Optimizing Health of Mind, Body, and Spirit in an Age of Noise

What does it mean to pursue health of mind, body, and spirit when the world feels loud, polarized, and oversimplified?

In this episode, Juli reflects honestly on the anxiety of meaning-making in a culture addicted to certainty. She explores why uncertainty is so uncomfortable for the brain, why influencer culture offers false safety, and how true health is built not through extreme protocols or borrowed confidence—but through simple, embodied, daily practices.

Drawing from neuroscience, spiritual direction, and lived experience, this conversation reframes health as capacity, wisdom as curiosity, and growth as a long walk rather than a quick fix.

Key Themes Covered

Why Uncertainty Triggers Anxiety

• The brain is a prediction organ; uncertainty activates the amygdala and threat response
• Ambiguity can feel more distressing than known negative outcomes
• This explains why certainty—real or false—feels soothing to the nervous system

Why Influencer Certainty Feels Comforting (But Isn’t Healing)

• Confidence lowers perceived cognitive load
• Simple answers reduce nervous system arousal—even if inaccurate
• Relief is not the same as regulation; certainty is not the same as truth

What Optimizing Health Actually Means

• Not eliminating questions, but increasing tolerance for them
• Supporting nervous system regulation and prefrontal cortex engagement
• Strengthening inner authority rather than outsourcing discernment

How Health Is Built

• Regulation before resolution
• Embodied awareness over external authority
• Simple, repeatable daily decisions
• Honoring questions as part of spiritual and psychological maturity

Spiritual Direction Insight

Henri Nouwen reminds us in Spiritual Direction that:

• Without questions, answers feel manipulative
• Without struggle, help feels like interference
• Without desire to learn, direction feels oppressive

Health—of mind, body, and spirit—grows where humility and curiosity are allowed to coexist.

