Breathwork, a powerful tool for self-care, has been a newer part of our journey. We delve into how it can induce different states of consciousness, create meditative states, and evoke profound emotions. Kundalini energy, accessed through the chakra system, is another concept we explore, discussing its potent healing capabilities. We also address the challenges faced in processing heart-wrenching experiences such as pregnancy loss and how spiritual growth helps us tackle challenging relationships and skepticism.
Speaking about breathwork, we cover its various types and explore the Wim Hof Method, box breathing, and the Holotropic breathwork method. We discuss how these techniques can effectively manage stress and lead to transformative states of consciousness. We discuss the importance of healing from past traumas and how tools like breathwork, meditation, reiki, and more can facilitate the healing process and contribute to personal growth.
Connect with Erica at Guided Place for some of the services we mentioned in this episode: www.guidedplace.com
And Saturdays with Spirit: https://jennyshanks.com/events/saturdays-with-spirit-2023/
Colors
Use code OTHERSIDE15 for 15% off of our favorite mushroom gummies!
Our Website:
https://linktr.ee/seeyouontheothersidepodcast
Breathwork, a powerful tool for self-care, has been a newer part of our journey. We delve into how it can induce different states of consciousness, create meditative states, and evoke profound emotions. Kundalini energy, accessed through the chakra system, is another concept we explore, discussing its potent healing capabilities. We also address the challenges faced in processing heart-wrenching experiences such as pregnancy loss and how spiritual growth helps us tackle challenging relationships and skepticism.
Speaking about breathwork, we cover its various types and explore the Wim Hof Method, box breathing, and the Holotropic breathwork method. We discuss how these techniques can effectively manage stress and lead to transformative states of consciousness. We discuss the importance of healing from past traumas and how tools like breathwork, meditation, reiki, and more can facilitate the healing process and contribute to personal growth.
Connect with Erica at Guided Place for some of the services we mentioned in this episode: www.guidedplace.com
And Saturdays with Spirit: https://jennyshanks.com/events/saturdays-with-spirit-2023/
Colors
Use code OTHERSIDE15 for 15% off of our favorite mushroom gummies!
Our Website:
https://linktr.ee/seeyouontheothersidepodcast
All right, welcome back. Another episode. See you on the other side. Just us, just us. We were supposed to interview somebody, but yeah, we've been struggling with getting our schedules coordinated, so and like sick kids and stuff coming up.
Speaker 2:Yeah a lot of shit's happening right now. Also, I think we should say we're about to come into our break season. Your eyelashes look so good.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, thanks. They look really long. Thanks, anytime, no problem.
Speaker 2:It's that grande lash and little lash, curler, you know.
Speaker 1:Which I read something that the lash serum makes your under eyes Dark, yeah, and like more sunken in, really. Yeah, we should look into that. And grande was one of them. Damn, so sorry, damn it. Long lashes, but more eye bags.
Speaker 2:That's what concealers for Exactly. So we're about to like go into our break season, which last year we decided was going to be mandatory for us. Yeah, and I also think because of that, like there's not as much pressure to put an episode out once a week. You know, yeah, I also don't ever want to feel like we're burning ourselves out. I've been feeling that way. So if an episode, if we have an interview, cancel, like usually, we're like scrambling, and in the past we would be like five to six episodes deep, we would have like one on the back burner to use. And now we're like at a point where it's just like no, if someone cancels, like we don't have an episode for the next week, yeah, but I am OK with just not putting one out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I am too.
Speaker 2:I'm OK with that.
Speaker 1:I don't want there to be pressure to perform Well, and I think we're both hitting that time period and maybe next season we take a break a little bit earlier, yeah, and I have some ideas for getting more ready for interviews or whatnot, but anyways, I don't remember what I was going to say. I'm starting to feel that way, yeah, because even people are asking us to do things and whatnot, and I'm like, oh, can't I have this this weekend, can't I have something this next weekend? Can't. Like. Everything feels like it's that time of year where I feel like the last. I don't know how long there's been something going on every day, every weekend, there's no free time, yeah, and I feel like in the blink of an eye, it's going to be Thanksgiving, 100%.
Speaker 2:So that's exactly how I feel. The fall for me is insanity. It is and it's rough. I'm just now getting to a point where I can breathe because my oldest is done with band season marching band season but then my daughter's gymnastics meet season starts in a couple of weeks, so I have two free weekends before I'm right back to the grind. But I'll say this before we keep going, before I forget. But I was like maybe during the summer we take a little bit of a break too. I would be down with that, and so, instead of season three going all the way through, it's season three, part one. Season three, part two.
Speaker 2:Because the summer is really hard for us too, without child care. That's very true.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's very true, and maybe we do that. So then we continue to enjoy this and continue to, because I think it's a hard balance because, again, the expectation to show up in a certain way on here, the expectation to show up, and we put that expectation on ourselves.
Speaker 2:Right, right, right.
Speaker 1:Nobody's like come on guys, it's us, yeah, but social media on here, I think it's nice to take those little breaks so it doesn't feel so long and drawn out, and something we both struggle with in the world that we live in, and it's with you being a manifestor, me being a projector. Those are the two human designs. That rest is mandatory. So when we don't get it, we're not living at our best selves and our most authentic selves, and I think that's something that we have to schedule it in. Yeah, which I'm not really able to right now, which sucks, but I see a light at the end of the tunnel which is keeping me going Right.
Speaker 2:So Right. So I think we maybe have three interviews left and then it's done for the season Two. I think Two, I think that's it All right, and then we're going to be drowning in the holidays.
Speaker 1:I know.
Speaker 2:Actually I don't know, because I feel like maybe I'm trying to shift my perspective.
Speaker 1:This year actually Same, especially after talking with Jenny Shanks, and my dad came through and Tony's mom came through, and with Tony's mom, a huge thing was how she wanted us to do the holidays differently this year. Yeah, because she is with us. Yeah, and she's enjoying the holidays with us. So to not be depressed, right, miserable hags.
Speaker 2:Well, and we have not talked about the situation that I was going through last year during the holidays, but that situation has kind of settled and decompressed.
Speaker 1:Oh, like we have not talked about it on the podcast, yes, are you ever going to share that?
Speaker 2:Maybe OK.
Speaker 1:I think I should. I don't think you have to go too deep into it.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:But I think it definitely.
Speaker 2:Because it wasn't just the holidays, it was a situation that kept coming around. It was a situation that was kind of what is the word I'm looking for? Like when my rage incident started happening. It was pushed by this situation. Can I say something?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so next week we have a break because Jason's going to go see Jenny Shanks. Yes, what if you?
Speaker 2:My husband's going to go see a medium y'all. Yeah, my husband the skeptic atheist, hey.
Speaker 1:Tony can do it, jason can too. I shouldn't even say that anymore. He's he's not.
Speaker 2:He's not the skeptic anymore and he's not atheist anymore.
Speaker 1:But never in a million years would I think that this day would come, so OK, so that happens next week, but I think, maybe think about talking about it, because I think a lot of people struggle during the holidays with maybe some similar stuff, so maybe that could be an opportunity to talk about it.
Speaker 2:You're right, I know. Ok, I would maybe need you to lead me through that Totally. You're so good at that. I Lead me. Projector.
Speaker 1:Gladly, gladly. I would love to interview you on that topic.
Speaker 2:That would actually be a really good thing to bring up, because I think it's especially with people going through the holidays.
Speaker 1:And I think it could be therapeutic for you to talk about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so You're right yeah.
Speaker 1:OK.
Speaker 2:All right, all right, but for today, we've never had anyone on talk about breath work. Yes, and there is a reason for that, and I think, well, kind of I think we've been wanting someone like the perfect someone to come on and discuss it, you know.
Speaker 1:Which I love that when we did our episode with ADHD in cannabis, yeah, we got a message of somebody who is like oh my gosh, I, this is what.
Speaker 2:I do. This is what I do?
Speaker 1:I would love to talk to you guys at work.
Speaker 2:I work with people who have ADHD and work with cannabis.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's she, and she helps like get people dose to help them focus and live a normal life, which I'm so excited to talk to her Season three. Season three. But yeah, same thing with breath work. I would love to manifest somebody who really knows what they're talking about to come on and talk to us.
Speaker 2:And not that we don't know people who have come on, but there is like this you know, I had an experience. We never really talked about it because I was waiting to have someone on to talk about it, so then I could go into it. You know? Yeah, because I didn't quite understand it.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And then now you've had a breath work experience a couple of them, actually, yeah and you're also getting trained to facilitate in breath work, I am. So I think we should do what we did in the very beginning of this podcast and talk about it from like an amateur lens.
