Don’t Put Me in a Box: Redefining Success and Authenticity

What does it really mean to live an authentic life? In this week’s episode of The Empowered & Embodied Show, Kim Romain and Louise Neil peel back the layers on what authenticity actually looks and feels like... beyond the buzzwords, beyond the curated versions of ourselves, and beyond the boxes we’ve been told to fit into.

We’re talking about the tension between wanting to belong and needing to be true to yourself...

How systems like patriarchy, corporate culture, and hustle-based entrepreneurship condition us to chase someone else’s definition of success...

And what it takes to reclaim your agency, make your own choices, and live a life that feels aligned, even if it looks different from the norm.

Whether you’re a business owner, leader, or a human navigating the twists and turns of life, this conversation invites you to question the script, stitch your own tapestry, and reconnect with your deeper why.

Key Takeaways from this episode:

• Authenticity means making choices that feel true to you
• Success isn’t one-size-fits-all
• You can be inspired by others without copying them
• The world doesn’t always make space for realness—but it’s still worth showing up
• Belonging and authenticity can coexist
• It’s okay to choose a conventional path if it’s aligned for you
• Your life is a tapestry—no one else’s will look like yours
• Staying connected to your humanity is the heart of it all
• Being yourself isn’t always easy, but it’s how you truly live

Key Moments / Chapters

00:00 – Welcome & Intro

02:08 – The Box We’re Supposed to Fit In

05:05 – The Cookie-Cutter Life Myth

07:02 – “I Thought I Was Being Authentic”

11:44 – When Sameness Feels Like the Only Option

17:27 – The Privilege and Risk of Being Real

19:05 – What Grows Authenticity?

21:08 – Who Am I to Do This?

22:23 – The Stories We Carry

24:08 – When It’s Hard to Be Yourself

27:34 – Wholeness & Being Human

32:21 – Your Life is a Tapestry

36:12 – Closing Thoughts & Where to Find Us

 “If we’re all the same puzzle piece, then we don’t actually have a puzzle.” - Kim Romain

 “You can gather threads from someone else without copying their tapestry.” - Louise Neil

Join a circle of changemakers committed to leading with purpose, presence and ease inside Kim's Rising Visionaries mentorship program.

Reclaim your career and confidence during midlife through Louise's Rise & Redefine program.

If you’re loving this show, come check out the Feminist Podcasters Collective, where creators like us are uplifting diverse voices and driving meaningful change. If you’re looking for new shows to fill your feed, head to https://feministpodcasterscollective.com to explore everything we have to offer.

Transcript

The Empowered & Embodied Show

Episode 166

Hosts: Kim Romain & Louise Neil

Title: Don’t Put Me in a Box: Redefining Success and Authenticity

Date: July 1, 2025

Kim Romain (01:01) 

Hi there, welcome to the Empowered and Embodied show. I'm Kim Romain. And I'm Louise Neil We're two transformational coaches who are also fellow travelers on the path of growth and self-discovery. And we're inviting you along for the ride. That's right. We're right here in the trenches with you navigating the ups and downs of life. And each week we'll be sharing our own experiences, bringing you conversations with amazing guests, and exploring insights and strategies that have helped us find more clarity.

confidence and ease in our lives. And trust us, we do not have it all figured out. We're learning and growing right alongside you. So if you're ready to rise above the chaos, doubt and confusion that sometimes life throws our way and step into a more empowered and embodied version of yourself, then you're in the right place. Let's get started.

Kim Romain (02:08) Hello, hello, hello everybody. Welcome back to another episode of the Empowered and Embodied show. I am one of your co-hosts, Kim Romain, joined as always by my other co-host.

Louise (02:09) Hahahaha

Let's me!

Kim Romain (02:21) Louise, who's giggling, as always, which is so lovely. Louise, we were just starting to dive deep into a really robust conversation about, we're just going to dive in, dive back into this. No chitter chatter today. We were talking about authenticity and how do we know we're being authentically ourselves? And you pulled out some words that are like, I've been saying these words all week myself. It's like, don't put me in a fucking box.

