Can We End This Performance?

 

You’ve probably heard of the word “performative,” but how exactly does it manifest in our lives today? In this episode, Whitney Lauritsen reflects on the “performance” people put up online or elsewhere and how it affects how we live our lives. From social media, content creation, and even in our diets, striving to put on a show or follow certain rules to match expectations has its downsides. Whitney highlights the positive outcomes of the opposite—just doing and creating what feels right for you! She dives deep into her content creation journey, her relationship with fame and food, and some reflections on how she navigates life online. Whitney also shares her upcoming travels for her work and her personal life and the meaning behind them.

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Listen to the podcast here

 

Can We End This Performance?

Creating Authentic, Non-Performative Content

I am excited to slowly start seeing headbands come back into style because I would love to be wearing a headband confidently. I usually wear my headphones, sit down in front of my camera and look at my hair, which naturally freezes out. That combined with my incoming gray hairs, which are also nuts to look at. For me sometimes it’s fascinating. I feel oddly insecure when my hair puffs out like this. There’s this creator on TikTok named Elyse Myers and her hair is always like that.

Most of the time, she wears it in a bun with her hair all frizzy. I adore her. When you see somebody and feel like you’ve got permission to do something that you feel insecure about, that’s how I feel about her. I also feel that way about women that have similar bodies like mine. I feel comforted. It’s fascinating. I feel like I’m in this period of gaining clarity, releasing old things and having more autonomy, which is a word that came up in an episode with Michael or Mike. It was great. It’s all about happiness and joy. I can’t wait for you to read it.

We could’ve talked for hours but we limit it to one hour to be mindful of each other’s time, as well as your time. The word autonomy is something that I don’t hear often enough but it does summarize a lot of what I’ve been feeling. I want to feel more confident and in control of my life. Oddly, I have not felt that much. I’ve been shedding a lot of shame, guilt, embarrassment and security. Not even on a deep path to do so. That’s not my aim to get rid of those emotions because I don’t know if you fully can. I don’t know if I can ever be 100% confident. It’s something that Michael or Mike goes by.

He and I talked about it in that episode but also before and after the show, having been in the online entrepreneurial’s personal development spaces of us for many years. He started in 2007. He’s been in it one year longer than me when I got into that world in 2008. There’s so much messaging about the right way to do things. I feel like that comes down to the core, something that deeply interests me and I find myself drawn to with every guest on this show.

It’s like, “What if we release those best practices and these rules by myself, not just with guests?” I find myself wanting to feel more autonomous. I’m deeply fascinated by it. It’s going to be an ongoing theme. I want to share a little bit about the behind-the-scenes of my life. I feel like I want to embrace that more on these solo episodes. I often feel a bit insecure about my Monday episodes because I’m alone. All of the weight and pressure that falls on me.

Performance is a word that I’ve been coming up against a lot. I’m trying to recall a conversation I had with somebody and I don’t even recall who it was. I don’t think it was a guest because I took some time off from recording with guests, not very purposefully but because of my schedule and having my computer repaired. I blocked off my schedule and Mike was one of the first guests I had in a little bit. It sometimes throws me off because I have so many conversations, meetings and things with clients and friends. I forget where information comes from.

The word performance has hit me. Regardless of where I was having this conversation, I’m been thinking about how performative many of us feel we need to be. From my perspective, I have felt so much pressure to perform. When I thought about that term, it resonated with me because I started to think, “Not only do I do not want to feel the pressure to perform but I don’t enjoy being around people that are performative.” I never have.

I was thinking back to being in college. I had a lot of awareness. I hesitate to say self-awareness, although that’s something that I’ve been very drawn to. I almost wouldn’t use the term self-aware for myself in college, Insecure is not quite the right word but I’ll use it for now. Looking back, I felt like a child. It’s so interesting when you have the hindsight of age and experience. Often when you’re in your late teens or early twenties, you feel like you know everything and who you are.

Certainly, I had a good amount of confidence. I was clear about wanting to study Film Production. My passion there was strong. I felt confident about going to classes and doing projects. I had some confidence but in terms of inner confidence or inner knowing, I can’t say that was there but I was curious and at least tuned in to things that bothered me.

I remember in film school being very turned off by things that felt fake. It showed up a lot in my screenwriting and even in some of the short films that I was making in film school. I was drawn to telling the truth, showing the realness and the core of things. That has been a thread through my work. It almost made me emotional because that has been a deep passion but I didn’t even notice it to the point of seeing it as a passion.

 

Many of us feel the need to be performative. Share on X

 

At the time, it felt like a preference. I was interested in something but not until now that I’m recognizing how important that was for me. If I even go back to high school, noticing how uncomfortable I felt around anything performance-related, ironically though, maybe I didn’t notice it because I’ve been drawn to the art of performance.

Since I was little, I was very drawn to acting. I thought I was going to be an actress. I have a few distinct memory. I was about to share the one when I was in Australia with my dad, which is timely because of something else I hope I get to. I’ll probably circle back to it. My dad took me to Australia when I was fourteen years old. I remember that feeling as the biggest deal because I was deeply interested in Australia. I don’t know for how long but at least one year or so before he took me on this trip, I wrote school papers on Australia and knew all these facts about Australia.

I’ve always been someone who gets hyper-focused on a passion and wants to know everything about it. I remember specifically a school project and made a magazine about Australia. I probably still have it somewhere with pictures cut out. That was such a cool project to work on. My dad got an opportunity to go to Sydney, Melbourne and the Blue Mountains. He went there for business and knew that I would love to go so he took me with him. I was like, “This is so cool.” I remember on that trip somebody asked about my passion for acting. This is where it all ties in. I remember my conviction in telling people about that.

For a few years around that time, I was set on being an actress but I received a lot of messaging around it that was discouraging years before that. I was closer to ten years old. I’ve shared this before but worth reiterating a pivotal moment in my whole life. It’s truly crazy to think back and have certain moments that could be short how just a few words from somebody can have a deep impact on us.

One of those moments was with my mom’s friend who had done a little bit of acting and some modeling. I’m ten years old thinking like she knows everything. Growing up in this small town, she lived in New York City so I thought, “This woman must know how this world works.” She was one of my go-to’s for figuring out how to become an actress.

I vividly remember her showing me how to do exercises to reduce my waist. I don’t know how concerned she was with my body size. I’ve always had around her stomach and hips going back to when I was a little kid, two years old, pictures of me running around barely, wearing clothes, sometimes not wearing clothes, the footage of that. My body almost looks exactly the way it does now, which is comforting to see, “That’s what my body naturally looks like when I’m not trying to starve myself or overwork it to look a certain way.”

