Healing Your Mind, Body, and Spirit with Dr. Edie Wadsworth

This is the transcript of an interview hosted on Ruth’s Feel Better. Live Free. podcast.

Ruth Soukup: Oh, my friends, do I have a treat for you today? My dear friend Edie Wadsworth is in the house today for a very special conversation that is so good. We had to split it into two parts. You’ll be able to listen to the first part here on my podcast, where I will interview Dr. Edie and then part two, where Dr.

Edie interviews me. We’ll be available on her podcast, the house of joy podcast on Thursday. It is a conversation that does run the gamut, but it is one that every woman needs to hear. It’s so encouraging. It’s so uplifting. It’s so powerful. And honestly, I cannot wait for you to listen in.

Welcome to the feel better live free podcast brought to you by Thinlicious. I’m your host, Ruth Sucup, and here we’ll talk about everything from the science of weight loss to practical tips for making your health a priority in the midst of a busy life. It’s a little bit nerdy, a little bit funny, and a little bit revolutionary.

So buckle up, friend, because it’s about to get real.

Hey there, and welcome back to the Feel Better Live Free podcast. For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Ruth Soukup and I’m the founder of Thinlicious and the creator of the Thin Adapted System, as well as the New York Times bestselling author of seven books. And like I said, today we are going to be chatting with Dr. Edie Wadsworth, who also happens to be our physician advisor here at Thinlicious. And she’s a mom of nine, a bestselling author, and a certified life coach, as well as the founder of the Life Mentoring School, also known as LMS. Not to mention one of my very best friends in the whole entire world. And today, as friends tend to do, we are talking about all the things.

So without further ado, let’s dive in. Edie, my Edie. 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: I know. I love you so much. I miss you so much. Is it crazy that I almost wanted to shed a tear when I saw your cutie little face on Zoom? Because I see 

Ruth Soukup: that’s so sweet. 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: I know. We never actually talk on Zoom. We always 

Ruth Soukup: just talk on the phone early in the morning when you’re going to see your grand babies.

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: I know I, you’re the only person that I would dare text at five 30 in the morning and say, Hey, can you chat on the phone while I drive to Knoxville? 

Ruth Soukup: And the answer is 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: always, yes. And we talked an entire straight hour. And then when I get to the babies, we’re still right in the middle of the conversation.

I feel like we could talk a whole nother hour. I know, 

Ruth Soukup: I know. And you always are like, okay, I gotta go. And then we have a million more things we want to talk about. So now everybody gets to listen to our conversation, but I know. Before we get into all the things let’s just give a little background for anyone who doesn’t know you yet.

How did you, who are you, what do you do and how did you get to be doing what you do now? 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: Well, I’m so glad you asked. I Ruth and I have been in the blogging world. We’re like the grandmas of blogging. Many years ago, blogging. But before that I was a family doctor. So that is what I trained to do. I did that for about 10 years.

I loved helping people make lifestyle change. I loved preventive women’s health. And that was before I had my own like natural health journey. So I was like in traditional medicine, doing family medicine. But really interested in helping people make lifestyle change. So losing weight. Stopping smoking back then.

Just making change, you know, in their life. And then I quit my job as a family doctor, stayed home with my kids and homeschooled them, which is when I started to blog, which is how I met you at a blogging conference, which was so amazing and fun. And we’ve had, I don’t know what, 12 year friendship, 14 year friendship, a long time.

Ruth Soukup: 2025. That was January of 2011. 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: Gosh, 14 years. It’s like our, it’s like our anniversary. It’s our anniversary. This is so fitting that we’re together. Yeah. And so, I started blogging and then I was way later to coming to, you know, doing online business stuff than you, but I started blogging then ended up writing a book, so I wrote a memoir that was traditionally published and in my journey, actually to healing from my past, I found the coaching world.

I ended getting, ended up getting certified as a life coach. Kind of around the same time. I had a health crash and Did a bunch of research. I didn’t want to go on a bunch of traditional medicine. Like my background was like, okay avoid that Like the plague if you can so I ended up doing a bunch of research and finding Natural health and supplements and essential oils and had this crazy transformation of getting healthy again In really mind, body, spirit in all the ways.

And from that, I ended up building a business in network marketing with young living for years. And I still have that business, but then I also became certified as a life coach, started a life coaching business. So I run a life coaching membership called Life Mentoring School, which I love. I’ve been doing that about almost six years.

