Experience more joy in life with Joy Fairhall.

Joy Fairhall is an in-demand speaker, emotional Intelligence and guidance coach, and a leader specializing in working with those affected by life-changing diagnoses or events and teaching them how to be more joyful.

Having been through these challenging experiences herself, Joy has a unique insight into the emotional turmoil people are experiencing, the support and guidance required during those challenging times.

Joy has created the 3 minute to calm meditation.
To learn more about Joy and the services she offers visit www.mindbodyjoy.com.au

Transcription:

Intro 0:05
Recovery After Stroke podcast. Helping you go from where you are to where you’d rather be.

Bill 0:14
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Bill 1:14
My guest today is Joy Fairhall, who is an in-demand speaker and emotional support and guidance coach and a leader specializing in working with those affected by life-changing diagnoses or events. Having been through these challenging experiences herself Joy has a unique insight into the emotional turmoil. People are experiencing the support guidance required during these challenging challenges type challenging times I’m having challenging times reading this.

Bill 1:45
Joy has created the three minute to calm and what fills your heart with joy methods, enabling people to easily create joy and happiness in their life every day, no matter the challenges they face. Joy Sounds like somebody that I might need to hire has tried in many modalities and brings with her a vast range of skills to support and guide challenging times, which enables her to connect with every audience and will make them laugh. And if need be, cry. Joy truly understands and believes in the power of the mind and body and strongly believes in the power of joy not only for its health benefits, but as the most powerful advantage a person could have during life changing events.

Bill 2:37
Welcome, joy.

Joy 2:40
Hi, Bill. Thank you. Yeah,

Bill 2:43
That’s a pretty cool bio.

Joy 2:45
Oh, thank you. I’m maybe I need to take out a couple of the challenging words for you next time

Bill 2:52
Maybe I need to learn how to speak English.

Joy 2:55
No you do very well. Thank you for having me here. I’m truly blessed to be able to share my story with you.

Bill 3:01
You’re welcome my pleasure. I’m going to just sort my screen out so I can see properly. So just tell me a little bit about Well, firstly, I want to tell the listeners and people watching on YouTube I want to tell them how we came to be known to each other or acquaintances at this stage before because what happens is after I talk to people on one of those podcasts, I become friends with them.

Joy 3:27
Beautiful and I feel I know you already. Yeah, Bill and I met through a mutual friend called Carrie Nelson at a wonderful event space. Our Place Melbourne and bill did a wonderful job as emcee for the opening night there. And I was one of the speakers there. invited to share why I was going to use our place Melbourne and my connection to Carrie. And we’ve since met a couple of times and shared a fantastic night together. on a panel, talking about resilience, which we both know quite a bit about. So that’s briefly how we met.

Bill 4:07
Yeah, brilliant. Now, I didn’t really know that you were somebody that had had to exercise resilience. Maybe to the extent that some others haven’t. And that’s all right. It doesn’t matter that others haven’t had something serious happened to make them resilient, or we prefer people not to have serious things happen to them. Yeah,

Joy 4:30
absolutely. Absolutely. You know, you can have resilience just in, you know, at what we would call an a normal life without too many life challenges. And, you know, that’s fabulous, too. We don’t want anyone to go through anything that is, you know, what we would call, you know, a crisis or a trauma, you know, absolutely not.

Bill 4:51
Yeah, no looking at you and having met you and having had a hug by you. It doesn’t appear as if Unlike with me, it doesn’t appear as if anything has gone wrong. And what’s really interesting what comes to mind often from time to time, often from time to time, well, it comes to mind often is that I don’t really know what people are going through, say by saying somebody’s meeting somebody for the first time giving them a hug and all that kind of stuff. You know, we’re not really aware that everybody really truly is going through something.

Bill 5:25
Something a little bit about what you’ve been going through in the past. Yeah,

Joy 5:29
And that’s very true appearances. People can put on appearances, and I’ll talk a bit more about appearances later. But my story is started from birth Actually, I was called joy because my mum and dad had a lot of trouble having children. So six years after my brother was born, I was born and I was called Joy, because I brought them joy and happiness into their life. And I really think that that’s been my whole life. message.

Joy 6:01
My mum had a chronic illness. It wasn’t a well known illness, but it meant that she was bedridden for months on end, often hospitalized and I was told that she probably wouldn’t live past 35. So I grew up knowing that in the back of my mind and I became mums carer, even from a very, very young age, I had a very happy, normal blessed life. I don’t look at it as a challenge. I look back now and look at what I learned at that time.

Joy 6:34
So I learned how to be a carer from a very, very young age and how to cook and clean and look after the family from a very young age.

Bill 6:42
You must have been attached later on in life.

Joy 6:45
I love cooking.And, you know, and I learned from my mum when she was actually she was my first listening resilience because she was going through these herself. I was just caring for her as well. My family, but she would when she was able to get out of that bed. And her focus wasn’t on herself and Why always me she would be the one that would be looking after other people. She would take people in herself.

Joy 7:13
So she was my first lesson in what resilience really was. Fast forward, my brother had a serious accident and we thought he was going to not be with us very long at the age of 18. And, again, we went into carer mode, so I was there to care for him when my mother was unable to and seeing road trauma is just completely different again to a chronic illness, so been touched by road trauma as well.

Joy 7:49
I had a wonderful marriage, but unfortunately, I lost my husband when he was diagnosed with cancer when I was 3037 We lost him six weeks later. So the children who were only 12 and 11 and 13 at the time, lost their dad. And another, not the chronic illness thing that I’ve experienced is my girlfriend who we lost her motor neurone disease. And I don’t know if you know much about that, but it’s a real man rollover disease.

