Is Your Inner Critic Blocking Your ReBirth?

Have you ever allowed your own self judgement to hinder you in your personal growth or birthing new versions of you? In this episode, you & I will explore the fine line between self-evaluation and self-judgement, including some introspective questions to consider to if and WHY you may be holding yourself back from birthing yourself into more expanded versions of YOU. 

Plus, I get personal and share my own fear of judgement and self judgement I had around "coming out of the broom closet" as a medium and I share the wonderful nd hurtful reactions I received. By the end of the episode, you'll have some tools to evaluate some of your own inner nudges to birth new versions of yourself in anything from a new self-expressive haircut to a full change of self expression in any area of your life! 

Show Notes and Sources:

Podcast Mentioned: We Can Do Hard Things. Website:  https://wecandohardthingspodcast.com

Episode Mentioned, Title: ”The One Question to Finally Let Go of Control with ALOK”

Episode 293

Find it on Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-one-question-to-finally-let-go-of-control-with-alok/id1564530722?i=1000650445707

Find it on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6AzxGzTIB4SNEIkJOfo7fh?si=fb0ce9c4ff8b450d 

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/

Article from Huff Post: 

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/whats-the-difference-between-judgement-and-evaluation_b_7908320#:~:text=Evaluations%20merely%20state%20what%20%22is,moral%2C%20self%2Drighteous%20approach.

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/rebirth

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Transcript

Hey beautiful soul Welcome to Spirit Speakeasy. I'm Joy Giovanni, Joyful Medium. I'm a working psychic medium, energy healer, and spiritual gifts mentor. This podcast is like a seat at the table in a secret club, but with mediums, mystics and the spiritual luminaries of our time so come behind the velvet ropes with me and see inside my world is I chat insider style with profoundly different souls. We go deep share juicy stories laugh a lot and it wouldn't be a speakeasy without great insider secrets and tips. You might even learn that you have some gifts of your own. So step inside the spirit speakeasy. Hey, beautiful soul welcome in for another episode of spirit speakeasy this week, I have a solo chat for you. Just you and I with maybe some food for thought some things to consider some things I've been considering. As usual, I have some notes. This. I don't know research that I did this, this thinking that I did this stewing around of this episode. The inspiration for it came from many things. But partially from an episode of a podcast that I enjoy listening to called we can do hard things with Glennon Doyle, Abby Wambach and, Sister is what they call her but, her name is Amanda Doyle. And that podcast I'll link in the show notes that episode. And the guests that they had on was a beautiful soul named ALOK. And the podcast itself was about judgment, rebirth, birthing a new version of yourself and a loks perspective on this. And like I said, I'll link it in the show notes. The episode itself was called "The One question to finally let go of control with ALOK". And they were exploring this idea of judgment in the episode. And ALOK said that they ask themselves the question, "what are the moments in my life that I judged someone else for living a more free version of themselves that I was willing to embody in that moment?" I'm going to read it to you again, this is a quote directly from ALOK. And they said they asked themselves, what are the moments in my life that I judged someone else for living a more free version of themselves than I was willing to embody in that moment. So that really got me thinking and I made lots of notes and thoughts and bullet points for myself and what I want to share with you about about all of this. But you know, they were talking about how does a Lok feel being judged by others. And like I said, you can listen to that episode if you'd like it's it's a great podcast. But really just we all at some point in our lives have an understanding of judging others forming opinions and about someone. And it's, I love the quote, because it's such a good point that often when we're judging someone else, it really is at least some of the time, a fear based emotion, right? That, you know, we in that moment maybe aren't willing to embrace that level of freedom or a version of ourself that might bring criticism or judgment. And so we then judge someone else for feeling that free or being that much of themselves or that version of themselves. So I decided I wanted to look up the word judgment, the Cambridge Dictionary defines judgment as a noun, the ability to form valuable opinions and make good decisions to show good sound, poor judgment, that the example they gave was the sentence I don't think you have the right to pass judgment on others. And to say people are good and bad, I'm going to reserve judgment on the decision. But that definition of judgment really didn't fit. And I think they're thinking of it as making good and bad decisions, which that's not really what judgment means. Right? So then I decided, okay, well, maybe what I'm looking for is the definition of to pass judgment, because that's a different thing than having good judgment, obviously. So the Cambridge Dictionary defines to pass judgment as an idiom, to pass judgment on someone or something to express a strong opinion about someone or something. And the example they gave was, don't pass judgment on that word. The name they use was Laurie, don't pass judgment on Laurie until you hear what happened, which is more of the definition of it. And I really was thinking yeah, a lot of times, maybe, you know, those less evolved versions of us or passed over In the bus or momentary versions of us are judging other people, and certainly a lot of us have a fear of judgment of others when we think about rebirthing ourselves or stepping more into who we want to be, but how often? Or how much? Are you passing judgment on yourself in this phase of your life? And what's the difference between passing judgment and self evaluation? It's, it's a fine line, because of course, we have to be evaluating ourselves, our lives, our likes and dislikes, what's working and not working, to see who we're trying to grow into, or what version of ourselves we want to birth Next, if we're making an intentional conscious choice, right. But what's the difference really, between passing self judgment and self evaluation? So I did a little search on that as well, just to get an outside perspective. And really, the one that came to me was one therapists article in Huff Post, which was formerly known as Huffington Post, some of you might know it that way. And the quote is, and again, I'll link all of these sources that I'm citing in the show notes in case you want to read the definitions or read the quote for yourself. But the quote from the Huff Post article was evaluations or positive judgments or negative evaluations help you decide what you want more of in your life and create a sense of connection. Judgment can create confusion and separation from others evaluations are expansive in nature, judgments are constrictive evaluations give you freedom of choice judgments, limit your behavior and the behaviors of others. Evaluation merely states what is in a neutral objective manner.
