The Scrumptious Woman

096 Rewriting Your Life: From Pharmacy to Fulfilment with Angela Orr

• Juliette Karaman / Angela Orr • Season 1 • Episode 96

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Hello and welcome back to another episode of The Scrumptious Woman! I’m your host, Juliette Karaman, and today we have an extraordinary guest, Angela Orr. Angela is not only an accomplished pharmacist but also a coach and author, dedicated to helping women thrive in all aspects of their lives. I’m so thrilled to have her here today to share her journey and insights.

Episode Summary

In this powerful episode, Angela Orr opens up about her nearly 40-year career in pharmacy and her journey of transformation. After being diagnosed with breast cancer, Angela realised that despite her professional success, she felt unfulfilled and stressed. This led her to make significant life changes, including selling her pharmacies and focusing on mentoring and coaching women to create the lives they truly desire.

Key Takeaways

  • Journey of Transformation: Angela’s personal experience with breast cancer was a turning point that led her to re-evaluate her life and career, focusing on health and wellbeing.
  • Importance of Self-Care: Angela discusses how crucial it is for women to prioritise their health and pleasure, and not just in terms of physical health, but in every aspect of life.
  • Integrating Science and Wellbeing: As a pharmacist, Angela blends her knowledge of medicine with science-based well-being practices like meditation and EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) to help her clients achieve true wellness.
  • Overcoming Stress: Angela emphasises the role of stress in our health and how managing it effectively can drastically improve our quality of life.
  • Community and Mentorship: She highlights the importance of seeking out a mentor or community to support personal growth, as it’s often challenging to make significant changes alone.

This episode is a heartfelt reminder that it’s never too late to rewrite your story and create the life you’ve always dreamed of.

To connect with Angela Orr, you can visit her website and follow her on social media:

Angela also offers a free six-minute guided meditation using HeartMath techniques, which you can download directly from her website. It’s a perfect tool to start or end your da

Find out more about Juliette Karaman here:
https://feelfullyyou.com/free-resources/
https://www.instagram.com/juliettekaraman/
https://www.facebook.com/juliette.karamanvanschaardenburg
https://feelfullyyou.com/products/7-days-of-scrumptiousness/

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Take a screenshot of your review and send it to me on https://www.instagram.com/juliettekaraman/ and you will be given access to a free group Spinal Attunement session. These have been life-changing for my clients!

The Scrumptious Woman EP96

[00:00:00] Juliette Karaman: Welcome to another Scrumptious Woman episodes. I have with me Angela Orr and you are an incredible woman. You've had, or you still have, you're a pharmacist and you have what, two pharmacies that have made A lot of money, a lot of you've overcome a lot yourself as well. So I would really love you to just, first of all, welcome.

[00:00:25] Juliette Karaman: Really happy to have you here. And then I'd love you to just pinpoint a little bit, like what brought you on this journey as a pharmacist, as a coach, as an author? I mean you're here to help other women thrive, right? 

[00:00:41] Angela Orr: Absolutely. So where do I start? But I think I know where to start. So first, I would love to say thank you for having me on your podcast.

[00:00:50] Angela Orr: I've listened to some of the episodes and it's just, they're all scrumptious, as you say, and you're just such an interesting person. So thank you very much. As Juliette said, I'm Angela Orr and I've been a pharmacist this year, 39 years at the time of this recording. So I know I started when I was in preschool, but I went to college fairly young.

[00:01:14] Angela Orr: And so I graduated and I've had a wonderful career, but it's changed a lot. And what changed for me, so the practice of medicine has changed a lot as well as me personally. And several years ago, I was diagnosed with breast cancer, which the surgeon told me that I was an uninteresting case.

[00:01:34] Angela Orr: So I guess it was a good time to be boring. And at the time I owned two pharmacies. I looked like I had everything and I felt like I had nothing. I was very empty inside and I was at the pinnacle of my career. And yet it was like, not enough. And that not enoughness led to me being grossly obese or morbidly obese, I should say functional alcoholic and just stress was literally killing me.

[00:02:02] Angela Orr: And I thought, I can't go on like this. So it's a journey. So it was really interesting. So I sold one of my pharmacies at that time. And then I sold the other one right before So the two pharmacies, I had total 15 years, the brick and mortar, and it was an eight figure business total. So I've cultivated quite a business.

[00:02:25] Angela Orr: And since that selling of the first one and then with the with the change in, again medicine, where I feel like, we don't really, Take care of people. We take, health care or sick care. And I didn't want to be part of that. So I wanted to be part of health care and that's when I decided to go into what I, my venture that I'm doing now, which is more about mentoring, coaching, speaking, and that type, I run retreats, that type of thing.