Speaker 1:OK, not that you're an amateur, no, I totally am an amateur. My training is going to take a year and I'm like one session in.
Speaker 2:Damn, I didn't know that yeah.
Speaker 1:It's going to take me a while. Ok, yeah, it's not so. Very factually, I am an amateur.
Speaker 2:Ok, perfect, and then it'll be really cool to see how much you've grown in this a year from now. Yeah, so breath work, what is it? I'll be the dummy in this and ask Well, I'm kind of Not the dummy, but I have a lot of questions.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so breath work is it's pattern breathing, especially holotropic breath work. It's pattern breathing to help you reach a certain state of consciousness. That's the goal.
Speaker 2:OK For me anyways. Well, and that's kind of why I wanted to ask, Because to me breath work is like yoga, as in there are so many different styles and types of yoga for different things, it's wild and that's something that I so I wasn't sure like if I would be.
Speaker 1:You do this kind of breath work and that's what you do. But the thing that I love about my mentor it's Nicole with the owner of Salt Cave here in Louisville, but we should have her on for that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, salt Cave.
Speaker 1:Yes, she is, she is. She has a soft presence, which I love, so I was. I was kind of curious, because I don't have that. I'm much harder.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. But the great thing I love about training underneath her is I have her. But I'm also going to be training under other breath work practitioners who are facilitators and I'm going to be creating my own style. I'm going to be doing all different types of breath work to see what resonates with me, but also, hopefully, when I am able to be a facilitator, I'm going to be able to kind of see who I have individually or, if I have a group, see kind of what the group is like, what the dynamic is like, the energy, what people need, and then do breath work based on kind of what's around me. Yeah, yeah, so it's like a prescription, yeah, kind of.
Speaker 1:And we've said this, but breath work is the closest thing to a psychedelic experience without taking any type of substance 100%, 1,000%. So I have done breath work at home. I did a breath work session, I did a mini breath work session at Saturdays with Spirit, actually with Nicole from Salt Cave, and then I did another one with Bear from Corp Pilates. So this last session was my second full session ever in my life with a facilitator. I know it was an hour and a half and I didn't think it would be that crazy because it was a softer breath and what I mean by that. It was just like an inhale in through your nose for four and then like a sigh out for an exhale and we're in the Salt Cave. I took a micro dose before because I wanted to really get into like a meditative state, but it was wild.
Speaker 1:And the thing with breath work is there are things that can come up and you have no idea why they are coming up Interesting and sometimes you don't have to know Right, like you don't need to go down every rabbit hole to like it's just like a release.
Speaker 1:It's just a release so. But usually within like 15, 20 minutes my arms and my hands start to go a little numb and then they're playing music and she's guiding you in the breath and what she wants you to do and giving you cues. But within 20 minutes I start sobbing uncontrollably and I don't know why, but I just chalked it up as it's a much needed release and it was like afterwards I felt so great and I felt like it's just such a weight lifted off my shoulders. But there were moments where I was crying uncontrollably and I had no idea why I was crying. There were moments that I was shaking and I couldn't stop like shaking, but I don't know. If you guys remember season one, we interviewed a girl named Molly. She posts the Cheers Sleeving podcast and there is a video of me because Leah and Molly are talking about astral projection.
Speaker 2:We need to find this video and we share it, and that was the first time I had.
Speaker 1:I was very new in this space and that was the first time I had ever heard of anyone talking about astral projection, and so you can see my face in it and I'm like what the fuck Are they talking about? What you can do, that you can have an out of body experience, and I just look just in shock and I'm so out of my element in that interview, which I was Were you in that moment, like what the fuck am I getting myself into?
Speaker 1:I'm going to be honest a little bit, because sometimes, when you are so new in this space or you're not in this space at all, you're like are these people full of shit? I would have been that way and I kind of was. I was like come on, you guys, really you guys do what.
Speaker 2:It's like if I hadn't experienced it myself and was listening to someone else talk about it, I would have been like that's bullshit, right, there's no way.
Speaker 1:And I'm always open, yeah, like I'm always open to what people have to say for the most part, and I was open to you guys, but it was just so not in my realm at that time in my life, yeah, and I was never into kind of woo-woo-wee stuff and I'm still kind of not Right. I'm not into the crystals and the like, which is circles. Yeah, yeah, that's kind of a joke. I'm getting more into that stuff, but I'm like it's time and again I have to experience things for myself. Y'all, I astral projected.
Speaker 1:I'm so happy for you, it was wild, you did it, I did it, you did it, joe. But and so it's funny because I was actually talking to my stepdaughter Mia, about this last night and she's like you astral projected. She's like where did you go? I'm like I didn't go anywhere.
Speaker 2:So that was me, the first time I was saying it and I was like I didn't go anywhere. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So I got so into this breath because it's like you do, you get in this meditative state. So my pattern of breathing actually kind of stopped because I was like I started to go into refloating.
Speaker 2:You felt like you were floating.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, I don't know where I was floating. I don't know where I was, but I had this awareness like you are here, you're doing breath work, you're in this cave, but you're not here, yes, and I felt like I was just floating. I wasn't, I was breathing, but not doing the pattern breath, and I just felt like I was floating.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:And that was it. But I was like, oh, and then afterwards I was like, oh, my god, and I said something to you and I was like, listen, I did this breath work and this happened and I felt like I was floating and I was out of my body. But I knew my body was down there and you're like, babe, you asked for projected. I was like, yeah, oh my god, I did it. I did it. Yes, I'm my hippie.
Speaker 2:I had to have someone tell me that's what happened to me. Yeah, because I didn't, Because I had never experienced it before. Like it was so hard to describe what I was feeling in the moment. And the second someone said that was what that was. I was like, oh my god, I felt true serenity.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's how it felt in that moment Like true serenity, like not release, not crying, not shaking, just peace, did you feel?
Speaker 2:held.
Speaker 1:And then there were moments yes, I did, I felt just safe, yeah.
Speaker 2:Safe.
Speaker 1:I guess that's what I mean, yes safe and just truly at peace in that moment.
Speaker 2:Like protected.
Speaker 1:Yes, held, it wasn't scary at all, so it's like I went through all of these, like the crying, the shaking, like the numbness, and then I just felt this peace.
Speaker 2:The numbness that you're talking about. I know there's a word for it, like tetany, yes, and it is tetany. Ok, so there is, and it depends on which type of breathwork you're doing. But the times that I've done it that really happens Like you feel like you're paralyzed. And if you are not warned about that or your facilitator is not letting you know that that could be a possibility, I can see how someone might freak out. Yeah, but like your fingers it goes away. Yes, it does go away, but like everything feels frozen, like you are paralyzed, you can't move. So for anybody who is new to breathwork or new to this type of breathwork, like that is normal to feel like you can't move.
Speaker 1:You know what? Another thing that is crazy about breathwork not this time, but the time before. This is TMI, but I don't really give a fuck.
Speaker 2:Was this the time With bear With?
Speaker 1:OK, that we did it with bear. Yes, we did a breathwork session and sometimes when you do breathwork it will go to like certain ailments or certain areas of your body that need maybe care or treatment or there's something wrong, or it so like in the group. My last group breathwork session it went to like a woman's shoulder because she like had a shoulder injury. Wow. So in the session with bear it went to Mahuha, All to Mahuha, and I was like why is Mahuha vibrating? Damn, I had a UTI.
Speaker 2:Did you know it in the moment? No, oh my God, oh my God it was.
Speaker 1:It was like something's wrong, it's right here and yeah, I forgot about that. Oftentimes I get UTIs if I'm incredibly stressed. And again when I went is going through all of this stuff with the doctors and the chronic UTIs, they were like, oh, take this pill, and looking at all of these internal factors where I get them, when I have a lot going on and I am external, when I don't take care of myself and I'm under a lot of stress, I'll get these ailments, like I'll get sick, I'll get UTIs, whatever. But yeah, it was.
Speaker 2:It was like my body saying, yeah, you need some, this needs some attention, so that I do feel like that goes beyond just you being external, because I do feel like so many people get physical ailments and don't realize that it's coming from within. That's very true and something that they need to address, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, but yeah, no, it's, it's. I'm really excited for this journey because I feel like you know, yes, I've loved using psychedelics, but I feel like this is another tool, yeah, where I'm going to go deeper into myself and find out a lot of things by myself about myself, like, for example, this was a considered a soft breath and I got more out of this breathwork session than anything I've ever done so far, yeah, and so I'm really excited to try out the different techniques and styles and and have you ever heard like people talk about like, do more, do more, do more.
