Episode 64: Finding Joy and Purpose with Coleen Greco
In this emotionally charged episode of “The Pursuit of Badasserie: The Podcast,” we engage in a heartfelt conversation with Coleen Greco, a Joyologist specializing in mindset and nutrition coaching. Coleen shares her transformative journey, which involves reclaiming her health, reevaluating relationships, and cultivating a resilient mindset through her patented SNAP method.
We delve into the significance of discovering joy in daily moments, conquering self-defeating thoughts, and fostering psychological safety for personal development. Join us as we explore the strength of vulnerability, embracing discomfort, and courageously confronting challenges. Together, we navigate through Coleen’s extraordinary narrative, witnessing how she turned adversity into a means of transportation toward a life brimming with purpose and joy.
Trigger Warning: This podcast episode contains discussions around sensitive topics, including suicide attempts, trauma, mental health challenges, and personal crises. Listener discretion is advised, as these discussions may be triggering for individuals who have experienced similar situations or are sensitive to these themes. If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health issues, please seek professional help or contact a mental health hotline in your region.
In this episode, we discuss:
- Colleen’s background, focusing on mindset and nutrition coaching
- Mention of Colleen’s transformative journey using her SNAP method
- Exploration of finding joy in everyday moments
- Colleen’s personal experiences with self-defeating thoughts
- Discussion on Colleen’s journey of self-discovery and crisis
- Colleen’s transformation into a Joyologist and global speaker
- Mention of trademark processes for podcast and SNAP method
- Colleen’s sharing of a traumatic event and her son’s suicide attempt
- Colleen’s determination to be a positive role model and focus on joy
- Importance of finding joy in small moments for overall happiness
- Colleen’s emphasis on the emotional component of weight issues
- Introduction and explanation of the SNAP method: Stop, Notice, Accept/Analyze, Practice gratitude
- Discussion on triggers and the physical/emotional responses associated
- Colleen’s recommendation to stop, notice, and document triggers
- Importance of separating facts from emotions in trigger analysis
- Colleen’s introduction of the SNAP method’s final step: practicing gratitude
- Concept of triggers as a gift and indication of personal growth
- Ability to anticipate triggers through consistent use of the SNAP method
- Colleen’s personal experience and emotional response to trauma revelation
- Amanda’s reflections on comparative suffering and individual challenges
- Emphasis on psychological safety for exploring deeper issues
- Challenges and healing in relating to other women, psychological safety importance
- Colleen’s gratitude for healing working with women, and gaining perspectives
- Discussion on women needing permission, believing in a different life
- Emphasis on running towards discomfort and challenges
- Colleen’s phrase, “trouble is your transportation,” transformative power of challenges
- Personal growth leading to leaving a corporate job and finding a better path
- Unexpected greatness and opportunities from a challenging period
- The urgency to act on belief in more for individuals
Find Coleen:
www.instagram.com/thecoleengreco
https://www.youtube.com/@thecoleengreco
Download her free ebook “4 Steps to Break Free From Limiting Beliefs” eBook:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdGwIo5uk74YYw4-qa61-QKJBHalK_ioatQhX-EAta2kdTt8g/viewform
- Like the show? LEAVE US A REVIEW wherever you listen!
- Have a question? CONTACT US at info@thepursuitofbadasserie.com!
- Want to sponsor us? Find out how HERE.
.
Continue reading for a full transcription of this episode:
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Hey, I’m Lynn and I’m Amanda.
Amanda Furgiuele
Welcome to the Pursuit of Badasserie, the Podcast. We have another exciting guest today.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Lynn, tell us all about her. Yes, we’re excited to have Colleen Greco and she is coming from Buff. I haven’t heard the Boston accent yet.
Our, our, our, our executive director, Joanne, she had the Boston accent, didn’t she?
Amanda Furgiuele
Oh, it was amazing.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Loved it. Anyway, joy isn’t just her calling. It’s her middle name. Well, it’s Joyce, but let’s like roll with it.
Colleen is a compassionate empathetic and violently authentic human being, but she wasn’t always this way. I love that violently authentic.
You are people. Like many, she’s been plagued with her own self-defeating thoughts. of them, she’s carried for over four decades.