Joy 8:24
And we know too much about that. Yeah, and the resilience from her and her positive nature and her spirit, which was exactly like my husband’s just really, really cemented what I’d been studying for years about the mind and the body and the joy you can have, no matter what the outcome but the time you have. It’s so important to have that positive mindset even in the most challenging, challenging circumstances. So that’s a little bit of me in a nutshell.

Bill 9:00
So yeah, these episodes they, I take him down this path I want people to understand that things can be tough, right? So and the whole purpose of the podcast is in so we can give people tools on where to go to get to where they would rather be rather than that state of despair or that state of hurt or pain or whatever it is. So you know what that sounds like any out anyone else’s life really, if we live long enough, most of us are going to go through something like that. And some of us have automatic, you know, in the first 40 years have had all that stuff already happened to them, which

Bill 9:39
you know, is part of life, isn’t it like

Joy 9:42
communities and especially with cancer and chronic illness, we see stroke, we see heart attacks becoming more prevalent we see type two diabetes, the one you can control, not type one. We’re seeing the rise in MND even At a young age, we’re seeing this and people are being more effective and touched, whether it’s themselves or whether it’s their, their family or friends. And, and this is what what drives me in my business is to show that you can like you didn’t know that I’d been through all this stuff I could have been sitting there in a corner was me, I’m a widow, and I’ve lost my girlfriend, and I’ve grown up with a hard childhood. But I see all of that as a blessing. And that’s, that’s how I look after my clients. I support them in using the happiness in the emotions they’ve had before so that they can make the best of every single day. I have a quote, though. Sorry, I have a quote that I say yeah, is that we’re making tomorrow’s memories today. So make them good ones.

Bill 10:51
Wow, that’s a really cool quote.

Joy 10:54
Yeah, so why Yep, whatever happens tomorrow happens tomorrow. But why do we have to worry about Today, why don’t we make today’s ones memorable? So we’ve got them for tomorrow.

Bill 11:05
Yeah, brilliant.

Bill 11:07
So it’s really inspirational, the work that you do. And so is your story, right? And most of them I guess I’ve got inspirational stories, but a lot of people don’t know what to do with all the stuff that they’ve been through, like what digest copper on the chain? Do I just, you know, huff and puff about it? Like, what do I do now? You’ve decided to make it your work to help people get through tough times. Yes, is it but surely, you weren’t always joyful? Surely you sometimes had really bad days and you felt bad and you didn’t want to do anything and all that kind of stuff was was there moments of that? Did you have that happen?

Joy 11:48
Okay, everyone has moments when they despair. You know, when you’ve been affected by losing your husband, you know your absolute soulmate. It’s devastating and You’re You’re emotional so using my speak bio about saying emotional turmoil, because you’ve gone from a normal life to going what I call in my, to my clients Limbo, not really knowing where you are, whether you want to hide away or just stay there or whether you’re going to move into what I call a new normal.

Joy 12:20
And when you’re in limbo Limbo is actually not a bad place as long as you don’t stay there for too long because Limbo like a chrysalis. You know you mentioned the caterpillar turning into a butterfly. You growing you’re changing, you’re digesting your going through things you’re making a choice and and then you come out like a butterfly. Now you may come out like a moth and feel like a moth. But you will definitely grow into a butterfly. So yeah, there are challenging times and look, I just recently had my husband’s 20 year anniversary.

Joy 12:57
I can’t believe he’s been gone longer than I knew him. And of course I’m I was typing in a blog saying how blessed I was to have him in my life and how blessed my life has been knowing him and having the children but I still had tears in my eyes because of course I wish he was still here. But I look at the positivity he’s a look at you know all the blessings of what we had together. You know, some people never find love and I had the best marriage and the best love.

Joy 13:28
Some people never find friends and I’ve been blessed to have so many good friends. So the way I look at it is I look at the positive 80s and it always lifts you up. If you look at the joyful the happy memories, whether you still feel sad that that they will bring you up and that mood brings you up and and that’s that’s how I live my my whole life is looking at the positives, not the things that could have been done better because I can’t change them. They yesterday

Bill 14:00
Do you know what? How to say your naming break? Hara, remember that. So if I, if we come across each other at the next event and I call you hara I’m talking to you.

Joy 14:29
Okay, how are you, Bill?

Bill 14:34
Uh, did you understand when you were younger, what your name meant?

Joy 14:43
Um, I actually did because of my mum and my dad. They were my mum always just said that I was a joy to her and you know, you think mums always say that to her but then other people would come in and go oh joy You’re such a delight joy by name or by nature. Every school report came in joy by name joy nature and after a while it was like you say something else I’m Joy, you know I can do other things. But I was always a very positive child. I always a bit lonely sometimes.

Joy 15:22
We had a lot of neighbors but we were in a court and a lot of those moved away and there weren’t many kids around for a little while. But I was happy I guess go and pick flowers in the garden and go and give it to the elderly neighbors or wait down the bottom of the court for a neighbor and I would sit on his lap and he would let me drive the car up the court so I was

Bill 15:47
Always I want to hear about when you broke the law.

Joy 15:50
Know that I die. Yes, I know. Even though I was you know this big and couldn’t even reach the accelerator drives that car dies

Joy 15:59
down But you know, I think it’s a positivity I think also my parents were always very positive as well.

Joy 16:07
My brother wasn’t such a happy

Joy 16:11
person, he was a bit bullied. I was always the one that was good at sports, anything. Anything. I turned my hand too I was able to do quite easily which is most people. But my brother, my brother wasn’t so gifted in sports and my dad was a very sporty and that he found puffing Billy and he loved puffing Billy and his stool on passing, Billy so

Bill 16:39
what’s that? What’s all about that? Billy for the people listening all over the planet who are not from Melbourne is a train that is how old

Joy 16:50
Oh, geez, I can’t even remember it’s a steam train

Bill 16:54
has a very simple track that it runs around by very small mini columns. But it’s still upheld the narrow,

Joy 17:03
narrow gauge bill it’s called narrow.