Judgment indicate an opinionated subjective value evaluation can be seen as a mental or scientific approach, while judgments are emotional in nature and often suggest a moral self righteous approach. Wow. Okay, that's a lot to unpack. Again, I'll link that article in the show notes if you want to read the whole thing. So it seems like we may be judging or evaluating on ourselves based on a standard of some kind, right? So we're talking a little bit more about that. But it seems like what this therapist is saying in this article is that judgment really is more emotion based and evaluation is more neutral. And I for me, I want to say in my own life, when I'm looking at self evaluation and self judgment, hmm, that's it's a little blurry. I can't say distinctively evaluations are never emotional and only objective and only scientific stating of facts. I don't know if that's true when we're evaluating ourselves entirely. But I do love the quote, and I thought it was a good article, and judgment, I believe, yes, it comes from a fear based emotion based. And I understand what they're saying it often suggests a moral or self righteous approach. But what about when we're judging ourselves? Is it a moral or self righteous approach? I don't know if it is, I think it's more of a using comparison, right? And when you're evaluating yourself, when you're moving into a new phase, or even in this current phase that you're in, when you think about your own life? Are you making those evaluations based on some kind of a standard? And is that standard, real or imagined? Meaning? Is it based on a standard of what you want your life to look like? Or is it based on a standard? Sometimes in this work, we call it programmed, a programmed standard of like the culture that you were raised in, or the society that you were raised in? Or perhaps the religion you were raised in? Of what the top top tier is? So you know, if you're striving to grow and striving to meet an ideal or a standard, is that your standard? Is it a real standard? Is it imagined standard? Is it a standard of being a good person, for example? Or is it a standard of being a pious person or a person who exemplifies this set of religious doctrine, for example? So I just think it's really interesting, you know, as part of this, evaluating ourselves and whether or not we're judging ourselves, and fear of judgment of others, just thinking about the standard by which you're evaluating yourself or judging yourself. Now, we know that judgment, especially self judgment, When done in a negative way, is not necessarily helpful. But doing it in a positive way, is that possible? Is it possible to judge ourselves and apos in a positive way? Or does that then tip over into the umbrella of like, critique or constructive criticism or constructive judgment? Do we need to delineate that? And is our own self evaluation or self judgment based off of comparison, not only to a standard that may or may not be real, but are we basing it off of someone else's achievements? Or what someone else is presenting on the outside? Maybe on social media? I know, it's a big topic these days for a lot of people is, you know, the life that perhaps is presented on social media versus the true life of that person. are you basing the comparison? Or the judgment evaluation? Is it actually a comparison of yourself to someone else's achievements or the way you perceive someone else's behavior? And in that, does that mean we're also judging that person? And maybe we're not judging them in a negative way? Maybe they're, we're judging them as Oh, they are. They are so wonderful, they are doing so well, they are seven steps ahead in the game of life, you know, ahead of me, and I want to be there. So is it that type of a compare and contrast that we're doing when we're looking at ourselves? And as part of self judgment? Or self evaluation? Or both? If you're comparing to someone else? Are you needing to make one better or worse than the other, even if it's comparing yourself to a past version of yourself? Where I find this in my own life, I can give you an example. Many of you know that I used to be an actor, and I did some fitness modeling early on, and I looked a certain way back then. But I was also working out six days a week up to, you know, six hours a day sometimes and doing lots of other unhealthy things to look that way. That maybe I'll talk about one day if you guys would like, and am I comparing myself to a standard of old photos or old, you know, even old video or old images of me wherever they may be, or even just knowing what I used to look like, what I used to what size I used to be, for example, and now what I look like, you know, at this age at this stage, am I comparing myself based on needing to make one version better or worse, right? And we might have our preferences of what we'd like things to look like not just in a physical way, but our life. are we comparing our neighbor, your parent? Are you comparing, you know, your parenting style or your family to someone else? And are you needing to make one better or worse in that observation, I think it's kind of human nature to be observant, especially if you're someone who does personal growth and personal development, whether you're on the spiritual path, which I know a lot of you who listen, are gifted as healers, as psychics as intuitives. If you like that word better as mediums, or maybe you're not entirely sure what your spiritual gifts are, and you're just starting on this path. So whether it's that or whether it's another area of your life, you know, your family, your home, your finances, your career, your physical appearance, the way you choose to demonstrate yourself in the world, how your expression of yourself is in the world, right? When you're looking at those things, whether you're comparing and evaluating and noticing things within yourself or outside of yourself, are you needing to make one right and one wrong, right, this imaginary standard that we were talking about? And I just think it's so interesting to think about because yeah, it's human nature for us to notice things. It's human nature for us to notice preferences. But that doesn't mean that my preference is better than your preference or your hairstyle is better than my hair. It's just different. And can we start, especially when it comes to self judgement? rebirthing ourselves comparing ourselves, can we start to maybe take a step back from that need of evaluating in a way that makes one thing better and one thing worse? Maybe it's just what we prefer more, right? Maybe there are things that you're trying to grow into or that you're trying to evolve into, or that you're focusing on creating in your life. And it doesn't mean that the way it is now is bad, or the way it was before is bad. And what you're wanting to quit Rate is good. It could just be in that you're moving towards that preference, and just kind of loosening those very harsh black and white standards, right. That's just some part of what I've been thinking about. Now. I also was thinking about how has social media affected this self evaluation and self judgment, on the positive side of the spectrum. And on the negative side of the spectrum, I have maybe a little bit of a unpopular feeling about social media. In some ways, I really love it. And if you could see my personal feed, I'm not on social media. Personally, very often, I only have the app joyful medium accounts, I don't have other accounts. There are of course, lots of fake accounts, which as we know, is a problem. But if you can see in into my side of the account, meaning like my feed, and what's showing up, it's certainly people that I admire their work people that are what do they call it like self help, or, or inspirational speakers like that, that vein of person or work, I enjoy that that shows up on my feed lots of like pets and animals doing funny things, show up on my feed, lots of cute theme park type stuff, if you follow my pages at all, you know that I go to a theme park here in Southern California that I love a lot. And I there's a lot of like tips and tricks. And here's what's been announced new, and here's the snacks of the month at this theme park. So there's a lot of that that shows up on my feed. There's some friends of course, you know, some of my friends, things show up. There's some astrology stuff. There's a lot of comedy. Anyone who knows me knows I love stand up comedy and comedians, I really just appreciate their work. So there's a lot of that I'm sure there are some other things that that are in there. But that tends to be what apparently I've trained the algorithm that I like, but