Speaker 2:Like you want to lose weight, do more. You want to do this, do more. And we're really learning that like the answer is not always more Sometimes it's less and sometimes it's not hard, sometimes it's soft. Yeah, there's actually a book out and I haven't read it, but I've recommended it to people. That's called try softer.
Speaker 1:Oh, I love that.
Speaker 2:And it's talking about how we are so hard on ourselves and so, like, sometimes the answer is to like go easier on ourselves and the things that we're trying to achieve will happen in a different way. Like, instead of like beating yourself up, like you're just like talking to yourself, like you're, you know, a child. Like be softer.
Speaker 1:Right, well, and I think about like this breathwork session and I think about like me working on being softer, being more vulnerable and showing up in a softer way in the world. I think about working with Michaela, the functional practitioner, and you know, coming from an exercise background, fitness background and her being like listen, your body is like under so much stress. You need to do lower impact workouts and you need to walk and you need to journal and you need to get yourself in a parasympathetic state as often as possible throughout the day, as much as you can, and so learning to oh, I don't need a box and do hit and do all this stuff like cardio and like work myself to exhaustion. Well, and even like, when I do I do Pilates now, and when I do Pilates, everything's slow. The slower the better, yeah, and I'm much more intentional because I'm not just going through the motions, I'm paying attention to my breath and how things feel. Yeah, and it's so opposite of everything I've done my entire life, I think that's opposite from what a lot of people yeah.
Speaker 1:I've been hard my entire life and this is, I feel, like the first. I haven't even hit two years since my first mushroom journey. Yeah, and so this year and a half it's learning how to show up a little bit softer.
Speaker 2:Well, I think about like the people who you know. Sometimes people end up like having heart attacks and people are like they were so healthy and they like ran three miles every day and they worked out, like those types of things. And it's like first off, like you know, you don't know what was going on internally. And I say this to my husband all the time, like because he gets stressed out but he still does a lot of cardio and I'm like you are working yourself up more because you're already like working in a high state of stress and doing cardio is putting your body in more distress.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So, and I'm not saying cardio is bad, and I think steady state cardio like walking and some, yeah, those are, those are good.
Speaker 2:I'm saying, when you are in a level of high stress, like, and you are already like at discomfort with like your heart level and your anxiety level, like that's probably not the thing that you should be doing, like putting more stress on your body. No, it's interesting because there's also like there's the Wim Hof breathing method yeah, I do Wim Hof and there's box breathing methods and there's hollow tropic and I guess we can talk about like my hollow tropic, yes, and what it brought for me yeah, we have not talked about that and spending like a year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's been a little over a year. We've never talked about it because I was waiting to have someone on. Yeah, so now it's you. So same. I had never really done breath work in that way. I had heard about the Wim Hof method. I think that I like even downloaded the Wim Hof app at one point. I did, too, you did, and it's great. But, like I remember hearing one time in a podcast like there are three things that we could be doing for our like, mental, physical and spiritual health, and one of them is laughter and one of them is breathing, and I can't remember what the other one was, honestly. But breathing was for, like, spiritual health, and we're breathing wrong, like we should be breathing through our noses at night, like we need to learn how to breathe through our nose, not our mouth, like that type of stuff. Yeah, so I started to learn more and more about breathing and why it's important to learn how to do it the right way. Who fucking knew that we breathe?
Speaker 1:wrong. Yeah, do you use mouth tape?
Speaker 2:at night I don't, but I don't think I breathe a lot through my mouth. That's good, unless I'm sick, that's good.
Speaker 2:And then I breathe through my mouth a lot. Well, that's understandable, yeah, because I can't breathe through my nose. But I yeah. So when was it? Same time as you did had my first tiny little breathwork 20 minutes at Saturdays of Spirit, and it wasn't a full session. But I remember walking in thinking I don't even know what this is, but I'm going to do it anyway. That's my life motto. I don't know what it is, but I want it, yeah. So I did this 20 minute breathwork session and I'm sobbing and Nicole, your practitioner, your teacher I don't know what to call her your trainer, yeah, afterwards I'm looking at her like what the fuck just happened that? I'm sobbing and she's like it's okay, you know, she's very soft.
Speaker 2:She is so soft and she's like it's okay, just let it out. It's okay, you know, you don't need to know what it is, it's okay. And I'm like what the fuck just happened.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because you don't know where it comes from. Right, and somebody asked a question. I can't remember who, but they're like well, what if I don't want it to come out Like what if? What if I don't? I don't want to touch any of that. And I go, so this was my response.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I go but it's already in there. I go and you may not know, like in your brain, that it's there, but I was like your body knows and it shows up in how you react and how you respond and what you do when you're triggered. Yeah, so people who don't want to touch it. I'm like it's already there, so you might as well, touch it Well and you're.
Speaker 2:It's there and it's impacting you, whether you realize it or not, because it's an unconscious thing, but I think because it's unconscious, right?
Speaker 1:people think it's not there, right, like, oh, it's there, it's there, it's there.
Speaker 2:And there's also, like this layer of healing where, like, in order to heal something, you kind of have to make the unconscious conscious, absolutely you have to.
Speaker 1:Well, I've, you can't avoid it, right? I've talked to you about Joe dispens. I listen to a lot of Joe's dispens, yeah, and like negative thoughts.
Speaker 2:So anytime like there are negative thoughts, instead of it just being like unconsciously going on in my mind, all day, every day, I tried to make them conscious, yeah, and reframe that thought to then change my thought patterns, yeah, so there's a Paul Conti talks about this a lot too, like making the unconscious conscious and really having to like we'll talk about that hopefully at the end of this episode if we have time yeah, like why it's important to touch those things and not try to bypass them in healing, but before we get there, so that same day, and I don't know if you've ever felt this way when you go to Saturdays with spirit and I, we say this like I go every fucking month and I don't. I go when I need to go.
Speaker 1:Well, and I go when I can go and I feel like it can never fucking go, that's true.
Speaker 2:Okay, well, we'll go. But the few times that I've gone and I've made like a full day out of it, like there seems to always be a theme for the day, and it's wild because I don't know if anybody else who's ever gone has experienced this. But I'm seeing like different practitioners and they're all touching on something that seems to be the same and I'm like, are you guys like on walkie talkies and you're like, hey, this chick needs her throat chakra cleanse, like talk about using her voice. You know, and they're not, but you know they're seeing so many people throughout the day.
Speaker 2:But this same day that I did the breath work, I had a biofeedback session, biohacking, I don't remember actually biofeedback biofeedback and this was a coincidence because I didn't go to this weekend thinking that that's what I wanted to do. There just happened to be an opening and I happened to be free. So I was just like sure, I don't know what it is, but I'll do it again. So I do this biofeedback session. I have to rewind a little bit. Okay, so I did a Kundalini appointment with Erica like two or three months before this whole breath work and biofeedback. Can you explain what Kundalini is?
Speaker 1:Nope, I can try.
Speaker 2:I do know that I we had just interviewed Erica with human design. Actually, I don't even think we had interviewed her yet. I went to go book a Reiki session with her and on her website there was like a Kundalini rising appointment and I was like I don't know what that is, but I keep seeing that word. We also had this, which I didn't know what that meant at the time, but I was like, okay, I'll book this appointment instead.
Speaker 1:So Kundalini is the term for a spiritual energy or life force located at the base of the spine, conceptualized as a coiled up serpent. The practice of Kundalini is supposed to arouse the sleeping Kundalini Shakti from its coiled base through the six chakras and penetrate the seventh chakra, or your crown.
Speaker 2:So she explained it to me like there's this coil at the base of your spine, literally what you just said and when you have this Kundalini arising, it's like this yin-yang of masculine and feminine energies coming together and balancing each other out through your chakra system and out through your crown chakra. So there are a lot of people who experience this through yoga. Russell Brand does a lot of Kundalini yoga, so I signed up for that, and I was like I don't know what this is. And I said, but if you think that I'm not ready for this and maybe I should just do a Reiki appointment or something instead, I'm totally down for that. And she was like well, I think that you signed up for a reason, so I think we should do it. She was like normally, people who do this do a series of six, and we do once a week for six weeks, but if you just want to try one and see if you like it, we can always do the six sessions later. And I was like, okay, let's do it. So we do this, and it's similar to Reiki.
Speaker 2:I'm face down, though, and she's got crystals down my spine, music going on, and it's been over a year that this happened. So, like my thoughts are a little bit cloudy, like my details are cloudy, but I get into this meditative state. I start seeing like bright white light, so much that I think she's like shining a light in front of my eyes and like waving it back and forth. And so I open my eyes and I'm like, nope, she's not. There is not even a light in front of my face.
