In-Between: Existential Musings

We're back this week with some existential musings - oOoOo! Not sure if you've heard of A Trip To Infinity, a documentary on Netflix about infinity, but any time I watch it, I'm introspecting. I've also been in a creative rut the past week or two., so I'm sharing what's helped get me out of it. Between these themes, I've had some interesting musings that I wanted to share with you all, hence the main topic for this week's episode. 

Here's a quick episode recap:

• How is it summer and I haven't been by a body of water?
• My body HURTS! These hips absolutely lie. Hello 33.
• Emotionally wrecking television - I'm looking at you Queen Charlotte!
• Emotionally wrecking movies - Inside Out 2; my body is ready
• Creative Ruts - ugh. How I got out and my advice for you to get of your own!
• Existential Musings - inspired by infinity; how I ground myself with our "speck" of existence and choosing to live loudly and boldly
• What does it mean to truly live? 

Connect with me:
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@in.betweenpod on Instagram
@elizabethcheney_ on Instagram
@theinbetweenpodcast on TikTok
The In-Between Podcast on YouTube

Transcript

Elizabeth: 0:06

Hello, hello, hello. Welcome back to another episode of the In Between Podcast. I'm your host, Elizabeth Cheney, and I hope you all are doing fabulous. Uh, before we get into today's episode, I just want to say, hey, Last week's episode was very short. I apologize. I'm not gonna lie, your girl was kind of in a little bit of a rut creatively. Uh, and I just had quick updates. But don't worry, your girl is back with a vengeance this week, and I've got a whole list of things to talk about. Because I've been introspectin I've been marinatin on some existential thoughts. It's getting a little philosophical over here. Ooh, my favorite thing to do. I'm just kidding. Well, not really. It is something I like to do, but I have a lot of favorite things I like to do. Anywho, but before we get into all of that, just want to say I can't believe it is June something or another. What is it? The second week of June? And I have not been to a pool yet. I have not been by any kind of body of water, not even a bathtub if I'm going to be completely honest with you because our apartment only has a shower and yes, it kills me. Oh, it kills me. Uh, but I haven't been to a pool. I haven't been to the lake. Part of that is because, well, I, uh, am not looking forward to facing that. I know that's going to be emotional, so one might argue I've been putting it off. But also, I've been really busy, so there's that. And then third, I've not been to the ocean, but that's not necessarily easily available. Um, but, hopefully we'll get to the lake here soon, and I will just deal with that emotional mess as it hits and as it comes. Uh, I know it's going to be good and healing, but, you know. It is what it is, which I say this and I'm like, Oh, it makes me wish I had a new puppy, but we're waiting on getting a house to do that. And I was going to update you all on the housing front. There is no updates to be had. It's just one of those things. It's one of those things. Not let it bother me. I mean, Sure, it bothers me, but I'm not letting it take me down. I'm just like, it's gonna happen. It's gonna happen. Reminding myself that things can change at the drop of a hat, just like the house that we lost that we were putting an offer on a few months ago. That's okay. That is okay. Um, Anywho, your girl needs to get by some water. Your girl needs to get by some body of water. Maybe I will this weekend. We talked about going to the lake this weekend for Father's Day, so maybe we will, maybe we won't. But we probably will, let's be real. Uh, another thing to, to, to bring to the podcast, cause here is all my truths, truths. Um, let me tell you something. My hips are really hurting. So I'm 33, you know that joke that everything starts to crick crack, snap crackle pop kind of thing when you turn, when you turn 30? You know, 30 is when I kind of started my fitness routine. That's when I healed. Excuse me, let me, let me just check myself. Not when I healed my shoulder, but when we finally found out, I don't know, four or five years later, what was going on with my shoulder, which put me in another round of physical therapy, which then led me to my fitness routine. But anywho, so 30, I was working on my body, my physical health, my mental health, because we all know that was the year that you're a girl in a rock bottom. Uh, I sing about that because, well, you know, it was a thing. You listen to the podcast. If you're new here, we'll go listen back to Opta, I probably should post some of those episodes, but I feel like I talk about it all the time Anyways, I ramble and I digress hips, so It's not that I think oh, I turned 33 and my hips have just gone out on me But I am now realizing that whole slogan Slogan that's hilarious that whole phrase that whole joke that your body just starts to I don't know Sabotage you, starts to go against you. It's, I'm starting to notice it. And it's not that I'm in