3 Things We Dive Into In This Episode:
Four concrete tools that can help you feel ready to take leaps that allow you to live the life you desire.
Why taking risks and surrendering is a requirement for having a fulfilling life and a fulfilling relationship with your body.
How to navigate the difficult feelings and fears that come up with taking risks and surrender.
📘Resources
Release restrictive dieting, break free from body shame, & create habits that help you live fully! Sign up for my one-on-one nutrition coaching program and get a FREE 20 Minute Discovery Call!
You can also check out my group coaching program!
Listen to Whole, Full, & Alive Episode 2: Fullness: The Foundations for Becoming an Intuitive Eater
📌Episode Highlights
[06:13] A Risky Few Years
I’ve taken many risks over the past year. Exactly a year ago, I ended my relationship, left my life in New York, and traveled full-time.
It is also the third anniversary of starting my private practice full-time after losing all my jobs due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Risks and trust falls are something I regularly talk about with my clients. It’s a part of surrendering to cultivate a healthy relationship with food and your body.
Caitie: “Surrender is such an important part of cultivating a healthy relationship with food and your body. Surrendering to what your body is asking for and really leaning into what your body is asking for is a bit of a trust fall in and of itself.” - Click Here To Tweet This
We have to take risks to succeed. If we avoid taking risks, we'll miss out on our lives.
R.I.S.K. is an acronym for four tangible things we can ask ourselves to prepare for taking a leap.
[10:55] The Importance of Rest When You Take Risks
R stands for Rested. We don't always make the best decisions around risk-taking when we are exhausted. Are you rested enough to take risks?
This way, we can ensure that our decision aligns with us. Step out of panic, stress, and exhaustion and sit on the decision. Is it right?
A bath is one of the most regulating and restful things for me. It allows me to be alone, breathe, and notice things while sitting in stillness and silence.
We can also create a secluding, isolating, and regulating cocoon to rest and think. Afterward, ask if you feel rested enough to decide.
It's difficult to rest when in a stressful environment. Instead, take a moment to prioritize rest and use that time to think about the risk.
[15:34] The Intention in Risk
I stands for Intention. Why do you want to take risks?
One way to understand our intentions is to look years ahead. Think about what we want people to remember us for in the future.
Another way to identify our personal values is to look at the qualities we admire in people. We can also be more aware of when we feel fully immersed.
Think about how taking a risk can allow us to live our personal values, emulate positive qualities and be more in the flow.
I recently took a small risk to stop taking one-on-one clients. My intention here was to show up for my present clients fully, which affirmed the risk.
[21:25] How Our Senses Ground Us As We Take Risks
S stands for Senses. While taking risky actions, we need to stay grounded in our senses. Think about how we can stay in touch with our five senses.
Our sense of smell can help us feel calm. Listening to what's around you or playing music can ground us in our sense of hearing.
Having a touchstone, breathing, and stretching can help regulate our sense of touch. We can also take our time to look around us and drink our tea slowly.
Risks can often make us feel unsafe. We can use these tools to stay regulated before, during, and after taking risky actions.
Grounding ourselves with our 5 senses is a powerful yet simple tool to take action even when we’re scared.
[24:39] Take Risks — It’s a Kindness
K stands for Kind. Let us ask ourselves if this is the kindest choice. How will this risk result in the highest good for everyone?
Not everyone will be happy with the risks we’re taking. However, our risk-taking will ultimately help them.
I've mentioned that I once took the risk of not taking any more one-on-one clients. Turning away people may not seem like the kindest thing. But it is ultimately kind because I can give my best to the clients I do take.
Similarly, I can become a better person even though I left many important people behind when I moved out of New York.
Caitie: “You might make people deeply uncomfortable for a moment. Trust yourself enough to know that that discomfort is ultimately going to serve them too in some way.” - Click Here To Tweet This
The risk we're taking might cause some pain and discomfort. That pain can bring out each person's purpose and permission to take risks.
[31:12 ] Taking the Risk and Letting Go of Dieting
Intuitive eating can be a risk and a trust fall. At the start, it can be scary as we try to trust our bodies and let go of trying to manipulate ourselves.
