The Healing Power of Living a Life of Gratitude – Ep #024 Interview With Inspirational Yogi Eve St. John

0 (1s):
Welcome to the Soul Science Nutrition Podcast, where you’ll discover that when it comes to your health, you’re so much more powerful than you’ve been led to believe. And now your host, she’s a holistic nutrition and lifestyle coach, chef author, and Yogi, Christine Okezie.

Christine Okezie (22s):
Hello, and welcome to the Soul Science Nutrition Podcast. I’m Christine Okezie. Thanks so much for tuning in today. And I just want to let you know how much I appreciate all your support. Thank you so much for leaving your ratings and review. And if you haven’t already hit that subscribe button, please do so. So you don’t miss the weekly episodes that came out every Thursday. So today’s special show is really a gem. It’s all about living a life of gratitude. And, you know, as I got to thinking about it, there are those handful of people in your life that you cross paths with that make you feel so inspired by the role that they’ve played in helping you shift and grow positively in your life.

Christine Okezie (1m 7s):
And today’s guest is one of those people on my path. Her name is Eve st. John. So by way of background, Eve is a certified yoga instructor, inspirational speaker life coach and personal trainer. She’s been recognized in magazines and newspapers over the past 25 years, both nationally and internationally for her work, uplifting and inspiring people to believe in themselves and live a life of gratitude. So eight years ago, Eve launched what is now a wildly successful business, where she designs her very own one of a kind beautiful crystal bracelets that come with signature inspirational messages in this show, you’ll hear how Eve had no intentions of starting an inspirational jewelry design company until an accident in 2012 happened at her son’s hockey game.

Christine Okezie (2m 0s):
So stay tuned for that, but today’s heartwarming show is rich with beautiful reminders about the personal power that we can have in our lives. When we trust the journey, when we make a choice to change our perspective and live with more presence and appreciation for ourselves and the life that’s right here, Eve shares her personal practical tips for finding calm in the storm and feeling freedom in our busy lives. She reminds us all that.

Christine Okezie (2m 31s):
We already have everything we need to get out of our own way and create a life of joy this episode. And these words that we share are truly medicine for these challenging times. But to be clear, there is no spiritual fluff or fake wellness gimmicks here. Eve walks her talk, listen, in on this authentic conversation that we’ll have you knowing you are limitless and that the best is to come.

Christine Okezie (3m 2s):
Hello, Eve St. John, welcome to the podcast. So great to have you here.

Eve St. John (3m 7s):
Thank you so much for having me. This is so exciting. Thank you.

Christine Okezie (3m 12s):
Yeah. So Eve you have play you and I have known each other for quite some time going through so many evolutions of our own, you know, life stages. And it’s, I wanted to have you on the show today just because you continue to be such a bright shining light for people when the area of health and self care and self love and gratitude, and you bring so much that’s needed, especially in these really challenging times.

Christine Okezie (3m 43s):
So that’s why.

Eve St. John (3m 44s):
Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. That’s sweet.

Christine Okezie (3m 50s):
So for let’s jump in, I would love to just start with, you know, how did you come to be a yoga teacher? How did you come into the yoga world?

Eve St. John (4m 2s):
Well, I started in the fitness many, many years ago, and then as I got older, I just fell in love with the yoga physically. At first, it wasn’t really so much of the spiritual world I’m going back like 15 years ago. It was like, Ooh, that stretch felt so good in my body. I wasn’t even thinking about meditation or anything like that. And then little by little, I gave up my physical classes, like weight training or step and slide and all those kind of things that were really popular back then started going into yoga.

Eve St. John (4m 38s):
And back in 15 years ago, it wasn’t that required to have like your 200 hour, five pounds an hour yoga training. So I was just certified through fitness world and then we’d go on a weekend retreat and get a certification. But then as I started teaching yoga, it became a required like you needed a 200 hour or 500 hour yoga training. So I got my training through yoga Alliance through lifetime, under the program of Johnny passed and I fell in love even more.

Eve St. John (5m 12s):
And I learned that yoga had so many different levels that I wasn’t even aware of. And my training was a stronger base, a stronger base and Vinyasa flow. So that’s how it all started. It all started with me feeling really attracted to the way to make me feel in my physical body. And now as I practice, I realized that physical part of it was like 1%. Wow. 99% is really more about connecting to your breath and movement of your body and just quieting your mind

Christine Okezie (5m 50s):
And, and tell me, you know, why did that come to be so fulfilling for you? What did you, what was your experience when you started to experience that and what did you want to people to know about it?

Eve St. John (6m 4s):
I think, you know, majority of us, I would say it’s a known fact on average person has 60,000 thoughts a day and your mind is constantly busy. You’re always either thinking or planning or worrying. And I found that with yoga, I was just in my space, I was more present. Like I was just present. I wasn’t planning. I wasn’t worrying, especially coming in and out of those balancing poses, it really made me feel grounded. I really realized, wow, like I’m not thinking about anything, except just being in the moment.

