Embrace Forgiveness, Healing, and Be Happy with Kelly CK Collins

Julie Hilsen

Host

00:00

Life of Love, life of Love Life of Love, life of Love With Julie Hilsen

Kelly Collins

Guest

00:09

Hello, dear friends, and welcome to another awesome episode of Life of Love where we explore living a life of joy and magic and different ways to live your life of love with people who are dedicated to curiosity, exploration, and personal growth. Today we have another special, wonderful guest, kelly CK Collins. Kelly has been a warrior of hope and love. She has a lifetime of experience and just compassion, from owning and selling a news and publishing company in Nashville, outside Nashville, to take time off to take a spiritual pilgrimage on the El Camino. Her book Swipe Right Effect the Power to Get Unstuck is a wonderful tool for self-discovery and heartfelt advice. Oh my goodness, Kelly, welcome to the show, so happy to have you.

Julie Hilsen

Host

01:00

Thank you, I’m so excited to have this conversation with you.

Kelly Collins

Guest

01:04

Me too. Me too, I was reading your book and then the song came into my head and I was like I wonder if people repeat this song. You know the song I will walk 500 Miles? Yeah, 100 miles.

Julie Hilsen

Host

01:24

Yes, I had a playlist for the Camino and that was the number one song. It was my first song on it, so every time I turned it on I heard that one.

Kelly Collins

Guest

01:32

I wonder if when they wrote that song, they knew about the El Camino. What’s a coincidence that someone wrote 500 miles and then you did it twice. So you did 500 miles twice and then in the song, they said I would walk 500 more. And how coincidental is that? And a lot of people. I interviewed another woman who had done it once and was planning to do it again. It seems like when people do the South France to Spain, then they’re like, oh, let’s do the Portugal one too. It’s like it’s just something you do.

Julie Hilsen

Host

02:06

Yeah, I love the Portuguese too. It was great, really beautiful. I did the coastal one, so it was all along the water until you turned into Santiago.

Kelly Collins

Guest

02:16

Just gorgeous and what a great way Nature calls you. Many people get comfort in nature and the sacred geometry of nature around us. It’s interesting how the birds do binaural beats and this whole thing about, oh, binaural beats balances your brain and helps clear your mind. But birds do it for us, like the Cardinals. They call and answer and call and answer. Nature gives us everything we need. We just need to take the time to do it right. Listen yes, listening is the key.

02:55

Oh, my goodness, so I’m excited for you. Well, you’ve done them both already, so are you going to do it again?

Julie Hilsen

Host

03:05

Oh yeah, I’m sure I will. I don’t have a plan right now because I’ve been on the road for a year and a half, so I’m kind of sitting still for a little while now and needed to focus on my second book and the workbook for this book. So I’ve been writing and I like to be.

The Power of Forgiveness and Healing

Kelly Collins

Guest

03:24

Still, it gives you your foundation. Right, you can. Oh well, I’m going to just start with a couple of questions, because as I was reading your book, I was like, ooh, I’m really drawn to ask you these things and you might see the pattern here, but I wanted to ask you what feeds your soul, as a way to introduce you to my audience.

Julie Hilsen

Host

03:54

What feeds your soul? I love that question, nature being out. I walk every day and I have several friends that I walk with back home in Nashville and also here in Newport. But walking is meditation for me if I’m by myself, and it’s communing with nature, and it’s also sharing time our most precious commodity with friends, and so that feeds my soul. And then time with my children, above all, definitely feeds my soul. They’re very special people and I love them and their partners, and yeah, I mean there’s just nothing like spending time with them.

Kelly Collins

Guest

04:44

Yeah, it’s so true. It’s that connection and your bond and community and, as you said in your book, it’s when you can express to a friend your vulnerability, exactly how you’re feeling, and they can give you unconditional support. It means the world because, like when you play it over in your head, it becomes this dragon monster, right, and then when you can just say it, it’s out there and you’re like OK, I live through that.

