Our hardest journey birthed IY - Dr. Nick and Nicoles Post Baby Story
Episode 223
In this episode, Kayla engages in a compelling conversation with Dr. Nicole Rivera, a trailblazing figure in integrative medicine and entrepreneurship. Dr. Rivera shares her transformative journey, moving from a successful brick-and-mortar medical practice on the East Coast to founding Integrative You. The discussion revolves around the pivotal decision to shift focus and prioritize a balanced life, synchronizing health, relationships, family, and personal fulfillment. Dr. Rivera emphasizes the importance of understanding core values, breaking free from societal programming, and embarking on a journey towards a "limitless 2.0 life." The episode delivers insightful advice for influential leaders, urging them to reassess their values and align their decisions with their authentic selves for a truly fulfilling existence. Interested in learning more about Dr. Nick & Dr. Nicole’s courses, memberships, or private work? Learn more at Integrative You . Have a quick question, Would you like to schedule a call, or just want to say hi? Text us at 732.913.0009. Our mission to innovate humans & Healthcare does NOT start and stop with us! This is why we are also dedicated to helping other practitioners in evolving healthcare too! If you are a healthcare leader and are looking to up-level your clinical + business excellence Learn more about our course membership: Limitless Healthprenuer and start boldly disrupting this industry! What you’ll learn: Start with Your Values: When feeling stuck or limited, start by identifying and aligning with your core values. Regularly reassess them as you evolve. Fun is Essential: Even busy leaders benefit from prioritizing fun. Creating a lighthearted environment contributes significantly to overall well-being and can be a catalyst for healing. Generational Change Begins Within: To create a meaningful impact on the world, focus on inner work and self-mastery. Balancing internal growth with external expertise leads to a more fulfilling and purpose-
Topics: integrative, family, unknown, nick, medicine, values, journey, nicole
Key takeaways from this episode
- ## Our Hardest Journey Birhed IY: Dr. Nick & Dr. Nicole's Post-Baby Story
- The Birth of Integrative You:** Discover how parenthood unexpectedly became the catalyst for a significant shift in their professional and personal lives, leading to the founding of IY.
- Redefining Success:** Learn how the demands of new parenthood forced them to re-evaluate their definition of success, moving beyond conventional benchmarks to incorporate well-being and family.
- Navigating the "Fourth Trimester" of Parenthood:** Gain insights into the realities of the postpartum period for parents and how to honor this crucial, often overlooked, time.
- Prioritizing Connection and Self:** Understand the importance of maintaining personal connection and self-care amidst the overwhelming responsibilities of raising a family and running a business.
Pull quotes
This is the place where you become limitless. **Unknown:** We are covering the latest and greatest topics, of course, in a disruptive fashion around integrative medicine, mental health, and human behavior.
We will be sprinkling in some truth bombs for our healthpreneurs, so they can join us in our mission to evolve healthcare.
If you are health curious and growth focused, you are in the right place. **Unknown:** But buckle up, because this is real, this is raw, and this is disruptive.
Transcript
**Unknown:** Welcome to IntegrativeU Radio, hosted by Dr. Nick Carruthers and yours truly, Dr. Nicole Rivera. This is the place where you become limitless.
**Unknown:** We are covering the latest and greatest topics, of course, in a disruptive fashion around integrative medicine, mental health, and human behavior. We are also covering how those topics affect the human and family dynamics. We will be sprinkling in some truth bombs for our healthpreneurs, so they can join us in our mission to evolve healthcare. If you are health curious and growth focused, you are in the right place.
**Unknown:** But buckle up, because this is real, this is raw, and this is disruptive. This is IntegrativeU Radio. Dr. Nicole, you are one of the most disruptive doctors in integrative medicine that I've seen, and I've been in the industry for a while.
**Unknown:** But beyond that, you've been making waves in the entrepreneurial space with your second successful company, IntegrativeU, where you're coaching some of the most influential leaders in self-mastery. So this leap in your work begs the question why, as an integrative medicine doctor who built and grew one of the most successful brick-and-mortar practices on the East Coast, would you take the risk of shifting focus when you were already crushing it? I think really what it comes down to is that my experience was to fill one bucket, there was a sacrifice of another. And unfortunately, I experienced it firsthand, and when my eyes were opened to this idea, I realized this was something that was happening with many people that I knew, but also inside of the healthcare practice.
**Unknown:** And really what I mean by this is I was able to fill my bucket of living my purpose. I was able to fill my bucket from a vocational success, a career success perspective. But the other areas that were getting little to no attention, essentially being sacrificed, was family, self, and social relationships. And this was one of the reasons why it took Dr.
**Unknown:** Nick and I a really long time to decide on having a family. And I can't even say that that was a hundred percent intentional. But I also sat back and I realized there were so many events that I was missing and birthdays. I, I was not connecting with my friends very often.
