How Being Sick Can Save Your Life and be a Blessing in Disguise

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I'm delighted to introduce our guests today, Jennifer Takagi. After a stellar career in the housing industry, Jennifer fulfilled her dream to start her own business as a speaker and trainer. She is certified as a success principles trainer, a professional behavioral analyst, a change style indicator facilitator, law of attraction, advanced wealth practitioner, and coaching specialist. She's also a five time Amazon Kindle best selling author. She has facilitated training workshops to the state of Oklahoma, many associations, nonprofits, federal government agencies and corporations. Jennifer has traveled the country training teams to work more effectively together. And today, she has spoken to more than 12,000 leaders and emerging leaders. Most recently, Jennifer has completed the training and practice to become a certified soul Care Coach. Using this training, she will assist leaders in using intuition to become truly authentic leaders. Welcome, Jennifer.

Hello, we're so happy to have you here with us. I am absolutely delighted to have a very special guest today. I mean, they're all special. But Jennifer, who you just learned about is here with us today. And I'll tell you when I first met Jennifer and I heard her story, I was so impressed in her ability and how she moved through adversity and how she moves through some of the experiences that she's had in her life. So I'm just delighted to have her here with us today. And welcome.

Hello, DeeAnne. I'm just so honored to be here. Thanks so much for having me as a guest.

It is such a delight. And I already know the story about well one of them when spirit called you. But I'd love for you to share with our audience today, what your experience was what you went through when spirit really spoke loudly to you. And we'll talk a little bit more about what you learned from that too. So I'm going to leave it over to you or send it over to you so that you can share a bit about your story and what you went through.

Awesome. Thanks. I was born on Monday. And my first time in church was the following Sunday. So I've always known God, you can call it Mother Earth Spirit, whatever. I call him God. And for me, he's a he but that's not a sexist thing. It just is what your traditions are. And I've always known and I've always known the power of prayer. I've been disappointed over the years when the answer was no and later found out. That was probably a good response. But the time he is talking about that the story she wanted me to share was probably the biggest, most monumental, impactful event that happens. And I woke up sick, I had been sick a couple of days had bronchitis. Or back in the day, you never went to the doctor you just ate whatever over the counter medicine you could get and just got sicker and sicker until you finally got well. And I had bronchitis and I was sick. And I woke up one morning, Wednesday morning, and I was terrible. I it was all in my chest and my throat and I kept thinking I have got to go to work but God just feel so bad. And don't judge me people. Please don't judge me but I smoked and when you smoke it doesn't matter how sick you are, you are going to light a cigarette and you're gonna smoke it. But it's a thing. If you've never smoked good for you better here's the deal quit judging people who do because once you light one that's kind of it. So I'm sitting at the kitchen table smoking cigarettes, drinking a glass of juice. And I'm debating go to work or stay home and but you have that measure. Am I sick enough to stay home kind of like when you were a kid at school, your mom would say you don't have a fever. You're going to school, right? Like how sick Am I in the softest, most gentle voice said stay home and take care of yourself. And I just felt engulfed in love and warmth and security and it was like maybe I should stay home. And immediately this voice came through that was very harsh. It was very critical, very judgmental, you need to go to work.

That was probably the ego mind, right? That Dreaded ego mind.

And so there's a gentle voice steps back in and says, Stay home, take care of yourself. Then the ego, mind, Satan, whatever whomever starts in, this is April, you have a deadline of September 30 that nobody in the country is going to make and you think you are you better get to work. A colleague is getting married and you're on the committee with well, committee, you're with a group of gay vows putting the shower together, give a luncheon today, you have got the tablecloth, the paper towel, paper plates, the napkins, everything in your car, everybody's expecting you to show you have to go to work. Okay, so not only is the ego being judgmental, I've got my laundry list of things to do. I mean, it just keeps piling on. And the calm, gentle voice comes back in and says, stay home and take care of yourself. So finally, I decided to have a couple is, so I call Teresa, my boss's secretary. And she answered the phone and it's probably 730 in the morning. And I was like she said, You sound horrible. You're not coming to work, are you? And I said, I'm gonna stay home a little longer. I'm going to take a hot shower. I'm going to try to be there by noon for this luncheon meeting. And she goes, yeah, we'll see you tomorrow. That was the last time I ever spoke to treat them. Because a couple hours later at 902 a m, a bomb went off a truck bomb and blew up the calm steady Murrah Federal Building,

