Are We Awakening Or Just Overstimulated?

What if the grind you’ve been praising is just survival mode wearing a shiny badge? We open up about how motherhood shattered a hustle-first identity, slowed life to a human pace, and made room for presence, financial creativity, and clearer priorities. That same stillness sharpened our ear for truth in a noisy spiritual internet, where intrusive thoughts often get sold as downloads and anxiety gets dressed up as intuition.

Together we trace a path from burnout to balance, separating awe from algorithm. We dig into why therapy and spirituality can strengthen each other, how real maturity demands accountability, and why the paranormal community needs receipts over theatrics. As parents and practitioners, we wrestle with a tender question: are we nurturing sensitive kids or projecting identities onto them? You’ll hear practical ways to let children explore without scripts—dream journaling, calm observation, and grounding—so curiosity grows without pressure to perform.

We also name the elephant in the feed: overstimulation masquerading as awakening. Seeing more isn’t understanding more; doomscrolling isn’t action. If the nervous system is always on fire, intuition can’t breathe. We share simple, humane steps to downshift—limits on feeds, nature, breath, movement—so discernment can do its quiet work. And for those who love the paranormal like we do, we offer a call to rebuild trust with ethics, context, and humility: show process, cite sources, admit uncertainty, and prize truth over clicks.

If you’re ready to trade performative hustle for grounded wonder, this conversation will meet you where you are and invite you to slow down without stepping back from what you love. Subscribe, share with a friend who needs steadier footing, and leave a review to help us grow a kinder, clearer community.

