TRANSCRIPT
Gissele: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele.
We believe that love and compassion have the power to heal our lives and our world. Don’t forget to like and subscribe for more amazing content. And if you’d like to support the podcast, you can go to buymeacoffee.com/loveandcompassion. Today, we’re gonna be talking about healthy boundaries, and
Our guest today is Nina Tiara, a self-growth coach who helps women stop over-functioning, set healthy boundaries, and reconnect with themselves. Drawing on her own journey of healing and personal transformation, Nina brings a no-nonsense, honest perspective to personal growth.
Her three pillars are processing emotions, understanding core programming, and creating healthy boundaries. Please join me in welcoming Nina. Hi, Nina.
Nina: Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to share the wealth of information I have in my lived journey.
Gissele: amazing. Thank you for being on the show.
Can you tell the audience a little bit about how you got started in [00:01:00] this work?
Nina: How did I get started? That’s interesting. I had an arranged marriage, and in that arranged marriage, actually, the arranged marriage had nothing to do it. It was just more stressful. What really happened was, as a child, I had a lot of programming.
I didn’t have any boundaries in my life. I didn’t know how to process my emotions. they say a child, when they’re young, from age, I don’t know, from the day they’re born till seven, I think, the age is, they take on programming. So basically, my parents, whatever they knew, they passed it on to me.
But me being a very sensitive nervous system, I absorbed it. I internalized it. And I didn’t have anybody to model anything different. My sister was younger, my brother came 10 years later. I didn’t have any cousins or anybody. That’s just the way it was in my environment at the time, okay, when I grew up.
So then as I got older and when I got into a marriage at 21, I had more responsibilities. I ended up having a host of symptoms: depression, anxiety, insomnia stomach [00:02:00] issues. I had a lot of symptoms like that, and there’s a lot more I could go into. But I had a lot of symptoms that are coming up, and I was looking for help everywhere.
I was going one modality to another. And then 2006, I met a woman who’s a woman’s health coach and naturopathic doctor, and I started working with her. And, she basically said a few things to me. You’ll become symptom-free. You’ll live the life you want.
Your children become like you. You’ll find your soul purpose.” At the time, it was just … I was like, “I wanna get, work through these symptoms.” And what I thought was, like, maybe a few months’ journey ended up on a, from 2006, I would honestly say October 2025, I still remember it clearly what happened.
Everything, like all the jigsaw puzzles just connected. I really started in tune with my emotions and having boundaries in October 2025. And that’s how I ended up finding my soul purpose after 20 years of work with her, healing myself, and that’s how I found a soul purpose to support [00:03:00] other women that are going through,
And I still see it and no judgment ’cause I was there too once Most of us as women, we know how to feel, but we don’t know how to process emotion deeper. So I help women process their unprocessed emotions, feel them, and then I help them look at their core programming, ’cause that’s huge. Those in- two interact.
And once we got that sorted out, then we can go deep into helping you create effective and healthy boundaries. All three of them connect together.
Gissele: That’s beautiful. Thank you for sharing your journey. And I agree with you. Many of us that had programming from, parents that might have had their own intergenerational trauma and their own issues, and so we tend to hand that down.
But the good news is we also tend to hand down compassion and love, and you can have that intergenerational health, which is important. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about how you recognized you did not have healthy boundaries. Oh. Because in this society, I think that we’ve been conditioned to [00:04:00] overgive, and so to not overgive may seem like an odd thing to do.
How did you realize you didn’t have healthy boundaries, and what helped you shift ?
Nina: So when I was doing the work with my practitioner, like I, I was already a very highly intuitive empath. I didn’t know this until I did my journey. So I was already thinking when things were happening, this isn’t right.
They can’t treat me like this. But I didn’t know it was boundaries. And when I started, people can’t treat me like this, right? In general or the s- stuff that was happening in my life. And it wasn’t until I started on the healing journey, I realized through processing emotions and then doing, and looking at the patterns where it was all coming from, that I was really not taught anything about boundaries.
It wasn’t… My family didn’t have it either. Basically, I was living on autopilot, and that was through shifting through my emotions, looking at my patterns. I realized that… And I used to think having boundaries was guilty and shameful. I can’t do this. W- but then I realized the way people were treating me people will take [00:05:00] advantage of you.
I’m sorry to say this, but even your family. And there’s nothing, no shame or any guilt around it. And I learned that people were taking advantage of me for my kindness. I was an overgiver, and being an overgiver was a reason I had all these health issues because I was go go. There’s no way this nervous system, I call it, or body can take the amount of stress that I took.
It’s a miracle as well because some of the things that were happening to me, like I was actually having mini seizures. I didn’t know this until later- Oh, wow … as I was healing. At night. Yeah. So now that I’ve healed, I notice that not feeling your emotions on a deep level and not connecting to your core programming, meaning patterns as well, where did it all come from?
Can you understand boundaries? If I told you right away, and you’re coming as a client to me or a friend, “Hey, do you have boundaries?” They’re gonna look like They’re gonna be so dumbfounded because if they don’t know boundaries, if they haven’t done the other two steps, feeling their emotions and [00:06:00] looking at where it all came from, understanding their upbringing, their subconscious programming, they’re not gonna understand boundaries.
