Hi, I’m Joanne Cary. Welcome back to The Embodied Soul Podcast, a multidimensional space intended to support you in mastering, living, being and thriving as the embodied soul you are.
In this week, I’m back down to the beach. I absolutely love it here, especially when I’m inspired to bring through a message for you. And this week I’m going to explore a truth that many of us say we understand, but very few of us actually embody. And that’s: if you say you want change, you have to be willing to change.
We’re going to talk about why so many people feel stuck, even while investing in their growth; why certain patterns keep repeating; what’s really happening inside your system when you want change but don’t take action; and how to tell the difference between a sacred pause — a genuine season of integration like we talked about last week — and a self-sabotage, where an inner part is quietly keeping you from moving forward.
If you’re ready to join me, pull up a comfy chair, invite in your Soul, and be open to receive exactly what you need, to live, be, and thrive as the embodied soul you are.
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Core Teaching
So let’s begin with the core teaching:
Most people say they want change. Very few people are actually willing to change.
And I don’t say that with judgement. I say it with a great deal of compassion. For you, for me, for all of us.
Because people spend thousands of dollars on courses, coaching, healers, activations — and then never actually apply the things they learned. And I’m saying this from both sides of the experience. I personally spent more than I’d like to admit on things that I’ve never fully enacted or completed. And I can share more about that later.
And as a creator, I’ve had people do the same thing to my offerings. They purchase something meaningful, and then it just… well, sits there, untouched, unopened.
They may read the book, but don’t take the steps. They may do the healing, but don’t embody the shift. They have the insight, but don’t change the behaviour.
And this isn’t failure. It’s not even evidence that you’re broken or uncommitted to what you want. It is evidence that you are multi-dimensional.
You’re not one singular “you,” and I put that in quotations. You are a constellation of identities, ages, rules, and fragments. Each with its own beliefs, fears, stories, and ideas about what is safe, and what is not safe.
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Inner Parts & Fragmentation
Now, there’s something I want to normalize here. In the spiritual world, we hear a lot about the inner child, as though there’s just one. But let’s be honest: most of us don’t have an inner child.
We have a group, a team. Honestly, maybe even a legion. I certainly know that I do.
Because each time we experience a little-T trauma or a big-T trauma, a part of us steps forward to protect us. A fragment that says, “I’ll hold this, I’ll keep you safe.” And with that fragmentation comes a belief, or a whole cluster of them.
So sometimes you genuinely have cleared a limiting belief as an adult. You’ve done the healing, the claiming, the reclaiming — and then something in life activates that old fear again. Suddenly you’re thinking, Ah, why is this coming back? Did I not do it right? Why am I still dealing with this thing?
But here’s what most people don’t understand:
The adult may have healed the belief, but the little part of you who learned it is still holding onto it.
Your inner parts, your inner children, have their own beliefs, their own fears, their own reasons for staying the same exactly as they are. And sometimes those little parts band together. They reinforce one another’s fears, stories, and requirements over time.
So you may clear a belief held by one part… and that clearing creates a ripple that only reveals itself later — in a new situation, when another part with a similar belief finally feels safe enough to come forward.
And the work is not to shame the parts or to get rid of them. It’s to meet them. It’s to hold them. It’s to love them. And to invite them home.
This isn’t about you regressing. It isn’t about you failing at something or doing anything wrong. This is reintegration.
This is your inner system finally feeling safe enough, resourced enough, and supported enough to show you what’s next to heal.
And this is why in my private sessions, so many clients have their little parts — and sometimes teenager parts, and sometimes young adult parts — show up so clearly. Why? Because they feel safe enough to be seen. Because the space is safe.
Their system trusts, and these parts finally come forward.
And when a client truly meets that part with compassion — when they let themselves feel it and honour it and listen to it — the shifts are profound. Not because I’m doing something to them, but because they are finally seeing, honouring, and welcoming home the parts of themselves that have been holding everything together for decades.
And you can do this, too. It simply requires awareness and an open heart.
