Cheryl Wilder on Shame, Healing, and the Long Road to Forgiveness

00:00 Sometimes our hardest moments come from one split decision. In Cheryl Wilder's case, a night out when she was 20 years old ended in a crash that changed everything for her and for the people she cared about. What followed was years of shame, self-reflection, and slowly finding her way back to a sense of worth. Cheryl shares what it means to live with moral injury and how she eventually found forgiveness and why she now speaks openly about a story she once kept in the shadows. 00:30 This is a conversation about accountability, healing, and the long, often complicated path towards forgiving yourself. At one point, we were going around a left-hand curve and I lost control of the car. And we skidded, so we were going to the left, and then we, so the inertia took us and skidded us into a pole right into the passenger side door. 00:54 I don't know how long I was out. I don't think it was very long, but I know that I was out for, and then opened my eyes and just was like staring at the steering wheel and staring at the dashboard and kind of looking around at everything. And then looked over to my friend and he was slumped over on the center console. 01:24 I'm Maciel Huli, and this is the Life Shift, candid conversations about the pivotal moments that have changed lives forever. 01:41 Hello, my friends. Welcome to the Life Shift podcast. am here with Cheryl. Hello, Cheryl. Hi, Matt. Great to be here. Well, thank you for wanting to be a part of the Life Shift podcast. The whole theme of the Life Shift really stems from my own personal experience. When I was eight, I was visiting my father. My parents lived states apart. My dad lived in Georgia. My mom lived in Massachusetts. I with my mom full time. 02:05 But I was visiting my father and one day after summer camp, he pulled me into his office and he had to tell me that my mom had been killed in a motorcycle accident. And at that moment in time, it was late 80s, early 90s, I felt like nothing that we had dreamed about for my life was ever even possible anymore because everything that I knew, all of my comfort was pulled from me because I was gonna have to move states, live with a different parent, go to a different school, leave all my friends. 02:35 And because of the time period, nobody was talking about how to help a kid get through these moments. And I say that because throughout the failing at grief that I had for 20 plus years, I always wondered, do other people have like these line in the sand type moments in which one moment, literally a second to the next, everything has changed and that person is instantly changed. And so this journey of talking to over 200 people now about 03:04 so many different kinds of Life Shift moments has just been really fulfilling. And I say that not to minimize any of the really hard stories, but the hard stories are the things that remind me how similar we are as humans and how we process things and move through the world and the resilience that we have. And so it's just an honor that you even want to be part of this platform. So thank you, before we even start, for just being a part of my journey that is the Life Shift podcast. 03:33 Well, I'm happy to be here and a part of your journey and your stories really touches me and where you've come and what you're doing with it. Yeah, very happy to be a part of this. Thank you. I think of that eight year old and he'd be like, never even get to talk about it. So my mom would probably be upset that I was talking about her all the time. But, you know, that's just part of my journey. And I think that she would probably be proud of the ability to, you know, my goal with the show is that. 04:01 people listening might feel alone in their circumstance. They might need a little inspiration. And my thought is that each guest brings their story and it's gonna find the right ears that needed to hear it at that time. And maybe their experience will be a little different. yeah, it's a nice little nod to my mother and my grandmother and all the people that have been a part of this show. So before we get into your story, 04:26 Maybe you can tell us who Cheryl is in 2025. Like, how do you show up in the world? How do you identify these days? Well, right now I'm identifying as a lover of false fall in North Carolina, because we dropped like 20 degrees in the last week or so. very happy with this transition in weather. As a person, you know, 04:54 I've been going through a lot of change over the past year in my career because I raised kids and stayed at home and did part-time work the whole time. And so for the past couple of years, but really the past year, I've been putting a lot of effort in my next career. You know, I'm another 20 years of working. So ah I'm showing up with intention. I'm showing up anchored in my work, you know, a little frightened, but also excited. So. 05:24 Yeah, I show up ready, ready to hit the pavement, I guess. I mean, that's half the battle or maybe more than half the battle. We're not really prepared for that. And especially, would imagine that there is a challenge of having not been in the full-time workforce for maybe as long as you were. Probably uh a whole different world now, too, right? Definitely. Well, I mean, I'm working for myself, so I'm not... 05:52 going into a company or anything, and I've actually never worked corporate. So, yeah, I've always been small business or working for myself. So that's been really nice. But it's still, it's a landscape. still have, you know, my clients are people in those spaces and I still have to understand what's going on in those spaces. So there is that learning curve, of course. I was a web designer when my kids were little, something I could do at home. I self-taught. 