Sign up to get updates from us
This week, we are joined by Elizabeth Mooney of Country Fusion. We discuss how her move from New York City to Nashville lead to her being bullied and ostracized & how she turned that challenge into an anti-bullying program for kids.
Also on the show, our very own Bruce talks about some of his childhood experiences getting bullied and offers some insights on how he grew himself some confidence.
Get your line dancing fitness on and learn more about Elizabeth's various programs, including her anti-bullying efforts at her website: countryfusion.net
If you want to learn more or are subjected to either Bullying or Harassment, you can go to:
If you feel that you'd like to make your story known, email us at karatechopbullying@gmail.com
If you are dealing with dark or suicidal thoughts call The National Suicide Hotline:
Phone: 988
Hello and welcome to the second episode of Karate Chop Bullying.
Speaker:We're kicking it off again with Tim Flynn, the founder of our little movement.
Speaker:Hey, Tim.
Speaker:Hello, Bruce.
Speaker:How are you doing today? Herren Lee, I'm tongue tied.
Speaker:How about yourself?
Speaker:I have those days as well. Tongue tied.
Speaker:But I'm doing just fine.
Speaker:So, Bruce, we know why I'm here hosting this podcast.
Speaker:Why are you co-hosting this podcast with me?
Speaker:What's your experience with bullying?
Speaker:Why am I here?
Speaker:It's not the great question we all ask ourselves.
Speaker:I went through a large amount of bullying through my life because, after all,
Speaker:I was a heavy, asthmatic, non-athletic kid.
Speaker:So from the time that I was entering school,
Speaker:I was basically pushed around and bullied.
Speaker:I was beaten up outside of my home.
Speaker:There were kids in the neighborhood.
Speaker:I was I tended to be the whipping boy.
Speaker:I also lived in an Irish Catholic neighborhood
Speaker:as a Jew and they were not very accepting of me.
Speaker:So I got a lot of bullying on that.
Speaker:And not only that,
Speaker:but oftentimes I was a little bit tortured by some of their parents.
Speaker:Although the Irish Catholic parents were bullying you. Yes.
Speaker:For example, I had a neighbor who would love to say,
Speaker:look at how handsome my son is.
Speaker:Look how fat and ugly Debbie's kid is. Wow.
Speaker:Along with directly blaming me for the death of Christ.
Speaker:It's stuff like that.
Speaker:And it didn't matter what their kids did because they were all nice Catholic boys.
Speaker:Of course not to make this about religion.
Speaker:That was part of my being bullied as I went into junior high school.
Speaker:I sort of sat between the nerds and the kids who nobody liked
Speaker:and also the regular kids.
Speaker:One of the kids, let's call him K, his initial
Speaker:not naming names, he decided he wanted to try to get popular
Speaker:and he decided to do that by picking on me.
Speaker:And what ended up happening is in sixth grade, we were best friends.
Speaker:And in fact, one time we went over his house
Speaker:and my mother was there with his mother and they seemed to really hit it off.
Speaker:And his mother didn't have that many friends.
Speaker:Then suddenly I began getting crank phone calls and they would hang up on me.
Speaker:Then he called me and blamed me for crank calling.
Speaker:Then one day, his mother called me up, called me a filthy Jew,
Speaker:Said Hitler had the right idea
Speaker:and that I was going to burn in hell because I was absolutely a bad person.
Speaker:To clarify, you are in sixth grade.
Speaker:I'm 11 years old. Tim. Okay.
Speaker:An adult telling you you're going to die or burn in hell.
Speaker:Going to burn in hell.
Speaker:Hitler had the right idea. Well.
Speaker:Someone who wanted to be friends with my mother.
Speaker:My mother did not react positively to this turn of events.
Speaker:She called up this lady, asked her
Speaker:what the hell she thought she was doing, calling me like this.
Speaker:Who was she to talk to me like that?
Speaker:And she was like, Well, he's been crank calling me.
Speaker:My my mother was like, First off. No, he hasn't.
Speaker:We've been getting crank calls.
Speaker:Second off, even if that was the case,
Speaker:where do you get off speaking to my child like that?
Speaker:You call him again?
Speaker:I will come over to your house and stab you.
Speaker:Now, my mom meant that, so I never heard from this woman again.
Speaker:But her son began attacking me at school.
Speaker:Not only that, they moved him from another class
Speaker:after they started tapping into my class so he could be closer to me.
Speaker:His mother requested that.
Speaker:And then she called the disciplinarian.
Speaker:Who told them that I threatened her son.
Speaker:So I was called to the disciplinary in his office
Speaker:and told if I touched him, I would be expelled.
Speaker:So I was exposed to bullying and the school itself was facilitating it.
Speaker:And then when I complained to the disciplinarian,
Speaker:this is what they were doing.
Speaker:They were jumping me. There was like a bunch of them.