**Unknown:** I started not really getting invited to things 'cause I didn't show up very often. And I realized that this was not how I wanted to live my life. I wanted to find some type of balance, but I was so deep in the trenches of entrepreneurship that it was overtaking so many other parts of my life, and I knew there had to be a solution. And I also knew that there was a solution that existed.
**Unknown:** It wasn't about me recreating the wheel. And so I embarked on really creating more of this balance. But what I realized is that the people that have lives that they truly enjoy, they wake up every day unbelievably gracious for their life. They feel energized about their day.
**Unknown:** They truly can tell you that they feel joy on a regular basis. These are individuals that didn't sacrifice. What they did was they synchronized all the different parts of life, and they figured out a way to do that. And the way to do that was not what people expect, which is do more, you know, the ultimate strategy, the ultimate protocol, the ultimate manifestation.
**Unknown:** It was about doing more inner work, figuring out who you are, what do you value, what is your uniqueness at your core that makes people either love you or hate you? And being able to take the time to calibrate that level of clarity, calibrate it so that you can then create a life around it, but always synchronize all of those important parts of life, from relationships to family, to business, to purpose, to personal. That's where the magic is, and that's what I want to do for people now. 'Cause health is a part, and you can have great health, but that doesn't mean that you have great relationships.
**Unknown:** That doesn't mean you have great finances. It doesn't mean that. And the same goes on the other end of the spectrum. You could have all the money in the world, but you could be divorced multiple times, have no true friends that y- that support you, that you can rely on, and what does the money matter?
**Unknown:** You know, having your health is always great, but if you have great health but you, you're not able to use that great health to do things you love and spend time with the people you love, then also it, it feels... it doesn't feel as good. So it sounds like this was more of a personal and professional change for you, kind of just creating a, a, a place where you can raise the standard for human experience-... overall, as opposed to just one's health, because that's not all it is.
**Unknown:** So how has the journey of creating IntegrativeU and pursuing your own limitless 2.0 life, as I've seen you say, impact your personal experience? My personal experience is that the, the phrase that I say now is, "What gets you here won't get you there." And I have two other phrases, but we'll get there. But what I realized is that I did create a good life for myself, and I did... On paper, there were a lot of people that were like, "Wow, look what she has been able to accomplish." But there was something uneasy in my own body, in my own psyche, and I really didn't know what it was.
**Unknown:** But I was so busy that I didn't even really have time to dive into that. And of course, you blame it on all the things. "Oh, well, you know, uh, I have a lot going on," or, "Oh, you know, there's a l- there's a lot happening at work," or, or whatever it is. And you just continue to put it aside, put it aside.
**Unknown:** And then it... unfortunately, if you're like me, you have to hit a pretty extreme situation before you pay attention, and I really advocate for people to not do that . But hey- We all do ... everyone learn, everyone learns at their own curve.
**Unknown:** Yep. But I just hit a point where I just knew... and don't get me wrong, I didn't have all of the answers. I didn't have the utmost clarity.
**Unknown:** I just knew that I needed to take a step back to take multiple steps forward. I just knew that I-- the-- having the brick-and-mortar office and having the integrative medicine practice, it wasn't just that. That wasn't it for me. There was more.
**Unknown:** And again, did I know exactly what that was? No. But I knew that the busyness factor that was happening, the business bucket overtaking all the others, I knew that had to change, and that had to change so that I could step into that 2.0, even if I didn't really know what that looked like. And when you have this level of clarity, you, you sit back and you look at all the clients that you've worked with and you're, you think, "Wow, that person that really struggled to get better with their health, that makes sense," because it wasn't necessarily about the protocol or their commitment or their discipline.
**Unknown:** It was a, it was about the fact that they had no vision beyond being well. Why do you wanna be well? Why do you wanna get rid of these symptoms? What is the bigger picture around how this will change your life?
**Unknown:** How will this create a 2.0 of your life? And that is really the biggest thing. It's not about one area is superior to the other. They're all equivalent, and everyone is different with which area needs the most attention foundationally.
**Unknown:** So obviously, there are some people... there's many people that I've worked with that health was at the foundation. Once they got their health back, they were able to succeed in the other areas of life. But a lot of the ones that didn't succeed in their health, it's because there was something else that was more superior, and that could have been their mind and all of the limitations and all of the trauma they experienced.
**Unknown:** It could have been more in the realm of social relationships, feeling betrayed, isolated, alone. You know, every single person is extremely, extremely different. And so now some of the principles that I've applied in integrative medicine, I realize were s- are so ap-applicable to this concept. And so one of the things I've always said is you don't know what you don't know, and that was around leveraging better data for health.
**Unknown:** But also, you don't know what you don't know when it comes to the unconscious limitations, limiting beliefs that are holding you back from a greater life. And Dr. Nick and I realized, wow, we have very unique ways of gathering this data, bypassing the unconscious mind, and really being able to decipher what is holding you back that you don't think about. It's o- it's totally running in the background of your psyche saying, "You can't do that.