06:20 web design back in 2012, focused on WordPress sites. I still do that, but I'm transitioning and I'm a certified coach in communities and also want to help people through their kind of pivotal moments, you whether that's getting a first job or divorce or retirement or, you know, something like that. And I'm also going into speaking. So, ah so the story that you'll hear today is kind of... 06:47 a story that over the time over writing about it and talking about it, was something that I, if I kept following what I call like the bouncing ball, and if you remember what age you are, like on Sesame Street or something, know, like all the ball and the words, I kind of feel that way. So I'm following it to try to talk, bring some of these topics into the light because they aren't talked about as much. that's kind of, that's the scary part of the journey I'm on, but I'm excited. think it's the most valuable part not to 07:16 minimize the other things that you're doing. like story, the power of story is just so much more than I guess I really internalized before. think I kind of just like on the surface knew that storytelling was powerful, but now being able to hear other people's stories and see how it affects the people telling the story, how it affects me as someone as part of the conversation and then the listeners on the other side, it's like, I didn't. 07:43 Maybe I was just dumb, but like I just didn't realize how how meaningful and you know, what's funny to me and I don't know if you've noticed this in kind of telling your story more is that the things you think when you're telling your story the things you think people are gonna attach to are Oftentimes not the thing. It's like this little Side note that you made like way early in the story or something that people are like when you said that It changed everything in my life and you're like that part 08:14 Have you noticed any of that? Oh, definitely. And I'm prepared for it. You know, I went I got my MFA in poetry. So in writing poetry, like I don't have an expectation that the reader is going to take what I got from it. Like I don't even expect them to. I actually don't even want them to necessarily on a certain level. I don't want them to be way off. You know, I don't want to be laughing if it's something I thought, you know, more heavy. But I like the idea of people bringing their 08:42 leaving space for people to bring their own experiences. And that's when it's the most impactful is when they are able to get inside the words or get inside the story and see themselves. And then like you were talking about whether that healing happens or where there's, know, whatever that emotion is. So I guess I've been trained in writing that I understand that, but it is startling sometimes. I mean, I've had poems where people like, 09:09 all like three or four different perspectives. And I was just like, yes, they're all correct. It must give you a different layer too, because you get to hear other people's perspective of your poems, but also probably part of your story and how they connect to different parts of your story and maybe not the biggest part or what you've deemed the biggest part. So speaking of your story, you maybe you can kind of paint the picture of your life leading up to 09:35 the main pivotal moment, I understand you probably have multiples, but the one that we're gonna talk about today and kind of paint that before picture of Cheryl. So without, you know, going back too far, I think one thread that's important to or for me, I guess that's important to the whole story is, so I wrote my first poem when I was in fifth grade. And then I proceeded. I didn't get in trouble for it, but I was definitely questioned about it. So I stopped writing. And then in high school, 10:04 my English teacher that I had for two years really encouraged my writing and nurtured me. And so by the time I ended up leaving high school, I was like, I'm going to be a poet. I don't know what that means. who's a poet? There's no poet. know, they used to have the Juan ads. They don't have them anymore. So I didn't know exactly what to do. I wasn't a great student because I'm not an auditory learner. So the traditional lecture style doesn't work for me. And I didn't think I was very smart because of that. So I left school. 10:33 My parents were divorced. My dad, so this is kind of all the little droppings before, right? My parents were divorced. My dad, once I turned 18, was like, I don't, great, I'm not legally obligated to talk to you or your sister, so he stopped talking to us. That's hard in itself. Yeah, so that's its own. That's abandonment of. Oh, yeah. Did you internalize that? I feel like as a kid with a dead parent, I also had abandonment issues just. Oh. 11:03 because that's what it feels like when you're that age. But you had like, Yeah. And I I felt it before when I was when I was 11, we my mom moved us to a different city to be closer to our family. So my dad, you know, as soon as I got divorced, I he was just like, I'll be every other weekend. Even if I live two blocks away, I'm never going to see more than what the says on paper. So I'd already kind of felt abandoned by him emotionally and also just because I felt like I was a burden. 11:32 So when he stopped talking to us, then I was like, oh, I guess I was right. Which is like validating, but also like so disappointing and really hard. So disappointing. So disappointing. And I mean, yeah, and to this day, he's still alive. I know where he lives, but we still haven't talked. I'm sorry. Oh, it's OK. Yeah, now I've, it's all good. It's been a long time now. So but thank you. Thank you. It took a long time to actually forgive him. 12:00 Yeah, for yourself. Yeah, for myself. 