Check out Whole, Full, & Alive Episode 2: Fullness: The Foundations for Becoming an Intuitive Eater for a dive into fullness, trust, and some general tools for the journey.
Remember to be patient with yourself as you take risks.
[34:11] The Stages of Our Break-up With Diet
Stage 1 of breaking up with dieting is grief, even as we practice surrender. Amidst surrendering, we should give ourselves time to process that grief.
We can process grief by working with a therapist or coach, or venting to a friend who understands.
Unfortunately, we live in a dieting world. It can often be frustrating as we work on our relationship with food and our bodies.
After grieving, we start to feel new and good in the next stage. After that, we might start thinking we should return to dieting.
Process each stage of your feelings. Once we do, it's possible to finally find peace and be at ease with food and our bodies.
Caitie: “And it is so, so, so, so, so possible to make peace with food and your body. And eating becomes easy and energizing. And to have your relationship with your body be a good, balanced, peaceful friendship.” - Click Here To Tweet This
[39:11] Processing Prompt and Actionable Experiment for Risk-Taking
Processing prompt: What risk do you want to take?
Is this risk in alignment with your values and intentions?
Is this ultimately the kindest thing you could do even if it’s scary?
Actionable experiment: Use the R.I.S.K. tool to help you be ready to take a leap.
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Transcript
Caitie Corradino: Becoming an embodied person, regardless of your body shape and size is a trust fall. There is an inherent risk in that.
Welcome to Whole, Full and Alive, a podcast exploring the art and science of falling in love with your life, with your story and with who you truly are underneath your titles, your resume, your relationship status, and your bank account. I'm Caitie Corradino, a registered dietician, nutritionist, certified fitness and yoga instructor, eating disorder recovery coach, Reiki healer, and founder of Full Soul Nutrition. But underneath my titles and resume, I'm a big fan of kitchen dance breaks, early mornings, all things topped with truffles, world traveling and serendipity. I'm here to share no bullshit stories and actionable tools to help you feel unshakably worthy. You have everything you need within you to feel whole, full and alive. Right here. Right now. Let's get into it.
Welcome back to another episode of Whole Full and Alive. I'm coming to you from Denver, Colorado today, where I have been settled for about a week now after traveling for two months straight to about five different countries. I really am still settling here. If you told me, Caitie, you arrived back this morning, I'd like to believe you.
It's been an absolute whirlwind since I arrived home because I had a lot of shifts happen while I was away. A lot of big changes and perspective, a lot of changes in what I thought I wanted for the rest of my life. Just a lot of imprints on my soul.
Honestly, I don't know how else to say that, but I am so excited to be back here on the mic speaking with you. Sharing from this new place, from this new perspective, from this new energy as I still attempt to settle back into it. Before I dive into today's topic, which is gonna be taking risks, I wanna invite you to ground.
Wherever you are tuning in from today, can you maybe close your eyes unless you're driving or walking and take a really deep breath in through your nose. Feel that deep breath, fill your body all the way through the muscles of your back, through the base of your spine. Hold it for a moment and then exhale to release and let it go.
We'll take one more deep breath like that just in case you didn't actually do it the first time. Take a nice deep breath in and imagine this deep breath is kind of collecting anything that's stuck in your body, any stress that you need to get rid of. Hold it for a moment and then imagine that breath picking up and collecting that stress, and as you exhale, pushing out of the body.
You can use those deep breaths whenever you need, and I encourage you to take more of them maybe throughout the rest of this episode, throughout the rest of this day. Our breath really is such a powerful, accessible tool for grounding and regulation and connecting with ourselves and. Believe me, I've had people telling me that for years because I’ve been involved in different wellness spaces for years.
I've been a fitness instructor since I was 18 and a yoga instructor since I was 21. Just obviously I studied nutrition and psychology and for years and years and years, I've had so many people tell me, “Oh yes, the power of your breath.” It wasn't until probably the last two, that I've really started to understand this, that I've really started to understand how if we can just get more oxygen into our bodies, if we can get more blood flow to our brains. It really makes such a difference in how we see the world for so much of our day.