**Unknown:** That's too scary. You can't do that because you can't control that." And those are the things that keep us paralyzed, they keep us stuck. And the second thing that I've always said in healthcare, which now I realize again applies elsewhere, is how... it's not about what you do, but how you do it.
**Unknown:** And so when it comes to strategy, strategy is one of the key things that we have brought to the table in integrative medicine. I feel like that was what set us apart, because people would come to us and say, "I did the elimination diet. I did supplements. I did infrared sauna.
**Unknown:** I did detox. None of it worked." But the question is, is did you do it in the right combination or in the right sequence? And the same exact thing goes for creating this new version of you, this new limitless 2.0 version of you and your life, is do you know what is at the foundation of it all? And also, it's not about just collapse.
**Unknown:** Like, "Oh, collapse your limiting beliefs. Oh, get rid of your limiting beliefs. Positive thinking." You can collapse all you want. If you have zero clarity on who you are and what your vision is-You're gonna stay stuck.
**Unknown:** You can have a bunch of clarity and still have all those limits running in the back of your brain, you're gonna get stuck. And then if you don't know how to apply practical tools to really calibrate your body and your mind to your new vision, you're gonna be stuck. And so that's where the magic happens, is getting extremely, extremely strategic in how you go about creating this. I- I'm curious if you can share a story about one of your clients.
**Unknown:** I know you work with some pretty influential people and, and their discretion's important to you, so you don't have to name any names, although I want you to. But I am wondering what areas of life seem to be the most sacrificed or chaotic, and how that creating that clarity and that synchronicity that you're talking about really impacted their lives. So kind of two questions there. What I would say is foundationally as a society, and I can't speak to all countries of the world, but let's talk about the US, is that there has been a lot of programming since we've been very young that have created a lot of limits.
**Unknown:** And a prime example of this is when you go to school, you have your teachers and your principals and your vice principals, and you have these people that are classified as your superiors, and what they say goes regardless if it makes sense or not. What they say goes because they're in a position of authority. And for myself, I got in trouble a lot because certain things just didn't make sense to me. I got in trouble going to Sunday school as a Catholic.
**Unknown:** I got in trouble going to conventional public school, and it was primarily... I wasn't a rebel, I just authentically wanted to understand because certain things didn't add up. And I realized that a large portion of the world is things are not black and white. There is a lot of gray.
**Unknown:** There's a lot of gray in this idea of science. Science changes every single day. It changes every hour because that's the beauty of it, is that science changes based off of new data, new discoveries, new observations, new testing, and we are constantly in a state of change. But then the world will say that you should not change and you should be scared of change and you should stay comfortable.
**Unknown:** And so what I find is that the mind foundationally is a huge part of the things that will create major imbalances in those other buckets. So we have this societal foundation of don't speak up, don't challenge, don't ask questions, and unfortunately, a lot of both school and the workforce has ripped us from our common sense and our critical thinking. So we have that foundationally, but then we also have a lot of organizations that wanna tell us what to believe, what's right and what is wrong, and this goes from religion and different organizations and, what am I trying to say? Like cults even.
**Unknown:** But really it comes down to believe this because this is what's right and wrong. But really right and wrong is in the eye of the beholder. That's actually dictated on your core values of who you are as a human. There is no right and wrong.
**Unknown:** That would create duality. That, that is a, a complete violation of physics. So everything is always in balance. There is always gonna be good, and there's always gonna be bad.
**Unknown:** So to focus on a one-sided life i- is going to keep you really stuck and unhappy. So that, and then in addition to the things that we experience with our families, our upbringing. It doesn't have to be family, but this could be friends, this could be professors, this could be mentors, whomever, but they will often share their perceptions of the world of bad things happen to good people, you know, money is root of all evil. Every person has had a different experience with what that is, and that just goes right into that memory bank, and that is something that will then be a compass to how you look at the world and how you make decisions.
**Unknown:** So, so many people have lost their ability to understand who they are as a person, and a lot of people are terrified to be their true authentic self because they wanna be liked, they wanna have community, they don't wanna be isolated, they don't wanna be ostracized, they don't wanna be criticized. And that is one of the ultimate things foundationally that I think is keeping all of us prisoners. It's keeping us trapped. It is keeping us from the life that we really, really, really, really want.
**Unknown:** Then the longer that that goes on, the longer you live a life that's outside of your values because you have to subscribe to someone else's or some religions, you're gonna have physical symptoms. Your health is gonna go down the tubes. Or you're gonna make a lot of bad decisions on who you should marry and who you should be friends with. And so I feel like after that, every person, it's a little different, but I would say the biggest thing that I've seen is the mind to the physical symptoms with health.
