#154 Listening to the Quiet Voice Within: A Path to Healing

Transcript of Interview

Find Your Voice, Change Your Life Podcast

Podcast Host: Dr. Doreen Downing

Free Guide to Fearless Speaking: Doreen7steps.com

Episode # 154 Sarah Dawkins

“Listening to the Quiet Voice Within: A Path to Healing”

(00:00) Doreen Downing: Hi, this is Dr. Doreen Downing, host of the Find Your Voice, Change Your Life podcast, and today, I’m interviewing Sarah Dawkins. Sarah’s a new friend to me and most of the time here on my podcast, I do interview people I’ve never met before, so it’s a moment to sit down and have a coffee and say, “Well, who are you? How did you find your voice and when was it that you felt like you struggled?” 

That’s what we get to do today. First, I would like to say hi, “Hi, Sarah,” before I introduce you. 

(00:35) Sarah Dawkins: Hi, Doreen. Lovely to be here and thank you. 

(00:38) Doreen Downing: Oh, I’m so glad that you said what you just said because people get to hear that you’ve got a beautiful lyrical tone to your voice as well as an accent. Thank you. 

I’m going to do an introduction bio that you sent me. 

Sarah is a highly sought after holistic health and healing coach, keynote speaker, and the author of Heal Yourself. As a former registered nurse with over 20 years of medical experience, Sarah brings a unique, integrative perspective to her work.

She’s also a multi award-winning entrepreneur and host of the popular Health-focused podcast, Heal Yourself with Sarah Dawkins. Sarah’s expertise spans from self-healing multiple chronic health issues to supporting clients in uncovering and addressing the root causes of their symptoms, empowering them to achieve vibrant, lasting health, and transformative wellness.

Ah, Sarah, that’s a wonderful bio. The transformative wellness. I haven’t ever really heard that phrase. I know I always like to start with the history, but let’s just start there. Transformative wellness. Tell me about that. 

(02:08) Sarah Dawkins: Because when we’re sick, we are not ourselves. We are having symptoms, so by finding the root cause of the symptoms and healing that, our symptoms heal, which transforms us back to vibrant health and wellness. 

(02:29) Doreen Downing: Wonderful explanation. I hope everybody just got that about—I love it. I love already what I’m learning. This is so fabulous. Of course. It makes sense that if I’m not well and I have some kind of sickness then I’m not myself.

(02:46) Sarah Dawkins: Absolutely. 

(02:48) Doreen Downing: Ah, good. Well, we’ll get more to that later in our conversation, but so you know that the podcast is about finding your voice and most people that I interview somewhere along the line remember having either a sense or an experience or maybe a time period where they felt like they didn’t have a voice. So, let’s start there, however far back you want to or need to go. 

(03:21) Sarah Dawkins: I think as a child, I liked to ask questions. I wanted to know how everything worked and why, why, why. I remember being shut down—”Stop asking so many questions,” “Be quiet,” “Why did you say that?”—which led to me losing my voice because I didn’t like the response to my questions. 

I still did ask questions, but not quite so many. Then in school, I remember, I think it was a physics class, and he was doing a long mathematical equation and I just asked for some clarity and as soon as he started giving me clarity on the first part of it I totally understood the rest of it and I’m like, “That’s great. Thank you,” but he went on to explain the whole lot and, to me, that made me feel stupid, so that compounded my childhood. 

And then when I was nursing, I wanted to help people through teaching and training, and so I did a course. I paid for myself privately. I did a teacher training course, so that I could teach people and then it dawned on me that I would have to speak in front of people. 

Now I was okay in little groups, informal talking sessions, teaching sessions, just two, three, four people, but then the thought, “What have I done?” I like to impart knowledge, but then the thought of doing it in a formal situation filled me with terror, so that was the start of my journey of losing my voice and being frightened to find it again. 

(05:11) Doreen Downing: Well, there were a couple of things that you’ve already pointed to the earlier childhood being kind of the—I think that curiosity helps us as we grow into the kind of—well, we’re women,—the kind of people we are that we’re meant to be, is that we like to explore, we like to discover, and that there’s always more, and especially with your work, where you do—like what we talked about when I started—transformative wellness. It’s like, “Oh, how did you discover that?”