When I was ten years old, my mother’s friend thought I could be changed and shaped because around stomach was not considered acceptable for an actress. I’m sure she was watching out for me and had that mindset, “She’s a little girl. I can teach her how to eat well and work out. She’ll get the body that makes it easier for her to get roles or modeling jobs.”

That moment with her, it was just the two of us in my childhood living room or family room, she showed me how to do some exercises. It imprinted me because it was the moment where I thought, “To get what I want, I have to follow these rules, change myself and shape myself.” That was pivotal for me because that was one of those key moments where I thought, “My body is not acceptable and good enough. It’s not going to help me get to this goal. I wanted to be an actress. I was going to do what it took.” I felt so out of control in most of the steps.

I remember even looking up on my dad’s computer back when I didn’t have a computer in my room. My dad was the only one in the house with a computer. I went on his computer to research. I was trying to figure out, “How do you become an actress?” Originally, I could go back in time to what websites did I go to? How did I look for this stuff considering how different the internet was back then? I was trying to figure it out on my own and remember feeling discouraged because I needed money, it seemed. I needed my parents to take me into the city and Boston, specifically a group of Massachusetts. I felt like I couldn’t do much on my own but what I could do was control what I ate and exercise.

It started probably ten-year plus the long path of trying to shape my body. Over time, I lost interest in it. When the control element comes into play, over time, I felt out of control. My parents weren’t that interested in helping me become an actress. I put it to the wayside. When I realized that I could make my movies with my dad’s camera at first, I saved up all my money and bought this $800 or $1,000 video camera that seemed the biggest expense. I worked hard in babysitting and got this camera. That was the beginning of this content journey that I’ve been on because I was 15 or 16 when I got that camera and it was my everything.

 

 

I was recording every moment of my life from school. I have all this cool footage of my high school. I’ve been thinking about releasing some of it because it’s interesting for people to look back and what school used to be like back then. I have footage of me, my friends and my sister doing skits or hanging out. It was documented. If TikTok had existed back then, all of that would have been on TikTok. It was my private archive and experimenting of figuring out my camera and the art of all that. Once I learned how to edit, that was a huge deal because back then I was doing it all in cameras.

Most digital devices are cut up in individual clips. Back then on that camera, it was all on tape. I could create my editing by planning the sequence in which I filmed things so that when you watched it back, it looked like it had been edited together. Sometimes that would involve redoing shots by the different angles and stuff versus with editing, you can shoot everything from one angle, from another, cut them together back and forth and make them look nice. It’s also interesting to reflect on that because I can see why I feel not quite burnt out but editing, making stories and stuff like that is a little exhausting to me. Looking back, I’m like, “That’s because I’ve been doing it for most of my life. It comes very naturally to me.”

I’ve developed a skillset. I was trained in that by going to film school. It is second nature for me to do videos and show up on camera. It’s been my life but I have so much resistance to editing because it’s tiring. It’s almost like when you see celebrities, Jim Carrey immediately comes to mind, who are not making as much as they used to. He’s over it and wants to do other things. Maybe it no longer resonates with him and that’s okay. You can retire from that career and do something different. I don’t even know fully where I was going with all of this. It was because of my natural desire to experience realness.

Performance is what I was getting at. You would think that I might’ve been drawn to making documentaries because I love capturing life. I loved the truth of things and the realness. I didn’t necessarily like it when it felt something was fake but what I enjoyed was almost the in-between of finding how to convey things through a performance that felt real and how to connect with people on a deeper level and feel like I could trust them, they’re reliable and stable. All of that stuff started to become important to me as I developed on this journey. All of my projects strive to draw out human emotions. Either to make somebody feel a certain way, inspire them or find performances within myself or others that I was working with that felt true.

It felt deep and rich. It’s so interesting because it helps me understand why I get triggered by superficial conversations like small talk. I also don’t enjoy any performance that feels transactional, meaning somebody is performing this way to get something from me. They’re being nice to me and getting something from me or they’re making the social media content to get me to buy something. You can feel that. I’m curious if you feel the same way. I’m so sensitive to it. In some ways, I can see through that but when somebody puts their heart into something that feels like there’s depth to it or they’re interested in connecting with me one-on-one, my spirit lights up and I’m like, “Yes, please. Thank you.”

The Clash Of Authenticity And Fame

It’s interesting how rare that is and to look back and see that even the things that feel modern and particular to us in the timeframe of 2022, there have been versions of this throughout our history. It’s just that the technology has shaped it in a certain way like TikTok. Even though it didn’t exist when I was in high school, I was still making TikTok videos on my camera and not sharing them with people. That in itself is interesting too because the challenge is that many people can relate to the same experiences I had as a teenager wanting to play around with tech and equipment, master things and find their sense of self through performance or capturing things.

Even those of us who capture our trips or concerts, we go to like that, there’s a desire to do that in technology. It has allowed us to do that quite easily. Even though many of us associate that with taking us out of the present moment, most of us have leaned into that desire to capture something. The desire to be creative with something makes sense. When it turns into something that feels transactional, that’s where it almost becomes a bit corrupt. It starts to suck out the life of it. Speaking of Elyse, who I mentioned with her frizzy hair, she posted a video on TikTok. She was crying saying that she did not go on TikTok to become well-known. She loves the process of creating TikTok and sharing her videos if you haven’t seen her.

In addition to her being authentic with her hair messier than your typical girl on a platform like TikTok, she’s got an incredible ability to tell stories. She comes across as so authentic. She’s very compelling. She also uses visuals of these emojis popping up on the screen. It’s endearing and sometimes a little too formulaic. I find myself not as interested in her because I feel like I know her formula and that would be a little bit of a drawback. I wonder, “Does she use that formula because she feels like she has to or that’s just how she is?” She admitted she got triggered because somebody wrote a critical article or something. I don’t know if it was a blog post. Someone cruel to her, critical in a negative way, is making fun of her. It triggered her.

I was thinking as I watched her video. Whatever it was that somebody wrote or said about her, I’m sure that would hurt me too. I love seeing her sharing her raw emotions about this. She kept repeating how this isn’t what she wanted. My heart goes out to somebody who stumbles into a level of fame or success and feels the negativity behind it. You’re doing something that you’re naturally good at. You’re not performing. You’re sharing with people. You aim to connect with people and have joy, yet the volume of people lends itself to criticism.

I don’t know if this is still used as much as it used to be but there’s this saying, “The way you know that you have made it is when the critics come out.” Critics are your sign that you’ve made it. I’ve never liked that phrase because I’m super sensitive to critics. That almost makes me not want to “make it,” be successful or famous because I don’t want to live my life with tons of criticism. In my journey as a creator, I feel so at ease. In podcasting so far, I’ve barely received criticism.