Oh, I just want to take a moment there to just let that soak in. Because like, I'm just covered in goosebumps. And I heard you share the story a couple times now. And it's still like, it just moves me so much. Because you were supposed to be there in that building at that time. So it's a pretty powerful. Oh, my goodness, Thank gosh, you listen to that voice that said, stay home and take care of yourself. And I just want to allow the audience a moment to just take that in. Yeah, Jennifer was supposed to go to work and she was sick. And she didn't go and a bomb exploded her building where she lost. Why don't you share the colleagues that you lost in that experience?

Yeah, there were 168 killed in the bombing. And there were 35 from my office killed. And we had two new employees that I didn't know and hadn't met. But the other 33 Not only did I know I had worked with and I was friends with so yeah, it was catastrophic. We had, there was a big, early out early retirement thing that happened in March. And so we had quite a few people that obviously were saved because they had chosen to retire that we will probably had on that day, I'm gonna say about 120 employees. And then 35 of them were worker killed. Yeah.

But so amazing. These are things that are so miraculous and that you weren't there. And you didn't have to experience any death or injury at least. But there's trauma still attached to that, because you've now lost a lot of people that you knew and cared for. And so what was that process like for you after? Did you go into like, grief or denial? Did you feel guilty that you weren't at work? And so you didn't have to be there with all of them? What was that aftermath of that?

I'll start with the survivor's guilt syndrome, because that is very true for many people. And it shows up in so many ways, like I had I still to this day, have people say, I was gonna go downtown that day, but I didn't or I would have been killed to. Okay. Okay. And then I've had people say, Oh, how guilty you must have felt, how did you move on like you had to have been consumed? Well, I'm very fortunate. Again, I already said born on a Monday, first time in churches the next Sunday, and in the Old Testament, which is history versus religion, really, in my opinion, anyway, it says God knew the number of days you would walk this earth before you ever saw one. So I knew instantaneously once I found out it was actually my building that had been bombed, because of it. Originally, I was told it was the building across the street. So took a few minutes to get the air helicopters in there to show us what actually happened. But I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt, I was not supposed to be there. So I never had any survivor's guilt, I did have a little situation where people would say things like, Oh, God saved you for a reason, you're going to do something great with your life. And I was like, Holy crap, I just want to go to work and get a paycheck. I like

The pressure of that, right? this, and now you're meant to do what we do to ourselves, right?

Or let other people do to you. Yeah, I've never in my mind, I just knew I wasn't supposed to be there. My parents were out of town. They did not find out until 11 o'clock at night, that anything that even happened much less that their baby was involved, right? My dad had worked there. And he and his best friend had retired about I don't know how many months apart. But of the 35 people killed all but the two new people have either been hired by my dad, or worked for my dad, or worked with him on projects at some point. So my father was impacted as greatly as I was. But it I mean, now, like you're here for great reasons. And I'm like, No, like I did, it was just automatic reject button. Fast forward. I'm in a Bible study class, because the one thing I couldn't really wrap my head around was why my friends had to die. Like, why was it her day and not mine, not like I was guilty that I live, but like the lack of understanding. And I was at this conference, and this gentleman said, God is always trying to talk to you. But we have other things going on, and we can't hear. And I thought, That's it. I was sitting at the table, dead silence. I was completely open to whatever came through. There was not a radio on a TV, nothing. I was by myself, it was perfectly quiet. I could hear I had friends that were in meetings, they weren't going to be able to hear, I had friends that were on the phone. Like one lady, I've heard this story that literally she was on the phone. And the person on the other end said the phone just went dead. And she perished. And so that gave me an immense amount of comfort to have that understanding that if you're not still in quiet, you can't hear spirit screaming at you get out of the way, get out of the way. I know that leads to people who were in the bathrooms, and they were completely uninjured. Because the bathrooms were interior rooms, they were solid granite, they were completely protected. Somebody else was in the stairwell what better place to be than a stairwell. So there were some like coinkidink II kind of things where people were that survived. But in a situation like that, you can't hear you can apply that to anything. If you're not still you can't hear the message.