[00:02:53] Juliette Karaman: I love it. So almost 40 years into pharmacy. And did you have to, was there obviously, yes, a study of medicine, right? Like you had to go to med school to become a pharmacist. And in those 40 years, a lot of things have changed. 

[00:03:12] Angela Orr: Yes. 

[00:03:13] Juliette Karaman: A lot of the way. And it's interesting because I have a lot of doctor clients because doctors are often the ones that are most disembodied, right?

[00:03:23] Juliette Karaman: They live most in their heads. And like you were saying, it's we have the eight figure business and we do this and that, but we're overweight or we're stressed. It's a lot of burnout I hear at this it's ah what was the turning point for you?

[00:03:40] Angela Orr: The day they said that the cancer, that the lump was cancerous. And I knew already because I it not only my family had breast cancer that did not run in my family. My brother had bone cancer and passed away decades ago. But just hearing that, I just thought, what the hell I've worked so hard for so much, and this is what I end up with.

[00:04:04] Angela Orr: And I thought, no, that's not the end of the story. This is not the end of the story. I'm going to write the end of the story. And 

[00:04:12] Juliette Karaman: I'm rewriting it. 

[00:04:13] Angela Orr: I'm rewriting the story and I'm actually not even rewriting it. I'm creating it. 

[00:04:18] Angela Orr: Because I'm not rewriting anything that's already been, I'm creating what I want in my life.

[00:04:25] Angela Orr: And that's actually exactly what I do now with my clients is help them to rewrite the last, the last chapter of their life or the final chapter, is they're going to write the book instead of reading the book. 

[00:04:37] Juliette Karaman: So beautiful. And it's oftentimes that we have to get to that almost rock bottom place, right?

[00:04:43] Juliette Karaman: Everything on the outside looks absolutely fabulous. And on the inside, it's there's something missing and then it creates a disease, right? It can create a cancer. In my case, it was other things, but yeah, so often. There's been that pivotal moment where it's no, we cannot go on this way.

[00:05:05] Angela Orr: And so many women in particular, I find, especially in that middle age, cause that's where I really focus on. I think with all generations and all ages, of course, but because I have familiarity and experience with that, they suffer, they silently suffer and, That's where my passion is that I don't, those women are a backbone and we need to not have that suffering and have a way to be able to get past that.

[00:05:37] Angela Orr: And I just feel like too many of us have think, is this all there is? My kids are grown my husband and I are, empty nesters or I've had some kind of health crises. And or I'm starting to really like that wine o'clock. I quit drinking four years ago and I find that really, and anyway, so I just feel like so many women out there just really don't know where to turn sometimes.

[00:06:08] Juliette Karaman: So if you think back at yourself, say what, before COVID so say five or seven years ago when you were probably still at your peak but bottom, what would you say to someone who's at that point thinking, I need to do something, I want to change?

[00:06:29] Angela Orr: I think what I would say to that person is the only way to not get what you want is to quit. I've had so many different renditions of getting to where I want to go. It's not a, it's not an A to B. It's an A. I equate it to sailing. You can't like go from here to there. You've got to tack according to the wind and the conditions.

[00:06:55] Angela Orr: And you also have to have, most importantly, before you even start, a destination. 

[00:07:01] Angela Orr: And a lot of people say I want something different, but I don't know what I want. You have to know that you have to really know. And that can also change as time goes on, it's, you're going to grow and change and that may evolve, but to at least have somewhere.

[00:07:15] Angela Orr: So I would say to that younger person is that don't ever give up work with a mentor. It's not a cost, it's an investment. And I've only made big changes in my life when I really decided to work with somebody. And I think the other thing is that first you have, before you, a lot of times you do those things, you have to have, even if it's an inkling of belief that you can get what you want in life.

[00:07:44] Juliette Karaman: I'd say. Because you can. Of course. You completely can. And I love seeing your transformation. You said that you've lost I don't know, 45, 

[00:07:54] Angela Orr: 50 pounds this year. I'm down over a hundred pounds from my highest ever. So when I was at that point where I was diagnosed I was, I'm down over a hundred pounds from that.

[00:08:06] Angela Orr: And this year I finally committed to really tackling this because again, it's okay. What do I want for myself truly? 