**Unknown:** Okay. So in, in that regard, what, what, what advice would you give another influential leader that may think they're not living authentically or may think that, you know, perhaps I'm not understanding what my values are? Mm-hmm. But this is the kind of person, you know, these influential leaders, they, they still may not be living in their values and they-- even though they've grown so substantially in their careers and their lives- Mm-hmm ...
**Unknown:** they can still be stuck and find a limit for themselves. Mm-hmm. Uh, and so, you know, th-they're in pursuit of a generational change, whether it be wealth, health, or global change. What would be your one piece of advice to them if they're in this pursuit but they feel stuck?
**Unknown:** That's a great question. What I would say is, it-it's two parts because when I think back to my journey is, one, I did not know what values were. I, I d- I had no idea what that was. But I graduated with a degree, and I was very driven.
**Unknown:** I had a very strong will, and I had a vision, and I was like, "I'm gonna go for it. Failure is not an option." And so I went for it, and I just-- I was like a bull in a china shop. Some people called me a tornado. I made shit happen, and I'm sure there was a level of unconscious manifestation that was happening 'cause I would set su-strong intentions, and they would come to life.
**Unknown:** But I also had to be in control because it was always about the how. Like I was, I was writing down master plans of how this is gonna happen. And so I led with that, and that's what they actually call manufactured manifestation, is when you're always focused on the how and you have this tactical plan. So chances are it, it will work, but it will, it will cap you out, and it'll keep you pretty stressed.
**Unknown:** So as I mentioned before is what gets you here or there will not necessarily be what gets you to that next level, that, that two point O. Mm-hmm. And so I realized I can't-- there's no more hours in the day. I can't work harder.
**Unknown:** I get this idea of working smarter, but I don't really get it. And I, I just... I was like I, I need-- I, I don't know what to do. I need help.
**Unknown:** And so I was introduced to Dr. Demartini. I, I was actually introduced to him a long time ago, but his, his work just seemed... It came into my-- back into my life saying, "Hey, it's time for you to listen." And he talked all about values, and for me, it wasn't necessarily about his lecture.
**Unknown:** It was about my observation of a man who was so energized and so lit up that he was able to do a seven-day seminar that ran fifteen to sixteen hours a day. He barely ate. He barely slept. He was on, like on.
**Unknown:** He was not tired. And I'm like, "Man, what the hell is this guy doing? Is he doing drugs? I don't know." And really what it came down to is that he just kept saying, he's like, "I live in my values, and I delegate the rest." There was part of me that was like, "Good for you, man.
**Unknown:** I can't delegate everything." Right. But as soon as I let that guard down, I let, you know, my bullshit settle, I, I really looked at him, and I, I was, I was just so impressed with the fact that he was so clear on who he was, and he focused his days to prioritize living in his values. And so he prioritized researching, reading, teaching, and he was humble enough that he teaches on podcasts for free. Like it wasn't all about you have to pay a premium rate for me to speak or lecture.
**Unknown:** And it made me start thinking, "I don't even know what I value. I don't know what's important to me." So I got clarity on that, and I started really using that as a compass to make decisions. I started using that as a compass of where to say yes and where to say no. But then also, two of my highest values that have been the most clear since this exercise that I did many years ago was leadership and teaching, and I have upheld those two values almost every day for a very long time, over a decade.
**Unknown:** But it was more in the recent few years that again, that, that lurking feeling of there's something off, there's something missing, there's something, there's something that you, you need to, to acknowledge. And when you do the values exercise, you know, it's like, where do you spend your time? Where do you spend your money? Where are you interested?
**Unknown:** And I always had like travel, food, conversation, fashion, and I was just like, "I don't understand. Like fashion is not a value. I don't understand." And when I was able to take the step back and I looked at the big picture, I realized one of my values was fun-loving spirit. And I sure as hell will tell you there was a large portion of my life, especially when my career was successful, I was not having any fun because I was, I was busy, I was working, or I was stressed about working, or I was putting out fires.
**Unknown:** And my other was expansive adventure, and this is about doing different adventurous things out in nature that either challenge and expand my mind or expand my physical capabilities. That was another one completely abandoned. I didn't have time for it. I-- if anything, I could go for a run occasionally.
**Unknown:** So I realized that fifty percent of my values, of who I am at my core-Was, was on the back burner Right And it made perfect sense as to why I felt uneasy, and it made perfect sense as to why I needed to now dive into this 2.0 of what does life look like with encompassing all four of my values. So values, that's where you should start if you're starting to feel stuck or like you're hitting a ceiling or limiting yourself in some way. I, um- And if you haven't... If you've done values in the past, it...
**Unknown:** You know, some people are very fast growth. They're like constantly moving and shaking, like their life- Right ... it's like almost like every five years is crammed into a year. That's me.
