The Importance of Exploring Your Inner Voice and Cultivating Kind Compassionate Internal Conversations

Welcome to the Satiated Podcast where we explore physical and emotional hunger, satiation and healing your relationship with your food and body. I'm your host Stephanie Mara Fox, your Somatic Nutritional Counselor. I've always been inspired by people who say what they mean and mean what they say. And that is exactly Vasavi Kumar. Vasavi is often described as the “Queen of Saying It Out Loud.” As a first-generation Indian immigrant raised on Long Island, NY, Vasavi has relentlessly searched to find her own voice, access the freedom of her creative spirit, and help others along the way…out loud. When she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder at the age of 19, she made it her mission to understand how her mind works, starting with making room to hear herself think. Her mission is to share everything ”the good, bad, and ugly” in order to teach a more mindful, practical, and simple way of running every aspect of your life. Through her Say It Out Loud podcast, keynote talks, group programs, social media, and weekly email newsletters, Vasavi has taught thousands of entrepreneurs, creatives, and artists from all walks of life how to work through any situation by saying it out loud. She is a Former TV host, Licensed Therapist, Voiceover Artist, and Creator of the Say It Out Loud Safe Haven, an online support community. She holds dual Masters degrees in Special Education from Hofstra University and Social Work from Columbia University. Recently she was on the May Cover of Austin woman magazine, and has been featured on VH1, NBC, FOX, Good Day Austin, CW, WSJ, and many more. Today we explore the wisdom she shares in her newly released book, Say It Out Loud, and how to get to know your inner voices and cultivate a kind, compassionate inner dialogue. We spend time tying this all back with your relationship with food in how the internalized messages we receive from others can shape how and what we eat. Welcome Vasavi! I am thrilled that you are here today. I'm so excited for our conversation.

Vasavi Kumar 02:28

Thank you, Stephanie. It's a pleasure to be here. Let's get into it.

Stephanie Mara 02:31

Yeah, well, I would love to first start out with what got you into your work of being so passionate about speaking out loud and we can kind of ebb and flow with you know how that's connected with our relationship with food and body. But I would love to hear your experience first.

Vasavi Kumar 02:48

You know, saying it out loud, if you got my book you know that say it out loud is all about self talk. And it's how to talk to yourself. But I think what it really boils down to for me saying it out loud is really about being honest. And it's about saying exactly what you mean and meaning exactly what you say and no no dichotomy in that, no conflict in that, no, there just needs to be full alignment. And the reason why I'm so passionate about it is because number one, I was given a diagnosis of bipolar disorder. Go figure. So on a almost on a metaphysical level, I had to learn how to come back home to be at one with myself. Here I am with this diagnosis of bipolarity within but number two, I just I now know what it feels like to be at one with yourself and just say what you mean and mean what you say and not feel so concerned with how you're being perceived and being okay with you within and making decisions from that place, including with your food.

Stephanie Mara 03:44

Yeah, I love how you're bringing it internally because that internal chatter of sometimes we are lying, so to speak, to ourselves trying to make something better, or just trying to put a bandaid on something instead of sometimes just saying this hurt and this didn't feel good and like owning our internal experience.

Vasavi Kumar 04:07

That's exactly it. I mean, you know even yesterday, I've been on these new medications for my bipolar disorder, which I've had for over 20 years. And it's fine. It's just kind of a love hate relationship with with pharmaceuticals, but this is a personal choice. Okay, so I noticed my appetite has gone up a little bit, my appetite has definitely gotten up and I noticed myself eating a little bit more, and my self talk with myself and food has become I would say phenomenal. I love the way I talk to myself about food and be with the experience of food and wanting to eat and yesterday, it was around seven o'clock and I usually don't like to eat after seven. It just it just messes with my digestive system. But I've been having this voracious appetite because of this new medication. So using the tools that I teach in my book, which is all about tone and how to speak to yourself, I said to myself yesterday, can we drink a glass of water and just see if this hunger passes? Can we just do something else for right now? Can we like, let's go brush our teeth. Let's go comb our hair. Let's, you know, because I knew that this like voracious hunger was a result of this medication. But I also knew like, I was well fed for the day, I ate enough, plenty, I did not need to keep eating more. Now in the past, Stephanie, the way I would speak to myself is either screw it just eat whatever, it doesn't matter, or, okay, if you eat this tomorrow, you can only have salads, you can only have smoothies, you've got to get a green juice, like, oh my God. Oh my God, you know what I'm talking about? You do know?

