Episode 114 – BPS Framework

Please click here to listen to Episode 114 of the Minutes on Growth Podcast

Hi Soul-Friends,

It’s Tannaz and welcome back to another short solo episode of the minutes on growth podcast. Today I want to share a powerful resource with you and after listening to this episode, your life literally will never be the same again… Here we go : Introducing the BPS framework, a game changer in helping us understand ourselves, and which recently helped me get diagnosed with pcos (& no longer feel confused about my symptoms !)

The BPS framework is the bio-psycho-social framework that therapists sometimes use with their clients. This means that when a client comes in, complaining about anxiety or depression, we don’t just assume that it’s stemming from their thoughts. We look at all three areas: biological, psychological and social.

I’ll use myself as an example. A couple of months ago, I noticed that I was experiencing anxiety more than the usual amount and I was displaying depressive symptoms such as this dissociated feeling from my body and the world around me, this feeling of emptiness, and I was super irritable.

I was literally crying myself to sleep every single night .. and I felt so frustrated that despite doing the work, like daily meditations, practicing mindfulness, avoiding alcohol, when the night time came, this darkness took over my soul.. and it felt so confusing!

As some of you might know, I’m back in school to get licensed in Canada as a clinical psychotherapist and in my studies, we had learn about this framework… and so instead of labeling myself as a depressed person… I applied the framework since I now had the tools to get curious with my symptoms.

To begin, I looked at it through the social lens by examining my relationships. While I’m in a healthy relationship with my significant other, I lost my dog in April after 12 wonderful years. Losing her and that relationship had a huge impact on my life.

Also, I love love travelling, and I tend to travel a few times throughout the year meeting up with my close friends around the world, but this year was the first year that I did not leave the country at all, as I had governmental administrative work that was taking longer than usual. Not being able to have the usual traveling experiences and that quality time with my safe tribe impacted me as well.

I then looked at it through the psycho lens by examining my characteristic patterns of thinking (& identifying any negative ones), looking at my current coping skills (& identifying any deficits), judgment problems, and impaired emotional intelligence (the ability to perceive, understand, and express emotions).

P.S with all that is happening in the Middle East, it’s very normal to be experiencing second hand trauma as well.

Lastly, I called up my doctor and asked him to run some tests. I asked him to look at my thyroid, and my hormones and after weeks of tests, he realized that I have pcos, which got activated once I gained weight after my dog passed away, which then made it harder for me to lose weight, thus exacerbating the issue. It also explained my anxiety, and depression (the two major side effects of pcos) as well as all the other symptoms I was having such as hair loss on my head, and hair growth on my body.

So the point of this episode soul-friends, is to remind you that human beings are multi faceted beings and it’s imperative that we look at symptoms through an integrated and holistic lens, and not just a black or white lens.

Had I not known about the BPS approach, I would have fixated on the psychological side of it, most likely labeling myself, and completely dismissing the role my biology and social dynamics play into how I am feeling, and thus not finding out about my pcos, and finally taking the correct measures to heal from it.

I hope this episode and framework serves you like it has for me, and creates space for you to look at everything that arises through multiple perspectives and angles.

Sending you lots of love,

Speak soon

Episode 112 – Finding “The One”

Please click here to listen to Episode 112 of the Minutes on Growth Podcast

Hi Soul friends,

It’s Tannaz and welcome to another short solo episode of the minutes on growth podcast.

Last episode, we briefly talked about the race to finding “the one”, as a result of social media and societal pressures… today I want to talk about the process of finding “the one”

To begin with, does “the one” exist? Disney and hallmark movies have convinced us that they do … but let’s get curious with it..

Let me ask you this … are you the same person you are today as you were 5 or 10 years ago? do you like the same things? think the same way? act the same way? dress the same? you’re most likely thinking to yourself… no I’ve changed over the past decade, and rightfully so.

as human beings, we are constantly growing and evolving especially if we’re being intentional with our personal development and self growth journey, So if that’s the case, would “the one” a decade ago be “the one” today for you? would the same person be “the one” for the 2 different versions of you?

well now it depends… sometimes the answer is yes because couples can grow together but they also can grow apart and we’ve heard this often when couples break up “they’re not the person they once were or we’re no longer compatible”

And that’s my point… “the one” doesn’t exist… “the one right now” definitely exists.

there are over 7 billion people on this planet… the likelihood of us only being right for just 1 person throughout our whole life statistically does not make sense… and in fact is a very disempowering belief too…

Btw this doesn’t mean that you can’t have forever with one person.. you absolutely can, as I mentioned before many couples grow together, but that doesn’t mean if you don’t get to experience that, then you’re doomed.

