On Finding Joy with Emma Lundwall

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:

Hi, thanks for joining us today on Composed Living with Elsa Elbert. Today, our guest is Emma Lundwall. Emma is a spiritual stylist and sacred space designer. She graduated from Uppsala University in Sweden with an arts degree and has since studied fine art, architecture, interior design, fashion and psychology. Basically, all of my favorite topics. She's a certified life coach and a certified integrative nutrition health coach. She has studied cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and mindfulness, as well as metaphysics and various healing modalities. Emma was born a psychic medium and is passionate about teaching others how to tap into their intuition using creativity. A mother of four young boys living in New York, Emma is also a passionate world traveler and has lived in six different countries on four continents so far. I can't wait to share this conversation with you and I hope you love it as much as I did.

EE: Hi, Emma. Thank you so much for being on the podcast today.

Hi Elsa, it’s so good to be here. I'm so excited.

EE: Me too. We met through... was it... Hey, Mama? I don't even remember.

EL: Yes. That's right. Through Hey Mama, yes.

EE: Which for everyone who does not know, it's such a cool networking organization, like networking and community building for moms and business. And they are all across the United States and they just host so many fun in-person events, virtual events, like learnings, teachings, networking opportunities. It's really a cool organization. And even if you don't participate in any of those things, sometimes you'll see a post from someone wonderful like Emma and something sparks and you're like, oh, the universe meant for me to see this person's bio today. And let's find a cool way to connect. So we chatted briefly and it was one of those conversations where I was like, hmm, I could really talk to you for like eight more hours.

EL: I agree.

EE: We would not run out of things to say on this one topic. So maybe we should record some of this gold for other people to hear too.

EL: So fun. I completely agree. I feel the same way.

EE: Well, good. Well, why don't you tell us a little bit about who you are, the business you're running now. You have such an interesting background. And I think people will find it fascinating and then we'll jump right in.

EL: Thank you. Yes. So my business is I am a spiritual stylist sacred space designer. My work is all about helping people feel good in their own skin and also feel good in their home. And that could also that means their physical space, but also the home that, you know, houses the spirit and the soul. So it's a very holistic approach to, I mean, I can style and design a home space, but also a person or even a life. So with my work, when I offer what I call a spiritual makeover, we work with all areas of the other person's life. And which is really exciting to me.

EE: I love that so much, a spiritual makeover, how beautiful. I shared with you prior to this, you know, I feel very much the same way about home organization. Like it's just one facet of where organizational tools and skills can really help us to create a holistic approach to living the life that we want to be living and co creating. And so when I heard you talk about that, I was like, yes, because all of these things are like your health and the way you feel about your body and the way you feel in your mind and your home and and everything. It's all one and all of those emotions just blend in and out of one another. So it's so cool to hear how you're integrating these things.

EL: Yeah, that's why I was sitting just so deeply with your mission as well in your business. Because yeah, we definitely agree have that holistic approach to everything and how one thing affects the other and yeah, and how everything is energy and yeah how that affects us in terms. So yes,

EE: …everything is energy. It always cracks me up when people say they don't believe in energy. I'm like, I don't even know what. It's not it's not a thing to believe or not believe.

EL: Yes.

EE: Yeah, energy is real thing that exists. You can certainly choose how much you want to believe about the impact it has on the world around you and you as a human, but it is very much real.

EL: Yeah.

EE: So one of the questions we ask all of our guests is if there is some word or feeling or descriptive phrase like, is there something that you at this point in your life feel like you're really focused on bringing into your life or like, you know, the feeling you want to be creating in your life. I feel like it always kind of changes throughout the seasons as we as we get older and our circumstances change. For me right now, I'm very focused on joy because I think I've spent so much of my life focused on like production and just productivity and ambition and I kind of forgot how to have fun. Like I thought that the more successful I was that meant fun and it turns out it didn't. So I'm trying to do all these like joyful playful things like diving under waves in the ocean and you know saying yes to like silly things that I normally would say no to with the kids or whatever.

EL: Oh my gosh.

EE: Okay, so now I completely know why we connected as well because I'm like goosebumps because joy is my word as well. I'm like, oh my gosh, yes, joy 100%. I'm all about reconnecting to the fun and play and I can relate to you and bringing up your children as well. I have four boys and just watching them and learning by like learning from their approach and definitely felt for a while that I didn't want to make my passion my business and then hate it like you know I wanted to keep the fun and the play in it. And I often have to remind myself, especially when I stress out about something that I'm why I'm actually doing this and how much I love it and how much I enjoy it and that's why I'm in this business to start with. So I always let joy. I try and I want to let your lead and I feel that that's a really good. I guess that's how it would just define success as well by how much fun and how much joy I'm feeling.