 

Creating a profile on some of these dating platforms feels like a performance… It’s all about controlling the narrative of how people perceive us. Share on X

 

There are only a couple of people that have come out of the woodwork and been rude. Every once in a while, someone’s called me out in a positive way. I’m so grateful for people who’ve helped me understand things like cultural appropriation and when they felt triggered by something that I’ve said or the way that I’ve said and guided me towards a different direction I can try. It doesn’t always feel good to hear that stuff but it’s helpful. It’s a good sting and discomfort because it helps me evolve in a way where I can be more aware of myself.

I don’t yearn to be famous in the way that I used to. This goes back to that ten-year-old self thinking that fame was the end goal. A lot of teenagers have that desire. I’ve even heard that children who don’t feel like they get a lot of attention from their friends, family, other peers or people that have felt bullied and disliked tend to want to be famous because they’re looking for the validation they didn’t receive from their community. They look for it outside their community. That resonates with me. I’ve often reflected, “Is that why I’ve desired fame?” I thought it might be a universal experience. Maybe it is. Maybe so many of us have felt like we were not getting the love or validation from people we know so we seek from people we don’t know.

Social media shortcut that. That even is interesting about dating. It’s another thing that my guest Mike brought up in our conversation. He touched very briefly on this towards the middle or the end of the episode and brings up online dating. The challenge with that is we have so many choices. It always seems like it’s possible that we could get someone better than who we’re currently with.

A lot of people have trouble being monogamous or settling down with a partner because the apps have trained us to believe that there’s always going to be someone slightly better. Maybe better looking, we’re more sexually attracted or somebody who has the same interest as us. These apps have made it so easy for us to vet people.

They’ve trained us to scroll that we always wonder if there’s going to be something else like TikTok does. It trained me for sure to go on there and get my dopamine hits. It’s like, “This video didn’t quite do it for me. Let me scroll the next one.” I find myself scrolling until I’ve filled up my cup enough that I could turn off the app. I haven’t used online dating apps in years. Thank goodness. To be honest, I have not needed it. I don’t want to be in that space of constantly feeling, A) There could be a better guy for me or, B) Somebody is thinking that about me. Speaking of performance, I certainly don’t like the performance.

In the city of Los Angeles, I feel like I have to post the right photos. Creating a profile on some of these dating platforms feels like a performance. I have to write the right words and say the right thing in my conversation. How much of that is me? That’s been part of the turnoff with social media too. It’s not that different from dating profiles, especially on platforms like Instagram, which are about the highlight reel. It’s taking the perfect photo, posting it, editing a little bit and writing a caption. It’s all about controlling the narrative of how people perceive us. I’m just not interested in that. It sucks. I paused posting on Wellevatr Instagram, which is the account attached to this show.

As of the time of this episode, I haven’t posted anything on there because I found myself hit with this emotion of not wanting to do it. It feels like a burden because I don’t want to be formulaic or do things just to perform. Frankly, the results are not that great. The only results that feel important to me on that platform but probably in most of my life, are connecting with people and giving them the information that they want. If I could help someone like you find this show faster and enjoy this show, that’s fulfilling to me. That is the purpose of marketing in my head, “Can I help get people what they want or need?” It’s hard to do that effectively on social media as a whole.

I wanted to pause and yet every week when the timeline comes up, I have my to-do lists set up with reoccurring tasks and one of them is to post clips for the show. Every week I see that recurring task, I go, “I don’t feel like doing this. I don’t want to do it.” Every time I think that to myself, I feel bad mainly because Wellevatr Instagram has been all about the guests and I want to honor them. I have told them that I’m going to share it on social media and I haven’t done it. I feel like I’m maybe letting them down. My mentality is that they will understand and one day I will catch up and share it, like one day I plan to get videos on YouTube.

The YouTube side of it is the same feeling. If you haven’t watched the YouTube channel for the show, it’s very raw. The videos are very minimally edited. If at all, the only thing I’ve been editing is cutting out any random things I’ve done funny from the behind-the-scenes moment. Back when Jason was co-hosting the show with me, the way I used to edit the show was it would focus on the person that was talking and you could not see the person who wasn’t talking. When Jason would speak on the show, that would be my opportunity to eat, drink something or pick my teeth.

There are all these clips of me that I’ve edited out because I’m embarrassed by me doing stuff like that. Generally, I don’t care if somebody sees me drinking water. There’s one moment when I was eating these green algae tabs and they got all stuck in my teeth. It was very uncomfortable. You could see it in my teeth. Behind the scenes, I’m picking my teeth trying to get all the chunks out and rinsing my mouth before I spoke. If you go back, you could probably find which episode, although I did a good job editing that.

 

 

For the most part, YouTube videos are very raw versus the audio that you’re listening to on the audio-only version of the show. That’s edited by the team that I work with. You’ll hear differences. The gaps are cut out and mistakes are taken out. It’s a contrast. I digress. My point in bringing up the YouTube is that it does take work for me to edit and I feel drained by it. It’s that ethos of, “Do I want to do something that drains me? If so, what is the purpose?” To be honest, not a lot of people watch the show’s YouTube channel. It’s a lot of work for very little payoff but if the people that watch those videos told me, “I love these videos so much, Whitney. I wish that you would do them more often. I want to see every episode on YouTube.”

If I heard that from even three people, it would be worthwhile for me. This is what I mean when it comes down to transactional versus that connected emotion that I am constantly seeking. As cliché as it sounds, if I know that a few people are positively impacted by something that I do, that is so much more nourishing than having thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands or millions of “followers.” That’s why I’ve stepped away from so much of the work I used to do on social, even for this show because I think, “I don’t want to do this just for numbers, to be performative or try to prove myself and worthiness,” as a lot of us feel compelled to do on social.

I know that I’m worthy. I do have deep self-love and confidence. It’s not perfect. I certainly have my insecurities and triggers. I probably always will but I don’t need to get likes on Instagram. I don’t need to go viral on TikTok. I’ve also detached myself from a lot of the financial elements of that stuff too. I probably have mentioned before how my work for many years was connected to all of that. If I grew my following, I can make more money. If I got X amount of viewers on videos, I could make more money. I could get sponsors, affiliates, ads and all of those avenues for monetization. To do that, I felt like I was selling my soul because that put me in a place of being more performative and strategic for the sake of the transaction.

That’s not part of my core value. If I go back to my teenage self, that’s not what she wanted. There’s a trend going around on TikTok. It feels a little old to me and it probably will be old by the time this episode comes out because TikTok moves quickly. As of mid-June 2022, I’ve seen a lot of videos and it starts with a clip of an adult or adult being at anyone over eighteen or maybe even teenagers. Let’s say somebody fifteen years plus. The screen says, “I realized I was doing it for HER. I realized I was doing this for HIM. SHE would be so proud of me now.” She and he or other pronouns like they and them would be in all caps to emphasize it.

