Episode 12: Three Keys to Success in Alopecia and Life

Today’s episode of the podcast is about the Three Keys to Success in Alopecia and Life 

KEY TAKEAWAYS COVERED IN THE PODCAST

• You need to be consistent.
• Once you identify the blindspot, hone in on it, focus your energy to rectify it.
• Challenge yourself to do a little bit more.
• Keep going until you find the person who can help you.
• Never settle, keep looking for a better option.

HIGHLIGHTS YOU CAN'T SIMPLY MISS

• The first key to success 01:45
• Magic happens with consistent actions 02:14
• When you upgrade your health, you upgrade your hair 05:02
• Second key to success 05:16
• Going the extra mile means doing a little bit more 07:10
• Third key to success 09:36
• It's possible to heal your alopecia even regardless of what people might tell you 11:02
• Dig deeper and keep asking questions 12:13
• Whether what health situation that you're dealing with, it's so important to find the right provider 13:03
• Having the correct team around you is very important 14:57
• Never settle, keep looking for a better option 19:00

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Transcription

Awaken to hair growth. Awaken to hair growth because there is, possibility to get your hair back. Awaken to hair growth because we're not told that we're able to conquer and overcome alopecia. Awaken to hair growth because I want to be a positive light and beacon for you because I've healed my alopecia and now I help others do the same with different types of alopecia, men, women, children, of all ages of all races and ethnicities.

Welcome back everybody and welcome to the alopecia angel podcast. I'm your host, Johanna and today we are talking about three keys to success in alopecia. After having helped hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of families, children, and adults alike from all over the world achieve their health and hair goals.

These are the three keys that I believe will help you and them, and even outside of alopecia to obtain their goals. And this is important because many times we think that it's a one-stop shop. We think that we just have to do things once and that's it. You know, it's kind of like you have the car, you just washed it and that's it.

Well, probably the week after or in a month, you're probably going to have to wash it again cause it's going to get dirty. The same thing goes for the oil change. The same thing goes for putting in gas. It's not a one-time thing, it's a consistent thing. You need to maintain the car. You need to gas it up, you need to keep it clean for it to keep running smoothly, for the car to allow you to get from A to B and C to D and beyond. So it's really important to have consistency. 

Consistency is our first key to success in alopecia and really in life. We need to do things on a daily, weekly, monthly, yearly basis to make progress, to move the needle. This happens just the same for alopecia as it does for any other goal in life like saving for a house, getting the job we want, finishing school and so much more. We need consistent action if we want to see progress. The magic happens, even when we don't see it, the magic happens with those consistent actions.

There's a book called Outliers and it talks exactly about this. Its premise says that we need 10,000 hours or more to be good at something to achieve something. So they give, for example, the Beatles and they talk about Michael Jordan and athletes and Olympians and other great people who achieved wonderful things.

And they didn't get their start overnight. You know, sometimes for us on the outside, it looks like they're an overnight success. When many times it's not it's because preparation has meant opportunity and also they've put in the hours they put in the work they've put in the nights they've put in the tenacity, the determination, the consistency, and practicing, whether that's basketball, music, golf or being their healthiest self ever.

So there was a lot of consistent action behind all these wonderful achievements, but there was also practice and follow through and without consistency, the Beatles wouldn't have been great at all. So the same goes for athletes, Olympians and other people too. If we don't have consistent work ethic, consistent follow through, consistent determination and discipline.

Then we're not going to get to where we want to get to, especially in less time. And I know you want to heal your alopecia and maybe get into the Olympics is not on your mind, but to make it to the finish line, it needs a similar approach. It needs the similar tenacity and grit consistency is needed. It's not just for two weeks, two months or two years, it's now. And for the rest of your life, it's now and to hone in on those learning lessons so that you can, not just overcome alopecia, but be your best self, but have an amazing outcome in terms of health.

