Look For The Good with Mindset Coach Carrie Rowan: Julia Fox Garrison

0:00What if the way you've been telling your life story reveals the secret to what is holding you back? Stories play an integral part in how we see not only ourselves, but the whole world. Stories are more than just an important part of communication. They also reveal hidden aspects of our inner talk, which can either support us, or end up holding us back from the very things we want most in life, without us even realizing it. Join author, mindset coach, and award-winning singer-songwriter Carrie Rowan on her show Look for the Good, Carrie Monday at 5 a.m. and 5 p.m., when she shares nuggets of wisdom from her internationally bestselling book, Tell a New Story, five simple steps to release your negative stories, and bring joy to your life. Carrie's powerful stories and compelling guests will empower you to change how you look at your own life, while giving you some powerful tools and tips you can use every day to help you feel better, and move yourself closer to the life you've been longing to live. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Look for the Good, I'm your host, Carrie Rowan, mindset strategist, and speaker, and I love sharing nuggets of wisdom about the stories

1:04that we tell each other, but more importantly, those little stories that we tell ourselves. And you can join me and my special guests as we share our personal stories of strength and triumph each week here on DreamVision 7 Radio Network. You can listen online, you can listen on your mobile device, or in your car, you can even ask Alexa to play DreamVision 7 Radio, and tune in every Monday at 5 a.m. and 5 p.m. Eastern to get real stories and tips on how to turn your story and your life around. And evolve with us as we unite humankind with universal love. And I'm so excited to be here, I have Julia waiting in the wings, hello Julia. And before we get started, you guys know I love talking about stories, right? And it's those stories like I said before, it is the ones that we tell each other. It's catching ourselves in those stories, how do we tell our stories, what is the story, how does it make me feel, how does it make the listener feel. And these stories we don't realize, the very worst ones, unfortunately, we say for ourselves, right?

2:05Those little quiet ones in our head, you'll never amount to much, or, oh, don't, you're not a good writer, whatever those little things are that spin around in our head all the time, because here's what I know for sure, it's that they're not true, right? But we just keep living based on those beliefs, because we never really take the time to stop and question them. That's why I love this work. Once you start digging into those stories that you tell yourself, you can pick them up and look at them and say, hey, is this, is this a loving story to myself? How does this make other people feel when I tell this story? And if your, your purpose is to inspire and in live and, um, which is what we all want to do as humans, right? And you can look at those stories, you can start to rework those stories, you can start to disassemble those limiting beliefs that are stuck in there from when you were like seven years old, and I always say to my clients, I'm like, would you let your seven year old drive the car? No, you wouldn't, but they're driving the show now, they're driving your life in a lot of ways, those little stories. So I love getting our arms around those. And another thing I know for sure is that when a client comes to me with a story, and I can't wait to dive into Julia's amazing story, stories, because she has a lot of them, um,

3:10is that when we say it's our worst story, our most awful, fill in the blank, our saddest or our, just most horrible story, I know that we're on the verge of a breakthrough because that, my friends, is where I super power lies. And that's exactly what Julia is going to talk about and share with us today. So pull a seat up and away we go with Julia Fox, Garrison, hello, Julia, do you mind if I read your bio real quick with them? Oh, go ahead. Okay. So, um, oh, wait a second, you've got a couple bios here. I'm going to do the shorter one because just for the sake of time, um, let's you guys can get the longer one on my, on my show notes. So Julia Fox, Garrison grew up in a loving, if chaotic household with eight brothers, wow, I'm upbringing that no doubt made her battle ready for the fight of her life at age 37, while busy raising a family and building a career, her plans and dreams were changed forever by a sudden and severe stroke. Thus Julia began a journey of recovery, rediscovery and reinvention on a adversity came an accomplished

4:15author dedicated health care advocate and powerful motivational speaker. Amazing. Julie is a seasoned keynote speaker and the best selling and award-winning author of don't leave me this way or when I get back on my feet, you'll be sorry, Harper Collins publishers. The book chronicles her struggle to regain control over her life and her body, following a mass of hemorrhage resulting in a paralyzing stroke. As Julia claims, she's been hospitalized so many times, she's earned a PhD, personal health care slash happiness discoveries of blueprint for how not to let the system dictate the direction, pace and objective of one's recovery. That's so amazing. I love that. Thank you so much for sharing that. Well, I'm very happy to be here and one of the things with stroke is that at 37 years old back then, there were no cell phones either, so it was a long, right, hoof.

5:15But it's a profoundly breaking experience and it felt the way I equated is like a tornado ripping through my life and shattering every part of me, my image of who I thought I was. Mother, I went through an identity crisis. I was, was I a mom, no, my, I had to have someone care for my three year old. He turned, he turned three on a Saturday. We had a birthday party for him and five days later, I died on an operating table during brain surgery. I live in the flat line. Wow. I, I, I share this in, in my talks that you, I had a choice to either leave or come back and the choice was very distinct that it would be a broken body. So my left side is, is paralyzed or they call it hemie weakness. It's not very functional and I have a lot of deficits still to this day. Now it's 29 years later. Wow. Wow. I've been through two more health crises that, that usually you're only one per, your

6:20personal, it gets once and I've had three now. One was double vision for 14 months with a brain injury of the, of blow to the back of my head, which was misdiagnosed. Wow. And just my most recent is in 22, I was diagnosed with stage four stomach cancer. And wow. Like the stroke, I, I was, I had, I had some negativity given to me about my prognosis, you know, to just pat my bags, do get my affairs in order and just live the rest of my life what it was left. And I just truly felt that the, the more negativity that I received, the more, the more defiant I got. Yeah. Defiance. Defiance is a form of resilience. And I, and I feel like, you know, I, I have a lot of scars, but my scars is the legacy of my resilience. I love that.

