Words of Wellness with Shelly

Transforming Life with Wellness Habits and Homesteading: Liza's Journey of Sustainable Living and Intentional Self-Care

• Shelly Jefferis • Season 1 • Episode 34

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Could a change of scenery transform your entire approach to wellness? Join us as we uncover the inspiring story of Liza Carden, an innovative entrepreneur and owner of an Aveda hair salon, who is boldly transitioning from Florida to North Carolina to start a homestead with her husband. With a mission to grow 80-90% of their own food, Liza shares her experiences managing a business remotely while embracing the challenges and joys of sustainable living. This episode dives into the importance of mental wellness during significant life changes, offering a holistic perspective on integrating high-quality nutrition and intentional living into your daily routine.

Discover the power of mindfulness and self-care as Liza and Shelly tackle the pitfalls of the all-or-nothing mindset. We explore the profound impact of incorporating small moments of stillness into your busy life and the transformative benefits of practices like journaling and goal-setting. Listen in as we reflect on the humorous and enlightening moments of making significant lifestyle changes, and learn why facing resistance can be a pivotal step toward personal growth. Through this heartfelt conversation, we aim to inspire you to make thoughtful, intentional life choices that enhance your overall well-being.

CONNECT WITH LIZA: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/_liza_carden

Look for YouTube channel coming soon: Carden's Garden

CONNECT WITH SHELLY:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wellnesswithshellyj
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShellyNeumannJefferis

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Thank you for listening to the Words of Wellness podcast with Shelly Jefferis. I am honored and so grateful to have you here and it would mean the world to me if you could take a minute to follow, leave a 5-star review and share the podcast with anyone you love and anyone you feel could benefit from the message.

Thank you and God Bless!
And remember to do something for yourself, for your wellness on this day!

In Health,
Shelly Jefferis

Speaker 1:

And we have an opportunity every day to wake up, to be renewed, to make new choices, to change our mind about something that we thought we wanted. If we decide that it's no longer for us, like, you don't have to be bound to that thing and you get to make a change and it's all okay. None of those things define you and you are worthy of exactly what it is that sets your heart on fire you and you are worthy of exactly what it is that sets your heart on fire.

Speaker 2:

Do you get confused by all of the information that bombards us every day on ways to improve our overall health and our overall wellness? Do you often feel stuck, unmotivated or struggle to reach your wellness goals? Do you have questions as to what exercises you should be doing, what foods you should or should not be eating, how to improve your overall emotional and mental well-being? Hello everyone, I am so excited to welcome you to Words of Wellness. My name is Shelly Jeffries and I will be your host. My goal is to answer these questions and so much more to share tips, education and inspiration around all of the components of wellness through solo and guest episodes. With 35 plus years as a health and wellness professional, a retired college professor, a speaker and a multi-passionate entrepreneur, I certainly have lots to share. However, my biggest goal and inspiration in doing this podcast is to share the wellness stories of others with you, to bring in guests who can share their journeys so that we can all learn together while making an impact on the health, the wellness and lives of all of you, our listeners. The ultimate hope is that you leave today with even just one nugget that can enhance the quality of your life, and that you will. We all will, now and into the future, live our best quality of lives, full of energy, happiness and joy. Now let's dive into our message for today.

Speaker 2:

Hello everyone, and welcome back to Words of Wellness. My name is Shelly and I'm your host, and I am excited to introduce to you today my guest. She is an entrepreneur and she is an incredible person that I feel like one of those people you know when you meet and you feel like you've known them for years and they've been one of your best friends for many years. That is how I feel about Eliza, and so welcome today, my friend. I'm so excited to have you on.

Speaker 2:

Thanks for having me, shelby, I'm so excited to be here on your podcast. I know, and we've been talking about this for a little while, and so it's happening and I'm super thrilled we are fitting this in today amongst your very full schedule. So thank you, I appreciate it so much, absolutely, and I know you're you know we were talking a little bit before we started to go live, but you're in a big transition in your life right now, and I know one thing we're going to kind of dive in today when it comes to the topic of wellness is kind of maintaining our mental health and our mental wellness when we are in business for ourselves, when we are in the middle of a transition. So do you want to share kind of everything you have going on right now?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I would love that. So I currently own an Aveda hair salon here in Sarasota, florida. We're coming up on nine years. I've been a hairdresser for 18 years and everything kind of led up to this. This is what I thought the pinnacle was going to be of me opening a business and building that, and it has been amazing, an amazing journey. I love being a business owner. I truly feel like that was what I was meant to do and over the last nine years I've grown. I've seen a lot of change within business and just the way things have gone and dealt with stress and transitions and that.