Last week's episode, there was a client who had done my hair and heal program and she not only saw hair growth, but she also reversed her hypothyroidism and her graves' disease. These are other two medical conditions that she reversed doing my program and she's, you know, continuing on with our alopecia journey and continues to see hair growth, but has some more work to be done. And so this is fantastic because she's already taken away two other issues that were, you know, that she was battling.

And so now they're, they're not, they're all her markers are great. The week before there was an interview with Dolores and she had not only saw consistent hair growth and she continues to see hair growth over a year ago but then she also got rid of her joint pain. She also got rid of her body odor and other things that were nagging that she couldn't shake off. And so when you upgrade your health, you upgrade your hair, you really do and they both go together. They really do the upgrading of the health allows for the hair growth to flow.

So the next key to success is going the extra mile and sometimes we just do enough. Sometimes our human habit is to just do the least amount of work to get the full results and actually that doesn't really work here. It doesn't work in many aspects either of, of anything. It won't work at work. It won't work and your career, it won't work in health. It won't work in many aspects of your life because that means if you're just doing enough, potentially you could be putting yourself in autopilot.

We don't want our relationships to be on autopilot. We don't want, you know, even  plants, they can't be on autopilot. They need consistent food and fertilizer and water and sun, and they need these things on a consistent basis. And if they don't have it, they'll let you know that they're gonna start to die, right?

And so even plants have this forcefulness where they need consistency, but they also need the extra mile. And this reminds me of extra credit in a class that perhaps I wasn't doing so well in, or perhaps it was a class where I wanted to make sure I got an A and going the extra mile it takes a little extra work.

It takes a little extra discipline and effort. And also yes, consistency, but going the extra mile is not cheating. It's focusing on healing. It's using the step-by-step formula, trying to incorporate more learnings on a daily basis. Once you have discovered and identified your blind spots, then focusing as much energy as you can to rectify this.

This is where it's crucial to really understand blind spots and understand your blind spots because they can, and they will hold you back. See episode number two for more information on blind spots. And I go in depth about that, but going the extra mile means doing a little bit more, you know, challenging yourself a little bit more for those of you who know or don't know, I do not like to run.

I don't like to run at all and I run because cardio is good for me. I run because it's important to exercise my heart because it's an important piece of overall wellbeing and I've learned to take certain healthy shortcuts so that I don't have to be on the treadmill for an hour or two every day. I've taken certain shortcuts where I can make my time more efficient.

And again, this is not cheating, but this is also reaping the rewards in less time. And this is what I'm all about, you know, taking strategic action and ensuring that your time is well used. It's efficient and it gets you to the results in less time. So instead of spending an hour on the treadmill every day, I spend maybe 25 minutes max, on the treadmill every, maybe three times a week. I'm going to be honest here three times a week I make it to the treadmill, but that's 25 minutes. I hit it hard, it's a strategic plan and it's not at one pace, and so this way I'm challenging my body.

And every time I try to up it, a notch, I try to up the pace so that I continue to challenge my body because that's where we gain momentum. That's where we improve, that's where the heart health, the cardio, everything comes into place. When you continue to challenge yourself, right? Just like when you go through school, you can't always stick at a first grade level. You have to continue to read and do math and science and all these other subjects at a higher level.

And so we have to continue to challenge ourselves to incorporate more learning on a very more technical level, right? You're not going to do algebra in first grade, nor are you going to do calculus, but all the math that you do in elementary school prepares you for that and so this is where we need to focus on the blind spots, hone in on it and go the extra mile into this area, because it might be an obstacle, it might be a Mount Everest for you, but at the same time, it's necessary to weed them out it's necessary to get rid of them.

So the third and the last key to success is digging deeper and sometimes we need to go, not just the extra mile, but also to dig deeper. When I was seeing various doctors from my alopecia and none of the templates doctors gave me any real solutions. They were all band-aids essentially. Digging deeper means asking the right questions, making sure the person who's going to help you focuses on alopecia and not 101 other things too. Making sure this person wants to help you versus being just another number. Digging deeper means not settling.

