A Return To Trust with Andrea Frank Henkart

In one way or another, we have all experienced being knocked down by life. We’ve encountered difficult moments where it seems that the hardest thing to do is to just keep on going. Andrea Frank Henkart is someone who has learned to trust in the process. After going through many difficulties, including losing seven people in seven years, Andrea learned the power of letting go of herself and instead holding on to a connection with a higher purpose. She now is able to live fully by trusting in the power of gratitude. Andrea is now an international speaker, bestselling author, entrepreneur and a certified nutritional counselor with a master’s degree in Family Psychology. She shares the pivots she made in her life while guiding us deeper into that energetic shift of consciousness that allowed her to experience and feel gratitude throughout all of her life experiences.

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A Return To Trust with Andrea Frank Henkart

I am taking a breath in this moment to feel gratitude for this day, to feel gratitude to be in my body in this moment, to be healthy, to be well and even to be present with sadness that I’m feeling in this moment. I think we feel sadness. It’s not something that gets discussed a lot. I don’t think it’s something that is promoted on Facebook. People aren’t running Facebook ads of their sad moments or their moments where they feel broken or in pain. That’s good thing, I suppose, but it’s also not giving people the real thing when it comes to what life is like at times. I want to be present and real about the fact that we are going to lose a member of our family. Some of you have cats and dogs. I don’t even like to call them pets, but companions that you’ve lived with for many years and they don’t live forever. We have this beautiful golden retriever. We have two dogs that we’ve had with us since our kids were little themselves and we got these little puppies.

Our golden is Duncan and our lab is Willy. Willy has looked like an old man for many years. He’s got a great beard, he’s slow and we always thought he’s the older brother and he’d be the first to go when that call was being made by God and it’s not. It’s Duncan. We’ve found out that he was ill and things were progressively getting worse. He is being put down. We’re going to be there with him as a family. I spent a few hours with him on a walk, his last walk, places that we’d been to. A lot of time I’ve spent with him out in quiet and peace. Ahead of that sad event, I’m sending out my love to our little beautiful puppy. We nicknamed him forever puppy. As I said to the kids, he is forever in eternity. I think he’s got good karma, so maybe he’ll come back as a beautiful bird or he’ll come back in some other way in our family or otherwise. We love him. We miss him. I’m grateful for the time we’ve had with him and I’m grateful for the opportunity even to express that in this way. I’m going to shift very quickly out of sadness, but be present to the fact that life is like that. It’s a beautiful rollercoaster and if we can’t feel sadness, it’s very difficult for us to feel joy or anything else. I’m feeling the sadness fully just the way that I feel gratitude, joy and love fully.

I am feeling blessed at this moment that I have a wonderful guest who is going to be with us on the show. She’s the embodiment of a lot when I think of what authenticity looks like. What does transparency look like? What does integrity look like? What does beauty look like inside and out, which you’ll see? I think of this lady because she embodies all of those things. Even though I’ve only known her a couple of years, I feel as though we’ve got a beautiful heart connection. I will read a little bit about her bio and then bring her on so you can get the wealth of wisdom from her. You will find out about her pivots in life and her experience because you’re going to learn a lot. You’re going to enjoy this lady.

Andrea Frank Henkart is a bestselling author, keynote speaker and entrepreneur. She has two teaching credentials from UCLA. From UCLA, she’s got a Master’s degree in Family Psychology and is a certified nutritional council with 40 years of experience helping families. She’s got 40 years of experience helping families, pregnant and breastfeeding moms and kids. She’s appeared on Oprah, Montel Williams, The Morning Show and hundreds of other TV and radio shows internationally. She is a proud mommy of two successful digital nomad adult children who are her best friends. When she is not traveling the globe, she lives in Northern California where she spends her spare time feeding the birds and the ducks and the flock to her garden. Andrea, welcome. It’s such a great privilege to have you on. Thanks for being with us.

Thank you. I’m so happy to be here.

You have this amazing life. Your credentials are impeccable and your history in businesses is long. What’s not written in that introduction that you would love for people to know about you as we begin?