Stephanie Mara 05:31

Yeah. Yeah.

Vasavi Kumar 05:32

So this is really a perfect example of where I can share with your audience on a personal level. And also the work that I've put into my book to help people talk to themselves in a kinder way. I truly believe we can talk to ourselves off of any ledge. In any situation, we can use our voice and the tone and how we say it to get to our next decision that we need to make, or the one that we've been avoiding. And that's how powerful our voice is.

Stephanie Mara 05:58

Yeah. Such an amazing example. You know, something that sometimes I talk about here is becoming a witness to ourselves. And just you were able to sit with the experience of voracious hunger in your body. And I heard just a lot of curiosity came in in that moment. Okay, I'm feeling voracious hunger. What is it like to feel voracious hunger and just giving yourself space to to have a choice like you could have still eaten, but you chose, okay, I want to sit with this. I want to get curious about this and see how this plays out.

Vasavi Kumar 06:29

Well, hold on, I want to tell your audience how it played out. I realized, you know what, you just need to go to sleep. You're a little sleepy, but you don't know how to actually put yourself to bed right now. Because you're you feel hungry. So I put myself to bed 7:45pm, I was in bed, I woke up at 5:45, was at the gym by seven this morning, I did not and I did it with such ease. I did it with such a I just took my time I drank my coffee this morning, I had a protein smoothie this morning, because I'm hungry first thing in the morning, I feed my I feed myself because I'm also on thyroid medication. But my point in all of this is whatever the relationship is that you're trying to repair, relationship with money, relationship with food, all stems with yourself. It doesn't have to be this awful process. Like growing can be joyful, it can be joyful too. Let me say that it will be painful. I'm not trying to say that there's no pain and sorrow, but it can be joyful to grow, it can be joyful. And I think we can bring more joy into our own growth by how we speak to ourselves.

Stephanie Mara 07:28

Yeah. So I'd love for you to share a little bit more around some of the tools that you offer in your book around how do we start this process of speaking to ourselves in this very different compassionate out loud way.

Vasavi Kumar 07:42

Start noticing when you're being unkind to yourself. So that means you're gonna have to turn down the volume of a lot of other things and turn up the volume on how you're speaking to yourself. It might be a whisper. For some people, their inner dialogue is very loud. I mean, there are people that are like, oh, I have so mean to myself. And then there are other people that are like, I don't have a voice in my head. And I'm like, okay, fine, there's no right or wrong to where you're at. But it's those moments where you make a mistake, or you say something goofy, or you're afraid of looking a certain way, it's in those vulnerable moments, just what are you saying to yourself? Are you saying to yourself, you're okay, you're gonna be okay. Or are you saying, oh my god, don't make a fool of yourself. Don't be stupid. Don't say this. Don't say that. Like, pay attention to how you're speaking to yourself in those moments where you need to be the kindest, which is usually when you're scared. And when you're anxious. And when you're panicky, or when you're lonely. When you're feeling lonely. You're tired, you're hungry, even, you know, and can you turn up the compassion, and turn up the curiosity with yourself.

Stephanie Mara 08:48

I love that. And what I often find is that internal dialogue, it gets cultivated at such a young age. But usually we talk to ourselves the way we were taught, from how our parents, how our siblings, how our teachers talk to us. And then if that wasn't loving, compassionate, kind patient, that we perpetuate that internal dialogue ourselves. Have you noticed that?