So who is the one for us right now? & its the person with whom we have a connection, chemistry and compatibility. the 3 magic Cs.

I will definitely get into the 3Cs in a future podcast episode, but today I want to dedicate the next few minutes to the question… “how do I find the one for me right now?”

and the answer is … shifting the way you see and experience dating… so many people want to find the person they can have the 3 magic C’s with, without having to date people who aren’t right for you

But take a moment about it, how do you know who the one for you even is? chances are the experiences you’ve had with other people has helped you recognize what you do want and do not want in a partner.

When we go to the ice cream shop, we ask for samples of different flavours and then we choose the one we like the most… there’s no way for us to definitively know which one flavour is our favourite, if we haven’t tried a few others.

For me personally, every relationship I have ever been in has taught me something about myself… Relationships are perfect opportunities to mirror back to us our strengths, and all the positive attributes we bring to the table as well as our weaknesses, our triggers, and our wounds. Sometimes, our dating experiences teach us that we need healthier boundaries and so that’s an opportunity for us to go learn about boundaries, what they are, how to implement them, how to honour them and so forth.

Sometimes they show us our manipulative tendencies that we need to let go of, sometimes they show us that we need to learn communication skills and how to regulate our emotions during conflict so we don’t shut down or storm out of the room or start yelling… every trigger is an opportunity for self-reflection and growth, if we allow it to be. Btw this process requires mastering the art of non-judgment towards ourselves. If we’re acting a certain way, it means up until this point, this is all that we knew, this was our best. When we know better, we can do better, and relationships give us an opportunity to highlight what we need to proactively work on.

Which is great news because how else can we grow… in one of the earlier episodes of the podcast, I mentioned that from a spiritual perspective, the goal of life is to enter as person A , and leave as Person B, and relationships are the medium through which we can do this.

Also every relationship or dating experience shows us what we desire in a partner.. or what even exists out there. For example, in university, I had this boyfriend who would always show up with flowers or candy on every single date.. we dated for 2 years, and not once did he show up empty handed… sometimes the candy was worth 50 cents, and sometimes the bouquets were huge…so it wasn’t the monetary value but the thought behind it.. . did he have his flaws? absolutely (so did i), but his ability to showcase love through thoughtful gifts (one of the 5 love languages)showed me not only something that I had never experienced before, and now I know that it exists in real life and not just in movies, or books, but also taught me how to do it too. I now receive this feedback often from my friends and family members that I’m a thoughtful gift giver, and it all began with him.

Or the person I dated during my post-graduate studies taught me the importance of self-regulation through his inability to regulation his emotions… I also learned what boundaries were in that relationship… I kept thinking to myself “how can I emotionally protect myself when he is yelling on the phone?” and that lead me to learning about boundaries and learning to say “I want to hear you but if you raise your voice I will leave the conversation”

Or a long-term relationship of mine taught me that having a reciprocated respectful relationship with my partner’s family was a non negotiable for me.. before then I would say it wasn’t important… but that relationship showed me that it was …might not be for everyone but for me it was so after that, I would keep an eye out for that.

Every date, every partner, teaches us something…shows us our desires and non-negotiables through both their positive and negative traits. So without them, we technically would have NO IDEA who the one for us looks like.

And soul-friends, thats the point of today’s podcast episode. it’s embracing the dating journey and not trying to bypass , rush or even hate it, because every date, gives us insight into the right person for us.

so let’s set an intention to shift the way we look at dating, and all our past dating experiences, and honour them for helping us gain clarity.

sending you lots of love,

speak soon.

Episode 111 – Not Enough-ness

Click here to listen to Episode 111 of the Minutes on Growth Podcast

Hi Soul friends,

It’s Tannaz and welcome to another short solo episode of the minutes on growth podcast. today I want to briefly talk about something that I’m noticing with my clients.. and its this feeling of not being or doing enough.

Social media and societal expectations have both created this illusion that our life is incomplete without certain things. for example in middle eastern culture, it has been normalized to ask girls after they’ve finished post-secondary school… “so when are you getting married?”… and then as soon as you get married, its “so when are you having kids?”… and once you have your first child, its “so when are you having the second one?” and so forth…

these questions while well intended, create this belief in the recipient’s life that my life as it is right now is not complete… and if it’s not complete, how can I possibly feel fulfilled or happy?

This is the energy of not enoughness. and in fact, the majority of us tend to operate from this energetic space quiet often…

we wake up in the morning thinking.. oof I didn’t get enough sleep last night.

we go to bed thinking… oof I didn’t get enough done today.

we open up social media and think … oof I don’t have enough.

