Grief and sadness are important emotions to be honest about, pay attention to, and process as they come up. Today I’m sharing some things that make me sad and that I tend to be grieving on a pretty regular basis. As a person who embodies a lot of joy, passion, fire, and humor, I don’t know if people realize that I grieve all the time. And I bet some of you can relate to this ー much of what makes me sad or has me grieve comes from systemic oppression and the myriad of delusions humans live under that cause us to do harm to ourselves and each other.
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In this episode, I share two recent experiences that reminded me of how these systems can show up in our daily lives, sometimes in really sneaky ways that are hard to detect. When we start to peel back all the layers that we’ve acquired since coming into these bodies, we can remember that we are so much more than our parts.
In episode 419 of the Embodied Podcast we discuss:
(1:21) Grieving over the systemic oppression that causes us to do harm to ourselves and each other
(2:46) How I reframe emotions like sadness, grief, and anger
(4:48) Recognizing why so many of us struggle with self-love and self-respect
(9:30) My eye-opening experience at a breast reduction consultation
(13:55) Honoring the unlearning, unpacking, and deconstructing of liberation work
(15:30) The truth about everyone’s purpose
(18:11) Why you can’t rush the healing timeline
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Quotes from this Week’s Episode of the Embodied Podcast:
- Everything that makes me sad and grieve really comes from systemic oppression and the myriad of delusions humans live under that cause us to do harm to ourselves and each other.
- I love reminding people that your body is a pathway, a portal, and a temple. You are love in a body.
- Everyone’s purpose is to connect with and express as much of their soul as possible in this lifetime and to be the fullest expression of your gifts, talents, love, generosity, and wisdom, but don’t identify with that stuff.
- The systems and structures, all of which stem from white supremacy, patriarchy, colonialism, and imperialism, really do have us out here thinking that our value is determined by all these man made concepts and ideas.
- We are all part of a big collective and there’s so much grace, beauty, and wonder available to us. So much of this is just made up. It’s just people’s ideas and you can unsubscribe from any-freaking-time. You have the power to decide to not allow yourself to be hooked into those things.
How was this episode for you?
Was this episode helpful for you today? I’d love to know what quote or lesson touched your soul. Let me know in the comments below OR share the episode on Instagram, tag me your stories @elizabethdialto, or send me a DM!
About the Embodied Podcast with Elizabeth DiAlto
Since 2013 I’ve been developing a body of work that helps women embody self-love, healing, and wholeness. We do this by focusing on the four levels of consciousness – physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual.
In practical terms, this looks like exploring tools and practices to help you tune into the deep wisdom of the body and the knowing of the heart, which I believe are gateways to our souls. Then we cultivate a new relationship with our minds that allows the mind to serve this wisdom and knowledge and soul connection, rather than override it, which is what many of us were taught.
If you’ve been doing self-help or spiritual development work for a while, these are the types of foundational things that often people overlook in pursuit of fancier concepts that often aren’t practical or sustainable. Here, we will focus on building these strong foundations so you can honestly and thoroughly embody self-love. If you’re feeling it, subscribe to the show, and leave us a review wherever you listen from. You can also keep up with show updates and community discussions on Instagram here.
Transcript for Episode 418 “Why I Want To Be Bothered“:
Elizabeth DiAlto 00:00
You are not your parts, you are a soul you really are. So you really are this infinite, exquisite, incredible, lovable, divine thing that in order to be here on earth comes into a human existence, a human body, a human form, there is just so much more to you than you’re ever going to know, than you’re ever gonna be able to fathom. And that’s the purpose of everybody’s life.
Elizabeth DiAlto 00:29
Hello, everybody, welcome to episode number 419 of The Embodied Podcast. Right when I sat down to record this, they started up construction, there’s an apartment next door to me, that has been getting construction for weeks. And it’s really been interfering with some of my recording schedules. But you know, a schedule is the schedule. So if you hear that noise, my apologies. Hopefully it is not too distracting that it ruins the episode for you. First of all, I need to let you know that I am feeling very sad today. And I’m letting you know because you’ll probably hear it or feel it in my voice throughout the episode. And you know, I love talking about who we can be and hold and feel many things at once. So I’m also delighted, intrigued, hopeful, happy. But I also feel sad today.
Elizabeth DiAlto 01:21
And what I’m talking about in this episode is why I’m feeling sad. It’s actually a deep source of my sadness. And I’ll also talk a little bit about what I do with that feeling. Because y’all I feel sad a lot. I don’t know, if people realize that I am grieving practically all of the time. There is always some grief running in my system in the background of my life. And everything that makes me sad. And everything that makes me grieve really comes from systemic oppression comes from the myriad of delusion humans live under that causes us to do harm to ourselves and each other. And I’m not necessarily sad about my own oppression. Although I’ll tell you what happens. I see how the system is trickled down into affecting people’s individual lives, my own included. And that shit also makes me sad. Fortunately, I’m oriented towards doing something about the things that upset me, right? Whether things make me sad, or make me angry.
