Life's Journey Coaching & Consulting

Getting ready for the next Phase of Life’s Journey. Some old, some new, all me✨ Lessons learned and still learning, ready for new ways to inspire growth and strong healthy connections ♥️ Curious? Needing inspiration & a way to grow? Ready to return to the authentic you? …stay tuned…

The purpose of Life's Journey Wellness is to accept and respect all individuals, where they are in their journey, to explore the paths taken as well as the paths that lie ahead, and to empower all people to make life changes to become their authentic selves.

Let’s be clear, this means ALL people. No questions asked.

I have a human and professional responsibility to support and advocate for all people which includes LGTBQIA+ human beings. All human beings deserve respect & human rights.

HAPPY PRIDE MONTH! 🏳️‍🌈

LGTBQIA+ Community:

I see you, I celebrate you 🦄🌈

LJW Community:

I challenge you 🏳️‍🌈

Educate: Ask questions, read books, watch documentaries, message me
Advocate: Get involved, speak up, hold up

Keep Growing!
Jodi (She/Her)

When you feed your body (including that amazing brain) nutrient dense foods, synapses fire faster, brain fog clears and that OG computer between your ears works more efficiently.
But where to begin?
🍎Limit refined sugars and processed foods
Once in awhile is okay, but think of your brain like a machine. Constantly putting nutrient void foods into your body leads to sluggish performance and cognitive decline.
🥑 Balance your macronutrients (carbs, proteins, healthy fats)
There are many apps such as My Fitness Pal that make tracking your macronutrients easy and convenient
🥗Eat more plants! Each color of phytonutrients has many unique properties including: anti-cancer, anti-inflammatory, immune boosting, hormone health, liver health, cognition, cell protection, anti-microbial. In order to get as many healthy benefits of phytonutrients, eat the rainbow!
🫐Up your game by increasing your brain healthy foods such as blueberries, walnuts, and nutrient rich spinach, kale and arugula
✨You pick where to start, just start! If you work better with structure and accountability, consider working with a Functional Medicine Health Coach (my bias as a Certified FMHC!) or another Certified Health Coach to help you tailor a food program to meet your specific needs.

Our brain is an amazingly resilient organ. Yet it, too, needs nourishment to function at its optimal level. I’m starting the series “What Are You Taking In” with Social Media.

Swipe through to clear that resentment!

If you find yourself feeling resentment, one sure way digging deep is to ask yourself:

Where do I have room to set boundaries?

Often we think our resentment is about someone else…what they have done/said, what they haven’t done/said. However, resentment is all about boundary violations and once again, it is our job to set and maintain our boundaries!

Hey, I get it. It’s easy to not recognize that we needed to set a boundary and now that it’s been crossed, shouldn’t the other person be accountable? Nope, it’s our job to go back and clarify our needs by setting a boundary.

Example:

Someone stops me on my way out of work and asks “do you have 5 minutes?” I look at my watch and agree as they proceed to process through their day. 30 minutes later I am frantically driving home SEETHING with resentment. “They don’t respect my time” “Pft, 5 minutes?” “Don’t they know I have a life outside of work!!??”

Mmm Hmm… you know it… look back on the scenario and see where it was my job to set and maintain that 5 minute boundary. Imagine if I did… I’d be home on time! And if I did not set the boundary, I would be driving home 30 minutes later asking myself “how can I set a clearer boundary next time” and practice taking agency instead of resenting.

Voila! Setting clear boundaries reduces resentment.



💚💚💚

I haven’t posted for awhile and here’s why..

Boundaries

Simply defined as:
‘what’s okay with me, what’s not okay with me’

I have had a busy couple of weeks and putting pressure on myself to post on social media is not okay with me. As a matter of fact, boundaries around my time were once my greatest challenge and now my biggest win! It’s taken a lot of time and practice to ask myself “what’s okay with me, what’s not okay with me” since the pandemic when I learned I am a closet introvert. Before saying “yes” to anything now, I look at my week and set boundaries around the balance I need to be the best version of myself. I’m definitely not perfect, but I sure try!

