I ain’t down yet, and even if I was, you’d sure never hear it from me!
..as my little sister Alice and I would passionately belt out this song from The Unsinkable Molly Brown. We sang and danced in unison and still do today.
Ohh, I hate that word down, but I love the word UP, cuz UP means hope. And that’s what I got, hope, for someplace gooder, someplace.. I don’t know, that’s cleaner and shinier…ah hell, if I have to eat catfish heads all my life, can’t I have them off a plate once?
..In a red silk dress.. when there’s girl enough on me to wear one. And then, some day, with all my might and all my may..
I’m gonna learn to read and write I’m goan’ to see what there is to see, so if you go from nowhere on the road to somewhere and you meet anyone. You know it’s me.
I’m goan’ to move from place to place and find a house with a goldn stair, and if that house is red and has a big brass bed
I’m liiiivin’ there!
People ask me all the time, “Kathleen, where do you get your energy, passion and zest for life?”
Well, I can say that my parents in their late 80’s are still dancing. I can say that my 78 year old aunts are doing Tai Chi, painting, traveling and visiting wineries. I can say that it’s because I am Italian, and Italians are always happy.
It’s all that, plus my inexhaustible curiosity of the body.
My efforts have become streamlined to where I have learned to use my brain in a way that is becoming more efficient in thought and movement.
It’s partly genetic, partly learned and unlearned behaviors that have become habits.
That said, the ‘unsinkable’ song has been engraved in my thoughts ever since I was a little girl.
It seems that for all these years I truly believed I was unsinkable.
It gave me permission to believe that I could do anything and be anything that I wanted to be.
Today, that is how I feel and have learned to carry myself. I know this conscious way of changing my thoughts kept the pointless and meaningless crap out of my brain that was taking up way too much room and wasted energy.
I did learn to read and write. I traveled the world ‘to see what there is to see’. I have ‘moved from place to place’ and found a house with a golden stair. I painted the door red. It had a big brass bed, and I lived there!
Hope, that’s just what I have, hope for someplace better. My song and dance continues.
I realize now that as Alice and I would sing and dance, the underlying emotion felt by the words was the key to impressing the brain and has literally cemented new neuro pathways. I created a belief and attitude that has been the fuel for my passion.
Somewhere deep inside of me, there was this little genius baby ready to explore this wonderful thing called life. My continued curiosity would keep the fire burning.
I was meant to teach and inspire women back to their core as I continued my own journey to the center of my true core, my whole being.
This personal journey required a tremendous amount of hope. Hope that I would eventually find the pathway to my purpose in this life.
The best description for Hope comes from one of my favorite books “No Man is an Island” by Thomas Moore.
‘Hope is proportionate to detachment. It brings our souls into the state of the most perfect detachment. In doing so, it restores all values by setting them in their right order.
Hope empties our hands in order that we may work with them.
It shows us that we have something to work for, and teaches us how to work for it.
If my intelligence is a gift from God, then I must show my trust by making use of my intelligence.
If my freedom is a gift, I must show my trust by making use of my free will and let hope purify and strengthen my human liberty and raise me to the autonomy of this beautiful God given human life experience.’
Because of hope, my path started to unfold more and more. I have learned to monitor my thoughts and use my intelligence which has molded me into the person I am today.
We are genetically capable of making changes. We are not destined to a life of unpleasant childhood or past experiences unless we choose.
We must stop telling that old story to our friends, family and therapists.
I knew I was evolving when I got in an argument once with a ‘therapist’ because I told him I could change my life with my thoughts and knowledge of the brain to form new neuro networks and deactivate the unwanted brain neuro networks in hopes of promoting healthier choices and behavior. He seemed a little perturbed and replied “Then why are you here”? I left and never went back to a therapist.
According to Dr. Nesbitt, our mind is our “movement journal” It’s where we keep track of what we have done, what we have observed being done and plans for how we might DO it in the future , the human part of our brain.
My life thus far hasn’t been all roses for me. I have had several bumps along the way, kind of like skiing moguls. Sometimes the bump would knock me right off my bum. I pick myself up (sometimes with a helping hand) and get back on course.
The worst thing about falling is that when it happens too often you begin to lose hope. And the worst part is you don’t even realize it when it is happening. In my own life after a few too many bumps I began to lose hope. In order to avoid “falling” I moved towards safer territory. I evaluated my own movement journal.
As I traveled the world working with women of all ages, teaching Pilates and core training, I noticed emptiness combined with a loss of hope and passion. Smiles were forced in agony. Slumped postures easily gave away their emotional state. Foreheads revealed the direction of their thoughts, showing an unpleasantness in their lives.
My natural inclination was to help these women feel better somehow; to find one thing that they could feel good about to restore their confidence. The more I looked, the easier it became to see something that could bring a smile to their face. It worked very well.
In 2008, I thought I finished ‘my journey’. I wanted to inspire other women.
I created the DVD, Pilates and Chocolate, to teach women how to manage and sculpt a beautiful body inside and out!
Little did I know that was the beginning of my journey and not the end. There was more.
I knew one hundred percent of only fifty percent of the core.
As I kept moving forward in my curiosity, I realized there was a whole other core, an inner core, the true core, and it had a bottom to it called the pelvic floor!
It wasn’t until my move to San Diego in 2009 that I made this discovery at a Pelvic Floor workshop taught by my current mentor and partner Dr. Theresa Nesbitt, The Movement Doctor. She had the missing piece, the true core which included the pelvic floor.
After multiple emails to Dr. Nesbitt, she recognized my relentless curiosity with the brain’s connection to the core and welcomed me into her world.
It has changed my brain, my body and my life – in that order.
Today I continue to be mentored privately by Dr. Nesbitt on the latest studies and research on how the brain, true core and pelvic floor work together, and develop programs for women’s wellness.
Hope has allowed this wonderful journey to the center of my core to continue to flourish.
My hope also remains, to teach and inspire women and help them with the return of their authentic smile. To restore a posture that exudes confidence and well-being. To redirect the forehead expression that now shouts hope and passion. To return to them the youthfulness they thought was gone forever.
I will do this as I have done for myself. Explore their true core and pelvic floor, and rediscover their own inner beauty.
Together we will sculpt a mind, body and spirit, in the right order, from the inside out!
La Dolce Vita