Writing this email couldn’t have come at a better time for me. I’ve been going through a period of change and discomfort and sitting with my capacity to handle it all. I genuinely couldn’t be prouder of the woman I am today.
Over the last eighteen months, I’ve changed a lot in my life. Writing this ten-part series about it has been an awesome exercise in reflection as I look back on all the ways I’ve improved my life, health, mood, and how I feel.
I’m at the tail end now. This email and my next are about the two most significant changes I’ve made to become the happiest, most connected and authentic version of myself. Honestly, these two are the needle movers. Without them, I’m unsure if I would have had the energy and space to do the rest.
Today, I am writing about awareness, how I’ve nurtured and grown my own, and how this awareness has created a foundation for change.
Ever since I stumbled into Personal Development in 2018, I’ve wanted to become more aware of myself, my thoughts, my triggers, the underlying belief system that activates them, and why I do the things I do.
Stumbling into personal development in 2018 thanks to an invite to NISI from Kerwin Rae.
Without awareness, we can’t change, grow, or evolve. First comes awareness. Always.
Everything I’d seen along the way told me that meditation is the best way to grow this type of awareness. But meditation had always eluded me as a daily practice. It takes time and a certain starting point of presence to get the most out of it. With my racing thoughts, persistent fight-or-flight nervous system response, busy life, and exposure to this crazy, changing world, I struggled to go from that to sitting in stillness for an hour at a time.
So instead I kept doing things the way I’d always done them, expecting things to be different. They never were. I spent most of my life leading up to late 2024 in the same stories, the same emotions and feeling the same way. No matter what happened, good or bad, my life always had a certain flavour. An underlying stress and anxiety. A disquiet. I was disconnected from my body and disconnected from my spirit.
In 2021, the discomfort I felt each day became almost unbearable. Makia was waking up before the sun every morning. I would wearily follow her to the living room, switch on the TV, have a coffee, eat some carbs, and bide my time until I started work at 9 a.m.
Baby Makia chilling out with some screen time. 🙁
I’d spend my days doing work that mostly didn’t excite me, except anything client-facing, stopping here and there to grab a convenient snack or sneak a mini scroll on my phone. By the time I knocked off, I would walk to the fridge, scan the shelves and ask, “What should I cook for dinner?” I don’t know why I bothered; most nights I ended up ordering Uber Eats anyway.
I’d sit and eat my seed oil, sugar, carb-laden meal, give Makia a lacklustre bath and limp to the bedroom. Makia would have the iPad. I would have my phone. We would scroll until I felt some kind of soothed, and then it would be lights off and do it all again tomorrow.
Uber Eats.
Then, one random day in a sea of days like this, I woke up and thought, “I’m so tired”. As I thought it, for some reason, I was able to observe the thought as separate. Something else, another presence inside of me, looked at that thought impartially. Something that simply observed the thought.
There was the Lauren that was thinking the thought, “I’m so tired”, and there was the Lauren that was observing the Lauren thinking the thought.
I jumped out of bed. It might have been the first time I ever had proof of my soul – who I now know as my higher self or the observer. It was the first time I didn’t feel attached to the thought. I went to the spare bedroom and wrote on my whiteboard, “What is the loop/pattern you are stuck in?”
As the day progressed, I kept noticing how my actions and how I physically showed up matched that initial thought: “I’m tired.” I was aware that my thoughts were affecting how I felt and behaved, ultimately creating another version of the awful day I outlined above.
I was so excited by my discovery. I imagined a Journaling practice that would create awareness of the thoughts from that first thought. I later tried to include that exact practice in our 2022 Strategic Plan for Phhnix, but we collectively decided that a physical journal was not a priority for us so I let the idea die. And my burgeoning awareness did, too.
And then came William. Falling pregnant with William was a catalyst for massive change in my life. My priorities shifted massively. Right at the beginning of my pregnancy, I knew my life had veered off course. It didn’t light me up anymore. My life force was depleted. I felt heavy—energetically and physically. It felt monumental to change my life, but I knew that if I didn’t do it, then I might never find the strength again.
