UNKNOWN: 0:00

Hmm.

SPEAKER_01: 0:02

To even question what you've been told is true is incredibly courageous. It doesn't always feel like courage what looks like courage to other people. For me, it feels like survival. This is our personal medicine.

SPEAKER_00: 0:15

If I'm surrounded by thinkers, by lovers, by passion, by integrity, then I really do think that I know who I am.

SPEAKER_02: 0:21

There is a peace that is indescribable when you're being who you are and you're living your purpose. I'm not going to come to the end of my life and be like, I didn't live the life I was meant to live.

SPEAKER_03: 0:30

Can I be so comfortable in the idea and so comfortable in that uncertainty that every version of it is going to be okay.

SPEAKER_01: 0:38

This is the Inner Rebel Podcast.

SPEAKER_03: 0:49

Oh my goodness, I'm so excited. Ruthie, I am so excited to meet you. I'm so happy to meet you. I read your book. You're such a beautiful writer. And I just feel very, very honored. And it's such a joy to have you. And Melissa has said nothing but the goodest, greatest things about you. So it's so nice to be in this space with you today. Thank you for being here. Thank you. Well, I'm so honored to be here with y'all. I'm so happy to meet you, Jessica and Melissa. You know, I adore you. You could ask me to do anything and I'm there. I just believe in you so much. And the work you're doing is so important. And it matters so much. And it's so in integrity. So yeah, I'm so excited to be a part of anything that you're doing. I really receive that. Thank you, Ruby. You're welcome, sister. It's very mutual. That's the fun thing about having dear soul friends. You're just like, no, I love you. No, I love you. No, I love you more. It makes me look at this juicy, genuine love fest. Yeah. Truly. And it gets to be that. It does. For so long, I wasn't always in that mode. And now I'm like, everyone wins. There's just more. And the love just gets to expand. Yes. I love it. I want to say one more thing on this, and then I'm going to dive us into the conversation we start with usually. But I had this moment. I don't even remember who

SPEAKER_01: 2:14

I was talking

SPEAKER_03: 2:14

to. It was one of my friends. This was in the last 24 hours, but a lot's happened in 24 hours. And I was like in awe of who she is. And I'm like, she's really remarkable. And there was a part of my brain that wanted to say, like, she's better than me. She's this, she's more. Yeah. And then I caught it and I was like, well, that's a reflection. You know, we get to have our friends be a reflection of who we are. And what does that say about me

SPEAKER_01: 2:40

that this is the company I keep?

