Developing Memoir Writing Skills with Christi Christiaens
Aug 13, 2026
Christi Christiaens belonged to an immortality cult for 30 years. Her book, Wager on Forever, explores how she was drawn into the cult, how the trio of cult leaders applied the usual strategies to keep their followers on the hook, and how Christi was ultimately able to leave the group. Unfortunately, in order to do this, she had to leave her adult son behind. He’s still involved with the cult as of this recording.
Based on what she shares in this interview, the writing process was healing for Christi, and you’ll hear her talk about why that was and what it looked like for her. It’s not an easy thing to do, to write about a traumatic experience, especially one that was 30 years in the making and I am so impressed with Christi’s drive and determination to tell her story.
Writing Out from Under the Shadow of Polygamy with Maggie Rayner
Aug 13, 2026
Maggie Rayner is the author of In Polgamy’s Shadow. She grew up in a branch of the Mormon church that was not polygamist, but that does not mean that polygamy didn’t have an effect on her family. As Maggie shares in this interview, among the many other challenges she experienced as a Mormon child, she and one of her sisters had a very close call with being recruited into the polygamous community of Bountiful, BC in the 1960s. They avoided that fate, but couldn’t avoid the other impacts that the church had on their lives. Eventually, as an adult, Maggie was able to write her book and, as you’ll hear, the writing process played a big part in the healing process.
Creative Alchemy episode 1: Writing My Way Out of a Cult with Alexandra Amor
Aug 13, 2026
What happens when we use creative expression to help us heal from a traumatic experience like being in a cult? That's what I'm here to explore in Creative Alchemy.
In this first episode, I share a bit about my story of joining a cult at the age of 22 in 1989 in Vancouver, BC, Canada. And I talk about how the recovery from that experience included a couple forms of writing, including journaling and eventually sharing about my experience in a memoir.
Pausing and Stepping Into Quiet
Jun 20, 2024
Hello explorers, and welcome to episode 68 of Unbroken. I’m Alexandra Amor.
I’m here today with a little announcement. As you possibly saw in the title of this episode, I’ve called it pausing and stepping into quiet. I’m feeling a really strong urge lately to do just that, to pause things, step into the silence, spend a lot of time in quiet.
We’re coming into summertime, here on the west coast of Vancouver Island, as I record this, and the days are getting longer and sunnier. And it’s not so much that I want to spend more time in the sun because I’m not really that type of person. But I do just want to spend time in quiet right now. And slow down a little bit and listen for wisdom, really.
This episode is a little announcement letting you know that that’s what’s happening. I will keep you posted on any future directions or things that go on. Hopefully I’ll be back in a few weeks or a couple of months or whatever it is however long it lasts. I really feel drawn to just listening to wisdom, listening to my intuition, that kind of thing and following those nudges. So that’s what’s pulling me at this moment.
For the next few weeks, I hope you are doing great, doing really well taking good care of yourself.
We Don’t Need To Figure It Out with Stephanie Benedetto
Jun 13, 2024
As we discuss so often on Unbroken, there is an intelligence and wisdom that, if we allow it to, can guide our lives to interesting and fulfilling places. As with most of us, it took Stephanie Benedetto some time to really listen to this wisdom and to trust that it would support her. When she did, she unlocked a life and a business that flow with ease, even in the challenging moments.
Stephanie Benedetto is a transformational business coach, storyteller and (Un)Marketer at The Awakened Business, where she helps transformative coaches, healers and entrepreneurs unleash their heart’s message to create soulmate clients with playful (Un)Marketing — no hustle, or hype of endless social media required.
You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below.
Show Notes
Business as a vehicle of creation
Giving ourselves permission to create the lives we want
Noticing what is alive within us that wants to guide us
Following the nudge to make a big life change
How we create our worlds based on Thought
How the pressures we feel have nothing to do with what’s going on in our lives and everything to do with what’s going on in our heads
How discomfort is created when our thoughts look real
Paying attention to what we’re listening to
How you being you is enough
Resources Mentioned in this Episode
The Surrender Experiment by Michael Singer
Transcript of Interview with Stephanie Benedetto
Alexandra: Stephanie Benedetto, welcome to Unbroken.
Stephanie: Thank you for having me, Alexandra, this is a great pleasure.
Alexandra: I’m so pleased to have you here.
Tell us a little bit about your background and how you got interested in the Three Principles.
Stephanie: I have been a pretty much a lifelong entrepreneur. Definitely in my adult life. But as I reflected on my childhood, I used to play games like Office and sell at Mr. Dobbs candy shop. And I used to sell cards and things. I was actually interested in entrepreneurship, even when I was quite young. So I’ve had multiple businesses.
The most notable and successful were we’re a business as a wedding DJ, with my now ex husband for 15 years. And then we transitioned into a digital marketing business, basically, internet marketing. So I used to create courses and a membership online, for other wedding professionals to teach them about business. I’ve been in love with business for a long time.
But my first love is really people. And I love business as a vehicle of creation. It’s a way that people can create the change they’d love to see in the world, they can be of service. That’s what I see business as. And so over the years, I wanted to have deeper impact with people. And that drew me more and more into coaching.
In my prior career, it looked more like consulting, marketing strategy.
And I realized that there was something missing from that, for me, that we talked about these great ideas and people that didn’t do them, because they were scared, or they felt insecure. And I saw this also in myself, because in parallel, I was on my own personal development and spiritual journey. I wanted to go deeper for me.
So I hired my first business coach. And then I wanted to do what they were doing. And it took me on this whole journey until I realized, Oh, my goodness.
The business I currently have, which is called The Awakened Business is really meant to support entrepreneurs, who want to share the truth they’ve seen, and the gifts that they have with the world.
And do it in a way that really feels good. Because there’s a lot that I was taught when I was studying internet marketing inside of business that maybe we could say is unethical or feels a little weird. And certainly people who are helpers and want to be of service often have a lot of what I could call head trash about selling and marketing. None of that has to be painful or icky, like it can actually be complete joy and totally enjoyable. And so that’s what I help people do now.
As I’ve gone deeper into my journey with the Three Principles have gone from Oh, this is a cool thing to add to all the other spiritual stuff.
This was like years ago, I saw no contradiction with neuro linguistic programming and Practical Magic and Access Consciousness and EFT and all the other things that I was doing. I was like, Oh, the Three Principles fits great into this mix. I really care about understanding those principles. I don’t care about explaining it to others. I’d say this to myself until I realized I started talking about three principles with other people.
Then I was like, I want to be a transformative coach. I’m interested in that until I find myself in Michael Neal’s super coach Academy and becoming a certified transformative coach. So I actually think there was a wisdom in it that I was trying not to take it seriously not to try to do it right. I just let the process unfold.
As time has gone on that is more and more, it’s really the foundation of everything that I do, not just in my business, not just with the clients I work with, but to help people to really enjoy their lives and whatever it is they’re creating, through the recognition of what they really are, who they really are, and, and how we work. How we create our experience. And when we’re really at our best, and that we can trust this intelligence that enlivens us. And when that happens, man, building a business is a piece of cake.
Alexandra: Oh, that’s great, good news for all the entrepreneurs out there.
How does it look different, trusting our own wisdom, trusting the intelligence that’s flowing through us versus trying to do it all ourselves.
Stephanie: Oh, my God, it is so different. I’ve been on this journey myself, for years. And of course, it’s quite natural that I also guide other people on that journey. People don’t see me this way. So often, when I say that, I used to be a total rule follower. They’re like, really? Because such a big part of my message is that you get to do it your way, you get to play the game of business the way you want to play it.
I was really devoted to doing things right. And being a good student and a good girl for much of my life.
I brought that with me into what I learned about business. And so it was doing things the way they were taught to me following the rules, and a lot of that I learned a lot from it. And some of it worked. And some of it didn’t. But at some point, the things that I was supposed to do just didn’t feel quite right. But this was, of course, mirroring what was happening inside of me.
It wasn’t until I was, I think, maybe 38 years old that I asked myself, What do I want to create in my life?
It just hadn’t really occurred to me. Asking that question sent me inward. And I began to discover, like, how do I even know what I want? That was a journey for me in itself. And then I discovered the difference between creating from my intellect, creating from the rules that somebody else gave me or the way I’ve always done it, and how limited it felt, versus those moments when I got quiet. And something would just tell me, and I would just know, to do something. So I don’t think I jumped in all at once.
I read a book called The Surrender Experiment by Michael Singer, I think about maybe eight or nine years ago now. With it came alive my own surrender experiment, an exploration of what does that mean to surrender? What does that mean to let life show me? What I found and how this looks so different is that I don’t need to figure it out, which is a great relief, because I don’t think I was really that good at it. I mean, I coped well, but I can’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow. And I don’t know what’s going to work and what won’t.
I’m not very good at thinking about all things that need to happen. It’s overwhelming, and it’s very stressful. And I’ve realized that I don’t have to. Everyone has an area of their life where they know this, by the way, it might be the one place where they feel like, oh, I can just relax and I’m in flow. So for some people, it’s at work, for some people it’s with their kids. For some people, it’s when they’re out in nature, maybe they do a sport.
That’s available anywhere, including inside of our business.
I am still discovering this, by the way, I’m still going deeper on this, that I can go to the source of wisdom inside of me for anything and everything. And in fact, that’s what I’m looking for is what I’m really looking for is there, including the answers about how to grow my business, how to market it, how to move past things that look like they’re stopping me. And of course, the feelings, the well-being and the peace and the happiness that I’m looking for. So that’s how it looks different. I hope I have answered that question.
Alexandra: You have Thank you. I love your analogy about how it does show up for everyone in some area of their life. And sometimes we take that a little bit for granted, I think we think oh well that it’s that one specific thing that I’m good at or relaxed about. And then we don’t realize that we can feel that way, in so many other areas, if not everywhere in our lives.
Before we hit record, we were talking about our intentions for the call. And one of the things I said was that I was interested in your personal story, and you touched on it a little bit already about being a good girl. And following the rules.
On your website, there’s some detail about how you followed your wisdom out of that way of being. Can you tell us a little bit about what that looked like for you?
Stephanie: When I started asking myself, what do I want, I realized that I had been making my choices, based on a role that I thought I needed to fill, I had a lot of people pleasing behaviors going on, which made sense, because it was how I knew myself. I discovered that some of the things I was doing were part of the reason why maybe I didn’t like them after a while or became resentful or was because it really wasn’t something that I wanted. I didn’t even know I was allowed to ask that.
And as I did, as that was alive in me, I was listening. This is how I see it. Now, I don’t think I knew quite what I was doing then. But I was listening for guidance. I was always on a spiritual journey of some type. And as I got quieter in the moments when I did get quiet, which were few and far between, but I was finding them more. I was hearing things, I was getting a sense of things.
I was actually at a yoga retreat. Yoga was one of the many things that I pursued on this growth path. I had been married for I think, at that time, at least 16 years.
This knowing dropped in that it’s time for you to leave your marriage. And I was like, why?
This is not the first time I would get a message from the universe like that and be like, right, but I felt lots of things. It wasn’t just no, but see, I just knew there was a knowing in that. I took my time, which I think was also wisdom, because I loved my husband.
This is another thing was like How can I leave there’s nothing wrong here. If there was abuse, if I was unhappy, if we didn’t like each other even, that will be a good reason. But I thought I needed a reason to make a choice. I didn’t know that because I want to, it’s a good enough reason. I waited about a year of just dropping expectations and letting go of the mess that I had and working with coaches and the mess that I had in my head. I had so much thinking about it. And until finally I felt clear, I knew that I knew it wasn’t.
I said to myself, if I’m going to leave this marriage, it’s not going to be because I’m trying to escape. That’s something I tried to do before I tried to implode our marriage earlier. Or because I’m avoiding something, but I’m going to do it from a place of peace. If I’m doing it. That’s how I’m doing it. And that is how it happened. I’m still friends with my ex husband and and I think we both…we could have done better of course, looking back I see so much more now than I did then. But we did really well navigating that.
My husband and I owned a business together. We owned two houses together, we had animals that we owned together. I left all of that. I had to close it off. It wasn’t an impulsive thing. We still worked in our business for I think almost two years before we sold it together. And I started traveling and pet sitting because I love pets, I love animals. And I didn’t know what I wanted to do and I didn’t know where I wanted to live and I didn’t just want to do what I’d always done and stay in New York, which is where I was.
That was my real experience. Surrender is I don’t know where I’m going to end up.
And it’s continued. And it’s deepened. And it was almost two years ago that a similar big knowing dropped in where it was like, okay, I’m going to Portugal, go to Portugal. And there was a new relationship for me there. I had a very strong sense about what was going to happen. And I had to drop all my expectations about what that meant.
What I’ve come to learn about this wisdom is that it is in real time, it is for right now. And when it says go to Portugal, it means go to that direction now, like whatever that means, start the process. It doesn’t mean what I necessarily think it’s going to mean. So I had all kinds of thinking about Alexandria, again, like I was like, No, you’re doing this, I like my life. I’m happy here. But I also know to follow that, because that’s how I want to live.
There’s a delight and a depth to living from that place that I am surprised at what I find myself choosing and what comes my way. And it doesn’t lead me wrong. It doesn’t mean that everything works out the way I think it will, though. So that’s why it was like surrendering, surrendering my expectations about what this would mean. And if it would mean what I thought I just knew to follow those directions, just do that. And I did. And it actually went the way that I had sensed.
Along the way, I just showed up in the moment as best I could.
It’s opened up a whole new world for me yet again, I didn’t realize the fear that had been driving me. It helped me see that. The world is bigger and possibilities that I never thought were available for myself. I can see them now. And I couldn’t before; they were invisible to me. And it’s not because I moved to Portugal, but that was a part of the journey.
Alexandra: Wow, there’s so much in there, I got goosebumps when you talked about being at a yoga retreat and feeling that knowing that it was time to leave your marriage. That’s extraordinary. And you touched on the good girl aspect of your personality earlier.
I imagine that there was some resistance from that part of your personality when you started going in this direction more of following wisdom rather than pleasing other people.
Could you talk about that resistance a little bit?
Stephanie: What was interesting, Alexandra, was it wasn’t just a good girl living in my personality, there was also a rebel. So it was kind of like both were going on at the same time. And you can imagine that’s quite a war to have, when I don’t know that what’s really happening is conflicting thoughts. I thought that was part of me. My identity, right.
That started when I was a kid. I remember the first time I seriously rocked the boat in my family. I think I was about 15 years old. And I had my first existential crisis like, No, I am the good girl. Everybody loves me. I don’t do things that upset people and like, cause conflict and division and my family. That’s not me. Well, yeah, apparently it was. Because that too, was an experience that I have.
What I saw, and I’ve actually seen this recently, that the people pleasing behavior and the nice girl persona, the need to be that person came from this false belief I had built my world on, that for my own survival, I needed to never be a burden to anyone. And I made up what that was, right? Like, what does that even mean? Well, it’s definitely made it up. I made it up. So I could never be a burden to others, which meant I’ve really had to know what other people wanted and try to anticipate it and a whole world was created on that faulty premise that if I was a burden to others, I would be abandoned, and I would die. So that felt really scary and really important.
I built my personality on that. I built these habits and behaviors, and some of them served me at least some of the time, but many of them didn’t.
As I grew and I would see these behaviors come up, like asking people for help used to seem impossible, then it felt uncomfortable, and then I’m like, this is trivial and silly. Why am I feeling fear? I saw that it made perfect sense based on the world I was living in and seeing the world I had created out of fear.
Seeing that we create it, seeing the fact that we create a world with thought. And then we call it my beliefs and my values and my identity. And this is the way the world works, meant that I didn’t have to create it that way anymore. And so now, sure, maybe those habits of thought, those habits of behavior may come up. But I see them in a way I couldn’t see them before. They were invisible to me, they looked real before.
I don’t feel the resistance of it anymore. I don’t care, honestly, it’s like, I just went to the market today. And I feel nervous. Sometimes I freaked myself out. I’m learning Portuguese, and I don’t understand the numbers they’re saying when I’m paying for things sometimes. And so the nerves are so bad, I feel nervous. It’s really okay, I get over it really fast. And it doesn’t mean anything.
It used to look like it meant something. It used to look like it was life and death to me.
And I didn’t see that. And now it doesn’t. Now I know, it’s just another experience like any other. So it’s not that all those things disappear instantly. But they don’t have the same hold over me. And actually, a lot of them have kind of disappeared. I notice things slowly just dropping away.
Alexandra: I want to ask specifically, we touched on it a little bit, but how the messages from your life pointed you toward another way to show up. So you talked about at the yoga retreat and you just had a knowing.
Are there other ways that you experience feeling wisdom or feeling being guided?
Stephanie: Those are my first big examples of it. But now, it’s every day. Now, I see it everywhere. So for example, I wake up and I can just like kind of tune in like, what will be good for my body to eat today. I take supplements, but I don’t take them every day. I kind of just check in. Okay, not today. Just interesting. I don’t always do this, by the way. And it’s not a practice. It’s just something that started happening.
As I’ve been on my business journey, I’ll weave it into my business a little bit. So in business, I was taught a lot of different things. First, I was taught that you’re supposed to schedule all the important activities in your business to make sure that you do them. And so then I would like time block my calendar and I felt all this pressure. So I was like, I don’t want that anymore. So I stopped because somebody else told me that you should only have appointments on your calendar, and you should have space so you can see the spaciousness of your account. Neither one of those things are true, by the way. They’re just someone’s opinion.
So I did that for a while. And I realized I was kind of drifting. So I started going how do I want to experience this? Like what experiment can I do? So I started experimenting with adding some structure back in. The way I’ve kind of settled my days are often quite full.
But the pressure I feel has nothing to do with how much is on my calendar and everything to do with how much is in my head.
I know that now, I didn’t know that when I wanted my calendar spacious and free. But what I do is I do sometimes is time block activities to set aside time to work on writing this thing or editing these videos. But I give myself full permission to show up fresh with it. So that if it doesn’t feel right, or something else is occurring to me like wisdom like go now you really need a nap right now. That’s what I’ll do.
Because how could the me from a week ago know what would be perfect for me right now. So that’s kind of an example of how wisdom shows up in small ways. And even recently, I’m seeing oh wow, I can go there for everything and anything. I didn’t realize how much I was still going to my intellect, which is great. You know, it’s served me so well, if I want something really fresh, if I want to grow my business, if I want to create money, why am I going to my intellect, which is only aware of these certain ways to do it? Why am I not going to the source? And asking there what occurs to me?
This is a fresh journey for me. But there’s always something that occurs from there.
And sometimes it’s surprising. Sometimes it’s common sense. Just the fact that I can look there is amazing. Just the fact that something’s there for me. It almost doesn’t matter what it is.
Alexandra: I love that. And I love that you use the word fresh, because that’s a word that I’ve been using more and more lately. We have this wisdom that’s within us and comes to life moment to moment is so fresh, and creative. And wise, of course. But yeah, that word fresh is just so important to me these days.
You may have already addressed this in some of what you’ve said, but tell us a little bit about your ideas about that.
Let’s talk about what the awakened business looks like.
Stephanie: That’s funny, I really don’t think of it in those terms of like, there is an awakened business and one that is unawakened. I really wanted to call my business the awakened entrepreneur, honestly, but I couldn’t get the domain at the time. But what that means to me is coming fully alive, inside of your business, inside of your life, really, because they’re not separate.
Your business is a part of your life and when a person comes alive, and by that I mean begins to feel life, moving through them. Whatever way they might experience that begins to really be in their experience, give themselves permission to create what they want and enjoy. What’s happening now. Because aliveness is enjoyable.
The feeling of aliveness is, I mean, even when something crappy is happening. The aliveness that flows beneath and in all of it is amazing. And when that starts to happen, not as a state to achieve at every moment, but when it begins to happen, even in tiny moments, throughout your day, and you create a business, that way, you have a business that feels alive, you’re up to cool things. It’s easier to communicate what it is that you’re up to so that the people you’re here to help and serve understand that. You’re no longer creating it, because somebody said you should.
This way, you’re creating it, because it feels right for you.
And you get to do it wrong. I’m putting that in air quotes, I don’t think you can do it wrong.