EE: Yeah, and I'm so thankful that this is where I am in my life where, you know, I, it's hard being so focused on something that isn't of service to other people. I think I think it's a very difficult path, at least for me personally like it just it didn't resonate with my own spirit. And I found that the more I shift towards being of service and just trusting that the universe will mean that I can provide for myself and my family, it really creates so much more room for experiencing joy in that process. So even with this, like people ask me, even like my husband, you know, he's wonderful and so supportive but he's like ahead of sales kind of a person. It's very different personality type than mine. And I was like, I'm going to launch a podcast and he's like, how are you going to make money doing that? And I was like, huh, why would I make money on a podcast? That doesn’t even make any sense to me. Like, I just want to have great conversations with people that I think are interesting. And I want to learn from them. And it's, that brings me joy being in community and, and hearing about what other people are doing with their lives. And, you know, if at some point, like some rich company wants to like sponsor this and it feels aligned, then that's cool, but like, it's certainly not, it's not the end goal and same for Composed Living, you know, it wasn't like, I'm going to make billions of dollars helping people organize their lives. It was like, I can't believe that people don't have the same skill set that comes so naturally to me. And I would be so honored to share that with other people. And that's, you know, it makes it more fun. It makes your passion and your purpose like a line. It's fun. It's fun to go to work and to do these things.

EL: Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And the more fun you're having also the more relaxed you are, which means you're also more open to ideas and downloads and guidance that comes through, which in lead, I mean, which in term can lead to something else that is going to bring you bring in the money or whatever. So it sounds counterintuitive, it's just some play and having fun, but you never know where that's going to lead you, although that's not your goal. That's just like the bonus that comes with it naturally when you're playing fun and following your heart for sure.

EE: I love that. What are you, what are you doing? Like, what have you already done that you were like, yes, this is so playful and fun. Or do you have something like on the calendar that's coming up that's going to be all about playfulness?

EL: Yes, I think I have the need to remind myself to do what I am teaching my clients or advising or like encouraging my clients to do to have something fun that they do every day to schedule the fun. I strongly believe in like good sleep to meditate, you know, eat well, but also for me at least I often forget the fun part. So what I'm doing for myself right now is I'm creating like an art shed just out in my backyard. We have an old shed that I'm going to turn into like a painting studio just for me because I love to paint. So just to do something that's only for me and super creative, but not leading to something necessarily productive, although I know it's going to benefit me in so many ways. So I'm super excited about that. And to do something just for me. And I'm also about to spend the summer in Sweden, where I go every summer, which is also an important part of the way I look at my business that I still want to make time for being a mom because I love being a mom so much and I do have four little kids. And that's just when I completely switch off everything and I want to keep that in my business wherever it goes. I still want to have the ability. I still want to be able to take the time off and just play. And that's what we do. We're just outside the whole day and you know for almost three months and just playing and having fun and I love that so much and I never want to let that go to like my summer break. It's like camp mom. We just all hang out and it's super fun.

EE: I love that. And what a beautiful way to create that balance in your life. And it's so European right like there's not a lot of American culture that allows for this sort of like three month long hiatus. But it makes so much sense. I actually worked for a health care company that was Swedish at the beginning of my career. And every single employee, no matter if you were like, you know, on the first employee or the most senior employee. Everybody got six weeks off and I and then it went up from there. And I was like, what is this magic? Are you kidding me? Like, where am I even going to go for six weeks? And it really set the tone for my career because it was one of my earlier jobs and I was like, why would I ever not want to try this much time off? And so now I find it much easier. I mean, it's harder, I think being a business owner, when my business is open seven days a week and it kind of continues even if I'm on vacation, I have to be very cognizant of like I'm not going to have my emails on my phone, or I'm going to, you know, temporarily take off our business Instagram so I don't see it and get sucked back into it. But I love this. It sounds so idyllic. Like, we're going to Sweden and we're going to be in nature and surrounded by trees and water and playing so wonderful. How old are your kids?

EL: And so I have a range from one to 15, so a one year old, a four year old, a 13 year old and a 15 year old.

EE: That's awesome. That sounds like so much fun right there.