Jennifer, I love where you went with this. Because I think it's such a profound piece in our world today. And we know that we've gotten caught up in the rat race, haven't we? It's like we're doing society instead of a being society. And so this idea of this quiet, or this stillness for us, I think is so critical. And it's part of the massive shift that's happening globally right now, too, because I think if one thing COVID Did do for us is that it allowed us to go inside a little bit, it allowed us to have some of that more quiet, we weren't driving to get to work, we weren't doing all the things that we normally would do, right. And so it really allow for some of that quietness, to come in. And so what I'm seeing as a spiritual mentor is that a lot of people are coming in, they're saying, Oh, my God, I'm getting this. And I'm getting this. And now I don't know what to do with this intuition. And so now that we're moving into that next phase, but if people could just be still and listen, and I think that this story is such a testament to the power of that listening to quieting the mind to quieting what's happening around you in your environment, as well, and creating that space in which you can receive that divine information. So I think that's brilliant. You also said something else really profound that I really loved. And it was before you even live one day, God already knows how many days are going to live is something to that effect that it didn't I butchered that quote, but you get the idea. And I think that's really powerful as well because I think we do tend to get kind of wrapped up in the fear. Would you agree with that? Jennifer that like fear is such a I mean, you even had your ego mind fear coming in, oh my god, I got all this stuff to do, and I gotta meet the deadline. And that's fear, right? And so fear is one of those pieces that can get really noisy. And it's what distracts us from the Divine information from God or spirit, whatever it is that's trying to get through. So do you have any tips for anyone around fear? Because even you going through a trauma experience and losing all those people that you love to that? Did you have any fear about going into work after that or fear of losing people that you loved or cared about? Did that come up for you at all?

Yeah, aren't we so good at doing that we have this bad experience. And then so we decide that the next experience is going to be like that is going to be bad, too. Right? And so then we set ourselves up almost for this decline. things to happen. It's like waiting for the other shoe to drop. You know that same where it's like, oh, everything is so great, but things are gonna get really crappy soon because they always do right Right. And so we have this way of thinking about life, don't we? I love that you brought that up, because I think that's something to shake up a little bit in our thought process.

Yeah, I mean, who says it's gonna get worse. And I remember having a conversation with you, gosh, I don't know how many months ago, I was not getting COVID into story on I'm not I reject this, I wash my hands, I wear a mask where I have to, I'm not getting COVID. And last year Thanksgiving in America as the end of November, and I got COVID. And I was very sick. I never went to the hospital that like, I hurt so bad. I couldn't get off the couch. I ran a fever for days. It was terrible. I never want to experience that again. Thankfully, I didn't go to hospital. Thankfully, it wasn't in my lungs. And I remember telling you, this is ridiculous. Because I was never going to eat COVID like brushing them off, not doing it. And you said, just think how sick you could have been. If you lived in fear that you were going to get it. Because you could have ended up in the hospital and on the ventilator and dead. And then yeah, it's I had just so vehemently rejected it. Obviously, I was exposed and I caught it. But it was not nearly as bad as it could have been. So I am too trusting. I have a personality profile test that says that I am entirely too trusting of people, I assume you have my best interests at heart. And when you don't, I'm a little bit heartbroken about that, or a lot bit depending on the circumstances. But I'm you like I am not a fear based person. And I refuse to live that way. And I'm not gonna and I've gotten real judgmental about people who are and just tell them flat out. I don't even want to hear that. I offended a girlfriend because she told me how Satan had taken over the world. I was winning. And I was like, I'll never win. I don't even know why you're saying that. And I can't even hear those words. And she got all butthurt and pissed off. But I came in here anymore. The world is a great place. It's a magical place. There's so much more to learn so much more to explore. Do I have bad days? Yes, yes. Yeah. Do you think it's not always go my way? Probably more often than I want to admit. But I'm happy living in my optimistic bubble of, you know, somebody said something about what would you ever do if there were another bombing you were involved in? And I said, I don't have to worry about that. Because it will never happen to me again. I know as if I know, I'm going to take my next breath. I will never have to live through that. Again.

