111: A few lessons I’ve learned about love
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hello my beautiful people welcome back to the moments podcast last time we talked i was in a car and i was driving to jacksonville and today i'm laying in my bed i can't seem to find my recorder so i'm hitting you guys with my voice memos again this is how easy it is to start a podcast just whip out your voice memos yeah you got to edit the audio quite a bit but anyways

I don't know what we're going to talk about today. I went to therapy about 30 minutes ago. It was so good for my brain. I do have to say my brain in general has been doing a little bit better because I've been home and when I'm stable and I'm home, my problems disappear a little bit because I can breathe easily, which is great.

I don't even know how to explain it. It's just when I'm go, go, go, my brain is always on catch-up mode. So my therapist told me I need to stop saying that because it's not going to get any better if I keep saying that. But it was always on catch-up mode. So I was always like, if I was on a trip, I would get back from that trip and be like, okay, got to make up for those days I was gone. And because of work, I was traveling a lot. And yes, while I was working, while I was traveling, I was traveling.

Not to the extent that I work when I'm home. And I honestly want to deep dive into this for a little bit of a second. I know that those of you guys who listen to the podcast are very kind people and you're not meanie pants up in my DMs saying I don't do anything. And I know that I don't need to justify it to anyone, but like, I be on my grind. Anyways, I'm not even getting into it. It's really not worth my time. People are just mean sometimes.

But I don't have to explain myself to anyone. And that's something that I learned in therapy today. Now what we're going to get into this whole episode, I want to talk about love. But my therapist told me that I clearly have some like emotional childhood trauma that I always feel the need to either justify like what I do or who I am or like let myself be the butt of the joke and like make fun of myself before I give people the chance to do so. And I think part of the reason I do this is because...

I got bullied so bad in middle school for doing yoga and just for like talking about mental health and all of that. And even now having my job title be like an influencer is so freaking ridiculous. And I'm already about to do it. But like old people make fun of it and people think it's a joke because it's a different kind of job. And look, I'm already doing it just like

basically talking down on what I do and like always letting myself be the butt of someone's joke and making fun of them before they can make fun of me and she told me I need to stop doing that because self-talk is so important and whether I realize it or not that is really mean to do to my brain and that is going to block off so many good things and good receptors yada yada yada um what I want to talk about in today's episode is

is what being in love has taught me. And I know I feel, see, I'm about to do it again, like just explaining myself and justifying things all the time. I know I've been talking a lot about my relationship. And I've done that because it has altered my life tremendously. Like I was someone who was so scared of this. And like, I'm finally at a point where I have accepted it as part of my life and deemed it as something beautiful and beautiful.

impactful and my life was thrown off of it. What? My life was thrown off because of it for quite some time and to finally be at the point where it's doing the opposite and I don't see it as like a interruption of my life and now I see it as a part of my life is a beautiful thing that I'm really proud of and I'm doing my best even just in this episode to be kinder like about the way that I talk about my problems or

my situations and just like accept that if this isn't something you want to listen to, you don't have to listen to. I'm not going to be able to please everyone with all the things I say. And that really is that on that. I just got a mean DM the other day too that I took so personally. It wasn't like some girl just saying that my content's changed ever since I had a boyfriend. It was some girl being really mean about how different my content is and how different I am since I got a boyfriend. And it was no profile picture, fake username. So

whatever. It's just, that says enough. If you want to say something, say it with your chest, you know, say it with your face. But I took it to heart and I was like, is my content changing? Am I changing? And the answer really is no. Like, yes, there's going to be different shifts in my content. Like my day in the life are almost, they are all going to include my boyfriend because we live together. And I've always taken pride on how

My content revolves around my life. My life does not revolve around my content. Therefore, if things change in my life, things are going to change on the internet, you know, and I actually find that to be very valuable and people are either going to grow with me or they're not, but it is not my job to just stay one version of myself forever to please anybody.

