[00:02] Valerie: Rise, renew, reconnect. Welcome to from the Ashes, a podcast where every story ignites hope and healing.
[00:23] Valerie: Hey everyone, my name is Valerie Hwang Beck and welcome to from the Ashes. This is my first podcast episode and I am just here to tell my story. So I don't have any real outline or agenda here today, but I decided to do this podcast because I really want to highlight stories of people who have recreated themselves and decided to press the reset button on life, as I have done many, many times. And it is a deep yearning to know truth that drives my story and what I want to bring to the table. And I'm still on that journey. I feel like I continuously go through struggle in my life, but I don't run away from it. And what that lends to me is a empowerment, but also it allows me to face my challenges head on, even when I feel like my challenges are winning against me. And I feel like I often, I often feel alone in this journey. And I am hoping by telling my story I will reach more people who feel or have gone through similar things. So when you hear my story and when you hear other people's story, please reach out. I would love to hear from you. I am kind of sick and tired of being alone in my journey of inner transformation and self inquiry. So I kind of want to start by just letting know a little bit about who I am and what I do. So I run a life coaching, holistic life coaching business called intrepid wellness. I actually have a background in holistic medicine. I am a certified ayurvedic practitioner and I've been learning ayurveda since 2018. And I have an eclectic background in other things. So before I landed on ayurveda and holistic health, I have been an English teacher in Japan. I have been a professional hip hop dancer, performing and teaching around the world, traveling internationally, also domestically in Los Angeles. I have produced and hosted events. I got my masters in international exchange. I have traveled internationally, done working holidays in New Zealand. I've worked in travel, I have been a tour guide, bringing people to Japan on vacations. So I have done a lot of things with my life so far, and I'd be lying to you if I didn't say that it hasn't all worked out in my favor. And that's why I'm here. And I have had some brilliant experiences. I have had some insightful experiences, but I've also had a lot of painful personal experiences. And part of this journey is. Is empowering other people not to run away from their pain, because on the other side of pain is a whole lot of possibility. There's a whole lot of joy. And I firmly believe that if you push on, if you are able to acknowledge your emotions and able to acknowledge your suffering, and you're able to acknowledge the discomfort rather than run away from it and numb it, then you can really turn around your life. In my mid twenties, I thought that I had it figured out. But even unconsciously, I knew that there was something driving me from a really dark place. I had just come back from teaching English in Japan for three years, and I decided to go into grad school. And I think this is one of the first times in my life where I felt like I was doing something out of duty and obligation and, well, everybody should go to grad school. And this is how you just get to the next level, rather than really thinking about, well, what is it that I really want to create with my life? What can I do and see? There's a really narrow path that I had envisioned for myself because I really didn't see how I can make something that actually wanted to do work at the time. When I was in Japan, I was also taking dance classes intensively, and I had gotten really good. I. The only way I could have seen myself stay in Japan, which is maybe what I had wanted deep down, is to become a dance teacher. And I just couldn't see how I could make that happen. It just seemed like there were so many hurdles, including, like, visas and money and all that, to figure out. And I just, like, I completely gave up on that. It was maybe like a split second thought, and I was like, no, I should be in New York with my family getting this masters and trying to figure out what I'm going to do to climb a supposed career ladder. And I had had some really good experiences professionally to point myself towards that goal in the school system that I was in. I had actually contributed a lot to developing a better elementary school English curriculum that really focused on cultural exchange. And it was so valuable at the time. And I was just. I felt so fulfilled by it. So I took that as a sign that I should go get this masters and go back to the States. And then when I did, like, life slapped me in the face, I got into NYU on a scholarship, and I decided to take the money that I had earned in my savings and put it towards this masters. And it turned out to be a lot, something completely different from what I thought it would be. In spite of my best efforts, the program was focused on american dominance in the world arena. America's role in supposedly democratizing developing countries and had less to do with cross cultural exchange and creating harmonious relationships between different cultures and nations, and more about bringing our education system to other countries so that we can essentially take over. And when questioned, the department director said that this might not be the best system, but it's the best system that we have. And I just remember thinking, this is so unacceptable, and yet everyone's going along with it because it benefits them, because somehow they're going to get a career in this and help to perpetuate this highly unethical mission. And part of my soul broke going through that program because I did. Ultimately, I felt like it was out of duty. It's like, maybe, even if this doesn't help me, at least I'll be educated about it. And that's the thing. That's. That has been my pattern, is like, well, let me be a martyr for the rest of the world. Let me learn this for the rest of the world so that I can maybe help make it better. And what I didn't realize at the time is that if I. If I do sacrifice my own happiness to do something for other people, that creates this cycle of continuous depletion of your soul. You are here in the world to do something that fulfills you and nourishes you. And from that place of nourishment, that's the way that you are able to give back to the rest of the world, the rest of society, whoever you want to contribute to. That's the way that you give love back and that you can only know by knowing yourself. So that was my deep dive into probably the first rounds of heavy, deep