chronic pain, I already have that because of my car accident injuries. But it's more, if I don't stretch really, really hard after a workout, I will not be able to walk, not even the next day, I mean like within an hour and a half. So my hips are so tight. I don't even know if I've ever shared this on the podcast, but I did this really Stupid thing on my, my bachelorette. I was a COVID bachelorette. We had a party bus because we couldn't do anything. So me and my few of my friends, we ran to party bus, drive around. And that's where we basically got hoot wild. I don't even know if hoot wild is the thing. I was gonna say hootin and hollerin and it came out hoot wild. Anyways, there she goes again, mixing up her words and her phrases. Uh, but I, I, I love her. I went to, well, let me first say I was not sober, all right? I was not sober. I was a little intoxicated, if you will. And I thought, oh, I've been stretching and doing yoga. Maybe I can do a split. So I swung from the rafters, the rafters, like the, like the bars from the ceiling of the bus and like jumped, plopped myself into a split. Well, the fun fact is well, I couldn't do a split. Drunk Liz, she thought she could do a split. Reality Liz, not necessarily. So I kind of fucked some shit up in my hip from that and I think that is actually what's driving a lot of this hip pain because I'm trying to really work on my mobility and it's like I think I'm making progress, but it's like highlighting. Oh girl your hips are tight So I know I just kind of went off about hip shit. This is your PSA for all my listeners It doesn't matter if you're 21 if you're 27 if you're 35 if you're 44 if you're 52 if you're 18 Stretch this is your reminder to stretch your body is gonna. Thank you for later My goodness. So, uh, yeah. And I say all this because like my left hip is hurting so bad because of course I've spent so much effort on the right hip trying to fix it from my stupid split. I've been ignoring the needs of the left. And now because everything's like crisscross applesauce back there, like I mean, I don't really know the anatomy, but the way my physical therapist explained to me, it's like lots of crisscross tendons. I don't know. Maybe I'm an idiot. So for y'all listening, if you are a physical therapist or in the medical field and you know what the hell I'm talking about and I just butcher that, well, I am not. Doctor or a physical therapist myself, so I don't know but regardless. Let's just go with this whole crisscross applesauce tendons thing The left side is now hurting so now I'm like oh Liz you You silly goose. Why didn't you work on that side when you're working on the right side? Huh, so we're just over here trying to Get our body right. And we haven't even had kids yet. So that is great. That's fun. Oh boy. Uh, you know, last week, one of the things I did update you on was Queen Charlotte. I started that. I don't even know if I mentioned this, but I had like 30 minutes left to finish. I finally finished the last 30 minutes, like literally last night. Oh my. I, when I tell you that show emotionally wrecked me, I. I was even surprised by how loud I was sobbing. Like, I was alone, Stan was off with his buddies, and I was thinking to myself, Oh my God, if my neighbors are listening right now, they can probably hear me whine, because it's not like these walls are very, very, very thick. And I am just like, audibly like, Huh, huh, oh, oh, this is so beautiful, oh my God. Oh my gosh, that show, Fuck me up emotionally in the best way and I don't even mean like oh So much heartbreak like in the best way. I know I mean like all that was so good That was so freaking warm and feel good and all the feelings and all the warm fuzzies And oh, I love love and that was beautiful and there's such good actors. That's like how I felt. Oh My god, so if you have watched Queen Charlotte We need to talk now because I need to like, I need to express, I need to express my thoughts on the matter with somebody who's watched it because, oh my gosh, chef's kiss. I think that was, not even think, that was better than Bridgerton. No hate, no shade of Bridgerton, but Queen Charlotte is so beautiful, so raw, so real. It tackles mental health in a way that I haven't seen on any kind of mainstream media, mainstream media. Okay, when I say mainstream, I don't necessarily mean those indie films either, okay, so don't come at me. But, mm, mm, mm, God, that was so good. And speaking of emotionally wrecked, Inside Out 2 comes out this week. I'm gonna go see it. First off, love a good Pixar movie. Secondly, If you've seen Inside Out, then you know what I mean by that movie emotionally wrecking you and that might have emotionally wrecked you kind of in the Oh my god, this was hard and deep way. Woo! If you haven't seen Inside Out, I'm just gonna say feelings developing feelings aka complex feelings. You know what? I'm definitely going to make my kids watch that movie through puberty. My, the kids I don't have. But I will have one day and when they get to that point like all right time for your lesson time to watch inside Out take notes