anyone really and this goes beyond social media like anyone in your life don't stay the same just to keep certain people around whatever that may be now that i've gone on my little ramble scramble um this is gonna be the last episode there's gonna be no episode for christmas i didn't do an episode last week i was supposed to but life just freaking life's man there's been really cool things going on

But then we're going to have an episode for New Year's and New Year's episode. I want to shift back into my more positive and impactful and knowledgeable science-y type of stuff that I talk about. Not science-y, but I want to give you facts and I want to tell you things about your brain and I want to tell you the things that are going to change your life. And in order for me to do that, I need to first practice that and study that to like tell you from personal experience. And

I don't know. I'm about to do it again. I was about to say like my episodes have just been so bad lately because blah blah blah blah blah. Girl, stop talking about yourself like this. Seriously. I love when I'm recording because I just sit here and I'm like right now I'm laying in my bed recording because I'm having freaking ovulation cramps. But I'm staring at my wall and I'm talking and I'm like, am I going crazy? And then I remember, no, I'm talking to my friends. I'm not just talking to myself. Now where was I? Yeah, so New Year's episode is going to be all of my...

New Year's not resolutions my tips tricks and things that we can do to feel better and to take care of ourself and to just feel good in a not so good world. That's the goal but I'm really excited to record that episode. I'm probably going to record it soon so I'm going to do my research this week and this weekend but yeah this episode is all the things I've learned from love and I

not necessarily just romantic I'm sure a lot of these things are going to pertain to a romantic relationship but they may also pertain to a best friend or a relationship with your parents it's just it depends I don't know what I'm about to say I didn't make an outline again I'm laying in my bed staring at my wall as I record this episode but even if you you want to if you whoa glitch you

If you're thinking about just ending this episode because you're not in a relationship, I don't think that's a good idea. I think you should listen because nobody told me these things and I didn't know that any of these things would be true when I got in a relationship. Like I didn't know jack shit about relationships before I was in this one. And I've been in a relationship. I don't even count it as a real one in my head because it is nothing like what this feels like.

But I did date someone for like three months in COVID times. And I was serious with them. But, oh my god. I just found my recorder. Why is it in my jewelry box? That's crazy. Wow. My brain is just as cluttered as my house, guys. There's boxes everywhere because I'm moving and renovating. And, okay. Where was I? One second, please. I've been in a relationship. It just wasn't serious. And...

I just wish that someone told me these things. Or I wish I could have known that these things would come from it. And I think it would have made my whole ease into this relationship a lot lighter and a lot less intimidating and scary and discomforting. Okay, I want to take you back to the beginning.

This is kind of like, yes, you know, you kind of love someone, but you're like, what is love? What does love feel like? And you don't know how to explain the feeling of love. And you don't know if you've ever been in love. And you think maybe you've been in love, but just for what you know love to feel like, but you see the potential of something being real.

And for me, that was terrifying and it was intimidating. And I did not know like what to expect. And when I don't know what to expect, I can be someone who gets really anxious. So in the whole first four months, especially of my relationship, I spent more time like fearing the future of our relationship and if it was worth it and if it was going to like last or

more than I actually enjoyed the relationship. And I look back and I'm like, damn, why? Why did I put myself through that kind of torture? Like those first four months,

I don't think that I had any priorities or any thoughts or any stresses besides like freaking out about the fact that I was in a relationship. And yes, that's going to vary person to person. I was not someone who dated in high school. I was not someone who's like hooked up with people. I, like I've mentioned in other episodes, have only been with one person.

And the and I'm talking like romantically seriously physically here. I've kissed people sure I have only been serious in that sense with one other person and I was blacked out every time that I did and I have like a lot of like resentment towards it and I'm not proud of it even though I was dating this person and I loved that person for what I knew loved to be moving on.