Speaker:He got several friends and they would jump me
Speaker:and they would say things and they would beat me up.
Speaker:But the disciplinarian told me to do was smile and laugh at them.
Speaker:They'll get bored showing just how abjectly
Speaker:unqualified this moron was for his position.
Speaker:I eventually began hurting myself, feigning being beat up and going home,
Speaker:like with torn clothes, bruises so they didn't have to go to school.
Speaker:Eventually, I just stopped going to school and I left school in seventh grade
Speaker:because of how bad the bullying was.
Speaker:I told my mom I was getting suicidal
Speaker:because I wanted her to take things seriously.
Speaker:I never truly was suicidal.
Speaker:It was a call for help.
Speaker:Eventually, what happened?
Speaker:A couple of things happened after I left school.
Speaker:I was still being bullied in my neighborhood,
Speaker:and my method for dealing with it
Speaker:was I basically one day decided to fight every kid in the neighborhood.
Speaker:Win or lose.
Speaker:I figured if I did that, I probably would get beat up a lot.
Speaker:But they also messed up picking on me because I'd be too much trouble.
Speaker:That's what happened.
Speaker:Now, I wasn't getting physically picked on.
Speaker:The bullying stopped to some degree and then around 15 years old,
Speaker:I got into metal music and suddenly all of these people
Speaker:became a bit of afraid of me, which was hilarious.
Speaker:I was the same kid, but the satanic panic was going on
Speaker:and suddenly I liked Black Sabbath, and that seemed to make a difference.
Speaker:And I leaned into that with these people.
Speaker:It kept them off balance and that left me alone.
Speaker:And so I didn't have to fight with anybody. I didn't get picked on.
Speaker:And I also, during this period of time, was growing my confidence.
Speaker:So ultimately, once I entered my early twenties
Speaker:and I found acting and performing in music,
Speaker:I had a degree of confidence so people really wouldn't pick on me anymore.
Speaker:But it took a long time.
Speaker:So you mentioned that you regained your confidence after school, correct?
Speaker:The effects that bullying had on me is even though I had very positive attributes
Speaker:that I was aware that I had, my confidence was at a zero.
Speaker:I wasn't able to talk to girls until I was about 23, 24 years old.
Speaker:Because of this, I thought I was hideous.
Speaker:I thought I was ugly.
Speaker:My entire self-worth to this day is tied almost completely to my weight,
Speaker:despite the fact that I'm a reasonably attractive person.
Speaker:I logically know this, and when I'm thinner, much more so.
Speaker:But all of my self-esteem is tied into my weight even today.
Speaker:It took a lot of time and effort to dig that out of my head.
Speaker:And even with all that time and effort.
Speaker:The root of it is still there.
Speaker:No matter what.
Speaker:Behind these eyes, I will always be a £280.11 year old kid.
Speaker:That's what drives the machinery of Bruce.
Speaker:And no matter what I do, no matter how much I try to dig that out,
Speaker:it is such a core tenet because those early experiences shape you
Speaker:in ways that something that happens to you when you're 20 or 30 doesn't.
Speaker:But yeah, so so for me, I learned to walk around
Speaker:with an air of confidence and also another skill
Speaker:that I developed was walking around as if I had a degree of authority.
Speaker:When you talk to me about things, I sound like I know what I'm talking about.
Speaker:Even if I have no clue.
Speaker:So you stand tall, make eye contact.
Speaker:You make eye contact. Speak clearly. Smile.
Speaker:Try to be kind in your voice.
Speaker:Show a little bit of humor.
Speaker:Nothing buys you more in this world than having a good sense of humor.
Speaker:I only tell me one time that you showed how to smile, to be confident.
Speaker:I'm like, That's true. But it does help.
Speaker:And when you smile, people are more likely to want
Speaker:to come up and talk to you versus if you're going to have a.
Speaker:Resting bitch face.
Speaker:Yes. RB Yes, that's where I was trying to think of.
Speaker:RB FS Smiling
Speaker:does help your confidence out, or if you don't feel confident smiling,
Speaker:that simple thing you can do or at least make you appear confident.
Speaker:It's a certain degree of social lubrication.
Speaker:If you come off as warm, friendly, approachable,
Speaker:that doesn't mean you've got to be a pushover.
Speaker:That doesn't mean you have to be telling jokes all the time.
Speaker:It just means that you're putting off welcoming vibes and it's helpful.
Speaker:Sometimes you feel awkward.
Speaker:You don't know how to talk to people.
Speaker:You know, you always think to yourself, If I could go back
Speaker:and say to young me, what would I say?
Speaker:And it would be, You don't have to be afraid of girls.
Speaker:Don't think of them as anything other than other people.
Speaker:Everything is just other people and treat everybody the way you would like to.
Speaker:Friendly, warm and just.
Speaker:You get a lot more just by smiling. Exactly.
Speaker:There's going to be people out there that are not going to accept that.