Eve St. John (6m 39s):
And a lot of us miss out on life because we’re not living in the moment. You know, I might be talking to right now thinking, Oh, what should I make for dinner? I gotta go food shopping. And you know, things just pop into our mind and yoga kind of teaches you to be more present. And I just wanted to my students to experience that. And I wanted to share that experience with as many people as I can. Just everything that you already need and want is already there. Like stop worrying so much, you know?

Eve St. John (7m 10s):
That’s okay.

Christine Okezie (7m 11s):
Amazing. Thank you. Now it really served you in, at a very pivotal, pivotal time in your life. I know that your journey from teaching yoga and working with your students on their mind, kinda had an inflection point at one point in your life. Can you share a little bit how that became a catalyst for the evolution that took you to where you were?

Eve St. John (7m 36s):
Yeah. Yeah. It was like year 2012. I was just at my son’s hockey game. My son is a hockey player and he was playing in Ridgewood high school at his game in Hackensack watching the game. There was like a broken glass and they had a wood panel and there was no seats when I got there. So I’m kind of sitting behind this wooden thing that you can’t see much. And this flying puck came, hit me right in my forehead, splitting that head.

Eve St. John (8m 7s):
Oh my gosh. In half, like opening it up. And it was like crazy scary. But at that moment, your yoga training, your breathing, everything that you practice comes in incredibly handy. Like there was this homeless, even though I was in pain, I was like, I knew everything would be okay. Like this is just a passing phase. It’s like a bad cloudy day is always, there is always there, but all these thoughts were passing mine. And I was honestly really glad that I didn’t like die, but I felt like this warm gush of blood, but I didn’t know it was all blood.

Eve St. John (8m 45s):
I just was like in pain. They’re holding my head together. And next thing I know the fire department, everybody, and I’m heading to the hospital and they kept Jim was with me. And he’s like, whatever you do just don’t look in the mirror. Like,

3 (9m 1s):
And of course I had to go to the bathroom after I’m like, okay, don’t look in the mirror. But I had to look. I was like, Oh,

Eve St. John (9m 7s):
Oh my God, I’m scared of severe head hematoma. So your head kind of grows like really big when it looks like your head is pregnant. And of course, when you have that much swelling, your eyes up there, your nose is down here. It’s really scary, scary. I was like, okay, okay. You know, everything is fine. I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m going to be fine. I am, as I’m out on the stretcher, even I remember doing a tree pose laying down because just to balance my body, it was automatic. It wasn’t like saying these thing.

Eve St. John (9m 37s):
I’ve noticed the whole time I was in the tree pose and I was doing my yoga, breathing, calming myself. And I was really truly like, kind of glad that it had happened to me. And not like to my, you know, my kids or somebody I don’t know in my family, because I couldn’t like I could handle it better than them. And I knew like deep down inside, even when it happened, even though it sucked, I just knew like something good will come out of this, stay calm. Like everything’s going to be okay.

Eve St. John (10m 8s):
I didn’t realize at the time I thought it was going to be like, okay, you get stitches, you go home, put some ice on it. But it wasn’t like that. It took like probably about two months. Wow. For the swelling to go down and fight eight weeks, I had to kind of sit up a, you can’t lay down because of the hematoma. And during that time, I really, really started meditating. Like I’ve never was that much into meditating. I just started my meditations with, I woke up today without a headache.

Eve St. John (10m 39s):
Thank you so much that I don’t have a headache. Oh my goodness. I’m so happy that I could breathe a little better. I could hold my head. I could turn my head. Like it just started like that. And then I said, well, let me change my words to more positive so that I could look at myself in the mirror or I could look at my kids and not scare them because the face was very scary. And I had severe black and blues. I mean, it was unrecognizable. So I would start like every day, you know, kinda meditating, covering my face and saying, okay, I am healed.

Eve St. John (11m 13s):
I am beautiful. All those, well, I am healing. And like, I would repeat these words and go look in the mirror. And I go, Oh my gosh, it’s not working. And I would repeat that. I would repeat that, but I was like, I need more help. So I started with the power of crystals. Yes. And I just made myself, I ordered online or something.

Eve St. John (11m 44s):
I ordered and I made these bracelets for myself and I felt so good. It was like my reminder, all those well, constant reminder on my, you all as well. You are healed. All is good. And that’s how Eve St. John, LLC was born. When I did finally go back to work, my face was healed. I mean, I still have a little bit of indentation here, which they had said they could fix that with Botox, but I am so against anything, chemical coming into my body. I’m just not into that kind of stuff. So I was like, that’s my reminder.

Eve St. John (12m 17s):
I like blessing, blessing. I love it. So when I went back to work to teach my students who are like, I love your bracelets, you know, can you make me one? Can you make me one? And then Eve St. John LLC was born. So that’s how the whole thing started.

