How to Combat Depression and Create Happiness and Purpose with Dannie De Novo

Today's guest Dannie De Novo is a lawyer turned elite happiness coach and international bestselling author. Her book Get in a Good Mood & Stay There gives you a step-by-step way to change your life. After having battled depression and anxiety for most of her early life, Dannie set out on a course to learn what true happiness was for her and for the sake of her baby girl. Because of her own challenges in the past, she is able to understand more intimately how to help others find their happiness.

Dannie regularly appears on TV news and talk shows as an expert and speaks globally about creating happiness and purpose, combating loneliness and depression, and managing anxiety. She is currently writing her next book, coaching privately, and speaking at events on “happiness."

Dannie is the go to expert on creating happiness and purpose, combating loneliness and depression, and managing anxiety.

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Transcript

0:59

Welcome to Empowered Within a Soul Quenching transformational podcast that will set your soul on fire through candid and inspiring conversations. Leading experts, celebrities, healers, and I share our journeys of how we've overcome challenges to living an empowered life from within. I'm your host, Jennifer Pilates. Welcome to another episode of Empowered Within. Hi there and welcome to the show. Today's guest is Danny Denovo, and I hope that you are ready to get happy because we are gonna get so happy with her. danny is an elite happiness coach and international bestselling author. After having battled depression and anxiety for most of her early life. Danny set out on a course to learn what true happiness was for her and for the sake of her baby girl. Now Danny is the resident happiness television expert on multiple stations nationwide, and has done well over 100 TV appearances across the country. Danny is the go-to expert on creating happiness and purpose, combating loneliness, and depression, and managing anxiety. Welcome to the show, Danny. Oh, it's so good to be with you. Oh my gosh, I am so excited. And now before we get into everything happy. I know life wasn't always so happy for you. They always say we have to go through the storm to get to the rainbow, right? So tell me what storm brought you to this rainbow of happiness? Yeah, there were multiple storms. There were multiple storms. and you know, looking back, you wonder why you go through the things that you do and then one day you just hope that you can connect the dots, right? So everything that I went through, I believe, put me where I'm supposed to be now, which is really, I. Trying to help people go through what I had once gone through before and come out the other side a little bit easier than I happened to do. But I had really struggled with depression and anxiety most of my life. It started. You know, as far back as I can remember, probably around the age of 11 or 12 I just remember thinking that I was sick because I just didn't feel right. I couldn't really explain it, but I felt off. I was tired all the time and the things that I really enjoyed doing, which were, you know, being with friends and I grew up riding horses. I loved to ride. I was on my horse all the time. All of a sudden, I just. Didn't feel the same way about it. It just didn't make sense to me. I just didn't feel like myself. And I remember going to my parents and saying, I think I'm sick. I have to go to the doctor because this stuff is happening to me. And they just kind of brushed it off for a while and said, it's just hormonal. It's part of growing up. You'll get through it. It's a phase. But it just continued to get worse. And to the point where I finally went to my parents, I said, no, look, I really need help. I'm. I'm sick, something's really wrong. And so of course doctors start running tests and they can't find anything. And finally one doctor said, Hey, there's a woman in my office I'd really like for you to sit down with. And I said, okay, I'll do whatever. I just wanna get better cuz I'm just tired of feeling like this. And she sat down across the table from me and she said, okay, tell me what's going on. And I just kind of laid it all out there and sat there and waited for her response. She looks at me, she goes, honey, I think you're depressed. And I said, oh, okay. And now I'm at this point, I'm 16. And I said, well, I. You know, I don't really even know what that means, but I don't think I'm depressed. Let me tell you why. I have friends. I get good grades in school. I'm popular. I mean, I have a horse. I've never seen violence or poverty, right? I mean, we weren't wealthy, but like, you know, I never had to go through anything really hard in life. So I, there's no way that I could be depressed and She just kind of sat back and looked at me again and she said, honey, I think you're depressed. And I said, okay, well you would be the expert, I guess. So what do I do now? And she said, okay, well we've gotta get you on some medication. And she picked up the phone and she called the md. And the next thing you know, I'm on this long road of trying all these different medications one after the other, not getting any better, getting worse and worse. Did manage to graduate high school, went off to college and then started, you know, partying, self-medicating, trying to