Jeannie Oliver:

build on that, it just is, man, it's, yeah, it's pretty, it's pretty

Jeannie Oliver:

awesome and it feels really good.

Jeannie Oliver:

It does feel empowering.

Jeannie Oliver:

It does feel empowering.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I've had the same experience with, with fitness.

Jeannie Oliver:

I got into that before I ever got into nutrition.

Jeannie Oliver:

Just that movement, like doing something that felt powerful with my body,

Jeannie Oliver:

even though I didn't like how my body looked, I feel myself getting stronger.

Jeannie Oliver:

And just that little incremental shift from day to day was,

Jeannie Oliver:

life changing over time.

Jeannie Oliver:

but man, you know, it, I didn't start out with being able to, you

Jeannie Oliver:

know, lift super heavy weights and do a bunch of pushups on my toes.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah, I think that people put too much pressure on themselves to meet

Jeannie Oliver:

a certain standard out the gate.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right?

Jeannie Oliver:

Or they're self-conscious to go to a gym because they imagine everyone

Jeannie Oliver:

else is fitter than them, or, you know, pushing themselves to do a

Jeannie Oliver:

class that's too hard cuz their friends are all doing whatever it is.

Jeannie Oliver:

Whatever it is.

Jeannie Oliver:

So it's cool to hear that reaffirmed from someone who's actually a fitness

Jeannie Oliver:

instructor, that you don't have to come in as this like perfect

Jeannie Oliver:

, super strong fitness woman, out

Nicole Field:

the gate.

Nicole Field:

No.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

You just have to come in as yourself and just have a willingness to meet

Nicole Field:

yourself where you're at and to ask like, Hey body, like what, what do you need?

Nicole Field:

What do you wanna say to me?

Nicole Field:

And that, you know, even in our own journeys of getting.

Nicole Field:

Stronger and more capable maybe with certain movements or exercises, et cetera.

Nicole Field:

There's still days where I need to walk or I need to do something

Nicole Field:

more restorative, um, because that's what my body's asking for.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

And I might have a whole plan of like, I do all this time and then I wake up

Nicole Field:

and I'm like, there is no way, like that would just push me to the edge.

Nicole Field:

And you know, we're so used to like using pain as a gauge.

Nicole Field:

Like, Oh, this has to have to be so harder.

Nicole Field:

Go home.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

You know, that mentality and it's like, what, what would it look like if

Nicole Field:

we switch that and just go instead of pushing, pushing, pushing all the time?

Nicole Field:

Like, what does my body need to feel it's best today in this moment?

Nicole Field:

Are you familiar with Elizabeth Gilbert, the author?

Nicole Field:

I

Jeannie Oliver:

know who she is, but I, I haven't read her

Nicole Field:

work.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

She, I would highly recommend her books.

Nicole Field:

She fiction and non-fiction.

Nicole Field:

Um, but she was in Denver this spring and she spoke and she said,

Nicole Field:

she talked all about the last two years and how she's come back into

Nicole Field:

relationship with herself in a way that she's never experienced before.

Nicole Field:

And she said, You know, I always thought that the most revolutionary

Nicole Field:

woman was a woman who was making all these changes and doing all these

Nicole Field:

things and, you know, involved in everything and helping in all the ways.

Nicole Field:

Shaker.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

All of that.

Nicole Field:

And she said, what I now believe is a revolutionary

Nicole Field:

woman is a woman who is rested.

Nicole Field:

Relax.

Nicole Field:

Oh my God.

Nicole Field:

Amazing.

Nicole Field:

And that space came into that.

Nicole Field:

Oh, and how hard is that?

Nicole Field:

Right,

Nicole Field:

? Jeannie Oliver: It's so hard.

Nicole Field:

And I think too, you know, it's constantly reinforced in the culture that we live in,

Nicole Field:

in our workplaces amongst our friends and family and the media that the more you're

Nicole Field:

accomplishing, the more value you have.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

And more is better, I can't tell you how many women that I've worked with who are

Nicole Field:

like cardio queens and they're going to like five days a week of spin or CrossFit

Nicole Field:

or something that's really high intensity.

Nicole Field:

And they are struggling.

