Shownotes
What if awakening is not one bright moment, but a slow return to yourself? If you have been getting through your days without really being in them, this conversation is for you.
On I Awaken, host Niharika talks with Cheyenne Heflin about life after cancer treatment, the difference between surviving and living, and why asking for help is strength. Expect small, honest practices for coming back to the present.
About the Guest:
Cheyenne Heflin went through cancer treatment when she was younger and adjusted to life with a disability. She shares her story so others feel less alone, and is completing a master’s in counselling to become a mental health counsellor.
Key Takeaways:
- Awakening is not having every answer. It is trusting you can meet what comes.
- Asking for help is strength, not weakness.
- Survival is not living. Old ways of coping can keep you from being present.
- Return to something you once loved for five minutes a day.
- Journal without rules. Simply notice your day and how it felt.
Connect With the Guest:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/resilient_aka
- TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@resilient_aka
Episode Chapters:
- [00:00] Waking From Autopilot (approx.) - Awakening as a gradual opening
- [01:30] What Awakening Really Means (approx.) - Confidence that you will get there, not certainty
- [03:00] Sharing the Story (approx.) - Cancer treatment, disability, and training as a counsellor
- [06:00] The Myth of Doing It Alone (approx.) - Hyper-independence and the strength of asking for help
- [09:00] Survival Is Not Living (approx.) - When the walls that protected us start to hold us in
- [11:30] Five Minutes Back to Yourself (approx.) - Hobbies, stillness, and listening to the body
- [16:00] Journaling Without Rules (approx.) - A simple practice for staying close to your inner truth
🎙️ Want to Be a Guest on Healthy Mind, Healthy Life?
Send me a direct message on PodMatch.
👉 DM Me Here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/avik
🌱 About Healthy Mind By Avik™️
Healthy Mind By Avik™️ Global Mental Wellness Podcast Network - focused, credible, no more identity clutter.
👉 Subscribe and be part of this healing journey.
Refer a Guest
Know someone who would be a great fit for one of our podcast shows? Email us at [email protected] with the subject line “Refer a Guest.” Requests without this subject line cannot be catered to.
Support Our Podcast: Support this Podcast
📬 Contact & Links
Brand: Healthy Mind By Avik™️
Based in: India & USA
📌 Disclaimer - This episode is produced for educational and informational purposes only. All views expressed by the guest are their personal opinions alone and do not represent the views of the host or Healthy Mind by Avik™. The Network does not verify, endorse, or assume responsibility for any guest statements. Nothing in this episode constitutes medical, legal, financial, or professional advice, please consult a qualified professional before making any decisions. Listeners are encouraged to engage critically and independently with all content do not consume blindly. Use this content as a starting point for your own reflection and research, not as a substitute for professional guidance. Third-party content is referenced under fair use for informational purposes only. Guest speakers are solely responsible for their own statements.
If you have concerns about any content, please contact us here
By listening, you acknowledge and accept this disclaimer in full. Read detailed disclaimer here.
#podmatch #healthymindbyavik #podhub.club #iawaken #awakening #innertruth #selfawareness #presence #mindfulness #survivalmode #healingjourney #cancersurvivor #resilience #journaling #mentalhealth #cheyenneheflin
Transcripts
00:00:10 Niharika: Welcome to I awaken. I am Niharika, and in each episode we explore the inner landscapes of consciousness, the moments that shake us awake, and the practices that help us stay present towards being. Today we are sitting down with someone who has walked the path of awakening and helped others find their way through it. Joining me today is Cheyenne. Welcome. It's so great to have you here.
00:00:45 Cheyenne Heflin: Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.
00:00:48 Niharika: So to start with, when people hear the word awakening, they often think that it's about reaching some. Enlightened state where everything becomes clear and peaceful. It's a dream and it goes all in one motion. It's so smooth. What's the most common misconception you've encountered about what it really means to awaken?
