Your body responds to rejection as if your life depends on it. Because for thousands of years it did.

In this episode Lesley unpacks why the longing to belong is not a character flaw, it is ancient wiring. Being excluded from the tribe once meant exposure. Death. Your nervous system has not forgotten this, even though the stakes have changed.

She talks about the real cost of performing for belonging, the last box she checked, the name she traded in, and the moment she finally stopped contorting herself to fit a container that was never made for her shape. And she tells you what real belonging actually looks like and where she finally found it.

In this episode:

· Why rejection still feels like survival, and why that is not weakness

· The body keeps score on loneliness the same way it keeps score on trauma

· Belonging is not a want, it is a need God wired into us

· Fitting in vs. true belonging and the cost of confusing the two

· The podcast program, the rebranded name, and the coming home

· Why belonging is what happens when the performing stops

Something to sit with:

When was the last time you performed for belonging — and what did it cost you?

Come find me.

📩 hello@thekindredjourney.com

📖 Substack — thekindredjourney.substack.com

🎙 Spotify — The Kindred Journey

🎙 Apple Podcasts — The Kindred Journey

▶️ YouTube — youtube.com/@lesleyalberts-i7p

📷 Instagram — @lesley_the_kindred_journey

Remember — you are not alone. You are seen. Heard. Understood. Loved.

LEAVE A REVIEW

If this episode met you somewhere real, leaving a five star review helps more women find their way to this space — and that is part of the healing too.

Share this with the one woman in your life who is wandering, wondering, or quietly longing for more. She might not know she's looking for this yet. But you do. 🤍

A NOTE ON THIS WORK

The Kindred Journey offers coaching, somatic practices, and educational content for personal growth and healing. Everything shared here is based on personal experience and is for informational and educational purposes only.

This is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for any medical concerns.

The Kindred Journey

New episodes every Thursday.

Follow or subscribe wherever you listen so you never miss one.

Remember — you are not alone. You are seen. Heard. Understood. Loved.

EPISODE 66 | Receiving Who You Were Always Made To Be

Your false identity is not something you chose. It is something that formed around your wounds.

This episode is for every woman who has been living inside a story about herself that was never actually hers. We talk about the false identities most of us carry without realizing it, the thought loops on repeat, the limiting beliefs rooted in scarcity, and why shame is not a character flaw but a lie of the enemy.

Lesley shares the moment she received her own true identity — not in her perfectly prepared quiet time, but at a friend's kitchen table, in community. And she offers a framework for understanding why we lead with the wrong identity, how to recognize the false one, and what it actually means to receive the true one.

In this episode: · Why false identity forms around wounds, not choices · The thought loops that keep us living small and why they are lies · Wrong belief about God → wrong belief about self → wrong behavior · Why true identity is received, not achieved · The moment Lesley heard her own true identity· What it means to stop earning and start receiving

Something to sit with: When someone asks who you are, what do you reach for first? That answer is information. Not judgment. Just a starting place on the way back to the truest thing about you.

Resources mentioned: Living Fearless — Jamie Winship

Come find me.

📩 hello@thekindredjourney.com

📖 Substack — thekindredjourney.substack.com

🎙 Spotify — The Kindred Journey

🎙 Apple Podcasts — The Kindred Journey

▶️ YouTube — youtube.com/@lesleyalberts-i7p

📷 Instagram — @lesley_the_kindred_journey

Remember — you are not alone. You are seen. Heard. Understood. Loved.

What happens when your body starts screaming what your mind refuses to hear?

This episode is one of the most personal ones yet. Lesley opens with the season she rarely talks about — her first solo summer as a mother of two, an overwhelmed nervous system, coping mechanisms she didn't yet have words for, and the moment a bag of spilled rice brought her to her knees.

From there she moves into the wide spectrum of dissociation — what it looks like to live entirely from the neck up, why high-functioning numbness is still numbness, and why the coping mechanisms you're most ashamed of were once the most brilliant parts of you.

She also tells the story of the camping trip — anxiety crashing in the middle of the wilderness, the place that was supposed to feel like sanctuary, being dismissed by the people she loved most, and the quiet shift that happened when she got home.

This episode closes with a guided somatic grounding practice. She is not sending you away with information. She is bringing you back into your body before you go.

In this episode:

· Operating from the neck up and the cost of disconnection

· The spectrum of dissociation — from dramatic to high-functioning

· Coping mechanisms as survival strategies — brilliant, not broken

· The body keeps score — trauma stored in tissue, not just memory

· The camping trip and the particular loneliness of being dismissed

· Talk therapy vs. somatic healing

· The July 19th breadcrumb — following the nudge that changed everything

· A guided grounding practice to bring you home

Something to sit with:

What breadcrumb have you been ignoring? What is your body trying to tell you that you haven't been willing to hear yet?

Come find me:

📩 hello@thekindredjourney.com

📖 Substack — thekindredjourney.substack.com

🎙 Spotify — The Kindred Journey

🎙 Apple Podcasts — The Kindred Journey

▶️ YouTube — youtube.com/@lesleyalberts-i7p

📷 Instagram — @lesley_the_kindred_journey

Interested in working together? Book a connection call:

tidycal.com/kindredjourney/connection

LEAVE A REVIEW

If this episode met you somewhere real, leaving a five star review helps more women find their way to this space — and that is part of the healing too.

Share this with the one woman in your life who has been pushing through, numbing out, or wondering why she feels anxious in places that should feel safe. Her body is not broken. It is just waiting for her to come home to it. 🤍

A NOTE ON THIS WORK

The Kindred Journey offers coaching, somatic practices, and educational content for personal growth and healing. Everything shared here is based on personal experience and is for informational and educational purposes only.

This is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for any medical concerns. You are responsible for your own wellbeing — and you are capable of it.

The Kindred Journey

New episodes every Thursday.

Follow or subscribe wherever you listen so you never miss one.

Remember — you are not alone. You are seen. Heard. Understood. Loved.