Louise (02:51) Yeah.

Kim Romain (02:52) You didn't say it that way, but that's how I've been saying it. Yeah.

Louise (02:54) I didn't drop an F bomb,

we could, you did. Yeah, it's been fascinating this last week, the number of conversations that I've been having with my clients and with people in general, and so some of the events that I've been attending as well. it's this idea of like, how can I bring my whole self, like me forward when

Kim Romain (02:58) Yeah, I did.

Louise (03:22) It feels like there's this box that somebody's trying to fit me in. so corporately, it feels like there's this leadership box that somebody's trying to fit me in. You have to do these things as a leader. You have to show up in this way and ⁓ check all of these boxes. And people are like, I don't want to be that corporate box. I don't want to look like that. I don't want to look like every other leader or every other executive.

And yet that feels like success. It feels like in order to get where I need to go or where I want to go, I have to show up in that box, looking that way, doing that shit, doing that stuff. And I'm having the same conversations over here on the other side with business owners. And how do we continue as a business owner to show up as ourselves when we're told

time and time again by business coaches or consultants or the media or social media or right, fill in the blank that in order to be a successful business, these are the things that you need to be doing. And it's like, well, what if I don't want to do those things or what if I want to do them differently? And the messages we hear back is like, well, then you're not going to be successful on both sides. If you don't fit into these boxes,

you're not going to be successful. And that's this theme that I've heard particularly this week. I hear it often sprinkled here and there, but this week it's been absolutely that all around me.

Kim Romain (05:05) Yeah. ⁓ the irony has not lost on me.

Prior to starting the conversation where we said those words, authenticity, don't put me in a box, right? All of that, we were talking about me recording this video that I did today and that I could hear myself back in it. And the video is talking about exactly this, that we're not meant to be cookie cutters.

Every single one of us, every single individual on this planet that has ever lived and that will ever live, that is living now or in the future, is unique. And yet we have this homogenized society where no matter if we work for other people, if we work for ourselves, it doesn't matter what industry we're in, it doesn't matter, just all of this.

It's this homogenized belief of, you talked about success, right? Of have I led a successful life? At the end of my days, am I going to feel successful? Did I do a good job? Did I do good work? Did I bring in enough money? Did I support enough people? Whatever that view of success is that you are living under, that the global you is living under, because we do have differing views of at least

Louise (06:12) Mm-hmm.

Kim Romain (06:33) a little bit of what success looks like, but even within the maybe five different ways that we could define success, it's still homogenized. And so how do we step out of that to find true authenticity, not the campy word that gets thrown around all the time, like I'm being my most authentic self. It's like beautiful, but what does that actually mean? And how do we start to do that?

And know the irony is not lost on me that I got a little fired up in my video about this too.

Louise (07:02) You

I know, it's, I find this interesting because we can think, and when I say we, I'm gonna just throw me into the we. I've thought this too. I've thought I am living my own authentic life. I am, like I'm doing my stuff and I've got, right? I'm doing my house and renovating my house. That's authentically me. I'm raising my kid in a way that's authentically me.

I hear it, I see it, I feel it. And yet sometimes there's like, I'm building a business that maybe hasn't been done before. Like a menopause duel and a career strategist like, like smashed together. It's like, Hey, that's pretty cool. And yet I find myself still in the box of like,

what does a successful business look like? What does a successful business do? What is the outcome of a successful business? And it falls into a box because I'm searching for that. I'm searching for what that looks like or what that is. And at the minute that I go searching for it, I put in a box, right? Because that's what's out there, boxes. ⁓ And so as much as I feel sometimes, like I can be like, I'm pretending.

authentically showing up. I maybe I am in a few ways, but I'm not in other ways. And I think we can fool ourselves sometimes. And that's where this this authentic authenticity word, like feels really like not deep. It's it's pretty shallow. It's surfacey. Because we throw it around because we think we're doing it in in this spot. And it just translates into all the spots. But I don't think that's true. Like there's there's a deeper

peace to being authentic and it's a real challenge for us to be in that space.