I mean how many of you have thought, if only I make 20 or 30 percent more than I do right now I’ll have enough… but you already have 20 or 30 percent more now than you did in the past…

you might be nodding your head right now, noticing that you too might have said these sentences a few times in the past.. we all have.

and as a result, we’re operating from a place where this moment as it is isn’t enough… an therefore we’re operating from a lack mindset, a scarcity mindset.. and if the law of attraction has taught us anything, its like like attracts like because thats the energetic frequency we’re operating from…

if I’m operating from this place of… I haven’t done enough.. or I’m not happy enough, as it is, I’m always in chasing mode… seeking the next best thing to fill in the gaps.

But what if we stopped for just a few moments… and shifted our energy… so that we could operate from a place of wholeness… I’m single, and whole. I’m married, and whole. I’m childless and whole. I’m with child, and whole. I’m making x amount and whole… the moment we’re able to let go of the not enoughness, and operate from a place of wholeness, perhaps then we can actually start to be in the present and live our life, able to fully acknowledge and appreciate all the blessings that every different phase of our life brings.

It’s not necessarily what is in our physical realm that gives us this notion of wholeness, but how we feel about what we have. I always tell my clients to meditate on the feeling that they believe their desires will bring .. because the moment we start to feel the feelings associated to having that vision, this sense of calm takes over us, and we become patient with the how and when.. which then ironically actually expedites the manifestation process, and allows us to take quantum leaps.

As the course in miracles beautifully wrote… infinite patience brings immediate results

also this feeling of wholeness brings confidence.. and true confidence is a super attractor. have you ever noticed that when you first enter into a relationship, you’re beaming with so much light, you’re glowing and “coincidently” your ex reaches out or everywhere you go, people are more interested in you? I mean hello where were you when I was single and desperately looking for people? that’s the thing.. when we’re chasing.. we’re exuding the energy of desperation and lack… and when we acknowledge our wholeness which comes from our innate self-worth (btw we’re all worthy and deserving, and there’s nothing you need to go to gain self worth), our aura brings people and opportunities to us.

so soul-friends, this is my tip for you today.. to notice how often your mind wants to operate from not-enoughness, and shift your thoughts and words to stem from a place of enoughness. I am enough, I have enough, I do enough… only then can we liberate ourselves from the chase, and actually fulfill our highest potential. that’s the irony of it all, when we stop chasing, we step into this realm of infinite potential and become super attractors of all that is for our highest good and the highest good of all involved.

Sending you lots of Love,

Speak soon

Episode 110 – Culture of Appreciation

Please click here to listen to Episode 110 of the Minutes on Growth Podcast

Hi Soul friends,

It’s Tannaz Hosseinpour and welcome back to another short solo episode of Minutes On Growth.

It’s been hard to create content when my heart has been aching for the Middle East. Watching children die, and a genocide take place right before our eyes while not being able to stop is is perhaps one of the hardest things, we as a collective are experiencing. This pain is shared by so many people, including many of my clients, individuals I love and care for deeply, and today’s podcast is dedicated to a beautiful and empowering relational realization that one of my clients had in the midst of her grief and pain.

She was sharing with me how difficult the past couple of days have been and the panic attacks she has experienced.

In our work together, we had highlighted her tendency to push people away and her desire to be alone when in pain, so it wasn’t a surprise when she shared that she had subconsciously tried to push her partner away this week. However because he was familiar with her coping mechanism, he stood in front of her and proclaimed to her how her presence in his life had changed him for the better.

In the midst of her pain, the moment her husband acknowledged how much he appreciated her empathetic heart, and how much he appreciated how her presence had made him into a better person, her mood shifted.. her heart opened up, and her walls came down… of course, the daily trauma she’s experiencing is too much for her to be in this open state for too long, but even if it was a short-lived mood boost, even if she was in this parasympathetic state for a few hours, it was powerful, and brought them closer.

This is the power of appreciation – the power of gratitude – it can mend broken hearts, it can heal grieving hearts – it can strengthen loving hearts.

often times, especially when we’ve been with our partners for a long time, we feel as if our partners already know how much we love and appreciate them. We love them so deeply within our own hearts, that we just assume that they too must know the state of our internal affairs, but even if that is the case, even if for example we do know how much they love us, how great does it feel when we hear them say it?

In fact, The Gottman Institute, founded by Dr. John Gottman and Dr. Julie Gottman, which is well-known for its research and expertise in the field of relationships and marriage, has highlighted the importance of cultivating a culture of appreciation and mentioned that it is a key component in building and maintaining healthy, strong relationships.