what shows up in your feed? And how is it affecting your self evaluation and your self judgment? In the positive and in the negative? For me, sometimes it helps me to discover new things, right? It might be new things I want to try from like a local restaurant or inspiration, inspirational quotes or messages or in decoration inspiration. So those are I think some of the positives and the things we can compare ourselves our lives our schedule, right? Maybe it's, maybe it's you thinking like, Okay, I'm trying to add some new fun. What are other people doing that's fun, that's in my local area, right? So in that way, I think it can positively affect us and positively move our self evaluation and self judgment. But it can also trigger a challenge for me, like if I'm comparing myself to, like how someone else is doing, for example. Like if I was to look at other mediums or other podcasters, or other spiritual practitioners, and look at how many views they're getting, or how their work is being spread far and wide, and maybe mine isn't quite to where I'd like it to be yet. I could, if I was maybe like, not in not the right headspace that day, or hadn't been doing my work, I could let that affect me in a comparative way negatively. And kind of get in a negative mindset of, oh, this, all these other people are doing so well. I don't know how I'm ever going to, you know, do that. I don't know how much we're gonna meet this standard, the mystery algorithm, or another way that I find that one, I, I think there's enough room for everyone to be honest with you. And I really feel like lots of us, all of us can succeed. And the other thing is, we're all meant to help certain people and there's enough people in the world that need what everyone does, that there's more than enough to go around. So sometimes I might get inspired by other people's work, but I rarely get discouraged by it personally, but I know it's an issue for some people. Or, you know, maybe it's not what other people are posting, maybe it's that self judgment and evaluation in the negative by allowing harsh comments or rude comments to like hurt me or make me question myself that certainly has been something that has affected me in the past and sometimes when you see me disappear from social media for several days at a time, sometimes it's just that I'm busy or that I'm you know, maybe I've taken a couple days for myself but sometimes it's because a comment that someone made or a something rude or something inappropriate or something harsh has hurt my feelings or has set me back on my heels and makes me want to take a break. And that I think can also I think what We'll talk about that as much. But I think it's definitely something I know a lot of people say trolls, it's definitely something that can affect our self evaluation and self judgment. And even in in just a minute, we're going to move towards talking about wanting to rebirth ourselves or wanting to birth new and different versions of ourselves. Sometimes I feel like these are the things that can hold us back or make us consciously or unconsciously have fear, fear based thought about shifting or changing or trying something new. The not just the way other people are doing it. But the the crappy comments that we might get, has this ever happened to you? Am I just totally on a tangent on my own? I'm gonna take a sip of water. I hope I'm not the only one. I don't think that I am, which is why I'm even talking about this. And yes, of course, we can block people and remove comments. And I'm not at the place where I have a whole team managing my social media to like, make sure I don't even see these type of comments, but I still see them. Because I don't have that quite yet. You know, maybe I will maybe I won't one day. But you know, and it's not even a matter of like, how do we not let these comments affect us? It's just something that can affect us, whether it's on social media, or whether it's online. And yes, there's a degree of the more we open ourselves up publicly, the more criticism that's going to come, there certainly is. Work we can talk about about like, you know, someone's making a harsh comment, it usually is saying more about them than about you or about me. And yeah, we know all those things. For sure, if you're here, it means you're spiritually evolved or personally evolved to some degree, if you're even interested in this podcast. So sure, you can identify, like, yeah, sticks and stones. And also that says something about their negative mindset or who they are that they need to even take their time and energy to say something mean, or harsh or rude to someone else online. But it doesn't mean it doesn't hurt our feelings. Because the truth is, if you're here, you're likely also a highly sensitive person in some area to some degree like me. So it that's maybe for me, where there's still a little bit of fear or resistance is, you know, if I make a post that's way out there like this, like, what I'm worried about what kind of comments I'm gonna get, or what people are gonna say, but sometimes things come to my awareness that I'm aware of them. So I'm gonna talk more about that in a few minutes. But how has social media affected you? Can you identify any ways as you're thinking about this? And as you're thinking about your own life, and the way you judge yourself, or evaluate yourself, how has social media affected this self evaluation or self judgment? Is it now like, you're just seeing so much of other people that it makes your self judgment and self evaluation more harsh? Does it help to inspire you and give you an idea of like, oh, where you're wanting to go and you're using it to inspire you, I feel like we all maybe have some of all of it happening for us, but let me know how you feel. I feel like I use it in both ways. But certainly things have affected me or hurt my feelings in different ways. So for me, yeah, that's how it is with social. And at this point, I think we all know the danger of looking at someone's like, quote, unquote, perfect life that they present, and realizing like, okay, that's not the full story. Of course, I follow some accounts that show the beautiful side of their life and the messy side of their life and don't make one better than the other. Just it is what it is. And I think there's now we've gotten to the point where there's a lot of that available to where people are showing more of the truth of things, and not always just the perfect life of it all. But I know certainly for some people I've heard you know, clients talk about it even that they see friends or people they went to school with showing their quote, unquote, perfect life on social media, and not showing the beside, so to speak, not showing the full story. So does that affect you at all? I think we know the danger of doing that and of believing everything we see online. And what's the joke that, you know, we only see a little square and a lot of people especially during lockdown, do you remember a lot of people joking about like, Yeah, this is a square you see, and the whole rest of their houses like toys and lunch and you know, just craziness. So I think I think the perspective shifted a lot on that. But how much does that affect you at this point? And as part of this continual self evaluation, we also know the power of evaluating ourselves, having personal growth, personal development as an ongoing part of our lives. And of course, I know we've talked about this before that Yeah, it's really hard to fit all these things in and are you judging yourself on how much you're able to fit in, or How little you're able to fit in. And as part of this continual self evaluation and personal growth, we may even feel a yearning or a nudge or an inner calling as we continue to evolve, to continue to propel us forward down those paths down, whether it's a spiritual path for you, whether it's exploring what else is outside of just this physical world, whether you It's you exploring art forms that you might be interested in, or even just personal expression that you might be interested in. Are there subtle ways, or ways that you may consider a full rebirth like things that you're being nudged towards? Or called towards? And how are you allowing self judgment, self criticism, self evaluation, to either propel you forward as you grow and evolve and change or stop you, right? Is it doing both of these things is doing one of these things do you do use it either way, for me,
