Nadine Dyer (00:00)
Welcome back sister and friend. We are so so happy you're here. If you caught our last episode I am back in the studio today with miss Erica Tomasik. If you remember her story, we talked about her burnout how she went from burnout to free burned out to free or overwhelmed to empowered and even gave us some like practical examples. She's a mom. She's a wife. She's a business owner running a coaching business called Unbound & Free.

And we're back today to talk about from overwhelmed to empowered, but practical applications. Like how do you take this information and actually apply it to your life? And so welcome back, Erica. Thank you for being here again. And let's dive into the content.

Erica Tomasik (00:48)
Yes!

Nadine Dyer (00:49)
All right, so let's talk about some practical applications. Like you are a coach, you're a speaker, you're a facilitator. How do you walk women who are overwhelmed to their freedom, to their empowerment? Like, how do we start? Where do we start?

Erica Tomasik (01:07)
Yeah, so for everyone, it's different, but the first thing that I really help women do is to understand where they're at. Like, example, women might say like, well, I just can't advance in my career. I just get to this place where my life is too much, or I've just got so many things going. And so to really pause

and to allow them to share like where are they currently at and what do they really desire? For us as women for so long, it's been like, I mean, even generations past, it's like we just get things done. We take care of the home. We take care of children. Or if we're not married, we definitely still have a role in our family where we are like the caretakers caring for elderly parents. And it is the thing of you don't have needs. You don't have desires. You are just here to keep the ship

Nadine Dyer (01:52)
Yeah.

Erica Tomasik (02:05)
moving. We don't, a common phrase I hear all the time. I used to say it all the time is we don't have time for this. We just have to keep going. And someone once said to me, they're like going where? Where are you like going off the edge of the earth? Like, where do you think you're going? Like, and women will say, I just don't have time for this. I don't have time to stop. Like, because why? What will happen if we stop? And so to understand where they're currently at and, and truly what they desire.

And for so many of us, we don't even know. I'm like, what are your dreams? What lights you up in life? What do you love? Like, what are you doing here on this earth? And they're like, ⁓ make money, take care of my family, and like, just get everyone safely in bed at night. I'm like, really? Like at the end of your life, that is what you're gonna be so glad that you did? No, God made you for so much more. And I had so many people do this for me, is to help me dream again, and to help me know

where my current reality is, because we're not getting it from this culture. It is like start to listen as you talk to other people, even in a basic interaction of like, hey, how are you? Hey, how are you? How are you doing? ⁓ I'm doing fine, which fine's always a curious word for me. I'm doing fine. Or my favorite one is, just staying busy. I'm like, I asked you how you were, which is like a deep internal state of your emotion, and your phrase is just,

Nadine Dyer (03:18)
I'm fine, everything's fine.

Mm.

Hmm.

Erica Tomasik (03:32)
keeping busy. I'm like, we could just study the word just and then keeping busy. People ask me all the time. They're like, how are your kids doing? Are they keeping busy this summer? And I'm like, do I want them keeping busy? We were really busy. I used to be busy in my life was super chaotic. And so my point in saying that is the world around us is not going to ask how you truly are. And even if you are, you're like, I am a complete mess.

And I'm falling apart and I'm so overwhelmed, you know what you're gonna hear? Me too, we just have to keep going. This is how it is. And so for you to take space for yourself with you in a journal or you and a friend or you and a counselor, therapist, coach, pastor, whoever, to like really know how you're doing and that it's okay and that it's also our whole culture is dysregulated and that's not normal. And so to know that how you're feeling is okay and it shouldn't just be, you know, made better with

Nadine Dyer (04:05)
Mm-hmm.

Erica Tomasik (04:30)
scrolling and eating and drinking and overworking. And then to then the next thing we do it then is really to know like what do you want in life and that is so hard for women that was so hard for me. My answer to this question a decade ago was for my husband to be happy. 100 % that was my answer because I my dreamer had died. I didn't know that I could have dreams. I thought I'm going to do a great job at all these things in life

and be a good mom and be a good wife and do a job helping our family, make money, save money, whatever. But I didn't know it was safe to dream things. I thought that was super selfish, honestly. Women who got massages and did all these self-care things, I thought they were the most self-focused, non-caring people in the world. And so that's really the baseline of like...

current reality and then getting to learn how to dream and desire again and I believe that's 100 % connected into our God-given desires that God gave us.

