Rebekah: Hey guys.
It’s Bex here and I’m here with my wonderful, gorgeous friend Danielle Diamond, founder
of Xen Strength which is this amazing program that has this whole lifestyle concept called
Breathe Smile Sweat and we will talk about that in a second.
I will let you talk in one second.
Danielle: OK, you talk.
You talk.
Rebekah: This is my 21-video series with my fabulous friends called She Has Four Minutes
because everyone has time in their day for self-care and self-love.
I know you don’t believe it but now I’m bringing women to prove it.
It’s not just me telling you.
It’s other women too.
So Danielle …
Danielle: Yes.
Rebekah: Founder of Xen Strength, Breathe Smile Sweat, you’re always happy.
You’re always glowing.
Danielle: Oh, thank you.
Rebekah: You have a husband to take care of.
You have two boys that are sometimes annoying to take care of.
You have a lot of stuff going on.
Danielle: Yeah.
Rebekah: Yeah, but you’re like in bliss all the time.
You’re totally blissed in.
You’re like the embodiment of blissed in.
Danielle: Oh, thank you.
Rebekah: What the heck are you doing?
Danielle: I don’t have any chickens.
So she – I love how she makes me look good and then she has got chickens and goats and
like three more kids than I do.
Rebekah: No, but it’s true.
I’m bringing in women who are not only like amazing career women.
They have all these other things going on.
Like, you have families.
You have projects.
You have like volunteer efforts.
It’s like all these things these women are doing but they still have time to take care
of themselves.
So what are you doing every single day in a small way to take care of yourself?
Danielle: I realized a long time ago that the most – the smallest thing that I could
do that would have the most impact on not only how I live my life on a minute to minute
basis but the overall grand scheme of things was to meditate.
Rebekah: Are you trying to steal my thing?
Danielle: I know.
She kind of said that I had to pick something else but it’s really my thing.
It’s like my non-negotiable in the morning.
Rebekah: No, but I love the way you meditate because meditation is different for everyone.
Not only are there like independent schools of teaching meditation and methods, but then
everyone can individualize it and make it really like custom to their life.
So what do you do?
Danielle: Absolutely.
Because it’s my non-negotiable whether I’m on vacation or whether I’m home, I make
sure I do it.
Sometimes that could mean we’re on vacation.
I’m going in the bathroom and sitting on the bathtub while my kids are still sleeping
and I’m just breathing and that’s it, right?
But usually if I’m at home and I’m doing my regular like wake-up, brush teeth, go sit
at my altar meditation, I sit for about 20 minutes but that doesn’t mean you have to.
It could be four, right?
So the first 10 minutes, I have these reiki-infused candles on my altar.
Rebekah: You don’t have to laugh.
It’s cool.
Danielle: I’m not – really not totally woo-woo.
I’m just …
Rebekah: You have your candle.
I like it.
Danielle: I’m just a little woo-woo.
You don’t want to scare people with something like reiki-infused candles.
What the heck is that?
You could use a regular candle flame but I do – I start off with the Trataka meditation
where you gaze into the candle flame and on each of these candles is a little mantra.
So say there’s one about abundance and it says, “May an abundance of goodness flow
freely through me and into the lives of others.”
So for about 10 minutes, I will do a mantra meditation staring at the flame, working with
that.
Then the second half is always a gratitude meditation, being grateful for all the things
that I have already and welcoming in the things to be thankful for that the universe is bringing
to me.
Rebekah: You’re a very grateful person though because you are one person that I know that
I can go to.
I’m not going to hear a lot of complaining.
Not that you don’t have your own struggles and your own stresses and we discuss things
that we’re trying to get past, but you’re not someone who ever brings me down.
You’re always very uplifting and I think that that’s a big part of it is recognizing
every day the stuff that we’re grateful for.
I do that too.
I wake up in the morning before anyone else gets up and I kind of wander around and I
will make my smoothie, but I will take notice of what’s happening outside my window.
I look at the trees and like wow, this is where I live.
I’m so grateful for my unicorn bust that’s in my office.
It’s pretty fabulous.
I have a big, gold unicorn head.
Danielle: It’s awesome.
Rebekah: But like things like that, just recognizing what we have, whether it’s material, whether
it’s relationship, and feeling that we have a lot even when we feel like we don’t, recognizing
that we are always being blessed and when times are rough.
Danielle: That changes – again, that’s why we’re friends because we get it and
there are so many people out there.
Rebekah: Because we can bitch.
Danielle: Listen, we could moan if our bagel isn’t spread with cream cheese, right?
Some people.
But about dumb little things, right?
But on the grand scheme of things, listen, everybody has their story and everybody has
got their baggage and we’ve talked about this.
A lot of what we’ve learned and how we’ve evolved with our yoga or spirituality practice
is letting go with that because you can hold on to the crap that has happened to you growing
up and let it ruin the rest of your life, right?
I think whether it was like my mother committing suicide or my father’s bankruptcy or whatever,
all the stuff that I’ve gone through, I’ve always tried to say, “OK, this has happened
and it’s in my past.
It’s not going to be my future,” right?
Every day finding something to be thankful for, it just – it literally just flips your
whole day around.
Rebekah: And thanks for sharing that because people see us a lot.
They will see us on video or they will see us out on engagement and it’s like wow,
you have this fabulous life.
You wear beautiful clothes.
You get to go to beautiful places and you have all this success and all these benefits.
But there is a back story and I think that there is something that really propelled us
into that place of really seeking out those gratitude practices because there’s a lot
of hurt behind it too.
Danielle: Oh, it’s in my – like I’m the first one to say and I speak a lot about
this with my clients.
It’s like yoga literally saved – like it saved my life.
You hear people say that a lot because it is so powerful and whether yoga is what you
do on the mat or your meditation every morning or your gratitude, it’s all forms of non-attachment.
All of those elements of the yoga practice that it encompasses, if you put those practices
into effect, they really do change and even like yesterday we were coming home from the
city with my boys who are like 13 and 11 and kids in this day and age – and just like
just – with everything just handed to them, everything is immediate gratification and
we were going into the tunnel and there was a homeless person.
Their house was a blanket with a tarp over it and my son five minutes before was bitching
about how he wanted a new pair of sneakers.
Without prompting, he looked at the guy and he goes, “I guess I really don’t need
that fourth pair of sneakers, do I?”
Rebekah: Yeah.
Danielle: I look at that.
I’m like yes, I’m doing something right.
Rebekah: Mindfulness trickles fast.
It really does.
It’s the practice.
Danielle: Listen, again, you do the same thing with your children.
It’s like when you live it and you don’t just talk about it, people feel it and people
see it and hopefully you influence the lives of others by your actions.
Rebekah: What I want to really press to the people that are watching this, when you take
the time to care for yourself, other people, even though they may be resistant to it at
first, the kids will be knocking on the door.
Your husband may be like, “Hurry up.
We need to get going.”
They will start to respect you more for it.
When you treat yourself well, it teaches other people how to treat you.
Thank you so much.
Danielle: You’re welcome.
Rebekah: To find out more about Danielle, you can go to XenStrength.com, also DanielleDiamond.com.
It’s such an amazing program.
It’s yoga and so much more.
Danielle: Thank you.
Rebekah: There’s like lots more.
Danielle: Yeah, it’s fun.
People are digging it.
So I’m happy.
Rebekah: Thanks for watching.
I will see you soon in another She Has Four Minutes video.
Danielle: Bye.
Rebekah: Keep watching.