Julie Hilsen

Host

05:16

Right. Well, I don’t know what it is and I’m sure people psychiatrists or something way smarter than me can explain it, but I know when I’m afraid of something or I’m in pain that’s caused by something if I say it out loud and I share it, it dissipates. My friend Kay gave me a quote and I shared it in the book that said grief is like water the more it is shared, the more it evaporates. And so, or the more you spread it around, the more it evaporates, and I think that that’s true and that is vulnerability, that is courage when you share the hard things.

Kelly Collins

Guest

06:03

Right and know that it’s perfect because you’re feeling it.

06:08

It’s not something to be sheltered from. It’s part of that process of healing letting it go. And yeah, sometimes that’s hard because people just want to be like, ok, I dealt with that. But a lot of times the really deep things are going to resurface and you’ve got to say, ok, I’m dealing with this again and it’s OK and it’s normal. When you’re deeply affected, when you have deep grief or deep sorrow about something that ended before its time in your view, you know sometimes you’ve got to revisit it and forgive and move on over and over.

Julie Hilsen

Host

06:49

Right, and I heard it, heard a quote. Well, the first time I saw it was probably on Instagram or something. I follow all these inspirational things. I just love them and I share, share them all the time. But somebody said in my mastermind group this morning that the best version of you is on the other side of that fear that you’re having right now, and I thought that that can also be true of anger. It can be true, you know, it’s not just necessarily fear, it’s all of those emotions that come from betrayal or loss or change.

07:31

You know, some people just can’t handle change, but I believe that there’s a better version of me. So, even when the anger resurfaces or I get triggered by something, I think, OK, this is a lesson I’m learning and I’m just going to be a better version of myself. You know, whether it’s 10 minutes from now or two hours from now, I’ll be better for having walked through it.

Kelly Collins

Guest

07:57

I told. That resonates with me so much because I’ll be like OK, what’s my highest timeline? I’m here. You can jump timelines like that. If you just say I want to show up differently. All of a sudden you’re that little subtle thing that you did differently. It’s the same feeling but you approached it differently, you acknowledged it differently, with more from your heart. You can. You can shift things. It’s really fun, especially those people that you all know like OK, this is a, b and C is going to happen, and you just know it.

Julie Hilsen

Host

08:33

And then eventually, sometimes it doesn’t.

Kelly Collins

Guest

08:38

Right, yeah, you show up differently All of a sudden. It’s like oh yeah.

Julie Hilsen

Host

08:42

I used to have a really hard time when my children would visit their dad and you know, it’s like it was just so weird for me because we’re a family and we’re supposed to all be together. But now we’re there together and then they come and see me and we’re together and it just I couldn’t get past that loss, you know, that feeling of left out really, and eventually it just got to be where. I’m happy that they’re with their dad, I’m happy that they both have. They have both their mom and dad. You know, and it’s because I have a lot of friends and I have some family who lost both their parents, and at a young age, and so it’s difficult, and so that’s how, when I kind of got to that place, that’s when it stopped hurting, when they were with their dad, without me.

Kelly Collins

Guest

09:39

Well, you recentered around love. The love for your children was stronger. You decide to focus on that more than your feeling of abandonment or of. You know that loss and you know the highest frequency always wins. It’s just a win-win.

Julie Hilsen

Host

10:01

You have so many good one-liners, anyone like wants to start writing them down. The highest frequency wins. I got to write that.

Kelly Collins

Guest

10:08

Sure, oh, man. So that’s how I want to ask you if you wanted to share your 12 words.

Julie Hilsen

Host

10:16

Oh sure, yeah. And I learned it from the secret. Secret, right, yeah. And it was when I was having a terrible time with forgiving and I kept thinking I was there and it, you know, it was anger. That was there and it just kept resurfacing and I I describe it in the book like it was a high school bully that kept coming around and instead of my lunch money it wanted my happiness and I just I didn’t even realize it was still there. But my family was telling me you know, you still need to work on yourself. And I’m just like it wasn’t.

10:58

Their words were not resonating with me as to what was going on and I went to visit a friend and she recognized it and said it for what it was she, she, she claimed it in my name, you know.