everybody But yeah, I'm ready to see inside out too. I think they introduce a few new emotions one of them being anxiety. So oh But that's gonna hit me right in the feels and maybe feel a little too Real if you know what I mean, but that's okay. I am ready for it So there's that Another thing is if you've been following me on social media, because I am assuming all of you do. If not, what have you been doing with your life? Get your ass on your social media. Follow me right now. Um, but my girl Sherry's was in town this weekend. She came to visit me. She was a podcast friend. I met online and she's in Baltimore. She came down to visit. I showed her. I showed her shoulder. Yay. I don't know why I was about to like. The A. Does that even sound funny when it comes out of my mouth? I was about to show her Hotlanta, which I did tell her we don't call it Hotlanta, but like, surprisingly, a lot of the places we went to eat, they had like a Hotlanta drink or dish. So I'm like, hmm, is Hotlanta like a, do people say that now? Cause I thought that was like, you don't say Hotlanta. Anyways, I digress. We were going to record an episode together because as you do in person, and, um, We partied a little too hard. For any of my locals, we went to the Claremont Lounge, which is quite a novelty experience. I will say that. Just Google it. And you might only be able to Google it if you're over the age of 21. But it's a strip club here in Atlanta. It's, when I say it's wild, it's not necessarily like, wow, this is the most insane shit happening, but I mean, it is, it's wild. Wild, like it's just not your stereotypical strippers. That's all I'm going to say. Um, like there's one woman who's got to be like in her late 70s, if not early 80s, and she is amazing. Her name is Blondie and I actually finally got to see her perform. She is like known in the city. Anyways, we're going to get into all of our adventures and all of the fun. just the fun we had this whole weekend. But the day we're going to record on Sunday and we woke up and I was like, girl, my voice is like gone. You honestly might be able to kind of hear it now. I was like, we can't record this episode because I'm be like, you know, when we talk. So, I will save all of the giggles and fun and adventures that we got into, uh, for later because we are going to record our Atlanta recap episode later this week, so that will come out next week. then, uh, Steph Laffey, uh, uh, came on the podcast again. If you remember, she was from the Introverted podcast. Stay Introverted. Her and I did a solo episode a few weeks ago, recorded one, so she's going to be coming on in the next few weeks. And I'm trying to work out a few other guests, so stay tuned, stay tuned. But I just want to say, man, there is nothing like, ah, just giggling with a girlfriend. Just even a friend isn't a big girlfriend, but just, I don't know, you know when you meet people, this was our first time meeting in person, right? And we've talked on the phone many, many times. Like, we're friends. But we finally got to meet and we just clicked and it was so it was so awesome. And let me tell you guys, like my, I giggled and laughed so hard this weekend. I mean, who knows how many times I almost peed my pants? If I probably did pee my pants to some extent, I could just be like that. And, uh, you know, I've been a little bit in a creative funk lately. I think that's kind of why I didn't feel really myself completely on last week's episode. And. I did a TikTok about this earlier this week. So if you're not following me on TikTok, here's another subtle reminder, aka not so subtle, go follow me. Uh, but it was about being a creative writer and like things that have been helping me get out of it. And one of which was, you know, hanging out with Cher. Hanging out with her and being able to talk to her. This is nothing against my other friends. I love my friends and my other friends do help me with the podcast. Help me get out of my head, whatever, whatever. But there is something to say about talking to your creative friends, like your friends who are pursuing something similar, whether it's a podcast, whether it's being a content creator, a vlogger, because you can, it's not even just about running ideas off each other, but like you are going to be a little bit more well versed with what's trending or what tools you're using and things like that. So. I don't know. It really, really, really helped kind of take me out of the hole that I was, I was in. I didn't even realize I was, I was in a hole if I'm being honest with you. Um, but I just want to shout out to share and, and shout out to your creative friends. Like lean on them when you're in your creative ruts because it's not like we talked about anything that I didn't already know or believe in, but it was like the reminder I needed. so much. And sometimes you just, you need someone to get you out of your head. So, there's that. Can't wait for that episode. I know it's going to be great. Uh, let's see what else. Ooh. Haven't planned anything for Norway yet. Oops. I'm going to, eventually. But, uh, I, yeah, just