Vasavi Kumar 09:18

Yeah, absolutely. So I have three voices. It's basically mine, which is only mine. And then I have the voice of my mom and the voice and then the voice of my dad. And I sometimes have the voice of my sister. This is like internal family systems, right? I mean, we've taken our families and we've internalized them. And we think that it's us thinking these thoughts, but it's really just internalized what we've heard from everybody else. That's why we have to be so important as to what we allow in and what we're consuming. We don't want to be around certain things. You know, we don't want to be consuming certain things. You don't want to be polluting your mind with that. Once you hear something. It's kind of hard to unhear it.

Stephanie Mara 09:53

Yeah, yeah. What have you found supportive in identifying that for yourself like you knew, oh that was that was my mom talking. That wasn't me.

Vasavi Kumar 10:02

Well, I get to decide then how I want to approach. I found independence in that. I found self trust, I found sovereignty in that, for example, my mother will always say, Don't put peanut butter in your smoothies, it makes you fat. My mother always says that. I don't feel that way. I love peanut butter. I'm a vegetarian. And our whole family is vegetarian. There's our food is already limited. If you think about it, you know what I mean? So we have, yes, there's a lot of vegetarian options, but yes, we are limited in terms of selection. Because this is a meat heavy society that we live in. You know, my mother says, don't eat peanut butter, it'll make you fat. I know that that's not my voice. That's just what my mom told me. Vasavi says peanut butter is great. Put a scoop in, it's a healthy fat. That's what I think. Or if I like to put, you know, like a little bit of a crumble of feta on my eggs. My mom will say don't eat that, it'll make you fat. And I say, you know, I love a little saltiness to feta and I'm going to enjoy the hell out of my omelet. That's it. But I just feel like we overindulge. Or we completely deprive when we have that critical voice inside of us. I mean, who wouldn't over indulge or starve yourself, you know? I'm usually the overindulgeder, I'm not the starver. This is just something that I feel we have so much power over. And it's gonna feel weird at first to be kind to yourself. Because if you're used to having that critical voice run the show. Then, all of a sudden, you come in with this kind voice, it's gonna feel kind of weird. So I just ask that everyone is kind to themselves and patient and be as extra kind as possible to yourself, extra sweet, see if you can be even sweeter with yourself.

Stephanie Mara 11:34

First in regards to the food piece, yes, it's kind of getting curious about who has said this to me in my life. Like, where is this message coming from?

Vasavi Kumar 11:43

Yes, because otherwise you're just a robot. That's the scariest thing for me is not questioning something. And oh, I've just been told. And so it's really important that we take stock and take inventory every season in our life, not just once and done. Like I'm in a season right now, where I'm questioning certain things about how I like to allocate, invest and spend my money. I was not taught to do it the way that I do it. But I like the way I'm doing it, it works for me, my lifestyle works for me, it's never been what I've been taught, it's how I decided it, but at least you own it, you own it, that it's yours, you're not living anyone else's life, and then you own your choices. You can also choose to disown that and do something else. You're not living according to anyone's beat of their drum, you're not dancing to the beat of their drum, you're dancing to the beat of yours. So that's the most important thing for me is that everything in my life from how my house looks to how I feel, I take full ownership, if I don't like something about the way I look or the way I speak. And when I say I don't like it, it means I want to improve on it. And there's nothing wrong with that. If I'm not growing, I'm staying still, if I'm staying still, I'm dying. You know, for me, it's really important that I look at where can I be the better version of myself, the higher version of myself and still have fun in the process. Growth is fun. And it can be even more fun for people. If you learn how to talk to yourself and cheer yourself on along the way.

Stephanie Mara 13:05

Yeah, I really hear this balance in this of accepting what is. And also I find that especially with those that I talk to or work with, there can be a challenge in that of oh, but if I accept what is does that mean, I'm stagnant? Does that mean I'm never gonna change? And it's yeah, it's like this balance. And it's both it's like you can accept and be with where you're at, and accept yourself for where you've been and how you got here. And bringing in that curiosity of like, is how I'm living resonating with me. And if there's something that's not you're allowed to grow and evolve and change.