Speaker 1:

But after I met my husband, we started talking more about different things and he started helping in the salon.

Speaker 1:

I had owned the salon about a year before I met him and he started getting a little bit more involved and we really realized that we love working together.

Speaker 1:

We wanted to have a business together of some sort and we weren't really sure what that was going to look like, but we just kept praying about it and seeing what would happen.

Speaker 1:

Well, throughout a whole nother journey of you know fertility and infertility, I guess, which you and I have talked about before getting really interested in where our food comes from, and and mental um, mental health and all so many different things that go into that we really started being interested in, like someday we wanted to have a homestead and what seemed like a dream that was going to be five, 10, maybe more years down the road we got the opportunity to purchase eight acres in North Carolina, which is not where my salon is, and move there. So we are currently in the process of moving. We move on Tuesday, move there, so we are currently in the process of moving, we move on Tuesday. And so it's this journey of I'm keeping the salon and going through. You know what that transition is going to look like, with putting somebody else in in a managerial position and now also moving and starting this homestead life and all of these business plans that we have in that and developing that together. So a lot of transitions that are happening.

Speaker 2:

That is so exciting and I love the different. You just literally like touched up on so many important topics when it comes to just our overall wellness and and really, ultimately, one of the goals that you both are working towards is growing your own food, having a healthier lifestyle, putting higher quality nutrition in your bodies, right. I mean, I think that's just so important and so exciting that you're doing that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's actually our goal to produce 80 to 90% of our own food, so we are going to have a huge garden. We're going to have livestock so that we can have even all of our own meat, which means we're going to be learning how to do all of those things that we've really never done before. We've had a garden and we have chickens, but we just use them for eggs. We don't do any butchering or anything like that right now. But it's going to be like a whole new world of just diving in and being able to really be responsible and care for something right, like caring for these animals and loving on them and then appreciating the fact that they're loving us by helping to sustain our life, and just this whole circle of being good stewards with the land that we've been gifted not gifted, we've purchased, but the land that we've been gifted by God.

Speaker 2:

I love that. I love that. That is. That is so neat and I can't wait to hear later on how it's going, because that to me is sounds so foreign. But how exciting at the same time to learn all of that. And you're going to learn it, you know, alongside your husband. I think that's so, so neat. Just this morning I was out I love like replenishing the sugar water for our hummingbirds and the seeds for our birds and I was literally this morning going wow, this is like I enjoy this, but it tacks on about half hour, 45 minutes to my morning. I can't imagine having a farm, I can't believe it's having those thoughts this morning. And here we are. So funny, that's so funny.

Speaker 1:

You know it's going to be a whole new, and part of this is just a different pace of life. Right, like I am somebody who my entire life have had the thought of why would I walk when I can run? Right, like I do everything fast, I move from project to project fast, I make decisions fast, I do everything quickly. And with this it's just a different life, like it is really going to be slowing down and being intentional in our decisions and being intentional with the food that we eat and the decisions that we make. And and really, because we're, the town that we're moving to has a population of 240 people, so there is no door dash, we are not having food delivered at night that we just feel like we want the our favorite pizza place.

Speaker 1:

So it's a whole new thing of being intentional and planning and slowing down and and really thinking about what we're putting into our bodies and what decisions that we're making. And that's something that when I have slowed down and like when I'm cooking gosh, like I really can slow my mind and like be present in that moment. And I am not a chef my husband will tell you I am not a chef, but it's like it makes you just be still for a minute, and I think that we can all use a little bit more of that, and that's something that I really struggle with, so this will be a huge challenge for me.

Speaker 2:

Well, and that's a hundred percent Well, and that's 100%. And I think this is so great that we are talking about this, because having the stillness forces you to be present so much, like you're saying, we are so caught up in society and so much of the time we're not taking that time to be present and it's like that hamster wheel right when we're just keep going to the next thing, going to the next thing, instead of like taking a moment to just chill and and be and have that downtime. I share a lot of times. There's a book uh, you maybe have read it or seen it but it's about that very thing just being still, and it's so great because each chapter just breaks down still, and it's so great because each chapter just breaks down different parts of our lives and being still in that moment and how to experience stillness, and it's just such an important topic. And I was also going to go back to. You made a reference to the fertility and infertility.

