In the hustle of life, have you ever paused to ask, "What do I need?"

Amidst the whirlwind of commitments, coupled with the weariness from breast cancer treatments, it's all too easy to sideline our emotional and physical needs. But what happens when we ignore the emotions that crave our attention or the fatigue begging for rest?

So, how do you pinpoint what you truly need? And once identified, how do you carve out the time, space, and connections to nurture those needs?

In this episode, we delve into the art of self-awareness, helping you discern your needs and crafting a life that genuinely supports them.

Referred to in this episode: 

The Mind, Body, Breast Cancer Challenge 

Read Full Transcript Below:

0:00
This is Laura Lummer, the breast cancer recovery coach. I'm a healthy lifestyle coach, a clinical Ayurveda specialist, a personal trainer, and I'm also a breast cancer survivor. In this podcast, we talk about healthy thinking and mindfulness practices, eating well, moving your body for health and longevity. And we'll also hear from other breast cancer survivors who have re engaged with life and have incredible stories to share. This podcast is your go to resource for getting back to life after breast cancer.

0:42
I am your host, Laura Lummer. Thank you so much for being here with me today.

0:47
I have a really great show I'm in such a great mood. It's been a big week and amazing week, I guess a week and a half. And I will start this show off by sharing that story with you.

0:58
Last week, I traveled with my husband to Georgia specifically we visited some friends in big canoe, Georgia, which if you live in big canoe, it is magical, amazing. It's like an enchanted forest. I've never seen anything like it in my life. It was spectacular. And we also visited my husband's brother, my brother in law in Asheville, North Carolina, also an incredibly beautiful place. So, so pretty. And I want to share this story with you for a couple of reasons. But it is going to lead into the topic for this show as well.

1:34
So my husband, we've been married for eight years now. In that time, he has always told me he wanted to take me back to where he grew up, which is Asheville, North Carolina. Now if you listen or follow me, you know, I'm all about having fun and saying yes to let's go here, let's go there. But my husband is not my husband, sees opportunity comes up and says I want to go do that. And then says Oh, but I'm busy, I have to work.

2:01
And he's a workaholic. Oh my God. He's the only person I know in the world who at 630. In the morning, as I I'm so far behind for the day, I'm already running late.

2:10
He's never late for anything.

2:12
But he works a lot and doesn't tend to take time for himself. And when I say works a lot, I mean seven days a week, he has his own business. And he works a lot invest a lot of time and energy into it. But he rarely takes time to just be off to just allow his brain to relax, and to just enjoy himself.

2:32
So I'm super, super happy that we took that trip. And he was able to do that. And we had an amazing time.

2:38
And in addition to doing what we had already planned on doing, I was able to meet two of my empower members, which was an incredible treat for me. One we flew into Atlanta before driving to big canoe. And she lived and works on the way in between where we were staying when we flew in and where we were heading to big canoe.

2:58
So I was able to stop and visit her and me her in the flesh. After coaching together for gosh, I think it's coming up on a year and a half.

3:07
And then another one of my empower members drove from Durham, North Carolina to Asheville, with her husband and son to have dinner with my husband and I and we had a blast. And it was so wonderful to get to meet these amazing women.

3:22
This particular woman I've coached for three years now coming up on it, yeah, Pat over three years.

3:28
So it's so cool to get to meet each other in person, see each other, touch each other, hug each other, and just a wonderful blessing. And then when I came home this Monday, October 11th, I celebrated one year since my diagnosis of stage four breast cancer.

3:47
And I cannot believe how fast that year went by. And it was so awesome actually to come back from this vacation from getting to connect to these amazing people, to friends, to family, to client forward slash friends to just get to, to really embrace just the abundance that's in my life.

4:08
You know, just amazing to get to be with my husband, to get to experience these beautiful places and connect with these beautiful people, and then come home and look at this additional year of life that I have been gifted with. And I look at it and it just fills my heart bring so much happiness.

4:28
And yes, in that year, there have been a lot of crappy things.