I've kind of always felt like I'm continually rebirthing my selves, or birthing myself into new versions of myself. I know a lot of you also feel that way. And I feel like of course, our personal evolution and our birthing new version of ourselves, is on a spectrum and can relate to any area of our lives at different times. So for you, maybe it's just that you're wanting to explore a new haircut, or a new style of the way that you dress or present yourself in the world, maybe it's a new career or adding some more Woo to your, to your life. Maybe it's a new plan for your personal wellness, or just an evolution of your personal wellness plan and what that means to you. And maybe it's moved from only being at the gym, to adding in some nutrition and to adding in some healings and like energy healing, or some yoga, or even some meditation, maybe that's the part of you that you're being nudged or pulled or called to continue to birth a new, maybe it's a whole new version of you, or a whole new version of the way you express in your body to the world. So it can look a lot of ways it can be something that's a very small change or rebirth, or birthing a new or something that's like, seems to the outside world like a total 180. Now, if you've ever had a big transformation or transition in your life, you will know as I know that, yes, sometimes there's a really big unexpected event that causes everything like a domino effect or like a spiral. Sometimes it's something gradual. Like I keep thinking of the wellness thing, and maybe you were a runner for a while and you realized, okay, running alone is not doing it anymore, I need to also worry about my health, I need to also worry about my mental health, I need to also take into consideration having some time to clear my mind. So it can be an evolution like that starts as one thing and really unfolds into a much bigger part of our life, right. But it can be in any area of your life, like I was saying. So really, like I said, for me, I have always felt like I'm continually birthing myself into new versions of myself, sometimes, in the midst of a transformation, we may not even realize the full gravity of the growth expansion changes that we are making, or that we have made. Which is why back to like that self evaluation, of course, there's value in looking at how far we've come, or how much we've changed from a previous version of ourselves. But do we have to judge it as good and bad? Because, you know, a lot of teachers that I follow, and even I say, you know, we're usually we're doing the best we can with what we have at any given time. So even if we can look way back in our past and say, oh, man, I was a mess, or I was not doing things the best way. Do you have to judge yourself? Or can you have love and compassion for that past version of you and say, you know, she was doing the best she could with everything she had and everything she knew at that moment in time. And I love her for it. And she got me to where I am today that past version of you. Or can you look at this current phase that you're in whatever it is, as you're thinking about it as we're talking that you're feeling nudged towards or pulled towards or breadcrumb towards, even if you don't have really a clear picture of what you're moving towards? Maybe it's just these gentle nudges of things that get your attention And maybe it's again, personal development, personal growth for some of you, I know, it's sort of what I'm doing moving through a lot of you know, or if you listen to one of the very first episodes, the one that's WWE Diva to psychic medium, my story basically are a part of my story. For me, it was very gradual, it was starting with wellness and then moving me to healing and as you know, if you listen to that, one that that personal development and self evaluation and and really looking at myself, my past trauma, my life, who I felt that I was truly inside, who I want to grow into, I've always been doing personal developments, sometimes more successfully, or more deeply than other times. And we're all a work in progress, right. But even in that statement, like I don't need to judge past versions of myself, even yesterday version of me, we're always doing the best we can with what we have with everything that's going on for us in that moment. But yeah, we can always continue to expand to be deeper, deeper, connected, more deeply connected to ourselves more understanding of everything that's going on around us. I will tell you, though, for me, the example that probably the easiest for me to talk about is coming into working fully with my mediumship. That's a really big rebirth. And there was a lot of fear in there for me, because some of it was the unknown. Some of it was that I needed to work through some old fear based thoughts about good and evil, good and bad, what was okay to do and what was taboo or what was not accepted or not okay to do. Some of it was fear around what other people would say about my work about me becoming a medium or expressing this part of myself. And it also felt really vulnerable, because as I started to understand, it started to give myself permission to grow into it. I also looked back over my life, and I also realized, oh, this has been with me one of my earliest memories, I don't think I've shared this before, one of my earliest memories has to do with the house that I was born in the house my parents had when I was born, being aware of a woman that was in a room at the end of the hall that other people couldn't see, being aware of people that other people couldn't see that were waking me up at night that I would then run across the hall into my parents room, because I could see them and I wanted to be alone sleeping, and I wanted to be with other people in a body and I was aware of these people outside of the body or not in the body is probably how I should say it. Those are some of my earliest memories, and I probably would have been two years old. So, you know, really, I'm expressing a part of me, that's always been with me, that's always been a part of me. And yeah, other people might judge it a person or perceive it as a new part of me. But it's just a part of me that I was trying to or was trying to decide if I was willing to bring to the world bring into the light. But it was always a part of me truly when I really evaluated it. So you know, that was a big change for me a big giving myself permission to birth, this version of myself who worked with spirit world. And other times rebirth or a birthing a new version of ourself might have a big event as the catalyst for it, right? Like I was saying, for me that came kind of really slowly and gradually and had a lot of personal development involved. And a lot of me being willing to study and practice and take classes and get to know several versions of it and get to know myself deeper. But sometimes, there's a big event as a catalyst for a big change or a big rebirth. Sometimes it feels like a forced birthing a new version of us like from a divorce or sudden passing of a loved one or even a significant life event or trauma, right. And sometimes, we resist change and we resist allowing ourselves or others to birth a new version of ourselves. Sometimes change is not always comfortable for us even as highly sensitive people. And maybe even more so we don't always love change. We might like like a new recipe or a new spice to add to our dinner. But we might not like a full rebirth, a full birthing a new version of ourselves a full change and an area of our life that can be uncomfortable so there might be some resistance to explore in there. So as we talk about rebirth, I wanted to give you a definition from Cambridge dictionary they define rebirth as a new period of growth of something or two time when something that was popular in the past becomes popular again. dictionary.com defines rebirth as a new or second birth, or a renewed existence activity, or growth or Renaissance or revival. I really liked that like a personal Renaissance, right. And like I said, it can be a whole new, a whole new version of you a whole new expression of you in life, maybe it's the way you present, maybe it's how you identify, maybe it's in your career, and it's not you personally, but it's the career path you