11:11

So she asked me to listen to the secret. I was on the long drive up to Boston and I did. I listened to it all the way through and then I went back and listened to a couple of chapters, but they gave me the words that I needed and it was I forgive you, I release you, I want you to be happy and it I’m not saying that works from that very moment, but it did shift something in me immediately. But I considered it a practice and I told my kids, I told my family, I told my friends. I want accountability. If you see me showing anger or pain, then remind me you know lovingly, as I want everybody to treat others lovingly. But yeah, but I had to keep saying it over and over again and it’s been my very great privilege to help people that have come back to me after reading the book and walk that with them because I think forgiveness is just very difficult and it is a practice.

Kelly Collins

Guest

12:24

Right, and you even talked about it in your book. It’s not condoning the behavior, You’re not saying it’s okay, You’re just forgiving it and releasing it. It’s huge because it stays in your field until you send it on its way. I release you, you no longer serve me anymore, You’re released. And then the idea that you want to be happy I mean even when you say the word happy, like the frequency, is just good, Happy, I just want you to be happy. And when you finish saying I’m a speech pathologist by trade, even when you say happy, your mouth turns up yeah and you make a smile. And when you smile you’re owning that feeling and even if you’re faking fake it till you make it right Like be happy.

Julie Hilsen

Host

13:16

Okay, I want you to be happy, and I remember I had a conversation with my ex and told him that I had been utilizing that practice, because I think it was about six weeks between when I listened to it and we were together at a wedding Not together, but we were both attending a wedding.

Kelly Collins

Guest

13:40

Yeah, family function. You needed to be there and I told him.

Julie Hilsen

Host

13:44

Yeah, I told him. I said you know, I forgive you, I release you, I want you to be happy. And he said I am happy. And I said and now it’s my turn.

13:52

You know it’s my turn to be happy, and it just everything shifted. It was like the final step and I’m not saying sometimes I don’t hurt because still, you know, because of something that happened, but the anger, it’s not anger, you know, it’s not that boomerang that kept coming back around and I think that was what was so powerful. But my friend Loretta said this anger is a boomerang and, like you’ve always been a happy, positive person and this is dragging you down, it’s bad energy in your body that has to go away, has to go somewhere else so that Kelly’s positive energy is can start impacting the world again. You know, and she’s just saying things so powerfully to me I couldn’t hear it.

Kelly Collins

Guest

14:42

You needed and you deserve it. You know you were showing up for everyone else and you know trying to be that perfect thing and we’re always trying to do our best. So I mean when, like you were writing, the contract changed, right, like you changed, and it wasn’t working and so you had to learn to forgive and forgive yourself. For you know, whatever, whatever you know, things just come up. I know that when I have a relationship, whether it’s a friendship or just any kind of interaction, any kind of relationship if I feel like it missed the mark, I’m always like, well, what did I do to contribute? Because I think I’m, you know, I can, I can change and I can make things better. But the thing is that sometimes you just have to accept that your agenda isn’t always gonna be the agenda. Sometimes you have to release it, right?

Julie Hilsen

Host

15:34

Yeah, yeah, you’ve got to learn to let things go, yeah, but I did have to forgive myself too, because for not recognizing when things were going bad and for allowing myself to stay in a very unhappy situation for six years, I was like that’s six years, I don’t get back, you know, and I had. I struggled with that. So I, yeah, I had to have a little come-to-Jesus meeting with myself in the mirror, you know. And then you know, I forgive the old Kelly, I release the old Kelly and the new Kelly wants to be happy and I love her. You know, I’m so excited about my new life and all these amazing people that I’m getting to talk to because I read this book. I mean, it’s just so much fun, it’s been fun.

16:29

And I’m grateful for it.

Kelly Collins

Guest

16:31

I am too. I’m so happy for you because it’s like if you can look back and be like all right, you know, if you hadn’t built your business and set up those things that happened in the six years. You were creating a platform so you could take off and fly. Yeah, and you might, you might have had a little harder time transitioning.

16:54

If you had, just if you had seen the signs, or you know, I mean, obviously he didn’t want to be caught. He was, you know, he wasn’t ready to end the marriage. He was going to make you do it so that he didn’t look like the bad guy or whatever, whatever reason. You know who knows, why Garth does the things he does, but you don’t have to own what he’s doing. But you were empowered and you were laying the groundwork for your scaffold, for your launch. I mean, you launched.

