Well I didn't plan to be gone for as long as I did, but I'm back, baby! In this episode, I’m sharing what happened during my unintentional one-year hiatus from the podcast - what I’ve been building, what I’ve been navigating, and the moment that woke me up.

We Explore:

1. My unintentional 1-year break from the podcast
2. What I've been up to behind the scenes
3. The panic attack that sent me back to therapy
4. How self-abandonment can look subtle and high-functioning
5. What self-abandonment actually is...and why so many of us do it
6. The signs you might be abandoning yourself without realizing it
7. Ways you can begin to come back to yourself

If you’ve ever been physically present but emotionally disconnected…if you’ve ever pushed through instead of paused…if you’ve ever said "yes" when you really wanted to say "no"...this one is for you.

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Please subscribe, rate, and review to help the show grow! Don’t forget to share this episode to your IG stories and follow me for updates (@iamallyrodgers).

CONNECT WITH ME ON IG & TIKTOK:

@iamallyrodgers, @mandmtherapy

Welcome to the Co Creative podcast.

I'm your host, Ali Rogers, entrepreneur, music psychotherapist, singer, songwriter and healer.

I truly believe we all have the power to co create the life of our dreams.

And I'm excited to share how creativity, personal development, and spirituality can help you get there.

Each week I'll share stories, practical tools, and insights to help you tap into your own creativity and live more intentionally.

Whether you're looking to spark new ideas, find deeper meaning, or simply bring more

joy and passion into your life.

So let's dive in and co create.

Hello, co creatives.

Oh, it has been a hot minute

since I've said that.

And I've missed saying that.

And I've missed you.

Let me tell you, I was not

anticipating taking over a year off from the podcast.

That was not the plan.

I know in our last episode, I had said, hey, it's gonna be the holidays and I'll have some extra episodes.

La la la.

And then not even a few days later, I got incredibly sick.

It was right around Thanksgiving.

We had family in town.

And then I just never got better.

It was a month of me being sick.

Then as soon as Christmas was over, I moved into a bum, bum, bum, bum, brand new office space.

And that was a journey in of itself.

That, that was the first week of January last year.

So it's been a little over a year since I've been in the space and I'm loving it.

But that first couple weeks, I remember, I. I picked up the keys the first day and I walked in the space.

I was so excited.

And then Brian and I looked around and we painted the whole space ourselves.

You know, we've put in all the furniture and all the things.

And I remember before we started painting, I looked at Brian and I was like, did I just make the biggest mistake of my life?

It's the biggest investment I've ever made in my business.

And looking back on it now, it truly has been the best decision I've ever made for my company.

But at that point, it just felt so overwhelming.

And like I said, we were putting together the office all by ourselves and I had, I think, three days to turn around and then see clients.

So it has been a slow decorating process.

Moving in process.

I'm still kind of figuring out the flow of the space and.

But it, it feels so good to be here.

I'm recording here.

That's what I always wanted.

I'm in my purple office and I have a brand new, like, mic set up.

I'm gonna start videoing the Podcast.

So that was always the vision.

And it's crazy that it's already been a little over a year, and I want to cry thinking about it sitting here recording this now.

So, yeah, we.

I moved into the office, and that was a really.

From being sick and then being out of town for the holidays and moving into the office and spending a lot of money, you know, making sure that that went the way that it needed to.

I'm not gonna lie.

It brought some incredible changes for me, for us, and at the same time, it really tested me in ways I've never experienced.

I think I. I cried more last year than I had in my almost 34 years of life.

I'm really grateful for it, though, because it really taught me a lot about myself and what I'm capable of, and it strengthened my trust and my faith, and I wouldn't change it for the world.

But, man, it was tough.

Kind of back to the.

The timeline.

So we.

I moved into the office space in January and then started kind of getting used to, you know, what is it like to lead sessions in this new space.

It definitely forced me to put myself out there more.

I made.

I made a goal for the two of us because I don't know if I've shared on here before.

Brian is also a business owner.

I made a goal for the two of us to put ourselves out there more, to make new friends, to just get into the community.

And I invited him to join me in networking.

I knew I wanted to make some professional connections to kind of form my elevator pitch a little better and just let people know, hey, I'm in Brentwood now.

So we started going to those, and that was a total game changer.

It really taught me how to speak about what I do.

It led me to meeting people that honestly changed the course of last year.

It allowed me to bring in some incredible clients.

So that kept me pretty busy up until, like, early February and I left to go to London for the second part of my vocal psychotherapy training.

And while I was in that experiential week of training, I had a moment in an experience that really activated me and showed me where certain emotions were being ignored and that they brought up a lot of anxiety.