4:31
There's been a lot of radiation, there's been chemotherapy, there's been pain and pain management and news that was difficult to process and all of that is true, but I just feel like life is so much bigger than that. And when we get to take that time out and look at how big and beautiful life is. I think it brings balance to how awful cancer can be.

4:56
And it can be awful.

4:57
You know I'm not I'm not trying to be rainbows and you unicorns here.

5:01
But also in processing the difficulty and the awfulness of cancer, living with cancer, worrying about cancer recurrences or death from cancer, or pain from cancer or whatever it is that we worry about, and not allowing it to overshadow the beauty that is still there, and the things that are available to us the abundance that is available to us, if we are willing to reach out and say yes to it.

5:31
So this kind of leads into the show, because when I came back, this was week two of the mind body breast cancer challenge. And each week are there are two lessons with a meditation and then there's a guidebook that has journaling exercises in it to support the thoughts that come up during that time.

5:50
And this week, on Monday, the one that opened was, I am capable, is the name of the lesson is really in exploring where you feel capable in your life where you have personal power, where you use your personal power.

6:04
And the verbiage I use was how to create the life you want.

6:09
And this is an amazing thing, something I love so much about coaching because I learn so much from the women in my programs from the women that I coach. And I feel very lucky about that.

6:22
So I post this and the lesson opens the I am capable lesson. And one of the members of the mind body breast cancer challenge. She posted a comment in the private Facebook group. And this comment really, really resonated with me. And I'm going to share it with you right now.

6:42
So the comment that she said this was just a part of it. But what she said is that rather than creating the life I want, I'm more focused on trying to create the life I need right now. I need peace, contentedness, gratitude. I need more nurturing of trust and peace through faith, and it goes on.

7:04
But that sentence or two sentences, they're just caused me to pause for a sec. And to think about that. And how beautiful, that little mindset shift that she had just the difference, the smallest word makes right the difference from what I want, which what I want can be pie in the sky, anything right? But what I need, brings it home.

7:28
It brings it home. It personalizes it. It causes you to explore and examine yourself, which is what we're doing in the mind body breast cancer challenge. It's tuning into ourselves, and looking at our thoughts about all these different aspects of our life.

7:47
And this caused me to think about this vacation we just took.

7:51
And when we got home, how my husband and I both felt so refreshed. And, and my morning walk on Monday, I was not only thinking about Wow, this has been a year, a year since I was diagnosed with stage four breast cancer, I feel so much better. I'm not in the incredible pain I was in at that time. I'm so fortunate to have all the treatments that are available to get to be here today, coming home from this vacation, serving these women, seeing these beautiful posts, and continuing this experience of learning and evolving as a human being.

8:35
You know, it's absolutely amazing.

8:38
And I thought about that for my husband.

8:40
That when we come back from taking something we need. And you know this vacation, as I said earlier, it was something he wanted, like I want you to meet this old friend of mine. And I want you to meet my brother and I want to show you all of the places where I grew up and the houses that I grew up in.

8:57
And over the years, because we didn't do it. Things changed one of the friends he wanted me to meet on this trip passed from COVID. And this trip changed from something he wanted to something he needed. He really needed this trip. He needed to connect to the friend as in Big Canoe, Georgia, to his brother and Asheville, North Carolina. He needed to reconnect to his own roots, where he grew up and revisit those places and have conversations with his brother about things that happened in those places.

9:40
And when he came back, it was just this incredible shift from this man who'd been worn down and tired and feeling mentally and physically exhausted for weeks now to someone who was refreshed and ready to jump back in. And I found my own self just feeling so much more creative and innovative. And thinking, you know, when we take the time we need. And we actually look at what is important to us in life. And we make the time for what we need.

10:10
It changes everything.

10:14
But what if you don't know what you need?

10:17
So a lot of times people will come to me and I think they're people in the mind body breast cancer challenge. I know there are people in my revived membership, in my empower membership, that found me and started working with me, not because they knew what they needed, but because they knew something was off.

10:35
So sometimes in our life, we just know something doesn't feel right. And I think that that's a big sign a big area to dig into, when you notice that. I'll use my husband again, as an example.