get myself out of this funk and just couldn't do it. And by my second year of college, I had to drop out. I ended up voluntarily putting myself into a mental institution because I was so suicidal and I knew that I was never gonna get away with. Being able to just kind of go about my life. But I wasn't functioning either. I couldn't get up and shower in the morning. I couldn't get dressed, I couldn't do anything. It was just, it was really bad. So I checked myself into the mental institution and I started going to these group. Therapy sessions and all of a sudden I'm in this room, this full lockdown unit. Now mind you, I like pretty, you know, my, my life was like pretty sheltered up until this point. So this was a lot for me to take on already. But now I'm in this room with these women who are grieving and telling me about abusive relationships and when woman had lost a child. And I couldn't even imagine having so much sadness inside of you. These women were really, truly depressed and they deserved to be. And here I was at the age of 19. I just didn't wanna live anymore, and I didn't even know why. And it was just so hard for me to wrap my head around. So I I went through the sessions. I got out, I held it together through the holidays for the sake of my family, and then I plummeted again. And I knew this time I was gonna be successful at taking my own life if I didn't get some real help. So I went back in. Of course, they say, we've done everything we can for you. We've tried every medication, we've done everything. And I said, well, look, I'm gonna succeed in this if I get released. So you've, there's gotta be something else. And they said, the only other thing we have left for you is electro shock therapy. And I said, okay, well if that's all there is, then let's do it. And you know, I was very isolated at that time. I didn't really have anyone advocating for me. My parents just didn't know what to do, so they kind of did nothing. And I was over 18, so I was able to sign on the dotted line. And the next thing you know, the next morning I'm being wheeled into the secret part of the mental institution that no one really knows about. And they wheel you in through these double doors into this place. It looks like, and I'm not exaggerating, Frankenstein's laboratory. And I remember just being so panicked and so fear stricken. And they threw my head back and they taped it down. And as my head went back, I saw this giant man come at me with these two big metal probes. And then I was out. And and when I woke up, I felt like I'd been hit in the head with a sledgehammer. So I went through these treatments every other day for a series of weeks, and it was just broke down my body on top of any little bit of spirit that I had left. One night I was having dinner with my little brother and and he starts talking about this time we were on our ponies together cuz we grew up riding horses together. And he is telling me about this exciting adventure we had and I can't remember anything he's talking about. And he's getting really upset because he's got all this detail and he's like, there's no way you can't remember this. And we went here and we jumped over the creek and then we went there, dad. So we couldn't go there, but we went there anyway. And he's just going on and on. He's like getting upset because I can't remember this, a very important memory. So I just said yeah, of course. Yeah. I remember we did that and that, and I pushed myself away from the table and I ran into my room and I got my photo album off under my bed, and I started looking through childhood pictures and I realized that my childhood memories were being erased. I couldn't remember anything. So I went in the next day and I said, okay, guess what? I'm not depressed anymore. I feel great. We don't have to do this anymore. Life is good. I'm just gonna get on with it. And they said, okay, well show us. And I said, okay, what do I have to do? So I was basically just supposed to go out in the world and look like everybody else. I got a job, I got back into school and I just started faking being happy because I didn't wanna go through that torturous treatment anymore. I had enough of the medication, I had enough of the electro shock therapy treatment, and I had enough of just not being able to live life anymore, of just kind of delaying everything. So I pretended to be okay, and I did all right. I went to college. I graduated, I went to a law school. I became a lawyer. I had the life eventually that I thought everyone wanted, that I thought I wanted. I had a beautiful house. I had a nice car. I was married. And then I had my daughter. And you know, one day she's on the floor in the kitchen playing with her bowls and spoons while I was stirring a pot on the stove. And she picked up that bowl and spoon. She's about a year old. She looked up at me with her big brown eyes and she started mimicking me. She was stirring and her pot just like I was At first I thought it was the coolest thing I'd ever seen, but then I realized she was copying my every move and I almost fainted on top of my daughter. Because I realized, like I was showing her how to live this depressed, lonely, unfulfilled life, and I couldn't do that to her. And I surely could not let her continue on and go through the same pattern and the same heartbreak, and the same trauma that I had endured my entire life. So I sat on the floor. I