I feel like I’ve lived so much life and I’m just getting started and I’m just learning. That’s something that I love about the whole idea of pivot, growing and being open. I was a yoga instructor back in the ‘70s before yoga was popular. There were two yoga studios in all of Los Angeles. Now, they’re on every corner. I was a massage therapist back in the early ‘80s when we had to say we were non-sexual body workers because anyone who was doing bodywork and massage, it was assumed that you were doing some sexual weird thing with that. I was a midwife back in the ‘70s, late ‘80s and early ‘80s as well. I could just go on and on. I was a hypnotherapist. All the things I was doing and I got certified in. I was enjoying all the new age things that were popping up. Now, I’m finding that there are many people that are learning and doing all these new modalities that aren’t new at all. They’ve been around forever. For me to be able to say, “Not only that I’ve done that, but I’m open to learning the new ways of everything.” It’s exciting for me.

You have lived a pivot lifestyle for sure because you’ve had many turns in the road and seemingly always being guided. I’m curious, I’ve never asked you this before. How much have you been guided in making these pivots? I know you’ve been the CEO of numerous companies including Family Freedom Inc. and Wise Mama Wisdom. You’ve done a lot of things and yet you’re just one person with 24 hours and seven days a week. You’ve had a massive capacity and a massive influence in the world. Have you done that and what’s been the guidance? Where’s the guidance come into play when it’s been time to pivot?

A lot of it has to do with being open. I have always believed since I was a young girl, it was divine guidance, if I can say that. I always felt like each thing I’ve done has led to the next thing. It wasn’t like, “I did this and didn’t like it any more so then I did this and then I didn’t want to do that.” It just flowed. Everything has been a flow. That’s not to say there wasn’t angst, there wasn’t sorrow, there wasn’t confusion. Fear was involved. It’s all about the human emotion. I’m human and I’m a very emotional person. I felt all of those things, but I’ve always gone back to trust. That’s something that I have. It’s harder because I grew in a family that didn’t have that. I grew up in a very dysfunctional family. I believe that I tune into that family to be able to bring light, to be able to be a change-maker, to be able to move out of that. I started feeling that when I was about sixteen years old.

You said trust. I’d love to know a little bit more about what you mean there and do you think you came into that family to learn trust?

I have learned trust not because of the family, but also because of the family. I have been able to move out of all that. I don’t even have words to describe it because it was conscious, but also unconscious at the same time. Trusting the process. I’ve raised my children believing that if it’s meant to be, it will be easy and effortless. When I say easy and effortless, I don’t mean that it’s rainbows and unicorns. There’s always a process. In that process, we have choice and I’ve learned that a lot in my life. Being open to the choices, being open to the process and always remaining in gratitude. That’s the biggest one for me because there are days when I wake up and I don’t feel so happy and full of choice. Automatically, my thoughts are tuned into, “Andrea, find the gratitude.” The gratitude for me, I don’t want to say it’s as simple as that, because when I look out my office window and I see half a dozen beautiful trees of all different colors. I can look at those leaves and I am so grateful for that. Sometimes it can be as simple as I’m grateful for the way the water feels in my mouth. That’s as far as I can take it, but I find whatever it is and that for me keeps me going and keeps me on track.

It’s so interesting, we were sitting out with some friends in the backyard around sunset enjoying what is the best of California as far as I’m concerned, is the gentle breeze around sunset and looking out at the ocean with the ball drops in the ocean thing. There are days when it’s covered in fog. We were socked in with fog. There are days when it’s rainy and it’s cloudy. Even sometimes when the sun is shining, we feel internally like crap. We were having this conversation with these friends because I was drinking out of this mug. It says, “Today, I am grateful.” It’s like a sticker that’s put over this mug that I’m drinking out of. These people asked me about that, “That’s so cool you have that sticker on your mug.” I said, “It’s better than a sticker that says, “Today, I’m feeling sorry for myself.”” It’s interesting because so often when we feel a certain way, you might as well put a sticker on your coffee mug or on your water bottle that says how it is that you’re presenting yourself to the world.