[00:08:16] Juliette Karaman: And I mean, it's such an interesting place to be, right? I was twice what I am now. So 70 kilos more than now, which is what? 150, I don't know, 170 pounds or something. So quite, quite a bit more.

[00:08:30] Juliette Karaman: But the funny thing is that the mind takes a little while to catch on that you've lost that weight and that you're not actually carrying it. Your body takes a while to, to get used to the different stride it makes. Yes. But the mind also, because I remember going to a PTA meeting.

[00:08:47] Juliette Karaman: I've got, I had four kids and under three years time. The weight just kept on piling on. And they'd look at me and say, Oh my God, you're always so glamorous. And I'd look at them and say, Because I just felt like a beach whale, right? So it really took a bit of mindset work to then finally get into that.

[00:09:03] Juliette Karaman: I'm like, Oh, yes. Okay. I get it. This is what my body actually is now. And that's, I think one of the biggest thing that I work with women for, with, When it comes to pleasure is one of these things you're like, oh, I got banned from Facebook about talking about pleasure. So now it's called scrumptiousness, right?

[00:09:24] Juliette Karaman: Plus it sounds much better. It's fun. It's luscious. But it's like we have this feeling that it has to be sex. Pleasure could be the sun on your skin, it could be making yourself a beautiful cup of tea, making a little bouquet, something that just brings you joy. And this gets frowned upon, but actually It's the backbone of who we are, right?

[00:09:49] Juliette Karaman: Because if we can't have those little moments of pleasure dotted in our day, every day, then, what is life living for? 

[00:09:58] Angela Orr: Absolutely. And I find that, again, women don't allow themselves pleasure. 

[00:10:04] Juliette Karaman: That's it. That's allowing ourselves, allowing yourself 

[00:10:08] Angela Orr: And pleasure. As you said I take pleasure in having a really great conversation with my husband helping, I still work part time as a pharmacist as I work on my mentoring and coaching business.

[00:10:19] Angela Orr: And but I love it. I've done it for so long and I'm really good at it. And I, Know so many customers and so many people and I find pleasure even in you know helping them like I helped somebody over the weekend with something and he just called back and said I just have to tell you for this whole ordeal that I've been through you have been the most helpful Person and all of this and I'm like thank you.

[00:10:43] Angela Orr: That's what I'm here for and it's just to me or like you said, even pleasure in spending time with my dog, spending time with myself. 

[00:10:53] Juliette Karaman: Completely. And I love that you're still continuing some of the pharmacy work because that's a big part of who you are, right? It's 

[00:11:01] Angela Orr: a huge part of who I am.

[00:11:03] Juliette Karaman: And I don't, and 

[00:11:05] Angela Orr: I don't, I don't believe in medic. I believe in the judicious use of medication. 

[00:11:10] Juliette Karaman: And I 

[00:11:11] Angela Orr: believe in the other thing that I love being a pharmacist is that a lot of the things that I do when I work with my clients, is all science based. Meditation, journaling, EFT, I'm an EFT provider.

[00:11:25] Angela Orr: I'm a heart mass certified provider. These are all science based modalities and I love blending the two. I just believe that, so often we throw a pill, as I said, I believe earlier is that, sick care, not well care. And I think if you can judiciously use medication with. These are the modalities we could, can truly have a well care system and we need more providers like myself who can blend the two.

[00:11:54] Juliette Karaman: Completely. And I remember when I spent nine months fainting, the Western medicine couldn't find out what was wrong. I had a heart monitor implanted. I was getting MRIs and all of this. All the time. It was only until I turned to meditation and to Chinese doctor and acupuncture that I had some semblance of a life again.

[00:12:16] Juliette Karaman: So it's like really when you get to that part, it's okay, I'm just going to really now look at other things because this is the Western Medicare is just not getting me anywhere. 

[00:12:28] Angela Orr: Yes. Or they say, it just really is frustrating for me when they tell customers or patients People. There's nothing we can do.

[00:12:37] Angela Orr: This is just the way you have to live life. And it's like, no, it's not. No, you can do so much more. It's estimated that 90 percent of doctor visits today's world is due to stress. And it's not the stress itself, but it is the result of what stress does to you. Chemically, biologically, and physically to yourself, to you.

[00:12:59] Angela Orr: And if we can help to regulate that autonomic nervous system through these different modalities, it's amazing the change that can happen. 

[00:13:09] Juliette Karaman: And I've seen it on myself where all of a sudden I could walk again and do things unaided and have seen it in Dr. Cho's events and other events.

[00:13:17] Juliette Karaman: Yes. 