EL: I'm so grateful. They are.

EE: Yeah, it's the best. Do they enjoy this time as downtime? Are they like classic teenagers that are like, I want to play on my phone or video game.

EL: It's funny like that. We've always because we've traveled, we travel a lot and we've also lived all over the world. So my kids said born into different countries, none of them are born in Sweden. And we always feel like since we've moved around so so much, our family unit has become so, so strong. And we all just love spending time together. So even at like in the evenings now, like we all just always hang out in the kitchen or in living room together, even if they're on their devices, they'd like to just stay in the same room, which is super nice and also when we're traveling like we're all just like, like we like spending time together. So, so that's really nice. And I think for them, it's been also been important to have this time away in Sweden to connect to their heritage and to feel …because it's hard like when people ask them, where are you from? It's like, well, like, because they were born there, but we speak Swedish at home.

So it feels important for me to give that to them. Some kind of identity or heritage where they go back and see their family of origin and you know, spend time there in the motherland in a way. So, yeah. So, we all enjoy that.

EE: That's really nice. Neither of my parents were born in the States. My brothers and I were all born here in California. And it was, it still is a little bit tricky, you know, during that time in the, I was born in the very early 80s. And my mom's family was all in the Middle East, and there was no internet. There wasn't social media. There wasn't an easy way to connect with family and we didn't grow up speaking Arabic in our house. So we have this vague sense of culture, and we know our mom's culture. We grew up eating, you know, Lebanese food and, and all of these things. And we hear our mom speak Arabic. Most of the family friends that we had were all friends that are from the Middle East, or they met my, both of my parents went to college in Beirut. And so they met people from all around the world who were all studying in Beirut together at that time in the -- probably early 70s -- and they all moved to California together. So really what we grew up around was this like immigrant community of foreigners, not just Arabs, but also, you know, people from all around the world who like my dad is Danish, for example, that all kind of merged here together but it doesn't quite feel whole, like never have never been to my mom's hometown. There's so much of her family that we still have not had a way of communicating with because I have not learned Arabic and they have not learned English and no one is traveling between the two places and I think that causes a lot of this like underlying sadness for my brothers and I where we would have really loved that opportunity to be so fully immersed into that culture. And it's such a good opportunity for us to know our parents better, you know?

EL: Definitely I can totally relate to that. And I think also that's one of the reason why I felt so drawn to creating this sacred space design business because for me sacred space is that to create a home where I feel safe and at home, wherever that may be. Yes, within myself, but also the physical space in my physical home to create somewhere a place for myself and my family where we can feel stable and safe and together so I can definitely relate to, to all your saying.

EE: Yeah, that's such a beautiful sentiment. I mean the home really is, it's the space, you know, it's where we all retreat back to sort of recover from whatever happens outside of here and so making that the most safe and sacred space is really important, I think, for everyone. You do a lot of work with energy and one of the things that you mentioned in a previous conversation or maybe in your bio I'm not remembering, but was this concept of how do you sort of protect yourself if you're an empath from other people's energy, and it just really, really resonated with me because I think this has come up more so for me now that I'm working in people's homes. It's, I didn't notice it as much in health care like it felt like you know you go to … I don't know what the reason was I didn't feel it as strongly and now that I'm in people's homes, and we're touching everything that they own and it's like this really intimate interaction, and also they have sometimes a big emotional reaction to letting go of stuff or this vulnerability of inviting someone into their space. I realize that I come home and it's like, I need to sit in my car before I can come inside the house, like the thought of having another human being talk to me or be physically around me is so completely overwhelming that you know I'll go for a drive like I just I can't do it. And I’m wondering if you have like a magical quick fix for me. I mean, I actually protect yourself from that.

EL: Yes, and actually I do, and it's been a lifesaver for me because I can relate to everything that you're just saying and this was a big problem for me as a child. I tend I mean I'm an introvert as well and I tended to isolate myself a lot as a child because it was overwhelming. That's also one of the reason I felt called to work with kids which I also do like on the side because I feel… especially I can definitely relate to the kids be the empath kids that I meet as well my kids are very sensitive as well to energies and you can obviously relate to this as well; and I think what one of the things that I learned it took me quite a long time but one of the techniques that I learned is a super simple technique. The good thing is it doesn't even matter if you believe in this stuff or not. I'm not going to go all goo goo but you know it even if you can visualize it and everyone can visualize because it's literally just thinking about something picturing something in your mind. So if you're able to conjure up an image of your mom, for example, in your mind, then you can visualize because it's just seeing with your mind's eye. So the trick is so all you need to do and this is something I recommend everyone does in the first thing in the Morning. I do this every morning. I do this throughout the day if I be directly with other people or if I go to a party or event.