Through her own journey of self discovery, spiritual exploration and personal crisis, she’s managed to transform her life into the most unimaginable source of joy.
Today, Colleen is a joyologist. She provides mindset and nutrition coaching as well as personal training to people who feel stuck and want to reclaim their life.
As a motivational speaker, Here she works with individuals and corporations around the globe teaching folks how to reclaim their joy using the snap method which she trademarked which I’m excited for because we are trademarking the pursuit of badass rate we’re in process takes for a while.
Colleen.
Coleen Greco
So happy to be here. Yeah, and by the way, the trademark process takes a long time.
Amanda Furgiuele
So our just came through. forgot to tell it ours just came through.
Coleen Greco
So we’re good. Okay. I know.
Amanda Furgiuele
Only took two years.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
That’s exciting. Colleen, we’re super stoked to have you on. Please tell us a little bit about how you got here.
Coleen Greco
Oh, yeah. No. And thank you for having me. I’m so excited for this discussion today. So about six years ago, we had a trauma in the house.
My younger son was 10 almost 11 and had a suicide attempt. So as you might imagine that, it’s be a pretty.
The jarring and traumatizing episode. As a result, I didn’t handle it well in the beginning. I ate and drank anything I could get my hands on and probably put on about 40 pounds in three months or something like that.
It never really had a weight problem before. also say that. It was very out of character for me. Through this, as we were trying to read build our life, we re-evaluated every single friendship.
I didn’t let anything in our circle. I didn’t let friends in. I didn’t let, you know, neighbors come over.
media was like off limits. There was nothing. really tried to figure out how I could be the best role model for my two kids and my husband who were all just sort of looking to me to figure out like, what do we do next?
And I can remember laying right out there outside my door, in front of my front door, on my rug, just not knowing what to do next and just saying, what we need to do is, because when you’re dealing with something like this, you think in seconds.
think, like, there is no, what am I going to have for lunch? It’s like, how am I going to make it to the next hour?
We started thinking about little things that we could do that would bring us joy. Like, instead of being angry about walking the dog and the fact that it takes an hour to get a mile, right?
He sniffs, he stops, he does. How about looking at it as like a moment of sweetness, a moment of joy, that he’s having a great time out there and what is he looking at and what bird is he trying to chase and how can I make that fun instead of a burden?
And we just did that across everything, every experience we had. We just found these little moments of joy. Enjoy has
I’ve been part of my core. I didn’t always know it, but it was. It was part of my core.
My father used to say, I really named you right. My first name is Colleen, which in Gaelic means girl, and Joy, or Joyce, my middle name, means happy.
And so that’s just always been who I am, and I’ve always been in these roles or situations where I was in service to other people.
And I can think of no better people to be in service to than my family. And so that’s kind of how this all started.
Amanda Furgiuele
love that. Finding Joy is so important, and it’s really underrated, I think, in your overall happiness. People think about these huge goals, and there’s nothing wrong with having huge goals.
However, those are often further away. And so if you can find Joy and Light in each day, rather than this giant thing that’s out there, it will make such a difference in how you handle life, how you feel about life.
Life, how do you feel about obstacles that come your way, which are inevitable?
Coleen Greco
Yeah, and I think, you know, when you start out in any kind of traumatic situation, anything like next week or next month is just insurmountable.
And so that really helped me to figure out how I could better serve them. And I’m super happy to say he’s now 17.
I like to say when people say, how’s he doing? I’m like, well, he annoys me like any other 17-year-old would, so I feel like we’re doing pretty well.
But he really is, he’s thriving. And we were in a really bizarre situation. We’re in Boston and we didn’t have a therapist or a doctor that would talk to us.
No one returned our phone calls. So we were really on our own to rebuild. And I’m so happy to share that we’re all in a much better place.
And it’s a little cliche when you hear people say, your mess is your… I’m but it really is. It has brought us to a far better place as a family.
I’m in a far better place. I have found my purpose and my calling as a result of it. So I look back on that time with gratitude, which I could have never imagined I would feel that way now.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Yeah, I am. It’s a bit personal for me, your story. Get emotional. This is the first podcast we’ve gotten emotional, and I’m sorry.