**Unknown:** Yep. So it was three years, I was like, "No, I know my values." But I ended up redoing it because I had this hunch of there's something missing here. So even if you've done your values, one, if you can't remember your values, they're not your values. Your values are like who you are at your core.
**Unknown:** Like you should be able to rattle them off. Like I love when people are... I'm like, "Oh, do you..." "Oh, yeah, I know my values. Wait, wait, I don't...
**Unknown:** Did I put them in the Google Drive or like did I write them on that pad? Hold on, hold on, let me go get them." I'm like, "No. No, no, no, no. We're redoing your values because they're bullshit." Like that's not your values if you can't remember them.
**Unknown:** So if they're at your core, do they change? I don't, I don't think that they change change. I think that they get further defined. Okay.
**Unknown:** Okay That's really what it comes down to. So like my version of leadership, what it was 13 years ago is actually very different than my version of leadership now. So that's the thing is when you get into the nitty-gritty of doing your values, you have your value and then you have a short description after that is very specific to you. Because w- a lot of clients that I work with, a lot of the times when we get to talking and, and talking about their values, it's be- partly because of the attraction I'm sure that Nick and I have is a lot of them they crave connection, connection and community.
**Unknown:** But if I put connection as their, their value, every single one of them, connection means something very different. Some of it's more family rooted, some of it is more a community rooted, some of it is more having a big social group, like some of it it's about being like having vulnerable... What was my client say the other day? It wa- hers was unfiltered.
**Unknown:** She's like, "I want vulnerable, unfiltered connection." Yeah. Some people want compassionate connection. They're looking for like support through compassion. They wanna bounce ideas off of people, and they wanna feel like they're, they have their back and they have compassion for where they're at or what they're trying to create.
**Unknown:** So that's really the cool thing about it is that it's not about the value, it's actually about your, your version of that value. I, I heard you say earlier about fun-loving spirit was one of yours, and I- I've known that about you. I also have noticed the words, "And have more fun" are- Mm-hmm ... at the end of every single offer you put into the world.
**Unknown:** It's always, "And have more fun." Right. And so m- you know, most of us normal people, and I don't mean to offend anyone when I say normal, but we would think that the one percenters of the worlds, the global influential leaders are, are too busy to be concerned about fun. Mm-hmm. So why do you place emphasis in this area when you work with extremely busy entrepreneurial leaders?
**Unknown:** One thing I will preface with is if you're a person that doesn't care about fun, we're probably not gonna work well together, and that's okay. There's nothing wrong with that. I just one, ha- working in chronic illness for a decade, I realized that one of the factors for these individuals that were so sick is that everything was heavy. Everything.
**Unknown:** It wasn't just about their health. It... Everything was heavy, everything was chaos, everything was extreme. They authentically could not remember the last time they had a good time, that they laughed.
**Unknown:** And when you came into our practice, you either stayed or you left because even in the most extreme situations, you know, the most extreme health conditions, we were still going to prioritize creating a fun and light environment in our office. And we made jokes, and we would tease, and, you know, we would... We literally had a giant island in the middle of our office where patients would come and like on Saturdays especially, we would have snacks out. They would bring snacks.
**Unknown:** I would find clients talking to each other sitting at the island. And that I truly think was a huge part of their healing process, was that fun-loving light environment. Because when we closed our physical office, there was a large portion of people that didn't move forward with us. And I realized at that time it wasn't necessarily anything personal, it was...
**Unknown:** One of the reasons why they stayed is because it was a place for them to come where they were able to feel that light-hearted, playful, fun-loving spirit, and they didn't get that in a lot of other parts of their life or parts of their environment. And so I feel like it is a really, really big part of having-A great life. And I-- O-one of the goals that I have for the people that I work with is I don't want you to go on a vacation every year because I want you to feel like your life is a vacation. I want you to feel like, "I don't need to reset.
**Unknown:** I don't need to escape. I don't need to do that because my life is designed to live in accordance to my values and my family's values." Hmm, that is so inspiring. I, I know that you and Dr. Nick have made so many changes in your lives.
**Unknown:** And because you're having so much fun, and you're creating a life that you don't wanna escape from, that orbit that you have around you, it affects everyone in your lives. And so I'm wondering, you know, we can see it from the outside, but I'm wondering if you could tell us, uh, what ways have the people closest to you been influenced by your, your own pursuit of generational change and a life filled with purpose and fun and connection? I'm actually laughing right now because I'm pretty sure, if you could hear my voice, I'm pretty sure that I messed up my sister and my mom with my, my work I've been doing. And some of you might be like, "What is she actually talking about?" So one of the reasons when you go on our website, and you go on our platforms, you're gonna see this, this term generational change.
**Unknown:** And this was something that we have talked a lot about in the world of integrative medicine, in the world of healthcare because there is this idea, this proven idea of epigenetics. And so one, your genes can change based off of environment. Part of the environment is your mind, so you can turn genes on and off depending on mindset, intention, collapsing of limiting beliefs. But it's also based off of biochemical changes, detoxing bad stuff out, putting good stuff in, et cetera.