You get to make mistakes, and change your mind and make shit up. I do that all the time. I’m constantly making things up. Things don’t work. And I know I’m okay. I know that something new will occur, that something fresh will occur. So that’s what it looks like to have a business that’s alive for me.
Alexandra: Do you find that either yourself or your clients when they’re starting to learn about doing things this way? Is there a discomfort that comes up for them?
Stephanie: Oh, yes.
Alexandra: Is it uncomfortable?
Stephanie: Yes. It often is. Because the first time like, I’m allowed to do that. Yeah, you’re making up your business. Because if you go into the typical business training world, people and I’m going to assume that most of them are well intentioned. I know they all are on some level. Ultimately, they all are. They want to help people. But what they do is they’re training people. They’re giving people their wisdom. And that’s not going to be the right fit for me or you, in parts of it might, it might inspire something for me. But that’s not the source. And it’s not going to be the perfect fit.
We’re taught that there’s a certain way to do things, you have to have a website, and on your website, you need to have this thing called the lead magnet, and you have to an email list and you need to do social media and the answer to those things. Is that true? No, no, no. And no. Or maybe yes, yes, yes. And yes. Only you would know.
It’s really weird for people at first, when I’m asking them like, well, what’s the current view? What do you know? So the people who do find me are kind of onto that, already a little bit like, they might describe it as I want to have a soul led business, or I want to follow more of my intuition or do things my way, because they’ve been around the block, and they haven’t been enjoying the way it feels.
But they still run up against that old thinking of there’s a right way to do it and a wrong way, and I better figure it out, because bad stuff’s gonna happen if I don’t. So yeah, that is uncomfortable. And I think, actually, something I’m seeing that is a bigger discomfort for people is letting go of the pressure, and the trying, and the doing and making ourselves figure it out. It’s all on me that many of us have used to drive our actions and our behavior, especially in our business, like actually going, I don’t have to figure it out. You mean I could listen to my wisdom, and that wisdom tells me seriously, that even seems like more of an uncomfortable thing for people.
Alexandra: I’m so glad you said that. Because that’s something that I struggle with as well. I go along for a while and then I noticed myself drifting off, and feeling like it’s all on me, and feeling a lot of pressure. And then I remember, and I bring myself back. But it’s a habit.
It is a little bit uncomfortable to break it, to know that there’s something else there that’s going to catch us and support us.
Stephanie: At first it’s uncomfortable, but it’s only uncomfortable because I have a thought that looks real, that says something like, If I don’t do it, nothing will happen. I have to be the one to do it. I just feel the discomfort of that thought if without that thought it’s amazing to know I don’t have to do it. It’s a miracle that I don’t have to do it. My job is simply to be me. And to do what occurs to me. That’s it. Can it be that simple? Yeah. And it’s a great relief.
Alexandra: That’s so true. The discomfort, the way that it feels is the clue.
The discomfort that we feel about taking it all on ourselves is the thing that lets us know that that thought is a lie. I love that built in feedback system.
Stephanie: It is becoming more and more black and white to me. As I am like, oh my really anytime I don’t feel good, peaceful, calm, I’m caught up in my thinking. That’s all it means. I don’t even need to know the content of that thinking. That’s what’s happening.
I know in that from that place, I am not seeing the world clearly. If I feel crappy, I am not seeing clearly, period, every time. It’s incredible to see that because it keeps pointing me back to look within. This is where I find what I’m looking for. And I start to settle down. If I’m not settled down, I know it’s just going to be a little while until it passes. It always does.
Alexandra: You mentioned that you were at the listening seminar recently. Tell us about that experience. Do you have a highlight from it?
Stephanie: There were so many little moments. It was amazing to be there. The first day we really just talked about and listened to people talking about listening. Some of my favorite mentors from inside the Three Principles, Michael Neill was there. Mavis Karn was there. I got to meet people in person who I’d never met in person before. And so we are all in a really lovely state.
This is a highlight I’ll share with you because it was unusual for me. Stephanie’s personality and my past, even though I like hugging people, I’ve always been a little weird with people in my personal space. Unless I know you, don’t come too close.
I was just in a really beautiful feeling listening to this presentation, I think it was on the first day. And I just look at this woman. And she just was so cute. She had a little bow, she had like a little flower in her hair, and this cute little dress on. And I looked at her and I see her look at me. And I’m like, it felt like we knew each other. I look away and I look back, and she’s smiling at me. And I’m smiling at her. I just went up to her and hugged her without saying a word. Without a thought. And as I hugged her, I was like, you have such a beautiful smile. And she was from the Czech Republic, I could tell by her accent as she responded.
She said, I was just thinking you’re such a beautiful woman. And that was it. We hugged, we spoke those words, we might have smiled and waved at each other at another point during that conference. But that was all. And it was such a perfect moment. I think this is what’s possible when we’re listening. When we’re just being.
Listening isn’t about hearing. It’s an openness, it’s a receptivity, it’s what happens when I’m really present.
Again, anytime I’m not feeling present, I’m not listening. And that’s what’s available, little miracles like that happen. nd I don’t even think about them, they just happen. Things move me. I don’t know why I hugged that woman. It just was the thing to do.
Alexandra: It occurs to me that when it comes to listening, it feels like it’s pointing toward the opposite of where we normally live, which is a lot of chatter in our heads about ourselves, about other people, about things that are going on, about life, about whatever. And as you said, listening is more like an openness, or receptivity.
I love that distinction. Because it’s not just about our ears.
Stephanie: My dear friend says, we’re always listening. Our listening is always perfect. What are we listening to? Most of the time, we’re listening to the chatter in our heads. And it’s not particularly productive. Sometimes it’s great fun, but other times, not so much. And we know by how it feels right.
When I’m listening within, it’s different. And things drop in, instead of me being caught up in them. It’s like they rise up or they drop in. That’s kind of a funny way to express it. But that’s how it feels. And it’s very different than when I’m listening to the contents of my intellect and my endlessly churning mind.
Alexandra: As we’re coming to the end of our time today, is there anything we haven’t touched on that you’d like to share with our listeners?
Stephanie: What I’d like to share is that you being you is not only enough, it’s amazing. I didn’t know that for a very long time. And it feels so good. That’s how you know you’re being you. It feels easy. It feels effortless. And I’m most myself when I’m not thinking about myself at all. And it’s a gift. It’s a gift for us, but it’s a gift for the world. And I would love for people to know that or know it a little more deeply.
Alexandra: Nice. Oh, thank you.
Where can we find out more about you and your work?
Stephanie: The best place would be TheAwakenedBusiness.com. That’s my website. I’m not active on social media. I’ve been doing some YouTube and a bit of LinkedIn, but I’m allergic to the rest for right now.
I do have an email list. If people would like to follow my adventures in life and business. I share a lot of my personal experiences and experiments, they can hop on my email list and learn more.
Alexandra: I will put links in the show notes to your website. Thank you so much for being here with me today. I really appreciate it. It’s been really nice to meet you.
Stephanie: You too, Alexandra. Thanks for having me.
Listening for Guiding Wisdom with Bonnie Jarvis
Jun 06, 2024
We all have a built-in GPS, a guidance system that never lies and that always has our best interests at heart. We can call that guidance whatever we want – wisdom, intuition, insight, knowing; the name isn’t as important as learning to listen to it. And, as Bonnie Jarvis points out, figuring out how your guiding wisdom speaks to you makes life so much easier.
Bonnie Jarvis has a BA in Graphic Design, MS in Computer Science, MA in Spiritual Psychology and has completed several coaching programs. Using the skills she learned over the years, she’s helped many coaches with the technical details of building successful and thriving online businesses.
For 9 years, Bonnie worked for 3PGC, a non-profit organization with a mission to share the simplicity of The Three Principles as uncovered by Sydney Banks. She developed all areas needed for their online business to thrive and significantly expand the understanding globally.
Bonnie: Thank you so much. Thanks for inviting me, Alexandra, I really appreciate being here.
Alexandra: Oh, my pleasure. I’m so thrilled to talk to you one on one. We’ve been in events together. I think I was trying to recall when that was. I think it was a class with Cathy Casey. That was last year, I think. But anyway, so it’s lovely to talk to you one on one.
Bonnie: I keep seeing your name around the community. So I’m glad that we’re getting this opportunity.
Alexandra: Me too.
Tell us about your background and how you discovered the Three Principles.
Bonnie: Well, like so many people who have come across the Three Principles, I was looking around for a very long time. I know people come to this understanding, or the understanding finds them maybe as a better way of saying it, when people are looking for very different things. For me, my seeking, if you will, started when I was really young.
My dad was in a really horrendous accident when I was four. And this was 1960, giving away my age. I won’t into the details, but he was electrocuted to the point where two silver dollars melted in his pocket and then he fell three stories. And he obviously was given his last rites, no one thought he was going to survive back then. But he did.
And I don’t know, maybe when I was around six or seven, he shared his experience of what happened to him. Now we know of what people call near death experiences. But that term wasn’t even around back then. And I don’t really know what it was he said that impacted me so deeply. But I think the quality of what he was sharing just touched me so deeply, that I knew this physical reality was not all there was, but I didn’t know what else was out there.
I was really young then, I was going to Catholic school, and I learned really quickly to not talk about it in Catholic school, because it was not approved of, and it wasn’t a well known thing.
I think that experience made me a secret seeker.
I looked at so many different things, I dipped my toes into so many different things once I got out of high school, different religions. I sought out channelers, I did different self help programs that were spiritually oriented. I did a spiritual psychology master’s degree. This was over a period of like, maybe 40 ish years.
In the spiritual psychology program, the organization about 10 years after I graduated from there, they were doing a coaching program. I should say, my other parallel life was that I got a master’s degree in computer science and worked in many corporations. And definitely was a secret seeker through that because it was okay to be in a religion, but everything else was very woowoo. So I really didn’t talk about anything. But I would pop in and out of corporate America jobs at that time in the 80s and 90s. And even early 2000s, it was very easy to leave one job and find another because not a whole lot of people knew a whole lot about technology then.
In 2013, I decided that was it. I was leaving corporate America for the last time. It was not where I wanted to be. And one of my very, very close friends became the admissions director of the organization that ran the spiritual psychology program. And she called and said, Well, if you don’t have any plans, which I didn’t, I just knew I didn’t want to continue on the path that I was in Corporate America why don’t you take this coaching program? I was like, okay, I have the time, I have the money, I’ll do it.
It turned out to be the best thing ever, because one of the facilitators introduced a little video of someone talking about insight.
At the time, I had to go research everything. So again, it was 2013, there wasn’t a whole lot on the web at the time. But I did manage to track down what the Three Principles were, and it was on a Wikipedia page of all things that I was reading it and, and it just hit me. Like, oh, this is what is before all of those other things that I was looking at, all of those paths that I took, I couldn’t get to the beginning of them, because there was usually a lot of things to do.
And, and so I’d follow something for a year or two and then look for the next thing. I can’t say I understood anything that I was reading, but I just had a knowing. So would you like me to keep going?
Alexandra: Yes, please.
Bonnie: I was following breadcrumbs really. I kept looking and looking. In 2013, there were some videos, but there wasn’t a whole lot out there. I finally came across that there was a conference going on in St. Paul, Minnesota, like a month later. So I hopped on a plane, and I went to that. And then that led me to meeting the woman who would organize the 3PGC conference. And the woman that was organizing them lived near me. So we got to be friends.
Then at the conference, I believe it was there, I learned that Christine Heath, who was one of the original board members for 3PGC and still is on the board, was doing a workshop in Hawaii. And I was like, Oh, I can I can go there. I’m not working now. So I went. I think it was like September, October was the conference. And then November was this workshop. And then I learned about the Pranskys doing the first practitioner retreat in February 2014. Went to that then went to Salt Spring Island.
Then I volunteered to help with the next in person conference that 3PGC was doing and got to know Chris a little bit more.
Looking back, it was so much following that little voice that said, yeah, do this next, do this next.
But I think when it was happening, I wouldn’t have been able to tell you, that’s what I was doing.
I think it was Chris that asked me, maybe this was 2015, they were trying to start a free webinar program. And it was sort of a start and stop. She asked if I’d be interested in volunteering to do that. So I did and and then it went from one a month to two a month and that program is still running. And then the the woman who originally did their newsletters and updated the first website was leaving and and that’s when I actually went to work for 3PGC very part time and learn more about the organization and then had a ton of ideas about what we could do online because that was my background
I started to talk with Chris a lot more and with the then president about what else we could do. And finally I think it was 2018 they they said yeah, go ahead and let’s build the new website. And they needed it done by the current for the in person conference in 2019. I’m kind of telling the story because looking back I feel like my finding the Three Principles and 3PGC when I did was incredible synchronicity. Because once the new website was done and we could we could create a membership site.
I think that’s when I started working for them full time for 3PGC full time and started suggesting online programs and that wasn’t really a well known thing at the time.
The board was a bit hesitant because getting the feeling in person was something they just weren’t sure of, if that could be sort of transmitted or really felt across the internet, but we finally said, Yeah, let’s do it. And we were originally shooting for a 48 hour conference, but it turned into like 54 hours of continuously running sessions, which was a lot of work to put together but it turned out to be incredible. People loved it, we had something like three or 400 people participating, people who couldn’t travel to the in person. It truly was a global event, and it was run at time periods where anybody could watch it.
And here’s the synchronicity of it. We ran it the last two days of February and the first day of March of 2020. And then the pandemic. And so we were set, we were all set up the board could see this was a great platform to do things and so we were able to build a practitioner program through and we had maybe four or five incredible programs. Not full on conferences, but programs where people could really participate in. And we were able to to really keep sharing this understanding when everybody had stay at home, basically.
So it was again, looking back, like, while I was in it, I didn’t see the beauty of following the breadcrumbs and the timing of it. But looking back, it’s like, wow, that was perfect timing for somebody like me to come in, and do it, because I just happen to have the right skills to help them out. And yeah, so that’s how I got involved with the three principles and 3PGC.
Alexandra: Wow, that’s so great. I have a few follow-up questions then.
For our listeners, 3PGC stands for Three Principles Global Community. So it’s sort of like the governing body, for lack of a better word, for the Three Principles.
You said that you felt like the principles explained what was before all the other things that you had been seeking? Could you say more about that? That intrigues me so much.
Bonnie: At the time, I didn’t know what I meant by that. I just knew this was underneath. I dippd my toes in Buddhism and Sikhism, and all sorts of all sorts of self help. And I knew there was something more to all of those things I was looking at. I just couldn’t get to it for whatever reason.
Now the words that I would put on it, and now what I understand of it is that the Three Principles truly are the formless principles that explain the human experience. So those are the words I would have put on it now. But at the time, I didn’t have those words.
Even in talking about my Dad’s experience, in looking back at that, what I think now, the quality that I felt, I think was when he talked about the light – a lot of Near Death Experiences talk about seeing the light and he was drawn to this light. And he felt that it was warm and loving and he did not want to come back. He wanted to go through. But in his words, he was told to come back. I think that feeling that he shared when he was talking about that was probably what what drew me into looking for what that was
Alexandra: Did that you said you were raised Catholic, so he was Catholic at the time this happened?
Bonnie: I was four when his accident happened. So I don’t really remember whether he was a churchgoer before then. I don’t think he ever went. I don’t remember him ever going to church after that, and possibly because of what he felt in that experience, I don’t know. I never talked to him about that.
I remember when Raymond Moody came out with his book Life After Life he coined the term near death experience. We were like, oh my god, other people have this and we talked about it. And this is the thing you didn’t make this. Because I don’t know this for sure, but I’m going to guess, that if he shared this with any doctors or nurses at the time, they probably thought, Oh, you were in a coma, and whatever.
We talked about it a lot, I would say the last six months of his life, and what it really brought for him that I got was, and he lived, this happened to him in 1960. He passed away in ‘98. So he lived a long time after that. What it really gave him was that he did not fear death. I remember talking to him and he said something like, No, I know where I’m going next. I’ve already felt that. So that was I think beautiful.
I think that’s one of the things he gave me is that I have never had a fear of dying either.
I’m not really crazy about having to go through what you might have to go through before that. There can be a lot of suffering in that, but with this understanding of the Three Principles that might even give me a different perspective of that statement. That off the tip of my tongue, but in reality, this understanding and and constantly looking and seeing things more deeply. Seeing new insights. You come back with a different perspective on the same thing.
Alexandra: Yes, absolutely. I’ve been thinking about this a little bit lately as well. I feel the same way that the idea of death doesn’t bother me at all. I’m interested in what that looks like. And the steps leading up to it, I hope they’re not too painful or terrible.
And then because our experience does come from the inside out, I realized that it is possible to experience peace, no matter what we’re going through. And yeah, so all of that is just so interesting. I could talk about that for hours for sure.
What a fascinating experience your dad went through, and just that idea that he must have thought he was alone in that for so long.
And I imagine coming from a Catholic background too he was probably very anxious about ever bringing that up with anybody. Any adults, I guess I should say? Fascinating. Really, really interesting. Thank you for sharing that. I appreciate it. And it makes me wonder, too, about any conflict that he felt? Betrayed. But you know about that experience? Anyway, fascinating.
Bonnie: I can look back and say, I wish I would have been in this place where I am now to ask him more questions. But I’m glad I got the opportunity to talk to him about it at the end of his life.
I also just want to say this, a near death experience is not what happened with Sydney Banks. I remember sharing this with some one of Sydney Banks’ original students, and I kind of got corrected. It’s like, this is not what happened. I was like, No, I didn’t mean to suggest that. It’s like he my dad just happened to leave his body and see that there was something else but the experience that Sydney Banks’ had was completely different and deeper and amazing.
Alexandra: That’s a great clarification. Thank you. It’s important for people to see the difference.
So you worked for the three PGC for a while. And I want to ask you two questions about that. I think you’ve already addressed the first one actually, I was going to ask you what did the job teach you and you’ve already talked about looking back and seeing the way that life was leading you in a direction.
It sounds like you didn’t fight that too much there wasn’t too much fight in you. Is that true?
Bonnie: That is true.Before listening to your wisdom, I would call it intuition. I’ve always had a strong sense of intuition. I didn’t always follow it. So following the breadcrumbs and just listening to what was coming next, which was not a huge jump for me. But there were certainly plenty of times when I could have said, I don’t want to follow these breadcrumbs anymore. But I didn’t. Something else was saying that keep following these keep doing this.
Alexandra: It led you in seems to be anyway in such a nice direction, to something that you needed.
Bonnie: I think that’s true. Whenever we really listened to our inner guidance, if there was anything that I would want to share with people, it’s that learning what that feels like or sounds like, or however you you get your guidance from wisdom or your intuition, whatever you want to call it, really get really cozy and familiar with how that feels different than what’s coming from your intellect or your personal wants and desires. Because it really does seem to me it really looks to me, like, that’s the way to go to have a happier life.
Alexandra: Speaking of which, how did you know that it was time to leave that experience?
Bonnie: That was a knowing too, I that about mid 2022, I started to get nudges. You’ve done what you’ve come here to do, and it’s time to move on. I did give notice. I think it was the beginning of December of 2022 for two months. I’m kind of a jack of all trades, master of none, when it comes to the online business. So I could do a whole wide variety of things. But in replacing me, it took a little longer because because they ended up having to bring on a number of people.
So I didn’t leave in the beginning of 2023, I waited until everything was completely set up. And then I left at the end of it, I think was September 2023. But again, that was an urge and I didn’t have anything planned next.
That’s the part that can be really scary. It’s the part of leaping into the unknown.
I guess that’s what that looked like to me. But I had done that so many times in my life, left jobs without really knowing what was going to be next and everything worked out. So I felt okay doing that.
It’s been incredible what’s unfolded since then. I was pretty busy minded when I was working for 3PGC because I was doing a broad range of things behind the scenes; I was taking care of just a lot of detailed things for the online business to keep running and it kept my mind really busy. I feel like I’ve had this massive download of understanding coming. But I was so busy with details that I didn’t really see what I was, what I was what I could see, because I had so many details on my mind all the time.
After I left, it was like this, because I really didn’t have the next thing lined up. There was this vast opening of space. And that was a wonderful opportunity also, to really I let things unfold.