Christine Okezie (12m 33s):
Incredible. So powerful. Thank you. Thank you. I mean, thank you. I love how, you know, your practice just went to a completely new level. It became so embodied. It became, so let me, you know, use this, let me use what I know. And, and so intentional and so much deeper and personalized. And

Eve St. John (12m 56s):
I think it happens to a lot of people. When you go through something very traumatic, it could be something really severe. It could be losing your job. It could be losing your love her to another lover. It could be a loss of a loved one, right? You become so strong. You become so strong from that. And if you just trust the journey, it takes away the stress. It takes away the stress. Okay. My love of cheated and left me.

Eve St. John (13m 26s):
But you know what? Somebody amazing comes into your life that you’ve never experienced that kind of love, or God forbid, you lost a loved one that meant so much to you, but you put your passion and love in helping others or, you know, creating something that gives you joy. So you just have to kind of change your perspective, you know, your perspective on how you’re looking at the things you can’t look at it as all of my gosh, poor me. How could this happen to me? You all, I’m so unlucky.

Eve St. John (13m 57s):
If you repeat those words, you’re going to believe them and you’re going to live that life. So it’s really up to you. Our words are so powerful more than we realize. So every word we speak, every thing we think about that becomes our reality, you know?

Christine Okezie (14m 14s):
Yes. Oh my gosh. And there’s so much acceptance, like the role of kind of not fighting your experience, the role of saying, Oh, this is so painful and this is hard, but I know it’s all, as well as you kept repeating something good will come. Something positive is waiting for me. That’s a huge shift in how we move through life.

Eve St. John (14m 39s):
Yes it is. And there always is after each storm, just like there’s a rainbow, same thing with our life after each big storm, horrible storm, there’s always something good coming out of it. But if you look back on your life and look at the, the challenging times, you’ll see, wow, from that challenging time this happened and that wouldn’t have happened. And you just kind of have to kind of trust the process.

Christine Okezie (15m 5s):
Thank you. So these days, you know, what would you say, you know, is your mission in life? What is Your calling?

Eve St. John (15m 11s):
My calling is to help others really like helping others. A lot of people, they have challenges. You know, everybody on the outside might look like, Oh, they have such the perfect life. They’re aggressive. So green, they drive the perfect car, but down deep inside people have issues. I mean, nobody has the perfect life where everything is perfect and they have no challenges. Everybody does. So I feel like I wanted to help people that I don’t know through my design.

Eve St. John (15m 43s):
So everything that I design, I actually write the story to help them to, to wear it as their reminder, you know, whether they need better health, whether they need courage, whether they need love, whether they need success, whether they need more peace, whether they need more balance, whatever it is, right. We all have a different need. So I designed my pieces and trying to help people, encourage people who I might not know through my designs, by writing a story.

Eve St. John (16m 15s):
So depending on, let’s say, you need love. The name of the bracelet would be goddess of love. I would write a story regarding whatever the stones are, whatever the crystals are, whatever energy that they’re known to bring. And then it’s just kind of flows from my heart. Probably the things that I wanted to hear at the time, let’s say I didn’t have love or the time that I didn’t feel balanced the time that I didn’t have peace, what were, what were the words that I needed to hear? Like my guardian angel telling me.

Eve St. John (16m 46s):
So that’s how the stories come about.

Christine Okezie (16m 49s):
Ah, I love the notion that everybody needs reminders, you know, because You said we all get caught up in.

Eve St. John (16m 54s):
Yeah, we do. We do. We, we feel sometimes like, we’re not good enough, you know, as we get older. I mean, I know now that I’m in my fifties, I feel like, you know, maybe I’m getting too old for certain things and it’s, it’s, it’s bad way to think. And then immediately you have to shift, you have to shift your thinking and change it. You know, you just have to say, stop. What am I thinking about? And it’s important to do that. A lot of times when you’re not feeling good, just kind of sit and say, what have I been thinking?

Eve St. John (17m 26s):
And then just kind of pause and say, Oh, no wonder. I don’t feel good. I’m thinking of all these things, right? Yeah. That change, change it. To being grateful for having the gift of the day. You know, a lot of times people say, well, I will be more grateful when I’m happy when I’m, but it’s actually the other way around when you grateful happiness comes automatically. Yeah. So it’s not the other way around.

Eve St. John (17m 58s):
It’s not like you’re happy and joyful and grateful, but it’s like, you’re so grateful for the day. Just for the day you woke up today and you’re given this day. So how do you want to spend it? You know?

Christine Okezie (18m 13s):
Yes. So tell me more about gratitude. Why, you know, what is your practice for gratitude every day?

Eve St. John (18m 21s):
Honestly, it’s so easy to me. It comes easy to me. Somehow. I wake up every morning and I’m just like, Oh, it’s a great day. I have running water. I have the choice of hot water, cold water. I wash my face And I run outside. I run outside in my pajamas. I know I’m like my neighbors know me by now. There she goes – crazy.