Gratitude is something you return to even when you've had tragedy. Share on X

There are days when anger and resentment and looking in the past or we’re being so anxious about the future and fear, you very well are doing the equivalent. No matter what’s going on to be able to apply gratitude, it’s simple but it’s not simplistic. It’s simple and profound at the same time in its simplicity, in its profoundness. If you take that one example, I am grateful for the taste of the water, the fact that my feet are touching the ground, that I have no pain in my body at this moment, that I’m breathing, whatever it is. I’m grateful in this moment. There’s an energy to that. It’s a complete way of being. If you instead replace that sticker with something like, “I am resentful. I can’t let go of an old hurt against so and so. I am feeling sorry for myself.” How many people would walk around with a water bottle that had a sticker that said one of those things? Yet internally, that’s part of the dialogue and it’s as powerful in terms of how it’s impacting our lives. You may not have the sticker on the mug, but you’re still walking around with the energy of, “I’m angry, I’m resentful, I’m beating myself up,” whatever that might be.

We are looking at trust. To trust in moments where things are not going perfectly. This is the part that I want to tease out with you because gratitude is something you return to, even when you’ve had tragedy. You lost a spouse, you lost a life partner and you lost a best friend not so many years ago. How do you have something like that happen and wake up in the morning and trust in the power of gratitude or trust in your connection to the higher purpose of your being, in spirit and God and whatever else? If you wouldn’t mind, dive into that pivot for us.

I’m happy to talk about that. I want to say I lost seven people in seven years. It wasn’t just friends. They were my father, my beloved dog, my spouse of 30 years, my best friend, my kid’s godmother. They’ve been very close. Seven people in seven years. Before that, I didn’t have that experience. Someone could say, “I don’t trust life.” Let me backtrack a little. I was married to my best friend for 30 years. We raised a beautiful family. We were all very close. We had our ups and downs and issues like any couples do, but 30 years with the same person. He died seven years ago in a plane crash. It was a sudden experience. When I received that phone call that Sunday at 6:30 in the morning that woke me up. It was shocking and everything crumbled. It’s everything you can imagine.

I have to be honest, in that moment, I wasn’t in gratitude. In that moment, I wasn’t anywhere but in shock. There was no way of feeling or experiencing anything, but all the emotions that I was feeling and most of that was numb. It took time but in that time, I have to admit, I sat on my couch for about a year and cried and ate and just curled up in a ball to decide whether I wanted to live or die. What I was going to do with my life? What was next for me? I had two grown children and they’re my best friends, so I wasn’t going to check out, but did it cross my mind? Yeah, I have to admit it did. Not my personality type but it was a gut feeling, a reaction, “What do I do now?”

Someone very dear to me said something that was a pivot for me at that moment. He said to me, “Andrea, how long are you going to stay in this space you’re in?” I had a few nasty words to say to him. I didn’t suddenly say, “That’s a good idea.” I was furious. I said, “You have no idea. You haven’t lost somebody. You don’t know.” I was not happy with what he said to me. He said to me again, “I’m not judging you. I love you. I’m just asking how long are you going to stay in this space?” From that moment on, it wasn’t some major revelation and I suddenly shifted. I didn’t pivot at that moment, but there was an energetic shift. I became conscious and I started realizing that the way I’ve lived my entire life, I still have choice. How do I want to proceed here? Normally somebody, a woman my age, they lose their home, they lose their job. Fortunately, I have to get a job, I didn’t have that issue but I had a lot of things I had to deal with.

I went into a place, not of gratitude but into a place conscious choice, “Who do I want to be now? What is available to me? What are my opportunities here?” I decided not to write a new chapter. As a writer, I wasn’t going to write a new chapter. As a writer, I was going to close that book and share it for all it was worth, because I loved that story. Now I get to reinvent myself and create a brand-new story. It’s been a process. It’s not just, “Sure,” and I was out there. I’m still in process, but it’s been absolutely magnificent and I’m grateful that this experience was given to me because not only can I be an example for others, but I can be an example from my own self. I can practice what I preach every single day and taking what happened and look at it as a gift somehow to be even more in the world.