And I started a Christian life coach certification. So I certify Christian life coaches and I absolutely love what I do. I love the way that I get to help women really create so much mental and emotional resilience and create lives that they absolutely adore. So in a nutshell that’s my journey here.

Oh, I do love it. So much. And then on the personal side, I am married to Stevie for 25 years. This year, we’re having our 25th wedding anniversary this summer. Thank you. And we have a beautiful, big blended family. We have nine kids. We have two grand baby boys and then a grand baby on the way. We live in East Tennessee and just are loving our lives together.

So that’s who I am. 

Ruth Soukup: Okay. So one thing you didn’t mention is that you are actually our. Physician advisor for Thinlicious, which means that you have not only helped us behind the scenes to make sure that everything that we’re teaching in our TAS program is medically sound, but you also helped to co teach many of our lessons in our main curriculum, which was so fun.

I feel like we should do that 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: again. That was so fun. I remember that was before I moved my office downstairs. So they were, those recordings were up in my upstairs office. It was so fun. I think it took us 12 weeks. I don’t know how long it took us, but every week for all those weeks that we were building out the curriculum for your program, TAS, we got to teach together.

It was so fun. 

Ruth Soukup: Yes. And it’s the curriculum is amazing. Like I can’t even tell you, we go so deep into all the stuff and it just like all the science, but also the mindset, like the thing that people talk about all the time, the lesson that people talk about. all the time is the mindset lesson, which is lesson six, which is the one that, that you led.

Do you remember that? I do because it’s my favorite thing to teach because it’s your favorite thing to teach. And I think that so often when we get into this, Journey, right? Like when you think about your health journey and I think so many people still have this idea that like, Oh, I just need the right meal plan or I just need the, give me the Ozempic shot and that’s going to fix all my problems.

Or I just need to know what to do. I need to eat less and I need to exercise more and do all the things. And it’s all about the physical piece of it. And what we really try to teach in our program, as you know, because you’ve been part of it is that it’s. It’s a combination of things. Yes.

Food is important and your food is fuel. And we teach you that. And we also teach you the science of what it’s doing, but man, it is the mindset piece more than anything else. And your program is all about mindset, which is really interesting, right? That, that you’re the doctor, but I have the health program, but it’s not the craziest thing.

It’s not unconnected. I think that’s why, like, that’s probably what makes us so such a good team here, but. I don’t think that people really always recognize that. So, so. That mindset is at the core of everything we do. So can you explain why this it’s so critical and why it’s so important and why you’re so passionate about it?

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: Yes. Yeah. So when I started learning the way that this was best demonstrated to me is when I started writing my book and I was writing a really difficult memoir. And I was writing about my past and I was learning these mindset tools. And I’m like, well, I’m sure that mindset applies to so many things, but it can’t apply to your past because how do you have a different mindset about something that actually happened?

And what I learned is that. You absolutely can have a different mindset about something that’s actually true. You can decide to change your mind about it. And when you do, and when you decide to have a new perspective, so say for instance, somebody struggling with their health and weight, and they say to themselves, well, how do I have a different mindset?

No, I’m actually 30 pounds overweight and I actually have this medical problem and this medical problem from it. So how do I. You know, I can’t think differently about something that’s true. No, you absolutely can. And when you decide to think differently, you end up creating something differently because our thoughts are powerful and they become things and what you’ve been thinking about your past or about your marriage or about your health for the last.

90 days, year that you’re living with the results of what you think. And so what you’ve been thinking about that you live with. So I first did this in relation to my past and I decided what if, even though I had these bad things that happened to me, what if I decided also my past was exactly what I needed to make me the person I am?

What if I start believing My past was, you know, exactly gave me exactly the tools that I need to create the life that I have now. What if I wouldn’t have learned those things without this past? And being able to sort of rewrite the story of my past made me see that anything is possible. You can rewrite the story of your health.

You can rewrite the story of your marriage. You can rewrite the story of your past. And I’ve been practicing that in every area of my life. And I am telling you. You literally wouldn’t recognize me from the person that I was 10 or 12 years ago, physically, mentally, emotionally. I’ve been able to re invent my life in every single area.

And I love spreading the hope that’s possible for people, no matter where you find yourself in your health, in your life, it is possible to rewrite the story you want to write, to start creating today, what you want to be living with as a 90 days from now, a year from now. And because I’ve been able to do it in the area of my health too.