SPEAKER_03: 2:43

Exactly. And what is also for me? Because it's just a reflection. Like anytime that I've ever been jealous about somebody, it's this lack story that doesn't get to be for me too. Instead of moving into, thank you, universe, God, that they get to have that. And thank you so much that that's a reflection. You're showing me something that's going to be in my own unique way for the Ruthie version. But that abundance is for me too. And wow, like what a... I don't know. It's a fun game to shift with. It is a fun game to shift with. Well, I want to introduce you officially before we dive much deeper, and then we'll get into even more of the juice. So Ruthie Lindsay is the author of the memoir, There I Am, The Journey from Hopelessness to Healing, a Nashville-based speaker, coach, and midwife of souls. She holds space for space holders, as many of her clients are therapists and coaches. She helps people become endeared to their own life, soul, and body. Welcome, Ruthie. I mean, I'm always excited to talk to you, but Jess is like, I can't wait to talk to Ruthie. She's been so excited. I'm so excited. I am too. I am too. Thank y'all so much. I have heard you say, maybe it was on another podcast, that you really value being different. And so our question to you is, what is your relationship with your inner rebel? Love that question. I actually taught a course in retreats called The Sacred Rebel because I love anytime that we break out of society's boxes, that is a holy, sacred rebellion, right? When we become a truer version of ourselves, when we listen to our own body's yeses and are in integrity with ourself, even if family thinks we're crazy, even if society and culture says you're crazy, that is the holiest, most sacred rebellion An integrity thing that you can offer this planet, that you can offer your own body, that you can offer the world. And it is not for the faint of heart. I so understand why I stayed in the box as long as I stayed in the box. I so understand when people I love stay in the box. We are hardwired for belonging. And to break out of it, we often lose the belonging that kept us safe. And so to be a rebel... which I consider not rebel just to rebel, like I've done in the past too, but to do it in integrity, to do it sacredly, is to do it in a way that is honoring who you are, honoring my body's yes and no, speaking the truth even when it's going to upset people, speaking my honest to God truth when you know that shit's going to hit the fan. That is sacred. Such brave work. And honestly, for me, it's such nervous system work because if I am dysregulated, I don't feel safe to do it. So that is a kind of random answer, but I really believe it's the holiest, most profound answer. It's freedom. It's really freedom. Because when I live, I am 6'1", and when I try to fold myself into this tiny little box for approval and belonging, and I love that version of me so much. God bless her. She is the most precious, earnest human. And holy shit, I can never go back. i will not go back it made me so ill it made me so unwell emotionally physically spiritually i can't go back can we dive into why and i'm paraphrasing how you put it but why you feel being an integrity and the honoring of that sacred rebel is the greatest gift we can bring to the world well Anything that anyone does in their inner world, we're all connected. Anytime anyone wakes up and is free, that ripples out. We can't even imagine who that's impacting. There's so many studies about vibration and regulation and what it does in communities, what it does for families, what it does for cultures. I really believe for a long time, people that were more free, I would feel really activated by because it scared me. There were people that I unfollowed. There were people that I was just like, ooh, oh God. And what's hilarious is I'm 10 times weirder than those versions of them. Today, I am 10 times more weird and freaky and all the things than those versions of them. But they planted seeds for me. Mm-hmm. They planted seeds for me and everyone will learn it in this life. And their journey is perfect. I truly, my higher self believes that with every part of me. My ego self wants everyone to change and be more like me and like, you know, and that is not real. That's actually not kind or loving or anything, but that's my shadow. My higher, truest, more enlightened, conscious version of me knows that everyone is on their perfect version. And when I Speak my truth. When I am my truest, fullest, embodied, freest version of me, it will activate the shit out of people. And that is actually kind and loving. Because for some people, they will run away and run for the hills and they're perfect. For other people, it will plant seeds for them of what is possible. The people that I was judging, they sure seemed a lot happier than I was. They sure seemed a lot freer than I was. And third, some people are ready. It just magnetized the people that are ready to free themselves from culture's bullshit telling us we have to look a certain way, act a certain way, talk a certain way, date a certain way, perform a certain way, work a certain way. Who made these rules up? They're bullshit. It's patriarchal. It doesn't fit. And when we break out of that, the world is better for it.

