The Body Of Change:
Using Your Body to Heal Love and Empower Yourself

Dr. Lisa Cooney, PhD, LMFT, is a renowned expert in personal transformation and trauma recovery, specializing in Soul Therapy, Life Coaching, and Spiritual Transformation. As the creator of the transformative Live Your ROAR®️ method, she has empowered thousands to break free from the chains of childhood abuse and embrace a “Radically Orgasmically Alive Reality” (ROAR®️). Dr. Lisa is the author of The Lies of Money, Radically Alive Beyond Abuse, Creating After Abuse, and The Body of Change, each offering powerful insights and tools for personal growth and healing. Her “I’m Having It!… No Matter What!” philosophy guides individuals to choose their own path, commit to growth, collaborate with the universe, and create the life they desire.

That all it takes to change is a one degree shift. Anyone can take one action or a one degree shift and simply start where you are.

More about Dr. Lisa Cooney at https://www.drlisacooney.com/

 

The Interview Transcript

Hugh Ballou:
Welcome to the Nonprofit Exchange. This is Hugh Ballou. I’m the founder and president of SynerVision Leadership Foundation. Our job is transforming leaders, transforming organizations, transforming lives. And right in that sweet spot, my guest today, Dr. Lisa Cooney is gonna share some important information with us that will help you be a better leader. Before we get into the topic, I’m gonna ask Dr. Cooney if she would say a little bit about herself. Topic the title for today is the body of change using your body to heal love and empower yourself Dr. Lisa, welcome to the show tell people a little bit about yourself and your passion for your work

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
Absolutely. Thank you so much for the introduction, Hugh. Thank you for having me here. And hello, everybody out there. I hope what I have to share today is a contribution to you. That is my intention. So my name is Dr. Lisa Cooney. I’m an originally, not an originally, I am originally from New York, transplanted now into Texas, and I live between Texas and Mexico City. which is quite fun. Spent a fair amount of time, two decades, had a clinic in San Francisco, California. And the clinic that I had was more in the psychological, physiological, psycho-spiritual and the energy psychology healing modalities, let’s say. I work with people with, for the last 30, moving toward 33 years now, people individually, families, couples, both men and women. I’m licensed as a marriage and family therapist throughout the United States and many different states, as well as I have a energy healing master’s degree in theta healing. I also hold a doctorate in psychology. specifically. So I weave the spiritual and the energetic together. And that’s what I’ve been doing predominantly in the areas of trauma, addiction, recovery, productivity in the workplace or an individual’s work. I work with a lot of entrepreneurs. And my ministry, what brought me into this work now for all these decades, Really, I have a huge heart and I care. And I also was someone who required the work that I do now. And it took a lot of trials and tribulations to find the people, places, circumstances and events that led me on my healing path. And now I just give back and do the same.

Hugh Ballou:
That’s a lesson in itself. Be dedicated and don’t give up. So before I get to my questions, you were kind enough to send me a copy of your book, The Body of Change. Would you talk a little bit about what inspired you to write the book and why people should have it?