When I first started my health journey, I was diagnosed with a bunch of things. My doctor told me at the time, you’ll probably live with this forever. That now 10 years later, I don’t have any signs of any of those things. Right. And I feel like I’ve been able to almost reverse age. I feel so much better than I ever have.

So I just know it’s possible in really every area of your life. And. Especially with your health because people feel so defeated in this area. And I just want women like you. I want them to have hope again. No, I can get healthy. It is possible for me. You know, and so, to me, that is just such a beautiful way to approach every part of life, but especially health.

Ruth Soukup: I love it. I love it. And so what sort of process do you take people on this mindset journey? Like, and what does that look like? Like, is somebody listening to you saying that, right? Like, okay, you just decided to change your past. Like, what does that process look like? 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: Yeah. Well, it looks like, A lot of practice.

And it looks like a lot of trial and error. And it looks like a lot of failing. It looks like saying to yourself, I remember the year that I practiced the belief, everywhere I look, I see miracles. I was not sitting in what I could see as any miracles in my own life, but I just decided like, What would happen if I practice this thought that right now I don’t really believe I also for a while practice the belief I’m fit and strong I’m fit and strong and healthy and I just practice the belief Because when you practice the thought the thing that happens is it generates emotions in you?

so whatever your default thoughts are about your health or about your past like for me my Thought was I had a terrible past and I’m probably never going to recover from it. Well, if you keep thinking that you’re going to that thought’s going to become true And if you keep thinking, you know I’ve just let myself go and i’m never going to be healthy again I’m never going to lose this weight if that’s your predominant thought that’s a very depressing thought And our thoughts our bodies are so smart that they match Our thoughts internally with this emotional experience that we have So as soon as you think that thought Your body instantly creates an emotional experience that matches the thought.

Well, I was thinking such terrible thoughts that my emotional experience of my life was terrible. I was felt sad and depressed. And, you know, I was overwhelmed and anxious, and I didn’t realize that there was so much of that, that I was contributing to with what I believed. And so I just started practicing like, well, maybe it’s possible to change that.

So I started practicing these new thoughts that I wanted to be true. And. You know, at first they don’t feel true. And at first it feels like, well, I’m not fit and strong. But as you practice them, those new thoughts are very motivating. And with those motivating emotions, you start taking walks. You start making just a little bit better choices with your food.

You start really enjoying the experience of your life. And I would get little glimpses of it. I’m like, Oh my gosh, this is kind of working. But then I would go back to those old thoughts, right? Because. They’re going to keep coming up because I’ve practiced them for so long. And as I would notice them come up, I’m like, Oh, there’s that old thought again.

Let me see if I can renew that thought, rewire my brain a little bit. And I just kept practicing. I just kept at it over and over and over again, until they started to take. And by that, I mean, Until those new thoughts started to generate these emotions inside of me, where I felt hope again, it felt possible.

I would be like, Oh my gosh, this is exciting. And as you take the actions, it’s not like, you know, manifestation where you just think something and it appears. No, you think something, it generates emotion. That emotion drives action. And as you take those actions. You start to see like, Oh, as I go for walks and as I continue to practice these thoughts that I want to be true, my life starts to change.

And it, it wasn’t overnight for me. It took a long time. It took dedication to practicing this over and over. But as I did that, I started noticing like, Oh, I feel differently about my life. My experience of my own life is different. Yes. I can start to see these. Amazing gifts from my past. Oh, I can start to see that I do feel better physically when I’m taking these actions toward my health.

And just slowly, but surely with lots of tools and, you know, things that you and I talk about in TAS, things that I teach in my program, you know, I really just started to change my beliefs and I’ve practiced it for so long now that people are like, Oh my gosh, you’re the most positive person. I know the way you think about life is so radical and different than anybody I know.

But I want to say, well, you should have been with me 10 years ago because I’ve been practicing and practicing and practicing. So now it feels like. This is just who I am. This is just how I see life. I see possibility. I see that you can make the change you want to make. And now I know it’s possible in every area of my life.

So I just get excited to what new thought do I want to practice now? You know, 

Ruth Soukup: does it start with. Okay. I’m having this thought. I need to change the thought. Is it, do you start with, Oh, this is the result I’m getting. This is not the result that I want to be having. So how do I get a different result and then work backwards to find the thought that’s leading to that result?

Or is it like almost like a circle where you can do it’s like a circle.