The video would cut to photos or videos of their younger selves, like five years old or something. The point of this trend on TikTok is we realize how proud our younger selves would be of how far we’ve come or what’s most important to us is something that we felt when we were kids. That’s a big moment of self-awareness. I feel that. Even though that trend feels a little cliché, it’s become a big trend because it resonates with us where when we can connect back to what was important to us before we were super influenced by the outside world. It reminds us of the deeper joy, purpose and purity that we had. There’s another video along the same lines of a man talking about how as kids, we haven’t developed habits yet.

Our brains don’t tend to have the habits but we’re also young that a habit is very short. It’s not like we’ve been doing it for years in most cases. I was thinking about how interesting that perspective is. As kids, we tend to be more at the moment. We tend to be very sensitive and feel joy over smaller things. Life feels simpler for many of us, not all, depending on how we’re raised. That cliché exercise of going back to who we were back then and trying to remove all of the influence that we’ve taken on from others, all the messaging, education and conditioning, how in many ways have taken us farther away from what we’ve wanted and also helps us connect back to deeper gratitude.

I don’t know if one of my friends was doing the trend but she said something along the lines of, “Here’s what I’m doing in my life now. If you had told me years ago this is how my life would be, I’d been so excited and proud of myself.” That almost gets me choked up because also another point that Mike brought up is that we can get caught up in the pursuit of happiness that in the present moment, we never feel as happy as we hope to be in the future. These are not his exact words but it’s this idea that the pursuit and chase of happiness can keep us in a place of never feeling happy, satisfied or content because we’re going after more all the time.

What if instead in this present moment, you can try this? Think back to some of your memories from childhood or teens, maybe college. What felt important to you back then? How much of that have you achieved? I bet you could find all the little moments because that person and desires are probably still there. You’ve probably achieved all sorts of things.

For me, it could be as simple as the first thing that comes to mind is a computer. I’ve loved computers for as long as I can remember. A lot of us appreciate them. They’re part of our lives. When I was growing up with my dad, having his computer, that I could occasionally access after school or on the weekends, I would get this limited window of time. It might not even be every day.

My dad is very protective of his computer. My sister and I had to follow his rules and do it on his time. Computers felt amazing. Later on in high school and then when I went to film school, my dad bought me a computer but it was a PC. No shade to PCs but back in the day of film school, Apple computers were the main type of computer that you would use to edit videos. That’s what I wanted to do. I wanted to edit all my projects. At the time, there wasn’t a lot of affordable software that I could use on my particular computer. I had the same computer throughout college. When I moved from Boston to Los Angeles, my parents had it shipped to me.

 

We can get so caught up in the pursuit of happiness that in the present moment we never feel as happy as we hope to be in the future. Share on X

 

We made a mistake, which was to ship it in the box that it came in. You could see from the outside what was on the inside of the package and it never arrived. It was a heartbreaking moment that I was thinking about out of the blue. I remember I had an internship. When I moved to Los Angeles, I was finishing up my last semester of college. They have a program in Los Angeles to help people transition from college to working in the Hollywood industry.

I was working at this production or development company. They would develop scripts and projects to be sold or turned into movies or TV shows. That was my first internship. I was there around this time when I realized that my computer is lost because had shipped out to my college housing and it never showed up there. I spent weeks trying to locate it.

I can’t remember if we had tracking on it. We had insurance but I was devastated because everything was saved there. This is before I had an external hard drive. This is before cloud storage. I was not savvy or prepared about backing up. I had maybe some USB flash drives. I had maybe some things stored on CD-ROMs. I was bare-bones, backing things up, restoring things elsewhere. Much of my digital life was wiped out because that computer never arrived. I was devastated. One of the guys that worked at the company I was interning up was like, “Brush it off. Let it go. You can get a new computer.”

He was minimizing the pain of all those memories of the photos that I had stored there, all my documents and my fears. I was like, “These documents have my Social Security number on there. What if they hack into it? They can get all my data.” I felt vulnerable and sad. He didn’t acknowledge my sadness. I tried to toughen up. I was like, “He’s probably right. I’ll get over it.” It still feels sad and painful. I wonder, “What was on that computer that I’ll never see again?” Also the violating feeling of someone stealing my computer. It was a cheap computer, a PC and this big tower. It was worth a few hundred dollars. “Why it was stolen? It’s beyond me.”

However, the silver lining for that story is we were wise enough to get insurance and the insurance covered the cost of the computer. I got at least $500 or so back and the computer is not worth it at that point. I got a good chunk of money to put towards the purchase of my first Mac computer. For those that don’t know, that became a huge part of my life because that inspired me to apply to work for the Apple store. I worked at the Apple store from 2005 to 2012 and it was a big part of my life. Getting that computer to tie this back to my younger self like Apple computers felt so expensive, especially compared to the PC my dad bought me. My parents wouldn’t have bought me that Apple computer. It was at least twice the cost of the PC.

When I was a little girl trying to figure out how to be an actress, it felt out of reach to me because I didn’t have that money. Although technically, I was able to save up for the camera I got. That was huge. That camera probably cost $900 to $1,000. That was a ton of money for me. Saving it for a $2,000 Apple computer felt almost impossible but because I lost my old computer, I got money to put towards the Apple. It’s those little moments that you look back and think, “How exciting?” It’s something that maybe I take for granted.

Fast forward to where am in my life, I’ve had multiple Apple computers. I’m doing this episode on my MacBook Pro which is my third Apple laptop. I have had multiple desktops and Macs as well. I’m looking back to how it felt almost impossible to get 1 computer and had at least 5 of these fancy computers since then. It’s cool. There are so many things. I could go on and on. I’m not trying to brag. Sometimes we take for granted the things that our younger selves would have been off or things that we didn’t think were possible, things that we thought were so hard or far off. That’s such a cool way to find some joy and gratitude in your life.

Going back to this performative transactional side of life, that doesn’t appeal to me. I would so much rather feel some of the simple joy than chase after the joy of having a lot of money. Going back to the fame side. When I see people like Elyse crying because she’s become so well-known that critics are coming out of the woodwork, I don’t even know.

In my perception of her, she is not a problematic creator because she doesn’t feel like she’s trying hard. She’s being herself. She’s not trying to impress people. Maybe she is but it doesn’t come across that way. What bad things could you say about her? I don’t know. I’m sure there’s something in there but it’s a sad reality that even someone authentic and heartfelt like her who seems deserving of success is crying because that feels unpleasant.