Trust And Gratitude: Sometimes, to keep going can be as simple as being grateful.

I’m taking that in. There’s a lot there. You described that energetic shift and I’m feeling in this moment because we’ve had this TED Talk that’s been out for a few months and has done exceptionally well from views and shares and things. There have been a lot of people too, in addition to all the people that are saying and declaring out loud how they feel about their lives and they’re grateful. There have been people that have written back to say, “I hate my life.” For some people from the Middle East and other places around the world, in Africa, “If you lived in my conditions, you would hate your life as well. You have some nerve, you some the audacity,” things like that. It’s been both an eye-opening and a wake-up call for me to see the diversity of perspectives and things that are happening in people’s lives. It is a steep gradient gratitude at times. You weren’t going to wake up on the morning of something like that and feel gratitude in that moment. Yet, ultimately that’s where you ended up. Trust became something that was being tested at that moment.

At that moment where you couldn’t feel gratitude, you described something called an energetic shift, which is interesting because Pivot has been out a few years. We’re working on another book. It’s more along the lines of instead of these major transition points or these inflection points in our lives where we change a career or we get fired or somebody dies or a business goes bust or something, that there are all these little gradients in between, these micro pivots, these small mini pivots. The shift of consciousness as Marianne Williamson describes that as a miracle, and I buy that. When you talked about an energetic shift of consciousness, that was both a miracle and a pivot in how it is that you approached your feelings at that moment. If you’re looking for a book title, I had a couple for you because this flows through me at times, A Return to Trust. Marianne’s book, A Return to Love is a classic. For you, A Return to Trust. I thought that would be a great title for you, as well as something along Conscious Choosing. Conscious uncoupling was a phrase that was coined and it was a Gwyneth Paltrow that had a conscious uncoupling of a marriage, but Conscious Choosing.

Our show is called The Conscious PIVOT because it is that miracle that happens when consciousness changes even in the smallest way. We’re so programmed to work from the program, to work from the grooves in the record that were formed when we were very young as children. The way we see ourselves, how we look at love, what’s our definition of love, those are grooves in a record. They’re pretty deep grooves for a lot of us. When you make even the smallest change in that consciousness to shift yourself energetically, that’s a big deal. I imagine you had many of those shifts in the distance that it’s taken several years ago to that loss to where you are, where you can experience and feel gratitude for the fact that it all happened.

I felt it early on. I felt it about a year into that whole process in my life. Experiences that I opened up to and allowed to happen helped me get there. It’s important because you touched on something I want to go back to, which is people who live in other countries or they feel suppressed, repressed, depressed, oppressed, all of those in their lives. It doesn’t look like they have much hope. It doesn’t look like they have much choice and they can’t see out of that cloud how to find that. It’s easy for us to sit here and say, “Here’s what you can do.” The truth is I still believe that it comes from within us. Even if it’s small little changes, small little movements to step forward, that alone can make a difference. Some of our major change-makers in the world came from other places. I spent time living in third world countries. I’ve watched how people’s lives are different than what I’ve been exposed to. Who am I to complain when I was building swing sets in the impoverished schools in Southern Belize and I’m looking at all these children who don’t even have a soccer ball? They don’t have a shade tree. They don’t have a swing set. There’s nothing on their playgrounds. Just these big empty spaces. There’s no money. It’s just absolutely in the jungles or on the beaches.

The locations are beautiful, but there’s nothing for these kids. Yet their gratitude when they received the smallest thing was an absolute miracle. Also another pivot for me, watching how something so simple, a jump rope from the dollar store, I pack up my suitcase, a suitcase worth of stuff and I bring it to the kids. I was everybody’s auntie, giving things away. Watching their smiles and their gratitude, they weren’t asking for cell phones and iPads and fancy bicycles and shoes. They were happy for the dollar jump rope or the box of crayons. It put things into perspective for me once again about where gratitude is at any level. I keep coming back about that gratitude and how we see it in our own minds. One thing else I want to say about that, the stories we create about our situation is what guides us because we create a story. For example, a breakup, “He cheated on me or she cheated on me. You’re a horrible person,” and we tell everybody. We’re on the phone telling our family and friends. We’re posting on Facebook. We’re all those things about how bad the situation is, whether it’s that or whatever the situation might be.