Speaker 2:

It will be quite something to see how this impacts you in that area as well, I think you know I had a gal on not that long ago and she's a coach in the area of fertility and it a lot of what she shares comes from. Exactly what you're talking about is just getting into that mindset of being more present, being intentional with what we're doing each day for our health and taking that time to slow down. And her story was fascinating because she went through fertility treatment and she was able to have children, but then when she went on later and learned more about the process and really started to kind of incorporate more tools about like what you're saying, she got pregnant naturally, like almost immediately. So it's really fascinating.

Speaker 1:

It really is and there's so many things that you know. Funny, my husband was talking to his Nana today and she moved to. Actually she moved to Canada from Italy and was an indentured servant while she was trying to get her citizenship here. Just a really interesting story. But we were telling her she's 96, that you know we were moving and that we were going to have livestock and a farm and all this stuff, and she just starts laughing. She's like gosh. I moved to America to get away from all of that and now here my grandchildren are recreating it and it was so fun. It was just like that circle of you know, I think.

Speaker 1:

For so long we were trying to industrialize everything. We're trying to, like, make everything more efficient and faster and really, at the end of the day, that's not necessarily always better and yet, for whatever reason in society, we've always been reaching for that. Whatever reason in society, we've always been reaching for that. This, this thing that I've been reflecting on a lot recently, is how we've been, how we've given up great for good, enough, right, like? There are these grounding sheets that I've been seeing that people are putting on their bed. That's supposed to help them be more grounded, but we could walk barefoot outside and also be grounded, or we could work outside and get a good sweat on and work in a garden where we have a sauna mat, like there's just so many things that like we already have it and yet for some reason, we're looking for this like new technology, advanced way to get the thing that we already had.

Speaker 2:

That we have and it doesn't cost anything.

Speaker 1:

Exactly, Exactly, but for some reason I think if I spend $200 on it it will be better.

Speaker 2:

Right, it makes no sense. No sense, but that's such an excellent point. You're right, you're totally right.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and even when you think about our food, how many times do you think you're making a healthy choice about something because it's labeled gluten-free or natural or whatever? I was actually looking at something the other day. I've, since I've been through going through this fertility journey, really been looking at, you know, reading ingredients and trying to have things that only have things that I can pronounce. And I was reading this snack and it had good, good, good, and then, like, the last ingredient was like something like organic canola oil. I'm like that's an oxymoron, like, oh, is that even a thing? But the cover of it it looked healthy, it had all the buzzwords. But really, how much better would I have been if I just like had a bag of carrots or like there's things? But we try to find these newer and improved things when really we don't need to reinvent the wheel?

Speaker 2:

No, we really don't, and I love that you're doing that. It brings me back our oldest. We have three children, as you know, and our oldest is 25, my daughter. And I'll never forget because, even though my husband and I came from a health physical education background, when I became pregnant with her, I became more intentional at reading labels, like you're doing, and I remember back then going, oh my gosh, like back then, you know, there were so much more, um, uh, not just the artificial ingredients, cause that happens today still but like the colorings, like there were certain things that went, oh, my goodness, you know. And so I think that's huge.

Speaker 2:

And, like you're saying, you can read a label and you get down to the bottom and go why is this? Ooh, this is, I don't want this in my body or what is this, and so many, I don't think do that, and it's time consuming, right, but it's one of those things that's important and it's time consuming, right, but, yeah, it's one of those things that's important. And that's one thing that I was actually on another podcast today and we were talking about just the fact that we want to increase the awareness around this very topic. Like it's overwhelming to think about making all these kinds of changes, but if you take small steps along the way, it's so important and it's just bringing about awareness with people to understand what we're being exposed to every day, what we're putting in our bodies. How can we make some changes so we're healthier in the long run for ourselves, for our families and our future families? And it's it's a really important topic. It really really is, and it's a really important topic.

Speaker 1:

It really really is and I think that it can be overwhelming. Like I am the kind of person like I am such an all or nothing person. I'm really trying to work through like 80% right, like 80% is good, but I'm like, oh my gosh, if I haven't cut out every single thing and done all of the things, and it's like okay, and sometimes even 80% is too much to handle, depending on what's going on in your life. And for me, one of the biggest game changers has been not just food, like I understood that.