Bill 17:06
And it’s still too narrow. It’s a tourist attraction and people can go in there and it’s sit in Emerald in the most beautiful countries, you know, boyish, amazing, amazing place. So yes, people want to feel nostalgic, they can go out to puffing Billy. And they can jump on the train and go for a drive around the track around this particular area that it travels through and experience what it was like to be on a steam train. And I think it’s amazing. But now you’re telling me your brother’s involved down there. Tell me about that.

Joy 17:36
Yeah, he, my dad and mum were always looking for something to get him interested because he wasn’t into sports and stuff like I was. But he loved trains, he loved model trains. So he would they had a model train set up and then my dad thought, Well, why don’t I take him to puffing Billy they have volunteers there.

Joy 17:56
And I think he was nine, nine when he first joined the volunteers and he is 65. And he’s a lifetime member now. So, yeah, so there’s always something and this is this actually leads me into a really good point. If you feel you don’t fit in with the norm, what is the norm? the norm is something for someone else. The norm is something for someone else. The norm is something for everyone is very different. Just because you don’t fit in with what they are fine.

Joy 18:31
What is your passion? Find what fills your heart with joy, because that’s what you should be doing. And I tell you what, it flipped my brother’s life around he felt he belonged. He could talk to people about trains, which which they all loved. You know, you sit on this train as you were explaining with your feet hanging out the window and holding on to a bar and everyone has a flag and just a little plastic flag but it’s bringing families back together.

Joy 18:59
You go in Have a picnic at the end. Or you sit on the side and the parents drive up to the other end and you wave to them as you go over a bridge. So, you know, there are the little things in life that just bring you joy and happiness. And it was a really good, it’s a really good metaphor for what I was saying is, look for what brings you happiness and do it because it will switch your life around.

Bill 19:25
Yeah, and it goes, it goes back to a time when there was no occupational health and safety issues. You know, you’re allowed to hang your feet out of a train people. So if you just want to get your feet out of a train, because you’re never gonna know what that’s like and wave a flag. Check it out, are really, really urgent. It’s a massive tourist attraction here in Victoria. So that’s really exciting. So what is your brother?

Bill 19:52
What’s his name? And what does he do there?

Joy 19:54
His name’s Bruce and he’s a volunteer. He actually got one of the steam engines. Another one of the steam engines up and running through 25 years of fundraising with the committee up there. So if you do the dinners on puffing Billy, and the Christmas train, they always have a fabulous Christmas train. He’s one of the ones that was responsible for getting those started. So, yeah,

Bill 20:22
well, this has become an ad for puffing. Back. Wow, okay, well, there’s podcasts off and going places we then expect them and

Joy 20:33
actually it’s showing the resilience to you know, this was a child that was bullied. This was a child who didn’t feel connected. And, you know, by just getting an interest, look at the difference he’s made and what other people could do but for his example, look at the difference he’s made with puffing belly he’s been on a committee run Christmas trains fundraised and actually got a full set same engine back on the on the on the train tracks. So this is what I’m talking about, you know, you get a passion, you have a choice to change your life, look what you can do, nothing can stop you. So it’s actually a really good metaphor,

Bill 21:14
and he brings a lot of joy to a lot of people.

Joy 21:18
Exactly. And anyone can do that. So you just need to make an eye and you heard me say this the other night, it’s a choice. People can choose to be miserable, and that they can choose that if that’s what their choice is. Doesn’t matter how much you want to help them that is their choice. You can choose to make good memories as I said, and and choose to turn your life around and and they the people that I work with and I support

Bill 21:49
and then you hang around with as well. You hang around with a lot of people like that. I mean, Carrie, who’s our mutual friend, unfortunately also lost her husband at a very young age and She calls herself the happy widow.

Joy 22:03
Absolutely, absolutely. I don’t like the word we don’t we don’t to me he has. When I was 30, I was 37. And I was like, I’m still me. I’m still joy. Why am I now that we do labeled? Why? Why are my kids the kids who don’t have a dad? You know, it wasn’t it wasn’t a choice, you know, and titles, you know, here, are they chronically depressed or they’re this or they’re that Oh, no, no, sometimes you know, you need those to to explain but don’t be defined by a title. And or make it something like Carrie has into something positive, that happy widow.

Bill 22:44
Yeah, I think titles are things that other people use to, for whatever reason, explain something about somebody else in order to get to sit the same about somebody else and you know, people can own somebody else’s title or they can make their own title for themselves. Own somebody else’s title doesn’t really fit with who you are. And if it doesn’t really fit with who you are, but you take it on, you could take on another person’s perception of what it feels like, you know, I’ve gone through a loss or you know, a difficult time or something like that. So, it’s really good what you say, you know, we need to avoid taking on titles that other people project. We’re not Yes, at all. We’re completely different. And I, when I went through my three strokes, you know, my three brain damages, I didn’t want to be a stroke survivor, that I was a survivor, but not a stroke survivor. I didn’t survive stroke only I survived lots of things, you know, like, absolutely the connotations of survivor is not for me, but the community uses it. And if people feel good about that, then that’s fine for them. But I just call myself somebody who experience three strokes, and brain surgery because I’ve experienced a lot of things, and I survived all of those things going on for the last year survivor.

Joy 24:10
Yeah, absolutely.