want to have. Maybe you're gonna keep your traditional career path. But you also want to learn to read tarot cards, or astrology or something like that, maybe it's a little less woowoo. And maybe, maybe it's moving from being, you know, in one field, maybe you work in restaurants, and you've decided I don't want to work in restaurants anymore, I want to be an accountant. It doesn't have to be woowoo, it can be something that's very muggle, I guess, for lack of a better way of saying it, or very typical, right? It doesn't have to be something crazy. But do you have permission to birth new or updated aspects of yourself? Maybe it's just taking on a new hobby, maybe you realize, yeah, you know what, I really do have a lot of creative juice or creative energy. And I really want to start expressing that in some area of my life. And, you know, I'm not going to change my whole career. But I do want to start decorating my home in a totally different style, or I do want to start wearing my hair in a completely opposite style from what it is. Do you have permission for that? Do you have permission to birth a newer, updated aspect of yourself? And another layer to that question, whose permission do you need? Who are you most afraid is going to pass judgment on you? And are you passing judgment on yourself? Or can you give yourself a past you need to judge something as good or bad or right or wrong? And for me, those are the phases of I think how it usually works. Typically, it's us within ourselves first, right? It's us accepting. Yeah, you know, what I do, I do identify differently than how I've presented for the last several years, or even like, I'm starting to feel different, or I'm now interested in or intrigued by this new area of study that I wasn't maybe interested in 10 years ago, and accepting that within yourself and letting go of judgment within yourself before you're willing to move to that next layer of announcing it to everybody else, right, or cutting your hair in a in a way that people that look at you will be able to see a clear change, like you can't hide it anymore. And whose permission do you need to make those decisions beyond your own? Is it based on some old paradigm or some old, real or imagined standard, like we were talking about earlier? Is it based on maybe a belief system that you don't even agree with anymore? Is it based on things your parents or elders would say? Or would have said if maybe they're not even here anymore? Is it based on what you were taught growing up is a good job or an acceptable job, you know, it was a little hard for me. And I resisted, even though I loved acting, and I did some acting in college even and was was for a very short time part of some theater courses and some film courses at UMass Boston, I was kind of taught that that's not a real job. So I resisted wanting to dive into expressing that part of myself for a few years because I had that kind of program pattern into me, or marinated into me about what a real job was and what a real job wasn't or what an acceptable presentation of you is or what it isn't. So sometimes, it's those closest to us or those around us, in our community or in our family in our workplace that have the hardest time or pass the most judgement as we spread our proverbial wings and step into new versions or new expressions of ourselves. Have you ever had an experience where you had a personal transformation or a growth in an area or even a birthing a new version of yourself and people in your life passed judgment on you or struggled to accept or to embrace you as you were as you are? Or in that transition of moving from who they knew you as to who you were be? Coming. And again, this can relate to any area of your life, maybe it's people passing judgment on you, because you were a certain style of clothing, one day that you wanted to experiment with. And they're used to seeing you in a different style of clothing, or maybe a disc style of music that you'd like to listen to, or maybe a hobby that you wanted to explore a type of restaurant that you wanted to go to maybe you shared with someone that you were thinking about a whole new career, they judged you. Maybe it was about some personal wellness that you were looking at doing or a whole new expression of yourself for a whole new area of your life. Maybe it was you thinking I want to run study intuition, or I really want to start to learn to work with my gifts, or know if I have any gifts, or, you know, I'm really interested in this idea of spirit guides and what that means. But have you ever had an experience you can relate to in any area of your life where someone outside of yourself a partner or friend, community, church, community, family, family community that really had a tough time embracing you, as you were shifting, changing, transitioning? And then another question to kind of consider in there as part of this is, have you ever allowed your own self judgment to hinder you in personal growth or birthing a new version of yourself? And, you know, it's a journey, right? So sometimes as we're starting to feel pulled or called, or moved towards birthing a new version of ourselves, it's part of that evaluation of, oh, what are people going to say? Or what am I going to say? Or judging ourselves of like, you know, let me give it to you in some examples to a lot of mine comes from this expression of mediumship. But for me, there was this feeling of like, no, like, you know, even though you're starting to experience these things, and having memories of times when you were younger, where you experienced these things, that's not you, you don't have it like those people on TV or you don't you don't experience it, like someone who's always experienced it, or you know how it is in movies, or that's not you? You're not you don't, you don't have gifts, you're not special like that. So that was at the beginning. How do I let that self judgment and that self negative evaluation kind of hinder me, of course, I did continue to explore it, it just took me a little while because I needed to feel safe. And I needed to feel like I was okay with it first. And then I eventually started slowly sharing with other people what I was starting to learn and starting to grow into, and some of it like Reiki energy healing, that kind of came in a little bit quickly. And once I trained and learned how to use it, and I integrated into my massage therapy practice pretty quickly and easily. I didn't really necessarily talk about it with my family. And my best friend didn't necessarily really like understand, and it's just not her, it's not her thing. So we talked about it a little but it wasn't really like I was explaining the whole thing in depth. But then as I started to move into like reading cards and learning trance mediumship initially, I kind of only talked about those things with people who were in my little woowoo world, people that I knew did those things, or were open to those things, I was very careful about who I shared things with. And that's okay, you don't have to, you're not required to share everything with everyone, right. And then as mediumship started coming to me, and I started becoming aware of people's loved ones, standing next to me during sessions and sharing the specific details that I got, and then started seeking out mentors. Well, then I was in class and then I had those people to share with but there became this tipping point in this birthing a new version of myself or new aspects of myself. And I think this is how it happens. There comes this tipping point where it's so uncomfortable, to hide these parts of ourselves. It's so uncomfortable to keep dressing the way you used to and not getting to just like express yourself in this new way. That it almost becomes more painful to hide it or more dishonest to hide it than just to start expressing it if anyone likes it or not, for example. So there came this point for me, where I was like, Okay, I'm going to need to tell people that I'm doing this at least the people closest to me. And, you know, I was afraid that's the truth. I was afraid I had a lot of fear of judgment of other people. And sometimes that fear looks like what are they going to say or are Are they going to believe me? Or are they going to accept me? Are they going to disown me?