Where was I going with this? I spent so much of the beginning of this relationship really, really stressed out about like... And not even on a physical level. I'm talking emotionally here too. Like, am I being a good girlfriend? Am I good enough? Like, is he going to like me once he sees me like this or like this? Or is he going to be able to handle my anxiety attacks or my randomly crying for no reason? Like, I just...

spent so much time fearing it and the one thing you learn about falling in love with someone is that those things actually make you love a person more like I have learned now and I think that it's a beautiful thing that my boyfriend and I can like mirror each other and whenever he's being unkind to himself or whenever he's going through something or he's having his own little dose of anxiety or overthinking or whatever it is

There is no part of me that looks at him and is like, oh, I don't love that or I don't love you. All I do is fall more deeply in love with him. All I have is more care and more compassion and empathy for him. Like when I see him hurting, even if he can't pinpoint the reason or if he's sad or if he's crying.

All I do is love more and love stronger. And I think anybody thinking back to like, think about your parents, think about your siblings, think about your best friends. Like you look at them hurt and you feel for them. There's no part of you that loves them less. And I think that in our heads, we convince ourself that showing weakness or showing any sort of less than the best version of ourself is

We're going to lose people. And I don't know why society has taught us to believe that. But if there's one thing Brene Brown did teach me, and I didn't really experience it in my life until...

I did is that there is power in vulnerability. Being able to cry in front of someone or hurt in front of someone is a beautiful thing and it strengthens a relationship and it strengthens everything about the connection that the two of you have and I just wish I would have known that in the beginning of this relationship because it is so scary showing someone that part of yourself, especially me. I'm someone who isolates when I'm hurting or when I'm going through things and I don't

Don't talk to people. I just get tired of explaining my problems and I don't like talking about things that make me upset. And when you incorporate someone into your life that you essentially live with and spend time with and have to talk about these things with, one, it teaches you how to open up about your feelings and how to release them. And two, it teaches you that it's okay and it's not like weak things.

or of any kind to feel and to be emotional and to struggle. And like you can let go of that fear that someone is going to love you less if you open up to them. And I do know that there's bad people out there. I don't want to call them bad people. There's not bad people. There's just hurt people who do bad things. And it's a hard pill to swallow because trust me, I know. But there's going to be people that don't see that as bad.

a good trait and there's going to be people that are going to make you feel bad about that and I think it's a clear sign that if you are with someone this goes again for friendships too if you are with someone who makes you feel bad about being vulnerable and about having human thoughts and human struggles and human feelings that is not someone you want to keep around in your life

Anyways, right? So that's number one. Let me just make a long story short there. Number one is that it's going to be really scary and you're going to put a lot of pressure on yourself to perform to the best that you can to be really, really beautiful all the time or happy all the time or perfect and doing all these little things and writing letters all the time and like, no, disregard the letters when we're going to get into that soon. Um,

You don't have to be perfect, okay? And you don't have to put the pressure on yourself to do so because the longer you put the pressure on yourself, the longer it's going to take you to actually fall into a real, true, deep love and connection and beautiful relationship. And I don't even know how to explain it. And I'm sure I've maybe touched on this on an episode or two before, but

I think that when when like Gabe was in the honeymoon phase like those first four months or five months when everything's perfect and happy dappy happy. What is the word? What's the expression happy and amazing? I was struggling not because of anything to do with him because of my own mental sanity that like if I did one thing wrong, he was going to decide he didn't want to be with me anymore and then he was going to run far far away. Yeah, so my

honeymoon phase even though it's hit now like in I want to say October is when I felt a switch flip and I was like wait I can cry in front of this man I can look absolutely terrible bonkers with 10 day dirty hair I can do anything and he's still gonna love me and once I let that go that's when I entered the honeymoon stage and that's when I felt this massive weight lift off my shoulders and

It was a crazy feeling that it's hard to put into words, but if anyone's experienced it, I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. Anyways, you don't have to be afraid of showing yourself, okay? Because when there is true love, that does not matter. It only makes you two love each other more. And it's so beautiful to watch it unfold. The next thing I want to touch on is like the love glow is...

different for everyone. Like I've heard so many people say that when you're in a happy relationship like you gain weight, you let yourself go. I think that yes, that does happen. I have not physically felt the best about myself in months and months and months. Like before I got into this relationship, I...