7:20And it really is, you know, when I say that I survived, it's usually when we say we survived, I made it, but I really wanted to thrive. So I, I grew because of it, I, I acquired wisdom because of it. And, and I, I wouldn't, I wouldn't take anything back, be honest with you, if that's, that alarms people, I, I have to say I went through hell and back, I came home and I, I, after three months in the hospital with the stroke. And it was a, I felt completely broken in a wheelchair. I didn't even recognize myself, never mind, you know, you know, I didn't even know what to do with myself. I didn't, was I going to go back to the corporate world and the more negativity I received in my recovery, the more I realized I had a story that I had to tell. And so I wrote this book. It's a four year window of my recovery. It's, it's, it's not a blow by blow recovery story.

8:23It's actually a very interactive read. The first few chapters are in, in, in third person, you see Julia kiss her husband and her three year old and go to a corporate job an hour away. And within, um, and within that ride, she's thanking God for house home and all the very obvious things. And once the hemorrhage occurs, I end the chapter with she's gone and start up with you. So now you're on the journey of the gurney with me. Wow. You feel everything I felt, the frustration, the anger and once, um, you know, a predominantly written in second person, at the end, it's in first person, two chapters because I wanted to show, um, the things I've learned without preaching to the reader and I've learned so much. And I continue to learn. I mean, we are beings that are always learning, you know, we talk a lot about hope. And I always say that hope is always evolving, the hope that you had in the morning is going

9:24to be different than the hope you have in the evening, but based on your experiences. Yeah. Is so true. Yeah. And I, I go off, I've been told, oh, you really bounced back and I don't, I don't really believe in bouncing back, we're not rubber bands, um, bouncing back means that we're returning to original form and I believe that we need to transform through the experience. And we're not going to be that same person as before. So each experience I've been through has taught me some type of lesson. I used to be the most impatient person and I feel like God wanted to, you know, with stroke, it's your recovery is measured in minutiae. It is so the, the, so when I was thinking God for a house home and family and all those big things at the end, I was thinking for autonomy, being able to go and brush my teeth myself, get myself, what, what my ask for that, my, you know, it was hate to lose on my

10:28own because I was a three person assist and I couldn't do anything. I had to be fed and, um, I had to do, everyone had to do my bodily functions was, was, was not mine. It was, it's, it's very disassociating. Oh, so you can only imagine. Yeah. You go through a lot of different emotions and like I said, that identity crisis happened and I, I had to reinvent myself, which is what happens with all of us. You have the choice to reinvent or, or just stay stuck. Yeah. And, yeah. I, I, I, I, I, I'm, I'm, I just said to my mother, I took it to the doctor's yesterday, she was like, it'll go away, go away. She has a pneumonia. No, it doesn't go away. She needs to be treated. Mm-hmm. I said, mom, you have to find a way to be more proactive than reactive. And that's what we do is we, we, we, we're often reacting to what our outside forces are.

11:29The proactive means that you're going and you're making that outcome. And I, I have, like I said, the, the book that I wrote was to show others that even when you're being told that you're most likely going to die, that you still, your spirit, your human spirit has no parameters. And I, I have really defied all the odds with, with both the stroke and with, um, with the double vision that, that was, uh, diagnosed as my stenegravist disease. And it actually was a blow to the back of my head and it took 14 months to heal. Wow. Wow. And then the cancer, which I call Cindy, um, because it, and, and people say, why do you call it, call it Cindy? I said, well, when you hear cancer, immediately, we all get like that black, that darkness. What was Cindy, I think of it as I have a friend, she's light in bubbly and it also was

12:30a method of disassociating the disease from me. Wow. That's really smart, really, really smart. Yeah. And, and from that, I, um, I was told that I was only had three years to live and I was like, well, get out of my way. I've been in the two percentile twice before and we all, we're all striving for that. We're all striving to get in that exceptional. Well, that's what I was just told by my own colleges in Boston. They actually took a vial of blood my last. I get pet scanned every three months and I got pet, I got a, uh, a lab drawn this last time that was for research. And I said, well, what, what are you researching? And they said, well, you're not a two percent, you're a one percent. You are in an exceptional group that is, is, is, is beating this. And I am, I am, I am disease free as today. Oh. Congratulations.