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: Yeah. It’s like a circle. And that’s exactly how I teach it in my program. So to be honest, one of the ways, because in the circle, it’s basically cognitive behavioral therapy, thoughts, create emotions, drive actions. And that circle is what gives you the results you’re getting in your life.

And a lot of times where I enter the circle is through my emotions, because I’ve learned to be very in touch with my emotions. So if I wake up one day and go, Oh, I just feel so unmotivated, or I feel. Overwhelmed today, or I feel really down today. That’s where I usually can enter the circle easiest because I know what I’m feeling.

And from that, I can say, Oh, well, what’s driving that? What are the thoughts that are driving that? And I’ll notice these sneaky thoughts, like even as practiced as I am at this, I will still get the sneaky thoughts that come up. I just recently had one that I had convinced myself that I probably couldn’t create anything as amazing as what I already had.

Kind of like a lot of people will think my best days are over or I’ve had my best health. And there was this sneaky thought that in my business, like I’ve probably done the biggest thing I can do. And what a sneaky thought to have. Of course I haven’t, of course, my best days are ahead. Of course, I’m still full of amazing ideas and things that I can create for my clients that will give them amazing transformation, but it was such a sneaky thought that I believed.

And so for a while I didn’t create anything new because secretly, right? Because secretly I was thinking, well, I did it. I did my thing. 

Ruth Soukup: And so 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: as soon as I in that conversation with you, I know, and I’m just 

Ruth Soukup: going to do this one thing forever. This is 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: it. And as soon as I caught the thought, which was back in the fall, I was like, Oh heck no.

Of course, I’m creating something new. Of course, I still have so much in me left to give. And right now I’m creating a master coach program for my coaches. And I’ve never been more on fire, but it was just a sneaky thought that even as a practiced mindset coach had gotten lodged in there. So, 

Ruth Soukup: yeah. So, I mean, I sounds like you’ve already answered this a little bit, but when it comes to mindset, there’s really a point that you’ve, there’s never a point that you’ve arrived, right?

Like it’s, there’s never a point where you’re like, okay, I’ve done the mindset work. Now I’m good. Now I got this figured out. Like it. Always comes up. So how do you deal? How do you deal with that? Like, how do you make sure that you are still staying on top of it and not letting those thoughts 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: sometimes they will sneak up on you, but I make a habit to practice thoughts every day.

So it’s part of my routine. What does that look like when you practice thoughts? Like, 

Ruth Soukup: do you, well, it’s funny being in the mirror, talking to yourself. 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: No, for me. It’s in my, I have it in my planner. So I designed a planner that goes along with my program and in there we practice thoughts every day. There’s a line in there for the thought that you’re practicing today.

Ruth Soukup: Yeah. 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: And so it literally becomes just one of the things that I do every day and I normally can access the thoughts by the emotion. So I’m usually asking myself, Oh man, I feel so energized today. So excited today. Why? And I think of like, what’s the thought that’s driving that or gosh, I feel really frustrated or I feel really stuck, you know, and then I can access the thought and then I decide what do I want to think instead, like, you know, I don’t want to go around with the thought all day, you know, whatever it is for your people or, you know, like.

I’m never going to get healthy again. That’s not the thought that I want to practice because that’s not what I wouldn’t want to create in my life. So then I’m asking myself, okay, people say that all the time. You’re going to work for me, never going to work for me. And instead, you know, I will teach my people like, no, It’s all about trying and failing.

So if I fail 10 times, I’m so close to my breakthrough. And so that, especially with health and weight, that is my favorite thought. Like if I’ve tried this and I found 10 things that don’t work or 10 ways of doing it, that, that are not sustainable for me, I’m so close to my breakthrough. And I love the process of figuring it out for myself because a lot of times we think, well, If I just get to the goal, if I get to the weight, if I get to the health, then everything will be fine.

But I promise you it won’t because we all know people in Hollywood who have the health, who have the body, who have the weight, who have the husband, who have the house and are miserable. So where you create that fulfillment and meaning and satisfaction, That you’re really craving is here in your mind, in your heart.

You create it here first, then whatever the results are physically are great. But even if you get the physical results and don’t do the mindset work, you still won’t be satisfied. You’ll think, Oh, well, I need five more pounds or I need whatever, you know, instead of learning to really create the results you want internally for yourself.

Mentally, emotionally, and then when you do that the external results are great. Really, what we’re wanting is an experience of life and you’re the only one that can ever create that. Your weight won’t create that. Your health won’t create that. Your job won’t create that. Your spouse won’t create that.