One of the things I did was I met Azul Leguizamon.
She and I became friends maybe a couple years ago. I kept hearing her name, but I never met her. So I reached out to her one day, and we just really hit it off, and we started talking regularly.
She’s so wonderful. And we would share insights. What we found was, I mean, that’s one of the things we did, we talked about a lot of things. But what was so wonderful about that is that we started to notice how sharing our insight was helping, we were helping each other see more of how we were being guided. It was like hearing what we saw, what was helping the other to look more to see how we were being guided.
One of the things that came out of that, I think we started in November, we decided to offer a free webinar series where once a month we offer an open call to anybody. And we call it What Has Wisdom Shown You Lately. It’s an open discussion where everybody can share or just come and listen.
Then what grew out of that, which I honestly did not really expect at all – I guess I really thought whatever I did next was going to be a technical thing again, because that’s what my background is. But we started talking about what would we do if we did a program to teach this understanding or point people in the direction and help people to learn to share it? And help people start up a business of some kind.
I’m going to say it came through us, we ended up writing a year long program that we called The Heart of Service in like a week or two. And then we put together the webpage. And I think we only sent out three emails and we filled our program. It’s very small, we didn’t want to have a big group. And that’s been incredible. And again, following those breadcrumbs, those nudges. Right? It was just the next thing to do.
It’s been really great. We have guest speakers in it. And it’s just been a phenomenal program so far, and the participants seem to really be enjoying it as well. And we’re in the third month of a year long program.
Alexandra: I’m thinking that it really doesn’t surprise me that that’s the way things unfolded after your job with the 3PGC. Because that’s how they happened going into it.
Bonnie: When I first learned about the Three Principles I had a handful or two of practitioners as clients, and I did their online website, membership site, etc. So I really saw myself more as a background person. So I think that’s why it surprised me. Oh, I’m facilitating co facilitating with us all.
Alexandra: That makes sense. I love that.
Shifting gears slightly, one of the things that we corresponded about as we were setting up this time to talk was you said you were really interested in one of the more famous quotes from Sydney Banks.
Why don’t you share that quote with us? And then tell us what you’re seeing in it lately?
Bonnie: I’m going to read it because, okay, terrible with remembering quotes.
If the only thing people learned was not to be afraid of their experience, that alone would change the world.
Alexandra: That’s right.
Bonnie: That quote has so many levels to it. You can read it at first and say, oh, yeah I can unless a gun’s being pointed to my head, I probably don’t really have to be afraid of my experience.
And then as you start to look deep, burrowed into the principles and start to understand like, alright, we really create our experience. Our experience is truly an inside out experience. And there is nothing to be afraid of. And it just goes deeper from there.
So I do that, that is one of my very favorite quotes from Syd Banks. I do have another favorite quote right now, that’s not a Sydney Banks, quote. It’s a quote by Rumi that I probably first learned about 30 years ago. It just has taken on such new meaning for me in the last six months.
You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop.
That’s another one with so many layers, but that has such deep meanings. Like, yes, when you really start to look down this path, when you really start to look at the three principles as truly being principles in the formless, that create everything. And that we are part of and we are people people say and I guess Syd said this as well – I think he would use the words divine mind, thought, and consciousness as opposed to personal mind, thought and consciousness, but it’s really one thing. We have the opportunity to share in that and to listen to the wisdom that comes through that. And, and so we truly are the entire ocean in a drop. That’s just so delicious.
Alexandra: There’s so much there isn’t there? And when I heard you say that quote, I felt that thing that happens when something makes the leap beyond my logical brain and it resonates within you. I love that feeling.
You mentioned the webinar series that you did with Azul and I will link to her episodes, she has been on the show. So I will link in the show notes to her episode.
Why don’t I ask you what has wisdom shown you lately?
Bonnie: That is a great question. Let’s see how to describe this. What I’ve really been seeing is that we all have so much that we can see if we listen to our inner guidance, to wisdom. We also have conditioning; beliefs that are hidden, that we don’t even realize they’re there, until a light is is shone upon them.
As my mind got really quiet all the learning that I was absorbing, but not really realizing how much I really saw brought this, I’m going to call it a bubble of additional thinking that sort of unraveled itself. Some of the things I don’t even really know what they were, but I knew I felt so much lighter.
The latest image I have of it was like if you have a ball of yarn, and you hold one end, and you just push it and it’ll just keep going until it reaches the end. It’s like that. That’s what the experience felt like. It’s like just all these beliefs that were so deeply ingrained, that I wasn’t aware of how they were sort of controlling my life, because I would make decisions.
Because I thought those were truths, not beliefs that I could see through.
So as that all came to the surface, it was years of weights lifted, and some of it, I didn’t really know what they were in particular, but I knew something was opening. And some were very painful. When I’d see them, because I could see how it drove actions or reactions in my life, that I thought, because I believed it needed a reaction. All of that opening up has been phenomenal.
Around two or three months ago, I feel it’s because I let go of this whole bundle of condition thinking that what I’ve been noticing is that the nudges that I keep getting now, it’s like when we all seem to feel our feelings in different ways. Some people have very specific things in their body, that they feel about their emotions, and I don’t really, but what I do notice is sort of a wave of energy. Like nothing really specific. But what I’ve been noticing is that I’m getting nudges more quickly. As that wave of energy comes in it’s the same nudge, very often, it’s come back to the moment, come back to the moment.
And I’ve got to tell you it’s been the most incredible experience, to keep getting reminded to come back to the moment. I get them when I’m starting to have some kind of judgment or something going on. Because in the moment, that doesn’t exist. When I first started to get this, I was calling it, it’s been pushing me into my puddle of kindness. I could feel so much kindness toward whatever I was judging, especially judgments that were coming against myself.
Since then, I’ve morphed it into this, this ocean of liquid love.
That’s what it feels like, it’s like I can nudge back into just taking a dive into it. And even if it’s just for a nano second, and then I pick up that thinking again, I come out of it with such a different perspective; the feeling changes. That’s been luxurious.
And every once in a while, I get to stay in it more than a nanosecond. People will call it being in the flow. I can be there for a little while longer before thinking takes me back into whatever I’ve decided to make up. And everybody can do that. That’s what everybody can do.
We were taught a lot that now is the only moment there is like, now is as the only thing there is, and it’s so true, it’s like because all our thinking is either thoughts from the past or thinking about the future. And so when you come into that moment, even if it’s just for a nanosecond, it’s no attachment to thoughts. And it’s so beautiful.
So I would say that, that to me, at this time the most significant thing that I would really say that wisdom has been showing me lately, to just keep coming back to the present moment.
Alexandra: Oh, that’s beautiful. And I want to pull out one thing you said a little bit earlier in that, which was, you talked about how when some of your beliefs were unravelling, that could be a little bit painful.
Could you share an example with us?
Bonnie: You know, nothing is really coming to mind now. But what I can tell you is that I’m not a big crier. But man, I would sit and sob. All the things are coming to light. I’m not even sure if I always knew what it was when I would start. But what I did know is not to try to stop it, not to do anything about it.
When people who talk about the three principles say there’s nothing you have to do, that’s where I think that applies. It’s something that was coming through me. It was coming out of me, it was energy moving through. And there was nothing that I had to do about it.
I didn’t have to look for better thoughts. I didn’t have to make myself do something else. I could just sit there with it, and wait for wisdom to tell me what to do next. So to me that’s one of the misunderstandings I think a lot of people have when they come into this understanding.
There’s nothing to do. That’s where I think that applies. It doesn’t mean you’re going to sit on the sofa for the rest of your life and do nothing. There’s nothing you have to do.
Alexandra: I loved your wool analogy, your ball of wool analogy, because it reminded me when I was a kid, my grandmother used to knit a lot, or was it crochet anyway, one or the other. She taught me that when you have a skein of wool, if you pull one, there’s two ends, right? If you pull one of them, it can kind of become a bit of a tangled mess, but if you find the other end, it just comes out effortlessly. It doesn’t get all knotted up in itself, and it almost just sort of falls apart. And it’s all very easy.
That was touching me when you spoke about that. There’s two ways to approach this.
Bonnie: I love that you just said that, because that’s so true. It’s like they’re some of the memory, the condition thinking that what’s coming up. I saw it before, but I was probably pulling the wrong end. I love that. Thank you. I was pulling the wrong end and making the ball even tighter. But yeah, so I got a hold of the right end. It all flowed out.
Alexandra: Yes.
Bonnie: That’s beautiful.
Alexandra: We created that together. That felt really good. That’s great.
As we come towards the end of our time together, I want to ask you, is there anything that we haven’t touched on that you’d like to share with our listeners today?
Bonnie: I think I already said this, but this would be what I would share. And that is if there’s anything that you set an intention to do, it’s to really get cozy and familiar with how you hear wisdom or see wisdom. I’m sure it comes to everybody in different ways.
Even when I think about how I connect with that, sometimes it’s just a knowing and there’s no words, I just know what to do next. But I’ve also had times where it’s yelled at me, because I wasn’t following it. So I heard words.
I’m sure it probably comes to people in feeling, too. However that is, if you can get familiar with that, with listening to that, hearing that and distinguishing it from your personal wants and desires it just helps life unfold in a magical way.
There’s no techniques and you can’t make it happen. I think you can set an intention or create an environment with being open. But as far as I’m aware, there’s nothing you can do to make that happen. Other than being open to listening to hearing it.
Where can we find out more about you and your work?
Bonnie: I do have a very succinct one page website. BonnieJarvis.com
I had a website years ago, but once I started working for 3PGC full time I closed it down and recently rebuilt.
I have a couple of things coming up: there’s the What Has Wisdom Shown You Lately is something that Azul and I do for free every month.
And there’s also the year long program that we call The Heart of service that we are talking about doing again, because we are just loving the program. So we set up a waitlist or a notify me list for that.
And then I’m also fortunate enough to be doing another program with Cathy Casey and Mike Heard and that is called, Stress and anxiety are just an illusion. It’s not what you think, or is it? I don’t have all the details of that. I believe we’re going to start in July and it will be for four sessions over four weeks. But more details will come out of that soon.
That’s what I do. I have been doing one on one sessions. I’ve been calling them Heart to Heart conversations. That’s all and there is a way to contact me on that website as well.
Alexandra: I will put a link in the show notes to your website and BonnieJarvis.com.
Bonnie: Thank you.
Alexandra: Thank you so much for being with me here today. Bonnie. It’s been just lovely chatting with you.
Bonnie: Thank you so much. I’ve always considered myself somebody who was more like, numbers, math and coding oriented and not very eloquent with words. So I hope I was able to share in a way that at least one person is touched by it. If just one person sees something I’d be really, really deeply grateful. So thank you so much.
Alexandra: You’re so welcome. And I would bet that way more than one person is going to be touched by what you’ve said, you did a great job.
3 Tips For Dealing With The Inner Critic
May 30, 2024
We all have one: an inner critic. That voice inside our heads that is critical of so much that we do. That voice can become debilitating, if we let it. But when we apply what we know about the Three Principles of innate health, we can teach that voice to take a back seat, where it belongs. And, on a positive note, hearing the inner critic can even become an ally in helping us to practice stepping into a better feeling.
You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below.
Show Notes
A neurosurgeon’s explanation for the inner critic
A reminder about the purpose an unwanted habit is serving
How the feeling that comes with the inner critic alerts us to its falsehood
On the possibility of having a different experience at any moment
The beautiful feeling that’s always available to us
How our thinking can be like the grooves in a record
Hello explorers, and welcome to episode 65 of Unbroken. I’m Alexandra Amor. I’m here today to talk about the inner critic or that negative voice that can dog us all the time. And this is a subject, particularly close to my heart. I feel like it’s something that I’ve wrestled with for a long time and for a long time, couldn’t see it.
Years ago, it was invisible to me, even though it was going on. And then gradually, I became more and more aware of it, but didn’t know what to do about it. And then I came into this understanding, and I put it off to the side. But it’s come up in my awareness lately. And I’ll tell you a bit more about that in just a moment.
I was reading a book recently about brain science, called I think it’s either called Mind Magic or Magic Mind by Dr. James Doty. And one of the things he mentioned in there was, how his approach to our inner critical voice or his understanding of it was really interesting. And it was about the evolutionary process that we’ve gone through, and how our brains are wired to look for danger.
Given the society that we live in now and how generally safe we are – I hope I can say that about you – that the part of our brain that’s looking out for danger, even looks out for it in our own behavior. So it’s able to be critical of us, or it believes it’s being critical of us, in order to serve a purpose in order to keep us safe.
I probably haven’t explained that, as well as he did in the book. But it got me thinking about the negative voice, the inner critic, that so many of us hear, and maybe don’t hear, that’s maybe silent. I find it at times just kind of running behind whatever else is going on, in my mind, and I’ll talk about in a minute how that doesn’t actually matter if we can’t specifically hear what it’s saying. So that’s some of the good news.
Let’s jump in and talk about this. The reason I wanted to bring it up was that, in the past, we’ve talked about how unwanted habits are working in our favor, even though it might not look like they are. They are a solution, not a problem. And one of the metaphors I use is that unwanted habits are like the valve on the top of a pressure cooker.
The habit itself lets off a bit of the pressure of what’s in the pressure cooker.
So this got me thinking about how that inner critic, that negative voice is contributing to the load of what’s in the pressure cooker, it’s contributing to all the stirred up thinking that’s in there, and not in a good way. It’s adding to the pressure that’s in the pressure cooker. And so that means that in a way I think it would help for all of us to look at that kind of negative thinking specifically, and learn how to deal with it, learn how to resolve it. And so that’s what we’re talking about.
Today, I’ve got three tips for helping you to deal with your inner critic. I’ve been experimenting with the tips I’m going to share for the last couple of weeks, and it really feels good. I’m really really enjoying it. It has opened up a space of a good feeling within me. It has taught me at a new level to not take my thinking so seriously, which I really really appreciate. And like I say I just feel this a greater sense of tenderness or compassion, kindness for myself since I’ve been practicing these things, and so of course, that feels really good. So let’s talk about the first tip that I’ve got for dealing with your inner critic.
The first one is pretty easy, and it’s something you’ve probably been looking at a little bit already. And that is to know that:
The thinking that we have going on in our minds is not the truth with a capital T.
Thought, of course is like energy, and it’s moving through us all the time. And it is not the absolute truth, even when it looks like it is. So let’s take an example of you are walking along one day and you trip and fall. And there are so many ways that you can react to that situation. In the past, one of the ways that I’ve reacted to any kind of accidental thing that I do – I drop a bottle and it breaks or I trip and fall or the other day, I bumped my hand on a kitchen cabinet knob, and it’s quite sore – my inner critic really flares up in situations like that. So it really takes a hold, and beats me up and it takes the opportunity at that time to tell me that I’m clumsy, or I should have watched more carefully what I was doing, it really does beat me up a little bit in situations like that. And that’s been a historical pattern.
What I found is that as I’ve been using these three tips that I’m going to talk about, it’s actually been fairly easy to break that habit, given what I see now and what I hope to share with you. So we trip and fall, there’s a lot of negative talk in our heads and whatever that looks like. And so the first thing we can realize is that all that thinking that’s going on, it feels so real. And it feels so true. And it’s so easy for us to live in, in the illusion that everything we think is true, and real. And it isn’t.
How our thinking reacts to a situation like that, when we’re being hard on ourselves, is probably based on historically the way we’ve treated ourselves, and probably the way that we’ve heard other people treat us or treat themselves as well, growing up. What we can recognize, and we’re going to dive into this more in a future tip is that whatever the inner critic is saying in that moment, there are so many other possibilities for what could be true.
So to stay with this example, if I tripped and fell on the inner critic told me, or was beating me up, because it was saying I should have been paying more attention. And that’s kind of the one note that it’s playing on, just by understanding that that thinking isn’t that the truth with a capital T is really helpful.
What can be more helpful to seeing that there’s all kinds of other things that might be true in that moment, as well.
Maybe there was a little uneven spot in the sidewalk and that’s why I fell. Maybe I was getting out of the way, I tried to be kind to someone and just kind of caught my foot. Maybe my shoes are too big. There’s all kinds of reasons that that particular circumstance that could have happened, which simply points out to us that whatever the noise is, the critical, negative noise that’s going on in our heads that’s not the absolute truth with a capital T.
And again, I say, Yes, it does feel like that. And yes, it’s so easy for us to be completely wedded to that thinking and to imagine that everything we think is true. But looking in this direction, about what other possibilities are available to us, is really helpful, especially in this case of dealing with our negative thinking. So that’s tip number one. Remember, you know as often as you can, that the critical noisy thinking in your head isn’t necessarily the truth with a capital T.
The second tip is that the feeling that you have, when that negative or critical thinking is going on, is telling you that it’s not the truth.
So, in other words, we don’t need to turn this into a situation where we’re monitoring our thoughts all the time, and trying to catch them all. Because that actually will take us in the wrong direction. We will add more thought, more pressure into the pressure cooker. So we can let that go. We don’t need to manage and monitor every thought that’s happening.
Our design is built so that it lets us know when our thinking is critical.
The way that we feel when that happens is the alarm bell, or the barometric reading, however you want to call it, it’s the thing that’s going to let us know. And sometimes we can skate past that, especially if we’re used to a lot of critical thinking, and used to the inner critic. And yet, what we can do, as we gradually begin to notice this happening, the feeling that we’re having, and the fact that the feeling is alerting us to the fact that we’re having some negative thinking, it becomes a habit it becomes it becomes a habit in itself.
It becomes automatic to notice what’s going on.
I’ll give you one specific example. I experience a lot of urgency when my inner critic is really flared up. I notice that urgency pretty quickly. So I feel that in my body, I feel it in my solar plexus, like there’s a tightness, there’s a clenched feeling. And then I kind of feel it in my I would say, my chest and my shoulders that I need to, yeah, there’s just this impulse inside me, it’s almost like it’s telling me to run. And what it’s telling me is to go faster, to do more.
I know that that comes from a habit that I picked up. So as soon as I feel that feeling I can be sure that I’ve got some thinking going on, that’s not serving me that the inner critic has flared up. And those feelings in my body will always tell me the truth about what’s going on in my head.
If we’re thinking it, we’re feeling it.
When that happens, I can go back to tip number one, and think to myself consciously, that there’s another experience to be had here.
I had this happen this morning, actually, when I was having a conversation with somebody. And I felt that urgent feeling, come upon me for absolutely no reason. I wasn’t in any kind of a time crunch. So I just did a little bit of silent talking to myself, and reminded myself that that feeling was letting me know that my thinking was not the truth, that I was feeling like there, I was thinking that I needed to move quickly, I needed to get out of the conversation that I was in and move on. And that wasn’t true at all.
Through that little inner process, I was able to relax into the conversation. That didn’t resolve the feelings, all of them, immediately. But I was able to step into a much more peaceful place in that moment by remembering that my body was alerting me to what was going on in my mind.
This brings us to tip number three.
Tip number three has to do with the awareness of the possibility of a different experience.
In that situation that I just mentioned about the conversation I was having, I simply became aware that there was the possibility to have another experience in this conversation with this person I was talking to. Now, we don’t need to get too attached to what that experience is going to be.
For example, let’s go back to the trip and fall example. So you trip and fall, having a lot of negative thinking about it, you notice, first of all, you remember that your thinking is not the truth with a capital T. That’s tip number one.
Then Tip number two, you, again, you’re noticing the feelings in your body, and how maybe you’re having a physical reaction to the thoughts that you’re having, or they just don’t feel good, they just make you feel kind of yucky. So that’s tip number two, you’ve noticed that the feeling the feedback that you’re getting, is that the thinking that you’re having isn’t the truth, and your body is alerting you to that or your experience is alerting you to that.
And then you remember that there could be another possibility. There’s another way to think about this tripping experience. And again, what’s important to know is, you don’t have to know what that alternative is that the universe is there with its wisdom, with its intelligence, and its creativity, its infinite infinite creativity. When we feel like we’re in the grip of a bunch of negative thinking, and this is the reason why this tip is so important, is that there’s always a possibility of another experience to be had. And when we know that it softens things and, and opens them up a little bit.