13:30Talk, let's talk about that for a second because you said a couple really important things. You said a lot of really important things, but I love what you're talking about with choice, right? Because the salt comes down to choice and you could choose to live in the negativity that they will often give you in the medical world, right? I understand that. I do people have them myself and you can choose to live in that or you can choose to say, yeah, no, this is wait. This is my body. Here's how I want to do this, right? Because we have a lot of internal control, even though we think we don't because we have to give a lot of it over there. But what I love mostly when I saw you talk is that you and I met at the Chamber of Commerce on it. I saw you do your talk on your book and it was so moving. But that, we have to, it's a weird thing about humans, but we need to keep being reminded that we have a choice because we fall into this haze, right? Of like, I'm just going to follow what they say and listen to all the doctors and I'm going to take all this bad. But truly, this and our spirit cannot live anything else, right? Which is what you're talking about and how did you choose when you got all that bad,

14:31like all that bad information, all the bad news, right? Most people, a lot of people, it would be very traumatizing. You've had this experience before, right? So how did that affect you like? What did you say to yourself, which I love talking to people about, did you have a little mantra, did you have a little something that you said to yourself to get you through? Absolutely. Yes. Well, first of all, it's the mind-body connect. So you were talking about earlier when, on your intro, about our self-talk and our self-talk either you're a coach or a critic and we need to be our coach. We need to be our best friend and we say things that no one, no, we would never accept it from anyone else. So why do we say to ourselves? And what I realized is that the medical community was not connecting that the mind can control the body and it's so connected, under your hardest connected as well as far as your emotions

15:33and your feelings. And with my mindset, I used them. So what I did, believe it or not, every night in the car, I said dissolve and disappear every any disease, tumor virus or inflammation in my body, restore all cells to perfect health in Jesus' name, amen. I used my faith, I don't preach to people, but I used my own faith to overcome. And I trusted that, but I said it over and over again. The amazing thing, Carrie, I said, why did my pesky not mention stomach in the report because that's where the tumor was and it had spread to my liver? It was in my lymph, it was everywhere. I had spots everywhere, like a leper inside. And he said, Julia, there's nothing there. Now you have to understand, we had ad nauseam talks about having it surgically removed even though it was dead. He said, no, I said, well, what will happen to it?

16:36It will absorb into your stomach lining and be a scar or it will lay dormant at the base of your stomach. That would be reported in the pepskin. The words I used, Carrie, dissolve and disappear. Excuse me, that's news. That's you. The dissolve and disappear is exactly what happened. So what we said, so the most important thing that I would like to share with your audience though is to use very important, not I think I'll get better. I am better. Yes, I am heal. Not I believe, I believe, I believe I am. Those are very strong words, not like I hope, now hope has a different aspect. Hope is the motivator, hope is what motivates you to go to the next level. But using words like I believe. I believe I am healed. Those are very strong. Your brain is saying those words and the most important piece, saying them out loud.

17:37Because when you say them out loud, your body hears the instruction and it will listen. Yes, the body is the biggest mind reader, right? Because the body is always listening. That's why I always tell my kids, like, don't say that to yourself. I'm this or I'm not. No, the body is always listening. Oh, I'm going to get this cold. I'm going to get that right, like so it's always listening. That's the program and takes it as a program. Well, I have a friend that when you say something negative, she'll go cancel, cancel, but from the air, from the energy and it's so true, we are what we think. We project our thoughts and it comes out in body language, I talk a lot in my medical conferences about the communication, how do we communicate and the listening and the words we use and the power of words that carry energy, which carry energy and words can hurt forever or they can heal and I believe that our words is, well, the other thing is

18:42our intuition. You know, medically, they don't really follow this, but your intuition is your direct link to your soul and it's the most honest voice you're going to hear. So when I was, when I stroked, I had Dr. Jerk in my book and I've had, I've had Drs. Why is he Dr. Jerk and I'm like, where do I start? He had so much hubris, you know, he, he should have been working with the filing system or something, but not, not humans. Yeah, not humans, he had, I mean, the first thing he said to me when I, when I first woke up and I was completely paralyzed on my left side was, well, at least you'll have better parking possibilities and I was like, what does he mean by that? I don't even know what he meant. Oh my gosh. You know, I lost 60% of my brain on the right side of my brain. There's apps, there's a big black hole there and that is what I need to convey to others is that look at me. I can still function.

19:43I can still love. I can still, I can still do all these other things, even though my body isn't behaving the way I wanted to, I can still be loved, I can still give love. And that's where we, like, diminished our ourselves and, and we shouldn't because we're not, we're, we're, we're compilation of so many things, so many things, and your brain has the power to be wire and that's called neuroplasty. I was doing neuroplasty before it became a, a major studying thing by the scientists. Yep. When I stroked in 1997, I was in a wheelchair. I had my mom bring me up to the, up to the mall, leave me there for two hours and what did I do? I watched people walk. I studied the mechanics of people walking by me. Then I would put it in my head and then I would say, I can do, I am for doing this. And then I would dream that I used to be a runner.

20:44I would dream that I was running. And then, and when you think it, it's almost like your body's doing it, and so, so these are the things that you can do to overcome whatever you're going through because everyone's going through something, everyone, their financial, emotional, physical, it doesn't matter. And there are, well, adversity knocks at all our doors. Sure does. That's how, yeah, it's, but it's how we deal with it, right? It's how you took that on, excuse me. And you really made it your mission, you know, you did the visualization experience, which is what practicing as a musician, I love the thought that, you know, they did studies, they put, you know, electrodes on people's heads and they studied somebody who practices an actual instrument versus somebody who practices it in their head. And the exact same neurons are firing off. So the brain doesn't know whether it's really happening or if it's not. So that's why I love what you're talking about, right? That's kind of the science behind that.