Kim Romain (08:59) Can you be authentic and do something like somebody else?

Louise (09:02) that's a good question.

Sure, you can. Absolutely. Yeah.

Kim Romain (09:05) Yeah, I think so too. Right? We don't

all have to do everything differently. It's, think, so I think what we're talking about with authenticity, this is my take anyway, is the, it's not just about how we do things. It's about the decisions that we make and are we making those from a place of, I'm going to use the word sovereignty. Are we using them from a place of like, I have made that decision for myself.

I see that X has created this career ladder or this business in this way. I really like what they're doing. I'm going to go be mentored by them and maybe take on some of the aspects of that business or that career ladder. But I'm doing that because that feels good to me, not because I'm trying to live their life.

Louise (09:54) Sure, and the key word that you said there, because I was like, nope, nope, nope, and then I'm like, oh, you saved yourself. Some. You said some. I'm gonna look at this person, or I'm gonna model this business, or I'm gonna look at this leadership style, and I'm going to take some of what might work for me from that space. I'm not going to be that, right? I'm not gonna take.

Right? It's the word some that

Kim Romain (10:25) I

think that's where we get tripped up is we say, so and so has such and such. And if I want to emulate that, I need to go take the same steps that they took. Where we mess up is that they have an entire lifetime of experience that are separate and different than yours. And they are completely separate and different individual than yours. So as an individual with my own experience up to this point,

Even if I follow somebody else's steps exactly, I'm not going to end up in the same place because I am not the same person with the same experiences. What I can do is say, that is something that inspires me. And so how can I learn from them and then take what works for me, leave the rest, and then maybe over here say, ⁓ this person inspires me too, or I'm inspired by

Nobody, and I'm going to figure it out on my own. But it doesn't mean that we're not, it doesn't mean that we're doing it in such a siloed space that it's like, have to keep my stuff to myself. Like we inspire each other all the time, but we're not trying to cookie cutter each other.

Louise (11:44) Right, absolutely. And yet sometimes there's these spaces that are created where it feels like we have to be that same cookie in order to fit, right? We have to be that shape of that puzzle piece to fit over here in this puzzle. ⁓ Society has done that to us, right? Patriarchy has done that to say like, this is the puzzle, this is the shape that you have to be and this is where you fit. ⁓ And it's...

Kim Romain (12:12) But that would also mean that we all have to be the same shape puzzle piece and then that means we don't actually have a puzzle.

Louise (12:13) doesn't feel good.

You

Kim Romain (12:20) Right? If we're all building the, if we're all a thread in a tapestry, right? Let's even say, Patriarcha said, this is the tapestry that we're building and it looks somewhat like Betsy Ross's flag, because we're going in the way back machine. This is the tapestry that we're building. You have a place in here. Not every single one of those threads in that tapestry are the same color, are the same width, are the same length.

They can't be, you're not going to be able to build the tapestry. You can't sew it that way. You would have a okay, you would have a giant single collar, non-diverse, very huma- hmm.

Louise (12:58) Hmm.

Keep talking. It's bringing back some kind of memory of something recently.

Hmm.

Kim Romain (13:09) Yeah,

yeah. So, right? So there's the desire for that, but that doesn't exist.

It doesn't exist. Not like there is, again, there are no two, when we look at identical twins, there are still some differences.

And those are the people that are like the most closely linked in terms of like mirror images of each other.

that they still live different lives and still have different experiences.

Even if it's the difference of like, took my bite of food before you took yours. Well, there was that three second difference there. And who knows what happened in that three seconds.

Louise (13:47) So let me ask you, do you feel that there is a place, so we're talking about like, people show up authentically. However you need to figure that out, figure that out, and then we show up in the world authentically. Do we live in a world that embraces authenticity?