Transcript

Hustle Meets Motherhood

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Motherhood killed my hustle, and I'm glad that it did. Welcome back everyone. This is your host, Melissa. It's Strange Strange Beyond Insane. I used to think slowing down meant I was failing. Then I became a mother and realized my hustle might have been a trauma response. What if the grind isn't ambition? What if it's survival mode? Slowing down allowed me to really, you know, smell the coffee and think about where I wanted to see my life and all of the things and accomplishments that I think that I had in life and what it meant and what success meant and looked like to me. I realized that completely like completely a different person emerged from having a child, and maybe this is what it took. Um I thought like constant productivity, measuring worth by output was success. Um, I was always feeling behind all the time. I was chasing a breakthrough. I was chasing this, chasing that. And what motherhood did for me was it forced, you know, stillness, like be still, be quiet, take it in, slower mornings, financial creativity. I've learned how to, you know, make a dollar go a lot further, right? Um, presence over performance. And I've really learned that like capitalism rewards burnout. And mothers that step off the hustle ladder really learn how to be even more creative and more focused. And it doesn't like doing less doesn't feel so radical, right? Because I always said growing up I would never be a stay-at-home mom, which I'm not. I still, you know, work sometimes at night door dashing, and then I work two days a week as a barber. Um, and then I do here at home too, right? But this is the slowest my life has ever been, and it has really made me redirect my path. So I'm asking all the moms out there, even dads that are listening, you know, with your wives or your significant others or baby mamas, whatever, did motherhood soften you or did it expose the way that you were surviving? And for me, it's it really exposed the way that I was surviving and how I lived my life. So unfortunately, um, actually a co-worker and I were just talking about this. I I too had to get out of the rabbit hole of social media um when Jack was sleeping, or you know, even if I'm like pushing him around in the high chair, the little indoor stroller that we have, or even like sitting with him in his playpen hanging out, you know, you find yourself, you know, scrolling a lot. But I love this part of me because I've really learned to I guess disqualify fakes and just fucking crazy people that want to really throw down doomsday type deal things on everyone, and they use social media as an outlet and how to make money, and I'm not cool with that. So with my motherhood time here and in my own thoughts, I've you know, I've been putting together some notes, some bullet notes to kind of like make this episode where I'm not saying that people don't have spiritual gifts because I am one person to to never disclaim that, like, oh, it's all woo-woo, it's all this, that, no, because there is, and there's a lot of it, and everybody has it. It's just if you want to tap into it or not. But I just want people to hear this that not every intrusive thought is a psychic download, and not every anxiety spiral is intuition. And like, honestly, when did we start calling mental health symptoms spiritual gifts? You're not attacking like your spirituality if you're listening and you're agreeing, you're just protecting it. And I think there's a huge, huge difference. You know, not everything is a sign, trauma does not equal awakening, anxiety does not equal empath. Now, a lot of anxiety stems from being an empath and being um an absorber, not an observer, right? And there's a dangerous gray area here. So when people avoid therapy because they think they're gifted, you know, or how paranoia can disguise itself as a spiritual insight and the difference between discernment and delusion. And I do want to be careful and tread lightly on this because mental health in America is a huge thing, right? But I I'm really tired of people, you know, pushing out some fake content and making people go into these spirals, especially people that are very um sensitive to this. So what I want to talk about is the balance. You can be, you know, intuitive and grounded at the same time. Therapy does not cancel spirituality, and real spiritual maturity includes accountability. Have you ever confused fear for intuition? I'm we all have, okay. Um, but I want that to kind of set in. And another thing is too, is you know, I want to ask the social media world, are we raising spiritually sensitive kids or are we projecting onto them? And that's one thing now being a mom. And do I want Jack to go to places with me and you know, explore? And if he wants to, absolutely 1000%. In fact, um, when Christina was here on our latest episode talking about how we went to the Bill Manor, uh, Dawn invited us, and her daughter and her boyfriend were there. So her daughter has grown up doing this, you know, these ghost adventures with Dawn essentially. I think since she was like four, I think she's 24 now. So Dawn said for like 20 years, and people don't realize how intuitive and how mature she is in this field, and she likes to do it. And let me tell you, she just she's the the girl that chills in the background and she really takes in what she's hearing, what she's seeing, and she's snapping pictures, and that's probably why she got that picture of Miss Daisy because she is Savannah's very calm, very, very calm, and that she was taught the right way by her mom. And I really respect their hustle in the paranormal field because they are not pumping out fake content, they're not, you know, trying to monetize, get money for fake shit, basically. Okay, like you see on you know, ghost adventures and stuff. So if a child says that they're seeing something in the corner, are they gifted or are we teaching them what to see? And I think that is very important. At what point does belief become projection? You know, parents labeling kids as empaths, indigo, psychic, and that's all you see. And I know it's about your algorithm too, but I really think we need to take a step back from that. Um, a lot of parents are seeking social media validation through their kids, which I do not fucking agree with. Um, and there's a huge difference between development and spiritual framing. So that looks like imagination phases, trauma sensitivity, pattern recognition, and children. So let's talk about responsibility. Okay, letting kids explore without scripting their identity. So let them be themselves, let them find their own voice, let them, you know, see with their