Hello everybody and welcome to the Adult Chair on RashPixelFM.
I am Michelle Schelfund.
Oh boy,
You guys,
We have a very special show today.
It is,
I can't even believe these words are coming out of my mouth.
It is the 100th episode of the Adult Chair that I am recording today.
And that absolutely blows my mind.
Going back in time when I first met Pete,
Probably four or five years ago,
And he was doing marketing work for me and helping me with my website.
He said to me,
You know,
You've got something here with this Adult Chair.
You could do a podcast on this.
And I said,
What's a podcast?
And I said,
I don't know.
I don't even know what a podcast is.
But anyway,
Obviously that was many years ago and three years ago we started the Adult Chair podcast and I thought,
Well,
We'll do a few episodes and see how it goes.
And here we are three years later,
The 100th episode,
Which,
Oh my gosh,
I want to just shout out to Pete Wright.
He is my producer and I call him my technology husband because he helps me with everything.
He is the behind the scenes guy here and I would not be here without him.
So Pete,
Thank you,
Thank you,
Thank you.
You wouldn't get this podcast.
You wouldn't get newsletters.
You wouldn't get so much.
He's the behind the scenes guy,
As is Sonja,
My marketing assistant.
So I feel like I'm the content producing machine,
But I can't do anything other than that.
So these two completely help me and get all the information to all of you.
So thanks to both of you,
But a special thanks to Pete because without him,
I would not be here and you would not be hearing me right now.
So anyway,
With that said,
The Adult Chair episode 100 is going to be today about self love.
When I think about where this model even came from and what my mission is,
It was my own healing journey that got me here.
It's 25 years,
The Adult Chair is 25 years of my own journey and helping myself,
Me learn how to love myself.
And that's where the Adult Chair came from.
It's all these years of my own learnings under one roof that we call the Adult Chair.
So anyway,
What a perfect topic to talk about today.
So today I am going to talk about cultivating self love.
How do we do that?
And we're going to get into it in a minute.
But first you can find out and learn more about the show at theadultchair.
Com.
You can subscribe for free by signing up for a mailing list or find us anywhere that podcasts are served with a quick search for the Adult Chair.
That's all you got to do.
Put in the Adult Chair and that'll pop right up.
You can join the conversation on Facebook or Instagram or I just,
You know,
It's kind of shocking.
We're now on Spotify and I think all of you know we're in an Insight Timer.
And if you go into any of these places and put in the Adult Chair,
This information pops up.
And also don't forget to request to join the Adult Chair private group on Facebook.
This is a place where,
I mean,
This is a place where we get to be vulnerable and really be ourselves and it's private.
Nobody sees it but the people that are in it.
And gosh,
We share and we practice and we comment on what's going on in our own lives.
And we get such beautiful comments and posts in that group.
It's all about living with vulnerability,
Living authentically and living in your Adult Chair.
So it's the best.
It's one of my favorite places to go in and visit every day,
The Adult Chair closed private group.
Okay,
One more big announcement.
Because I was harassed by so many of you,
I have put one more class Adult Chair group on the calendar in Nashville.
It's going to be April 28th and 29th,
It's Saturday and Sunday.
So please come join us.
I've already had a bunch of people sign up.
So I know that there's a demand for it out there.
So come and join us April 28th and 29th and come learn how to live in your Adult Chair.
I had some beautiful comments when I was in Delray Beach a couple of weeks ago now.
And people said,
You know,
We've learned so much from the podcast,
But taking the class or the workshop,
It's like you start to integrate it,
You start to live it.
It's different when you are in that group because there's so many great questions and lots of experiential learnings,
Guided meditations to take you very,
Very,
Very deep.
And yeah,
There are lots of tears,
But they're good tears and lots of good processing.
So come join us April 28th and 29th.
All right,
Here we go.
Self love.
And like I said earlier,
This is a topic that's near and dear to my heart.
I spent so much of my life not loving myself.
I just,
I didn't,
Not only did I not know who I was,
But I did not love who I was.
And I had such vicious thoughts in my head and I did everything I could to numb those thoughts out or down.
But what I realized is it's not about numbing them out.
We have to figure out what's going on underneath at all.
And what I discovered was I don't think I loved myself.
I didn't know how.
I wasn't mirrored correctly.