So that’s when I realized that when I started doing the work that I was… All this stuff, I started connecting dots. I remember when my mentors taught me, told me to connect the dots. That was the hardest thing. I was like, “Connect the dots.” That took me a long time. And once I started connecting the dots and now I have simpler, more prompts and tools for my clients.
I feel my mentors were very hard on me. Maybe that was my journey. But I know depending on where my client is, I want them to learn to process their own emotions, how to get to the boundary parts. But I found my mentors were very hard on me. Maybe that’s, that was my journey, right?
But yeah, that’s how I realized that through my own healing journey, The way my stories had flowed, the things that happened in my life, I didn’t have any boundaries, and that’s why they happened
Gissele: Yeah. Yeah. That’s very interesting.
I wanted to go back on the the comment you made about [00:07:00] kindness. And I think it’s often a misconception that kindness is over-giving, and it is not. Because the kindest thing and the most compassionate thing you can do for yourself is have healthy boundaries. Because I don’t feel like other people want to violate our boundaries.
They don’t wanna do hurtful things. They just do it out of ignorance or fear. And so the kindest and most compassionate thing you can do for yourself and others is have healthy boundaries. But we have been taught that over-giving is kindness. We have been taught that putting others first is kindness, and it is not.
That’s why in the Bible… I think it’s in the Bible, they talk about love your neighbor as yourself, right? And so in order for us to be able to give to others, we have to be able to give to ourselves.
Nina: 100%. And I actually had a aha moment, ’cause I visited somebody on the weekend that I hadn’t seen for over a year, connected to my past.
And it was interesting. She brought up some stuff, and I said, “Wow.” She was absorbing that. So people were [00:08:00] seeing it because they had boundaries, or they just didn’t sit right with it. So she shared with me, like, when I was in that place, in that family, or in that system or environment, what her perspective was.
I’m like, “Wow.” And so going back to kindness, I had to do more journaling that day when I got home. Actually, I was doing it last night. I was like, “Wow, do I be mean to this person and totally shut them out of my life because they are part of my life?” But I had already done this work, so that kindness part was healing myself further because this person is gonna be part of my life as long as I’m around, my children are around, and I will be connecting with them somewhere as I have grandchildren, all that.
I f- I thought I had to heal that part of me, right? So yeah, the kindness is… Once you start loving yourself and you start feeling your emotion, you start understanding what happened to you it’s gonna take time. It’s not… Because first it’s gonna… It’s not gonna feel so good. I gotta be honest.
This work does not feel too good. But it’s not a quick [00:09:00] fix. And, you’re nodding your head. You agree . It’s not a quick fix. I don’t… I remember when I was doing the work, my mentors did not tell me it was gonna be hard. Because had they told me, “Oh, you’re gonna feel like crap,” I may have not done it.
Seriously. I tried to get out of it a couple of times. She goes yeah, but your symptoms aren’t gonna go away.” And I’m like, “Oh, shoot. That’s what I’m here for. I wanna get better.” So going back to kindness, I think that you develop that kindness muscle as you heal yourself. You understand those people were a mirror to your healing, to your deep- understanding yourself. And you know what? You’re still mirroring. As, even as you heal… I know, I’m looking back, some of the stuff that’s happening, but it’s just flowing through me. As you heal, the healed version, people are gonna be triggered by you. So first you’re the unhealed, people reflect.
You don’t have boundaries people are gonna treat you that way. So once you have the boundaries, you develop that kindness, people are gonna be kind to you, and their kindness may look like they don’t call you [00:10:00] anymore. That’s okay. Yeah. A- that means they’re not supposed to be in your life anymore, right?
I’ve developed that kindness muscle now. But Women are shunned for their emotions and having boundaries. and I do not bash men at all, because everybody’s unlearning.
Okay? Yeah. Once we learn it for ourselves, we treat the other person way better, whether it’s male or female. But going back, it’s a belief that we have to be kind, right? But kindness at the expense of where we’re hurting ourselves, no. Then that comes people pleasing, right? So I think on my journey, as I healed, I mirror to others that I’m not accepting that behavior, and it’s just been a ebb and flow.
It… I’m just mirroring, and I’m sure you’re mirroring with other people you connect with. So I think that’s how I developed my kindness muscle. Yeah.
Gissele: Yeah. So you mentioned your culture and how it influenced your ability to have healthy boundaries. How can you still… respect your culture and at the same time do something that might [00:11:00] support yourself that may not necessarily align?
Nina: That’s a good question.
I think when I look at… I don’t think it’s just a culture, it’s a family system. So we- … can name it as a culture. You’re in that environment. That’s where you grew up. That’s where you were born. That’s how they were programmed subconsciously. They’re not being bad parents, but you know what you know, right?
Yeah. So they keep doing the same thing, it’s like they always say, teaching a dog a new trick. And to ch- shift that programming, or the, they also call it neuroplasticity, to change it, it’s a lot of work. It’s not a day’s work. And it’s also depends how much are you willing to do the work every day.