Nicole Field:

They're struggling with health weight.

Nicole Field:

They're exhausted all the time.

Nicole Field:

Their adrenals are shut.

Nicole Field:

Like, and they have on top of that, like kids high powered, demanding careers.

Nicole Field:

Um, you know, households that they're managing, work, travel, like it, it's

Nicole Field:

an insane amount of stuff for one person to deal with on a daily basis.

Nicole Field:

And here they are pushing their bodies harder and harder and trying to eat less

Nicole Field:

and less and work out more and more.

Nicole Field:

And it's just this completely unsustainable, awful

Nicole Field:

depleting way of life, right?

Nicole Field:

And it's pretty incredible when I can convince them to get off the cardio coin

Nicole Field:

train and do more restorative exercise, be it Pilates or yoga, or just take a day

Nicole Field:

off between your high intensity workouts.

Nicole Field:

Like whatever that is.

Nicole Field:

Like, they're so fearful about that because it's an identity, but it's

Nicole Field:

also that like calories and calories out mentality that they're stuck on.

Nicole Field:

Like, well, if I'm not burning more calories, am I gonna gain weight?

Nicole Field:

But when they're actually willing to trust the process, like these

Nicole Field:

women feel better, they sleep better, they do lose weight, like they.

Nicole Field:

Have happier lives.

Nicole Field:

I mean, it just can change everything.

Nicole Field:

And then there's some space created within that too, for them to get a

Nicole Field:

little bit more in touch with their body and their emotions through

Nicole Field:

those more restorative practices.

Nicole Field:

So yeah.

Nicole Field:

I mean, have you seen shifts with people over time that are working with you as

Nicole Field:

far as doing more restorative stuff?

Nicole Field:

Yeah, for sure.

Nicole Field:

Um, I think it, it can be incremental for some people, but

Nicole Field:

still make a huge difference.

Nicole Field:

and even just, I think a part of that is like creating, we have to create

Nicole Field:

capacity within our body to not be busy all the time, to not be pushing, to not

Nicole Field:

be doing, I think in a way we get addicted to that, I'm honest, because we don't,

Nicole Field:

we don't have to connect to ourselves.

Nicole Field:

if we're doing something, whether it be exercise or work from the

Nicole Field:

morning, from the time we wake up till the time we go to bed.

Nicole Field:

And so it can be really scary to slow down and come more in touch with ourselves.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

You know?

Nicole Field:

But I feel like that's like a window to the doorway of the

Nicole Field:

possibility of so many things.

Nicole Field:

Shifting and healing and weight and heaviness.

Nicole Field:

Not in terms of like body weight, but just like a heavy weight Yeah.

Nicole Field:

That we carry as women.

Nicole Field:

Yes.

Nicole Field:

And start to, to fall away.

Nicole Field:

And we can start to, to recognize that maybe there's another way, you know, we

Nicole Field:

can still be responsible for these things, but maybe we can take care of ourselves

Nicole Field:

a little bit more in the process.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

No, that's, that's a beautiful way, beautiful way of putting it.

Jeannie Oliver:

I love that.

Jeannie Oliver:

I think it is really hard for some people to be alone with their thoughts.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

And to have that, that quietness, because that's when those, um,

Jeannie Oliver:

negative thoughts, emotions, whatever, that are unpleasant will surface.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

But I, I just think it's so liberating to actually be able to acknowledge

Jeannie Oliver:

those things and face them head on and learn to deal with them in

Jeannie Oliver:

healthy ways versus just suppressing and suppressing and suppressing.

Jeannie Oliver:

Because I feel like that is often what is driving us to make, like we talked about

Jeannie Oliver:

before, the self-destructive choices.

Jeannie Oliver:

It prevents us from reaching our goals professionally, you know,

Jeannie Oliver:

health wise in relationships.

Jeannie Oliver:

It really has a huge effect.

Jeannie Oliver:

So that slowing down and aligning for some quiet space, even if that

Jeannie Oliver:

quiet space gets noisy, is sort of a crucial first step, right.

Jeannie Oliver:

. Nicole Field: Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Just to be able to hear like, what is there.

Jeannie Oliver:

Exactly.