Speaker 2:But this is weird because I keep seeing like lights shining back and forth in front of my face. So I close my eyes again, I try to get back into it and this is where I like astral projected, but I didn't know it. Like I am completely outside of my body and I see a boy who is trying to distract me or get my attention. I don't know which one he's doing, but he is like a little boy, maybe 10, 11 years old about the age of my middle child at the time and he's like shining this light, this reflective light, and trying to get me to go to him. But I was like a little bit like what is happening right now.
Speaker 2:I was wasn't aware of what was happening in my body at that point because I was so far gone. And then I woke up, I came to and when I came to I had been sobbing. And I'm like that's weird, because normally you know when you're crying and I was just like I was gone. And then when I came back I was in the middle of sobbing and I was like I would have known if I was crying, right, right. So I'm like okay, so clearly something just happened. And then the session was over and I was like, oh my God, it just started, what the fuck?
Speaker 2:So afterwards I'm talking with Erica and this is before I really knew her. I didn't really know her that well, and she was like there was a boy with us today and I was like you saw it too. Literally, I was like Holy shit, I saw this boy and she was like he was trying to show you something and I'm like, oh my God, I don't know what he was trying to show me. But yes, I saw that like he was trying to get my attention, like there was a bright light flashing in my eyes, like I don't know what it was, but it got me curious. But at the same time I remember saying to you I want to do this, but I don't know. Like what's going to come up for me and I'm scared, like I was really thinking it was like he was going to show me something dark from my childhood and I didn't want to go there.
Speaker 2:Yet I also had to commit to six weeks at the same time, same day, so it was really hard for me to do that. At the time I was still working and so fast forward a couple months. Sorry, I had to put that in there. We do this breathwork session, I do the biofeedback session, and in the biofeedback session she's got me hooked up to these things on my wrist. Have you done that yet?
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:I want to. She had me hooked up to this machine. It was on my wrist and, I think, my ankles. Maybe I could be wrong about that. It's been a long time. And she, like, I'm just laying there and I'm like, am I supposed to be doing anything? And it wasn't like Reiki. She's just got this computer next to me and she's like, pulling up my chart, she, she prints something out and she's like, okay, this is what I'm reading. And it's got this body scan and there's colors that are summer brighter and summer like dim, and around my sacral chakra there's, like this, a lot of like yellow and it's really bright. And she was like this is showing that there's like a lot of religious trauma. And I'm like I don't know that. I don't know, but I'm like I don't even know this woman. There is some religious fucking trauma.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no you've got religious trauma for sure.
Speaker 2:This was in August of last year, like literally a few days before we left for Sedona. Okay, I had to put that in there. Another thing that the scan showed she says are you pregnant right now? I was like no, and she was like have you lost a baby before? I was like yes, and she was like so this right here is showing that there is a loss.
Speaker 2:Have you really processed that? And I'm like thinking and I was like I mean I feel like I did, maybe I didn't, I don't know. She was like I think you need to like maybe mourn and grieve and process that a little bit more in your own time. And I leave and that whole day just kind of fucked me up a little bit. I was like what the fuck is happening? I go home and I realize I had a miscarriage almost to the day Like 10 years before, 11 years before, in the month of August, before I had my middle child, and that story I'll get there in a minute. It did happen but I didn't really process it because I was trying to get pregnant and I got pregnant again right away afterwards and I was trying really hard not to focus on that because I was afraid it was going to happen again. So I kind of like out of sight, out of mind.
Speaker 1:I think a lot of women do that. Yeah, because I've suffered a miscarriage too, yeah, and mine was a little bit different because then Kai came into our lives. But it was this mentality of like okay, don't, like, don't touch that, because you've got, you know, you've got a child and you've got to be grateful and yeah. And so I think a lot of women do do that.
Speaker 2:They push it down.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:It was. I hadn't thought about that since my second child was born.
Speaker 1:And this month is pregnancy loss awareness month, really.
Speaker 2:I did not know that. Yeah, interesting, yeah that this episode is happening now.
Speaker 1:I know, I know.
Speaker 2:So we go to Sedona and I think that's the next, literally like that same week we're in Sedona and there's so many layers to this and there's so many things that I think maybe contributed to my breath work experience. On the flight there I read a book called many lives, many masters, and I think that's the book. I mean it's not about, it's a psychiatrist from the 80s real life who was an atheist, didn't believe in this stuff, and he started working with a woman who could remember her past lives Really great book.
Speaker 2:And it like really hypnotizer, right, he hypnotized her and every time and he worked with hypnosis, like so, and he was like I don't know what to do with this life, but it would be something relevant to her anxieties present day and she was able to heal that anxiety. Wow, like little things. Like you know, she had a fear of drowning, fear of water, and then in one of her past lives she was, she drowned. So when she like worked through that past life experience, she would come back from this hypnosis therapy and like her anxiety around water was gone. Little things like that.
Speaker 2:But it just really follows this guy's progression from being like this atheist who is very scientific and result driven, to like really thinking like there's more to this world than he thought and it was hard for him to ignore because he just witnessed it firsthand, right. So read this book. On the way to Sedona, we sign up for breathwork. We were saying at a place called Savannah which is like a retreat type center and they have like breathwork and yoga and all the good stuff. Sign up for breathwork for the first time, a big session, an hour long session, and I'm so excited and Jason's like down for whatever which by the way when you did your mini session with Nicole.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Were you like Holy fuck, how can I do an hour of this? Absolutely Okay, I felt too.
Speaker 2:Well, and I also remember calling my husband after I did it, because I'm like I'm going to have to drive home and I feel like I just did mushrooms.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And that was only 20 minutes. Yeah, it was the most psychedelic experience I have ever had, without taking psychedelics. Yes, but the come down was much quicker.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And I think we interviewed Kali. Kali talked to us one time about how breathwork was one of her favorites, because it's like doing a trip without yeah, and then you can drive and go home, and then you could just drive and go home and for us, like doing a mushroom trip is like six to eight hours and a whole day and they're a little bit different, but I understand what she's saying.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we do this breathwork session. Nobody in there had ever done breathwork before. She asked beforehand I raised my hand because I had done it, but literally just like the weekend before and a mini session. But I was like I kind of know what we're doing. You know, I was like you in this experience, like complete meltdown, sobbing.
Speaker 2:I had an out of body experience where I am above myself watching, and again, this is what I mean by like things that happened before this, like we're part of this experience.
Speaker 2:I was watching myself have a miscarriage from above and it was watching because it was like over a three day period of time and it was watching it happen In, like it felt like three days, but it was like 30, 45 minutes worth, Right, but watching it back and seeing what happened. And at the time my husband was still very much an alcoholic and I was really struggling with this miscarriage and there was nothing either one of us could do. So he went out and left me home and again at this time in our lives I was very much Well, yeah, you can go out, it's fine. Like what are you going to do here and he also wasn't very safe and comforting for me and even though he knows what was happening, he was very he's very black and white, Like well, there's nothing we can do. So you know, very like thought he was helping but wasn't helping at all.
Speaker 1:He didn't sit with you in it at all.
Speaker 2:No, no, but I was also like I don't need you to sit with me. You know what I mean. Like I gave. I was like you can go out. What?
Speaker 1:else are you going to do? I was like I'm going to sit with you because he wasn't going to sit with you, even if he physically sat with you.
Speaker 2:He wasn't going to be there for me the way I needed him to be there for me. He wasn't going to show up the way I needed him to show up, right. So I was like you can go, it's fine. So this was like over a weekend. He went out Friday night and then he went out Saturday night and I laid in bed for like three days and didn't shower. I was just like laying in bed, going down like rabbit holes, like is there a chance that? Like maybe it's not a miscarriage, or could it be this or maybe it's not? You know, like just going through like so much emotional turmoil. And then on the last night he was out partying and I went to the bathroom and it and it came out Like I passed it on my own and I remember them saying like if you don't pass this on your own, you're going to have to have a DNC.
Speaker 1:I had a DNC.
Speaker 2:I can't even imagine, like I know, like those are painful as well, like they are.
Speaker 1:I literally wore like a diaper for six weeks. Oh my God, I'm sorry, that's okay. I mean I could, but I couldn't imagine passing it at all at home.
Speaker 2:That was like traumatic because I could tell what it was Right and I was like freaking out and I called my husband to come home and I was like I need you to come home and he did come home but he was drunk and wasn't very helpful and I couldn't bring myself to flush the toilet, like all these things, like I'm just like a hot fucking mess During this breath work session. It's like bringing all of this back up and it's reminding me of what was happening and it was like saying like you didn't process this because you didn't know how, like you didn't have anyone there to help you process this. Have a safe space. I didn't have a safe place. I didn't know what that even meant. Like I didn't get to grieve, I didn't get to feel what I needed to feel. I didn't have the right support system.