There's a few things you can do but just around yourself imagine you surround yourself in a bubble of white light and it's literally that simple. You can do this for other people as well I do this for my kids but just see yourself surrounded in a bubble of white light. What I do as well when I do that so I asked you can ask for it or you can just visualize it whichever way - both of them work - and you can also see yourself ground through your feet so just imagine like roots coming out of the bottom of your feet going into the earth and just really ground you to the center of the earth and then just watch this bubble of white light even if you see like a tiny sparkle white light at the center of your chest just growing and expanding so it covers your entire body. And if you feel like it you can just see this bubble grow and watch it expand until it covers the entire room that you're in, the entire building that you're in, and just watch this light expanding so it expands covering the entire town that you're in, and now just see this light cover the entire state that you're in or entire country, and then just expanding outwards surrounding the entire planet and it just brings the most peaceful kind of feeling of protection for me. Even just knowing that you can do this for other people it's super simple and I even just tell my you know even with my four year old before he goes off to daycare I just tell him do you have your bubble already or something and it's just a fun thing to do and it sounds silly and you don't need to believe it but it actually is really really effective. So that that's someone you can do beforehand to protect yourself. You can also, what I do if I go to a harsh environment or a busy environment or if I just go to the mall or something, envision your lucky shield in front of you. So just even like a golden shield just like you know for my kids I tell them like a superhero shield, just as like an extra protection around the chakras, which are like energy centers and all throughout your body.So just sometimes if you need some extra protection the shield is good. But then also to do after like you said because I teach a lot about clearing your space energetically and also cleansing your own energy and then there are a few techniques where you can I'm not sure how much you want to go into.

EE: All of it…

EL: Yeah, there's simple ways to also clear because what I talk because I work with energy and for about 20 years I've been working individually with clients and coaching and mainly focusing on people's energy. So I see I can see like so the energy attachments that so I call them cords so when you interacting with someone or if there's an exchange where someone is a bit needy or someone is wanting something from you. It could be a client or it could be a child but not necessarily a child because that's more of a loving exchange; but if you have people wanting things from you, it can create like a cord, which is an energy attachment that is draining energy from your own aura. So it's always good to cleanse yourself of those attachments and you can do that simply by something called court cutting. You can never cut chords of love so all the attachments that you have to people in your family, they can never be touched, they're always there, but it's good to just even if you just what you can do is if you want to visualize an angel or a spirit guide or just some celestial being helping you just cutting away from me.

I work with the Archangel Michael so I just envision him having a sword that just cutting away all these attachments. Yeah, and especially that simple or if you just want to see, yeah, just visualizing them releasing from yourself. And then I finished with a white light shower. So I just envision white light coming from above and just completely showering me and just washing everything away. And it's just a simple cleansing technique that I do at the end of every day. And so if you have the bubble, you will feel better. And I always say to my clients as well that you wouldn't go out in the rain without an umbrella and this is exactly the same thing. This is how I protect my energy when I go out because it's so important for me to keep my energy clear and clean because of the work that I do so that I'm able to tune in. So, yeah, I'm very, very strict on my very strong boundaries when it comes to my energy.

EE: That's awesome. So every morning you start with the white light bubble visualization. And then I love this image of the golden shield if you're like in the interaction. It's kind of like a, like a woman warrior. You've got your gold shield you've got like Archangel Michael with his sword cutting away.

EL: The whole team!

EE: Oh, that's so fun. I love this. And I think it's so good for me to know like the timing, I guess, of how to, of when you're doing these things because I feel like I have enough inner strength or fire where I can sort of like endure these circumstances, but it is so depleting. And I don't want to go through any interaction feeling like I'm just going to have to sort of like muscle my way through this so that I can be the best leader and be the one who's like upholding the energy for everybody else in the space, which is really like if you're a team lead for Composed Living, this is your most significant role right you're the energy center for everyone for the client for the rest of the team and it's something that comes naturally to me but it's not always joyful. Right? And so having something in my toolkit where I can go in feeling like I have a little bit more armor so to speak and I'm not just like muscling through these interactions sounds actually really nice and same like I have a lot of interactions in my personal life where I guess I'm just, I don't know if it's like my age or where I am in my life I just feel so extremely sensitive to other people's negative emotions specifically. I don't seem to absorb other people's joy as easily as I absorb other people's misery, which is terrible.