And again,
I have no blame about anything in the past,
But I need to learn how to do that.
So what I've done is I've come up with about 10 different ways that we can cultivate self love.
And of course there are hundreds,
But I've come up with 10,
What I feel like they're pretty easy things that we can do and incorporate into our lives.
Of course we have to commit to doing them,
But they really will start to change who you are and help you also to begin to love yourself.
So all right,
I'm going to jump right in here.
Number one,
We need to start being gentle and kind with ourselves.
I find we are vicious at times with ourselves.
I mean,
Most of the time,
Like if we make a very small mistake,
We jump all over ourselves and it's not good for us.
It's not good for us.
It certainly does not help self love.
So just think about that for a minute.
How many times throughout the day do you beat up on yourself?
And by the way,
We have choices over our thoughts.
So many of us say,
I can't help it.
My brain just goes,
No,
No,
No,
No,
No.
You can add thoughts in and you can choose what thoughts you want to have.
But we live like robots.
We live from that unconscious mind,
From that adolescent chair where these thoughts just sort of trickle in like they're on an assembly line,
Like a treadmill.
And we just let them all come in.
It's like,
No.
Who says we have to believe everything that is on that assembly line,
By the way?
It's like,
Okay,
I'm not going to choose to believe that.
I'm going to choose to believe this.
And by the way,
I'm going to add this thought.
So if you hold the intention to start being gentle and kind with yourself,
That is you got to start somewhere.
I thought this was a great place to start.
Just having the awareness that I'm not really nice to myself.
I need to change that around and start being gentle.
Okay.
Something else that happens with us,
You pretty much on a daily basis,
I think,
Or at least often,
If it's not daily,
Is we get triggered.
We get triggered by something we read.
We get triggered by people.
We go to work.
Our kids trigger us.
Whatever,
Wherever and whomever triggers us,
We get triggered.
Something upsets and tips over our apple cart on the inside.
And in order to start healing and transforming,
We must look at what is going on on the inside.
And that's shadow work.
Shadow work is looking at the unconscious beliefs that are deep within that were formed,
By the way,
At age,
Like from age zero to six.
All these are so old.
They're old unconscious beliefs.
And when we're triggered,
These beliefs want to come out and they want to reveal themselves.
And we typically just shove them down or get mad at that other person.
And I think so many of you know about and listen to that podcast I just did on triggers.
Listen to that because that helps you to understand what you do with triggers and how do you do some shadow work.
Really powerful.
We have to stop getting triggered so often and start looking inside,
Taking responsibility for our own lives and not blaming anyone else.
So it's really this work of the adult share and self-love is going internally.
We're going deep inside and trigger or,
Excuse me,
And shadow work does that.
Number three,
Ask yourself,
What's good about me?
Okay.
We're so great again at beating up on ourselves.
But what's something good?
And it doesn't have to be huge.
It can be the smallest thing.
I think you guys have heard if you listen to any of my previous shows,
I brought up this example of like,
Did you make your kids lunch today?
Huh.
Okay.
Then I must be a pretty good mom.
I made my kids lunch today.
I find that our mind searches for these huge events.
It thinks that we've got to do these really,
Really,
Really huge things in order to love ourselves and that's just not true.
We need to look at the little tiny things,
Which by the way,
Add up.
They really start adding up.
So start paying attention.
Did you tell someone that you love them today?
Wow.
If you did,
You might be a compassionate person or even a loving person.
Did you help someone out today?
It can be really small things.
Did you make your bed today?
Start making your bed every day.
I can't remember where I read it,
But it was somewhere I read it.
I think it was from someone in the military that said,
If you can make your bed every single day,
You've at least accomplished one thing.
So make your bed and become a cheerleader for yourself and say,
Hey,
Look at me.
I made my bed.
Like I said,
Compliment somebody.
Volunteer.
Do these really small things.
I found myself even today.
Today is my podcast recording day and I sit and write content.
I come up with content.
I do tons of writing and thinking.
I looked at the clock today.
I started working at seven o'clock and I looked up at the clock and it was 1 30 and then I looked down at myself.
I said,
Oh my God,
I'm still in my pajamas and slippers.
And I thought,
Oh my God,
I can't believe this.
And I started going into stories about how bad I am because I'm still in my pajamas.