hugged her and I cried my eyes out and I promised her I was gonna learn everything there was to know about being happy because she was gonna be happy. I didn't think I could ever be wired for it. In fact, I was told many times I would never be happy. I just didn't have the brain capacity for it. But she was gonna learn. I. And so I started studying happiness like I studied for the bar exam when I was in law school. And the funny thing was, is when I started implementing these things and when I started reaching out to other people who I thought had answers to my questions, and they started helping me, and I started doing what they were doing, my life very quickly started to change. And I realized, huh? Maybe I can be wired for happiness. And then everything just sort of came full circle when one day my little brother, the one that I was having the conversation with at dinner, and he came to me and he said, you know, what are you doing? What are you know, you're reading this stuff. And I said, oh, you're gonna make fun of me too. Because at that point a lot of people just thought I was crazy and lost it. And and he said, no, this is. This is the first time ever in your life I have ever seen you happy. And I was also wondering, you know, if it worked for you, maybe it could work for me too. So I didn't even realize that he was struggling, you know, to the extent that he was. So I gave him some stuff to do and his life started to change and that's when I was like, ah, maybe there's something to this. You know, maybe I really can recreate this for people so that they can avoid. All of that pain and suffering that I went through, or if they're in it at this period of time, maybe they can help bring them out in a way that's so much healthier than all the things that I endured. So that's kind of how I became the Happiness Coach and how I went from being the expert in unhappiness to the expert in happiness. That is such an amazing story and journey that you've been through. I ca I mean, my mind is still back on. Wait a minute, you. Self checked in to a mental institution, which a lot of people, I don't even think, believe that we still have them. Not only that, but at the age that you did, this wasn't like 50 years ago you were getting electro, shock treatment. This was right. I mean, what, maybe 20 years ago? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's and honestly it wasn't that long ago that they were giving shock therapy to people without anesthesia. I at least had that benefit. Oh my Lord. I just, I can't but the thing, you know, and as much as I can't, at the same time, I'm like, my God, I am so proud of you for being your own advocate, right? When no one else could stand up for you. Look at what you did. Even in the depths of the darkness you were in, you were still trying to claw out even though it might not have felt like it. Oh, no, it definitely felt like clawing. I mean, I was hanging by a fingernail, you know, I think it just came down to a decision. I remember, you know, you're locked in, into basically a cell. You can't have, at least when I was there, like you couldn't have a pen, you couldn't have anything in your room. I had. A pillow and like one little blanket and a chair and that was it. And there's bars on the window and I, you know, I was just like, remember looking out at the moon? Cuz I never slapped. I was just, you know, my head was so messed up looking out at the moon and just thinking to myself, you know, is this it? Like, is this at 19 years old? This is really what my life is gonna look like for the rest of my life. And then being told so many times that people like me didn't make it. You know, we would either be successful, it's suicide, or we would become addicts and that would take over our life and eventually kill us in some way. And I just, I didn't wanna do that. I didn't wanna be that person, and I kind of just came to this. Decision. It was just sort of a moment, one of those things you hear in your head that's, I think is divinely guided. I believe that, you know, that if I'm not gonna take my own life, then I'm sure is, you know what, not gonna live it like this. And so, you know, I was just looking for answers. And the answers that came up at the time they did happened to be the answers that were there. And again, I. You know, it was obviously a very difficult thing to go through and something I had a lot of shame around for a very long time. I could, there was no way I could have ever had a conversation like this with you about everything I went through. I, I tried to hide it as much as I could. I couldn't even bring it up without crying, but realizing that it's really my ability to have gone that far is what allowed me to. See what people are really experiencing on a daily basis and how much they're really suffering so that I can be a help and a little bit of a guide through that. Absolutely. It sounds like that treatment center and all treatment centers very much could use you. I think so. I think, you know, to be completely fair, I think. Depression is something that's very hard to treat if you have never been depressed, right? If you're a doctor and someone has a heart attack, you at least understand physical pain on some level. If you went through medical school, you at some point saw an actual heart and how it worked, right? You had some mechanical understanding of it. But if you've never experienced