Podcast Recap: Heal Squad x Maria Menounos
What to Do When You Hit Rock Bottom
A Discussion With Sahil Bloom
In this podcast episode, Maria Menounos speaks with Sahil Bloom about hitting “rock bottom” and how to build yourself back up. Mental, emotional and spiritual health tend to be greatly overlooked when it comes to our overall health and wellness. These pillars of our health directly impact our brain and mindset which ultimately controls our thoughts, beliefs, actions, etc. which paves our entire life and directly effects our physical health. Hard, difficult and trying times are inevitable but how we handle them can drastically change the trajectory of our life.
In this episode, Sahil Bloom introduces us to a dark time of his life where he essentially was hitting rock bottom. Bloom explains that from the outside looking in, he was winning. Externally, he was doing all of things that society deems as successful but he was left drinking most nights, saw his parents only once a year and his wife had been struggling with infertility issues for two years. He explained that while catching up with a friend, his friend asked how his heart was and Bloom went on to explain that he struggled with the fact he was not seeing his parents enough. The friend pointed out that if he continued to only see his parents once a year, he would maybe have only a handful more of time of seeing them.
For many people, it takes a life altering event (such as sickness, disease or death of a loved one) to bring you to these pivotal moments and for Bloom, it was this conversation and the sinking feeling of losing out on something that was deeply important to him. He goes on to explain that if everything he was feeling and experiencing was the definition of success, he didn’t want it.
This is where the conversation of life’s natural cycle comes in— creation, destruction and rebirth. These difficult times in life are the destruction and what we do with that, and what comes after, is up to us. Living a life for external validation from others is not a life lived truly and purposefully. We must intentionally face the challenges head on and take action to grow and transform into who we want to be and the life we want to live. Bloom explains that for much of his life, he was struggling with the battle of external and internal validation and wanting to be known and loved for who he really was opposed to who he thought he needed to be. Bloom went on to leave his job and move to be closer to family. Shortly after that, he and his wife found out that they were expecting. For him, this was a God wink moment. Facing the hardships, being okay with becoming uncomfortable and being intentional with his thoughts, decisions and actions lead him to true happiness and gave him a completely new perspective on life.
Lyndsay’s Takeaways:
This podcast episode greatly resonated with me and the season of life I have been in. My husband was diagnosed with Leukemia in March of 2019 when I was pregnant with our daughter and went through an extremely challenging and traumatic fight until his passing in March of 2024. For five years, I was living in survival mode. I was constantly anxious, stressed, overwhelmed, lonely and depressed. I never slept well, I was giving my body no nutrition or support, I had no self care or workout routine, I had completely ran myself to the ground trying to be a new mother, a business owner, a caretaker and ride the intense waves that was our life. Looking back at those 5 years, it feels like I stepped out of my own reality and lived in such a different realm, and then was dropped back off but a lot more damaged. Losing my husband after such a difficult and long 5 years with a 5 year old by my side was my rock bottom. That was my destruction. I remember in the moments right after finding out Derek was going to stop treatment, I had a thought that crossed my mind and hearing my internal voice say, “You are not going to let this ruin you.”
Truthfully speaking, I was so numb and miserable at that point, that I felt I had no choice but to do anything to move forward even if it was just a little bit. With that came a lot of serious thinking about what I wanted for my life. When you are in such a dark place, external validation no longer serves you. External validation isn’t going to pick you up and carry you through to tomorrow and it surely isn’t going to take you to your true self. While this year has been hard in ways I never imagined, so many blessings have followed. I’ve learned to use the pivotal moment to drive me in the direction of what I want for my life and not what other people, or society, thinks I should do with my life.
I remember hearing an analogy once that these difficult moments of life can have a slingshot effect, and although it feels like we are being pulled back, it ends up directing us to exactly where we need to be. Bloom also quoted an ancient poet, Rumi, that I loved that said, “The wound is where the light enters you.” We cannot run away from our internal battles and the only way to heal is to face them and have the courage to grown and transform from them.
When it comes to our health and healing, looking deeper into our internal reality can have a life changing impact. The healthiest and best versions of ourselves are the ones that are living according to our truest selves and the only way to that is to stop living for external validation and start living for yourself.
Listen to full episode here: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/heal-in-10-what-do-you-do-when-you-hit-rock-bottom/id1320060107?i=1000690541211