Are they going to think I'm crazy? Especially when it comes to mediumship? Are they gonna? Is this gonna affect my work life? Is
this gonna make people think I'm weird, and they don't want to be my friend anymore, or they don't want to work with me anymore, right? My personal expression of this and when I started telling people, it was kind of a mixed reaction, to be honest with you, when I started coming out to people as a medium. Probably the person or people that I was the most scared to share this with was my kids, if I'm honest, they're the most important people to me, my in my life as is for most people. And I just, you know, I had been their mom already for so many years, they were teens, when I decided to start sharing more about it. I worked a lot on my own, because I really wanted to understand and I really felt like I wanted to have some answers to the questions that I had, like, what is this? What's going on? What does this mean? How does this work? You know, just I wanted to understand it a little bit more, I did share with my best friend. Pretty early on, just because we've been friends for so long. I always lose the math of it. But I'm 46 We've been best friends since I was 19. That's a very long time. So I'm really not afraid to tell her anything, she accepts me 100% No matter what kind of shenanigans I'm getting into, but with my kids, I was afraid my my daughter at the time was involved in a very restrictive religion with her dad. She's not any longer. But at that time, she had a lot of judgment about me even like listening to music, or, you know, a lot of things as part of that belief system, there was a lot of judgment for other people. So I was really scared to tell her. Ultimately, she did fully accept me and told me she loved me, no matter what job I did, or what you know, what I wanted to explore in my world. My kids both about my son did also accept it. I was a little nervous about telling my dad, he's the parent that I have in my life. He's, I'm so blessed to have him still in my life. He is just as we're recording this, he's just a month shy of 85. So I'm very lucky to still have him and this was probably more than 10 years ago, maybe not quite somewhere in that vicinity. So it's a while ago when I was like, oh, what's he's very open minded and used to talk to me about lots of things like psychic stuff, and aliens and all kinds of stuff when I was a kid. So I thought, well, I know he's open to this type of stuff. I never really heard him talk about mediums or anything like that. But he had some experiences, I actually think he's mediumistic and had some experiences because he told me some quote, unquote, like ghost stories when I was a kid. So, you know, I knew he was open to this vein of thinking or accepting that there's more than just what we know, with our physical eyes. But I didn't know if he would accept it about me since I had never, I never told him that I saw a lady in the room down the hall, for example, I never told him that I was aware of things or could know information. Sometimes before someone told it to me, or I just never shared those parts of myself. I kept them to myself for fear of judgment from other people. So how was he going to react when I was in my 30s, telling him, Oh, I'm a medium. But he accepted it. And I actually had a really cool experience, many of his siblings had already passed away by that time. And I didn't know many of them. Actually, many of them passed away when before I was born, or when I was very young. My dad was a bit older when I was born, at the time, so I was able to communicate with several of his loved ones on the other side and give him details. So it's more like through the work, it was validated to him of like, oh my gosh, you didn't know these people. There's no way you could have known these details about our relationships. And one of my uncle's through a medium ship communication, he's on the other side, communicated to me some things I didn't know about a time he stole some very expensive coins from my dad and told me the place that he took them from where it was for in one of those books that has the plastic sheets where you can slide the special coins inside and have them protected. And it was he told me what the book look like he told me, you know that it was in the pages and that there were different pages that he took them from kind of in the middle and so pretty specific. And some things about his passing that he had kind of said goodbye, and then didn't want anyone to know that he was going into hospital and passed away kind of on his own. So some things like that, that I didn't know and had no way of knowing and my dad was, on one hand a little shocked but on the other hand, like wow, you're doing this this is happening. So he was accepting and But at the time, the partner I had was was very accepting because of some experiences that happened when he was there or some things I was able to tell him about his own loved ones and his own memories and things I couldn't have known and some things like that. So I didn't feel like I had to, like prove it to them. But I also felt like, well, this is who I truly am. And I felt not really fully known by the people that loved me. And it was my own doing it was my own not sharing. And it had been a few how many years, maybe like, four or five years that I had been working on this stuff before I was like, Okay, I'm think I'm gonna start becoming a little more public with this. So I'm going to need to tell the people first that are close to me. And they'll accept it, it really where I got pushback was people that were fans of my work in the WWE, ie, not all of them, or people that knew of that time period in the WWE. Maybe they weren't like fans of me, per se, or like, didn't get didn't care, didn't give a care about me. But just were fans of like that time period or knew that I was an actor. And to be quite honest, I don't spend a lot of time reading comments or looking at, you know, Googling myself or looking at things people have said about me online. But I have looked in the past and I have had other people tell me Oh, did you know that there's this whole thread saying these things about you. So things come to our awareness. And that was a little hurtful, because there are some really terrible, harsh, horribly judgmental comments out there about me and about the work that I do now. But with that, I was able to do that personal development and personal work to tell myself like, well, these people don't know me, this is actually something that's always been a part of me separate from a job that I had a year in my 20s for one year. So they're judging a version of me that they didn't even actually know personally, the way that they perceived me to be and didn't like that. You know, 15 years later, I was growing into a new version of myself. So does that matter? I mean, maybe maybe that's part of what we fear is the judgment of strangers, right? People that don't know us, that don't actually know very much about us that maybe have made up ideas of who we are in their own mind. Maybe it's like your coworkers, for example, or people in your neighborhood, for example, or people that are, you know, go to your kids school that you're like, oh my god, I'm gonna cut my hair, and I'm gonna get all these comments. Yeah, those people don't really know you. But it doesn't mean that it doesn't, on some level, to some degree, hurt your feelings, right. So that's part of the personal development journey that's there for all of us, no matter what area we want to change in. And the funny thing is, when I connected with or reconnected with old friends, and kind of had the talk, so to speak, about what I do now. They were all really accepting, actually, and I have a little funny story that I can tell you. So I had reconnected with someone that I dated when I was in high school and this person, it's kind of a weird story, I should just tell you the whole story, because it's kind of funny, I don't I'll be a little bit General, I haven't asked their permission to share the story, but I don't think they'll care. So this person that I dated for maybe just under two years in high school, their parent, their mom was not a fan of mine. When we were kids. She didn't like my family. I my parents were divorced. I was also raised with the gay community, she had some issues with that based on her own beliefs and and the way that she was raised, so she didn't like me, she didn't like me dating her son. She wasn't a fan. But I knew that this person really loved his mom and really was very close with his family. And, you know, this is many, many years later, we hadn't spoken since I was very young. I think the last time we connected, I don't remember when I was much younger, it had been well over 10 years, probably probably closer to 15. And I knew that his mom had recently passed away at the time, this was a few years ago. So I didn't want to reach out to him because I knew that he was married. And I'm just very, as a person, I try to be very respectful. I have other people's relationships and the rules of their relationships. And I just didn't want to stir up anything for this person. So I knew that their mom had passed.