depression yourself, I don't really know how you're supposed to treat it. Because you have no concept of what is going on inside someone else's head. Right. And it's so different for each and every person. I don't, I've never met two people with the exact identical depression ever. Right. Right. It's a very uniquely targeted thing. It really is. So tell me about the three sides of happiness that you love to share. I found these quite fascinating because you think happy and you're like, okay, happy. And I'm sure somebody's like, yeah. Tell me how you know Danny to get happy, but no, we're gonna do one better. She's gonna talk to us about the three sides of happiness, which are freaking amazing. Is there one you wanna start with? I wanna, yes, of course. I wanna start with the spiritual side. Okay. Oh, the hardest side, I think really I think the spiritual side really begins with asking for help, sort of surrendering to the fact that. You know, like I did, I don't have the answers, and I just need guided, I need help. I don't know in what form and where it's coming from, but I need it. And then that sort of opens the door to begin with. But spiritually speaking was really, for me, a journey in learning how to become brave because, If you wanna be happy, you have to be brave. I honestly believe that and there's two parts of that. I think the first is being brave enough to be able to sit with yourself, hear what's coming from your heart, and be honest about what your heart has to say about being happy. Because if you really learn how to tune into your heart, I believe that it will tell you everything that you need to know about being happy. But you've gotta be honest with yourself about what it's saying, and that's not always the easiest thing to do. And then after you have figured out that you're actually listening to your heart and you've accepted what it has to say. The second part is being brave enough to act in conformity with that no matter what anyone else around you has to say, what society has to say, what you happen to think about yourself at the current time. You've gotta be brave enough to push past that because your happiness has to be more important to you than your fear. And once you allow yourself to be a little bit courageous, it sounded like a muscle. You know, once you've learned to flex it a little bit, it becomes a little easier and a little easier and a little easier. Not that the things you're getting over are necessarily easy, but it becomes easier for you to sort of show up for yourself and to allow that guidance to come in and to hear what's coming from your heart. People have a really hard time with that because we've been taught over our lifetime. How to shut down that voice, how to ignore it, how to suppress it, how to tell ourselves stories around why it could never really be true. I could never want that because I am too old. I'm not pretty enough. My time has come and gone. I have kids now, or I was never good enough to do that anyway. Right? All the things that we tell ourselves over time about why something just ha didn't happen to work out at a specific time in our lives could never work out. And it becomes really an exercise in allowing yourself to get over yourself. Right. Which is, I think, probably the hardest thing that we can learn throughout our lifetime. Right. And when you say get over yourself, do you mean more so like relinquishing our ego, putting the ego side down and really just connecting with spirit and connecting with ourself. I think yes, you have to definitely be able to suspend ego and see it for what it is, right? But it's also about, you know, getting over sort of the human part of ourself that keeps us from really experiencing the spiritual part of ourselves and being able to laugh at the human side. Right. I. This whole idea of, you know, self-image and being self-conscious about things and not feeling worthy about yourself, right? Being able to get over those things to get out of your own way. You know, trust me, I was in a place where, you know, it wasn't good by the end of my marriage I remember not being able to look at myself in the eye in my own bathroom mirror when no one was around, couldn't make direct eye contact with myself. I just had such a low self-worth. Right. And so to think that I could ever come on a podcast or go on television or talk about any of these things is remarkable. But I really had to get out of my own way and sort of, you know, look at myself from a completely different perspective than I had. And it feels like lying to yourself at first because you've been this person for so long, right? And now all of a sudden you're gonna be this. And your brain says, no, that's not how we do that. That's not how we live. That's, people are gonna laugh at this. Right? Being able to get away from all of that to really stand in a place where your spirit can express itself. That is so beautiful and something that I just wanna kind of go back to because I feel like someone's gonna go, well, it sounds like this happened overnight, and I want people to understand that for you, this didn't happen overnight. No, it's been a lifelong journey. So again, the depression, you know, I really can pinpoint it around 11 or 12 as starting. And I believe, you know, that it was try, they were treated, trying to treat it chemically, and it wasn't a chemical imbalance for me. It really was a spiritual