Eve St. John (18m 51s):
My routine every morning I wake up, we’ll wash my face, running outside. Usually I get up like 5:00 AM or before, before seven. For sure. Yeah. You know, and I go outside. If it’s a sunny day, I look towards the sunrise. Okay. And if it’s a cloudy day, that’s okay. I still go outside. And if it’s cold outside, I try not to put a jacket on. If it’s snowing outside, I don’t put anything on, I just go with a tank tank top and my pajamas and I’ll bring my hands up.

Eve St. John (19m 21s):
Just say, like, feeling the air, feeling, feeling it in my lungs. I feel like, you know, when your house doesn’t have fresh air and you open the windows, when you open all the windows, this wonderful, fresh air comes in. I feel like that’s what I’m doing to myself, to my body. I’m like, Oh, either then, and then I’ll practice my fire breath and I’ll do, and I’ll pump my arms up. Now. I started pumping my arms up because there’s a lot of power. I never used to do that. I used to be just like this or my enhanced by my heart.

Eve St. John (19m 54s):
But I started pumping my arms up and down because I’ve seen Tony Robbins has had tremendous success in bringing good energy into his body. So I added that practice into my routine. Wow. Data with my fire breath and that, and I’m just like, I’ll do that for about a couple of minutes. And then, and then I’ll sit. If, if the, if the cushions are wet, I’ll go inside, get like dry cushions and stuff. And just for like a minute or so, just breathing in the air, just taking it in.

Eve St. John (20m 25s):
So grateful for the sounds of whatever the leaves moving birds might be chirping. Some sprinklers in the neighborhood might be on just listening to the nature. It’s just so beautiful. And it’s priceless. It’s so nice. And I’ll take deep breaths cleansing, and then I’ll do some tapping, whatever it is that I need for like, if I’m worried about something or if I want to bring more energy, I’ll do that.

Eve St. John (20m 57s):
And then I’ll do my gratitude, which is my beads. I’ll take them. And I’ll just say, thank you to everything. Like thank you for this tree. Oh, wow. Like I have grass. I have a seat. Oh, it feels good. This, this blanket I’m sitting on. If it’s really chilly, I’ll wrap the blanket around me after awhile. And then if it’s really cold outside, I’ll come inside. I’ll light a candle. And I will send blessings to everybody that I could think of whoever I happen to think about.

Eve St. John (21m 27s):
So it’s usually starts like when I first did a lot of renovations in my house, it was like, God bless the person who did the floors. And I would name their name, Carey, what a great guy. He was his family. God bless him. He’s so talented. God bless joke for putting the beam and God bless. And I’ll start naming all the people that have worked in my house. God bless them, their family, whatever. It could be. Anything. If a cleaning person came or a chimney cleaner came or whatever, just sending blessings to them. If the garbage man are picking books, the recycling, God bless them.

Eve St. John (22m 1s):
God bless them. You know, that kind of thing. And then I’ll name my neighbors. You know, God bless the wheelers. God bless the berries. God bless the broad guns. And it’d be these people don’t know if they listen to this, they’re going to call you.

3 (22m 16s):
It’s just, it makes me,

Eve St. John (22m 18s):
I feel really, really good. It makes me feel good. Sending blessings to other people. And my grandmother always taught me from a very young age. She said, never, ever be jealous of anybody. Wow. She told me when somebody has more than you all the way, celebrate them always celebrate and be happy for them because that means you’re going to get that too. So I always liked to try to teach that to my children.

Eve St. John (22m 48s):
I tried to pass that on. And when you don’t have jealousy, it’s a good way to live. It’s really like you celebrate others. You celebrate like somebody, he got a new car or somebody going on vacation. It’s like, yeah. Good for them. Good for them. You know? That’s what life is about. Celebrating feeling good. Yeah.

Christine Okezie (23m 10s):
Feeling good in your body connecting to nature. Absolutely.

Eve St. John (23m 15s):
Oh yeah. Then I’ll take my flip flops off. I’ll walk on the grass just to get rid of the negative energy from my body. I should do that more often. I don’t do it long enough because my feet are still like, Oh, I don’t like this. It’s kind of cold. So that’s a routine that I started probably about a year or two years ago, but I feel good about it. Just connecting to nature. Now, one thing I do miss a lot. I used to have a really big tree in my yard, but it died and we had to cut it. So I really loved hugging trees.

Eve St. John (23m 48s):
I’m a big time. The tree

Christine Okezie (23m 50s):
That’s beautiful.

Eve St. John (23m 52s):
You really, really love it. And now I have all these pine trees and they’re not so huggable. So when I go, you know, they’re just not. So when I go for a walk, I try to walk with a friend and I’ll go, come on, let’s talk a tree And they’ll hug the tree. And it just feels so good. There’s so much energy in that. And yeah, I’m one of these people that became a tree hugger. Cause it feels so good. So if you’ve never done it, I highly recommend you love that. Cause it feels so good.