So that is always your job to do. And so I just make it my job every day. Here’s my job. I practice my thoughts. I practice the emotions that I want to create. And from there, it drives these actions and you’re so good at the action. I feel like I’ve had to spend a long time being good at the mindset. 

Ruth Soukup: I am the action girl.

Like you have brought me along on the mind, on the mindset piece, but I. But I see it, right? Like, and I, well, and I don’t know if that’s necessarily true. Cause I spent a lot of time in therapy, you know, going crazy when my twenties gave me a two year sentence to mental health. But it’s really did dbt did CBT all the BTs.

But I think, but I, it’s funny now because it’s been what? 25 years since all of that and spending all that time. But I really, I, those tools are tools that I pull out every single day of like the mindfulness of. Controlling your emotions and learning how to control your thoughts and understand, like, just because I think it doesn’t mean it’s true.

And like all of these like little things that. Once you start to learn them and you’re in an environment, I think that part two, that’s so important is that you are in an environment where that becomes the norm that you’re hearing it and you’re embracing it and you’re learning how to embody it. It’s very hard to do all of this in a vacuum on your own.

It’s like you, because you don’t have that normalization from other people who are working on mindset, or you might have the opposite, which are people that are surround and surrounding you who are. Not supportive or in a negative space. I mean, you can act like I almost have this, like, I don’t know how you are, you’re nicer than me, but I get into these situations where you’re with people who are just like negative energy.

Everything that comes out of their mouth is just like one up, one up on you on like how much worse their life is and how bad everything is and why they can never change and I just. And I just want to like, take them and shake them and go, don’t you know, there is a better way. Don’t you know, there is like, I just want, I don’t, I just want for your life to, for you to see that there is a different way of living.

Where you are not controlled by all of these negative thoughts. Because they, that they just keep coming and you think that you, there’s nothing that you can do about them. And so that’s why I see like there, if we could just get around more people that are. Like thinking this way and then the trickle down effect of that is crazy too, like it doesn’t matter what part of your life you start applying that to, it will spill over into every other part of your life.

And so if you focus on. Mindset when it comes to your health journey, then it becomes mindset in relation to your marriage. Then it becomes mindset in relation to your career. Then it becomes mindset in relation to your friendships. Like it’s amazing how that works. And I, we see that in TAS, like all the time.

And I’m sure you see that in your program all the time. You have people that come because they want to fix their marriage. And they probably end up like getting a new job, 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: right? Like, well, the funny thing is in our program, because our program, I mean, I have a little course in there called unlock your metabolism because I do love helping people you know, get healthy again, but I mostly just send them to your program because I don’t teach that formally in my program.

But the number one thing that the side effect that people have of being in my program is they lose weight because they just get healthier mentally and emotionally. So that they can deal with their life. They don’t need to cope with food. They’re just dealing with their life so much more. And you’re so right about the people that you surround yourself with, because this is a hard, well, maybe that’s a limiting belief, but for a lot of people, it can be a tough thing to do to change your mind because you’ve worn a rut in your brain for 40 years or 50 years with this way of thinking.

And when you’re trying to build new roads in there, It takes work. And one of the ways to make the work go faster. Well, one of that we just talked about, practice it every day, write it down, say it to yourself, just practice it. Second way is to surround yourself with people who this is just the way they think, and then that just becomes the water you swim in.

So, Again, we both have done that for ourselves in this online world, you know, surrounding yourself with other business owners or whatever that have learned to practice this. Cause listen, nothing will teach you how to practice it like building an online business. And. Yeah. And so, you know, the process of doing, and I think you have to commit to it.

One of the things that I think really helps too, and you alluded to this, is that your brain is going to offer you you know, I think they say 50, 000 thoughts a day and you just have to learn to say, Oh, my brain, you separate yourself from your brain. From what your brain is doing. Oh, my brain is offering me the thought.

I’m never gonna get healthy. I hear you brain, but here’s what I’ve decided to practice, right? And so you make a little separation between all those thoughts that your brain offers you versus the ones that you want to embody, the ones that you want to really decide like, this is what I’m focusing on. And that little separation really helps because all day long your brain is gonna offer you negative thoughts.

That’s its job. It’s trying to keep you safe. It doesn’t want you doing this new program. It doesn’t want you setting this new goal. It wants to keep you kind of stuck where you are, because if it keeps you where you are, it doesn’t have to expend as much energy. So that’s your brain’s job. Your job as the owner of this amazing mind you have is to guide your mind where you want it to go.