00:01:23 Cheyenne Heflin: That's a good question. I think. The reality is like, you're not going to have some moment where all of a sudden you know everything. You know how to handle everything in your life. Everything's going to be fine. Nothing's going to bother you anymore. That's just not that's not that's not how life works. To me, it's more awareness of the fact that I can handle what's going to come. It doesn't mean that I'm going to be perfect at it. It doesn't mean I'm not going to struggle. But I know that I have been through hard things before, and I have the awareness to recognize that they will be hard, but I will make it through them eventually. It's kind of more a confidence in myself than it is like, oh, I feel like I know the answer. It's I'm confident I will get there eventually.
00:02:19 Niharika: Yeah. So so if it's not about reaching that mountaintop moment or reaching a destination, how do you help people understand what they are actually stepping into.
00:02:35 Cheyenne Heflin: Lots of different ways. I mean, the biggest one that I do is I like to share my story like everywhere, because I feel like it's always hard when you can't find someone who's been in similar shoes, not even exactly the same thing, but similar enough that, you know, they probably understand what you're going through. And when I was younger and going through cancer treatment the first time, I really didn't have any. I had one person who I met during treatment, but once I left the hospital, once it was all done. Nobody really understood what it was like to be recovering from chemo, adjusting to being disabled. And so I started sharing my story as a way to kind of connect with other people and show them like, hey, you're not alone. I'm going through this too. The other way that I'm slowly working on getting to is, um, I'm training to become a mental health counselor. Right. Because my experience is one thing, right? But I really wanted to learn how to help people navigate kind of the process of adjusting to these kinds of conditions and circumstances. And so I hopefully will be done soon with my, uh, master's in counseling program. And then I will start my journey as a practitioner, right? Not only using my personal experience, but using this professional training to help guide people in the direction that they're wanting to go.
00:04:18 Niharika: I really appreciate you for sharing that. You are an inspiration. And that shifts the whole thing Because awareness is a willingness to be with what is, rather than a promise that everybody will suddenly feel better. It's almost more honest, more grounded than the fantasy of. And it's so true.
00:04:49 Cheyenne Heflin: Mhm. Absolutely. I think I used to have a hard time because I thought, like, I should just be better. You know, one hundred percent better. Like once I got out of treatment and stuff, it was like, okay, I should be good now. The answer to that is no. It took me a while to realize that for myself. But no, these kinds of things linger with you. They don't really go away, per se. You learn how to accept them as part of your life and not let them control your life. Moving forward, I think, is the real truth that I learned, and I'm hoping to help other people learn as time goes on.
00:05:33 Niharika: And when you look at the people you work with, what do you notice as the deeper patterns or causes that keep them asleep to themselves, that keep them from recognizing their own truth?
00:05:56 Cheyenne Heflin: I think at least here, right in like the states and stuff, because that's where I am and I'm sure other places too. We have this idea that we need to be able to do everything by ourselves, like independently, like we shouldn't need to ask for help. And this is something that, again, I also really struggled with. I was very hyper independent as a, as a child, as a early teenager or young adult. I thought, you know, if I couldn't handle it on my own, I just wasn't trying hard enough. And I think it's what keeps a lot of people from going to therapy in the first place, is they think they shouldn't need someone else to guide them through what they're dealing with. But the reality is that sometimes what you're going through is too much for one person to handle. And I say this all the time because of everything I've been through, if I didn't have my family around, like despite me being hyper independent, if I didn't have my family, I do not know what I would have done. That support system carried me through everything that I've been through as a young person. And it took me a while to understand just how powerful that was. But now, when I'm dealing with kids, adults doesn't even matter. One of the first things I talk about is you're not weak for wanting to come get help from me. That that's not weakness. If anything. You are strong for recognizing that you need help to get to a place where you can handle it yourself again. And that's really the truth, right? It's we're not saying we need help literally for the rest of our lives. We're saying that we need someone to kind of help us through this section to get us to a point where we can stand on our own two feet again. And I think a lot of times we forget or ignore that for the sake of like seeming independent and strong, when really all you're doing is just hiding your, your pain and your, your struggle so no one else can see it.