We talked about conscious uncoupling. When we can talk about conscious uncoupling in every areas of our lives, if we can accept it and say, “This is now an opening for me. Bless and release that person. This has been created for me to be able to move on in a new way.” Instead of spending all our negative thought, negative energy, bad mouthing and going around with that negative attitude, how was this a gift in my life? How has all of these things a gift? Turning it around that way, even if we’re living in a place where we don’t have that freedom. How is that a gift and what can I do as an individual to make a difference, even if it’s small? From that, comes joy and gratitude and change.

We do what we need to learn. Share on X

It’s a conscious uncoupling from attachment in so many ways. Randi and I will be celebrating our 30th anniversary, July 29th this 2019. Her phrase, she likes to remind me of this question. She’ll say, “What is the creative opportunity at this moment?” which is tough to ask. When you described that energetic shift that we could say is this little micro pivot, this little mini miracle at that moment to find the creative opportunity in something, as you were describing. Even just the opportunity not to be attached or to let go of something. For example, we’re going to have this very sad moment where I’m going to let go and release a being that has been so close to us. This beautiful dog is so much part of our lives and we’re going to release and let go of that. For me anyway, I won’t speak for anyone else. I can be grateful for the times that I had with him because they were nothing but sweet. That’s how I want to remember him. That’s how I want to think about him. That’s where I want to keep him in my heart. That’s a choice.

Choosing is a powerful thing because when we’re not choosing, we’re in victim mode. When we are choosing something, we’re empowered. It doesn’t mean we have solutions in the moment. It doesn’t mean you’ve solved your money problem, your relationship problem, your health problem, but choosing is a completely different energy. It’s why if you’re walking around with your water jug, mug, bottle and you put something on it that says, “Today, I am grateful,” that’s one choosing. Whereas, “Today, I am angry. I am resentful. I’m attached to my story.” You might as well put it on and display it because that’s what’s going on the inside. You might as well put it on the outside and be completely transparent about it. The reason that people wouldn’t do that is because to write that on the bottle you’re drinking water from, it’s like slicing their throat. It would be an act of self-harm, and yet we’ll allow it to go on inside of our minds and keep it to ourselves and have it impacting our heart space. We’ll do that but we won’t take the step to write it down.

What I’m saying is when I catch myself going forward feeling that way and I can’t let it go, I can’t release it, I can’t create that energetic shift, that little pivot in my choosing, how I’m approaching this moment, how I’m framing my story at this moment. I’ll write it down, put it on one of those little Post-it notes and stick at someplace that I got to look at. I will literally put it someplace like maybe my forehead, because it’s that powerful. I appreciate you bringing that to the front. In addition to all the other pivots that you’ve had, you’ve had a health pivot of sort.

You said when your husband passed, you had trouble dealing with it and maybe you were dealing with the emotions through eating and other behaviors. Me and you are the model of health. I’m going to say you look pretty good for 36, and gorgeous and fit. Not just for yourself, but for thousands of other people that are a part of the business that you’ve been running for yourself, as part of your organization. We don’t typically talk about the business model, but it’s relevant to your pivot both out of the despair of losing seven people you loved in seven years, as well as what was going on in your personal health. Set a little context for that and then let us know what that pivot was like in the business that’s helped you with that.

Many years ago, as a matter of fact, it seems like forever, I was quite unhealthy. I was a size 3X. I was wearing a ten basically. I have always been thin my whole life. I was a model when I was younger. I let my body go. My husband luckily and unluckily at the time loved me for who I was. It wasn’t ever an issue. We enjoyed life and enjoyed food. I had some hormonal imbalances and my body was out of whack. I’m sure some people can relate when they get diagnosed with certain issues that sometimes they say there’s no cure. For about eight years, I was going back and forth to doctors trying to figure out what I could do and nothing was working. I wasn’t in a happy place. I was a certified nutritional counselor for 40 years. I always relate to that healthy eating and exercise is all you need to do. I wasn’t abiding by that, but I can teach people that well.