Kim Romain (14:06) Not currently.

I on the large scale, not currently. I think that there are spaces for that and people are finding those spaces where they can be more authentic because it doesn't feel safe. It genuinely doesn't feel safe to be authentic in a lot of spaces right now.

Louise (14:26) Yeah, think we're really, and we really suffer from that, right? Like we really like deeply as a culture, as a society, we suffer from having created that cookie cutter.

Right? Society. We all buy Oreos. Nobody, right? We all buy exactly the same thing. ⁓ We all look for exactly the same thing. We all look the same. Taste the same. Yeah. Yeah.

Kim Romain (15:02) I mean, it's a disservice to humanity. ⁓ When we are thinking about our lives, what then is the purpose of our lives? And I don't mean to go completely bleak here, but if we're living a fully homogenized life, what is the purpose of our lives? Why are we here? What are we each as an individual here to do if that is the direction we're headed?

I mean, I think it's pretty clear that's not the direction that I'm nor are you. And that's why we do the work that we do. The more conversations I am in, the more I recognize how important is the work that we do.

Louise (15:37) Mm-hmm.

Kim Romain (15:44) Because even if it's just for that moment that we're with the person or the group that we're with, they can see themselves still.

Louise (15:52) Yeah, or for the first time.

Kim Romain (15:55) Mm-hmm.

Louise (15:57) Yeah.

Kim Romain (15:58) And if we don't keep seeing ourselves, we've all read the books, we've all seen the movies, we know where we end up.

And here's the thing about those books and movies. There's always the revolution at the end where the individuals rise up or the androids or whatever, but we're going to go with humans. We're going to with the humans rise up. knowing that that could be the direction that at least a portion of humanity is heading towards is this tapestry of a single color.

a unified length and width of thread where nothing is different.

What happens to those of us who are not part of that? How do we keep showing up?

Louise (16:49) That's the question, right? How do we, when it feels like we go against the grain or it feels like it's too impossible. let's just, instead of fighting the current, let's just go with it. Like really at the end of the day, it gets back to purpose. What does it matter? Right? Because it's swimming against the current. Sometimes it's tough.

Kim Romain (16:52) Mm-hmm.

is really tough.

Louise (17:14) It takes

extra energy, takes right afforditude. We gotta dig deep sometimes to keep going when it feels like we're swimming against the current.

Kim Romain (17:27) It's so interesting. I've, I, a lot of, black creators and black authors that I follow have been saying lately that w welcome to their entire experience and that, that awakening as, ⁓ for white people that are willing to wake up, ⁓ to say, wow, it's not always okay for me to speak my mind.

It's not always safe. yet sometimes I'm still going to do it anyway. ⁓ It's not safe for me to be authentic. That comes with privilege. And I think it does. Right? I mean, I do feel I'm living on this side of the border. I have fear about going back home because I can't continue to have, I don't feel like I could be having these conversations as freely if I still lived in the States.

I feel like they would be hampered. My authenticity feels like it would be hampered if I weren't living outside of the United States at this point. And we have very close proximity, you and I. And that's scary. There's a little bit of safety, but it's still a little scary to think about what is going to try and bleed over.

Louise (18:35) Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Kim Romain (18:48) And so how do we, if we're in a, if we have that privilege of not being in the thick of it, again, how do we hold the space for those that are just trying to stay connected to themselves through this process of whatever's

Louise (19:05) Well, you know, it's...

authenticity isn't like a on or off, it's not a light switch. And so I think, you know, as we're talking about like, how do we be authentic? And it's great if we can, right, have that kind of freedom and that kind of privilege to do that. And yet we are still, we still have so much control over

not what we do, but maybe how we do it. And it comes back to, I think, that essence of coming back to understanding in your deepest part of self, how are you showing up in those spaces? And I think that's the fertilizer for authenticity.

is the more we show up in places and spaces in a way that feels aligned with who we are, it can be small little bits, but it can start to grow within us and grow around us. We're never going to change anything if we just go with the flow. We're never going to see what's upstream if we just float downstream.