Actually, I don't even know if I knew their mom has passed. Their mom kept coming into my mind, right? I just was like that was that's weird. And then I think I didn't know that she passed. I'm not sure how I knew maybe I saw a social media post or something from someone in the family. You know how Sometimes on one of the social medias a lot of us just have people that we maybe grew up with or lived in our neighborhood of friends of friends kind of a thing. And I'm never on my personal page to be quite honest with you. But I think maybe the sibling of this person had made a post about the loss of their mom, or maybe I saw other friends, you know, sending condolences or something like that. So she kept popping into my mind. And I was like, I'm, I'm not, I'm not going to reach out to him. So I kind of sent the thought to her, I could feel her I could feel her in the spirit world, I could feel her with me. And I just sent the thought to her, Hey, I'm not going to reach out to him. But if he reaches out to me, I'll tell him what I do now. And I'll offer him a reading if he'd like it, because I didn't really know anything about his life or what was going on with him. I didn't know that he was married. And I did know that he they had had a couple kids, but that's really all I knew. So I was like, Yeah, you gotta get him to reach out to me somehow, I'm not going to make first contact. But if he reaches out to me, I'll you know that I'll tell him and allow him a reading. Well, within a week, he reached out to me on that social media platform in the in the messages and just was very general messages kind of said hello, and may have mentioned about his mom or not, I'm not sure I don't remember. It's been so long. And then I just felt uncomfortable. And I was like, Yeah, I don't know. So I asked for a sign as I often do, if you know me, you know, I love signs. If you haven't gotten my sign mini course yet, it's called sign magnet teaches you how to get signs on the homepage of my website, joyful. medium.com totally free, three day mini course. So I asked her for a sign. I don't think this is revealing too much, I hope they were by religion, Greek Orthodox, it's a very specific type of religion. It's not something that I hear or see or hear of, in my day to day like at all, I'm I'm Italian. As many of you know, I'm not Greek Orthodox. So I was like, for some reason that popped into my mind. And I, I asked her, Okay, I don't know how you're gonna get this to me from over there in the spirit world. But the sign I need from you is Greek Orthodox, I need you to get that signed to me in the world. If you can get that sign to me, I will answer this message that he has sent to me. So I put it into the side, I put it out of my mind. And I'm just like, Okay, well, just, that's what I need. And then I'm going about my week, and I'm seeing clients and I was already fully working as a medium at that point. And that's, that was the only work I was doing psychic and mediumship readings. So I was reading for the mother in law of a previous client, I didn't know this woman, I didn't know anything about her. And as with most of my clients, I don't know anything about them. I don't even know if the reading is going to be about their own life and things going on in their own life, or people from the spirit world communicating, I have no idea when I'm going into a reading, like what we're going to be doing or who the person is. Sometimes I don't even have more than their first name, which is fine, the less information the better. So I sit down to do this reading, it was on Zoom. And I'm working with this mother in law, this woman, this beautiful woman, and her family's communicating, and I'm understanding things about her life. And as this readings going on, I believe it was her mom in the spirit world I was communicating with. And I was talking about her being a really, you know, even still today that she went to church, like religiously. That's a funny way to say that, right? She went to church, she goes to church as a dedicated person. Like she's there all the time. She's a member of that church community. She is been going to the same one for many years. And as I was working, I was like, you know, I know that you go on Sundays. And I know that there are a lot of I don't think I said rules. But I know that there are a lot of requirements. And I know that there are certain ways to pray and certain ways to and I kept feeling like I was like, I know that it's very similar to Catholicism by No, it's not Catholic. I know. It's like being Catholic, but I know it's something right next to Catholic and I don't quite understand what religion This is. And all of a sudden she she just blurts out, oh, we're Greek Orthodox. And I just was like, Oh, okay. And I put a pin in that I finished up with the reading. And then to this lovely woman in spirit who this friend's mom who had been wanting me to communicate with her son, I was like, Okay, you did it. Good job. I'm gonna reach out to him. So I did reach out to him. This was a few years ago. And I said, you know, hey, let's schedule a zoom call. I'll send you a zoom link, and I did and we hopped on Zoom. And I was Like, hey, I want to catch up with you. But first, let me just tell you, I'm a medium now. And I would love to offer you a reading. If you feel open to it. I might have even said that to him in the message. I would love to give you a reading from your mom, if you're open to it. If not, that's fine. That's totally fine. But I just want to offer this to you as a gift if you would be interested. He said, Yes, we came on the Zoom call. I told him the story. And then I said, don't tell me anything we can catch up after. But let me do this reading for you. And I did. And I told him the story. And I was a little worried, to be honest. I was like, oh, no, I have to tell this person that like, I mean, this person in high school knew me pretty well, we were together, like I said, for almost two years. hasn't known me for many years, but knew that version of me back then. So I was like, Okay, so I'm a medium. And he was like, Yeah, I know, I've seen your social media. And he's like, I don't think it was weird at all. And he said, Actually, you were very spiritual. And in the kindest way, like a little witchy when we were kids, even you had something spiritual about you always. And I actually didn't realize that he had perceived me that back then that way, I thought he was gonna think this was a total 180 For me, but he was like, No, you were always very spiritual, you were always into signs, you're always into spiritual things. So sometimes the whole reason I'm telling you this story is to say sometimes, there are elements of us that have always been present that maybe we didn't perceive or didn't think other people perceive that they do. The other reason I'm telling you the story is because, yes, there are people way outside of my circle, like people that maybe saw me do an old career who didn't know me personally, or maybe some even co workers from the past that I don't realize, take issue that maybe take issue with what I do now. But the people closest to me, did actually accept me and did actually say like, yeah, there are some parts of this that we have maybe been able to see with you for, for quite some time, you're maybe more intuitive than, you know, then you think you've said more intuitive things over the years, or we always feel this kind of spiritual vibe with you.