haven't done it yet. So, are we still going to go? Yes, I hope. But, Your girl needs to research a little bit more because I honestly have no idea what I'm doing with this. Um, but that's okay because I'm sure it'll be great no matter what. Ah! Um, okay, so let's get a little existential. Womp, womp, womp, womp. Really weird sound effect for that statement. But, let's get a little existential. So, I think I mentioned this a little bit last week about protecting my peace and wanting to, uh, What's the word I'm looking for? Like, I'm being more mindful of things that, Take away that piece. Give me a little bit of negativity. Maybe it's like intrusive thoughts. Maybe they, I don't know, they just stress me out. And it doesn't necessarily have to, it's not like one thing in particular I'm talking about, but I'm just in this evolution of me, Elizabeth Cheney, uh, in self improvement, self development. I am, I'm being very cognizant and mindful of things that, ooh, Why does this not make me feel 100 percent or make me feel good? Like, like, why does this make me feel in any way less than? That's what I'm being very, very mindful of. And with that, in the past week, I've just really thinking, introspecting, marinating on this. Hanging out with Cher this weekend helped. Like I said, that kind of took me out of the creative rut I was feeling, And that goes into protecting my peace because even though I'm talking about stressors or things that may take away my, my self worth in any capacity, but protecting my peace also means anxiety, stress that shouldn't be there. And I was getting in a creative rut because I think I was like compounding stress. So I have a lot of balls in the air, a lot of things that I can't like quite talk about right now that I will here in due time. You know, it's fine, I've gotten really good at juggling the different balls, but sometimes maybe I've worked really well on not getting stressed out or having negative thought pattern about this one topic or this one thing in my life, but then, because maybe something hasn't quite worked out yet, maybe I'm in a more stressful period. Maybe there's a lot of shit going on at work. I'll take that stress I would normally put towards that thing and I put it towards something else. So we're working on that again, being very mindful and cognizant of our inner narrative and our peace. Yes. So with that said, one of the things that I was in the creative rut about was, I was compounding my stress in what was really like a 3 in a scale of 1 to 15. Over time, it starts compounding to like a level 12, level 15. And then I just start spiraling. And what really is not a big deal? And, you know, you can do it in your pastime, like your free time, whatever. Oh man, it gets me, gets me stunted and then I start thinking about how I haven't posted content or I should be posting more content because that's growth, baby, that's growth, being consistent is growth and it's like, I get immobilized. I know part of this is ADHD and that's been like a big, big thing that I've been working on the past year plus. Um, and again, like I, sometimes I'm like, I am just giving all my thoughts and feelings and emotions on this podcast, but you know what, I know it resonates with some people and also, you know, It's good to talk about this shit because we realize we're not all alone. And also, it is my podcast. Um, but anyways, It's funny, I say all of this besides just sharing my shit, but too, I always talk about starting. Starting is the hardest part. Get out of your own way. Just do it. Just record the episode. Paint the picture. Whatever. I was having the same problem with posting content, filming content, even guys. I have so many funny, well, I think they're funny, funny ideas for videos, maybe more deep, more like self love, introspective, give you the feels kind of ideas for videos and isn't I truly think they're good. And it's like, why can I not film them? You get stunted, right? So there's this quote, I'm a, I subscribed to this newsletter by James Clear who is the author of Atomic Habits. If you haven't read that book, I highly recommend, your girl should probably actually read that book herself, like reread it again, cause I have read it, but he said, there is no right time, but right now is the best time. There is no right time, but right now is the best time. It, feeds the mindset to start. So getting out of my creative funk this weekend, having my friend take me out and remind me, Lizzie, why are you letting these things compound and bother you? Get out of your own head and just know that it's going to work out because you are making the efforts to get yourself out of this situation, to make this change in your life, to do these things. Don't stress out about not happening yet. Um, just know that it's going to happen and sit in that allowing, sit in the feeling that this is not forever. This is, this chapter is about to end. You are moving forward from this one thing, from this other thing. Basically zoom out. And it got me thinking, Ooh, I did something that I try not to forget about or try to lose sight