We're never going to see what's on the other side of the river if we just let the current take us away. And so, but it's finding these little bits of strength, these little bits that allow us to move forward and continue on. And by modeling that, it's amazing the ripples that we send out. So even though I...

can never ever imagine what it's like to be indigenous in this country ever. Right? That doesn't mean that I should stay quiet. It doesn't mean I shouldn't be my authentic self because I like, who am I? There's all these, all of these questions, right? Who am I to, right?

Kim Romain (21:08) Amen.

Louise (21:19) start some crazy ass business and right, who am I to think that? It's like no, no, no. It's like yeah, who? Me. I am me. That's who I am. And yes, because if I can do it, then other people can see that I can do it and they maybe take some of that from right from me to to bring into it. And as I'm doing it, how am I lifting others?

How am I shedding light on colonialism or what kind of practices is I bringing into my work so that it feels authentically and genuinely me? And by doing that, yeah.

Kim Romain (21:57) Well, and it's

bringing in those different aspects that we see that we may or may not touch up against, but what do we see? What are we learning? What are we understanding? ⁓ And how does that influence and impact us? And how do we then catalyze that? And how does that come forward?

Louise (22:20) Right.

Kim Romain (22:23) And that's that constant evolution, that ability to say, we see what's happening. How can I step into the spaces that allow me to feel brave enough and courageous enough, where I do feel some sense of safety? Not saying that all spaces are safe, particularly those that say this is a safe space. Generally, you want to be a little cautious. ⁓

But in those spaces, when we step into them, we want to say, OK, if I feel grounded in this moment where I can speak my truth, that is allowing yourself to come back. I mean, think of stories from growing up in a Jewish home. I think of stories from the Holocaust. I think of all different types of stories from all different walks of life.

and those individuals both inside the camps and outside of them who stayed connected to self for as long as humanly possible. They stayed connected to their own humanity. And that's where I think that fertilizer, that core nugget of authenticity comes from is when we stay connected to our own humanity. Because that's what's gonna see what's happening around us.

good times, bad times, whatever, it doesn't really matter. It's just what's happening around us, allowing it to come in and filter through our systems, and then we get to bring it out into the world in a different and new way that we can only do. That to me is authenticity.

Louise (23:54) Right,

right. And it takes a hell of a lot of courage sometimes to do that, right? Like, let's be honest, those two things go hand in hand, often.

Kim Romain (23:59) Yeah.

Yeah.

Louise (24:08) And if

it's not our external environments that feel really safe and we need to find the courage to do that, our internal environments also are often chaotic and disruptive. And sometimes just saying those things feels like such, like it feels so scary because of our internal dialogue and our internal stories and our internal environment that we carry around with us.

So sometimes we're fighting this on the inside and fighting this on the outside, all in the all in the name of authenticity, like all in the name of that. so why do like, right? Why do all of that? Right? Sure. Maybe we're changing the world. But like, why? Why?

Kim Romain (24:55) Just that little thing. We're just changing the world. Whatever. But why do it? Other than changing the world? I mean...

Louise (24:58) Yeah, why? Yeah.

Kim Romain (25:01) I don't think you have to do it. I want to give a little voice to that is if you consciously choose to say, that's too hard, that's not for me, that's not what I want, I actually like being like everybody else. I don't want to be different. If you have no appetite for desire to see why it is that you want to be that, what's driving that?

That's your choice.

That's your choice. If you do have a desire to belong and be authentic, because I think there's also the far side of this one also is I'm so authentic and unique that I don't give a fuck about what anybody else wants. I'm just going go off my own. You wouldn't think we're talking about those individuals in this conversation either. It's this middle place where it's like, I want to fit in, I want to belong, which are two different things, and I want to feel authentic and

own my own individuality. I want to have that place of personal agency.