What I was picturing when I was preparing to do this episode was a tight little ball of string, and it’s all tangled in knots. And when we’re aware that there’s a possibility, for another experience, I just see that tight little ball of string kind of loosen. So you know when you see a ball of wool that’s quite loosely wound, that’s the difference between the tight little ball of string and the availability of possibilities.
So that’s tip number three, being open to the idea that there is always the possibility to have a different experience in any given moment.
We like to feel of course, and our minds like to feel that we’re in control, and that we know the outcome of everything, and we know how things are going to go. But when we can soften a little bit and open up to the idea that there are infinite possibilities available. That, to me, anyway, creates a much better experience of life. My grip isn’t so tight on it, and it it can flow much more easily through me.
That sounds kind of wishy washy, but I guess I mean, it just does, it feels like to me, like, the more open I am to the idea that I’m not in charge, that life is flowing through me, and that it is wise, even when things are going wrong, even when things are not going the way I would like them to go.
I had a different conversation this morning that was difficult and things are not going the way I would like them to go in that situation. And by remembering that there’s a greater intelligence involved and that it is flowing through both myself and the other person I was having in the conversation with and that there are, as I said earlier, infinite possibilities available that could you know, come to light, could occur to someone or could change the situation, that allows me to let life flow to a greater degree within me and just seems to make things honestly so much easier. It lessons my suffering about what’s going on.
That’s the key really, isn’t it, for all of us; we don’t want to suffer. We want to suffer less.
Relying on that universal intelligence, that wisdom that’s always available to us is, to me, it seems one way to be able to do that.
The final thing I want to wrap up with is reminding you I’ve said this before, but I want to say it again, because it’s so connected to what we’re talking about today. A few episodes back, I think I talked about how Michael Singer who’s a spiritual teacher, talks about how there’s really only one practice. And that practice is to relax. That’s the one thing we can do, that will ease our suffering.
That points to exactly what I just said, when we relax, we allow the wisdom of the universe to step in and to flow much more freely through us.
And my friend, Tania Elfersy, who’s been on this show a couple of times, she phrases that slightly differently. She refers back to Sydney Banks who said, over and over again, to look for a beautiful feeling. And that, again, really ties into when we’re talking about this inner critic, that inner critic doesn’t feel good. And when we notice it, when it gives us those signals in our body, another way to say that we can look for the other possibilities are that are available, is to say, look for a good feeling.
There’s a beautiful, or a good, feeling available to us at all times.
It is the thing that will loosen us up, that will change the thinking that’s going on in our heads. When I have a lot of critical thinking, I go through these steps, remember them, I tend to imagine myself stepping into a good feeling, a beautiful feeling. Now, that doesn’t necessarily mean I can feel it all the time. But it does mean that I’m open to the fact that it does exist, that there’s a good feeling to be had.
Even if the needle inside me just moves one little notch toward a good feeling, you know, one little notch away from the yucky feelings that my critical thinking have been giving me that my body’s been giving me that feedback, that’s a victory to me.
Circling back to the brain book I was talking about, I imagine that there is a physical result from doing this. So in other words, we are physical beings, of course, as well as spiritual beings. And we have those physical, neural pathways in our brain. And they can be like the grooves in a record. So when something happens, when we’re triggered, like, your spouse doesn’t load the dishwasher properly, and they never do it the way that you want them to do it. The needle inside ourselves can fall into that groove and just go running with all the usual things that we say about the dishwasher and our spouse and how they never listen and all that kind of stuff.
But by practicing the tips that I’ve talked about today, what’s going to happen is new neural pathways are going to be built. So that needle falling into that old groove is going to happen less and less. And that path is going to be built somewhere else.
In other words, it feels like this is both a spiritual practice and it’s going to have some physical results in our brain. Now I’m not a neurosurgeon, and I’m not mapping my brain at this time. But I suspect that that will be happening as well, as we practice these three tips.
I hope that’s been helpful for you. If you’re someone who struggles with a lot of negative self talk, the thing we often call the inner critic, what I’m realizing is it’s not as complicated to change my relationship to that kind of noise, that kind of negative thinking, as I used to think it was. And like I said earlier, there’s a balance.
There’s a way to do this without monitoring our thoughts and adding a lot more work to be done.
And that’s the balance that I would love to see you strike. And so like I said earlier, this isn’t about monitoring your thoughts. It’s not about managing what you’re thinking, because your design is perfect. And it will always let you know when you’re thinking. And when it alerts you to that with the feelings in your body, then you can do something about it, but until then, you don’t need to worry about it. And when that happens, it’s just very simple. Knowing that there are other possibilities and stepping toward a better feeling, knowing that it’s possible to have a better feeling in that moment. I hope that’s been helpful.
I look forward to talking to you again soon. Thanks for being here. I really appreciate it. And I will talk to you on the next episode. Bye.
We Are The Peace We Seek with Ellen Friedman
May 23, 2024
When it comes to our mental well-being and our physical health it can be so easy to look outspide ourselves for answers. Ellen Friedman takes a different approach; she guides her clients inward to connect with the innate wisdom and wellness that is already there.
Ellen Friedman guides people home to the sacred space within, where they shift their relationship with themselves, their health, and others. She partners with people who are curious to explore a simple path to wholeness through the inside out nature of life.
In addition to having a Master’s degree in Spiritual Psychology with an emphasis in Consciousness Health and Healing, Ellen has a Certificate in Soul-Centered Professional Coaching, and she shares the Three Principles understanding. Her journey has been blessed coaching nearly 1000 divine beings using a human experience to remember who they truly are.
Ellen: I’m so happy to be here with you, Alexandra.
Alexandra: I’m so happy to have you here.
Tell our audience a little bit about yourself and your background and how you got interested in the three principles.
Ellen: I’m always amused where that story begins every time. I was happily minding my own business, enjoying my career as a physical therapist, when the knock on the door to coach came in 2011. And I was like but I love what I do. I thought you had to be miserable to do something else.
Then I started feeling miserable by not following that. I got in my car one day after seeing a patient and I was like, almost without logic, and I said, Okay, I heard you, I’m coming back. So I began coaching in 2011.
Then, in 2013, in a coach training program, one of the instructors introduced a video on the inside out understanding of stress. At that time, it was a really old video. And I remember the feeling inside me, I can like, remember the chair I was sitting in. I remember the feeling. And then I also remember my personal mind going, Oh, but we’ve got techniques and tools and things to do with people.
Alexandra: Moving forward from there was it difficult to get your head around the idea of no tools and techniques?
Ellen: I’m not sure because what was more difficult was trying to intellectually figure out what this understanding was. I spent a long time reasoning with what I was learning, comparing it to what I had already known. Seeing where it fit in, seeing where things didn’t fit in. And at that time, at that time, there were so many free opportunities to learn. I mean, there are today, but there were so many opportunities, and you and I could participate in almost all of them. And, there were also many wonderful paid opportunities and workshops and trainings. And, and you didn’t have to choose because there weren’t the abundance that there is today.
Alexandra: So this was around 2011 or 2012?
Ellen: 2013 was when I first heard that, and then it stayed on the back burner until 2016. But Alexandra, I am so clear that it doesn’t matter how many years you’ve been looking in this direction or exploring the principles because we we all see what we see when we see it. And don’t you love it with when clients just see something that you don’t see? I mean, it’s so fun.
Alexandra: Absolutely. Insight doesn’t really have a timeline, does it? I mean, it can happen anytime.
You mentioned being a physiotherapist.
You had an interest in healing, and helping people. Can you tell us a little bit about that? And where that began to if you know.
Ellen: Where was the interest in physical therapy health?
Alexandra: Well, yeah, healing and those kinds of things.
Ellen: I didn’t have any exposure to physical therapy, personally or for family members. So I don’t remember exactly how I landed on it other than healthcare seemed kind of interesting. But nursing didn’t and going to medical school I had no drawn to.
The allied health professions sounded fun and interesting and had a couple of opportunities to work as an aide and, and I was like, Okay, I’m going to do this. And so I went to physical therapy school. And different circumstances in school led me down the path of wanting to work with people who had chronic neurologic or new neurologic conditions. So that was a specialty for me right out right out the gates.
What I really loved about that is, you kind of had to look at the whole person; when someone has an injured back or an injured wrist or an injured knee or have had surgery, it can be very easy to be focused on the body part or the joint. But looking back, I was interested in the whole person. And I remember right out of physical therapy school, I had two patients, both of them had very similar strokes, their MRIs looked similar. And they had completely different outcomes. And I was so fascinated by that.
Alexandra: Oh, that is really interesting. Wow, that is so cool. So transitioning then, I noticed on your blog, you have a post about rest and its importance. I think our culture is so not wired that way. Rest is almost a four letter word.
Can you talk about rest and its importance, and why you recommend it to your clients.
Ellen: I recommend it because it works. Well, there’s so many different things that come to come to mind now. I literally was witnessing miracles or what looked like miracles in the people that I was working with, who had multiple sclerosis, ALS, stroke, brain injury, I worked with a lot of people who survived traumatic brain injury.
When their nervous system was downregulated, they did better, they had less pain, they had less more mobility. And so it just began to make sense to explore that with people and let them figure out what works for them. I worked with a lot of people with MS because I actually trained in a hospital where every patient in the hospital had multiple sclerosis; it was wild that that even existed.
This was before there were any medications to help people with their symptoms. I would notice that almost every one of my patients would be busy doing everything they could before they hit the wall of fatigue, and then they say things like, that’s all I can do for the day or, or I’m okay till noon around them okay till two o’clock.
I won’t get into the details of story, but I’m happy to share it with anyone who who inquires, a patient suddenly went from requiring rest at four hours after she woke up to eight hours. Increasing endurance from four to eight hours seemed impossible. People were taking medications to try and do that. And that wasn’t happening to them while helping.
I noticed that she and what a big part of her treatment program was, was relaxation exercises, and what I call down regulating the nervous system. Rest is the simplest form. Well, maybe not this one of the simple forms of of down regulating the nervous system. I think taking a long, deep exhale is also a very simple way and learning to rest before full exhaustion is so important for all of us neurologic condition or not.
Alexandra: Do you meet resistance when you suggest this now to clients?
Ellen: Well, I’m just going to explore your question a little bit more because I don’t really think that I suggest it to people. I explore with them what happens when they do. What happens when they don’t? I share stories and then they kind of come up with Well, maybe I could try that.
Now, as a physical therapist, I did recall having resistance. No, I can’t, I have to get everything done before noon, because I’m not good after that. And this other clients, she was like, Oh, I’m good to one now. Oh, I’m good till a couple of weeks later, oh, I’m good till two o’clock, oh, I’m good till three o’clock.
She goes, oh, I never have energy after four. And I said, Really, even after what’s happened? Oh, I can’t. Because if I have energy after four o’clock, then I have to make dinner and I don’t ever want to make dinner for the rest of my life. And I said, I can’t help you with, I can’t help you have energy after four, if that’s what it means to you. But maybe it could mean something else. That’s what I said, maybe it means something else. So the suggestion would come in the form of stories and explorations and experiments I love. I love the idea of experimenting. Because you can’t get it wrong in an experiment.
Alexandra: Say more about what that looks like.
Ellen: It could look like we’ll just experiment with resting and not sleeping, or just experiment with tuning into your body. What would it look like to go to the gas station and fill your car before the red lights going put more fuel in me? If you fill up a gas tank in a car, when it’s half full, or half empty, whichever, whichever you see it, then it takes less time to fill up the tank. And so when you rest, you are down regulating the nervous system. And there’s so many different ways to do that. It takes less time.
We can even experiment in a session with you know, I have a lot of people that used to measure their fatigue, and I’m like, Let’s measure energy instead.
Alexandra: So in other words, on a scale of one to 10, this is how tired I am.
Ellen: Yes. But I would say, on a scale of one to 10, with 10 being the most energy you’ve ever had, how much energy do you have?
Alexandra: I’m going to ask this question from a very personal place. What do you see as some of the causes or some of the primary causes of fatigue? You’re obviously dealing with people with physical issues.
Ellen: Not always. There’s lots of things that create fatigue, and trying to figure them out is no longer necessary for me, for myself, or for my clients. In fact, I’m on the other side of three autoimmune conditions, one of them being chronic fatigue syndrome.
In the past, I would see fatigue as an indicator or as a marker of illness or disease or a reminder that I have something and it doesn’t even enter my mind anymore to be anything other than an indicator of my body saying, Please give me a little bit of rest.
Alexandra: That’s really fascinating to me, that chronic fatigue. And so that was something that you experienced yourself.
Can you tell us a little bit about that journey and what you saw?
Ellen: I was masterful at avoiding discomfort. I have to be honest, I’ve never really shared with many of my practitioners that I had it because there was nothing you could do. It came at the top many, many, many years ago. It came with a lot of ideas around mental health and emotional health.
But then I had a client I was working with a client that had chronic fatigue and Lyme disease. And she started telling me some of her chronic fatigue symptoms. And it was like, oh, like, she’s waking up with a sore throat, waking up more tired than when you went to bed. I was like, Oh, I guess I guess that I do have chronic fatigue. I thought it was just chronic stress. So back to your question again, I’m sorry.
Alexandra: I’m just interested in your experience of chronic fatigue, and how you might see it now, with your understanding of the principles.
Ellen: Well, I have to say, it’s really hard to tap into how I felt, because it was for such a long time, and I can’t even say like it started here. But the understanding that I have now is, whether it’s chronic fatigue syndrome, or any fatigue, I think the mental busyness is a huge component to it.
And as I say that I’m aware that I also at one time in my life had a fairly rigid meditation practice.
I wouldn’t say that I was feeling any better. My fatigue symptoms were not better when I was meditating, they’re probably better now that I’m living into a meditative life rather than having a daily sit practice.
I think there’s so many mental, emotional, and physical contributions to fatigue. Food, environmental toxins, but mental busyness mental stress is a huge contributor for all disease and illness processes. A huge contributor.
Alexandra: I find that so fascinating. Because one thing I know about myself is how busy my mind has been. And it’s gradually slowing down over the years, now that I understand the role that thought plays in our lives, and I still find myself quite fatigued. I described myself as having no stamina. I have very little stamina. I know that that comes from a busy mind. That just seems to be what’s been the constant in my life.
I want to ask you, if you had a client who recognized that their busy mind was affecting their levels of energy, how would you approach that with them?
Ellen: I don’t know. There’s so many different ways. But let’s talk since you brought it up. Let’s talk about you.
Alexandra: Okay, sure.
Ellen: I know this identification with or stamina, low activity tolerance, I had that script running for a long time and not too long ago. And one day, I was somewhere and I hiked six miles. I haven’t hiked six miles in years. And I felt so good doing it and I was like, Oh, I guess I don’t have poor stamina. I guess I don’t have poor endurance. I just thought I did.
I just experiment with what would you like to do more up and do it? I remember the days when I would like okay, I can do this much of a walk or I can exercise and I just see how masterful my personal mind, my ego, was trying to control and manage my life rather than let’s just see, let’s just see, let’s just walk out the door.
What if we just know when we turn around? And what if we push too hard and then we have to take a longer than normal rest? From my PT days, I do remember that telling people if you need more than a 10 minute rest, when you get back then you’ve probably done a little too much. So what? So you rest a little bit more. But the background noise of poor stamina, low energy is, can be louder than we think.
Alexandra: Yes, absolutely. And it’s interesting to see that attachment to my identity of that idea of not having a lot of stamina or energy.
I can almost see myself telling myself that story.
Ellen: For sure. An experiment would be what do you love to do? Where do you love to walk or move?
A couple of months ago, we were at a friend’s house and I said, what is that? And she said, it’s a water rower and I said, I’ve never heard of a water rower. It’s a rowing machine that uses water as resistance. I love the sound of water, no matter how it comes; waterfall, ocean, streams. And my husband’s like, I can’t believe how committed you are to the rower every day. Commitment doesn’t come from here. It comes from I just love being on the rower and I love feeling my entire body working.
Alexandra: Oh, isn’t that amazing? I love that. As we’re touching on this, it occurs to me as well, that it feels like it’s all on me to manage my energy and kind of parse it out in ways so that I don’t run out of gas.
Ellen: I’ve got a great story for that. Before I go to the story of whose energy is that, the other thing back to just fatigue in general, there’s so many contributing factors. I investigated all of them heavily, especially food and where this food was sourced, and all sorts of stuff around food.
And what did that do? It just added more mental pressure, more mental energy to it. And so sometimes, sometimes not. So now, when I have any kind of symptoms that are I just think, Oh, I’ve got pressure on the system. Just got pressure on the system. What does my body want right now? Does it want some breathing? Does it want to sit down and relax back in a chair or lie down?
Alexandra: Nice. Oh, I love that. And then you said you had a story?
Ellen: I was blessed with the opportunity to speak at the London conference in 2019. The conference was Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. My talk was Monday at 1pm and Saturday night, I was committed to officiating a wedding on the east coast of the United States. And I’m closer on the East Coast than I am on the southwest of the US so I landed and officiated the wedding. The next day, got on a plane to Heathrow landed at the airport landed.
As we’re landing, I’m thinking, Hmm, how many hours sleep did I get? Because I was trying. I was like working hard to sleep on the plane. I couldn’t calculate if I had a total of two hours. I remember feeling this oh my gosh, two hours of sleep. How are you going to do this? And I heard and felt, “You are not the source of your energy.”
Alexandra: Wow. That is so cool.
Ellen: I had so much fun at that talk. The whole day was great. And the whole night, I didn’t have any jetlag, I didn’t have any pressure on the system. I didn’t have any fatigue. I loved how I showed up for myself and for the people that were present. That really stayed with me for everything. We’re not the source. Source is the source, right?
Alexandra: Yes. Wow, that’s so great.
Ellen: What happened to you when you heard that? I’m just curious, because I felt a shift within you.
Alexandra: It’s so easy for me to fall into, it’s all on me. Whatever ‘it’ is. So it can be manifesting something, or it can be in a relationship. It’s all on me. Figuring everything out. So I need to keep hearing this message over and over and over again.
Ellen: Is that true that you need to hear it over and over and over again?
Alexandra: I guess every time it clicks with me again, it feels good, feels like a new, deeper awareness that it’s not all on me.
Ellen: And the other thing that has helped me and the clients that I’ve worked with along that journey is, not only is it not all on me. But I’m always going to have some variation of thinking that it’s on me. And that’s what I love most. That’s one of the things I really love about this understanding is that understanding has helped me to really deepen my acceptance of the human condition, and of me as a human.
And that even though I know something, and even if it’s not just an intellectual knowing but a knowing that I’m not the source of my energy, there’s still going to be personal mind ego tendencies to forget it, or to want to grasp a hold of control, because I see that the personal mind, my personal mind, is masterful for me.
Knowing how to maintain the illusion of safety, security, and control and some insight many years back, had me see the perfection and the mastery of my ego doing that. And since then, I’ve had so much humor when I see it, it’s like oh, you again. You’re trying to pull me into thinking that you’re the source of my energy. Hmm, what a clever way you do that. And it was never light hearted with my relationship with myself before. Like I was serious.
Alexandra: It was serious work.
Ellen: It was serious.
Alexandra: Something you said there made me want to go a bit deeper. It was around I’ve lost it now. Maybe it’ll come back. Probably it will. We’ll see.
On your website, you have a mention of healing the beyond dis-ease. Can you tell us what that is and what that looks like to you?
Ellen: Well, first of all, just the word dis-ease I’ve come to know as lack of ease. When I feel a lack of ease and any part of my life it’s a little tap on the shoulder to move into ease, to move into instead of swimming across the current or upstream to flow downstream with ease.
I’ve been blessed to witness so many people who have chronic illness and I hate to say it this way and I’ve been blessed to have so many winners, so many people have deep, emotional, spiritual, mental healings, deep forgiveness for themselves and others in spite of their physical illness not shifting. Because again, for me just like, source is the source of energy. Source is also the source of physical healing.
Alexandra: Right, so it’s in other words, it’s not all on them for the healing, right? I feel personally challenged by living in ease. I guess that’s partly habit. And part maybe partly ego, like you just reflected on; my ego wants to be in control, it wants to manage everything.