Speaker:And that's fine.
Speaker:Let them be. Don't let them bother you.
Speaker:If somebody doesn't value you, respect you,
Speaker:that is not your problem.
Speaker:That is their problem.
Speaker:The important thing to realize is that you have value
Speaker:and your value is not based on anything that anybody else perceives.
Speaker:If you're out there and there's somebody at your work or at your school
Speaker:who treat you like you're valueless, they're telling you who they are.
Speaker:You don't need to win them.
Speaker:You don't need to give them any attention.
Speaker:You don't need to be concerned about them.
Speaker:There are people out there to care about you and support you and you can find them.
Speaker:So I'm a very introverted person.
Speaker:Like, for me, I cannot just come up with a way to strike a conversation
Speaker:with somebody I don't know.
Speaker:But when I go do my seminars,
Speaker:what helps me out is I bring a piece of my school with me.
Speaker:I had a big backdrop, you know, characterized behind my name.
Speaker:I feel like I'm at home again, and that makes sense.
Speaker:You also have context.
Speaker:You have a context to be talking to people.
Speaker:And that makes a big difference.
Speaker:So when you see somebody that you don't really know,
Speaker:I can't speak for what's in your head.
Speaker:I can speak for what? What certainly was in mine as a kid.
Speaker:What right do I have to interrupt this person's day or life?
Speaker:Why am I doing this to them?
Speaker:Why am I inflicting myself on this person?
Speaker:That's the noise in my head.
Speaker:But generally speaking, if you just go up to somebody and say hello.
Speaker:The worst thing that's going to happen, you're going to be like, Oh, hey.
Speaker:Or I'm busy. I get that.
Speaker:What's a follow up?
Speaker:What's a follow up?
Speaker:Oh, hey, what's your name? Bob.
Speaker:Nice to meet you, Bob. Tim.
Speaker:And then an awkward silence.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Well, you know, so I was incredibly introverted.
Speaker:Nobody believes that.
Speaker:Everybody believes.
Speaker:How the hell were you introverted?
Speaker:I don't believe it either.
Speaker:You're seeing the end result of a lot of direct training of myself.
Speaker:Intention and purpose.
Speaker:I didn't become an actor because I wanted to act.
Speaker:I became an actor because I was dating a girl who I happened to fall into dating.
Speaker:And I always figured if I broke up with her, I was going to die alone.
Speaker:I had to figure out how I was going to be able to talk to somebody.
Speaker:I learned that if I wanted my life to be more interactive,
Speaker:if I wanted to get people
Speaker:to respond to me, I was going to have to learn how to bridge the gap.
Speaker:So I did some things.
Speaker:Probably the best piece of advice I can give somebody who's like
Speaker:incredibly shy, who feels like they have difficulty bridging.
Speaker:One of the best things I ever did for myself is I took an improv class
Speaker:not to become a comedian, but by taking the improv class.
Speaker:What it taught me was how to think on my feet, how to be humorous
Speaker:to a certain degree, because humor is the greatest social lubrication.
Speaker:You make somebody laugh.
Speaker:They're your friend.
Speaker:You don't have to have that much of a context to talk to the person.
Speaker:I try to be observant, genuinely curious.
Speaker:So you can combat that introverted ness by
Speaker:just being genuinely curious about something unique about them.
Speaker:And the less physical it is, the better off you are.
Speaker:You don't want anyone to come up to you go, Hey, Tim, I noticed that you're big.
Speaker:Big in which way?
Speaker:Bruce In every way possible, big boy.
Speaker:But no, if somebody comes up to you, it's like, kiddo, karate.
Speaker:What form? Instantly, the ice is broken.
Speaker:Oh, well, if I practice this form,
Speaker:there's a common basis you can build a conversation on.
Speaker:No one's going to stab you because you went up high.
Speaker:I notice you're got this really cool karate T-shirt on.
Speaker:What forms do you do?
Speaker:You find, like, little moments,
Speaker:and that can help you because it gives you the context.
Speaker:The whole idea of this, I'm invading the space.
Speaker:I do not have the permission.
Speaker:You find something you can use as context.
Speaker:If you're introverted, it's still going to be an effort of will
Speaker:to push against it because you're going to always want to wallflower even now.
Speaker:My instinct is to wallflower.
Speaker:So to tie this back into bullying, the benefit of making an effort,
Speaker:even if it's a force of will to learn to push
Speaker:past your introverted ness, is part of what happens in bullying.
Speaker:Is that isolation?
Speaker:It's a lot harder to isolate you.
Speaker:If you're good at improv and you can roll with the punches
Speaker:and you can make things humorous, it's hard to isolate you
Speaker:when you can reach out and talk to other people.
Speaker:It's hard to isolate you when you are flexible of thought.
Speaker:I think you covered it all, Bruce.
Speaker:There's not much more to follow up with that if you got people behind your back.