21:44You were practicing in your mind and you were starting to dream about it because when we dream about it, then it's really starting to manifest in our life that's exactly what you did. It's just a beautiful example of that. So I was told I wouldn't get out of a wheelchair and if I lived, if I lived because my brain was, was blistered, every vessel in my brain was blistered. So they were like saying don't, you know, be careful not to sneeze, don't, don't laugh too hard, don't stray on the toilet. And then they wondered why I was constipated for nine days in hospital, you know, fear, fear of, and if I die, I want to die laughing, I love that. Let's die laughing. That's amazing. We're going to break real quick. This is a good place to break. And I know everybody's hanging on your everywhere. It will be right back with Julia, don't go anywhere. Did you know 73% of employees are considering leaving their jobs and almost half of Americans fear being laid off in the next year? That's a lot of fear and anxiety mulling around the office.

22:47In today's environment, employees need easy to use tools and strategies they can count on when the atmosphere is making them feel less than productive. To find out about proven ways to help your employees turn their stress into success, go to carryroin.com and sign up for a free wellness consultation for your company today. Ever notice how your brain automatically focuses on what's wrong in your life? Ever wonder why you find yourself telling the same old story about yourself over and over again? Tune into this high energy show with author and mindset coach, Carrie Rowan, to find out how to retrain your brain to look for the good. Every Monday at 5 a.m. and 5 p.m. Eastern on syndicated Dream Vision 7 radio network. Carrie uses powerful storytelling, easy to use tools and inspiring guests to exemplify how a simple shift in perspective can bring miraculous results. Join Carrie on a journey into your own transformation that will leave you feeling inspired, empowered, and ready to find the good every day of your life. Are you tired of feeling stressed and stuck?

23:47Did you know that the stories we repeatedly tell can be the very thing that makes us feel worse about our life? In her best-selling book, Tell a New Story, host and author Carrie Rowan shares the five simple steps to release your negative stories and bring joy to your life. This is not your average self-help book. It's a joy to read and it's interactive with QR codes for meditations, original songs, and how-to videos at just the perfect point in the story, which makes transformation easy and at your fingertips. So if you're ready to go from humming a sad song about your situation, to finding your voice and whistling a new upbeat tune as you skip along with joy as the new soundtrack of your life, then get yourself a copy of Carrie's highly acclaimed book today. Go to CarrieRowan.com slash book to get your copy now, that's C-A-R-R-I-E-R-O-W-A-N. Hello everybody and welcome back to Look for the Good. I'm here with Julia Fox-Carrison, she has so many incredible stories.

24:47It's hard to just choose one because she is just as you can see this beacon of light. If you're listening on the radio you can't see, you'll have to wait until you see it on YouTube, seriously, you're just radiating and after everything you've been through, it's pretty incredible. We talked a lot about, well a lot of different things, but I love how you said the I AM statement, right, like talking to yourself in I AM because they say that I AM is directly actually, you know, what it no matter what you believe in, but they say that I AM is the word of the creator, right? It is the creation. So that when we do that and we say that, we are becoming the creation of our own life and I really love that. I think it's really powerful. And for somebody who could have given up so many times, like you have this incredible resilience about you and maybe it was your defiance, resilience, call it what you want, but it's so deeply embedded in who you are. You can just see it coming out of you. So how do you have, where does that come from? Where's that belief? How can we all maybe borrow your belief a little bit in times when we really need it? So I was raised Catholic. I went to

25:52Prokiel School and, you know, the whole thing with all the nuns, the whole and my mother is extremely devout goes every day. I am no longer that person anymore. I used to go to church every day, but I found that my conversations with God have been what has sustained me through all of my issues and they've been profound. So with the stroke, I do believe that when I died on the operating table, that I had that opportunity to leave, my image that and I end most of my conferences with this image because it struck me. I was on a ladder. Most people got lights or tunnel. I was on a ladder and there was no beginning or end. And I remember this, do I want to stay here in my relationship with God or come back? I'll be in a broken body, but work at being even a better

27:01person and not that I was a bad person before, but my eyes have been opened. In fact, when he was seven is when I published my book. He was three when I stroked. And I remember looking for a title originally and he said, how about your curtains are closed and now they're open? And I thought, wow, that is such an interesting approach. It's true. So insightful. Yes, but when so with my relationship with God is very personal and I think we all have conversations with whoever their higher being is. Our conversations are sometimes I always start with gratitude. I live in gratitude. I wake up in gratitude. There is not a day goes by that I am not grateful for everything in my life for even these hardships because resilience is messy. Resilience is not

28:01pretty. We always say, oh, you're so resilient. It sounds so fabulous. Well, it's actually you're down in the weeds. You're in the grit. And the resilience for me is healing isn't grateful, graceful. And I always say heal like a weed, you know, be unpredictable and stubborn because that's how you heal. And I feel that God gave me the tools to one, he gave me humor. I was able to find humor in so many of their dark times. And I believe that that is a vehicle to getting better to when you can find humor in those times. And I believe that the strength that I've been given is truly comes from God. When I had double vision, here's an example, I was very low. There was probably brought me to my knees more than the stroke. I couldn't see. I couldn't walk my dog. I couldn't drive. I couldn't watch TV. It was terrible. And it was 14 months of that. And my mother being