17:26

You went from, just, you know, you’re a successful businesswoman and then you’re a mom who’s running everything that it takes to run a household and volunteering and all these things that you are doing. That is, you know, paid with hugs. You know that’s paid in smiles and arms. We’re here for free Right? So you know you channeled in yourself and that I think that there’s divine timing. So the guilt, and you know the things that happened, you know it’s just your. It was the transition you needed to take and you know six is a number pregnant with possibilities, the six years you were growing and you were manifesting what you needed to do to have your metamorphosis. You know, without really even knowing it.

18:16

Yeah, yeah, you don’t, I mean you can only look back and say oh yeah, that’s, that’s six, that’s the number, yeah, and this is. You know, if we saw all the signs, then we wouldn’t have an adventure anymore. Right, we would just be following a script.

Julie Hilsen

Host

18:30

Yeah, well, and I did teach all of this Stuff did help me learn to follow the signs. I learned about manifestation I, you know I I always. I mean I grew up Christian, I raised my children in the church and I think there’s just such. I think people who are Christian sometimes don’t understand that. I believe manifestation is just a conversation with the universe, and to me, the universe is God and the angels and your spirit guides, and I think manifestation is prayer, and prayer is a manifestation to me, so I’ve been trying to talk to my mom about it because she’s like it just kind of makes me uncomfortable to think that I have power when I know that in my heart I’m supposed to rely on God, and so I think it’s just a really interesting conversation to keep on having over and over and over again.

Exploring Divinity, Meditation, and Self-Soothing

Kelly Collins

Guest

19:34

Well, Jesus even said God is in all of us.

Julie Hilsen

Host

19:38

Right that we’re divine.

Kelly Collins

Guest

19:39

We are divine and he said every one of you has the power that I do, can heal, can do what I do. So it’s like Jesus was telling us to go for it, own it. There’s a lot that has been diluted a little bit.

Julie Hilsen

Host

20:05

I agree.

Kelly Collins

Guest

20:06

It’s coming around. I mean, there’s research that shows there’s a black hole in each atom in our body and there are people who believe that a black hole is God’s presence, the source.

Julie Hilsen

Host

20:21

Oh, that’s cool. I’ve never heard that before. You know, have you seen the series The Calling?

Kelly Collins

Guest

20:31

I’ve heard of it, but I haven’t caught it yet.

Julie Hilsen

Host

20:34

Yeah, it’s pretty amazing and anyway, there’s a scene in there where Jesus is explaining that you know, and it’s super powerful, Not the Calling of the chosen.

Kelly Collins

Guest

20:46

I think it is a choice. I think it is a choice. Yeah, yeah, sorry. And I wonder if John the Baptist is in there too, because John the Baptist is just like he got it, like he and you know when Jesus would go off. You’d read about in the Bible, in the New Testament Jesus would go off by himself and you know he was meditating, you know he was clearing, he was right, or he was praying to God, which you know it’s. It’s sort of like, I think when you’re praying you’re talking to God and when you’re meditating you’re listening to yourself.

Julie Hilsen

Host

21:19

But that’s interesting.

Kelly Collins

Guest

21:20

That’s sort of how I look at it. Now I change, you know I will. I’ll see it a different way and I’ll have another opinion tomorrow, but that’s where I sit today and I give myself the freedom to, make a change Like I don’t. I had a guest on this that I that the wise men in India. They say it’s a privilege to know less today than I knew yesterday, to live in that curiosity right To say you know, this is what it is today, but maybe I don’t know. You know, just be open, and that’s what’s fascinating.

Julie Hilsen

Host

21:52

That’s like yeah, I feel like it can shift. I feel like meditation can shift between a conversation with God, a conversation with your subconscious, and your spirit guides, Like I feel like it’s not the same every time. I feel like your subconscious or your soul is going to utilize it in the way that it needs to be utilized that day, that moment. And yeah, I think I don’t have the superset way I meditate. I do like to a guided meditation in the evenings because it helps me quiet my brain just to listen to one other thing, and but in the mornings it’s I like meditating right away when I’m still sleepy and I feel like I’m in that zone of my subconscious.

