Shannon shares her lived experience living with CPTSD, anxiety, and caregiving while describing how she moved out of survival mode into self-love, discussing imperfect balance, lessons from therapy, and ways to feel less alone.
Cadre, Happy Friday. I'm here today in actually our new office, which is super exciting. Here doing my live this morning on how I stopped living in survival mode and started loving myself.
Shannon is part of the Cadre team. She lives with anxiety and she has a child with autism. She talks about how she started to love herself. She hopes to make people feel less alone.
LZ: Balance for me is just something that, like, feels so foreign. I think I'm living in the best time of my life. But at this moment in my life, I do not have balance. Instead of punishing ourselves for that, I think what we can do instead is notice the wins and the imbalance.
There's big words when it comes to mental health. Balance, faith, calm, all the things. But let's just remember that we're going to be imperfect. My balance right now is imbalance. And I'm also the happiest I've ever been. I deeply, deeply appreciate this community.
Cadre, Happy Friday. It is Shannon from Cadre. I'm here today in actually our new office, which is super exciting. I'm going to show you guys. This is our new office with all of our new friends and I'm here doing my live this morning on how I stopped living in survival mode and started loving myself. So happy Friday to all of you guys. It's nice to see you. It's nice to meet you. Okay, so. So for those of you who I haven't met, my name is Shannon. I am part of the Cadre team. I am a person who lives with cptsd.
I live with anxiety and I have a child with autism. So I'm a caregiver. And so I come here on Cadre as a peer. I come here to share my lived experience as a human being to hopefully make you feel less alone, help you feel seen, help you feel like you're just a normal person, because that's what we all are. So. So today is Friday and I also this stream itself, I talk about how I started to love myself and stop living in survival mode. Loving myself is a hard thing. Loving yourself can be a hard thing.
I went to therapy for eight years and so I take everything I learned and I bring it to you guys just in hopes that you're going to feel less alone. I see so many of you guys coming in, it's awesome. Okay, so today I'm here with the team and we've been talking about balance. And I'm thinking about my live stream today and I'm thinking about, like, balance for me is such a hard word. Balance for me is just something that, like, feels so foreign. I am a super type A personality for those of you who know me.
And so when I think about the word balance, it's just like, ugh. Like, it honestly makes my body feel stressed because I don't live in that space typically. And balance is also important, right? Like, we have lots of parts of us and we have to take care of all of it. So for me, I'm gonna say something which is amazing and exciting that I just realized yesterday, which is I think I'm living in the best time of my life. I didn't know that I would ever get to a place to be able to say that, but I think it's true.
I am living in the best time of my life. I'm 49 years old. It went through a bunch of stuff. It went through a bunch of s***, frankly, as I told you in the upfront. And I hit this place Where I'm like, I think I'm in my best time of my life. Guess what? It's not balanced. It's not balanced. Right now. I have Cadre, which I work on a lot, and it's my baby. I have my actual babies, who are actually also not babies. They are 16 and 17 years old and getting ready to head out into the world. You know, there's just a lot going on.
And at this moment in my life, I do not have balance. I don't have have balance friends right now, if you went home to my house, my kitchen's a disaster. I have dishes in the sink. I'm gonna walk because there's some other folks coming around. I have dishes in the sink. My house is a little disastery. I was supposed to go out of town this weekend, and honestly, I'm tired and I don't think I can do it. Is that balance? It's not. Did I want to work out today? I did. Have I worked out today? No. Right.
So why am I saying all this is that I think as humans, we can choose to seek balance. We can choose to seek the best case scenarios of things that we want to try to be or do. And sometimes in life, you're not going to get there in a balanced way. And so instead of punishing ourselves for that and making ourselves feel bad that we're not able to achieve balance, in this case, I think what we can do instead is notice the wins and the imbalance. So for me, what are my wins and my imbalance? One is you guys.
You guys are one of my wins. Jules, I see you here. Happy afternoon, Jules. You're in the dirty house era club. Yes, you are. That's okay, right? Like, there are things in this moment, in my time, in my life that are so fantastic that they're more important to me than balance. That's probably not a long term thing I want to live into, right? And it's my truth, and so that's okay. And it's letting me live in this place, in the space where I feel really great about things and it's imperfect. And so I think that's my reminder today is that there's big words when it comes to mental health and when it comes to how we want to live, there's big words and there's big themes, right?
Balance, faith, calm, all the things. Right. There's a lot of big words that we think about when it comes to what living a good life looks like or what good mental health looks like. And sometimes that's Theory versus practice. Hi, Amar. Nice to see you. Hopefully I said your name right. Correct me if I didn't, but I'm so glad you're here. When we use those big words to help us with our mental health, when we use those big words to help us with, you know, how we are finding the right ways to go forward in our life, let's just remember, too, that we're going to be imperfect.
And so my balance right now is imbalance. My balance right now is a ton of work and honestly, more doordash than I wish to admit to you all. And also, that's my truth. And I'm also the happiest I've ever been. So I want to give us all permission to say, yes, these big words are amazing. And balance is. Is amazing. And, you know, healthy mental spaces are amazing. And all the things that we're seeking to try to be in theory, and also notice that in practice they're going to be different. And that's okay.
And you can be the happiest you've ever been and be imbalanced, right? And you can be wildly balanced and not be the happiest you've ever been. So I just want us all to, like, pay attention to ourselves and know that whatever you're doing is right for you. And if that gets you closer to your version of balance, to your version of happiness, whatever that is, keep doing it. And you can take these pieces of advice and thoughts and you can say, you know, that are from the world and from culture and say, yeah, it's great to have balance in a traditional way.
And also know that for you, you get to define that. And that's it. That's what I wanted to say today. You know, I. I think I just. I am imbalanced right now. And I'm also really happy. And I'm also really happy, Amar, that you're here today. I'm happy. Jules, that you're here today. I see Nikki popped into. I'm happy you guys are all here today. I deeply, deeply appreciate this community. Why I am so happy in my life right now is because of you all. And that is a fantastic gift. And so thank you for being a part of that and thank you for being there for each other.
You guys are amazing people. You're doing an awesome job being you. I'm so grateful for you. And I hope everybody has a fantastic weekend and we will see you soon again here in the Cadre sphere. So have a great day. Bye, guys.
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