And then I thought,
Hold on,
Hold on a second.
I've been working my butt off all day and creating content and classes.
I mean,
I create so much material to then put out into the world.
How is that a bad thing?
So I had to go in and ask myself,
Wait a minute,
This is a good thing.
We don't need to beat up.
I don't need to beat up on myself for this.
There's no reason for it.
So it's catching those thoughts.
Kind of like the very first thing that I said,
It's like catch those thoughts and then validate like what's good about what I did.
I'm creating content.
I'm putting it out for free as much as I possibly can just because I love what I do.
That's a really,
Really good thing.
But don't think you have to do something huge like that.
Who cares?
So what if you're in your pajamas and it's one o'clock,
Did you do anything good from zero or from when you woke up till one o'clock?
Think about that.
So start asking yourself what's good.
What's good about me and find some really small things.
So even if you're in your PJs at one o'clock,
Go make your bed,
Then you've done one good thing.
We need to start sorting for the good.
And it's got to be an intention.
If you're not intentional about it,
Your mind goes into that default robotic place and you won't find it.
You've got to look for it.
So be intentional about sorting for the good.
This is a good one.
And you've heard me say this often,
Learn to observe your thoughts.
Observe.
This kind of goes with the first and the one I just said.
It's like,
Who says we have to believe everything that we say?
It's about learning how to meditate.
When we believe everything that we are hearing in our heads,
That's where this anxiety comes from.
That's where our depression comes from.
So you know what I'm going to say now,
Which is to meditate.
Meditate,
Meditate,
Meditate.
Because meditate is a practice where we sit and learn how to observe our thoughts.
It's just a practice.
That's where people have meditation wrong.
It's not about stopping your thoughts.
It's not about meditating for an hour.
In fact,
Change the word meditation.
I think meditation in itself can be a very triggering word for people.
What if you call it,
This is my relaxation time,
And it means you sit for five minutes,
Put your timer on your phone,
Sit for five minutes,
And just relax and breathe with your eyes closed.
When you have thoughts,
Witness those thoughts.
That's very much a term of the adult chair and of course higher spiritual teachings.
Sit and observe your thoughts.
Watch them go by.
Watch them fall off a cliff.
Watch them fly away.
Watch them evaporate.
Watch the ocean wave pull them away.
Whatever you need to do.
Just learn how to watch those thoughts and you'll start laughing because we have so many thoughts that are so silly.
What happens is we have a thought and we chase that thought and we think it's real.
We have 90,
000 thoughts a day.
Come on.
They're not all true thoughts.
In fact,
Most of them are not.
Oftentimes,
Because of the collective consciousness,
They're not even ours.
Stop paying attention to every single thought.
We have to become choosy.
Pick the thoughts that you like and feel best.
So meditation gets us in the practice of learning how to witness those thoughts.
Number five,
What do you do for your body?
So even though we're talking about creating self-love,
This is part of you.
It's your body.
How do you take care of yourself?
What do you do that's good for your body?
Do you eat well?
Okay,
So if you don't eat well,
Can you incorporate eating some fruit?
Can you incorporate eating vegetables?
Can you drink water?
That's probably the most important thing we all need to do more of.
Drink more water.
When you're doing it,
Notice,
Don't do it unconsciously.
Do it consciously from our adult,
Which is,
I'm consciously drinking more water because I know it's good for me.
That's a sign of self-love.
Eating an extra vegetable,
Even if you haven't had veggies or fruit all day,
Incorporate veggies or fruit.
Start shifting things little by little.
You don't have to do 180-degree shift.
Do it little by little by little.
What can I do today?
Okay,
I'm going to eat a fruit with my breakfast.
Great.
That's a sign of love.
Do you exercise your body?
Now,
Sometimes when I say this to people,
They'll say,
Oh,
Gosh,
Either they exercise like maniacs or they have a good morning routine a few times a week,
But some people say,
I don't have time.
Well,
Can you just for five minutes a day do some sit-ups,
Push-ups,
Get some little barbells,
Not barbells,
Those little handheld things,
And just do that.
Do some very light weights every single day.
Start small.
You're amazed at what develops when you just start small.
Do you go and get massages?
How do you take care of your body?
Your body is part of loving yourself.
