We were lucky to catch up with Michelle Ward recently and have shared our conversation below.
Michelle, we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?
I’ve made a lot of grande mistakes in my life and up until around my early 40’s I would find a way to blame others for my decisions and play the victim. I had a very difficult time taking personal responsibility for my choices and would make excuses as to why I would react a certain way or would justify my behaviors to make myself feel better.
I knew down deep inside of me that something needed to change but I wasn’t sure how or what those changes were. I began my personal development journey and slowly started to realize that all the events of my life and the outcomes associated with them were a direct result of my attitudes and choices. It was then that I began to reframe the ‘bad’ in my life to look at life through a different set of lenses. I began to accept that I could control my thoughts and responses through awareness and looking for the good in any and every situation.
I started to believe that life doesn’t happen TO me, it happens FOR me. I embraced the lessons I was being taught through my environment, the people I surrounded myself with and the choices I made through my actions and thoughts. And then, I consciously began to shift my mindset and remove the obstacles that were keeping me from becoming who I wanted to be. It was a much-needed pruning process that was difficult and painful at times, but well worth the outcomes I experienced (and still do!).
I then looked back on all of the life events that shaped who I had become and reframed any self-perceived negative events into positive ones which gave me a completely different perspective on how my life had unfolded and I realized that everything happened the way it was supposed to.
These realizations have helped me see all things in my life as good and FOR my good. Even when something doesn’t go the way I want or expected it to go, I know from years of experience that there is something better around the corner, something I didn’t even think to expect or hope for. This change in mindset has brought me more joy, better outcomes and wonderful surprises.
I’ve found that taking responsibility for my choices and reactions, and reframing challenges into opportunities for learning and growth takes courage and requires me to set boundaries that I otherwise wouldn’t have been capable of. This in turn has developed a resilience and a self-respect that I would have never expected from myself 15 years ago.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
I began nutrition coaching in 2012 after graduating from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. I had big dreams of transforming the lives of my clients through nutrition and lifestyle changes because I had transformed my own health through the same.
I developed a 6-month coaching program and had great success with my clients. However, I became frustrated by the numbers of ‘repeat customers’ I had over the years. My goal was to coach my clients how to become self-sufficient in making lifestyle choices that were sustainable and long-term. But what I found is that they fell into the same yo-yo dieting trap that most Americans fall into and ended up gaining the weight back and then some, only to return to me for help to get back on track.
I would encourage them to get in touch with their “WHY” and use that as their catalyst for getting & staying on track; and, it worked for a period of time but then the old habits would creep back in.
It wasn’t until a few years ago that I realized that a lot of the lack of long-term change was driven by the subconscious thoughts driving the behaviors. not the lack of desire for change. Add this to hormonal imbalances, environmental factors outside of their control and chronic, persistent inflammation, no matter how big the desire for change, it was virtually impossible to make sustainable changes unless the entire body system was addressed at an energetic, cellular and subconscious level.
Fast forward to where I am now, my practice has dramatically evolved. Nutrition and Lifestyle are still key focuses with clients and are necessary for health, vitality and longevity BUT I realized those are ancillary items to address once the body & mind are getting back into balance. I discovered the real key lies in healing at the subconscious and cellular level.
I mostly work with women who are pre, post or peri-menopausal. A majority of them are empty-nesters who have spent their adult lives focusing on their kids, husbands, volunteering at the schools, church or other organizations and a lot of them put their careers on hold to put others first. As a result, they also put their own self care on the back burner and found themselves losing their identity in the process. Many of them viewed self care as selfishness instead of a requirement in order to be the best version of themselves in order to serve others well.