We're staring at a screen and when we stare at a screen, we really constrict our breathing. We don't take deep breaths, and that is like, one of the primary causes of illness, I think right now is just the fact that we are all just immersed in this digital world, where we're like holding our breath essentially all day long.
Remember that you're breathing, it doesn't naturally become deep when you're staring at a screen, so if you can take just a few moments throughout your day to look away from that screen to deepen your breath, to improve the flow of oxygen, energy, blood throughout your body, it just, it makes such a difference and it sounds simple, and that's because it is simple, and I really want to make just breath work breathing techniques, taking deeper breaths, more accessible to more people.
Such a tangent. Let's get into today's episode. I guess before I get into today's episode, one more thing. I would like to remind you that I do have space for a few one-on-one clients at my practice, Full Soul Nutrition. I provide a combination of nutrition, counseling, body image healing, and holistic self-care coaching.
In order to help you feed yourself, feel yourself, and live fully. I also will be opening up enrollment for my group program in a few weeks, so keep your eyes out for that and a whole bunch of resources, free resources. A free weekly newsletter with a tangible tool is available on my website @fullsoullnutrition.com.
Just don't forget that this podcast isn't the only way for us to connect. Let's get into the meat of today's episode. Today, I wanna talk about taking risks, and I'm feeling so inspired to talk about taking risks because I just, I've taken so many risks over the past year. As I say here, it is actually the one year anniversary of the day I decided to end my relationship and end my life in New York City after 10 years and start traveling full-time before landing somewhere.
It's also the three year anniversary of when I went into private practice pretty much full-time after I lost all my jobs at the top of the COVID-19 pandemic. I feel like it's always the anniversary of some sort of risk for me because I guess my twenties have just been full of trust falls and as I talked about in episode two where I talk about fullness, I feel like I'm constantly talking about trust falls with my clients because surrender is such an important part of cultivating a healthy relationship with food and your body. Surrendering to what your body is asking for and really leaning into what your body is asking for is a bit of a trust fall in and of itself.
There's just this through line of trust falls and risk taking that has been popping up for me in my counseling, the counseling work that I do with clients on nutrition and also on body image too. The surrender to your changing body, the surrender to living in a human body that's subject to change without trying to control or manipulate it is also a risk and a trust fall in a world that's always telling us that we have to control and manipulate our body shape and size.
Risk taking comes up in my counseling with clients and obviously my group coaching as well. Risk taking, trust falls, surrender has come up in so many different ways throughout my twenties. Starting a private practice, becoming an entrepreneur, traveling, ending relationships. I saw this quote the other day on Instagram from Steven Bartlett that basically says, “Taking no risks will end up being the biggest risk you ever take.”
You have to risk failure to succeed, you have to risk rejection to be accepted, you have to risk heartbreak to love. If you spend your whole life avoiding risks, you really miss out on your life. The risks that I've taken throughout the last decade really have inspired me to share a message like that with so many of my friends and family members and clients.
I feel like I wanted to hop onto the microphone today to share with you. If you are feeling called to take a risk, there's a good chance that that act of courage is not going to go unrewarded and I wanna provide you with some tools so that you feel prepared to take that risk. Because I guess through all this risk taking I've done throughout the last couple of years, I have been lucky enough to learn a thing or two about creating the conditions for surrender and creating the conditions for a trust fall.
I’m also… I can't believe I'm saying this, but about to take another really, really big leap in my life. Even though I can't talk about it yet, I am going to be implementing these steps and these tools that I'm going to share with you today. Whether you are looking to end a relationship, start a relationship, end a business, start a business, move somewhere new, travel, take a financial leap, take an emotional relational leap by setting a boundary with someone. Whatever risk you are feeling called to take today, I hope that these tangible tools that I've come up with today will serve you.
