SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hey y'all, welcome back to the podcast. This is a space for real conversations, real growth, and coming back home to yourself. I'm your host, London, and here we talk about what it actually looks like to navigate life as a woman who's holding a lot, doing a lot, and somewhere along the way may have forgotten herself in the process. If you've been feeling overwhelmed, disconnected, or like you've been pouring into everyone else but yourself, you're in the right place. Let's get into today's episode. All right, so welcome back to the podcast. Today's conversation is one that I feel so deeply connected to because it's something that so many of us are craving but really don't have the words for. And that is the feeling of being heard. Because as women, especially when you're balancing so much in life, we can show up for everyone else, but still feeling seen, unheard, and even disconnected from ourselves. So today we are diving into the power of listening, not just listening to others, but learning how to listen to ourselves. And I'm really excited to have Deb here with me today. So welcome, Deb. I'm really glad you're here.

SPEAKER_01 1:13

Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited, London.

SPEAKER_00 1:16

Yes. And before we dive in, I would love to give you this space just to introduce yourself, share a little bit about who you are, what you do, and who you work with.

SPEAKER_01 1:26

So uh I'm Deb Porter. I um I'm in Reno, Nevada. Um, my business is Hold Hearing Out Life Drama. I created it for those people whose family friends or coworkers are too close to a problem or worse are the problem, and people need somebody to listen. And so that was the initial model. People could book in 15, 30, or 45 minutes via phone or via Zoom. Um and uh that's what I do. I listen, uh actively listen. So that means when people need space, they don't need judgment or advice. There is no advice unless they specifically ask. Um yeah, and that grew into um a business side as well. And so for businesses, I do team trainings and um offer some other things as well. So um yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:12

I love that. Thank you so much for sharing. I'm really excited about the conversation today.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

Me too. I think it's so important to listen to yourself. And when we learn to listen to others, it changes things deeply.

SPEAKER_00 2:25

Yes, it does, especially when we learn to listen to ourselves too. I think that's really important. So to start us off, I would like to first ask what does it truly mean to be heard?

SPEAKER_01 2:38

So um to truly be heard, it requires two things. Active listening involves both the hearing the words that are spoken, but also the emotions. And if you only do one or the other, you're gonna miss. It has to be both. It's a really key, both the words and the feelings.

SPEAKER_00 2:56

And when you say actively listening, how do you actively listen to someone?

SPEAKER_01 3:01

So uh this is this is exactly what I teach. I I have a method, it's called the core, and I'll just briefly explain that if you'd like.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 3:10

All right, so this is the process that I use because it's repeatable, it's rememberable, because it's simple. Um, core stands for calm, outcome, relate, and empathy. So if you're really going to listen to somebody, you have to be calm because as soon as you're not, you're not able to stay in your prefrontal cortex where all the higher thinking happens, and instead that dissolves and you're no longer able to hear. So calm is the exact first step that you have to manage. The second is outcome, you have to know what is it that the other person really wants from this conversation? Do they need to vent? What are they looking for? What is it that they want? Like, you know, some conversations is obvious, and you don't have to do the work because if we're deciding where we're gonna go for dinner, that's clear, right? We know, okay, we're gonna figure out where we're gonna go for dinner. But when you're in a more emotional conversation, if it's an if you're in a relationship or in a business uh meeting, you want to make sure what is the outcome we're going for here? What it what do we want to come away from with? And uh next is relate. This is a really complex piece of listening, it's the largest part in my course. Um, relate involves um body language, uh, it involves learning to ask those uh questions that we already mentioned. Um, and there's a lot to relate and being able to stay dialed in, right? You have to be able to relate. And then finally, empathy. Um, and empathy, while it seems simple, is probably one of the more challenging pieces because it means coming at um the experience of listening with your heart and being open and um making sure that you're offering empathy. And when I say empathy, there's a really clear understanding for me that there are some people that I'm not going to be able to understand completely because we all have our individual unique experiences. And uh I would not presume to believe that I could understand, for example, your experience as a black woman because I am not that. I would not presume that I could understand somebody that's LGBTQ plus because I'm not that. But what I can do is um still bring my love and compassion for what it is that you're seeing and what you're experiencing.