I’ve experienced that in little ways, chips, criticisms and trolling. Most creators experience that at some point but to have that consistently. You see all these stories of celebrities like, “They’ve got it made because they’re famous and have all this money.” Look at the Kardashians. Those women have so much money but they’re criticized constantly left and right. It’s almost like they’ve had to create their lives in a way to constantly deflect criticism. Can you imagine? I certainly don’t want to go about my life. What a waste of time? Not to be judgy but do I want to waste my time deflecting criticism every day? How exhausting.

 

 

As a podcaster, the big names like Joe Rogan, my thoughts of what he does aside, he’s in the same boat. I’m sure every single day, someone is trying to tear him down and call him out. Whether or not that’s valid is another story but that’s intense and yet a lot of podcasters aspire to be at that level. Even Brené Brown is tied to the Joe Rogan situation. She got so much criticism for some of her decisions there. She’s also a big well-known name and has a podcast too. She’s somebody that I could easily look up to and aspire to be but I don’t know if I want to deal with that stuff. A lot of these people have huge teams behind them. They need to manage everything. I’m not sure that I want that.

I have one person that assists me very part-time. That’s all I have. Everything else I do on my own. It makes it pretty easy. This is Amy. The only thing that person is doing for me is responding to some emails and messages that I don’t have the bandwidth to write out myself. That’s all I need. Do I want more that would require me to have all of these other people around me? Do you know what that does? It creates buffers. I don’t know if I want a buffer between me and someone like you. This is why I created Beyond Measure, my private community. It’s my passion project because every week, I connect face-to-face virtually with people like yourself and people I’ve met through this show, Instagram or YouTube.

We come together as a group, connect in real-time and have deep conversations. That is the ultimate source of joy. It continues to amaze me. That’s my biggest goal. I also have the privilege at this time of generating income from other sources. I used to make money from all this content. I do have sponsors from time to time on the show but I’m particular about who I work with because first of all, I don’t want to constantly be hocking products. I’ve thought about that a lot where in the past I used to spend so much time on YouTube and social media promoting products.

I have a box from Goddess Provisions, a subscription box I’ve had for years. I enjoy them. This box is on my desk because I don’t know how else to talk about them other than what I’m doing. There are tons of examples of this on this show and my social. I would do all these cliché things of unboxing. I’m not judging it or trying to be rude. I’m using a mocking term. I’m emphasizing those words. They feel cliché because they’ve been done so many times by me and other people. I don’t even know what to do anymore. In this Goddess Provisions box, my favorite thing thus far is the spoon.

It’s a gold spoon. It’s got the word shine and bright printed on it but I love the feeling of it. It’s got a good texture. When I got this in the box, I was like, “This is cool.” There are also these little superfood packets of this matcha-chlorella mixture. I haven’t tried it yet. I’m thinking, “How could I even do content around this? I don’t know when I’m going to try this. There’s a bath bomb in there which looks nice but I haven’t tried it yet. What am I going to do? Put it in the bathtub and shoot a video?” I used to purposely try out products, film myself trying them and react to them for the video. It was a performance.

In all honesty, I haven’t felt like taking a bath with the bath bomb. I’m going to save this. If history is any indication of the present or the future, I won’t use this for months or maybe one year. I have to push myself to use a bath bomb. I often save them because I want to be in the right mood to be craving a bath bomb. That might happen to me a few times a year. It’s the same thing with this matcha. It sounds great and looks nice but I don’t drink a ton of matcha. Why should I drink this just so I can promote it or sell more products for somebody else and make a fraction of that money? That’s also the bizarre side. I’m ranting a little bit here.

To give you perspective on how the influencer industry works makes my skin crawl because companies will hire someone like me to make a video that’s creative, cool and has a level of authenticity to it. They’ll pay that creator a percentage based on how much they think they’re going to sell from that creator. In other words, “Whitney has X amount of followers. If 10% of those followers buy our product, we’ll make this amount of money. Let’s give Whitney whatever fraction of that to promote this. That way we’ll make a profit from working with Whitney.” That’s how it works. It makes sense from a business standpoint.

From a capitalist standpoint, it’s a little disturbing because first of all, it’s not based on inequality. I’m getting paid far less to do something that gives someone far more benefit. That’s how things work but on a human-to-human level, I would so much rather be equal like, “How about we both make the same amount of money?” In the company’s sense, they’re spending money to produce things like this, on and on. I’m not saying it’s that simple of a concept but that dynamic does not feel good to me. It feels like I’m being used and I’m using you.

The deeper issue here is that I don’t want to use you and manipulate you to spend your money so I can make some money from the company because the company is making money from you. On a deep level, it doesn’t feel great to me. That’s no shade to Goddess Provisions or these companies. I appreciate them. They send me this box for free. I’m grateful for it. I’m happy to promote things I use and recommend things to you that I feel value. Gone are the days when I will promote anything that I like.

For example, this matcha looks cool. I read the ingredients. I’m like, “I like all that stuff. I’m sure it tastes good. It’ll be pretty. It’s going to be photogenic.” I could think of a perfect video to make. I probably would enjoy making the video but also when I think back to when I was doing all that work, every time I would post a sponsored video, something in me felt unsettled. There was like a little voice. Maybe it was my little self or not.

 

To take a break from something that you love so much wasn’t hard because you’re doing it for this deeper reason. Share on X

 

It was almost like a little angel on my shoulder saying, “This isn’t quite right.” I would ignore that voice because I thought that voice was insecurity. In hindsight, that voice was saying, “You’re trying to make money off of other people and not in a fully authentic way. You’re performing for the company and the social media audience. You’re trying to make money even if you will align with something.”

I would try so hard and still do because I occasionally work with sponsors to ensure that I am aligned with them. I align with Goddess Provisions. Based on what I know and my experience with them, I align with them and I’m happy to talk about them. Usually, the products there seem ethical. It checks off all these boxes but it’s still that question of, “What cost?” When I pay attention to this inner voice that says, “Why don’t you pause posting on social media?” It’s because there’s part of me that feels like it’s not nourishing, worth it and feels in full alignment.

The only reason I often do is because of some societal pressure because I think, “I want to please the guest on my show. I want to honor them.” That feels one of the more legitimate reasons to post but I hesitate because of people like you. Does this add value to your life? Hopefully, it does. You wouldn’t be reading this show if it didn’t serve some value to you and maybe you like seeing the posts on Instagram because it tells you a little bit about the upcoming guest. That makes some sense. Ultimately, I’m feeling a little burnt out. I need some creative inspiration and I’ll get back to Instagram likely in the future.