Joy 24:12
Yeah. And that’s the power, you have the choice to say what you want about your life. And you’ve chosen to use those words because they’re powerful to you. And you’re absolutely right. We’re not just defined by one or two stories, you know, it’s, it’s a combination of our life to today.

Bill 24:30
So, you know, when you’re feeling down when something bad happens, and you can’t, and you can’t explain it or you’ve never experienced it before. So people will go through all different sorts of things, and it’ll affect them in different ways. Like, how do you what do you tap into, to be able to go through that experience and then move away from it so how do you kind of tell somebody that might be going through a tough time now about this experience and then you know what could come or what might come What? What do you say to them?

Joy 25:10
Well, everyone’s story is unique. Your story’s unique to you compared to another stroke person or someone who’s been through loss. carry in my story, you know, we both lost their husbands at 37. But we’re uniquely different as

Bill 25:24
well. Both both of you seven.

Joy 25:26
Yes. Which I didn’t know when I first met Carrie. It was only after that we we started seeing all these alignments of our life and then tell you this.

Bill 25:35
My first brain damage happened when I was 37. Wow.

Joy 25:39
Oh, there you go. There’s a number there.

Joy 25:43
Well, she was

Bill 25:46
numerologist numerologist. Listening tell us what it means.

Joy 25:50
Yeah, well, number nine is one of my lucky numbers. But anyway, aside from that, so I don’t assume to know what they going through. You know, I’ve been through stuff you’ve been through yours. However, the emotions are typically the same, the overwhelming sense of loss of control, not ever feeling that they’re going to be happy again, not even be able to contemplate in their mind what their life is going to be like in the future little own tomorrow. And and compounded with all of this is that if it’s a chronic illness, then there’s lots of doctor’s appointments and hospitals and people ringing and I’m sure your wife probably experienced this with your first hemorrhage. Everyone is trying to find out because they care and they love you. And the last thing you feel like is just let me just leave me. I just want to take it in myself. So there’s just that overwhelming of everything, if that makes sense. So normally, I just get them into a relaxation and they just talk. And just absolutely getting an off their chest with someone who they know has experience something like that is the number one thing. So I really advise people to talk to someone, it is really important to seek support. And if you and it’s quite often easier not to do it to your family and friends, because you feel you should be strong or you feel you shouldn’t be feeling like this or you. You might get the giggles and you feel you shouldn’t be laughing. So speaking to someone who is not close to you, I think is a really, really good idea. And then what I do is I actually show them how they can feel happy in that moment. So I use a technique where we go back to a memory where they felt happy or confident or whatever feeling they want to feel the most. And we just tap back into that. So I might say to you, do you remember what something that Makes you feel really happy once a moment that would make you laugh out loud that you can remember

Bill 28:05
some of the experiences that we had camping with my mates?

Joy 28:09
Yep. So I would say to you, can you just just think of a time when you were camping? You know, I might say Close your eyes. Can you remember what it was like? What can you smell? Can you smell the fire? What can you see? Can you see the cloud? Was it raining? Was it sunny? And I really just go back into that because the brain remembers it automatically goes back to the moment that’s perfect for them.

Joy 28:31
And they start to feel the emotions there straightaway. And that’s just a really quick demonstration. So when they actually experienced that, it’s like, like, I do remember when I felt like that. And that actually gives them the strength. I call it the power of joy, and actually gives them a strength to go. Well, I’ve experienced it in the past I can experience again. Yep. And you know, I feel a bit better now. But I’ve felt that happiness too.

Joy 29:00
I’m a bit stronger I can cope with tomorrow and I can cope with the next day. So it happiness and joy gives you so much strength. You know, I just find if you’re positive during times when it’s challenging, it actually gives you a strength. Whereas if you’re miserable, everything feels like you’re walking through mud. always feel like you just feel like you’re plodding along. But if you have a bit of strength about you and, and a bit more confidence, it actually empowers you to move forward. So that’s basically what I what I normally do first is get them to talk about it, tap back into a happy memory. And then, you know, just give them that strength and support until they’re ready to choose what they’d like to do next. How important

Bill 29:49
is it? Other words that we use in either experiencing joy or the opposite of that, like dwell words shape, how we experience joyful moments.

Joy 30:01
Absolutely. You know, I, I’ll go to a visual example see we’ve got video on but I’ll talk it through. I could say I feel really rotten today I’ve got a bit of hay fever. I don’t think I can do anything. And if he got the video on, you can see what happens to my body. It goes down my face slumps, energy lowers automatically. But if I change the word to a year, I’ve got hay fever today, but the sun’s out and I’m ready to go outside and do a bit of cleaning or something like that. You actually see the voice changes, the energy changes. The shoulders lift up, and you feel propelled you this is this mind body. The mind goes, Oh, yeah, she’s, she’s got to be a high fever, but she’s feeling positive. She sees the sun. She feels happy. She’s going for a walk. Let’s go. But in the other scenario, the brains going on look at it. You know the bodyslam she’s feeling low. Yeah, we’re not going to do anything today. We’re just going to sit here. Yeah. So that’s weird language is really, really, really important. You know, the cart and can, you know, you know, I won’t be able to, why won’t you be able to? So ask the questions and and challenge yourself. Yeah, I can do that. I don’t feel like getting out of bed this morning and going to gym. Well, what do you feel like when you don’t go to gym? ask those questions. You’re not as energetic. Are you? I think I will go. Yeah, yeah. So there’s simple you’re exactly right. And mine language is is so important. I call it a healthy diet for your mind. Is your language.