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Where People Get Stuck
So here’s where most people get stuck:
You want change. You say you’re ready. You invest in the healing. You receive the insights. But the moment you go to take action, there’s resistance.
And not because you’re lazy — which I know comes up. Not because you’re unmotivated. Not because you’re not doing the work. But because within you, your inner system, there is a sacred part, a protective part, a part that believes change isn’t safe. A part that thinks expansion will lead to loss. Or a part that is benefitting in some way from staying exactly where you are.
So it’s not that you don’t want change — and I’m going to say that again — it’s not that you don’t want change.
It’s that another part of you doesn’t want change because on some level, the life you’re living is still working for that part of you.
Until those parts feel safe to come with you, to trust you, to trust the direction you’re heading, you will feel blocked from moving forward.
And this is where awareness becomes liberation. When you can see which part is resisting and why they’re resisting, everything begins to shift.
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The Other Pattern: Doing Without Integrating
Now, on the other side of the spectrum, there’s another pattern that keeps people stuck.
And that’s doing, doing, doing, without integrating.
Activation after activation. Course after course. Healing after healing. Session after session. Workshop after workshop. You get the point.
It feels productive. It looks like momentum. But it can actually be another form of avoidance.
Because if you never pause, you never actually become the version of you the work is pointing you toward. You stay in the cycle of next thing, next thing, next thing. But nothing fully lands.
And without integration, nothing transforms.
Because integration is where embodiment happens.
Integration is where our identity shifts.
Integration is where the soul steps in and fills that space you’ve just cleared.
So whether you’re someone who resists action or someone who keeps doing without resting, doing without integrating — both lead to the exact same place: a feeling of being stuck.
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The Big Question
And this is exactly what leads us to the next question.
Because I already hear a number of you saying:
Okay, Joanne, I’ve done this. I’ve given myself space. I’ve honoured the season I’m in. But then months, even years pass, and nothing changes.
How do I know if I’m truly in a season of integration — the sacred pause — or if another part of me is soothing me into staying stuck?
And this is real, and it’s an important question. Because there is such a thing as a sacred pause — the authentic, meaningful slowing down that happens when your system is integrating, rewiring, or calibrating. We literally just covered this in last week’s episode, The Sacred Pause.
But there is also something else.
There are pauses that are not pauses at all.
They’re protective strategies.
A quiet, soft-spoken part of you that might be saying:
“Shhh… don’t move. Don’t change anything. It’s safer here.
You’ve already survived the worst. Let’s not risk it. Let’s not risk any more.”
And it speaks in the language of:
“Just rest a little longer.”
“Don’t force anything.”
“It’s not the right time.”
“You’re not ready yet.”
And those can absolutely be true. But they can also be the exact same words a protector uses — that little aspect of you that’s protecting you — when it’s afraid that change might require something different… when it’s afraid of what change might require of it.
So how do you tell the difference?
How do you know?
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The Clarifying Question
Before I get into some lists here, here’s something incredibly clarifying — just a simple question to ask yourself:
If I were truly safe to take the next small step, would I?
If the answer’s yes, you’re in a sacred pause. You’re waiting for clarity, timing, or integration.
If the answer is no, a part of you is still holding onto a belief, fear, or memory that needs some loving.
Neither is wrong. Both are sacred. But they are not the same.
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Signs of a True Sacred Pause
So let’s look a little deeper at some signs that you’re in a true sacred season — the sacred pause.
A real integration period has these qualities:
1. You’re internally quiet, but not depleted.
There’s a sense of spaciousness inside of you, like soil resting before the new growth pops up.
2. You’re still connected to your future.
Even if you’re not taking action, you can feel what you’re moving toward.
3. You’re processing, noticing, and receiving.
Insights still come. Your body is shifting. There’s movement happening inside of you.
4. The pause feels supportive, even if it’s uncomfortable.
It feels like life is rearranging on your behalf.
5. You’re not abandoning yourself.
You’re resting with yourself, not hiding from your life.
A sacred pause feels like your soul whispering:
Wait. Something is ripening. Don’t interrupt the becoming.