SPEAKER_00 5:16

Does that make sense? It does. I love that. Thank you for breaking that down for me. It makes a lot of sense, actually, especially when it comes to empathy. I think some people feel like with empathy, you have to understand, but you don't necessarily set necessarily need to be in that same experience, but just be open to listening with your heart and understanding or giving that person a space to say whatever it is that they need to say or fit.

SPEAKER_01 5:40

Exactly. And accepting that their experience is real and that even if you can't understand it all the way, that you that they matter to you, and uh you want to have that understanding to the extent that you can. That that really moves people.

SPEAKER_00 5:55

Yeah, thank you. So why do you think so many people feel unseen or unheard even when they're surrounded by others?

SPEAKER_01 6:05

Lennon, did you know that only 2% of people have ever been trained in active listening in our nation? 2%. Nobody, I mean, if I ask you, have you ever had any training in active listening?

SPEAKER_00 6:17

So as a coach, yes. Okay. In general in life, no. Yeah, it wasn't to choose to do.

SPEAKER_01 6:25

Exactly. You had to choose to do it. And so that's true of most people. It wasn't taught to us in our education in the United States, wasn't uh until I was in my master's program. I didn't have any training at all in active listening. So unless you're uh unless you happen to be in a corporation that uh that understands the importance of this and has sent you to training, in which case those people that I've talked to have often said, Oh, they sent me this training, it was awful, and I had to do it, but I didn't learn anything from it. That's not helpful. I'm just telling you. That's not better. Uh, but it's exact exactly what you said, you have to choose it. And so, unless people are actually choosing it, unless people really want to learn, that's not gonna happen.

SPEAKER_00 7:07

Yeah, that's true. And that resonated for me a lot, especially working in corporate and taking those trainings, and we're just like, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, just do it to get out of there. And that's another thing. Like, I see so many women doing this, right? Where they're doing everything and showing up for everybody else, and then still kind of feel disconnected inside because they're not really getting heard or feeling seen, or even listening, honestly, or actively choosing to listen to anybody else because you don't know what you don't know. So that's really important to be able to actively listen. So, what would you say happens internally when someone is not being heard?

SPEAKER_01 7:48

Think about it from your own experience. What do you notice if you think about it from your own experience?

SPEAKER_00 7:54

When I think about it from my own experience, who you turned it back on me. I did.

SPEAKER_01 7:59

If that's uncomfortable, I'll take it into it.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

No, that is totally okay. When I don't feel heard, um there's a mix of emotions that I would say comes up. I feel maybe rejected. Um, I definitely don't feel seen in that moment. I don't feel like I have, or I might have a voice, but I don't feel like it matters. So I think what I used to do in that moment, when I don't feel heard, I would shrink.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

Shut down. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 8:25

Yeah, definitely shut down, especially when I was working in corporate. Um, more often than not, when we were, we would have our meetings, our weekly meetings. I very rarely showed up in the meetings, meaning I was there, I was present, right? I knew what they were talking about, but I didn't feel like my voice mattered, so I never voiced my opinion because you're not gonna hear me anyway. So, what's the point?

SPEAKER_01 8:49

Exactly. And when you think about that from a business perspective, did you know that billions, billions with a B are lost every single year in business exactly because of that? Because when employees don't feel seen or heard, their very best ideas, your most valuable asset is your people. And if you have people that are sitting in meetings in those rooms and they're not feeling seen and heard, and they're not bringing up those ideas, you're losing money every time, every time.

SPEAKER_00 9:15

Yeah, that is so true. And I think that was one of the main reasons why I kind of decided like corporate wasn't for me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:24

Yeah, because exactly it doesn't when you don't feel like that, when you don't feel good, when you're in that experience of you know, what does it feel like when um when people aren't seen and feeling heard, it it's uncomfortable. It it's not we're not valued. And that's um if if the number one thing that most people want is good communication in their workplace. That is the number one desire. Good communication. Think about that for a minute. Good communication. And and what is the foundation of good communication? It starts with listening. Listening's the bedrock. Like it's great to be able to talk, but if you can't hear the other person, you haven't communicated at all.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

That is so true. So my next question was how does that show up in a woman's life, especially for high-achieving women who are used to holding everything together?