So how can we cultivate a culture of appreciation? Well here are some key principles and advice from the Gottman Institute on this topic:

  1. Express Gratitude: As I mentioned earlier, regularly express gratitude and appreciation for your partner. This can be for small things like doing chores (thank you for shopping for groceries, doing the laundry, grabbing me a bottle of water) or for larger gestures (thank you for helping me out with my errands, for remembering to check in with my mom on her birthday, for supporting me with my project). Expressing gratitude can make your partner feel valued and acknowledged, and everyone wants to feel loved, valued and seen in their relationships.
  2. Nurture Fondness and Admiration: The Gottman Institute emphasizes the importance of maintaining fondness and admiration for your partner. Remember why you fell in love with them and focus on their positive qualities. I appreciate your kind heart, your empathy, your ability to see the good in people, how organized and disciplined you are, how creative you are, how you motivate me to take better care of my mental health… why is this important? because it helps you keep a positive view of your partner, which also comes in handy when challenges arise because you’re then more likely to give your partner the benefit of the doubt instead of assuming the worst of the bat.
  3. Celebrate Achievements: Celebrate each other’s successes, no matter how big or small. Recognize and applaud your partner’s accomplishments, which can foster a sense of support and encouragement in the relationship. Be EXTRA AF. Be their biggest cheerleader. Once again, feeling seen and valued is everything in a relationship!
  4. Lastly, Create Rituals of Connection: The Gottman Institute recommends establishing regular rituals of connection, such as date nights or daily check-ins, to reinforce your appreciation for each other. Texting each other throughout the day with messages like “thinking of you”, “how’s your day going?”, “here for you if you need me”… or 5 minute night caps in bed, checking in to see what the best part of their day was and if they need support can really help couples feel supported, even when life circumstances feel out of control… These rituals provide opportunities to bond, and express love and gratitude.

Remember, healthy loving relationships aren’t manifested. They’re co-created by individuals who are committed and willing to do the work… Before I end, I just want to highlight that sometimes in life, we’re unable to do the relational work because our nervous system is in fight or flight mode or freeze mode as a result of experiencing trauma. This is normal. I don’t want you to feel the pressure to do all of these tips all the time. I just want you to be aware of them so that when you are in a state where you feel able to do them, then you’re willing to do them.

Sending you lots of love,

Speak soon.

Episode 109 – Instant Manifestation

Click here to listen to Episode 109 of the Minutes on Growth Podcast

Hi Soul friends

Its Tannaz Hosseinpour and welcome back to another short solo episode of the minutes on growth. a lot has been happening in my life so I haven’t had time to create as much content as I would like for you, but this past weekend, something happened which I just simply couldn’t not share with you

last week, a close friend of mine shared with me her sister’s diagnosis of severe autism and the challenges her and her family had faced trying to her support her. We discussed potential therapy modalities and support systems that they could seek, and we both prayed for a miracle! The next day, on Friday night, was Rosh Hashanah. For those of you who don’t know I have been studying Kabbalah for the past nine years (BTW Kabbalah is a spiritual modality) and I truly believe that the tools and insights that I have learned from my Kaballah teachers over the past decade, have helped me become the person I am today, have helped me regulate my nervous system, strengthen my connection with the light, cultivate trust in the universe, tap into my potential, and better serve my community. I shared with my friend that there was a Rosh Hashanah celebration taking place at the Kabbalah Centre and I asked her if she wanted to join me. She told me that she had never experienced such an event before, but she was open to joining me. When we were at the centre, in the midst of one of our prayers, she looked at me and asked, have you ever made a wish while you were at the centre and it came true? I paused for a second and reflected back on my decade long journey and said, pretty much! She then followed up on her question and said that they happen right away? I said they happen when they’re meant to happen. Answers come to us when we’re ready to receive them. Miracles come to us when we’re ready to see them. The course of miracles defines miracles as a shift in perception, so we’re not really praying for a miracle, we’re praying for a shift in perception to see the miracle that already exists. I want to repeat the sentence because this insight really helped elevate my experience of reality. We do not pray for miracles, we pray for a shift and perception to see the miracle that already exists. Why is this? Because the universe wants the best for you at every given moment and it presents the best for you at every given moment. We however as human beings have the free will to see and noticed that, or to shift our perception and see the world through the lens of blame and victimhood.

anyways, after I told her that I have been able to witness multiple miracles through the tools that I have learned at the Kabbalah Center, we continued on with the group prayers that we were all partaking in and the conversation ended there.