SPEAKER_02: 8:42

I think the theme of season two is dismantling the patriarchy. And

SPEAKER_03: 8:46

it's coming up in every single episode, which, you know, we're right on time. I had a beautiful side thought that came up this week when you said, I am weirder. And whatever you said around being weird, we had this moment the other day where we were talking about who we want to call into our lives. And the woman who's leading our Boulder chapter said she wrote in this piece of paper at a work event of I want to attract weird, powerful women. And she was so insecure about saying the weird part. So this conversation has come up a lot this week of being bold enough to say out loud, I'm a weird, powerful woman. And I'd like more weird, powerful women in my life. I mean, what makes us weird? It's just us being us. But I just loved her experience of finding another woman that saw her post. It was like, Yes. And now they're dear friends. And this other woman was judging and didn't like it and was like, why would someone put weird on the wall? And it's just to magnetize what we're looking for. So the more we can really be out there with who we are, the more magnetic we are to what we actually want to be around. That's right. And what's for us. The weirder you get and the freer you get, things will die away. And it is scary. Yeah. People will go away. work will go away. But what it opens up, it's clarifying. It draws in what's actually true for you. Because if those friendships needed you to fit in that tiny little box, if those employees or those employers or family members needed you in those tiny little boxes, maybe they're not for you. Maybe those aren't your people, right? Because all I have time for now, I'm like the weirder the freaking better. I'm like, be so full of yourself. Like fill yourself up with so much of who you are. I had lunch with two of my dearest friends yesterday. And like also the people that I'm drawn to, we can laugh at ourselves. We were howling. Like we have done all the spiritual things and all this stuff. If I can't zoom out and laugh at myself at the hilarity and how serious I take myself and the mistakes that I made, that levity, the people in my life that I am the most drawn to have so much levity and are able to joke and be silly and laugh. That's what I want. That's what I have time for. That's what I have space for. And I've just gotten clearer and clearer what doesn't work and focusing more on what does. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there was many moments when I knew I was going to love you forever when we met because we met on a retreat a year ago, actually last week. Yeah. And I don't even know what you and Laura Sprinkle and I were talking about, but I just remember walking through the property laughing so hard at the dumbest shit. And I'm like, we're on the same wavelength. We love talking about weird, stupid shit and we get each other. And we were just giggling and I was so pleased. Yes. Yes. Levity matters. Levity matters. I know I'm not in a good place when I'm taking myself so seriously and I haven't laughed. I'm also so intrigued by your childhood and you've described it and maybe there's more layers to it, but you've described it as being very loving and you feeling really accepted and really seen for who you are. And so it makes me curious what boxes you still felt you had to break out of. I love that you asked that question So much has changed since I wrote that book. I love that book. And I love that version of me who wrote that book. And I would have told you like that was the true version of me at the time, right? We protect ourselves and we protect our families. And writing that book, it took me on such a journey. I had a nervous breakdown at the end of that book. After I turned it in, I just spent three weeks in a residential treatment center. I stopped sleeping for like eight weeks. And it was horrible. I had no clue about. Right. Children... Right. Not until I did some... inner child work I learned about some pretty major pre-verbal trauma and I want to hold two things at once I love the non-dual thinking of like I can hold the nuance of everyone was doing the exact best they could my parents loved me so much and would have done anything for me and they could raise me at their level of consciousness there was so much trauma that was never looked at therapy was never a thing and You know, my mom sought help outside of her through religious things, which that was her perfect journey. My dad was in Vietnam, had so much trauma, never looked at any of the trauma. And he was very informed by the patriarchal systems. My dad never touched a baby until we were two years old. Never once. He never changed a diaper. He never fed. So my mom, we did not have money. My mom had everything on her own plate. And if you knew her childhood, everything would make so much sense. She was So traumatized on a level that my heart breaks when I know what she lived through. Having heard my mom, of course I chose her to be my mom because it sent me on the deepest remothering path of my life, which is the work I do today. She didn't know how to do it. And so she knew how to be there and make sure I had food, make sure I look perfect. Everything was about looks. In my house, the only reason a body was talked about is if they're skinny, pretty, fat, or ugly. Every time I'd come home from school, Ruthie, what did they say about you today? Did they say how pretty you were? What did they say about your outfit? What did they say about I learned, which became a massive shadow part of my life, that what do the right people say about me? What do I need to do to get the right people to like me? So, of course, I unconsciously used people. I had this whole Hollywood world where people were taking me all over the world. And, you know, on some level, the egoic level, that made the right people think I'm special and want to be with me. I blew it all up and I walked away from all of it. And it was a death in the most profound way. Thank you, God, that I blew up my worlds so intensely. Can you dig into that? Because I would blow up our worlds on purpose. Sometimes our worlds blow us up. Sometimes it's both. And... I think it's an important thing to talk about because there is death. There is death to make room. And it is painful. We started off saying where the friendships that are not for you do go away. Can you talk to why, how you blew all of that up? And also, I want to extend my appreciation for your honesty and candor. I love that you are able to go back, reflect, and retract your own writing. I think that's very... brave. So continue. And it was my truth when I wrote it. I think it was my own self-protective truth to feel okay in the world. A child, when a daddy leaves, doesn't say, what's wrong with daddy? He's traumatized. He's having a midlife crisis. He's having an affair. They say, something is wrong with me or else daddy would be here. Yes, of course. A child has to protect themselves. So I was still in that And honestly, if you'd asked my brothers, they tell me they had a pretty perfect childhood and they're perfect and they're on their perfect journey. And it's not my job to fix it or change it. If I talk about any of this stuff, they can't hear it. And I'm like, that's okay. No one else has to believe what my experience was. No one else has to believe what my body knows was true for me. Have y'all ever read the book, The Way of Integrity? Yes. Yes. Yes. That book, Martha going through it for the third time. So much of my life shifted. It feels like the most clarifying. It's like, I can't not tell the truth. Like, I have to tell my truth, even if it offends people. Because a lot of what I talk about offends my hometown. My dad was the big leader in my hometown. And I am obsessed with my dad's past. I love my dad. He was a major leader in my town. And there were a lot of really painful things.