Speaker 1:

I knew that I've always been a fairly healthy person, but I thought that I could skip the mindset work, the meditation, the being still like if I'm, if I'm exercising and I'm eating well, like you know, those stuff, those things help with my stress management. Like I don't need to do any of these other things that take all this time. And even just starting to take five minutes a day and doing like mindfulness practices Gosh, like that really was a game changer for me and I actually would set alarms on my phone at different times and like force myself to go into my office and like take, even if it was just 60 seconds or 90 seconds of like breathing and being still for a second it was like, okay, I could move on and that was a really different. It's still a very difficult thing for me to commit to all the time, but that's a huge game changer and we, I think, we think we can bypass that.

Speaker 2:

I love that you're bringing this up, because I talk about that too, and it doesn't have to be a lot of time, like literally stepping outside in the morning. I'll step outside for five minutes yeah, some deep breaths, get a little fresh air. Minutes, yeah, some deep breaths, get a little fresh air, and it's. I think we have kind of stuck in our minds that it's going to take a lot of time or it's going to interrupt our day. We don't have the time.

Speaker 2:

When you're like you're saying it doesn't take that much time and it's so critical and it's easy to overlook, I mean, I even think back in the days when I was teaching fitness classes at gyms and I would stay and I would work out back in the day, many, many years ago, what would I kind of cut out was the stretching part and well, a high that's. That's just as important, if not more important, than the cardio and the strength, right? So it reminds me. You know, that's okay, I don't need to do that. Well, yes, we do need to do that and we know that it's very critical for our overall physical health. So it's the same kind of thing. I mean, all of it's important. It's just finding the balance and and try not to get overwhelmed by doing it and just knowing that it doesn't take a lot of time.

Speaker 1:

My challenge would be for your listeners to. It's like, whatever that thing is that you have the most resistance to, that's probably the thing that's going to be the most beneficial for you to. That's probably the thing that's going to be the most beneficial for you. Like I struggled to exercise, to be motivated and I struggled to stay on a good eating routine and all of that, but like I was fine. This thing, the being still part that was like where I had the most resistance. So whatever that thing is for you, I feel like that's probably something really beautiful. On the other side of that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's so true. I love that. You say that, I love that, and it's so interesting to think that's where you have the most resistance. But this new lifestyle is going to force you to even be more still right, I told you I'm all or nothing.

Speaker 1:

I'm all or nothing. I am just moving to the middle of nowhere. We can't, we cannot get high speed internet where we're living. I think I should Girl Like I am slowing down.

Speaker 2:

Wow, what are you going to have to like drive like an hour to like a coffee shop or something?

Speaker 1:

I know we're going to. We got like this little Verizon hotspot thing. We're like, oh, this should work like four days in there Like you have used all of your data.

Speaker 2:

Oh my gosh, that's hilarious. Okay, that's hilarious. I love it. I can't wait to. I can't wait to hear. I feel like you, you're going to need to do like a, a journal, write a book on this, on this whole venture, seriously. Yeah Well, we're going to need to do like a journal or write a book on this whole venture, right, seriously.

Speaker 1:

Yeah Well, we're going to start a YouTube channel Perfect, and we were talking about. It's not going to be to teach anybody anything, because we don't really know anything. It's just going to be to take you on our journey of all of the shenanigans.

Speaker 2:

I love it. That's hilarious. That's going to be entertaining. I can't wait. So going back for just a minute, cause I know one thing we've touched upon and talked a little bit over various conversations is like you're talking about the mental health and and and experiencing some anxiety with some of the things that we go through in life. What do you think in your, your it sounds like your experience and now, what has helped you in those moments and I'm guessing you taking the time to now really practice being still is a big one Anything else that you feel has helped you?

Speaker 1:

The number one thing when I started doing all this yes, being still, but taking a step further is I committed to journaling. Journaling was huge and I, because I am a goal setter, I committed to writing three pages a day. Wow, there were days that I would write I have nothing to write about over and over, like they were lines. At school, I got to get my three pages. Someday somebody's going to find my journal. It's just going to be pages and pages. I have nothing to write. I think this person was psychotic.

Speaker 2:

But hey, I love it. You kept big promise to yourself, right, I did.