Chilling out at 4:30 PM on a weekday. Powerless. Depleted.
Sitting down with my business partners to decide to close Phhnix was devastating. Splitting up to tell our team, many who believed in us more than we did, was extremely painful. Letting our clients know that we would be wrapping up coaching in six months was awful. That whole period was just painful thing after painful thing.
And when the dust settled, I still didn’t slow down to sit with who I was as a soon-to-be mother of two. I didn’t rest, increase my awareness or do anything to change.
Although I went from working 40 hours a week to working 0 hours a week, I found a way to remain stressed, anxious and in bad habits.
Money scarcity kicked in. Shame kicked in – BIG TIME. I still wasn’t taking care of myself or doing anything noticeably different. My life still had that certain flavour.
An underlying stress and anxiety. A disquiet. I was still disconnected from my body and disconnected from my spirit.
I had a baby. His birth changed me as a person. I gave up my iPhone for a year. I surrendered to a season of motherhood. We moved back home to my mum’s. Time passed. Not much else changed.
Change was coming; I just didn’t know it yet. The most powerful day of my life.
Makia was still having too much screen time. I was still eating poorly. I wasn’t exercising or being mindful. I had no awareness. I was regularly triggered – especially by the back-to-back sicknesses of early motherhood and a second round of Covid.
It was late 2023. Still, nothing had changed. I had turned my life upside down to exit a business, had a second child, consciously stepped away from entrepreneurship, and simplified my life, but I was STILL feeling completely powerless. I was unable to change my behaviour in any way, unable to start new habits, unable to think more positively, and had zero momentum.
That was a season.
That’s when the idea for an Awareness Journal popped back into my head. I was desperate for anything to help me make sense of it all and shake me out of my disempowering habits.
One morning, I sat down with a regular journal and asked, “If I were to make this Awareness Journal, what would I include?” And then I made it. I made it in a word processor, printed it on the spot, and filled it out. That alone made me feel like I was taking action in the right direction.
“I’m sick of my own shit. I’m sick of my thoughts never changing. I crave more awareness and the ability to catch my thoughts quicker & with more regularity so I can change them & therefore change the behaviour.”
Since then, I have created twelve versions of that Awareness Journal Practice and used it roughly 500 times. I have significantly increased my awareness of the human condition so that no matter how uncomfortable things get, I have space from them. There is the thing that is happening, and then there is the observer of the thing that is happening. I don’t get pulled in and under anymore. I am free.
That sense of stress and anxiety. That general disquiet and disconnection? I know where they have come from in my childhood. I don’t choose them anymore.
Version 12 in my hot little hands.
I understand exactly how our early childhood creates our understanding of the world and sets a blueprint for the flavour of our lives. For me, and many others, that’s the flavour of powerlessness, victimhood, anxiety and shame. “I’m not doing enough, I’m not good enough, I’m not enough. These things keep happening to me. I’ll never have the life I want. I’m stupid. I’m lazy. I’ll never change.”
I didn’t know those were the underlying stories of my life until I became aware of how I showed up in life and worked backwards. I would ask, “What must I believe about myself if I feel this way? What must I believe about myself if I treat myself the way I do? What must I believe about myself that I would be broke, unfit, and unhealthy? What must I believe about myself that I would feel so overwhelmed by motherhood?”
I use my Awareness Journal to dissect my morning thoughts, emotions, and how my nervous system works. I track my menstrual cycle, the lunar cycle and how much sleep I get. I pay attention to my self-care and whether I complete it or not. I practice gratitude. I reflect on my choices. I set intentions. I do this every single day.
What do I have to show for it?
