“We get to decide who are we?”
Rochelle Cook
Clinical Hypnotherapist, Author and Co-Founder of Joymind
What happens when the beliefs shaping your life were never really yours to begin with? Clinical hypnotherapist Rochelle Cook joins The Audacious Living Podcast to explore how our inner dialogue influences our choices and why the stories we learned growing up don't have to define who we become.
Episode Summary
Have you ever caught yourself repeating a pattern you promised you'd change? Maybe it's the way you speak to yourself, the relationships you find yourself in, or the automatic assumption that when something goes wrong, you must be responsible.
In this conversation, Audley Stephenson welcomes Rochelle Cook, clinical hypnotherapist, author and co-founder of Joymind, for an honest discussion about the subconscious mind, limiting beliefs and the stories we carry from childhood.
Rochelle explains what she calls the storybook syndrome, her way of describing how early experiences can become deeply familiar beliefs about our worth, relationships and identity. She shares her approach to clinical hypnotherapy, challenges popular misconceptions about hypnosis and offers practical ways to recognize and question the inner critic.
The conversation also gets personal. Rochelle reflects on childhood abandonment, her recovery from brain surgery and her experience undergoing cancer treatment. She describes how self-talk, acceptance and gratitude helped her navigate difficult moments alongside medical care.
Audley brings his own experiences into the discussion, including his tendency to apologize before knowing whether he's actually made a mistake.
At its heart, this episode is about recognizing that what we've learned is not necessarily who we are.
Listen in for a thoughtful conversation about awareness, identity and the quiet courage of choosing a different story.
Key Takeaways
- Question the stories you've inherited. Familiar beliefs about your worth, relationships or abilities may reflect earlier experiences rather than the full truth of who you are today.
- Challenge your inner critic with evidence. When negative self-talk appears, ask whether the thought is supported by facts or driven by assumptions.
- Practice a different internal conversation. Rochelle recommends identifying what disturbs your peace, writing down alternative perspectives and interrupting recurring negative thought patterns.
- Give yourself permission to evolve. Your past experiences can influence your identity without permanently defining your future choices.
Meet the Guest
Rochelle L. Cook, MA, CHt, is a clinical hypnotherapist, author and co-founder of Joymind, a virtual hypnotherapy platform offering personalized sessions with certified practitioners.
With more than two decades of experience, Rochelle works with individuals seeking to understand and change long-standing emotional and behavioural patterns. Her areas of focus include relationships, feelings of abandonment, self-worth, fears and personal development.
She holds a master's degree in Spiritual Psychology from the University of Santa Monica and has training in clinical hypnotherapy, inner child work, depth psychology and other complementary approaches.
Rochelle is the author of The Soul's Coach: 7 Paths to Healing Your Relationship, which explores personal relationships through the lens of learned beliefs and self-understanding.
Her professional approach is also shaped by her own experiences with childhood adversity and serious health challenges. Throughout her work, she emphasizes self-awareness, acceptance and the possibility of choosing a different response to familiar patterns.
Special Offer
The Soul's Coach: 7 Paths to Healing Your Relationship
Rochelle's book explores the beliefs and relationship patterns that can influence how people experience connection, self-worth and personal growth. It provides a deeper introduction to the ideas she discusses in this episode.
Joymind Hypnotherapy
Joymind offers live, one-on-one online hypnotherapy sessions focused on personal growth, confidence, habits and emotional well-being. The service is not a replacement for licensed medical or mental health treatment, and individual experiences may vary.
Explore the services at Joymind
Audley's Personal Insight
One of the things that really stood out to me in this conversation was how easily we can accept something about ourselves without ever stopping to ask whether it's actually true.
I shared a story about a friend who immediately assumed she'd made a mistake on a job assignment simply because someone else approached it differently. I challenged her to consider what evidence she actually had. And the interesting thing is, I recognized a little of myself in that story.
Sometimes, when something goes wrong, I'm already apologizing before I even know whether I had anything to do with it.
That's why I appreciated Rochelle's reminder to challenge our thinking. Living audaciously isn't always about making some grand, dramatic move. Sometimes it's simply having the courage to question a belief we've carried for years.
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