An hour later, our group got divided into two, and the women went into a separate room. There was a 3 seater sofa there, and my friend and I quickly went and took a seat. There was an empty seat next to me and so the teacher asked out loud who wants to sit next to Tannaz and this random woman who I have never met before came and sat next to us. I asked her what her name was and since it had Persian origins I looked at her and I said oh wow are you Persian too and she told me that she was from Turkey but her name was Persian, and we got talking. After a few minutes, the teacher asked us all to be silent because she wanted to share a story with us. I really want to share that story with you too, because it was a great reminder to dream big dreams, and that’s my wish for you, to allow yourself to dream big dreams.

So her story was that once upon a time there was a couple who loved each other very much. However the wife started to have this vivid dream where she would give birth and immediately die. She went to a kabalistic sage and told him about her dream and the sage responded that the dream was accurate and that it was dangerous for her to get pregnant, so she stopped being intimate with her husband. After a while the husband asked her why she stopped being intimate with him and she shared her dream with him. They really loved each other so they didn’t want to do anything that would cause pain to each other and so they decided to not have a family. After many years, the woman really wanted to experience parenthood with her husband whom she loved a lot. They decide to get pregnant and birth, while she’s in pain and inlabor, she prays to God, the universe, to allow her to just be with her newborn for a few months after birth. To their surprise, she gave birth, and she didn’t die. At this point they believe that the dream was no longer valid, however unfortunately, after a couple of months she passed away. Her husband went to the Kabbalistic Sage and said I don’t understand, she gave birth and she was alive so why did this happen? And the sage responded that when his wife was praying to God, to that universal power and she was expressing her desire, she only asked for a couple of months, she could’ve asked for 10 years or 20 years or 30 years, but her literal desire was a couple of months. The moral of the story is to not place limits on our desires. The only limits that exist are the limits that are stored in our subconscious mind, that we have been conditioned to believe. There is an abundance of abundance. The universe, is abundant in everything, so this was a wonderful, powerful, reminder to not limit ourselves and to allow ourselves to ask for and seek big desires, desires that transform and expand us to New Horizons. As our teacher was reminding us to dream big, I looked at my friend and I said this is the perfect time to pray for a miracle for your sister. A couple of seconds later our teacher asked us to turn around and share our dreams with the people sitting next to us.

my friend and I had already spoken about our desire so we were familiar with each other’s desires but we turned around to the woman sitting next to me and she asked me if she could share her desire with me. She shared that she got pregnant late in her life and her child was born with a very rare developmental disorder. The moment she said these words, I had a feeling that she was about to say severe autism. Just remembering this conversation gives me goosebumps because she turned around and said those exact words. What are the odds. For these two people to be sitting on my right and left, to have the exact same pain, and for both of them to have the same desire which is Health and Support for their loved ones. In that moment, I was speechless. I couldn’t believe that the universe brought these two people together in the most random setting, to show them that they’re not alone, to show them that despite the statistics, and the disorder being labelled as super rare, that they’re not alone. The more they talked to each other, the more they realized how similar both their loved ones’s diagnosis’s were, and in that moment God spoke to my friend through that woman, she shared that there was a therapy modality that she had been trying out for the past eight months that had really helped her out. We had never heard of it before so we immediately started to Google to see if there were therapists in my friend’s hometown that were trained in this modality, and the wildest part was that the first link that came up was for a centre in her city named after her sister’s name – the centre’s name had my friend’s sister’s name in their name. How wild is that!

Can you believe that? An hour ago, she was curious to see if her prayers and desires could be answered in the setting, and here we are an hour later, getting those prayers answered through a strangers mouth. The woman ended up being seated at our table too, which is wild to me, because the seating chart was finalized a week prior, so somehow the person in charge felt the energetic urge to seat us all together.

this is what I mean when I say there are no coincidences. Everything is divinely orchestrated for us for our highest Good, we just need to be willing to see it. We need to be activating the trait of curiosity within us that allows us to change the way we look at things, and to have hope and faith in the universe, to believe that there is a solution to every problem, that there is support available to us, even when and if it logically doesn’t make sense.

my friend and I were both so honoured by this whole experience, and she kept telling me that this is one of the most memorable weekends of her life. BTW She wasn’t meant to be here with me this weekend, but somehow, her initial plans had changed and her trip got postponed to this exact weekend.

so this is a wonderful reminder to all of us to be flexible when things don’t go our way, because that’s the universe’s way of rerouting us to something better.

and I hope soul friends, this short podcast episode, has reminded you to trust the universe, to be open to new experiences, to be curious, and to dream big dreams, and to allow yourself to connect to those around you.

you are born worthy and deserving, and there’s nothing you need to do to earn that worth so you’re able to manifest that desire. no – That worth is already there, all you need to do is open yourself up to what the world has to offer.