depression that I've been through. And it is from that very deep place of feeling inadequate and unworthy of happiness. And even so, I continued to think, well, I gotta make it work. But another part of me also was like, I really love hip hop. I really love dance. I want to see what I can do with this. That wisdom pretty much led me to drop everything after completing my masters, and I flew on a one way ticket to LA. So it's not that I was completely. I had not surrendered myself completely, which I'm immensely grateful for, but I think I was still holding onto this, like, I'm going to make this international education thing work. I'm going to be the noble one to help to contribute to this world and get rid of corruption. But I also wanted to do the hip hop dance. So it's like, maybe I can combine those two things. And it ended up working out for a while. I actually did become a hip hop educator. I did become a professional dancer. I did do some work with nonprofits for cultural exchange, helping people with some programs for japanese cross cultural exchange. I even ended up bringing a group, an international group of Americans and chinese people to Japan to do, like, cultural exchange and dance development program in Tokyo. And got a lot of good feedback, did a lot of good work. After that, I joined a dance company and also went to Ecuador to be a state Department ambassador for hip hop dance and culture. And it was really fulfilling. But I was also broke. I was barely scraping by. Like, those projects gave me a little bit of money, but I didn't want to charge people so much because I still felt like I wasn't valuable enough to receive money. And I felt guilty and honestly, like, you know, people would guilt me if I wanted to charge them. At the time, I didn't know. I don't have to listen to those people. If I'm going to create an experience for dancers to have this amazing dance exchange in Japan, I should be compensated, right? But that never occurred to me that I should stand up for myself. So as this was going on, I was having trouble with personal relationships. One thing that I noticed is that a lot of my relationships were tied to my skill in dance and my identity as a dancer. And I had lots of so called friends in the dance world, but I didn't have any real friends that I connected with and could have soul to soul conversations. It was all about dance all the time, with a few exceptions. And I was attracting people, energy, vampires, narcissists, and people who were willing to take advantage of me, especially in romantic relationships, people who just wanted it for themselves. And I had this construct in my head of, well, if I don't do exactly what that person wants, then they're not going to love me. Such a one sided relationship. And I would continuously get into these relationships, and it was starting to cause me a lot of pain. And I didn't have any idea of what I wanted for myself. I didn't have any standards for men. So you can imagine the kind of pit that I dug myself into. I attributed all of this, the lack of connection and everything, to my involvement in the dance community and by blaming my misery on the thing that I love the most, my dance, my modality of self expression. I isolated and alienated for myself from it, and I fell out of love with it. So that's when I was like, okay, it's time to reset. And I was about to turn 30, and I was like, I can do a working holiday in New Zealand. So I sold all my stuff, packed my bags, and I moved halfway across the world and did a working holiday. And there I had some temporary relief. I worked in a printing factory, and I had also miraculously talked or asked a parkour studio, parkour gym to allow me to train there in exchange for some assistance labor. And not only did they allow me to train there for free, they paid me. And I was like, oh, my goodness. Like, someone's willing to give me money. Oh, my God, right? This is the first time that I didn't attach my personal value to what I was doing as a profession. And it was so freeing, and I wish that I had kept that mindset. But several things happened in New Zealand where one, my at the time, boyfriend broke up with me, probably because of my toxic habits and ways of relating with people. And then I got tipped on a job back in LA, bringing people from America to Japan on vacation. And I was like, wow. And they were looking for an educational director. So like, oh, this is something I can do. This sounds really cool. And then I would be back in LA. So I got the job and I flew back to LA, and I thought, I think I've got enough of a reset. When I was back in LA, I mean, this was a very startup job. And I quickly realized, well, I'm not going to make a lot of money on this, but it seems fun. I'm going to Japan, lots and lots and lots. And I get to reconnect with people in Japan, and I was having a little bit fun. And then I started to notice the same patterns of self destruction and low self esteem come back, just in a different way. So I was going, I was going to work, practicing some parkour and capoeta at night, and I had a pretty good flow going on. Felt good about myself for a while. And then I started to get into these so called relationships again, and those started to fall apart really quickly because I was still chasing men, I was still chasing relationships because I didn't feel like I deserved to be loved. So the only way to be loved was to try to please other people. Does that sound familiar? Right. So, you know, and at the same time, I was going to Japan and I noticed this pattern also in going to capoeira that, like, I would have a relationship with the teacher where I would want to make her happy. And more and more, it became about showing up for her and less for me. And when that happens, eventually you start to resent. You start to resent those people that you are supposedly giving for, because in. Deep down, you know that you're not getting as much out of this. Deep down, you know that you want rest. I wanted rest. I wanted. I wanted renewal, and I was not giving it to myself because I was like, I have to show up. She's expecting me to show up. And then I. So eventually, I burnt out again. Same way I burnt out with dance, same way I burnt out with grad school, because I was doing it for the wrong reasons, even though I thought it was a noble reason. And there was one day in Japan, I was in a luxurious hot spring resort, and I was crying. I was like, I can't do my life like this. I'm so miserable. And I have good things. I'm surrounded by good things, like, why can't I live a happy life? And why can't I get into a relationship where someone