Speaker:What's there to worry about? You have people to turn to.
Speaker:And speaking of things to turn to, I think it's about time
Speaker:we turn to our guests and get off of talking about me.
Speaker:Joining us now is Elizabeth Mooney,
Speaker:the founder of Country Fusion and Dance Fitness for Kids.
Speaker:Elizabeth, how are you doing?
Speaker:I'm doing well. How are you?
Speaker:I'm doing awesome, Tim.
Speaker:I'm doing excellent. Bruce, as always. Of course.
Speaker:I'm really excited, though.
Speaker:I am super excited to hear about this country fusion line dancing for kids
Speaker:and how you're making it into an anti-bullying program later on.
Speaker:But just start.
Speaker:Tell us a little bit about yourself.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So I started dancing at the age of two.
Speaker:I'm from Long Island, New York, born and raised,
Speaker:and I've been into the fitness industry since my early twenties.
Speaker:And I performed acted my whole life.
Speaker:How did you get into the fitness industry?
Speaker:So good question.
Speaker:My ex-husband at the time was working out at a gym Saturday mornings,
Speaker:so I went with him and the manager there was like, What do you do?
Speaker:And I'm like, What do you mean? He said, What do you do for a living?
Speaker:I said, I'm a dancer.
Speaker:He's like, Well, why don't you teach fitness classes?
Speaker:I'm like, I don't know what to do with the fitness classes.
Speaker:You'll figure it out.
Speaker:So I said, Okay.
Speaker:So at that time I was teaching salsa, Latin hip hop.
Speaker:So I had a fitness class and I just sped up the music
Speaker:to make it a little more fitness wise to get them breaking out of sweat.
Speaker:And I went from three people
Speaker:to a brand new class to about 30 people.
Speaker:It was packed to one class a week to about 15,
Speaker:teaching all over and fitness found me.
Speaker:So is country fusion like a national brand
Speaker:that you started, or is it just like local in Nashville?
Speaker:So it's everywhere.
Speaker:So I contacted the fitness industry and I was teaching dance.
Speaker:I was also performing at the time, but I used to go to a dude ranch
Speaker:since I was six years old in upstate New York.
Speaker:So that week I played country.
Speaker:I would dance with the cowboys and ride horses
Speaker:and listen to Cowboy music and country music and everything.
Speaker:When, as I got older, I, Jason Aldean, Luke Bryan,
Speaker:all these songs started coming out and I was like, You know what?
Speaker:I'm going to put a couple of these songs in my dance fitness class in Queens,
Speaker:and I choreographed a cute little dance to them.
Speaker:And then when I was teaching in the class, I saw everyone was loving it.
Speaker:In that moment.
Speaker:I remember I looked to the left, I saw the Manhattan skyline,
Speaker:and I was like, That's it.
Speaker:There's no country fitness program out there from me
Speaker:being in the industry for so long.
Speaker:I knew I wanted low intensity interval training
Speaker:and I knew I wanted a program where people could get more than just working out.
Speaker:I wanted them to learn something because I know I don't have a lot of time.
Speaker:So if I'm going to put a time in, I want to get the most I can out of it.
Speaker:I wanted them to learn actual line dances, but in a fitness form.
Speaker:So I put the programs together and I say it's
Speaker:where sneakers and water bottles meets whiskey and cowboy boots.
Speaker:What they learn in the class.
Speaker:We did the dance at night.
Speaker:So I just really wanted to make it for everybody.
Speaker:So children, seniors, everyone in between.
Speaker:Men, women. Right.
Speaker:But I want to circle this back towards the focus of this podcast,
Speaker:which is bullying
Speaker:and the way we deal and process and the effect it has on our lives.
Speaker:So my first question to you about that is, as a child,
Speaker:did you have any experience with bullying or was this
Speaker:something you encountered just after
Speaker:you got into your fitness business and moved your way into Nashville.
Speaker:As a child? I really did.
Speaker:I always face hardship
Speaker:in the way of like more of jealousy.
Speaker:And like I remember actually
Speaker:in high school, I came over to talk about this.
Speaker:I was a senior.
Speaker:It was my first week of high school.
Speaker:And part of me, if I'm
Speaker:saying anything that
Speaker:maybe is too much, but this is what happened.
Speaker:So I entered high school and I was getting attention
Speaker:from the seniors and I was on the volleyball team.
Speaker:And when I went outside to go, the bus on the concrete was written.
Speaker:Liz Mooney has big tits
Speaker:and mind you, I'm a kid.
Speaker:And there was nothing there.
Speaker:There was nothing.
Speaker:And so that was really hurtful.
Speaker:And I remember my whole volleyball team scrubbed that out.
Speaker:So that was what I encountered.
Speaker:And was that a one time occurrence?
Speaker:Yeah, that was a one time occurrence with that.
Speaker:But I remember that was my first week in high school.
