[00:00:00]
Sometimes I think when we're working on healing or working on ourselves, we can get so caught up in the healing process that we might forget to actually heal. Let's talk about it in this episode of Success In Mind.
Many years ago, I was attending a three day mastermind summit with about 20 other entrepreneurs, very intimate setting, beautiful setting. And they brought in guest speakers to educate us on different aspects of growing our businesses. And after one particular speaker spoke, [00:01:00] he made an offer to attend his three day personal development seminar, and people were so excited about it.
We broke for lunch after that speaker. And I remember sitting at my table with several other women and they were all talking about, Oh, I can't wait. I'm definitely going to sign up to attend that weekend event. And I just sat there quietly eating my lunch. And then one of the ladies turned to me and said, Teri, are you going to attend?
And I said, no, probably not. It was like there was an audible gasp at the table. People were stunned that I wouldn't go. They said things like, what do you mean? It's such a great offer. It's such a great price. It's going to be so incredible. And I said, yeah, yeah, I'm sure it will be incredible. But I've attended a lot of three day weekend seminars and You know, how many weekend seminars do we need to attend before we're [00:02:00] good?
Stunned faces looking back at me. And I continued, and I said, well, really, think about it. Do any of these self development trainers teach anything revolutionarily different at their weekend event? Or have you heard it? Have you gotten the message? Because how many times do we need to attend these things before we're good and can carry on with life?
They're all teaching the same things, packaged a little bit differently, but it's all the same concepts. So how many of these do you need to attend before you're okay? Before you're ready to move on with life? Silence came back to me. No one knew what to say and so I was just like, well, you know, but if, if you feel called to go and enjoy it.
But I could tell they were all thinking a little bit differently. So cut ahead to last summer. Last summer, I was interviewed on another [00:03:00] podcast with Lauren Gaggioli, who you might recall was. Also on this podcast, I think in the summer, yeah, I think in August, her episode came out August or September, and she's an SEO expert.
So she invited me to come back onto her show and it was a fantastic conversation. I really enjoyed talking with her on both occasions. And she asked me the question, Teri, is the work ever done? And I think I gave her an answer that she probably wasn't expecting. Is the work ever done? And I said, yeah, I think so.
I mean, I sure hope so anyway, but yeah, I think, I think there has to be an end point. Otherwise, what's the point? And you might be shocked to hear this coming from someone who's made her career in personal development through coaching and training others and NLP and hypnotherapy and timeline therapy.
But I really think there needs to be an [00:04:00] end in mind. I see people all the time who get so invested in their personal development. That they never actually apply what they're learning. There's no growth, there's no transformation, there's no healing. And it's almost like they're just constantly chasing the high that the seminars give them.
You know what I mean? That seminar high? So they go to these three day events, and they get their big rush, the big dopamine hits. And they break their board, or they break the arrow, or whatever it is, whatever the magic moment is at that seminar. And I'm not dissing those, by the way. I have people break boards in some of my trainings, and it is a very transformational moment.
But then what? So you leave this three day event on this big rush, this big high that your life has just changed for the better, but do you take the time to implement what you learned? Do you take the time [00:05:00] after to strategically change your behaviors, to change your perspective on things? Are you actually applying what you're learning there?
Or do you just ride out the high and then look for the next three day seminar? Or maybe you invest in a week long seminar next time or a retreat. And this time you do the exact same stuff, but now you're in Mexico or Costa Rica. And you do the exact same stuff, packaged differently. Different trainers, different people around you, a different board.
But you go through the same kind of journey, the same kind of learning. To get that rush once again. I would go so far as to think that sometimes people get addicted to personal development and they never actually do the developing. I had a client before who came to me many years ago. Well, first she came to me as a student of my trainings.[00:06:00]
And She had a massive breakthrough through the trainings, a couple of massive breakthroughs, actually. And then she came to me for coaching. And it became really clear to me after working with her for a while that she was just chasing that high she gets after having a big breakthrough. And she just wanted more and more and more.
And so eventually we had to have a difficult conversation about that. That, you know, this isn't really getting her where she wants to be because all she's after is the rush, the thrill of a breakthrough. But she's not actually breaking through if she's not moving forward.
So I go back to the question, is the work ever done? I don't think we're meant to spend our entire lifetimes. And let me, let me clarify that. I think we are meant to spend our entire lives growing and developing, but I don't think we're meant to be constantly [00:07:00] dredging stuff up to heal, you know, doing the work, efforting through it, getting into the muck of it and digging up all the childhood trauma and past life trauma.
If you can't find in your past lives, go back into generational trauma and dig it up and, and sit in the muck of it. I don't think we're meant to spend our lifetimes doing that. I think we're actually meant to have a lot of joy and fun in our lives. And that to me is not fun. And I love personal growth and development, but at some point you've got to say, Hey.
I'm good. I'm good. I'm ready to challenge myself in a new way. I'm ready to grow in this new area of life or this new direction. But if you're constantly revisiting the same old stuff, the same old behaviors, and you're never actually changing, then are you really even doing the work? There's a speaker that I know in the personal development space who always talks about healing work, [00:08:00] constantly healing, that after decades of doing this, uh, they are constantly still in a state of healing.
And I'm like, but what's What is being healed at that point? If you've been after this for decades, what are you still healing from? And is it effective? Now, granted, maybe new stuff comes up or you become aware of something that you haven't dealt with before that you need to address. I've certainly had that happen.
I've been at this personal development game since, well, the 2000s, first by reading books. I think my very first book that sort of opened the door for this, for me, was a book by Pema Chodron called When Things Fall Apart, Heart Advice for Difficult Times. That was my first peek into this world of personal development and growth. And then I read The Alchemist, [00:09:00] The Celestine Prophecy, which I know is a, you know, many of us read on our journeys. And then it continued from there and I was devouring books on spirituality, Buddhism, uh, mysticism, new age philosophies, books by Wayne Dyer, books, anything I can get my hands on, I was devouring.
And then I started going to seminars and trainings and developing further. And for me, it just got to a point where I was like, okay. Okay, I've, I've done this part of the work. I've done this part. I'm ready for what's next. And for me, that was learning NLP, hypnosis, timeline therapy. And then that was kind of the, the thing for me, the thing that did the work that did the healing.
And I'm not going to say that life has just been smooth sailing from there. Other things have come up. Sure. I have a husband who has [00:10:00] PTSD that contributed to some issues for myself. I, um, took on some of that trauma and it became my own trauma that I had to deal with and I went to therapy for that. I guess what I'm trying to get at my point in all of this is that too often in the personal development space, people become addicted to doing the healing and they forget to actually heal.
So if you keep dredging through the same stuff over and over, ask yourself, are you really Are you really doing it? Are you really applying what you're learning? Or are you just chasing another high, another fix, something to put a band aid over what's really hurting and not actually dealing with the wound?
Because I'll say it again, I don't think we're meant to spend our entire lives [00:11:00] healing and working and efforting to make ourselves better. I think we are meant to grow and to learn and challenge ourselves in new and wonderful, beautiful ways. But I don't think it's meant to be hard and sticky. So I ask you, are you in it for the healing or are you in it to heal?
And if you don't understand the difference, maybe, maybe this message is for you then. Thank you so much for joining me today. I will be back again later this week. I do have some more interviews coming up to bring you some more guest experts onto the show. And for now, I hope you have a wonderful week.
I'll talk to you soon, my friends.