Vasavi Kumar 13:40

You know, it's funny that you say that even with how we talk about certain parts of our body, I guess in society, some would say back fat. I've grown a little back fat on my back, okay, it's fine. And I'm like, oh, that's interesting. I have a little back fat. So I went to the gym today. And I said, alright, I did some battle ropes. I did some other stuff. I was doing some just like all upper upper back area, and it felt really good. And I was like, oh, yeah, we're waking this part of our body up. I'm like, I even jokingly said to my body, sorry I got you so soft. Like sorry, I got you to the point where we got to, like, start from scratch. But my point is, man, my self talk when I'm working out is so different than what it was in my 20s. In my 20s, it's like, gotta get rid of this backfat it's disgusting. Now it's like, I'm more like, man, I'm really sorry, like sorry, I haven't worked you out a little bit and, and then I get joyful when those muscles start to wake up. I'm sore right now even saying this, but I'm like, oh yes, I'm awake. So it's just showing a little love to our body, you know, but even the tone which we do it because I see so many women get caught up and gotta, you know, gotta hit my workouts, got to do the workouts, gotta gotta gotta and I'm like, okay, really respect the discipline. Are you happy? Are you happy? I just want to know that you're happy. If you're happy doing it this way do it. But for me, I want to be happy, joyful. I still want to see results. But I want to make this an act of love not, oh, it has to feel like torture. Like no, because even when my muscles were waking up today, sure, it felt like torture, I guess. But it felt more like a massive dose of self love to these parts of my body that were weakened. Because I haven't been strengthening it, you know. Just such a different way of talking about working out, you know?

Stephanie Mara 15:19

Yeah, yeah. Something that I've been hearing in what you've been talking about is just this sense of autonomy. Like you get to choose for yourself, what is going to be best for you. And we get to kind of explore the intention behind it. Because we cannot hate ourselves into change.

Vasavi Kumar 15:37

No, you cannot. That was beautiful. Say that again.

Stephanie Mara 15:41

Yeah, we cannot hate ourselves into change.

Vasavi Kumar 15:45

We literally cannot. It's like the...No listen, you can actually, I actually want you to know that you can, but it's misery. And you're hurting yourself. You're hurting yourself in the process to become this person. And then why do you think you're going to be kind to that person that you've become? No, you're going to be beaten down. I refuse to live that way. I would rather be a little soft in my back right now and work towards whatever I'm looking for, than get these like instant quick results, and like trying to fix it. And when you act in panic mode, it is not, is not healthy. It is not healthy to act in panic mode, you know, so we can be slower and softer with ourselves. We can accept where we are. And, we can also have gusto for wanting to make some changes in our life. Why not?

Stephanie Mara 16:29

Yeah, yeah. So when you maybe have a moment of hearing that harsh, critical inner voice, how do you find yourself navigating those moments these days?

Vasavi Kumar 16:40

I did something about a year ago, that really has helped. And I recommend that everyone do it. I don't care who's in your house or not. But you have to say out loud, this is a no shame house, I say this is a no shame zone. I said that out loud standing in my kitchen. I said, this is a no shame zone. I'm saying all of that because my harsh and critical voice is very quiet. It has a different tone. It's much more stern. It's less harsh and critical. It's stern. It's like come on Vasavi. Let's go. You know, and sometimes I need that because I can be a little lazy pants, you know, and I'm very good with excuses. I'm very good at making excuses for myself, I know that about myself, I can procrastinate like nobody's business, I know that. So I have this voice that's just very, that's very stern and just kind of guides me. So I recommend that everyone says that their house is a no shame zone so that you can start to cultivate the voice that's gonna guide you, I call it your bold voice. Your bold voice is the voice that guides you. And it helps to guide others too. It is such a voice that is like rooted in conviction and clarity about who you are as a person. Now you have to understand when you speak from this voice, not everyone is going to resonate with you. Not everyone likes me, Stephanie, can you believe that? I can't believe that. Not everybody likes me. But you want to know something, when you are rooted in your bold voice and you feel really good about you and you speak from your truth, it doesn't really matter whether you like me or not, you respect me though. There's a big difference. You don't have to like someone, but you can respect who they are. And the fact that they're being themselves. I don't have to agree with everyone. I don't even have to like everybody. Because not everyone likes me and I don't like everybody else. But I think it's important that we at least have to be anchored into our truth and speak from that place. It's not about having everybody like you. It's about you speaking from your truth, whatever that is, whatever you're saying is 100% 100%. And the right people will come to you.