Speaker:I didn't want to tell anyone, like I didn't want
Speaker:my mom knowing or anyone knowing I was, you know, I was embarrassed.
Speaker:But I saw the efforts of my volleyball team to scrub it out.
Speaker:And and I really understand why.
Speaker:And I know who who did it.
Speaker:So through that, I definitely encountered jealousy in my life
Speaker:and people more that wanted to take me down.
Speaker:Not so much bullying.
Speaker:It really the bullying started when I came to Nashville in my adulthood.
Speaker:And we will get to that.
Speaker:I did want to ask another question in the follow up.
Speaker:You've said that you dealt with a lot of jealousy and a lot of negativity.
Speaker:Did you have parental support through it?
Speaker:I didn't tell my parents a lot.
Speaker:I felt like, I don't know.
Speaker:I kind of felt like I was always in it on my own.
Speaker:I felt like it was always like me against the world.
Speaker:So no, no one really no one really knew anything.
Speaker:I really didn't feel like I had anyone to really talk to about it.
Speaker:So it all started when you moved to Nashville.
Speaker:You were successful in New York.
Speaker:What happened?
Speaker:How did bullying or harassment enter into your world?
Speaker:It was something I didn't expect at all because it was already hard enough.
Speaker:I left my family when I knew up north, and I'm
Speaker:a single mom coming here, starting this business.
Speaker:I went out to show face, so I was dancing.
Speaker:There's a nearby honky tonk.
Speaker:Mostly the older women.
Speaker:They did not take me.
Speaker:They didn't like me.
Speaker:They thought I was to steal their man.
Speaker:They called me a Yankee.
Speaker:They were so hateful and mean to the point where, like,
Speaker:I literally when I would go there, I would walk in the door
Speaker:and people would say they would watch me and I would scan the room to see
Speaker:who was there.
Speaker:Just so I knew to watch my back.
Speaker:You know, I danced, I did my thing.
Speaker:But they all were very
Speaker:I feel how much they didn't like me.
Speaker:And most these people I had never spoken to a day in my life.
Speaker:And here I am.
Speaker:I'm about positivity and and spreading love and help.
Speaker:And I just I knew I was jealousy and I knew
Speaker:they didn't like that I was a dancer from New York,
Speaker:but I just was never expecting that.
Speaker:Were these women dancers as well? No.
Speaker:They just like you because they thought you looked better than them.
Speaker:Yeah. And they thought like I was was still their man.
Speaker:When you must.
Speaker:You don't want your man
Speaker:when even got in my face
Speaker:one time and that one to back down.
Speaker:But I do have a brand.
Speaker:I am a mom, you know, and the owner of the bar had a kick her out
Speaker:which she was in my face. And I mean, older women.
Speaker:I mean, like I'm in my third.
Speaker:She must be like in her sixties.
Speaker:So did this spread to outside of the club as well?
Speaker:I was mostly there.
Speaker:It was mostly there.
Speaker:And like, why I even went there was because how I found
Speaker:my studio was through the owner of it.
Speaker:So I through people I got connected to this area of Nashville and I went there.
Speaker:It was during Calvin, I met the owner and then he is like, Well,
Speaker:I told him what I was doing while I was in Nashville for a studio.
Speaker:So he was like, There's a whole strip right here.
Speaker:So I found the studio, so he was really the only person I knew.
Speaker:So I thought like a comfort, like a dad, kind of in a way.
Speaker:So I didn't have anyone.
Speaker:So when I would do the back and forth and come
Speaker:there, the people I knew were there.
Speaker:So there were some good people too, and they were my comfort.
Speaker:I didn't know anyone else.
Speaker:Did you ever confront any of these women?
Speaker:Did you ever do anything to try to deal with it?
Speaker:Did you ask for intervention from the owner?
Speaker:So with the owner, I said,
Speaker:you know, that I was going to deal with this coming here.
Speaker:And he was like, Yes. And like, you knew this.
Speaker:He is like, I knew you and you were going to cause a stir.
Speaker:And I'm like, You prepped me.
Speaker:Why didn't you give me a heads up?
Speaker:Because I was not expecting this, but confronting them.
Speaker:No, but as time went on, Bruce, I did.
Speaker:But it took time.
Speaker:At that moment I was still knew I was trying to keep the peace.
Speaker:I don't like drama, but it was like they were out for me.
Speaker:I just didn't even stay there long.
Speaker:When I go there, I just popped in dance, showed bass,
Speaker:did my thing, dancing and left, and that was it.
Speaker:It wasn't until this past, I guess, was when everything
Speaker:got really bad, and that's when I started standing up for myself.
Speaker:In what regards did it get really bad?
Speaker:So every year
Speaker:I'll do like a photo shoot for my brand because as I get older and evolve,
Speaker:I want to keep up with where I'm in my life.