Kelly Collins

Guest

22:44

It’s beautiful, yeah, and I think that part of the reason you like to travel is because it’s different. Every time you know it’s a newness and every time you get quiet and meditate it could be different, it’s a new journey. So, except when you do the guided that’s, I guess different things could show up, but you’re listening to the same thing.

Julie Hilsen

Host

23:07

Yeah, I’ve had several that I like to listen to, ones about oceans, ones about breathing, but I think I hear different things every time. Maybe not every time, but most of the time, you know, there’s something that clicks for me. That day that’s beautiful.

Kelly Collins

Guest

23:26

I asked you what feeds your soul, and then I also wanted to ask another question. You’re going to see the pattern here. How do you self-soothe?

Julie Hilsen

Host

23:35

There are some good answers to that in my book. I have to say, hiking will always be a self-soothe for me, but my meditation practice has drastically increased and so, yeah, I have shifted a little more. I didn’t use to do the two meditations a day, and I think there are some really interesting ways to incorporate it into your day. You know, like the middle of the day as well, so I like to strive for that, but it’s, you know when you write a book, that turns out to be the easy part, and then promoting your book is like a 10-hour day job. But it’s been so much fun. I mean, it’s like it doesn’t feel like 10 hours, it just flies by and all of a sudden it’s seven o’clock. Look how that happened.

Kelly Collins

Guest

24:31

Right, right, and then like that discernment as to how to use your energy right, because if you’re in that flow, if you’re in that place where you’re showing up as your most authentic self and not spinning your wheels, you’re so much more effective, right? So if you can get quiet and just tune in, okay, what seems to be the best thing to do? And, as you said, it might be just to go take a hike and then come back and you’re going to have more clarity as to your next step because the book is there and it’s beautiful. I mean, it’s just beautiful and I just love how you put it together and you know it’s helpful, supportive, and you know I can understand why you want to stay connected to your readers because you are taking them on this path. Right, like, okay, these are your steps.

Julie Hilsen

Host

25:17

Yeah, and it feeds me too. Every time somebody says this book was just what I needed. I’ve been looking for something for two years and it just ended up in my hands. A friend gave it to me, you know, and I just, I love that. To me, divine intervention, you know. And then that I’m accessible to them, you know when that might not always be the case, of course, but it’s, I don’t know. It feeds me and it makes me want to do more. It makes me want to help more and you know that I’m actually about to launch a coaching business so that I can be there for people one-on-one, and I’m having to set that up and start shifting priorities in my life and putting, you know, blocks of time aside so that I can have these conversations and help people take those steps.

26:10

I think accountability is huge and I learned that the hard way. Well, in a great way. You know that, with that, like the forgiveness thing, I would say, I want you to hold me accountable if you see me sliding. You know I want to get those 12 words out again.

Kelly Collins

Guest

26:28

So Mm-hmm, and it’s so applicable. Those 12 words, I could see those being like part of a vision board, you know, or just a daily mantra, I mean the daily affirmations that you can use to set up your day. They seem to me to be so grounding and centering and to have that like the accountability of every day revisiting those, because life, you know, you get woken up in the middle of the night, life takes over and then, all of a sudden, you haven’t done your affirmations for three days or three weeks and you’re like, oh, I used to do that. So I mean maybe just finding a place. I always like to give my listeners suggestions.

27:16

If, if you’re in trouble with forgiveness and you want to write those 12 words down, which I’ll put in the show notes because it’s just so wonderful If you could put those in a prominent place on your mirror, write them. I have a chalkboard outside my kitchen. I write things down that I want, I want to remember and then hopefully, my family will absorb them. But if they, curiously, you know any place, you can, you know it’s okay to put little signs around your house just to remind you and I’ll like set.

27:48

You have your Post-it notes yeah, I love this one.

Julie Hilsen

Host

27:51

I stand for who I will be in life rather than what I will have. I love that one and I want to look at it every day. Who I will be, not what I will have. Pretty cool. Catherine Woodward Thomas, not me that is cool.

Kelly Collins

Guest

28:10

Yeah, I was driven by. It was the mantra that you had written.

Julie Hilsen

Host

28:18

Yeah, yeah, please.