Elizabeth DiAlto 02:19
And you know, sometimes I’m more angry than sad if you have signed up for the real up level. And you’ve heard some of these liberatory conversations, or you’ve seen the bullet points because the series actually isn’t live yet. But when you listen to those interviews, you’ll hear me more like hot, right, like fired up about stuff and really getting into things that make me angry, and some of those conversations, but the whole point of those conversations is to do something about it, right? Because these different emotions, sadness, grief, anger. For me, I always see as invitations to do something, right. Those things show us where our boundaries have been violated, or where our values are not being upheld in our lives, or when things are not in alignment with how we believe they should be or could be, and things like that.
Elizabeth DiAlto 03:09
So I actually really appreciate these, you know, what some people might call negative or darker emotions. Because for me personally, and for a lot of people I know, depending on how you relate to them, they can point you towards some really important truths, and some really big invitations in our lives to do something right to stand up for something. You know, whether you identify as an activist and advocate of co conspirator and accomplish you know, whatever the hell you want to call it. I rarely ever even call it anything. It just is how I’m oriented. I’m oriented towards justice and liberation. And those things are super important to me.
Elizabeth DiAlto 03:51
So first, I want to back up and tell you a story. If you follow me on social media, you might have seen me posting about this. I got a haircut a couple of weeks ago. And I know you’re probably like we’re jumping from liberation to haircuts, but hang with me here. I got a haircut a couple of weeks ago. And it is so short, like shorter than my hair has been since I was like four years old. And I was posted about I was being a little dramatic unless I was being intentionally dramatic because I am not. I’m not someone who’s like very dramatic like interpersonally dramatic Right? Like I’ll be you know, I have Mars and Leo and Venus like so I am expressed. I am not what’s the word? You know, my expression is not like bland or toned down or calm. I saw someone post something the other day about being low key and I’m like, I’ve never been low key a day in my life.
Elizabeth DiAlto 04:48
I also am not a particularly dramatic person. But I was being dramatic. It was fun. It was part of the expression. It was part of me coping with this friggin haircut that I hate. I was posting about it online. And I was saying, you know, I hated the haircut, it was too short. And listen, when you have curly hair, sometimes in order to keep it healthy, like they do kind of need to chop a bunch off and I needed some shaping, I needed some trimming. So I knew I knew this was going to happen. And the hair cut itself was actually an excellent haircut, it was not a bad haircut. But they had to go shorter to also fix some things from my last haircut, which I had messed up. So I posted on Instagram and my stories I posted on my private Facebook. And people are kept telling me they liked it. Well, you could rock it, you have the face for it, you’re still beautiful. And I’m like y’all like, just let me be mad about my haircut. Like, just let me hate my hair cut. And I had jokingly written on which Listen, people are lovely, I appreciate those comments, I understand the spirit in which they’re offered.
Elizabeth DiAlto 05:52
But I just wanted to, you know, be a little dramatic and be a little miserable, about how much I hated the friggin short hair, it doesn’t feel like me, it’s hard to put up and I put my hair up almost all the time. And so I jokingly wrote on my Facebook posts that I needed to go listen to India or read song, I am not my hair, like 30 times. And you know, this is the problem with things in writing. I was joking, but I think people thought I meant it. And a friend of mine, one friend in particular not getting the joke was like, I’m not gonna let you talk badly about yourself. And then I realized what was happening. People were not realizing that I was upset about the hair cut. I didn’t like the hair cut. But I didn’t feel bad about myself. So, you know, I added a note to my Facebook posts that while I didn’t feel entirely like me with the short hair, I also didn’t feel bad about myself because of hair.
Elizabeth DiAlto 06:45
And this just reminded me how fragile a lot of people’s self esteem self love and self respect is that it could be shattered or even waver because of something like a haircut. And by the way, I’m not being condescending or knocking you like if you’re a person who like a haircut could cause you to like, spin out and feel bad about yourself, you know that it’s important to know that about yourself. And if you want to, like do some work on that, you know, I teach self love, I have this self love framework. Self love is very deeply embedded into who I am. But a very real like cellular and body level at this point. So hair cut or not. And if you’ve ever listened to the episode I did last year on like self love after weight gain, like my physical appearance might change over time for various reasons. But that’s not going to affect how I feel about like my whole entire self, right.