of. Okay. Um, but because I was letting all this other stress take over and manage my attention and manage my creativity, kind of mentally blocked me from, from starting from doing whatever it is, I'd lost track of my why and it was becoming a chore in my head. And granted we're talking like very short windows of time here. For all I know, this is still me recovering from almost burning myself out in April. Going back to my why. It was the last step I needed in the let's get out of the creative rut hole. Get out of the creative rut bubble. So find your community, your creative community. Maybe you don't know anybody directly like in your life personally that you see. Even if you're not friends in person, you can meet people online to be frank with you. Most, if not all of my creative, I say that in quotes friends because I have creative friends, but I mean like friends who are actively pursuing some kind of career as a creator, whether it's a podcaster, a vlogger, an actor, a singer, whatever the case may be, a performer. Most of them came from the internet. Most of them I found on Instagram or TikTok, social media, and we just connected. Find your people, they are there, I promise. And what's even better, are these people are like, within your vicinity, like, your same level, so you get to not just come up together, but you can work out all those, I don't know, intrusive thoughts, negative thought patterns, all of the things together. I don't know if you remember this, but back, I think it was toward the end of last year, um, When Joshua Darin was on, like it was the last episode he was on, we talked about this. Like find your neighborhood. You don't want to be a king in the castle. You don't want to be a queen of the castle. You want to be with your neighbors in coming up the ladder because the top is lonely. Community is everything. Two, be mindful of the compounding stress. Really check in with yourself. If you're finding yourself mentally blocked, you're not, um, something is not meshing well within yourself. Like, you know, you're off. Take note of that. And does it really require that level of stress? Is it really a 15 or is it more like a 2? And, if the stress is coming from a place of you trying to make changes, you're trying to like, for us, trying to buy a house, and not being bogged down with the apartment and still being here and, and, you know, wanting a puppy and knowing I can't get the puppy because I have this compounding stress because this apartment and I love a house and I can't find a house and the interest rates are so high and oh la la la la la oh my god oh my god. Oh my god. Sit in the knowing in the allowing that I will find a house. I'm going to find a house. We got a brand new realtor and she's badass and I love her. She is exactly what I was looking for to trust. It's going to work out in the right timing. And the timing that's best for me because there's a few other things that I'm trying to get my shit together with, so to speak. And I, to be honest, would kind of like them to work out before the house works out. And again, when these things do work out, I will be sharing all of that on the podcast. Do not worry. Um, but it's still like holding space for, okay, these things haven't happened yet. These changes haven't happened yet, but they're going to. And I'm making efforts to those changes. I am taking actions to get me closer to those resolutions, to those conclusions, to the finish line, so to speak. And three, remember your why. Why do you want to be a content creator? Why do you want to be a podcaster? Why do you want to be a performer? Why do you want to be an actor? Everyone has different reasons. Even if your reason is just, well, I'm a skincare junkie and I love sharing all of that information with people because it's a crazy ass world out there and I love connecting with people and giving them part of the recommendations that I think are really going to help them. Wow. That was a very oddly specific example, but you get my point. You get my point. Go back to the why. So for me, my why was, Well, I enjoy doing this. It's like my creative outlet and I love connecting with people. When I get messages from you all that, that an episode resonated, it was exactly the message you needed to hear that week. Ooh, it made you giggle or whatever the case may be. That brings me so much joy and that, that revalidates the why. This is why I do it. I want to entertain. I want to empower. But it's, it's easy to get bogged down and lose sight of that. Doesn't mean I suck. Doesn't mean I don't care. Doesn't mean the passion and the drive aren't there. But sometimes we need that check. So, reach out to your creative friends. Find your creative friends one of my podcast girlies that I'm friends with, we've been talking about doing kind of some Friendship Siri episodes. Uh, not just about making friends as an adult, but like you know, friend breakups, friend breaks, things like that. And I wouldn't mind going into a little bit of like how you find your, communities. Like, whether it's online, cause I don't know. Sometimes you can't