Because I can be your guide, but how much are you willing to… I love learning. I could sit there and journalize and come to a conclusion within minutes. I connect dots really quickly. So when you go back to the culture I think understanding where I am at the level, that was their level of consciousness .
And I saw that through my family, how my father started [00:12:00] treating me when I first separated in 2012 to divorcing 2015 to now how my family was treating me. I could see that. Sure they said a lot of things. “Oh, she’s doing this to culture. She’s leaving.” But once I shifted myself, and the biggest fear in a culture or even a system it wasn’t too long ago divorce was shunned even in other communities .
Yeah. It’s not just my culture. In the white culture- … or Chinese, whatever, it’s… At the end of the day we’re all one under this umbrella. But we have these names. It was shunned Upon. And people worried about what happened to your children. But what I learned in going back to when I was doing the work, she said, “Your children will become like you.”
I actually saw that shift with my children, I would say more so in the last five or six years when I shifted. And I was shifting. My older one’s a very old soul, and I have a different relationship with him, the firstborn, and I have a different relationship. Now it’s all good, but differently. But with the younger one they’re only five years [00:13:00] apart, but he would make co- little remarks here and there as I was doing the healing journey.
“Oh,” just little remarks and I would like okay.” “Are you going to learn that now, Mom?” And I’m like I think he knows. Yeah, he’s a s- he’s a old soul.” And as I’ve healed I have an amazing relationship with my two boys. Yeah. So going back to the culture, that’s all they know, but you shift yourself.
And shifting doesn’t mean I’m gonna be mean to you now, but I’m gonna have boundaries. And boundaries are self-love. You actually have better relationship with people, first with yourself because you’re in control of your time, you’re in control of your environment, you’re in control of everything around you.
And also the people you shift, and then you decide who do you want to be with. Andyou’re gonna have to have different boundaries with different people because you’re able to decide, oh, this person operates this way. Not in a mean or a manipulative way, but that’s how kindness and compassion or boundaries are gonna work with them.
Yeah.
Gissele: Definitely. I’ve observed that in my own [00:14:00] life. I wanted to comment on what you had said, which I think is so important for my listeners to understand, is that this journey is not an easy journey. It’s simple, it’s not easy, which means you have to be willing to face those difficult feelings.
You have to be willing to sit in the muck, to sit in the fears, and to constantly or daily show up for yourself. And that’s why, you mentioned, you’re like if they had told me how hard this was gonna be, I probably wouldn’t have done it.” That’s probably why they didn’t tell you,
Because if somebody tells you, “This is gonna suck,” we are taught to avoid pain. We are taught to move away from difficult feelings, but it is through the feelings where the healing happens. I know from my own journey, there was many years where I… My journey could have to healing could have been a lot faster, but there were some things I wasn’t ready to face in that time.
So I still kept taking baby steps, but I was like- … “Okay, I’m not ready for that yet. I’m, I’ll do whatever.” So I’m curious as to [00:15:00] what helped you keep going in the face of-… the adversity and the challenges you faced in your healing?
Nina: Oh, what kept me going? I’m also a kind of person when I start something, a course or any kind of thing, I love learning, so I keep on the route.
But what was interesting with this lady or the modality I did, it’s called biotherapeutic drainage. Not many practitioners do this, but she was also same culture, about 10 years younger than me, and she was just… She embedded in me those four things. You become symptom-free. You’ll live the life you want.
Your children become like you. You’ll find your soul purpose. So as I was stepping in one step, I saw ebbs and flows of the journey where a year … So from 2006 to 2010, I was completely fine. I had energy. I was still on autopilot, but I still saw the energy coming. But I was still not 100% well. I still hadn’t learned how to feel emotion.
And [00:16:00] then I had my heating crisis, which was 2010 or 2011. That was hard, ’cause all of a sudden I felt well, and then I crashed with deep depression. It wasn’t just deep depression. I crashed with … ‘Cause I had irritable bowel syndrome, and everything that I had came to the surface, right?
So now I’m actually connecting more dots. So it came to the surface. I think what kept me going on, because there were times I felt better and there were times I didn’t, and I finally connected the dot that, yeah, your body that wasn’t felt at that time when you’re going through that situation or a problem and you don’t feel it then, it has to come out.
That took me a long time to understand. And I, in the back of my head, I would say, “This woman’s crazy”, and I would swear at her. I would never do it in front of her, but it was in my head. I’m like, “Is she nuts?” I’m not … I would question it continuously. And I think that was the biggest thing, that I had that resistance.
If I don’t, now I’m gonna have to … Okay, I’ll [00:17:00] tell you. A situation that happened yesterday. I was coming down the stairs and I was putting on my jacket and about to go to the gym, and I hit this funny bone on a edge of a corner. Oh, my God. Did it hurt. old Nina would’ve screamed and yelled and She breathed through it, and because she breathed through it, she had less adrenal hormones that came up.
She had less cortisol that got pumped out. Everything. I breathed through it. I’m not saying it didn’t hurt. I breathed through it, and I was fine. Sure, it’s sore. I gotta get to my massage therapist soon. It’s still sore. But that’s how I, I think I had a lot of resistance, and that resistance only created a lot more adrenaline in my body.