Recognizing that everything is energy from the thoughts we think to the food we eat, I developed a program utilizing cutting edge technology to get all of the body systems back into balance. I utilize high-end red light therapy to aid the body in quick weight and fat loss while also addressing inflammatory issues at the cellular level. Additionally, I use sound and vibration technology that increases cellular voltage. This increases ATP (cellular energy) and improves mitochondrial function thereby addressing inflammation and improving disease states. And finally, I use a brain entrainment device that utilizes light, sound and vibration to rebalance the brain and retrain the subconscious thoughts in order to help people make better decisions thus balancing the entire body which results in better sleep, less anxiety, more energy, clarity, focus and recall.
This program also includes a 12-week lifestyle & nutrition coaching program with meal plans and additional training on mindset, nutrition, exercise, hydration, sleep & breath work to ensure long-term, continued success.
Each client is different and depending on the severity of the inflammation, amount of weight to lose and other factors will determine how many sessions are required to achieve their desired outcomes. In any event, I have had great success with the clients who have gone through my program with weight loss and alleviating symptoms of anxiety, chronic pain, low energy, insomnia, hormonal imbalances, etc.
The thing I find most exciting about what I’m doing is that the results are measurable and backed by clinical trials & data. And most of my clients have tried so many other things with little to no success and with my program, often tell me that they finally have hope again.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
Consistency: I always tell my clients that where they are now didn’t happen over night so they have to be patient through the process of change and do it with consistency. We live in a microwave culture and have become accustomed to getting what we want, when we want it and often without too much thought or effort. We want the ‘quick fix’ and oftentimes those quick fixes end up causing problems in the long run. Whether it’s the newest weight loss drug or newest diet or medicine or whatever it is, it may work in the short term but most of the time it comes with consequences if you’re not removing the things that got you to that place and replacing it with the healthy habits that will get you where you want to be. It’s the things that we consistently do that get us to where we are: the unhealthy and the healthy habits. Consistently doing anything will produce results, you just have to choose what you’ll be consistent with and determine whether it’s congruent with the results you’re wanting to achieve.
Self-Awareness:
Too many of us are completely out of touch with ourselves so it’s hard to know what’s working for us and what’s working against us. Developing the skill of self awareness takes time but it reaps big rewards. For example, being aware of how certain people affect your energy could affect your health in a positive or negative way. Or, being aware of how you feel when you eat a certain food or perform a certain exercise. Journaling consistently or keeping a food/mood journal can help you develop these skills so you can make the appropriate changes necessary to achieve the results you desire.
Intuition:
From a young age I remember being intuitive but somewhere along the way, I stopped paying attention to those ‘feelings’. It goes back to self awareness but on a different level. When I started my personal development journey in my 40’s, I realized I had stopped listening or paying attention to that ‘gut feeling’ that probably saved my booty in my younger years from a lot of heartache or dangerous situations. I have redeveloped (and still working on) my intuitive muscle by being firm in my boundaries and trusting myself. We all know what’s best for ourselves but we have learned or have been conditioned to what others think or tell us or not to question authority. I have learned that if something doesn’t sound right or feel right then to question it and look for the alternative answers before making any decisions. I have found that it has served me well and that intuitive feeling is often spot on!
One of our goals is to help like-minded folks with similar goals connect and so before we go we want to ask if you are looking to partner or collab with others – and if so, what would make the ideal collaborator or partner?
Yes! The people I would most love to collaborate with are those who believe in the power of the mind and body to heal itself through proper nutrition, lifestyle choices and light, sound & vibration therapies.
Those individuals include:
* functional medicine doctors
* doctors who practice TCM
* chiropractors
* therapists/psychologists/psychiatrists who work with their patients utilizing EMDR or any type of brain entrainment or energetic work to balance the brain & body
* physical therapists
* sports medicine practitioners
Basically, anyone who understands the value of increasing the cellular energy of the body, the importance of detoxifying the mind & body and who are open to scientifically backed therapies that support the body & mind through non-medicine adjuncts in order to get the body systems back into homeostasis.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.themichelleward.com
- Instagram: @redlightrevolution
- Facebook: The Michelle Ward
- Linkedin: Michelle Ward
- Twitter: @wardmi
Image Credits
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