EL: And so that's amazing that you're aware of that. I mean that's a big thing. I mean, because I've definitely become I mean I like to call myself like an energetic snob because I just cannot be around negative, negativity in any form I can't even watch, you know, I can't watch movies I can't watch like there's so many things -- I'm not on Netflix -- because there's so many things that just affect me so deeply and the more that I've been doing this work the more I realize that… Yeah, that's actually what it does so you're definitely following your intuition and your guidance right you're doing the right thing by distancing yourself when you can.

EE: Well, and I yeah that's I guess the thing is I don't always feel like I can or I know how to so I love having, you know, even these few simple to like that's something I could incorporate into every day or in the moment that's as long as I remember, or I can at least be in habit of practicing it because you know there's certain people that you love and you want them to be around but for whatever reason, your energies are just not jiving all the time. And so they're not people that I want not to be in my life I just want to feel more joyful in my own body while I'm around them.

EL: Yes, and everyone benefits from that as well. So definitely it's nothing selfish it's because they're going to benefit as well for sure.

EE: Yeah, wow thank you for those tips how cool. I feel also weirdly connected to Archangel Michael. Well, not where I thought this was going to come up but it's like the one and I'm not like I mean he's probably like the only angel that I know by name. So this is definitely not my realm of expertise but I read something about who he is a sort of like this, you know, the ultimate character figure. And then I had these like really quick flashbacks to my life of like really significant turning points some of them actually literally lifesaving moments where the person there was named Michael and I was like, what is this weird coincidence, you know, like how bizarre because I also don't I don't think I even have any friends who are named Michael. I'm sorry if I do and I've like forgotten you in this moment, but it's not like a significant name in my life, you know, and then to have like, you know, a doctor who saves my life and his name is Michael and like all of these things I was like, that has to be more than coincidence or at least you know I'm very happy to believe that it's more than coincidence.

EL: I love that for you and you have a percent right yeah you are 100% right so I love that for you and especially if you feel connected to him then you know that's definitely if you think oh it's a sign is that it it always is so I know I know you have that.

EE: Oh, so cool. It's so random that you brought that up to. How fun.

EL: I did call on the before this session so I'm late. I've seen it coming here so I'm like yeah, that's what's in the conversation. I love it.

EE: Well thank you so much for taking the time to be on the show with me to have this conversation and for those energy clearing tips I think that's going to be so helpful for me and I hope it's helpful for anyone who's listening who might have the same feelings about being an empath and what that does to your own bod. When do you leave for Sweden? you're going soon.

EL: Yes a couple of weeks so just getting ready trying to focus on on the joyful things I'm doing and not being too stressed about packing for four kids but you know it's all good.

EE: I love that. Well the teenagers can take care of themselves.

EL: Absolutely. They're even going to babysit tonight when we go for date night so they're really good so I can't complain.

EE: So nice. Yeah our kids are well the 23 is the oldest and then very soon this month and next month they'll younger too will be turning 15 and 13. So it's wild. I know I see my girlfriend with like new babies and I'm like whoa I can't even, I can't imagine you with a one year old you know I'm like I'm so far removed from.

EL: Yeah but they just get more. I think it's better and better I think it's all so fun.

EE: Yeah it is. I love every stage of parenting. They all have their challenges and they all have so much beauty. It's cool. Cool thing to have happen.

EL: Well thank you so much again. I hope you have a wonderful summer. I hope you find lots of moments of joy and play and creativity when you come back to your art studio. That's such an exciting thing for you.

EL: Thank you. This was such an honor. I'm so glad we connected. I look forward to staying in touch. I'm excited.

EE: Yeah, me too. And for everybody who wants to connect with Emma and learn more about what she does you can find all the ways written in the episode notes below wherever you're looking for every listening to this podcast.

Thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode with Emma. I hope that you found some little tidbits that you can use in your daily life to protect your energy and go about your days feeling wonderful in your body. If you want to learn more about how to work with Emma she's a fascinating human being. You can find all of her contact info in the episode notes and we will chat with you next week. Thanks for tuning in. Be sure to like, follow, share, subscribe, anything you can possibly do to interact and spread this joy to everyone you know and love, we would greatly appreciate. Thanks so much.