Speaker:And I asked the owner, I said, Can I do a photo shoot by the pool table
Speaker:because I want it where New York Burlesque
Speaker:dancing met the honky tonk.
Speaker:So New York meets Nashville.
Speaker:And he goes again. Sure, that would be great.
Speaker:So did a photo shoot. Everything was fine.
Speaker:I said to him.
Speaker:I said, Any of the photos that come, I'll tell you.
Speaker:And the place, the venue to promote.
Speaker:Because in New York I grew up like you tag everyone.
Speaker:You tagged the photographer, the makeup artist, everybody.
Speaker:You said, okay, great.
Speaker:So when they came in, I went on vacation and I put on my Facebook story,
Speaker:the photo and a song, and I tagged him in the venue.
Speaker:Well, I got a call the next day.
Speaker:I was taking my daughter to the beach and there was a problem.
Speaker:And the problem
Speaker:was that I had a married man.
Speaker:It caused a big stir that the daughter was upset,
Speaker:the wife is mad, and now everyone's on board.
Speaker:And I couldn't understand because it was just one business.
Speaker:Tagging another had nothing to do, and it was a professional photo shoot.
Speaker:I just I couldn't stand.
Speaker:So I contacted the owner and I said I heard what happened.
Speaker:Please extend my apologies.
Speaker:That was never my intent.
Speaker:I'm going to take it down.
Speaker:When I got back, I said, I'm just going to stay away from it.
Speaker:I thought it just might blow over.
Speaker:While it didn't, I was banned for six months
Speaker:and then by this woman who is really, really hateful of me.
Speaker:And I, again, I never spoke to her before.
Speaker:So you were banned from going to this club by this woman?
Speaker:Who was this woman?
Speaker:It was the owner's wife. Oh, okay.
Speaker:And then she was still talking about it.
Speaker:And this woman that was there, she caused a lot of problems.
Speaker:She didn't like me from the beginning, and I never spoken to her before.
Speaker:She put the picture of me, she screenshot it, she got it from somebody
Speaker:and she put on Facebook and called me a Yankee whore
Speaker:at that point.
Speaker:Now it got out of hand because, I mean, I'm a single mom.
Speaker:I work really hard and it was not my intent.
Speaker:And now this is going to affect my daughter.
Speaker:Did it affect your daughter?
Speaker:No, because I right away,
Speaker:I went into the honky tonk at that point because my gym, my studio's nearby.
Speaker:And when I saw everything, I was in my studio.
Speaker:So I contacted the wife and I said, this is getting out of hand.
Speaker:It's now on social media.
Speaker:I have a phase, I'm a brand, and this affects my daughter.
Speaker:And then she wasn't answering me.
Speaker:So I walked into the honky tonk and she went out the back door.
Speaker:The way she wouldn't be. Talk to. Me.
Speaker:So it was a timeline.
Speaker:Here we are talking about like the time you posted that picture,
Speaker:when they screenshotted it to time, you're going back into the bar.
Speaker:Three weeks. Three weeks. Okay. Three weeks.
Speaker:And then I see the daughter,
Speaker:and this is where I learned I was banned because I didn't know
Speaker:I was just staying away, you know, just trying to keep the peace.
Speaker:And then when I went there to talk to the wife and to talk to the daughter,
Speaker:the security was like, Honey, I'm sorry is how you your band.
Speaker:I'm like, Are you serious?
Speaker:I'm like, you know, I don't even care what I care about.
Speaker:I'm like, you guys, The talk be however you want to be mean here,
Speaker:but once you put on social media, I said, I have a problem.
Speaker:How did that affect your business?
Speaker:Luckily it didn't because I
Speaker:literally took care of this right away.
Speaker:It didn't affect business, but it's affected.
Speaker:It affected in a time of how people viewed me
Speaker:and they thought I had a thing with the owner and I didn't.
Speaker:From there they took my voice away and it was so hurtful.
Speaker:It was so hurtful.
Speaker:This is a place that majority it was people that I felt comfortable
Speaker:with and the wives, and they've lived there very long.
Speaker:And then I'm banned for the photo.
Speaker:Wesley I got in a fight, did anything, and I've never been
Speaker:told to leave someone before, let alone banned.
Speaker:And where was the owner in all of this?
Speaker:What did he ever say to you?
Speaker:So when I first contacted him and said, I'm so sorry, he's again,
Speaker:my wife's unhappy about that, blah, blah, blah, that was it.
Speaker:Then I was staying away.
Speaker:Then I contacted him about when that woman posted.
Speaker:So Yankee, who are I'm like, this has gotten out of hand.
Speaker:He said, These girls have gone crazy.
Speaker:That's all. You said You did nothing.
Speaker:That's all.
Speaker:So he understands that, like it's not me, but he's also not doing anything.
Speaker:Like, it's funny to this day.
Speaker:People said he should have just said Liz was tagging me in the photo.