SPEAKER_01 10:16

So certainly, if we want to be heard, we have to take the risk of being vulnerable to use our voice. That's certainly true. I mean, there is our there is responsibility in that. I I'm not gonna let us all off the hook with that. But um, but in that, um, I think it's so important to listen to ourselves in order to understand what it is that we need to bring forward. Like we have emotions in our lives to help to help guide us. That's what they're there for. Took me a long time to learn that, but when I really began to understand that's what our emotions are for, I began to not hate them for what they did to me and instead began to embrace them and go, Oh, what is this teaching me now? Oh, I feel what do I feel? And for the longest time, because I was so disconnected, because I grew up in a generation, I'm older than you, so I'm 54. I grew up in a generation where those feelings weren't necessarily the people didn't want to know. And if if they did show up, they were often shut down pretty quickly. And so I had to take some time to learn, okay, to learn how to name them. That's really the first step. If you don't know how to do that, you got to do that for yourself. You got to know what you feel. And if you don't know what you feel, you got to take steps to learn how to know. Um, for me, that looked like um creating a board with a list of feelings. Um, there's a the Center for Nonviolent Communication has this great list, um, uh feelings when your needs are met and feelings when your needs aren't being met. And so I would go to that list, and I when I got stuck early on in my my personal work, and I'd be like, well, okay, I know I feel something. What is it that I feel? And I would just read the list until I would able be able to identify, ah, ah, that's the thing I feel. And so then as soon as you know what you feel, then okay, now I've named it. Now I know what it is internally. Now, how do I begin to articulate that and share that with another person uh in my life? That's really, really important.

SPEAKER_00 12:11

I love that you shared that because it's so important to be able to name the emotion behind a feeling. And I feel like sometimes that's where we could lose ourselves when we know we are feeling something, but we don't necessarily have know how to name it. So it's just you'll it's easier to relate to anger, right? Or even sadness, even right. So it's like I feel sad or I feel angry, but like really, what is it that you're feeling right now?

unknown 12:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:38

So I think it's really important. Thank you for sharing that.

SPEAKER_01 12:41

I had to learn that the thinking thought, the thoughts, the thoughts are different than the emotions, and then uh being able to distinguish the two, because I would a lot of well, I I feel that I would I would give a thinking thing. Nope, that doesn't work. What is it that I feel? I feel, for example, you know, if if I feel frustrated that, you know, once again the milk's left out on the counter. I whatever silly thing. Yeah, it's usually something silly, uh, things that set us off. Or um, you know, if it's in um we've been talking about corporate and if we're talking about business, you know, I feel really unhappy that um when I attempted to do this thing, there was this problem, and um we didn't we weren't able to move it forward together. What what happened, right? And then then you can start to get into the what happened and the thinking part, but at least you've begun to name what you feel, right?

SPEAKER_00 13:38

So it's like for me when I talk to other people, how I like to see it is like I always ask why. Remember, one of my coaches is like, you're not supposed to ask why, Linda, but I like asking why. So it's like I feel blank and why, right? So I feel this way, and this is why I feel it. So that way you could kind of like articulate whatever it is that's going on for you and be able to express it.

SPEAKER_01 14:00

Yeah, that's a good tool. That's a good tool. Because um, and what what's really key about what you just said there is I feel. And so what you're doing is you're starting with an I statement. You're not accusing somebody else, like you made me feel this, you you did this thing. Like when we come at our communication from those I statements, it's it'll it smooths and softens the way forward um to make sure that those connections are really happening.

SPEAKER_00 14:27

Absolutely. Where do you see women disconnecting from themselves the most?

SPEAKER_01 14:37

I think that anytime there are old messages that get started in our brain, things that we're reacting because we have a thought of this is how we're supposed to be. Um I think I've certainly seen it women who are getting divorced, um, they often they're trying to get back to themselves, but there's been that disconnect um and they're trying to figure out their way back. I hear a lot of that. I also hear um uh because of my experience, I also talk to a lot of caregivers. And so the caregivers, uh, they've been disconnected because they have this uh huge sense of responsibility and they've forgotten that it's important that they matter too, and they have to put themselves first in order to be able to serve. Um, yeah, things like that.

