E111 Nicole Sung Uni Student Exploring Wellness
Let’s Be Well Together Podcast - Episode 111
Date: March 12, 2024
Participants: John Webster, Elise Seifert, Cameron Earnshaw and Sheila Webster
Guest: Nicole Sung
Start Times and Segments:
[0:00:35] What’s On Your Mind: We share thoughts about a quote: “The world is changed by examples, not by opinions.” – Paulo Coelho. It’s a life lesson that’s become important to John.
[0:09:05] Expanding Minds Interview: [Wellness in General] Nicole Sung is a 4th year University of Waterloo student who passion in exploring wellness to enhance others, and her own life. She las lived in many countries while studying over the past 8 years. This helped her gain a unique perspective. She became interested in wellness because of a painful experience from high school. Her mom influenced her to think more on the positive side, to be okay saying things out loud even if it’s scary, and to vocalize your needs so that other people can help you. Nicole remembers and reminds that we’re all human beings – a work in progress. Through her Instagram wellness page, @wellnesswithnics, she hopes to share the same passion with others – to view and live life moment by moment. She highlights highs and lows in life, avoiding the trend to highlight only positives. Strengthening and conditioning positive thoughts and optimism leads to positive outcomes. Nicole hopes to be a beacon of light to others, because she experienced lows in life and knows what it felt like to be in a negative state. She hopes to help someone, because she wasn’t able to gain that sort of help when she was younger.
[0:24:05] Adventures of the Starving Artist: Cameron’s band experiences glitches and challenges before a show. They sorted them out. Someone who jumped in to help had a pre-show shoutout he hadn’t heard before – “all right boys, I want heads up hockey tonight!”
[0:29:36] Move That Body: There are lots of winter activities that can get us movin’ that body.
[0:35:21] Running Popup: Quietening the mind and body helps. It takes things to another level by creating with quality for its own sake, not for money or praise or anything else.
[0:37:17 ] Flipside of the Coin: It was hard to predict what would happen on the tv show White Lotus. It threw us for a loop. Why oh why didn’t some of the couples communicate better?
Quotes and Take-Aways:
Nicole – @wellnesswithnics [Instagram] started in January 2022, during the pandemic. Not a lot of people resonate with the topic of wellness and positivity.
Nicole – Positivity is an attitude I express. I hope to have that optimistic outlook on everything I do.
Nicole – [When asked whether it’s challenging to put herself out there by sharing personal stories and experiences] Challenges will always come with a sense of vulnerability and risk, because you’re putting yourself out there. You’re putting content out there for people to hopefully resonate with. The fear of judgment definitely creeps up sometimes, and how people will perceive and articulate your content.
Nicole – [In sharing experiences on social media] It’s important to highlight the balance between highs and the lows in life, not using social media in a negative way to only highlight the positives and only highlights the highs. That’s something we sometimes forget about.
Nicole – With @wellnesswithnics, I hope to be a beacon of light to others, because I know what it felt like and I’ve experienced the lows in life, and being in the negative state. I hope to help someone, because I wasn’t able to gain that sort of help when I was younger.
Nicole – I hope to continue to create content from the heart and hopefully it resonates with other people. I hope to gain more experiences, meet new people and connect with likeminded people.
Nicole – The strengthening and conditioning of positive thoughts will lead to positive outcomes. It’s hard to live positively sometimes, so it’s good to have that reminder to keep us going.
Nicole – I’m reading the book The Untethered Soul by Michael A. Singer. They talk about having a choice every day, to choose whether you live life happy or live life sad. It’s really important to remember and remind ourselves that we have the choice to open our heart or close it, and how we choose to view the world through our senses. Moments are fleeting. People are fleeting.
John – It would be nice if younger people started getting interested in wellness, because they’re at a time in their lives where they have a lot of creativity and ingenuity flowing. We might come up with great ideas about wellness if we can get a lot younger people talking more about it.
Nicole – Wellness is a life skill that universities or institutions don’t usually teach us. We just need to learn on our own, in our own time, or through social media platforms.
John – My approach to wellness is very practical. It tries to demystify the process. I talk different categories of wellness, activities that foster each category that you can actually name and do, then finding balance between them, which is also an activity. It would be nice if we could start making the topic more approachable, including teaching some of these basic things at university or even earlier.
Nicole – I became interested in wellness because of a very painful experience from middle school – high school. I experienced bullying at that time – dark moments. It was my mom who influenced me to think more on the positive side, to be okay saying things out loud even if it’s scary, and to vocalize your needs so that other people can help you. Spiritually, it’s helped me grow more as a person and understand more about myself, and the inner trauma narratives that I told myself when I was younger. Just reminding and remembering that we’re all human beings – a work in progress.
Bulletin Board Quote brought to you by John: It made me intellectually uncomfortable, a lot
Guest Information: Nicole Sung is a 4th year University of Waterloo student in Communication Studies. She finds passion in exploring aspects of wellness to enhance others, and her own life. Her unique storytelling abilities looks to balance and sparks connection with those around her. Nicole las lived in many countries, while she’s being studying, ever since she was 14 years old. This helped her gain a unique perspective about the world around her. Through her Instagram wellness page, she hopes to share the same passion with others – to view and live life moment by moment.
Nicole’s Instagram page: @wellnesswithnics
Connect with Let’s Be Well Together Podcast:
website: https://letsbewelltogether.com
Follow our Instagram account: @lets.be.well.together use hashtag #letsbewelltogetherpodcast
Provide input on Instagram using hashtag #letsbewelltogetherinput
Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/Lets.Be.Well.Together