100%. So my mom is, you know, and she hung in there, but I think my sister's older. So I think by the time though, I got, became 18, she was like, she didn't have an emptiness problem. Like she moved and she was, had her new relationship that they ended up getting married. And so I was feeling a little unmoored when I left, when I graduated high school, not. 12:25 really having any plans. The parents were kind of happy to be without kids at home. And I wanted to write, but I didn't know how to do it. And so I started going to community college. But at one point I was like, you know, I need to go do something. You know, obviously I didn't know Emily Dickinson at the time because she didn't travel much at all. But I was like, I need to go live some life. So let me go do something. So had a friend kind of a summer fling. And he was like, I'm going to this. I grew up in California, by the way. 12:53 He was like, I'm going to go to Wilmington, North Carolina because they make movies there and I'm to see if I can get into the acting business through there. So, why don't you come with me and hang out and whatever. was like, sure, that'll be the thing. I'll go where? Looking on the map. is this? Yeah. So, we went to Wilmington, North Carolina, which is on the Atlantic Ocean. It's beautiful beaches, one of the best kept secrets, though I think the secret's out now. So, I went from coast to coast and. 13:22 He and I, you know, didn't last, he went his way. I was like, I'll be here for a year and then I'll just go back and, you know, go back to school and kind of buckle down. I started working at a restaurant on the Atlantic Ocean, got some friends, got some roommates, you know, was just kind of living the restaurant life. So I was 19 and then I turned 20. And then in June of 1992, friend of mine called me up. I was actually in bed. 13:51 But he called me up and he was like, hey, I got off work early. Let's go out. And I never went out. didn't even, I was 20. We went out to go dancing, but I was like, I was always a homebody. like, I don't like big crowds. don't want to, I'm not, I wasn't a bar person. So he's like, just come on, let's just go out. You and I, we're going to go dancing. I'm going to take you to this one spot and whatever. I'll get you in. Cause I know the people there. So was like, fine. So. 14:19 We called another friend of ours who I was dating at the time and he couldn't go because he was in summer school. So he was like, I got tests in the morning. I can't go out. And my roommates were gone. And this is before cell phones. So you're just calling on the landline. So my friend picked me up and we go downtown and we go to one little bar and just hang out and talk and talk and just have a great time. 14:44 And then we go to another bar and we start dancing and continue having a great time. And then we go to a third bar and we didn't close the place down, but I think it was like a Thursday, so it closed a little early. And then when we left, we were walking towards his car down the street and he threw me the keys as we were walking towards it. And he was like, you drive. And he had a... 15:11 300Z, so it was kind of a fun car to drive. He's like, why don't you drive it? And I like, and I threw the keys back and I was like, I'm not driving your car. And I didn't say that because I drank too much. I had just said that because I was like, I can't drive your car. It's too, you know, it's too nice. It's, know, I'm not going to do that. And so we did that a few times back and forth on the way to the car. And when we got to the car, I realized that he had 15:39 walked to the passenger seat and then he threw the keys over to me and he was like, you're driving. And he got inside. And so I got inside and started driving his home. ah were, so I don't know, I don't know, 20 blocks, 30 blocks. Cause it was from downtown Wilmington area, which is a gridded space with a lot of just stop signs and stuff taking the back way home, listening to California Dreamin. 16:09 because he wanted me to take him back to California with him and all that. At one point, we were going around a left-hand curve and I lost control of the car. And we skidded, so we were going to the left and then we, so the inertia took us and skidded us into a pole right into the passenger side door. 16:32 Um, 16:36 I don't know how long I was out. I don't think it was very long. But I know that I was out for, and then opened my eyes and just was like staring at the steering wheel and staring at the dashboard and kind of looking around at everything. And then looked over to my friend and he was slumped over on the center console. 17:06 And I was pleading with him, you know, like, wake up, we gotta get out of the car, we gotta get out the car, wake up, we gotta get out. And he wasn't moving. And then I was just, you know, please wake up. And so he didn't move. So I leaned over and could hear that he was breathing. He was like, but it was, was a curdling, like there was saliva blood, you know, but he was breathing. 17:36 And so I got out of the car and just stood there and someone, there was an apartment complex close and I, so someone approached me and I was male. don't remember anything really about him, but, and then I heard sirens from far off and um they took me, know, put me in the back of the car seat and I went to jail that night and 18:04 Because you had been drinking or because of the accident itself? because I'd been drinking. yeah, the bar popping included drinking. yeah, ah I don't remember what I blew, it was, it was, it was, it was, know, I was, yeah, was in, yeah, I was over the limit. Yeah, I definitely should not have been driving. 