**Unknown:** But there is also this idea of transgenerational trauma. So beliefs, limiting beliefs, different types of like traumatic experiences, if it was abandonment, if it was fear, if it was grief, loss, whatever it may be. If the magnitude was significant enough in one event or if there was a compounding of the same emotion, constant fear, constant worry, constant anxiety, then that will change our genes, and it will carry on to the next generation. This is sometimes why when you see...
**Unknown:** when you, you hear about like little kids that are saying stuff, and they're like, they're worried about something, or they're, they're almost exhibiting anxiety, and you're like, "You're two years old. How do you even know what that is? Like, what's going on here?" Or they say something, you're like, "Whoa. Like where, where did you hear that?
**Unknown:** How do you know that?" And that is sometimes not their experience, it is what has actually been passed to them. And so with that, it only takes one person. We always say it only takes one brave soul or one risk-taker that will create generational change backwards and forward. So for myself, I more recently have been going on a deep dive journey into everything that I'm talking about.
**Unknown:** This clarity, collapsing my old shit that again is not in my conscious brain, and now creating a calibration to my, my new and improved higher self. And going through the collapse work, I didn't tell anybody. I was just doing my thing behind the scenes. And I talked to my sister 'cause we live in separate states, so over Christmas.
**Unknown:** She told me that she was bawling her eyes out, and she had no idea why and but she felt a lot lighter after a few days. And her husband goes, "This is Nicole, isn't she? Isn't it? She's doing this." And that's how...
**Unknown:** They, they all, they know. Right. And so she reaches out, and she's like, "What are you doing?" And I was like, "That's interesting you ask because I just released some serious shit from like childhood and all this." Oh. So that was kind of funny.
**Unknown:** And then my mom got really sick right after Christmas, and she was coughing, and she was having pain in her pancreas, and she started freaking out like something really wrong. Do I have pancreatitis? And ironically, that was an area... I'm trying to remember exactly what I was holding in my pancreas 'cause I did a very deep dive meditation with Dr.
**Unknown:** Nick, and it was not worthy, feeling not worthy. Hmm. And that was associated with my pancreas, so there was an identity of not feeling worthy. And so I went through the process, and I, I worked through that, and then this happened to me.
**Unknown:** The voice, the... I had mucus coming out of my sinuses. I had things coming out of my throat, and I just intuitively was like, "This is old." Like, this mucus I feel like is from my teens. Like this stuff is gross, and it has been in there.
**Unknown:** Like I am not sick. There was no fever. I was not run down. It was just stuff pouring out of my head.
**Unknown:** And so this is something for people to know is that, one, the body keeps score, and two, when you go on this type of journey to heal yourself and do that deeper inner work, you will have physical symptoms that come up. Those symptoms, I'm navigating them through, you know, different like laser therapies. That's the beauty of the integrative medicine is like I have tools, but this is all just part of this release. It's not just about releasing the emotion.
**Unknown:** It's releasing the, the-- what the emotion did to the physical tissue. So it-How the people around me are affected. Do you feel like after, you know, after that release, do you feel like you're one step closer or higher in becoming your, you know, your limitless self? Does that...
**Unknown:** Uh, does it kind of come in waves, in other words, of growth? It's a great question. You know, I think that in the beginning of my journey with meditation and deeper work, I was very attached to specific outcomes. And I think now I'm just to the point of surrendering to whatever happens, happens.
**Unknown:** If I have a, a... If I notice a huge change in my life or some crazy opportunity comes in now because I was able to release that, great. If that doesn't happen, that's okay, too. And but I'm also paying attention to the subtleties.
**Unknown:** I'm paying attention just to very small, subtle changes that can be happening. Sometimes you see them in your dog. Your dog is more chill or more loving. Sometimes you see them in your kids.
**Unknown:** Sometimes you see it with a complete stranger with, "Wow," like, "that person gave me their cart at the grocery store, and then I ended up getting a little discount when I did..." Like, there... It-- You just kind of observe the subtleties, opposed to being attached to, "Oh, now that I released that, I'll manifest that million dollars I've always wanted." Like, it's not exactly how it happens, and some people, the-- it could be that black and white. But I think we need to learn how to, one, surrender and, two, appreciate those subtle changes. Well, I'm glad you brought up some of the positive changes .
**Unknown:** That was what I was originally asking you, but you gave some of the negative ones. And knowing you personally, I've seen firsthand the, the positive ripple effect in the world that you have made. But- Oh, yeah, of course. It's definitely not-- There's no-- There-- So what I always say, that I think a lot of people need to understand, is that there needs to be a death for a birth.
**Unknown:** There needs to be a breakdown for a build-up. Right. So that doesn't always mean pain, per se, but you know, a lot of people are scared to eliminate the one friend in their life who is not really a friend. If anything, they bring you down.