Eve St. John (24m 22s):
You feel your whole energy change. It really is phenomenal. So my routine, okay, so I didn’t have a tree because I have pine trees, but if I’m going for a walk, I’ll do it. Yes. It follows. You know, depending on the day, if I have time to squeeze in a yoga practice, I will take a yoga class from zoom or I’m teaching and then I’ll go take a shower. So now I started doing this for the past few years. I’ll after I take my shower, I’ll turn the hot water off and then I’ll take ice cold shower in the beginning.

Eve St. John (24m 55s):
It was a nightmare. I started with like five seconds. If not much. I’m like, Oh, like if you build it up to seven to 10, so now I’m able to comfortably actually stay under there for about a minute or a little bit over. And it’s about being non-reactive it’s like just taking it in, taking it in and it feels amazing. And this is, I don’t know if it’s just me, but let’s say like, sometimes you sleep wrong. Your neck is bothering you. I’ll just hold that cold water right there.

Eve St. John (25m 25s):
It really feels so good. It feels really good. And then you feel, so, I dunno, it’s just the energized and ready to take on the deck. Then I’ll go throw a lot of laundry.

Christine Okezie (25m 35s):
Yeah,

Eve St. John (25m 38s):
No, I’m serious. I do all this like this before I met with you today, I did so much. I did loads of laundry. I vacuumed, I always make my bed. I feel like if my bed is made, everything is good. You know, I never leave the house without making my bed. I just want to have nice organized home. I feel like everything has been controlled.

Christine Okezie (25m 59s):
Yes. But it starts with you. It starts with you feeling centered and grounded in your body. It sounds, you know, and it’s interesting because what I’m noticing is that when you started your journey and your, you fell in love with fitness, you fell in love with the fitness world. You said it was really because I, I loved the feeling I had in my body. And over time, I think that continues to be, you know, a real powerful place for people to start. What does it feel like to feel good in my body? Right. And what do I need to do around myself, care around my mental self care, around my lifestyle to get, have that feeling of being, feeling good, feeling great.

Christine Okezie (26m 39s):
As a matter of fact, cause I found, and you probably had the observation, There’s this kind of feeling that I don’t know, it’s kind of this, this, this mediocrity or this kind of low, low energy kind of place where we’ve kind of accepted this as normal, you know, it’s just part of aging. Oh, well, you know, that’s just the way I am and I have no control over that. And I guess that’s just the way things are. But what I’m getting from you is that with the curiosity to like, what can I do to feel amazing, hug a tree, get my feet on the ground, do some breathing.

Christine Okezie (27m 17s):
Right.

Eve St. John (27m 19s):
You can change that. So yeah.

Christine Okezie (27m 21s):
Powerfully, right.

Eve St. John (27m 23s):
I absolutely. Yeah. I mean, it has worked for me, for sure. I mean is every day, Oh, such a great day. There are many days where things happen. You’re not grateful for, you know, something tragic happens. You’re not great feel for that tragedy obviously. But what you have to do is you have to say, you know what? I am given this opportunity to become stronger from this very difficult situation and maybe help others who might be going through the same thing. And you unite with people and you become more compassionate. You become more understanding.

Eve St. John (27m 55s):
You understand people who went through it, whereas before maybe you didn’t have the same compassion. So like we evolve constantly evolving, constantly changing. And you just have to learn to go with the flow and not fight it. You know, go with the wind behind you. Just, just let it think, you know, and take it one breath at a time,

Christine Okezie (28m 15s):
One breath at a time, such powerful reminders because we’re living in super challenging times, super turbulent times. And we need all these reminders to that. We can change our perspective and experience our life differently. How do you teach people in your classes to train their minds, to train their eyes, to feel more gratitude in their life,

Eve St. John (28m 41s):
By changing your perception. So let’s say we have a mom who’s overwhelmed who has, you know, I’ve been there, you have to off nonstop with the kids. It’s like nonstop. You don’t have a second to yourself. So you could look at that and call all your friends and say, I’m exhausted. I can’t believe it all my God. I got to go food shopping. I got to do laundry. Or you could say, you know what? I’m privileged. I am privileged that I couldn’t go food shopping. I am so privileged that I have to choose from which store do I want to go to today to buy my foods from, I am so privileged that I have clothes to wash.

Eve St. John (29m 19s):
I’m so privileged that I have annoying kids. At least I have kids. You know, you just have to change your perception, changing your perception, changes everything. Right? You could look at something as half full or half empty. So as soon, I mean, it’s very normal. It’s very normal for us to look at things like on, Oh, but you just have to be very of your thoughts. You have to be aware of what am I? Oh, I’m on that negative path. Again, let me change my thinking. Let me change this negative thing. I’m looking at.