Speaker 2:And I guess in that session, in the breath work session, she was playing this music and one of the songs was this Hawaiian phrase and I can't remember the name of it. I can post it, but it's. It's like the law, the word for it is like a Hawaiian word, but the phrase is I love you, I'm sorry, I forgive you, please forgive me, and it's this chant that plays over and over and over and over and I'm just like weeping and I'm sobbing. And then the session's over and she's coming around and she's like asking if she can she ask permission to like help us ground. And I'm and she asked and I was like yes, please, I'm sobbing and she's like putting her hands on my shoulder and putting her hands on my hands and putting her hands on my feet, like trying to like bring me back down to earth because I just had this like otherworldly experience. And she has no idea what's going on and what just happened in my mind. And then it's over and everybody else just like yeah, that was cool, that was wild. And I'm just like terrified in a corner like what the fuck just happened. And I like look over at Jason. He's like I mean, yeah, that was cool, that was pretty cool. And I'm like, fuck you.
Speaker 2:But also, this week for us was supposed to be like a very healing week. Right, I paid for it with my divorce fund. So on the way back to our room, I'm I'm quiet, and you know that's not me. Jason like makes fun of me because I talk so much. I'm like stone cold quiet and he's like something wrong and I was like, yeah, but I don't know if I can talk about it. And he's like okay, and I was like, but I feel like I need to talk about it. And he's like okay, I just walked into the room and I run a bath and I'm like I think I need you in here with me because I think I need to talk about what just happened and I don't want you to get upset because I'm going to bring up something from the past.
Speaker 1:But I need to get this out and I need to process it but you guys never really we never dealt with it, so you kind of have to talk about it, even if it's from the past.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I tell him what came up for me and he's just sitting there like I'm really sorry and I was like I know, I know you are and I know that you didn't know what you were doing and I didn't know what was going on and I couldn't have expected you to show up for me the way that I needed you to, because I didn't even know what I needed.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And that's kind of why I kept hearing like I forgive you and I forgive myself and I'm sorry. And you know, I don't need you to know like what to say right now, but like, thanks, you know, I just need you to know that, like I was really hard for me to go through alone.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it really sucked.
Speaker 2:And I'm like just saying that, like you know, 11 years later, this huge like this happened 11 years ago this week Like fucking wild you know, and neither one of us ever talked about it ever again.
Speaker 2:So crazy. Okay, there's a good thing for this. Okay, I was like you know, that definitely brought something up that was sitting in my unconscious, my subconscious, and it brought it to the surface, like. And then I was like how am I supposed to grieve this? Like I don't know how to do that. All right, I told you this is gonna be a story time and I'm really sorry. No, it's okay. So we get back from Sedona and I finally have a break where I can do this Kundalini session, the full six weeks, yeah.
Speaker 1:They get comfy, all right.
Speaker 2:All right, oh wow you're really Wow.
Speaker 1:you're really getting ready for it. There's a lot of snot that would tell my throat from crying.
Speaker 2:Okay, so I go to this Kundalini session fully prepared for it to bring something up for my childhood. First session nothing happens. I mean, stuff happened, but like not what I thought was gonna happen. I was a little bit disappointed. I was like, damn it, I didn't natural project. Second session I was like I'm gonna micro dose this time, cause maybe this time I can like get myself into a meditative state and I can natural project.
Speaker 2:This time, like I was like really trying really hard to like force this experience to happen. Gotcha, third session something happens, but not the same thing. Like I'm in this meditative state, there's like nothing all around me. It looks like I'm standing in the middle of like nothing but darkness and it's like standing in the middle of nothing. I don't know how else to explain that other than like I was just standing in the middle of nothing, right, and it was like echoey and you know what I mean. Like just in the middle of the world and I kept hearing this voice like stop doing and just be. And I was like I'm trying to like force this experience and I need to just like let whatever happens happens instead of like trying to force myself to like have the same experience that I had that first time. I need to just like let this happen the way it's supposed to. So after that I stopped trying. I was like I'm just gonna go to these and I'm gonna get what I need out of them. And every time I got something like really beautiful out of it.
Speaker 2:So there was another time I went and she was, I guess, basically working from my bottom, from the bottom of my chakra system, all the way up, like the way that we said in the beginning, like the chakra systems needs to go all the way through.
Speaker 2:So second to last session, she was like we need to do a grounding exercise before we do this, a grounding meditation, because we're going further up your systems and what I'm gonna do today. I really need you to stay here on earth, like earth side, and I know that sounds weird, but I kind of knew what she meant. So I was like, okay, all right. So we did this grounding exercise and I could feel myself in the session and these are also like maybe 30, 45 minutes long I could feel myself lifting off and I was like here we go, like I'm going up, I'm going up, I'm going up, and then I like slammed back down, oh wow. So it didn't quite happen, but I could feel up and then it went down, and then up and then down, and then, like the furthest, further up I got, like the last up, I got. This sounds so weird, but I feel like you know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2:I came crashing down and it woke me up, like I was like, like I jumped on the table, like I was like you know, when you like fall asleep and you wake yourself up because you snore or something, that's what it felt like. And so afterwards we always had these integration sessions afterwards where she would say what she saw and what came up for her. And she's got this connection to this spirit side. So I'm just like trusting what she's saying, because I'm not seeing anything that she's talking about. This time she was like you started to get up there, you were lifting off and I had I was having a hard time getting you back down, and so the only way I knew to do it was to change the music. And so that's when it happened she like switched the music and I immediately crashed back down. It's fucking wild right.
Speaker 1:Interesting because when I asked her projected in the breath work session it stopped because I think she changed the music and it like got me out of it. Okay, go ahead.
Speaker 2:It's weird, though, how like music has that like can have that type of effect on you.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, she changed the music. I think she changed it from something that was like soft and ethereal to something that was like tribal and there were like drums and stuff, and so, like I came just crashing back down. So during my last session I like go in and at this point I'm just like I'm not expecting anything other than what I've gotten so far, because every experience, every session up to this last one, has been beautiful and beneficial, even though it wasn't what I thought it was gonna be. I stopped putting pressure on it. I was like just surrendering to whatever it was. You know, this last session we pulled cards before and I had never done that in a session with her before. So she had me pull three cards and we laid them over to the side and she was like we'll flip those over at the end. I remember I was seeing you this day afterwards.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So I came in here afterwards.
Speaker 1:A hot-ass mess, Hot-ass mess and we had to record and I remember being like I don't know, can you record?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and we did. But like I was like I just need a minute, I just need a minute. So during this very last session the boy comes back and I am just like in this other world with this boy and it just feels like love. I don't know how else to explain it. He wasn't showing me anything. I was just in this nothingness with this boy. And we're not speaking in any of these sessions, so like it's silent until we are done and she does the integration. So we go to do the integration afterwards and she says do you remember that boy from the first session?
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I was like yeah, and she said he was here today and I was like I know I was with him. And then she said feeling like a motherly connection there. She said, have you ever lost a child? And I was like yeah, and then I started thinking back to the first time I saw this little boy and he was around my middle child's age. Like I couldn't like quite explain. I'm like I've never lost a boy. You know, like I've had a miscarriage but like I would have assumed like it would show up as like a you know, a little baby.
Speaker 2:But no, like showed up in the way that I would be able to understand what it was. And she said have you ever? When she said that I was like you know, what's funny is like I have, and this, this stuff keeps coming up about it and he would have been, you know, this age, this age, he would have been 11. Um, and she was like you know, sometimes they show up in the age that you would remember, you would be able to understand who he is. And, um, I just felt this like overwhelming, like sense of peace, like not that it was supposed to happen in that way, you know what I mean. Like I hate when people say that like oh, the miscarriage was supposed to happen.
Speaker 1:Right, right, that's the worst thing to say to somebody.
Speaker 2:I know, and that's not what I felt.
Speaker 2:No, but you felt with peace with, with what happened, right, and the way that it happened, and that I felt like maybe he's always with me and that's why I'm like it kind of maybe had to happen, because I had to have this guide with me and it needed to be someone that was connected to me.