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
This book was very interesting, and thank you for asking me, Hugh. It is actually my fourth book. And this book was all about the body. And what I wanted to do with that is I actually started it around 2017, I believe it was. And it was only published in 2024. So it’s been sitting with me for a while. And I wanted it to be something for people to carry. It’s small enough to carry in your hand. put in a briefcase, maybe put in a backpack, or even put in a woman’s purse. And maybe you’re going to a coffee shop, open it up. In the back, there’s a whole workbook, a journal workbook, where you can ask yourself and answer questions, so to speak. They are reflective of each chapter, let’s say. And I wanted it to be like a guide to be your own inner physician. Because I think in this world, and especially since COVID, at least I’ve noticed this for myself, I don’t really have to see people if I don’t want to. I could do everything online. And even though I’m seeing you here now, Hugh, which is wonderful, and I love technology for that reason, I consider it like talking about the body. As we sit on Zoom, I have to pay attention to my body, because I do this 8, 10, and 12 hours a day, every day. And so I noticed that I got really disconnected from my body in those first six months of COVID. And that wasn’t good for me in what I do and in my presence. And so I started to change that. Now the book takes that a whole other level and really gets you to start dialoguing and knowing what you feel inside. And to make it easier, what’s your yes and what’s your no? And how do you know you’re yes or no? Maybe doesn’t count. Because I always say when someone says, well, maybe, kind of, sort of, I said, can you be a little pregnant? No, you either are or you’re not. That’s what I do. That’s why I wrote this book. And more on a personal note, I actually was very sick. And I got sick at the age of 30. And at that time, I went only to allopathic medicine. This is way before this book came about. And the doctor was doing what they were supposed to do, because it was an endocrinologist and just focused on the endocrine system. Okay, that’s what happens here in America. I understand you have expertise and I believe that, but in my gut, here’s the body of change, in my gut, I knew what this doctor was telling me was right for what, just the endocrine system, but wasn’t right for my body. And so I told him, thank you for your time, I, there has to be another way. Cause he gave me three choices that I wouldn’t have these organs essentially that I have now. If I stayed with that doctor, I kept my organs. And I said, I have to find another way. He said, you won’t. And I said, I will. And I will not come back and see you. And I didn’t. Did I know what the other option was at that time? No, but I had a very strong feeling in my gut, the body of change. And lo and behold, within three to six months after that doctor meeting, I found a healing institute, which I eventually got my master’s in, in energy healing. And I walked out of that institute without the disease.

Hugh Ballou:
That is such a pivotal story. I commend you. Take charge of your own life and don’t abdicate to somebody else. Yes. You talked about that in your book a little bit, but you also talk about the patterns of the four Ds, denying, defending, disconnecting, and associating. Yes. Can you expand on that a little bit for our listeners?

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
Absolutely. So the four Ds is like, imagine like a cage on top of you. It’s not very, and some of you aren’t going to have to imagine this because if you feel really, if you wake up and you feel really, really heavy and like you’re dragging 2000 pounds in your head, or just your body, your legs, your arms just feel heavy. I’m not talking about physical weight. It’s just like an energetic weight, a dead weight where it feels like you’re just trudging through quicksand. That’s a version of living in your own invisible cage. And it has four bars. One is denying, one is defending, one is dissociating, think of it behind you, and one is disconnecting. And it just fits right over you. And what I found is when people came to me in my office, let’s say on Zoom, and they would tell me about whatever’s going on, addiction, depression, anxiety, a sickness, a divorce, a bankruptcy, hard childbirth, conflicts in the marriage, doesn’t matter what it is, it would fit under three topics, relationships, health, and money. And then everybody’s story would be different. But those are the three topics I’ve learned in over 30 years now of working with people. And whatever their presenting issue was, I could find the awareness, let’s say, and to guide my client by paying attention to the invisible cage of abuse and these four Ds. So it really depended on what the client was telling me. what the client was telling me as they’re presenting problem, did it appear more as completely dissociated? What would that look like? I actually worked with somebody who, this is a painful word, but who was R-A-P-E-D at one point when they were very young, raped very young. And the only thing they remember about that event was that it ruined their coat, brand new coat, that they got for Christmas. That’s dissociation. So they were upset at the action for the ruining the coat, but they had no connection to what happened to their body. But they knew it in their mind what had happened. That’s dissociating. It’s a very severe form. Disconnecting is a little, still painful and tragic, but it’s not as lethal as, or can be as lethal as dissociation. So you’re like, you had an argument with your partner, you go to Whole Foods or somewhere, Sprouts or something like that, and you yell at the cash register person or the person in front of you because they’re too slow, because you were upset with your husband. That’s a little bit of like disconnecting, let’s say. What was the other one? Defending, oh, I didn’t do that. No, no, no, they did this, they did this, they did this. Oh, no, no, no, they got it wrong. That’s not what I said. You defend. And deny is like, I always say, even though it’s not the perfect acronym, denial. Don’t even know I am lying. So don’t even know I am lying. And you get a lot of that with addictive family systems, or even like rageaholic family systems and things like that. family secrets. And so once I can identify what somebody’s dealing with, I can guide them through how one example of what they’re dealing with hits these four D’s, and then it covers them. So everything in the outside world that comes in internal goes through the four Ds, denying, defending, dissociating, disconnecting, which actually is the truth to what they’re feeling and experiencing inside, but it isn’t necessarily the truth about what’s coming toward them externally, because they have that filter system and their filter’s a little dirty with the invisible cage of abuse.