When it comes to posting and working with other companies in the last few years, I’ve had constant pause because there’s something that feels off about it. I’ve verbalized. There’s even more to it. It’s the deeper thing I could probably dive into in a whole new episode. It’s given me a lot of opportunities to pause, reflect and not feel rushed. It’s important to tune into yourself, reflect on yourself and tie into your younger self on what mattered. It’s okay to do things on a different timeline than others. It’s okay to do things differently, coloring outside the lines and finding out what works for you. Confidence is key.

Intuitive Eating And A Better Relationship With Food

With all that said, there are a couple of other random things I wanted to share. I decided to do a juice cleanse. I had mentioned on an episode that I’ve been struggling with my food sensitivities and I’m not even sure if it is food sensitivities because my symptoms feel confusing and complex. It’s a bit discouraging because I’ve been struggling off and on with food sensitivities most of my life but the past many years.

I went to all these doctors and tried to figure it out. Every doctor shrugged. It’s depressing. It’s shocking how in the mainstream medical industry either there’s ignorance or a lack of systems in place to properly help people and evaluate them, especially for me with my insurance. I get the bare minimum care from doctors. Generally, it’s fine though. I’m very grateful for the coverage I have and it’s good enough but for something more complex, like my sleep disorder, me going to the sleep clinic and not getting any answers, doctors are saying, “You’re fine.” It’s like, “I know I’m not fine. It’s not in my head.”

I have some sleep issues. I would love to fix it but they haven’t figured it out. I don’t seem to be getting much help. I would have to dedicate so much of my life to figuring something out. I don’t have the bandwidth to do that. With my food sensitivities, I felt like I had them figure it out. They have gone wild where my body is going through something and for some reason, multiple times a week, having these flare-ups. For me, that would be inflammation, feeling my body was puffy, heavy, tired and having the sniffling, sneezing and brain fog. It’s awful. For many days I felt that way.

I was like, “That’s it. I can’t do this anymore. I’m going on a juice cleanse.” Within a matter of hours, I got a plan together for me. I didn’t feel great about paying a ton of money for it. I’m not in a financial place where I want to throw $200 to try to solve this problem. I did all this research and felt very frustrated. I’m excited to share with you a solution I’ve found, which is Trader Joe’s. This is cool. I almost want to do a blog post. Even though I barely blog, I almost want to do a dedicated blog post about how to do a cleanse with only Trader Joe’s. It was remarkable.

In June 2022, you can go to Trader Joe’s if there’s one near you. They have organic cold-pressed juice there, which is very similar to the juices from major companies and juice places. The quality might not be quite as good as a local juice shop. It’s not going to be as fresh. I don’t know how long they’re on the shelf but it’s the lowest price I could find. I looked at a ton of different places locally in Los Angeles. The one place I was leaning towards came out to be about $5.50 per bottle of juice.

I almost went there to buy from them but a lot of their stuff didn’t feel that appealing to me. I wanted something basic. My desire to do a cleanse was like I want to take a break from solid food and more processed food because I was wondering if some of my reactions were coming from specific ingredients and processed foods. I needed to narrow down why I was having these reactions and the juice cleanse felt like the best way for me to pause, reset and reevaluate.

 

 

Long story short, after researching online cleanses or places that could deliver to me within a day, I felt a sense of urgency. It was a Wednesday and I want to start on a Thursday. I could not wait. I went to Trader Joe’s that Wednesday night and was so thrilled to see that they have a cold-pressed organic green juice and cold-pressed organic red juice, which was beef based. They also have the most amazing organic coconut smoothie. Organic is important to me. If you don’t align with the organic way of drinking juice, there were some non-organic things but the default there was organic. That’s why I’m emphasizing this. The coconut smoothie was coconut water and coconut meat blended, which was magical.

I bought it for the first time on my third day of the cleanse. At that point, my body thought everything tasted amazing because your taste buds change so much in 1 day or 2, at least the perception of taste. It’s those three items plus they have a celery juice from Suja, which makes organic juices. It was celery juice and lemon was in it, plus an apple cider vinegar lemon maple drink, which is the master cleanse. I’ve done that a few times but didn’t want to do that this time. I don’t think it’s the greatest thing to do for your body. It depends on your philosophy.

They had a version of that with added apple cider vinegar and probiotics. They have this large container. The other drinks I listed were maybe somewhere between 10 to 16 ounces. The large drink was 32 ounces. It’s also an organic green juice. They didn’t call it juice. It’s called something different because they added mint tea. I bought that too. That was what I purchased. They also have an organic watermelon. I didn’t buy it so I don’t remember if it was organic or not but it’s a watermelon juice. They have pineapple and orange juice. I listed all this off because I didn’t know they had all of those things.

I don’t pay attention to that. I go to Trader Joe’s all the time. Not only do they have those products but the price is amazing because the highest price for the small bottles was $3.99 compared to the average I was finding, which was about $5 or $6 per juice on one of these other pre-packaged cleanses or at the local juice shop I looked at, it was $5.50. They bring it down to $3.99, especially where food prices are going way up. Don’t quote me on those prices because with the current inflation, those prices could certainly go up. Fingers crossed they do not because having access to that when I could just go to Trader Joe’s load up on those things and immediately started a juice cleanse, I was just a blown away.

When you have gratitude for access to something affordable and nearby, I was thrilled. I haven’t yet checked to see prices on stuff like that in some of the other stores I shop at like Whole Foods and Sprouts because I was fully satisfied with Trader Joe’s. I did about 4 or 5 days of mostly juice. I decided for each of those days that I would have one meal at dinner time because I had a bunch of ProJuices that I didn’t want to go to waste. I’m still not sure if I would continue drinking juice, ease myself in and do a few days of only juice and no solid food. I found myself thinking about why I was doing what I was doing.

Unlike other times where I’ve done strict cleanses, meaning no solid food and following intense protocols, I realized this was for me and by me based on my intuition. When I combined intuitive eating with cleansing, I found a whole new meaning to it. I didn’t need to deprive myself of solid food. The reason I was doing that cleanse was to give myself a break from feeling all those horrible food-related symptoms and figure out what foods were triggering those symptoms.

I decided that my meals each night would be the simplest vegetable-based meals. For example, one night I had zucchini and yellow squash because that’s what was in my fridge. I added some oil, salt and pepper to it. It tasted magnificent because I had been juicing all day. To have my first solid meal was wow. Simple food made me so happy.

Another day I had green beans. I steamed them and might’ve put some oil on them, also salt and pepper. They were incredible. One night I had romaine lettuce chopped up with cucumbers or something. It’s a simple salad. Normally, I make salads with tahini, nutritional yeast, pumpkin seeds and olives but I don’t know yet if any of those foods are causing reactions. I haven’t added them to my diet. I’ve been afraid of them because something in my regular way of eating is causing a reaction for me. It’s happening frequently. It was fascinating to eat simply because the juicing helped me appreciate the food so much that it tasted great, unlike how I was eating before I juice. Those simple meals wouldn’t have felt filling, satisfying or exciting.