It takes somebody like you who has curiosity. But it was—putting my hands up—”Stop,” or “Don’t ask.” Then the experience with the teacher who just took it as his own platform to take the spotlight and over-explained to you—So, yes, thank you for those two stories about not having a voice. 

Becoming aware early on during your teenage years, let’s say something like that, before you get to that place where you’re going to go teach or want to teach, what was that like for you? Just having been shut down anyway and like socially. How did you manage? What was your life like? 

(06:39) Sarah Dawkins: It was very Victorian—my upbringing. When I hit 17, I left home on my birthday because I didn’t like the rules. I felt very, very shut down and constrained and I became a rebel. I went out, and I partied, and I drank, and I smoked cannabis, and I took some drugs, and really worked hard.

I worked seven days a week, long, long hours in a cafeteria/restaurants, and then would go out after that to the bars, to the nightclubs, and dance and party, and really rebelled, and threw myself into being the me that I wanted to be, that I felt was shut down throughout my childhood. 

(07:29) Doreen Downing: Yes. Shut down, kind of squished in there. This vibrance. That’s another word you use—vibrant. That means a lot to you, and I can see how your natural vibrancy, if it was contained, that there’s this breaking free—the wild, beautiful, and wild, not meaning crazy, destructive wild, but just expressive.

(07:57) Sarah Dawkins: Yes, and I was bullied at school as well by three separate girls, so I felt very shut down there as well. So, I really was finding myself, expressing myself, however, I wanted to, and I was quite loud and boisterous. 

(08:15) Doreen Downing: Well, I’m glad you put in a few extra details and some more stories about the difficulty that you experienced because I think that’s what listeners relate to. It’s like they are on their own journey, and they have their own struggle and so that today, something like being bullied is a way in which you, we, shrink ourselves. Who wants to be seen and visible if you’re going to get assaulted or attacked, even verbally, not necessarily physically? 

Okay, well then you talked about moving out as a nurse. I’m curious. I picked psychology probably because I was or am more of a quiet kind of person, listener. I’m not fully extroverted out there, so I kind of have a sense that I chose psychology because of, not only the deep inner kind of exploration I like to do, but also the listening and I’m quiet. So, why did you pick nursing? 

(09:22) Sarah Dawkins: My mum was a nurse and then she was a midwife, and then she was a health visitor, but I just liked caring for people, helping people, especially in vulnerable times. I mean, we’re all vulnerable at different times and our vulnerabilities are different, but I really wanted to help people. 

I think it came from the point of not having the help as a child that I needed and feeling the need to give that to other people, because maybe they didn’t have that either, so nursing seemed the right choice for me to be able to help people during vulnerable times.

(10:01) Doreen Downing: Fabulous. Yes. It kind of helps me look back on why I chose, even for a deeper sort of reason, in terms of my mom having mental health issues. So, it makes kind of sense, doesn’t it? That I would pick psychology. 

(10:16) Sarah Dawkins: Yes, to understand. 

(10:19) Doreen Downing: Your mother was somebody who, yes, for me it was understanding, but you had a good model. You had a mother who was already doing nursing, and so it was something like a painted picture in front of you that you were familiar with, but also, the caring. 

I just want to tap into that a little bit. Look at your radiance right now. For people who are watching, you just saw how Sarah just, when we tapped into caring, her face opened, and there’s a radiance all of a sudden. Did you feel it? 

(10:53) Sarah Dawkins: Yes. I feel it in my heart. I feel it’s a Dharma. I feel living my Dharma now and nursing felt good when I started out. I trained in 1998, qualified in 2001, and in 2004, we moved to America forever to nurse out there, live out there and integrate, but it wasn’t quite what we thought it was, so we moved back, but during that time, somebody questioned my use of pharmaceuticals at home. Just the regular stuff that everybody uses. 

So, it set me on a journey looking at why would a nurse question me using pharmaceuticals because that’s what we do and that was my belief system. We need doctors, pharmaceuticals, and hospitals.

That opened so many doors about how powerful we are and how our body heals itself by itself, and I just started looking into that further, and started my own healing journey. I healed a whole range of health problems. Three autoimmune, burned-out adrenal glands, depression with suicidal thoughts, candida, bulimia nervosa, which, as you know, is a mental health disorder. 