Eve St. John (29m 49s):
How do I look at it? Positively, whatever that may be. I don’t know. It could be something as simple as the food that you spent, hours cooking turned out horrible. Right? And you spend all this time and you’re frustrated. You’re burned it, you know, or whatever. How do you change it? Well, you know what I have, I’m privileged to get other food. Maybe I’m privileged to make an egg or make a little salad. I have food. It’s not like I’m going to starve and I’m not going to have food for the rest of my life.

Eve St. John (30m 24s):
There’s always a silver lining. You just have to look for the silver lining.

Christine Okezie (30m 28s):
Love that. Thank you. So in terms of the most important thing you’ve learned in your life thus far, right in what were your life was like before you learned it and what it’s like now, knowing it? What would that be?

Eve St. John (30m 45s):
I would say about 16 or 17 years ago, somebody gave me a card. It was, I don’t know. I had given her a gift or something and she gave me this card and the front of the card sets, appreciation, opens the doors to abundance. I was like, wow. I mean, I always knew to be appreciative, but it really hit home. I actually cut the card and look, I put in a frame to show you I’ve had this for 15 years or maybe more.

Eve St. John (31m 18s):
And the woman who gave it to me, I should mention her name. Karen Dillon. She probably doesn’t even know she gave me that. But it’s like those little things. It’s good to have reminders here and there that touches you. That make you feel like aha moments, you know, you could either say, Oh yeah, I’m always gratefully. You know, I hear my friends saying, I’m always grateful. I I’m like the most grateful person. There’s a difference between being grateful and living a grateful, life, thank you.

Christine Okezie (31m 50s):
Okay. Tell me more about that.

Eve St. John (31m 52s):
Living a grateful life. Like not basing it on, not basing it on. Oh, I’m grateful because you know, this happened and I’m so grateful, this positive thing happened and I’m so grateful this, but are you just like grateful that you woke up? Yeah. And that you’re just, you’re in a safe place. You have heat, you have air conditioning, you have running water. These are like such privileges that we take it for granted as simple as I really truly enjoy my coffee every morning. Like immensely to a level.

Eve St. John (32m 23s):
That is a little crazy. I do this every day. No, I don’t do it every day. But just to give you an example, so I’ll make my cup of coffee. I’ll feel it in my hands. The cup feels so cozy and warm, especially if it’s cold outside and I’m sitting the scent, I’ll smell it. Like, wow, that smells so good. And then think about the coffee that’s in there. The coffee beans had to have to grow. Somebody has to pick them. Then. I mean, it went through so many people, so many processes, somebody had to package the packaging, bringing it to the supermarket, the truck driver that drove it there, the person that put it on the shelf, you had to buy gas to go to the supermarket to get it and bring it home electricity.

Eve St. John (33m 11s):
Thank you. I was able to make my coffee. Thank you for the spoon. Thank you for if you’re using cream or whatever you might be using. Like there’s just so much energy and just little by little cup of coffee. There’s like hundreds of people that were involved in bringing you that cup of coffee, but we don’t really think about it. I mean, I try to think about that. Not all the time, but sometimes the coffee smells extra good. Then I’m like, Aw, but it goes for everything. The clothes that we’re wearing. Yes. Like when you’re taking a shower, if you put a shampoo on your hair and, or on your body and it smells so good, like think about how much was involved in that.

Eve St. John (33m 51s):
That’s so far that shampoo, you know, so much love,

Christine Okezie (33m 56s):
So much love that you can connect with in, in an, in just these practices. So much presence, so much presence presence now. And it’s it’s, I love it because you know, for our listeners out there, these are a lot of, you know, in spiritual self care and self development. There’s a lot of fluffy concepts out there, particularly gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, self love, self love. But what I love about this conversation Eve is that I think people are getting a sense that this is not fluff.

Christine Okezie (34m 27s):
This is just, you know, having a cup of coffee is a meditation. You know, taking a shower is a meditation.

Eve St. John (34m 36s):
Oh my goodness. Absolutely. And this is what people

Christine Okezie (34m 38s):
I think, you know, can really benefit from, you know, those who are listening because it doesn’t have to be this huge, complicated, you know, get it perfect kind of thing. If you have, if you have the ability to breathe, right? Yes, absolutely. Then you have the ability to be present and grateful for your life. And then

Eve St. John (34m 58s):
You said it so perfectly Christine amazingly perfect. Because a lot of times people get intimidated by the word meditation. Oh, why can’t sit still and meditate. But what you just said is so true. When you’re taking a shower, can you be present? Can you enjoy the sensation of that water? Touching your skin? Can you feel the sense of the shampoo or, or, or that warm towel? Like all these wonderful things are being present. Yes. So that could be your meditation.