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To be perfectly honest, we do what we need to learn. I had gotten very off-balanced. I was introduced to a nutritional program many years ago and I absolutely said no. I’m one of the biggest skeptics. I’ve got to review, understand and research. I take things down to the DNA strands of whatever is going on to decide if something is appropriate and right. As a nutritionist, I’m very cautious about what I recommend to people. I had said no and I was introduced to this by John Gray who wrote Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus, who happens to be my kid’s godfather. I trusted him with everything. When he told me about this, I said, “I am not interested.” Fast forward, I was in a place with my health at that moment in time when my body wasn’t supporting me and I didn’t know what was going to happen. At the time, Bonnie Gray, his wife, said to me, “Andrea, trust me. Just try this.” I said, “I’ll do it to get you off my back.”

What happened in the next few months was miraculous because my body shifted, my mindset shifted, everything changed for me. My husband had already said yes to John, which was interesting because he said, “Sure, I’ll try this.” I said, “Don’t tell any of our friends because I don’t want to talk about this to anybody.” He gave it to our children who didn’t have weight issues. My son had some learning challenges at the time. He’s since outgrown them. My daughter kept off the college at fifteen. It worked for everybody and I still said no until that moment. That was a huge pivot in my life. Probably one of the most significant in my entire life when I said yes and then watching the transformation that happened in my body. People were asking me what I was doing. I started sharing it with them with no intention to create a financial gain at all. I wanted to serve people because that’s what I’ve done my whole life. It’s always been the work that I’ve done has been about service. What I found is that we started having some residual income. That’s the money that comes in that you make while you’re sleeping. It was pretty nice. It was very sweet.

What happened when my husband passed away, I always have this platform that if I could educate adults on proper health and proper nutrition and break through all of these ideas of keto, paleo, Mediterranean, vegan, all the different things people get confused with. If I could help adults understand what’s right for them, they’re going to give that information to their children. That’s what’s going to make a difference for generations to come. Adults can do whatever they want to do whenever they want to do it, but the kids have to follow along and kids have always been my platform. With that said, when I was educating people and watching what was happening for families, and then having this residual income come in, not just for me but for everyone else, I was watching some major changes here. When my husband passed away, I didn’t have to sell my house or get a job because while I spent that year in total grief, my income was coming in whether I was on the couch crying or not. I suddenly realized I had something in my hands. I was holding a gift that was the best life insurance and the best health insurance that anybody could have because it keeps on giving still to this day.

For many years, I’ve been sharing this with families all around the world who share it with others. It’s not MLM, but it is word of mouth marketing. It’s been nothing short of a miracle for me, for my children, and for all the people that I’ve reached who’ve reached other people. I’m beyond grateful for that. One more thing about that is the culture and community. That’s something else that kept me going. In these times of diversity, having that support, having positive people in our lives doing positive things, whether it’s with you or not, being attached, involved, relating to, being able to reach out to a community. That can be a huge change-maker for anybody.

That friend of yours that said that thing that you didn’t like very much. That wasn’t John, wasn’t it?

That was David Wood.

It’s somebody else that we both know. It’s not easy for somebody to look at you and ask you that question, “Are you going to continue to feel this way or are you going to get over it?” It’s tough. A grieving process is a grieving process. You’ve got to trust the process as well. It’s a fine line there. Just to take the mystery out of it. It’s not typically something that we do and I don’t give out my endorsements lightly. I’ll say that for the last better part of the year, I’ve been using products from this company, the company that you’re referring to, and the name of the company is Isagenix. I got invited, it was a wonderful thing. I was in Phoenix for a speaking engagement and their offices are in Scottsdale. Is that where the home office is?

When we take better care of ourselves, we're better able to show up in the most challenging moments in the best way that we can. Share on X

Gilbert, actually.

