Sober not Somber Hour

Doing Happy Tuesday, last Tuesday of June. I'm Jen Morale and your host of Sober Not Somber Hour. Welcome. Yeah. Today has been a day of meetings and being out and about in the city and it is time to crack a cold one. If you've joined me on Sober Not Somber Hour before, you know that I like my non alcoholic beverages. So today we are cracking open what I call the beautiful thing of not having to mix cocktails. Just opening a can of ready to drink goodness. This one is by Dana Thompson and Dana is known for her work at Owamni.

Native American. And Hetty in the Native American culture means home. And I love this beverage. This one actually. So you guys, I don't do this very often. This one is balanced. Hi, Amar. With. It's got 3 milligrams of THC and 5 milligrams of CBD. So we're getting crazy for Sober not somber hour at 4pm today. Who's got a beverage? Who's joining me? Let me know. Drinking anything exciting? Hi, Sherry. Oh, yeah. Cheers to y' all. I do an na Cheers to start my program every Tuesday. Mmm. Oh my gosh.

These are all always so good. There's not a beverage I have on here that I don't love. This one is. It's called Woodland Edge and it's got cedar, maple and wild bergamot. Low dose, low dose cbd, thc. And we can have a whole conversation about that completely substance free drinks or ones with a little adaptogens and all the things in them to make us feel good. So today, if you've noticed in the Cadre sphere, we're talking about balance. Last week I did a share from my family's hometown and location and the connection wasn't great.

So I don't know. Last week I talked all about balance in terms of social balance. So how to give energy and respect to the introverted and the extroverted experiences that we want to have. It was a good one. But moving on this month as we wrap up with all of our Cadre contributors on the theme of balance. Today I'm talking about life, integration and the idea that balance is very personal to each of us. So seeking that balance. Everyone who's joined in, welcome. I'd invite you to answer the question, do you feel balanced today?

Whatever your version of balanced is, is. And sometimes it's a gut reaction when somebody asks you that, like, don't overthink it. You feel imbalanced, you feel unstable, grounded are some other terms I use. Let me know how you're feeling, I'm feeling a little bit all over the place today. Been all around the city meetings and picking up na product in St. Paul. But what I want to touch on today is why balance is so personal. And, and there's also in terms of life integration. Right. So that's a lifestyle more holistic type overall balance we're talking about.

But I liken it to the idea of like physical balance. Like, how do you experience physical balance in your body? And hang with me because this is like, I'm thinking about my upbringing as a gymnast on the balance beam and what balance meant to me at the age of 10, what balance meant to me 20 some years ago as I was introduced to yoga. And those two physical experiences I want to talk about because if you listen to one of Luke's shares earlier this week is about balance maybe equating to the idea of perfection.

Yeah. Mel's feeling scattered. Amar says, just a little bit sleepy. I get that. Yeah. So this idea of balance is perfection and I resonated with that 100%. Like literally would do a balanced beam routine at the age of 10 and the perfection element of staying balanced was not falling off and getting a high score was not fun to mess up your balance beam routine and fall off the beam and, and be incredibly humbled to have to put your hands, if you see in the Olympics, put your hands back on the beam, take a deep breath and get up and go again.

Obviously there are many good life lessons in the idea of physical balance. So that was gymnastics. And then I was thinking about yoga. And when I discovered it 20 some years ago, I was like six months pregnant and I was like, I don't know if I can do step class and all the intense activities that I've done. What's one way I can slow down and honor my body while being pregnant? And it was yoga. And what I think about most, when I think about what that has taught me in terms of balance, is always moving toward like a state of comfort or mid level where I'm not toppling over and I may be on the outside.

I'm looking like, for example, I'm holding a certain pose, like tree pose. I think most people know what that looks like, but not an easy thing. I mean, I've been at it for 22 years and sometimes I will fall out of balance because my focus is off or, you know, something around me distracts me and I get off balance. But what I notice when I'm striving for balance is that I am working on that Focus, not letting outside distractions come in. And I am integrating, right? All the thoughts like, I'm not steady enough or I'm just really off today.