29:04who she is sent over the pastor to my house. And he sat with me for three hours. And he kept saying, I feel the Holy Spirit between us. And I kept saying, and my job, why am I going through this again? You know, I'm my job. I don't understand. I'm not mad at God. I'm just frustrated. That's exactly how Joe felt. And I said, so you're saying, I'm job. And he goes, the message I'm getting during that three hours, he kept using this mantra. And he kept saying, what is already fixed? And I literally say, what the after's that mean father? Literally, I was like, it goes, I don't know. And I said, I don't know either. And it's confusing to me. And by the end of it, I said, I know what is already fixed. And there, and it just became, like, like, the skies opened up. And what was already fixed meant that I had known how to fix

30:06my attitude in the past. And I could fix it again. And I had the tools to do it. I had just lost my way. And so that was so profound to me. And it was such a strong message. I recently was asked to write a story, a presentation about my faith. And it's called, I got your back Julian, love God. And it's all those signs that God has given me through my, through my adversity. And they're unique to me. And I think everybody has their own signs, their own uniqueness of what they would receive that would be special. For me, it was hearts. I get hearts everywhere. I get them when I bleed, I get them when I bruise, I get them when I have, when I had the double vision, I had, I started having hearts all over my body. And I have pictures of them. And I have them in this talk. It's really

31:06absolutely. You give me chills. And one of the craziest things was, what, years before I, the heart, I didn't know this, but I had an MRI that someone said to me, oh, you should put your MRI in your presentations. And I'm like, well, that's a crowd pleaser. I got invited to speak to a neurology conference. And I said, this is a good place for me to put it in for the clinicians. So my brother, who's a doctor, came over and he got the video is, it's a video, my MRI. Well, the MRI ended with the, the damage in my, my brain, which is very deep and very widespread, according to all the neurologists. But it ended as a heart. You kidding? The damage is a heart. The black hole is a heart. And my brain, which they said, is not typical, which is usually round and kind of muscular, my brain is shaped like a heart.

32:08Wow. It's, it's, it's, and I brought so much comfort. So when I had all these issues, so this is what happened with the stage 4 stomach cancer. Now, don't get me wrong. I want to let people know, we do get, you have to have a pity party. I went into a deep, when I got that news from two, I went from one doctor to another, I went to Dana Farber. And I got the same news that, you know, the, the, the second opinion was he told me he was sorry five times. And I know what, after the first two sorries, it's okay. But the, by the fifth time you're just being a bystander in my care. So you're not giving me any kind of hope. And so I turned again to my faith. And I said, you know, I believe I have so much purpose left in me because that's what drives us. Yes. Yes. Yes. And I said, God, show me the way. Leave me where you need me. I know I have more

33:09purpose to give. And more, if I can, can share, you know, I believe a lot of the things that come, I don't read anybody's wonderful stories about their overcoming because I always get nervous that I would, through osmosis, take their thoughts and make a mind. So I really kept myself isolated from that. And I believe I'm a channel and a conduit to, to, to, um, God's mercy and, and, um, his strength. Yeah. I just feel like I'm so, I, like, again, it's rooted in gratitude. And, um, that's beautiful. And, and gratitude is going to boom, you know, gratitude, kindness, those things will boom or rang back to you. You get what you give. That's so true. And, and, and that's what I'm saying is if you put it out there, it's going to boom or ring back to you. Yeah. And so I smile, you know, in this world today, people are more, like,

34:14they're more grumpy. Yeah, they are. I always smiling. And I might, I like to say, um, you know, a smile is the most basic link to humanity. So true. And it doesn't need translation. It doesn't, it's, it's a connector. Yeah. And so when I'm out and about, I always make sure I smile at people, I say, Hey, hi, how are you? Of course, sometimes they think I'm insane. I don't know you. But, um, I really, I really enjoy trying to put the spark in someone's day. Yeah. My prayer every morning is God may I, um, impact at least one person today. And may they do the same for someone for going forward. That I say that every day and I try to live it. And I don't always do. But, um, you know, and they're other than getting back here's the bouncing ball of how Julia speaks. I'm just saying, I'm following you. They're with you. Getting back to the pity party. We, yeah, we need to acknowledge when we're

35:16depressed, we're sad or upset. Yeah. When we have something not go our way or you have something really upsetting, um, we need to go through, we need to go that pity party. Yeah. I think it's very important that you do that. But make sure that it has an exit. And then day, yeah, Friday, right, the party begins this and because we need to honor those feelings. And I think we're a lot of people nowadays just want to rush them aside. They want to say, let's just watch Netflix. It'll all go away. Like that's not dealing feelings are meant to pass through us. They're not meant to hang out and come out sideways. And I love what you're saying because you're saying honor that. Yeah, it's so funny, Julia, because I talk about the pity party in my book. Honor it. Have the pity party for yourself. But make sure it has an end date. Put the balloons away, pack up all the parties. People at the lampshade go and make sure you had a good time at it, but make sure you have an exit strategy. Exactly. It's okay to do. And if you, if you don't do that, you become a victim. Yeah. And victims, victims usually don't, don't survive well. They don't do