10:47
There was this itch, right? This, he couldn't scratch this thing inside of him that said, I need to connect to these people. And then when he lost his friend, you know, that solidified it that changed everything from I want to take this trip to I need to connect to these people, because life is short. And I don't know how much longer his brother will be there, or his friend will be there.

11:09
So sometimes there's this, I want to do it this uncomfortable feeling. And we don't realize, like I really need this in my life.

11:17
So how do you figure that out?

11:19
Sometimes it is just trying things. So for people in the mind body breast cancer challenge, they may have come to that challenge thinking well, there's something that feels off in me, let me check this challenge out and see if that takes me in the right direction.

11:31
And some of them may have gotten inside the challenge, see what I have to offer it?. And said meh No, that's not for me.

11:37
And some of them may have thought, let me give this a shot and see what comes up.

11:40
Sometimes, when we're just in that uncomfortable, awkward state. And we feel like something is off life isn't fitting, right.

11:48
We just have to start trying things to see and get clarity on what it is that we need.

11:56
And a big part of that, whether it's trying it, whether you already know you have clarity, like the the quote that I posted, that I shared with you earlier on this woman in the mind body breast cancer challenge, understanding what she needed, and she got clarity in that moment.

12:11
But how did she do that?

12:13
She took time, she took the time for herself, she took time to go into the challenge. She took the 15 minutes a day, to do the meditation, to listen to the lessons, to explore her own thoughts in quiet in silence.

12:30
And so taking time creating time for yourself, even if it's just five to 15 minutes a day, where your mind can just be at rest, and you can connect to your body and begin to notice what you need.

12:47
This is so important.

12:48
It sounds so simple. I know it sounds simple. And some for some people, it sounds terrifying. For some people, you'll hear I don't want to do that, I don't want to see what's in my head.

12:58
But without seeing what's in your head while you resist the thoughts that are driving these feelings of discomfort in you. The more you resist, the more discomfort you're going to feel. But it is in the looking at them and getting curious about them and saying, oh, wow, wow, this is what's making me uncomfortable. I need more nurturing in my life. And then when we see that thing, and we see it, we might say, well, how am I gonna get more nurturing?

13:27
Oh my God, if I get more nurturing, that's gonna be I'm gonna have to change this, and I'm gonna have to change that.

13:32
And, yes, that's it!

13:35
You want to keep going down that path. When we don't look at what it's going to take to get what we need. We just continue to go through life without fulfilling our needs.

13:47
Now, in fact, in my empower membership this month, we're working on exploring the possibilities.

13:53
And one aspect of that is looking at some of the things that we say we want in our life that we don't do or accomplish or have, and looking at why we're making the choice not to have or to have something.

14:09
And what that comes down to is weighing what you say you want against what the cost for that is.

14:16
And this is a little bit of how we drill down to the need. Right? So if I say I really want to go on that trip to Georgia and North Carolina, and connect with my old friend and my family member. And then I just keep letting time go by because I don't create the time for myself to sit down and say, what would I need to do to make that happen?

14:39
And then we put pen to paper is a well I'm going to need this much time off. I'm going to need this much money, whatever it is that you need to make this happen. And when you look at and say okay, this is the cost of getting what I need. Is it worth it to me?

14:52
Do I value that enough?

14:54
Do I really need that or is it just off the top of my head I should, I want, I wish?

14:59
Or when you look at it and you drill down into it When it comes to say what I said in the quote before, if you needed more nurturing, right, this woman's and she needed more nurturing, what does that look like? Are you going to have to use your voice more to connect with people you love? Are you going to have to take more time for yourself? How will you communicate that?

15:20
And as we start moving into, and across those boundaries of what I have to do the action I have to take to get what I need, that's when we start to back off.

15:29
That's when we start to get scared, and we start to get nervous. And that's when you need support. It really is.

15:35
Because having that support to help you through that time of understanding the action you need to take to get what you need in life is really important. Because we can talk ourselves out of it really, really quickly.

15:49
We leave it in our head, that's mistake, number one.

15:52
We don't get it out and down on paper, in all of my coaching programs, pen to paper is an essential part of it.

16:00
And I see the change in the people who take the pen and put it to paper and start working out the issues that they have, or the thoughts that they have or what they need.