The more I was doing the healing, the more I wanted to spread the word to others because it was new to me, it was a revelation because I’d been brought up that when we’re sick, we take a pill, and that’s what makes us better, and now suddenly, I’m like, “My body heals itself and I’m so powerful.”

So, I wanted to share that with the world, and that was where I felt pulled to. This is really helping people to help themselves. In the hospital, I’m helping them to get out of bed and I’m helping them by giving painkillers. Yes, it’s helping them, but it didn’t give me the fulfillment after a period of years that I was feeling it would. 

So, I trained as a coach and surrendered my license as a nurse because I felt it was a bit amoral to be doing one thing totally the opposite of what nursing was, so now I feel coaching people is really helping them to understand their own bodies, their own healing, and support them on their own journey. That is really what healing is. 

(13:19) Doreen Downing: Oh, boy. Now that’s a stake in the ground. This is your truth. Speaking of voice, it feels like your voice just came out loud and clear. Meaning it’s what you know to be so true in your heart, and in your gut, and in your soul. The reason why you’re here on earth right now to do this kind of work. 

I’m going to take a quick break and there’s a few things I want to reach back into because you just talked about your own healing journey, so I want to get a few more details about that. We’ll be right back.

Hi, we’re back with Sarah Dawkins today talking about transformative wellness, being able to heal ourselves from the inside out. As a nurse, she discovered that there is somehow—and we’re going to talk about this next—is that as a nurse, she came across the sense or the discovery that, really, it’s not about a pill.

It’s not about going to a doctor. There’s something else that we, as humans, are capable of. She’s written a book, Heal Yourself, and has a podcast, and is talking to us today about how from our own resources, our own inner—you didn’t say this word—pharmacy, inside of our natural pharmacy, that we can heal ourselves.

That’s what I want to go back to. You mentioned your own healing journey. You mentioned quite a few things: candida, you mentioned mental health, some depression, I think you even said suicidal thoughts, if not attempts, I don’t know. 

So, please, tell us whatever you can, because I’m sure people who are suffering out there and wanting to hear from somebody who went through a journey of healing. 

(15:21) Sarah Dawkins: I first started out healing psoriasis and then went on to heal eczema and acid reflux. It was about getting outside more in the sunshine, walking, de-stressing. I also cut out milk, lactose, and gluten from my diet because they can both exacerbate. Within about a month, I’d healed all those conditions, just from those small tweaks, so that was me now seeing, I don’t need a pill. I don’t need steroids. I can do this. 

Then I went on to heal the bulimia and candida. I also had chronic joint pains, low backache, neckache, shoulder pains, a frozen shoulder one year, a frozen shoulder the next, the other one, and then that led into the depression, the suicidal thoughts.

Whilst I was in that, my thyroid stopped working and I burnt out my adrenal glands, so I’d got quite sick, and I healed all of that over a period of time, but it wasn’t until I actually did my coaching training that I realized there was a piece of my jigsaw of my healing that I wasn’t even aware of.

That was to do with healing our emotional body, our past, and we have to heal our past because we just hold on to it so tight and we took it down so low, and when I was depressed, I took to drinking as well, but didn’t see that I had a problem until the doctor told me because I’m trying to suppress the emotions.

So, I healed all of that with changing for a healthier lifestyle, cutting toxins out of my environment, my products, exercising more, hydrating, getting back in touch with my own inner voice because a lot of us disconnect from it, and it’s there for us, and it’s the quiet voice that speaks to us. Whatever name you want to give that; it’s not our ego that’s shouting in our ear. It’s that little quiet voice. 

Then the mental health work, the mindfulness meditation, practicing gratitude. It is so simple. Just for a good cup of coffee, or to be able to see a bit of blue sky outside, or go for a walk, or the roof over our heads, and the food in our pantry. The real little things are what really matters. 

And the emotional and physical, obviously exercise, sleep, nutrition, all that needs to be addressed for us to truly heal. I learned that on my journey over a period of years, but it slowly fell together bit by bit by bit, and that’s how my book was born, from my own healing and understanding as I started to heal.