And I also, I forgot to mention, I lived in a fear state most of my life. Okay? So having lived in fear state, I already had a lot of adrenaline. Of course, I had insomnia. ‘Cause your body the human body is just amazing, and I got to learn that over 20 years. And I’m still learning [00:18:00] it, and you, I can see you’re shaking your head smiling ’cause you agree with me, right?
And it’s just a miracle. It’s like even after my parent, both my parents passed in the last year, and I started looking into … Afterlife, and I always… My mentors always said we’re multidimensional, and you know what?
We are. So that kind of work is being mirrored to me now, and I’m like, wow. Why are people afraid of death? And actually on my mom’s anniversary, ’cause my sister had mentioned I know it was August, but I didn’t know exactly when. And it was just in August 18th, I think it was. At that night, in my sleep, I think it was early morning, I remember I had a phone call.
I picked the phone up, and I said, “Hello?” And it was my mom on the other end, and I said, “Hello,” and the phone went dead. So I was like, yeah, that had a profound effect on me. So there are, there is something. This body, yeah, we’re not gonna be in it. It does disappear, but there definitely is something beyond us.
We don’t know exactly what it is. So ’cause I always think we came [00:19:00] here. we came from somewhere. We’re not just gonna go air. So yeah. So that’s very interesting. So people not doing it. And that’s people’s own journey, ’cause I was scared of death very bad. And now
I’m living more in the moment, and it’s amazing, yeah.
Gissele: Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. I wanted to go back to, you mentioned the body symptoms and unfelt emotions connection. I was wondering what tips you would have for someone who is having… experiencing body symptoms- and wants to get to the root of the actual feeling. Like, how do we invite ourselves to feel those feelings when it’s just showing up as a physical symptom?
Nina: Okay. First, you wanna make sure you do see a practitioner, okay? D- I’m not against it, ’cause I worked with a doctor. I still do. Get my- Right
get their blood work done. Get that all done, and make sure that’s… ‘Cause sometimes low iron can contribute to you feeling tired.
when someone tells you meditate, and you’ve got all these symptoms, I’m sorry, you are not going to…
i- there’s no way you’re gonna [00:20:00] meditate because your mind is “Oh, my God, my stomach hurts,” or, “I got heart palpitations.” I- you’re already in a fear state, okay? So start with five minutes of journaling every day. I love my me time. I have lots of it . But sit five minutes, ’cause most people are running on autopilot.
That’s just what they’ve been taught as when they were younger. So sit with yourself just five minutes, whatever you have, five minutes and just sit there Feel what’s going on, feel underneath your feet, feel what’s around you. Touch, feel. Try to get out of that mind and journalize for five minutes. And maybe just sitting with yourself five minutes and slowly working towards journalizing.
That’s one way of doing it. Okay? Another way with your emotions, and this might be hard for someone at first, because I didn’t get it just recently and I’ll share that with you later how I got there. That’s sitting with your emotions. I read about sitting with your emotions. My mentor talked about sitting with your [00:21:00] emotions.
I think I listened to every podcast. So I had a situation, even though I’d done all kinds of healing, to get to the the root emotion. And every’s gonna have a different journey. Okay? So I don’t want people to be afraid, “Oh my God I don’t have 20 years.” But in those 20 years, I was still living life.
I was still raising my kids. I was still going to work. It may not looked exactly… People probably thought I was a bit crazier than normal, but that’s okay. I don’t care, because I know… Yeah, they probably thought, “Why is Nina having so much anxiety? We didn’t see her this way.” Because before, it was suppressed.
There was six months I used to fight with my parents. I used to call them to fight with them. They go, “Why are you fighting with us?” Because I, and I didn’t know how to contain myself at the time because things were coming up, right? So going back to how to feel your emo- is sit with them. I literally had two years, I’m not kidding you, I didn’t even know I had anxious attachment style.
So there was a relationship, in my life, a male. And this person came in my life, I don’t know yet, specifically came into my life in [00:22:00] 2023 to show me I had anxious attachment. And in that anxious attachment, so this went on for two years, and then a friend of mine says to me, “Nina, this is getting ridiculous.
Do you not have respect for yourself?” It’s… She goes, I see so much healing in you, and this is happening.” I said, “I don’t know, I would text and I would like…” And finally I go, “Okay.” A light bulb went on. “Sit with yourself, Nina. You’re going to plop yourself on a couch and you’re gonna sit.”
So literally I sat with this April. May or April. I sat with it. Literally- … every time the urge came to text this person or connect with, ’cause it was a dopamine hit I would get.
Gissele: Yeah.
Nina: I was like, “Oh, he text- … she texted me,” or, “He texted me.
This is great. We’re connecting,” right? But what I didn’t know where it was all coming from, and once I sat with it, I started to feel more healing. It wasn’t about the, about connecting with this person. I realized that anxious attachment and where it was coming from, and the other emotions [00:23:00] below the anxious attachment.
Boundaries. There’s so much that came underneath the anxious attachment. Why was I doing that? More self-love, more kindness for myself, and seeing that the other person as well is dealing with stuff, they might have… And I don’t like labels, but apparently there are labels, there are things for secure attachment.