Jeannie Oliver:

There are those feelings and emotions and sensations that, um,

Jeannie Oliver:

are wanting to, to come forth.

Jeannie Oliver:

I mean, I feel like that is literally why I kept having so many panic

Jeannie Oliver:

attacks and all these health issues.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like my body was like, Okay, you have not listened to me for a

Jeannie Oliver:

really long time, and so I'm gonna get louder and louder and louder.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah, exactly.

Jeannie Oliver:

Until, until you acknowledge me and listen , you know, for a minute.

Jeannie Oliver:

And, uh, that again, can be one of the most difficult things to do.

Jeannie Oliver:

But I think, like you said before, we can, we, we can build that capacity to face

Jeannie Oliver:

what's there, to process what's there, and to allow our bodies to heal emotionally,

Jeannie Oliver:

physically, spiritually, like, It's just, I feel like I'm just scratching

Jeannie Oliver:

the surface of what it even means to like, feel really good , you know?

Jeannie Oliver:

Mm-hmm.

Jeannie Oliver:

. Mm-hmm.

Jeannie Oliver:

. And it feels good lately based on all this stuff that I've done.

Jeannie Oliver:

I'm like, Oh my goodness, this is just like a little taste of it, you

Jeannie Oliver:

know?

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

That's exciting.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

I love that.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

As far as, Well, I'd love to hear what you think this work can do, either, you know,

Jeannie Oliver:

if you wanna share what it's done for you or what you feel it can do for people

Jeannie Oliver:

in terms of, you know, we talked about kinda like physical healing, but also like

Jeannie Oliver:

body image and relationship with food.

Jeannie Oliver:

Mm-hmm.

Jeannie Oliver:

. Nicole Field: Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

That's, um, that's a big one, isn't it, for all of us as women.

Jeannie Oliver:

Gosh, I think, I mean, I, I think I'll just speak from my own story of.

Jeannie Oliver:

Growing up in the dance world and kind of, you know, hearing a lot of messages

Jeannie Oliver:

of you're not quite skinny enough, or Oh, you need to lose weight and,

Jeannie Oliver:

you know, whatever those things were

Jeannie Oliver:

the dance world in Southern California.

Jeannie Oliver:

PS Yes.

Nicole Field:

And you know, I put on a lot of weight when I went through

Nicole Field:

puberty and was a, you know, 15, 16 year old, like, and that, that kind of had

Nicole Field:

a lasting impression on me on my self esteem and how I felt about my body.

Nicole Field:

And then add on top of that some of the family dynamics I was dealing with.

Nicole Field:

And then, um, you know, coming so close to dying a couple times, I didn't necessarily

Nicole Field:

think that my body was this gift to me.

Nicole Field:

Sure.

Nicole Field:

You know, I saw it more as like a problem.

Nicole Field:

Right.

Nicole Field:

And then I had to solve and I had to figure out, and I think.

Nicole Field:

in my own journey of healing, um, I have just come to view my body as more

Nicole Field:

and more of, almost like I see myself as this little, it, the little girl

Nicole Field:

version of my body that just needs, like care and just needs someone to

Nicole Field:

like listen for a minute and to notice.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

And when I ha the more I've worked in, um, coming back into relationship with

Nicole Field:

my body, the more I see it from that perspective of like, what do you need?

Nicole Field:

And yeah.

Nicole Field:

You know that it has precious, um, intel and wisdom, right?

Nicole Field:

That I think as women, we hold such incredible wisdom in our body that

Nicole Field:

we, we are not taught to tap into.

Nicole Field:

because we're taught to fix and to change and to make better and all this stuff.

Nicole Field:

But what if we were taught like what, what is, what are those deep giftings that our

Nicole Field:

body holds, that wisdom that wants to come forth and we start to open up that portal?

Nicole Field:

You know, that blows my mind and that has changed my perspective

Nicole Field:

of like how I see myself.

Nicole Field:

You know, I used to be so critical in certain, you know, like my belly, Oh,

Nicole Field:

it's not perfectly flat, or whatever.