Transcript

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I wanna start today by admitting something. I've been carrying a bit of angst as I've been thinking about this episode about health, about meaning, about mind, body, and spirit. I've been talking a lot about what does it look like for the healthiest mind, body, and spirit? How do we optimize that'cause? So like times, genuinely, I don't. Know what it all means. What does it mean when I feel nothing at all and everyone around me seems to be feeling everything deeply, loudly, and confidently? What does it mean when I find myself deeply bothered, not by emotion, but. Misinformation by false claims, by ill-informed statements that sound certain, but aren't grounded by self diagnosing and blindly following influencers who have not earned the right to speak into the lives, health or nervous system of others, and people who misunderstand science and sometimes even the basics of anatomy and physiology. These being my area of expertise. I notice, and I'm sure that if you have an area of expertise where people are constantly making claims or speaking with certainty, this might hit you in a different way, in a different area, on a different topic. I notice this tension within myself, and part of me is trying to understand the world I live in, and part of me feels like I'm struggling in vain. like the volume is loud. The certainty is high, but the depth. Not really there. And I've been sitting with that because I don't think the answer is to become louder or more convincing or more certain. I think the discomfort in itself might be part of the work. Henry now and writes in his book on spiritual direction, something that has been studying me. He says, the quest for meaning can be extremely frustrating and at times even excruciating, precisely because it does not lead to ready answers, but to new questions. When we realize that the pain of the human search is a necessary growing pain, we can accept as good the forces of human spiritual development, and be grateful for the journey on the long walk of faith. That stopped me. Because we live in a culture that demands answers and fast ones and certainty and solutions that fit neatly into a caption. But now one goes on to say something even more confronting, he says, without a question. An answer is experienced as manipulation or control without a struggle. The help offered is considered interference, and without the desire to learn direction is easily felt as oppression. This is why one of my favorite questions of people are discussing problems and all of the solutions I like to ask. What is the problem we're trying to solve? Because sometimes we're solving a problem, we're not even really sure what it is. We're just spitting out solutions or things that we know and we're not really grounded in. What is the problem? This also is a very much a guiding principle If you are a parent of adult children, those relationships transition. And this is a good guiding principle for how we go about, understanding that communication now. When I read that, and you might wanna go back and listen to that, or maybe I'll just say it again without a question. An answer is experienced as manipulation or control without a struggle. The help offered is considered interference. If this is where we get the, if, uh, if it's not broken, don't fix it. And without a desire to learn direction is easily felt as oppression. People are going about their, their lives and have no desire to learn, and yet people are coming at them with all the things they have to do differently and that feels oppressive and people resist so suddenly. With all of that so much. Makes sense. Why advice feels intrusive, why truth feels threatening. Why guidance, especially around health and faith and meaning can feel oppressive instead of supportive. Especially if you're not saying what they wanna hear. Right? So it's not because people don't care, it's because questions haven't been honored. Maybe they're not a value, and we're not asking questions, and I wanna be very clear about something. Also, as we begin this conversation, I am not here because I know it all. I don't, I'm here because I don't presume to know it all, and because I'm willing to stay in the question long enough to learn what I wanna offer. Today is not certainty. It's not a formula, and it's not influencer wellness, it's orientation. Some guidance, some truth, some grounding rooted in neuroscience lived experience and faith that allows space for mystery because optimizing health of mind, body, and spirit is not about bypassing the struggle. I know that we want it to be, but it is not. we cannot bypass that struggle. It's about learning how to stay present inside it without manipulation, without control, and without pretending that we've arrived. And maybe just, maybe that's where real health begins. Okay, so when I started writing this episode, my, my intention was, how do we optimize for the healthiest, mind, body, and spirit? What does that look like and why uncertainty feels so unsettling and why we reach for easy answers now in. Fully transparent. I am also trying to communicate with people about coaching and what it means to step into the yes society and what it means to hire me to walk alongside you and help you get that optimization but I'm also not always comfortable with that marketing message. I want you to live the life that you're created for. and we could have a conversation and I could know if I could help you or not, and we could learn that together. But what I really wanted to figure out is what it looks like and what people are really wanting. So what I've been sitting with lately is this tension between meaning and noise, and it has a neurological component in that the human brain is wired for prediction. And at the basic level, your nervous system is constantly asking, am I safe? What's coming next? Do I know how to respond when the answers are unclear, the brain experiences uncertainty as a threat. Now neuroscience shows us that uncertainty activates the amygdala. That's that brain's alarm center, and often more intensely than known negative outcomes. In other words, not knowing can feel more distressing than knowing something difficult. So this helps to explain so much of what we see around us. When life feels complex, when health feels confusing, when meaning feels elusive, we naturally gravitate towards voices that offer certainty. Simple answers, bold claims, clear villains, quick fixes. This is why you will get from every coach. Their solution in 90 days, because that's a quick win. That certainty, that's simple. That's easy. That's what our brain craves. Now, it's not because people are foolish, but because the nervous system is seeking relief, there are people who have invested many years in education and many dollars in research to learn these things about how our brains work and how. How that plays into marketing too. and when I say marketing and sales, we have to understand that everything is sales. If you want to, um, if you wanna convince your friend or your husband or your child to do something that they maybe aren't usually doing or isn't on their radar screen, you have to sell it. And if we know what the brain is wanting, then we will make it sound simple and we will make it sound fun. Now, again, this isn't because people are naturally manipulative or foolish it's again, because the nervous system is seeking relief. And here's where things get tricky. Certainty feels like safety, but certainty without depth is not wisdom. It's sedation. That's why misinformation spread so easily. That's why influencer cultures thrive, and that's why confidence is often mistaken for credibility. The brain relaxes when it hears. I know. Do this. Trust me, even when those claims misunderstand science, ignore physiology or even flatten the complexity of the human experience. But relief is not the same as regulation, and certainty is not the same as truth. This used to drive me crazy when even in church when we hear messages, A, B, C 1, 2, 3. And that's how it is when you're knowing that that's not probably going to, that's the human experience and the complexity of relationships, like in the workplace and in out in public is not as easy as they make it seem. but we like the certainty involved in. A plus B equals C, and just do this and it will work. But again, relief is