Eve St. John (35m 28s):
Just being really present in whatever you’re doing

Christine Okezie (35m 31s):
In whatever you’re doing. And again, the, the benefit is, is so profound because in those moments of being present, you know, your mind just quiet, you’re not doing your to do list. You’re not exactly time traveling with all the things you regret and what have you.

Eve St. John (35m 48s):
Okay. If those pop in that’s normal, it’s okay. Like don’t beat yourself up all. I couldn’t do it because my mind went to this. It’s okay. That’s how it starts. Like there’s no right or wrong, but you’re being more present than you have been because you’re, you’re training your brain. You’re training. Oh, let me be more present. Let me breathe. Let me feel the, that sensation of my lungs expanding. How far do I feel? My breath. Wow. That feels good.

Christine Okezie (36m 18s):
Okay. So yes, you don’t have to be perfect. It’s just, you know, working with your current experience and having an intention, having a curiosity about what am I thinking and what am I noticing? I love that now. What do you do when you feel stuck? What do you do when you hit a road?

Eve St. John (36m 36s):
Cause we all do you know, we all do. Of course. It’s okay to be sad. It’s okay to cry. It’s okay. Like of course you’re human. You know, you’re going to have a moment, but the important thing is snap out of it. As soon as you can. And it’s up to you. Sometimes you can’t snap out of it. It’s not as easy. You know, I can’t snap out of it. I’m really depressed. I know why I should be doing this, but I can’t get myself there. Don’t beat yourself up on it. It’s normal. You start by one step at a time, one step at a time, take one breath.

Eve St. John (37m 10s):
Ah, there’s a lot of power in just doing It’s our universal language, our breath, everything that we need, allow that breath to calm you. It has a lot of power. So don’t beat yourself up. You know, a lot of times people go, I just can’t do that. I can’t be grateful whenever my world is falling down, you know, everything is not going the way I want. I lost my job and this and that.

Eve St. John (37m 42s):
I can’t, but you just have to start with one step at a time, take a cup of coffee or tea and say, Oh thank you to all these beautiful people that brought this to me. Thank you. That I was able to afford to get this cup of coffee. Thank you so much. Thank you for the electricity. Thank you for the seat I’m sitting on. Thank goodness that I have clothes. I have clothes that I wear. I have clothes I don’t wear. I mean like there’s so many things to be grateful for, even in the middle of a chaos, right?

Eve St. John (38m 14s):
I always, I wrote this quote in the back of my matches, which I feel like I wrote it in my darkest time because I was like miserable. My head was pounding. My face looked awful. My kids couldn’t even look at me. So I just kind of wrote this. And I said, when you can stay grateful in your most challenging days, by counting your blessings, your light will always take over to darkness. And it’s so true. Your light is always within us, right?

Eve St. John (38m 45s):
The light is always it’s our heart. It’s our breath is our light. But sometimes that light becomes a little dark, a little den. So how do you relate it again? I feel like I’m repeating myself. It’s so simple yet. It’s so challenging and hard to accept, but just gratitude. Look for the things you’re grateful for the fact that you turned the light switch came on as a miracle. Like you take it for granted, right? In other countries, they don’t have that luxury. They don’t have the running water.

Eve St. John (39m 16s):
So there’s so many things to be grateful for. And that’s how I snap out of it. I just immediately go into gratitude and forgiveness. Forgiveness is a very big thing. Hmm. Tell me if somebody hurts you, if somebody hurts your feelings, then they said something too. And you’ve been planning that in your mind, over and over and over in straining you. I can’t believe they said that. I can’t believe they did that. I can’t. Anytime you use the words, I can’t believe, Oh my goodness.

Eve St. John (39m 46s):
It’s like drama, adding more drama. It’s like, you’re, you’re causing more pain for yourself by repeating it. So immediately say, you know what? They’re going somewhere else. There must be really hurt. Send them a blessing and say, God, I hope that their life will be blessed so that their heart will be soft and open and beautiful. I forgive them. They didn’t mean to hurt me. This is they’re hurting inside anybody that hurts you intentionally by saying mean things.

Eve St. John (40m 17s):
They have, they have, God knows what’s going on in their life. So maybe try to reach out to them and say, listen, I was hurt by this, but I’m letting it go because do you need a friend? Do you need to talk? Then just reach out.

Christine Okezie (40m 30s):
Beautiful. Again. I love that. Not getting caught up in our own drama because we make up stories about things.

Eve St. John (40m 35s):
We make it worse Popcorn. And now we’re like thinking about it and we’re eating the popcorn. And we’re like joining the situation, like watching the sad movie. Yes.

Christine Okezie (40m 48s):
So we had caught up in our own drama and we make our suffering worse. And again, we’re not in, we’re not present when that happens. Right. And going back to the power of presence. My gosh, thank you. What does being healthy mean to you?