But through that I learned, I think that person is avoidant. But I don’t wanna do that, because they’re on a healing journey, too. We all are. So that helped me get into secure attachment, and actually this person is still in my life, and it’s interesting. And so yesterday was, like, another, I noticed this person had liked all my Instagram posts.
I’m like, the old Nina would’ve said, “Oh, I think things are, coming apart.” And I’m like, “No, Nina. Sit with it.” And it was a different kind of sitting with it. I was a lot more relaxed. I was like, if this person stayed in my life as friend or whatever, I’m open to it. But I am not over-giving [00:24:00] and over-pleasing anymore, because it’s not doing me any good.
I don’t like pen pal relationships anyway . Texting is huge, and we start playing mind games, right? So those are- Yeah … two ways of healing, journalizing and sitting with your emotions, right? I know people read books. I did a lot of book reading. But until you actually start embodying these tools… And, workshops are great ’cause they give you a sense of, “Oh, okay.”
But I remember when my coach, it was interesting, going there, doing all the book reading. I used to keep all her notes. Everything she emailed me I would have in a file. So I think it was around 2010 or ’11, all of a sudden I couldn’t find her notes. I was like, “Where did they all go?” ‘Cause I would refer back to them, right?
They were gone. Yeah. And I told her. She goes, “‘Cause you don’t need them anymore.” So yeah, so it’s like embodying it. If I hadn’t actually tested this out, I still test myself in certain things, not in a bad and manipulative way, but from my kindness, my learning, right? Instead of jumping to conclusions, ’cause that person may not be thinking that at [00:25:00] all.
So yeah, so journalizing is a first step, sitting with yourself, going for a walk, just being in the quietness as well as sitting with yourself if you can do it, is … I think it is a bit of a advanced technique depending on how much, what is actually you’re trying to heal
But someone could try it because, but then they might feel uncomfortable with that, whatever that emotion is. I don’t know. Mine was that wanting to chase that person. Why aren’t they texting me back? Why aren’t they connecting with me? So it depends on what their situation. They can try sitting with it five minutes, and as they’re sitting, journalize.
‘Cause your subconscious will load into the conscious. I learned this in 2025 and had done so much work in 2006, right? So it’s a journey and everybody’s brain processes things differently, and I’m able to connect right away and say, “Okay,” so within a few sessions, okay, they lear- they’re a different learner.
Everybody’s a different learner and I know we can go with this topic for hours and hours. Reflecting back to my younger one, he was told [00:26:00] that he would not graduate with a proper grade 12, and I’m like, “No , he’s just a different learner.” And the kid has outdone expectations that I had.
And only I know as a mother what he was going through because I was also struggling. he’s just thriving at 27 So those are two techniques, and then people can shift and play with them. … But as someone starts working with me or somebody else your body always gives you information.
I find for me now that I’ve gotten so in tune with myself, even yesterday I was feeling, oh, I was having a temptation. I had ice cream. And Nina decided to have three scoops. Guess what? It didn’t sit with me and I was like, “Okay, why is this happening?” The next day I clicked in one, I’m lactose intolerance.
There too much sugar all at once for your nervous system to deal with.
And your blood sugar spiked, it’s gotta get rid of it somehow, right? Yeah. So yeah, you become … Once you do the, learn the tools, you learn how to process your emotions and get into the patterns and then have the [00:27:00] boundaries, you’ll see as you shift, your body’s gonna tell you, “Oh,” like my body will literally go nauseous if there’s a deep emotion for that situation, it’s gotta release.
It will literally, I will feel the nausea. I’m like, “Oh, that’s it.” And then slowly my brain kicks in. I’m like, it’s done. It’s healed.”
Gissele: Yeah, thank you very much for that. That was really helpful. as a person who’s sat with her own difficult emotions, I know how dynamic it can feel, right?
And you just have to breathe through it, and there is a level of courage that is required. And I also really appreciated that you mentioned it’s a journey. It might take somebody six months. It might take somebody 20 years. Oh, I’m still learning … yeah it’s a journey. I’m still learning.
And it’s not linear. It’s like it has ups and downs. Like you do great and then you think, oh my gosh,” and then you take a step back, and then you move five steps forward. And so it’s a journey. So once… I think once we stop judging ourselves as to what it should look like, I think we can do a lot better.
We- There’s the key.
Nina: [00:28:00] Judgment. Judgment.
Gissele: Yeah.
Nina: Yeah. Judgment is huge. I still find myself judging. What am I judging? And I have two rules in life: as long as I don’t kill anybody or hurt anybody, I’m good to go. Why am I judging myself, right?
Gissele: Yeah. Yeah.
Nina: Yeah.
Gissele: Yeah. I found in my own journey that I had a lot of expectations about what it should look like-
And then how fast it should look like. And what I’ve learned in my experience is really it’s not what we expect. It’s- … really about allowing and surrendering and releasing. Ah. So what role has surrender played in your experience in helping- Oh, I
Nina: love that
Gissele: question
your healing?