Nicole Field:

My thighs are touching all the stupid things that we get caught up into in

Nicole Field:

terms of aesthetics instead of like putting my hands on those areas and

Nicole Field:

then feeling into and thanking that part of my body for what it's given me.

Nicole Field:

Yeah, yeah.

Nicole Field:

You know, it's such a shift.

Nicole Field:

It feels subtle at times that it can be really profound.

Nicole Field:

And, and now I um, you know, of course I still have days where I'm like, Oh, I'm

Nicole Field:

getting more wrinkles or whatever, . But I feel like my relationship myself is, it's

Nicole Field:

like this, uh, it's like a book, you know?

Nicole Field:

And I'm just starting to like learn and read and discover

Nicole Field:

like what it's here to teach me.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

And isn't that just so it's so cool and it's just so in, you know, part

Jeannie Oliver:

of me, I really am enjoying my forties because I feel like a lot of the BS

Jeannie Oliver:

that that clouds are thinking when we're younger, I've kind of let go of that.

Jeannie Oliver:

You know, I think that's one of the blessings as we get older is we're

Jeannie Oliver:

like, I don't really give a shit what people think that much anymore.

Jeannie Oliver:

And you know, I'm just gonna do me.

Jeannie Oliver:

. But there's part of me that grieves the fact that I didn't clue into

Jeannie Oliver:

this stuff at a younger age because I feel like, wow, if I had been able to

Jeannie Oliver:

appreciate my body, even if I didn't like exactly how it looked at a much

Jeannie Oliver:

younger age, like in my twenties, or I would've just not wasted all that

Jeannie Oliver:

time in self hatred, and you know, that feeling of just not being enough, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

Never being good enough or perfect enough, or pretty enough or thin

Jeannie Oliver:

enough, all that nonsense that we waste so much of our lives on.

Jeannie Oliver:

And so ladies, if you're out there and you're younger and you're listening

Jeannie Oliver:

to this, like, just let that shit go.

Jeannie Oliver:

that shit go.

Jeannie Oliver:

Because you'll hit a point in your life where you're like, Why did I

Jeannie Oliver:

waste my time worrying about it?

Jeannie Oliver:

You know?

Jeannie Oliver:

And everything that we're taught, At least in our culture, um, and to a

Jeannie Oliver:

lot of us who grew up in the church, there's the whole purity culture thing.

Jeannie Oliver:

I mean, there's so many layers to this.

Jeannie Oliver:

We're not, We are deconditioned away from our intuition and

Jeannie Oliver:

being in touch with our bodies.

Jeannie Oliver:

We're actually conditioned for the opposite.

Jeannie Oliver:

We're taught like, and we're told too, especially even to this day, women are

Jeannie Oliver:

dismissed so often in doctor's offices.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

You know, were told it's all in your head.

Jeannie Oliver:

Oh, don't worry about it.

Jeannie Oliver:

You're just being paranoid or you're just whatever it is.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

I remember as a child being told, you're just tired or hungry whenever I was upset

Jeannie Oliver:

about something, which I'm sure some of that was true, but it also, the message

Jeannie Oliver:

it sends is that your emotions don't matter or don't take yourself seriously.

Jeannie Oliver:

Don't listen to that intuition.

Jeannie Oliver:

Don't listen to that gut thing.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, yes, I remember being a young person and every once in a while I would have.

Jeannie Oliver:

A sense of something, something would pop into my head like, Oh, this specific

Jeannie Oliver:

instance I can think of is my godparents.

Jeannie Oliver:

One day I'm just, I'm in high school, I'm driving along for no reason.

Jeannie Oliver:

Out of the blue, they popped into my mind and I just felt a really strong

Jeannie Oliver:

sense of like urgency and concern.

Jeannie Oliver:

And all I knew to do in that moment was just pray for them.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I found out later that day they had been in a car accident

Jeannie Oliver:

at literally the moment.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I remember telling someone about that.

Jeannie Oliver:

I had lived with this family at the time and, um, , they, the

Jeannie Oliver:

father was a pastor and they were very different types of Christians

Jeannie Oliver:

than I was and had grown up with.

Jeannie Oliver:

They were very conservative and, you know, much more rigid and legalistic, which was

Jeannie Oliver:

not my experience and is still not the way, you know, my faith is to this day.