I don’t know why I am. I need to get out of my way. I definitely want get To share with the audience, the steps that you took to really put one foot in front of the other, live second by second to rebuild, because regardless if it’s a dramatic experience or not, this is a fundamental tool.
know that you teach this and it’s a fundamental tool and I know from my own experience, my own way of navigating stuff like that, to be able to get to that next second.
And then get to that next minute and then get to that hour and then get to that day and then get to that week and then get to that month where you are making moves to create momentum to either heal, produce, whatever that is, like process through what’s going on.
So I would love for you to share a little bit about that.
Coleen Greco
Yeah, and thank you for your vulnerability too. I am sorry if I triggered you in any way, but it is
It is highly emotional, but it is an amazing story when you unpack it. So, again, in the beginning, we were working off of the next minute, making sure he was safe, making sure that we were functioning.
We still had corporate jobs to attend to and whatnot, and another child to make sure he was okay. And as I started to reclaim my health because I had ballooned up to weights I hadn’t seen since pregnancy, I was working with a nutrition coach.
And again, these moments come, and at the time, they’re painful and they’re offensive in some cases. But I look back now and think, that was the greatest gift.
So, one thing that happened was I was probably 35 pounds into my weight loss. I had lost 52 overall, so I about 35 down, and I said to my coach, don’t you want to know what caused my weight gain so that you can help me develop strategies so that I never have to do this again?
Like, what woman wants to lose that weight twice, right? Guys have a little bit of an easier time, but women especially.
And he said, I’m not your therapist. And I was like, now wait a second. Like, that was not supposed to I’m There could have been a better delivery, but what it did was it unlocked an idea in my mind, and I said, I can do this so much better than he can.
Like, I know how to lose the weight. I have walked that walk. I know all the struggles. I’m a working mom.
I am like all the labels I could possibly think of. And I can develop these strategies to help women keep the weight off.
It’s the emotional piece that we tend to ignore. We separate that. We think, you know, we’re overweight. But it’s not because of these limiting beliefs and these triggers that we have.
It’s 100% because of those. That is exactly why you’re overweight, right? I really believe the SNAP method found me.
I’m out on my front lawn, kind of journaling, and it came to me that there are really four steps to identifying these triggers and then deciding what you want to do with them and letting them go.
The SNAP method is an acronym. stands for Stop, Notice. The AI can never decide if I want it to be accept or analyze, so I have it as both.
And P is practice gratitude. So you begin to, as you kind of journal through this and you really do have to journal through it, you can begin to see these triggers coming.
The first thing that happens is you have some sort of visceral response. You know, you get like sweaty palms or shakiness in your voice or I get something in my throat, like a nice lump in my throat.
Other people, they have their heart start to raise and you just like you feel it and that’s the trigger.
You have been triggered. Now what are we going to do with it? So the first step is to stop.
You literally allow the trigger to come. It’s already here. Like it’s kind of like a storm, right? Just own it.
Might as well deal with it. And you stop, you break the thought pattern by just allowing it to settle.
You don’t run off to the pantry or the liquor cabinet and self-soothe. And the next step is to notice.
And so when you’re noticing, that’s when you grab your journal and you start to document all the things that are part of this trigger.
So that visceral response that you get. But it’s also the story as you believe it to be. This isn’t the time to judge or
Or criticize your own version. It’s really important to capture it as you believe it to be, which is one version of the truth.
The next step is accept and analyze. So now you can judge. Now you can go back, reread your entry, decide which of your comments are based on fact and which ones are based on emotions.
Two very different things, right? Sort of like your opinion of something versus what actually happened. And the last step is to practice gratitude.
And again, like, that sounds kind of crazy to think about. I’m so glad I was triggered today. This is awesome.
feels so good. Well, yeah, because it’s your body’s way of saying you have work to do. Like, you haven’t gotten over that thing yet.
And so it is a gift. You just don’t really see it that way. But it also, in my opinion, keeps you humble.
It reminds you that you’re human and that we all get caught off guard. We all get triggered by things.
Sometimes triggers come in like the side door. You don’t always see it coming. It’s again your body’s way of telling you that there’s work to be done.
When you walk through those four steps, you’re able to identify trends over time. You’re able to see the trigger coming before it comes.