SPEAKER_04: 17:44

Both

SPEAKER_03: 17:45

things get to be true. He had a really good heart and he was really traumatized. Both things get to be true. It's so nice to hold all the truths at once. Yeah. Right? Totally. And again, Going back to what we were saying earlier, that's nervous system work because dysregulated nervous system only sees the world black and white. Most people walking on this planet is living in that us against them, that dual thinking. It's bad or it's good. There's no gray area. There is no room for nuance. I feel like part of my soul's work, and I'm also a Libra, but it's to live in that gray because both things get to be true. It was fucked up and they loved me as well as they knew how to do it. So going back to 2019, up to that point, two things are true. Amazing humans. No one's bad here. Amazing humans. I was very embedded in the Hollywood world. I had a lot of really famous people that the world knows taking me under their wing, taking me around the world, getting me inside of fancy places. traveling, jobs, all kinds of things, honestly. The reason I had a book deal is I was with a very famous person backstage at Glennon Doyle's book tour. And they were obsessed with this person I was with. And they opened up a door for me to talk about my story. And I ended up getting Glennon's book agent. It opened up a lot of doors for me. And I think that none of that was by chance because I was supposed to write that book. I was supposed to have that breakdown. I was supposed to see my shadow parts. I was supposed to see how I unconsciously use people. All of it was a part of it. And all of it ultimately served my greater good. And it was freaking brutal on a level I can't even describe. Because in 2018, I had a pretty massive spiritual awakening that changed everything. And it was scary. When it happened, I thought I had the spiritual awakening. I see now. Now life's just going to be so playful and easy. Isn't that cute? Y'all. It was one of the most painful, traumatic, debilitating, all the masks that I learned to wear to survive on this planet and to belong. I was homecoming queen. I always knew how to make friends. I knew what I needed to do. I remember jumping back a little bit in second grade. I was probably seven, having this conscious thought, if you smile really big at people and just ask them a ton of questions, they will love you. I was seven years old. They don't have to know anything about you, but all of a sudden they will love you. And I was not wrong. I had such a high level of emotional intelligence. I couldn't read. I was the worst student ever, but I was the queen of the playground. I knew how to be with people. I knew how to make people feel special. I knew what to do to get people to like me, right? And if you make people feel special, they like you. That was my motivation. It wasn't because I wanted people to feel special. I wanted them to like me so I could come home and tell my mom what people said about me that day. I needed to be needed. And that followed me throughout my life. I knew what I needed to do. I sat at a different table every day at lunch because then no one has to get to really know me. I never had one group of friends. I was friends with everyone. I was that smiley, happy girl. When inside, I felt like I was dying inside. I remember the day after Homecoming Queen, the principal told my dad, who was the superintendent, that I got more votes than anyone had ever gotten because I got the black vote and the white vote. And it was always down the middle, segregated. And of course, it made me feel so good that night. And I will never forget the depression I felt the next morning. Oh. Yeah. Everything's great. I had a massive eating disorder. I was starving myself all the time. I hated my body. So that's a little backstory, right? So 2019, I finished writing this book. I had had this spiritual awakening at the end of 2018, moving into 2019. I did not know how to handle it. I was not grounded. I worked with plant medicine, but didn't know how to integrate. If you have a spiritual awakening, you just need to get locked up for a while, not be in culture. Dear God. I was so ungrounded and very untethered, seeing things, hearing things, experiencing things I didn't have a context for. I didn't have people to talk to about it. It was brand new. I finished the book. I changed the book drastically. I changed the name of the book, but I still wasn't aware of any of the pre-verbal stuff. That summer of 2019, seven years to the week of my first nervous breakdown. I had lived in a bed for seven years because of a complication of dying in a car accident and a wire piercing my brainstem and had a massive nervous breakdown. When I got out of that bed seven years later, I'm not kidding, to the week, I stopped sleeping again. My body was just not okay. And I had done so much work around pain with my rep. I had done zero work around gestation to that wreck happening. And I lost it. The shame spiraled. What do they say about you? I'm having a nervous breakdown. I'm going to three weeks of residential treatment. Oh, here's the best. My friend owns this place called Onsite. We used to have a podcast together. And we would put on these incredible retreats. All these famous people that I would invite would come in. All the people doing all this amazing work in the world, we would bring them together for a week-long intensive at Onsite, co-hosting it with my friend Miles. People come from all over the world at this place. I helped organize it. I had invited all the people. I'm losing my mind. So they send me down the hill at the same property for three-week residential