Jeannie Oliver:

But they, I told them that for some reason in conversation and they mocked me.

Jeannie Oliver:

The wife mocked me and she goes, Oh yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

So apparently Jeanie has these premonitions.

Jeannie Oliver:

And it was very mocking and dismissive.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I remember a few instances like that where people were

Jeannie Oliver:

just so dismissive about that.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think that we experienced that a lot now, less often, maybe nowadays

Jeannie Oliver:

because people are more embracing luo.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like we embrace things, you know, that are a little bit more, um, what we

Jeannie Oliver:

used to call hippie luu and maybe a little more, um, new age that we speak

Jeannie Oliver:

we're, it's a little less out there.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, but I do think that there's a real job for us to undertake in

Jeannie Oliver:

reconnecting with that intuition.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, that sixth sense, if you will, It's that kind of spy sense that

Jeannie Oliver:

people refer to as like, you kind of know if someone's right behind you

Jeannie Oliver:

or looking at you or whatever that is, and tapping into that and really

Jeannie Oliver:

learning to trust your instincts.

Jeannie Oliver:

Listen to our gut feelings.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yes.

Jeannie Oliver:

I mean, there's a reason we say gut feeling, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

It's like we're doing more nerves around our, our gut

Jeannie Oliver:

then we do in our spinal cord.

Jeannie Oliver:

And so, you know, I wanna encourage people like connect with Nicole,

Jeannie Oliver:

connect with someone that can do this sort of work with you so that you

Jeannie Oliver:

can better tap into your intuition.

Jeannie Oliver:

Recognize that.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think for a lot of us too, there's so much noise in our world and we do

Jeannie Oliver:

have, if we special, especially if we struggle with anxiety, um, those of

Jeannie Oliver:

us who are newer, divergent, it can be really hard to distinguish between

Jeannie Oliver:

just anxiety or fear and intuition.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yes.

Jeannie Oliver:

So being able to connect back in your body and distinguish those two things, I

Jeannie Oliver:

think is a really, really crucial thing.

Jeannie Oliver:

And.

Jeannie Oliver:

What a gift, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

If we can go, Oh, okay, no, I know.

Jeannie Oliver:

I can recognize that as anxiety or whatever else is going on, and

Jeannie Oliver:

no, that's not what's going on.

Jeannie Oliver:

This is my intuition and I need to trust it and listen to it.

Jeannie Oliver:

Especially when it comes to physical healing, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

It would better allow us to advocate for ourselves with doctors and

Jeannie Oliver:

when they say, Oh, just do X, Y, Z, or, Oh, that's not reality, you're

Jeannie Oliver:

just imagining it or whatever.

Jeannie Oliver:

We can go, Nope, no thanks.

Jeannie Oliver:

I need to seek out better help.

Jeannie Oliver:

Or, I know what I need to do for myself and I'm gonna do it regardless of what

Jeannie Oliver:

somebody in a white coat says to me.

Jeannie Oliver:

Anyway, that was a long tangent, but

Nicole Field:

I love it.

Nicole Field:

I love everything you shared, . I think that's a good piece to

Nicole Field:

embodiment and connected to our bodies.

Nicole Field:

Connected to our intuition and, and I guess, you know, I was

Nicole Field:

kind of calling that that inner wisdom that our body holds for us.

Nicole Field:

Um, . And I definitely believe that there are, when we're in touch with

Nicole Field:

that, we are gonna get messages about things in the moment or people or what

Nicole Field:

we need or what someone else might need.

Nicole Field:

And um, the more we can tap into that and get comfortable with that

Nicole Field:

communication, the more we'll be able to use those gifts to not only heal and help

Nicole Field:

ourselves, but to help others and yeah.

Nicole Field:

Absolutely.

Nicole Field:

I still think it's, a lot of people think it's taboo or a little bit like

Nicole Field:

out there, but this is our birthright

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

You know, to be able to have that and Absolutely.

Nicole Field:

Um, and to call that forth, that's so powerful.

Nicole Field:

And we, we deserve to be living and moving and walking in our intuition as it's

Nicole Field:

connected to our body and spirit and mind.