I can't stay in this without, like, toppling over because balance is, it's in motion. And I think that's an interesting concept too, to not think of it as like, oh, I've arrived, I have balance in my life. No, it's maybe more like we're striving, striving toward balance. So I use those two. Hey, junk food junkie, welcome. Use those two physical examples of where I experience balance in my body and in my lifestyle with working out. And then I translate it, thinking about translating that into life integration.

And one of the biggest things that I feel like I take away from that is my balance in my life looks very different from what maybe was outlined to me as a path. For example, my corporate life that I did for, gosh, 15 plus years, and now my entrepreneurial life that I've been in for about 13 years. To me, there's a drastic difference in how balance shows up in both of those spaces. Oh, by the way, I'm drinking an n a beverage. It's called Hetty Minnesota Maker. It's amazing. So, yeah, I'm just thinking about how I always thought that I was supposed to be like, destined to be in corporate America, climbing up some certain sort of ladder and achieving.

And ultimately I'd have this perfect life balance of career, family, you know, a husband, a dog, whatever, you know, and that balance just wasn't in the cards for me. I found my balance in entrepreneurship, and as crazy as it can look from the outside, it can mean working every day and then also can look like taking a break exactly when I need it and making time for self care. So that to me, and it's not perfect. It is not perfect. The lifestyle of an entrepreneur. Can anyone relate? Any entrepreneurs out there?

If you're logging in here at 4 o' clock, we might have some of them. But you know, not to feel guilty about not being in what society might perceive as balance, a balanced life and integrated life. You know, what does balance look like to you? So I'd encourage you to kind of explore the physicality of balance and how you experience that in movement and thinking about what's going on in your body and how that translates what we say in yoga, off the mat, and how our broader life experiences and idea of balance applies.

I'm okay with entrepreneurship because I'm okay with falling off the balance beam and getting back up. Others Might not have that same type of risk tolerance that I've somehow developed and may never want to fall off. So they work on keeping a safe routine and being able to stay on the balance beam and keep their life fairly contained in a way that feels like balance to them. Yeah. Oh, I love that. I can relate when I'm in stress mode and when things don't work out. Yeah, yeah. Stress throws it off.

Like I was saying earlier, focus and like distractions are always there. And stress. Yeah, that is a huge gosh, that is a huge thing that pulls me out of balance. Like I can be going along in my day and then something stressful will come in and it throws literally everything off. If it's significant enough, it will do that. And I just had that happen on Monday at an extremely stressful situation, work wise that I was forced to address and deal with. And my response to it was, was actually due today.

I needed to complete it and work through it. And then once that was done, around noon today, I sent this email with a response and the stress was released and I felt like I came back into some sort of balance in my day. It's huge. Huge to pay attention to. Yeah, Always elusive. Well, I hope you guys are all enjoying the content over the course of the month. On balance. It's so good to be in the Cadre sphere and hearing everyone else's commentaries. We've got a few more days left of that and hearing what balance means to everyone.

And then we also get to hop into July very soon on the theme of free freedom. Junk food junkie. I learned from a physical therapist that life's balance is just like balance on your dominant side leg. It's steady and sturdy, but balancing on your non dominant side will be wobbly and not perfect and that's how your everyday life will be. Oh my gosh, that's amazing. Yeah, just like yoga in tree pose or a certain pose on one side of my body, it can be no problem. And I can feel all the confidence in the other side.

Keep falling out, keep falling out. Oh, that's such good insight. And I also know that like if you're right handed and you do exercises or like drawing with your non dominant hand, it totally taps into a different part of your brain. So there is a really cool combination when it comes to balance and thinking about the physicality and how it shows up. So I encourage you all to think about that, take that into your next movement sessions and be thinking about balance. And then as Amar pointed out, stressors and different things that come into that that affect your balance?

And what do you do to get back on track? Comment or watch the replay? Add a few thoughts if you like and I will sign off with a happy hour at a Cheers. I'm actually headed over to Italian Eatery for another nonalcoholic cocktail with a friend, so enjoy this summer night, everyone. Take care. We'll see you next week.