I was on my grind. I was like really focused on what I was putting into my body. I was working out. I was keeping a tan. I was gua shaing every day, keeping my body moisturized, whitening my teeth. I mean, all the things you could imagine. I was on it because I was very focused on my physical looks, which isn't like a

It was a, I was so focused on myself that my physical looks were positively impacted. I wasn't like, oh my God, I just want to look good. Let me, I just want to emphasize on that. But when I got into this relationship, I think that physically a little bit of a downhill trek, but mentally I have felt like this glow from within in the sense that I don't really give a shit so much about

You know, the things that used to make me extremely, extremely insecure, they don't phase me in the way that they used to. And this might be so, I'm doing it again. I was about to say this is so dumb, but it's not dumb. It's human. Like I was really, really focused a lot of the time on how I look and not necessarily to impress anyone, mostly to impress myself, but I was too focused on it that it was consuming so much of my time and my energy. And what being in a relationship and being in love has taught me is that like,

Whether I am fresh blowout, full glam or just waking up in the morning that I'm still beautiful and like I still deserve to feel beautiful and it doesn't matter. It just simply doesn't matter. And I think that that is something that not everybody struggles with.

But for me personally, just seeing myself on the other side of it, I know that it was a struggle and I know that it wasn't healthy. Okay, your appearance and I've talked about this. It's just different now that I've actually felt the shift within myself because it was one of those things I preached all the time, but I hadn't personally made the shift. And I don't feel bad saying that because like I don't always practice what I preach, but I preach it because I need to practice it. I only tell you guys things that I am personally working on myself because

Or things that I have done. It's not often I'll come on here and try to give you advice that I don't think applies to my life. Because, again, we're all in the same boat. But until I actually started realizing that my appearance is the least interesting thing about me. I mean, wow. It has made...

a world of a difference in my life and in my like everyday feelings. Doesn't matter what you look like, okay? Nobody but you is noticing the tiny little details about your looks, okay? And that is it. And I think it's really cool that a relationship could have taught me that because again, going back to those first four months, I would have thought the opposite, you know? I always wanted to look perfect and feel perfect and I wouldn't even let, I wouldn't even stand or sit on a certain side of Gabe because I hate like a certain side of my face. Like what was I hiding from?

What was I thinking? That if I was going to marry this man, he's never going to see the right side of my face? Girl, grow up. But that's just what we do, okay? Anyways, you're beautiful and your appearance does not matter. And that's just something I want to emphasize to you, okay? You will glow differently when you feel true love. When you feel loved. And that also being said, if you are in a relationship... And again, this goes for friendships too. Just because...

A relationship is a friendship and a friendship is a relationship. And I've said that one for a very long time. But if you are in a relationship where the person you are with has anything to say negative about like your appearance, you deserve so much better than that. And

I want you to have high standards. And I want you to know that there is nothing wrong with having high standards. You are supposed to. Have those things written down because there is someone that is truly made for you. And there is someone who is going to treat you right. And you should not settle for someone who does anything but that. And I didn't even know that it existed out there. I didn't know that there were men who were actually always kind. I've seen so much...

negativity online about like people who are with their boyfriends who call them fat and tell them they need to go to the gym and I've always been like wow is that the only thing out there?

And then I met Gabe and it's not. There's really, really good people out there. And I don't say that to like rub it in your face. I say it for you to understand that there is someone who is made just for you and you should never rush ever. Don't rush trying to find that person. Okay, because they're going to come into your life exactly when they are meant to.

And there's going to be people that leave your life exactly when they are meant to. And it's going to suck sometimes. You're going to have to end things that you don't want to end. But we stay in our comfort zone for way too long. And you deserve better than your comfort zone. Let's move on to the next thing. I've literally gotten through two points. I don't even know how many I have though. Again, I don't have an outline. Another lesson that I've learned about being in love. And the thing that love has taught me. My therapist also asked me today.