Many times we are told there is no cure that nothing can be done, wow. If I could just tell you how many people I know, and myself included, has been told this one way or another for alopecia or another health condition, and really it's nonsense. They don't know, and I'll call it out as I see it, and the doctors have told me false things, and they've told my clients the same false things that there's no cure, that they can't be held, that there's nothing to be done.

You know, with that interview with Dolores a couple of weeks ago, they said to her the same thing that she had a certain type of alopecia that nothing could be done and nothing would be helped. Well, by week five, I believe it was or six, she said she started seeing hair growth and it's been a year later and she continues to see hair growth.

So yes, it is possible even regardless of what people might tell you and that's, I think that's part of the problem is listening to people who think they have the answers and they don't. They're going by textbook and they're not looking at the bigger picture. They're not looking outside of the textbook and guess what? We're not all textbook examples. We can't be, there's no such thing. 

And so due to that, there's so much we can do for ourselves, for our body, for our health and digging deeper is really part of that. Settling is also part of that and so you don't ever want to settle just because one doctor or one person tells you “Sorry, can't do anything for you”. Don't believe them, keep going, keep looking, keep searching until you find the right person who can help you, who has helped other people and who has so many success stories around that because It's not just a one and done.

And again, my story is probably very similar to yours where you've seen a gazillion doctors. I did too and none of them could help me. So it's very important to not settle and to keep digging deeper, to keep asking those questions, you know. Had I known, I would have been asking everybody how many people have you dealt with alopecia and seen success in your solutions that you're offering me.

You know, how many people have you seen succeed? not just immediately, let's say in six months, but how about after? You know, this is all important key information and no one's asking these tough questions and I can guarantee you, your doctors don't have the answers for that either.

So there's always more that you can do. So if you are surrounded by people who are telling you no, go to someone else who is telling you yes, perhaps even let's see, let's try, let me help you. This is what's optional, this is what, what can be done. This is just so important because whether it's alopecia. Whether it's another autoimmune disease, whether it's another health situation that you're dealing with, it's so important to find the right provider.

When I was pregnant with my first baby, I had my baby in the Netherlands and the Netherlands has a very different healthcare system than in the US. So for example, when you're pregnant here, you never see a doctor, never see a doctor. Imagine that, what you do, you see a midwife and the midwife is, is and takes charge of the whole pregnancy, unless you have twins or unless you have a certain condition where it requires to be seen by a doctor.

And I don't know what the process is to become a midwife, but at the same time, I have come across many inept incompetent midwives as I have doctors in my life and we need to look at professionals not like, holy deities, but we need to see them as who they are. They are humans. They work in a certain capacity and they're there to help you.

And if they're not there to help you, if they're not there to give you good information, correct information, positive options, alternative options, then go somewhere else. Absolutely go somewhere else. I changed three times in one pregnancy and the last time it was, by week 37, I changed midwives because the other two were just absolutely incompetent.

And I wish there was a rating scale here in the Netherlands where you can rate the midwives. I should probably create this but it was just absurd that not just the customer service, but their lack of knowledge was not making me feel comfortable. On my due date, in my delivery and having to go through labor with these people at my side.

And so having the correct team around you is very important, not just for your mental health, but for peace of mind. If you're going to have a doctor, who's like, nope can't do this, nope can't do that or any practitioner or anyone you want them to be on your side, A.) Because you're paying for them, but B.) Because they're there to help you.

They're not there to limit you and these are characteristics that I look for now, when I look for people to help me in different things, whether that's my taxes, whether that's fixing a repair of any sort, like a car or whether it's doing a simple task, when you want help, especially for alopecia, you want to go somebody who's been there, done that.

You want to go, somebody who has the experience but then also has the answers and, you know, it's a huge bonus when they're positive, when they think there's always a possibility versus having the door shut. And, you know, sometimes they say that having the door shut is a redirection, it's not a final note but it's a redirection just like being confronted with people who are not competent for my delivery, for my labor, for anything I had to keep looking, keep finding until I found somebody I felt confident with.