Elizabeth DiAlto 07:39
So a week later, I was standing in front of two strangers topless, getting pictures taken at a breast exam. Because for the first time in my life, though, you know, I’ve probably been a candidate for this for most of my life, I have actually been considering getting a breast reduction. Now real quick, I have to set a boundary here. If you’re listening, if you’ve had that experience, or you know someone who has or you have any opinions about surgery or whatever, I’m not sharing this to get any advice or opinions, you know, how I feel about unsolicited feedback and opinions about personal stuff. I am not interested in that. So I’m sharing this because there’s relevance to what I’m talking about here today. But you know, that’s an important and it’s a personal journey and inquiry I’m currently exploring right now. So not interested in anyone’s input whatsoever. So just need to say that. So my DMs don’t fill up with things I’m not interested in hearing. But um, for me, my reasons are for health, strength and longevity in my body.
Elizabeth DiAlto 08:35
I am a person with an extremely high tolerance for physical pain and discomfort, and not just physical pain and discomfort, but like pain and discomfort in general. And this has been the case of my body, you know, the two major surgeries that I’ve had in my life. My senior of college, I had a hernia repair. And then last year, many of you who’ve been listening for a while know, I had my gallbladder removed. And in both of those instances, the doctors were like, how have you been dealing with all of this pain for the amount of time that you’ve been dealing with for and I realized it’s just because I’m adaptable, right? Like, I have a high threshold high tolerance for pain and discomfort I adapted, it became normal. And I didn’t even actually realize how bad it was, until physical things started happening, in addition to the pain that were affecting my health are affecting me in ways that I could no longer just bear it or adapt to it.
Elizabeth DiAlto 09:30
So I was with the doctor at my first consultation because I definitely want to meet a lot of different people get different opinions, see how different doctors would approach it. But even more than that, I want to see how the doctors treat people. I’m not interested in just being treated like a customer like a business transaction, you know. So the doctor my first consultation, asked why I was there. And I told him the discomfort. It’s the burden. I recently actually pulled up my scale and put it on my dresser so I could weigh my titties. If any of you have ever done this, I was laughing the whole time I literally like plopped my TD down on the scale. And each one weighed between four and five pounds. So I started thinking, this is like carrying an eight to 10 pound dumbbell on my chest. And especially when I put it up bra, it’s like hanging an eight to 10 pound dumbbell around my neck. This is probably why I’m so anti bra. Because at least when I’m not wearing one, I don’t have to experience the strain of feeling like it’s hanging around my neck.
Elizabeth DiAlto 10:28
So then the doctor pulled out his Sharpie and started drawing on my right breast, like letting me know how that procedure would work, how he would recommend doing it, where the incisions would be whatever. And in the process, he suggested doing something aesthetic that I hadn’t thought about or considered. And he added, you know, I know you’re not here for aesthetics, but you want pretty breasts, don’t you? And I have to tell you. I mean, I don’t have a poker face. So I definitely made a face. But I decided not like there were just a million things I could have said to that doctor about that in that moment. And I just, I didn’t have the energy for it. I didn’t have the desire for it. I didn’t see the point. So I was just like, sure. But that’s what made me want to come home and record this podcast episode because this this fucking culture.
Elizabeth DiAlto 11:14
Yeah, you know, like, I’m gonna think my breasts are beautiful, no matter what. Whether they’re perky, symmetrical, or however big or reduced. They are. Obviously it wasn’t about to lecture a plastic surgeon who makes his living on aesthetics about beauty being in the eye of the beholder. But then after that, you know, came the sales pitch. And truly, it was like sitting down at a car dealership, the woman who was I guess, there, she’s there, like salesperson, their main like liaison or whatever the hell they call her. Even it kind of explained it to me that way. She’s like, you know, this is just like buying a car. There’s different bells and whistles, there’s things you could add. And I was like, wow, this is this is so not my world. This is not my mindset. I don’t think this like, this is the Kardashian world, you know. And again, like, here’s what I want to say, I’m not going to say no judgement, because more accurate thing is, I don’t necessarily have judgments about this, but I certainly have strong opinions about it. And there is a difference, right?
Elizabeth DiAlto 12:08
I’m not going to judge people’s choices that they make for themselves, because I’m always out here wanting people to make choices that do make them feel healthy, happy, safe, comfortable in their skin and like themselves. Do I think some people make those types of choices from a place of delusion, or like self delusion? Like they’re deluding themselves, they’re telling themselves that that’s why they’re making it but that’s not really the case. Yeah, but that’s not my job. When I say my not judging, it’s not my job to judge if people are telling themselves the truth or not. Right.
Elizabeth DiAlto 12:39
So the other thing that was just fascinating to me, was just like being at a car dealership, then she started explaining the financing options and, and like there’s different credit cards you can apply for, or you can get this loan, or here’s the financing company and you apply for this and you have to you pay it off within six months, or otherwise, the interest starts and the interest is really out of control. And they just made me realize how many people must be out there in deep debt, for this reason for these aesthetics because they wanted to go make themselves more beautiful or desirable by cultural or societal standards, and not necessarily by their own standards.