The question was why. To me, that middle group wants to actually experience their life.

I don't know how you experience life if you're choosing to just fall in line.

There's a difference between performatively following in line to keep yourself safe. Right? I'm going to show up and do the things that need to be done so I can keep myself safe. And then do the things that you need to do to also fulfill your own...

meaning in life. Those places of

that light you up from the inside like nothing else does. To feel all the feelings that we are gifted in being human beings, to have the experiences that we can have as human beings, to love, to be loved, to feel sadness, to feel grief, to feel anger, to feel rage, and all the other feelings in between. Like that to me is to think deep thoughts, to speak our mind.

I think that's why we do it. Like we do the work, the inner work and the outer work, because it's both, because otherwise we're not really experiencing our own lives.

How about you? mean, what do you see? do you think we do it?

Louise (27:34) I think it's this desire, like when we can shed all of those other things externally or shed those beliefs that are imposed upon us. we come back to ourselves in order to, and you said it, I think I would just use different words, but in order to be whole and to live a whole and full life, period. That's why I do it.

Right? It's about like, it's about understanding who I am and what I need in the world and what I need to be putting out into the world to feel whole. Right? If nobody wants my shit, if nobody buys my stuff, well, then I have a finance problem. ⁓ But if nobody feels like they need what I'm putting out or how I'm putting out, I can adjust and I can change, right? maybe there's...

Maybe I just don't have the product right. Maybe nobody wants a career alignment strategist slash menopause doula who helps them navigate midlife. Maybe nobody wants that. Maybe there's not a right. Maybe not. But I can find my thing. That's just the thing. Right. That's just the thing. That's just but when I can find like who I am and and put me out into the world attached to something or not attached to something. ⁓

Kim Romain (28:46) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Louise (28:59) That's being authentic, right? That's being whole. That's, I would say the word fulfilling. I don't like that word. That's like stitching parts of me together, right? That's how it feels. I do things because of that, right? And when I show up authentically in some place, I feel like, fuck yeah, that was awesome.

Kim Romain (29:28) Mm-hmm.

Louise (29:29) And it could be like, maybe I don't make any connections. That's fine too. But I was me. And maybe I was in the wrong space. That's okay. I was me. that coming to that is absolutely a journey. ⁓ And I think that's why I do it. Like, I hope that it sends out ripples and I hope that those ripples like, right?

help others or impact others or infect. I don't like the word infect after COVID, but infect others, right? With that sense of joy or purpose or optimism, for sure. And I'm still putting it onto the world, ⁓ regardless of if somebody's not picking up what I'm laying down, damn it.

Kim Romain (30:21) I love

it. I love it. Yeah. It's, and I think that goes across so many different places, right? You're speaking as an individual and as a business owner. And I can think of, right, my time both in the practice of law and in the nonprofit sector. And I think of my own like nonprofit, the organizational clients that I have.

It feels really hard to do that because there's one way to do it. And yet what history has shown us is there's never just one way. There's always that quote unquote trailblazer. And wherever we are and in whatever we're doing, whatever capacity we're doing it in, whether it's our work, whether it's personal lives, whether it's our individual development,

having the ability to say, in here is my path? Is my path to follow along? Sometimes that is our path and that should not be shamed, right? And I don't say should in the shoulding on us kind of way. Like shaming individuals for choosing to stay on a path. One, because they may not know any different. Two, because they...

are choosing it because it feels safest and it helps them stay centered in who they are for whatever reason. Allowing people to make that choice. Not everybody has to be a trailblazer, but taking that moment and saying, where is my path in here? Am I on my path or am I on somebody else's path? And which one feels most aligned to me in the moment?

I think that's where we make the decision to step into authenticity wherever we are. What path am I on and am I choosing to stay on this path?

Louise (32:21) Yeah, yeah, you're making your own tapestry, right? And some threads you have and others you gather along the way. And gathering a thread from someone else doesn't make your tapestry less unique, right? And let's just remember folks, right? Like your tapestry doesn't have to look like everyone else's. Like it's not even going to.