What have you learned about love? You know, and it was cool. We had a great conversation about it. But another thing I've learned about love is that it's okay to argue. Okay, it is important to argue. If you're not arguing, this goes in friendships too, and relationships with your family. If you don't argue, someone's not speaking up about what they're feeling. Okay, every single one of us is a different human being with a different set of morals, values, goals, ideas, and

whatever it may be. Each and every one of us is going to have a different feeling about something than another person. And if you don't talk about those differences and you don't communicate about them, you're only going to keep letting little small problems build up and eventually someone's going to break and something's going to break and it's going to be a disaster. Gabe and I argue. I don't even think I want to call it an argument. We discuss our differences and

Yeah, let's just call it arguing. We argue all the time. But the important thing about that is that when we argue, we aren't ever arguing against one another or like at each other. We are communicating about what we're feeling and we always are listening to one another. That is the most important thing. If you are in a fight with someone,

Again, this goes in friendships too. And I think that being in a relationship has taught me how to treat my friendships and how to treat my relationships even with my parents. It's so interesting. When Gabe and I fight because of my unconditional love for him, all I want to do is like make things right between us. So we listen to each other and we change things for each other. I don't know how to explain it more than that. Work as a team, okay? Don't work as...

Two people trying to get to an end goal that are different end goals. You work as a team trying to get to the same goal for you to both feel okay. You're going to have differences. You're going to have to make compromises in any relationship, in any friendship, because there is going to be differences. And if you're with someone who is exactly like you,

That's a problem too because you want to be with someone that you have different ideas of and you have different strengths and weaknesses from because you guys want to be able to grow each other and to help each other and to learn things from each other every single day. When you argue with someone and you hear their side, it just opens your mind in a way that most things can't open your mind.

So if you fight with someone in a relationship, that's not the end. That's what makes you guys stronger. And that's a really good thing. And it's very healthy. And I'm an advocate for an argument every once in a while. And also in the beginning of the relationship is when it's super important because that is when you learn how to treat each other. That is when you learn that like,

For example, I... I'm trying to think of an example. This isn't even a real one. But, like, the other day, I... What am I saying? Sorry, I'm glitching so much. If I, like...

having help with the laundry if I don't talk about that if I don't communicate what I want and what I need and what I would appreciate in a relationship how could I expect Gabe to just assume that I want help with that because there's other things like the dishes that I don't want help with because I have a certain way that I like to do it how can he know where to help and what to help with and how can I know what he needs help with if we're not talking about it so

don't expect what you don't clearly communicate. And talk about these things early on, okay? Because if you spend so long wishing you just had some help with the laundry, two years down the road, you're going to get in a really big fight about the laundry that's way bigger than it needs to be. Does that make sense? I hope it makes sense. Another thing that love has taught me. Let me think here. The next one I got, and I think that many of us have heard this before, you can't stop dating each other.

You can't stop showing each other your love and appreciation. And I think it's something really easy to do because eventually Gabe and I are best friends now. Like we quite literally are best friends and we spend every second together. It's easy in those moments to...

To stop chasing each other and to stop dating each other and you just get comfortable with each other and that in itself is a beautiful thing and it's a great thing and it's gonna happen and you want that to happen. But continue to show each other acts of kindness and acts of service and love and this also goes for your friendships, okay? Eventually you're gonna get to a place where you're really comfortable with your friends but never stop showing up as a true friend to your friends. You get what I'm saying?

Never stop checking in on your friends. Same way you should never stop dating each other. And I think those are just going to be my few lessons on love for today. I'm going to keep this episode short and sweet because my brain is starting to be fried. It's given up on me and I hate to bramble your ears off when my brain is giving up on me.

But I love you guys so much, like with my whole heart. And thank you for listening to me ramble about all sorts of things. And I hope that there's something that you could have taken away from this. And if you want me to do a part two of this episode where I get in more detail about each thing and I give you more than, you know, four points.

please let me know because I would love to and I think it could be a very great episode and I would love to record it and I also want to record an episode with Gabe one of these days but I just don't know if we could take each other seriously enough to sit down and record a podcast episode but we'll see maybe maybe not I love you so much hope you have the best week ever and I will talk to you in two weeks