Of course, I thought there’s got to be more people out there doing this. I can’t be the only one, but I also need to let people like me, who didn’t even know any of this existed, know that we can heal ourselves, and here’s lots of people sharing how they’ve done it to heal themselves.

(18:22) Doreen Downing: Well, the personal stories around your own adjustments that you needed to make without using, I guess, traditional, whatever you might call it, some kind of medicine, you looked within, and you said the inner voice. You said something about that. There was wisdom or guidance perhaps, right?

(18:47) Sarah Dawkins: From our inner voice. Some people call it our higher self, our innate wisdom. Other people call it God, spirit, the angels, the universe. It doesn’t matter the name, but what matters is we get back in touch with it, and to do that, we have to be either still and quiet or I like to walk out in nature with my dog and it’s quiet, it’s tranquil, and for me it’s a walking meditation as well. I’m with nature. It’s nourishing my soul. I’m able to listen to myself. 

(19:21) Doreen Downing: The listening. You’re right. The distractions and the noises of “busy” is something that takes us away from being a good listener to our own bodies, our own inner wisdom. Well, wonderful. This is a journey with you today, and I want to know how people can find you. It looks like you’re coaching. Talk about that. 

(19:50) Sarah Dawkins: Thank you. Most people can find me through my website, which is my name, SarahDawkins.com—Sarah with an H, Dawkins, D-A-W-K-I-N-S. My book is on there. My contact details, my social, my podcast, anything and everything is on my website. 

(20:09) Doreen Downing: And if somebody comes to you, what, do you do an assessment? How do you work? 

(20:16) Sarah Dawkins: All the clients that have come to me so far have found me through social media, internet, podcasts, summits, and they come to me and say, “I want to work with you,” so I’ve never had to do that initial interview, but if somebody came to me and was unsure, then I could certainly have a talk with them, explore what their symptoms are and to see if we would be able to work together because not everybody’s at the right point to actually start their healing. They might think they are, but their subconscious is holding them back, and that can be explored through conversation. 

(20:55) Doreen Downing: Yes, I totally understand about being held back because a lot of people who have the fear of speaking, speaking up, think that it’s going to be horrible to actually look at their fear because they keep projecting how difficult it’s been in the past, so how could it ever be in the future? So, they put it off. They delay. 

(21:18) Sarah Dawkins: Yes, and there’s also that lack of confidence as well to want to go in, like I said, the fear to do that. But the beauty of that is, once you’ve got that confidence to go in, be supported, find the root cause and work on that, you heal because it’s that root cause that’s causing the symptoms, so they just dissipate naturally as you heal that root cause. 

(21:46) Doreen Downing: Oh, yes. I love watching you today because you have this wide-eyed, the possibility, and you just get so passionate. So, thank you. Before we end today, I’d like to give you a little bit of an opening to see what you might want to leave the listeners with today.

(22:12) Sarah Dawkins: I think if you look at healing, it can look overwhelming because there’s so many facets of it, but actually, start with one thing, one tiny little thing that you feel able to do, whether it’s change a food in your diet, whether it’s take a walk every day, whether it’s do the inner work and go back into yourself and listen for that inner voice, it doesn’t matter, but choose one thing that you feel able to do and do that. As the saying goes, “A journey of a thousand steps starts with one step.” Something like that.

(22:54) Doreen Downing: Yes. 

(22:55) Sarah Dawkins: It’s about choosing something you feel able to do and doing that. You can always have more in later, but don’t look at the whole big picture. It can be overwhelming. 

(23:07) Doreen Downing: Right. Thank you. It’s what’s right in front of you, right? You don’t have to make a commitment to forever. You just make a commitment to what’s right in front of you, what’s next, but also being held by you being accountable. It’s like being supported by you. And just the message, like what you just said is, “I’m here.” I don’t need to push. You’re just saying, “Let’s just do.” It’s a gentle approach. I like seeing that with you. 

(23:41) Sarah Dawkins: Let’s do what you can do. 

(23:44) Doreen Downing: That’s a good last line. Let’s do what you can do. Thank you, Sarah. 

(23:52) Sarah Dawkins: Thank you, Dr. Doreen.