Category Archives for "Interview"

It’s not very often that you meet someone the first time and experience an immediate “Wow!” moment, where you’re just blown away.  Well, I had one of those moments when I interviewed Vironika Tugaleva on my radio show earlier this year, to talk about her awesome book, The Love Mindset: An Unconventional Guide to Healing and Happiness.

As I had said at the time, I was left scrambling to listen to the replay of our conversation to gobble up all the great information, examples, insights, and profound thoughts that she had to offer!

That’s why I was so thrilled to hear that she has figured out a way to share her insight, wisdom, and support with so many people, at one time, through an exciting program that she has just unveiled!  I asked Vironika if I could ask her some questions about her program, so that I could let everyone know about it (and to re-introduce you to her if you don’t already know her), and I was so honored that she took some of her valuable time to spend with me.

I have no doubt that you’ll be as impressed and captivated with her as I was that first time I met her, and I have no doubt that if you’re hurting, or looking for someone who can help you in a way that nobody else can, Vironika is totally worth listening to.

I’m delighted to share my interview with Vironika with you!  Enjoy!

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Vironika, it’s delightful to be with  you here.  Let me start out by asking — How did you come to doing the work that you do?

Honestly, I didn’t mean to do this for a living.

I came to helping people overcome mental and emotional distress by overcoming my own. I’ve been through a long struggle with eating disorders, addiction, anxiety, trauma, and a mind that was slowly cracking at the seams with each day.

I tried, for years, to live as if nothing was happening, but there was a darkness that loomed in the background, slowly growing bigger. My mind was out of control and, soon enough, I couldn’t ignore it anymore.

What began as body image issues, social anxiety, and constant mental noise ended up as addiction, self-destruction, and insomnia. I started to hear voices. I became addicted to the idea of killing myself.

That’s how, one March evening in 2012, I had a mental breakdown. Looking back, it was more like a mental breakthrough, but that was not how it felt at the time. At the time, I sat on my bedroom floor and all the noise in my head went quiet except for one, small and crucial idea. I had to make a choice: change or die.

It wasn’t the easiest choice at the time, but I made the right one. I wish I could tell you it was downhill from there, but it wasn’t. I began a long, strenuous journey of learning to understand and heal my mind, my past, and, most importantly, my relationship with myself.

Many months and countless epiphanies later, I began to get a grip on my thoughts. I started to have some control over how I reacted to my reflection, to social situations, to vulnerability. Over time, that control grew into a beautiful, intricate relationship with my mind – the kind of relationship that allowed me to do more than just “deal” with anxious or self-hating thoughts. I could actually understand my mind, why it worked the way it did, and how to make it work for me, instead of against me.

I started sharing what I learned with people, first through my book The Love Mindset, then through speaking and coaching. I found that, even though few people saw as deep a bottom that I did, the cause was the same and the solution was the same.

Now, I could not imagine doing anything else. This is my calling. I shine light into the dark spaces where I used to hide.

 

What was the most difficult part of healing for you and how does that affect your work today?

Honestly, the lack of guidance and support was the worst. When I shed my mask, I shed any trace of a support system I could have had. All those who loved me as a self-destructive addict didn’t want me as a vulnerable, makeup-less, unguarded, sensitive woman.

I didn’t give up and I didn’t give in. I didn’t put the mask back on just because that’s what people wanted. I told myself that I would never be friends with someone who didn’t want me as I am. I told myself I’d never be intimate with someone unless we could get along in a dark cave in the Arctic with parkas on and our hands over our eyes.

I thought I’d resigned myself to a lifetime of celibacy and isolation, but I hadn’t. Shortly afterwards, I met my partner, and he’s still my biggest inspiration and my biggest fan.

While I learned what to do with my mind on my own, he taught me the importance of the right support at the right time. He showed me what’s possible when a person is allowed freedom to be themselves, space to sort things out, and a mirror to reflect their strengths and their self-deceit.

I suppose that is why I do what I do – to make it easier for people to understand their minds than it was for me and to give people some of that amazing, important support that my partner’s shown me is crucial in times of transformation.

 

What is the most important thing you’ve learned about mental health from your experience with helping yourself and helping others?

I’ve learned that mental health is not a by-product of winning the genetic lottery. A healthy mind is something you cultivate, one day at a time. A person can be born with a clear mind and end up with anxiety and depression.  A person can be born hearing voices and live a healthy, productive life, voices and all.

A mind is just like a body. Just like you need to eat to live, you need to think to live, and what you nourish yourself with every single day matters. I’m not talking about affirmations, I’m talking about vital processes of perception that every single person needs to have to have a healthy mind. It’s incredible that we have such a wealth of information about what we need to eat to be healthy, but nothing like this for our thoughts. I hope to change all that in my lifetime.

I’ve found that many types of mental and emotional distress, things like anxiety, depression, addiction, mania, psychosis, eating disorders – these are products of a lack of control over what one thinks, day to day. Just by changing our relationships with our minds, we can cultivate joy, love, and peace, regardless of circumstances. And that is something everyone should know how to do.

Don’t get me wrong, I think there are mental health issues that go deeper than learning to use the mind in this way and I also think that when everyone learns the simple, effective things I’m teaching, we’ll have so few people presenting with such problems that we’ll actually have the tax dollars, staffing, and time to resolve them.

 

What exactly is it that you’re doing now to help people?

At the moment, I’ve stopped doing speaking, radio shows, and interviews for the most part. I’ve been working on something new that is already impacting people in a profound way.

A few months ago, I got to the point where I was getting more coaching requests than I could honour and many readers of The Love Mindset wanted more from me. They wanted to know how to apply the principles in the book to their own lives.

Needless to say, there is only one of me, so I was having a hard time making myself accessible to everyone who needed my help. One evening, after a session, one of my clients told me that she wanted to “put me in her pocket.” We had a laugh about it, but she insisted, “No, really, would you make a workbook, or a program, or a course?” She said she wanted to have me available to her without having to be right in front of me.

Her comment sparked off lights in my head and, now, months of hard work later, I’ve created a beautiful, accessible, informative, multi-sensory, multi-media guide to help people heal their minds and change their lives on their own terms.

It’s been an incredible ride and, now, not even a week after its release, I’m getting emails telling me about how amazing this program is. Honestly, I might be biased, but I have to agree. Even my inner perfectionist says – this is good stuff. I’m excited to see where it goes, whom it helps, and just how wide-reaching the ripples will be.

I always get excited about healing people because people who have healthy, peaceful, happy minds are people who change the world just by existing. And that’s what I’m working on right now – I’m helping as many people as I can transform into the healthiest versions of themselves.

That’s incredible! How can we get access to Mindset Makeover?

You can read all about the program by clicking right here (this is an affiliate link).  You’ll get all the details about what the program has to offer and how you can benefit from it when you follow the link.

 

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I invite you to check out Vironika’s program and see what she has to offer.  I stand behind Vironika one hundred percent and I highly recommend anything she has to offer.  She’s never let me down, and I know she won’t let you down either.  

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you take a moment to get to know Vironika by visiting her at her website!  You won’t be disappointed!