**Unknown:** You know, they're always a drag. They're really judgmental. They're always negative. And they're just like, "Oh, they've been around forever, and they're loyal, and they're this and they're that." But they don't understand that if you let one go, then that other person is gonna come into your life that is truly aligned with who you are now, that is going to be supportive, and collaborative, and vulnerable, and, and unfiltered and all of those great things.
**Unknown:** And so that's very relevant to this, this process is, you know, I had to let go of a six thousand square foot office- Yeah ... with twenty-five employees that I worked so fucking hard for. I literally like, blood, sweat, tears, all of my money, like, to create that. And I-- That was hard.
**Unknown:** That was really- Yeah ... really fucking hard. And I let go of that so that I could birth something bigger, and I don't even wanna say better. It was just more better for me, more aligned for me.
**Unknown:** Um, and that is something that is uncomfortable for a lot of people. And it's just there's so much beauty. Who I am as a person now, like, the way that I wake up and feel every day, I just feel like I don't-- I, I swear I would have never am-- I would have never said this to anyone. But like, I look back, I'm like, "I w- I think I woke up with anxiety every day." I just powered through it.
**Unknown:** Like, I woke up genuinely like, "Another day, same shit. Another-- more fires to put out, more chaos." Like, just never feeling good in my skin, never feeling calm in my brain, never feeling like I had options. Like, I didn't have... I didn't really have the option to just, like, take a break and disconnect.
**Unknown:** All these people needed me. I c- I'm not allowed to do that. I'm a doctor of chronic illness people. I'm not allowed to do that.
**Unknown:** I have twenty-five employees. What if they need something? Like, it was just I lived my life for other people. I don't do that anymore.
**Unknown:** Thank you for sharing that. It's-- that was really vulnerable and for all of you to say, but I think it's important that a lot of people hear that in their journeys and understand that there are people that are going through that. A lot of people feel that same sentiment. But the fact that you're sitting here saying, "I made that bold change.
**Unknown:** It was scary," but you're on the other end of it, and you're happy, and you're fun, and you're enjoying life so much more, but you haven't had to sacrifice your success. Yeah. So which ripple do you wanna reach the farthest in, in creating your generational change and in your coaching experiences as well? What is that main ripple that you want to reach the farthest?
**Unknown:** I feel like the-- a huge catalyst to this entire conversation and this very bold move that I made a few years ago was my son. I, I realized that, one, I, I was not gonna be... I wasn't gonna be the parent that couldn't be present 'cause I was pulled in a million directions. I wasn't gonna work seventeen-hour days anymore because I had to, and I couldn't be part of his life.
**Unknown:** And I really wanted to give him what he needs to tap into his genius.To have a ton of fun with him, with Nick, to explore and be adventurous. And I just knew that, that, that wasn't negotiable. Like, that was gonna happen, and I n- and I knew I had to make a change in order to make that happen. And I think foundationally what I want to create in the world working with other people is something similar.
**Unknown:** And I'm not saying that a-all my priority is, is everyone's kids. But I didn't do anything to him. I did, I did the work on myself. Nick did the work on himself.
**Unknown:** And we realized that how we show up is going to dictate everything about him and the family dynamic, but it dictates our success, it dictates our finances, it dictates everything. So what I personally love doing is I love working with couples and families or, or people aspiring for that so that they can get this right, figure out how to balance and synchronize those areas of life, and create a life according to their values, figure out their family values, and figure out how they're gonna be able to, to live more present with their families, but all... still have all of the successes that they desire. And I know that if we can do this, that family, the other family, my family, we will ripple out to create a global generational change.
**Unknown:** So if we can make generational changes inside of families, that all the generations after the people doing the work can... That's going to ripple into, into the world, but then also just that one family is gonna immediately ripple out into the world. So you're saying, you know, it- whether it's wealth or bus- your business or your family or wherever you're feeling like you're sacrificing, that if you bring your work internal and your work, you... your work is self-mastery, it's working on yourself, that that is actually where the balance comes from as opposed to, "My children are having a hard time.
**Unknown:** I'm gonna go get a child's coach." Mm-hmm. "My business is terrible. I'm gonna go get a wealth advisor." Instead think, "I'm going to master myself and balance within," and that will create the ripple in the-- in their lives in, in a more synchronicity and balanced way. What I will say to that is there is an 80/20 rule.
**Unknown:** 80% is about the inner work, the self-mastery, and 20% is about the tactical tools. Most of us are, are working in the inverse. I sure as hell worked in the inverse. Right.
**Unknown:** It was 80% about what needs to happen, what needs to be done. Do I need to invest in the coach, in the healthcare professional, in the this, in the that? And then 20% of it was the inner work. Maybe not even that, probably like 2%, to be honest.