Speaker 1:

I did, yeah. So journaling was huge and I think, releasing yourself of judgment of what you write about and remembering that it's your space it's not for anybody else to read and just writing to yourself, writing questions down that you don't have answers to it's amazing the answers that I would come up with as I was writing the question. So I think journaling is really, really good. And, yeah, keeping promises to yourself, like you just said. I mean, if you commit that you're going to do something because you're helping yourself and you wouldn't break a promise to your best friend, right? You wouldn't make a promise to your spouse. So why do we break promises that we make to ourselves? It just doesn't make any sense.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's a good one, so true, yeah. Well, I am just excited for your future adventures here. I seriously can't wait to hear and then see all of the fun moments. It's going to be, I'm sure entertaining, you know, for our listeners. I'm going to encourage you all to follow Liza, because she does some very funny lives and things on Instagram. You're you're entertaining already. So to add this whole new life and experience into the mix, I can only imagine what it's going to be like.

Speaker 1:

Thank you. I'm glad you think I'm funny. Sometimes I think I'm the only one who thinks I'm funny.

Speaker 2:

No, you're hilarious.

Speaker 1:

You're hilarious.

Speaker 2:

It's so much fun to watch you. So what would be any last tips or areas that you want to share with the listeners when it comes to your overall wellness and what you've experienced? And I mean, you've shared so much already, but any last minute tips?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think the two things that I would say that I would want to leave somebody with are one that you are worthy. You are worthy of whatever it is that you are seeking. If that is your health, you are worthy of being healthy. You are worthy of being successful, and I think sometimes we subconsciously don't believe that we are. So therefore, that's where our saboteurs come in and kind of prevent that. But when you can change that mindset of reminding yourself that you are worthy of it, that can really break down some walls.

Speaker 1:

And the other thing that I would say is that you are not your actions, you are not any of those things that you label yourself. You know, I think sometimes we get stuck with the label of either we're lazy, we never work out, or I am a health coach, or I am an entrepreneur, or you know whatever these labels that we give ourselves entrepreneur, or you know whatever these labels that we give ourselves, and we're none of those things and we have an opportunity every day to wake up, to be renewed, to make new choices, to change our mind about something that we thought we wanted. If we decide that it's no longer for us, like you, don't have to be bound to that thing and you get to make a change and it's all okay thing. And you get to make a change and it's all okay. None of those things define you and you are worthy of exactly what it is that sets your heart on fire.

Speaker 2:

Love that. I love that. Well, if our listeners want to follow you, my friend, where's going to be, where's the best place? And when you start your YouTube, your YouTube channel, what is that to be called?

Speaker 1:

Yes, so Instagram is the best place to follow me. My name on there is going to be changing, probably next week. So when you post this, probably so our YouTube channel, our website, all of that. My last name is Carden Liza Carden. It's going to be Carden's Garden. It's going to be Cardin's Garden.

Speaker 2:

Perfect, that's perfect, love it. I always love making like a play on words or rhymes. Perfect, I love it. We saw an opportunity, hey, and it's going to be an amazing. It's going to be an amazing journey, I just know it.

Speaker 1:

And well, thank you so much for having me on here and sharing this with me, and I'm so proud of you for, you know, creating this space and creating an opportunity for women to just pour into other women and I know that wellness is something that you are so passionate about and creating this platform for you to share your knowledge and your wisdom with your listeners is a really amazing thing. I know that this was something that you wanted to do for a long time, so I'm really proud of you for taking the leap, and I know that you're just pouring into so many amazing women through this.

Speaker 2:

Oh, you're so sweet. Thank you for that. That means so much and I'm just, I'm just loving sharing people like yourself with, with our listeners, and just sharing journeys and wellness journeys and inspiration and and you've definitely done that today. So thank you so much. I love you tons and again, we're going to have to do a follow-up, follow-up episode from Cardin's garden, have to do a follow-up, follow-up episode from Cardin's garden. I can't wait. And to all of our listeners, thank you so much for tuning in and, as always, do something for yourself and your wellness on this day and until next time, have a blessed week, everyone, and we will see you real soon.

Speaker 2:

Thank you so much for tuning into today's episode. I hope you gained value and enjoyed our time together as much as I did, and if you know someone who could benefit from today's episode, I would love and appreciate it if you could share with a friend or rate and review Words of Wellness so that more can hear this message. I love and appreciate you all. Thank you for listening and if you have any questions or topics you would like me to share in future episodes, please don't hesitate to reach out to me through my contact information that is shared in the show notes below. Again, thank you for tuning in to Words of Wellness. My name is Shelly Jeffries and I encourage you to do something for you, for your wellness, on this day. Until next time, I hope you all have a healthy, happy and blessed week. Thank you you.