imbalance that no one around me knew how to see or how to fix. Then depression all through high school into college at 19 is when the whole check myself into the mental institution started. Right? That whole series of events ended somewhere around, I don't know, 22, 23. I finally get into law school and I just kind of did what I had to do to get through that. And then, you know, I was functioning in life after that, right? I was. Going to work, doing a good job at it. I was going to the grocery store, I went to the gym. I paid my bills. I did all the things that you're supposed to do. But I was miserable. And I knew I was miserable, but I didn't know how to change it. I just thought, and ba basically had been told up until that point that this is just what life was going to look like for me. Right. And and I was really suffering in a lot of ways, but it was silent because I was not gonna go back. To any of the things that I had gone to before, and there were many a times when I thought, you know, at this point, no one even really knows I'm depressed, right? I mean, they might have an idea, but I've not gone and said to anyone, I'm depressed. You know? If I wanted to end things, I could probably do it pretty easily and kind of make it look like an accident and. You know, no one would really like internalize it as being a suicide. So I wouldn't hurt anybody cuz that was my major issue. I didn't want my parents, well my father had passed away at that point, but I didn't want my, the people that I love to, you know, ever be hurting over me. But if I could make it look like an accident, you know, then they could just sort of accept it. And these were really thoughts that were going through my head a lot of the time. And truthfully, if my daughter had not come along and she came along later in life too, so now I'm into my thirties if she hadn't come along, I, you know, I don't think that I would have made it. I think those thoughts would have gotten the better of me and I would have found my way out because that's desperately what I wanted. So she is what made me get over the fear of everything else like her growing up I just could not, I could not ever accept the thought of her going through the things that I had gone through. The thought of her being in a mental institution just made me absolutely sick. I couldn't even eat. So, it was, my why was so big, it was so powerful that I had to learn, I had to do something. And when I took that step, and I really meant it right, I really meant to figure out this idea of happiness, even if it wasn't for me. That's when all the answers started to show up. And then from that point, I feel like it was a pretty rapid transformation, but I was also very much immersed in it. I was obsessed with this idea of happiness, what it meant, how I could get there, and and since that day on the floor with my daughter in the kitchen, I have. Studied happiness in one way, shape, or form every single day. But I know that I have to because I know how easy it is to slip back into where I had been before, and that's just not something that's ever going to happen to me again. Right. And Danny, I wanna say thank you so much for sharing so much and being so vulnerable right now, because I feel that there are so many people out there that are gonna go, oh my gosh, nobody has ever been this frank and this open and gone this deep. And I'm just so happy because I know so many people are gonna resonate and connect with this and go, my gosh, she went through all of this, pulled through and she's still saying, look if I may, almost like alcoholism or anything, any other vice that you have in your life, this is something that you have to work on every day. It is. It is. Because you know what, being in that cycle of thinking is very addictive. I'm not gonna lie, it's very easy to sit around and throw myself a pity party. But also now that I'm kind of on the other side of it, right. You know, people say, oh, it's so easy for you. Well, no, the all I know is that if I can get through what I did, then you can get through what you're going through too. And it's at the point now where people just sort of gravitate towards me, right. So I'm in line waiting for my coffee and just a random stranger will start sharing their story with me. You know, and I, it really. It is very humbling to me that people are willing to share their vulnerabilities with me. So I feel like I need to do that as well because I really do want to help and I think by being transparent is the best way for me to help people at least get started and not feel like this is such a an overwhelming undertaking that it can't be done. Absolutely. Okay, so we've done the spiritual side. Talk to me about the neuroscience side of happiness. Well, there's so much great research that's always coming out now, and you know, I. Very much lived for many years of my life, of behind the idea of, you know, why do it the easy way when you can do it the hard way, right? So I was always banging my head off that brick wall and wondering why I couldn't get the results that I wanted to get. Well, I was always just making it harder than it needed to be. And I feel like neuroscience is like that hack, right? It's the way to, to help us, help our brains out a little bit better, a little bit easier, a little quicker than Then, you know, honestly, a lot of the professionals out there even know how to