Nina: So surrender actually happens. People talk about surrender. For me, surrender, ’cause… it was- isn’t taught because the world is on autopilot. They don’t believe that we actually surrender and let life unfold, right? Yeah. So slowly surrender, and I would think the deeper surrender came after releasing my anxious attachment.
So that’s a great question, how that flowed well into releasing that surrender. I think it came after I realized my anxious attachment. I released it and worked around that, journalized, and sitting with it, [00:29:00] whatever worked for me. And I learned- That I was still too much in thinking how things are gonna look like in the future, how my business is gonna look like.
Am I gonna find a relationship? All that, right? What I learned was once I stopped doing that, that, Eckhart Tolle talks about that space in between, right? I started to become more present. I’m a lot more present today than I was a month ago. And it’s so easier to stay there now because I know being anxious is not going to resolve it.
And actually releasing … Another tool that I learned is we … I don’t know if men do it, but I know I, as a woman, we do it, or as I talk to women is, we start playing … This is only released through anxious attachment. We start playing stories in our head. Okay, he did this, she did this. Why did they say this?
When you can soften those stories or Every time a story comes up, bring yourself back to the present moment, and not get caught up in the story in the loop. Once you stop doing that, you’ll [00:30:00] find you can start living in the present moment. It … You have more what do you call it? Mental space.
You have more mental energy. You have more physical energy because you’re not in that… I noticed that right away. You sleep better, so many things. I used to have a lot of tension here in my head and like pressure here. And so I went to my eye doctor. It’s a good example of it. And I went to… I still get it on and off, but I I got it from my father.
‘Cause my father, when he was angry he would, he would get a lot of tension. So I would tell her, at certain points my feeling and programming, correcting all that, I would tell her, my eyes feel really weird.”
And so what it was, we pick up even gestures that our parents have. So I picked up that gesture, and then later it’s diagnosed as ticks, right? It’s actually what’s going in your life, unprocessed emotions, patterns, and all that, right? And not knowing who you are. So actually going back to that, so I had this pressure.
So once I released the anxious attachment and the stories [00:31:00] I’d created I felt that pressure went down. I gotta be careful with screen time and all that. And, we do get… We’re gonna have some sort of stress. But now I’m able to connect so quickly. Okay, am I bringing a story around that or am I just letting it flow and living in the present moment?
I found I have so, I’m so much more relaxed around my eyes now. I don’t get that pressure. If I do, that’s okay. I don’t judge it as much as I used to. So yeah, so- Going back to surrender, once we start becoming aware that I was creating stories around everything, I found that space to surrender, and I found some of the things that have been happening in my life, the things that have been showing up after releasing surrender,
and I find I wasn’t surprised some of the things happening right in my life because of the surrender, yeah.
Gissele: Yeah, definitely. And surrender is such a beautiful strategy that you can use. And I have found in my life that the more I surrender, the more things come or, you know- Isn’t that amazing?
things get better. Yeah it’s very [00:32:00] paradoxical. It’s almost if you don’t care about it, it comes, but if you do, you cling to it for dear life, it’s like it repels. It completely repels. And I’m like, that is so interesting. It’s very interesting.
Nina: And I’ll tell you a very
Gissele: interesting
Nina: story.
Yeah, of course. I’ll tell you a very interesting story on that, on surrender. So I’m also a caregiver on the side. As, as I move through my business and give it up once I start, working full-time there. But I love this caregiving job. I find the elders teach me so much, ’cause my… I worked in healthcare for 20 years before I, I started doing this, ’cause I didn’t wanna work in an office environment as I was launching my business. So I had this running joke, and I said, “Yeah when I, either the man… It’s just a running joke.
It means nothing. I said, “You know what? Either he’s got to own a jet or charter me a jet, or he’s got to be able to fly me first class.” And I told my friend this, and
one of my clients, all of the, all the father, the daughter, the son-in-law, the daughter-in-law, they’re all pilots. They’re all pilots.
Gissele: Oh,
Nina: So once you surrender, your subconscious, you change all your [00:33:00] programming and process your emotions, and surrender’s huge. You find the things. The subconscious is so deep. Sometimes I wonderit’s like a deep hole. The more you go into it… i’ve- done a lot of it, but some of the stuff that still comes out, I’m like, “Wow, I didn’t know that was there,” right? So I don’t know why.
Gissele: Yeah. Yeah. It’s definitely very interesting when you observe sort of your mind. I remember many moons ago I was meditating. I’ve been doing this self-love and self-compassion- … in, in the work that I do And I remember when I had, transitioned into creating a new career, and I was really struggling in terms of trying to force things to make things happen and all of these things- and, working on living my dreams, quote-unquote. And so I’m sitting in meditation, and I remember hearing myself basically “I don’t think I deserve… i’m not worthy of making it happen, that I’m not worthy of my dreams.” That’s what it was. And I was like, where did that come from? That was…
I was so shocked because I was never [00:34:00] actually the kind of person that was consciously mean to myself. We talk about that inner critic. You’re like, “You loser,” like- … stuff like that. I’ve never talked to myself that way. But actually having the belief that you are not worthy of living your dreams is also negative self-talk, right?