Nicole Field:

For sure.

Nicole Field:

So thank you for sharing that.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Well, in another instance, or example that comes to mind is, you know,

Jeannie Oliver:

often children, as children, we have a sense about certain things.

Jeannie Oliver:

I've had so many clients come in and say, like, as a kid, I

Jeannie Oliver:

never wanted milk, for example.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like, I hated it.

Jeannie Oliver:

I hated dairy products when my parents forced me to drink milk because

Jeannie Oliver:

it's supposed to be good for me.

Jeannie Oliver:

And it turns out like later in life, the person had like a

Jeannie Oliver:

full on like dairy intolerance.

Jeannie Oliver:

And as a child, they knew it.

Jeannie Oliver:

Mm-hmm.

Jeannie Oliver:

. But it wasn't acknow.

Jeannie Oliver:

Like they weren't trusted.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right.

Jeannie Oliver:

And all the societal things, they're supposed to be what you do, were

Jeannie Oliver:

pushed on them by the parent with the parent's best intention, right?

Jeannie Oliver:

It's not trying to have a child, but it's just an example.

Jeannie Oliver:

Or kids that, don't wanna be around a certain relative.

Jeannie Oliver:

and the other friends to like give them a hug or give them a kiss when they

Jeannie Oliver:

greet them, like that kind of thing.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's like we know so many women or, and even men who have been molested by

Jeannie Oliver:

relatives, they had no business being around, but because the parent was

Jeannie Oliver:

concerned and didn't take the child seriously and didn't wanna offend a family

Jeannie Oliver:

member, they were pushed into a situation and then they were harmed because of it.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think that as parents as, and I'm not a parent, but you

Jeannie Oliver:

know, I have, oh God, what is it?

Jeannie Oliver:

Eight nieces now and a couple nephews, . Um, just as people, you know, we can

Jeannie Oliver:

really help younger people, be they small children or teens, young adults, other

Jeannie Oliver:

young women to really embrace that because it's kind of our superpower, but it's yes.

Jeannie Oliver:

Suppressed a lot.

Jeannie Oliver:

So anyway,

Jeannie Oliver:

, Nicole Field: I absolutely agree

Jeannie Oliver:

something that needs to be encouraged.

Jeannie Oliver:

For sure.

Jeannie Oliver:

And it's never too late exactly.

Jeannie Oliver:

To tap back into that part of you.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's still there.

Jeannie Oliver:

It just, you know, it went away or you think it went away because you

Jeannie Oliver:

had to protect it or keep it buried because it wasn't safe to express.

Jeannie Oliver:

So more that you can safely express those things that come up for you, the, the more

Jeannie Oliver:

you're gonna to tap into that and, um, and feel that flowing a little bit more.

Jeannie Oliver:

For sure.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I think that that's where hiring a professional to help you with this

Jeannie Oliver:

can be really key because it's someone that's there for that specific purpose.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

You, you're not wasting their time.

Jeannie Oliver:

It's not a friend or family member that you're expecting to show up

Jeannie Oliver:

in this level or this capacity of holding space for you and guiding you.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right.

Jeannie Oliver:

But it's a professionally safe person, . Cause often times you don't have that

Jeannie Oliver:

safe person in our social or family life.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, . And so, you know, it's, it's a good thing to seek out and have that

Jeannie Oliver:

safe space with someone that knows how to help you through that process.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, absolutely.

Jeannie Oliver:

Anything else that you wanna say around just how this work can influence our,

Jeannie Oliver:

our mindset overall level of motivation, ability to stay consistent with the

Jeannie Oliver:

changes that we wanna make in our lives?

Nicole Field:

Yeah, I think it's just another piece of the

Nicole Field:

puzzle that sometimes is missing.

Nicole Field:

You know, we do sure, it, it's a lot easier for many of us to access

Nicole Field:

mindfulness or focus on maybe just exercise or nutrition, but we maybe

Nicole Field:

might not think about like, how does our body fit into this whole equation?

Nicole Field:

And it does.

Nicole Field:

It definitely does.