treatment. All my friends, all the people that I had invited are at the top of the hill. No, no. I am losing my mind. I am so ashamed. I'm supposed to be putting out a book that says There I am, the journey from hopelessness to healing, and I'm losing my fucking mind. Can't even breathe. So much shame. I didn't want anyone to see me. I'm having panic attacks all night long. I don't believe in a place called hell, but I know hell. I believe hell is the illusion of separation from God, from yourself, and from others. I know hell so viscerally in this life. I know hell. Hell, and I can dance there in a millisecond when I believe that illusion of separation. That season was so dark. And I was like, I'm a fraud. I'm not even putting the book out. I am a liar. None of it's real. I can't help anyone. The stories were the meanest, most vile. Shame and fear have probably been two of the loudest parts in my life. And they were driving my life at that point. I will also say it was the most important part. Thank you, universe. Thank you, God. Thank you, body, for that experience because things died. And everything that died were the conditioned parts of me, the mask that I learned to wear, to belong. Now, people talk about ego death. My ego is still right here. Like, she's still here. Yeah. Until I become, and I don't foresee this happening in this life, fully enlightened, I will have a massive shadow. My shadow is a part of everything I do. But all of a sudden, I was conscious of it. I started becoming aware of these parts. Started becoming aware of pre-verbal trauma. Started becoming aware of these parts of me that I don't have to over-identify with. And I can learn to bring compassion and care and kindness. Because up to this point, no one on this planet has healed through shame. It has not worked yet. If it worked, we would all be living our best lives, completely awakened and enlightened. Like it doesn't work. We don't heal that way. And so learning tools to go take care of baby Ruthie, whose mama was really unwell when she was born and couldn't take care of me. And so I didn't have attachment or attunement. Learning how to take care of her, walking away from friendships that didn't serve me. No one's wrong. No one's bad. It just, it didn't fit anymore. It didn't fit anymore. I saw my shadow. I am hanging out in situations that don't feel aligned for me. I'm a massive introvert. I know I don't come off as late. I am a massive, highly sensitive, empathic, porous introvert. But I was conditioned to be like an Enneagram 7, talk to anyone. And I thought it was my pain that kept me from being able to fully embody that. No, I am an Enneagram 4 that feels everything, that is so emotional, could like gnash their teeth and feel the whole world's pain. True story. I was removing a spider from my house the other day and I accidentally pulled out one of its legs and I cried. I cried over the fucking spider's leg. I am so sensitive. All of you guys are much nicer than me. It's so over the top and I know it, but also I laugh at myself. I'm able to laugh at myself. I wish you could see out my window. I feed... Hundreds, if not thousands of birds. I feed every feral cat that ever existed. I feed raccoons and possums and dogs. I mean, like. Oh, my gosh. I want to do your human design. All I know is I'm a generator. Is that a human design? It is, but. That's all I know. All right, we'll talk later. She needs a lot more information about you. Yeah, that's all I know. I would love it, though. So in that season, right after COVID hit, my little ego thought, I'm writing this book. Y'all, I have the best agent in the world. I got the biggest book signing ever. My book came out three weeks into COVID. I'm in my underwear feeling so sorry for myself, but then feeling shame for feeling sorry for myself because people are dying and I'm not on this massive book tour. I had no idea what the book did. I told them not to tell me because I didn't want to know. But the book did exactly what it was supposed to do because it sent me on this journey. Thank you, God, that all these things fell in my lap. I did not want to write a book at all, but I did it because I thought it was supposed to make me like more famous and help more people. And I did that book for myself. That is the creative process. It's not even about the result at all. The process of it broke the shit down and it was so important. It got so clarifying. And then COVID hit. I couldn't travel. I used to travel constantly and I worked with all these brands and they'd send me all over the world. Nothing was happening. And all of a sudden I was in the woods every day. I started growing a garden. I started cooking for the first time in my entire life. My mom hated cooking. I never learned how to cook. I started spending so much time with animals. I started spending so much time with the people that felt so aligned with me that I felt expansive being around and I didn't feel like I had to be a certain way or can say a certain thing or you can't post it because the world knows them and they need to FaceTune themselves before and you have to look a certain, you know, it all died away. And what was left was so true and so beautiful and funny and slow. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. That season was just this clarifying cut through the bullshit. This does not fit anymore, even though the world thinks this matters. And, you know, my little egos come in and it's like, you were a husband. You were so buddy then. And my higher self's like, bitch, what a story. You're hilarious. I've never felt more free than I do in this moment sitting across from y'all right now.