Bill 31:46
Yeah. Remember just a couple of days ago when we did that presentation, and I shared briefly about that when I was in rehab. That gentleman his name was Ivan, who was calling his hand in hand. He was trying to get his hand to move. And I was learning how to use my hand again and all that type of thing. And he was getting he’s frustrated, and he was calling his hand a bastard.

Bill 32:13
And what why he wasn’t realizing is that creates an environment for his hand not to work not to do what it needs to do. And I don’t know what it was. I don’t know why I was more interested in him than my own recovery. But I said to him, you know, Ivan, if you fret if your hand moved, what would have been? He said, I will be my friend. I said, I pretended to move.

Bill 32:33
Then call your hand your friend and see what happens and within moments of him saying, I come on friend move. He’s, Well, firstly, his voice changed because you talk to your friend differently. Yes, his body change his breathing change, his stress levels dropped. Everything about it was different. And then within moments of his hand, not doing anything for him, and him being really frustrated. He did exactly what he wanted to do.

Bill 33:00
And he was stunned. And he just couldn’t believe it. So people who are recovering from whether it’s a stroke related injury or another brain injury or any other condition where, you know, they need to get back on their feet, so to speak. Sometimes it’s not just the physical part of us that we need to get back into action, we need to get the emotional part of us, you know, the internal part of us back on the right track.

Bill 33:28
So, so, language helps with everything, and I even had one of my other podcast guests. Claire Caulfield had a stroke, and she actually made a point of telling other people how to speak to her, especially the rehab people because they were talking to her about her bad hand, and she was gonna know I didn’t have a bad hand that is getting rehabilitated. That is going to be better and Yeah, that person didn’t come back to that particular Kara wasn’t comfortable coming back and I said somebody else.

Joy 34:07
Oh, wow. You know, the perfect example. You know, it’s people who say, I’ll never experience happiness again. What you tell yourself the mind believes, oh, she’s never going to experience happiness again. Okay? And they take it there. Whereas if you say, someone in the panel the other day said, Oh, I just can’t do Facebook and I need to do it for my social media. And I said, Why didn’t you change it to? I’m learning to master Facebook. And she said the sentence and her whole body just changed. She goes, Oh, okay. And she got on there and she did it. You know, just a simple sentence.

Joy 34:51
You know, I’m learning to Master Master is a powerful word learning means that okay, I’m learning to take the pressure off. Yeah, like Can’t do Facebook and I need to Yeah, harsh weather our harshest enemies in our language. You know, we probably wouldn’t say I wouldn’t say to you, well, you can’t master Facebook. How does that make you feel? But we’re very good at telling ourselves the same thing. Yeah. So language really, really important. And as I said, support and getting the reminders, you know, we often say, don’t say, Oh, I’m not doing very well say I’m learning. Yeah, whatever it is, you know, I wonder what it will feel like, you know, change the language around.

Bill 35:36
You know, when something serious happens to somebody. And things change rapidly and we don’t have the opportunity to sort of understand exactly what’s happening so quickly, especially when a loved one passes away. Yeah. How does identity shift because people need to understand a little bit about your Identifying when somebody is in your life and things are happening a certain way, you’re picking up the kids, they’re doing their chores, or they’re doing this donut, there’s a certain identity that you have wrapped up within each other. And then that person is no longer there. And identity shift, and I think people sometimes could struggle with what does it all mean? Now? Who am I? Now? What did you know? salutely? Absolutely. I did identity shift and what did it come? What were you and where did it go to? And where is it going?

Joy 36:29
Yep. So a little bit about our marriage. We were absolute team. So my husband and I, I used to work afternoon shift for a company. So that meant I worked from eight o’clock at night to 12 o’clock and my husband would get home at 330. So between the two of us there was either one of us home during the day and one home at nighttime, we didn’t have the traditional day care and stuff like that. We wanted to do it ourselves. So we were an absolute team.

Joy 37:00
What changed with that is that whereas he used to take the kids to basketball and do the dinner and everything while I was working, it all changed just me. And it was hardest for the kids to because they were used to having their dad take them to basketball where everyone else had their mums do that traditionally and mums normally the dinner so I’m opening a center next year and it’s called I’m still me. And the reason for that is really directly related to your question is, it didn’t matter what, what changed it means that I’m still the same person.

Joy 37:42
My role had changed but I was still the same person. So this is what happens people go who am I now? Well, you’re still the same person. It’s just you’re doing other stuff so I’m still may is something that comes up again, you know, I feel I need to change but you The same person, you’re just doing different things. So Excuse me, I had to change to working day shift. The children ended up not having me on social committees at the school. And we went to traditional family where I was home at nighttime. So things changed.

Joy 38:20
But the big shift for me was, I wasn’t part of a team. You know, he was my best friend. He was the one who always had my back and vice versa. It was the loneliness that that got me with the loss of my husband, you know, and I had to be struggled for my children. You know, my daughter was going to have a special 30th birthday without her dad. My son was very close to Well, obviously, they were very close to their dad. So seeing their grief was the biggest challenge and actually getting my daughter to hypnosis because there’s nothing was working with a grief even me was the thing that propelled me on to the studying of hypnosis myself over 20 years ago.

Bill 39:12
Tell me about hypnosis do you need a drink of water?

Joy 39:14
Yes. Can I just do that? Yeah. Thank you.

Bill 39:18
My guests are allowed to drink water in between sentences. Absolutely.

Joy 39:22
No worries.

Bill 39:25
Tell me about hypnosis what’s um, how does that work for grief?

Joy 39:28
Yeah, well, hypnosis can be used for many things. So I’ve studied many modalities and many before hypnosis, but hypnosis was the one thing that helped my daughter actually accept and move on and go through grief in a better way. Which doesn’t really make sense. But what was happening she knew her dad wasn’t there, but she couldn’t accept it. And she was Trying to be strong for me and strong for her brother.