Thank you all so much for listening,

speak soon

Episode 107 – What is Love?

Please click here to listen to Episode 107 of the Minutes on Growth Podcast

Hi Soul Friends

It’s Tannaz Hosseinpour and welcome to another short solo episode of Minutes on Growth

Next week, our manifesting love 28 day online program starts and I couldn’t be more excited because this is a program that pretty much encompasses everything that I’ve learned about relationships both in the past 15 years from my own personal experience and specifically over the past decade from an academic standpoint. So I thought I would dedicate this episode to love – and how we can feel more of it on a day to day basis.

So what is love? When I think of love I think of this warm feeling inside of my body that is calm and expansive. Expansive in the sense that it gives me the courage to up level myself, to put myself out there, to walk more confidently in the direction of my dreams… perhaps because love feels supportive, and when we feel like someone has our back, that they see us, that they believe in us… well it gives us the nudge we need to believe in ourselves too, and to take inspired action. When I think of love I think of inclusivity, I think of community and nonjudgmental people around me… I don’t think we spend enough time talking about how important it is to be in close proximity to Safe and caring people… their presence can make the world of a difference in the journey of our growth and evolution… When I think of love I think of acceptance, even when I mess up and make mistakes. A love that sees and accepts my humaneness… because we’re all human, and being imperfect is part of it. Perfection is an illusion that I wish upon no one to pursue. Love is knowing that people will extend grace and forgiveness to us when we mess up, and we too will extend the same to others. When I think of love, I think of laughter and giggles and smiling until your jaw starts to hurt, I also think of feeling safe enough to cry, feel your feelings without shame or judgment and have a shoulder to lean on during hard times..

Ooof .. honestly an opportunity to love or be loved can show up in so many different ways, small and big throughout our days… but are we able to see it?

well I think the media, Hollywood and Bollywood and Disney have given us a distorted definition of love and have created this false belief that true love is synonymous with romantic Romeo and Juliet like stories. They’ve made love synonymous with grand and sometimes unrealistic gestures.

Social media has exasperated this issue too. I mean think of Valentine’s Day, for many, it turns into this competition of who gets the more gifts and whose flower bouquet is bigger? & that can really hurt both the relationship we have with our significant other and the relationship we have with ourselves. Why? Because we either want to show our own experience to the world on social media (& it better be a good photo otherwise we’re mad at our significant partner for not doing better) or we’re sad because we’re comparing ourselves to content that has already been posted on social media (& consequently feeling like we’re not enough or don’t have enough”

In those moments of comparison and competition, we lose our opportunity to acknowledge and appreciate the smaller day to day blessings, to connect to our partners… to nurture the love that exists…

which brings me to my next point that love is a choice… love is a verb

When couples start working with me, in one of our first sessions, I explain to them that the hallmark of a healthy relationship is the ability to cultivate a culture of appreciation. So their homework contains 2 parts.

Part 1 is to notice each other’s efforts and to express appreciation often for even the smallest gestures. “Thank you for grabbing that bottle of water for me, thank you for helping with dinner prep”

The other is to notice each other’s strengths and express our admiration. “you handled that situation with such grace and patience. I admire your ability to remain calm and find a solution”

These habits help bring both people closer to one other as it increases their feeling of being valued, appreciated and ultimately loved in the dynamic.

& these tools don’t only apply to romantic relationships -practicing them in any dynamic can cultivate love.

Some platonic friendships become powerful mediums for us to experience deep love. The type of love that makes you feel like you’re worthy of all the beautiful things in the world, the type of love that validates your feelings? The type of love that inspires you to dream big and actually makes it feel like it’s possible for you to accomplish it. One of my biggest blessings that I express gratitude for every single day, are my soul sisters who have elevated my experience of reality from the moment that they entered my life.

I’ve always been a social child, so I always had a lot of friends growing up. My dad is also a super social person, so I always saw him making time for his friends and putting in the effort to cultivate those friendships, so that got engrained in my subconscious mind from a young age, but this is not mean that I didn’t experience my fair share of heartbreak in friendships and I noticed that as I got a little bit older, those experiences kind of prevented me from allowing people in. Yes I had a lot of people around me, but I didn’t allow them in, fully in so I didn’t get to experience the blessings of true friendship. I started therapy at the age of 18, or 17 I believe, and for the first two years I didn’t even let my therapist in. After having a near death experience, somethings shifted inside of me that allowed me to bring down my guards a little bit. It reminds me of the Rumi poem where he quotes the wound is where the light enters you. That was definitely the case for me. This did not mean that I did not practice discernment when it came to allowing people in, but at least the option of allowing people in was now active. Manifesting love in my opinion is becoming aware of the barriers that we have built within ourselves that are preventing us from letting people in. Those wounds, as valid as they are, need to be recognized and healed so that we can allow ourselves to experience an expansive and deep love once again, whether that’s love in our friendships or romantic love.