18:31 So they took me in and they took him to the hospital. He spent four months in a coma. He suffered a stroke. The part of his head that he hit was like the part that had to relearn everything, like how to walk and how to talk. And I don't know all the extent of the damages because I wasn't allowed to have a relationship with him afterwards. 19:00 So I know like he survived and I don't know where, what he's at, but I did see him years and years later and he kind of was still, he had been able to get some work, you know, doing the back stuff and he had a caretaker, but he, you know, he couldn't live on his own and he had, you know, I don't know all the other problems, but yeah. That is a, is a giant life shift moment that I can imagine. 19:30 I imagine that there's so many emotions that happen with that. what do you recall, like, what was the main, like, what came up first? Was it fright? Was it, like, what was the main emotion that came with that? Because it feels like it could be any of those. My first reaction was like, 20:00 what did I just do? what? So it was a blank. questioning. It was kind of a shock. what, like what happened? What just happened? Like what did I just do? And I kept asking myself like that when I went to jail, you know, I was just like in this little cot staring at this stone wall that's all rough and stuff and just looking at it and like, like it could almost feel. 20:29 all my sense of understanding about the world, you know, of what it means to be a person, like draining out of my mind. It just started going, I mean, not like blank. 20:44 Like I didn't have thoughts, but it's, don't know if that's, if I can explain that, but it, it was really, what did I do? And it was, I mean, it was very much blame. And also like, how did I get here? Like, how did I get to a point where I made this choice? This is not me, you know, like, did I do? wasn't the life you were living. No. Wasn't your traditional every Thursday you went and did this and this was just like on a whim kind of. Yeah. 21:14 Yeah. So it was a very questionable sense of self. Just that was probably my first. And then adding to the fact that like he was severely injured, I could imagine that that becomes a whole complex piece where we naturally as humans will now absorb that blame and some sort or some kind of guilt. And I don't know if is it is it rightfully so? Is it like how how do you process that to understand like 21:44 accidents happen. 21:47 That took me a really long time to get there. So it's like, I think it's these two pathways in our brain. Like I knew for a fact, if this was my friend, like if this was two other people, like that's an accident. Like, and I know that that person didn't mean to, and I know that that person should forgive themselves. And I know that- 22:13 Like if it wasn't me, right? Like if I was saying to somebody else, like I knew that. Right. But I also knew that since it was me that I knew better than to get in the car. I knew better than to put myself in that position. And that moral weight, like I actually just learned about this term moral injury not too long ago. And that's really what it is. It's this, you know, I. 22:42 I had a better sense of self. I knew right from wrong, on this level, this way, right? And I broke that. I broke a code with myself, with my friend, society. mean, drunk driving is a huge blister, right? It's everywhere. So I knew that I had just broken my social contract, and that's how I felt. So on so many levels, I... 23:12 couldn't continue to grasp the fact that it also mattered that I didn't intend it, right? Like I couldn't get there. It took a long time to get to that point. And I know that because he, if he would have walked away like I did, it would have been a very different thing. But it was very much tied to the fact that the situation altered his life, like, you know, completely. 23:42 I mean, it's a split decision, kind of not the choice to drive because I mean, that was a back and forth. That was a he's, you like you guys went back and forth how many times and it could have been either of you that ended up with the keys in that moment. But I think it's kind of like it's relatable in a sense of so many of us have taken a step that maybe we didn't we knew maybe we shouldn't have and then it led to something we're like. 24:11 Had I just not taken that one step? Like, that's all it is. It's like a single moment decision that can unfold in this way. But it's really, it's like a hard thing because now people see you as the driver, right? So you now have public perception of whatever happened and did that weigh into you and kind of overwhelm or did you have more people that were logically like it was an accident? Poor choice. 24:41 probably, but accident. The latter, definitely. At least as far as people I knew and family. all the people telling their own stories about, oh, well, I've been lucky in all of X, Y, and Z. Yeah, because you're certainly not the first 20-year-old to go to a bar and drink and then drive home. It was my own moral. 25:08 It was the standard that I broke within myself. And I don't think I was, I know I wasn't able to convey to anybody at the time the moral injury because I didn't understand it. I didn't, cause you know, every, you know, people who love me and who cared about me and their intentions were a hundred percent altruistic, but you know, to tell somebody like, it was just an accident you didn't mean to, doesn't, didn't help. 25:35 all of the weight and it didn't help all of the other things. So I could kind of compartmentalize that a little, but that was tied to my friend being hurt so that I couldn't take them apart. And I didn't have the emotional intelligence or the understanding at the time to communicate, no, this is not just that. This is something that's multi-layered and very messy. And I got help, but it 26:05 It was my own stuff too. Yeah. What does that path to recovery for you look