UNKNOWN: 29:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 29:51

Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. There's so much here. We talked a lot in the first season about that dismantling, that we can really build whole lives on top of our inauthentic selves.

SPEAKER_01: 30:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 30:04

And I've heard you say, you kind of said it now, it was like the best thing that ever happened to you. Unless you've really lived through the rock bottom, people don't realize that it can be the best thing that's ever happened to you. Yes. But you also had multiple experiences. I'm like, are we done, God? Can we be done with that? I think I'm good. struck and then there was other things going on so you went through this huge pain journey yeah that you describe in the book yeah and then there's like a whole other layer of a pain journey that i'm like i know she's so wonderful why my soul y'all i've had more come to jesus meetings with my soul be like bitch really this is the shit you want to experience this round of earth school And I'm so endeared to my soul because I'm like, you are the bravest fucking human soul, whatever. Like, I am in awe of my soul. And I'm like, really? These are the things you signed up for the experience. Like, I'm the only human in the world that's had a wire pierce their brainstem, right? Like, I shouldn't be alive. I shouldn't be breathing. I shouldn't be walking. And for some reason, I am still here. And even after all that happened, I was still so asleep for so long and just so frozen and so scared. And I have so much tenderness for all those versions of me because what I believe now, if y'all had interviewed me five years ago, all I would have talked about was my pain story. Yeah, this is what I want to know is what's your perspective now? It's important to have context. Like I will never say don't talk to me about my pain story because it's so important to have that context to understand. But now the thing that lights me up is talking about what pain has invited me into. Because what we know is pain is universal. If you come to earth school, you brave soul, if you come here, you're going to experience pain. I don't care who you are. There are different levels of pain, but you will experience pain. But it's not the pain that happens that causes the suffering. It's the story we tell ourselves. The pain story, yes. That's where we suffer. I have suffered so. So much over my pain stories in this life. And now I'm so bored with them. So now I get lit up. It turns me on to talk about what pain has invited me into. And can I tell you some of those things? Yes, please. So I believe pain has invited me into nervous system work and understanding that when I live with a dysregulated nervous system, which I believe my nervous system was probably dysregulated in the womb. My mom was losing her mind. I don't know that I ever fully embodied pain. you know, until now. And I'm still working on it. This is ongoing work that I'll do until the day I take my last breath. But I do a lot of nervous system work. When I'm dysregulated, I see life in this us against them, this black and white, they're good and they're bad. And everyone that thinks they're good thinks the other side is bad. And over here, all these people that we think are bad, think these people are bad. Look at our political system. It's the most dualistic us against them. Everyone's in it. I mean, not everyone, but most. I'd say most of the world. And it's coming from a very dysregulated. There is no room for nuance when you're dysregulated. There's no room to be open to change and having your mind changed when you're dysregulated, right? And so when I am more regulated and I feel safer in my body, I will never tell someone that I'm going to create a safe space for them. I will say I will create a brave space because only you know if you feel safe. It's an internal thing. job. I never tell my clients I'm creating a safe space. They get to choose if they feel safe with me. So I'm going to give you tools to create safety within you. Learning and studying and practicing nervous system work has changed my whole world. Shadow work has changed my life on a level I cannot describe to you. There's that Carl Jung quote that I always get a little wrong because I can't remember exactly, but it's something to the effect of until the unconscious becomes conscious, you're going to have the same results over and over and you're going to call it fate. I think that's the way life is because we're co-creating every second of the days, but I'm either co-creating out of fear and hate or I'm co-creating out of love and expansion. And when you're unconscious, you're co-creating out of fear and lack and hate, right? I know what I don't want. I know what I hate. I know what's wrong with me. And we're co-creating more realities and then we call it fate. We think that's just the way it is. Or I can co-create with magic, falling so in love with what's here right now. and being able to have a vision. This isn't saying that I don't get to like have magical things in the future, but I want to find magic right now. And then I think the biggest things I've noticed, the theme I've had going on so much lately is how can I bring more pleasure, more presence, and more play. Presence, play, pleasure. So much pleasure. Like Your body cannot release cortisol at the same time it's releasing oxytocin. But to feel more pleasure, I have to be in the present moment. I have to actually allow myself to feel the pain. For the longest time, my favorite quote was Viktor Frankl, the deeper sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. But what I didn't understand is I would think about how much misery I'd been in. So I'm like, I just one day experienced the best joy in the whole world. I've suffered more than any of my friends. And now I'm just thinking about it. It's like knowledge is just a rumor until it moves into the muscle. I could think about my trauma and I would re-traumatize myself thinking about how miserable I was and how awful it is and how bad it is to hurt so bad every second of every day. And like, I lived there for so long. Right. Right. If that worked, no pastor would ever have affairs. We can't pray it away or else no one would be gay. Like, give me a freaking break. I was going to say, pray the gay away. It's crazy. It's not how it works. It's never worked. We know the body keeps the score. It goes to the basement. It's going to come out sideways. People are going to have affairs. Anger gets pushed down, comes out as rage. Anger is holy. But when we don't know how to actually feel it, bring compassion to it, and treat it like our beloved child that has information for us, it will come out sideways. We are going to cuss out the person that just cut you off in traffic. You are going to yell at your child. You are going to scream at your husband. It's going to come out. It doesn't go away because you prayed it away and you wished it away or you hated it enough. It's never worked. Only thing that shifts things is presence and love. How can I meet it? How can I be with it? How can I be with that without making it bad, without making it evil, without making it something I have to change? I can't change the state of the world right now. Is it insane? Yeah, it's insane. And I'm not going to change it. But what I can do is be more present, lean into what's here, be more loving to my neighbors, myself, animals, and my community. The world needs more enlivened beings. It doesn't need more people with more knowledge. It needs more alive, awakened people. This is not me saying this is what everyone else wants to believe. This is just what works for me, you know? Melissa, are you noticing a theme in season two outside of the patriarchy and the fucked up government? I feel like the conversation keeps expanding around being in our bodies and building the resiliency to feel. Yes. And to process our feelings and to be with what is and to be present. Yeah. But our minds do work a narrative. It is how we perceive reality, right? So we are in a constant narrative. If we are going to be in narrative anyway, we might as well have power over that narrative or take ownership of that narrative. So maybe you can speak into, okay, when we hear the pain story, how do we reframe it? How do we... Something my partner and I do, and I invite my clients to do this over and over. What we say when there's a negative story that's causing me pain, instead of saying, I am anxious or what they're doing to me is da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da, the language we use is the story I'm making up right now.