Kelly Collins

Guest

28:21

With your permission, I’ll read it. I seek peace at all times. I seek joy at all times. I live in a state of happiness. I shine my light on others. In love, I bring empathy and kindness to others, and that was part of a meditation you have in your book, and that was. That was beautiful. And you know if you, if you could set your reminder on your phone to do this every night at eight o’clock, or you know if you know a time you’re going to be not occupied, or in the morning when you first rise, you know it’s just like. It’s a beautiful way to center and to calibrate, right If you, if you feel like your head is like spinning and everything’s coming at a million miles an hour, just stop and say these four sentences.

Julie Hilsen

Host

29:15

Yeah, I read the book the magic by Rhonda Burn. It’s one of the I hate to call a sequel, but it’s a follow-up book from a secret and I did that. I’m trying to remember when I started it I think maybe in February or March, and it has a nice intro, but then it has a 28-day practice to jump-start your gratitude practice and jump-start the good energy within you. And the first thing she does, which I have done now for 70 days I guess that would tell me when I started it if I go back 70 days. I think today was day 71, but you write down 10 things that you’re grateful for. I am grateful for my children, but you don’t stop there. You say because I am grateful for my children. After all, they bring joy into my life, or whatever it is, and I love, I love where she takes the reader in this, in this book, and it’s not real long. And you just add you know it’s probably four or five minutes if you listen to it on audible, it’s like four or five minutes a day. And I started that with Through that book and I do it every day now and that’s I do it.

30:31

I haven’t, and the reason I brought this up? Because you said reminder. I have a reminder for 8 am On my phone every day and I also have a reminder that comes up that says Good news is coming my way today. I am grateful for the good news that is coming my way today, and that was that’s another thing from her book and I just love that. And so I have those reminders pop up every day and so I usually go do my sunrise walk. I come back and get a cup of coffee right when that reminder pops up. But if I get busy and distracted If that reminder is there every day and I will.

31:08

I will say, oh yeah, that’s my priority, gratitude is my priority, and so it does help and you’re right on to To you, I suggest that yeah well, thank you so much.

Kelly Collins

Guest

31:23

It was so great to be in this field with you and I can’t wait to share all your resources with my audience. I’ll put them in the show notes and your book. I mean, if someone’s going through a divorce or even a big life change, or just dealing with some difficult things, your book would be a great, a great resource and I love that you have other books in there and say, oh, if you’re interested in this, go read this book, and you know it’s just well that all those books helped me.

Julie Hilsen

Host

31:52

They were an important part of what I Was able to accomplish. You know whether it’s mainly just my happiness.

Rediscovering Self-Love and Joy

Kelly Collins

Guest

32:02

Right, and that’s and that’s a beautiful quest to see happiness and not settle, and that’s what that’s. My big thing is. You know every day is a chance to create the life of your dreams. You know, and you know we are talking before the show about chat, get, and how it’s wonderful, but you just have to know how to ask it. You got to know how, and what to ask for, and wow, isn’t that a secret to happiness just to have an idea of what that means to you instead?

32:30

I resonated with the woman in your book about her floating down the river, because, you know, some of us are water signs. Like I’m a cancer and I spent the first 40 years of my life Just pleasing everybody else going down the river and I was like, wait a minute, I need a life raft. Like I’m a zombie. I got to figure this out because it does. It gets to be this heaviness that you’re. You’re not filling your bucket, you’re, you’re um, living for everyone else. And so, knowing what that means to you, you deserve joy, you deserve to have divine light, and uh absolutely.

33:06

Yeah, god doesn’t want us down here suffering. There’s enough suffering. We don’t need to have self-imposed. Exactly.

Julie Hilsen

Host

33:14

Oh yes, thank you for saying that, because I think we do self-impose, um because of the trauma and it’s tough To come out of it, but it’s worth it.

Kelly Collins

Guest

33:23

Kelly, thanks again for joining us on life of love. I really admire how you’ve lived your life, centered around love, and you’re recalibrating and helping others, and I just adore what you’re putting out there. Thank you so much.

Julie Hilsen

Host

33:36

Thank you so much for having me on. It’s been a joy to meet you.