Speaker 2:Um, so then we like turn over the cards and I took pictures of all of this. I'd have a like a whole album just of like all the Kundalini stuff that I did in the cards, like she's turning them over and she didn't know what I was feeling when I was with this child and one of the cards was I love you. And I just lost it because I was like that's what I felt when I was with him, was just this like overwhelming sense of love, yeah, wow, and it just it felt like I knew him because I did Wow, um, yeah, so that's my story, wow. So I wonder if and I know that that wasn't just breath work, but it was like this series of modalities that led to this intense healing of a traumatic event that happened so long ago that I thought that it was out of sight, out of mind, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, I think a lot of people are like that. I've been like that, yeah, where, cause I? You know, now that you're talking about this, I don't think I have probably processed my miscarriage, you know, and I, and, but I think a lot of people, well, it's because, like, how do you do that, don't Well, and it's this. I think a lot of people, if you've never had it, it's hard to understand it, or how to know how to grieve something that never happened, right?
Speaker 2:So it's this kind of weird territory but Well, and I think, like my husband would say things like well, it was so early in the pregnancy and you know, so it wasn't like it was real, but it was real to me, you know he was growing in your body trying to have a baby and so there was that like immediate, like connection and that bond and it was still a part of me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think when he said that, that's kind of what I started to believe Internalize, yes, yes. So again like he's come a long fucking way, he never would leave me in something like that alone now. But, yeah, I think a lot of us like because what are you going to do? I read somewhere recently that in another country of course it's in another country they're allowing parents time off to grieve loss, pregnancy loss, wow, and I think that's huge because I didn't.
Speaker 2:I took the time off that during the time that it was happening and it was still a loss, but I was back to work literally like the next week. I was too, because I had to be yeah and I didn't think of it. And there's also like I don't think we talk about this enough either is how many times that loss shows up again. Because there were a few people who knew I was pregnant and I had clients who knew I was pregnant and I had to say I wasn't yeah, and say what happened. And you know, I was going to be in a wedding later and I had to tell the bride that, like I'm due around this time and this is, you know, I'm going to have a hard time finding this dress, whatever. And then that coming up in a conversation and being like, actually no, I'm not anymore, you know, yeah, so it was just like it kept showing up and I kept. I had to keep, like, pushing it down.
Speaker 1:That's interesting because when I found out I was pregnant again, you feel this bond right away. Yeah, I did anyways, yeah, um, I think most yeah, and I was so excited, I told a lot of people. I told a lot of people at the gym because at that point, like I had heard a heartbeat, yeah, and I think the very next appointment we were like going to announce it to everybody, yeah, Cause that was 12 weeks by then, so it was pretty far along.
Speaker 1:but it is one of the worst things going back and having to tell everybody that there was no longer a heartbeat and and there was no longer going to be a baby, and feeling embarrassed going back to work on Monday.
Speaker 2:And what do you have to be embarrassed about, right?
Speaker 1:But feeling shame, feeling embarrassed, feeling like there's something wrong with my body.
Speaker 2:I felt that too.
Speaker 1:Um, and that that part was hard, but luckily, I think, the day that I had my DNC and I had to have surgery, I a bunch of the members at my gym I got a video message every 30 minutes from the start of the day until the end of the day, the day that I had my DNC, just saying like we love you, you know, we're here for you, you're not alone, like. So that part was huge and helped me and that goes to show really how much community matters, because, although I didn't address it really myself, feeling so loved by everybody else around me was huge, huge, huge, huge. So but I don't want to cry, but I think that kind of goes into what we wanted to get into now, which is those things need to be addressed. Yeah, and oftentimes we don't remember it, we push it down because there's nothing we can do. Yeah, so we let it go or don't think about it or don't deal with it, because we don't think that we need to.
Speaker 2:Right, there's also, before we get into that, I did want to say this and I've been holding it in, like literally since you had your breathwork experience and you were like it was wild. There's a layer to that that I wanted to talk about in this space how, sometimes, when you're not open to things, you don't have these experiences. And I think with every layer that comes open with you, like you experience more and more, not you in general, but like I mean, but it is true, right, but it's with you, know, my husband and with me. Like I had had Reiki before, twice before I was actually like on a healing journey and they did nothing for me. You know what I mean?
Speaker 2:Cause I wasn't, I was a skeptic, and then, the minute things started to really open up for me, like I started having these like profound experiences. Yeah, and so which is another reason I'm really happy that, like my husband is doing a medium session next week, because where he is now, if he would have gone into this fully skeptic, I don't think he would have a good experience. Where he is now is very like. He's still black and white, he's still a logical thinker and that's just part of who he is and who he'll always be, but like there have been too many things that have happened to him for him to be that skeptical.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like when I told him example, like when I, the day that that happened, that I saw the little boy again and knew who it was, I was a mess that entire day. Like I said, I came here I was like sobbing. You're like let's like calm you down. That night I was like I have to tell you something I'm afraid to tell you, but you know those sessions I've been going to. He got so quiet. This is in bed, laying in bed at night.
Speaker 2:He was so quiet and it ended up starting a fight between us the next day why he was freaked out by it. He got really quiet and it was dark in our room because, again, we were laying in bed and I was like can you say something? Like I feel like maybe I shouldn't have told you this. Like you're being really quiet and he's just like I'm just processing and this is a lot to hear. Like I've never heard of anything like this before. Like it's just a lot. The next morning he's like talking to me and he's just like I don't know if I can be married to someone who's this out there.
Speaker 1:As we said literally.
Speaker 2:And I was just like do you think I'm lying about this? Like this happened. And he's like no, I don't think you're lying, I think that it happened, I believe you. It's just a lot for me. I'm like atheist as fuck Right. Like to hear you saying this stuff kind of freaks me out a little bit. Like, do you have these superpowers? And I'm like no, I don't fucking, I'm just normal, I'm normal, I'm normal. But he ended up having like a mushroom journey after that that was similar to Tony is like, where he had a very spiritual, similar spiritual astral projection experience. And then he was like, oh, this is, this is a thing, like. But he could not even understand how it happened. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:I kind of get that though.
Speaker 2:I do too, and I was very much like, if you can't, like I'm not lying about this stuff, but like if you can't handle that, then maybe you're right, like I don't think we should be together if my experience was too much for you.
Speaker 1:Right, you know right right, right, but it is. It is a lot Like when you hear, like when you and Molly were talking about astral projecting, right, it was a lot for me because I'm like, what the fuck are you guys even talking about? And that's too, it's kind of hard to understand and it's. It's something that you have to experience.
Speaker 2:You kind of do to kind of really understand it and he's done it multiple times now, so now he gets it. But to be also like this is another. I do want to like kind of bring this up because we've said it before it's really really almost impossible to be with someone in a relationship when you were healing and growing and open to new experiences. And they're not, and that's what I mean by why, like, he wasn't mad at me, right, but it was just a lot for him and I, I respected that and I understood it. I was like, if this is too much for you, like, like, because this is going to keep happening.
Speaker 1:Like this type of shit is going to keep happening, keep getting weird.
Speaker 2:I'm going to keep getting weird. I think I remember saying that was like I'm going to keep getting weirder, weirder. Things are going to continue to happen, because the more they happen and the more unbelievable they sound, the more I'm like huh, that was cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, it becomes like second nature to me yeah, yeah, that's very true, that's very true. And gosh, I heard that almost two years ago and it took me two years to just astral project.
Speaker 2:Well, and you had to have this experience on your own.
Speaker 1:I think that's well and I had to go through like a lot of different modalities yes, not just psychedelics Like yes, they hold a special place in my heart because that was the catalyst, but there have been. There's been breathwork, there's been meditation, there's been reiki, there's been therapy. They're like there's all of these different modalities, right.
Speaker 2:Which I think we can carry into this next part of this, because I think a lot of people think, once you start healing, that's it.
Speaker 2:There's like a destination, like I'm healed, you know, I think that everything you do is like chipping away yes, layer by layer, and I have had this conversation with my husband so many times where it's like, you know, he's like I've done this and I'm still not healed enough, and I'm like no boo, that's not how this works. Like you've done, you're right, you've done all this work, but there is this one thing that you will not touch and it is going to continue to show up until you touch it. And that's true for everybody, not just my husband, it's true for me, it's true for you, it's true for everybody. Like there is always going to be work to do. And I would try to say this by saying like you know, I've had 39 years of life, and to think that I can erase all the hurt and pain and damage and wounds, conditioning, conditioning societal beliefs, like feminine beliefs, like all this stuff, to think that I can undo that in one breath.
Speaker 2:Work session one mushroom trip one ayahuasca journey is just ignorant. You know, yeah, and I think it's kind of what you were saying like each time chips away a little bit more, and I think that they do it in the order that it's supposed to happen.