own eyes, right? I think it's probably kind of tough at this angle, like especially when they're talking and you know, being able to say, hey, this is what I see, or this is what I've seen. And I think there is a very balanced way to come at that. And I for me with Jack, I would just listen and I would say, okay. And I would tell him what my mom used to tell me, write down notes about your dreams. And that's why my mom always bought me these dream books from Scholastic and um like libraries and stuff, because I I was that kid that had a lot of dreams, and a lot of my dreams were true. Like I've said on here many times, I knew my great grandma died before they told me. Um, I still remember my parents walking up and I heard them in the hallway talking. I don't know how we're gonna tell her, you know, I don't want her to be upset. And they I was watching cartoons. It was Saturday morning, and they walk into the room and I said, Hey, I know Gigi passed away. And they're like, What? And I'm like, Yeah, great grandma, you know, grandma Carlson. I know she came to me in my dream, she gave me this really pretty um designer egg, like a collector egg, and I was like, she, you know, she told me she was okay and she was smiling, and I'm okay with that. And my parents were like flabbergasted, right? They're like, what the hell? But it and it that's the thing that was that's always been a spiritual gift that I've had is my dreams. Um, and I know I understand even more as an adult why I had the dreams growing up. I from how I came into this earth, and um, you know, I did I did have a lot of you know trauma with my health um when I was a baby. And I was on a lot of different medicine, like steroids and stuff for like my lungs, and I always had breathing issues. So I think coming into the world with some trauma like that, I think yeah, you do even maybe develop more of a sensitivity to a spiritual world, right? Um, and I wouldn't say I had a tough childhood um at all. I had a great childhood, it just I knew some things that I probably shouldn't have known at that age, and I was probably a little different than my, you know, my average friend, right? Um so getting back, you know, I think it's important to protect them from spiritual pressure. And I think it's a really good thing to teach grounding, and grounding comes in all different forms, you know, it's not all woo-woo. Um, it also helps mental clarity, right? So, would you rather your child be gifted or grounded? I would definitely say if the question, if it was for me myself, I would say I'd rather Jack be grounded, right? Um, very, very important. So, you know, the motherhood connection with kids' projection and mental illness, you know, romanticizing, big spiritual debates. I think people don't talk enough on social media. I don't think that there's enough time in like a video clip to do that, and that's I think that's why this episode is so important. And I hope it reaches a lot of my listeners so that you can kind of like separate, right? I think it's very important to separate, look at things from a logical, you know, in a grounded area. And, you know, I just want to let everybody know that like I'm sure this conversation can could escalate and cause tension. And just know that I'm not being reckless, I'm you know, just trying to stay grounded and I'm I'm talking about what's going on, and that was a big reason why I wanted to start a podcast. And I think we need to build some authority on the spiritual world and paranormal. And um, if you've noticed, there's a huge decline in like paranormal stuff in general, and and woo-woo stuff and aliens, you know, it it got so normalized. It was on the news, and people were like, and everybody was out ghost hunting, and everybody was, you know, for some of us, we've been doing this for years and like our whole life, right? Like we've always kind of known that there was something else out there, and um, I think with the decline in shows and all the bullshit going on in the you know, quote unquote Hollywood uh paranormal world, I think people are still out there trying to get famous for the wrong reason, and there's a lot of like not correct information. I'm trying to, I'm not one to jump around the issue on here, right? But I do have to stay grounded myself while speaking to everyone because I'm not trying to like piss everyone off, or I'm not sitting here and you know, retracting what I've said in all different episodes on having spiritual gifts because I do 1000% believe in that and I know that it is real, and I know that there are some real psychic mediums mediums out there, excuse me, um, but I'm just I'm really sick of seeing the bullshit on social media, and I think we need to start talking more about this and we need to spread awareness because it can really like it can really cause people to do like in into what we call like a spiritual psychosis, right? And I'm seeing a lot of that and it's scary. So um, you know, and so anyways, getting back to like motherhood and how this has softened me and it's opened my eyes into what's happening into the world, and it's kind of allowed me to slow down too, you know. Um, I thought I was ambitious before. No, I think I was just afraid, and I was afraid that if I stopped producing, I would disappear. Motherhood did not make me weaker, it exposed the spell that I was under. And I think it's even before I had Jack, I was so like, I need to pump out so many episodes, this and that, daily, daily, this, blah, blah, blah. And I was always checking out my achievements on Buzzsprout, and I was like, oh, when's the next achievement? When do I gotta do this? How many, you know, days or months? And now it's like I just don't, I'm just so fucking unbothered. And I'm like, just let it happen naturally. So saying that, um, going into my achievements, so I didn't even realize this how close I am. Uh let's see. Achievements right here. So I only need 58 more downloads to get to my 7500 download that I've been trying to forever. I'm already at 203 episodes. Um, I only have 47 more episodes to go to get to the next achievement, which is uh I want to say who's that would be 250, right? Yep, 250. And all of this has happened like so quickly when I wasn't worried about it. And I think all of this, this whole entire point of this podcast episode is to say, you know what, it's okay to slow down and kind of redirect yourself on choices that you're making and thoughts in your head and the intrusive, like, don't ever let intrusive thoughts win, right? And I think we really need to take we instead of taking a step away from like the world and social media and what's going on, I think we need to fucking stand up and be