Joy 40:03
She you know, she’d learned from me how to be strong when it wasn’t really helping her. So I 12 months after I took her to hypnotherapist, and in one session she had moved through that and into acceptance and was then able to start the grieving process. So what hypnosis does it you cannot be hypnotized unless you want to be hypnotized.

Joy 40:28
hypnosis, all hypnosis is self hypnosis. So everyone is hypnotized, self hypnotized every single day when you get in a car and you drive from A to B and you don’t remember how you got there. That’s a form of Self Hypnosis. That’s your subconscious going, where it knows without you even thinking about it. So that’s a form of Self Hypnosis.

Joy 40:53
So what what I do with hypnotherapy is that you actually tap into that subconscious everything. That’s there. And you take it back and go into a form of acceptance so for grief it yes you’re allowed to grieve yes, these feelings are normal and, and just really giving them permission to be themselves which is still comes back to that acceptance of being yourself.

Joy 41:21
There’s not a role you need to feel you don’t have to be strong or have to be weak or whatever the titles are, whatever you do is perfect for you. And and it’s just that support and it’s the positivity again. So yes, so I learned hypnosis or hypnotherapy straight after that, as well as going into coaching and Reiki and all the other natural modalities that I really, really am passionate about.

Joy 41:50
So it really is just a fast track. You know, I’ve had hidden hypnotherapy clients who have been saying psychologists For years, and I’m not saying that hypnotherapy replaces psychology, but they walk out feeling after one sentence, so for further along in their recovery than they do after maybe years of psychology, and they often work hand in hand because we work on the emotional whereas they may work on specific longer term. Yes. So there’s a real way of working together with people. But that, you know, the effect of a hypnotherapy session is evident at the end of that first session.

Bill 42:36
Yeah, sorry, what I like about psychologists, is there a good place to go to talk to somebody who is going to have your back who’s not going to judge you who’s going to do any of the things that you know, sometimes friends do offer advice where we don’t want advice or? Yeah, so I experienced similar to what you’re saying. I still say a second Just time to time. But the best part of I think, from my mid 20s, when we lost somebody that was close to us, very young at a very young age.

Bill 43:12
And it helped me go there and vent. And it helped me go there and get some tools to understand why other people behaved a certain way towards me. And it made me less reactive to other people, because now I knew why they were behaving that way. And I knew it wasn’t because of what what we were experiencing in our interaction. It was stuff that was happening to them that they didn’t even know about that was making them respond that way.

Bill 43:40
But then, yeah, so when I was going through it, I felt like I was doing a little bit too much of living in the problem with psychology. Although we were talking about, you know, what the solution was, we didn’t really have a tool to get us to the solution. We weren’t being coached on how to get to the solution. And when the Knicks Yeah, I when people ask me about what is coaching and you know, Surely it’s no good because you know, it’s not a you know, anyone can be a coach or whatever.

Bill 44:15
Yeah, that’s right, anyone can be a coach because we teach people how to improve on the tasks that they need to do to get to the point where they need to go, like a tennis coach doesn’t need to be a psychologist, they would benefit from knowing about psychology, but that I need to be because what they do is they teach people how to hold their hand specifically when they’re striking a ball. And if the ball is going outside of the lines, well, to pay attention to how the hand is holding the racket, and then to ask them to adjust it so that they can hold the racket in the way which is going to make the ball go in the lines. So that’s that’s what I found when I went to get coached.

Bill 44:59
I found that for the First time I had somebody redirecting me and helping me change slightly my path so that I can achieve my outcome when the psychologist did a really important part of understanding the psychology behind why I wasn’t enjoying my life at the time why things were difficult while I wanted to change.

Joy 45:24
Yeah, and a coach a coach also hold you accountable. You know, we coach doesn’t do the work for you. A coach works with you to work what you want to work on. And then, you know, puts them in the top five or whatever and works on your values, make sure they’re aligned to your values, which is family, money, career, whatever those values are for people who don’t know values, but also hold you accountable because you set those goals together.

Joy 45:54
Yeah, and together. That way the coach is there. It’s like a footy coach or a teacher tennis coach, whatever sort of coach, they make you get to where you want where where the end game is to be the champion. And it’s exactly what you’re saying, you know, a coach is there to support and guide you. And hypnotherapy is like that as well. It actually goes, Okay, let’s just what is that emotion, let’s just get get rid of that emotion, just let it go.

Joy 46:22
And once people have let that go, then they’re able to move forward. Sometimes they’re just stuck. And that’s only one method that I use, but you’re exactly right. You know, there are so many methods out there you need to find the one that you’re comfortable with. It may be something that someone else has tried to you haven’t tried, give it a go. But the number one thing is choose it. Choose to get the support, you know, because, as you say, being there by yourself when you’ve had a huge massive change in your life, look, it may even be I’ve been seeing a few clients who had to put their aged parents into a home and then massively torn about it.

Joy 47:06
You know, it’s a difficult condition, that’s a life changing event. So it doesn’t have to be a death or a chronic illness. It’s something that affects your life that tips you from normal, to not going into Limbo and not working out where you’re going next. So, always make the choice to seek support with something that you’re comfortable with. And always go with recommendations by friends. And if you’re not sure, you know, speak to friends of friends, or get professional advice.

Bill 47:35
And the people who succeed in life. And I’m not saying that there’s only one way to success but have do the most work at learning about what it is that’s stopping them from being where they want to go. So coaches support that but also, if you’re being if you’re the best in the world at tennis, Rafael Nadal, those types of guys.