SPEAKER_00 15:25

Yeah, that reminds me of what we said earlier when we show up for others and we're so used to showing up for others that we forget about ourselves. Yeah, and we lose like a piece of ourselves because I can relate with my own experiences in life being a caregiver, you know, just going through a divorce, even losing my job. Just because at one point you just put on this cap or this mask and you show up wherever you gotta show up and do whatever it is that you gotta do. When you go home, you go to sleep and you wake up and you do it all over again, whether it's for the job, for the person, for the kids, for the spouse, whatever it is. But then it's like when it comes back to you. The question I found myself asking was like, Who am I?

SPEAKER_01 16:07

Who am I now? I just wrote a resource. I actually wrote two resources specifically for that, because that question is so key. Who am I now? Yes, um, you can find that on my website if you're looking for it and if you need it, because I it's 10 pages of richness that helps you through that process. Yes, please.

SPEAKER_00 16:24

And what is your website? Just so we know.

SPEAKER_01 16:26

It's hearingoutlifed drama.com.

SPEAKER_00 16:28

Hear now. I'm gonna make sure I put that in the link.

SPEAKER_01 16:31

Yeah, and then the resources uh hearingoutlifed drama.com slash who and then dat hyphen m hyphen i hyphen. Who am I now? All the hypens. There's a lot of hypens. Who am I now?

SPEAKER_00 16:42

Yes. I'm gonna make sure I put down all of these resources because I think it's really important as women that we understand one, how to actively listen, two, how to articulate our fill-ins. I love what you said about the calmness and just everything overall, how you put that whole framework together to help us get to that space and just being able to reconnect with ourselves and just kind of take off the mask for the moment. So I think that's really important.

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Yeah, it's authenticity. That's exactly what it is. We have to be authentic with ourselves.

SPEAKER_00 17:12

Yes.

unknown 17:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:14

And another thing that you said, it reminds me because you said authenticity and then being vulnerable.

SPEAKER_01 17:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:20

And I remember I was in this group, and so they asked me, um, and we were talking about business at the time, and they were asking me, like, what do you fear the most when it comes to showing up for your business? And I'm like, oh, being vulnerable. Like, I, you know, as a coach, you want to show up and you want to help other people. And this is me wearing a hat again. You want to show up for other people, you want to be present for other people. Um, but then that in that space when you're going through whatever it is that you're going through, you don't feel like maybe you can show up because you're supposed to show up in this perfection. And somebody said, just be authentic, just be yourself. And that requires to be requires you to be vulnerable, which is a little difficult.

SPEAKER_01 18:04

I think the thing about vulnerability that I've come to learn is that ultimately it's my job to love me and to be safe in me. And so if I'm vulnerable, I'm not really caring anymore about what anybody else thinks. I'm I'm being me. I'm being that authentic self. I'm being I'm stepping into that power. And then, you know, they get to think what they want. I mean, it's fine. You get you get to have your opinion, it's perfectly fine. Not everybody's gonna love me. It's perfectly fine. This is my truth, this is what I know. If it helps you, I love that. If it doesn't, it's okay. It's okay. Move on. Find the one that find the one that does resonate with you. It's all good.

SPEAKER_00 18:45

And do you would you feel comfortable sharing like what did it take for you to get into that space to just be comfortable with yourself? A lot of the feeling uncomfortable that you just described. Right. That's not another phrase. Be comfortable with the uncomfortableness. That's it.