Ellen: So that’s the way it works. It no longer makes sense for me to try and make it do anything different other than to recognize and become aware that it’s masterful for me and your ego is masterful for you.
Alexandra: Right and so holding that lightly, like you talked about a minute ago
Ellen: Yes. I think the other thing that can be really helpful is no matter what it is, is like what is it that you really want?
I hear you don’t want the low stamina, the low energy but what is it that you do want? And how would you feel if you had that and 90 percent of the time, it’s the same thing. I mean, that was different people. I’m saying like, take 100 people or 1000 people that I’ve worked with now, it’s all some variation of peace or being in a state of loving and so coming close if that is there something like is that true for you?
Was there another word for you or for your clients that you think that they that people are really seeking?
Alexandra: I think peace is the one that resonates the greatest the most with me personally.
Ellen: I did the doing on almost anything that was possible to find peace, literally on my hands and knees before I believed in anything to preach toward. I meditated for peace 360 days a year. I medicated for peace. I learned lots of skills and tools and techniques to try and calm down.
I’m laughing because it just makes no sense to try and calm down my human and I think one thing that all that effort did was show me how committed I was to it. When I’m moving away from that peaceful feeling I’m just more sensitive to it now.
It was the habit. I was always back here in some variation of chaos or stress or tension. But now I’m sensitive to moving toward or away from it and I can catch myself so instead of in the past, it would have been like what do we do to not be in this tension place? Not possible. But having this sensitivity of you know that I’m moving more in the direction of peace or away from peace has been really a helpful guide.
Alexandra: I want to ask a follow up question. For our listeners, you talked about all the things you were doing to try to achieve peace. What do you do differently now? What’s the alternative to that? You talked about that a little bit about that sensitivity.
Ellen: I want to be aware that I want to share that, it sounds like I’m not happy with the things I did in the past. They all made sense at the time, they looked like good ideas. They were helpful, for sure. But I didn’t know what was possible.
And I would say, I still don’t know what’s possible, I think that that experience of living in peace is ever expansive, that I’ll really, really never know the edges of that.
Now, I don’t have to fix or change or do anything when there’s tension. I feel like tension is just kind of like a divine tap on the shoulder waking me up.
I might choose to stay in the tense place for a moment, but I know, it won’t stay. I know it’s temporary. So if it serves me in that moment to stay there, so be it.
And I would say this, this leads me into this. This other thing, this other area that’s really shifted for me is I’ve become more and more aware of how somehow I mastered feeling when I wanted to feel when I wanted to feel it and how I wanted to feel it. So it was very controlling about my feeling experience of life. I thought that because I could feel and because I could cry and because I could get angry that I felt all the feelings. But I really wasn’t not to the level I’m am now.
I’ve become so attuned or sensitive to my feeling state. So I think of like, my anxiety that I was medicated for. And the continuum of anxiety now, I could literally sometimes feel just a very shift, very brief shift in my breath, where it’s more shallow. And I’m like, oh, that anxiety train is driving by. I don’t have to get on it. The wakeup is that I don’t have to get on it.
At the other extreme, maybe there’s some heart palpitations. But maybe that’s when I wake up to there’s anxiety stirring. Or just a pressure and uneasiness. There’s just this continuum and I just love that I’ve become so sensitive to it, that I don’t spend a lot of time outside of a peaceful state. We never really went into this quiet mind, quiet body, but the peaceful mind, peaceful body really makes a difference. I know that’s what has helped me reverse three autoimmune conditions and other things that are currently healing in my body.
Alexandra: I want to point out for listeners to that what you’re pointing to, is that the feeling that comes always lets us know the truth of what we’re thinking, it’s always there giving us feedback. So that tension that you described, you use that word, is not bad or wrong or something to be managed or fixed. It’s simply a message.
Ellen: An indicator.
Alexandra: An indicator letting you know.
Ellen: I love the metaphor of a barometer, because what a barometer does is it measures pressure on the system. Sometimes I feel it with a shift of a breath. And sometimes I feel it with a shift in my heart rate, it doesn’t matter. Before the understanding that I have now it would have been like, what do I do to avoid the more severe ones? I’m laughing because it didn’t work. And now it’s like, oh, I caught it when it was here. And sometimes I catch it when it’s here. And ad that’s just the way it works.
Alexandra: I love that barometer metaphor. It’s such a good one. And when we think about it, if we spent a lot of time looking at the barometer that’s on the wall and saying, Well, you know, a movement of the needle within this zone is okay. But if you go outside that I won’t be okay. None of that is true, either.
Ellen: I love that expansion, too. It’s not true.
Alexandra: And I love hearing that, for you being able to rest in peace has helped you with these autoimmune conditions. That’s so extraordinary. And so often with guests on the show, too. And I love hearing this. We’ve tried so many things. And again, innocently, like you pointed out, and those things looks like the right thing to do at the time.
Noticing the difference between knowing that we are peace, versus searching for it is so powerful.
Ellen: And for me, it was also a period of time that the knowing that I was peace was way more intellectual than the experience of I am peace. I was really, really kind of, Oh, I know, peace, because I was comparing it to the massive anxiety that I used to write. I’m not saying that I and as I said before, I don’t know, the boundaries, the depths of what peace is available, but I have unknowing that it’s way more than I could ever imagine.
Alexandra: We’re coming toward the end of our time together, I want to ask you to tell us about your project around Mavis Karn’s book, It’s That Simple. Mavis has been on the show, and for the listeners, I’ll link to Mavis’s episode in the show notes.
So tell us what you’re working on.
Ellen: Please do because I’ve had so many amazing mentors. But something happened with Mavis and this book.
She wrote a book called It’s That Simple: A User’s Manual for Human Beings. It’s a series of 15 letters. I read one, two, and three, and I woke up in the middle of the night thinking, I’ve got to talk to Mavis about this. This must be a program.
Something said don’t email her, because it could be a short conversation. So let’s do it. Let’s have a conversation with her. So I set up a time to talk to her and I said, Mavis, I woke up at three in the morning and this book needs to be a program. And she said, Well, what does that look like? So we talked about it and she asked me if I would do it with her.
Then a few minutes later, she said, Oh, you know, just an hour ago, someone asked me the same thing. I think the two of you should go off and do it together. So I ran five programs with her virtual assistant Azul, which was lovely. It was our first time working together. We just jumped into doing it.
We had small groups where we invited people to have the book or not, it wasn’t a book club. And in each session I would read a letter and we would have a shared experience of what people heard, where it made sense, where it didn’t make sense, where the exceptions were.
I just want to say stay tuned to how it’s gonna come out in the world. I am on a new venture to put it out where it’s more accessible to people, anytime a day or night and not just by enrolling in a program. So we’ll see how that unfolds. It feels like a big, well, I could make a good idea that it’s a big project, and let’s let it but when I remember this feeling that said, there’s something else that you can do with this. And it’s easy.
Alexandra: Nice. Touching back in with that feeling. That’s great.
Is there anything that we haven’t touched on today that you’d like to share with our listeners?
Ellen: I love that you asked me that. I want people to know that I’m also really committed to educating and informing people on End of Life Options. And in each state, and each country has different laws and rules. But there are some end of life options that are universal, they can happen and that you can do anywhere.
Knowing what you want at end of life and sharing that with people is so important, because in my health care, working days I saw so many families struggle over thinking that they knew what their loved when their loved one couldn’t speak anymore, or share what they wanted, that they that they knew. And we might know now we can always change our mind.
I’m really committed to educating as many people as I can on that. And I love that conversation as well.
Alexandra: Wow, that’s so fascinating. I love that too. That’s a subject that’s dear to my heart as well, just based on personal experiences. And various other things. So I love hearing you say that.
Ellen: Thanks for having another conversation about that.
Alexandra: Ellen, this has been awesome.
Why don’t you let everyone know where they can find out more about you and your work?
Ellen: I’m always open to an email Ellen@healinghousecalls.com. My website is healinghousecalls. And I also have a healthcare-coaching.com website where I support health care providers, doctors, nurses and others to know that stress and burnout is optional. Even in the workplace, even in that workplace.
Alexandra: I will put links in the show notes to those things.
Ellen: Thank you so much for a fun conversation, and more than fun, meaningful, deeply meaningful conversation. I’m always open to inviting people into a conversation. I don’t buy a pair of jeans without trying them on. So I don’t want to hire someone or think about working with someone before I try them on.
Alexandra: Oh, that’s a great way to put it. Thanks so much, Ellen. Take care.
Stress Relief for Female Entrepreneurs with Clare Downham
May 16, 2024
We usually think of stress as coming from the circumstances that surround us: busy jobs, busy lives, difficult bosses or clients. But what if stress has another origin? What if it comes from the thinking we have in any given situation?
Clare Downham is the dedicated mentor you need on your unique journey to unlock your innate potential and cultivate a thriving business aligned with your true purpose. As a certified ILM Success Mentor, she specialises in guiding emerging and established female entrepreneurs to embrace their innate mindfulness and harness it as a powerful tool for success.
With a deep understanding of the inside-out nature of our human experience, Clare expertly navigates the complexities of the entrepreneurial journey, helping women to silence the inner critic, dissolve self-doubt and cultivate a strong sense of intuition and self-trust.
You can find Clare Downham at ClareDownham.com and on Insight Timer at claredownham.
You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below.
Show Notes
On what happens when we ignore warning signs from our bodies
The false messages business owners receive about having to be ‘on’ and ‘up’ all the time
How motivation ebbs and flows naturally and there’s nothing wrong when we’re at a low ebb
On the cyclical nature of levels of personal energy
How some of our best ideas come during down or quiet times
How we believe we need to be busy all the time and that resting is ‘lazy’
How we so often try to be in a different feeling state than the one we’re naturally in
On overwhelm and its one cause
How being in the present moment starves stress of the oxygen it needs
Alexandra: Oh, my pleasure. It’s lovely to see you.
Why don’t you tell us a little bit about your background and how you got interested in the Three Principles.
Clare: I was a primary school head teacher. So our primary school in the UK is aged three to 11. I was in primary education for 20 years. And the last five or so I was a head teacher to two different schools. And I became very stressed, although I didn’t know I was stressed at all, I didn’t have a clue.
I knew there were things wrong with me. But I thought those things were what was wrong with me rather than stress as the underlying cause. One day I went into work, fully intending to start my working day and I took one look at my computer. And it was like, it was like I was frozen. It was like, my body just finally went, “No, no more, let’s go, let’s leave.”
I literally did walk out of work.
And I never went back in the end. Didn’t know I wasn’t going to go back. I thought it was going to have a nap, and have a little rest for a couple of weeks and then go back. But that’s not what happened.
I was initially diagnosed with depression, because I was burnt out. And it looks very similar. Because all your motivation is gone. You can’t get out of bed, you can’t really do anything. But all the way through they were saying it was depression, I kept thinking I don’t feel depressed, I’m not really in a low mood, I’ve just got no energy, it was like it had been syringed out of me.
It was a messy year. I didn’t work for a year, I was off sick for a year. And through a vast part of that it was all depression, depression, it’s depression. So obviously I was taking tablets, I was trying all sorts of things to cure myself with depression. And it was only really much later on in that journey that I realized that I burnt out and realized actually how stressed I’d been and how, as I learned about stress, how my body had been screaming the warning signs at me. But I had just ignored them or not known they were there.
I didn’t deliberately ignore them, I just didn’t know they were there. I didn’t know that’s what they were telling me. So a year went by, and eventually my governing body and the people I was working for needed to know when I was going to come back. And I just didn’t know. I couldn’t give them an answer because I was still not brilliant. And so in the end, I had to resign.
I resigned on the first of April. April fool. I think it’s quite funny that I resigned the first of April, and then didn’t know what I was going to do. Obviously at that point, apart from just, it felt like a massive, I actually got a lot better once that weight had been almost like my thinking. Now I know my thinking about going back to work was really not helping my recovery. So I didn’t know what I was going to do.
Then I got a random email 10 days afterwards which invited me to train to be a hypnotherapist.
This is in 2016 I resigned. And so I thought, well, I’m interested in that thing. I had had a bit of hypnotherapy, and it helped a bit. And I thought, You know what, I’m going to go and I’m going to go and do hypnotherapy. So that’s what I did. Not really with the intention of starting a business just, well, it’s something to do you know, something to learn, something new, I’m always interested in learning new things. And it was only like partway through the course. Well, near the end of the course, when they started to say they started talking about clients, they started talking about business, started talking about marketing, Facebook, all these things and only think about in terms of business.
It seemed I was starting a business completely by accident. That’s my first accidental business. I didn’t say it was a first accidental business. So I started this business and I guess it was probably about the autumn of 2016 when I started going networking and things like that. I started to go to these networking events where they would have somebody do a little 20 minute presentation. And a lot of them were self development and there was a lot of messaging around, “You have to have all these big goals and you’ve got to have a plan. You got to have like a 12 week year plan, you got to have a three year massive or a five year plan and you’ve got to stick to these plans.” She was scheduling your day and there was all this stuff about time management about managing tasks.
What I picked up from that, and wrongly held maybe, the business world seems to think this is right was that motivation wise I was supposed to be a straight line.
Never fluctuating, never changing, just be motivated all the time supposed to get up every day and just smash through everything, and hustle and if I didn’t do that I was going to be a failure as a business owner.
As a result of that, I get into all these different self development things. So I’m reading books and listen to podcasts, I’m going on endless courses. And then I’m doing all the therapeutic look into the past. What’s wrong with Clare? When did she become broken? Was it as a child and those sorts of things? Counseling more, obviously, that was a hypnotherapist plenty hypnotherapist I could tap into, I was just trying so hard. Oh, Miracle Morning, every day, get up, do this ritual in order to make yourself be okay.
That went on for about three and a half years. Now when I say that to a lot of people to go, Oh, God, I was like, for 20 years or whatever. So actually, I think three and a half years, I was very fortunate. It was only three and a half years I was like that. Then in January 2020 I can only say a miracle happened really. And again, I don’t know miracles, accidents, luck, whatever you want to call it. So a friend of mine, Peter, had just finished his training with Michael Neill. He had just done the Super Coach Academy. And he just put a post on Facebook saying, I just need some people to sort of practice on to finish my qualification off. And I was like, Oh, you can fix me then. Come on, put my hand up. Like, come on. Let me come.
I went to his office. He doesn’t live far from me. I cried through the entire first session.
I can’t even remember what he said to me. Only I remember him drawing a stick person. We’d like a lot of squiggles above its head. And I’ve seen Michael Neill and other teachers draw that picture since. I remember that but I don’t remember much else other than I cried and cried and cried. There was so much frustration that I’d done all this stuff. I’ve done everything the blinking gurus have told me to do and I still wasn’t motivated all the time.
That was the starting point. I had some coaching with him. I then started to really listen to Michael Neill’s stuff first of all, I guess. He was my route in. Then lockdown came along. And my in person hypnotherapy business went poof. There it was gone, literally overnight. But actually, that was really fortuitous in the end, because I didn’t really want to do hypnotherapy anymore, anyway.
That opened up quite a lot of space for me to look in this direction. And trained then with Jules and Rudy Kennard. My fiance and I were in the last cohort of people doing pure Three Principles stuff, they’ve moved on to something a bit more multi dimensional, shall we say since then. Everything changed.
Then my business began to be more about that.
Nothing looks the same as how it did, particularly other people. They used to be really annoying. There are a lot of synonyms. That’s really good. My main thing was ranting about other people in their behavior and wanting other people to be different. Yeah, that’s gone. And life just looks a lot more easy.
So that’s how I came across it. And since then I’ve stayed in the conversation, is what they say, don’t they? I’ve explored lots of different teachers, done bits and pieces of all sorts of different things. Listen to a lot of podcasts. And at the moment, Amy Johnson and Clare Dimond seem to be my main people that I’m connecting to. I’ve loved it. It’s been amazing, really. And I’m so grateful that those little accidents happened along the way. There’s way more bits of luck or bits of miracles, I guess, to get me to now.
Alexandra: Looking back at your experience in the primary school, what do you see now about why you burned out?
Clare: Well, first of all, not because of teaching. The first thing when I say I was a primary school head teacher and I burn out people just Oh yeah, it’s such a hard job. Actually, my working life was the bit that was okay. I always felt good at work. I never really felt stressed out about work or anything related to work, although I had taken on a new headship in the autumn of 2014, and obviously I burned out in March 2015. I think it might have been the straw that broke the camel’s back that it was a new headship.
There’s a lot to see very quickly when you’re in your second headship because in your first headship you don’t know that much. So you can’t really see the problems. Whereas when you go into second headship, and you’ve left your lovely school that you’ve just made, all nice and pretty and wonderful, you go into this new place, and you’re like, ah everything’s wrong. There’s a bit more speed to it. And yet, there’s a lot coming in. But really, it wasn’t really that. I also separated from my husband in the autumn of 2013.
And then just, the only thing I can describe it is, now I look at it, and I know, I was trying to control the world out there in order to make myself feel okay. I was doing a lot of online dating. That’s not a great place to be, if you’re a control freak, let me tell you, because they don’t behave Alexandra and they behave appallingly. So many of them. So that wasn’t good.
I also was going out a lot more, doing a lot of salsa dancing, I was going out partying with my friend.
I had a friend who was also a head teacher and also split from her husband. You can just imagine what those nights were like; they involved a lot of wine, and blurry memories. But you know, there was a lot of that there’s a lot of doing doing a lot, and trying to find it out there.
So I was tired all the time. And my mind was very busy with what can I do next to make myself feel better? So it was really all the outside world stuff. That was the problem. And how I was trying to control all of that, to make myself feel okay.
Alexandra: I loved what you said about motivation. And you work with a lot of female entrepreneurs. I had a little bit of an aha moment when you said that; of course, our motivation goes up and down. It ebbs and flows. In the entrepreneurial world, there’s so much information brainwashing about jumping out of bed and achieving your goals and always feeling 150%. And of course, that’s not the way it works.
I’m sure seeing that for you was such a lightbulb moment.
Clare: Massive. I think there’s the word acceptance or surrender or something like that comes to mind.
I’m 53. So I don’t have a cycle of my own, over 28 days now, but I have been looking at like, How does my energy change? Because it still does seem to have these kinds of patterns to it and looking a bit around the moon. There was a new moon last week and I just noticed that I was very much hunkering down and I was writing things. I do stuff on Insight Timer, and I didn’t want to record anything. It wasn’t in that energy to record and then at the beginning of this week, I’m ready to record again. I’ve woken up, I’m ready. I’m energized to do that now.
And like last week, if I went to a networking event in person yesterday, if I tried, I couldn’t have done that last week. I just wasn’t in that energetic space. But I think that one of the things especially for female entrepreneurs, is that you have to remember that the world of business has been – and this is nothing against men – but it’s been created by men, for men by men, just because that’s the nature of how it’s been. The world of work was a man’s world up until not even 100 years ago to be fair, you know, it’s not even been 100 years that women have been in the workplace properly.
I look at my fiance and he just is the same every day.
He just gets up and he just like yeah, I’m doing this thing and I’m just singing. I’m like that some days and then other days I just want to cry and sit in a coma. And he doesn’t seem to get that. He’ll ask, “What’s wrong?” Nothing’s really wrong. I’m just crying and just feel a bit flat and I’m just not in the mood. I’m this undulating energetic thing.
I’m not a man and I’m sure men fluctuate as well, but Bruce just doesn’t seem to. I speak to a lot of women who say, Oh, no, my partner just gets up. He’s just the same every day. He doesn’t seem to really half this cycle thing going on. So I think there’s there’s something about self compassion, knowing that and also realizing that sometimes in those quiet times is actually when I’m still around, I’m slower. Some really cool ideas come through, because I’m not dashing about doing everything and trying to do everything.
Some of my really cool things that have felt like downloads or channeling or whatever you might want to call it have come in those moments when I have been like, oh, I don’t really want to do anything. I just want to sit about and read a book, or whatever. That’s when that stuff comes through.
Alexandra: Absolutely. In fact, just last week, I had a day where I was wanting to be working, had some stuff that I wanted to do and just couldn’t do it. I spent the afternoon just lying on the couch, staring at the ceiling. Because that felt like the thing that I really wanted to do.