That deep appreciation for food in that way is valuable to me. I didn’t expect that, plus it was interesting. I had coffee for the first time, which has been almost a full week since I started cleansing and it was an intuitive decision to have coffee. I’ve only had a little bit of it. It was interesting because I had been in this pattern of drinking coffee every morning and then oftentimes a few hours later. I loved my routine of making lattes. I have this espresso machine.

To take a break from something that I love so much wasn’t hard because I was doing it for this deeper reason. I thought the first day, “I’ll see how I feel.” I’m fortunate not to get caffeine withdrawal. I don’t get headaches. I didn’t feel any different except after about seven days of doing this protocol, which I came up with myself. I noticed how I felt so much energy all week.

 

It’s crucial to align with anyone you work with. Share on X

 

I’m not drinking coffee for energy. I drink coffee for pleasure but it was good to take a break from it because I was wondering, “Am I reacting to coffee or the milk I’m using?” How ambiguous my food sense of these was I could not place them. Long-winded story to share that if you thought about doing something like this, Trader Joe’s is awesome if you have one near you. You could certainly juice on your own. If you’re wondering, I do have a great juicer but I realize all the time it would take for me to go to the store.

First of all, to prep a bunch of recipes, I have to figure out how many of whatever produce I needed, what recipes I wanted to make, go to the store or wait for the next farmer’s market and get all these products. I would have ended up spending close to the same amount of money given how inexpensive Trader Joe’s was but a lot more time. It is more ideal from an environmental and waste standpoint. I was using several plastic bottles but considering that I was able to do this quickly and take care of myself and feel I got that break that I needed, it felt like the best route for me. I wasn’t ordering online or going to a store so there’s probably a little bit more waste getting things from the grocery store.

It worked out great and tied the intuitive eating side into it versus how I would have cleansed in the past, which had been strict, “I’m only going to do liquids.” The fact that I had the philosophy of not wanting to waste food inspired me to eat meals. It was my way of “giving myself” permission. I got to feel out what it was like to juice all day and then eat at night. In the last few days, I started adding in lunch again and feeling that out like, “How did it feel to have two meals a day and eat specific foods?” What I have been doing is eating. It broadened the way that I was eating in some unique ways. For instance, for dinner and lunch, I had artichokes and dip them in some simple vegan butter that didn’t have a ton of ingredients. It was the most satisfying meal.

I aim to eat basic, almost mano meals, although I’m still adding usually some oil, salt and occasionally black pepper. I haven’t used garlic. I don’t think I’ve had garlic at all because I wanted to see if that was impacting me. I did have some fresh onion. Normally, I’m loading on the nutritional yeast and all the spices. My meals would have ten plus ingredients in them to hone in and have maybe four ingredients in a dish. It was cool.

In a way, that preps me for some bigger things because another episode I could do in the future is about my feelings on the recession and inflation. I’ve been thinking a ton about this and wondering what happens if all these food costs go way up and almost feel out of reach as some people are concerned about? Do I want to start making my food? Do I want to start growing more food? Does that mean I’m going to simplify my diet a lot?

I’ve been doing a ton of research. I’m starting to do some actual actions in growing some foods, planning a garden, things I’ve been wanting to do but haven’t felt super inspired. Eating simply and also barely eating packaged foods was such a cool experience for me because I’m someone that typically will eat a bag of chips or get some sweets. I love trying all-vegan chocolates or gummies. I get super into them. Those are things that I was frequently putting in my body. Maybe my body was having trouble navigating the complexities of a vegan gummy bear that has tons of ingredients in it. I tend to eat low-sugar or sugar-free. What are these sweeteners doing to me?

I’m stepping back to evaluate these individual ingredients. How they impact my body and my budget is interesting. I want to lean more towards foods that could grow. I found myself craving potatoes. Since I’ve been on a relatively low-carb diet off and on for many years, I’m not strict about it. I’ve talked about this in an episode with my friend Elizabeth. That was a super popular episode. It was interesting because low-carb keto can be so polarizing. I love Elizabeth because she and I both look at vegan, the plant-based low carb way of eating as an intuitive process, not as a strict restrictive dietary thing. Both of us struggle with food sensitivities and found ourselves more interested in higher-fat foods.

I don’t generally eat a ton of potatoes. I do love potato chips and French fries but I try to have them in moderation. It was super interesting how through the juice cleanse several days in, I started craving potatoes. I made my French fries in the air fryer and they were super simple. I was cutting up some potatoes soaking them in cold water. That’s a good trick. I put some oil on them, which you don’t have to do in an air fryer but I’m not against oil. I put salt and pepper on them, air fried them and they were so nourishing.

This is intuitive eating because especially through cleansing, you feel more aware of what foods you want versus what’s a craving or something that’s meant to make you feel good or give you a burst of feel-good emotions. A lot of times, I eat emotionally and was able to get more in tune with that and then also savor these foods. The French fries that I made were the bulk of my meal that night as a side dish. They were something I was eating intentionally, enjoying every bite of and not attaching any of that old guilt, not thinking about the carb content and all of that. The cleanse was so freeing but it helped me refocus on simple vegetables so that whenever I decide to pause on the juicy, I go back to eating solid foods and coffee, as I usually do.

I’m more tuned in to myself and what makes me feel good physically and emotionally, not feeling so drawn to a lot of the packaged foods that weren’t making me feel good. I’m not against packaged foods, although from an environmental standpoint, there’s another big benefit to cutting back on that. From the budget side, a lot of our packaged food prices are going to go way up. We’ll see the ripple effect on all sorts of single-ingredient foods too sadly. The cool thing is those are a lot easier to grow and source from farmers directly as opposed to the grocery store. I plan to dig into that subject matter at some point because it becomes very passionate.

 

 

Upcoming Meaningful Travels

Last but not least, I teased this earlier and want to make sure that I touch upon it but certainly, in another episode what I plan to make is about my upcoming travels. As you have read if you’ve read a lot of episodes, I do road trips. I love them and I’m planning my next cross-country trip. Before that, I am almost positive that I’m going to two international destinations, which is going to require me to fly in a plane for the first time since 2019. My last flight was in November 2019. I’m okay with that. I was a little nervous that I would bring up some negative emotions but I feel fully comfortable with it.

I will be wearing my mask. I’m still a big fan of wearing my mask. There have been spikes in COVID. I can see myself wearing a mask long-term to avoid cold flu or whatever else. I like wearing a mask and all my little protocols in place for protecting myself from all opportunities to get sick. That’s another subject I don’t mean to dive into. The reason is I was invited to go on a retreat in Costa Rica and got hired to support them with their marketing. I intend to share more about that because I align with the purpose of this retreat and that ties into what I was sharing earlier about how it’s crucial for me to align with anyone I work with. Most of my income comes from being hired to help people with social media and marketing.