And that is where the intention comes in. 

Ruth Soukup: Is there any sort of trick to it? Like, do you have to, do you have to start slowly with the changes of your thoughts? Like, do they have to be dramatic changes or I don’t know if I’m wording this correctly. Like, can you literally tell yourself anything? Like I could be Julia Roberts if I want to be like, well, no, probably not.

But right. Like my brain is telling me I can’t be Julia Roberts. If I start telling myself that I don’t think I’m going to believe that. I probably am not going to be an astronaut. But, and so if I start telling myself that I’m not, I’m, that doesn’t mean I’m going to be going up into space. So, 

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: But one of the tools that we teach you for doing this, that’s a great question.

People ask that a lot is that what we are trying to do is become more of who God made us to be, become more of our true selves, living our lives on purpose by design. So when I tune into that, like my highest, the highest version of me that I could become like fully me. What does that look like? Well, for me, that means I love writing and I want to write books and I want to add value to women and help them change their lives.

Like if I tune into my real desires, those desires that God has given me that feel so true to me, if I tune into that, It doesn’t have me saying crazy things like, Oh, I want to be an NBA basketball player. Well, I’m five, four. I probably never will do that, but that’s not really the desire of my heart anyways.

Right. And so I think if you really tune into those true desires that you’ve been given that call that you’ve been given on your life, like one of mine forever was, I wanted to adopt a child and. It didn’t seem like that was ever going to happen for me because I already had an established family. We had a bunch of kids.

We pursued adoption for a little while. It didn’t work out that first time, but there was something about it that kept coming up for me. And I don’t know, I just trusted, like if it’s supposed to happen I’ll keep putting myself in a position where I could do it. And it’s funny because then. My husband ends up coming home with this whole story about this little boy He met like it ended up coming true But again, that was just always like this really true desire that I always had And so if you ask yourself like what make what would you know, make me the most potent loving Powerful nurturing version of me those true desires that we’ve been given.

It won’t be crazy things like that It will be Things that, you know, God really has put on your heart. And so, yeah, I mean, put in the result line for your life, whatever you want, but really tune into what you really want, you know what I mean? Yes, 

Ruth Soukup: I do. And I think that for a lot of women, that’s really hard.

Right. Like I, I hear that. I mean, like we’ve both been doing this for a long time. I’ve been coaching women for a really long time. And the thing that I have heard over and over again, because that, you know, I used to talk about goal setting and setting big goals and it’s so important. And that’s how you decide your productivity, right?

All the things I just, I don’t know what I want. I just want to want something like they’re paralyzed by indecision of just deciding on What it is and whether, do you think they’re really parent? Like, do you think they really don’t know or they’re afraid to admit it to themselves?

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: This is my second favorite thing to talk about besides mindset. And I’ll tell you why women don’t know what they want, because we have disconnected from ourselves and from our emotional lives for so long. That we really don’t know what we want. And what I help women do is through mindset and emotional work, connect back to themselves.

We have to stop ignoring ourselves. We have to stop ignoring our emotional lives. We have to stop ignoring thing. We have to stop ignoring ourselves because it’s exactly the thing that women always tell me. I don’t even know what we want. And as soon as she says that I know what that means. That means life has been really painful at times.

And at some point I needed to disconnect because it was too hard. It was too painful. It was too much. It was too whatever. And that disconnection that we have. Done for good reason for survival reason or whatever. I remember when I did it as a kid, like I disconnected, I just started living in my head and totally disconnected myself from my emotional life.

And we do that for various reasons that are good reasons probably, but what we have to do now that, you know, most of us are in midlife and we have to decide, no, I’m connecting back to her. Emotions are just gifts from God. Messengers. They’re not to be feared, they’re to be felt, they’re to be experienced.

And when we open ourselves back up to that, I find that what happens is those dreams have been there all along and you will get access to them as soon as you decide, no, I’m connecting back to my life, to myself, to my emotional life. It’s not, I think we were scared of it because I remember this and because I had such a hard past, I’m like, I have to disconnect from that because it’s too hard.

To face and when I opened myself back up to it, what I realized is no, there’s so much wisdom in those emotions. Let me open myself back up to my emotional life. They’re just waves that pass through us. Again, gifts from God, nothing to be feared. And when I started doing that, it wasn’t very long at all until I started waking up to my dreams, because what happens is if you’re suppressing your emotions, your whole life, it’s like you’re carrying them in a backpack too.