Where I tend to go with that is, oh, no, I’ve lost all my motivation. That’s what starts to happen in my head. I’ll never get it back. I’ll be lying on the couch staring at the ceiling for the rest of my life.
Instead, what happened is when I got up to go and do and make supper, I had two ideas for new programs. So I completely agree about that. The quiet time is often the most fertile time for sure.
Alexandra: In your work, do you find that female entrepreneurs struggle with burnout? And if so, how does that look for them?
Clare: I think it’s not uncommon. I think there’s something around how many different things, women, whether they’re entrepreneurs, or they’re in work, are managing, there’s still there’s still, like, we’ve moved full on into the workplace full on into entrepreneurialship. But we’ve not dropped any of the stuff in the house. We’ve kept it all. So we can’t do it all.
I also think it’s where we’re trying to get to the pushing and the forcing, and the keeping going, when really, we should be resting and really tuning out from our bodies completely and utterly. When I was burning out, my body did a little tap on the shoulder and then it gave a little light tap on the cheek, and then it was literally punching me around their head going, when you’re going to listen to me, I’m dying here. And you’re not doing anything about it.
We just don’t listen. So this busyness, we’ve got loads going on, there’s home, there’s business, there’s all the stuff. There’s also this sense that we’re supposed to be energetically on all the time. So we’re not resting, we’re not taking care of ourselves. And eventually that you can’t, so sleep starts to go around. I mean, that for me, it was massive.
My sleep went completely to pot. And then we go treat the sleep as if it’s the sleep that’s the problem. It’s not really the sleep. That’s not the problem at all. It’s the underlying stress and moving towards burnout. And so eventually, it’s running on this level of adrenaline, it’s just not sustainable for the body.
One of the things I often talk about is, are we going slowly enough and quietly enough to hear the body saying? When our eyes start to feel tired and we’ve got a bit of a headache because we’ve been in front of his screen too long. I don’t imagine many people are even listening to that. I can sit here, I’m middle of doing something and I don’t even go to the loo. I don’t really need the loo, I’m just going to finish this little thing that I’m doing.
No, go to the toilet. Start there. Just start there by listening to the very fundamental signal from your body that is saying go to the toilet. Eeven that we’re not doing, we’re not listening. But we have to be able to go slow enough to do that. And we have to be willing for things to change, and I’m not sure with the drive for money and things and just this concept of success, which is made up anyway. Whether we feel that we can afford to stop or slow down that feels like it’s too much of a sacrifice, I think really, so people keep going and keep going until it’s too late.
Alexandra: Right, and especially when we feel like, the only thing that’s going to get us to where we want to go is that drive forward. We don’t understand the value in resting and taking care of ourselves.
I see that so clearly, as you’re speaking the connection between, of course people have a hard time relaxing, because that looks antithetical to what they’re trying to do.
Clare: I’m just thinking then that The L Word, the lazy word comes up, doesn’t it? I’ve just been on a call earlier with a group of women and one of the women said that on Sunday, I mean, not even on a normal working day, on Sunday, she actually just laid on the sofa and put Netflix on. And it took her a big leap to do that. Because a big pushing through some discomfort, because it was like, Oh, I shouldn’t be doing this. “I should be out doing something. I should be in the garden. I should be busy all the time.”
She had headache, and then the headache went away. And she felt so much better and so much energized, because she just had rested. Sometimes you watch something on Netflix, it just washes out for you a bit, doesn’t it? And it’s just what you need. She was saying how difficult that was to just lean into that and allow that to just happen. Instead of fighting it and having a story about what else we should be doing.
Alexandra: One of the other things I wanted to ask you about is you mentioned this on your website about how managing our feelings isn’t the answer.
Clare: I guess fundamentally, when I was in the thick of all that self-development stuff, that’s what I was trying to do was trying to manage my feelings. I was trying to just all the time be in a different feeling state than the one I was in.
What I see about that now, and it’s that it’s still like developing is that that takes quite a lot of energy. And also, it’s fundamentally impossible to manage your feelings. You can’t do it. So that’s the underlying premises, actually, you can’t do that, it doesn’t really work that way.
But when we are very focused on an emotion that we don’t want to have, then we’re spending a lot of energy thinking about that emotion and trying to fix it, it just makes it worse. It just makes it more unpleasant. And actually, I’m seeing it now as fighting against the present moment. If what is present now is a feeling of anxiety, then, if I sit with that, then I’m really in the present moment, because I’m with this feeling of anxiety.
What I’ve noticed when I do this, I feel like it’s almost like when you pump a balloon up till it’s like really, really full. And then instead of knotting it, you let it go, and it goes whizzing around the room. And so it’s got all this energy and then it just goes up and it just sort of falls to the ground, no energy left.
When you watch these emotions, and you do that non judgmentally, that’s about how long they last. They whiz round and they move around and then they just disappear. I think that’s because you’ve fallen into the present moment, you’ve surrendered, you’ve accepted whatever word you want to use. And it’s just there.
What I see often as well in the female entrepreneurial community is that there’s always work going on to try and feel differently. And it’s taking a lot of time so nothing’s getting done. Like a fraction of the thing if they do because the whole idea is they want to get more done but they’re spending so much time and energy on managing feelings, they’re getting less done.
Whereas actually what happens when we just sit with the feeling and allow it to be there it passes anyway. And then what I find comes very quickly after that is a feeling of lightness, a bit of clarity, often the next step often like, Oh, do you know what, that’s what I need to do next. And then almost like this inbuilt motivation or energy to go do that thing just sort of comes with that energy built in.
Whereas if we’ve spent all that energy, even if we did get rid of the feeling, by the end of all that manipulation, and trying to get rid of it, and whatever we might be doing to get rid of the feeling. By the time we’ve done all of that we’re tired, then we’ve got nothing left to go do the thing that we might have wanted to do.
And the other thing is, as well as that in business, you’re often going to compete against things that feel uncomfortable, like putting yourself out there, let’s just call it that marketing speak. But putting yourself out there is going to sometimes mean that you’re going to butt up against some growing edge of yours. And actually, you could spend hours trying to get rid of this awful feeling so that you can then go do the thing.
But actually, the most potent way to get rid of that is to do the thing. That’s the most powerful thing that just allows that whole limitation to fall away. So instead of going round the houses trying to get rid of the feeling, trying to manage the feeling, just do the thing, like not from a place of hustle. Because those feelings aren’t telling you about the thing anyway. The feeling doesn’t come from that thing.
The feeling is coming from how you’re thinking about the thing.
And when you do the thing, that thinking falls away. So when you see it in that light, it just gets easier. Once you know that that feeling isn’t information about the thing you’re about to do, you can then do it. And that’s got to be quicker and more efficient than going round and round, is trying to chase the feeling away before you can do anything.
Alexandra: Absolutely. For our audience, I’m in a class with you at the moment about Insight Timer. And there have been a couple of things that I’ve bumped up against in that exact way, and I noticed myself, I might spend a bit of time backing away from whatever the thing is, and thinking about it a lot and, and worrying about it a bit.
And then eventually when I did it, it’s never as hard as we think it’s going to be. And all the thinking that I had about that just drops away. So now I’m not carrying the weight of all that thinking that I had about whatever the thing is.
Clare: Absolutely.
Alexandra: We touched a little bit on how women have entered the workforce, but they haven’t let go of the things they were already doing. Raising children, taking care of the house and that thing.
What is overwhelm then, as you see it? Is it tied into having too much to do or is it something else?
Clare: I don’t think it’s helped by having too much to do. However, I do think there’s one thing about being overwhelmed and that’s thinking you’ve got to do it all now. It’s as simple as that.
If you’ve got a list of things to do, you only think about one of them and you go do that one thing to completion, and you cross it off, and then you go do the next thing, then you may not get it all done. But you will just be very present. And you’ll just be very focused on one thing.
I think tied into that is seeing how much thinking we might have about completing the tasks on a list. I mean, there’s that thing, isn’t it? I’m sure it’s absolutely true for most people, you’ve got a list of 10 things, you do eight of them and you mega focus on the two that you didn’t do.
So there’s noticing if we tend to not be very compassionate to ourselves or beat ourselves up about not doing whatever things we’ve not done. Realizing we’re not superhuman.
Tied into that, is when we’re calm and when we’re present, I think it’s easier to say no. And sometimes we have to say no, or we have to ask for help.
I was rubbish at asking for help. I was drowning in my life. And nobody knew. Nobody knew how ill I was getting, because I hid it very, very well. I didn’t ask for help. So there’s all the stuff that is about us needing to keep up some facade of being okay all the time. Because we don’t want to be a burden, and we don’t want to get in the way, or we don’t want to seem to be a problem in some way. But fundamentally overwhelmed is thinking you’ve got to do it all now.
Alexandra: I love that. It’s such a simple definition. And it resonates with me so much. I think of times when I felt overwhelmed and I had so much thinking about whatever was going on. And it really does feel like that pressure. Oh, it all has to happen in the next five minutes. And that was all made up, of course, by me. Such a good point. I love that.
When someone is experiencing that stress, or a different stress, what do you see about dealing with that in a way that’s fresh and new?
Clare: The first thing is just that phrase, dealing with it, as if it’s something to do, rather than something to be seen in a different way. Because I mean, I’ve got a workshop stashed away somewhere, it’s available if you want it. It’s called The Truth About Stress. And it just takes people through the difference between pressure and stress.
Absolutely, in this crazy bonkers world that we live in, where everything’s too fast, and we’re wired into [our phones] all the time. And it’s harder to switch off and all these other things are going on, then there’s pressure but that’s not the same as stress. That’s our relationship with the pressure.
Let’s say we’ve got a busy job or a busy business. And yeah, we could literally go into that business, work our socks off all day. And if we can just, like, close the office door at five o’clock, and go chill out with our family, and have a lovely evening, be really focused on that when we’re doing that, then we won’t experience stress. It just won’t work like that.
In this workshop, I talk about the fact that on a Sunday night, loads of people don’t sleep because they’re already in the working week. And they’re already thinking about what’s to come and how much they’ve got to do and everything.
And equally on a Friday afternoon. Everything goes really well, everybody’s really light hearted, and it’s all cool, because actually, already they’re thinking, oh, I’m going to the beach that weekend, or I’m going to do this with my kids. The thinking is already thinking not even the job is like, Oh, it’s just really easy to do exactly the same, the same things that they were on Wednesday afternoon, or Monday morning. But all of a sudden, it all feels a lot lighter, because their mind’s already traveling forward in time.
As I’m saying that I’m just thinking, if you really in the present moment stress can’t survive, it can’t be there. That would almost be like starving of oxygen, it just wouldn’t be able to take hold. And what’s really interesting about that, from my teaching background, is that obviously teaching is seen as a very stressful profession. I think that is because teachers are not very good at being in the present moment. They are when they’re in the classroom. So a lot of teachers will say I love being in the classroom.
But the rest of the time is really stressful. And that is because in the classroom, when you’ve got 30 kids to manage, you can’t not be in the present moment, because they’ll eat you. They will actually eat you if you’re not properly on it. So when you’re in the classroom, even if you’re dealing with quite a difficult group of children, you’re actually very, very present.
Whereas the rest of the time teachers are fast forwarding through their lives all the time. So in primary schools in this country, the day is broken down into little chunks, obviously, the terms and then there’s a holiday and so all the time teachers are counting down counting down, when’s the next holiday, when’s the next holiday? And then when they get into the holiday, like, Oh, I’ve only got three more days and that’s working. And so they’re always like they’re always out of the present moment.
I think that’s a massive factor in how stressed people are in not just in teaching them sure but in other jobs. But if if we are 100% in the present moment, all we notice when we’re not, and therefore fall back into the present moment, I don’t think stress can get a foothold. It’s like it trying to get up a greasy pole, it can’t do that. If we are in the present moment. I think that’s a quote: the present moment is a greasy pole to stress. Profound.
Alexandra: That’s great. I can really see what you’re saying, because I’m thinking back to my corporate life, the brief moments I’ve had in corporate Canada, and sitting in a meeting was always really stressful for me. And it wasn’t because the meeting was stressful. It was because I was thinking of the three other meetings I had to go through that day. And I was thinking about the emails that were piling up in my inbox while I was sitting in the meeting. It’s such a good point.
And teachers too, especially it feels like a calling.
It feels really sad to me when a teacher expresses feelings of burning out, because this is the thing they felt called to do. And yet they can’t manage the stress of it.
Clare: Definitely is. I don’t know what it’s like over there. But over here I think it’s like 30% of left within the first three years or something. They graduate and go into teaching. Dropping like flies. It is a shame.
Alexandra: As we start to wind up here a little bit, I just wanted to ask if there’s anything we haven’t touched on today that you’d like to share?
Clare: Nothing that I can think of off the top of my head.
Alexandra: Could you tell us about Insight Timer: what that’s like for you and maybe a little bit about that part of your business?
Clare: That’s been just such a wonderful journey. When I first found the platform, I didn’t really engage with it fully. I didn’t really know how useful it could be in my business. But it was this time last year, so may 2023, that I really started to get active on the platform, and it’s just so much fun. I have a lot of fun.
This afternoon, I’ve just been pondering my thoughts on what new courses I might make and what are the content I want to create and that sort of thing. I do find that the creative juices for it really, really flow. I think that’s because I used to create a lot of content for social media.
I was very, very active on LinkedIn. I mean, very, very active, ridiculously. So to be fair. And it never felt like creating a link for insight time. And I think that’s because that you can see your impact. I go on every day, and there’s all these beautiful reviews, and there’s people on my courses saying thank you, this has completely changed my general perspective.
Or on my lives, people saying this is just what I needed to hear today. And that sort of thing. So you know that you’re having an impact on the thing in our work. You know, actually, we do want to earn a living, it’s lovely that you get paid on Insight Timer as well. But it’s just seeing that impact, just getting that feedback to know that what I’m saying is changing people’s lives. And it’s giving people a nicer, happier, more peaceful experience of life.
That is, is huge, really, and you don’t get that from posting on social media, you might get the occasional nice comment, but everybody’s too busy on there. Whereas on Insight Timer, people are really going to find help. So they really are appreciative when they find something that is helpful to them.
Alexandra: So true, and it’s such a different atmosphere than your typical social media platform. Not that it is social media, but just the fact that for someone like you or myself, who feels called to teach and share and try to help people, it’s such a better fit than just shouting into the void on Instagram, or whatever it is.
Clare: Spitting in the wind. I often say nothing’s seems to be landing energetically, it feels more aligned as well you know that, that we are being rewarded financially for the content that we’re sharing and the help that we’re giving people. That feels quite significant as well.
Because I mean, on social media, there’s only one group of people benefiting financially. They own the platform. That’s right. It’s very aligned.
Alexandra: Lovely. That’s great. Well, thank you so much, Clare, for being with me here today.
Can you tell our listeners a little bit about where they can find out more about you and your work?
Clare: Yes, so I have a website called claredownham.com. And I do have a nice little gift that people might want to check out. It’s called the Letter to the Inner Critic.
It was one of those things that came to me and one of those quieter periods that I just allowed to happen. It’s quite fun, but it’s also quite poignant in terms of my own changing relationship with that voice in my head, that seems to twitter away nonsense at me. I think it’s really helpful to people.
So it’s claredownham.com/letter. That’s my website. And people can download that letter there and hopefully enjoy reading it.
Alexandra: I will put links in the show notes so people can find that at unbrokenpodcast.com. Well, thank you so much, Clare. I really appreciate you being here with me today.
Exploding The Myth That We’re Using Food To Replace Love
May 09, 2024
Old-paradigm psychology can try to convince us that unwanted habits are caused by a need to feel loved or safe or cared for. It can feel like we’re using food, or other substances, to soothe or comfort ourselves. In this podcast episode we bust this myth and look toward the true origin of unwanted habits.
You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below.
Are you interested in connecting with others who are exploring this understanding? Would you like some coaching and ongoing support with an eye toward resolving an unwanted habit? Click the image below to learn about the Unbroken Community and join the waitlist.
Show Notes
The five reasons an unwanted habit has nothing to do with replacing love
Does it matter where our painful thoughts about food originate?
On the fluidity of thought and how it can change, morph and disappear
How the feeling connected to a thought is going to tell us if it’s the truth or a lie
How it’s not on us to change, manage or control our thoughts
How we are not in control of the timeline of when things change
Transcript of episode
Hello Explorers and welcome to episode 62 of Unbroken. I’m Alexandra Amor. I’m here today to talk about the really common myth that when we have an unwanted habit where we’re using that habit to replace love that we might feel that we are missing.
So in other words, as it said on the title card for this episode, is food really love? Or is that a myth? I’m going to tell you why I think it’s a myth.
Before I say that, I should say that I think it makes sense that we came to that conclusion. And I know for me, I spent years and years trying to love myself in a way that would cause my unwanted overeating habit to disappear. And none of what I tried worked. I tried things like journaling, affirmations, radical self-compassion. What else was in that arena of loving ourselves? Cognitive behavioral therapy. I took a course I’ve talked about this before. And it was all about creating a loving feeling within ourselves. In order that our overeating habit would drop away. And none of that worked.
I’m going to talk about that today and about what I see now, when we have the thought that we’re using a substance like food to try to replace love within ourselves.
Before we get into that, I want to quickly have a reminder here, that if you haven’t done so already, you can sign up for the waitlist for the Unbroken community.
The community will be launching later this year in 2024. And we will be having some live coaching in the community, we’ll have an online group, we’ll have a couple calls a month live with me. And as I say, all the details are there on that page, AlexandraAmor.com/community.
Okay, so let’s get into this subject of whether or not food is love.
Are we are using something like food and overeating to replace love that we believe is missing within us?
The reason I’m talking about this today is that I had another coaching session with Tania Elfersy recently, and you may have listened to the episode, number 53, where Tania coached me. And so we’ve gotten together another couple of times since then.
Today, we had a conversation about this thought and feeling that I have when I’m putting food on my plate, specifically at supper time. And the thought that I have is, there’s not enough. We talked about that, and what that meant, what that thought means for me. It felt as I explained to Tania, it felt like it was saying to me that I wasn’t loved enough, that that feeling of there’s never enough I’m sort of transferring it to food, but the food represents love that might be absent in my life or had been in the past.
We talked about where that thought might have originated. And I can see that there was a time in my life when that thought probably came into being and how we innocently can assume or conclude that because of the circumstances that we’ve experienced in the past, and that we now have an unwanted habit like overeating that we are substituting one thing for another. That’s where the myth comes in that we are using food as a substitute for love.
I want to share the five things that Tania and I talked about, and explore this a little bit more and hopefully help you see what Tania has helped me to see. And what I’ve seen, during my exploration of the, the understanding that we’re exploring here are the three principles.
The first thing that I want to share is that connected to what I’ve just explained about this idea that we’re substituting food and love is that where that thought and feeling originated doesn’t really matter.
What really matters in this exploration is that we see it as thought. So that’s what seems to really create change, at least, it has done in my experience. And what I mean by that is, in the old paradigm of psychology, the outside in paradigm, if I had been coaching with Tania today, in that old paradigm, what we would have done is gone back to potentially where that thought originated. And then we would have dived into the feelings around when that thought originated, and the circumstances and the places perhaps where I felt an absence of love.
And we would have dug up a lot of the painful emotions around that, and all that kind of thing. And Sydney Banks often talked about how digging into the past to him didn’t make a lot of sense. And it was for that exact reason that digging into the past brings up all these feelings within us.
Now having said that, what I’m not implying is that we need to just bypass our past experience at all. That’s not the intention here. But what I do want to encourage you to see or to try to see is that when we’re having a thought about overeating or about a certain food, I really want you to notice that it is a thought. It’s not something written in stone, it’s not a pronouncement that’s come from someone that you can trust and believe that it’s the absolute truth.
We’re going to talk about the truth; where you can see that what that thought is bringing is not truth.
I’ll talk about how you can tell that a thought like that isn’t true, that’s coming up in one of the points I want to make later.
Initially, I invite you to see when you have a feeling or a thought that’s similar to the one that I’ve described, the first step really would be to see it simply as a thought.
It’s creating feelings within you that thought; we can always tell what we’re thinking by the feelings that we’re having.