But then you get to decide what to do with it. In that instance, it’s always my recommendation, let it go.
You know the truth. You can see the fact from the fiction. know nine times out of ten, the story you believe is not the truth.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
A lot of our audience know by now, I’ve definitely lived through some major trauma and I’ve done a lot of the work that you’re talking about.
I love the two A’s. I thought of another one, acknowledge, because I think it’s also like acknowledging that you’ve been through it, but it’s different behavioral styles.
It’s also a process. But in the practicing gratitude, I really like because it helps you take, and this is a big thing about mine, is taking responsibility for my part in that practicing graduate allows you to be able to say, okay, like, I am thankful and why am I thankful?
Like, what is my connection to that? I think that there’s so many different layers to your methodology, which I’ve been loved, because it puts it in a pretty bow, so it’s something easy for people to follow that process.
But yeah, I appreciate that because I love that how clear it is, and it is like four simple steps that you just described, even in the hardest of times, regardless, personal, not emotional.
I mean, usually it is, but some people maybe not be living in the motion. That is a very simple process for you to say, okay, where am I feeling this?
am I doing this? Even the patterns, not even just triggers, but patterns in which we continue. Why do I keep inviting the same type of clients into my life?
I know it might sound after your story. This might sound a bit superficial, it transcends so much.
Coleen Greco
I love the methodology. Oh, thank you. And it’s not superficial. I mean, I have plenty of limiting beliefs that are aligned to the dumbest of the dumbest things.
We also happen to have a community back all. When we all do, that’s the other thing. I really believe very strongly in like, there is no such thing in my world as comparative suffering.
My biggest thing is just as big as yours. I can remember back in the day, my brother-in-law, so the same child when he was about a week old, we brought the priest in to pray for him.
He was really, really sick. Obviously, this is 17 years ago now. And I remember my brother-in-law calling and being like, such a jerk.
I was so upset this morning that my daughter had conjunctivitis, and I had to stay home from work. And I’m like, but that’s your biggest thing.
Like, you don’t get to minimize that just because we’re praying for my son to live. Like, you don’t have that.
So you have this. This is big for you, right? So yeah, I mean, any, I think like all triggers are created equal.
Just some have like a longer shelf life than others.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Well, and it’s our own experiences. And I love that you say that because this is something and Amanda’s heard me talk about this a lot, especially when I was teaching it, like, you’re what we used to call our emotionally charged connection, but essentially, I go a lot deeper.
But essentially, it’s like a connection to your patterns and the whys that you do. And because I live such a traumatic life, mine are very much embedded in
And I remember like sharing this stuff or like opening up the space for people to share it. they were like, oh, like mine’s nothing compared to everybody else’s or even as a child actually and I wrote about it in the book, which is coming.
It’ll be out by the time this this podcast comes out, but that I remember telling myself as a young girl, like people have it so much worse than I did.
I didn’t realize the programming that I was programming. And myself at that point. I do it on the top because it’s me as like a five, six, seven year old.
And just this like, you know, that there’s a lot worse in the world that people are suffering worse. But and it was a survival mechanism.
However, now I do understand like it’s not comparative and we all have to live through our own experiences and both bad and good and to like really mind that because then, especially like for those of us that are.
I had an extreme traumatic experience and then people are kind of, so now I’m feeling the other side of people are like, oh, you suffered so much or you did this or you did that.
I’m like, no, that was a choice. That’s kind of like the whole joy thing, which I want to get back to joy and happiness.
it’s kind of a choice of mindset. I think that that’s what you’re kind of navigating around with the snap method too, really honoring that and owning that.
I’m so sorry. I’m like, I’m taking all of the questions in the dialogue. I’ll stop.
Amanda Furgiuele
You’re allowed to say what you want to say, Lynn, this is your podcast too. These are all great points.
have, this is a very, I think the comparative is something that we all do. And it’s okay that we do that as long as we acknowledge that it isn’t this giant comparison to everybody else.
This goal is everybody else’s achievements. Everybody else’s struggles are not your own. And that’s okay too.
Coleen Greco
Well, let it I also think as you’re going through something, you don’t realize a lot of, or at least I’m working with several clients that are doing this right now, where they think their initial issue is the issue.
