It's a new dawn. It's a new day. It's a new life. Do you ever, do you ever, like, record yourself singing Michael Boubley? Well, I know that's not Michael Bubley, but I, like, picture Michael Bubley in my head when I sing that. And then you listen to it back and you're like, man, I sound nothing like I think I sound. In my head, I'm like, you should go on the voice because you have a voice of an angel and then I

listen to it and it sounds horrendous anyways hey hidey ho welcome to episode 12 of the run selfie

repeat podcast where we talk about life with a side of running I I'm Kelly Roberts, your host and lady pal,

and today I want to talk about something that I wanted to talk about since episode one,

but I wasn't exactly sure how to do it because I'm not sure I totally understand it, but I'm

going to take a stab at it because this is important.

And I want to talk about our need to be liked and validated and understood and heard.

But the problem that I run into more often than not is what it means to be authentic. And I think authenticity is a buzzy word that gets thrown around a lot right now. And it's something that I get a lot of praise for, which I find kind of bizarre. But at the same time, I kind of understand, ironically enough, I really fought accepting or even being the person I am today, the woman I am today. because before my younger brother, Scott passed away,

shame, honest to God, ran my life. I was so insecure that I was, like, shrouded in this false

confidence, and I would try to be intimidating in an effort to control what people either knew

about me or, like, thought that they knew about me. And I was really mean and judgmental because I was

confident that so many people were judging me. And I almost wanted to beat them to the punch

or have the upper hand, which is horrendous. And I know I heard a lot of people or tried to push

them away whenever I lost control of what I thought was my happiness.

But then my brother died.

And it was kind of like all the walls and moats and defense mechanisms that I built over the decades of self-loathing and struggle came crashing down.

And we are talking like Great Wall of China walls. Like imagine the

Great Wall of China built like four times over. Like that was my existence. I didn't want

anyone in. Like I didn't want anyone knowing what I'd been through or what I was going through.

And this was before my brother died. If that gives you even an ounce of understanding of what

I've gone through. But then Scott died and surviving and

making it through the day required so much effort that I just lost the energy and brain power

...