not the same as regulation, and certainty is not the same as truth. So that's kind of the why. Now what? What does optimizing health really mean? This brings us back to that deeper question. What does it actually mean to optimize health of mind, body and spirit? first of all, it does not mean eliminating uncertainty. It does not mean having all the answers, and it does not mean outsourcing your discernment. Optimization means capacity, and I totally get that this is not a popular subject not something that is going to make you go running to my coaching program or seeking out self care academy or aroma cognition to solve your problems. I'm told that I would need a different message. I'm told To offer you chocolate and then give you broccoli. but I wanna talk about optimization and what it really means, and that's capacity. From a neurological perspective, it means a nervous system that can tolerate ambiguity, a brain that can hold nuance without panic and a prefrontal cortex that stays up. Online under stress. I think that's what we all want. We want to be able to navigate the ups and downs without being shaken. And what we're taught is if you do this, it will work this way. When I started network marketing, I was told, all you have to do is show up and you will succeed. And talk about flattening the complexity. You have to show up, but you have to show up consistently and you have to do certain things when you show up, and you have to do those things consistently, and you have to do them in a right, the right order, and you cannot stop. Well, and they tell you that the only way you fail is to quit because they're assuming on that you will continue to learn and you will continue to grow, and you will continue to push yourself. But what we really want is that we can figure it out. One of the best advices that I've had recently is My coach, said. Yeah, just commit, commit, commit, commit, and then go figure it out. You, you form a hypothesis, you try it. It's the research method. That's how we approach life. We try something, it works or doesn't, and we just keep going. If we have a brain that can hold nuance without panic, a nervous system that can tolerate ambiguity and a prefrontal cortex that stays online under stress. Now, from a whole person perspective, it means a mind that can think without spiraling a body that can respond instead of react, and a spirit that can remain anchored even when answers don't come quickly. That's how I would like to tell you about coaching is that this is what you will get is a mind that can think without spiraling a body that can respond instead of react and a spirit that can remain anchored even when answers don't come quickly. and this is why health cannot be reduced to trends or protocols or personalities. True health strengthens your ability to stay present inside complexity, which is very different than avoiding it. Now how do we do that? Daily practices that build inner authority. we can cultivate a kind of health, especially in a world that profits from urgency and certainty? Well, first of all, we start small. We start embodied and we start honest. We have to start with regulation before resolution. The brain cannot learn when it is overwhelmed before seeking answers. We calm the system, so we slow our breathing. We do some sensory grounding. We establish some predictable rhythms. A regulation tells the nervous system, I am safe enough to stay curious. Now, second, we ask some questions as strength, not failure. So first we regulate with before resolution, and then We honor questions as strength, not failure. And this is where I'll return again to Henry now and who reminds us that the questions are not obstacles to our faith or wisdom that they are the soil where both grow because without asking questions, answers, feel manipulative. Help feels intrusive and guidance feels oppressive. We naturally resist it then, but when questions are honored, direction becomes invitation. This is something that I've had to get really good at in my nurse coach training. We use the term authentic curiosity, and I really had to dive into what that meant, and that meant getting curious with. Out leading the process with my own agenda or my own preconceived notions or hearing somebody say something and wanting to lead them in the direction that they, that I think that they should go. I have to let that go and really follow and maybe ask a question instead of offering, insight. And that is still something I'm growing in. and I think that something we would all benefit from that skill so regularly before resolution, questions of strength, not failure, and then embodied discernment over external authority. This is something where we're working on this a lot in the Yes society, because I believe that influencers offer borrowed certainty. And embodied wisdom is cultivated, and this means learning to ask, how does this feel in my body? Does this bring clarity or contraction? Does this invite agency or dependence? If you have to be in somebody's course or you have to be in somebody's book or listening to their podcast, or every time you have a question, you immediately go seek what they're saying. That's dependence. and there's nothing wrong with learning. Learning is good and learning from a a from experts is, is a good thing. We all, we all need it for one thing, but your nervous system knows more than you think. When it's regulated enough to listen. So sometimes just sitting quietly. And listening how your body feels And does this, is this what I'm hearing, bringing clarity or am I contracting? Is this inviting agency or dependence this? These are filters that we can use to sort through when we're consuming. get curious and create before you consume and compare. And the, that could maybe be a topic for another day, but it's so important for us to create and contribute. And so many of us spend more time consuming and comparing than we do creating and contributing. And that's off balance. And our bodies, our nervous system, know it. that's also what creates burnout All right, we have to make some simple daily decisions, not dramatic overhauls and not perfect consistency. This isn't the new year, new you. This is more you every day, one step forward. Just small repeated choices to pause, to notice, to breathe, to think critically, to stay teachable. make it a rule to always ask a question before you give an opinion or before you state a fact, ask a question. Health is built on ordinary faithfulness, not viral moments. I am in the process of really trying to decide if I wanna do a 90 day reset. Now I know the science between a 90 day reset, but I also know that a lot of the language is to tell you, it kind of gives you the idea that in 90 days you'll be able to reset your health and optimize your health. But it goes so far beyond the 90 days. 90 days is where it happens from the beginning, and it does take 90 days to make a change. And that's not a popular message either, but. But I kind of contemplating doing that because I wanna do it for my myself. I, I want that reset, like, um, intentional paying attention to my body and doing some intentional work, in really clarifying my habits. Regardless. I wanna say again, that health is built on ordinary faithfulness. It's not viral moments. It's not that one 90 day reset. It's not that one, course that you take or, water bottle that you buy. All of those things go together maybe the goal is not to feel deeply all the time, and it's not to feel nothing either. Maybe the work is leaning on how to stay present with our questions and our bodies with our limits, and maybe wisdom looks less like certainty and more like humility, less like performance, and more like practice. Less like answers shouted from a platform and more like truth discovered slowly and quietly in the body. And I don't offer all of this because again, because I know it all, I offer it because I'm still learning. And I believe that optimizing health of mind, body, and spirit begins right here. Not with control, not with certainty, but with curiosity, with the courage to ask better questions, and with the patience to stay embodied, with the humility, to let wisdom unfold in its own time, and maybe that. That long walk of faith and that honest search for meaning is not a problem to solve, but a way to live As you go out every day and default to yes, your extraordinary self.