Bill 47:59
By the way, They’re still getting coached, even though they are the best in the world at tennis, and have been the best in the world. And I’m making millions and millions of dollars because they understand that learning is ongoing and learning how to overcome, learning how to get by how to get through, you know how to how to perform under immense pressure, etc. It doesn’t end You can’t just learn it, and then you’re there. You’ve got to continue it. So if you’ve never been coached, and you’re wondering, and this, again, is not an ad about coaching, but if you’re wondering about how to be, you know how to be better at what you do, consider it, that’s all.

Joy 48:40
Yeah, absolutely. It’s absolutely right. And look, they probably haven’t had just one coach in all their career, a lot of them you get a coach and get you to where you are, but then you actually sometimes outgrow that coach and you need another coach and who may specialize in something else and you know, keeps going on So, absolutely, I mean, I’ve had three coaches in the last probably three years. And they’re all giving me different things as I’m growing and developing him into the life that I desire and deserve.

Bill 49:13
I’m an awesome host at this program. And believe it or not, I needed to be coached to get to here so that I can overcome all of the fears that were associated with having a voice and putting it out in the public domain. It was terrifying. And it I didn’t I delayed by a year before I released my first podcast.

Joy 49:37
So yeah, well congratulations to you for doing it. Well done. You chose to do it and, you know, you sample of what we’re saying if you want something, yes, seek support to get there and you know, it’s not painful. Having a coach is it Bill?

Bill 49:51
No, it’s not. It’s joyful, I want to be but see joy. I want to become in three minutes. can tell me how to become in three minutes. I don’t want to take four or one take five minutes. I want to become in three minutes. Tell me about that.

Joy 50:06
Absolutely. Yes. So a lot of people would know that breathing actually calms your whole system down. So when you get overwhelmed, what happens you tend to breathe faster. When you’re hyperventilating, you’re breathing faster and shallower. And that stresses your body. So what I did, I combined a method of breathing and associating it to colors because a lot of people can take in verbal but quite often like to associate a visual so three minutes to colm is learning how to breathe deeply. But also breathing in a calm color and that’s different for everyone. So what what the calm color for you tell me what’s the first color you think of when you’re calm? All right. this?

Bill 50:54
Can we can you actually take me through this? Can we do alright, let’s do it. Should I close my eyes? Can I do that?

Joy 50:58
No, no, that’s fine. Tell me But you’re calm color. What’s the first color? It’s the very first one you think of? Blue, blue. And once a color you think of when you’re stressed or overwhelmed and upset,

Bill 51:13
Red.

Joy 51:15
Okay. So what I want you to do, and we’ll do it a bit quicker than three minutes, obviously because of the podcast but I want you to Breathe in.

Bill 51:25
Breathe in three minutes. This is we we do it in three minutes. I want I want the whole experience Joy.

Joy 51:32
Okay, I haven’t got my time. Put that on at three minutes. Okay, Bill close your eyes. And I want to put your hands just on the top of your belly. Just sort of on the top of your just on the top there. Just relax. And I want you to take a big breath in. This a big breath in and a breath out when really feel your stomach right And for with every breath and then this time when you breathe in, breathe in a blue color breath it in that in blue and blow out red.

Joy 52:18
This time I want you to really imagine that blue breathing through your nostrils as you breathe in. Breathing in. Blow out that red there’s not red, left anywhere. And I want you to do that without me talking for another two goes. Breathing in, blue out that other color and repeat. And this time when you breathe in that blue, say in your mind, I am so calm and blow out the red. It’s gone.

Joy 53:34
And repeat that three times yourself. Powerful blow you’re gone and when you’re ready open your eyes I was watching your face there every when you when you were smiling and that powerful it’s gone. So how that works explain how did you feel with that.

Bill 54:36
I felt really good blue is my a GNC ocean amazing blue color that you get when you go on a holiday and you go to an amazing place and I could feel as I was breathing in. I was cooling down actually I could feel it cooling me down. Yeah, yeah. Beautiful. Yeah, we feel it. And then breathing Yeah.

Bill 54:59
Breathing Yeah kind of the the temperature shifted again a little bit and I could feel it you know, escaping you know the it was kind of like an exhaust you know getting rid of an energy. Yeah. So I’ve done a lot of meditating and a lot of breathing in the past and yeah, I add a lot of different layers in but that is so simple and so powerful that really made a massive difference to you know how I’ve experienced breathing and meditating before.

Joy 55:29
Yes, so it’s that the important thing is and it’s not just that you know, simple method where I take you through you can use this anytime anywhere and it’s really easy. I say, you know, the perfect tool in your back pocket and might be in the middle of the night when you’ve got a crying child is stuck in traffic or whatever you you’re stuck in a meeting your boss has just had a go at you and you’ve got to go straight back in this is three minutes. And the tricky is that you’re breathing in that calm and you’re you actually go like you do, your brain goes to the perfect moment for you. I didn’t tell you what color blue that went for you.

Joy 56:07
Yeah. And you’ve associated it. And this is where it’s a perfect example of the mind. Whereas with that other color, and I don’t know, did you notice I only use that color once? Because then we disassociated it and just said it’s gone. So this is the mind going on bit confused. Now I can only really feel the power of the blue in the power of whatever’s gone. Yeah, yeah, that did that is the secret. You don’t keep saying that other word. And I won’t say because you’ll get that effect back again. But can you imagine in a state of overwhelm, just being able to do that in three minutes? It’s very powerful. And if anyone wants that I give that as my gift to everyone because I think everyone should be calm, and no one should feel so overwhelmed that they feel helpless.

Bill 56:58
Yeah, well, that that’s doesn’t need anything, it doesn’t need you to go anywhere or be anywhere you can just imagine that you can do while you’re driving. Keep your eyes open, why the driving or pullover? Even better?