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Signs of Sabotage Disguised as Spiritual Language
So the signs that it’s sabotage dressed as spiritual language:
1. The pause feels heavy, foggy, numbing.
Like you keep checking out rather than checking in.
And this could even look like alcohol. It could look like eating too much. It could look like over-exercising. It could look like a number of different ways that you’re numbing yourself.
2. You may feel disconnected from your future vision.
When you try to imagine what you’re moving toward, it feels blank or distant.
You just can’t feel it, see it, sense it.
3. Your internal world is noisy, not quiet. [Although these waves crashing against the shore right now are pretty loud. I hope you can hear this.] So your internal world is noisy, not quiet. You feel fear, avoidance, tension, or overwhelm.
4. You keep waiting for a feeling that never comes… that motivation, that clarity, that right time. Meanwhile, months are ticking by.
5. Your actions contradict your desires.
You say you want change, but you consistently avoid the steps that would create it.
And this is the moment where compassion matters.
Because sabotage is never really sabotage. It’s protection.
It’s a part of you saying:
I cannot let you move forward until someone finally sees me. Until you look at the fear I’ve been holding. Until you recognize why I stopped you all these years.
And when you meet that part with presence — not pressure — with curiosity and not shaming, not trying to fix, that’s when everything starts to shift.
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The Paradox of Change
And here’s the beautiful and often frustrating paradox:
Change is both effortless… and deeply uncomfortable.
Your soul is always pulling you towards what’s next. That’s natural. It’s organic. It’s encoded literally within you.
But your human system — your parts, your protectors, your patterns — they were all built around keeping you alive. To prioritize survival, not thriving. Not expanding. Just being alive.
So the paradox is this:
The part of you that wants change and the part of you that fears change are both trying to protect you — just in completely different ways.
One is saying,
“Let’s go! It’s time! We came here for this! Woo hoo!”
And the other is saying,
“Please don’t. I don’t know who I become if everything shifts, if everything changes.”
And both are valid. Both are sacred. And both deserve a voice.
The real work of embodied transformation — being an embodied soul — is learning to sit with both truths without forcing one to win.
And when you can hold that tension, change becomes not something you push, but something you allow. You open yourself to allow and receive it.
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Bringing It Into the Practical
So now that we’ve explored the dynamics that are inside of you — the parts that want change, the parts that resist it, the parts that overdo it, and the pauses that can either heal you or hide you — let’s bring this into the practical.
And before we do, I want to lovingly call something out right now, because this is the moment when some parts of you may suddenly want to tune out, pause the episode, get distracted, or tell you, “Oh, I’ll come back to this later. I’ll come back later.”
That’s the exact pattern we’ve been talking about.
The part of you that doesn’t want change, trying to quietly guide you away from the very thing that would support it.
And if that’s happening now — just notice it. Stay with me. Let them know you’re safe.
You are safe, and we’re doing this gently.
When you understand that your resistance is just a part of you trying to keep you safe, you stop fighting yourself. You stop trying to overpower your own system. And you begin to work with yourself instead of against yourself.
And here are a few ways to do that — to move with your parts and not against them.
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1. Name the part that’s activated.
When you feel stuck or scared or overwhelmed or resistant — don’t push it down. Don’t force yourself through it.
We often have this thing — it’s sort of spiritual — we think it’s spiritual to have to maintain that positivity, to, you know, suck it up and move on.
And that’s just not the case.
So instead of saying, Why can’t I just do this? try asking:
“Oh, there’s a part of me that’s scared.”
“There’s a part of me that’s overwhelmed.”
“There’s a part of me that doesn’t want to be pushed again.”
Who inside me is feeling this?
Not “why,” not “what’s wrong with me” — just who?
Who inside of me is feeling this right now?
Is it the seven-year-old who learned that attention equals danger?
Is it the teenage version of you who survived heartbreak and humiliation?
Is it the exhausted protector who’s been on high alert for 30 years?
Just identifying the part opens space.
Awareness becomes connection.
Connection becomes safety.