What are you doing for the body?
Massage.
Hey,
Men and women can both get manicures,
Pedicures.
That's something fun that we do for ourselves.
It decorates the body.
Do you.
.
.
What else?
I do myofascial massage,
Which is deep.
That's sort of like not as deep as rolfing,
But gosh,
My body loves that.
I go every two weeks for 90 minutes.
It's just something I do for myself.
It does not feel good,
But I know that my body loves it.
So I do it for my body because I sit a lot.
I think my body really enjoys that because when I'm done,
I feel fabulous.
So do something for your body,
Dumbbells,
Sit-ups,
Push-ups,
Something,
And cheerlead yourself.
Don't forget,
You've got to be the biggest cheerleader for yourself.
Who are you hanging around?
This is a big one because we want to change so often,
But we're hanging around people that are kind of negative.
They're negative,
They're critical,
They're judgmental,
They gossip,
They've got low self-worth.
So they're doing all these things.
Okay?
They're doing low self-worth,
Gossips,
And judges because they don't feel good about themselves.
They put other people down to boost themselves up.
So if you're hanging around people like that,
That is not good for loving yourself and raising your own self-worth.
So start incorporating some time with people that feel a little bit better.
Again,
As humans,
We're not going to go from hanging around one group of people that we think are all of our best friends,
But they judge the heck out of everybody,
To a new group that's like these enlightened,
Wonderful beings that love themselves.
But how can you transition and maybe incorporate some new people into your life?
Maybe you met someone and they seem kind of positive or you liked them for some reason.
Go have a coffee.
Go out to dinner.
Go for a walk.
Go meet them at the park.
Go play tennis.
Whatever it is,
Find that one person that feels a little bit better than these people with low self-worth that you might be hanging around and go see how it feels with that person.
And you'll notice you might feel lifted up a little bit.
And then the more you hang around that person,
You're going to attract more people like that.
And it's just a natural transition out of these other people or out of the group that feels so low to you.
I often find that this happens when people,
They start loving themselves and taking care of themselves in new ways.
When we're on this beautiful spiritual path and self-loving path,
This happens where people come in and go,
I'm not a match for so-and-so anymore.
I'm like,
Yeah,
Because you're vibrating higher.
You are loving yourself and that person doesn't.
Not that we judge anyone else.
I don't judge other people,
But it's just not a match.
It's like you don't put plaid with polka dotted shirts.
It's not a match anymore.
So you're different.
So you might not be a match.
I did a whole podcast on that.
I think it was like ending relationships.
It's like sometimes they just end.
They serve their purpose.
And when we choose a path of growth,
It's a very different path.
It's about loving yourself and finding self-worth and living authentically.
That takes a very brave person.
Not everybody can do that.
So the people that aren't ready to do that yet,
And they might be in a year or whenever,
We got to let it's like,
Okay,
You can still be friends with them,
But hang out with the people that might be a better match for you.
So choose who you hang around.
It's like bringing consciousness into your relationships,
That's very much something that we do from our adult share.
We are conscious and we're noticing this person doesn't feel good,
So I better go over here and hang out with this person,
Or I'm going to spend less time with this person that just doesn't feel good to me anymore.
Okay?
Number seven,
Learn to connect with the inner child.
Oh,
You know how much I love this one.
This is the part that is key to self-love.
Okay?
This is the part of you that has emotions and needs.
It is the part of you that has your passion,
Your fun,
Your creativity.
This is key.
This is key.
We really want to get in touch with that inner child,
And when people start to connect with the inner child way in the beginning,
Boy,
A lot of tears and a lot of internal shifting,
And when we notice that this is where so many of these internal beliefs of self-hatred or the opposite of self-love are not feeling worthy,
They're coming from this beautiful inner part of you that we call the inner child.
So we got to get into this child share and start wondering what's going on in here and connect with that part.
So much beautiful shifting happens here.
I've got on the website and on YouTube,
I've got the connecting with your inner child,
And it is,
I think it's even on Insight Timer now,
It's beautiful.
It's a guided meditation to connect with the inner child.
It just helps you to connect with that part of you.
I'm going to do a lot to,
I think I've talked about this,
I have a whole podcast on this.