Speaker 1:Well, and when I did my first, first mushroom journey, I was like I get it Right. But then I did more and more and I'm like, oh, I know I kind of get it, but it's, it doesn't end Right. And I think people are wanting to. Well, they'll reach out to us and they'll be like all right, I want to do this, I want to do this mushroom journey, or I want to do MDMA, because they think that one journey, that one trip, that one modality is going to fix them.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Where my first mushroom trip was just the start of the beginning. Yes, it was a great starting place and it was a great tool to be like ah, there's so much I didn't know. It gave you what you needed. It gave me what I needed at the time, but it also allowed me to have an openness to being open to also other things Right, that I wasn't open to before.
Speaker 2:One. I do want to talk to Jason about each one of his journeys, because they were so, so, so different. But he has even said now like his third journey, which was almost a year ago, was the one that was very spiritual and he was like I don't, if that had happened first, like it would have just freaked me the fuck out, but his first two. He had to go through those first two in order to chip away at other things, in order to break away some of those conditions, in order to open his eyes really to like the things in the world around him, because he was very closed off to everything. So he had to go through those to get to that third session, that third, you know, spiritual experience.
Speaker 2:And then even that I'm like, and every time you do something, every time you do something for healing, it's gonna be a little bit more. You're never gonna get there ever. But when you are like down here at step one and you get to like step 10 of infinity, life feels better, things feel easier. There's still shit going on, but there's just this like level of peace that you have that you couldn't have even imagined having down here at that first one you know, yeah, and again, we talk about this a lot.
Speaker 1:Being so much more connected to yourself, you are much more aware when things start to go awry, and not feel that way.
Speaker 2:Right, and like you feel burnout before you're burnt out, right, you feel it coming. Yes, I feel depression before I'm depressed.
Speaker 1:Yes, I know when I'm going to start feeling anxiety and a panic attack could come on. But now it's, I don't even have panic attacks.
Speaker 1:Because you catch it Because it doesn't even get that far, right, because now I have the awareness and now I have the tools in my toolbox, not just one tool, multiple Tools, tools plural. So I know what to do. I know like, okay, do I need rest? Do I need to go to Dr Shealy to work through something? Right? Is it another journey? Is it some more breath work? And also there are things that I do every day.
Speaker 2:Can you feel when you're stuck? Oh my gosh, yeah, I can feel when I'm stuck.
Speaker 1:Yes, and so, like now, like what we were talking about earlier, it is a hard time of year.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And there are a lot of things going on. We do need that rest. I don't think I have been getting the rest that I need. I know that. But, I also see like a lot at the end of the tunnel and I know it's not gonna be this way forever.
Speaker 2:Right, kind of a thing. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, so yeah, so there's this word that gets thrown around a lot and something was happening with Jason and I over the last six months that I couldn't quite put into words, and then I finally realized it was this, and I'm like, oh my God, now this makes sense.
Speaker 1:How did you come to that realization?
Speaker 2:Well, so these rage things everybody knows I've been going through this it keeps happening. Because the same thing keeps happening and I am like I need you to touch this thing, like I need you to work through this because, like every time you react or respond in this way, like I can't handle it, like this is gonna continue to show up until you figure out why you're reacting this way, you know.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:And I know that it comes from his childhood. Dr Shealy knows that it comes from his childhood. Like anybody on the outside can look at this situation and be like, well, duh, like that's because this happened and I'm like I need you to go into that. Yeah, you need to touch it, bob. I need you to touch that. And he won't touch it. And I don't know if it's fear. I'm sure there's some fear there. I'm sure there's a lot of stuff that once he touches it is gonna come up that he's gonna have to work through and feel.
Speaker 2:And he has been like reading these books on how to meditate and stoicism and Astral projection, astral projecting and like all of these like really good books, they're great.
Speaker 2:Like books on Buddhism and Kabbalahism and like all of these like very like Buddhist, like nothing bothers me, everything is fine.
Speaker 2:So anytime I'm like I need you to do this, he's like I am doing this stuff, I'm doing the work, and I'm like no, no, no, you're doing work, I see that and I recognize that, and you're sober and you're like learning how to meditate, but like I'm telling you this is what you need to be doing right here.
Speaker 2:And then I get in my head because I'm like, should I really be the one telling him what he should and shouldn't be doing, you know? But the way I saw it, I'm like it's affecting me, like this thing continues to show up and I need you to touch it. Please, for God's sake, fucking touch this thing that keeps showing up in our relationship, like I need it, like I'm doing all the work I can about this, but like you won't touch it Right? So, and he's been reading a lot into like higher consciousness type stuff, so I think what he was trying to do and no, I don't think this is what came up for us this weekend. He is the type of person who has to experience something to believe it.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:He does this meditation, he astral projects and this thing comes up where it's like you're never gonna reach this level of consciousness, of higher consciousness, without also balancing the other chakras that lie underneath it.
Speaker 1:To get to the top, you have to start at the bottom.
Speaker 2:Right. So he brings this up to me and he's like so I never really believed in chakra stuff before, but I started doing these meditations and like these colors keep showing up for me and I looked up the color of what this one was and it's my sacral chakra. And then I looked up what sacral chakra was and it's a lot of mommy issues and I'm like, hmm, interesting, because that's the thing I've been begging you to touch, that you don't wanna touch. It's the thing our therapist keeps telling you to touch like you don't wanna touch it because you think you can just get up to here and then nothing will bother you. And then I realized what he was doing is spiritual bypassing.
Speaker 1:He's trying to pass the work to get to an enlightened space.
Speaker 2:Yes, that word comes up a lot. I didn't quite think that that's what he was doing. I think that word comes up a lot because there's a lot of healers who are like love and lights and da, da, da, da, da. And then people start this healing journey thinking that's what it's gonna be and it's never that it's dark. There's a lot of dark shit that comes up in healing.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of heaviness, there's a lot of grief that comes with it, because there is so much, especially if you grew up with childhood trauma. There is a mourning of the childhood you didn't get, yeah, or the parents you didn't get. There's a lot of shadow work. Yeah, the things that you felt like you deserved, or even for me, taking a look at the things that I've done wrong in the past and loving myself and forgiving myself for not having the tools, not knowing better, projecting my trauma onto other people, right?
Speaker 1:So much of that there's so much of that.
Speaker 2:And it's like there's shadow work. That's kind of what shadow work is.
Speaker 1:It's like really like looking at those dark spots, the deepest, darkest parts of yourself.
Speaker 2:And not ignoring them or trying to reform them, but really like becoming friends with them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it's so. Often we feel shame and we feel guilt, but I think the true trick is loving it even harder, right those darkest, most shameful things and most shameful parts of ourselves. Showing them the most compassion and the most love.
Speaker 2:Exactly One of the things like our therapist has brought up is like my husband needs to grieve his family and he's never really done that and he doesn't think he needs to. Well, he does now. But like he was just like I'm not gonna grieve someone who isn't even dead. He was very defiant on it. He was very pushed back a lot on that. He was just like that's stupid, I'm not gonna do that.
Speaker 2:And I'm like, okay, well, I'm just telling you like that's how I got to be at peace with my relationship with my mom is I had to go through this process of grieving what was, what could have been, what should have been the type of mother I thought I should have had. I had to grieve all of that and I had to really sit with, like what that relationship was gonna look like now, right, in order to accept it. Right, like there's still pain there, and I honor that, and there's still grief and I honor that. But like I had to go through this, like I don't see her that way anymore. I'm not angry at her because she was doing the best she could and I see a lot of pain in her too, you know, right, so there is this realization that he had over this weekend where he's just like I'm stuck in this chakra and I'm like uh-huh.
Speaker 2:And it's the root chakra right. Well, the sacral chakra Sacral sorry.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's got it.
Speaker 2:He's good at grounding, but like it's like grounding sacral Gotcha, gotcha, it goes up from there, but like he's still so far down here, yeah, and he's trying to get up to the top. He's been trying to get up to this top this whole time and he really said that he was just like I just figured, if I could get myself into this calm state anytime I needed to, that it would work. So he was like I shouldn't have to do that. If I can do this, then that'll help. But it just kept showing up. It kept showing up. So it's just interesting because I never really thought of that as like spiritual bypassing, because it's like there should. I'm wondering if there's another word for it in healing, where it's like bypassing these like deep dark things, because you're trying to get to this other state of healed.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Or would it be the same word? I feel like it'd be the same word, just bypassing in general. Like you're going from like step five to step 20, thinking that you're gonna just not have to do those six, seven, eight, nine, 10s and on out.
Speaker 1:They're gonna continue to show up. It's like you can't read the first chapter and then the last chapter and know how to describe the book. You gotta go through all the chapters to learn about what's going on. Same thing with yourself.