Nadine Dyer (05:34)
There was just like, felt like I was drinking from a fire hose. There was just so much. So I'm like trying to take notes of all the things you're saying, because I want to be able to go ladies X, Y, Z, right? Like I want to like baby step out of us. But there was so much goodness there. And I almost want to like clarify something. I'm curious to ask you this. Like when you are talking about the first step, which is like getting honest with where you are, identifying.

How are you really feeling? Like, what is really going on in me? Am I looking for the pain point because that will help me figure out what I want or not necessarily?

Erica Tomasik (06:16)
Yeah, I mean, I guess when I'm working with women and even in myself, usually pain is our first motivator. Desire was the best motivator, but usually we're first. So I still have a health coaching business, but my first coaching aid was health coaching. Pain always motivates us. So yeah, I would just say, what are you feeling inside of you? Where are you currently at? So yeah, it typically is a pain because...

Nadine Dyer (06:23)
Okay.

Yeah.

Erica Tomasik (06:43)
Most women who aren't in pain, but they're doing really well are probably already doing a lot of this work. So yeah, I would say it's like really identifying where are you at? Where are your longings? Where ⁓

Nadine Dyer (06:54)
Yeah,

Where are you not satisfied, right? Because there are certain areas of my life where I'm just flowing, things are cranking, things are good. And then there are pain points in my life. That's probably where I need to get real honest. That's probably where I need to do the work.

Erica Tomasik (07:08)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, and too, I would be curious Nadine of like when things are going well and clicking along, like to really sit in that and be like, because there's so much information there for the areas that aren't going well. What is an alignment there? What's flowing? How do I feel in my body? Okay, feel this in my body here. How can I get it over here?  You know, there's just, there's so much about our bodies. That's another thing we, you know, we might get into, but learning to feel it because

Nadine Dyer (07:20)
Hmm.

Yep. Yep.

Erica Tomasik (07:40)
we only engage, especially in the Christian world, our heads. We're so theological. We just have all these thoughts and everything below our neck, even our face, we just shame the heck out of it. We just are super cruel, super mean.

Nadine Dyer (07:50)
Hmm. This makes me so

sad even just like it's true, but it's sad. Because God calls us masterpiece.

Erica Tomasik (07:55)
Yeah. It's so sad and

Totally and a quick piece of neuroscience is that we have this thing called a vagus nerve and it literally touches like so many parts every organ so many parts of us it's like an information superhighway And 80 % of that messaging is going body to brain that means only 20 % is going brain to body so if we only are up in our heads all the time and we're not sensing what we feel in our bodies then we're missing so much of what God meant for us to listen to and but it takes work

When I do this with women, they're like, I have a body. They're like, I feel nothing. I'm like, no worries. You noticed you had a body and you were gonna listen to it. Step one, You have a body.

Nadine Dyer (08:37)
Good stuff. First step one, you have a body. That's

Good. Ah it's interesting. It reminds me of when I was probably in my 20s. I want to say like mid 20s. I had a mentor and her first assignment for me was every day. And it was so annoying to me at first. I had to text her how I was feeling every day. Because she realized that I was so out of tune with myself. Like I was so consumed with

everything and everyone else and people pleasing and relationships and everything that didn't matter. And she's like step one every day every day I had to text her for almost I want to say it was almost a year. But it taught me to pause and go how am I feeling? What is happening here? And that was pretty powerful. So I love to like pause pay attention

Erica Tomasik (09:18)
amazing.

Yeah. So powerful.

Nadine Dyer (09:33)
Check in with your emotions, check in with your body, check in with what's working, check in with what's not. Why are you so busy? What's the real why behind it? You like all this like, ⁓ you said something that I just have to point out and you didn't say it in these words, but this is what I wrote. Busy is not always blessed. Like I love that statement, you know? You said it in so many words, but it's like, I have to remember that. Like just because I'm busy, doesn't mean I'm blessed.

In fact, it probably is clogging my blessings.