Hugh Ballou:
What you’re helping me with is self-awareness.

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
Yes.

Hugh Ballou:
So in your book, you talk about micro shifts. We think that we got to make these big deal changes, but the daily micro shifts rather than the dramatic overhauls, talk about that a little bit.

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
I love that, the micro shifts, one degree shifts. I realized even for myself that if I couldn’t do the big thing, let’s say, I don’t know, maybe get out of a million dollars worth of debt, right? Let’s just say that as an example. If I couldn’t do that today, what is one small action I could take today to hit that, to deflate that debt or to feel empowered that I can actually deal with it? Maybe it’s not spending money. Maybe it’s just for today. Maybe it’s hiring somebody to handle your books. Maybe it’s talking to a debt consolidation person. Maybe it’s finding somebody to lend you the money or a zero APR, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Whatever it is, but those are just one, make a call, send an email, talk to somebody about it, get a therapist, go to Debtors Anonymous. There’s even business debtors anonymous. You know, you can do, it doesn’t have to be a stigma that there’s something wrong with you. Cause all that does is keep you in don’t even know I am lying denial. So take one action.

Hugh Ballou:
Take one action. That’s most areas of life. I teach that on setting goals. You know, one thing, what’s one thing you can do today to make a difference? Talk about, you talk about radical aliveness and you have a trademark of ROAR, R-O-A-R. That’s fascinating.

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
Yes, I, so ROAR is an interesting, that’s my labor of love very, very clearly. And that’s really a deep part of my ministry. And it’s specifically my signature series that I created to work with traumas and abuse. And I called it ROAR because in order to heal from these sorts of violations of trauma and abuse and more of the egregious sexual assaults sorts of, well, sexual assaults. I don’t need to say anything more than that. But not specifically, I also work this, the ROAR method with veterans. I worked a lot with Secret Service veterans and those sorts of things, as well as people that were just put on these random wonderful things to keep our country safe. And the things that they have seen and gone through and the traumas that they have suffered to keep us safe, I really wanted to give back. And so I worked and put myself a lot in that community also to help them. and to work through what people have seen in war as well as being kidnapped or sexually trafficked or assaulted even in family systems where family systems don’t want to even acknowledge that there was assault going on or that there was abuse. You have to have a tenacity and a ferocity of consciousness to stay true to your knowing and some people actually have to leave their family systems never to reunite again because they will never be believed. Those are the worst case scenarios, and I’ve been through thousands of them with clients, and it’s horrific. But that’s where Roar came from, to get that ferocity like a lion and be like, I am going to roar into my truth. Doesn’t mean like biting off the head of somebody else or killing anybody. Cancel, clear, delete. It just means I need to dredge that up inside of me so that I can believe myself and move through this and heal. Because as we see with the world, perpetration in a lot of ways politically is a I don’t even want to get so much politically, but in the world, it’s allowed. Even though so many people say they hate it and there’s so many laws against it, it is allowed. It is allowed, that’s all I’m gonna say on that.

Hugh Ballou:
It’s amazing, it is amazing. So I got time for another question here. So these are so helpful, Lisa. Thank you. It’s not us, it’s somebody we know, somebody in our, the leaders on our teams, our volunteers and our nonprofits, our churches, you know, there’s people in our communities that we need to be sensitive to some of these themes and be educated on them.

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
Absolutely.

Hugh Ballou:
So talk about fear to freedom. You’ve written, all it takes is the courage to face your past. How do you encourage someone who feels overwhelmed by trauma or fear to take the first step toward freedom and embodiment?