Nicole Field:

Um, and I think the more we open that door to coming into reconnection to

Nicole Field:

ourselves, um, that a lot of the ne for me, like a lot of the negative beliefs

Nicole Field:

and things like that are starting to just fall away because I've dealt more with

Nicole Field:

what's in my body, if that makes sense.

Nicole Field:

You know, coming at it from through that doorway and releasing emotions or beliefs,

Nicole Field:

then I, it's like I don't feel the same struggle that I did before where I was

Nicole Field:

constantly just like, Okay, come on now.

Nicole Field:

Just can you believe that this is true and this is not?

Nicole Field:

And just tell yourself like Right.

Nicole Field:

You know, sometimes that can only go so far.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Um, so for mindset, that's, um, that's been really powerful for me.

Nicole Field:

Um, and what else did you ask me?

Nicole Field:

What others?

Jeannie Oliver:

Just maintaining like, you know, maintaining habits as we're

Jeannie Oliver:

trying to create new habits stuff in our life or being consistent with

Jeannie Oliver:

the things that we know service well.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah,

Nicole Field:

yeah.

Nicole Field:

Again, I think, um, all of that is just kind of built one on the other.

Nicole Field:

And the more we sort of practice things, the easier it becomes

Nicole Field:

to do them consistently.

Nicole Field:

And then if you feel and see the results in your body and in your life, you're

Nicole Field:

more apt to like continue down that road.

Nicole Field:

Right?

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

So, um, when you feel less, um, heavy energetically, emotionally, mentally,

Nicole Field:

it's a lot easier to stick to whatever your goals are than it is when you feel

Nicole Field:

really, um, pressed down by those things,

Jeannie Oliver:

right?

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

Cause it stops your.

Nicole Field:

Exactly.

Nicole Field:

All your energy goes into that.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Right?

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

. Jeannie Oliver: So what are just, I know

Nicole Field:

respectful of your time today, but what are just a few simple practices, like

Nicole Field:

maybe the top few things you can think of that people can do to, help regulate

Nicole Field:

their nervous systems or put this kind of into practice for stress relief.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

. Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Um, cause we went super deep on this stuff, right?

Nicole Field:

But it's like the end of the day people just wanna feel less stressed out,

Nicole Field:

, Nicole Field: Right?

Nicole Field:

And again, it's, um, it's difficult to just go, just do this and it'll

Nicole Field:

Right, you know, feel better.

Nicole Field:

But, um, I think a good doorway to some of this work is are grounding practices.

Nicole Field:

So often time I'll start a session with, um, just having a client

Nicole Field:

maybe place one hand on their heart.

Nicole Field:

One hand on their belly and wherever they're seated, they just start to feel

Nicole Field:

that surface underneath them, supporting them, their feet on the ground, maybe

Nicole Field:

even imagining there's roots that come from their feet into the earth that really

Nicole Field:

have this support system underneath them.

Nicole Field:

And guided, even just spending a couple minutes just breathing and just feeling

Nicole Field:

a sense of maybe even like honey dripping off your body and just feeling a little

Nicole Field:

more grounded or weighted into the earth, um, can just help us to feel

Nicole Field:

a little less like frenzy and mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

anxious.

Nicole Field:

Um, I will say for some people that that might not feel good, and if it doesn't,

Nicole Field:

, definitely don't do that on your own if it doesn't feel like it's helping you.

Nicole Field:

So really just listening in and, and, um, trying out different things.

Nicole Field:

Maybe it's breath work that is a doorway for you into your body.

Nicole Field:

Um, you know, perhaps it's movement practices, things like that.

Nicole Field:

Um, but just finding like, what is a doorway that feels like I could go

Nicole Field:

walk through in order to connect with myself a little bit deeper and go there?

Nicole Field:

So for me, that's been a, a really windy path.

Nicole Field:

And I'm like, I've tried some things and I'm like, Oh, okay,

Nicole Field:

that was interesting, but that's not quite what I need right now.

Nicole Field:

I have this one massage therapist that it's just not working right now.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

It's making me more dysregulated every time I go.

Nicole Field:

Mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

And then I went to this other type, I did a fun, uh, guha facial massage and

Nicole Field:

it was the most amazing, relaxing thing.