Erica Tomasik (10:06)
Yeah, I mean, I love it is so hard for me because I hear it all the time. They're like, you guys keeping busy, your kids keeping busy. And I'm like, Erica, this is not a coaching session. And I'm like, actually, look, this person is not asking you for deep level, like, you know, diving in. So because yeah. And I used to be that person. How are you doing? I'm so busy. And I expected everyone to be like, my gosh, Erica is so amazing because she's so busy. And I.

Nadine Dyer (10:14)
Deep breaths, deep breaths.

Yeah, just answer the question.

Yep. It's almost

Like we hang our hat on it. Like a badge of honor.

Erica Tomasik (10:37)
Totally. Yeah.

And then we have our kids step into it. And now our kids are so full of anxiety. They're so stressed out because we're making them like little adults from a tiny age and we constantly keep them going. So yeah, I have lots of thoughts on busy only and I can only come from this place because it totally was me and I have to constantly work at it like weekly really. Yeah.

Nadine Dyer (10:42)
Ugh.

Yeah.

Yeah,

Me too. And this is such a good reminder. And you said something else that I loved so much that I had to point out, and that is self-care is not selfish. And again, I don't know if you said it in those exact words, but like, self-care is not selfish. And I just thought that was a good call out. So I'm kind of hearing like one major theme of pause, listen.

be honest, get to the why, get to the root, get, you know, all of that. But then I heard this other theme of practical application of what do you want? And like this permission to dream again. And, ⁓ you know, at the end of your life, I do this exercise once a year and I, some people might think it's morbid, but I, it helps me. And that is at the end of my life, on my deathbed, what do I want to be able to look back and say?

Erica Tomasik (11:38)
Yeah.

Nadine Dyer (11:56)
And is what I'm doing in alignment with that? And it's like, what am I here for? What's the purpose? Because it can't just be this day-to-day check the to-do list thing. But it can be dreaming without reality. It's like this both. But then what? OK, so I get honest.

Erica Tomasik (12:09)
Yeah, totally.

Nadine Dyer (12:18)
And I don't sometimes I don't want to get honest so there are certain areas of my life I just kind of want to like just keep ignoring and hope they go away but they won't and they just keep getting uglier. So, okay, I gotta get honest and then I can dream but help me with the middle give me some practical applications.

Erica Tomasik (12:32)
Yes. Yeah.

I love the middle because I spent so much of my own life there. It's the best.  It's so painful.  Yeah. Tell me more. You know what? The one thing when we as we talk about the middle, the first woman that I ever worked with, she told me every time I came and left, she said, Erica, great things are happening.

Nadine Dyer (12:44)
Okay, if you say so.

Erica Tomasik (13:00)
Great things are happening and they always are. Great things are always happening. God is here with us, great things are always happening. We just have to have a mind to see it. And that's not like we have to be super happy in Pollyanna, but like we can, know, like we're going through some hard things in our life right now personally. And I, my husband and I were like, great things are happening. We know it. And this situation is going to be a great thing. And so keeps our mind there. So to this messy middle, it's different for everyone, but

now when we know what we desire, and your desire might be like, like you said Nadine, like I'm thriving in so many areas, and for many women it's like that. But like my health is falling apart, or my marriage is not where I want it to be, or my kids hate me, or know, XYZ, whatever it is. Is then to look at and to see like what is holding me back in this place? And for so many of us, what I find is it is things that we are believing or have been taught from a really young age.

Mostly it's probably before the age when I work with my own self and my clients before the age of like seven to nine years old. And and and some of us and this has been my hard thing is... We think well, I didn't have those like big t traumas, know, like in the therapy world they talk about big t little t in the semantic neuroscience world that I'm more operated we don't use those exact words, but it's similar. And we think I wasn't raped, I wasn't molested like for me I have amazing parents all these things.

Nadine Dyer (14:03)
Yeah.