SPEAKER_01: 39:19

That's such a good one.

SPEAKER_03: 39:21

Just that statement creates a one-degree shift. It creates a little bit of spaciousness away from this, I know this is a fact. Because do you know that's a fact? Do we know that our whole world is going to end in four years? Do we know, is that a fact that the world is over in four years? We don't know that. The universe is so much bigger than any kind of brain thinking story. And does this story cause me pain and retraction? Or does this feel like, They say, pray, move your feet. Does this feel like something I can move towards to bring more love to? More than likely, most of the stories that are running through my head, and there's so much science backing this, are limiting stories that do not serve our bodies that aren't even necessarily true. How many of those stories that you told actually came true? When you create that little bit of spaciousness, one, like we said, it gives a little bit of a one degree shift. Two, when you bring it up to someone, you get to examine it and you also give the other person an opportunity to tell the truer story. And Eric and I use that with each other so much because there are times when he brings that up that I get to say, you're not wrong. I am mad at you. I just not feel brave enough to say it. But more often than not, it's not a true story. And then you get to say the truer story, the one that's actually more loving and more true. and how you actually feel and defenses get to come down. Oh, absolutely. Because when you come in and say, when you did that, you just made me feel blah, blah, blah. Like, how well has that ever gone? Doesn't go well in my life. It's never gone well. To that point, though, you said something about how often do those stories end up being true, but I think we are so attached to our stories that we actually do things to make them true. So true. Right? So if we're in the story, we then react to the story and create conflict where there wasn't conflict to validate it. Until the unconscious becomes conscious. Yeah. You have the same result over and over and call it fate. I'm so glad you brought that up again. Sorry to interrupt you. It's just, It's just a reminder. Yeah. Yeah. And all our brains want is to be proven right. All our brains want are to be proven right. If I think everyone on the other side is this and this and this, I'm going to scour information to prove my narrative. Algorithms help that because we're all in our little echo chambers. If me and someone that thinks very differently than me, which mostly is my family, Google the exact same thing, Their results of their Google feed would be completely different than what my Google feed would show me. But this is because we think our minds are who we are, right? Because we identify with the voice in our head. So we're threatened by it not being true because we've made the voice who we are. Does that make sense? Yeah, it makes sense. It's that unconscious bias. Here's one example. For the longest time, because of the wounding I had in childhood and not having the attachment or attunement, my story is I'm all alone and everyone will leave me.

SPEAKER_04: 42:34

That

SPEAKER_03: 42:35

has been a theme in my life. I'm all alone and everyone will leave me. I did not date anyone until I was out of college. I would choose people that would ultimately leave me. And then I could say, see, I'm all alone and everyone leaves me. I did that over and and over unconsciously because of this core wound. My unconscious thing was scanning people to be who's not safe, who's avoidant, hitting all the things that I grew up with

SPEAKER_04: 43:05

to

SPEAKER_03: 43:05

feed that narrative for me to be like, that's what it is. That's who I am. Every man leaves me. And I believed that until my mid to late 30s, until I did it. And then I was like, what? Bullshit. I'm amazing. Now you have such a love. I'm so curious. You're so lit up about presence, pleasure, and play. And I know this man of yours has a big role in that. So can you share what does presence, pleasure, and play look like in your