You can journal to that part of you,
Imagine that he or she is standing in front of you,
Dialogue with that part,
And even just asking yourself how do you feel starts to connect you with that inner child part because that's the part of you that has emotions and needs.
Number eight,
Spend time in nature.
Your physical body will thank you,
Your mind and your emotional body will thank you because nature vibrates in the heart.
It's a fourth chakra or a love centered activity.
So everything has an emotional,
Excuse me,
A vibrational frequency to it and it is vibrating at the heart level.
So if you want to love yourself,
Get in nature.
It cleanses our energy field.
And when you're in nature,
Be mindful in nature.
Don't go for a walk with like your headphones on listening to music because honestly you're missing out on the beauty.
So a mindful walk would be one where I'm walking and I'm observing what's going on around me.
Like look around,
Look at the rich colors or the colors that aren't quite rich yet because it's still winter time.
I know here it's very brown in Tennessee,
But you'll see green.
You might see birds and then listen,
What are you hearing?
This is a mindful walk.
This completely brings you in your body too,
By the way.
Notice what you smell.
Stop and touch the trees.
It really truly works to touch trees.
It helps with grounding.
Go sit under a tree and just contemplate,
Journal.
Do something that's really mindful in nature at least once a day.
I love to step outside every single day with my dogs and I just step outside.
I throw my big dog his frisbee.
The little one wanders around and I love to take walks in the park with them.
Bring your dogs,
But notice everything while you're on your walk.
The other thing I love doing is getting up in the morning and meditating outside.
That's beautiful too.
When the sun is coming up,
There's so many rich,
Beautiful features for lack of a better word in nature that we miss because we're so distracted.
We're talking to people.
We take walks on the phone.
Stop it.
Just be present.
Okay.
Speaking of touching trees,
Number nine is grounding.
Grounding,
Grounding,
Grounding.
This helps us to love ourself.
To be mindful and accepting of the self,
To have compassion for ourself,
To raise our awareness,
All of these key adult share concepts that I just mentioned,
We have to be in our bodies.
In order to be in the body,
We ground.
So taking that mindful walk is extremely grounding.
We can do that earthing.
Just be outside in your bare feet.
Meditate.
Get in nature.
For those of you that don't know,
And I draw this whole diagram out in my classes,
But you know,
Everyone thinks,
Oh yeah,
Grounding.
When I ask people,
What the heck does grounding even mean,
I draw a picture because so many of us don't know what exactly it means.
So let me explain it to you.
When you're walking around on the earth,
Your physical body is on the earth,
But you have that beautifully energetic body that goes all the way around you.
It's called your aura,
Your auric field.
When you're grounded,
The auric field extends about two feet outside of you and it goes down into the earth.
So think about a bubble all the way around you,
Down into the earth and all above your head when you're grounded.
When you're not grounded,
That energy or auric field or energetic body lifts up.
So physically you're still walking on the earth,
But the energy body is not going down through the earth.
That's what grounding is.
We want the physical body to be on the earth and the energetic body to come down through the earth and underneath you about two feet into the earth.
So that happens.
And if that's not happening,
We can't live in our adult chair and you certainly cannot love yourself.
You can't have self-compassion.
You're not intentional.
We need to be grounded in order to feel self-love.
So very,
Very important.
Okay,
Number 10,
Last one,
Gratitude.
Start a practice of gratitude.
Unfortunately,
Our mind sorts for what's wrong and we live from this adolescent chair.
You know,
It's the egoic part of us which is based in fear,
Remember.
It's the seat of the survivor.
So it's always on guard in looking for how you're going to get hurt,
How you're going to get kicked out of your tribe,
All of these things.
It's supposed to be there to help us to survive.
But unless we are doing something like become mindful of it and not pay attention to it,
Remember,
Become witness of these thoughts,
Then we start buying into it and it does not put us in a very good space.
But when we start incorporating gratitude,
Okay,
Gratitude is something we do from the adult and it starts to change the neural pathways.
They've done so many studies on the practice of gratitude.
So again,
When I ask people to start incorporating a practice of gratitude,
They say,
I don't have time,
Just like when I asked them to meditate,
Which again,
Everyone has five minutes.
And if you say you don't have time to meditate or to practice gratitude,
Then you need to do it twice as long because that means that the adolescent part of you or the egoic part of you is on overdrive.
