020 Sharon Wallen - The Transformative Power of Gratitude and Reflection for Mental Wellness
Jun 28, 2024
Deborah Edwards and Debbie Pearson
Can practicing gratitude genuinely transform your mental wellness? Join us at Shero Cafe as we celebrate Sharon Wallen, an exceptional National Board-Certified Teacher with over three decades of experience in Miami-Dade County Public Schools. Sharon, who ranks among the top 3% of America's educators, takes us on a journey filled with personal stories and insights into the significance of her NBCT certification. She passionately explains her motivation behind creating the "Grateful Reflections Journal," a tool that aims to foster mental wellness by encouraging positive routines over 21-day cycles, especially in the wake of the pandemic's impact on mental health.
In our conversation with Sharon Rose Wallen, we uncover the transformative power of gratitude and reflection. Sharon shares her wisdom on nurturing mental wellness through disciplined self-care and mindful practices. Her anecdotes vividly illustrate how daily habits can combat negative thoughts and behaviors, offering every listener a pathway to mental resilience. Don't miss out on learning how you, too, can benefit from these practices. Check out Sharon's Grateful Reflections Journal on Amazon and remember to always nurture the "Shero" within you.
---CONNECT with Shero Cafe--- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shero.cafe.podcast/ Email: thesherocafe@gmail.com
Can practicing gratitude genuinely transform your mental wellness? Join us at Shero Cafe as we celebrate Sharon Wallen, an exceptional National Board-Certified Teacher with over three decades of experience in Miami-Dade County Public Schools. Sharon, who ranks among the top 3% of America's educators, takes us on a journey filled with personal stories and insights into the significance of her NBCT certification. She passionately explains her motivation behind creating the "Grateful Reflections Journal," a tool that aims to foster mental wellness by encouraging positive routines over 21-day cycles, especially in the wake of the pandemic's impact on mental health.
In our conversation with Sharon Rose Wallen, we uncover the transformative power of gratitude and reflection. Sharon shares her wisdom on nurturing mental wellness through disciplined self-care and mindful practices. Her anecdotes vividly illustrate how daily habits can combat negative thoughts and behaviors, offering every listener a pathway to mental resilience. Don't miss out on learning how you, too, can benefit from these practices. Check out Sharon's Grateful Reflections Journal on Amazon and remember to always nurture the "Shero" within you.
---CONNECT with Shero Cafe--- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shero.cafe.podcast/ Email: thesherocafe@gmail.com
Well, hello everyone and welcome to the Shiro Cafe. I'm Debbie Pearson and I'm here with my co-host, deborah Edwards, and we are the co-host of the Shiro Cafe podcast, where we celebrate the Shiro in you. Today we're going to be talking to Sharon Wallen. Hi, sharon, and welcome.
Speaker 2:
Good afternoon Debbie, deborah, and it's my pleasure to be with you. I love the concept of your Shiro Cafe and the work you're doing in our community. Just that bounty and that feast between self-care and wellness. Congratulations and thanks for your service.
Speaker 3:
Thank you, thank you, right back at you.
Speaker 1:
Thank you. So, sharon, tell us about these four initials behind your name. What is an NBCT?
Speaker 2:
Great question National Board Certified Teacher and it's been a joy of my career 32 years in miami-dade county public schools elementary school and majority of those years was as a national board certified teacher and the difference of that it just uh, only 3% of America's teachers are national board certified. Wow, the process started in 1999. And just two years later I had a great mentor who said Sharon, I think you should go at it. And in 2001, I did and was successful and have renewed ever since because it's that worthy. And even in 2019, when I retired from work, I renewed that certification because it's that valuable. And National Board teachers in Miami they do invite me to still mentor and help incoming teachers and new beginning teachers and work like that.
Speaker 2:
Wow, that's really what it is Nice.
Speaker 1:
Good for you. That is your Shiro's journey, isn't it?
Speaker 2:
It is Absolutely. Yeah, it really means you can. I can go in any state in America and for the age group I'm certified. I have the strategies and ability to be able to help a child in any elementary school. That's amazing, yeah, and it is. So. I do have to have my Florida license and I will probably have to get a license in whichever state I am. But the national certification means that you can work and be successful with children at the age group. You're certified in any state in America.
Speaker 3:
That's amazing. That is awesome. So I am going to turn around this conversation a little bit. And the book I read. What was the book that you read that you included in the book?