That almost sounds ironic, given that I struggle with social media on my side but I’ve found that guiding other people towards intentional social media marketing aligns with me because I can help people uncover what’s important to them, help them speak and connect with their audience on a whole new level. I’ve found it deeply rewarding. I’ve been doing that work off and on since 2009. I enjoy it. I like the strategy side of social media when I don’t have to execute it myself. I do a lot of that work but also marketing in general, helping people figure out how can they find the ideal customer? How can they speak to them? How can they support them? My clients are almost exclusively mindful-related companies, not necessarily in health and wellness.

Two of my main ongoing clients are a podcast company. The other one is a live stream video company, eCommerce. This new client of mine is the retreats. They are having me as part of my work go to Costa Rica. I’ve never been super excited. To my recollection, I’ve never been on an official retreat like that, depending on how long you’ve known me in my work. In 2013 or 2014, I was part of a retreat in Costa Rica as well. Long story short, at the last minute, I didn’t end up going. I participated in teaching the classes I was going to teach there virtually. They had me go on Zoom and teach the people in Costa Rica. It was interesting. If you ever want to read that story, send me a message. I will tell it as I share more about this actual retreat I’m going.

I’m excited. I’ve been learning so much about retreats and helping them come up with fair and clarify the messaging. I’ve been encouraging them to prioritize diversity, which is nourishing for me. In our meetings, it’s a key thing for me. I said, “I need to be involved with projects that prioritize diversity in all different senses of that word, racially, age-wise, gender-wise, financial income-wise, physically including people that are not able-bodied, thinking about how can we make things available and inclusive to all different types of people.” Fortunately, that’s something that they’re working on and hopefully prioritizing more with my influence. I’ll tell you more about that retreat as it unfolds but I have to book my flight. I’ve been overthinking it and getting in my head about it.

The other thing is my dad told me that he’s going to Singapore for business. This comes back around to when I mentioned him taking me to Australia when I was fourteen. Out of the blue, he was like, “I’m going to Singapore. Would you be interested in meeting me there?” How could I say no to that? It’s going to cost me money to do it. He’s not paying for my ticket to get there. It’s an expense but I am fortunate that I’ve had whole savings account dedicated to travel because it’s become a big priority for me. With my work with the retreat, I’ve been able to make it work financially to go spend some time with my dad in Singapore.

Those tickets have also yet to be purchased but hopefully, I’ll get those books and make it official. I will have a lot to share with you before and after my road trips because it’s such an interesting mental process for me to do something like that. It feels outside my comfort zone. It’s uncomfortable. If I think about it too much, I’m like, “I can’t believe I’m going to these places.” I could go on and on. I knew they were the right decisions because they both felt good on that deep, intuitive level that I’ve mentioned. They felt like things I was aligned in with. With my dad, it’s an opportunity to do something with him that I haven’t done since I was fourteen.

That’s the only time my dad and I have traveled together alone. We used to do family trips growing up but that was special to go to a foreign country with him. Even though I don’t feel as attached to Singapore as I did to Australia back then, how could I say no and focused more on what would my inner child want to do? I’ve always deeply loved my dad. Even though there’s a lot involved with it, I feel called to do it. I have to leap. I remember thinking some of these same thoughts back in 2018 when my boyfriend at the time and I went to Greece. I remember having all this odd resistance to it. I was nervous about booking my ticket.

I remember when he brought it up and I was like, “I don’t know if I can do this.” He was financially supportive on that trip. No money got in the way. He even helped me book my flight. He was so involved. I kept coming up with resistance. I pushed through the resistance and went. It was amazing. Greece had been on my “bucket list” or my list of places to go. It’s interesting noticing the resistance and the discomfort that comes up with even doing something that you want to do. It was a great lesson for me. I’m still not fully through my resistance because I haven’t bought my tickets but maybe I’m going to go look at them and then have some sort of wonderful dinner.

What will I have? I have a bag of kale, peppers and more zucchini onions. This is fun as I’ll go downstairs to the kitchen, look at the food and decide, “What is calling me? What feels what I want to eat?” That’s something to have for dinner. That is my share for you. This has been a longer episode. It’s unusual for me to go this long with a solo episode. Thanks for reading. I appreciate you. If you would like to connect, here are the ways to do that because the connection is very important to me. Number one, it feels like Instagram DMs are very easy for many of you. Even though I pause from Instagram, I still check it often. I use it a lot for messaging.

If you’d like to send me a message, there are two accounts you can use. One is the elevator @Wellevatr on Instagram or you can use my account @WhitLauritsen. You can email me as well. My email is easy to find either on the Wellevatr website or my domain, which is WhitneyLauritsen.com. It’s also on my Instagram. I have a few email addresses. Lastly, the Beyond Measure community, which remains free. I’ve mentioned how at some point in 2022 I do plan to charge a small membership fee looking at somewhere between $5 to $10 a month to help me cover the costs of it because it does take a financial and time resources to run that community but it is such a big joy and not something that I look at for profit. It is a place to connect with you and other amazing people.

I can’t stress enough how much that community has shifted and impacted my life and the members. It’s embodying community in ways that I haven’t experienced before. It’s a great way for me to get to know you. I do want to connect with you. If you’re not already in there, I would love to have you part of it. You can come to check it out. We meet once a week. There’s an event calendar there. When you sign up, you can see that. You can RSVP to join us. We meet on Zoom and have a theme for each call. We do some group exercise, which is optional.

You can sit there and observe, talk, share or participate however you want. It’ll give you a cool opportunity to connect with me in real-time, which is my ideal. If you’re interested in future episodes, the easiest way to be notified of them is to subscribe and/or sign up for the newsletter. I’ve paused on that as well because I’m reevaluating how I want to do that. I can’t promise exactly when you’ll get the next newsletter but if you sign up at least, at some point, you’ll find out some info.

In the past, I used to email every week with a list of episodes and I wanted to reevaluate that. If you have input on that, you can send it to me in an email or a message. Hearing from you is my big goal and making sure that you’re getting value from the show. I want you to know that your input is helpful to me. If you ever have requests, you’re liking something or you see opportunities for me to shift things, let me know it. Thanks again for being part of my life through this show. I’ll be back with a guest episode. Bye for now.

 

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• YouTube – Wellevatr
• Beyond Measure
• Goddess Provisions
• @WhitLauritsen – Instagram
• WhitneyLauritsen.com
• https://WhitneyLauritsen.com/GoddessProvisions

 

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