And I wound up having a panic attack in the middle of the experience and having to excuse myself and had support from our trainers to bring me back, calm me down.

But I Was anxious pretty much the rest of that week.

And literally on the bus ride to Heathrow airport to come home, I said, you know what?

This is not how I want to live my life.

There's a lot here that I haven't worked on and I think this is the year that I need to do that.

And so I searched up somatic therapists, found my incredible therapist, and, and started a new therapy journey.

And it showed me a lot where I was not sitting with myself.

I was really ignoring my needs.

I didn't know how to tell her what I needed.

I didn't.

And it made me realize I didn't know how to ask for what I need from really anyone, including myself.

And it led me to realize where I was not making myself a priority and hadn't been pretty much my whole life and taught me a good lesson on where I was self abandoning.

And so that's kind of what I, what I wanted to talk about today.

Those of you who are like, well, self abandonment, what is she talking about?

From my experience, for example, I could tune into everyone else's needs in a room.

And I know that that's what makes me an excellent therapist.

Like, I can tune into someone and get a sense for how they're feeling, or I'm very attuned with other people.

But that has kept me from acknowledging how it's impacting me.

It's kept me from really stopping and pausing to check in on what I need in a moment.

And, and I used to think, oh, I'm so low maintenance, you know, I'm easygoing, don't worry about me.

But that's people pleasing.

And, and instead of just saying, I don't like that, I don't want that.

I'm feeling sad, I'm feeling anxious, I was ignoring all of that.

And that's not helpful for anyone.

You know, I would say yes when I really wanted to say no.

I wouldn't pause to actually see if it was something that I was truly wanting to do.

So that's a, that's a little bit about what I mean by self abandoning.

I do want to clarify, though, that when I talk about prioritizing yourself, prioritizing yourself is not selfish.

And I think that's where a lot of us, especially those of us who are lean a little on the people pleaser side, asking for what we want, voicing our boundaries, checking in with ourselves before we make a decision, we've been made to feel that that's selfish and it's not.

It actually helps everyone involved.

So it is not selfish.

I want to just say that right off the bat.

I also want to clarify that prioritizing yourself does not mean cutting everyone off just because they cross a boundary or, you know, cutting everyone off to protect your energy.

That is not what we're doing here.

We don't want to just cut off people just because.

Right.

It's also not becoming so rigid that you're not showing up for important people in your life.

So when we're on this path, sometimes we can, like, swing too far in the other direction and become so rigid that then we're just canceling on people all the time to protect ourselves or to prioritize ourselves.

But how does that then impact your relationships?

So those are some things I want to say right off the bat about prioritizing yourself.

So what prioritizing yourself actually is.

Is turning inward, checking in with yourself, giving yourself space.

So what I've really learned and has been incredibly helpful is pausing before you respond, letting someone else know, hey, I like that idea, but I need.

Just give me 24 hours before I give you an answer.

Because what I used to do is be like, yeah, that's an excellent idea.

Let's do it.

And then two hours later, I'm going, oh, no.

I don't know if I actually have the capacity to do that right now, but I've already given my word that I'm going to do it.

So it's pausing before you respond, and it's turning inward.

It's giving yourself space to say, what is my calendar look like?

What does my schedule look like right now?

What season of life am I in?

Did I just have a baby?

Did I just move into a new space?

Did I just start a new project?

Have I been feeling more tired lately?

Have I changed things in my health routine or in my diet?

Like, what is my current capacity?

And letting people know that from the beginning.

I think that's something that I've learned this year, is that especially as I was learning how to prioritize myself, I was realizing where I hadn't communicated clearly.

And when I was having to, like, go back and almost backtrack and let someone know where I was coming from, then it actually created more problems than it probably would have if I had just communicated from the start.

So it's allowing yourself space to check your capacity and be able to communicate that clearly.

It's also honoring your body and what you know, your habits to be like when you work best.

Like, for me, I've learned that I have a lot of creative energy and capacity earlier in the day.

And so I want to do more things like creating podcast episodes or content or songs, or like prepping for the day.

I've learned that about the way that my body functions best and recognizing where I need to move more or eat more and like really just sitting with myself more throughout the day to say, you know, actually I'm feeling kind of tired.

Maybe I need to take a 15 minute break to just lay down for a minute instead of sending these emails.

Or I'm actually feeling a lot more hungry today.

Let me pack a couple more snacks so that I make sure that I have what I need.

And then finally, like, prioritizing is also making aligned decisions.

So knowing more about what you believe, what you value, what you want to do, or where you want to spend your time, does it align with who you are right now?