do, because our society's still very quick to throw a medication at it or something like that instead of kind of going towards other things to help you. And neuroscience just gives you. All those little tweaks and things that you can do throughout the day that aren't necessarily going to fix anything long term, but can help you sort of hold on when you're having a really bad moment or help you, you know, flip the script from that pity party in your head to, you know, I do have gratitude. I do have appreciation for my life and these are the reasons why. So anything that can just sort of switch that, that. Cycle that we get so stuck in sometimes that's just running through our brains on autopilot a lot of times, I think is a huge benefit. I agree. So I'll give you one example. So one thing that I'm really into is our ice baths. And I hate being cold. I hate it. And it took me a long time to build up to these things. So I started, you know, just soaking my hands for a few minutes in ice and then I went to my feet, and then eventually I got in and I could stay in for 30 seconds, maybe a minute. Now I can stay into up to like 45 minutes if I wanted to. And it's got so many benefits to your body, which it just, you know, I could sit here and talk about four hours. But it has great benefit for your brain as well. It's just one of those things that's amazing. Just sort of flip that, that, that switch in your brain and when you come out of there, you feel so good. You've got endorphins flowing. You're present because obviously, you know, you're very much in tune with the fact that your body is cold and that you know, your survival kind of. Switches on for a minute, but then you just come into a state of presence and being and just really allows you to sort of accept what is around you. So it's just like a great thing to do that. But I, you know, my daughter's seven now and we talk about all kinds of things that she can do throughout the day when she's feeling a little bit anxious because obviously she was in school when the whole covid thing happened and. And a lot of her friends are experiencing a lot of anxiety around things. So we try just little hacks throughout the day, little things with her breathing. Anything like sensory that can sort of switch it off for you. So just like a really soft brush against your face can sort of flip that switch for you once in a while, or a feather or a little rustling in your ear. I mean, it's amazing. There's so many smells and foods that you can do to sort of hack your way to happiness, if you will. And when you. Combine all these things together, right? And you do them throughout the day and they make it your practice and make it your The habits that you go to when you know that you need a little bit of an upkick. But for me, I don't even wait for that. I just do them because I know that the benefits are gonna be prolonged, you know, throughout the day or throughout the week. Anything that you can do to just sort of give yourself that little bit of extra edge is just incredible and amazing. So why you wouldn't utilize those things? I don't know. Because they make it so much easier. Absolutely. Okay, so now the health side of happiness. Right. Well, this part is hard too. I think because we live in a society of convenience, it's go all day long. We are not programs, I think it's changing a little bit, but we're not really programmed to take care of ourselves, right? And to really listen to what our bodies need and what our brain needs and what our chemistry needs. But diet is a huge thing. And you know, I think you have to be really honest with yourself about what you're putting into your system. Anxiety loves sugar. It feeds off of it. It's what keeps it up and going. Right? And so if you're putting sugar and constant caffeine and. Other crap into your diet all day long, then your brain isn't gonna be able to function at a higher level. And then we do things like self-medicate like I was doing. So you're using alcohol or you using other drugs or other ways to sort of stimulate yourself to keep that going or to numb it out whichever way you're headed. Right? Is you know, such a detriment to our health and our happiness over a long period of time. And I'm not saying anything that you don't already know, but I think what people don't realize is, How just a little bit of negativity into the system can correlate into so much crap out of your system. Right. So, for me, I don't drink at all anymore because just, you know, a sip of alcohol I know is gonna translate into a whole lot of. Stuff not going so great upstairs for me, right? It's going to increase anxiety. It's gonna make me feel like crap. I'm not going to sleep well. All these things are gonna go on and on. You think, oh, well, on any given day, that's like not really a big deal. Like if you don't have a problem, you just have a drink here and there, and if you can manage it, that's great but for me, it just wasn't worth. You know what happened on the other side of things. And so I started watching other things about that as well. I started watching different things that I ate and I started watching my movement and my exercise and correlating it to all those things and how much, you know, just even being outside and getting fresh air means to your system when I was really depressed and I was, you know, hanging by a thread. I promised myself one thing, right? Because