Erica Tomasik (14:25)
Why am I struggling so much? And to be able to know, like, all of us, even as parents now, we struggle, we've messed up, the world is hard. Like, there are beliefs and things that we've taken on that our body took on to help us. One, I mean, just very simple things that we can all agree on, or not agree on, but have all heard. When it rains, it pours. How many times have you heard that? Well, you know, if you have something hard happen, Nadine, and someone might say to you, well, when it rains, it pours. And it's like,

does it? When it rains, you'll have to pour. Or one that I hear all the time is, well, just be ready because the other shoe might drop or is probably going to drop. These are just tiny examples of little things that affect our brains. Or we are told, like maybe if you don't have a lot of money growing up, but all these other people in town, especially the ones who gave all the money and supported the church, they had a lot of money. Well, those people

Nadine Dyer (14:56)
I renounced that lie.

Erica Tomasik (15:24)
and us and all a sudden there's a divide. Those people, they can give a lot of money to the church and this is so hard with money. Money isn't bad, know, money is bad. We often hear or get it misconstrued, even though money's not bad, it's the love of money that's bad. Money is bad, but these people over here, they make a lot of money and somehow they're good because we need it for the church. But we're over here, we're these people and so we can't ever make this money. And all of sudden as a seven year old, you're like, okay, I'm these people, they're those people, I should want to be those people.

So it can even be these small things. It can be something as much as something someone said to you in the health coaching world. So many women I work with as young children, they were told by a grandpa and uncle, someone that they're fluffy or chubby, or they shouldn't be wearing that shirt. Or it's like the smallest comment, but it impacts their entire life. And now they believe. And so what happens is this informs our belief. We now believe we are fluffy.

We now believe, you know, our uncle told us we had a big butt, he was being funny. And so that is the next work I believe is to really dive into the deep parts of us and what are our beliefs? What are we truly struggling with that's holding us back? Because we can go and change like the outer parts of our life and maybe we need to, maybe you need to quit your job. Maybe you need to do something in your life drastically. Maybe you need to get rid of all the Oreos and Twinkies in your pantry that aren't serving you, get some healthier foods.

But there's a reason you keep going to the pantry for the Oreos. it's an addictive, Oreos are addictive. It's a true nature. But not everyone's, yeah, they're delicious, but not everyone's addicted to them. And so there's something deeper that's causing us and that deeper, that is such my passion that I love helping people with. And this is the work I think people don't do. They get rid of the Oreos. They don't go to figure out why they can't. Yeah, totally. Yeah.

Nadine Dyer (16:57)
They're a douish.

I know.

I love the great things are always happening. It reminds me of like God makes all things work together for the good of those who love Him. Like even the ugliest of uglies, God still like knits it together, right? To make something so very beautiful. I'm gonna walk away, I don't wanna grab this cross, you know. It's probably not even gonna end up on video, but I got this as a gift and I just think it's so beautiful. And it's this like, it's out of broken glass.

Erica Tomasik (17:26)
Yes.

Yes.

Nadine Dyer (17:47)
And

It's like you can take the brokenness and make it into something so beautiful. And that's what God is doing in our brokenness. So even through the hard, beauty is like forming, right? So I love that reminder.  I love kind of like the way you're helping talk about this messy middle, right? So there's like the truth of where I am. There's the dream of where I want to be. And then there's the messy middle. What do I do with that? And what I'm hearing you say is it's heart work.

It's what is keeping me stuck? What is the old stuff that I'm still carrying? What are the old tapes that I'm listening to? It's like digging in and like opening up these doors that have been closed in my heart, like looking through the window, you know, like it's heart work. And you said something else and it made me write down, if it's hysterical, it's historical. I heard that before and it's so true. Like if I have like a hysterical reaction to it,

that means it's historical. That means it's something from my childhood that I need to address. Gosh, there's just so much there, you know? So getting honest, getting to the dream, right? Being clear about the dream and then doing the work. Can you speak any more as we start to wrap up about like, how do we get there? Like, what does the work look like? What does the heart work really look like?

Erica Tomasik (19:10)
Yeah.

Yes. I, for each of us, I believe it's different based on how we process and how we do things. But the first thing is to bring it to the forefront and to honor it, to know like, I am not bad. I am not wrong. There are things that I believe, things that Satan so loves that we believe these things as they hold us back. And to bring them and to show grace and mercy and love, especially if it was a situation where you weren't shown grace, mercy and love. And to be

in the somatic and neuroscience world, it's to be that compassionate witness, to attune to the brokenness and the pain that you had, and to bring people in to attune to that, to bring yourself in, to ask God to come in. I mean, there's so many different healing modalities that can happen, even sitting and journaling, being on your own and allowing this to come out, and then to bring in truth. And so this is where the Bible comes in. This is where, and I'm not someone who's just like paste a Bible verse over it and be good.