16:10
Because when we can look at, and let's go back to this saying this woman again, who's saying, I need more nurturing. If you say you need more nurturing, and then you write down and you look at it, and you say, what does that mean to me? What does nurturing look like? Who I am to get involved in this? Where do I have to speak up for myself in this? Where do I have to rearrange my schedule in order to get this?

16:32
All of the different aspects.

16:34
And then we can ask ourselves, who do I need to bring in from my support here? Who do I need to talk about this with, so I can get the support I need to create the things I need in my life.

16:46
We don't do this alone, right?

16:49
We've got to have our champions, we've got to have those people that we can trust and say, Hey, call me out when you see I'm not doing this for myself. Hey, help me work through this and see how I can create this for myself.

17:01
That's so important, big, big part of getting what you need.

17:05
I know from my husband, he's got me always here tripping is here, right saying babe You've got to take time for yourself.

17:13
Are you important enough to take time for yourself? And eventually he gets it.

17:17
But he's a tough cookie.

17:19
So notice where you're talking yourself out of doing the things you need, we've been so conditioned to do that, right? We've been so conditioned say, Oh, I'm done with breast cancer, I need more nurturing, I need more time. I need more peace. Oh, you know what, I should be doing this for the kids. I'm being too greedy. I'm being too selfish, and we judge and we push it aside.

17:42
So that's why that support piece is super important. We need to test things out. Take time for ourselves to listen to ourself. Look at the fear we have in allowing things to come up and say I don't have to be afraid. The worst thing I'm going to experience if I sit down and I listened to my body, and I listen to the thoughts that are going through my head is going to be potentially an uncomfortable emotion.

18:08
But if you face that uncomfortable emotion, you can start working through it and gain clarity. It's when we face these things, the fear factor and the resistance fades away.

18:19
But then we can fall right off that wagon with the net Oh, well, then I'll have to change this, I'll have to change that. And I need help from so and so.

18:27
And the last thing, I know, nearly every woman I speak to wants to do is ask for help.

18:34
But loves w need help. We need support, support and community in this life is critical.

18:43
I mean, let's go back to that statement. I just love it so much. So I keep referring to it.

18:46
If I need nurturing and peace and positivity and less stress, don't you need support in your life to get that?

18:56
Of course you do. Because we don't go through life just on our own. We've got friends, we've got family, we've got pets, we've got kids, we've got parents, whatever it is.

19:06
And so partnering with people in using our voice to help them understand what we need is a very critical element to creating that life that you need.

19:16
And this was the whole reason that I designed the mind body breast cancer challenge and put it out in the world during the month of October. It was because I wanted to offer an opportunity for people to really get in touch with themselves and be able to tune out a lot of the messaging that is coming in that doesn't work for us breast cancer survivors during Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

19:38
You know, it's important to know what we need for ourselves so that we don't let external things overwhelm us because it's in that knowing, in that being very solid with what you need, then you can use your voice to get it.

19:52
Then you can use your voice to reach out and get support in the world. You can use your voice., and you can use your capabilities and your power to create that situation around you and create what you need.

20:06
So if you feel that this resonates with you, and you're in that position where you're thinking something just doesn't feel right, but I'm not sure what I need, you still have time come and join the challenge you can find where you can register for the challenge at thebreastcancerrecoverycoach.com/mindbody.

20:22
I built it to go slow, I built it so something doesn't open every single day and you feel like you're behind, and you have access to it until the end of October.

20:33
So come in and take some time for yourself. Use the meditations and the lessons and use the guide book that you find in the challenge to support yourself through this month and understand what you need and understand how to create what you need and also be a part of that community and the support to help you understand how to get that in your life.

20:55
And then for ongoing support, you can join me in the revived membership experience that is open for enrollment, now until the end of October. You can get all of the information on my website, just go to coaching and support or go to the homepage and you will see revived you can read all about it. It's an amazing transformational experience.

21:17
And I hope you'll join me there.

21:18
Alright I will talk to you again next week. And until then, please be good to yourself and expect others to be good to you as well.

21:26
Take care.