Kim Romain (32:24) Mm-hmm.

Louise (32:50) no matter how hard you try, right? So it's this collection of these threads, right? And sometimes Kim, you and I probably might have a few of the same threads, right? We use the same color, we write the same, all of those things. It doesn't make us less unique. But if we were to copy someone else's, and I think that's like, that's where we get into trouble.

Kim Romain (32:50) I was gonna, it can't. It can't.

Louise (33:19) is to say like my tapestry has to look exactly like that person's because they're successful and no matter how hard we try it's just not gonna it's just not gonna work.

Kim Romain (33:32) Yeah. I think the big thing for me is remembering that every single one of us is living a separate life. Like we get to live them together, but every one of us experiences life differently from the first breath we take into the last one we take. There is, there are no two lives that, that are identical. so making your own choices within your own life is the greatest gift that you can give yourself.

Again, understanding there are sometimes we can't make decisions because of the circumstances that we're in. We can't make specific decisions we would like to. So where can we make those decisions? Where can we carve that out for ourselves? What ⁓ do you want to highlight today for our listeners?

Louise (34:14) Mm-hmm. Yeah.

I just love that whole imagery of the tapestry, right? And really like, you know, you can start on your tapestry without knowing what it's gonna look like. You don't have to have a right? You probably won't even if you did, it's not gonna turn out exactly like it. And that you collect those threads along the way from the people, from the experiences, the places you go.

All of those things just add to your tapestry. ⁓ I love that. Thank you for sharing that and saying that today. Yeah.

Kim Romain (34:50) Yeah. Yeah,

you're welcome. It's so interesting when you were saying, you're probably not going to know what it looks like. I was thinking about those hook rugs. Do you remember hook rugs? So when our daughter was little, I bought her some hook rugs and it has a pattern on it and kind of like a light color for you to follow in the different areas. Well, she decided she was going to go like rogue for a little while. I think this was back in her, the part of her.

Louise (35:01) I do. ⁓

Kim Romain (35:19) time where she was like, I'm going to test the boundaries. And then she went, I like following rules better. But she was doing that for a while and it created this really cool abstract design that was not part of what the tapestry was or the rug was supposed to look like. But it was still beautiful. And so we may have this idea that this is the way that I think, or society has said, I'm supposed to live my life, but go pick a different color.

Louise (35:45) Mm-hmm.

Kim Romain (35:48) and grab a different hook and see what happens. Because, right, that's when we start to understand our truest nature is by testing something. It's an experiment.

Yeah. Louise, thank you. know we didn't dive into everything that we have to say about this, but we have more episodes that we can do that in.

Louise (36:12) Absolutely. So make sure that you come back, dear listener.

Kim Romain (36:16) Such a polished ending. Please come back.

Louise (36:18) Thanks, please come

back. And in the meantime, you can follow us on YouTube or wherever you listen to podcasts. And also, you can follow me on Substack. And I've got the rag going on there, where we talk about the no BS stuff around perimenopause and menopause. So that's what the rag is all about. How about you, Kim?

Kim Romain (36:43) Beautiful. Yeah. I'm also over on Substack over at the Alchemy of Ease where we talk about ways to create ease by utilizing both what the cosmos is giving us, what the 3D world is giving us outside of ourselves and how we can align that internally to find our way forward with ease, even in the shit storm of life.

Louise (37:05) All right, thanks everyone for tuning in today. Bye for now.

Kim Romain (37:10) Take care.

Kim Romain (37:12) And that's all for this week's episode of the Empowered and Embodied Show. We hope today's episode has sparked something within you. Remember, we're all on this journey together. If something did resonate with you today, why not share it with a friend who might need to hear it too? You can find us everywhere you listen to podcasts. Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode. And if you're feeling generous, leave a review. Your feedback not only helps others find the show, but also helps us understand what's most valuable to you.

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