I got to visit the corporate office, this beautiful new building. I met the founders and the executive team. I was ridiculously impressed not so much the physical surroundings. Environment is an important thing. I do look at environment. If the environment feels a certain way, then there’s a reason for all of that. What I was impressed with was what felt like a culture of family, what felt like this very heart-centered mission within a model that clearly has been met well by the marketplace. I know the company’s expanded well all across the world, globally, and doing amazing work. It’s attributed to its leadership. It’s attributed to the founders. It’s attributed to the vision of people like you that have gone in, worked with those products for yourself and been able to model something that other people can’t resist, which is good health, good mindset and good things happen. We take better care of ourselves when we trust ourselves and develop more self-care.

One of the things we talk a lot about these days is resilience. Resilience certainly is physical, but it’s also mental, emotional and even spiritual. There’s no question that when we take better care of ourselves across in that holistic way, we’re better able to show up in the most challenging moments in the best way that we can under the circumstances. We get hit with a wave. It’s unexpected. We get hit with something that’s sudden and we have an opportunity at that moment. A big part of how you showed up in these significant pivot moments was the fact that you’ve been more conscious of taking good care of yourself. Do you buy that? I was in a conference and somebody said, “That self-care stuff, I’ve heard too much of that. People are selfish now and they’re so self-centered, they’re just taking care of themselves. I don’t know if I buy that one.” Taking care of yourself is a very key factor in how it is that you create resilience for yourself as well as for the organizations you work in and the people you’re around, all that thing. Do you buy that?

When you’re on the airplane, they tell you to put on that air mask on yourself first before you put it on the child next to you. We know that poor people can’t help poor people. When you have something to give, then you can help other people. We have to take care of ourselves. I don’t believe that I’m self-indulgent and all. I don’t think I’m self-indulgent enough to take care of my body, but these products that I’ve been using for many years with Isagenix has kept my brain chemistry balanced. That’s what it does. It balances brain chemistry. For the stress levels, the sadness levels, all of that, it’s been able to keep me at a more even keel. Have I been like that? Absolutely. I’m human. There’s such a difference than how I was before I had this stuff in my body for long periods of time. For me, it’s been the key and the miracle in my life that allows me to do what I’m able to do. I told you, I’m going to be 64. I don’t think I shouldn’t tell anybody because I don’t have any friends my age. Everyone’s 20 and 30.

I can’t even believe that I’m chronologically this age because I don’t feel it. I’m getting ready for a new pivot in my life. I don’t even know what it is. I travel in Europe teaching workshops in the summertime. I do some work with Mind Valley and I’ll be teaching some workshops for them, and I’ll be teaching for Happiness Museum in London. I know I feel it because I trust it. There are some major relationships that are going to come from that. Some new friends, some new opportunities. Being open allows me to be able to experience it all. It’s not that I’m looking forward. It’s not like I’m going, “Where is it?” I don’t do that because when I do that, I don’t find it but when I do this and I’m open and ready to receive, it blows. I don’t mean for this to sound airy-fairy, but I believe that there is an alignment of flow with the universe when we’re open to receiving. Taking care of ourselves is a huge component of that.

You’re also not waiting for the bad taste. A lot of people pivot in their lives because something has gotten to the point where it’s left a bad taste in their mouth, whether it’s their work or the career path they’re on or some other relationship. It’s a forced pivot because they don’t have a choice. They’re in such pain or someone else’s has taken the next step versus what you’re talking about, which is remaining open so that you can make those better choices. When you’re taking better care of yourself overall, you make better decisions. That’s at least been my own experience.

Trust And Gratitude: Choosing is a powerful thing because when we’re not choosing, we’re in victim mode. When we are choosing something, we’re empowered.

I told you I came from a dysfunctional family. From the time I was a young child, I could have made a different choice all along the way. I could have made that negative choice to stay in the anger, to stay in the sadness, to stay in the story, just stay in a victim state. It’s been a process and I’m still in the process. I’ll always say that I’m a work in progress until the day that I die, and hopefully even after that. I have goose bumps. How we look at it, how we choose, it’s back to choice, how we look at this because I could have easily stayed in a negative story. I’ve got stories. That’s not what our conversation is about and I don’t want anyone to think, “She just got it made from all these written books.” No. I’ve been open and I’ve made things happen and I’ve worked to make it happen. I didn’t sit here receiving, I’ve worked to make it happen. I continue to work to grow myself and to learn more about myself every single day.