As I was reflecting on this, what tools do I wanna share with everyone around risk taking, around making it realistic to take a risk and making it accessible to take a risk. I ended up coming up with an acronym, I came up with an acronym R I S K, which spells out risk. These are four things, four tangible tools that, not even tangible tools, but just things to kind of ask yourself to determine whether or not you are ready to take a leap into the thing that you are looking to take a leap into.
The R in this risk acronym that I am so excited to share with you today stands for rested. Am I Rested? For example, if the risk you're taking is quitting your job, are you able to regulate your nervous system enough to make sure that that decision to leave your job is truly aligned? Can you get your body out of fight or flight mode? Can you get your body out of panic mode? Can you get your body out of high stressed and exhausted mode long enough to be able to sit with this decision and know that it's the right one.
I don't believe that we can make the best decisions around risk taking. I don't believe that we can tap into an authentic sense of self-trust unless we are rested. One way of simplifying this is, “Do I still want to take the risk, after I take a bath?” For me,I find a bath to be the most regulating and soothing thing that I can possibly imagine. I really, really value the bathtub. I will never move into an apartment that does not have a bathtub ever again. Oh my God.
I lived in so many New York City apartments that did not have that. Now, I can't imagine my life without the ability to fill a warm bath, put two drops of lavender oil and a scoop of epsom salt in it, light a candle, close the door, put my phone in the living room so that it's not even coming into the room with me, and just be alone and breathe.
Notice what comes up when I'm sitting in stillness and in silence in this fully, fully secluded, isolated, regulating environment. Maybe the idea of taking a bath doesn't appeal to you right now, I can't wrap my head around why someone would not wanna take a bath if they have access to one. But I also know that even if you have access to one, sometimes it's not super accessible to do it if you've got kids or family members that are gonna come and bother you and things like that.
Can you try to create some sort of cocoon for you. Maybe the bathtub is not accessible, can you create a different kind of cocoon and ask yourself, “Do I still want to take this risk even after I go into that cocoon?” Even after I have all this time to regulate, breathe, relax, be in my body, sit and get immersed in the water, and not look at my phone, and not talk to anybody and not read anything just be there.
Do you still want to take this risk? Are you rested enough to make a clear decision? I know that if the risk you're taking is to exit a very stressful environment. For example, a stressful work environment or a stressful relationship, you probably are spending a lot of your day in fight or flight mode, and it's not gonna be realistic to have this full day where you're at like maximum rested capacity.
But can you take a moment, a day, maybe even a week two, prioritize rest if you can with the job. Try to take two, three days off a long weekend to see: Am I rested okay with this rest, with this full tank? How do I feel about taking the risk now from a little bit more of a regulated place? That's the R in the risk acronym.
The I in the risk acronym stands for intention. What is my intention for taking this risk? Why do I want to take this risk and can I identify a way that it's in alignment with my personal values? If that statement isn't resonating with you, what I mean by that is what do you hold most important? What really matters to you?
If you were at a celebration of your life in, or you were watching over a celebration of your life in 5, 10, 15 years from now, what would you want people to be saying about you? What qualities and traits would you want them to have remembered about you? What impression do you wanna be making on people?
If someone was writing you a birthday card about all the things they love about you, what would you want them to recognize in you? What qualities and traits are important. Another thing to ask yourself to identify your personal values is who do you admire? Who do you look at and say “Wow, I feel so inspired by this person in the way that they walk through the world and the way that they live their life.”
What is it that you admire about that person? What qualities and traits do you want to emulate? What do you love about the way that they live their life? Or what do you love about their energy and their vibe? Another question to ask yourself is like, when do you feel fully immersed in something? At what point do you get into a flow state where you kind of just don't even really notice the time and you feel super present and you don't even think to look at your phone or your email or whatever it is.
You're just immersed in a positive way, not in like a grinding-through-a-spreadsheet-at-your-corporate-job kind of way, but in a “I'm so immersed in this time is just flowing and I feel like I'm in flow.” Maybe spreadsheets at your corporate job is the thing. I mean, some people do love spreadsheets, but whatever it is that gets you in that flow state, that's gonna help you identify your personal values.