And once we unpack, it’s like an iceberg, right? So once we take away the, I don’t know what a friend, I need to get more out there.
It’s like, I have a terrible relationship with my child, right? it gets like, the bigger stuff is under there, but they just don’t realize it until we take Some of the top layer bricks off and things can rise to the surface.
Amanda Furgiuele
So, so true. The iceberg. I don’t mean to laugh. mean, for those of watching the video, both Lynn and I kind of chuckled at that statement because it is so true that it’s never that thing that you think it is.
And I don’t know where I heard this quote recently, but often that thing that you are avoiding is the thing you need to lean into because there’s more there.
Then you are trying wanting to admit to yourself and it definitely makes a difference when you actually chip away at your mindset and what’s really triggering you.
It’s usually a whole lot bigger than you are admitting to yourself.
Coleen Greco
I used to have this phrase that I would tell my clients all the time, I would kind of let it go because people don’t understand it, but I would say run towards your turkeys.
Because I like turkey show up in my life in the most bizarre ways and I like run away from them and I decided on a run a couple of years.
Well now it’s like four or five years ago. Turkeys were literally in the middle of the road and I was like, I’m having a great run.
You are not getting in my way and I started saying this is a metaphor for my life. I normally just want to run away.
So I started running towards the turkeys which I think turkeys tend to attack people so that was probably not the best choice, but I was like I’m going for it.
This is my road too. was kind of like the Red Sea, that kind of made space for me. I think I probably thanked God on the other side of it.
you for not letting them attack me, right? It is true. These situations present themselves. They’re all learning opportunities. turkeys were there for some reason.
Still not sure why. But they’re there to teach you something. Dive into it. When you get that feeling of fear, and I’m not talking about the feeling of fear when a bear maybe shows up, you should be afraid of that.
You should not run towards that bear. But other types of fear, I really do believe that’s misunderstood emotion. It’s actually excitement.
There is something to learn because there’s such amazing stuff on the other side of that. When I was going through, this was probably about six months after everything happened, was reading this book and this one phrase came up and it was trouble is your transportation.
I had that phrase on repeat. I can’t tell you millions of times. I have said that to myself. Hang on, it gets better.
This is bringing you to a much better place. I could not have imagined where it would bring me. I’ve met you guys.
met so many great people as a result of this traumatic event. I left my job in corporate IT marketing leadership.
it was 26 years in the wrong career. had no idea I was in the wrong place. All of that as a result of this.
And so there’s so much greatness that came out of it. And I can’t help but have gratitude for it.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Yeah, it’s amazing when we one lean into the discomfort or run towards the trickeys, as you say. I love that saying.
But it is so true because if you don’t, going back to what you were saying about the clients, It’s they think it’s one thing, but when you dive deeper, you can actually get to the root event.
It’s something that I’ve practiced for years and I’ve worked with clients. I don’t do it as much anymore, but I definitely do for special clients to dive into that kind of root.
And the thing that I’ve found, and I’d love for you to speak on this if you find it as well or not, but what I’ve found is when you continue to just look at the surface, all you’re doing is putting in a band-aid, so you continue to live that hamster wheel and you continue to, it might show up slightly different, but it’s the same lesson over and over and over again.
You’re not fully processing through, you’re still manifesting the same things over and over, but as you get your clients to dive deeper and deeper and deeper and really the root of it, that’s where real change happens.
That’s where long time change happens too. You’re reclaiming a part of yourself, part of your energy, part of your mental, you know, stability.
Billides spirit all of that and then you’re able to build differently off of that.
Coleen Greco
Do you find that as well or do you find something different? No 100% you’re absolutely right. There’s so many things that are going through my head.
I’m lucky for you. I’m like ADHD so I’ll lose it in two seconds. But one thing is, and this is especially true for women, for some reason we need permission from someone else to address these things.
We actually think we’re supposed to just have this life that we have, not the future life. So I talk to women a lot about you don’t need permission.
You don’t need permission from anybody. You just have to know that there’s more out there for you. So that’s the first thing.