SPEAKER_01 19:03

Early on, I had a teacher in my world that that said, you know, that the goal is to be comfortable in your own skin. And when she first said I had such cognitive distance, I'm like, I don't even know what that means. But I'm finally at the place in my life now where I do understand what that means. And it's really, she told me at the time it's a process, and I wanted to strangle her. I'm like, what do you mean as a process? I don't want to show up there. I I don't I don't want this process thing that you're talking about. I just want to know now. And um, but I as I discovered and as I um you know walked through things, um I've begun to learn that I can choose how I feel, I can choose life that's good, or I can choose to be unhappy about what's going on around me. It's really my choice. And yes, um, with with the caveat to saying that um there are people with clinical depression, and I don't want to dismiss that. That's a real thing. Um uh but for many of us, we can choose and we need to be um mindful of what it is. And I think those with clinical depression have gotten there because they've chosen it for so long, they don't remember how to get back, and their their chemistry has actually adapted to the other way. But I think it can be brought back. Um, but it takes intention and it takes a lot of work and a lot of self-love, a lot of accepting this is where I am now, and that's okay. Uh, what's a thought that feels just a little bit better than where I am now? Because if we're in if we're in a feeling of you know, um hopelessness or powerlessness or depression, we can't just jump to joy, it's not possible. There's um Abraham Hicks um uh teaches the emotional scale, and I really believe I have found that to be true in my own life, and that we got to work our way up.

SPEAKER_00 20:51

Yes, absolutely. So, would you say that in order for us to begin listening to ourselves, it would start first with um vulnerability and acceptance?

SPEAKER_01 21:01

I think it starts first with us, yeah, absolutely. I think um starting to notice times when you're being harsh in your own mind with yourself. I think that's really key. You gotta start listening to what's going on in your own mind.

SPEAKER_00 21:15

I think that's really important. Yeah, what is one small shift that someone can make today to feel more connected to themselves?

SPEAKER_01 21:30

I think if you don't know your feelings, if you're experiencing that that you're in a moment where you don't know what you feel, a really easy thing that you can do is um make a decision that three times a day, tie it to, you know, when you put your feet on the floor in the morning, when you brush your teeth, or or even if you're just when you go to the bathroom, like make it a habit to say, okay, what am I feeling now? And begin to notice, like um, because until you tune into what is it that I feel and what Is it that I know about myself? It can't shift. So you have to do that part first.

SPEAKER_00 22:05

I love that you said begin to notice. That's something I teach. Notice, like just notice and I feel like there's just so much power in noticing being an observer. Like just putting on that lab coat and just saying, you know what? I am going to be the subject right here. And I'm just gonna observe whatever it is that I'm feeling going through. Like, obviously, don't get caught in your thoughts, don't get stuck in your head. But also don't be like a prisoner to your thoughts and emotions and you know, whatever is going on. So that way you can observe and figure out like, okay, this is how I feel. Why do I feel like this? And so what's next? So what now what? Now what?

SPEAKER_01 22:45

Now what? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:46

Well, what is it that I do want? Yes, I love that. This was awesome. I really enjoyed this conversation. It was really a pleasure having you here today. Like I have to keep going and going and going and going and going, but I think we have some like really great tools here that I am excited to share. So before we wrap up though, I would love for you to share where can our listeners find you? Where can we connect with you and learn more about the work that you're doing? And I'll be sure also to include all of those links at in the podcast and at the bottom so everybody can click into it.

SPEAKER_01 23:21

Thank you. Yeah, the the website's a great place, hearingoutlifed drama.com. I am I write blogs. Um I've recently started to audio record them if you'd like to listen instead of read. That's a that's now an option for most of them. I I discovered I had like 183 blogs, and so it got a little overwhelming when I started doing going to record all of them, but I'm working my way through them. And um, yeah, so the website's a great place. Um, I'm also on social media, um, wherever whatever your favorite platform is TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, wherever I'm I'm on there.

SPEAKER_00 23:54

So thank you. Thank you. All right, so thank you so much for sharing that. And thank you again for being here and just pouring into this conversation. This conversation is really a reminder that being heard is not just something that we look into or look for in ourselves. It's something that we have to learn to give ourselves. So, everyone listening, take a moment today to just slow down and just ask yourself, what have I been trying to tell myself that I haven't been listening to? So I really hope you enjoyed today's podcast. This is a space for conversations with real women, navigating real life, and learning how to come back home to yourselves. My favorite phrase is just taking it one ghetto day at a time. So if this conversation resonated with you, I'd love for you to stay connected. You can follow me on YouTube at Empower HerPodcast and on social media at Her Love Growth, where I share more conversations, tools, and support to help you on your journey. And if you're ready to go deeper, I'll also have some free resources to help you reconnect with yourself, but you could find that in the link in my bio. So until next time. Make sure you're following the podcast so you don't miss those next.