But to bringing what is true and to begin to believe that. And then if it's really hard to believe that, I believe there's way deeper modalities and there's so many out there that you can pursue to really figure out, I know that this is a lie and this is what's holding me back. Like some women are like, I literally can't work out. I don't know why I can't figure it work out. I have all the gym memberships, everything, all the equipment and they come down as we piece it apart, they do not value themselves.

If you don't value yourself, you're not gonna find time to work out when you need to take your kids and do all these things. And so then figuring out, okay, if I don't value myself, where is that coming from? And so some of these things have a deeper hold and we need deeper help. And for some of us, it's just so illuminating to be like, my gosh, that was so helpful. Now, how do I see that play out in my life? One thing I use with my clients is listening to your body to really understand where do you feel that and what do you need? So you're feeling sad right now. That's why you're eating.

Nadine Dyer (21:02)
Mm-hmm.

Erica Tomasik (21:05)
We've come to that that took a long time Now go sit on the couch do something that's resourcing maybe listen to some music have a fuzzy blanket and really feel that feeling. What does it feel and what do you need? What I really need is I need to feel loved. Okay, how could you feel loved? So it's that process of finding out now like what do you, you now know the struggle the lie the whatever that you're believing. Now, what do you need and what healing what attunement needs to happen to give yourself that,

Nadine Dyer (21:17)
Good.

Erica Tomasik (21:34)
that grace, that love that you didn't have at that point. And then ask like, what do you need? I need to go like do a dance party. I need to move my body. I need some better community. My friends are not uplifting to me. And then like you said Nadine on the last podcast is surrounding yourself with people who are doing the same thing, who can hold space and attune and actually listen. It's the greatest gift we can give someone is to listen to them.

Nadine Dyer (21:37)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.  I love it. I call it my ABCs. This is something that I use because I have big T trauma, right? Being in war zone and all the things. And that's like, that's what it just reminded me of what you just said. And so maybe this will help you sister out there who's listening. Like the A is the awareness. Okay. So you have the awareness, right? What do I feel? The B is breathe. Just breathe. Like

And I love how you like attach that, what do I feel and what do I need? So maybe as I breathe, I can start asking myself, what do I need? What do I really need? And then the C is make the choice. It's like, I can choose what's old and what keeps me stuck. Or I can choose what I actually really need, which is I need to go for a walk or I need a cozy blanket or I need to call a friend or I need to cry or whatever. 

Erica Tomasik (22:42)
Hmm.

Nadine Dyer (22:58)
This has been so rich. have two pages of notes. Like I just need to review it and apply it to areas of my life. And, you know, as you listen, sister out there, just know that we're in this together. You know, we're all on a journey. None of us ever really arrive. You know, so I'm sitting here like acting like I know everything. I don't know anything. I just I'm a work in progress just like you. And we're in it. We're in it together. So reach out to community. We have that through purposeful living.

 Obviously, Erica is a phenomenal coach that's also available for you out there.  But just know that you are loved and you are worth it and you are valuable and your heart matters and you matter and your dreams matter and you have a purpose and we want to encourage you and invite you to step into that. that.

Anything you want to wrap up with Erica?

Erica Tomasik (23:55)
Anything I want to wrap up with? I just so want to encourage you that you are designed so perfectly and you are not a mess up. You are not a screw up.  And when you feel misaligned in this world, it's because we weren't created to live in this crazy hustle bustle and all the things around us. And so there's nothing wrong with you. And there's always healing. There's always an opportunity. There's always solutions because God is in it with us.

And so you are never stuck. It might feel like you are stuck, but you are never stuck. And opening yourself up to the Holy Spirit to ask what He has and what He has for you and where the healing can be. There's always solutions and always answers when you're ready for it.

Nadine Dyer (24:43)
Beautifully said. We love you sister. Catch you next time. Bye.