Nicole Field:

Um, you know, like you go and you have your sauna sessions mm-hmm.

Nicole Field:

, which

Jeannie Oliver:

is amazing.

Jeannie Oliver:

Oh my god.

Jeannie Oliver:

I know.

Jeannie Oliver:

I think God has sauna.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

And that's like so beautiful.

Nicole Field:

And you're able to get a sense of yourself in that space, um, where you

Nicole Field:

can connect and, um, feel like maybe you can slow down a little bit, maybe

Nicole Field:

you could breathe a little bit more.

Nicole Field:

So whatever that looks like, it's, maybe it starts with just a question

Nicole Field:

to yourself, What do I need?

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

And walking in that direction, getting the help that you need, support that you need

Nicole Field:

from others, Trying some practices out.

Nicole Field:

And um, and that's honestly like, that's what I do with clients as well, is.

Nicole Field:

We try on different things and it's very individualized to what they need.

Nicole Field:

And that might change session to session because our needs change as well.

Jeannie Oliver:

Right, right, right, right.

Jeannie Oliver:

Yeah, absolutely.

Jeannie Oliver:

Awesome.

Jeannie Oliver:

Well, this is super, super exciting and helpful information, Nicole,

Jeannie Oliver:

and I appreciate you joining us.

Jeannie Oliver:

I am excited because Nicole will be offering her somatic work with, well

Jeannie Oliver:

to some of my clients here soon.

Jeannie Oliver:

Um, but tell us in the meantime where people can find you and how they can

Nicole Field:

work with you.

Nicole Field:

Yeah.

Nicole Field:

Well, thank you again for having me.

Nicole Field:

I just, I love these conversations.

Nicole Field:

I feel like I could talk, we could talk for hours.

Nicole Field:

I know for sure.

Nicole Field:

Thank you for everyone, for just listening.

Nicole Field:

we both really appreciate that.

Nicole Field:

So I, right now I'm on Instagram, Nicole at Nicole Le Field.

Nicole Field:

So you can find me there and I'll be posting probably more from my

Nicole Field:

personal, um, page, how to get to my website and how to work with me.

Nicole Field:

And so my website will be whole living healing.com.

Nicole Field:

And so you can reach me there when, uh, that should be up

Nicole Field:

and running here quite soon.

Nicole Field:

And then email, whole living healing gmail.com as well.

Nicole Field:

Okay, cool.

Nicole Field:

You can also connect people to me as well, . Yeah.

Jeannie Oliver:

And then how about your Pilate

Nicole Field:

studio?

Nicole Field:

Yes, and so my plot studio is whole living pilates.com on Instagram.

Nicole Field:

And you're Colorado Springs, correct?

Nicole Field:

Yes, we're in Colorado Springs, Colorado, so if you're in the

Nicole Field:

area, we'd love to see you.

Nicole Field:

Um, but yes, and then Instagram is at whole living supplies,

Jeannie Oliver:

so.

Jeannie Oliver:

Awesome.

Jeannie Oliver:

And I'll put all that in the show notes too for everybody so

Jeannie Oliver:

you don't have to remember it.

Nicole Field:

Perfect.

Nicole Field:

Awesome.

Nicole Field:

Well, thank you so much

Jeannie Oliver:

for your time today and, um, this was just great.

Jeannie Oliver:

And so we appreciate you joining us, and I'm excited to do this again soon.

Jeannie Oliver:

We'll have to get more specific next time.

Jeannie Oliver:

Do another

Nicole Field:

episode down the road.

Nicole Field:

Oh, I'd love to thank you again.

Nicole Field:

This was such an honor just to be here and to share with your audience, so yeah.

Nicole Field:

Thank

Jeannie Oliver:

you.

Jeannie Oliver:

Awesome.

Jeannie Oliver:

You're welcome.

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About the Podcast

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The Nutrition Edit

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About your host

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Jeannie Oliver

Jeannie is a Certified Nutrition Coach, NASM Personal Trainer and classically trained chef. She helps high performing women improve their overall health, optimize their energy and performance, and discover what it's like to feel good in their own skin - all while enjoying delicious food and creating sustainably healthy lifestyles.