And so- 100% … it was interesting to me when it came up, to actually examine and look at some of these beliefs, right? Anything that comes up, like the belief that life loves you. Do you truly believe that life really loves you? Do you truly believe that you are loved by the universe, right?
And sometimes these thoughts, you’re like, “Wow, do I really believe that? And has that really shown up in my life this way,” right? And so that… It’s really interesting to, go deep with yourself and be present with yourself and try to understand and- And you’ve
Nina: got to change it. You’ve got to… you have a belief there, you’ve got…
Y- you can’t just surface it because… You can, and that’s called bypassing. So you bypass it. Yeah. But if you really wanna change it, it’s gotta become a new way, embodiment all across if you want [00:35:00] your life to shift.
you really gotta start embodying it. Use those tools. It’s like changing that neuroplasticity and then you know what? Things will start.
The universe… I know they say the universe also hears if you don’t… You can fake it till you make it. That’s part of it. But you’ve got, your actions have to align to get where you are, and your emotions. It’s what you feel, your thoughts, feelings. It’s all connected if you want to make your life go a certain…
And then you end up getting- It’s like a flow. Now I get so many synchronicities. now I look back at my coach, what she say, “You’ll find your soul purpose.” Now I think I’m understanding, oh, okay, the way my business is flowing, that, oh, my soul. She say, “You’ll find your soul tribe.”
And at the time I was dumbfounded. Now, I, as I’m going deeper into my business, I’m like, okay, let’s see, ’cause I’m doing some advertising and some marketing. Let’s see whose marketing the kind of women that register. I put my flyers and marketing material everywhere. It wasn’t [00:36:00] to one culture, but everywhere.
And let’s see the kind of people that gravitate towards my work. And, I create that soul tribe, ’cause I’m sure she had them. She had all kinds of people come to her. It wasn’t just cultural. But-
Gissele: Yeah …
Nina: it should be interesting how that works out. Yeah.
Gissele: Yeah, definitely. And definitely.
And so going back to the sitting with difficult emotions, I know that y- you had mentioned this as well is that the… Probably the biggest one has been the fear of death, right? Once we overcome the fear of death, I think a lot of people will release that anxiety.
‘Cause, I really liked what you had said earlier. Yes. When we’re in that anxious state and our mind’s constantly going, you can feel physically tired. Some people are like I didn’t do anything today. Why do I feel so tired all the time?” But if you have anxiety and your mind is constantly going, you literally feel physically tired because you are using the brain- Your thoughts are making you tired.
Yes. It’s energy. We’re all energy. Absolutely. Everything’s energy, yeah. Yeah. And so sitting with my understanding of [00:37:00] death and my… the viewpoint of death has really been probably re- a really interesting journey in terms of how we view death and getting past the point of death. I love NDE stories and thinking about what do we really know about death?
But it wasn’t until I was willing to and able to explore it that I was freeing myself from that belief that I am this body, and this body is the whole thing. ‘Cause the more that you believe you are a physical body, the more that any changes will have a negative impact on your wellbeing.
You’re like, “Oh, my God, that can’t be,” or, “I can’t age, I can’t die .” And so the more you realize, oh, I’m not this body. I have a body, and a body I love. 100%. And I am more than this body really goes a long way to free you. Can you talk a little bit very quickly about your journey with death? So I,
Nina: so I…
Th- that’s interesting. So I think having learned to heal myself, my emotions, and then, again, I’m gonna go back to the core programming, the patterns- … and shifting the boundaries, all that. [00:38:00] Learning me and who I am in this body, because everybody’s got a different soul, right? Yeah. I think on that spiritual level- That’s where I learned that to love myself and learn about me.
And as I came out of fear state and started feeling and just started flowing with life, all these synchronicity started happening. Some of the synchronies I should eventually maybe write a book on synchronicities. Some synchronicities that I had were amazing, and I know Deepak Chopra talks about in one of his books, I know it’s a small paperback, and basically he talks about synchronicities are your connection with God.
And the amount of synchronicities I’ve had And some of the things that have shown up oh God, I could… Some of the things, people have shown up at the right places and I’ve had money come in like money showing up that much I needed left in my bank account to help pay for something, that’s when as, as, as I started learning about myself, it gave me more deeper trust in the [00:39:00] universe. And when you have that deeper trust, you realize we’re not just a body. We came from somewhere. You start investigating more. Those kind of stuff starts coming at you through social media or whatever platform you use.
Or those kind of people start gravitating towards you. They come in your life and you start “Yeah, that’s… that makes sense. We’re not… We c- we didn’t know where we came from. We have no idea, but…” And everyone, we came from… And my journey was on a cellular level. So bi-therapeutic drainage is the modality, but it’s all on a cellular level, how your cells turn and how you can shift your cells and how we were born from two cells.
I just got to get so interested ’cause I got healed myself. I just got so interested in it and I started looking more into it. I haven’t gone to any workshops. I haven’t read any books yet. But just what I’ve connected with on social media, hospice nurses, and my own journey go deeper.