Eve St. John (41m 2s):
Healthy means having joy, having joy in your heart. Yes. Like truly having joy in your life. Because a lot of times healthy people think, Oh, you know, if I drink green juice, I’m going to be healthy. If I it’s about the joy. Because when you look at people that are like, I look at Jim’s mother who’s, God bless her. 94 years old. I really look at her. She had a very, very, very tough life. She lost her son to she at a young age.

Eve St. John (41m 35s):
Then she lost her husband and this woman has never, ever complaints. So I said to her, I said, Barbara, like, what’s your secret? She’s like, what are you talking about? She doesn’t even think how positive she’s like, she just goes with the flow. I think she truly, truly enjoys life. Just truly enjoys life. But it’s not because she’s trying to be, she just truly enjoys. If she’s eating a hotdog, she’ll take an hour or eating that hot dog she’ll savor.

Eve St. John (42m 9s):
She’ll enjoy it. She’ll have her glass of wine. I mean, she’s amazing. And I think looking at, you know, we always learn from the older generation. I think I look at people who are really truly happy. I think they just enjoy life. They don’t get stuck in identifying themselves with their trauma. They don’t get stuck identifying themselves with their misery. Yes. They identify themselves as each day. This is the day on given.

Eve St. John (42m 40s):
This is a beautiful day. It’s sunny out or, Oh, it’s raining. My flowers are going to be blossoming. You know, looking at everything in a, through like us rose colored glasses, kind of,

Christine Okezie (42m 52s):
why not? we can pick the glasses why notrRose colored ones. Right?

Eve St. John (42m 56s):
Being healthy also is besides of course you try to eat healthy. I try not that you’ve processed food, but do I eat processed food? Of course there are times we’ll I’ll have potato chips. I’ll have French fries. Cause I love those things. But everything in moderation, I try to eat more organic foods. Yeah. Try not to eat packaged foods and just having love, being kind, being, giving and uplifting others is the best way to have health in your life.

Eve St. John (43m 28s):
Just uplifting, helping, motivating, being kind, having a lot of energy. Yeah. And the best way to get your energy, to set your circadian rhythm, get up early in the morning, you know, make a routine so that your body is used to all right. It’s time to go. I looked at the sun, the brain received the message. It’s it’s time to go and you’ll be shocked how much you get done before nine o’clock. That’s beautiful.

Christine Okezie (43m 53s):
Thank you. Yeah. So many beautiful components there. Yes. So working with your body, working with your natural rhythm, you know, getting it on your side. Yeah. You’re not fighting it, you know? Yes. And being aware of, I think, you know, you talk about Community and service, you know, feeling, connection, being, being, being, kind, being of service. I think we’re wired for that, you know, and it helps us get it. It helps pull us out of our own story and drama.

Eve St. John (44m 20s):
Absolutely. You know, if you’re sick, go help. Somebody who is sicker than you, you know, it really is wonderful. Or if you’re going to the supermarket, just text your neighbor and say, Hey, I’m running the supermarket. You need anything like simple things, simple things like that makes a big difference. Yeah. It makes you feel good.

Christine Okezie (44m 40s):
And, and at the core you mentioned, that’s it it’s joy, you know? So how do you cultivate that joy? How do you cultivate that joy? And thank you so many beautiful reminders and powerful reminders that you bring to the table. If you could have a billboard, right? What, what would you put on it and why?

Eve St. John (44m 59s):
So it would probably have to be your one of a kind, because everybody is one of a kind. And, and I think people need to know that there is no competition for anybody because there’s only one you and nobody else has your essence or your beauty or your talents, just like nobody else has your fingerprint. That’s a powerful message.

Christine Okezie (45m 24s):
And just to show you how, you know, consistent or beautiful you are, that message has been, that was actually the core message when I first met you, which goes going on 14 years. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s what my experience was with you is you’d walk into class and you know, they were pretty competitive club, tough classes. You would always say, do your best, just be your best. No one can do anything as well as you do, just do it, you know, love yourself, right yourself, you aren’t unique and special love yourself right now.

Christine Okezie (45m 60s):
Don’t love yourself later when you think you’re better. No better. Exactly. And that, that is just, you know, such a gift for people to really trust, you know, in, in, in themselves and in life. And what better gift is that? So thank you. Thank you so much for that. Where can our listeners find you online and learn more about you and have more of you in their life?

Eve St. John (46m 26s):
Well, I’m teaching on zoom every Thursday at 12 to one through Flow Yoga and they could find my inspirational designs and stories through my website or through local stores that are listed. They could find me on Facebook, Instagram.

Christine Okezie (46m 53s):
So yes, that’s www.evestjohn.com and at evestjohn on Instagram as well. All right. Well thank you and keep doing all the beautiful work you’re doing

Eve St. John (47m 5s):
Than so much for having me. This Day, shining, brighter and brighter, stay to you and your listeners. Please remember there’s nobody like you, Christine and your listeners as well.

Christine Okezie (-):
Thank you Eve.