values me? And it's like I have to do something different? It's time to move on from this job, because I need the space to figure out who I am and what is going on here. So I decided to give several months notice before I exited. And in the meantime, I started to explore, what can I do next? And not only that, I gave myself a ten day silent meditation in the desert of a passionate retreat to help to calm the voices in my head, to help to figure out why it is that I was stuck in a cycle of misery. After that, I enrolled myself in a type of yoga called the stanga yoga, Mysore style yoga, where you go in early in the morning, you do a very personalized practice in silence, and then you go home. And I did that for six days a week. And I would just do that so I could breathe and be with myself. Along the way, I was introduced to Ayurveda, which is the ancient vedic system of holistic medicine. What really drew me to Ayurveda was the philosophy. It was not its power to reverse certain diseases or anything. It was this idea of exploring consciousness and exploring the underlying roots of suffering, mental and physical. Because disease is just physical suffering, right? Mental health, also mental suffering. I wanted to get to the root of it. That was what I was going through. I wanted to get to the root of my suffering. And so I decided to enroll in Ayurveda school. So the thing about this pattern of feeling like you're not enough is that you constantly feel like you need to be the normal one to give back, that you need to do something in your life to make, to validate your existence. So that became the thing for ayurveda, is like, I'm going to become a practitioner. I'm going to become a clinician who helps people uncover their suffering. And again, I was putting myself second. I didn't realize it at the time, so after a few years, I became an ayurvedic practitioner and I started my own practice. But there was still this thing deep down, I was like, I don't deserve to be. I don't deserve the money for helping people. I don't deserve the life that everyone else gets to live, making a living. So I'm going to charge people as low as possible. Not only that, but there's also this hole that I had is like, people are telling me like, oh, you can't make money if you don't have a massage therapy license. Because that's part of the gateway of ayurveda, is, for a lot of people, is to start doing the massages. So I spent another over ten grand getting this ayurvedic, not ayurvedic even like just a massage license, draining my resources, continuously trying to validate myself. And at the end of that, then I, by that time, I had my own clinic. I was paying rent to have my own little space inside of an acupuncture office. And what I didn't realize was that I had pigeonholed myself into creating a charity where I was. I was charging really low prices, especially for my consultations. And I made pretty much enough to break even on the rent each month. I was making a lot of good differences, helping people, but not making any money for myself, and continuously relying on people to help me, to keep me going so that I could be this supposed savior. And I was just not willing to save myself. And it finally broke. The whole thing finally came apart. When I finally decided to talk to a financial advisor, she, we created some spreadsheets together, and she's like, you're basically paying your clients for you to do your job. And I knew at that point that I was in the wrong place. And I had to really look at myself and question, what if I did increase my prices? Would I still want to be here? Would I still want to be running this clinic? I mean, I'm making a lot of good difference in other people's lives, but what kind of difference am I making? In my life, am I living the life that I wanted to be living? And I had to be. For once in my life, I had to be 100% brutally honest, because I wasn't even just working at that clinic for myself. I was also taking part time jobs in order for me to run this clinic. And I was like, I cannot see myself doing this for the rest of my life. I don't care how good of an impact I'm having on other people. This is not my path. I have to discover what that is. But at the same time, I have to put my foot down, and I have to do something for myself. And I got really lucky in that I went to a conference and met someone who deals with people like me, who have been trying to martyr themselves for their entire life and give them a business model where they can help people and also make a living. And I used to be really against what is life coaching. Why are people charging, like, thousands of dollars to help other people in their lives? Well, it's that we have these goals that seem so lofty and unattainable, and when we get present to them, we really tap into that desire. And so I want people to reach their highest potential. I want to reach my highest potential. And so I decided to let go of that clinic, and I decided I am going to jump into this new pool, and I am going to create something that can really help people uncover their own limiting beliefs about themselves and be the greatest version of themselves that they could possibly be. And, of course, at the same time, using the ayurveda, using the tools that I've learned throughout the years through dance and acrobatics, yoga, et cetera, to create that structure for people to thrive not only physically, mentally, but also spiritually. And that is my story of embracing the inner phoenix. I, too, am rising from the ashes of burnout, of perpetually being a people pleaser, of being someone with horrific low self esteem. And I am here to make myself better. I am here to be on that journey and to be the absolute best and most fulfilled person for myself. So that's it in a nutshell. I really am looking forward to bringing stories of recreation, of ego death, of self empowerment. I am going to be bringing some of my friends who have gone through similar journeys and yet really different, so that you can hear that we as human beings, we are here to do something really special with our lives and that it is never too late to turn it around. So thank you so much for tuning in for the first episode of from the Ashes. I hope that you enjoyed this episode and I so look forward to the next time you tune in. If you would like to get in touch with me. If you're interested in contributing to the podcast, my contact email is [email protected]. You can also check out my website www. Dot intrepidwellness Dot life and learn a little bit more about what I have to offer. Thank you so much from the bottom of my heart. I will see you next time.