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
That’s beautiful. I will never ask somebody to go back to their past and deal with it on an emotional level until they’re ready to do so. So as a trauma-informed therapist, which I happen to be also, you have to assess what a person’s ego strength is, they call it, and where they are in their healing. First of all. And so I will tell somebody that first and foremost, like, we’ll go back if we need to go back when you’re ready to go back. And that creates safety. I want to create safety and rapport with my clients, especially if they have trauma, so that if we’re going to go, we’re going to get in and we’re going to get out. And we’re not going to recapitulate the trauma. That’s first and foremost. And really what everybody needs is the acronym of HOW. Honesty, openness, and willingness. If somebody is honest, is open, and is willing to face and turn and look back, 50% of the problem is healed because you already know what skeletons are in your closet. It’s what you don’t know that is actually informing your subconscious, which is actually most likely limiting your life in the present. So largely what I mean by that, going back to the past to get free, is before you were, let’s just say abused or even addicted or stuck in something, you were not that. Before it was, you weren’t. And most people forget that they were something else before the trauma, or the tragedy, or the assault, or the violation, or the addiction came in. And when those events come in, that’s when you change. And we have all the symptoms of either complex post-traumatic stress disorder, or post-traumatic stress disorder, or anxiety disorder, or depression, or treatment-resistant depression. It goes on and on and on, the diagnoses. But if I can get somebody to remember who they were before the trauma, before the split, if you will, before the harshness, then they will start to remember that they are not only the abuse or only the addiction or only the tragedy. And that actually helps to diminish the fear and meet it with courage.

Hugh Ballou:
Ah, this is such important work. So if you didn’t catch all these soundbites, there will be a full transcript of this interview. And you can go to the nonprivate exchange.org and you can find this episode and you’ll find the transcript. So in the couple of minutes we have left, I would like to bring up your website. and your website is your name. And so, it’s DrLisaCooney, C-O-O-N-E-Y dot com, no dashes. So, what will people find when they go there, Lisa?

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
You’ll get a whole bunch of information about me, about working with me one-on-one, about the energy healing that I really believe in, theta healing. There is a shop with a minimal cost for some downloads, little meditations and things like that. You can get on our newsletter and you can work with me. And if you don’t find what you’re looking for, you can always go to customer care, just like it sounds at drlisakuni.com and one of my team members will assist you there and we also you could also just sign up on the website to get into a private HIPAA protected text messaging app with you and me and you and my team. So plenty of ways to get in touch with me or just any social media handle at Dr. Lisa Cooney, C-O-O-N-E-Y.

Hugh Ballou:
And there’s your book, The Body of Change. Tell me about real quick, we got a couple of minutes to unlock the four Cs. What is this?

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
So the four C’s is, the ROAR method actually has 12 parts to it, like the 12-step model, but it’s a different model. The four D’s we started, the four E’s are in the middle. In the interest of time, I’ll just go to the four C’s. The four, it’s not in alphabetical order, obviously, but the four C’s is, It’s a beautiful course that I created to help people motivate with those one degree shifts. And you can download it and receive it as a gift. And the four C’s are choosing for you, committing to you, collaborating with the universe, conspiring to bless you, and creating from there. And a lot of people believe that the universe is like not their ally. I am of a totally different perception. The universe is my ally and the universe is a giving universe to all of us. What you speak, it will give you. I don’t have money. I don’t have money. Universe goes, oh, they’re saying they don’t have money. Well, there you go. We’ll make you know, you know, you say I have money. Oh, I am making this very simple right now. But generally, you get the essence of what I’m speaking to.

Hugh Ballou:
Absolutely. Dr. Clooney, thank you for sharing your wisdom and insights from the book, The Body of Change, and your whole body of knowledge. I know our listeners will be encouraged by the idea that transformation doesn’t have to come through force or struggle, but through learning to listen and partner with your body, that’s a major breakthrough for me. So for those who want to go deeper, I encourage you to get a copy of her book, The Body of Change. You can find her website. and explore her roar method. And so, Dr. Glennie, thank you for sharing your wisdom and insights with our listeners today.

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
Thank you, Hugh, for having me. Thank you, listeners. I really appreciate you out there. And if no one’s told you all today that you are loved, I’m telling you, you are loved.

Hugh Ballou:
It doesn’t get better than that. Blessings.

Dr. Lisa Cooney:
Blessings. Thank you.