Stephanie Mara 18:25

Something that I'm really hearing in that is, first we have to give the internal dialogue space to talk to us. You hear that stern voice. You know, it's not kind of a tape that's playing in the background that's just become this automatic pilot mode of oh, this is just what happens. And so it's first saying, okay, my stern voice, my harsh, critical voice. What are you saying to me right now? And then what I heard was, you can talk to me, but you cannot disrespect me. And you cannot shame me.

Vasavi Kumar 18:59

This is about you having an inner authority, right? Because for so many of us who are off, who live this off the beaten path type of thing. You know what I mean? We've kind of, we've danced to the beat of our own drum. I'm like this, you're like this, we are rebellious. We are rebellious by nature. However, we want to make sure that our rebellious nature does not turn us against ourselves, right? Because we need that inner authority. Your bold voice is your inner authority. It's the voice that guides you. And it's the voice that you speak from because then you become a voice for others to shine the light on their boldness. So that is the bold voice. It's yes, Say It Out Loud, my book, is all about learning how to talk to yourself. But once you talk to all the voices in your head, and you have managed your self talk and you're not such a jerk to yourself, you can actually start to hear that voice of God, that voice of reason, that bold voice inside of you that's like, Stephanie, I am your father. You know, like, Stephanie, I am your mother or Stephanie I am the God, I am you, you know, you know what I mean? It's you. It's the, it's THE you, it's the only one here that can be you, that voice. And that's what I call your bold voice. Nobody else can sound like me, Stephanie. Nobody can. Nobody can sound like me. And I feel that, because you know what, at the end of the day, it all boils down to energy. It has nothing to do with oh, you can try to copy someone, you could try to emulate them, you can try to dress like them. But everyone has that unique, you know, special energy and sauce. And that's what we need to cultivate.

Stephanie Mara 20:28

Yeah, I love that. And the other thing that I heard was, so often, those inner voices are trying to support and protect us in some way for external purposes. Like if I show up like this, because that internal dialogue can be so harsh and critical, you need to sound like this, you need to talk like this, you need to look like this, that it's coming inside of okay, so I hear that you're wanting something from someone else. And really, like a couple questions you were asking was, does that make you happy? How does this feel to you? So also hearing like, okay, how is that trying to serve a purpose in my life? But also, how could I come inside myself to serve that for myself? And then, you know, the individuals who resonate with that are the people who are also meant to be in your life, because you don't have to try to be anyone else.

Vasavi Kumar 21:21

Yeah, that's right. I mean, here's the thing, it's, we don't have to make anyone try to like us if we just start speaking the truth. You'll start to see how people respond. If you speak the truth, people don't like it that's okay. They don't like it, you speak the truth, people accept it, then that's fine, then they understand that those are your people. It's that simple. It's just you got to speak the same language. As people know, you don't have to speak the same language as anybody. You need to speak your language. And if people want to be in your presence, and they have to understand your language, they have to speak your language. And not everyone can speak your language. So the way you find out who could speak your language is that you you anchor into your bold voice. I'm not for everybody. And that's okay. Say that out loud. I'm not for everyone and that's okay. But I love me, but I love me. That's all that matters. I love me. Isn't that? I mean, you see that's all that really matters at the end of the day.