Speaker 2:
Yes, it's one that I created just post the pandemic Grateful Reflections Journal, written by Sharon Rose Wallet, and it came out of part of my work in school. I worked with advanced academics gifted and talented but I've always had an interest in the brain and strategies for thinking and wellness and critical thinking, problem solving, creativity and things like that. So during the pandemic and when I kept hearing about mental illness and increase in suicide rate, and especially the young, 20 to 24 year olds and the armed forces, and all of that was draining on me because I knew that there were some habits, that if folks had some habits of just wellness and hope what I call hope in my hands, then they would be able to probably not be so distressed all the time. So that's how, oh, this can't be the show. I'll put it next to you.
Speaker 1:
Put it in front of your face. Sorry, but if you put it in front of you, oh, it's not working.
Speaker 3:
Go down below, put it down right here.
Speaker 2:
There you go.
Speaker 3:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
Grateful Reflections Journal.
Speaker 1:
Okay.
Speaker 2:
And that, and it's loaded with strategies or habits. And it's loaded with strategies or habits, daily habits of wellness, and built on Dr Carolyn Leaf's work that in the brain, if we go through trauma or negative memories, we can break them in the cycle of 21 days, and it might take series of 21 days. So the book has five sets of 21 days in it.
Speaker 2:
And at the end of each 21 day is a reflection. What have I noticed? What's a picture I would draw about what I worked through or whatever and I had since I was published in early 22,. And I have worked through five books, five copies of those, and I noticed I've always struggled Well, not always, but especially later in my career work late nights, early mornings and the drive-thru were great for me or restaurants I didn't cook at home.
Speaker 2:
Now I might cook at home since post-COVID, but before, no, I did not. And so, little by little, we drive everywhere, my you know the weight I gained that and I would never tell anyone I'm overweight. I would never say I'm obese, I would never. Would never because I didn't even see myself as that. But came a time, after some spores with cholesterol numbers and things, and I began to look at it also. There was a time when I knew I wasn't hungry and I just kept eating and I had to realize, sharon, that's binging. And I noticed I was coming to terms with certain things and after a while I noticed there weren't an issue anymore. It was after writing those habits and the discipline of what I had in the journal.
Speaker 1:
So it's like seeing it in black and white in front of your face rather than just kind of throwing it in the back of your head. Yeah, yeah, I often wonder about that, because I will do that myself. I'm like eating going. I'm really not hungry. Why am I like putting this? And I figured it's because I'm I'm trying to satiate something inside of me and I'm learning it's more in my heart is what I'm trying to satiate or fulfill, not so much my belly and so that's. But I've not done the process of writing it down and seeing it. So I think I'm going to be going to get me a reflections. What is it? Grateful Reflections.
Speaker 2:
Grateful Reflections Journal and what it was, debbie and Deborah. What it was is it starts out because it's the messages we tell ourselves. Initially, because initially I was dealing with the wellness part of it and also rebuilding whatever's traumatic or the bad memories for what I was hearing in the community, but because it's a good discipline of habits that are in there, then my working it through, then I was able to also see the growth of that. It starts out with one of the reflections and it's daily what is something positive I heard or received this morning? So it might just be whether something I read, or nature, hearing the birds or, you know, seeing my loved ones. So you write that down and then it goes into affirmations.
Speaker 2:
Our self-talk is critical in that inner dialogue and there are three different ways. And it's a guided journal. So I have the stems there, I am, I have I, and then the person completes that. There's also gratitude is critical. There's no way you can be happy and upset in the same minute or the same second. So today I'm grateful for, and then you write out what am I happy for, and it's important to have a sense of I'm achieving something or I'm getting something done, I'm using my time well. So there's a statement about the goal I want to achieve today is. But what also the research shows is, if you write the goal and don't necessarily do it, you still didn't nothing happen. Goal and don't necessarily do it, you still didn't nothing happened. So in the space where I have my goal for today is, there's also a space of steps I'll take to achieve. Them are nice, so like for me.
Speaker 2:
I remember going to the gym was something new. Those are new behaviors that started post-COVID for me, and so then steps I'll take for that. Okay, I might put out my gym clothes the night before. I might make sure my sneakers and socks are ready. I'll set my alarm that I get up in time and I get there. If I miss it let's say I usually get there at 8 in the morning, I will not beat upon myself, I'll probably get there at 11 if I prefer to do that that day. And then that's the am, and then there's a pm little section where in the evening you can just reflect on the same day.