meet people. Cool. It's hard out there. I'm busy. I'm so damn busy. How am I meeting people? Online. I'm telling you. Oh my gosh. And um, on these notes of protecting our peace, Checking in with yourself, going back to your why, you know, getting out of your ruts. For me it was creative. I want to zoom out and just get a little existential because I do enjoy introspecting. I do enjoy a good existential moment to conversation. There is this documentary on Netflix called A Trip to Infinity, which, um, I highly recommend you watch it. I'm obsessed. I've watched it like four times, but it talks about the concept of infinity, from a scientific, mathematical perspective, and then it kind of segues into infinity, In space, like an infinite universe. And then it goes into this existential philosophical element of infinity. Ooh, that's where like, mmm, I was just munching on that information so hard, I loved it. Like, to me, that documentary is the intersection of my faith, like what I believe spiritually, and science. Hopefully you can chew on that. Highly recommend you watch it. Um, it is very deep. It is very philosophical. I think anybody from any religious background would get something from it. But, I recently watched it and every time I watch it, it really gets me in some kind of existential kind of mindset, which again, I do love. I love it. So if you're ever down to get introspective, just holler at your girl because I'm into it. Like I am that friend. I can meet somebody at the, you know, we're at the bar and a restaurant route together on vacation. I don't know. I can meet a complete stranger in like within 10 minutes. We are introspecting, we are talking about the meaning of life and all of those fun things. So I am that person and I argue that those people find me. And maybe it's just like we find our people, but there we go. Anyways, on the note, the things that I've been kind of marinating on and I think I've been introspective because of the creative rut I've been in. And here lately I've just been thinking about like creating meaning, and I, I do think it goes into everything I'm talking about today because I'm protecting my peace. I actually realized today in therapy that I think that is coming from a place of me trying to heal my child wounds. of this, this inferior feeling that I don't belong. Don't worry guys. We just started unpacking that in therapy and I told my therapist, I was like, you know, uh, I plan on talking about this on my podcast eventually. So childhood traumas and child wounds. They'll be coming to you. I don't know, maybe a few weeks, maybe months. We'll just see how that journey takes us. but it all ties into protecting my peace being. Not even like the best version of myself, but like the best mental version of myself. I want to be happy because We are here for a speck. All right, our existence is a speck the reason I brought that infinity documentary because it kind of talks about ideologies these these ideas and And I'd already started to feel this way in my own self improvement, my self development journey, but it's like it being the universe, it being the world, it being whatever you want it to be, but it being so vast, so big, so infinite that you are so small, but that's what makes you big. And I'm really, really thinking about that and creating meaning I've said this before, but like, I'm an existentialist. Like I believe I put my purpose in life. It's not nihilistic necessarily because I, it's not that I. Is it fate? I have no idea. All I know is I have my birth chart read several times and each time it's read I'm like, how do you know this shit about me? These are weirdly specific details. So that's all I'm going to say on that matter. However, I do think that we have the ability to choose. Maybe it's more like, here's all the infinite versions of how your life could go based on choice and they all have a path, but you are still in the conductor seat. Does that make sense? So, we are here for a speck of time. I have been really mindful of that and I'm not scared of death in that sense of like, oh, I'm not going to be able to accomplish everything that I want to accomplish. If I take that mindset, yeah, I'm probably not. Instead of getting stressed out about my speck of existence, I view it as, ooh, I am going to try everything that I can to create the life that I want. Because who says I can't? Because I'm creating this meaning in life. Why get bogged down by stress? Unnecessary stress? Life is hard. We're gonna have hardships. But that is part of the beauty. The grief, like losing Loon, the fucking hardest thing I have ever experienced. in terms of emotional emptiness. I mean, it's different than the depression, but you know, actually I wouldn't want to compare because it's so different, but I recognize that pain is beauty at its core because of the love and the connection that I had with her. So I create meaning, I move forward in life and try to pursue everything, building this crazy, like, I don't know, career with the podcast and being mindful of anything that takes away from my self worth, my positivity, my, my