On the days that I don’t, I give myself time for a pity party. To be transparent, when I woke up, I thought, “I’m going to be on Adam’s show and I feel like crap.” I almost didn’t go. I was telling myself all these negative things and I thought, “How am I going to be on this call and be real?” I thought, “Andrea, this is one part of yourself. You’re feeling not so great. Why?” I didn’t even know why. I didn’t have a specific reason. It just was. I thought, “I’m going to go and be in it.” I’m going to allow myself to be in this space, feel as crappy as I can feel. I’m going to give myself the opportunity to sit in quiet. Not necessarily meditation but sit in quiet, refocused, remember gratitude, remember who I am at my core and release that and go back to love, go back to gratitude, go back to being who I want to be in this world. That was a pivot right there. I made a huge shift and it was a conscious shift. I had to make it happen and I did.

There is the book right there, A Return to Trust.

We all can do that. We just need to trust that we can.

This is a perfect point for the gratitude that I want to express to you for being here and a choice that we all have to make. First of all, thank you so much for your time and for shifting and being willing to shift. It was same for me. When we knew that this day was coming and we were going to be going to the vet with Duncan, I said to myself, “I don’t I think I want to do this show.” I don’t know if I can or want to. In the end, I came to the same fork in the road that you did. I said, “What a perfect opportunity to be in the energy I’m in and be in the emotion I’m in and share that.” There are lots of people who wake up in the morning each day and are dealing with what they’re dealing with, which could be the loss of a pet or a friend or something else that’s going on. How do they deal with those things? We’re going to deal with them together. That was my answer. Sure enough, you and I both for ourselves and for a wider community, we’re able to be in this and be open. This is a miracle for me, a beautiful conversation. Thank you.

Thank you.

Poor people can't help poor people. It is only when you have something to give that you can help others. Share on X

Our choice was how we greeted the day. I want to end in that place where we all made a conscious choosing when we opened our eyes. That was a blessing. Andrea, was there any guarantee that you’re going to wake up today?

No, and that’s the first blessing every day.

My question to you is, Andrea, do you want to wake up again tomorrow?

Absolutely.

That’s my question for all of you that are reading. I hope that your intention is to wake up, that you realize that waking up, regardless of the day that you’ve had so far, that there was no guarantee that you’d have this day. Tomorrow when you wake up and you’re realizing that you are waking up again, being given another day, that in that moment of conscious awareness, as you’re taking that first breath, that you realize that there are people who are taking their very last breath in that moment, which makes that moment special. For me, it’s a holy moment. I’m giving gratitude at that moment, not because I’m going to have a perfect day or because I’m going to have a day that’s free of challenges. Sometimes that’s the case too, but it’s primarily gratitude for the day itself. The fact that it’s a blessing and it’s open to the universe, open to possibility, open to the creative opportunity.

Tomorrow, all I want you to do, if you’re willing to wake up, is take ten seconds to sit still and listen to that moment when you’re waking in your bed or when your feet hit the floor. Take ten seconds to feel gratitude for yourself, love and appreciation for you in that moment. If you’re willing to say these words out loud or think them, say them out loud even more powerfully, they come out of your mouth. The words are, “I love my life. I love my life. I love my life.” I’m blessed that we get this time together and I love the fact that our community has grown and your feedback is so valuable. Please leave your comments at AdamMarkel.com/Podcasts or on iTunes. You can join us on Facebook at Start My Pivot community for you. We would love to have you find out a lot more about Andrea’s history and her work in the world and the companies that she’s been representing and the health products and services that she is a model of great health. Blessings to all of you. Ciao for now. Thank you again, Andrea.

Thank you.

Important Links:

• Andrea Frank Henkart
• Lifebydesignworks@gmail.com
• Pivot
• A Return to Love
• Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus
• The Conscious PIVOT Podcast on iTunes
• Start My Pivot Facebook Group

About Andrea Frank Henkart