Speaker 2:And I also trust that, like when things start to come up, they've probably always been there, but they're coming up and they're continuing to show up because now it's like okay, now this is the next level, this is the next chapter.
Speaker 1:Cause that's how I feel Like. I felt like again, the mushroom journey was like oh my gosh, I get it. And then, with each modality, it's like no, I don't really still know. I'm learning more and it's like an onion. I'm taking another layer off, that onion of, and I'm the onion it's me, I'm the onion, I'm taking another layer off and another layer off and another layer off and finding myself deeper and deeper and deeper and deeper.
Speaker 1:Hence why, when I do things like breath work now, then maybe I can ask for a project, because I'm ready to before.
Speaker 2:I wasn't. Right, I really like your book analogy, yeah, yeah so. Because it's almost like this is the book of your life. Every layer is a chapter and you are never gonna finish writing this book until you die. That's the end. There is no end to the book.
Speaker 1:So what is he gonna do then? Now, what's his plan of action?
Speaker 2:So I've been saying to him for a while I think you're stuck, I think you're stuck, I think you're stuck and one of the things that I've done this before too where I was stuck, but I thought that I could do it without using a tool, which is, to me, that's ego. You know what I mean. Yeah, I remember doing this after my first journey and not having another journey for like another year and a half, and feeling guilty that I felt like I needed to do another mushroom journey to get out of this thick, heavy space. And then our psychiatrist being like but it's just a tool, like you're not leaning on, you're not using it as like a substance, you're not abusing it, like you're not using it to escape, you're using it as a tool to get you through this muck that you're in, right, and I was like oh okay, all right, I think that was him.
Speaker 2:I think, cause he did say he was like so what am I supposed to do? Like I'm supposed to just do another mushroom journey every time we get into a fight, I'm like no, like, but when something keeps showing up, and it keeps showing up and you, I think you found yourself stuck, like you didn't know the answer. You thought that this was the answer. It wasn't. Like I think that you're stuck and I was editing a podcast last week and I sent you the clip from it and Dora said you said, how do you know if you're ready for a mushroom journey? How do you tell, like, how does someone know that they might be ready for one? She said, journal, if something keeps showing up for you, keep asking why, keep asking why, keep asking why. Why does this happen every time this shows up? Why do I feel this way every time this shows up? And then allow the mushrooms or the medicine or the breath work or whatever modality you're using, do all this work upfront and then allow the medicine to assist you in the why.
Speaker 1:Yes, cause oftentimes we don't ask ourselves why we suppress and shame whatever it is that shows up, whatever pattern that we have. Whether it's anger, whatever, it doesn't even matter, cause for me it was anger, and so I would just feel shame and guilt instead of approaching it with curiosity. Well, why am I angry, right? Why is this triggering? Why do I do this?
Speaker 2:Why does it make me feel this way?
Speaker 1:Why does it make me feel this way? Why does this situation trigger a wound from when I was five?
Speaker 2:Well, I guess that's what I mean, because, like you're probably even like doing the mushrooms for something like that is probably not gonna give you a direct answer as to why. Right, you know, and it never is. It's never like a direct answer, but it's almost like you get this knowledge from it. That's like, oh, my God, this was why. Now I fully understand it, now I can work through that, yeah, and then it's up to you to work through it. That's where the integration comes in, like it's still it might give you the answer, but it's not gonna do the work for you.
Speaker 1:You know, when we talk a lot about integration and I think when people think of integration, they think post psychedelic journey. Yeah, I have integration after I do a breathwork. Yeah, with my facility, my coach, my mentor, whatever we integrate, what happened in that breathwork session I've had it with. Reiki. We have it. You have it with Reiki, you had it with Kundalini Right. Like integration can be with everything.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:Anything. So it doesn't just have to be with psychedelics, right, it can be with any type of modality healing modality that you use.
Speaker 2:Well, it's almost like if you are going to see a therapist once a week, like you're integrating that week with your therapist, right, like therapy is integration in a sense, you know, right. So yeah, you're exactly right, cause I've never had like a Reiki session. You know, even with massage, like this isn't even like a healing, spiritually healing modality although I guess it can be for some but like a physically healing modality. Every time I've had a massage, they come in and they're like this is where I felt that you were tight. Yeah, this is what you can do in the meantime before I see you again. Same with, like getting a facial Like this is where you're breaking out and this might be why and this is what you can do in the meantime to help clear that up. Those are all things that are like integrative, but we don't do that spiritually.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:That's like so and again, I think people are becoming more aware.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:But it's so out of touch for so many people.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:They don't even know where to start. What to do? Yeah, or they're scared to do it.
Speaker 2:Well, I'll tell you right now you're not gonna go from step five to 10 with one of any type of modality. Yeah, yeah, and that's where I think I'm just gonna say this Do you remember? In the very beginning, when we first started this, you kept saying like you're further ahead, you're further ahead, you're further ahead. Like you felt like a baby in this space. Yeah, uh-huh, but I had been doing all these things for two years at that point, right, but now we're almost like here because we've both continued to do things and we might be on different paths. So funny, I forgot about that pace of my life Right.
Speaker 2:Think about that for a second, Because I did.
Speaker 1:I'm like I remember interviewing Henry and me like I don't even know what the fuck to ask him. I've done one mushroom jarding.
Speaker 2:Okay, like I don't know, imposter syndrome for real.
Speaker 1:It was cause I'm like I don't know what the fuck to ask. I don't know anything about anything, yet I'm really just learning and feeling so inadequate in this space.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Because I felt like I wasn't as enlightened or as spiritual or as woo-woo as most people that are in this space. But I still think that is true in a lot of ways. Like, I'm still not into like the crystals or tarot cards or stuff yet I just haven't touched that yet, right. But having the realization that I'm meant to be in this space and just belong as I am, you might not ever touch that stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's perfectly fine, right For you and your tiny.
Speaker 1:I think sometimes people feel this maybe in adequacy, because they're not where we are or certain things don't resonate with them. And I think again, why we're here is to not say you have to go do this, this, this and this and this. There are all of these tools. Right, it's never gonna end, you're gonna keep going. Like the journey of self-discovery is a Never ending process. Life, you know long journey and it's your journey Right. These are just tools we are offering and modalities we're offering and perspectives we're offering.
Speaker 2:Well, and how many times have we had an experience or done something and been like, yeah, that's not for me.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, it's not my medicine, yeah.
Speaker 2:Like for sure. It happens because even though we've talked about it doesn't necessarily mean that, like, we have like, fully resonated with it, and it also doesn't mean that it might not come back around for us in a different way, right, and we might be like oh, maybe I just wasn't ready for it, right.
Speaker 1:Right, totally, totally.
Speaker 2:Because that keeps happening.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, a year or two from now, who knows, I may be a tarot card expert. I don't know. I doubt it. But you never know. You never know, but it's also, it's. I have much more of an openness, yeah, an acceptance to different things, but also more of an accepting, acceptiveness. Is that a word? Acceptance, acceptance, thank you, I had to think about it.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Acceptance of where I am now. Yeah, I don't need to be at chapter 30, because I'm not there yet.
Speaker 2:Right, you'll get there when you're ready?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm on chapter 36 right now 35.
Speaker 2:I don't know if we can talk about this and maybe we should ask permission before we share. So I think maybe we have had people reach out to us who have had psychedelic experiences in the past, but then they listen to our podcast and they do it in a different way and have a completely different experience. And I'm saying that because someone messaged us yesterday.
Speaker 1:I love that message.
Speaker 2:I loved that message, but I don't want to share it if they don't want us to share it. So I do want to go back and ask them permission and we can keep her anonymous. But it's just kind of like, even when you think you know and that's the thing A lot of people are like you have done mushrooms dozens of times, like the horrible interview that we never aired and him being like pfft, I've done psychedelics before I got sober and we're like you're not.
Speaker 1:No, Jimmy, not like the way that we're talking about it, the way that we're doing them.
Speaker 2:And this is a very different experience, and so this person reached out because this happened with them, where they had had this experience in the past.
Speaker 1:Very recreationally.
Speaker 2:Very recreationally different type of set and setting and did it after listening to one of our episodes in a very different way and it saved their marriage and it had a very different experience and it saved their marriage. And I say that about MDMA with me and my marriage all the time.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Anyway, how can we close this out? I don't know, because I feel like we talked about a lot of things today. We did a story time spiritual, bypassing breath work, breath work, projection, Kundalini, all of it. I guess the lesson here is just be open to being open, and we say that in all of our closing too. So stay curious, be open, we'll see you on the other side. Bye, love to be.