The second thing is psychological safety. I feel like there, and again women are more prone to this than men, but we really need to
Need to feel psychologically safe in order to open up. So again, that initial client, they think, you know, their biggest thing is, you know, lack of friendships, you know, kind of like these things that might feel, I think you call that like surface level problems as their biggest problems.
And they don’t really realize that there’s more to it. Well, the more psychological safety we can establish, suddenly they’re like, you know what happened?
And they throw this landmine at you and you’re like, you know what’s there? Right? But it has to do with psychological safety.
And I can’t underscore that point enough. And I think I’ve struggled with psychological safety with women for years. have had more bad female managers.
Then men. I’ve had more bad female relationships than men. Yet I. Like predominantly, oh, like, I would say for every 100 women I coach, I have like two men.
Isn’t that wild? Like those women are the ones that I’ve had the biggest challenges with. Yet I can work with them the best.
It’s wild to me.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
I know I think that’s a big one.
Coleen Greco
that’s a pop-up.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
You relate with them differently, obviously. just the man and the woman, but also like you understand the needs because you knew what your needs are now.
Maybe you didn’t then, but now you see it. And so it’s amazing how that kind of comes full circle.
Coleen Greco
Yeah, and I think it’s really healing too, because you’re able to see things from a different perspective. It’s almost like you’re stepping outside of your own situation, looking in.
So…
Amanda Furgiuele
So if you could leave the audience with one last thought, what would it be?
Coleen Greco
Oh. One, okay, I would say get really curious about what else is out there for you. We know, like in our heart, and just very different than being in your head.
You know in your heart that there’s more out there for you, so act on it. And act on it with a sense of urgency.
I was literally just at a wedding recently, and there’s this woman at the next table has a massive heart attack.
Right, do you think she thought that was going to happen that day? No, of course not, but it’s like we tend to put things off because we think we have this longevity that isn’t guaranteed for us.
So if you believe there’s more out there for you, do the work to get yourself into a situation where you can enjoy that future life now.
Instead of next week, next year. When your kids graduate, whatever the scenario may be. And so I just always tell people, please act with a sense of urgency because, you know, that future life is out there just waiting for you to invite it in.
And it takes far less work than you think in order to capture it.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
And Tamara’s number promised.
Coleen Greco
Right. And I think we know that intrinsically. Do we really believe it?
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
And do we live it?
Coleen Greco
And do we live it?
Amanda Furgiuele
Well, how can people get in contact with you?
Coleen Greco
Best way is through Instagram. And my Instagram is at the Coleen Greco. My name is spelled uniquely. So take note, C-O-L-E-E-N-G-R-E-C-O.
Thank you for having me. This is a great discussion.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Too quick. Just got on. I’m always the way it is.
Amanda Furgiuele
have interesting people talking where we look up and like, oh, look, there we are. I’m sorry about that. But in addition to being able to speak with you, you also are offering something for our audience.
Coleen Greco
Is that right? Oh, thank you. Yes. So I have an e-book that I’d love to share. It is four steps to removing limiting beliefs.
It’s available on my website, which is calling Greco.com slash e-books.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Thank you, Colleen. I, yes, this was a first for me for podcasts and emotions. I am definitely the one who’s going to be more vulnerable to a bus.
But this one’s just a little bit rare than usual. So I appreciate you showing up and sharing your story because I definitely believe both of us believe in sharing stories, you know, and really, you empowering each other.
through the life that we’ve lived and experienced. So that way, others can see from experience or from example.
Coleen Greco
I love it. And again, thank you for your vulnerability. I just think it was, it was a beautiful moment and I was glad to experience it.
Amanda Furgiuele
Yeah, we’ll just see if she lets me keep it in the podcast.
Coleen Greco
will.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Okay, everybody listen into the podcast. allowed it. I’m sitting here.
Amanda Furgiuele
Well, now it’s official. Thank you so much for joining us. We enjoyed having you. And of course, everybody listening, you can find all information in our show notes.
So if you’re listening on another platform, you head back to the pursuit of badassery.com slash podcast, you’ll find everything that you need right there.
Lynn Howard (Lynn Howard)
Absolutely. So thank you for tuning in and subscribing and listening and sharing and leaving us comments.
Amanda Furgiuele
And until next time, get after it.