00:08:13 Niharika: I think that's how we've been taught conditioned. Having it all figured out is, is the only positive thing. And that uncertainty We were not aware until we get to experience that and as it is out of our comfort zone, obviously there is some sort of resistance or friction to what you said is so needful. And I would say, because there's something profound in recognizing that the differences we sort of bring to survive are the same ones that keep us from truly experiencing life, like truly living. Mhm. Like it's like the walls that once protected us become the prison we need to step out of.
00:09:12 Cheyenne Heflin: Mhm.
00:09:13 Niharika: What you said.
00:09:14 Cheyenne Heflin: Mhm. Absolutely. I, I love talking about the idea of like, uh, especially like trauma responses and stuff, because that's where I come from personally. right? And it's not just trauma. It's all kinds of stuff that we learn that keeps us from truly like living and experiencing our lives. The hyper independence is one, right? If you feel like you need to do everything, you're not going to take time to actually like, be present and enjoy life as it is. Same thing with a lot of trauma and anxiety and stuff. Like the way you learned to cope with it may not be the way that allows you to live. You're surviving your day to day. That's true. But survival is not living. There are two entirely different states of being, and it's taken me. How many years has it been now? Over ten years of work, basically on and off, to get to a point where I feel like, okay, I am living my life now, not just surviving one day to the next. And I think it's important to recognize that because it's not an easy thing to do, to learn how to actually be like a present human being again. And I think exactly, a lot of people feel vulnerable and uncomfortable trying to do that because they're so used to dealing with things the way they have. But once you can, you start to realize just how much you've been missing and like how much more joyful your day to day is, even when stuff is bad, because you're able to go from that bad moment and be present for the good things that come after instead of just being stuck. And I think it's a really beautiful thing that is.
00:11:04 Niharika: Very true. And once they start noticing those signs, what's a simple way to begin responding to them without overwhelming themselves?
00:11:22 Cheyenne Heflin: That's a good one. I think it's going to sound really silly, but, um, the way I kind of started, right. If we're talking about like adjusting back to Italy, I started by kind of reconnecting with myself a little bit, finding the things that maybe I had put off to the side or wasn't doing as much because I thought I didn't have time. Uh, for me, that was a lot of my hobbies, right? I, I would find no energy for my stuff that makes me, me because I was so focused on just trying to get through the day to day. And then I started working to reintegrate stuff just a little bit at a time, like thirty minutes, ten minutes, whatever amount of minutes you can manage. Uh, a good one for me is reading. I fell out of reading for a long time because I was so stressed by school and everything else that I just couldn't. I couldn't find the energy for it. And that was crazy to me because as a kid I was devouring books that was like my personality, and then it was just suddenly not a part of my life anymore. And so I started like even just five minutes. I would pick up a book literally for just five minutes. And I felt the joy it brought me to even read just like a couple pages of a book. And I realized how much I missed that. And it led me to doing it a little more and a little more. And then suddenly I realized like, oh, this is something I actually care about, is part of me and I really want to include in my life. And once you kind of start that loop, you start realizing other stuff you might have left out or other stuff you want to do. And I think it kind of helps pull you out of that survival mode a little bit, because you have to be present to do those kinds of things, right. I have to be present. If I want to write. I have to be present if I want to read. And so these are kind of things that require you to be present without you actually having to think too hard about the idea of being present. And then if that works for you, you can always do the, the really uncomfortable thing and just sit still for five minutes and not do anything and just and just focus on what's going on around you. That's like the super, if you want to just hobbies are the kiddie pool. If you're a person who's like, I just want to get in there. I'm sure people have seen the trend on TikTok where people were like, I'm going to sit and be bored for like thirty minutes. That's a way to be present, too. It's, it's definitely a more extreme way, but focusing on kind of what's going on around you. How are you feeling? Like, what's the air feel like all these little things that you might not be noticing in your day to day. Paying specific attention to them. It starts out being difficult. If you practice enough. Suddenly you're going to find yourself. One day it's going to be as natural as breathing. And that goes for the hobbies thing too. A lot of being present really is practicing being present until that's just your default.