Stephanie Mara 21:21

Yeah. Yeah. You know, we come into this world with ourselves, and we're gonna leave this world with ourselves.

Vasavi Kumar 22:22

Yes, that is right. That is right.

Stephanie Mara 22:24

Yeah. So I just want to take a moment, you're talking about this bold voice, which I'm loving, what would be a first step someone could take to start to cultivate this internal bold voice.

Vasavi Kumar 22:36

The internal bold voice is cultivated in your everyday life. Think about if you need help with something let's say your you know your you need someone to open the door for you. It may sound like, can you please open the door for me? Can you please get the door for me? That is being bold, right? Because what do most of us do? Suck it up. We'll figure it out. We'll just we'll just struggle. No, if I see a man at the door, I will say can you please get the door for me? Can you please get the door for me? If I'm carrying stuff. I don't, no, please, I don't go around ordering men around. But if I'm carrying stuff, and if I see anyone at the door, I'll say can you please get the door for me? I don't even actually, it doesn't even matter what what somebody is, it's like, yes, it doesn't matter if you're a man or a woman like can you please get the door, that seems so simple. But that feels so difficult for a lot of people. That's so simple to me but, that can feel so difficult, especially if you're not used to tending to your needs. Or if you are not in the receptive mode where people do stuff for you. Let's say you're not in situations where you have people to pour into you. That may feel weird. That's a great way to cultivate, it can be at work when you're in a meeting and someone says who thought of this idea and it was you, raise your hand. Don't let somebody else take credit for your stuff. It could mean you want to have somebody on your podcast, and you have this insecurity. You think they're somehow better than you, which is all bullshit. No one's better than you. You know what I mean? They may be a little farther along. They may be a little down the line in the journey, but no one's better than you. And better than you in terms of what, you know what I mean? Like, but that using your bold voice might mean to reach out to them and be like, hey, I really admire your message. If you have the bandwidth, can you come on my podcast? Boom. Ask. Yes or no. That's it. But wondering and waiting because you're not using your voice is no way to live. I don't want anyone listening to this to be on their deathbed regretting that they did not ask for the thing that they want. Everything that I have in my life Stephanie is because I asked. I am shameless when it comes to asking. I will ask for an upgrade in an airplane, at the airport. I will ask for an upgrade at the hotel. I will ask for a free upgrade. I won't even ask, I won't pay for it. I want a free upgrade. Or if I'm the vegetarian at a restaurant, I'll ask the chef to make something special for me. If I'm at a resort at an all inclusive resort, a lot of times the veggie options aren't the best. I'll say can you please make me something special? I will ask because I deserve the best. Who are we waiting for to pour into us? We have to be the advocate for ourselves. I learned that from my mother and father. My mother and father advocated for me and my sister. We always got the best everything. And it wasn't like Neiman Marcus best, you know what I mean, you know, my mom took us to Alexander's, that was a store back then. But they always gave us the best of like what they could, you know, they never skipped with the best education, I got into Columbia and NYU, my father said, you're going to Columbia, you're going to an Ivy League, they paid for my education, I'm very lucky. And not everyone is given that, not everyone has the kind of parents that I had growing up, I know that for a fact. And so if you were not given that type of attentiveness, then you can give that to yourself. In a lot of ways, I had to repair it myself emotionally. I got a lot from my parents in terms of travel and experiences and education, and really great experiences. And that is oh my god, education in and of itself, but emotional education, learning to regulate myself, my relationship to money, my relationship to my body, my sexuality, you know, my my food, I taught that to myself, and it's an honor to do so. So take what you got, and give yourself the rest. It's all it's meant for you to give to yourself now.