And it doesn't mean that you can't change your mind.

One of my good friends, she always uses this phrase, choose to choose again.

And it's given me a lot of ease knowing that I have the power, I have the ability to change my mind and to choose again.

So if an aligned decision feels really good right now, but six months from now it doesn't, then that just means that you're aligned to a different direction.

But it's really important to again give yourself the space to know, is this for me or is this for someone else?

So I'm wondering how you're feeling hearing all of this.

Is this resonating with you at all?

Like patterns, things that you've noticed in yourself?

And I know a lot of you might be wondering, especially those of you who are like, yeah, this sounds like me, and wondering why, why we don't prioritize ourselves, why we self abandon.

And I know in my experience it's been a fear of disappointing or hurting people.

It's been people pleasing.

Like just old habits from growing up, like just wanting everyone to, to feel good and to make sure that we're not rocking the boat in any way for other people, it might be like a fear of being too much or asking too much, like putting people out, being a burden.

It might also be a fear of people leaving.

Like if I prioritize myself or I tell someone, hey, that makes me feel sad or, hey, you know, I don't have the capacity right now, but talk to me in two weeks.

Like, will I lose an opportunity if I do that right?

So we just, we're always kind of putting ourselves last.

I know I've shared a few examples of How I have self abandoned or like not prioritized myself.

But I want to give you some things to consider, see if this resonates with you at all.

So you say yes before you check your calendar.

You feel resentment, but maybe it also just kind of feels like being overly tired.

You over explain yourself.

Like when you set a boundary and then you give a dissertation on why you're setting your boundary instead of just saying, I can't do that right now, but thank you for asking.

You feel physically there, but you're just emotionally checked out.

You don't know what you want.

You don't know how to ask for what you want.

That was the biggest sign for me.

My therapist looked at me and was like, what do you need?

And I was like, wait, what?

What do you mean what do I need?

What do I need?

I have no idea.

I know I've given a lot of information, but I want you to just think about pausing before you respond, asking if this is something that I really want.

Asking for what you want.

Charging what you're worth.

If you're a business owner choosing to leave something a little early, if you're really tired and you've, you've kind of stretched yourself thin and not feeling bad about needing to excuse yourself to take care of your body.

Protecting your creative time.

How many times have you set aside a creative project and said, I'll get to it later, like I have 50 other things that I need to do that come first.

But you really, really want to do that thing.

Make sure that you do that thing.

It's so important.

I know I've done it where I want to sit down to write a song or work on a creative project.

And I'm like, no, no, you know, I've got to work on these emails these people are waiting on, on these quotes from me or whatever.

Like, no, do your creative thing.

They can wait.

It's not an emergency.

Wear the outfit that you want to wear.

Take the class that you want to take.

Like, where are you not prioritizing your joy?

I think that's a big thing that I'd like to continue talking about is joy.

And where we make excuses to not participate in our joy because again, it comes back to this.

Like it's too much.

It.

I'm not good enough at it.

It's going to take away from these other things that I've committed to.

You should prioritize your joy.

And then finally like saying, let me get back to you.

I like this idea, but give me, give me 48 hours.

I want to sit on this.

I want to think about it again.

It's normally not an emergency.

I know for me, sometimes things feel like I have to urgently respond to a text or urgently respond to an email, but it's, it's not an emergency.

So it's okay to take your time with it.

So I want you to really consider where, where are you abandoning yourself?

Where have you not made yourself a priority?

And what would prioritizing yourself look like this week?

Right, because this is a, this is going to be a change.

I know for me.

I'm still working on it and I've been working on it for a year now and I, I've been better at catching myself.

And that's, that's.

Usually the first step is like you're catching yourself.

You're starting to make those slow changes in real time.

So if this feels like it's gonna be a slow road, it's okay.

But if you could prioritize yourself this week, what would that look like?

And then lastly, if joy were enough of a reason, what would you choose to prioritize joy for yourself?

I think that's a good start to this conversation.

I'm sure it'll be something that I will continue to share here and there, but I am curious to hear your thoughts, your questions, your feedback, any takeaways from this episode?

Again, I am just so thrilled to be back at the mic.

I can't wait to get this on camera and up in other spaces.

And I'm back, baby.

In the spirit of asking for what you need, I'm going to ask you for something that I need.

If you found this to be helpful, please give this a five star rating and review.

Share it with someone you think it might help.

The more that we share it and rate it, the more people get to hear it and we get to help.

So that is what I need from you this week.

If you feel so inclined.

I guess I'll see you on the next episode.

Feel free to share your thoughts and I'll.

I'll see you soon.

Bye.