And for me, this situation happens at the same time, this thought and feeling so the thought is there’s not enough food on my plate. And the feeling is one of a little bit of fear, a little bit of desperation, a little bit of panic, that kind of thing. Very light. It’s not huge, but it’s definitely there.
I invite you to notice in a situation like that, that what you’re experiencing is thought.
The second thing I want to talk about is an experience from the past. And what I really was able to see today in my conversation with Tania. If you’ve read one of my books, the one called It’s Not About The Food, in that book, I talk about the soda habit that I had, that I’d had for like 30 years, and how when I began to explore this understanding, that habit fell away. And what I saw today was that in the past, before that habit fell away, I felt a very similar feeling about that soda that I would have every day at lunchtime.
That feeling was I need this thing, it’s a treat for me, I’m giving myself a lot of care and love by having this treat every day at lunchtime. And before I started exploring the principles, anytime I tried to let go of that habit, those feelings would rear their heads and become really tricky for me to navigate. And I was not able to do it until I came to this understanding. I quit that habit probably hundreds of times in those 30 years. But I always picked it up again, because those strong feelings of that need for love that I had projected onto the can of soda would overtake me, and I would fall back into the habit.
What I saw today, which was really fascinating was that, since that habit has dropped away, I don’t feel any less loved.
In other words, the love that I feel in my life, from family, from friends from the universe, from myself, hasn’t changed at all. It hasn’t diminished at all, because I don’t have that soda habit any longer. And when I realized that as I was having the conversation with Tania, what I saw was that the nature of that thought was not true. Therefore it wasn’t telling me any bit of truth.
Now, it felt true. In the moment, for those all those years that I had that habit, absolutely, it felt true. It felt like if I don’t have this thing, I won’t feel as nurtured, I won’t feel like I’m having a treat, I will feel bereft, I will feel a sense of loss. And I would feel deprived those kinds of feelings. And so like I say, what I saw today was that that wasn’t true, because that didn’t happen when the habit fell away. I feel just as loved now as I did when I was experiencing that habit.
That also points to the idea that that habit was created by thought.
And it wasn’t a truth at all. It felt like a truth, but it wasn’t. So that was the second thing that I want to share.
One other thing as well about that, that Tania pointed out was, what this also points to is the fluid nature of our thinking of thought, and our attachment to things and how fluid that can be as well. When we think of our thinking as being much more solid and real, and therefore dangerous in that way, of course it can be really hard to shift these habits that we have, these unwanted habits because the thinking that surrounds them feels so real. And what this example pointed out to both Tania and I, this soda habit example, was just how fluid thought really is.
It was attached to this can of soda that I had every day. And then it was so fluid though that it was able to to shift and move and change and the connection that I had between those two things, between soda and love, which felt really, they felt really sticky and glued together. What I see now is that as the habit fell away that they weren’t stuck. They felt like they were stuck together in me.
The truth is, they weren’t an equation, like one plus one equals two. Soda plus lunchtime equals love. That seemed like a real equation to me in the past. And now I see that it’s not that things are much more fluid than that. I’m not sure what other word to use.
The third thing I want to talk about when we talk about the myth of unwanted habits and food being love is that – and I touched on this a little earlier – the feeling that happens when we have a thought about food, the feeling that comes up within us is what is going to point out to us that thought is a lie.
Here’s what I mean by that. When I have the feeling and the thought, when I’m putting food on a plate, that there’s never enough, there’s not enough, that comes with, as I said earlier, feelings of fear, and panic. And it’s a real clench up feeling.
Those feelings are telling me that that thought is not the truth.
The truth always feels peaceful. The truth is only ever going to feel like a good feeling, like a beautiful feeling. So when I’m having the thought of putting too much food on my plate, and how that’s necessary because there’s never enough, and I feel the feelings associated with that thought that information is so valuable about the fact that that thought is a lie.
It’s not the truth, because it doesn’t feel peaceful, it doesn’t feel good, it doesn’t make my shoulders drop. It doesn’t make me feel relaxed. I feel like I said earlier, fearful, panicked, worried, a real clenchy concern about that. So that’s another thing to look out for, and observe. There’s nothing to be done when you feel that feeling. But noticing it is really important and noticing the difference between a feeling that brings you peace, and a good feeling, and a feeling and a thought that doesn’t bring those things, a thought that makes you clench up and feel fearful.
That’s your barometer, that’s the compass, pointing to whether something is the truth or not.
And then the fourth thing that I really want to point out in this exploration, and something that Tania I really specifically talked about this morning for quite a while, is that it’s not up to us to manage our thoughts.
She brought this up, probably just via her experience and wisdom around working with people on these things. And as human beings, when we begin to see the nature of our thinking, probably the next that question out of my mouth or question that someone might have is okay, I see that this thought isn’t true, I see that the feelings that I have with it are pointing away from the truth. They’re pointing toward a lie. So what do I do about that thought? How do I manage that thought? How do I make that thought go away? How do I change that thought, which is something that as people with long term unwanted habits, we’re probably very familiar with that feeling, wanting to change what’s going on.
Tania’s point was that there’s no need to do any of that.
This thought that we’re having, that we’re struggling with, that we’re equating food with love is going to fall away because we see its nature.
So the only thing we really need to do is be open to the observation of what’s going on. And that’s a tricky thing to do. And it’s a tricky thing to understand, because our human minds are designed to solve problems.
The mind anticipates. It says, “Okay, I get it, this thought is pointing toward a lie. So now what can I do about that?” That’s natural and innocent. There’s nothing wrong if that happens. I just wanted to bring this up as an important point related to this subject. It can be a little bit challenging to get our heads around this, that we see this thing that maybe we would label as a problem and then you’re asking me not to do anything about it. That seems a little weird.
Where we’re really wanting to put our attention, rather than digging in, and getting concerned about that thought and its presence in our lives, and getting bogged down in that problem solving, what we’re wanting to do is look in a different direction. We’re looking toward the nature of thought itself; that it is fluid, that it will change on its own, there’s nothing we need to do to make that happen.
Our thoughts are changeable, they are using that old metaphor, they are like the weather. They are flowing through the space that we hold for them. We are the sky. And the thoughts are the weather. Trying to control them and change them is like trying to control the sky trying to control the weather in the sky. That’s impossible. What creates change more easily than digging into trying to get rid of the thoughts we don’t like, push them away, manage them, control them, replace them with different kinds of thoughts.
What works better than that, in my experience, is just understanding their nature that they move, and change and flow.
And that that is how they are. They are energy flowing. Thought is energy flowing through us. And we can no more control that than we can control the weather. So that’s point number four.
And finally, point number five. Tania brought up the timeline and how…
…we can get really concerned and knotted up at times about how things aren’t changing in a time frame that we would like to see them change.
I do experience that myself, especially because I’m here in public talking about these things. And there is part of me that wishes that some of these habits would fall away faster than they have. But going back to what I said in the previous point, worrying about the timeline of how these things shift is like trying to control the weather. It is like shouting at the sea, was the example that Tania gave, being angry at the ocean.
Thought is a force of nature that we’re dealing with. And it’s big, it’s huge. And it’s really not on us to control it. It’s going back, as I say to the previous point, it would be like trying to control the weather. And putting energy and effort into doing that really is just a waste of effort. Honestly, it’s just a waste of energy.
Imagine how frustrated you would be if you thought it was your responsibility to change the weather. If you had given that task to yourself, and it’s raining, let’s say, and you have decided that well, it’s my responsibility to change that rain to make it go away, to turn it into sunshine. Imagine how frustrated you would be.
So this final point is about a little bit of allowing, a little bit of surrendering to what’s happening. And again, being the observer in what’s happening and noticing the fluid nature of thought, of your thinking, but not necessarily being tangled up in trying to change that.
What happens is that the more we see the true nature of thought, in all these points that I’ve talked about today, then what happens is that thinking can change on its own.
I’ve experienced that during these years that I’ve been exploring this understanding and so many of my unwanted habits have fallen In a way, almost I would say, almost all of them. I feel like I’m down to the last, I don’t know, 4 or 5%. And that happens, not because I put a lot of effort into controlling my thinking, replacing my thoughts with other thoughts, saying lots of affirmations or trying to use willpower to change my habits.
The more we look in that direction, what I’ve seen is the more change can occur. So I hope that’s been helpful for you today.
If you have any questions, please always let me know if there’s anything I haven’t explained clearly. I would love to hear about it so that I can take another run at it. You can do that at AlexandraAmor.com/questions. That’s it for today. I hope you are doing well and taking good care. And I will talk to you again next week. Bye.
Thriving Is Effortless with Dominic Scaffidi
May 02, 2024
As a long-time coach, and before that an HR professional, Dominic Scaffidi points his clients back toward an awareness of their innate wisdom and ability to thrive effortlessly. He reminds us that we are always more than our human minds can grasp. As a Master Certified Coach (MCC) credentialed with the International Coaching Federation (ICF)…
Why Your Habit Proves You’re In Perfect Working Order
Apr 25, 2024
So often we demonize our bad habits. But what if those habits are working to bring us messages about our perfect human design? You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below. Click the image below to learn about the Unbroken Community and join the…
One Sunday afternoon in April a traveller and a podcaster meet and share a drive through the mountains of Vancouver Island. As a result, the podcaster is deeply moved by the message the traveller, and the universe, had for her. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a…
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Leaning Into Curves with Dr. Linda Pettit
Apr 04, 2024
Life has an unerring knack for presenting us with challenges and opportunities for change. Dr. Linda Pettit explores our innate intuitive nature and how we can use that to help us navigate the curves that life brings to us. Dr. Linda Sandel Pettit is a distinguished author known for her insightful work, including her acclaimed…
When we strive for perfection are we doing ourselves a favour or adding unwanted stress into our lives? When it comes to eating well and resolving an overeating habit, I think embracing the beautiful messiness of life is much more helpful. Click the image below to learn more about the Unbroken Community. You can listen…
When was the last time you felt deeply heard? Nurse and Three Principles practitioner Wendy Williams shares the impact deep listening has on both the listener and those being listened to. We also discuss the priceless benefits that understanding every human’s innate resilience can have for nurses and other healers. As a nurse educator and…
Follow-up To Last Week’s Coaching Call
Mar 14, 2024
Last week, on episode 53 of Unbroken, Tania Elfersy coached me around my overeating habit and the return of that habit after months of having it resolved. This week I share the moments that had the most meaning for me and also expand on some of the highlights to offer greater clarity and understanding for…
It’s Not All On You with Tania Elfersy
Mar 07, 2024
You’ve heard me struggle for the past few months because I’ve had a relapse into my overeating habit. I finally wised up and called in my friend Tania Elfersy to coach me. In this episode, Tania shares so much wisdom and teaches me many things including that awareness of what is truth and what isn’t…
Insight creates change. This I know for sure. Not willpower. Not restriction. Not even information. Insight. But what happens when we get tired of waiting for insight? What if we want to change and just…aren’t? Can we cultivate insight? Is there a way to seek out insight without layering more thinking onto a situation? You…
Loving Relationships with Lori Carpenos
Feb 22, 2024
Author, therapist and coach Lori Carpenos has seen that what affects our relationships the most is our state of mind. When the couples she works with see that ‘working on’ their relationship is not the answer to a loving relationship, that’s when everything changes. Lori Carpenos opened a private individual, couples and family counseling practice,…
In instances where our bodies and our innate wisdom are speaking to us, it can be tempting to see those messages as problems. But when we see them for the wisdom they carry and stay open to the messages these ‘problems’ have for us, we begin to see that they are always trying to help…
Resolving the Habit of Discontent with Nikon Gormley
Feb 08, 2024
Nikon Gormley had achieved success as a top-level athlete, but he was still searching for answers. He wanted to feel calm during his taekwondo matches so he began looking in all the usual places. It wasn’t until he discovered the Three Principles that things began to click into place for him. Now he coaches others…
Q&A 49 – Noise Vs. Signal In Weight Loss
Feb 01, 2024
When we’re looking to change an overeating habit we can innocently get caught up in the noise in our heads that talks about diet plans and strategies for mastering new habits and willpower. Alternatively, what creates real change – including dropping an unwanted habit – is learning to pay attention to the ‘signal’ that is…
The End of Self-Help with Gail Brenner
Jan 25, 2024
Psychologist and author, Dr. Gail Brenner, shares about the healing power of being present and compassionate with whatever is going on within us. And how when we begin to recognize that there is no ‘out there’ in our lives – there is only our perception – that we begin to suffer less. Gail Brenner’s interest…
Q&A 48 – What does being calm have to do with weight-loss?
Jan 18, 2024
In this excerpt from It’s Not About the Food I share a story about the surprising thing I learned at an Equus training and how it impacts the drive to overeat. Learn more about the book here. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are…
Problems as Illusions of Thinking with Jack Pransky
Jan 11, 2024
When coach, speaker and author Jack Pransky first heard about the changes happening in the community of Modello, Florida, he knew he had to find out more. Pretty quickly he ended up writing a book about Roger Mills’ work using the Three Principles in that community, which was radically changing lives. Since then he’s written…
Q&A 47 – How our thinking is like a television
Jan 08, 2024
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The Surprising Simplicity of Life with Dicken Bettinger
Jan 04, 2024
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Q&A 46 – New Year’s Resolutions Are BS
Jan 01, 2024
When we expect change to happen as a result of will-power naturally it looks like a good idea to choose a day on the calendar to begin making that change. But, really, change happens via insight, and that can happen any day of the year. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on…
After rapid success in her own coaching business, coach Grace Kelly now helps others wanting to do the same. She has learned the value of trusting our own innate wisdom, and also the importance of taking care of ourselves before we can help others. Grace Kelly is a transformational coach.She left her job as a…
Take a moment and extend yourself a little kindness today. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below. Transcript of episode Hello Explorers, and welcome to Q&A episode 45 of Unbroken. I’m Alexandra Amor. As this goes out, it’s Christmas Day, 2023. Whether you…
The Wisdom of the Moment with Alex Linares
Dec 21, 2023
Alex Linares describes herself as a lifelong seeker. She has always been curious about how life works and what it means. When she stumbled across the Three Principles she realized that there was no more need for seeking, or even for self-help. Alex Linares is a scientist and lifelong seeker; curious to understand life, purpose…
Q&A 44 – How are weight-loss strategies like an ice pick?
Dec 18, 2023
When we’re trying to change something like an overeating habit, it can feel good to take lots of action. But how many times have we failed when approaching it that way? And what if there’s another way? You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are…
The Fluid Nature of You with Amanda Jones
Dec 14, 2023
Coach and author Amanda Jones explores the simplicity behind our human experience and how understanding this can free us from suffering with things like bulimia, anxiety, depression, binge eating and more. Amanda Jones is the author of Uncovery: A New Understanding Behind Radical Freedom from Eating Disorders and Depression and explores with clients their true…
Q&A 43 – How can I be at peace with food during the holidays?
Dec 11, 2023
The holiday/end-of-year season can be fraught with so much, including extra temptation for those of us with an unwanted overeating habit. Here then are three tips for navigating this time of year, including remembering your innate peace and how it is always with you. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes,…
Calm Self-assurance In Business with Marlene Cameron
Dec 07, 2023
A small business can be a really accurate reflection of that’s business’s owner. So when an entrepreneur is fraught with insecurity that is going to show up in the business. Marlene Cameron helps business owners and entrepreneurs to connect with their innate wisdom and resilience and to see that their moment-to-moment thinking doesn’t need to…
Are diets the right tool when we want to lose weight? They tend to be the only one we use, but what if there’s an alternative? What if diets are actually contributing to the suffering we experience about food? And what if there were an alternative way to approach resolving an overeating habit? You can…
Healthy Relationships With Food And Life with Bill and Connie DeKramer
Nov 30, 2023
Bill and Connie DeKramer have long worked in the field of offering solutions about healthy eating and healthy living. But they found that there was a piece missing when it came to helping their clients find lasting results. Then they discovered the 3 Principles of innate health and everything fell into place, for them and…
Q&A 41 – Why is it good news when we backslide?
Nov 27, 2023
What should we do when an unwanted habit that has been getting better suddenly rears its head again? Contrary to what we might believe, when this occurs it’s good news. It means there’s more for us to see about our innate well-being. It’s also a very natural part of the learning and growing process. You…
Changing Our Relationship To Problems with Ian Watson
Nov 23, 2023
When we have a challenge or problem in our lives it can seem obvious to focus on that problem in order to solve it. But what if finding the solutions to problems – like an overeating habit – didn’t involve this kind of approach at all? Ian Watson’s work as an educator is to provide…
Q&A 40 – Book excerpt: The Call Toward Home
Nov 20, 2023
Today’s episode is an excerpt from my book, The Secret Language of Cravings. We suffer with an overeating habit when we misunderstand the message our cravings are trying to give us. In this book, author Alexandra Amor explores how to understand what cravings and the drive to overeat are telling us and therefore how to…
The Wisdom of Anxiety with Sarie Taylor
Nov 16, 2023
The wisdom of the feelings in our bodies is so misunderstood. Today coach Sarie Taylor and I discuss how we can see the signals we feel for what they are and how they can help us navigate life. We don’t need to be afraid of being afraid. Many years ago Sarie Taylor found herself very…
Q&A 39 – Why does being a victim feel good?
Nov 13, 2023
Universally, human beings are always searching for a better feeling. We are wired to connect with the peace and love that we are made of. And when we have feelings like victimhood, they are pointing toward exactly this innate drive within us. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources…
The Past Can’t Hurt You with Carol Boroughs
Nov 09, 2023
After riding a roller coaster of a profound spiritual experience followed by post-trauma flashbacks, Carol Boroughs had questions about the root cause of suffering. This practised healer began a search and stumbled across the work of Sydney Banks, which highlights Thought as a central, powerful force that affects our experience of life. Carol Boroughs brings…
Q&A 38 – What if we weren’t afraid of our cravings?
Nov 06, 2023
Cravings can be scary. And when they happen we can automatically brace ourselves against them. But what if there was another way to deal with cravings that encouraged them to dissolve on their own? You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below. Show Notes…
Connection With The Love We Are with Rohini Ross
Nov 02, 2023
In intimate partner relationships, we can often believe that change needs to happen in the other person in order for us to be happy. Rohini Ross, and her husband Angus, work with couples and individuals to help them see that our experience of everyone in our lives is coming not from them, but from within…
Q&A 37 – The courage to look for different answers
Oct 30, 2023
When we explore the inside-out nature of life, especially as it relates to resolving an overeating habit, it can take some courage to be looking in this direction for answers. In this episode, we explore three instances where that courage may be required. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links,…
The Practical Power of Love with Rachel Singleton
Oct 26, 2023
Sometimes the most powerful lessons we learn come from the darkest places. It was when Rachel Singleton’s physical health took a dark turn that she was able to see the love and kindness in her body’s design and how it had been trying to speak to her for years. For over 20 years, Rachel Singleton…
Q&A 36 – The Secret Language of Cravings book excerpt
Oct 23, 2023
Today’s episode is an excerpt from my book, The Secret Language of Cravings. We suffer with an overeating habit when we misunderstand the message our cravings are trying to give us. In this book, author Alexandra Amor explores how to understand what cravings and the drive to overeat are telling us and therefore how to…
Hope and Resilience in Prison with Jacqueline Hollows
Oct 19, 2023
In 2015 Jacqueline Hollows founded Beyond Recovery which brings the understanding of innate health and well-being to incarcerated people. Now, she’s launching a book about her experiences, called Wing of an Angel, so that this understanding can be shared in prisons all over the UK. A social and digital entrepreneur, author, mentor and professional…
Q&A 35 – What should I do with intrusive thoughts about food?
Oct 16, 2023
Intrusive thoughts can seem like a problem. Just by their nature, they can seem scary and as though they are a sign of something that is wrong with us. But what if this isn’t true? And what if dealing with them is simply a matter of understanding their nature? You can listen above, on your favorite…
Surviving a Narcissist with Del Adey-Jones
Oct 12, 2023
Coach, speaker, and author Del Adey-Jones grew up in Wales in very difficult and unusual circumstances. We discuss how that upbringing affected her adult life, including the realization that she was married to a narcissist, and how she recovered from this. Del Adey-Jones is a coach, guide, instructor, and podcaster. She is dedicated to helping…
Q&A 34 – How does stepping away from thinking solve problems?