36:24well. They don't do well. They get a bad rap. Rightly so. But you know, I love you're wrapping this all around gratitude. And I feel like some people, you know, because I talk a lot about that coaches does coaches. We love gratitude, right? But here's the thing. I think people have a misconception about what gratitude is. They think, of course, I'm grateful if something good happens, but it's really as you and I know, gratitude is a practice. It's like, it's like yoga, like being on the mat and practicing. It's a practice. It's very deliberate when you really practicing gratitude to become this buzz word. But truly what it is is to find what's good, which is what this is all about here, right? Which is why we're here and look for the good. It's being able to find the good despite the circumstance, right? Because you and I both have circumstances, everybody living, everybody listening, we all have circumstances, right? And it's finding a way to be happy despite fill in the blank or finding a way to be grateful. Because gratitude does lead us to higher level feelings, call it happiness, calling whatever you want. But when we can

37:27find things that we're grateful for, we can flip our minds that are around in a second. Well, I tell my son all the time, you know, if something bad has happened to him or whatever, I say, let good rise from that. Find the good. There is always good out of that. It's like strong. I don't like that. I had a stroke. I don't like that. But I do like what it has done for me as far as showing me how powerful I am. Yes, I'm still paralyzed on my left side. I still can't use my, oh, here's another thing. I said, can't yet. Because when you can't, you close all the doors to possibility. So currently, my left hand doesn't work very well, but it's yet. I can't roll a blade. Yeah. Right. You haven't done surfing again. Why? Yeah. All this possibility of alive. Yeah. We always look for, you know, you know, there's, we're going to have bad all the time.

38:34That that's life is a balance of both. Right. We need the contrast. On the joys. Yes. You need the, if you don't have the contrast, then the joys aren't as amplified. Exactly. I think we need to amplify them by the hardships that we've been through. And so, you know, it gets back, it gets back to going with the words we use, how, but another part of gratitude, I feel that this is hand in hand with gratitude is forgiveness. We don't, we don't realize that forgiveness is another very strong component to well-being. And like you said, Carrie, we have to make all of these habits. We can't just say, oh, I'm going to do it today. And when I went, what I've asked people to do, I've gone to people's houses that have had stroke and they're going through something. And I'll say, well, you have all the shades drawn. You're, you're, you're all, you've closed your whole body down with that blanket around your head. I said, we're opening the blind.

39:39We're going to put stickies around where you sit. So you can't move from that chair right now, but you're going to, let's put stickies about today's a good day because and and why is today a good day? It's sunny out or it's very, I personally like rain. You know, we're just because I'm alive. And yes, because I'm alive. And we can reframe negativity. And to give you an example, I go to the gym and there's a lot of older guys there. And this one guy said, I went in one day and I said, um, he said, uh, hey, how are you? I go, hey, how are you doing? And he goes, it's raining. He said, you know, like, my dad was like that. My dad was like, everything was negative. Kind of you orish. Yeah. Everything is like, oh, look at that beautiful treat whilst too close to the house. You know, things like that. Yeah. And so I say, hey, how are you doing? It's rainy. Just think you woke up to experience it. How many people didn't have that opportunity?

40:41You know, I love that. It's just reframing redirecting. Yeah. And negativity isn't always bad. I mean, like, you know, someone said, how do I explain? How do I deal with negativity in my workplace? Well, I say you have to really analyze what the negativity is stemming from. Is it just going through something and it's a moment? Let them bend. Is it somebody who's, that's their habit? You know, try to redirect it. Um, so true. You know, it's about how, um, how we view things is it is a lighter dark, you know, if you had the same view, you would get a different response from like three different people of how they see something. It's so true. And it's about exchanging perspectives. Yeah. Yeah. Our perspectives, um, are, are become our truths. So sure, if we, if we, if we are open and we need to be open, because I don't know everything. And yeah, and I, I, I always talk about how we listen. And, um, listening is, is such a hard skill.

41:48Listen, you do it really well, Carrie, because you grab nuggets and then you, and you expound on it, but listening is a very hard skill. And, and when you are truly listening, you're not forming the words what you're going to say to respond, because then you're not truly listening. That's so true. And, and so listening with intent to learn versus, you know, to, to educate, you know, we, no one got educated by talking. It's so true. That's why, you know, the old thing we used to say, the kids, we have two ears. And one mile per reason, right? But listening to other people's perspective is really powerful. I love you said, because we see the world not as it is, right? The nice and end quote. I put this in my book. We see it as we are. So we're all viewing it back to that little seven year old that I said in the top of the show. We're viewing it. If we're seeing our life through those belief systems, we're still viewing it through that lens. And when we can clean up our windshield and listen to other people like you, who can shift our perspective, that's where all our power lies. And we're going to break real

42:51quick. Everybody, don't go anywhere. We'll be right back with Julia. This is not your average self-help book. It's a joy to read and it's interactive with QR codes for meditations, original songs, and how-to videos at just the perfect point in the story, which makes transformation easy and add your fingertips. So if you're ready to go from humming a sad song about your situation, to finding your voice and whistling a new upbeat tune as you skip along with joy as the new soundtrack of your life, then get yourself a copy of Carrie's highly acclaimed book today. Go to carryroin.com slash book to get your copy now that's C-A-R-R-I-E-R-O-W-A-N. Are you ready to consistently be in the flow of success? Build an abundant business. Easily find your right clients and feel good inviting them into your community to do business with you? If your answer is yes then you want to listen to business success with human design with Nancy O'Keefe. I'm syndicated DreamVision 7 Radio Network every Thursday at 7 a.m. and 7 p.m.