you know, everyone's like, oh, smile and do this and do that, and I trust me, I know when you're at the bottom, I. You don't wanna hear any of that. And so what I did is I promised myself one thing every day. I was gonna go outside and get fresh air for at least 15 minutes. And I, you know, I don't live in the best climate in the world. Like the winter isn't nice and it's raining in the spring and the fall, but it didn't matter what it was doing outside. I was gonna go outside and spend 15 minutes outside just getting fresh air, seeing what kind of sunshine I could and just being present there. Right. And I got an old school calendar and I hung it on the wall, and every day that I went outside, I put a big X on that day, and it doesn't seem like much, but at the end of that month, I saw all of those Xs. And what it did for me is give myself just a little bit of confidence. I could get up and I could do that for myself every single day. If I could do that, then what else could I do for myself every single day? Could I drink a little bit more water? This month, could I, you know, eat a little healthier? Could I do this? Could I do that? And you start stacking these things up over time and you begin to see how much of a shift it has over your personality, over your attitude over. How you're feeling, how you interact with other people. It really makes you wonder how much of it is, you know, really bio biochemical and and how much of it is just sort of the stressors that we put on ourselves of trying to keep up and trying to do things a certain way instead of a way that works for us individually. Right. Oh my gosh. Excellent tips and advice. I so appreciate all of this, and your heart and your soul is just shining so brightly. It is amazing. Danny, we are getting to this time in the show where I ask this one question. Are you ready? Okay, I'm ready. What is one thing that no one knows about Danny? That's a good question cuz I really do kind of put it all out there now, but I think one thing that people really don't realize is that I am very hard on myself. Right? Like I, I really do kind of push myself to understand this stuff and And I forget that I'm human. So when I have a day where I may be a little sad or a little anxious or a little grumpy, right? I really, I get mad at myself for being that way instead of just understanding that, Hey, I'm human. This stuff comes in, it'll go out. And I just try to get back to those practices that I was talking about to help shift it so that I can kind of look at it, right? Because I think emotions are information and we need to feel them and we need to look at them, but not in a self judgmental way, just in a, oh, that's curious. I wonder why that's going on. Let's figure this out. So, yeah I tend to be a little bit hard on myself and kind of jump the gun when I'm like, you know, not exactly. Perfect. Geez. I don't know. I think we could all resonate with that, Danny. Absolutely. And I love, again, you are just so honest and so authentic. It's so refreshing and I so appreciate it. For those in our community that would love to connect with you and maybe continue the conversation, where can they best reach you? Through my website, it's danny de novo.com, or you can find me anywhere on social media at Danny de novo. I'd love to hear from you. Just tell me, you know, what's going on in your life, if you wanna chat, if you just wanna vent or whatever else, but I'm always here and always open for a good correspondence. Great and of as always, all of Danny's information will be over in the show notes on Jennifer pilates.com as we close out the show today. Danny, what is one last piece of inspiration that you'd like to leave with us today? To keep going. You know, there were a lot of times in my journey where I felt like quitting because I felt like I wasn't getting the information or I wasn't, I just wasn't getting it. I was on the wrong path, or I was just, you know, sometimes it was just like, I'm just not smart enough to get this maybe. But the truth is, There are a lot of people out there saying a lot of things right, and a lot of people are actually saying the same thing. They're just saying it a little bit differently. Sooner or later, you will come across that person who says it in a way that you're just like, oh, I get it now. I. It will resonate for you. It will make sense. It will flip something inside of you that will make you wanna learn more, do more, and suddenly you'll just have, you know that next step, that next piece of the puzzle that will help carry you on. So whatever you do, keep going because you will find what you need. Beautiful. So beautiful. As are you, Danny, thank you. Thank you so much for being here today and sharing all of your happiness, insights, and true vulnerable journey and story and your light with us today. Oh, it was so great to be with you. Thank you. Thank you. Well, as we say, until next time, may you live an empowered life from within. Thank you so much for tuning into another episode. Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe to Empowered Within with Jennifer Pilates. Your feedback is important. It helps me to connect with you and gives me insight into who you are and what you're enjoying about the show. For today's show, notes and discount codes from today's sponsors. Head over to jennifer pilates.com. Until next time, may you live an empowered life from within.