Oct 09, 2023
An innocent trap we can fall into when we have a problem like an overeating habit or anxiety is layering lots of thinking onto that situation. Counterintuitively, the solution to problems like this is less thinking, not more. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript…
Mavis Karn is one of the OG Three Principles teachers. It was such a joy to talk to her about how she came across this understanding, how it resonated with her even though she couldn’t explain it at first, her work with incarcerated youth and their impact on her, and her latest venture – being…
Q&A 33 – How does relaxation aid weight loss?
Oct 02, 2023
When it comes to weight loss we tend to think of it as a problem that needs to be solved, and one that is serious and potentially fraught. What if this was not the case? What if relaxing and relying on the innate wisdom that is within each of us was part of the solution?…
Strength in Vulnerability with Sharon Crabbe
Sep 28, 2023
One of Sharon Crabbe’s most profound insights was that we don’t ever need fixing because we can never be broken. She now applies this understanding in her work with children, adults, and horses and recognizes that our strength often lies in our willingness to be vulnerable. Sharon Crabbe is a coach, mentor and educator. She…
Q&A 32 – Overeating: The loving nature of cravings
Sep 25, 2023
Traditionally we look at food cravings and the drive to overeat as a problem, something to be fixed and overcome. What if we’ve misunderstood the message cravings are trying to send us? And what if they’re actually trying to help us? You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and…
Peaceful People, Peaceful Dogs with Julie Cluley
Sep 21, 2023
Our state of mind can affect those around us, including our pets. Julie Cluley teaches dog owners to listen to what their dogs are saying, and she also coaches those who are dealing with anxiety and its ripple affects. I was fascinated by the potential cross-over of these two subjects, and couldn’t wait to talk…
When we start a new diet or eating plan we often have success for the first few days. Why is that? And why does that success quickly fade away? In this episode, we discuss how this is caused by a lack of understanding about how our thinking works and how a deeper understanding of Thought…
Experiencing anxiety and panic attacks can often lead us to do more (and more) to try to manage and control them. Lily Sais found herself in exactly this situation – working with children as a school psychologist while suffering in silence about her own anxiety. When she found the Three Principles she was released from…
When we don’t understand the nature of Thought, our thinking can (innocently) be fearful, to greater or lesser degrees. This, in turn, causes us to need to comfort and distract ourselves with unwanted habits like overeating. Alternatively, when we learn about the nature of Thought our unwanted habits become unnecessary and fall away. You can…
What Stress Is Telling Us with Vivienne Edgecombe
Sep 07, 2023
Even when we’re experiencing stress and overwhelm there’s far less for us to do than we sometimes imagine. In this episode I talk to Vivienne Edgecombe about that, about her experience grappling with the idea that she might never have children, and about her work with businesses helping their staff uncover their innate resilience. Vivienne…
Q&A 29 – Overeating: Is there such a thing as relapse? Part 2
Sep 04, 2023
This is part 2 of our conversation about whether or not relapse is a thing. In part 1 I left out an important part of the discussion, so this episode addresses the idea that when ‘relapses’ happen we can view the feelings we’re having to help us get back on course. Listen to Part 1…
Love Behind Every Feeling with Juliet Fay
Aug 31, 2023
What if we humans are designed so perfectly that every feeling we have comes from a place of love? This is the question that Juliet Fay and I explore during our conversation, as well as looking at control and what it may have to tell us, and much more. Juliet Fay divides her time between…
Q&A 28 – Overeating: Is there such a thing as relapse?
Aug 28, 2023
What’s really going on when we ‘fall off the wagon’? When we revert to the behaviour associated with an unwanted habit like overeating should we refer to that as a relapse? Or is it something else? Something less scary, less serious, and more natural. Listen to Part 2 of this episode here. You can listen…
Relief from Chronic Pain with Chana Studley
Aug 24, 2023
Coach Chana Studley had a personal and difficult experience with chronic pain after three violent muggings. She used all kinds of modalities to manage and try to control the pain but continued to suffer. Then a friend introduced her to the Three Principles, which explore the role thought plays in our experience of life. That…
Q&A 27 – Overeating: Why are diets a different kind of suffering?
Aug 21, 2023
Why do we fail so often at diets? The answer may surprise you: it has to do with what and how much you’re thinking and how diets exacerbate that thinking problem, rather than relieve it. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below. Show…
Finding Freedom in Prison with Mason Suehs
Aug 17, 2023
Mason Suehs used to deal with anxiety and a gnawing sense that he was broken by using drugs. This, of course, led to some poor decisions and eventually to two stints in jail. However during his second period of incarceration he took a class offered by Anna Debenham and the Insight Alliance that pointed towards…
Q&A 26 – Anxiety and Urgency: Does your past matter?
Aug 14, 2023
When we experience feelings of anxiety and urgency do we need to dig into the past to figure out where they started in order to deal with and resolve them? In this episode I explore how the answer to that question is actually, ‘no’. Feelings of urgency and anxiety are feedback from our innate wisdom.…
The Joy of Well-being with Joy Belonga
Aug 10, 2023
Like many others who have been interviewed for this podcast, Joy Belonga describes herself as a lifelong seeker. Until she found the Three Principles as articulated by Sydney Banks. Now, Joy works with her clients to point them back to their innate well-being and natural state of peace, possibility, mental resilience and yes, Joy. …
Q&A 25 – Overeating: What are we escaping from?
Aug 07, 2023
So often we believe we have unwanted habits like overeating because of the circumstances of our lives. We innocently believe that we’re trying to escape from old feelings (maybe even trauma) by doing our unwanted habit. What if that’s not the case? What if the only problem lives between our ears? What if, when we…
The Unbroken First Responder with Rick Ruppenthal
Aug 03, 2023
Rick Ruppenthal worked for 30 years as a paramedic and knows intimately the challenges that come with that job. He also knows that every human can rely on the innate resilience and well-being that are part of all of us. And how seeing Thought for the temporary, moving energy it is, can help first responders…
Q&A 24 – Being Present With Ourselves
Jul 31, 2023
What happens when we try to be present with ourselves, including uncomfortable feelings or experiences we have? Is there a way to be with ourselves the same way a good listener is: without judging the experience or tying to change it? You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and…
The Truth of Who You Are with Fiona Jacob
Jul 20, 2023
On this episode of Unbroken, Fiona Jacob and I talk about my favorite subject: the field of possibility that is within all of us. That connection we all have to infinite universal intelligence, peace and well-being. Fiona shares about her journey to coming to understand and trust this intelligence, and also what she does when…
We tend to think of our uncomfortable experiences in life – unwanted cravings, depression, anxiety, etc. – as problems. What if instead they are love letters from the innate wisdom and well-being that is within all of us? What if they are trying to get out attention and point us back toward that innate wholeness?…
The Wisdom in Unwanted Habits with Charli Wall
Jul 13, 2023
Charli Wall has experienced so much of what life has to offer and much of it hasn’t been easy. She’s dealt with chronic anxiety, stress, C-PTSD, dysfunctional eating, devastating, debilitating loss, and much more. Her experiences also included tremendous success with a health and fitness business. Then in 2017 she discovered the Three Principles and…
Q&A 22 – What does looking upstream have to do with diet and weight-loss?
Jul 10, 2023
When we use the phrases ‘upstream’ and ‘downstream’ in the conversation about the nature of Thought, how does that relate to resolving an unwanted habit like overeating? What does the way we look at our thinking, and whether it’s upstream or downstream, have to do with weight-loss? Today’s episode answers these questions. You can listen…
Life Wants to Live with Maryse Godet Copans
Jul 06, 2023
Maryse Godet Copans suffered with anxiety and other physical symptoms for years and sought out answers for this suffering. Then she found the Three Principles and her symptoms fell away. She received coach training and began to share what she’d seen with others. Then her symptoms returned, which was frustrating and confusing. Maryse used this…
Q&A 21 – Overeating: Putting the Cart Before the Horse
Jul 03, 2023
Traditionally, when we tackle an overeating habit with diets and white-knuckling and other strategies like that, we’re innocently focusing on the wrong thing. Using this horse-and-cart analogy, today we explore where to instead place our focus and how that leads to lasting change and the resolution of unwanted habits. You can listen above, on your favorite…
Recovery from the Need to Be Perfect with Gabby Pritts
Jun 29, 2023
Like so many of us, Change coach Gabby Pritts lived for a long time with a misunderstanding about where her experience came from. This led to her developing the unwanted habit of needing to be perfect so that she could be safe. And this focus on perfection led to some disordered eating. Thankfully she came…
Q&A 20 – Two Ways to Look at an Uncomfortable Feeling
Jun 26, 2023
We innocently tend to think of discomfort and unwanted feelings (like food cravings) as problems that need to be solved. What if they are actually something else? What if they are reminders, pointing us toward our true nature of peace, calm and joy? You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links,…
Remembering Our Innate Wholeness with Jeri Kramer
Jun 22, 2023
Psychotherapist Jeri Kramer was experiencing burnout (and grief) when she discovered the Three Principles. Exploring the understanding that we are all well and whole has revitalized her enthusiasm for her work and brought lightness and laughter into her time with her clients. In this episode, we talk about how understanding that humans are designed to…
Q&A 19 – What’s happening when I feel a craving?
Jun 19, 2023
When we feel the drive to participate in an unwanted habit what’s really going on? This three-part answer is based on my experience over 30 years of dealing with an unwanted overeating habit, and on my exploration of the field of spiritual-psychology called the Three Principles. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch…
What happens when we lean all the way in and meet life on life’s terms? I discuss this question with coach Michael Fall and we wander into some interesting territory, contemplating the role of action in our lives and what we do when life presents challenges. Michael Fall is the President and founder of Insight…
Our minds love what they know. But did you know that when we’re searching for answers to life’s problems there is another place to go for answers other than our minds. It is a field of possibilities that holds infinite fresh thinking and creative ideas that contain the answers to our questions. You can listen…
Letting Go of Trauma with Azul Leguizamon
Jun 08, 2023
Azul Leguizamon experienced trauma and disfunction in her childhood, which led her on a path of healing as an adult. She trained in several fields, but still believed she was irreparably broken and damaged by her past experiences. However, when she came across the Three Principles and began to explore them she discovered that her…
How do you solve problems? I used to get caught in what I now call a ‘knowledge loop’, which very often wasn’t particularly helpful. In this episode I talk about where we can go for answers to life’s challenges and how to create our own magic portals to the insights that offer those answers. You…
Calming Our Nervous Systems with Stephanie Wood
Jun 01, 2023
Beyond the immediate effects the recent global pandemic had on us (isolation, grief, loss, and illness, to name but a few) what have the long term effects been? Coach Stephanie Wood began asking herself this question when she noticed that some of the unwanted habits she’d picked up during the pandemic had stuck around. Knowing…
Q&A 16 – If reality is created from Thought, how do we create boundaries?
May 29, 2023
How can we draw clear boundaries with people in our lives if everything we’re seeing and experiencing comes via the gift of Thought? Today we explore the difference between circumstances and experiences and how this awareness can inform us and help us to understand when a healthy boundary might be appropriate. You can listen above,…
Like so many of my guests, Paola Royal has long been interested in health and well-being. She has worked as a physiotherapist, studied Emotional Freedom Technique, among other modalities, but knew that there was a piece missing when it came to helping others heal. Then, her mentor Ann Ross introduced her to the Three Principles.…
Q&A 15 – How is a quiet mind related to weight loss?
May 22, 2023
A busy, insecure mind can cause all kinds of problems in our lives: misunderstandings with friends or family, unnecessary worry and anxiety, a lack of clarity about decisions and much more. A busy, insecure mind can also contribute to creating or maintaining an unwanted habit. In this podcast episode, I explore why that is and…
Living From Wisdom with Sheela Masand
May 18, 2023
Coach and author Sheela Masand received the idea to interview those who had learned directly from Sydney Banks about the three principles that describe how we experience human life. That idea became Inside Out Transformation: A Revolutionary Guide for Coaches, Therapists, and Counsellors, which has been described by reviewers at ‘extraordinary’, ‘powerful, engaging and inspiring’…
Q&A 14 – Searching for Happiness is BS. (And some follow-ups.)
May 15, 2023
Is happiness something we need to create in our lives? Or does it occur naturally? And does searching for it actually get it the way of experiencing it? You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below. Show Notes Transcript of episode Hello explorers and…
Thriving in Difficult Times with Joseph Bailey
May 11, 2023
Joe Bailey knows that life can be difficult. In addition to life’s ‘regular’ challenges, he’s had personal experiences with illness, including Lyme disease (more than once), and the effects of mould. He also knows that all human beings are in possession of an innate and trustworthy ‘compass of wisdom’. Our thoughts can be noisy but…
Q&A 13 – Where can I go for guidance?
May 08, 2023
When we have problems and challenges in life, where can we turn for guidance? What if there was a source of pure, clear wisdom that was 100% reliable and could guide you under any circumstances? The good news is this source of answers is available and it’s within you. You can listen above, on your favorite…
Understanding Overthinking with Anne Gleeson
May 04, 2023
Our brains are designed to think and to solve problems. However, we ignore other innate tools available to us at our peril; things like our access to wisdom and peace of mind. Poet and coach Anne Gleeson went through an exceptionally difficult time in 2020, which included a cancer diagnosis. A lifelong explorer, she happened…
My mood sucks today. It took everything I had to get to my desk and record this episode. But I hope that by sharing what I see about low moods, it will help you when you encounter one. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript…
Innocently, we can fall into a habit of resisting the experiences our lives bring us. We resist the challenges, the heartache, the struggle. But what if that’s where the juicy stuff is? Author and coach Phil Goddard joins me to talk about embracing all that life has to offer, even when it’s painful or challenging,…
If you experience anxiety this podcast episode will help clarify where it comes from, what it is, and how simply knowing these two things will change your anxiety for the better. You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources, and a full transcript are below. Show Notes Resources mentioned in…
Sensitivity to Our Thinking with Jonelle Simms
Apr 20, 2023
When we are struggling with an overeating habit, does that mean that we’re extra sensitive to the thinking that’s going on within us? This is the question I posed to my friend Jonelle Simms. We go deep into the source of our thinking, if we can in fact be ‘too’ sensitive to it, where our…
Q&A 10 – What does the present moment have to do with resolving an unwanted habit?
Apr 17, 2023
The present moment fascinates me. In the past I’ve been afraid of it. Or, at the very least, cautious about it. I’ve taken training with horses as my teachers to try to be more connected to it. Gradually, I’m beginning to see that there is nothing to fear in the present moment and that, in…
When it comes to resolving unwanted habits, the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous have become the most popular and widespread approach. In this conversation, Greg Suchy shares some of his experience with AA and how he transitioned to the 3 Principles approach for dealing with unwanted habits and addictions. Greg Suchy spent years in the…
What is depression really? Is it a problem? Is it a sign there’s something wrong with us and our psychology? Or is it something else? In this episode, Alexandra reflects on her personal experience with depression and what she saw about the role it plays in our divine design. You can listen above or on your…
Healing Anxiety and Binge Eating with Clare Assante
Apr 06, 2023
Clare Assante knows whereof she speaks. For years she struggled with anxiety, which also created a binge eating habit. And like so many of us, she tried All. The. Things. to try to manage, control, and eliminate those struggles. Thankfully, Clare discovery the 3 Principles, which not only helped her with the anxiety and binge…
Q&A 8 – Will I be happy when I stop overeating?
Apr 03, 2023
One of the misconceptions we innocently carry is that our happiness can only begin when we overcome our overeating habit and lose weight. Today I examine whether that’s true, and if not, what else might be true about our experience of an unwanted habit. Resources Mentioned in this Episode Transcript of the episode Hello, explorers…
Being Friends With Our Bodies with Becs Steele
Mar 30, 2023
When it comes to resolving a relationship with food, there are two factors involved: our bodies and our thoughts. These two brilliant systems work together and getting to know them both more intimately can help us find peace with unwanted habits. Becs Steel is both a registered nutritional therapist and a rewilding guide so we…
Q&A 7 – I know it’s my thinking, so why can’t I stop overeating?
Mar 27, 2023
When it comes to breaking unwanted habits we’re up to our eyeballs in understanding. Why then do we struggle to change? In this Q&A episode, Alexandra answers Carmen’s question about her habit, what she knows and understands, and what else there is to see. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the…
The Reflective Presence of Horses with Cassandra Ogier
Mar 23, 2023
In January 2023 I was delighted to spend two days in the hills above Malibu, California with Cassandra Ogier and three beautiful horses. Those two days were powerful; they taught me about my energetic boundaries, the easily accessible (but often overlooked) quality of presence about my being, and that when it comes to experiencing emotions…
Q&A 6 – Why do my cravings feel like life or death?
Mar 20, 2023
The pressure that comes from cravings can feel almost unbearable. It can be so powerful that it distracts us from other areas of our life. Is there a way to handle this? In this Q&A episode, Alexandra addresses this concern, talks about why it exists and what we can do about it. You can listen…
Coming Home to Ourselves with Beka Elle
Mar 16, 2023
Innocently, when we are struggling with an overeating or binge eating habit, we can come to believe that peace of mind exists outside ourselves. We can believe that ‘if’ or ‘when’ certain scenarios happen – like, when we stop overeating or binge eating – only then we will feel peaceful and begin to love and…
Q&A 5 – I can only ever stay on a diet for 3 days. What’s wrong with me?
Mar 13, 2023
Why are diets so hard to stick to? Why do we fail more often than we succeed? The answer comes down to the brilliant way we are designed and when we work with this design, instead of against it, that’s when our unwanted habits begin to fall away. Transcript of episode Hello explorers! Welcome to…
Who We Are Beyond Our Thinking with Jason Shiers
Mar 09, 2023
Jason Shiers was my coach for several months in 2022. It was through our work together that I felt I reached a tipping point in my understanding of why my overeating habit existed and was then able to see it transform and release. Jason has been through it. He can share so deeply about the…
Q&A 4 – Why is overeating not about the food?
Mar 06, 2023
The title of Alexandra Amor’s book about healing the drive to overeat is It’s Not About the Food. How is it possible that a ‘problem’ related to eating too much can not be about the food we consume? You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are…
The Innate Wisdom of Our Bodies with Tania Elfersy
Mar 02, 2023
It seems that in our present-day culture we have an attitude that our bodies are something to be conquered, mastered, and controlled. We object to the feelings in our bodies, often to the point that we mistrust everything about them. However, what my guest today, Tania Elfersy, points out is that our bodies are wise…
Q&A 3 – Why are unwanted habits part of our perfect design?
Feb 27, 2023
Traditionally, we think of our unwanted habits as problems. They need to be fixed and eliminated. They are a sign of a flawed character. What if that isn’t true? What if we are designed perfectly and our unwanted habits are pointing toward that innate health? Transcript of Episode Hello Explorers! Welcome back. This is episode…
Addiction: One Cause, One Solution with Barbara Sarah Smith
Feb 23, 2023
This is part two in our series about the book Addiction: One Cause, One Solution. My guest is Barbara Sarah Smith, who co-authored the book with my guest from Episode 1, Christian McNeill. Barbara shares about her connection to the subject of addiction recovery, why it matters to her, and how she sees addiction differently…
Q&A 2 – What should I do about my cravings?
Feb 20, 2023
When we have an unwanted habit, what action should we take to deal with it? The answer may surprise you. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Resources Mentioned in this Episode Transcript of Episode Hello, explorers,…
Q&A 1 – How is this not another technique?
Feb 13, 2023
What is the Inside-Out Understanding? When it comes to letting go of unwanted habits, how is it different than all the other techniques and strategies that we’ve tried? Answers are here in today’s Q&A episode of Unbroken. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the…
We Are All Unbroken with Alexandra Amor
Feb 10, 2023
In this first episode of Unbroken, Alexandra Amor introduces herself, shares about the path that brought her to the Inside-Out Understanding and how it helped her let go of a 30-year overeating habit. She also shares why she works with people to help them let go of their unwanted habits. Alexandra Amor is an author,…
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