00:14:49 Niharika: Yeah. I myself have experienced how relieving it is because rather than performing, we tend to live and we be ourselves. But that eases off so much from that. It's. Like I feel it's remarkable how the body knows before the mind catches up and that restlessness, that subtle discomfort we feel it's not a problem to fix, but it's an invitation to listen more closely.
00:15:31 Cheyenne Heflin: Absolutely. Absolutely. It is a skill that I've had to work on very hard. I was not naturally attuned to my body in the slightest, but once I started practicing a lot of the times, now I can catch all my feelings before I even like, like you said, am consciously aware they're happening. I can feel my heart start to race and I'm like, oh, I must be anxious about something. Let's think about that for a little bit and see what's going on. Or and it's so much more than just like, oh, I'm anxious, oh, I'm depressed. Like our bodies are the way they are for a reason. They are connected all across the board. I mean, you get a stomach ache because your, your brain's messed up. Like, you know, it, it I could go on a whole rant about how the human body is cool and like, there's so much we can learn from it, but exactly like practicing being present means we're going to start getting those messages more and be able to like, understand ourselves and how we're responding way more effectively than if we just waited for thoughts to pop into our head.
00:16:42 Niharika: So. When someone is ready to move forward towards that, toward a more awakened way of being, what's one approach or practice you recommend that helps them stay connected to their inner truth or inner self?
00:17:09 Cheyenne Heflin: I have a couple and it depends on the type of person you are, because I know everybody's a little different. The first one that everybody always recommends, but it is very sound is meditation, right? That's a very classic. You want to connect a bit more and be more present meditating. But not everybody likes meditation and I totally understand that. For me personally, I can do meditation. It's not my personal favorite. I journal and I feel like people hear journaling and they're like, oh, I have to treat it as this super serious thing. And like, no, no, my journal is literally like full of scraps of colorful paper. And I just write about whatever is in my, in my noggin at that point in time. Sometimes it's not even anything super serious. Sometimes I'm just like, I saw this funny meme today, right? And it made me feel blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But the, the point is you are actively noticing what is going on during your day, actively noticing how you're feeling about it. And I think writing it out makes it feel a little more tangible, a little less abstract than just sitting there and going, okay, how am I feeling right now? And so I would I would highly recommend anybody. Like all you literally need is a piece of paper and something to write with and just start letting the words flow. Doesn't matter what you're writing about, you are actively engaging in noticing what's going on inside of yourself. And that is an important thing to practice.
00:18:49 Niharika: That makes sense. And so. Excuse me.
00:18:58 Cheyenne Heflin: Oh you're good.
00:18:58 Niharika: So you're saying it's not about carving out all of sidings. Sorry for that. So but it's it's about finding those micro moments of return, like those small choices to come back to Even in the middle of all the chaos and the noise, that's what that is accessible. Like real. That makes sense.
00:19:35 Cheyenne Heflin: Exactly.
00:19:38 Niharika: And Shane, thank you so much for sharing so openly today and joining us. Thank you so much for that. And if listeners want to continue this conversation with you or learn more about your work, which is the best place to find you?
00:19:54 Cheyenne Heflin: Best place to find me is you can either go on Instagram or TikTok. I have the same handle for both. It's at resilient underscore a k a, and I keep all my stuff there. And then there's links to my website and all that stuff through through both those profiles. So easiest place to find me.
00:20:14 Niharika: Thank you for sharing that. And thanks again for joining us for sharing and listeners. As you move back into your day, carry this with you. The small moments of noticing the quiet invitations from your own consciousness. They matter more than you think. A weakening happens not in the grand gestures, but in the willingness to be present in one more breath, one more choice, and one more honest look at who you really are. Until next time, stay awake to your sleeplessness.