[00:13:18] Angela Orr: Yes, 

[00:13:18] Juliette Karaman: a lot of metaphysical things that I teach as well. It is easy to change in people. And you see when you work on yourself, you can also change in your relationships and the people that you may be having the problems with and all of a sudden they change. It's It's just really beautiful because we're all made up of energy, right?

[00:13:39] Angela Orr: Absolutely. Frequency first. 

[00:13:42] Juliette Karaman: Completely. I think that's what we all lead with. Frequency first. What would you say to someone who's thinking hey, I want to learn a little bit more about Angela or I want to learn a little bit more about this frequency and not be so dependent on my pills, my aches, my everything.

[00:14:02] Angela Orr: If they wanted to learn more about me, I'm on various social medias. Is that what you're talking about? Is and I have a website. I have a weekly newsletter that I send out. But I also am on Facebook and LinkedIn primarily. And I do quite a few videos where I will just Give my thoughts on something and give some tips and things like that.

[00:14:26] Angela Orr: I also work I have a one to one mentorship. I'm working on some fun group programs and I also am working on a new updated offer for a one time strategy session to blueprint out. I have a, I'm a certified stress and being assessment provider for HeartMath and I use that assessment because it's stress and wellbeing.

[00:14:49] Angela Orr: So we look at both areas of your life. It's important to have that balance because it's not always bad. We may, our mind may want to go there, but it usually isn't. And so we take that and we map out a strategy for a person of how can you get on this journey to where you want to go. 

[00:15:08] Juliette Karaman: Beautiful.

[00:15:09] Juliette Karaman: This will all be in the show notes and you also have something really cool to give away to our listeners. 

[00:15:15] Angela Orr: Yes, I do. I have a six minute guided meditation from using a heart math technique. And those who may not know heart math, they are an organization out of California that has been around for decades.

[00:15:28] Angela Orr: And they have, we have over 400 published studies that show. that scientifically prove when you can connect with your heart and have a coherent heart, it changes your biology, physiology, and chemistry. So very science y, but very simple. And the bottom line is, it works. And really happy to be associated with them as well as using my own insights, my own intuition and my own experience to, to work with people.

[00:15:59] Juliette Karaman: I love this. So this will all be in the show notes if you want to get the six minute meditation and do this heart. It's a 

[00:16:08] Angela Orr: download, downloadable meditation.

[00:16:10] Juliette Karaman: It's brilliant. So I would say, what I tell my clients is do this first thing in the morning and at night, or if you can just commit to one, just do it wherever you have six minutes.

[00:16:21] Juliette Karaman: Six minutes is, 

[00:16:22] Angela Orr: yeah. Six minutes is better than none and HeartMath has shown if you can actually do 15 minutes a day of connecting with your heart and it doesn't have to be contiguous, so it can be five by five. 

[00:16:34] Angela Orr: But it's scientifically shown that you can actually change your resiliency and your baseline for emotional intelligence.

[00:16:44] Angela Orr: by 15 minutes a day consistently. 

[00:16:48] Juliette Karaman: And that's it. So 15 minutes. So that's two times your meditation and then, another 

[00:16:53] Angela Orr: three or four minutes here. Yep. 

[00:16:55] Juliette Karaman: Yep. Excellent. Angela, this was really delightful. Thank you so much for coming on and sharing your expertise. 

[00:17:04] Angela Orr: It was such a delight to be here and, what I have to say to women out there is when you think, is this all there is?

[00:17:12] Angela Orr: No, do not take that at for an answer. Whether you decide to seek out Juliet or myself, seek out somebody. It's hard to do it alone. Community and a mentor is everything. 

[00:17:27] Juliette Karaman: And that's the beauty, right? You don't have to go at it alone. If finding one mentor by yourself is a bit scary, find a group. Find a group.

[00:17:38] Juliette Karaman: There are 

[00:17:38] Angela Orr: lots of free groups out there. 

[00:17:40] Juliette Karaman: There are lots of group programs that you can join and where there's actually that kind of like a sisterhood where it's like, Oh, I'm not the only one out there. All right. And that's often all we need a little push in the back saying, Hey, you're normal.

[00:17:52] Juliette Karaman: You're okay. 

[00:17:54] Angela Orr: Yes, absolutely. 

[00:17:56] Juliette Karaman: All right, my love. Thank you so much for having it for being on. 

[00:18:00] Angela Orr: Thank you so much for having me. I really enjoyed it. 

[00:18:03] Juliette Karaman: Much love. Thank you.

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Juliette Karaman

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