The biggest thing I have to show for it is something I can’t show you at all: how I feel. Regardless of what is going on externally in my world, internally, I feel powerful, grateful, and filled with excitement. Life feels like a big adventure with miracles around every corner. I feel rich and abundant. I trust myself, my choices, and how I will show up. I don’t fear self-sabotage because it never hooks me for long.
I have found openness and peace in my body—no, that’s the wrong word. I haven’t found it; I’ve uncovered it. Peace is always there. When my emotions have space for expression, my nervous system is regulated through thoughtful self-care, and there is space from, rather than attachment to, my thoughts, the peace that always lies inside me is easily accessible.
Openness and peace in my body.
The external results have come about from the changes I’ve made with the benefit of my awareness.
I was a size 14, and now I am a size 8. My physical size dropped effortlessly once I recognised how little self-love I had and endeavoured to change that.
I dropped three dress sizes in a few months without thinking about it or trying to, and I’ve kept it off.
I undertake a minimum of two and a half hours of self-care every single day. I used to tell myself I didn’t have time to meditate for 15 minutes or go for a walk, but now I journal for half an hour, swim at the beach and collect shells, do a 25-minute breathwork session, and move my body for at least an hour—every day!
I have become a proud, strong, and regulated mother. I navigate my children’s needs, am a present and connected SAFE person in their lives, and teach them skills that will save them a lot of trouble down the track. (For example, how to regulate their emotional and nervous systems.) Screen time is way down.
I cook every day and spend hours and hours shopping for and preparing beautiful quality, mostly organic meals.
Making green juice with William last week.
I show up on social media every single day, sharing the highs and lows of my beautiful, imperfect life.
I’m back in business, and so proud that the first thing I am launching is the journal that saved my life – my Awareness Journal Practice. I have been diligently taking action and doing the work required to bring this journal to the world. Lots of hard things. Lots of new things. Lots of discipline.
I am beautifully balancing self-love, motherhood, and business. I am doing it without stress, in a way that feels kind. I am filled with excitement, motivation, and a deep knowing that I am on the right track again. There is no more disquiet, no more unease, and very little anxiety—a hangover, really.
Balance means I can have it all.
This is not a sales email. You’ll probably get a load of them in another week or so, but not now. It’s not ready.
And you don’t need to buy my journal to increase your own awareness. What you need is curiosity. How can you create space from your thoughts, space from your emotions and space from the way you feel in your body when you are dysregulated?
What makes you tick? What beliefs must you have to be living the life you’re in? Where do you feel like a victim? Where do you feel powerless? Where do you feel poor? And WHY? Where did it all come from?
How does your menstrual cycle affect you? How does the lunar cycle affect you? (We’re coming up to a new moon. Is anyone else feeling drained this week?) How do you feel with 8 hours of sleep? What about 5?
When was the last time you set an intention for how you want to feel during your day? When was the last time you put yourself and your own needs first? How often do you schedule self-care before anything else on your to-do list?
What self-care makes you feel more connected to yourself? What self-care is more list-ticking?
What do you think about when you first wake up? What state do you wake up in? What do you dream about? How do those dreams impact your waking state?
If you can decode the mystery that is you, and choose from the peace and power that is your birthright, how will you show up differently in your life?
Awareness is the one thing standing in the way of sustainable life changes.
I hope that this post gives you plenty to think about. One left in the series – we’re almost there!
I love you,
Lauren xx
P.S. If you’ve missed the earlier posts in this series, you can catch up by searching for the subject lines. I’ve so far written about water (“How to Change Your Life”, personal care (“Be a sexy, smelly animal”), fasting (“Fasting: Punishment or Reward”), sleep (“Giving myself a fighting chance”), movement (“Oops, I accidentally didn’t exercise for ten years”), personal development (“Put Yourself in Rooms That Will Make You Question Yourselves”), food (“Hungry and Depressed”, and Breathwork (“It’s about Breathwork”).
NB/ The Awareness Journal has since launched and is on sale until the 23rd of April, 2025. Check it out here.
**Originally published to my email database on the 25th of February, 2025**
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