**Unknown:** Right. And when we flip that switch is that you... 80% is doing that work, the self-mastery, cha- shifting the beliefs, creating the vision, creating the calibration and synchronization, and then the 20% is who do you need to hire that's smarter than you in that field? So do I have a amazing set of wealth advisors?
**Unknown:** Yes. I 100% do. They know things that I don't know, I don't care to know. I'm not, I'm not gonna...
**Unknown:** It's not something that I feel passionately about researching and reading tons of books, but it is something that's valuable to my life and my family's life. And the same thing, you know, what-- why people hire me, is they might be crushing it in other parts of their, their areas of life. Like, they got the business, they have a great marriage, they have great kids, they have money, but they're like, "I just can't... With my health, I can't, I can't figure it out.
**Unknown:** I don't... I need, I need you. I need your data. I need your knowledge.
**Unknown:** I need your experience." So I do think that those tools are really important and hiring those experts, but you have to, you have to be able to embrace that 80/20. And the last thing that I'll say is that throughout the 13 years that I've been working with families, it was about half, probably six years in, took six years, that I realized working with a kid alone, siloed, and not working with the parents was not a good option. Because a lot of what's happening with the kid foundationally is correlated to the parents knowing or unknowing. So sometimes it's this, it's this transgenerational stuff, so it's not...
**Unknown:** nothing is conscious, and sometimes it's more around the parents can't see what they can't see. You know what I mean? Like, you operate a certain way or you use certain language, like you don't, you don't know any different. You don't know, oh, this might be contributing to why my kid's acting this way or why my kid is struggling with this.
**Unknown:** Like, so it's a matter of I work with the parents in order to help the child, and that is where I see the magic happen. So all in all, I feel like as we wrap up this conversation, the biggest thing that I would say is if you are feeling unsettled, and you can't necessarily put words on it but you just feelUnfulfilled, you feel unsettled, y-you, you just are not 100% content. It's time to really ask yourself what is missing. Like, what is that 2.0?
**Unknown:** Is it time for that, for that 2.0? Because we change as people. As we get older, we have new experiences, we have new jobs, we move new locations, we learn, we gain wisdom, and we get to a point that things that used to really fulfill us, relationships that used to fulfill us don't feel the same. And it's not about judging yourself, it's about just saying, "What is this?
**Unknown:** What's going on here? Is it time for me to look a little bit deeper to see who am, who am I now? And does this require me to start making decisions that will help me to create this 2.0 that aligns th- so I can feel energized and excited and on purpose again?" The work you and Dr. Nick do is incredible, and I've watched it f-firsthand, and it's really inspiring.
**Unknown:** So I want everyone to be able to understand where they could get started with you, whether it's just a course or whether it's your mastermind or whether it's one-on-one. How do they get in touch with you? Our lovely website, designed by yours truly. I'm a her.
**Unknown:** And our website is definitely chock-full of information. I will say it's, like, constantly a work in progress, primarily because I always have new, fun, inventive ideas. But right now, working one-to-one with us is... been available for many years, and that is something super easy that you can access at any time.
**Unknown:** You can talk to our team about questions, how it works. We have videos on how it works. But some of the other things that we have recently developed is courses with live coaching and soon-to-be live events, which we're very, very excited about. But this is a way for you to get this foundational knowledge.
**Unknown:** You can read it, watch it at your own pace, but then hop in with real-life questions, how to navigate this material and apply it to your life, and we are very, very active in our community, constantly asking... answering questions. We do lives every week. We do more comprehensive lives and workshops every month.
**Unknown:** So there's a lot of magic happening in there. We also are going to be kicking off our Italian retreats, so we are in the process of putting together all of the amazing details around that. Italy is one of my favorite places, and my main goal is for people to learn how to live in the now and live in the present by going there and to really just have a boatload of fun and see the amazing scenery and literally immerse yourself in the beautiful ocean there, and also gain some wisdom around your values, get some clarity while you're there. But it's really actually all about having a shit ton of fun and drinking a lot of really good wine.
**Unknown:** Amazing. We will link everything in the show notes that you're looking for to connect with us, and thank you so much. This was a lot of fun. Thank you.
**Unknown:** We thank you so much for being an avid listener of Integrative U Radio, formerly known as Integrative Wellness Radio. We appreciate all of your support. We love your comments. Please visit us on social media as well as our website to see all of the fun things happening behind the scenes and the new amazing content and courses that is being rolled out on a monthly basis.
**Unknown:** We hope to see you there.
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About Integrative You Radio
Integrative You Radio is a root cause medicine and integrative medicine podcast hosted by Dr. Nicole Rivera and Dr. Nick Carruthers — two integrative doctors who build personalized wellness protocols from your DNA, minerals, hormones, gut, and nervous system rather than from a population template. Looking for an integrative doctor who reads your labs together instead of in isolation? This is the show.
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