Elizabeth DiAlto 13:20
And again, this stuff is complex, but just really made me think about how often people feel badly about themselves. Because this culture is telling them they should look a certain way, promoting different standards, ideals, or mythical norms, as Audrey Lorde calls them. And here I was just trying to feel better in my body. And in that moment, I felt more naked than I did when I was standing in front of a doctor with my titties out while he was drawn on me with a Sharpie. Because I felt like an alien. I just felt like such a weird anomaly that I wasn’t there for these aesthetic reasons I was there because it’s physically very uncomfortable for me to lug around these big titties.
Elizabeth DiAlto 13:55
And it made me think about currently, at the time I’m recording this. The real up level business interview series, which you’ve probably heard me mentioned before, is open for registration. It doesn’t start till April 3, you could sign up at the real uplevel.com If you’re interested in that. But all those conversations I interviewed 18 different people, and so much of what comes through and each of those conversations even so many of them have different contexts, is how much unlearning unpacking, deconstructing is involved in liberation work, because so many of the choices and ways people conduct themselves and their businesses and serve others that actually replicate and perpetuate the systems of oppression and supremacy. People just don’t know.
Elizabeth DiAlto 14:44
They don’t even realize they’re doing it in so this series is for people who realize and are you know, actively trying to like do better. And similarly, all my work at the school of sacred embodiment is meant to be a massive catalyst for collective healing, joy and liberty. creation, especially through the body. And I love reminding people that your body is a pathway, a portal and a temple, and also that you are love in a body of all the things we’re not our hair, our traumas, our past. And even the good things, right our talents, our gifts, our accomplishments, we are not any of those things, all the different labels, all the different roles, titles, we are none of that we are souls living here on Earth, in human packaging. We’re having human experiences.
Elizabeth DiAlto 15:29
And I also love reminding people from my years doing Akashic Records readings that every single time someone asked about their purpose, which it all was, like, 80% of the time, people usually were conflating their purpose with a career or a vocation, right? They were asking, what’s my purpose, but what they were really asking is, what should I be doing with my life? And the answer because this was coming from the Akashic records, not from like, the culture was, you know, your purpose. And everyone else’s purpose is to connect with an express as much of your soul as possible in this lifetime, to be the most you you could possibly be to be the fullest expression of your gifts, talents, love, your generosity and your wisdom, but not to identify with that stuff.
Elizabeth DiAlto 16:16
And so the systems and structures, all of which stem from the same stuff, right? White supremacy, patriarchy, colonialism, imperialism, you really do have us out here thinking that our value is determined by all these manmade concepts and ideas. The whole point of this episode is just to remind you that that’s not it. That is not it, you are not your parts, you are a soul, you really are. So you really are this infinite, exquisite, incredible, lovable, divine thing that in order to be here on earth comes into a human existence, a human body, a human form, there is just so much more to you than you’re ever going to know, than you’re ever going to be able to fathom. And that’s the purpose of everybody’s life, to contact as much of it as possible in a given lifetime. And express it into the world, especially in ways that do contribute to collective healing, joy and liberation, because we all need more of that.
Elizabeth DiAlto 17:16
And that’s like, kind of like the collective purpose of humanity, right? It’s not to like, amass things. It’s not to like pillage and plunder the Earth. It’s not all these innovations and improvements that men and when I say, Man, I’m using, like general like mankind’s thinks they’re making, when really, they’re destroying what was already beautiful and exquisite. And so incredible, and self sustaining, and also mysterious, right? So if this episode does anything, I hope it reminds you that we really are all part of a big collective, and that there’s so much grace and beauty and wonder, available to us. And that so much of this is just made up. It’s just people’s ideas, and you can unsubscribe, any freaking time, you could decide to just not allow yourself to be hooked into those things.
Elizabeth DiAlto 18:11
Now, when I say you could decide it doesn’t mean you could like snap your fingers and be done with it. Because it’s so deeply ingrained and internalized, and so many of us but that’s where healing is about. Healing is about peeling back on all that stuff that we’ve acquired since coming to the earth and coming into these bodies, and remembering remembering, remembering, remembering, remembering that there was just so much more to all of this. And as well, we’ll never even know, we’ll never know how much there actually is. But if we’re really lucky, and if we show up for it, we can connect with and contact a lot of the mystery, especially in ways that bring us healing, joy and liberation.
Elizabeth DiAlto 18:53
So hope you enjoyed listening to this today. Share it up if you did, you can always slide into my DMs on Instagram. Let me know what you thought email us at Hello at untamed yourself.com. As I mentioned, the real up level business interview series is open for registration right now. If you are a coach or a healer, who is oriented towards liberation and wants your business to be a catalyst for more good in the world in those ways, check the series out at the real uplevel.com our show notes are at untamed yourself.com forward slash podcast and we’ll see you later