success, because I'm only here for a little bit of time. And I want to experience as much as I can. I don't want to get bogged down by all the bullshit because there's so much bullshit and this is not me saying that I'm turning an ignorant ear, ignorant eye to all the shit going on in the world, but it's also me saying I also have to hold space for experiencing life. I think we lose sight on how special it is that we get to experience life and I'm not trying to be gaslighting cause we are all going through some shit. Trust me. I know. I've been through some shit, but instead of letting it take me down, I'm going to be reminded for this brief moment of time that I get to exist in this infinite universe, It's not even about regrets. It's just, love me more than the intrusive thought. I love me more than someone else's ego. I love me more than someone else's insecurity. I can meet people where they are, I can hold space for them, but I can also protect myself. You know, if you think about it, we are these little bitty tiny specks in the universe existing on this floating blue rock in the middle of space. It's insane. If you think about it, it's insane. It is insane that we exist, that we are alive, that we are recording podcasts. We are responding to emails. We are in society, but it's incredible at the same time too. It's insane. Yes, but it's also incredible. So think about that when you're stressing out about all the little things, thinking about, Oh gosh, well, is this person judging me? Oh, oh my God. Did, did my friend overthink what I said? Oh, did that come off the wrong way? Oh, did I, did I mess up an email because I misspelled this word? I'm None of that matters. Protect your peace. Don't hide. Don't go away. Don't shut down. Don't turn off. No, no, no. Protect your peace so you can experience this insanely incredible, beautiful life that we get to do. Told you I was going to get existential today. Told you guys. Mmm. So with the existential thoughts and all of this, like it's, it's also kind of helped me with what I was talking about earlier with the sitting in the knowing and the allowing that it's going to happen. You're doing the work, you're making the gains towards what, towards the thing. So sit with that. Don't let it stress you out. Cause for me, it distracted me and took me out of the focus on the pod and the content and all the other goals and things that I got to do. And sometimes we just need that reminder to get out of our own head. Oh, man, I need that reminder often. But, you know, that's okay. Like, this is part of who I am. I'm always in my head. I always got a thousand thoughts running through my head any given moment. But over the years I've learned how to kind of manage it. So that's, that's the joy. That's the beauty. So I embrace my, my imperfections and I, I find their value and strength. And I use them to my advantage. And now I'm at a point that when I falter with that, well, I can get back up a little bit quicker. Or I can at least recognize, Ugh, I'm not doing so hot. Let me just take a beat. Let me rest. And I say this to say, I'm not always the best at that. Especially with the rest thing. I'm still working on that. But I've gotten a lot better. So remember, protect your peace. We're here for a speck of time. But don't let that make you feel small. Don't let that make you feel, oh my gosh, all this pressure, stress, anxiety that life is closing in on you. Absolutely not. I want you to actually think the complete opposite. I want you to think big. Because we're small, it means to live loud. It means to live big, to exist, and that's what I want to end you on today. So, I hope you enjoyed today's episode. I feel like myself again, just need a little recheck, so to speak, um, and I'm really happy you're here. I hope you can be reminded that your existence is incredible. Sure, maybe a little insane, but absolutely incredible. And it is, it is your right to protect your peace and to experience life and live life to its fullest. And to live it unabashedly and live it confidently and go after whatever it is your heart's desire. I'm not trying to sound like a Hallmark card. It just is what it is, babe. So on that note, thank you so much. Stay tuned for next week. We will have a Sherry's on the podcast again, for the Atlanta episode. And I say this to say, assuming that we are still recording this weekend, in case something happens, uh, but that is the plan. And, uh, if you're not doing so already, I know I've mentioned my social media several times in this week's episode, but. Check me out on Instagram at in dot between Pod and Elizabeth Cheney. Please follow up both accounts. You can follow me on TikTok and YouTube at the Between podcast. And if you are like, wait, what were all those things again, you can just go to in between.co, the website and you can find all my links there as well. So thank you all for being here. Thank you all for existing. I love you. I hope you love yourself. You better. If not, well, we'll work on that. And I will see you next week on an all new in between. Until then I'm Elizabeth. Bye.