like in a way of finding self again and finding confidence in yourself? don't know, whatever maybe you fell out of you looking at that wall, like what does that path to rebuilding look like? 26:28 Well, for me, was a moment about, so I had the crashes in June of 1993 and then the court waited for him to see, obviously to see if he was gonna die. So I had a manslaughter charge pending depending on what happened. So he came out of a coma and then got to the point where he was gonna get out the hospital. So my court date was. 26:55 like the following August, so was like over 12 months. So I kind of had this year of limbo and at one point, and I didn't, I was completely lost and just, you know, I just went to work, you know, just, people were like, oh, this is horrible. And then I'm like, just go to work. Just checking the boxes and living. Just checking the boxes and like paying the bills, going, I know how to do these things. I know how to keep living. 27:24 Luckily, did not. Depression wasn't on the table for me. That is, I was very lucky. But about, I guess, May, so a couple months before the court date, I was in this situation actually at a concert and this guy that I met and I was talking to and he was like, you could just run away with us. You could just come with us and we'll go and, you know, let's go travel. He's like, I've got to warrant out for my arrest, you know? Like, you don't have to go to your court date. 27:54 And it was so, at the moment I was like, huh? It had never occurred to me. Like, it's not even in my brain chemistry to be like, oh, I'm gonna run away. Like, that's just not who I am. But it was so, when I thought about it, like in real time, I was like, well, let me think about this. 28:13 I'm so thankful for him for that opportunity because it provided me a moment to intentionally say, no, I am dealing with this. And not only am I, I'm not gonna just go home and like go to court, pay my dues and then get some job and like live half ass, you know I mean? Just like take the boxes. I'm gonna go home and I'm gonna do my thing and I'm gonna make something up. Like I'm gonna intentionally get better and. 28:40 figure out how I can make something out of this. And so I was really grateful for the opportunity to choose that path because it was it really like presented itself. I mean, I could easily gotten in that car. I mean, I would eventually go to jail. But I mean, at least for a while, I could have took a very different path. And that was, know, it's another like life shift in a way of like someone stopping you and like a mirror to yourself of like. Look where you could go. 29:08 or what do you want to do? Like, what is your moral contract? How do you make it? How do you make you you again? You know, so I mean, sometimes people just get placed in our in front of us for the right reasons, you know, and like, yes, thank for that one to to to give you like, I could go that path, but no, that's not what I want for my life. That's not what it. Yeah. So that was the beginning. And it was slow for me. Not easy. I well, I didn't believe I 29:38 So I still, for years, didn't believe that I deserved to feel better. So that was one of those paths in my, like, I always lived, I know that you can hold, not you, anybody or me, we can hold two thoughts at once that are opposing and get through them. And that's actually how I survived. actually, you know, because I did not believe I should be happy, I did not believe that I was worth it. I didn't go to therapy because of it. I was like, you don't deserve to feel better, you know? So you're not gonna go to therapy. 30:08 And the other side was, do believe when the Dalai Lama says this, I do believe that people are worth it. I do believe that I'm worth it. know, I am one of those people. And so those are the things that just were parallel until they eventually met. And then what superseded was you are worth it and this is what you're doing. And that was reading and just being as mindful as possible. I I just was, a, I guess I was just self-learning. 30:38 for me for a long time. 30:46 Was it an external thing or was it an internal thing? 30:52 Like did someone recognize something about you that finally um 31:03 I don't know, I think... 31:06 When did I feel? I feel like it was something that kind of was chipped away. So I had my first child when I was 23 and I wasn't any unhealthy relationship with his father. 31:23 But that, like having him was kind of, having my son was a moment of, oh, he deserves a happy mother. So I'm gonna work to give him a happy mother, know, like a truly, not just, oh, you know, like I'm gonna do the, like, so it kind of doubled down on the work. He just being able to be a mother, like, did give me some pride in myself and, 31:52 Not that I was obviously, I we all make mistakes, but just in that being, you know, being there for him. So, you know, and then at one point, when I, with my husband now, I'm like, I got to the point where I could really allow somebody in and to love me. So like, that was another piece, right? So I think it's late for me, it's been layered. And actually this piece that I was talking about in the beginning, like this past year with this new career, I called it going public. 32:21 with speaking about it and is, I mean, my shame is like reared its head over the past year. Like I call it my shame beast. Like it still lives in there, you know, gotta make space for it. But all year long, I mean, it's just like, you're not, you shouldn't do that. You can't, you're not worthy of doing this. You know, so it still rears up. And I know how to be like, no, no. 32:47 You know, we do this all the time. We know how to do this, but it hadn't done that in a long time. It's just that this is another layer of me saying I'm worth this work. Because this is me being a person in society in a different way. And I used to think that I was, you know, a pry on society. So that I'm not surprised that my shame is like rearing its head, but it allows me to to kind of, you know, take another, you know, layer of that offer. 