Safety becomes movement.
Naming it immediately softens it. It shifts you from fusion — “this is me” — to relationship — “this is a part of me.”
And you can feel the difference in that if you just repeat it:
“This is me.”
“Oh… this is a part of me.”
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2. Let the part tell you what it needs.
Ask it directly.
Every part, no matter how messy it feels, is trying to protect you.
So ask:
“What do you need right now?”
Often the answers are simple:
• I just need more time.
• I need reassurance.
• I need to know we’re not rushing.
• I need to feel safe first.
• I need clarity.
• I need permission.
• I need a plan — even if it’s just one step.
• I need validation.
• I need to be seen and acknowledged.
And when you meet the need — even in a small way — the internal resistance softens.
These parts don’t want to sabotage you. They want to be included.
So I just feel called to say, like, we’re not trying to fix them or get rid of them just because they make you feel uncomfortable, and make you feel like you’re not going where you should be going.
They really are there to go along with you. And it’s helping them do that.
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3. Let both parts have a seat at the table.
There’s the part that wants the change, and there’s the part that’s afraid of change.
That’s why you often feel this duality — like you take a couple steps forward, then a couple steps back, then steps forward… and you’re in this tug-of-war.
You don’t need to exile either one of them.
Let them both exist. Let them both speak.
And when both have had a voice, you — the Self — become the one directing the movement forward.
And that’s where you have your empowerment.
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4. Make the steps smaller… and then smaller again.
Take the smallest possible next step that you can.
Not the whole thing. Not the entire transformation.
Just the next step that feels doable.
Your parts relax when you don’t overwhelm them.
Most protectors aren’t resisting the goal.
They’re resisting the size of the step.
And if the step feels too big, they’ll shut you down.
So make the step smaller, and then say:
“How can I make it even smaller again?”
Instead of writing the book, sit with a single idea.
Instead of recording a video, set up your space.
Instead of building the business, take one 10-minute action.
Small steps create safety.
Safety creates momentum.
Momentum invites your soul forward.
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5. Celebrate the micro-wins.
Anyone who works with me knows that I’m all about celebrating our wins.
Because each tiny step tells your system:
“See? That wasn’t dangerous. We did it. You’re safe. Yay!”
That’s how trust is rebuilt with the parts inside of you who’ve been holding onto the past.
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6. Shift from pressure to partnership.
You don’t need to overpower any of the parts of you.
You don’t need to drag yourself into change.
Partnership is where transformation actually happens.
Try saying:
“We’re doing this together.”
“I’m not leaving you behind this time.”
“You get to come with me.”
We’re doing this together.
I’m not leaving you behind this time.
You get to come with me.
This rewires the entire system.
It turns change into collaboration rather than conflict.
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7. Practice true integration.
Give yourself space to integrate.
This goes back to the actual sacred pause.
No avoidance. No procrastination.
Not spiritual bypass disguised as stillness.
But true sacred integration:
• Quiet
• Digestion
• Reflection
• Embodiment
Ask yourself:
What in me is becoming?
What wants to land?
What is ready to be lived?
Integration isn’t inactivity.
Integration is becoming.
It’s the moment the work stops being something you do… and becomes something you are.
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Closing
So as I close out today, I want you to remember this:
You are not one self.
You are many selves — many stories, many ages, many fragments, many protectors — all trying to walk this life with you the best they can.
Change isn’t about forcing them to disappear or fixing them.
It’s about inviting them home.
It’s about listening with compassion, moving with intention, resting when your soul asks, and taking aligned action when the path opens.
You’re not behind. You’re not stuck. You certainly aren’t broken.
You’re simply navigating the beautiful architecture of a multidimensional being — and every part of you deserves to be included in this.
This is a pretty important life guide, like… this is pretty important.
Let all of you come home.
Let all of you do this.
You’ll be stronger for it.
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If you love this episode of Embodied Soul, please follow, share, and leave me a five-star review. It truly helps this work reach the people who need it.
And I look forward to seeing you on next week’s episode of Embodied Soul.