So we need to do it more.
So when can you be grateful?
And again,
You don't have to sit for an hour in gratitude.
All I'm asking is maybe three to five things and it can be so basic.
It can be,
You know,
I'm really grateful that I'm alive and then feel it.
I'm really grateful that the sun came up today or that it's raining.
I love the rain too.
So I'm grateful because I love a good rainy day or I'm grateful that my children are safe or I'm grateful that I have a job or small things.
I'm grateful to have food on the table.
It can be anything,
Anything at all.
So find a time throughout the day that you can start to become grateful.
So maybe when you first wake up in the morning or even last thing at night,
Which is so beautiful to do it when you're falling asleep,
Find three to five things that you're grateful for and just sort of sit and simmer in that energy of,
Oh,
So grateful and feel it.
Feel the emotions behind what you're grateful for.
Gratitude attracts like if you're in that energy,
You guys,
It attracts more of that into your life.
So we need to balance out this egoic part of us with adding in some gratitude.
It really changes the game when you add gratitude.
When we practice it every day,
This is what I'm saying,
Think right now,
When can you incorporate gratitude into your life?
Maybe it's on your way to work.
Maybe it's after dropping the kids off from school.
I'm asking for three things.
You can't do three things,
But you've got to do it every day.
Then it becomes a habit.
Otherwise,
You're going to do it for two days and it's going to be done.
But if you want to learn how to love yourself,
Got to start doing it just a little bit every single day.
It really is something that will incorporate much more self love because you're looking again for the good.
Ten things.
I feel like that they're pretty easy,
But you just have to apply them.
Don't just listen to this and not do anything.
Pick one or two out of the 10.
I listed 10 things and I tried to find,
I really thought I found some ones that were easy to apply.
You can start doing them right now.
Go meditate.
I think I've done a podcast probably on every single one of these topics.
If you go to my website,
There's a search bar.
You can actually type into that search bar whatever topic you want to learn more about or hear more about and all the shows that I've done on that particular topic will pop up for you.
Whether it's gratitude,
Meditation,
Grounding,
Connecting with the inner child.
I've done podcasts on every single one of these things.
So you can have 20 more minutes on that one topic if that's the one that you really like.
I can honestly say that after practicing so many of these things over the years,
My inside voice of really just feeling like I was damaged goods and did not love myself has changed.
Now I'm not going to lie and say that I don't have a day,
Some days I'm like,
Oh,
Not feeling it today but I can honestly say most days I don't fall into that place anymore.
I really do.
I would say that my baseline now is one of self-love and again,
Over self-love,
Sometimes I can be lonely.
Sometimes I can have a sad day or a sad moment but my core now is much more of self-love than it ever has been in my entire life.
It's only because I've done these things that I just gave you,
These 10 things.
So good luck with this.
I want to hear how you guys are doing with it so please comment.
I would love to see you and hear you on either in the closed group or on one of the social media outlets that I have.
So today's podcast is sponsored by Audible.
You can get a free audiobook download in a 30-day free trial at audibletrial.
Com slash the adult chair.
There are over 180,
000 titles to choose from and there are apps on the phone that you can listen to.
And again,
I don't care if you have the iPhone,
The Android,
Kindle,
Whatever,
You can listen to it on any of those devices.
So the book that I want to talk about today,
Which is one that I recommend to my clients so often is called You Can Heal Your Life and that's by Louise Hay.
And she again is just one of my many mentors but transformed my life.
I remember learning about her when I was 20 years old,
So 30 years ago.
And she's just amazing.
So thank you to everybody who has subscribed to the show.
You know,
We don't pay to advertise the adult chair so our growth is directly thanks to your excitement and the sharing of what we do here.
So from all of us at the adult chair team,
We just really want to say thank you and we're so grateful for your support.
We would love if you could go to iTunes and give us a review.
That helps so many other people find us and learn how they can also transform and live in their adult chair as well as you can just share the show.
That's also a great thing to do.
So thank you to all of you for helping spread this transformational model called the adult chair around the world.
I hear from so many people around the world every single day and it is just a gift to sit here and chat with all of you.
So thank you.
Thanks again to Pete Wright and Sonia.
I am Michelle Schelfant and I will see you next time right here seated firmly in the adult chair.