What are other examples of healthy boundaries? Here are a few of my fav’s. ..
😴Getting enough sleep
🧑🏼‍💻Monitoring social media by both curating your feeds for healthy intake as well as time spent
🍎Eating an 80/20 diet and keeping that 20% to moderation🍿
🚫Saying “no” to things that feel obligational but are not necessary
💲Setting a fee schedule that respects the work I do
💸Spending money only on things that bring joy
✨Managing energy by avoiding energy voids & vampires and seeking those who share energy
🫱🏼‍🫲🏽Reciprocal respectful relationships

You get to design your life with boundaries that work for you. All boundaries are set by you for you and the only one responsible for determining, setting, and maintaining your boundaries is YOU!

A few tips on setting boundaries…

Setting boundaries can be uncomfortable for everyone, but they do get easier with practice. When setting a boundary, be assertive which I define as “getting your needs met with respect to you and the other person”.

Setting boundaries is the first step, but often the boundary needs to be maintained. When someone steps on your boundary after it’s been set, it is your job to go back and remind them of the boundary.

What are some examples of boundaries you set?

🎤 Introducing…
🥁 roll please…

The Feelings Wheel 🎉

Research shows that the average American can identify 3-4 emotions. Part of improving your mental health is learning yourself. Developing insight into yourself and realizing why you think your thinks 🤔 and do the things you do begins with 🆔ing what you are feeling. We are complex human beings and we can experience a plethora of emotions all at the same time.
😄🥹😊🤨😫😭😡🤔🙄😵‍💫😲🥱😳😝😍😆🤪☹️😏😉

Understanding these emotions can help us to sort and then move through them.

You can find my favorite feelings wheel at www.feelingswheel.com

Another great resource for digging deeper into understanding emotions is Atlas of the Heart, Brené Brown.

Boundaries are good stuff... they keep us safe and let us know what is okay and what is not okay!

When it comes to any social media post, let's be clear.. it's a sound bite. A snippet of information created to promote or influence. The sound bytes I am putting out this month are offered for you to consider mental health. That's it, that's all.

I am a Licensed Professional Counselor but on social media I am not offering my professional services. I am using my wisdom.. that combination of experience and education to promote the discussion around mental health. These posts are not a replacement for therapy, they are for informational and thought-provoking purposes only.

Mental Health is a spectrum for all of us and it is FLUUUUUU-ID!

Our brain biology places us on a particular area of the spectrum ranging from significant mental illness to mental wellness. This is the hard-wiring of our brain and the chemicals that flow through the 🧠 right from the get go. Many things affect our mental health as we grow: the color of our skin, our assigned gender, the culture we are born into, the socioeconomic health of our family. These are all things that contribute to our overall mental health leading to inequities in mental health. This is one of the MANY reasons "pull yourself up your bootstraps" and other cheap and easy advice bits are SO invalidating and SO harmful.

People who say these things:
IF we could we WOULD 🙄

However, there are things we can do to move us even a little bit more toward that mental wellness end of the spectrum on any given day. Even if you are "down in the dumps" (another unhelpful idiom) and are allowing yourself all the feels (yay you!) you can continue to build your mental wellness. As a matter of fact, allowing yourself to feel those feels is so much healthier than "smiling through the rain" (someone stop me!!)

Though we may not have a say on where our brain and background set us on the Mental Health spectrum, we can commit to working toward our mental health. What is your #1 🌟no matter what go-to for improving your mental health?
Drop your 🌟below👇🏼!!

First of May! Mental Health Awareness Month begins today. Guess what year the first Mental Health Awareness began??
? 10 years ago
? 20 years ago
? 50 years ago!!?
The first Mental Health Awareness Month was held 74 years ago in 1949!! (Ironically the year both of my parents were born 🤔)The intent was, and still is, to increase and focus on mental health and wellness.