& let’s not forget self love – many say that we need to love ourselves for others to love us.. and while I agree that the way we treat ourselves sets the precedent for how others treat us… for many who grew up believing they’re not loveable, this advice not only doesn’t serve them but also makes them feel like they’re stuck… safe loving relationships can serve as powerful mediums for us to see the love that exists within us… we heal those parts of us that don’t feel loveable in those relationships, so yes, self love can flourish in loving relationships too…

We’re going to be diving deep into all of these concepts inside the manifesting love program so if this is something that interests you, I highly suggest enrolling. we start on July 2nd.

I’d like to end this episode with a quote by George Sand, “There is only one happiness in this life, to love and be loved”. I believe that love is our core essence. The analogy I like to use is imagining love as the electricity in the socket. it’s always there. it’s our choice to plug ourselves in and reap its benefits, or unplug ourselves and disconnect from the light.

So may we all have the courage to plug ourselves in as often as possible so that we can feel and experience our true light.

Sending you lots of love,

Speak soon,

Episode 105 – Overcoming Our Fear of Judgment

Please click here to listen to Episode 105 of the Minutes on Growth Podcast

Hi Soul Friends

It’s Tannaz Hosseinpour and welcome back to another short solo episode of Minutes on Growth Podcast. Today I want to talk about a fear that I’ve noticed many people, myself included struggle with: the fear of judgment

I am originally Persian and I was raised in Dubai, the Middle East, and the notion of judgment, I’ve noticed is more prevalent in conservative societies than in liberal ones. This doesn’t mean that there’s no judgement in for example North America, but from my personal experience of living in both continents, the more conservative a society is, the more taboo-ness that exists.

Growing up, I heard these statements so often “what will people think if you do that”, “don’t say that in front of our extended family members”, “you know its not proper to do x y z”

By the time you’re a teenager, there are so many limitations placed on your mind under the label of it being taboo or improper. Think of yourself as a bird, and these limitations as people clipping your wings. How are you supposed to fly without them?

I’m not gonna lie, fear of judgement can really have a significant impact on our emotional and psychological well-being. It can lead to feelings of anxiety, self-doubt and even low self-esteem. I’ve noticed that it can cause us to avoid situations or activities that we enjoy due to fear of being judged negatively by others. I remember the first time I went to a pole dancing class, I was 18 or 19 years old – I really enjoyed getting in touch with my body and that feminine energy, but I noticed myself judging myself while I was IN the class. I kept asking myself is this proper? am I doing something wrong? What type of girl would be dancing in this class? So many ridiculous questions based on again the statements that were imprinted in my subconscious mind at a young age by not necessarily my parents (who by the way were extremely liberal compared to others) but by society in general which included my teachers, my friends parents, & pretty much strangers that you would have conversations with. For the longest time I censored by passion for pole dancing out of fear of judgment. And that wasn’t the only thing that I censored out of fear. I realized that I was hesitant to take many risks in the pursuit of my goals and dreams because of it.

For those of you have been following me for a while, you’re familiar with my initial career path. I was trained as a young child to pursue a legal career and after getting my masters in law and getting trained in family mediation I realized that my Soul was not really aligned with that work, and I think I had known that truth for quite some time, but I was SO scared to admit it to myself and to others.

Only when I started doing the inner work, and reflecting back on my childhood did I realize that my dream was always to be a teacher – thats when I feel the most alive – when I believe I have the most positive impact in the world. I realize that while I was good at family mediation and law, I wasn’t passionate about it and I really believe that unless you’re passionate about something, the drive and willingness to be the absolute best diminishes. So it made the most sense to remove myself from that space and to allow those who are passionate about it to take over because they can serve much better than I can in that line of work.

But I’m not gonna lie, taking that risk, doing a complete 180 U-turn in my career was so scary at first. I was so worried about what my parents would think and what my extended family members would think and what my friends would think. That fear of judgement really kept me stuck & it did not allow me to show up as my true self – to serve as my true self. And now as a teacher and a coach it is one of my core missions to ensure that people have the courage to be fully seen as who they truly are because honestly, when you do show up as YOU – life starts to feel like its happening FOR you – as if everything is rigged in your favour!