43:51Eastern time. Business success with human design is a podcast designed to help you feel back the layers of who you've been taught to be and how you've been told to do business, moving you from overwhelm to a business model that aligns with your authentic self and feels right for you. Come and explore human design for business with Nancy. Did you know 73 percent of employees are considering leaving their jobs and almost half of Americans fear being laid off in the next year? That's a lot of fear and anxiety mulling around the office. In today's environment employees need easy to use tools and strategies they can count on when the atmosphere is making them feel less than productive. To find out about proven ways to help your employees turn their stress into success go to carryroin.com and sign up for a free wellness consultation for your company today. This is DreamVision 7 Radio Network uniting mankind with universal love. Our shows are created from the heart bringing each listener to a place of

44:51divine enlightenment. Breathe. Relax and enjoy. Let life flow. Hello, hello everybody. Welcome back. I'm here with Julia Foxcares and this conversation is so good. You are just a wealth of light and joy and your stories are so beautiful. We talked a little bit on the break about regrets and I want you to talk a little bit about this because it's so important because a lot of people do live in the past. That's what depression is thinking about the past living in the past. Let's talk a little bit about regrets and how you learned about regrets through your stroke. My stroke taught me regrets because I was in the corporate world and I wanted to be back in the corporate world. I thought I had it all. I was a work in mom and I wanted to have more kids and you know life happens. Unexpected happens and we don't

45:51that's what life is. Unexpectedness and with regrets all that does is keep you in the past and that's going to be your determination of what your future is because you live in the past that's your future. I always say if you spend all days thinking about what you did yesterday then you've wasted today. So regrets take away from being mindful. When you have regrets that means you're playing a channel in your head over and over again and that channel being replayed is building actually going back to the neuroplacia is creating those wiring in your brain. So I believe that you know of course there's things that if I could have changed, if I could have, if I would have I should have those are not going to do anything about what is concrete, which is your past. Yeah, the woodish it could have stories of the worst stories. I talk about those in my book right everything is about the stories because you can't do anything about it and all they do is make you feel worse and like you said they're recreating the future right because what we focus on we get what

46:56we focus on in life not what we want. We say we want this this and this but yet every day we wake up and we focus on what we don't have or what we didn't do or what could have been different and so guess what we're going to get more of we get what we focus on and the other half of that sentences whether we wanted or not. See I really work on the mind well so I walk my talk and I let you do I have to walk my talk or I won't be authentic you would know that when someone is an authentic they're you can feel it you know we can sense it and I do try to live in the moment I am telling you when I hit my feet hit the floor I oh thank you I have feet that are getting me here I'm not even when I am at a store doing my marketing I'll be like well I'm here no one's pushing me in a wheelchair no one's directing me where they want to go so it's I am so full of gratitude about that unloading the dishwasher oh my body is pivoting with one hand I'm

47:57doing this all one-handed and I'm still you know so the little things the little things do I do I do I regret the past there are things that I wish I had changed but do I dwell on them no I have learned from them I learned why did I do it that way and then it's regrets like I said you're not going to have a future if you're living in the past and or it's a strong predictor of what your future is and and when you when you think too much about the future you're you're you're creating a very complex view because you're creating things that may never happen so it's the same thing it's kind of a hand-in-hand thinking about the future and regrets about the past really be it goes to being mindful yes might still be as being present in the moment in the moment when you're in the moment that is the most important moment like right now this is the most important thing me talking to you and hopefully conveying a nugget or two that someone can say

49:03hey I'm going to ruminate on that and I'm going to think about changing the way I do this because my goal is always you know it's always about intention and and the the if your intention is pure I'm going to make mistakes I'm going to fumble I'm going to trip by fall all those things and I may say I fumble my words and have to be correct but um you intend if your intention is pure uh then then it's always going to be good um speaking about speaking I mean that it goes to embarrassment like I never wanted to be a speaker and my vp used to want me to be uh he had sent me to classes to speak you know really yeah I was terrified and then when I stroked and then I wrote my book I started getting invited to speak everywhere and I was like oh I can't do it and there's the word can't and then I was like why can't I I have a lot to say and I I started

50:03realizing that if as long as I'm trying to convey a strong message that will help someone else okay it's going to be it's okay to to get up and I've read in front of thousands of people and I I spilt a bottle I spilt a uh bottled water and I had I was on a feed out to other places and there were 1500 people in the crowd and I I would I stepped aside pretend I was being electrocuted so that totally got everyone uh like you know I did uh you were in love and and and then we all like that that disarmed like why did I drop someone came up to me after and said you didn't miss a beat and I spilled coffee all over the white linen at lunch and I was just mortified and I said no one was upset no one was worried that was you talking to yourself and that goes to embarrassment embarrassment that if I had to talk to my if my one nugget I would say is don't be embarrassed