Joy 57:10
Yes. And it’s fabulous for children. I’ve used this method on lots of children and then a lot of my friends have used it, any children that can associate to a color. And I often have the paint samples in my clinic. And so what color do you think is your angry color or when you have a tantrum and they’ll pick out a color and we’ll use that and same It works very, very well for children because they’re very open to it.

Bill 57:37
Yeah. I noticed the shift in my belly Actually, I kind of withheld the burp it might have come up a little bit but like I noticed a shift in my belly I’m not sure what that is. But anyway, I

Joy 57:52
know that today’s stress it’s because what if it was it you know, you were in weren’t in a stressed or overwhelmed state, either. But that’s what happens. You know, your whole body holds stress no matter where it is. So you will find sometimes that you, you might get a bit gassy or you might get a bit of an itch or something.

Bill 58:12
Well, that’s really cool. I really did find that powerful. Thanks so much for sharing that. And if you’re listening or watching, they go go as a toy you can help out your little children with if they have a bad day at school, or I don’t know one of your colleagues who’s just been told something silly by one of their bosses or whatever. That’s amazing. We’ve had a really awesome chat and really, an hour is not enough. But we can continue this at another time. If somebody wants to get in touch with you. How do they do that? What’s the best way?

Joy 58:49
I’m probably through the website. I respond fairly quickly. I’m on all social media, but the website is www dot Mind, Body joy.com Dada you send me a message through there. look me up on any social media, I’m quite active on Facebook. I’d love to hear from you if you’ve got any questions, and you can also, sorry, you can also download that three minute to come method there that comes with instructional videos. So you can actually see, have the words written up there for you. And I also send you a cheat sheet. So you’ve got it forever.

Bill 59:25
Okay, and I’ll have that link on the notes. So people can find that easy on the YouTube video and also on the podcast. It’ll be in the notes there. So you can find that link and click it and go there. Do you have any programs coming up in your courses or anything like that, that you want people to know about?

Joy 59:44
Yeah, well, I actually run workshops quite a lot. I do the power of joy workshops. So we tap into what brings you joy. We go through the three minutes to come in a bit of detail, but we actually come at you actually come out with tools and techniques. You can use every single day. So that’s a half day workshop. Next one is the 15th of July. It’s a Saturday from 930 to 1230 $47. You know, we could do way more in that time. Yeah. So this fear, best Thunder $50 you can buy. So come along, we have an absolute blast. It’s, it’s not PowerPoint, we get up, we have a bit of fun. We do some fun stuff, but it’s really, really empowering. And it’s all about you. So yeah, I’d love you to join me.

Bill 1:00:34
Awesome. So everybody watching and listening. Thanks so much for being a part of the program again, I really, really do appreciate it. And it gives me a lot of joy to bring these episodes to you. And the fact that people are listening probably isn’t that important to me. I would have been doing it anyway because it gives me a lot of joy to talk to people and learn from them and actually just understand what’s going on in other people. minds and bodies about how they go about healing and recovering.

Bill 1:01:03
So if you found this episode useful and you think somebody that you know might need to have a listen and just understand what it’s like to get through a serious condition or a loss or something like that, please do share this with them, let them know about the podcast. And if you feel like you want to get along and experience some joy for $47 that’s not a lot of money to experience joy, go to mindbodyjoy.com.au and check out the events that are being run by joy.

Bill 1:01:39
And if you did love this episode, do us a favor, go to iTunes and give us a five-star review. Just click the iTunes link on the five stars. That’s it. On the iTunes link on Recovery After Stroke podcast comm website and go to the end give us fantastic feedback. We really love it in it helps other people find the podcast.

Bill 1:02:05
And if you’re watching on YouTube, give us a thumbs up, because a thumbs-up means that again, YouTube ranks the episode a little bit higher and allows other people to come across it and it recommends it. So joy, thank you so much for being part of the

Joy 1:02:20
Thank you. And I really pleasure. Thank you for having me on. And you know, giving the opportunity to people to see that there is there is a good outcome there is hope. And there is a chance of happiness and joy again, and as I always say, make sure you feel every single day with joy make it a good one.

Bill 1:02:43
Now, if you or someone you care about has had a stroke, and has started their recovery, you’ll know what a scary and confusing time it can be. There may be a whole lot of questions going through your mind like how long will it take to recover will I actually recover. What things should I avoid? In case omega was my doctors and therapists were always helpful in explaining things. But obviously, because I’d never had a stroke before, I didn’t know what questions to ask. And so I worried a lot and missed out on doing things that could have sped up my recovery.

Bill 1:03:19
So if you’re finding yourself in that situation, stop worrying and head to https://recoveryafterstroke.com/ where you can download a guide that will help you. It’s called seven questions to ask your doctor after a stroke. These seven questions are the ones I wish I’d asked when I had my stroke because they not only helped me better understand my condition. They helped me take a more active role in my own recovery, rather than just waiting to be told what to do at my next appointment to the website now, https://recoveryafterstroke.com/, and download the guide. It’s free. Thanks for being a part of the show.

Intro 1:04:01
This has been a production of recoveryafterstroke.com check out our page on Facebook and start a conversation by leaving a comment at https://www.instagram.com/recoveryafterstroke/. Subscribe to the show on iTunes and check us out on Twitter. The presenters and special guests of this podcast intend to provide accurate and helpful information to their listeners. These podcasts cannot take into consideration individual circumstances and are not intended to be a substitute for independent medical advice from a qualified health professional. You should always seek advice from a qualified health professional before acting on any of the information provided by any of the transit lounge podcasts.