So I wanted to take a few minutes and share with you a couple of ways that you can overcome fear of judgement

One of the best ways to overcome fear of judgement is to recognize and challenge negative thoughts. I want you to take a moment and ask yourself how in the past your thoughts have contributed to your mood, or state of well-being. Because unless we recognize how powerful our thoughts are, we won’t be as enticed to want to do the work. Perhaps it was the time when you were super excited to go on your date but then looked at yourself in the mirror and your inner critic made a nasty comment about how you were looking and then you started to feel self-conscious about your body and your weight and your whole mood shifted or that time when you really wanted to ask your boss for a promotion but your colleague just made a small comment about a minor mistake you had made earlier and suddenly you have all these thoughts of not being good enough and being a failure which prevented you from asking for that well deserved promotion and you started to feel stuck in your job. Once you recognize the power that your thoughts hold then you can start to get intentional with identifying and challenging the negative ones because while our feelings are always valid, our thoughts are not always true. The sooner we accept this truth, the sooner we are able to challenge the negative thoughts that keep us playing small, that make us feel like we’re not good enough, that prevent us from putting ourselves out there.

Another way to overcome your fear of judgement is to practice self compassion. This means that we are kind to ourselves and we remind ourselves that we’re human beings, and as human beings it’s normal to make mistakes and to have flaws. No one is perfect. I tell this to my clients all the time, think of perfection as the last level in your favourite video game. If you reach perfection now, do you really wanna spend the rest of your life the next 40, 50, 60 years of your life being stuck in that same level. How boring would that be. And the moment you realize this, you let go of your attachment to perfection which by the way is a coping mechanism on its own. When we allow ourselves to have flaws, we are allowing ourselves to be fully seen, meaning that we are allowing people to see our strengths AND our weaknesses. Honestly how refreshing is that. I don’t know about you but I truly admire people who share their mistakes – who share their flaws and let us know how they’re working on at it. It makes me feel like I’m not alone when I notice others navigating similar feelings. We tend to be so kind and understanding with others but not as much with ourselves. But if we’re able to create this shift in perspective in the way that we see mistakes and flaws, then we’re able to extend that same level of kindness and understanding to ourselves.

Another way to overcome fear of judgement is to surround ourselves with supportive, and non-judgmental people. My life changed when I got up from tables where people were tearing each other apart instead of uplifting one another. My life changed when I intentionally started to seek out people who were positive and accepting, spending time with those who valued and appreciated me for who I was, for my whole self. Finding that tribe in my opinion was the biggest factor in helping me overcome my fear of judgment. Going back to my U-turn in my career, I honestly was able to do it when I started to surround myself with people who were honouring their truth, people who had been through similar experiences. When my mind saw that a person had switched careers and were now pursuing something that they were truly passionate about AND they were succeeding, then it made a mental deduction that that can happen for me too. Because alongside fear of judgement there’s fear failure, so when we surround ourselves with people who are winning in something that we are considering, it makes it feel possible for us too. More importantly when you surround yourself with people who create space for you to be yourself, it gives you courage to show up more and more as yourself every day. We truly heal in relationships and that includes our platonic friendships.

Lastly I would suggest taking small steps to face your fears. When we expose ourselves to situations that make us feel a little bit anxious and instead we start to intentionally practice coping strategies like positive self talk or breathing or meditating to manage our fears, over time we start build confidence and resilience. Our fears, or should I say the shadow of our fears start to become smaller when we walk towards them. I remember when I first started the minutes on growth podcast and community, I was so scared of creating video content and for a good year I refused to do it, until we were preparing for our in person wellness retreat and my dear friend and cohost Pazi told me to face my fear and to just try it out. If I show you my first video, you can tell how anxious I was, I don’t even think I blinked once in the video, but the more I faced that fear, the easier it got. I don’t think twice about recording a video now and I’m so comfortable in front of the camera, but that only came after someone supportive in my community encouraged me to face the fear.

So I hope so friends, this podcast will encourage you to face your fear of judgement and allow yourself to overcome it, so you can show up as your most authentic true self, and you allow yourself to be SEEN. I keep using the words “allow yourself to do it” because ultimately we are the ones standing in our way And I want you to get out of the way of your own greatness.

I would love to hear your stories of overcoming fear of judgement. Feel free to send me a DM on Instagram @MinutesonGrowth Because when we share our stories, we not only empower ourselves but we also empower others.

Wishing you an empowering and liberating week

lots of love,

speak soon