51:05because embarrassment is you're an internal thoughts again it's not external we are not mind meters so that's what made me overcome speaking but I do I make mistakes I'm not embarrassed anymore because the only what embarrass me is is how I'm judging myself and and no one's judging you it's so true and I love what you said too about when your message and your intention is so strong you can get up and do anything because you were focused on being of service you're not focused on what am I wearing how do I look my hair okay oops I dropped the water whatever what if I sneeze or whatever right so it's your focus you're so focused on that message because your message is so powerful and you know when you're got and your heart that you are here to share that without the people just like you're doing here today on my show um and we so appreciate you coming on because that is what we're here for we're here to share that my dad used to say to me when I was younger he would say carry when god gives you gifts like that it's your job to share them with

52:11the world so that's that I always hear that in my head right that's what we're here for to share those and through our worst stories is where we dig down and figure out what our superpowers were and I think it's so not a quid sentence that your boss was training you to be a speaker because that's what you were evolving to become you just didn't know the rocky road to get there right but it's all part of the plan isn't it there's purpose in everything there is purpose in every I started out as a composition editor what was that that was formatting a book for technical manuals that and and to and and to think that I first self published uh and then in two months it and went to the best this was when it caused all that uh uh a option amongst all the the bidders of the big houses in but wow and and I was like I made my book look like it wasn't self published though and I knew how to do that from my past experience and and and so everything has purpose everything

53:12you do has purpose and when you realize that even in the mundane that's where actually the mundane is even more purpose and so realize that everything that's happened does have a reason or you know I have people that say I don't believe there's a reason to to everything but when I review the things I've been through and then how I grew from it and how I came up from the weeds through through it and how I became even stronger and more powerful you know my body is in as powerful but my my my life is more powerful and uh I I feel we we need to realize that everything is has has purpose to it and when you do that you're going to be more mindful and yeah and right and don't get hung up on the embarrassment because that that's someone I think that was my number one lesson from stroke because you know my my the stroke for me is actually in the book but

54:19I probably shouldn't share it was an outside source it wasn't something I had done it took four years for me to learn why I had a stroke I was in enigma and and and right now I'm in enigma with the cancer community because um I'm I'm I'm beating it by um and I think it's it's a good roadmap for others to say hey I I may not like this I mean we all have a timeline where our story ends because we don't get out of this world alive that's right right so may be the most impactful person that you can be while you are alive because you're dead a lot longer than you're alive and we're just getting out here alive we might as well have fun have fun laugh you know find the humor um and and make I I find that self-deprecating humor I'm I'm like a Lucille ball you know I'm always

55:19fine you know finding the the funny things in it I'm married my husband says I I get no one gets more of a kick out of me than me that's contagious right I love that I I love I think that's a really great mindset and everything you're saying is just it's so deep it's so on a on a spiritual but yet such a human level like we all get it because we've all had those things that happened to us that we thought we could never get through that we thought would devastate us right that we thought was the end of everything your identity well your life was all those things that we thought we worked for but when we can see that truly there's a bigger purpose for us right that is when everything changes you know and that's why you're such an enigma because the way you've handled and what you say to yourself and how you have this beautiful perspective on life is just so admirable Julia I you're just incredible this is why I had to have you on the show you are you are enigma and all the right most beautiful ways oh thank you well you have to realize that um the people that

56:26we admire the most are usually the ones that have gone through a lot and the the you know I have a I have a slide that I say admiration to empathy um but to admiration I'm sorry empathy to admiration and there's a uh there was a uh there was a uh there was a story that was told to me it was actually my doctor um growing up and and over her son did an interview with me he was doing an article on me and he had a very different last name and I realized he was I said that I only name I know is my old doctor he's old my father was so wise and I said he he was he knew how to connect with every single personality that he met and he said one day I was out I was probably about seven years old and my there was a woman that was bent over and I I said what's wrong with her dad and my dad said she most likely has scoliosis and that's why she's hunched over and the

57:29boy said I feel sad and bad for her and he goes don't feel sad don't feel bad for admire her why why because she's out doing the exact same things you're doing and you're full functioning and she's not and she's out doing it with a challenge and I love that analogy of transforming empathy to admiration yeah that is really um the the crux of seeing someone else I would never want anyone to go through what I've been through ever and I've been thankful to God every day that it wasn't someone I love because I would not be a good witness I am much better having the control over me and how I react to it versus trying to tell someone else how to react yeah well I've been grateful for that too because absolutely beautiful Julia your story is amazing and I know people are gonna what we could talk a whole another hour here and I know people are

58:31gonna want to listen again and again because there's so many nuggets of wisdom that you've dropped so I can't thank you enough and I know my listeners are loving this thank you so much for coming on look for the good you are the epitome of look for the good thank you my friend oh thank you so much for having me you are so everyone yeah amen and remember everybody if Julia is not representative of this it is I don't know who is it is never too late to live your best story be well thanks for tuning in to look for the good with your host Kerry Rowan best-selling author and mindset coach join us every Monday at 5 a.m. and 5 p.m. right here at dream vision 7 radio network if you weren't able to catch an episode no worries just visit our website to find all the archived episodes of look for the good on demand so you don't miss a thing and remember it's never too late to live your best story for additional resources or to find out about how you can work with

59:31Kerry directly visit Kerry Rowan dot com for more details this is dream vision 7 radio network uniting mankind with universal love our shows are created from the heart bringing each listener to a place of divine enlightenment breathe relax and enjoy let life flow