3 Things We Dive Into In This Episode:
How to use boundaries, self-examination, and introspection to make sure you are friends with the right people.
The powerful role friendship plays on your health — especially as an adult.
How to navigate losing or outgrowing certain friendships over the course of your life.
📘Resources
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📌Episode Highlights
[07:32] Connecting With Shelagh Curran
Shelagh does many things. But first and foremost, she is a human being.
Shelagh is doing more than transform her labels — she’s removing them and letting herself be a fluid person.
As a manifesting generator, she's continuously changing and following what lights her up.
Shelagh is also a registered dietitian specializing in hormone health and helping people with PCOS and similar conditions.
She owns a private practice called Shelagh Rose Nutrition.
[11:38] Shelagh and Caitie’s Friendship
Shelagh and Caitie met at a retreat.
Caitie's work resonated deeply with Shelagh, forging a powerful connection before the retreat began.
Shelagh saw Caitie as an inspiration and an expander.
An expander is a person who shows proof that what we desire is possible because they’re already doing it. For Shelagh, Caitie is an expander.
[17:24] Starting Friendships
When you're young, you usually make friends based on proximity, like the people in the same class, same club, or your co-workers.
As adults, you'll likely have to put yourself out there to find people with a shared interest. Relationship management may mean taking the initiative.
Children find it easy to make friends, but adults tend to be more guarded due to their life experiences.
The people around you will influence your life. Build ones that align with who you are now, where you want to go and who you want to be.
Adults tend to be competitive and see other people as threats, preventing friendships from forming. Instead, see other people as an inspiration.
Shelagh: “You totally absorb the energy and the beliefs of the people around you. Build friendships that align with not only who you are but where you want to go, and who you want to be.” - Click Here To Tweet This
[23:44] Friend Breakups
Friendship breakups can happen because one person can feel triggered by the other. As one person evolves, the other might not be ready to change alongside them.
Evolving and expanding can also mean outgrowing people. As we grow into who we are, friendships can fall away.
Unlike romantic breakups, the end of a friendship doesn’t always have a conversation. There can be a lot of confusion about where you stand with a friend.
Ask yourself: Do you still want to be part of this friendship?
Friendship is a two-way street. You need to practice relationship management and check in with your friends. However, as a friendship fades, you may start to talk less and less.
[31:36] Boundaries for Effective Relationship Management
Setting boundaries is necessary for healthy friendships.
Shelagh recently went through a breakup and several big changes. During that time, her friends supported her and always checked in on her.
However, Shelagh didn't have the energy to keep up with constant check-ins. She set boundaries about how she wanted to receive support and what she could give.
Shelagh: “I think that even just having those types of boundaries with ‘this is how I'm able to be your friend’ is like life giving back to yourself, but also those friendships.” - Click Here To Tweet This
It can take a lot of energy to stay in touch with people. That's why we must set boundaries about how much we can give and when we want time for ourselves.
How a friend responds to a boundary can tell us whether or not they're a true friend.
[41:27] The Power of Friendship
It’s beneficial to have a community of friends.
Take some time to create an inventory of your friends. Who are you still close to, and who's drifted away?
Caitie has experienced having her life evolve around one person. It can be easy to get wrapped up in one other person and forget the rest of your life.
Caitie’s friends caught her during a bad breakup. They were her safety net, and showed her that she had so much support from great people in her life.
If you have yourself and your people, romantic relationships can be a plus you can have on the side.
[46:12] Appreciation: Another Form of Relationship Management
It's great when your friends are there to listen and support you. Everyone has a different dynamic, but Shelagh and Caitie can talk to each other almost constantly.
Express gratitude and appreciation to your friends. Let them know how much they matter to you; telling your friends you love them is also relationship management!
A simple text or audio note can help brighten up a friend's day and their perspective of themselves.
Shelagh: “Every time you pour love into your friends, you pour it back into yourself.” - Click Here To Tweet This
[49:19] This Week’s Processing Prompt and Actionable Experiment
Processing Prompt: Do a little relationship management! Take an inventory of your friends and family. Write a list of the friendships you have.
From your list, pick one and send them an appreciation note. Tell them something you sincerely believe would make them feel good about themselves.
With this note, remind them how much you appreciate their friendship.
Actionable Experiment: Ask your five closest friends to write about what they appreciate about your friendship. Save their reply somewhere to look at on a bad day.
Don’t be afraid. Put yourself out there and create new and stronger friendships.
[52:06] How Friendships Keep You Healthy
Joy is the most important missing ingredient in our health.
Feeling happy and having connections can help keep our bodies healthy.
A lack of joy can affect your hormones and other physical aspects of your body. We might feel like we’re out of alignment.
[53:13] Shelagh’s Ever-evolving Routine
Every morning and night, Shelagh tunes in to herself and asks herself what she needs.
A quick meditation, journaling, a card pull, and some self-love can help start the day.
Shelagh also does some movement to get her blood flowing in the mornings.
A quick yoga flow before bed helps Shelagh transition from work to rest.
About Shelagh
Shelagh Curran is a registered dietitian and the founder of Shelagh Rose Nutrition. She chose to work in the field of nutrition because of her love for food. After finding out she has PCOS and other conditions, she successfully navigated her health through functional nutrition. Now, Shelagh specializes in PCOS and hormone functional medicine, and nutrition. She has worked with hundreds of women to take back their health and feel better in their bodies.
Connect with Shelagh: Website | Instagram | LinkedIn
Enjoyed the Podcast?
Whole, Full, and Alive is 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. Who is your authentic self? Remember, friendships can be one of the most empowering things for you — or unhealthy. It’s vital to practice effective relationship management to have happier and healthier friendships!