Speaker 2:
Today I was, I was, I'm pleased that so and so happened, um, something I would fix or change, and then you write that out and sometimes there might be nothing. I might just say I'm pleased how today went. And then thinking is important. So there's a statement where my summary word for today is and then they write that down and amazing, amazing, I noticed that I wasn't struggling at all.
Speaker 2:
No, and now I can talk, I can identify BMI. So, like in my chapter in our book, I share with readers how to calculate the BMI. So, like in my chapter in our book, I share with you, know, readers how to calculate the BMI so they can know that body mass index and then what level of obesity it might be or not. And then to also be here, in the most recent research, obesity is a disease. I would never think so. So you know, it's calling all these realities and facing them. And definitely my life is transformed because for me to be able to name these things, apply them, see a change and be able to even identify and tell others new behaviors and new space and time for me. And those are just some of the changes.
Speaker 3:
Well, I have two questions for you. I'm really curious. You were talking about five 21-day sessions in the journal, so is there a different focus for each one, or does the reader choose what that focus is?
Speaker 2:
They could probably choose that. For me it's the repetition of those 21 cycles of the discipline, because usually it doesn't all set in the first 21 days that everything has changed. I have to repeat because usually, if, uh, what is based on the research of dr carolyn's leaf work, where she talks about switching on the brain, and it's that where I saw, where she shows the synapses that are happening in our brain and the growing new neurons and just some new pathways, right, and then so that's what these 21 days she shows, where you can break. But if during, let's say, day six, I have six, I have you wouldn't say a relapse, but it's not as good or on the track as I wanted, then a new set of 21 has to start so the person can finish that. But the book has cycles of 21. So they can just have fun learning about themselves going through the cycles. It's going to take a while. It's going to take a little while, okay.
Speaker 3:
That is awesome. And then my next question, although we are here talking about the book I read and I really am just inspired by the stories in the book, where can they get the grateful your journal, Great Full Reflections Journal?
Speaker 2:
yeah, yes, amazon. Amazoncom is a great source for that. Covenant Books was the one that I published it Covenant Books and also certainly Amazoncom Perfect perfect, perfect, thank you.
Speaker 1:
So, sharon, as we wind this down, we always ask our guests if you could share one thing with anyone listening to this. What would that be? What is one thing you would love for people to just know?
Speaker 2:
What I would love for folks to know. My chapter opens up what I would love for folks to know. My chapter opens up and it's called Emerge Cheerful. We can emerge cheerful and it opens up I can achieve anything I want to achieve today, and that is true, and that is so for any Shiro who is listening to you. She takes or he, they take their own life in their own hands. It's going to take discipline, but with the strategies, with renewed vigor, I face 2024 daily and that's how my chapter opens up. We emerge cheerful because I am being my own cheerleader.
Speaker 2:
Ladies, what I realized is I have favorite places, fabulous restaurants. I live in Florida, so we're on the water, so it's fabulous locations, fabulous. So it's fabulous locations, fabulous, and I will go there. And in the past I will eat whatever and I may gorge myself. Now I'm able to go to those same locations. I can walk, I can order things that are within control and I'm in the same community. So I've now learned that my community was not hurting me, because now I am bringing in a new set of strategies facing it differently.
Speaker 2:
I'm in the same community and having empowerment and the life I want to live, and that is what anyone who, if they just it's got it, takes a little work and effort. You have to. If you want good, you have to do. You know, do do different. And Stephen Kovitz habit he talks about those seven habits of highly effective people. He talks about some private habits and that's what those journal, what I was writing, those were private things before I went out in the world and now I'm living a new renewed in that area and there will be other areas of growth that will also open up. So they can do it. Every Shiro listening to you can do it.
Speaker 3:
I absolutely love that. Yeah, and it's true.
Speaker 1:
Well, sharon, thank you so much for being with us today. We really appreciate that, and we welcome everyone to go to Amazon and get the Grateful Reflections Journal by Sharon Rose Wallen, w-a-l-l-e-n. And so thank you very much and we will see you all next time. Do you have something you want to say, deborah?
Speaker 3:
Yes, I do. As always, we invite you to love and care for the Shiro in you. Bye.