Which shocked me a little bit. I'm not everybody said that either. Some people were just like, oh, okay, and moved on. So is part of what you're doing. And whatever this area of you that you want to grow into, or that you are feeling, the nudge, or maybe even the kick in the pants to let yourself expand into? Is there some part of you great or small, that is holding yourself back? Because of fear of judgment? Are you judging yourself? Is there fear of judgment of other people? Like what are people gonna say about me, when I come out of the closet as a medium when I, you know, express this version of myself, when I started dressing like this, when I decide that I actually identify as a totally different version of myself? Am I going to be accepted? And the truth is, maybe you won't, maybe not everyone will accept it, maybe there are some people that will fall away or not be as present in your life. And maybe that's okay, I feel like the place to start is, where are you with judging yourself? And where are you with giving yourself permission, maybe you don't need to fully like, jump into the deep end of whatever this is that you're feeling nudged to explore. But maybe you can give yourself permission, at least to start exploring yourself more deeply, privately. And just not worrying about just yet what other people might say. Asking yourself, if you're evaluating yourself, or if you're being judgmental, if you're passing judgment against yourself, and is there a kinder, or a more compassionate way to do it, maybe you're already past that part. Maybe you're already like, Yeah, I'm good with me. I've decided I can accept that I'm a medium for example, or that I want a totally different career or that I want to look totally different. But it's everyone else that yeah, I realize I have some fear about birthing a new version of myself and expressing it into the world for other people to see your past judgment against. And to that I say, you know, that's something we all struggle with at different times. But are you going to continue to hide your light under a like a way I keep seeing it as like, under a glass dome, like you know, those domes that they if you've ever had like room service, if you've ever had a meal brought to you and they take the warmth, warmth or cover off of it, you know, are you going to continue to hide your light or you kind of just let yourself be yourself and stuff. fighting yourself? Can you release the perceived or anticipated judgment of others and just start to move towards who you want to be? Yeah, keep evaluating yourself? Am I in alignment with my values? Do I believe I'm still being a good person? Is what I'm doing harmful to myself or others? Am I allowed to just express myself? Am I allowed to cut all my hair off? Am I allowed to start dressing totally different? Am I allowed to and whose permission do I need to make a choice for my life about myself? You know, maybe you have a partner and you want to take into consideration their feelings? But does it mean that you have to confine yourself? Does it mean that you can't grow personally as a person? Does it mean that you can't express a more true authentic version of who you're evolving into being? Yeah, maybe it'll be outside of people's comfort zone. And as we talked about earlier, human nature, especially for anyone who's sensitive to any degree is to stay in the comfort zone, right? But that doesn't mean you have to be subject to their comfort zone 100% of the time, their comfort zone doesn't get to dictate if you get to evolve as a person. And how sad would it be if we always stayed exactly the same as we always were? And we never evolved based on learning based on growth based on life experience, based on what just feels? Interesting, delicious, expansive to us. I can tell you, just from my personal experience, yeah, sure, I could have just kept my mediumship a secret, I could have not started being public with it, I could have stayed in in massage therapy, practice and wellness and never expressed a different, or what feels like a more authentic version of myself, I could have made that choice. And even if you make that choice, it's okay to not judge yourself for it. It's okay to make that choice. Slowly. That evolution for me was over many, several years. It wasn't just one overnight, and then I started telling everyone, I'm this different person, it was, it really was a personal evolution. And I feel like if that's the starting point, or that's the intention is personal evolution, then who else's permission do you need? So this is something I've been thinking about and something that I was inspired to talk to you about, I hope that it's been meaningful for you, I hope that it's given you some things to think about, for yourself about self judgment versus self evaluation about to what importance what gravity are you giving to the judgment of others as it relates to you getting to do what you want, or be who you want, or express how you want, or change your mind birthing into a new version of yourself. In this phase, who are you? In the next phase? Who are you growing into? And whose permission do you need? And really just getting honest with yourself about what are you feeling nudged towards? In what area? Are you feeling that maybe it's just the like, seedling version of growth or expansion or change or rebirth or birthing a new? What area is that for you? So I hope that I've given you some things to think about. And just know that these are things that I'm always working through and growing through and thinking about too. I hope this is a safe space for you to feel like you can grow and expand and express. And if you want to share a personal story about your own self judgment, and how that's held you back or not held you back or the judgment of others or fear of judgment and how you move through it. I would love to share it on an upcoming episode of the podcast. And you can call in to the spirit speakeasy Hotline at area code 305-928-5683. That's a 305928 love L-O-V-E, 305-928-5683 Or you can also email your story to admin@joyfulmedium.com And I can share it with or without your name on an upcoming episode your experience with rebirthing new versions of yourself. I'd love to hear from you Big hugs lots of love bye for now from inside Spirit Speakeasy