like, listen, this is not right, like stop spewing out this false information. Okay, um, it's really affecting a lot of people, and like I said, I'm I'm seeing a lot of it, and the TikTok culture has changed so much. Um, I still love TikTok. However, uh, you know, for the weak-minded, it's not always a good place to be, especially with spiritual paranormal talk. So, not every voice is divine, right? We need to talk about the spiritual ego because not every intrusive thought is prophecy and not every fear is intuition, and that's very, very important. Some of what we're calling like the awoke world, the woke world, whatever, the awakening is untreated trauma. And I think a lot of people are, and I and another thing is too, I'm not all about like over analyzing and therapy this, therapy that. But I think if people just like learn to take a break and find the small things in life that, you know, like go touch fucking grass, like go watch the birds, like go look at the clouds, you know, go moongaze and just take a step back. Um, yeah, so I think we need to protect our community, our paranormal community, more. And I think we need, like I said, I'm gonna start pumping out some content on TikTok. And I know a lot of people are gonna get pissed and I don't care. Uh, but you know, everyone says that we're in this woke era. We're more informed, we're more aware, more conscious. Some people, yes. Um, people that have had life-altering things happen, I think, have really learned to redirect themselves. But what if we're not awakening like all these people? What if we're just overstimulated? And this is another thing now coming into motherhood that I've really learned. Um, seeing everything isn't the same as understanding anything, and that's very important. Now, like every tragedy is recorded, every injustice is live streamed, every opinion is amplified. We are exposed to more human suffering in one week than previous generations saw in a lifetime. Access to information doesn't equal wisdom. I'm not I'm not an anti-awareness person. I'm just an anti-constant nervous system activation person. Like we we we need to like bring down our nervous systems and kind of think logically, right? And I did talk a little bit about this briefly on a previous episode, a few episodes ago. You know, and doom scrolling is false activism, right? And this is kind of like where it's gonna get spicy. You know, we easily scroll tragedies, we repost headlines, we feel outrage, we mistake emotional reaction for moral action. Consuming crisis is not the same as changing it. And I'm really talking, I mean, this this is like broad, right? But for me, like really in the paranormal community and the spiritual community, like we need to fucking do better because I'm tired, like, and I'm really like kind of ranting and raving on here, and I'm sorry, but I really want this to like reach the right listeners. It's just putting a bad taste in people's mouths, and it's kind of like making us spiritual people that are into paranormal and all the research that we do and the history and the places that we travel, it's making us look like the crazy woo-woos, right? And we're not all like that. So let's kind of bring this down and ground it, you know, let's ground our nervous systems because if we if we don't, um, there's chronic cortisol rising, which we all know what cortisol does to the body, too much of it. Um, collective anxiety, hyperviligant, you know, not good. Um, the woke quote unquote culture feeling like constant alert mode. You cannot be spiritually grounded while your nervous system is constantly on fire. That is so important. It's very dark, but those are wise words. It like let me let me repeat, you cannot be spiritually grounded while your nervous system is constantly on fire. And I think that you need to let that resonate. Um, very, very, very, very true. I don't I don't feel like we need more exposure. I feel that we need more fun and lightness and bring back the spiritual realm, paranormal realm, you know, enthusiast, fun feeling. Okay. And that's where I'm gonna drop the mic on that. I I'm very, very, very headstrong about this. And I I'm sure you can hear that. I'm like, I need to get this message across. Um I'm sorry, like it just needs to be said. You know, are we actually more conscious or are we just becoming overwhelmed? And you know, I think we should position ourselves more as observant, not absorbers, right? Cultural, um, not too extreme and psychologically aware is okay, but you know, hypersensitive. Um, I just feel like we're not so woke, we're being fed. And I think here's another thing too. You need to cross-check your facts and make sure they're facts because again, there's a lot of misinformation being spread. And I'm not fucking talking politically, okay? I'm talking from a person, a small person in the world that has a podcast that enjoys doing this and feels like there are just messages that need to be sent out to podcast land. And I really want it to resonate. And, you know, they don't talk about this a lot on social media because they're too busy feeding, you know. Nonsense and making everybody scared all the time and making everyone's nervous systems go crazy. And I want to bring back more of a community. Uh, and I'm gonna work really hard on that. And I know there's a lot of people that feel the same as me, and you know, bring back that paracommunity, that you know, spiritual, good health, good mind, good feeling type feel. And I want to end this episode with saying again, so the whole entire point to this episode is that everyone is saying that we're in this woke era. We're more aware, we're more conscious, and we're more informed. But what if we're not waking up? What if we're being optimized? Because outrage is profitable, fear is profitable, division is profitable. If the algorithm decides what you see, is this your awakening or is this on the agenda? All right, everyone, thank you for listening. And again, you can listen to this podcast on any platform that you listen to podcasts on. Um, of course, we're on most social media. If you just look up Strange Strange Beyond Insane, your search engine bar, you will find, you know, video clips, YouTube, uh, there's pictures, um, Buzz Sprout, Apple, Spotify, Pod Chaser, Podbean, um, iHeart. You know, there most pretty much every platform, right? Again, you guys, please, if you want to talk or you have something to add, go through BuzzSprout and put in that text message, whatever you want to say, good or bad, whatever helpful suggestions, criticism. Um, and it directly comes to me as a text message. So I I will get it right away. Again, thank you guys for listening, and we will be chatting soon.