Stephanie Mara 26:02

Yeah. I love the simple suggestions that you're offering of it just starts with asking for something that you would normally hold yourself back and make it your responsibility to figure out on your own. I actually provide a similar example of asking for a glass of water. It's so simple. Like, if you live with someone, a significant other, roommate or whatever. You can absolutely go and get up and get your own glass of water. But let's say you've had a really hard day, you're exhausted, you don't feel like you have any energy to get up off the couch. What would it be like to receive support from the people around you to say, hey, could you get me a glass of water? And it could be, can you open the door for me? You know like all these little things that it's I love where you were going to of why is it that we feel like we need to deserve the best?

Vasavi Kumar 26:51

Or earn it or earn it, we have to earn it. And it's like, you know, it seems a little childlike. But it's kind of like, why can't we want what we want and want it right now. Listen, I understand. We're talking about delayed gratification and all that. But I think what the point here in this example is why are we not allowing ourselves to ask for what we want. You know, this is obviously a different context. Use discernment clearly. But you know, I think this is just a great example of ways that we can love on ourselves. When we were babies, we were not taught to ask, we were just given to us. And then when we get older, we ask and maybe you were shut down, or maybe someone didn't provide you with what you needed, or you realize you couldn't rely on anyone. So you became self reliant to a point where it's become a little unhealthy. You know, this is a great example of cultivating your bold voice, just like Stephanie, what you said, ask for a glass of water, even though you can get it yourself, ask for it.

Stephanie Mara 27:40

And then slow down. And just to bring in the somatic work of notice as someone walks towards you with the glass of water, how that feels, and how it feels to like hold the glass in your hand and receive the support of the people around you, the world around you that you don't have to navigate this world on your own, like you are allowed to receive support from others. And take a moment to take that in when also you ask and it happened. Because so often I feel like we filter that out, we asked, it happened and it's like, oh, but that's not the norm. So I'm, you know, we just filter it out of our body and our brain and our being where it's like, no, let's take this in and take a moment to say I did something different. And let me feel that inside of my system.

Vasavi Kumar 28:28

That is beautiful. I love listening to you talk.

Stephanie Mara 28:30

Thank you.

Vasavi Kumar 28:30

You're so right. And you know what, I'm going to pay attention to that even more next time when someone brings me something. Like, for example, I live in Mexico a few times out of the year, I have a condo there. And that is something that I definitely really appreciate it even more when I was living there because just everyone is so like my guy who works at the front desk. His name is Ezekiel. Ezekiel let me borrow his bike every single day. He let me borrow his bike. And he just he was so sad the day before I left and I just really felt that I was like, man, you don't even understand you letting me borrow your bike every day was the highlight of my trip. And you're sad that I'm leaving! You know? And it just shows that like people are yearning for love and people want to give and people also want to have a sense of purpose. You're not the only one. So let people receive, let people give to you. Let people pour into you because that too is a gift.

Stephanie Mara 29:23

That's such a beautiful note to end on. And I want to make sure that we leave time for how individuals can keep in touch with you and where can they find your book?

Vasavi Kumar 29:32

Yes, you can keep in touch with me go to my website vasavikumar.com. I drop weekly voice notes, which I love. So much fun by the way and then find me on Instagram @mynameisvasavi and then please order my book. It's in paperback, Kindle, audio book. It's Barnes and Noble, Target, Amazon, everywhere. Say It Out Loud. There are still bonuses that we offer. It would be truly an honor for your support to order my book and follow me, send me a DM, let me know that you listened to this episode with me and Stephanie.

Stephanie Mara 29:32

Thank you so much for your time and your wisdom today. This was such a powerful conversation.

Vasavi Kumar 30:04

Thank you, Stephanie for having me. You're wonderful.

Stephanie Mara 30:07

So are you. For all who are listening, I will drop all of these links into the show notes so that you can keep in touch. And if you have any questions, reach out anytime and I will talk to you all again real soon. Bye!

Keep in touch with Vasavi here:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mynameisvasavi/

Website: http://vasavikumar.com/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/vasavikumar

Book: Say It Out Loud

Contact: vasavi@vasavikumar.com