SPEAKER_01: 43:38

life now? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 43:40

Thank you for asking. I mean, Eric, he is nothing I thought I was looking for, but he was everything I needed. He makes me laugh until I am actually in pain. We are so goofy and silly. He's an Enneagram six. I don't like get too built up in all this, but it's a fun tool. So I identify as a four. He identifies as a six. He's more cerebral and a doer. He gets more things done in one day than I probably do in a month. I move very slow. I feel everything so deeply. He'll walk by me and he's like, are you feeling things? And then thinking about them and then feeling them some more. And I'm like, Yes. And he's like, let's go on a walk. Do you want to come dance with me? And he can get me up and bring me out when I'm taking myself so seriously or suffering over animal abuse or suffering over any kind of injustice on the planet or how people are treating the soil. And he can help pull me out. And we will laugh and be so freaking doofy. One of the things that's been the most beautiful with him is I've never shown someone so many of my shadowy parts, my deepest fears, my deepest insecurities, the parts that I would hide away when I didn't want anyone to see. And not only does he not run away, he leans in so hard and holds me in that and loves me. It is amazing. A love that I didn't know I'd get to have in this life. I saw glimpses of it with other people. And it's so human. Don't hear me say that it's not messy and all the things. But in the mess, we just go towards each other. I think the thing that is the most beautiful is we laugh so much. We both do our own inner work. He supports me doing my own inner work. I'll be like, babe, I'm going to go to this retreat. It's kind of expensive, but I feel so called. He's like, great. We're abundant. Go, babe. He does everything. therapy every week. He's taken an art class, runs 13 miles every Sunday. He does his own inner work and I get to release more control to let him be on his own journey because control is loud at my table. And when he sees it, he talks to me about it lovingly. There's a tenderness, humor, and a playfulness that just, it's such medicine for me. There's no one I'd rather spin with besides myself. I love being with myself. I'm my favorite person to be with. Outside of myself, he and my cat are my favorite to be with. And I feel so blessed for that. I just want to acknowledge because I have to watch myself in this language because I went through my own version, definitely not what you went through, but my own version of dismantling and starting my whole life over and through it wanting some kind of outcome to prove that the work was leading somewhere. And for a long time- You really don't know if it is. Yeah. And so I keep catching myself like it's not a reward, but it is a reflection of authenticity. It is a reflection that the more you come home to yourself, the more you release the layers of inauthenticity, like attracts like the people who resonate with the essence of you will find you. And it does. Yes. become what you're describing. Yes. Oh my goodness. You went through so much. I'm just feeling so grateful that you get to live that now. Thank you. And it is not for the faint of heart. I understand why people stay in the box because it feels a lot safer. It feels a lot safer to live in that black and white, like tell me what to do so that I can be okay and be safe. I don't judge it because I get it. I Get it, if my world hadn't blown up in 9 million ways, I probably would still, this is not time, but I'd probably be the most basic bitch you've ever met in your entire, this is what we'll call the episode. How to not be a basic bitch. Oh, my gosh. Like, that was me. Like, whatever you want. Yes, ma'am. Yes, sir. Yes, thank you. And then I would just go home and binge eat and watch 9 million episodes of a show because I was not okay. And I don't want to come off all of a sudden after that 2018-2019 thing okay. I was just good. It has been a struggle. I have struggled. I have had to dismantle so many pain stories and I still can dance in that so easily. It's part of life, right? It's a part of life. Like being human is being in the pain story. Yes. And then you remember again. And then I'll forget and I'll go back to my bullshit and then I'll remember again. And I'm like, oh, bed and work. Here's what I actually want. Here's how I actually want to be. I love what Martha Beck talks about, the eagle and the mouse. We can have the eagle eye view. My physical therapist teacher is 80 years old. She might be five foot nothing. She still goes to conferences because she loves it. She loves it. And like, she's walking around with a notebook of life. Like, what can I learn? Yesterday, she was like, you wrote a book. Will you bring me your book? I have to read your book. She's 80. So she is an eagle eye view of how I want to be at 80 years old. She is alive and healthy and joyful. All I focused on the past is like, that scares the shit out of me. I don't want to do that. So I'm like, what are my baby mouse steps today to be more alive, to be more curious, to feel more play and pleasure and laughter and joy and bring that love? What do I need to do today? to help me become that kind of crone energy. I love it. It feels like such a perfect stopping point. It's so beautiful, Ruthie. Thank you for, I mean, I just... I want to bottle you up and put you in my pocket and hang out with you all the time. I'm coming. Thank you for your generosity and your honesty. It's so refreshing and beautiful. I'm so honored to be here with y'all. Thank you so much for inviting me and allowing me to share a bit of my story and just your generous, thoughtful questions. It's just been a real joy. Very grateful. Thank you.

UNKNOWN: 49:46

Bye. Bye. Bye.