Okay. I’ll deal with that later. How many times? Mentally, have we said that, like, I don’t even have time to grieve this. I don’t have time for this. We just load it up in a backpack. We carry it all around. I carried mine around for literally 44 years. And when I decided to dismantle that, to see what’s in the backpack, to take, you know, let all of this stuff come out first of all, none of it killed me.

I’m fully capable of feeling grief, of feeling disappointment, of feeling rejection. And feeling those emotions makes me strong. I say this to my clients all the time. Every emotion you’re willing to feel makes you stronger. Every emotion you’re unwilling to feel makes you weaker. And what happened to me is as I was willing to feel all of that and be present with myself in the grief, in the disappointment, in the rejection, And I’m like, Oh, okay.

So that didn’t kill me. It made me stronger. It made me lighter. So now there’s room in this life and this heart for my dreams again. So I just started to wake up to all the things I had always wanted. And I started putting those on my goal list. Okay. Now I want to create this. Now I want to work on my relationship to money.

Now I want to write a book. Now I want to start a program. There’s like been no into it since I. Unpacked that. So 

Ruth Soukup: I think as you were saying that it was just re reminding me, I had like this flashback to being in the mental hospital and having to do anger therapy and where they, we would go into the gym.

And they would give us this big bucket of clay balls and we’d literally have to take the clay and throw it as hard as we could at this board and as we were doing it, I’m angry at you, right? Like you’re speaking to all your trauma and the people that you’re angry at and all this stuff. But it was like such a thing, right?

Because you don’t let, you don’t let that stuff out and you don’t unpack it. I mean, that’s a very physical. Example of it, but I think . But in true Ruth, so much truth in true Ruth fashion, I went early and I went totally all in when I decided to go crazy, got it all out of my system and my twist got it all out.

And then I was good, honestly like, like, and I say that a little bit flippantly and it’s not a flippant subject like depression and suicide. Yeah. And all that stuff is not flippant and I don’t mean it that way, but no, I am. Have been well now, like completely well with zero depression for 25 years, which is pretty amazing.

Right. When, especially when you consider that most people who go through something like that are lifers in, in that kind of situation. And so I just, I do think, but as you’re saying that, I think I like, there is something to be said. For letting go of all of that past hurts so that you can be your true self so that you can step into it and whatever it takes, however painful it might be to do it, man, the benefits and the other side of that are worth it.

Dr. Edie Wadsworth: Well, and it’s so interesting that you say that about anger because. I remember the session where I felt like a thousand pounds lighter when I left the session. And what I confessed in that session was I’m angry with my dad. And I had never allowed myself to say that because I felt bad for him. So I didn’t allow my own emotion and I’d suppressed it for so long.

And. I thought, well, that maybe it means I don’t love him if I say that, but once I got that out, it felt like such a relief and it felt like such a way to honor myself. It’s okay that I, of course, and I say this to my clients all the time, when you have hard emotions, your big sister, part of yourself needs to say, of course you feel angry.

Of course you’re disappointed and that’s okay. And in learning to be with ourselves in those difficult emotions, I feel like is one of the best ways to connect back to ourselves and then. Man, watch out because you do have dreams and goals. You have so much possibility still within you. And when you can learn to really let that backpack go, take it, take some time, see what’s in there, unpack it a little bit, honor yourself.

For why you needed to carry all that around. You don’t have to be mad at yourself for doing it. You can honor yourself. And I really had to come to terms with, look, of course, that’s what I did because it was so hard, what I was trying to process. I couldn’t do it at the time. I didn’t have the skills.

Now I’m older, I’ve got the skills. I can do this. And it was so powerful, but yeah, anger was the one that unlocked it for me. I feel like we could talk about this all day. Guess what? There is a, to be continued part of this podcast. Surprise. We are going to keep talking. So tune in for part two and I’m so excited because in part two, we’re going to, we’re going to delve into Ruth’s expertise and I can’t wait for you to learn from her. She’s amazing. So, all right, we’ll see you there. Okay. Bye for now. 

Ruth Soukup: All right, guys. That about does it for this episode, but like I said, this is only part one.

Part two will be aired on Thursday on Edie’s podcast, which you can find by searching for the House of Joy podcast or searching Edie Wadsworth or by clicking HERE.