Speaker:She said that I knew that and it was just a professional thing.
Speaker:He never did.
Speaker:Because you also said you take the make up artists and everybody else, correct?
Speaker:No, no, no.
Speaker:In New York, I was I was taught that you tag
Speaker:everyone, makeup artist, hairstyles, everyone in that photoshoot.
Speaker:I did my own makeup, I did my own hair.
Speaker:Gotcha.
Speaker:So there's no one else to tag.
Speaker:That makes. Sense, right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So Instagram, I tagged the photographer, but I wasn't friends
Speaker:with the photographer on Facebook, so I only tagged the venue and him.
Speaker:That was the only reason I even tagged him
Speaker:was because I told him I was going to tag him.
Speaker:So he had control of the photos of what he wanted to possibly promote.
Speaker:So it was just completely a professional layout.
Speaker:That was it. And like
Speaker:if I, if I
Speaker:honestly, if I wanted him, I, I wouldn't have done that.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You know, and that's where the whole thing, when there
Speaker:so I was like, okay, you don't like this photo.
Speaker:Well now I'm going to put on a billboard and
Speaker:I put on a billboard right outside the studio
Speaker:and the honkytonk and everything,
Speaker:and I put my company and everything
Speaker:exactly what it was meant to do, which was branding and everything.
Speaker:I made sure I put it on the billboard because you took away my voice.
Speaker:Well, here you go. Now I'm going to pass by it every single day.
Speaker:Did you have any friends in Nashville that you kind of turn to
Speaker:for some help as well?
Speaker:No, because the one girl that was telling me who was my friend,
Speaker:she told me that
Speaker:if he started dating someone and he was friends with the owners
Speaker:as well, she went against me because she said she'll be damned
Speaker:if she loses another man and she went against me.
Speaker:That's pathetic.
Speaker:It sounds like some high school girl
Speaker:drama stuff like you deal with like and senior high school.
Speaker:You know? And these are grown women.
Speaker:Yep. Yep.
Speaker:She says she'll be down. She lives in another man.
Speaker:And she totally went against me.
Speaker:Went with them And it's it's funny.
Speaker:So this goes full circle everything.
Speaker:So yeah I felt very alone and no one, I felt alone.
Speaker:It was definitely the low part of a lot
Speaker:like I was dealing with some of my partner at the studio.
Speaker:And then the guy I was dating there broke out right before all this stuff.
Speaker:It was a mess, so I just stayed away.
Speaker:I tossed my family back home, but like,
Speaker:I still had to go to
Speaker:my studio and pass by these honky tonks for six months.
Speaker:What was some motivation for you
Speaker:to stand up for yourself and walk back into that club again.
Speaker:After the six months? Yeah.
Speaker:I'll tell you. So just real quick.
Speaker:So I started the kids program because I saw the Netflix show
Speaker:and I was like, Wow, what these kids go through being bullied
Speaker:and they have no one to talk to and they take away their voice and like,
Speaker:I couldn't change what these people thought of me.
Speaker:Like the other people, they all thought of me anyway.
Speaker:And it wasn't true.
Speaker:And I thought about these kids and that's how I created the anti bullying
Speaker:through country fusion.
Speaker:So one of the kids program,
Speaker:I wanted a purpose, but literally it was like it was a vision of
Speaker:I wanted something deeper and I related to the kids in that moment.
Speaker:So my voice was taken.
Speaker:People were looking at me in a different way.
Speaker:They were talking about me and I had I couldn't even defend myself.
Speaker:I was bad.
Speaker:And so six months later,
Speaker:one of the women sitting around here, her husband passed away.
Speaker:So they were having a benefit and they were looking for donations.
Speaker:And in the valley, you're a family.
Speaker:So they were collecting
Speaker:the donations and they said to drop it off.
Speaker:So I walked in and out of my donation.
Speaker:When I walked in, the daughter came out to hug me.
Speaker:Ronnie is there, the owner,
Speaker:and they said to me, they're like, You're welcome here.
Speaker:You're a good person, you're a good mom.
Speaker:And sorry.
Speaker:I just I wasn't expecting it.
Speaker:And I was like, I need a minute.
Speaker:I need a minute.
Speaker:And they kept on going and everything.
Speaker:And you're a good person, You're good mom.
Speaker:And they just kept on.
Speaker:I said, I know, I know.
Speaker:What made them change.
Speaker:If you know why after she is the harlot of Nashville, is it?
Speaker:You're a good mom.
Speaker:You're a good teacher.
Speaker:Little bit of a change there. Yeah.
Speaker:So what happened was they had the time, the six months
Speaker:to experience those hateful people of me, of their own.
Speaker:They saw those people that were extremely hateful.
Speaker:They got to experience them with themselves,
Speaker:with me not being in the picture.
Speaker:So I was more of like a decoy, like they put everything on me.