And lo and behold, I found a midwife here who was trained in the UK, had done over 3000 births and to me, that's mind boggling, 3000 births like she knows what she's doing, right? She knows exactly and she's experienced at all the good, bad and the ugly and that's who you want on your side. That's who you want someone who can coach you through it because lo and behold, I was coached through labor and it was an amazing experience.

It was an all natural experience, but I only mentioned this because I struggled finding the right fit, the right care, the right person to be with me, for my labor and delivery because again you're not seen by doctors unless it's a medical emergency, which it wasn't, I was fine throw in everything so I got seen by the midwife and, you know, depending where you live, whether it's the UK, Australia, the US, Canada, or any other country outside of that, there are so many different laws, red tape, and so many hoops to jump, just to get that first appointment.

And so many times we're wasting our money and our time going to these places. Like I've had clients who wait six months, if not more in the UK to finally see a dermatologist and by the time they get there, guess what? there's nothing they can do for them. So we're holding her breath, we're waiting and nothing's happening.

This is part of the problem, that the lack of education, the lack of help, and the lack of having a strong support system, when it comes to hiring people to help you in this situation. There is however, a bonus characteristic that I wanted to mention and it's to never settle because settling is something that never goes away. 

Once you settle, it'll always come back to haunt you, I guarantee it. It will always come back to haunt you when we regret our decision to settle or when we do settle, it's a regret that in many ways, it compounds. I know many of you listening to this may already feel the pain of brushing alopecia off to the side, thinking that it would grow back because that's what someone told you and know it's gotten worse.

Didn't it? because I've had clients, multiple who always say the same thing, I've waited, uh, you know, it grew back, I brushed it off and then 10 years later, bam, it comes back and it's, you know, mayhem. And so this is when we're forced to do something because we didn't take care of it earlier and I see a big percentage of people who fall into this category.

Settling only brings on regret and bitterness, never settle, keep looking for a better option. That's how I healed, I kept looking for a better option because I wasn't finding it. I didn't find it in Europe, I didn't find it in the United States. I kept looking, I kept searching, and I carved my own journey, I carved my own path.

And again, that's why I do what I do because you know, when you cross over the proverbial finish line, this is what you want. You want to cross over the finish line and many people have asked me, okay, so you've healed your alopecia. Did it come back? Did it come back when you had your hormones fluctuate after pregnancy or during pregnancy?

Because sometimes people experience that, sometimes let's say you think you healed and then you have a situation where let's say you have, you become pregnant and then during pregnancy or after pregnancy, alopecia comes back or resurgence after a certain situation in life.

I know it hasn't, it hasn't come back. It's been more than six years strong and I had a baby during that time and no, it hasn't, it's been fantastic ever since. This is the lesson and the takeaways is to not settle that there's always a better way to do things, whether that's to buy things, whether that's to heal alopecia or, you know, to do anything, there's always a better way. And someone more than likely has already crossed that bridge.

And if they haven't crossed that bridge or you can't find somebody who hasn't crossed that bridge, then perhaps, maybe you're the one to do it. Maybe you're the ones across that bridge, you know, before we never thought that going to outer space for tourism would be a thing and lo and behold, now that's happening.

There's many things in life that I never thought would be a thing and yet now they are so crossing the finish line will take you to dig deeper. It will take consistency and it will definitely take going the extra mile. And never settling, keep looking for a better option again, that's how I healed.

And our race is all very unique to each of us, but we all have the same intent, our race, as in like our race to the finish line. It's very unique to each of us. Some of us have just alopecia, others have alopecia plus another autoimmune disease. Sometimes we have alopecia plus other health situations, but the intent, the effort is all towards healing is all towards the finish line and to heal naturally and to heal supporting our bodies.

That's what we're all about. So keep these traits in mind as you move forward, as they will cost you in the long run and they will come back to reinforce your values and instead of hindering your health, they will upgrade your health. I hope you liked this episode of alopecia angel and I look forward to speaking to you in the next episode, take care.

Thank you for listening to the alopecia angel podcast, a positive light and healing alopecia. You can do this and we can help. Spread the word that reversing alopecia is possible by telling your friends and family.