33:16 add a layer of worth, however you whatever metaphor you want to. mean, I would imagine that it'll always be a part of your story. And so I think I think now maybe in 2025, people are getting a little better of carrying all of their story. And and it's just it's part of it, right. And so I say that because maybe 20, 30 years ago, people just pushed down and 33:43 you know, and hide it and pretend to be X, Y, and Z. And I ask you that question about when did you feel worthy? And I think your answer is perfect because it was like a small unfolding at a time. For me, I... It's totally different story, obviously. But losing my mom and feeling like that abandonment, I became like a perfectionist and I was afraid that if I wasn't perfect, the other people in my life were going to leave me. 34:13 And the worthy part came in is, or why I asked you that is because I would find, looking back now, not in the moment, but I would find that any time that I won some kind of award or I did really well, it was because my mom died. Or if I did something bad or I failed at something or I screwed up like a human does as they're growing up, it would be because my mom died. And so, so much of it was not me trying to find the worth of me. 34:42 it was assigning it to that experience and I am because of that experience where I could see very well how Cheryl, as you go through all your things, that experience could define so many people. And it's really hard to like pull yourself from that. So that's kind of where that question was, where you were no longer that, but now you're like you, the full human that had that part, but not just that part. So it's... 35:12 It's an interesting, these are the moments in which I hear story totally different than mine, not something that I have experienced in that way, yet the feelings and the way you describe certain things make my experience make more sense to me. And so it's like a crazy power of story. I think it's, I mean, I love that you are actively. 35:42 living now, would you say that's true? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And acknowledging. And acknowledging. And I have been for a while, I just am doing it differently, I guess. I mean, I have been like with my family and my friends and my immediate community. I've been very active and I write poetry. So I have a poetry book that's all about the crash and the immediate aftermath. then 36:12 So, and so then that was came out in 2021. So it's, you know. Was that healing? Oh, it's huge. Yeah, that was. Oh, yeah, it was. It's frightening, of course, but it's extremely healing. And and I think an even more so, I mean, because for me, writing poetry, mean, there is a lot of, of course, there's therapy. But for me, part of the therapy is actually taking the therapy out of the poems so that you don't, you know, like, how does that mean? Well, because if you 36:41 Like a lot of times when you first do like a first draft or a second draft, there's a lot of overwriting and a lot of stuff that doesn't necessarily serve the poem, but it's part of the process of healing. Like you would almost like in a journal or like in therapy writing. So for me then to take that and then to revise it down towards just the essence of emotion that someone, you you, a reader could connect with. 37:09 They're not going to connect with me being like, and then today I was oh just going on and didn't feel like doing this. And the shame came up. You they want you want to it's like creating that piece of art just to evoke the emotion. But revising it down to me was even was very therapeutic. And then sharing it, reading, being at readings and with people. That was when I really knew that this path was more for me is getting the reactions from people. 37:39 and some of the stories from people that, like you said, are very different, but people that have been in situations, where someone was unintentionally killed or hurt. And there's so many examples of that that we did just goes that nobody really knows of, you know, it goes into the radar and there's probably a lot of people with some shame about, you know, in some ways that they don't even realize that they 38:09 have because they think they deserve it. Right. And so I would love to help or at least touch those people and share, have them share with them because I understand that feeling. So, yes, it was extremely therapeutic. then people during my first book launch, you know, because the book doesn't end. There's really no redemption. I kind of left it in very shame filled book because I wanted. 38:36 because shame doesn't get a big stage. I'm like, this is gonna be a book about it. That's okay. But at the book launch, people were asking like, so have you forgiven yourself yet? And how did you do it? And I had by then. And so my second book, which actually comes out on September 6th. So it's out now. It did come out. So it's out now. It's all about forgiveness. And so it was extremely healing to look back at my life through a different lens. 39:05 I had not really looked back and saw what I did right. And so that was extremely healing as well. I feel like this, I don't know if this is true, but for me, feels like shame is so much easier than forgiveness. It's so much easier to live in shame and much harder to live full force forgiveness. And I guess I kind of equate it to 39:33 my teenage years, I did have bouts of depression and stuff from pushing all the grief down. And it was so much easier for me to just stay depressed than it was for me to work my way through and out. So kudos to you for shedding some or all of that shame and finding the forgiveness for yourself, because I know that was not an easy thing to do. 40:03 No, I actually have a poem. Do you know what a katana is? You the Japanese, it's a Japanese sword. Yeah. Yeah. And it's very like painstaking and a long process to actually make one perfect. So I have a poem in the book that's called Learning to Forgive. And it's all about the process of making that sword. Because for me, it's that hard. was for me that difficult. 