I’m like, this really… We weren’t scared to be born, [00:40:00] so why is there such fear of death? And then having my parents pass away within a year of each other. My mom was sick, so we knew. But with my father, and I think I also had a different relationship with my father. And each child has a different relationship with their parents and siblings.
So seeing my father pass away so peacefully , and even at his funeral, my sister was saying, “Dad doesn’t look the same,” and I… And then I learned that her perception, where she’s in her level of conscious in her life journey, that’s where she’s at, right? Her development.
My father looked so peaceful, Gissele .
I can’t tell you how peaceful- … he looked i, in the casket. He looked like himself. He glowed, and there’s some people I’ve, I haven’t gone to too many funerals, but some people don’t look like themself based on how they passed away. Their skin color changes. And no judgment at all.
I’m just observing on that topic. So there definitely is something after [00:41:00] death. I do believe it, ’cause you can’t just die and all of a sudden- people say you turn to birds. I don’t believe that. I think you turn into something non… It’s okay. Everybody’s got their stories. I believe that one too, once too.
So I think what’s… it… You… We don’t know. We don’t know the unknown. So why fear the unknown? What’s interesting… It’s sad when someone passes away young.
Gissele: Yeah …
Nina: that’s very sad. I really I can feel that, right? ‘Cause they didn’t get to live out their full journey, especially have, they have young children.
Their children get, didn’t get to know them. There’s a lot there. Full compassion there. And I’m sure there’s a reason behind that as well, right? We don’t know. Only they would know if they went deeper into their own healing, right? But there is- … something beyond death. There has to be. and that’s where surrender comes in.
I think you get to live your life without fear of death, and when it comes, you’ll embrace it I’ve come out of deep fear state, and now I, I talk about love and compassion, kindness, and I know some people think just crazy. It’s [00:42:00] okay. Call me crazy. But that’s okay.
We’re all, at different points of our journey. But yeah, there’s something… there’s gotta be something more beautiful after death. I don’t know. I’m in more surrender- Yeah, for sure … right now than ever. Yeah.
Gissele: Yeah. Thank you for that. A couple of more questions. What is your definition of self-love?
Nina: Self-love is first being able to- And I only can relate to my own journey, right? For me, it was releasing all those unfelt emotions and then getting- … to the underneath of them and having boundaries. But if someone didn’t have those conditions when they were born, can you imagine…
I was talking to my brother, I get these little stories, insights, and, we were talking about it last time. I think it was last summer when my mom passed away, we were talking about it, and I… He goes, if we didn’t have this conditioning,” my fa- my brother probably had a little bit, and he goes, “We could’ve been anything.”
He goes, “I could’ve been a doctor.” I go, “Me too.” The, how s- our conditioning affects our self-love, and then we gotta go through and work through it and [00:43:00] heal. Not saying-
…
Nina: If you heal it at 50 you can’t be a doctor, but then you may not wanna be a doctor, right? So I ended up-
Being a coach . So I think self-love came deeper through me through my own healing journey and learning about myself, and then I learned to love myself and have deeper compassion for other people because I’ve healed. I’m like, God, imagine what they’re going through, because-
Gissele: Yeah …
Nina: they haven’t done the healing or they’re not, as aware as I am today, right?
But I’m also looking at children that are being born today. They’re a lot more, depending, ’cause if parents have less conditioning, they may still have conditioning, but they’re a lot more self-aware of how to raise their kid. They may be doing it fake it till you make it. I don’t know. They may be reading books, they may workshops, or they could have family friends that are also helping out with the kids.
I don’t know. Or they’re going to daycare and they’re learning different things. But all of it’s making a difference. I’m seeing it with, kids that are being born today. They’re different. They’re smarter, and their [00:44:00] parents, their family, they’re questioning it. Oh my God, my niece’s two-year-old.
so smart. all of it’s a blessing.
You can’t change your parent. That’s what they were born in. That’s what they were struggling with as well. But yeah, I mean I learned at a different journey, but these kids that are born now, imagine what they’re going to be.
They’re gonna be cool. They’re gonna be rocking it. They’re going to be doing some amazing things out there
Gissele: Yeah. Thank you very much. Last question. Where can people find you? Where can they work with you? What do you wanna share with the audience?
Nina: Okay. So like I said, if someone may gravitate towards me, that’s great, but I’m not the only person that can support you.
There are other coaches out there. You can reach me on Facebook under Nina Thiara. The last name is spelled T-H-I-A-R-A. You can reach me on Instagram under Nina Thiara. I also have a Meetup group. So that Meetup group runs in the States and in Canada. It’s just meetup.com, and there’s… it’s called Becoming You, okay?
So it’s under there, and I’ll share the link in there. And I host a weekly meetup every [00:45:00] Thursday, and that’s complimentary. I also offer a 45-minute complimentary discovery call, https://www.facebook.com/nina.thiara.16/
you can share what’s, what you need support with. We can see if we’re a good fit to work together, and then go from there. So those are some of the ways that you can reach me.
Gissele: Wow. Thank you, Nina, for sharing your wisdom with us today. Yeah. Thank you to everyone who listened to another episode.
of Love and Compassion Podcast with Gissele. If you loved this episode, please share it far and wide, and we will see you soon. Bye.