Speaker:But once I was gone. They themselves.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I knew that too.
Speaker:I knew so hurtful and everything I said, I knew myself.
Speaker:I put my head down on the pillow.
Speaker:I know what happened. And everything will.
Speaker:The truth will shine and everything will come out in the wash.
Speaker:And I knew that. And it did. It took six months, but it did.
Speaker:So what advice do you have for other adults
Speaker:who may be going through this same issue?
Speaker:Just feeling like
Speaker:the world is against them, even though it's nothing that they did wrong?
Speaker:It's so hurtful because you feel so vulnerable, you feel defenseless.
Speaker:So I totally get it and understand
Speaker:what I did.
Speaker:I really dug deep in myself because I knew who I was.
Speaker:I did pray and I knew that things
Speaker:would come out and the truth would come out.
Speaker:And I stayed true to myself.
Speaker:And I and I love my I know I'm a good person.
Speaker:I have good intentions and everything I it would come out.
Speaker:I really have faith in what God will show
Speaker:because I had no control of anything else.
Speaker:And I just continued on my path and I felt protected and I just
Speaker:kept on going forward and bettered myself and my dreams and my goals.
Speaker:And I started writing a book and it was something I wanted to do.
Speaker:And I didn't know if it was ever going to go back into honky tonk.
Speaker:I had no idea. I had no idea what was going to happen.
Speaker:But I just kept on going forward in my path.
Speaker:I can't change the way people view and think of me, but I know myself.
Speaker:So in an actionable way.
Speaker:What advice would you give to somebody else going through it?
Speaker:Take that energy and the pain and that hurt and better yourselves.
Speaker:And then the day you lost control, you feel vulnerable
Speaker:because you can't control what they're thinking, saying or anything.
Speaker:But what you do have control of is your actions and yourselves.
Speaker:So you take that hurt, take that pain, put it into yourself and better yourself.
Speaker:That's really that's one thing you have control over.
Speaker:You don't control over other people.
Speaker:So my advice is, yes, talk about it if that makes you feel better,
Speaker:talk about it with people, but then really sit with your sit with yourselves.
Speaker:Think about what's your goals, what your dreams, what is it that you want?
Speaker:And instead of the depression and the sadness you're feeling,
Speaker:turn that into motivation and go in that direction.
Speaker:Go into a positive direction.
Speaker:Try to spin it into a positive, which is what I did.
Speaker:Please.
Speaker:In the wrap up, you have this anti-bullying program
Speaker:which is connected to dance.
Speaker:What's special about it?
Speaker:What makes it an anti-bullying program?
Speaker:So we're going to open up the program talking about bullying.
Speaker:So we want to be in schools and just make it kind of a safe haven.
Speaker:We want to talk about want to talk about what bullying is, an awareness
Speaker:and make it an area and a class to open up with for people
Speaker:that maybe that are being bullied and they have a place to talk about it.
Speaker:So we just want to talk about awareness, what it is and who you can talk to.
Speaker:Someone is bullying and kind of make a comfort safe haven for people, for kids.
Speaker:Then after that, we're going to have a Sundance dance fitness program.
Speaker:So they're going to exercise.
Speaker:They're feeling good.
Speaker:But then we're going to end the program with words of affirmation.
Speaker:So we are kind.
Speaker:We are loves to instill that.
Speaker:So really, it's about planting seeds of positivity
Speaker:and kindness and love and also fun fitness, but
Speaker:also creating an area for the kids to feel they could talk to someone.
Speaker:Love it.
Speaker:So if we wanted to contact you, if we wanted to find you,
Speaker:if we wanted to come dance with you, how would we do this?
Speaker:So the website is country Fusion dot net.
Speaker:My email is Elizabeth at Country Fusion dot Net
Speaker:and an Instagram Contribution LLC in the Facebook.
Speaker:Awesome. Well, thank you for joining us.
Speaker:Yeah, thank you.
Speaker:I appreciate it.
Speaker:Thank you, Elizabeth. Thank you.
Speaker:And as for finding us, you can find us
Speaker:now on Facebook at our Karate chop bowling support group.
Speaker:Just search for it and we'll be there.
Speaker:Also, we would love to hear your story so you can email that to us
Speaker:at Karate Chop bullying at gmail dot com.
Speaker:If you yourself are being bullied and don't know where to reach out to find
Speaker:more information at the government website at stop bullying dot gov.
Speaker:You can also reach out to pacer dot org backslash bullying
Speaker:and if you find yourself dealing with dark thoughts,
Speaker:if you are thinking about harming yourself or even something even more,
Speaker:you can reach out to the National Suicide Hotline.
Speaker:And that phone number is very simple.
Speaker:It is 988.
Speaker:I'm Tim Flynn for Bruce Noxon.
Speaker:We are here to break the silence of bullying.
Speaker:Thank you for listening.
Speaker:We'll continue this conversation next week.