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Transcipt
Shelagh Curran: Joy is like the most important missing ingredient in our health, right? Even like the mind-body connection, if you're feeling unfulfilled, if you're feeling lonely, if you're feeling stressed without an outlet for someone to talk about it too, if you've had a lack of physical touch lately, these things are so important just for your literal physiology.
Caitie Corradino: 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 dietitian, nutritionist, certified fitness and yoga instructor, eating disorder recovery coach, Reiki healer, and founder of Full Soul Nutrition, but underneath my titles and resume, a big fan of kitchen dance breaks, early mornings, all things chocolate 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.
Hi, welcome back to another episode of Whole, Full and Alive. That was a very aggressive energy I just served there. Let's calm it down. Wherever you are, in this moment, wherever you're tuning in from, take a nice deep breath in. Hold it and a nice long, extended exhale. Actually, do it one more time. Deep breath in. Hold and then try to clear it out. Nice long extended exhale.
I hope you're feeling more grounded, a little more peaceful. Whatever's going on for you today, we’re still pretty early in 2023. How is your January going so far? Are you feeling like you're connected to your intentions for this year? My personal intention for this year is ease, that's my word of the year.
Maybe I'll do a little podcast episode just talking more about why I chose ease but I love, love choosing a word of the year. I've talked about this on a few episodes now, and I feel like it can be such a centering thing when I'm having a hard time making a decision about something, it's like, well, what honors my intention more, which of these things would honor what I know I really need this year or what I know is going to help me navigate this year.
Anyway, before we dive into today's episode, I want to let you know that I have a few spaces available for one-on-one holistic nutrition coaching and body image coaching right now. So I offer a three month one on one program that is a very unique combination of holistic nutrition coaching, body image coaching, and if you need it, eating disorder recovery coaching, and just overall well-being, confidence and embodiment.
I use a combination of my skills as a registered dietitian and my skills as a somatic breathwork facilitator and a yoga instructor and fitness instructor and body image coach to really help you feed yourself well, to feel yourself, to feel good in your body and feel good about yourself and your life and to really live fully and freely and authentically. I think just a sense of freedom is the ultimate goal with all of my clients. I love, love, love when my clients are able to tap into a sense of freedom.
So if you are ready to get started working on nutrition and body image and an overall sense of well being and confidence, just go to my website at fullsoulnutrition.com to book a free discovery call. I'll also try to get that link in the show notes in the discovery college just like a consultation. We'll chat for about 15, 20 minutes and see if it seems like a good fit for you.
Pretty soon, I will be opening enrollment for group coaching again, so keep your eyes out for that if one on one is not a good fit for you at this time and also if you just maybe you want a little bit more of a community vibe. As always, the Whole, Full and Alive toolkit is available for purchase on my website for $99 at fullsoulnutrition.com. This is a collection of many workshops, journal prompts, actionable experiments that you can use to develop nourishing nutrition habits, rituals, routines, positive body image and really feel more whole, full and alive every single day.
So let's get into today's episode. I have an amazing guest on today's episode, one of my dear dear friends, Shelagh Curran, and she is actually a newer friend of mine, which is unbelievable, because we are so unbelievably close, although we've only known each other for literally less than six months.
That is why we're actually talking about friendship on the episode today, having friendships and adulthood some of the stickiness and trickiness that comes with making friends and sustaining friendships and adulthood and how do you know if someone's like a good friend for you and setting boundaries and all that good stuff that comes with friendship in adulthood, very different than friendship in childhood and high school and college and all those things.
So that is what Shelagh and I were inspired to dive into today, and I'm so excited to have her voice here on the show. She actually also happens to be a registered dietician, nutritionist. She helps people who are living with PCOS and fertility issues to rebalance their hormones through a holistic approach, and she also has her own private practice.
She's going to tell you a little more about it in the beginning of the episode, but without any further ado, let's get into my episode with Shelagh Curran, amazing, inspiring human being, one of my great friends. So let's talk about friendship.
All right, Shelagh, thank you so much for joining me today.
Shelagh: Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here. I've been looking forward to it all day.
Caitie: This is long anticipated. I think we've been trying to record this since like October, maybe?
Shelagh: This is not our first try. Finally, it happens.
Caitie: So I feel like it's perfect timing, honestly, all things considered with the amount of things that I know you've learned through life since October. So I'm excited to be here in this moment.
Shelagh: I'm so excited. You're so right. I feel like even in the last like two or three months, now I have so much more to bring to this conversation. Let's go. So divine timing.
Caitie: Tell everyone who you are.
Shelagh: That is a big one right now for just like where I'm at in my life. I am, first and foremost, a human being, I would say. In terms of who I am, I do a lot of things, and I have a lot of labels. Like at the end of the day, I am a human who is also a registered dietitian and a friend and a daughter and all of the things, but at the end of the day, I’m a person, just a human and a soul here on Earth.
Caitie: Love that, love that. So many people get intimidated by that question. I've actually found it to be a really interesting thing, just to see how people react to that question when I first asked it. I felt really passionately about making sure I asked my guests who they are before I asked them what they do, because I think it is so important that people find value in themselves beyond what they do.
It's been so interesting to hear people be like, “Oh, that's big,” or to hear people be like, “I don't know,” or to hear people be like, “Oh my gosh, thank you so much for asking.” It's just such a range of responses. So I find that so interesting in and of itself.
Shelagh: I feel like just where I'm at in my life right now. So many of those box labels are not applying anymore. I don't live in boxes anymore. Just like so many things about my life and kind of what I have identified as over the last few months are completely no longer true, or they're transitioned out. So now I'm in this, I don't even want to call it a limbo period, because it's not like there's one destination that we get to but there's just so much unlearning that I've been doing about myself that right now like, who are you? It's just a very active journey.