40:33 ah I can't imagine. mean, I guess I can in a smaller way and we shouldn't compare things. But I mean, I commend you for that because it is it's a journey that is so much harder than just living in. Not to say that shame is easy, but it's it's it's. 40:51 It can be weirdly comfortable to live in a bad state and it just becomes easy after a while. So I think that's really challenging. You I was thinking as you were telling your story is like your story is not really necessarily a before and after. It's almost like a before, a middle and a now in a way, because it feels like that earlier version of you is maybe not. 41:20 that different than the current version of you. But there was this like middle ground in which you kind of lost the ground, you lost the things that maybe were pushing you forward and maybe you're a much more full human now, but it seems like the early version and the current version are maybe more similar than maybe that middle version. Would you say that's true? 41:44 That's a really interesting perspective on that. You can tell me I'm wrong too. That's totally fine. Just curious. Well, it's so when I first met my husband, you know, I would always say like, well, anybody would do this, you know, because he knew how much I was working on it. He's like, no, no, no, no, no. He's like, you're not giving yourself enough credit. This is who you were before. This is the part of you that was there, you know, that whatever it is. 42:12 whether it's just you're tenacious or you just, you know, it's my poet. I always say it's my poet mind that wants to reflect and know things. So he really helped me kind of own the fact that it was me before is part of the person that I am now. So I always, kind of, I first, when the crash first happened, I would, you know, felt like that it was, people say, oh, I have a clean slate. 42:39 Well, for me, mine was broken. It was like a shattered slate. And I had to figure out how to put the pieces back together and to like be an adult. was 20, so I didn't even know what it was like to be an adult. Like, still don't know what it's like to be an adult. luck. Yeah, right. So perhaps, I mean, I think I don't know what my path would have been. You know, that's, I can't know that. So maybe. 43:07 Yeah, I mean, I don't I can't say no, because I do think that I do think that there are definitely pieces of me didn't change who I was. In some in the ways, I think that you were saying, as far as who I am as a person really deep down, I really think it helped me double down on it and also really try to understand like what it meant to live like a uh 43:36 good life, you know, and I use quotes for that, because I didn't know what that meant. And so it turned me into a researcher in a way that I never would have. More intentional living, it seems. Definitely more intentional living. you know, I definitely I got into I'm not a big adopter just on one style or system or anything, but the mindfulness really helped me because I got I was really OCD about making decisions. 44:04 for a long time for, I guess, obvious reasons. And so the mindfulness really actually helped me be aware in the moment, you know? And this is how I spent my 20s. I guess that's the other thing is like, I just spent my 20s. This is what I would do in my, when I wasn't doing anything with anybody else, you know? I'd be thinking about my actions and my intentions and working on my mindfulness just so that I knew I wouldn't be in that situation again. 44:30 So I think it changed, it definitely changed that. I mean, I would not have done any of that. So it definitely made me more intentional and more mindful. I think I went through like that midlife crisis, you know, because I'm really on, because I'm 51. So I'm experiencing that in a different way now and with people around me. Those are the same things I was feeling when I was in my early 20s. And you mentioned the decision making. I didn't even think of that, but like. 44:59 because one seemingly small decision turned into a very big thing in your life, is it hard now or because you have all those practices now, your decision making is, you have more trust in your decisions? Because I would imagine that would kind of fade for a bit or really be scary. Definitely. um I definitely have more trust in myself. 45:27 I've been, you it's been 30 years, so I've been practicing for a long time. I definitely trust myself a lot more. I still work, you know, on my mindfulness and my intentionality and my thinking as much as I can. I mean, I'm not, obviously not perfect before I speak or act, but it's, not as, like, I used to, you know, be very, you know, diligent every moment, every moment. What am I gonna do now? What is this? 45:57 for a while, so I don't have to do that anymore, which is How are you on mistakes and things that happen not the way you want? Are you easy to forgive yourself for any missteps these days? Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's actually one of the easier things for me to do because I've made the biggest mistake. So everything else, I'm like, and if I can forgive myself for that, and I really have adopted, I 46:26 you know, the yielding and the making space for just being human and allowing that. I think it's super important. I don't, I believe in change. don't, you know, we're not a constant thing. So it's gonna, we're gonna do things all the time that we love and that we also aren't a fan of. So. Cause we're human. Yeah. Cause we're human. Yeah. You know, you, you won't love this question, but I'm curious of like 2025. 46:55 Cheryl, if you could sit in that jail cell with Cheryl right after the accident, looking at the wall and feeling like all of your worth is kind of fading away, what would you would you want to say anything to her or do anything with her? 47:13 Mmm. 47:17 I would definitely want to hold her, just let her know she's not alone. I can't say I would want to change anything. I don't want to say, I would go with therapy earlier or I'd be kinder to myself because I don't have regrets. 47:38 I don't regret my life in the path that I chose. I've had a lot of wonderful memories and friends and family and people, so I would never change those things, but I would hold her because she really needed to be held and just tell her she's not alone. Yeah. So I mean, it's the impossible question that I like to ask in a different way or sometimes the same way to a lot of people. And I'll tell you that. 48:05 more often than not, that is the response is like, in those moments, whatever our life shift moments are, especially if they're a traumatic side, we feel so alone and we feel like we might be the only person that will ever understand how this feels. And turns out we're not, but in that moment, it just, all we need is like a hug. We just need like, like I would do the same thing for the eight year old version of me that was like, where is my life going? Like, 48:35 there's nothing left, you know, like, I don't know. If I just, I mean, I'm sure my dad hugged me, but like he was dealing with his own stuff, right? Like, I feel like if I was just able to see an older version of me that still was living, I'd be like, oh wow, look, you've moved, you've made it through. And so sometimes we just need, and I think that's a good lesson for those of us listening or talking is like just showing up for people and seeing people in their moments and holding 49:04 I know this is the phrase of 2025, but holding the space and just being there for them, whatever they're going through. We don't need to fix anything. We can't usually, right? Yeah, no, I agree. I didn't know that was the term of 2025, but I like it. Yeah. It's true. mean, we just need to care for people and show up and be imperfect and just let 49:33 everybody, you let that person know and let ourselves know that we're not alone in this community is so important. And it sounds so cheesy, right? Like, you're not alone. We're here. But like if we can sit there and just be and exist with another person when they're going through something, sometimes that's all they need. But that's actually very difficult. It is like that. We're trained to do it. We're not to be vulnerable and to allow that person to be in a vulnerable state of whatever that emotion is. 50:02 That's it's actually really hard. So I'm all for a movement of sitting with our vulnerabilities. Yeah. Let's do it. Now, if people want to like say they're listening to your story and they really resonate with a certain part of it or they've had something very similar happen to them and they want to reach out to you, connect with you, read your books. What's the best way to find Cheryl? um On my website, it's born wilder dot com. My books are on there. 50:33 I am not a big social media person, though I'm trying to figure out my next step with maybe writing some sub stack or a blog or something. So, but my website is where everything, especially as a web designer, that's my hub. Everything will extend from there, whatever I decide to do, whether it's a speaking engagement or, you know, if I'm reading my book somewhere, but yeah. All Well, I will definitely put that link in the show notes. How do you feel? Do you have a contact form on your website? Like if they want to reach out to you? 51:02 Because I always encourage people, know that you and I know the power of telling our own story and what it does for us. And we've seen people react to it in different ways. So I encourage listeners that maybe they connect with something that we've said and they haven't told someone part of their story. whether you like it or not, I'm going to tell them to reach out to you and share a little bit of their stories because... That would be great. I think they'll feel better and then maybe it'll validate something in your experience that you didn't even know needed validation. 51:31 Yeah, I love it. I've had in this journey of 200 plus episodes, I've had many moments in which I'm like, oh, I totally validated the experience that I thought I was just weird for. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. I love it. Well, bring it. So I encourage anyone listening, please reach out and reach out to me. Whatever whatever you need, we'll connect you to Cheryl and just so thankful that you wanted to go on this life shift journey with me. I. 51:58 didn't know where we were gonna go and I don't know if you did either. So it was a lovely conversation and I think it's things that I wish more people would have is just conversations like this. Thank you so much. Now I really appreciate the questions and the conversation. And the space, you you're holding space, right? That's what this is. And I appreciate that and the opportunity. Thank you. I accept that. And thank you all for listening. 52:27 And with that, I think I'm gonna say goodbye and I'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Thank you so much, Cheryl. Thank you, Matt. 52:46 For more information, please visit www.thelifeshiftpodcast.com