Again, I want to commend you on this idea, this concept that you believe that everyone has your best interests at heart. Because to be honest, I would much rather have that perspective on life that everyone always has my back, everyone is always meant to help me to support me to love me. And yes, it bites us sometimes. But I'm way rather to have that thought in that belief than to have one that everyone's out to get me. Because if I have the one that's everyone out to get me, oh my gosh, I'm not going to be living at all right?

What do you focus on, you get more of everybody's out to get you they're coming in droves.

This is exactly the point here. Because, Jennifer, I think that again, with you, we allow the fear to create the narrative, and we allow it to control us. But the truth is, is that that's our ego mind, the ego mind doesn't rule the roost does it, we have control over that ego mind. And so we have a lot more power over that. So I want to allow it to be part of the message today for the listeners, for them to recognize that they have the power to shift that thinking and they can choose if they want to choose to focus on negativity and things going sideways and when the next bad thing is going to happen. So be it but they're gonna miss out, they're going to miss out on joy, they're going to miss out on being present, they're going to miss out on so much because of that. So that is not to induce any type of fear and people to say, oh my god, if I don't get rid of fear, I'm in big trouble. It's a practice people. And I still have to work on that. I'm not free of fear. Jennifer, Jennifer is a little bit more free of fear than I am even she's just one of those like warrior goddesses, right? But nonetheless, nonetheless, though fears gonna come up. The point is how we respond to the fear. And I do believe that if we can look at fear as a gateway of possibility, who what's on the other side of that that's scary to me. But what could that look like? Or if I change how I look at this, how does it change everything. And so that's an invitation. And you also said something else that was really profound and I want to just highlight that before we wrap up today. Use when you were talking about your grandmother, she says go always speaks gently. And with grace, something like that, again, butchering your quotes. But nonetheless, there is something to be said about that. And so oftentimes, I'm sure you have this in your coaching practice as well, Jennifer, you know, where people come in, they're like, Oh, I just like, you know, I don't know how to tell whether it's my ego mind, or whether it's my intuition what's actually speaking to me here. And I think that what you share today was really powerful, because it's an indication of what is speaking what. And so when something comes in with graceful and joy of guidance and navigation and telling us something that we need to look at. It's not supposed to be fear based, it's not supposed to be angry. It's supposed to be gentle and kind and loving. And so that is a bit of a tip for everyone listening today, if you're really struggling between Okay, is that my ego talking is that someone else talking is that intuition talking, when spirit when God works through us, it's gentle, and it's kind, and it will definitely lead us down the right path. So Jennifer, I want to give you a chance for any last words of wisdom to share with everyone today. And if you let them know how to reach you, as well, as you've heard in her bio, she does have incredible programs around leadership and as a wonderful coach. So Jennifer, last words of wisdom and how they can reach you, if we want to find you.

Well, I love what you said about we have a choice, and we can wake up every day. And when we stub our toe, we can tell ourselves, that's the way my whole day is gonna go. And you will literally create a whole day of running into traffic spilling coffee on your blouse, being late to a meeting, the computer goes down, you literally create that, yeah, or you can stub your toe and say, Oh, thank goodness, I got that out of the way, it's going to be a great day, and move on. And so it's our choice how we want to do things. My website is to takagiconsulting.com . And it is being upgraded right now should be ready by the time this airs world. So there should be links to be able to schedule a discovery call with me, see what you're doing what I have to offer if there was a fifth there. I do Akashic readings, I have kind of bundled together Akashic greetings with some heart healing and some Reiki. And so it's kind of a fun little session to put it all together. And, you know, you can't break it all down, like exactly what's going to happen, because everybody has different stuff in their life. But my biggest invitation to people is be open to the possibility of the good in the world.

Yes, be open to the possibility of the good in the world. So that was just so brilliant. Jennifer, you are such a great speaker and you bring such life and energy to all your talks that you do. So we will have to do this again. So folks, a gain to takagiconsulting.com , and that is takagiconsulting.com. Go and check that out. If you feel called today, take advantage of Jennifer's beautiful opportunity for you to do a discovery call with her. And folks, we will see you again next time and hear from you again next time on our next episode of when Spirit calls. Thank you so much, Jennifer.

Thank you so much for having me.

Bye for now everyone.